“So you two are going to spend the night,” their mother said. “I insist.”
With only days until Salt’s party, Charlie didn’t have time for a black eye or being stuck at her mother’s place. And yet the pain in her face was yielding to exhaustion. Besides, there was something she’d come here to find.
“You want me to get the blow-up mattress out of the station wagon?” Charlie asked.
Her mother shook her head. “No, you stay put. Your sister can go. Or Bob.”
Charlie got up, glad to have an easy excuse for her search. “I got it.”
A constellation of magnets covered the refrigerator. A few were from local businesses, and others were emblazoned with sayings like “All I Need Is Coffee and Wine” or “So Punk Rock I’m Out of Safety Pins.” Charlie grabbed the car key from where it was suspended and headed back out into the cold.
At almost sixty, Charlie’s mother had collected more stuff than was going to fit comfortably into the hotel, especially given Bob’s cards, which required a “climate-controlled environment” and were too important to him not to be kept nearby. And so, the back of Mom’s wagon was full of her clothes for the off-season, decorations, taxes, and, apparently, an air mattress. The bins were crammed in tight. One of them was marked “CHRISTMAS,” another “FAMILY PHOTOS.” Charlie found the stale-smelling plastic mattress under a tub marked “VITAL DOCUMENTS.”
That was what she’d come for.
After she’d escaped from Salt’s house, the guy who’d found her had called an ambulance. She didn’t remember much after that, but they must have done a tox screen at the hospital. The results ought to be with the rest of her medical paperwork.
Charlie pulled the lid off the bin. And there, under birth certificates and her mother’s divorce proceedings, she found a folder with her name on it. Inside was a copy of the police report, hospital release, and the bill sent to the insurance. She skimmed over the details. Scratches on arms and face consistent with branches. Mild dehydration. One stood out: traces of ketamine in system.
She closed the folder, Liam’s words echoing in her head: One of the doctors that works here is known for being generous with prescriptions. I saw Remy’s cousin Adeline buy some ketamine off him.
It seemed that stealing a quickened shadow hadn’t slowed down Salt’s experiments, and that he’d gotten the rest of the family involved.
“Did you find it?” her mother called across the lot.
Charlie stuffed the folder under her shirt so her jeans held it in place. “Yeah, Mom,” she called back, and dragged the mattress inside.
Her mother had made feverfew tea, which she said was good for pain. Bob slipped her some ibuprofen, which worked much better.
Charlie went back to the couch and the frozen peas. After a few moments, when she was pretty sure no one was looking, she eased the folder out from under her shirt and into the seam on the side of the couch, where the cushion would cover it.
Lucipurrr patrolled the new space, meowing as Mom took out some chopped meat and started making something for dinner. Bob put on that show where people bring in old stuff and experts tell them whether the item is worth money.
A long-haul trucker had brought in a cuckoo clock of his grandmother’s that turned out to be a real antique, from the Edwardian period. When it struck midnight, a man appeared, running from his own shadow. “This was a time of great spirituality,” said the elderly appraiser, stroking his beard thoughtfully. “Gloamists performed elaborate shadowplays against the walls of ballrooms. Magic was right in front of people, and yet few looked closely enough to discover it.”
“Don’t let the front desk know you’ve got a cat in here,” Mom told Posey. “There’s a hundred-and-fifty-dollar cleaning fee for bringing a pet into the room.”
“I wasn’t going to tell anyone,” Posey complained, an adolescent whine creeping into her voice. “And I don’t know where I am supposed to talk to clients. It’s so loud in here.”
“Try the bathtub,” Mom said unhelpfully.
An hour later, they ate goulash sitting on folding chairs around a café table that couldn’t hold all their plates at once. They drank Posey’s wine. They were following the Hall family tradition of pretending everything was okay, and Charlie was glad. Nothing was okay and she had no idea what to do about it.
“Posey tells me that Vincent moved out. I’m so sorry,” Mom said.
Charlie nodded. The less said about that, the better. One more thing that was definitely not okay. “Yeah, well. You know my luck.” She didn’t say our luck, because she liked Bob. Of course, it was possible that she would have liked anyone who’d brought her ibuprofen. If he’d brought her coffee too, she might have married him herself.