Lazar pursed his lips in that irritating French way. “I’m supposed to know?”
I asked the question I’d been putting off. “How much?”
Lazar snorted. “How much is it worth? More than you’ve got. How much will I take for it? That’s another question.”
I pulled out my wad of cash. “This is what I’ve got. This is all I’ve got. I don’t even know if I want that thing.”
“It’s yours either way. You think I’m happy something worth this much belongs to a little girl who doesn’t even clean her hair? No. I wish it was a rich man’s treasure. Oh, well.” He picked ten twenties off my pile. Considered the two that remained, and took one more. “A girl shouldn’t walk around with empty pockets. It’s still not enough, but how’s this for a deal: if you tell the beauty to bring me a few more bottles of that stomach settler, we’ll call it even.”
“Just, she’s got a name,” I said, rubbing my forehead. “Call her Felicita, alright? And I don’t know what you’re talking about with stomach settler.”
“She’s an herbalist, your friend. A good one. My wife is receiving chemotherapy, and nothing else works so well for the nausea. I take your money now, and Felicita brings me five big bottles of stomach settler. Do we have a deal?”
Still I hesitated, trying to imagine why I’d need the box. How would it feel to carry it around like a self-fulfilling prophecy, an empty place where stolen memories would one day reside? But whose—my father’s? My own? Someone’s I hadn’t even met yet?
It didn’t matter. Whether it was power of suggestion or true enchantment or my dad’s Polish blood in my veins, I wanted it. It was meant to be mine. And right then it was comforting to be told I had a future coming at all.
“Okay,” I told Mr. Lazar. “If telling me how it works is part of the asking price, then yes. We’ve got a deal.”
* * *
I caught Fee up on my visit with Lazar. When I showed her the box she said, “Huh.”
“What do you mean, huh?”
Delicately she placed a palm over its top. Bottom, whatever. It didn’t matter, I knew how to open it when the time came. “I’m wondering if he’s right about like calling to like. I look at this and I don’t feel anything. It’s pretty, but I wouldn’t necessarily know it was even magic. What does it feel like to you?”
I took it back, sandwiched it between my hands. The metal was the same temperature as my skin, its grain so softly burnished it felt like fur. “It makes me hungry,” I said. “I hope I never have to use it. The idea creeps me out, honestly. But I couldn’t not take it. It makes me hungry just to hold.”
“That’s sort of how I feel in a garden,” she said. Then, abruptly, “My mom’s grandmother was a yerbera. My dad just told me. And I’ve been thinking. When all this Marion stuff is done, I want to be better. I want to use magic to help, you know? No more selfish shit. There’s this practitioner in Pilsen, I know she’d take me on as her apprentice if I asked. When I’m done with school, or maybe before, even. Lazar is right, I think. About working stronger if you work with what’s in your blood.”
“Wow. That’s so cool. That’s … you’ll be amazing.” I bit the inside of my cheek. “It’s just, I’ll miss you. I’ll miss working with you.”
Under any other circumstance she would’ve reminded me we were sisters. Now she sighed. “Let’s just get through tomorrow, okay? Let’s get that over with.”
“You think it’ll be over after tomorrow?”
“Not really,” she said. “You?”
I held the golden box to my chest. There was a slight vibration to it, like a purring cat turned down to its lowest setting. It made me feel braver about the shadows gathering in the upper corners of Fee’s room, that would turn into breezes and whispers as soon as we turned off the lights.
“Personally, I think we’re fucked.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The suburbs
Right now
When I closed my eyes I could feel it, the way your body remembers roller coasters. Billy’s arm around me, pulling me in, and the whole warm dreaming world gone underwater.
When I kiss you, it won’t be our first kiss.
I opened my eyes and the rest of it tumbled in.
I peeked out of my room around dinnertime, the house so quiet I got scared my dad had gone somewhere. Then I heard him talking behind his bedroom door. My heart leapt before I realized he was calling into the void of her voicemail.