So was the encyclopedia, but it didn’t try to suck out your soul in return.
My response was airy in contrast to her hiss. “It is a rather hectic life.”
“Well it ends tonight.”
“My life?” It was a flippant comment…but I wasn’t so sure that wasn’t what she meant.
A small sneer lifted her top lip, and her pale skin was mottled red. “You’ll be staying here from this night on. It’s time you shouldered more responsibility as the sole remaining member of the Archer dynasty.”
Even Olivia wouldn’t have let that pass without comment. “You don’t even like me, Helen, so what’s it to you?”
She lifted her chin. “Your father wanted it this way.”
She referenced Xavier, but the Tulpa was the one she meant. And “Helen” was so blindly in love with the Shadow leader I doubted she even saw her own reasons for it anymore. The spark igniting those feelings all those years ago had probably snuffed into long-cold ash, and she just held it so tightly inside of her it had yet to come apart. Not that she could afford to let it go. Everything around it, all her insides and reasons and feelings, would crumble if she did. It defined her life. Without it, I bet she wouldn’t even know how to live.
“You miss him, don’t you?” I asked softly, ostensibly referencing Xavier too. “I understand, you know. You think you can count on someone to always be there, but sometimes they’re gone even before they leave. Sometimes,” I said, shaking my head sadly, “they’ve been gone for years.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Then let me clarify.” I stared at her, tried to regain a sense of deference, and failed. “Fuck my father and what he wanted from me. I’m not a belonging, and no one claims me. Got it?” Pass that along to your schoolgirl crush, you bitch.
Helen’s face was sandblasted shock. “Olivia…?”
“And fuck you too for being such a goddamned sycophant.” My mouth was dry but my tone never wavered.
“He never thought of you as anything but a tool. So keep dusting, Helen. Because you and I both know you’re just here to keep things clean.”
I pushed past her then, and wondered what I’d smell if I could still manage it. Shock like an acid burn? Sorrow like stale air freshener? Then I forced myself to stop wondering, to cease caring if I ever smelled emotion again. There was no point in lamenting that loss.
And, I thought, shutting the door behind me, there was no pity for Shadows.
19
“That is one nosy twunt,” Cher said, cocking her head at the closed door. Helen could be heard stomping down the hallway, and Cher’s rude amalgamation only increased the effect. I smiled and looked for Suzanne, before hearing water running in the adjoining bathroom. “She’ll probably offer to bring up some cookies and milk just so she can spy on us. We can’t let her ruin our sleepover, okay?”
Shit. I tossed the box Helen had given me on the dresser, then flopped on the bed next to Cher. I’d entirely forgotten about the sleepover. It’d been a sound enough idea in the monotonous safety of my sickbed, at a time when I believed the supernatural world had abandoned me altogether.
Cher, misinterpreting the wince on my face, smoothed the hair back from my forehead. “Don’t worry. I’ve brought enough alcohol and chocolate to last the night. We’ll bar the door with a chair back like we did when we were kids.”
“Sounds great,” I lied, because it sounded dangerous. I couldn’t allow Cher, or anyone else, to remain in this house any longer than necessary. If Mackie knew I was here- and odds were he did-he wouldn’t wait long before trying for me again.
Suzanne appeared just then, and clapped like a schoolgirl upon seeing me. “Oh, good! I was starting to get worried. And hungry. Arun flew in his personal chef from Delhi. Get ready for some Tandoori to-die-for!”
I momentarily wondered what it was like to live in that brain.
Cher, used to it-a party to it-reached over the bedside to hoist an overnight duffel. “I brought the letters too.”
“Letters?” I asked absently, watching Suzanne apply poinsettia lipstick.
“The ones I told you about before?” She crossed her arms, piqued. “On the party bus, remember?”
“Nah. It kinda fell out of my head when you got hospitalized,” I told Cher, though I did remember now-the letters her birth mother had written when she found out she was dying.
“I thought tonight would be a good time to reminisce.”
I glanced at Suzanne. Weren’t we supposed to be celebrating? Looking forward, not back? But Suzanne shrugged as she caught my gaze through the mirror, seemingly more concerned with her updo than anything else. “Oh, I think it’s a wonderful idea. We’re products of our pasts, after all. And of the people who shaped them. I’m not jealous when it comes to love. I want my baby to feel as much love as possible.”
Cher teared up. “Aw, Momma…”
“Besides, my psychic told me it’s not too late to have another baby with Arun. Fingers crossed that your replacement is on the way!” She did just that.
“Momma!”
“What’s in the box?” Suzanne asked, pointing at whatever Helen had left in there to flatten me.
“Nothing,” I lied, but she was already lifting the lid. Her movement slowed, then froze altogether, though her eyes darted to my face and away so quickly I knew I’d been right. Helen’s intent was to sully the celebratory mood. I held out a hand for the box, wondering why some people thought making someone feel bad would make them feel better.
The only blessing was that it wasn’t Olivia really opening this box. Had to give it to Helen, I thought, shaking my head. She sure knew how to hit below the belt.
Cher had told Helen that tonight’s gathering was about mothers and family…but the photo I held was devoid of either. It was of my college graduation, three people glaring into the afternoon sun with false smiles plastered over sweating faces. Olivia’s had been bright and eager, almost frantic in her hope to wring some happiness out of the occasion. Mine was as stiff as the cardboard in my graduation cap. Xavier’s wasn’t even that, just a half squint, and a meaty-jawed scowl as he gestured for the photographer to hurry up. Of course, my mother was absent entirely…just as she’d been for nearly the entire previous decade. And that was what Helen was so clearly pointing out.
Yet even before my mother left, we hadn’t been the Cleavers. Xavier was only present on this day because it was expected. He’d hopped from his limo, posed for this moment upon Olivia’s request, before tossing me this sterling silver frame and an unsigned graduation card with the down payment for my own house, then disappearing again. Both his absence and the money were readily accepted. We all knew he wanted me out of the mansion as badly as I wanted escape.
I filled that new home with items that spoke to the person I’d become-photography equipment and a darkroom, modern pieces with Asian accents-taking nothing from the mansion, including this frame. I shook my head again. Olivia had been so desperate for a normal family life that even a farcical photo of a broken, unsmiling family had moved her.
“What’s that say?” Suzanne asked, pointing to the frame’s lower edge.
I read the inscription. “‘Making an impact is easy. Making a difference is hard.’”
I scoffed at the irony, musing how he’d only ever accomplished the former, but halted in mid eye roll. “Huh. That’s funny.”
“Really?” asked Cher, tilting her head. “I think it’s profound.”
“No, I mean I know someone who used to say that.”
“Xavier?” Suzanne guessed, pointing at the quote’s attribution.
“Someone else,” I murmured, biting my lower lip. Someone I hadn’t known when this photo was taken.