IN THEORY, I’M WATCHING television even though I can’t make sense of anything on the screen. Oz is on the front porch and everyone else stares at me. The everyone else would include:
Oz’s mother, Izzy, the lone partially sane person in the state of Kentucky
Cyrus, a giant impersonating a human
Olivia, the once dead and now alive
They’re probably wondering if I’m going to spaz at any second. So here’s the thing: they may not be wrong.
Wrapped in a blue crocheted blanket, I sit in the middle of the couch. Olivia has staked a claim beside me. It’s hard not to picture her popping out of the casket. Because of that, my spine is curtain-rod straight and I remain perfectly still. Sort of like those small woodland creatures when they realize the big, bad carnivorous beast has spotted them. Doesn’t console me to know things don’t typically work out for the woodland creature.
So long, woodchuck. I hope you had a great life, squirrel. You didn’t really want that nut, did you, chipmunk?
Yes, I know, no one’s going to eat me. My eyes drift over to Cyrus. He quickly turns his head and pretends to be immersed in the movie. He might sauté me up with some onions and throw me on a sesame-seed bun.
Stop it. This train of thought...it’s because I’m exhausted and I’m scared and I’m desperate to talk to my parents and...
Moisture pools in my eyes and I wipe at it. I won’t cry. Not in front of them. They are the enemy. They are the ones that created this situation. With each flutter of my eyelids, the urge is to keep them closed, but I force them open. I don’t know these people. I don’t know them and it’s not safe to sleep.
“If you’re tired,” Olivia says as if she already knows the answer, “we have a spare bedroom. Two in fact.”
“I’m not tired,” I answer through the yawn. “But can I use the bathroom?”
“Of course,” says Olivia.
Cyrus and Izzy hop up, but Olivia forces them to reclaim their seats with one slice of her hand. She’s slow as she stands and a large helping of guilt plops into the bottom of my stomach.
“You can tell me where it is,” I say. She repeats the gesture to me and I also withdraw into silence.
I follow her down the hallway. We pass two bedrooms and the hallway turns. In front of us is a larger bedroom and to the right is the bathroom.
Olivia prevents me from entering the bathroom by placing her cold hand on my arm. My heart stutters as if shocked by electricity. She’s not dead. Nope, not dead. Very, very much alive.
“We’re going to my bedroom,” she says in a voice you don’t argue with. She flips on a light and I’m surprised by the pink-and-blue pastels on her comforter and curtains.
“I like your room.” I’m drawn to the door leading out of her room to the porch. I could bolt and possibly escape from this madness.
“Did you expect skulls and crossbones?” She opens a jewelry box on her dresser. “A gun arsenal and torture chamber?”
Well...yes. “No.”
“You’re a bad liar, Emily, and I’m going to need you to get better at it, but I have faith that will happen. You are, by blood, a McKinley.”
A wave of defiance tightens my muscles. “I’m a Jennings.”
“Thanks to a paper trail and a judge’s signature, but you are one of us. You always have been.” Olivia riffles through stacks of photos she took out of the jewelry box then offers one to me.
No. There’s no freaking way that picture is real. Dizziness overtakes my mind as I lose myself in a haze. I’m asleep and this is a dream.
“Take it,” she demands.
Can’t make me. I shake my head and step back.
“Olivia?” Cyrus calls from the living room. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” Olivia raises her voice to answer while refusing to break eye contact with me. She lowers her tone again. “I promised Eli and your mother that I would take this to the grave. The way I see it, I already have one foot in, so what difference does it make.”
My gaze drifts to the picture trembling in her hand and I wince. The pink elephant in the chubby hands of the baby in the photo is more than familiar. He’s cherished and adored and has seen me through some of my scariest moments. His name is James and, at home, in Florida, he’s propped on my dresser looking a lot more worn and a lot less pink and lot more loved.
The baby is old enough to rip through the mess of presents in front of her. She has long brown hair and she wears the same pink dress that my mother drags out on my birthdays to show how I’ve grown over the years. I hate that the baby sports a huge smile as she beams reverently at the person who’s holding her—Olivia.
My lower lip quivers and tears burn my eyes. I’m too tired for this. I’m too tired and there’s no way this is true. It’s not. My mother would never lie to me. Never. “My mom left Snowflake when she found out she was pregnant with me.”
“Your mother walked out of this house, your home, with you in the dead of night right after your second birthday.”