She looked out into the crowd for Troy. She could see the golden crown of his head above some of the others. “So, yeah I got my test.”
“We’re officially not related,” he said.
“Right,” she said. “Lucky you.”
He smiled a little, but it wasn’t a nice smile. “No,” he said. “Lucky you.”
Then he walked off, disappearing into the throng. She stood there shaking for a moment. Then, no. She wasn’t going to freak out and leave. She was going to find her friends, her boyfriend, and have a good time.
She was still unsettled a little when her mom came up behind her.
“Who was that?” Claudia asked.
Her mom had white glitter shadow on her eyes—which might be a little young for her. But she just looked happy, lighter, freer than she had in as long as Raven could remember.
“No one,” said Raven, in what she personally thought was a stunning act of maturity. She deserved some kind of a reward for how grown-up she was being right now.
“You gave him the death stare,” said Claudia. There was a little wrinkle in her brow, as though she detected something was not right. Mom radar, always on.
“I don’t talk to strange boys, right?” said Raven. “Isn’t that what you taught me?”
“Yes, it is,” said Claudia, kissing her on the head. “Good girl.”
She might tell them later, but not now, not tonight. Tonight, they were going to be happy, have fun. The shadow of Melvin Cutter was gone from their lives for good. She biologically belonged to Ayers and was surprised to find that it didn’t matter all that much. Because it was the life they shared that mattered, the hours they’d spent in the park, the million Band-Aids he’d put on her knees, how he carried her bloody tooth in his pocket all day while they were at Great Adventure and still remembered to put it in the little pillow so the Tooth Fairy would come. Those were the things that made Ayers her dad, not the blood running through her veins. She didn’t love him any more totally. But she would never have known that without knowing. A pall had lifted from her mind, from their life, and they were free to move into the future.
“I think we’re going to have a wedding,” said Claudia in the bathroom. Her mother had no issues whatsoever raising her voice so that Raven and everyone else could hear over their peeing. “Another wedding.”
“Okay,” said Raven pushing her way out of the stall and over to the sink. The thought of a wedding excited her, and also freaked her out a little. How many teenagers had to go to their parents’ weddings? It was—odd. Why couldn’t they just be normal? Her mother squished in next to her.
“So, I was thinking,” said her mom. “Will you be my maid of honor?”
Raven rolled her eyes. “Mom, that’s weird. I’m your daughter.”
“So what?”
“Mom.”
“So that’s a no?” Claudia pouted. She reapplied her lipstick, a deep berry plum. “I suppose Martha would do it. Again.”
“Mom!”
Claudia looked at Raven in the mirror, and Raven smiled. Claudia pulled her into a tight hug.
Raven laughed. “Of course, I’ll be your maid of honor.”
Claudia, embarrassingly, teared up a little. “I love you—so much.”
And all the other ladies in the bathroom broke into applause. It was New York, after all.
They danced that night, and cheered, and jumped around. Her mother was still working on the house, now repairing after the fire, but they weren’t going to live there. And Claudia was doing what maybe she was always meant to do: she was writing a book. Raven felt like every ugly thing was behind them. And even if it wasn’t true—it was true tonight.
forty-six
My head is still spinning as I return to Nate Shelby’s apartment. Tiger and Milo meet me at the door, wrapping around me, mewing. Milo reaches up and I lift him, nuzzle against his snow-white fur. I go into the kitchen and fill their food bowls, refresh their water. Then I head up to the roof. It’s slow going, but I make it.
I don’t sit on the ledge like I used to. I sit in the center, on the tar paper that is still warm from the day’s heat, even though the sun is setting, a big red ball in the sky dipping below the city buildings. It is quiet, as quiet as this place will ever be. I can’t hear the wind, though it is blowing, just the traffic noise carrying up. Even when it grows dark, I won’t see many stars, the city is too bright. The city is alive, with a beating heart. I feel its pulse inside my own.
I try to make sense of the things that have happened today. What I know. What I suspect. What I may never know for sure. I draw in and release long, slow breaths, let my thoughts swirl and pass through me. The Buddha says, “There is no external refuge.”
Meaning, you cannot look into the outer world to feel safe, to feel at peace. You cannot look without for understanding, or for justice. You must look within.
I think about the money. A million dollars stolen from Whitey Malone. One hundred went to Mike and a hundred to Boz ten years ago. Paul took four hundred thousand after my parents were gone, and sealed up the other four hundred thousand in that space beneath the stairs. Slowly, over ten years he deposited it in my college account. It paid for my education without my knowledge; what’s left of it is being used at the school. Three hundred thousand was just given to Melba’s group home. That’s one hundred thousand still missing. Seth? Maybe he’s on a beach somewhere. Maybe the money’s doing some other good work. Or maybe Seth is at the bottom of a river somewhere, and someone else, maybe Boz, has a fatter bank account.
Can I live with it? Do I still have work to do? I don’t know.
The thinker panics. The watcher bides her time. The Red Hunter acts.
Is she dead, I wonder? Did The Red Hunter die in the warehouse that night? Was her only power rage? Now that my rage has cooled, now that a kind of justice has been served, will she find her way back to wandering the city streets? I don’t know.
? ? ?
BACK DOWNSTAIRS, HE’S WAITING IN the kitchen. Nate. I’m not the cat sitter anymore.
“There’s someone here to see you,” Paul said one day while I was recovering in the hospital. But Paul had come in through the door alone, with only his oxygen tank in tow.
“Your invisible friend.”
“No,” said Paul. “Yours. I found him in the hallway. Nate Shelby. He’s says you’re his cat sitter?”
“Nate Shelby?” I said. I am not vain by nature, but I had to wonder what I looked like after my recent adventures, convalescence, and depressed state.
“Bring him in?” asked Paul.
“Um,” I said, shifting up. “Okay.”