Roach: A Love Story

Liz Boysha

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Cooperative Nonviolent Public License CNPL – 2024

https://thufie.lain.haus/NPL.html

Chapter 1

As Roach awoke one morning they found themselves transformed into a gigantic human - or, rather, a normal-sized human, but gigantic by cockroach standards. They were lying on their back on the hard, wooden floor of the apartment that had been Roach’s home for their entire, short life - six months, more or less. It was an ordinary place as far as cockroaches were concerned, dusty and filled with crumbs and niches in which Roach was oh-so-fond of hiding.

Roach will not be able to hide now, not with this monstrous, fleshy casing and stiff, inflexible bones. They twist their body around experimentally, considering. Their limbs are too few, too short and too stiff, their flesh too soft and too tender. They cannot smell the air nor sense the vibrations in the floor, but they can see - Oh, what sights to see, the light streaming from the open, cracked glass window too bright for Roach’s tender, squishy eyes, and they blink and squint and shy away from its luminance.

Roach rolls and squirms on the ground. They have too few limbs to move about efficiently. They are accustomed to crawling low to the floor on their belly, but the human limbs want to extend, to stretch and reach and grab. Cumbersome things, these limbs are, and the head: positioned such that it would always be looking at the floor if Roach were to continue with their crawling around. They sit up, vertically: a dizzying change of perspective that leaves them gasping for breath.

Oh, but they could hear, too, they realize, at the sound of stomping (the most terrifying of sounds to a cockroach) and slamming and then a human shriek, so high and shrill! Then another human shriek, this from Roach themself, lower and more primal. Their instinct is to run, unwieldy limbs flailing against hardwood floor. Then the digit of one foot catches on the corner of some furniture, sending a shock of pain up Roach’s lower limb: a sharp, spastic pain of a type they have never before experienced. They collapse on the ground, looking up at the human figure in the doorway in panic.

The shrill human, towering over Roach, has pale skin and grey eyes; the hair is long and stringy, uncombed; and there is a smell, Roach realizes, a subtle chemical scent beneath an overwhelming wave of human body odor. The person turns to run, out of the room, down the hallway, their smell disappearing with them. So, they have to be next to things to smell them. The realization is strangely isolating.

Roach realizes the difference between themself and the other person: Roach has no bits of fabric to conceal themselves and their awkward, fleshy body. They stand, foot throbbing, and take three long, awkward steps towards the door, which is once again filled with a looming, stinking figure, still shrieking and now carrying a long, thin stick, a broom. The person swings it around at Roach but the attack is too frantic, disordered; they dodge the stick easily.

“Get out!” the person screams, “Get out!” and Roach wants to comply, but the weapon still flails between them and the doorway. They turn their head - a useless maneuver, to have to turn one’s head to see behind oneself - and eye the open window, its cracked glass. Without really thinking about it - because this is the way to move, of course, do not think about it and the body will do what it is supposed to - Roach spins around, races towards the window, and dives through it.

What Roach is not expecting, because Roach has only been human for a few short minutes: the height of the third floor window, and the fact that they can no longer fly. What would likely be a trivial fall for a cockroach, whose terminal velocity is a mere 5 or 6 meters per second, could be fatal for a human, who could achieve a terminal velocity over 10x faster by orienting themselves head (or feet) first - assuming they had enough fall time to reach such speeds. Fortunately for Roach, this fall is not, ultimately, fatal, thanks to a shrub below the window that slows their impact. It does, however, result in a severe concussion and a broken femur, which Roach will not find out about until they regain consciousness in the hospital some time later.

Chapter 2

Mr. Gregor, who is Dr. Gregor Samus to most, but always Mr. Gregor to his wards, is called to the hospital to speak with a social worker over the thin, wiry body of a child of unknown origin, who looks to be sleeping peacefully despite the bandages wrapped around their head and the heavy plaster cast holding their leg stable.

“Kid was chased out of a crack house by a woman with a broom,” the social worker says. The social worker has dark skin that wrinkles near his eyes as he squints at the paperwork he is holding. He wears a clip-on tie and two pairs of glasses: one over his eyes and the second pair perched on his shining, bald head. “She was entirely out of it, though, insisted she'd been attacked by a giant insect.”

Mr. Gregor nods as though this is not an unusual error to make. This is what Mr. Gregor, Dr. Samus, does: trader of unusual items, procurer of natural oddities, researcher of the unconventional, and foster parent of wayward children. He owns a narrow shop on Main, wedged between a bakery and a tattooist, with an apartment on the second floor. The brick exterior is painted black; a black sign with “Oddities” printed in small white block letters near the center obscures the entire bay window overlooking Main St; the windows for the second floor apartment are curtained in deep, light blocking red. No one in town is quite clear what degrees inform the title Doctor, for he is certainly not a medical doctor, nor a dentist nor psychiatrist nor chiropractor; indeed, even Mr. Gregor has long since lost track of what bits of paper have been awarded to him from which university. There are just so many of them.

The child sprawled out on the hospital bed before them, whom Mr. Gregor is aware is only pretending to be asleep, is an unknown: their name, their age, whether they even speak English. “To be perfectly honest,” the social worker explains, “we don't even really know if they're a boy or a girl.” The medical report says: Intersex - ambiguous genitalia (pubescent?). Complete with the question mark. Much to the social worker's relief, Mr. Gregor does not ask him to elaborate.

As the social worker continues his speech, describing the severity of the child's injuries, the lengthy surgery they had undergone to fix the femur together with metal screws, and the accommodations necessary for their care, Mr. Gregor watches a large, brown shape skittering across the disappointingly dirty hospital floor. 

When the social worker has concluded his speech, he asks if Mr. Gregor has any questions.

“What is that?” he asks, his voice neutral, gesturing towards the insect.

The social worker is less tempered in his reaction, first screeching, then groaning. “Ugh, a cockroach,” he says. “County hospitals, you know?” He shudders visibly, then notices the child on the bed has opened their eyes. “There you are!” he exclaims, any trace of disgust removed from his voice.

The child squints up at the social worker, whom they recognize, then the other person, a stranger. Mr. Gregor stares evenly back at them. Their eyes are black, ringed in purple bruises; their skin tan but dusty-looking; their dark hair clipped close to their scalp by an impatient nurse. They are completely silent, their face devoid of expression.

“How are you feeling?” the social worker asks; without waiting for an answer, he continues, “This here is Mr. Gregor. He's graciously offered to provide you with a roof over your head while we sort out who you are and where you've come from. Do you want to introduce yourself?”

The child does not answer.

“I am sure we will get along splendidly,” Mr. Gregor says.

Then: another squeal from the social worker, followed by a loud crashing sound. Child and man look over, and he shrugs. “‘Roach,” he says, and the offending creature races across the wall behind him.

Eventually, the child is discharged. They are dressed in donated clothing that is too big, manhandled into a wheelchair by a grumpy, middle-aged nurse, who wheels them alongside Mr. Gregor across the oversized asphalt parking lot to an unsheltered bus stop on the desolate road into town.  “Next bus is in 23 minutes,” the nurse says, then briskly turns to leave.

Mr. Gregor sits on the bench next to the teenager in their wheelchair. Neither speaks.

Roach examines the desolate landscape around them. The discomfort they are experiencing is all-encompassing: pain, in the leg and in their head; overheated, from the scratchy clothing and the bright sun overhead, glancing off the landscape at odd angles and searing into Roach’s tender eyes. The hospital is located on the outskirts of a rural desert town. It is surrounded by browned, dehydrated grass, with mountains fading into blue in the distance. It hurts to look out so far, so Roach blinks hard and turns their attention towards Mr. Gregor.

Mr. Gregor is an ordinary looking human by cockroach standards, with pale skin and curly white hair that frames his head. He wears a black newsboy cap which does nothing to keep the sun out of his pale blue eyes; round, frameless glasses; a white button-up shirt and black pants. He smells like roses and sweet smoke, and something else; that peculiar human scent, no single one alike. Mr. Gregor does not look particularly dangerous. He has made no attempt to harm Roach, quite unlike the doctor and nurses who swarmed over their bed in the hospital with sharp needles and rapid questions Roach had no hope of answering. So they had kept their eyes closed, listened to the words filling the air around them, and tried to translate their thoughts into human language.

As they wait for the bus, Roach experiments with their unusual new mouth. After soft, unappetizing meals of eggs, oatmeal, soup, the hospital gave them dry crackers and peanut butter, which turned into mush between the new hard, bony teeth in Roach’s mouth. However, in their haste to eat, they had inadvertently bit into their fleshy cheek, prompting an instant shock of pain and a curious metallic taste. Now Roach uses their tongue to poke at the wound, poke at their teeth, poke at the gums and glands, the ridged palate on top. They pop their lips together, make a humming sound in the back of their throat that Mr. Gregor makes an effort to appear not to notice. They squirm around uncomfortably in the wheelchair, their leg extended and immobile on the footrest.

“Water?” Mr. Gregor asks, suddenly. Roach stares at the crinkly plastic bottle he holds out but makes no move to take it. Mr. Gregor takes a drink, demonstrating, then offers it to Roach again. The odd child awkwardly forms their lips around the opening and tilts the bottle upwards; water spills out of their mouth, soaking into their grey T-shirt. They swallow, wipe their mouth with their hand, and return the bottle to Mr. Gregor.

“I apologize for my lack of preparation,” he explains, “My car has recently...” Here, Mr. Gregor hesitates, then finishes, “gone missing. The public transportation system in this town is not great.”

Roach does not reply.

“I know that you must have a name,” Mr. Gregor says, “I do not need to know what it is, but it would be nice to have something to call you.”

Roach watches Mr. Gregor carefully. They move their lips around and clench their teeth. “Roh,” they say, “Row-chuh.” They repeat the stumbling phrase again and again until it solidifies into a single word.

Mr. Gregor nods his head slightly. “It is nice to meet you, Roach.”

The bus eventually arrives, and Mr. Gregor stands behind Roach as they wait for the driver to lower the hydraulics so he can push the chair on-board; then they are made to wait longer as seats are folded to make room. The bus is badly air-conditioned and smells perpetually of exhaust and exhaustion. There is only one other passenger: a small woman, older than Mr. Gregor, with a pink scarf around her head. She stares resolutely out her own window.

Chapter 3

The bus ride into town is not long, and the older woman is still aboard when Roach and Mr. Gregor disembark on Main St, across the street from the Oddities shop. Mr. Gregor pushes Roach’s wheelchair over cracked, uneven sidewalk; past a realtor and a gift shop with brightly colored t-shirts hanging in the windows, across the black asphalt road, past a nondescript building with “Tattoos and Piercings” on a sign in the window. Another human, younger than any of the doctors or nurses or Mr. Gregor - someone Roach’s age, perhaps - sits on the sidewalk in front of the next shop, leaning against the black painted bricks.

“What’s up, Mr. Gregor,” the new stranger says as he stands, “You already looking to replace Evelyn?”

“Evelyn will be back,” Mr. Gregor replies calmly, “This is Roach. Roach, meet Lucas. He doesn’t live here, but that doesn’t stop him from spending most of his time with us.”

Lucas winks as he says this, then twitches his head, a strange gesture of hello that also serves to move the hair out of his face, albeit only temporarily. “‘Sup,” he says. Roach appraises him silently as Mr. Gregor unlocks the front door to Oddities. Lucas has skin the color of smooth sand and a narrow, angular face; his black hair sweeps over his forehead and falls in front of brown eyes.  His irises are the color of dark chocolate, Roach's favorite food from Before, and they feel a strange desire to lick them. They look away, uncomfortable.

Lucas holds the door to the shop open as Mr. Gregor pushes Roach over the threshold, then follows behind, declaring grandly, “Welcome! To Mr. Gregor’s Freak Show and House of Oddities.”

“Just Oddities,” Mr. Gregor corrects, lightly scolding. He does not like the term “Freak.”

Oddities is a small, dimly lit space, crowded with strange antiquities and animal specimens. Despite its clutter, Mr. Gregor has made a point to keep the walkways relatively clear and accessible - you never know what type of person might find themselves inside an oddities shop. He pushes Roach past a glass case full of shining stones, intricate metal figures, knives and badges. A taxidermied bear looms over them behind it, mouth frozen in a permanent snarl. Other taxidermied animals - birds, a rat, a large cat, and dozens of others that Roach cannot identify glare down at the trio from shelves that line every wall. Their sight makes Roach feel inexplicably sad, and they look away. They are still trying to get a hang of emotions.

At the back of the Oddities shop is a red velvet curtain, which conceals a doorway. Beyond that is a small, crowded workshop, piled with boxes (most unlabelled), tools, and bits of delicate and expensive looking items. A mattress sits on the floor on one side, no sheets but a blanket thrown lazily on top. Lucas has to run ahead of Roach to make room for the wheelchair; it appears Mr. Gregor had not made the same effort for accessibility in his workshop as he did for his storefront.

At the near corner of the workshop, a set of stairs spirals around an elevator shaft that is gated off by a metal grate. “See you up there,” Lucas says before darting up the staircase several steps at a time.

The elevator is slow and rickety, with three options: B, 1, 2. Level 2 lets out into a foyer, with a single door hanging open; Lucas has already been through here. Mr. Gregor pushes Roach through the door into a small, open area. Despite the grandiosity of the shop downstairs, the upstairs apartment is nondescript: off-white walls, beige carpet and linoleum sheet flooring, mismatched furniture that has seen better days. The heavy velvet curtains blocking each window feel extravagant in comparison.

Lucas emerges from the kitchen to the right, holding a large bag of chips and eating from it as though it was his own. Roach's mouth waters at the sight.

“No one's here,” he says, “Can I take Roach on the grand tour?”

“If it is okay with them,” Mr. Gregor replies, and both look at Roach for a few seconds too long before they finally nod their assent. It is an awkward gesture, like a toddler exaggerating their motion.

“Sweet,” Lucas replies, tossing the chips aside (to Roach's dismay) as he ducks behind the wheelchair, pushing it around with none of the care shown by Mr. Gregor; he bends down and speaks in a low voice somewhere behind Roach’s left ear. “Downstairs was the Oddities, up here is the Freak Show,” he stage whispers. The tickle of his breath sends chills down Roach’s neck.

“Lucas,” Mr. Gregor says, warning. “Be kind to yourselves.”

Lucas rolls his eyes, a gesture no one present can even see, and stands straighter. “To your left, we have a television and couch, which is rarely free if you want to sit on it,” Lucas starts, “Lucky you brought your own chair.” He spins Roach to the right, towards the kitchen and dining room. “Food and food adjacent,” he says, walking past the rooms to a dark hallway. He names the occupants of each room as they pass, although each room is closed with an identical white door. “Millie and Evelyn, usually... This is the twins, Ash and Willow, they’re just little ones... bathroom... laundry...”

At the end of the hallway, Lucas reaches past Roach to turn the doorknob, then uses the wheelchair to push the door open. “This’ll be your room,” he announces, flicking a switch so that the naked bulb hanging from the ceiling casts a dim glow throughout the room. He pushes Roach towards the middle of the room, then nudges open another door with his foot. “More luck, you get your own bathroom.”

Roach silently looks around the room. Two windows are curtained in the same red velvet as the rest of the floor; a large, wooden posted bed with red sheets sits between them. There is also a desk, chair, and bookshelf; all empty. Roach is grateful to be indoors, glad for the dim light that doesn’t hurt their eyes. They watch as Lucas sits onto the bed next to their chair.

“I've slept in this bed before,” he announces, bouncing around a little. “It's super comfortable.”

Roach nods, more smoothly this time.

“So, Roach,” Lucas says. He is a talkative person, Roach thinks. “Is that really your name?”

Roach nods again.

“I’ll give you the breakdown before the rest come home and you get overwhelmed.” Lucas begins describing the current residents of Mr. Gregor's home.

“I'm an honorary member of the Freak Show, which by the way is not my creation, it's just the name Mr. Gregor's kids came up for themselves, so if you have a problem with it take it up with the girls. I'm here a lot. My home life sucks and Mr. Gregor is cool so...” he breaks off and shrugs, a gesture Roach repeats. “He's had a lot of foster kids over the years. Most of them are temporary, but a few stick around for years.”

“Millie is Mr. Gregor's little sister. Somehow. He's ancient and she's sixteen so make of it what you will. She's the oldest now, but she hasn't always been. You'll probably hear a lot about Jordan, who used to live in this room.

“Evelyn is my best friend and she is an absolute disaster. Just a complete trainwreck. Don't worry about her. She and Millie are an on-and-off thing, which is currently way off because Evelyn stole Mr Gregor's car and disappeared, which she does sometimes.

“Ash and Willow are the twins, and they're almost 2. Their mom is, uh...” Here Lucas hesitates for the first time, trying to decide how much to say. “Young. She visits every week and if you end up staying here to the school year she might be in some of your classes.” Lucas isn't sure why he decided to lie about this - something about Roach's newness, their blank slate. The first kid Lucas has met who doesn't know him from Before.

“How old are you, anyway?” he asks.

At this, Roach shrugs again. The doctor at the hospital had estimated they were 14 or 15, which was an unfathomably long time to a cockroach, but they had not figured out how to make that “Ffff” sound yet, and they did not want to sound foolish to Lucas.

“Well, I’m fifteen, so let’s say you are too,” he says, ironically, but Roach nods. “Can you say ‘no,’ or am I just talking to myself?” Lucas wonders. To his delight, Roach shakes their head. “Good.”

Lucas shows Roach how they can move their own wheelchair by gripping the handrims on the wheels and pulling or pushing, depending on which direction they want to go. They practice steering by pushing one wheel, pulling the other, and end up crashing their extended leg into the wall next to the bathroom doorway.

“Crap,” Lucas says, jumping up to help as Roach lets out an anguished groan. The painkillers the hospital had given them were not particularly great, they think. The noise is enough to summon Mr. Gregor, who appears in Roach’s doorway as though by magic.

Here’s the thing about a broken femur: any time Roach has to pee, they have to wrangle their awkward, lanky body from one chair to another, without jarring too hard the leg encased in hard plaster. It is not the easiest of tasks for even experienced humans, and Mr. Gregor has been instructed in how to assist them in the maneuver. The clinicality of it does not make it any less uncomfortable. Of course, there is no reason why Roach should feel embarrassed to have their pants down around a stranger, but it feels like being without an exoskeleton.

This, Roach thinks, must be what it means to be human: to constantly be uncomfortable, and to seek out new ways to eliminate discomfort.

Cockroaches have it easy; they just go where they please.

Chapter 4

Millie and the twins arrive at Oddities after a rather enjoyable afternoon at the nearby park to find the shop closed but unlocked - not a rarity, as Gregor is forgetful and also because nothing ever happens in this dinky little desert town. She opens the glass door to a familiar chime, and Willow races through on fat wobbly legs, greeting every single dead animal in the shop as Millie turns to lock up.

“Ho Mister Owl. Ho kitty. Ho swirl.” Squirrel is a hard one for the toddler. Ash is curled up on Millie’s hip, sucking his thumb sullenly. He is really getting too heavy to be carried around everywhere like this, Millie thinks. She patiently climbs the steps behind Willow, who insists on holding on to the handrail and climbing them herself, then sets Ash down in the foyer to remove his shoes. Willow has already kicked hers off and is running through the apartment, shouting for Lucas.

“Lulu!” A tiny blur of a human races to the dining room table, ignoring the bulky wheelchair that sticks out into the hall, and climbs onto Lucas’s lap. She shrugs off his hug as she reaches for the potato chips laying between Lucas and this new stranger.

“This is Willow,” Lucas explains to Roach, who is staring at the toddler like she could be a dangerous animal; venomous, perhaps. “She’s mostly harmless.” A second tiny human approaches the table, stumbles, and grabs Roach’s wheelchair to prevent from falling. “And that one is Ash.”

At first glance, Roach thinks the twins are nearly identical, aside from their clothing. They both have round, pudgy faces, skin somewhat darker than Roach's, and soft, curly black hair. But as they look closer, Roach can see that Willow’s eyes are dark brown, and Ash’s are stormy grey.

The third newcomer, who introduces herself as Millie, looks like a much younger version of Mr. Gregor, except where his hair is white with age, hers is such a light blond as to appear almost white. She wears it loose, falling in waves down past her shoulders. Her eyes are the same pale blue as Mr. Gregor’s, and when they stand together, Roach can see they are almost exactly the same height.

“I don’t suppose anyone has heard from Evelyn,” Millie asks no one in particular. Roach inexplicably shakes their head.

The best part about being in the park with the twins was how it kept Millie’s mind completely blank: she could crawl around in the dirt with Ash, “ooh” and “aww” at the bugs he finds, and make sure Willow doesn’t kill herself or someone else with the stick she wields like a sword, and that is the extent of demands from her.

Back home she sees traces of Evelyn everywhere: a hearing aid battery discarded on the floor (which Millie is always getting on her about - gods forbid one of the twins swallows one); a stray hair, long and dark; the jar of candies, devoid of grape or cherry (Evelyn’s preferred flavors, followed by watermelon, green apple, and she refuses to eat the blue raspberry). Not to mention the bedroom they share, the upper bunk Millie lost her virginity to Evelyn in, Evelyn’s lotion and socks and underwear. All these traces of Evelyn are a painful reminder of her absence, and the circumstances surrounding it: the stolen car, but also the argument they'd had the night Evelyn stole it. About how Millie was afraid they'd gone too fast, sharing beds too quickly, and maybe she would like to take a step back? Millie wasn't even sure if this was true; she loved Evelyn, and her mouth and fingers and breasts and every part of her, but Millie also had something to hide, something fundamentally incompatible with sex and intimacy.

Millie has a secret: a darkness inside of her, an oily pit nestled somewhere deep inside her heart, and if she is not ever-vigilant the darkness threatens to spill out, consume her entirely. The darkness feeds on bad news and worse thoughts; some nights Millie can feel it crawling through her veins, squirming just under her skin. On these nights, the only way to stop the darkness from overwhelming her is to cut open the flesh on her upper arm with a tiny razor blade, which Millie unscrewed from a pencil sharpener. A single slice produces only a thin line that oozes droplets of bright red blood. Some nights she cuts deeper and deeper, always expecting to see the darkness crawl out of her like thousands of tiny black ants. But it is only ever her own blood, red and sticky.

So: Evelyn is a nice distraction, but one Millie can't risk getting close to. If only she was blind instead of deaf, Millie thinks. What a terrible thought to have, she thinks.

Millie has plenty enough to distract her in the Freak Show, anyway. She babysits the twins, which Gregor pays her for better than any other possible job in town. Sometimes she runs the store’s register, which makes her wonder how her brother can afford to pay her so handsomely; she has never before actually made a sale. She has Lucas, not to mention the ever-revolving cast of Gregor’s fosters, usually more temporary than Evelyn or the twins.

The most recent character, who is apparently called Roach, isn't the worst case Millie has seen (Lucas had given birth to one of the twins vaginally, and needed a C-section for the other, and he'd been only 13 years old at the time), but they definitely seem off. Roach eats chips by nibbling at them, like a mouse. They do not make eye contact; instead, their dark eyes dart around, constantly, like they are waiting to be attacked. Everything seems new to them. Their injuries are severe, but not insurmountable; particularly not with physical therapy (and whatever other therapies the kid might need). If they stay with Gregor, he will ensure they get these things. But their odd quirks and reticent silence feel deeper, baked-in; Millie suspects Roach was quiet long before they were lost or injured.

Anyway, Millie is grateful for Lucas, who can talk more than enough for all of them as she prepares a lunch for the toddlers, who would gladly subsist on potato chips, and for Roach, who looks half-starved.

Lucas was supposed to work at Oddities today, but since Mr. Gregor was busy retrieving Roach and busy helping Roach adjust to being broken, but somewhere safe, something like home, and busy busy busy... and since nothing from Oddities is ever sold, Mr. Gregor gives Lucas the day off, and he spends it with Millie, who is not talking about Evelyn, and Roach, who is not talking about anything.

Lucas leaves Roach and the twins in front of cartoons that are unusually hypnotizing to Roach. They stare intently at the screen, subtitles always on for absent Evelyn, and they study the things they think that humans study.

. . .

Lucas runs home. Lucas is always running, even if he doesn’t want to be where he is going - like now. He takes the long way home. If it weren’t for his little siblings, he would probably never go home. Lucas is the 4th of 12 Park children, the result of a pairing between a white Christian fundamentalist and a fourth generation half-Korean-American Christian evangelist. When he told Roach his home life “sucks,” he was putting it lightly. Before he turns onto his street, he fishes his head covering out of a pocket and pulls his hair back. Strictly speaking, he’s not supposed to leave the house without it. It clashes horribly with his running clothes, which consist of loose, baggy shorts and a t-shirt, beneath which he wears a sports bra tight enough to function as a binder. None of these articles are things he should be wearing in public, but since he is such a disappointment, there’s not much more his parents can do. Only God can forgive him.

“Mother, ‘Lizabeth is finally home!” his older sister, Maribell yells in her horrible, nasal tone as soon as Lucas steps inside. “You’d better not make us all late for church. What are you wearing?” she accuses, not much quieter.

“I’m allowed to go running,” he mutters as he darts up the stairs and into the room he shares with three younger sisters - Maribell inexplicably gets her own room. A sign on the door labels it: “Elizabeth; Annalee; Sophia; Grace.” Therein lies the other half of Lucas’s secret, which everyone knows except for Roach: his name, his identity, his gender, are all made up. Here they call him Elizabeth, and growing up his mother always used to lecture him on his place in the home, as homemaker, as birthing machine, as punching bag for the man he would eventually have to marry.

Only his friends and Mr. Gregor call him ‘Lucas,’ which they had been doing even Before. Before he had been sent to conversion camp; Before he was raped by a camp counselor for insubordination; Before he found out he was pregnant with twins. Abortion was never an option, not with his parents, but he agreed to keep the pregnancy and his silence in exchange for... what, exactly? The right to choose where his eventual offspring would live, mostly. He would never let his parents have them, never wanted to be a parent himself, so when Evelyn suggested her foster family it was perfect. He can be the rad uncle and never have to make a life or death decision for a tiny, helpless human. Everything is cool.

Except at home and at church, where he is still Elizabeth, the Irredeemable Sinner. No Good Christian would want to marry him, not only not a virgin but a failed mother, too. Could he imagine, if Mary had given up baby Jesus for adoption? His cesarean scar, an angry red slash running down from his belly button, is a gift from God: a permanent reminder of his sins.

But here, in his room, sitting on his bed, is one of the reasons why Lucas puts up with his shitty parents: little Sophia, who is only seven, who quickly tosses an old stuffed animal aside and screeches, “I wasn’t playing with it!” As long as his mom is criticizing Lucas, she isn’t criticizing his sisters. As long as his dad smacks Lucas in the head for talking back, he forgets that Davey was the one angrily refusing to eat his vegetables. As long as there are little siblings to protect, Lucas returns home to protect them.

Though, the more Lucas’s mother keeps popping out newborns, the harder it is for him to care about them. In order, there are: James (21 and married with children of his own; a golden child); Ricky (19, also married); Maribell (17, desperately wants to be married); Lucas (15); Joseph (14); Annalee and Matthew (12); Paul (10); Sophia (7); Grace and Davey (4); and Theodore (6 months). Lucas is pretty sure Teddy was supposed to be a substitute for the twins.

Lucas picks up the discarded plushie, some sort of nondescript black beetle he’d made instead of an apron when he was made to learn how to sew, and places it on his dresser, from which he pulls a plain, modest dress; not too dissimilar from the one Sophia is wearing currently. In a few years, she will wear this dress, which originally belonged to Maribell. In a few years, hopefully, Lucas will never have to wear a dress again.

“Go get your shoes,” he tells Sophia, whose stockinged feet reveal a hole in one toe. She jumps off his bed and races out of the room. Alone, Lucas undresses; he slips out of his boxers, squeezes out of the sports bra, and folds them neatly, tucks them behind one of his drawers. Then he redresses in his church clothes, feeling detached; he won’t feel like himself again until he has left this house in the morning.

At church, instead of praying, Lucas bows his head and stares at his hands, and thinks about the things that he should be grateful for: Mr. Gregor and Oddities, which keep him gainfully employed and out of the house; Millie, who is better with the twins than he could ever be; even Evelyn, whose drama makes him feel almost sane at times. Then he thinks about Roach; a strange name for a strange kid. He thinks they are always alert, even if they appear distant and detached. They absorb everything around them; he can’t know this for sure, but Lucas can see it in their eyes. Lucas thinks a lot about Roach’s eyes, because they are nearly black, like they are sucking the light out of the room, and it almost feels like if they actually made eye contact with him they might suck out Lucas’s soul.

A strange, not unpleasurable shock jolts through his stomach, and Lucas opens his eyes, only just now aware that they had been closed, that the time for prayer is over. But thoughts of the stranger named Roach still hover in his mind, and Lucas squirms, shakes his head to banish them. The rest of the church is singing, and he tries to listen, to hear the words, but they are in Latin.

...

Roach enjoys watching cartoons with the twins - they enjoy it even more when Willow is made to relinquish control of the television, handing over a device with dozens of colorful rubber buttons. Roach wants to chew on the buttons, for which Willow promptly scolds them.

“Kiddos that young don't need so much screen time,” Mr. Gregor explains as he drags the pouting toddlers from their television, “but you are healing, you watch as much as you want.”

With the single press of a button, Roach can flip through hundreds of channels, one at a time. They can watch sitcoms with canned laugh tracks; nature documentaries with soothing narrations; infomercials for products Roach would never want or use; soap operas where everyone kisses, which Roach finds a fascinating human habit. Like touching antennae when you greet a familiar cockroach. There are words, so many words, and Roach longs to use them, if only they could practice making the sounds. The toddlers practice making sounds all the time. Willow’s words are sometimes coherent, but Ash just repeats syllables: mamamababadada, over and over again. How long does it take, Roach wonders, to become a master of language?

Roach waits until nighttime; until after, with Mr. Gregor's patient help, they have awkwardly stumbled into the soft bed that is now their own; after all the sounds of the apartment and the desert town outside have died away. In that silence, Roach begins to whisper the human noises out loud, over and over, until they have fallen asleep.

Chapter 5

Where is Evelyn? If she were to write a memoir, that would be its title. Not that Evelyn would ever write a memoir, because that sounds tedious as fuck, as much of Evelyn’s life has been so far: tedium. Monotony. Ennui. Surely that's why Evelyn does the things she does - she is bored. She was bored when she decided to steal Mr. Gregor's car, which wasn't really stealing, was it? Because he left the keys right there on the kitchen counter. She was bored when she decided to turn right, towards the Interstate that goes from No to Where, with Nothing in-between. She was bored when she decided to pick a fight with Millie, but no, she's not going to think about that right now.

Where is Evelyn? If only she knew. She has been driving for hours, for days, and has seen nothing worth driving to. Desert bleeding into grassland and mountains and every town always the same. Always bored and boring.

If she had brought her phone, she could use a map. She could TTY roadside assistance and ask them to bring her gallon of gas, because this tank is empty. She could text Millie and beg her for forgiveness, because she's the one Evelyn is worried about. Mr. Gregor would just thank her for not wrecking the Bentley. But she left her phone at home, after she'd angrily thrown it down the hallway and it crashed into Jordan's room.

God, she misses Jordan. He was there when she first arrived at Mr. Gregor's Freak Show, as he called it, eight years ago. Has it really been so long? And Millie said she was worried they were going too fast. They'd known each other for nearly a decade but only started fucking a month ago. The comment still nags at Evelyn, Millie’s concerned expression as her hands swiftly signed, ‘too much’ then ‘fast’ frozen in her head. Had Evelyn been too pushy?

It was Jordan who taught himself sign language, in his own, choppy way, so he could teach Evelyn and Millie. Jordan who figured out it was her new hearing aid that was causing sensory overload in Evelyn to the point of near-constant panic attacks. Jordan who suggested she just take it off, if she doesn’t need it on. That it could be okay, to be different. From Jordan, who had spinal muscular dystrophy, the Freak Show was a term of endearment. For Evelyn, it was home. Evelyn’s mother could regain custody, lose it again, regain it, lose it again, but she never had to worry about where she was going to sleep, because the Freak Show was always there.

Now Evelyn is crying; she angrily swipes at the tears with her sleeve. Because Jordan had to go off and die - a cold, turned into pneumonia, turned into an ICU, turned into a cold, dry, sunny funeral. Evelyn sniffs, rubs her eyes with her sleeves. Six months gone. 

Whatever. That's his problem.

Evelyn’s problem is the car, and its lack of gas, and also the fact that she is generally a fuck up who sabotages every good thing that happens to her.

No, scratch that thought. No sense dwelling on the past. The gas problem, that is here and now, and now there is another car, finally, heading towards her. Pinning her with its headlights as it approaches, slowing. Evelyn is only just starting to realize how late it is, how dark, how foreboding. The driver stops in the middle of the empty road, right next to where Evelyn is leaning against the driver's door of the Bentley. He opens the passenger window and leans over and shouts something. He looks harmless: a neat polo shirt and khakis and thick black framed glasses and male pattern baldness. He looks like he has three kids that he doesn't beat every night before bed. He looks confused, shouts something again.

“I'm deaf,” Evelyn signs, then, for good measure, “no hear you.” The sign for “hear” involves pointing directly at the ear, and it tends to be more clear to strangers. But not this one - he just waves his fingers around and shrugs.

Evelyn sighs. “I'm deaf,” she shouts, fishing through her pocket for her hearing aid, and the guy finally nods, understanding.

“DO. YOU. NEED. HELP?” he calls out, slowly.

Evelyn nods, equally slowly. She eyes the dark road behind his car. Still empty.

“CAR. BROKE?” the man grunts out.

“Gas!” Evelyn says. The ASL involves miming fueling up a car, a motion that triggers a concerning smirk on the driver.

“GET. IN,” he says. “GAS. STATION. AHEAD.”

Success. Evelyn climbs into the passenger seat, and the man accelerates hard before she even gets herself buckled. She watches the road signs glow in the headlights and blur as they drive past, avoiding looking at the driver’s speedometer. He drives her to the promised gas station, waits as she purchases and fills a red plastic gas can, and begins driving back in the direction of the abandoned Bentley. And Evelyn almost thinks she's gotten away with it, this Profoundly Bad Idea, trusting a random male stranger at night. Until, somewhere on the empty stretch of highway between gas station and car, he pulls over, stops his car on the shoulder.

Evelyn tries to open her door. Locked. She tries to flip the latch, but the man grabs her arm and squeezes, hard. His nails are dirty. Why hadn't she noticed how dirty his nails were?

“There's still a matter of your payment,” he mutters, and even with the hearing aid Evelyn can only understand what he says by reading his lips. He squeezes her arm again, then begins fumbling with his belt buckle with his other hand.

Then Evelyn understands: he expects a blowjob in exchange for the ride. Not the worst thing in the world, and she could do it, she's done it before for less; except, the thing is, she doesn't want to. She doesn't want to be here; she wants to be back home, in bed with Millie, which is absolutely the dumbest name for a lesbian, Evelyn thinks. It has always been like this: Millie warm, Millie safe. Long before it was ever about sex. That first night, after Evelyn watched her mom overdose (the first time, when the experience had been terrifying and not exasperating), she'd woken up from a nightmare in a strange bed in a strange room, and she’d wanted to scream. She wanted to cry. She did both, several times over the next month, but every time she would be comforted by Millie: just a kid, like herself, but somehow so much older; and Millie’s bed: warm, safe.

The driver's dick is out, and he's pulling Evelyn closer, but she doesn't want to; instead, she screams. A raw, blood-curdling scream. A buzzing fills Evelyn’s head as the scream pours out of her, growing more intense as she screams and screams, filling her skull until it threatens to explode. And then it does explode, Evelyn's entire head and her entire body - into a swarm of buzzing, black flies that swarm over the driver's nose and mouth and eyes as he scrambles to flee his car.

Evelyn wakes up at dawn, laying in the gravel next to the Bentley. She is inexplicably barefoot. She still doesn't know where she is, but she has five gallons of gas in a red plastic can - enough to get to the next town and find a map.

Chapter 6

Mr. Gregor is standing behind the counter of Oddities. He is examining a phone, which Roach found under their bed after falling off it overnight; Roach is having some difficulty with beds. It is Evelyn’s phone. The lock screen is a selfie with her, Millie, and Jordan, but it is obscured by notifications for over a dozen missed phone calls and unread texts. Mr. Gregor wonders if Roach will need a phone, as well. It is a strange new world, one where teens are expected to be constantly connected to this monstrous web of online social interactions.

Even Lucas has a phone, albeit one he keeps secretly tucked away, hidden inside his mattress. He mostly uses it to share memes with his friends. He sends one to Evelyn now, not knowing her phone is currently in Mr. Gregor’s hands. That would explain why she isn’t responding, perhaps.

Lucas isn’t allowed to have a phone, but he isn’t allowed to do a lot of things. Currently, it’s leaving the house, at least until the bruising around his right eye has faded a little. Lucas was just about to make his escape when his father popped up, unexpectedly, as is his way. Now Lucas is in trouble - for being seen, yesterday, in his running clothes, which wouldn’t have been a problem if a lady from church hadn’t thought he was one of his older brothers and asked about it at church.

His excuse, “I was just going for a run,” is what earned him the new shiner.

Lucas helps his mother with the little ones all morning as she rants about how embarrassing he is for the family. “I had to explain it was my own daughter running around like a harlot.”

The running isn’t the problem - physical fitness is one of God’s virtues, although Lucas’s mother maintains that life and family should keep you active enough, and exercise is just vanity. But the shorts, the uncovered hair, the fact that Mrs. Stempson could have mistaken Lucas for either James or Richard - those are unforgivable for a young lady.

Lucas can tell his parents he’s not a young lady all he likes. They never hear it.

The other problem - that he encourages such unladylike behavior in his little sisters - is what gets him out of more than a few hours of lecturing and Bible verses. When he gets Sophia and Grace in a competition over who can find the most moths tucked away behind curtains and underneath dusty furniture (an odd infestation that occurs year-round in the Park household), and when said competition devolves into the girls throwing moths at each other, giggling when the insects flutter away harmlessly, he is sent away with instructions to pray for repentance. Which just means he gets to spend some time alone. In this chaotic household, it's a gift.

According to the generic Holy Baptist Church that the Park family attends multiple times a week, being trans is inherently a sin. It is a perversion: a spit in the face of God's creation. The LGBTQ+ agenda is Satan in disguise; not even a very good disguise. An actual snake, luring innocent children and force feeding them the fruit of sexual deviancy.

Since his very existence is a sin, Lucas wishes he didn't have to fret so much over all the other ones. Like his phone, and the things he uses it for, sometimes, when he is alone. In his defense, how can Lucas wish for a penis if he doesn't know how one even works? Wishing for a penis is a sin; looking at penises is a sin; touching yourself between the legs and pretending the empty space is actually a penis and not just a disappointment is also a sin.

Lucas never risks using his phone for more than a few minutes at a time, since privacy is never guaranteed in a household like his and he could never let it get taken away. As he tucks it back into his mattress, he wonders if Mr. Gregor knows what all Lucas uses the phone for, since he provided it, “In case of an emergency.” The idea is stupid embarrassing.

It will be a week before Lucas is allowed to go back to work - because no matter how much his parents loath it, they need his paycheck from Oddities. They don't seem to notice that the ridiculous check Mr. Gregor signs every week is clearly charity. No other business in town would pay a teenage cashier 3X minimum wage plus commissions; which is, if Lucas is honest, nothing. Has anything ever been sold at Oddities? It just seems to grow more crowded.

. . .

Mr. Gregor is, in fact, dealing with the rare customer at this very moment; likely she has wandered in from the bakery next door, and is touching everything she sees with slender, neatly manicured fingers.

“Are you looking for anything in particular?” Mr. Gregor asks pleasantly.

“Oh, no,” the woman stammers, “I'm just waiting for an order next door, honestly.” She is disarmed by Mr. Gregor's syrupy sweet smile. She actually had been considering purchasing something, maybe a gift for her son: a tiny carved scarab, which felt like ivory but was probably just resin.

“Tagua nut,” Mr. Gregor says.

The woman, startled, drops the beetle she had been fingering back into the bowl with the others. She feels embarrassed for some reason, like she had been caught shoplifting. “Excuse me?”

“They are carved from the tagua nut. Not resin, or ivory,” he explains.

Had she said anything? The woman politely says goodbye and hurries out of the Oddities shop. She can finish waiting for her order in the bakery.

Chapter 7

By the time Lucas is allowed back at Oddities, Roach has graduated from wheelchair to hobbling around on crutches, broken leg stretched awkwardly to the side. They prefer it this way, secretly: more like crawling. Roach is genuinely excited to see Lucas, and share their other new development.

“Hello, Lucas.” Roach has a deliberate way of speaking, a sort of monotone that reminds him of Data from Star Trek. Not that Lucas is allowed to watch Star Trek. He definitely hasn't shown it to Davey and Gracey in exchange for a few minutes of silence on the rare occasion his parents leave him in charge.

“Roach! You talk!” Lucas wants to hug them, but he has a feeling they would cringe away from that much contact. He settles for a fist bump; Roach stares at his closed hand for an awkwardly long time before shifting their weight on the crutches and extending their own fist. Boom. Progress.

“What happened?” Roach asks, pointing at the bruise, now a sickly yellow, around Lucas’s eye.

“Caught an elbow from my little brother,” he says, shrugging. “I have eleven siblings. It can get rough.” He glances quickly over to Mr. Gregor, to see if he buys the excuse. His boss is pleasantly humming to himself as though he were ignoring the conversation entirely.

“Is eleven a lot of siblings?” Roach inquires. They suspect they have hundreds, but keep this information to themselves.

“Way too many,” Lucas answers, laughing, and Roach nods. Ash and Willow come crashing into the shop behind them, startling them. Willow is chasing her brother, who is screeching like some sort of tiny dinosaur.

“Two has felt like a lot,” Roach confesses, barely loud enough to be heard over the noise. Millie enters behind them. “Are you going to the park with us?” Roach asks.

“Gotta work,” Lucas shrugs.

From the counter, Mr. Gregor shakes his head. “No, no, go,” he says, “I have things to do anyway.” He is distracted and irritable, not an uncommon state for Mr. Gregor. Ostensibly, Mr. Gregor's “things to do” are the reason he pays Lucas to man the shop, but he's not going to argue. The twins race to the door in front of Roach, arguing in whatever twin language they've developed about who gets to hold it open, eventually agreeing they both are needed.

“Thank you,” Roach says, politely, as they hobble past. Neither stays behind to keep the door open for Millie or Lucas; they're already racing over to the bakery next door. Ash presses his face and hands against the window, while Willow loudly demands a cookie. She is easily enough distracted, but Lucas has to pull Ash away from the window and carry him.

“Hey, little man,” he says, and the toddler's usually grim face offers a tiny smile. Ash lays his head against Lucas's chest and starts sucking his thumb contentedly; so Lucas really doesn't have much choice but to carry him to the park.

At the park, Roach sits on a bench, intently watching the people around them. Millie plays with the twins - she actually enjoys that, if you can believe it - so Lucas sits with Roach. Lucas is thrilled that Roach does, in fact, speak; perhaps their initial silence was due to the concussion. They no longer wear a bandage over the jagged wound on their head, which is healing, skin puckering around four metal staples. Roach’s hair is growing back, dark and prickly, and the bruising mostly gone. They glance over at Lucas, catch him staring, then - is that a smile?

“It itches,” they explain, scratching the metal staples in their scalp, which makes Lucas cringe.

“Does it hurt?” he asks.

Roach considers. “I still get headaches,” they say, “My leg just feels like it wants to escape. A molting gone wrong.”

“Interesting metaphor,” Lucas says. Roach's eyes quickly dart around the park, then return to Lucas; not quite meeting his eyes, but focused at some point on his forehead. Close enough.

Roach does not know what a metaphor is. This is how Roach learned to speak: for three days straight, they watched television during the day; and at night, while laying in bed, they would quietly repeat the words that had been spoken on screen. It was not hard. Roach is not sure why the twins, especially Ash, seem to struggle with it. They let the others believe it was the head injury that made it hard to talk; no sense complicating things.

“Lucas,” Roach asks, suddenly, “do you like insects?” Roach's favorite shows on the television are the nature documentaries, where they learned about cockroaches; just one of millions of species of insect on this planet.

“I'm not afraid of them, if that's what you mean,” Lucas answers.

“Is fear the default human feeling towards insects?” they ask.

Lucas shrugs. “I know a lot more people who are afraid of bugs than fond of them.” This seems to disappoint Roach, and Lucas realizes they must at least like insects a little, to keep their name. “I'm sorry,” he says. “Do you like insects?”

“I have learned about insects a lot over the last few days,” they say. “I am eager to be able to walk, so I can find something besides moths.” There are no cockroaches in Mr. Gregor's building, nor any flies or even spiders, but plenty of moths.

Lucas thinks about the insects he's seen: bees or wasps, he wouldn't know; the moths that infest his house; spiders and flies. “What about ants?” he asks. “You could find an anthill, and then you wouldn't have to move around, you could just watch them.” 

Roach considers this. “I think that would be acceptable,” they say. Another tiny smile, which makes something shift inside Lucas; for a second he feels like he would do anything to see Roach smile again.

Lucas stands up and extends his hand to offer help, but Roach shrugs him off and pulls themselves up with their crutches. “Let’s look for some ants,” he says. The park is a small playground at the end of Main; behind it is a stretch of empty, scrubby desert. It had been cleared at some point, to make way for development that would never happen, and the loosened sand made it easy for ants to build their homes. Lucas feels safe here - no one from church would dare be caught on this side of town - but still he wonders what he looks like, slowly walking around a desolate field with a broken Roach, each staring intently at the ground at their feet. They find half a dozen anthills, easily, and Roach leans against their crutches as they watch the tiny red ants running about.

“Fascinating,” they say, and Lucas finds he agrees; each individual has its own orders, its own mission, but they all work seamlessly together to build and grow the hive. He watches one ant in particular: it is carrying a small stick in its jaws, easily running while holding it underneath its body.

He's about to remark on this, but is interrupted by a shrill shriek coming from the playground; definitely one of the twins. Ash, as it turns out, finally got tired of his twin’s harassment and smacked her in the face with a tiny, pudgy fist.

“Which is not okay, at all,” Millie reminds them all, because Lucas looks like he's about to congratulate Ash on defending himself.

“Hey, now we'll match,” Lucas tells a tearful Willow instead, pointing to his own eye; she cheers long enough to offer a small giggle.

“It's time for them to go home,” Millie says. “Are you staying here?” she asks Roach.

“Yes,” Roach responds in their usual, blunt way.

Millie looks over to Lucas, who shrugs. The indifference of the gesture is a lie; of course he wants to stay here, with Roach. Fuck, he realizes. I have a crush on a kid named Roach.

“See you guys later, then,” Millie says, leading the twins away from the playground; which is rather more difficult than herding cats. Or ants.

Chapter 8

Evelyn, it turns out, also spends her morning at a park: one hundreds of miles away, much larger and somehow also much sadder; one of many in this big, grey city she has found herself in. She is looking for something, although it is not entirely clear to her what that something is. This park is a vast stretch of mowed grass and rows of identical, cultivated trees. Climbing them is forbidden. A creek borders the park to the north, and offers something vaguely resembling nature in stark contrast to the urban environment.

It serves as an oasis for wildlife, Evelyn learns, as an enormous rat crawls out of a long, desiccated log and stares directly at her.

“Evelyn,” the rat says. She can't hear it, of course, so it must be beaming its thoughts directly to her brain.

As one does.

“Evelyn,” it says again, pressing. The rat is meticulously cleaning itself, ignoring her entirely.

“Uhm,” Evelyn says, out loud.

“I need you to bring back the car,” the rat says.

Ah. Evelyn sighs and stands to leave. The rat startles and races off into the bushes. Problem solved? She turns and starts walking, but then another voice drills into her head.

“Evelyn,” it says. She looks around: a crow, perched on a tree branch nearby, glares down at her.

“What?” she signs towards the bird, an irritated flourish to her gesture.

“Bring back the car, Evelyn,” the crow demands. It ruffles its wings, shakes its head.

“Later,” she signs, brushing it off.

“I need the car, Evelyn,” a third voice insists. This one is a turtle, crawling near the water. Why do they keep saying her name so much?

“Same.”

“Why?”

Evelyn shrugs. “I don't know.” She waits for another animal to talk at her, but her head is silent.

What is she doing here, anyway? Looking for something, but she doesn't know what. Running away, from - an argument with Millie, but there was something else, wasn't there? A mother's drunken confession, one Evelyn couldn't hear but felt.

No, Evelyn will not think about her mother. She sniffs the polluted city air; catches a whiff of smoke, slightly skunky. If it was a skunk, it might talk to her, but if someone's smoking weed, maybe they'll share.

Mr. Gregor is relieved to find Evelyn safe, albeit somewhere he cannot recognize, far away. Speaking to her so directly was a violation (against the animals he inhabited; against Evelyn’s mind), but a necessary one. If she had just taken her phone with her, he would have sent her a text.

The search for Evelyn and subsequent conversation leave Mr. Gregor drained, but calmer, and he is glad when Millie and the twins return soon after. Willow's audacious intelligence and Ash’s solemn curiosity are exactly the sort of rejuvenation he needs. Mr. Gregor has been on this planet for a very long time, and during that time, he has learned two things: that his fellow adults tend to suck, and that children contain a nearly unlimited source of energy. If only humanity could find some way to harness it all.

“Wanna cookie,” Willow demands, and Ash agrees, making the sign for “cookie.” He shouldn't give in to the demands from tiny terrorists, but Mr. Gregor happens to have a sweet tooth, and the bakery is his second favorite place. The sweet, yeasty smell of baking bread and cookies; the gentle chimes on the door; the owner, Douglas, an enormous man with long auburn hair and a big, bushy beard. Exactly what you don't want in a baker, but no one has never found a hair in their scones before, so clearly the hairnets are working. Douglas always gives the twins their cookies for free, and Mr. Gregor always overtips to compensate.

It's a cute little dance, Millie thinks. Same as the polite small talk, the gentle joking, the tiny gifts they are always exchanging. Earlier this week, the baker brought her brother flowers: a small bouquet of wildflowers he'd picked on his way to work. She wishes Gregor would just suck it up and ask Douglas out. What would they do on a date? Discuss ancient artifacts, cursed objects, taxidermied rats posed in everyday situations. Recipes for croissants and cakes. They could go to a bar, or a movie. Millie wonders if Gregor has ever been in a movie theater before. He probably saw the first nickelodeon.

After they finish their cookies and scones, Mr. Gregor bids Douglas a polite farewell, and they return to Oddities. Then it is nap time for the twins, then Millie finds herself alone for the first time in a while; Lucas and Roach at the park, and Evelyn wherever she is. Millie decides she wants to take a nap, too. Why should napping be limited to toddlers and children, when they're the ones least likely to appreciate it?

This is what Millie dreams about as she naps, because dreams are important in tales of magic such as these: she is tiny, so small that blades of grass tower over her, obscuring the sky. She is some sort of beetle, with sharp mandibles and shiny green elytra. She scurries through the grass forest, over sticks like logs, stones as big as boulders. She runs so fast that she loses sight of her surroundings, objects blurring together into a senseless grey. She has to stop, every so often, to reorient herself. Run, stop. Run, stop. Run, stop. Repeat, forever.

Chapter 9

Lucas has a crush on a kid named Roach. A really weird kid named Roach, who speaks like an android and memorizes facts about insects to share in lieu of real conversation. Who he doesn't really know, not at all, because they just kind of appeared; it's not like he would have missed them at the one high school in town, unless they were private school, or homeschooled. What does ‘they’ even mean? Does Roach dream of having different parts, too? What parts might those be, anyway?

Lucas really wishes he could stop thinking about Roach, even just for a minute. He wishes he could talk to Evelyn about this, but she doesn't even have her phone with her. Why would she leave that behind? She doesn't just use it for texting and the internet - it's often a lot easier to type what you need, when communicating with strangers.

On the other hand, Roach has learned about texting, and every time Lucas checks his phone, he has half a dozen unread messages from them. And each one sends a sharp jolt of pleasure through his abdomen.

Fuck. Lucas has never felt this way about someone before. He has always been more than content to observe Evelyn's chaotic dating habits and not have to worry about living through them. For the last several years, Evelyn has had a pattern: she would allow herself to get too close to Millie, then catastrophically push herself away, rebounding with increasingly worse decisions. And she would tell everything to Lucas, in way too much detail, and he would smugly think about how he has never had to deal with that sort of emotional drama and probably never will.

Maybe it is better Evelyn is not here for him to dump all of his feelings on right now. Her know-it-all look would be insufferable. Hopefully, by the time she returns, Lucas will be over his little crush. The brighter they burn, the faster they fall, right?

Lucas is interrupted from his thoughts by the sudden appearance of a screaming Grace, followed by Sophia. It is only by a miracle that neither notices the way Lucas’s Bible is awkwardly propped up on his knees, concealing the small rectangular phone he's staring at. They are distracted: Grace has something in her hands, something she is trying to keep away from her older sister. She makes a loop around the room then races out the door, where Sophia nearly catches her. Lucas quickly stashes the phone away and gets up to follow his sisters. In the hallway, Sophia has tackled Grace to the ground and pulled the coveted object out of her hands: Lucas's beetle plushie. 

“Girls!” their mother yells, sharply, and Lucas looks up to the doorway she has appeared in, face immediately falling. She is scolding the younger two, but glaring directly at him; he probably should have intervened. 

“What is that disgusting thing still doing here?” his mother asks, taking the beetle out of Sophia’s hands. “I thought I told you to throw it away.”

Sophia instantly pouts. “But I like it,” she whines, “it's cute.”

“Bugs are not ‘cute’,” their mother scolds. “Good little girls are afraid of bugs. They are evil incarnate.” She glares again at Lucas, then turns and stomps away, beetle in hand.

“I'm sorry, Lizzy,” Sophia says, mournfully. “I told Gracey not to take it out of the room.” Grace briefly interrupts her sorrowful face to shoot a sharp glare at her sister.

“No worries,” he assures them, “I'll make a better one next.”

On his way out, Lucas pauses at the trash bin, perched at the sidewalk for the morning pick-up. He tentatively opens the lid, holding his breath to avoid the waft of hot air and old diapers. The beetle plush sits at the very top, unharmed. Lucas grabs it before taking off at a sprint towards Oddities.

. . .

“It is not very accurate,” Roach says bluntly, turning the stuffed beetle around in their hands and examining the stitching.

“I was, like, ten when I made it,” Lucas responds defensively.

Roach continues examining the beetle. They hold it up to their nose and smell it, and Lucas really hopes it hadn't been sitting in the bin for too long before he found it. “In that case,” Roach finally declares, “I find it perfectly satisfactory.” They have no idea what should be expected of a ten year old attempting to make a plush insect, but this is probably better than Roach could make. They hand it back to Lucas.

“Oh, no, it's for you,” he says, pushing it back. “A gift.”

Roach is quiet for a moment, then: “Thank you.” Then: a tiny smile; it warms Lucas inside.

They are sitting together in Oddities, of which Lucas is in charge while Mr. Gregor inquires about renting a car. The only rental place is at the county airport, an hour long journey by bus. Roach is sitting in their wheelchair, since there is nowhere else in the shop to sit besides the hard, straight backed chair Lucas occupies behind the counter. They tilt the chair backwards, balancing by constantly adjusting the two back wheels. Lucas really hopes they don't fall and break something (on themselves or in the store). But he also likes watching them do it: the look of concentration, of surprise when the chair tilts unexpectedly. He just kind of likes watching Roach, in general.

“I have a question,” Roach says, suddenly.

“Shoot,” Lucas replies. 

Roach looks over at him, quizzically.

“What's your question?” he clarifies.

Roach nods, then asks, “Where does the ‘B’ button in the elevator go?”

“B is for Basement.” That is the extent of what Lucas knows. Ostensibly, Mr. Gregor sleeps on the mattress in the backroom, since the apartment’s rooms are almost always occupied, but he spends more nights in the basement, which is entirely off-limits to everyone, even Millie.

“There are no stairs going down,” Roach observes.

“You haven't been in the back?” It's a dumb question, Lucas realizes too late; Roach can't get to a lot of places. “Okay. Behind the big red curtains upstairs is a fire escape. I guess if the building burns down, you're outta luck unless you can hobble down them.” Jordan was also in a wheelchair, though, and lived here forever, so Mr. Gregor probably had a plan, right? Lucas keeps this thought to himself. Instead, he continues, “There's also stairs to the basement. The elevator is actually for cargo. You noticed how it's weirdly long? This used to be a funeral home.”

“A funeral home next to a bakery?” Roach queries.

Lucas makes a face. “No, see, the bakery used to be a button factory,” he says, laughing.

“Buttons,” Roach says flatly.

“This town’s history is very interesting,” Lucas assures them. Then he wonders if Roach is capable of understanding sarcasm. “It's a shame we don't have a museum.”

“Indeed,” Roach agrees. They look thoughtful for a moment, then say, “So Mr. Gregor lives in what was the morgue.” They have been watching a lot of forensic television, lately.

“I guess so,” Lucas says. “Creepy, huh?”

Roach shrugs. They do not judge.

“Actually, he only lives there about half the time, because usually he's on the road,” Lucas realizes. “Since you got here is probably the longest time he's stayed in one place his entire life.”

“Because Evelyn stole his car,” Roach says.

“Yep,” Lucas says. “She's really pushing it this time.” His voice falters. “I'm actually really worried about her,” he confesses.

“Millie is anxious as well,” Roach says, “but Mr. Gregor seems unconcerned.” This is their attempt at reassurance.

“Mr. Gregor is unflappable,” Lucas says. “You could steal his car out from under his nose and he'd just spend the next week fretting over whether it is environmentally unethical to rent a replacement.”

Just then, a sleek black car parks in front of Oddities; through the narrow glass door, Lucas watches Mr. Gregor step out of the driver's seat. “Boss is back,” he warns, jokingly, but Roach groans.

“I have to go to the doctor,” they say.

Lucas makes a concerned face. “You okay?” he asks.

“Just a check-up,” Roach says, “But I do not like doctors.”

Understandable. Lucas is about to reply but the bells on the door start to clatter, indicating Mr. Gregor's entrance. “Yo, Mr. Gregor,” he says instead, “is that a Jag?”

“It was the only electric vehicle available,” Mr. Gregor replies. “Are you ready, Roach?”

Roach has pulled themselves out of the wheelchair with their crutches; Lucas watches as they stuff the beetle into their pocket. “Goodbye, Lucas,” they say, oddly formally, as they hobble past the counter.

“See ya,” Lucas says. He watches Roach follow Mr. Gregor out of Oddities, then awkwardly climb into the back seat of the Jaguar. As the car pulls out of sight, his phone buzzes on the countertop, drawing his attention: a text. A picture from Roach of the beetle plushie, safely buckled in the new car.

Chapter 10

When Roach's pediatrician, confusingly named Doctor Baker (no relation to Douglas, the baker), asks if they have any questions, he is not prepared for the sheer depth of the teenager’s curiosity about the adolescent human body. At one point, Dr. Baker feels as though he is reliving old study sessions from medical school. Their appointment runs well over the scheduled time, but Roach emerges from the clinic room with a decently thorough understanding of human anatomy and physiology: organs and organs systems, neuromuscular interactions, hormones and puberty and reproduction, immunity and healing. In some ways, his new patient's curiosity is refreshing; most of his young patients are rather indifferent to the intricacies of their bodily functions.

Roach leaves the medical office relatively satisfied; they were not stabbed with any needles, and they got to see an X-ray of their femur, the screws and metal rod holding the healing bone together. They learned about why the sun makes their eyes hurt, why their digestive system is so long, what intersex means (at least for them; there's a whole spectrum of humanity out there), what that occasional ringing in their ears means. They learned that most of the odd things their body does are just a normal part of the human experience, which is rather reassuring. They did not mention being a cockroach in a past life.

The pediatrician’s office is in a building adjacent to the hospital, and Roach meets Mr. Gregor in the lobby. As they are leaving, Mr. Gregor is stopped by a woman calling his name. She is wearing a tank top and large flannel shirt, unbuttoned, that extends beyond her very short shorts. As soon as he sees who it is, Mr. Gregor’s face turns a sort of greyish color.

“Forgive me,” he mutters towards Roach, then he plasters on a polite mask. “Ms. Summers. How do you do?”

The woman doesn't answer, but says, “You been keeping my baby from me, Mr. Gregor?”

Mr. Gregor's pale eyes flash. “I assure you, Evelyn's whereabouts are entirely of her own volition.” He is smiling, his voice jovial, but somehow Roach feels as though he is terribly uncomfortable.

It is not clear if Ms. Summers understood, but she didn't need to. “You know, I told her,” she continues, “I said, ‘Evelyn, I'm gonna need you at home a lot more coming up.’”

Mr. Gregor blinks; a muscle in his jaw is twitching. “Why might that be?” he inquires.

“Didn't she tell you?” Ms. Summers tilts her head and arches her back, sticking out her belly slightly. “I'm pregnant!” Indeed, there is a slight curve, a roundness to her stomach.

“Pregnant?” Mr. Gregor asks. For a moment, his polite mask slips, revealing a look of pure shock before recovering. “Congratulations,” he says.

Ms. Summers rubs her belly fondly as Mr. Gregor makes his excuse to leave, hurriedly shuffling Roach out of the hospital and to the car. His face is tense, his jaw clenched, and the ride back to Oddities is silent.

Lucas is in the same place behind the counter when Roach enters the shop, followed by Mr. Gregor. “Go ahead and take the afternoon off,” he says, turning to lock the shop door behind him and flip the sign to “Closed.” “There are some things I must attend to.”

“Sweet,” Lucas says. He jumps over the counter, looking for a response from Mr Gregor (he gets none), and follows Roach to the elevator. They leave Mr. Gregor in his room-slash-workshop, digging through old boxes.

In the apartment, Lucas is immediately accosted by Willow, who clamps onto his leg and screeches, “Lulu!” He bends over to pick her up, feeling a warm tenderness when she hugs him. He can't help it; he did give birth to her. Even if the twins were something he never wanted, Lucas is still glad to have them in his life. Just, tangentially.

“Don't let her distract you,” Millie says, “it's nap time.” She is already carrying Ash, whose head rests sleepily on her shoulder, towards the twins’ room.

“No nap!” Willow says, pouting.

“No?” Lucas asks, and the toddler shakes her head violently from side to side. “But what if I tuck you in?” he asks.

Willow sighs dramatically. “Okay,” she relents.

By the time Lucas is allowed to leave the twins’ room, Roach has disappeared; Millie sits at the table, reading.

“Where's Roach?” he asks, sitting down across from her.

“Their room,” Millie answers, then she puts her book down to give Lucas a quizzical look. “Is that... disappointment?” she asks.

Lucas tries to neutralize his facial features. “What? No,” he says, too quickly, “I was just going to see if they've ever played Halo.”

“Mhm,” Millie says, returning to her book. She can tell when Roach appears in the hallway behind her because Lucas's eyes light up and he sits up a little straighter. Everyone deserves love but you, the darkness hisses, turning Millie’s stomach.

Roach is not very good at first-person shooters, as it turns out, but that's okay, because neither is Lucas. It's not like he gets any practice at home. He is sitting in the middle of the couch next to Roach, after Millie made him give up his seat at the other end. That was clever, Lucas thinks. He should find a way to thank her. He tries not to get too excited every time their arms almost brush, their legs come within inches of each other.

“I have a question,” Roach says, suddenly, while waiting to respawn for the dozenth time.

“Okay,” Lucas says.

“When I first arrived, you said the mother of the twins visits every week,” they say.

“Oh, fuck,” Lucas mutters. Millie puts down her book, stares at him.

Roach continues as though they did not hear him. “I have been here for nearly two weeks now, so I was wondering why she has not visited.”

“Okay...” Lucas says again, watching his character die on-screen. “I guess that was a lie,” he admits.

Millie chimes in, “It's complicated.” She is offering Lucas a way out, and he is tempted to take it.

Instead, he sighs. He can feel Roach's dark eyes on him, but keeps his own eyes focused on the controller in his hands. “I'm their bio-mom,” Lucas admits.

Roach just blinks and says, “I see.” They watch Lucas a moment longer, then return to the video game.

Something inside Lucas feels crushed. He had been expecting revulsion, or concern, or curiosity, but not... nothing. Roach's complete non-reaction, their apparent indifference to Lucas, hurts in a way he could not have expected. He glances at Millie, then back to the screen. He avoids looking at Roach; who knows what's going on in that weird head of theirs. Maybe they are repulsed. Maybe they are mad that he lied; about the twins, about being a guy. Maybe now he won't get butterflies every time he sees them. Now, his stomach just hurts.

Then, Roach says, “I had thought maybe they were the mysterious Evelyn's.” 

This causes Millie to start laughing almost hysterically, partly because the tension emanating from Lucas is painful, mostly because if anyone was more opposed to the existence of the twins and the concept of reproduction than Lucas, it was Evelyn. “Sorry,” she manages between giggles. “Just, Evelyn doesn't do kids,” she explains to a blank-faced Roach. She'd even been opposed to Millie babysitting them, though she had been the one to come up with their names.

“Is that why she left?” Roach asks.

“It's been almost two years, I think she's gotten used to them by now,” Lucas says, feeling suddenly defensive.

His tone makes Millie feel bad for laughing. “She secretly loves them,” she says.

“I met Evelyn's mother at the doctor's office,” Roach says, suddenly unsure if they ought to be sharing what they learned.

“What a trash heap,” Lucas grumbles.

“Pardon?” Lucas can feel Roach staring at him, and wants to disappear. Millie saves him.

“She is not a great person,” she explains, “at least not where Evelyn is concerned.”

“A trash heap is a bad thing,” Roach clarifies, nodding. They are quiet for a moment, thinking. The video game in front of them has been long abandoned, their virtual avatars bobbing around impatiently. “Evelyn’s mother is pregnant,” they reveal.

Finally Lucas looks at them, eyes wide with shock. Millie’s face mirrors his expression, and Roach memorizes their features, filing them in their mental encyclopedia under “surprise.”

“Oh gods,” Millie says, at the same time Lucas asks, “Do you think she knows?”

. . .

Of course Evelyn knows - that's why she's gone.

Evelyn feels like crying. Evelyn feels like crying? Why does Evelyn feel like crying? “Because everything is shit, thanks for asking,” she says out loud, to no one. She hears her own voice through the hearing aid, that deaf accent that she hates. She doesn't know where she is; she is looking for something, but she doesn't know what. She is avoiding something, but she doesn't want to think about what.

Evelyn doesn't know what she is looking for, but she has found plenty of things. She's learned she doesn't even really need to look, she can just find them. She can dig her hand into the sand at a beach at random and pull out a gold necklace with a gaudy green jewel. She can peer into a trash can and take out the wallet sitting neatly on top of a stack of papers, untarnished. She asks a man for the time in ASL, pointing at her wrist, and he takes off his watch and hands it to her.

The wallet, Evelyn strips of cash then tosses into a nearby post box. The jewelry and watch, she pawns at a sketchy shop in a sketchy downtown, ignoring the owner’s suggestive leers. 

Outside the pawn shop, she sees a woman, heavily pregnant, waiting for a bus, and she thinks, No. She looks away, eyes landing on a nearby street sign. “EVELYN,” it reads, and she thinks, No. She turns right and starts walking, a random direction, heading nowhere.

There's a man reading a newspaper at the corner, holding it up so Evelyn can read the front page headline: Evelyn, Please Bring Back the Car.

“No,” she says, out loud, and the man drops the newspaper to glare at her. She is glad she can't hear what he says. She crosses the street, passes by a restaurant called “Come Home.” Another newspaper, 50c for a copy. A Help Wanted sign. A bus schedule. The Bentley's license plates, which, how did she get back here anyway? She was trying to lose herself. It doesn't matter - eventually, everything she reads is the same three words: Evelyn Come Home. In the car, Evelyn screams: “NO!”

Chapter 11

Lucas awakes sometime overnight when Sophia, who frequently has nightmares, elbows him in the chest as she climbs sleepily into his bed. Then he has to pee, which means carefully crossing the creaky hallway to the bathroom without waking any of the eleven other people living in the house. Then he discovers his period has started, which is just fucking perfect. This is why Lucas likes to run: he heard somewhere (the internet) that running a lot can stop your menstrual cycle. It kind of works, in that he only menstruates a couple times a year, but when he does, the agony makes him want to crawl into a small hole and die.

His parents do not believe in painkillers. Genesis 3:16 - God gives uterus-havers pain and makes them subservient to men; the natural consequences for eating an apple.

Lucas sighs, and sighs again. Then stands and flushes and washes his hands and walks carelessly across the creaky hall back to his room, because why not?

Back in his room, Evelyn is standing at the open window, staring out at the waxing moon.

“JE-sus wept,” Lucas says, the first syllable a cry of shock, the other two hissed so as not to wake the others. Evelyn doesn't respond, meaning she isn't wearing her hearing aid. He goes over to his friend and grabs her shoulder to turn her around, but instead grabs a handful of squirming, grey maggots.

“What the f-” Lucas says, biting his lip to stop the curse, throwing the maggots onto the floor where they disappear. He violently shakes his hand; he can feel them crawling around, still, even though they are gone.

Evelyn gives him a strange look. “You okay?” she signs.

“What the fuck?” Lucas signs. Evelyn just shrugs, so he signs, “Why are you here?” 

“I'm not here,” Evelyn replies. The skin on her arms looks like it is crawling, and Lucas shudders.

“Where are you?” he asks.

Evelyn fingerspells something, presumably the name of a town, but her hands move too fast for him to parse. To be honest, Lucas is not very good at signing; before Jordan introduced them to ASL, he and Evelyn had their own way of communicating. Like how Ash, still non-verbal, and Willow, loquacious, have no trouble communicating with each other.

“You okay?” Evelyn asks again. Her eyes are practically glowing with intensity. No, they really are glowing, Lucas realizes.

“I’m good,” he signs, “You?” Evelyn just shrugs.

“When will you come home?” Lucas asks.

Evelyn looks away, towards the window again as she signs, “I don’t know.” She is fading; no, she is shrinking, collapsing in on herself.

“I miss you,” Lucas says.

“Me too,” she answers, before collapsing into a cloud of flies that swarm out the window and disappear into the night air.

Lucas closes the window, trapping another moth inside. He goes back to the bed, in which Sophia has sprawled out to fill. He thinks she is asleep, but when he sits down, she moves over to make room for him. A sharp cramp stabs through his abdomen when he lays down, then Sophia curls up so close he can’t shift to get more comfortable.

“Who was that?” she asks, sleepily.

“Nothing,” Lucas responds, “it was just a dream.” Sophia nods and rolls away, already asleep again.

Lucas does not sleep; he stares at the ceiling, wondering, Evelyn, what have you gotten yourself into?

. . .

Even though she would never really ask for it, Evelyn wishes Mr. Gregor would help her, because she is actually quite scared about these things that are happening to her, especially as they don’t seem particularly under her control. One minute she’d been laying on the beach under the stars, thinking about Millie (of course), the next she was in her room, floating, her skin crawling, her hair buzzing around her head. Then, just when she thought maybe she would get to stay, she was gone again.

Evelyn found herself in Lucas’s room, which she had only been in once or twice before. Theirs was a friendship forged at the playground adjacent both to Lucas’s church and Evelyn’s trailer park. Before Mr. Gregor’s charity, it was just Evelyn and Lucas; Evelyn and Elizabeth, then, before even Lucas knew he was a boy. They’d been so small, not much older than the twins are now. Evelyn was already deaf by then; she’d survived meningitis as an infant, and was left with enough residual hearing in her right ear that her mother insisted to others she was just difficult. A problem child.

Then there was Lucas, with an overabundance of patience from already dealing with too many siblings, more than willing to put up with Evelyn's problems; Evelyn's difficulties. She met him at the park nearly every day, because the Park family went to church nearly every day.

Lucas said he was “good,” but he’d had a fresh cut and a fat lip and was wearing a nightdress; he was not okay. His home life was not okay, and if he didn’t stop letting himself be the punching bag to protect his siblings he was never going to be okay.

Evelyn lays sprawled in the sand, staring at the stars overhead and listening to the ocean waves. She tries not to think about what she is looking for, or what she is running from. Maybe, if she just asked, she could make Lucas’s parents leave him alone. She could ask them to please just accept him for who he is, and maybe they would oblige, like the man who gave her his watch. She digs her hand into the sand, which is still warm underneath, despite the night chill. Her fingers land on something hard, metallic, and she pulls it out: an old-fashioned skeleton key. The handle is ornately molded to resemble the body of an insect, with green jewels for eyes. Neat, Evelyn thinks, this is worthless. What is a key without a lock?

. . .

Mr. Gregor is going on a trip. This is only unusual to Roach and, still being somewhat medically complex, he expects them to have some amount of anxiety about his departure, so he is surprised when they just shrug and ask if Millie will still be here.

“Yes, yes, of course,” Mr Gregor answers, zipping up his suitcase, “And Douglas next door will be by to feed you all breakfast at least.”

Millie, accustomed to her brother’s travels, doesn’t even bother asking Gregor where he is going. She hopes, at least a part of her hopes, it has something to do with retrieving Evelyn and bringing her home. She’d had a dream that night that Evelyn’s body was laying on a beach, desiccating, crawling with maggots and flies, and she’d woken up and immediately felt like she was going to vomit black sludge all over. The terror and nausea could only be relieved one way, and now she lets the dull ache on her arm serve as a reminder that Evelyn left her, and didn’t even tell her why.

Gregor has been taking in foster kids for as long as Millie can remember, and if you were to have asked either of them, at any point, if it was okay for Millie to fall in love with one of the foster kids, the answer from both would be an emphatic “No.” It is what Millie told herself the first time they kissed (once, when they were in 6th grade; once again, six months ago; then again, three months ago; and then again, last month, and then again and then again and then again...). Gregor would have found the idea absurd. Like kissing your sister.

That is, in fact, what Gregor had to say about it, when he first caught them together. But, like, he got over it pretty quick. It's not that weird. Right?

Mr. Gregor's road trip is not his usual mission of tracking down rare artifacts, tainted by death or life or darkness or magic. And it does, tangentially, involve Evelyn. He knows where she is, now, and now has a reasonable idea of what she is looking for, in a less metaphysical sense: her father, or, rather, the man who raped her mother and left his sperm behind. This man, Mr. Gregor knows too well, appears normal on the outside, but inside he is twisted by darkness and power too great for him to yield. In a less metaphysical sense, he is a moderately successful businessman and school board member, with an overextended reach of influence and lots of favors owed.

He is dangerous, Evelyn. The thought has crossed her mind already, thanks. She's not about to trust a rapist. An alleged rapist; Evelyn's mother is prone to histrionics. She shakes her head to banish the thought. What a fucking feminist she is, she thinks.

The thing about her father that rattles Evelyn is how perfectly normal he looks. He has her blue eyes, her black hair. He isn't particularly attractive, and he isn't ugly either. Middle-aged, middle bellied. She wants to hate him - she does hate him. But if she didn't know any better, if she just saw him on the street before, she would have ignored him entirely.

The way Evelyn found him is: she thought about him, and there she was - her skin crawling, her hair buzzing. She doesn't even know his name, just who he is. She'd wanted to collapse into a swarm of flies, no, better, bees, stinging wasps and attack his face like she did that man, the driver who tried to extract payment in sexual favors; whatever happened to him, she wonders. But then, her father looked at her, looked right at her in the eyes, and Evelyn just dissolved, reappearing back in the car.

Dangerous. It is not fair that someone so bland, so normal looking, could be dangerous. Maybe Evelyn is dangerous. She wants to be dangerous, because she is tired of feeling helpless.

. . .

This is what happens to Lucas, who wakes up in too much pain to leave his bed, to even move, and Sophia scrambles away to bring him a glass of water, because what else could a seven year old offer, and he groans and sweats and bleeds through his sheets and his mother comes into the room once, twice, then it is his father, who grabs him by the arm and drags him out of the bed, who sees the stain of blood Lucas has allowed to leak through his nightdress, and throws him through the door, into the doorframe, and agony rips through Lucas’s lower abdomen like a knife made of fire, of fire ants, and so he screams and vomits and passes out.

“She is exaggerating,” he hears; it’s his father screaming at, is that Annalee? She is crying and holding something up to her ear.

“No,” he mutters; don’t touch her, he doesn’t, because he can barely move.

Annalee called 911; she used Lucas’s phone, which she knew was tucked away in his mattress because there are no secrets in a house as crowded as the Park’s, and if she could see him she would apologize for ruining his secret, but in her defense, she thought he was dying.

Lucas had certainly thought he was dying, but he wasn’t, not exactly; he’d had an ovarian cyst that ruptured when he fell against the doorframe. Fell, because that’s what his father told the doctor in the emergency room, and though he was seething with rage because his daughters had betrayed him, had betrayed Him, he managed to remain perfectly calm the entire time.

His father had wanted to take Lucas home immediately, but there was more to be done: risk of infection, pain management, and his father had said, “What if I refuse?”

Tylenol: a compromise. Lucas gets to stay at the hospital overnight for monitoring: a fucking Godsend. After his father leaves, repulsed by the medical setting, repulsed by his daughter in the bed, seething and probably ready to murder Annalee for her insubordination; after he cries for a really, really long fucking time because everything hurts and he’s terrified; then Lucas asks a nurse to borrow a phone, which he uses to first call Mr. Gregor, who turns the Jag around immediately, promising to be at the hospital by morning, and calls Lucas's social worker.

Then he uses it to call Roach, because he’s really fucking scared and everything hurts, and when Roach answers their phone with a dull, “Hello?” Lucas almost starts to cry again.

“Roach, it’s me,” he says softly.

“Lucas,” Roach says, their voice instantly brighter, or is that just Lucas’s imagination. He doesn’t know what to say, just sits there in silence on the phone until Roach asks, “Are you okay?”

Lucas breathes out, almost a laugh, then says, “No, I’m not, I’m sorry.” His eyes are burning again, filling with tears. “Can I talk to Millie? She hasn’t had her phone on in weeks.” And since Roach immediately obliges, hobbling their phone across the hall to Millie’s room, Lucas feels safe to assume that they are either oblivious to or indifferent to the tears in his voice. And not, perhaps, hovering over Millie as she listens to him describe the amount of sheer fucking terror and agony he is in.

He definitely doesn’t expect Roach to show up at the hospital alone, over an hour later, but here they stand, leaning against their crutches, dark eyes scanning Lucas, the IV tube, the hospital bed. Dangling from one hand is a familiar pink and black striped paper bag that makes Lucas's mouth water.

“Douglas the baker drove me,” Roach explains. “He provided,” they pause to hold the bag out, “a lot of pastries.” 

“Thanks,” Lucas says, and when Roach sits down next to him and rests their hand on his, he almost forgets how much pain he’s in.

Chapter 12

Mr. Gregor wouldn’t be able to do anything for his siblings, which is why Lucas is always reticent to social workers and the like, but he can at least give Lucas a place to sleep for however long it takes for his parents to pray for peace or serenity or whatever it is that allows them to tolerate his presence. Lucas wonders if this is going to be his life now, like Evelyn: back and forth between the family that loathes him and the one that loves him.

All the rooms are occupied, though, and Lucas doesn’t want to take Evelyn’s bed, even if she wasn’t sleeping in it, so Mr. Gregor ends up dragging the mattress from the workshop into Roach’s room, which is not exactly allowed, but no one is checking. Since Roach is Roach, they insist on taking the floor mattress, giving Lucas the proper bed. And since Roach is Roach and unwaveringly, unceasingly polite, it is impossible for Lucas to get a read on what they think, what they feel, what they want.

“Have you tried just asking them?” Millie asks him, exasperated, after Lucas asks her what she thinks for the fifth time, like she is supposed to be psychic or something. Normally, this is Evelyn's job, and Millie’s pretty sure that is because Evelyn really is psychic. Or something.

“Asking them what?” Lucas scoffs, “Hey Roach, do you like me or do you think I'm disgusting?”

Millie’s eyes focus on something behind him and she grins. “Oh, hey, Roach.”

“Shit,” Lucas curses, twisting to look behind himself, but the hallway is empty.

“Gotcha,” Millie laughs, and Lucas glares at her. “But seriously, I'd just go with the first part. Really hard to mess up a question like that.” Gregor has taken the twins next door to eat too much sugar, and Millie could be enjoying a rare moment alone right now, if Lucas would just figure out how to talk to Roach.

“Maybe I will,” he says, but when he finds Roach in their room, reading something on their phone, he forgets what he was supposed to ask entirely. Roach has recently gone from watching inordinate amounts of television to voraciously consuming literature with such pure fascination that if Lucas didn't know any better he would think that Roach only recently learned that reading was a thing. They sit on their mattress, broken leg extended, the other bent at the knee so they can rest their phone on it.

“What’s up,” Lucas asks. He can't remember what it means to sound casual.

Roach turns off their phone screen and lays it face down on the mattress. “I have been researching about the human experience,” they say.

Lucas climbs onto his own bed, laying on his stomach diagonally so he faces Roach. “And what have you learned?” he asks.

“A lot more questions than answers,” Roach confesses. “It is difficult to assimilate experiences second-hand.”

Lucas looks at them for a long time. “Where are you even from, man?” he asks. There is a strange quality to his voice, something between awe and scorn. Why doesn't Roach have their own experiences to assimilate?

“I do not know,” Roach replies softly, “and I am not a man.”

“Sorry,” Lucas says. Then he says, “If you ask my parents, I'm not either.”

“Do your parents have any say in the matter?” Roach asks.

“Definitely, if you ask them.”

Roach is quiet for long enough that Lucas thinks they've given up on the conversation. His stomach still hurts; he rolls over so he's on his back, then curls up on his side. It's the least painful way to exist.

“The human concept of gender and sex is puzzling,” Roach confesses. “The idea that there is a binary when there clearly is not, and the idea that those existing outside the binary must conform or perish.”

“Perish, in my case,” Lucas says to the ceiling.

“I hope not,” they say, softly. Then: “Even the concept of sex chromosomes is deeply flawed. They say that human males are XY and females are XX. In cockroaches, females have two copies of the X chromosome, but males only have one, nothing to replace the other. In honey bees, there are no sex chromosomes. Females are diploid and hatch from fertilized eggs, while males are haploid and hatch from unfertilized eggs. There is an entire species of lizard that only has females, that reproduces via parthenogenesis.”

“Roach,” Lucas interrupts, sitting up to look at them, “when did you become an expert on animal sex chromosomes?”

“This morning,” they say, and they don't even know why that's funny, Lucas can tell.

“Okay,” he says, then he lays back again. “Tell me more.”

Birds have ZZ and ZW chromosomes; male and female, respectively. Mushrooms have thousands of sex chromosomes, or none; but only certain combinations can reproduce. Fruit flies can be male, female, metafemale, or intersex, based on the ratio of sex chromosomes to autosomal chromosomes. The speciation between some millipedes is based entirely on the direction of the curve of their genitals.

“Okay, wait,” Lucas interrupts them again, this time sitting up entirely. “You said you were studying the human experience. This is a bunch of animals.”

Roach thinks for a moment, then says, “Biologists are human.” And they offer a half smile, or maybe it's a smirk? Can Roach smirk now? Lucas realizes he has been spending an inordinate amount of time staring at Roach’s mouth, their dimples and soft-looking lips, and he looks away, his face feeling suddenly warm.

“Ducks have corkscrew penises,” Roach offers, prompting Lucas to start laughing so hard he has to remind himself how to breathe again. It's kind of uncomfortable, to be honest; his abdomen cramps to remind him of his place.

“Sorry,” he says, “it's just, I got this mental image.”

“I could show you a picture,” Roach offers, reaching for their phone.

“Nope, no,” Lucas says, “I'm good.” To think, all his research into penises, and he never thought to consider the duck’s. 

“Am I making you uncomfortable?” Roach asks.

“No,” he says quickly, “no, I like listening to you talk.”

A pause, then: “I enjoy listening to you talk as well.” Roach would like to ask him questions, listen to him talk more, but the last time they unwittingly uncovered something personal, Lucas had seemed terribly uncomfortable.

“So, have you learned about anything besides sex?”

Roach thinks for a moment, then answers, “Some people add nutmeg to their macaroni and cheese.”

“What the fuck?”

“Indeed.”

Well, Lucas still doesn't know what they feel or want, but at least now he has some insight into what Roach is thinking about.

Chapter 13

Mr. Gregor and the twins have returned from the bakery, the latter with chocolate smeared faces - Lucas can hear Willow complain about having her face cleaned off from the kitchen. Then Mr. Gregor is knocking at their door, to apologize but he has to leave again; he is now a day delayed on his journey.

“Due to the circumstances, Douglas has offered to take the twins while I am away,” he tells them. This, too, is not uncommon; they even have their own bedroom at Douglas's house. “He will keep an eye out, lest your father resolve to retrieve you.” And Lucas thinks about his siblings, especially Annalee, who risked so much to help him.

A day behind Evelyn means she has likely already figured out where Mr Gregor is headed, and might even beat him there; he can only hope she has enough sense not to make contact with her father before he can stop her. He drives through the night, stopping only to charge the Jaguar and stock up on caffeine and soak in energy from the Milky Way.

. . .

Evelyn tracked her sperm donor by stalking him enough that she was able to deduce his town from his surroundings. This was an exhausting effort, involving far too many maggots and flies and dissolving events. She drives the Bentley to a neighboring town, and when she asks the clerk at the motel for a room they give her a key, no questions asked. From there, it is not hard to discover the identity of her target: his portrait is on the front page of the newspaper. The headline reads: “He's Dangerous - Stay Away,” but the caption provides a name and job title: Board of Education Vice President Mr. Brent Smalls. In the photograph he wears a red hat; he stands on a stage, surrounded by blank white faces and American flags, calling for the immediate removal of any books referencing race or gender or sex or communism or whatever. Of course he's one of those book-burning bigots responsible for terrorizing school kids, hosting rallies full of hate and encouraging children to turn on each other.

Okay, so maybe Evelyn can see how this guy might be dangerous, but it's not like this school district is anywhere near home. He's dangerous for these kids, not her, but maybe he needs to be stopped.

Right. And she's the one to stop him. My name is Evelyn Summers. You raped my mother, prepare to die.

Evelyn’s mother. Why does she even care about her mother? Let her kill herself slowly; if only overdoses were cumulative, right? Whatever makes her happy.

“I’m pregnant.” The sign flashes through Evelyn’s head. Lucas, coming home from ‘summer’ camp in the middle of winter; no, it was conversion camp. He was pensive, melancholy, lachrymose, moody for weeks. Yeah, it was the same year she’d bought a thesaurus on a whim; there are so many words, so few signs for them. Lucas: changed in some inexplicable, ineffable way.

“Pregnant.” Lucas had had to look up the sign so he could tell Evelyn; there are two of them, actually, the clinical and the enthusiastic, and he had chosen the former, but Evelyn didn’t know the sign either, so he’d ended up typing it out on her phone and deleting it as soon as she read it. He’d figured it out too late to get it taken care of the easy way, with chalky pills that dissolve under your tongue, and Evelyn was so angry with him when he decided to go through with it, anyway. They could have gone out of state; she could have gotten him a fake id; surely, they would have figured something out.

Evelyn had been in school, answering questions about the War of 1812, while her best friend was ripped apart in two different ways to make room for new life.

Why is she still so bitter about this? “I'm pregnant!” The enthusiastic sign, the optimistic show of a growing belly, the expression of shock like a full grown adult doesn't know what the natural consequence of sex might be.

No, Lucas hadn't been an adult, he'd been just twelve, and he'd been raped at conversion camp by a youth pastor who thought his healing dick would cure Lucas of his perversions. Maybe Evelyn should track down that man and stop him, too.

Stop him, how? Stop her father, how? There are no good signs for “rape,” no way to convey the violence of the act without becoming a violent act itself, and Evelyn has only ever finger spelled it. R-A-P-I-S-T.

“Your father was a rapist,” Evelyn's mother had told her. “You probably have psychopathy in your genes.”

Thanks, mom. Glad I saved your life all those times.

Evelyn has found the thing she was looking for, but now she doesn't know what to do with it; she feels like there's still something she needs to find. Things to run from and nothing to run to. She is glad for the motel room, because sleeping in the back of the Bentley is awful. Millie would tell her to look for bedbugs, so she does, though bugs don't bother Evelyn anymore. No, bedbugs would probably bother her. She takes a bath, pouring the entire tiny bottle of shampoo into the running water to make thick, foamy bubbles that hide her body. Not that it looks like squirming maggots, right now. She washes her hair, which isn't made of flies, because she has a perfectly normal human body. She towels her perfectly normal human body dry and wraps her perfectly normal human hair in a towel and doesn't bother getting dressed, just slips between the bleach white motel sheets and closes her eyes and sleeps.

Evelyn dreams of buzzing, deep inside her skull; of metamorphosis inside a dark and warm place; of sex with Millie, or Millie’s parts - a hand here, lips there, her thigh, her toes. She awakes in her perfectly normal human body and remembers nothing.

. . .

“Lucas,” Millie says, sitting down heavily on the couch next to him.

Lucas grunts in response.

“Are you still in pain?”

“No,” he says, which is mostly true. Just a twinge once in a while.

“Then spill,” Millie says, “because I haven't seen you this mopey since you had to tell me you were pregnant.”

Lucas looks up at her, eyes wide, then scans the otherwise empty room.

“Oh, gods, you're not pregnant again, are you?” she asks.

“Fuck off,” Lucas says, half-heartedly.

Millie is in a good mood; the twins are with Douglas next door, Gregor isn't home. The only thing they're missing is Evelyn. “I thought we moved past the sulking eggshell stage a long time ago,” she says, “weren't you laughing about it a week ago?”

She has a point. “I'm allowed to laugh about it,” Lucas says, “you just offer your unwavering love and support.”

“Okay,” Millie says, “so what am I supporting you in?” Lucas sighs, so she asks, “Did you ever ask Roach if they like you?”

“No. Who asks a question like that?”

Millie shrugs. “Have you talked to them at all?”

“I guess.”

“...and did they talk back?”

Lucas smiles now, thinking about their conversation earlier, and that is all the answer Millie needs.

“Have you considered,” she explains, slowly, “that by virtue of engaging in conversation with you, one that puts that,” she gestures, “look on your face, no less, perhaps Roach has implied they do not, in fact, find you, quote, ‘disgusting’?”

Lucas blinks at her. He's getting there.

“How about you go invite them to a movie night,” Millie suggests. “We can watch something cute and gay.” At the look on Lucas’s face, she amends, “Okay, something nerdy sci-fi.”

They end up watching a Star Trek movie Lucas has seen a hundred times before, so he doesn't have to pay attention, and at one point Lucas's knee and Roach's thigh touch and they don't recoil in horror, and his skin tingles and he can think of nothing but that little square inch of contact.

. . .

Most parents fuck up their kids in some way. Some of them almost die, over and over, and force their kids to raise themselves because they're too fucked up to take care of themselves, let alone a child. Some of them raise their kids too strictly, offer them no freedom to grow and become themselves. Some raise them to be full of hate, or self-loathing, if the object of hatred is themselves. Some of them create their children out of dust and beeswax and sage, and inexplicably raise them as their sister.

This is only one of Millie's theories about Gregor, anyway. 

One of the reasons Millie cuts herself is that, until she watches the blood escape, she almost doesn't believe it's there. Maybe those thin, blue lines sneaking beneath the thin, translucent skin on her wrists are wires, fibers, tunnels full of fleas. Maybe it is not blood at all, but thick black sludge, the same that pours out of Evelyn’s mouth and nose and vagina in the dream Millie wakes up from, sweating, heart racing, throat raw as though she had been screaming, but if she had, no one was around to hear it.

There is no black sludge in her, at least not now, so Millie is free to continue her day.

. . .

There he is. There he is. A public park, neatly mowed grass and rows of identical trees; some sort of gathering, the kind where Evelyn and Millie and Lucas would not be allowed. Ridiculed, ostracized, attacked. If this were a bigger town, perhaps it would be a rally, but here it's just a gathering. Of like-minded folk. There are dogs and children and grills and everyone looks so. Fucking. Happy. To talk about Satan’s gay agenda, or lizard people pizza delivery drivers, or how to secede your sovereign room share, or whatever; Evelyn isn't going to put in her hearing aid to listen in.

She just watches him, Brent Smalls. What a name. In another universe, she would be Evelyn Smalls, which is somehow worse.

Summers. Smalls. Small Summers. Summer will be over soon and school will start, and that is what these people are celebrating: one of their own on the educational decision-making committee, a mountain summited. She asks for the bag of hot kettle corn from someone who's already paid for it, before they have a chance to get their grubby fingers all over it. No, his grubby fingers; where Evelyn is, he would be offended to be misgendered with the neutral they/them. She eats it, salty and sweet, as she watches Brent Smalls on his soapbox.

Evelyn lingers, as the crowd dissipates, as a crowd of Brent Smalls’s closer associates forms around him, and they talk, and they laugh, and she trembles and she walks away.

A coffee shop, across the way. Evelyn orders a mocha latte by pointing at the board, and she puts her payment in the tip jar because the barista doesn't even try to charge her, just makes the drink and hands it over. She takes a sip as she exits the coffee shop, oblivious to the barista's called goodbye, the chimes on the door, the sound of traffic, birds chirping, the couple arguing, the sounds of footsteps, the distant police siren, the rhyming game of children, because this is Evelyn's world, and she is deaf. Imagine that. Imagine crossing an alleyway, and missing the sound of heavy footsteps echoing behind you, a rush of fabric, a growled warning; being oblivious to all of this until his hand is on your arm, gripping, painful, and you are being whirled around to see his face.

He is dangerous.

Evelyn stares him in the face and she drops her coffee and he drags her into the darkness of the alley. He is taller than her, towering over her, and he pins her against the brick wall behind the dumpsters where no one can see them.

He is asking something, but Evelyn doesn't know what; she stares at her reflection in his sunglasses, not his lips. She cannot move; her body is frozen, fingers locked, eyes wide. Fuck, she's scared. He takes his sunglasses off and stares into her eyes and it feels like she is falling, drowning, freezing and burning. He's still yelling.

Then, her rescuer appears: Mr. Gregor, at the entrance of the alley.

“Go, Evelyn,” he shouts silently, “Somewhere safe!”, his words burning in her mind. She's dissolving; she's flies; she's swarming, fleeing, dodging Brent Smalls’s swatting hands. Then, she's nothing at all.

Chapter 14

“Have you ever climbed a mountain?” Roach asks.

“Nope,” Lucas says, “but there's a climbing gym in the city and I've been there exactly twice.” He is sitting on his bed. More importantly Roach is sitting on his bed, too, albeit on the opposite end of it, and it doesn't mean anything.

Roach is interrogating Lucas on the human experience. “Have you ever eaten durian fruit?”

“No.”

“Have you ever tried fencing?”

“Does fighting Evelyn with sticks count?”

“I suppose. Have you ever been to a funeral?”

“A lot.” Lucas's family attends every funeral held for their church members.

“Have you ever experienced racism?”

“I live in America and I'm half Asian. Yes,” Lucas laughs.

“Have you ever driven a car?”

“Yes.”

Roach looks at him curiously. “It is my understanding you cannot obtain your driver's license until you are sixteen,” they say.

“That's correct,” Lucas says, slyly, he hopes, like he's the one who steals cars and goes on joyrides and not Evelyn.

“Have you ever been kissed?”

Lucas hesitates. “Most people would think that's a given,” he says.

“Why is that?”

“Because,” he has to spell it out?, “I've had babies. I'm not a virgin.”

“Is kissing an essential component of human reproduction?” Roach asks.

“I suppose not.” They don't continue their line of questioning, because he hasn't answered the last question. Instead, he turns it around. “Have you ever been kissed?”

“No,” Roach says frankly. “I do not fully understand it.”

“Why not?” 

Humans have so few mouth parts; Roach doesn't understand how they are supposed to come together, interact. Instead, they say, “I do not know if I would like it.”

“Do you want to find out?” Lucas asks, suddenly feeling bold, or whatever that hollow pit in his stomach is.

“Pardon?”

“I mean, I could,” Lucas falters, “we could kiss and then you could see if you like it and want to do it for real or whatever. Later.” His face is warm and his stomach hurts. He already regrets everything.

“Okay,” Roach says.

“Wait, really?” Lucas looks up and his heart is pounding because Roach is smiling, nods.

Okay. What next? Lucas hesitates. He moves so he is sitting next to them. He hesitates. Roach is watching him intently, their black eyes boring into him, and they reach out and touch his hand because he is trembling, just slightly, and he says, “Close your eyes.” He hesitates; his stomach flips. He leans in and presses his lips against theirs.

It is an awkward, stiff kiss at first, but then Roach’s lips soften, part slightly as they apply more pressure. Their lips taste salty, slightly chapped. Lucas feels light-headed - he's been holding his breath. He pulls back and exhales, inhales, exhales. His heart is pounding in his ears. Roach appears unmoved, their eyes still closed.

“So, uhm, what did you think?” Lucas asks the space between them.

Roach’s eyes open and they smile. “I am beginning to understand the appeal,” they say, before leaning in and kissing Lucas some more. And some more. And some more.

. . .

The first place Evelyn reappears is at the park, near her mother’s house, impossibly far away. In front of her are three of Lucas’s siblings: Joseph, Sophia, little Theodore in her arms. Joseph looks furious, Sophia horrified, but she is looking at something just past Evelyn. She turns: an unknown girl, perhaps Sophia’s age, dressed in the same modest dress everyone at that church wears; she is screaming, red-faced, fists clenched.

Evelyn turns back. “Lucas?” she asks, and Sophia recognizes the sign, subtly shakes her head. Evelyn vanishes again.

She reappears in her room, the one she shares with Millie: red curtains, eclectic pictures taped to the wall, Millie’s romance novels, Evelyn’s comic books, shag rug that has given her rug burn in her back, her knees. In her room, with her perfectly normal human body.

Behind her, Millie opens the door, freezes. Maybe she is hallucinating, but Evelyn turns and her sapphire eyes flash, and she isn't made of insects at all. “You came back,” Millie signs.

Evelyn's smile is wide. “I'm back,” she signs, before pulling Millie into their room, closing the door, pressing her against it as they kiss; not the chaste, experimental kissing going on down the hall, but something deep, hungry, desperate. Millie slides her hands under Evelyn's shirt, around her back, grabs her butt, and then she remembers.

“Wait,” she says, out loud. She pulls back, untangles her arms, steps away. “Where were you?” she signs.

“No matter.” Evelyn signs, then she reaches for Millie's arm, but she flinches away.

“Yes it does,” Millie signs. Evelyn waves her hand at her, an enraging gesture of dismissal. “You stole a car!”

Evelyn shrugs. Somewhere safe, my ass, she thinks. “Gregor will get it back,” she signs.

“Will?” Millie asks, verbally, and Evelyn rolls her eyes and pushes past her, out of the room. She doesn't hear Millie's protest, whatever it is. She stalks down the hallway, glad to see the twins aren't here, and opens the door to Jordan’s old room, which she assumes is empty.

It is not empty, though: sitting there on Jordan’s old bed is Lucas, who is making out with some stranger. Is this the same Lucas she left behind a few weeks ago? Evelyn pushes the door open more, so it hits the wall, and the sound makes Lucas jump, and as soon as he sees her he is on his feet. The stranger remains seated, leg encased in a huge plaster cast.

“Who's this?” Evelyn asks, grinning.

“Uhm, hi, Evelyn,” Lucas says. He signs, “New guy.”

“Why are you making out with the new kid?” Evelyn signs. She turns so Millie, halfway down the hallway, can see and signs it again. “Why is Lucas making out with the new kid?” Every time she signs “making out,” Lucas’s face gets redder. Evelyn is enjoying this.

“Finally? Good.” Millie signs, and she says it out loud for Lucas's benefit, too. “Leave them alone,” she says, then she pulls Evelyn back down the hallway, back to their room, where Millie is going to forget about Evelyn leaving, Evelyn stealing the car, Evelyn lying, and just be glad she's back. Millie can fuck her and keep her shirt on, and if Evelyn thinks anything strange about that she keeps it to herself.

. . .

What happens after Evelyn disappears from the grasp of Brent Smalls in the alley, with Mr. Gregor as a witness to the violence, is a very calm, casual conversation between the two about the strange weather, the odd activity of insects this year. By the end, Mr. Gregor is nearly convinced that Mr. Smalls has forgotten the whole incident, and Brent Smalls is nearly convinced the same of Mr. Gregor. And both walk away knowing this isn't finished.

Mr. Gregor finds the Bentley parked down the street, the keys tucked safely behind a loose brick in the building next door and has to spend a few minutes organizing the return of the rented Jaguar, a few more minutes readjusting the seat and mirrors, a few more minutes contemplating this situation, then he is ready to drive home.

The other man has his own plan, a new one, and it is going to require a fair amount of work to bring his plans to fruition. The things Brent Smalls said to Evelyn as he attacked her:

“I keep seeing you.”

“Who do you think you are?”

“Who are you?”

“I know who you are.”

Chapter 15

Evelyn next finds Lucas in Oddities, even though the shop is closed, because he's weird and likes being surrounded by dead animals and strange objects with frightening energies. He's stretched on the floor behind the counter, the bear looming over him, frozen in a snarl. He's on his phone, because he keeps his charger there, even though ostensibly he could unplug it and take it anywhere. Lucas is complex and illogical, the result of an upbringing by strict traditionalists who are themselves very hypocritical.

Evelyn snatches the device from him, because she can't find her own phone, and opens up the notepad app so she can interrogate him on his “new guy.”

E > tell me about him

L > Them*

E > tell me about them then

L > Their name is Roach.

Evelyn grimaces, then makes a sign for “bug” with her fingers crossed in the letter “R.” Lucas shrugs.

E > more

L > They fell out a 3rd story window.

E > ouch. more

L > They are researching the human experience.

E > me too. more

L > I think they're cute.

This prompts Evelyn to elbow Lucas, gently, then she leans against him and rests her head on his shoulder. She is beyond happy for him, admitting he thinks someone is cute, kissing them, finally maybe actually moving on from Before and all the shitty things his parents taught him to think about himself. Maybe.

E > do i need to lecture u on condoms?

L > I'm good, thanks.

Lucas has no intention of having sex anytime soon, but, not for the first time, he wonders what “they” means for Roach and tries to ignore the tingling below that such thoughts prompt.

E > u ok? mils said u were in hospital

L > Yeah. I'm good now.

E > what happen?

L > Where did you go?

A standoff, then. Evelyn sighs and takes the phone, staring blankly at its screen a few moments before typing.

E > i took the car to track down sperm donor. not a good idea.

L > Ovarian cyst. Annalee went against father’s orders and called 911. Big mess. New phone, actually.

Evelyn reads the response for a long time, a lot longer than necessary to parse the words. She doesn't have a response, just hands the device back to Lucas, signs, “I love you,” and draws him into a hug that a part of him hopes will never end.

. . .

With Evelyn back, and Mr. Gregor’s text announcing his success in retrieving the Bentley, Millie is almost but not quite ready to think that everything is ok, going back to normal. Except for Jordan, whose absence is still a black hole in Millie’s heart, and whose death is probably what catalyzed this whole series of unfortunate decisions.

Like kissing Evelyn, the night of his funeral, her face salty with tears. Like pretending it never happened, for three excruciatingly long months. Like letting it happen again.

When Millie cuts herself after sex with Evelyn, she doesn't think of it as punishment, not exactly; but once they've finished, and the emptiness settles in, the darkness and disjointed thoughts, she needs a reminder of her place. It's not like she’s Lucas, indoctrinated into believing love is a sin, that his core self is a product of evil; if she liked any other girls besides Evelyn maybe she wouldn't feel the need to do this to herself. 

Therein lies at least one of the problems: Millie only likes Evelyn, but Evelyn likes everybody.

“Did you know,” Roach says, eyes not leaving their phone, “since I have been here, no one ever mentioned Evelyn is deaf?” They are sitting at the dining room table, alone, intently studying something on the screen, when Millie emerges from the bathroom.

“Really?” Millie thinks. “I guess it didn't seem relevant?” She ends her statement with the inflection of a question, but it is not one, Roach notes.

“I could have been learning sign language,” Roach remarks.

“Evelyn’s kind of got her own signs, a lot of the time,” Millie explains. “She’s the only deaf kid at school.”

“Can you teach me?” they ask, both verbally and in slow, mechanical ASL. Millie wonders if this is the sign language equivalent of Roach’s monotone. She sits down at the table across from them.

“Learn ASL,” she signs, “watch us.” She finishes the thought out loud: “You'll pick up the differences in vocabulary.”

“Okay,” Roach signs; and they do, although they find that learning a second language is not nearly as easy as the first. First, glancing at her arm, they ask, “Are you bleeding?”

Fuck, no, she thought it had stopped, but a small patch of red is staining the fabric of her sleeve.  “Oops, yeah,” she says, “don't tell Gregor. I snagged my arm on something in the shop and I don't want him to feel compelled to perform an exorcism on me.”

Roach gives her an odd look, then returns to their phone, and Millie goes back to her room to change into a darker shirt. Problem solved.

. . .

As Evelyn climbs the staircase to the Freak Show, she puts on her hearing aid, indicating she wants to talk to Roach, and Lucas stops her at the door.

“Go easy on them,” he pleads.

Evelyn tilts her head and gives him an appraising look. “Who do you think I am?” she asks.

And maybe she was prepared to interrogate Roach about their intentions with her friend, but when she sees them, really gets a chance to get a look at them for the first time, their darting black eyes and shorn hair growing in and that strange, bizarre aura hanging around them, Evelyn's skin starts crawling and everything hits her at once. Where she'd been; how she got back. And what the fuck was that, anyway? What the fuck was she?

“I need to talk to you guys about something,” she says, still inexplicably staring only at Roach. But that's weird, isn't it? So she forces herself to look away, at Millie, her expression a complex combination of confusion and concern. Because “we need to talk” is pretty much the same succession of signs and always a bad way to start a conversation with a significant other. Evelyn shakes her head and concentrates, and in front of her two closest friends and a complete stranger, she dissolves into a cloud of flies.

She reconstitutes a moment later and is thoroughly disappointed by the lack of reaction from her friends.

Lucas, because he had seen this before, didn't he? He had almost convinced himself it was a dream.

Millie, because she'd had this dream before, right? She had almost convinced herself it was real.

Roach does not react because they are a cockroach in a human body. But they aren't so much anymore, are they? Because cockroaches do not talk, they do not read, they do not ask questions, or kiss boys. Roach is something else, now. Something resembling human.

There are no maggots crawling under her skin as Evelyn signs, “Nothing, really?”

“Weird,” Roach offers in ASL.

“Welcome to the Freak Show,” Lucas says, out loud.

. . .

When Mr. Gregor gets back the next day with the Bentley unscathed, Evelyn realizes she has some choice words for him. “You had no right to fuck with my head like that,” she writes on a piece of paper, because she doesn't have the signs for whatever he did that made her see, read, hear the things he wanted her to.

“I apologize,” Mr. Gregor answers after glancing briefly at the paper. “If you had taken your phone with you, I would have simply texted you.” He hands over the device, dead after so many days, and refrains from reminding Evelyn that she had no right to take his car. “Please accompany me,” he requests instead, “there is something we must discuss.”

Evelyn follows Mr. Gregor into the elevator, eyes going wide when he presses the “B” button. As far as she knows, no one has been in the basement, and the hairs on the back of her neck tingle as the elevator grate opens. The basement is a large, open space, lit by narrow windows near the ceiling in the back and an actual lantern everywhere else. It largely looks like an extension of the shop: walls lined with weapons, with shelves, with books and gadgets and gemstones and animals and locked chests. It is cold, so cold Evelyn feels like she should be able to see her breath.

Near the darkest corner of the basement, Mr. Gregor has an enormous oak desk, neatly stacked with textbooks and papers. Odd markings are carved into nearly every surface. He sits on the far side and gestures towards another chair for Evelyn to sit. The lamp flickers, casting eerie shadows on the walls.

Mr. Gregor opens a briefcase and begins slowly removing objects from it: a wallet, a watch, a necklace, an empty plastic bag, a coffee cup. Evelyn watches the procession of items and instinctively puts her hand in her pocket, where the strange skeleton key still sits. Her hearing aid is buzzing uncomfortably in her ear but she keeps it in so she can hear Mr. Gregor, so he doesn't just burn his words into her mind again.

“You recognize these things?” Mr. Gregor asks.

Evelyn nods.

“Is there anything else you have taken that is not yours?”

“I tried to pay for the coffee,” she insists, “I left a twenty-dollar tip.”

Mr. Gregor doesn't react. “Is there anything else?” he asks again.

“The car, but obviously you have the keys for that,” Evelyn says, squeezing the key in her pocket.

“Anything else?”

“Like, half a joint that I smoked,” she admits. “And a guy gave me a ride for gas, but I don't think that was the same.” She shudders, remembering.

“Is that all?”

Evelyn pulls her empty hand out of her pocket, trying to look casual. “Yes.”

Mr. Gregor nods. He waves his hand over the items on the desk, and Evelyn watches as they collapse into a mass of squirming ants that immediately begin to separate, disperse; moments later, they all start to smolder, shrivel up, turn into ash. He brushes the ash off his desk and waits for Evelyn to look at him again.

“You had no right to ask them to give those things to you,” Mr. Gregor says, gravely, and Evelyn swallows. She wants to explain that the necklace was in the sand, she didn't steal it, but it would be futile.

“You are dealing with powers beyond your comprehension,” he continues, his eyes, Millie’s eyes boring into her; she wants to look away, but she can't. “You cannot wield them. They wield you.”

“You seemed to be doing okay,” she accuses. Animals talking to her. Headlines changing. Street signs and words burned into her mind.

Mr. Gregor sighs. “I am much older than you, Evelyn. This is not a game.”

Evelyn continues looking at him, but says nothing; until he finally blinks, and she does too, her eyes burning.

“All I ask is that you be careful,” Mr. Gregor says, standing. He pauses for a second, as if about to say something more, but instead he simply signs, “You're dismissed.”

He doesn't follow her back up the elevator, which Evelyn vows to never ride down to B again, and she quickly makes her way to her room, but she can't look for a place to hide that damned key because Millie is there, looking sexy as hell in an unusually short skirt, but who wears a sweater in summer? She signs, “We need to talk.”

Evelyn is getting really tired of talking.

To stall she makes a show of finding her charger, plugging her phone in and waiting for it to power on, the barrage of missed messages. The lock screen forces her to look away. She watches Millie and waits.

“Why didn't you tell me about your mom?” Millie asks. How did she find out; is Evelyn’s mom already going around and telling everyone?

Evelyn grabs a notebook, full of conversations. She scrawls, “i kinda freaked. mom said my dad raped her. i decided to find him.”

A few seconds later, the notebook returns, a new addition in Millie’s looping handwriting. “Did you? What happened?”

More scribbles. Evelyn's handwriting is trash, because she writes too fast, and also because she cares about absolutely nothing. “yea. nothing happened. hes gross.”

“I'm sorry,” Millie signs, and Evelyn shrugs. The metal key feels heavy in her pocket. She doesn't want to think about her mother, or about the shitty things her mother said, or about how her mother has never been sober for longer than a month, let alone nine, no matter what she insists. Some people just shouldn't reproduce. Mae Summers is one of those people, and so is Evelyn, but she has accepted that. Her mother probably still thinks she's done a great job with her.

Evelyn gestures for the notebook back, writes, “she wants me to move back in. take care of her+baby”

Millie’s so cute, even when she wrinkles her nose in disgust. “Will you?” she writes.

“never.” Evelyn writes, underlining it twice.

The thing that Millie doesn't say, or write down, the thing she keeps to herself, pushing it down to feed the darkness, is this: there was a time, not too long ago, when Evelyn would not have just immediately run away upon learning bad news. Even just a few months ago, Millie thinks, she would have come to her, cried with her head in her lap while Millie ran her fingers through her hair and came up with a plan for revenge.

Evelyn is staring at her. “What?” Millie asks.

“I like your skirt,” Evelyn signs.

Why is she wearing the skirt? Because she's also wearing a sweater, and it's summer. “It's yours,” Millie admits, signing.

“I know,” Evelyn says, “I like you wearing it.” Millie could wear anything and Evelyn would like it on her. Or nothing. She leans in to kiss her, to pull her closer, to push her hands under Millie's shirt and touch her skin, her breasts.

But Millie pulls back. “Not now,” she signs, moving away, fixing the sweater that Evelyn had been trying to remove.

Evelyn signs, “sorry,” hand circling her heart, looking at her with such concern and disappointment that Millie wants to scream. She feels like she is going to cry, or throw up, or both, and there's only one way she knows of handling that. Without saying anything, she leaves the room.

Alone, Evelyn signs “too fast” to herself over and over, remembering. That her dad is a rapist and what does that make her? She retrieves the skeleton key from her pocket and she squeezes her hand around it. The metal is old and worn smooth, so it doesn't even hurt. She stands and wanders over to the window, opens it, and disappears.

Her mom's house: a single-wide in the only trailer park in town. Mae Summers is passed out as usual on the couch, her halter top bunched up around the slight curve of her belly. Bottles of cheap wine, ash collecting in the bottom half inch of sickly-sweet alcohol. An acrid, smoky, chemical odor in the air. Evelyn walks over, her head buzzing, and shakes her mom's shoulder, trying to wake her up. She shouts, but no response. Her mom is breathing, but completely out.

Something whizzes past Evelyn's shoulder, thumps on the floor next to her: a shoe. She looks up in time for another shoe, better aimed, to hit her in the head. A man, beer-bellied and sunburned in boxer shorts and nothing else. Mae’s new boyfriend, Evelyn assumes. He's shouting, and she can get the gist. “Get out, go, fuck off.”

“She's sick,” Evelyn signs, says out loud even.

He flails his hands around, stutters mockingly. Have they ever even met before? Mae Summers has a history of codependency; when Evelyn isn't around for her to leech off, she finds boyfriends. This one is a real winner. He stomps over to the kitchenette and grabs a knife to threaten Evelyn; but she is gone before he even turns around, replaced by a cloud of flies. Mae groans from the couch and vomits.

Chapter 16

With Evelyn back and Roach and Lucas and the twins back from the bakery Mr. Gregor's apartment has suddenly gone from feeling somewhat lonely to very full; he is glad to have his car back so he can resume his road trips. The wisdom gained from the books, the memories, the histories he collects are invaluable. He is rarely gone for more than a couple days at a time, and he places a good amount of trust in Millie to keep things in order in the apartment, and in Lucas to keep things in order in Oddities. They have never let him down. It also helps that Mr. Gregor has Douglas the baker to keep Millie and Lucas in check.

This is how things are between Mr. Gregor and Douglas, despite Millie’s convictions that he is in love: Mr. Gregor has been around for an extraordinarily long time, and never once in that time has he felt the need for a sexual or romantic relationship, and Douglas understands that; but he very often invites the baker down to his basement, after hours, to enjoy some tea or whiskey and scones and play chess and discuss current events. Theirs is a relationship of minor gifts and deep conversations. Often, these conversations stretch through the night; more than once, Douglas has had to duck out before sunrise, to return to the bakery and start his daily breads.

The summer stretches onwards, several weeks behind, several weeks ahead. Lucas still has not seen his family and he feels antsy, regretful. His mind comes up with increasingly severe punishments his parents could be inflicting on his sister. The ones he had been shielding her from. 

What Lucas was not expecting, never possibly could have expected, is seeing Annalee in person, inside the shop of Oddities. He is sitting behind the counter, watching Roach restlessly pace the walkways. They are tired of the cast, the crutches, of limited mobility. They want to walk. Not necessarily run, like Lucas, who always returns sweating and breathless and tired. Just walk. Maybe climb. They could climb the fire escape behind the building. They could climb ladders. They could climb the few trees in the desert parks. The climbing gym in the city Lucas described sounds interesting.

The chimes of the front door draw the attention of both of them; customers are rare at Oddities. Young customers wearing light, modest dresses and head coverings are even rarer. It's Annalee and Sophia, who is clutching her sister's arm as though afraid she might get eaten. Probably by the bear.

Lucas jumps out from behind the counter to wrap his sisters in a hug; nothing can describe the relief he feels when Annalee returns the embrace. He is not so lost that she cannot hug him.

“What are you doing here?” he asks, scanning her face for signs of bruising; nothing.

“We cannot be seen,” Annalee whispers, hushed, timid.

“Come with me,” he says, directing them towards the back room.

“Lucas?” Roach says, a question.

He hesitates. “Can you make sure no one comes in?” he asks, and Roach nods.

In the back, Annalee stands looking around solemnly. Sophia finally lets go of her arm to embrace Lucas, threatening to never let go. 

“We’re not supposed to be here,” Annalee explains. Well, that much is obvious. “There is an,” here she hesitates, casting her eyes down at the floor, “event nearby. You would not be welcome.”

Lucas sighs. “Why are you here then?” he asks. He's glad she's safe, but now she's put herself in danger again.

“It is your friend, Evelyn,” Annalee explains, still not looking up.

“She's a witch!” Sophia chimes in, and Annalee quickly shushes her.

“She is being accused of witchery,” she explains. “Ruth saw her, and Joseph insists he saw it too.” Joseph and Lucas are less than a year apart, but distant as siblings, as all of his brothers are. Boys and girls are pretty much segregated at birth in the Park household, even twins.

Sophia tugs at his arm. “I saw it too,” she insists.

Annalee hisses, “You know not what you saw.”

Sophia ignores her. “She appeared in front of us surrounded by flies, then disappeared just as quickly,” she explains quickly, “Ruth was behind her, but she didn't recognize her. I didn't tell,” she promises.

“But Joseph might,” Annalee adds, “which is why we are warning you.”

“I'm not scared of witches,” Sophia says, a determined look on her face. “Evelyn is nice.”

“Witches aren't real,” Lucas says, even as he knows that Evelyn and the flies are real; Sophia looks like she is going to protest, but her sister interrupts her.

“You will not convince the church,” Annalee says, grimly. Lucas wonders when his little sister got so mature; she knew to call 911. Has she been defying the church, its teachings, its restrictions, its horrors?

“Thank you for telling me,” he says, and Annalee looks relieved. “Come on, you can leave through here,” he continues, leading them to the back door.

Annalee stops him before he opens the door. “What did he call you?” she asks, voice barely more than a whisper.

Lucas stalls. “Who?”

“The boy in the front. He said your name.”

“Lucas,” he says.

“Lucas,” Annalee repeats, and he feels like glowing. He watches his sisters dart into the alley behind the shop and race back towards whatever hate rally their parents have deemed fit to attend.

When he gets back to the shop, Roach is standing in front of the glass door, staring out. Lucas watches them sway back and forth on their crutches for a moment before he speaks. “Sorry about that,” he says. Roach turns. They smile. “That was two of my sisters,” Lucas offers.

“I could tell,” Roach says, “Which ones?” They amble over to stand next to Lucas, leaning against the glass case full of old knives.

“Annalee,” Lucas says, “and Sophia.” Roach watches him. Their eyes make his skin tingle, his stomach flutter; Roach’s attention is intense and undistracted.

“Do you want to tell me about them?” they ask.

“Annalee is twelve. I think she saved my life,” Lucas says, “Sophia is seven and she’s way smarter than I was at that age.”

They stand there in the silent shop for a while, Lucas lost in his thoughts until Roach turns to him. “Can I kiss you?” they ask, polite as ever, and a spark of desire shoots through him.

“Yeah,” he says, and they do.

. . .

A few things happen during the last few weeks of the summer that are of significance:

Evelyn quietly returns to sleeping in the top bunk, and Millie quietly refuses to acknowledge this, except internally. She busies herself with the twins, who are growing quickly and increasingly more troublesome.

Roach continues to ask Lucas if they can kiss him and continues to ask nothing more of him. 

Rumors of Evelyn’s witchcraft spread rapidly through various circles, eventually landing on Mae Summers. She recalls the cloud of flies in front of her, the event she is convinced triggered her recent miscarriage, and her heart begins to turn to stone.

The new superintendent for Desert Bluffs School District, Brent Smalls, quietly amasses a following from the right-leaning members of his new quiet desert town.

Two weeks before school is scheduled to start, Roach finally gets their cast removed, exposing a pale, spindly leg with gnarly purple scars running up their thigh. “It is like molting,” they remark to Lucas, who has accompanied them to the doctor’s office as moral support. They leave the hospital still on crutches, but with a slightly more mobile limb.

Afterwards, Mr. Gregor drives both of them to the closest city, which has a mall, because neither has clothes suitable for wearing to school; Roach has been living in sweatpants, Lucas in athletic shorts. He is tempted to never wear a dress again.

Roach has never been clothes shopping before and finds themselves easily distracted by the variety of fabrics, colors, textures, shapes. Lucas makes a selection of lightly colored button-ups and khaki pants; not much different than his brothers, he realizes uncomfortably, as he stares at the plain, modest colors.

“This one is softer,” Roach remarks, feeling the sleeve on a rack of loud, bright satin shirts. They filter through the various patterns and colors, selecting one and holding it up in front of Lucas: black satin, with a subtle floral pattern stitched throughout. “This would look good on you,” they declare, and Lucas blushes, and Lucas grabs it, and Lucas decides to look for some more adventurous shirts. He even finds a binder; a real compression binder, and decides to buy it, too.

Roach, on the other hand, settles on a pack of black t-shirts and a couple identical pairs of black cargo pants. They watch as the cashier scans each item, the total price going up, Lucas passing over Mr. Gregor's credit card. As they leave the store, they ask, “Where does Mr. Gregor get his money from?”

Lucas shrugs, speaking low in the crowded mall. “Big secret,” he says. “My guess is inheritance. Evelyn thinks he's a hedge fund manager, or into something shady.”

“Shady?” Roach questions.

“Sketchy, underhanded, potentially illegal,” Lucas clarifies, and Roach nods.

They visit an arcade, and though Roach is terrible at shooters they are quite good at the games that require rhythm or reflexes, and Lucas finds it more fun to watch them than play. They use some of their tickets to buy a dozen little plastic cockroaches and give the rest, an enormous stack, to a random kid.

Roach is hungry; they are always hungry, and there is something incredibly enticing about the mall’s food court: the cacophony of sounds, of smells, of people and pests quietly coexisting. They sit together at a table, and Roach watches the people, and Lucas watches Roach and wonders if any of the people around them could mistake them for being on a date.

“Humans waste a remarkable amount of food,” Roach says, snapping Lucas out of his thoughts. He nods, then looks down at his fries, embarrassed; he wasn’t going to finish them.

“You want these?” Lucas offers, and Roach takes the extra fries, consuming them happily. Roach will eat anything; they are positively delighted by the variety of flavors humans are capable of detecting.

“Can I ask you a question?” they ask after they have finished the fries.

“Oh, uhm,” Lucas stammers, “I'm not sure we should kiss. Now. In public.”

Roach tilts their head curiously, then says, “I imagine you would not be comfortable discussing my topic of inquiry in public, then.”

“Oh?” Lucas says, his mind jumping to all sorts of places that make his face warm.

“It is about being trans,” they explain. 

“Oh,” Lucas repeats, blushing more. “Yeah, we can talk about that later.” So, not the same headspace, then.

Mr. Gregor arrives to pick them up with an enormous potted plant buckled in the front seat of the Bentley. “Say hello to Susan,” he says as Roach carefully settles into the back seat with Lucas. Their leg is sore, throbbing, but they try to ignore it.

“What is it?” Lucas asks.

“A ficus,” Mr. Gregor answers.

Maybe he would have asked for more elaboration, but Lucas is distracted by Roach's hand, grasping his own. They hold hands the entire way home.

. . .

“What the fuck?” Evelyn signs, reading the paper in front of her. New school policies, including new rules on bathroom use:

Students are only permitted to enter the restrooms and locker rooms corresponding to their assigned sex at birth according to their birth certificate. Noncompliant students may request access to a private, unisex bathroom from the front office.

“Noncompliant?” Roach wonders. That is one way to describe them. “I do not have a birth certificate.”

“Well, you got enrolled somehow, so they've got something on you,” Lucas says, miserably. This feels oddly targeted; as far as he knows, he's the only trans kid at school. He’s been attending public school with Evelyn and Millie since he was kicked out of the church’s private school when he was twelve. The students at Desert Bluffs High might occasionally bully him, but he's never had much issue with administration. Some of his teachers even call him Lucas.

“I will have to use the unisex bathroom,” Roach says. They add, “I am intersex,” prompting a questionably interested look from Evelyn. Lucas quickly reads another new rule, partly to avoid her interrogation, and partly to avoid asking for clarification himself.

Gender non-conforming clothing will not be tolerated.

“We can't wear pants,” Evelyn signs towards Millie, grinning. “You want to borrow my skirts? Shorter, better.” Her stomach twists when Millie offers a half a smile and winks.

“Do you think they'll check if I'm wearing a binder or a bra?” Lucas asks.

“I should get a kilt,” Roach muses.

Lucas says, “I'd like to see that,” then immediately regrets it, his face warming. That was supposed to be an inside thought.

In addition to the new rulebook, they have their new schedules for the semester. Unsurprisingly, Evelyn and Millie share no classes; Millie is honors, and Evelyn a straight-C student. But Roach and Lucas share biology, social studies, and home ec.

“Do they still make you do the baby thing in that class?” Millie wonders. She managed to skip the class in favor of extra science and doesn't remember Evelyn ever having one.

“Mine died,” Evelyn signs, “Couldn't hear.” She shrugs; it doesn't matter that she left it in her locker, too. This is why she doesn't take care of the twins.

Roach makes a face, something between concern and confusion. “Baby thing?” they ask.

“They have these creepy robotic babies that cry randomly,” Millie explains. “If you don't feed or change them every time, you fail.”

Lucas groans. “Maybe I can get credit for the twins,” he suggests. 

Millie is glad to hear Lucas is back at the laughing-about-it stage. Not that he isn't allowed to be as fucked up about it as he wants, but he deserves something better than self-hatred. Then Evelyn signs, “I think Millie has more experience with the twins than you.” She cringes, but Lucas seems unphased.

“Millie didn't squeeze them out,” he signs, adding a vulgar, suggestive sign.

Roach watches the interaction, fascinated, memorizing their signs.

. . .

In order to get their student IDs, which are required to be worn visibly this year for “security purposes,” they have to attend orientation, which seems to personally offend Evelyn.

“We have to go to school,” she signs, irritated, “before school starts?”

The school is a twenty-minute walk away, made longer by Roach’s crutches and constant distractions: a spider, a lizard, pieces of litter they diligently pick up, a stray cat, an unusual car that drives past. School is a square brick building with narrow windows and a short, uninspiring green lawn that probably takes up way too much water for a school called Desert Bluffs. Outside the front doors, a small gathering of like-minded adults loiters around. Lucas recognizes some of them, not from his fundamentalist church, but from one of the local ones friendly to it. He ducks his head as they pass by the group.

Millie quickly figures out where the photographer is staged for their IDs, bypassing the less interesting activities required of them. Roach has never had their picture taken; they blink the first two attempts, until the frustrated photographer instructs them to keep their eyes closed until she says so, hitting the shutter in time to catch a wide-eyed look of surprise.

“It's not terrible,” Lucas says, lying. It's hilarious. Then the registrar hands him his own ID, and he says, “What the fuck?”

“Language, Elizabeth,” the registrar says, glaring disapprovingly. “You don't want to get detention before school even starts, do you?”

Lucas walks away without saying anything. On the corner of his school ID, to be visibly displayed at all times in school, is printed a bold, pink “F.” Evelyn’s and Millie’s have the same, but Roach’s just has a black “X.”

Outside the school, the small crowd has gathered around someone, and when Evelyn spots him she immediately turns around, back into the school. 

Millie has to jog a bit to catch up with her. “What's up?” she signs.

“Different exit,” Evelyn responds. She hurries through the hallways and the others struggle to keep pace without looking suspicious. They exit through a door in the back, into the teacher's parking lot. There, leaning against the brick wall and smoking a cigarette, is Mae Summers; and Evelyn briefly wonders if she might have been better off facing the crowd in the front.

When Mae Summers sees her daughter, she has a flash of horror, of bugs and death and decay. And judgment: Evelyn is always judging her, always criticizing her. She remembers her daughter's disappointment, her refusal to stay for her, the thing that happened after Evelyn exploded into a cloud of flies in front of her. Even more judgment, from the doctors who blamed Mae for her miscarriage.

But Mae knows better, now. “You witch!” she growls, and she slaps her daughter across the face.

Evelyn just stands there in shock, and she wouldn't think to move if Millie didn't pull her away; and if not for Lucas's hand gently placed on Roach’s arm, the crutches, they would have attacked Evelyn’s mother. It would have been so easy to hurt her, even with their hurt leg, to hurt her so much worse than she hurt Evelyn. But no, it is not okay for kids to attack adults, even if it is okay for adults to slap their kids around, as long as it doesn't leave too bad a mark.

All they can do is walk away, Mae glaring after them before she stalks around the school to rejoin the following. Only God can judge her.

Evelyn's frozen in shock face has settled into a sort of determined blankness, and for the entire walk to Oddities she occupies her hands by repetitively tapping her fingers on her thumb. Roach falls behind, limping on their crutches, and Lucas slows to walk with them.

“This really sucks,” he says.

Roach responds, “Indeed.”

Chapter 17

“She called me what?” Evelyn signs, face incredulous. She is in her room with Millie. She is not crying, she is not trying not to cry, she's fine.

Millie finger spells, “W-I-T-C-H.”

Evelyn makes the sign for “bitch,” which is both what she thought her mom had said and what she thinks of her, right now. Not that she's never been hit before, but never just straight out of the blue like that. Usually she's done something to at least kind of deserve it. She signs, “everyone’s crazy,” as in daft, demented, mad.

Millie looks at her for a long time. She gently touches Evelyn’s cheek, skin just a shade too pink, and with the other hand she signs, “You ok?”

Yeah, everything's great. Evelyn leans into Millie's hand, craving her touch, and instead of pulling away Millie leans in and kisses her, softly, gently, sweetly, and Evelyn wants the kiss to never end, but instead she pulls back and her hands move, all on their own.

“I can't keep doing this with you,” her hands say. Evelyn says.

Millie blinks at her, once, twice. Her beautiful eyes. “This?” she asks.

“Back and forth, back and forth.”

“Oh,” Millie says.

. . .

By the time Lucas and Roach get back to Oddities, the girls have disappeared upstairs, but the shop is oddly crowded with the twins running around, arguing over who has more cookie, and Douglas the baker talking with Mr. Gregor at the register. There is a solemn look on the baker's hairy face, and the rainbow striped flag that normally hangs in the front window of his shop sits limply on the glass countertop between them like a dead thing.

“What's up?” Lucas asks.

Douglas grumbles, “Coupla kids came in and pretended to be interested in ordering while their buddy cut this up with a knife,” he says. The vandalism is a shock; he’s never even gotten a negative complaint about the flag before now.

“Do you know who?”

Douglas shakes his head. 

“I am trying to convince him to report this to the police,” Mr. Gregor explains.

Roach shrugs; they have never had a pleasant encounter with the police. A cop came into the hospital shortly after they woke from surgery; still groggy from anesthesia and a concussion, and still without words, Roach was unable to answer any of her questions about how they had gotten into that flat, why they were naked, why they jumped out the window, and she was not happy with his noncompliance.

There's that word again, they think.

Upstairs Lucas is glad to see the girls’ door open, which means he won't be interrupting anything, even if they're sitting awkwardly on opposite sides of the room, staring, the air thick with tension. That can be their problem, later, because Lucas has to tell Evelyn about what his sisters said, because if it's spreading outside the church then something is really, really wrong.

E > if i was a witch i'd turn into something better than flies

L > That's not the point.

E > what is the point?

The conversation is rather shorter than Lucas was expecting; Evelyn seems undisturbed about being accused of witchcraft, unbothered about whatever is happening to her and how has her mom gotten involved? He leaves the room feeling worse, not better, about the accusations against his friend.

Evelyn gently closes the door behind Lucas, then returns to her standoff with Millie, that she hadn’t intended to start. Weren’t things supposed to end the other way around? Mils would get so tired of her shit, and she’d break up with her. Evelyn has been so wrapped up in her own head she didn't even notice that it was Millie pushing her away for once. Why did she have to say anything? Because Millie is treating her like she has done in the past: hot and cold, distant but craving intimacy.

“I love you,” Evelyn signs, and Millie looks sad and says, “me too,” which is not the same thing at all. Her chest feels tight. “Too fast, too fast, too fast,” the thought in Evelyn's head buzzes and she can think of nothing else. So she just keeps staring, Millie staring at her, until Evelyn can’t take it anymore and she disappears into a cloud of flies.

Millie watches the Evelyn-flies disperse, and she feels no disgust or fear or confusion or any of the things she should be feeling when confronted with the inexplicable. Just darkness, always weighing her down. She picks at a scratch on her arm until the scab peels off in one long, thin ribbon, and she watches the blood well up underneath, and she wonders why it's not black like flies. She pulls her sleeves down, stands, and makes her way downstairs to help Gregor with the twins.

Evelyn reconstitutes at the school, not in front of anyone but behind the baseball equipment shed, which she knows is probably devoid of people because it always is; she's smoked here, she's been fucked here, she's ditched class here because she'd rather be anywhere else. It's not empty, not exactly: some stoner kid with his head in a cloud of vape misses her appearance, startles, then offers the vape. She takes it, because why not, and sends the stoner kid away because she doesn't want him here. She sucks on the vape - it's strawberry mint flavored. She looks at it and wonders if she could make it disappear into ants; but no, she wants to keep it.  She can make people give her things but she can't figure out what Millie wants. Maybe, Evelyn thinks, she's been inadvertently fucking with Millie’s head. Maybe it's all her fucking fault. She sucks on the vape again, exhaling a ridiculously thick cloud of white.

Head buzzing, she looks around the wall. The baseball field is beyond the soccer field is beyond the football field, where Brent Smalls is giving a speech to a crowd of followers, and even though they are far away she can see a sign one of them carries: “Protect Our Children.” And even though he has no reason to know she is there, behind the distant storage shed, he looks Evelyn straight in the eye as he speaks.

Back in their room, Evelyn is relieved to see that Millie is gone. She wants to take a nap, because that means putting off the inevitable just a little bit longer. She dreams of a giant spider, Brent Smalls's piercing blue eyes multiplied over its face. She can't move as it creeps over to where she is stuck in sticky webbing; she screams as it jabs two long, dripping fangs into her stomach. She wakes up and frantically scrambles to pull her shirt up, verify her smooth, unpunctured skin. She has to rub the spot with her fingers to make it stop hurting.

. . .

Roach wants to learn how to cook, which is easier said than done, Lucas learns, because they have never before so much as boiled water.

“How have you been alive this long?” Lucas wonders, and Roach does not answer because the answer is not an easy one.

Lucas, who knows how to cook at least as well as his mother, suggests something easy: pasta and tomato sauce, which simmers and fills the apartment with a warm, seasoned fragrance. Roach loves smells and tastes more than any other human sense; foods are so much richer and more complex than they had ever previously imagined. They also like sharing the small space of the kitchen with Lucas; the way their skin tingles when they touch; the way their heart flutters when Lucas kisses them, randomly, unexpectedly.

Despite everything, the meal is enticing enough to bring everyone together. Even Ash enjoys the spaghetti, though Roach decides it is a mistake to give toddlers pasta sauce. By the time they are finished the twins have matching red-smeared faces and hands and even tomato sauce in their hair. Evelyn surprises Millie by offering to help bathe them, and even if that only means carrying Willow into the bathroom and staring quietly at the wall, Millie is glad for the company. If Evelyn wants to pretend whatever happened earlier didn't, then Millie won't have to explain her own actions. Problem solved. Millie will just have to remember not to touch her, but right now, because Evelyn looks so exhausted and disheveled and sad, that's all she wants to do.

Mr. Gregor insists on washing the dishes, so Lucas follows Roach to their room, his stomach twisting because he just spent the last hour flirting with them, even kissing them, and he doesn't know what they want. He is both relieved and disappointed when Roach just sits down awkwardly on the floor to begin stretching their leg. Lucas doesn't know what he wants. He crosses over to his bed and watches.

“Does it hurt?” he asks.

“Yes,” Roach says, and Lucas blushes, feeling foolish. He lays back and Roach asks, “Are you worried about starting school?”

Lucas thinks about it. “Not really,” he confesses, “Everyone already knows me. I'm used to it. Are you?”

“I am apprehensive. I have never been to school.”

Figures. “You haven't done a lot of things,” Lucas points out. When Roach doesn't answer, he presses further. “Where are you even from?”

“I was in an apartment and I jumped out the window,” Roach says, “that is all I know.”

“You still don't remember anything else?”

“That is correct.”

“Does that bother you?”

Roach shrugs. “I am content.”

“I can think of a few things I'd rather not remember,” Lucas admits.

Roach finishes stretching and sits back against the wall. They watch Lucas stare at the ceiling, considering. They want to ask about it, they think maybe he wants them to ask what, but also, if you wanted to forget something, would you not avoid talking about it? Roach does not forget; so far as a human they have an eidetic memory, and though there is not a whole lot to remember about being a cockroach they remember that as well.

Lucas fills the silence. “It's the twins’ birthday, tomorrow.”

“I have heard,” Roach says, “Willow has been very excited.”

Lucas chews on his lower lip. His stomach hurts.

Roach asks, “Do you want to talk about it?”

“It was the worst day of my life,” he whispers.

Roach stands and limps over to Lucas’s bed; they lay down, facing him, and place a hand gently on his stomach. It is warm on his skin, even through the fabric of his shirt. Lucas squeezes his eyes closed, and he remembers.

This is Lucas's trauma dump, because Roach asked and because, aside from the therapist Mr. Gregor made him go see for a few months afterwards, no one else has ever really asked. Everyone just knows, or thinks they know, from the rumors that spread like wildfire from one church to another, from parents to children who permanently scrawl them on bathroom walls. Even Evelyn avoids the topic, because it's over now. Move on.

“When I was twelve, my parents sent me to conversion camp to try and make me a nice young lady.” Lucas was never a nice young lady, he was a difficult, troublesome child who got his dresses muddy and spoke out when he thought something wasn't fair. “That brought about the first worst day of my life.” But Roach didn't ask about that, and he doesn't want to think about it, so Lucas skips ahead.

“I got pregnant and my body changed in all the worst ways and I pretty much just hated myself and everything. I was living here, because my parents didn't want me influencing my siblings with my sin or whatever, and school had just started for everyone else, so I was alone.” The pain had come on all at once, like stabbing, like, well, not too dissimilar from the cyst he'd had a couple weeks ago, but then so much worse. Lucas didn't want it, didn't want anything to do with it, so he'd tried to just curl up in bed and ignore it.

“But it turns out your body will just keep going on without you.” Mr. Gregor found him, groaning and wishing he was dead, and Douglas had to carry him to the car because he wouldn't walk, because he was fucking thirteen and more pregnant than human. “By the time I got to the hospital Willow was pretty much almost out, which sucked a lot, and then I don't remember much because I almost bled to death.” A ruptured placenta, an emergency c-section, but Lucas was still out of the hospital before the twins.

“They were preemies,” he explains, “turns out teens aren't great at growing multiple babies.” 

Roach has been silent the entire time, their hand rubbing gentle circles on his stomach. Lucas opens his eyes and they are watching him, so he tries to smile. “So, yeah,” he says. “Worst day of my life.”

“I admire your strength,” Roach says.

Lucas doesn't want to cry, so instead he asks, “Do you want to see the scar?”

Roach looks surprised. “Okay,” they say.

Showing them the scar means showing them his stomach, the stretch marks and wrinkled skin that will always look awful, no matter how much Lucas runs. The scar is a jagged, purple slash from his belly button to his pubic bone, and his skin prickles as Roach traces it with their fingers, after asking first because that's who Roach is, and Lucas really, really likes that about them. He pulls them closer and kisses them, the deep sort of breathless kissing that involves all the major mouthparts. Roach keeps their hand pressed against his skin, and Lucas doesn't banish the warm rush of pleasure the touch brings.

Eventually, too soon but also at just the right time, Roach pulls away, so they can breathe and readjust the aching pressure between their legs and so they do not go any further. Lucas is watching them, so they say, “I am sorry,” because they think getting an erection after his revelation is probably inappropriate.

Lucas just shrugs. “I've been wondering what you have down there,” he admits.

Roach frowns. “It may yet not be what you expect.”

Lucas wants to know, wants to ask, to see, but he has a feeling that if he does, he will no longer be able to reason himself out of the desire pooling inside him. No, he doesn't want to have sex, not yet, but maybe, eventually, maybe even soon. But not now.

Roach gives him a little smile that makes him blush, so he says, “Do you want to try Mario Kart?” They nod, and Lucas forces himself to move, to leave the bed and exit the room.

“I will join you momentarily,” Roach says, and Lucas definitely doesn't think about what they could be doing after he leaves.

Chapter 18

Roach wakes early the next morning and hobbles next door to the bakery, because they want to learn to bake, and Douglas is making a cake for the twins’ birthday. Not for the first time, the baker wonders where his neighbor and friend finds such unusual company; they are a quiet, neat, and precise assistant, and Douglas finds he rather enjoys the kid's company. 

The rainbow flag, Roach notices, has been stitched back together, the words “Love Will Win” stitched in black. When they inquire about it, the baker simply says, “Gregor’s work, do you like it?”

Lucas wakes early too, because he likes to run. He used to run because it was an excuse to wear anything but a dress and get away from his house. He keeps running because he heard somewhere it would stop his period. He keeps running because if he can keep his weight down, maybe his chest won’t grow any more. Because when his lungs are burning and his legs are aching he can focus on that and empty his mind of everything else. He runs in random loops through familiar streets, because the town is not very big.

Lucas runs, almost literally, into Evelyn at the park, the old one where they used to meet. A cloud of flies congeals in front of him so he slows to a jog, and then it is Evelyn, and he stops and looks around panicked but the park is deserted. “Should you be doing that?” he asks.

Evelyn shrugs. “I’m not scared,” she signs. Then, even though he's been running and is sweaty and gross, she pulls him into a hug and doesn't let go for a really long time.

Eventually she pulls away and signs, “Why are you here?”

Lucas shrugs, but Evelyn gives him a look, so he signs, “I need to see them.” He is referring to his siblings, the ones who don't hate him for everything.

“They're dangerous,” Evelyn says, referring to his parents, and something about this suddenly feels familiar.

“That's why.”

“To you,” she says, “not them.”

“You don't know that.”

“Yes I do,” Evelyn insists, and Lucas has a flash of Evelyn standing in the window, her skin crawling with maggots. He is torn between anger at the intrusion and grateful for her concern.

“They see you?” he asks.

“Of course not,” she responds.

Lucas swallows, looks towards the direction of his house, sighs. “Thank you,” he says.

Evelyn doesn't answer; instead, she signs, “I need to show you something.”

“Here?”

“At home.”

“Then wait. I can't fly.”

Evelyn rolls her eyes in response, then poofs into a cloud of flies, and Lucas turns around and begins running towards Oddities.

. . .

Evelyn slams a newspaper down on the counter in front of Lucas. It is a newspaper from some distant town on the coast. “My father,” she signs, pointing to the picture on the front page.

“Okay,” Lucas says. The caption on the photo describes the man as vice president of whatever school board the newspaper comes from.

She opens something on her phone and hands it over. It is the website for the newspaper; Lucas scrolls around a bit, confused.

“It's missing,” Evelyn signs, pointing at the article.

Lucas signs, “Okay,” again. He is not getting this.

Evelyn takes the phone and opens up another article, this one from a week ago. It is a photograph of the same man in similar surroundings, but his suit is different. This article identifies him as the newly hired superintendent of their local school district.

“Okay,” Lucas signs a third time.

Evelyn huffs and grabs her phone. She opens the notes app and types.

E > he was vp of that school district now he's here. he erased everything and they weren't even hiring a superintendent. why is he here?

Lucas wonders what the sign for paranoid is. He types,

L > Does he know you live here?

E > he's seen me but idk if he even knows me

L > Then it's probably just a coincidence.

Evelyn is frustrated; Lucas isn't getting it. He didn't see how Brent Smalls’s eyes pierced into her like ice, how they keep following her: in her dreams, in her periphery, in her thoughts.

E > mr gregor said he's dangerous

P > Then you should probably tell him about this.

E > maybe i will

Lucas looks at Evelyn closely for the first time in what is probably too long, given how exhausted she appears: her eyes are glazed and ringed with dark circles, her hair rumpled and greasy as though she has not showered in a while.

L > What's wrong?

E > idk

L > Millie?

Evelyn puts her phone away and signs, “I’m fine.” But she doesn't look fine; the word haunted comes to mind. For the hundredth time, Lucas wonders what she is getting herself into; he wonders why no one else seems perturbed by her newfound abilities, the accusations against her, the way her mom reacted when she saw Evelyn. Mae Summers was a lot of things, but she was never religious, and certainly not the type to run in the same circles as the local fundamentalists. Why would she call her daughter a witch?

Roach returns from the bakery and Evelyn immediately feels like a third wheel, the way Lucas lights up as soon as he hears the door chimes; she didn’t even need to hear them, just knew Roach was there by the look on his face. Evelyn is pretty confident she has never looked like this about anyone (she has, about Millie. It's embarrassing). She opts to leave them alone, exiting through to the back of the shop, but instead of taking the stairs, she finds herself standing in the elevator, pressing the “B” button. She finds her earpiece in her pocket, same as the key and the vape, and turns it on, and it buzzes in her ear for no reason at all.

Evelyn is not supposed to be down here; she is alone, though Mr. Gregor should be here, was supposed to be down here. She looks around the cluttered basement, the shelves and shelves of junk. Something catches her eye: a display of pinned insects with large green eyes and glassy wings. Their shape reminds Evelyn of the key in her pocket.

A tap on her arm and Evelyn jumps, her heart racing. Mr. Gregor, looking displeased. “What are you doing here?” he demands.

She holds up the newspaper, the photograph. “Who is he?” she asks. 

Mr. Gregor peers at the newspaper for a long time before looking back up at Evelyn. “You are already aware of your relationship with this man,” he says.

“How do you know him?” she implores.

“I do not know him personally.”

“You said he was dangerous.”

Mr. Gregor gives her a pitying look. “Did you think it would be safe to confront a rapist?”

“Alleged rapist,” Evelyn corrects, and she ignores the new look this comment prompts. “You knew.” she signs.

Mr. Gregor sighs. “Evelyn,” he starts, but then he stops - she is turning into a mass of maggots and flies, her skin writhing with white worms, her hair frizzing out with buzzing, black flies.

“I want to know what is happening,” she says, but it's not really her voice at all, a discordant hissing and clicking in the air. “What is happening to me?”

“Evelyn, you are doing this to yourself,” Mr. Gregor says.

The maggots wriggle, giving Evelyn's skin a sort of sickening shimmer. “How?” she signs.

“As you will it, magic will find a way,” he explains enigmatically.

“I can't always control it,” Evelyn complains.

“Magic has a will of its own, as well.”

That sounds like a lot of bullshit. The constant movement on Evelyn’s skin eases, her hair settles, and she is back to fleshy human again. “Why flies?” she asks, disgusted. She could be a swarm of bees or a flock of starlings. A herd of fucking elephants.

“I do not know all the rules,” Mr. Gregor says patiently.

“You know nothing,” she signs.

“That is increasingly apparent,” he responds.

Evelyn shakes the newspaper at him. “He's here,” she signs.

“Here?” Mr. Gregor’s eyes flash. Is that concern?

“In town. At the school,” she explains, “he's the new superintendent.”

“You saw him?” She nods. “Did he see you?”

Evelyn hesitates. “Maybe,” she signs.

Mr. Gregor strokes his chin with his hand, looking thoughtful. Despite his white hair, his skin is smooth, with few wrinkles, and Evelyn wonders again how old he is. It is a common topic of debate in the Freak Show; Jordan insisted he was at least a hundred.

“It is likely you brought him here,” he finally concludes.

That feels ominous. “Can you get rid of him?” she asks. 

“Who do you think I am?” Mr. Gregor asks, looking surprised.

Evelyn isn't sure. “My mom called me a witch,” she says instead.

“Your mother has suffered a great loss.”

Evelyn blinks. She's going to ask, then decides she doesn't care.

“What are you doing down here, Evelyn?” Mr. Gregor asks.

She looks around, at the bizarre room, the bizarre collection. What is she doing here? Confronting Mr. Gregor about her father, about the flies, about the magic, because he knows more than he is telling. “I can't sleep,” she signs.

“Is something troubling you?”

“Dreams.”

“Dreams are made of magic,” Mr. Gregor says, “You can control them too, if you wish.”

Something about this conversation is infuriating, like speaking to a therapist. Evelyn bites her lip, tasting the metallic tang of blood. “I don't want to control people,” she finally says.

“Then don't,” he responds.

“But you said magic has its own will,” Evelyn says, “what if it uses me to control people?”

“Aha,” says Mr. Gregor, smiling grimly, “therein lies the problem.”

Evelyn glares at him. “Thanks,” she signs, using her middle finger to make the sarcasm abundantly clear.

Mr. Gregor chooses not to react to the rude gesture. “The only winning move is not to play,” he explains patiently. “Now go. You are not supposed to be down here.”

. . .

The door chimes, followed by a familiar squeal: “Lulu!” Millie has returned from the park with the twins. Willow darts behind the counter and into Lucas’s arms, followed closely by Ash. He picks them both up in a bear hug and groans. They're really getting too big for this.

“It's our birthday,” Willow announces proudly when he sets them down.

“I know,” Lucas says, “happy birthday! How old are you now, seven?”

Ash frowns at him, looking like a grumpy old man. He carefully spreads apart two fingers with his other hand, then holds them up.

“Oh, two!” Lucas says, smacking his forehead. “I forgot.”

They each demand another hug before they are willing to follow Millie out of the shop.

“It is our birthday, comrade,” Roach says after they leave. It is their first joke, and it makes Lucas laugh.

“Twins are like that,” he says.

“I do hope they enjoy their cakes,” Roach remarks.

“Cakes?”

“We made two,” they explain.

Lucas considers this. “I think as long as the cakes are made of sugar, they'll like them just fine.”

“Indeed.”

. . .

Millie finds Evelyn in their room, laying on the top bunk and staring blankly at the ceiling. There's a strange, fruity smell in the air. She has to tap Evelyn's arm to get her attention.

“What are you doing?” Millie signs.

“Dying,” Evelyn signs, looking away. In front of Millie, she dissolves into a pile of maggots, a cloud of flies, but instead of disappearing the swarm just hovers there near the ceiling. Millie watches the mass of wriggling maggots on Evelyn’s mattress for a moment, then leaves the room; as soon as she is gone, Evelyn returns to her human form and resumes staring at the ceiling.

She isn't really dying, not exactly, but Evelyn feels drained, bled dry by some sort of vampiric energy. She wishes Mr. Gregor would teach her more about this magic shit. It's probably sucking seconds off her life every time she uses it. She takes another hit off the vape and the light blinks, dies, and since she doesn't want to charge it she turns it into ants. They crawl all over her bed, her sheets, a mass of confusion, so she turns them into rose petals that smell sweet and rancid at the same time.

Evelyn is so tired. When she tries to sleep, she dreams of eyes, Brent Smalls’s fucking eyes, which are the same shade as her own so she can't even look in the mirror without him watching. She had woken up screaming last night, catching herself before she woke the entire house, and Mils wasn't there, warm and safe in the bed below; Evelyn was alone. By the time Millie had returned from the bathroom, she was gone. Flies and maggots, disappearing and reappearing at random until morning came and she ran into Lucas.

Evelyn is afraid to talk to Millie, afraid she might inadvertently influence her; magical mind control. She wants to sleep, and not dream of her father’s beady little eyes watching her, devouring her. What had Mr. Gregor said, dreams are magic? But she can't control her dreams any more than she can control the magic; it just responds to her thoughts on a whim.

A darkly visceral part of Millie is jealous of Evelyn and her flies; she is convinced of something dark lurking deep inside her, but Millie can't access it. If Evelyn has flies, Millie imagines she has something slimy - leeches, perhaps. Where she's gone wrong, she thinks, is assuming the darkness flows through her blood, but perhaps it lies somewhere deeper.

Chapter 19

Willow and Ash have a pleasant second birthday; definitely one of their more memorable ones, being two. There are balloons and gifts and Douglas shows up with not one but two cakes, each decorated with an intricately detailed tree, frosting in shades of brown and green. “Roach did the decorating,” the baker explains.

Even Evelyn manages to drag herself out of her room, and Ash is particularly fond of Evelyn. Lucas makes it through without crying, which is a step up from their last birthday, not that the toddlers can remember that. It is the first birthday party Roach has ever attended and they watch the twins demolish their neatly constructed cakes with a perfectly human combination of sadness and bemusement. 

The only downside, which was barely a blip in the twins’ experience, was a sudden piercing alarm sound from next door, which prompted both Douglas and Mr. Gregor to abandon the party, albeit only temporarily in the latter's case. He returns smelling strange, like burnt toast.

The twins are allowed to stay up past their bedtime and watch a movie, which neither Willow nor Ash are awake to see the end of.

. . .

Someone burned the pride flag in Douglas’s bakery. Just the flag, nothing else; it was hanging inside the window. The doors were locked and there were no signs of forced entry. The fire chief says it was probably an electrical issue.

“Bullshit,” Evelyn signs, so the movie-absorbed twins don't happen to overhear.

“Language,” Mr. Gregor warns. “There was no evidence a crime was committed.”

“Except for the vandalized pride flag,” Lucas says.

Mr. Gregor sighs. “There is no evidence-”

“We get it,” Evelyn cuts him off. Then she signs, “Whatever.”

“Anyway,” Mr. Gregor continues, “Douglas was lucky that no other damage was done.” He excuses himself to shower, as his clothes reek of smoke, and vanishes down the stairs. Which makes Evelyn wonder if she even saw a bathroom, down there.

After he is gone, Lucas asks, “Do you think we're safe?”

“Of course we are,” Millie says immediately, dismissively. Too quickly.

“Mr. Gregor seems to think so,” Evelyn says. Her voice is scratchy, her eyes sunken and red.

“Are you ill?” Roach asks.

Evelyn shakes her head, then shrugs. “Maybe,” she signs, “I can't sleep.”

“That is unfortunate,” Roach says.

“You look like shit,” Lucas says truthfully.

“Thanks,” Evelyn signs, using the same rude gesture that she gave Mr. Gregor in the basement. She is very, painfully aware of Mils sitting next to her, avoiding looking at her, and she is doing the same, so that the few inches between them feels like a chasm. At the other side of the table, Lucas is very, hypnotically, aware of Roach’s leg, the unbroken one, pressed against his own.

Evelyn stands suddenly, signing, “Shower” as she retreats down the hall.

Lucas watches her leave. “What's going on with her?” he asks.

“You mean besides turning into flies and being accused of witchcraft and finding out her rapist father is in town and-” Millie rattles on.

“Okay, I get it,” Lucas sighs. He feels a bit called out, like he's been a bad friend. Maybe he has. But also, it's this day. He puts his head on his arms on the table, and Roach starts gently rubbing circles on his back.

It's almost sickeningly sweet, and Millie gets up to start carrying the sleeping twins to their cribs, and to let them have their moment without her scowling at them, and by the time she has finished they have both retreated to their bedroom. Regardless of whatever assumptions she has, the only thing that happens behind the closed door is them laying in Lucas's bed, Roach holding him as he absolutely does not cry himself to sleep.

Millie doesn't want to be alone and sad in her room, so instead she gets to work cleaning up after the small party. She is putting cake and frosting-smeared dishes in the sink when a figure appears in her periphery. Millie looks over, and screams, and then covers her mouth - it's just Evelyn, but she has cut her hair so short, it just forms a dark fuzz on her scalp. 

“What did you do?” Millie signs. She doesn't want to know what her face says right now.

“I didn't want to wash it,” Evelyn says.

Millie hesitates. It doesn't look bad, not exactly, but it is a shocking change. “Where is the hair?” she asks.

“Bathroom,” Evelyn answers, but it's not hair anymore. A dozen flies crawl around the stained sink.

Millie stares at them a moment, then turns around. “I'm worried about you,” she says.

“Don't worry about me.”

“Okay,” Millie signs, and she walks away, back to the kitchen.

Ouch. Evelyn understands what happened, but that doesn't make it hurt less. So she can accidentally influence Mils, and in the worst ways too. But an idea starts to form, one that hurts her stomach but she thinks might be necessary, if she wants to get the words “too fast” out of her head. She follows Millie to the kitchen, and signs, “I love you.”

Millie has to drop the plate she is scrubbing to reply, maybe a little too exasperatedly. “Love you too.”

Hot, cold, back and forth, too fast. “I need to say something,” Evelyn signs. Millie watches her hands. “I think you need to forget about us,” she signs before she can take it back. “We’re friends. Nothing more.”

Millie blinks at her, the darkness inside her churning. Of course they're friends, best friends, since little Evelyn showed up at Gregor’s, sad and traumatized. Mils and Evelyn and... well, not Jordan anymore. “Okay,” she signs. Evelyn looks so sad, so tired, and why did she cut her hair? 

“I love you,” Evelyn signs again.

“Weirdo,” Millie responds. She finishes washing the dishes alone, feeling inexplicably sad.

It worked - problem solved. Evelyn can't influence Millie if they aren't together anymore. She climbs into her bed and sinks into a fitful, nightmarish sleep.

Chapter 20

After school starts, it is apparent where the real name for the Freak Show originated - none of the members, Roach included, are particularly popular at the school. Most of the former short-term residents of Mr. Gregor’s house are at least willing to acknowledge them, if only out of some warped sense of obligation, but interactions with the general population involve at best being ignored and at worst getting actively bullied. Evelyn is an easy target, since she doesn't bother to hear the remarks made about her, and with the recent rumors of witchcraft (“and maybe even murder,” someone whispers), there is a lot to be said. Lucas is openly trans - he has to be, with the little pink F on the ID hanging around his neck. And with Roach’s intense, staring black eyes, their monotone and candor, their limp and new cane and the rumors surrounding them, not to mention that odd black X, they are quickly shunned as well.

Millie could probably be normal, Evelyn thinks, if she pretended to be.

Their new superintendent’s following has grown so immense that barricades must be put up in an area across the street from the high school to contain them; only teachers, students, and administration are allowed on campus. Lucas is glad for the distance when he realizes his own father is among the crowd, as is Evelyn’s mother.

“What is he even doing here?” he grumbles, “They don't do public school.”

They manage to avoid being seen as they pass, but Evelyn is not so lucky when she discovers Superintendent Brent Smalls at the school’s entrance, greeting every student and, in the process, checking their IDs. She ducks her head as she passes, avoiding his eyes but watching his hands as he signs.

“Welcome, Evelyn.” He uses the sign her friends use for her, an E erratically flying around. She shudders, her skin cold.

Millie shares no classes with Evelyn, which she remembers feeling disappointed about, at one time, but not why, and now that she thinks about it she is glad. Evelyn has been tense and moody lately, and being around her has made Millie feel an inexplicable melancholy, which would probably distract her from her studies. They do all share lunch, which consists of 20 minutes of Roach gazing around, fascinated; Evelyn staring, eyes glazed, at nothing; Lucas glaring at his food because he has PE next; and Millie reading. And an empty plastic bottle tossed carelessly in the direction of the table, which runs no risk of hitting anyone.

The day runs a shortened schedule because of an all-school assembly that Evelyn would gladly skip, but Lucas, nerd that he is, does AV club, so she sits in the dark booth at the back of the auditorium and ignores the superintendent’s big welcome speech. Which is something that's never happened before, as far as Evelyn knows. She doesn't even know who the former superintendent was. Lucas doesn't really pay attention to the speech either; all he really needs to do is turn the mic off and the lights on when it's all over. He feels uneasy because Roach wasn't in their last class together.

Only Millie pays attention to Superintendent Smalls and his subtly vitriolic speech - about “stamping out indecency” and “producing strong national citizens” - and by the end of it, she feels overwhelmed by a cold wave of fear.

. . .

“Yo, where were you in home ec?” Lucas asks Roach, who is standing outside the school watching a pair of crows flit around the cars in the parking lot when the assembly is finally dismissed.

“I was tired,” they explain, “I found somewhere to sleep.”

“I like their style,” Evelyn signs, grinning. “I want naptime too.” Something about her smile makes Millie’s stomach flip.

“Uh, where?” Lucas asks.

“A maintenance closet.”

Lucas tries not to laugh. “Ok, so,” he explains, “You can't just ditch class to take a nap.”

“Can I sleep in class?” Roach asks.

“No, you sleep at home.”

“Then school should start later.”

“I don't disagree,” Lucas says, “but there are rules.”

“What if I do not follow them?” Roach asks.

“Detention, in-school suspension, expulsion,” Lucas lists.

Roach considers this. “That is acceptable,” they say, finally. “I will face those consequences as needed.”

“I like them,” Evelyn signs to Millie, whose heart twists, fills with something dark like jealousy that she quickly quashes down.

“I think you're too late,” she signs back, gesturing towards Lucas. They are walking behind their friends, talking behind their backs, which is rude but also feels oddly familiar, like Evelyn and Millie have had a lot of their own personal, intimate conversations behind people's backs. Well, sure, they've been friends forever. Whatever.

“Cute couple,” Evelyn says, and Millie's heart flutters.

Millie picks up the twins from daycare, which they attend now for a few hours each afternoon, and ends up having to carry a despondent Ash the entire way home. Evelyn holds Willow's hand, spending the rest of the walk alone in her own head. As they reach Oddities, each child is interrogated by Mr. Gregor about their first day of school; only Willow responds in the positive.

. . .

Roach is, as it turns out, an infuriatingly decent student. They take neat, organized notes and finish their homework quickly and efficiently, without any apparent struggle. Within the first week they have completed all of the first semester assignments for math, because math problems are easy if you just follow the instructions provided in the textbook, but when they try to turn it in, their teacher, Mr. Bruce, accuses them of cheating and tosses the neat stack of papers into the trash can by his desk. Roach later recovers the homework, rewrites the pages with coffee stains on them, and keeps them in a folder in their locker to be turned in as needed.

It is fortunate that neither Brent Smalls nor his crowd of followers are a permanent fixture at their school; although the school district is small, there are at least some other schools for him to harass about the contents of their libraries and curriculums. The response to their new superintendent's policies among their teachers seems entirely split. Some, like Evelyn’s third period English teacher, loudly appreciate his coming in and fixing this degenerate school (staring directly at Evelyn, for some reason). Others, like Lucas and Roach’s Biology teacher, are vocal against what she calls “regressive” policies. Many, it seems, just duck their heads, and continue to teach what they are told and enforce the rules they are given.

By the end of the first week Evelyn has been sent to the office for her hair (or lack thereof) several times. It is noncompliant; it is distracting to the other students. She won't wear a wig, and hats aren't permitted in school, so their “compromise” is a head scarf, which she also refuses to wear. As the detentions for her noncompliance pile up, she begins to refuse to go to those, too.

Eventually, Evelyn finds herself at in-school suspension with Roach, who keeps skipping classes they find boring (Latin, social studies), in favor of reading in the library, napping in secret closets, or going to other classes they find more interesting (usually sciences). Once, they show up at lunch covered in dust, and confess they had been exploring the liminal space above the auditorium.

“What the fuck,” Lucas had said, “you’re not allowed in the auditorium.” He is uncomfortable with Roach’s flagrant disregard for the rules. He is really uncomfortable with Evelyn’s obvious approval of their insubordination. Ugh. That word makes Lucas feel queasy.

For a while, Roach at least made a point to show up to the classes they share with Lucas. They particularly enjoy Home Economics, because they can cook in class; but ISS means no classes at all. In ISS, Roach and Evelyn aren't allowed to talk, but nothing stops them from signing back and forth when the gym teacher overseeing the group is asleep, head tilted back, sunglasses over his eyes. Nothing stops them from passing notes, since all they have to do is their homework and reading. Roach particularly enjoys reading, so apart from the uncomfortable plastic chairs ISS is a fairly pleasant place to be. Also, the ISS room is on the opposite side of the building as the unisex restroom they are required to use, and they enjoy taking advantage of the necessary walk.

Roach and Evelyn in ISS also means that Lucas and Millie sit together alone during lunch. As much as Lucas loves Millie, he feels eternally awkward around her. Because Millie has changed the twins’ diapers hundreds of times; she takes them to the park and teaches them about cactuses; she feeds them snacks and cuts their grapes into quarters and when one of them starts crying Lucas invariably finds himself not there.

It was easier when he wasn't living with them.

The worst part is, if Millie knew he felt this way, she would admonish him in the gentlest, most loving way, and Lucas would definitely not be able to live through that. The deal was always that he didn't have to take care of them, he didn't have to even look at them if he didn't want to. It's not that bad - he can even admit he loves them, sometimes. But not as much as Millie does, he thinks. 

The empty seats are more problematic because they invite others to come sit with them. Like this guy, whom Lucas doesn't recognize, but is evidently in one of Millie’s classes. He is trying to convince her to go out with him, despite making it clear she is uninterested.

Finally, Millie gives up on trying to read and fend him off at the same time. “I'm gay,” she says with what she hopes is finality.

The guy, Ryan from calculus, makes a face. “Gross,” he says. A pause, then: “I could fix that.”

Lucas cringes; he's heard that before.

She sighs and puts down her book. “Please, tell me how you propose to fix me.”

Ryan stammers, then recovers. “You know. Sex?”

Millie scoffs. “Okay, let's say we sleep together, and I fall in love with your magical, heteronormalizing dick,” she says, “Are you really prepared to accept the onus of responsibility for keeping me straight for the rest of our lives?”

Ryan doesn't know how to answer that; he doesn't know exactly what was asked, if he is being honest. “Being gay is a sin,” he finally says.

“I don't believe in any gods,” Millie says with a confidence that always stuns Lucas.

The new guy looks back and forth between Millie and Lucas. He notices Lucas's ID, then has a revelation. “So, are you guys, like, together?” he asks. “You think dressing like that will absolve you of your sin?”

“No,” Lucas says, and for a second he wishes he was more like Roach, or Evelyn, or Millie, or anyone more confident in themselves than he is.

Ryan peers closer at him. “You look familiar,” he says.

“Just one of those faces,” Lucas mumbles. You know. Generic, eastern Asian, like maybe 20 or 30 other people in the entire town, who all go to his father’s old church.

Millie interrupts, saving him. “Now that we've established neither of us are into you, can you kindly fuck off?” she asks. Millie never curses, except when she does.

This interaction is why Lucas is feeling particularly sour on his way to class, until Roach suddenly appears in front of him, grabbing his hand and leading him down the wrong hallway, away from the gym that is his destination. “What are you doing?” he asks.

“Bathroom,” Roach explains. A hall pass dangles from the hand leaning on a cane. They find a door to a closet that really should be locked, considering the cleaning chemicals stacked on the metal shelves, but Lucas isn't really considering them at all, because Roach has him pressed up against the closed door and their tongue in his mouth.

Lucas ends up with his first tardy, in gym of all things, but it was definitely worth it.

. . .

“Can I ask you about sex?” Roach signs. They use Evelyn's sign for it, scissoring their first two fingers together, and she has to suppress a laugh to keep from waking the gym teacher in the front of the classroom.

“You... and Lucas?” she asks. They nod hesitantly. “You have to be careful with him,” she signs sternly.

“I know,” Roach signs.

“Really,” Evelyn signs, “if you fuck before he's ready I will kill you.”

“Okay,” Roach agrees, their face sincere.

Evelyn sighs and rubs her face with her hands. She looks over at them and signs, “You penis?” It's a good guess; they nod.

On a scrap of paper, she scrawls, “get condoms from nurse - the good nurse, not the new one. use them. learn about clit + how to find it. dont trust porn - you cant just shove it in.”

Roach reads the note, then signs “thank you,” and begins folding the paper up into a very small square.

An odd feeling of dread fills Evelyn’s stomach, and she hits Roach’s shoulder harder than necessary to get their attention. “Don't hurt him,” she signs.

“I won't,” they promise, but part of Evelyn still wants to cry.

The only reason Roach asks, wants to know, is because of Lucas had done earlier, in the closet: wrapped his leg around theirs so their hips were pressed together against too many layers of fabric, moving against them so that if the bell hadn't rung in time, they might be dealing with a mess in their pants and not just an aching disappointment. Now they can't stop thinking about it, which kind of sucks. Lesson learned: school is not a good place for kissing.

Chapter 21

Shortly after the flag burning incident, Douglas received an offer for the sale of his bakery, which he politely declined; his bakery is his favorite place. In Douglas's second favorite place, his neighbor’s basement, he discusses the offer with Gregor, who reveals his own shop has been subject to a continuous campaign to buy-out, evict, or otherwise displace him.

“I am not concerned,” Mr. Gregor says calmly, “I just continue to move into their comfort zone.” His numerous diplomas and general air of mystery are enough to earn the respect of the general population, if not those who care little for such credentials. Mr. Gregor considers the baker beside him, stroking his chin thoughtfully.

“I would like to expand my protections to your bakery,” he reveals, “but I am afraid the side effects may not be... conducive to your operations.”

“Side effects?” Douglas wonders.

Mr. Gregor’s hand quickly reaches out, snatching something out of the darkness around them. He holds it towards Douglas: cupped in his palm is a small, fuzzy grey moth. It flutters away past Douglas’s furry head.

“Hmm,” Douglas considers, “can those keep away the health inspector too?” Mr. Gregor chuckles, and from then on, Douglas finds the occasional moth tucked away in the window, the bathroom light, beneath a cupboard. Never enough to concern an infestation, but enough that he is always careful to check the dishes before using them.

Douglas considers Gregor's comment, to expand into their comfort zone. He sets up a few more tables inside the bakery and purchases an espresso machine and a juicer. He replaces the scorched rainbow flag with a dozen more clean ones. Douglas’s Bakery becomes a popular after school destination for at least some of the students at Desert Bluffs High School.

. . .

Evelyn is fucking exhausted. Between school and sleepless nights, she feels like a dead thing, zombie shambling along on autopilot. She gets another vape from the same stoner kid, because he had good taste, and the head in the clouds feeling it gives her, if only temporarily, is the only thing not weighing her down. She fucks the stoner kid, too, there behind the baseball equipment shed where she also lost her virginity. Evelyn really is too predictable. The sex is mediocre and when stoner kid is done she sends him off without even asking his name. She wonders if she just coerced him, raped him, but she doesn't even remember saying anything. Just hands and other body parts touching her all over. She pictures Mils finding them, seeing them, and she crouches in the dirt hugging her stomach and crying. She dissolves into flies and stays that way for a long, long time, hovering, murmurating, swarming. She goes to bed and dreams of eyes; not just Brent Smalls’s but her mom's, Lucas's parents’, a teacher’s, strangers' eyes everywhere watching everything she does.

She wakes up not screaming and not crying and not writhing with maggots.

She pretends to do her homework with Lucas. She helps Millie with the twins at bedtime. She answers Roach’s bizarre questions about the human experience. She goes to class and to the principal and to ISS and back again, and she will continue to do so until her hair grows back enough to be compliant. She debates shaving it off again.

Evelyn is fucking numb.

. . .

Millie has started making a habit of stopping at the bakery with the twins after school at least a couple times a week. Evelyn usually finds an excuse to not join her, always too tired for anything, but Millie enjoys the bakery and its new and improved atmosphere, the twins enjoy their cookies, and it has absolutely nothing to do with another girl who has also started frequenting the shop. Who always orders a skinny latte and sips it at the corner table, typing on a laptop, golden eyes occasionally glancing around the bakery and always, always lingering on Millie.

She never stays long enough to see the other girl leave; inevitably Ash or usually Willow will get bored and Millie will have to herd them out of the bakery and towards Oddities, and the other girl always offers an unreadable smirk as they pass by. 

Upstairs, Evelyn is on her bed, looking faded, half there. Her skin is crawling and Millie feels an inexplicable urge to reach out and stroke her fingers along her arm. She inexplicably follows through with the urge, and the maggots congeal into smooth, dry skin beneath her touch. She inexplicably imagines her own skin could do that, the scars and gashes smoothing out under Evelyn’s touch. Millie keeps cutting herself to find the darkness inside her. She shakes the thought away and finds Evelyn watching her.

“I'm worried about you,” Millie signs, changing her own subject.

“I'm okay,” Evelyn signs. Mils frowns, her forehead creased, her eyes glinting with concern. Why can't those be the eyes to haunt Evelyn at night? Or maybe that would be worse. Look but do not touch.

“You don't look okay,” Millie insists. Her eyes are red, ringed with dark circles, her skin too pale and face too gaunt. “Did you eat?” she asks.

Evelyn shrugs. She sat with Roach during lunch and watched them eat. That should be enough.

“Do you want ice cream?” Millie asks, and even exhausted as she is Evelyn has to laugh, because this is exactly how she tempts Ash into eating when he's on a hunger strike. But then she shrugs, because Evelyn doesn't really want to leave her bed. “I'll be right back,” she signs, and Evelyn watches her leave and closes her eyes. When she opens them again Mils has returned with two bowls with ice cream, caramel and chocolate syrup, peanuts, whipped cream. They sit side by side on Evelyn's bed. She feels Millie's eyes on her, so she takes a bite. Despite her initial reluctance, the ice cream and its overindulgence of sugar do make her feel slightly less dead.

Millie pulls out her phone and begins typing one handed, passes it over.

M > Can we talk about this magic shit you're getting into?

E > magic shit?

M > Do you have any better way to describe it?

E > im fly-ing hehe

M > Seriously. Have you talked to Gregor about it?

E > ya. sups unhelpful. said something about magic having a will and too many rules

M > I don’t think you should be doing it.

E > i wish i could stop

M > ?????

E > it's like it just happens to me. idk

M > I'm really worried about you.

E > im fine

M > When did you start lying to me?

Evelyn reads the words and tosses the phone back without responding. She can feel Millie's eyes on her, imploring, so she changes the subject. “Thanks for the ice cream.”

“Okay,” Mils says, and she hops down off the bunk and grabs the two empty bowls before leaving, and Evelyn is alone again.

Millie brings the bowls back to the kitchen, feeling confused. She has been feeling confused a lot lately, like some small piece of her is missing, a button discarded in the middle of a field. She is craving something but doesn't know what. It wasn't ice cream.

. . .

Lucas is alone in Oddities when the rare customer comes in, and his blood runs cold when he sees who it is: that new superintendent, Mr. Smalls. He keeps his sunglasses on indoors as he examines the shop for several moments before finally settling on Lucas behind the counter. “Greetings,” Mr. Smalls says, even though he is pretty sure that is meant to be the boy's line. He approaches the counter, slowly, deliberately.

Lucas clears his throat, swallows. “Can I help you find anything?” he asks.

“I am just browsing,” Mr. Smalls answers, looking around the shop again, “seeing what all the hype is about.”

Hype? No one ever comes in. “Let me know if you need anything,” Lucas says.

Mr. Smalls continues staring at him, then smiles broadly. “You attend Desert Bluffs High, correct?”

Lucas nods.

“You are friends with that troublesome little pest, Roach,” Mr. Smalls says.

Lucas frowns - he's pretty sure you're not supposed to talk about students like that.

“And that harlot Evelyn,” Mr. Smalls continues, “and that little brat of Gregor’s, Mildred.”

Lucas stiffens. “I think you should get out,” he says. He wishes Mr. Gregor was here. Or Roach. Or anyone.

“And I know you, too,” Mr. Smalls says. He takes off the sunglasses, finally, and glares down at Lucas with shockingly blue eyes. Evelyn's eyes, he realizes. “I know your family, and I know you have disappointed them all,” he continues.

“Fuck off,” Lucas says.

Mr. Smalls leans back, disappointed. “Language, Miss Park,” he says, “you don't want to get detention like your friends, do you?”

Lucas shrugs. A moth flutters between them, and Mr. Smalls suddenly puts his sunglasses back on and smiles at Lucas. “I will be seeing you, I’m sure,” he says, and he swiftly exits the shop. 

Lucas jumps over the counter and locks the door behind him. He is breathing heavily; he can hear his heart pounding in his ears. He leans against the glass door and sinks down to his knees, but the door is glass and feels unsafe so he crawls away, to the counter, to the dead bear towering over him. He can't catch his breath and tears are leaking out of his eyes and it feels like his blood has turned to syrup and he's pretty sure he's dying. Again. Because twice wasn't enough.

“You are not dying,” says Mr. Gregor from somewhere behind him, but when did he show up? And what does he know; can't he hear the gasping, rattling breaths Lucas can't take? Mr. Gregor is counting, telling him to breathe, in and out, gently tugging on Lucas’s arms that are wrapped tightly around his knees, relaxing the muscles that have turned to stone. “You are having a panic attack,” Mr. Gregor explains, so infuriatingly calmly.

So it is true; Lucas finds that he can, indeed, breathe, in and out; he can unfurl his body and sit up without screaming and keep breathing as he does it all. Mr. Gregor helps him to his feet and guides him to the elevator, B for Basement, and Lucas would be in awe if he weren't so focused on breathing. He sits on a soft, red velvet chair and Mr. Gregor brings him a cup of steaming, herbal tea, a plate of cookies from the bakery next door.

Once he has regained his voice, Lucas explains, “There was someone in the shop.”

Mr. Gregor nods. “Do you know who?” he asks.

Lucas tries to remember, shakes his head. All he can remember are eyes, electric blue. “He said...” he starts, then trails off.

“Yes?”

“I don't remember.”

. . .

Lucas is dreaming he is at school. He knows he is dreaming, although he doesn't know what exactly to do with this information. The school is empty and echoing and eternal. He goes into his asshole English teacher's classroom and kicks over his desk and it flies across the classroom like it's made of styrofoam. He draws a giant dick on the whiteboard with sharpie. He opens lockers at random and they are all empty. He ignores the eyes plastered everywhere, shining and blue and infinite.

He is about to jump off the second floor balcony when he sees Evelyn, racing down the hall below him. He calls towards her, but she's deaf so she can't hear him. He jumps and lands lightly on his feet because he is dreaming and runs after Evelyn. He grabs her arm and spins her around. Her eyes are wide, they're piercing, they're blue.

“What are you doing here?” she says, the words bubbling out of her in floating purple letters.

“We're dreaming,” Lucas says. His letters are white and taste cool, like mint.

“Dreaming,” Evelyn repeats, and the word twists around itself in purple and yellow, then crashes down onto the ground with a splat.

“Look,” Lucas says, and without thinking about it he has sprouted enormous, fuzzy grey wings, like a moth’s. He flutters around the school, the wind from his wings rustling Evelyn’s short hair.

“Stop it,” she says, but she is laughing. Lucas lands on his feet and the wings disappear. “Can you make them go away?” she asks, pointing towards the creepy eyes everywhere.

“Oh good, you see them too?” Lucas asks. “I thought I was going mad.”

This makes Evelyn laugh more, and more, and she can't stop laughing, and the eyes are laughing, they have teeth, and Evelyn dissolves into flies and leaves Lucas alone with the laughing eyes. He runs, and they chase after him, cackling.

“Lucas,” he hears. He keeps running. “Lucas!” That's Roach's voice. He slows to a jog and looks around. “Lucas!”

. . .

Lucas wakes up in his bed gasping and panting. He is absolutely soaked in sweat and the air feels cold on his skin. Roach is sitting next to him, their hand on his shoulder, eyes wide with concern. “You were yelling,” they explain.

Lucas blinks at them, rubs his eyes, looks around the room again, trying to catch his breath. “Fuck,” he says, “sorry. Did I wake you up?”

Roach doesn't answer, asks instead, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, no,” Lucas says, sitting up. His damp shirt touching his skin makes him cringe. “I'm fine. Just a bad dream.” He can't even remember it. Roach keeps looking at him so he says, “I should take a shower,” and hurries to the bathroom to get out of the cold, sweaty clothes. He stands under the water for a long, long time, trying to erase something he can't remember. He exits the shower and wraps himself in a towel and because he forgot to bring clean clothes he wraps the towel a little tighter and leaves the bathroom. 

Roach is reading on their mattress on the floor, sitting propped against the wall. “I will not look,” they say as soon as Lucas opens the door, and he crosses over to his dresser and pulls on some clean pajama pants and a shirt and is honestly a little disappointed that Roach does not look. He notices with some embarrassment that they changed his sheets, but instead of going back to his own bed he sits down next to them.

“Thanks,” he says.

“No problem,” Roach responds. “Do you feel better?”

“I guess,” Lucas says. “I haven't had a nightmare like that in a long time.”

“Do you remember it?” Roach asks.

He shakes his head. “No. Nothing.” Roach reaches over to hold his hand, rubbing their thumb in circles on his palm, and Lucas leans over to rest his head on their shoulder. The red digits of the clock by his bed say 4:47, and he decides it's not worth it to go back to sleep.

“I guess I had a panic attack at the shop, yesterday,” Lucas finds himself confessing.

Roach puts their book down. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Lucas shakes his head. “I don't really remember it, either. But Mr. Gregor took me down to the basement, so that was cool.”

Roach gives him a small smile. “Was it fascinating?”

Lucas thinks for a moment. It was very dark. “Mostly just an extension of the shop,” he confides. “Lots of stuff on the walls. He used an actual lantern.”

“Do you think your dream was related to the panic attack?” Roach asks.

“Maybe,” Lucas says. That would be an easy answer. “Sorry, you can go back to reading. I didn't mean to interrupt.”

Roach moves the book to the floor. “You are more interesting than the book,” they say, so Lucas leans in to kiss them.

Entirely too soon, Roach pulls away. “Sorry,” they say, “my leg.” It is an excuse to adjust their position. Lucas places his hand on their other leg and leans in to kiss them again. Roach shifts again. And again.

“Am I making you uncomfortable?” Lucas asks, pulling back.

“No,” they say, bluntly. “My penis is making me uncomfortable.”

Lucas smirks. “I could help you with that.”

“Excuse me?”

“If you show me yours,” he suggests, “I'll show you mine.”

Roach frowns. “It is my understanding you are not quite content with yours,” they say.

Lucas sighs dramatically. “It's true. I really just want a dick of my own to play with.” Roach shifts again. “Really,” he emphasizes, “I can help with that.”

“Evelyn told me she will murder me if we have sex before you are ready,” Roach confesses.

“Why were you talking to Evelyn about having sex with me?” Lucas asks. “Wait, never mind. I don't want to know. What makes you think I'm not ready?”

“Your waking up crying half an hour ago is an indicator that now is not the best time.”

Lucas makes a face. “Okay, well,” he says, “did she say anything about blowjobs?”

Roach looks surprised, then contemplative. “She said I need to learn how to find the clitoris.”

“I can help you with that, too.” Before Roach can answer, Lucas leans in and kisses them; he sucks on their bottom lip and they groan and pull away again, breathing heavily. “Okay,” they say, their voice husky.

Lucas smiles wide. “Okay?”

“Okay,” Roach says again, laying back. Lucas hooks his fingers around the elastic band of their pajama pants and pulls them slowly down. Finally, an answer to the question that has been pressing in the back of his mind for weeks. It is a dick, more or less, but nothing else; where there would be a scrotum is just some wrinkled skin, folded like the impression of a labia.

“Huh,” Lucas says.

Roach is feeling incredibly vulnerable laying there on their bed, their pants pulled down to their knees, Lucas staring at them like an alien. They feel like saying something, but what, an apology? A biological description of the medical term “ambiguous genitalia”? Thankfully, before any words can form, Lucas stops staring and starts moving, and then there are no thoughts at all.

It functions more or less exactly like a penis. Lucas has no idea what he is doing, but it turns out that doesn't matter so much; it's not long before Roach comes, which is weird, and Lucas swallows the salty liquid, which is even weirder, and when he sits up he doesn't know where to look.

Roach pulls their pants back up, taking a moment to remember how to breathe before sitting up and kissing him. “Now it is your turn,” they say.

And Lucas says, “What?”

Roach tilts their head at them curiously. “You said, ‘if you show me yours, I'll -’” they start.

Lucas cuts them off. “Yeah, no,” he says, “I remember.” He just didn't really think it through.

“It is okay,” Roach says, moving away. “You do not have to.”

“Wait,” Lucas says. “No, I want to.” So he does.

With his eyes closed and Roach’s head between his legs, Lucas can almost imagine he has a dick to be sucked. It helps that they apparently took Evelyn's advice and read up on how to find the clitoris. Unfortunately, Lucas also can't stop thinking about sin. Because what he's doing is a sin, what he's thinking is a sin, and Roach’s very existence is probably a sin too, because the church has a habit of making sins out of noncompliance. “Oh God,” he says, because he might as well add some minor commandment violations to the list. Then, “oh, fuck!” because it also feels really fucking good to sin with someone else.

Chapter 22

Evelyn doesn't bother going to her first classes. She stays in her bed ignoring Millie, and then Lucas, and then even Roach, as they come in to check on her, tell her she's late, they are leaving. When Mr. Gregor comes into her room, she signs, “I'm sick.” Maybe he'll call the school and excuse her absence. She lays there as a pile of blind deaf maggots for an hour. She disappears and reappears in a bathroom stall at school, the one near her next class. Scrawled in permanent marker are the words, “Evelyn is a slut.” Someone else drew an arrow pointing to the word “WITCH.” A third person: “Evelyn had an abortion.”

She wishes she had a sharpie and then she does. She scrawls, “evelyn doesn't give a fuck.”

She doesn't write, “evelyn wants to fucking die.”

When she exits the stall she spots Mils at the sink, washing her hands.

Millie has been washing her hands for an inordinately long time, waiting for Evelyn. She had presumed it was her, judging by the flies and the fact that the bathroom had been empty, then it wasn't, and the door never even moving. The lack of response to her called out, “hello?” was also a decent clue.

“Hey,” Evelyn signs. 

“What are you doing here?” Millie asks.

“School?” Evelyn signs, making a face because what a question to ask.

“You're sick.”

Evelyn looks past Millie, into the mirror. Her reflection is just a grey, formless shadow. She focuses back on Mils, then frowns. “What are you doing here?”

“Toilet?” Millie signs, her face a question because that's a dumb thing to ask. But Evelyn keeps staring, because there's something wrong, she just can't put her finger on what. “I need to go,” she says.

“No,” Evelyn says. She stares at Millie, she stares at Millie’s hands, feels something crawling down her neck, her back, and then she notices.

Blood. Red and vibrant, smeared on the porcelain sink, on Millie's pale skin, soaking through her shirt: a sticky dark patch on black fabric but somehow Evelyn knows exactly what it is.

Millie’s hands move. “I'm leaving.”

“No!” Evelyn screams; she reaches out to grab Millie’s hand, just to stop her, but then they both disappear.

They reappear in their bedroom. Millie yanks her hand away from Evelyn, shouting, “What the fuck?” Then her face blanches, and she races out of the room. Evelyn follows her to the bathroom across the hall and holds her long, silky hair back as she retches, pukes up a mass of wet, dead flies, retches again.

When she's somewhat recovered, Millie recoils from Evelyn. “What the fuck?” she says again.

“I'm sorry,” Evelyn signs.

Millie shakes her head, backs away from her. “No, you had no fucking right,” she says. Her entire body is trembling, feverish. She feels like puking again.

“I know. I'm sorry.”

Millie doesn't respond, just keeps glaring.

“You're bleeding,” Evelyn says, using the sign for menstruation because she doesn't actually know the one for bleeding. She points to Millie’s arm for clarity.

“Fuck you,” Millie says, and she hurries back to their room, locking the door before Evelyn can reach it. Evelyn immediately starts knocking and calling her name, and Millie does her best to ignore it.

Millie is bleeding, more than usual because she has gotten a sharper blade for deeper cuts, and though she doesn't want to kill herself, really, she does want to see how close she can get. In the Middle Ages, they used to bleed the darkness out of people using leeches. Millie suspects she has leeches swimming around in her heart. She peels off the black, long-sleeved t-shirt that has become a part of her standard uniform and examines the wound on her arm. It is not great. 

A sound behind her: Evelyn has appeared on her bed. From her vantage point she's certainly able to see Millie’s arm, and Millie thinks, fine, let her see it. Let her see all the darkness inside her.

Evelyn wants to cry but she's too fucking tired to do so. She jumps off her bunk and exits the room, returning a few seconds later with a red first aid kit. She presses gauze against Millie’s arm then peels it back to look at the newest gaping slash. The edges are clean; blood pulses weakly out of the wound, and Evelyn thinks that means Mils nicked a vein. She presses Millie's hand over the gauze, and she holds it there while Evelyn prepares the butterfly strips, because that's the best she can do. They won't stick well, because there are dozens of other cuts in varying stages of healing, and Evelyn is pretty sure what Millie needs is real stitches, but she does what she can. She cleans up the blood and applies antibiotic cream to the other cuts and wraps the arm in gauze because a band aid wouldn't fit.

When Evelyn is done, they sit together in silence, in stillness, for a very, very long time. This is beyond anything Evelyn can fix, she knows; she is going to have to tell Mr. Gregor, if Mils won't, and wouldn't that be such a betrayal.

Finally, Millie signs, “Thank you.”

Evelyn considers her, signs, “How long?”

“Years.”

How has Evelyn never noticed? A few weeks ago, she would've thought she knew every part of Millie's body, but now, she realizes, there was always something. A shirt, a blanket, the lights turned off. Evelyn wants to ask why, but that seems unanswerable. She wants to ask how, but that feels callous. She has a lot of other questions, but not the signs to ask them, and no desire to put in her hearing aid. Finally, she signs, “You have to tell Mr. Gregor.”

Millie looks at her, panicked, just a brief glance before plastering a smooth, blank mask to her face. “No. I'll stop.”

Evelyn looks at her pitifully. “No you won't.”

That's probably true. Millie had promised Jordan she'd quit too, but then he went and died, so she doesn't owe him anything.

“Is that why you broke up with me?” Evelyn asks.

“What?” Millie says, "You broke up with me,” she signs. Isn't that right? Yes, she remembers now, Evelyn telling her to forget about them and Millie just accepting it. She simply forgot: about them, about kissing after Jordan's funeral and their first time having sex and signing “I love you” and really, truly meaning it. How could she forget?

Millie glares at Evelyn, her eyes devastating. “You fucked with my head,” she accuses.

Evelyn screams internally; this is exactly what she had been trying to avoid. “I don't know how,” she signs, then she flutters her hands uselessly; she doesn't know what to sign. She reluctantly pulls out her phone and types.

E > i don't know what i’m doing. i can't control it. i say something and it happens and i can't do anything about it.

M > You made me forget. You had no right.

E > i was afraid i was making you do other things. it was easier that way.

M > Easier? You fucked with my head! What else have you done?

E > idk

Millie shoots Evelyn a look of pure disgust before typing.

M > I can't even trust my own thoughts now. My own memories?

E > i know. it was the first fucking thing i thought of when i realized i could do it. mils says too fast and evelyn can fuck with heads and its really fucking obvious what i did.

Evelyn tosses her phone into her lap and before Millie even finishes reading the note she has vanished. Millie sighs and deletes the text before locking Evelyn’s phone and walking it over to her desk. That's not what Millie meant, not at all; she's been in love with Evelyn for years, a lot longer than whatever is going on with the flies and the fucking manipulation. Now that she knows what she was missing, it's obvious, like a bloody hole in her gum where a tooth used to be. That odd, persistent confusion is gone, and her head feels clear. But maybe Evelyn is right, maybe it does go back further; maybe all her memories of love are fabricated.

Millie pulls on a clean shirt, her arm twinging to remind her why this is all happening in the first place. Her darkness, a complete loss of control; no matter what Evelyn did to Millie, she can't touch the evil sludge boiling up inside her. What was it that happened to cause this? A run-in, an errant touch, and Millie had snapped and slapped the guy named Ryan in front of her English teacher. You deserve this, the dark voice says. She was sent to the principal's office, but she didn't go, she went to the bathroom instead and started cutting herself.

Eventually, Millie realizes she was to pick up the twins from daycare; she reorganizes her thoughts, her face, her mood before leaving, because they don't deserve this drama.

Chapter 23

Roach has started attending their classes, because Mr. Gregor informed them that their continued truancy could get him in trouble, which feels entirely unfair to Roach. Their presence or absence in some classes seems to make no difference. Biology makes sense to attend - the labs are fascinating and 60 percent of their grade. Home Economics is also at least interesting, in that Roach has been learning to cook. Math is not; math makes no sense to go to because they have already completed their homework and sitting through the lectures is meaningless. Being human, they are learning, means doing a lot of pointless things for no reason.

One benefit of going to their classes, at least some of them, is they get to spend more time with Lucas. Now, Lucas and Roach are holding hands as they walk home from school. Lucas's heart is skipping both because he really, really likes Roach and also because he is deeply apprehensive about showing this affection publicly. Roach’s other hand leans heavily on their cane with every other step. They are walking closest to the road, so when someone screams by on a bike while yelling a slur, it is also really easy for him to stick out his foot and knock the cane out from under them, promising an easy escape.

Roach collapses quite heavily and painfully, but fortunately not on their already broken leg. Other than a rough twinge, a new hole in their pants, and a scraped knee, they are unharmed. Lucas helps them stand and then pulls them into a long, standing hug, right there in the middle of the sidewalk.

“I am okay,” Roach says finally, voice muffled in Lucas's shoulder.

“I know,” he says, letting go. “I just really, really like you.” Roach does that head tilt thing. It's really, really cute.

Inside Oddities, Mr. Gregor is standing at the counter, peering through an antique-looking microscope. He looks up at the bell chiming. “Lucas,” he says.

“I'll be right back, Mr. Gregor, I'm gonna help Roach with their leg,” Lucas says, gesturing towards their skinned knee.

“I tripped,” Roach explains. They are pretty sure this is the first time they have lied. They are not sure why they do it.

“After yesterday, I would like you to take a few days off anyway,” Mr. Gregor explains to Lucas. “It will not affect your paycheck.” He still sends the money to his family.

“Sure,” Lucas says. No complaints there. He follows Roach into the elevator. He says, “Can I make a confession?”

“Okay,” Roach says.

“When that guy called us that,” he says, referring to that slur he can't even bring himself to repeat, “I was kind of glad? Like, he thought I was a real guy. He thought we were gay.”

“You are a real guy.”

“Thanks,” Lucas says, and he means it. “I'm sorry you got hurt.”

“I have had worse injuries.”

Lucas directs Roach to sit on the couch while he goes to find the first aid kit, which is not in its usual place in the hall bathroom. Millie and Evelyn aren't home but he goes into their room because he can see the red case on Millie’s desk. There is also bloody gauze and wrappers strewn about which, what the fuck? He gently cleans and bandages Roach’s knee. Then he kisses them, because he can.

. . .

Millie leads Willow, who is leading Ash, into the Bakery. They immediately race to the counter where Douglas is taking payment, cutting in front of the paying customer, and Millie chides them as she drags them back into some semblance of a line. She orders chai for herself and a sugar cookie each for Ash and Willow. The cookies are identical but for whatever reason they each break theirs in half and swap one of the halves. Twins are weird.

She sits them down at the low, paper-covered table that they and other visiting kids have been working diligently to cover with crayon. She looks over to the girl in the corner. Millie was late picking up the twins from daycare, and so later to the Bakery than usual. She steels herself, then walks over to talk to her.

“Hey,” she says, “Have I seen you around school?”

“Doubt,” the girl says. Her golden eyes fix on Millie for half a second, then flash back to her screen. “I'm homeschooled,” she explains.

“Oh,” Millie says. “Is that what you're doing now?”

“Something like.”

“Sorry for bothering you, then,” Millie says, “um, I'm Millie.”

“Jade.” She starts typing.

“Cool,” Millie says, blushing. “I'm going to leave you alone now.” She turns to head back to the kids’ table where Willow and Ash are squabbling over a crayon.

“See you around,” Jade says to her back.

Herding the twins out of the bakery is like herding cats.

. . .

Evelyn watches Millie flirt awkwardly with the girl at the bakery. She watches Lucas kiss Roach on the couch. She watches her mother pour vodka into a mug and drink it like water. She watches Lucas’s family at church, but Annalee is absent; she is laying in her bed at home, staring quietly at the ceiling. She watches Brent fucking Smalls sit in his office in the district building and plan how to spread more hate, and unlike the others, he looks up at her and winks. She watches Mr. Gregor and Douglas, after hours, sipping glasses of ancient whiskey. She goes to a beach. She goes to a temple in Kyoto. She goes to Antarctica and when it's not cold enough, because it's spring there, she finds a random peak in the Alps to stand on. Wind slices through her skin and she feels nothing. Evelyn can be everywhere at once but she can't be nowhere; she could be anything but she can't be nothing. She can run with the last remaining herd of elephants in a wildlife reserve in Kenya and gouge her tusk through a poacher’s face. She can swim with sharks in the Gulf of Mexico. She can grow fangs and claws and make her hair stand out on end, cackling with electricity. But she can't sleep. She goes to a concert somewhere that she can't hear, and stands so close to the speakers that she can. She goes to the center of Australia where she finds a fucking British flag and basks in the sun as a lizard. She keeps herself occupied.

. . .

Evelyn's gone missing again. She's just kind of like that; Millie is used to it. The first time Evelyn ran away, she ran back to her mom's house because she couldn't handle rules, even with Mr. Gregor's lackadaisical attitude towards them. Another time, she ran away because she accidentally washed her hearing aid in the laundry, and was worried Mr. Gregor would kill her over the cost. She ran away anytime Jordan got sick, she ran away when Lucas told her he was pregnant, she ran away when she found out she was pregnant (the graffiti’d rumor is true - Evelyn has had an abortion; Millie had sat with her the night she took the pills). She ran away when her mom got pregnant. She always fucking runs away.

And Millie is always there for her when she comes back.

Gregor has to file a missing child report, and at school Millie has to talk to the social worker about her friend's absence: no, she doesn't know where Evelyn is; she last saw her yesterday; she can't contact her, she left her phone behind. She didn't even say goodbye; she doesn't even have a stolen car to track. On her way out of the office Millie passes by the superintendent, who offers her a smile that doesn't reach his eyes. She ducks past without saying anything, pretending not to hear him when he says, “Mildred.” She really doesn't like him.

Millie goes to the library during lunch because she doesn't want to face Lucas and Roach, who are so obviously in love it's gross. She scribbles out the graffiti on the privacy wall around the desk she sits at: “Evelyn babykiller.” Not for the first time, she wonders why Evelyn’s is the name that keeps appearing. Surely there are more interesting girls to gossip about. If she didn't know any better, she would think this is some sort of coordinated smear campaign against her friend.

Millie needs to find Evelyn.

Lucas needs to find Millie. He'd forgotten about the blood, the first aid kit in their room; he hadn't made the connection to Evelyn missing until someone threw a basketball at his face in gym, prompting a bloody nose and a trip to the nurse. The old one, the cool one, who actually calls him Lucas and suggests he stick tampons up his nostrils to make the bleeding stop. It even works. He sends a selfie to Roach who responds hours later with a confused emoji face. He grabs a handful of condoms when the nurse offers them and thanks her awkwardly as he leaves for his next class. The bloody tampon is what made him think of it, but whatever.

Millie wasn't at lunch, which it's too late for anyway, and his next best bet is to find her after school. Her locker is next to Evelyn’s, which is easily recognizable for the word “WHORE” written in bold red against the yellow door. Lucas wonders why the school doesn't repaint it, but Evelyn said she liked it, because it's easy to find. But Millie doesn't go to her locker. The longer it takes Lucas to find her, the more concerned he grows that Evelyn has somehow been hurt and is in danger.

Lucas finally finds Millie at home, and only as he is describing the bloody stuff does he realize Millie must already have seen it; it was on her desk. 

Entirely unconcerned, Millie explains, “It was mine, I accidentally cut my arm on something in the shop.” It is the same excuse she used for Roach weeks ago, but only they remember it.

“Can I see?” Roach says, and Lucas gives them a look, like it was inappropriate to ask.

Okay, so Evelyn is still missing, but she's probably not bleeding to death, right?

Mr. Gregor cannot find any trace of Evelyn, nor her magic. There is something blocking him, something vast and unknowable. He visits her usual haunts, and there is nothing there, either. Mae Summers rants deliriously about Evelyn causing her miscarriage, which makes Mr. Gregor feel unfathomably sad.

Something incredibly powerful is at work to mask both Evelyn and itself, and that alone is incredibly concerning to him. He considers the conversation they had upon her last return: her difficulties with magic, her concerns about her father. The new superintendent of the schools, and someone making waves in the more conservative crowd in town. Mr. Gregor was certainly premature in dismissing the man’s potential power. If he is the one responsible for masking Evelyn's whereabouts, there is no telling what else he might be concealing.

Mr. Gregor's concerns grow when Millie comes to him about her own observations: illness, malaise, depression? The flies that follow Evelyn around like an aura, whenever she performs magic. Flies: those might be a useful clue. Flies and the superintendent of DBSD. Mr. Gregor needs to do more research. He needs to travel, to leave this town and its oppressive metaphysical haze. He needs to track down Evelyn.

. . .

Evelyn is pretty sure she is dead. She thinks that maybe she's been dead for a long time; months, at least as long as Jordan has been dead. She remembers begging to the ether for his life. She remembers offering a trade, his life for hers, and he went and died anyway. Jordan was going to go to college, he was going to become a lawyer and save the planet and Evelyn was failing remedial algebra so it was an obvious choice. Whatever she did to initiate such a trade, whatever fucking witchcraft she's being accused of, she must have screwed it up and now they're both dead, but she's stuck here rotten and decaying and full of flies.

“You are not dead,” a passing centipede hisses, straight into her head, and she ignores it. She is laying on the floor of some deep, ancient forest, and it is raining microplastics from the sky. The forest floor is absolutely electric with life: ants and rollipollis and spiders and centipedes and millipedes and worms and beetles and smaller and smaller things, smaller than her pinky nail, smaller than the freckle on the inside of Millie's thigh, smaller than she can see but still she knows them. She lets them crawl all over her, under her, through her. The trees that tower overhead dig deep into the earth below. Mushrooms conceal their entire networked lives underground and emerge to the surface to fruit only briefly, sporing then decaying within hours. Sometimes, a bird lands on the ground to peck at the bugs. Sometimes, a mouse scurries through to chew on a seed. Roach could probably identify all these things, Evelyn thinks. Everyone around her is more interesting than she is. She vanishes and reappears in a different ancient forest with different ancient trees to get rid of the centipede in her head.

. . .

“Do you know what might drive one to intentionally harm oneself?” Roach asks.

“Woah,” Lucas says. He is sitting at his desk; he was working on homework, but now he spins around in his chair to stare at Roach, sitting in their usual spot on their bed, reading. As usual. They don't look suicidal. “You’re not thinking of doing anything, right?”

“I am not.”

“Okay,” Lucas hesitates. “I know there are a lot of reasons people hurt themselves, but the only one I could even begin to relate to is dysphoria. If your body doesn't match up with your gender identity, you might try to do something about it. Or, since you can't really do anything about it, you hurt yourself in ways you can control.”

“Do you experience dysphoria?” Roach asks.

“I dunno. The opposite is gender euphoria and I've definitely experienced that. When I'm wearing my binder and I accidentally catch myself in the mirror with a flat chest and I'm like, ‘oh, yeah, that's definitely me.’ It's pretty great.” Lucas hesitates before continuing, “But with other stuff, it may not be ideal, but I can make it work, you know?”

Then Roach asks, “Do you plan on doing hormone replacement therapy?”

“I've honestly never thought about it,” Lucas admits. Modern medicine is a sin, just like being trans is. “My parents don't do medicine. Mr. Gregor even had to sue for temporary custody so I could get prenatal care and give birth in a hospital.”

“That is disgraceful,” Roach remarks. Their word choice hits Lucas in a strange way. He wants to defend his parents, which is absolutely absurd. Instead, he asks, “Have you been reading Evelyn’s thesaurus?”

“I finished it yesterday.”

“You read a lot.” It is not a particularly good observation, but Lucas wants the subject far away from his parents.

“It is the most efficient way to assimilate new information.”

“Okay...” Lucas says, then he decides to return to his homework. “Have fun assimilating new information.” He spins the chair back to his desk.

“You as well,” Roach says, softly, from behind him.

Does Lucas suffer from dysphoria? He once woke up from a dream about having his non-existent dick ripped off by a tiger, walking around a haunted jungle with blood pouring from between his legs, to find actual blood pooling between them. That was the start of his 6th period, as in the menstrual kind, not the school kind. He has still had so few of them he can keep count, even after four years, because he runs and he runs and he runs and he starves his body of the extra resources needed to build and shed a uterine lining.

He knows his gender identity is fundamentally incompatible with his religious upbringing, and that he is a living sin even though he doesn't know if he even really believes in sin or God at all, which is cognitive dissonance, which his therapist had him work through when he was thirteen so he's fine now, thanks.

Lucas tosses and turns in his bed. He can't sleep. He thinks about Evelyn and how exhausted she had looked. He wonders how she does the fly thing. He tries to do it himself, and though he doesn't dissolve into flies, he does eventually fall asleep.

Chapter 24

Roach confronts Millie about her apparent inability to navigate Oddities without hurting herself before school the next day.

Actually, their exact words are, “I do not believe that you are so clumsy that you would repeatedly injure yourself in the same place in a relatively neat shop in which you have spent your entire life.” No introduction or context or anything, Roach just walks into her room as she's brushing her hair and says that. At least they had the decency to knock, first.

Millie puts her hairbrush down and sighs. “What are you talking about?” she asks.

Roach explains, “Several weeks ago you claimed to hurt your arm in the shop. You said the same thing yesterday, because you had the first aid kit.”

Millie suddenly can't look at them; she can't look at herself in the mirror; she can't look around the room at Evelyn’s things. “There's a metal shelf with a rough edge,” she lies, “I bump into it all the time.”

“No, there is not,” Roach says confidently.

“Look, Roach,” Millie says finally, feeling the darkness fill her throat, “I don't know what you're trying to imply, but back off. My injuries are none of your business.”

“Okay,” they say. And they leave.

Alone again in her room, something in Millie is moved to cross a line she had never even considered before: she looks through Evelyn’s things. Specifically, her desk drawers: pencils and pens; notebooks and papers; the bottom drawer a chaotic mess of junk. Tampons, batteries, plastic animal figures, condoms, gum, acetaminophen, coins, bills, a murky tray of watercolors, is that a tooth?, a skeleton key, a vape. Of course; Millie is disappointed in Evelyn, and in herself for not figuring that out sooner. She closes the drawer and leaves for school.

. . .

The monthly assembly featuring Superintendent Smalls is about drugs and related debauchery. He actually uses the word “debauchery”, which Lucas would have noticed if he hadn't been involved in his own debauchery up in the isolated sound booth with Roach. He still doesn't miss any of his cues, so there isn't any reason at all for his English teacher to walk into the booth when he does. And definitely no reason for the teacher to react the way he does; they really were only kissing, even if he was sitting on Roach’s lap, straddling them, pressing against them.

All in all, really fucking embarrassing. Also, that door was locked. He knows it was locked, because it is always locked; it only opens from the inside. It's a security feature, but apparently not a very good one.

“You two,” Mr. Smalls sneers down at them, “are exactly the sort of degenerates I have been working to rid this school district of.” There is a gnawing pain in Lucas’s stomach. He glances over at the principal, who doesn't react to the superintendent’s criticism, but it feels excessive to Lucas. Unprofessional?

“You should not end a sentence with a preposition,” Roach recites.

Superintendent Smalls blinks, then focuses his glare on Roach. “What are you talking about?”

“It is one of the rules listed on a poster in Mr. Planer’s classroom,” they explain, nodding towards the English teacher. “However, I should add that in modern academics it is more of a suggestion than an actual rule.”

Brent Smalls had been glad to have been here to oversee the punishment of Desert Bluffs High’s finest delinquents, but Roach’s non-sequitur throws him off, if only temporarily. He shakes his head to reorient his thoughts, then tries to glare down at Roach. Roach doesn't meet his eyes, because Roach rarely makes eye contact with anyone.

Lucas can't break eye contact when Mr. Smalls turns his gaze on him; it is like staring into fire, hot and dry and too bright but he can't look away.

“I ought to make a public example of you,” Mr. Smalls says. “If only we still had the pillory.” Before he can continue, Mr. Gregor appears at the office door. Without preamble their guardian strides over to the chairs and stands next to Lucas and Roach. He discusses the details of the incident and the appropriate consequences with the principal and guidance counselor, resolutely ignoring the input from Mr. Smalls. Because Lucas has a relatively clean record (“One tardy is hardly a pattern of behavior,” Mr. Gregor argues), he only gets a day in ISS. Roach, who likes ISS, is instead suspended for the day. Later, Lucas will complain how unfair this distribution of punishment is, because he still has to wake up and go to school.

Mr. Gregor insists on driving them home. Before he starts the car he inhales deeply, exhales, removes his glasses and rubs his eyes and the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. He replaces the glasses and glances at the teens in the back seat.

“I am disappointed in both of you,” he says, finally.

Roach does not stop looking out the window, but says, “I apologize.”

Lucas's eyes drop to his hands in his lap. “Sorry,” he mumbles.

Driving, Mr. Gregor asks, “Do I need to give you guys the Talk?”

Lucas has a flash of fear that Roach is going to answer yes, so he quickly says, “Please don't.”

“No,” Roach agrees.

Mr. Gregor sighs again. “Do you have condoms?” he asks.

“Yes,” they both answer, and then they look at each other awkwardly.

“Okay,” Mr. Gregor says. What else is he supposed to do, forbid two teens from having sex? Never in the history of mankind has that ever ended well.

. . .

“You got suspended for what?” Millie laughs incredulously. She's pretty sure she's seen kids do worse than make out during a boring assembly. She knows Evelyn has done worse, and been caught.

“We were in the booth,” Lucas explains miserably.

“Did you keep all your clothes on?” Millie asks, and he nods. “Then Evelyn has definitely done worse. That Mr. Smalls is terrible.” A chill runs down her spine when she says his name.

“He is dangerous,” Roach says from the kitchen. They are making dinner, something with rice and vegetables and chicken that they learned in school.

“What do you mean?” Millie asks.

“I do not know,” Roach says, “It is just a feeling I have.”

. . .

Evelyn is alone in the school. The hallways and the lockers and the concrete walls are all familiar, but they are also never ending. She walks in straight lines, she walks in circles, she takes only right turns but there are no exits.

In the library, Evelyn knocks over the stacks of books like dominos, and when they fall they reveal Mils standing there in the middle, unscathed. “You!” Evelyn signs. She is always so fucking happy to see Millie.

Millie climbs over the toppled shelves and scattered books and pulls Evelyn into her arms. She pulls away. “Where have you been?” she signs. “You need to know what Lucas did.”

“Lucas ok?” Evelyn asks, face frightened.

“He's fine. S-U-S-P-E-N-D-E-D,” Millie fingerspells the word.

Evelyn puts on a face of exaggerated shock. “No way,” she signs, “why?”

“For this,” Millie signs, then she leans in and kisses Evelyn; a deep, longing kiss, and they kiss for eternity, then Mils pulls away and says, “I think I'm dreaming.” The words spill out of her mouth like technicolor balloons. 

Evelyn looks around at the empty library, the toppled bookshelves, and she says, “Well, duh.” The words are cotton candy pink but taste like frog skin. Evelyn wonders how she knows what frog skin tastes like. Then she thinks and starts to panic. “Wait, no. I can't be asleep, I'm dead.” Her words are like ash in her mouth, fragile in the air.

Millie gives her a sad, disappointed look. “No you're not,” she says.

“That's what the centipede said.” Evelyn reaches out and pokes the word centipede, and it crumbles and disintegrates and falls to the ground.

Millie stares at the pile of ash on the floor. “Who is going to clean this up?” she asks. She reaches down to pick up a book.

“DON’T TOUCH THAT,” Evelyn screams, bright red words that taste metallic and bitter. It's too late, but Millie throws the book to the ground, where it lands on its spine, pages splayed open. A pair of dark brown eyes, rimmed in yellow, stare out from its pages.

“Ugh,” Millie says, and she kicks the book closed. She looks at all the other books, scattered throughout the library. The ones with pages exposed all have eyes on them, and all the eyes are staring at the girls. “Let's go,” she signs.

The eyes follow them out of the library, through the hallways, into the classrooms, through more hallways. 

“I don't like them,” Millie says, her words icy and cold. They sit on the floor in an empty classroom in the center of the infinite building. An infinite number of eyes are staring down at them, watching, waiting.

“We can't do anything about them,” Evelyn says.

“Sure we can,” Millie says. She gets up, walks over to the light switches and flips the lights off. The room is immediately filled with a suffocating darkness, and Evelyn feels completely lost, alone, detached until Mils finds her in the void and pulls her close.

Chapter 25

Evelyn wakes up still in the middle of the forest, still crawling with insects, still turning into dirt, with Millie’s taste still on her lips.

Millie wakes up with bugs crawling under her skin; real, live bugs, tiny black swarms of them, but when they drip from her skin to her desk they splatter into ruby red drops. She cuts deeper and deeper, trying to find the bugs.

Lucas wakes up early, although he doesn't think he can wake up from a sleep that never happened, not really; he just tossed and turned and kicked and sighed, all night. He puts on his shoes and slips out through the fire escape to go for a run.

Roach watches Lucas leave, pretending to sleep, then they creep quietly out of their room and down the hall to the elevator, where they press the forbidden “B” button. The metal grate doors clang loudly open, and Roach steps into the basement. It is dimly lit, and their eyes take a moment to adjust. They orient themselves to a dim, flickering light source in the corner, remembering what Lucas said about Mr. Gregor using a real lantern. The basement is a cluttered, ancient place, and Roach feels immediately at home.

They find Mr. Gregor sitting at a wide oak desk. He is staring into a large, shiny black rock, and when he looks up he does not look surprised to see Roach. “What are you doing down here?” he asks. The words are stern, but the tone does not meet his eyes.

“I need to talk to you,” Roach says. “It is about Millie.”

. . .

Millie isn't going to school. Mr. Gregor first drives her to the local hospital, where the ER can stitch up the cut on her arm but hasn't the resources to handle the underlying cause, not in any substantial way at least, so then they begin the long drive to the city. Millie says nothing besides mumbling something about bugs, and Mr. Gregor struggles to get the image of her bloodied arm, gaping wound among dozens (hundreds?) of scars. He regrets not noticing before, not somehow intuiting Millie’s struggles sooner.

Lucas returns from his run to find Roach alone with the twins.

“My penance,” they explain, “for getting suspended. I am taking over babysitting duty for Millie for some time.”

“Where is Millie?” Lucas asks.

Roach hesitates, only for a second. “She had some errands to run with Mr. Gregor.”

“Are you going to be okay alone with them?” Lucas asks.

“Sure,” Roach says. They lean in conspiratorially. “Do not tell Mr. Gregor, but I fully plan on taking advantage of their love for television.”

Lucas laughs. “Good plan,” he says. Then, “I wish I didn't have to go to school.”

“You should have taken your shirt off,” Roach says, deadpan, “Maybe you would have gotten a stricter punishment.”

Lucas blushes and hurries off to finish getting ready for school.

. . .

Roach spends the morning watching television with the twins. They help Ash sort plastic animals into some semblance of a taxonomic grouping. They read the same book over and over ad nauseum for Willow. They make blueberry pancakes for lunch then take the twins over to Douglas's Bakery, because toddlers like sugar and so does Roach. The Bakery has only one other customer, someone on a laptop in the corner. The twins race to their usual coloring table and Roach stands at the counter, interrogating Douglas about various recipes. This continues until the other customer approaches and orders a skinny latte. Douglas turns to prepare the drink, and her eyes fix on Roach.

“Hey,” she says.

Roach keeps their eyes on the twins as they say, “Hello.”

“Cute kids,” she says.

“Yes they are,” Roach agrees.

“Are they yours?”

This question jars them for a reason they cannot identify. “No,” Roach says, “They are my foster-siblings. I am babysitting.”

“That's a shame,” she says.

“Excuse me?”

“The family is the masterpiece of God's creation,” she says, “Psalm 127:3, children are a gift from the Lord.”

“Okay,” Roach says.

“I can't wait to fulfill my purpose and become a mother,” she says.

Roach examines her briefly, then says, “I wish you the best of luck in that endeavor.”

“I'm Jade,” she says.

“My name is Roach,” Roach says.

Douglas returns with Jade’s drink, and by the time she has accepted it Roach has already limped across the bakery to join the twins. They wave a farewell to the baker, hold the door open for the toddlers to race through, and exit the Bakery.

Roach spends the afternoon watching television while the twins nap next to them on the couch. They fall asleep themselves and wake up to tapping coming from behind the curtain that covers the far wall. Lucas is standing on the fire escape.

“Sorry,” Roach says. They have the keys to the shop door. “I was asleep.”

“No worries,” Lucas says, “I cut through the Bakery and got a muffin.”

“Was a girl with a white laptop and yellow eyes there?” Roach asks.

“Uh, yeah,” Lucas answers. “Why?”

“She makes me uncomfortable,” Roach explains.

“Weird. That's not like you.”

“Indeed.” Roach changes the subject, “How did you enjoy in-school suspension?”

“Oh my God,” Lucas huffs, “it was so boring. I don't know how you stand it.”

“I read.”

Lucas shakes his head. Then he asks, “Are they still not back yet?” referring to Mr. Gregor and Millie.

“I think it might be a while yet,” Roach says. Lucas looks at them curiously, but they do not elaborate.

Douglas arrives as they are eating dinner, appearing in the foyer as if by magic, but he just has keys, nothing special. “I'm here to take the twins off your hands for the night,” he explains. “Will you guys be okay here alone?”

“Yes,” Roach says, and

“Sure,” Lucas says at the same time.

Then they are alone, standing awkwardly in the middle of the apartment. Lucas still feels kind of shitty about everything. He's exhausted. A disembodied voice saying, “your family is disappointed in you” keeps floating through his head. He wants to touch Roach all over and he also wants to bury himself alive and never think about sex again.

“It is Friday,” Roach suggests, “would you like to watch a movie?”

A sigh of relief. “Yeah,” Lucas says, “good idea.” So they watch a movie, and another one, and Lucas is feeling significantly less shitty by the time he finally falls asleep with Roach on the couch, their arms wrapped around him.

. . .

“You're supposed to be Millie,” Evelyn accuses him. They're in Lucas's biology lab, surrounded by dead frogs.

“Millie isn't here,” Lucas says. His words are shiny and silver, and he can see his reflection distorted in them.

“I can see that,” Evelyn says, the words burning black. She signs, “I'm deaf, not blind.”

“I'm asleep,” Lucas says; periwinkle, fluffy, feathered letters like pillows. Evelyn looks at him strangely. “Roach should be here,” he complains. These words dissolve into cockroaches that quickly skitter away.

“Wow, you've really fallen hard,” Evelyn observes. The words fall to the ground as sand.

“What?” Lucas signs.

“Looove,” Evelyn says, the word expanding and billowing into a pink frilled heart. “Wow. Awkward.” She points at his crotch, the inexplicable tenting in his pants.

“Wait, I don't even have one of those,” Lucas protests, but all the frogs are laughing, and he feels so embarrassed he wakes up with a jolt.

. . .

Mr. Gregor returns to Oddities very early in the morning; he spots Roach and Lucas on the couch and glides past silently, so as not to wake them. In Millie's room he collects the few personal items permitted by the psychiatric ward: a sweatshirt; loose, comfortable clothing; a plush bird she has had since she was an infant. Mr. Gregor remembers newborn Millie as though it was yesterday. When you are as old as Mr. Gregor has become, all of your memories are condensed into infinite yesterdays. Millie was so tiny, eyes bright, fragile limbs and paper-thin skin and fine, translucent eyelashes.

He feels Lucas's eyes on him as he exits the apartment and tries to wave in such a way as to encourage him to go back to sleep, but he slips out from Roach’s arms and catches up with Mr. Gregor on the grand, spiraling staircase.

“What's up, Mr. Gregor,” Lucas says. The sky is still dark outside; it is incredibly early. 

“I am just stopping by to pick up some necessary items,” Mr. Gregor says vaguely.

“Where's Millie?”

Mr. Gregor sighs and turns to face Lucas at the bottom of the stairs, gently placing the duffle bag he carries on the ground. “Lucas,” he says, then pauses while he thinks. “How are you doing?”

Lucas automatically answers, “I'm fine.”

“Do you mean that?” Mr. Gregor asks.

Lucas grinds his teeth together, considering. “I haven't seen my family in a long time,” he says, his chest tightening.

Mr. Gregor puts a hand gently on his shoulder. “Your family is healthy, and they are content,” he assures. “They have become involved in activities that serve to promote fear and hate, hence your continued distancing. Your sister Annalee is deeply uncomfortable with the trend, but has learned from you not to rebel so openly.”

Lucas's eyes burn with tears. “Have they hurt her?” he asks.

“Not to my knowledge,” Mr. Gregor says. He hugs Lucas and Lucas buries his head on his shoulder and only cries a little. Then he steps back and wipes his face with his hands and Mr. Gregor asks, “Is there anything else troubling you?”

“No,” Lucas says, more confidently this time. “No, everything else is fine.”

“I suggest you focus on the people who love you,” Mr. Gregor says, glancing up towards the ceiling. “A family is ultimately the people you love and who support you, not necessarily those with whom you share blood.”

“Thanks, Mr. Gregor,” Lucas says. “So, where's Millie?” he persists.

Mr. Gregor sighs again. “Millie has fallen ill,” he says, voice clipped, “I am giving her a few days to sleep it off.”

“What are you talking about?” Lucas asks, “What's wrong with her?”

“Lucas, please,” Mr Gregor implores. “I am simply trying to respect Millie's privacy.”

The words hit Lucas like a slap. “Okay, yeah, sure,” he says, backing off. “Right. Don't worry about us, I'll keep Roach in line.”

“I trust you will,” Mr. Gregor says. “I will return later this evening, tomorrow at the latest,” he promises. He picks up the duffle bag and then turns to leave. Lucas watches him, unmoving, until the door has closed; then he runs over to lock the back door and trudges back up the stairs.

“What happened with Millie?” Lucas demands.

Roach blinks up at him sleepily from the couch. “Pardon?”

“What fucking happened to Millie?” he yells.

Roach frowns. “I am not at liberty to say.”

Lucas gives him a disbelieving look, which is returned with an unwavering stare at some point on his forehead. “But you do know,” he says.

Roach considers Lucas. His eyes are red and swollen, as though he had been crying. Then they picture blood, so much human blood, Millie's blood spilling out from between her fingers as Mr. Gregor rushed to prepare for the ER. Millie, whispering, “Please don't tell anyone.”

“Yes,” they say softly, “that is correct.”

“I can't believe you,” Lucas says, voice bitter, and he stomps down the hallway towards his room, and Roach does not follow him.

Chapter 26

Evelyn is a forest floor. No, she is a human body, a dead thing, rotting into the forest floor. She is becoming a part of the forest floor. She is crawling with maggots and flies and mycelium.

“You are not dead,” a squirrel says, “you are just being dramatic.” It sits on her stomach dismantling an acorn.

What do you know, Evelyn thinks, You're just a squirrel.

The squirrel tilts its head at her. “You are just a human,” it says. Its tiny claws prickle her skin through her shirt.

Didn't I tell you to stop fucking with my head? she asks.

“Did you?” the squirrel asks, tilting its head again, suddenly reminding Evelyn of Roach.

She sits up abruptly, throwing the squirrel off her chest along with clumps of dirt, moss, bugs. “What are you doing here?” she signs.

“Finding you,” the squirrel says casually.

Well, lose me again, she thinks. And stay out of my head.

“Something happened with Millie,” the squirrel says.

Evelyn freezes. “What?” she signs.

“She will be okay,” it says, “but she is currently in the hospital.”

“Why?”

“You will have to ask her that,” the squirrel says, “when you have both returned.” Then it leaps away, chittering.

Evelyn lies back down on the forest floor. She watches the sky through the canopy above as it fades from black to navy to pink to yellow to blue.

. . .

By the time Lucas has finished showering he realizes he'd been a dick to Roach, taking out his frustration on them. He thinks about the question Roach asked him the other day, about the first aid kit in Millie's room, and suddenly he has a pretty decent idea of what might have happened. He wants to apologize, but they aren't anywhere in the apartment, or in the shop downstairs. Lucas wanders around, confused, before finally ending up in his bed. It's still early and it's a weekend so maybe he can sleep in a bit. If he could actually sleep. His head hurts and that voice, familiar but so, so foreign, unearthly: “your family is disappointed in you.” Roach, disappointed in him for prying. Mr. Gregor, disappointed in him for screwing around at school. Evelyn disappointed, Millie disappointed, disappointment like a lead vest weighing him down.

He tosses and turns. He kicks off his sheets and pulls them back on. He tries to masturbate but he can't get past his disappointment in his own body. He covers his face with his pillow and presses down and screams.

Then Roach is there in their doorway. Lucas sits up so quickly his head fizzes. “Hey,” he says, “Hi. Uhm. I'm really sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” they ask, tilting their head in that way that makes Lucas’s heart dance.

“I was a dick,” he says, “about Millie. Mr. Gregor was being all secretive too. I was frustrated.”

“You are concerned about your friend,” Roach says, “I understand.” They don't move, just stand there hovering in the doorway. “Can I show you something?” they ask.

Lucas follows them down the hallway, through the foyer, into the elevator. He says, “Uh,” when Roach presses “B”, then stops. He follows them through the basement, its odd collections, its strange energies, its glassy-eyed animals staring blindly down at them. Roach uses their phone for a flashlight as they limp to a desk near the back of the enormous open space.

“We really shouldn't be down here,” Lucas says.

“I found Evelyn,” Roach explains, and he immediately stops his protest.

“Where?”

“I do not know, exactly,” they admit, “a forest in North America, I am certain.”

Lucas stares at them like they have grown antennae. “Go on,” he says.

“Mr. Gregor has been unable to find Evelyn, because he has been looking for magic,” they explain. 

“Obviously.”

“There is some sort of fog around this town though,” Roach continues, “it is making everything blurry. So he was looking for other clues. Flies.” Then they gesture to a book Lucas recognizes: a field guide to North American insects, checked out from their school library. “He did not know what flies to look for exactly, so his search was too broad. I just narrowed it down.” They point to a page featuring a large, hairy fly, and Lucas shudders. “Genus Protodejeania. Bristle flies,” they continue.

“Roach,” Lucas says, “what the fuck are you talking about?”

“Mr. Gregor was using this obsidian,” Roach points their phone light at a large, sharp looking rock on the desk, “to try to find Evelyn. I narrowed down the search and found her.”

Lucas looks at the rock, then at Roach, then at the rock again. “How?”

“That I do not understand,” Roach confesses, “I simply followed Mr. Gregor's notes.” They wave the light over a thick, yellowing paper covered in spidery handwriting.

“This is fucking insane,” Lucas says. Then Roach looks hurt, and he regrets it. “I mean, what is all this?” he gestures over the stuff on Mr. Gregor’s desk, the room. He rubs his temples with his knuckles. “Is Evelyn okay?” he finally asks.

“Physically, she is fine,” Roach says. “I do not know how much else I should reveal.”

“You are very good at keeping secrets,” Lucas says, swallowing the acidic taste that their reticence brings.

“I suppose I am.”

Lucas sighs. He reminds himself that keeping confidence is a good trait, actually. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Okay.”

“I love you?” Lucas doesn't mean for it to come out as a question, but in his defense, he is very nervous.

“I love you, too,” Roach says automatically. Roach does not know what love is, not exactly, no matter how much they read about the human experience, but they do not think Lucas wants to hear that. They think maybe love means wanting to be around someone, wanting them to be happy, to self-actualize, to never want for anything.  Roach definitely feels that way about Lucas.

The basement is super quiet, Lucas realizes. “Can we get out of here?” he asks, “We're really not supposed to be here.”

“Okay.” They walk back to the elevator in silence. Lucas watches the door close, the button light up under Roach's finger.

“I told Annalee that magic wasn't real,” he says absently.

“There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio,” Roach quotes, “than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

“You're reading Shakespeare now?”

“Oh, no,” Roach says, “I finished that weeks ago.” At the top floor, they head straight to the kitchen and ask, “What would you like in your pancakes?”

“Chocolate chips?” Lucas hops up on the countertop and watches them prepare the pancakes from scratch. They do not reference a recipe. They mix the batter, add the chocolate chips, heat a pan on the stove and rub a stick of butter on the flat, sizzling surface, pour small, neat circles of batter onto the pan, flip them at exactly the right time, stack them all on a plate while Lucas just sits there and watches. He feels weird, just sitting there and watching while Roach makes breakfast for him. Just sitting there while Roach reads Shakespeare and figures out how magic works and tracks down his best friend. Just sitting there while Evelyn is missing and Millie in a hospital somewhere and his family is part of a witch hunt.

“Are you okay?” Roach asks, snapping Lucas out of his trance. He looks at them, standing in the kitchen with a plate stacked with chocolate chip pancakes made from scratch, and his stomach churns with a complicated cacophony of emotions: love and lust but also self-loathing and fear and sadness and happiness. He's not going to start crying or anything, but he's really glad when Roach puts down the plate and wraps their arms around him and holds him in a tight hug. Sitting on the counter, Lucas is taller than Roach, and he buries his nose in their hair, which is growing back soft and curly and smells like soap. They hold him like this until Evelyn appears next to them, suddenly, with a cloud of black flies.

“Gross,” she signs, “get a room.”

“What the fuck,” Lucas says. He feels an odd urge hit her, but that's not who he is.

Roach signs, “Hello Evelyn.”

“Can I eat?” she asks, gesturing to the pancakes. She is fucking ravenous. Roach nods then steps away to make more, which is a good idea because Evelyn grabs the entire plate and starts shoveling them into her mouth before she even sits at the table. She feels like she hasn't eaten in weeks.

Lucas jumps off the counter and sits down heavily at the table across from Evelyn. He glares at her until she acknowledges him. “Where were you?” he signs.

“Trees,” Evelyn signs with one hand, the other occupied with pancakes. “Dying,” she signs.

“Evelyn is not dying,” Roach assures Lucas from the kitchen.

“You're not dying,” Lucas signs. She does look awful though. She is covered in dirt, caked black under her fingernails, her face pale and gaunt. Lucas watches a spider crawl through her short, spiky hair as she eats the last pancake.

“I fucked up,” Evelyn signs. She notices her hands, examines them curiously. “I need a shower.”

“What did you do?”

Her face falls. “I knew about Millie,” she signs, “I didn't say anything.”

Lucas studies her, his face a stony mask. It only softens when Roach sits next to him, passing over his own stack of pancakes.

“Sorry,” Evelyn signs, then she stands. “Shower,” she says, grabbing one last pancake off the top of Lucas’s stack before ducking down the hallway.

Lucas stares, unmoving, at the remaining pancakes. “Are you okay?” Roach asks.

“I don't know,” he says. “No. I'm really, really mad at her.” He is also lost and confused and worried but when Roach puts a hand on his knee, which he realizes now was bouncing around agitatedly, he feels a warm rush of affection towards them. He decides to focus on that. “Thank you for breakfast,” he says, kissing them gently on a smooth cheek, “and thanks for bringing her back. I think.”

“I only found her,” Roach says, “Evelyn came back on her own.”

Chapter 27

In the shower, Evelyn scrubs all the dirt off her skin, then continues scrubbing at her skin until it is pink and raw. Part of her thinks if she keeps scrubbing, her flesh will flake off and expose something new and grotesque underneath. She scrubs at her scalp with shampoo and rinses and repeats twice and stands under the showerhead until the water starts to get cold. She lets the cold water run over her body until her skin prickles with goosebumps before she finally steps out of the shower. She crosses the hallway to her room in a towel and before she's even finished getting dressed Lucas has joined her, sitting on Millie's bed and watching her like a zoo animal.

“Creeper,” she signs, and he shrugs. She goes over to sit next to him. “I'm so tired,” she says.

“Me too,” Lucas signs. He says, “There's something really fucked up going on.” He can't sleep. He can't stop feeling awful about everything. He feels it like a cloud of negativity, soaking through his skin and into his thoughts.

She doesn't catch exactly what he says, but she gets the gist from lip-reading. “I thought it was me,” Evelyn signs. “I don't know.”

“I'm so tired of you running away,” Lucas says out loud, and Evelyn gives him a confused look because his face was turned down, looking at his lap. So he signs, “I hate you.”

Evelyn just looks sad and signs, “I know.” Then, “sorry” again, circling her hand over her heart.

“Roach saved Millie,” he signs, even though he doesn't know for sure it's true, just because he wants to make Evelyn feel worse. He wants Evelyn to feel as bad as he does about things, but also to have to stick around and deal with things like he does.

The way Lucas's face looks when they sign “Roach” sparks a thought. “You got S-U-S-P-E-N-D-E-D?” Evelyn asks.

Lucas watches her fingerspell and has to say the letters in his head to parse them. “How did you know?”

Evelyn starts to answer, but realizes, “I don't know.” She is getting really tired of signing that. She blinks and looks around her room like she can't recognize it. “You and Roach were making out at school,” she signs, grinning, and Lucas blushes.

Then he says, “Don't change the subject.” He signs, “Why did you go?”

“I don't know,” Evelyn signs once again, and though the answer is infuriating, the look on her face is so sincere it makes the ice on his heart thaw. “Roach found me,” she says.

“Roach knows magic,” Lucas says, awkwardly stumbling through an old sign Evelyn made up when they were kids.

“Of course they do,” she says, rolling her eyes. “They're perfect.” Evelyn ends the sign with her middle finger, her usual way of denoting sarcasm.

“I love them,” he signs defensively.

“I know.” Finally, something Evelyn knows, no negation needed. “I'm happy for you.” Lucas starts chewing on his lip, a signal he's thinking about something indoctrinated deep inside him, so she taps his leg and signs, “It's just us, no Twins?”

“With Douglas,” he says.

“Cool,” she says, “what are we doing today?”

. . .

The tattoo shop next door has been sold and is being steadily emptied, most of the furniture and equipment inexplicably getting thrown away in an enormous metal dumpster parked on the street out front. Evelyn watches a person in a blue work suit carelessly toss a tattoo gun into the dumpster and signs mournfully, “I was going to go there next year.”

“Why are they throwing these things away?” Roach asks, “They are all still perfectly good.” Chairs, decorations, mirrors, equipment, even unopened boxes of alcohol wipes all go into the dumpster.

“Welcome to America,” Lucas says ironically, “throwing things away is a national pastime.”

Their new neighbor, a middle-aged woman with peroxide blond hair piled in a beehive style on top of her head, tuts at him disapprovingly. She has been listening to the teenagers talk while overseeing the efforts of the workers, whom she does not trust not to steal the items they are meant to be disposing of. “I need to get rid of all the evil energy from the previous owners,” she drawls, “before I can open my salon.” 

“Evil energy?” Roach queries as Lucas tugs at their arm to try to pull their attention away.

“The entire building reeks of wickedness,” she explains. “Leviticus 19:28.”

“The Old Testament?” Roach asks, and the woman nods disapprovingly at the question.

Lucas feels nauseous as he pulls harder at Roach. “We've got to get going,” he urges, “remember?”

Roach looks at him, confused, then says, “Indeed.” As they pass the shop, they say, “Good luck with your energies.”

Roach is fascinated by this unusual method of speaking in allegory via Bible quotes, which they have encountered twice now. Lucas is extremely familiar with it and despises it. As they continue down Main Street, they see two more shops across the street that have recently exchanged hands: a craft store boasting new ownership, and what was formerly a shoe store, now gutted.

“Where is everyone going?” Evelyn signs, and Lucas shrugs.

Roach’s destination is the grocery store a half hour walk away, longer when your femur has been screwed together with a titanium rod and you walk with a cane. They have a recipe they would like to try, ingredients needed not currently available in the kitchen, but as soon as they enter the large, airy building they are overwhelmed by the sheer enormity of different products available. Roach makes their way immediately to the produce section, picking up fruits and vegetables seemingly at random and examining them, smelling them, squeezing them to feel their ripeness. Evelyn watches them, amused, but Lucas looks around at the other shoppers, embarrassed by their enthusiasm.

“What are they?” Evelyn signs, and Lucas shrugs.

When it becomes clear they are not leaving any time soon, Lucas offers to at least go through and pick up the items on their list, which they hand over wordlessly. Roach feels vaguely uneasy by the vast amount of food just sitting here, shipped in from out of state, out of country, across oceans, waiting to be purchased or thrown away. Unlike the mall, with its excess of artificial manufactured goods, the food in the grocery store has real, tangible value to Roach. They have been reading a lot of current news lately, and hunger, starvation, famine are common headline topics; never here, always somewhere else. But they are also in awe of the variety, the colors, the textures, the potential flavors - if only they could sample them. These conflicting emotions combine with the fluorescent lighting overhead, the music piped out from invisible speakers, people talking, so many people, cart wheels squealing, scanners beeping, shoes squeaking on the floor, and Roach feels like their head might explode. So they focus on the fruit in their hands, the textures, the colors, and they try very, very hard to block out the rest.

Lucas finds the ingredients on Roach's list, as well as plenty of drinks and snacks, the kind Mr. Gregor is generally above buying unless they come from the Bakery. Evelyn pulls him down the feminine hygiene aisle and makes a big deal out of pretending to look at the different brands of tampons.

While standing there, she signs, “Do you need condoms?” Lucas blushes and shakes his head. “L-U-B-E?” she fingerspells, pointing towards the shelf. Again he shakes his head, looking around as though afraid he's being watched. “Strawberry!” Evelyn teases, handing him a bottle.

Lucas places it back on the shelf and signs, “Can we go?”

Evelyn grabs a box of tampons, her usual brand; she actually does need to buy some. Part of the reason for her return, her loss of the conviction that she was dead, was the start of her period. Evelyn is pretty sure if she was really dead her body wouldn't bother doing that anymore. At least she hopes so.

As they're leaving the aisle she signs, “If you can't talk about sex, maybe you shouldn't be doing it.”

She has a point, and Lucas starts chewing on his lips anxiously, but still he's glad he put the flavored lube back when they turn down the greeting card aisle and run into three of his siblings: Maribell, Paul, and Sophia. Their faces go through identical transformations from humor (due to the jokes on the cards they were reading), to shock (at seeing Lucas), to guilt (because humor is technically verboden; but greeting cards are like memes for fundies), and then they diverge. Maribell’s face immediately sets into an expression of bland disapproval, while Paul’s becomes a mixture of rage and disgust. Only little Sophia looks happy to see him, and she calls out, “Lizzie!”

Maribell grabs her little sister’s arm and starts pulling her away. “Hush,” she hisses, “we do not consort with witches.” Paul lingers for a moment, as if debating something, then turns on his heel and follows them.

Lucas doesn't realize Evelyn is holding his hand until she tugs it, gently, to get him to move. He doesn't let go because he's pretty sure that the connection is the only thing stopping him from falling through the crust of the Earth straight into hell right now. He tastes blood as he chews through the skin inside his cheek.

Roach is standing absolutely still in the produce section, staring at a neatly stacked display of cabbages. A woman has to awkwardly reach around them to grab one, but they do not move. They do not think they can move. They do not notice Lucas until he places his hand on their shoulder and shakes it, gently; then they give him a blank look, like they are not even sure who he is.

Evelyn recognizes that look; it's the same one she gets after a particularly busy day at school when she is made to wear her hearing aid and listen to its buzzing and artificially modulated output for hours on end. She hands Lucas the basket and signs, “You pay, we will get coffee.” She gently guides Roach out of the store while Lucas heads to the self-checkout alone. He keeps his head down, trying not to pray but doing so anyway, trying not to look around to see if his family is still here but doing so anyway, trying not to feel the confusing jumble of sadness and relief when he doesn't see them but doing so, anyway.

Evelyn leads Roach to a table outside the coffee shop next door and goes inside to order. She is actually surprised when the barista takes her payment, and she wonders what that means. She exits the coffee shop carrying three stacked paper cups. Roach is still sitting at the table, but now they are reading a pamphlet or something.

Evelyn sets the cups down to free her hands. “What's that?” she asks.

“Someone gave it to me,” Roach says, then they sign, “I don't know.”

Evelyn recognizes the logo on the back and snatches it from Roach’s hands. At their offended look, she signs, “Don't read this trash, it's from Lucas's church.” Roach looks confused, so she gestures towards the logo and signs, “Lucas” and they nod.

“He said I looked troubled,” they say, slowly fingerspelling the word T-R-O-U-B-L-E-D.

Evelyn rolls her eyes and looks at the heading: it reads, “Are You Confused?” She crumples the paper into a ball and tosses it into a nearby garbage can as Lucas walks up, carrying the bagged groceries.

“What was that?” he asks.

“Garbage,” Evelyn signs. She hands Lucas a coffee cup and takes one of the bags from him. Roach stands, painfully, and they begin the slow, silent trudge back to Oddities. 

. . .

Millie wakes up from a drug-induced sleep, one of the first full nights of sleep she has had in what feels like weeks but feeling entirely unrested, as though she had not been asleep at all, but her memory wiped. She chalks it up to the side effects of the sleeping pill the nurse gave her the previous evening. She is in a generic cinderblock room with greyish colored walls and linoleum flooring. The bed she sleeps in is designed to be structurally solid and suicide-proof. The sheets are thin and scratchy and cool against her skin. Another identical bed mirrors Millie’s, occupied by a girl whose name she can’t remember and doesn't care to.

Yesterday, Millie watched in a daze as an indifferent doctor prodded around the numbed flesh of her arm, looking for muscle damage and severed nerves before sewing the layers jaggedly back together. Millie had done the damage to herself, so the doctor felt no obligation to go out of her way to make it pretty. She lost a lot of blood, but not enough to warrant a transfusion, so she was discharged to Gregor's care, and he drove her to this hospital. She knows, objectively, that she was questioned and analyzed and admitted and given a tour and introduced to other patients and nurses and a doctor and she even ate a meal, but it is as though someone else was doing those things, and she was just casually watching from a distance, a boring TV show with too much exposition.

Millie doesn't particularly like the hospital, but she recognizes the need to play by the rules and say the right things in order to minimize the time she has to spend here. She wears the mandatory sticky socks and the magnetic bracelet that makes sure none of the doors accidentally unlock around her and the comfortable, suicide-proof clothing with no loops or zippers. The string in her hoodie that Gregor dropped off has been removed. She follows the outlined schedule and takes the pills in the little paper cup. She attends half a dozen different types of therapy and talks to a doctor, and she is very, very careful about the things she says. She talks of sadness, of low self-worth, of morbid thoughts but never suicide. Never bugs, or flies, or magic and chaotic dreams. She talks of negative impulses and intrusive thoughts but never of the physical darkness consuming her from within. There are just some things, Millie realizes, that a person of medicine would not be able to comprehend. They would determine there is more wrong with her than there actually is, and it would be that much harder to get out.

Chapter 28

For what it's worth, Lucas and Roach go out of their way to not make Evelyn feel like a third wheel for the rest of the afternoon. They play video games, and Evelyn handily demolishes them both. Lucas gets the bright idea to play Scrabble, a game which is over almost as soon as it starts when Roach fits “quixotic” on a triple word score. Roach makes salmon risotto and asparagus for dinner and Evelyn feels bad for growing up on cup noodles. She manages to not think about magic or Millie or flies or blood or dying too much. At least until it comes time for her to pick the movie, and she chooses the goriest horror flick she can think of.

It does not take long for Roach to excuse themselves, using a shower before bed as pretext but also because something about the blood and guts on screen makes them profoundly uncomfortable. Like when they learned some people step on insects for fun.

Lucas, bless him, manages to stick through the first movie, but when Evelyn puts on the sequel he opts to go to bed as well. He finds Roach reading, sitting on their mattress under a little pool of light from their reading lamp.

“Hello,” they say, not looking up.

“Hey,” Lucas says, but he finds he doesn't really want to talk, so he just climbs into his own bed and curls up, facing away from Roach and their book.

“Good night,” Roach says from behind him, and something inside Lucas twinges sharply.

Evelyn keeps the movie running, muted, all of the lights off around her. She watches it sitting cross-legged in the middle of the couch, then puts on another. She is not going to sleep. She focuses on the screen and the splashes of red and the silent screaming. She does not notice the shadowy figure creeping through the darkness until it is too late, it has grabbed her arm, and then Evelyn screams.

. . .

Lucas is dreaming. He is at school and they are building stockades in the gym, not like for animals, but for people; what was that word Mr. Smalls had used, pillory? The kind that locks your head and hands into a wood board and forces you to crouch painfully and suffer as the free people mock you. For the sinners who deserve public humiliation as repentance.

“This is fucking bizarre,” he says, and he is relieved the words do not float out of his mouth in bright, conspicuous letters. Why had he been expecting that?

“It is,” Annalee agrees.

Lucas starts, only now noticing her sitting next to him on the bleachers. “What are you doing here?” he asks, “You don't go here.” She looks so out of place with her shapeless, pale blue dress, her hair covered.

Annalee nods sagely. Then she squints and looks around, trying to take in her surroundings. “I think I got in trouble,” she explains. 

“I've missed you,” Lucas says, pulling her into a hug, grateful she does not pull away; she returns the hug, squeezing him tight.

“Lucas,” Annalee says, the sound so sweet in her voice. Then Lucas remembers he is in a dream, because otherwise she would be calling him Lizzie.

He doesn't want to hear whatever she has to say. “Are you okay?” he asks.

Annalee says, “Mhm,” but she doesn't look at him.

“How did you get in trouble?” Lucas asks, gently turning her face so he can look at her, but if this is a dream, nothing would show, would it?

“Blasphemy,” Annalee confesses, softly.

“Blasphemy?” Lucas repeats, amused despite himself.

Annalee nods. “I said I didn't believe Jesus would have taught us to hate others in the way our church does.”

Lucas’s heart flutters. “I'm proud of you,” he says. And he remembers once again that he's dreaming.

There is a scream, piercing, all encompassing, and Lucas looks at Annalee, panicked. “That's not me,” she says, and she vanishes as the screaming continues everywhere, forever, always.

. . .

Lucas wakes with a start to someone screaming and is out of his bed before he can even process it. Roach is struggling off the mattress on the floor behind him as he races out of their room to save Evelyn or whatever.

Or whatever. It's only Mr. Gregor, back again and checking to make sure they haven't burned the place down. As soon as Evelyn realizes it, she bites the bottom knuckle of her thumb to stop her screaming, but it's too late; Lucas and Roach are both standing in the hallway looking ready to fight their guardian, who has backed away and flipped on the lights.

“Welcome home, Evelyn,” Mr. Gregor signs. He looks tired.

“Where's Millie?” she demands.

Lucas and Roach glance at each other, and silently agree to go back to their room. Lucas sits on his bed and Roach sits at their desk and he wonders where this distance between them came from so suddenly.

“Can I ask you something?” he says.

“Okay,” Roach answers.

“Do you really not remember anything from before?” Roach shakes their head. “Like, you just woke up and suddenly, you're here!, nothing?”

“That is correct,” Roach says. It is not entirely correct, they think, but close enough.

“What if you have a family somewhere, looking for you?”

Roach pauses for a moment. “I do not think I do,” they say, finally.

“That doesn't bother you?”

“I have a family here.”

Lucas chews on his lip. “I'm feeling really fucked up about my family,” he admits. They're disappointed in you, a disembodied voice floats through his head.

Roach does not know what to say. They do not understand how anyone could be treated the way Lucas is and still feel any loyalty towards their abuser; but then again, they have never suffered in any way close to what Lucas has gone through. If empathy is the crux of humanity, it certainly is not something that comes instinctively, or easily.

“I am sorry,” they say, finally, inadequately.

Lucas sighs. He shrugs. He plasters on a mask of indifference. “Good night,” he says, pulling his blanket over himself.

“Good night,” Roach repeats. They turn their lamp off with a click. Then, into the darkness, they quietly say, “I love you.”

Despite everything, the words send a spark of pleasure through him. “I love you, too,” Lucas says.

. . .

“Where have you been?” Mr. Gregor asks Evelyn.

“Where is Millie?” she signs again.

“Sugar?” he signs, again ignoring her question.

They are drinking tea out of a fancy China tea set like fucking aristocrats in a basement surrounded by dead things and haunted things. “Millie,” Evelyn signs again, then again and again and again.

“Hospital,” Mr. Gregor signs, “None of your concern.” Then he says, “Can you please put in your hearing aid? I am afraid I do not have the signs for what we need to discuss.”

And Evelyn signs, “Millie?” again, but he shakes his head, so she doesn't. They sit in silence, sipping their tea, glaring at each other. Well, Evelyn glares; Mr. Gregor just gives her a calm, measured stare. Evelyn thinks about leaving again; maybe she could find Millie. 

“Please do not leave,” Mr. Gregor signs, and Evelyn flinches.

“I told you to stay out of my head,” she signs.

“I was not in your head,” Mr. Gregor says, out loud so she has to read his lips. “Your intentions were evident from your skin.”

She looks at her arms: maggots crawling, writhing, squirming. “What is happening?” As Evelyn signs, the maggots disappear, smoothing back into skin.

“You are learning to control magic,” Mr. Gregor says, “or else magic is learning to control you.”

Evelyn rolls her eyes. “Second one,” she signs.

Mr. Gregor shrugs. “Your choice,” he signs.

“How?” she asks.

“How does one breathe?” Mr. Gregor asks, “How do you see? I cannot teach you to use your magic any more than I could teach you to hear.”

“Rude,” she signs.

“There are few who naturally find themselves with your abilities,” Mr. Gregor says. “Traditionally, it involves years, even decades of rigorous study. It requires the development of discipline before supernatural forces are even approached. You are a child playing with fire.” So was Mr. Gregor, so many years ago, but she does not need to know that.

Evelyn tries to read his lips and follow along, really, but she can't parse half of what he said. At least until the end, then she feels insulted. “Teach me,” she signs.

Mr. Gregor rubs his face with his hands for a very long time. Evelyn looks at him closely; the flickering lamp light brings out the strangest details. Thin tendons popping through pale skin on the back of his hands. Glowing, wispy white flyaway hairs. A long, thin scar running down the inside of each forearm. She finally relents, fishing her hand through her pocket to find the hearing aid.

“Did Millie try to kill herself?” She says the last part out loud; she doesn't know the sign for suicide.

“No,” Mr. Gregor says quickly. Millie had done a lot of damage but insists that was not her intention.

“I knew,” she confesses, “I knew and I didn't tell.”

Mr. Gregor fixes her with a neutral gaze, but his eyes are a mirror for Evelyn's own feelings about herself: disappointment, mostly. “You are sixteen,” he says, “I do not expect you to know how to handle a mental health crisis.”

“Roach did.”

“Roach told me their suspicion and we happened to intervene at the right time,” Mr. Gregor explains.

“I gave her a band-aid.”

“And I am sure it made Millie feel very loved,” he responds exasperatedly. “You did what you could.”

Evelyn just shakes her head. Her skin crawls with maggots.

“Please stay here,” Mr. Gregor signs. “Where do you want to go?” he asks.

“Everywhere,” Evelyn signs, gesturing broadly.

“Then why are you still here?” he asks.

Evelyn looks at him, confused. “You asked,” she signs.

“I asked and so you stayed,” he explains, “You controlled your magic.”

Evelyn glares at him, not entirely sure why she feels angry. “I didn't mean to,” she signs.

Mr. Gregor gives another long-suffering sigh. “Do you mean to move each of your muscles when you stand to walk away? Do you have to consciously coordinate your sense of balance and the sensory feedback from your legs and intricately adjust the tension of each muscle fiber accordingly to keep yourself from falling?”

Evelyn does have a desire to stand and walk away, but she doesn't. She just sits there and scowls.

“The self-control you exhibit over your impulses is no different than the self-control you need to exert over your magic,” Mr. Gregor says. “If you can refrain from hitting me when you are frustrated with me, you can refrain from unintentionally using your magic.”

Evelyn relaxes her hands. “People do what I want,” she says, struggling to come up with the signs. “I can't help it.”

Mr. Gregor frowns at her. “You cannot make people do anything they do not already want to do, at least somewhere deep inside.”

“I got a watch,” she presses, “I made Millie forget.”

“We have no idea what that person’s relationship with the watch might have been,” Mr. Gregor says, “Perhaps he was a recent divorcee, and it was a gift from his former spouse.”

“Oddly specific.”

“There was an inscription,” he explains. “As for Millie, although I am loath to speculate on what should be a personal matter,” Mr. Gregor continues pointedly, “I suspect her willingness to forget was tied to the emotional issues that have landed her in the hospital.”

Evelyn isn't sure about that. She's pretty sure wiping someone's memory is necessarily involuntary. Something about informed consent. She doesn't know how to say these things.

“You spoke in my head,” she signs.

“And I occupy the bodies of animals,” he agrees. “It is your decision what level of invasiveness you are comfortable with.”

Evelyn isn't convinced that everything Mr. Gregor has said is logically consistent, but she is tired and she's starting to get a headache. She takes out the hearing aid and stuffs it back in her pocket and finishes her tea and signs “good night” and rides the elevator to the top floor and collapses on the couch in front of the television while it soundlessly flashes images of other horror movies she could be watching, because she doesn't want to go into her room alone.

Chapter 29

It is Sunday. Lucas's family will be going to church; they go to church nearly every day, but Sundays are special, of course. Lucas wakes up early despite a restless night. He dresses in exercise shorts, a tank top, sneakers, and quietly creeps past Evelyn sleeping on the couch to exit through the fire escape. He climbs down the rattling metal stairs and starts at a jog down the alleyway towards the park.

The Downtown Park is not typically a popular one, since it is older and is backed by an open desert, but this morning it is swarming with workers apparently setting up for an event. Dread fills a pit in Lucas’s stomach as he runs along the familiar paths; he does not know exactly why. Graffiti on one of the park benches reads, “Burn all the Witches.”

Beyond the park he runs through a neighborhood, one of the richer ones with rows of neatly spaced adobe houses, a pool in every other backyard. A cat races out from some sort of exotic xeriscape bush, sleek and black. It trots alongside Lucas as he slows to a jog, then stops.

“What are you doing, friend?” he asks, as the cat starts rubbing his ankles, weaving between his legs. He bends down and it immediately starts rubbing its prickly whiskers on his hand. He pets it a few times, the fur strangely gritty under its softness.

“You shouldn't pet him,” someone says from nearby. He looks around and identifies the source: someone standing on the porch of the house he stopped in front of. In front of which he stopped? For some reason, Roach's mini-lecture on prepositions crosses his mind, and Lucas smiles at himself. Then he recognizes who is talking to him - the girl from the bakery, the one Roach said made them uncomfortable.

“Why not?” Lucas asks, “He seems friendly.”

“He is feral,” the girl says, stepping towards him down her driveway. “See his ear?”

Lucas looks at the cat's ear - the tip has been cleanly snipped off; the skin long healed over. The cat purrs as he rubs its ear between his fingers.

“It means he was neutered as a part of a catch-and-release program,” she explains. Now she is merely a few feet away, towering over Lucas as he crouches on the road with the cat.

“He might be feral,” Lucas says, still petting the cat, “but he's sweet.”

“He's filthy,” she says, yellow eyes flashing. “He’s probably covered in fleas.”

“He can't help that,” Lucas defends. He is starting to see why this girl makes Roach uncomfortable.

“First Corinthians 33,” she starts.

“Yeah, no,” Lucas interrupts. He stands, picking up the cat, which continues to purr in his arms. “If you hate him so much, I'll take him off your hands.” He walks away, still carrying the cat, grateful it cooperates as he storms off. Once they leave the neighborhood it jumps down, but continues to follow him back through the park, where a small platform stage has been set up, speakers have been set up, signs have been set up; down Main Street and past the Bakery, where he spots Mr. Gregor inside with the twins and Douglas.

“Wait here,” he tells the cat, absurdly, and it rubs against his ankle then sits down a few steps away and stares at him with wide green eyes.

He opens the door and pulls it closed behind him. Willow and Ash look up at the chimes and both shout and race towards him as they usually do, except he's never heard his name in Ash’s tiny new voice: in contrast to Willow’s “Lulu!”, he enunciates “Lucas” quite clearly. He crouches down and pulls both of them into a hug.

“Hey, little ones,” he murmurs, “I missed you guys.”

Willow immediately squirms away but Ash clings to him, staring grimly at his face. Lucas carries him over to the table where Mr. Gregor and Douglas are sitting and pulls his own chair over.

“Good morning, Lucas,” Mr. Gregor says calmly, as if he wasn't interrupting anything at all.

“Hey, so,” Lucas says, stalling by grabbing a chocolate croissant from the stack of yesterday's pastries between them, “Hypothetically, if I were to find a homeless cat, and -”

Mr. Gregor cuts him off. “Hypothetically?”

Just then, Willow knocks into the glass door, causing the chimes to ring. “Kitty!” she yells. The black cat is pawing at the dangling bells through the glass.

“Hypothetically, I have reason to believe he's in danger on the streets,” Lucas explains.

Douglas covers his laughter with a deep drink of too-hot coffee, while Mr. Gregor examines Lucas critically. “I am allergic to cats,” he says.

Lucas’s face drops, then he grins. “I'll keep him upstairs. It's not like you ever go up there anyway,” he says.

Sitting on his lap, Ash says, “Kitty.” Another new word. He's growing.

Mr. Gregor sighs. “Fine,” he says. “Just make sure you keep it clean.”

“Aw, thanks Mr. Gregor.” Lucas immediately starts thinking. He'll need food, bowls, a litter box, a flea comb. A cute little collar with a tiny little bell. He'll need to find a vet. He stands and places Ash down on the chair with a final hug, grabs a couple more pastries for Evelyn and Roach before leaving.

Willow is staring through the door at the patiently waiting cat outside as Lucas moves to open it. She looks up at him with curious eyes. “Kitty?” she asks.

“You can't pet him yet, but soon,” he explains, wrinkling his nose dramatically, “I think he has fleas.” He's out the door before Mr. Gregor can object.

Roach helps Lucas bathe the cat, which mostly consists of keeping it calm in the water while he combs through its soft black fur with a fine-toothed comb and dish soap to remove and kill the fleas. At first Roach is perturbed by the need to kill the insects, until they see just how much damage the fleas did to the poor cat; the bathwater quickly turns a shade of rusty pink. Then they just feel conflicted. Also, the last time they saw a cat this close it towered over them, its claws and teeth as long as one of his legs, and this new perspective is disconcerting.

“What are you going to name it?” they ask after Lucas wraps the cat up in a towel to dry.

Lucas can't think of anything. “Any ideas?”

“Mercutio,” Roach says.

“Really?” Lucas asks.

Roach thinks. “Frodo?” they ask.

“Better, but not quite.”

“James Tiberius Kirk.”

“Big name for a little guy.”

“What about just ‘the Cat’?”

Lucas scoffs. “I'm not just going to name him the Cat.” But he does; he can't think of anything better, so the name sticks. Evelyn simply refers to him by the sign for “cat.”

The Cat escapes from the towel and bolts away, darting loops through their room, fur still damp and scraggly. Roach examines the scratches left on their arm from the struggle in the bath, remarking, “I thought you said he was friendly.”

“Maybe now he associates you with baths,” Lucas suggests. The Cat slinks up to him, rubbing its damp fur on his ankles before laying down to start licking itself dry.

“You were the one bathing him,” Roach argues, “I was merely the assistant.”

“Tell that to the Cat,” Lucas says.

The Cat quickly makes a habit of never leaving Lucas alone, climbing in his lap if he sits down for even a second and weaving around between his feet if he stands or walks. As he works on his homework that evening the Cat swats at his pen, chews on the spiral binding of his notebook, rubs his face all over his arms. Lucas enjoys the regular distraction, even if it means he'll never be done with his essay.

Roach, who is somehow always done with their homework but never seems to do any, watches them play from their usual spot on the mattress. “I never thought I would be jealous of a cat,” they say mildly.

Lucas glances towards them, then spins his chair to face them fully when he's processed what they were saying. They offer a small, half smirk that makes his stomach jolt. Lucas realizes, suddenly, that this distance he has perceived between himself and Roach has been a complete fabrication. He's been wrapped up in his anxiety about his family and the insecurities his parents drilled into his head, and he's projected those emotions onto them. And Roach, being Roach, has quietly stood by, offering exactly the right distance. Wow. Evelyn’s sarcastic sign flashes through his head; they really are absurdly perfect.

Lucas waits for the inevitable “disappointed in you” to float through his head as well, but the room is only filled with the sound of the Cat purring. He realizes he has been staring at Roach for an awkwardly long time, but they just calmly regard him, black eyes never quite meeting his own. The Cat jumps off his lap and gives him an offended look as he moves to sit next to Roach on their mattress. As they kiss, Lucas waits for thoughts of sin, of damnation and hellfire, Bible verses and disappointed families, but none appear; just a dull, aching desire that grows with every touch. He pulls himself onto Roach’s lap and tugs at their shirt, pulling it over their head, and runs his hands along their smooth skin and lean muscles as they try to unbutton his own shirt, fingers trembling. They groan as he presses in closer, and he finds he really, really wants them to make that sound again. He kisses deeper, presses closer.

Buttons undone, Roach rests their hands on his thighs, and Lucas pulls back to shrug his shirt off and take a breath. The thing Evelyn said at the grocery store yesterday, before his day was ruined by seeing his siblings, flashes through his head. His heart pounding, Lucas asks, “Do you want to have sex?” because that seems like the best way to start talking about it.

Of course Roach wants to have sex, their erection throbbing between them, but they give Lucas a long, considering look before answering. “Okay.”

“Okay?” Lucas says, skeptically, “Just, okay?”

“Yes,” Roach clarifies, “I would like to have sex with you.”

“Great,” he says, and he leans in and kisses them for a while longer, and they make that sound again. “Good. Do you have a condom?”

“In my desk drawer,” Roach says.

“That is very far away,” Lucas murmurs, kissing their neck.

Roach leans their head back against the wall and sighs. “I will get the condom,” they offer, “but I need you to do something about the Cat.”

Lucas twists around to see the black cat staring dolefully down at them from his bed. He laughs and reluctantly pulls away, stands, picks up the Cat and carries it to the door. There is a knock just as he reaches it, and he opens it: Evelyn.

“No,” he signs, tossing the Cat into the hallway. “Go away.”

Evelyn's eyes slide past Lucas into the room, where Roach is standing rigidly at their desk, facing away from her. She realizes they are both shirtless. She realizes she is interrupting something very important, but she also needs to tell them something very important. 

“Urgent,” she signs. She pulls out her phone, where the video she was watching is still paused.

Lucas shakes his head. “Later,” he insists, pleading, but Evelyn just thrusts the screen in his face. His eyes flick back to Roach, hesitating, then return to focus on the recorded scene. It is a bonfire, near dark, with shaky camera work, but after a moment the location becomes clear: the park down the street. At Lucas watches, someone carrying a cardboard box strides up to the bonfire, accompanied by someone else carrying a tiki torch. As he tosses the box into the burning pile, several books tumble out.

“When was this?” he asks.

“Twenty minutes,” Evelyn signs. Holy shit. She takes the phone back and scrolls to another post, this one just a photograph of some kids from school under a “Burn All Witches” banner and turns the screen to face him.

“What the fuck,” Lucas says. He looks back at Roach, who has their shirt back on and is picking up Lucas's off the floor. “They're burning books?” he explains, not trying to make it a question but coming out that way anyway.

Roach tosses Lucas's shirt to him. “Where?”

“That park down the street.”

Lucas watches the screen as Evelyn scrolls through more pictures. One catches his eye and he takes the phone without thinking. A group of people from his church, including his brothers, casually intermingling with kids from his high school. His mouth feels dry when he tries to swallow. “I guess a casual book burning is all it takes to bring them together,” he mutters for no one to hear.

“We need to go,” Evelyn urges.

“Fuck no,” Lucas says out loud. “No way,” he signs.

“Books,” she signs.

“Not worth my life,” he says.

Roach speaks up, startling Lucas; he hadn't noticed them come up behind him. “I would not mind rescuing some books,” they say. Lucas looks at them incredulously. This is not what they should be doing right now.

“Let's go,” Evelyn says, but Lucas puts his hand out to stop them.

“You guys are going to get shot,” he says.

Roach frowns. “I do not think that is likely,” they say.

“What do you know?” Lucas asks, “Until yesterday you'd never even been to a grocery store.” Roach looks offended, and he immediately regrets it.

“I would like to go see what is happening,” they say simply. “You may stay here if you like.”

“We won't be seen,” Evelyn signs in an attempt to break the tension between them. “Look, all black.” She gestures at herself, then towards Roach; they are, indeed, wearing all black.

Lucas chews on his bottom lip. “Let me change first,” he says.

Chapter 30

“I'm sorry for cockblocking you,” Evelyn signs; the visual descriptiveness of her made-up sign makes Lucas have to suppress a reluctant laugh. They are waiting at the bottom of the fire escape - by far the easiest way of getting out of Oddities unnoticed, much to Roach’s dismay. They carefully climb down the metal staircase, cringing at every creak, hands gripping each side of the handrails while Lucas waits with their cane below. He shrugs, feigning indifference. He's really, really pissed, not just at Evelyn but also at Roach for choosing to go on this dumbass mission instead of staying with him. He shivers in the night air.

Any ideas of contacting the authorities about the event vanish quickly: a firetruck and several police cars are present in the parking lot, their drivers already participating in the activities. They approach the park from the side; the glow from the bonfire indicates the crowd isn't technically in the park, but the empty desert land beyond. The playground is dark, deserted, and out of sight; Lucas doesn't want to go any further. From the distance, they can only see shadows of the crowd, dark ghosts tossing books from stacks around the edges. The detritus of earlier festivities litters the grass between the playground and the bonfire, glinting under the pale moonlight: styrofoam cups, paper plates, plastic cutlery, signs, flyers, chips bags. The sight makes Roach feel deeply melancholic.

“I am going to try to take some of the books,” they say.

“Don't,” Lucas pleads, “We have books at home. We can go to the library.”

“They are being destroyed,” Roach says plainly.

Lucas isn't proud; he is a coward. He says, “There are other books,” and can feel the disappointment in both his friends' faces. He remains at the playground as his friends disappear into the darkness. He crouches in the cold and waits.

Evelyn recognizes some of the faces around the outskirts of the bonfire and from the peculiar looks they give she regrets not coming more prepared, bringing a mask or at least a hat. As she is thinking it, Roach reaches into their cargo pants pocket and pulls out two black face masks, the ones ostensibly everyone should still be wearing because of some virus or another. 

“Where did you get these?” she signs.

Roach shrugs; they legitimately do not know. They do not know what drove them to look in their pocket for them in the first place. They hand one over to Evelyn and put the other on over their own face. It does very little to conceal their identities, but if they stick to the shadows, it might be enough.

Not enough to prevent whispers of a witch from spreading through the crowds, Roach notices with trepidation.

The stacks of books waiting to be burned sit roped off to the side. A suggested donation of $1 lets one select a book to toss into the bonfire; Roach watches as a group makes their way through the transaction, their chest feeling tight as their eyes follow a book’s trajectory into the flames. A different part of the collective cheers each time a book is thrown in; otherwise, they mill around the desert in variously sized groups, chatting, sipping from plastic or styrofoam cups, sticking close to the bonfire for warmth. 

“Wait here,” Roach signs to Evelyn. She shrugs; she feels inexplicably drawn to the bonfire, its warmth, its light. Like the moths that inevitably flutter around candles if she tries to burn them in her room. The flickering orange flames stab at the sky, occasionally ending sharp shocks of red-hot embers sizzling down. Some members of the crowd wear traditional clothing, suggesting they are members of Lucas’s old church, and Evelyn wonders if his family is here. God forbid.

Roach approaches the table for donations and hands over a wrinkled dollar bill to a person sitting in a camp chair in front of a table. Without even breaking his discussion with the woman sitting next to him, he takes the dollar bill and drops it into a large, half full jar on the table behind them. They continue conversing and ignore Roach as they pass through to examine the stacks of books. Some are library books, from the schools and the public library. Others are store copies, dozens of identical mass-produced paperbacks. Still others look like they may have been read, once; personal donations, perhaps. Roach grabs a small paperback off the top of a pile (Fahrenheit 451, naturally), then quietly approaches the table holding the jar of donations. They swiftly reach in and grab a large handful of bills, stuffing them in their pocket before passing by the still distracted pair. Instead of throwing the book in the bonfire, they tuck it into their cargo pocket as they return to Evelyn.

Evelyn doesn't really notice Roach's approach, then she continues to ignore them even as they grab her shoulder and shake it roughly to get her attention. She stares into the fire, increasingly convinced there are eyes in it, staring back; eyes in the pages, smoldering, curling, blackening. Roach grabs her arm and starts pulling her away from the flames; why are they being so rough? They are looking past her, eyes wide and dark, and she turns her head to see: Mae Summers.

Evelyn spins around to face her mom, who immediately reaches over and rips the mask off her face. Even over the thick smoke in the dry air, she can smell the alcohol on her mom’s breath. Her mom’s mouth moves: you killed my baby, witch. Not bitch, then; Mils was right.

Mae Summers pushes her daughter, and Evelyn stumbles backwards towards the towering fire; she was not expecting it. Roach was expecting it and manages to catch her before she falls in the flames, but then their leg gives out and they both fall to the ground, one of Roach’s hands catching them on a scorching hot stone, Evelyn landing unharmed on their lap. She looks up at her mother in horror, grabs Roach’s leg, and they both disappear.

. . .

Lucas spots a small, pale figure running away from the bonfire, practically glowing, and he realizes it is Annalee. He catches up to her in a few seconds and leads her back to his hiding place behind the swirly slide. Real cool, Lucas.

“What are you doing here?” Annalee whispers as she tries to catch her breath. She glances at the darkness around them nervously, crouching to look over towards the bonfire; is she worried she was followed?

The question feels vaguely familiar to Lucas, but he hasn't seen Annalee in forever. “I was going to ask you the same thing,” he says, and he doesn't wait for an answer before pulling her into a tight hug. He is grateful when she doesn't push away, gently wraps her arms around him.

Why does this feel so familiar?

“Liz-” Annalee starts, then she catches herself. “Lucas?” He nods, his heart pounding. “Everyone is going insane,” Annalee says. The word is so strange coming out of his little sister's tempered, modest mouth. 

“I've noticed,” he says.

“I mean it, something is happening. There is an evil in the air.” Annalee looks at him, “Your friend is being accused of witchcraft. Her mother claims she's been killing unborn babies.”

“How do you know Evelyn’s mom?” Lucas asks.

“The church has expanded its relations with anyone who shares its agenda,” Annalee says mechanically, as if it has been said a hundred times already. “It's not true, is it?”

“Of course not,” Lucas lies.

They hear the scream, “Witch!” from the playground, and she looks at Lucas, panicked. The crowd’s celebratory murmur quickly escalates into chaotic chattering, then yelling, each voice trying to be heard over the last.

Annalee stands, pulling at Lucas's arm, imploring, “You should run!” He wants to run, but where the fuck are Roach and Evelyn?

“What about you?” Lucas asks, standing.

“I should get back.”

“Back there?” He is being too loud. “No way.” His phone buzzes from his pocket, indicating a text from Evelyn: get out go home. roach+me safe

“I will be safe there,” Annalee says softly, “you would not.”

Lucas texts back: k.

“Come with me,” he says, “You'll be safe there too.”

Annalee shakes her head sadly. “Mother is pregnant again,” she offers, as if that were an excuse to stay.

Lucas's stomach drops. His chest hurts. He gives his sister another hug, then turns and runs away from her. Like a fucking coward.

. . .

Evelyn and Roach reappear in the bathroom, an awkward location given the way they landed. She immediately stands, moves away to give them room and opens the toilet lid in the process; when they start retching, the bowl is right there for them to puke her nasty black flies into. Evelyn is learning, see?

Roach has never vomited before, and flies would not have been their first choice for their first experience with it. The black, bristly hairs stick in their throat and tongue and they continue to gag for a long time until Evelyn passes over a glass of lukewarm tap water.

“Sorry,” she signs, watching them gulp the water down, “it's not that bad for me.” As in, she's pretty sure she does not swallow flies. God she better not be swallowing any flies.

A throbbing pain in their hand screams for Roach’s attention. Their palm is already blistered, indicating a second degree burn, their fingers sore and reddened. Then, they realize where they are, and say, “You left Lucas behind.” They struggle to stand, pulling up one handed with the countertop because their cane is missing.

Evelyn already texted Lucas, but Roach isn't paying attention to her hands as she tries to explain this to them. She waves her phone at them, the text and Lucas’s reply open on the screen.

“That is not acceptable,” they say, limping painfully out of the bathroom, leaning against the wall for support. Their leg hurts quite a lot after falling, after Evelyn landed on it instead of the fire, and Roach sincerely hopes they have not damaged it further. They make it down the hall, ignoring Evelyn’s silent protests; past the kitchen and dining room, the foyer, the living room. They make it to the first set of stairs on the fire escape before collapsing to the metal grate floor, gasping with exhaustion and weeping with frustration. Roach did not realize how much they relied on their cane until now. Evelyn sits down quietly next to them, and Roach wonders why she has not simply teleported back to the park to get Lucas. They dangle their legs off the fire escape and hang on the railing and stare down the dimly lit alleyway, waiting.

He appears as a shadow on the pavement, shrinking and growing and changing directions as he jogs past the evenly spaced lights illuminating the back doors of the Main Street shops. Roach watches him run down the alley then stop in the pool of light behind the Bakery. They realize he cannot see them, sitting in the darkness, and call out, “Lucas!”

Lucas steps out of the light and squints into the darkness above, his eyes eventually making out two forms on the fire escape above. “You guys decided to just fucking leave me there?” he shouts. He didn't realize he was angry, but he is livid.

“I apologize,” Roach says, their voice sounding somehow thinner; too quiet for the distance between them but too loud for the darkness. “I was unable to go back.”

Lucas trudges up the stairs and is tempted to stalk past them, but Evelyn intercepts him, thrusting her phone in his face.

> it was my fault i did the fly thing and took them with me. roach saved me please don't blame them

Evelyn’s face looks so sad and sincere when he returns the phone, like she's about to cry. Roach stays silent, sitting there on the fire escape, watching him carefully. They smell like smoke. Evelyn is signing something, but Lucas ignores her.

“I'm going to bed,” he says, pushing through the door and into the apartment. The Cat follows him to his room, watches him change and crawl under his blanket, then jumps up and curls up on his stomach. Roach enters the room several minutes later, limping heavily, and Lucas realizes they are missing their cane. He wants to ask what happened, but he is also really, really mad at Roach for getting them all into this in the first place. The Cat purrs soothingly on his chest, and Lucas pretends not to watch as Roach slides their pants off before sitting on their chair in their boxers. They wince as they rub their thigh one-handed, the other resting awkwardly on their desk.

Lucas sits up and the Cat flops onto his lap, glaring disdainfully. “Are you hurt?” he asks.

“Somewhat,” Roach answers. “No permanent damage, I think.”

Lucas pushes the Cat off his lap so he can stand, pulls his chair over to sit next to Roach. They hold out their hand to reveal a shiny, swollen blister on their palm, and Lucas cringes. “Hang on,” he signs, and he leaves to find the first aid kit, still on Millie's desk; it's been getting a lot of use lately. He notices Evelyn isn't in her room.

Roach rinses the burn under cool water, far too late to do much for stopping the burn, then washes their hand with soap and pats it dry with a towel while Lucas globs burn cream on a wound pad. He gently places the dressing on their burned palm and loosely wraps it with gauze. He examines Roach’s leg, pushing the fabric of their boxers up to past the surgical scars where a deep, purplish bruise is forming. Lucas traces his fingers over them, gently. Finally, he asks, “What happened?”

“Evelyn's mother tried to push her into the fire,” Roach says. “I caught her, but not very well.”

“What the fuck,” Lucas says, “is she okay?”

Roach hesitates, then says, “I doubt it.” Lucas looks up at him, surprised. “I think you should go talk to her.”

Chapter 31

Evelyn is sitting in the center of the couch, hugging her knees to her chest, watching infomercials on a muted TV. Lucas sits down next to her and pulls her into her arms, but she remains curled up, tipping over to lean into his hug. He is reminded of his panic attack and tries to remember what happened that day. Evelyn is breathing normally, just acting blank. Indifferent.

Evelyn is fucking tired. She is tired of everyone having a problem with her or being everyone's problem. Being accused of witchcraft was tolerable, since there are flies and everything, but her mom accusing her of killing babies is fucking unacceptable. If she was still pregnant the last time Evelyn saw her, she was also trashed out of her mind; witchcraft had nothing to do with it.

The Cat jumps up and worms its way onto Evelyn's lap, making her relax her tight stance somewhat, let go of her knees so she can pet him. He starts purring and she can feel the warm vibrations through his fur, and it soothes her more. Eventually she hands the remote to Lucas, and he picks Star Trek, naturally, and he doesn't turn on the sound. She falls asleep with her head on his lap before the first ship even appears on the screen.

. . .

Millie is asleep.

She was cooperative all day, so she thought, maybe, they wouldn't give her the sleeping pill, accept that she doesn't need it, but they did. Then she thought she wouldn't dream, the pill would block her dreams again, but here she is.

The reason Millie knows that she is asleep is because the wounds on her arms are all gaping open, bloodless. The most recent reveals shiny striations of muscle. It is quite horrifying to look at. She investigates it all very thoroughly.

Millie is at school, not the hospital where she is laying in her cold, generic medical bed. She finds the bathroom, the one with the “Evelyn had an abortion” graffiti. There is nothing written on any of the walls in the dream school, which is a damn shame. She wishes she had a sharpie and then she does, so she writes “Millie loves Evelyn” in big, loopy writing on the mirror.

Evelyn is behind her in the reflection and says, “Still?” The word appears on the mirror in her handwriting.

Millie whirls around, half expecting Evelyn not to be there still but she is, and Mils throws her arms around her. “I miss you so much,” she says into Evelyn’s neck.

Evelyn tries not to recoil from the gaping slices in the flesh of Millie’s arm. She thinks she might be dreaming. “I think I'm dreaming,” she says, and the words spill out from her mouth and land on Millie’s back.

“I know,” Millie signs. Her next words come out like looping candy canes that shatter when they hit the ground. “Isn't it great?” She starts floating, and her skin turns hot pink with jagged blue bolts of electricity swimming all over.

“How do you do that?” Evelyn signs.

“You just think and it happens,” Millie says, laughing, the words laughing, the eyes all watching and laughing too. She tries to ignore them.

“What if I think the wrong thing?” Evelyn's words are jagged lines.

“Evelyn,” Millie says as she floats back down to stand in front of her, “your brain is a bag of wet sugar and fats and lightning bolts.” It is a rough paraphrase from one of the counselors, therapists, or psychiatrists Millie met; she doesn't know which. Her skin turns back to normal except for her words scrawled in blue ink on her arm, the one not completely mangled. “You have to go easy on yourself if the thoughts don't come out right the first time.”

“What the fuck?” Evelyn says, the words spilling out like strawberry jello, and then she leans forward and kisses Millie and she tastes like strawberry jello, too.

“I really hate the eyes,” Millie signs.

Evelyn gazes around as if seeing them for the first time, the eyes that are always staring around here, so many of them she's actually used to it. “We could turn off the lights,” she suggests.

“Didn't we try that?” Millie wonders in cornflower blue.

“Did we?”

Millie says, “Why are we in a bathroom?”

“We’re dreaming,” Evelyn explains, the words prancing away like small deer.

“About a bathroom?” Millie looks incredulous as she signs.

Evelyn turns out the light. They kiss. Someone turns on the light. He grabs Millie’s arm and presses his thumb inside the biggest wound, pushing through muscle, to bone, further and further and further.

. . .

Evelyn wakes the next morning exhausted, which is usual for her, and rattled, which is not. She is still on the couch, her head in Lucas’s lap as he sleeps slumped over the armrest. She had a really fucking weird dream that she barely remembers, and she really misses Mils. She sits up and rubs her face, her eyes, her short fluffy hair. 

Lucas wakes with a start and a crick in his neck from sleeping on the arm rest. He looks at the clock on his phone and says, “Shit,” because they have five minutes before they need to leave for school. He nudges Evelyn and shows her the time, and she gets up and hurries down the hall to get ready.

Roach retrieves a new cane from a pile of them in the shop. “It's probably cursed,” Lucas grumbles. They have to hold it in the wrong hand because the other one has a large, painful blister on the palm, which also means they have to adjust their gait, which adds to the all-consuming discomfort surrounding their leg. Roach is in an unusual amount of pain, and it is putting them in a very foul mood.

Evelyn is also not talking, not signing, not paying attention to the world around her. That is not terribly uncommon for Evelyn, but it still makes Lucas feel lonelier, isolated between his friends. He also keeps remembering that he's pissed at them for ruining his night and leaving him behind when he didn't even want to go investigate in the first place. And also at himself for leaving Annalee behind. His stomach hurts.

. . .

Millie does not wake up screaming, even though she definitely was in her head, in her dream; but here in her bed she is paralyzed, a head with no body for several moments after she wakes. So, the scream stays locked up inside, where it belongs; because waking up screaming in a mental hospital is one of those things that keeps you there longer than necessary.

Millie remembers her dream, as though it had just happened: the school, Evelyn, strawberry jello. The lights off and Evelyn’s lips, soft and sweet and so real. Then that man, why him? Superintendent Brent Smalls digging his thumb into Millie’s bicep.

When she can move, she immediately examines her arm, but it is still neatly wrapped in gauze to protect the stitches; a dozen of them she can feel pulling at her skin. She breathes a sigh of relief, because getting hurt in a mental hospital is also one of those things that keeps you there longer than necessary. She glances over towards her roommate, whose name she still does not know. She doesn't know anyone's name, here - they all pour through her head like sand. All of Millie’s thoughts pour through her head like sand, now, and she has to sift through it to find the useful gems. Millie attributes this sensation of sluggishness to a side effect of the medication she obediently swallows in front of the nurse.

. . .

There is a small crowd gathered around a new display in the common area of the high school, just past the main entrance and therefore unavoidable to cross. A portion of the wall is now decorated with the words, “Wall of Shame”; below it is a handful of polaroid photographs of students, each carrying a white board with their crime written in black marker. They are too far away to really see the pictures, but no one has the inclination to push deeper into the crowd to investigate.

“I'm glad we got off before they started this,” Lucas says, gently nudging Roach, who winces.

“I believe this is Mr. Smalls's attempt at a pillory,” Roach says, then they continue wordlessly to their first class. They do not talk to Lucas for the rest of the day.

Evelyn is immediately sent to the attendance office by her homeroom teacher, where she is admonished and photographed with the word “Truancy” for her absences last week. She inspects her new place on the Wall of Shame and recognizes one of the other pictures, the stoner kid whose broad grin, red eyes, and sloppily scrawled “DRUGS” are oddly endearing. Although they share several classes, they do not talk; no one talks to Evelyn, especially not after they fuck. Except Millie. The next time she sees him, she passes a note. “congrats on making the wall o shame”. It returns a few minutes later with the addition, “got there before u without even trying.” She looks up and he's twisted around to face her, a lazy grin on his face; he winks, then turns back to his desk.

Roach is sitting on a bench outside the school, looking vacant, after the final bell rings. “I cannot walk home,” they explain when Lucas finally tracks them down, “Mr. Gregor will pick me up after getting the twins.” Roach has their copy of Fahrenheit 451 in their hands but they are not reading it, just flipping the pages back and forth restlessly. They feel tense and irritable. They are in an extraordinary amount of pain; not the same as when they originally broke the femur, sure, but this one is more insistent, demanding their constant attention.

“I'll wait with you,” Lucas offers, sitting on the other end of the bench while Evelyn starts the walk home alone. Distance.

“You do not have to,” they respond, but of course Lucas wants to. To him it sounds like they don't want him to be there. It is more like Roach does not want to be here at all; they want to curl up and shrink and crawl away with a perfectly functional exoskeleton. They stare at nothing in front of them, flicking relentlessly through the soft pages of an old paperback.

Lucas wants to hold their hand. Instead, he says, “I saw Annalee last night.”

Flick, flick, flicking, Roach asks, “At the park?”

“The whole family was at the bonfire, but she found me at the playground.”

Pages rustle. “How is she doing?”

“Fine, I guess,” he says. “Evelyn never told me what happened at the fire.”

A sigh. “I left Evelyn alone to rescue this book and steal seventeen dollars in donations,” they say, their usual monotone tinted with something like irritation. “When I returned, I noticed her mother approaching, and tried to pull her away, but she did not respond. Evelyn’s mother yelled at her, then attempted to push her into the fire. I caught her but was thrown off balance in my effort and we both fell. That is when I hurt my leg and burned my hand. The next thing I knew I was vomiting black flies in the hallway bathroom.”

“Evelyn brought you with her?”

“That is my assumption,” Roach says. “I tried to go back for you, but I did not make it very far.” 

“I wish we had just stayed home,” Lucas says.

“Then you would not have seen your sister,” Roach points out.

Lucas is grateful for the arrival of Mr. Gregor’s Bentley, because he doesn't have a response. He sits in the back seat with the twins, crowded from the dual car seats. He listens to Roach politely decline a trip to the doctor to look at their leg and watches them disappear inside as soon as the car is parked. He helps get Ash and Willow out of their car seats and asks Mr. Gregor when he's going to start working again, accepting a shrug for a response. He climbs up the stairs. Evelyn is sitting on what has apparently become her spot on the couch, petting the Cat.

“Your cat is great,” she signs. 

“I know,” he replies. The Cat has a purr that's, like, instantly soothing. Lucas is a little sure it's magic.

Lucas finds Roach exactly where he expects in their room and has come prepared with acetaminophen and an ice pack. They are back to shuffling through the pages of the book, too distracted to read it. Lucas sits down next to them and places the ice pack on their leg. He takes their hand, the one wrapped in gauze, and sets it gently down on top of the ice. He says, “You stole seventeen dollars?”

Roach puts the book aside and finally looks at Lucas. “The bonfire was a fundraiser for some hate group. They were soliciting donations in exchange for books to burn. I pilfered some bills out of the jar on my way out.” They actually use the word pilfered.

It is quiet for a while, then Roach says, “I am sorry for making you go out last night. I regret not staying home.”

“Me too,” Lucas says. More silence. He asks, “Did you have any crazy dreams last night?”

Roach tilts their head curiously. “I do not dream.”

“Of course you don't,” Lucas says, not trying to sound derisive but coming across so anyway. He chews on the inside of his cheek, which is already shredded. “Sorry,” he says. “I feel like I was up all night, but I don't remember anything.”

“That is unfortunate.”

A sound behind him: the Cat has pawed the door open and starts meowing enthusiastically as soon as Lucas acknowledges him. “Crap, I need to feed him,” he says, and he stands.

“Can you help me up?” Roach asks, extending a hand. Lucas pulls them up then hugs them for a long, long time. They say, “I need to make dinner.”

Lucas lets go and they wobble a bit. “Can I help?” he asks.

“Okay.”

Chapter 32

Willow watches with rapt fascination as the Cat consumes his cat food. Evelyn looks through a book with Ash, who is now picking up words faster than signs because he is not deaf, just quiet, and that makes her sad. She signs the words in the book and Ash copies her with tiny, fragile fingers. Lucas and Roach work close together in the kitchen, preparing fajitas for everyone. Mr. Gregor comes upstairs, sniffling pointedly at the Cat, and joins them for an excellent dinner.

If only Millie was here.

Millie eats canned fruit for lunch and canned vegetables for dinner. She talks about her feelings to a group of nameless, faceless others and paints a rainbow with harmless, non-toxic children’s paints. She watches as a nurse replaces the bandages over her arm, using surgical tape to keep her from messing with the stitches. She remembers the dream last night; every cut she's ever had, open and gaping. It does not look that bad. She takes her medication. A sleeping pill.

Evelyn helps Mr. Gregor put the twins to bed. She ignores the homework piling up behind her and stares blankly at a mute television until her eyes are dried out and burning.

Lucas sits at his desk doing homework, getting distracted every five seconds by the Cat, while Roach showers. After their shower Roach investigates their burned palm, the swollen, pus-filled blister, before replacing the bandaging. They exit the bathroom wearing boxers and Lucas says “Jesus wept.” Not because of their skinny brown chest and smooth lines of muscle but because of the enormous purple bruise on their leg. Not that he was looking anywhere near there or anything.

Roach crosses the room to sit carefully on their bed. “I apologize for my sour mood today,” they say, “I have been preoccupied.”

“With your leg? Maybe you should go to a doctor.”

“It is not just my leg,” Roach says. They pause, thinking. “I have read a lot of books these past few weeks,” they explain, “including this one.” They gesture towards the rescued paperback, but Lucas hasn't read it. He really doesn't want to admit that. “Never is the burning of books an indication of positive change,” Roach concludes.

“Like pinning kids’ faces up in a public Wall of Shame?” Lucas asks.

“Precisely.”

. . .

Lucas dreams of Millie and Evelyn. They are all in the school and the two of them clearly do not want him around. Eyes are all around, staring, and he is trying to convince them of something very important. What is so important? The word gym floats in front of his head like a basketball and Evelyn is shaking her head.

“No way,” she signs, “The gym is gross.”

It is urgent they come with him to the gym. He grabs their hands and pulls them down the hallway, an endless hallway. The lockers have eyeballs instead of numbers that track their progress. When they finally reach the gym, Lucas opens the door to reveal a dozen of their classmates, each imprisoned in a pillory.

Evelyn says, “What the fuck?” The words expand as fog and make the gym smell like pepto. She recognizes the stoner kid, his head and hands bound in wood.

He grins at her and salutes, “Hey.”

“We're dreaming,” Millie signs.

“Why?” Lucas asks. What the hell kind of question is that?

Evelyn ignores their protests as she storms through the gym. She reaches the stoner kid and pulls at the lock keeping the frame closed. It collapses into ants that crawl all over her arms, but before she can finish freeing him, she is grabbed from behind by someone. He drags Evelyn to her own post, forcing her arms and head through the holes. As he walks away, she recognizes him: Superintendent Brent Smalls.

Lucas and Millie stand freely on the gym floor, staring at Evelyn. “This is stupid,” she admonishes them, “We're asleep.” It comes out letter by letter, as if printed by typewriter. Lucas thinks about Roach, who claims to never dream. Lucas thinks that's bullshit; they probably just don't remember their dreams. Then again, Roach isn't here, and he is.

Millie walks up to Evelyn’s post. A sign over her head says, “WITCH.” It says, “WHORE.” Then, “TRUANT.” She leans in and kisses Evelyn, whose head is at a rather painful angle right now, thanks. Evelyn pulls her head out of the narrow hole, her flesh a liquid mass of maggots, then her hands. They kiss again and disappear from the gym.

Leaving Lucas behind. Again. Thanks. He tries to leave the gym, but he is grabbed by Mr. Smalls and dragged to something that might resemble an office.

“How did they do that?” Mr. Smalls demands. He has claws that grip into Lucas’s flesh and teeth like a wolf’s. He has eyes that pierce into Lucas's soul. A voice that makes his teeth rattle.

“I don't know what you're talking about,” Lucas says.

“DO NOT END A SENTENCE WITH A PREPOSITION,” Mr. Smalls yells, his breath hot like acid.

“This isn't Latin class,” Lucas retorts, and he wonders where that came from. Then he remembers - Roach. It was a rule created by a dead old white guy who wanted English to be more perfect like Latin. He wishes Roach were here. He wishes he was in the booth with Roach. He wishes he was fucking Roach from behind like a real guy.

. . .

Evelyn wakes with a start, as though a lightning bolt has zapped through her brain. A bag of sugar and fats and lightning bolts. She can't remember where that came from.

Millie wakes with a start, as though crashing to the Earth after a long fall. She cannot move, but she remembers the dream: Lucas, Evelyn, the stockades. Evelyn's list of transgressions flashes through her mind as she works to remember her limbs.

Some stoner kid, whose name is actually Andy, wakes up from a weird-ass dream. He has a crick in his neck as though he had been bent at an odd angle all night. He remembers the gym, the pillories, the deaf girl trying to rescue him. He’s fucking tired. He chugs a Red Bull and takes a hit off his vape and shakes it off.

Lucas wakes feeling sluggish and horny. The Cat is a heavy weight on his chest. He dresses quickly to go for a run. He passes by Evelyn, who barely acknowledges him from the couch. Why won't she sleep in her room? Millie, obviously. He climbs down the fire escape and starts to run. He runs and runs and runs, avoiding the street where he found the Cat.

Roach is in the bathroom brushing their teeth when Lucas returns, sweating and no less tired, the yearning between his legs no less pressing. “Sorry,” he says, “I need to shower before school.” 

Roach shrugs, watching him in the mirror as he passes by to turn on the water because it takes forever to heat up. They continue watching as he peels off his damp, sweat-soaked shirt. Roach has been brushing their teeth for an inordinately long time and reluctantly pulls their eyes away from Lucas to spit into the sink and rinse their toothbrush.

Lucas comes up behind them and wraps his arms around them, slipping his hands underneath their shirt to feel their smooth skin, pushing his fingers further down into their pants. He rubs their penis and traces along the folds of skin behind it. Roach groans. They reach back with their unbandaged hand and start fingering him through the fly of his boxers. Lucas rests his head on Roach's back and unbuttons their pants and strokes their dick until they come into the sink with a grunt. He takes his shower quickly, the water lukewarm.

. . .

Millie has been a model patient; so perfect, in fact, that in her few short days at the hospital she has made a record turnaround in her reported mental and emotional health.

“You can see where that might be a red flag, I think,” the psychiatrist says, peering at Millie over her notes.

“I have been sleeping really well here,” Millie justifies, “I think I just needed some time to reorganize my thoughts.”

“And yet you insist you do not need the sleeping pills each night,” the doctor remarks.

“They have these side effects?” Millie says; it was not supposed to be a question. “I wake up and I can't move.”

“Sleep paralysis is not an unheard-of side effect,” the doctor agrees, “but why haven't you mentioned this to a nurse?”

“I didn't think it was relevant.”

“You were waking up paralyzed and you thought that was normal?”

“No,” Millie says, frustrated. “I just knew it was probably a side effect.”

The psychiatrist writes some more in her notes. She asks, “Do you have any thoughts of hurting yourself?”

*No.”

“Do you have any thoughts of hurting others?”

“No.”

“Do you have any thoughts of suicide?”

“No.”

More writing. “Well, Mildred,” the doctor finally says, “I will say I am impressed with your apparent progress. If you can keep this up, we might have you home by the end of the week.”

The end of the week? It's Tuesday.

. . .

Lucas and Roach are dissecting an earthworm in biology. The syllabus has them going through a series of dissections starting with worms and progressing up through fetal pigs. Lucas is not sure how he feels about that.

Roach thought they would be squeamish about the worm, as they were about Evelyn’s horror movies, but instead they find themselves fascinated looking at the insides of the simple annelid and eager to continue through the progression. Lucas lets them take the scalpel and do the dirty work.

“Earthworms are hermaphroditic,” Roach explains, “see?” They poke at a yellowish lump inside the dead worm with a needle. “Seminal vesicles,” they say. They move the needle to a smaller yellowish lump nearby. “Spermatheca. The ovaries are too small to see.”

Lucas scribbles the labels to the corresponding parts on his worksheet, a diagram that looks almost nothing like the real thing splayed out in front of them. “So, what, do they just mate with themselves?”

Roach gives him a perplexing look. “No,” they explain, “Earthworms reproduce sexually. There is a mutual insemination and both members will eventually lay eggs.”

“A mutual insemination,” Lucas repeats. He flips his worksheet back and forth. “Roach,” he says, “That isn't even a part of the assignment.”

“No, I just thought it was interesting.”

Lucas thinks Roach is interesting. He watches them carefully cut apart a dead worm and tries not to remember their fingers inside him. That the two thoughts are capable of occupying his head at the same time is mildly revolting. Cognitive dissonance.

“How's your leg?” he asks to change the subject in his own head.

“Hurts, but tolerable,” Roach answers. They have been alternating acetaminophen and ibuprofen and wishing they had the painkillers given in the hospital. They walked to school but have already texted Mr. Gregor to pick them up after school because they have no desire to walk back. Their palm throbs under the oozing blister. Roach does not remember the cockroach body being so fragile and slow to repair. “Cockroaches can lose an entire leg and grow it back during their next molt,” they mutter.

Lucas looks at them strangely. Roach recognizes that look; it is the look they get when they have crossed some invisible line in the obscure game that is human normalcy. 

“Maybe you should go to a doctor,” Lucas says.

“You may be correct about that,” they say softly.

Cleaning up after this experiment involves unceremoniously dumping the dissected worm into the trash and rinsing off the tools and tray, which Lucas offers to do since Roach did all the work before. And also because they look miserable every time they have to stand.

The bell rings as soon as he gets back to their table and Roach has to stand, anyway. They follow Lucas out of the room and down the hall and stop in front of the dual set of restroom doors. Each has a sign with a stick figure and a letter signifying who is permitted in the room behind. Neither has the letter X.

Here is the thing: Roach has to pee. In all this time, Roach has been compliant with the ludicrous rule regarding in which restroom they are allowed to do so (a single private restroom near the front office), because it usually provided a net benefit (i.e. an excuse to not be in class). On the other hand, Roach does not want to limp all the way to the front office, ask for the key, limp to the restroom, limp back to the office to return the key, and then limp back to their class which is about 20 feet away, currently.

The idea is, frankly, absurd.

Lucas watches Roach’s eyes dart uncertainly between the two doors and understands. Lucas has always been compliant with the rule too, because he does not want to cause trouble and also because he can't use a urinal anyway. He glances up and down the hallway, which is not terribly crowded, and quickly pulls Roach through the door marked “F.” The room is blissfully empty. Lucas waits outside the stalls as Roach pees, then cringes internally when the door opens and an unknown girl enters. She immediately gives Lucas a suspicious glare.

“You shouldn't be here,” she says.

“Yes I should,” he retorts, flicking the ever-present, always visible ID card with its bold pink F.

The girl narrows her eyes then strides over to one of the sinks and begins playing with her hair in the mirror. Her eyes keep flickering towards Lucas in the mirror. She pulls out her phone and starts typing away as she exits the bathroom.

Roach leaves the stall and quickly washes their hands. Lucas moves to open the door for them and check the hallway and is greeted by a school resource officer, a stout middle-aged woman who reminds Lucas weirdly of his mother.

“What are you doing in here?” she demands.

“Peeing?” Lucas says, gesturing towards his ID. The resource officer glances between his face and the photograph from the beginning of the school year. His hair has only gotten longer.

“What about him?” she asks, gesturing towards Roach. 

“Washing my hands,” they respond calmly. They toss a wet, brown paper towel into the trash and limp towards the door. “If you will excuse me, now I would like to leave.”

Her eyes zero in on the black X on Roach’s ID. “Nope,” she says, “You're coming with me.”

“What the fuck?” Lucas says, “They didn't do anything.” 

“Language,” the resource officer chides, “And he knows the rules. You both do.”

“The rules are bullshit,” Lucas says, “And Roach is a they.”

. . .

Lucas writes “Insubordination” on his whiteboard and grimaces at the instant camera’s flash. His stomach hurts.

Roach writes “noncompliance” on theirs. They are blinking in their photo for the Wall of Shame.

They are each assigned to detention after school.

Neither of their troubles approach Evelyn’s. She skips class after lunch and finds herself behind the baseball equipment shed with stoner kid.

“Hey,” he signs. He says, “Did you come to take another vape of mine?”

They sit side by side against the wall, passing his vape back and forth. Evelyn rolls her eyes at the cloud he makes. She signs, “What is your name?”

He shrugs.

She writes, “name?” on the back of his hand and he writes, “andy” on the back of hers. Andy is not surprised Evelyn doesn’t know his name. He knows her name because she is the only deaf kid, and also because it is disparaged in every bathroom in the school. She scrawls her phone number on his hand, and he does the same for her.

“You wanna fuck?” Andy signs, mostly because it's one of the few things he knows how to say.

Evelyn signs, “No.” She signs, “I'm in love with someone.”

Andy shrugs. This is Andy's relationship with sex: like Evelyn, he enjoys having sex. He wants to fuck anyone who is willing; girls, guys, nonbinaries. He has no desire to form an attachment to people. Evelyn would maybe understand his sentiment, if it weren't for Millie.

Andy likes Evelyn; she's cool. She's a lot more exciting than most of the kids in school, if even half the graffiti about her is to be believed. He hopes she doesn't get her heart broken. He really hopes she doesn't break someone else’s heart. He doesn't know how to tell her this, but then it doesn't matter - a school resource officer has discovered them both behind the shed. Andy moves to hide his vape but finds it gone. In its place in the sand is a swarm of ants.

. . .

“Drugs?” Mr. Gregor admonishes, “Evelyn, you disappoint me.” He has just emerged from yet another meeting with the administration of this school. He is starting to believe perhaps Millie is the glue that holds his life together. Without her, everyone is coming apart. 

“A-L-L-E-G-E-D-L-Y,” she fingerspells. Technically she's only suspended for being out of bounds; they could find no evidence of drug paraphernalia on her, and Mr. Gregor declined to sign his consent for a drug test. He doesn't need one; he can see it in Evelyn’s eyes, red and distraught. He is somewhat impressed that she spelled the word correctly. He notices the name scrawled on her hand in ink, a phone number underneath, and decides not to ask.

Mr. Gregor is also greatly perturbed by the Wall of Shame display in the school; the faces of three out of four of his school-aged dependents stare down at him. Evelyn’s is there twice: once for truancy and once for trespassing.

“Roach and Lucas?” Evelyn asks.

This is a touchier subject; Mr. Gregor’s heart rate still has not recovered from the intensive argument he had with the school principal over the ridiculous rule regarding the school bathrooms. The principal refused to back down, pointing to district policies, and suggested he contact the superintendent, who is a person Mr. Gregor neither wants to meet nor discuss with Evelyn.

“I have excused them for the afternoon,” he says, “Since I have to pick them up anyway.” Mr. Gregor cannot abide a child getting detention for using the bathroom. They wait a few moments longer in the common room, staring at the Wall of Shame; Lucas arrives, then Roach, and Mr. Gregor drives them all back to Oddities.

Chapter 33

The week drags on. Roach remains reluctantly compliant with the rules. Their leg continues to hurt with each step. The blister on their hand pops in an absolutely fascinating gush of translucent, watery fluid, revealing sensitive, shiny red flesh underneath, which is a slight upgrade, Roach thinks. 

Millie continues to be a model patient, even after the sleeping pill is removed from her nightly schedule. She remembers less of her dreams without the narcotic. The last night of the sleeping pill, she dreamed this: two of her friends were imprisoned in the stockades in the gym. Some other people in the school Millie does not care about were also imprisoned, but Roach was absent. There were no locks - shouldn't there have been locks? - no visible way to free their heads or hands at all. She ran out of the gym to find the woodshop classroom, but there were no tools. What a useless woodshop. Then Evelyn joined her, because Evelyn can teleport as flies, which makes no sense at all when you really think about it. Then she kind of forgot about Lucas all together. Sorry, Lucas.

After that night, she can only recall glimpses; always Evelyn, always a feeling of terror and exhaustion. But the details wash away when she wakes up without sleep paralysis, immediately able to move. It's a trade-off.

She still takes a pill every day from a paper cup. She still attends the therapies and says the same bland, impersonal facts about emotional negativity and personal fears and intrusive thoughts. She understands her perfection as a patient is a red flag but has no way of normalizing it without risking revealing too much; she believes in magic and teleporting flies, after all. Her stitches itch but she does not scratch them. She realizes, importantly, that her conviction of bugs underneath her skin was illogical. That should be enough, Millie thinks.

On Friday, Roach finally consents to go to the doctor about their leg. Lucas comes along for moral support; it has nothing to do with missing school, he assures Mr. Gregor. Never mind that all Lucas can do is wait in the cafeteria while Roach is wheeled away for an X-ray.

He interrogates Mr. Gregor while they wait. “Why haven't you gone out to visit Millie?” He worries she feels abandoned, alone in a hospital a hundred miles away while they're all here pretending nothing happened.

Mr. Gregor levels his gaze at Lucas. “I am needed here,” he says simply.

“So you don't even know how she's doing?”

“I have been in contact with both Millie and her physician all week,” Mr. Gregor says sternly. “None of this is any of your concern.”

“I have every right to be concerned about Millie,” Lucas retorts.

Mr. Gregor breathes a long-suffering sigh. “She will be home soon,” he promises.

The hospital has its own version of the school’s Wall of Shame, consisting of photographs of patients labeled with their self-inflicted afflictions: drugs and overdoses, fighting, accidental injuries caused by recklessness. Roach remarks how this must be a violation of privacy rights somehow, and the nurse pushing their chair through the corridors has no answer. “It's just policy,” he says with a shrug.

“Your policies are illegal,” Roach points out.

“Look, man,” the nurse says, helping them onto the X-ray bed, “I don't make the rules. I'm just a nurse.” He leaves the room so the radiologist can flood the room with gamma rays. Roach thinks about the nurse’s indifference. They think that his policy towards policies is probably one of the things most fundamentally wrong with the world around them.

Roach has cracked the bone around the titanium rod holding their femur together, delaying the healing process even more as they continued to walk around on it. Nothing unmanageable, but they leave the hospital on crutches, which are slightly easier on their burned hand. They are mildly disappointed not to be given any stronger painkillers.

. . .

It is Friday evening and Evelyn is alone. The twins are asleep, and Mr. Gregor is in the basement, and she's pretty sure Lucas and Roach are fucking in their room; she's not about to interrupt them. Again. She does have the Cat to pet, which is nice. She is fucking exhausted.

Evelyn texts Andy.

> sup?

He replies with a picture of a neatly rolled joint and a series of question marks. She responds:

> where?

They meet at the park down the street. There is no bonfire, no evidence of the event at all; the litter has been picked up, the signs removed. Only some written graffiti: “Burn all the Witches” with an arrow pointing to Evelyn’s name underneath the word witches.

They sit against a low wall surrounding the locked public bathrooms, passing the joint back and forth. Evelyn actually puts her hearing aid in, just so they can talk.

“Why do they hate you so much?” Andy asks.

“Good question,” Evelyn says while signing. “I guess I'm a witch?” The sign involves an evil sneer and using a finger as a long, crooked nose. She looked it up.

Andy laughs. “Uh huh.”

Evelyn disappears into a cloud of flies. They hover there for a few seconds, then she reappears.

“Oh, shit,” Andy says. He's not that high. He stubs the joint out on the sidewalk.

“I don't know,” Evelyn signs. It is understandable as a gesture.

“Can you go places?”

“Anywhere,” she signs.

“Can you get me a Red Bull?” he asks.

Evelyn disappears for a minute. The cloud of flies has already dissipated when she returns, two unnecessarily large cans of caffeinated energy drinks in her hands.

“Sweet,” Andy says. He flips the tab and chugs half the can, then pulls a bag of weed from his pocket to roll another joint. “Why don't you go visit your girlfriend, then?” he asks. He doesn't know the details, except that Evelyn has been pining after the absent girl all week.

“I don't know where she is,” she explains.

Andy lights the joint and inhales deeply, holding the smoke as he passes it to Evelyn. “Have you looked?” he asks, exhaling.

She shrugs.

“Have you been having some weird-ass dreams this week?” Andy asks, suddenly. Evelyn looks at him like he's sprouted cat ears, passing the joint back. “I think your girlfriend's been in my dreams.”

“Ew,” she says.

“No really. Mils right?” The nickname in his voice, through the tiny speaker in her ear, makes her chest tighten. “White-blond hair, intense as fuck blue eyes? You were there too, don't worry,” he adds, winking.

Evelyn shrugs again. Andy isn't in any of Millie's classes and has no reason to know her, but he's probably seen them around. Her head feels pleasantly light and the sky overhead is an impossibly deep purple blue. She declines the joint when Andy offers it again.

“Weird shit is happening,” he observes. He takes a last hit and puts it out. “It's the Roach,” he says, referring to the joint; but then he says, “You're friends with them, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Do they smoke?”

Evelyn shakes her head. Roach would be insufferable if they smoked; they would never shut up about millipede antennae or bee orgasms or whatever. She has a brief, bizarre concern about whether Roach knows that monogamy is the default expectation in relationships. She wants Andy to shut up. She takes her hearing aid out and sticks it in her pocket and they sit in silence, watching the moon, for almost an hour before she heads home.

. . .

“Where are you?” Evelyn asks. The words flitter around Millie’s head like birds.

“We're at school,” Millie says, the words tasting like chalk. She looks around at the endless hallways. “We're dreaming,” she reminds herself. She wants to eat these words, stretching like saltwater taffy in front of her.

“I know,” Evelyn signs. “Where are you, really?”

Millie considers the question. She gazes down at her arm, where every cut she has ever given herself gapes open like mouths. “The hospital,” she answers finally. The words have a strange, chemical taste to them.

“I know,” Evelyn signs again. “What floor? Room number?” she asks in grassy green.

Millie has to think about the question for a very long time. She knows the answer is there, she can even see it, but it is as though written in a foreign language. “Four hundred and twenty-seven,” she says finally, the number spelled out in a fine ink script. “I'm guessing that's the fourth floor.”

“I'm going to find you,” Evelyn promises. It tastes like popcorn.

Mils looks around nervously. There are eyes, everywhere, watching them always.

“It will be okay,” Evelyn promises.

Chapter 34

Lucas wakes up early in the morning in Roach's arms in his own bed. He is fully clothed and so is Roach, and contrary to Evelyn’s assumptions they did not have sex last night. Lucas feels pretty good about what they did do, though.

His confidence is disrupted slightly, later, after a shower, when he emerges from his bedroom to find Mr. Gregor sitting at the dining table. But of course, without Millie, he has to come upstairs to take care of the twins; he really does rely quite heavily on the poor girl. Roach is making breakfast. Evelyn is pretending to sleep on the couch while Ash bounces and jumps on her back. She remembers, vaguely, a dream about Mils. The number 427 is burned in her brain. She thinks about Andy’s comment about weird dreams and wants to ask more, but her phone is on the floor, and she doesn't want to stop pretending to be asleep.

“Lucas, do you mind closing up the shop for me this afternoon?” Mr. Gregor asks as he sits down across from him.

“Not at all,” he says.

“I will be out of town for a few days,” Mr. Gregor explains, “Douglas will take the twins.”

“Are you going to see Millie?” Lucas asks.

“Yes.”

Evelyn lays unmoving on the couch; she cannot hear their conversation. “Can you take Evelyn with you?” Lucas asks.

“I do not know if that would be appropriate,” Mr. Gregor says. Lucas glowers, and he sighs. “Hopefully, Millie will be returning with me,” he confides, “but please do not tell Evelyn. I do not want her to be disappointed.”

Lucas sits back in his chair, relieved. “Okay,” he says. Okay.

. . .

Lucas is standing at the counter, petting the Cat, who is not supposed to be down here or in the shop at all, when the girl walks into the shop, the one who disparaged the Cat while Lucas was petting him on the street.

The Cat hisses and darts away, through the cracked open door to the back room. The room feels somehow more oppressive, darker. Roach looks up from where they are sitting on the floor, reading a book from one of Oddities’ shelves: a hand-bound copy of the Lesser Keys of Solomon. Their jaw tenses.

“How can I help you?” Lucas asks, trying to sound casual.

“Was that the cat you took?” she asks.

“I didn't take him,” Lucas says, “You said he was feral.”

She looks around the shop. If she notices Roach, she does not acknowledge them. “This whole place reeks of depravity,” she remarks.

“Then why are you here?”

She stares at Lucas with bitter, yellow eyes. “I know your family,” she says, “They are disappointed in you.” Lucas's stomach drops.

Roach struggles to their feet and moves next to Lucas behind the counter, placing one hand gently on his back. The girl looks at the book they are holding and cringes away.

“See,” she says, pointing at the symbol on the cover, “all the proof I need.” She pulls out her phone and snaps a picture of the book in Roach's hand before they even realize what she is doing.

“You need to get out of here,” Lucas says. He said those words before, with some other customer. That one had electric blue eyes, like Evelyn's. His chest feels tight, and he focuses on Roach's hand on his back, praying he doesn't have another panic attack.

“Why are you pretending to be gay?” the girl asks.

“Fuck off,” Lucas says.

“Leviticus 18:22,” the girl says.

Roach abandons their crutches and limps out from behind the counter, an act that can only be viewed as threatening because they tower over everyone. “Please get out,” they say, towering over the girl.

“Deuteronomy 18:10 through 11,” she recites, backing towards the door.

Roach reaches out and she suddenly grabs their hand, staring wide-eyed at the red, partially healed burn in their palm.

“Revelation 13:16,” she spits. She lets go and races out of the shop.

Roach continues to stare out the door for a moment. “Does she just have the whole thing memorized?” they ask.

Lucas shrugs, trying not to appear shaken. “Yeah, kind of,” he says, “I'm surprised you don't.”

Roach limps to the door and turns the key in the deadbolt. They flip the sign to “Closed” and start back towards the counter.

“I know the first one,” they say, “about being an abomination.”

Lucas pales. “More or less,” he agrees tentatively.

“I do not believe it,” Roach says when they reach him. “I cannot believe that anything as wonderful as the way you make me feel could be considered an abomination.”

“Oh,” Lucas says, “fuck.” He wishes he was half as eloquent as Roach. He says, “I love you,” and wraps his hand around their head and pulls them in to kiss instead.

. . .

Mr. Gregor drives to the city hospital in time for visiting hours, where he is deeply consoled upon seeing Millie; apparently content, if not eager to get out of the hospital. He has a meeting with her and the psychiatrist, then with the doctor alone, who confides her concerns regarding Millie's apparently perfect progress.

“You think she is too happy,” Mr. Gregor clarifies skeptically.

The doctor, whose name plate reads Dr. Samantha Nguyen, continues scrolling through her notes on her computer. “My concern,” she reiterates, “is that Mildred may be feigning progress in effort to appear well enough for release,” she says, without looking up.

“Is there any reason she cannot continue with outpatient treatment?”

“I understand that Mildred has a lot of foster siblings at home.”

“That is correct.”

Dr. Nguyen finally looks up at him. “Have you considered,” she asks, “that perhaps the stress of so many troubled youths in her life may be contributing to her emotional problems?”

Mr. Gregor’s brow furrows. He sits up straighter in his chair. “Have you considered,” he repeats, “that perhaps Millie loves her siblings quite dearly, and might miss them rather terribly?”

“Mildred speaks of them fondly,” Dr. Nguyen agrees, “She seems to hold a lot of responsibility, especially for the younger ones.”

“For which she is paid handsomely, I should add,” Mr. Gregor interjects.

“She has also expressed concern over maintaining appropriate boundaries in her relationships with her foster siblings,” Dr. Nguyen finishes, pointedly.

“That sounds like an excellent discussion for Millie to have with her continuing therapist,” Mr. Gregor says. “Now, it is my understanding that we are not here to criticize my decisions as guardian, but to determine if Millie is fit for release. You have my opinion on the matter, and my assurances that she will continue her medication and counseling. What is your decision?”

Dr. Nguyen clicks the computer mouse a few times, types some more. Finally, she says, “Mildred is scheduled to get her stitches removed tomorrow. We can discharge her afterwards, assuming her behavior continues.”

Mr. Gregor nods his head and stands. “Much obliged,” he says, “I will see you tomorrow.”

He gives Millie a hug before leaving and signs, “tomorrow.” She nods, beaming.

. . .

Evelyn lets Roach pick for movie night, even though Roach mostly likes nature documentaries with needlessly up-close footage of bugs and long shots of carnivores very slowly killing their prey. If she'd chosen, she would have picked something obnoxiously oversexed, and maybe Lucas and Roach would go off to their room. She wants them gone, because she wants to be alone, but she doesn't want to say that, because she doesn't want to arouse anyone's suspicions.

Eventually, she signs, “Bed,” and retreats to her room. This piques Roach’s interest, because Evelyn has been resolutely refusing to sleep in her room all week, but Lucas barely notices. Lucas is busy petting the Cat and not thinking about sin or Roach's dick. Not hearing the words “disappointed in you” like a cattle prod in his brain. The Cat purrs and rubs its head all over his face, leaving behind hairs that make Roach's nose itch when they kiss him. Lucas falls asleep to images of creatures of the deep sea.

. . .

Millie is laying in her bed, staring at nothing when she notices flies dripping from the ceiling. She sits up in her bed and glances over nervously at her roommate. Despite herself, Millie has learned some things about the girl: her name (Amanda), why she is here (anorexia), her boyfriend’s name (Jaxton) and what a complete piece of shit he is, that she snores with a tiny whistle while she sleeps. She looks back at the flies and there is Evelyn in front of her; she puts her finger to her lips, needlessly, “Shhh.”

Millie throws her arms around Evelyn and holds her tight. She doesn't think she is dreaming; the stitches in her arm pull and itch. She lets go and says, “What are you doing here?”

“I missed you,” Evelyn signs.

“Me too,” Millie signs. She pinches the skin on her wrist and Evelyn notices, covering her hands with her own. Millie anxiously looks over at the other bed.

“You really shouldn't be here,” she signs. “We're not dreaming.”

“No eyes,” Evelyn signs. Why did she sign that? Time seems to stretch around them as they stare at each other in the near darkness.

“You remember?” Millie asks.

“What?”

“The dreams.” Evelyn looks confused, so Millie adds, “At school.”

“I don't know,” Evelyn admits. “I'm so tired.” She looks tired: dark circles under her eyes, too thin. Millie wants to ask if she has been eating.

“There's something wrong,” she signs instead, “at school.”

“I know,” Evelyn says, “Everyone is going crazy.”

Amanda the Roommate stirs in her sleep nearby, and Millie startles. “You should go,” she signs, “night watch.” They embrace for some time longer, too long, then pull apart reluctantly. Millie remembers, signs, “Home tomorrow,” and Evelyn’s smile glows before disappearing in a cloud of flies.

. . .

Lucas dreams he is in the school gym. His head and hands are locked up in a pillory. It is rather uncomfortable. He is not the only one in the gym. Some people are free and mill around, staring down at Lucas and the others imprisoned. Thousands of eyes press down on him.

His sister Annalee walks up to Lucas's post. “Why are you here?” he whispers.

“Why are you like that?” Annalee asks.

Lucas rolls his eyes. He can't look at her without twisting his head painfully. “Obviously I'm in trouble,” he says.

“Homosexual,” Annalee reads from a sign above his head.

“It could be worse,” Lucas suggests. He flutters his hands in an attempt at nonchalance.

“I've seen you with him,” she whispers, “he's cute.”

“Them,” Lucas corrects. Annalee looks confused; of course she doesn't understand. He says, “Are you even old enough to find guys cute?”

Annalee doesn't answer. “Lucas,” she asks, “Why don't you two just pretend to be straight? The church would accept you then.”

“No,” Lucas says, “I'm not a girl and I'm not straight, okay? I like who I like.” Why is he even discussing this with his little sister? “And Roach isn't even a man,” he adds as an afterthought.

“I don’t understand it,” she admits. “But I know you love him. Them,” she corrects herself.

Lucas remembers he is dreaming. “Are you dreaming?” he asks.

Annalee looks around uncertainly. “I think so,” she says.

“Will you remember this?”

“No,” she says sadly. “Neither will you.”

“How can we learn from our punishments if we can't remember them?” Lucas asks.

“The punishment isn't the point,” Annalee says, “The torment is.”

“The torment?”

“The eyes,” she gestures. The eyes stare down at them, full of disdain.

“What are they?”

“Judges.”

Lucas’s neck hurts. His hands are tingling.

“I have to go,” Annalee says. She bends over and kisses Lucas on the forehead and disappears.

. . .

Lucas wakes with a start, stretched out on the couch alongside Roach. He feels inexplicably weird about this and his neck hurts. He slides off the couch and quietly makes his way back to his own bed.

Chapter 35

The next morning, Lucas leaves for a run through the fire escape. He passes by Roach still sleeping on the couch with the Cat, and his heart swells. He runs down the alley one direction, to the end of the road, then turns around to run back up Main St. He spots the graffiti several buildings down and sprints up the sidewalk to reach the Bakery and Oddities.

The Bakery has a slur spray painted in red, and a pink triangle. Oddities has “Exodus 22:18” in red. Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.

Lucas pounds on the door to the Bakery. He can see Willow scribbling at a table through the glass. Douglas appears carrying Ash and unlocks the door for Lucas. “I've already called the police,” he explains. “They'll be here when they get here, I guess.” Spray paint isn't exactly a national emergency.

Lucas texts Roach:

L > Bring Evelyn to the Bakery asap. Go around back.

They immediately text back:

R > We will be there soon.

They can't scrub the graffiti away until the police have come and taken their statements. Lucas is absolutely certain the girl from yesterday is responsible. 

“She kept quoting Bible verses,” he says. “She'd definitely know Exodus.” Everyone knows Exodus.

“What girl?” Evelyn asks.

“Sits in the corner there, sometimes,” Lucas says, pointing, “Yellow eyes.”

“Her name is Jade,” Douglas adds warily. She has always been pleasant enough; he has no reason to believe she would do this. He is uncomfortable with the kids all here, standing around under the shadow of a hateful slur and an old Nazi symbol. He decides to take them to his house, a bungalow a few minutes’ walk away. His home is small and sparsely furnished; in all honesty, Douglas does not spend a whole lot of time in it. He does watch the twins often enough that they have their own room and a swing set in the narrow, graveled backyard.

Roach sits on one of the swings. The sun overhead is hot, but a cool, dry breeze makes it tolerable. The chains of the swing creak under their weight as they sway back and forth. They are watching birds sing and flit around a large pine tree behind the yard. They feel an intense desire to climb the tree, but their leg throbs to remind them they cannot. Roach stares at the sun through their closed eyelids, letting it fill their vision with warm red light. When they open their eyes again, the landscape has a clear blue tint. This is the result of the overstimulation and desensitization of the red sensing cones in their retina, and it is only temporary.

Roach is sitting alone outside because they are confused. They are confused a lot of the time, and they have just grown to accept that confusion is just a part of the human condition. They are confused about why people are being so cruel to each other, here and everywhere else. They are confused about Lucas's attitude towards them, towards himself, towards his family and church. They are confused about Evelyn and how she can teleport with flies and why Millie has been in the hospital for so long when Roach was only in there a few days after breaking their leg. They are confused about the restrooms and the Wall of Shame at school, at the hospital, about the girl with yellow eyes and her way of speaking in verses. They are confused about why some words are worse than others, even when they mean the same thing.

Roach is not confused about the birds, or the piñon, or the arcing path the sun traces in the sky. These things are knowable. These things are predictable. They are comfortable.

. . .

Andy goes into his backyard and is surprised to see the kid named Roach in his neighbor's yard. His neighbor is Douglas, a baker rather infamous around town for pushing his gay agenda or whatever. Andy likes him for giving his family not very old, unsold baked goods, often enough to keep Andy and his too many little siblings well fed. He's never even been to the bakery; his neighbor just brings them by in large brown bags, seemingly at random. Never when Andy’s stepdad is home.

The kid named Roach doesn't move as Andy approaches the short chain link fence separating the two yards. “Hey,” he says, and they still do not move. “It's Roach, right?”

“That is my name,” Roach finally says. They twist the swing around to look at the intruder, someone at school whom they only recognize from the Wall of Shame.

“I'm Andy,” he says, “I'm friends with Evelyn.”

“Indeed.”

Andy is fascinated by Roach. He knows a lot about them from the rumors surrounding them like a plague of locusts, which means he knows nothing about them that is likely true. He says, “Is it true you kicked a security guard in the ‘nads when he tried to drag you out of the bathroom?”

Roach looks at him peculiarly. “No, that is not true,” they say.

A shame. Andy takes a hit off his vape and blows out a thick white smoke that smells like peaches. It reminds him of a dream. Roach is staring at him with intensely dark, almost black eyes but won't make eye contact. Andy waves the vape at them as an offering.

“No, thank you,” Roach says. They speak in a pleasant, emotionless monotone. They should record phone menus for a living.

“So, what are you doing in Douglas's backyard?” Andy asks.

“He is my neighbor,” Roach says. Then they clarify, “The Bakery, rather. I did not know he lived here until today.”

“You live next to the Bakery?” Andy asks.

“Above the Oddities shop.”

“I've never been to it. Is it creepy?”

“Not particularly.”

“So why are you here then?”

“There was an incident,” Roach says vaguely, “Vandalism. Douglas thought we should all come here.”

“There's been a weird amount of vandalism lately,” Andy observes. A lot of it is about Evelyn, he's noticed.

“This entire town is weird to me,” Roach says frankly.

“Amen to that.”

Roach does not understand, but they are saved from asking by the appearance of two loud, excitable toddlers behind them. Andy knows the twins, because they are roughly the same age as two of his siblings and often play with them when they stay with Douglas. Why they stay with Douglas has remained a mystery until now, but Andy is starting to connect the dots. They are followed by another kid Andy knows better by reputation than actual interaction.

Roach pulls themselves out of the swing and hobbles to a nearby Adirondack chair instead, intending to make room for the twins. Lucas stands next to them, towering over Roach for a change. They squint at him, details lost in shadows with the sun bright behind him.

“We have to get rid of the graffiti by this afternoon,” he says, “Millie's coming home.”

. . .

Millie watches the nurse snip each of the wiry black stitches and pull them out of her skin with forceps. The tugging sensation is odd, like prickling bugs. She banishes the thought.

She packs up the few things Gregor brought and puts on real pants and socks and shoes and she follows Gregor out of the ward, out of the hospital, through a parking garage and into the Bentley. She breathes, deep, and it feels like she has been holding her breath for a very, very long time. Gregor asks Millie what she wants for lunch and she asks for ice cream so he stops at a Dairy Queen on the way out of the city. Millie eats double fudge cookie dough and watches the bland suburbs change into warm, colorful desert.

Gregor is driving quietly beside her. She needs to say something. “I'm in love with Evelyn,” Millie confesses.

“I have noticed,” Gregor says mildly. “Evelyn has been very concerned about you.” He stares at the road for a while before muttering, “I really need to stop fostering teenagers.” He cannot deal with them falling in love all the time.

Millie watches him for a while. “Gregor,” she says, “why do you say you're my brother?”

“We are siblings.”

“Bullshit.”

He glances at her briefly, surprised. “We share a father,” Gregor explains, “I thought the genetic resemblance was obvious.”

“You're, like, eighty.”

“I am older than you think,” he says cryptically.

“You're not helping your argument,” Millie says, mildly disgusted.

“Our father was also extraordinarily old,” he explains.

“You're still not helping,” Millie says, more disgusted. “How old was my mom?”

Gregor is quiet for a moment. “She was twenty-three,” he says reluctantly.

“And she died giving birth to me.”

“Yes.”

“Because she fucked someone old enough to be my grandpa’s grandpa?” Millie raves.

“Millie,” Gregor says.

Millie sighs. “I think you owe me an explanation,” she says, “I'm almost seventeen.”

Gregor looks at her curiously. “Does seventeen feel like a particularly significant milestone?” he asks.

“Should it?” Millie retorts.

“It is the brood cycle for a periodical cicada,” Gregor muses.

“Are you saying I'm a cicada?” Millie asks.

“No.”

“How long have you been doing magic?” 

Gregor does not answer that one. “I would rather we talk about you,” he says, “I regret being oblivious to your emotional struggles for so long.”

Millie stares out the window. “Can I get a pass?” she asks glumly.

“I advocated for your release, Millie,” Gregor says. “Please do not make me regret that, too.”

The darkness inside her churns. She wants to scratch at the dry, scabby scar on her arm. Instead, Millie lets her hands fall into her lap, and she explains to her brother, half-brother, whatever he is, why she does the thing she does.

. . .

The windows in front of Oddities are the cleanest they have ever been by the time Mr. Gregor parks in front of it, but Millie won't notice; she is too anxious to be home. Every mile they got closer to their destination felt infinitely longer than the last. Mr. Gregor carries a duffel bag full of her things and still opens the door for her. Her stomach churns and her mind races as she slowly climbs the staircase to home. 

Millie's friends are all just sitting there at the table, clearly waiting for her. Evelyn spots her first and is out of her chair and flinging her arms around Millie before she can even say “hi.” All of the tension Millie felt, her apprehension about returning home and facing her friends, melts in Evelyn’s embrace.

The only reason Evelyn is so calm, the only reason she can even breathe in the first place, is because she is high. She had not realized Andy was Douglas's neighbor and was pleased to find out, because now she's high and can cope with welcoming Millie home from a mental hospital. There's nothing wrong with that, right?

Roach watches Millie cautiously. They stare at her arm and think of blood and muscles and bones and scalpels and razor blades. They do not want these thoughts or associations, but they arrive vividly in Roach's mind anyway. Lucas nudges them gently, then not so gently, because they are being rude, so they stare at their own hands instead, flicking through the pages of an old paperback. This seems worse, somehow.

Millie sits down at the table across from Roach. She watches them fidget uncomfortably. She says, “It's mostly healed up now. Do you want to see?” The last time Millie saw Roach, their fingers were stained with her blood. She owes them an apology, or something, and she might as well show them their efforts weren't for nothing.

Roach nods, so Millie pulls off her sweatshirt that will probably forever smell like hospital. She pushes her sleeve up and shows them the closed, scabbed wound, the tiny holes where stitches have been removed. The other scars, the oldest going back over five years. Roach looks over them carefully then nods again, silently. Lucas, pretending not to look at them, not wanting to look at them, feels his stomach drop and immediately start to hurt at the sight. He feels particularly shitty about this reaction.

Mr. Gregor leaves Millie alone with her friends, against every instinct, to go to the Bakery and pick up the twins and discuss the morning's events with Douglas. He owes an enormous debt of gratitude to the baker for his swift handling of the situation.

Willow is inordinately pleased to see Millie, her absence like a missing piece to a puzzle; but Ash, always resistant to change, opts to cling to Evelyn instead. Millie tries not to feel offended by this. She plays with both of them, reads the same book over and over, and eventually Ash consents to sit in Millie’s lap and watch her forlornly. A cat appears, whom Lucas just introduces as “the Cat.”

Eventually, Evelyn and Millie end up side by side on the couch, typing on Evelyn's phone and passing it back and forth instead of texting like normal people.

M > What'd I miss? Tell me everything.

Evelyn doesn't want to tell Mils everything, because everything kind of sucks. But she also doesn't want to lie. She gossips about her friends instead.

E > roach almost got expelled for peeing in the girls' bathroom. luc got in trouble too but idk why

M > WTF?

E > mr gregor had to come bail us all out on the same day lol

M > What did you do?

E > truancy 

Millie rolls her eyes.

M > Did you attend any classes at all?

E > 1 or 2

M > I actually miss school.

E > of course u do. when do u go back?

M > I don't know. I'm also terrified.

E > i'll be there for u :)

This assertion is something quite new for Evelyn, who spent at least part of her absent time absolutely convinced she was decaying in a forest. Several different forests, because she couldn't even stick to one; anytime she thought she recognized Mr. Gregor in a rabbit or bumblebee, she would find a new place to die. Commitment and consistency are not Evelyn’s strong suits, but for Mils she really wants to try.

Lucas is tired. Physically, he is tired, as though he hasn't slept in forever, but mentally he is exhausted. He wants to turn off his feelings - about Roach, about Millie, about life, about the weird shit happening around school and town. Not forever, just long enough to wake up well rested again. He wishes he had something interesting to do, like Roach and their reading, instead of just sitting around feeling awkward. He could go for a run, but he also doesn't want to be away from Millie; he really missed her. He sits on the floor in front of the couch while the others ignore him and rolls a ball back and forth with Willow. The Cat climbs into his lap and plays along, batting at the ball with his claws when it rolls past. His antics cheer Lucas up, a little.

Mr. Gregor sticks around, sneezing occasionally, eyes itching, until after dinner (prepared by Roach), after giving the twins their bath and putting them down for bed, after a rare shared dessert. His presence is an obvious obtrusion; he cannot help it.

Finally, Millie pulls him aside. “You can't keep watching over me forever,” she whispers.

Mr. Gregor wants to argue - of course he could - but also, she is not wrong. He bids Millie and the others goodnight, then retreats to the basement, where Douglas is already waiting for him with orange and cranberry scones.

. . .

“Are you doing okay?” Roach asks. They are sitting on their mattress, as usual, reading, as usual.

Lucas is not doing okay. He feels conflicted. He feels exhausted. A voice floats through his head saying, “disappointed in you.”

What he says is, “What? Yeah, no, I'm fine.” Roach continues staring at him for a long time, so he tries again. “I'm just kinda tired, you know?”

Roach asks, “Are you having trouble sleeping?”

“I guess.” Lucas wakes every morning feeling as though he has already run a marathon, but he does not remember why. 

“That seems to be a universal truth,” Roach observes, “Being human means having trouble sleeping.”

“Are you having trouble sleeping? Lucas asks.

“I am not.”

Lucas tries to joke, “I guess that means you're not human then,” but it falls flat. Roach just looks at him like he made a joke about a dead dog.

“I suppose not,” they say, and then they do not talk again for the rest of the night.

. . .

Lucas is in the school gym. The gym is very crowded. Some people stand on platforms, their heads and hands locked in a board, their sins labeled over their heads. Others are free, like Lucas, wandering around aimlessly. Others are just eyes, scowling down at all of them.

The words, “what the fuck” float to the ceiling, and Lucas traces their source back to Evelyn, who is standing with Millie against the far wall of the gym, where there should have been a fire exit. She spots Lucas and quickly signs, “Don't talk.”

Lucas signs, “Am I dreaming?” 

Millie nods quickly, subtly. “Come,” she signs, and they weave around the crowds to exit the gym into the rest of the school. The hallways are sparser, and also infinite, so it doesn't take long to find a quiet place.

Millie turns to face the others. Her arm is a horror show of bloodless, gaping wounds. Lucas tries not to notice as she signs, “We've been here before.”

“Yeah, school,” Evelyn signs, rolling her eyes.

“Dreaming,” Lucas says, since they're alone in a classroom anyway. The word is soft pink, like a pillow. 

Millie nods. “Something weird is happening.” The words look like spider webs crawling out of her mouth.

Lucas asks, “Where is Roach?”

Millie gives him a weird look. Evelyn signs, “That's what you're thinking about?”

There's a knock at the door, and Lucas and Millie both jump. Lucas's heart starts racing, then drops when it's not Roach, just some kid from school.

“Sup,” Andy says in grape, “Hey! You found your girlfriend!”

Evelyn offers him a small smile, while Mils and Roach just stare at him.

“We’re dreaming?” Andy asks, and they all nod. “There's some weird shit going on.” He casually strolls to a desk next to Evelyn and sits down.

Lucas chews on his cheek. He feels no pain, tastes no blood until he says, “Why are you here?” The words are rusty nails.

Andy leans in and leers at him, eyes wide. “Why are you here?” he asks.

“We're dreaming,” Evelyn signs, reminding them.

“All of us?” Lucas asks. The words feel hollow.

“Except your friend Roach,” Andy points out with a green haze.

Lucas looks around at the eyes, always there, always watching. None of them are black.

Millie says, “Why are we here?”

The lights turn out, and everyone is alone again.

Chapter 36

Evelyn wakes up fucking exhausted. There is something seriously wrong going on, she is certain, but even as she rubs the sleep from her eyes the certainty fades away. What was her dream about? Millie and Lucas, the school, Andy? It all seemed so significant, but now it was just a dream. She hops off her bunk, landing on the floor with a thump. She looks down at Millie, sleeping beneath her. Not, not sleeping; Mils is also awake, sitting up in her bed and rubbing her face with her hands. Evelyn sits a respectful distance away from her.

“Weird dream,” Millie signs.

Evelyn gives her a curious look. “Me too,” she signs.

Millie looks at the alarm clock next to her bed and sighs. It is too early to be up, too late to go back to sleep because Evelyn has school. “Come here,” she signs, pulling her blanket to the side and making room for Evelyn, holding her and listening to her breathe until Evelyn's watch buzzes to warn her about school.

. . .

Lucas wakes up feeling like he has already run substantially too much and decides to run some more. He notices the Cat is in Roach's bed, but they are not; he finds them outside, sitting on the fire escape, their legs dangling over the height. It is still dark, but the sky is starting to lighten.

“Couldn't sleep?” he asks, faltering.

“I wanted to watch the sunrise,” Roach answers without moving.

Lucas looks around; most of the view is blocked by buildings or houses. “There's a better view from the park,” he suggests.

Roach looks up at him, asks, “Were you going to go for a run?”

“I would rather walk,” Lucas says, “With you, I mean.”

“Okay.” Roach gets up and hobbles down the metal staircase. They are slow on crutches and by the time they get to the park the sunrise is in full swing. It is quite beautiful with the desert backdrop, the warm colors of dirt and rocks glowing under a pink and yellow sky. They cast long, purple shadows as they stand watching.

Lucas reaches out to hold Roach’s hand; they almost flinch away then recover, squeezing his fingers gently. He doesn't know what that was about. Briefly, he was concerned he grabbed the wrong hand, the burned one, but it wasn't. He chews on the inside of his cheek and finds the flesh there already mangled. After the colors have faded to blue and the sun has made its appearance over the horizon, they turn around and walk slowly back to Oddities in silence.

. . .

“I don't have to go to school,” Evelyn signs, grinning. Millie just gives her a disappointed look. “Fine,” she assents. She leaves Mils alone to walk to school with Lucas and Roach, who has been oddly reticent all morning. Evelyn is reminded of when they first showed up, but then it was like they didn't know how to talk; now they just don't want to. She briefly examines the growing Wall of Shame - at least some students appear to have made a game out of who can get their picture up there the most. She goes to her locker with the scarlet “whore” but now it says, “witch”. The two don't have to be mutually exclusive, she thinks. She drifts through her classes on autopilot and is relieved when the final bell rings, her classmates all packing up and moving out in unison in response to cue Evelyn cannot hear.

She finds Lucas outside in their usual meet-up location, but Roach is conspicuously absent. “No idea,” he signs. He has been trying to text them.

. . .

Roach has been secured away in the principal’s office, where they stoically refuse to submit to the interrogation Superintendent Brent Smalls is attempting.

“Look, kid,” Mr. Smalls says, exasperated, “There are just some irregularities in your paperwork. We can solve this whole thing right now and you can go on your way.”

“I would like to call my guardian,” they repeat.

“Your guardian could be charged with fraud, depending on how he got you registered,” he rebukes.

All the more reason to bring him in, Roach thinks.

Roach is here because they used the wrong bathroom again, this time the men’s because it was empty. Roach would really like to be able to pee without getting harassed. The “X” on their name tag, which has up until now been generally accepted by administration, has now set off a flurry of confusion and inquiry. Superintendent Brent Smalls wants Roach to submit to a genital inspection to verify their sex. Which is not going to happen.

“I would like to call my guardian,” Roach repeats again.

Brent Smalls fiddles with the kid’s phone on his desk. It keeps buzzing and lighting up with notifications. Roach has been an irritating little flea every time he has to interact with them. There is something about them that makes Brent Smalls uneasy, a hidden abyss behind their dark eyes. He cannot read them. He cannot feel them. He is trying very hard to figure out why that might be the case.

. . .

“Yo,” Andy says, “Sup.”

“Have you seen Roach?” Evelyn signs.

Andy shrugs.

“Have you seen Roach?” Lucas asks out loud.

Andy says, “Last I heard they were getting dragged out of the bathroom by a security guard.”

“Fuck,” Lucas says. He calls Mr. Gregor.

. . .

Mr. Gregor easily bypasses the front desk, the office, the executive assistant to the principal, and the locked door to the principal's office to get to Roach. Sitting rigidly in a chair in front of a desk, they look relieved to see him. On the other side of the desk is Superintendent Brent Smalls, whom Mr. Gregor has met before and dismissed. Prematurely, it would appear.

“Go on, Roach,” Mr. Gregor says coolly, “Lucas is waiting for you outside.” He watches as they pick up their backpack and hobble out of the room on crutches. He closes the door behind them, then strides back to their abandoned chair and sits. He stares Superintendent Brent Smalls in the eyes and waits.

. . .

Millie is at the Bakery with the twins when the others finally show up, later than usual and edgy. Also, Andy the stoner kid from school has inexplicably tagged along. He plops down on a chair next to her.

“Sup,” he says, “Long time no see.” Andy doesn't know Millie, and, rather more unusually, he knows very little about her. Somehow, Evelyn’s girlfriend is immune to the rumor mill that plagues her. He knows two things about her: she is gay, as in no guys whatsoever, and she left a bright red handprint on Ryan's face before disappearing from school.

Millie doesn't answer; she doesn't know why Andy would be seeing her around anyway. They don't exactly run in the same circles - except with Evelyn’s overlap, apparently. That explains some things.

“So, what's the deal,” Andy asks, oblivious to Millie's standoffishness. Or maybe he just doesn't care. “Did you get expelled for giving Ryan a shiner?”

Evelyn looks at Millie, surprised. “You did what?” she signs.

Millie shakes her head. “No,” she says. “Long story,” she signs.

“Tell me,” Evelyn persists.

“Later.”

Andy looks back and forth between their hands, oblivious to the discussion. He sits back in his chair and says, “Man, I like it here. Can't believe I've never been before.” The atmosphere and rainbow flags would give his stepdad a coronary.

Lucas comes over to sit down next to them, while Roach lingers at the counter, talking to Douglas a few moments longer. Then they hobble out of the Bakery without talking to anyone else.

“What's with them?” Evelyn asks.

Lucas watches the space they vacated. “I don't know,” he says. His stomach hurts.

Roach is not okay, not really; since Lucas's comment the night before, or perhaps even before then, they have been feeling an encompassing sadness, a sense of otherness that keeps them apart from the rest. A big, bold X instead of a person. They are, they think, growing tired of being a human. Being human is complicated; it is painful, and it is confusing. It is loud and itchy and tiring. Even love is not all it is cracked up to be. Roach fell in love with the first boy they met and then had to learn that being in love doesn't mean being happy with them all the time; sometimes it means they get sad, and there is nothing at all you can do about it except feel sad alongside them. That makes Roach feel helpless, and they do not particularly like feeling helpless, either.

So, like a cockroach scurries away from light to hide in the darkness, Roach avoids their friends and the person they love and with whom they associate all of these negative feelings. They lock up their feelings deep inside and let them fester and rot.

Inside the elevator at Oddities, they hesitate. They push the “B” button, and the elevator jolts downward. Mr. Gregor is not here; his car is still gone, and he is probably still at the school. Roach does not know how long they have, nor do they know what they are looking for. They approach a bookshelf at random and scan it idly: old, leather-bound books, a magnifying glass with a jade handle, the skull and jawbones of some small carnivore; Roach can tell by the teeth. They move past the shelves towards the back of the basement, using their phone for light. They scan through some of the papers on Mr. Gregor's desk, but they are not written in English. They reach their fingers out to touch various stones and crystals scattered on the desk. The big, black chunk of obsidian they had used to find Evelyn is absent.

Mr. Gregor’s bed sits behind a curtain behind the desk, swathed in shadows. Roach picks up the book on his nightstand: On the Nature of Cockroaches. They keep it. Another book catches their eye as they are leaving, and they pull it off the shelf as well: Healing Magick. Roach tucks both books into their backpack with their textbooks, then rides the elevator up to the apartment.

Chapter 37

Mr. Gregor returns to Oddities that evening, rather later than intended. He feels exhausted after his meeting with Brent Smalls, who has far more power behind him than Mr. Gregor had previously thought. Granted, he knew such basic facts about the man that could have tipped him off. Why did Evelyn have to go and find him? He must have followed her here, and within weeks now he is the center of a movement, a hero with a gathering of followers to feed his strength. 

Mr. Gregor can see how Brent Smalls has done it; the question is how to stop him. When he said, “I can do anything I want,” he was not speaking hyperbolically. He turned Mr. Gregor's teeth into shiny shellacked beetles that wriggled out of his mouth; he turned into an enormous, hooded snake; he set Mr. Gregor's chair on fire, hot orange flames licking his skin; he made his secretary come in and witness the fire, stoically, then ask the enormous snake if he needed anything more. That Mr. Gregor was able to so easily reverse these showy acts of power merely solidifies his place as enemy in Brent Smalls‘s eyes. 

This is not over.

. . .

Roach does not make dinner. This is the thing that really kicks Lucas out of his well of self-pity and makes him realize there is something wrong. That they were in their room, reading, all afternoon does not feel particularly unusual; but they have steadfastly made dinner every night for weeks, and now they are skipping it. Lucas's chest hurts as he walks into his room to talk to them.

Roach has just healed their leg. They have already healed the remaining burn on their hand; the skin is smooth and pink, and painless. Their leg was trickier, since there is a titanium rod stuck through the femoral shaft, but they managed to knit the bone back together around it. They are standing to test the strength as Lucas enters their room. They are also not wearing pants, only boxers.

“Uh, hey,” he says. He watches as Roach takes a few experimental steps.

“Hello,” they respond after a moment. They take a few more steps; no pain. They squat experimentally, they hop up and down.

Lucas stares. “What are you doing?” he asks.

“I am healed,” Roach replies. Satisfied their leg is now functioning, they return to their desk and sit down, closing the book in front of them.

“How?” The tightness in Lucas's chest feels even worse as he crosses the room to sit on his bed.

“One of Mr. Gregor’s books,” they say, proffering a small book with green leather binding.

Lucas scans the cover: Healing Magick in gold print. “Does he know you have it?” he asks. He is not comfortable with this, at all.

Roach shakes their head, and Lucas somehow feels even worse.

“How does it work?” he asks.

“I do not know,” Roach responds, “I just followed the instructions.”

Lucas thinks about his lie to Annalee: “Witchcraft isn't real.” Lucas's faith, or lack thereof, has been a fundamental component of his core being for as long as he can remember. His assurance that witchcraft isn't real is as essential to him as his understanding that God, Zeus, and Fenris are also not real. If one of these facts is false, what about the others? What does that say about Lucas?

“This isn't okay,” Lucas says dully.

“I think it is,” Roach says. “My leg feels a lot better now.” They stand up and dance around a bit to demonstrate.

Lucas is genuinely glad to see that. He is genuinely terrified of the potential consequences for their use of magic to get that way. He grinds his molars through the inner flesh of his cheek. It hurts. “No, I mean,” he starts, uncertain what to say next. “Maybe you should talk to Mr. Gregor?” he suggests, finally.

Roach shrugs. They do not look at each other again until several moments later, when the Cat comes into the room, meows loudly, and jumps into Lucas's lap.

“What happened at school today?” he asks, changing the subject.

Roach is quiet for a long time. “I had to pee,” they say at last.

“Who ratted you out?”

Roach tilts their head, confused. “I do not know who,” they answer, “A kid saw me go in and called a security guard over. He dragged me out before I could wash my hands.”

“I'm sorry that happened.” The Cat jumps off Lucas’s lap, to the floor, to Roach’s lap in one smooth motion. They pet the Cat for a while and Lucas realizes, way too late, that they are crying, tears falling silently down their face.

“Oh, shit,” Lucas says. He gets up and tries to hug them, awkwardly crouched next to the chair they sit in, rigidly. His chest feels painfully tight. He straightens and they continue to stare at nothing, petting the Cat. He suddenly feels awkward and intrusive, so he steps back.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he tries, but they just shake their head. His stomach hurts even worse. “Do you want me to leave you alone?” he asks, biting his lip because he feels like he might start crying himself. 

To his relief, Roach shakes their head again. “Please stay,” they murmur quietly.

“Okay,” Lucas says. He backs up and sits down at his desk. “I'm just going to be here doing my homework, okay?” They nod, not looking at him. “Okay,” Lucas says yet again, as though trying to convince himself.

Roach has never cried before. Even when they were laying in agony in the bush beneath the window they jumped out of, concussed and broken-legged, they did not cry. That seemed like a reasonable time to cry, Roach thinks, but not now. They do not know exactly why they are crying. They were quite happy to have fixed their leg, but the look of apprehensive disappointment, of disappointed apprehension on Lucas’s face was rather disheartening. It was a reminder of all the pesky, human emotions Roach had been avoiding when they were studying, and then all those pesky human emotions hit them at once. Now they are crying, and they cannot seem to stop. It is not comfortable.

Ironically, if Roach had just taken Lucas’s suggestion to talk about it, they probably would have stopped crying a lot sooner.

Lucas sits at his desk and does not do his homework. He thinks about magic. Every time Roach sniffles from behind him, he gets a stabbing pain in his stomach. He doesn't know what to do. He realizes that in the past he probably would have run to Millie, and that is probably the last thing she needs right now. It is probably at least a part of why she was hospitalized in the first place. Lucas really doesn't like thinking about that. He is disappointed in himself. His family is disappointed in him. His friends are all disappointed in him. He wallows in it.

. . .

Lucas is not the only one who notices Roach's absence during dinner, and Evelyn feigns ignorance to Mille; she can't delve into everything that could be bugging Roach without also discussing the events they have collectively agreed not to discuss with her. She explains the situation with the bathrooms, but not how they burnt their hand or hurt their leg. She says nothing about the graffiti that is starting to feature their name as well as her own.

There is something else Millie needs to ask Evelyn about, that eats her inside but she doesn't know what to say. It is about Andy, and about the vape in Evelyn’s drawer and the redness of her eyes. She doesn't want to ask because she doesn't want to scare Evelyn away. She doesn't want to know why she and Andy the stoner kid are friends all of a sudden, or why he acts so familiar with her, but she thinks she already knows.

This is Evelyn; Jordan called her the four Fs, from a joke in his psychology textbook. She feeds, she flees, she fights, she fucks. Millie likes fucking Evelyn but Evelyn likes fucking anyone, and Millie sincerely wonders if she will ever be enough. Certainly not now; aside from hugs, Evelyn has made a point to maintain a respectful distance from her. Even though Millie has surely dreamed of coming home and kissing Evelyn, they still haven't. What that means, Millie cannot decide.

Night falls, and everyone goes to bed feeling isolated and withdrawn. This is the point, of course: to make everyone feel alone, even when they are surrounded by loved ones.

Chapter 38

Lucas wakes up from dreams he can't remember, his heart racing, soaked in sweat. He is bleeding from his vagina, which is always a shock and always a disappointment, but at least he managed not to stain his sheets and he doesn't feel like he's dying. Yet. He goes to the bathroom and when he comes out, Roach is awake and pulling on their shoes.

“What are you doing?” Lucas asks, “Did I wake you up?”

“No,” they say, “I was going to go for a run.”

“Oh,” he says, “I was going to skip that today.”

“That is a shame,” Roach says. They stand up and ready to leave; they are prepared to run regardless.

“Wait, hold on and I'll come with,” Lucas says quickly before they can leave. He goes into the hall bathroom for a tampon and to change into running clothes. He follows Roach out the fire escape, down the metal stairs. Roach matches him step for step as they run, showing no sign of pain or distress. That's cool, it's not like Lucas has been doing this for years or anything. He leads them down the alleyway, through the park, across some random streets. They pass by graffiti, “Burn all the Witches,” now featuring both Evelyn and Roach’s names as additions. From a distance, Lucas sees a family that is not his, but could be, with the way they shuffle along in identical, modest clothing, heads down so as not to be tempted by the influence of depravity around them. He turns down a different sidewalk, away from them. They pass by a new Christian greeting card store, a new Christian candy shop, the Christian hairstylist on the other side of Oddities. Roach can tell they are Christian because of all the crucifixes hanging in the windows, as though attempting to ward off evil from the streets. They run all the way down Main St, then back up the alley to Oddities. Roach collapses on the stairs, panting, upon their return. This makes Lucas feel slightly better.

“You need water,” he says, pulling Roach up to their feet. He continues holding their hand as they climb the stairs.

The twins are in the kitchen when they get inside. Ash is attempting to help Willow climb onto the counter, presumably to retrieve something sweet like Bakery cookies.

“What do you think you're doing?” Lucas growls playfully, swooping in to grab Willow before she falls.

“Nothing,” Willow says.

Ash signs, “Cookie.”

Roach pulls the cookie jar closer and reaches in, extracting four soft chocolate chip cookies. They hand one to each of the twins, much to their delight, and one to Lucas, who clicks his tongue in mock disapproval.

“Don't let Millie catch you spoiling them,” he warns, but Roach looks rather pleased with themselves as they eat their own cookie. They keep an eye on the twins as Lucas runs to take a shower, realizing now why he showers in the mornings; Roach feels uncomfortably sweaty after their morning run.

Mr. Gregor appears a few minutes later, surprised to see the twins up and about; it turns out they can both climb out of their cribs now, which means his life has suddenly gotten much more difficult. He cleans the chocolate off their faces without asking how it got there.

Roach sits awkwardly on the couch. They do not want to get up and reveal to Mr. Gregor that they can walk. They do not have their crutches nearby to pretend. Their attempt at nonchalance is in vain, because as soon as he has gotten the twins back under control he comes over to sit down next to Roach.

“How is your leg doing?” Mr. Gregor asks.

“A lot better,” Roach says honestly. They rub their thigh superficially, remembering too late that their hand is also supposed to be injured.

Mr. Gregor looks at him over his round eyeglasses. His pale blue eyes are piercing, but warm and comforting beneath; not at all in the same way as Brent Smalls's. He says, “I expect you will be returning my books, then?”

“You can have the Healing Magick one back,” Roach says. “I am not done with the other one.”

Internally, Mr. Gregor is amused by their audacity. Externally, he puts on a stern face. “You stole my property, Roach,” he scolds, “It is not up to you to decide when to return it.”

“I apologize,” Roach says, sounding absolutely insincere. Another door opens in the hallway; Millie, or Evelyn, or both are awake.

“Go get Healing Magick,” Mr. Gregor instructs, “You can hold on to Cockroaches for a while yet.” He watches as Roach stands and strides smoothly down the hallway, no limp.

Lucas is getting dressed when Roach comes in. Roach says, “Sorry,” even though they are not sorry. Roach likes watching Lucas get dressed. They would like it more the other way around. They miss touching Lucas and being touched by him. They feel a stirring in their groin and try to will it away.

Lucas lets Roach watch him get dressed. Their eyes feel hot on his skin. He misses Roach's touch and wonders why they stopped; they haven't even kissed since before the day of the graffiti. Then “disappointed in you” dances through his head and he remembers. He's on his period and God gave Eve menstruation as a reminder of her sins. Roach's gaze lingers even after he is fully dressed and somehow Lucas feels even more exposed. “What?” he asks, not trying to sound hostile.

They blink, as if startled out of a thought. “Nothing,” they say. Roach grabs a book off their desk and stalks out of the room.

. . .

“The cockroach is by nature a solitary creature,” Roach reads. “Aside from a few gregarious or subsocial species, the majority of cockroach species are solitary.” Roach suspects this is why they feel the way they do. Outside, different, noncompliant; they are not meant to be a social creature. Their chest hurts at the realization. Roach really enjoys socializing with their friends. They especially enjoy spending time with Lucas. But if their nature is solitude, who is Roach to deny it?

In Biology, Roach dissects a crayfish while Lucas watches. They point out the parts from the worksheet and answer the questions.

“What, no fun facts about crayfish ovaries?” Lucas asks. He wants to hear Roach’s random monologues of information; he wants to know why they have stopped sharing them.

At lunch, Roach and Lucas sit in silence together at their usual table. Millie is at home, Evelyn off with Andy somewhere, so they are alone. Roach reads while Lucas pretends they aren't ignoring him. The cafeteria chatter forms a thick fog around them, but it is not loud enough to conceal the slur thrown at their table. A few seconds later, a plastic bottle whizzes past Lucas, narrowly missing his head, bouncing off the edge of the table and spinning to a stop on the floor nearby. It is full of a bright yellow liquid, recognizable instantly as piss. Lucas's face turns grey as Roach walks over to the bottle and picks it up. It is immediately clear from the group laughing several tables away where the bottle came from. Roach irritatedly chucks the bottle back with incredible speed and precision; it bursts on the table, spraying the entire group.

Roach didn't even wait to see if they hit their target; they pull on Lucas's arm, saying, “We must go.” He follows them swiftly through a fire exit, out before the piss-soaked group even has a chance to react.

Once outside, they run. Lucas leads Roach to one of Evelyn's old hiding spots, which is apparently also her current hiding spot; she sits against the wall of the baseball equipment shed next to Andy, passing a joint back and forth.

“This is what you've been up to?” Lucas says, forgetting himself. Roach anxiously peers around the shed; they have not been followed.

“You want some?” Andy asks, holding the joint out to Lucas. He shakes his head, disappointed. “Roach?” Andy continues, but they also decline.

Evelyn signs, “What's up?” She has a lazy, relaxed grin.

“Uhm,” Lucas says.

“I threw a bottle of pee at assholes,” Roach signs.

What an odd assortment of signs to know, Lucas thinks.

“Nice job,” Evelyn signs. “I guess you're not going back?”

Roach shrugs. She pats the dirt next to her, indicating they should both sit down. Roach sits, but Lucas remains standing, glaring down at Evelyn disapprovingly. Andy ignores all of them, leaning his head against the wall with his eyes closed.

“How are you walking?” Evelyn signs.

“Magic,” Roach says. The sign appears dismissive if you either don't understand or don't believe in magic.

“Wow,” Evelyn says. All she can do is teleport flies. “What else can you do?”

“Nothing.”

Lucas says, “I should go back to class.”

“No,” Roach says, surprising him. “I do not want to go back. I want ice cream.”

“Right on,” Andy interjects.

Roach nudges Evelyn. “Ice cream?” they sign. She shrugs, sure.

Lucas is outnumbered. He walks next to Roach. He says, “That was a nice shot, by the way. You should play baseball.” Roach offers him a small smile, which disappears all too quickly behind their clenched jaw.

They go to a frozen yogurt parlor near the school. Frozen yogurt is not ice cream, nor is it ‘close enough,’ as everyone insists, but it is enjoyable in its own right, and Roach mostly just selects the toppings anyway; a spoonful of each. They catch Lucas watching them, and smile again, a kid-in-a-candy-shop type of grin. Lucas finds himself smiling back.

Chapter 39

“Lucas,” Mr. Gregor says, locking up the shop behind him. It is Wednesday, after school, and Lucas is, ostensibly, working. “Please join me. There is something we must discuss.” He tries to keep his face neutral, but Lucas immediately looks concerned. He looks over at Roach, who touches his hand briefly, then shrugs.

“Okay,” Lucas says, feigning nonchalance. He follows Mr. Gregor down to the basement and sits in a too-nice chair and watches him bustle around, preparing tea. Lucas doesn't want tea; he wants to know what is going on.

He knows what is going on as soon as Mr. Gregor opens the back door to let a visitor in. Lucas immediately recognizes his social worker, Shelley, whom he only ever meets when something bad is happening.

“I am afraid I have some bad news,” Mr. Gregor says, and Shelley gives him a stern look because this should not be considered bad news.

“No,” Lucas says, preemptively.

“Your family has been making significant progress in their efforts to regain custody of you,” Shelley explains. “Your father has been taking anger management classes, and both of your parents have completed a six-week parenting course.”

“No,” Lucas says again. He can't look at Shelley. He won't look at Mr. Gregor. He feels betrayed.

“Those were the requirements set forth by the judge,” his social worker starts to explain.

“Were the classes held by the church?” Lucas interjects, bitterly.

Shelley nods. “We feel that having the church community backing -” she starts.

Lucas interrupts again. “No,” he says. “I'm not going back.” He shakes his head again and again until he is dizzy.

Mr. Gregor gives him a pitying look. “Lucas,” he starts. 

“I'm afraid it's not your choice, Elizabeth,” Shelley says, and Lucas cringes. So does Mr. Gregor.

“Fuck off,” Lucas says, and he storms out of the basement before Mr. Gregor or Shelley can stop him. He takes the metal stairs three steps at a time and ducks through the fire escape. He ignores Millie, and Evelyn, and the twins as he stomps through the hall like a child. He slams his door and locks it and is thrilled to see that Roach is locked in here with him.

“Hey,” he says, trying to sound cheerful. He is crying.

“What is wrong?” Roach asks.

Lucas wants to explain but instead erupts in sobs. He stumbles over to his bed and collapses into it, curling up and choking on his tears. He doesn't want to go back. He can't go back. He can't put on another fucking dress and pretend to be a girl just to make his parents happy anymore. The thoughts feel like a betrayal to his sisters. Black spots float through his vision and he realizes he's hyperventilating and he thinks, Good, maybe I'll just fucking die instead.

Gradually, Lucas becomes aware of Roach’s hand rubbing slow circles on his back, the other tapping gently and rhythmically on their own leg. His breathing and his heart rate slowly ease, and he doesn't just fucking die, so he slowly uncurls and sits up to face Roach. He looks at them very, very carefully, memorizing their features, while they tap their fingers and resolutely avoid eye contact. 

“They're making me go back,” Lucas finally explains, when he has his voice back. “To my family.”

“Mr. Gregor?”

“My social worker. I guess my parents took some classes or something and now they're perfectly fit to take me in.”

“You do not believe them,” Roach states simply.

“Of course not,” Lucas says. “I've heard it all before. They're not bad parents to anyone else so I guess they just really, really hate me. No parenting class is going to change that.”

“Maybe it will,” Roach suggests, too optimistically. “Maybe it taught them not to hate.”

“You can't undo decades of indoctrination in six weeks,” Lucas scoffs.

Roach casts their eyes down. “I am sorry,” they say.

“Me too,” Lucas says. 

. . .

Lucas doesn't bother packing his things; none of it would be allowed at home anyway. Even the Cat has to stay at home. He doesn't say goodbye to anyone, either; not even Roach. He figures he'll see them at school, anyway. Shelley the social worker picks him up from Oddities after school on Friday and drives him home across town to his parents’ home, to his siblings’ home. She sticks around long enough to not feel bad about abandoning him there with the wolves, chatting pleasantly with his parents in the kitchen while his siblings peek around the doorway to catch a glimpse of Lucas, in all his boyish glory. 

As soon as Shelley is gone, Lucas’s father demands he go change into proper clothes. Lucas refuses. His father yells, and still he refuses. His father grabs him by the arm and drags him up the stairs and plants him in his room, and still Lucas refuses to change. He stands stoically in the middle of the kitchen while his mother strips his shirt off him, the black button-up Roach recommended. She uses scissors to cut the binder off his chest, the blade cool against the skin of his back. She tries to strip his pants, his boxers but he won't move his feet, pulling them back up every time she tries. At some point she notices his tampon string, earning him a slap - tampons are sinful. It stings, but not as much as the embarrassment of having your mother treating your body like this.

Eventually, she gives up. Lucas is shuffled, half dressed, into Maribell’s room, where he is blissfully left alone; he is not allowed to be seen by his siblings until he can dress appropriately. He imagines his older sister is none too pleased about this new arrangement, but she can deal with it.

He skips dinner. He lays in his bed in his boxers and stares at the ceiling until it gets dark, and then longer.

Evelyn appears on the bed next to him. She looks relieved to see him. “Wrong room,” she signs.

Lucas sits up and wraps his arms around her. A fly crawls across his arm. He doesn't let go until she has to push him away.

“I miss you,” he signs, even though it's only been a few hours.

Evelyn rolls her eyes and pulls a phone out of her pocket - Lucas’s phone. “You left this,” she signs.

Lucas didn't want his parents to take it, so he left it behind. A notification on the screen indicates a message from Roach. He opens it: a neatly framed photograph of the Cat playing with the beetle toy he'd given them. His heart lightens.

“Thank you,” he signs.

“You okay?” Evelyn asks.

Lucas shrugs. “So-so,” he signs. His stomach grumbles loudly and he is glad Evelyn cannot hear it. His house creaks and he panics. “You should go,” he signs.

Evelyn looks at him sadly. She gives him another hug, signs, “I love you,” and vanishes. The flies linger for a few minutes, keeping Lucas company as he tries to think of something to text back to Roach. Eventually, he falls asleep.

. . .

Lucas is at school. He is alone in a hallway, but all the lockers have eyes. A sound echoes down the empty corridor, and Lucas identifies its source: an enormous, white, long-limbed monster racing towards him, its mouth gaping open to reveal hundreds of needlepoint teeth. It races towards him like a spindly, four legged spider. Its eyes are cold blue and deadly. Lucas turns and runs.

. . .

Lucas makes it through the weekend running on spite and a packet of graham crackers his sister Sophia sneaks him, tucked neatly into a folded towel. He tells himself it will be okay; he still has school and work. Until Sunday night his father comes into his room and informs him he has been pulled out of public school and readmitted to the church’s private school.

“You are aware of the dress-code at the church, I presume,” he says, eyeing Lucas with disgust. He is wearing the same boxers he arrived in, which he thinks is kind of disgusting too, but it's not like he has any alternative. Except that he does; he could always just wear the clothes given to him.

“What happens when I refuse?” he challenges.

His father raises an eyebrow, only slightly. “Then you will not be going to school,” he says, then he leaves. Lucas hears the click of a skeleton key in the antique doorknob; he is locked in. Well, at least he has his own bathroom.

Chapter 40

Roach is, by nature, a solitary creature. They have had an unpleasant week. After throwing a bottle of urine at the group of people who had originally tossed it at them, they quickly found themselves the target of harassment. This culminated in a fight on Friday, the day Lucas left; if you can call six against one a fight. Roach was only lightly beaten and dragged to the men's restroom, where their head was dunked in a dirty toilet and flushed around a few times. They left them there to be picked up by a security guard and charged with assault (for the three of their attackers they managed to hit hard enough to cause damage), and trespassing (for the whole bathroom thing). Roach left the school before they could be expelled. They went home and grabbed On the Nature of Cockroaches and snapped a picture of the Cat, because Lucas would think it was cute. They leave before Lucas can get here and make them say goodbye.

They wander around the town. They sleep in a tree overnight and dig through dumpsters and bins for food when they are hungry. They respond to texts, from Millie and Evelyn and even Lucas, somehow; until the former’s messages just become questions, “where are you?” - those they ignore.

On Sunday, Lucas reveals through text that he is not going to school, he is not going anywhere. He is exhausted and tired of Maribell's room. He thinks of Evelyn, laying around in a forest somewhere, convinced she was dying, and he decides this must be what she felt like. He wishes he could teleport to a forest somewhere.

Lucas not being at school solidifies Roach's decision not to go back. They wish this town was larger. Everywhere they go, they see accusations and death threats. Roach is a witch, Evelyn is a witch, thou shalt not suffer the witches to live. There are other accusations, pejoratives against gender and sex and race and class. The entire town seems to hate itself.

. . .

On Monday morning, Lucas's mother attempts to dress Lucas herself. She pulls a dress over his head and he sits there like a statue, arms trapped in the tube of fabric. His mother tugs and pulls and eventually the dress tears. 

Lucas knows he is being imprudent. He is acting like a toddler. Every act of disobedience is digging him deeper and deeper into a very dangerous hole. He doesn't care. He is tired of everything.

Millie returns to the drudgery of school. The antidepressants she is on make her feel numb, in a bored, unenthusiastic way. She doesn't bother going to lunch. Despite her assurances that she will be there for her, Evelyn is apparently busy getting high with Andy, so Millie goes to the library instead. Its shelves are mostly empty, stripped sometime while she was gone of any books that could be considered offensive, which is most books. That is the point of books, Millie thinks: to be offensive, to make your mind process new things in new ways. There is a group of kids passing around banned books in some sort of underground library, instead; their faces are showing up on the Wall of Shame.

In chemistry class, Evelyn’s lab partner attempts to light her on fire with a bunsen burner. Valerie, a small, quiet girl whom Evelyn has never even spoken to outside of class, waits until she is not paying attention, then tilts the tiny, blue flame towards her sleeve, watches the fabric catch, holds it there until Evelyn notices, then claims the whole thing was an accident, caused by Evelyn’s negligence no less. Aside from a scorched sleeve and a minor burn, Evelyn is unharmed, so there's really no point pursuing the matter any further, the teacher says. Andy is the only other witness to the incident, and he's hardly credulous. Unlike Evelyn, he heard the word Valerie hissed under her breath before the attack; it's what drew his attention to it in the first place. When he tells her, Evelyn just responds with a wicked grin; one that is completely disingenuous. He drags her to the baseball shed after class; this is why Evelyn misses lunch.

She plans to tell Millie what happened after school, but Millie insists on taking the twins to the Bakery, and sitting there in the corner is that girl, the one with golden eyes who Lucas insists is responsible for the vandalism on the windows. Douglas had said her name, but no one bothered interpreting for Evelyn. She marches over to the counter and signs, “What is she doing here?”

Douglas doesn't know a lot of sign language, but he tries. He definitely understands the question, the contempt emanating from Evelyn towards the girl in the corner; but the police had found no evidence she was involved. They found no evidence anyone was involved, but when Jade showed up at the Bakery her usual time the next week, acting completely normal, making no comment on the decor; Douglas had no reason to turn her away.

He doesn't know how to sign that. He signs, “She pays.” Evelyn scoffs and storms away to sit with Millie.

“What's your problem?” Millie asks. Evelyn is in a bad mood. Evelyn is always in a bad mood.

“Nothing,” she signs. She watches Ash scribble wide, chaotic circles in black on the table. Willow has to push him away to keep him encroaching in her space, which is decorated with slightly less chaotic scribbles of various colors. Kids are weird.

Millie glances behind her at the apparent source of Evelyn’s tension: the girl with yellow eyes. Jade. They haven't spoken since that first, awkward attempt what feels like months ago, but was really only a couple weeks. “Do you know her?” she asks.

“Nope,” Evelyn signs, which feels like a lie. She explains, “Lucas and Roach said she's a big Jesus freak.”

Millie can understand Lucas's trepidation towards religion, but she's not sure it's a reason to completely dismiss a person. “That’s weird,” she signs. She can't be that bad, to be spending so much time here.

Evelyn’s eyes flick back towards the girl, then return to Millie. “Watch this,” she signs. Then she hesitates. “Can I kiss you?”

Millie doesn't answer, just leans in and presses her lips against Evelyn’s; she has been waiting for this for a very long time. Too soon, Evelyn pulls back and nods towards the corner without looking. The girl is on her phone, a poorly concealed scowl on her face. Millie has no reason to believe they are the cause of Jade’s vexation, until she looks up; if looks could kill. A chill runs down Millie’s spine. Whatever. She leans in and kisses Evelyn again.

. . .

Lucas is dying. In addition to a period that never wants to end, he is starving. He won't get dressed for meals so it's his own fault. Whatever. The graham crackers are gone, and hunger gnaws at his stomach. 

He doesn't tell his friends his situation, just as his friends don't tell him Roach is technically missing. No one wants to be a bother.

Lucas lives for the hours his family is at church, and he can pull out his phone from its hiding place behind one of Maribell's cross-stitches. He reads through the backlog of sent messages, most of them from Roach.

R > There are 4,500 species of cockroach, but only 4 are typically considered household pests.

R > Have you ever gone sledding?

R > [a closely shot photograph of a squirrel in a tree]

R > Have you ever eaten lox?

R > The American cockroach has a three-lobed brain. Most of the brain is devoted to controlling the antennae or processing their sensory data.

and so on. Lucas tries to make sure he answers all of the questions, but he doesn't have much else to say. He doesn't call Roach. He doesn't want them to answer, to hear their voice and miss them even more. Or worse, Roach could screen his call; they don't like talking on the phone. 

Roach reads and rereads Cockroaches. Despite the early assertion that cockroaches are antisocial, it turns out many species form aggregations at some point in their lives. Roach does not know what this means about them. They are starting to think the book might be less helpful than anticipated. They go to the public library, but the shelves are severely depleted, including most of the books about invertebrates; because they talk about evolution, according to the librarian. She suggests Roach use the Internet to find what they need, which goes against everything the librarian stands for.

They find a park with a tall piñon and climb it and sit nestled amongst prickly branches and poking needles, their hands sticky with clean scented sap. They watch the people below, oblivious to their presence. Roach misses Lucas. They wish they knew where he lived. They remember the flyer, the one Evelyn said was from Lucas's church, and they find it on their phone; it is on the other side of town. They send Lucas a picture of a spider that made its home in the tree. They send him a picture of the sunset. They send,

> Cockroaches have around 1 million neurons in their brains. Humans have around 10 billion.

Roach wonders what that means for them.

. . .

Mr. Gregor is a remarkably old human, having successfully extended his life through various supernatural means; he has, as they say, been around the block. The only person he has ever known to be longer lived than himself is his father, with whom he has not spoken in over seventeen years. Mr. Gregor does not know where Brent Smalls comes from, or how long he has been walking on this earth, but the power behind him is something immense. He is either very, very old or very, very ambitious. Neither possibility inspires much confidence in Mr. Gregor. There is clearly something dark at work in this town, and Brent Smalls is behind it.

Mr. Gregor does not worry about finding Roach; they are still in town, and he knows they will return. He does not worry about Lucas, who has his phone and would certainly text him or one of the girls if something was wrong at home. He does worry about Millie; he brings the twins down to the basement so he can keep an eye on them while he researches, relieving her of duty but making his own job infinitely more difficult; the basement is hardly child-proof. He sets Millie up with an online therapist, because he does not trust this town, not right now. He closes the shop early and spends more time in the apartment in the evenings, much to Evelyn’s chagrin.

. . .

“Do you think I'm disgusting?” Millie signs. She is in her room with Evelyn. She is working on homework, while Evelyn is glued to her phone on Millie's bed. She had to lean over and grab Evelyn's foot to get her attention.

Evelyn tries to mask her wtf face but does a poor job of it. In her defense, it's a hell of a question. “No,” she signs, “Why?”

Millie shrugs. She gestures towards her arm, which is covered by long sleeves anyway. 

“I think you're beautiful,” Evelyn signs, “All of you.” Millie looks skeptical. “Let me see,” she gestures. Mils holds out her arm, and Evelyn can feel her pulse through her wrist as she pushes the sleeve up with her other hand. The wounds are all mostly healed; even the one that needed stitches, and the one above it that Evelyn knew about and ran away from. She lets out a breath she didn't realize she was holding as she rubs her thumb over the ridged lines.

“See?” she signs, “No problem.” She lifts Millie's hand and presses her fingers against her lips.

Millie asks, “Where were you at lunch?”

A pause. “Outside.”

“With A-N-D-Y?”

Evelyn nods, signs, “Andy.” His name is a combination of the letter A and the sign for weed.

“Why did you start smoking?”

Evelyn smokes because she's fucking exhausted; because she is bored of this town and her life; because Andy does and she likes spending time with him. She uses his excuse, “A-N-X-I-E-T-Y.”

“Do you get weird dreams?” Mils asks.

Evelyn gives her a curious look. For a second, she wonders if she is dreaming now. She half expects words would fly out of her mouth like bubblegum if she were to talk. “Sometimes,” she says.

“I have weird dreams about school,” Millie signs.

Evelyn blinks. She shakes her head. “I don't want to think about school,” she signs, “School dreams feel like hell.” But she has them too, doesn't she? She tries to remember, but can't.

Evelyn's phone buzzes; another text. “Are you fucking him?” Millie asks suddenly.

Evelyn looks confused. “Lucas?” she asks.

Millie grimaces. “Andy,” she signs.

“Once, long time ago,” Evelyn signs, trying very hard to look indifferent. She opens the text from Lucas, then flips it around for Mils to see, eyes filled with concern.

L > I need food.

From the kitchen, Millie retrieves Lucas's favorite snacks and nonperishables; she repackages the loud chips bags so he doesn't get caught. Evelyn stuffs her backpack full and gives Mils a grin. “Hope this works,” she says; then she disappears from the room, flies hovering in her place.

Lucas looks like shit. “Have you even moved?” Evelyn signs; he looks like he hasn't left his bed. He kind of hasn't.

Lucas’s hands are too busy shoving food into his face to respond. He nods towards the door and mimes turning a key.

“They locked you in?” Evelyn signs, dismayed.

Lucas nods.

Evelyn stares at him like he's grown two heads. “I want you to come with me,” she says.

Lucas shakes his head. “Mr. Gregor would get in trouble,” he says. 

“Mr. Gregor?”

He nods. He doesn't know how to explain that he is doing this to himself; all Lucas would have to do to reintegrate into his family is wear a dress, but he won't. He pretends to hear something from the hallway outside and urges Evelyn to leave. He hides the extra food in a shoebox inside Maribell’s closet.

Evelyn reappears in her room. Mils is waiting for her expectantly. “How is Lucas?” she asks.

“Locked up,” Evelyn signs.

“What the fuck?” Millie signs, “Why didn't you bring him back?”

She shakes her head sadly. “He wouldn't come,” she says.

Millie looks disappointed. “Didn't stop you when you moved me,” she says. She doesn't know the signs for teleporting with flies in the air and maggots under your skin. She shudders.

“I'm trying to be better,” Evelyn signs. Her honesty derails Millie's animosity; she actually looks impressed. “I love you,” she tries.

Millie answers her with a kiss.

Chapter 41

Millie’s head and hands are locked up in a thick oak board, mounted on a post tall enough that she has to stand on her toes to keep the pressure off her neck. She can see Evelyn in front of her, also imprisoned in a pillory, this one too short so she is bent over awkwardly and Millie definitely doesn't notice her butt.

She has no way of getting Evelyn’s attention or communicating with her. There are people walking around, avoiding eye contact with her. “Evelyn,” she says; her name tastes like honey and flows out of Millie’s mouth, winding through the air in front of her target.

Evelyn sees her name in front of her and knows she is dreaming. Of course she is dreaming, she has had this dream every night for months, or some variant of it. She pulls her hands out of the narrow holes in the board, her bones rubbery, maggots under flesh. She places her hands on either side and pulls her head out, her ears folding over and stretching, her skull stretching and reforming; all completely painlessly.

“How?” Mils signs, hand dangling awkwardly.

“Pull,” Evelyn signs.

Millie pulls at her hands, but they do not budge.

Evelyn places her hands on Millie’s arm, the one with hundreds of gaping wounds, and pulls. Millie feels her bones turn to sludge. Her hand slips out of the hole easily. She pulls the other one out, then her head. Evelyn still clings to her hand.

“We're dreaming,” Millie says, and as the powder blue words float to the gym ceiling some of the people around them look up with interest. Then they see the eyes; thousands of them, all different colors, all filled with venom, and they quickly look down again.

Evelyn puts her finger to her lips. “Shh.” She pulls Millie through the crowd, past the pillories. They leave the gym into a school of vast, infinite hallways. Lucas is running down one hall towards them; he shouts, “RUN!” the command big and bold and indigo. Behind him is a towering monster, white straggly hair and glowing red eyes and claws like knives. They turn and run, hand in hand.

. . .

Roach wakes up to a falling sensation; they scramble to catch themselves, but they did not sleep in a tree last night. They are safe on solid ground. They are trespassing in Douglas's house. It was very cold last night, so they slept in the closet of the twins’ room. Roach does not know why they do not just return to Oddities.

Douglas leaves for work very early in the morning, baker’s hours; Roach waits until they are sure he is gone before emerging from the closet. They take a shower in Douglas's bathroom, eat a bagel in his kitchen, and charge their phone with his electricity. They consider writing Douglas a thank you note, or perhaps it would be an apology note, but decide maybe it is better he just did not know Roach was here at all. They meticulously clean up after themselves.

Roach exits the house through the front door, locking it with the spare key Douglas keeps under a flowerpot in his garden. As they return the key, they spot Andy on his porch next door. Despite the still early hour, he already has his vape.

“Sup,” Andy says. “I heard you got expelled for, like, doing six guys in the bathroom or something.”

Roach cocks their head at him; they do not catch the innuendo. “I was dragged in there,” they say. As they cross the yard to his porch and its pool of yellow light, Andy can see the shadow of a healing black eye. They sit down next to him on a wood porch swing, and he offers his vape, surprised when they accept.

“What do I do?” Roach asks.

“Press the button and breathe in,” Andy says, leaning back.

Roach does as they are told, then erupts into a coughing fit that tastes like maple syrup. Andy thumps them on the back a couple times as they try to catch their breath.

“Quiet, man,” he says, but he is smiling. “There's kids sleeping in there.”

Roach hands the vape pen back. They say, “How many siblings do you have?”

“I'm the oldest of six,” Andy says, “Well, technically I'm the bastard. They're my half-siblings.”

“‘Bastard’ is derogatory,” Roach says.

“Yeah, I know,” Andy agrees. “My stepdad calls me it all the time.”

“That is unfortunate.” Roach is disheartened to learn of yet another dysfunctional family.

He shrugs. Takes another hit. Asks, “So did Lucas get expelled too?”

“Why do you smoke so much?” Roach asks. They do not want to talk about Lucas.

“I've got killer anxiety,” Andy says. “It helps.” He also can't sleep at night; he wakes up sweating and breathless. He is tired, all the time. 

Roach's heart feels fluttery, their head airy and light. It is not unpleasant, but it feels more like anxiety than not. They say, “I am glad you found a solution.”

They sit on the porch swing in silence for a few moments longer, the chains creaking as they rock back and forth. Andy hears the loud blare of an alarm clock from inside, signifying the start of the day.

“Gotta go,” he says, standing, “See ya.”

“Goodbye,” Roach says. Andy turns off the porch light when he goes inside so Roach won't be seen as they slip across the yard to the street. Watching their shadow, Andy realizes they aren't limping.

Roach finds Lucas's church. There is a park next to it, a large, grassy area that could not possibly exist naturally in this desert. They sit on a metal bench and pretend to read Fahrenheit 451 while watching the people around them. A small group of children shuffle past; not Lucas's family but wearing similar clothing. Light colors, long sleeves, dresses and button ups. Some of them have their long hair pulled back with a white cloth.

The oldest, or at least the tallest, glances at Roach as they walk by. “That book is banned,” he says pompously.

“That is why I am reading it,” Roach replies, and the kid hurries away.

Later, they recognize Sophia and Annalee shuffling alongside an even larger group across the street; it is not clear whether either of them sees Roach or recognizes them. Lucas is not a part of that group, which Roach assumes is his family; is he at home then? Roach does not know where home is for Lucas, except that it is somewhere nearby. They wonder how conspicuous they would look if they were to follow his family home after school.

After the brief wave of pedestrians slows to a trickle, Roach goes to a nearby fast-food restaurant and waits for someone to throw away a perfectly good hash brown. They drink three-quarters of a cup of orange juice, still cold. At the attached gas station, the attendant is throwing out day-old fruit, and Roach takes a banana. They return to the park and climb one of the densely needled pine trees. From this vantage, they watch two older men leave the church and walk around the park, as if looking for something. They stop at the bench Roach was sitting on and Roach realizes they recognize one of them: Superintendent Brent Smalls. Roach stays very, very still in their tree until the men leave. Roach remains in the tree. They text Lucas, and he doesn't respond for several hours; but then he responds almost immediately.

R > Echinoderms sequester approximately 0.1 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide per year as calcium carbonate. This is less than one-third of one percent of global emissions.

(Roach has been reading about global warming, which may be contributing to their melancholy).

L > You dissecting starfish today?

Roach is not sure if they are supposed to be doing a biology lab today; they are not entirely sure what day it is. They check the date on their phone: Tuesday.

R > Indeed.

L > Any more fun facts?

R > Most starfish species are free spawning, but the smallest known starfish gives birth to live young. The developing juveniles feed on each other in the brood pouch.

L > Ouch. Like tiger sharks.

Roach beams despite themselves. Lucas remembered that from them.

R > Why are you not at school?

L > Family stuff. Means I can talk to you :)

R > Where do you live?

Lucas does not want to tell Roach where he lives. Not that he doesn't want to see them; Lucas is dying to see them. He also knows that Roach showing up on his doorstep would be an absolute disaster.

L > You can't come over here. My parents would kill me

R > O ye of little faith.

Lucas shudders. Matthew 8:26.

L > Please don't quote that shit at me. I get enough of it here

R > I apologize. Also, I do not intend to get caught by your parents.

L > How do you plan on doing that?

R > I will learn to do what Evelyn can do.

L > Please be careful

Lucas is tired of magic and flies and Bible verses. He is tired of dreams he can't remember and being alone. 

R > Have you ever been in a fight?

L > Just beaten up

R > Same. Have you ever learned a martial art?

L > Nope. What happened?

R > When this is over, we should take MMA classes.

L > When what is over?

Roach is not sure how to answer his question, but they have been coming to the realization that something bizarre is happening. The thick fog they saw in the stone when looking for Evelyn; the fervored graffiti and accusations; an actual book burning, which everyone has just put behind them like it wasn't a major red flag. The deep, dark circles underneath everyone’s eyes; the way that none of Roach's friends are sleeping; the dreams that keep them up at night, but no one can remember. Superintendent Brent Smalls and his piercing blue eyes. Instead, they say,

R > When you come home.

Lucas is at home, as much as he wants to deny it. This is his house that he grew up in with his family, minus a few months here and there. They are the people he shares blood with. He loves Mr. Gregor and his Freak Show, but you don't get to just pick your family. Eventually, Lucas will give in. He will get tired of snacks instead of real meals, he will put on his dresses and meekly make his way to the family dining table. He will accept his place because it is the place given to him. He texts,

L > Gotta go, parents

It is a lie.

Chapter 42

Annalee recognized the guy at the park, the one who caused a ruckus in the church for bringing a banned book so close to its sacred ground, or whatever it is the grownups are in such a fuss about. Annalee is beginning to lose interest in the things that grownups say to her; they always seem to be angry, or else lying.

She wants to talk to them, Lucas's friend; there is something she thinks they should see. She wants to tell them about Lucas, because he is not okay, she knows, locked up in Maribell's room. She wants to go to Oddities and tell the owner to go save him. She would need saving herself if she were to do these things, she fears.

Roach does not appear to be at the park in the afternoon, and Annalee and her siblings and her classmates are permitted to spend some time playing outside after lunch. Pastor MacCready had been unable to find the alleged iconoclast but makes a point to stand outside and watch over his sheep.

Roach waits until Annalee is alone, standing near the tree before softly calling her name. Annalee starts and looks around, so Roach calls again and rustles a tree branch. She squints into the tree and spies a dark shape, which moves and suddenly reveals itself as human. Annalee almost jumps but suppresses her surprise, swiftly glancing towards her pastor; he is not even looking in her direction.

“Roach?” she asks, not looking towards the tree, not allowing her voice to carry. She cringes as more rustling in the tree threatens to reveal her transgression.

Roach partially descends the tree, getting close enough to Annalee to talk without sacrificing the shield of branches. “How is Lucas?” they ask.

Annalee keeps her eyes cast down. “I do not know,” she admits, “Our parents have forbidden us from seeing him.” She spoke to him, briefly, while waiting for the hallway bathroom this morning; he sounded tired, broken.

Roach feels a twinge in their gut, a crushing wave of sadness. “I wish to see him,” they say.

“You would not be allowed on the lawn,” Annalee says with some humor in her voice.

“What if I looked like you?” they ask.

Annalee can't help herself; she checks that the coast is clear before glancing into the tree. They look fairly ridiculous, perched amongst thin, spindly branches. “They would know you are not from the church,” she says. Roach does not answer. The other children are starting to make their way back to the church; recess is over. Quickly, Annalee asks, “Does your phone have a camera?”

“Yes.”

“Can I borrow it? There is something in the church I need to show you. I will take a picture and bring it back after school.”

Roach does not answer, but a black metal rectangle knocks through some branches and lands on the needle scattered dirt below with a thud. Annalee checks that Pastor MacCready is not watching, and quickly kneels to pick up the phone.

“0-6-0-6,” Roach's voice says from above; a PIN. She tucks the phone into her sleeve and hurries towards the church.

. . .

Annalee makes an excuse to pass by the tree on her way home; if Roach is still hiding in it, they are invisible. She wordlessly drops their phone at the base of the tree and pretends to find her necklace, a simple golden cross, in the grass, then hurries back to cross the street and join her siblings.

The thing she wanted to show Roach, which she took several pictures of because it spans too large for one, is the church’s recently new “Wall of Sin”; the words emblazoned in red above hundreds of photographs of people around town, each inscribed with the sin depicted. Roach recognizes some of them: Evelyn and Millie, kissing in the Bakery; Andy, joint in hand; the Lesser Keys of Solomon in Roach’s hands; Lucas and Roach kissing behind the glass door at Oddities. The last two were taken by Jade, Roach realizes, the day she accosted Lucas, before the graffiti. Roach wants to send the pictures to their friends, but refrains from doing so; at least for now, they do not want to needlessly cause them to worry.

They text Evelyn, instead:

R > I need to learn how you teleport.

E > can't help u. idk how it works.

R > Can you show me?

E > where ru?

R > I am still in town.

E > meet me @ park tonite

Evelyn's texts often need some extra interpretation. Roach abandons their tree and starts the walk across town to a different park, in a different place, with the same general air of neglect and graffiti. They find a place to hide, a ditch behind a row of backyard fences. They do not want Mr. Gregor to see them, or Douglas, or Millie or the twins. They watch the sun set and wait for Evelyn. When the sky is black overhead, Roach spies a shadowy figure lingering behind a pool of orange light from an overhead streetlamp. They approach and soon learn it is not Evelyn but Andy; not smoking, just enjoying the night air.

“Sup,” he says when Roach steps into the light. 

“Good evening,” Roach responds.

“Hey, get out of the light,” Andy suggests. “They don't do intensive sweeps or anything, but you kinda stand out there.”

Roach joins him in the shadow of a small, squat building. “I am waiting for Evelyn,” they explain.

“She’ll find you here,” Andy says confidently.

“Okay.” They wait in silence for a while. “Do you go to church?” they ask suddenly, randomly.

“My family does,” Andy says. “I prefer sleeping in on Sundays.”

“Does your family’s church have a Wall of Sin?” 

Andy gives Roach a look like they have just sprouted mandibles and maxilla. “You mean like at school?”

“Correct,” they say, “but sin instead of shame.”

“Not that I know of,” Andy replies, “but it's been years.”

Roach pulls out their phone, the screen lighting up their face. They open one of the photos Annalee took and turn the screen to show Andy.

“Holy shit,” he says, “that's fucked up.”

“I agree,” Roach says. “I would like to know if it is just this church, or if more are doing it. The hospital has a wall of shame, too.”

“Damn,” Andy says, still looking through the different photos on the wall. He recognizes himself, Evelyn, even Roach in various pictures. He hands the phone back. “I can find out,” he promises.

“Thank you.”

More silence. Andy asks, “Have you been having weird-ass dreams?”

Roach is about to answer that they do not dream when Evelyn appears, fuzzy black flies buzzing languidly around her head. Andy jumps; he's not used to that. “Welcome,” he says, which she can't hear because she is facing Roach.

Evelyn ignores Andy. She is surprised how glad she is to see Roach; she hadn't realized how much she missed him. But she refrains from hugging them, because Roach is Roach and only one person can touch them.

“Do you want me to take you to see Lucas?” she signs. She can teleport people easier than explaining how to do it.

Roach shakes their head. “I want to do it myself,” they insist.

“I don't know how,” she signs. “I told you.”

“Take me somewhere,” they sign.

Evelyn reaches out to grab Roach’s hand, but they recoil. “I have to,” she signs. “Where do you want to go?”

Roach thinks for a moment. “Forest,” they sign, then they tentatively touch her hands.

Roach and Evelyn vanish into the darkness, leaving Andy alone in the park. He shrugs, and starts walking home.

. . .

Evelyn respawns in her bed before Millie has even finished her shower; no one has to know she left. Definitely no one has to know she saw Roach, teleported them to a forest somewhere in the Pacific Northwest, then left them there. In her defense, they insisted on staying; they kept running away. They climbed a fucking tree. She's not a babysitter.

She sends them a text.

E > FU

R > Thank you.

Mils comes into their room, wrapped in a towel, and Evelyn instantly brightens. “Hey, beautiful,” she signs, grinning even broader when Millie blushes.

Chapter 43

Roach is in a forest. They are not dying; they feel quite peaceful here, surrounded by trees and invertebrates and birds and squirrels. There is a cold bite in the night air, and it makes Roach's chest tight. They sit down in soft dirt against the hard, prickly roots of a tree, wrapping their arms around their legs for more warmth. They send a text to Lucas:

R > Cockroaches can survive temperatures below freezing due to the production of glycerol antifreeze in their hemolymph.

They watch the night sky and wait.

. . .

Lucas is dreaming. He is at school, alone, infinite hallways and infinite eyes. He's sitting in his biology classroom wondering where Roach is, because they're the one who always does the dissections. Lucas misses Roach. Where is everyone, he wonders. What are they dissecting today, he wonders. He draws a picture of a cockroach on the whiteboard. He misses Roach.

Lucas turns around and there it is: human but not, with deathly pale skin, teeth like a wolf’s and piercing blue eyes. It towers over him, tall enough that its head grazes the ceiling and its spindly limbs dangle past its knees. Lucas is paralyzed with fear; the monster reaches out with long, thin fingers that taper into dagger-sharp claws, black as though dipped in ink; it digs the claws through the scar on Lucas’s abdomen, into his flesh, his guts, wrapping around his spine with a grip like ice. It lifts him up, so they are eye to eye, and Lucas screams.

. . .

Lucas wakes up screaming; he is soaked in sweat. With even more shame, he realizes he has wet the bed, like a fucking toddler. No one comes to save him, to check on him, to scold him. He wants to lay there crying for a while, but he forces himself out of the bed. He strips the sheets and dumps them on the bathroom floor to deal with later; thank God for waterproof mattress covers, apparently. He climbs into the shower, t-shirt and boxers and all, and sits under the stream for way longer than he should; if his parents were awake to notice, his father would probably beat him for his impertinence. He washes the boxers with soap and wrings the clothes out and hangs them up to dry on the towel rack. Now he has nothing to wear. Lucas digs through Maribell's dresser, but he still can't bring himself to wear anything from it. He wraps himself up in his towel and lays down on his bed and stares at the ceiling, because he doesn't want to sleep ever again.

If only he could remember why.

. . .

In mid-morning, after a long, frigid night and a sunrise wet with dew, the warm rays thawing out their frozen body, Roach figures out how to teleport. There are no flies when they vanish or reappear, no nausea or vomiting the prickly black bodies. Just a poof of dust that smells like the absence of all scent.

The first place Roach goes is their room; the lights are all off, the windows shaded, but when their eyes adjust to the dim light they can see nothing has changed. It is as if the room is waiting for their return. Or Lucas's. The Cat meows from the doorway, staring at them with doleful eyes.

“I need you,” Roach whispers, striding over and gently picking it up, feeling the warm purring through its fur. Roach is taking a gamble; at this time, Mr. Gregor has probably taken the twins to the Bakery, which means Roach will probably be able to get to the basement. They carry the Cat with them to the fire escape and place it delicately on the metal mesh landing. This is another gamble: that the Cat will cooperate, or even understand what it is supposed to do.

“Do you think you can find Lucas?” Roach mutters, feeling foolish. What is a cockroach doing talking to a cat? It yawns, stretches, then leaps down the staircase and away from the shop. Roach feels sick; if this does not work, Lucas will probably never forgive them for losing the Cat. They take the elevator to the basement and stand still long enough for their eyes to adjust to the near complete darkness. They walk carefully towards Mr. Gregor's desk in the back of the room.

The stone Roach used to find Evelyn is in a pile of various other shiny, colorful rocks they cannot identify. They suddenly regret focusing primarily on the biological sciences to which they are most drawn. Somewhere in this room there are likely dozens of volumes on gemstones, but Roach does not have time to look for them right now. They grab the shiny black chunk of obsidian and vanish from the room.

Sitting in soft white sand on an empty tropical beach, Roach stares into the rock. They think about Lucas. They think about the Cat. The rock remains solidly opaque; the magic is gone. Roach vanishes, reappears in the middle of a savannah. The rock remains a rock. A mountain peak; the Mississippi riverside; a broken down, abandoned stone house somewhere in Wales. No matter where Roach goes, the rock stays resolutely a rock. 

. . .

Lucas is breaking; Lucas is so fucking tired. He is very, very hungry and very seriously considering putting on a dress. This morning, his clothes were still damp so he's just walking around the room naked; he has washed Maribell's sheets and blankets in the bathtub, but they will take even longer to air dry. At least his period finally ended. He is cold. He opens his window to let an even colder breeze in and flashes the backyard because it is always completely empty, except that it isn't; a black cat is sitting in the tree outside his window.

“No fucking way,” he says. He bends the screen inwards to remove it and hides it in the back of Maribell's closet. He turns around and the Cat is already there, meowing at him. “Shhhh,” Lucas chides, picking the Cat up and cradling him to his chest. “Fuck,” he whispers into his fur. He smells like home.

. . .

Roach gives up scrying with the rock after 218 tries in 17 different locations. They chuck the obsidian as hard as they can, and it lands with a red poof of sand. They lay down, avoiding a prickly cactus near their head, and stare at the endless blue void above. A beige, spiky lizard crawls over their legs. A vulture soars lazy circles overhead. Somewhere, a cricket chirps.

Their phone buzzes in their pocket. Roach is surprised they get signal out here, wherever here is. 

L > Yo check it out.

L > [a photograph of the Cat]

L > You didn't say he was missing

R > I did not know. He must have slipped out this morning.

L > wtf do I do?

R > Perhaps he will find his way back home if you put him outside.

L > But I wanna keep him :(

R > Keep your window open.

Lucas does not respond after that, but Mr. Gregor texts Roach later that afternoon.

G > Bring the stone back.

Roach looks lazily over to where they had thrown it. They are burning under the dry desert sun. They do not want to leave. 

R > It is broken.

G > It only works here, you fool.

Oh, well, that explains that. Roach rolls over and grumbles to their feet, trudges through the sand, and picks up the rock. They disappear in a wisp of dust.

. . .

Evelyn is sitting at the bakery when she gets the texts from Andy; the first is a wall, not dissimilar from the one at school, decorated with the words “Wall of Sin” and photographs beneath it. The second is a picture of Evelyn and Millie in this exact same spot a couple days ago, kissing. Evelyn glances back to the corner of the job, where Jade is conspicuously absent. She fucking knew it.

Millie signs, “What's up?”

“Nothing,” Evelyn lies, badly, then she reluctantly shows Millie the first picture.

Millie stares at the photographs for a long time, long enough that Evelyn’s phone buzzes with another photo. Millie opens it absently, remembering it's not her phone only when she sees who sent the message: Andy, naturally. This time it is a picture of Evelyn’s 8th grade school portrait; scrawled in red over her face is “babykiller.” She reluctantly hands the phone over, watching Evelyn carefully as she glances at the latest addition. She swallows, her teeth clenched, then she sighs and looks around.

“Did you notice?” she signs. She gestures broadly at the shop around them. “Lots of them here.”

Millie nods, face grim. “J-A-D-E,” she signs, and now Evelyn finally knows her name. Mils looks behind her at Douglas, then signs, “Do we tell him?”

“I don't know,” Evelyn replies. He is going to be so devastated when he finds out.

. . .

Roach appears with a powdering of pale dust in the alley behind Oddities. They step down the concrete stairs to the basement door. One hand holding the large glass stone, the other knocks on the door, which opens under the light force.

“Mr. Gregor?” Roach calls into the darkness.

“Have you come to return my rock?” a voice calls out from the darkness.

“I need to use it.” Roach steps inside and lets their eyes adjust. There is a small light at the other side of the basement; Mr. Gregor must be sitting at his desk. They walk over and stand watching him, still holding the rock.

“Theft of need is still stealing,” Mr. Gregor reminds them. “Three times, now, you have come down here uninvited and taken my things.”

“I am sorry,” Roach says. They do not sound sorry. They do not feel particularly sorry. But they understand it needs to be said.

Mr. Gregor sighs and stands. He is much shorter than Roach. He holds out his hand, expectantly, but they do not hand it over. “Roach,” Mr. Gregor says, “It is not yours.” He is relieved when they finally hand it over.

Roach watches Mr. Gregor place the obsidian down very precisely on his desk. He steps back and gestures for Roach to sit down. They now notice the fine, thin lines carved into the desk, the loops of which they trace with one finger.

“How does it work?” they ask.

“The obsidian is just an object on its own. It needs magic to flow through it to work as intended.”

Roach places their hands flat on the table on each side of the rock, centering it between their thumbs and forefingers; this they remember from the instructions. They stare into the obsidian's inky black void. They think about Lucas, which does nothing; same as when they had searched for Evelyn. People, it would seem, are off-limits. They think about the Cat, and a light seems to form inside the stone; Roach's eyes are drawn to it, painfully, like a vacuum sucking their soul out through their pupils. They feel as though they are falling through the stone.

Chapter 44

Lucas is sitting on his bed, hunched over, cradling the Cat. He is still naked. The Cat purrs and he scratches under its chin. He says, “Who's a good kitty?”

The Cat says, “Hey.”

Lucas sits up straight and pushes the Cat off his lap, saying “What the fuck?” The Cat jumps gracefully off the bed and turns around to face him.

“Lucas,” the Cat says. “I found you.” He recognizes the voice now, in his head; it's Roach, whether they're in the Cat or in his head he doesn't know.

“What are you doing here?” Lucas asks.

The Cat gives him a long look. “I missed you,” it says. Then it tilts its head at him, exactly like Roach does. “Are you naked?”

“Fuck,” Lucas says, “Hang on.” The Cat does not follow him to the bathroom, where he pulls on the clothes hanging off the towel rack. The shirt feels crispy, still damp in spots, but nothing smells bad.

The Cat is looking out the window when Lucas returns. “Now I know where you live,” he says, jumping to the floor to rub on Lucas's ankles.

“Please don't come here,” Lucas begs. He really doesn't want his parents to meet Roach. He doesn't want to get in more trouble. He doesn't want things to get much, much worse than they already are.

“I need to see you,” the Cat insists, “I will not get you in trouble.”

“How?” Lucas demands.

The Cat does not respond, but a few moments later, a strange haze of dust appears in the room; seconds later, the dust forms into Roach. His heart aches at the sight. Lucas crosses the room and wraps his arms around them, holding the embrace for way longer than Roach is probably comfortable with. He lets go, pulls back to look at them again. A fading yellow bruise under one eye is the only difference. He puts his hand lightly on Roach's face, his thumb gently tracing the bruise. “What happened?” Lucas asks.

“Restroom drama,” Roach says indifferently. “Will you come with me?”

Lucas looks over at the locked door to the bedroom. “I can't leave,” he says.

“Yes you can,” Roach replies.

He chews on the inside of his cheek. Lucas is tired. He is hungry. He feels like shit. “I have no clothes,” he says, gesturing towards the boxer shorts.

“We can fix that,” Roach says. They hold out a hand, and Lucas warily takes it. They disappear from Maribell's room and reappear in their own room above the shop. Lucas's stomach churns, nausea rising.

Roach watches him, concerned. “You might vomit,” they warn, but he manages not to; maybe because of the lack of flies, or maybe because there is nothing in his stomach to expel. Lucas sits down heavily in his old bed and rubs his face and head with his hands. It hasn't even been a week. Roach pulls clothing at random from Lucas's dresser and brings it over to him, where he stares at the pile absently. They place one hand on his, and he looks at them, feeling torn between crying and hugging them and never letting go.

Roach is extremely concerned about Lucas. He looks exhausted, faded, stretched out and worn. He looks like he has not eaten for weeks, even though he has only been gone a few days. All Roach wants right now is to fix that; they do not even need Lucas to smile, just to look slightly less morose. They squeeze his hand, then lean in to kiss him.

The kiss is like electricity, sparking arcs of desire through him. It is what he has been dying for, all this time. He pulls Roach in closer, deepening the kiss, not really caring where it ends up, but then his stomach betrays him, grumbling loudly, causing Roach to pull back.

“Sorry,” Lucas says, embarrassed. “I'm kind of hungry.” Understatement of the century.

Roach stands up and tosses the pile of clothes at him. “Get dressed,” they say, “What is your favorite food?”

“I don't know,” Lucas says, dressing. “I could eat anything right now.”

“I could find a restaurant that specializes in entomophagy,” Roach says.

“What's that?”

“Eating insects. Like entomology, the study of insects.”

Lucas blanches. “Ok, not anything,” he says, and Roach shrugs, almost looking as though they are disappointed. “I don't know. Street tacos?”

Roach taps around on their phone as Lucas finishes getting dressed and tying his shoes. He stands up and wobbles a bit, feeling dizzy. Roach catches his arm to stabilize him. “Are you ready?” they ask, intense black eyes scanning him.

“Yep,” Lucas says, and they disappear together in a cloud of ash.

They are on a narrow street, lined with buildings like boxes. There are no cars on the road, which is swarming with pedestrians. A line of canopies across the street shelters a large, smoky grill and taco stand.

“Roach,” Lucas asks, looking around for signs, not in English, “Where are we?” He feels dizzy and disoriented.

“Mexico City,” they answer.

“Mexico?” Lucas asks, feeling dumb.

“That is correct,” Roach says, eyes wandering across the street to the taco stand. “Uhm,” they hesitate, “I may need you to order.” Everyone at school takes Spanish, except apparently Roach, who decided to take Latin.

“Isn't Spanish a romance language?” Lucas asks, “I'm surprised you haven't picked it up sooner.”

“I think sign language took up all the resources I had for a second language,” Roach mutters. They do not particularly enjoy Latin class.

“You know adults learn languages all the time, right?” Lucas asks. This conversation has taken an odd turn.

“Yes,” Roach agrees, “It is just more difficult than I anticipated.”

Roach starts leading Lucas across the street. “Wait,” he says, pulling back. “How are we going to pay for this?”

Roach hesitates for only a second; they had not considered that. They reach into a flower bed on the sidewalk next to them, pulling out a wallet, scuffed brown leather. Inside is empty, save for several hundred pesos. They take the cash and drop the wallet back into the dirt.

“Uhm, no?” Lucas says, “That's stealing.”

“It is lost,” they say. “I know not to whom I could even return it.”

It takes Lucas a second to parse their odd grammar. “Someone is looking for it,” he asserts.

“How do you know the wallet was not left there for us?” Roach asks.

That sounds like a load of bullshit. “Because we aren't even supposed to be here!” Lucas scoffs.

Roach picks up the wallet and puts most of the money back, supplementing the missing bills with a twenty from their own wallet. “Is that better?” they ask.

Lucas doesn't know the exchange rate for US dollars and pesos. That's hardly the point, right? His stomach growls again; he relents, and the real Mexican street tacos are delicious; totally worth it. They walk down the street, Roach seemingly unperturbed about being in a strange place, hundreds of miles away from home; but Lucas can't stop looking around, trying to understand conversations, trying to not look completely out of place.

“Where would you like to go next?” Roach asks.

Lucas thinks. “I don't know,” he admits. “Is there anywhere we could just be alone?”

“Sure,” they say, grabbing Lucas's hand, and then they are in their room again.

Lucas stands there for a moment, eyes closed, willing away the nausea; it is harder now that he isn't starving, but he manages. He looks around the room. “Really?” he asks, smirking.

Roach shrugs. “It is my favorite place,” they say, walking over to the door, quietly closing and locking it.

The apartment is completely silent. “Is anyone else home?” Lucas asks.

“I do not know,” Roach responds, “but I am glad to hear that you still think of here as home.” Lucas blushes, feeling caught out. Roach comes over to him and entwines their fingers in his. “Is there somewhere else you would rather go?”

“Nope,” Lucas says, and he leans up to kiss them. He wraps his arm around their back and steps backwards until his legs hit his mattress; then he lays down, pulling Roach onto the bed with him. This time, his stomach won't interrupt them.

. . .

Roach brings Lucas back to his house, his jail cell, before his absence is noticed; hopefully. The window is still open, which Lucas realizes means if anyone came in here, they would think he jumped out. Would they just leave it open, then? He doesn't know. He tells Roach they should probably go but doesn't let go of their hand to let them. He wants them to stay here all night; or better yet, take him home and he could sleep there. Maybe he wouldn't wake up so tired.

Roach lingers, also reluctant to leave Lucas here alone. “I could stay,” they offer, “We would not get caught. I can disappear instantly.”

“That would be worse,” Lucas says, “My parents would freak out if they saw that.”

Compared to this morning, Lucas feels pretty okay. He is wearing clothes again and not starving. He really doesn't want Roach to leave; he wants to have sex with Roach again. He enjoyed himself and right now, he's pretty sure there's no shame in that. He thinks that maybe guilt over something as innocent as love is a consequence manufactured by the church in order to keep its followers miserable and in-line.

Lucas marvels at this moment of clarity, then pulls Roach in for a final kiss. “You've gotta go,” he says.

Roach lets him go, takes a couple steps back. “I love you,” they say, then they vanish.

. . .

The girls decide Millie should tell Gregor about the Wall of Sin and let him decide how to tell Douglas. She explains the situation while helping him put the twins down for bed that night, and he takes the news with the same sort of mild indifference that he takes most bad news. Something makes Millie ask if he has had any weird dreams lately, and he looks thoughtful for a moment before shaking his head. Millie has been having weird dreams, but she can barely remember them; more like the essence of them, a sense of impending doom. She doesn't elaborate. She doesn't want Gregor to worry.

On the advice of her therapist, Millie has written a letter to Evelyn about the things she needs to say and can't communicate effectively. She writes about her anxieties surrounding their relationship. How she felt inadequate, given Evelyn’s history with casual sex, and maybe she pushed herself to move faster with her for fear of losing her. How she'd rather sit by and let Evelyn fuck a thousand other people than risk losing her. Millie does not tell her therapist about that last part; she doesn't know how the patient but stern young woman would react.

She folds the note unnecessarily small and writes on the outside: “You need to read this alone, then we can talk about it.” She gives the note to Evelyn in their room, then sits on the couch barely paying attention to the twins as they play a complicated game of chase and ball in the room around her, snakes squirming in her stomach. Time stretches on indefinitely but entirely too soon Evelyn emerges from the room and casually strolls down the hall to Millie, sitting down next to her on the couch. 

Mils watches her hands expectantly. “Okay,” Evelyn signs.

“Okay?” Millie asks, confused.

Evelyn smirks. “I don't want to fuck a thousand people,” she signs. She laughs as Millie’s eyes dart to the toddlers, making sure they are not paying attention. Gods forbid Ash start copying Evelyn’s sign for fucking.

“Oh,” Millie says.

“Are you disappointed?” Evelyn asks.

“Of course not.” Millie doesn't know what she was expecting, but a calm, casual conversation with Evelyn was not it.

“Thank you,” Evelyn signs. “We can talk about sex when you're ready.” Mils blinks at her, like she doesn't believe she's awake.

“Okay,” she finally signs, “I love you.”

“I love you too,” Evelyn signs, and she leans in to plant a chaste kiss on Millie’s cheek, grinning when it makes her blush.

In truth, the letter from Mils sent Evelyn’s mind reeling, and the only reason she isn't totally freaking out right now is that she is high, and she is pretty sure that's a problem too, but it's a different one she can't be fucked to address right now. At least now Evelyn has an answer to the words too fast that keep flying through her head, that awful, persistent feeling that she has been exploiting Mils. She thinks about what Mr. Gregor said: you can't make someone do something they don't want to do, but it seems you can make them do something they want to do but know better; and Millie definitely knows better than Evelyn. All Evelyn has to do is sit back and let Mils take the reins and never ask for anything, ever. That sounds perfectly reasonable, right?

She texts Andy. She meets him at the park after sundown. She asks him about the Wall, surprised when he says it was Roach who tipped him off.

“What happened when you guys left last night?” he asks.

“I left them in a forest,” she signs, but he doesn't get it. She shrugs, Andy shrugs. It is easy to feign indifference when there’s weed involved. She texts Roach and all they send back is,

R > I am fine.

Good enough, Evelyn supposes. She texts Lucas, who doesn't respond; but then again, when does he ever? She misses him; maybe she'll go visit him tomorrow.

. . .

“We are dreaming,” Evelyn says to Lucas, holding both of his hands tight. He ran into her, almost literally, full tilt sprinting, knocking them both over. Whatever he was running from, it's gone now, but he is still panicking, hyperventilating. What happens when you have a panic attack in a dream? Evelyn shakes the thought from her head.

Lucas stares at the words, hovering in the air, a soothing pulsing blue. Dreaming. What an awful place to be dreaming about. Why are there so many eyes in his school?

“This isn't my school anymore,” he says in Times New Roman. “I don't go to school anymore.”

Evelyn gives him a sad look. “What were you running from?” she signs.

“Big, scary, teeth,” Lucas signs. It seems less scary, now that he knows he is in a dream. He could become a moth if he wanted to. He feels like he's been a moth before, but he would remember something like that, wouldn't he? Lucas turns into a moth, just to see if it would be like he expected, and it is exactly like he expected. It's a more familiar body than his own. He has big, fuzzy antennae and he can smell everything in the entire school, even the monster that disappeared. It smells like wood ash and vinegar.

Evelyn watches Lucas turn into a giant moth. He doesn't fly or anything, just sits there waving his feathery orange antennae around. Lucas is a beautiful moth, she thinks. She wonders if he would let her ride him.

Lucas turns back into a human. “That was fun!” he says, the words flying off like moths. “We're dreaming,” he explains, unnecessarily. 

“You're weird,” Evelyn signs. She wants to find Millie. She wanders randomly down the halls and finds her. “You're here!” she shouts, her words golden bubbles.

Millie turns to look at her, wide-eyed, puts her finger up to her lips to say “Shh.” She is staring into an open locker, looking absolutely terrified. 

Evelyn jogs up to her to look inside the locker; inside is a narrow, vaguely yonic cave entrance. Small white spiders are crawling around the opening.

“We're dreaming,” Evelyn signs.

“I know,” Millie says. She points to the cave and makes a sign for screaming.

Evelyn looks behind her; Lucas is a moth again. “Stop it,” she signs. “Can you hear?”

Lucas reluctantly turns back into a person. He reluctantly stares into the cave. It feels like he is staring into a void, and the void is staring back. Yes, he can hear the screaming. He doesn't like it. He closes the locker door; problem solved.

Evelyn and Millie walk hand in hand through the infinite hallways while Lucas trudges behind them like a third wheel. They find the gym, which is full of pillories and people in them. None of them is Roach. Lucas wonders why no one is surprised about all this. He taps Evelyn’s shoulder.

“This is weird, right?” he signs.

Evelyn rolls her eyes. “Yeah, we're dreaming.”

“All of us?” he asks.

This stops her for a second. “We won't remember this,” she signs.

Millie looks around at all the eyes, dotting the walls and staring down at them. “A little,” she signs, “I think I remember a little, sometimes.”

Lucas shakes his head. “Never.”

Evelyn remembers waking up from weird dreams, feeling exhausted, like she'd never slept. Is this the dream she has been having? “Me too,” she signs, “very little.”

“We need to remember something,” Millie signs. “The same thing.”

Lucas turns into a moth. He really is a gorgeous moth, with a fuzzy orange body and long, grey wings with yellow spots. The people milling around the gym, those not locked up, give him a wide berth.

Millie and Evelyn look at each other and shrug. “M-O-T-H,” Evelyn signs.

. . .

Lucas wakes up from his dream feeling tired, remembering nothing, but at least he isn't soaked in sweat or worse. The Cat is curled up next to his head, and he buries his face in its fur. He takes a shower and gets dressed in his own clothes. He waits for his family to leave before taking his phone out of its hiding space to ask Roach if they are coming over today. He gets their response almost instantly, and moments later they are standing in front of him. Roach looks as tired as he feels, their clothes disheveled, and he's pretty sure it's the same clothes as yesterday. It's kind of hard to tell with Roach's wardrobe.

“Did you go home last night?” he asks.

Roach shakes their head. Roach has been doing the Evelyn thing. They went to the Himalayas, to Antarctica, to the middle of the Pacific. They dried out under a hot desert sun. They feel dusty and faded. “Breakfast?” they ask. They hold Lucas's hands and take him to their room.

“This isn't breakfast,” he says, smirking.

“I want to make sure no one is home,” Roach explains. “I will make breakfast.”

“Can we do something else first?”

Roach tilts their head. “What?”

Lucas answers by kissing them.

Chapter 45

Millie doesn't even make it through a whole week of school before she decides she has had enough. Thursday morning is close enough to the weekend, right? Part of it is how tired she is. Part of it is the relentless minor assaults against her that Ryan and his cohort of thugs have started up. A random groping in the crowded hallway, a foot extended to trip, an accidental shove into a metal locker door. It's not just Millie, but other kids, too, all with some invisible beacon over their heads asking for abuse. Or not so invisible: most of the victims are faces on the Wall of Shame. Millie gave Ryan a bloody nose for grabbing her butt, and went home before she could get in trouble.

The twins are at daycare and Gregor is at the Bakery, so Millie is expecting the apartment to be empty, but she is hit by the smell of cinnamon and bacon as soon as she gets upstairs. She finds Roach and Lucas in the kitchen. Lucas looks like he's been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. 

“Uh,” Millie says, “What are you guys doing here?”

“Breakfast,” Lucas says.

Roach avoids Millie's gaze. “I am not here,” they say, “I am sprinting through the plains of Mongolia’s Eastern steppe.”

She looks between Roach and Lucas, torn between exorbitantly happy to see them both and anxious about why they are here. Good thing Millie has those antidepressants to suppress all emotion. “Is that where you've been?” she asks Roach.

They shrug. “Does Gregor know you're back?” she persists.

Lucas looks at Roach, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. They say, “I am not back.”

Lucas asks, “What do you mean?”

Roach declines to answer, so Millie says, “They've been gone all week.”

“I have been around,” they say.

Lucas says, “What about school?” He chews on his lip. Didn't Roach say they were at school?

“What about it?”

There is a long, awkward silence in the room, punctuated by sizzling from a pan on the stove. Roach turns off the heat, then says, “I have made cinnamon pancakes. Would you like some?”

“Is there enough for Evelyn?” Millie asks.

“Plenty.”

Millie sends Evelyn a text. She feels like they all need to talk about something, but she doesn't know exactly what. She arrives a few minutes later. If she is surprised to see the others, Evelyn doesn't show it.

Lucas has to shoo the flies away from his plate and gives her an irritated look. “What's your problem?” Evelyn asks.

“Roach does it without flies,” he signs.

Evelyn frowns. “Rude,” she signs, “I like my flies.”

Millie asks Roach, “When did you learn to teleport?”

“Yesterday,” they answer calmly.

Lucas waves his hand at another fly, complaining, “Why can't it be something cool, like moths?”

Evelyn and Millie look at each other, eyes wide. “Moths?” Millie asks.

“There are over twelve times as many species of moth as there are butterflies,” Roach offers.

“Thanks,” Evelyn signs, refraining from adding her usual sarcastic touch. She signs the letters M-O-T-H to herself. The word makes her heart race.

A moth flutters around the light overhead. This is not terribly unusual; moths live everywhere in this building. They are harmless. Willow likes catching them and holding them delicately in her chubby little hand, examining them up close. Millie can't stop watching the moth beat its tiny body into the glass fixture. Evelyn is also watching, transfixed; she can't hear the little tap tap on the glass.

“Guys?” Lucas says, waving his hand in front of Evelyn’s eyes. She starts, then shakes her head a little, a gesture repeated by Millie. They look at each other again, then busy themselves with eating pancakes.

“I think I had a dream about them,” Evelyn signs, gesturing towards their new friend above.

“A dream?” Millie asks. “Me too,” she signs.

“Weird.”

Roach is watching them curiously. “Have you been having weird dreams?” they ask, signing, “weird dream” for clarity.

Evelyn and Millie nod in unison. Lucas hesitates, and says, “I think I have too? I don't know. I'm so tired.”

“I'm so tired,” Evelyn signs, agreeing. Millie nods as well.

“Fascinating,” Roach says.

Lucas isn't exactly thrilled to learn he's been kept out of the loop about what's happening around town. It especially hurts when Roach reveals they spoke with Annalee, that she has spoken to them more recently than she has Lucas. He feels a twinge of guilt for causing so much trouble, and fear over whether his absence has been noticed at home. Roach holds his hand, squeezes his fingers. Their other hand is tapping rhythmically on their leg.

Something about the picture of Millie and Evelyn kissing in the Bakery on the Wall of Sin really hurts. It would be a sweet picture, if not for the clear intention of hate behind it and the label: Jude 1:7 - The punishment for sexual immorality is eternal fire. The punishment for having sex with Roach, the punishment for being trans, the punishment for giving birth to the twins out of wedlock are all the same. Damnation and hellfire. Lucas gets a stabbing pain in his stomach and a sudden, inexplicable wave of terror washes over him. He closes his eyes to suppress the nausea, eager to not puke up his breakfast all over the table. His skin feels cold, but he is sweating.

“Are you okay?” Roach asks.

Lucas opens his eyes. Everyone is staring at him like he just sprouted wings. “I don't like this,” he says. “I don't like any of this.” Roach touches his face and wipes tears off his cheek with their thumb. Why is he crying?

Millie says, “I think we should talk to Gregor.”

. . .

Mr. Gregor has spent half the morning assuring that Douglas is not responsible for the use of his Bakery as a way of outing some of the local LGBTQ+ community, and the other half assuring him that he has the right to refuse service to anyone, should the girl responsible for the photos return.

Douglas wonders if he should call the police, and Mr. Gregor has to remind him, “The police go to church, too.” It is not only the more traditionalist churches; every single Christian church in town has its own version of the Wall of Sin. If this little town had any other faiths, Mr. Gregor would have checked them, too. His trek around town to visit all the churches revealed other obvious signs of rancor and discord, particularly in the form of graffiti accusations. The ones against Evelyn and Roach are especially disconcerting, but that is just Mr. Gregor's personal biases showing.

After returning to his shop, Mr. Gregor is immediately accosted by his charges, none of whom should be here; isn't it a school day? He focuses on the most pressing outlier. “Lucas,” he asks, “do your parents know you are here?”

Lucas gives a quick head shake, looking nauseous. 

“We need to talk to you about something,” Millie says, saving him.

“There are a great many things I need to discuss with each of you,” Mr. Gregor says smoothly, looking at each of them in turn. Evelyn’s bloodshot eyes and Roach's continued absences and truancy are his most pressing concerns, but also more private, so he settles on, “Why are you all not at school?”

“School is not safe anymore,” Roach says simply. This seems to surprise the others, but then they agree.

“My parents pulled me out,” Lucas offers, “I'm supposed to go to school with the others, but I can't meet the dress code.”

This is news to Mr. Gregor; Lucas remaining at the public school was one of the stipulations his parents agreed to when custody was returned to them. “Why didn't you tell me?” he asks softly.

Lucas shrugs, and Mr. Gregor sighs.

“There's something really weird going on around town,” Millie explains.

“I have noticed,” he agrees.

“We're also having strange dreams,” she adds, less confidently.

“Dreams?” Mr. Gregor asks, curiously. “All of you?”

Roach shakes their head. “I do not dream.” Interesting.

Lucas doesn't remember them, but he wakes up exhausted. The other two remember moths. It is not the most compelling clue, but it does spark an interest in Mr. Gregor. “Do you know when this started?” he asks.

Millie hesitates. Evelyn signs, “When I got back.” She knows exactly when she started feeling like this; it was the day she came back to town, after meeting her dad. It is not a happy revelation.

“Did you have these dreams at the hospital?” Mr. Gregor asks Millie.

“Really vividly,” she says, “I thought it was a side effect of the sleeping pill.” She recalls the terrifying sleep paralysis, the bits she can remember: eyes, stockades, Evelyn. She blushes at the last part and trails off.

“I found you,” Evelyn reminds her, “I knew your room number.”

“Excuse me?” Mr. Gregor asks.

Millie changes the subject. “We're sharing dreams,” she insists with greater conviction. “There's something supernatural at work.”

“So it would seem,” Mr. Gregor agrees. “Evelyn, I do not think you are to blame for this,” he adds, addressing a concern she had been reluctant to sign out. “I think it is your father.” Oh, well, that's alright then.

Chapter 46

When they get back upstairs, Lucas immediately starts interrogating Roach about school. Because they lied to him, claiming to be at school all week but not even being home; they said they were dissecting a starfish. Then, “Why didn't you go home?” he asks, “Where did you even sleep?”

“I slept in a tree most nights,” they say vaguely, “I broke into Douglas's house once.”

“Does he know?”

“No.” At least Roach has the sense to look chagrined.

“What about last night?”

“I did not sleep last night,” they say truthfully.

Lucas sighs. “I feel like I didn't,” he says. 

“I am sorry. I wish I could help.”

They sit together in silence for a while, Roach stroking their fingers over Lucas's hand in a way that makes him think sinful thoughts. He doesn't want them to be sinful thoughts; he wants them to just be thoughts. They've had sex twice now. They used a condom both times. Roach was perfectly respectful and made sure he enjoyed himself, which is way more than he can say about his first time. They did everything right, but he still feels wrong. He realizes only now that, for all their emphasis on consent and waiting until he was ready, Roach had been a virgin, not him. His chest hurts. He tastes blood from chewing on his cheeks.

He says, “I should probably go home.”

There is a knock on the door. “Yeah?” Lucas says. The door cracks open and Evelyn's hands appear.

“Are you fucking?” she signs.

“No,” Lucas calls, loud enough for her to hear.

Evelyn steps into the room, looking incredibly sad. “I have to tell you something,” she signs. Her eyes dart between them nervously.

Lucas's chest gets even tighter. “What?”

She walks over to sit on the bed with them. “The Cat is missing,” she signs, “I haven't seen him since yesterday.”

“Oh, fuck,” Lucas says to her dismay; but then he starts laughing. “I'm so sorry,” he signs, “I have the Cat in jail.”

She hits him with a pillow. “How?”

Roach signs, “My bad,” so she hits them with the pillow as well.

“I should have told you,” Lucas says.

Evelyn shrugs. “It's okay,” she lies, “I wasn't worried or anything.”

“Sorry,” Roach signs.

Evelyn looks back and forth between the two of them. They're such a cute couple, just sitting there holding hands. She wants to take a picture of them, hang it up somewhere on a Wall of Love. Fuck this shit. She pulls out her phone and takes the picture anyway, but just for herself, before Lucas can notice and object.

Standing, Evelyn signs, “Love you guys.” 

After she leaves Lucas leans his head on Roach's shoulder and they sit like that for a while longer. He might even doze off for a short time. Then Roach says, “I need to take you back now.”

“Okay,” Lucas says, and suddenly they are in Maribell’s room, in the same spot on his bare mattress. The Cat looks at them with displeasure from the foot of the bed; the window is still cocked open enough for him to come and go. It looks as though nothing has changed.

“Will you please go home tonight?” Lucas asks Roach.

“It feels less like home without you,” they say.

“I don't want you sleeping in a tree.”

Roach considers for a moment, then says, “I am going to try to learn how to dream.”

Ugh, dreams. “Not really worth it, if you ask me,” Lucas grumbles.

“Why is that?” Roach asks curiously.

“They're horrible. I can't even remember them,” Lucas shudders, “I just know I've seen some shit.”

“If shapes of ugly seeming haunt thine eye, beseech them to deliver thee from ill,” Roach quotes, “And for thyself, thy children, and all thou lovest good things to fill.”

“I don't know that one.”

“A play from Aeschylus,” Roach explains, “the Persians.”

“Obviously.” Roach brings his hand up and gently kisses his fingers. “I guess I'll see you tonight, then,” Lucas says glumly.

“I hope so.” Roach gives him a long goodbye kiss, then steps away from the bed before disappearing with a sprinkling of colorless dust.

. . .

Mr. Gregor doesn't know what to do about Evelyn. He has been an incredibly lax guardian, allowing her perhaps too much freedom from consequences when she pushes boundaries. He would think to draw the line at illegal activity; then again, it has been an incredibly long time since he was a teenager, and he has done his fair share of illegal things both then and in the interim.

“I'm not okay,” Evelyn signs when he confronts her. “My dad being here really fucked me up. The thing with Millie fucked me up. The dreams. G-R-A-F-F-I-T-I. Death threats. Someone tried to set me on fire. Did you hear what happened with my mom?” Her hands fly around in a blur. She has been holding this in for a long time.

“Your mother had an early miscarriage,” Mr. Gregor says, “it is unfortunately fairly common.”

“She blames me,” Evelyn signs, “Like I fucking V-O-O-D-O-O killed it.”

Mr. Gregor refrains from correcting her derogatory phrasing. “That is unfair of her,” he says.

“She pushed me into a fire. I could have died.”

“A fire?”

Then Evelyn has to explain the bonfire at the park, the book burning they definitely should not have been at. She has to get chided for putting herself and Roach in danger. For taking on too much emotional responsibility. For skipping classes and getting stoned with Andy. Because even if she's not okay, she is still expected to trudge along pretending to be. Mr. Gregor offers to set her up with a therapist, online like Mils, but Evelyn declines. She doesn't need therapy; it's the world that's gone bonkers.

She finds Millie in their room, working on homework even though she skipped class today. Evelyn is pretty sure that skipping class means a free pass from homework, too, but then again, Evelyn is a C student, and Mils still has all As; despite being out for two weeks. She sits down backwards on her chair and watches Millie's back as she writes.

Millie feels Evelyn's eyes on her and spins the chair around. “What's up?” she signs.

“I love you,” Evelyn signs.

A weary smile. Millie is the best at pretending everything is okay; she proved that last week. “I love you too,” she signs.

“Are you okay?”

Mils shakes her head. “I'm so tired,” she signs. “I got groped again.”

“Who do I need to kill?”

She shakes her head again. “I already gave him a bloody nose,” she says aloud.

“I'm proud of you,” Evelyn signs. Millie rolls her chair across the space between them, leans in to kiss her. Flies flutter in her stomach and Mils pulls away too soon. This is Evelyn's sin: lust. It has been entirely too long. She sighs and puts her head down on her hands, resting on the back of her chair.

“Are you okay?” Millie asks.

“Yeah,” Evelyn lies. She remembers the picture on her phone. “Want to see something cute?”

Millie nods. Evelyn turns her phone screen towards her, revealing a picture of Roach and Lucas; they are sitting together, holding hands, Lucas looking down and Roach looking at him, black eyes positively glowing with affection. It's so sweet it makes Millie groan.

“Right?” Evelyn signs. She mimes gagging.

“Don't let them see it,” Millies warns, referring to the general public.

“I know,” Evelyn signs, offended.

“You should take more pictures,” she suggests. It is a sweet compliment, and it makes Evelyn blush. Millie kisses her again, this time lingering. She misses having sex, too, and she doesn't know what is making her hold back; some self-righteous sense of propriety. Sounds like something she should discuss with her therapist.

. . .

Roach brings On the Nature of Cockroaches back to Mr. Gregor. They say, “This book is outdated.” They explain about some recent papers they have found about the sociality of some cockroaches. How there is so much more to cockroaches than just pests. How some cockroach mothers raise their young and even make a substance not dissimilar from milk for their nymphs.

Mr. Gregor listens to them patiently. When they are finished, he says, “Roach, not only do I have nothing to do with the contents of this book, it was published over a century ago.”

“It is wrong,” Roach insists.

“Most of the things published throughout human history are wrong,” Mr. Gregor says, “To err is human.”

Roach looks disgruntled. They say, “How do you know the difference?” Their fingers are tapping relentlessly on the cover of the book.

Mr. Gregor considers Roach for a long time. “That is an excellent question,” he says. “It takes scholars many years of study to even begin to answer that question.”

“The same scholars who are publishing lies?”

“You are assuming ill intent where there is rarely any. The author of this book wrote what he knew about cockroaches. Many authors have expanded on it, including the authors of the papers you read. Science is a process, not a means to an end.”

“Do you have any books about dreaming?” Roach asks. Tap tap tap.

“Possibly,” Mr. Gregor answers, “But before I lend you another book, I need your assurances that you will not take off again. Or,” now his face gets stern, “break into my friend's house and secretly spend the night in his spare room.”

Roach stares resolutely at the floor. “I am sorry,” they say.

“You can tell that to Douglas,” Mr. Gregor scolds gently. “Now, I have to go pick up the twins from daycare. Can you please make dinner? I have rather missed your cooking.”

“Okay,” Roach says, and they stalk away. Mr. Gregor exhales a long breath, feeling like he has been holding it the entire conversation. 

Chapter 47

Lucas is laying in bed, petting the Cat, when the door opens and Maribell walks into her room. She looks surprised to see him, then disappointed. She watches the Cat dart out the still open window.

“Oh, Elizabeth,” Maribell says, shaking her head sadly, “Why did you come back?”

So his absence was noticed, the open window a dead clue; the snacks, the clothing, his phone are all discovered in due time. His parents’ attempts at starving the evil out of him thwarted, Lucas is instead beaten, his father's black leather belt striking deep red welts on his back as he sits on his knees and tries to think of anything else. The same belt becomes one of the things tying his hand to a bedpost; the other hand is restrained with a tie, his feet held out by window sashes. He pulls at the restraints, but they just pull tighter, digging into the skin on his wrists. He could probably get his feet free, but he is just so tired. Lucas lays uncomfortably, sprawled on his aching back, and stares at the darkening ceiling until sleep takes him.

. . .

Millie is at school. The hallways are much longer than they ought to be, and it seems to never end. There should be fire exits, at least. That is how she knows she is dreaming.

Millie can't find Evelyn, even though she knows she must be around, because that's what this dream is, right? Infinite halls and infinite eyes staring down at you from the walls. She opens a door at random, and she finds Lucas, strapped down to a lab bench. He looks at her, face frozen in terror. A tall, spindly white figure towers over him. It is mostly human, its mouth covered by a surgical mask, stringy black hair but too tall and too thin, too pale. Lucas mouths, “help me,” then the creature stabs a scalpel into his stomach, slicing down to disembowel him. His guts spill out, shiny and writhing.

I'm only dreaming, Millie reminds herself as her friend dies slowly in front of her. The creature makes eye contact with her and though his face is hidden behind a mask she can tell it is grinning.

She runs, leaving Lucas behind.

. . .

Lucas wakes up screaming; he is absolutely certain he is dying, excruciatingly, but as he wakes up he realizes there is no pain. It was all in his head. He is soaked, his sheets are soaked; he's wet the bed again. He screams and pulls at his restraints, his wrists and ankles burning, as his mother watches silently from the doorway.

Millie wakes up in a panic. She scrambles to reach Evelyn in the bunk above, shaking her shoulder until she's awake.

Evelyn rubs her eyes blearily. She signs, “What's wrong?”

Millie’s wide-eyed panic slowly resolves into a blank stare. “I don't know,” she signs. She looks almost physically ill.

“A dream?” Evelyn asks.

Millie starts. “I think so,” she says. “I think I did something wrong.” She can't shake the feeling, that familiar feeling that everything she has done is bad, a darkness inside of her.

“You’re okay,” Evelyn responds. “Come here.” Mils climbs up to her bed and Evelyn holds her, rubs her back, feeling her racing heart slow, her breathing relax. She tries to remember what she was dreaming, but she can't.

Millie’s hands are trembling as she signs, “I'm worried about Lucas.”

“Because of your dream?” Evelyn asks, and she nods. Evelyn offers, “I can check on him.” She sits up.

“Don't get caught,” Mils signs, reaching over to kiss Evelyn before she disappears.

As a fly on the ceiling, Evelyn finds Lucas in his bed. At first she thinks he is just sleeping, but then she notices the straps. She drops from the ceiling and multiplies into a swarm, coming together to form something vaguely resembling her body. She doesn't even bother fully forming, just reaches a maggoty arm out to touch him.

“No,” Lucas says, weakly. His mother watches from the bedroom door as Evelyn and Lucas disappear in a cloud of flies.

Lucas and Evelyn reappear on the floor of her bedroom. He is still sprawled out but his hands are free now, and he groans and rolls over to his side. He curls up around his stomach and wills himself not to hurl; he really prefers Roach’s method. Where is Roach? Evelyn kneels next to him; she's signing something but Lucas doesn't care what. Millie jumps down from the top bunk and disappears. Evelyn puts a hand on his arm and he jumps. Roach is standing in the doorway. Lucas wants to see them but he doesn't want them to see him. He's wearing a damp flannel nightdress. He smells like piss. Roach holds him regardless.

Mr. Gregor has already left, as in gone left; another mysterious road trip. The twins are with Douglas, or at daycare, whatever; somewhere safe. Lucas does not feel safe, even here, the safest place in the world with his favorite person in the world.

“She saw us,” he says again and again. “My mother watched me disappear.” Into a thick, black cloud of flies, no less. He makes Roach sit in the bathroom while he showers. They sit there quietly for a few minutes until his crying becomes too much; then they step into the shower behind him, still wearing the clothes they went for a run in. Roach sits in the cramped bathtub, holding Lucas until the shower runs cold. They trace the marks on his back, just barely not touching the raw welts. They quietly seethe; so this is the human emotion, rage.

Roach waits for Lucas to leave the bathroom before stripping out of their sodden clothes, wringing out the excess water and hanging them on the curtain rod. Lucas is gingerly pulling on a shirt, and he doesn't acknowledge Roach as they cross the room to their dresser, quickly pulling on dry clothes. They turn to face Lucas, and he is watching them, face blank. 

“I think they were going to perform an exorcism on me,” he says dryly.

“Is that very common at your church?” Roach asks. Maybe not the best response.

Lucas turns away and starts to leave the room. “Fuck if I know,” he says.

Roach follows him without saying anything. He finds Evelyn and Millie sitting at the dining table passing a notebook back and forth. He sits down across from Evelyn and hits the table, making Millie jump. Evelyn gives him a bemused look.

“What have you done?” Lucas signs.

Her face falters, slightly. “I saved you,” she signs.

“You brought this shit here,” Lucas yells. “You did this,” he signs. “Before you came back, everything was fine.” 

Evelyn looks hurt. She starts to sign, “Mr. Gregor,” but Lucas interrupts her.

“I don't give a fuck what Mr. Gregor says!” he shouts, “You started doing magic and this whole town went to shit!” The graffiti, the Bible verses, all of them directed at Evelyn flash through his head.

“It is not just her,” Roach interjects plaintively. “I have also been accused of witchcraft. I can do the same things she can.”

Lucas falters. “Okay, but she started it.”

Now Evelyn just looks pissed. “W-T-F,” she signs.

“That is not necessarily true,” Roach says, “You saw how I found her. Mr. Gregor has certainly been practicing magic for longer.”

“What do you mean?” Millie asks.

“He has a scrying stone, but it only works on his desk,” they explain.

Evelyn twiddles her thumbs, unable to follow along with the conversation. Millie takes the notebook and writes, “scrying?”

“like looking into a mirror and seeing what ur looking for,” Evelyn writes. She writes, “have i gone completely mad? i saved him”

Millie signs, “I know.”

Lucas has his head on the table and is groaning. He is so very tired. He doesn't know why he is blaming Evelyn for this. No, he does; because she's an easy target. He could blame Roach, too, for taking him out of his room yesterday. At least Evelyn was trying to save his life, and not just trying to get laid. That thought makes him wince, too, because Roach isn't like that. He bangs his head on the table, and everyone starts.

“I'm sorry,” Lucas signs without looking up, the gesture hidden by his bent form anyway. “I wonder how long I have until they come get me,” he mutters.

“I made sure all the doors are locked,” Millie says.

There is a soft tapping at the fire escape. Three heads swivel to stare at the red curtain that covers it, then Evelyn's, belatedly. Roach stands up to investigate, but Lucas grabs their hand.

“Don't,” he pleads.

“I do not think it is dangerous,” they reply softly, but they sit down.

Tap tap.

Millie goes over instead, saying, “This is ridiculous.” She pulls back the curtain to reveal the Cat, pawing at the glass to get inside. “We're just being paranoid because we're tired,” Millie says as she returns.

“I have every right to be paranoid!” Lucas finds himself yelling again. He can't stop it. “My parents tied me to a fucking bed. They were prepping me for a fucking exorcism, and then I have to get saved by Beelzebub herself.” He gestures towards Evelyn, who gives him a disgusted look before getting up and storming out of the room. Lucas can't be bothered to include her in the conversation then insults her; he can figure this shit out himself. She wants to slam the door but can't; Mils has followed her.

Evelyn ducks her face to hide her tears, rubs her eyes with the palms of her hands. Millie grabs her wrists to make her pay attention, then quickly lets go because that's really rude. “Lucas is being a dick,” she signs. “He's scared.”

“And I'm not?” Evelyn asks, rolling her eyes. She is not perfect Roach with their instant understanding of everything; a week ago, she didn't even think she could control these powers. She has no idea where the flies come from. She still doesn't know how it works or how to control it. “I couldn't leave him there,” Evelyn signs, face desperate.

“I know. You saved him,” Millie says, “He will get it.” 

Evelyn fidgets for a moment. She signs, “I need to stop my dad.”

“We don't even know what he's doing,” Millie protests.

“We need to find out,” Evelyn insists. “It's him, I know it.”

“Okay,” Millie signs. She doesn't know what she is signing up for. She's so tired; her head feels heavy. She kisses Evelyn because kissing Evelyn makes her feel better, if only temporarily. And because Evelyn is still crying, but she's acting like she isn't. She keeps on kissing her, because she loves her.

Chapter 48

“Are you hungry?” Roach asks. They are always hungry, so it seems like a fair question to ask.

Lucas shakes his head. He's starving, but he doesn't want to eat anything. He wants to lay down and go to sleep forever. He also wants to never sleep again. Cognitive dissonance. The Cat sits on his lap, purring soothingly.

“I am sorry for not being there for you,” Roach says.

“What?” Lucas asks. Roach has not left his side since he got here.

“I tried to dream,” they say, “I listened to a music video that purported to induce lucid dreaming, but it did not work.”

Lucas looks at Roach like they have sprouted an extra set of legs. He says, “I don't think I can blame you for that.” As he says it, he feels lighter, somehow. “Anyway,” Lucas adds, “Even if you were there, I wouldn't remember it.”

“Here,” Roach says, handing him the top of a blueberry muffin. They eat the bottom while Lucas picks at the blueberries and tries not to think about tops and bottoms. “Millie remembered enough of the dream to know you needed help,” they remark, almost as though to themselves.

“Or it was a coincidence,” Lucas grumbles.

Roach pulls their phone out of their pocket and starts typing. “I do not think so,” they say, not looking up until they have hit send on a text.

Lucas hates himself for asking, “Who are you texting?”

“Andy.”

“Andy?” Lucas feels something. Jealousy? Definitely not of Andy. Andy has as bad a reputation as Evelyn. Lucas bites his cheek. Why is he being such a dick to Evelyn?

“He has been asking everyone if they are having weird dreams,” Roach explains, “He also claims to remember some of them. I am interested in learning if he has gotten any other positive results.”

“Oh.” Roach is talking to Andy. They have his number. An odd tension grows in Lucas's stomach.

“Do you want to take a nap, perhaps?” Roach suggests, peering at Lucas's face like he's a specimen.

Yes. He's fucking tired. “No,” Lucas says, “No way.” He doesn't want to sleep until whatever is happening is gone forever.

“Okay,” Roach says, hesitating, “How about we sit on the couch, and you can not sleep while watching the television?” they offer. The television made Roach feel better when they were unwell; maybe it could help Lucas.

“Can we watch Star Trek?” he asks.

“As you wish.”

Lucas ends up falling asleep soon afterwards, his head on Roach's lap, the Cat curled up against his stomach. He doesn't dream at all.

Roach makes a list of the people who can recall having strange dreams: Evelyn, Millie, Lucas, Andy; and a fairly substantial list of people they do not know. Of those, few remember any details from their dreams. Roach needs to determine what they have in common that the others do not. They do not use social media, but they have a feeling Evelyn will be able to see the connection immediately. They send her a text, and she replies some time later with,

E > easy, half that list is andys friends 

R > What about the other half?

E > harder drugs?

R > That would include Millie?

It would, though, Evelyn thinks; Millie is on an antidepressant. She shows the exchange to Mils, who adds,

E > Mils says sleeping pills are the best for remembering the dreams

R > Do you know where to get sleeping pills?

E > lol

Yes, but also no; if Mr. Gregor has a problem with her smoking weed, she's definitely not going to go out and buy pills. She types out “u and i need to get blasted before bed tonite” and shows the thread to Millie. Mils rolls her eyes; Gregor is going to be so disappointed. At least the twins will be with Douglas all weekend.

Evelyn turned her last vape into ants, but quickly finds a replacement in her desk drawer. “Magic,” she signs, but she means this literally. She plugs it in to charge, thinking what a weird world she lives in. She also finds the skeleton key she found in the sand all those weeks ago, and she puts it in her pocket.

“Do you think Lucas will do it?” Millie asks.

Evelyn makes a skeptical face. “Doubt,” she signs. “Roach, probably.”

Lucas ends up sleeping for a long time, way longer than he intended, but since he didn't have any dreams he's not going to complain about it. He doesn't feel rested, exactly, but he doesn't feel dead, either. His head is still in Roach's lap, as though they haven't moved the entire time.

“I have not moved in hours,” Roach says, stretching their legs after Lucas sits up. His face feels pressed, his hair rumpled. His hair is getting too long. He needs to talk to Evelyn.

Evelyn is in her room, pretending to read but really just watching Millie, because she is incredibly sexy, and Evelyn likes watching her. Mils could be wearing an inflatable dinosaur costume, and she would find her sexy; she could be doing calculus and Evelyn would like watching her. That is, in fact, what Millie is doing.

Lucas gets her attention from the doorway and signs, “Can you cut my hair?” In deference to his parents, Lucas has always kept his hair longer than he'd like. He wants it short; maybe he could cut it all off, like Evelyn did.

“Not bald,” Evelyn signs, “Cold.”

Okay, not bald, but she cuts it short, and she even manages to make it look nice.

Roach goes to pee. Roach really appreciates being at home and being allowed to use whatever bathroom they want. Lucas left his nightgown in their bathroom and Roach picks it up because they do not think he would want to see it. They roll it up small and throw it away in the kitchen trash, burying it deep. They stand in the hallway bathroom doorway and watch as Evelyn cuts Lucas's hair. His hair is shorter than Roach's now, and they want to run their fingers through it. They banish the thought because they do not want to be aroused right now. It is more difficult than they would like.

Lucas looks at himself in the mirror for a long time. He has never been so aware of his ears before. Evelyn signs, tentatively, “Do you like it?”

He breaks out into a wide smile. “I love it,” he signs, then he hugs her and she relaxes.

When Lucas asks Roach, they say, “You look wonderful,” and kiss his head. The spot tingles on his scalp. He likes to run his hands through it, especially along the sides and back, where the hairs are short and prickly. He likes it even more when Roach does the same. 

Evelyn and Millie break the news to Lucas about their plan before dinner, which is, coincidentally, pizza, albeit one made from scratch by Roach. His face is, predictably, a combination of disappointed and amused. “You want us to get stoned before bed,” he says, “in hopes of remembering the nightmares that have been literally scaring the piss out of me?”

“Yeah,” Evelyn signs.

“No?” he says, like it should be obvious. Because it is obvious.

“That's fine,” Millie says, ever amenable, “You don't have to.”

“I will try it,” Roach says.

Lucas looks at them. “You don't even dream,” he says.

“Perhaps this will assist my quest to do so,” Roach responds. In truth, Roach has learned that THC tends to suppress REM sleep in rat studies, implying it ought to suppress dreaming; but since Roach is neither rat nor human, they are willing to test the possibility it might affect them differently. Moreover, it is clearly not suppressing the odd dream state in the likes of Andy and Evelyn, since they remember pieces of their dreams.

“I need you guys to understand that what you're planning to do is illegal,” Lucas says. “This isn't, like, sheltered little Christian kid complaining. We're underage.”

Evelyn shrugs and Millie nods. Roach says, “I am prepared to accept the consequences.”

“It's really not that big of a deal,” Evelyn signs. “What's the worst that could happen?”

. . .

It's not all that bad, being the only sober person with all your friends thinking everything around them is hilarious. The thick, strawberry scented vapor clouds make Lucas wonder if he is getting a contact high. His favorite part is Roach, whose relaxed state resembles that of a highly verbal walking encyclopedia.

“The smallest known cockroaches are in the genus Attaphila. They are tiny enough to infest the nests of leaf-cutter ants. They eat the fungus that the ants cultivate, which makes them a pest of ant farms,” Roach says.

“The reason cockroaches appear immune to radiation is that their cells only divide when they are molting,” they say. “If a cockroach was exposed to radiation while it was molting it would be just as susceptible as you or I.”

“The order Blattodea contains both cockroaches and termites, so they're closely related. Termites are eusocial, which means they have overlapping generations and division of labor.”

Evelyn and Millie disappear to their room. Lucas asks, “Do you know about anything besides cockroaches?”

Roach thinks for half a second. “Yellow ants raise aphids for their sweet excretions, which is called honeydew,” they say, “They are also known as citronella ants for the lemony scent they produce when threatened.”

And so they continue to drone about ants, in their pleasantly soothing monotone. Lucas doesn't realize he's falling asleep until it is too late.

In their room, Evelyn has to reluctantly extricate herself from Millie's embrace, her wandering hands, their limbs entangled, before she gives in and goes too far. “Not tonight,” she signs.

Mils pretends to pout. “Why?” she asks.

Evelyn laughs, a hissing sound. “You're high,” she signs.

“I know,” Millie signs, “it's fun.” She leans in to kiss Evelyn again, pressing closer until Evelyn groans and rolls away.

“That's why,” Evelyn signs.

Millie sighs. She doesn't like it, but she gets it. Actually, she kind of loves Evelyn a little more for it. “I love you,” she says.

“See you in my dreams,” Evelyn responds. She climbs up to her bunk, because they actually need to sleep, then lays there awake for way too long, trying not to think about Mils sleeping right below her. Eventually, her eyes close, and she falls asleep.

Chapter 49

“So, we're here,” Millie says, the words green ribbons like kelp in the ocean.

“Not all of us,” Lucas says in pink, looking around for Roach. All he can see are eyes, everywhere, glaring down at them.

“Maybe they're in the g-y-m?” Evelyn asks.

They walk tepidly down the halls. Lucas thinks he can hear screaming from behind some of the doors but he's not about to check. None of them sound like Roach, at least. The gym is decorated with its usual mode of punishment. Andy is in one of the pillories. He salutes with one dangling hand when Evelyn spots him.

“Sup,” he says, the word coming out of him like a green haze. “Woah,” he adds, staring at the floating letters.

“We're dreaming,” Evelyn explains. “You can get out of there.” The words stay small, and they dissolve quickly.

“How?” Andy asks.

“You just have to try,” she answers blithely. The words look like a teacher's comments on a failed paper, scrawled in red ink.

Andy pulls his head out, then his hands. “Yo, thanks dude,” he says.

Evelyn asks, “Have you seen Roach?” Their name scurries to the ceiling, briefly drawing Lucas's attention. He is busy sulking near the bleachers because he can't find them.

Andy shakes his head. “Have you tried outside?”

Outside? Andy points towards the far wall, where the wall is usually blank, even though it shouldn't be. In their real school, there should be a fire exit. There is an exit here now too, but Evelyn is pretty sure it's new. She finds Mils and holds her hand tight. She finds Lucas and holds his hand, too. She walks them both to the door that neither has noticed before now. She lets go of Lucas's hand to push open the door. He immediately drops to the ground, crouching and covering his ears. Millie pulls away and does the same. They both disappear while Evelyn is blinded by the light from outside. She can see something, but what is it? She tries to step outside, but it is as if the air is too thick, pushing her back. She's too busy trying to see outside to notice the shadowy figure approaching from behind. A hood is thrown over her head and she is blinded, deaf, dragged through the threshold and into the thick, hot air outside. Evelyn can't breathe through the hood, the heat, and she is thrown onto a stack of wood that splinters into her skin. It shouldn't hurt but it does. She is pulled to a standing position and tied to a pole, and is that smoke she smells? Then Evelyn knows nothing but pain.

. . .

Millie is shaking Evelyn awake. Evelyn is screaming but Millie is pulling her arm, urgently, and only then does Evelyn notice the blinking light that accompanies the alarm system for the building. She jumps down from the bunk and follows Millie out of the room, still half asleep.

Lucas and Roach are both to their feet before either has recognized the source of their disturbance: a piercing, shrieking alarm ringing through the apartment. Roach looks towards Lucas, confused, and he pulls them towards the fire escape. He can smell smoke.

They pull back. “What about the others?” they ask. 

“Just go,” Lucas directs, pulling the door open. Millie and Evelyn appear from the hallway behind them. Evelyn joins them, but Millie goes the other way, towards the staircase.

“Millie?” Roach calls.

“Just go,” she says, “I'll meet you guys down there.” She races down the winding spiral steps to the workshop, which looks unharmed. Through the door to the shop, Millie finds the source of the alarm: the front window has been shattered. She can smell gasoline and smoke, but there are no flames. She carefully steps through the shop, feet bare, until she can see what happened. Someone threw a brick through the window, followed by a glass bottle full of gasoline. A charred cloth next to the broken bottle suggests the source of the smoke smell. Only some quirk of physics - or Gregor's protections - has kept the entire shop from going into flames. Millie turns and starts towards the back door, hissing when she steps on a shard of glass. She plucks it out and limps to the back of the shop, disabling the alarm before opening the door for her friends.

“It's fine,” Millie says, “I think.”

Written in red, the brick says: Exodus 22:18. Roach does not pick it up, just crouches precariously over the scene, examining the shattered glass and splatters of gasoline. The scene is covered with the bodies of soft, delicate moths. They stand and lead Lucas away before he can get close enough to see them. In the back room, Millie talks on the phone while Evelyn sits on the cold marble stairs, staring at the wall. She spots them and signs. “W-T-F happened?”

“Failed Molotov cocktail,” Roach says. They spell, “M-O-L-O-T-O-V.”

Evelyn looks at them like they have grown compound eyes. 

Lucas says, “I'm too fucking tired for this.”

Millie hangs up the phone and joins them. “Douglas will be here soon,” she says, “He'll probably get here before the police do.” The operator who took her call did not sound particularly alarmed by the reported incident.

They stand around in silence for a while. Evelyn signs, “Dream?”

Roach says, “No,” too quickly, glancing down at the floor as though to hide their face. Lucas shakes his head tiredly.

“I think I remember the gym?” Millie says. Then, more confidently, “Roach wasn't there but we were.”

Evelyn remembers the gym, opening a door, a white-hot light that burned her eyes, her skin. “I thought you can't feel pain in dreams,” she complains.

“I do not think these are normal dreams,” Roach says.

The back door opens and they all startle. Douglas comes in carrying a sleepy looking Ash. He looks surprised to see Lucas, and Lucas remembers he is not supposed to be here. He's supposed to be tied up in a bed at his parents’ house, waiting for an exorcism. He doesn't want to explain this to Douglas, but, fortunately, he doesn't ask.

Willow races through the room and Millie intercepts her before she can go into the front. Only then does Evelyn notice Mils is bleeding, leaving a bloody print every step she makes. 

Douglas sends them upstairs with orders to go to bed; it is still very early in the morning, even for a baker. But he'd had to wake up the twins, and it is unlikely they'll go back to bed now after this excitement. Millie plants them on the couch in front of a cartoon, provisions them with snacks, and joins the others at the table.

“Give me your foot,” Evelyn signs. Honestly, Millie had forgotten about the wound. It had mostly stopped bleeding, but there's dried blood smeared all over her foot. Evelyn has come prepared with the old first aid kit. Millie watches with what she hopes is a look of disinterest as she cleans and bandages the cut. She tries to ignore the small thrill she feels from seeing her blood outside her body again. She has to remind herself there are no bugs crawling deep down inside.

Lucas ignores them all. He rests his head on his arms on the table. He wants to go back to bed.

“Would you like to go back to bed?” Roach asks.

“You read my mind,” Lucas says. He follows Roach back to their room, holding on to their hand and directing them to his bed because he doesn't want to be alone. He's so tired. He rests his head on their shoulder and wraps his arms around them. He says, “I'm sorry the dream experiment didn't work.”

Roach runs their fingers through his hair, and it tickles. They say, “I had a dream, but it was not the right dream.”

“Oh,” Lucas says. He feels disappointed. “Do you remember it?”

“Vividly.”

Lucas laughs, just a quick chuckle. “Do I want to know?” he asks.

“Maybe I will tell you in the morning,” they say. 

Evelyn stays up with Millie, even after Ash and Willow have fallen asleep to their cartoons, until Douglas comes trudging up the stairs. “I boarded up the window and swept up the glass as well as I could,” he tells Millie. “I can handle the rest in the morning.” He pauses, then glances at his watch. “Well, later in the morning,” he says. He sends the girls to bed then collapses on the couch between the twins. Douglas is so very tired. He falls asleep with the Cat purring on his lap.

Evelyn is too rattled to sleep. She can guess Mils is, too, by the way she sits at her desk and tap tap taps on the wood surface. “What's up?” she signs.

Millie grins. She quickly writes something in a notebook, then tosses it towards Evelyn, sitting on her bed. “Am I sober enough to consent yet?”

They do not go back to sleep for a while yet.

. . .

Lucas wakes up at sunrise. He is curled up against Roach, and he listens to them breathe, feels their heartbeat under his fingertips. He doesn't want to think about the night or the day before it or the night before that. He rolls onto his back and the welts on his skin burn, reminding him. He can't believe this is fucking happening. He rubs his hands over his head and remembers, with a thrill, the haircut. He goes to the bathroom, mostly to pee but also to look at himself in the mirror. He brushes his teeth, an excuse to look longer. He looks like his brothers. The thought is both unsettling and euphoric. Cognitive dissonance.

Roach is awake when he leaves the bathroom, leaning their head against their hands and following him with their eyes. “Are you going to go for a run?” they ask.

“I don't know if I'm ever going to go outside again,” Lucas admits. Even against all evidence, considering what happened right below them last night, Lucas still feels safer here than he would outside. 

This declaration makes Roach feel incredibly sad. “Never?” they ask. “What about butterflies? And squirrels and grass and sand and trees?”

“Okay, okay,” Lucas says, interrupting them. “I'll go outside when there's no chance I'll be seen by anyone who wants me dead.” He sits down on the bed next to Roach.

“I could take you anywhere,” they say softly, “Do you want to see the tallest tree in the world?” They sit up and place a hand on Lucas's lower back, sending a tingle up his spine that almost makes him forget the painful welts.

“What about the shortest tree?” Lucas asks.

The question confuses Roach. They say, “The shortest mature tree species is the dwarf willow, which grows in the Arctic. Do you want to go there?”

Lucas stares at Roach like they have sprouted elytra. “How do you even know that?” he asks.

“I read a lot,” Roach answers. They pull away, and Lucas instantly misses their touch. “Do you want me to try to heal you?” they ask.

“No,” Lucas says. Fuck magic. “So, how did you like your first ever dream?” he asks, changing the subject.

Roach hesitates. “It was interrupted rather dramatically,” they say, “but that was probably for the best.” 

“Why's that?” Lucas asks, but Roach doesn't answer. They are uncomfortable talking about the subject matter of their dream considering the recent trauma Lucas has been through. They do not exactly understand Lucas's emotional turmoil but his family, his identity, and his relationship with Roach all seem to be contributing to it. They think about Evelyn’s threat of consequences if they had sex with Lucas before he was ready. They do not know if he was ready. They do not know if they were ready. They do not really know what being ready even means, except in a physiological context; in that case, all signs were pointing to ready. Being human is extraordinarily confusing.

Roach excuses themselves to the bathroom, just to get away for a second. They brush their teeth and drink from the tap and splash cold water on their face. They consider going for a run, without Lucas, but they leave the bathroom and see him still there on his bed and the consideration is gone. Roach wants to cry. They want to hit something. They want to have sex with Lucas, but they want it to be like it was in their dream. They wonder if dysphoria by proxy is even a thing.

“You okay?” Lucas asks. Roach is just standing there in the doorway, staring at him.

“Yeah,” they say, too quickly, the informality of the word harsh and awkward on their tongue. Lucas watches as Roach stalks over to their desk, instead of rejoining him. They grab their phone and distract themselves with something on the screen.

“Okay,” Lucas says, his stomach hurting. Ok, so now he knows what Roach sounds like when they lie. They move about agitatedly, tossing their phone back onto their desk, tapping their fingers, fidgeting with a book. Lucas asks, “Where do you want to go?”

Roach stops. They ask, “What do you mean?”

“You offered to take me anywhere,” Lucas explains, “So where do you want to go?”

Roach wants somewhere quiet and dark and quiet and humid and warm and quiet. Emphasis on the quiet. “A cave, perhaps,” they say, “Or underneath an old, decaying log in the middle of a rainforest.”

Lucas gives them that look, the one that reminds Roach that they are inhuman, but then he smiles. “You want to go looking for bugs?” he asks.

“Something like that,” they say. Something presses hard against Roach's chest.

“Cool,” Lucas says. He stands up and moves towards his dresser. “Let me find my shoes and we can go to the Amazon.” He pulls his old t-shirt off, exposing vicious looking red welts on his back. The sight hits Roach like a punch to the gut.

“No,” they say quietly.

Lucas turns and gives them a confused look. “No?” he asks.

“I do not wish to get you in any more trouble,” Roach says.

“Well, technically it's Evelyn who got me mixed up with witchcraft, so,” Lucas tries. He pulls on a new shirt, wincing again at touch of the fabric.

“This did not all start with Evelyn,” Roach says.

“Yeah, I know that,” Lucas says, “her dad -”

“I was here before Evelyn’s father arrived,” Roach interrupts.

Lucas takes a second to realize what they're saying. “But you didn't do anything,” he protests.

“My existence is an anomaly,” Roach insists. “I am not -,” they falter, then recover. “I am not supposed to be here.”

“Roach,” Lucas starts to ask, “what are you talking about?” But then he recognizes the look on Roach's face - it is the exact same look Evelyn gets when she's fucked something up and she's planning on running away from her problems. “Don't you dare,” Lucas says as Roach starts to fade; he darts across the room and wraps his arms around them before they disappear.

They reappear in the same position, minus Roach's chair, and they both fall to the forest floor as though Lucas had tackled them. The landing knocks the wind out of Roach, giving Lucas enough time to scramble away before they decide to take him back. He watches from a distance as Roach stands carefully and brushes exotic bugs and dirt and moss off their skin and clothes, which is barely clothing at all - Roach is still wearing what they slept in, which is boxer shorts and a t- shirt. Lucas refuses to feel bad about this; that was their decision. Neither of them is wearing shoes.

“What was that about?” Roach asks, their usual monotone tinged with irritation.

“I was about to ask you the same thing,” Lucas retorts. Roach takes a step towards him, and he takes three steps back. The ground hurts his bare feet.

“I would like to take you back,” Roach says.

Lucas shakes his head. “I would rather stay here,” he says obstinately. 

“Why are you acting like this?” they ask.

Lucas doesn't know. In his defense, Roach is acting weird too. “What was it you called yourself?” he asks, “An anomaly? You can't just drop a bomb like that and disappear on me.”

“Lucas,” Roach says, taking another step towards him; Lucas scrambles backwards, wincing as his foot lands on a broken branch. Roach knows this game; they played this game with Evelyn a few days before. But their intention then was to be left behind, and they will absolutely not be doing that for Lucas. 

“Come on,” Lucas says, still stepping backwards, “You said you wanted to look for bugs. Here we are.” He looks for a rock to flip, but it's mostly just trees and roots. It is eerily silent for a rainforest, Lucas thinks.

“I would like to take you home,” they say plaintively.

“I don't want to go home. I want to know why you said you're not supposed to be here.”

“Right now it is because I am barefoot in the middle of a rainforest.”

Lucas rolls his eyes. “I said wait for me to find my shoes,” he says.

“I would not recommend you continue your current trajectory,” Roach warns. Lucas is about to walk into an anthill, and though they are too far to identify, there are not many ants with a pleasant sting.

Lucas glances back at the swarming black ants behind him. “Found your bugs,” he says wryly.

Roach wants to examine them, but they have more pressing concerns. “Excellent,” they say, reaching out towards Lucas, “now we can go back.”

He hops onto an exposed root, worn smooth by the elements. “Nope,” he says, “Not until you tell me what you meant.” He hops over to the next root. He can practically climb them like a ladder.

“A week before we met, I went to sleep as a cockroach and woke up as a human,” Roach says, “I jumped out of the window because I thought I could fly.” Only some species of cockroaches can fly.

Lucas stares at them for a very long time. “I think I'm dreaming,” he says.

“You are not.”

“How would you know?” he asks.

Roach does not have an answer for that.

A sharp, burning pain stabs into Lucas's foot; one of the ants has found him. He hisses and leans against the tree so he can pick up the foot and examine the tiny red welt. “This isn't proof,” he reminds himself, “Evelyn said she felt pain in her dreams.”

Roach stands still, watching him.

“What kind of ants are these?” he asks.

“I do not know,” Roach says, “From your reaction, I can assume they are not bullet ants.”

Lucas pales. “Bullet ants?”

“Named for the amount of pain their sting causes,” they explain. “Dr. Schmidt likened it to walking over a coal fire with a three-inch red-hot nail stuck in your foot.”

“Okay,” Lucas concedes, “it’s not that bad. Who's Dr. Schmidt?”

“An entomologist who intentionally got stung by different insects in order to study their venom.” As one does.

Lucas rubs at the spot where the burning pain is already almost gone. He doesn’t know how his morning has gotten so badly derailed. He is not willing to accept Roach's assertion, but he has also watched Evelyn turn into a cloud of flies and maggots. Lucas doesn't fucking know what is real anymore.

“Maybe you hit your head harder than you think,” he suggests.

“Excuse me?”

“When you fell out that window,” Lucas clarifies, “You had a concussion, right?”

“If I agree, will you let me take you home?” Roach asks.

“Not anymore,” Lucas says. Roach stares at him. He stares at Roach. An extraordinarily loud bird caws somewhere, the first jungle sound Lucas has heard since they arrived.

“I do not know what more you want from me,” Roach says.

Lucas shrugs. “So, what was it like being a cockroach?” he asks.

“Very simple,” they answer.

“How long do cockroaches live, anyways?”

“That depends on the species.”

“What species were you?” Lucas is getting tired of the absurdity of this conversation. 

“I do not know,” Roach admits.

“You identified Evelyn’s flies but you never tried to figure out what you were?”

Roach tilts their head and Lucas's stomach drops. He is not prepared to address the possibility that he fell in love with an insect. “I do not have a lot of evidence on which to base an identification,” they say.

“You are infuriating to talk to,” Lucas says. Roach winces, and then he feels bad. “This is really fucked up,” he says to the tree. “Why is this happening?” he asks no one.

“I apologize,” Roach says. “Would you like to go home now?”

“I'm going to stay here until I wake up.”

“If you fall asleep and wake up in the same place, will that convince you that you are not sleeping?”

“If I fall asleep here, you'll just take me home,” Lucas accuses. He glares down at Roach, still planted in the same spot. Ants are crawling all over their bare feet and legs, but they do not seem to notice or care. Lucas shudders. He hits his head on the trunk of the tree in a half-assed attempt at waking himself up. It hurts. He breathes in deep and then exhales, and it is like releasing some toxic gas he's been holding onto. He looks at Roach, patiently standing there, waiting for him to stop throwing a fit. He looks at the forest around them. What is he even doing here? “Okay,” he says.

“Okay?”

Lucas steps carefully down from the tree. He reaches Roach but makes no effort to touch them. “I'm done,” he says, “take me home.”

Roach gently grasps his wrist, and they both collapse into dust. They reappear in their bedroom. Roach doesn't even completely reconstitute; they let go of his wrist, step back, and disappear. Lucas crawls back into his bed and cries; huge, heaving sobs that hurt his entire body. Roach does not return.

Chapter 50

Mr. Gregor has been traveling, tracing down the life of the man currently known as Superintendent Brent Smalls, who has been known by several names over a couple decades at least. With each new revelation, Mr. Gregor feels increasingly uneasy. His influence leaves a lingering stain on the towns he inhabits, atmospheres of distrust and paranoia and hatred. Mr. Gregor keeps going. He would like to find the source of the man's power, his origins perhaps, if he is to have any hope of stopping him.

Mr. Gregor is not informed of the incident at the shop until later in the morning, after Douglas has slept off the adrenaline from the night. He turns around immediately, but is a day away, at least. According to the baker, Mr. Gregor's protections worked perfectly to prevent any serious damage to the shop, but he fears the worst may be yet to come. He feels particularly bad for saddling Douglas with four moody, anxious teenagers in addition to the toddlers. He is also curious and apprehensive as to why Lucas is there at all; he is not answering his texts. Mr. Gregor presses his foot on the accelerator; speed limits be damned.

Millie examines the brick that shattered the shop window, the painted-on verse. The shop still smells faintly like gasoline, but Douglas has done a fine job of cleaning up after the attack. He swept up all the glass and hundreds of dead moths. A large sheet of plywood covers the broken window.

“The police never showed up,” Douglas explains, “So I guess you won't be needed for a witness statement.” He is trying to be optimistic. He looks exhausted.

“Have you been having any weird dreams?” Millie asks. “Like, the same one over and over?”

“Huh?” Douglas starts, the question catching him off guard. “I suppose so. I don't really remember my dreams,” he admits. He knows they're there, though; he wakes up so tired, sometimes.

Millie needs to tell Roach about this new information, but they have disappeared. Lucas is not coping well with this development. Nor is he capable of handling Roach's confession with any of the confidentiality that Roach always affords others; he spilled to Evelyn, who immediately told Millie. A part of her thinks that Roach might find benefit from the hospital she stayed at, but most of her believes them. Roach has always been an odd creature, and why would they lie about something like that? 

Lucas wishes he could hold Millie's cavalier attitude towards this shit, but then again, she didn't sleep with them.

“Do you want me to kill them?” Evelyn asks.

Lucas shakes his head. This is the worst part: of weren't for the fact that he hates them for dropping that revelation then disappearing, he also still loves them. Cognitive fucking dissonance.

Lucas drifts through the afternoon, the evening, the night. He picks up a book off Roach's desk and reads it to the Cat until he can't keep his eyes open anymore. He is hoping Roach will come back, but they don't. He tiptoes through the apartment. Douglas has taken the twins back to his house; he wanted to take them all back to his house but had to concede that there really wasn't enough room. Lucas opens the elevator and presses the B button. The pit in his stomach grows as he descends into the basement. He uses his phone to navigate to Mr. Gregor's desk, which is not set up for whatever it was Roach did to find Evelyn. Lucas shines the light over the wood surface and notices fine, intricate lines carved into it; he places a chunky black rock in the center, and it looks right. He sits down and places both hands on the table and stares at the rock.

Nothing.

Lucas looks around some more. He notices a book titled, Transmogrification. He flips through the pages, but it is not in English. He stops at a set of diagrams. One is a drawing he vaguely recognizes from school: a sketch of a human figure superimposed on itself in two different positions, so that it looks like the person has four arms and four legs. On the facing page is a sketch of a cockroach in a similar position, one set of wings spread out, the other folded neatly. Lucas chews on his cheek as he studies the drawings. There are more drawings, ones that make him blush. He gazes into the rock again. He wonders what Roach and Evelyn have that he lacks; why they can do magic and he cannot. Bugs, apparently.

Lucas tries again and again to look into the stone and find Roach. He looks for the instructions they claimed to follow but fails. Frustrated, he grabs his phone and starts looking around the basement. It really is just more of the same stuff as upstairs, like Mr. Gregor just ran out of room upstairs. Of course, he would; nothing ever sells, he just brings in more junk. For the thousandth time, Lucas wonders where he gets his wealth from. His flashlight lands on a collection of pinned moths, which makes him cringe. They are all quite large, fuzzy and soft and colorful; reds and oranges and yellows and a bright green one. He reaches out to touch one - orange and grey with yellow spots - then recoils when one flutters out to attack him. Not, not attack; it's just one of the little grey moths that infest this building. And Lucas's house. And Douglas's bakery. Is this where they come from?

Heart still pounding from the shock, Lucas quickly heads back to the elevator, back to his room, his bed. The Cat purrs on his chest as he tries not to think about Roach.

The first thing Roach did after leaving Lucas alone in their room was find clothes. They appeared in a rural backyard, clothes drying on a line. They took a pair of blue jeans and the boots sitting next to the porch steps, then disappeared and reappeared in a forest; a different forest, or at least a different place. Roach is trying to figure out the rules of this game. They can think, forest, and go to a forest; think, clothes, and find themselves in a backyard surrounded by clothing. But they couldn't find Lucas without first knowing exactly where he was.

Roach teleports again and again, over and over, until their skin feels like it is going to flake off. They go to 117 different places in five minutes and then they collapse to their knees in the sand. They feel weak, like they are falling apart. They are in a desert, baking under the sun. The sun sets, and the air turns cold. Still, Roach does not move. They watch the Milky Way above and imagine they were a cockroach again.

. . .

Something is dragging Evelyn by her hair through the school halls. She doesn't even have long hair anymore; it just grips the short tuft that has grown back. She can't see who or what, just a long, spindly arm cloaked in white. Her screams pour out of her mouth as blood splatters floating in the air.

Millie was wandering through the school, looking for Evelyn when she ran into her screams instead. She follows the trail, running endlessly, tirelessly. It leads to the gym, through the gym. Lucas is there, trapped in a pillory. 

“Get out of there!” Millie scolds as she runs by, “I need your help!”

“How?” he asks.

“You're dreaming!” she says, her voice drifting away behind him. Lucas scoffs. That's what he thought when Roach said they were a cockroach. If Roach can be a cockroach, he can be a moth, Lucas thinks, and then he is; giant, by moth standards, but smaller than human. He pulls his head out of the board, his fluffy front legs. He flutters his wings and scuttles around the gym, waving his antennae and knocking into people. He finds Evelyn’s scream and follows it to the gym exit, where Millie is standing, staring into an impossibly bright white outside. Evelyn’s screams fill the air, blood splattered red. The light feels like a physical barrier. Lucas turns back to human, but it is equally painful. Millie is fighting the light, trying to push through, yelling and crying. Her own flesh starts to burn and she collapses into Lucas's arms, exhausted and frustrated.

Evelyn’s screams fill the air around her, not as blood splatters but as an ear-piercing, mind-numbing sound.

. . .

Millie wakes up to agonized screams coming from right next to her; by the time she has shaken Evelyn awake, Lucas is at their door, wide eyed and panicked. Evelyn doesn't acknowledge anyone as she stumbles across the hall to the bathroom, where she pukes up thankfully not-flies then steps into the shower still wearing the sweat-soaked clothes she slept in. Even with the water turned all the way cold, her skin feels like it is burning, on fire, surrounded by flames and thick black smoke. She only realizes she had been keeping her eyes closed when Mils taps her arm, goosebumped from the cold, and Evelyn practically jumps.

“W-T-F happened?” Evelyn signs.

“Bad dream?” Millie asks. She remembers a moth.

“Fire,” Evelyn signs, then she reaches up to turn off the water. She peels off her soaked tank top and underwear, and Millie wraps her in a towel and holds her shivering.

Lucas accosts her almost as soon as she is dressed. “I need you to find Roach,” he signs.

“Rude,” Evelyn replies, “I almost died.”

“In a dream?” he asks, “Do you remember?”

Then Evelyn shakes her head, because she doesn't, not really. Just pain; more excruciating than anything she has ever imagined. “I can't find people,” she says. She would have to know where they are.

“You know magic,” he signs, “S-C-R-Y-I-N-G.”

“Never tried it.” First Lucas blames her for witchcraft, and now he wants to use her for it. “Why are you being a dick?”

Lucas bites his tongue. He's been through a lot, but he shouldn't be taking it out on his best friend. “I'm sorry,” he signs. “This is all really fucked up,” he says.

Evelyn nods; no argument there. She follows Lucas to the basement, to Mr. Gregor's desk. He gestures to a rock sitting there. He signs, “Look.”

Evelyn stares at the rock. It is a pretty rock, black and shiny and sharp looking like glass. She shrugs. She signs, “What did Roach do?” But Lucas doesn't know; Roach had mentioned instructions. He digs through the papers scattered over the desk, but none of them look like ones he has seen before.

Evelyn stares into the rock. She tries to think about Roach, which does nothing. She thinks about Roach's magic, that odd periwinkle aura surrounding them, but the air becomes thick and foggy, her vision blurry. She pulls her eyes away from the stone. “This isn't working,” she signs.

. . .

Roach wakes up still a human, still in a desert. They are sunburned, and moving hurts, but they are still here. They turn into dust and mix with the sand for a while then reconstitute. They disappear and reappear in a shallow cave behind a waterfall. Its roar echoes through the stone walls around them and fills their head, pushing out all thoughts. They close their eyes and meditate. It is a peaceful state to be in.

Roach has a revelation while sitting in this cave; they are currently doing more or less exactly what Evelyn was doing a couple weeks ago. Also, they feel significantly more clear-minded out here, away from that town and its invisible darkness. They recall the heavy, smokey fog that seemed to cover the town when they were scrying for Evelyn; could that darkness be affecting everyone in town? They consider the odd, tense quarrel with Lucas yesterday; heightened emotions, mood swings, reactions and contradictory thoughts that make no sense in retrospect. But it had all continued in the rainforest, at least for a time. Could Roach be carrying the darkness with them? But that would not explain the peace they feel now. More likely it takes time for the effects to wear off; whatever that means.

Roach considers the waterfall some more. They get close enough that its cold spray soaks their clothes. They disappear into dust and reappear in the basement, in front of Mr. Gregor's desk. Evelyn is sitting in front of them, staring at a rock. She looks up at them, surprised, then taps Lucas's shoulder; he is sitting on the floor, disconsolate. 

“Found them,” she signs, gesturing.

“Hey,” Roach says. Evelyn watches as Lucas scrambles around to the other side of the desk. She half expects him to hit Roach, but that's not what kind of person he is; Lucas just hugs Roach, then steps back to look at them.

“Why are you wet?” he asks.

“Waterfall,” Roach responds, “would you like to see it?”

Lucas hesitates. Wasn't he angry with Roach for disappearing? But right now, he's just glad they are back.

Roach signs to Evelyn, “Can you take Millie somewhere?”

Confused, she signs, “Where?”

“Anywhere,” they sign, “far from here.”

“Why?”

Roach doesn't have the signs for this. They point to the obsidian stone sitting on the desk in front of her. They sign, “You see it? Dark.” They sign, “E-V-I-L.”

Evelyn did, potentially, see something unsettling in the rock, but she was pretty sure she'd made it up. “Millie doesn't do magic,” she signs. Last time she teleported Mils, it ended poorly for both of them.

Roach sighs then spins around and strides across the basement and over to the elevator. Lucas follows them, then makes them wait for Evelyn, who opts to slowly meander over. “What's going on?” he asks, half hanging out of an old-fashioned elevator so that if it were to move, it would probably cut him in half.

“There is some sort of magic fog cast over the town,” they explain, “I believe it may be negatively affecting everyone.”

“What, like, mind control?” he asks.

“Do you know how anxiety works in humans?” Roach asks. Their clarification, in humans, hits Lucas hard. He remembers that Roach isn't a human, even though they're pretending to be. Well, Lucas is plenty experienced at pretending to be something he's not. Evelyn finally reaches the elevator, fidgeting with something in her pocket.

“Anxiety is the result of your autonomic nervous system reacting to threats that are no longer there,” Roach explains, “Your fight or flight reaction kicks in, but there's nothing to fight or run away from, so there's no resolution.”

“But you ran away,” Lucas points out.

“Exactly,” Roach says, “Evelyn and I both ran away,” they sign. They are trying very hard to keep her in the conversation, but they are not doing very well.

Evelyn signs, “Ran away from what?”

Roach signs, “The dark.”

Millie is not in her room. Or anywhere upstairs, or in the shop, or even the Bakery next door; nor is Douglas, or the twins, as far as Evelyn can tell. The door is locked, the lights off. A feeling of dread grows in Evelyn’s stomach as she searches, because this is absolutely not like Mils; safe, stable, solid Millie. Except when it is; Millie is the best at pretending everything is okay.

While Evelyn looks for Millie, Lucas follows Roach to their room. He closes the door behind him, leans against it and tries not to watch them change out of their damp clothes. “Can we talk?” Lucas asks.

“Okay,” Roach says indifferently, “What would you like to talk about?”

“Uhm,” Lucas says. He hadn't really thought that far ahead. “Where'd you get those jeans from?” Roach doesn't usually wear color.

“A clothesline,” they. They replace the damp denim with their own black cargo pants. “I stole them,” Roach confesses.

“Well,” Lucas shrugs, feeling awkward, “how do you know they weren't left there for you?”

Roach smirks. “Are my trousers really what you wanted to talk about?” they ask. Lucas shrugs; there is an awkward silence. “Are you upset with me for lying to you?” Roach finally asks.

Lucas chews on his lip. “I don't know,” he admits, “That, I kind of understand.” He can absolutely understand why someone might want to lie about the circumstances of their birth; mostly he feels weird about it. It explains a lot, like how Roach didn't talk then had all those questions about the human experience, how they'd never had curry or been kissed or... Lucas stops himself before going down that line of thought. “I'm really just mad that you dropped that on my lap, then left,” he says.

“I sincerely apologize,” Roach says. They take a step towards him, then another.

“I mean, you know how much I hate it when Evelyn does that shit,” Lucas continues.

“I do.” Another step; Roach keeps halving the distance between them like Xeno’s fucking paradox.

Moths churn in Lucas's stomach. Roach might be weird, and it may be fucked up, but there is no denying his attraction to them. “Okay, so, don't do it again,” he says, lamely.

“As you wish,” Roach says. They are standing in front of him now; not too close - never too close - but near enough that Lucas could stretch up and kiss them. So he does. He presses his lips against theirs - soft, fleshy, not at all an insect’s - and they return the kiss, hesitantly at first, but then deeper; they step even closer, pressing him against the door.

They are interrupted, naturally, by a frantic knocking on the door behind him. Lucas opens it to find Evelyn, looking truly scared. “Millie’s missing,” she signs.

. . .

Here is what happened to Millie, though they have no way of knowing it; she is not quite convinced she is not dreaming. She had gone downstairs to the Bakery to procure breakfast, but found it mysteriously closed, lights off. Glancing up and down the street, which was eerily empty, Millie noticed all of the shops were closed, even those normally open on Sundays. The new hairdresser next door has a sign: “Closed for Sunday Event.”

That is as far as Millie got before she was grabbed from behind, her head covered, and dragged into a vehicle she knows wasn't there before. She can't see; it's hard to breathe through the fabric hood; her wrists are bound behind her with too tight zip ties, plastic biting into her wrist. She screams. She kicks out frantically, futilely, because she's only wearing stupid flip flops so the metal walls just hurt her feet. She tries to think about being anywhere but here, but it doesn't work, she's still trapped.

So, no, the situation is not great. Even Millie wouldn't be able to pretend otherwise, if she weren't completely alone here.

Chapter 51

Mr. Gregor is having trouble getting home. None of the roads seem to exist anymore; the entire town has been wiped off the map. After several passes by the mile marker that should have indicated an exit from the interstate, Mr. Gregor gets in contact with Douglas, who comes up with the idea to load the twins up in his own car and drive out to the interstate to meet him.

The trouble is, Douglas can't seem to leave town; it's as though the roads are looping around on themselves. Willow sings along to Frozen on the stereo and Ash carefully deconstructs a blueberry muffin in their respective car seats, while Douglas drives and drives and gets nowhere.

Any hopes of finding Millie by phone are quickly extinguished with the discovery of the device buried in her bed; she didn't take it with her, wherever she is. The three find themselves yet again in the basement, at Mr. Gregor's desk. Roach looks into the stone and jumps back as if burned. Whatever the dark cloud obscuring the town is, it is much harder to look at than it was before. They suggest Lucas let the Cat out, and he exhaustedly trudges back to the elevator, up to the third floor, back to his room, across the floor to the fire escape, where he gently places the cat on the metal grate and says, “Can you find Millie?” feeling kind of foolish; but Roach swears it worked for them. Lucas is really tired.

Evelyn texts Andy, on the bizarre off-chance he's seen Millie.

E > have u seen mils?

A > nope. Y'all should stay in today. Weird shit happening.

E > ?????

She gets no further response. This isn't Andy's usual flavor of being flaky; it's just that shortly after sending the text he finds himself in roughly the same situation as Millie. The weird shit he was referring to is something he overheard from his parents: church stuff, some sort of Sunday event. Until now, Andy's born-again Christian mom and Bible thumping stepdad were content to let him be the black sheep heathen of the family, but apparently something has changed; abruptly and violently. His stepdad came in and knocked him around a bit and Andy was taken from his room, bound and gagged, and dragged into the family van. Now here he is at church, still bound and gagged. His family sits on the pew around him like this is all perfectly normal. The pews are overflowing: Sunday morning service, standing room only. Andy does not listen to the sermon; he is too busy trying to figure out what the hell is going on, and how the hell he is going to get out.

Millie is in the school gym; she can tell by the footsteps squealing on the floor, echoing through the open space. She tries to remember what is significant about the gym, other than being generally unpleasant to be in; Millie doesn't particularly like gym class. She is being troublesome and won't stop talking, shouting, demanding, so someone quickly removes her hood and gags her. They put the hood back, but not before she catches a glimpse of the dozen or so other kids who are tied up and lined against the wall. This is horrifying. Millie still wonders if perhaps she is sleeping.

Roach stares into the black rock. They think about the Cat. Evelyn and Lucas watch on as Roach falls into a deep trance. Their eyes go blank, as if some part of them was sucked into the stone, leaving behind a husk of a body. 

Roach is the Cat, strolling aimlessly through the streets. They recognize the walk to school.

They are a sparrow, flitting around the trees at the nearby park.

They are a cricket, chirping in Lucas's backyard. A lizard, basking on a rock at the nearby park. A squirrel, climbing through a tree. A crow, circling overhead the school. Despite it being a weekend, there is something happening at the school.

Roach returns to themselves with a start. “There is something happening at the school,” they say. The parking lot is full and overflowing, cars lined up on the street as though everyone in town was visiting. Groups mill around outside. Lucas's family is there. Brent Smalls is there.

“Did you see Millie?” Evelyn signs, and they shake their head.

“Maybe she is inside?” Roach suggests. Aside from a toad in the science classroom, they can't think of where to look. Are there mice in the school? They cannot find them, if there are; the entire school feels like some sort of dead zone.

Evelyn disappears. She tries to reappear in a school bathroom, but it is as though she is on fire; she can't reform, her entire essence is repelled by itself. She goes back to the basement. “Holy fuck,” she signs, “that hurt.” She inspects her arms under the flickering lantern light, but there is no sign of the excruciating burning she felt.

Lucas and Roach give her matching curious looks. “Don't magic to school,” she explains.

“We could walk?” Roach tries. 

“Andy said not to go outside,” Evelyn says.

“Where is Mr. Gregor?” Lucas asks, “Douglas?”

Neither are answering their phones or returning their texts. Mr. Gregor, because he is busy trying to figure out how to get home. Douglas, because he has been arrested under what could only be considered false pretenses: a phony traffic stop; a shouted demand at gunpoint that he step out of the vehicle, hands raised; handcuffed and dragged to the police car. The twins, crying, removed from the backseat of his own car, to be taken... where? Since Douglas hasn't been read his Miranda rights and the cops who arrested him are taking him to the high school, he's pretty sure the rules have changed, somehow. He regrets pulling over in the first place; he should have just driven off into the desert, the roads be damned. Douglas is pulled out of the police car, gagged with a piece of cloth, then his head is covered with a hood. As he stumbles into the high school, Douglas prays the twins are safe. 

Lucas and Roach are arguing; from what Evelyn can gather, Lucas wants to stay here and hide, wait for the adults who are notably absent right now. Roach wants to go see what's going on. Evelyn is on their side; she thinks Millie is at the school, which is reason enough to go to investigate. She doesn't know where exactly this assertion comes from. She lets them argue it out and come to whatever conclusion they reach. Evelyn will be going to the school regardless; all she wants is to find Mils. She wanders around the basement, holding a flickering fire lantern out to examine the shelves. She finds a small, neat wooden box, a golden insect inlaid on the locked cover. It is a similar design to the one on the key Evelyn found all those weeks ago. The key is in her pocket now; she has been carrying it everywhere. She is about to retrieve it when Lucas taps her on the shoulder, and she jumps; she hadn't been paying attention.

“What are you doing?” Lucas asks. Mr. Gregor has a general “no touching” policy and a strict “no basement” policy; Evelyn running her fingers over every dusty surface down here certainly violates both.

“It's Millie's,” she signs, only realizing afterwards that it's true; the bottom is inscribed with Millie’s name and birthdate. She fishes through her pocket for the key. It fits; the lid pops open, revealing a delicate green and silver brooch, an insect with large eyes and wide spanning wings.

“It is a cicada,” Roach says, finger spelling “C-I-C-A-D-A.”

“Cool,” Lucas says. “Put it back,” he signs. Lucas looks pissy. He's in a bad mood. He doesn't understand why Roach wants to go to the school so badly. Last time they convinced him to go investigate something they ended up straight fucking leaving him there at the park. Not that it was really Roach's decision, but still. Lucas is so tired.

Evelyn closes and locks the box, but she does not return it or the key to the shelf. The key goes in her pocket, and she holds onto the box; she picks up her lantern with her other hand, so now she can't talk. She gives Lucas a look and shrugs.

He rolls his eyes. He stomps over to the elevator. He considers just closing the door, not waiting for the others at all. Roach gives him a small smile when they get in, and Lucas warms a little.

The power goes out when they're midway between the basement and the first floor; the lights power off and the elevator thunks to a halt.

“Shit,” Lucas yells, grabbing the metal grate door and shaking it, “Fuck!” He kicks the door. “I fucking hate this god damn magic shit.” He is blaming the magic for what is apparently an electrical issue.

Roach touches his back; they grab Evelyn’s wrist. She is starting to panic in the darkness. They concentrate; they do not know if it is even possible to teleport three people. It is as though she is concealed by the same cloud that covers the town, however; something like an electric shock travels from Evelyn to Roach, who has no choice but to release her. Roach and Lucas disappear in a cloud of dust; a few moments later, Evelyn is also gone, flies hovering in her wake.

Roach takes Lucas to the waterfall. Lucas is angry, at first, for leaving Evelyn behind, for taking him away, for doing more magic. But soon enough the fog that seemed to fill him with gloom lifts; the roaring sound of the waterfall fills his head instead; its spray cools his thoughts. He stands close enough to the mouth of the cave that his clothes get damp. He takes way too long to recalibrate himself, leaving Evelyn in that town, maybe even in the broken elevator, alone. Hopefully she has enough sense to get herself out of the elevator, at least. He would really like it if someone would tell him that he's okay, that everything will be okay. Roach comes up behind him, wrapping their arms around him, and Lucas melts into their embrace. Whatever this dark cloud of magic negativity that hovers over their town is, if its purpose is to destroy the love between them, it has failed. He turns around and kisses Roach; a tired, weary sort of kiss. 

“Now what?” Lucas asks.

Now what, indeed. “Your clothes are wet,” Roach says.

Lucas shrugs. “They'll dry.” Roach pulls him away from the mist and touches their hand on his shoulder; his clothes feel warm, then dry. Roach looks at their hand curiously, then shakes it with a spray of water droplets. “How'd you do that?” Lucas asks.

“I do not know, exactly,” they say, “I wanted your clothing to be dry, and so it was.” This is how magic works, for Roach: they think, and so it is. They do not understand the how, or the why, or the limits of this ability. They do not know why sometimes it applies and other times it does not. Roach wishes they could just will the evil away from town and make this all be over; make Lucas's family accept him and make people leave them alone when they want to use the bathroom. What is the point of magic if you cannot use it to keep your loved ones safe?

Lucas sighs. “For all you know, every time you do something, a kitten dies,” he says. He doesn't understand why Roach wants to mess around with something they don't understand. Then again, Roach has been through a lot they do not understand.

“If that is the case,” Roach muses, “I imagine Mr. Gregor has killed many kittens in his long life.”

“How old do you think he is?” Lucas asks.

“Centuries,” Roach answers.

“We need to find him,” Lucas declares, his certainty only hitting him as he says it.

“Shall I return us to the basement?”

“I guess,” Lucas says, reluctantly. The town and its blanket of hostility are the last place he wants to be. Roach kisses him deeply, sending a spark of arousal through him, and then Lucas is even more reluctant to leave. Then they pull away, still clinging to his wrist, and he holds his breath to avoid breathing in the dust as they both disappear.

Chapter 52

Inside the school gym, the hood covering Millie's head is finally removed. She is, as expected, in the school gym, lined against the wall with others who have been bound and gagged. She sees Andy. She sees Douglas, but where are the twins? She sees Superintendent Brent Smalls prepared to make a big speech.

“You are all gathered here as sinners,” he announces, “because someone has seen something inside you fit to redeem.” It is, of course, their choice to be saved. He certainly hopes they all choose to be saved, after what they will be witnessing tonight: what happens to those who are deemed irredeemable. There is a small kerfuffle after his speech but it is hard for the captives to offer much protest, their hands and feet and mouths bound as they are; they are drowned out by applause from those not held hostage, scattered about the gym in random groupings and clusters.

Ryan, as in the guy whose nose Millie bloodied for unwarranted touching, is supposed to be her savior. Of all people. He practically skips up to her after Brent Smalls's speech. He is graceful; perhaps because he plays football? Millie has no idea how the game works, to be honest.

“I understand that you're all counter-culture rebellion right now,” Ryan tells her patronizingly, “but I see some real potential in you. I could make you my wife one day if you just submit.”

Millie glares at him. She tells him to fuck off through the cloth gagging her. She wonders why this guy is so obsessed with her. He just shakes his head and looks sad. 

“You will understand after tonight,” he says cryptically, before walking away.

Douglas is actively ignoring that yellow eyed girl, Jade, who took all those pictures at his bakery. Andy is silently pleading with his younger siblings to help him get out. Dozens of others - names and faces in the Walls of Shame or Sin or Whatever - meet with their friends and loved ones who only want them to be saved.

Millie hits her head on the concrete wall behind her. The pain rings through her skull and her teeth. She is dreaming she is dreaming she is dreaming. Just wishing it doesn't make it true.

One by one, the hostages are led out of the gym by two men Millie doesn't recognize. When it is her turn, she throws herself against one of them, kicks out her feet as she squirms around helplessly on the floor. One of the men grabs her under the arms, and the other holds her feet, face blank as he helps lug Millie into the principal's office, where she is sat in a chair facing Superintendent Brent Smalls.

“Good afternoon,” he says, piercing blue eyes leaving hers only for a second as he glances down at the folder in front of him, “Mildred. Welcome to your redemption.”

Millie glares at him. She says, “fuck you,” through the gag in her mouth. She struggles against her restraints. There is not a whole lot Millie can do.

“Language, Mildred,” Brent Smalls says. “I would like to be able to take that gag out of your mouth, so we can have a proper conversation, but first I must be assured of your cooperation.”

Millie laughs. She has no intention of cooperating. Brent Smalls stares into her eyes and suddenly she feels a searing pain in her arm, as though dozens of razor-sharp claws are ripping through her flesh. Her sleeve feels damp. Millie tears her eyes away from Mr. Smalls's to confirm she is bleeding, but the cloth of her sleeve looks dry. She looks back up, and he is snarling.

“I know your sins,” he says, face filled with disgust, “I know your thoughts. I know about the darkness you keep hidden, deep down inside.” His eyes are like ice. He has Evelyn's eyes, but none of the spark, none of the mirth. His stare chills Millie down to the bone. She feels the gag being roughly untied at the back of her head, pulling out hairs that had been entangled. The cloth drops to her lap, but Millie doesn't speak; she is frozen.

“Are you ready to confess?” Brent Smalls asks. When Millie doesn't answer, he continues. “Tell me all about your darkest thoughts; you've thought of killing your friends, haven't you? You have wondered what would happen if you set your home on fire. You have even thought about dropping a toddler off the fire escape, evil little wretch that you are.”

The numb cold paralyzing her seems to lift, and Millie scoffs. “No shit,” she says, “they're called intrusive thoughts.” She'd spent over a week locked up in a hospital with nothing better to do than to discuss them: how insanely common they are, because it turns out the human brain gets things wrong all the time; how the difference between having bad thoughts and being a bad person is vast; how the latter requires you to actually act on those thoughts.

Millie can tell that her response has thrown Mr. Smalls off guard. He leans forward in his seat and gives her an appraising look. “The first step to redemption is to confess your sins,” he says, “if you won't acknowledge them, you will burn in the same hellfire as your friends.”

Her friends? Millie hasn't seen them, in the gym or between there and here. She can only hope they are safe. She tries to remain unaffected by his implication.

Brent Smalls studies Millie for a moment longer, then shrugs, sitting back. “It is all the same to me,” he says indifferently, “You will suffer either way.” He snaps his fingers, and the ties begin to burn around Millie’s wrists and ankles; just as suddenly, they dissolve into ash, and she is free. Millie rubs her arm, which is undamaged but throbbing. She glances at the superintendent, who dismisses her with a flick of the wrist. She scrambles out of the chair and exits the office, but the school outside is not the same; it is the school of her dreams, vast and infinite and exitless. So I am dreaming, Millie thinks, but she still can't convince herself of it. She picks a direction at random and begins to wander.

Evelyn gets out of the elevator, easily, without Roach's help - or whatever that painful, shocking attempt was, that sent jolts of lightning down to her fingertips. Now she can figure out how close to the school she can get before the strange energy surrounding the building threatens to tear her apart. She swarms through the air, unnoticed by the crowds, and finds somewhere safe to regenerate where she will be unnoticed - the baseball equipment shed, naturally. Evelyn will have to pass the groups of people milling around between here and the school, without drawing attention to herself. She needs a disguise. She vanishes again, reappearing in Lucas's sister's room, unabashedly since his family is at the school right now. Evelyn is taller than Lucas, but she can fit in Maribell's clothes. She pulls a simple blue dress over her own outfit; the dress is long enough to cover her leggings, her immodest feet. She ties a handkerchief over her short hair; hopefully no one looks closely enough to tell the difference.

Once back on campus, Evelyn strolls casually along the sidelines of the baseball and soccer fields, managing to reach the football bleachers unnoticed; she feigns enough confidence in her disguise that no one who spots her has any reason to see through it. She carries Millie’s wooden box in one hand, placed low against her side so the dress conceals it. They are preparing for something in the courtyard, a grassy field between the school and the football field. She watches blank faces shuffling back and forth between trucks loaded with firewood and neat little stacks in the grass. The gym doors are wide open on the other side of the courtyard; Evelyn watches as Lucas's family exits the school and joins another fundamentalist family loitering around the lot. Her heart skips when she notices two extra members of the group: Annalee is holding Ash, while little Grace holds hands with Willow. Even from a distance, Evelyn can recognize their tragic faces; both twins look like they have been crying. Where is Douglas? 

With the Park family right there, there's no hope of slipping past unnoticed; if nothing else, the twins would recognize her in a heartbeat. Evelyn backs into the shadows below the bleachers. She taps the lid of the box as she watches and she waits.

Chapter 53

Roach is a vulture, soaring high above the desert, keen eyes looking out for an old fashioned looking black car. Roach the vulture does not know a lot about cars, but they have never seen another like Mr. Gregor's. They try following the roads out of town, but the black lines just loop back in on themselves. Dark, foreboding clouds form overhead.

Lucas is watching them stare blankly at the rock when he hears something from upstairs. The power is still out so the only way to go upstairs would be through the back. The sounds are subtle at first; maybe some footsteps, light enough that Lucas is almost able to convince himself he heard nothing. Then, unmistakably, an enormous crashing sound, as though an entire glass cabinet full of knives and gems and oddly shaped rocks has been knocked over and shattered. Roach does not stir.

Roach is a tortoise, watching the desert highway they are too slow to ever cross. They are a crow, pacing back and forth over where they remember the exit leading to town to be; there are no other roads. Eventually, they find the Bentley, parked well off the shoulder and abandoned. From there it is easy to track down Mr. Gregor by his footprints; evidently, he intends to hike the entire 30 or so miles into town. Roach finds him, off-course already, and circles overhead.

“What are you doing?” the crow asks Mr. Gregor.

“I am trying to get back into town,” he huffs; the sun overhead is scorching. The landscape is so flat, Mr. Gregor can see the ominous, purple-black clouds forming over Desert Bluffs, keeping it magically isolated. 

The crow lands on a towering cactus some distance ahead. It cocks its head at Mr. Gregor. “Why do you not teleport?” it asks.

“I do not teleport,” he growls, “because doing so involves disassembling one’s entire being into base elements, then simply hoping it will be reconstituted at one’s destination, using entirely new materials, in more or less exactly the same way.”

The crow caws and ruffles its wings. “Could you perhaps make an exception today?” it asks, “There is something happening here.”

Mr. Gregor pauses in his trudging. “I am afraid I am not as proficient at it as you are,” he confesses. As in: he has never even attempted it before. Teleporting is scary; kids these days don't understand what they are getting themselves into.

“I will join you momentarily,” the crow says, then it flies off cawing. Mr. Gregor waits for an uncomfortably long time, but Roach does not appear.

When Roach returns to themselves, it is too late. Lucas has been captured, and someone is dragging him kicking and struggling out the back door of the basement; before they can react, there is a hood over Roach’s head as well. They consider disappearing, but they would never leave Lucas behind; even as they hesitate, their wrists are bound with some sort of metal that feels hot against their skin. Their captor pulls them to their feet, and Roach takes advantage of their proximity to throw their head back, colliding with the person’s nose. Temporarily freed, Roach tries to teleport away, but the bindings around their wrist burn even hotter, white hot, spreading over their arms to keep them whole. They are grabbed again, and hauled roughly out the exit, despite going along willingly; Lucas is already gone. They listen to the sounds of destruction in the basement behind them and cringe.

Lucas is having great difficulty breathing, his head covered with thick cloth that blocks nearly all light and also air flow, his own breath stuck hot in his face. His body trembles and his heart races, chest tight; he clenches his teeth through his cheeks in a futile attempt to stave off the impending panic attack. It hurts. Too bad he's not dreaming. In Lucas's defense, if anyone is justified in having a panic attack, it's someone getting actively kidnapped. He hunches over, leaning against the car door keeping him trapped. Somewhere to his right, another door opens, and someone else is pushed into the car. It's probably Roach, but they don't say anything, and Lucas is too busy dying to check.

A car door shuts with a slam. Though they speak softly, Roach's voice breaks through the noise of Lucas's own breathing. “I am here with you, Lucas,” they say. It is little consolation, but it is what they can offer.

More car doors, the rumble of an engine, and then they are moving.

. . .

Evelyn watches from under the bleachers as her friends are dragged out of a car and in through the gym doors. They are easily recognizable, though their heads are covered with black hoods, and Lucas's family watches on, expressions ranging from solemn to pure fury; only Annalee looks away, keeping the twins distracted with two of Andy's younger siblings, with whom they are already acquainted. Andy is in there too; apparently, Evelyn is going to have to save everyone. If only she knew how.

Andy is inside, wandering around the infinite fucking school like a nightmare. He doesn't know how long he has been in here; at least a few years, or else only a few minutes. Time has lost all meaning in this prison. After a discussion with Superintendent Smalls about his drug habits and his sexual proclivities, Andy was set free into the school, which is now never ending. Andy can only conclude that Mr. Smalls has given him something pretty fucking hardcore. He has not come across any other people, even though he knows for a fact several of his friends and Millie are here, somewhere.

Lucas and Roach are led to their science classroom, their hoods removed to reveal Superintendent Smalls sneering over them. Lucas can't talk; his tongue feels glued to the roof of his mouth. He feels lightheaded and his heart is still pounding in his ears.

“I remember you two,” Brent Smalls leers. He calls them a slur that Lucas is getting really tired of hearing. “Do you know why you're here?”

Lucas's tongue still feels frozen, but Roach speaks up. “I can only assume you will benefit from this flagrant violation of the law.” 

Brent Smalls smiles smugly. “In case you haven't noticed,” he says, “law enforcement is on my side. The local police are absolutely convinced of the righteousness of their public service.”

“So you manipulated them,” Roach says.

Brent Smalls sighs. “I did no such thing,” he says. “As for the question I posed you,” he continues, looming over Roach as he approaches even though there is no possible way he could be that much taller, “the answer is, you're not even supposed to be here, are you?” Brent Smalls snaps his fingers, and Roach disappears; in their place on the floor sits a small, brown cockroach.

“No!” Lucas finds himself screaming as Mr. Smalls stomps his oversized foot down on the cockroach; a moment later, the little brown insect scurries out from under his boot. 

“Can't kill these little pests,” Brent Smalls mutters has he picks the cockroach up and carries it squirming in his closed fist over to a glass aquarium housing the class pet: a brightly colored fire-bellied toad. Lucas watches in horror as the cockroach scurries underneath a piece of bark before it can get snatched up by the toad.

“As for you,” Mr. Smalls says, turning now to tower over Lucas. His eyes are glowing icy blue, his teeth lengthening as he speaks, “your family has given up on you. If you look outside, you will see they have replaced you,” he instructs, and Lucas has no choice but to crane his head to look out the nearby window. He can see his family. Annalee is carrying Ash, who is resting his head sleepily on her shoulder, while walking Willow around the courtyard.

“Replaced by your own bastard children,” Mr. Smalls finishes, and Lucas turns to look at him; but he has transformed into a monster of his nightmares: long, thin, pale limbs, fingers ending in black, razor-sharp claws, a mouth full of wolf's teeth. “Tonight, you will serve as an example for the rest,” he says. The ties around Lucas's wrist burn off with a searing heat; he doesn't stop to think, just turns and bolts out of the science room, away from the monster Smalls.

As for Roach, they continue hiding from the enormous predator, enormous by cockroach standards. Safe underneath the bark, they groom their face and antennae, crumpled from the attempted stomping. Boots are a cockroach’s second greatest fear after toads, probably.

“What are you doing under there?” the Toad asks, voice thunderously booming through Roach’s hollow little head. It is not one they recognize.

“Hiding,” they say.

“Lucky for you, I prefer crickets,” the Toad says merrily. “Get out from under there,” it directs, “you will never get anywhere hiding like that.

“If it is all the same to you,” Roach mutters, but they do not continue. They skitter around under the piece of bark, antennae waving over the substrate for food.

The Toad says, “Are you not going to rescue your friends?”

“I have no friends,” Roach says, “I am just a cockroach.”

“But what about before you were a roach?” the Toad asks wisely.

Roach does not answer. They find something moldy to chew on instead. Being a cockroach is simple; it is easy. Cockroaches do not fall in love. They feel no need to rescue anyone.

“Do you really think that?” the Toad asks, “Or has your little cockroach brain just forgotten all the joys of humanity?”

“What do you even know about humanity?” Roach retorts, irritated. “You are just a toad.”

“Sometimes I am a Toad,” the Toad says, “other times I am a Cat. Sometimes I carry the face of a Man. Always, I am all three at once.”

“Why does that sound familiar?” Roach asks.

“Nothing sounds familiar, you are just a cockroach,” the Toad scolds.

“Bael,” Roach remembers, “I read about you in a book.”

The Toad sounds sad when it says, “Not a very good one, I'm afraid.”

Roach sighs. “Do you know how to help me?” they ask.

“You can only help yourself,” the Toad says.

“Thanks,” Roach says.

“Sarcasm,” the Toad muses, “A unique linguistic device for a cockroach to utilize.”

“If you know how to transform,” Roach persists, “you can teach me.”

“You have done it before, no?”

“Never voluntarily.”

“Never?” the Toad questions, “What about the first time?”

Roach does not remember the first time; just waking up as a human. “You are infuriating to talk to,” they say.

“Others have said the same of you!” the Toad chirps excitedly. It can only assume that is a compliment. It is silent for a long time, so the Toad says, “You could get out of here.”

“How?” Roach asks.

“There is a hole in the lid above,” the Toad explains, “You can crawl up a branch to reach it.”

“How do I know you are not just trying to lure me out?”

“What is the purpose of a cockroach, if not to be eaten by a Toad?” the Toad ponders.

Roach hesitates. They dart out from under the piece of bark and race up a branch, fast enough to avoid the jaws of the Toad, who just sits by and watches them passively. Roach squeezes through the hole in the screen; they turn around in place, orienting themselves, then take off flying.

Chapter 54

Lucas runs through the endless hallways of his school. He is being chased by a towering, spindly monster. His lungs and legs are burning. He is so tired.

Millie walks through the endless hallways of her school. She is completely, utterly alone. The old scars on her arm are throbbing. She is so tired.

Andy strolls through the endless hallways of his school. He is alone. He is bored. He opens the lockers that line the walls at random. Some of them are lockers, others are caves; entrances to some dark, hellish abyss. Voices scream from somewhere deep below them. Andy is tired. His anxiety is spiking and he wishes he had his vape.

“Andy!” a voice calls, and he spins: it's his little sister, Jolene. She is six and way too young to be his savior. She stands in the hallway looking exasperated, as though she has been following him, trying to get his attention for a very, very long time.

“What are you doing here?” Andy hisses, approaching her. 

Jolene opens one of the locker doors, waving for him to join her. “You need to get out,” she insists, “You need to run.”

“There are no exits,” Andy complains.

Jolene gazes into the locker, her face confused. “Andy,” she says, “Come on.” He follows her through the tiny, cramped locker and finds himself outside the school. Jolene lets go of the heavy fire exit door, and it starts to swing closed.

“Wait,” he says, catching the handle before it can click shut, “It's going to lock.”

Jolene looks confused again. “Are you coming back?” she asks.

Andy kicks a rock into the doorway, keeping the door propped a few inches. “My friends are in there,” he explains. He looks around; they are in the back of the school, the teacher's lot, which is abandoned. It is late in the afternoon, the sun sinking in the sky. “Where are the rest of you?” he asks Jolene.

“Playing out front,” she says, “I’m supposed to be in the bathroom.”

“Then you should get back,” Andy urges. Jolene heads for the door, but he stops her. “Go around,” he says, “Don't go inside there again.”

Jolene hesitates. “They're doing something here tonight. My new friends are scared.”

“You're safe,” Andy says, “that's what matters.” He wonders about these new friends but doesn't ask. Jolene turns and starts to jog around the school. “Hey,” Andy says quickly, “Thanks.” She waves in acknowledgement but doesn't stop.

Andy heads the other way, towards the side of the school that is less exposed. There he runs into a sleek black cat who meows at him plaintively. He crouches down to pet it, fur staticky under his hand. It rubs its body on his ankles, then moves some distance away and meows again. He follows the cat to the fire exit door, where it paws at the narrow gap. He opens the heavy door, and the cat darts inside, disappearing down the halls. Fuck this; Andy's family is here, which means his house is empty. Maybe his vape is still there.

Roach scurries around the school. They are looking for Lucas but instead they find the Cat, casually strolling through the halls. Roach the cockroach climbs up the concrete wall, hopefully out of reach of the Cat's vicious claws.

“So,” the Cat says, peering up at them with shining green eyes, “you are still like that.” His voice is the same as that of the Toad’s.

“This is who I am,” Roach says. “I do not know how to go back.”

“You have changed from man to cockroach. You have changed from cockroach to man,” the Cat drawls, sounding bored, “You have teleported across the world, and you have no trouble with that.”

“I do not know how that works, either,” Roach complains. They also do not know how the Cat has this knowledge, but then again, they are a cockroach talking to a cat. Logic has been thrown out the window.

“Does a cockroach know how its antennae detect odors in the air?” the Cat asks, “Does it know the difference between Death and Molting?”

Roach the cockroach shudders, their exoskeleton chattering. They shake their wings. They wave their antennae through the air, searching.

“You were in my head,” the Cat remarks suddenly.

“I am sorry,” Roach says, “I was looking for my friend.”

“I know, that is why I permitted it.”

“I am looking for him now,” Roach says, “have you seen him?”

“You will not be able to find him in that state,” the Cat says, “He is in the realm of dreams.”

“He is dreaming?”

“No,” the Cat explains, “the line between the real world and the dream world has been dissolved.”

As Roach considers this, the Cat turns and leaps away, turning and vanishing down another hallway. He finds Millie, who has been wandering through the infinite hallways for an infinite amount of time. Unlike a cockroach, a Cat has no trouble descending into dreams.

“Be a dear and open this locker for me,” the Cat instructs a blank-faced Millie. This is the first lifeform besides herself that she has seen in... Millie doesn't know how long. She is finding it difficult to react to his presence. The Cat scratches his claws on a locker, producing a teeth-chattering shriek with his claws. Millie opens the locker. “Go wait for your friends,” the Cat instructs before disappearing into the locker, which shuts behind him with a heavy thud. 

Friends? Millie wonders. Her arm throbs. She is so exhausted. She doesn't want to find Evelyn, because that would mean Evelyn is here, too.

Outside, the Cat races unseen to the football field, where Evelyn is still cowering underneath the bleachers. She hisses and tries to shoo the Cat away, but he just stares at her. “Is this your plan? he asks, the words sticking to her brain like flies on honey.

Get out of my head, Evelyn thinks. She doesn't recognize this voice; it is not Mr. Gregor.

“My apologies,” the Cat says, “I am trying to help a friend.” 

Evelyn wants to help her friends too, but she is terrified. She doesn't have a plan. She doesn't know what to do. She is afraid of leaving these bleachers and being seen.

The Cat paws at the pretty wooden box she left on the ground. “What is this?” he asks.

“It's mine,” Evelyn signs, picking it up and holding it close.

The Cat looks at her curiously. “It is not yours,” he says. “You ought to get it to its rightful owner. She is waiting for you.” Then he darts away, running straight past the growing crowd.

There is a commotion that Evelyn cannot hear; some of the people race away from the Cat, while others attempt ineffectively to chase him. Evelyn takes advantage of the chaos to sneak across the lot, taking note of the three bonfire pyres being built. There is no pain as she steps through the doors to the gym; as long as she stays whole, it seems. Once inside, she is spotted by someone approximately her own age, in a dress very similar to the one she stole from Maribell.

“Who are you?” the girl asks.

“No one,” Evelyn signs, and the girl shrugs and turns away. Okay, so not all magic is forbidden here, just teleporting. Evelyn quickly crosses the gym to see the rest of the school, holding the wooden box against her stomach. The halls are nearly empty; she watches two people, one of them Andy's lab partner in chemistry, wander past, blank-faced, acknowledging neither Evelyn nor each other. She climbs the stairs and finds her locker, still scrawled with “WITCH.” She looks inside some of the classrooms. She enters a bathroom, the one where she found Mils bleeding, so long ago. Written on the mirror in her loopy handwriting is “Millie loves Evelyn.”

“Millie?” Evelyn calls out carefully, her own voice ringing awkwardly in her ear. 

Millie is sitting in the bathroom stall, one covered with Evelyn graffiti, examining her arm to uncover the source of the throbbing pain. The cuts seem to be at once healed and all gaping open; it would be a horror show if it was real, but there is no blood, no wounds at all. Millie’s name floats over the metal stall wall, purple-pink and scribbled.

“Evelyn?” she calls, the name spilling out with the taste of sweet orange. She's seen this before, Millie thinks, but in her dreams. Is she still dreaming now? It would explain the way that time has stretched around her in all directions.

Millie comes out of the stall. She looks dazed, almost drugged, and she blinks at Evelyn like she doesn't quite recognize her. “What are you wearing?” she signs.

Evelyn looks down; she's still wearing Maribell's dress. She pulls out the skirt and does a curtsey. “Like it?” she asks, one handed.

Mils shakes her head, looking sad. Her eyes dart around, suddenly concerned; “You shouldn't be here,” she signs.

Evelyn thrusts the box she's carrying at her. Millie takes it, delicately, confused. “It's yours,” Evelyn explains, “I found it.” She lifts up the dress so she can reach her pocket underneath, where the key is; Mils watches her disinterestedly.

Millie puts the box down on the sink. “Why are you here?” she signs.

“Rescuing you,” Evelyn replies. She hands over the key. “Open it,” she instructs.

“No,” Millie signs, desperately, “You can't be here, go!” She waves her hands and adds, “Magic.”

Evelyn shrugs. “I can't.”

This is not good. Whatever they have planned for Millie, they have much worse in store for Evelyn. Why is she acting so casual? Millie has been trapped in this infinite school hell for gods know how long, and Evelyn just shows up, dressed like the fundies that are looking for her, no big deal. “Are we dreaming?” Millie asks, her words floating out of her like cotton candy, but Evelyn just looks at her confused. Can't she see them?

“Open the box,” Evelyn signs again. Millie picks it up, but just drops the key in her pocket. Evelyn peeks out of the bathroom door, verifying the hallway is empty before dragging Mils out of there. She is acting so strange, like she is sleepwalking. Evelyn tries to lead her down a staircase, near a fire exit, but Millie pulls back, resisting.

“It's not safe here,” she insists, “You're not safe.”

No shit, Evelyn thinks. She doesn't hear the footsteps behind her, the person coming up the stairs to grab her and bind her in some sort of scorching hot metal. There is a struggle, because of course Evelyn wouldn't go willingly, but she is easily overpowered by two cops. Evelyn doesn't even have a chance to see her captors, but she does see Millie tuck the wooden box up against a wall support, out of sight.

Fucking Ryan comes up to Millie and gives her a side hug as she watches Evelyn get carried away down the stairs. She wants to have done something, anything to prevent what happened but her body feels numb, slow, like moving through sludge. “Well done, Mils,” Ryan says, the nickname gross in his voice. “See, I knew there was hope for you.”

Millie wants to puke. She would make sure to vomit all over Ryan's shirt if she could. But she can't, because she is dreaming, and because she has no control over what is happening to her. What a nightmare, she thinks. Ryan leaves Millie for more endless wandering; he never noticed the box. She picks it up and carries it slowly back up the stairs. She goes into a random room, one of the science classrooms with big black lab benches for tables. She sets the box down and examines it. A decorative cicada inlay, her name and birthdate inscribed on the bottom. She has no idea where Evelyn got it from. She pulls the key out from her pocket; it, too, is intricately decorated with a cicada.

“What are you waiting for?” a toad in a nearby glass terrarium asks, “Open it.”

Millie shakes her head. She doesn't take orders from amphibians.

“Do you take orders from cats?” asks the Cat behind her. 

Millie closes her eyes and rests her head on the cool, smooth surface of the lab table. She wills herself to wake up. Nothing changes.

Lucas is running endlessly from his monster when he comes across Evelyn being dragged away by two other monsters. If Lucas were less of a coward, maybe he would stop to help her, but instead he just keeps running. Aren't men supposed to be brave? Lucas thinks. He thinks, maybe his family was right, maybe society is right. He will never be a real man if he can't even rescue his best friend. He keeps running and running and running.

The first time Lucas passes Roach, they are too shocked and too slow to respond; they just twitch their antennae through the air, latching on to his scent. They follow his trail, slowly, until the floor vibrates from behind them. They turn around and Lucas is approaching again. “Lucas!” Roach tries to yell, but they are just a cockroach. How did the Toad do it? How did the Cat? Lucas strides past without noticing Roach, the little brown bug on the floor. He is running too fast, too far to maintain forever, but still he runs.

Again and again, Lucas runs past Roach the cockroach. Again and again, they fail to stop him.

Chapter 55

Once Andy has a decent buzz going, he decides to go around town and look for help. Trouble is, there is no help. The entire town is deserted, or everyone is at the high school. He finds Douglas's Jeep abandoned with keys tossed carelessly in the passenger seat. His phone is there too, ringing and ringing because Mr. Gregor is trying to reach the baker.

“Yo, what's up, Mr. Gregor,” Andy says. He's met the guy all of, like, once, but everyone in town knows and respects Mr. Gregor. At least until recently; recently, there has been some bitterness associated with the name, but recently the entire town has been acting peculiar.

“Who is this?” Mr. Gregor asks, sounding breathless and irritable.

“Andy?” Andy says, like it's a question. “I'm a friend of Evelyn’s,” he explains.

Of course. “Okay, Andy, friend of Evelyn, what are you doing with Douglas's phone?” Mr. Gregor asks. 

“Shit’s going weird here,” Andy explains, “A bunch of us are being held hostage at school, the baker included. I managed to escape.”

“Held hostage?”

“Yo, my family dragged me to church with my hands tied up and no one batted an eye,” Andy moans.

“I see.” Mr. Gregor does not see. “Listen, I need you to come get me.” He has sent a text to Douglas's phone with his coordinates, the only place in the desert that apparently gets signal. “There are no roads. Luckily, Douglas's vehicle has four wheel drive.”

Andy doesn't have his license, so he shouldn't be driving. He's a little high, so he definitely shouldn't be driving. But he's under orders from the most respected, oldest man in town, so it's not like he can refuse. The coordinates aren't too far, about 20 miles directly. “Be there in a few,” Andy says into the phone cheerfully before hanging up and revving the engine.

Mr. Gregor groans. Desperate times and all that. He needs to figure out how to stop Brent Smalls and make him leave his town forever.

Everything is coming together for Brent Smalls. The town’s desperate, frenzied witch hunt has been an unexpected but powerful boost to his energies. Brent Smalls feeds off discord and strife in the same way those idiot children gain power from their puny, sordid affairs. But now he has each of them under his thumb. The ancient fool Mr. Gregor is out of town. Nothing can stop him.

Unlike Lucas, who is easily kept distracted, Brent Smalls cannot risk allowing Evelyn to roam freely through her dreams. He keeps her tied to a chair in a custodial closet, with two of the kids from one of the churches to keep watch over the door. There is no chance he is going to lose her before tonight.

. . .

Roach needs Lucas to stop running. They are pretty sure there are limits to human endurance. They once read about the first marathon: the war hero Pheidippides ran nearly 25 miles from Marathon to Athens to announce his army’s victory over the Persians, then promptly fell over and died from exhaustion.

Roach tries flying in his face, but it's like Lucas doesn't even see them. Roach ends up landing on his shoulder. He doesn't feel their tiny prickly legs. He doesn't notice their antennae tapping on the skin next to the collar of his shirt. Roach considers biting Lucas there, which they have done before, in a gentler, more erotic way; and what is a cockroach even doing, thinking about eroticism. Being human, they have learned, means thinking about sex at the most inopportune times. What does that mean for Roach; a person in a cockroach body, or a cockroach in a person's body. Or both, all at once.

Lucas, for his part, is busy thinking about all the ways he has let people down. He left Roach to get eaten by a toad. He left Evelyn to get dragged away by her own monsters. He hasn't even seen Millie. Despite everything he has done to prevent it, the twins are in the hands of his parents. His family is disappointed in him. He is disappointed in himself. His legs are burning, his lungs are burning, he is so damn tired of running but the monster just keeps chasing him. It is going to catch him at some point anyway, so why the fuck is Lucas still running?

Lucas runs past Douglas, but neither notices the other. Douglas is wandering around an endless school, too, even though he hasn't been in a school in nearly two decades. The baker is busy torturing himself with his own apprehensions, such as how his best intentions seem to inevitably lead to ruin. He has lost Ash and Willow. He has failed Mr. Gregor. His attempt at creating a safe place for queer kids turned into a trap beneath his own nose. The girl, Jade, who took advantage of his hospitality and naivety, has also decided they are destined to be wed (her words), despite his being over twice her age and openly gay. Why is he even here, and where is anyone? None of the faces he saw earlier in the gym, including Millie, are wandering these infinite halls; Douglas is completely alone.

Evelyn is tied to a chair, the plastic school kind, a hood over her head so she feels completely isolated from the world. She could be anywhere. She is cold. Perhaps she is in a castle dungeon; a research station in Antarctica; a mineshaft buried deep underground. She tries to rely on her sense of smell - bleach and mold? A janitorial closet, probably. She's probably fucked someone here; not Mils, but someone else. No one. Nemo. Evelyn has had a lot of casual sex in her short life. Like Andy, except she's a girl, so it's not okay. She is well known around school for it; Whore is Evelyn’s middle name. It probably would have been, if her mother thought she could get away with it. She wonders why Millie is so willing to turn a blind eye to her past. She wonders why Evelyn herself is so willing to drop casual sex with anyone for the sake of formal intimacy with one. She could be losing no small part of her identity in doing so.

Millie is thinking about bugs under her skin. Bugs under Evelyn’s skin. Bugs under Roach's skin. Maybe humanity is a myth, and it's just bugs all the way down. No, Millie has to remind herself, there are no bugs under her skin. She has checked and checked and checked; a hundred wounds or more and never once has a bug crawled out from underneath her flesh. But Evelyn learns to teleport on a whim, and with it she has flies. What was it Gregor had said, seventeen years is the brood cycle of the cicada? Millie traces the wooden box with its cicada inlay. She fingers the key with its cicada handle.

“So, are you going to open it?” the Toad and the Cat ask.

“Why are you here?” Millie wonders aloud. “Why do you care so much?”

“The matters of humans amuse me so,” the Cat purrs, licking his paw.

“Who are you?”

“I am a toad,” says the Toad.

“Fuck off,” Millie says. She is tired of all of this. “Are you friends with Roach or something?”

“Roach needs your help,” the Cat says. “As do Lucas and Evelyn.”

“What am I supposed to do for them?”

“You could start by opening the box,” the Toad says plaintively.

Millie sticks the key into the keyhole and turns it. Click. The lid opens, revealing an ornate, jeweled cicada brooch. The green wings are hinged, revealing a small compartment inside the insect’s abdomen. It is certainly quite beautiful, but also completely useless.

“What am I supposed to do with this?” she asks, looking up. The Toad is silent; the Cat has disappeared out the door. Millie watches as Lucas races past the door, chased by some invisible horror. This is new; she couldn’t see any of the others before. Millie fidgets with the cicada. She fidgets with the box. She fidgets with the key, which also looks like a scalpel in her hand. She could cut herself with it. No, it is just a key; cold, heartless iron. She thinks about the cut on her foot; it is dirty, probably going to get infected, because Millie is walking around school barefoot. She lost her flip flops somewhere along the way; wonderful. She picks the scab open and squeezes a few drops of blood out of her foot, lets it drip, drip into the abdomen of the cicada brooch. The metal feels warm, but that is probably just from her own body heat.

Lucas runs past the door again. And again and again ad infinitum. Ad nauseum. Ad absurdum. Millie hits her head on the table again then forces herself to her feet, drags herself to the door. When Lucas approaches again she shouts, “Lucas!” but he doesn't acknowledge her. She shouts again and grabs his arm, but he shrugs her off and keeps running. A small brown bug lifts off from his shoulder and flutters to the door. Millie looks at it curiously; this must be Roach. No other insect has ever been so familiar towards a human.

“Why are you like that?” Millie asks. The cockroach doesn't respond. She's pretty sure they could turn back, if they really wanted. She scoops them up in her hand and tries not to cringe at their legs tickling her skin. “Are you going to make me figure this all out myself?” she asks. Roach crawls up her sleeve and shakes their wings at her.

Millie takes the box to her locker. She keeps the brooch in her pocket. She wanders through the halls; all the fire exits she never noticed before but now does. She passes by others who appear not to notice her. Lucas runs past, panting heavily. She does not see Evelyn.

Not everyone has the same blank, aimless stare; Millie avoids making eye contact with Jade, who seems to be watching the wanderers with a smirk on her face. She avoids making eye contact with two teens from Lucas's church, who are standing outside a closet looking for all the world like guardsmen. Here, the cockroach on her sleeve starts buzzing their wings. Millie wanders closer to the wall and Roach jumps off her sleeve, making a short flight to the top of the lockers. She continues walking, turning the corner to another hallway, only to find herself immediately recaptured by Mr. Smalls and a couple of cops, and she is once again dragged into the gym. The cicada brooch feels warm in her pocket, but her hands are bound tightly behind her, and she is gagged to prevent conversation.

Oblivious to Millie’s fate, Roach skitters down to the floor and past the teens who are not doing a very great job of guarding the closet. They scurry over Evelyn's shoe. They wave their antennae over the floor. They have absolutely no hope in the world of untying her, or even removing the hood over her head, because they are a cockroach.

Roach pokes their head out from under the door as Lucas runs past. One of the teens guarding the door mocks his exhausted gasping while the other laughs heartily. What miserable little people, Roach thinks, to laugh at another’s suffering. They duck back into the closet and try to think. Cockroaches don't think, but Roach does; cogito ergo sum. Cogitat ergo humane est. Roach gives themselves the gender neutral; because they are intersex, and also because they feel no strong feelings towards either masculinity or femininity. Roach likes having sex with Lucas, and they would like it if he had a penis, too. Cockroaches don't have a gender identity or a sexuality, but Roach does. Roach has opinions and preferences and desires and aversions so much more complex than a cockroach could ever imagine.

Roach thinks, and therefore they are: human, tall and gangly, soft squishy flesh and sensitive skin and thankfully clothed. They pull the hood off Evelyn, who glares at them fiercely until she realizes who they are. She is bound by silver wire that is either burning or cutting into her flesh or both; but there's a bolt cutter right there on the shelf, easy access for when some kid inevitably forgets their locker combination. Roach frees her wrists and her ankles and Evelyn leans into them. She is sobbing, tears pouring silently down her face. 

“You are okay,” they sign uselessly. “We need to get out.”

They don't have to tell her twice. Evelyn stands and reaches for the door, but they stop her hand. Roach shakes their head, holding up two fingers to indicate the guards outside.

“How?” Evelyn signs. As she signs, a single drop of blood trails down her wrist from the biting silver wire.

“Be small,” Roach suggests. Then they turn themselves into a cockroach.

“W-T-F,” Evelyn signs, “I can't do that.” She watches the little guy scurry around and tap their antennae on the floor. She is signing to a cockroach. Can they even see her hands?

Roach turns human again. They make it look so easy. “Yes you can,” they sign. They wave their fingers around, trying to try to indicate “flies.”

Evelyn shakes her head. She can't teleport here. Unless the flies and the teleporting are something different, in which case she has been seriously wasting her time. As she considers this, her skin begins to squirm. She looks down; maggots writhe where once was flesh. Flies buzz around her head in a black cloud. Fuck; Evelyn has seriously been wasting her time. She condenses the cloud into a handful of fat black flies, then follows the cockroach through a nearby vent. Roach crawls through, taking turns seemingly at random before they reach the science classroom.

“Okay,” Evelyn signs once both are human again. “What next?”

Roach tilts their head at her, considering. “Millie is okay,” they sign, “Lucas is running.”

Like that makes any sense at all. Evelyn looks around the classroom for inspiration. She finds none. Looking out the window, Roach waves for her attention. It is nearly sunset. It looks like half the town at least has gathered outside. Two wooden posts stand tall, surrounded by piles of firewood. A couple men walk around the courtyard, lighting torches. Those aren't for books, Evelyn realizes.

She turns and paws at Roach frantically, trying to get them to move. “Millie?” she signs, “Lucas?”

Roach struggles to tear their eyes away from the scene below. A few kids chase each other in figure-8s around the stacks of firewood, Willow and Ash included. This is a new emotion, one they have only ever known through rough description; Roach is terrified. Evelyn pulls on their arm. “Lucas,” she reminds them, “Millie.”

Lucas; is he still running? He is destined for one of those stakes, and Evelyn for the other. Roach darts out of the room then freezes in the middle of the hallway. It is too late; Lucas has been captured by his monster. He stares blankly at Roach as he is dragged down the stairs. They duck behind the wall to avoid being seen by Mr. Smalls and shoo Evelyn back into the classroom. They open the window. “Come on,” Roach instructs, then they turn into a cockroach again and fly out the window.

Chapter 56

Mr. Gregor and Andy don't go straight to the school, because he has to pick up something or other from his shop, and Andy gets to see inside Oddities for the first time ever. Too bad the entire shop is trashed, the glass counter shattered and all of the cabinets knocked down. A taxidermied bear claws at the floor. A plywood board covering the window looks as though it has been broken down with an ax.

“Do not touch anything,” Mr. Gregor says before he races around to the back entrance of the basement. Andy immediately starts looking around and touching things under the guise of cleaning. He picks up an actual monkey’s paw, one single finger curled up. He picks up a shattered magnifying glass. He picks up an arrowhead, shiny black and lethal looking. He picks up a folding pocketknife, razor sharp, and he keeps this because he likes the dragon carved on the bone-white handle. He picks up a tiny, emerald green gemstone, and he slips it in his pocket, too, not entirely sure why.

Mr. Gregor returns. “Let us go,” he says grimly. He does not bother to lock the door behind him.

Evelyn hovers over the courtyard, observing the scene below. Annalee and some others have figured out what is going on; they are each dragged into the gym screaming. She follows them through the door. Millie and Lucas sit against the gym walls, their faces visible for the leering crowd. Mils is gagged, but Lucas’s silence comes from fear and exhaustion. Dozens of other blank faces mill around the gym. The rebels from outside are made to sit on the bleachers, under guard by some church elders. Evelyn doesn’t see Andy anywhere. Members of the crowd outside wander in at random, circling a loop around to leer at the hostages and then return outside. Brent fucking Smalls stands in the center, pale blue eyes glowing, smiling hideously with too-long, too-sharp teeth.

Roach lands on Lucas's leg. They spin around in circles, tapping their clawed legs on his pants. They flutter their wings and try to hiss. They are not the hissing type of cockroach, but they make enough noise to capture Lucas's attention. He looks down at the insect miserably. He is very extraordinarily exhausted. His muscles feel like lead. He ran and ran and still he was captured by the monster now basking in all its glory in the center of the gym. No, not a monster, just Mr. Smalls, for whatever fucking reason.

Sitting crossed legged on the gym floor, Lucas hunches over. “Why are you here?” he breathes, not even a whisper. He can feel the cockroach’s antennae tapping his face; it tickles. “Save yourself,” he instructs, “maybe the twins if you can.” They have not been in to see him. They would probably be more upset to see Millie tied up next to him, as would be right. She deserves their love, when Lucas never wanted it.

Evelyn flies in front of Brent Smalls. She turns back into a human right in front of him. She hauls back and sucker punches him in the nose.

“Witch!” someone screams, and another, and another, but Evelyn is deaf to them all. Someone tries to tackle her, but she is a fly before she ever touches the ground. Someone swats at her but she buzzes out of reach. Fuck Brent Smalls.

Millie watches Evelyn deck Mr. Smalls, heart swelling with pride. She watches her disappear and listens to the ensuing chaos.

“Evelyn Summers,” Brent Smalls calls out over the cacophony of the revelers, “You are hereby accused of witchery. Show yourself!”

Evelyn appears at the top of the bleachers, then disappears again. She reappears clinging to the rafters, then disappears again. She has no real plan here, except to delay the inevitable. Brent Smalls is laughing in the middle of the gym, blood pouring down his face. The hateful, frenzied chaos of the crowd around him is better than nectar and ambrosia, better than manna, better than Iðunn’s apples or the fountain of youth. Brent Smalls laughs and laughs and laughs.

Members of the crowd pick up Lucas and Millie and carry them outside; they are each tied to a post amidst a stack of firewood. Evelyn reappears, balancing awkwardly on the pile of wood behind Millie; she manages only to loosen Millie’s bonds before she is captured with a loop of silver. When Evelyn tries to transform into a fly again, the thin wire glows red hot and squeezes into her flesh around her arms. Her captor drags her down to the short, dried brown grass.

“Fool,” Brent Smalls spits, gazing down at Evelyn with disdain as he towers over her. She couldn't catch it, but she got the gist; she kicks out, hitting his knee with both feet. He stumbles, briefly, then catches himself. “Fine,” he assents, “you two can share.” He snaps his fingers and Evelyn is dragged to the pile of wood, bound to the post so she is back-to-back with Millie. Her eyes dart around at the crowd, their eyes glowing in the growing darkness. Each of them is absolutely convinced of their righteousness. Evelyn makes eye contact with her mother, who firmly believes her daughter caused her miscarriage, then Lucas's mother, who believes Evelyn is the cause of his corruption. Maybe she is; she and Lucas have been friends forever. Maybe, if it weren't for Evelyn, Lucas would be in that crowd right now, wearing a dress. Maybe that would be better than tied to a stake next to her, waiting to be burned alive.

Millie works her fingers through her bindings until she can reach Evelyn’s hand; she grips her fingers tightly.

Lucas watches his family; well, the ones who remain. The younger girls have all been taken away, and, if Lucas knows his church, their objections will be written off as hysteria at best; corruption at worst. The twins are watching the scene before them wide-eyed and confused; Willow is in his mother's arms, Ash in his father's. Evelyn named them, it is too late to tell them; she named them and convinced Lucas to ask Mr. Gregor to adopt them, to keep them safe. Out of the hands of the church that robbed him of his childhood then, of any sort of life now. Lucas looks down at Roach, crawling around his shirt. At least Lucas is going to die wearing men's clothes.

One benefit of being deaf is Evelyn doesn't have to listen to Brent Smalls's big fucking speech about their alleged sins. She doesn't have to hear the mob chant, “witch, witch, witch,” though when enough people join in even she can't avoid it.

“Burn the witches! Burn the witches!” The sun sinks beneath the horizon. Lucas's little brother, Joseph, only a year younger than him, picks up a torch. Evelyn's mother picks up another. They slowly step towards the people who, only a few months ago, they would have sworn they loved, sins and all.

Joseph finds himself hesitating. Despite everything, Lizzie is still family; the kid tied to the stake before him, silently pleading, could be his twin. He turns to look back at the twins. None of the Park children questioned it when Elizabeth disappeared for almost a year, returning sunken and deflated; or if they did, they did not speak of it out loud. None of them questioned these twins, who arrived just this morning; their parents have never shown an interest in fostering before. Joseph's hesitation is long enough for a person to suddenly appear in front of him and tackle him to the ground. He doesn't resist; he holds the torch upside down so it puts itself out. The kid who tackled him punches him, which Joseph thinks maybe he deserves, then disappears. No, not disappears; a small brown bug crawls away.

Roach reappears in front of Mae Summers, grabbing the torch from her and capping it before disappearing again. Evelyn is kind of disappointed to see they do not punch her; what outdated chivalrous bullshit have they been absorbing? Roach reappears over Brent Smalls, tackling him to the ground with sheer physics. They only get two hits in before they are pulled off, and they start swinging at whomever has them now. They fight with a blind fury, ignoring the blows that are returned. They disappear and reappear at random until someone gets a loop of silver around them, albeit loosely around the neck and under one arm. Roach is held down and still they try to transform, until the white-hot metal band around them burns their captors too, and they recoil. Temporarily freed, Roach slips out of the wire loop and disappears once again. In the darkness, it is impossible to see the little brown bug flitting around; it looks like they are just teleporting.

Watching Roach leap around and transform back and forth in a futile attempt to fight off half the town and save their friends is inspiring, really. Lucas wishes he could transform like them. He wonders how they do it. They make it look so easy.

Douglas's Jeep arrives at some point during this chaos; Andy follows Mr. Gregor through a thick crowd of people to the school’s courtyard, lit by dozens of torches lining the lot. One of Andy’s hottest friends is passively watching Roach get the shit kicked out of them. He really looks like he's not there at all. Andy waves his hand in front of his face, then passes over his vape. After a hit, his eyes seem to clear, and focus on the scene in front of them.

“What the fuck?” he says, and Andy nods. What the fuck, indeed. He pushes closer to the center of the crowd, where they are preparing to burn the witches at their stakes. Wow; Andy watched a movie about this once.

Ignoring the chaos around her, Mae Summers has picked up a new torch; she races towards her daughter and buries the flame into the pile of wood at her feet. The fuel catches instantly, hot fingers of fire threatening to lick her feet. Millie squeezes her eyes closed, squeezes the tips of Evelyn’s fingers. She smells smoke and she hopes theirs is a smoky fire, and maybe they will pass out sooner rather than later. The metal in her pocket seems absorb the heat from the fire; Millie is certain it must be glowing, but it does not burn her skin.

“ENOUGH!” Mr. Gregor storms through the crowd. The frenzied mob of witch hunters out for blood all pause, hesitating. They stop kicking at Roach on the ground and Roach disappears, landing as a cockroach again on Lucas's shoulder. Even the flames at Evelyn's feet seem to pause.

Brent Smalls interrupts his evil laughter to appraise the newcomer. As far as he is concerned, Mr. Gregor is ancient, and therefore he is more than harmless. He snaps his fingers and says, “Back to work.” He waits for his minions to continue, but they are frozen, staring back and forth between the two men.

As far as Mr. Gregor is concerned, Brent Smalls is a child; the power he gains through discord and strife is like a cheap sugar rush from too much candy. He surveys the man, and he cannot prevent his lip from curling in distaste. “You will restore this town and leave it, tonight.”

“Fat chance, old man,” Brent Smalls says, lifting his arms as the people around him begin once again to stir; the flames at Evelyn’s feet begin once again to greedily consume the firewood. She can feel their heat, starts coughing in the smoke, but her feet do not burn; they are crawling with small green insects. Cicadas.

Mr. Gregor sighs. He does not want to do what he must do, then. He reaches out and touches Brent Smalls’s shoulder, and the two vanish into thin air.

Then, it is as though the entire world is standing still. The mob hesitates, lost without their master. Roach returns to their human form, sitting on the woodpile next to Lucas. They wearily eye the crowd as their fingers fumble to untie the tight bindings around his wrist. 

Andy climbs up the firewood stacked at Evelyn's feet. He cuts the ties binding Evelyn and Millie to their shared post, including a thin loop of silver wire, then tosses the folded pocketknife over to Roach, who never keeps their eyes off the crowd. A disturbance from the darkness; the high-pitched squeal of toddler protestations, then the twins emerge. Millie only just gets the cloth gag untied as they reach her, first Willow, then Ash, and she stumbles off the stack of firewood to greet them with a hug. Their faces are stained and streaked with tears. To Evelyn, Ash signs, “scared.”

She responds, “Me too,” but then she smiles, exhausted as she is, to show him it will be okay, and kneels to cuddle him. Evelyn’s mother stands, swaying, watching her from a distance.

Douglas shuffles over; his eyes starting to clear, the fog over his mind starting to clear, the reality of the situation around him starting to become painfully clear. He feels as though has failed the toddlers, the teens, Mr. Gregor; but this is a different, more personal conviction, not the oppressively heavy weight that has been eating at him for months now.

Lucas's sisters emerge tentatively from the gym, no longer under active guard; the elders all have a dazed, glazed look about them. Annalee races over to Lucas instead of their family, wraps her arms around him and buries her face in his chest, sobbing. Lucas sways under her weight, legs threatening to crumble beneath him. Fuck, he is exhausted. Only Roach’s hand, gently pressing on his back, keeps him standing.

“It's okay now,” he whispers into Annalee’s hair, “we're okay now.” He looks up at his parents, standing amidst the mob that almost killed him. They show no sign of remorse, or confusion, or contempt or disgust. Their eyes are just empty. Joseph still lays on the ground where Roach tackled him, staring blankly at the dark sky above, one eye already swelling shut. Dark, purplish clouds swirl overhead. Lucas kisses Annalee on the top of her head, then tells her to take their family home. He watches her delicately help Joseph to his feet, unaware of the role he almost played tonight, and lead him back to their family. His sisters wave; the rest turn and walk away without acknowledging Lucas.

“You guys should go,” Douglas says softly, not wishing to disturb the petrified crowd behind them. He takes up the twins, Ash in one arm, Willow in the other; he is a very large man. His car is in the parking lot, no worse for the wear considering its recent journey, but he won't leave until the teens are somewhere safe.

The crowd remains fixed, no shouts of fear or witchcraft as Lucas and Roach simply vanish, leaving behind a sprinkling of dust. If teleporting is an option now, Evelyn would really like to get going, but Millie pulls away, reluctantly. This is not finished. She fidgets with the cicada brooch, opening and closing its wings, as she stares out at the town standing numb before her. They look like sleepwalkers. Evelyn resolutely refuses to look at her mother.

“Hey,” Andy says from beside Millie; he's holding something out to her, concealed in his closed fist. “So, I kinda stole that knife from your brother,” he admits, “and also this. I dunno why I picked it up. Shiny, I guess.” He drops a small green stone in Millie's open palm, then darts away, vanishing in the night. Andy plans on finding somewhere very dark and isolated, and he plans on taking his friend and a lot of weed with him, because holy shit fuck this day.

Millie fiddles with the cicada brooch; she drops the stone into the hollow of its abdomen, mostly just because it fits. When she closes the wings, however, the entire thing twitches and vibrates as though it were alive. Neat; the stone was a lot more effective than her own blood. Millie looks back out at the crowd, blank-faced zombies who tried to kill her and her friends.

She says, “You should all be ashamed of yourselves.” Her voice is much louder, more permeating in the still air than she would have expected. Millie continues, “You all need to go home and think about what you've done.” For as lame as her words feel, the crowd complies, slowly dismantling and retreating into the darkness. The jeweled cicada offers a soothing warmth in one hand; the other is held tight by Evelyn. The ominous purple clouds overhead begin to disperse, as though whisked away by thousands of insect wings.

“Is that it?” Millie asks the sky.

The Cat’s eerie green eyes glint in the darkness beyond the torches. “If you want it to be,” he says.

Millie rolls her eyes. She slips the cicada brooch into her pocket. She squeezes Evelyn’s hand and signs, “Let's go.” Her fingers aren't even done moving when they both vanish, a dark cloud of flies dissolving into the darkness above Douglas's head.

Douglas exhales a long breath. He buckles the twins into the car seats and drives the short way home. Willow is already asleep by the time he pulls into the driveway, but Mr. Gregor is there to help him take them inside. They are both quiet as they tuck the twins into their beds, recently converted from cribs due to their propensity for climbing out.

“What happened after you left?” Douglas asks finally, after he has prepared hot toddies for them both. They sit at Douglas's kitchen counter, the room lit only by the light over the stove.

“I am afraid Mr. Smalls may have slipped from my fingers,” Mr. Gregor says, though he does not sound concerned. “I lost him during teleportation.”

Douglas turns pale. “Lost during teleportation?” he asks.

Mr. Gregor was crunching merrily on a stale cookie, but now he shudders. “I have never wanted to teleport,” he explains, “Your entire body disintegrates, and you just have to hope it will get reassembled on the other end.”

“But the kids do it all the time?”

“Bravery and ignorance are often indistinguishable,” Mr. Gregor agrees, amused. They will learn, in time.

Douglas asks, “What happens if you aren't reassembled at the other end?”

“I suppose one might eventually find a way to reconstitute,” Mr. Gregor reflects, “If one knew how.” Douglas gives him a concerned look, so he adds, “It could take a very, very long time, depending on where one was dropped.” Then Douglas's face relaxes, reassured.

“Millie handled the situation here fantastically,” Douglas says, “She is strong.”

Mr. Gregor nods, agreeing. Somehow, Millie got a hold of the brooch left to her by her mother; he noticed it missing from the basement immediately, despite the overall wreck of the building. Better: somehow, Millie managed to make it work. She was not supposed to get it for a couple months yet, but Mr. Gregor is glad that she did. Tomorrow, the townspeople will wake up from what they consider to be a terrible dream. No longer affected by the ominous powers of Brent Smalls, no longer driven by their most negative thoughts and fears, perhaps they will even learn from this, reevaluate their deepest held prejudices. Mr. Gregor is not terribly optimistic.

Chapter 57

In their room, Lucas just collapses into his bed, oblivious to the scene around him; his muscles ache and even his bones feel bruised. His heartbeat is pounding in his head. He wants to sleep forever. Roach remains standing, surveying the scene; they use their phone as a flashlight, because the power is still out. The people who came in to kidnap them were wanton in their destruction. Roach’s bookshelf has been pulled over, ripped paperbacks scattered on the floor. They crouch down to pick up Fahrenheit 451, pleased to find it unharmed. They sit back on their mattress and flip through the pages. 

Lucas rolls onto his side, muscles screaming, so he can look at Roach. He watches them for a while. They are oddly stoic for someone who just got the shit kicked out of them. He says, “So, how do you do it?” 

Roach starts; they had thought Lucas was asleep. They shine the phone flashlight in his face, then apologize, hurriedly turning it off. “Do what?” they ask.

“Magic,” he says.

“I think, and it happens,” Roach explains inadequately.

“Do you think you can turn into anything besides a cockroach?” Lucas asks.

Roach considers the question for a while. “I do not know if I would even try,” they admit. They have enjoyed experiencing how other animals view the world through scrying; they particularly enjoyed flying as a crow, but there is a difference between occupying the mind of an animal and changing one’s entire self to become it.

“Do you think I could do it?” Lucas asks.

“You could probably learn,” Roach says agreeably.

“I'm going to magic myself a dick,” Lucas declares, and, to his delight, Roach actually chuckles in the darkness.

“I look forward to seeing that,” they say. 

“Can you please come here?” Lucas asks, feeling kind of pathetic for asking.

“Of course,” Roach says, as though they were just waiting for an invitation, because they were. 

Lucas can taste Roach's blood, from a swollen cut on their lip, when they gingerly kiss him. He does not know the full extent of their injuries, and he is kind of afraid to see them. He says, “Are you going to heal yourself?”

“I do not have the energy to do so,” Roach admits. They feel drained, depleted. Each time they transformed into a cockroach, they were less certain they would be able to come back, and by the end their human body was so bruised they were not sure they even wanted to; except, of course, for the fact that Lucas exists and is human. “I feel like shit,” Roach admits; this is the first time Lucas has heard them curse, and he's too tired to even appreciate it.

“Same, though,” Lucas agrees. He wonders how far he actually ran today, how many endless loops around the school. Not just running, but sprinting; racing away from some hallucinated monster. He shudders, and Roach's arms tighten around him.

“You are okay,” they say gently, “you are safe.” Their words carry Lucas to sleep.

. . .

Evelyn doesn't bother taking Millie home yet. They can talk about witch hunts and the trauma of nearly getting murdered by your entire town later. She takes Mils straight to a warm, sunny beach, where they fuck on the big, ugly dress, laid out on like a towel. Sand gets everywhere regardless. It grits between Evelyn's teeth. She really doesn't care. They go skinny dipping in turquoise water and nap in the shade of a great palm tree. Evelyn watches Millie sleep and counts the scars on her arms. The scabby, burned rings around her own wrists will probably scar too. It could have been so much worse.

Millie’s clothes are itchy with sand when they get back home. She no longer feels nauseous when she teleports, which is nice; the trick, she has learned, is to hold your breath the entire time. She shudders at the implication.

The power is still out, the entire apartment a wreck, as though ravaged by burglars; but nothing is missing, just broken. Nothing they can't fix. It is early in the morning, the sky only just starting to lighten. Millie wonders if she could use that information to pinpoint where they were; it was nighttime at the beach. She wonders how Evelyn found that beach. She goes to the breaker in the workroom and various lights click on, highlighting the destruction. It's just stuff, she reminds herself.

Millie trudges back upstairs. She places the cicada brooch, still warm and vibrating with energy, on her desk, then climbs into bed with Evelyn. Below them, the mess of the shop is blanketed by insects, both cicadas and moths. By the time she reawakes, a few hours later, they have dispersed, and it is as though nothing ever happened. The shop is whole again, organized in its own neatly chaotic fashion; only the window will still need replacing. The basement, an extension of the same; the apartment, the books - all are cleaned up and repaired. This happens all around town: the stacks of firewood, one set partially burned, vanish from the school's courtyard; graffiti is wiped off the walls; all evidence of the town's attempted crimes erased, except from their own memories. Are they going to be expected to just move on, like nothing happened?

That apparently is the case; that afternoon, Mr. Gregor explains, “I can excuse your absences for a couple days, but your school is eventually going to expect you all back.” Including Roach, whose expulsion will be erased.

He does promise Lucas won't have to go back to his family, so there's that, at least. This, to the system, is a failure. The goal of fostering is, generally, to eventually reunite with the loving family. Mr. Gregor is confident Lucas loves his family; but they love a version of him that is fundamentally incompatible with the reality of him, and their way of communicating that love is fundamentally incompatible with his well-being. The scars on his back may be the result of anomalous behavior, but they are only the most visible of the extensive damage his parents have caused. There is a reason they have gone to such great lengths to keep the twins from them; Mr. Gregor can only hope the terrifying day spent with the Park family is quickly forgotten by the toddlers.

Willow and Ash are especially demanding of everyone's attention the day after everything. No one minds, not even Evelyn. Not even Lucas, who is oddly cheerful, all day. They all go to the Bakery and the park. Roach, their face a mess of bruises and cuts, makes everyone French toast for dinner. The twins play with the Cat and watch cartoons to sleep. They feel warm and safe at home, surrounded by family.

. . .

Lucas figures out how to do the whole magic thing in the shower that morning. It’s not difficult; like Roach said; you just think, and it happens. Somehow. Somewhere, behind the scenes, dark forces are probably at work. Kittens may be dying. But Lucas has a dick now. He has balls. He gets rid of the breasts, too, because fuck binders. He keeps the old scar on his abdomen, and the new ones on his back. The first thing he does with his new penis is pee, standing up, in the shower. Then he masturbates, and it is so much better than anything he'd ever dreamed. This is what gender euphoria feels like, Lucas thinks.

He doesn't get a chance to talk to Roach about it until nighttime, which gives him plenty of time to become anxious about it; but, like, the normal amount of anxiety, not the all-encompassing, oppressive sort of anxiety that Lucas had grown accustomed to, so that's nice. Also, he has a dick, which makes him feel pretty great, despite everything.

Roach looks like shit, the day after getting the shit kicked out of them. They have a cut over their nose, over their eyebrow, on their lower lip; a black ring under one eye; a raw scrape on their jaw; knuckles bruised; a smattering of purple bruises on their chest, which is also ringed with a thin, deep burn, like a sash. Lucas's body aches, like he ran forever yesterday, but he feels a lot better than Roach looks.

They do not seem at all bothered by the split lip when they kiss Lucas in his bed that evening. After a day of pretending everything is normal, Roach kisses him like they have been away on a decades’ long journey. Like they almost died and are now remembering what it feels like to be alive; that's how Lucas feels, anyway. He gets lightheaded as blood rushes down between his legs; that is going to take some getting used to. He pulls away, now understanding Roach's awkwardness when they first started making out. 

“Hey, so, uhm,” Lucas starts, eloquently, “There's something I want to show you?” 

Roach tilts their head, examining him. “Is that a question?” they ask.

“I don't know,” he says. Lucas did this without really considering what it might mean for his sex life, though by now he's had all day to think about it. Evelyn fingerspelling “lube” flashes through his head, and he shakes his head; he does not want to think about Evelyn right now.

“I did something, and I don't know if that's going to, like, change something between us or something,” he stammers, "I don't know.” 

“Lucas,” Roach says, mildly concerned, “what are you talking about?”

Might as well get it over with; Lucas grabs their hand, and places it on the new bulge between his legs.

Roach looks confused for half a second, then breaks out into a grin so wide it has to hurt. “You did it!” they exclaim; it is, literally, the most excited Roach has ever sounded about anything. Then, “I think I had a dream about this.” They gently stroke his dick through his pants and lean in to kiss him. Lucas groans as he feels a couple drops of precum soak into his boxers. Roach pushes closer and he can feel their erection pressing urgently against his leg as they slip a hand into his pants and grope his new balls.

A moan escapes from deep down, making Lucas blush. “You're going to have to go easy on me,” he says, “I don't have a lot of experience with it yet.”

“I understand,” Roach says, solemnly. Then, “This is going to be such fun.”

Also by Liz Boysha

Apis

Queen of the Bees

Wild Things

Roach

Watch for more at Liz Boysha’s site.

About the Author

Liz is an artist, ecologist, and occasional author. She enjoys being alone or spending time with goats.

Read more at Liz Boysha’s site.