I Cover the Waterfront - uwotm8 (2024)

Chapter 1: The Offering

Chapter Text

It had become exceedingly clear to anyone who visited Fiddlehead Farm that things were not going well.

The fields, once meticulously maintained and beautifully fecund, were snarled with weeds and dead branches. Colorful childrens’ toys littered the property, faded by the sun and rain. Production of the farm’s luxury goods had all but ground to a halt - no wines, no cheeses, no jams. The fences that contained its animals were degrading more and more by the day. At least once a week, Marnie, her mouth set in a grim line, had to bring back an errant chicken that had wandered onto her property.

“Yuli, honey, this has to stop,” she said now, gently placing the fugitive back in the coop. “I’ve known you for a while now, and I never took you for the type to neglect an animal.”

The farmer nodded slowly, as if doing so took tremendous effort. Her undereyes were stained with shadow, her skin was sallow. She wore a ratty cotton robe knotted over a pair of sweatpants. The perfect picture of depression, Marnie thought. Living with her nephew had made her all too familiar with the stinging smell of the whiskey that Yuli had added to her coffee. “I know. I’m sorry,” the farmer murmured.

Marnie sighed. Her vibrant neighbor, the one who cried “Hey, Marn!” whenever she entered a room, the one who always grew perfect pumpkins for Marnie’s favorite pie, was nowhere to be seen. A lecture would do no good here, she knew. “There has to be some way we can help you. Shall we look into hiring some temporary workers, to get the field back in shape?” she said briskly, quickly switching to caretaker mode.

Yuli pressed her fingertips to her eyelids. “No, I...it’s just too much.”

“What do you mean? Has the workload really changed so much since...? I never got the impression that Elliott was much for farm work…”

A slight flinch at his name. “It’s not that. Just...everything is too much. I can barely face getting out of bed every morning, but you know, the kids…” She rubbed her mouth and shook her head quickly as if to clear the thought. “Speaking of, they’ll be waking up soon. Gotta put on my happy mommy face.” She attempted a wide, beauty pageant smile that ended up more as a grimace. “And sorry, again. About the chickens. I’ll be better.”

Marnie placed a hand on her shoulder. “Oh, honey. I really hate seeing you so upset. I wish...I wish that none of this had ever happened. To either of you.”

The corners of Yuli’s lips turned up slightly. “You and me both.”

Fucking Marnie, she thought as she trudged through the forest. It was late morning, and she had just dropped the kids off by the ranch so they could walk to the library together with Miss Penny. It was almost mid-spring but the air still had a chill to it. The flannel Yuli had worn was definitely not enough.

She knew the kindly rancher meant well. It was just the wording she used sometimes. This has to stop. We’re worried. It just made Yuli hate herself more than she already did. She felt like a liability. Someone the entire town pitied. The idea of that was absolutely unbearable.

She reached the moldering tower on the edge of the forest and looked up. This was a stupid idea. But this morning, when she saw the cobwebs forming over the tiny structure in the middle of her field, she felt an odd compulsion to do something about it. Just clean it up, she reassured herself. Just get your shit together and you’ll feel better.

Out of some sense of politeness, she knocked the door twice. Then she heaved it open with her shoulder. It tended to stick, she knew from her previous travels here. The air was always so humid with whatever the Wizard was cooking up.

“Hey, Ras,” she said casually, as if speaking to a coworker and not the somewhat foreboding mage that muttered in strange languages and took Spirit’s Eve a little too seriously.

The squat, big-nosed man in the center of the room closed his eyes and sighed deeply. “I’ve told you many times now that we are not on a nickname basis.” His voice was tinny, higher than one might expect from a dark master of the arcane.

“Sure,” Yuli replied. “Meant to tell you a while ago, my kids loved the maze this year. You outdid yourself.”

“Something troubles you.” It was an observation, not a question. The Wizard didn’t look her way, didn’t take his eyes off the massive cauldron that brewed a green, rank-smelling sludge. “You are...deeply unsettled.”

Yuli laughed mirthlessly. “Oh, you know how it is. Divorce, am I right?”

The Wizard still didn’t look at her but his lips twisted into a scowl. Not many people knew about his calamitous marriage to a supposed witch, and fewer still dared to mention it out loud. “If there’s nothing further, then begone. I’m very busy.”

“There is something, it’s about the Junimo hut.” She motioned at the dais that held a large book. She had flipped through that book many times, marveling at the illustrations of magical structures that could be hers if she could get a lot of cash together. It seemed a lifetime ago now. “The one I got over the winter. I, um...it’s not been a good season for us...me... at the farm. And the thing takes up space and, honestly, with how this year’s going, I could probably use the cash. So I came over to see if I could maybe...return it or something.”

Finally, the Wizard whipped around to look at her incredulously. There was a long, stunned silence.

“Return it,” he said flatly. “The Junimo hut.”

“Okay, sorry, never mind.”

“An enchanted structure inhabited by the very spirits of the forest upon which we all depend. That one? No, you cannot return it.” He shook his head, disgusted. “I didn’t imagine that I’d need a ‘No Refunds’ policy.”

“Look, man, I don’t need to be made fun of right now.” Her eyes burned, and breathing just seemed to make it worse. It felt very stifling in this tower all of a sudden. She hated the tremor in her voice. “I just didn’t know what would happen to the stupid things if there wasn’t anything to harvest. I didn’t know if they’d...die or something, and then I’d be the fuck-up that killed the Junimos because she couldn’t get her shit together.”

To the Wizard’s obvious horror, she started to sob.

“There’s nothing to harvest. Grandpa’s farm, his life’s work. My life’s work. It’s all fucking gone. The snow melted and it was just a mess, like it is every year but this time I just couldn’t...the sprinklers are fucked and my dog is dead and my h-husband is living it up on the beach with our kids and when I do have the kids, I don’t know what to do with them because they ask for their dad all the time...fuck, why is it so hot in here?” She ran up the stairs to one of the tower’s tiny windows and pushed it open in a frenzy. Greedily sucking in the cool outside air helped her focus somewhat.

But from the window, she could see the river snaking from the forest to the town. To the bridge. The bridge where she had first laid eyes on the beautiful man who would be her husband. She could see the clearing in the forest, where he had whirled her around at the Flower Dance and told her that the stupid dress made her look “ravishing.” She could see the secret spot where she harvested spring onions every year, and remembered how his eyes shone when she brought him there for the first time. Like she had shown him buried treasure, something precious.

“He’s just...everywhere,” she whispered. “This town...there’s nowhere that doesn’t remind me of him. And I can’t leave. My life is here. My kids...where would I go? I’m stuck.” She turned to the Wizard. “When does it get easier? How long does it take for you to just...forget all the bad?”

He shrugged. “Perhaps you won’t.”

“Thanks, good talk,” she snapped, irritable. She descended the stairs and headed to the door. What a waste of time this had been. She’d take a sledgehammer to the damn hut herself, vent her rage a little bit, she decided.

“But you could.”

She stopped, her hand halfway to the door handle. What? Had she imagined that?

He had his back to her now. “It can be done. The forgetting. Not for free, of course. It would require an offering.”

There was a fluttering in Yuli’s chest - hope? Fear? “I...don’t understand.”

The Wizard sighed and turned to face her. He really does think I’m an imbecile, Yuli thought. “There is a shrine. Offer 30,000 gold and you and your spouse won’t remember that you were married. In fact, you won’t even remember that the other exists. So, to answer your question, you can forget all the bad overnight.” The Wizard seemed to be making an effort to conceal his delight. It clearly thrilled him to talk about dark magic.

“Overnight. 30,000 gold,” she repeated dumbly.

It was not a small amount of money. Legal fees and her temporary emotional paralysis had bled her coffers dry. She had come here trying to refund a building, for fuck’s sake.

But she had some savings. She could sell the batch of wine that sat aging in hardwood casks in her cellar. They weren’t nearly ready yet, they had another month to go before they would reach a quality she was happy with. But if she sold them now, it would still be enough.

She had enough.

“But how does it work if...I have kids? Would they forget me? Forget him? I couldn’t…”

He waved a hand as if her children were a bothersome fly. “For a prismatic shard, I can take care of them for you as well. Doves, I think it is. Yes. Pure, innocent doves, flying blissfully away.”

“Take care of--Ras!” she shrieked. “What the actual shit...who would do that?!”

“Very well, very well. The children will remember their parents, then,” he said, shuddering. “They will remember you as their parents, but they won’t have memories of the two of you together. They are very young, yes? So their memories should not be any trouble for you.”

“This is so...just so...I'm kind of not over that dove thing yet...I need to think.” Was she lucid dreaming? Was there a hallucinogen in the Wizard’s cauldron? How could any of this be real? And if it was real...what would it look like? What could she allow herself to hope for?

A friendly handover of the kids every weekend, and that would be the end of it. They could exchange friendly nods at Pierre’s, raise a glass to each other from across the room at the Saloon. They could marry other people. Have more kids, be a happy, blended family. Maybe they could even all squeeze together at a table for the Feast of the Winter Star. It didn’t sound so bad.

It also didn’t sound possible. They could never get to that place. Not after the horrible things they’d screamed at each other, the cascade of betrayals. Not when the thought of her kids having a stepmom made her want to break things. Not while her family farm fell to pieces around her.

But here was someone right in front of her, telling her it was possible. Telling her that she could move on, that she could get out from under this boulder that was crushing her more and more every day.

“How?” she finally managed to say. “How does it work?”

The Wizard’s eyes gleamed. “You pay me the offering. Then you are to go home and prepare for an early night. Immediately before bedtime, you drink the draught I will provide you. The work will happen as you sleep. You’ll wake up tomorrow, and…” he swept his hands outward, as if clearing her a path to the future. “It’s really a very fascinating and tidy practice.”

“You said ‘the work.’ What does that mean, exactly? And this draught or whatever...doesn’t Elliott have to drink it too? How would I pull that off?”

“Well, I mean my work. The work of erasing your memories of your lives together. And no. It’s a one-sided process so it’s somewhat of a...gray area, morally. He’ll see the memories in his dreams but he won’t know why it’s happening.” He trailed off, as though the moral implications of erasing Elliott’s memory would change Yuli’s mind and call off his deranged little experiment.

She shook her head. “Ras, we were married for 6 years. I met him more than a year before that. And you’re saying that in one night, it could all just...be gone?” Every kiss, every winter night in front of the fireplace. Every cup of coffee on the porch. How could it be possible?

As if he read her thoughts, The Wizard shrugged noncommittally. “The brain has a way of keeping only what’s most important. And I told you to stop calling me Ras.”

She exhaled and tried to steady her shaking hands. Scared as she was, Yuli knew that she would be hard-pressed to come across this kind of gift again. An end to fighting. A release from pain. Just clean it up. Just get your shit together and you’ll feel better.

"I gotta admit...I’m having a hard time seeing the downsides here,” she said sheepishly.

There was something like a smile that flitted across the Wizard’s face and disappeared just as quickly. “Very well. The bargain will be struck when you present the offering. Now,” he gestured to the door and it flew open with a loud bang, making Yuli jump. “If you will excuse me.”

She felt like she was sleepwalking as she numbly walked down the steps to the forest. The sun had burned off the morning fog and shone warmly on her scalp. She could smell the faint sweetness of a cherry blossom on a distant tree. 30,000g. 30,000g. She repeated it in her head like a mantra. Marnie was in the yard brushing her cows when Yuli passed. Yuli waved, an irrepressible spring building in her step. It’s just like I said. I’ll be better.

Soon, I’ll be better.

For the first time in months, she felt light.

Chapter 2: Burn

Chapter Text

The vial held a clear blue liquid that looked and smelled suspiciously like antifreeze.

Can’t remember your ex-husband if you’re fuckin’ dead, Yuli thought drily.

She wondered if she could really put it past the Wizard, to take her money and try to poison her. No one would be the wiser. Just some poor jilted sadsack ending it all, they would think. She gave the vial another wary sniff.

“Cleanse your house of all the evidence,” he had told her when she brought him the money earlier that day. “Photographs, letters, other keepsakes. You must be thorough. If you miss anything , you will be in for quite a shock after the work is done.”

That’s how she found herself cutting down the twin pomegranate trees that shaded the stone bench where Elliott had sometimes done his reading on autumn days. The trees had been an anniversary gift to him. She hacked their thin trunks into thirds and threw the limbs onto a pile. They would burn. Not very well, there had been rain recently, but they would burn.

She mopped her brow and tried to think. Luckily, there wasn’t much in the way of mementos lying around the house. She had been the minimalist in their relationship. Elliott had long ago taken all the books and writing materials from his study. In a fit of pique, he had thrown his mermaid pendant into the fish pond. He must have fished it out later when he was feeling less dramatic, because it had been gone when Yuli searched for it the next day.

Letters, she thought. Focus on letters. She rummaged through every drawer in the kitchen, master bedroom, and study, looking for any scrap of paper that contained his handwriting.

A grocery list. Oil. Paper towels. Tillie keeps asking me for something called “sparkle yogurt.” I don’t know what that is but I told her you’d check. Love, E.

A letter he had written to her when he was away on his very first book tour. I miss the peacefulness of home. Our home. How good that feels to write!

A limerick he’d once written to apologize for saying something thoughtless that Yuli couldn’t even remember anymore.

There once was a farmer named Yuli

Who made Elliott go all drooly

But he stuck his foot in his mouth

And things quickly went south

And he cried, I’m an idiot, truly!

All of it was tossed onto her makeshift bonfire that was emitting a weak, white smoke.

Fortunately, she had already consolidated the majority of her photographs in her nightstand, shoved into a drawer during a wine-fueled rage months ago. All she needed to do was stick them on the burn pile like everything else. A shirt of his that had been wedged behind her dresser. The romance novels featuring the square-jawed hero with flowing hair on their covers, the one she always teased him for resembling. All the fucking crabcake recipes.

The smoke was thick now, with an acrid smell. She coughed as she looked at what she had saved for last.

It was their wedding photo in a simple silver frame. Such babies, she mused. Young, beautiful, and in love. Haley had shouted “get a room!” when she took the photo. But they hadn’t even been kissing. Just the intensity of their gazes at each other had felt salacious.

Yuli ran a thumb over Elliott’s face in the picture. He didn’t have the laugh lines then that he did now. His hair was a little less silky now that he had two kids to take care of. But in many respects, he was constant. The same Elliott, her Elliott.

But not anymore.

This was it. The last time she’d see him and know who he was. “Bye, honey,” she whispered. Though it felt so silly, she gently kissed the cool glass of the picture frame. She was doing the right thing, she knew. It was a kindness to them both.

Finally, she extracted the photo and let it fall from her fingertips into the flames.

Tomorrow, a fresh start.

“I...are we in the movie theater?”

Yuli looked around groggily. She could taste something metallic. The last thing she remembered was sitting on her bed and swigging from the dreaded vial. Shit must have really knocked me out.

It was the movie theater. She recognized it from taking the kids to see The Brave Little Sapling countless times. The seats were the same plush polyester. The floors were even sticky from sodas past. And there was the Wizard, sitting behind her with massive reels of film stacked beside him. “How is this...what? Why here…?”

The Wizard fed a spool of film through a huge projector. “This will go a lot quicker if you don’t ask so many questions.” He paused and seemed to acquiesce. “Think of it as a holding area while the memories are organized.”

She wriggled experimentally in her seat. It felt exactly like the real thing. “Cool. Wish I had popcorn.”

“Alright,” the Wizard said. “Let’s begin. The last time you saw each other.”

A small bead of light on the center of the massive screen. It expanded slowly until an image began to form. Roll film.

Yuli grimaced as light streamed in through her blinds. It had been a rough night. She had gone to the Saloon already a little tipsy, made a complete fool of herself at the pool table, and eaten an unholy amount of fried foods. She groaned and curled into the fetal position as her stomach protested. Well, surely it was only 5 AM and she had a little longer to sleep. Right? She looked at the clock.

It was already 8:00.

She jackknifed up in the bed. “Shit. You gotta go.”

The blond lump next to her stirred and lifted his face. His eyes were bleary, the corners of his lips raised in a half-smile. “Hmmm?”

“You have to go. My kids. Elliott is coming over with the kids. It was his weekend. You can’t be here when they are.” She yanked a brush through her hair and searched for mouthwash.

Sam leapt gamely out of the bed and started searching for his clothes. She found his easygoing obedience confusing. Do older women routinely kick you out of bed?

“So hey,” he began. “Last night was fun, right? I mean, I thought it was.”

“‘Uh, yeah,” she said as she tore the bedroom apart looking for her other boot. “Yeah, it was fun.”

“We could maybe…”

“MOOOOOOOMMMMYYYYYYYY!”

Ah, fuck. She exhaled and made an effort to relax her face as she went out onto the porch.

Elliott had their daughter Tillie by the hand and their son Jasper on his hip. Yuli saw his lip twitch as he watched Sam lope out behind her, but he kept a magnanimous smile on for the kids. “Shall we say good morning to Mommy?” He sank into a squat so the toddler could dismount and run to Yuli.

“My babies,” she cooed, scooping them up and kissing each on their chubby cheeks. “Mommy missed you!” Tillie made a “yuck!” face and raced off to catch the cat. Jasper hugged Yuli’s leg contentedly.

“Sweet, the whole gang’s here!” Sam said brightly. If he felt uncomfortable around his lover’s ex-husband and their children, he did an admirable job of not showing it. He held up a hand for Jasper to high-five. “Looking good, champ!”

Jasper’s gaze slid over to his father, as if, at two years old, he already knew that he found himself in a situation he shouldn’t be in. Elliott smiled encouragingly but his eyes were cold.

Sam shrugged and raised a hand in greeting. “Hey Elliott, how’s it going?” Yuli rather envied his ability to ignore the awkwardness of a situation. “My mom really digs the new book, by the way. Talks about it all the time!”

Yuli’s cheeks burned as Elliott gave Sam a subtle once-over. She could feel him looking at the younger man’s rumpled clothes, his tousled hair, the skateboard tucked under his right arm. There was a pulling feeling in her gut that might have been shame.

“That’s very kind of you to say, Samuel,” Elliott finally replied. “You’ll have to give her my regards.”

Yuli was confident that Elliott knew Sam’s real name wasn’t Samuel. He was just doing it to be spiteful.

“It’s actually Sams--never mind,” Sam said, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. “Anyway, I gotta jet. It was good to see you guys. Later!” One final wave and he was off, with that boyish, springy walk.

Tillie wandered back into frame, having failed to catch the cat and sensing an opportunity. “Mommy, can I have a cheese stick?”

“Our own ? We don’t have to share one??” Tillie darted inside the house, not waiting for an answer. Jasper toddled behind her, happily chattering to himself. The screen door banged as it closed and a thick, uncomfortable silence descended for a beat.

She cleared her throat and said, lamely, “well, thanks for bringing them. Hope they behaved themselves for you.”

“You are unbelievable,” he hissed.

“Elliott, I don’t want to hear it.”

“He’s half a child.”

“Elliott, I said--”

“How did this even come about? Did you play some video games over a round of Joja Cola ?” Elliott’s voice was tight with fury, Yuli knew he could go on for hours in this kind of mood.

“ Enough ,” she thundered. “It’s my business who I see.”

“I had only hoped that you might pick someone a little older than Tillie,” he sneered.

“And your Zuzu University co-eds, that’s so different?” She felt a nasty satisfaction at the way Elliott’s face paled. “Yes, I’m not so stupid as you thought, am I? You know, Ell, if you had to have a midlife crisis, you could have picked something a little more original.”

“In our house, in our marriage bed, though? I would never do that to you.”

“You don’t live here anymore, this is my house. My family’s land.” It was a lame argument and she knew it.

“And you’re welcome to it,” he said, waving a dismissive hand at the weeds and debris as he turned away. “Love what you’ve done with the place.”

Rage bloomed behind her eyes and, for a moment, she couldn’t see anything. Before she could stop herself, she picked up and threw the closest object she could find - one of her daughter’s sandals that was sitting on the porch. It was too lightweight to hurt or do any damage even when thrown with all her strength, but it bounced off Elliott’s shoulder in a small plume of dust.

He whipped around to look at her, then the shoe, then her again. Ridiculously, she wanted to laugh. Did I really just do that? Throw a fucking shoe? Throw a shoe at my husband, who just caught me after a one-night stand?

Who am I?

What is happening to me?

Elliott’s face was inscrutable, which was worse than anger. Yuli wished he would yell and scream. Throw the shoe back. Slap her. Slam her against the wall and kiss her.

Anything.

Instead, Elliott just shook his head and walked away.

Something strange was happening. The faces in the memory gradually grew less distinct, until they were blank. Colors desaturated, smells and sounds faded. Yuli realized it was actually being erased, right in front of her eyes. It was terrifying and thrilling all at once.

The scene dissolved and before she could get her bearings, she found herself sitting at a large conference room table, her skin erupting in goosebumps as the air conditioner worked overtime in the background.

Across the table, a stone faced Elliott sat next to a diminutive man in a gray suit. He jiggled his leg, and Yuli could tell he was agitated. She wanted to reach out and touch that bony knee, to still him. Could she? She raised her ghostly arm and gently touched Elliott’s restless leg with her pointer finger. Nothing. No sensation, no reaction.

“So I guess he...we...they can’t see or feel me,” she remarked to the Wizard, who nodded curtly.

“You’re a spectator now,” he told her. “All there is to do is watch.”

Yuli scowled. She hated watching herself from above. She was really meant to watch this trainwreck bumble through life all night?

“On to the matter of custody of the two minor children,” droned her attorney, as if carving up a family was a typical Wednesday for him. He squinted at the paper in front of him. “Matilda, age 5, and Jasper, age 2. Have the parties agreed on the arrangement?”

Yuli nodded and said “joint” just as Elliott said “sole.”

Silence. Elliott’s lawyer rubbed his forehead, clearly anticipating a blowout.

“I’m sorry, what? Sole ? In what fucking universe?” She felt as though all the blood were leaving her head and pooling at her feet.

Her lawyer put a hand up to silence her. “Yuli, the point of mediation is--”

“This is ridiculous! He’s clearly just trying to prove some stupid point here. That cabin doesn’t even have indoor fucking plumbing.”

“I’m selling the cabin,” Elliott said softly. “The department chair said he could secure me an apartment closer to the university by the beginning of summer.”

“He...He can’t take my kids.” The room was spinning, she gripped the table as if it might anchor her to earth.

“Yuli, again, we have to--”

“He’s trying to take my kids.” Yuli’s heart was pounding in her throat, she could hear her voice devolve into a pleading cry. “He...he can’t, you can’t let him…”

“My client has raised questions about your client’s fitness as a parent,” Elliott’s lawyer said brusquely.

Her ears started ringing, drowning out all sound. Her lawyer’s mouth was moving, he was gesturing passionately. She looked beseechingly across the table, at the man who had been her husband. “Elliott.”

She couldn’t stand the way he was looking at her now. Like she was just another stranger. Like he hadn’t held her hand while she gave birth to the children in question. Like he hadn’t written a poem after Tillie was born, in which he called her triumphant queen, warrior, mother to my dearest hopes.

Where have you gone? Do you have any love left for me at all?

She didn’t say any of that. All she could say was a repeated “Elliott.” He said nothing. The ringing in her ears finally ceased.

“So it’s going to court, then,” her lawyer said quietly.

“Indeed. We’ll see you in court. Don’t communicate with each other outside of legal channels.” Their lawyers nodded at each other, and Elliott’s steered him out of the room with a hand on his shoulder. The door slowly clicked shut behind them. Yuli could hear a subtle breeze and the memory seemed to blow away with it.

The next few memories were short, almost like pictures on a projector, advancing with a loud click. “This is crazy,” she whispered to herself.

She was digging a grave, right at the foot of her grandfather’s shrine. She paused when her tears blinded her, when her throbbing palms made her throw the shovel down in frustration. Wordlessly, Elliott shrugged off his jacket, rolled up his sleeves, and picked up where she left off.

CLICK

“Oh, honey,” her mother sighing into the phone, her voice laced with disappointment. “You two are so beautiful together…”

CLICK

Penny’s soft, halting voice. “He’s leaving bite marks. The other parents are starting to complain. I never told them it was Jasper, but I think they’re getting together on the side and figuring it out on their own. He just, well, he seems very angry. He was always such a happy little boy and loved to look at the picture books, but now...Yuli, I really hate to ask this.”

Yuli glanced at her son, who was currently hell-bent on pulling the stuffing out of the couch cushions. She could hear Tillie sniffling in the other room. Her brother had just kicked down her dollhouse.

“...is there something going on at home?”

CLICK

“Jeez, could you slow it down a little? I’m getting motion sick.” Yuli tried to grab onto any surface she could to stabilize herself. She found that, even though it felt like she had been put through a spin cycle, she hadn’t really moved at all.

“You said it yourself, we only have one night. And everything must go.” The Wizard lifted another reel, cracked open the case, and queued it up.

She took a deep breath. She misspoke before. She wished she had brought something a lot stronger than popcorn.

Chapter 3: Venom

Chapter Text

She felt it in her stomach before the next memory even began. She knew this was the one. The one that blew it all apart.

“I don’t want to see this one,” she told the Wizard quickly.

He glanced at her and slightly raised one shoulder in a sort of half shrug. “And it shall be erased.”

“Seriously, I don’t want to see this one again, can we just, I don’t know, fast forward through it?”

The Wizard shook his head. “It doesn’t work that way. But your reluctance has really piqued my interest in this memory, I must admit.”

“Bastard,” Yuli muttered. The image came into focus and her stomach roiled.

It was the first true cold day of winter. Yuli could see her breath as she yawned and trudged across the farm to her henhouse. Hope the heater didn’t go out , she thought idly. Sometimes it faltered early in the season and it always pissed the animals off.

As she got closer, she paused. Usually the building was a cacophony of clucks and screeches, her ten “lovely ladies” all quarreling and gossiping in chickenese, as she liked to tell Tillie. Tillie would tell people that she was learning “chickenese” to talk back to them.

But today, there was silence. No clucking. They surely couldn’t all be asleep. It wasn’t that early in the morning. Something was wrong. Yuli quickly nudged the door open.

Inside, a horror. Two chickens dead, their broken bodies heaped in the corner. Eggshells littering the ground, yolks smeared haphazardly. The surviving chickens roosted in the rafters, paralyzed with terror. Out of the corner of her eye, a flash of shimmering purple.

“Elliott,” she called. Then again, more urgently. “Elliott!!”

If the assailant was what she thought it was, she had only seen its like once in her life. On the 100th level of the infamous Skull Cavern, where a mysterious man awaited her, surrounded by swaying iridium cobras. Sometimes Yuli thought she had dreamed it all. Were it not for her ruined henhouse, she might have thought it a dream for the rest of her life.

Yuli had no weapon and the snake was hiding somewhere behind bales of straw. She backed slowly towards the door, trying not to make a sound. One misstep could be fatal. Where on earth was Elliott?

Footsteps approaching. Was it Elliott? No, it was Champ. The grumpy old dog that showed up one morning in Marnie’s arms during Yuli’s first week on the farm, a tiny grumpy puppy. He was clearly a shepherd mix of some kind, ears pointed, eyes alert. At this age, he was mostly lazy, resigned to accepting the occasional rough handling from one of the kids. But he could still give a mean warning bark if one of the animals came too close to wandering off the property.

Sensing Yuli’s apprehension, Champ quickly ducked his head close to the ground, eyes narrowed. Waiting for a threat to appear. The hairs on his back bristled. He let out a growl, lower than Yuli had ever heard from him.

Minutes slowly ticked by in silence. At last, she could hear the sound of something sliding across the floor. Okay, she thought. If I get to the tool chest, I can get my hoe and dispatch this thing. One clean hit to the head. I can do this. I’ve done things like it before.

Though it sure would have been a lot easier if Elliott could help her. Where the hell was he?

She felt a sudden rush of cold air by her side, and realized that Champ had made his move. With a speed that she no longer thought him capable of, he had leapt and pinned the writhing purple serpent to the ground with his front legs. Still rumbling with that terrible growl, he closed his jaws around the area below the snake’s head, and shook fiercely.

Yuli whooped. “Good boy, Champ!” She was about to retrieve her hoe when she heard it.

A high-pitched yelp, strangled and squeaky like air being let out of a balloon. She almost couldn’t figure out where it had come from. She turned back to her dog.

In its death throes, the snake had worked its upper body free of Champ’s powerful jaws and reared its head back. It struck, quick as lightning, on the underside of the dog’s throat where it sank two thin, glittering fangs.

Yuli dashed across the coop and recklessly yanked the snake free. She threw it to the ground and stomped with all her might once, twice, thrice onto its head. Once she was satisfied that she had dispatched it, she grabbed a dazed Champ by the jaw. “Let me see it. Let me see.”

The dog yowled and thrashed as she did her best to hold him still. She could see the two clean holes left by the fangs and kicked herself for not being able to remember more from her first aid classes. She couldn’t tourniquet it like she knew she was supposed to. It was on his neck. Were you supposed to suck the venom out of a snakebite like they do in the movies? Probably not, but what else was there to do? She lowered her head to the wound and made a seal with her lips. Blood and something sour filled her mouth. She spat, and her lips tingled.

She was about to try again when Champ suddenly went stiff as a board in her arms. Then his body relaxed, then stiffened again. Soon he was seizing and Yuli searched frantically for something he could bite down on so he wouldn’t swallow his tongue. That was what you were supposed to do. Right?

She couldn’t fail. She couldn’t lose him. This was Champ . She’d had Champ before she had anyone in this town. On cold winter nights, he’d always warm the foot of her bed. When he’d first met Elliott, he headbutted his hand for treats. One of Tillie’s first words had been “cap,” always said while pointing insistently at the dog.

Now he’s dying.

“No,” Yuli sobbed. “Please.”

More footsteps behind her. “Were you calling me, before? I thought I heard...what on earth?” Elliott gaped at the carnage before him. Dead chickens. A pulverized snake. His hysterical wife clutching a mad dog.

“Elliott, call someone,” she bawled. “Get Marnie. Get Harvey. Get anyone. Help me!”

But he only stared, as the foam spilling out of Champ’s mouth slowly turned pink from blood.

Yuli’s mouth was sandpaper-dry, every swallow felt like it would make her vomit. She scrambled to her tool chest and fumbled blindly around until her hand closed on the handle of her prized golden scythe. She kept it hidden behind her back even though the dog, his eyes rolling wildly in their sockets, could surely see nothing.

She held his stiffening, jerking body close to her chest, crooning atonally into his ear, choking through her sobs. “It’s okay, sweet boy, it’s okay, Champy, I’ve got you, mama’s got you.”

“Yuli,” Elliott croaked.

“Shhh, be still, Champy boy, I’m here, I’m here,” Yuli chanted shakily.

“Yuli.”

She let out one last, shuddering breath and took one sure swing with her scythe. With a horrible yelp, Champ’s body finally went slack. Yuli buried her face in his damp fur, but his usual dog smell had been replaced by the sharp odor of terror and adrenaline.

She could feel a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Yuli. I am so…”

But he was cut off by an otherworldly howl that bubbled up from Yuli’s gut. He jumped back like he had touched a hot stove. She could hardly blame him, in retrospect. But still, she screamed.

“What fucking good are you? What kind of a fucking man? What is even the point of having a husband if I have to take on every, single, thing by my fucking self,” she roared, accentuating each word with a pound of her fist on the ground.

“You don’t have a real job. You don’t help me on the farm. You don’t write a goddamn word. You haven’t touched me in weeks. Now you can’t even help me put down my fucking dog? You can’t even take care of a snake?” She was screaming so hard that she thought she might fracture her larynx. Now I can sound as crazy as I feel.

Tears streamed down Elliott’s cheeks, and it only seemed to goad Yuli further. “Nothing to say, Mr. Writer? No fucking words, that sounds about right. Pathetic.”

In the movie theater, Yuli covered her eyes. She couldn’t bear to see the bestial rage on her own face, the pleading sadness on Elliott’s. She could, blessedly, barely hear when Elliott finally said “I’m going to stay at the cabin awhile.” When the memory finally ended, she felt as though she could breathe again for the first time in hours.

“Your anger is a powerful thing,” the Wizard mused. “You struggle to control it.”

Yuli exhaled, miserable. “Your point?”

“None at all. I just find it intriguing.”

Yuli surveyed her husband’s study, dismayed at the overflowing wastebaskets and pyramids of crumpled paper. The typewriter was covered in a thin layer of dust, obviously untouched for some time.

Elliott had always been prone to “moods,” as she’d called them. She assumed they were just part of having an artistic temperament. One day he’d be funny, warm, amazing with the kids. The next day, he’d appear as a man trapped underwater. Moving silently through the house, his smiles empty, his gaze blank.

This particular mood had lasted longer than usual. Yuli had given him plenty of room, waiting for him to work it out himself. But it just didn’t seem to be happening this time. Guilt churned in her gut.

Because really, she knew why. His latest volume of short stories wasn’t getting very well-reviewed. “Stultifying” and “derivative, pastoral” were some of the worst ones that made her wince when she read them.

But that wasn’t all. Even worse, she had betrayed him. He had betrayed her too. But this tit-for-tat act certainly wasn’t making either of them feel better.

She knew that, to a writer, this was a violation of the worst kind. But she had to know what he was thinking. What misery he’d kept locked up in his head. She reached down to the nearest wastebasket and plucked the first balled-up paper from the pile. She glanced behind her to ensure she was alone, then smoothed out the page.

His handwriting was small and cramped instead of his usual elegant cursive.

I hope when you think of me, years down the line,

You can’t find one good thing to say.

And I hope that, if I found the strength to walk out,

You’d stay the hell out of my way.

I am drowning.

There is no sign of land.

You are coming down with me, hand in unlovable hand.

I hope you die.

The last line had been fervently crossed out and replaced.

I hope we both die.

The letters swam as Yuli blinked back tears. She dropped the page like it was a hot coal, almost wishing it would singe through the rest of the wastebasket and burn it all to ash.

“I’ve asked you not to come in here,” came a soft reproach from the doorway. “I’ve kept the door closed, as you requested.”

She cleared her throat, hoping the sound and the darkness obscuring her would make her sound casual. “Elliott, you’ve got to let me clean up in here. Come on, it smells .”

“Like what?”

She paused. “I don’t know, human misery?”

He chuckled darkly. “Perhaps you should be the writer instead of me.” He stalked out of the room, leaving her behind in his darkness.

“Elliott? Who was that?”

At first, Yuli had rejoiced when Elliott landed an adjunct lecturing gig at Zuzu University. It gave him something to look forward to, to dress up for, the opportunity to hear his own voice talk about topics that he loved. It wasn’t for much money, but it was certainly better than nothing.

What she hated were the events. The readings, the conferences, the book release parties. There was always the expectation that she would fill the role of “artist’s wife.” Always dutiful, never outshining him, merely giving glassy-eyed smiles and saying “yes, it’s amazing to see Elliott’s creative process at work.”

What’s more, she never felt as though she were properly dressed for them. She thought she did an okay job for the faculty party tonight, with her best black dress pants, clean boots, and a new decorative hair clip. But the college girls always came to these events dressed to kill, with dramatic eyeliner and toothpick heels that towered over her. Worse yet, they knew how to discuss literature. They used words like “evocative” and “allegory.”

Yuli had gone to college. She liked to think that she was still decently smart, she had been one of those girls once. Still, she knew she could never compete. Gradually, she convinced Elliott to bring her along to fewer and fewer of these events until one day she stopped attending them at all.

She couldn’t very well have gotten out of this one, though. This party was to celebrate the release of Elliott’s short story compilation. Not having his wife there would have raised too many questions.

Elliott was brushing his teeth, face still aglow from an entire party devoted to him. He spat into the sink. “Who was who , darling?”

She suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. He knew exactly what she was fucking talking about. “Green dress.”

All the young women, his “advisees,” clamored around him at these things. Yuli was used to it. Who said she wouldn’t have done the same at their age? Elliott was young, handsome, talented. What was the harm in being hot for teacher?

But Green Dress had been different. She didn’t giggle, didn’t try to make an excuse to touch Elliott’s arm or chest. On the contrary, she’d hardly gone near him at all that night. But her eyes had followed Yuli at the party. There was something...possessive about her gaze. When Elliott was leaving, he and Green Dress had shared a quick conversation, quiet, unsmiling. And Yuli had just...known.

“Hmmm…” Elliott was pretending to think. “I think more than one person wore green tonight. Zara, maybe, or Nadine.”

“I’m talking about the one you’re having sex with, Elliott.”

His toothbrush clattered to the counter. He turned to look at her, narrowing his eyes. “Now what are you on about? What’s got you so upset?”

“Do I look upset?” she replied, gesturing to herself. “I’m not. I was just curious if you were going to be honest with me.”

Elliott didn’t move, his eyes still suspicious. “You’re...not upset.”

“That you’re having an affair?”

“I’m not-- ”

“No, I’m not upset about it. It makes sense, honestly. It just...fits.” Oddly, Yuli was being completely truthful. She didn’t feel upset. A strange peace had settled over her. She could handle this.

“I can’t tell if you’re trying to insult me.”

“I mean, it just fits better. Than you and I do. You and your writer friends, the parties, the girls, it just...makes sense to me. That’s all. It just seems like you’ve found where you really belong.”

This seemed to infuriate him. He balled up his fists and his jaw tightened. “Where I really belong. You really are insulting me. Have you ever given a thought to what those Zuzu City literati might think of me? I can tell you, my darling ,” he spat. “They think I’m a hack. That I’ve gone native, that I’m completely out of touch, that I can’t possibly know what’s happening in the literary world because I’m rotting out here on a farm, of all places.

“So I come back to that farm, to the woman I love, the woman for whom I left all that behind. Except, she’s not there. Of course she isn’t! She’s off plumbing the depths of some horrible mine somewhere. Or no, she’s building an island settlement from the ground up so some poor wretched bird boy can have a real home. She’s slinking about the sewers with the dwarves and shadow people. So that leaves me to think of something to tell our children when they ask me where she’s been.”

“Do not bring the kids into this,” she warned. “You knew from the start that I was not going to be a housewife.”

“Diapers, nursery rhymes. By the time I’m done, I can’t even bear to look at the typewriter. Eating dinner alone. Sometimes I have to look in the mirror to make sure I’m still real. I’m rather convinced that I’m disappearing. So yes, when someone speaks to me as they would a human being, I don’t turn them away. I welcome it! Sometimes it soothes a man’s soul to be reminded that he exists!”

“Poor you,” Yuli muttered. “Is that what you’re going to call it? Being reminded that you exist? Fuck’s sake, Elliott, just say you fucked her like a normal person.”

“You’re being monstrous. I can’t talk to you when you’re being like this.”

“Sleep in your study, then. Better yet, drive your ass back to the city and maybe you can remember that you exist again.”

Elliott raked both hands through his hair, making some pieces stick out at an odd angle. “I don’t understand you. You...we’re talking about me with another woman, and you hardly even care. I’m honestly blown away by how callous you are sometimes.”

“Because it’s a relief, Elliott!” she exploded. “Honestly, it’s a relief to have an answer to something. I’m sick of all the mystery and the guessing. What is Elliott thinking, what is Elliott doing late at night? Why is Elliott so cheerful one day, then moping around the house the next? It’s exhausting. I’m tired of it. So now I have an answer and I can just let it be. If you want me to throw a fit, I’m sorry, but I’m just too tired right now.”

At that last sentence, it was like the pin had been pulled from the grenade and Yuli suddenly choked out a sob.

“You have no idea how much pressure it is, to be the person everyone needs. That fucking bulletin board. ‘Get me this, bring me that. Could a local farmer grow this?’ As if local farmer could mean anyone else. It never stops. And then there’s the kids, always ‘mommy, mommy, mommy.’ Now my husband is throwing a tantrum, saying that, because I’m such a failure, he fucked another woman and is in my face trying to get me to react. So here’s me reacting, Elliott! I’m tired! I’m so tired!”

He crossed the room and gently grabbed her wrists. “Look at me,” he insisted. “I have never called you a failure. Nothing could be further from the truth.”

She looked at his hands holding hers and tried to imagine them on someone else. Couldn’t. “How long were you two...?” she asked softly.

He dropped her hands and sank down to the edge of the bed. “Over the summer. You were...living on the island most days, I suppose.” He shook his head fiercely. “But it’s over. It’s nothing.”

“It’s clearly not nothing.”

“It is. I made a mistake, and now I’m going to pay for it. The rest of our lives, if I have to. I will. I promise you.” He moved to hold her hand again. She ripped it away.

“I’m going out. I need to think.”

But thinking had nothing to do with what she was about to do next.

Chapter 4: All or Nothing

Chapter Text

My husband. MY husband. MINE. Not someone else’s.

The calm that Yuli had felt while confronting Elliott about Green Dress had fully disappeared. Now there was a wild, panicked animal clawing at her heart and she had to stop every few steps to take deep, gasping breaths as she stumbled up the path by the bus stop. Her husband. Her cheating, bastard husband.

She didn’t know what the past version of herself had been smoking. I don’t care. I’m not upset. What the fuck!

The lights of the saloon beckoned as her vision slowly tunneled. Soon she couldn’t see anything but those glowing, inviting windows. A drink. That would settle her down. One drink and she would figure out her next step. Blinking, she numbly passed through the double doors.

“Yuli!” Gus cried jovially. “You’re just in time for last call. What’ll it be?”

She smiled gratefully. “Negroni, thanks.” She definitely was craving something bitter, to match the thoughts curdling in her heart. Gus raised an empty glass in acknowledgement and got to work.

Willy sat at the small cocktail table closest to the door, a slight frown on his face. “Bit of a late night for you, lass.”

Like it always was with her and Willy, the true conversation went unspoken. Are you alright?

She shook her head and patted him on the shoulder. Later.

He drained his glass and set it down with a sigh. “Well, that’s it for me then. Back to the shop I go.” He drummed the table and stood up, squeezing Yuli’s shoulder in return. “You be careful, Gup.”

“You too, old-timer.”

She looked around as he left. It had been a long time since she’d been at the Stardrop this late. Gratifyingly, the faces were all the same. There was Pam, barking orders at Gus like a fishwife. Emily, flitting around the bar in her own world. And...

“Why does he always call you that, anyway?” a beer-soaked voice drawled from the corner seat at the bar.

She turned, surprised. She and Shane weren’t technically unfriendly. She’d been his neighbor for 7 years, after all. But they certainly weren’t big conversationalists, beyond lighthearted small talk at festivals. “Huh?”

“Gup,” he clarified. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Even though she hadn’t been invited, she plopped down on the stool next to him. “Guppy,” she muttered, scowling as Shane snickered.

“Cute.”

Yuli shrugged. “He was friends with my granddad. Known him since I was a little kid.” She sighed with pleasure as Gus brought her drink. It was nice and strong.

“One more of these, Gus,” Shane piped up, pointing to her drink. “Looks good.”

Gus’s smile flickered slightly. “Coming right up, Shane.”

“This round’s on me,” Yuli added. Gus nodded but still looked somewhat perturbed.

Shane glared resentfully. “I can buy my own drinks, you know.”

She shrugged. “Yeah, well, so can I. It’s not that deep.”

He glowered and they sat in silence until Gus brought the second drink. He took a sip. Then another. “Shit, that’s good.”

“Right?” She picked up her glass and raised it towards him. “Hail Joja.” He snorted and clinked his glass on hers.

This was good, she realized. This felt good. To sit and joke with a man who barely knew her. It had to mean something, the fact that it was so easy.

One of Gus’s weak spots was that last call was rarely ever last call. He was just too nice, always wanting to keep the party going. They managed to get two more cocktails each before he flickered the lights on and off and said “okay, this time for real.” Now or never, Yuli thought.

“Hey,” she said, touching Shane’s arm. He stared, bewildered at the sudden contact. “Let’s get out of here.” Smooth. It certainly doesn’t show that it’s been 7 years since you’ve seduced a man...

“You mean, to…” Shane trailed off, his eyes huge and confused. “To, like…?”

She nodded fervently. This was perfect. Elliott would hate this. Wait. Don’t think about Elliott right now.

“You’re...married, though,” he frowned. “Like, we all went to your wedding.”

“Yeah,” she said, shrugging.

“And like...I don’t know Elliott very well but I can’t say I have anything against the guy.”

She sighed impatiently. “I’m telling you, it’s not an issue. But fine. Suit yourself.” She pushed away from the bar and flounced out the door, hoping she looked at least somewhat dignified rather than a tantrum-throwing drunk.

The cool evening air was a shock on her flushed face. Stupid, desperate Yuli. Now what? Now back home, where nothing had changed. Where she was still some pathetic wife who couldn’t keep her husband from stepping out. The same situation, just reeking of vermouth.

She could hear sneakered footprints on the cobblestone behind her. Shane was panting, he had clearly jogged to catch up with her.

“Hey,” she said, trying to sound as casual as possible, her heart thudding against her ribs.

“Hey,” he replied, catching his breath. “I won’t lie and say this isn’t a longtime fantasy of mine.”

“What is?”

He shrugged. “A pretty girl just marching up to me and bossing me around out of the blue.”

“...oh.” She didn’t know how to answer that. A pretty girl?

It was almost like he could read her mind. “I mean, this is embarrassing. But I always thought you were really pretty. Ever since the day you got here all those years ago.” He scowled at himself and she could see a blush bloom under his stubble.

“No, please.” She put two fingers to his lips and he made a soft noise of surprise. “Just please...please don’t be nice to me.”

His brows furrowed. “...what?”

“Please, I can’t take it.” Her eyes burned with tears that she refused to let spill. “I can’t, I don’t deserve…” She didn’t know how to say it. She didn’t know how to tell this practical stranger that she didn’t deserve to be held like a precious, fragile thing. She didn’t deserve a tickling whisper in her ear saying “come for me, darling, I can feel that you’re close.” She didn’t deserve loving, long fingers sweeping her hair out of her eyes.

She wanted to be treated like the trash that she was.

Shane’s eyes softened and she knew that this was something he could understand. “Okay. So it’s like that.”

“Yes! Like that, exactly,” she exclaimed, almost giddy with relief that she didn’t have to explain herself.

“So, should we go back to my place, or…?”

“No!” she blurted out. They could run into Marnie, which would be a catastrophe. And it just felt far away. She looked around. The town square was completely deserted. They would be undisturbed mostly anywhere, but she still would appreciate a bit of cover. Her eyes landed on the side of the Stardrop, near the trash cans and across the way from the Mullner’s mysterious dog. “Here!”

Shane paused. “Here…? Near all the trash?” A bit on the nose, isn’t it?

“Shh,” she said, pulling his hand toward her, placing it on her breast. “Just…”

It was springtime, seven years earlier. Yuli was out late at night, trying to catch some fish or other with a shitty wooden rod. She’d heard the clanking of metal and Old Man Mullner’s shouted demands to get rid of the raccoons plundering his garbage cans. But it wasn’t a raccoon, it was Linus. The man who lived in a tent in the mountains, who was feared and scorned by all even though he’d never hurt a soul. His eyes darted back and forth like a cornered animal as he begged Yuli not to tell on him. Gus had smiled so kindly as he told the wild man that no one would starve in Pelican Town as long as he had anything to say about it. Yuli herself shrugging casually, saying who was she to judge?

Who, indeed. Now she was bent over, her forearms braced on a scratchy, ivy-covered brick wall. Her breath came out in ragged puffs as Shane’s hips slammed into her. “Harder,” she hissed as though his cock could reach the snarling self-loathing inside her and somehow just turn it off.

He couldn’t have been more different. Shane’s hair was coarse and his stubble scratched her skin raw. He had the soft body of an athlete gone to seed. Yuli knew she couldn’t exactly talk, with her stretch marks and loose flesh from bearing two children. Shane gave no indication that this bothered him. Shane didn’t give much indication of anything at all. He was one of those men who was seemingly afraid to make noise during sex. His eyes were closed, his lips screwed up in concentration.

Against her will, her mind wandered to the women in Elliott’s program. Young, tight-bodied, bookish girls. Was Elliott the same way with Green Dress as he was with her? Did he stretch out across the bed, luxuriating like a cat in a spot of sun, after he came? Did he go down on her like a man on the brink of starvation? Did he lift her by the waist and pin her against the wall, whispering “don’t worry, I’ve got you. I won’t let you fall.”

She burst into tears.

“Okay, yeah, no.” Shane practically leapt away from her and was tucking himself back into his pants. “I’m not into this. Um. Sorry.”

“No, it’s fine,” she sobbed. “I’m okay. Just keep going.”

“Yeah, it’s obviously not fine. I know, this was a mistake. Don’t worry, we can pretend it never happened.” The light that had briefly appeared in Shane’s face dulled. Yuli felt horrible. Another man I’ve hurt.

“Oh, Shane,” she said softly. “I’m sorry. It’s not you, really. I’m just...everything is so fucked up right now.”

He smiled wanly. “Sure. You take care, Yuli. It’s, um...things will get better.” After a halfhearted wave, he was gone.

She stood by the stinking trash cans, pants around her knees, and wondered how she ever could have sunk this low.

She didn’t remember how she got home. It was almost like she had floated or walked in her sleep. Her house was silent as a tomb as she blindly made her way to the bedroom.

Elliott was asleep in bed. He hadn’t slept in his study after all. His lips were parted slightly, his breathing slow and steady. His face was so relaxed. She could feel her heart breaking as she climbed into bed beside him.

“Elliott,” she whispered. “Elliott, I do care. I care, I care so fucking much, I’m sorry, I’m just so goddamn sorry…”

Elliott’s eyes snapped open, no hint of bleariness or confusion. And for a horrible moment, Yuli saw herself as he must have seen her then. A disgusting, puffy-eyed mess. Smelling of shame, sex, and Campari. She shuddered.

Elliott reached out and cupped her face, running his thumb along her beard-burned jaw. Yuli closed her eyes and felt a sudden coldness as he withdrew his hand. She opened her eyes and his back was to her.

“Go take a shower. You stink.”

“Damn it!” she cursed as pain ripped through her scalp. She threw the hairbrush onto the bed in defeat.

The salty breeze and tropical humidity of Ginger Island was usually a blessing, but it wreaked absolute havoc on Yuli’s hair. It was somehow simultaneously dry and greasy. The tangles started at the roots and went all the way down to the ends. It was all going to form one giant mat if she didn’t act soon.

“Fuck it,” she announced, stomping to the kitchen. “Where are the scissors?” She rummaged angrily in the drawer. “Or a razor. I’d rather be bald than deal with this.”

Elliott stepped behind her and gently closed the drawer. He was holding the hairbrush that she had thrown. “I don’t think it shall come to that. Couch,” he ordered.

“Elliott, there’s no way. I’ve been trying for an hour. You’re not gonna fix it.”

“Indulge me in an attempt, then.” He pointed at the couch again. She realized he had set up a row of hair products on the coffee table. Good grief.

She sighed and reluctantly followed him to the living room. He sat and motioned for her to lay her head on his lap. She pouted and obeyed.

His soft voice. “There, now. My little brute.” He spread her hair across his legs to survey the extent of the damage. “My whirling dervish.”

“Yeah, yeah. Just leave me to baldness. You can have the nice hair in this relationship.”

“Can have?” He popped open a tube of pomegranate-scented leave-in conditioner and squirted a small mountain of it into his palm. “Darling, I’ve always had the nice hair in this relationship.”

She laughed. “True.”

He gently worked the product through the tangles and she hummed softly as his strong fingers massaged her scalp. He kissed her forehead when he was done. “Now we let it sit for 10 minutes.”

She took his hand and kissed it on the knuckle. “Thank you. This was really nice.” It had been so long since they had touched this way.

He stroked her cheek with the hand she had just kissed. “I miss you. Well,” he caught himself. “The children miss you. And Champ misses you, of course. You’re gone so much.” He sighed. “I know it’s necessary, and it makes you happy. But I really miss you.”

Yuli’s cheeks flushed. “I know. I do work too much. I’m sorry. I miss you too.”

He paused, knowing she had more to say.

“It’s just...not like anything I’ve ever seen before. Everything grows. Everything grows there, faster, better than I’ve ever seen. The soil is just amazing. Like, I’m growing pineapples, Elliott. Pineapples!” She could hear her voice quickening with excitement. “Mangoes too. And bananas! There’s just...all the new jams and wines...it’s all so new, every buyer in the valley just goes nuts for it all. I just...I really think I have something here. I think it could be something amazing.”

He smiled sadly. “I know, darling. You’ve worked so hard. I know you’ll succeed in anything you try.”

She rolled onto her side. “Come with me next time. For winter! We can get someone to look in on the animals. The kids will just love it. All the birds and fish. I’ll get the house ready. Just us, our family. Doesn’t that sound nice?”

He began to comb his fingers through her hair, the tangles giving way with ease. “It does. We’ll see.”

Everything about Jasper’s birth had been hard. Yuli’s body seemed to reject him from the start. Her pregnancy had been a fever dream of swollen hands and feet, itchy skin, high blood pressure. Her contractions started weeks too soon, her body seemingly desperate to expel its tiny inhabitant. The hospital in Zuzu City tried all they could to keep the baby in for longer, everything short of shoving a cork up inside her. And after all that, he had gotten stuck during labor and they had to cut him out of her anyway.

The cherry on top was that he was small. Too small. He’d had to spend days in the NICU, kicking his spindly little legs in his isolette, like a slow-motion swimmer.

Tillie wasn’t allowed to visit her little brother in the NICU, so Yuli’s mother had stayed at the farmhouse to help out. When asked what she wanted to find underneath the Spirit Tree that year, she would solemnly announce that she wanted her baby brother to live. Elliott had hugged her and said “your brother will live to steal your toys for many years to come. My morbid little duck.”

It was mostly a brave face. Every day, Yuli would hobble to the NICU, her incision screaming at her with every step. She and Elliott would sit in sheer terror as roving bands of doctors discussed their frail son as if they weren’t even there.

It was strange how quickly they came to love the tiny creature in the glass box. Some days, they would marvel at his every move, rejoice over every ounce gained. Other days were harder. Sadder. They each took turns, being the strong one and the one who fell apart. One day, Elliott even wrote a poem that the hospital asked to publish in their quarterly newsletter.

I would stand behind the glass

However long it took

You’ve caught me here without a net

And in my heart, the hook.

But mostly it was just waiting, day in and day out. Elliott curled up in a chair, miserable and nervy. Yuli attached to a breast pump that looked like it had come straight out of a science fiction movie. Part of her felt relieved to be a slave to the pump day in and day out. It was something else to think about. At least, she thought, I can do something. I can be useful.

A medical resident took pity on them once and taught them about “kangaroo care” - holding the baby to their bare skin, which ostensibly was to make him stronger and healthier and maybe even get him out of the NICU quicker.

Elliott had jumped at the chance. Sometimes he would shed his shirt as soon as he sat down by the isolette first thing in the morning. It was a stirring sight, she had to admit. A tall man, hair falling softly around his shoulders, holding a tiny, wrinkled baby to his bare chest. She would catch some of the younger nurses stealing a glimpse here and there. Sure enough, Jasper was allowed to come home soon after and everything could go back to normal. So she thought.

It seemed as though Yuli’s brain had waited for her baby to be out of the woods before completely falling apart. She’d had a mild case of the baby blues after Tillie was born, and she could immediately tell that this was not that. Night falling would send her into a tailspin, complete with hyperventilating and pacing. The slightest disruption from Tillie or Champ set her teeth on edge. Even when Elliott accidentally brushed up against her, she wanted to scream.

One day was particularly bad. The baby was colicky. Tillie was curled up on the window seat like a cat, fast asleep after bawling her little heart out.

She had quickly grown bored with her brother’s lack of capabilities and started to act out. Every other second was “Mommy, watch this!” followed by something that was invariably not worth watching. She tried to give Yuli a running hug that ended up more as a tackle, colliding right with her incision. The pain was like a lighting strike. Yuli fell to her knees, clutching her stomach. “Tillie, go away,” she hissed through gritted teeth.

“Mommy, I--”

“I SAID GO AWAY!” she exploded.

The guilt. The instant, burning guilt as Tillie’s eyes widened and filled with tears. The guilt as Elliott promptly swept their daughter into his arms and said, “now I think everyone needs some space, my sweet.” Tillie sniffled and sobbed as he rubbed small circles into her back.

Yuli checked her incision in the bathroom mirror. It looked angry and red but it hadn’t reopened, mercifully. She crawled into bed, wishing she could hibernate for the next 15 years. She could hear Elliott singing softly in the other room.

“I cover the waterfront

I’m watching the sea

Will the one I love be coming back to me?”

“Fuck,” she whispered as a familiar heat pressed behind her eyes. She felt as if she spent most of her time crying these days. She wiped her eyes fiercely as she heard footsteps coming down the hallway. Elliott popped his head around the door.

“Everything alright? Looked like she got you pretty hard there.”

“Yeah, I’m good. I checked,” she replied, faking a smile. “Toddlers, man.”

He chuckled softly. “Indeed. Try to get some rest while she’s down, hmm?”

“Yup! On it!” she said brightly. Too brightly. Elliott frowned.

“Oh, dear. What is it, love? You can’t fault yourself for shouting, you’re a human being and she really hurt you, accident or no.”

“It’s not that. Well, maybe it is. But you’re just so...good. With her. And with him,” she said, pointing at the bassinet where Jasper slept. “And I’m so...not.” Her voice broke.

“You’re terribly hard on yourself.”

“No, I mean it.” The tears weren’t stopping and now her nose was starting to run. Great. “All I do is yell. They don’t need me. You don’t need me. Everything just hurts, all the time. I feel like shit, all the time. My brain’s broken. My body...this shitty, stupid body almost killed our baby, Elliott. Every day, I look at the three of you and think, they’d be so much better off if I just...disappeared, somehow.”

Elliott abruptly crossed the room to their bed. “Shove over, you,” he demanded.

Confused, she acquiesced. He gently took Jasper out of the bassinet, placed him on her chest and folded her hands over the baby’s back. Jasper squawked at the transfer but settled in against Yuli’s warm skin.

Elliott picked Tillie, still sleeping like the dead, up from the window seat and nestled her limp body next to Yuli’s left side. He flung the two bedroom windows open, stuck his head out, and whistled.

Not needing to be told twice, Champ scrambled inside, up the stairs, and leapt onto the foot of the bed. He was allowed up there, but rarely invited so explicitly. Finally, Elliott sat on Yuli’s right side.

“Alright, I’ve set up my little scene here. Look at this. Take it all in,” he instructed.

“You did this, Yuli. You made this. You built this. Smell that? I opened the windows so you can smell the melons ripening in the field. The tomatoes aren’t far behind. You did that with your own two hands. This land that sat in ruins for so many years. This town you brought to life.”

He pointed to Tillie, whose mouth hung wide open in her sleep. “Look at your daughter. One of those melons is going into her birthday pink cake. A whole crop, just because your child loves them. You told her that you’d give her a unicorn ride for her party. And this one,” he continued, stroking Jasper’s tiny back with his pointer finger. “Fights harder than a lingcod. The very spit of a determined, stubborn woman I know. You are a fantastic mother. I won’t have you say otherwise.”

“Elliott…”

“Look at Champ. That damned animal who only chews my shoes but has to run and make sure you’re safe during a thunderstorm.”

“You have a lot more shoes than I do,” Yuli pointed out, smiling weakly.

He pretended to shush her. “My point is, there is no family without you in it, my love. I know you feel absolutely rotten right now and that’s alright. We’ll handle it, together. But I won’t allow you to think, for one second, that we would be better off without you. We wouldn’t. Now,” he said, sliding under the covers and kissing her on the shoulder. “We mustn't turn down an opportunity for a Family Nap.”

She affected the posh accent she used for mimicking Elliott. “No, we mustn’t. Huzzah!”

“There she is,” he whispered, already halfway asleep in the enviable way of men.

I want to keep this one.

She stared at the tableau unfolding on the screen, her family all serenely cuddled up in bed. She couldn’t lose this memory. This one, the Wizard would have to spare.

“This one,” she managed to say. “Don’t...don’t do the thing. Don’t erase it.”

The Wizard lounged in his theater seat, looking rather bored. “Everything must go,” he repeated from before.

“Please. Just this one. Let me keep this one, you can get rid of all the rest.”

He looked down at her. He was backlit by the projector, so he briefly appeared as a menacing silhouette. “I think you know that what you’re asking for is impossible.”

“No, please, I...just one! I promise, just one. I’ll do anything you say, if I can just keep the one…” Tears pricked her eyes, her breath hitched.

There was no annoyance or levity in the Wizard’s voice anymore. He spoke, coldly and with an air of finality. “You intruded upon my tower. You made the offering. You drank the draught. You chose this, Yuli. And it’s all or nothing.”

“Then I choose nothing. You can keep the money, I don’t care. Stop the memories. Wake me up.” The tears were flowing in earnest now but she did her best to still her body against the threatening sobs. “Rasmodius. Wake me up.”

There was a hint of a smile playing on his lips now. “You remind me of her, you know. My wife. Fickle. Mercurial. Always so very angry.” He lifted another huge reel of film and the spool clicked to life. The picture on the screen from the previous memory disappeared.

“No,” she gasped.

It’s gone. But not forever. I’ll remember it. I’ll memorize them all and when I wake up, I’ll remember. Think, Yuli.

There was Elliott...a rocking chair...no…a song...how did it go…

With a slowly dawning horror, Yuli realized that it really was too late. She had already forgotten.

Chapter 5: Everybody

Chapter Text

You say the ocean's rising, like I give a shit

You say the whole world's ending

Honey, it already did

You're not gonna slow it, heaven knows you tried

Got it? Good, now get inside.

We're going to go where everybody knows

Everybody knows, everybody knows

- "All Eyes on Me," Bo Burnham

I have to get out of here.

Yuli’s eyes darted back and forth as she assessed her surroundings. They weren’t really in the movie theater, she knew. In reality, her body was asleep somewhere and this was just...her brain? How had Rasmodius described it? A staging area, a waiting room, a format in which the parade of memories would make sense to her. What would happen if I leave?

Could she even leave?

She sighed when the loud clicking noise signaled the beginning of the next memory. After this one, she would figure something out.

It was an unseasonably hot spring day. Yuli was hugely pregnant, lying on the couch directly underneath the A/C window unit. A beached whale, she thought. Elliott sat in the loveseat across the room, frowning at the newest volume of a literary journal. “Well, Linden seems to be putting that fellowship money to good use,” he remarked bitterly.

Yuli could only manage a listless “hmmmmm” in response. Maybe because Linden writes more and complains less. Her eyes involuntarily widened at the horrific, uncharitable thought she’d just had. This baby really couldn’t come soon enough.

Tillie sprinted into the room, breaking Yuli out of her reverie. “Daddy,” she announced with great solemnity. “I made you a story.”

Elliott made a big show of sitting up straighter and looking at her with interest. “A story ? For me?”

She nodded and brandished a sheaf of construction paper. She had drawn straight lines at the bottom of every page, to mimic the childrens’ books that littered her room. The illustrations were all amorphous scribbles. Yuli smiled in spite of herself.

“Well, go on! You must read it to me this very minute!” Elliott cried, hoisting her onto the chair next to him.

Tillie did her best to sound like she was clearing her throat, the way her father always did before a reading. “ Ehhhhm . The story is called The Jumin...the Juminim...the Juninim…”

“The Junimos,” Elliott corrected her gently.

“I can do it,” she insisted. “The Juminos and The Pony.”

Yuli could never have imagined how challenging it would be to have a daughter that was her mirror image. So stubborn. So sassy. The only exception was that she had inherited Elliott’s flaming red hair. She seemed to know where every single one of Yuli’s buttons were installed, and pressed them mercilessly. The two of them were beginning to get into honest-to-goodness arguments. Arguments . With a three year old.

“I don’t know how you do it,” she had despaired to Elliott after a big blowout over cleaning up her toys. “She’s...she’s me. What the hell do I do?”

He had laughed softly. “Candy helps. Speaking of...” He held a packet of fruit candies out to her and laughed harder when she smacked his arm.

“ Brava! ” he exclaimed now as Tillie concluded a rather nonsensical tale. “So imaginative. The stream of consciousness...ingenious. Don’t you agree, darling?”

Yuli smiled weakly and gave a thumbs up. “I liked the part where the pony turned the witch into a butt.”

Elliott planted a kiss on the top of Tillie’s head. “Your very first reading. Thank you for sharing that with me, little duck.”

Tillie slid off the loveseat and slowly sidled up to her mother, her eyes expectant…

“Yes, you can have a cheese stick,” Yuli said. Tillie was off like a shot.

She heard Elliott sniffle as he straightened out the pile of construction paper. “Are you crying…?”

“No,” he muttered thickly.

She grinned. “Aw, it’s okay. The witch won’t stay a butt forever,” she teased.

“Very funny. No,” he said, with a watery smile. “Just, we made that. You and I. Our little family. We’ve come a long way, haven’t we?”

Yuli was about to answer when she heard little footsteps dashing up the stairs. They both got a quick glimpse of Tillie, her arms around a massive pile of cheese sticks. Yuli was about to heave herself up from the couch but Elliott shook his head. “I’ll go.” He walked to the bottom of the stairs. “Matilda Rose…” he thundered in his deep, “dad” voice.

“Go away! I didn’t do anything !”

Yuli shook her head. “Writers…”

He winked at her as he ascended the stairs.

The red EXIT sign glowed the same way here as it did in the real life movie theater.

“I sense you are about to make an unwise decision,” came the warning voice from behind her.

It is my brain. These are my memories. If anyone can make it stop, it’s me.

“It’s not just about you anymore,” Rasmodius continued. “You have embarked on something that is much, much bigger than that…”

Yuli stood and stared him down as she began edging closer to the exit. “I’m not powerless here. I know it. I think you’re hiding something from me and I’m going to find out what it is.”

“All you will discover is the true extent of your weakness…”

As soon as he began speaking, she whirled on one heel and made a break for it. Sprinted down the improbably steep theater stairs to the door. Past the popcorn machine, the crane games, the posters showing coming attractions. It was all the same. She knew where she was. She’d be fine. Was the Wizard following her? She could feel a malevolent presence behind her but it felt broad, all-encompassing. She was too afraid to look back and see for sure.

Finally, she reached the main entrance, the double doors to the outside world. She wildly hurled herself against the push bar and the theater surroundings gave way to…

The town. Was it?

She kept running until she had crossed the stone bridge from the movie theater to Pierre’s. Panting, she looked around. It certainly looked like the town. She nudged a shrub with her foot, dragged one finger along the cobblestone of the square. Felt like the town. But something just seemed...off…

The unsettling presence was gone. But it still felt like she was looking at her surroundings through a tinted window. Everything was darker, shadowy, nondistinct. The streetlights all were ringed by glowing halos. Most of all, it was silent. It was late at night (right?) but there was still no wind, no rustling of bushes, no soft hooting of owls.

Maybe if she found a person, she would wake up. Or they could help her, in some way.

It was funny, in a way. Yuli had often fantasized about there being fewer people in Pelican Town. Fewer eyes, fewer awkward attempts at conversations. But now that it had seemingly come to pass, it felt wrong.

Almost like it was detached from her body, her hand floated up to the handle of the glass doors to Pierre’s General Store. The chime trilled at her, echoing in the surrounding silence. At the first step she took into the store, the wood floor seemed to buckle underneath her and the shelves dissolved. Yuli opened her mouth to scream when she found herself on steady ground just as suddenly.

The light had changed. It was a sunny midafternoon, and Yuli saw herself as she had looked during her first spring in the valley. Skinnier, no muscles. Her legs a constellation of bruises, her palms blistered from acquainting herself with her outdated, ill-suited farming implements. She scowled as she painstakingly counted coins from her pocket. Just enough to buy a bag of wheat flour.

Another memory. But this one was out of order.

The door chime chirped again. The clicking of impractical dress shoes on the wooden floor. The scent of ocean air, cedar, and old books.

Him.

“Hello,” he said to her in passing. She gave him the same grim, tight half-smile she gave everyone else and went to the cash register to pay for her wheat flour.

“Only this?” Pierre said loudly. Yuli clenched her jaw. This fucking guy.

Before she could answer, Elliott exclaimed “ah, the long-awaited strawberry season!” He gestured at the bins of red, juicy berries prominently displayed in the center of the store. “The smell alone is intoxicating. Your local suppliers have outdone themselves!”

Pierre beamed and thumped his broad chest. “Look no further! Grew these beauties myself.”

Yuli’s face felt as though it would go up in flames, her jaw clenched so hard she could crack a tooth. She had practically bankrupted herself on those strawberry seeds. They took weeks to sprout, even longer to fruit. She spent hours every day obsessively tending to those plants, fighting off crows and insects alike. For this grimy asshole to just...to claim...

“Why, Pierre,” Elliott murmured, rolling a berry between two fingers. “I had no idea you had such a...green thumb.” He made eye contact with her and the corner of his mouth quirked up. He knew.

It made her feel better, knowing that someone knew.

He inspected the berry again and took a bite. For the moment, every single one of her senses was heightened and attuned to him. The soft squish of his white teeth sinking into the fruit’s flesh. The ruby-red juice glistening on his lip. The flash of his tongue as he licked it off. The low, approving noise coming from somewhere deep in his throat.

Why did this man’s every single action come across as...somehow obscene?

Elliott cast a winning smile back at Pierre. “Marvelous!” He strode out the door, flicking the strawberry hull into the waiting trash can.

“You should pay for that…” she heard a weak voice say from the cash register.

The scene abruptly ended and she found herself dumped back onto the floor of...Dream Pierre’s. Weird, alternate universe Pierre’s. The man himself, however, was nowhere to be seen now.

She creeped hesitantly to the door and down the hall that led to Yoba’s altar, to Caroline’s aerobics class, and what she assumed were bedrooms.

“Pierre?” she called. “C-caroline…?” No response.

Okay. So that was a bust.

“Next door,” she whispered to herself. The clinic. Harvey. A doctor. Surely he would know a way to wake her up? He could help her come up with ways to improve her memory, maybe?

It was worth a shot. She darted out of the general store.

The blue cross above the clinic door seemed to glow in the strange dream lighting. As she opened the door (why was nothing locked?), the sharp smell of antiseptic immediately cleared her sinuses. Maru must get really aggressive with the cleaning when they close up. All of the gleaming white and chrome surfaces were soothingly familiar.

Everything was so real, yet unreal.

“Hey, Harvey?” she tried. “You around somewhere?”

“Yuli,” she heard a faint reply.

She gasped. “Harvey! Harvey, I’m out here, out front! By the desk! Where are you? I’ll come find you!”

“ Yuli, ” the voice said again, more insistent. A slight glow appeared beyond the door to the exam room.

She ran to the light and eagerly opened the door. “In here…? Oh, for the love of--” she cursed as she felt herself swirling into the beginning of another memory.

It had been a pretty rough day in the Skull Cavern. She had been so close to meeting the Adventurer’s Guild’s monster eradication goal of the month - 50 Pepper Rexes.

They were big, plodding things, like an overfed dinosaur. Slow-moving, not particularly intelligent. There was just the fact that, well, they breathed fire.

She sat, sullen and covered in shiny, oozing burns, in Harvey’s clinic now. Elliott was there, far more disheveled than he would ever appear in public. Hair a mess, wearing a Zuzu U t-shirt with a hole in the sleeve. He had clearly been woken late at night. Harvey was briskly typing notes into his workstation, clearly trying to avoid the argument the couple was having.

“...reckless, is what it is. Irresponsible. We have a daughter now, Yuli. How could you not think of that?”

“I am thinking of her. What do you think all this shit is even for? I’m trying to make this place safer for her. And if I can make some money in the process, why is that so wrong?”

He shook his head. “How dare you. How dare you lie to me and use our child as an excuse. Use money as an excuse.”

“You are so fucking dramatic…”

“ I thought you were dead !” he screamed, making Yuli and Harvey jump. Elliott almost never raised his voice. “I’m giving Tillie her bath, the phone rings, then rings again and again until I’m standing there with a screaming, naked baby, trying to get the man on the other end to repeat himself when he says ‘we have your wife’ then passes me to some other man who says ‘we have your wife’s body .’ How was I to know which one was telling the truth?”

“The porters we use out there are unfortunately pretty disorganized,” Harvey mumbled, his mustache bristling. “Miscommunications like this are common. Though that doesn’t make them okay, of course,” he added hastily when Elliott’s blazing eyes turned to him.

“So I practically throw our baby at poor Marnie while I go to find my hurt wife, my dead wife, whichever ends up being the case. Now here you are, burnt to a crisp, pouting like a child, and calling me dramatic.”

“Okay, I’m hardly burnt to a crisp …”

“You’re lucky you didn’t need skin grafts, Yuli,” Harvey said sternly.

She had fucked up, she knew. But she was terrified that they would somehow take the mines and dungeons away from her. She wouldn’t be able to stand it. To not feel the rush of seeing an unopened treasure chest in the middle of a room. To not see a bag full of glittering gemstones that she collected and mentally calculate what they could buy her. To not triumph over the hundreds of monsters, insects, and demons that wished her dead. No, she couldn’t lose that.

The anger and yelling had exhausted Elliott. His shoulders slumped and he gently pressed his fingertips to his eyelids. “Just...tell me it’s not always going to be like this,” he croaked.

“...what?”

He took his fingers off his eyelids and Yuli could see them swimming with tears. “Being married to you.”

A thick, uncomfortable silence. Harvey cleared his throat. “Well, I’m going to get your discharge paperwork going now...see if I can find some samples of burn ointment and, uh…” He scurried out of the room.

Not here either.

It was just as she had told the Wizard. There wasn’t a single place in town that wasn’t infested by her memories of Elliott. It was useless. Everywhere she went in this dream world would likely bear the same result. She would waste time out here until morning came, and everything was gone.

So, find him.

Find the person that this is all about. He’s here just as much as you are. Explain it. Fix it.

Yuli took off running, her arms pumping. Her feet felt light as air, barely touching the ground. Out of the clinic, across the square, down the street, down another street, past the sewers, across the bridge…

The beach.

Find Elliott.

She would find him. She would beg his forgiveness, they would stop the Wizard together. They would plug this drain that sucked their love story into nothingness.

Find Elliott.

Together, they would remember.

Chapter 6: Higher

Chapter Text

It was a breezy summer morning, nary a hint of the sticky heat that would inevitably follow later in the day. Willy stepped out of his shop and twisted his torso right, then left, until he heard a satisfying snap. Days like this always helped him feel looser, less achy. Cold, dry weather had his joints acting up more often than not these days.

“Alright, off ya fuck,” he grumbled to the gulls that swarmed him, hoping for a dropped snack or piece of bait. He sipped at his battered thermos of coffee and sighed. A perfectly peaceful morning.

“Willy! Hello!”

Maybe not.

His neighbor was not typically an early riser. But Elliott appeared to have had quite the exertion already this morning. His burgundy suit jacket had been abandoned and his trousers were rolled up halfway up his shins. The sand was cool enough that one could walk barefoot. He was waving, that exuberant, whole-arm wave.

“Mornin’, lad,” Willy said finally. “You seem...ready to go.”

Elliott beamed, tangible excitement coming off of him in waves. “That’s where you’ll have to be the judge. Behold!” He gestured at the wooden structure on the beach with a flourish.

It was the rowboat, Willy realized as he left the pier and walked closer to the cabin. That hollowed-out carcass had moldered on the beach in front of Elliott’s cabin for years. He’d meant to clear it off and use the thing for firewood but it was always maybe tomorrow, maybe tomorrow. Now the warped wooden boards had been replaced and sanded to a shine.

Willy was slightly mortified that he hadn’t gotten around to doing this himself. That this foppish, flamboyant boy had done it better. “This must have been quite the doing, Elliott.”

The younger man sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck. “It took much longer than it should have, I’m afraid. I confess that I’m rather hopeless at, ah, woodworking and such. But it was important that I do it myself.”

Willy looked at him, his raised eyebrows asking the question that his mouth didn’t. Elliott laughed.

“I asked myself the same question many times, believe me. But then I think about Yuli. Running that massive plot of land all alone. Throwing her entire self into that community center project. If she wanted a boat, she would build herself a boat. And if I wanted to impress her…” Elliott trailed off, then busied himself by throwing a stray piece of driftwood into the waves. “I am aware of how you all talk about me, you know,” he said, softly.

Willy felt his face grow hot. “Oh, no, lad--”

“You know, ‘his highness,’ ‘fruit loop,’ ‘Miss Priss,’ that sort of thing.” There was an edge in Elliott’s usual soft, rich voice.

“Elliott,” Willy said firmly. “I need you to know this, it’s just...it’s just talk. Don’t pay us old fools any mind. We’re just bitter drunks whose looks and good days are behind us.” He was rambling. Over-correcting. Elliott’s green eyes were laser-focused on him right now. It made Willy feel like a fish flopping on the pier. Exposed. Suffocating. “I...I’m sorry, lad. On my honor as a sailor. I should have known better.”

Elliott shrugged, as if he hadn’t just had Willy pinned down and flailing. “No need to apologize, my friend. I’m quite comfortable with who I am.”

An uneasy silence. Waves lapped the shore. It would be high tide soon.

Willy broke the silence first, clearing his throat awkwardly. “So....Yuli.”

A wistful smile spread across Elliott’s face but he didn’t take his eyes off the distant horizon. “Yes.”

“The two of you. That girl, she…” Willy rubbed his face on his sleeve. “She’s special to me. You know, her granddad was the best friend a man could have. Ever since we were in short pants, we were always together. Surf and Turf, they called us.”

Elliott laughed, an easy, warm sound. “She speaks rather fondly of you, too.”

“Now he’s gone and she’s had a tough go of things, but she can handle it, she’s a tough gal, but...if you…” He was flailing again. Like a fish trying to climb a tree. Forgive me, Jed. You should be here, doing this.

Elliott placed a hand on the older man’s shoulder. “I know, my friend. ‘Clawing at the ceiling of his grave,’ and all that. The usual threats.”

Willy chuckled but his face was thoughtful. “She don’t warm up easy, that’s for sure. But I’ve seen you two together and…” he shrugged. “I dunno. Seems like you make her smile.”

“That’s the plan, at least. So, what do you think? Is she seaworthy?” Elliott nudged the boat with his foot.

Willy crouched down, wincing inwardly at the symphony of cracks that came from his old knees. “Aye, she’ll float, alright. Nothing crazy, just a quick trip around the block, you know? I’d feel more comfortable if you stayed away from the open ocean. Hot day like today, weather can turn on a dime.” He straightened back up and saw a speck approaching from the path to town. Yuli.

She walked like him sometimes, Willy realized. Both Jed and his granddaughter had the same sure step, with the jingling of coins, tools, and trinkets announcing their arrival.

“Speak of the devil, there she is now. I’ll make myself scarce, then. You kids have fun.”

He was halfway back to the shop when Elliott shouted. “Willy!”

He turned around. The younger man was smiling again. Impractically long hair flying wildly in the breeze. Leaning on an oar like a conquering hero. “Aren’t you going to wish me luck?” he asked cheekily.

This man. This soft, silly, fussy man.

This man that Jed’s little girl has come to love. This good, earnest man.

What else was there to say?

Willy laughed, a soft exhalation from his nose. “Don’t think you’ll need it, lad.”

Why was I able to see that?

It was not Yuli’s memory. None of that had happened to her. She wasn’t even in the memory, save for a speck in the background at the very end. Who’s to say that it even happened at all? Was the Wizard making stuff up just to mess with her? Just to drive her completely insane? Because it was working. All it took was one dodgy memory and she felt completely unmoored.

She was standing on the beach now. The night sky made the sand shine purple. It felt soft between her toes but she could walk on it without sinking at all. The sea glowed the unearthly green that it sometimes did on summer nights. It was beautiful, peaceful. There was no sharp fish smell coming from Willy’s shop.

Where was Elliott?

The cabin, maybe. It loomed before her, larger and darker than it seemed in person. She put her hand on the doorframe, could almost smell the rotting wood.

She didn’t yell. She whispered his name like a mantra, over and over like an incantation. Elliott. Elliott. Elliott.

Come find me.

A cabin on the beach was not as relaxing as Yuli imagined it might be. Every slight breeze wove through the gaps in the walls, in the roof, in the floor. The entire house seemed to groan and sing in a storm. Rain drops sounded like machine gun fire on the roof. Not to mention, the typewriter.

TAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAP

Confused, Yuli slowly wrenched one eye open.

Elliott was sitting at his writing desk, wearing only his boxers and the tiny iridescent mermaid pendant that rested in the hollow of his sternum. The sight of him wearing that and only that would never get old to her, would never stop her breath from hitching. He was squinting in concentration, chewing on his bottom lip, as he frantically worked the typewriter. He finally looked over, saw her awake, and winced.

“Ah, sorry, my love. I should have known this damned thing would wake you.” Even as he talked, as he looked at her, his fingers were still typing, skipping over the keys like two restless spiders. “I just have to…”

“You, sir, are getting a laptop for whichever gift-giving holiday is coming up next.” Yuli cocooned herself in the covers and rolled out of bed, padding across the room to where he sat. It was freezing as all get out in this cabin. She didn’t know how he could just be sitting here in his underwear. Gripping the blanket with both hands, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders like a mother bird enveloping him in her wings.

“Mmmm, hello,” he murmured, turning to face her and pulling her closer. “I don’t want a laptop, though.”

She sighed. “Ell, you can’t outrun the internet forever. You’ve got a publisher now. They’re going to want you to have some sort of web presence if the book sells well. And it will,” she said when he opened his mouth to rebut her. “I know it will.”

She loved that he loved old things. Quills, record players, exclaiming over ancient yellowed nautical maps with Willy. How he still mixed shaving foam with a little furry brush and shaved with a straight razor, of all things. But sometimes it was annoying as hell. Stop cosplaying Robinson Crusoe for one second and send a fucking email, she’d wanted to scream on more than one occasion.

But he was kissing her nose, her forehead, her cheeks, telling her that he was going to make her a grilled cheese, and who could argue with that?

His first order of business, after turning on the rickety old hotplate to preheat, was to quickly scan his record collection, make a selection, and take it over to the player, flipping the vinyl over and over in his hands. Yuli examined the sleeve he had left behind. Jackie Wilson - Higher and Higher.

“Would have taken you for a classical fan,” she remarked.

“Only when I’m writing.”

“Really? I was kidding.”

He grinned, somewhat ruefully. “Oh, yes. It’s terribly embarrassing, actually. If I listen to any music with lyrics while I’m trying to write, I almost compulsively end up writing the lyrics down.”

Yuli was failing to suppress her giggles. “What?”

“No, really! You should have seen me in undergrad, trying to come up with an explanation for why there were Patti Page lyrics in my dissertation.”

She shook her head, laughing. “Men really can’t multitask for shit, huh?”

He scrunched his nose at her and pretended to put on a thoughtful expression. “I recall you being quite pleased with some of the multitasking I achieved last night…”

“Hmm, sorry, no idea what you’re talking about.” She stood next to him at the record player and bumped him with her hip. “My literal grandpa listened to Patti Page, you know.”

“A man of taste.” He dropped the needle and bumped her hip back. Then it was off to the “kitchen” to cut a slice from a golden stick of butter. It sizzled and bubbled beautifully as it hit the pan, filling the cabin with the scent of browning butter.

The record player guttered to life. Bass notes bounced off the walls, a jaunty keyboard and guitar followed. Finally, the singer. There was joy in his voice, the kind you could feel. Your love, lifting me higher than I’ve ever been lifted before…

She couldn’t help herself. Her hips were swinging almost of their own volition as she remade the bed, she was shimmying her shoulders as she fetched a plate for her sandwich.

Your love keeps lifting me, love keeps lifting me, higher, higher and higher!

The song reached and reached, towards some infinite crescendo, and never seemed to come down. Higher and higher. She realized that Elliott was standing in front of her, his hand outstretched. Panic briefly flared in her gut. “Uh uh.”

He looked genuinely confused and even a little hurt. “What! But you were just dancing.”

“I’m not...I don’t…” What was she trying to say here? Why didn’t she want to dance with the man she loved, the man she had just proposed to, for crying out loud?

Because it was trite? Cliche? Like something her parents would do? Something that basic, uncool girls would kill for? She and her other maladjusted friends had made fun of such things in their youth. In this house, we slow dance in the kitchen. Live, laugh, love.

“I just can’t,” she said, lamely.

He shrugged and grabbed a spatula. “This song makes me think of you, you know,” he said softly. “Of being in love, with you.”

This song, this upbeat, soaring song, made him think of her. That fact rested on her brain, buzzing like a pollen-drunk bumblebee. She didn’t know what to do with it. “Don’t burn my grilled cheese,” was all she came up with. Real nice.

He looked at her, face incredibly solemn. “I would never burn your grilled cheese.” He slid it off the pan onto the plate she had set out for him.

He had no dining table, no chairs. She sat on the edge of the bed. “I’m sorry. I just have a lot of…” She made a vague motion around her head. “Stuff.”

He set the plate aside, sat next to her, kissed her shoulder. “I know, darling. Shall I run down my short list of indisputable facts?”

She shrugged noncommittally.

“You’re safe right now, bodily and emotionally. You are here with me. Your fiance. The man who loves you and your stuff. It’s you, me, and a sandwich.”

Yuli laughed, and she could feel him smile against her skin. “No one is watching. No one will say anything cruel or embarrass you in any way. A song is playing now. It’s one that you like, one that you respond to. So why not dance? Why not let yourself feel good? Things are allowed to be that simple, sometimes.”

“Everything sounds so obvious, when you say it,” she remarked.

“My one in a million girls,” he sang along with the record.

She watched him as he got to work making another sandwich. He was a total hedonist, she knew. He ate whatever he liked whenever he wanted, basked in every orgasm, took care of his hair like it was a living, breathing thing. All because it felt good. What must that be like?

Fuck it.

She got up and danced. There was no rhythm or sense to it. She pirouetted around the cabin’s perimeter. Did a weird little jig. Put her hands on her knees and shook her ass. And felt gratified when she heard Elliott laugh, a sudden, joyous thunderclap.

Sometimes, things can just feel good.

I feel good.

The grilled cheese was cold when she finally got to it. She couldn’t remember ever having tasted anything so good in her entire life.

“It wasn’t all so terribly bad, was it?”

Yuli jumped, her adrenaline surging. “Yoba’s sake, Elliott, you scared the shit out of me.”

“Well I beg your pardon, but I’ve kind of just been along for the ride this whole time,” Elliott spat, his voice absolutely dripping with bitterness. “We all have.”

Going from the Elliott of their early days to this...specter was jarring, whiplash-inducing. His eyes were haunted and red-rimmed. His hair was mussed and she could tell his nails had been bitten to shreds.

I did that to him, she realized. She had turned a beautiful young man into an angry shell. Wait a minute. “What do you mean, we all have?” she asked carefully.

He didn’t answer her at first. He entered the cabin almost in a trance. He picked up the thin vase containing the solitary rose, the one he’d struggled to keep alive for years. In this dream world, it was flourishing, a sunburst of scarlet petals. Suddenly, like a snake striking, he hurled the vase against the wall. It shattered, staining the wall with water. “There’s more than just you and me in our marriage, you know,” he said with deadly calm. “There’s your parents. My parents. The town.” He heaved the typewriter over his shoulder and lobbed it like a shotput. It fell to the floor with a clangorous thud.

This is bigger than just you now, the Wizard had told her. She closed her eyes. “So the memory from Willy...that was real.”

“Gone, gone, gone,” he drawled, violently upending the writing desk and chair. “Every trace of us, everywhere. All for Yuli. All so Yuli can move on.” His voice quavered at the last sentence and he looked as though he might faint.

She took a deep breath. She deserved this. This anger, this tension. “So you just saw something,” she said softly, speaking as she would to a spooked horse. “What was it?”

His breaths were ragged, uneven. His lips moved soundlessly for a moment, as if he couldn’t quite spit out the words. “Tillie,” he croaked finally. “When you and I built her the sand castle and she...she…”

“She called you da-da,” she finished for him, still using that soothing voice. “I remember.”

The dam broke. His face crumpled, his shoulders shook. He was wracked with sobs, so strong and painful they were almost silent.

“How could you do this to me?” he whispered.

I never thought it would be like this...you weren’t supposed to know…

The tide suddenly sounded very close. It was as though the sand were being swallowed, the cabin was about to be lost to the waves. “No, Elliott, don’t go...stay with me.” The wind was howling, the mangrove trees bent nearly horizontal from the gale. Was he doing this? “Please. I’m sorry. I was wrong. I’m sorry.” She ran to him, wrapped his rigid body in her arms. He did not hug her back.

Water pooled around their ankles, receding with a hiss. Then advancing again. The sand shifted under their feet as the tides pulled and pulled. Let go, the waves seemed to whisper. Sleep. Elliott was tempted, she could tell. His body was slackening, his eyes looking wistfully into the depths.

No.

She had found him. She had lost him. She wasn’t about to let them be pulled under without a fight.

Chapter 7: Ancient

Chapter Text

On all accounts, the person sitting next to her on the park bench looked real.

It wasn’t an idealized version of Elliott, a cut, glowing Adonis, his imperfections smoothed. He still had the writing callus on the knuckle of his middle finger, the chicken pox scar behind his right ear. His eyes were still glazed with that dull hatred she knew she must inspire in him. Even so, he let her touch him. Let her press his warm palm against hers, real. Let her grip the bones of his shoulder, real. It all felt real.

“Satisfied?” He wasn’t looking at her, hadn’t looked at her since she dragged him out of the water threatening to swallow the beach. Had been practically catatonic since she plopped him down onto the park bench.

Her hand was hovering over his auburn hair. She knew, if she touched it, it would be soft and tangle around her fingers like a hungry vine. She dropped her hand back into her lap. “I’m trying to make sense of...how you’re here right now. Of what, exactly, you are.”

He tilted his head back, leaned against the back rest of the bench. “You should have let me go. I wanted to go,” he whispered.

“You seem to know everything that’s going on, and the Wizard made it pretty clear that you wouldn’t. That leads me to think that you’re just my imagination.” She got up and started pacing. “But you’ve seen things that I haven’t. And, like... you’re also kind of nasty to me. And I know I can be pretty hard on myself, but if you’re really just my imagination, why wouldn’t I imagine a version of you who’s nicer to me? One who...automatically understands what I was going for?”

“Because you know you’re wrong.”

She sighed. This certainly wasn’t going the way she’d hoped. “I do. I was. But I’m here now, trying to make it right. Doesn’t that count for anything?”

He turned his head to look at her now, eyes blazing. “I suppose that depends. Will it bring back the memories I have with my children? Will it stop me from losing the last seven years of my life?” he demanded, his voice rising.

“I said I’m going to try, Elliott. If you’re going to just keep moping around and taking shots at me, then go fuck off into the ocean like you wanted to. I won’t stop you this time,” she snapped.

He exhaled for what seemed like an eternity, his eyelids fluttering to a close. “What did you have in mind?”

Eagerly, she sat back down. “Okay. So I started out the night in the movie theater. The Wizard was there and he had these...films. Like, all of the memories were in these giant rolls of film.”

“A wizard,” Elliott said flatly.

“Yes, the...you know, the guy who makes the maze every year? The freaky purple one?”

“I know who you’re talking about. The man’s a bit of an eccentric, sure, but...a wizard, Yuli?”

She frowned. Figment Elliott would know what she was talking about, wouldn’t he? Like, he would automatically be with it? Things were becoming less and less clear by the minute.

“So, I’m thinking. He had me gather up all the things related to you and destroy it. Everything, even those pomegranate trees by the house. That pile of film looked pretty...finite, I guess. We could try and get to them and get them back, somehow. Or…”

“I loved those trees,” he said wistfully.

“I know.”

“I made such a nice iced tea out of…”

“My point is,” she cut him off. “Maybe there are things, films, that he doesn’t have. That he wouldn’t think to bother with. Maybe if we find one of those, we can hide out til morning and get away with what we can once we wake up?”

A vein in his temple was pulsing. He sighed. “That actually isn’t the worst idea.”

“...thanks.”

“It’s likely that he’ll have thought of this as a potential loophole. But maybe if we were far enough ahead and he spent enough time chasing us rather than erasing things…” He nodded and sat up straight. “It’s our only option. So, where to?”

“Somewhere you wouldn’t be. A long time ago, far away, far removed from you…” She sat cross-legged on the bench, taking his hands in hers. “So, how do you think I do this? Just close my eyes and we--”

“--end up somewhere?”

What the hell?

Immediately the fresh scent of hay and sweet corn flooded her nose. She heard the chattering of hens and a fiercely lowing cow. Could it be...but it looked so different...

Fields of wheat rippled in the breeze and she could hear a squeaking sound as the chain holding a wooden sign swung back and forth in its socket. Fiddlehead Farm.

“So much for far away,” Elliott murmured.

A little girl sat on the front porch of the farmhouse. Her chin was resting in her hands and she traced designs in the dirt with the toe of her sneaker. Her hair was in braided pigtails that were already starting to frizz, even though it was still early morning.

Next to her, a wild-haired, black-bearded man sat, chewing absently on a wooden pipe. He wore a newsboy cap and an anchor tattoo adorned one of his burly forearms.

“My word, is that...is that Willy?” Elliott asked, his lips already creeping into a smile. Yuli chuckled and nodded. She couldn’t have been more than 8 years old here. Twenty seven years ago.

“How much longer?” Child Yuli complained, to no one in particular.

Willy grunted and briefly took out his pipe. “Thought yer mama said you was learning patience and all that, gup.”

She scowled and savagely kicked at her dirt drawing. “She says. Patience is stupid.”

“Alright already, maybe that’s him comin’ now.”

Elliott rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Yoba above, our daughter is the absolute spit of you,” he murmured, almost to himself.

Yuli clutched his upper arm, her eyes burning with tears. “Oh, Elliott, it’s him, it’s him, I get to see…”

The hinges on the barn door sang as a man exited, wiping his weathered hands with a rag. His hair was steel-grey, not the white it had been as he whispered to her from his deathbed. In all other ways, though, he was the same. Still a tower of a man, larger than life, twinkling blue eyes, her beloved grandfather. Seeing him walk the earth again was healing something in Yuli that she hadn’t even known was broken.

When Jed reached the pair sitting on the porch, he paused for a beat and said, “Say, darlin’, would you mind getting your old granddad some of that lemonade? Awful thirsty.”

“And then can I see the baby cow?” she demanded, scrambling to her feet.

“Well, the faster you get your little butt in the house, then maybe we’ll see!”

She sprinted into the house, yelling something about “time me!” Jed mopped his brow with his shirtsleeve and sighed.

Willy stared off into the middle distance, still mouthing his pipe. “Bad?”

Jed shook his head. “Worst I ever seen. Calf came out backward, damn near killed Jessie trying to get it out. And it’s...small. The calf. Real runty. Dunno if the others will let it live for long, they’re not used to anything like this…”

“No sight for a little girl,” Willy said, his voice solemn.

“Well,” Jed paused. “Not most little girls, anyway.”

“Damn it, Jed, not this again.”

Elliott knit his brow. “How are we seeing this, if you weren’t even there?”

In response, Yuli pointed. Inside the farmhouse, behind the front door, the little girl crouched close to the ground, clutching a sweating glass of lemonade.

“I see. Little sneak.”

The two men were arguing in voices that gradually got louder and louder.

“She needs to see this. She needs to know what it’s like, if she’s gonna run this place one day.”

Willy pointed to the farmhouse. “Enough of this legacy crap! That girl is gonna go to college, move to the cities, and do something that you and I wouldn’t be able to make heads or tails of. That’s a good thing, Jed. It’s plain ignorant for you not to see that.”

Jed shrugged. “You just wait. I know my girl, she’s just like me. Can see it in her eyes. One day, not tomorrow or the next day, but one day, she’s gonna wake up and she’s just gonna know.”

The girl sprang to her feet and skidded out onto the porch, the screen door slamming behind her. “Okay, what’s my time?” she asked breezily, knowing full well that her grandfather had not actually timed her.

Jed glanced at his watch. “57 seconds. You trying to kill your old granddaddy? I just about keeled over from the thirst,” he fake-rasped as Yuli, scowling, handed him the glass. He knocked it back in one quick swallow. “So what do you say, time to see a baby cow?”

Yuli squealed and took off running in the direction of the barn. Jed clapped Willy on the shoulder and followed. Willy worked his jaw but said nothing.

Elliott watched as the three wove their way through the fields of wheat towards the barn. “That conversation they had must have made quite an impression on you,” he observed.

Yuli shrugged. “Not really.”

“Why not? The spying, your grandfather proudly admitting how similar you are and accurately predicting your path...it’s so vivid. So significant.”

“I guess. At the time, I didn’t really care about what they were saying. It was the first newborn calf I ever saw and I just wanted to see it.”

“So single-minded. Til the very end.” Yuli could swear she saw a smile playing at the corner of his lips. Maybe he was starting to hate her a little less after all.

The girl was watching, wide-eyed, as a frail, matted creature approached its mother to nurse. But Jessie ignored her calf like it was a pesky fly. She snorted agitatedly and side-stepped the knock-kneed baby.

Jed was silent but swift as he gathered the calf up in his brawny arms. He deposited it, an awkward pile, at Yuli’s feet. It bleated, blinking at her with unfocused eyes. “What’s wrong with it?” she whispered.

“Her mother rejected her,” Jed said in a tone that was both gentle and firm. “If I don’t separate them, the calf might get kicked or worse.”

“But how…” She looked at Jessie, blissfully munching on her feed. “How will she…” The calf was struggling to stand, wobbling on scrawny legs and clunky hooves. “How can she just…” Her vision swam with tears.

Willy sucked his teeth. “C’mon now, Jed.”

Jed ignored him and put both hands firmly on Yuli’s shoulders. “Listen to me. Animals live in a world that’s different from ours. Sometimes they do things that we don’t understand. Now I love these here heifers, and I like to think that they’re pretty fond of me, too. But they’re not puppies. They’re here to do a job, and I need to make sure that every one of them can do that job. And this one?” He motioned to the little brown calf. “Her mama doesn’t think she can do the job.” He paused, his face solemn. “Do you?”

“Do...I?”

“Do you think she can do the job? Or should I let whatever happens...happen?” He motioned to the rest of the herd.

Yuli balled her fists until she felt her nails digging into her palm. “She can do it!” she declared hotly. “I can do it! We’re gonna do it! I need a bottle. She needs to eat.” She stomped around the barn until she found a dusty blanket, which she threw over the calf. It was hot outside, but she figured the bony calf might still need it.

“It’s not a small job, gup,” Willy said softly. “You sure you’re up for this?”

“I’m gonna do it,” she repeated. “And I’m gonna sleep out here at night so they don’t mess with Brownie.”

“Brownie,” Willy sighed. “Of course.”

Elliott made a small, surprised noise. “Hold on, I’ve...I’ve met Brownie.”

Yuli giggled. Seeing this memory had considerably lightened her mood. “You have. My first year here, Marnie let me know that she still had an old cow of my granddad’s. She wouldn’t sell her to me, and I couldn’t have bought her anyway. She was basically just a hay burner and I was broke. Crazy bitch lived 20 years. Just like a normal cow would have.”

“And she remembered you. I swear it!”

Yuli was about to argue when she felt a sudden pit in her stomach. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. Something was wrong.

In the memory, Jed had finally produced a large plastic baby bottle that he had filled with some of that morning’s milk. He handed it to his granddaughter, who gingerly peeled the blanket away to reveal…

Brownie was hairless, every vein visible through pinkish, almost translucent skin. Every organ pulsed with the beat of her heart. Her limbs were curled, wrinkled, almost fetal. At the end of her stubby neck, a horrifically gigantic head...purple hair and beard...eyes glittering with malice...lips whispering soundlessly...

Elliott jumped, cursing under his breath. Yuli tried to scream, but her throat was too dry and it came out as a strangled sob. “He’s found us. Run!” She staggered on numb legs, thinking of the path she would take. Out of the barn, across the fields, to the farmhouse, across the gate to the road to town...

“Run where?” Elliott panted as he tried to keep up.

“Anywhere! Just run!” But the earth was shaking, threatening to swallow them up. The wind started to blow, making her eyes sting and stream. Dust and grit pelted every inch of exposed skin. She blindly thrust out a hand, groping around until she finally felt Elliott lace his fingers through hers. She opened her mouth to tell him not to let go, but the strength of the wind knocked her voice right out of her.

She had landed on her face, her head throbbing from whatever had just happened to them. “Ugh.” The greenhouse was so humid that her skin instantly felt wet, even though it wasn’t exactly hot inside. Outside, one could see a sparkling winter wonderland from last night’s frost. Yuli saw a younger version of herself again, hunched over a plant.

The plant was a curling vine that grew straight out of the ground but somehow needed no trellis or other support. Behind lush green leaves peeked a brilliant blue fruit.

Younger Yuli sprinted to the door of the greenhouse, her cheeks flushed and her eyes crazed with joy. “Elliott! ELLIOTT!!”

She had called it the FUBAR Fruit. She had only half-expected it to even sprout, let alone flower, and for good reason - she had been told it was a pipe dream, impossible, not remotely realistic.

“What do you think,” she had said to Gunther months ago, holding the large seed between thumb and forefinger. “Could it grow again?”

Gunther blinked owlishly. “Wh--of course not. Something like this...it’s been dormant for centuries. Eons, even. Genetically, it doesn’t remotely resemble anything cultivated in the world today. There are no mentions of it in any historical texts I’ve ever read - technically, there’s no proof that it’s even from this planet. It’s really just a seed in name only. It’s an artifact.”

“Yeah, well,” she said, rolling the seed over and over in her palm. It was the size of a peach pit, but smooth and perfectly round. It felt warm in her hand. “It’s an artifact that I’ve already given you one of, so…”

Gunther’s right eye twitched. “You’re...you’re going to put...a priceless historical artifact...in the ground. You’re going to just bury it in the dirt. On purpose.”

“I didn’t say that.” Even though she totally was.

Gunther turned around to face the wall. “You didn’t have to. Just go. It will be easier for me if I don’t see you leave. If I don’t...think about what you’re about to do.”

So dramatic. “You’ll see. I’ll make it into a jam for you once I’ve grown it. Maybe I’ll even name it after you. ‘Gunther’s Gold.’”

“Goodbye!” he sang, still facing the wall.

When Yuli fell for an idea, she fell hard. For the next few days, she ate, slept, and breathed obscure plants. Every so often, Elliott would bring her a book that he had found, each more stultifying than the last. Still, she devoured them in their entireties. Cultivating Rare Plants. The Science of Seeds. Fruits Throughout History. Propagation for Experts.

“Fascinating,” Elliott would say. He read every single one after she had finished. “Did you know that the application of extreme heat sometimes revived seeds found in the tombs of ancient Egyptians?”

She had shown the seed to Rasmodius, who squinted at it and shrugged. “It wants to grow. But there’s no telling if it can.”

Fucking wizards.

When the spindly shoots first emerged from the ground, she bought a magnifying glass. If the delicate leaves looked yellow, she added more nitrogen to the soil. She started grinding her own fertilizers out of various disgusting ingredients - fish meal, bug meat, tree sap, even the bones of small monsters. Elliott tried to remain cheerful but his eyes looked panicked with every foul concoction she made.

“I read about, um, a harvest ritual,” he coughed as an acrid smoke bloomed from her furnace. “Practiced by ancient followers of Yoba. Maybe you could, er, try that...instead?”

Months passed. It won’t grow, she told herself. It’ll never grow.

But it wants to grow.

And now, here it was. The size of a turnip, shaped like a strawberry. Its flesh was a shade of aquamarine she had never seen in a fruit or flower before. Now she could see another tiny bud peeking from the stem. Her breath caught. There’s more. It’s not a single-bearing fruit.

“Look!” she cried breathlessly. “It grew, there’s a fruit, I can’t believe…” Her voice cracked and her face grew hot.

It was 6 in the morning. Elliott was still half asleep, his hair adorably mussed. When she burst into the house screaming his name, he had pulled a thick sweater over the undershirt he wore to bed, blinking sleep out of his eyes. She had expected him to bend down, to examine the fruit, to proclaim how fascinating it was.

But instead he crushed her in a hug, kissing her all over her face. “You did it. They said you couldn’t, and you did. You absolute harvest goddess. My amazing, determined Yuli. You worked so hard. Incredible. I’ve never been more proud of you.”

Every word made the tears come faster. She did it. He was proud of her. She pressed her cheek against his green sweater, the one that perfectly suited his eyes. All she could think to say was “hey, marry me.”

He paused and pulled away slightly so he could look her in the eye. “Hey, marry you?” he repeated.

She laughed hoarsely. “I’m sorry. You’re a romantic, you built me a boat, for fuck’s sake. And you’re so good with words, you deserve better than...my fucking greenhouse on a Sunday morning. And no ring. Or necklace, or whatever it is they use here. I’ll get one. I know where to go. But I mean it. Let’s get married.” She flopped stupidly onto one knee and his eyes widened. “Is this better? I just...I want every day to be like this. When you wake up here, and I tell you something good that’s happened. Something that happened because we worked together. Because I love you. More than I’ve ever loved anyone, so I want to marry you. I’m sorry, this is so bad…”

“You’ll make it up to me,” he replied softly.

What? “...I…”

“Plenty of time. The rest of our lives, in fact.” That nose crinkle, the secret smile that was just for her.

“So you will?”

He pulled her to her feet and wrapped her in his arms again. “Of course I will,” he murmured into her hair. “You must take me for a fool. Not marry you? I’ve never heard something so ridiculous in all my days.”

She exhaled, finally. Had she been holding her breath this whole time? “I’ll get you that necklace. Next time it rains. I’m gonna make an honest woman out of you,” she teased.

He touched his chest in mock indignation. “Goodness. In the meantime, shall we toast?”

“I mean, it’s 6 AM, but…”

He gestured to the blue fruit at their feet. “With the fruits of your labor, I meant. We should try it.”

Oh, right. The fruit. “Yeah! Let’s do it!” She deftly plucked the fruit off its stem and got out her pocket knife. The fruit’s skin was taut, but easily split in half. She handed half to him. “Here’s to us, and the shittiest proposal possible!”

“To us and the heartfelt, authentic declaration of commitment from my incomparable fiancée,” he corrected her with a wink. They both leaned forward and took a big bite from their slices.

Oh. Oh, no.

It was what she imagined drinking battery acid to be like. The fruit was somehow bitter and painfully sour at the same time. Yuli couldn’t even swallow it, her throat simply would not accept it. She spat the fruit out but the lingering taste made her feel like a slug that had just been salted. Elliott was cringing and clutching his stomach. His face was shockingly pale and tinged with green.

“Did you....swallow it?” she panted. How?!

“I did,” he said with a wince. “But indeed, perhaps I shouldn’t have…oh, no.” He ran out of the greenhouse to preserve his dignity, but Yuli could still hear him retch as the fruit violently exerted its wrath.

Seriously, the worst proposal ever.

Elliott had been out of commission the entire day. He lay painstakingly still on her couch, the slightest movement sending him over the edge. He was currently wearing one of her hair ties so he didn’t have to keep holding his hair back as he emptied his stomach over and over again.

“Your fiancé is repulsive,” he groaned.

“That’s exactly how I like my fiancés,” Yuli replied, holding out a room-temperature can of Joja Cola. He wrinkled his nose. “Drink it. It settles your stomach.”

He sighed and held the cool metal can against his sweaty forehead. “That fruit is an abomination.”

She walked to the sink to wash out the bowl he had been puking into. So this is love. “Ugh, I know. Guess I can’t give some to Gunther after all. What the hell do I even do with something like that? I wouldn’t even feed it to the animals.”

He tried to sit up but winced, clearly thinking better of it. “There are plenty of fruits and vegetables that taste terrible but can still be useful. Have you ever tried to eat a wine grape?”

“Can’t say I have.”

“They’re just meant for wine, they’re terrible for eating. They’re musty, they have this awful thick skin, and they’re just full of seeds. But they make a terrific drink in the end.” He lay back down on the couch with a small sigh. “Who knows. Perhaps that horrid thing would make a decent wine.”

“Yeah,” she said absently while wringing out a cold washcloth for his face. “Yeah, maybe.”

It did. It made more than a decent wine, in fact. The brewing process mellowed the fruit considerably, and the bitterness turned into a complexity that she had never tasted in another wine before or since. The juice was not blue, but a light goldenrod that sparkled when you held a glass up to the sun. When she gave a few bottles to Gus as a gift, it flew off the shelves. Something so good had to be shared, he had insisted.

The day after she kegged her first batch, Elliott had come bounding up to her, an old receipt from Pierre’s in his hand. On the back, he had written Fiddlehead Vineyards with his duck-feather quill, the letter “y” underscoring and looping around the words. In the backdrop, a slightly shaky and asymmetrical fiddlehead fern loomed.

She paused. Thought about it. “I love it. Maybe have Leah draw the fern, though.”

He laughed gaily as he picked her up and spun her around. “My wife, the vintner. How could my life get any better?”

“He’s taunting me,” Yuli fumed as the memory withered away before her eyes. “Asshole wizard. That was on purpose.”

“What do you mean?” Elliott asked.

“Because I--” she started then abruptly shut her mouth. “Nothing. Never mind.”

She couldn’t say it. She couldn’t say that, when aged to perfection, a bottle of Fiddlehead Vineyards Ancient Fruit wine could go for as high as 3,300 gold. Sometimes, the bottles that had been aged for 5 years would go for even higher, like 4,500 gold. She had been saving those bottles, though. For special occasions like a birthday. Or a wedding anniversary. To share with the man who had helped her start it all.

She couldn’t say that, earlier in the week, she had sold seven of those precious bottles. She couldn’t say that she had received a check for 31,500 gold in return. She couldn’t say that she had gone to the bank and cashed that check, feeling the weight of the coins in her bag. That the money had gone straight into the waiting hands of the villain who now plagued them, who had told her false promises of a better life.

She couldn’t say it. Because if she did, she knew she would start screaming and never stop.

Chapter 8: The Body Keeps the Score

Chapter Text

The Pelican Town in Yuli’s dreams wasn’t so empty after all. Now, she saw a past version of herself everywhere she turned. She and Elliott watched as the ghosts of themselves wandered the streets, only to disappear like mist.

Yuli picking out the mushrooms from his bowl of tom kha soup because she knew how much he hated them. Elliott highlighting lines in books that reminded him of her. Sharing a pomegranate and laughing at how feral they both looked, red juice dripping down their chins and arms.

Two figures were walking past the bus stop on the road to the farm. One wore a white tea-length dress, the other a suit with a bottle-green necktie. Their fingers were loosely interlaced, occasionally one of them would lightheartedly swing their arms. The woman was wearing heeled wedges, so as not to sink into the dusty, pebbly path.

“Oh, our wedding…” Elliott sighed over Yuli’s shoulder.

The groom was talking animatedly. He seemed agitated, yanking on his tie with the hand that wasn’t holding his bride’s. Their voices gradually grew more audible as they came closer.

“And at your wedding, of all places? Honestly, I think I’ll say something to him.”

“You will not,” the bride replied, horrified.

“‘None of us really knew if Yuli would fit in here.’ I’m sorry, who is ‘us’? Speak for yourself, you loathsome little functionary. Not as though your grandfather practically founded this place. Not as though you essentially grew up here. No, only now, when you’ve married another newcomer, is when we can trust you. You’re so welcome, dear!”

“I really do appreciate the whole defending my honor thing, but forget him! This day is about us,” Yuli responded, bumping her shoulder against his.

In truth, she wouldn’t have been able to remember what the mayor had said during the ceremony if she’d had a gun to her head. He had faded into the background along with everything else as she held her husband’s gaze, as she felt his bright green eyes swallow her up, as she watched the corner of his mouth quirk up in that secret smile that was just for her. The one that made her feel as though life were a grand inside joke between the two of them. Who cared what anyone else said?

“I suppose,” Elliott grumbled. “But can’t a man indulge in a little toxic masculinity on his own wedding day? That’s my woman he’s talking about.” He winked.

“Well, alright. Just this once.”

They reached the front porch of the farmhouse where Champ waited for them, gnawing on a large stick he had found somewhere on the property. It was noticeably cooler in the shade of the porch, and it hadn’t been a very warm spring day to start out with. Yuli rubbed her bare arms.

“Do you think he’ll try to bite me if I pick you up and carry you over the threshold?” Elliott said, that devious spark returning.

“Forget Champ, I’ll try to bite you if you do that.”

He made an approving noise. “Oh, well, in that case...” As soon as he said it, he bent down and snatched Yuli’s knees from under her, catching her shoulders as she fell backwards. He sprinted into the house with her shrieking all the while.

“Some help you are!” she yelled back at the dog, who huffed and continued chewing on his stick.

Once he reached the living room, Elliott whirled her around once more before gently lowering her down. He glanced at the clock and laughed almost incredulously. It was barely 10 AM.

“Goodness, it’s still so early,” he sighed. “I confess I’m quite bewildered by Valley wedding traditions. I pictured something more like in the cities.”

“Yeah. I guess here, it’s like alright, show’s over, everyone back to work. From the olden days.” Yuli kicked her shoes into a corner of the room. “I don’t mind it, though. I think it’s more my style. Not flashy or fussy.”

“But so dull…”

“I think it’s more romantic that way. No, really, I do!” she laughed when he threw up his hands in confusion. “It’s just, like...keeping everything in perspective. You know? It’s about the marriage. Not the party. I really like that.”

“Have you been to many weddings here?” he asked.

“Just one. Robin and Demetrius’s, back when I was a kid. Maybe the summer after Brownie was born.” She still remembered how shockingly red Robin’s hair had been as a younger woman. It had been over so quickly, the butterscotch hard candy that her grandfather had bribed her with had only just melted on her tongue. Sebastian, then a rather sensitive toddler, had followed his mother like a shadow. After the ceremony, Grandpa Jed picked him up and chucked him on the chin, earning a rare, shy smile.

“You’re right, the sentiment is nice,” Elliott conceded. “But the vows, the flowers, the dancing...oh! Yuli, we didn’t even get to do a first dance!”

“Believe me, that is for everyone’s benefit…”

But he looked so heartbroken. Predictably, his eyes darted to the record player that he had moved from his place to hers. Yuli suppressed the heavy sigh she so desperately wanted to let out. “Alright, alright. The one that I like.” Elliott grinned, kissed her cheek, and wasted no time in obeying.

A wistful, tinkling piano. A woman’s voice, plaintive and beautiful. Yuli nestled her cheek into her husband’s (!) broad chest and felt the warmth and the sure beat of his heart. He swayed with her gently and it was almost as though she were lying in a hammock on a perfect sunny day, slowly swinging to sleep.

I cover the waterfront

In search of my love

And I’m covered

By a starlit sky above…

They were so entranced by their younger, prettier doppelgangers that they both jumped when a sudden gurgling heralded the erasure of this memory. The image was diluted, then slowly sucked away as if down a drain.

“This isn’t working,” Yuli muttered, stating the obvious. “It’s going faster now, if anything.”

Elliott was looking at his hands, flexing them as though to make sure he was still there. “Well, pick something else then. Another place he wouldn’t expect to find you. Maybe one not on your family property this time.”

“Give it a rest,” she snapped.

Another place he wouldn’t expect to find you. Somewhere without Elliott. It was hard to remember a time before Elliott. She made a face at how cheesy that thought came out in her head. But it was true. She was drawing a blank.

No, think harder. Somewhere I wouldn’t want to be.

Somewhere embarrassing. Somewhere painful. Somewhere she never wanted to think of again.

The look on Elliott’s face tipped her off, he knew exactly what she was thinking. “Dylan,” he said quickly, urgently.

“No.”

“Yuli, it might be our only--”

“I said no. I’m not doing it. I can think of something else.” She squeezed her eyes shut, wringing her brain out like a sponge. Think, Yuli.

Shame. Humiliation. Wanting the earth to swallow her whole.

There was another way. There had to be.

She was 11, leaning her hot forehead against the grimy window of the school bus. She shouldn’t have gone to school that day, but it was field trip day. They were supposed to go to the new science museum that had just opened up earlier that summer, and she certainly wasn’t willing to miss that. She just had to power through the bus ride. Just a few more minutes. It would all be fine.

Until it wasn’t. The driver, one she had never seen before, was terrible at changing gears on the bus. The bus, along with its passengers, lurched back and forth even during what was supposed to be a smooth acceleration along the city highway.

After a particularly bad jolt, Yuli couldn’t take it anymore. She scrambled to wrench the tiny window open, stuck her head out as far as she could muster, and violently lost her breakfast. But the bus was speeding along, so the contents of Yuli’s stomach did not fall onto the street, but instead were plastered to the windows behind her.

The unlucky inhabitants of the window seats shrieked, shouted “EWWWW,” and fake-gagged between bouts of giggles. Then, the killing blow. Austin Wright, the popular boy, tanned and blond and beautiful, stood up and yelled, “Alright there, Spew-li?”

The joyous screams began anew and more and more kids began to sing and chant “Spew-li, Spew-li, Spew-li!” with all the raucous, innocent cruelty of 11 year olds. Yuli slid down to the very bottom of her seat, silent tears streaming down her cheeks.

“Poor little dear,” Elliott murmured. “How long did they call you that?”

Yuli reflexively shuddered. “Years. Until high school. Ugh, so not excited for Tillie to be this age.”

He gave her a sad half-smile. “I wish we had been friends then. I would have given this little rat a piece of my mind.” He flicked the back of Austin Wright’s head. Austin, not being real, felt nothing and did not react.

“Oh, yeah?”

His smile widened. “No. I was terribly sensitive as a child. I would have been crying too, for no reason at all.”

She laughed. “Figures.” It felt good to laugh, after a long night of existential horror. Maybe they could rest here. Sure, life as Spew-li hadn’t been terribly fun, but the prospect of showing it all to Elliott until morning didn’t seem too bad.

The bus’s brakes squealed as they ground to a stop. “Alright, science museum. Everybody off,” ordered a gruff voice.

The other kids bounded off the bus, Austin sauntering off at the classic popular kid pace. Yuli didn’t move, didn’t look any of her classmates in the eye as they passed her. She waited until they had all gone before letting out one last watery hiccup and sniffle.

“That means you too, Spew-li.”

She looked up. In the driver’s seat, a familiar purple-haired man lounged with his feet up on the wheel. “It’s time to get off the bus,” he said, his voice sickly sweet, barely suppressing a cackle.

“Fuck,” Yuli whispered.

She felt Elliott’s hand on her shoulder. “Look, we need to try--”

“No!” she shouted. “I can’t...I can’t.”

With a contented sigh, Rasmodius stood up from the driver’s seat and his eyes landed on Elliott. “Well, you certainly aren’t supposed to be here,” he said casually, as if this fact were no more than a mere inconvenience. “Let’s see if we can remedy that…”

“Yuli, please, please try,” Elliott begged, gripping her shoulder for dear life.

I can’t. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.

It was just such a...young adult’s room. It screamed “my first big girl apartment.” There were twinkling string lights strewn haphazardly atop the vanity. There were no posters or art pieces, just a collage of photographs tucked into where the mirror met the frame.

Yuli as a child, sitting astride her Grandpa Jed’s massive old quarter horse, Bolt. Jed was beaming proudly at his granddaughter, not looking at the camera.

Clutching a bouquet of roses after her graduation from Zuzu U, flanked on both sides by her grinning parents.

Four girls in short party dresses were leaning on each other, their eyes cocked and their tongues sticking out. Clearly, someone behind the camera had said “now do a silly one!”

“Wow,” Elliott murmured. “I never knew…”

“Never knew what,” she grumbled. Why am I here. This is exactly where I didn’t want to be.

“You just look so...different. Yuli, you look so happy.”

The young woman at the center of the room was bobbing her head to a song playing on an aqua-blue clock radio. She stood and considered a pile of high-heeled shoes. This pair. No, this one. Well, those go on last anyway. Time for mascara. The familiar, slack-jawed expression of trying to apply it just right.

It was her. It was a different person. It was somehow both.

Her cell-phone chirped and she quickly dug through a pile of clothes to find it and answer. “Hey, Dad. Yeah, I’ve got a minute. Not much, though. I’m actually going out with some friends from work tonight!” She put the phone on speaker and placed it down on her dresser so she could continue applying her makeup. “Yeah, a bunch of us from the 15th floor. That guy I told you about, Dylan? He’s introducing me to some Marketing guys.” She frowned as she swept her bangs back, pushed them back forward, and swept them back again. “Yeah, Dad, I’ll be safe. I think this place might do karaoke, so I for sure won’t be embarrassing myself! Can you imagine...” She laughed, an effervescent, tinkling sound.

Elliott sniffed and Yuli realized that the tip of his nose was red and his eyes sparkled with tears. “Why are you crying?” she asked, incredulous.

He swiped his eyes with the heel of his hand and shook his head. “I was wrong. I thought I could handle it and...I can’t...seeing this girl. Knowing what happens to her.”

Yuli pressed her lips together, her stomach feeling as though it would sink to her feet. Yeah, well, she wanted to say. There's knowing.

And then there's seeing.

Chapter 9: Forever Blowing Bubbles

Chapter Text

Yuli took a sip of the foul-looking concoction in the shot glass before her before screwing her eyes shut. “Oh, no.”

“What the fuck, Wyatt?” demanded the sandy-haired man sitting next to her.

Wyatt, the short man across the table from them, shook his head and shrugged. “It’s supposed to be like a cereal and milk shot! The guys in my frat made them all the time!”

“It’s, like, curdled,” complained a third man, swilling the small glass. “There’s chunks and shit.”

“Alright, alright, hey, fuck all of you,” Wyatt grumbled.

The sandy-haired man turned to Yuli and lightly touched her bare shoulder. She felt a rush of heat to her cheeks that wasn’t necessarily related to the cinnamon-flavored whiskey she had just drunk. “Alright, Yul, you’re up. What are we drinking?”

The four of them had met at The Prickly Pear, a desert-themed Zuzu bar that was well-loved by recent college graduates and young professionals. The drinks were sugary and served in glasses with cactus-shaped stems. The free baskets of stale chips with watery salsa gave patrons a false assurance that at least their drunkenness could be offset by some food.

Dylan, the man with the sandy hair that curled in charming ringlets around his ears, had known the other two men (Wyatt, Brody) from Zuzu U., where they had graduated a couple years ahead of Yuli. He sat at the cubicle behind her and was often pulling pranks.

One day, he had popped up behind their cubicle divider like a gopher. “Hey, Yul, check out Marsha’s desk...do you think she’s okay?” His eyes were wide, alarmed.

“Oh, shit, she did say her kids brought some daycare bug home…” Yuli said, jumping up from her chair and walking briskly to the next cubicle over.

A plastic skeleton, strewn with dollar-store fake cobwebs, lounged in Marsha’s seat, its mouth lolling open. Yuli rolled her eyes but couldn’t keep from chuckling. “Dylan…” He always had the most charming “who, me?” expression on his face.

Brody raised an arm to summon a Prickly Pear waiter over to their table. “Yeah, Yuli, what are we drinking?”

“Hmmm. Well, I do know one…” Yuli mused. “It’s called...a Gotoro Car Bomb.”

Brody and Wyatt snorted and hooted with laughter. “I told you guys she was funny,” Dylan said, his voice proud. The heat in her cheeks deepened.

Suddenly, a tidal wave of different, painful sensations. A sledgehammer straight to the solar plexus. A booted kick to the gut. Yuli felt herself flying backwards, all the breath knocked out of her. She heard Elliott wheeze somewhere nearby and knew that the same thing had just happened to him. Her vision spun violently so she closed her eyes.

She heard ringing in her ears, then a complete silence dropped like an anvil. She opened her eyes to a soft white nothingness.

It was rather like being in a fogged bell jar. She couldn’t see through the amorphous walls but shadows slowly moved across them. The oppressive silence had abated somewhat and she could hear low, indistinct murmuring sounds in the distance.

It was…cozy. Almost womb-like in its peace. But Yuli could tell that the coziness would just as easily give way to claustrophobia after too long.

Had she failed? Was it done? Had Rasmodius caught up with her and wiped her brain clean like a chalkboard?

Am I all alone?

“No, you’re not alone.”

Yuli startled so violently that she nearly fell over. She whirled around looking for the voice.

It had been her own.

Her younger self sat in the corner of the void, looking just the way she had that night at the Prickly Pear. Her eye shadow sparkled and she wore dangly earrings. Her heels had been kicked off and she crossed her bare feet at her ankles. “Hi,” she said, her voice pleasantly soft.

Yuli regarded her warily. “...hi.” She slowly lowered herself to the ground and sat across from The Girl. A dream within a dream? Now this shit’s getting really confusing. And how did I manage to lose Elliott again? Fuck, she can read my thoughts…

The Girl giggled. “Yeah. Well, I’m glad to see you. Not very many people to talk to in here.”

“Yeah, so when you say ‘here’...” Yuli looked around and gestured at the walls. “This is a bit weird…what is…?”

The Girl hugged her knees and smiled. “It’s nice, right? Safer in here.”

“Safer,” Yuli repeated dumbly. “From?”

The Girl shrugged one shoulder and her smile faltered slightly. Suddenly the ambient murmuring sound sharpened and voices could be scarcely made out.

“I dunno, man, she looks kinda out of it…do you think we should stop?”

“She’s fine. Look at her, she loves it.”

“No…please, I wanna go home.”

Yuli felt as though she had just swallowed an ice cube. “Oh,” she whispered.

The Girl nodded fervently. “Right. So, stay here with me! We’re safe in here. No one else can get in.”

No one else. Maybe she could stay here. At least there was no wizard.

No wizard, but nothing else, either. Just the scared, sad Girl. And, of course, the spectral reminders of the worst night of her life prowling just outside the false sanctuary. No one else can get in.

Of course. That’s what this was. The bubble of trauma, Emily had called it once when she was practicing her new reiki techniques on some unlucky Stardrop regulars.

You think it protects you. Protects the people you love, she had said while placing her cool, dry palms around Yuli’s temples.

But it doesn’t.

Yuli briskly hopped up onto her feet. “Okay. We’re out of here. You and me.” She started feeling the erstwhile walls of the bubble, looking for a way out.

“What? Are you insane?” The Girl looked scandalized.

“We can’t stay here. There’s gotta be a way to –” she muttered as she plunged her arm through the barrier.

There was a sudden, sharp noise, like the crack of a whip. Then an animalistic wailing.

“No! No, no, no, no, no!”

The Girl had changed. Mascara tracks below her pleading eyes, lipstick smeared around her screaming mouth, finger-shaped bruises around her shoulders and her throat. She clutched the torn ruin of her dress to her chest. “No, why did you do that, you shouldn’t have done that, it was perfect, we were safe!” she bawled.

Yuli pointed to the wavering wall. “This is not safety. You can’t just stay here. How are you supposed to move forward?”

The Girl covered her face with her hands and shrank into the corner, actively trying to disappear. “I don’t want to, I don’t want to,” she whimpered.

“But that’s just it! You DO! You’re gonna look back on this and…yeah, that’s it. You’re gonna look back on this. Because you’re going to move past it and it’s just going to become a thing that happened to you. Not the thing. It won’t define you. Listen to me!” She sank down to her knees to get on level with The Girl’s face. “You’re strong. You do things you never thought were possible. People call you a hero. You meet…you meet a man. And you have two kids, a girl and a boy, and they’re so beautiful and so…everything is just…”

“And then what?” The Girl asked. She slowly lowered her hands, her eyes dry and flinty. There was a hard edge to her light, singsong voice as she grabbed Yuli’s wrist.

“I…” Yuli’s mouth went dry and her pulse banged wildly. “Let go of me.”

The grip around her wrist tightened. “And. Then. What.”

She yanked her wrist away, scrambled to her feet, and bolted. She had no idea if The Girl was following, but she just knew she needed to run. “Elliott! ELLIOTT!” she screamed as she ran uselessly down some interminable tunnel that seemed to stretch before her eyes.

Then she heard it. A ringing in her ears, another underwater voice. “Yuli? I hear you but I can’t…where are you? Come back to me.”

“Elliott!” she gasped once more. Panicking, she hurled her entire body weight against the barrier. This time it gave way like the popping of a bubble, and she tumbled through the void until she suddenly landed on something blessedly warm and solid. Well, as solid as a dream…memory…ghost…thing could possibly be.

“Okay, what…” gasped Elliott. “What...happened.”

She opened her eyes halfway to make sure that the room had stopped spinning. She found herself staring at a rather familiar ceiling. When she tried to sit up, a sharp twinge in her temple had her slumping back down. “What the fuck…” she groaned. “How did we...end up in the saloon? And what keeps beating the shit out of us?”

Elliott rubbed his chest as he rolled over to face her. “I think...I think that was you,” he murmured. “Where did you go, just then?”

“I was in a trauma bubble with my younger self but it got really freaky so I managed to bust out somehow.”

“I have absolutely no response to that.”

“But on the bright side,” she added. “No wizard!”

“No wizard,” Elliott agreed. “But what’s going on here?”

Yuli looked around. The saloon was empty. Covered in a thick layer of dust and cobwebs. Suddenly a hissing noise cut through the silence. It wasn’t quite as aggressive as the rushing of wind. And it wasn’t as subtle as a lit fuse. It sounded, Yuli realized, like something being inflated. A ball or a balloon. No. A bubble.

POP

The worst part of seeing a man who everyone in town seemed to love was just how damn long it took to get anywhere.

A stroll around the Cindersap Forest - oh, there was Haley with her camera or Robin scouting the best trees for lumber. He knew all the photography terms and Haley would blush (prettily, of course, like she did everything else) when he complimented her “eye.” He would ask Robin all the right questions that highlighted her status as a female business owner and one of Pelican Town’s wise elders in her own right. You mean you got Joja to sell you the land rights to that marble quarry?! How on earth did you manage that? You could see her walking just a little taller after every conversation with Elliott.

A walk on the beach - oh, but there was Alex throwing a gridball or Sam and Vincent gamboling on the sand. A quick trip to Pierre’s - oh, there was Harvey to gush about aviation, there was Caroline to extoll the virtues of green tea.

All the while, Yuli would hover off to the side and avoid any attempts to rope her into the conversation. She would forage for dandelion greens and earthy mushrooms in the forest. On the beach, she would gather rainbow shells and unlucky sea urchins that had washed ashore.

And then, of course, there was Leah.

Elliott’s relationship with Leah had been hard for her to suss out in the beginning. They looked like siblings but interacted with the comfortable ease of lovers. Inclining their beautiful red heads towards each other, gesturing wildly and occasionally bubbling with peals of laughter. Conjoined twins. A two-headed beast.

Yuli sat across from them now, sipping at some mediocre Stardrop house red wine. Her companions were animatedly discussing some movie that was coming to the movie theater in Zuzu City the following week.

“--so excited. Apparently the filmmaker listed Maya Deren as one of his inspirations? You know she’s my favorite,” Leah said, the wine flushing her cheeks.

“Oh, Yoba, not Maya again. I just can’t get into her, I’m sorry, I just can’t, I thought I might combust from boredom when you made me watch Meshes of the Afternoon…again.” Elliott leaned back as far as his chair would allow and groaned theatrically.

“Just a terrible take, Ell. Just wrong, wrong, wrong,” teased Leah. She looked at Yuli and smiled encouragingly. “What about you, Yuli? What kind of movies do you like?”

“Me? Oh. Um. Movies…honestly, I feel like I don’t get out very much to see any these days? I guess…I guess I used to watch old westerns with my grandpa when I was a kid. It wasn’t so much that I liked them, it was…I liked how much he liked them, I guess.”

“Aw, that’s really sweet!” exclaimed Leah. “Westerns can be a super fun genre. I love seeing, like, the influences that they share with films from other countries. Ugh, I wish we had a movie theater here. Wait a minute. Elliott!” She smacked his shoulder with the back of her hand. “What the hell, were you raised by wolves? You have to bring Yuli to see Mysterium with us!”

“Oh, I don’t–” Yuli started to say.

Elliott draped his arm across the back of her chair. “It really will be such fun. Marnie said she’ll let us borrow that old pickup she has out front, we can all squeeze. Or tie me to the roof, I suppose.”

“I think I’m just–”

“You have to come!” Leah said. “That theater in Zuzu has such good food and wine, you wouldn’t think so, but it does!”

“Don’t listen to her, Leah eats salad at the movies.” Elliott snickered into his wine glass.

Yuli hesitated then felt a smile slowly spread across her cheeks. “...really?”

Leah huffed. “That was one time. But okay, it was a panzanella summer salad and it was really good, you said so yourself! Oh, stop laughing, Mr. Cappuccino Mousse Cake.”

Elliott and Leah both seemed cheered by Yuli’s laugh. Elliott shrugged. “Sometimes a man has primitive urges.”

“I think this time I’ll try the kale smoothie,” Leah added. Elliott looked aghast.

Yuli leaned forward in her chair. “...you guys ever heard of popcorn?”

They both laughed and Yuli felt warm inside. Maybe this wasn’t so bad, having friends, going out with them, being in on an inside joke, maybe she actually could do this…

Elliott nudged Leah and jerked his head in Yuli’s direction. “Didn’t I tell you how funny she is?”

Her good mood evaporated. I told you guys she was funny. Her guts felt like they were being clenched by an icy fist.

“So what do you say?” Leah prompted. “This Saturday afternoon, you in?”

Yuli cleared her throat and attempted a smile but it came out as a grimace. “Ah, thanks, but I um, I can’t.”

“Oh, then…Sunday, maybe?”

“Yeah, uh, Sunday’s no good, either. Or um, any day, really. Sorry. Farm shit.”

Elliott narrowed his eyes. “Farm shit,” he said flatly.

Leah looked crestfallen. “Is something wrong, did I say something…?”

“Nope! Nope, all good, I’m just, uh, I’m just gonna get out of here. Gotta go home. Feed the dog. Get the animals settled for the night. Um.” She dug around her pockets for money but her fingers were numb and shaking too hard to pull the bills apart. She finally just placed the entire wad on the table. “For the wine.”

“Yuli, wait.”

“I’ll see you guys around! Bye!” Her voice cracked with false brightness as she shouldered her bag and briskly made for the exit.

The sun was beginning to set, bathing the square in golden light. A faint breeze hit her face and she exhaled slowly. It was still technically summer but the air was starting to crisp up and smell faintly of leaves. She was too sick with nervous energy to go home. The mine, she decided. It would feel good to hit something. To feel strong. She hadn’t brought any weapons with her on this erstwhile drinks date with friends, but she knew Marlon would let her borrow whichever old thing was lying around the Guild, no questions —

“I think you owe me an explanation for your little performance back there.”

Elliott had caught up to her quickly with his long-legged stride. He looked angrier than she had ever seen him. Yuli could see his genteel facade start to crack. “Why are you acting like this? Leah was really looking forward to getting to know you better, you really hurt her feelings.”

“I’m sorry for that. But please, I need to be alone.” She kept walking.

“She wanted to get to know you better because I’ve told her that I care for you. And I do. I thought that this…what we have…was going well. But then you’ll go off and act like you can’t stand me most of the time. Sulking like a child who doesn’t want to share her toy. Is that what I am to you, a toy? You seem perfectly happy for me to fuck you senseless but I’m beginning to think that you don’t actually like me or want to be seen with me.”

“Please, leave me alone, I can’t talk about this right now. Please.”

“I understand that it might frighten you to be vulnerable with me, or anyone. But you take it over the line. You make it feel…selfish. And cruel. How am I supposed to know what the right thing to do is if you never tell anyone?”

“Elliott, can you please just fuck off?” she begged.

“No, I don’t think I will, actually. You don’t get to just disrespect me and my friends and then just flit away without any accountability. Stop walking away when I’m talking to you, it is so fucking rude.” He reached out and grabbed her wrist.

“Stop it!” she shrieked, loud enough to scare even herself. Birds flew out of the trees. Even Dusty, the Mullners’ outside dog who was always sleeping, opened an eye at the sound. Elliott jumped back like he had been electrocuted, his hands up.

Yuli’s chest was heaving, adrenaline fizzed in her limbs. “I’m done. This, you and me, this is done. I’m walking away now. You are not gonna follow me. And you are not gonna fucking touch me. Got it?”

Elliott breathed hard and raked a hand through his hair. All the warmth had left his face and he worked his jaw as he seemingly wrestled with a dozen unspoken thoughts. “Go on, then,” he finally spat.

The disgusted expression on his face, the dismissive tone of his voice…it made Yuli want to cry but she was too far gone, there was no going back now, her lizard brain screamed at her.

She turned and started walking towards Mountain Road, her feet feeling as though they were weighed down with concrete. She could feel Elliott’s eyes practically burning a hole into her back but, true to his word, he did not follow. No going back.

At the Adventurer’s Guild, Marlon greeted her with a nod. “So, you saw my ad?”

Yuli frowned. “No. What ad?”

“Bats, bats, bats,” Gil mumbled between snores, his eyes still tightly closed.

Marlon inclined his head in the direction of the mine. “The bats are really bad this season. Can barely get down past the 12th floor in there. We need a good cull, thought you might have seen the ad for the reward money.”

She nodded fervently. “Totally, that sounds perfect. I’m just gonna borrow this here, uh…” She looked around until she saw a dingy falchion in the corner of the room, where the items from Marlon’s recovery unit were kept. “This guy right here.”

“Hey, batter batter…” Gil sighed.

Marlon raised the eyebrow that wasn’t obscured by the patch. “That one’s a bit heavy on the downswing for flying targets. Don’t think it’ll be the right balance for you.”

Yuli was already halfway out the door. “That’s alright, I won’t be long.”

“Take a flare. Helps draw ‘em out.”

“Will do, I’ll be back for the money tomorrow.”

She studied the flare as the old mineshaft elevator groaned and creaked its way to the tenth floor. It was similar to a road flare and the label said it should give off about 30 minutes of light. Plenty of time. She strode out of the elevator and shimmied down two sets of ladders to reach the 12th floor. Once she reached the bottom of the second ladder, she grimaced. The air was musty and the acrid odor of bat guano stung her nostrils. This was the place, alright. She could feel thousands of beady little eyes on her, even though she couldn’t see a foot in front of her.

After taking a couple warm up swings with the falchion, she removed the cap from the flare and struck both pieces together to ignite the head. The flame hissed and roared softly as she held the flare aloft. She couldn’t see much past the light, but she could follow the sound of fluttering wings as her target descended in the dozens, then the hundreds.

It was her favorite kind of oblivion. For thirty minutes, she didn’t have to be a person. She could just be a blade. A sword-arm. The only thought she had to have was swing, swing, swing…

Later, Yuli groaned as she emerged from the mine and shuffled towards the edge of the mountain lake. She was completely splattered with viscera, bits of leathery wing, and tufts of fur. She could smell nothing but sweat and coppery blood. She had probably pulled a muscle in her shoulder, or worse. She gingerly eased herself down to the ground.

Marlon had been right about the weapon. It was too heavy and ill-suited to the job. She would stop by the bathhouse to soak on the way home, she decided. But for now, it was a good hurt. One that made sense, that she was in total control of. She sighed and looked up at the stars while the frogs sang on the island across the lake.

From behind, a soft rustling noise. Yuli was in fight-or-flight mode but too tired to do either. Her senses were heightened, she could smell him, cedar and salt. “How did you know I was here?” she asked dully, without turning around to face him.

Elliott skidded slightly on the dewy grass as he walked down the embankment. “You told me once that you come here because hitting things clears your head. That, and I had a chat with Linus on the way.” He blinked and shook his head at the sight of the blood and guts that covered her head to toe. “I do hope none of that’s yours.” He sat down next to her

“Yeah, I’m good.”

They sat in companionable silence, listening to the dueling songs of the frogs and cicadas. Finally Elliott spoke, in a voice barely above a whisper. “If I may ask. Who was he?”

Not “what happened” or “what’s wrong.”

Who was he?

To her horror, a keening sound escaped from somewhere in her chest. She couldn’t hold the sobs back anymore, she was utterly exhausted from doing just that for over a year. Somehow her diaphragm was out of rhythm with her jagged breaths, so she alternated between hyperventilating and choking. Her eyes were beginning to swell. Her nose ran like the river before her. This was Yuli’s nightmare come to life.

True to his promise from before, Elliott didn’t touch her. But he placed the fingertips of one hand onto the ground just next to her and murmured to her under his breath. You’re alright. You’re safe. I’m here with you. You’re alright.

She ground the heels of her hands into her eyes. She couldn’t inhale without hiccupping. “Fuck,” she hissed.

“Forget I said anything,” Elliott said softly. “Please. I’m sorry. You don’t need to tell me.”

“I mean, I’ve gotta fuckin’ tell you now, I look like an absolute lunatic,” she mumbled, her throat dry and raw. She coughed. “Fuck. Okay. Did I ever tell you that I used to work at Joja Corp?”

He nodded. “Yes. Marketing, if I recall correctly.”

She exhaled hard to get all the air out of her lungs and steady herself. “Yeah. So. I worked with a guy who I went to Zuzu U with. Well, he was a couple years ahead of me. Anyway, I…” she trailed off and then shrugged. “His name was Dylan and I…I liked him. He was…handsome. He was charming. I liked him. I guess I was excited by the prospect of him…seeing me as more than just a friend.”

Elliott nodded wordlessly. She could tell that he was trying to keep his expression as neutral as possible. Without sadness or, worse, pity. At that moment, she appreciated him for it.

“We, um…we went out one night and we just…drank. I didn’t really realize that they weren’t getting as many drinks as I was. They kept buying me drinks left and right. And none for themselves. And like a total idiot, I didn’t see it.”

“You are not an idiot.”

“At one point, they started talking about going to Dylan’s place to play video games…I think the new Journey of the Prairie King had just come out or something. So we got there and, um…well, you can probably fill in the blanks of what happened.”

“Oh, Yuli,” Elliott breathed. “I’m so, so sorry.”

Yuli took another shaky breath. “Well, it gets even better. They took a video of it.”

“What? Oh, no…”

“Yeah. I don’t know if it was Dylan who uploaded it or one of the others. ‘College Slut Can’t Get Enough’ or something like that. Charming, huh? Guess I should consider myself lucky that they didn’t include my name.” Elliott winced.

“But they didn’t blur my face. And you know what they say, the internet is forever. I got some sites to take it down but it just…keeps popping up. Faster than I could ever catch up with. So it’s just out there. Forever.” She grabbed a handful of small stones from the riverbank and worried them between her fingers. “And so now, every time someone looks at me for like a second too long or in a certain kind of way…I wonder, do they know? Have they seen it?” She flung the pebbles into the water, heard them skitter above the surface. “I’m pretty convinced that Clint has. Just something about the way he looks at me. I don’t know. Or, like, what if Willy ever saw it? He probably doesn’t even know what the internet is, but still. How could I live with that, you know?”

Elliott was sitting almost impossibly still, as if scared that any slight movement might spook her out of talking. “You must have felt so betrayed,” he said at last.

“They were…I thought they were my friends.” She hated the way that her voice caught and squeaked on the last word. “We were having fun. At least, I thought we were. I even told my dad how excited I was to be going out that night…”

“Small wonder you’re wary of people. Did you ever…tell anyone, report it?”

She shook her head. “I mean, yeah, I went to HR and asked for a transfer. But, um. Turns out he’s a Jorgensen. On his mom’s side. Nephew, I think.”

He looked apologetic. “I’m sorry, I don’t follow…”

Yuli laughed mirthlessly and put on a tour guide’s chipper tone. “However many years ago, two college friends started a bookselling website out of their basement. Their names were Scott Jorgensen and Harry Jackson. Using their last names, they decided to call their new enterprise–”

“Joja,” Elliott finished. “I see.”

“So, yeah. That was pretty much the end of that. They were like, ‘well, he said it didn’t happen, so you two must have had a miscommunication.’ I just wanted a transfer. I didn’t want to have to see him, day in and day out. Finally they said they could maybe put me in Accounts Receivable. Way down in the basement. Locked away. I just couldn’t do it. So I walked.” She made a halfhearted flourish. “And that was that. Now I’m here.”

It was a bit of an oversimplification. She didn’t tell him how, when she was fumbling through her desk drawers at Joja Corp, blinded by her tears, she had found the letter. The one her grandfather wrote before he died, promising her a new start if only she wanted to reach out and take it. The match with which she had burned her old life to the ground. The map that would lead her to Pelican Town, to the height of the wizard’s tower, to the darkest depths of the mines, to Elliott.

“I’m sorry, Yuli. I should never have pried. You didn’t owe me an explanation for any of this.”

She shrugged one shoulder and attempted a half-smile. “Guess you had to unlock my tragic backstory sometime, huh?”

“Don’t diminish yourself so,” he said softly.

She sniffled and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. All she managed to do was smear more blood around her face. She sighed. “I want to diminish it, though, Elliott. I’m so tired. The idea that I’m going to have to live with this for…well, forever…it’s just too much sometimes, you know? How much longer do I have to be a fucking mess for? Are my grandkids gonna be like, don’t mind Nana, she still goes insane over something that happened 60 years ago. I’m just so sick of myself sometimes.”

“Well,” Elliott said. “I won’t pretend to be able to understand what you’ve gone through. I never will. But when I get into that despairing place, when the future just seems insurmountable…I resolve to try and drive out the bad with some good. Chip away at it bit by bit. And one day, there won’t be room in your heart for whatever haunts you.”

“Damn. You should be a writer.”

Elliott snorted. “There she is. Let’s get you home, shall we?” He stood, brushed off his pants, and held his hand out to her.

She slowly rose to her feet, staggering slightly as her legs stiffened and buckled under her. “One of these days, I’m gonna get those mine carts working. Then it’ll be all, bam! Right at my front door.”

“We’d never be able to keep you out of the damnable place then. You’ll have to content yourself with taking my arm in the meantime…”

They made a funny, demented picture then, her a hobbling and disheveled mess, Elliott all put together and so very…Elliott. Him holding his arm out like they were about to take an elegant stroll of the grounds. Her apologizing for getting guano on his jacket. Him threatening to give her “the most undignified piggy back ride if you don’t just lean on my damned arm already.”

When they finally reached the farmhouse, Champ sniffed the air when Yuli entered and appeared to be stumped. “Yeah, you don’t wanna know,” she muttered in response.

“You’ll be wanting to shower, I imagine,” Elliott suggested mildly.

Yuli’s face fell and she groaned. “Ugh, yeah, I do need to…I’m so tired, though…”

“Here, allow me. Sit in the tub. Your showerhead’s detachable, yes?”

Yuli peeled off her clothes and, after some consideration, threw them directly into the trash. She sat in the bathtub and hugged her knees to her chest, the cold porcelain sending a chill through her body. Sitting on the edge of the tub with his sleeves rolled up to the elbows, Elliott turned the water on and held his hand over the showerhead until the water got sufficiently warm. He started with her back and shoulders first, sending rivulets of bloody water swirling down the drain. He gently tilted her chin back with his fingertips so he could soak her hair.

She closed her eyes and held the position, like an obedient child. “Hey, thanks for not telling me that I stink.”

“I’m not in the habit of telling a woman covered in the blood of her enemies that she stinks. Speaking of, what manner of…thing are we cleaning off you today?” he said lightly.

She smiled and tilted her head back further into the spray. “Bat.”

“Ah, yes, of course, bat.” He scanned the shampoo and conditioner in her shower caddy. “We have got to get you some new hair products,” he murmured. “Just sulfates as far as the eye can see.”

“I like sulfates,” she responded. “They make me feel cleaner. Helps get the bat out.”

Elliott chuckled. “Fair, I’ve never had that problem.” He lightly scratched her scalp with his fingernails.

She sighed with pleasure. “I do like you, Elliott,” she said softly.

“Hmm?”

She turned around to face him. “What you said before, that I act like I don’t like you. I do. I like you so much.”

“You’ll see a movie with me, then.” He ran his thumb along her jaw.

“What?”

“You’ll come see a movie with me and Leah. We’ll laugh at Leah’s horrible theater food. You’ll complain about how incomprehensible the film is, I’ll pretend to have understood it but in reality I probably will be just as befuddled as you. We’ll steal kisses while she’s in the bathroom. We’ll watch the sun set over the mountains from Marnie’s truck. Then we’ll come back here and do everything that we had thought of doing to each other while we were out. Because you like me so much. And I, you.”

Yuli propped her elbows on the side of the tub and held her face in her hands. She shrugged. “I guess you read my mind.”

As the memory in front of her faded to black, Yuli closed her eyes. She desperately hoped she could reach The Girl somehow, maybe through telepathy or some other mysterious avenue that tonight’s magic made possible. Yuli wanted to show her everything. She wanted The Girl to see her finely muscled arms and legs from years of farming and fighting. She wanted to show her her stretch marks, her C-section scar from the two lives she had created from nothing. She wanted to show her the strands of grey in her hair, the laugh lines around her mouth, the other souvenirs of a life well lived.

She wanted her to know that no wizard could take away the fact that this story had a happy ending.

Chapter 10: The Storm

Chapter Text

Hot day like today, weather can turn on a dime.

Willy always had a knack for predicting the weather and ocean conditions. He would say something so seemingly out of nowhere, like “Smell that? Means the tide’s going out,” or “Hear that static? Gonna snow tonight.” But it would always, always come true.

She wondered what he would say now. Elliott’s little rowboat adventure had taken them to a stretch of ocean where the water hardly seemed to move at all. There was no wind. The sun beat down mercilessly. The air was stifling, the humidity oppressive. The doldrums, Willy would have called it. There’s a reason they call it the calm before the storm, gup.

Elliott gathered his damp, sweaty hair in one hand and lifted it off his neck. He had sweat through his white shirt. “I really chose quite the day for this, didn’t I?”

He was a lot less put together than she’d ever seen him. She couldn’t stop looking at the hollow of where his neck met his shoulders. She knew that, if she licked the skin there, it would taste salty. Is this heatstroke, or what? “Yeah, the weather is a bit weird today,” she said lamely.

They drifted in silence for a minute, both staring at the mirror-smooth surface of the water. No waves. What even is this? Why are we here?

“The review in the Valley Gazette came out today,” he finally said, softly.

She leaned forward. “Oh?”

He smiled as he reached for his shirt pocket and drew out a newsprint cutting. “Would you, ah, would you like to see it?”

“You brought it?” she shrieked. For a second, she forgot she was on a rowboat and lunged forward to snatch the paper. Elliott cackled as the boat lurched wildly and he grabbed both sides to try and steady it.

“Elliott! That’s five fucking stars!”

“I know. I know! Ahhhh!” he yelled, covering his face with his hands.

She kept reading. “Though it boasts some truly impressive and detailed world-building, The Blue Tower crackles with energy and never feels bogged down or pedantic. This is the start of what will undoubtedly be an exhilarating career from Stardew Valley’s own native son. Oh, Elliott, this is amazing! I’m so excited, it really seems like they get you. Like they were actually picking up what you were putting down!” She carefully folded the clipping back up and handed it to him.

He laughed nervously. “Truth be told, I’m terrified. I’m so scared. I never really considered the idea of being…perceived by so many.”

She nodded. “Yeah, I bet. Things are happening pretty fast, huh?” It had only just occurred to her that Elliott might leave. To Zuzu or even further, to be feted by sophisticated and beautiful people. Lost to her forever. Dread twisted and sickened her insides.

He sighed and wrinkled his nose conspiratorially. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Of course.” No. Stop talking. You’re just gonna leave.

“I find myself hoping that I’ll wake up to find that none of this happened, that I never actually wrote or published anything. That my life can just…be the way it was. Well. With one…notable exception. Isn’t that terrible?”

Fuck, why isn’t there any breeze out here? She fanned herself with both hands. “I don’t think it’s terrible. I think it’s only natural to fear such a big change. Yoba knows I wouldn’t be able to handle it. But, um…I think you can. Handle it. I don’t know. I’m just really proud of you, okay?” She forced out a shaky laugh.

Elliott stared at the paper for a moment then suddenly crushed it in his fist. “You know you’re the reason for all of this, Yuli,” he murmured, sliding it into his shirt pocket.

“Oh, no, I’m sure –”

“No,” he cut in. There wasn’t a hint of the usual teasing lightness in his voice. Instead it sounded shaky, urgent. His legs were restless and she could sense how tightly wound his body was, like a guitar string. “This story was nothing before I met you. I frolicked about playing the starving artist here for a year before you came along. With absolutely nothing to show for it. Then I met you and it was as if…I couldn’t stop myself from writing. There were some nights I could barely sleep for all the ideas that plagued me. I kept replaying that conversation in my head, when you talked about what you liked about mystery books. And every time I would sit at the typewriter, I would think, what would Yuli want from this story? What would Yuli like? I think…I think I was writing to you the entire time.”

Her stomach was doing somersaults. “Elliott, that’s so…romantic. I honestly don’t know what to say.” She reached out and gently held his trembling hands to hold them still.

A smile played on his lips but his eyes were desperate, imploring. “So you’re going to make me say it, then…”

“No, no, I won’t, you don’t have–” she whispered, leaning forward a bit. She wondered if he could feel her palms sweating. This time, it was Elliott’s turn to forget that they were on a boat as he pulled Yuli’s hand to bring her crashing into him.

At first, his kisses were hesitant and neat. Calm, not sloppy or crazed. Yuli wanted more. She wanted to punch through his genteel shell, goad him into behaving indecently. When he kissed her again, she sucked on his bottom lip and introduced just the slightest edge of her teeth, repressing a grin when he moaned into her mouth. For a moment, she forgot how sweaty she was or how scared she had just felt or how she hadn’t thought to wear nice underwear for this…date, holy shit, I am on a date with Elliott and this is our first kiss and I think he might have been trying to tell me that he loves me…

An oar clattering to the bottom of the boat broke the spell. She was straddling him, cupping his face in her hands, he was gripping her waist and the back of her neck, they were both breathing hard. She laughed. “We’ve gotta get out of this fucking boat.”

He let his head roll back and his eyes fluttered closed. “Don’t rub it in. This was possibly the worst plan I’ve ever had.”

“No, I loved it, I love it.” She ducked her head and buried her face in his neck. She couldn’t resist poking out her tongue for a lick. I was right. Salty. She could hear his breath catch in his throat. “Though I think we definitely need to go for a swim and cool off before we head back.”

It gave her a perverse sense of pleasure to watch him shift uncomfortably in his seat, trying to hide what she knew was there. He cleared his throat. “Right. Yes. I think…we passed a sandbar a little while ago…”

“Okay.” She pressed one last soft kiss to the spot right below his ear. “Let’s go.”

The boat creaked as it ground and scraped to a halt along the sandbar. The water just barely covered the tops of their feet but its glassy stillness made it appear as though they were walking on the surface. The air shimmered with heat and she thought of how Willy had told her once, as a child, that the ocean is just a different kind of desert.

Maybe stop thinking about Willy for one minute, you fucking weirdo.

Elliott practically vaulted out onto the sand and started pulling his shirt over his head. He stepped out of his pants and shoes, balled up his clothes, and threw them back into the boat before diving headfirst into the deeper water. Yuli laughed at his haste and made to join him, but her feet remained planted to the sand. Shit.

He surfaced and rubbed the water out of his eyes. “Yoba, it just feels like a warm bath,” he complained, chuckling. “Maybe it’ll get cooler as I dive deeper down.” He saw Yuli’s face and paused. “Coming in?”

“Uh huh!” she chirped, her voice artificially cheerful. “Just a second…”

Clearly unconvinced, he came ashore and walked towards her. Yuli swore under her breath as she looked at his body. The water droplets beading on his bare skin. The way his boxer briefs clung to his…

“Everything alright?” he asked, dipping his head to catch her lowered gaze. His hair was a darker auburn when it was wet. It made his eyes stand out even more.

She nodded slowly, trying to appear chill and calm. “Yeah. You are, um. You’re just really beautiful.” It wasn’t technically a lie.

He smiled slightly but narrowed his eyes at her. “Mmhmm. You know,” he said, taking her hand and pressing his lips to her knuckles, then her palm. “You don’t have to look with just your eyes.”

Yuli exhaled, relieved by the change in subject. “Oh yeah?” She ran her hands down his cheeks, down around his neck, along his broad shoulders. Up close, without his clothes, she could see them, sprinkled along his cheeks and the tops of his shoulders. They were hard to spot, just slightly darker than his skin, but they were there. Freckles.

She fake-gasped and pointed accusingly. “Ginger…” she stage-whispered.

“Oh, she’s funny, she’s so very funny,” he murmured before tilting her chin up and kissing her again. It was more passionate this time, which caught her off guard. His tongue was in her mouth, her clothes were getting damp as he pressed her body close to his. And just as suddenly, he stopped, leaving her panting and confused.

“Now then,” he said, so quietly into her ringing ears. “Tell me what the matter is.” He pulled his head back when Yuli tried to kiss him again.

“It’s nothing. It’s so cliche, so stupid. Please, Elliott.” All he did was raise his eyebrows and she groaned from frustration. “You’re just gorgeous, okay, like it’s kind of ridiculous,” she said, motioning nonspecifically at his body.

“So you’ve said. Thank you, by the way.”

“And I…” She gestured at her own body, feeling her throat constrict. “I’m not…”

She wished he could have met her back in Zuzu City. When she was lithe, clean, feminine. Not now, with her bruises and calluses that came from using her subpar farming implements. Her arms and legs thickened with muscle from the way she held down her raging, thrashing sheep for their seasonal shearing. The dirt that seemed to live permanently under her fingernails.

She wouldn’t have traded her new life, her newfound strength, for anything. But it certainly made it more difficult to imagine being someone who Elliott might want.

His eyes softened. “I see.”

Yuli shook her head and reached for him again. “I told you it was stupid. Anyway, I’ll get over it. Come on…”

Elliott ran his thumb along her jaw. “Beautiful girl. If you could just indulge me in something. Come into the water with me. I can turn around while you undress, if you like. Don’t deprive or hide yourself on my account.”

Yuli hesitated, trying to remember what she had on underneath her clothes. Oh well. No getting out of it now. “It’s not that I don’t want you to see me,” she told him, taking a few steps backward. She wiggled out of her t-shirt and jean shorts to reveal a black sports bra and heather gray boy shorts. She silently thanked Yoba for not letting her choose a period-stained or holey pair that morning. “I’m just scared that I’m not your type.”

Before giving him an opportunity to answer, she finally walked beyond the shoreline until the water came up to her chest. She let herself drop and be entirely submerged before using her feet to launch herself forward off the sand. The water felt warm and soothing while she was in it, but the air thankfully made her feel a little cooler when she surfaced. She slicked her hair back and sighed.

Elliott surfaced nearby and lazily floated closer to her. “Feels a bit better, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, a bit.” She looked over at him and grimaced apologetically. “Sorry for being weird. It’s been a while since I’ve…done anything like this with anyone. Sometimes I’ll go days just talking to my dog and that’s it.”

He nodded. “It’s been quite some time for me as well. Probably…yes, going on a year by now.”

Yuli tried to hide the surprise from her face. Sure, Pelican Town itself was short on eligible bachelorettes, but…an entire year? Not even a night in Zuzu to blow off some steam? It felt improbable. “Wow. I never would have been able to tell. Guess you’re just naturally confident.”

Eliott grinned but there was some melancholy to it. “On the contrary. There’s nothing natural about it. Confidence is like…well, a farm,” he said, gesturing to her. “Something that one has to maintain every day. Build it, nurture it, shore it up against the elements. Every day. Especially if one is a little different, like us.”

Like us. Yuli rolled the words around in her head like a marble, loving the way it sounded and felt. Like us, like us. Us. “Well, my farming involves spreading a lot of shit around so that tracks,” she remarked.

He giggled and her heart twinged a little at how sweet it sounded. “It’s an imperfect metaphor,” he told her before bending slightly to lightly kiss her forehead.

She felt an unexpected flare of boldness overtake her and she slowly reached down in the water to lightly touch the bulge in his underwear with the very tips of her fingers. Even with the barest of touches, she could feel how hard it was. Elliott was just staring at her, seemingly wondering what she would do next.

“So, what do you think?” she whispered with another ghosting caress. “Did you get a good look? Am I maybe your type after all?”

“Oh yes, my type…” he mused. He put one foot slightly forward so that one long leg stuck out in front of him. “Now what do you imagine that is?” In one smooth motion, aided by the weightlessness of the water, he gently pulled her off her feet and placed his thigh between her legs.

Her head felt light but her eyelids felt heavy. She felt as though she could simply float away. “I guess I don’t know,” she whispered.

“I suppose not,” he agreed. He placed his hands on her hips, anchoring her to him. “What I do know is that you’re a woman of action. That means I could tell you how beautiful I find you, how often I think about you when I close my eyes at night, all the things that I’ve imagined doing to you…” As he spoke, he slowly rocked her hips back and forth, grinding her against his leg. A completely undignified noise, somewhere between a yelp and a gasp, escaped Yuli’s throat.

“I could tell you all of this and more until I have no more breath in my lungs and you wouldn’t believe me. Because you are a maddening, intransigent woman who would never let some silver-tongued writer pour honey in her ear. I quite like that about you. It just means that I have to be more…creative with how I express myself to you. Learn to communicate, in other ways, how you are just my type.”

She was holding on for what felt like dear life, her arms tightly wrapped around him. Her face was buried in his neck and his ocean cedar smell was overwhelming her senses. And Elliott himself wasn’t helping at all. His lips brushed against her ear, the soft warmth of his breath. He spoke to her in a pitch that seemed to travel directly through her. He pressed down on her to create more pressure between her legs and it took all she had not to scream. “Please…” she choked out. “Please, Elliott, please, please…”

“Please what, sweetheart,” he whispered.

He rubbed up against a particularly good spot and Yuli tried and failed to bite back a whine. “Please,” she said again, her voice a broken whisper. “I need…I need more, I need you, I need…”

A low but booming rumble in the background made her stop abruptly and look to the sky. It must have turned this nasty shade of yellow while they were distracted. Elliott froze and they let a tense silence fall over them for a moment. Then they heard the first raindrops hit the surface of the water. First in slow drips, then a skittering like beads along a wooden floor.

On a dime.

The current that had evaded them all day returned with a vengeance, sending the little boat plunging and flying with each roiling wave. Wind and rain lashed them but Yuli could hardly feel it, didn’t register her slowly-mounting seasickness. She had snatched an oar from Elliott and the two of them rowed like bats out of hell. In the distance, she could see the lights on the pier beckoning them home.

One final wave crested and dumped them unceremoniously onto the beach in front of Elliott’s cabin, the tide hissing as it receded. It wasn’t raining quite as hard here as it had been further out to sea, but Yuli knew it was only a matter of time. The wind whipped around her ears, making a moaning sound as it ran through the mangroves. She staggered onto shore, blinking the stinging raindrops out of her eyes.

Elliott stood a few feet ahead of her, cupping his hands to his mouth. “Forget the boat!” His voice was starting to get lost in the howling of the wind.

She threw up her hands and laughed incredulously. “What do you mean, forget the boat?! You busted your ass on this thing, and this wind? It’s a goner if we don’t get it secured.”

He worked his jaw like he wanted to say something, but eventually stalked over to the boat. With surprising strength, he grabbed the prow and began to drag it up the beach. She scrambled to pick up the back end and help. They both stumbled as another gust of wind slammed into the boat between them like a freight train.

When the boat was secured, Elliott grabbed her elbow and hustled her into the house like he was her personal bodyguard. The inside of the house was dark and still. Yuli idly wondered how he would ever get through a storm like this in this house. “House” was almost too generous a word. There was no fireplace, no heat, no storm windows. Miraculously, there was still power, but she couldn’t imagine it would last for long. She jumped as the wind whipped the door shut behind them with a loud slam. Elliott crossed the room to the tiny kitchenette and started rummaging through a drawer.

“Duct tape?” she piped up and he held a roll aloft without turning around. She plucked it out of his hands and started making an “X” shape out of tape on each delicate window.

“I don’t suppose you have a generator,” she remarked, only half-joking. As if in response, the power cut out with a low hum. Great.

Elliott didn’t stop what he was doing as he answered. “No. I’m told it’s difficult to get the gasoline out here consistently.”

“Figures. So what do you usually…”

“Leah’s,” he answered softly. “I’ve stayed with Leah during particularly bad ones. But, for now…behold!” A strained smile on his face, he held up three tragically small tea candles and a book of matches.

“Oh, Elliott,” she sighed.

He arranged the candles in a neat row on his writing desk, next to the hulking typewriter. “I suppose it’s my turn to be embarrassed,” he said as he struck a match. “I know I’m not cutting a particularly impressive picture here.” The match whooshed as the flame flared. He lit one candle. “Beautiful, fierce, heroic woman who built a farm, a business, a community from scratch.” Another candle. “And a silly boy writing his silly stories in a glorified shed.” The final candle, then he shook the match back and forth to extinguish the dying flame.

She shook her head, her eyes stinging. “Don’t say that.”

“Yuli, it’s alright. I’m not looking for pity. I merely meant to say that a woman like you needs a good man in a storm, so to speak.”

She stomped across the room to him and poked his chest. “Just don’t…don’t talk about yourself like that, okay? I don’t care about all that stuff. I think the fucking world of you.”

He stared at her for a moment, his eyes inscrutable. “And I you,” he finally replied.

She motioned at the writing desk, at the sad candles. “We’ll make it work.”

She didn’t realize the double meaning of what she’d just said until he huffed out a laugh and said, “Indeed. Now, get on the desk.”

Yuli raised an eyebrow. “Sorry?”

His eyelids fluttered. “You’re right, I misspoke. Let’s get these off.” He lifted the hem of her shirt and ran his hands over her hips, his palms blessedly warm and dry against her cold, clammy skin. “And then get on the desk.”

She mock-scowled even as she pulled her shirt and sports bra over her head. Their dampness made it a whole ordeal. “You’re so bossy.” She took her shorts off but left her underwear on out of some last lingering, nonsensical shyness.

“You can’t blame me,” he breathed in her ear, making her shiver as the hairs on the back of her neck stood up. “You expected me to wait one more second to touch you?” He ghosted his fingertips along her inner thigh. “To taste you?”

Something in her chest thrummed. “Now it’s your turn. I want to see you. All of you,” she told him.

“And you will,” he answered, but made no move to undress. Instead he brushed the underside of her breast with his fingertips and warmed her nipple with his palm, smiling serenely when she gasped. “I have some things to attend to first.”

Yuli’s head fell back and she groaned. “Please don’t tease me any more, I swear I’ve had all I can take…”

He rolled her nipple in between his thumb and index finger, head tilted in mock contemplation. “Have you, now? Already?”

“What do you mean, already? What are you gonna make me do, row a boat in a thunderstorm?” She was so turned on that she wanted to grind and writhe against something, anything. She darted a hand to her crotch but Elliott didn’t miss a trick. He grabbed the offending hand and laced his fingers with hers, kissing her knuckles before reaching down with the other hand to touch the spot that had been her target.

“You have to see it from my perspective,” he murmured. He lightly ran his fingertips along the thin cotton of her underwear, even though her skin was screaming for him. He stopped at the waistband, a silent question. She nodded her silent reply, and could finally let her muscles relax when he pushed the cloth aside and gently, hypnotically stroked her sex.

“Yuli, I’ve wanted you since I first saw you that day on the riverbank. And ever since then, I’ve wondered if you would look my way, if you thought about me at night, if you thought about me at all. Because I’ve thought about you halfway to madness. And now, that woman that I dreamed of, she’s here. She’s bared herself to me, looking more beautiful, more like a goddess than I dared dream. Splayed out on my desk at my mercy, soaking my fingers, begging for me. Both with her words and that perfect body. I’ll be damned if I don’t make it last.”

Even though she bucked and ground her hips against his fingers, he never put them inside her. He only slid them between her lips and folds until she was dripping through her underwear, his thumb keeping an insistent pressure against her clitoris. She couldn’t hear anything except for her own arousal, the lewd, liquid sound of his fingers working her.

“All for me,” he whispered, his voice hitting her very core. “All this for me, Yuli?” He withdrew his glistening fingers and slowly brought them to his mouth to suck on, humming his satisfaction with her taste.

“Yes.” Her voice was trembling just as hard as the rest of her, she felt desperate for him to be on her, in her. “Yes, it’s yours. It’s all yours.”

Apparently it was the right thing to say. Elliott closed his eyes and slowly exhaled as if he were restraining himself, settling himself. When he opened his eyes again, lust had darkened them and she almost didn’t recognize the man looking back at her. He sank to his knees in front of the desk and pulled her hips to the edge, then further until she was almost off the top of the desk entirely. She braced herself, gripping the edges with both hands, as Elliott rolled her soaked underwear down her legs and let them fall to the floor with a savage urgency.

His eyes flicked up to meet hers and his grin was wicked and feral. “Lovely,” he breathed before pulling her down onto his mouth.

In another life, with another man, Yuli would have done the whole song and dance. Oh no, I didn’t shave! I probably smell bad! Here, let me just go down on you instead. But in this life, with this man, the very idea seemed ridiculous. When the most beautiful man she’d ever known was on his knees before her, whispering filthy things about how good she tasted and how he wanted her all over his face, desperately clutching her hips so she wouldn’t be able to lift herself off his mouth. Why should she deny herself this pleasure, this moment?

Of course he’s fucking good at this. He’s good at everything. She cursed inwardly as he alternated between licking and sucking. His enthusiasm had her burning up, the pleasure built and built between her legs until she could barely think. Once again, she didn’t know what to do with her hands. She reached down and grabbed a fistful of silken, auburn hair.

He made a soft, surprised noise in his throat. It vibrated through her.

She chuckled and took her hand back. “Sorry. You probably don’t like The Hair being touched, huh?”

He took her hand and slowly placed it back in his hair, never breaking eye contact. “On the contrary.” He suddenly clenched his fingers around hers, forcing her to grab a handful of strands. “I fucking love it.”

She inhaled sharply. “Oh. Okay. Um. Cool.”

“Use it to guide me, if you need to. I want to know just how you like it.” He clamped his lips tightly around her clit and gave it a quick swipe with his tongue.

“Fuck,” she wailed. He took that as his cue to suck harder, to lick faster. She could feel his hot breath against her as he panted from his ministrations. She buried her face in both hands to try and stifle her whimpers, to hide the wild look in her eyes. “Like that, Elliott, like that, oh, please –”

“No. Don’t you dare cover your face,” he commanded roughly. “I’ve waited so long to see what you look like when you come.” He waited until she lowered her hands to continue.

She would have teasingly reproached him for his cockiness if he hadn’t slid one long finger inside her and continued licking. Her bones liquefied and, if it hadn’t been for the desk holding her up, she would have fallen to the floor. He laughed softly and added a second finger. Made a beckoning gesture inside her.

It shattered the last of her restraint, the last ditch effort to look coy and sexy and not completely unhinged. She was beyond caring about looking ugly, not when his eyes were searing her with his desire. “Elliott,” she sobbed. She was twitching uncontrollably at this point, like a hooked fish.

He held her down with the hand that wasn’t inside her and cursed under his breath. “Hearing you say my name like that…” he muttered. He shook his head, as though in awe, and started thrusting those curled fingers in and out of her.

Yuli’s release surged forth and burst, like a breach in a dam, as she keened like a desperate animal. Distantly, she could hear his answering groan and his whispered yes, yes, yes. True to his request, she left her face uncovered. Her shaking thighs involuntarily tensed and she gasped as she felt her legs clench around his head. “Shit. I’m sorry.”

“Mmm, don’t be. You’re so responsive. It’s terrible for my ego, really.” He grinned cheekily before taking another slow, languorous lick. She was so sensitive that it made her grit her teeth. “I could spend all night down here.”

“Well, don’t,” she begged breathlessly. “Come back up here. I miss you.”

“Poor dear,” he teased, but he furtively wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and stood to meet her, pressing a kiss to her neck. “Hello,” he said softly.

“Hi. That was…I can’t really feel my legs.”

“Let’s move to the bed, then.”

“Yes,” she said, even as she reached for his shirt and began fiddling with the buttons. “Yes, that is an idea.” She encountered a difficult button, quickly gave up, and began pulling at his belt. “A very good idea.”

He laughed as he finished undoing the remaining buttons. “The state of you right now.” He unthreaded his belt from his pants.

“Just get naked, already.”

“And she calls me bossy–oh.” A sharp intake of breath as Yuli grabbed the bulge in his underwear, quick as a striking snake. She slipped her thumb through the opening in the front and softly ran it along his length. Then, gently, menacingly, she squeezed.

“You’ve had your fun,” she said sweetly as Elliott’s eyes slowly grew frantic. “Teasing me and making me lose my shit. But I’m taking you down with me. I’m gonna make you a mess.”

Even though she quite literally had him by the balls, he cocked his head and said, “You think so?” That earned him a harder squeeze but he laughed through his gasps. She had no choice, Yuli realized. She had no choice but to love him.

He tilted his chin up defiantly, a dare sparkling in his eyes. “You’d might as well look at it, then, before you go wrenching it off.” He hooked his thumbs in the waistband of the last remaining layer between them and nudged it toward the floor.

Yuli did her best to appear nonchalant. As if his cock weren’t just as gorgeous as the rest of him. As if it didn’t feel so perfectly right, heavy in her hand. As if it didn’t have a slight, sinful curve to it that she knew would hit all the best spots inside her…alright, focus.

She relaxed her grip on him until she was just barely cupping his balls. Elliott huffed in protest at the sudden withdrawal of contact and tried to pull her closer, but stilled when it only made her pull back further. She stood on her toes to graze his earlobe with her teeth and whispered, “Hands behind your back.”

His eyes glittered and his lips parted slightly as though he wanted to say something. But he obeyed, crossing his wrists behind his waist.

Yuli did her best to keep a grave, yet innocent expression on her face. She was really in the driver’s seat now, she realized with a thrill. The possibilities were endless and terrifying. “You said you’ve thought about it. What I look like when I come.” She leaned down to spit in her palm.

Wordlessly, warily, he nodded.

She wrapped her fingers around him once more and began to slowly stroke him, back and forth. “And? What did I look like?” She broke her gaze to brush her lips along his collarbone.

Elliott sagged against the wall. “Beautiful. Revelatory.” He screwed his eyes shut and swallowed hard. “Life-affirming.”

“Wow,” she teased. “All that, huh?” She tightened her grip and sped up her stroking, smiling when she heard his breath hitch. “Now, tell me…what else have you thought about?”

Yoba bless him, he was still trying to stay cool and in control. But she could see the pulse jumping wildly in his throat. A rosy flush was starting to suffuse his shoulders, his chest. “It’s…it’s difficult to, um…to speak when…oh, damn you,” he cursed when Yuli spit in her hand again.

“When what?” she cooed. The frustrated groan he bit out was all too familiar - it was the same sound she had been making at his deft, teasing hands. He was so tightly wound that every movement seemed somewhat involuntary. She could tell that he wanted to writhe, to buck his hips, to use his hands on her or himself. But not as badly as he wanted to choreograph the situation, to be the one pulling the strings, to avoid being the vulnerable one.

She wouldn’t have it.

Yuli sighed and pressed her body against him where she could feel every twitch and jerk. “Looks like you’re gonna make me guess. Or maybe you want me to tell you what to do. Hmmm…”

“Yes. Tell me what to do. I’ll do it. Tell me.” He was twisting from side to side to escape her grip, but she had him pinned against the wall. “Yuli. Please.”

“Sorry, what was that?”

“Please! If you don’t s-stop, I’ll…I don’t want to yet, please, my love, please,” he begged.

“Oh, well, since you asked so nicely…” She wound her arms around his shoulders and leaned in closer to whisper. “Take me to your bed and fuck me.”

He scooped her up and moved so quickly across the room that she could have sworn they teleported. She laughed as he practically tossed her onto the bed, he was much stronger than he let on. “Careful, now. I am a lady.” When he joined her in the bed, she motioned for him to sit with his back straight against the headboard and finally settled in his lap.

“You evil thing,” he breathed, desperately clutching at her as if she might melt away. “You diabolical tease.”

She kissed him deeply while slowly sliding herself down on his length, savoring the sensation of fullness, of stretching. “You love it,” she whispered.

“I do.” He cupped her cheek with one hand, grabbed her hips with the other, and drove himself home.

In an instant, the world felt much smaller. Everything had been distilled to that tiny shack, the bed, his depthless eyes. She couldn’t hear the storm raging outside, couldn’t feel the draft rushing in through the cracks in the windowframes. Here, there was only him. All she had to do was match him breath for breath, thrust for thrust. There was no shame, only pleasure.

There had been boys in college. There had been boys after that, in her apartment downtown. But Yuli had never experienced anything like this, this vortex of need, this call and response with someone who she could have sworn could read her thoughts. She needed only to lean back slightly, and he would immediately position himself to hit the spot that made her scream. She needed only to think that it would feel really good to have him kiss her breasts, and he did it. It was magic. How had she gotten this far in life without this? How would she ever move forward without it?

I never want to do this with anyone else, ever again.

She didn’t realize that she had said it out loud until Elliott cried out and clutched her closer to him, thrusting faster and harder. He crushed his lips to her neck and whimpered a prayer as he spilled into her. “No, never, never, never.”

The lovers disappeared as a thunderclap sliced through the air, loud enough to make Yuli’s eardrums ache. She stumbled and slapped her hands over her ears, shaking her head to try and clear it. Suddenly, a frisson and a sharp blast of heat nearby. Lightning striking the sand. She was on the beach again, and the storm howled. The palm trees were nearly horizontal, clinging for dear life in the punishing wind. Behind the swirling black clouds, a purple sky.

Rasmodius had caught up with them at last, she knew. She couldn’t see him but she felt him there in the tightening of her lungs. She fell to her knees and struggled for breath. Was this it? Would he kill her now for crossing him, for evading him this long? Every cell in her body screamed for air, her chest felt aflame. Her head lightened, her vision was beginning to white out.

Just as she knew that Rasmodius was there, she knew that Elliott, dream Elliott, was gone. She was alone. She would go through the rest of this nightmare alone. And if she were allowed to survive and wake up in the morning, she would still be alone. It was the whole point, after all.

She heard her own voice, crooning dreamily in her head. I never want to do this with anyone else, ever again. Then Elliott’s faint, echoing reply - never, never, never. She screamed as a blinding pain seared behind her eyes, the scenery was disappearing and being replaced with horrors.

Never. The clink of two glasses. Shane waving two fingers at his temple in a sardonic salute.

Never. The click of a pen. Elliott’s girl in the green dress peering back at him over one bare shoulder.

Never. The scrape of a skateboard wheel against concrete. Sam’s sunny, crooked smile.

The cruel, torturing bastard just had to take it that much further. Yuli felt as though her skin might disintegrate, as if she might be completely torn apart. It didn’t work. She couldn’t outrun this outcome. Who was she, to think she could outsmart ancient magic? She had gambled and lost. When the pain reached a fever pitch, she screamed again.

I lost. You win.

You win.

The snap of a finger, and the pain was gone. The voices, the ghosts were gone. She was still on the beach and the sun was shining now. But the trees were flattened. The shoreline had eroded and was littered with driftwood. The cabin was destroyed. A pile of planks and shattered glass slowly being reclaimed by the ocean. The piano still stood but was encrusted with wet sand and seaweed.

Rasmodius sighed grumpily, a surprisingly mundane sound, as if he were just a normal old man and not a manipulator of time and space. He shook the sand out of his sleeves. “I suggest you don’t try that again. We’ve wasted a lot of time and you still have plenty of ground to cover.”

Yuli was still on her hands and knees, silently shivering from the memory of what she had just felt. Failure tasted like battery acid in her mouth. It was over.

“You’re a bit stunned, I see. I’ll rephrase.” He held a hand out to her. “Pull another stunt like that and you won’t come out on the other side of all this. You won’t come back to them.”

Them. She didn’t have to ask who he meant. She closed her eyes. What choice did she have? She ignored the wizard’s gnarled, hateful hand and stood on her own two feet.

“I’m ready.”

A lie. But there was no time for the truth.

Chapter 11: Beryl

Chapter Text

Yuli trudged forward as though through wet sand, her entire body feeling terribly heavy. She could feel soft shapes blowing past her and grazing her ears, like the fluttering of wings. Each came with a mere second of sound - a laugh, a sob, a moan.

She missed him, oddly enough. Dream Elliott. To the extent that you could miss someone who didn’t really exist. But even though he had groused and needled her every step of the way…being alone felt so much worse.

She could never have imagined how awkward it would feel to watch her past self having sex. And she could really have never imagined how insane it would feel to watch her past self having sex while sitting next to the shade of her ex husband who kind of hated her. She stared straight ahead, pretending to intently focus on the action, but she could feel him sitting beside her, hear the churning of blood in her ears. She wondered if he felt embarrassed too. Or disgusted. Or…maybe a little aroused?

The lovers in the memory clutched each other as if to save themselves from drowning. They were achingly carefree, unburdened from children, hatred, or jealousy. Yuli tried to crack jokes to defuse the tension. When the lovers disrobed, she wolf-whistled. “I could kill that little dumbass for having such bad self esteem. Damn, I looked good.”

“You still do,” was the muttered reply.

She finally looked at him, her eyebrows raised. He was resting his chin in his hands and shrugged noncommittally. As if to say, what’s the use? What difference does it make now?

“Well,” she said, clearing her throat. “You do, too. You always have.”

Their eyes met, his gaze a tractor beam as always.

That wasn’t their problem, she reminded herself. They had never lacked for connection in the bedroom, never lost the attraction they had for one another. It was the other stuff, the other people…every other part of their life.

But Rasmodius had taken him, ethered him in a clap of thunder before they could say anything, he was lost to her now. He was gone and she might be gone too if she didn’t straighten up and fly right.

The wizard stalked 10 paces ahead of her, muttering to himself under his breath. The shapes circled him like vultures and eventually dissolved into mist. They were memories, Yuli realized. Rasmodius had picked up the pace and was destroying her memories even faster. He waved impatiently at the clouds of mist as though they were pesky flies. She pursed her lips to keep them from quivering.

“--already short on time and now everything is in disarray…totally balanced, I had it completely organized…”

She continued her slow plodding, robotically putting one foot in front of the other.

“The one time I try to do someone a kindness…how could I have been so foolish?”

He was baiting her, she knew. All she had to do was ignore it.

“Never again. I’ll burn the damned shrines myself if I have to. Leaving this power in reach of housewives and amateurs…”

A dark, familiar thrill of anger flared in her chest and she couldn’t stop herself. “That would mean crawling back to your ex-wife, Ras. You know, the one with the actual magic?”

She regretted it instantly. Rasmodius turned on his heel and she could tell from his upturned lips that he was satisfied to have gotten her goat. “She speaks.”

She tossed her head, affecting nonchalance. “Whatever.”

A memory whizzed past her ear again and she could picture it, even though it was only sound. She could see Elliott sprawled along her couch, his feet dangling over the arm, always taking up so much space. Holding the phone to his cheek with one hand, stroking Yuli’s hair with the other. She could see it so clearly, even when she was firmly rooted in space with the wizard.

“I just wanted you to know that I’m getting married…yes, to that awful girl from the farm, the very same…”

Yuli shook her head briskly and rubbed her ear. “Can we just get this done already?” she snapped, her voice a little wobblier than she intended.

“Didn’t like that one, I take it?”

Her eyes burned but she refused to cry, for some reason it would feel like a violation for him to see her cry again. “I don’t want to do this with you anymore. The banter, the fucking traps and double meaning to everything. I want to get this done and go home.”

“It was all going perfectly well before you ran, if you’ll recall,” he pointed out.

It’s really a very fascinating and tidy practice, he had told her in the tower. She felt the strange desire to laugh. Everything that had happened…everything she had seen…if this was tidy…

Focus. Objective.

“Will you have a fucking heart, just for one second? I told you I’m done fighting. Do what you need to do. But please, let me just go home. I need to get home. To my babies. Please.”

Rasmodius seemed to deflate somewhat. “Right. The children. Always such a complication.” He thought for a moment and raised an eyebrow. “It’s not too late to turn them into doves, you know.”

“Not this again,” Yuli hissed.

“You should give it more serious consideration. Don’t you want to start fresh?”

“Not like that. I told you.”

He shifted his weight from side to side, his eyes gleaming with dark mischief. “Your daughter’s hair. Your son’s eyes. The man you seek to forget…you’ll never be truly rid of him as long as they live.”

“And I’ll live with that, okay? He’s part of them. Part of me…I’ll live with it.”

The wizard seemed to love this, Yuli thought. He was a contrarian, he wanted her to fight. She should have known that “the one with the actual magic” dig would backfire on her. “You’ve never even thought about it? How much easier it would all be if they…disappeared?” He splayed out his fingers as if her children were already less than dust.

“No.”

It was a lie. He knew it. She knew that he knew it.

How many times had she hidden in her bedroom closet, clamping her hands over her mouth so Tilly and Jasper wouldn’t hear her sobs after another meeting with her attorney? How many times had she inwardly cringed when she saw the light hit Jasper’s playful green eyes a certain way, when she heard Tilly say “oh, dear,” in the exact same cadence Elliott always used?

How many times had she wistfully fantasized about her old life of staggering home after one too many at the Stardrop, with the only consequence being some very pissed off chickens the next morning? Of spending hours, days at a time exploring the Skull Cavern, getting lost in a project, making slow and leisurely love with Elliott?

How many times had she wished she could spare them from this life, this broken home?

“Always so busy,” Rasmodius mused, breaking her reverie. “So busy, so angry, so absent. Don’t you think they’d be better off?”

“No,” she thundered, pointing her finger at him like he was a dog she was chastising. “You can say a lot of shit about me but I am a good mother.”

“Are you?”

It felt as if he had taken a needle and poked a hole in her lungs. All her breath came rushing out and she briefly saw sunspots before her vision blacked out completely. There was a roaring in her ears. Hit him, hurt him, don’t let him, he can’t, he can’t, he can’t.

Just as she rounded on him, Rasmodius flicked his wrist again and sent a memory flying directly into her face. It felt like a cloud, like cool vapor flooding her mouth and nose.

“Are you?”

She was back after spending an entire week on Ginger Island for the first time. She came home to a monster in the shape of her 4 year old.

“Make it a girls’ trip,” Elliott had suggested that morning. “The two of you can have some mother-daughter time.” It sounded great when he said it. Shopping. Ice cream. Books at the library. Yuli had dressed Tilly in a cute outfit, done her hair nicely, and left in a cheerful mood.

But she’s me, she’s me, SHE’S ME.

Yuli didn’t know how it started, but a dark mood overtook Tilly as suddenly as a thunderclap. Trying to escort the toddler through a shopping trip at Pierre’s was like trying to carry an angry wolverine in a burlap sack. Tilly’s shoe, kicked off in the throes of her tantrum, sailed past Abigail’s head into a crate of parsnips. Yuli fished it out, her fervent apology drowned out by Tilly’s howls. Her little face was red, her voice was hoarse from screaming.

The little demon knew how best to get to her, Yuli fumed. All the parenting books would say she didn’t, but she did. Tilly had to know that her mother hated being the center of attention, hated unsolicited advice or conversation, hated being stared at.

And everyone was fucking staring.

Evelyn. Caroline. Abigail. Pierre. Gus. All of them. Staring, their eyes full of pity and shock and maybe some relief that this whirling dervish didn’t belong to them.

Tilly thrashing in her arms. “I don’t want you. I want Daddy!” she shrieked at top volume, making Yuli’s ears ring.

Every sense, every nerve in Yuli’s body was screaming for it all to stop. She grabbed Tilly’s shoulders and, Yoba forgive her, shook her daughter hard.

“Tilly, enough!” she hissed through her teeth. “We’re going. Put your shoe back on and let’s go.”

“I want Daddy! I don’t like you!” was the response.

And there it went. Her last nerve, snapped like a twig. “I know! I know! I fucking get it!” Yuli screamed back. With a sudden, wrathful strength, she heaved Tilly over her shoulder in a fireman's carry and fled, the groceries completely forgotten in the middle of the aisle. Tilly kicked wildly and beat Yuli’s back with her fists as she stomped down the path for home.

She practically threw Tilly at a flabbergasted Elliott, ignoring his confused stammering and Jasper’s wailing in the background. She locked herself in her bedroom, pressed a pillow to her face as hard as she could muster, and screamed her throat raw.

I never should have done this. I’m not meant for this. They’re going to break me. They’ve broken me.

Make it stop.

“You ended it too early,” she scoffed at him when the memory cleared. “She was four. You ever met a four year old? They’re monsters. We made cupcakes later that day. It was fine.”

In her logical mind, Yuli knew that she was a good parent. She could never outrun the mom guilt, though. It was primordial, it coiled in the back of her brain like a snake and hissed in her ear about how she never did enough, about how the stuff she did do was all wrong.

Rasmodius shrugged. “It’s not like there aren’t plenty to choose from.”

This was his plan, Yuli realized. To trick her. He was going to assail her with memories of her worst parenting moments until she second-guessed and doubted herself into a childless existence.

All because he could. All because it excited him to wield chaos and weaponize the unknown. His fucked up dove magic was his shiny new toy and there was no telling how far he would go to play with it.

She thought back to the beginning of this horrible night, her long ordeal. When she had first contemplated her great escape.

It is my brain. These are my memories. If anyone can make it stop, it’s me.

But she couldn’t make it stop. Hadn’t she learned that by now? No matter what she tried, it was no use.

But these are my fucking babies.

One summer, a magpie had nested in the rafters of her barn. Yuli had felt an uncharacteristic softheartedness and left the nest alone. But she came to regret it once autumn rolled around and the mother magpie would dive-bomb anyone who got within striking distance of the nest. They go for the eyes, Marnie had told her, nodding knowingly at Yuli’s scratched and defeated face. Next year, be sure to knock the nest down before the mama lays any eggs. She had smiled and tilted her head toward Tilly and Jasper, who were gamboling around the feed store. Guess you can’t blame her, right?

Yuli had sighed and laughed. Yeah. I guess not.

Rasmodius was watching her, a curious expression on his face. Could he see where she had gone, did he know that she was thinking of birds, of babies, of a cornered animal stuck in a trap?

He’d been poking fun at her about her anger problem all night. Laughed as she struggled to subdue the thrashing and writhing creature that inflamed her head and banged against the walls of her ribcage, demanding to be let out.

She’d been trying to deny it, to hide it, to close the proverbial door and keep the monster locked away. After all, she’d seen the damage she could do.

Then again, it had only done damage to the people she loved. She had never really gotten the chance to unleash it around the people she hated. The people who wronged her.

What would happen if…I let it out? Just for a minute? If she stepped aside and let this bastard, this villain, feel the full force of her anger. Would it work for her for once, instead of torching everything she held dear? Would it send the wizard her message? Would it tell him, here I am. You don’t fuck with me. You don’t fuck with my kids.

She opened the door. And she went for the eyes.

She felt a howl tear from her throat and it almost sounded the way the mother bird had, that grating and furious screech. She leapt at him like she had been released from a coiled spring. She didn’t even know how she was doing it, she had never jumped so far, so fast, so high. She reached out blindly, swiping furiously with hooked fingers, each swing more desperate than the last. If her nails had snagged flesh, she couldn’t feel it. If he shouted from surprise, pain, or anger, she couldn’t hear it. She could taste the metallic tang of blood, but was it hers or his?

Suddenly, she felt herself being thrown back in some invisible explosion. She sailed further and further away as the Wizard remained where he stood with his arm outstretched, flinging her away from him like a Frisbee.

But when she saw his eyes in the split second before she disappeared, she could have sworn he looked afraid.

Why can’t I stop?

Why do I keep pushing and poking instead of quitting while I’m ahead?

I could have just been fucking done, kept my head down and pushed through it, ignored all the bullshit, but I just had to be…me.

Why?

“A vacation spot for the wealthy, you say?” Yuli teased, fluttering the ornamental fan that she had brought for Gunther to assess. “How elegant.”

Gunther was cringing at every shake of the delicate, paper-thin fan, his arms halfheartedly outstretched. “Alright, okay, do you mind? I cleared off a spot on the shelf over there, next to that elvish jewelry you found. Please?”

Yuli gave him a lazy salute as she turned back towards the display shelves. “Yes, my liege.” Tormenting Gunther was one of her guilty pleasures, but she considered it compensation for the fact that she was the only one who had done any work to restore the town’s “museum.” She had a conspiracy theory that the old collection had never even existed, and the story of the old director absconding with it was just a sob story.

The door to the library slammed open with unusual force and everyone in the building jumped. Gunther raised his eyebrows. “Elliott, what on earth?”

Yuli’s heart stuttered. Much as she hated to admit it to herself, her crush on Elliott was getting out of control. Every morning was exciting, the promise of running into him by chance had her practically cartwheeling out of bed these days. You came here to work, you dizzy bitch. You came here to WORK, her brain would be screaming at her as she fiddled with her hair every morning in the mirror.

“My apologies, Gunther. It was the wind, I promise!” Elliott exclaimed over his shoulder, even as he crossed the room in three quick strides on those impossibly long legs. He stopped when he saw Yuli at the shelf. “There you are.” He was breathless, his cheeks pink and his hair wild. Yuli would have bet anything that he ran here.

“Here I am,” she answered, unable to hide a small smile. “What’s going on?”

He leaned against the shelf, slipping his hands behind his back, and looked at the ceiling. “Oh, nothing.”

“Uh huh…” She stood on her toes and peered around him. In his hands was a fat interoffice envelope hastily tied shut with red string. She gasped and covered her mouth. “Is that…?”

Elliott screwed up his lips to hide his smile, his eyes brightening.

“You finished it??”

He finally exhaled and sagged a little, the very picture of relief. “I didn’t sleep. The idea for the third act resolution, that last damned puzzle piece, just hit me at 2 in the morning and I couldn’t stop. I’ve had so much coffee, I think I may have replaced all my blood volume, I feel as though I may faint…Yuli, it’s done. I did it.”

“You did it,” she echoed, clasping her hands to her heart. “You did it, you’re holding your book right now!”

Elliott, she had come to realize, had two laughs. The first was the one he used all the time. Pleasant. Flattering. Safe. The second one was bubbly and unrestrained, like a shaken soda bottle. Like he was so giddy and taken aback that he couldn’t help but let the unpracticed sounds escape. That was the laugh he did now, the one that she could see herself becoming addicted to. The one that she would do anything to hear again.

“This is huge. We have to celebrate!” she continued. “But first…I think maybe you should sleep?” She could feel the frenetic energy coming off him, his hands were shaking so subtly that she doubted that he even noticed.

He mock-frowned, even as he swayed on his feet. “Hmm, perhaps, perhaps…”

Yuli laughed. “Sleep. And then we can celebrate. I’ll buy you the stiffest drink that Gus can legally concoct.”

Elliott nodded as he obscured the lower half of his face with the envelope. “I’ll take that deal. But first…” He slowly, hesitantly held out the manuscript to her with both hands.

She raised her eyebrows. “Oh, you want me to…?”

“Well. I mean. Usually Leah’s the one who, um, gives my drafts a once-over. But she’s not so enthusiastic about the mystery genre. But you, you said that they’re your favorite, so…as a connoisseur…you could…” He was starting to blush behind the ears. Yuli found it charming beyond all reason.

“That…wow, I’m really honored, Elliott. Thanks.” She took the envelope and nearly buckled under the weight, both literal and metaphorical. He, of course, used a typewriter so every page was single-sided and this was likely the only copy. And he trusted her with it. Wanted her to see it first.

It has to mean something.

No. Bad Yuli.

She peered at the envelope and read the title that had been painstakingly written on it. “The Blue Tower. Damn. It already sounds classy.”

He deflated somewhat and anxiously flexed his hands as though he wanted to try and grab it back. “I suppose you’re rather busy, though…you, um, mentioned something the other day about harvesting…I wouldn’t want to add something else to your plate…it’s probably too long…”

“Hey,” she cut in. She set the manuscript down on the shelf and firmly grasped his shoulders with both hands to ground him. “I’m really excited to read it. For real.”

If he felt any sort of way about her touching him, he didn’t let on. He sighed again and nodded. “Just don’t…don’t open it. Wait until I leave. Please.”

She grinned as she slowly grabbed the very end of the string holding the envelope together. “Oh, you mean…don’t do this?”

“Yuli! I don’t want to be on the same planet as anyone reading my work, let alone the same room.”

“I know. Don’t worry. Now go. We can talk about it this weekend, maybe.”

Elliott nodded, then furrowed his eyebrows and slowly shook his head. “Goodness. I can’t believe it actually slipped my mind.”

“What?”

He rubbed the corner of his mouth, seemingly lost in his own world. “I can’t. My…my mother is visiting this weekend. Here. Visiting me here. At my house.”

“Oh, yeah? Nice. Hmm, Elliott’s mom…” she pondered teasingly. “Let’s see…I’m picturing a name like ‘Muffy’ or ‘Bunny,’ sweater sets, sits on multiple charity boards…”

He smiled thinly. “It’s Beryl, actually. But yes, the rest of what you said is…apt.” The smile didn’t reach his eyes, his gaze was still far away and stormy.

“...you okay?”

He cleared his throat and rapidly nodded. “Yes. Yes, it’s good. She just…she hasn’t before. Visited, I mean. This will be…her first time seeing it.”

She knew they were both picturing Elliott’s moldering cottage, the ever present danger of it being taken by the waves. She shrugged. “Put her up at the Stardrop. Some of those rooms are probably nice. You can kill the time by giving her a tour. Hell, bring her by the farm. I can help out.” She cringed inwardly as she said the last thing. Too much, Yuli, too much.

He smiled again, warmly this time. “That’s so kind of you. Truly.”

She could tell that anxiety was starting to subsume his euphoria from earlier. She patted the envelope to bring his attention back. “Hey. This is great. Everything’s gonna be great. We’ll talk about it next week, then.”

He nodded gratefully. “Next week.”

Elliott was a good writer.

Of course he was. It was what he devoted his life to. Spent all his time doing. It was what he studied, what he talked about, what he practically breathed. But somehow, the thought had never occurred to her that he might be this good.

Every night after sundown that week, Yuli sat down to read The Blue Tower. She had practically set up a sterile field in her own home, so terrified was she of staining the pages with grease or wine. The pressure of possessing the only copy of a man’s magnum opus…it felt immense.

The manuscript felt alive, in a way. Everything about it just exuded Elliott. She could hear him saying the words, see him agonizing over every plot point. Reading it gave her the sense that she was peering directly into his heart. The pages even smelled like him – GET A GRIP.

She was so engrossed that she hadn’t realized she was chewing her thumbnail to shreds. Absently, she reached for the next page, only to find that there wasn’t one. “What - he’s just gonna leave Jenu like that?! Lu had the key the whole time??” she panic-whispered to Champ, who was snoozing on top of her feet like the world’s heaviest pair of slippers.

Ridiculously, her pulse was pounding from the plot twist at the end. She rubbed her face and exhaled. “Yoba,” she muttered. “Feel like I need a drink after that one.” But she wasn’t quite to the point of drinking alone. She glanced at the clock - plenty of time to hit the Stardrop before closing. Champ kept snoring as Yuli slipped her feet out from under him and pulled her boots on.

It was Friday night, so there were more people at the saloon than usual. There were the kids (how she referred to Abigail, Sam, and Sebastian even though they weren’t really that much younger than her) holding court at the pool table, Robin and Demetrius cutting a rug to the tinny songs coming from the jukebox, Shane and Pam stuck to the bar like barnacles on a shipwreck.

Emily greeted her with an airy wave. “Hi, Yuli. A pale ale for you?”

Yuli smiled tightly. Emily always unsettled her with this kind of thing. “Got it in one. As usual.”

She nodded sagely and reached for a pint glass. “Lots of red in your aura tonight. But interestingly, a touch of indigo.” She handed Yuli her beer and smiled dreamily as if that were a perfectly normal thing to say to someone.

“Ha…well, hopefully that only means something good.” Emily just turned and flitted somewhere else to her next task. Fuck’s sake.

Yuli headed over to what she called the Crusty Old Man Table, where Willy and Clint were sitting in companionable silence.

Do you guys even like each other? she had asked him once.

Willy had shrugged. Well enough. Doesn’t hold a candle to Jed, though.

Yeah. No one does.

“Next round on me?” she announced as she sidled up to the table.

“Evenin’, gup.” Willy patted her on the shoulder, their version of hugging. “No shadow tonight?”

“We’re not always together,” she scoffed as she plopped into the chair next to him. “Anyway, apparently his mom’s in town.”

“Not always together, she says,” Willy murmured out of the side of his mouth to Clint. The blacksmith exhaled through his nose in what Yuli assumed was a laugh.

She rounded on him. “You, sir,” she began, pointing at him. “You closed at 3:45 today. I saw that shit. Had to lug all my Omni geodes back home like a jackass.”

Clint grumbled into his pint glass. “That damn mine cart…”

“Yeah, that damn mine cart,” Yuli gloated. The cart and its track had just been repaired and she was rather enjoying the speed at which she could now whip around town and terrorize lazy blacksmiths. “I’m gonna be on your ass now, Clint. Gonna start setting up camp there.”

Willy chuckled as he reached for the dish of peanuts in the middle of the table. “Good thing that track doesn’t go out onto the beach.”

Clint’s mustache twitched as he tried and failed to hide a smirk. “Doesn’t need to, not if she’s gonna be shackin’ up with Stardew Shakespeare.”

“You guys are gross,” she muttered, turning to leave. “I changed my mind, I’m not gonna buy the next round any more–”

“Hey, whoa, hey now, gup!” Willy wheedled. “Clint didn’t mean it. In fact, he’s gonna open up shop a half hour early tomorrow, just for you. Crack open all your fancy rocks, bright and early. Ain’t that right, Clint?”

“Uh–”

“Right!” Willy finished triumphantly. “So we’re all square.”

Yuli shook her head as she headed back to the bar. “Whoring out your friend for beer. You’ve got a problem, old man. You know, there’s programs for people like you…”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah…”

Mercifully, Gus was manning the bar this time. She gave him a quick smile. “Hey, Gus. Just another round of whatever the idiots were having, please.”

Gus nodded and pulled the pints himself. He knew what the idiots were having. He knew what every idiot in this bar ever had, ever. Not in Emily’s weird telepathy way, with the premonitions and readings. But you didn’t bartend in a tiny town for 40-odd years without developing a knack for noticing things about people.

“Just tapped this keg half an hour ago, should be nice and fresh,” he announced, sliding 3 beers to her on a small round tray. “You should get some food. I’ve got a really nice artichoke dip for specials today. Today, I used a secret ingredient - your goat cheese!” He beamed.

That’s not what secret ingredient means, you silly, perfect man. “Well, I can’t very well say no to that, can I? One special, please.”

Later, on a bellyful of beer and cheese dip, Yuli sighed as she flipped through the mechanical catalog on the jukebox. Dud…trash…dud…when will Gus ever update this thing?

It was getting late. The casual crowd was long gone and only the dedicated barflies remained. It was time to call it a night, she decided. Get home somehow, throw some corn in the general direction of the chickens, take Champ out…

She stiffened as she felt a soft pressure sink down onto her shoulder. A familiar cedar-and-salt scent encased her and her eyelids reflexively fluttered. “Oh. Um, hi,” she stammered. Shit. I’m too drunk for this.

Elliott’s chin was resting on her shoulder as he peered into the backlit jukebox. “Anything catching your eye?” His voice was practically a purr, tickling her inner ear and sending a shockwave of goosebumps across the back of her neck. If she turned her head just slightly to the left, the tips of their noses would touch. Their lips would be…

He’s effusive, he’s touchy, he’s like this with everyone, her subconscious chanted in a desperate effort to snap back to reality. “Hey. Uh, nope. Same as usual, I don’t know why I keep bothering to check, honestly.”

He sighed, standing up straight, leaving Yuli’s shoulder buzzing with want. “I quite agree,” he said, nodding. “I must say that I’m feeling rather desperate for a good song right now.”

Stardew Shakespeare, Clint had called him. It was spot on, she had to admit. “Hey, wait a minute. What are you doing here?” She glanced at Elliott, then the door, then quickly scanned the rest of the bar. “Aren’t you…I thought…is she…?”

Now that she was looking at him straight on, Yuli wasn’t sure how she could have missed it. Elliott was well and truly drunk. His eyes were red-rimmed, his cheeks almost glowed pink. He had shed his jacket and tie somewhere along the way and stood there now with his white shirt in disarray. He had apparently unbuttoned some of it in an attempt to get some air, and it sagged open almost to his sternum. “Shit. Elliott, what happened?”

He just shook his head brusquely and turned away.

“But your mom–”

“Yuli, please,” he murmured through clenched teeth. He closed his eyes and exhaled through his nose, then looked at her again beseechingly. “Don’t. Please.”

His tone brooked no argument. She knew that if she brought it up again, he would bolt. And she didn’t want to imagine where he might go after that.

So the visit hadn’t gone well. That was easy enough to see. Yuli certainly knew what it was like not to want to talk about something. That much, she could understand. But it was hard, seeing him like this. Why had he come? Did he get drunk alone and set out in search of a friend, someone to distract him from his hurting heart? The thought made her want to cry.

She lowered her voice and adopted a relaxed stance to try and put him at ease. It was more than a little similar to how she would speak to a spooked animal. “Okay. Okay, fine. Let me at least fix your shirt?” She slowly gestured at his askew buttons.

He glanced down. “Oh,” he said meekly, like a chastened child.

“Yeah,” she continued. “This isn’t a strip club, you know.” He laughed, and she knew there was hope.

She channeled what remained of her drunken focus into deftly threading the buttons through their slots, leaving the top one undone at his neck. She patted him twice on the chest when she was finished, doing her best to ignore the heat of his skin and the smell of his sweat. Doing her best to ignore the fact that she had seen his chest hair and now knew that it didn’t actually match the red of his hair, it was actually more of a dark brown like his eyebrows and it would therefore stand to reason that his hair down below might look the same…

She was too drunk to scold herself the way she usually did but she was still conscious of the fact that she should probably just throw herself into the dumpster right now.

“Thank you,” Elliott said quietly. And she knew it wasn’t just for the buttons.

Willy shuffled up to them now, clapping Elliott hard on the back. “There you are, Shadow.” He looked at Elliott again, then cast a questioning sidelong glance at Yuli. “Say, looks like you really tied one on there tonight, lad.”

Yuli nodded. I’m okay. Willy might tease her about her friendship with Elliott, but she knew she could count on him to check in on her anyway. “He’s celebrating. He finished the book.”

Willy’s eyebrows shot up, he looked genuinely impressed. He shook Elliott by the shoulder, earning a sheepish smile. “No kidding! Well that changes everything. Hey, the conquering hero over here. Gus!”

Gus’s head snapped up almost instinctively. Willy held up three fingers, his voice boomed across the bar. “What say you break out a bottle of the ol’ Pirate’s Finest? The boy finished his book!”

Emily beamed and clapped, Shane silently raised his glass, Pam said “nice one, kid.” Gus hesitated, then relented immediately. “Well, alright then. It is last call, though.” He nodded at Elliott and disappeared to a room behind the bar. When he reemerged, he was carrying three rocks glasses and a large, dusty bottle of dark rum.

“Oh boy,” Yuli remarked as it was all set down on the bar in front of them. Her stomach was already starting to churn, anticipating the sickly burn of the liquor. “I dunno, man…”

“If you’re gonna drink like a sailor, you might as well do it right,” Willy informed them as he briskly poured a shot in each cup. He held his aloft. “To the famous author!”

“The famous author!” Yuli echoed, downing her glass. She shuddered and repressed a cough, clamping the back of her hand to her mouth. Just as bad as she thought.

Elliott drank his as though it were water, leisurely and smooth, seemingly beyond the point of feeling physical pain. “Next, to our friendship,” he said in a low, husky voice as he poured the next round.

“Next?” Yuli exclaimed, scandalized. “I gotta get out of here, you guys are trying to kill me…”

Elliott put his fingertips on the small of her back, his touch feather-light, and bent so that his lips were nearly touching her ear. “Don’t go. You don’t have to drink anymore. But stay with me,” he whispered. “Please?” Willy pretended to suddenly be very busy dusting off his hat.

Leaving suddenly became out of the question. She would stay there until night turned to day, then night again. She would stay there until the river ran dry. She would stay there even if she were on fire. “Okay,” was all she said.

“To friendship! And your old man, Yoba rest him,” Willy said loudly, popping the bubble of tension. He flipped Yuli’s glass upside down, duly acknowledging that she was done for the night.

“To good old Jed,” Elliott intoned, leaning against the bar. “A lucky man, from the sound of it. You two always speak of him so fondly.”

Willy’s leathery throat bobbled as he knocked back the shot, reminding Yuli of the pelicans that often perched on the pier in front of his store. “Can’t help it,” he rasped, wiping his mouth. “‘Specially now that his little girl is back out here runnin’ things. You know, sometimes I see her comin’ down the beach or I hear her out choppin’ down trees like a madman and I…” His eyes misted as he clumsily patted Yuli on the forearm. “Sometimes I forget, is all.”

Elliott was propped up on one elbow, examining the bottle of rum with his other hand. “The two of you were navy men, yes? That’s where you got the taste for Pirate’s Finest?”

“For a time. Before that, we did a couple seasons out on them shrimp boats, then the crabbers. Pass me that,” he said, gesturing to the bottle. “Turns out you really get to know a man once you share a pisspot for long enough.”

Yuli grimaced. Gus noticed and, thankfully, procured a glass of ice-cold water for her.

“Yeah,” Willy continued, getting more maudlin by the minute. “We had ourselves some times.”

“Hmmm.” Elliott swallowed his second drink and briefly let his head fall back to loll around on his neck. When he brought it back up, he smiled slyly at Willy. “Well, if we’re going to drink like sailors,” he began, a devious spark in his eye. “We ought to sing like sailors.”

Yuli groaned as Willy chortled into his glass. “The boy’s gone and lost his gourd.”

“Yeah, Ell, might wanna read the room,” she said, gesturing at the room of somber, silent drinkers.

“I don’t know, I think I actually might wanna hear this,” Willy snickered.

“Come now! It’s too quiet here and I, for one, think we’re all sick to death of the same old songs. Willy, you must know plenty from when you were out at sea all those years. Let’s hear one!”

Willy forced out an awkward chuckle. “Was never much of a singer, really. Sure as hell not gonna be winnin’ one of those singing contests, Valley Idol and whatnot.”

“Aw, but you’ve got the looks for it,” Yuli teased. The old man rolled his eyes.

“Oh, nor am I,” Elliott laughed, holding a hand to his heart. “I’ve been told that I…what is it? Can’t carry a tune in a bucket…at least I think that’s how the expression goes. Anyway, it’s not the point, is it? The point is…” He held up a finger and pointed to Willy. “He who sings scares away his woes.”

“Yoba wept, he still does his fancy quotes when he’s shithoused?” Willy muttered incredulously. Yuli shrugged.

“Indeed he does! No changing the subject. Regale us with tunes from a bygone era,” Elliott said, holding his hand out and wiggling his fingers imperiously. “Yuli tells me you were something of the cad in your day.”

Willy waved dismissively. “Let it go, lad. Believe me.”

“Fine, then.” When Elliott smiled like that, like a child about to stick his hand into the cookie jar, Yuli could see the boy he’d once been. It got her thinking of his mother again, of what must have led to this point. “You’ve left me no choice. I’ll sing one so poorly that you’ll have to correct me.”

He winked at her and tilted his head back. “We are two mariners--”

“WAIT!” Everyone jumped as Gus’s voice boomed. Yuli had no idea he was even listening to their conversation. He ran back to that room behind the bar, faster than she had ever seen him move. Everyone at the bar stared at the saloon doors, waiting to see him come back.

When he did return, he was carrying a violin, clearly old but lovingly cared for. “Okay,” he panted. “Now I’m ready!”

“Oh shit,” Yuli wheezed, hiding her laughter behind her hand. Willy was frozen, like he could sense the shrinking window of opportunity for escape.

“Marvelous! Now I’ve really got you, Willy. Ahem.” Suddenly and with surprising agility, Elliott sprang up and stood on top of the bar. He held a hand out to the fisherman, who glowered.

“Not on your life, lad, famous author or not. Quit prancing around up there.”

“Aw, come on, old timer. Show us how it’s done,” Yuli chimed in.

“You’re supposed to be on my side!”

Elliott shrugged and used that hand to grab his glass instead. “It’s a lonely place, the stage.” He drained it and cleared his throat.

“We are two mariners

Our ship’s sole survivors

In this belly of a whale…”

He trailed off and held out his hand to Willy again. This time, the other townsfolk joined in.

“Go on, Willy!”

“Let’s hear it!”

“Wil-ly! Wil-ly!”

Gus waited, his bow hovering over the strings. The look on Willy’s face could curdle milk. But at last, he sighed and made a big production of taking another drink. Then sang, in a creaky baritone. “Its ribs are ceiling beams, its guts are carpeting, I guess we have some time to kill…”

A mighty cheer erupted around the room, prompting Willy to finally clamber up on top of the bar with Elliott. Gus began sawing out some rusty notes that could reasonably fit a sea shanty. Someone had begun stomping their feet to the beat, and soon they all joined in.

“You may not remember me, I was a child of three and you a lad of eighteen…”

Elliott had been correct. He was not a good singer. But he was one of those maddeningly confident people who made that fact almost unnoticeable. And there was something about the reassuring way that he had his hand on Willy’s shoulder, that he was willing to risk humiliation to make a bitter old salt smile and relive the glory days…even though he was in so much pain himself…

You’re on your own, Yuli’s disapproving inner voice told her feral, smitten id.

When they reached the chorus, Willy pointed at her. “Go on, gup. You know this part calls for a lass’s voice,” he shouted as she studiously pretended to ignore him.

“Yuli! You know the song?” Elliott cried, his grin widening. Willy was nodding fervently, thirsting for vengeance.

She did know the song. Jed and Willy had sung it together since before she could remember. They taught her the words when she was barely old enough to speak, and Yuli’s grandmother had swatted them over the head with a newspaper. They would sit around the fire pit, sing it, and roar with laughter long into the night while Yuli was trying to sleep. She never minded, though. After a while, her grandfather’s laughter was as comforting to her as the crickets in summertime.

Feeling dozens of eyes on her, she swallowed her rising bile. But finally, she sang.

“Find him, bind him

Tie him to a pole and break his fingers to splinters

Drag him to a hole until he wakes up naked

Crawling at the ceiling of his grave.”

Pam cheered. Clint banged out the drum beat on the table with his fist. Emily twirled around the room. Even Shane was smiling. And Willy…for a second, he wasn’t the hunched and shrunken figure that doomed himself to walk the rest of his days alone. Before Yuli’s eyes, he almost turned back to the stalwart, ruddy-cheeked giant of a man she had known in her youth.

Elliott did this. Elliott made this happen. She could build a hundred community centers and it wouldn’t come close to this.

And nobody knew. Nobody saw.

They didn’t see him…because he didn’t want them to see him, Yuli realized. He was okay with the fact that they all saw him as an oddity, a silly and pretentious figure, just as long as it drew attention away from the scared, sad side of him.

But what about her?

He had run to the library and practically thrown The Blue Tower at her. He had sagged onto her shoulder tonight, drunk and disheveled and practically in tears. Stay with me. Please?

It meant something. It had to.

Willy linked arms with Elliott and hopped around in a do-si-do. Elliott threw back his head and laughed, the sound ricocheting off the walls. The song ended with a cacophony of stomping, clapping, and violin screeches.

Willy sat down gingerly and scooted off the bar. He grabbed Gus near the back of his neck and shook him, shouting playfully about “look at this guy, who’s this fine fiddlin’ man?”

“You guys gonna get the band back together?” Yuli asked, laughing. “Gonna take this show on the road?”

Gus set down the violin and slung his bar towel back onto his shoulder. “Thanks for the fun, Elliott. Now get off my bar.” He flicked the light switch on and off, and everyone began the slow leaving process simultaneously.

Elliott saluted and jumped down, nearly going boneless at the knees when he landed. Willy grabbed him by the elbow and hauled him back up. “Easy does it. Hey,” he said, boxing Elliott’s ear affectionately. “Well done on the book, lad. Really.” He nodded a farewell to Yuli and shuffled toward the door, holding the bottle of Pirate’s Finest aloft. “Her tab, Gus.”

“Hey!” Yuli screeched.

The rum seemed to hit Elliott all at once, like a runaway train. He was fighting it valiantly, but his head was starting to droop as he quietly hummed the song they were just singing. “Where to next?” he asked Yuli, barely able to keep himself from slurring.

“Uh, home,” Yuli said firmly, slinging her arm around him and hustling him out like a bodyguard. “Home next. And water. And bed.” With you lying on your side, preferably…

“Oh, no,” Elliott pouted. “Should be me walking the lady home, the lady that needs walking home…” Even as he protested, he still went compliantly into the chilly night.

The weight of this situation slowly dawned on her. It was 2 AM. Home was all the way across town. Her intoxicated crush was loping alongside her, tripping over loose cobblestones and laughing softly. It was one of those nights that felt significant and not quite real at the same time.

“That was fun. You’ve got a nice singing voice,” he drawled.

“Thanks. Uh…you too?”

He snorted and nudged her with his shoulder. “Filthy liar, you.”

She smiled and nudged him back. “It was fun, though,” she acknowledged. You probably made Willy’s whole month.”

Elliott was fighting a losing battle for steadiness. “You know, I don’t think I care for rum very much,” he mumbled breezily. “In fact, I think I may despise it.” He bobbed and weaved along the bridge between the town square and the beach, teetering ever closer to the river.

His precarious balance set her teeth on edge. “Should I…do you want me to get someone?” she asked feebly, stopping in the middle of the bridge and jerking her thumb in the direction of Cindersap Forest. “I know it’s late, but do you want me to go get Leah?”

She regretted it as soon as she said it. Ugly feelings simmered inside her. She didn’t want to go get Leah. She didn’t want to hear him say “yes, please go get Leah,” didn’t want Leah to come and say “okay, I’ve got it from here,” didn’t want to turn around and walk home like an idiot because Leah made things better just by existing…

He shook his head and mimed taking a field sobriety test, trying (failing) to walk in a straight line with his arms outstretched. “No, no. All is well, you have performed your duty admirably.” He sketched a bow and grimaced when he straightened up too fast.

They had made it to the beach, Elliott traipsing around and cackling when he sank down to his ankles in the deep, unpacked sand. You have performed your duty admirably. He was home. She had done the right thing, and now she should go. That was what she should do.

Seemingly separate from her brain and the rest of her body, Yuli heard her mouth say, “I don’t really feel okay leaving you alone right now.”

Elliott had finally given up and taken off his shoes, dumping out the sand. His face brightened at her words. “So don’t! Stay here and we can watch the sun come up. You ever seen a sunrise out here? It’s so marvelous.”

She had, many times, on early fishing trips with her grandfather. Plus the sunrise was still hours away. But she didn’t feel like correcting him. She wanted to put shouldn’t and can’t to bed for the night and just…be. So she sat with her back against the dune next to Elliott’s cabin. It felt so good to sit, to rest her head against something. The sand felt cool against her skin. It made for a nice contrast for the flame of her blood when Elliott flopped down next to her, so tantalizingly close.

Something felt different about the scenery. Something was missing. “Hey, what happened to the boat?” she asked.

He opened his mouth as if to say something, then decided against it and shrugged. “That old thing. Finally turned it into firewood like everyone’s been telling me to.”

“Sad,” she teased. “No pirate’s life for Elliott.”

He groaned good-naturedly and rested his head against the dune, his eyes fluttering closed.

They sat in silence for a while, just listening to the quiet hissing of the nearby waves. It didn’t feel awkward, Yuli noted with a nervous delight. It felt normal to just pass time with him.

“Hey,” she stage-whispered. “Elliott. You awake?”

“No,” he whispered back, his eyes still closed. He smiled.

She turned her head, relishing the feel of the soft sand on her cheek. “Do you want to talk about…what happened tonight?”

His whole body stiffened. He opened his eyes, and the sadness in them plus the set of his jaw had her wishing she could cut out her own tongue.

“Never mind,” she said hastily. “I’m sorry.”

“She…” His voice cracked. He cleared his throat and chuckled ruefully. “She wouldn’t get out of the car.”

Yuli lifted her head to stare at him. “...what?”

“She took one look at me and just kind of…shook her head and left.”

“What the fuck? Why?”

He laughed again and shook his head. “If I had to guess? My hair. I haven’t seen her since I moved out here and it’s…well, it’s grown. A lot.” He absent-mindedly wound a lock of the offending hair around his pointer and middle fingers. “I think she saw me and my hippie hair, you know, the bus stop and Pam was nearby, and…I think it was rather too much for her.”

“So you haven’t seen her in over a year…but because you grew your hair out…she…just totally blows you off?” she said incredulously.

“I know, I know how it sounds. She didn’t look angry,” he continued. “More like…disappointed. She was quite opposed to my moving here to begin with, naturally. Wasn’t her plan for me.”

“Still, it’s no excuse for her to be so shitty to you.” She gestured around them. “Yeah, it’s not exactly a palace but you’ve got a good setup here. You’ve got friends, you’re living life on your terms.”

“Exactly!” He nodded slowly. “I’ve told her that I’m happy here. I’ve never asked her for money. And I think that galls her. I think she wants me to fail. Wants me to crash and burn out here, then come crawling back to the nest. At least, that’s what she always said would happen.”

“That really sucks, Elliott. I’m so sorry.”

He turned on his side to face her, cheek to the sand, mirroring her posture. “Part of me can’t help but feel that I led her on, going along with things for so long. It was always just the two of us. You know, no siblings, father was a nonentity…there was always the expectation that I would join the company with her. That I would take her place after she retired, marry one of the dancers and settle down, while still always cleaving to her…”

“Dancers…?”

Elliott shook his head as if to clear it. “Right, sorry. Zuzu City Ballet. Mother’s the, um, general director.”

“Oh, wow.” She could have laughed. Of course, it had to be ballet. Beautiful, willowy girls orbiting Elliott like graceful satellites. Lifting them up, his hands circling their well-defined waists…

“And I almost did it, that’s the thing. I almost gave her exactly what she wanted. They had set up an interview for me on the creative team…perfunctory, of course. I would have gotten it. My girlfriend was about to be tapped for prima, and…” He shrugged. “I woke up one day and I couldn’t breathe. Because I looked in the mirror and didn’t know who I was. I couldn’t see where my mother ended and where I began…if I even began at all. So now…here I am.” He was staring at the horizon, his expression solemn and distant. “I suppose it’s an artist’s rite of passage, isn’t it? To break your mother’s heart.” He grabbed a handful of sand and let it filter through his fingers. A lone tear slid down his cheek and left a shining path.

She debated telling him that she had read The Blue Tower. That his talent was real, that this had all been worth it, that soon he could be getting everything he’d ever wanted. It all seemed too heavy now. “You’re right where you’re meant to be,” she said simply. “You know what? I’m glad you’re not a playboy ballet millionaire.”

The corners of his lips quirked upward into a smile that did not quite reach his eyes. “You make it sound so much more appealing than it actually is.”

“And you know what else? I like your hair.” And before she could stop herself, she reached out and brushed some sweaty strands off his temple and tucked them behind his ear, making sure to wipe away his tear in the process.

Without taking his eyes off her, he held her wrist in place and slowly rubbed his cheekbone across her palm. “You do?” His energy, his very presence, burned with a quiet intensity.

Usually his eyes had her helpless, pinned like an insect under a child’s magnifying glass. But now she met his gaze head-on, she could feel her confidence emanating from her like light through a prism. She felt immovable, powerful, as she gently cupped his beautiful face. “Yeah, I do.”

He turned his head toward her hand a little more, she could feel his eyelashes brushing her thumb, his lips barely skimming across the skin of her palm. He exhaled, released her wrist, and said, in a voice that was quiet yet firm:

“Not right now. Not like this.”

Time slowed, planets shifted, his voice rang through her head with its true meaning clear as a bell. He was confirming every neurotic thought she’d ever had about him, about his feelings. It meant something. I want you, too. But not while I’m drunk. Not when I’m mourning my mother. Not when this can’t be what we both deserve.

Yuli smiled as a sense of peace washed over her. It was an unusual feeling for her - this beatific patience. Her entire body relaxed, she felt like she could finally breathe. “Yeah. Later.”

Sunrise wasn’t too far off after all.

Chapter 12: Mae

Chapter Text

“Oh, yes,” Leah whispered. They had happened upon a particularly thick patch of spring onions. She whipped out a thin weeding knife and started to dig with gusto.

It was Female Foraging Friday - some silly tradition the two of them had started that seemed to just…stick around. Elliott never joined them. “I shan’t interfere, you two enjoy your double, double toil and trouble,” he declared groggily from his blanket nest in bed.

Yuli wouldn’t call Leah a friend, per se. But she also didn’t particularly mind her company. She even looked forward to it, the comforting ritual of waking up early and walking to Leah’s cabin, shrouded in the morning mist. They would walk in silence until they found something interesting. Leah was the one who taught her how to use all the parts of a dandelion. “Tea,” she had said, holding up the thready roots. “Salad,” plucking off the jagged green leaves. “Something sweet.” She pinched off some petals and popped them in her mouth with a grin.

Yuli had to concede that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if Leah were her friend.

She unearthed a plump onion and beat it against the ground to knock off the bulk of the dirt. “How much do you know about Beryl?” she blurted out.

“Elliott’s mom?” Leah faltered somewhat. “I mean…I’ve only heard stories.”

“None of them good, I take it,” Yuli sighed, sitting back on her haunches. “I’m meeting her this weekend. I feel like I have no clue what I’m about to walk into.”

“Yikes. Sorry. I’d help you if I could, honest.” Leah shrugged. “And look, for all I know, it’s not that bad. It just sounded like…one of those sonsband situations.”

Yuli raised her eyebrows. “What?”

Leah gathered the spring onions in a neat pile and straightened them in her large, flat basket. “A son-husband. You know, single mom, he’s her only child, nobody’s good enough…a sonsband.”

Yuli tipped her head back and groaned. “Fuck.”

Leah laughed and extended a hand for Yuli to pull herself up to a standing position. “Hey, look at it this way. You guys are already married. What’s the worst that could happen?”

Yuli considered herself a relatively adventurous eater. Willing to try anything, no allergies or sensitivities, no issues with unusual textures or smells.

The exception was duck. Everything about eating duck disgusted her. The slimy, studded skin. The sickening richness and thickness of the fat. The unsettling pinky-brown color of the meat. She just couldn’t do it. Once a morsel crossed her lips, her entire body would short-circuit in an attempt to expel the offending bite.

Rich people, she had come to learn, eat a lot of duck. Or, at least, Beryl did.

She would never come to them. Elliott had accepted that by now. After he went through with the wedding, he had been officially disinherited and unofficially disavowed. But after the paperback run for The Blue Tower topped the bestseller list again, Beryl gradually came sniffing back around.

“Her friends and donors are probably asking about me,” he muttered, staring at the postcard she had mailed him as an apparent icebreaker, a peace offering. “It must drive her absolutely mad. Not knowing what to say when she’s asked about her son, the writer.”

It was an announcement of the Zuzu Ballet Company’s lineup for the upcoming season. The focal point, adorned with the iconic feathered headpiece from Swan Lake, was Elliott’s ex-girlfriend. Natalya. Frozen en pointe, prima ballerina assoluta, her spine ramrod-straight, her facial expression almost orgasmic.

Yuli had brought in the mail on her way back from the mines, covered in slime and soot. She snorted, trying to quell the desire to wallow in jealousy and comparison. “Oh, sure.”

It was an uneasy truce. Beryl was never outright rude or hostile to Yuli’s face. But there was no shortage of passive aggression. When her icy green eyes would flick down to Yuli’s unmanicured hands and back up to her face, a quick but unmistakable judgment. When she referred to Yuli as her, the girl from the farm, my son’s friend.

Yuli had overheard the last one on the phone once. She stalked over to where Elliott was sitting on the couch and bent down close to the speaker. “Yeah, such a good friend, one who licks his –”

Elliott rocketed up and bolted from the room. “Yes, my wife sends her love, thank you, Mother...”

But Beryl would never deign to cross the threshold of Fiddlehead Farm, would never sit by the campfire in front of the cabin on the beach and watch the boats creep along the horizon. Would never walk beside her son as he showed her his new life, would never take in the places and the people of the town.

“It’s just her way,” he used to say when he was still in denial, when he still had hope. “Perhaps she’ll come around to the idea later on.”

Right…

If he wanted to see his mother, it had to be on her turf. They would have to borrow Marnie’s truck, or let Pam drive the rickety bus to the train station. They would have to take the train to Zuzu City, then the subway to the upper west side of the city. They would have to emerge from the dark cave of the underground station and walk 3 blocks to a grand old apartment building. The well-dressed and imperious doorman had known Elliott since he was a child, now they exchanged the back-patting, one-armed hugs of generically acquainted men. “Oh, man. Bet she doesn’t like that,” he had chuckled when he first saw Elliott’s long hair as he ushered them into the elevator.

He still fits here, Yuli would think as she watched Elliott joke with the doorman or expertly navigate the crush of people boarding the subway car. All the stories he told of growing up in the city, poor little rich boy, were one thing. Seeing him in the actual environment was another. He would always be the Elliott she met, who would roll up his pant legs and prowl the shore for oysters and mussels straight from the shell when his grocery money ran low, she reassured herself. Still her Elliott. But here in the city, it was harder to see.

They would ride that elevator up 35 floors, to the penthouse unit overlooking the park. The doors would gracefully swish open and there she would be, waiting for them in the marble lobby that was bedecked with orchids and seasonal flowers.

Though she doubtless had “people” who could do this work for her, Beryl would always tend to the plants herself. That’s how they would always find her upon their arrival, with a ridiculously impractical crystal plant mister or tiny pruning shears in hand. Every time, Yuli would think of the sad, stubborn rose in Elliott’s old cabin. Do you think it’s wilting? She wanted to swipe one of the priceless vases off the sideboard like an angry cat.

She was tiny and delicate, sylph-like in a way that had Yuli feeling like a moose that had been hit with a tranquilizer dart. Elliott had clearly inherited his height from his father - he towered over Beryl by a full foot. Where his mother’s were porcelain-pale and flawlessly free of blemishes, his cheeks were sun-kissed and speckled like a robin’s egg. His eyes were the deep green of a glass bottle, hers were light and cool like celery. Her hair was more of a burnished copper, streaked with gold and gray. They did share the same fine-boned features and expressive eyebrows, the same mellifluous way of speaking.

On weekends, Beryl would wear loungewear - but not real loungewear. It was the loungewear of the wealthy, where something would look comfortable but feel stiff and quick to stain. Silk caftans. Linen jumpsuits. She would embrace Elliott warmly, then give Yuli an air kiss on each cheek. Yuli just knew that her perfume had ingredients that sounded like they had come out of a fantasy series. Vetiver. Bergamot.

They would then be escorted to the solarium for lunch. Never the dining room, only a gorgeous sun-soaked corner where Beryl had her more informal meals, more relaxed occasions. Like trying to lure your son away from the witch who holds him captive out in the country…

In the solarium, on a beautiful round glass table set for three, would be the duck. Always fucking duck, Yuli thought miserably. Today’s iteration was duck a l’orange. Plump slices of decadent, crispy-skinned duck breast interspersed with bright, juicy orange segments. A side salad of peppery microgreens and watermelon radish.

Without fail, Beryl would eat a mere third of what was served and not really seem to enjoy it, even as she extolled the wizardry of her chef. Elliott always ate his entire serving and would sometimes help Yuli out by furtively whisking the duck off her plate and onto his own when Beryl’s back was turned. Yuli crunched through the salad and picked out the orange slices.

“Why won’t you let me just tell her that you don’t like duck?” he had asked her once, after they had come home from the second of these duck-centered visits that had left Yuli famished.

She had looked up from the sandwich she was gobbling and fervently shook her head. “No way. Makes me sound childish. And that would mean, she wins.”

Elliott, hopelessly frustrated, closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “ What?”

She pointed to him and took another bite. “Not a word. I mean it. Swear.”

He shook his head, his face pained. “I can’t be…darling, I’m not worth all this.”

Tense and tedious as they were, Yuli grew to love these visits. Everything she could learn about Elliott and his past life felt like a gift to uncover. She had never loved a man this much, never felt that insatiable need to know every version of him. It was all she could do not to grab Beryl by those spindly shoulders and grill her endlessly about the minutiae of his childhood. What was he like as a baby? What was his first word? What did he do when he stayed home sick from school? When they finally coaxed Beryl into digging out the old photo albums, Yuli desperately tried to commit each picture to memory. The impish toddler. The gawky preteen.

They were so alike, she marveled. Both mother and son cloaked their true selves in gentility, in clever turns of phrase, in those alluring green eyes. Smoke and mirrors, no real person involved. When she finally realized this, Yuli had felt an immense lifting of pressure, the disappearance of any intimidation. Because now she saw the situation for what it was - theater.

The sumptuous lunches, the nostalgic stories, the overall ease of city life…it was all shiny set dressing for Beryl’s true aim - to make Elliott miss it all so much that he had no choice but to come crawling back home.

“We just finished the run for La Esmeralda. Natalya was…just a triumph, Elliott. There was a bit of drama with her ankle earlier in the season, but she persevered so admirably…” Beryl pressed a hand to her heart, as if overcome by emotion.

Elliott’s expression didn’t betray any irritation, just the slightest twitch of the muscle between his jaw and his ear. “Wonderful. She always worked very hard, I’m happy to hear she’s getting recognition for that,” he said evenly.

“It might have been nice of you to come and show your support. It would have meant a great deal to her.” She took a sip of water that was more for theatrics than for hydration. “You know you can use our box any night, all you have to do is say when.”

Elliott exhaled through his nose and his body language went on the defensive immediately. “Mother–”

“We should go,” Yuli exclaimed with a false brightness, placing her hand on his shoulder and lightly squeezing. “That would be so fun. I don’t think I’ve seen the ballet since I was a kid, probably The Nutcracker or something.”

Beryl smiled tightly, her face an uncomfortable mask. No doubt she had seen the way her son had relaxed under Yuli’s touch. “Well. I’m sure the farm keeps you…very busy. And, as I said, the run has concluded.”

Yuli knew good and damn well that only Elliott was included in the offer of Beryl’s oh-so-special box seats. After all, his wife being in attendance would only ruin the fantasy Beryl probably had of his emotional reunion with Natalya. Graceful, perfect Natalya, the daughter-in-law that got away. Yuli would have bet anything that duck a l’orange had been her favorite. The sudden realization made her smile.

She looked Beryl square in the eye and speared a large slice of duck breast with her fork. “What a shame,” she said lightly, before popping it in her mouth.

It was a big piece. Too big. There was something pleasantly carnivorous and primal about sinking her canines into a hunk of game meat. That was the only thing pleasant about it. Grease gushed out with every chew, her taste buds were screaming, her throat muscles were about ready to throw in the towel…but she chewed slowly, neatly, keeping her face as neutral and dignified as possible, never taking her eyes off Beryl’s. She could feel Elliott staring at her, holding his breath, waiting for the fallout.

What if I very literally “ate her lunch,” Beryl? What are you going to do about it?

She felt a twinge in her heart. Here she was playing mind games with an old-money millionaire via duck. And Elliott somehow didn’t think he was worth it. He didn’t know that she would endure a thousand tense lunches, a million pointed postcards, just to be the place he called home.

“Excuse me,” she said sweetly, rising from her seat and placing her cloth napkin onto the table. She turned and walked slowly, leisurely, as if she had all the time in the world. She felt their eyes boring holes into her back as she walked, then turned a corner and walked further, further back into the apartment, towards the guest bathroom all the way on the other side.

She locked the door behind her, and spread out one of the fine monogrammed hand towels onto the floor in front of the toilet. She gently knelt down on it, gripping the edge of the toilet bowl with one hand and sweeping her hair out of her face with the other.

Then, and only then, did the duck make its reappearance. Followed by the salad, the oranges, and everything else she had eaten that day. Maybe even everything she had eaten in her entire life. Her diaphragm heaved violently as she tried to silence the sound of her retching. Stomach acid burned her throat and tingled in her mouth.

Was this what winning looked like?

As she washed her hands, she scanned the bathroom for toothpaste or mouthwash, anything to get the bitter smell and taste out of her breath. She found a tiny tube of travel toothpaste, squeezed a pea-sized dollop onto her fingertip, and popped it in her mouth. She checked her eyes in the mirror to make sure they weren’t too bloodshot. They weren’t. She looked fine.

I’m not so bad, am I? I don’t look bad. Yuli sniffed and straightened her shoulders, centering herself. Beryl always treated her like she was some inbred hick spitting sunflower seeds onto her plush high-pile carpets. I grew up here too, you asshole. I went to fucking college.

It didn’t matter, she thought as she opened the door to the hallway. It didn’t matter who she was. It mattered who she was not.

In the hallway, the picture hung there in its usual spot. Prominent, a place of honor, where even the most casual visitor could see. The watermark on the bottom right corner, ZCB Winter Star Gala. Two nondescript old men with rhyming names - Terry and Gary? Barry and Larry? Yuli couldn’t remember. The Company’s general director and the chairman of the board, Elliott had told her once. They sat glowering in their chairs, twin gargoyles in bespoke tuxedos.

Next was Beryl in elegant black, with a pale lavender scarf draped around her twiggy elbows. She was looking at something off camera, her eyes alert and her lips pursed in a coy smirk. Next to her, the dutiful son. Elliott slouched slightly in his chair, as if trying to conceal his prodigious height. He looked devastatingly handsome in his slim-cut tuxedo and his movie star hair, short on the sides and longer on top. A small smile, no teeth. His arm was draped over the back of the chair next to him.

Natalya was looking over her bare shoulder, wearing a pearly gray halter top gown that left the sharp planes of her back exposed. She was the bright spot in this solemn tableau, her big brown eyes twinkled, her face was frozen mid-laugh. So vibrant, so fulfilled. So in love. So oblivious to the storm clouds gathering behind her lover’s eyes. Heartbreakingly unaware that, come the spring, he would be gone.

“She didn’t really know me,” he had whispered to Yuli once. They were in one of their early relationship post-coital fugues, when they couldn’t touch each other enough, when they would have confessed to anything. “It wasn’t her fault, though. She wanted to. I wouldn’t let her.”

They were lying on their sides facing each other, their limbs intertwined. She wasn’t sure what time it was, not even if it was morning or night. They hadn’t eaten in hours. But still she buried her face in his hair as he kissed down her neck, still she wound her leg around his waist to keep him inside her, to stay connected. “Why?” she whispered back.

His eyes were heavy-lidded but he still brushed his thumb over her lips, still smiled when she took it in her mouth. “Just afraid, I suppose,” he mumbled. “Sometimes, when I write, I become so terribly self-involved. And when I get that way, I get to feeling as though there’s no one in the world who could possibly understand me. And the idea of a wife, of children…it all becomes so daunting. It became so easy for me to decide that it would be better for everyone if I were on my own.” He took his wet thumb from her mouth and circled her nipple with it, even though he was still sensitive and overstimulated from their last round. A man possessed. “Do you think me a terrible coward?”

“No.” She traced his cheekbones with both thumbs, cupping his face in her palms. “But if you did that to me…”

It felt too vulnerable to admit that, if he did that to her, she didn’t know what she would do. That if he did that to her, she might die.

She rubbed his shoulders then placed her fingertips on his neck, miming a throttling gesture. “If you do that to me, Yoba help you,” she finally said.

Her tone was teasing, but there was a very real stab of insecurity deep in the back of Yuli’s brain. Who was to say that she was any different, that she was immune to something that this man had already done to someone else?

“I could never.” He covered her hands with his and pressed down so she was gripping his neck harder, practically purring as he did so. He liked this sometimes - a little manhandling, a little pain. “You’re the only one to whom I’ve shown my true self.”

She clenched her pelvic muscles around him, smiling when she heard his shuddering gasp. “This true self…I like him. I want him here all the time.” She pulled him closer and pressed her forehead against his. “So, don’t take him away from me. Okay?”

“Don’t fret, my love,” he whispered into her mouth. “Wherever you go, there he’ll be.”

Yuli stopped walking, hovering just behind the doorway in the hall. The duck had thankfully been cleared away and replaced with small silver bowls holding dainty scoops of a deep purple sorbet - pomegranate, she assumed. All of Elliott’s favorites, really busting out all the stops for the sonsband, she thought wryly.

Their backs were to her, but she stayed breathlessly still. Elliott was absently swirling the cold dregs of his coffee. Beryl was leaned in close to him, talking urgently.

“--and she looked positively green. Surely she isn’t…there isn’t…is there something you’re trying to tell me?”

“I’m not discussing this with you,” Elliott replied, shaking his head.

“So does that mean there’s something to discuss? Elliott–” She grabbed his wrist from across the table, her eyes wide.

He snatched his arm away and narrowed his eyes. “Not at present, no,” he said coolly. “But given the intensity of your reaction, I almost wish there were.”

Beryl picked at some invisible lint on her sleeve, clearly ruffled. “Just continue to take precautions, that’s all I ask. Marriage is one thing, but children are so…permanent.”

“Coming here was a mistake,” he muttered. “Would it truly be so terrible, Mother, if I were to find happiness and have a child of my own? You couldn’t possibly muster up any decency for that?”

“Enough!” Beryl hissed, somehow speaking without moving her lips. Yuli wondered if this was how she had told Elliott off for misbehaving in public when he was a child. Keeping a straight face while the threats poured unrestrained.

“This identity crisis of yours has gone on quite long enough. I won’t pretend that I was thrilled to watch you fritter away your time and talent in obscurity, in that…hovel, but I could endure it. Everyone told me that you just needed some breathing room, that young men need to roam, that I would only lose you if I interfered, fine. I have been more than tolerant. I let you break a good woman’s heart, grow your hair like a fool, wear that thing around your neck,” she said, motioning to the mermaid pendant nestled in his collarbone. “Because, unsavory as it may be in the short term, all can be fixed. All can be forgiven. Just, please, do not do something that you will come to regret. Do not bring a child into this situation.”

Elliott slammed his cup down onto the table, making Yuli and Beryl both jump. “So many chances,” he snarled. “I have given you so many chances…”

Waiting in the wings, Yuli weighed her options. She could hang back and wait for Elliott to fight back, to sing her praises and valiantly come to her defense, to say how she was the woman he loved and that he would stay by her side until the bitter end. She could wait for him to jump to his feet, storm to the exit, and renounce his mother for good. That would be the choice for someone who wanted to win.

Not someone who had already won.

“Is that pomegranate sorbet?” she chirped, marching across the solarium and breezily taking her seat.

Beryl cleared her throat and pretended to roll up her cloth napkin. Elliott was biting the inside of his cheek, his eyes murderous. The tension was so thick that Yuli could almost chew on it.

She waited a beat, shrugged, and pulled the silver dish closer. “Looks good,” she announced to no one in particular.

Elliott blinked and shook his head slightly, as if he had just woken up. “It is good,” he answered hoarsely. He scooped a small spoonful and held it to her lips. She let him feed it to her, savoring the cold, tart flavor as it melted on her tongue. She could feel Beryl watching in stony silence.

“Mmm,” she said, and smiled her smile that wasn’t for show. He exhaled and smiled back, his eyes crinkling at the corners. For a moment, they were more in sync than they’d ever been. The city around them dissolved and it was just her and her Elliott. She could see him again, even in this fussy penthouse.The one who made terrible driftwood sculptures with Leah and showed them to Yuli while nearly crying from laughter. The one who softly sang Jeff Buckley as he helped her mend the fences that the goats had breached for the millionth time. The one who woke up with her at the ass-crack of dawn every day, even though he had nowhere in particular to be.

Wherever we go, there you are.

“Think it’s about that time?” she suggested. She hadn’t even finished the sentence before Elliott started nodding.

“Let’s go home.”

“Did you ever dance?” she asked him.

They were crabbing - filling wire cages with pungent chicken necks and tossing them off the pier. Later, she would steam their catch and dig out the lumps of meat with her fingers, dipping them in egg yolk and wheat flour, then frying the cakes in oil. Her favorite person’s favorite meal, for his birthday tomorrow.

She asked because she had just seen him leap over her tackle box with particular grace. It would explain a lot - his ever-straight back, his fluid movements. Light in the loafers, she had heard Pam say once.

Elliott raised his arms over his head like a music box figurine, keeping his face neutral. “For a time. Something to do after school while Mother was working.”

She could picture it perfectly, the bored teen mechanically helping the girls practice their lifts in between geometry proofs. “You think, if we had kids, you would want them to –”

“No,” he cut her off. “Never.” He was looping an extra length of twine around his shoulder and elbow to keep it orderly. He was the only one patient enough to ever work out all the knots, whereas Yuli would just use her knife to wildly hack everything free.

She hesitated. “Never kids or never ballet?”

His face softened. “Oh, my sweet. I apologize, that was rather brusque of me.” He carefully laid the loop on the pier and kissed her temple. “The latter, my love. Having grown up in that world, I…I just don’t have much to recommend it.”

Relief flooded her but she didn’t want to show it. She shrugged. “I just think the little outfits are cute.”

“The little outfits could be arranged, I suppose,” he conceded.

They worked in silence for a while.

Finally, he spoke again. “I think, if we do go that route, I’d like to have at least two.” His voice was so soft that the waves threatened to drown it out.

She squeezed his hand. He’d been unusually pensive lately. Probably had to do with his birthday, the passage of another year. “Yeah. Not a lonely only like us, huh?” she said, smiling.

He returned the smile. “Just not in that respect. Personally, I’d consider myself quite fortunate to have a child like you.”

Elliott, thank everything above, did not do the whole “you’re Yuli’s mother? I thought you were her sister!” song and dance when he met her parents for the first time.

Instead, he did what he always did - he listened, really listened, to what they said and quietly hoarded every piece of information like a dragon. Then he would shine each tidbit up and present it back to them at the best possible moment, when it felt like a precious jewel.

He shook hands with her father and discussed the ongoing Gotoro conflict as adroitly as though he were a political correspondent, even though she had never once seen him watch the news. Her mom made a casual mention of how much she liked sourcing antique furniture. Before they returned home the next day, Elliott slipped her the phone number of Zuzu’s most highly sought-after antiques dealer with a note.

Dearest Mae, Nils is a family friend. He knows to expect your call.

“He’s really something, isn’t he?” her mom exclaimed, grabbing a clean dish towel. “I mean, wow…”

Yuli laughed and handed her a wet bowl. “Yeah…it’s going really well. I…I really like him a lot.”

“No kidding! You two look just beautiful together. And I gotta tell ya, I’m so happy that you’ve found someone out here.” Mae rubbed the bowl dry and placed it in the cabinet above her head with a sigh. “I worry about you, you know, all by yourself.”

Despite herself, Yuli felt her lips twisting into a scowl. Not this shit again. “I do pretty well for myself out here, Mom,” she mumbled. She hated herself for that, the mumbling. It was early winter, so the crops were dormant, but her animals were still healthy, her storage shed was still teeming with treasures from the mine, she had even gotten enough money together to buy machines that would turn milk into cheese, eggs into mayonnaise. All it took was one offhand remark from her mother to turn her back into a defensive, insecure wreck.

What would it take to prove herself to them? I brought you out here so you can SEE.

Mae sighed again as she threw the towel down onto the counter. “I’m not talking about farming, I’m talking about being safe. I know you have this all built up in your head as some strong, independent pioneer woman adventure but do you know what, Yuli? The world just isn’t like that. Look how easily that can all go away. Look at those awful Joja boys –”

“Stop it,” Yuli warned, glancing over her shoulder at Elliott and her dad in the living room.

“You know, I talked to Mark last week. They had a new associate join their practice, someone who’s really an expert with these new, like, Internet harassment laws and stuff like that. He says we’re still not likely to get Dylan on anything but the other boys…”

A wave of nausea overtook her and she gripped the sides of the sink with both hands. When she closed her eyes, she felt tears threaten to break through, so she squeezed them shut. “Mom, please…” she whispered.

A hand lightly placed on her shoulder had her so startled she almost hit the roof. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’ll stop. I’ve just been so sad and so scared for you, for so long…”

It hasn’t exactly been a picnic for me either, Yuli wanted to snap, but that wouldn’t make the conversation end any quicker, so she just did a weird shrug-nod instead.

“So I’m just really happy that you have someone out here who can look out for you, protect you. That’s all.”

Yuli snorted. “Protect me. Elliott nearly cried when I killed a spider in front of him. Now he releases them all, so I probably have a spider colony in the attic.”

The man himself chose that moment to stride into the kitchen to refill his and Yuli’s dad’s wine glasses. “Yes, there I go again, showing respect to all of Yoba’s creatures, great and small,” he drawled theatrically. He touched her hand, his thumb just barely brushing the inside of her wrist. She felt her heartbeat in her throat. She had asked him to keep the PDA to a minimum in front of her parents and he had obliged. The entire evening, they had been as chaste as a brother and sister. Apparently that was enough for a simple hand touch to have her about ready to burst into flames. It was almost annoying, how their chemistry crackled like dry, staticky winter air between them. Fucking Elliott. Fucking honeymoon phase.

Seemingly oblivious to Yuli fighting for her life, Elliott gestured towards her mother. “But tell her, how’s that fly problem you had?”

She rolled her eyes and smiled. “Better.”

“Better,” he confirmed, winking conspiratorially at Mae before leaving the kitchen.

Later, when her parents had gone to stay at the Stardrop for the night, they packaged the leftovers and put away all the dishes while they drank the last of the wine.

“I thought that went quite well,” Elliott ventured, his voice lilting at the last word to open it up for her interpretation.

“Oh, they’re fully on board. They’d already take you over me, I bet.”

He made a face and bent down to stow the serving platters in their cabinet. He already knew this kitchen so well. “Hardly. You’re a credit to them, you’ve done so much to be proud of.”

Yuli made a noncommittal noise and shrugged.

Elliott stood up straight and frowned slightly. “I can’t tell, are you trying to diminish your accomplishments again or…?”

She laughed. “I mean, always. But yeah, no, things just get…weird with my mom sometimes.”

“It did feel a bit fraught in the kitchen for a moment there,” he admitted “Are you alright?”

“Yeah, you know. The whole, you shouldn’t have moved here, you were stupid to move here bit. You get it,” she said, gesturing to him.

The slightest shadow of a wince at the vague reference to Beryl. He tipped his head to the side. “But Jed was your mother’s father, if I recall? So wouldn’t this have been her childhood home?”

She snagged her wine glass from the counter and made a beeline for the couch. “Yeah. But that kind of makes it worse, in a way? She hated it here. She never liked all the farming stuff, doesn’t really like the outdoors, even. If it’d been left up to her, this place would probably be Joja Town by now,” she snorted. “My mom was one of those people who, like, saved all their money under their mattress and got the hell out on their 18th birthday.”

“Hmm. Headstrong and single-minded. Doesn’t sound familiar at all.” He sat down next to her on the couch and gave her ankle a squeeze. “I don’t imagine your grandfather was too happy about that.”

Yuli shrugged. “That’s kind of just how it goes around here. Young people don’t stick around for long. So she did the whole college thing, became a pharmacy tech, met my dad, had me…pretty much the life she wanted. Pelican Town just…wasn’t part of it for her.”

“But for you…” Elliott prompted her. He tugged on her foot, motioning for her to drape her legs over his lap. He handed her a pillow so she could lean against the arm of the couch, she grabbed an afghan to throw over their legs. It was their secret language, their unspoken motions of love. You have me. Talk to me.

“For me…the summers here started when I was five. You know, school’s out, but she and dad still have to work. And, well…I loved it. I looked forward to it all year, it was my favorite place to be. My mom would bring me here, eat dinner with my grandparents, then leave the next morning…I would hardly say goodbye before I was off getting into something or other. And every year, on the last day of summer, I would cry the whole way home.”

“That sounds like it was very special.” He stroked her shin like it was a cat curled up on his lap.

“Yeah…and don’t get me wrong, I loved my grandmother too. She was awesome. She just really ran shit, like I’m pretty sure Willy was terrified of her.” She chuckled. “But my grandpa…all year, he would save stuff for me. He would set his growing season so all my favorite crops were ready, he would time livestock breeding cycles so there would be babies…he would save the best stuff for me to do with him every summer. It made me feel so important. I think that’s a big deal when you’re a kid.”

He nodded in agreement. “Feeling needed.”

“I was 17 when he died. Just about to finish high school and just…so destroyed. I got really hyper-fixated on the farm. I was like, if I have the farm, maybe it would help my grief, like it had always made me feel closer to him. I just knew that he would want me to have it, because I was the only one who…cared. So. It’s after the funeral. My mom gets back from the will reading and I’m all, ‘okay, so when do I get Fiddlehead, is it when I turn 18?’ And, um…” She swallowed hard, her voice thickening. “She said ‘you don’t. He left it to the town. Just like he always wanted.’ And I…I didn’t…sorry, wow, this is really heavy, we don’t have to talk about this.”

Elliott scooted closer to her and drew her to his chest, resting his cheek on the top of her head. “Nonsense,” he murmured. “I want to hear it all.”

She closed her eyes and nestled closer, positioning herself to hear his steady heartbeat through his shirt. “I didn’t pick up on it at the time, but I should have. ‘Just like he always wanted’…there was such bitterness in her voice. She said that all he left me was a picture. That picture of him and me on the horse, over there,” she said, gesturing back towards the bedroom. “Just a picture in a frame. I should have noticed but I just…accepted it. Let myself be crushed by it. Like okay, wow, guess those summers hadn’t meant as much to him as they had to me. It was like he died all over again, at least the version of him that I had in my head.”

“And…that was it,” she said, waving her hand. “I had to move on. I went off to Zuzu U, did the whole normal girl thing. Spent summers with my friends, internships, then…then, Joja. And you know what happened with all that.”

He rubbed her back to confirm that yes, he did indeed know what happened with all that.

“I’d just talked to HR, they said they couldn’t take my word over Dylan’s but they could reassign me to basically rot in the basement while his life would stay the same. And I’m a total wreck, it’s after hours and I’m at my desk just crying and crying. And I can’t stop. It was that kind of crying where you think you can never possibly be happy again and that all doors are just totally shut for you.”

“Yes,” Elliott said softly. “A feeling I know all too well.”

“I was cleaning out my desk. Just piles of shit, dumping it all in the trash. And at the very bottom of the biggest drawer was that picture of me and Jed. I pulled it out and I was just looking at it. Like this, this was the last place where I was truly happy. And everyone in that picture…he was dead, the horse was probably dead too, and little me…who hadn’t made anything of herself, who let herself be treated like trash…”

“What happened wasn’t your fault, Yuli,” Elliott reminded her.

“Looking at the picture…I was so fucking mad. Like all the sadness got shoved out and I was just furious. And I just…” She hid her face in his chest, retrospectively mortified. “I smashed it. Banged it right against the desk, there was glass everywhere…but that was how I found out, for the first time, that there was writing on the back of the picture. My grandpa’s handwriting.”

Elliott began stroking her hair. “What did it say?”

Yuli knew the message by heart at this point, courtesy of countless hours of staring and trying to make sense of it all. “There will come a day when you feel crushed by the burden of modern life, and your bright spirit will fade before a growing emptiness. When that happens, you’ll be ready for this gift,” she recited. “Of course, there was no gift. But it got me thinking - what could the gift have been? Something big. Something my mom didn’t want me to have, just like she didn’t want me to see that message.”

“So I decided to see who owned the farm, if it had really been turned over to Pelican Town, if they would maybe sell it back to me. Just crazy, crazy thoughts. But I couldn’t stop. It was after business hours, too late to call anyone in the land records offices or anything like that. But they have this registry online where you can look up property deeds. It was hard to find because of how small Pelican Town is. You have to go through the county court, then some weird archive but, um, yeah. It was there. My name on the deed for 1 Fiddlehead Road.”

Elliott’s hand stilled. “She lied to you,” he said, sounding stricken. “Jed never sold the place.”

Yuli nodded. “She wasn’t even sorry, that was the worst part. When I confronted her, all she said was ‘oh, this could be a good thing, you can go lay low in Pelican Town until this blows over.’ Like, I was just violated and humiliated in the worst way and she thought I should just lock myself away like a fallen woman or some shit. I didn’t know how to forgive her. You know, she made me think for ten years that my grandpa didn’t care about me the way I thought he did. It was…it was the path I wanted to take for my life and she hid it from me. How could I move on from that?”

“How did you?” he asked.

She laughed awkwardly. “I didn’t, not for almost a year. I blocked her number. I sent all her emails to spam. And I just…worked. Every weed I pulled, every boulder I broke up…it took me a long time to stop picturing my mom’s face. And the longer I stayed here…I always said that this place made me feel close to my grandpa, but it made me feel…if not closer, then just more connected with her, too. I could feel her. I would dream about her as the little girl who hated this land, the one who always wanted something better for herself. In my dreams, the kid versions of us…we were friends. We were friends and then, I started to realize, we were rivals. I think, in her eyes, Jed chose me. Her dad chose me over her.”

The words almost felt electric coming out of her mouth. This was how it felt to say the quiet part out loud. To put words to how she had always felt about the way her mother saw her. “And I…I think she has always resented me for that. You know, even though she made her choice and she knew it wasn’t for her…she just always seemed kind of bitter about what I had with him. And like, I didn’t mean to…” Her voice trembled. “I wasn’t trying to take him away from her.”

“Of course not. You were a child who loved her grandfather,” Elliott insisted. “You aren’t responsible for their relationship.”

“And I told her as much, when we finally started talking again. I was like, okay, you made your choices. I’m going to make mine now. If you want this, us, to survive, then don’t interfere. I would say we’ve…mostly made peace with it. But it’s not the same as it was.” She propped herself up on her elbow and poked his cheek with her nose. “You’ll stay the night?”

He poked her cheek in return. “If you’ll have me. I must say that I really admire your maturity…I don’t know that I could find it in myself to forgive anyone that did that to me,” he said, shaking his head slowly.

“You would,” Yuli said at once, dropping her head back down on his chest.

“No, truly, I don’t know that I would! To take away your birthright like that…such a breach of trust…to assume she has unilateral authority over what’s best for you…”

He had that faraway look in his eyes again, the one he always got when thinking about his past life, about Beryl. Yuli suppressed a smile. He really didn’t seem to see how similar their plights were. How his mother’s disapproving specter had shaped his life into what it was now.

“Wasn’t her plan for me.”

“I think she wants me to fail.”

Tonight was not the night for pointing out the pattern and rubbing it in his face, she decided. Instead, she wiped her tears and traced her pointer finger down his sternum. “It’s different when it’s your mom.”

Chapter 13: Matilda

Chapter Text

Feral. Yes, feral was the word.

Yuli blinked the sweat out of her eyes as she lowered her scythe. It was early spring and the snowmelt had revealed wild and lush patches of green grass speckling her fields. Winter had depleted her silos so grass cutting and drying was the name of the game for today.

It was deeply physical work. Bending, cutting at the roots, standing back up, arranging the blades in a pile for drying, repeating it all like a wind-up doll. She knew her arms and quads would be aching tomorrow. But she needed it. Needed more physicality, needed to go fight something in the mines, needed to wrestle a thrashing, oversized fish off her line, something.

Two weeks prior, she’d had her IUD removed. It had reached the end of its viability and she was married now, which meant that she and Elliott had decisions to make.

“I don’t know…” she had said.

“I mean…maybe?” he had said.

“Yeah, like…at some point?” she had said.

“But also, how…soon?” he had said.

It hadn’t been a terribly productive conversation.

They had finally decided to table it for the time being, with Yuli getting the IUD out and then the two of them slowly easing into the “not trying, not preventing” stage of things when they felt more ready.

But Yuli had been on some form of hormonal birth control since she was a teen. She had no clue what her cycles felt like without it, the unmitigated peaks and valleys of her hormones, the erratic timing of everything. If the booklet she had received from the gynecologist’s office was to be believed, she was ovulating right now.

And, it turned out, this made Yuli feel absolutely bonkers, insane…feral, to be more precise.

This must be what Jenu feels like, she thought. Jenu was their gray barn cat, who came and went as she pleased. Yuli had named her after the protagonist of The Blue Tower before she had found out that he was really a she, but the name had stuck.

Every few weeks, Jenu would go into heat and lose her everloving mind. She would yowl and lick herself at all hours. She would aggressively rub her body against their legs, sunlit furniture, any surface that was remotely warm. She would stop eating and disappear for days at a time, roaming the streets of Pelican Town and generally being a menace.

Before, Yuli had laughed during these periods. Oh, Jenu. Jenu’s being crazy again. She regretted that now that she was seemingly going through the exact same thing. She wanted to track the cat down and ask her, does that work? I want to rub my body all over Elliott and scream incoherently at strangers, too. Does it help?

She sighed and let the scythe clatter to the ground. It wasn’t just that she felt demonically horny. Every part of her body felt more sensitive, more alive. Maybe it was narcissistic to say, but she felt that she had a glow about her. She absently ran a hand down along the edge of her breast, down the curve of her waist to her hip. If she really allowed herself, she could even feel beautiful, appealing.

There was nothing for it. Nothing but to find Elliott.

Midday quickies weren’t completely unheard of. When Elliott had first moved in after they married, they would often take little breaks to find each other during the day. She’d suck him off under his writing desk, he’d bend her over the workbench in her greenhouse. He would understand her feeling a bit squirrelly…or her insatiable need for release…right?

They had abstained from sex for three weeks now - one before the IUD removal and then the two since. They didn’t want to risk it yet…Elliott was busy putting the finishing touches on the sequel to The Blue Tower…she was busy preparing the farm to open back up after winter’s end…the excuses felt so thin and infuriating now.

It would end today, she decided, marching toward the house. She would find her husband wherever he was and jump him right then and there. It didn’t matter that she was dirty and sweating - sometimes he even preferred her that way and would intercept her on the way to the shower. It seemed to bring out a primal side of him, he would fist her damp hair and bite at her neck, her earlobes…

She threw the front door open so hard that it bounced off the opposite wall, flinching a bit at her unintentional show of strength. “Shit.” She gingerly pushed it closed until it clicked in the frame. “Hello?” she called softly.

“In here,” came the distant reply from the back of the house. His study.

She attempted a leisurely stride, her brain buzzing. Should I go in there naked? No. Just sit on his lap and go for it? Invite him to join me in the shower? No, not invite. Tell. Order.

Why did this feel so awkward all of a sudden?

He is your husband. Just do it. She squared her shoulders and walked with purpose.

But when she saw Elliott sitting at his desk, the flame that had been brewing in her belly was immediately snuffed out, leaving smoky dread in its wake.

His fingertips had been tented over his nose, but when he lowered his hands, his eyes looked dull and dead. His hair was mussed, a sign that he had anxiously been pushing and pulling at it. There were pink splotches haphazardly dotting his face and neck. “Hi,” he said softly. “Something the matter?”

Yuli scoffed. So this was how he was going to play it. “Uh, you tell me,” she remarked, gesturing in his general direction. She rolled her shoulders to subtly exorcise the last of the lust demons clouding her brain. “Are you okay?”

Elliott swallowed slowly, painfully, his Adam’s apple rippling. “Well. This arrived today.” He took a thick envelope from his desk and emptied the contents into Yuli’s hands, his face impassive.

She blinked. It was a copy of the finished manuscript for The Blue Tower’s sequel, The Obelisk. Elliott had gone through several rounds of edits and had officially given it over to the publisher. For all intents and purposes, it was done.

So why, then, were the pages covered in a familiar, perfect script?

Beryl had even used red pen, which Yuli thought was a bit on the nose. It was a massacre. The pages seemed to bleed.

Trite.

Rings false.

How would you know?

Disingenuous.

This isn’t you. This isn’t your voice.

Unbidden, an image popped up in her head of Beryl, hunching over a massive oak writing desk, methodically tearing down the life’s work of her only child. Perhaps she had even laughed while she did it. Bile rose in her throat.

“What a fucking cunt,” Yuli spat, flinging the manuscript away from her. Her ardor had so easily given way to rage. One day, down the line, maybe she would laugh about how her mother-in-law could manage to cock-block her all the way from Zuzu City. But this was not that day.

“She’s right,” Elliott said miserably.

“What?”

He splayed his hands out around his head, flexing his fingers emphatically. “She’s right. It’s all accurate.”

She stared at him, a sick feeling of annoyance rising in her blood. “This is a joke, right? You’re joking?” When he half-shrugged and shook his head, she continued. “You seriously think that your mom, who’s not a literary critic or, like, an English professor, you think that she knows more than your editor, your publisher, everyone who’s already read this fuckin’ thing? More than me?”

He continued as if she hadn’t spoken. “The worst part is that it’s too late. She’s sent me all this and…it’s slated for release already, I can’t change anything. She had to have known that…do you think she knew that?”

The servility, the self-doubt in his eyes made her want to puke. “Obviously she did, Elliott, it says ‘Advance Copy’ at the top of every fucking page,” she fumed. “And why does she even have it? Why in the world would you send it to her?”

He hesitated. “I don’t…I just thought…”

Yuli wouldn’t let him finish that sentence. She couldn’t - if she did, her heart would break. She pointed at the manuscript. “You have to stop doing this to yourself. It’s…it’s sick. It’s so warped.”

“I don’t know what you want me to say. She’s my only family, Yuli,” he snapped.

She felt as though she had been doused with a bucket of ice water. The remark stung, far worse than she would expect it to. “I’m your family,” she said, her voice sounding terribly small.

Elliott waved his hand dismissively. “Oh, you know what I –”

“No,” she interjected, balling up both fists by her side. “We talked about this. You…you promised me.”

He shook his head slowly, a defensive scowl forming. “I promised to choose you, Yuli. I promised that I would choose you and our life here, forsaking all others. But I never promised to only have room for one person in my entire world.”

“I didn’t ask to be the one–”

“And I never promised that I wouldn’t speak to my mother again.”

“She doesn’t fucking want you, Elliott!” she said hotly. “Why can’t you see that? You try and you try and you try…you twist yourself into knots over someone who could not give less of a shit and it’s…it’s embarrassing! It is so hard to watch, like, will you just take the fucking hint?”

Elliott looked like someone standing on a landmine, afraid to move the slightest inch. “You are being terribly unkind,” he said stiffly, his voice strangled from trying to hold back tears.

Really? More unkind than her? The ugly voice in her head wanted to scream. “I’m sorry,” she said instead. “I just don’t like seeing you get hurt over and over again.”

“It’s just her–”

“If you say ‘it’s just her way’ one more fucking time…”

He stood abruptly, his chair squeaking against the floor. “Well, what am I allowed to say, then? Please, do tell me what you’d like to hear right now, I’ll do my best to remember my lines.”

Yuli shivered with disgust and turned away. “Oh, fuck off.”

“Right, thank you, darling. Eloquent as ever.”

She spun around on the ball of her foot, hackles thoroughly raised, until she saw him rummaging through the bottom drawer of his desk.

“Elliott,” she said, keeping her voice quiet and even. “It is 11 in the morning.”

He sat back up, a rocks glass in one hand and a squat brown bottle in the other. “Worked that out for myself, thanks,” he muttered, yanking the cork out from the neck of the bottle. A warm, spicy scent filled the room.

Yuli stood there as her entire body was overcome by a mute terror, like spiders skittering through her veins. Her hands shook every time she opened her mouth to speak, her tongue leaden. She firmly dug her heels into the floor to ground herself. “It’s getting bad again, isn’t it?” she was finally able to croak.

“What is?” Elliott tried to sound light but she knew him too well by now. The panicked flare of his nostrils didn’t escape her, nor did the rigidity of his fingers around the glass.

“It” was the specter that stalked them both, the one they weren’t brave enough to name. The one that had made Elliott hop on a bus to starve on the beach for a year. The one that had told Yuli to destroy her cubicle in a last ditch attempt to find a way out. The twisted urge to escape, destroy, and reinvent themselves.

The irrepressible need to run.

It felt like their life together was a tent caught in a windstorm. She took mental stock of the stakes they used to tether it to the earth. We are married. We have a house. We have crops, animals. We’re starting a winery. We’re talking about having a kid –

Fuck.

“You don’t want to have a baby with me,” she said, quiet but resolute. “That’s what this is about.”

He stiffened. “That’s a bit of a reach, don’t you think?”

“And it’s fine, if you don’t, you know. I just wish you would have said–”

“But I didn’t,” he snapped. “I said nothing of the sort.”

He didn’t need to. Yuli could see it so clearly now, as if he had telegraphed every move from the start. They’d been talking babies, so he reached out to…well, yes, his only family, she conceded. She wondered what Elliott had written to her when he sent the manuscript. Something light and casual, no doubt. Something to obscure his real feelings. I miss you. I’m scared. I need someone to tell me what to do. And Beryl had…

What had “family” ever meant to a man like Elliott?

Yuli felt like her entire life had been driven by it. Before she was “the farmer,” she had been Jed’s girl, Mae’s daughter. The very land she stood on was in her DNA; a living, breathing family member. She was heavily rooted, drawing strength from it. Elliott was a tumbleweed. He could roll along and lose himself, bit by bit, if she let him.

Without realizing it, she had done all of this work for the promise of tomorrow. For her kids to grow up smelling the sweetness of hay, the crisp mountain air before it snowed. To run wild through the amaranth and torment Lewis by ruining his precious soup. To know, soul-deep, this is where I come from. This is where I belong.

“We have to…” Yuli’s speech came out garbled and she cleared her throat. “We have to talk about…what we do.”

Elliott shook his head, his eyes reddening. “Please. Please, not now.”

“Because I’m a definite yes,” she continued. “And you are…”

“Yuli, don’t do this...”

“...not. So, what do we do?”

Then she did the worst possible thing. She burst into tears.

She hadn’t consciously known that she wanted to be a mother, not really. And now that it was seemingly being taken out of the running, she found herself feeling desperate. Scrambling for purchase on an island of shifting sand.

“What do we do?” she repeated, her voice growing high with hysteria. “What do I do?”

Normally, he would have embraced her by now. He would surge towards her and pull her into his arms, murmuring conciliatory nonsense to stem the flow of her tears.

Today, though, he did the opposite. Shrunk back against his desk. Pulled away. “I don’t know,” he whispered, almost soundlessly. “I don’t…I can’t.”

Her chest tightened and she felt briefly dizzy. “Right. Okay. I’m going to, um…take a lap. We can…we can talk about this later.” She turned around and practically fled to the hallway, her head spinning ever faster.

“Yuli.” He looked shell-shocked, in disbelief that she was running away now.

“Just going for a walk,” she called over her shoulder. Her burning lungs felt compressed, like she was an accordion being played by a sadist.

She stumbled back out the front door and, panting, leaned on the mailbox for support. They both knew that this “lap” would take hours, even days. Elliott was wise to the ways of his wife by now, and knew better than to chase her down and demand answers when she was in “cornered animal” mode.

But there was no precedent for something like this. How did one tackle the death of an unrealized dream?

One day at a time, she told herself. One day at a fucking time.

The mail. She would check the mail. That was as good a place to start as any. She straightened and released one last, healing exhale. With numb fingers, she absently flicked through the small stack of envelopes. A strange little shouting laugh sawed out of her chest when she glimpsed the familiar stationery from the Mayor’s office. It would be quite funny, if she weren’t so sad.

The fucking Flower Dance was tomorrow.

Yuli grunted as she heaved another decorative barrel of flowers off her shoulder and onto the ground near Pierre’s festival stand.

“No, please, don’t get up,” she deadpanned at him as she went to get another barrel from Marnie’s truck bed.

“Sorry, can’t leave the stand!” he cheerfully informed her. “Wouldn’t want to miss out on a sale!”

Someone snorted beside her. “Yeah, what if someone wants to buy some wilted dandelions, Yuli?” Leah smiled cheekily as she took a barrel off the truck and carried it towards the picnic tables. Yuli nodded her thanks.

Pierre made an affronted sort of sound. “They are not wilted,” he insisted, his hand hovering protectively over a small pile of wilted dandelions. “Anyway, don’t you young ladies have somewhere else to be? Shouldn’t you be preparing for the dance?”

Leah blew a lock of fiery hair out of her eyes and propped her arm up on Yuli’s shoulder. “Nope. This one got her stay of execution when she pranced down the aisle -” (“I did not prance,” Yuli grumbled) “- and Lewis is letting me sit this one out so things won’t be…uneven.” She shuddered with mock horror.

“Ell would have still danced with you, you know,” Yuli added, turning her back on Pierre. She was really quite done speaking with him today.

Leah motioned at her coveralls and the splotch of paint on her cheek. “What, you don’t like my getup?”

“‘Course I do. Miss Flower Queen herself,” Yuli said dryly.

Leah did a sedate little twirl. “Where is Prince Charming, anyway? Oversleeping again?”

Yuli’s gut clenched. She had slept on the couch last night and slipped out early in the morning without checking to see if Elliott was even awake. Not exactly Wife of the Year material, she chided herself. But she wasn’t about to let Leah in about any of…whatever she had going on with her husband right now. “Yeah, probably. I’ll give it another half hour before I go check on him.”

She hoped she looked more at ease than she felt. Even though Leah was correct and there was no obligation for her to dress up, Yuli had chosen a breezy, pale blue cotton dress, the flowy skirt of which floated around her mid-calves in the breeze. All the business with those flower barrels had wrinkled the bodice and left Yuli sweating, though, and the sun was only getting hotter as the day went on. “I’m gonna go find some shade,” she told Leah, fanning herself for emphasis.

The redhead nodded. “Try to get to the punch before Pam does.”

Yuli made a vague sound of agreement and quickly walked away. Because he was here. She sensed him before she saw him. But there he was, wearing a soft white linen shirt, his hair tumbling around his shoulders just so. Giving George Mullner a firm handshake, smiling graciously at Evelyn while sticking a pink tulip in his front shirt pocket. Politely complimenting Jas on her painstakingly practiced dance moves, causing the girl to squeak and redden deep as a beet. Consoling a tearful Penny when she had to confiscate her mother’s third secret flask.

In a way, she considered herself lucky. She could disappear from events like this and not be missed. But Elliott…she wondered if they would even start the dance without him there, or if they would all agree to call it off until next year. Always Mr. Popularity. She loved him for it. She hated him for it. How could she ever be enough for someone like that?

She sniffed away the threatening tears and made her way across the field to the entrance of the woods.

The entrance had been unmarked ever since she first sawed through the giant log blocking the path. In her mind, these were her “secret” woods. They weren’t technically a secret, anyone could enter if they so chose, but few ever did. Yuli’s trips there were primarily functional - to hunt for morels, to fish the elusive woodskips that skulked around the pond. Every venture had a purpose, there was always some higher plan. It was nice to come here, for once, to just be.

The grove of towering hardwood trees insulated her from most of the sound coming from the festival outside. She could only vaguely register some of the louder speaking voices, some snatches of Gus’s violin. The air felt ten degrees cooler in the inviting shade. She felt she could finally exhale, so she did, loudly. A couple of the meandering slimes nearby turned to look at her, their expressionless faces somehow looking peeved at the broken silence, before resuming their slow creeping along the grass.

Yuli slipped off her sandals as she approached the edge of the pond. Frogs leapt off their lily pads with a barely-there splash when they saw her coming. She dangled her feet over the edge and sighed when she felt the brisk water lapping at her ankles. She knew the seat of her dress was likely getting stained with dirt or grass. For now, she couldn’t care.

A breeze wafted through, bringing the light scent of the flowering trees. A few stray petals from the cherry blossoms and redbuds swirled, riding the wind. It was such a gorgeous spring day, perfect for contemplating the sinking ship that was her life –

“Thought I might find you here.”

She cursed herself for being so predictable. The music had arrived. It was time to face it.

Elliott stood at the opposite side of the pond, careful to put an entire body of water between them. He bore the unmistakable air of the life of the party. He carried two red plastic cups and his cheeks were flushed pink. His hair had been swept to the side off his neck and it now caught the sun in a way that made it look as though there were a thousand colors to it, not just red-gold. Someone had tucked a blue jazz behind his ear and in the pocket of his white shirt, next to Evelyn’s tulip.

What Yuli really wanted to say was, you always find me. No matter where I run and hide, you always know where I’ll be because you fucking listen to me and see me in a way that no one ever has. I hate you for giving that to me only to take it away. I hate that I might not be what you want.

Instead, she shrugged one shoulder. “Yeah, well.”

He politely edged closer to her, holding up one of the plastic cups in offering. “I brought you some of Pam’s, er…special beverage.”

The corner of Yuli’s mouth twitched. Try as she might, she couldn’t help her inner laughter at the idea of Elliott comforting Penny over her mother’s drunken antics, only to immediately turn around and fill a cup for his awkward and reclusive wife. “Thanks,” she said, extending her hand without getting up.

He finally strode over and gave her the cup, then hesitated. “Shall I go?”

She shook her head and patted the ground next to her. He sank down gracefully, his long legs slightly bent at the knees. She saw his eyes linger on the hem of her skirt and suppressed a smirk. Elliott loved this dress. It was the trusty article of clothing that would have her lordly, buttoned-up husband acting like a smitten cartoon dog. Had she worn it intentionally, for this precise reason? Would she ever admit that to herself?

The punch was a pleasant rosy color, with a chemically sweet smell that abjectly failed to disguise the sharp sting of the added liquor. Yuli exaggeratedly swirled the cup as if it were an antique brandy snifter. “You ever had Pam Punch before?”

Elliott wrinkled his nose slightly. “Can’t say that I have. The year before you arrived, the high school set managed to get their hands on it after it had been dosed, so we had to deal with…all that. That boy Alex got alcohol poisoning, I think. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen Harvey so upset.”

She was already starting to feel more normal, to talk and be with him like this. It felt good to talk about anything that wasn’t the real problem. She gently tapped the rim of her cup against his. “Well, here’s to the good doctor, I guess.”

“Cheers.” He drank, then coughed and raised his eyebrows. “My word. Pamela, you reprobate.”

“Total menace to society, Yoba love her.” She took a sip and wiggled her shoulders as the gin surged through her blood like a wildfire. “Whew.”

They sat for a moment. Birds trilled noisily in the trees right above them. The slimes milled aimlessly around behind them, making a light sucking sound as they oozed over the weathered marble tiles of the ruined courtyard.

She could always count on Elliott to make the first move. He lightly touched his shoulder to hers. The faintest brush of his shirt against her bare skin filled her with warmth. “Do you remember our first one of these?” he murmured.

Yuli shuddered, making Elliott chuckle. “Unfortunately.”

“Oh, dear,” Lewis had said, frowning. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of this…but we have an uneven number of dancers!”

Yuli’s eyes widened, wild panic overcoming her. She had stumbled across the festival quite by accident - she meant to see whether the woman with the traveling cart had brought red cabbage seeds like she had promised. “Oh, no, I…I can’t stay, please don’t worry about it.” She motioned to her outfit, jean shorts and an old t-shirt from a charity fun run. “I’ll just be going –”

“Nonsense! I’m sure we can find someone for you…say, I think that Gunther fellow is unattached, but where is he…oh, perhaps Clint…but we don’t have any more suits…”

“Hey! HEY! New girl!” Leah was practically hopping up and down, waving her arms above her head. She rapidly patted Elliott on the arm and turned her back to him, moving her thick braid to the side. “Hurry, get that stupid clasp by the neck – new girl! Dance with him! Dance with Elliott!” Elliott deftly undid the top clasp of the terrible polyester costume and it fell to the ground, still stiffly keeping its shape. Leah leapt out of the hated dress, clad only in a sports bra and bike shorts, and waved to Yuli again.

Lewis rolled his eyes. “Really, Leah, that’s quite enough, you’ve made your objections to this ‘silly ritual’ quite clear,” he scoffed.

Leah ripped off her flower crown, a circlet of braided cherry blossom branches, and marched over to Yuli, eyes gleaming with purpose. “Not clear enough, apparently.”

“I should have made her wear that damn dress to our wedding,” Yuli grumbled.

Elliott was smiling, his eyes crinkled at the corners. “I don’t know, she may have appreciated that full circle moment…artists are rather funny that way.”

“Actual sadists, the two of you. It was like a high school nightmare. I was so convinced that you only did it because you felt sorry for me.” She gently rested her temple on his shoulder, an opening. A peace offering.

He accepted immediately, rubbing his cheek in her hair. “Hardly. I was so in love with you, even then.”

She turned her head and buried her face in the juncture between his neck and shoulder. He was so warm, so solid, so present. How could she lose him, how had she miscalculated so badly? “Liar,” she mumbled into his skin.

“No, sweetness, never. Even if you fancied the prospect of dancing with me as much as a hole in the head,” he teased.

Yuli grinned as she nuzzled his neck. “And you know what? That Gotoran bitch didn’t even have any red cabbage seeds the next day.”

“Mmm, yes, but then you grew so much of it that I’m afraid I’m getting rather sick of coleslaw.” He pulled away and cupped her chin in one hand, swiping his thumb across her cheekbone. “Yuli, I’m sorry,” he said, his voice low. “You were right. You’ve never made me choose. And I love you. You are the dearest treasure of my heart. I love you, I love our life that we’ve made. I chose this, and I would choose it again every day.” His voice broke on “every,” his sheer earnestness had her eyes pricking with tears.

“I’m sorry, too,” she whispered, her eyes never leaving his. “You’re enough for me. Just you. You and me, that’s enough.”

It was his turn to get misty-eyed. Yuli gathered her resolve. She would not look away, she would not run this time. Nor would she let him run, either. She did the best she could to make her voice even and calm, squashing any notes of pleading or panic. “But you have to stay. We’re going to figure this out together, you can’t leave me. Don’t run away, not before we can fix this.”

He cocked an eyebrow at her, even as a lone tear tracked down his cheek. “You…are telling me not to run away?”

He had her there. “Hush. Do as I say, not as I do,” she joked, unable to suppress a nervous giggle.

Elliott took a deep, shuddering breath and bowed his head slightly. “I don’t want…to be like this,” he admitted softly. “I want to be your man, the one you can count on. I want to be the one who gives you everything you want. But every time I try to become that man, I feel so lost and inadequate and...” He met her gaze once more and slowly shook his head. “Yuli, there’s something so deeply wrong with me.”

She couldn’t stand it. She had to kiss him, needed to wipe the imploring pain from his eyes. “Listen to me.” She dotted kisses on both cheeks, across his forehead, on the tip of his nose. She combed her fingers through his hair, plucking out flower petals and running her nails along his scalp the way he liked. He sighed, slumping somewhat into her touch. “There is nothing wrong with you. Nothing.” She kissed his eyebrows, his earlobes, his chin. She could taste gin and the salt of his fresh tears mingled with her own. “You’re mine. My man. Say it.”

Elliott pulled her closer to him so that she was straddling his lap and claimed her mouth at last. He kissed her so deep and long that she nearly lost her breath. “I’m yours,” he repeated hoarsely. “And you’re mine.”

“And I’ve got you.” She snaked her hands under his shirt and covered his hardening nipples with her palms. “Always.” She kissed him hard, swallowing his uneven, panting breaths.
“Always.” He ran the tip of his tongue across the roof of her mouth and clutched her closer to him when she shivered. “You and me.”

Their tears were dry, their drinks forgotten. The slimes were hightailing it deeper into the trees. How ridiculous, Yuli thought as she closed her teeth around the pulse fluttering wildly in Elliott’s throat. How ridiculous that they were doing this right now, right here. How ridiculous that Pelican Town’s very own Romantic hero was clinging to Yuli like a life preserver because he thought he was too fucked up to be a father. How ridiculous that she, the queen of trust issues and avoidance, was entreating him to stand and fight for the ridiculous family they were bound to create.

His hand was questing up her skirt along the inside of her thigh. He ran his fingertips over the outside of her underwear and sighed in her ear when they came away damp. “You know how I feel,” he whispered through clenched teeth as he roughly moved the gusset to the side. “About this fucking dress.”

“Yes,” she gasped as she fumbled with his zipper. “Yes.”

Later, when they finally separated and the evidence was slowly dripping out of her, she fixed the straps of her dress with shaking hands. Her mouth suddenly felt dry and she found herself missing the drink that had spilled into the grass. She glanced at Elliott through her eyelashes, somehow feeling terribly shy. “Did you mean to…”

He, in contrast, seemed utterly relaxed. He was leaning back on his elbows, his face upturned towards the sun. Rather like Jenu basking after a large meal, Yuli thought wryly. Fucking cats.

Slowly, lazily, he took her hand and pressed his lips to her knuckles. “I said everything, remember?” he murmured. “Everything you want.”

Breathing suddenly became a very deliberate process that Yuli completely forgot how to do. “And what about what you want?”

He took the blue jazz from behind his ear and placed it in her palm, folding her fingers over it. “I want to give it to you.”

Seven months later, Yuli sat on a restaurant patio, pushing her lunch around.

People always said that, during pregnancy, “you get to eat for two!” What they neglected to mention was that, aside from some extremely esoteric and specific cravings, most of the time her stomach would decide for her that there was simply not enough room for both food and the baby. She nibbled at a piece of sourdough that was sitting in a napkin-lined bread basket, just to placate her watchful mother.

Mae had invited (okay, summoned) Yuli out to the city for a shopping trip for all things baby. She had spent most of the morning making puppy-dog eyes as she held up various horrible onesies for Yuli to review.

“Uh, no,” Yuli laughed as her mother showed her a garish pink romper embroidered with purple text, proclaiming that “My Heart Belongs to Nana.”

“Oh, alright, fine. I’m not 100% sold on ‘Nana,’ anyway. Today I’m thinking maybe ‘Mimi,’” she announced, tossing the romper back onto the pile.

Yuli snorted. “Mimi Mae-Mae.”

“Okay, so maybe not that…”

They had stopped at one of their favorite brunch spots, the one that had been her family’s default for birthdays and other special occasions. It was crisp autumn, but the weather was just nice enough to sit outside. “Probably the last patio weekend!” Mae had exclaimed gleefully. Yuli just smiled. An outdoors hater she may be, but she had never known her mother to turn down the opportunity to have a mimosa outside.

She forced down a mouthful of bread, then dropped the rest of the piece down on her plate. And then she saw her.

Impeccably coiffed short hair, a familiar shade of auburn shot through with a handsome silver. Dressed casually and seasonally appropriate - a camel coat. Black cigarette trousers. Such simple pieces, but Yuli knew that a single one of them cost more than it had to build her chicken coop.

The click of heels on the sidewalk. A quiet, melodious voice. “Well, if the board doesn’t like it, then let’s just force a vote. Make them say, on record, why they’re not playing along here. It’s not my problem if you’ve burned through your connections on that side, why are you acting as though I’ll hold your hand through it?” barked into a cell phone.

They hadn’t spoken since that visit where Beryl had essentially told Elliott that a child was the worst thing that could possibly happen. And here Yuli was, “that awful girl from the farm,” the one who had stolen him away. Here she was, her belly swollen with Beryl’s worst fear.

Yuli’s heartbeat came to a sudden stop when she realized that Beryl was walking right towards them. “Mom. Switch seats with me,” she urged, trying to keep her voice dead quiet.

Mae blinked as she fiddled with the cloth napkin in her lap. “Oh, are you feeling sick? Is it the smell – you shouldn’t smoke out here, young man!” she berated a haggard-looking line cook who was probably just trying to enjoy his break.

Beryl was just up the block, getting closer. “Mom. Mom! Stand in front of me or something.”

“What are you–”

“Don’t look!” Yuli hissed despairingly.

“I’m not, I’m not!” Mae insisted, looking. “Do you see someone you know?”

Too late.

Yuli rose from the table with all the grace that her rotundity allowed. “I do,” she said, her voice blessedly steady. “Mom, this is Beryl Beaulieu. Beryl, this is Mae, my mother.”

Yuli wondered what Beryl would do. Would she keep her nose in the air and pretend not to notice her? Or would her painstaking etiquette prevent that? Did she expect Yuli to grub around on her knees and beg her for money? Or nastily rub her sex life with the woman’s only son in her face?

Mae was far from a slouch. She got her hair done monthly at the local salon, she dressed appropriately for her age in fashions that were relatively current, she wore tasteful accessories. But Yuli knew nonetheless that her mother was dazzled by, and slightly jealous of, this woman’s inimitable presence.

Beryl nodded and summoned a benevolent smile. “Charmed.”

Mae’s face brightened. “Oh, Elliott’s mom! I should have guessed, with the hair. Well, it’s nice to finally meet you! And hey,” she gestured at Yuli’s midsection, smiling exuberantly. “Pretty great, right?”

Beryl’s only sign of shock was a slight pursing of her lips. Yuli only recognized it because she had seen Elliott do the exact same thing. For a moment, it felt as if she and her mother in law shared the same lungs. She could almost feel Beryl’s breath catch, feel her chest collapsing in, feel her heart desperately trying to regain some sort of rhythm. At the same time, Yuli felt a burgeoning power inside herself. Three generations stood here - her mother, her daughter, herself. She wasn’t nobody. She had context. She had no reason to feel ashamed or afraid.

“I was thinking about my grandparent name,” Mae continued, blissfully unaware. “We probably shouldn’t both pick the same one, so, which would you like? You don’t strike me as much of a ‘Memaw,’ but I could be wrong.”

Yuli laughed weakly. She hadn’t planned for a Mae-Beryl encounter, not in her wildest dreams. Her mother tended to ramble when she was nervous and Beryl was…well, Beryl.

“I’m sure whatever you decide shall be perfectly lovely,” replied Beryl, her voice clipped. “Ladies, I do apologize. I’m just on my way to a meeting, for which I’m afraid I’m running late.”

“Yup,” a grateful Yuli said immediately, nodding. “See you around, Beryl.”

Mae was left with her mouth hanging slightly open as Beryl whisked off, leaving behind a cloud of her expensive perfume. “Well, you weren’t lying,” she remarked when the other woman was finally out of earshot.

“I know, right?” Yuli finally felt hungry. She smacked a nearly-empty miniature bottle of hot sauce against her palm, heartburn be damned. “Pretty sure I won’t be seeing her around.”

“Good,” her mother commented through a mouthful of arugula. “You know, I wasn’t the biggest fan of my mother in law, but…”

“In fairness, Nana was a huge bitch.”

“Ugh, she really was…”

As she laughed, Yuli felt the tiniest fluttering in her stomach, like a misplaced hiccup. It wasn’t the first time the baby had kicked her. It was one part of the whole pregnancy thing that she kind of enjoyed. It was like carrying a little friend along with her, one that laughed when she laughed. It felt like being constantly acknowledged.

The first time Elliot had felt their daughter kick, it had made his creativity erupt like a volcano. He couldn’t stop writing, seemingly every scrap of paper in the house was covered with poems, stories, dreams, songs. When The Obelisk was reissued in paperback, it was dedicated to her. To M, the fire that burned away my fear.

“I want you to know me,” he had whispered to Yuli’s bump, late one night when he thought she couldn’t hear. “Almost as much as I want to know you.”

He would know this child. Yuli would know this child. And Beryl wouldn’t.

That was punishment enough for all manner of sins.

Chapter 14: Jasper William

Chapter Text

The stone was a deep blood-red veined with black but there was a certain warmth and luminosity to it, as though it burned from within. It was large, the size of Yuli’s fist, and deceptively heavy.

Elliott picked it up from his writing desk and turned it over in his palm. “What’s this?”

Yuli looked up from her lap. Champ was sprawled across her legs, patiently waiting to receive his flea and tick preventative. “What’s what? Oh. Found it in a magma geode. Clint says it’s jasper.”

Elliott flicked on his desk light and peered at the stone again. “I’ve never known you to hang on to the minerals you find,” he remarked. “Something special about this one?”

She squirted the medication onto the skin behind Champ’s neck, then patted his rump to signal that he was free to go. He loped off to the porch, wiggling his shoulders slightly as the cold liquid absorbed. “I dunno. Thought it looked cool. Gunther said it ‘used to be prized by ancient cultures’ and whatnot. Seemed up your alley.” She shrugged.

“Hmmm.” He had a faraway look in his eye, the kind he got whenever he was trying to think of a passage from some obscure book or another. His eyes would almost imperceptibly jerk to and fro in their sockets, as though he were actually reading. Yuli found it both impressive and somewhat unsettling. “That minister of ministers, imagination, gathers up the undiscovered Universe, like jewels in a jasper cup.” He smiled, clearly proud of himself.

Yuli nodded with mock solemnity. “Yeah, exactly.”

“Don’t make fun. I have to make sure I haven’t fully lost my head yet.” He tapped his temple and grimaced when he noticed a sticky syrup stain on his sleeve. Tilly loved pancakes and was very grabby these days. “Fatherhood has a way of…dulling things. I don’t remember the last time I read something that wasn’t to do with the misadventures of one brave little sapling.”

She made a sympathetic noise and rose, crossing the floor to where he stood. “Hey. You’re still the smartest person I know, if it helps.” She took his wrist, quickly licking her thumb and rubbing it on the stain. “Even without the perfect rock quotes. You’ve still got it, babe.”

He grumbled but Yuli could tell that he was temporarily mollified. The male ego. So fragile, she thought. Incidentally, she knew what she could do to put an even harder stop to his miniature existential crisis.

She inclined her head toward the doorway. “She still napping for a while?”

Elliott’s eyes glinted as they narrowed. “For another hour or so.” He surreptitiously rapped the wood of his desk in a fit of parental superstition. “Why ever do you ask?” he murmured, a smirk growing despite his best efforts to appear innocent.

She shrugged, faux-casual. “I was just thinking that maybe you could show me what else you’ve still got.”

He moved, quick as a lightning strike. With one arm, he clutched her close and hoisted her up, her legs instinctively wrapping around his waist. He used the other arm to clear off the cluttered desk in a wide sweeping motion, plunking her none too gently onto the now-empty surface. He cut off her giddy shriek with a blazing kiss. “This,” he panted. “Can be arranged.”

Later, as they cleared the floor of the scattered books, pens, and sheafs of scratch paper, Elliott placed the hunk of jasper onto the highest shelf of his bookcase, next to a photo of Tilly, his wedding cufflinks, and other precious things.

It had been the only thing Willy had said to her on the phone. She’d called to let him know that she, Elliott, and Tilly were on the way to the beach for a planned boat outing to celebrate Tilly’s 3rd birthday.

“10-4, gup. And, uh…bring some tongs.”

Tilly tore down the hallway, a huge “3” balloon bumping along after her. Jenu chased and batted it, meowing with savage delight. Yuli pressed the receiver closer to her ear, in case she’d misheard. “Sorry, what?”

“Just bring tongs,” was the terse reply before he hung up.

Yuli grumbled to herself about cryptic and questionably senile old farts, but threw two pairs of kitchen tongs into the beach bag nonetheless. It was worthwhile to indulge him, after all he’d done for her family. Willy was ferociously fond of Tilly and had the tendency to spoil her horribly. He was endlessly patient with the toddler’s interminable seashell hunts and her clumsy, fumbling hands. He’d started carrying candies in his pocket, even after Yuli teased him for indulging in such stereotypical old man behavior.

It stood to reason, then, that her daughter’s idea of a perfect birthday was a day on “Wiyi’s boat.” The idea of Tilly experiencing life while being guided by a doting old man made Yuli’s chest tighten with emotion.

That could be the hormones, though. She was 18 weeks pregnant and an utter wreck. It was true love for her daughter that had her gallivanting around in the crisp autumn air rather than staying behind for a nap in blessed quiet. She grimaced and rubbed her aching hip.

Elliott sauntered down the stairs, wearing a child-sized captain’s hat. Tilly started to jump up and down, as though she could reach to swipe it off the top of his head. He put his hands on his hips, like nothing was amiss. “What ho, daughter! Shall we venture forth to sail the forbidden seas and land on barbarous coasts?”

Yuli gave him a look, which was studiously ignored.

Tilly kept jumping, grunting with effort. “I want - ugh! Go Wiyi’s boat! That’s my hat!”

“Why, that’s precisely where I said we were going.” Elliott knelt down. “Climb aboard, skipper.”

Tilly finally clambered onto his back and snatched the hat, plunking it on top of her fiery curls. “Nuh uh. Daddy’s silly.”

Elliott wiped off an errant smear of sunscreen from his daughter’s shin. “Silly and late if we don’t make haste.” He gallantly took the beach bag from Yuli, paying no heed to her half-hearted protests.

In truth, she secretly appreciated being coddled a little bit right now. She was barely at the halfway mark but her newest little passenger was stealing most of her lung volume. Weighing her long-legged husband down with a bag and a toddler was the only way he could match her own plodding, out-of-breath pace.

Everything was different this time. She hadn’t exactly been spritely with Tilly, but the symptoms hadn’t been this intense this early. Her standards hadn’t slipped so far, so fast. She actually accepted Elliott’s anxious offerings of neck and back rubs now. Lately she’d even taken to paying Shane, Sam, or Alex to take care of some farm work on the days when she opened her eyes and just could not. It didn’t feel nice to accept help, but at least the coming winter promised more low-key days ahead.

They stopped to rest at the bench closest to the beach, but Tilly had no sooner vaulted off Elliott’s back before she made a mad dash for the sand.

“Tilly, wait,” Yuli called impatiently as Elliott warned, “Matilda Rose…”

“The starfish! I gotta see the starfish, the orange one!!”

“I’ll go,” Elliott said apologetically. “She just wants to check the tide pools.”

Yuli nodded and gestured towards Willy’s shop. “Okay. I’m gonna go see if he needs any help with the boat before we head out.”

“Or you could stay here and rest,” Elliott said pointedly, already knowing this wasn’t a battle worth fighting.

She divested him of the beach bag as they walked together. “I have to pee, anyway. Just catch up when you guys are done.”

When they reached the beach, Tilly was already peering intently at the tide pool closest to her father’s old cabin. Her brows were furrowed, as if willing said starfish to appear. “No Starry,” she grumbled.

“Hmmm,” Elliott said thoughtfully, crouching down beside her. “Ah, therein lies the problem.” He pointed to a large crab nestled beneath a clump of sand. Only its beady eye stalks were visible. “Looks like this pool has been taken over.”

Tilly looked absolutely distraught. “He EATED Starry?” she demanded shrilly.

“No, no,” Elliott quickly assured her. “Starry is probably just hiding. Waiting for the predator to leave, you see?” The poorly-disguised grimace on his face suggested that Starry had likely met the fate Tilly feared.

Her frown growing, Tilly balled up her fists and leaned down so her face was nearly touching the water. “GO AWAY, CRABBY!” she hollered.

The crab blinked in response.

“Remember, Tilly, we mustn’t upset the balance of nature. The crab is merely doing what crabs do. Let’s take a look and see what we might learn from our friend Callinectes sapidus over here…”

Yuli took that as her cue to continue on to the dock. She really did have to pee. “Make it a short one, professor,” she called over her shoulder.

Elliott waved her off as he gently disturbed the still water of the tide pool to draw the crab out of hiding. “Look at its brilliant blue color! Isn’t that beautiful?”

Tilly nodded, Starry evidently forgotten. “Bootiful,” she declared.

“In fact, the scientific name Callinectes even means ‘beautiful swimmer’ in Gr–a very old language. If you look at the back legs…”

Willy had hung a scrap of paper on the shop door with “Out For The Day - Gone Fishing” hastily scrawled on it. Yuli chuckled to herself. He hardly ever had the need for such a sign before Tilly was born. She checked that the door was still unlocked and opened it slowly. “Hey, old man, ahoy and all that…”

“Shut the door!” Willy growled from his perch atop the counter. He was decked out in makeshift protective gear - rubber boots up to his knobby knees, gloves up to the elbow, as if to do battle against…

Oh. Yuli shut the door, her need to pee entirely forgotten.

The shop floor in front of them seethed and boiled with live crabs. There had to be at least 50 of them, claws raised to the air as if in praise, skittering side to side. They didn’t seem in any particular hurry to escape or actually get anywhere. Their spidery legs clicked along the old wooden floors. Some stayed perfectly still, bubbles and squirts of water dribbling out through their mouth parts. Some scrambled on top of their indifferent comrades. Yuli wrinkled her nose. To make matters worse, they stunk.

She looked back up at Willy and raised her eyebrows. “So, um…” She paused to shake off a curious crab. “This is nice and all, but we’re not really looking for another pet right now…”

“Har har. Yeah, no, they’re not for you. I thought I’d try my hand at farmin’ ‘em. You know, like they do the farm-raised shrimp and fish an’ all that.” Willy sheepishly scratched the back of his head. “But, uh, it hasn’t really gone according to plan.”

“You don’t say,” Yuli said drily.

Willy clapped once, back to business, and held out an expectant hand. “Didja bring the tongs?” She held a pair up, clicking them twice before handing them over. He motioned to a large, wheeled trash can with a hinged lid that sat against the wall. Willy had already thought to fill it a quarter of the way with seawater and some rapidly melting ice cubes.

Without further ado, Yuli got out the second pair of tongs and followed suit, plucking a crab off her beach bag and gently dropping it into the can. “Won’t they just get out again?”

“The sides are slippery, they won’t be able to climb up.”

“But if they climb on top of each other–”

“It’s got a lid, don’t it?” he huffed exasperatedly. “Tell you the truth, kid, I haven’t really worked out what to do beyond this. Can’t let ‘em go, they’d be goners in the wild.” He grabbed a pair of fighting crabs and flung them both into the can.

Yuli cringed at the sound of so many sharp legs scraping against the plastic receptacle. “Maybe call Gus?” she suggested gently. Sensing an objection, she added “...they’re kinda goners either way, Willy. Gus can put them to good use.”

Willy blew out an aggrieved sigh and doffed his cap, revealing his sweaty, thinning curls. “I s’pose. Maybe. Just, eh…not before I say goodbye and all.”

Yuli examined the crustacean she was holding. It was a thick red Dungeness crab, different from the dainty blues that Elliott was currently busy pontificating about. She could see a small white marking on the pointed corner of its shell. She rubbed it with her thumb but the mark stayed put. Upon closer inspection, the mark was actually a number - 34. “Oh, Yoba, you didn’t name them…” Yuli groaned, aghast.

“And why not?” Willy replied defensively, swiping the crab away from her and examining for himself. “Number 34, that’s…number 34 is Beth-Ann. Did I ever tell you about Beth-Ann? Talk about a crabby ol’ bit–”

The bell hanging over the door tinkled as Elliott chose that moment to enter with a flourish. “Here comes the birthday gir–what the f–” He caught himself, self-censoring for the toddler that was shrieking with joy at the utter chaos in front of her. He swept Tilly off the floor with one long arm like an orangutan and mouthed “what the fuck?” over her shoulder to Yuli and Willy. Yuli shrugged helplessly.

“Crab!” Tilly sang, flailing to be released. “Daddy, more crab!”

“Hiya, sweetheart,” Willy said warmly as he chucked Beth-Ann into the bin. “How ‘bout a hug from my favorite two year old?”

“I’M THREE, WIYI!” Tilly bellowed happily. She furtively reached for a crab with one wiggling index finger, which Elliott promptly snatched away.

“Right, erm…” He finally gave up and slung Tilly over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. “So I’ll just…assume you have this all in hand, then?” His eyes looked slightly desperate.

Willy looked askance. “Eh…”

Yuli rolled her eyes. “Yup, we got it. Here.” She tucked a coin into her husband’s shirt pocket. “Go call the Stardrop from the dock phone and tell Gus that his crabcake specials are ready for a, um, stat pickup. Like, really stat. We’ll finish up here and be right out.” She patted his chest reassuringly.

Almost unthinkingly, Elliott rubbed the back of her hand with his thumb. “O Captain, my Captain,” he teased.

“Yeah, yeah.” Yuli’s bladder chose that moment to aggressively remind her of its existence. “Alright, be right back, Willy, I’m gonna hit the head.”

She had nearly reached the bathroom in the back of the shop when she heard Willy’s voice, faint but urgent. “Oh, hold on there, you actually might need the tongs back–”

She was going to ask why, until she heard enthusiastic splashing coming from the toilet.

Once the crabs were finally all contained, Willy shuffled to the kitchenette and filled two chipped mugs with his notoriously strong coffee. The pair leaned against the shop counters and drank in contemplative silence.

Now seemed as good a chance as any. “It’s a boy this time,” Yuli said quietly. Despite herself, a small smile grew.

“Hey, that’s great. Good on ya, gup,” he replied, giving her an awkward sort of side hug. He was always a bit gruff when the topic of her pregnancies came up. Probably in an effort to avoid thinking about what got her in that condition in the first place.

“Yup, one of each. Very nuclear family of me, right?”

“A little boy,” Willy echoed. “About time, I say. Between yer mama, you, and Tilly, I was starting to think it would only be lasses from here on out.”

“If only!” Yuli lamented, setting her coffee aside. She could realistically only drink half of it. Willy’s recipe could double as fuel for the boat. “What am I even supposed to do with a boy?”

Willy seemed pensive, staring at the trash bin full of crabs. “How’s Elliott feelin’ about it?”

“Oh, he’s thrilled. He would have been either way, honestly, he’s such a good girl dad.”

“Hmmm,” Willy agreed with a mindless nod. His lips momentarily pursed, then twitched back to normal.

Irritation pricked at the back of Yuli’s head. “What?” she demanded.

“Nothin’.”

“Willy.”

He threw his hands up in a gesture of surrender, but his eyes were defiant. “Look, Yoba knows I like the lad. It’s like you said, he’s a good pappy to our Tilly bean. But a boy needs…a son needs…” His mouth twisted, as if he were cringing from his own thoughts.

Yuli suspected that the coffee had nothing to do with the spike in her heart rate. “Say it,” she ordered, her voice soft and cold.

Willy squared his normally stooped shoulders and met her stare. “Yul, you know already. You know.”

She did. Her mouth filled with a sour taste she wished she could spit out.

“The same dream?” he murmured, his voice thick with sleep.

Yuli sat up, fully awake and alert from the adrenaline of her nightmare. Her blood fizzed in her limbs. “It was different this time. This time, I f-fought them. I fought them all off.”

She could still recall it so vividly. Her fist exploding with pain as it crashed through Dylan’s sneering teeth. Driving her knee up into Brody’s crotch as he howled. Jabbing the sharpest bony point of her elbow into Wyatt’s soft, vulnerable throat. For a brief, blissful moment, she allowed herself to believe that this was the way it had actually happened. She imagined herself strong and safe. It was…

“It was amazing,” she whispered, awestruck. “Amazing and so easy. Why didn’t I do it? Why didn’t I fight?”

Elliott pushed himself to a sitting position with his elbows and rubbed his face. “Honey…” he sighed.

“I mean, obviously I didn’t know how to fight back then like I do now, but I knew some things. I could have at least tried. Instead of just…freezing. Like an idiot. Like just another victim.”

He studied her face for a while, his eyes narrowed slightly. Finally, he spoke up. “Might I show you something?”

She nodded, thinking that he’d come up with one of his trademark literary metaphors to try and make her feel better.

Instead, he jerked his chin toward the bed. “Lie back and put your hands up by your ears.”

Oh. This was different. As if in a fugue state, she obeyed. She lay on her back and left her hands resting loosely by her head. He tenderly laced her fingers through his and pressed down into the mattress.

“Now get me off.”

Her eyebrows shot to her hairline. “Excuse me?”

Elliott blinked rapidly, then scoffed at himself. “Goodness. No, sorry. I meant push me off of you. Fight me off.”

Yuli hesitated. “I…I don’t want to hurt you.”

He smiled at her but she could see the tension in his jaw. “I can take it,” he assured her soothingly. “Don’t hold back.”

She pressed her lips together and pushed with all her might. She braced her feet on the bed and bent her knees to get better traction. She thrashed and twisted at the waist to try and throw him off balance.

Nothing.

She arched her back. She clenched her abs. She pushed from her quads, the strongest part of her.

Nothing.

“Harder,” he instructed. “Push me off.”

He wasn’t struggling. It looked like he was barely even trying. His face was perfectly impassive, his lips and eyebrows completely relaxed.

Yuli had never felt more like an animal. Blind, desperate panic screamed through her entire body, she was seconds away from chewing her own arm off to escape. She was trapped. She was trapped. He could do anything he wanted to her. She was trapped.

Her breath rushed out in an aggrieved huff. “I can’t,” she snapped. “I can’t do it. Let me go.” He released her wrists at once, as though they had burned him. She scrambled away from him and flattened herself against the headboard.

Utterly unruffled, Elliott moved towards the foot of the bed and folded his hands in his lap. She knew, logically, that he was keeping his movements slow and subtle so as not to startle her. But now, in this moment, that same body language felt unpredictable and terrifying.

“What did you do?” she hissed. “What the fuck was that?”

“The difference between your dream and reality.”

“But I…I’m stronger than you,” she bleated pitifully. Her vision swam as hot tears threatened to overflow.

“Yes, you are,” he conceded calmly. “But I am a man.”

Yuli’s stomach roiled. The way he just perfectly summarized it made her feel sick. Her entire life, her greatest struggles and triumphs…it all just boiled down to this. But I am a man.

She slammed her pathetic, traitorous hands down by her sides and curled them into shaking fists. “This is fucking ridiculous!” she erupted. “I’ve seen you eat an entire cake in one sitting. You’ve never even been to the mines.”

“Not even for a moment, no,” he agreed sagely.

“And that one time you picked up my hoe, I thought you were gonna cut your damn toes off.”

“There is simply no reason for it to be made of solid iridium.”

Yuli meant to laugh, she really did. But she couldn’t stop staring at his hands. She had seen them do a million things, a million times. Dancing over piano keys, hammering away on the typewriter, expertly bringing her to orgasm. She had never really thought them capable of violence or uncontrolled physicality. Not until now.

She hugged her knees to her chest, wishing she could disappear completely. “I don’t want to do that again,” she whispered, hating how small and timid her voice sounded. “I didn’t…I didn’t like that.”

“Oh, my heart. Forgive me,” he breathed, brushing the outside of her thumb with his fingertips. “I’m sorry, love. I just wanted you to see.”

A safe man. That was what she had thought he was. But was there really any such thing?

“I wanted you to see that there wasn’t anything you could have done. You were hurt because a man wished to hurt you. That’s all.”

He meant it as a gift, she knew. To expose the fragility of hindsight, to give her a blessed relief from guilt, to lift from her shoulders the oppressive burden of being a survivor. For years, this was all she had ever wanted.

Tonight, she wasn’t so sure.

Yuli stalked over to the sink in the kitchenette and poured out her cold coffee with unnecessary force. “So you think, because he’s not some meatheaded he-man, that he can’t be a good father to my son. It didn’t occur to you that maybe I like that about him.” She wet a rag and mopped up the coffee that had splashed out onto the counter.

Willy skulled the rest of his mug and placed it next to hers. “Listen, I know you’re a tough nut and you can handle yourself. You always were, even when you were just up to here.” He motioned at his gnarled knee. “But you can’t blame me for wanting to see you taken care of, too. I promised Jed, remember. I don’t think he’d be all that happy to see you having to be the man of the house, you know?”

Yuli scoffed. Elliott himself had said some variation of the same when they had first slept together. A silly boy writing his silly stories…a woman like you needs a good man in a storm. It never occurred to him, to Willy, to anyone that masculinity was a weapon, a blunt-force instrument that she was afraid of. “‘Man of the house’…come on. What year do you think it is?”

“A boy needs a daddy no matter what year it is.”

“And a girl? What does a girl need?” She continued before he could answer. “Look, all this ‘man this, woman that’ stuff, it’s so boring and hypocritical. You and Jed taught me how to do everything myself and not rely on a man, but when I actually live by it, it’s a problem?”

“The whole point was to teach you that you could go it alone, not that you have to. And look, it’s not just Elliott, it’s all those damn kids!” At this, he motioned vaguely outside, towards town. “The Mullner boy, Pam’s girl, Kent off at war…a whole generation of this town losing their way.”

She could hear Elliott’s soft laugh and Gus’s booming voice floating in through the window. “Yes, but how many crabs?” She felt overwhelmed with fondness for the old barkeep and his perfect timing.

Yuli picked up her bag with a huff. “Well, if you must know, Mr. Moral Panic, I was going to ask if we could name him after you but if you’re going to be a shit about it, I won’t bother.”

They left the store and walked along the pier in silence. Finally, in a voice so small she could barely hear it, Willy asked “...really?”

She exhaled heavily, trying to drive all the air out of her lungs and make herself less shaky. “Yeah. We were gonna ask if the baby’s middle name can be William. But if that’s how you feel, then forget it.”

Willy stopped walking, so she did, too, staring at him expectantly. For the first time, she noticed that he was carrying something. She hadn’t seen him grab it from the store, but he must have done so while she was distracted by her righteous indignation.

It was an old shoebox that had been painted over with ocean blue, complete with little wave details painted in white. There was no lid, so Yuli could see right inside. The inside of the box had been painted a pearly pink, but it was hard to tell on account of all the dolls.

There had to be at least a dozen of them, nestled in a neat row. A knobbly starfish, painted orange. A little red crab whose claws were hinged so they could click. An octopus with 8 legs made of dangling wooden beads.

All hand-carved. All hand-painted. Yuli knew this for a fact, as she had a set of her own wooden animals in her old childhood bedroom. Hers had been farm animals. Pigs, sheep, a whole family of tiny wooden chickens. Even then, Willy had known what she was all about.

“I can make more,” he said quietly once he realized what had caught her attention. “For the, uh, for the little lad.”

She looked at the detail of the seahorse’s ridged back, the shark’s tiny teeth. She looked back at Willy, his tremulous hands with the arthritic fingers. Yoba, when had he gotten so old? Her grandfather had never been this old. He and Willy had been young men together, chewing tobacco and repairing fishing nets with a toddler at their heels. Say, Jed, Willy would say out the corner of his mouth. The little ‘un ties a better cleat hitch than you do. Jed would fake shock and outrage while tiny Yuli preened with pride.

Willy seemed to interpret her speechlessness negatively. “She still likes dolls an’ all that, right?” he ventured hesitantly.

A harsh sob tore from Yuli’s throat. “You fucker,” she whispered, fiercely swiping the tears from her eyes.

Willy snorted before politely averting his gaze. “Allergies been a real killer this year.” He nudged his shoulder against hers before starting back down the pier. Somehow, he seemed to stand taller.

“Yeah,” Yuli replied, sniffing one more time. “Allergies.”

Chapter 15: Birthright

Chapter Text

There he lay in his fish tank lined with the yellow baby blanket that Evelyn had knitted. Her son, her Jasper. The newest and smallest of her precious things.

Intrauterine growth restriction, her obstetrician had rattled off at her during the 20 week anatomy scan, blithely unaware that the words were daggers in Yuli’s heart. IUGR, she vaguely registered through the deafening, desperate roaring in her head when she’d woken up from the general anesthesia and saw that they had taken her baby away.

Jasper had arrived at term but was just…small. Too small to regulate his own body temperature. Too small to fight off any looming infection. People could give Yuli the “it’s not your fault” speech until they were blue in the face. She knew, bone-deep, that it somehow was. That this was her penance for something. That she had done something wrong.

The pain that came postpartum seemed welcome, seemed right. Every time her incision burned or her nipples chafed against the flanges of her breast pump, she thought good. I deserve this. I worked too hard. I ate that weird slimy algae soup that Willy made. I didn’t drink enough water.

I hurt my baby.

She watched him writhe and bleat in agony as the nurses came to prick his heels, to hunt for a vein in his tiny body that could support an IV, to insert tube after tube. Every moment seemed an eternity. Every moment had Yuli wondering if it would be their last together, if her son’s entire life would be bookended by pain and terror. She couldn’t stand it. Elliott sat beside her, rigid, his fingers turning white from gripping the edges of his seat.

The two of them moved robotically, taking their life in shifts. The toll of making sure their daughter went through as little upheaval as possible was immense. It required assiduous acting - Tilly was remarkably perceptive for a 3 year old. Elliott and Yuli couldn’t break and let their grief show, even for a moment.

“I just wanted to be back here,” Elliott had mused after he’d spent the day with Tilly. He was mechanically washing his hands at the NICU visitor sink, scrubbing all the way up to his elbows. “The whole time I was with her, I wanted to be back here with him.” He ripped off a piece of scratchy paper towel with uncharacteristic viciousness. “And now that I’m here…”

“You miss her,” Yuli finished for him, rubbing a small circle between his shoulder blades. “Me too.”

He tossed the paper towel into the trash and exhaled, closing his eyes. “I took her home today so we could feed the animals together and so she could see Champ and Jenu. We went out to lunch and of course everyone’s asking her about her new brother and she…” He squeezed his eyes shut tighter and his voice grew strained. “She kept saying that she had a little brother but that he’s going to die.”

Her stomach seemed to fall to her ankles. “Oh…Yoba, she’s really something else, isn’t she.” She hugged him from behind so he wouldn’t have to wash his hands again. “I’m sorry, Ell. That’s brutal. I’m sorry our girl is such a little creep.”

Elliott started to relax into her touch but stiffened just as suddenly. “She can’t help it. She doesn’t understand, so we just have to be strong for her.”

He turned to face her and Yuli groaned internally. His expression was blank and still, with none of his usual easy lightness. It was his “I Am This Family’s Rock” face, the one he wore when he disappeared into himself in a misguided attempt to be strong and stoic. It didn’t suit him.

“Hey,” she said gently, pushing a lock of his hair behind one ear. “It’s just you and me right now, you know. It’s okay to let the walls down for a minute. This has all been just…such a shitshow.”

It was no use, she could tell. Elliott was completely shut down. Something had broken in him after the birth, after he’d almost lost his wife and son in a bloody caprice of simultaneous birth and death. She still hadn’t managed to ask him the question she dreaded most.

Do you blame me?

He attempted a smile and seemingly abandoned it halfway through. “Go get some rest,” he told her, quickly kissing her forehead. “Your parents are taking Tilly to the aquarium so you’ll have the house to yourself.”

“Nice,” she said, even though being completely alone with her thoughts sounded like a nightmare.

She later woke with a start on her parents’ couch, where she had inadvertently fallen asleep. Her mother was sitting by her feet, casually perusing a furniture catalog. From the light and stillness in the room, Yuli couldn’t tell whether it was midday or midnight.

She jerked herself upright, anxiety washing over her. “Shit. Where’s my…” She dug through the couch cushions in search of her phone. “Did the hospital call? Did…my…my pump alarm! Did I sleep through my pump alarm?” She looked down at her shirt to see if she had leaked in her sleep. She hadn’t. But the jittery feeling remained. “Where is my phone?”

Mae calmly picked the phone up from the coffee table and handed it to her. “You didn’t miss any alarms. You didn’t miss any calls. Tilly is sleeping. All’s well, Yuli. Go back to sleep.”

But it was too late, the abject dread and sadness and fear all mixed and twisted in her gut. She tried to hunch over and hug her stomach to make the feeling go away, then yelped when she painfully reminded herself of her brand new incision. Now she felt too awake and knew that, even if she wanted to sleep, she wouldn’t be able to. She settled for leaning back and resting her head on the couch, staring at the ceiling and letting the waves of wild grief crash against her.

Sundown, she thought. It must be sundown. She always felt the worst at sundown.

“I think things are starting to get a little bit on top of me,” she said mildly, trying to school her features to remain calm and still. Trying to pretend.

Her mother snorted. “Well, of course they are, and who could blame you? You guys have had a terrible time of it. But Jasper is right where he needs to be, and you’re doing the best you can. This will pass before you know it.”

The platitudes, intended to calm her, had Yuli’s chest feeling tighter.

“I think Elliott hates me,” she blurted out abruptly.

There was no getting that horse back in the barn - now that she’d said it out loud, it was more real and she was more convinced than ever.

Mae furrowed her brow, finally looking up from her catalog. “Yuli, he doesn’t hate you. Why on earth would you think that?”

Perhaps because he saw me nearly bleed to death on an operating table. Perhaps because he saw them yank a tiny blue baby out of me, after months of me complaining and doing this pregnancy all wrong. Perhaps because he saw the rest of our lives, laid out in front of us with all the hurdles and chasms, and decided that this is not what he signed up for.

“He can’t look at me,” she whispered instead. “He can’t talk to me.”

Another frown from Mae. “Sometimes men are just bad about this stuff. They’re not quite in it during the whole 9 months like we are. And then they can’t cope when the show isn’t all about them anymore.”

Yuli’s eyes fluttered closed. “It’s not like that. He…I can tell he’s in pain. But he won’t let me help.”

Her mother tilted her head to the side. “Help how? You both are in this together, the blind leading the blind. What more could he possibly ask of you?”

“I just…he’s not…” Her exhale was rough with frustration. Her words were slipping through her grasp like tiny river fish. “He doesn’t have…this,” she said, gesturing between herself and her mother. “He doesn’t have a family or friends who can help or who…who know what it’s like.”

“What about that friend of his, Layla? Aren’t they close?”

“It’s Leah and they are and I tried that. I thought having her visit would cheer him up but…you know Elliott…he put on a total front. Gave her a damn tour of the hospital like he’s the mayor. Then that was, um…” Yuli hiccuped, realizing for the first time that tears were pouring down her cheeks as she talked. That was just a thing that happened to her now. Crying became just another bodily function, as automatic and effortless as breathing or blinking. “That was the night we had the infection scare with the baby and…yeah.” She hastily wiped her face and took a deep, steadying breath.

Mae’s eyes were fixed on her now, blazing with a familiar intensity. “Hold on…on top of everything else, you’re arranging visits…to try and cheer him up?” she demanded.

“I know, I know, but…you didn’t see him. He was so…”

It would be another few days until they would get to hold Jasper. The infection thankfully didn’t spread to his intestines but the doctors were still suggesting an abundance of caution, even as their faces crumpled with sympathy for the despairing parents.

Another interminable stretch of the same routine. Sit. Wait. Pump. Repeat. If one more cheery nurse told her to “keep making that milk, mama!” while brandishing pumping supplies at her, Yuli felt that she might smash the hated machine against the wall.

Elliott’s eyes were dull and unfocused as he stared into nothing. He flinched as Yuli rested a gloved hand on his shoulder. “When was the last time you slept?” she asked softly.

“I can’t,” he muttered, inclining his head towards the dozen monitors surrounding the isolette. It was almost impressive how many different types of sounds the NICU monitors made. High, grating chirps. Deep rumbling tones. Urgent blares, dull hoots that sounded even when nothing was amiss. It was enough sensory overload to fry one’s nerves for the rest of the day.

“So let’s go home, or to my parents’ house–”

“Yuli,” he cut her off. “I hear them there, too.” He ran one hand over his face, as if trying to wring out one more moment of energy. “Everywhere I go. I always hear them.”

“Well, he is not the one who nearly died–”

“Mom,” Yuli groaned, throwing her arm over her eyes to block out Mae’s furious expression.

“Exactly! I’m your mom. I am here to take care of you above anyone else. And Tilly, yes, of course, but you most of all.” She threw her catalog aside with a frustrated huff. “So if Elliott is making this all about him and making you feel worse, I am not here for that!”

She felt the wind go out of her sails. This was clearly not the right time, the right person with which to litigate all this. Here are Exhibits A, B, and C of why my husband clearly hates me. The prospect of being misunderstood felt like too much right now.

Her eyes still closed, Yuli reached out across the couch with her other hand, flexing it a few times in case it escaped her mother’s attention. Mae jumped up as though she were spring-loaded and settled on the couch next to her daughter. She squeezed the offered hand and patted herself on the lap, indicating that Yuli should lay her head down on it.

Yuli acquiesced with a watery smile. She hadn’t laid on her mother’s lap since she was in middle school, if not younger. But it felt like the right thing to do now, especially when she got a stronger whiff of Mae’s body lotion. Juniper Breeze, the same scent her whole life.

“My baby,” Mae murmured softly. “So strong, my baby.”

“I’m 36, Mom,” Yuli whispered, letting her eyes drift closed once more.

“You don’t get it,” Mae replied, her voice serene. “Not yet. But you will.”

In her mother’s lap, the world and all of its demands seemed to stop. It felt good to be petted, defended, and cared for in this moment. Ever since Jasper was born…well, scratch that, ever since Tilly was born, she’d had to be an advocate rather than someone to be advocated for. She was tired of making medical decisions, of being talked to like she didn’t know anything. She felt her muscles relaxing, bit by bit, as she finally let herself be mothered.

Her eyes sprang back open.

You don’t get it.

Mae was wrong. Yuli did.

“You’ve reached the office of Beryl Beaulieu,” an unbearably snooty male voice informed her.

Yuli cleared her throat and tried to posh up her speech as best she could. “Yes, it’s regarding her account at Fothergills. I’m afraid it’s quite urgent.” She cupped her hand around her phone in an attempt to block out the beeps and hums of the NICU.

There was silence at the other end of the line. Yuli’s stomach clenched at the thought of her flimsy ruse being so immediately dismantled.

“One moment,” the voice cut in smoothly.

Another silence. Apparently ZCB didn’t bother with hold music.

After a slight rustle, her ears were filled with the melodic, commanding voice she hadn’t heard in years. “Hello, Pilar? I confirmed the order with Jacques last week, I hope you’re not calling to tell me there’s been another production delay.”

“It’s me. Listen,” Yuli snarled, she could almost see Beryl moving to hang up the phone. “It’s about Elliott.”

There was a long silence and she could hear the creak of leather, like Beryl was sinking down into a chair. “He’s alright?” was finally the prim reply.

“No. I mean, he’s…no. We had the baby. A little boy. He’s…” She paused to blink back tears and swallow the lump in her throat. “He’s sick, Beryl.”

Silence on the other end. But she didn’t hang up.

Yuli exhaled hard through her nose, impatience flaring. “I don’t want any money. I don’t want anything from you. I’ve never asked you for a damn thing since I’ve known you. And I never will. So, I’m telling you. I’m telling you that Elliott is not okay and that he needs you.”

Jasper made the tiniest gurgling sound from his isolette as he waved his pinpricked and bruised arm around. He was so small and difficult to stick that they’d had to tape a rigid board to his arm so he wouldn’t bend it and occlude the IV. It still didn’t stop him from doing it twice a day anyway.

The tears came back and, this time, they did not stop. “You need to come. You need to be here for your son. Because I have one of those now, Beryl. I have a son now too and I can’t…I just can’t imagine…”

I can’t imagine doing this to him. I can’t imagine leaving him, this child of my body, to walk this earth alone just because he didn’t do exactly what I wanted.

But Elliott had been Beryl’s baby, once. Had she once sat across from her infant son, her body swollen and bleeding, promising to never let him feel pain, promising to always love him?

I guess no parent can imagine what they might do. What they might be.

She could hear the click of Elliott’s shoes against the hallway tiles. “Zuzu Children’s. Fifth floor,” she hissed, hanging up and throwing her phone back into her bag.

He was carrying two cups of pallid hospital coffee. “Did the respiratory therapist come by yet?” he asked, handing her one.

“Nope,” she replied, affecting a sort of casual breeziness. “His color looks a little better since this morning, though, don’t you think?”

“Hmm. Maybe.” His eyes were already far away.

Things weren’t much better the next day. In fact, they were quite a bit worse.

“I’m afraid we have to reinsert the feeding tube again,” the nurse said apologetically. “I know we wanted to reduce his tube and wire burden a little bit and trial him on breast milk, but he’s losing percentiles now.”

“He’s losing weight?” Yuli repeated numbly. She had been pumping milk around the clock, but Jasper just couldn’t seem to keep it down. The tears came back, though they had never really left. It felt like the theme of their NICU journey at this point - another day, another setback.

“Yes. And we have to get the tube back in before he falls further behind. I’m gonna go get the new supplies and we can hopefully have it done before his 11:00 cares.” She gave them a grim half-smile and left the room.

Elliott tented his fingertips around his nose. “Further behind,” he muttered.

Yuli exhaled shakily and searched her pockets for a tissue. “Yeah, I caught that too.”

He shook his head briskly and cleared his throat. “Right. So I’ll give Marnie a call to check on the animals and let her know it might be…a while yet.” His voice wavered a bit. “Did you need me to get anything from your parents’ house?”

She shook her head. Sometimes, when he managed to pull himself out of his catatonia, this was Elliott’s way of coping, of comforting her. Making a plan and showing her that everything would be taken care of. Everything except for what lay in front of them in his isolette.

He nodded and pressed a mindless kiss to her temple. He idly glanced over her shoulder, then did a double take. All color drained from his face.

“Mother,” he croaked.

There she stood, in all her glory. Beryl had her fur coat clutched tightly around her, as though guarding against some nonexistent chill. Her hair had grayed significantly since Yuli had last seen her, giving her an even statelier appearance. Her gaze fell on Yuli. She felt quite conspicuous with her unwashed hair, her milk-stained shirt, the dark circles under her eyes. But she didn’t look away, she met that flinty green stare head-on.

Then, the slightest, almost imperceptible nod. Yuli returned it.

Elliott whirled to face her, his eyes widening. “You…”

“Gonna go pump,” she whispered, shooting him a quick, reassuring smile before darting towards the exit.

She made it as far as the hallway before she dared to turn around and watch from the door.

They didn’t speak. Elliott watched warily, as though trying to anticipate any number of chess moves. Beryl stood in the center of the room, staring at Jasper’s isolette. He was completely enclosed in it, safe, a beautiful and delicate fish. Hesitantly, gently, she extended her hand toward it and touched it with her fingertips.

The sight of her mother-in-law standing over her son filled Yuli’s head with a primal, howling fury. That wasn’t the deal, you’re supposed to be here for ELLIOTT, you fucking bitch…

Before Yuli could get too ahead of herself, Beryl turned away from the isolette and slowly sat in the empty chair next to Elliott. They sat in silence, Elliott staring studiously at the floor. For a moment, Yuli was convinced that she had thoroughly miscalculated, that she had done the exact wrong thing.

Beryl cleared her throat. “He looks well,” she said softly. “He looks strong.”

“Well, he’s not,” Elliott snapped, his voice quavering. He cleared his throat and swallowed hard. “He’s not.”

Another silence. Beryl folded her hands in her lap, her spine ramrod straight. Elliott was too far gone for that. The chair seemed to be the only thing holding him up.

“Why are…how are you here?” he finally demanded. “I gather that Yuli…she…how did you…”

Beryl sighed, the corner of her lip quirking upward. “Your wife managed to thwart my office’s phone screening. My poor secretary is beside himself.”

He shook his head fiercely and flexed his hands. “She had no right.”

Beryl slightly raised both shoulders in the most elegant shrug Yuli had ever seen. “Clearly, she’s very worried about you. And rightly so, from the look of it.” She looked pointedly at her son’s lank hair, his gray and haunted face. Then her face softened. “She said that you needed me.”

Elliott laughed, a harsh, over-loud bark that wasn’t truly a laugh at all. “Needed you. I haven’t needed you for the past 4 years, if you’ll recall. What makes you think this time is any different?”

Beryl’s gaze floated over to her grandson. She said nothing, but Yuli heard it so clearly that she might as well have shouted it.

Isn’t it?

Jasper’s IV occlusion alarm beeped, breaking the tense spell. Panic clenched Yuli’s chest as she saw a cheery young woman wearing polka dotted scrubs bounce towards the room. The room that Yuli was currently skulking outside of, eavesdropping on her husband and mother-in-law. The nurse waved and opened her mouth to greet Yuli.

No! Yuli mouthed, shaking her head, gesticulating wildly. I’m not here!

The nurse (Amanda, Yuli remembered) abruptly closed her mouth, paused, and then shrugged before bounding into Jasper’s room. Yuli exhaled with relief. “You get all kinds, in the NICU,” Amanda had murmured to her once, when they’d overheard an absolutely knock-down, drag-out fight between the parents in the room next door to theirs. “But that’s why it’s so much fun!”

“Hi, handsome boy!” Amanda cooed now to Jasper. “I’m just here to check on your line - did you pull it out again, naughty boy?” She looked up at the pair sitting on the other side of the room. “Hi, Mr. Beaulieu. And who do we have here, is this Grandma?”

They both answered simultaneously, Beryl saying “yes” while Elliott muttered “no.” The older woman stiffened slightly, as though she had been pinched.

Amanda blinked and then looked back at Jasper. “Okay. Well, the line looks good, so I’ll just go ahead and reset that alarm.” She reached over and pressed a few buttons on the receiver before declaring it “all good!” and breezing out of the room, her eyes briefly lingering on Yuli as she passed.

Beryl wrung her hands a bit, then recovered. “He looks rather like you,” she said awkwardly. “He has your eyes.”

Elliott worked his jaw, the anger radiating off him almost palpable. “His sister has my hair,” he finally replied, deadly quiet. “My daughter. Matilda Rose. But you knew that already.” He finally looked up and met his mother’s eyes. “You knew that because I sent you her picture. I sent you a picture of my beautiful, brilliant daughter that you wished never to know.”

“That is not what I wished,” Beryl whispered, her voice trembling.

“Is that why you’re here? You wanted to see the depths to which I’ve sunk, you wanted to be able to crow to your horrid friends that you were right all along about your son’s failure?”

“No, Elliott,” she cried. “I would never–”

His eyes were alive, burning with rage. Yuli shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot. This was not going the way she had hoped, but it was also somehow…better? This anger, while frightening…anything was better than the cold, dead nothing that had been in him before.

“You would never what, Beryl?” he spat. Beryl winced. “You would never disavow me for the heinous crime of starting a family with the woman I love, in the town that I love?”

“Elliott, I–”

“Don’t think I haven’t noticed that you won’t say her name, by the way. Yuli. I’ll have you say it now and say it with the respect she deserves.”

Yuli froze, her stomach dropping.

“She nearly died bringing forth that child, did you know?” Elliott continued, pointing to Jasper. “They had to put her under and she nearly bled out. She looked…there was so much…” His breath quickened and he balled his fists to quell the shaking of his hands. “I almost lost her. My Winter Star that guides my way…I almost lost her and I would have been alone.”

“And now she’s taking care of you,” Beryl cut in. Then corrected herself. “Yuli is taking care of you. She reached out to someone you clearly despise–”

“The audacity to play the victim right now,” he hissed.

“--because she seemed to have no other choice. She spoke to me, mother to mother, and asked, no, begged that I bring you back from whatever precipice upon which you have found yourself.”

“I am handling it, I am managing just fine,” Elliott argued, not meeting her eyes. Yuli had to stop herself from scoffing aloud. “And even if I weren’t, the precipice would be none of your concern. Not after all that transpired. You missed it all, you missed everything.” His voice thickened and cracked on “everything” and Yuli felt her heart break.

Beryl was no longer shrinking in her chair with shame. Her voice was back to that clear, regal tone that smacked of authority. “I know it’s too late for us, Elliott. I know that my actions have driven you away and that I cannot undo it. I know that it is I who failed, not you. That is not why I’m here today. I did not come here to address the failure of the past.”

Elliott was staring at his mother as if she had grown a second head. Yuli was intimately familiar with the expression he wore. The one you wear when you’re hearing everything you always wanted to hear, far later than you wanted to hear it.

“No, I am here because of the future.” Beryl motioned toward the isolette. “That child, that lovely little child, is the future. Your future and your strength lies out there, with Yuli and Matilda Rose, whose picture I keep in my handbag and look at every single day.”

She touched Elliott’s shoulder then. “Perhaps it is your birthright - this urge to withdraw, to retreat inside yourself. Resist it. You cannot make my mistake. I will not let you fail them.”

“I already have,” Elliott said, his voice terribly small. “I’m so afraid. I think I’ve been afraid for years. I’m not strong enough for them, not man enough–”

“None of that,” Beryl ordered. “It does no good to wallow in self-pity.” She softened her tone. “These wretched days in this place…they will be a drop in the river that is your long, beautiful life with Jasper. Our door may be closed, but yours is open. There will be time. You have time.”

Elliott deflated then, sagging and hiding his face in his hands. His hair curtained his face as his shoulders shook from the sobs that he hadn’t been able to let out.

And Beryl didn’t run. She didn’t freeze or look askance or chastise him. Instead she drew him to her chest, this man who was taller than her by at least a foot. Her hand cupped his shoulder and she rested her cheek on the crown of his head, exactly the way Yuli had seen Elliott do with her, with Tilly. She looked younger. Before Yuli’s eyes, Beryl had turned into the woman whose memory Elliott still clung to and mourned. She held her son.

Satisfied, Yuli set off down the hallway towards the hospital’s pumping area. She wiped errant tears off her face as she settled down into one of the creaky armchairs and got everything set up. The lactation consultant had told her that looking at pictures of her baby would help get the milk flowing, so that was what she did. She swiped through her pictures of Jasper, smiling even as the tears flowed afresh.

Jasper sleeping next to the stuffed animal Tilly had picked out for him personally. Jasper’s hilarious, almost adult-like scowl while he tried to work out some trapped gas. Jasper snuggled up to his father, staring up at him with matching eyes.

Yuli closed her own eyes, thinking of Mae’s lap. Of Elliott finally breaking apart in his mother’s arms. She felt the tingling rush that signified a letdown.

Soon you’ll be out of here and our story can start. No matter what you’ve done, what I’ve done…I’m going to be that person for you.

We have time.

Where are you, Yuli screamed. Come out and face me.

It soon became apparent the Wizard was hiding from her. Sending her into unknown territory, hurling all these random memories at her to throw her off his trail. The next time she felt the gale-force wind that threatened to send her hurtling into another wormhole, she wrapped her limbs around whatever stable object she could reach in the memory she was currently inhabiting. In this case, it was a creaky armchair.

No, she screamed again, her voice lost in the howling wind. I’m not going.

The wind grew fiercer, so much so that she wondered if it could actually peel her skin off. Still, she tightened her grip, buried her face into the seat cushion. Her muscles shook, her joints ached, but still she held on.

Then she felt a shift. The wind lessened a bit, then whipped around her in some sort of cyclone. The setting was slowly starting to change. The hospital room was being swallowed up, piece by piece. The smells of antiseptic and terrible coffee were being replaced by the dank smell of some sort of cave. Humidity enveloped her, an eerie green glow hazed over her vision. She could feel spongy ground beneath her feet.

Evidently, Rasmodius figured that, if he couldn’t take her where he wanted her to go, he would instead take the place to her.

It stunk. A moldering damp, sulfurous kind of smell. It was a smell she had smelled before. She shut her eyes and tried to concentrate on placing it.

An unassuming pot of ink. A squat, glowering goblin. Void mayonnaise.

The Witch’s swamp.

Why would he have taken her here? She didn’t have any memories of this place that involved Elliott. Nothing that seemed to fit with the strange theme of this latest slate of seemingly random memories.

It must be someone else’s, then. Like when she saw the one of Willy and Elliott’s boat. That would be fine, right? She could handle that. She nodded to herself in confirmation. Not me. Someone else.

But whose?

The hairs on the back of her neck pricked up as she heard a rough, dragging sound behind her. She whirled around to see the source and her blood froze solid.

A man, half-hunched and shuffling, moaning in pain. The cave’s shadows obscured him and his face was covered by his hands, but his short stature and dull, lavender-colored hair revealed his identity. Rasmodius was gravely injured.

His hand was clamped over the worst of it, but what Yuli could see was still beyond grotesque. His flesh was bubbled and blistered, skin hung off in fluttering strips. Thick black blood streamed through his shaking fingers. Blinded by pain, he stumbled, briefly losing his footing.

Did I do that?

Yuli shook her head, as if to clear the brief but ridiculous notion. She couldn’t have. She had attacked and scratched him…or a vision of him…or whatever, yes, but this looked like it had been done with some sort of flamethrower.

He hobbled past her, unseeing, down the boggy path to the Witch’s hut. Underneath the copper tang of blood in the air, she swore she could smell the abject fear on him. His knees were trembling, it was all he could do to even stand, yet something had him so terrified that he pushed the pain aside to flee.

And if he was running from whatever did this to him…

Yuli ran after him, looking behind her shoulder to see if anything was approaching. Whatever they were running from had cut off the primary escape route out of the swamp. She would have to enter the hut and find another way. Maybe there was something in there, a totem, a secret passageway…

“Hey!” she shouted as she wrenched open the red door and braced her body against it to keep the enemy out. “Hey! I’m here! What is this?” she shouted louder, hoping the real Rasmodius could hear her and come pull her out. Surely he wouldn’t let her be eviscerated in some twisted dream swamp…

Would he?

His dream world shade knelt on the floor before her, groaning and gasping. But when he heard her slam the door, he scrambled to her on all fours, limbs quivering, his terror renewed. “Please,” he screamed. “Please, it was a mistake!”

Yuli whipped around to see who he was addressing, only to find the silent red door. “I…what?”

Rasmodius was fully prostrate at her feet now. In a sudden, desperate motion, he swung his arms around Yuli’s ankles and held tightly, as if she were the last solid thing tethering him to the earth. He looked up at her, his injured eye a bloody ruin, his good eye imploring.

“Cera, no,” he sobbed. “Mercy, I beg of you!”

An icy hand wrapped around her spine as she realized that it wasn’t Rasmodius doing this. He wasn’t in control, he hadn’t sent the cyclone. This memory, this world, belonged to someone else entirely.

Her own venomous retort came back to her. You’d have to go crawling back to your ex-wife, Ras.

You know, the one with the real magic?

He’d been comparing Yuli to her all night.

You remind me of her, you know. My wife.

His wife, whose hut housed the shrines responsible for the hellish magic of this night. Who, for all Yuli knew, could have even created them.

Fickle. Mercurial.

The witch who had cursed Yuli’s chicken coop the night she had stolen that pot of ink for Rasmodius. The next morning, the hens had all laid foul-smelling black eggs with angry, glowing red spots. Yuli had hurled them to the bottom of her burn pit and built the largest bonfire she could. She’d retched as she heard each egg emit a tiny shriek when it was licked by the flames.

Always so very angry.

A small part of Yuli had always known one thing - the Wizard was frightened of his ex-wife. He put on a good show of being unruffled and dismissed her temper as irrational and womanly, but there was a sort of reverence there. Something suggesting that, of the two, the Witch was more powerful.

It made sense to her then. Something clicked in her brain, so much that she could almost hear it. There would be no running. There would be no rescue. M. Rasmodius, master of the elemental and arcane, hadn’t sent Yuli here.

She had.