Suddenly her head jerked up, and this time there was something to see in the sky. I couldn’t quite make it out; it seemed to be both very close and very far away. It looked like a bat, a giant black one, with a wingspan that grew larger as it grew closer.
“Time for you to go,” Pippa said.
Everything shimmered, rippled, a dance of air on a palette of grey.
Then I was back in the apartment, standing in the living room in Dex’s t-shirt, my legs and feet bare and cold. I heard a little snuffle from beside me and saw Fat Rabbit roll over on the couch, seemingly asleep and uninterested.
The fuck just happened? Was I sleepwalking, dreaming I was in the Veil with Pippa? Or had she actually, physically brought me there? Wasn’t that supposed to be dangerous in a way?
I just know that when demons get to the other side, they look for a host and they go after the ones with power.
I shuddered at her words as they played over in my head. I’d already faced my demons, I’d already gone to hell and back. There was no way that could happen to me again. No way.
But what about Dex? asked the voice in my head. Ada?
I knew I’d do whatever I could to protect both of them. But I also knew I couldn’t freak out over an unsure warning in what might have been just a dream.
It had to be a dream.
I sighed. I headed to the bathroom to pee when suddenly there was a burst of vibration and a buzzing sound. With my hand at my chest, I spotted Dex’s cell on the kitchen counter, dancing and skipping from a muted phone call.
I frowned and quickly went over to it. Not only was it four in the morning, but the number was 1-234-56789123456789, something I had never seen before.
I picked it up and pressed answer. “Hello?” I said quietly, not wanting to wake Dex if I didn’t have to.
There was silence though I thought I heard breathing.
“Hello?” I asked again.
Someone cleared their throat. “Sorry. I may have the wrong number. Is…is Declan Foray there?”
“Declan?” I asked, always finding it funny when people addressed him by his full name. “He’s sleeping.”
“That’s a shame,” the man said. I couldn’t really figure out if he was young or old. He had a clipped way of speaking.
“Can I take a message?”
“Who is it that I am speaking to?”
I paused, feeling funny about the whole thing. “Perry,” I said reluctantly.
“Are you his girlfriend? His wife?”
I would have snorted at that if I wasn’t so creeped out.
“Who is it that I am speaking to?” I asked.
“I must have the wrong number,” he mused slowly. Then the call went dead.
I stared at the phone, trying to wrap my head around it. Then I shrugged and headed back to the bedroom. It was time to go back to sleep.
***
I didn’t really remember the phone call, nor my dream about Pippa, until a couple of days later when we were getting ready to leave for Oregon. I left out the dream since it was probably nonsense anyway—I was under a lot of stress when it came to seeing my parents, so my mind was probably concocting a bunch of nonsense—but I told Dex about the call. It didn’t seem to interest him a bit so I left it at what he thought it was—a pushy telemarketer in the night.
“The dog sitter will be here in ten minutes,” I yelled at Dex from the bedroom. He was in the bathroom and taking forever. “And then we have to be out of here.”
I heard him mumble something that sounded like, “Relax, kiddo,” followed by the buzz of his electric razor.
I sighed. Rebecca had been Fat Rabbit’s regular dog sitter until she joined our team. Now we’d been trying to find the right one for a while. The last one we had was Dex and Rebecca’s friend Seb, and when we returned home, we were paranoid that Seb had turned the place into a marijuana grow-op. Even the dog seemed to be extra lazy upon our return. As soon as the new sitter, Ana Rita, showed up, we’d take off for Oregon.
I still hadn’t told my parents about it. In fact, I hadn’t told Ada either. We’d decided to head straight to the coast and then stop by Portland on the way back, so at this point I’d only called Uncle Al. He sounded overjoyed to hear from me—it’s wasn’t like I regularly talked to him anyway—and it calmed my nerves a bit.
But only a bit.
Because I was pretty fucking nervous about this whole thing. The child ghosts at this school weren’t even entering my head—I was worried about my parents and their reaction to me showing up. I was worried about how they would or wouldn’t accept Dex. Even though I’d cut the ties and I was more than old enough, they were still my parents and they still had a strange hold on me.
I looked over my shoulder at my small suitcase I’d packed on the bed. Then I looked at Dex’s duffel bag on the floor. I peered inside. It was completely empty.
I rolled me eyes and ran over to the bathroom door and pounded on it. “Hey, you haven’t packed yet!”
The buzzing stopped momentarily. “It’ll take me two seconds.”
Right.
I went back to the room and started flipping through his closet, pulling out a leather jacket, a cargo coat, a hoodie, and a long-sleeved dress shirt for when he’d meet my parents again, then headed to his dresser. I rummaged through his drawers, picking out a few t-shirts and folding them before I tackled his boxer briefs. I only pulled out one pair before I heard the bathroom door open and Dex cry out, “What the hell are you doing?”
I whipped around to see Dex charging toward me and slamming the drawer shut. Thank god I removed my fingers just in time.
“What’s your problem?” I asked him, noting how his body was now blocking the entire dresser, his eyes wide with panic. He’d trimmed down a lot of his beard and ‘stache so it was just sexy scruff, and put in his eyebrow ring. He was looking good. But obviously nuts.
“What are you doing?” he asked again.
I gave him an odd look. ”I’m trying to pack for you.”
“I told you I’d do that,” he said, though he was starting to relax.
“Well I’m not counting on that. Why are you acting so sketchy? I’m allowed to touch your underwear.”
“Not when there might be skid marks on them.”
“Ew!” I wrinkled my nose. “Holy TMI, and also, don’t you know where the damn laundry basket is?”
He shrugged. “Now that you know what you’re up against, you can continue packing if you’d like.”
I shook my head and gave him a wave of disgust. “No thank you, it’s all yours.”
He grinned at me like he’d won some kind of war, and I could do nothing but take my suitcase out to the front door just in time to hear the buzzer from downstairs.
Fat Rabbit immediately started barking, staring up at me with a forlorn expression on his wrinkly face. He always acted a bit weird whenever we went away and the suitcase was a clear sign. I hoped he wouldn’t give the new sitter too much trouble.
I buzzed the woman up and turned to see Dex strolling proudly out of the bedroom with his duffel bag in tow.
“See,” he said, “packed in seconds flat.”
I narrowed my eyes suspiciously, figuring he’d probably forgotten a bunch of stuff like deodorant and socks.
When he got next to me, his face grew serious and he reached out to touch my hand, holding onto my pinky. “Are you okay? You’re the one who is acting a bit sketchy lately.”
I nodded but still said, “I don’t know. Just feeling antsy for some reason.”
He raised his brow. “Some reason? Kiddo, going home to see your parents isn’t some reason. It’s a big deal and it’s okay, I get it. But I’m here for you, you know that. Right?”