Alexa made a left at the old church onto a one-lane road, unlit under a dense canopy of trees. At the end of it, she turned onto Dan’s gravel driveway.
“Whose car is that?” Alexa asked at the exact moment that Dan said, “Motherfuck.”
A red Range Rover was parked at the end of the long driveway. In the driver’s seat, a girl with long blond hair was frantically tapping something into her phone. The screen cast her face in a blue glow.
Dan squeezed her eyes closed and took a deep breath. For the first time in months, Dan wished she still had anything to do with magic: she’d make the Range Rover vanish.
“Who is that?” Alexa asked again. Dan heard the door of the Range Rover open and shut, footsteps crunching against the gravel. “Is that—”
“You should go home, Alexa. I’ll see you at school tomorrow.”
Before Alexa could protest, Dan was out of the car and slamming the door behind her.
“What is wrong with you?” the blond girl hissed. “Don’t you ever check your phone or are you the one young person on earth who’s above that?”
“Hello to you too, Liss.”
“I’ve been texting you all night—I called a million times and you know I hate calling.”
“I deleted your number,” Dan said as coldly as she could, which wasn’t very cold at all, because she couldn’t stop herself from softening the truth with a lie. “My phone kind of broke and I lost a bunch of numbers. It doesn’t matter—what do you want?”
Liss folded her arms. One hand still clutched her phone, but with the other, she was touching the pad of each finger to her thumb, as if she were counting up to four and back again. Liss did this when she was nervous, Dan knew, which was basically all the time. “I need to talk to you. Alone,” she added, jutting her jaw toward the little white Toyota.
Alexa was standing against her door, one arm thrown up on the roof. She was glaring at Liss with such derision that her lip practically curled. “So you’re Liss? Nice outfit.”
It wasn’t necessary, Dan knew, and that made it mean, which made her love Alexa fiercely.
“Kudos, you’ve correctly identified that I’m wearing a school uniform. Where did you find someone with such amazing powers of observation, Dan?”
Dan soured. Being around Liss gave her a dizzy, nauseous feeling—the collision of how much she’d loved her before with how much she hated her now. For so long they had been almost a single unit that even now, Dan found it hard to resist Liss’s pull. Liss could ask anything of Dan—and she had—but it was another thing entirely to go after Alexa.
Dan took a long look at Liss. She’d never seen her in her new uniform. Dan hadn’t seen her at all, in fact, since she’d started school at St. Ignatius. There was something fractured about her, a vision of the old, perfect Liss with spider cracks running through. Her hair was frizzing in the fog, and even in the dim light, Dan could see the dark circles under her eyes. Her kneecaps and cheekbones seemed sharper, as if she’d lost weight—at least her mother would be happy about that.
Strangest of all was the dirt. The white uniform shirt was smeared with it, her hands and knees were grubby, and her tennis shoes were crusted with mud. That wasn’t like Liss at all—she hated being dirty—and it raised a lump in Dan’s throat. She forced herself to say, “I don’t want to talk to you.”
Liss’s fingers counted to four and back, but she didn’t move. She’d never taken well to people saying no to her.
“Go home, Liss, I’m serious.”
“Don’t be stupid, Dan. I’m telling you we need to talk.”
“Do people usually do what you want after you insult them?” Alexa snarled.
Liss’s mouth was half open, but Dan spoke first. “Just say whatever you came here to say.”
Liss shook her head. “Not in front of her.”
Dan bristled. “Her name is Alexa. And I guess you’ll be leaving, because this is the only way we’re having this conversation.”
Dan met Liss’s eyes. She could tell Liss was burning, and she willed herself to take some pleasure in it.
“You’re going to regret that decision,” Liss said through her teeth, then closed the space separating them in a few steps. The air between them seemed to turn staticky, crackling with energy, although Dan didn’t know if it was magic or just mutual animosity. She reminded herself that Alexa was behind her, ready to defend her if she needed to, and she schooled her features to a look of indifference.
Then Liss took a breath and said, “I talked to Johnny.”
Liss
Liss didn’t expect to feel as gratified as she did to see Dan speechless, but she also hadn’t expected her to put up such a fight. And she hadn’t expected to get this other girl—Alexa—involved. Dan’s new best friend was still leaning against her dingy little car like an emo James Dean in a thrift-store sweater. It was funny that Alexa thought she could protect Dan from Liss.
As if Liss was the danger Dan needed protection from.
“That’s impossible,” Dan finally said in a small voice. “Johnny’s gone.”
“Who’s Johnny?” Alexa asked.
“A guy we used to know,” Dan answered.
Liss held out a flat hand. “He’s my boyfriend.”
Dan darkened. “Don’t be pathetic. You don’t get to call him your boyfriend after all this.”
“You can’t still be jealous.”
“I was never jealous of you, and you aren’t dating Johnny. Johnny is—he’s gone.”
There was something frantic in Dan’s dark brown eyes. Liss wondered if she thought Johnny was dead, if she thought he died right away or if it was drawn out, long and slow. She wondered if Dan thought Johnny might make it back without her help—their help.
She wondered if Dan still thought about Johnny at all.
“Let me get this straight,” Alexa cut in. “Johnny is some guy you used to know—past tense—and your present-tense boyfriend, and no one knows where he is?”
Dan bit her lip, her shoulders curled in. It was no surprise that Dan didn’t talk about Johnny to Alexa, but everyone had heard what happened to him. Had this girl been living under a rock?
“Johnny Su,” Dan said carefully. “He went missing at the end of February. Before you moved here,” she added for Liss’s benefit. “No one’s heard from him since.”
“I have,” Liss said emphatically. “Understand what I mean? I can tell you what he said, but we should be having this conversation in private, don’t you think?” Liss glared at Dan, trying to convey the significance Dan was obviously missing. Dan should have at least been happy that Johnny was alive, even if she couldn’t muster any enthusiasm over reuniting with her old best friend. Instead Dan looked like she wanted to hide under her bed.