The woman nods, wiping under her eyes.
There’s a knock at the door and the woman calls, “Come in.”
Fia walks in, dressed in the school uniform, looking young and sweet except for the tension in her eyes.
“Oh, here’s Sofia.” James smiles paternally at her. “She’s the girl I was telling you about. She was in Des Moines visiting relatives and so we thought she could stop by, talk with Sadie, answer any questions she has. It’ll be easier if Sadie has a familiar face at the school.”
“Sadie, can you come in here?”
Hands pulled into her sleeves, Sadie slouches in, immediately curling into a ball in the corner of the couch. Her mom signs the papers. James and Eden watch. Fia leans against the wall, staring out the window, then turns. Horror flashes across my sister’s face. Eden looks up sharply, but Fia smiles brightly, falsely, at the girl. She taps on her leg, tap tap taps, but no one notices. “You’re going to love the school,” Fia says.
Then the darkness is back. “. . . asleep?”
I shudder, the pain dull and familiar behind my eyes. “Get Cole. I need to go to Iowa. Right now.”
FIA
Eighteen Hours Before
WE SIT ON THE CURB A FEW LOTS DOWN FROM THE house where Sadie is staying. Pixie stretches her skinny legs out into the street. Good thing she’s so short she’s safe from having them run over.
She kicks at my boot. “Are the short jokes funny in your head? Because they aren’t funny in mine.”
“Shut it, Shortie.” I dial James and wait for him to pick up. I am spinning out of control, I know I am, everything is spinning out of control and I don’t know if I can do enough to hold on to everything, to twist everything in the way I do, but I have to try I will try.
I thought New York would change things, make me even more focused, put me directly in line with our goals. But I feel further away than ever from my flames, my beautiful flames.
I’m cold.
“Fia,” James says, and I love the way he always answers the phone with my name: a statement, not a question.
“So, here’s the thing about Sadie.”
“Sadie?”
I slap my forehead, swear. “Did your father not tell you? I’m in Florida with the brain leech. We found Sadie.”
“He didn’t tell me.” There’s a pause, and I can feel his worry seeping across the miles and miles and miles of empty air between us. “But I haven’t talked to him yet today. I’m sure he would have mentioned it.”
“Mmm.” I lie back, the concrete of the sidewalk hard and baking hot through my T-shirt, but it’s not hot enough. I squeeze my eyes shut against the sun, let it burn my eyes through my eyelids. I once stared at the sun as long as I could, trying to go blind like Annie. Maybe if it had worked, we would still be together, be safe, be worthless to evil men and therefore free to just be.
James prods me. “Are you still there?”
“There’s something wrong. Sadie’s only a Seer, but . . .” But why is she special? Why was she so important? Seers aren’t super useful in general. There’s no reason she should keep popping up on the radar like this.
“Is . . . anyone else with her?”
He doesn’t say the name. He doesn’t know that Pixie knows that Annie isn’t dead. The tightrope I walk keeps stretching, with no end in view. Farther and farther from my goal.
“No. I’d know if she were here again.” I would. I
would know that, I’d have to.
I tap tap tap tap. Tap tap tap tap. Tap tap tap tap. What is so important about Sadie? There is something I’m not realizing, some huge piece I’m failing to put together, and that failure scares me. I can’t fail. Sadie shouldn’t be dangerous, shouldn’t set off my warning bells. I bring all sorts of girls in. Sure, she has a history of triggering bloodshed (four, four taps, I hate them), but she’s just a Seer. Seers are lame. They can’t control what they see or when they see it.
“Oh.” It’s an exhalation, a curse and a prayer and a eulogy. Because I understand now. What she is. What she means. Seers can’t see me, none except Annie. I’m too slippery, I slide right out of their visions.
Sadie looked at Pixie’s hand and thought she didn’t want to see that future. She knew she would. There was no question.