Loretta emerged first, dressed in a billowing rainbow-striped gown with a purple cape covered in silver stars and bearing a flashing light sabre she treated as a wand. Her new purple-rimmed glasses matched the purple streak in the bangs she was growing out and had pinned to one side.
Her indigo aura was practically put to shame in all that drama.
Behind her streamed a gaggle of sixth graders of every gender, all garbed in costumes Larraine had her workers help sew together. The bullied, heckled queer kid Larraine had once been now had the confidence to help other misfits find their pride. Evie got out her phone and snapped photos as they paraded past, down the steps, across the dance floor, and to the food.
It was good that Loretta’s friends were forming a place where everyone could be accepted. Her Indigo child was changing the world, one sliver at a time.
“Let the games begin!” Mavis’s shout came from the side gate as she shoved it open, bearing a flaming citronella torch. Behind her marched a contingent of flame-bearers singing an off-key Happy Birthday song, which the band picked up in screaming guitar and drum rolls.
As the torch bearers spread out around the perimeter, slipping the poles into waiting holders, they were followed in by Roark and the sheriff carrying a table of cakes with flaming candles.
“How do they keep those candles from blowing out?” Gracie, Evie’s sister, whispered as she emerged from the kitchen with her wide-eyed daughter.
“Special candles that glow forever, I think. Ariel found them online. Which reminds me...” Evie got out her phone and texted Jax’s sister that it was party time. Roark had set up video cameras around the yard so she could watch. She’d been right about Ariel’s aura—she was the Crystal Key to accompany Loretta’s Indigo awesomeness.
The band rocked out. Roark and the sheriff found space for the cake table and stood back as Loretta attempted to blow out the candles. Evie beamed as her once solemn ward crowed with delight when the flames wouldn’t die, and all her guests had to huff and puff with her.
Roark waved at the camera. Ariel texted a laughing emoji and fireworks to all their phones.
Pris strolled out of the kitchen covered in flour and wearing rainbow stripes in her hair. She leaned against the wall, observing. “Days of work, and I give it half an hour before the tables are wiped clean. Birthday cake first?”
“Yup. That’s what Loretta wanted, and it’s her day. I figure they’ll be starved after an hour of line-dancing. Reuben’s a demon on heels.” Evie nodded toward the prof in his cowboy boots. This new Reuben could be right entertaining. “Where’s Dante?”
“He booked his flight before he knew about the party. Good riddance,” Pris said stiffly.
Iddy climbed the steps with her raven on her shoulder. “La Chusa saw them fighting last night. Make her tell us what that’s about.”
“He’s gone. Who cares?” Pris marched off to supervise the picnic tables.
Ariel rang up on FaceTime. “Dante has problems.”
Huh, so Roark had the cameras wired for sound. Evie looked around, found the nearest one and gave Ariel a thumb’s up. Ariel added, “Pris knows.”
Evie wanted to hug Jax’s sister through the phone. She loved this addition to her family. “We’ll let them fight it out. I’m taking you to the party, new sis.” Leaving her family to size up the band, she worked her way through the buzzing kids on the dance floor to the tables where she was supposed to be guarding the punch, letting Ariel see it all.
Jax was waiting for her. He waved at his sister on the phone, then tugged Evie against him so they could watch as Larraine and Reuben got up on the proscenium to order the kids into line.
Roark grabbed Evie’s phone and took Ariel out to the dance floor. He’d ordered a new state-of-the-art fancy smart phone with the promise of payment from Gump, but it hadn’t arrived yet.
“Sometimes I’m really dense,” Jax said as they settled on the concrete bench they’d uncovered earlier in the week.
Evie laughed. “Focused. The word is focused. Goal-oriented. What did you work out?”
“That this is what I’ve been missing.” He gestured at the rowdy, laughing mob of kids and adults chowing down on food and drinks and grooving to the music. “I was only twelve when my parents died, and I spent so many years trying to be the well-behaved child that our adoptive parents wanted, fitting in with their country-club set, that I repressed earlier memories.”
Evie gazed up at him in concern, but his aura was lovely and content. “Your real parents were a little less... puritanical?” Given her family’s history, that was a word that held generations of meaning.
He nodded. “My parents’ parties looked like this—all ages, colors, gender. They had philosophical and political arguments over casseroles and cheap wine with crazy music in the background. I remember eating potato chips and kicking a ball around the backyard with kids I’d never met before. I don’t know who they were or where they are now, but I felt at home.” He turned and looked at her. “The way I do now. You make me feel at home.”
Evie thought her heart might explode with joy. “Your aura isn’t red anymore. We’ll have to ask Loretta if your walnut is growing.”
Jax laughed. “I love you, Evangeline Malcolm Carstairs. I’ve never said that to anyone, but I’m pretty sure if I don’t say it, I’ll burst holding in the words. I love you, and you make me happier than I’ve ever been.”
“Even when I tell you those torches contain illegal fireworks timed to go off at dark?” Evie kissed the corner of his lips and felt them turn up in a smile.
Laughing, he hauled her on his lap. “Even then. Maybe because of them. I love you even more.”
“That’s good then, because if you hadn’t said it first, I was going to say I love you the instant they fired off and the band starts playing ‘Witchy Woman’.” She tugged his head down and kissed him so he didn’t laugh too hard.