Chapter 11
Carmen
Even days after Arccoo left for his home planet, the ghost of their final kiss still lingered on Carmen’s lips. The way his violet eyes gazed back at her as he boarded the ship as though memorizing every inch of her haunted her waking thoughts. She’d only known him for a few weeks, but saying goodbye felt like cutting off a limb.
She met the love of her life, and now she might never see him again. It wasn’t the worst pain she’d ever felt—that would be learning about the car accident that killed her parents—but it came close. At least this time, she had the comfort of knowing he was out there somewhere in the stars. He was alive and relatively safe, taking care of his people.
Still, she found it difficult to get out of bed in the first few days after his departure. She had so much to sort out in the house, but she didn’t have the energy to do it.
About a week after Arccoo left, she heard a perfunctory knock at her bedroom door before Sofia and Elena barged in. “Time to stop moping,” Sofia announced.
Carmen sat up and glared at her younger sisters. “I’m not moping.”
Sofia carried a collection of scary movies, nail polish, and alcoholic beverages while Elena balanced Carmen’s favorite chocolate chip cookies on top of a box of pizza.
“One: yes, you are,” Elena said, setting the pizza and cookies on the writing desk.
“Two: you’ve been locked up in here for days, and we’re worried about you.” Sofia tossed the collection of horror films onto Carmen’s bed.
“And three: it’s been way too long since we’ve had a girls’ night,” Elena finished.
Sofia flopped onto the bed beside Carmen. She wore a T-shirt with a ghost on it that read, I’m just here for the Boo-ze . She gestured to the pile of movies. “You get first pick.”
Carmen rolled her eyes but couldn’t help the smile that grew on her face. Mercifully, her sisters had picked out supernatural-themed horror instead of science fiction. She wasn’t sure if she could deal with more aliens at the moment. “Hmm, I think I’ll go with A Nightmare on Elm Street .”
“Our wise elder has spoken,” Sofia announced, tossing the DVD box at Elena. The youngest let out a squawk of surprise and fumbled with it before finally managing to grab hold.
Carmen rolled her eyes. “Sofia, you do realize that I’m only a year older than you. Right?”
“A whole four hundred and twelve days more experience than me. You’re practically a senior citizen in comparison.”
Elena picked up the pizza and moved the box in front of the TV before setting up the DVD player. Sofia and Carmen got out of bed and sat on the floor with their backs supported by the footboard. Opening the box revealed a pepperoni and sausage pizza, Carmen’s favorite.
“You guys are the best,” she said, tears of joy welling in her eyes.
Elena winked and took a bite of her pizza. “We know.”
As soon as Carmen took a bite, the feeling of hunger struck her full force. She hadn’t eaten much since Arccoo left, so as soon as the first bite touched her taste buds, she began scarfing down the whole slice.
As Freddy terrorized Nancy and her friends, Carmen devoured her dinner and laughed at special effects almost as cheesy as the pizza. For the first time since Arccoo left, she felt like herself again.
Soon, the pizza was eaten, and all three girls were tipsily trying to paint one another’s nails without painting on each other. When the movie was over, Elena and Sofia played rock, paper, scissors for the next movie. Sofia won and picked The Exorcist . Soon, they were nibbling on cookies as Regan’s head spun around and she spat pea soup on a doubtful priest.
Elena went with the more recent Godzilla vs. Kong film, which was fun until that movie’s version of Ann Darrow had to say goodbye to Kong as he headed back to Skull Island. Suddenly, Carmen was remembering her own farewell, and the wounds that had been scabbing over reopened.
“Seriously, Elena?” Sofia said, slapping the youngest’s arm.
She pouted. “How was I supposed to know that would set her off?”
“Stop fighting,” Carmen said, sniffling. “I’m just sad and drunk. Very drunk. Why did I drink so much?”
Sofia shrugged. “It’s the quickest way to forget a boy.”
“And just about everything else that happened lately,” Elena added.
“My point is… I’m tired…” she slurred.
Elena yawned. “Me, too.”
“Sleepover?” Sofia suggested.
“Sure…” Carmen’s eyes felt as though they had ten-pound weights attached to each lid, and her sisters weren’t much better. Soon, they had all drifted off to the end credits of the film.
Carmen woke with a pounding headache and a crick in her back. Her dry mouth tasted like something had crawled into it and died. Groaning, she rubbed her temples and took in the room.
The empty pizza box and cookie plate sat on the floor while her sisters curled in a circle around them. Between Sofia’s ghost hunts and Elena’s love of late-night research rabbit holes, Carmen was the only early bird among them. Behind Sofia and Elena, the theme to Godzilla vs. Kong played in a loop on the DVD menu screen. Despite the hangover and her body protesting her stupid choice to sleep on the floor, she felt fine. Better than fine. She felt more like herself than she had ever since Arccoo left.
Groaning like an old lady, she got to her feet, her spine giving a series of crackles as it realigned itself. She staggered to the bathroom, drank some water from the sink, and brushed her teeth before taking a nice, hot shower.
Her sisters were still fast asleep on the floor, and Carmen watched the gentle rise and fall of their chests with a small smile. After their parents died, she sometimes feared that she would be stuck in the role of surrogate mother for them, but it was never so one-sided. Her sisters cared for her as much as she cared for them.
Humming to herself, she headed to the kitchen to pop some pain medication and make some scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast. Thinking about Arccoo still hurt, but the night before was a reminder that she still had a life on Earth and people who loved her right where she was. If she spent too long grieving what she’d lost, she might forget what she still had.
Elena was the first to come stumbling down the stairs. Carmen pressed a cup of coffee into her sister’s hand, and she grunted her thanks. Her youngest sister was the type of person who was almost entirely nonverbal until she had her first coffee of the day.
“Thanks,” Elena finally managed after a couple sips.
Carmen waved her off as she made up a plate for her sister. “I should be thanking you and Sofia. You guys really got me out of that awful funk.”
“I smell food,” Sofia said by way of greeting. She leaned against the doorway, looking a lot like how Carmen felt.
She stepped aside. “Help yourself.”
“Mmm, bacon,” her middle sister mumbled, scooping some, along with the eggs, on top of the toast. She made herself an open-faced sandwich and dug in.
Carmen set the ibuprofen on the counter, and her sisters cheerfully popped some in along with their food. “I was thinking of cleaning out the library today,” she said, taking a bite of her buttered toast.
Now more alert, Sofia and Elena exchanged glances. Sofia smiled. “I’m glad you’re feeling better.”
“You were right yesterday when you said I was moping around. I really needed a distraction, and cleaning things out might be just what the doctor ordered.”
After finishing their breakfast and getting dressed, they made their way to the library. As she flicked on the lights and took in the dusty atmosphere, Carmen fondly remembered the summer afternoons she would spend hiding in there and reading away the afternoon. The three sisters donned their dust masks and got to work.
First, because it was a crisp, clear, sunny day, they opened the windows to let in some fresh air. Elena pulled out her phone and began playing her infamous electropunk playlist. Carmen’s rule was that they each would have an hour of their choice of music before passing the torch to the next sister. Elena won the rock, paper, scissors game, so she went first.
They spent the next hour in companionable silence as they dusted and took stock of every book. First, they would dust a bookshelf. Then they would take each book out, write down the title, and check for any signs of mold or mildew. Some of these books were valuable, so they would also write down if it was signed, a first edition, or both.
“Sofia, Grandma and Grandpa were almost as obsessed with the paranormal as you are,” Elena said. “This is the fifth signed book on parapsychology that I found. There’s also a whole shelf on that wall that’s just about the study of UFOs.”
“I found a lot of astrophysics books over here,” Carmen said, pulling out and dusting a first edition signed by Carl Sagan.
“Well, that’s nothing,” Sofia said. “I found the section with the Kama Sutra .” She let out a low whistle. “Grandma and Grandpa could get downright freaky-deaky.”
Carmen chuckled and pulled the next book from her shelf. Instead of coming free, though, a mechanical whirring sound began. “Hey, guys? You might want to see this.”
Sofia and Elena came bounding to her. “What’s up?” Elena asked.
“Watch this.” Carmen pulled the book again, and the whole shelf made that same mechanical sound. This time, the shelf swung outward, revealing a hidden room.
“No fucking way,” Sofia breathed. Her entire face lit up as she let out a delighted squeal. “This is awesome!”
“Whoa,” Carmen said, blocking her adventurous sister’s path before she could explore the creepy, dark, secret room all by herself. “Let’s just hold on a second. We don’t know what’s on the other side of that door.”
“Exactly!” Sofia exclaimed. “It’s a mystery.”
While Carmen was focused on corralling Sofia, Elena slipped her arm into the room and felt for a light switch. The lights flicked on, revealing an old laboratory like something out of a science fiction movie from the 1950s.
Carmen was so startled that she let Sofia and Elena pass. The youngest immediately went to the large central computer while the middle sister rushed to a wall of photographs.
“This thing is ancient,” Elena said with the excitement of a kid on Christmas morning. “I wonder if I can get it to work.”
Across the room, Sofia let out a gasp. “Holy shit, you guys. Do you remember those stories Grandma and Grandpa would make up before bed? The ones about them going to space and meeting aliens? I don’t think they were just stories.” She pointed to a picture in the center of the wall.
Carmen approached it as though in a dream. The photograph was in color. It looked to have been taken in the early seventies and showed a man shaking hands with someone who had gray skin and violet eyes—someone who bore a striking resemblance to Arccoo. Beside the younger version of their grandfather stood their grandmother holding a strange device.
“Is-is that his father?” Sofia asked.
“I think so. Or maybe his grandfather.” She bit her lip, a feeling of bittersweet melancholy filling her at the thought of her lost love. “He never really said why he came here of all places.” She ran a finger over the dusty glass frame, studying the strange device held by her grandmother in the photo. A wave of excitement washed over her. “I think Grandma is holding the parantaa.”
Sofia tilted her head in confusion. “The what?”
“It’s the device Arccoo came here to find. Supposedly, it can cure any disease but can also be used as a deadly weapon, so the Thryal people decided to hide it off-world. I guess they trusted Grandma and Grandpa with it.”
“But why them?” Elena asked, joining her sisters.
Carmen shrugged. “They must have thought humanity wasn’t advanced enough to know how to use it.”
“Makes sense. If you need me, I’ll be looking over their notes on the computer. I’ve never had to navigate anything as old as this before.” Elena grinned, flapping her hands in excitement. She always loved a challenge. “It might as well have been built by Ada Lovelace.”
Carmen and Sofia gave their genius sister a blank look. Elena sighed. “One of the original inventors of the computer. Her dad was Lord Byron.”
Now that Elena mentioned it, Carmen did know him. In high school, she wrote an essay about how his melodramatic personality influenced both Frankenstein and Polidori’s The Vampyre. And his daughter invented computers? “Cool.”
Elena rolled her eyes and returned to her happy place, the computer. Meanwhile, Carmen and Sofia searched the rest of the room. Opening a drawer, a strange glow caught her eye.
She pulled out a small canister like the kind they would use for nuclear rods. Painter’s tape had been stuck to the top, a label in her grandmother’s handwriting. Frillin crystals . She fumbled, nearly dropping it in her surprise. “Holy shit.”
“What?” Sofia asked. She and Elena were immediately at Carmen’s side.
“This is the missing part to his ship. The energy crystal core had burned out, stranding him here. All this time, he’d been searching for replacement crystals exactly like these.” Suddenly lightheaded, she set the canister on the table and reached for a dusty swivel chair.
Her breath caught in her throat. “Do you know what this means?”
Sofia grinned. “Hell, yeah! We’re going to Thryal!”
Carmen blinked. “I-I couldn’t ask you to give up everything and come with me.”
“Are you kidding?” Sofia slung an arm around Carmen’s shoulders. “Pass up the opportunity to explore strange new worlds and boldly go where no man has gone before? Have you met me?”
“And there’s no way I’m going to miss out on all that alien tech,” Elena said. “I’m still trying to figure out how his invisibility cloak works. It’s fascinating, and I cannot wait to see what else Thryal has to offer.”
Carmen lunged up and hugged her sisters. “I love you both so much!”