Chapter Twenty-Two #3
The moment felt heavy in a good way: solid and pure despite the pain at the root of it. While around them the crowd laughed and chattered with excitement, the five of them—Pax, Maddy, Al, Gloria, and Josie—shared the weighted silence in unexpected solidarity.
Her shoulders slumped and Gloria nodded once in agreement. “Yes. I suppose they are.”
Deciding the excitement would most likely result in the planetarium canceling or at least delaying the show, Al proposed they take Amos out to Don’s by the lake instead.
He generously extended the invitation to all of them and Gloria didn’t even object, but Pax and Maddy declined politely, and Josie told Al she would come with them the next time.
Amos’s departure was punctuated by the clicking of cell phone cameras and Josie’s last-minute reminders to wash his hands before he ate and use his best manners.
A cheer rose up outside the museum when Naliti finally emerged, flanked by a bevy of older men and women in various states of distress.
Josie would not want to have been Naliti at that moment, but the faery appeared nonchalant, and from where Josie stood, the ensuing discussions appeared calm enough.
Once Gloria was out of earshot, Josie turned to Maddy and Pax. “Thank you—”
Maddy held up a gloved hand, palm forward, blocking Josie’s thanks.
“This”—she continued to hold her palm in the air but dropped all fingers except her pointer—“this was a debacle.”
True. “Debacle” was an excellent SAT word for what was happening around them.
“Hurry up and get to work,” Maddy spat from between clenched teeth.
Before Josie could ask her exactly what “work” she needed to get to, the crowd parted and Naliti stood before them.
While the princess huddled with Pax and Maddy, Josie was pressed into service as a photographer. Almost twenty minutes later, all the pictures had been taken and all the water bottles signed. As the group made its way back to Number Five, Josie found herself walking next to Pax.
“Is everything all right?” she asked him. “What did Naliti say?”
His eyes met Josie’s and he reached out his hand. Before she could think better of it, they linked fingers and even that small a touch sent her heart rate soaring, and a bittersweet contentment settled in her bones.
She wanted to stop in the middle of the sidewalk and climb him like a tree, wrap her limbs around him, and lose herself in his touch. She wanted to run in the opposite direction and never feel this kind of need again.
“Unbeknownst to us, the princesses have become social media phenomena. Naliti has been conducting scientific experiments online and today was her first in-person event.”
He sighed. “Maddy is livid, and I cannot say I am happy, either.”
Famous faeries didn’t exactly help the rest of Number Five’s residents keep a low profile.
“I’m pretty surprised,” Josie said. “She seems sensible, I can’t imagine why she would blow up a museum.”
Pax squeezed her hand lightly. “She claims it wasn’t on purpose. She was conducting a simple experiment when something went wrong.” His gaze shifted between their clasped hands and the group of faeries in front of them.
“The experiment was a demonstration of bases and acids—elemental science on this world. No magic whatsoever until she used her powers to heat a flask of liquid. Her hypothesis is the unused, latent magic on this world exists in a volatile state, and our presence is exciting it.”
“Not exciting in a good way, I take it,” Josie said.
Pax agreed. “Not good at all.”
He held the door to Number Five open for Josie and she let go of his hand to brush by him, sparks prickling at her wherever their bodies touched.
“Pax,” Maddy called. She was in the office doorway ushering Naliti inside, looking unaffected in that way you knew she was furious.
“You better go,” Josie said.
“I must go,” Pax said at the same time.
Before she could turn and make her way to the stairs, Pax caught her by the elbow.
“You were generous back there with Gloria,” he said.
“I have…” Pax paused and looked upward as though the words he needed were hovering up by the decorative plaster arches crossing the lobby’s ceiling.
When she’d moved in, they had been a dirty white with missing chunks.
Now, though still dusty, they were almost whole again.
While conscious of the crowd of folks milling around them, they spoke quietly within a bubble of their own making.
“Whatever happens, you have changed something within this place. Changed something within me. Please, don’t leave until we speak again,” Pax said. “Please.”
He knew.
He knew Josie had one foot out the door.
Gloria might back down for now, but blowing up the science museum wasn’t going to go unnoticed, and the magical plants and gargoyles aside, Number Five wasn’t a place you could put down roots.
Josie and Amos were only two people, but they made up a family, and a family needed a place to grow and thrive, like plants in a garden.
“I’m not going anywhere tonight,” she said. “We can talk in the morning.”
The elevator opened and Raphe stalked out, bedecked in a puffy white shirt and tight black jeans.
“Paladin,” he called to Pax. “What happened now?”
Pax ignored the question, keeping his eyes on Josie’s face, but he frowned, and she knew it was time to let him go do his job.
“We can talk in the morning,” she repeated.
He nodded, reluctantly. Before Raphe could say anything more, Josie turned her back on them and walked up the stairs toward the third floor. Amos would be home in a few hours and she had some thinking to do.