Chapter 13 Ellis #2
I stepped back into the more reasonable temperature outside, grateful.
I spotted Dove standing at the back of the car, bags by her feet as she spoke to Liv.
Her cheeks were still pink, and her expression looked more guarded than usual.
Maybe she was finally reaching the end of her bottomless patience.
Liv looked over and grinned at me, said something to Dove, who turned her head sharply.
Her eyes widened a fraction before she called out, “Which way we headed?”
The walk to our room was filled with trepidation, at least for me. I was bracing myself both mentally and physically for something sticky or stained. The bar was very low at this point.
The door swung open, and I winced as I peeked one eye open.
It wasn’t horrible.
I took in the forest green patterned bedspreads and white walls. The carpet looked clean and didn’t squish under my feet as I stepped into the room. It didn’t smell like death or mildew—another plus—and I felt comfortable saying the bedding had actually been washed.
Dove dropped her duffel with a dramatic thud and let out a loud sigh, face-planting onto one of the beds with a groan, arms outstretched as she fell forward.
“Okay, this mattress isn’t horrible,” she moaned through a yawn. “I can’t feel any of the springs. We have a winner.”
“I’m going to check out the vending machine,” Liv said with a grin. “Who’s hungry?”
I blinked at her. “You can’t use it, Liv.”
“A little haunting might scare the food out of the racks,” she said with an ominous shrug. “Just listen out for me.”
She disappeared.
Dove snorted, and I kicked the door shut, setting down my duffel bag and rubbing my eyes, feeling more fatigued than ever.
“Okay,” Dove said, getting up and grabbing her bag.
“I know this stop wasn’t planned or welcomed, but it feels like fate.
I need to wash some clothes. I really underestimated the length of this trip.
That said, I packed like, right before you came to pick me up, so.
.. do you know if there’s a laundromat here that won’t give us tetanus?
My clothes have been smelling weird since we got caught in the rain. ”
I blinked at her, then glanced at my own bag. I definitely still had a few clean things, but it couldn’t hurt to knock out some washing while we waited for the drive-in to open.
I grabbed my phone and tapped away.
“Seven minutes away,” I told her, holding out the screen. “Reviews are good. No mentions of blood, murder, or rats.”
“Ah, the top three prerequisites for the Ellis Langley Guidebook,” Dove teased, flashing that same smirk that was starting to make me a little dizzy. “Okay, great. Want to do some washing, then?”
“Yeah, we can,” I said lightly, getting to my feet. “The drive-in doesn’t open until six thirty. If we do this efficiently, we can get everything knocked out in time and still have time to shower and eat an actual meal before we gorge on movie snacks.”
Dove’s eyes lit up. “You’re letting us get movie snacks?”
“Ha-ha,” I said with an eye roll.
I pulled out a spare canvas bag I’d rolled into my main bag and began filling it with clothes I’d already worn.
Dove eyed it with interest. “Do you mind if I, uh, throw mine in too, or does that gross you out a little?”
I frowned and shrugged. “No, it’s fine. They’re all getting washed anyway.”
Soon, it became a flurry of dirty socks, crumpled T-shirts, and a pair of jeans Dove insisted were “still good for another wear.” She hadn’t worn them once on the trip, so the likelihood of her having pulled them off the floor of her bedroom while packing was high. I snuck them in when she turned away.
I tried not to let myself think about how strangely domestic it felt. Intimate, even. Like we’d done laundry together a dozen times before.
I also liked how unchaotic she was making this unplanned stop feel. How she was giving me tasks to occupy myself with before we went to the movie. I hadn’t planned any sightseeing here, and we couldn’t just sit around the motel room, so this was the alternative.
Liv hadn’t reappeared from her vending machine expedition, but she always popped up when she was ready to torment us.
So we headed to the pinned laundromat, clothes piled into the canvas bag now sitting on the back seat, and I navigated us through town, eyeing potential places for food along the way.
Dove had made sure Margaret was safely secured in her duffel bag back in the hotel room.
The laundromat was smaller than I expected.
Just six washers and four dryers. Only two were humming in unison, and a single woman sat in the far corner on a rickety-looking chair.
She wore a windbreaker and a tired expression, clutching a celebrity gossip magazine in her hands while absentmindedly eating Cheetos.
A row of vending machines stood along the back wall, one for snacks, its interior light flickering in a way that made me instantly cross it off my list, and two for soap. The floor was covered in lint, bits of rubbish, and more scuff marks than I could count. The air smelled like warm detergent.
It was the type of underwhelming space I needed right now, and I chose to overlook the general mess.
Dove moved toward a washer and hoisted up our bag.
“Okay,” she said, “are you the type to sit there and section all your clothes, or can we just chuck them in and make soup?” Her eyes held a worried edge that told me she hoped I was the latter.
“I only separate if I have whites,” I said with a shrug. “And underwear.”
“Okay, cool,” Dove said, promptly dumping everything in at once—including the underwear—then slamming down the lid and programming the wash before I could say anything.
“Dove!”
“Relax, Ellis,” she sighed. “I promise you, the clothes won’t die, and neither will you.”
I glared at her and ran a hand through my hair before leaning back against the silver bar-top table.
“You’re a bigger pain in my ass than Liv sometimes,” I muttered.
Dove grinned. “Just living life on the edge.”
The washing machine began to move, slowly filling like it was mocking me. I let out a steady breath. There were worse things in life to get upset about.
“So,” Dove said as she hoisted herself up onto the bench. “I have a confession.”
I crossed my arms and looked at her. “What?”
“I looked you up,” she admitted, her expression a little sheepish as she swung her legs back and forth. “You know. Your videos.”
I tensed out of reflex, but I’d known this was inevitable.
“Ah,” was all I said.
“What was it like?” she asked casually, not in that too-casual way that meant someone was prying, but genuinely. Her brows were knitted together. “What was it like to grow up sick all the time?”
Maybe it was the low hum of the machines around me, or the fact that Liv’s taunting voice wasn’t there to deflect. Or maybe it was Dove’s voice, low and kind and not crowded with expectation, that made it easier than it should’ve been to utter my next words.
“It was shit,” I told her honestly. “I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.”
She didn’t flinch or pull some crumpled pity face. She just nodded, drumming her fingers along the metal tabletop.
“I mean, I was five when I was first diagnosed,” I continued, surprising myself.
“So my earliest memories of it are there, but they’re kind of hazy.
Sometimes I confuse the two times. But I remember hearing the word leukemia and seeing the looks on my parents’ faces, like it’s burned into my memory. That’s never going away.”
The machines hummed steadily. I heard the woman in the corner flip another page of her magazine.
“They tried to make it magical for me,” I said softly.
“Balloons and coloring books at appointments. Describing chemo like soldiers marching into battle to protect my body. Telling me over and over how brave I was. But that look in their eyes... I didn’t understand it then.
I know now. The panic. The fear. My mom lost so much weight from the stress.
I’ve seen photos. It’s insane. Their joy became measured by blood counts and test results. ”
I rubbed my forehead.
“My brother, Thomas... he was seven when I was first diagnosed. It’s not like he understood, but he knew things weren’t great.
He just knew the world suddenly revolved around me—and only me.
He was so... we were so... close, back then.
He’d lie beside me while I recovered from chemo, hold barf buckets if Mom was in the other room.
He even remembered what foods I could and couldn’t eat, what germs were dangerous. He really had to grow up fast.”
Dove stayed silent as I spoke, her feet still swinging slightly, her eyes fixed on me.
“He taught me how to tie my shoes. Let me play with his Legos. He even punched some kid in the face who made fun of me when I lost my hair.” I smiled at the memory, feeling the tears build behind my eyes as I pictured him—my brother, back then.
“Then I got sick the second time, and it was worse, you know? He was with my grandparents a lot more, or he’d be at school or training.
He was out there being normal, which I get. But we drifted.”
The woman in the corner loudly crinkled her empty Cheetos bag before settling deeper into her chair, flipping another page.
“I don’t even know who he is anymore,” I muttered, swallowing and blinking the tears back.
“There’s like this crater between us, you know?
He never said he resented me or anything, but you can feel those things.
I became our parents’ sole priority a lot of the time, and there was so much pressure, so much exhaustion.
And it wasn’t just my body wearing down. .. it was all of us.”
I turned and faced the benchtop, resting my hands on it as I frowned, truly allowing myself to sit with these memories instead of stuffing them down.