Chapter 1
Maddox
I sit in the open back of a neon pink moving truck, legs tucked beneath me as I flip through a photo album gifted to me by my best friend and, as of today, ex-roommate. When I get to a Polaroid of the first night in our shared apartment, I pause.
The floor is littered with boxes, open take-out containers, and bottles of cheap champagne.
The green fairy lights Javen wound haphazardly up the wall cast us both in an emerald sheen that is more flattering on his deep brown skin, whereas I just look sickly.
Even more sickly. But I’d been so fucking happy that night.
A rare smile brought out the dimple in my freckled cheek, my gray eyes turned to half-moons with unconcealed joy.
Content and full and ready to take on life with the person who knew me best. Didn’t matter that we didn’t have parents or any stable partners. We had each other, and that was enough.
Now a painful lump swells in my throat, and my stomach churns.
I swallow the emotion. There will be plenty of time to fall apart later, after Javen is well on his way to San Francisco to realize our shared dream of escaping this dying logging town.
The lingering buzz of a panic attack hums just beneath my skin, waiting to take over. Not yet, though. Not just yet.
I reject the feeling. Lock it down.
My attention is drawn away from the frozen memories at the sound of a high-pitched squeal emanating from the bushes lining our apartment’s walk.
A pair of vibrant blue pixies are seemingly fighting to the death over a plump huckleberry.
I used to watch them all the time when I was little, giggling at their antics.
Now I merely glower. There is nothing funny or cute about the fae.
Javen shoulders his way out of the front door with three bottles of cider in hand and a family-sized bag of sweet onion chips clenched between his teeth. He breezes right by the tiny fairies, nearly crashing into one, but they disperse in a huff before he’s able to.
Even after all this time, it still feels strange that no one else can see past the fae’s glamoured veil.
Once upon a time, I thought the Sight made me special, blessed by some magical god.
Now it feels like a curse. Every winged creature or horned beast I stumble upon makes me see red.
The same shade that pooled in the dirt as I screamed for help on Myrtle Tree Trail sixteen years ago.
“Three ciders?” I call to Javen, closing the photo album and placing it atop a box labeled More Costume Shit in bright green marker. “Please tell me you didn’t invite one of your weird coworkers to see you off too.”
He makes a face. “Ew, of course not. One cider for me since I’ll be driving, and two for you, to help you cope with the fact that you won’t get to see my glorious face every day.”
The words are said in jest, but they’re far too painful for me to offer more than a tight-lipped smile.
Cloaking misery in humor is a habit Javen and I both acquired in foster care.
Succumbing to emotions in a house with people you didn’t trust was not an option, so we made light of heavy things.
It made them easier to carry, along with the black trash bags of meager belongings we toted from house to broken house.
He settles beside me now, popping the top off a spiced apple cider with the edge of the pink truck. “When are you taking all your stuff over to the new place?” he asks. “You talked to the landlord, right?”
I hide the lie I’m about to tell with a deep glug from the bottle. “Tomorrow, probably. Wanted to spend today wallowing.”
“Valid.”
Javen tried to convince me to move with him to San Francisco, but I told him I needed to save money.
The understatement of the century, as I’m currently down to my last hundred dollars.
And two days ago, I had to inform our tiny apartment complex that I won’t be able to afford the deposit on the one-bedroom I’d been planning on moving into.
Lack of money aside, I can only apply for Medicaid in Oregon as a former foster youth in this state.
So I can’t go to California until I get a job that would either pay enough to cover my medical supplies or has excellent insurance.
And, for some reason, none of the places I’ve applied seem particularly impressed with my measly high school education, my handful of service and hospitality jobs, or my five-month stint as a virtual assistant.
As of this moment, my house is none other than the Jeep I bought back when I naively assumed I’d be able to afford the monthly payments with my fancy new corporate job.
That’s what happens when you believe the bullshit promises of a tech company selling you a dream only to let all their remote workers go a few months later.
Javen rips into the bag of sweet onion chips, grabbing a handful before passing it to me. “Want me to get your diabetes bag? It’s in your car, yeah?”
“No need.”
My dark ginger hair is piled in a messy bun on top of my head, held in place by a black velvet scrunchie.
Tucked in the bun is a capped syringe filled with insulin—a backup for when I’m not wearing pockets or don’t want to bother with the whole process of drawing insulin from a vial when I’m in the middle of doing something like packing a moving van full of the brightest part of my life.
I slide the syringe from its hiding place, remove the cap with one hand, and jab the needle into my bare thigh, emptying two units into my bloodstream to cover the carbs I’m about to devour.
Javen watches with half-lidded eyes. “You’re going to accidentally stab someone doing that shit, you know.”
“If I’m stabbing anyone, it’s not going to be an accident.”
His eyes open all the way now. “You’re a bit vile sometimes, you know.”
A bit.
Shrugging, I pluck a handful of chips from the bag, trying not to make it too obvious that this is the first sustenance I’ve had all day. Between rationing insulin and saving money, food has become a bit of a luxury the last few weeks.
“Any luck with job applications?” he asks, trying and failing to sound casual.
I swallow and take a long drink of cider, buying myself time to figure out an answer.
Wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, I place the bottle on a box labeled Smut.
“Not yet, but I was going to talk to Twanna about working at the bar again for a little while. I’ll save up some money and be right behind you.
Then we can live out all our most chaotic dreams in the city. ”
It’s a lie, but maybe it will stop him from worrying. The only local bar in Arborfell just hired a new girl after the guy who replaced me moved to Eugene to work at a bigger bar.
The problem with living in a dying logging town on the coast is there aren’t enough jobs to go around.
Businesses are closing left and right, and it’s not as though we have an abundance of tourists traipsing through our little town.
The second a position opens that doesn’t involve operating feller bunchers or fishing boats, it’s snatched right up like a piece of bread tossed at a flock of seagulls.
When I was younger, I used to look at twentysomethings like me and think, God, I can’t wait to be like them.
Able to make my own decisions. Live where I want.
Do what I want. Be free. Now? I’d give anything to go back to my sixteen-year-old self.
Grounded and sent to my foster room for sneaking out again.
Pissed at the people who weren’t my parents, blissfully unaware of how easy I had it with my “free” insulin and a roof over my ungrateful head.
Sucking his teeth, Javen presses the mouth of his bottle beneath his chin. “I could murder your fucking boss. I swear to all the gods.”
“Same.” If it meant I could afford a home, food, insulin, and all the other supplies it takes to manage this disease, I would sincerely consider it.
The worst part about that corporate job was that it gave me a taste of what life could be like if the Fates had been kinder.
New car, clothing, and spending money, and I got to see how easy life with type 1 diabetes can be if you have enough money to manage it.
Cordless insulin pumps and continuous glucose monitors.
The ease of being able to dose for food without injections, to check my blood sugar on an app rather than prick my finger and feed it into a test strip.
Those few months made me feel like I could actually breathe again.
Gave me that sense of control I’ve desperately searched for ever since I was a child.
But all of it was snatched away with a single email.
All I can afford now are vials of insulin and syringes, and even those have me pinching pennies and skipping meals. And ever since those days of luxury, I swear the needles sting more going in.
Javen sighs, tossing another chip into his mouth and pulling out his phone to scroll social media, pausing on a muted video of a man gesturing wildly at the sky.
In the subtitles, I spot UAPs and ORBS. Without looking up, Javen says, “Well, you know, if looking for a job here doesn’t pan out, you could always make a deal with a dryad. ”
I roll my eyes at him, though he doesn’t see. “Fuck off.”
Dryads have been a part of Arborfell’s local lore for decades, perhaps even centuries.
Like Bigfoot, the Jersey Devil, or the Loch Ness Monster.
The rumors were probably started by someone else who had the Sight, warning everyone about the forest creatures with antlers and blades made of wood.
Even Javen, someone who listens to hours of podcasts about the existence of aliens, has never viewed dryads as anything more than another silly cryptid fable.