The Edge of Everything (Untitled #1)(19)

Zoe’s mom asked her and Jonah to follow her out to the garage.

“There’s some mess we have to clean up,” she said.

“Now?” said Zoe.

It was four in the morning.

“Now,” said her mother.

“I hate raccoons,” said Zoe.

Her mother seemed not to have heard her—she probably hadn’t slept in 24 hours—but at length she responded.

“Hmm?” she said. “Yeah, I hate them, too.”

The garage stood on the other side of the circular drive. Zoe had lived on this plot of ground her whole life, but it still amazed her that it could be so quiet—deep-space, science-fiction quiet—when it was nighttime and there wasn’t a wind. Silence, her mother liked to say, could heal you or it could make you crazy. It all depended on how you listened to it.

Zoe couldn’t tell what the silence would do to her tonight.

“Why’d you tell me to shut up when I said the thing about the cops not going to get Dad’s body?” she asked her mother.

“First of all,” her mother told her, “I would never tell you to shut up, because those are uncool words. But nothing good’s going to come from stirring everything up now. The police didn’t do their job. End of story.”

Zoe let it go, and they trudged along some more.

“I know you think we were lying about what happened with Stan,” she said as they crossed the drive.

“We weren’t, Mom,” Jonah interrupted. He had stopped to stab holes in the snow with a stick. “We weren’t lying at all.”

“Of course you weren’t, sweetie,” said Zoe’s mom.

“Stan really did hurt Bert and Betty,” he said. “And the magic man really did save Spock and Uhura.”

“Of course he did, sweetie.”

Zoe was annoyed by the way she was just yes-ing him. She fell behind to walk with her brother, who was still hacking at the snow like it was his enemy.

“Can you not?” she told him. “The snow is dead. You killed it. You win.”

She loved Jonah, even during his weird outbursts. She felt it strongly now. She wished the night could have bound them even closer to their mother, and for a while it’d seemed as if it would. Now her mom was floating away from them, looking up at the stars like Zoe and Jonah weren’t even there.

“We didn’t lie, Mom,” said Jonah, trying to reel her back in. “We didn’t.”

“Just drop it, Jonah,” Zoe said. “It’s not important that Mom believes us—because we believe us.”

They were 20 feet from the garage, and only now was it taking shape in the darkness, like the bow of a ship approaching through fog. It was a shingled shed built for two cars and divided down the middle by a thin wall. Jonah was strong enough to open the doors all by himself. He rushed forward delightedly.

“Which one?” he asked his mother.

“The one on the right,” she said. “But let me do it, please.”

The carport on the left held her mother’s silver Subaru Forester. Zoe’s car—a heinous old red Taurus that she referred to as the Struggle Buggy—used to be parked on the right. But Zoe had let Jonah convert her side of the garage into a mini–skate park so he could practice year-round. Her brother had installed a quarter pipe and a rail, and covered the walls with posters that said, Shred Till Yer Dead, and, Grind on It!

Zoe’s mom let out a sigh that made a cloud of vapor in the air. She asked Jonah to step back. Jonah wasn’t happy about it—he stamped his feet in the snow like an impatient horse—but he did.

Zoe stood by her brother, his partner in pouting. From inside the garage, she could hear scratching and scrabbling. She pulled Jonah even farther away, prepared for the raccoons to come tearing out. They were nasty animals. She picked up a snow shovel that was leaning against the garage and gripped it like a baseball bat.

Zoe’s mother reached down to open the door, then stopped and turned to them.

“I do believe you guys,” she said. “I’m sorry if it seemed like I didn’t.”

She appeared to have more to say, but she opened the door before continuing. It swung up with a metallic groan.

“Later, I want to hear all about the magic man,” her mother said. “But right now—”

Zoe saw a dark figure huddled on the floor of the garage. The figure turned to her, his face damp and beautiful and as pale as chalk.

“Right now,” her mother said, “you’ve got to help me get him inside.”





part two


A Binding of Fates





four


X heard a flurry of noises outside the garage: Voices. The rustling of clothes. Boots in the snow.

The door rose with a shivery screech, and the wind rushed in around him. He felt feverish, nauseated, depleted. Every sound was like a detonation in his head.

He looked up and saw three figures approaching in a funnel of light. It was the girl from the lake and her brother. A woman stood in front, shielding them. Their mother, surely. X winced and closed his eyes, as if it would make them disappear. He wasn’t afraid that they would do him harm. He was afraid they’d try to save him.

X knew he couldn’t be saved. Bounty hunters like him were just glorified prisoners, and they were bound by laws. He had been reckless—he had trampled on every one of them.