The Serpent King(18)

“I’m okay.”

“Come on.”

“Fine. Plain coffee in the Victory Venti size.”

The girl behind the counter handed them their drinks with a cheery grin and wished them both a blessed evening. Dill and Lydia found their seats.

“How do we not have a Starbucks here yet?” Lydia asked. “I’ve literally seen a Starbucks that had another tiny Starbucks in the bathroom. And anyway, how is a coffee shop Christian?”

“It implies that normal coffee shops are satanic.”

“Which they totally are. It’s like, can I please just get a cup of coffee without having to kneel before Lucifer and pledge my eternal soul?”

“Here’s your latte. Will that be cash, credit, or the blood of a virgin?”

They laughed, content to procrastinate doing their homework.

“We learned in church that the Starbucks logo is satanic,” Dill said.

“Of course you did, and of course it is. What’s the reasoning?” She made air quotes around “reasoning.”

“Mermaid demon.”

“Ah, yes. But your new church is slightly less nutty, right? No snakes?”

“No snakes.”

“So while we’re here in the temple of Christian coffee, do you still have the snake verse memorized?”

This was exactly what Dill hated talking about, but he humored her. “Mark sixteen eighteen. They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.”

“Bravo.”

“You don’t know if I got it right.”

“Eh. It felt right. It felt Bible-y. I have such cred coming here with you.”

“I’m not that faithful. I volunteered for the praise band because I was scared of the snakes.”

Lydia sipped her latte. “Well, I assume you could also play and sing reasonably well, not that I’ve ever heard you do both at the same time.”

Dill shrugged. “I guess.”

Lydia appeared to be pondering. “Back to the snakes. Do you think that’s what Jesus really meant? Maybe he was like, ‘And theoretically, you could probably pick up snakes,’ and Mark’s over there writing and he’s like, ‘You should literally pick up snakes. Cool, Jesus, got it!’ And Jesus is going, ‘Well, calm down with the snake business. Don’t be weird; just be a decent person. It’s really more of a metaphor.’ And Mark is writing, ‘Definitely pick up actual literal snakes and drink actual real poison like rotten grape juice or other Bible-y poison.’?”

“Who knows exactly what he meant?” Dill tried not to sound impatient with the conversation. He really did enjoy Lydia’s showing interest in his life.

“I’m sorry, do you hate talking about this?”

“No, it’s fine.” Let me just turn the temple of Christian coffee into a black pit of lies.

“Am I going to hell for joking about it?”

“Not if we find some snakes for you to handle. And I slipped some arsenic in your latte when you weren’t looking.” They laughed.

Dill sighed, the way he did when he knew he’d procrastinated doing something for as long as he could. He fished around in his bag for his schoolbooks. “Homework on the first day of school,” he muttered under his breath.

“Hey, Dill? Hang on a sec.” Lydia spoke quietly, the snark gone from her voice. “There’s something I want to talk to you about.”

Dill’s heart began to race. Over the past few years, when people had prefaced something they were about to say with “there’s something I want to talk to you about,” it proved to be nothing he wanted to talk about.

“There’s something I want to talk to you about. Your father is in trouble.”

“There’s something I want to talk to you about. We need you to testify.”

“There’s something I want to talk to you about. Your mother was in a very serious accident coming back from visiting your father in Nashville, and she might not pull through.”

“There’s something I want to talk to you about. With the house, the church, your father’s legal fees, and my bills from the accident, we’re about two hundred seventy thousand dollars in debt.”

“There’s something I want to talk to you about. I’m leaving you behind to go on to a bigger and better life, and I’ll never think about or speak with you ever again.” Probably.

“Okay,” Dill said.

“I want to do some school shopping with you. The kind where you actually shop for schools.”

Dill eyed her blankly, not quite processing what she was saying.

“Colleges. I want you to go to college.”

“Why?” Dill’s heart continued to race. What Lydia said wasn’t bad in the way he feared, but it still wasn’t what he wanted to hear.

“Why?” Lydia appeared flustered, a rare condition for her. As though it hadn’t occurred to her that she’d have to explain why. “Because. First of all, college is good. You learn how to function in the very big world outside Forrestville and you set yourself up better for life. College grads make way more money. Millions more over their lifetime.”

“So I’ll stay in Forrestville and I’ll be fine. And I don’t need millions of dollars. Only enough to live.” Dill wouldn’t make eye contact.