The Dysasters (The Dysasters #1)(75)

The plane began taxiing and Foster sighed. She was staring at the boring in-flight magazine and picking her fingernails.

“Hey, are you okay?” he asked.

She didn’t look at him. “No. I hate flying. Actually, hate isn’t a strong enough word. I loathe it. Despise it. I would rather try to corral those giant evil monster dinosaur horses and get stomped to death than fly.”

“You think our horses are evil monsters?”

She did look at him then and he saw a world of misery in her emerald eyes. “They’re a lot smarter than we think. Do you realize how much they talk? Clearly, they’re planning something. Maybe a Percheron revolt.”

“But you’d rather deal with that than fly?”

“Exactly.”

“That’s why you won’t sit in the back of the plane?”

“That’s something Cora taught me. She used to tell me that it’s impossible to crash if you fly first class.” Foster shrugged. “I know it’s not logical, but it stuck. Southwest doesn’t have a first class, but still.”



“Front of the plane?” he said.

“Front of the plane,” she agreed.

The captain said something incomprehensible through the loudspeaker, and within a few minutes they were accelerating down the runway. Tate watched Foster. She’d stopped picking her fingernails, but her hands were gripping the armrests so hard her knuckles turned white. She was breathing in short little pants, staring at the back of the seat in front of them.

Tate decided a distraction was in order. He turned his body to face her, and said, “Can we please talk?”

He was relieved when she gave him an annoyed look. “No.”

“I said please.”

“And I said no.”

“Okay, I’ll talk and you listen. I’m sorry.”

When he didn’t say anything else, Foster glared at him. “That’s it? That’s your ‘talk’?” She air quoted.

“No, but it’s the basis of my talk. I am sorry, Foster. I should have told you about me calling G-pa. At first I didn’t tell you because I knew you’d just disagree with me and be a pain in the ass.” When she started to puff up, he hurried on. “But then I actually got to know you, and I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to lose your trust.”

“So you just kept lying.”

“Foster, I didn’t technically lie to you.”

“Tate, an omission of the truth, when you actually know the truth, is a lie.”

“Yeah, that was G-pa’s point, too.” Tate ran a hand through his hair. “I was going to tell you when I came up to find you before our date. But, uh, then you were so pretty and sweet and you asked me to go out with you, and I was selfish. I didn’t want to mess it up. My mom would be real pissed with me about that. So, I apologize. You were right. I was wrong. I shouldn’t have called G-pa, and since I did, I shouldn’t have kept that from you.”

She breathed a long sigh before speaking, and when she did, Foster sounded utterly defeated. “No. I wasn’t right. You said your grandpa’s home, landline, car title, basically everything about him is buried under a trust that’s almost impossible to lead to him, right?”

“Well, yeah, that’s what G-pa said, but it can’t be true because the fucking Fucktastic Four found him.”

“Sure, but what are the chances that they found him by tracing a landline to a pay phone on Sauvie Island?”

“I—I don’t know.”

“Well, I do. The chances are almost nonexistent, which means the Fucktastic Four didn’t find him by tracing a phone call. They dug up something about where he lives or another of a hundred different things they could’ve figured out, which also means if you hadn’t been calling him we wouldn’t know that they grabbed him. They’d just have your grandpa, who wouldn’t know anything about us at all. And then what would they have done with him?” Foster shook her head. “No, this isn’t only your fault, Tate. It’s mine, too. If I’d really thought this through—really been smart—I would have had you call your grandpa and tell him to get the hell out of there and come to us, where they wouldn’t have found him, and he would’ve been safe.” Foster folded her arms across her chest. “So, because of that I’m going to allow you the opportunity to earn my trust back. You know what that means?”

He reached over and pried one of her hands free, holding it gently in his. “That you like me and you’re extremely forgiving?”

“No. It means if you mess up and lie to me again I’ll never allow you another opportunity. This is a onetime thing. Got it?”

“Got it.”

She blew out a long breath and seemed to relax—and even though she’d pulled her hand from his, Foster’s voice was soft and more than a little sad. “And I’m sorry, too. I was being a bitch—telling you what to do and what not to do, and not listening or even thinking. I was just reacting. I—I really didn’t know what else to do after Cora died.” She looked down at her lap and curled in on herself like a wilted flower petal.

“Don’t do that.” Tate gently touched her chin, turning her face to him. “None of this would be happening if the Fucktastic Four weren’t after us. That isn’t our fault. We didn’t ask to be bonded to the elements. We didn’t ask to be orphaned.”