One last stop, p.9
One Last Stop, page 9
“Isaiah,” Wes says. Niko returns to searching for the right key. “Hey.”
Even in the washed-out darkness of the street, it’s obvious Wes is blushing under his freckles. As Niko would say, that’s interesting.
“Hey, uh … what are y’all doing?” Isaiah asks.
“Uh—” Wes stammers.
Niko glances over his shoulder and says flatly, “A séance.”
Wes looks mortified, but Isaiah is intrigued. “Oh, no shit?”
“You wanna join?” Niko says. “I feel good about the number five tonight.”
“Sure, uh—” He turns, addressing the guy who’s been waiting for him. “You good to get home?”
“No worries, babe,” the guy says. He waves and heads off toward the nearest subway stop.
“Who was that?” Wes says, very obviously trying to sound like he doesn’t care at all.
Isaiah grins. “That’s my new drag daughter. Freshly hatched little baby. Goes by Sara Tonin.”
Myla laughs. “Genius.”
“Aha!” Niko crows, victorious, and the door to the shop swings open.
Niko leaves the overhead lights off and moves purposefully around the shop, lighting velones de santos like the ones he’s shown her at home until the glow mixes with the moonlight and the muddy flood of the streetlights. The space is wall-to-wall shelves, full of stones and bundles of herbs and animal skulls, bottles of Niko’s home-brewed Alcoholado. One rickety bookshelf sags under hundreds of bottles and jars, most filled with murky oil and labeled things like FAST LUCK and DRAGON’S BLOOD. There’s a collection of pillar candles too, with cards explaining their uses. The one closest to August is either for reuniting past loves or penis enlargement. She should probably get the prescription on her glasses updated.
“So … is this a … general séance?” Isaiah says. He’s on the other side of the room, examining a jar of teeth. “Or are we trying to talk to someone in particular?”
And now August is in Wes’s position, stammering and hoping Niko doesn’t come through with the truth.
“We’re doing a séance to reach a woman August has a crush on,” Niko says, coming through with the truth.
“Please, sir,” Myla says in an absolutely terrible Southern accent. “It’s my girlfriend, she’s very dead.”
August considers pulling the shelf of potions over on herself and ending it all. “Thank you both for making me sound like a necrophiliac.”
“You know, I thought you were a little spicy when I met you,” says Isaiah, taking it remarkably in stride.
“We don’t know if she’s dead,” August says. “She just happens to have not aged since 1976.”
“That’s basically what we said,” Niko says. “Follow me.”
In the back is a tiny room with a round table draped in the same heavy black cloth as the walls around it. Little poufs surround it, and a shimmery, sheer scarf rests on top, purple and glistening in the low light, spirals of gold and silver stars winking up at them.
Niko’s already lit a bundle of sage and set it to smolder in an abalone bowl. He’s at the table, carefully arranging incense and a ring of crystals around tall white candles, the kind you see in a Catholic church when you’re leaving a prayer for the Virgin Mary, except August is definitely the only virgin here and she doesn’t think praying to her would accomplish anything.
“Grab a seat,” Niko says. He’s holding a spent match between his teeth and a lit one between his thumb and forefinger. August has never seen him so fully in his element. Myla looks turned on.
“How is this going to work?” August asks.
“We’re going to try calling Jane’s spirit,” Niko says. “If she’s dead, she should be able to project herself here and talk to us, and then we’ll know for sure. If she’s not, well. Probably nothing will happen.”
“Probably?”
“Something else might come forward,” he says, lighting another match with total nonchalance as if he has not just suggested some unknown force from the great beyond could Beetlejuice into the room and rub its little demon hands all over them. “It happens. If you open a door, anything can come through it. But it’ll be fine.”
“I swear to God, if a ghost kills me, I’ll haunt the shower,” Wes says. “You guys will never have hot water again.”
“We don’t have hot water now,” August points out.
“Fine, I’ll haunt the toilet.”
“Why do you want to haunt a bathroom, man?” Isaiah asks.
“It’s where people are most vulnerable,” Wes says, like it’s obvious. Isaiah frowns thoughtfully and nods.
“Ghosts can’t kill you,” Niko says mildly. “Everyone hush.”
He lights the remaining candles, speaking quiet Spanish to someone no one can see. Wes tenses at August’s side as the last flame goes up.
“August?” Niko says. He’s looking at her expectantly, and she realizes: the scarf. She unwinds it from her neck and lays it on the table, the image of her uncle’s pocketknife laid across a gauzy cloth flashing through her brain.
“Okay,” he says. “Take one anothers’ hands.”
Myla’s callused palm slots neatly into August’s. Wes hesitates, looking unwilling to release his iron grip on his sweatshirt sleeves, but he finally gives in and laces his fingers through August’s. They’re clammy and as bony as they look, but comforting. He tentatively picks up Isaiah’s on his other side.
Across the table, Niko closes his eyes and releases a long, steady breath before speaking.
“This works better if everyone is open to what’s happening,” he says. “Even if you don’t know that you believe, or you’re afraid, try to open your mind and focus on radiating a sense of welcoming and warmth. We’re asking for a favor. Be kind about it.”
August bites her lip. Isaiah’s usual bright glow has dimmed to a reverent smolder as he brushes his thumb across Wes’s hand. It’s pretty late on a weeknight for a post-drag séance, especially considering he works a desk job, but he looks unbothered by the time.
“August,” Niko says, and she snaps her eyes to him. “Are you ready?”
Focus. Welcoming and warmth. Open mind. She releases a breath and nods.
“Spirit guides,” Niko says, “we come to you tonight in search of understanding, in the hopes we’ll receive a sign of your presence. Please feel welcome in our circle and join us when you’re ready.”
Should August close her eyes? Leave them open? Myla slides her eyes shut, totally at peace; August guesses she’s had a lot of time to get used to this kind of thing. Niko’s signature look of mild constipation is taking over his face, and August chews on the inside of her cheek, fighting a wave of nervous laughter.
“Jane,” Niko says. “Jane, if you’re there. August is here. I’d love for you to come forward. She’d love to talk to you.”
And suddenly, August couldn’t laugh if she tried.
It was one thing to talk in hypotheticals—if Jane isn’t what she seems, if they can reach her, if she’s dead. It’s something else to be here, breathing in smoke, face-to-face with whatever the answer might be. This girl August has spent almost every morning and afternoon with since she moved to the city, who’s made her feel things she hasn’t felt since she was a kid, like reckless hope—
Niko’s eyelids flicker open.
“It’s gonna be okay, August.”
August gulps down a breath.
“Jane,” he says, louder and clearer this time. “Maybe you’re lost, or you’re not sure where you are, or who you can trust. But you can trust me.”
They wait. The second hand on Myla’s watch ticks on. Isaiah’s fingers twitch. Wes exhales a shaky breath. August can’t look away from Niko’s face, from the set of his mouth, from his lashes twitching and fanning out on his cheeks. Minutes go by in silence.
Maybe she’s imagining it—maybe it’s the fear, the uncertainty, the atmosphere creeping under her skin—but she swears she feels it. Something cold brushing against the back of her neck. A hoarse whisper into the creak of the old building. A charge in the air, like someone’s dropped a toaster in a bathtub down the block, a surge of power just before the lights go out. The flames on the candles list to one side, but August can’t tell if it’s from her sharp inhale or something she can’t see.
“Hm,” Niko grunts suddenly, his lips pulling into a frown. Myla’s knuckles go white, gripping Niko’s hand tighter, and August wonders fleetingly how many times she must have done this—grounding Niko to this side while he drags his fingers through the other.
Niko mumbles under his breath, his brow furrowed, and somehow, the air settles. Something that’s been unfolded tucks itself back in and ties itself off. August’s ears start ringing.
Niko opens his eyes.
“Yeah, fuck, she’s not there,” he says, shattering the mood, and Wes deflates with relief. Niko looks at August almost apologetically. “She’s not a ghost, August. She’s not dead.”
“You’re sure?” August asks. “Like, totally sure?”
“The spirit guides are telling me wrong number, so,” he says with a small shrug.
He leads them through a closing prayer and thanks the spirits politely and promises to talk again soon like they’re a grandparent he calls on major holidays—which, August realizes, they might be. He blows out the candles and starts bundling the herbs back up. The others pull themselves to their feet, tucking shirts back in, rolling sleeves back down. Like nothing happened.
August is sitting there, frozen in her seat.
“What does it mean?” she asks Niko. “If she’s not a ghost? If she’s not dead, and she’s not alive, what is she?”
Niko dumps the crystals into a bowl of coarse salt and turns back to her. “I don’t know, honestly. I’ve never seen anything like her before.”
Maybe there are more clues, something she missed. Maybe she needs to go back over all the information she has. Maybe she can break into the employment records at Billy’s. Maybe—
Shit. She sounds like her mother.
“Okay,” August says, standing and dusting off her jeans. She’s across the shop in seconds, dodging a table of pendulums and tarot cards, whipping her jacket off the back of a chair. She jabs a finger at Niko. “You. Let’s go.”
* * *
When the doors of the train hiss open, there are a few terrible seconds in which August glances at Niko and wonders if she’s about to make a complete ass of herself.
It’s the middle of the night. What if Jane’s not on the train? What if she never was? What if she’s a loneliness hallucination brought on by too little sleep and too many years of not getting laid? Or worse—what if she’s some nice, normal, unsuspecting woman just trying to get through her commute without being harassed by freaks who think she’s a sexy poltergeist?
But Jane’s there. In the middle of an empty bench, reading a book, as matter-of-fact as the scuffs on the tunnel walls.
Jane’s there, and the world tips.
The skeptic in August wanted to believe it wasn’t real. But Jane’s here, on the same train, at the same time as August, again.
Niko nudges her on, and Jane keeps being there, long legs stretched out loosely in front of her, battered hardback open in her lap. Niko steps on behind her, and Jane looks up and sees them.
“Coffee Girl,” she says, tucking a finger between the pages.
It’s the first time August has seen Jane since she was rejected by her. And despite the whole undead mystery of her—whether Jane is a vampire or a ghost or a fucking teen wolf—that remains humiliating. And Jane remains distressingly hot, all kind brown eyes and ripped jeans and a soft, conspiratorial smile. It would be really helpful if Jane would stop being confusing and gorgeous while they’re trying to figure out whether or not she’s human.
The train jerks into motion, and Niko has to grab August’s waist to keep her from tripping over her feet. Jane eyes them, Niko’s fingers clenched in the fabric of August’s jacket.
“You’re out late,” she observes.
“Yeah, we’re meeting my girlfriend in Soho,” Niko lies smoothly. It’s a trick of the light, August thinks, when a muscle in Jane’s jaw twitches and relaxes.
Niko nudges August toward a seat, and she focuses on not letting their impending interrogation of Jane’s corporeality telegraph across her face.
“Neat,” Jane says, a little sarcastically. “This book sucks anyway.” She flashes the cover—it’s an early edition of Watership Down, the orangey-red print rubbed halfway off. “I feel like I’ve read it a dozen times trying to figure out what people like about it. It’s a depressing book about bunnies. I don’t get it.”
“Isn’t it supposed to be an allegory?” Niko offers.
“A lot of people think that,” August says automatically. Her voice clips up into daughter-of-a-librarian mode, and she’s powerless to stop it. She’s too nervous. “Like, a lot of people think it’s religious symbolism, but Richard Adams said it was just some bunny adventures he made up for his daughters as a bedtime story.”
“Lot of carnage for a bedtime story,” Jane says.
“Yeah.”
“So, where have you been?” Jane asks her. “I feel like I haven’t seen you around.”
“Oh,” August says. She can’t tell her that she changed her entire commute in mourning of the joint Netflix account they’ll never share. “I—uh, I mean, we must keep missing each other. Odds are we were gonna get on different trains one of these days, right?”
Jane leans her chin on her hand. “Yeah, you would think.”
Niko crosses his legs and chimes in, “You two have really always been on the same train until now?”
“The same car, even,” Jane says. “It’s nuts.”
“Yeah,” he says. “The odds of that … wow.”
“I’m just lucky, I guess,” Jane says with a grin. And August is too busy trying to figure out everything else to figure out what that means. “I’m Jane, by the way.”
She leans forward and extends her hand to Niko, and excited curiosity sparks in his eyes like Myla presented him with an antique alarm clock. He takes it gingerly, folding his other hand on top, which would be weird or creepy if it was anyone but Niko. Jane’s smile softens, and August watches the faintest expression flitter across Niko’s face before he lets go.
“You’re not from around here, are you?” he asks her.
“Are you?” she says.
“I’m from Long Island,” Niko tells her. “But I spent a lot of time in the city before I moved here.”
“You came for college too?” Jane asks, gesturing between Niko and August.
“Nah. My girlfriend. College wasn’t really for me.” He runs a thumb along the edge of his seat, contemplative. “These trains always have the most interesting smells.”
“What, like piss?”
“No, like … you ever smell, like, petrichor? Or sulfur?”
Jane eyes him, tongue in the corner of her mouth. “I don’t think so? Piss, mostly. Sometimes someone spills their takeout and it’s piss and pork lo mein.”
“Uh-huh,” Niko says. “Interesting.”
“Your friend is weird,” Jane says to August, not unkindly. She doesn’t look annoyed, only mildly entertained, like she’s enjoying the turn her night has taken.
“He’s, uh,” August attempts, “really into smells?”
“Super into smells,” Niko says vaguely. “Love an aroma. You live in Brooklyn? Or Manhattan?”
She pauses before answering.
“Brooklyn.”
“Us too,” he says. “We live in Flatbush. What neighborhood are you in?”
“Um, I’m in Flatbush too,” she says.
That one surprises August. Jane’s never mentioned living in Flatbush. She’s also never looked quite this shifty. Niko adjusts his shoulders. They both know Jane is lying, but that doesn’t mean anything—maybe she doesn’t want this guy she just met to know where she lives.
“That’s interesting,” he says. “Maybe we’ll see you around sometime.”
“Yeah, maybe so,” she says with a small chuckle.
August doesn’t know how long Niko needs, or what exactly he’s reading off of Jane, but he watches her return to her book with his hands palm-up on his knees, fingers relaxed, holding up the weight of the air.
August keeps waiting for him to bust out another question. Hey, ever walked through a wall? Or, Do you have any unfinished business in the realm of the living, like maybe a tragic unsolved murder, or a loved one who needs to give all the workers at the factory Christmas off? Or, Do you happen to see horned creatures when you close your eyes? But he sits there, and Jane sits there, both of them incomprehensible.
Finally, as they’re pulling into the first Manhattan station, Niko announces, “This is our stop.”
August looks at him. “It is?”
He nods decisively. “Yep. You ready?”
She glances over at Jane, like she might have disappeared in the last few seconds.
“If you are.”
They have to pass by Jane to exit, and August feels a gentle hand close around her elbow.
“Hey,” Jane says.
When August turns, that muscle’s twitching in her jaw.
“Don’t be a stranger.”
Niko pauses on the platform to look back at them.
“Okay,” August says. “Maybe I’ll—I’ll see you on Monday.”
She turns to Niko as soon as the train pulls away, but he’s eyeing the ceiling thoughtfully. She waits like she’s one of the nuns at her Catholic middle school waiting to hear if they picked a new pope.
“Yep,” he says finally. “Okay.” He uncrosses his arms and turns, striding off down the platform. August has to jog to catch up.
“Okay, what?”
“Hmm?”
“What’s the verdict?”
“Oh, tacos,” he says. “I decided tacos. There’s a stand that’s open late a few blocks from here; we can pick some up and take the 5 home.”
“I meant about whether or not Jane is dead!”
