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It’s not very mature, but when have I ever professed to be grown?
I ask, “He really asked for my help? What’s he working on?”
Alister shrugs. “No real idea. He was just muttering about you in relation to it.”
August sighs and lifts a brow as she adjusts her thick black glasses. “Are you still insisting that Decenter is going to happen?”
Her husband laughs. “That sounds like dissenter. Which is what you’re being right now.”
“How rude.” She scoffs. “More, please. If I’m doing a toxic jester next, I think I’ll need loads more insults. It’s practically a jester’s job to make fun of people. So you should practice.”
My heart splits between jester book and wait, was that a December and Wynnter ship name?, but I settle on the former, because it feels more realistic. Eyes weepy, I sniffle and hold up my palms. “December can haz jester story?”
August pats my head. “Only if you’re very, very good…”
“And don’t keep Wynnter waiting,” Alister cuts in. “It’s been months since you last saw him, hasn’t it?”
My stomach knots, because, yeah, it has been.
It’s been months since he inexplicably showed up outside my parents’ house after having gotten the gate code from August. He gave me a heart attack and tried to barge through the front door, asking where my boxes were. It was one of the most mortifying things I’ve ever experienced, and I still can’t fully shake the harrowed expression he pinned on me after the way I shrieked at him. It haunts my nightmares.
The whole event haunts my nightmares.
You don’t remember, he’d said, voice distant and empty. Then he’d clenched his fist. Then he’d sworn. Then he’d punched a hole in the front door.
Then…
Then he’d left.
And I haven’t seen him since that dreadful afternoon in August. When now…now it’s the last few weeks of October.
Good news at least? My parents’ opinion of him remained exactly the same.
Oh. No. Wait. That’s just bad news on top of bad news, isn’t it?
Yay…
I murmur, “You’re sure he wants to see me?”
“Yeah. He was fairly grumbly, but he was definitely saying stuff like December’d know what to do about this.” Alister settles his cheek atop August’s head. “Don’t ask me for more details. I only understand spreadsheets.”
My heart flits as I gather up August’s manuscript, get to my feet, and deliver the stack to her desk. “Well…if you’re sure he needs my help…”
“Positive.”
August’s expression calls him a total liar, and I’m not stupid enough to believe he isn’t lying, but I am…desperate…so. I’ll take it. I’ll take the chance that maybe I can apologize for whatever happened and hope he’ll go back to being my friend. “I can’t think of a single thing I could help with, but I might as well try.” I bolster and beam. “It’s been ages since I’ve been able to get under his skin. Might be fun!” Or traumatizing. Either or, really. To distract myself from the trepidating possibilities, I look at August. “When can I expect the first chapters of my jester to arrive?”
“I’ll keep you abreast of the progress I make. I need to order props. And you—” She pokes her husband in the head. “—you need to learn how to juggle.”
Leaving them to whatever it is they do, I see myself to the door and my car. Tugging the cream turtleneck of my dress up over my nose, I tuck into the driver’s seat and…sit there for a moment.
Wynnter.
We haven’t had a proper interaction since before I got drunk and passed out at August’s wedding. I woke up in August’s guest bed—which is actually a pretty pink casket she bought in summer—and then I suffered through the worst headache of my life. That afternoon, I barely crawled home to find my parents worried sick. A mere hour after I’d settled them, Wynnter showed up, acting like…like he was ready to take me away.
Breath leaves me as I turn the key in the ignition and back out of August’s driveway to ease up the gravel road toward Wynnter’s cabin home, which rests just a street down, at the top of a winding hill. The entire way, my heart thumps in my throat.
I park in his driveway, take it all in.
