The Crumpled Mirror by Elizabeth Loea (free novel reading sites TXT) 📕

“I don’t know my parents very well,” I said at last. It didn’t feel all that wrong to say something like that to Cassie, even though I didn’t know her well. She didn’t know my parents, and she lived in separate realm. It was unlikely they’d come back from Dallas just to ask her what I’d said about them.

“Nobody really knows their parents,” she said. “And we know them less as we get older, even though we grow to be more like them.”

“No, I don’t mean I don’t understand them. I just haven’t spent a lot of time around them. I’ve lived on my own for years. They visit for my birthday, for some holidays, and for New Year’s, but that’s not a lot of time to get to know people.”

Cassie watched me for long enough that I wondered if she’d spaced out and forgotten what I’d said.

“You must be very lonely,” she said.

It was something I hadn’t ever heard before. My parents knew I was fine on my own—just fine, thank you very much. They’d never even thought I might be lonely, especially since I’d pushed so hard to be allowed to stay behind in Half Moon Bay. And I’d never told my friends at school that I lived on my own, so they’d never thought of it.

And now a woman who looked as though she was about to leave for a Renaissance Faire was looking at me with more sympathy than I’d seen from any adult in years.

“Thank you,” she said at last.

“Really, there’s no need to thank me. Indigo’s the one who’s helping me—”

“Not for my son. Thank you for visiting,” she said, and that made me realize how heartbreakingly lonely it must have been to live in a library with nobody other than a husband, a son, and a bunch of weird robots.

Maybe, in a way, we weren’t all that different.

A loud meow broke me out of my reverie and Toto hurtled through a little kitty door. He padded up to me, surprisingly fearless for a cat, and pawed at my knee until I lifted him into my lap.

“He misses Indigo,” said Cassie. “You probably smell like him.”

I wanted to protest, to say I hadn’t spent so much time in close proximity to Indigo that I’d smell like him, but Toto rubbed his chin into my shoulder and gave Cassie an accusatory glance.

“No tuna today,” she reminded him. “Cats who pee on the books don’t get tuna. Just kibble.”

I laughed. I couldn’t help it. My life had fallen to pieces an hour before. My apartment was gone, my family would be notified, and cops would be on the lookout for a panicked teenage girl trying to do magic in the streets. And there was a cat on my lap, a kind woman sitting across from me, and a home I could return to for the time being.

It could have been worse.

When Vivi finally appeared, standing right behind Cassie’s chair, I bristled. Toto made a low noise, presumably reacting to my sudden anxiety. Considering what that ghost had done to Racquel earlier, it was safe to say that the border between the physical and the ghostly was tenuous at best. I didn’t want Vivi to even think about hurting Cassie.

“Ma’am—uh, Cassie?”

She raised an eyebrow at me and gestured for me to continue.

“Could you tell me anything about Indigo’s sister? Uh, Cecelia?”

Another silence fell between us, this one longer than the last. Toto went back to purring in my lap.

“She was a beautiful little girl,” Cassie said. “I know you’re not supposed to have a favorite child, and you can never tell my son this, but Cecelia was my favorite. Don’t get me wrong—I love her brother—but I felt as though I was doing something good by raising her to be the kind of woman I am. I hope that doesn’t sound prideful.”

“It doesn’t.”

“My kids weren’t close to each other. I guess Indigo isn’t close to anyone—not easily, at least. Even you. There’s a lot you still don’t know about him, I’m sure.”

I thought of his wariness, of the way he’d looked at me when we first met. Yes, we didn’t really know each other yet, did we?

“Cecelia wasn’t like that,” Cassie said. “She was unafraid. Not cheerful—never cheerful—but she had no fear when things went poorly. She just took things as they came. Especially impressive for a little girl. Everything seems monumental at that age.”

I stood to go at last, since Cassie was so focused on her memories of Cecelia and I didn’t want to interrupt that reverie.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, although she didn’t turn to me. “Take Toto.”

“Take...take him?”

“He’ll be better off with his owner. And he’s my son’s responsibility, anyway.”

I glanced to Toto, paused, and then lifted him onto my shoulder. He wasn’t quite small enough to settle there, but it seemed safer than carrying him under my arm like a briefcase. Claws dug into my shoulder, but he didn’t jump down.

I left Cassie there, her eyes on the sky, Vivi’s hand on her shoulder. It would have been wise to warn her, to tell her that there were ghosts and they were here, but I had no way of knowing what Vivi might do and I didn’t trust Cassie not to overreact.

Vivi didn’t follow me, which should have been a warning in the first place. She just watched me as I went, her hand on Cassie’s shoulder as Indigo’s mom watched the sky. Vivi’s eyes followed my back, watching me as I climbed the hill away from the library, but she let me be.

I thought about extending my hand toward her, about trying to work some of that magic that had blown my apartment to bits earlier, but I had no way of knowing whether or not it would hurt Cassie, too, and I couldn’t take that risk. I just gritted my teeth and tried to shut off the voice in my head telling me to run.

I’d seen far too many burned trees