Wisdom

She dashed into the room, her skirt flying around her, and ran towards Peter. At first, I thought something had happened, but when she jumped at Peter, she screamed with glee and giggled as he caught her in her arms.

“What are you doing, kiddo?” Peter asked, holding her to his side.

“I finished my picture!” Daisy said.

Rainbow colored chalk smudges covered her pudgy cheeks and arms. One of her hands was balled into a fist. I thought she held a piece of chalk, but she pulled it away from Peter, like she was trying to hide it.

“What have you got there?” Peter asked, and she put her fist behind her back. “Let me see.”

She shook her head fiercely, making her ponytail bounce. Peter reached around and pried open her hand, revealing a rather squashed cockroach. He wrinkled his nose and tossed the bug corpse away.

“Daisy, what did we say about bugs?” Peter reached for one of the towels I’d brought.

“That they’re yucky,” Daisy said, dutifully letting him wipe the bug guts from her hands.

“That’s right,” he said. “We need to leave them alone so you don’t get sick anymore. Right?”

“Right,” Daisy said, adding an overly dramatic sigh. “Do you wanna come see my picture now?”

Peter exchanged a look with me, checking to see if I was alright. I wasn’t, not yet, but I could pass for it.

“I should be going anyway,” I forced a smile.

“You have to look at my picture first!” Daisy shouted.

“Sure, of course,” I nodded.

Peter carried Daisy out into the tunnel with me. Her floor mural had gotten much more extravagant while we’d been talking. The flying purple hippo had some sort of deformed frog companion, and there were random letters and stars and hearts all over.

Next to all that, she’d drawn a stick figure drawing of a guy, a woman with curly hair, and a little girl with curly hair. I assumed it was Peter, Mae, and Daisy, but I couldn’t be completely sure.

“That’s really lovely,” Peter told her.

Daisy immediately launched into a story explaining exactly what happened in the picture, and she had him put her down so she could run all over pointing things out. As she talked, Peter watched her with a smile on his face.

I left as soon as I could, with Daisy waving and yelling goodbye long after I was out of eyesight.

Walking back to the car, it all hit me again. The distance between Jack and me that I couldn’t fix. The way Jane had felt when she died. The fact that I had to live forever with the regrets from the choices I made.

I drove home and all I could look forward to was curling up next to Jack and falling asleep. I didn’t care what problems we might be having, sleeping next to him was the only thing that would make me feel even remotely better right now.

Everyone was asleep when I get home, except for Matilda. She should’ve been in bed, but she was pacing the kitchen, whining. I gave her food, but she wanted nothing to do with it. I went over to the French doors, and as soon as I opened them, she darted outside, growling and barking.

“Matilda!” I yelled and stepped out after her. She ran around the lawn, sniffing in the snow with the fur on her back standing up. “Matilda, what’s going on?”

But I heard it before she did. In the house behind me, something crashed, and Milo began to scream.

19

I ran so fast, my feet barely touched the ground, but I only made it as far as the bottom of the steps. Samantha stood in front of me, her hair smoothed back in a painful looking bun. Her eyes still looked deceptively innocent, but she’d traded in her pencil skirt for a black leather outfit that looked as if it’d been stolen from Olivia’s closet.

Milo had stopped screaming, but he yelled at someone to get off him. I looked past Samantha at the top of the stairs, and I couldn’t see Milo. I could only hear him struggling and the sound of his heart pounding, and worst of all, I could smell blood – heady and sweet.

“Hey!” Jack shouted. He’d just come out of his room, dressed only in his boxers, and his hair was messy from sleep.

“Take another step closer and we’ll kill your human,” Dane said, and Bobby whimpered. Jack didn’t move, but I heard Milo grunting and fighting more. “Do you want me to kill him?”

“Just let him go!” Milo yelled, but I think he’d finally relented.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” I asked Samantha.

I wanted to push past her, but I didn’t think I’d help the situation any. Milo was strong, probably stronger than me, and they had him. So far, Jack had been left out of the mess, and I didn’t want to antagonize them into going after him. After Bobby, Jack was the weakest here.

“Looking for you.” Samantha smiled, her lips a thin line of red. She stepped forward, off the bottom step, and I had to back up so she wouldn’t run into me. “We’ve been following you. It’s not that hard to track down a cherry red Lamborghini.”

“You know them?” Jack asked, looking warily down at me.

“And you took the Lamborghini?” Ezra asked, his voice resonating behind me. I glanced back to see him standing in the dining room, holding back Matilda. She growled and gnashed her teeth, and if he let her go, she’d get herself killed up against Samantha.

“Why are you following me?” I asked, ignoring Ezra and Jack.

“If I let go of you, do you promise to be good?” Thomas asked Milo. Milo mumbled something in response, and I heard the sound of cracking bone, making Milo yell out in pain. “Answer me, or I’ll do that to the human.”