Page 75 of A Shade Too Far
I smiled. “Yes.”
She burst into tears, covering her face with her hands. Eli and I helped her sit up, leading her to a chair.
I hugged her while she sobbed, telling me through her tears that she thought her baby would grow up without her. She’d been so tired, up all the time feeding her son.
Edgar rejoined us and his face drained of all color. “Wh-where’s her shadow?”
Mrs. Krantz’s head snapped up, her eyes wide.
“Don’t panic,” I said. “It’s temporary. As is your magic loss.” I told them what to expect based on Jude’s regeneration, and was about to leave Mrs. Krantz in Edgar’s care when I noticed a bunch of residents staring at us out the lounge windows.
“Sapiens or Ohrists?” I asked.
“Mostly Saps,” Edgar said, pulling a juice box out of his scrubs pocket and punching the straw in for Mrs. Krantz.
“Oh no,” the woman moaned. “What will they think?”
“That you had a bad reaction to some new medication,” Edgar said. “Just like I told them. They’ll believe that you fainted and need to take time off.”
Assuring myself that all was well, and I could leave Mrs. Krantz in Edgar’s care, Eli, Sadie, and I walked back to my sedan.
My family was quiet. Too quiet.
I unlocked the doors. Had this backfired horribly and they were even warier of magic than before? Where had I gone wrong? Was it the scythe, Mrs. Krantz losing her shadow, falling unconscious, or—
Sadie’s arms came around me in an attack hug.
“That was badass, Mom!”
Beaming, I squeezed her hands. “Told you.”
She scrambled into the back seat. “If you hadn’t helped her, she would have died, right? Like Aunt Jude?”
“Yup.”
On the passenger side, Eli clicked the seat belt in. “I saw it through the window. It was pretty incredible.”
Yaas, queen.
“You had your badge on you?” I pulled the sun shade down and backed out of the parking spot.
“Figured it might come in handy,” he said.
Sadie requested the right to DJ. When we were partway home, she put on “Fuck You” by Lily Allen. Usually, I rolled my eyes at the peppy, yet expletive-laden tune, but today I turned it up, jumping in on the chorus.
Laughing, Eli joined in, adding his bass to our voices. We sang at the top of our lungs, the windows down, and the summer breeze streaming in. Our fuck yous weren’t about the song. They were about magic, and dybbuks, and all the strife we’d experienced, but in the end, we’d come together, because we were a family and that’s what families did.
Fuck you, house divided. We had this.
How wrong I was.
