Page 43 of A Mastery of Monsters

Surprise!” Bailey exclaims when I open the door to my room.

She’s beaming and holding a box with a few dusty photo albums and a plant, plus a bulky campus bookstore bag slung around her wrist. I shuffle aside to let her into the room, and she does a bunch of oohing and aahing like my room isn’t in the exact same threadbare condition it was when I moved into it.

Minus the random landscape print stretched on the wall behind my desk that Corey picked up at the poster sale because apparently my room felt sad.

Mostly the space is “decorated” by the dirty clothes that have overtaken my desk chair to the point where I’ve started sitting on my bed to work.

Bailey sets the box and bag on my bed, taking out the plant and placing it on my windowsill.

“It’s a snake plant, so you don’t have to water it often—once every two to three weeks.

I should have brought it a lot earlier, but I wanted to give you time to settle in.

” Really, she’d texted me multiple times about when she should come by, which I ignored.

“Glad you found the place okay….” I hadn’t told her my floor or room number.

“Yeah, the guy at the front desk let me know. I told him I was your aunt, and we have the same last name and everything, so he let me in.”

Campus security is very permissive. I shift in place. I have to be at Summerhill in an hour to see if I made it through the first cut of candidates. I’m not exactly in a silly goofy mood and definitely don’t want to chitchat with my aunt, but there isn’t anything to do about it now.

“I thought this was such a cute set.” Opening the bag, she reveals a pair of black sweatpants and a sweatshirt both with the Queen’s University logo on them.

I pull the clothes to me and check the tags. They are my size and they do feel soft and comfortable. “Thanks.”

She pushes the box aside so the area between us is clear and sets a photo album there. “And I found these and figured you might want to look through them. I try to print pictures as often as I can.”

Bailey opens it, and I stare at the first photo.

I recognize the spot. It’s on campus, not far from Summerhill.

And there, with his legs spread out and laughing, is Dad, and beside him, Mom.

Her hair was relaxed back then and draped across her shoulders.

She had bangs that she swept to the side.

Bailey’s there too, a little girl, tucked against Mom’s side.

If that’s my parents’ first year, Bailey would have been about eight, since she and Dad were born ten years apart.

“I idolized her,” Bailey says. She flips the pages, revealing more shots of her with my parents and a lot more than expected of just her and Mom.

“I begged Mike to propose to her within a week of them dating. She used to take me to all sorts of places. We went to the island, and historical sites around the city, and the haunted walks, and pumpkin patches and corn mazes in the fall. She was the big sister I always wanted.”

Bailey and Mom were close? And there are photos to prove it. It doesn’t make any sense. I barely talked to Bailey until this year.

She picks up a new album. It’s a soft baby blue. Inside, there are pictures of us. Me and Jules. Tiny versions swaddled in blankets or held on laps. In one, Bailey’s in a slinky black dress holding on to me, and there’s a kiss mark on my forehead the exact shade of her lipstick.

“I have one of the three of you.” Bailey pulls out another album and flips through it before exclaiming, “Here it is!” She takes out a picture and hands it to me.

It’s me, Mom, and Jules. I was probably four or so, making Jules five.

This must have been right before we moved away from Kingston. “You can keep that.”

“Thank you.” I hold the picture in my hands. Bailey reaches for it, and I tug the photo away, my eyes going wide.

She holds up a frame. “Just… I thought this one would fit it.”

“Right. Sorry.” I let her take the picture and put it inside, then she hands it back to me.

She taps the box. “I can leave these here with you. Take whichever ones you want. Though if you stick them up, please use the sticky tack instead of tape. I packed those too.” She rummages around in the box until she finds the white gummy stripes.

“How come you weren’t around when we could actually remember you?” I ask.

Bailey bites her lip. “Busy, I guess. There’s no good excuse.

I was in school and trying to, like, be an adult or whatever, and you guys were always moving, and I never had the money to just go where you were.

And Mike couldn’t afford to pay for me to come.

And then… I guess I was a little ashamed. ”

“Ashamed?” This woman drove a yellow Honda and put flowers in her hair unironically. What could possibly shame her?

“Annie was so brilliant. I wanted to be just like her, but I was a screwup.”

Since when? Bailey is a little do-gooder.

She lives in her tiny house community, and plants greens, and goes to protests, recycles and composts, and sells her serums and other crunchy granola stuff on Etsy, plus the whole YouTube influencer gig.

And that actually makes her enough money to live. She’s, like, successful and shit.

Maybe reading it on my face, she says, “Everything you see me doing now is pretty recent. In the last two to three years. It’s why I could agree to have you stay with me. To be honest, it’s probably the only reason Mike was cool with you living with me.”

I scoff. “Like he cares.”

Bailey sighs. “I’m not going to make excuses for him or speak for him, but I can say that I care.

I meant what I said. If you need me, let me know.

Not just if you’re in trouble or struggling.

But also, like, I dunno, if you want to go to the mall or, like, the knife store or wherever you get those knife throwing things.

I know we don’t know each other as well as we should, but I’m here for you.

” Bailey’s eyes start to fill with tears.

“You’re my family, and I love you. And I want to know you.

I loved your mom so much, and I let us drift apart.

I don’t want that. And I know you’re doing better now, and you’re committed to school and that’s great, but that doesn’t mean you won’t need help. ”

“Don’t talk about her in past tense.”

“I know, I know,” Bailey says. “But she’s not here right now.”

I hunch my shoulders. Bailey’s trying. She’s been trying this whole time.

She brushes my braids from my shoulder. “I know it can be hard to let people in when you’ve lost someone. Especially someone you were so close to. But when you lock everyone out, all you end up with is yourself. And I never want you to be alone like that if you don’t actually want to be.”

I swallow. “I don’t want more people to let down.” Why am I saying this to Bailey of all people? Maybe because I waited too long to tell Jules.

“It’s your life. Who cares if you let me down? I’ve let so many people down over the years. But the problem I needed to solve wasn’t how not to let them down, it was how not to let myself down. Because that was who I cared the most about disappointing.”

I stare at Bailey for a long moment. Yeah, she’s cringey most of the time, but just now, she said something that made a lot of sense. “Okay.”

“Okay.” She tilts her head, staring at me. “You can also call me when you need your braids redone.”

I scowl. “Wow.”

“They’re just looking a little… old.” She picks at some braids where the split between my hair and the Kanekalon is becoming increasingly obvious.

“Could you do them this weekend? It’s Thanksgiving. And reading week. I’m off until the twentieth.”

“Of course!” She pauses. “Well, we’re not celebrating the colonizers.”

“Obviously.”

“But we can still eat a lot and get this hair done. What do you want? Mashed potatoes?”

“And gravy. And chicken.”

She beams. “And apple pie.”

“A must.”

She laughs, and we keep naming dishes, making our menu for the holiday weekend.

I even find myself looking forward to it.

The crowd in Summerhill is smaller today.

Apparently the first cut isn’t open to the entire society, who will find out at the next lecture on Monday.

It’s a small mercy that if I fail, at least it won’t happen in front of everyone.

But it means that me and Virgil are the only ones allowed into the room, and Margot and Corey are forced to wait outside.

We sit at a table near the front, which isn’t my preference, but Virgil insists. I slouch in my spot while he keeps his body stiff and at attention. We’re eventually joined by Violet and Bryce. And I’m actually all right with it. I like them, and they’ve helped me a couple of times now.

Or Violet has, at least. And Bryce is pleasant enough.

Only a couple of other candidates are attending with monsters.

“Have you guys not started looking for partners?” I ask Violet.

She shakes her head. “My dad said it’s not worth it until you make it past the first cut. You’ll see. A bunch of people will suddenly be paired after this.” She waves at Virgil. “Hey, I’m Violet. This is Bryce.”

Virgil clears his throat. “Oh, yeah, uh, hello. Virgil.”

I side-eye him. “That was the worst introduction I’ve ever heard.”

He glares at me. “I wasn’t expecting to be involved in the conversation.” He sits back, crossing his arms.

“Are you two related, or…?” Bryce asks, and my eyebrows go all the way up, while Violet groans.

I take it back, Bryce has lost all the points.

He holds up his hands. “No, no, I mean—not, like, ’cause you’re both—” He takes a deep breath.

“People who come to the candidacy already paired usually know the monster they’re with really well.

Often, they’re family. I’m sorry, I worded that poorly. ”

Fine, Bryce points reinstated. But he’s on thin ice. “Do people not just have monster friends?”