Page 77 of Bit's Bliss

“How long did it take you to get over it?”

“I still hate walking past the room where the attack happened, but it gets easier each time I do.”

“You were attacked and left for dead. My phone rang a bunch of times at midnight. Vast difference in experiences.” Eberly was facing the window, so I couldn’t see her expression.

“Who did you learn that from?” I asked.

“What do you mean?” she asked, turning toward me.

“Which of your parents discounted their feelings?”

She shrugged. “My dad, I guess. From him, I learned to be a realist and to believe in magic from my mom.”

I pulled up to the newly installed gate, entered the code Snapper sent me, then drove through.

“That closes fast,” Eberly commented, looking behind us.

“Its sensors are set to once a vehicle has safely crossed,” I muttered, noticing Snapper walking in our direction. The look on his face was one I was familiar with; I’d seen it in the mirror often enough. He was frustrated enough about something that, with every step he took in our direction, his expression darkened.

“Give me a minute before we go inside,” I said to Eberly after walking to open her door.

“What’s up?” I asked when my brother got closer.

“Nothin’,” he muttered, looking off in thedistance.

My mouth gaped. “If whatever you’re pissed off about will affect Eberly in any way?—”

“It won’t. It’s some ropin’ shit with Kick.”

My two youngest siblings had been joined at the hip from the time they were kids. In fact, they looked and acted so much alike that most people thought they were twins. They weren’t. Two years separated them in the same way it did Snapper and me.

“Is he here?” I asked since I had expected he would be.

“Yeah, he’s here.” He sneered.

“We’ll talk later,” I said, motioning to where Eberly sat, waiting for me—to go into her own house. How fucked up was that?

I knew something serious was up when, rather than protest, Snapper thanked me.

“Hey. Sorry,” I said. “Ready to go in?”

“No problem, and I guess so.” Eberly took a deep breath, put her hands on her hips, but didn’t take a step forward.

“We don’t have to do this now.”

“It isn’t that I’m afraid or anything. It’s more that wherever I look, something will remind me of what my dad did.”

I took her hand and led her over to a bench that sat in the middle of the garden that was planted in the middle of the circular driveway. “Tell me about this,” I said, motioning to the flowers and other plants.

She surveyed the space, and gradually, her expression turned from a frown to a smile. “My mom and I started this butterfly garden when I was a young girl. I might’ve been ten. I can’t remember exactly. We worked on it all the time, until she got sick. Then she’d come out with me and sit where we are while I weeded and deadheaded.” She chuckled.

“What?” I asked.

“She took great pleasure in ordering me around while I did.”

“Are there other gardens the two of you planted?”

“Many, actually.”