Page 12 of Touch the Sky

“Yeah, the plumbing is all good to go.” Natalie leads the way down the hall into the kitchen. “They’re just finishing up the cupboards.”

The renovation crew is long gone for the day, but the kitchen is still littered with paint cans, plastic tarps, and power tools. We had to get a wall knocked down to make a kitchen big enough to serve up six rooms’ worth of breakfasts every day. The cost of the new fridge alone made me feel like I was going to pass out, but Natalie’s inheritance money from her aunt has covered a big chunk of the start-up costs, and we scraped enough together from business loans and a Québec tourism grant to get almost everything else taken care of.

“Here.” Natalie shoves a water glass into my hands. “You sure you’re okay?”

I smack my lips together after taking a gulp. “I’m always okay,chérie.”

Maddie scoffs where she’s filling up her own glass in the sparkling new double sink. “You were just telling us you almost died yesterday.”

“Right!” I snap my fingers and then set my water down on the kitchen island still wrapped in plastic. “Let me tell you about that.”

There are no stools, so I try to heave my ass up onto the island to take a seat. I’m way too short, and I end up screeching with pain when the edge of the island digs into my bruises.

“Shit, Jass!” Natalie rushes over and grabs my shoulders like I’m about to faint. “What the hell is up with you?”

“It’s nothing,” I hiss, even as I have to press both my hands to my tailbone to try and dull the ache.

I yelp again when I feel a second pair of hands tugging my shirt up.

“Tabarnak, Maddie, how did you get over here?”

Thepetit fantômesomehow snuck right up behind me.

“Hey, personal space!” I shout when she yanks my own hands out of her way and reaches for the edges of my shirt again. “I do not consent! Stranger danger!”

“I’m not a stranger. I’m your cousin, and you—oh.” Maddie’s know-it-all tone disappears, her hands going still as her breath catches. “Câlice, Jacinthe. What happened to you?”

Natalie swerves around me to catch a glimpse of my back just as I’m escaping Maddie’s clutches.

“Oh my god, you’re, like,blue. Are those bruises?”

“They’re not that bad,” I grumble while I flick my t-shirt back down over my jeans.

I walk to the other side of the island so they don’t get any ideas about exposing me against my will again.

“Did you get attacked?” Maddie demands, her eyes somehow even wider than normal behind her glasses.

I cross my arms and plant my elbows on top of the island. The plastic wrap crinkles.

“Yes,” I say. “I did. By Joaquin.”

I watch both their expressions shift from confusion to horror and back to confusion again.

“The…donkey?” Natalie says, after what feels like a full minute of silence. “The donkey did that to you?”

I roll my eyes. “Yes, the donkey. Do you know any other Joaquins?”

Maddie cranes her neck like she’s trying to get a look at my back again. “Did he step on you or something?”

“No, he launched us into an avalanche of literal shit and then embarrassed me on purpose in front of my new farrier, who is, like, the most butch butch to ever butch, and then she had the audacity to laugh in my face and overcharge me.”

Maddie blinks and then looks at Natalie, who blinks back at her, and then they both look at me and blink some more.

“I think we should go sit down for this one,” Natalie announces.

It takes me a full fifteen minutes to tell them the story. We sprawl out in the lounge, which is a mixture of new furniture and some of the old lady sofas Natalie’s great aunt had the place filled with. Brooke has somehow styled them to look cute and cozy instead of like something out of an episode ofThat ‘70s Show.

Maddie and Natalie keep interrupting to accuse me of being overdramatic, but I don’t back down.