Chapter 23: XXI: QUICK, SOMEONE STEAL A CAR!

[ ━━ ❝ ✧˚⋆｡☾✩˚⋆｡࿐❞ ━━ ]

RACHEL

RACHEL FEELS LIKE a cheap whore.

Not that there's anything wrong with that. Be you, be cheap, be a whore. Do whatever you want. It's 2018, who cares? But that isn't her. Her brother's instilled a certain set of standards in her, what with his constant nagging about prostitution. It's okay if you want to sell your body, Rachey! Just don't sell it for less than what it's worth! You're a beautiful ray of prostitution! Every rich old white guy's dream! She'd be fine if she felt like a whore, really. But a cheap one? Come on. She's worth at least a grand a pop. Also, she wouldn't want to start so young.

She wants to be an expensive whore, a fancy one that gets to fuck millionaires. No, not just millionaires. Billionaires. She knows that that's what she deserves. But standing there in the middle of this city as the sun starts to rise, shivering in a tight black leotard and hot pink fishnets, her hair shoved up inside a Texas-sized cowgirl hat (it was the only thing big enough to mask her hair), she can't help but feel like a little bird: cheap, cheap, cheap, cheap, cheap.

And it's freezing out here. It's late May, but New Hampshire weather is, as the French say, horrible. Even the warmest spring days can hardly be classified as warm. And when the weather starts to change, things start getting, well, unpredictable. You could have a week of sunshine and high 60's and then the next week there'd be a blizzard. And a tornado. And a hurricane, too, if you were closer to the coast. All at once. Plus, adding insult to injury, it's pouring the rain.

She's nestled up against Silas for warmth. Mainly because he's the only person other than her dumb brother that's taller than her, and she likes to be able to tuck her chin under his. (Even though she's got to bend down a bit to do it. He's only, like, two inches taller than her. Which is a lot when you consider that Rachel's 5'11. But she's fine with it. She likes looking down on people.) He's good, he's a good friend. A gentle giant. He understands her plight against cheap whoredom. He's got his arms wrapped around her shoulders, and he's not saying anything. Not. A. Single. Thing. He's the best damn person out here.

Rachel takes an inventory of everyone that made it out of the prison. They're all just loitering around the bottom of the fire escape like a bunch of high schoolers that think they're hardened prisoners when the worst thing they've ever done is smoked weed. Rachel hates those kids. She helped her brother kill a man, stood there and watched as the life bled out of him, and she doesn't feel the need to gloat about it like she's some young god, now, does she? No. Rachel is a perfectly rational human being.

There's Maya in her wheelchair, desperately trying to fix her hijab without a mirror or any pins. She'd used it in Avani's disguise, wrapping the scarf around the other girl's head. Avani herself is wide awake, ranting passionately to Atlas about something or another. (Probably some bullshit botanical knowledge she's making up on the fly to make herself seem smarter.) The little girl's wearing a plain purple sweatshirt that fits her like a dress. Atlas, in a dumb hat and gray sweatpants like a wannabe fuckboy, tiredly listens in. Cain sits a good six inches away from the two of them, staring at the ground, looking haunted and unhappy in a fedora and trench-coat. Bianca sits beside him. He's leaning his head on her shoulder. They don't seem to be saying much of anything.

Some instinctual part of Rachel keeps looking over at Avani, checking to make sure she's okay. The two had been through so much together, Rachel hurts as bad as a mother missing a child every time she's out of her sight. Being trapped in a cell without knowing if Avani was dead or alive, imprisoned or free . . . it just about drove her insane.

Inside, the alarms blare, the warning lights flashing red. Callie, Meredith, and Rachel's dad are still in there. They don't have much time.

Trying to distract herself, Rachel peels herself away from Silas's warmth and moves over to Maya. She seems to be struggling greatly with the light pink scarf.

"Need some help?" Rachel asks.

"No."

"I've still got some bobby pins in my hair and I have a mirror on my phone."

Maya sighs in defeat. "You're legitimately a lifesaver. Give 'em here."

Rachel takes the stupid cowgirl hat off, tucking it under her arm. She shakes her hair out as it falls down her shoulders, pulling out the bobby pins, running her hands through her locks to make sure she got them all. She places the pins in Maya's outstretched hand. Turning her phone's camera on, she faces it towards the other girl so she can see her reflection. With the help of the pins and the "mirror," she's easily able to get her hijab situated.

"Juslims." Rachel holds her fist out for Maya to bump.

Maya lifts an eyebrow.

"You know? A while back, there was this little Jewish girl and another little Muslim girl. They were best friends. They created a superhero team together, the Juslims, and it went viral. That's us."

"I don't remember that . . . " Maya mumbles. Rachel suddenly fears that an interdimensional cultural difference is separating her from her biggest dream: being a part of a superhero team. "But sure. Juslims." She returns Rachel's first-bump. "Solidarity."

"Badassery," Rachel agrees.

"GIRL POWER!"

"WE HAVE A PROBLEM!" shouts, as to be expected, a man. Rachel's dad. The three missing members of the party are sprinting down the fire escape. "QUICK, SOMEONE STEAL A CAR!"

Rachel sighs. Typical.

Meredith comes rocketing down the rickety black stairs as if she threw herself. Callie and Rachel's dad follow a couple seconds later.

"WHAT'S WRONG?" Silas yells to them.

"SILAS!" screams Meredith as she barrels straight into him. "YOU'RE ALIVE!"

"I'm fine," Silas replies, bewildered.

"You big stupidhead, I thought you were gonna die!" Meredith sobs into his shoulder. "I thought I was never gonna see you again!"

"They're coming!" Callie shrieks.

And then something happens that Rachel always knew was going to, eventually.

Meredith kisses Silas.

It's quick, panicked, awkward. Silas's eyes are open the entire time. Meredith pulls away hardly a second after their lips touched, her hazel eyes wide and full of tears, her eyebrows collapsing in on each other.

"Meredith . . . !"

"Never do that to me again," she orders.

Silas just stares at her, his face going completely red.

"You guys, they're coming!" Callie yelps again.

"Shit!" Meredith yelps, brought back to reality.

"You guys go find a car," Rachel hisses. "I'll distract them."

"Rachel—" her dad starts.

"—don't." She cuts him off with a warning glare. "Go! Quickly! I can handle this!"

I can handle anything.

And they split like a banana, racing off towards the cars lining the street.

Maya gives Rachel a steely smile, but she can see the panic in her eyes. In her chair, she won't be going anywhere fast. "Juslims," she tells Rachel, serving up some moral support.

"Solidarity, badassery, girl power," Rachel replies with everything their little superhero team stands for, nodding frantically, her hair whipping about her face. "Maya, go with them. You can keep up. I know you can."

"Solidarity, badassery, girl power." Maya repeats, nodding at her. Then she pushes off with all her might, shooting off down the sidewalk. She lets out an excited howl.

Just as Maya disappears down the dark street, the door leading to the fire escape bursts open. A herd of cops swarm out of the door like cockroaches. Their guns cocked on their shoulders, blue flashlights bleeding into the midnight street. All aimed on a lone dark-haired girl standing below them.

In this strange world with nothing but time to kill, Rachel's spent a lot of time practicing her power, her telekinetic abilities. She's quick and she's strong and she's completely in control of it. It's gotten so easy to control, it feels like the world's made out of wet clay, waiting for her to shape and manipulate. Sometimes, she has to focus to refrain herself from using her power.

She focuses on the chipped black stairwell the cockroaches swarm over, feeling her invisible hand grasp it and squeeze. It's play-doh to her. She simply thinks about the fire escape collapsing and it does. The cockroaches make an interesting noise as they hit the bavement, a closed fist slamming into hot bricks. SPLAT! Rachel covers her ears.

It was a three- or four-story drop from the top of the fire escape to the ground. No human being could have survived that fall.

Rachel is no longer a murderer's accomplice; she is a murderer.

She wonders, vaguely, if she could plead self-defense.

She turns around to see her dad literally shove a middle-aged white woman weighed down with brown paper grocery bags out of her minivan, grabbing the keys from her as he does so. She watches in a strange mix of amusement and horror as Bianca plucks a toddler from the backseat and sets him on the ground next to her dumbstruck mother. Bianca then throws herself in shotgun as the others climb into the backseat. Silas helps Maya in, and her dad tosses her wheelchair in the trunk, not even bothering to fold it. Her dad gets into the driver's seat and Silas climbs into the back. Off they go, the backdoor still wide open.

When they reach Rachel, they don't even bother to slow down so she can get in. They just yell at her to hurry up. Once she's in, Silas slams the door.

There's a third row of seats behind the middle row, where Meredith and Callie are sitting. Rachel climbs over the seats and sits between them only to discover, to her horror, that there isn't a third seatbelt.

(Rachel's big on the whole click-it-or-ticket thing.)

"WHERE ARE WE GOING?" she has to yell to be heard over the radio. Someone's playing Kidz Bop at the loudest volume physically possible. Rachel isn't sure if it was the mom and her son or her own dad that put it on.

"OUT OF THIS DIMENSION," answers her dad.

[ ━━ ❝ ✧˚⋆｡☾✩˚⋆｡࿐❞ ━━ ]

THE DRIVE IS quick and silent. Deciding to fuck caution in the ass as gently as a teenaged boy driving in Grand Theft Auto, Rachel's dad runs every red light and drives at a consistent rate of fifty miles over the speed limit. It's late enough that traffic's started to thin out, but not late enough that the highway's completely empty. At one point, the police start tailgating them, their lights flashing and their siren blaring, but Rachel quickly takes care of the problem by slamming the car into the back of an unsuspecting semi. You know, with her mind, like she's in fucking Stranger Things.

She hopes they were only after them because they were speeding, not the whole escaping-from-prison shebang. Really, it wasn't their fault that they'd been framed for arson. So they can't be blamed for escaping. Not when they were wrongly incriminated.

Rachel's dad turns into the parking lot of a 7-Eleven just outside the looming expanse of the gate. The gas station's surrounded in a small patch of dense forestation; she recognizes the woods as those where the rift resides. They park, her dad shutting the car off, and, for a moment, sit in silence. Rachel leans her head against the cool car window, watching the neon flicker of the green-and-red 7-Eleven sign buzz and pulse with dying electricity. The lights drip into the warm, wet cement like thick watercolor paint. It's still raining, a gentle drip, drip, drip.

As she's sitting there in the dark parking lot, the weight of everything that's happened to her suddenly collapses on top of her. She realizes that she really doesn't want to go home.

This world isn't safe, but she knows that all she has is herself and Avani. Back home, she doesn't have that luxury. Her family, her friends, even her teachers . . . they all expect so much of her. She knows they only expect the best from her because she is the best, but what if the day comes when she isn't? What if the day comes when she fails? What if the day comes when she's simply average, mediocre?

The pressure of always having to be so perfect had been too much for her. She'd broke. Before the world ended. She destroyed herself so they'd stop asking so much of her. Lowered their standards, lowered their expectations. Let them watch her fail.

All she'd wanted was for them to stop asking so much of her. She wanted to be able to try new things and fail. She'd wanted to be able to discover herself, to explore parts of her psyche that she never knew existed before. She'd wanted to be able to break without having to worry if she'd have the time to put herself back together. She'd wanted to be able to breathe. Most of all, she'd wanted her father's approval. Cain got a C and their dad took him out for milkshakes. Rachel got an H+ and it was simply what was expected of her. It was ridiculous. She wanted to be taken out for milkshakes. She wanted to know that he was proud of her, not that she was simply fulfilling his expectations.

She doesn't want to have to face the world she left behind.

Cain's trying to push his door open, but it's not budging. "Goddamnit, Dad, please turn child-lock off."

"Where are you going?" their dad asks, turning the car back on and fumbling for the child-lock button. After clicking a couple random ones, he seems to finally have found the one he was looking for. "Also, language."

"To get a slurpee." Casually, Cain opens his door and slides out onto the pavement. "Anyone else want one? Keep in mind I only have two hands."

"Me," replies the entire car.

"Fuck you all—"

"Language!" scolds their dad.

"Rachel, come help me," Cain orders.

She climbs over the seat and out the door. "Do you have any money?"

"Who do I look like, Steve Jobs?"

A bell tinkles as Cain pushes the doors open. They walk inside, heading towards the promised land of American gas stations: the 7-Eleven slurpee machine. The routine of it is so heart-achingly familiar and comforting, Rachel feels tears harden in the back of her throat. There used to be one of these bad boys right across the street from their house; the two would walk there after school every Monday, get themselves a slurpee, then sit in the parking lot outside sucking on them while they caught each other up with the hottest gossip flying around town. Cain's stories usually involved drugs and who was fucking who. Rachel's usually revolved around tamer topics, like volleyball and space. But it didn't matter how many good memories they had there. It closed down about a year ago 'cause some gun-totin' Trump-supportin' assnut white guy shot it up during rush hour and killed, like, ten people.

Cain grabs five styrofoam cups and fills them with cherry slurpee. He hands Rachel five more, and she sets the first cup under the blue raspberry machine, pushing down on the lever. Out squirts a viscous, gritty blue liquid like Smurf poo.

A little bit of bright red slurpee catches on Cain's thumb, sliding down his wrist. He licks it off and nods back to the cashier. "Mm, Rachey, I'm McFreakin' losing it over that guy." So casual, like they didn't just escape from prison.

"You literally have Atlas."

"What? I'm allowed to window-shop. I just can't walk into the boutique. And that boy right there? I never knew gas station employees were legally allowed to be that cute."

Something blossoms inside Rachel's chest—something burning and green. Envy. It's always been so easy for Cain. Talking about boys, talking to boys, talking about his sexuality . . . he's never had to hold his tongue. She doesn't even remember him coming out to her, or anyone, for that matter. She doesn't think that there was a single moment of her life when she thought her brother was straight. Actually, she doesn't think that he ever did come out to her. Maybe he just came home with his boyfriend one day, maybe it just slipped one day while they were watching a movie—it's just always been an accepted part of her life. Because it's not a big deal. Or, no, scratch that. It's not a big deal for him.

Rachel envies people like him.

She can hardly even admit that she's queer to herself, alone in her room at night, staring at the glow-in-the-dark stars peeling off her ceiling and walls. She tried to tell Cerberus, once, and he pissed on the floor when she was in the middle of saying the sex in bisexual, and she really didn't take that very well. She doesn't know how it was possible for their dad to end up with two gay kids, but here Cain is, actively a homosexual. And here she is, still getting cruses and girls and boys. And she knows that no matter what her future holds, no matter who she ends up with—whether they're a boy or a girl or if she ends up alone with seventeen cats—she'll never stop loving men and women.

Because that's kind of what it means to be bisexual, you know? Loving men and women. Maybe equally, maybe not. It's nothing dirty. It doesn't mean she's going to cheat on every partner she has. It just means that she had a crush on Jon from her honors English class and Marie from her volleyball team and maybe a little teeny-weeny one on her best friend Abby.

And there's nothing wrong with that.

Rachel clasps the clear, curved lid on top of her first slurpee and slides a red straw into it, taking a satisfactory sip peppered with nostalgia. This one is her slurpee. She deserves this one good thing. She takes a deep breath and another sip, steeling herself over.

"Hey, I was just wondering this for no reason, but . . . how'd you come out to Dad?"

The question doesn't seem to bother—or, to Rachel's horror, surprise—Cain. "While intoxicated."

"I'm listening."

"Remember that year he got us a bunch of gag gifts for Chanukah?"

"Oh, yeah. He got me a bag of unicorn farts."

"Yeah, anyways, he got me this grow a girlfriend toy since I'd never actually had a girlfriend before because I was, you know, gay. I started laughing so hard I nearly shat myself, and he asked me what was so funny. I wasn't thinking straight—hah, I know—'cause of the alcohol, so I just flat-out told him I was gay. I didn't realize I'd even come out to him until the next morning when he returned it. He got me a grow a boyfriend one instead and left it on my nightstand, so that was a lovely thing to wake up to. I was horrified. I thought he'd figured it out on his own."

Several thoughts swirl through Rachel's head, only one of them being anywhere near coherent. "You got drunk during Chanukah?"

"What's so bad about it? Christians get drunk on Christmas."

"You're not even twenty-one yet, Cain, and that was so long ago! What were you doing drinking back then? Was kindergarten really that rough?"

"It was only like three years ago."

"You drank when you were thirteen?" Rachel's, honestly, horrified and a little embarrassed. She's fourteen. Older than he was when he got drunk enough to out himself to their dad. The most she's ever drank was a little sip of wine during passover.

Cain tucks his slurpees under his arm, spinning to Rachel and flicking his pointer-finger at her. "Don't underage drink, yada, yada, yada, whatever." He takes a sip from the center one. "Where's all this coming from? You finally start watching Rupaul like I told you to?"

Rachel takes a deep breath. She's braver here in this strange world than she's ever been at home. If she doesn't do it now, she'll never woman up enough to tell him.

"Cain, I think I might be bisexual." All of a sudden, it starts pouring out of her. "And I'm really not ready to tell Dad or anyone at all but I need to tell you because you're gay and you're my favorite brother"—not that she has any other brothers, but she thinks that even if she did, he'd still be her favorite—"and you can help me, can't you? You have to. I like girls and I like boys and I really don't know what to do about it. I get nervous around everyone and Abby has really pretty eyes and it's just been so hard bottling it all up inside"—she's started to cry—"and I've wanted to tell you for so long but you weren't here, no one was, and it's just been so difficult and I've felt so awful keeping it a secret but anyways that's all and I'm so sorry and are you ready to go now?"

Cain sets the slurpees down on the counter, looking just about as sad as Rachel's ever seen him. She knows that people do this to him; she's listened to him talk about how friend after friend after friend came out to him. As in, he was the first person that they ever came out to. He's like the gay whisperer. He's so proud of his sexuality, people tend to come to him for advice about their own. And whenever someone breaks down over it, whenever they admit that it's caused them any sort of pain, it seems like it genuinely hurts him. Almost like he knows what it's like. (Even though he couldn't quite possibly. Their dad is the living embodiment of the I SUPPORT MY GAY SON t-shirt.) She hates to add anymore weight to his burden.

"First things first: never apologize for who you love. Second things second: of course being gay is hard. That's why God only picks the strongest people to do it, okay? And you're one tough-ass motherfucker."

"Hell yeah I'm one tough-ass motherfucker."

"Third things third: you don't have to bottle your emotions up. If you don't feel comfortable enough to tell Dad, that's fine. You don't have to tell him anything. You don't owe him shit. But I don't want you to feel like you can't come to me. You can. With anything. Even if you don't actually want to tell me about it, you can just come to my room and we'll cry together and watch gay short films on YouTube. Because that's the only place you can find any good gay shit other than PornHub, and I'm not about to watch that with you—"

"Great, my brother won't force me to watch porn with him."

"Oh, shut up. Anywho, fourth things fourth: thank GOD." Cain looks like he's about to get down on his knees and rejoice in this humble 7-Eleven. "Another gay in the house. Finally. I'm so sick of Dad and Bee defiling our DVR with all those straight-ass Hallmark movies."

"Bianca's bi, too, though, I think. She was dating a woman before she started dating Dad."

"Is she? Oh, my God, that's amazing! Bi Bianca!"

In his excitement, Cain raises his voice just a bit too much. The cashier suddenly takes interest in them.

"Hey, what's the hold-up back there?" he calls.

Rachel giggles and nudges Cain with her elbow. He swats at her arm.

"Nothing, sir!" Rachel squeaks.

They start heading towards the door, walking right past the counter.

"Are you two gonna pay for those?" the cashier asks.

"Nah," says Cain coolly, taking a chug of his slurpee.

They exit into the night. The cashier doesn't even try to stop them. When they reach the car, everyone piles out, and they pass out the slurpees. They sit there on the concrete parking blocks for a moment, sipping on their slurpees on silence. The rain gone, the stars shining above them. The night is a warm blanket draped over their shoulders. Rachel figures that it was actually pretty hot out, for twilight in New Hampshire. It was just the rain making things colder than they actually were.

She can see the dark outline of the mountains holding up the sky, the trees mere brushstrokes in the painting of this world. Above her, if she tilts her head back, she can see the stars, she can see so many stars. They trace the night sky like the glowing lights of a city. There are so many of them out here in the middle of nowhere it fills her heart with a bittersweet longing, the kind that bubbles up in the back of your throat and tastes like mercury when it settles on your tongue.

It reminds her of when she and Cain and their dad used to go camping in the White Mountains. Telling ghost stories by firelight, chasing lightning bugs to catch in mason jars when the sun went down. Sleeping out under the stars, no tents required, sleeping under these very same stars (she's sure of it), sleeping under the vast universe. The universe the air in her lungs; the mountains her beating heart. So close to the stars that they could lean down and kiss her.

When had she ever lost that little touch of magic? That curiosity, that innocence, that love of the world? Why had she let this place rip it away from her? Here she is in the mountains again, the mountains of her childhood (she's sure of it), jagged and dangerous and home. Here she is under her vast universe again, her definition of vast and her definition of universe forever altered. Here she is and here she isn't. She takes a deep breath of the sweet mountain air, stardust melting into her lungs

"So this is where we part ways, huh?" observes Maya, sucking on a cherry slurpee.

"Nooo, Maya," Rachel croons.

"What?" Silas asks, slack-jawed. "No. Aren't you coming with us?"

"Why would we?"

"Because friendship?" he offers.

"You're sweet," Callie replies, leaning her head on his shoulder, "but we've got our lives here."

"I'm, like, actually gonna miss you guys," states Meredith, the words coming out in a rush. "Like, I know we haven't even known each other for a week, but it feels like it's been so much longer. Probably because y'all broke us out of prison, and that's some real shit."

"Oohhhh, Meredith!" Maya opens her arms wide for a hug. "Bring it in, sister."

Meredith's face softens. She leaves her slurpee sitting on the concrete block and jumps to her feet, leaning down to give Maya a proper hug.

"I'm gonna miss you guys, too," mumbles Silas, who's started full-on crying.

"Oh, Silas!" Maya yelps in the same shrill tone. "Come on, buddy. Join in on the love. You know you want to."

"I do want to, I do," Silas tearfully admits, wrapping himself on Maya's other side, one arm wrapped around Meredith's waist. "I love you all so much, you guys."

"What about Mama Cain?" Cain asks. "Is anyone gonna miss Mama Cain?"

"No," Maya snaps.

"Well, fuck you, then," he replies. "I'll miss myself."

"I'm joking, asshole," she clarifies, rolling her brown eyes to the sky. "Join the hug, you motherfucking piece of shit."

And so Cain does, wrapping his arms around Meredith and Silas, resting his forehead on Maya's. And then Atlas joins the hug, and even he's sniffling. And Rachel thinks that that's when she starts to miss her.

She's hardly known her for two days. She only really started thinking of her as a friend maybe an hour ago. And yet . . . they'd really had a connection, you know? She'd felt some kind of a kinship with her. Maybe it was the moment they had outside the prison. Maybe it's because she broke her out of prison. Maybe it's because every potential bonding moment they had happened because of prison. Prison does change you, after all. Rachel likes to think that in another life—in another world—they were best friends. That they grew up together. That this could have been a life-time friendship, not one where they knew each other for two days and never saw each other again.

Maybe that's it. Maybe she feels so close to her because she knows that she's never going to see her again. And maybe that's why this hurts so bad, because this isn't normal loss. It's grief worse than death; you know the other person is alive and out there somewhere, but they're just out of your reach. And it isn't like you can add the other person on Snapchat or text them or even send them a humble letter. They don't exist in your world. Maybe they never existed. Rachel knows that her friendship with Maya is just as fabricated as her dad thinks the moon landing was.

Maybe she'll find her again, one day. Maybe . . .

Meanwhile, back in reality, Cain, Silas, Atlas, and Meredith have separated themselves from Maya.

"Maybe we'll find you in our dimension," Meredith's offering.

"If you find her, kick her ass for me, okay?" Maya replies. "And make sure she's eating her veggies."

"Will do." Rachel steps up to Maya, offering her a quick hug and a fist-bump. She's trying to keep her words short and sweet. She's got a lump in her throat, and she doesn't want Maya's lasting memory of her to be this weird fourteen-year-old that knew her for two days and started bawling when they parted ways. "Juslims for life."

"Hell yeah," Maya agrees, grabbing Rachel's clenched fist instead of bumping it and thrusting their clenched hands in the air. "Girl, you gotta promise me you're gonna grow up to be the most badass fucking astronaut to ever walk on Mars."

When she was a little girl, Rachel wanted to build something to reach the stars. She wanted to build something that would deepen man's understanding of the universe, of their universe, of her universe. She wanted to build the first manned spacecraft to taste the red dirt of Mars. And then reality hit her, and she helped Cain kill a man, and she realized that maybe humanity didn't deserve to be among the stars.

There'd been the time when she thought that the stars were bullshit. She's grown, now. Older than her body and wiser than her years. She looks up at those blue lights twinkling light years away, and she sees her home.

"An engineer, actually," Rachel mumbles, rubbing the back of her neck, embarrassed. Not because they're talking about her fucking future, but because her voice raises an octave every time she opens her mouth. "I'm gonna grow up and be the most badass fucking astronautical engineer to ever build a Mars-headed spacecraft."

"I don't think you were speaking English, but I like the enthusiasm!" Maya exclaims, which Rachel doesn't really understand, since she used the exact same wording that Maya did. She only changed a word or two. Political science majors must be even dumber than they appear. "So go you! Solidarity! Badassery! Girl power! Hell yeah!"

Speaking of which: "And you've gotta promise me you're gonna grow up to be the most badass fucking first female president ever to walk on earth."

"First female president? Girl, you trippin'. This isn't some dystopian shitshow. Half our presidents have been women. But I will be the first gay Muslim president, so. And I don't think there have been any other desi presidents. Cal, babe"—Maya leans over to Callie—"was Farsi desi?"

"She was Iranian."

"So I'll be the first gay desi Muslim president. Infinitely cooler than the first female president. That was in, like, the 1700's. They still wore corsets and shat in holes in their yards. Can you imagine?"

It's getting to be too much. The tears are really starting to flow. She hasn't even known her for forty-eight hours, and Maya Zaman is hands-down the coolest person that Rachel's ever met.

"I'm gonna miss you, Maya," Rachel says, her smile as bittersweet as raw cacao.

"I'm gonna miss you, too."

And then Rachel is swept up in a whirlwind of Callie, the scent of old dusty books and a fruity perfume and backstages (enough hairspray to pacify a Toddlers and Tiaras contestant, heavy makeup, and the leathery smell of dance shoes) engulfing her as the girl hugs her goodbye, and Maya is washed up in Bianca, and the two slowly fade out of each others lives.

Callie spins Rachel around several times, loudly proclaiming her love for her, and gently sets her down. Then she moves on to her brother. She actually remains stationary as she hugs him. Rachel can only imagine what's going through their heads, having to lose each other for the second time.

"Callie—" Cain starts.

"I know," she replies, her voice soft as she buries her face in his neck. "I know, and I'm sorry."

They fall into silence for a moment, just standing there, loosely holding onto each other. Knowing they both got a second chance. Knowing they'll never see each other again.

"Maybe we'll find each other again in our dreams," Callie says ominously.

Cain laughs so hard he snorts, but that's probably just because he's crying so hard. "Well, I'm gay, so."

Callie stands up on her tip-toes so she can lean real close into him. "I'll tell you a secret," she whispers, her dark eyes flashing, "I am, too. I just don't want to lose you again."

"Callie," Cain whimpers. "You're making me not want to leave this place."

Rachel's fingers gently touch her Star of David necklace, her other hand tracing the Space Camp logo on the shirt she's worn since the day she disappeared, since the day the world ended. This all feels so surreal.

"Rachel," she whispers her name to herself, savoring the way the letters taste. They melt together on her tongue like grapes turning into sour wine. It tastes like the universe forgiving her. She knows that she forgives the universe. "Rachel."

"What the fuck?" mumbles Cain. "Rachel, stop talking to yourself. You're ruining our moment."

But Rachel doesn't care what he has to say about her. The universe has forgiven her; things are going to be okay. What she did—helping Cain on his assignment, killing those cops—won't matter in the grand scheme of things. In the grand scheme of things, this here, this is what matters. Her; the mountains; the stars; the moon; the universe; the night sky. God, her God.

So maybe her heart's been tainted. No element is ever found in its purest form.

For the very first time, Rachel's going home.

They leave Callie and Maya alone in the 7-Eleven parking lot with stolen slurpees and a stolen minivan. Then, as one does, they disappear into the dark woods like a local cryptid, hopefully never to be seen again.

[ ━━ ❝ ✧˚⋆｡☾✩˚⋆｡࿐❞ ━━ ]

the epilogue will be published tonight (-: