Holden

Holden grabbed his sweatshirt off his bed and tugged it over his head.

He couldn't remember the last time he went to a party. Not an all-nighter with beer, half-finished bags of chips, and Call of Duty. An actual party, with kegs and girls and regrets.

He wasn't looking forward to this.

But he was being a sport. Because that was what boyfriends did, right? They were sports. And Chelsea wanted to go to a party. A party party. Even though Holden wasn't her boyfriend boyfriend.

Well, maybe he was. They hadn't actually established their relationship status, and he didn't want to bring it up only to scare her away. He'd never had such a casual relationship before and didn't quite understand the rules.

"I guess I was wrong about you being a demi," Lauren said as she laced up her work shoes in the living room. "I haven't even met this fling of yours yet. Why haven't you brought her over?"

Holden stepped from his room. "She's afraid of dogs."

Lauren scoffed. "Francis isn't a dog. He's a teddy bear."

Francis lay panting contentedly on the couch. Holden had just taken him for a run in the park, and the dog was about five-point-three seconds away from conking out.

Lauren grabbed her backpack off the kitchen island stool. "Where are you going, again?"

Holden shrugged. "Some party in the woods."

"The woods, eh? Make sure you have a Mike's Hard Lemonade for me. They're usually in the cooler by the cheerleaders."

"Oh, fuck off."

"Though they may just be chasing Pinnacle with Diet Coke." Lauren deadpanned. "And don't forget to wear a condom. I don't like kids."

Holden sighed when Lauren opened the door to leave, but then seized up when he saw who was waiting outside.

He'd never mistake that shiny dark hair and those icy eyes.

"Ummm, hi?" Lauren glanced back at Holden in confusion.

"It's fine, I got it," Holden said.

Recognition crossed Lauren's face. She gave him a sorry, dude look, and then bolted out the door. Apparently, she didn't want to stay for the show.

Becca watched Lauren leave and then turned back to Holden. "Replaced me quickly, I see."

Seriously?He hadn't seen her for months, and jealousy was still her first instinct.

"Are you here for a reason?" he asked. "I'm about to leave."

"She's cute."

"She's also gay," Holden said without missing a beat. "I needed someone to pay the other half of the rent, not like it's any of your business."

Before she could retort, Francis zoomed past Holden to greet Becca, breaking the tension between them.

Becca bent over and scratched Francis between the ears. "Oh, hello, my sweet boy. I've missed you so much!"

"Seriously, Becca. I really have plans."

She stood straight with an injured expression, almost like she'd expected him to beg for her back. Was he so predictably pathetic?

"I needed one of my things and realized I left it here," she said. "I was hoping to pick up the rest of my stuff."

Holden nodded, vaguely recalling the box of items he had collected from around the apartment prior to Lauren moving in. He retreated to his room to grab the box.

"Umm, can I come in?" she yelled.

"I guess, but I'm really on my way out." He entered his room and opened his closet, scrounging around the bottom for the unlabeled box. When he returned to the living room with the box in tow, Becca was flipping through Without a Trace, which Holden had left on the coffee table.

"Never mind, this is what I needed. I'm re-reading it for book club. Thought you would have put it away by now."

"That's not..." Holden flipped open the box lid, and the girls on the cover of a beat-up copy of Without a Trace stared back at him. He fished the book out of the box and handed it to Becca. "I don't remember you ever reading this."

Becca reluctantly placed Angel's pristine hardback copy of Without a Trace back on the coffee table. "I don't remember you ever reading."

"I read," he said, though it was a flat-out lie Becca definitely wouldn't fall for.

She gave him a soft smile, the kind of sympathetic smile reserved for kids who have just fallen off the monkey bars. Becca smiled that way when she was flirting.

"Well, did you like it, then?" she asked. "Without a Trace?"

Word vomit bubbled up from Holden's stomach into his esophagus. It had always been so easy to talk to her. His instinct was to tell her everything—the recordings of Dr. Dupont, Maidei Chari's research, how it tied in to the Deadswitch Five, and the spooky oddities surrounding all he'd uncovered.

It played out perfectly in his head: he'd speak, and Becca would slowly lower herself onto the couch, hanging on to his every word. Hours would pass, and he'd miss every single text from Chelsea, and when he finally realized the time, it would be too late. He'd make Becca tea, or something. He didn't have wine. She'd be as fascinated with the case as he used to be, picking apart all the details and clues he and Angel had missed.

She'd stay late. And then what? What would happen next in this imaginary scenario?

For the first time, the thought of getting back with Becca revolted him. Not because he no longer loved her, but because time had finally given him a fresh perspective.

She even looked different. Not completely, of course, just a little less beautiful. Like his loneliness had rendered his memory of her more perfect.

"You're right," Holden said. "I didn't read it." He checked his phone. "I really do need to go. I'll walk you out."

Holden pulled his beat-up Camry to the side of the dirt road, at the end of a long line of cars. "What did you say this place was called?"

"The Playground." Chelsea flipped down the visor mirror and applied lip gloss. "That's what the kids call it."

"The kids?"

"Oh, you know, the local Newport high schoolers who want to party."

"The coast is an hour from here."

From beyond the windshield, people-silhouettes with flashlights veered from the road into the woods.

Chelsea shrugged. "Some kids really need to get away from their parents."

"There are no high schoolers at this party, though, right?" He despised the idea of being the older leering creep in the woods.

"Ugh, god, no." She dropped her lip gloss in her purse and kicked open the car door. "Just undergrads."

Not much better, but at least there were no minors.

"Hurry up. I think Emma is already here."

Emma... Emma...

Oh right. The friend Chelsea was with all those months ago back at Clodfelter's. God, he hoped Kyle wasn't here. He'd been dodging every one of that guy's texts since March.

Holden got out of his car and locked it. Chelsea pulled a flashlight from her purse, clicked it on, and held his hand. He tugged his flimsy sweatshirt tighter around him, feeling woefully unprepared for this. He'd been hoping to get back home before midnight, snuggle with Francis, and watch some stupid videos on his phone—definitely the thought process of a tired almost-middle-aged person.

Chelsea dragged him off the road into the woods. A bright orange flame about a quarter mile away illuminated the forest. Shrieks and laughter filled the night.

"Is that a bonfire?" he asked.

"Looks like."

"You can't have bonfires out here. It's July."

"Okay, Daddy," she said in a faux-sexy tone that just pissed him off.

"I'm serious. You could burn half the state down."

"Me? I didn't start it! God, let me have my fun."

He had been letting her have her fun. Every time she asked, he came to her place. He didn't fall asleep until she'd gotten off at least twice. He paid for her dinners, her movie tickets, her tampons from restroom dispensers when she didn't want to "lug her purse all over town." Fun was all Chelsea had been having with him lately. It was exhausting.

As they neared the fire, he took stock of the area. There were about fifty people, all about a decade younger than he was. A few coolers, a keg, and crumpled red cups littered the clearing. Someone had driven a pickup truck all the way from the road. Obnoxious music pulsed from the stereo as girls drunkenly danced in the truck bed.

Chelsea screamed gleefully and darted from his side to hug Emma, like she hadn't seen her in years. A couple of guys Holden didn't know flanked Emma. One of them hugged Chelsea for ten seconds too long. When they separated, Chelsea glanced at Holden before turning her attention back to Emma and giggling.

Well, this was dredging up all his worst undergrad memories.

Holden shoved his hands in his pockets, plotting a way to escape back to his car for the rest of the night and not piss off Chelsea, though she seemed perfectly distracted. He jumped as some jackass poured lighter fluid on the bonfire. As the flame plumed, Holden caught sight of a scrawny guy on the other side of the fire, smoking a cigarette and staring at him.

The guy dropped his cigarette and stomped it out, then walked the edge of the clearing around the fire. As he approached, he nodded. "You Holden?"

Holden took a step back on instinct, out of shanking distance. "Who's asking?"

The scrawny guy extended his arm, pointing into the woods behind him. "There's a chick out there looking for you."

"A... chick?"

"I was trying to find a spot to take a leak. She's got a whole setup out there for the party, reading those weird fortune cards the way goth chicks do. I asked to bum a cigarette, and she told me she'd give me one if I found you."

A goth chick giving fortunes? No one in Holden's life fit that description. "Do you know her name?"

The kid shrugged. "You gonna go, or not?"

"Uhh..." Holden glanced back at Chelsea, but she and her group of friends were gone. He quickly scanned the crowd around the fire and failed to find her.

"Listen," the kid said, picking his tooth with his thumbnail. "I already got my smoke, so I'm gonna get out of here. This party is lame."

He passed Holden and took off toward the road. Bewildered, Holden watched him disappear between the trees, and then returned his attention to the goth chick part of the woods. A trail led to a soft glow about fifty yards into the forest.

Holden walked toward the trail, ignoring the warning sirens going off in his brain. This scenario was too weird to not end with him getting jumped, but absolutely anything was better than being the old guy standing alone at a college party. He couldn't believe he'd gotten suckered into driving all the way out here only to be ditched.

He passed a group of young women in sweatshirts and jeans whispering back and forth to each other about tarot. The soft glow came from a pair of oil lamps—actual oil lamps—arranged on a wooden table about to collapse from dry rot.

A woman sat on the other side of the table. She wore her long hair in two braids beneath a wide-brimmed black hat, her vest patterned with gold leaves. The choker around her neck was also gold, a replica of stag's antlers resting just above her collarbone. A hand-rolled cigarette hung from her lips as she shuffled a deck of cards. But the smoke didn't smell of cigarettes. It didn't smell of marijuana or some shitty vape pen flavor either. It reminded Holden of burning citrus rind.

The woman rested the cards on the table, plucked the cigarette from her mouth with slender brown fingers, and blew smoke from her lips. Her enormous eyes squinted as she smiled at him. She looked vaguely familiar, but for the life of him, Holden couldn't remember where he'd seen her before.

"You've finally arrived," she announced, her voice sultry.

"Do I know you?" he asked.

"I suppose you do." She took a final drag from her smoke and stubbed it out amid a graveyard of burn marks on the table. "Though you won't remember my name if you try recalling it." She gestured to the folding chair next to him. "Please sit."

Holden was no longer afraid of getting jumped. Still, he was nervous. And confused. He wouldn't be able to recall her name? What the hell did that mean?

Just like the warning siren screaming in his brain, he ignored every jolty nerve ending in his body and sat, nodding toward the deck of cards. "Are you giving tarot readings to partiers?"

"Not tarot." She slid the deck of cards to the center of the table. "This is a different type of reading." Drawing two cards, she placed them next to each other, facedown. "Less about what has and will happen to you, and more about who you are."

Holden scratched his head, studying the backs of the cards and the hand-drawn sketch of birds perched on the skull of a dead stag. "Shouldn't I know who I am?"

The woman cocked her head. "That depends. You tell me."

He sank a little deeper into his thin sweatshirt.

She flipped over the card on his right. The words THE RANGER topped a drawing of a cloaked and faceless figure in the middle of a forest.

"The Ranger," said the woman. "Faced with peril, you are reactive. You do not make decisions, but support the ones of those you protect. And those you protect—they are your identity, Holden. You are their hand, not their hero."

She spoke as though her message was grave, but it was all gibberish to him. A hokey fortune reading at an equally hokey party. He could still hear the drunken hollers and shitty music playing from the truck.

Only one thing nagged him.

"How do you know my name?" Suspicion crawled up his spine, the way it had when he listened to the last unlocked recording of Dr. Dupont. Like he was the butt of a joke far more elaborate than his puny brain could comprehend.

The woman didn't answer him, flipping over the card on her left.

THE MOTHER

Beneath the title was an illustration of a woman in a dark green gown, backdropped once again by a forest. She wore a majestic pair of antlers as a headdress, with more prongs than Holden could count before the woman across from him sighed and touched her fingers to her own antler choker. Her shoulders sagged, like she was relieved.

"What does this card mean?" he asked, returning his attention to the sketch of the antlered Mother. He was wrong; the antlers weren't a headdress. Blood seeped from The Mother's temples, where the antlers had sprouted. They were a part of her.

"It means we are on the same side," the woman said.

Holden tore his eyes away from the card to her. "The same side of what?"

The woman blinked her big glassy eyes, and stared at Holden like he was a thing of wonder. Like he was an answer to something.

She smiled. "The apocalypse."