Chapter 16

Georgia refused to be physically present for experiment night but found an ingenious way to contribute. Matching pajama sets. For everyone.

“Since you wanna be test subjects so bad, you can dress like them too,” she said, passing them out. “All the same design but different neon colors so it’ll be easier to spot each other at night if anything goes down since we know Hennessee likes to play with the lighting.”

“How thoughtful,” Xander said, masterfully blurring that line between genuine and sardonic.

Georgia pointed at him and threatened, “You better wear them. I’ll know if you don’t.”

Xander generously gave her a lazy smile. “Then what will happen?”

“It’ll hurt my feelings.” She switched it up on him so quick it almost gave Lucky whiplash. “I’ll cry.”

“Well, I wouldn’t want you to do that.” He leaned down slightly, head bowed. “I will wear them. You have my word.”

Sibling vibes sparkled between them, so vibrant Lucky felt like she could touch it if she tried. Interesting.

After dinner and sundown, they decided to separate immediately to give the house as much time alone with them as possible. Xander took the room directly across from Lucky, with Maverick and Stephen shacking up in opposite rooms at the end of the hall. Each person had a camera set up to continuously film the room and a second for self-tapes, if they chose to do so.

Gengar silently judged Lucky as she did everything and anything to burn off the anticipation anxiety keeping her awake. Jumping jacks, dancing, push-ups, wall-sits, handstands, yoga—for literal hours.

Around midnight, after a third failed attempt to walk out of a back bend, she asked, “Do you want to go outside? I haven’t tried that yet.”

Gengar jumped from the bed and sat by the door, staring at the doorknob.

“Do you understand me? Blink once for yes,” she joked.

Outsidewas one of Gengar’s words. He also recognized hungry, snackies, and Rebel. That last one often sent him running for his favorite hiding spot. According to Maverick, he knew Lucky’s name too.

Gengar entered the hall ahead of her, trotting toward the stairs at a quick pace. Overall, he seemed to be adjusting well to being a house cat, but Lucky didn’t think he’d ever want to give up roaming around the orchard, climbing the trees, and chasing the rodents to his kitty heart’s content.

“Lucky. Hey.”

“Maverick.” They met at the top of the staircase in their matching pajamas as if they planned it. She leaned against the banister, pathetically happy to see him. “Still awake. Well done.”

“Barely.” He held up a mug of what smelled like coffee. “I tried everything else. If I start reading, I’ll fall asleep. If I try writing, I’ll fall asleep. If I listen to music or watch a movie, I’m definitely going to sleep.”

“But we talk every night for hours. I figured you were a night owl.”

“Only for you.”

“Stop. You have not been staying up just to talk to me.”

That indulgent grin looked so good on him. “Was I allowed to call you tonight?”

“Technically, no.”

“Thought so.” He nodded. “I made coffee to keep me awake because otherwise I. Will. Fall. Asleep.”

Lucky’s cheeks began to warm. She realized she was always the one to hang up first. She always accidentally fell asleep before him. She always teased him if he called even five minutes later than normal.

He’d really been staying awake for her the whole time.

Gengar yowled at her from the bottom of the stairs.

She laughed, grateful for the reprieve. “Go on. I’ll catch up.”

Gengar paused for a second more before dashing off for his newly installed kitty door.

Maverick asked, “What are you two up to?”

“A midnight stroll around the orchard. I can’t sleep.”

“Well, we’ve already broken the experiment rules. Might as well keep going.” He sat on the top step, gesturing for her to join him.

“That’s like saying I have a crack in my phone screen, might as well shatter the whole thing.” She sat down anyway.

The staircase was narrower than average, barely enough room for two adults to walk side by side. Lucky held her hands between her thighs, hoping to take up less space. Their shoulders and hips met in the middle despite her efforts—a comforting warmth radiated through his clothes.

She asked, “Anything exciting happen for you yet?”

“Not really. I smelled flowers again when I was in the kitchen. I followed it but it might have been leading me back to my room. I think it faded when I saw you. I stopped focusing on it so I’m not sure.”

“Interesting. What kind of flowers?”

“I don’t think it’s a specific one. It’s more like a pleasant floral perfume.”

“Is it familiar?”

“Yep.” He nodded, clearing his throat. “Very.”

“I wonder what the parameters are for scents. Can the house make them for anyone it wants to? It made one for Eunice and she hadn’t slept yet either.”

Maverick sighed, shaking his head.

“What?” After accepting he wasn’t going to elaborate, she said, “At least yours isn’t like mine and completely random. Hennessee hasn’t shown me anything personal at all.” If Hennessee House wanted to get her attention now, it should use Maverick. He always smelled so good. She’d follow even faster than with the peppermint. Currently, his usual cocoa butter scent was stronger than normal, still lingering on his skin after his shower.

“That’s a good thing,” he said seriously. “I’m never sleeping in this house. With the way my dreams work, I’m low-key terrified what it’ll show me.”

“With a mind like mine, it should be having a field day. It could have tried to put the fear of everything in me a million times over using the things I’ve read in people. And yet? Nothing. It doesn’t make sense.”

“Maybe it has other plans for you.” He shrugged. “I get where you’re coming from, but no one person can know everything. Sometimes things just won’t ever make sense, no matter how you spin it.”

“Well, I can’t accept that.”

“I know.” The resigned look on his face made her heart sink. Words fell to the wayside as they stared at each other until he said, “Your eyes are starting to look better.”

“Ah, going for my eyes again, I see,” she joked. “I promise I’m fine.”

“What’s it like?”

“The pain?”

“No, being able to read people the way you do. What’s it like living with it?”

“Oh, um.” No one had ever asked her that before. “I don’t really remember what life was like before I could do it, so I guess you could say it changed everything for me. I’ve never met a person I couldn’t read. No matter how old or young, confident or shy, good or bad—I see them for who they were. Who they are. Who they want to be. Who they will be if all their stars align. Sometimes it feels like cheating.” She looked away, concentrating on her knees, and felt him move impossibly closer.

Their temples nearly touched, and he didn’t need to use more than a whisper. “What do you mean?”

“Life gave me a cheat code, but it wasn’t free. I have to pay for it.” She shrugged. “No one wants to be around a know-it-all. No one likes it when you know their secrets, sometimes before they do. My family doesn’t like me very much because they think I’m too self-righteous, among other things. Keeping friends is difficult when you start being too weird or too driven. I see everyone and my payment, my punishment, is no one sees me.” She smiled at him to keep from crying. She’d never said that out loud before. Easy to forget how much it hurt when she forced herself to never think of it.

He shook his head, frowning and concerned. “Having a gift isn’t a punishment.” His fierce whisper was almost enough to convince her.

“A gift. Sure. I wish whoever gave it to me left a note so I could return it.” She laughed.

“Who would you be without it?”

She stared at him wide-eyed, slightly in shock.

“Don’t misunderstand,” he said gently. “I’m not saying you’d be nothing without it. I’m asking who would you be instead? What would your life be like? Would it be better? Would it be worse? Who would you want to be? It’s obviously had a profound effect in shaping who you are. Would you be the same person without it?”

She shook her head. Of course, she wouldn’t be. Her ability was tied to her existence. Not to be dramatic but losing it would be like staying alive after giving up her heart—she didn’t know how she’d function. That was why it hurt so much to be rejected so thoroughly by her loved ones. Changing for them meant denying a part of herself.

He asked, “If you could really give it up, right now, right this second, would you?”

“It was just a joke, Maverick.”

“I know that. But why did you make it? It came so quick, like it was nothing. Rolled right off the tongue. Why? I don’t think it was to make me laugh.”

Because when she pretended it was a burden people felt sorry for her and stayed a little bit longer. Pretending to hate parts of herself made her relatable. But she said to him, “I don’t know.”

“You do know.”

“I don’t—I don’t know. I was just being stupid.”

“No, you weren’t.”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“I think it does,” he said. “Maybe you feel like no one sees you because you don’t let them. I ask you a personal question, you almost always try to dismiss it at your expense. You think it’s stupid. You don’t know why you said it. You ask me to forget what you said. It’s like you want to erase any traces of you genuinely being yourself. Why?”

Because sometimes you make me forget how to think.

Because you make me let go of who I trained myself to be.

Because I’m trying so hard to be normal. Because I’m better in small doses.

Because no one wants the real me.

For the first time in a long time, Lucky couldn’t figure out the perfect lie to answer his question. Her brilliant mind had finally failed her, a moment she never thought would happen. It’d gone blank—every word and quip and pun and turn of phrase wiped clean. Nothing remained except her feelings.

The raw burning of unshed tears. The lump in her throat. The persistent, phantom ache in her chest that grew stronger every time she looked at him. The bottomless pit of inevitability in her stomach ready to consume any hope she dared to have.

She was so close to falling apart and he just sat there next to her. Patiently waiting and refusing to let her fake her way through an answer.

A loud bang echoed from downstairs. Maverick and Lucky shot to their feet, fully alert. His hand found hers as if it were always meant to.

He asked, “Just checking: You heard that, right?”

Heart hammering in her chest, she glanced at their joined hands and then his face. “I did.”

“We stay together.” A statement not up for negotiation.

Wind howled downstairs, whistling and demanding attention as an endless cascade of purple flowers flowed into the house like an evening tide. They hit the front door, curling up and around and out, swirling with every gust.

Lucky smiled as if it were the most magical thing she’d ever seen, but said, “I hope that’s an illusion because I’m not cleaning that up.”

“It isn’t.” Xander stood behind them, wearing his pajamas as promised. Maverick gently pulled Lucky toward him and out of the way as he wordlessly squeezed by them, down the stairs, and toward the kitchen.

“Come on!”

“Lucky, wait—”

But she wouldn’t hear him. Possessed by the spirit of Rebel herself, she pulled him after her. If he didn’t move, he would’ve fallen. “We can’t let him go alone.”

“We can actually. Wait, wait.” Maverick gently gripped her other arm—she allowed it, holding momentarily still in the hallway. “He told me this might happen. He doesn’t want us to follow him.”

Dutch door wide open, flowers continued to spill inside seemingly from nowhere. She barely caught sight of Xander’s back as he disappeared into the orchard.

“Why?”

“You’ll have to ask him. I’m sorry.”

“Will he be safe out there?”

“Probably. It’s his house. He knows more than any of us.”

“Maverick, do you understand what this means? Look.” She gestured to the ground as flowers whirled around their feet and up their calves. “It gave him flowers. This is his welcome home. Hennessee has been waiting for him to come back.”

He looked uneasy and skeptical.

“Don’t be like that, please?” she pleaded. “This is good. This is so good.”

“We don’t know what it’s showing him,” he said. “We don’t know what comes after this. I know you want to believe the house has good intentions, and I’m sorry, but I don’t. Neither does Xander. And if he says that, it means something.”

She shook her head, taking a step back.

He took a step forward. “Just wait until you talk to him before deciding if this is actually a good thing. Please? In the meantime, we’ll stay down here until he comes back or if something happens and he needs us. Okay?” They sat together at the small kitchenette table in front of the window. The vibrant colors of the orchard were no match for the oppressive darkness, but the white gazebo glowed in the moonlight next to it. Maverick pulled their chairs together, as close as they’d been on the stairs. Fifteen minutes of silently waiting passed before she said, “I hope he’s okay.”

“Me too.” He paused. “I want to tell you something.”

She tore her attention from the window for him.

“Since I’ve met you, I’ve started dreaming again. I’ve written more in the past week than I have all year,” he said. “I really do believe you have a gift. The kind that helps people see the best in themselves. You guide them toward where they would be happiest. You’re a muse, Lucky.”

“That’s very sweet, Maverick. It’s not true, though.”

“That’s what I see in you,” he said. “I also see that you’re a know-it-all and a little self-righteous. And you lie all the time. I see everything and I’m still here. Because I want to be and I’m not going anywhere unless you tell me to.”

She scoffed. “Sure, you say that now.”

“Because that’s how this works. This is how it starts.” He huffed in frustration. “You’re so brilliant it’s ridiculous and yet you think it’s okay for you to make decisions for me.” He paused. “For us. Why can’t we do that together?”

“Because it won’t work.”

“But you’re not psychic, remember? You don’t know how this will end until we live it, but we’ll never find out if you keep running away,” he said. “I want to see where this goes. What do you want? Honestly. Not based on what you think will happen or how you think I’ll react. What do you honestly want?”

She didn’t even need to think about it. “I want to be wrong about us. You don’t know what it was like for me when I tried to be with other people.” Her voice was shaking as badly as her hands. She didn’t want to cry. She didn’t want him to think he made her unhappy because he didn’t. Not even close. “I want…I want to take things slowly. I need slow.”

“Slow,” he repeated, wiping her tears. “We can do that.”

Lucky sniffled, laughing as she smiled, but then something made her yawn. She felt it, like a command in her head telling her body what to do. The edges of her vision began to blur and darken as she looked at Maverick and whispered, “I think I’m tired.”