Page 43 of In Somnis

Her talking to me unprompted does something stupid to my pulse, but I manage to sound almost normal. “Nope. She just kind of… appeared. I’m not ruling out that Jasper manifested her.”

Sydney’s mouth twitches. Almost a smile. “Well, she’s better than the last guy.”

“A rock would be better than the last guy,” I say. “Actually, Jasper has a bunch of rocks in his room. Should I grab one? Put it in a chef’s hat?”

She actually laughs, and I mentally high-five myself for not completely fumbling this interaction.

“No, but you should hire her.” Sydney glances toward the kitchen, then back at me. “The food looks fantastic. And she seems nice enough.”

That stops me cold. Sydney said someone is nice. I don’t think that ever happened before. If she likes Lemon, then fuck my reservations, fuck the weird lemon theme.

I can explain it to Mabel. I can handle this.

With that fragile spark of optimism, I shove back into the kitchen, where Lemon is already cleaning, humming to the music.

The stove is wiped down, the pans are washed and angled neatly on the drying rack, and her hair is now free, falling over her shoulder in loose waves. The apron she borrowed is folded neatly on the counter beside her.

I yank off my own apron and watch her finish wiping down the station. The kitchen looks better than it has in weeks, and she did it without even being asked.

“Not bad,” I say, and she looks up. “You want a job? Because I can admit that you just saved my ass, and I’d like to make that a regular arrangement.”

“Oh.” She blinks, surprised, then her smile turns a little sheepish. “I don’t really know yet if I’m staying in town, but I guess I could…”

The pendant around her neck shifts as she reaches up to tuck her hair behind her ear.

That fucking crystal.

I freeze so hard it feels as if the entire room goes silent around me. My breath stops halfway in my chest, and for a moment, even the hum of the refrigerator seems to disappear.

There is absolutely no way.

That pendant has been in my life longer than most people I know, even though I thought I got rid of it.

My mind yanks me backward.

Six-year-old self, my belly hurting from hunger while my mom lies on the couch in the late afternoon, incense thick in the air, telling me she was “traveling between planes,” and that I should make dinner myself because the universe was guiding her somewhere more important.

Ten-year-old me shaking her shoulder during a power blackout, the trailer swallowed in darkness, and her smiling dreamily as she whispered, “Trust the universe, it always provides,” even though it never provided anything but disappointment.

She pressed a crystal into my hand when I asked for help with homework I didn’t understand, insisting I should study my intuition instead.

She slept for days while fifteen-year-old me worked double shifts at this very inn, so my seven-year-old brother didn’t go hungry as I did.

The necklace was there for all of it.

Hunger, darkness, and her choosing literally anything else.

The stone that was there my whole shitty childhood is now dangling between the breasts of a woman I met twenty minutes ago, quietly mocking me with the reminder that my mother’s spiritual obsession mattered more to her than I ever did. The anger hits so fast it catches me off guard. I know it’s not rational, she didn’t do anything wrong, it’s just a fucking crystal. A rock. She has no idea what it means, but my chest tightens anyway, and I can’t separate the pendant from every shitty memory attached to it.

“… think about it?” Lemon finishes. “I mean, the kitchen is great, and you clearly need help, so maybe we could⁠—”

“Where did you get that?” The words come out harder than I mean them to as I point at the crystal.

She stops mid-sentence, hand going to her throat. “This? Jasper gave it to me. He said⁠—”

“Get out.”

Of course, Jasper gave it away. He was only seven when our mom developed Alzheimer’s and stopped wearing it. He wouldn’t know the weight it carries for me.