"Do you want to sit down?"
"No, I'm okay. Really. I feel much better now."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes. Whatever it was, it's gone. I feel fine."
"So it was nervousness?"
I opened my mouth to deny it and then decided that agreeing was better than admitting the real reason. Me being pregnant after less than two weeks under Esmeralda's roof definitely wouldn't look good. "Well, maybe a little bit. I'm not used to social workers."
She smiled again. "I imagine not." I wondered if all social workers were told to smile and laugh as much as possible. They probably thought it relaxed the clients. "But if it happens again, you should see a doctor. Vomiting like that is not normal."
"I will."
"Are you well enough to show me your bedroom now?"
"Okay."
"You're sure you're all right?"
How did I answer that question? "I think so," I said.
"Have you always been a nervous vomiter?"
I glared at Tom. "I guess."
3
Not Alone
Jennifer Ishii walked around my
room slowly. I watched her and tried not to seem nervous, though after vomiting like that, I didn't know why I bothered. I'd made Tom and Jay-Tee stay downstairs so they wouldn't inadvertently say anything else wrong.
She ran a finger along the top of the bookcase, opened the glass doors to step onto the balcony. "Nice view," she said, though all you could see was the street and parked cars and other houses, but only tiny bits of green, stunted trees growing out of the footpath with their roots covered over with asphalt.
She peered into the wardrobe. Pushed the winter coat that Danny'd bought me on its hanger. "Don't think you'll get much wear out of that here. You don't have many clothes, do you?"
"No. Esmeralda says she'll buy me some more."
"Do you always call her Esmeralda?"
"Yes. That's her name. We don't really know each other very well yet."
"No," Jennifer Ishii said, smiling. "I imagine not."
She stepped into the bathroom. "This is lovely. Must be nice having your own bathroom."
"Yup. I never have before. It's grouse."
"Are you happy, Reason?"
I blinked, saw dots of magic light and the dark gap where Jennifer Ishii must be standing. Shivered again. Her not being there was spooky. It was as if she were dead.
"Are you okay?"
I nodded.
"Really? You don't seem okay. Or happy."
"I miss my mother." It was true. I missed our life together. I missed her being sane, or at least not scary mad, like she was now. Sarafina had always been odd. Even the little I'd seen of other people had taught me
that
. I missed the time when I hadn't known about magic.
And even though it had only been one night, I missed being able to close my eyes without seeing it everywhere. I missed how I was before Raul Cansino had done whatever it was he'd done to me. I missed being able to sleep. And Danny. I missed Danny, even though we'd only been apart for a day. Jay-Tee had called him, but I hadn't. I didn't want Tom and Jay-Tee overhearing.
"You've been to visit your mother?"
"Yes, twice, but she's…she's not how she was." I sat down on the bed.
"Are you getting enough sleep?"
I opened my mouth, then shut it again.
"Those are very dark shadows. And your eyes are so red. Like you've been crying. All the time."
Not like I've been crying— like I've been trying not to blink, not to see the world the way Raul Cansino saw it: a world of magic.
"I don't sleep very well." That wasn't true. Usually I slept fine, but yesterday the old man had given me his magic and taken sleep away. I wondered what I'd look like in a week.
"Does she treat you well? Your grandmother?" Jennifer Ishii was peering at my face, at the fading bruises around my eye.
I touched it. "Oh, no, that wasn't Esmeralda. Truly. I tripped."
"In the cellar?"
"I really did. Esmeralda would never hit me."
Drink my magic, maybe, but hit me? No.
"But she leaves you alone a lot?"
"Oh, no," I said. "I've hardly been alone since I got here. First Tom, then Jay-Tee." And Danny. "The three of us hang out all the time. Like I said, Esmeralda's almost always here for lunch. And Tom's dad keeps an eye on us. You can talk to him if you want." Then I remembered that Tom had said he was spending the morning at the library.
"I'll be doing that after I've talked to your grandmother."
"Also, I mean, we're fifteen, so it's not like we're babies that can't be left alone. My mum had me when
she
was fifteen."
"Which is not recommended. But Reason, I'd be worried about an adult who'd been through what you've been through."
I didn't know what to say. She didn't mean magic. I tried to think what she did mean.
"It must have been awful for you, finding her like that, having to call the ambulance…."
I flashed to my mother, covered in blood. She'd tried to kill herself. I blinked, wanting to push the image away, and saw only magic: Tom's, Jay-Tee's, all the magic objects in this house and next door, and a little way out Sarafina, and, I supposed, Tom's mother too, stuck together in the loony bin, and beyond that countless other magic lights, belonging to who-knew-what or who. I wobbled. Jennifer Ishii steadied me.
"Are you all right, Reason?"
I nodded, though my eyes had filled with tears. They stung but at the same time felt good against my eyeballs. None of them spilled out.
"Here," she said, handing me a tissue. "It's good to cry, Reason. You're allowed to if you want to."
I blinked, saw magic. The tears were already gone.
"Have you had a chance to talk to anyone about what you've been through? Your grandmother? Your friends?"
I shook my head. "Not really." There had been too many other things to talk about: magic and the choice between using it and dying young, or not using it and going mad, the new Cansino magic, the baby growing inside me…
"It might do you good, Reason. To talk to someone." She handed me a card. "It's the name of a counsellor. She's a friend of mine. Isabella's very good at listening and at suggesting ways to look after yourself. I'll tell your grandmother about her. It will help you, Reason." Jennifer Ishii looked at me as if she'd asked me a question.
I looked away so I could spare myself the sight of her not being there when I blinked.
"Reason, you've been through so much. It makes sense that you would feel sad, or angry, or nervous, or any of the ways you've been feeling. You need to let yourself feel those things. You need to let yourself rest, take care of yourself. It's still early days. In a very short amount of time, you've been through a lot, including moving into a new house in a whole new city. Just that alone would be overwhelming for most people."
"You won't send me away from Esmeralda, will you?"
Jennifer Ishii smiled again, but it was a smaller smile— realer— sadder too. "Of course not. My job is to make sure you're okay. The last thing you need right now is to be moved again. I wouldn't recommend it unless it was absolutely necessary. You're lucky, Reason. Most kids in your situation don't end up in such a lovely house. Your grandmother has a lot of money, but I have to keep in mind that just because a household is rich doesn't mean it's healthy. Children can be neglected anywhere.
"I'm trying not to be distracted by how gorgeous this place is. It seems to me you need more attention than your grandmother has been giving you. No one should be left alone with the kind of experiences you've been through. You're only fifteen, Reason. You've had to look after yourself and your mother for a very long time. You don't have to continue taking on everything all alone."
She was staring at me. I nodded, not knowing what to say. I hadn't been prepared for her to say something like that. Had I really been looking after Sarafina?
"Promise me you'll go and see Isabella."
"Isabella?"
"The counsellor."
I looked down at the card in my hand. ISABELLA SANDITON, SPECIALISING IN CHILD PSYCHOLOGY. I couldn't imagine taking the time to sit with some stranger and tell them the tiniest portion of my troubles, when I had so many bigger and scarier problems, like what to do about this scary Cansino way of seeing, and how to keep Jay-Tee from dying and bring my mother back to sanity. Not to mention seeing Danny again, telling him about our baby.
I grunted.
"I'll tell your grandmother the same."
I nodded.
"Are you ready for your tests? I was pleased to hear that you've been preparing. It's great that you've decided to go to school even though you don't have to anymore."
"I always wanted to go to school," I said, feeling confused. "Test?"
"This Saturday. Your scholastic abilities test."
"Scholastic abilities?" I had no idea what she was talking about.
"Isn't that what you've been studying for?"
"Um."
"You don't know? You were supposed to be told about this. All the information has been sent to this address. Your grandmother hasn't mentioned it?"
Too late to lie. "Not that I remember."
"She really should have told you." Jennifer Ishii's forehead crinkled and her lips turned down before she remembered to smile.
Another black mark against my grandmother.
It wasn't as if she'd had time to fill me in. The first day I'd stayed locked in my room not talking to her, and then I'd gone through the door to New York City. There hadn't ever been a quiet, let's-talk-about-your-future moment. Well, there had, but it was the more pressing immediate future:
Don't use magic or you'll die; your mother is a liar, your grandfather a very bad man
. Not a single mention of my scholastic abilities test.
"You have no school records, Reason. You have to be tested so we can work out what class to put you in. Obviously, it would be great if you could be placed in year ten, so you'll be the same age as your classmates, but you've had a very unusual upbringing. We can't be sure you'll be able to cope with year ten."
I nodded. "That makes sense."
She opened her backpack, pulling out a sheaf of papers. "Your grandmother should already have these, but just in case. The test is on Saturday. I'll come and pick you up a half hour beforehand. Is that okay?"
I nodded again.
"My contact numbers are here." She pointed to the top of one of the pages and handed me a card. "And this is my card. Same information. Smaller format. Call me anytime. I'm serious, Reason. Even if you need help at four in the morning, I want you to call me, okay?" Jennifer Ishii lost her smile again and stared at me as if…I wasn't sure what. She seemed to pity me.
"I will," I said, taking the papers from her. They felt slippery in my hands.
"And if you keep vomiting like that, you must see a doctor. Yes?"
I nodded.
"I think I've seen everything I need to see. You've been very helpful, Reason. I know how strange this must be for you."
There are stranger things
, I thought.
4
Pots and Pans
"So, is she putting you
in a foster home?" Jay-Tee asked, which made Tom want to smack her. Couldn't she see Reason was upset? He elbowed her instead.
"What?" Jay-Tee turned to glare at him. "She knows I'm joking, Tom!"
Tom didn't know any such thing. Reason had been acting strange ever since she got back from the cemetery. She kept staring off into space like she could see stuff they couldn't. It was creepy. He wasn't surprised she was freaked: after all, that weird monster had done unspeakable things to her in the cemetery.
Well, okay, not exactly unspeakable. Tom could say what had happened: that Cansino ancestor-thing had made Reason pregnant using magic. He wasn't sure he was capable of taking it in without his head exploding. What kind of baby was it going to be? If he were Reason, he'd have been doing a lot more than staring into space.
"I'm okay," Reason said. "It wasn't that bad. Jennifer Ishii seems okay. You know, for a social— "
"For someone whose job is to pry into other people's lives," Jay-Tee said. "She smiles too much."
Tom couldn't help agreeing. She'd definitely been trying too hard.
"She was being nice," Reason said flatly, as if talking was just too exhausting. "You probably have to smile a lot in her job. Show that you don't mean any harm. Something like that."