Page 95 of Death and Do-Overs

And then it was over.

“What happened to you guys today?” Imogen asked Levi. “We found Guy Jones. That was a bust except for these cool t-shirts I got. Oh, but I only got two. Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Mar said, eyeing Imogen’s bag with suspicion.

“We fought an alchemist, too,” Imogen said. “Someone else killed him.”

I reached a hand for Mar. She stared at it but made no move to accept. There was no reason for conversation when we could share everything.

“We didn’t find the fox,” Levi said.

“Mar,” I said, with a shake of my offered hand.

She glanced at Levi, then back at me. Her expression was blank.

I could feel her hesitation as surely as I could feel my own frustration.

Mar was quiet a moment.

Finally, she licked her lips and took my hand. “Yeah, okay. Let’s get this over with.”

Her arm was tense. Her whole demeanor was tense. She didn’t want to do this, but we had to. We were the same person and being one meant all future Marnies could begin on the same page, with all of the experiences and information required to move forward fully informed.

I closed my eyes and found the field of blue bubbles. They weren’t close like they’d been before. They felt distant, and pale, almost like they weren’t there at all.

And even though I held onto Mar’s hand, no new bubble appeared.

I waited for the purple sphere, for Mar to appear with me in the field.

She didn’t.

Something was blocking us from reaching each other. Or maybe she was blocking me.

I opened my eyes and released her hand.

“You don’t want to rejoin,” I said.

She flattened her lips together. She said, “I’m trying.”

I believed her. But she couldn’t do it. She wasn’t sure that this was what she wanted. Something happened today in our differing experiences that changed the way we thought and felt.

“It’s all right,” I told her.

I could create as many of us as we both needed. And when she was ready, she’d rejoin the fold.

“Okay, well, I want more details thanwe didn’t find the fox,”Imogen said. “And I can tell you all about the dead guy we left at Birdie’s house.”

CHAPTER 21

MAR

Imogen paced and talked while Levi leaned against the wall by the hotel room door.

I stared across the space between beds, into my matching set of eyes. Greta and I were supposed to be exactly the same person, just as the last iteration of Mar and Nie were supposed to have been.

Yet, Nie had ventured to Nevermore while the last reiteration of Mar had sulked.

Greta and I were both of them and neither.

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