Page 104 of Go Luck Yourself
It slips through two of the bookcase panels, and I stop, feeling the crack. There’s definitely space here, along with a hinge three feet to the right for a door to swing open.
Even though there’s no one else in the room, I resist doing a fist pump.
Hidden passage.
I move along the shelf, try a few books or random items that might be levers. Nothing.
Should I push on it? It wouldn’t be that easy—
It is.
I shove on the edge, and something clicks, the door rebounding and swinging open as a magnetic latch releases.
Nowis when my guilt chooses to rear up and go,This is a bit invasive.
But if I can get proof that it is Malachy stealing from us, then Loch can use the scandal to push out his uncle. It benefits him, too.
No. If I can get proof, I’ll use it tohelp Christmas.We’ll force Malachy to give back what he stole.
Don’t think about Loch.
Don’t think about what I can do for him, who I can be, to get him to want me.
I push open the door until light from the window on the opposite side of the office shows a space barely big enough to be considered a closet.
At first I think I found an air conditioner or heater. It’s no taller than I am, a hodgepodge of iron fixings and gears, more functional looking than the Merry Measure in all its steampunk grandness.
But there’s a familiar series of gauges across the front, tracking inputs, outputs.
I bend closer. The input needle swivels to the max; the output needle is in a state of drain. Malachy, pulling joy to feed his business’s success. That asshole.
Carefully, I search around the joy meter, looking for—I don’t even know what. One of those attachments similar to the one on the Merry Measure? They’d have to have put a gadget on this one to act as a receiver for the one in Christmas.
Ah.
Wedged in at the back is a little box exactly like the one left in Christmas, brass and about the size of my fist. There’s a readout display on this one, a date and time stamp. The last draw was yesterday. Or… it’s not shut off, is it? The light on the one in Christmas was green, but this one has a red light on top.
I reach for it. I can unplug it and take it back with me.
But then whoever installed it will be alerted that we know, and nothing about this tells me thewho.
I pull my phone out and shoot off a picture of it to Coal, asking him to check that it matches the one in Christmas, but I’m almost certain they’re identical.
There’s a switch on top next to the red light. I bend closer—On/Off.It’s in theOffposition.
Malachy could have turned it off when he met me yesterday; he could’ve been worried I was getting close to realizing what he’s doing. Maybe he’s intending to turn it back on once I leave.
Or maybe it’s Loch.
I scrub at my face, giving myself a beat to feel how that fits in with everything that’s happened.
It could still be Loch stealing from us. His uncle refuses to let him have magic for what he needs to do, so he’s taking some from Christmas to bridge the gap. He funnels it into their joy meter and draws it out before it can get sucked up into Malachy’s pull, and he uses these small amounts to do what he can to spread joy during his Holiday. I’ve only seen him use magic once, though. But he would be doing it sneakily, wouldn’t he? If he’s stealing from us, and his uncle would flip shit again.
Shouldn’t I feel, I don’t know,betrayedif it’s him?
All I really feel, staring down at that device, is grief. For the notebooks on Loch’s desk full of how he’s fighting to make up for what Malachy lacks. For the distraught look on his face when he said I deserved better than him.
I found proof that St. Patrick’s Day is, in fact, stealing from us, regardless of who exactly is the culprit. I’ve given the paparazzi plenty of material to counter that tinsel incident, so I can leave now, and not have to deal with any of these terrifying, too-massive-too-fast feelings. Coal can decide how to proceed with confronting St. Patrick’s Day and getting our stolen joy back, and I can burrow into my duty-laden existence of following him around like a purposeless, sulking shadow.
