Chapter Text
Paper Man-
1) A person who acts all high and mighty, but is actually weak-willed and pathetic in reality.
2) A sorry excuse for a man, one who acts smug and in-control, but is actually a wet napkin.
3) A fake person, when put under pressure or are called out they seem to crumble.
* * *
Up until the beginning of her junior year, Luz Noceda had never really put much thought into what she’d want to do after graduation. The first time she’d been faced with the question was by her mother when she was in eighth grade. It had been in passing, during dinner, answered with a shrug from the girl. “I don’t really have to know right now , do I?” The question was brought up again and again throughout the years, with the same excuse. It hadn’t really occurred to her until now, as she sat in her counselor’s office, having the same question presented to her by Ms. Clawthorne.
“What do you plan to do after you graduate, Miss Noceda?” the woman asked in her cool, smooth voice. Her minty eyes gazed through Luz, as if reading her thoughts.
“I… don’t really know,” Luz admitted to her. Her eyes drifted to the clock that hung on the wall beside the window. It was a bright day outside, the late summer heat letting out its last waves before it would inevitably die out beneath the thumb of the fall season. She was happy to be inside instead of in her P.E. class right now, which she was thankfully excused from for this meeting with Ms. Clawthorne.
“I’ve asked you this question many times over the years, but now it’s time you start taking it seriously.” The woman folded her hands neatly on the desk that separated them from one another. She lowered her gaze to peer at Luz over the rims of her rounded glasses, and her voice softened slightly. “You’re sixteen now, Luz. Haven’t you got even a clue of what you’d like to do for a career?”
Luz couldn’t help but grin as her first name was used. She’d known Lilith for most of her life, after her sister, Eda Clawthorne, had become involved with Luz’s mother, Camila, when the girl was just going into eighth grade. If she was anything, Lilith Clawthorne was a lot like her younger sister in the fact that she cared very much for Luz, as if she were family by blood. She’d been there for Luz to talk to when she was too afraid to bring something up to her mother or Eda.
“I mean, not really.” Luz pressed her thumbs together in her lap. “Does it really matter right now? Sixteen isn’t exactly an ideal age to know what you’ll want for the rest of your life, is it? When did you know you’d want to be a school counselor? Surely not when you were barely about to graduate.”
Lilith’s gaze hardened for a moment before she let out a sigh. “May I be honest with you, Ms. Noceda?”
Luz’s attention was drawn away from her hands and instead focused on her aunt.
“My original goal was not to work at a school at all .” Lilith leaned back in her chair, far enough to be comfortable but not so far to seem unprofessional. “I wanted to become assistant historian to the head of the Bonesborough Historical Society. They decided that I was not ‘qualified’ for the position, so I came looking for a job at Hexside.” She removed her glasses to wipe them with a cloth that sat at the edge of her desk. “Principle Bump is an old family friend, so he managed to swing me a job as the librarian while I continued to work on my degree. Counseling provided me more money, however, so I traded jobs when a new librarian was able to step in a few years later.”
“How come you never told me that?” Luz cocked an eyebrow. “It sounds like even if you know what you want to do it won’t always work out like you want it to.”
“That’s exactly why I’m telling you now.” Lilith pushed the frames back onto her face, regaining her composure. “You need to start thinking of appropriate career choices now, so that when time comes for you to do something about it you’ll know enough to know if you’re cut out for the kind of career you wish to pursue.”
“But what if I don’t know, Aunt Lilith?” Luz leaned forward in her chair. “What if I’m not cut out for anything at all?”
“Luz, listen to me. You are an above average student in Sciences and the Language Arts- your grades from the past semesters have proven so. There are many different careers and degrees manageable with those skills. There’s bound to be at least one that you’d take an interest in.”
Luz slumped in her seat. “None of it sounds very fun.”
“The real world normally isn’t,” Lilith told her with an amused edge to her tone. “But that doesn’t matter, because- if I may be blunt- the real world doesn’t care about your feelings. You have to put up with a lot in your adult life.”
“Weren’t we supposed to be talking about credits?” Luz asked in annoyance, fixing the beanie atop her head.
Lilith cleared her throat. “Yes. In fact, there’s something I do need to discuss with you regarding your required graduation credits.” She turned to the computer sitting on the side of her desk, typing something out on the keyboard. Luz shut her eyes, listening. She found the sound relaxing. “Although you’re on the right track with your basic subjects, so long as you pass your Math this year- and that you don’t change your Physical Education to something else like you’ve done since freshman year- you still have your community service hours to consider.”
“ Community service ?” Luz asked in disbelief. “That’s required?”
“Of course it is. Why did you think it was on your credits list you were given at the end of every year?” Lilith turned an eye to her.
“I thought they were just recommended,” Luz mumbled, avoiding eye contact with her aunt.
“Unfortunately not.” Lilith swiveled her chair around to face her again. “Now, community service can be performed in many ways. You can volunteer at the soup kitchen or community center, assist in setting up for school events such as the dances or fundraisers, anything that would be considered volunteer work that you are not getting paid for.”
“How many hours?”
“Pardon?” Lilith glanced at her.
“How many hours do I need to graduate?” Luz repeated.
“A minimum of one hundred,” Lilith told her.
Luz winced. “A hundred ?”
“Yes, Ms. Noceda. This is why it is often recommended to perform these hours over the span of your four years in high school.”
“But I have other things I’m doing! I’ve got Literature Club and Theater, and studying and homework. There’s no way I’d be able to manage that many hours!” Luz said a little too loudly.
“Then it appears that you’ll have to sacrifice some of your time with your luxuries such as clubs and extracurriculars in exchange for those required hours.”
“But Lilith-”
“Now Luz, this is nobody’s fault but your own. You understand that, don’t you?” Lilith fixed her with a hard stare, cutting her off.
Luz lowered her gaze, her face crestfallen at the prospect of dropping Literature or Theater to volunteer somewhere she didn’t want to be. When she didn’t respond, Lilith’s tone softened.
“Perhaps there is a way around that unfortunate decision.” She opened one of the drawers beneath the desk surface, catching Luz’s curiosity. After searching for a moment, she pulled a file out. She fingered through the papers before removing one, placing it on the desk and sliding it toward the teen. “Tutoring.”
“Tutoring?” Luz echoed, glancing down at the paper.
“Yes, Ms. Noceda. Tutoring a student as a voluntary activity would be a good alternative to leaving your home and heading across town to spend a weekend that you would be using to do other activities in another situation. With tutoring and a little determination, you could take two days out of the week, every week of the school year, to achieve fifty hours of your community service hours this year. You can work on your own homework and study during your tutoring hours if you think you would be able to multitask.
“In order for your hours to be counted you would have to do it on school grounds under the monitoring of a staff member. The only staff member that stays after school for at least an hour and does not run a club or team would be the Chemistry teacher, Mr. Deamonne. He oversees the yearly tutors for the community service hours in one of the labs in the science wing. Since he only stays for one hour after school, that’s the timeframe you’d have to tutor the student or students that you are teaching.”
Luz’s eyes drifted over the page as she thought about Lilith’s words. Literature Club met after school on Mondays; Theater on Wednesdays, Fridays, and the occasional Saturday if it could be managed. If Luz could take Tuesdays and Thursdays after school to do tutoring, it would give her the required hours for her credits. It was crowded and messy, but doable. Luz looked up at her counselor with determination in her eyes. “I think I can do that.”
“Fantastic.” Lilith pointed with a sharpened nail on the paper where the requirements were listed. “Now, this is a matter of deciding what subject you excel the most in to be able to tutor another student. If you want to become a tutor, you must have a complete understanding of the subject you’re teaching. If your knowledge of the subject you choose is only general, on the same level or below the student coming to you for help, you will not be approved to go through with the tutoring.” She turned her computer screen so Luz could peer at it from her seat. “Based on your grades in both AP English and Language Composition as well as Chemistry from last year, as well as your FSA scores in Language Arts, I’d suggest tutoring for something within those subjects.”
Luz remembered how difficult it was to get a high grade in her science courses over the years; as much as she liked the subject, all those formulas and vocabulary words messed her up (which was another reason that she struggled to achieve a passing grade in math). English was something that was difficult at times, but Luz loved reading and writing, hence the reason that she was part of Literature Club. Her eyes returned to her aunt.
“What about English tutoring?” she suggested.
“I think that would be the best option,” Lilith agreed with a firm nod. “Fill out this form and bring it back to me tomorrow. Get your English teacher to sign the bottom as well.”
Luz’s ears rang as the bell sounded over the speakers and she shot out of her seat, grabbing the paper from the desk and sliding it into her backpack. “Will you be over for dinner tonight? Mami’s making enchiladas.”
“Not tonight, I’m afraid. I’ve got a lot of paperwork to do for some of my other students and by the time I arrive home it’ll be well past dinnertime.” She flashed Luz a smile that the girl knew was only for her, and none of her aunt’s other kids. “Tell Edalyn hello for me.”
Luz gave her a two-fingered salute. “Don’t work too hard, Lilith!”
“That’s Ms. Clawthorne- ”
“Only in front of the students and staff!” Luz cut her off, relishing in the woman’s slightly annoyed expression that she knew held no real malice.
Luz pushed open the office door, stepping into the hallway. She weaved her way through the river of teens, trying her best to avoid the usual goons who made the past couple of years less than desirable. It had luckily not been as bad as her time in Gravesfield, Connecticut, where the bullying had become so relentless that she’d moved in the middle of junior high, right before she and her mother had met Eda. It still hurts her feelings, even now, at the age of sixteen. Why wouldn’t it? If there was something nearly every teenager is, it’s sensitive to words .
As if on cue, Luz felt her shoulder bump another student as she passed. “Watch it,” the girl said, who Luz immediately recognized as Boscha Langley. She was one of the previously mentioned goons, if not the start of it all. Her pathetic attempts at driving Luz off only faltered further and further after the first year, so now she was really just a thorn in the girl’s side.
She didn’t stop to begin her usual chastising of Luz’s fashion sense or taste in friends, which told Luz that she probably had other things to do this morning- most likely colorguard business. Luz had no complaints about this as she slipped into one of the classrooms, her third period math.
Her eyes instinctively traveled to the back corner of the room where her friends Willow and Amity sat, heads together in deep conversation. She smiled to herself as she picked her way through the desks and approached them.
Willow noticed her first. “Hey! Where’d you go during gym? You missed the half-mile.”
“Thank goodness I did,” Luz huffed. “I got called to the counselor’s office. Lilith wanted to talk to me about my credits.”
“You know she’d give you a good lecture if she heard you calling her that around us,” Amity told her with a smirk as she rested her chin in her hand.
Luz waved a dismissive hand in her general direction as she dug through her backpack, plopping down in the seat in front of her. “She likes you guys, it’s fine. And who’s going to tell her anyways?”
Willow angled her face to the window where they had a clear view of the track and field, where soon enough the colorguard team would go through their drills. “Did you talk to Gus today? He was really excited for captain tryouts.”
“Captain tryouts?” Amity snorted good-naturedly. “He’s only fourteen.”
“A fourteen-year-old in junior year! That’s hardly heard of,” Willow reasoned.
“Just because he skipped two grades doesn’t mean that kids will be any less cruel to him.” Amity slumped back in her chair. “Teenagers are ruthless, especially Boscha and her posse. They’ll take any chance to be mean to the kids that are lower on the social ladder.”
“Skara isn’t bad,” Willow pointed out. “She’s still in colorguard, but she stopped following Boscha around after she and I became friends.”
“That’s one girl. The rest are still assholes.” Luz rubbed her eyes as a fatigue that only math class could manifest so suddenly took over her senses. She didn’t think she could deal with this lesson today.
As if on cue, the late bell rang overhead. The last few kids walked into the classroom right before their teacher, Mr. Wrath, closed the door. Luz’s eyes drooped just at the sight of him as she faced the front.
Mr. Wrath had been notorious for being one of the most hated teachers on campus, even though he only ran two periods in the morning. Along with the fact that he was the teacher to run detention after school, he was also the coach of the football team, often ignoring complaints from other students that they’d been bullied or teased by the members of his team, even if his boys were in the wrong. He had a reputation for seemingly enjoying calling on students who usually struggled in his class and watching them attempt to answer the questions. Luz struggled in math anyways, so for this reason, he was her least favorite teacher.
He droned on about the lesson for the day while Luz tried her best to pay attention, but it was fairly difficult while a few of his aforementioned players snickered and chatted a few seats away. The routine was normal: a joke here and there, a paper thrown her way that most likely had a sorry excuse for an insult on it which she idly ignored, swiping it away and off of her desk, and then she was left alone in favor of averting their attention who’d give them the time of day.
She felt herself begin to drift out of consciousness with every word that her teacher spoke. She tried her best to pay attention, she really did, but anything Mr. Wrath managed to spiel out was lulling her to sleep. Her eyes were closed for one second before she heard her name called. Luz’s eyes shot open and she was faced with a very disgruntled-looking Mr. Wrath.
“Thank you for rejoining the land of the living, Luz,” her teacher sneered. His arms were crossed in front of his chest as his foot tapped the ground at an irritating tempo. “Would you care to tell me the answer to the formula on the board?”
Luz looked past him to the whiteboard where an equation that should be illegal rested, taunting her. She didn’t even know what part she was supposed to be solving. The class had gone quiet, and Luz could hear the silent snickers of the football players and see them in her peripherals. As much as she wanted to show them up, give Mr. Wrath a perfect answer, she knew she couldn’t.
“I don’t know, Mr. Wrath,” she murmured, just loud enough for him to hear her.
“Perhaps you could tell me the conjugate of the complex number seven plus three “i”, and how you find that answer?”
Luz blinked dumbly at him, slowly shaking her head. “I… don’t know, Mr. Wrath.”
Her teacher’s lip turned up in satisfaction before taking on a hard expression. “I’m aware that you had a family member pass away at the end of last semester, Ms. Noceda, but the excuses ended over the summer. There’s no reason you shouldn’t be able to pay attention and answer a simple equation.”
Luz pointedly avoided eye contact with Mr. Wrath, instead looking down at her fists as they clenched in her lap. She felt pressure behind her eyes, but refused to cry in front of these people, especially Mr. Wrath or any of his goon players.
“Anyone can answer a math equation, it doesn’t prove anything,” a voice across the class said. Everyone’s eyes turned to a boy who looked to be about a year or two older than Luz, with blonde hair that was longer on the top and a very pronounced scar tracing up his jaw. His brown eyes gazed at Mr. Wrath as the teacher’s brows furrowed.
“Oh yes, Mr. Wittebane? Then perhaps you would like to answer it instead?” Mr. Wrath held out the Expo marker to him, one eyebrow raised in a challenge.
The boy- “Mr. Wittebane”- stood, crossing the classroom in a soldier-like posture, taking the marker and uncapping it before making his way to the board. Luz’s eyes followed him as he turned his back to the class, raising his arm to begin crossing things out and jotting down numbers and symbols. It was dead silent aside from the squeak of the marker, and everyone seemed to hold their breath as the teen made it to the end of the problem. He capped the marker again, stepping aside for the teacher to review it.
Mr. Wrath’s eyes squinted as he made eye contact with the boy, who stood unflinchingly. “That is correct, Mr. Wittebane. However, I’d watch my tone if I were you.”
The boy tilted his head as if scrutinizing the authority standing before him. “You’re a good teacher for trying to push your students to do better, but bringing up someone’s deceased relative doesn’t make you look good; you just look like a dick.”
A few of the students let out surprised gasps, and others hid their laughter behind their hands. Luz’s eyes just widened at the boy, mouth slightly agape.
“You’ll see me after class, Mr. Wittebane,” Mr. Wrath said through clenched teeth.
The boy just nodded. “Of course, Mr. Wrath.” He turned and headed back for his seat, sitting down again as if that interaction had not just happened. Luz tried to catch the boy’s eye as Mr. Wrath angrily erased the board, but he didn’t seem to be paying attention to really anything else around him.
The rest of the period was quiet as Mr. Wrath lectured, and Luz was happy to get up once the bell rang. She was going to thank the boy for sticking up for her, but the teacher got to him first and she decided she did not want to talk to Mr. Wrath any more than she had to. She followed Willow and Amity out of the room, keeping pace until they made it out to the courtyard.
“That was amazing!” Willow said as soon as they were hit with fresh air. “I’ve never seen anyone stand up to Mr. Wrath like that.”
“Dude’s certainly got some balls,” Amity agreed as they slowed their jogging to a walk, crossing the grassy clearing toward the next building. “What was his name?”
“I’ve seen him around, but I don’t think I’ve ever really heard his name,” Luz said. Her heart was still racing thinking about the interaction from earlier. Nobody outside of her immediate friend group had ever decided to stick up for her in class, much less against a staff member. What was this guy’s deal?
“What’s up!” Gus’s voice cut through their conversation as he came jogging up, bag slung over his shoulder.
“Gus! You’ll never believe what just happened in math,” Willow said, slinging an arm around his shoulders. She proceeded to recall the event to her friend, who listened with wide eyes.
Luz was silent, and Amity seemed to notice. “Hey,” she murmured. “Are you okay?”
Luz nodded with a smile. “Yeah, yeah… I just didn’t expect to get the ‘dead family member’ dropped on me today.”
Amity frowned. “He was super wrong for that. You should really report him.”
“Nobody’s going to take it seriously,” Luz protested, kicking a rock as she walked.
“Principle Bump would,” Amity reasoned.
“I don’t want to bug him about it. Besides, he’d have to get my mom involved, and I don’t want to do that to her.” Again . The unspoken word hung in the air, and Luz could tell from Amity’s expression and lack of argument that she could hear it, too.
“Oh, you’re talking about Hunter,” Gus said to Willow once the tale had been told, dragging Luz from her thoughts.
“Hunter?”
“Hunter Wittebane! Willow said he had partially shaved hair and the scar on his jaw- that’s Hunter. He was in my gym class last year.” Gus walked along beside them, a bit of a pep in his step. “He doesn’t talk much, but he’s a nice guy. He spoke up against Boscha when she was being rude to me once.”
“Did he?” Willow made eye contact with Luz. “He’s brave, that’s for sure… First Boscha, now Mr. Wrath. Guy has some courage.”
“He has a death wish is what he’s got,” Amity corrected her. “Between Boscha and Wrath, his school year could be hell.”
“Well, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Luz joked. “Who else would be my savior against Wrath’s wrath?”
Finding the lab she’d been directed to wasn’t that difficult, being that she’d nearly blown the room up in her freshman year. Luz had successfully gotten her form signed by her English teacher and gotten permission from Lilith and Mr. Deamonne to begin her tutoring for her community service credits the next week. It was now Tuesday at 3:17 p.m. and she was already two minutes late to her first session with whatever student needed the help. It would definitely not be a good first impression.
Luz followed the room numbers until she got to number 112, walking through the open door. She tucked her phone into her back pocket as she scanned the room, finding Mr. Deamonne as he spoke to another student.
“Ah, Ms. Noceda. Do come in,” the man said, beckoning her forward with a hand, the other nursing a cup of what she could only assume to be coffee or tea. She grinned at his warm tone. She’d had Mr. Deamonne in her sophomore year for Chemistry, and he was one of the only teachers there that actually liked her.
As she walked forward, the student turned to face her as well, making her stop in her tracks. Of course, the universe had to do this to her. Hunter stared back at her, brown eyes meeting brown.
“Luz, you’ll be tutoring Hunter for now, in language arts. I assume you have a general idea of how you’ll be doing this?” He looked at her, taking a sip from his mug.
Luz was still for a moment, and then just nodded. “Yeah. Come on, we can get started over here.”
“Don’t mind me, I’ll just be here monitoring,” Mr. Deamonne told them, pulling out his desk chair to sit back down. “Bring your form back up here for me to sign at the end of the session.”
Luz awkwardly led Hunter to a table near the door, sitting down. She waited for him to get settled. “So… you’re having trouble in English?”
The boy nodded, his eyes fixed on her and his hands set politely in his lap.
“It’s only the beginning of the year, were you having trouble in previous years?”
Hunter’s eyes flicked across her face, probably looking for signs of mockery. When he didn’t see any, he relaxed a bit. “I was working way harder than I should have been last year for an A, so I wanted a jump start this year for some help.” His voice was a bit raspy, which is something that Luz noticed in math, as if he didn’t use it very often.
“Alright, what class is it for specifically?”
“AP English and Language Composition,” Hunter said with a grimace.
Luz perked up. “With Mrs. Barlow?”
“Yeah. How’d you know?” He tilted his head at her curiously.
“I had the class last year, and she’s the only one that teaches it.” Luz smiled to herself fondly at the memory. “It was a good class.”
“I’m… pretty terrible at English,” Hunter mumbled. “Which is why I’m here.”
“That’s okay, it helps me out because you’re probably the only person who’d take help from me anyways,” Luz said, trying to lighten the mood, but the joke was hardly received. She cleared her throat and took out her book, along with the notes she had. “Alright, tell me what you’re having trouble with mostly, and we can start there.”
It was perhaps the longest hour of Luz’s life. She was awkward, had a hard time holding a conversation, and she felt as if she was making it more difficult for Hunter to understand the subject than he had initially before coming into the lab. She tried desperately to sound as confident as she felt teaching the subject at hand, but toward the end of their session she just felt like she was doing a terrible job.
Once the clock hit 4:15, she announced to him that they were done with their lesson and that Hunter could go ahead and leave. He stood up, collecting his things without a word and heading out of the room. Luz huffed out a silent breath, gathering her belongings. She took the form up to Mr. Deamonne as he’d previously instructed, holding her breath as he signed it. “So, how did it go?” he asked as he handed it back to her.
She hesitated. “It was… interesting. He doesn’t talk much.”
“I’d like to think it would be you doing the talking during your tutoring lessons,” the teacher hummed.
“Of course, but he didn’t even ask any questions,” she murmured.
“Then maybe he understood it perfectly the way you were teaching it,” he suggested, gesturing with his mug toward the door, and Luz took that as her invitation to escape the conversation. She thanked him and headed out of the lab.
Luz headed for the parking lot, shooting a text to her mother that she was headed home, and retrieved her bike from the bike rail on the side of the building. She walked it down to the parking lot before hopping on, riding it down the side road off where the buses would exit the school. She wasn’t technically supposed to use that route, but without someone there to monitor the street she used it as a shortcut toward the backroads so she could get home quicker.
Luz stood up as she pedaled the bike down the mostly abandoned road, going around the potholes that littered the pavement. She hummed to herself, reaching up with a hand to tug the beanie further down on her head to avoid it flying off.
After about ten minutes of pedaling, she took a left turn into her neighborhood. The familiar trees and houses brought her comfort as she slowed down, rolling into the driveway to her house; she noticed immediately that Camila’s car wasn’t in the driveway with Eda’s motorcycle, making her deflate slightly. She hopped off the bike, putting it up in the garage before coming in through the side door. The smell of freshly lit candles hit her, as well as what she assumed to be Chinese takeout. “Eda?”
“Hey kid, get in here and quit letting that cold in!” her stepmother called from around the corner, and Luz could see her in the kitchen taking Styrofoam and plastic takeaway containers out of bags. “Chinese tonight; your mom got held back late at the clinic. A dog came in for emergency surgery last minute.”
Luz gave Eda a lopsided smile, letting the woman know she was okay. “That’s fine, Eda. Thank you.” She walked over to wrap the woman in a hug, burying her face in her side. She let out a sigh.
Eda wrapped one arm around her, using the other hand to remove the beanie from atop her head. “Your hair is growing out again,” she commented.
Luz giggled tiredly. “Yeah… it’s getting curlier again, too.”
“I’m glad,” Eda told her, placing a kiss on the top of her brown curls. “You look much nicer that way, anyways. Fuck whoever tells you otherwise.”
“Don’t let mom hear you saying that word,” Luz warned her with a grin, stepping back. “But yeah… It feels good to not have to straighten it anymore.”
Eda pushed a container toward her. “How did tutoring go? How hard did you hit those books?”
“It was…” She brought the Chinese container closer to her, trying to search for an answer. “It was interesting.” Not technically a lie.
“That bad, huh?” Eda asked her knowingly.
Luz shook her head. “It was awkward, sure, but… not bad. It was this guy named Hunter. He stuck up for me against Mr. Wrath last week.”
“Really?” Eda allowed her eyes to widen in surprise. “Kid must have been fed up with him already. It’s only about the second week of school.”
“Yeah, well, Gus said he’s stuck up for him before, but that was just against some other teenagers.” She tapped her chin with her plastic fork thoughtfully. “I’ve never seen a student stand up to a staff member like that.”
“What was he getting on to you for anyways?”
Luz hesitated. “Nothing important, really. I just spaced out when he asked me a question.” Again, not a lie. She suddenly felt a shift in her mood as she took a bite of her food. She wasn’t hungry. “Hey, uh… I’m going to take a shower. I’m not feeling so bright.”
“I’ll put your food in the fridge for you,” Eda told her, messing up the hair atop the girl’s head playfully. “Go to bed early if you have to.”
“Mami’s starting to rub off on you,” Luz told her with a wink as she ascended the stairs, making her way to her room to retrieve her clothes.
She entered her bedroom, crossing the carpet toward her dresser. She dug through the drawer for a t-shirt to wear to bed, looking up at the picture framed atop the wood. Luz sat on the dock at the lake nearby, camera held up as she leaned back to get another girl in the frame. She felt a pang at the memory of that day. That was probably the last picture she’d taken with her.
Luz felt her hands tremble as she backed up, sitting down on her bed. She felt the familiar pressure of tears behind her eyes, except this time she was home. She didn’t have to hide it. She rubbed her eyes with a hand, sniffling.
Luz fell onto her side, curling up in the darkened room as she buried her face in the blanket of her unmade bed. She knew she was about to spiral, so she tried her hardest to ground herself with her surroundings. She counted off what she felt, what she smelled, what she could see and hear- she felt like she could still taste the blood from that night, so that’s what she counted.
She didn’t even flinch when she felt the mattress dip on the other side. Eda’s comforting hand rubbed against her shoulder, waiting until Luz sat up to bring her into a soft, warm hug. She’d probably been able to tell that something was off with her the moment she didn’t want to eat. She held the girl close as she cried. “I know kid, I know… It’s okay…” she murmured, though she knew it wasn’t okay. Luz didn’t know if it would ever be okay, and she thought Eda probably knew it too. She was just trying to make Luz feel better, understood.
Luz sniffled as her body tremored. She didn’t want to remember, but she did anyway. The car. The smell of alcohol. The blood- dear God, the blood. The metallic scent nearly drowned her. “Eda, I-I couldn’t do a-anything- I-”
“Shh… kid… it wasn’t your fault,” Eda insisted to her quietly, placing her chin on her daughter’s head. “It wasn’t your fault… I promise.”
Luz wished she could believe it, she really did, but she couldn’t- not now, at least. Not when the memory tore her apart every day. She missed Vee so much, and she didn’t know if she could live with how the girl’s life had ended so suddenly.
“Does it ever get better, Eda?” She looked up at her stepmother with wet eyes and a defeated voice.
Eda’s eyes lidded as she brushed Luz’s hair out of her face. “I wish I could tell you, kid, I really do. But I don’t know… not yet.”
Luz already knew the answer. She’d lost her dad when she was no more than seven, and now, nine years later, she was no less upset. She’d relived that sort of grief again just a few months ago, except this time she was right there- she was right beside her . She watched her eyes glaze over, her bones break, the blood leak from her wounds. She relived the memory every night, and she wanted it to end. She wanted everything to end. But she held on for her mom, for Eda. If it weren’t for them, Luz didn’t know if she’d be alive at all.