He’s right. I didn’t notice, but the bottle in my hand is practically sloshing beer. I down the rest. “I’m fine. Totally happy. I’m just shitting rainbows all over the place.”
“That sounds attractive. Where the fuck did you get that expression?”
I shrug. “I read it in some book. It seems applicable here. ‘Bucking up in the face of tragedy and whatnot.’ You know, shitting rainbows.”
“I kinda dig that. Here’s to shitting rainbows.” He clinks his beer against mine. “But you’re still all wonky. Give me your arm.”
“I said, I’m fine.” I can hear how irritable I sound.
“No, you’re not.” Costa takes my arm and begins kneading his fingers into me.
“Ow!”
“Shut up. It’ll help.”
I let him dig into my muscles and nerves, and it actually does work to soothe my agitation. “Why is this happening to me?”
“Being around a death tripper who is dying or who has been dying a lot is a trigger.”
“A trigger for what?”
“Don’t you feel it?” he asks with a smirk.
“Feel what?”
“The urge to trip, to die. That’s what your body is after.”
I yank my hand away. “Don’t say that.”
“You’re a death tripper, Stella. You need to trip occasionally. At least once a month, if not more. I don’t know how this power-augmenter thing is going to play into it. Tripping enough but not too much keeps you sharp and stable.”
“That’s bullshit. Sam hadn’t tripped in months and months when I first got here.”
“Yeah? And what was he like?”
Costa has a point.
“He was…angry, cold.”
“Probably drinking a lot?”
I nod. “But he had a lot to be angry about.”
“That’s true. He had a lot of good reasons to act however he was acting. But the need to trip was one of them, whether you like it or not.”
“But then, we got together.”
“Right. And he got better.”
“Yes,” I say. “So, he doesn’t need to trip.”
“Well, it might be less true now that you’re in the picture. But you’re his power augmenter, so you’re giving him something, some kind of influence or energy. You’re feeding the death tripper in him, so it might satisfy his craving enough that he can go without tripping—until he gets a taste of it.”
“Oh, like when you shot him,” I say snarkily.
“Well, yes.”
“Sorry, that was mean. Sort of.”
