Whisking the sugar with the milk and vanilla, Calisa tried not to feel lied to again. It hadn’t been Mom-Elise’s secret to spill. Or even Mom-Kate’s. They must have felt they couldn’t tell her. Maybe they’d expected Auntie Zee to fill her in.
Or maybe they thought I wouldn’t believe it until I saw it.
She began to stir less vigorously.
That could be true. She would’ve thought they were joking. She might not have even come if she’d believed it was all some elaborate prank. The more she thought about it, the more Calisa thought that was likely it. Her moms had both encouraged her to go to Vermont, despite the fact that they’d hated sending her away to one measly two-week camp the summer after eighth grade—she’d also hated that camp, mainly because her roommate had been the world’s most devoted pessimist, who talked exclusively about how much her boyfriend (also an eighth grader) had wronged her by not loving her nearly as much as his Nintendo Switch. But she’d so obviously needed a distraction from mourning what she’d lost with Ethan….
Behind her she heard footsteps. She didn’t turn.
“Are you making a cake?” Jack asked, eager.
She looked out again at the statue. It was in the same position, at least for now.Jack has answers,she thought. But would he tell her the truth if she asked? She wanted to think yes—she liked him—but she couldn’t be certain. Besides, how did she phrase the question she really wanted to ask? Should she hintaround it? Coax it out of him? Hope he volunteered it?Eh, screw it.She’d never been good at subtle.
“Yep, a cake,” Calisa said. In a cheerful perky-casual voice, she asked, “So, are the guests from other worlds?”
He blinked. “What?”
“Just wondering.”
“Ah,” he said.
“Because there seem to be portals in the guest room closets.”
He looked as if she’d dumped a bucket of ice water on his head. She considered that maybe just jumping into the question nonsequitur–style had not been the best approach.
She stirred harder.Come on. Tell me the truth. Please.
“Uh, no. What? Portals? Closets? Haha…”
He was choosing to lie to her.
Like Ethan.
Ethan had lied to her again and again, and when finally caught, he’d tried to gaslight her into disbelieving the overwhelming evidence in front of her eyes.
It didn’t feel good to have that happening again.
“Of course there aren’t,” Jack said. “You must have been dreaming. I have the strangest dreams sometimes—this one time, I dreamed I was a moose, and I had these really heavy antlers, which was funny because I don’t actually have antlers—”
“You’re lying to me,” Calisa cut in. “You’ve been lying to me since the second I got here, and you’re continuing to try to lie to me. Badly. Really, really badly.”
He slumped. “I…”
“You have your reasons, I’m sure,” she said flatly. She triedto match Auntie Zee’s thundercloud glare, imagining that a lightning bolt would strike him if he lied again. “But whatever they are, you can stop now. I’ve seen the portals—are they portals?”
He glanced at the window as if he were longing to jump out of it and run off into the forest like Melidor, cawing wildly all the way.
“If you don’t start talking,” Calisa said, “I’m going to go to Auntie Zee and ask her every question I have.”
His body jerked, and he paled. “She’ll fire me. Instantly. I can’t lose this job. You don’t understand. It’s more than a job; it’s my home. It’s my future.”
Calisa continued to glare. She wasnotgoing to be distracted by how uncomfortable and unhappy he looked. She didn’t care how puppylike he was. Or how angelically handsome. He’d lied to her with every word and every smile.
“I can’t lose my place here,” Jack pleaded. “You haven’t been here long enough to know, but this inn…it’s special. When I was a kid, it was full every single night, with a waiting list a mile long. Our guests were desperate to come. Even now, when it’s falling apart and we can’t even guarantee breakfast, much less tea, our regulars still come back….” She could hear the worry in his voice, woven into each word. “It’s still special.”
He’s scared,Calisa realized, and she felt some of her anger drain away. He wasn’t the one who had really lied to her. That was Auntie Zee. And her moms, if they knew, which she thought they probably did.
Unable to keep looking at his wide, bright eyes, Calisapoured the batter into the two cake pans. In a calmer voice, she said, “Look, Jack, I’m here, and I’m figuring things out. Slowly and clumsily, and it’s way too late to stop now. If you’d rather that I didn’t do something irreversibly embarrassing for the inn that will piss off Auntie Zee, it would be best to tell me what’s really going on here. I’m not going to stop wondering, so don’t you think it’s safer for everyone if I’m not just bumbling around trying to find answers on my own?” She slid the cakes into the oven and then turned to face him.
