Page 35 of Some Kind of Haunted

All eyes turn to me, like they don’t believe Logan speaks for me. When everyone has always taken Logan’s word over mine. That’s how it works.

I don’t know how to be us if that’s not how it works.

But maybe it’s time to figure it out.

“What’s wrong with here and now?” I ask instead.

Jack scowls. “Some of us have jobs,” he mutters, then stalks off.

“Acting like we’re not all small-town nepo babies,” Cleo says with a laugh. “But he’s right. I’ve got a flight student coming out to the airport in an hour. I need to get back, get the plane ready, prepare to soothe a man through his first attempt at actually landing a plane instead of just assuming he can because he’s male. You know, the good stuff.” She chugs the rest of her coffee and stands.

“And I need to open the shop,” Nora agrees. “If you come by around seven-thirty, I’ll drive you guys since the airport can be kind of confusing to get to if you don’t know the way.”

Logan and I share a glance and what I am sure is the twin thought of what kind of airport is hard to get to if you don’t know the way?

The two of them walk off together, after Nora tries out an awkward wave and looks like she regrets it immediately.

Probably because my usually charming twin just glares at her.

“I’ve got calls to make,” Logan says when I raise my eyebrows at his extreme Nora weirdness.

I get up to let Logan out, then make a move to follow him for lack of a better plan, but Marleen comes back over with what looks a whole lot like an egg white omelet. She sets it on the table along with a frothy-looking latte in a mug the size of my face. She does not look at me as she does this, as if I, too, have a regular order that requires no comment.

I assume Logan made this happen. Except when I look at him, he’s frowning a little, like he doesn’t know where it came from, either. Then he shakes his head.

“We’ll talk later,” he tells me, then takes off.

Leaving me alone at the table with my breakfast and the first genuinely amazing cup of coffee I’ve had in Iowa.

And nothing to think about but dreams that have been true all along and the small matter of what the hell I’m going to do about demons.

Not to mention the doom that is me, all up in the middle of it.

Chapter Twelve

Breakfast is delicious. Either I’m starving and delirious or it’s miles above the quality of yesterday’s offering.

I find this suspicious.

Particularly when I try to pay and Marleen tells me it’s already been taken care of. Again, I want to give Logan the credit, but I didn’t see him pay any bills. The only thing I can see is Jack’s broad back from my spot in the booth, a towel tossed over his shoulder as he moves around behind the counter.

The mystery does not solve itself as I sit there, thinking about shoulders. But now that I’m stuffed and fully caffeinated, I decide I’ll head over to the knitting shop. Not just to poke at Nora for more information, more understanding of this place and these people and my grandmother, too—to say nothing of generational demon feeds—but also to lose myself in some yarn. Maybe pick up a new project to keep my hands busy while my mind tries to cycle through the implications of . . . everything.

I want to be ecstatic that my dreams are being taken seriously, but you know, then I have to accept demons are real. And feed on the humans in this town where I am currently located.

Proving years of dreams about slurping were not just the broken inner workings of my mind. At least, not exactly.

My plan was to leave out the front door and head across the street, I know it was, but somehow I find myself standing in the little hallway that leads between the diner and the antique store. Maybe, since everything last night actually happened, I should go thank Harrison for the assist in bandaging up my feet. I kind of like that this is the first time I can take pride in the fact that there’s an actual reason my feet are still tender.

Today is a day of firsts.

But my tender feet don’t move when I tell them they should. I’m rooted to the spot, staring out the window at the looming clock tower.

I remember with a start that the slurping is not the only thing I dream about.

There’s this clock that has loomed in my head for years.

If my dreams are real—or at least whatever real is here in Midas, the least real-feeling place I can imagine—that means that there’s something awful and dangerous about that clock, too. Or it wouldn’t creep me out so much, in my dreams and awake.