The realization chokes me, and when my mom comes out of the back room with a stack of books in her arms, she looks so familiar and warm and mom-like that I burst into tears.
"Oh, pipsqueak," my mom says sadly. She sets the books down on the nearest counter and holds her arms out to me.
I release Kassam's hand and race into my mom's arms, holding her close and weeping. I haven't even gotten the words out yet, but Mom knows there's something wrong. How am I going to leave her behind? My mom is my best friend and the only family I have. She's held my hand through a dozen broken relationships, and those horrible years when my dad was strung out on drugs and took it out on his family. She's been my rock, for all that she loves to keep her head in supernatural clouds. How am I going to leave her behind?
"You don't have to explain," she tells me in that gentle, motherly voice as she strokes my hair. I notice the jangle of a quartz bracelet as she does, and dimly see Kassam retreating to the far side of the room to give us space. "I know what you're going to say, Carly."
"You don't," I promise her, my heart aching.
She steers me toward the small storage room, away from Kassam, and shuts the door behind her. As I fight to compose myself, my mom just gives me a knowing look, brushing a lock of my thick, straight hair behind one ear. "You're leaving with him, aren't you?"
"How did you…"
A smile curves her lips. "Lachesis came to me in a dream last night." Her expression turns both sad and loving. "She said you were leaving me behind."
That only makes fresh tears well up, and I bury my face against her shoulder again. "Mama, I can't. I love you. You're my family. I can't leave you here alone."
"Oh, my pipsqueak. Don't cry. The goddess said you're needed. That you have a great destiny waiting for you over in the other realm. How can I possibly keep you from that?" She cups my face and brushes my tears off my cheeks, a brave smile on her face. "I'll miss you terribly, of course, but how can I keep you from great destiny?"
I manage a small smile. Most other parents would probably roll their eyes at being given a message from the gods in a dream. My mother, however, believes all of it. She's exactly the kind of person that pays attention to messages from another world, and for the first time, I'm grateful that she's into all this woo-woo nonsense, because she didn't bat an eye when I said I was bonded to a cursed god from another world. She just looked for solutions. And right now, instead of begging me to stay, she understands. She's going to hug me and let me go fulfill my destiny, whatever the hell that might be.
I'm grateful, but it makes me miss her even more. Why do we not appreciate our parents when we have them? I hug her again. "I love you so much, Mama. Will I ever see you again?" Fresh tears roll down my face, and I try to memorize the way she looks in this moment. Her hair is a messy version of my own, more gray than caramel brown. She's shorter than I am, and wider, but god, I love her so much that it hurts. "Did Lachesis say?"
My mother shakes her head. "Just that you were needed, and for me not to grieve."
A horrible, snot-filled laugh erupts from me. "Easy for the gods to say." I wipe at my face. "Kassam says…he says once everything is straightened out, he'll talk to the Fates, see if he can bring you over to the other world. Would you be okay with that?"
"Of course I would, honey." My mom gives me a sweet look. "But don't you worry about me right now. You worry about yourself and that new husband of yours. I'm going to do your cards every day and check in on you. Lachesis promised to help me. And I'm going to miss you terribly, but I know you're in good hands." She squeezes my shoulders. "The gods are involved. Multiple gods, pipsqueak. How could you possibly be any safer?"
How indeed. I bury myself in my mother's arms again and try not to worry too much. This is just temporary. Kassam is going to come through for me. "We'll get everything squared away and settled, and then I'll have him bring you over."
Neither one of us brings up that I've never finished a task in my life.
24
I cry all afternoon as I straighten up my apartment and pack a bag of my most valued possessions. I can't guarantee that anything will be here when I come back—or if I come back at all—so I have to go through everything and decide what I'm taking with me over to Kassam's world. I pack a few shirts, a pair of jeans, a sturdy pair of cute hiking boots, and a pair of comfy pajama pants. I don't know if his world has toilet paper, so I add a few rolls of that, too, and then I see the cross-stitch project on the end of the sofa that I never finished, the one I was stitching for my mom.
It sets me off into a fresh round of tears, as does the half-completed quilt sticking out of my sewing machine. I can't decide if I want to take all my half-finished projects with me or burn them all to hide the evidence, but I cry anyhow. I cry as I pack a couple of foil packs of crackers into my bag and a half-eaten jar of peanut butter that Kassam has somehow missed. I cry and I cry and I cry, even as the bag grows enormous and I have to switch out some of what I've decided to bring.
It keeps me busy, at least. And if I'm busy, I don't have to think about the foolishness of what I'm about to do.
Kassam heads into the living room at some point and watches me try to shove a wrapped bar of soap into the overstuffed bag. "My world has soap, Carly," he teases. "You don't have to bring that."
I just sniff. "Just in case, you know? This is like…an overnight trip. A big one. I'm trying to be prepared." A trip I might never return from and might kill me. I'm allowed to pack heavy, I feel.
"I see." He is quiet for a moment, and then says, "You forgot this."
When I glance over, Kassam holds out my vibrator, a shit-eating grin on his face. I just stare at him. "Are you trying to be funny?"
"Yes." He looks crestfallen that his joke fails, and he waves it at me, then gives up and tosses it down on the bed. "I was trying to make you smile, my little light. I do not like your tears." He sighs heavily. "I'm tempted to tie you down and use it on you until Seth gets here, but I suspect that won't make you smile, either."
I lick my lips, a little pleased that he's trying to cheer me up and clearly doesn't know how. It has to be hard for a party-focused immortal to deal with a sad person. Doesn't feed his hedonism bug at all. But I appreciate him recognizing that I'm miserable, and I sit down next to him on the bed. He immediately takes my hand and this time he doesn't zing me with an orgasm. He gives me a gentle wave of pleasure and laces his fingers through mine, rubbing the back of my hand. "I'm just…sad," I manage to choke out. "I'm all that my mom has, and the thought of leaving her behind really hurts."
"Where is your father?" Kassam asks. "Can your mother not lean on him?"
I flinch. It's an automatic reaction to anytime my father is brought up. He's been dead fifteen years, but the scars still run deep. "He's gone, and even if he was here, my mom couldn't count on him for anything. He was a horrible person."