My heart swells, thinking about how she’ll probably remember this moment of magic for the rest of her life. I know it’s technically a lie, but Ches needs this. She needs this little win.
And maybe I need it too. But this is for her, I remind myself.
Slowly, I ease myself back onto the carpet, their fingertips still pressed against me, and open my eyes.
It’s quiet for a moment as they pull back from me, each of us stunned.
Ches claps her hands together with glee and Matt rushes to turn on the lights and blow out the candles. “I think I need to chug some holy water.”
I touch a hand to Ches’s knee. “You’re one badass witch.”
7
Grandma Lou agreed to let me take the car for the day and said that Miss Ella owed her a favor in case she needed a ride anywhere.
I head over to Dakota’s place, a small two-bedroom house near the center of town. The whole street is lined with seventy-five-year-old bungalows that have been rehabilitated and are painted all sorts of bright colors. There isn’t really any part of Glenwood that’s hip, but if there were, this would be it.
After parking beside Dakota’s bright white Tesla, I lift my fist to knock on the door, but Dakota’s already there, swinging the door open.
She grins and gives me a one-armed side hug. “I saw you pull up. Come on in!”
I step inside to find that, like her car, the interior of Dakota’s home is all white. “Wow, this place is really . . . white.”
“I . . . yeah. I didn’t really grow up in the brightest place, so something about crisp white makes me feel calm.”
“Should I take my shoes off?” I ask, half-joking.
“Oh, no, no. Just because I like white furniture doesn’t mean I’m good at keeping it that way. You should’ve seen the cleaning bender I went on before you got here.”
I open the folder I’ve been holding to my chest with her application for Bumble. “I guess we should get this part over with.”
“Oh, yeah,” she says.
Somehow being around Dakota in my official capacity as a shelter intern is less complicated than just being around her as plain old Faith, so armed with my folder and pen, it’s easier than I expected to take command.
I check out the backyard, which has a brand-new fence tall enough so that Bumble won’t be able to jump it, and I talk to Dakota about how all her beautiful furniture might not stay so beautiful, but she’s not at all bothered by that. I ask her where Bumble will sleep, and Dakota tells me that Bumble will sleep in her bed or in the many dog beds she plans on buying. I also sit down and talk through diet options for Bumble and possible health issues she should be on the lookout for down the road. We even talk about what will happen when Dakota travels or goes back to California, where she and most of the cast live when they aren’t on location, and Dakota assures me again and again that she’s in this for the long haul.
“Well,” I finally say as I’m signing off on the home visit paperwork, the two of us seated about half a cushion apart on her cozy sofa, “I think Bumble will be very happy with you, and all your references checked out. So if you’ll have her, she’s all yours.”
Dakota beams and reaches to hug me, but then stops. “Are you a hugger? Can I hug you? I’m so excited!”
I laugh. “Definitely a hugger!”
She squeezes me tight. “Thank you, Faith. I’m so excited to call Bumble family.”
“And I’m sure your family will love her too!” The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them. No one in the Grove fandom or the media in general know much about Dakota’s family, because she goes to great lengths to make it very clear that her family is not up for discussion.
“I’m sorry,” I blurt. “I know family is a sensitive subject.”
She waves me off with a gentle eye roll. “Don’t worry about it. Seriously. I just don’t like to make my family public business or whatever.”
“Oh, I totally get it. I’ve got some family stuff too that I don’t like to talk about much, and . . . well, I can’t imagine the whole world thinking that just because you’re on TV, that gives them the right to know all sorts of private information about you.”
She leans back, one arm propped against the back of the couch, and looks up at me, her eyes hooded and her swoop of bangs adding another layer of protection. “I don’t mind talking about them with friends.” She pauses. “And I’d like to think of you as a friend.”
My breath hitches. “I’d like that too.”
Pushing a hand through her hair, she squeezes her eyes shut for a moment. I can see then all the reasons why she’s a good actor. It’s not that I’m feeling duped or manipulated, but it’s the way she truly speaks with her whole body. “My story isn’t special. I know it’s not. I grew up in a forgotten suburb of Chicago. My mom loved me, but not as much as she loved getting high, and my dad . . . well, who knows who the hell he is? I’ve got a sister. Different dad. She lives with her grandma. She’s got a good life, and I help out with, like, stuff. But the truth is I was barely scraping by when Margaret Toliver met me. Shit, discovered me. She plucked me out of obscurity. She saw something in me no one else had before.”
I want to ask her how and where and when. I want to know everything. I’m greedy and I want to gobble up every little detail of her life. I want to feel like I’ve known her my whole life.
“My parents died,” I blurt, like I’ve got to somehow return the family trauma secret.
She places a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Oh, Faith. Oh, I’m so sorry.”
I nod. Her hand burns through my T-shirt, warming me. “School had just started and we were driving to some con over the weekend. Mom and Dad were going as Mario and Luigi and I was going to be Princess Peach. We’d worked on our costumes all summer, staying up late at night with our hot glue guns.” The memory of us all out in the garage with a box fan while Mom ran inside to fetch Popsicles. The whole street was dark, but our little garage burned bright.
“That sounds amazing,” Dakota says. “You’d make a really good Princess Peach.”
“My parents let me wear my costume in the car. I never wanted to take it off. I even wanted to sleep in it.” I shrug, trying to swallow back any tears. It’s been so long that it’s almost easy for the memory of it all to feel like a movie—something I clearly know and remember, but not an experience I can feel and inhabit. “It was a really bad storm. Dad was pulling off the highway when we hydroplaned. The car flipped and . . . people kept telling me it was instant. I know that’s supposed to make me feel better.”
She lets this all sink in for a moment, not trying to fill the silence with cooing or some awful nonsense about everything happening for a reason.
Dakota touches her hand to my leg. “I can’t imagine what that must feel like. For everything to just change in a moment.”
“I guess we both have a few dings and bruises.”
Dakota glances up from under her swoop of bangs, giving me a look I’ve never seen on The Grove, one that feels like it’s meant for me alone. “Margaret always says the broken have ways of finding each other.”