I was very much in love.
And it was nothing as the famous poets had said.
It was a strange love … the kind that didn’t feel good all the time … the kind where my greatest fears crawled, but an undying acceptance too. The kind where I had to stand in front of a mirror, forced to see me for what I was. What this was. The kind to question myself and everything I knew. I was certain this was like no other … though I had nothing to compare it to. Maybe no one could ever. And perhaps that was the point we could not see. No two were the same … or would ever be. And there would never be an answer for what it was, but I was in love … the kind where King had said; how, “Blood called to blood.”
Because I was so much in love.
And, maybe … he was too.
“Oh, look—another glorious morning. The full Harvest Moon is in our midst, and what better way to celebrate our small business owners of Weeping Hollow than during today’s Hollow Fall Festival? Show your support and dance on over to town square with your wallets. This is Freddy in the Mournin’, have a wicked Sunday, witches, and remember, no one is safe after three a.m.” Freddy’s howl from the gazebo speakers faded into Michael Jackson’s Thriller, and I closed my eyes as my head fell back, the Sunday morning sun heating my face. Pumpkin, apple, and cinnamon from Mina Mae’s pies weaved into the crisp fall air that brushed my skin, and Monday bumped my side.
My eyes snapped open, and her red locks grazed my arm when she whispered, “This sucks.”
A laugh sputtered through my pressed lips. I turned my attention to the handful of residents forming lines over the grass surrounding the gazebo.
“What’s happening?” I asked, scanning the crowd. Then, all at once, townies broke out into the Thriller dance in perfect synchrony. “No,” I laughed, my palms hitting the table under our tent, “this is great.”
Monday rolled her head back with a groan. “Oh, that’s nothing. Just wait.”
At my side, Monday crossed her arms over our matching red shirts Jonah made us wear. The shirts read My day starts when yours ends, with the funeral home logo on the back.
It was just this morning Jonah had shown up at Gramps’ house and offered me my job back. I couldn’t help but think Julian had something to do with it.
Our sales goals at the fall festival was to get three people to put a deposit down on a pine overcoat—what Gramps liked to call a coffin—and to reserve a grave.
It was ten in the morning, and I hadn’t gotten one yet.
“And here we go,” Monday whispered, her finger pointing at Milo, who moon-walked across the grass to the center just when the chorus rang through the speakers. Milo broke out into dance in his suspenders and newsboy hat.
“No way,” the words sailed out of me. “Milo!” My palm hit my chest. “Monday, this does not happen. This isn’t normal.”
“Unfortunately, it’s our normal.” She released a sigh, and my smile burned as I watched the people dance, Michael Jackson’s voice slithering through the square. Some people were in costumes, some in their everyday clothes, some old, some young. “This happens every year. Milo says he does it for the kids, but c’mon, look at him,” she tsked, her flat palm in his direction, “he loves it.”
I shook my head, disbelief carving into me, and my eyes continued to roam the rest of the square for Julian, hoping I would see him here.
The memory of us from only a few days ago slammed inside me as if my lover were visiting—the heat spiraling between us, the ice swirling around us, ripples of pleasure and pain. Why was it that I felt so happy, yet so miserable? That to be able to think and go about my day after the night we’d shared, and the way he’d left, oh! it felt like waking on an ivory moon with a dark cloud looming close behind.
Somehow, Julian felt undeniably close to me, in my blood now. I suppose it was Love’s weakness that turned our eyes from what stood in the way, allowing our hearts to wander in this feeling. Or could it be Love’s strength? And I knew where my thoughts were … If Julian only knew…
Julian had once said he would never give himself entirely to anyone, but that night, he’d given me everything, as I to him. Could I look past his continuous absence? The ghost of him after the sun had fully risen, the moments just after his departure? He’d always left me, but not ever really leaving me. He said he never wanted to leave me, and perhaps he meant it in some other way. Like this way—inside of me, all around me, in my heart, in my head, so loud and enduring and permanent now.
I’d woken alone, and the worry of something happening to him kept my mind sticking to him, kept my eyes everywhere, looking for him. Kept a knot in my stomach, an ache in my chest.
But how could I know if he wasn’t okay if I couldn’t go to him?
“Incoming,” Monday whispered, straightening her spine and painting on a fake smile, the kind of smile I knew so well.
Jonah appeared from behind, carrying a box. “Anything?”
“Nope,” I said, eyeing Monday. “I don’t think anyone’s rushing to pick out linens for their coffin.”
“They’ll come,” Jonah insisted, his eyes scanning over the crowd. “No one wants to be buried next to Jasper—” his voice dropped suddenly when a customer approached the booth. “Miss Driscoll, good morning!” Jonah’s octave changed. “Thank you again for the shirts.”
“Jonah, we talked about this,” she smiled, blinking her long, heavy lashes, “Call me Carrie. You make me feel like an old woman.” When her glare hit me, her eyes were like blue lightning—sharp and quick and sliced through me. She returned her gaze to Jonah, and her features softened as conversation carried on.
I froze, admiring her posture, her golden tendrils, her flawless skin.
“She’s so perfect, it’s sickening,” Monday whispered as Jonah and Carrie walked away from the booth, side by side in light-hearted banter. “If she takes my spot in this October’s initiation into Sacred Sea, I’ll be pissed,” Monday went on. “They don’t just let anyone in, and I’ve been workin’ on it for three years now.”
“Why do you want to be in their coven so bad?” I asked, turning my attention to unloading the box filled with pens, clipboards, and sign up forms Jonah had dropped off.
It was hard to keep my distance from her when forced to work with her. It was hard to keep any of those from Sacred Sea at arm’s length when this town was impossibly small.
At the corner of my eye, Monday turned and leaned into the table, her bright red hair falling down her back. “You don’t get it. It’s like being a part of a family. Somewhere to belong and people to fight for you.”
“What about your parents?” My eyes drifted from her to the cup I was filling with blue pens.
“They never gave a damn about me.” Monday turned, eyes narrowing across the square. I turned too, following her gaze. On the other side of the gazebo, three bodies stood under a tent. Wicked Soul Cakes was printed on the banner running across the top. “I was always the different one,” she whispered. “The milkman’s baby.”
The edge to her voice, the hurt in her eyes, the longing in her expression, it was all too familiar. She had a family, a home inside this town, and she still felt rejected by them. For a brief moment, I felt for her. I could relate to her.
“Is that your brother?” I asked, and threw my hand over my eyes to see better. Under the tent, a blond-haired boy stood with the blonde-haired parents. My eyes flicked back to Monday’s expression.
“Yup, the one who can do no wrong.”
“Their loss,” I said, an attempt to put her at ease. Although, I knew there was nothing I could say to help.
She smiled, but it was empty.
As the day went on, I talked the legendary Jasper Abbott, the town’s blabbering crazy man, into securing two graves. One for him, one for his dog, Cujo. Jonah hadn’t mentioned it had to be for a human. I only needed one more when Monday and I finished our coffee.
“I’ll head over to The Bean, get us two more. Watch the booth,” I told her.
Monday nodded when Kane and Maverick approached our table just as I was leaving.
“I see how it is,” Kane called out, and I turned and held up my palms at my sides with a shrug, the timing perfect.
Jolie waved at me from under her mom’s booth outside of the apothecary store as I passed, hay bales decorating both sides. My gaze roamed their booth and inside the store, hoping to get a glimpse of Julian but knowing it was a lost cause.
My fingers touched the cold metal of the knob when “Fallon” carried on the wind. At first, I thought it was all in my head. Until I heard it again.
I whipped my head to the side and squinted, seeing him standing there, leaning against the corner of The Bean, his passionate eyes touching me in a way that was a fluent language only we spoke. The sun hung directly behind him, drawing his outline in silver. He looked haloed in the light as he moved closer. I raised my hand to my forehead to shield my eyes as he peered down at me.
“Come with me,” Julian whispered, then took a quick glance at our surroundings.
I couldn’t believe he was out here so exposed at this hour, in Town Square. The wildness in his eyes was a telling of a secret, and it made me smile. “I can’t, I have one more grave to fill,” I explained, trying to play off the effect his presence had on me. “You interested?”
“Fallon Grimaldi,” Julian clicked his tongue, “I knew you only wanted me for my body.”
A laugh left me, and I scanned the square to see if anyone was watching us, and there wasn’t. No one was watching the freak. No one cared about me or what I did. We stared at each other in an odd way, as if it were a silent argument.
Our gaze battled each other until my voice arose. “Julian …”
“Fallon,” he insisted, a nudge of his head. “Come with me. I only need a moment of your time.”
I glanced around once more before sliding around the corner of The Bean after him.
I followed Julian down Seaside Street and into an alley, and my chest fluttered like there was a heart racing inside my heart.
Once shadows swallowed us, Julian turned and caught my hips. My breath suspended for the briefest moment, anticipating him.
His fingers locked onto my sides, walking me backward. A spiral of heat climbed inside me, poured into my blood. And his scream-filled eyes latched to mine when my back hit the brick wall.
“Once upon a time,” he said in a rush, leaning into me. “There was this Heathen so lost, he screamed so loud …” he lifted my hands high on the wall and laced his fingers with mine, “He followed the rules, followed the code, but never followed the useless thing inside his chest.” His hands traced along my outstretched arms, his palms smoothing over me, like sleet against my heated skin.
My body sank against the wall, and I cleared my dry throat, keeping my eyes on him. “Until now. You’re supposed to say … until now.”
Julian pressed his hips into mine and dipped his mouth to my ear. “Until now.”
My mouth parted, and I closed my eyes.
My breath seized as he cupped the warmth of my neck, replaced it with his chill. His breath was like cinnamon, biting as he seduced my senses.
His voice dropped into a whisper, “Until you.” And I heard the crack in it, the chasm of hurt that crept around the curves of his syllables.
Until you. Two words that connected us.
“I’m sorry,” he continued in my ear. “For not being there in the morning after—”
“It’s okay,” I cut him off, shaking my head. “You’re okay.” I bit my lip, laid my hand over his chest. He was here now. “That’s all that matters.”
Then he kissed me. Oh, god, and he was kissing me. I couldn’t hang on to a solid breath as his tongue moved against mine like an obsidian vortex, a desperate force demanding to accept him for all that he was, to accept this position we were in. I kissed him back, a push and pull and a fight and a scream.
I hear you, Julian. I already have.
Secrets and promises exchanged between us like a pact. He cupped my face and pulled me onto my toes, and I was a wave carried on his current, on his lips.
He was kissing me, and I was flying …
“AHHHHHHH!” a scream erupted! and pierced my eardrums.
Like a reflex, Julian’s palm slapped over my eyes the same time his head snapped to the side. His chest was heaving against mine, his muscles twitching under his skin, ready to bolt—to run.
“SOMEONE, HELP!”
“I’m so sorry.” Pain etched in his words.
Then his hand fell from my face, and a rush of cold wind smacked my skin.
I didn’t have to open my eyes to know Julian was gone.
I was shocked by how the cold pierced his absence.
“FALLON, OH MY GOD, FALLON!”
My skin, my lips, everywhere he’d been, it felt strange from the rest of my body now. Not fully mine anymore. The feeling slipped away from me. Plummeted. Bailed and left the stratosphere.
“Are you hurt?!” Carrie Driscoll appeared before me, scanning over my features. “Don’t worry, help is coming,” she told me, and I wanted to say something. I wanted to tell her I didn’t need help, that he did nothing wrong. “Thank goodness I came just in time.”
Just in time, her words echoed.
Julian
I was running faster, harder, my legs threatening to buckle. I was running until my sight became hazy. My breathing echoed in my head, jolted my chest. Inhaling, exhaling, I was running, past the pain, toward the Norse woods, where I was loved and not feared.
And I didn’t stop there. I was running, my chest burning. I’d felt the betrayal of my witchery begging to be released—the jerk of my hands, the vibration in my veins. It pulled me, and it wasn’t even nightfall! I couldn’t understand it. My mask was gone, lost somewhere along the way. The temperatures were biting my face, sinking its nails into my eyes. I forced them open, dry and burning and running.
Then I collapsed somewhere in the heart of the Norse woods.
The canopy allowed little light to filter through. There was no sound aside from my starving lungs. My arms spread out at my sides, and I curled my hands into fists under the dark tresses of the trees, grasping to the velvet flesh of the forest ground, desperate to release this build-up.
I couldn’t feel my legs, yet I felt every morsel of inescapable torment. When I opened my eyes, the sun’s rays glittered off the reds and golds of the fall leaves—October’s kaleidoscope. One mad burst of flames around me, inside me. I’m on fire!
I squeezed my eyes shut and let go.
My scream reverberated, unleashing me. It burned in my chest, tore through my throat, and filled the woods. I screamed, expelling the fire until I could no more. I screamed until darkness engulfed me, silenced me. All that lighted my way was the will to lay here because I couldn’t lay with her. And the trees answered as they always did, the whispers of the woods telling me it would all be okay. The Norse woods hadn’t left me, though my heart had left the Norse woods.
And nothing would ever be the same.
Fallon
Townspeople crowded around, their faces blurred. Carrie Driscoll had pulled me to a bench outside of The Bean and had her hand on my shoulder as Monday, Kane, and strangers talked all around me, cursing the Heathen. Outrage multiplied, and I was coming down from shock as it turned to a boiling turmoil.
“No,” I kept repeating, “It wasn’t like that, it wasn’t. You have it all wrong.”
I didn’t know if they could hear me, as they twisted my words, filled the spaces between. My head shook, clouded, and I couldn’t breathe.
I stood, looking for air, for space. “I need space,” I chanted as pressure piled on top of me, their chatter not ceasing. “Why won’t anyone listen to me?”
“Fallon,” Jolie said, coming through the crowd of people. “Fallon, come with me. Let’s get you some water.”
She grabbed my hand and led me toward the apothecary, and with every step, the flustering heat lifted. My mind was lost. My eyes darted for Julian, but all I saw were people and tents and worried, watchful eyes of Weeping Hollow.
The store bell rang as we entered the apothecary, and Jolie guided me toward the back and through a swinging door.
“Sit down,” she insisted, then turned toward the sink to fill a cup. “What happened in the alley? What happened to my brother?”
My fingers gripped the edge of the plastic chair, and I looked up at her. “I don’t know. He just took off.” I thought of Julian and all the things they could do to him. “Oh, my god, this is all my fault, isn’t it? What are they going to do to him?”
Jolie turned to me with a paper cup of water, offering it to me before sitting over the tile. “It won’t get that far. Nothing happened. It’s all speculation unless something happened, and there is no proof. If anything, the Order will question you, but that’s it. I have no doubt Jai is in the woods. He’s safe there, and they’ll make this go away.”
They’ll make this go away. She meant Norse Woods, Jonah even. Or both, if Jonah was a part of Norse Woods.
But hearing Jolie’s steady voice brought me comfort.
“This can’t happen again,” she continued, laying her hand over mine, “I’m happy he has you, Fallon. Really, I am, but I can’t lose him. You two have to be more careful. No one can see him with you again. Once, maybe it was a fluke, but twice?” she shook her head, “It just can’t happen again.”
“It won’t,” I promised.
“Fallon?” a voice called out, and both of our heads jerked toward the doorway to see Agatha Blackwell. “Is everything okay?”
“Yes,” I quickly said, rising to my feet. Jolie followed suit, and I felt her eyes on me as I brushed my hair from my face and stood tall. “Everything’s okay. I just got a little light-headed.”
Agatha squinted her eyes, studying the two of us. “What is going on outside, this talk about a Hollow Heathen?”
“It was nothing,” I assured her. “I was walking in the alleyway alone, and I’d crossed paths with one. Someone thought they lured me into the dark, but it was all just a misunderstanding. He hardly said anything to me, let alone touched me.” Lies, they’re all liars, even me. “Carrie screamed, and he took off, but he didn’t do anything wrong,” I reiterated. Agatha Blackwell was part of the Order. She had to know her son didn’t hurt me. Truth.
“Oh, good,” she nodded, “People like to get carried away. It’s not like this hasn’t happened before.” Her eyes lingered a moment longer, and Jolie stood silent, but I felt every fragment of energy radiating off of her as if it were a struggle to keep her thoughts at bay. “I’m sorry for all the drama.”
“It’s okay,” I waved off the incident as everyone else should have, “I have to get back to the booth. I doubt Monday returned, and someone should be there in case someone is dying to pick out a coffin. Or a grave. You know, the things that put the fun in funeral,” I rambled, then stopped before rambling myself into more trouble.
I thanked Jolie and Agatha, rushed out of the apothecary and back to the fall festival, forcing myself not to run to Norse woods to find Julian. It would only make it worse.
This was the way it had to be.