Archive of Our Own

Kristen got lost in the Elm Valley mall, once, when she was seven years old. 

She doesn’t remember what happened, really, but she remembers what came after. There was yelling—deeply public, altogether frenzied, and accompanied by all kinds of stomping and grabbing. There was the simmering car ride home, oppressive silence like a weighted blanket pulled up to Kristen’s chin. Then there was her room, where she was made to stay for three days with no books or toys or playtime with her little brothers. 

She wasn’t sure why they were so mad when she didn’t mean to. Her mother’s voice, mocking, rings in her head even now. A fake sob dripping from the words I didn’t mean to as she mimicked Kristen. Would mimic Kristen—that was the first time, at least that she can remember. I didn’t mean to was a staple of her childhood ridicule, a trump card against any attempt her young, withering self could make at standing up for or explaining herself.

After a while, she just stopped trying. She didn’t mean to. And she really didn’t mean to get lost that day. 

She’s sure Riz didn’t mean to, either. 

It starts with Gilear’s shitty futon. 

The thing is that it’s a futon, and that it’s shitty, even for a futon. And yet Kristen doesn’t identify it as the cause of her back pain—half thinks it’s just Helio punishing her for all her sins, half thinks its all the adventures and battles the bad kids have been getting themselves into—until someone else does it for her.

It’s lunch, Wednesday. She’s trying to find a way to sit comfortably and finds that she can’t. 

“Is this a new somatic component to a spell I don’t know about or do you just really have to shit right now?” Adaine asks bluntly, staring at Kristen as her she props her head up on her hand, looking both transfixed and bored out of her mind at the same time. 

“It’s my back,” she whines, rubbing her shoulder for emphasis.

“It must be that ghastly couch,” Fabian says, lips curled into a scowl before he drops his expression into something softer and turns to Fig. “No offense.” 

“Uh huh,” Fig says flatly. 

“Could you cast a healing spell on yourself?” Adaine offers.

Kristen sighs. She doesn’t like to waste spell slots on herself—shouldn’t waste spells on herself—when she’s the party’s cleric and they could find themselves in another battle at a moment’s notice. It’s been a while, but still. “Mmm,” she hums noncommittally. She’s pretty sure it wouldn’t work, anyway. 

“It’s definitely the couch,” Riz says then through bites of Adaine’s sandwich crusts, “I’ve slept on that thing and it is not comfortable. Why do you guys think I’m always trying to get you to have sleepovers at my place instead of yours?”

Fig scoffs. “Guys, come on. It is not that bad.”

“Your deception is good, but not that good, Fig.”

“Ugh. Fine! My dad has a weird prescription couch that’s bad for sleeping on! Is that what you guys wanna hear?”

“Wait, what?” Confusion erupts as Fig explains, reluctantly and through what is really wavering on the line between laughter and tears, that Gilear’s couch was prescribed for… his hair loss.

“How on earth would that work?”

“Fig, I think your dad got scammed.”

And that well and thoroughly derails the conversation until third period is starting so they never really do end up circling back to Kristen’s dilemma.

It comes up again later, though, when they’re at Riz’s that night, just the three Luxury Lads. Kristen is rubbing her shoulder again when Sklonda connects the dots and gently inserts herself into the problem. 

“You know,” she says, “You guys could always look for a new couch on fantasy facebook marketplace. They have lots of good stuff on there.” The way she says good stuff makes Kristen think that maybe what she means is that it’s maybe not good as in good, but good as in better than what Gilear currently has. 

“Fantasy facebook? Like that website everyone used when we were little kids?” Fig asks, fully looking up from her crystal, genuinely mystified.

Sklonda raises an eyebrow and sighs. “Alright, you could at least try not to make me feel a million years old, I did feed you dinner.”

“Sklonda,” Kristen starts, clearing her throat and thinking, I got this, “You are so young and hot and honestly if I was—”

“Nope,” she shouts, holding her hands up as if the sheer force of it alone could stop Kristen from finishing her sentence. “No, no, no thank you, I’m fine being an old hag actually. Good luck with your problems, Kristen.” With that she turns and walks out of the room, not to be seen for the rest of the night.

And Kristen likes to think she’s referring only to the couch thing, but in her heart of hearts she knows that Sklonda is probably talking about whatever it is that makes Kristen say things that make people—adults, mostly—react like she did just now. Because it is, a problem, but it’s one for the back burner for now, due of course to the still-lingering aforementioned back pain. 

She takes her suggestion, though, and after dishes and a password reset that somehow takes an hour to complete, the three of them are logged into Fig’s old fantasy facebook account on Riz’s laptop and scrolling through the marketplace tab with little to no abandon. It takes them about three minutes to forget what it is they’re looking for and just zero in on all the weird shit the people of Elmville have to offer. Because there is a lot of weird shit. There are some normal things, don’t get Kristen wrong. There’s a lot of clothes, some home decor, and a good amount of furniture, which is what they should be looking for. But there’s also charmed hair extensions, decommissioned taxi cabs, and a supposedly cursed sourdough starter. Free to anyone immune to being charmed, reads the ad, do not ask if still available. There’s also some ads for diy spellcasting services—namely hexing exes—and even though Fig, to Kristen’s knowledge, does not have any exes, she gasps. 

“We should totally pay these people to hex Porter.” She clicks on the ad—a picture of a rudimentary-looking ritual setup with the words Totally real spellcasting cheap now 100% guarantee serious inquiries only beneath it—and says, “Woah. Legit.”

Riz rolls his eyes. “You’re obsessed with that guy. I promise you he is not whatever you think he is. Also, that ad is definitely a scam.”

“You’re definitely a scam.”

They waste another hour and a half going down the rabbit hole of brand name stuffed animal reselling/trading and learn that Fig’s Mint Bunny is probably worth upwards of 300 gold pieces. Riz notes that she could probably fund the entire couch project, based on the prices they’ve seen so far. That is around when they remember they’re supposed to be looking for a couch. Fig bookmarks a dragon stuffie, sighs, and goes to search tab and finally, finally, types in the words couch that turns into a bed. 

Spoiled for options but with nothing particularly catching their eyes, they scroll for another twenty minutes or so. After a while they all start to look the same. Kristen thinks maybe they’re going to give up—Fig starting to yawn and Riz starting to get restless; Kristen too is finding herself bored even though she’s the one this whole mission directly benefits—but then Fig gasps again and shouts, “Orange!”

Kristen blinks, looks up from the friendship bracelet she’d been picking at. “Orange?”

Riz smiles, strokes the screen of his laptop. “Orange.”

The couch is orange, and clean-looking, and probably comfortable because it’s a couch—which is all to say that it’s perfect. It will stick out like a sore thumb in Gilear’s mustard greige apartment, but so do Fig and Kristen, and it’s for them, really, so who cares? Fig types out a message to the seller at record speed—hi i would like to buy this from you are you free saturday—and they sit there patiently waiting a reply. It comes only a minute after.

Price firm pickup only. 

Riz hums. “Yeah, I was gonna ask how you guys are paying for this?”

Kristen actually fully hadn’t considered that, at all, but Fig waves him off. “I have a plan.”

“You have a plan?”

Fig ignores her, types back, Yes I can pay and will pick up on saturday if you are free on saturday?

“Because we also don’t have a way to pick it up,” Riz continues, and he’s right. The address the seller gives them a moment later is all the way across town in Elm Valley and Gilear’s car isn’t running right now. Even if it was, it wouldn’t be big enough to fit a whole couch. Also none of them can drive. Or lift a couch. Or afford a couch. Or—

“Okay, okay, I know you’re thinking about all the problems,” Fig says, easy breezy, “But I’ve got solutions,” she continues with a determined look as she types out thank you we’ll be there to the seller. Her fingers come to rest on the keyboard and her smile falters, just a bit. “Well, solution.”

“What is your solution?”

Rather cryptically, she says, “I’m working on it.” The next morning she leaves for school before Kristen has even woken up, a message left on her crystal that reads solo mission. see you at lunch! <3

Kristen gets a rare ride with Riz and Sklonda, speakers blaring the latest episode of This Solisian Life. The talkback format of it reminds her, just a little, of the Helioic self-help radio station she’d grown accustomed to her mom tuning into nonstop—You should listen to this one, Kristen, I think you’ll find it helpful she would say pointedly before some hysterical mom called in about their troubled teen—but she finds she doesn’t mind all that much. 

It aches, a little, but she thinks it might kind of feel good, too. She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know. She does know that she likes when Riz and Sklonda sing along to the outro of the podcast, even though it is not a song outro. They pull up to the front of Aguefort just as they finish belting it out and Sklonda reaches over to ruffle his hair and says, “Love you, kid.”

It aches, a lot. 

She has the feeling under control by the end of homeroom, so her focus is free to zero in on her persisting back pain for the next two periods before lunch. By the time lunch rolls around she is considering healing herself just to get the placebo effect it brings, while knowing it won’t actually undo any of the damage Gilear’s futon has done. She lays on the floor beside their table instead of sitting at it and Gorgug wordlessly passes her down a slice of clementine as the rest of the group talks about the orange couch.

Adaine holds up a finger, opens her mouth and shuts it several times while waiting for a break in the cross-talk to say, “Okay, but how are you planning on, one, paying for it, and two, getting it into your apartment?”

Riz throws his hands in the air. “Yeah, c’mon, Fig. Let’s hear your grand plan.”

Fig stands up on the bench of the table, clearing her throat as she waves her hands to quiet everyone down, milking the hell out of the moment as she is wont to do. Kristen cranes her neck to see her from the floor, just as interested as the rest of them. After another moment, she finally speaks.

“Fabian is rich and can drive so we’re gonna get him to rent a U-Haul for us,” she says flatly, almost sheepish.

Adaine shrugs. “Oh. Yeah, that’ll work.”

Fabian clear his throat. “You’re forgetting the part where you cast suggestion on me to do it,” he informs the group, leaning back and crossing his arms. 

Fig squats down, shimmies her legs out from under her until she’s sitting again and leans into Fabian, slinging an arm around his shoulders. “Yeah, but you would’ve done it anyway ‘cause you looooove us!” she teases, the rest of the group ooohing and laughing as he rolls his eyes. They recently discovered that Fabian was the mastermind behind the gifts they all received earlier in the semester, back when they still barely knew each other, and they are all still jumping on every opportunity to remind him. 

“Well yes,” he says matter-of-factly, arms still crossed. “And you owe me bardics for like a month.”

“Deal.”

Saturday comes sluggishly but it comes all the same, the Luxury Lads piling into Sklonda’s car and singing along to Pitbull’s Greatest Hits as she takes them across town to the U-Haul rental lot. Fabian is already there when they arrive, leaning against the wall of the building like he’s trying really hard to look cool. The smile on his face gives it away a little bit, but Kristen doesn’t blame him. They’re all excited; today is an event. 

“Are you ready for your last night of shitty sleep?” he asks as he peels off the brick, sauntering up to them and giving out a round of fist bumps. He’s in a good mood, today. 

“Technically,” Riz says, “it’s not her sleep, it’s her back.”

Fabian gives him a look, then amends, “Are you ready for your last night of shitty back?”

Kristen exhales a long breath. “Yes.” 

“You know,” Riz starts again, turning to Fig, “You sleep on the same couch and you never have back pain.”

Fig takes a drag of her clove then stomps it out under her boot. “That’s ‘cause I’m punk, Riz.”

“Huh,” he says, evidently thinking pretty hard about that. He kind of just stares off into the middle distance for a while, until Fabian snaps his fingers in front of his face.

“The ball? Hello?” He’s looking at him expectantly—the perfect Fabian mixture of unimpressed and concerned that really just looks completely unimpressed unless you already know what concern looks like on him, which is this. “How much sleep did you get last night? I know you’re not allowed to get less than four hours and you’re all—Riz, did you get less than four hours?”

“No,” Riz says, “I got exactly four hours, which is the minimum, so.” 

Fabian scoffs, crosses his arms. “Well,” he says, “we have paperwork to do, if you’d like to be helpful, now.”

Riz stands at attention at that, nothing if not wanting to be helpful. It sends a wave of fondness through Kristen, and a little bit of relief, too. They’re all doing this for her, which makes her stomach kind of curdle in guilt a little bit, but if she can convince herself that she’s the one that’s helping them—at least Riz—by letting them be helpful, then that makes her feel a little bit better. 

Fabian leads them then into the building, walking into it like he owns the place. With his dad, Kristen isn’t one hundred percent sure he doesn’t. It ends up being Max Durden working behind the counter, and he seems a little bit stoned but takes them through all the paperwork and rules and legal stuff, anyway. Kristen mostly tunes it out, fiddling around on her crystal instead. The service is spotty, here, her text to the group chat (guys it’s the police state kid renting us this uhaul) not even fully sending before she gives up and pockets her crystal again. 

“Can we—” Fig stops herself before she starts, laughing a little bit before she goes, “Can we ride in the back?”

Max gives her a sympathetic smile and begins to drone, “U-Haul does not allow passengers to ride in the bed of any U-Haul rental vehicles. This includes our pickup trucks, cargo vans, as well as ten foot, fifteen foot, seventeen foot, twenty foot, and twenty six foot trucks. It is illegal to ride in any motor vehicle without a seatbelt and—”

“Okay so no?”

“No, dude. Sorry.”

“Okay.” Fig smiles, saccharine sweet. “Thank you.”

“This is fun!” Kristen screams in complete darkness, pressing into Fig as they slide across the back of the truck. Fabian makes another turn and they slide back the other way, Riz whooping as the girls laugh, crazed with adrenaline.

They got in the back as soon as Max was out of sight. There was never any confusion that that was what was going to happen. There is confusion about everything else as Kristen loses all sense of direction, not a single guess as to where in Elmville they might be even though it’s only been a couple of minutes since Fabian started driving, a couple of minutes in the pitch black. 

“It’s so dark you guys!” Kristen shouts, only a little bit scared, and only a little bit nauseous. She thought her eyes would adjust but she still can’t make out the shape of Riz in the darkness, can only sense where he is from the sound of the excited tapping of his feet, across from her and Fig. Fig, who grabs blindly at Kristen until they’re holding hands, tight and bouncing with every turn and bump of the truck.

“Are you guys still there?” asks Riz, “I can’t see, like, anything.” Kristen takes that as an okay to cast light, the staff laying at her and Fig’s feet beginning to glow softly, their first glimpse of light since Fabian shut them in. It casts Riz’s manic smile in dramatic shadows as he says, “This is awesome.”

The truck rumbles to a stop not long after, Fabian with one hand on his hip as he opens up the back and says, “Have fun?”

“It was like a roller coaster!” Fig says as she jumps up, “A very dark roller coaster!”

They amble out of the truck, Kristen last and catching the tail end of Fabian’s smile after Fig and Riz, incredibly fond. She smirks as he turns back, wipes it off his face, and coolly offers a hand for her to step down. She takes it. 

The marketplace seller answers the door with a warm smile and a Hello! that is so not at all indicative of their brusque messaging style that it kind of throws Kristen off. She’s grateful that Fig steps in immediately to lead the interaction, cheerleader voice taking centre stage as they make polite small talk. 

Then they’re inside, and the couch is there, and it’s perfect. The seller gestures to it like go ahead and immediately the bad kids are all over it, slumped in a variety of positions that are only realistic for really testing out how they’re gonna use it at home. They stop short of jumping, because while they are teenagers they’re not children, thank you very much, but they do do a fair bit of bouncing. 

Next is getting it out of the house. Kristen knew it would be a challenge, but it really is a challenge not to scrape up this poor guy’s walls as they struggle through the hallway. Fabian and Fig are all, I’m strong! and Riz is vocally bemoaning not asking Gorgug to tag along while Kristen kind of just accepts that she may end up, at least for the next few days, more sore than she was sleeping on Gilear’s shitty couch. But they make it happen, and when the couch is in the U-Haul—taking up a comically small amount of space in the huge truck—they reward themselves with a good old fashioned photoshoot, selfies abound and high-fashion poses struck. It’s kind of dim in there even with the natural light from outside so they all turn out kind of shitty, but Kristen can’t find it in herself to care. She’s going to print them out for the scrapbook, anyway. 

They do end up loitering so long that the seller has to pop back out to ask them if they’re okay, but once they do gear up to leave they are presented with another challenge. 

“There’s only three seats up front,” Fabian says, “So one of you is going to have to ride in the back again.”

“Have to? Don’t you mean get to?” Fig says, Riz high fiving her shortly after. They jump up into the truck and start dancing across the floor. 

Kristen shrugs. “I’ll come up front with you,” she says. She’s not going to admit that she was scared of the dark, but she does say that it made her nauseous. “I don’t know if you were like, trying to make it a rough ride,” she says, “but it was a little. You know.” She sways from side to side, hoping it gets the point across.

“Oh, I’m sorry that my personal chauffeuring services aren’t good enough for you. It’s not like I’m paying for this truck or your couch or anything like that,” Fabian laments, but it has no bite. Kristen tries not to let the guilt bubble into her throat and buckles up. Fabian climbs in the truck a moment later and, as if reading her mind, quietly says, “You know I really am happy to do this.”

“I know,” she replies automatically. Maybe she doesn’t believe it, not completely and not yet, but she knows it’s true. 

They’re mostly quiet after that. The drive isn’t long, and they’re back at Strongtower within fifteen minutes, Riz and Fig hopping out of the back of the truck chanting something Kristen can’t decipher. She has a little bit of bit FOMO, but that is quickly forgotten when she sees the old couch by the loading dock.

Fig and Kristen said their goodbyes to the old couch this morning, shaking out the cushions and taking pictures of all its notable stains and tears before they dragged it downstairs and out to the building’s dumpster. In retrospect it made the four-person job of getting the new couch into the truck feel like a dream. They did, though, figure out a bit of a system between the two of them, which towards the end was just Fig realizing she could use dimension door to get them the rest of the way. Kristen feels a little weird, a little sad, seeing it again now. There’s something in her head going change change change, like alarm bells sounding off a crisis. 

She takes a breath, blows the old couch a kiss, and moves to help her friends get the new couch out of the truck. Apparently Riz texted Juan ahead of time so they’re all set up to use the freight elevator, which isn’t even something Kristen had thought about. She is struck once more with that sour fondness, the twin guilt and appreciation for her friends being so on board with doing this, for her. For Fig, too, and for Gilear, she guesses, but really she knows it’s for her. It’s for her when they’re going one, two, three and lifting it up and it’s for her when they’re saying fuck, turn this way—no, this way and it’s for her when they’re laughing in the elevator, Fig accidentally pinned to the wall for the better part of two minutes. 

It’s a struggle. They’re all sweaty and tired but they’re almost there, and Kristen feels strong. Well, she feels weak, is weak, bodily, but she still feels strong. She doesn’t know how to explain it other than the swelling in her chest, the ache in her arms, the I did this without my parents. 

She feels strong. 

It all feels a little reminiscent, somehow, of something that hasn’t happened yet. Kristen can see it clearly in her minds eye—an apartment in Bastion City, or Ashgrove, or somewhere else far from here. A third-floor walkup where maybe the floors are a little slanted and the walls are a little scuffed but it’s hers and not anyone else’s. A truck full of boxes and a sidewalk full of friends who can lift them. A long day, morning through night, up and down and up and down and up and down until the empty rooms are filled and the spiders have been banished and the pizza has been ordered. They eat it on the living room floor because she doesn’t have a table yet, but she’s saving up. 

She watches Riz close his eyes and settle into the corner where the armrest meets the back of the couch, content. Watches Fig lean her head into his as she stretches out her legs into Fabian’s lap. Kristen doesn’t have enough money saved in her rainbow sock—sticking out of her duffel bag across the room, Camp Husk logo still turned towards the wall—to get pizza for them now, but one day she will.

For now, they just lay there, and that’s enough. 

Kristen is halfway to falling asleep—notably painless—when, awhile later, Fabian softly groans and says, “We gotta take the truck back.” 

“Ugh.”

They spend a good twenty minutes extricating themselves from the couch—really, that comfortable—and getting themselves back down to the loading dock. Kristen is groggily listening to Fabian gush about how much his bike has been telepathically missing him all day, when Riz, unseen, calls out, “I’m gonna check in the back to make sure we didn’t leave anything in there.”

“Sounds good, thanks Riz,” Kristen calls back over the sound of Fabian’s obnoxious fake revving. Fig is already in the front snooping through the glove compartment for cigarettes or a gun or shady receipts. Kristen kind of wishes Fabian would wrap it up already—the thing he has with his bike borders on weird on a good day—and she is grateful when her gaze wanders and she sees Riz out of the truck, standing on the loading dock watching them. 

“All good?”

He doesn’t respond, just waves a little woodenly. “I gotta go,” he says, turning to leave without another word or explanation. She vaguely remembers him having something to do with his mom later tonight, but she’s pretty sure that was later on.

“Okay?” Kristen says.

“Goodbye bad kids.” He calls over his shoulder before disappearing, briefcase in hand. Fabian gives Kristen a look. 

“Weird,” she notes.

Fabian shrugs. “It’s the ball.” He doesn’t seem concerned, so Kristen shrugs too and hops into the truck beside Fig as Fabian closes up the back.

“Anything good?” she asks, nodding over to the glove compartment. 

She shakes her head. “Nothin’. They keep this place squeaky clean. Maybe—maybe too clean,” she says quietly, narrowing her eyes. 

“Ugh,” Fabian says, “It’s always a conspiracy with you people. And besides, I would hardly call this vehicle clean.” He backs them out of the loading dock, pulling out into the street and taking the three of them on their way back to the rental lot. 

A couple minutes into the drive, Riz texts the group chat a flash-lit photo of himself in the back of the truck with the caption, riding in the back is so much fun. He’s all teeth as he grins wide in the dark and Kristen heart reacts the photo. She hoped they could hang for a little longer, but it was nice of him to send a text, anyway.

Max, who seems a little stoned still, is waiting for them at the lot when they arrive. He says, “We’ll be inspecting the truck tonight before we lock up, just to make sure everything’s all good and nothing was left behind. Cool?”

Kristen smiles. Riz already did that for them. “I think we’re good,” she says. 

The truck is left at the lot. Fabian rides his bike home while the girls take the bus, camping out in the raised section at the back for the hour it takes to loop all the way around to Ballaster. Kristen was never allowed to take the bus, before—You could come across all types there, Kristen. We have a car, we’re not poor—and it feels, now, like an act of rebellion to do so. There are all types, and Kristen defiantly enjoys watching them come and go as she and Fig ride nearly the whole length of the bus’ route across town. The sun has gone down, bursts of cold air chilling her ankles every time the doors open and close. 

Eventually it is their turn to go, and Fig brightly thanks the bus driver as she hops down onto the sidewalk. After a cold eight minutes later they’re spread back out on the couch, a fluorescent beacon of warmth and comfort in the middle of the apartment. They stay there for an hour doing nothing on their crystals until there is, unexpectedly, a knock at the door. 

“Hey guys,” Sklonda says, peering into the apartment behind them. “I know you guys are hanging out and all, but any chance you could send Riz back? I need him home tonight.”

Kristen blinks. Wait a minute. “He—didn’t he go home already?”

“He’s not here,” Fig says. “He’s not with you?”

“Wait, he’s not with you?”

Kristen feels the air get sucked out of the room. “No?”

“I haven’t seen him since this morning,” Sklonda says, “He did go with you guys to get, to get a couch, right?”

“Yeah,” Fig says, nodding a little frantically. “He did. He left when, when—”

“When we were going to take the truck back. He seemed…” She doesn’t want to say it. She doesn’t want it to be true.

“He seemed what, Kristen?”

“He—I don’t know. He seemed a little weird? Like he left pretty quickly, which I guess isn’t that weird but it just. I don’t know, it seemed off. Maybe I’m making that up? I don’t know.”

Sklonda nods, looking grave. “Okay. Okay. This is—okay.” Kristen isn’t sure whether Sklonda is saying it is for them or for herself, and she wants to believe her, but it sort of seems like maybe it’s not okay. Sklonda sighs, looks at her crystal. “I’m sure he’s just out on a lead somewhere. I’m—I’m not worried.”

“Yeah,” Kristen tries, halfheated. Her stomach hurts, but if Sklonda isn’t worried, then she shouldn’t be either, right? 

They round up the rest of the bad kids anyway, Fabian and Gorgug and Adaine arriving in record time with varying levels of concern on their faces. Sklonda has retreated to her own apartment to make some calls so the bad kids are alone in Gilear’s apartment, gathered on the couch. Kristen and Fig lay out the facts, of which they know only little: Riz was with them the entire afternoon, and was last seen on the loading dock before they took the U-Haul back to the lot. He texted the group chat a minute or two after he was last seen, and no one has heard from him since. Calling his crystal goes straight to voicemail and texts to him aren’t delivering.

“We’re here to help,” Adaine says encouragingly. “What can we do?”

Fig’s grand plan—she has a grand plan, apparently—is to have Adaine cast locate creature to point them in the right direction, or at least let them know if Riz is in the building or neighbourhood. That plan is quickly foiled when Adaine announces glumly that she has no spell slots left (Sorry, guys, me and Aelwyn kinda had a day) and they go back and forth on the next best plan of attack for about ten minutes until Gorgug quietly asks if Adaine would like to take a nap.

“Do I want—what?”

Normally, Kristen can kind of track Gorgug’s line of logic. Because there almost always is one, just not usually one the bad kids immediately understand. That doesn’t mean it’s not there, though. 

This time, she’s at a loss.

“For the spell slots,” Gorgug explains, blinking down at them from behind his bangs, “If you trance then you’ll get spell slots back, right?” He looks small in that moment, tucked up against the armrest of the couch, unsure. “That’s a wizard thing?”

“Oh,” Adaine says, “Sorry, yeah, that’s a wizard thing.”

“So…?”

“I mean. I could. It would take four hours—well, maybe less if we just need one spell—but I could. If that’s our best shot?”

“A four hour nap cannot be our best shot,” Fabian says then, leveling them with a look like, Guys.

Fig shrugs. “I mean, while Adaine is trancing we could go look for him. It doesn’t have to be just that.” Fabian grumbles something under his breath but evidently doesn’t have any better ideas so they leave Adaine on the couch to trance on her own and go check in with Sklonda before heading out in Gorgug’s parents’ van. 

She’s on the phone when Kristen pops her head into the apartment, but waves them inside anyway. 

“Okay, thanks. Yeah, I’ll give you a call if we find him.” She sighs as she hangs up, then turns to the bad kids with a forced smile. “Hey, guys. Any word?”

“Not yet, but we’re having Adaine trance so she can cast locate creature. While that’s happening we were gonna go drive around town to check out our usual spots.”

“Well,” Sklonda says, hands on her hips, “You guys would know better than I do.” She shakes her head and then her face creases up, pinched. “Oh, god,” she mutters, “Am I a bad mom?”

Kristen feels lightly horrified, stomach churning again. 

Meanwhile, Fig steps forward immediately, assuring her, “No, you’re a great mom, Sklonda. Trust me, my mom sucks, I would know.”

“Oh,” Sklonda chokes out, half a sob and half a laugh. “I’m sorry, I don’t want to—in front of—it’s just hard, you know? I try to be there for him but I have to work and with Pok—I just—it feels like it’s never going to be enough.” She runs a hand over her face and Kristen watches as Fig comforts her quietly, rubbing a hand over her back.

Kristen feels useless but at least the boys are right there with her, standing a little ways off and a little shellshocked by the display of vulnerability. 

Fig coos and shushes and comforts Sklonda through her tears. “You’re like, the best mom out of all our moms,” she says, to which Fabian bristles and Gorgug opens his mouth, then closes it. Kristen readies herself to shut them up, which is at least something she knows she can do, here. 

Sklonda laughs, but she looks sad. “Thank you, Fig,” she says, recovered enough to add a little sarcasm to it. “Riz is lucky to have you guys. I’m glad he has you guys. It’s been just the two of us for so long, and it’s so nice to see him finally have some friends.”

Gorgug shifts, the movement catching Kristen’s eye. She has a feeling Sklonda isn’t alone in her sentiment, there. 

“He’s lucky to have you, too,” Fig says.

And then, because there is something deeply wrong with Kristen, she says, “Yeah, not all of us can have a mom that’s so smokin’ hot and—”

“Kristen,” Sklonda cuts in, as stern as she’s been all night. She enunciates every word as she continues, “I need you not to call me hot anymore. Do you understand me?”

Kristen shrinks. “Okay,” she says, very small. 

Sklonda visibly softens as she says, “I appreciate what you’re trying to do but I am sure there are girls your own age that would love to get a compliment like that from you.”

It takes a second, but then Kristen is the one crying, mouth wobbling as fat tears fill her eyes, fists balled at her sides. In an instant Sklonda is across the room, arms open, a quiet, “Oh, come here, honey,” as she wraps Kristen up in a hug.

She sniffles into her shoulder and asks, “Do you really think so?”

“Do I think what, kiddo?”

“That—that, um, girls, that they’d love—want—”

“Yes,” Sklonda says, quite forcefully, “Of course, Kristen.”

And then she is fully sobbing, chest heaving and body shaking in Sklonda’s arms. 

“Thanks,” she says wetly into Sklonda’s neck, “For, um, being—”

“Always,” Sklonda says, “Always, Kristen.”

At some point she is vaguely aware of other arms around her—someone petting her hair, someone else rubbing little circles on her back—and she realizes that the rest of the bad kids, the ones that are there, anyway, have all gathered around her and Sklonda in a group hug. Kristen pushes down the uncomfortable feeling that’s been plaguing her the whole afternoon—Don’t let them help you, don’t be a burden—and sniffles, pulling herself gently out of Sklonda’s embrace.

“Uh, thanks,” she says lamely, squeezing back when Fabian squeezes her hand. “Not to, uh, derail or anything. Maybe we can go look for Riz now?”

Sklonda smiles, small and a little sad. “That sounds like a good plan, kiddo.” Then, she laughs a little, mostly to herself, and says, “Man, I wish—this is stupid, but I wish Riz was here to solve his own disappearance. Kid’s a little obsessive, I’ll say that, but he knows his way around a corkboard, that’s for sure.”

Kristen smiles, lets her eyes slide over to the board he has in the corner of the living room, the missing girls’ pictures pinned up with a web of red string. It’s been a while since they worked on it together, but she’s not surprised that he’s still been picking away at it.

Sklonda gently ushers them out of the apartment as she starts in on another round of phone calls and the bad kids are left to map out their own route. Standing around in the hallway outside their two apartments, Kristen has a note open on her phone with a list of locations to hit, in no particular order:

• school
• woods behind the school
• basrar’s 
• river - throwing rocks?
• krom’s
• st. owens (call first?)

They don’t have any leads except that Sklonda thinks he could be investigating his own lead, for the missing girls case. Kristen vaguely remembers hearing him and Adaine talking about palimpsests on the way home from school the other day, but she kind of tuned out after a while. She feels guilty, now, stomach upset with it as the minutes without Riz get longer and longer, and she tries and fails to think of a physical location any info about the palimpsests would have led him to. 

“Would it be bad if we ate first?” Fig asks kind of sheepishly, kicking the toe of her boot into the carpet of the third floor hallway. 

Gorgug offers, “I don’t think that’s bad.”

“No?”

“No.”

Fig sighs in relief and they end up going down to the vending machine, questioning Juan on the way. He hasn’t seen Riz since this morning. Kristen tries not to feel defeated but the hits keep coming when she discovers the vending machine is fresh out of sour candies. It’s out of a lot of things, one of which just so happens to strike Kristen and Fig at the exact same time.

“Ketchup chips,” Fig gasps. 

“Holy shit.”

Kristen knows for a fact that there were ketchup chips in stock as recently as late last night, because when she and Fig and Riz came down to get chocolate for their movie night, the machine was full of them. Riz had even gotten a pack, but had specifically only gotten one to make sure to leave some in stock for other Riz. Which means that all of the rest of the ketchup chips had to have been taken today. 

Fig looks at Kristen, a wild glint in her eye. “Let’s go.”

 Kristen is first through the portal, clutching her broken finger for the minute it takes for everyone else to come through the wall. Frist timers Fabian and Gorgug look especially betrayed by the pain as they fall to the ground of the fourth floor. Kristen puts out a mass healing word the moment Fig and her bass appear. 

Then down to the third floor they go. Other Sklonda opens the door with a Oh, hey, guys, and calls out for other Riz. He emerges from the corner of the living room that functions as his room, a piece of red string hanging out of his mouth and newspaper clippings in his hands. 

“Hey!” he says brightly. “Haven’t seen you guys in a while.”

Kristen shifts her weight. Opens her mouth, closes it, then opens it again. Remembers Riz on the loading dock and takes a chance. “That’s not true though, is it?”

Other Riz smiles around the red string, caught. “I was hoping you thought that was your Riz,” he admits guiltily. 

Fabian, who, along with Gorgug, had previously just been standing there and staring at other Riz with his mouth open, says, “Wait, what?”

“Oh, sorry, how rude of me.” Other Riz shakes his head, drops the string and the newspaper clippings, and walks across the room to the door. He pulls two business cards out of his pocket and says, “Some literature for you. I’m Riz, it’s nice to meet you.”

“Yeah, I fucking know who you are.” Fabian takes the card and throws it over his shoulder, other Riz frowning as he says, “You—other you—our you—is missing.”

Now it’s other Riz’s turn to go, “Wait, what?” His eyes are wide and sad. He mutters, “That doesn’t fit the pattern.”

“Yeah,” Kristen says, “We don’t think it’s related to the missing girls. Or—he might be off looking into that, but we don’t think he was taken.”

“Okay,” other Riz says, “When did you see him last?”

“Well, not on the loading dock, because that was you, right?” Kristen knew there was something off about him, standing there stiffly and calling them the bad kids. At least I helped at something today, she thinks victoriously.

Other Riz looks sheepish. “I—yeah. I try not to use the main entrances. I don’t want to mess up his life or anything, so I try not to be seen as much as I can. Must’ve failed my stealth check, I guess. And deception. Damn.”

Kristen considers this carefully. It seems like he’s implying, in so many words, that this wasn’t his first time going into their world and leaving Strongtower. Fig has the same idea. “So you come into our world often, then? Not just for ketchup chips?”

“Another girl from school went missing yesterday, here. Ostentatia Wallace. I wanted to see if it was the same on your side.”

Kristen has no idea who that is. Shit. She puts a pin in it for Riz—their Riz—and says, “Okay, so the last time we saw Riz was when—we got the couch upstairs and he came down with us to take the truck back, right?” She turns to Fabian and Fig, suddenly unsure. “Right?”

Fig nods. “Yeah, yeah. No, because he’s the one who knows how to get out to the loading dock. We were following him.”

“Okay, so he must have snuck away sometime after that, when we were outside. So that leaves us—”

“At square one, still,” Fabian finishes, pinching his forehead with two fingers. 

“So you haven’t—he hasn’t been here?” Kristen tries, looking at other Riz with her dwindling hope. As far as she knows their Riz doesn’t regularly come to the other Strongtower without them, but if other Riz does it then she can’t put it past their own.

“I haven’t seen him, no. I didn’t see him at the loading dock, either. Do you guys—do you want help?”

Fabian snorts. “Do we want the ball to help us investigate the ball’s disappearance?”

Other Riz frowns. “I’d rather you not call me that,” he says coldly. 

“Oh,” Fig says, “That’s a term of endearment, in our world.”

Other Riz doesn’t look convinced. Kristen is swiftly reminded of the fact that none of them are friends, in his world. “Still,” he says, looking uncomfortable. 

But not uncomfortable enough to rescind his offer of help when Fabian says a rare, “Sorry,” and sighs. “Why not, right? Our lives are already weird enough. Let’s get Riz to help us find Riz. Fuck it, sure.”

And then they’re back on their own third floor, other Riz in tow, stomping into Gilear’s apartment to go wake up Adaine. She groggily notes that it has not been four hours, but that the new couch is so comfortable that she’s regained two entire spell slots. 

“Oh,” she says once she’s gained her bearings, “You found him?”

“No, other one. I’m here to help.”

“Oh. Hey, dude. Thanks.”

A preliminary casting of locate creature tells them that Riz is in fact not within one thousand feet, much less at Strongtower. Which is disappointing because wouldn’t it have been nice if he decided to just go take a swim without remembering to tell anyone? But at least they know, and can move ahead with their plan of checking around town. 

They all pile into Gorgug’s parents’ van, minus Fabian who follows on the Hangman. They check the school first—maybe the talk of palimpsests would have led him to the AV club?—and discover that it is straight up just left unlocked on the weekends. Thirty minutes of roaming the halls leaves them with nothing, so Gorgug calls Skrank and Biz in case Riz went to either of their houses to talk AV club stuff, but there’s nothing there, either. They don’t exactly want to be telling the whole town that Riz is missing especially given that they don’t really know who is involved with the missing girls, but the AV club losers seem like a safe bet. 

After the school they divide and conquer the Far Haven woods, which are kind of scary after the sun has gone down. Kristen sticks close to Gorgug as they traipse around calling Riz’s name, and she breathes a sigh of relief when Fig messages the group chat, Okay let’s meet back up at the school in 5. 

Next they loop around to Basrar’s and Krom’s, which are both another bust. Krom’s isn’t all that far off from Kristen’s parents’ place, and as they piled back into the van she is acutely aware of the fact that she hasn’t been back there in months, now. 

And the thing is this—Kristen always sort of thought she would understand her mom more as she got older. Or at least that’s what her mom said would happen. She hasn’t heard it since November but her mom’s voice is still ringing clear in her head: You’ll get it when you’re an adult, Kristen, she would say, an adult always with that sneer like what she really meant to say was a person. Kristen does not know what to make of that, but she does know that she does not get it, as the minutes with Riz unaccounted for slide by, one after another. Her parents were outraged when she got lost in the mall but all Kristen feels now is worry, thick and expanding like a balloon in her throat, every breath she takes without Riz’s whereabouts known filling it up just a little more. 

She tries and fails to swallow it down as Gorgug mutters an Uh huh and a Thank you on the phone with St. Owen’s. She opens the group chat instead of listening to the conversation go south, looks at the selfie Riz sent after they left with the truck. 5:45pm. Their last communication with him. He looks so happy, so thrilled to be in the back of that truck in the dark with Fig and Kristen, so innocent and unknowing that in a mere hour he’d practically be a missing person. 

She saves the photo to her camera roll just as Gorgug is hanging up the phone and shaking his head. 

“At least that means he’s not hurt,” Fig says encouragingly and Kristen thinks, We don’t know that. He could very well be hurt and just not at the hospital—alone, scared, needing help that she’s not there to provide—but Kristen keeps her mouth shut as the car starts again, taking them slowly along the river to see if he’s just throwing rocks again. Last time he went throwing rocks he ended up in the river and Kristen can’t help but think hypothermia, especially at this time of year. 

“Guys,” she croaks, “I’m starting to get worried.” 

She doesn’t want to cry—not again, not so soon after her breakdown in front of Sklonda, not when morale is starting to waver—but she feels a burn behind her eyes in the back of Gorgug’s van and starts to cry not long after, wiping her eyes on her sleeve as discretely as she can, which actually for the record isn’t very discretely at all.

“We’ll find him,” Fig says determinedly, throwing her arms around Kristen. “We will.”

Adaine reaches back and puts her hand on Kristen’s knee. “Maybe we should go check in with Sklonda? See where she’s at?”

“That’s a good idea,” Gorgug says, turning them around and in the direction of Ballaster. 

Kristen almost starts to cry again when Sklonda’s eyes light up at the sign of other Riz, but she quickly sobers herself and says, “Hey, kiddo. Thanks for helping out.” 

“No problem, other mom.”

Sklonda tells them that she’s giving Riz another hour before she files a missing persons report with her work. The forty-eight hour thing is apparently a myth. And he’s done this before—disappeared overnight once before—but given that his phone is still off or otherwise not receiving messages, Sklonda isn’t fucking around. The bad kids give her the rundown of where they’ve been and she frowns, looking off into the middle distance for a minute before suggesting that they check, of all places, the Cravencroft Cemetery. 

“Why would he be there?” It slips out of Kristen’s mouth before she can stop it, unintentional skepticism dripping from the words. Woops. She notices that other Riz suddenly gets very still, and very quiet. She does not have time to examine it before Sklonda blinks at her, staring unreadably for a moment before softening and letting out a sigh.

“Well. His dad is there.”

The room is quiet for three whole seconds. Then, Fabian spits, “What?”

Sklonda widens her eyes, just a little bit, and stammers out, “I mean he’s—he’s there. Buried, at the cemetery. We don’t go as, as often as we probably should, but we go see him from time to time.”

Fig is open-mouthed, horrified. “Riz’s dad is dead?”

“Oh, sweetie. Yes, he passed away about five years ago.”

Gorgug catches Kristen’s eye and they share a look like, Did you know that? It appears none of them did, not until this very moment. 

Adaine asks, quietly, “Are we bad friends?”

Fabian throws a hand in the air. “Well, we lost him, so.”

“I didn’t lose him,” Adaine corrects. “Gorgug didn’t lose him.”

They go back and forth for a little bit until eventually Sklonda quiets their bickering. Gorgug turns to other Riz and asks, clumsy, “Is your—uh, in your world, is—”

“Yeah,” he says quickly. “My dad is dead too.” He looks down at his feet. “I guess he doesn’t really tell people, either.”

Kristen wants to ask—nearly does—but in a rare show of restraint, she doesn’t. She knows that now isn’t the time, not with Riz still missing, and she knows that it’s also still not really their business, because they don’t actually know other Riz that well and their own Riz hasn’t told them, yet. It would be an intrusion on both of them to pry further. 

And besides. Now they have another lead. 

They head back out into the cold—late, now, shops closing down and roads gradually emptying—and make their way to the cemetery, its large gates gothic and imposing. Kristen hasn’t been here since they were looking for Zayn. 

Riz didn’t say anything about his dad then. She wonders how much else he doesn’t talk about. 

The lot looks pretty empty but they search up and down its rows of headstones, calling Riz’s name after his dad’s grave is found to be unattended. When that doesn’t magically conjure him either, the group decides to have Adaine cast one final use of locate creature. Kristen holds her breath as Adaine’s eyes glow white, hands held up in concentration. For a second she almost thinks it’s gonna work out, but then Adaine groans in frustration and says, “No.”

“Fuck.”

Fig kicks a nearby headstone and Fabian runs his hands down his face. Gorgug just sort of stands there and other Riz starts going through his notepad, mumbling to himself and pacing. Kristen takes out her crystal and opens her camera roll, looking at the picture she’d saved earlier. 

“There has to be something else,” Adaine says, “there has to be.”

Kristen faces her crystal out to the group. “Look at that innocent face,” she whines, “Look at it.”

Adaine nods, dismissive, then does a double take. 

In the dark of the cemetery, she looks, really looks.

Takes out her own crystal, opens up the group chat. Looks at Kristen’s crystal, then back to her own. Then Kristen’s again, then—

“Kristen,” she says calmly.

“Adaine?”

“When did you guys leave to go take back the truck?”

“I don’t know, like, quarter to six?”

“So like when this photo was taken?”

“No, he took it earlier when we were all in the back. Or, when he and Fig were in the back. He sent it after we left, just the three of us. He was already—well we thought he went back to his mom but that was other Riz. But he wasn’t with us.”

“Kristen,” Adaine repeats, “Your crystal—the metadata tied to the photo in your camera roll—says this photo was taken at 5:44pm. My crystal says Riz sent his text at 5:45pm.”

“Okay?”

“So if you guys were already on the road for a couple minutes at 5:45pm, and he took the photo in the back of the truck at 5:44pm, then he was in the back of the truck when you were driving it.”

“Oh my god. Oh my god?” Kristen looks down at her crystal again, into Riz’s smiling eyes.  The answer was in her hand this entire time. 

Fig’s mouth drops in horror and she whispers, “There was no service in the lot.”

Adaine lifts a finger. “That would explain the texts and calls not delivering.”

Fabian does not move. “So, he, he—”

“So he at least was in the truck for—for some time.”

“But Max said, said they would inspect the truck. So he has to have found him, right?”

Gorgug grimaces. “It was Max?”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, I don’t know if he… I don’t know. I don’t know.”

Fabian closes his eyes. “So the ball has been in the back of a U-Haul truck—we left the ball in the back of a U-Haul truck—for like, hours?”

“Uhhhhh—”

“What the fuck? You guys, what the fuck.”

There is all other manner of guilt and freaking out and blaming and such, and then other Riz speaks up and says, “Guys. Shut the fuck up. Let’s just go get him. Me. Whatever.” There is a beat, and then he adds, “You guys are weird, just so you know.”

We forgot Riz in the truck. These six words play on repeat in Kristen’s head like a penance and she wonders, briefly, if her mom ever felt the same guilt. She decides she doesn’t care as other Riz takes out his lockpicking kit—thank god they have, if not their own rogue, the next closest possible thing—and begins picking the lock to the back part of the lot with the trucks. Fig takes the opportunity to disguise herself as Max, Just in case anyone comes by. 

The lock drops onto the pavement and it’s a little bit chaotic from then on, the bad kids splitting up and banging on the sides of trucks and yelling Riz’s name in hopes of locating which of the identical box trucks was theirs. It’s deeply unstealthy, save for other Riz who is moving exclusively within the shadows of the lot, and Kristen just hopes the security cameras are rusted out enough that they’re not in any real danger of being recognized, if the tapes are even being reviewed. 

They are, maybe, as a group, getting a little too accustomed to committing crimes.

But that, at the present moment, is neither here nor there because then Fabian is yelling out a frenzied, Guys! Over here! and the group is gathering around him at the back of one of the trucks. 

“I think this is the one,” he says, panting as he climbs up on the ledge and unlatches the lock, sliding the door open with a grunt. Kristen casts light, pushes her staff up into the retreating darkness, and holds her breath.

Inside, Riz Gukgak is sitting cross-legged on a pile of blankets.

“Oh, you guys aren’t dead. That’s cool.”

Kristen barks a laugh, nearly a sob. “What?”

Riz shrugs, shifting on the blankets. “I thought maybe—oh, hello—” He stops as Fig, still disguised as Max, crawls up into the back of the truck and tackles him into a hug. “—I thought maybe you guys had died?”

Fabian sighs, shaking his head. “Why would we have—not important, I don’t care, we found you, this is—this is good. Hello, the ball.”

Riz smiles. “Hello.” His eyes scan the crowd, bowled over by various levels of relief, and says, “Oh, hey other me. How’s it hangin’?”

“Having an interesting night. Otherwise, good. Your friends are weird. They were very worried about you, though. 

Riz snorts. “Yeah,” he says. “Fabian, I totally thought you saw me when you were closing the thing.”

Fabian widens his eyes in a What do you want from me sort of way. “You’re—it was dark. You’re small.”

“What’s your passive perception again?”

“Hey, fuck you. You’re the one that hid without telling any of us.”

“It’s okay,” Kristen cuts in, “we know you didn’t mean to,” she says encouragingly, warmly. Fuck you, mom, she thinks. 

Riz blinks. “Oh, no, I definitely meant to.”

“Oh.” Well. “We’re not mad at you, still.”

“Well yeah, I would hope not, considering you guys are the ones that left me back there,” he says matter-of-factly, bumping his head gently into Fig’s as she continues to hold him. She mumbles a Sorry. No one else really has anything to say to that, mostly because it’s true. Kristen looks down at her shoes, sheepish. She feels a little faint, actually. Whether from guilt or relief she’s not totally sure. The balloon in her throat deflates. Riz is safe.

Adaine says, after a sort of awkward silence, “We should probably let your mom know you’re okay.”

“Oh,” Kristen says, “Yeah.”

Riz hops out of the truck, other Riz offering him a packet of ketchup chips from his briefcase, which he devours promptly. They all make their way back to Gorgug’s van and Fabian’s bike as Kristen holds her crystal up to the air, waiting for service to return so she can text Sklonda the good news. She doesn’t exactly know how to word it in a way that doesn’t make it sound like they all kind of just left him in the U-Haul for like five hours, so she just takes a picture of Riz—high flash, mid-chip—and sends it with the caption, :) found him! 

Her stomach twists as she awaits a response—there is a part of her, small and afraid and not yet found, that is waiting for it to happen. The yelling, the grabbing, the grounding. Not that Sklonda could ostensibly ground Kirsten, but she could do the rest, and she could take it all back, from before. That might be worse. 

The three dots appear on her screen and her stomach twists but the other shoe does not drop, in the end.

AMAZING

thank you kristen

And that’s it. Kristen heart reacts the messages and turns off her crystal as they all load into the van, en route to Strongtower once again. Other Riz bids them adieu, citing bashfully that he doesn’t want to worry his mom, either. He and Riz perform an intricate handshake before parting ways, and then the bad kids are on their way to the third floor again.

Kristen’s stomach settles as they walk through the halls she’s, over the past few months, come to call home. No one is going to yell at her, here. Well, they might, but if they do, it will be because she’s cheating at monopoly. If anyone grabs her, it will be to pull her into a hug at the end of the night. There will always be someone there at the end of the night. 

They round the corner to their hallway, units 304 and 306 in sigh. “What are the chances your mom would let you have a sleepover tonight?” Fig asks hopefully. Riz barks out a laugh.

“Low.”

“Can we ask anyway?”

“Sure.”