You love your sister, but you don't like her right now.
You know she was whammied, and you know she never would have said those things to you under other circumstances, but there was some truth to what she said.
She's leaning back against the side of the crib looking at the mountain of trash in the middle of the nursery, obviously confused, and you know that, despite how she made you feel, you're still going to help her clean this mess up because she's your little sister.
"Listen, Tracey," you begin. "When you were, um… when you were coming back to consciousness, you said some things, and I thought maybe we should talk—"
"Myka," Pete calls from the hallway.
"Just a second!" you answer. You turn back to her. "Tracey, you said something about naming my mole, which I…" you roll your eyes and wave your hands, "don't care about anymore, of course, but you also said I was jea—"
"Myka!" Pete calls again. His voice is more urgent this time. You can tell that something is wrong.
"Okay, just a second," you tell her, standing up. "Wait another minute before you try to get up."
Pete is talking to Chloe on his Farnsworth in the hall. He looks up at you when he hears you approaching.
"Something's wrong at the Warehouse."
"Why?" you ask. "What makes you say that?" You turn to Claudia. "Is Josh okay?"
"He's fine," Pete answers for her. "Artie lied to Claudia…" he nods toward the Farnsworth, "about where her brother was, and he hung up on me when that tattoo box was burning me from the inside out. He just hung up. He never does that."
"Well, he's distracted," you say with a shrug. "Brother Adrian is in the Warehouse a-a-and Artie said the database is down."
"Yeah, except that it's not," Claudia replies. "I set up a remote testing system. It checks in every few minutes. I would have gotten the alert."
You turn to Pete. "Why would Artie say that?"
"I don't know," Pete sighs. "We need to get back to the Warehouse right now."
"Right now" turns out to be eight hours later, because there isn't a flight from Colorado Springs to Rapid City today.
You know something is wrong as soon as you get to the Warehouse. Mr. Kosan's car is there, and so is Pete's mom's.
Pete is already standing outside, the door of his car still open. He's talking to Leena with his arms tightly crossed. You can tell she's been crying. Her brown floral shirt is stained with blood.
She starts crying again when she sees you.
"I'm so, so sorry, Myka," she sobs, shaking her head. "I'm so sorry."
"What's going on?" You ask slowly. You turn to Pete. "Why's your mom here? Where are Helena and Artie?"
Pete sighs. "Rapid City Regional Hospital." He takes your arm and guides you toward his car. "Come on, I'll explain on the way."
Helena is still in surgery when you arrive at the hospital. By the time she gets out, Claudia and Leena have arrived.
"She's spending the night in Intensive Care," the doctor tells you. "She's stable. We're hoping to transfer her to a different unit tomorrow."
So you go to a motel and pay for two rooms. Pete takes one in anticipation of Steve's arrival, and you, Leena, and Claudia pile into the other.
You're slumped on the end of the bed pulling off your shoes when Claudia stops in front of you, hands fidgeting at her sides.
"What, Claud?" you ask without looking up.
"I know she's not Jewish," Claudia says. She shoves her hands into the pockets of her pants. "But, um… do you want to say Mi Shebeirach?"
When you go back in the morning, Helena is awake and higher than the heels Tracey wore to prom her sophomore year.
"Myka!" she exclaims when she sees you. "You look beautiful. And Claudia, has your hair always been that red? Does anyone know what time it is? No one will tell me."
"10:32 in the morning, H.G.," Claudia answers as she flops down on the side of the bed.
"How do you feel?" You press a kiss against her hair.
"I feel amazing," Helena murmurs. "I feel like I'm a cloud. Or maybe a whale."
You sink into the chair beside the bed and lace your fingers through hers.
"There's the woman of the hour!" Helena exclaims when Leena walks in. "My guardian angel! My guiding light!" She turns to Myka conspiratorially. "She saved my life." She's trying to whisper, but the people in the hallway can probably still hear her.
"Hey, hey, hey." Pete leans toward Leena in his chair. "We didn't hear that."
"Because it wasn't a big deal." Leena waves him off. "I had to Tesla Artie. It was horrible."
"She was like that superheroine," Helena continues. "Wonder Woman. Just when death was closing in. I could feel her unrelenting embrace."
"Leena, what happened?" you ask. "I didn't know you were there when… when it actually…"
Leena sinks into the chair on the other side of the bed. "I was talking to Artie, and I got the call from Mrs. Frederic. She told me brother Adrian was in Rome, and Artie was—he wasn't making sense. He was talking to himself, he was confused, and that's when H.G. showed up. I guess Trailer got her—"
"I'm renaming him Lassie!" Helena cuts in.
"And Mrs. Frederic told me to leave and H.G. practically pushed me down the next aisle… so I started to go, and then I heard gunfire, and I knew I had to do something, so I grabbed a Tesla." Her voice cracks, and Claudia rests a hand on her back. "And when I got back, Artie was standing over H.G. holding a gun. He looked roughed up; I guess H.G. tried to take it from him, so I Tesla-ed him before he could shoot her again, and I threw my shirt on her to try to stop the bleeding, and that's when I called Mrs. Frederic."
"Why did you apologize to me yesterday?" you ask.
"I just feel like if I hadn't left in the first place, Artie might not have—"
"Leena, if you hadn't left, you might have been shot too," you tell her. "Thank you." You reach across the bed and squeeze her hand. "Seriously. Thank you."
She nods. Her chin is shaking like she might start crying.
"No one really flies kites anymore, do they?" Helena asks you.
Helena's hand is still in yours, but you're standing in the doorway of the kitchen you recognize from the house where you and H.G. live. Leena is sitting at the table with Kate. A half a dozen jars of paint lie open before them.
"I think it could use a little blue," Leena says to Kate. "What do you think?"
Kate smiles and dips her fingers into the jar of light blue paint. She dabs it onto the paper in front of her. She can't be more than eight or nine, old enough to take care in what she's creating but not too old to delight in the feel of paint between her fingers.
"No, I guess not," you answer. "I hadn't noticed. We still had kites when I was a kid. We didn't make them, though. They were plastic and we bought them at Wal-Mart."
Helena clicks her tongue and shakes her head.
Kate reaches up and smears blue paint across Leena's cheek.
She laughs, "Hey!"
She dips her own fingers in pink and dabs it onto the tip of Kate's nose.
Helena squeezes her hand. She's back in the bed with an IV attached to her arm. "You look like you were dreaming. Were there unicorns?"
Helena falls asleep early, and the others get up to leave.
"The car Steve drove is down in the parking lot," Pete tells you. He squeezes your shoulder. "Try to get some sleep."
"If she wakes up, tell her we'll be back tomorrow," Claudia adds.
The lights are dim in the hospital room, and you can hear Helena's slow breathing. You take a moment to watch her sleep. Helena has cheated death in every way imaginable, and it seemed too much to hope that she would be lucky again.
But here she is, alive and snoring to prove it.
You fish your phone out of your back pocket. There are three missed calls from Tracey, probably because of the way you and Pete rushed off yesterday, and a missed call from your mother, probably because Tracey told her you were in town and didn't visit her.
You tap Tracey's name and hold the phone to your ear. It rings twice before she picks up.
"Myka? I'm so glad you called me back! What happened yesterday? I was worried."
"There was a problem at my office," you answer. "Pete and I had to get back to help."
"What was it?" she asks. "Is everything okay?"
"Not… not really," you answer. "One of my…" It feels wrong to call Helena a coworker. "One of my friends was shot. She's stable. I'm at the hospital with her now."
"Oh no! Myka!" Tracey exclaims. "You know, sometimes I forget that your job is dangerous."
"Listen, I wanted to tell you something yesterday, before we got pulled out—"
"Oh, right, the mole thing," Tracey replies. "I'm sorry about that. I was thirteen. It was stupid—"
"It's not—it's not the mole thing, Tracey. You said some other things that… that I wanted to talk to you about." You sigh. "You accused me of being jealous of you because of your husband and because I'm not married. You said that I've always been jealous of you." You swallow. "Do you really think that?"
"Oh, Myka…" There's a long break on the other end of the line.
"Three years ago, you would have been right," you admit. "For a long time, all I wanted was for things to be easy like they were for you. Fitting in, dating, living the life Mom and Dad wanted me to. It all came so naturally to you, and I was always too loud or too stubborn or too boyish. But… but I've realized that's not what I want."
"What, the house with the husband and the kid?" Tracey asks.
"No, I do want the house and the kid someday, but…" you take a deep breath and exhale slowly, "I want them with a wife."
There is silence on the other end of the line.
"Tracey?" you ask after a moment. You can feel your heart beating in your fingertips. "Are you still there?"
"Yeah," she sighs. "Yeah, Myka, I am." She pauses. "Are you saying you're…" she trails off.
"Gay?" you ask. "Yeah, Trace, that's what I'm saying. Is that… are you okay with that?"
There are another few seconds of silence, and then, "Yeah. Of course, I am. You're my sister."
"Good," you breathe.
"Have… have you told Mom and Dad yet?" she asks.
"No," you answer. "And I'm not sure when I going to, so don't say anything to them. I just have this feeling they're not going to take it very well."
You still have no idea if what you're seeing is the future or some other timeline, and at this point, you've gone back and forth on it so many times you've lost count, but this, you're sure of.
"You know, I'm not even that surprised. It makes sense," Tracey tells you. She hesitates. You can almost hear her thinking over the phone line. "You've always been so brave."
"It's not bravery. It's just—" you start to tell her, but she cuts you off.
"I remember when we were kids and I broke something or ruined something or got something dirty, you used to say you did it so Dad wouldn't yell at me because it made me cry. I remember when you punched that guy who stood me up for homecoming freshman year and got detention for a week. You've always been there for me, and I thanked you by naming your mole, so this time I'm going to be there for you." She pauses to take a breath, and you want to say something in response, but you're not sure what.
"Do you have someone?"
"What?"
"Are you seeing anyone?"
"Oh." You let your eyes slide over to Helena, still asleep beside you. "Yeah, I am. The friend, the one I told you about who… who got shot."
Tracey gasps. "Oh my god, Myka."
"Her name's Helena. She's been my friend for… for years, and there were some complications but that's…" you wave your hand, "that's not important. The relationship is new, but… the love isn't."
"Do you know if she's the one?" Tracey asks.
You smile. "I'm positive."
"Oh, I'm so happy for you," Tracey gasps. "You deserve this, you know? You deserve this after everything. And I want to meet her."
"I hope you will."
"Helena, it's so good to see you. Congratulations."
You're in a hospital, but the room is different. There are balloons and flowers and stuffed animals, and you're the one in the bed.
Tracey hugs Helena. Kevin is trailing behind her, holding another basket of flowers and a balloon that says, "It's A Girl!" in pink bubble letters.
Tracey turns to you. "Oh, there she is. Look, Kevin! Our niece!"
Tracey hurries to your bedside as Kevin deposits the flowers on the table at the end of the bed. Helena sits down on your other side and brushes a strand of hair out of your face.
Tracey peers at the bundle in your arms. "I can't believe I'm an aunt."
"You've been a mother for nine years," you point out. "This can't be that exciting."
"Of course, it is," Tracey coos at the bundle. "I don't have to change this one's diapers. You went with Catherine?"
"We're calling her Kate," Helena says. "At Myka's behest. She assures me that it's going to get shortened anyway, and we might as well decide what it gets shortened to."
Kate yawns and stretches her arm out. Her fist is no larger than the bouncy balls you used to get out of the vending machine at the grocery store.
"Look at her," Tracey gasps. "Myka, you have such a beautiful family."
"Tell that to the nurses," you mutter. Helena's hand comes to your shoulder.
Tracey cocks her head. "What do you mean?"
"They're giving us funny looks," you answer. "Pete was here yesterday, and they were fine until they found out he wasn't the father."
"Do you want me to go talk to them?" Kevin asks, already moving toward the door.
"No, no," you answer quickly. "That'll just make it worse. We're going home tomorrow anyway."
"If we'd determined confrontation was the most appropriate course of action, I assure you, I'd have taken care of it already," Helena adds, the hand on your shoulder tightening.
"Myka, you still there?" Tracey asks.
"Yeah, sorry," you say into the phone, shaking your head. "I'm just tired. It's been a long day."
"I should let you get some sleep," she says. "You will sleep, right?"
"Funny," you reply. "Pete had the same concern."
"I know how you like to take care of people," Tracey says. "I remember that time Dad got sick with… whatever he had. You worked around the clock."
"I promise, I'll try to sleep," you answer. "Goodnight, Tracey."
"Goodnight," Tracey answers. "I love you, Myka."
"Love you too."
"Helena?" you call. The door of her room is cracked, and you push it open.
"In here!" she answers from the bathroom. When she steps out to meet you, she's holding a washrag to her back, just below her ribcage, where you know her exit wound is.
"Are you bleeding?" you ask.
"Just a tad," she answers. She's trying to wave it off, but you can feel your heartrate increase.
"For how long?" you demand, grabbing her shoulder and turning her so you can look at the wound. "They said to come back if you had bleeding that didn't stop after applying pressure for five minutes.'
"It hasn't been that long," she answers unhelpfully.
You sigh. "Is that a clean rag? Did you wash your hands?"
She doesn't answer immediately, and you brush past her into the bathroom, pushing your sleeves up as you turn on the water.
"Myka, it's not a big deal," she says.
You shake your head. "You could get an infection. Do you want to be back in the hospital again?"
You fish under the sink for one of the bandages she was given when she was released and unwrap it.
"Lie down," you tell her.
She climbs onto the bed and lays on her stomach, and you pull the hand holding the bloodied rag away. She groans when you press the bandage to the wound.
"Sorry," you say.
She shakes her head. "Please. I gave birth without an anesthetic at seventeen years old, and I was quite the rough and tumble child. I know how to handle pain."
You chuckle, "I think if I'd been alive then, that would have put me off the idea of having children altogether."
"As would the having sex with men," Helena points out. "That was the only way to do it then. Something I rather excelled in, of course, but I know it doesn't interest you."
"I always forget how different your life must have been before you were bronzed," you comment.
"Ha," Helena replies. "Sometimes, I wish I could stop remembering. I never would have survived this injury. I forgot, when it happened, how advanced medicine had become. I expected to die."
You're quiet for a moment, considering her.
"Do we need to have a conversation about your nonexistent sense of self-preservation?"
"I'd rather we didn't," she answers.
"Have you ever considered…" you hesitate, "talking to someone about it? A professional?"
"No," she answers flatly.
"Have you ever thought about… having a child?"
You're driving through a neighborhood. The street is lined with trees and two-story brick houses. You used to dream of living in a neighborhood like this when you were in elementary school.
You glance over at the passenger side of the car, where Helena's hands are twisting in her lap.
"Yes," you answer measuredly.
You expect her to elaborate, but when you reach a red light and look over at her, she simply purses her lips and looks out the window.
"Why?" you finally ask.
"Because, well… I've been thinking about it. Quite a lot, actually." She clears her throat and shifts her gaze across her lap to your phone, leaning upside-down in the cupholder. The screen shows an album cover you're not familiar with but know that you love.
"What have you been thinking?" you ask slowly.
"That I might…" She takes a deep breath. "I've been thinking that I might want to have another child." She says it so quickly that it sounds like one, long word. "I might want to talk about it at least." She looks up at you. "What would you say to that?"
You look back at the road as the light turns green. You can't help the smile on your face. "I'd say I've been hoping you'd say that."
You see Helena frown at you out of the corner of your eye.
"Why didn't you say anything about it?" she huffs.
"I wasn't sure if you'd want to after Christina," you answer. "I didn't want you to think you were…" you shrug, "denying me of something. I know how self-sacrificing you get when you think you're burdening someone. I didn't want you to agree just because you felt guilty."
You feel her hand come to rest on your leg and squeeze.
"I wasn't sure I wanted to either," she admits. "For a long time, I couldn't imagine—and then last month when we were at your sister's, I was playing with Jake, and I just… wanted it all of a sudden. I thought the feeling would wear off, but it hasn't."
And then you're back in Helena's room at the bed and breakfast pressing a bandage to her back.
"Is this about Christina?" you ask softly.
Helena shifts to look up at you as best she can.
"Try not to move," you tell her with your free hand on her shoulder.
"It is not—" she begins firmly, but then she sighs and deflates beneath you. "I have a hard time feeling concerned about the prospect of dying if it means I'll be wherever she is."
You swallow. You suddenly feel very out of your depth in this conversation.
"I can't tell you not to miss her," you begin. "I can't even imagine what that must feel like."
You feel a sort of phantom pain for the loss of a child who hasn't been born yet—who may not be born in this timeline at all—but you know it's not the same as the almost tangible pain Helena lives with.
"It feels like…" Helena pauses for a moment. "It feels like you're stuck in a dark hole and there's no way out, and you can see the light like a tiny pinprick in an all-black sky, and you remember what it was like to be up there, but you know you'll never be there again." She hesitates and you squeeze her shoulder.
"And then sometimes, occasionally, you forget that you're stuck in a hole; you think maybe it's just dark out right now, and the sun will come up soon, and everything will be as it was, and then you look up and you see the tiny light, and the weight of it becomes even more suffocating than it was before, and you wonder how you ever could have forgotten. You feel so guilty about forgetting, even for that split second when you first wake up in the morning. You feel like maybe it's a sign that you never deserved her in the first place, and maybe that's why she was taken from you."
It takes you a long time to speak again.
"Wow."
"Well, I am a writer, darling."
You lift the bandage carefully off the wound.
"You've stopped bleeding. Wait a second," you add as she starts to get up. "Let me get you a clean one."
You slip off the bed and back into the bathroom to fish another bandage out of the cupboard. You peel off the wrapping as you return to her bedside. You smooth the bandage over the spot, just below her ribs, where the bullet left her body.
"Thank you," she tells you as she sits up.
You lean forward and kiss her, your free hand on the back of her neck. You know you can't take her pain away with a kiss—that's something that only happens in the romance novels on the shelf buried in the back corner of your father's shop—but you try anyway.
Helena and Artie are both out of work for a while. Artie goes before the Regents, but because he was under the influence of an artifact and Helena is expected to make a full recovery, it's a relatively straightforward matter. When Helena offers to testify on his behalf, Mrs. Frederic tells her it won't be necessary.
Helena is restricted to light duty, and she is furious about it.
"We don't even do that much running," she's saying as you enter the Warehouse office, Pete behind you and Claudia and Steve in front. "I can aim and shoot a Tesla. That's all I need to be able to do."
"The last time I was in the field, we were taken hostage by a bunch of mobsters and I had to get us out of it myself. In heels," you argue.
"Good, you're here," Artie says without looking up. "There's been a series of falling deaths in Las Vegas. Pete, Myka—"
"Vegas!" Pete pumps both fists. "You know what they say, Mykes. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, which means…"
He points to you with both index fingers as if he wants to you finish. You shrug.
"I'm going to see Criss Angel," he says, clapping his hands together.
"Here's the file." Artie stands up and hands you a folder. "Flight's out of Rapid City in four hours."
His eyes slide over to Helena.
"Oh," he says. "You're back."
"I'm back," she repeats.
"You look well," he comments.
"Yes," she replies. "Well, I'm told that the survival rate for abdominal gunshot wounds has increased nearly ten-fold since I was bronzed. I suppose we're, as you say, even now."
Artie stares at her for a moment, and then shakes his head. "Good, well, we've been short-staffed and we're behind on inventory."
He hurries to the other side of the office and picks up a precariously stacked armful of clipboards. When he dumps them into Helena's arms, they pile so high she has to look around them to see him. He sets a ring of keys on top.
"You can take the cart."
"Oh yeah! That golf cart thingy." Pete turns to you. "I haven't seen that thing since we started. How come we never use it? We could do inventory in half the time."
"That's exactly why you never use it," Artie answers. "The only peace and quiet I get up here is when you all are down there." He points out the window into the Warehouse.
"Mama, why do you have two belly buttons?"
"Have you seen my light blue shirt? The one with the…" Helena straightens up and looks at you and Kate. "What?"
Kate is sitting beside you on a queen-sized bed in a room you think you've been in before. She's wearing a pink bandana and you can see short wisps of hair poking out from underneath. Helena is bustling around the chest-of-drawers, blouse unbuttoned, obviously looking for something.
"You have two belly buttons," Kate repeats. She scoots forward on the bed and pokes the pucker mark on the left side of Helena's stomach that you know, with a swoop of your stomach, is from a bullet.
She looks up at you, a question in her eyes, and you shrug. You have no idea how old a child should be before learning that her mother was shot.
"That's not a belly button, it's a scar," Helena answers. "I got it at work a long time ago."
"Did it hurt?" Kate asks.
Helena laughs as she picks her up. "It did hurt, but you know how tough I am."
"Did Mommy kiss to make it better?" she asks.
Helena's eyes drift to you briefly, before returning to your daughter. "Yes, she did."
"Fine, fine," Pete lifts his hands in surrender. "Come on, Mykes." He bumps your shoulder as he turns to leave. "There's a fake Eiffel Tower and a pair of really cool sunglasses with my name on them. Hope you're ready to recreate the last scene in Ocean's Eleven."
You're lying in your bed with Helena beside you. Now that she's stopped panting, she has gone silent, but you can tell from the speed of her breathing that she's still awake.
"I can hear you thinking," you say, rolling onto your side to face her. "What's up?"
"It's just that—" Helena breaks off, and you can tell that she's frustrated. "Say you knew something, and you knew I would want to know about it, but there was really no reason to tell me, and it would only upset me. Would you?"
You have to suppress a laugh.
"No," you answer.
"I won't ask why you were able to answer that so quickly," she replies. She hesitates. "I've learned something… something troubling."
"Is there anything you can to do to…" You don't know how to finish. Fix it? Stop it? Help?
She sighs. "No, what's done is done, and it was for the best, but what I know about why it needed to be done makes me uneasy."
"Why?" you ask.
"Because of how close it came to being our reality," she says. "Well, yours. Let's just say I've gained some insight into what it's like to look into another timeline."
"Did you know about this?" Helena asks you.
She's looking up at you with wet, bloodshot eyes. She looks devastated. You feel a pain deep in your chest just from looking at her.
"Yes," you answer, because it doesn't seem like the time to lie.
"And you didn't tell me?" Helena stands up from the table and turns away from you, toward the window, her arms crossed.
"Would you have still wanted her if you'd known?"
Helena scoffs. "Of course, I—" She breaks off.
"Think about it," you tell her gently. "When we were first talking about it, before you knew her or who she would be, if I'd told you that this would happen… that you'd have to go through all this again, what would you have said?"
"I…" her shoulders slacken. "I don't know."
"And now that she's here, do you have any regrets?" you ask.
"No." She turns to look at you. "None."
The room is dark and you're back in bed.
"I don't think you should tell me," you say.
She turns her head to the side to look at you. "You don't want to know?"
"I definitely want to know," you answer. "But if you tell me, I'll probably just be mad at you for telling me. It's better this way."
She narrows her eyes. "That's unexpected."
"What can I say?" you reply. "I'm full of surprises." You waggle your eyebrows suggestively and she laughs.
