“Finally. I was getting nauseous.” Maverick crossed his arms and rolled his eyes as he took his usual seat in the living room.

  “Next time, pull up a chair.” Dimitri patted the other boy on the head, much to his shock and disgust.

  “You knew he was there?” I gawked.

  “Of course I did. I knew there was no way he’d let you go alone with me anywhere.” Dimitri smiled knowingly as he took a seat on the couch, a comfortable distance away from Aidan, who still made a face anyway.

  Still feeling queasy from earlier, I decided to lie down in my room. I had just taken my shoes off when there was a knock at my door. Holding my breath and silently praying it wasn’t Dimitri, I opened the door.

  “H-hey…” Aidan glanced away from me. “C-can we talk?”

  I welcomed him in and sat at the edge of my bed. He grabbed a pillow off the edge of my bed, placed it on the floor, and that would be his new home for however long this conversation took.

  “W-where did you and Dimitri go?” he asked.

  “A cafe. Why?” I tried to read his expression. He looked bothered and uncomfortable.

  “Did anything… happen?”

  “I’m not interested in him if that’s what you mean.” I facepalmed. Why did he think I had a crush on everyone?!

  “What did he mean last night when he called you ‘lady?’”

  “Oh that…” I bit my lip. I had forgotten to tell him, hadn’t I? “Sylvis told me a while back that I’m the daughter of the Lord and Lady Venia.”

  “W-what?!” Aidan slipped off his pillow. “W-when were you going to tell me this?!”

  “I don’t know! I kind of forgot about it!”

  “Forgot?! How do you just forget you’re the daughter of one of the most prominent Houses in Meridia?!”

  “By being not from Meridia?!” I threw my hands in the air. “…What do you mean most prominent?”

  “I guess Sylvis didn’t tell you,” he muttered, annoyed. “Some of the houses have fallen out of favor. Venerabilis, Venia, and Dignitas are the three most prominent Houses, as evidenced by their wealth. Venerabilis being the most revered.”

  “Dimitri’s House…” I mumbled.

  “D-Dimitri is the son of Lord Venerabilis?! I-I knew he looked familiar… That actually explains a lot.”

  “Elaina Venia…” I spoke aloud, trying the name out on my tongue. “Doesn’t exactly have a ring to it.”

  “U-uh, no. You would have been Ethel Venia.”

  “Ethel?” I raised an eyebrow.

  He nodded. “The names of the sons and daughters of the Houses are public information. Yours was announced at your birth.”

  My name was Ethel… Huh. I guess Sylvis failed to mention that detail. Just as she failed to mention my lineage and me being an Ethereal when I got there. I wondered, what else was she hiding from me? From everyone? She’d hidden that people could block their thoughts from Finn. Maverick had mentioned she hid a lot of stuff from him. What else was this woman hiding?!

  “E-Elaina?—"

  “Ah!” I shouted. I was so lost in thought that I had completely zoned out of reality. The poor boy stumbled back with his hands held up defensively. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to shout.”

  “I-it’s okay, you just looked kind of creepy staring off with that creepy smile on your face…”

  I spent the rest of the day resting in bed. Or trying to rest. Despite gorging myself on sweets, I was still exhausted from the amount of ether I had used earlier. According to Finn, I would recover slower since there wasn’t any ether to draw on in this world. Speaking of Finn, he and Dimitri took turns checking on me, what felt like every twenty minutes. Both looked annoyed when the other’s name was mentioned. Eventually, I resorted to spending all of Dimitri’s visit talking about Finn, successfully stopping him from intruding for the rest of the evening. Unfortunately, that didn’t work as well with Finn. Still, he was at least kind enough to bring dinner to my bed.

  The next morning, I felt weirdly restless. Maybe it was from spending almost all of the previous day in bed. I wanted nothing more than to go out, and I didn’t care who it was with.

  “You’re going to the mall?” Finn’s face lit up. “I love the mall! I want to go!”

  “She should go with Dimitri,” Maverick said to everyone’s surprise.

  Dimitri quickly shifted into his human form and pointed to himself, looking puzzled.

  “The rest of us have targets on our backs. I say we avoid being seen with Elaina in public,” Maverick explained.

  “Agreed. Besides, there’s a chance someone could take our photograph and post it on the internet, meaning Elaina’s family could see,” Zephyr added.

  “I don’t like this.” Aidan huffed, crossing his arms.

  “It’s not like Maverick won’t be there,” Dimitri tried to reassure him, but Aidan wasn’t having it.

  “T-then you don’t need to go either.” Aidan lifted his chin, turning away from Dimitri.

  “Oh? What’s that I hear? You want me to have Elaina all to myself?” Maverick waggled his eyebrows at Aidan, who just briefly caught the motion.

  “Y-you’re going, too!” Aidan pointed at Dimitri, who sighed and shook his head.

  Maverick was the one who drove us to the mall. Dimitri offered to drive, but Maverick wasn’t trusting him with “his” car. An elderly woman looked at us funny when she saw the driver’s door open all by itself. She mumbled something about how technology was advancing too quickly.

  We walked around for a bit. Maverick was invisible and wasn’t talking for obvious reasons, so I had to assume he was following us everywhere. Every store I went into, Dimitri would follow me around, forcing a smile. I could tell he was bored and growing impatient. To compensate, I suggested visiting stores he was interested in. He seemed to have little interest in anything other than men’s clothing. He spent a long time looking at three pairs of pants that looked the same to me.

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  Eventually, he sighed. “Maverick, this isn’t working. Why don’t you take her somewhere else?” He made eye contact with something behind me. Not even a second later, he jumped quickly, turning to look behind him.

  “First of all, I’m over here,” Maverick’s disembodied voice said. “Second of all, I couldn’t agree more.”

  “Try not to enjoy your date too much.” Dimitri smirked, and I instantly felt heat rise to my cheeks. Thankfully, my emotions weren’t intense enough to set off my magic.

  I would make someone pay for that comment. And by someone, I meant Maverick.

  First! I stepped into a women’s clothing store. Everything was overpriced and ugly. So, unfortunately, that idea tortured me just as much as it probably tortured him. But then there was a plushie store across from the ugly clothing store! I made my way over to a pink bird, and then a purple panda, and a green ostrich— Okay, that one was a little weird even for me.

  I spent as long as I possibly could, admiring the hundreds of plushies the store had before I heard a groan from behind me. I turned, and nobody was there, so I had to assume it was Maverick.

  After the plushie store, I went to a candy store where I bought three bags of chocolate with Maverick’s credit card and didn’t feel the least bit guilty about it!

  I quickly plopped a piece of chocolate in my mouth when I noticed two familiar faces sitting near the children’s play area. Not like in it, but pretty close. Before I could walk away, hoping they wouldn’t notice me, Zuri called my name and motioned me over.

  I swallowed the piece of chocolate, its sweetness suddenly becoming bitter as I walked over.

  “If it isn’t Lumi’s friend!” Zuri stood up, her smile as bright as the fluorescent lights in the mall.

  “You-you’re embarrassing me!” Lumi muttered as she elbowed Zuri in the side.

  “Hmmm…?” The older girl hummed obliviously.

  “Uh, what brings you guys here?” I decided to change the conversation.

  “Zuri’s date said he’d be here,” Lumi answered boredly as Zuri blushed.

  “I-I think that’s him!” Zuri pointed behind me, into the plushie store, and dashed off.

  That left the two of us alone in an awkward silence. Well, awkward to me. Lumi didn’t seem to mind.

  “So, uh, what’s the deal between you and Zuri?” I asked.

  “We’re sisters,” Lumi replied, keeping her eyes on the kids who were tumbling around on the kiddie slide rather than actually trying to slide down…

  “O-oh?” I asked. They didn’t look related in the slightest, but that felt rude to say.

  “Not by blood.” She must have heard my confusion. “She lost her sister, and I lost my family, so now we’re sisters.”

  Well, that became dark really quickly.

  “I’m sorry… Can I ask what happened to your family? It’s okay if you don’t—”

  “They were murdered in front of me.”

  My eyes widened, and my jaw dropped at how casually she mentioned this.

  “It’s okay. They had to die. They were going to, anyway.”

  “I don’t… think that makes things any better.” I twitched. “What about Zuri’s sister?”

  “She abandoned her.”

  “Her parents…?”

  “They’re not in the picture.”

  “I see…”

  The more time I spent talking with her, the more awkward I felt. Maybe it was the subject.

  “Do you have any friends back home?” I asked, hoping to change the subject to them.

  “No,” she answered plainly.

  I paused, defeated. “Is that the reason Zuri is intent on us becoming friends?”

  “I don’t know. Probably. Do you have friends?”

  “Oh, yeah. Lots of them.” I smiled, finally taking a seat next to her.

  “People are always telling me how nice it is to have friends. Is it nice?”

  “Yeah. It’s really nice.” I smiled. I thought about Rose, Carol, Aidan, Finn, Zephyr… Even Maverick. “They’re there for you when nobody else is. They cheer you up when you’re sad. Or, if you’re happy, they share in your happiness. Sometimes it’s just fun to hang out with each other. Though… Thinking about it, you probably have this with Zuri.”

  “Hm… I always wondered if Zuri was my friend. Can your sister be your friend?”

  “Of course! N-not that I would know personally… I don’t have a sister.”

  Her gaze was still on the kids playing. I noticed that she seemed to be fixated on one particular kid, a little boy who seemed left out among all the other kids. He was slower than the rest, and by the time he got to a piece of empty equipment, another kid had already beat him there. I tried to read her expression, but it was empty.

  I sighed inwardly. “Why don’t I show you some of the things friends do together?” I offered my hand to her.

  She looked at me hesitantly. “Really?” she asked, semi-hopeful.

  I nodded. With her hand in mine, I took her to the plushie store where I retraced my steps to show her each of the plushies I had been interested in before. Sorry, not sorry, Maverick.

  She seemed particularly interested in a rooster. I couldn’t stop myself from buying it for her. The look on her face was priceless—I think that was the first time I saw her actually smile.

  "It's so soft," she repeated to me as we left the store. "I love how it feels."

  "Yeah, all of the plushies at that store are super soft." I sighed wistfully. I should've bought myself something...

  Next, I took her to a cupcake shop by the food court. She looked like she’d practically melt when she bit into the chocolate cupcake with strawberry frosting!

  “Do friends do this all the time?” Lumi asked, pulling her yellow rooster closer to her, burying the bottom half of her face into it.

  “Well, not all the time,” I answered. “But they do spend time together like we’re doing right now.” I smiled at her. She was so cute!

  We were sitting near the food court, but far enough away so that we couldn’t hear the crowd. I remembered Zuri said something about Lumi not liking crowds. I wasn't particularly a fan of them either, anyway. “Wait, isn’t that Zuri?” I pointed to a lady with long auburn hair. We briefly made eye contact before she stumbled over to a table with a man with shoulder-length brown hair and a hat. I guess that’s her date.

  “No, that’s not—“ Lumi quickly pursed her mouth shut. “Want to listen in?”

  “Sure.” I shrugged. The two of us moved to a table closer to Zuri and the mysterious man.

  Zuri cleared her throat. “W-where have you been?” Her fingers fidgeted as her gaze remained on the man in front of her.

  “What an odd way to greet someone.” The man across from her smirked. “I’ve been well, thank you for not asking. And you?”

  Zuri cleared her throat again, and something in her snapped. “How long were you going to lead me on?! On that stupid… campfirey website!”

  “Tinder?”

  “Tinder! Police approved my ass!”

  “Where did it ever say that?”

  “On an ad on that face place!"

  “I—”

  “You should be ashamed of yourself! You made me chase you all around New York City! And for what?! Maybe that girl was right! This isn’t true love!” With that, she slammed her fist on the table and took a seat with us instead.

  “My dear Lumi! I’ve been so worried about you!” The older girl pulled the younger one close to her, the plush rooster the only thing in between the two. She quickly noticed the object between them and her expression softened—as if she was recalling a distant memory. “I see you’ve made a friend.”

  “Yes,” Lumi answered, glancing over to me.

  Zuri’s eyebrows raised, her expression exhausted and genuine for once. “Really?” She looked at me hopefully.

  “Yeah. You were right,” I answered softly, a smile on my own face. Maybe going out today wasn’t so bad— Oh crap! I completely forgot about Dimitri! “I’m sorry! I have to go!” I quickly apologized as I darted off in the direction of the nearest men’s clothing store. Unfortunately, I’d have to go to three more stores before finding Dimitri. He looked as exhausted as I felt after I accidentally came across a pair of male thongs. We agreed to meet back at the parking lot.

  To my surprise, Maverick was sitting on the floor at the entrance of the mall.

  “When did you get here?” I asked.

  “I don’t know—two hours ago? I got tired of looking at multicolored fabric in the shape of animals.” Maverick shrugged.

  “I…I thought you were following me.” My eye twitched at the idea of being all by myself that whole time. What if my magic had been triggered while I was with Lumi?

  “I figured you’d call me if anything happened.”

  I sighed. Maybe I’d let Finn tag along with me next time after all.