Page 62 of Just This Once

I lifted my hands in dismayed outrage. “Well, did it ever occur to you to make an instruction booklet to go with it? Or a color chart? Orsomething!”

“What would be the fun in that?” she asked with a thoughtless shrug. “Then I’d never get the pretty boys such as yourself to come back and visit me again with questions.”

“For fuck’s sake,” I muttered, wiping a hand over my brow. “So you’re telling me she’s dying. She’s really, honest-to-God, fuckingdying?”

“She is dying,” Mirlande answered without any pretense.

A cold wave of dread passed over me. I swallowed thickly and then shook my head. “No.”

The shop owner didn’t try to console me again. She didn’t try to argue with me. She just stayed there behind the counter, letting me process my shock.

And process it I did.

Suddenly, I was twelve years old, standing inside Thane’s bedroom as his mom, Chauncy, explained to me how I was never going to see my parents again. My flesh prickled with dread. That awful, breath-stealingfullnessinvaded my chest. I could no longer capture air in my lungs.

Nothing made sense. A ringing filled my ears, and my vision wavered as the whole world went dizzy.

I was trapped in the past for the longest heartbeat before I blinked my surroundings back into focus.

My gaze went to Mirlande. “How—” Pausing to lick my lips, I cleared my throat and hoarsely asked, “How long?”

She shook her head. “That I cannot know.”

“Helpful,” I muttered dryly.

She shrugged. “All I can tell you is the darker the green, the more time she has. The lighter the green, the less time. A severe case can dim more quickly than a slow rot, but know this. Her souliswithering as we speak.”

My chin trembled before I could stop it. Setting my jaw hard, I sent Mirlande a terse nod. “Well, thanks for nothing,” I rasped and slapped my hand onto the counter to grab my amulet before marching from the shop.

My anger carried me most of the way down the block. I think I was more angry with Hope now that I knew she’d told me the truth than when I’d thought she’d been lying to trick me.

But Jesus, who the fuck mademeone of their dying wishes?

You couldn’t just do that kind of shit to a person.

“Fucking pain-in-the-ass brat,” I muttered, swiping a hand over my hair to try to control some of the rage sizzling inside me. She definitely knew how to get under my skin with every single, fucking thing she did.

But seriously.

How dare she bring this tome?

Didn’t she know I couldn’t handle death and loss?

This was so much worse than the stupid trick I originally thought it was. Watching her die would fucking destroy me.

Prepared to drive straight to her place and bitch her out for possibly a full month, I reached my truck and jerked the driver’s side door open, only for my phone to buzz with an incoming message.

I yanked it from my pocket to find a text from Oaklynn in our group chat.

Waverly just called. Keene’s causing a ruckus at the library and needs someone to get him out of there ASAP. Any takers?

I started to put the phone away, ready to ignore the request and let someone else deal with Dugger, but then I paused.

If he was at the library, then he was probably visiting his mom who’d been haunting the place since she’d died a decade earlier.

I could visit a real ghost right now and test my amulet, make sure it was actually working correctly and that the old broad hadn’t just been blowing smoke up my ass.

Because Ireallywanted Mirlande to be wrong about this.

---