Page 78 of The Seven Miracles of Beatrix Holland
“About six months. Me running away helped.”
There was so much family history Beatrice didn’t know, wasn’t there? “Where did you go?”
“Just to Portland. I didn’t have a place to go, and the shelters were okay, but there were some super-skeezy people in there, sofor most of those months, I usually slept in this abandoned house with some other kids.”
“Jesus! How old were you?”
A shrug. “Twelve. It was fine. And when Mom found me, she was beyond pissed but itreallychilled her out, so it was worth it. Oh, my god, your face! Nothing that bad happened.”
Beatrice wanted to roll Minna in bubble wrap, leaving just her head poking out. If that’s what she wanted to do after knowing Minna for fourteen days, how had it felt for Cordelia? “But what does that have to do with your dad?”
“She has this stupid belief that the people we love most are the ones we shouldn’t hear from once they go through the veil, or we risk never letting them go. I get that. But it’snotfair—she got plenty of time with him, and I got none. She thinks if I obsess over him, it’ll be bad for me and my ‘psychosocial development.’” She put air quotes around the last two words. “I just don’t want her overreacting again, like she did when I came out. That was really hard.”
The catch in Minna’s voice ripped the air from Beatrice’s lungs. “I get that.”
“But…”
“What?”
Minna’s voice was so thin, Beatrice had to strain to hear her. “But he didn’t say if he’s okay that I’m a girl.”
“Oh! No, Minna, he said he loves you. That came through really clearly, didn’t it?”A ghost told a girl he loved her using my hands to write his thoughts.Would Beatrice ever get used to this? Would she have time to?
“He was talking about me as a baby.”
“He said he’s with you now, though, so I’m guessing he probably noticed your gender. Or maybe genders don’t matter where—where he is?” Wherever the fuck that was.
Her niece turned her wide wet eyes to her. “Could we ask him?”
She took a deep breath. “No. You have your answer. He told you he loves you now. Sometimes answers take a form that’s different from what we want, but that’s not less of an answer.”
Minna laced her fingers together under her chin. “Please?Please?”
Beatrice had no skills at this, zero parenting techniques, no resources or muscles built up that would help her refuse this girl. “I’m sorry. No.”
Minna grabbed the tattoo gun and thrust it at her. “I knew using this would work, and I was right. Youhaveto.”
Beatrice shook her head.
Minna dropped the gun into Beatrice’s lap.
And it twitched again.
Minna saw it jump. “Auntie Bea!”
Beatrice breathed, trying to recapture her resolution, her firmno, but it felt far away. Instead, she imagined the tip of the pen entering the keyhole, thought about the tumblers inside it moving.
She thought the words of the spell, hearing them inside her head, stuck like an advertising jingle.
The tattoo gun twitched harder, still open to whatever it was channeling. It still had something it needed to say.
Fine.There was obviously something going on Beatrice didn’t understand. Without looking at Minna, she picked up the tattoo gun, ignoring Minna’s quick indrawn breath.
Should Beatrice address Taurus directly? “Your daughter wants to know—do you accept her as the girl she is proud to be?”
The hum built inside her, and it was almost as if there was a flavor to this feeling, or a scent just beyond her nose’s ability to comprehend. Taurus was here—she recognized the samefeeling she’d had just a few minutes before. He gave her the same impression, as if she were shaking hands with someone in a dark room. Just as she’d know her father’s own handshake even if blindfolded, just as she’d know Grant’s, and Iris’s, she was now learning Taurus’s.
The tattoo gun whirred, as if in confirmation.
