Page 130 of Horror and Chill
Mom and Agatha appear, with our mom carrying a tray with a fat glass pitcher and mismatched mugs. Steam coils and cinnamon sticks rest inside each mug. Agatha is talking with her hands, animatedly. She’s already telling Mom about a kid in her class who pronounces volcano like “bokano.” Mom is cackling.
We sit and drink. The cider is hot and apple-sweet with a perfect amount of spice. Dad asks about the drive, and Mom asks if Agatha can cook.
“So, Agatha,” Mom says. “You teach kindergarten. What else do you do? Hobbies? Does teaching pay much nowadays?”
Agatha’s smile falters just enough to notice. She glances at me, then Evander. Garron lifts a brow, silently daring her to lie.
“I have a second job,” she says finally. “Online.”
Mom hums, stirring her cider. “Online like tutoring? Or… something a little less PTA-friendly?”
Agatha lets out a breath that sounds halfway between a laugh and a sigh. “Less PTA-friendly.” She straightens in her seat. “I run a cam channel. Horror-themed. Costumes, storylines, explicit content. It started as performance art, but it pays the bills better than teaching.”
Mom looks up, eyes sharp but not cruel. “Well. You certainly don’t bore easy, do you?”
Agatha shakes her head. “No, ma’am.”
“Good.” Mom leans back, studying her like she’s measuring weight, not worth. “You own what you are. I respect that. But I’ll tell you something about my boys—when they love, they don’t share. And what you do? It’s built on being seen by everyone.”
Agatha holds her gaze, unflinching. “Being seen saved me. It made me stop feeling like a ghost. I can’t give that up.”
Mom nods slowly. “Then you’d better make sure you’re the one holding the leash.”
Dad chuckles, low and dry. “Sounds like you already figured them out, honey.”
Agatha smiles, small but sure. “I’m trying.”
Mom takes another slow sip, then sets her mug down with a quiet clink. “You talk like someone who had to build herself from ashes. Where’d that start?”
The air shifts. Agatha’s smile softens, but doesn’t fade. “You really want to know?”
Mom nods once. “If you’re sitting at my table and claiming you’re with the three parts of my soul, yes.”
Agatha exhales, eyes flicking toward the steam rising from her mug. “My parents were church people. Not the kind that bake casseroles and send postcards. The kind that called their sins obedience and their punishments love. I grew up being told pain was purification.” Her throat tightens, but she keeps her voice steady. “I left at eighteen and never looked back. Haven’t spoken to them since, and I don’t plan to.”
No one moves for a moment. Even Dad’s steady presence stills.
Finally, Mom reaches across the table and lays a hand over Agatha’s. “Good,” she says simply. “Sometimes family is something you survive, not something you keep.”
Agatha’s eyes glisten, but she blinks it away. “Exactly that.”
Mom squeezes once, then releases her hand. “Then welcome to ours. For however long you can stand us.”
Agatha laughs, a sound that cracks something open in the room. The tension lifts, replaced by something quiet and dangerous and almost tender.
When it’s time to leave, Mom insists on a picture. She still uses her old Polaroid, the one that squeals when it prints. We line up on the front porch steps. Garron tries to look respectable. Evander fails at looking anything but kind. I do my best not to look like a felon. Agatha slides between us and hooks her fingers in mine, and Evander’s belt loops like she has always been there. The camera spits the square out, and Mom shakes it like it is still 1998. Colors bloom. We look like a family in a haunted postcard.
“Perfect,” Mom says, satisfied. She tucks the picture into the mirror frame by the door, like it has always lived there.
She kisses all our cheeks, mine a second longer, and whispers, “Do not ruin this.” I kiss her wrist in apology, and she lets me go.
Dad shakes our hands, but when he hugs Agatha, he leans close and whispers something that makes her eyes widen before she nods. She doesn’t say what he told her, and I don’t ask….yet.
We head for the car. Evander opens her door, Garron brushes a hand down her back, and I glance once over my shoulder at my parents on the porch. Mom waves. Dad just watches, quiet, unreadable.
Back in the car, Agatha blows out a breath like she’s been holding one since the oaks. “Your mom is terrifying in the best way,” she says.
“Yeah,” I say. “She runs the world from that porch.”
