Page 10 of A Dead Girl's Guide to Living
His hands fell away, and I took a hesitant step toward the car I had grown up in, my fingers grazing the cool metal.
“I’ll leave you with it for a bit,” he murmured, turning on his heel to leave. He slipped out without another word.
Something stirred within me. A feeling I couldn’t quite name.
But I knew one thing for certain.
This was freedom.
I opened the driver’s-side door and slipped inside, my hands going to the wheel as I ran them along it. Taking a deep breath, I leaned back and closed my eyes, letting the silence wash over me—the peace that came from being on my own.
I fished out my phone and settled into the seat, navigating to TikTok to edit my latest video and upload it quickly before I had to head back inside.
The app opened straight to my FYP, and I almost tapped out immediately, until the first video caught my attention.
A pair of hands held what looked like tarot cards on a surface draped in red velvet. The person’s nails were painted a chipped black. They tapped the deck against the table, then began to shuffle. I realized the feed was live.
“All right,”a feminine voice murmured, tapping the cards again.“If you are a Libra sun, moon, or rising, this one’s for you. Stick around. You’re going to get a whole reading for your biggest week yet. For you Libras sitting around waiting for the next shoe to drop… well, things are about to get interesting.”
Comments flooded the screen in droves. I noted about ten thousand people were watching and interacting.
“Some of us carry pieces of home as we go,” the woman continued.“Some of us dump it all at once and leave.”
Ida_Evergreen has pinned a heart.
Eliiimorhhhan_s: pleeeeeeease give me some good news, babe.
I glowered and rolled my eyes. Yes, I was a Libra, but I was not into this hocus-pocus bullshit. The ache in my chest—and the flash of Alexis’s eyes—had me navigating out of the app entirely. I set my phone down and turned my gaze back to the wheel.
I had a car, and while I wasn’t starting the engine tonight and flooring it out of here, it already felt as if I were moving.
DOVE
Tip #2: Tell your own story, or a man in a robe will tell it wrong.
The church was suffocating.
I grimaced at the sheer number of bodies crammed together in a space that smelled of old wood, musty carpet, and about fifty different suffocating perfumes. Half the women here must have showered in them before arriving.
Too many hands belonging to too many strangers dabbed at their eyes with tissues, reciting too many prayers for a woman who had never prayed a day in her life.
My eyes went immediately to the photo of my grandmother, Margaret—never-call-me-Grandma—perched on a wrought-iron frame. Her eyes, cheerful and full of life, stared out at us in the congregation, and I dug my nails into my palms as renewed anger washed through me.
She would have hated this.
"Margaret Porter was a woman of kindness and great wisdom, a pillar of strength to those who knew her." The priest’svoice was droll and heavy as he stood at the dais, his eyes solemn as he looked toward the coffin, adorned with an over the top lilly arrangement. Never mind that she was allergic to lillies. "We commend her soul to the Lord, knowing she has found eternal peace in His embrace..."
I bit the inside of my cheek so hard I tasted blood. I winced, but the anger in my veins only burned hotter as I scowled up at the robed moron.
Margaret never wanted peace. Hell, she didn’t even know the definition of the word.
Margaret was life and laughter, noise and color.
Her wish had been fireworks. She wanted to be cremated and have her ashes shot out over the Pacific Ocean so she could mix salt with sand and become part of the earth once more. She had wanted exactly what she had given her late wife, Diana. A proper send off.
She didn’t wantthis.
She didn’t want hushed whispers and sobbing from strangers, church bells tolling in the background like some tragic soundtrack to a period drama.
