Sublime

Jane set the cake down on the table in front of Ruby just as the birthday song reached its warbling crescendo. It was a cheap cake from Baskin-Robbins, Frozen-themed. She worried it was a tell that this house, even this shirt, didn’t belong to her. But maybe it was the opposite—maybe it made them seem more ensconced in this life, better, cooler—the

“Since when am I distracted by men?” I whisper. “Have you met me? I’m here using the Wi-Fi, not giving out free lap dances.” “We’ll see,” she says tartly. (Like, give it twenty minutes, and I will, in fact, be doling out lap dances in the local independent bookstore?)

Clemetine Wembley, Certified Medium and Psychic.

The awareness gave him pause: perhaps a funny-looking mixed-race kid could exist at the center of the world, not just on its periphery.