a goodbye, for now
The sun is dipping down below the houses surrounding them, casting the word in golden light as Kate flits around the van, stuffing all their stolen treasures from Agatha’s house inside. Tommy leaves her to it, hesitantly approaching Rio on the doorstep, her face blank and still as she stares out at the road.
“Hey.”
She dips her chin slightly in response, and he takes it as enough permission to join her, scuffing the toe of his shoe on the concrete anxiously.
“So, uh. Jennifer Kale…?”
“What about her?” Rio asks flatly, and he shrugs, Señor Scratchy squirming in his arms.
“Dunno. Anything? Like, at all?”
Rio pulls her cloak tighter around her, lips twisting in a scowl. “She’s a potions witch. Previously bound, now not. Thanks to your brother, I suppose. She walked the Road with him- what do you want to know, precisely?”
“The road?” he prods, and she laughs, a dry sound.
“Hm. You wouldn’t know, now would you?”
“I hate it when you’re vague,” he tells her sweetly, rolling his eyes. “What road?”
“The Road. The Witches’ Road.”
“Doesn’t help literally at all, but thanks, yeah.”
She almost smiles, but it doesn’t quite break the mournful look in her eyes. “The Witches’ Road is an old tale, a myth for witchkin. Dangerous trials that would give you your deepest desire if you made it to the end.”
“And Billy… walked it?”
“Finished it, actually. A fact that makes me sick. After all, you’re here, aren’t you?”
“I’m-” He stops, blinking at her. “...you’re saying I’m what Billy wanted from… your magic-y road?”
A flicker of amusement sparks in her eyes, and she tilts her head at him. “Do you find it so surprising? After all, wasn’t it you who said you’d do… anything, to get him back?” She straightens, scoffing. “Of course he has the same mentality.”
He… well, he knew that, he did, that Billy would do anything for him- they’re twins, Billy is his everything, Billy brought him back from the dead -but the way Rio says it so plainly, a simple fact, that he’s what Billy wants most in the world…
His eyes sting, and he hates crying, he’s been crying so much, but Billy… just…
He scrubs at his face quickly, trying to stop the tears before they fall. He misses his brother so badly it hurts, he wants his brother back- “Why’d you call it a myth?” he says, before he can get dragged into his grief.
Rio frowns. “Hm?”
“The… Road,” he repeats. “Why’d you call it a myth if it’s real? I mean- you just said Billy walked it. And the Jen person, and Agatha too if I had to guess.” A correct guess, for the record, because Rio’s lips twist in displeasure at the mention. “So why say it’s just. A myth?”
Rio doesn’t reply, for a long moment, before she dips her head toward him, a light acknowledgement. “You’re observant, little abomination, I’ll give you that.”
“So?”
“A long story,” she says flatly. “One you do not have the time for, nor the capacity to understand. Yet.”
He purses his lips, rocking on his heels. “Yet?”
“...another time.”
“The drive?” he offers, and she goes silent, a mournful look in her eyes.
“Hm.”
“...Rio? You are- are you coming with us?” he asks quietly, squeezing Señor Scratchy tightly against his chest. The contact is comforting, in a way- even if it is from an opinionated rabbit who at best is overtly neutral about his existence and most definitely has a favorite twin that is not him.
Rio’s eyes are… cold is the wrong word. Sorrowful? Empty? “I have business to attend to. I don’t spend all my time babysitting Agatha’s mistakes.”
He tilts his head, grinning crookedly at her. “Oh, and that’s what I am?”
“Convolutedly,” she concedes, a ghost of a smile flickering across her own lips before they fall back into a numb line. “Helping your brother was her mistake, and you are his.”
“Mistake-in-law, then?”
She exhales sharply, and it almost borders on a laugh. “One of the many things you are, mi pequeño problema.”
He blinks, not quite catching the murmured words she adds to the end, her accent thick enough to mask the details. “Sorry, what was that?”
“It doesn’t matter,” she sighs softly, resigned. “Tú no eres él.”
He watches Kate pack the last of the spellbooks in the trunk- they’d figured it was safer to take all Agatha’s witch shit with them. No reason for the neighbors to accidentally cause good ol’ Westview even more magical problems. “So, you’re leaving.”
Rio doesn’t look at him, but she reaches out, running a hand down Señor Scratchy’s fur and letting her corpse-cold fingers rest, briefly, on his arm. “I’ll be around. You won’t escape me that easy, little one.”
“Right. ‘Course. Can’t outrun Death, yeah?”
“No,” she agrees simply. “Although your brother is certainly trying.”
“Makes me the favorite twin, doesn’t it?” he asks with a grin, and her splits into a smile before she controls herself.
“Sí. I suppose it does.”
They lapse into silence, the painfully normal sounds of the suburbs filling the space. “I think I’d like it, if you came,” he offers after a moment, keeping his eyes fixed on the grass.
Rio stiffens, her hands curling in the fabric of her skirt. “Is Death so familiar to you it’s comforting, Tommy Shepherd?”
“Yeah,” he mumbles quietly, squeezing Señor Scratchy closer. “I guess so. I dunno. I- just saying that you could. If you want. Or just forget it, because-”
“I’ll be around,” she repeats, softer this time.
“Okay,” he agrees, past the lump in his throat. “I- yeah. Okay.”
She strokes Señor Scratchy’s ears, not meeting his eyes. “Take care of him, hm? He was… a gift.”
“I’ll try. Make no promises, though.”
“All packed!” Kate shouts, sticking her head out the car window. “Let’s get a move on, ‘kay?”
“Coming!” he calls back, turning to Rio. “...bye. I guess.”
Her hand brushes his shoulder, cold through his shirt. “Te veo.”
He blinks, frowning. “Wait, that’s not-”
He stops, taking a step back.
“...what goodbye is in Spanish,” he finishes awkwardly to the empty yard, staring at the place Death had just been. “...huh. I- uh. Alright, then.”
“Tommy!” Kate shouts again, and he sighs, calling back at her over his shoulder.
“I’m coming!”
One step closer to his brother.
He is coming, Billy. He is. Just wait.