The Budding Metalinguist

XI

There was no pre-arranged agreement between Lillian and Rachel that the sight of one another required a subsequent rush into each other's arms. And yet this sequence of events continued to happen every time they met, especially given their recent long periods of separation.

Lillian clasped Rachel so tightly that her friend stepped back in confusion. "Is everything all right?" Rachel asked in that melodious voice that Lillian had missed so dearly.

"Everything's fine," Lillian replied in a deeply casual tone that she never used when speaking to almost anyone else. "A lot has happened in the last month. I missed you."

Rachel affirmed that she had as well, and the two proceeded back into Morgan and Chris's house to discuss everything that had happened. Lillian went first.

She realized that, despite how close she was to Rachel, there was no way that she could tell her everything. So she omitted the details of the DIAO investigation and instead told a long and rambling story about how hard her thaumaturgy lab had been for so long. She incorporated slightly exaggerated details of Amandi's and Matt's torments and general unpleasantness along the way, finally culminating in the result of the DNA test and Dr. Hests entering in shining armor to waive Lillian's university requirements. Rachel listened avidly and, when Lillian was done, displayed an appropriate mix of concern about an unfortunate circumstance and relief that another unfortunate circumstance had been avoided. Rachel was always so gullible, Lillian thought. Maybe gullible wasn't the right word. She had an inherent assumption of honesty and truth, and Lillian was sure she believed there was more good than evil in the world. At any rate, she believed every word of Lillian's story.

After an adequate amount of time had elapsed, Rachel began launching into her own- major- complaint. "Have you heard anything from Rory lately?"

Lillian was jolted back to reality by the memory of Rory. She had been so distracted by everything that had happened that she hadn't even noticed his conspicuous silence. Too conspicuous.

Rory had been the third of Lillian and Rachel's group. He had been placed in the same physics class in which Lillian and Rachel had met, and had ended up as their lab partner by pure chance. Over the years, Lillian had grown to like him a great deal. But much as she enjoyed spending time with him, she had to recognize- there was something odd about Rory. Something slightly off. It was held back so well that Lillian could never tell anything from reading his facial expression, and it had intrigued Lillian for a long time before she finally started to ignore it.

"No, I haven't heard from Rory."

"I've texted him every day for the last month. Every day. Never get any response."

"Maybe he got a new phone," Lillian suggested. It had been known to happen.

"I tried to contact him every other way I could think of. I went to talk to his dad, too. Alex said that he'd been talking to Rory and that he seemed fine, but that he'd been very busy with schoolwork and that he was using new accounts for everything because he was at Portland State."

It was rare for Rachel to believe that someone was lying, but Lillian could tell from her tone of voice that she was very suspicious of Alex. The lie must have been barely concealed.

Which raised the question: Where was Rory?

☙❧

Talking to Dakota and Ashley.

Dakota was complaining about his nightmares again. Rory found it endlessly annoying. Dakota had been through a lot, he admitted that, but there was no way to fix the nightmares unless Dakota saw Mira. And that, Rory assured himself, was most certainly not going to happen.