✓ | The Crown of the Dead

Family Bonding and Attempted Kidnapping

There was a bus stop that wasn't far from where we ended up. We walked to it, bought tickets that should take us all the way to Indiana (which pretty much blew a lot of our money), and boarded. This whole "quest" thing had been rather easy so far, other than the fact that we almost got killed by a creepy man dressed in all black and then taken in by police for ransacking a pharmacy, which I assumed had to be some sort of crime.

Blake told us that the bus ride would be approximately ten hours— and without my phone or anything else to keep me busy, I grew very bored within the first five minutes. It was only around three o'clock when we left, so I still had a long way to go before I got sleepy.

This time around, I was seated next to Charlie. Essie was behind us with Blake, and Luke had yet again decided to sit alone. I sort of envied him. Being alone sounded nice right now.

"We should make a scrapbook," Essie said once we had all gotten settled— our bags tossed haphazardly at our feet.

Luke was munching on a stolen pack of Oreos. "And why would we do that?"

"To document our adventures," Essie said obviously. "I mean, just think about what we've already been through. At camp and on this quest! We've almost gotten killed by that creepy guy twice, we've met three gods so far, and we just committed several crimes! At our next stop, I'm definitely investing in a Polaroid camera. Our scrapbook is going to be amazing."

"Uhh, no you are not," Luke said. "We barely have enough money for another round of tickets. We'll probably end up having to hitchhike."

"Heck no," I muttered, a shiver running down my spine. "That's kind of the number one way people get kidnapped."

"How do you know that?" Luke asked, wrinkling his nose.

"My parents disappeared when I was eight, Luke. I kind of got interested in true crime."

It wasn't that big of a deal to me to talk about it. Yes, I was at peace with the fact they were dead. Their bodies never being found? Their killer never being identified? Not so much. It sent me down a bit of a cold case rabbit hole a few months ago. I listened to all these podcasts and YouTube documentaries, and scared myself into thinking that the world was nothing more than a horrendous place for queer people to try and survive in. I guess it was partly true.

"That's upsetting. Let's talk about something not upsetting," Essie said. "Icebreakers, anyone?"

Groans.

"Aww, come on! We're going to be in here for eleven hours!"

"Ten," Blake corrected.

"Not with traffic," Essie said, a twinkle in her brown eyes. "It can be fun! We'll just ask each other questions to get to understand each other better! I don't know Blake that well, and I'm not sure that Luke and Bea get along swimmingly due to their differences—"

"Hey!"

"—but that can all be fixed with some 'getting to know each other' games!"

Everyone was quiet, debating on whether or not it would be worth it to go through a bunch of long trials of bonding. Just as I was thinking that I'd rather jump off of this bus than have to share mundane details about my life with Essie Valdez, Charlie spun around in her chair.

"Fine. I'll play."

What was I supposed to do now? Say no? I wasn't rude. (Ohhh, that is such a lie. That is such. A. Lie.) I wasn't going to crush Essie's spirits by refusing to play her dumb game when everyone else inevitably would. Besides, we were going to be on this bus for about eleven hours.