But as I put my hand in my pocket, my fingers felt my newest weapon. The one that had replaced my zapper the last few weeks because I liked it more, and the feel of it gave me an idea.
“That movie did something else as best friends.” I told Angel as I pulled out my thing called a knife. “They used thisto cut lines in their hand and become something called blood brothers. Do you want to be brothers with me? I can be a good brother; I do it for Yeva already by giving her snacks and water and blankets when she has wet cheeks and is not happy.”
Ever so gently, Angel pulled the knife from my hand. “Blood brothers are for big kids. We don’t need to do that. We can just use our words instead, and it means just as much.” He frowned. “Where did you get this?”
My knife was rainbow when I held it into the light, and if I pressed a button on it, the sharp part came out, just like Angel did to see how fun my new possession was. It hadn’t been my knife at first. It had been one of Widow’s. But he had gifted it to me when Henley was gone and he had been drinking the funny juice that made him all wobbly and tired, just like Yeva had been last night. He’d said I needed to keep myself safe, and that I was big enough for a knife, so he had gifted it to me before he fell asleep in the garden, on the floor next to the horrible water.
Angel nodded his head when I told him, and he nodded even more when I said, “Beau’s best friend Aiden told me how to use it. He said we must be careful and not touch the stabby part. It’s just for enemies.” I grinned as I remembered how Aiden had seen me playing with my knife by drawing lines on the floor outside with it, and he had told me if I was going to play, I had to learn how to do it safely. “I like Aiden. He has lines on him like Henley does, which means he fought off monsters. And I hate monsters.”
Yumi had lines on her too, but they were secret ones that she’d told me not to tell anyone about. I’d seen her putting some on her thighs herself when I’d been doing my spying and stalking around the house again. When she found me, she had told me through her robot voice on the phone that I could not tell anyone because they were just for her to know about. And that as we were now sisters, I had to promise not to share. So I did.
I liked having a sister. I didn’t know what it was, but I liked the sound of having stuff.
Angel pushed his fingertip on the end of the knife. A second later, there was a single drop of blood on his skin, slowly rolling down his hand.
He sighed. “This is sharp. You might hurt yourself.”
Even though I didn’t want to be hurt, I didn’t want to lose my new thing even more. So I nodded my head hard and fast. “I will be careful.”
“Promise?” He asked.
“Promise.”
He handed it back with a tiny frown. “Okay then. I trust you. But if you end up hurting yourself, you make sure you tell someone straight away. We won’t be mad at you. We will just need to make sure you’re okay.” He moved towards the hallway a moment, grabbing the boxes that someone had put out there earlier on. “We need to pack, anyway. Everyone else is doing it, so we have to make sure we can be ready to leave.”
I grabbed one of the boxes, bringing it to my floor.
“You said everyone comes, but Delilah isn’t here.” I said. “Neither is Widow, or the others. Kellan told me he was off on a secret mission when I stalked him and saw him and Darius leaving.”
Angel’s face went funny for a second and he ran his hand through his hair. “Delilah is with Widow. They had to do a mission together and she’ll be back soon. The others are helping them.”
“I heard Beau say they were missing, and missing means they’re not here at all.” I didn’t know what kind of mission a missing was, but I was sure it was dangerous. Sapphire had been on a missing for ages before and had come back sad.
Plus, Henley had been worrying about Widow and she didn’t seem to worry a lot. At least she hadn’t until she had beengone for a while, then came back all different and sad, too. I thought she had been somewhere exciting because she had lots of lines on her skin. I thought they had been from her having fun and fighting monsters. But she didn’t seem to feel the same way for some reason.
She seemed more sad when she stared at her lines, especially the one on her face and the one on her tummy.
“Yeah, they’re somewhere else doing super secret stuff. But don’t worry, they’re going to be back soon – they will meet us in Diamond Grove.” Angel said.
Bending over a bit, I laughed. “I am not a grove. I’m just a Diamond.”
The lady had said I had another name too – Montana. Now I had two of them, not just one, and I was rather happy with it. I wanted to get a collection of names to go with my collection of stuff. I thought the name Lasagne sounded fun because I enjoyed eating it, but when I’d told Beau, he’d said that maybe I should wait until I was bigger before changing my name, as I had to be sure that Lasagne was something I really badly wanted. He had been laughing a bit too when he said it, but I wasn’t sure why it was funny. Maybe he also wanted to change his name to Lasagne, and he found it fun that we had the same thought?
Angel laughed too. “It’s a place – it’s where Sapphire and her men are from. Where Beau and his friends live, too. You share a name with it the same way you share the name with the pretty gems Sapphire likes to wear.”
I watched him bring more boxes into my room and asked, “Do all my stuffs get to come with me? I like all of them.”
“Yeah.” He put a box down in front of me, opening the top. “That’s why I’m here. We have to pack, and I can help lift things that are too heavy for you.”
“What is pack? Beau said it, but he did not tell me what it was and I didn’t want to ask him.” My voice got quieter. “He isscary sometimes. Not to me, but with all of his skin drawings and his face. He looks mad all the time. And I want to make him happy and not mad, so I just said yes to the packing.”
“Packing is when we put everything into boxes, so that we can bring it with us in the cars to the new house.” Angel replied. “And Beau is not mad. He just looks that way. But he is nice; you don’t need to worry about him, and he would always be kind to you too.”
If Angel said Beau was not mad, then I trusted him and would be nicer to Beau. I would let him have a ribbon, too. Maybe a blue one like his eyes. Or a big red one because he stared at Ruby a lot and she was red. Her hair, sometimes her clothes, and the paint she wore on her mouth. She liked red lots and Beau enjoyed staring at her red, too. So yeah. I would give him a red ribbon so he could be happy.
Looking around my room and all my stuff, I tried to work out where to start with my new task and still be quiet enough that Yeva could stay sleeping.
“Can we pack the kittens first? They’re my favorite.” The lady had let me get loads of stuff for the kittens. Before I’d put ribbons on them, Maui had a bow on his head made of green fluffy stuff, and Kiko had one around her neck that was purple. They had toys, and clothes, and more bows. Plus, they had lots of bigger stuff, like a thing that Angel said was called a cat tree. It didn’t look like the trees outside, but I guessed that it was a special kind of tree, grown just for cats.
