Glory Alley and the Star Riders (The Glory Alley Series) (99 page)

“
Glory
Alley
,”
Mom
finally ga
s
ped.
“Sick or not, I will not tolerate such behavior in my house
!”

“What did I do?” she asked
defensively
.

“
Put your hands down this instant.”

Glory
slowly lowered h
er
fists
,
warily watching
Brandon
.

"Look!
”
Patrice
broke the tension and pulled a long slender box out of the tree
.
"We missed one
.
It’s addressed to
the
…the
Rock Collector
?
”

“That’s me,” Glory somehow knew.

Mom
took the package first, flipping over the nametag with interest
.
"The writing is smudged, but I think it's from
somebody named E. L. Bonnie—or E.L. Boney—I dunno.
” She squinted hard
and then handed it over
. “
A friend of yours?"

Glory
shrugged and untied the green ribbon
.
Inside was a
long and unusually slender
silver
spike.
She
picked it up; twisting it this way and that way, fascinated by the colors dancing along its surface as it caught the lights from the tree.

“Looks like a
fat knitting needle
,” said Danny.
“
What kind of stupid gift is
that?
”

“
M
ust be from Aunt Martha,
”
Randy surmised.

The room erupted into laughter.

“That’s not a knitting needle
.
”
Patrice
corrected.

"Sh
h
h,"
Dad
hushed, watching
Glory closely, who was looking at the gift as
if it were a poisonous snake
.
Face
screwed up in alarm
, her
lips moved, but no words came.

"
Sh
e
's remembering something,"
Mom
said as everyone quieted, watching
Glory
’s
face mirror the struggle within
.

“
E
l
...
E
l
...
E
lboni
!"
Glory
blurted out in triumph.

The family exchanged perplexed glances, except Randy and Danny
,
who were trying hard to hold in their laughter.

Four years
of smells
,
sounds, sights and feelings whirled back in an instant
.
She
remembered the indigo
rock
, the
Hoogula
named
Budd
, White Feather, Needle, Bone and how
s
he had tricked them
.
Scenes from Wybb filtered through
. Sh
e saw Lady
G
ost
and heard
the
sentence
of
death by extraction
.
The Bamboozle and all its door
s
, how
Clash
and the others had come through the first one, but were sent back again
, except faithful
Clash
.
She
physic
ally shuddered at the memory of the
Wein
, Jason Belway’s fate, and the
Weinling
who fed upon
him.

She
remembered other things
s
he'd just as soon forget, such
as the
fight
on the bus,
Dad
's drunken tirades,
M
om
's death and the emptiness and shame at having her buried in the welfare plot without a grave marker
.
Yes, s
he
remembered everything
—
everything except the years spent
in this new reality, with the kinder, gentler All
e
ys.
And
s
he remembered dear little
George
and h
is sweet
butterfly kisses
.

Where was he anyway?
Sh
e glanced about, expecting to see h
im
playing with a new
truck
.
She
scratched h
er
head, realizing that
s
he had not seen a single present for
George
under the tree.
“Where’s George?”

“George?” Mom asked.

Glory
hurried
to the kitchen
, with her parents trailing behind her, expecting to see him curled up in the co
r
ner with his blanket. She glanced around, even peeking into the cupboard where he liked to hide.

“George-eee!
”
She called his name, panic creeping in, but there was n
o
reply. A sinking feeling started at the pit of her stomach. “Oh, no…”
She
ran
from room to room, calling h
is
name.
"
George
!
”
She
turned to
her
mother
,
alarm bells screaming
inside
of
her.
"Where
is he?
"

"
George
?
”
Mom
held a palm over her mouth, eyes watering
.
“You mean
your great
,
great
,
Grandpa Kracker
?”

"
No
—
I mean
my
little
brother
—
your
son
?"

Dad
gave
Mom
a curious look
.

"I haven't told a soul
that I’m expecting,”
Mom
said
, holding up her palms, shaking her head. “I don’t know where this
is
coming from.”

"
George
,"
Glory
pleaded
desperately
.
"Don't you know h
im
?"

Dad
let out a long sigh
.
He walked to the counter and poured himself a drink
.
Swishing the vodka around in his glass a
mom
ent, he then downed it in one gulp
.
Within seconds, he was choking.

Mom
yelled for help
.

Brandon rushed in
a
second time. Another splinter of bone hurled out
.

Fingers curled at his mouth,
Dad
coughed
out his words,
"What in the heck is going on
?
I checked first
—
definitely no bones
.”

“
The fates are warning you,
”
Mom
said knowingly
.
“Time to cut back.”

“Maybe you’re right,” Dad said, not sounding totally convinced.

Everyone forgot about
Glory
and
missing
George
,
in the aftermath of
Dad
's second choking incident
.

Glory
’s
own words spoken in the cemetery reverberated
back to her
.
I wish my Dad would quit with the booze, so he can be nice again.
W
ere
Dad’s
brushes with death her fault?
Worse, had
s
he wished
George
out of existence
?
She
stood by the back door unnoticed and completely crestfallen. To add salt to
the
wound
Mom
was pregnant again
.
In
Glory’s
old life
,
s
he’d lost mother shortly after
the birth of George
.
Surely, this meant that
her mother
would die
—
again.
The sound
a
coffin lid slamm
ing
shut
echoed across the snowscape
.