Book Six, Chapter 62: A Chance of Rain

When we got back, the others were very excited to see Ramona, which was a bit of a surprise because most people kept a distance from her.

It was clear that they hadn’t gone on The Final Straw, because that storyline lasted multiple days, whereas ours had lasted less than one.

Anna was in tears and embraced her.

“We thought we lost you,” she said. “You just disappeared.”

Anna was using her Are you okay in there? trope. I didn’t even have to see it on the red wallpaper; it was obvious from how stressed she looked.

“I saw that you were dead, and I thought that you had somehow triggered an Omen. We didn’t know what had happened.”

Ramona was a little uncomfortable with the hug, but had the good sense to hug back. She eventually managed to escape.

“It was a whole ordeal,” she said.

As we filed in, we quickly explained what had happened, to the best of our understanding, about how we had been intercepted by an enemy who could take over certain types of storylines.

That was interesting to everyone, though not quite as interesting as the fact that I got married, which apparently was hilarious.

I tried to ignore that.

There was excited chatter about the storyline and about having met with a narrator. Logan and Antoine were both quite willing to drop all talk of Homibridal and preferred to discuss Lucky’s offer.

Of course they wouldn’t want to talk about this storyline; they had both died pretty unceremoniously. Not that I blamed them. I was saved by the love of a bad woman.

“I just have to see this,” Isaac said. “Can we watch it?”

Oh yes, my role as the team’s DVD player. Didn’t pay well, but had good job security.

“Maybe later,” I said. “Am I correct in understanding that there are no groceries in the house?”

“No,” he said. “We spent all day looking for Ramona.”

“Great,” I said. I was starving. The wedding cake and champagne weren’t enough to keep me full.

I made my way further into the loft. We had kind of been brought to a halt at the entrance by all the people who cared about us, those inconsiderate jerks.

I didn’t care about food, not at that moment. I just wanted to get away from all the talk of my failed marriage. As I made my way toward the living room, I noticed that Camden had continued to research Eternal Savers Club after they were returned to the loft.

As strange as it was, I was eager to get into another storyline. Even though we had managed to survive and even look cool in the finale, I felt embarrassed. I needed a capital V victory to make me feel like we had any hope of success.

Regardless of how things had turned out, we had fallen into a trap. We hadn’t been cautious enough when activating the Omen for Ida Rae, and as a result, we ended up in the wrong storyline. I had allowed myself to get distracted.

One thing was certain: we would want to avoid bringing extra players to a location where we were going to activate an Omen. I didn’t know if that was a good rule of thumb, but if we had not brought the others with us on their way to The Final Straw, we would have ended up in the right storyline.

And I wouldn’t have this stupid thought pattern in my brain, wondering if I could fix Daphne Sinclair. I knew I couldn’t, but the heart is the stupidest organ.

I locked eyes with Ramona as everyone was filing in, and a line for the bathroom formed. We only had one, after all.

I made my way up to the roof, and she followed.

We walked in silence, and we didn’t say much when we got there, not for a while. I didn’t know how to navigate romantic relationships. I hadn’t watched enough rom-coms, apparently. But it was nice to be able to be silent and it not be seen as a bad thing.

Eventually, I did have something to say.

“I’m sorry for that whole thing,” I said.

“Last I checked, it wasn’t your fault,” she answered, sitting next to me in one of the lounge chairs that only hours ago had been on top of the casino, or at least one that looked like it.

“Sure felt like it was. When the trope broke, I suddenly felt like a total idiot,” I said, pausing as someone down on the street below screamed out in joy. Night had fallen, and the bars on the downtown streets were filled.

“You know, I can actually relate to that,” she said. “I look back on my whole life, and I can see these obvious points where things were scripted. I mean, I had guys and girls constantly asking me out, even when I wasn’t even trying. I have to imagine that Silas or even Carousel was doing that just to create drama.”

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I laughed.

“Now you’re just bragging,” I said.

“No,” she said. “I was a hot mess in my early twenties. My parents were dead, and I was raising my sister, who apparently had the consciousness of an adult woman but didn’t tell me about it because the script told her not to. And yet, all these people seemed very interested in me.”

“I can’t relate,” I said. “Or at least I couldn’t until I met Daphne.”

I still had false memories of falling in love with that homicidal maniac.

“I went to prom with a guy named Billy Hannigan,” Ramona said. “I think that was his last name, at least, and we drank the spiked punch, and he threw up all over my dress. To this day, I have to wonder, was that scripted or did he just do that?”

“Did he lose the job right after that?” I asked.

She shrugged and nodded her head. “You know what? He did. His family moved away just after that, but I thought it was because he graduated,” she said.

“No. When he struck out with you, he and his family got put in the refrigerator, or wherever NPCs go whenever they’re out of work,” I said.

I probably shouldn’t have made that joke.

“From the sound of it, we might be able to find out soon,” Ramona said. “What exactly did the narrator say?”

I looked over at her. It hadn’t occurred to me, but Ramona might have a unique motivation to join Lucky’s throughline. I had assumed that she wouldn’t want anything to do with any of the narrators other than Silas, but if the safe haven for free-range NPCs was real, there might be someone waiting there for her.

“So, you wanna run the throughline?” I asked.

She shrugged her shoulders. “Every decision is the wrong decision, but I wouldn’t mind choosing that one.” She was afraid to seem too gung-ho. Her sister Phoebe was somewhere in Carousel, surely.

“You think we might find her there?” I asked.