Young Writers Society

Queenie was typically the master of acting busy. She could teach a class on the art, really. Every job, it seemed, required her to look preoccupied when she had absolutely no clue what she was doing. Desk jobs were easy, fidgety jobs like waitressing were simple enough, but cooking? That she absolutely couldn't fake.

Women of this era usually knew how to cook, right?

Or 'women'. People were apparently wrong a lot about who was and wasn't a woman.

She shook her head.

Your head keeps distracting you. She could practically feel the ache where Briar's knife had sliced her skin. Teasing, really, taunting. I could kill you if I wanted.

I fucking know that. Prick.

Queenie focused back on chopping the vegetables in front of her, not that she had to. She could do this in her sleep.

Because the only way to get around an inability to fake being busy, was to actually be busy. And this was probably the one thing she wouldn't screw up, as much as she hated to admit that.

Briar can cook.

She grit her teeth and focused harder, allowing herself only to be vaguely aware of the others in the kitchen.

Carter had no idea what he was doing. Never in his life had he been required to cook. He'd hardly ever even been in the kitchen, besides to watch or eat. Needless to say, he was lost.

He followed Queenie's example, trying to keep busy and strictly following the directions Edith gave them. He was in the middle of washing a spoon in the back of the kitchen and accidentally splashed himself when he heard a voice that sounded strangely familiar.

He dropped the spoon into the soapy water and abandoned his post at the sink, poking his head out to see the librarian of all people, coming to order food.

Esther was treating her like a normal customer. What was she doing?

"Ask her what she's doing here!" he whispered around the corner.

Considering that I had spent the first chunk of my life living on the streets, and the next, much larger chunk of my life being stuck in a jar haunting my own skull, cooking really wasn't a skill I had ever found important. I had a feeling that the librarian knew things would turn out like this; she seemed like too meticulous of a planner to not guess we'd end up in the kitchens at some point.

I could try following Edith's directions, but I wasn't exactly fond of that, either. So I had spent the majority of the time we were in the kitchen so far wandering aimlessly around it, trying to look at least a little busy so I wouldn't lose the job and my apparent one shot at getting back home.

Then the librarian showed up.

And, for once in my life, I actually agreed with Carter.

"I don't think Esther meant help with food," I said. "Why are you even here?"

"I want to talk," The Librarian said plainly. "I know Edith is going to let you take a break and eat yourselves once you serve the morning rush. I'll be waiting."

Queenie glanced up to see most of her group fixated on the woman Esther was talking to. The Librarian. Of course. Why not.

Queenie rolled her eyes and set down the knife - partially to remove the temptation to use it for something other than veggies - and went to Carter. Skull could go ahead and get in trouble for being an unsubtle moron, but she wasn't going to risk the only other competent person there getting her kicked out with him. They were a pair, after all. Why would Anna stick around without her boyfriend - fiance - whatever?

She tugged on his sleeve and silently inclined her head toward where he'd been incompetently washing the dishes a minute earlier. "I can take over over there," she said, hoping she'd properly judged the calluses on his hands to mean he knew how to use a blade. He'd probably be better at cutting, then, than he was at cleaning. Because he was absolutely terrible at cleaning.

Smoothly she swept over to his spot at the sink and got to work, remaining tuned in to the conversations around her all the while.

Carter turned away at Queenie's touch and retreated back into the kitchen, but he listened as the Librarian informed them that she wanted to talk after their shift was over. He went to the cutting board that Queenie had abandoned and started chopping a carrot.

He hoped Esther would keep her wits about her and Skull wouldn't make a fool of himself like always.

I wanted to retort that we could have talked back in the library, but I somehow managed to bite my tongue. I just wanted to get back to my world at this point. I'd play along right now and demand more information when we talked to her after our break.

...Of course, I'd have to figure out what exactly I was supposed to do in the kitchen, first.

While I waited for our break, I went back to what I had been doing before: a very good imitation of working.

Before long, their break had appeared and the group got their food and joined the Librarian at a table.

"I need you to kill the boy," she said.

It was as Esther feared. "What about me? What about Adam?"

"Esther," the librarian said. "So many people suffered because of your father."

Before anyone could say anything else, they were in the past. Or, supposedly the future. Depending on what you looked at. Except this was different.

Either way, it was 1971, and they were in the midst of a scene that Esther had often thought about but never hoped she witnessed. They were in a beautiful home in the mountains. It was the Fourth of July. Esther could tell because of the fireworks and decorations. Except, this time, they weren't a part of it, they were watching it as if were a movie.

Margaret was reading a book. The Fellowship of the Ring. The Lord of the Rings book. She was drinking looked to be a cocktail of kind. It was pink. A goldendoodle puppy was curled up next her. She didn't know Margaret liked fantasy. Or a good cocktail. Her nightgown was white with pink lace. She looked like an angel. That was cliché, and kind of corny, but it was true.

There was a noise outside. Rustle in the leaves. Margaret looked up at her book, and then back down. Just then, three people in black came through the door. One of them was Esther's mother. They all had knives. She recognized Sasha in dark. And Blake, of course. They hadn't met him. He'd join later.

Margaret, startled, put down her book. "Alex?" Margaret said.

Just then, Sasha led two others into the room at knifepoint. The three pleaded for their lives. Butt one by one, they were stabbed.

The scene drifted to some time later. The house was now a crime scene, surrounded in yellow tape. Detectives took photos of the bodies. News cameras were there.

The scene drifted. It was some years later. 1976, to be exact. The midst of a concert. The Grateful Dead looked to be playing. An entire crowd had gathered. It was rowdy, to say the least. Someone was her brother and he appeared to fighting with someone. He looked much different. His hair was long and he had scruffy facial hair. He wore bellbottom jeans and a tie-dyed shirt, definitely a different image from who the others had met. It was hard to decipher, but Esther did her best follow along.

"What did you say to me?" Adam shouted.

"I said you're a beefcake, Whitman."

Adam mockingly widened his eyes. "Wow. I hope you don't kiss your mother with that mouth."

"At least my father's not a fucking pedo," the other concert goer shouted.

Adam punched him in the face. But he didn't stop there. He kept attacking the man until he was covered in bruises.

Just then, they were back in the dining area.

"Why would you show those things?" Esther said. "You know my brother's not like that anymore."

Just then, the librarian slid a gun to Queenie. "There's much more I could show you. Helen killing herself a year after you. All the pain Claire and Debbie caused their daughters. Jennifer Wade growing up without ever knowing her parents. Margaret's fiancé losing the love of his life. Your mother in prison. All I ask to think about it."

Esther watched as the Librarian left, trying not to cry. It wasn't fair. She just wanted to go home.

Queenie took the gun, eyeing it quickly to get an idea of the model before slipping it under the table and testing the weight of it in her hands. Loaded. The corner of her lips quirked up into a quickly-hidden smirk. Whether she planned to use it for its intended purpose or not, having something truly deadly in her hands was a real comfort.

She discreetly tucked it away, taking care to ensure none of the others saw her hide it, and folded her arms on the table. "Well, she's a real jackass," Queenie said, glaring in the direction the Librarian had gone. "All in favor of not doing anything that little bitch says?"

Carter thought killing a child was cruel, but at the end of the day, if it meant he could leave this reality and return back to his own, it was a means to an end. Esther, though, naturally was opposed to it. Jay was her father, and if he was killed as a child that would mean she would never exist.

The librarian’s motives seemed much darker than he’d first suspected. Esther was suicidal, but to put before her murdering her father as a way to blot out her existence was another type of trauma entirely.

He supposed he’d just have to wait for an opportunity. Death could come in many ways - ways that he could easily pose as an “accident,” if the others weren’t on board - which they didn’t seem to be.

The thing was, he understood their reactions. They were rational, and moral. But sometimes things had to be compromised for the greater good. If Jay died, they’d all go home, Esther wouldn’t exist to grieve the loss, and they could all forget about what happened. End of story.

Of course, he didn’t say any of that out loud.

He only sighed in frustration at the Librarian’s disappearance and raised a hand in ‘agreement’ with Queenie.

“Aye.”

The librarian came, showed up the worst parts of Esther's family tree and life, and then promptly left without being helpful in the slightest. A gun technically could be used to kill Jay, but I still wasn't even convinced we should be changing history to begin with.

Call me selfish, but I'd rather keep Esther and deal with the consequences of letting her dad live later.

"Agreed," I said. "I'm not doing whatever she says to do - I'll figure out some way to get out of this without her help."

I glanced over at Esther.

Esther buried her face in her arms. Now, there wasn't much they could do about it. Not until Anna and Jay came in and walked right over to the four of them.

"We wanted to say hello," Anna said.

Esther wanted to disappear.

Queenie gave Anna and Jay a friendly smile, "How have the pair of you been?" she asked. Just a pleasant woman in an unpleasant time, working a normal job. This act was a little more complex than the ones that typically got her where she needed to be.

She'd hardly spared Jay a glance, but she was thinking about the Librarian's words. Would she kill a child? The problem had never really come up. Children were better hostages than corpses, if they factored into her job at all. On top of that, a healthy, completely unharmed child was a more useful hostage than a shrieking, snot-covered, high-maintenance gremlin with nothing useful to say and a lot of begging to do.

All in all, killing kids? Waste of time and resources.

In this situation, though, the Librarian had a point. That would be the simplest solution to her problem, and therefore Queenie's problem. Unfortunately, the Librarian had been the one to suggest it, and Queenie wasn't just anyone's asset to order around.

So, for now, that little outdated excuse for a firearm would be a last resort.

Before I could say anything to Jay and Anna, Elizabeth beat me to it. I settled for giving them a smile before looking back over at Esther. Something told me the librarian had known that Anna and Jay would be showing up for a visit right after she left. At least the gun still wasn't out; that would be the last thing Esther needed right now-

Wait.

...Where had the gun gone?

The librarian had slid it to Elizabeth earlier. I had seen that much. But it was gone now. I glanced down at the floor. We would have heard it if it fell, but I wanted to make sure my guess was right.

Someone had taken it.

Elizabeth was the one it had been given to, but Carter wasn't that far away, either. And I wasn't really a big fan of Carter to begin with, so I had no reservations with thinking he might have taken it and hidden it away.

I just hoped whoever had taken it wasn't going to go against our agreement.

Carter only glanced at Jay and then looked back at Anna. Now was not the time to kill Jay. Esther and Skull were watching, Anna was there, and they were in public. Carter knew the Librarian wanted them to kill Jay, and that would be their ticket home, but he didn't trust her to pull them out of the reality the moment they ended his life. That would be too generous.

He smiled beside Queenie to match her warmth. He didn't say anything and instead waited for Anna to answer the question, hoping for but not expecting anything interesting.