“That’s what I always say, isn’t it, Debbie? Rough times and rough people.” Liam Peterson fumbled for something in his pockets, pulling out a lighter and a crumpled cigarette. “No, wait, is it rough times make tough people? Doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter.”

He tried to light it several times to no avail and then put the single cig back into his pocket. Jaelle missed smoking even though, evidently, people had realized it was bad for you now. They’d probably poisoned it with over-manufacturing the way they had chocolate and soap.

Or that’s what she’d read, anyway. It was hard to know for certain when you couldn’t try things out yourself.

Mrs. Peterson had trained her eyes on the wreck of the gas station, the wafting smoke, a few fires still burning half-heartedly within an explosion of candy-colored heart attacks. It smelled horrible. Like melting plastic or burning hair. “You said you didn’t see Carol? How could she have gotten out?”

“She probably ran into the woods, same as we did,” Liam said and shuffled. He didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands.

“But how would she have gotten out? They were blocking the front door?”

Jaelle was pretty sure that if someone didn’t think of something to say soon, Debbie was going to turn hysterical. She glanced at Mal, wondering if he had anything to add to the unknown fate of the woman who’d been tending the counter, but thankfully, Liam noticed his wife’s distress and wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

“You know Carol! That fiery girl knows how to take care of herself. She’s probably hiking over to the old Broussard property behind us.” 

Jaelle was about to volunteer to go check when Eleanor’s car pulled into the gas station parking lot, looking a little worse for wear but still functional. She relaxed considerably, and because she didn’t want to deal with the trials of being incorporeal in a moving vehicle, she volunteered to look anyway. 

“I’ll see if I can’t find Carol,” Jaelle said cheerfully. “Someone needs to catch up with emergency services when they get here anyway.”

And she really would look in the few moments she had before slipping invisibly back into the red world of Mal’s scepter for the ride back to headquarters.