Free Poison Ink by Christopher Golden

turned around in the seat to give her a smile. “Home safe and sound.”
    Grabbing her bag, Sammi popped open the door. “Bye, Caryn. See you tomorrow.”
    Caryn lifted her hand in a wave. “See you later.”
    Sammi forced a smile. “Thanks, Mrs. Adams. I’m sure my mom’ll be happy not to have to make the trip.”
    “Anytime, sweetie. You know that.”
    As the car pulled away, Sammi ran to her front door with her overnight bag over her head, fishing her keys out of her pocket. When she entered the house, her mother sat on the living room floor with the Sunday paper spread out around her. Linda Holland looked up and smiled.
    “Hey. What are you doing home? I thought I was supposed to come and get you.”
    Sammi stepped out of her sneakers and left them on the mat inside the door. Her house enveloped her with welcoming arms. The smell of coffee brewing seemed to ease some of the tension from her shoulders. For the first time since agreeing to get that stupid tattoo in the first place, she felt safe. “Caryn had to go home early and Mrs. Adams offered, so I figured I’d save you having to get out of your pajamas,” Sammi said. And this time when she grinned, it felt real, as though she’d woken up from a bad dream and found her mother at the edge of her bed, telling her everything would be all right.
    Her mom glanced down at the cotton pajamas she wore and the white socks on her slender feet. She didn’t sleep in the whole outfit, but on weekend mornings she pulled PJ’s on the instant she woke up and didn’t shower and change until she went to the gym. Most Sundays for the past few months, that had been uncharacteristically early. Sammi had missed the Sunday-morning ritual with her father today, but she took it as a hopeful sign that her mother hadn’t rushed off this morning.
    “You’re just jealous of my jammies.”
    Sammi went into the living room and plopped onto the couch, pulling her legs up under her. “True. Very cozy. Anything interesting in the paper?”
    “More every day,” her mother said. “All the things you think are boring when you’re sixteen—stuff you can’t imagine ever being anything but boring—becomes strangely fascinating when you get older.”
    “Sorry. Can’t see it.”
    “It sneaks up on you.”
    “On you, maybe.”
    Her mother gave her a familiar look that suggested the wisdom of the ancients and then looked back down at the paper.
    “You want to go to the movies later?”
    “If we can go at dinnertime. I’ve got some stuff to do today. Library stuff. I think I’m gonna meet Caryn there,” Sammi told her mother. It surprised her how easily the lie rolled off her tongue.
    “Where’s Dad?” she asked.
    “At the gym. The Patriots game is on later. He’s getting his workout in before he sets up camp in front of the TV.”
    Sammi rolled her eyes. She didn’t mind football, but the season felt like it started earlier every year. And when the Patriots played, the living room became her father’s man cave.
    “Fantastic. You enjoy that.”
    Her mother stuck out her tongue. Sammi laughed and hopped up from the couch. Maybe her parents had made amends. The way their relationship had been fraying lately, she hardly dared hope. Overnight bag in hand, she trotted up the stairs, all too aware of the folded paper in her back pocket.
    She’d promised the girls she would go back to Dante’s today. In the back of her mind she could still hear the whir of the tattoo needle, smell the ink, see Katsuko flinch as the little design—that tiny world with its five ocean waves—was scarred into her flesh.
    In her bedroom, she tossed her bag on the floor at the end of her bed and pulled off her sweatshirt. Sammi hadn’t bothered taking a shower at Letty’s house, just wanting to get home. But before she could shower, she had more pressing business. Moving back to her door, she peered out and looked down the stairs. When she saw no sign that her mother had abandoned the newspaper,