#greer lott

The cardboard cutout talking to her, accusing her of allowing everyone to die Other cardboard cutouts: Kennedy, Trevino, TiVy, Elijah, Hobbs, all accusing her. Why is she alive and they are not? What makes her special? What did she do to earn this? Greer runs out of the forest, to the rocky shore encampment of Elsewhere. There’s people there, and everything she needs is there. She refuses to eat. Instead, she sits on the shore and watches the ferries come in and out.

She notices a cardboard cutout behind her. It’s Dot. She bristles at this. Fucking Dot. And then there’s another Dot cutout. This one’s holding a coffee. And then it moves.

Greer is, of course, annoyed to see Dot there. But also relieved. Dot is an anchor back to the real world.

Dot doesn’t like that Greer’s not eating. They bring her cinnabeef. “You’re punishing yourself.”

Greer: I could have stopped it.

Dot: No you couldn’t. You don’t have the blessings for it.

Greer: Then I should have gotten them!

Dot: It doesn’t work that way.

Greer: That’s easy for you to say. The darling of the gods. Mx. Perfect Pitcher. At least I earned my strikeouts, Patterson. That’s all me. I didn’t need help from those fuckers.

Dot: [listening, thinking] Do you want it?

Greer: …what?

Dot: Do you want the blessings of the gods? Do you want to be under their thumb all the time?

Greer: [says nothing]

Dot: You could have it. You could get shelled, and sacrificed, and pitch games until your fingers bleed. That can be you. And when it’s all done, you could be dragged around the league every season, far from home, far from the people you care about. And when that’s not good enough, they will ask you to be someone you’re not. You can have all of that if you want it.

Greer is quiet. Who would even want me?

Dot listens

Greer: The Pies didn’t want me. Who else would? They sent me back as soon as they could.

Dot: That’s not true. The fans wanted you back, enough to send one of our best batters to get you.

Greer: …why?

“Yeah, what's your point? You playing hide-and-seek or something? Because I'm not. I'm just sitting here in this closet minding my own business.” Greer points the half-eaten blaseball at her threateningly. “You’d better not be planning on ratting me out for eating the blaseballs. There's like a million in here, and nobody’s using them for anything. Can't let them go to waste.”

Eugenia shakes her head emphatically, which makes her entire body jiggle. “Won't tell.”

“What do you want, then?”

She wiggles with excitement, reaching out two armlike appendages. One shoves the door open, and the other wraps itself around Greer’s hand, shifting into something almost handlike itself. It's sticky and squishy and strangely warm, and Greer's first instinct is to pull away, but Eugenia pulls first.

“Come,” she says, tugging on Greer’s hand, leading her out into the rest of the Gleek. 

Greer stumbles through the soggy halls; Eugenia moves surprisingly fast for an amalgamation of garbage. “How many times do I have to tell you, I’m not joining your stupid nightmare arts and crafts club for babies!”

Eugenia shakes her head again, the jiggles traveling all the way down her arm and making Greer’s hand tingle. “Just showing you.”

“Showing me what?” Greer shoves the last of the blaseball in her mouth and chews it impatiently.

“This!” Eugenia gestures to the open door of the art room with a flourish.

It looks the same as always. Scattered art supplies on the tables, drawings tacked up on the walls. Greer belatedly realizes Eugenia has a few markers sticking out of her goop as she tugs Greer forward to a piece of paper that's been left on the table.

“For you,” she says proudly.

Greer squints at the drawing. It depicts two figures on a blaseball field, standing next to each other on what seems to be the pitcher’s mound, a pile of blaseballs beside them. One is a blob with a big smile, winding up to throw a pitch. The other is a taller stick figure with an unusually sharp toothy grin and a half-eaten blaseball in their hand.

She recognizes this scene. She’d started giving Eugenia pitching lessons, annoyed at how Hobbs kept bragging that he’d taught the garbage how to bat. Any loser can wave a stick around, but throwing the ball to the losers in the right way takes skill, and anyway, Eugenia had seemed more than happy to learn. She'd accidentally absorbed a few blaseballs before she got the hang of throwing them, but hey, those things are tasty, Greer can't blame her.

“Thank you for teaching me,” Eugenia enunciates slowly and carefully. “I drew it!’

“It's. Uh. It looks good. Nice job on the teeth. Thanks.” Greer is starting to feel weird, all soft and goopy inside, like Eugenia’s sludge that's still wrapped around her hand. Maybe she ate too many blaseballs?

Eugenia somehow manages to beam brighter than the smile she gave herself in the picture. “You're welcome!” Greer tries to put it back down, but Eugenia shakes her head, dislodging one of the markers. “Keep it! It's yours.”

“What am I supposed to do with it?”

She shrugs, finally ungooping herself from Greer's hand. “Look at it.”

Looking at it makes her feel things she's not used to, so Greer rolls it up and sticks it in her pocket, then swipes the marker off the floor and bites it in half, soaking in the juice. Mmmm, red. The best flavour.

“Wait a minute,” Greer says suspiciously just before Eugenia can turn to go. “Why’d you have to drag me all the way here? You could’ve just brought me the picture. It's like you wanted to hold hands with me or something.”

Eugenia blinks at her, but Greer knows all kinds of plots and schemes lurk beneath that innocent front. “Friends!”

“Friends?” Greer snorts. “We're not friends. I don't have those.”