White Space Season 2

was gonna meet? Well, I met him. And we’ve been talking on and off for the past few weeks. He’s told me about some really weird shit happening on the island.”
    “Like what?” Katie asked. If she thought Milo was crazy, she was hiding it better than Alex.
    Milo looked around. His eyes seized the street lamp, as if just noticing it for the first time. He shook his head, ever so slightly. “Not here.”
    “Huh?”
    “It’s not safe to talk here,” he whispered, leaning closer and scratching his arm harder. “They’ve got cameras and microphones, all over the island.”
    “Alright then,” Alex said, weirded out. He looked down at Milo’s arm, “You OK?”
    “Huh?” Milo asked, his eyes still narrowed on the lamp.
    “Your arm, you’re scratching it like jock itch, dude.”
    Milo’s eyes met Alex’s. “You don’t believe me, do you?”
    “I don’t know what to believe,” Alex said. “I’m pretty sure there’s something going on, sure, and I’d love to think that my dad really didn’t mean to shoot up his classroom.”
    “No,” Milo whispered, “I can guarantee you he didn’t.”
    Alex felt a chill slither up then down his spine, like the sort he sometimes got when telling scary ghost and UFO stories with Milo in the middle of the night as they lay in his backyard, staring up at the sky.
    Milo scratched harder, and finally Alex grabbed his hand and lifted the sleeve.
    “Oh fuck!” Alex said, dropping Milo’s hand immediately, staring at the dozens of red and pink open sores on his arm, severely irritated by his furious scratching. “What the hell?”
    “It’s these things,” Milo whispered. “There are these things inside us. I can feel them moving around.”
    Alex lowered his voice, now unable to hide that he thought Milo had just gone full-on “Looney Tunes” and was about to follow OtherMom Bea right into the bin. “What the hell are you talking about?”
    “I’ll tell you later,” Milo said. “I’ve gotta go home.”
    “Wait,” Katie called out as Milo hopped off the porch stoop, jumped on his bicycle, and sped off down the street.
    Alex met Katie’s eyes, “What the hell is wrong with him?”

    * * * *

CHAPTER 4 — Cassidy Hughes

    The jukebox was rocking, drinks were flowing, people were laughing, and 10 different sports programs were on the TVs throughout the bar. The place crackled with energy, and it felt great to be back at Shipwrecked, doing her thing behind the bar.
    Cassidy had been serving for two weeks, though the first week was anything but normal, with a constant stream of apologies and well-meaning sympathies over the loss of her sister.
    Now, things were finally making a return to the usual.
    Cassidy felt at home behind the bar, schmoozing, flirting, and earning her tips. She was good at her gig, and crap job that it was, working Shipwrecked allowed her to get lost in familiar routine while navigating the new and unfamiliar life she was forced to look in the eye when not working.
    She was suddenly playing Mom to Emma, and girlfriend — if that’s what you’d call it — to Jon Conway. It was almost surreal, as if she’d opened her eyes into Sarah’s life instead of her own. Cassidy thought she could ride things out, that she didn’t need to know what would happen next. But once Jon asked her to move in with them, everything suddenly became very … real. The bar was a comfort, perhaps a narcotic, listening to her fellow bartender Lewis’s idiot come-ons, joking around with her regulars, like Chris, Ray, and Sammi Jo. She didn’t even mind the drunks like Bruce Henderson, who had to get kicked out of the bar more often than not, after starting stupid arguments over darts or pool.
    It was chaotic, but comfortably familiar.
    “Whatcha smilin’ about?” Lewis asked, as he brought a bucket of ice from the kitchen and poured it into the storage bin.
    “Nothing,” she said, still smiling.
    “You were checking out my ass, weren’t you?”
    “Yeah, busted,” Cassidy said, laughing as Lewis went back to the kitchen for more ice. As he walked off, she found herself, ironically enough, checking out his ass.
    Lewis was tall, well-built, and had pretty boy looks with blond hair and blue eyes, but he was also a big mouth. He’d slept with one of the waitresses, Roxanne, a couple years back. That shit had spread faster than herpes in a whorehouse. Any thoughts Cassidy had of hooking up with him died the day she heard him mouthing off about