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Me and Nora took over clean up duty. She tried her darnedest to be chipper about it, but that dadgum vision broke the good mood brought on by Fame’s pan-fried pork chops and a passel of yummy sides. We said goodnight not long after, while Mary Alice was still resting from her turn as Old Mother, and Riley drove me and Nora back to my roost.
I said my own goodbyes to him after Nora went inside, though he did his best to try to talk me into coming back to his apartment with him. It was tempting, no doubt about it, but I had a load on my mind and needed some time to think ever thing through. I kissed him sound to make up for it, then got out of the Range Rover and waited on the porch while he drove off, in spite of the cold knocking my knees together.
Inside, Nora was already at the kitchen table, her head just about buried in that old book of Miss Jenny’s. That was fine by me, as I had studying of my own to do. I said goodnight, accepted her mumbled grunt as a like adieu, and went on back to my bedroom.
Most of that vision hadn’t made a lick of sense to me. Not surprising, given the nature of Old Mother’s visions. A coupla things stood out, though, most important the coupling of water with a reference to the old man.
That could only mean one person, and he was the very being I’d been trying to get ahold of.
Since he was on the lam, I dug the card Euryale give me that morning outta the front pocket of my jeans and dialed her number. She picked up on the first ring and said, “Miss Walkingstick. What a lovely surprise.”
Her voice was so smugly polite I almost hung up on her right then and there, which wouldn’ta got me them answers I needed. I gritted my teeth. Galling as it was, she might be useful. I couldn’t afford to alienate her when I had a perfect way to keep her on the hook.
“I’ll take your case,” I told her, flat out. “It’ll cost you dearly in money and information, and I expect you to cough both up soon as I ask for ‘em.”
“Done,” she said.
I’d expected a little more bargaining, but I was ok with none. “You need a contract or something?”
“A woman’s word is her bond.”
“Good enough. Me or Nora’ll be in touch tomorrow.”
I hung up on her, which I figured was her just desserts for the way she answered the phone.
––––––––
The next morning, I was startled awake by somebody pounding on the front door. A second later, Trey hollered loud enough to wake the dead. “Sunny, you better get your scrawny butt up and answer the door, or I’m coming in whether you want me to or not.”
I rubbed gritty eyes and glared at the thin gray light streaming through the curtains. Well, dadgum. What’d got his panties in a bunch at daybreak? Trey never knocked, and that hadn’t changed when Nora moved in. Nowadays, he opened the door and stuck his head inside just enough to make sure we was both dressed before he come on in.
Hunh. Must be something wrong, though why he couldn’ta called instead of trudging down the hill on a cold winter morning was beyond me.
I rolled outta bed and fumbled some pants and one of Daddy’s old t-shirts on over the tank top I’d slept in, and stumbled out of my bedroom and down the hallway toward the living area. Nora met me there, her honey blonde hair tousled. Her face was bare of makeup and a red crease marred the line of her cheek. If I didn’t know better, I’d put her age at maybe twenty. But I did know better and I weren’t fooled one bit by her innocent appearance.
Trey’s fist hit the door again, startling her so bad she about jumped outta her skin.
“What in the world?” she murmured.
I shook my head. “No idea. You might maybe wanna put on some pants, though, before he walks on in.”
Her eyes went wide as saucers. She turned and fled back into her temporary bedroom, my boy Henry’s old room, her cotton nightie flowing behind her.
I shook my head again. I ain’t never been one for fancy clothes, and I never seen the need for wearing nothing fancy to bed. Weren’t like anybody could see it but me and God, and maybe the mirror, if I happened to look in it.
Well, and sometimes Riley, but he weren’t here now, was he?
The door popped open right then and Trey thundered in, looking for all the world like he was gonna loose lightning on me any minute now.
I propped my fists on my hips and scowled. “What in tarnation is the matter with you, busting into my house like that while the world’s still a-sleeping?”
He shut the door behind himself none too quiet and pointed one finger at me, matching me scowl for scowl. “I got something to say to you, Sunshine Rainbow Walkingstick, and you’re gonna hear me out for once.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
He dropped his hand to his side, then lifted it and adjusted the ballcap he’d slapped on over a thick thatch of dishwater blond hair, same color and texture as Fame’s. Fact was, Trey was about Fame’s spitting image, from the wild, piercing blue of his eyes to the way he carried himself, like if trouble ever found him, he’d take care of it faster’n spit.
He was a handsome feller, too, and he coulda had his pick of the ladies, if he cared to. Thing was, he was pickier’n God in a turnip fight with the Devil: Only the right turnip would do. Trey’d found his turnip, and that both pleased and worried me, considering who the lady in question was.
His mouth worked for a good minute, opening and closing beneath that scowl. Finally, he blurted out, “She only has visions around you.”
Well, speak of the devil. I folded my arms over my bitty breasts and arched an eyebrow at him. “That you know of.”
“I know plenty,” he said, kindly hot. “She only messes with the herbs when you need her.”
I sputtered out a laugh. “Like I said. That you know of.”
“She told me she don’t need ‘em for nobody else. She come here for you, followed your longing for Henry to the mountains. If it weren’t for you, her granny’d be the cunning woman still, but no, you just had to reach out to her and reel her in like you do ever body else.”
I was so shocked and hurt, I dropped my arms same as my jaw and gaped at him. “I ain’t never reeled nobody in, Trey Carson, not a single dadgum soul. She brung them visions to me, not t’other way around. I sure as hell never asked her to.”
He started to speak, and I held up a hand, stopping him dead in his tracks. “That’s for one, but for t’other, if she hadn’t come, you wouldn’ta never met her.”
He yanked his cap off and slapped it across his thigh, but his expression had gone from scowling to uncomfortable. “You think I don’t know that? You think I wouldn’ta went looking for her nohow?”
“I think you woke up with your hormones in a wad this morning,” I snapped, “and you’re aiming to fight with the first body what comes to mind.”
“Ain’t done it.”
“Yeah? How about you rewind this conversation in your head and tell me exactly how I’m to blame here?” I huffed out a breath as hurt washed up and over me, carrying my heart with it. “You think I wanted Henry to die, and by his own great-grandmama’s hand? You think I wanted to spend my days hunting down monsters so another young’un wouldn’t go missing like that, so another mama wouldn’t mourn the loss of her own flesh and blood the way I done Henry?”
He looked at me for a long time, them wild blue eyes of his churning with whatever was going on in his head and heart. Finally, he pulled his ballcap on and tucked his fingers into the front pockets of his jeans. “I just wanna protect her, Sunny. I just wanna keep her from harm, and them visions, they take a lot outta her, you know?”
I swallowed down my own hurt for a minute, ‘cause I did know. I knowed exactly what it felt like to wanna protect somebody from something, to try real hard to keep ‘em safe and whole and loved. And I knowed what it felt like to fail in the worst way possible.
I wanted to tell him all that, to tell him I understood and if I had a choice in the matter, I’d never ask Mary Alice for another blessed thing again, just to lessen his own worries. But when I opened my mouth, what come out was, “You ever think maybe she’s old enough to decide what to do with her own life?”
Gentle as my words was, they brung that scowl back to his face. “I never figured you for being so downright mean, Sunny.”
He turned and opened the door, and I stepped forward and touched my hand to the Carhart jacket covering his shoulders, regret heavy in my heart. “Trey, c’mon now. You know I didn’t mean it like that.”
“I think you meant it exactly like that,” he said real quiet, with his back still to me. “But as mean as it was, I know you ain’t a selfish woman. You think on that, ya hear?”
I opened my mouth to say something, anything what’d scrub the sorrow outta his voice. When nothing come to mind, I let my hand drop, and he walked out the door and closed it so quiet, I barely heard it latch shut.
“He’s right,” Nora said from off to my left.
I glanced her way and found her leaning one shoulder against the hallway wall, her arms crossed over the logo of one of Daddy’s old sweatshirts.
“Right about what?” I said.
“People are drawn to you. Magic is drawn to you.” She shrugged once and resettled herself against the wall. “You’re like a magnet for it. I don’t know why.”
I swallowed down the hurt still lodged in my throat. “Maybe it ain’t got nothing to do with me. Maybe it’s just this time and this place.”
She shook her head, tumbling her hair down around her shoulders. “No, Sunshine. It’s you.”
“So I really am the reason for all the trouble we’ve had, for Mary Alice’s visions and Brenyn kidnapping them young’uns and—” I let my hands flap at my sides and looked at her, so helpless I coulda cried.
“Not that, no,” she said, gentle as a lamb. “You’re not a magnet for trouble. I think—”
Her lips clamped together tighter’n an oyster around a pearl, and my hands flapped again at my thighs. “Just spit it out already.”
“I think you were put here because of the trouble, and we were pulled toward you so we could help you sort it out.” She cocked her head to the side, resting it against the wall, and smiled real soft. “Does that make sense?”
I thought about it for a minute, tried to anyhow, but my brain was so tangled up in it all, I couldn’t find a clear enough space to think it through. My stomach rumbled right then, which was a good enough excuse for me to avoid all them well-deep ruminations.
“It’s my turn to make breakfast, if you wanna grab a shower,” I said.
She looked at me for a minute, her eyes wiser’n her appearance by far, then she pushed herself away from the wall and grinned. “I’m all about the bacon.”
“You do eat a lot of it, for a vegetarian.”
“Reformed vegetarian,” she said, real sassy, and I snorted out a laugh and hopped to it in the kitchen. Anything to get my mind off the hurt I done caused to the folks I loved best.
