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Miss Jacqui was wise enough to suggest using her kitchen footstool to help Lydia vault the fence. She’d offered it to Lydia, with her blessing, before taking on Cordelia duty. Flora watched from the safety of Miss Jacqui’s porch as Lydia scaled Victor’s chain-link fence. With a phone in one hand and Jacqui’s binoculars in the other, she tracked Lydia’s movements.
Lydia tossed the stool over the fence. Victor’s trash barrels were most natural to use for entrance. Lydia would need the lift on her way back. Her crafter sandals were horrible for climbing fences. She left them behind and completed her journey with bare feet.
Victor’s greenhouse lit up his entire yard. With the sun still stalling, the light wasn’t necessary, but it did comfort, Lydia. She perused the back yard. A barbeque and a lawn chair sat on a small cement slab. Other than that, the only exciting thing in the yard was the greenhouse.
The You Pick Logo clung to a glass wall. It reminded Lydia of Mario’s You Pick inspector’s cap swimming among the heads at the Market. He’d been so proud of his contribution to Honey Pot’s home farmers. Now, he was gone.
Lydia was still thinking of Mario when she reached the greenhouse door. It was sealed with three chains and three separate locks. Lydia gave each lock and chain a tug, hoping they were for looks and not protection. Each stayed secure and firm. She was relieved. If she could not gain entry, neither could the trespassing shadow.
Lydia couldn’t see any damage or other signs of tampering. She also couldn’t see any plants in the glasshouse. She cupped her hands around her temples and pressed her face to a panel. Her breath fogged the pane. Lydia took a deeper look. She cataloged a pile of cardboard boxes and two tables.
Lydia’s phone twirled, her face still smooshed to the window. She startled smashing and sliding her nose against the glass. She pulled away and rubbed her insulted feature while checking her messages.
Out now!!!!
Flora’s text flummoxed Lydia and her thoughts scattered. It was too light outside to make a straight out run for the fence. Dusk was only barely approaching. She silenced her mobile and tucked in under a bra strap. She’d have to hide and pray Victor didn’t come outside.
Lydia’s cheeks warmed with embarrassment. She wasn’t a thief or a vandal. Still, she didn’t need Ethan pulled from the office to haul her in. She decided to wait out the sunset and make her exit under the night sky.
Her only nook of safety was an overgrown bush that traversed each side of the fence between the Muggs’ home and the Cotton residence. She shoved herself between its branches and padded her shelter with broken twigs and fallen leaves. I must look ridiculous, Lydia thought as brambles and thorns poked at her. They tangled in her hair. She waited.
Victor’s front door slammed. Lydia steadied her breathing. Her calves already ached and shook beneath her. She searched, with blind hands, for a spot to anchor herself. The back screen to the yard squeaked open and swung closed with a clatter. Lydia froze. Her position was now more unsustainable than before.
Victor stomped to the greenhouse. He muttered to himself and repeatedly smoothed his dark hair off his forehead. Keys jangled in his hand. Smoothly and swiftly, he unlocked the door to his garden and entered. Through the bushes, Lydia squinted.
Victor sat at the cleanest table and fidgeted with a hot plate. He paced and played with his cell, eventually turning on a playlist and setting down the device. From the nearby box, he extracted another hot plate and an aluminum pitcher. Using the pitcher, he scooped up a serving of dark blue beads. Lydia watched the man melt and pour the first layer of his Victor E Candles. In every other jar, he added a small sack and patted it, like a seed, into the cooling blue wax.
He pulled out a separate pitcher and repeated part of the process with white wax pellets. Holding the wicks sturdy, he poured the center to his Americana candles before reaching for the red pellets. On the candles, with the sacks, the wicks rested in the center of the white layer. Victor moved slowly and purposefully. Delicately ensuring every candle looked the same.
Lydia could no longer feel her feet. Her quads sent prickles of pins and needles like lightning through her body. Nighttime settled over Honey Pot, but Victor Cotton was not leaving his well-lit greenhouse. Lydia didn’t know how to go without being spotted.
Her phone rattled at her shoulder. She tugged it out with her free hand and teetered with the redistribution of weight.
Jacqui’s got this. Be ready to run.
The message frightened Lydia. She wasn’t sure her body could run after being cramped up for so long. She prayed and waited. In the distance, a phone rang. Victor paused his music. Trilling continued from inside the house. He set down his pitcher and exited the greenhouse.
Lydia scooted out from the bush. Her legs responded at a snail's pace. “Come on, body, move!” She whispered, trying to connect her brain to limbs. Her first lurch forward sent her to the dirt. A mouthful of grass and soil revived her senses, and her muscles woke. She charged down the side of the house.
Using her stool as planned, she flung herself up the chain-link. Its little sharp edges tore at her feet and the palms of her hands. Remembering, at the last second, her sandals, Lydia turned around and retrieved them from the top of Victor’s trash barrels. A metal bat clanged against the cans and hit Lydia on the top of her foot. She swallowed a scream and halted to prop the bat back against the trash cans. Then she hustled across the street and straight into Miss Jacqui’s living room.
“He hasn’t come back out yet.” Flora informed her with a warning finger on her lips. She tilted her head toward the kitchen as she peeked through the blinds.
“...yes, well, let me know if you think of anything else.” Miss Jacqui spoke into the receiver.
“Victor?” Lydia mouthed without sound while her heart raced in her chest. Breathlessness stung her dry throat.
Miss Jacqui replaced the phone and helped herself to a seat on the couch before reprimanding Lydia. “You look awful. What happened to you? And what was that noise? It sounded like someone dropped a truckload of tin cans on the driveway.”
“Do you think Victor heard that?”
“If I could hear it, he most certainly did.”
Flora interrupted her soft voice brimming with concern. “He’s at the fence.” Lydia froze. Though he wasn’t in the room and couldn’t see through walls, she felt as though Victor Cotton was staring right through her. “Uh, oh.”
“What, uh oh?” Lydia hurried behind Flora. They each spied out at the Cotton drive. Victor stood, in his backyard, at the fence. He bent, inspecting something. His face morphed with irritation and confusion, as Victor lifted Miss Jacqui’s footstool. He turned his head from side to side, wiping back his hair as he’d done before, searching the street. His eyes landed on the mess Lydia created at the trash cans.
Lydia held her breath as she watched Victor race around his yard. He disappeared and reappeared out his front door. He knelt on the concrete, still holding the footstool. He tossed the stool in the bin and carried the bat back inside the house.
“You’re going to go get that,” Jacqui snipped. “That was my mother’s stool, and I want it back.
Flora gawked. “Now?”
“No, when he’s asleep.” Lydia’s stomach dropped. Another trip over to the Cotton’s did not bode well with her cramping muscles.