Chapter 77

 

Jared

 

 

What with giving statements, signing complaints, and restraining Patterson from running out and buying a laser cannon at the nearest military surplus store, they were all late in getting home. Louise was already there, sipping tea with Evvie on Jared's front porch as he pulled into his driveway.

Patterson departed, with the intention of calling Trudy to see if this might be grounds for a new custody hearing. "Imagine, my Yvonne Marie, right in the same house with that man! What kind of example are they setting her?" he demanded of the unjust universe as he strode up the street to the Hardesty house, where Al was parking his red car.

"This brother-in-law," said Louise. "He's allowed to have Patterson's little girl? That's awful. What could the court be thinking?"

And this started Jared laughing; he had to sit down on the porch steps, with Louise staring at him as if he had gone crazy, and he laughed until his eyes streamed, although, as Cara pointed out when she brought him a cup of coffee, it wasn't very funny to have some weird person shooting laser pistols at him. He and Patterson both could have been killed by this lunatic. Or some innocent bystander could have been hurt. Jared thought of the flowering bush and laughed harder.

Cara sat down beside him, and he heard Evvie's voice, and Maud, also, murmuring explanations to Louise. After a little while he was able to get himself under control well enough to hug Cara with one arm and lift his coffee cup with his free hand. "Did you get any dinner?" she asked, and he remembered Patterson explaining how the military surplus store was right across from a hamburger stand and they could get dinner while he was shopping, and he started laughing again. "Is that a no?" she asked him, and he was able to nod, wiping his eyes.

"I'll make a sandwich," he said, and got to his feet. They had brought the stools out onto the porch; Louise was sitting with Evvie on one side and Maud on the other, watching him warily.

"At least," said Louise, "I can understand why you and Cara prefer to live here. Your house may be a little smaller, but you certainly have better neighbors. I can't imagine anyone in our neighborhood offering that much help."

"They'd call the police," said Cara.

"I had already called the police," said Jared. "And they were a little unhappy we didn't wait for them."

"I hope that man is in jail," said Maud. "You did, I trust, sign a complaint?"

"As many complaints as they would allow," Jared assured her, and went on into the house with his cup in one hand, and his other arm around Cara.

 

It was hard to get back into the proper frame of mind to conduct rituals next door. Jared ate his sandwich, asked Cara about the Bahtan sisters and their reaction to Numum's projected employment – they were worried at the chance he might be kidnapped, but they were pleased that he was happy, and they seemed to regard it as a proof of neighborhood acceptance of their unconventional arrangement. Issio and Sofi and Gina came in the back door, and he inquired about the shopping trip and listened to Gina's excited account of pants and shirts and skirts and jackets, adult styles suitable for this new phase in her school life.

The mouse was hidden in the back of their bedroom closet, out of her sight.

On the front porch, he heard more voices, Lalia, Carter, and after a few minutes, Zarei poked her head in the back door, looked cautiously at Sofi, and waggled her fingers in greeting. With a popping sound, air abruptly displaced, Chazaerte materialized in the middle of the living room, looking quite a bit better than he had the day before. "Have we started?" he inquired.

"Not yet," said Issio. "We were delayed."

"You were shopping?" Zarei asked Gina. "You are looking for clothes for school? And for you also, I suppose, teaching this fall, if you decide to do this," she added, glancing at Sofi, and Sofi turned her back abruptly, looking irritated.

"I have not decided," she said, her tail switching.

"We have decided," said Issio, his tail also switching.

"You have decided," Sofi said. "I have not."

"With Shamri due before the Winter Break," said Issio, "it hardly seems worth the effort to begin the school year. We intend that Sofi stay home with Shamri for the first year," he said to the company at large. "There is no purpose to her beginning this year, only to leave before the first semester is over."

"Besides," said Zarei helpfully, "it will be very difficult to work at the last; I understand that women become very tired by the final months. It will be better for you and for Shamri to not work."

"It will be better for me and for Shamri for you to mind your own business," said Sofi grimly.

"Shamri is my business," said Zarei recklessly, and Sofi turned on her at once, claws showing, tail bushing.

"And by this you mean what?"

"Only, she is my granddaughter," said Zarei.

"So? You knit booties, like Maud?"

"I do not know how to knit," said Zarei. "But she is still my granddaughter. I wish for her the best, and for you also – "

"And you believe that you know what this best is?"

"I am sure that Issio knows, and your doctors –"

"And you?" said Sofi, advancing on Zarei, who gave ground rapidly. Chazaerte, who had been watching from the middle of the living room, stepped in between them, holding up his hands to Sofi.

"She is only concerned for you," he said in a placating tone. "She wants to help –"

"You are good also at helping," snarled Sofi, turning on him, and he backed up and ran into Zarei, who yelped.

"Don't you dare start laughing again," Cara said to Jared, looking as if she was within a millimeter of laughing herself, and she grabbed Zarei by a white-gold arm and steered her toward the front door; Gina seized Chazaerte's elbow and pulled him back into the living room. All that was needed now, Jared thought, was for Ann to walk in and see Chazaerte standing there.

But she didn't; instead, Lalia leaned in the front door to say that the D'ubians were on Clyde's front porch. "To make the power go the right way," she said, "whatever that means, and everyone's getting together out here."

Issio put his hands on Sofi's shoulders and eased her down in the arm chair. "You will stay here and keep Gina safe," he said to her, and let go of her, and she rose instantly.

"I will keep Gina safe by coming with you," she said, "to be sure it is done right."

"I'll come," said Gina. "Terry's playing music," she reminded Jared. "I can do something too."

"Honey, no," he said at once, and turned to Cara and Sofi. "You all stay here," he said, and Cara came to him and firmly backed him into the study, hands against his chest, where they could speak a little more privately.

"I think Sofi shouldn't come," she said. "With Shamri. And I agree with you about Gina. She's too young. And I know I don't have that kind of power, but I have to come anyway."

"Sweetheart," he said, looking for words. "Cara. It isn't safe. We all understand that. And I have just found you. Just over three months ago, that's all it's been. I love you. How could I bear to risk you? Have you thought of that?"

She looked back at him. "And I," she said, "have just found you. Just over three months ago. What would I do if I lost you? Have you thought about that?"

They looked at each other. He could not think of a single thing to say.

"I have your back," she said. "You have mine."

"I guess so," he said, and he took her face between his hands and kissed her and felt her kiss him back, arms sliding around his waist. "God, what are we doing?" he said, and she hugged him tightly.

Mud cleared her throat at the door to the study, getting their attention. "I take it you are going with them," she said to Cara.

"I don't need permission, Mother," she said.

"No, indeed." Maud looked at her and sighed; she did not, Jared thought, seem willing to risk her daughter, any more than he was willing to risk his wife, but she couldn't think of any way to stop Cara either. "All right, then," said Maud, and headed back into the living room; Jared and Cara followed.

"Mrs. Ramirez is joining us," Jared announced. "And you," he said to Chazaerte, "are going to keep a good eye on her. You hear me?"

"Certainly I will," said Chazaerte, sounding, Jared thought, almost competent.

"No," he said to Sofi and Gina, who both opened their mouths at the same moment. His overprotective caveman gene was rising up full force. "No way. Under no circumstances. Cara is the only concession I'm making. You two stay here. You three," he added, thinking of Shamri, and Sofi sighed and glowered.

I don't feel right about this. Gina gazed at him, troubled. She really was scared, he saw, but she was willing to come along anyway, if he and Issio needed her. He shook his head and smiled at her.

Stay with Sofi and Shamri; take care of them. She and Sofi would be safer together, he thought, taking care of each other, if, say, something got loose, something searching for a new vehicle, a better one than the little body of the white mouse.

Gina clutched Sofi's hand and sat down with her on the couch. Neither of them looked happy, but they watched without further protest as the rest of them filed out of the house and crossed the lawn to Clyde's porch, where the D'ubians, clustered around the boy and his guitar, were tuning up their instruments. Evvie and Ollie were sitting on the stools on Jared's porch; Mutai was hanging over the Bahtan front gate, with a shadow behind her that could only be Numum. Jared caught a glint from the lowering sun on his polished horns. Willis and Lillian and Al were sitting on the porch swing at the Hardesty house, and Patterson and Phyllis and Ann were sitting on the steps. He had no sense of them as mere spectators; he had, instead, a sense of a joining, a sort of humming power in the background. The whole neighborhood was involved one way or another, he thought, just as Lalia had said; this was power that he and Issio could use.

If they could figure out how.