Ink and Shadows

by Ellery Adams

  “Are you going to walk home?” Nora asked.

  “Just a walk around the block. I need my car to visit Tyson tomorrow.” Her eyes softened. “Look, I know you’re worried about me because of the similarities between Celeste’s girl and my boy. But Tyson is getting the help he needs. I thank God for that every day. And I’m worried about you. You need to sleep late tomorrow, so you can recover a bit. I’ll tell Sheldon to open the store. Don’t you dare show up before noon, or you’ll get an earful from me at book club tomorrow night.”

  Nora smiled. “I’ll try to sleep.”

  “Do you have chamomile tea? Melatonin? Anything to help?”

  There was a bottle of wine in the pantry, but Nora tried not to think about that.

  The two women embraced, and Nora climbed up to her deck to watch June cross the parking lot with her tomcat escort. Once they were out of sight, Nora turned toward the hill. For a moment, she saw the dark shape of Bren’s body again.

  She remembered Celeste’s pained questions.

  Did she come to you tonight? What happened? Were you home?

  The guilt Nora had felt when she’d heard those questions came flooding back. Yes, Bren had probably come looking for her. And no, she hadn’t been home.

  If I hadn’t walked to the store first, could I have gotten back in time to help Bren? Nora wondered, her gaze falling on her welcome mat. If I hadn’t gone to look for devils, could I have saved her life?

  Weary in body and spirit, Nora let herself into her house, dropped her keys on the kitchen counter, and fell into bed. She kicked off her shoes and waited for sleep to deliver her to a sweet state of oblivion, but it refused to obey.

  Part of the problem was that her phone was still in her pocket, and it was digging into her side. Taking it out, she stared at the image of the book page until the symbols blurred. Finally, she closed her eyes.

  Her dreams were haunted by a raven-haired woman and a man who wore a snake around his neck like a scarf. The woman cried as the man pressed a wooden cup into her hands.

  The man’s fingers were covered in tattoos. His face was a shifting shadow. The snake—a horned viper—was terrifying. Black beads of venom dripped from its fangs, and it reared its head back, ready to strike.

  Nora’s dream self knew that if she got too close, she wouldn’t survive the encounter. She tried to run, but her legs weren’t working. And when she looked down, she saw that her lower half was made of marble. She couldn’t move, and the man with the snake was coming for her.

  Chapter 7

  You want happy endings, read cookbooks.

  —Dean Young

  The next day, Nora’s whole body ached from lack of sleep. But after ibuprofen, coffee, and a long shower, she felt almost human. She dressed in her favorite jeans and a rust-colored blouse, spending more time than usual on her hair and makeup. Crowds of festivalgoers would be visiting Miracle Books today, and Nora was determined to make a good impression.

  As she dabbed concealer under her eyes, she wondered how Celeste was doing. Was she at home? Was the social worker watching over her? Had she been questioned again?

  There wasn’t much more for Fuentes to do until the ME submitted his report, and Sheriff McCabe would be back before then. The thought comforted Nora. Deputy Fuentes was a good man, but he’d been working extra shifts to cover for McCabe, and he needed some time off. The sheriff would look into Bren’s death with tact and sensitivity. And if Nora knew him as well as she thought, he wouldn’t be too happy about the Women of Lasting Values.

  What will they do next? Paint a devil on Bren’s gravestone?

  The possibility of those self-righteous women adding to Celeste’s grief reignited Nora’s anger. If they got wind of Bren’s drug use, they’d triumphantly shout, “We told you CBD was a gateway drug” to anyone who’d listen. But to what end? To drive a grieving mother out of town?

  Nora pulled on a barn coat and went out to the deck. She gazed at the hill where a million dewdrops clung to a million blades of grass. They shimmered in the sunlight like clear crystals. Like the jewelry Bren made.

  A breeze drifted through the grass, and the dewdrops danced and sparkled. In that moment, Nora felt like Bren was there. But when a cloud slid in front of the sun, the feeling disappeared.

  A train whistled from somewhere down the line. Its hopeful, haunted note made Nora wish that Jed wasn’t so far away. She took out her phone and called him.

  “Hey, stranger. How are you?”

  “I’ve been better.” Jed’s voice was leaden. “Mom’s in the hospital. She has an infection. Nora, it’s in her lungs.”

  Having spent months in a burn unit, Nora knew that patients with internal injuries were more prone to infection. It wasn’t something that went away after they left the burn unit either. Many survivors were plagued by a weakened immune system for the rest of their lives.

  Though Jed’s mom had been hospitalized several times since the fire, he’d always been around to take care of her. This time, she’d been admitted to the hospital by someone else because Jed was six hours away in Miracle Springs.

  “I’m so sorry,” Nora said. “I wish I could reach through the phone and hug you.”

  “Me too,” Jed said. There was a pause, and when he spoke next, his tone was frosty. “Just so you know. I’m not leaving until she’s okay. Like she’s back home and feeling one hundred percent okay.”

  Jed wanted to pick a fight. Nora knew that he wasn’t mad at her, but at himself. After all this time, he was still filled with self-loathing for starting the fire that had injured his mother. Nora had given him a list of books to help him heal, but he’d refused to read it. He repeatedly told her that he didn’t need bibliotherapy or any other kind of therapy. He just needed to work as hard as he could so that his mother received the best possible care.

  “You’re a good son, Jed.” Nora tried to infuse every word with tenderness and warmth. “Your mom will probably recover twice as fast because you’re there. Can I do anything for you while you’re away? Check on your house? Stop by your neighbor’s and see how Henry Higgins is doing?”

  Jed exhaled into the phone. “Maybe. I don’t know. I’m too distracted to think right now. I know there’s a big festival today, and you’ll be crazy busy, so go sell a billion books. My mom’s nurse is heading this way. I’ve gotta go.”

  Nora opened her mouth to tell Jed to take care, but he was already gone.

  “Sell a billion books,” Nora repeated. After last night, there was nothing she’d rather do.

  * * *

  She entered Miracle Books to find that Sheldon had already brewed coffee, arranged the book pockets, and straightened the shelves. He was cleaning the reading chairs with the hand vac when she tapped him on the elbow.

  “Any signs of vandalism?” she asked when he put down the vacuum.

  Ignoring her question, Sheldon enfolded her in his arms. “I won’t ask why you’re here when you could have slept in because I already know the answer. You needed to be among friends. Jane Austen, JRR Tolkien, and Sheldon Silverstein Vega.”

  Sheldon’s bear hugs were magical. When Nora laid her cheek on his shoulder, she smelled peppermint and wool. With Sheldon’s arms around her, she felt safe. For someone who’d never been much of a hugger, Nora would accept one from Sheldon any day of the week.

  When he released her, he wasn’t smiling. “Before you believe that your troubles went away just because I squeezed you like Charmin, you’d better take a look in the stockroom.”

  The devils! Nora pictured Celeste’s statue and Marie’s sign as she hurried to the stockroom. When she saw a pumpkin sitting on the mailing counter, she moaned in relief.

  Whoever transformed the pumpkin into a devil hadn’t put much effort into it. They’d used black marker to draw a malicious face and pointy beard on the gourd’s surface. After poking a pair of devil horns on either side of the pumpkin’s stem, they’d left it for Nora to find.

  “Where was it?” she as
ked Sheldon.

  “In the front planter. The marigolds are totally flattened.”

  Nora studied the pumpkin. “I can use this.”

  “You’re going to put it back out there?”

  Nora grabbed a can of black spray paint from the supply shelf. “After I make some improvements.”

  All the parking spots on Main Street were taken by the time Nora put the last of the food-themed paperbacks on the sidewalk table. The table wouldn’t be staffed, but Nora found that the presence of other people tended to discourage shoplifters. She also expected shoppers to stream in and out of Miracle Books all day long, so she decided to use the planter to prop the front door open. No one entering the bookstore could miss her newly improved pumpkin.

  After covering the pumpkin with two coats of black spray paint, Nora had written a quote across the glossy surface with a white paint pen.

  When she carried the finished product to Sheldon, he put on his glasses and read the text out loud, “‘You don’t need a silver fork to eat good food.’ ” He looked at Nora. “Who said that?”

  “Chef Paul Prudhomme. He’s the jolly bearded guy on the Magic Seasoning labels. We have some of his cookbooks on the display table. Louisiana Kitchen is a classic. I thought it was a good quote for a farm-to-table celebration.”

  Apparently, her customers agreed. Most people smiled after reading the quote and many took photos of the pumpkin.

  A woman wearing a T-shirt that said I LIKE MY COWS AND MAYBE 3 PEOPLE asked Nora if she could leave a stack of paperbacks at the checkout counter.

  “I want to get more from that sidewalk,” she said. “My town doesn’t have a bookstore or a library, so this is my chance to stock up. Cool pumpkin, by the way.”

  Nora pulled Louisiana Kitchen from the table and slid it into an acrylic stand by the cash register where everyone could see it. She touched its cover with the tenderness of a mother caressing her child’s cheek.

  Once again, a book had come to Nora’s rescue. The person who’d made the devil pumpkin had wanted to insult or scare her. However, thanks to a short but charming quote by a chef and cookbook author, the pumpkin that was meant to hurt her was generating sales and social media posts. It was setting a positive tone for everyone entering the shop. Nora wasn’t hurt or scared. She was delighted.

  Books had saved her the last time she’d been scared too. After someone had thrown a brick through her front window, Sheldon had come up with the brilliant idea to turn the shattered window into a banned books display.

  That display became the talk of the town, and readers tagged Miracle Books in social media posts for weeks. Not only had the shop’s sales soared, but people across the state also started having conversations about banned books.

  Today, everyone was talking about food. Growing it, harvesting it, selling it, preparing it, and eating it. Aromas from the street vendors drifted into the shop, and when a man walked in carrying a basket of Fuji apples, Nora’s stomach grumbled. She was thrilled by the line of customers waiting to be checked out, but it didn’t look like she’d be able to grab lunch anytime soon.

  She’d just given a customer his receipt for a pile of books on baking bread, brewing beer, and canning fruits and vegetables when Estella breezed into the bookshop. In her calico dress, cowboy boots, and straw hat, she looked like the cover model for a romance novel about a farmer’s wife.

  Though most of the customers in line openly admired her, Estella didn’t flash a single coy smile. She’d exchanged her coquettish behavior for the respect and patronage of the local women. Without their support, Estella’s business couldn’t survive.

  Besides, she didn’t need to flirt anymore. She was in love with Jack Nakamura. And love looked good on Estella. She was as radiant as a new bride.

  “I brought lunch,” she said, sashaying behind the checkout counter with a reusable shopping bag in hand.

  After thanking her customer, Nora turned and beamed at Estella. “You’re an angel.”

  Estella cackled. “Puh-lease. A halo would limit my hairstyles. Anyway, I have ninety minutes until my next appointment, so sit down and eat. You can tell me how to use the register in between bites. It’s a food festival, after all.”

  “What about Sheldon?” Nora asked after greeting the next customer in line. She used the price gun to scan the barcode on the back of each book while Estella watched with interest.

  “Hester’s taking care of Sheldon. She slipped in while you were making change for that hottie in the cowboy hat.”

  Estella observed two more transactions before declaring that she was ready to take over.

  Nora never ate in front of her customers, but she decided to break her own rule just this once. The shopping bag held a bottle of iced tea, a sandwich, and a container of fruit salad. The salad was a refreshing blend of apples, pears, grapes, and pecans tossed in a light yogurt dressing. The sandwich was a grilled ham and Brie on honey wheat.

  “This looks incredible,” said Nora.

  “It’s all from the same vendor. He uses food from local farms, and his wife’s the bread maker. If she and Hester hadn’t started talking about sourdough, we’d have been here sooner.”

  Nora cleaned her hands with a wet wipe and bit into her sandwich. It was warm and delicious, and the caramelized onions and apple spread perfectly balanced the saltiness of the ham and cheese. She polished off both halves in the time it took Estella to complete five transactions.

  Nora had just loaded her fork with fruit salad when the woman at the front of the line asked, “Do you ladies know why Soothe is closed? A couple from my hotel said that I could get CBD products there. My dad’s arthritis has gotten really bad, and I’d do anything to help him.”

  Nora slid off her stool and leaned over the counter, encouraging the woman to lean over too.

  “The owner just lost a family member, and I don’t expect her to reopen anytime soon,” Nora whispered. “And I’m not trying to talk you into buying more from me, but Sheldon, the handsome man in the back making the world’s best coffee, is a bit of an expert on arthritis. On chronic pain, in general. He might be able to give you a few ideas.”

  The woman left her books at the counter and stepped out of line. Nora led her to the ticket agent’s office, and within minutes, she and Sheldon were sitting in the readers’ circle, lost in conversation. Nora took Sheldon’s place behind the espresso machine and told Hester to stop washing mugs.

  “You already worked at the bakery this morning. You don’t need to work here too.”

  Hester dried her hands on a dishrag. “I want to help. I’m worried about you. After everything that happened last night.” She shook her head, took a deep breath, and went on. “As if that wasn’t bad enough, Sheldon told me about the pumpkin. I thought those wolves were going to leave you alone. Guess I was wrong.”

  Nora pulled a face. “I hope it’s the last message they send. When the news about Bren breaks, people should think twice about hounding their neighbors. Especially a neighbor who just lost her daughter.”

  “That’s what decent people would do, yeah. But if Celeste reopens the store, she might still be a target. These women might focus on the CBD products and ignore the grieving mom bit.”

  They stopped talking for a few minutes while Nora made a Jack London and Hester heated up two chocolate book pockets.

  “Where’s Celeste? Do you know?” Nora asked when they were alone again.

  “In her apartment. The social worker is with her. Nora, she really has no one. No family. No close friends. We’re lucky, you know?” Another head shake. “Jasper said that she was given a sedative last night and managed to get a little sleep. This morning, he stopped by to check on her. She was kind of groggy, but she grabbed his hand and whispered that they should have gotten out of the community sooner. Jasper tried to figure out what she meant by that, but he couldn’t get a clear answer.”

  For some reason, Celeste’s confused mumbling bothered Nora, but she didn’t know why. She’
d never heard Bren or Celeste mention a community before.

  “How can we help her?” Hester asked.

  As another customer approached the chalkboard menu and studied the choices, Nora realized that it was time to relieve Estella.

  “We’ll make a plan tonight. We’ll talk about Celeste first, and if we don’t discuss the book, then we don’t. The book won’t mind. Books never leave us. They always wait. They’re as loyal as a dog. As patient as a grandparent.”

  Hester smiled. “You get all starry-eyed whenever you talk about books. Do I look like that when I talk about scones?”

  “You don’t get stars in your eyes, my beauty, you get entire galaxies,” said Sheldon as he walked into the ticket agent’s booth. “I love you both, but you need to leave. My personal space is a deluxe suite, and I’m checking in.”

  With Hester in tow, Nora walked to the front and thanked Estella for the help and the delicious lunch. Then, she took her place behind the counter.

  The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur of recommending and bagging books, wrapping shelf enhancers, rearranging displays, and replenishing stock.

  By closing time, the shop was a total mess. There were big holes on almost every shelf. Everywhere Nora looked, books leaned on other books. They reminded her of small children resting their weary heads against a parent’s leg.

  As much as Nora loved a festival crowd, she didn’t love the debris they left behind. She’d been in business for years, but she still got annoyed to find wads of gum, balled receipts, hair ties, candy wrappers, apple cores, dirty tissues, water bottles, straws, toothpicks, potato chips, Cheerios, pens, pencils, napkins, and coins—mostly pennies—all over the shop.

  Nora couldn’t remember the last time the floor had been covered in so many different shades of dirt, and the trash cans were overflowing.

  “Dios mío!” Sheldon cried from the children’s corner. “These Clifford books are sticky and blue.”

  “It’s probably cotton candy.”

  Sheldon groaned. “Cleaning sugar-and-germ-infested toddler residue is not in my job description. This sailor’s abandoning ship.”