The Secret Ingredient of Wishes

by Susan Bishop Crispell

  “I know. But you don’t have to settle for the first place you find either.”

  Rachel tossed the pillow aside and dropped back into the rumpled sheets that smelled of lavender. “I know I don’t have to. But I have to do something, Maeby.” And Nowhere seemed as good a place as any. If she was lucky, the wishes hadn’t followed her to Nowhere and everything she’d run from would stay firmly in her past.

  “Just promise me if you’re not happy, you’ll try someplace else.”

  “Someplace else meaning home?”

  “Obviously that would be my preference. But I understand how starting over somewhere without all of the bad memories and constant reminders of things you can’t change could make you happy. If it’s what you need, I’ll be okay with it. And I’ll eventually forgive you for not saying bye.”

  Rachel laughed. Mary Beth could hold a grudge, but thankfully never against her. They were all each other had for a few heartbreaking years in their teens and neither of them ever forgot it. Rachel would sooner hurt herself than Mary Beth. Which was precisely why Rachel couldn’t be anywhere near her friend if she couldn’t control her ability.

  * * *

  The voices in the kitchen grew louder the closer she got to them. Rachel kept her steps light, only a slight hitch in her breath at eavesdropping on Catch and Ashe.

  “This is just crazy,” Ashe said. “One night I can understand, but living here? You can’t take in some strange girl just because she needs—”

  “Yes, I can,” Catch cut in. “Where would you or your brother be if I’d left you to fend for yourselves while your parents were too busy spitting at each other to notice y’all?”

  “That’s different, Catch. You’d known us our whole lives. And we were kids. She’s a grown woman, fully capable of taking care of herself.”

  Rachel pressed against the doorframe between the foyer and the dining room. She could slip back upstairs, pack her bag, and be out the front door before either of them realized she was gone. And she might have given in to the urge if she’d had anyplace else to go.

  “Just because she should be able to doesn’t mean she is. That girl needs my help whether either of you realizes it. Now, I don’t want to hear another word about it. Got me?” Catch’s raspy voice was firm, determined.

  Ashe’s loud sigh carried to Rachel. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “And when she comes down here, I want you to be nice to her. No arguing.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said again.

  Someone set a plate or something on the counter. The ceramic scraped along the granite with a shrill scratching. Rachel crept back up the stairs to the landing. She’d been right the evening before when she’d guessed Ashe thought it was a bad idea she was staying in the house with Catch. Well, she’d just have to prove him wrong. As she started back down the stairs, she let her flip-flops slap each step so they wouldn’t think she’d overheard them when she walked in.

  Ashe sat at the island, digging in to a plate of breakfast pie. He glanced up, nodded.

  She took the seat next to him and said, “Not even a good-morning pat down to make sure I don’t have my ax hidden in my shirt? I must not be giving off my menacing vibe today.”

  He cracked a smile, then buried it in his coffee cup.

  She added a check mark to the Rachel column of her mental scorecard for the small victory. “How’s the bribe working?” she asked Catch.

  “I hadn’t gotten to that yet, Little-Miss-Big-Mouth. Shoulda shoved this plate in front of you the second you sat down.” Catch dumped a plate with a triangle of pie and a few slices of pear in front of Rachel. Silverware clattered down a second later.

  Rachel stuffed a forkful of hot egg pie in her mouth, and Ashe turned to her, eyebrows raised in curiosity.

  “I thought something tasted funny about this pie,” he said. He cut off another hunk and inspected it on the end of his fork. “Yep, there it is. Artificial guilt flavoring.”

  “Oh, shut up, you,” Catch said.

  “Whaddya need?”

  Catch smacked at his arm with a damp dish towel, then did the same to Rachel, who couldn’t help but laugh. “Since you’re here, I was thinking it would be nice if you showed Rachel around town.”

  “You didn’t tell me I was part of this bribe,” Rachel objected.

  “You’ll learn,” Ashe said to her. He polished off the last bite of his breakfast, eyed her barely touched piece, and said, “That’s worth at least two servings, I think.”

  He leaned across Rachel to reach the pie dish. His arm grazed hers as he sat back and carved out a piece almost twice the size of his original one. He shrugged at her when she continued to stare at him.

  “I’m in if she is,” he said.

  “Oh, she’s in,” Catch said.

  * * *

  Twenty minutes later, Rachel followed Ashe through the backyard to his house. It was barely past eight, but the air was already thick with humidity. A bird jabbered at them from one of the trees before taking flight. The cherry tree shook, its plush leaves stirring up a tart, ripe scent that tickled the back of her throat. Another tree, thick with bright pink and yellow peaches in varying stages of ripeness, rubbed against her arm as she passed, almost as if it had reached out to pet her.

  “So, Catch got you to stay, huh?” he asked. He flipped his sunglasses down to block the early-morning glare.

  “For now,” Rachel said, squinting without the sunglasses she’d left at Catch’s. “Mostly because I don’t know where else to go.”

  He was a step ahead and turned to look at her when he asked, “Were things bad in Tennessee? I mean, did you leave a bad situation?”

  “No.” Even if she’d wanted to explain what she could do with the wishes, she would have no idea how to. So she just said, “But they weren’t really good either. They just were.”

  “Sorry, I shouldn’t have asked. Catch is always telling me to mind my own damn business.”

  “It’s okay.”

  They walked in silence the rest of the way. A few steps out of the trees and they were at the back deck of the gorgeous house she had glimpsed from the attic room at Catch’s. Windows ran along the back of the house from floor to ceiling. The glare from the sun made it impossible to see inside. The tiered roofs created subtle overhangs for the levels below and she could imagine leaving the window open even when it rained. On the second floor, a minuscule balcony jutted off the back of the house with enough room for one chair to fit between the wall and the railing.

  Ashe stopped at the base of the deck stairs, as if deciding whether or not to invite her inside.

  She shielded her eyes from the sun with a cupped hand and looked at him. Thanks to the reflectiveness of his sunglasses, she couldn’t tell if he was looking back, but if she had to guess, she’d say he was. And that he had no intention of making the next move.

  So it was up to her.

  All she had to do was talk to him. And if she was steering the conversation, she could keep topics off of ones that would lead to questions she couldn’t answer.

  “How’d you end up living in the family home?” she asked. When he quirked an eyebrow at her, she added, “Catch told me you grew up here and I assume you don’t still live with your parents.”

  “I’ve always loved this house.” He ran a hand over the porch rail. “My mom was always trying to change things. Take out a wall here, add a bathroom there, rip out the eighty-year-old mahogany floors to put in Travertine. I needed to get it away from her before there was nothing of the original architecture left. So, for their twentieth anniversary, I designed a new house for them with all the details she wanted and none of the ones she didn’t.”

  He inched the back door open, keeping an eye on something across the room as the hinges sighed, and held the door for Rachel.

  “How old were you then?”

  Ashe gave her that smile again. The one that said, Yep, I’m as good as you think. She hated that she believed it so easily. She was a master at keep
ing people out, or so her ex-boyfriend attested. How Ashe could get through her defenses with a damn smile both baffled and unnerved her. Turning away, Rachel focused on the curved wood railing that led to the second floor. The rungs were dusty, but the banister itself gleamed.

  “Twenty-three,” he said. “I was pretty young when Dad and Carol Ann got married, but since my real mom took off when she found out about my dad and Carol Ann, Carol Ann’s the only mom I’ve got. I’ve just got to grab something real quick.” He ducked into a room to his left and came out a moment later stuffing a handful of papers into a legal-size envelope.

  Rachel followed him back across the room. A folded blanket and pillow sat on the pool table that separated the kitchen from the living room. “I guess since you’re in this one, she liked it. The new house.”

  “She loved it at first,” he said, tucking the envelope under his arm. He held the back door open for her and followed her outside. “Until she went out there one day to check on the progress and found my dad screwing another woman on the granite countertop she’d picked out.”

  Rachel cringed and said, “Sorry,” but Ashe waved it away. “You know, I’ve heard that’s the only way to really test out granite to make sure it’s installed properly.” The words were out before she considered how he’d take them.

  “That was not at all the reaction I was expecting.”

  Her face burned when she realized he thought she was making a suggestion instead of a joke.

  Before she could set him straight, he added, “Well, if it’s what you’ve heard I might have to try it out next time.” She dropped her gaze to the ground to avoid eye contact, and he chuckled. Whether at her reaction or because he was joking too, she didn’t know. “Anyways,” he said, “after that she didn’t really want the house anymore. She moved about an hour away, so my brother, Scott, has to split his time off from college between there and here.”

  The sun soaked through her shirt and heated her skin as they followed the stone path to the driveway. She rubbed at a dribble of sweat on her neck with sticky fingers. “Do you think he’ll come back when he graduates?” Rachel asked.

  “He’s got a few more years, then vet school, but yeah. This is home.”

  Ashe reached the door handle of his pickup before she did. She stepped back from the passenger door and waited.

  “You gonna get in?” he asked.

  “Sorry. I thought you needed to get something out,” Rachel said.

  “Nope. Just gettin’ the door for you.”

  Rachel told herself it was just because he was a gentleman and not because he thought she’d been flirting with him. But she couldn’t deny the sweetness of the action.

  She stepped onto the running board and pushed off the door to maneuver into the bed of the truck. Even with the added half foot of height, she was still barely eye level with him. When she wobbled, Ashe steadied her with a hand on her lower back. His fingers brushed a swath of skin as her shirt rode up an inch.

  “So, where are we headed?” she asked, trying to ignore the jolt of heat that traveled up her back from where his fingers had been.

  “Downtown. I’ve gotta drop this off at my dad’s, but then we can walk around a bit. Show you enough that Catch knows we upheld our end of the bargain.”

  She cut her eyes to him without turning her head. “Is there going to be a quiz at the end? Because I didn’t bring anything to take notes.”

  Ashe closed the door, cutting off his laugh.

  She watched out the window as they passed old house after old house with doors propped open in welcome and rockers waiting patiently on front porches for friends to stop by for a long chat, deciding she might be able to imagine why someone would want to make this place home.

  6

  The converted warehouse that housed Ashe’s dad’s law practice had been sectioned into office and retail space. With its gritty brick exterior, small square windows, and metal doors, it stood out from the quaint wood buildings that occupied most of downtown.

  Ashe tapped the envelope against his palm. He tried to smile, but his look carried a chill despite the warmth of the sun beating down. “Okay, so I need to run in here for just a minute. And I know this is shitty of me to do, but I was wondering if you minded waiting out here? This isn’t something I want an audience for.”

  Things must be pretty strained with his dad. “Yeah, of course. And I won’t even tell Catch you left me to fend for myself…” Her voice trailed off as a young man walked out of a building a few blocks up. He reminded her so much of Michael—the same heart-shaped face, same mop of shaggy brown hair falling over his eyes, same crooked smile. But a grown-up version.

  She blinked and he was gone.

  In his place were shoppers fanning themselves with to-go menus and tourist brochures, cars idling as pedestrians claimed right-of-way, and a murder of crows dotting the town square, waiting for someone to drop a bite of bagel.

  She took a few tentative steps toward where the young man had been, a strangled sound coming out of her throat before she could stop it.

  “Rachel?” Ashe said. When she didn’t respond, he placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Hey, you okay?”

  She blinked at the sidewalk as if that would make him reappear. “Yeah. Sorry. I thought I saw—” she said. Her heart rammed against her ribs, threatening to crack those closest to it. After a few seconds, she turned back to Ashe. “Never mind. Must be the heat.”

  He frowned, his hair falling across his eyes as he leaned closer to her. “Maybe you should come inside after all. Sit down for a minute?”

  Cold air rushed out when he opened the door. With his hand still on her shoulder, her skin erupted in goose bumps.

  Rachel glanced up the street again. “I’m fine. Really. You go on in and do what you need to do.”

  “You sure?” he asked.

  “Yeah. I’ll be okay in a minute.”

  Ashe still looked unconvinced. “If you pass out on me, Catch will have my hide.”

  She pulled her hair up and gathered it into a ponytail, the breeze caressing the back of her neck. She took in a deep breath. “I won’t.”

  Ashe hesitated, his eyes narrowing as he studied her face. She stared back and smiled until he seemed satisfied she was okay and went inside.

  Breathe, Rachel told herself.

  Her lungs burned from holding her breath. Exhaling, she looked to see that Ashe wasn’t still watching her. Then she took off down the sidewalk. Her heart thundered in her ears. Sweat and goose bumps battled on her skin. She wiped her palms on her thighs and forced air into her lungs. In and out. In and out.

  It wasn’t Michael.

  Even as she thought it, she looked left and right, trying to find the young man again. No one looked familiar. She passed building after building, storefronts and offices half-concealed by blinds. The windows reflected the morning light so everything inside was hazy, indistinguishable. She strained to find the navy plaid shirt and dark hair she’d seen a few minutes before.

  She kept walking. And searching.

  The sun blinded her when it shot through a gap between two buildings. She stared at the pitted concrete in front of her until the sun spots dispersed. Light-headed, Rachel caught a flash of blue disappearing around the corner a few blocks up. Her shoes slapped the sidewalk and she hurried to close the distance. She passed street signs without reading them.

  By the time she reached the next street, it was empty. Here, at least, the buildings blocked the sun. She searched shops as she passed, seeing flashes of clothing—bright colors like cherry and lemon, avocado and melon. But no young guy wearing blue.

  But she had seen him. Hadn’t she?

  “Damn it, Rachel,” she whispered. She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, forcing a mother pushing a double stroller to swerve around her. “Pull it together. There’s no one here. He is not coming back.”

  Though it had gotten easier to say over the years, something ballooned in her chest, making her choke
on the words. As if just by saying them she was wishing him away again.

  On the day he disappeared, she hadn’t seen her brother in hours. Not since he’d bulldozed her Lego castle with a swift kick, scattering the pink and purple and white pieces she’d spent days snapping into place, and she’d shouted that she wished he’d get lost so he’d stop ruining all her stuff. She’d read the wish she found buried in the rubble of her castle but figured Michael’s version of “lost” would be sulking in one of his hiding spots she had yet to discover. He was six years younger than her, and at age four, he was still small enough to fit in under-the-sink cabinets and way in the backs of closets where no one could see him.

  He wasn’t in his room when she went to apologize, so she set a plate of thumbprint cookies on the floor in front of his door where he couldn’t miss them when he came out of hiding. She’d only given him the blue, green, and yellow ones—the pink ones he always said were only for girls. Snagging a yellow one off the stack, she popped it in her mouth, the sprinkles baked into the edges crunching with the first few chews.

  She had tucked the wish safely in her pocket, where her mom wouldn’t be able to find it and yell at her for being mean to her brother.

  She tried to concentrate on rebuilding the front wall of the castle, but every creak and thump in the house had her jumping up from the floor and rushing to the door to tell Michael she wasn’t mad at him anymore. But it was never him.

  After an hour, the ground floor, including the throne room, the ballroom, and the kitchen, were back in place in the castle. Her fingers ached from pressing the plastic pieces onto one another. When her mom knocked on her door, she shook her hands back and forth, half-waving and half-trying to get the blood flowing again.

  “Why are there cookies in the hallway?” her mom asked.

  “They’re an apology. I think I hurt Michael’s feelings,” Rachel said.

  “What?”

  Rachel knew her mom would be mad about how she’d treated her brother, so she focused her eyes on the Lego princess as she placed her next to the prince so they could dance. “He ruined my castle,” she said, pouting. “I can’t help it if Michael’s a baby about getting in trouble.”