“I went last night,” her friend said.
I logged into the first search engine on the list. It utilized names to browse through old newspaper articles dating back to 1880. I used the school’s provided password and login name, then typed Oma’s maiden name into the search space. A timer came up, and I leaned back in my seat to wait.
The search finished, resulting in one match. I clicked on the link and an article came up. It was from 1930, about a woman named Lina Venus who had written a book about her ancestors.
I skimmed the article until my eyes landed on Oma’s name. Back in 1850, Lina’s grandmother had an uncle and aunt who had died from pneumonia, orphaning their only daughter. The daughter’s name was Leontien Kinbeer.
That was Oma’s name, only Oma hadn’t been a child back in 1850. This girl was probably a relative, since the name couldn’t be that common.
For the fun of it, I read on. Leontien had been set to move in with Lina’s grandmother. Lina recounted how much her grandmother had looked forward to spending time with her American cousin.
Leontien had disappeared from her small town of Logan, New York. Authorities had no idea what had happened to her, and Lina’s family had never learned the truth about the missing relative. Lina mentioned that, when she and her husband moved to America, she’d almost expected to meet Leontien, but she hadn’t yet, and wouldn’t know if she did, since no one knew what Leontien looked like.
Lina was probably dead now. The newspaper article portrayed her as a middle-aged woman back in the 1930’s. Leontien would be gone now, too.
Unless Leontien had been captured by the Goat Children.
I laughed at my own silliness. The Goat Children were the imaginings of a woman who now had dementia and didn’t understand reality versus fantasy. Oma might have heard about this other Leontien and used her in the book. After all, this Leontien’s childhood was the one Oma had spoken of as her own. The loss of parents, the uncle in Holland, the disappearance before moving. Oma had taken another girl’s story because she and that other girl shared the same name.
I tapped the stiletto heel of my boot against the tile floor. I exited that website and opened another. This one offered a service to members so they could build an electronic family tree, either public or private. I entered the school’s offered password to browse the private genealogies and discovered one match for Leontien Kinbeer.
The family tree belonged to a man with the last name of Venus, and this Leontien Kinbeer was a distant cousin, the same girl Lina Venus had mentioned. Scanning the family tree, I spotted Lina as being the maker’s grandmother.
I flipped over the packet and wrote down the names of the Leontien’s parents.
This project was going to suck if I couldn’t find the Leontien Kinbeer I needed. It would be fun to keep looking up this woman though, if only to find similarities.
****
The snow still fell as I walked home from school, now a thin dusting – the flakes huge and fluffy. I caught one on my palm. The delicate crystalline shape melted against my flesh. I turned my hand over, flexing my fingers. The edges of my fingernails turned purple. I hadn’t thought to wear mittens, and the fingerless gloves I wore in New York City were banned at the school because a gang used them to designate membership.
I slid my hands beneath my hair, cooling skin against heated scalp. I shivered at the delight, sighing as my scalp warmed my fingers. Some snowflakes clung to my hair where strands dangled over my face.
Squirrel and dog prints littered the sidewalk. One person had walked by wearing boots. I studied the star pattern left by the rubbery soles and stepped into one of them, removing my foot to study the contrast. My print was much smaller, with an oval behind belonging to my heel.
I walked backwards up the hill so I could watch my footprints form in the snow; fresh and crisp, untarnished yet by filth. Too soon, that filth would invade the pristine haven, staining it with darkness.
I took smaller steps since the man had moved with long strides. Cat prints joined in, but then the cat had moved off over a yard, abandoning the sidewalk.
Did Oma feel like that when she thought of her imagined world of the Goat Children? She’d adopted a teenage girl from the past to join her on the adventures. In fact, Oma had given that girl the adventures. What did the real Leontien think of as she stared down from Heaven?
I stepped off the sidewalk into the nearest yard. The man’s footsteps had stopped. He hadn’t walked off somewhere else. He hadn’t turned around. He’d taken a step and disappeared.
Impossible.
I licked my chapped lips. Maybe some snow had fallen, hiding his tracks. I ran ahead to the driveway, but there were no footsteps there either, only the tracks of the dog I’d assumed the man had been walking.
I forced myself to laugh. What, had he started levitating?
A car drove by, tooting the horn. I jumped, landed on a hidden patch of ice beneath the snow, and spun sideways. Cold wetness exploded around my face, biting my hands as I crashed into the ground. My messenger bag hit and flopped open, and a book slid out.
“Crap.” I snatched the book from the snow to shake it. Flakes flew off. I stuffed it back into my bag. The car pulled into the next driveway. As I stood, brushing off my jeans, Michael opened the car door.
I expected him to wander down the street, asking if I needed help. It was his fault I’d fallen, after all, but Michael only stood next to his car with his hands in the pockets of his coat. I slung the strap of my bag over my shoulder and stepped out of the snow.
Snow soaked through my jeans. Oma had told me to wear winter boots, but I’d insisted I couldn’t. I loved the way jeans looked with heels, and the knee boots were waterproof.
I snorted. So much for loving the way I looked.
“That was quite a fall,” Michael drawled.
“Yeah, it hurt.”
“How’s your grandma doing?”
“Fine. Uncle Jan came over yesterday, saying mice always move in when the snow falls. He set up a mousetrap in the living room. I didn’t believe him, but this morning, I found a huge rat squished in the trap. I called up Uncle Jan and made him promise to not just remove the rat, but purchase a humane trap in case there were any others.” Remembering the gory sight, I shuddered anew.
“How’s school?” Michael pulled a pack of cigarettes from his coat pocket.
“I didn’t know you smoked.” You don’t give a crap about my mouse story.
“I quit.” He spun a cigarette around his fingers before holding it to his lips, winking at me. “I just play with them a little. Bad habits are hard to break. Don’t ever start smoking, kid.”
“I won’t.” My heart skipped a beat as he licked the end. “I think it looks disgusting.”
Michael chuckled. “So it does. I might be moving soon.”
“Really?” I found it hard to swallow. He was odd, but when I thought of New Winchester, I pictured him as a part.
“Where are you going?” I kept my voice light, as if I didn’t care.
“Places.” He balanced the cigarette on his lips. “But really, my job is transferring. I might be moving to Alaska.”
“What do you do for a living? I thought you worked at the library.”
He flashed a grin, lifting the cigarette from his lips. “I’m a mercenary.”
I leaned back on my heels. My panties were wet from the snow, clinging to my butt cheeks. “Ha ha, very funny. I’m serious. What do you do?”
“Fine then, don’t believe me.” Michael spun the cigarette through his fingers. “I still might be moving. I’ll know in a month, maybe.”
I turned away, to hide the anger at his proposed move. “Okay, but I have to get home now.”
“You know,” his voice drifted with the snowflakes, “if you ever want to just come over and hang out sometime, you can. I’m home when my car’s here.” He laughed. “I don’t bring friends over, either.”
“Okay.” I increased my pace. Therefore, I w
asn’t his friend, since he never brought friends over.
Did he like me? At twenty-three, he was too old for me. Right?
What if Michael only wanted to get in my pants? I wanted to wait until I was married for sex, even if that seemed old-fashioned. Tiffany called it prudish.
I pulled open the screen door, propping it with my shoulder while I fitted the house key into the lock. I turned it, frowned, and turned the other way. It clicked.
The door had been unlocked.
I turned the key once more, unlocking it again. I pushed the door open and dropped my bag on the stairs as I stepped inside. “Oma, the door was unlocked!”
My heart stopped as a male voice said, “Company’s here.”
I grabbed a decorative snowman off the hall table and lifted it in front of me like a baseball bat for protection. I pictured Oma tied to a chair, gagged. The man might brandish a gun, but I would have to take a chance with that, no time to call 911.
The floor creaked beneath my feet, heels clicking against the wood. I swore under my breath, surrendering the chance for sneaking up on the intruder. I bolted into the living room swinging the snowman. “Get away from her!”
“Keziah,” Oma gasped.
“Is this your granddaughter?” The man held his arms akimbo as he leaned against the fireplace.
Oma sat in the chair near him, glaring at me.
I tightened my hands around the snowman. The new mail carrier was in the living room.
“Get away from her,” I repeated, softer this time.
The mailman looked from me to Oma.
“This was an interesting evening,” he said. “I hope you take my words into account.” He swung his gaze to me. “It was nice meeting you, my dear.”
“What are you doing in the house?” I growled through clenched teeth.
He lifted his hands. “Am I in the house?”
Oma’s eyebrows furrowed, as though she had no idea what was happening. The mailman was taking advantage of a senile old woman.
“I’m going to call the police.” Still holding the snowman, I grabbed the portable phone off the table near the couch.
“My dear, put that down.” Laughter remained in his voice. “There was a package your grandmother needed to sign for. I brought it in to make it easier for her. There has been no harm done.”
“Where is this package?” I had a feeling it was illegal for mail carriers to bring packages into the house. Sweat broke out across my face.
“Why, right there.” He swept his hand toward my mattress. I followed the movement with my gaze, and my jaw dropped open. A large box rested on the bed. That had not been there when I first came in. It was huge, able to fit a chair in there! I would’ve noticed it.
“Go ahead, read the label,” he purred.
“Isn’t that nice?” Oma asked.
I inched towards the bed. The label had our address, but the addressee was Rex Curatola—whoever he was—and the sender company was in Michigan.
“This isn’t for us. This man doesn’t live here.”
“So he doesn’t? That’s what your grandmother was saying,” the mailman said. “I will return it to the office and have everything straightened out.”
He hefted the box as if it weighed no more than a feather. When his gaze met mine, they were dark and gray, so dark the pupils seemed to dissolve into the irises.
I gulped, backing towards the door.
“It was nice meeting you, Leontien,” the mail carrier said too softly for Oma to hear. I ran to lock the door behind him. Once he got into his mail truck and drove away, I set down the snowman.
“I feel like I knew him a long time ago.” Oma stroked the doorway with a blank look on her face. “He was an enemy, one of those against the Goat Children. He told me not to go back. There’s going to be a war. There’s always a war.” Oma shook her head as she walked toward her bedroom. “I feel like I knew him before. Isn’t that weird?”
I gnawed my lower lip. Maybe it was good for Oma to believe in her imagination.
Should I tell Mama about the mail carrier? No, I’d let it go unless it happened again. If Mama thought I couldn’t take care of Oma, they would put Oma in a nursing home, and she wouldn’t like it there. It was best this way.
****
I am nine years old. Oma takes me to the mall to get my ears pierced.
“She won’t go through with it,” Mama says, but I’ll show her I will.
“How come you don’t have your ears pierced?” I ask Oma.
“Not too many girls got theirs done when I was little.”
Oma helps me pick out a pair of studs in my birthstone. The woman who will use the piercing tool gives me a stuffed bear to hug, but I hold Oma’s hand instead. My earlobes sting, yet I don’t cry until after we’re walking away from the pagoda.
Oma buys me a Sprite from the food court. We sit at one of the tables while I sip it. My head feels light, and I’m not sure if I can walk to the car without fainting.
“Pain is only in your mind.” Oma strokes my shoulder. “Some people enjoy pain.”
“I don’t.” The icy drink does make me feel clearer.
“My mother pierced her own ears,” Oma says. “She used a sterilized needle and a cork.”
“They didn’t have a piercing gun?”
“Not back then.”
If her mother could survive doing her own ears, then I can make it through this.
Chapter 15
Oma pressed fifty dollars into my hand. “You have to have a Halloween costume. Be a princess.” I might not be a princess, but I would love a costume to wear to school.
A thin layer of murky white covered the sidewalks as I walked to the mall. Bundled against the frosty wind, with cars rushing by, I stared at the houses and offices. Inside those houses were probably nuclear families: a mother, a father, and some kids. Then, there was me. I’d lost my nuclear family.
I shoved that thought aside. Oma needed me. Only that mattered.
At the mall, I visited Hot Topic. A black skirt and matching corset went well with the black lace Oma had at home, which I fastened around my neck with one of her cameos. Oma’s elbow gloves finished off the outfit. I wasn’t sure what I was, but I liked it. I was going to look awesome at school.
During math class, Meg, sitting behind me, tapped my shoulder. “Psst, hey.”
“What?” I turned my head away from my worksheet.
“What are you supposed to be dressed up as?” Like always, Meg wore jeans and a Batman T-shirt.
“I’m a Goat Child,” I said.
Meg lifted her eyebrow. “Cool. That’s hot. I’m Batgirl. What’s a Goat Child?”
I took a deep breath. “A mythical warrior woman who flies around in the sky on a Pegasus. She fights evil only she can see.”
“That’s different.” Meg scratched her cheeks. “We’re all going to a party tonight, over at my place on Munn. We might do some trick or treating, too. Why should kids get all the fun? You wanna come too?”
I licked my lips, tasting cherry lip-gloss. Yes, yes, yes! “I’d love to, but I don’t think I can.” Uncle Jan had brought over candy, and Oma expected me to pass it out to the children who came to the door. “I have to give out candy.”
“Sure.” Meg’s frown said she didn’t believe the excuse. “It’ll be cool. Stop over if you change your mind.”
I can’t change my mind.
“Okay.” I returned to my worksheet.
****
“This is so exciting,” Oma rambled. “I’ll sit on the bed, and I’ll tell you when they come, then you can go to the door. Okay?”
“That’s fine.” I pulled back the curtain so Oma could see out. “You need new curtains,” I said. The colors on the blue roses had faded, the hems ragged, and the material had rotted with age. I poked my finger through one of the holes, wiggling it to prove my point.
“Well.” Oma snorted. “How nice of you to make me feel bad. You just can’t give me one day, can you?
You have to be the one in power.”
“But, Oma, all I said was—”
“You just have to make me feel bad and old. Go away.” A tear slid down my grandmother’s cheek. “Just go away if you only want to make me feel bad.”
“What do you think I said?” I groaned.
“Go away,” Oma stretched her legs on the bed, shoes catching in the comforter.
I wanted to scream at Oma to stop talking. I wanted to tell her to make sense again. Instead, I stormed out of the room. It wouldn’t help to yell at her. My grandmother couldn’t help the way she was.
A sentence followed me into the hallway.
“Where has my little Kezy gone?”
****
The first trick-or-treaters knocked ten minutes before five o’clock in the evening; little boys dressed like pumpkins and carrots with huge smiles and rosy cheeks. Snow clung to their costumes.
“Aren’t you adorable?” I propped open the door with my hip as I leaned out.
“Cold out,” the mother called from the sidewalk.
I dropped a miniature candy bar into each of the baskets held out by two children.
“What do you say?” the mother asked when the boys turned away.
“Thank you,” the small voices chimed.
I smiled. “You’re welcome.” I shut the door and set the bowl of candy back on the hall table.
“What are you doing?” Oma hovered in the doorway to the kitchen, nibbling on potato chips.
“Handing out candy.” I wrote two tally marks on the notepad to designate the two trick-or-treaters. “What?”
“It’s Halloween.” I snapped the cap onto the pen. “Those were the trick-or-treaters.”
“But no one knocked.”
“Yeah, they did.”
“You didn’t tell me it was Halloween. I was going to sit in the bedroom and watch.”
More knocks sounded at the front door; a group of five children this time, three mothers standing at the sidewalk chatting. The children wore glow-rings around their necks.
“Isn’t that cute? You all match.” I dropped a piece of candy into each of their plastic bags, colored to look like pumpkins.
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