Firefly Rain

by Richard Dansky

  “Jenna!” I whispered. “What are you doing?”

  “Trying to be polite,” she shot back. “And just so you know, he’s got a handshake like a dead fish.”

  I thought about trying to explain how what she’d said would be all over town before we finished sipping our sodas, but something kept me from it. Something in the way Hilliard had looked at me after Jenna had said I hadn’t changed, when we all knew that wasn’t true. Instead, I just settled for, “He’s getting on in years. That’s all.”

  “Uh-huh,” she said. “Vanilla cola. Right.”

  Mr. Hilliard emerged from the back a minute later, a container of what I assumed was vanilla syrup in his hands. “Sorry about that, folks,” he said. “This will just take me a minute to set up.”

  “That’s fine,” I told him while Jenna shot me a furious look. “We’ve got nothing but time.”

  “Good, because you’re going to need it.” He set about fiddling with the fountain, while I watched and Jenna fumed. Eventually, all the tubes were connected to Mr. Hilliard’s satisfaction, and he slowly and carefully drew us our sodas.

  “Ladies first,” he said, and set Jenna’s down in front of her. He was waiting for her to take a sip, the straw bent precisely to the right angle, before putting mine down in front of me.

  “It’s… very sweet,” Jenna said around sips. I turned to look at her, my lips wrapped around my straw, and nearly sent an explosion of laughter down into the bottom of my glass. The poor thing looked so surprised. Of course it was going to be sweet. Too late, I remembered that her tastes ran to Diet Coke and suchlike, and that the level of sugar that was standard in a drink around here was liable to put her into a coma.

  “You don’t have to finish if you don’t want to,” I whispered, while Hilliard watched us like a hawk from across the counter.

  “No, no,” she gasped. “It’s… just not what I’m used to.”

  She tried valiantly, she did. A few more sips, each one scrunching her face up more, while I drank mine slow and easy. Hilliard said nothing, just bustled around back there as if we’d suddenly become unworthy of his attention.

  “Thank you, Mr. Hilliard,” she finally said and pushed her half-full glass away. “It was lovely. I’ve never had anything like it.”

  “I’ll guess you haven’t,” he said, even as he reached for my empty. “Enjoy your time in Maryfield, Miss Conlon. I’m glad you came to visit us.”

  “Thank you,” she said, sliding out of her seat and heading for the door. I looked back and forth helplessly, and then I followed her out.

  Jenna had somehow managed to assume a pose that said she’d been waiting for hours when I caught up with her on the sidewalk, despite the fact that she was maybe ten seconds ahead of me. “Jesus, Logan. How can you drink those things?”

  “Through a straw,” I said, and I held up my hand to forestall the inevitable explosion. “Look, I’m sorry. I grew up on them, so they taste great to me.”

  “It was like shoving sugarcane right into my pancreas,” she said, shaking her head. “I tried, Logan, I really did, but if I’d finished that thing, my teeth would have melted on the spot.”

  The urge to defend the honor of the esteemed Mr. Hilliard rose up in me, but I tamped it down, tamped it down good and hard. If I was going to show Jenna the lure of Maryfield, I couldn’t afford to get into a fight with her about it.

  At least, not until she’d seen it all. Then, maybe, we’d have some words.

  Doctor Trotter wasn’t at the church when we strolled past, but we did run into him across the street from my old school. We’d been up and down the few square blocks that made up the town’s main strip, skipping the library but precious little else. I could see from her expression that Jenna was less than impressed, and that the town’s charm was lost on someone used to bigger, faster, and more.

  “Where is everyone, Logan?” she asked at one point. “It’s Saturday. Shouldn’t there be people around, or something?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, and I didn’t. “I remember it being a little more lively than this, but it’s prime growing season. Maybe they’re working the farmer’s market over in Winston-Salem.”

  “The whole town?” she said, but let it drop.

  Doctor Trotter saw us coming from across the street, and he jaywalked with practiced ease to intercept us. “Jacob. How are you? Who’s your friend?”

  “Jenna Conlon,” I said before Jenna could jump in. I got an elbow in my ribs for my trouble. “She’s visiting me from up north.”

  “I see,” he said in a way that indicated that maybe he saw more than there was to see. “A pleasure to meet you, miss. Don’t be too hard on our Maryfield. It’s all we’ve got.”

  “It’s very nice,” she said, about the first time I’d seen her even near a loss for words. “Logan is just showing me around.”

  “Good.” He chuckled. “Maybe it will jog his memory a bit. Goodness knows he could use a refresher.” He turned to me, then, and his smile faded. “Really, Jacob, I’m a little surprised at you.”

  “Me?” I squeaked. “Why?”

  Doctor Trotter frowned. “From everything I hear, you’ve got all sorts of troubles going on out at your place. It’s not polite to invite a guest into a troubled home, Jacob Logan. It can get uncomfortable for them to come into a… situation.”

  I stood there, my jaw fair hanging open, while he turned back to Jenna. “Sorry you had to see that, miss, and it’s no reflection on you. I just expect better of a Logan, that’s all.”

  “Logan?” she said in a tiny, strangled voice. “I think I left something back at the house. Can we go now, please?”

  “Of course,” I said. “Doctor Trotter.”

  “Jacob, Miss Conlon.” He nodded. “Have a good day.” He walked off, and Jenna stared after him.

  “Logan…,” she started, but trailed off, wordless.

  “I don’t know what the hell that was about, either,” I said. “But you’re right. Let’s go home.”

  “Home,” she said. “Yeah. Let’s go there.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said as we walked into the kitchen. “I can see why you wanted to leave this place, Logan. I’m less certain why you came back.”

  “Cheap real estate,” I joked, but my heart wasn’t in it. “Look, Jenna, I know this isn’t Boston, but there’re things here that mean something to me. Things that helped make me who I am.”

  “Things you left behind,” she corrected, and she shivered. “Do we have to always talk in the kitchen?” she asked. “Can we go somewhere else?”

  I nodded. “There’s the living room, but no one ever really used it for talking.”

  “Perfect,” she said, and she walked away.

  I caught up with her as she dropped herself down into one of Mother’s high-backed chairs. “Comfy,” she said, and patted the armrest. “Sit yourself down, too. You’re making me nervous.”

  I paced back and forth behind her. “That’s good,” I said, “because I’m nervous. I’m nervous about the ghost, I’m nervous about my car, I’m nervous about that dog, I’m nervous about the fireflies—”

  “And you’re pissed off at me,” she finished.

  I stopped and stared at her. “Well, yeah.”

  “That’s the plan,” she said. “If you’re pissed off, you’ll usually do something. It’s been driving me nuts, Logan, listening to you talk about this. Everything’s happened to you. Why didn’t you just shoot the stupid dog? It was on your land. No one would have said boo.”

  “I don’t know,” I said truthfully, and I sat down on the floor in front of her. “I honestly don’t.”

  “That’s interesting,” she said. “You think you’ve got too much city in you to use a shotgun anymore?”

  “It just didn’t feel right.” I shook my head and thought about Carl, and the kick of the shotgun in my hands. “No, that’s wrong. You know what? It never even occurred to me. I had the shotgun in my hands the first time, but I never even thou
ght about using it. Hell, I could have put both barrels through the mudroom door and shredded whatever was on the other side of it. Instead, I just held it.”

  Jenna nodded. “Do you really belong here anymore, Logan? I mean, look around. This house is a tomb, this town is dead, and this place is trying to kill you. Why stay?”

  “This house is my home! It’s where I grew up and this town is what made me,” I shot back.

  She half-rose out of the chair. “It made you leave. Why come home at all? You could have gone anywhere. I know how much you got when you liquidated everything. You could have done anything. Why come back here?”

  I blinked and looked up at her. “Because I thought I should,” I finally said. “Because once upon a time, I promised Mother that I would.”

  “They’re dead, Logan.” Her eyes flashed with anger—and a little extra brightness that the edge in her voice couldn’t explain. “You don’t have to keep those promises.”

  “Yes, I do.” My voice was a whisper. “You always keep your promises to Mother.”

  She blinked and sat back. “That’s what your father said, in the book.”

  “I know.”

  Her voice was almost pleading now. “He left, Jacob. Just like you did.”

  “He came back.”

  “He didn’t want to. I think he wants you to go. You ever think about that? About how maybe it’s his ghost, not hers, trying to get you out of here?”

  I stood and turned away from her. “It doesn’t matter, anyway. I’m here for a while no matter what. There’s the car insurance to take care of, and things to tie up, and new arrangements to make with Carl.”

  She shook her head. “Just sell the place. Go.”

  “No. You don’t sell family land.” I walked over to the mantel and picked up one of Mother’s knickknacks. It was a porcelain hummingbird, painted bright colors that seemed out of place. “You know why I always call them Mother and Father?”

  I could hear Jenna stand and take a few cautious steps toward me. “No. Why?”

  “Because I always felt I was theirs more than they were mine. Does that make any sense, any sense at all?”

  “No,” she admitted, and she slipped her arms around me from behind. “But it doesn’t have to, if it makes sense to you. I’m sorry, Logan. I’m not trying to make fun of things that are important to you. I was just hoping that I could get you to see them that way, so you could go. I think you should leave. I think you should leave right now. You can take care of the insurance and everything else from the road. Something here’s not right for you. It’s not safe.”

  I closed my eyes and just let her hold me. “It hasn’t harmed me yet, whatever it is.”

  She exploded. “It’s nearly killed you how many times? And yet you stand there and let it come after you again and again. Why aren’t you more worried, Logan? What do you know that I don’t?”

  I turned to look at her and cupped her face in my hands. She was, I thought, very beautiful at that moment, as beautiful as Adrienne had been. “I know this place,” I said softly, and kissed her forehead. “All right. I’ll come away with you in the morning. You’ve got a week off? Let’s drive around Carolina. We’ll go to the Outer Banks, or maybe up to Asheville. I’ll show you the sights. You might even find something to be impressed by.”

  Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes and ran slow tracks down her face. “Don’t joke about this, Logan. I’m scared for you.”

  “I’m not joking. We’ll go. At the end of the week, bring me back and I’ll see what I want to do next. But tomorrow we go.”

  She smiled then, a brave smile, and crushed herself against me. I held her for a minute, and then I gently made some distance between us. “Now, more important stuff. Shall I make dinner?”

  “God, no.” The old Jenna was back, the tough one who wasn’t afraid of anything. “I remember your cooking when you had good ingredients to work with. Down here, I can only imagine what you’d whip up.”

  “Baloney tartare,” I said, grinning as she punched me in the arm. “Come on. Let’s see what we’ve got.”

  Dinner took longer than expected, due in large part to the odd assortment of ingredients I had lurking in the icebox. By the time we agreed on what to make, it was dark; by the time we finished it was getting on eleven o’clock.

  “Not bad,” I said as I dumped the plates into the sink. “We make a good team.”

  “We always did,” Jenna replied from her chair. “As long as you remembered who was in charge.”

  “My house, my kitchen—I’m in charge.”

  “Keep telling yourself that and you’ll sleep nights,” she said, and she laughed. “On a more serious note, do you think that dog will come back tonight?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe.” I jerked a thumb in the direction of the mudroom. “Shotgun is down there, if you want to shoot it instead of waiting for me to try.”

  “Don’t tempt me,” she said. “Sit down for a minute. We can do the dishes later.”

  I shook suds off my hands and pulled up a chair. “You have a point. Besides, I’ve been thinking about things, and I might have come up with something.”

  She sank into the chair next to me. “Do tell, O mysterious one.”

  “Bear with me,” I told her. “This is something I’ve never told anyone, and I can’t say that I’m proud of it.”

  “Uh-oh.” She moved her chair fractionally closer to mine. “Confession time.”

  “Sort of,” I agreed. “Now, this is going to sound stupid,” I said, and I caught myself. “Of course, it all sounds stupid.”

  Jenna nodded. “So why stop now? What’s this great revelation you’ve had?”

  I took a deep breath. “Did I ever tell you what Mother said about fireflies?”

  Her eyes unfocused as she tried to remember. “That they were sort of tour guides into Heaven? I think you told me that at a party in Somerville once, after you’d gotten well and truly plastered on Ketel One and OJ.”

  “Oh, right. That party.” I did my best to avoid blushing at the memory. “But you’ve pretty much got it right. She thought that they guided angels to righteous souls and showed them the way back to Heaven.”

  “Cute.” Jenna drummed her fingers on the table. “Did she actually believe that, or was it a story to keep you from bringing nine zillion bugs into the house?”

  “They’re beetles, not bugs,” I corrected her. “And I don’t know. She might have. That’s where it gets weird.”

  “Weirder,” Jenna corrected. “Spill the details.”

  “When Father died and we put in his stone…” My voice trailed off, and I started again. “After Mother had said her good-byes at the graveside, I went back out there. The stone was crawling with lightning bugs. Hundreds of them. And I brushed every last one off. The ones who kept coming back, well, I killed them.”

  “Cripes,” Jenna breathed. “And you think—”

  I held up my hand. “I’m not done yet. When Mother died, I did the same thing. No fireflies on her grave, not a one.”

  Jenna got up and turned away from me. “For God’s sake, Logan, why?”

  “Stupid reasons,” I said. “With Father, it was because I was angry at him, angry that he’d wasted his life and been none of the things a boy wants his father to be. With Mother, it was different. It was like she could find her own way to Heaven, and I’d be damned if I’d let some insect grab the credit. I had faith in her, you know?” I exhaled sharply, a sound that might have been a sob leaking out with the air.

  “That was a pretty unrighteous thing to do,” Jenna finally said. “Not that any rational human being would believe that firefly crap, but still, you don’t mess with your parents’ gravestones. You just don’t.”

  I shrugged. “I guess. It was a long time ago.”

  “Five years for your mother,” she shot back, and she sank back down into her chair. “This makes a bit more sense now. The firefly stuff, anyway.”

  “It does, at
that,” I nodded. “But it’s hard to believe, you know?”

  “Tell that to the ghost in the bedroom,” she said wearily. “You can’t do anything the easy way, can you?”

  I shook my head. “Nope. Never could.”

  “What you need,” she said cautiously, “is someone to take care of you, because you’re clearly not capable of doing it yourself.”

  She looked as if she was going to say more then, but a knock on the door interrupted her.

  “Who the hell is that?” Jenna asked, half-rising out of her chair. “It’s kind of late for the neighbors to come over for a cup of sugar.”

  “The neighbors wouldn’t come over here after dark if the devil and all his personal injury lawyers were chasing them,” I replied, edging my way over to the door. I pulled back the shade a little bit, enough to see who was out there.

  It was Adrienne, wild-eyed and clutching a bag, and behind her, like the Angel of Death, was Hanratty.

  I unlocked the door. “Jacob, who is it?” Jenna asked, but I didn’t answer. Instead, I opened the door and stepped back, and Adrienne and her escort tumbled in. Without a word, Adrienne collapsed into my arms and started sobbing. Hanratty stared at me with undisguised contempt, while Jenna looked back and forth with an expression that slowly hardened into pure granite.

  I stroked Adrienne’s hair and murmured that it was going to be all right, that she was safe. It didn’t seem to do any good, but it didn’t seem to do any harm either, so I kept up until Hanratty impaled me with a look.

  “Mr. Logan,” she said in a tone that chilled the room nicely, “I am very sorry to disturb you at this late hour.”

  “It’s fine,” I said, raising my head and my voice. “My friend and I”—I indicated Jenna with a nod, which she returned—“were just talking. What can I do for you?”

  She snorted. “For me? Nothing. For her”—she jerked a thumb at Adrienne—“it remains to be seen.” With surprising gentleness, she detached Adrienne from my arms and led her over to the table. “You got any coffee or Wild Turkey or something you can give the girl? Can’t you see she needs a little help here?”