Season of the Dragonflies

by Sarah Creech

  The perfume was well beyond sensual—it was controlling. And that’s what Zoe needed. That’s what Mya wanted to give her. No more capricious, malicious decisions for Zoe Bennett. The scent would work on her inner circle first, her entourage and leading man, her agent, manager, public relations specialist, and stylist, and then outward with the directors and investors and executives, and finally the public. They’d all despise her; it could be that swift.

  Mya sealed the perfume and then printed instructions and signed it: So sorry for the mix-up. Hope this helps. With love and admiration. Yours sincerely, Mya Lenore. She sped to the factory and commissioned her mother’s pilot and his assistant to deliver the package today, ecstasy filling her heart to capacity. Nothing else gave her a feeling like this. Only an experiment proven successful had this kind of pull.

  Now that one problem had been resolved, Mya worried about the plants. She tried to convince herself that whatever was going on was a one-time fluke, a result of poor hydration or sensitivity to the frost, but she just didn’t believe it. The plant didn’t operate that way. It was the most resilient plant she’d ever known.

  Mya drove up the driveway and crested the hill at dusk to see a Ford truck parked in front of the cabin with a sign plastered on the back. With her headlights on, she squinted to read the words WHITE FARM ORGANIC PRODUCE. Instead of paying attention to the road, Mya was thinking, What’s Ben White doing here? and then she felt a small thud underneath her tires. She parked the truck right there, assuming she had run over an Adirondack chair or weed whacker. She hopped out and her red cowgirl boot landed on the delicate leg of a young fawn pinned beneath her front left tire.

  Mya screamed without thinking, and her mother came out of the cabin first, followed by Lucia and Ben. The legs twitched, but she couldn’t see the little one’s head, and her entire body froze: it was Spots. No matter how badly she wanted to move the truck or not move the truck or do whatever was best, she couldn’t motivate her body.

  Willow ran to Mya and stopped short as soon as she saw the blood on the grass.

  Lucia followed behind her and said, “What is it?”

  “Nowhere,” Mya said. “I didn’t see her. Just out of nowhere. I don’t know.”

  Lucia looked at Willow as if Mya had lost her mind, and maybe she had. In all the years she’d lived in the mountains, she had never hit a deer. She’d come across many dead animals on her hikes, but a fawn was the one animal she never wanted to watch suffer, much less kill. Willow walked over to Mya and wrapped an arm around her, and Lucia followed. Ben dropped down on his knees to look under the truck, and the fawn’s legs began to jump like it wanted to dash away.

  Ben put the truck in neutral and then pushed it backward to free the fawn. Once the weight lifted, Spots jumped off the ground and then collapsed and let out grunt after miserable grunt. Quickly, Ben put his hands around the fawn’s neck and broke it. Lucia let out a whimper. Ben scooped the deer up and turned toward the forest without asking what to do with the body. Mya watched him go as if viewing a play, and then suddenly her breath returned and she shouted, “No!”

  Ben stopped. She ran to him and he refused to look her in the eyes. Mya outstretched her arms and said, “Give her to me, it’s my fault.”

  Ben finally looked up, and his eyes told her that he definitely agreed. She’d seen that look from him before. “Here,” he said.

  She took the fawn’s dead body from Ben and held the deer close to her chest as if it were an infant. Its little body was still warm, and behind her she heard Lucia say, “Hang on a minute.” Ben quickly walked away, like he couldn’t be around Mya and Lucia at the same time.

  Mya just wanted to be alone, and she moved forward. A dragonfly landed on Mya’s shoulder and she flicked it away, then Lucia’s hand touched down in its place. Mya stopped walking. “I’m fine,” she said.

  “It’s not that,” Lucia said. “I thought you’d want to know the cloud’s gone.”

  Mya turned around quickly. “It is?” she said. “Like gone gone? Disappeared?”

  Lucia nodded.

  So that’s what it took to make the cloud go away: she had to sacrifice her favorite fawn. Zoe wasn’t worth it. “Forever?” Mya said.

  “I guess,” Lucia said.

  “Thanks for telling me,” Mya said. Lucia returned to Ben and Willow.

  She didn’t need to see Ben. Why had that happened? Why hadn’t Lucia warned her that he was coming over? It was all so long ago, but it still made her feel guilty, especially with Lucia so near. Mya clutched Spots tighter as she walked away into the faint golden light of the setting sun, and she wondered if she’d ever be forgiven for the many bad choices she’d made in her life thus far.

  CHAPTER 18

  Dinner with Ben

  BEFORE BEN ARRIVED, Lucia had stood over the sink and washed the last of the pans she had used to lightly sauté mushrooms, green peppers, and red onions for the homemade supreme pizza. She’d left her phone on the island in the kitchen just in case Ben got lost on the way and needed directions. Lucia hoped that he hadn’t forgotten his way back to her. Washing dishes and cooking for Ben made her momentarily forget she was divorced. She felt independent and twenty-one with a host of possibilities before her. Nothing set. Nothing determined yet about who Lucia would become.

  Until Jonah called, as if he knew she had a semi-date. The phone vibrated on the island, and Lucia drained the dirty sink water. She stood over the phone with wet hands and watched as his name disappeared on the screen, his call sent to voice mail. She heard Ben’s truck pull up and shut off just when a small chime from her phone signaled that Jonah had recorded a message. She could forget that until tomorrow, at least, and she tucked the phone into her pocket.

  Lucia met Ben at the front door. He’d dressed up in jeans and a collared shirt rolled to a three-quarter cuff to show off muscular forearms that he hadn’t had when they were teenagers. Dragonflies of every size swarmed the porch, and Lucia cracked the door just enough to let Ben inside. “Thanks,” he said. “Wasn’t sure I’d get through.”

  “Every day there’s more,” Lucia said. “I guess it’s that season.”

  “They like it here, if I remember right,” Ben said. In one hand he carried a six-pack of Quartz Hollow beer from the local brewery and in the other, a tub of homemade herbed goat cheese. “I know you ladies go nuts for this stuff.” He handed it over.

  “It’s been so long,” Lucia said. “Thank you.” She stood to the side so he could pass. He smelled like fresh cedar mulch. Ben’s father had always made the best goat cheese in town, the secret for an inoculation against poison ivy. The goats ate those wicked three-leaf plants, digested them, and left small traces in their milk, which built up the body’s defenses in all who consumed their famous cheese. Though poison ivy grew all over their land and throughout the Blue Ridge, Lucia had never had a rash during her childhood, thanks to the White family.

  Ben had only been in the house long enough to offer Lucia one of his craft beers when they heard Mya shriek in the driveway. Her mother came running through the kitchen, and Lucia followed her. She had never expected to see a fawn pinned beneath the truck. Mya had always been so careful, always hyperaware of the deer during this season. The trail of blood trickling from the fawn’s head distracted Lucia so much that she didn’t at first notice that the black cloud had disappeared. Something about it didn’t make sense to Lucia. Why would it leave Mya now, in a moment of despair, when she’d accidentally killed something she loved? She stood beside her mother and Ben and watched Mya walk into the meadow to bury her deer with only a wash of sunlight accompanying her.

  Lucia turned to Willow and said, “The cloud’s gone.” Ben instantly looked to the sky.

  “For good?” Willow said.

  “I think so,” Lucia said. Ben was too polite to interrupt, but he scraped the ground with his boot heel and Lucia could tell he was confused.

  Willow said, “I didn’t even have a chance to say hello to you.”
She opened her arms to Ben and wrapped him in a hug.

  Lucia said, “The beers are getting warm.”

  Ignoring Lucia, her mother said, “Robert called you, I hope?”

  “He did,” Ben confirmed. “Would it bother you if I went to the fields while it’s still light?”

  Willow said, “I wish you would.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Lucia said.

  “Me too,” Willow said, and Lucia controlled her face like a good actress so he wouldn’t notice her frustration. They didn’t need a chaperone.

  “Lead the way. I just need a bag out of the back.” He jumped onto the side of his truck bed and pulled out a leather bag. “After you.”

  Willow smiled. “It’s nice to see you around again, Bennie.”

  Ben’s cheeks turned red and Lucia wanted to shake her mother. She’d specifically asked her not to call him that, and that’s exactly why she did. He said, “It’s good to be here,” and he checked out Lucia from the corner of his eye. She tried to suppress her smile but with Ben here it made the place not so oppressive. He always did love the land much more than she did.

  Lucia and Ben hiked through the tall meadow grass and up the hill, remaining a few feet behind Willow. They didn’t talk at first. Had they been alone, the process of catching up would’ve begun, but no matter how old you are, talking to a boy in front of your mother always feels strained. Lucia’s hair came out of its bun and fell down her back. Ben looked away like he’d been caught. He used to stroke her hair and drape it over his face and inhale. Remembering this gave Lucia tingles. He caught her eye again and she smiled.

  Her mother led them past the gnarled weeping willow tree she was named after, and the fields became visible on the hill. She turned to Ben. “Thank you for doing this.”

  “No problem,” Ben said. “I can’t promise anything.”

  “I understand.” They crested the hill, the grass brushing against their knees, and then the ground leveled off and they stepped into a well-manicured field many acres deep. The white flowers looked succulent and healthy. Their saturated scent normally floated on the wind, but despite the movement in the air, Lucia smelled only a hint, like the trace of perfume left on an evening gown.

  Ben dropped his bag in the cut grass and bent down to open it. He removed multiple containers and small spoons. “I’ll sample every part of the plant, if it’s okay with you to take it off-site,” Ben said. “I need to culture them on nutrient plates, and I can do that in my home lab.”

  “That’s fine, whatever you need to do,” Willow said.

  He looked up at Willow and Lucia. “And when I’m done?”

  Willow straightened her skirt. “Return it all here, if you don’t mind.”

  “Not at all.” He proceeded to gather what he needed from the hedges closest to them, and then he walked through the rows to the far end of the fields. Lucia watched his strong back as he leaned over the tall hedges. That’s when Lucia thought one of the flowers straightened its petals to try to reach out and brush against his leg. She shielded her eyes with her hand and continued to watch, but she didn’t see it happen again. She was so sure of what she had seen, though, that she approached the edge of the field and offered her hand to a blossom.

  “What’re you doing?” Willow said.

  The flowers did not budge. “Nothing, I guess,” she said.

  Her mother joined her at her side and said, “You want them to move?” She too reached out her hand and the flowers remained still. “They used to.” Willow pushed her hands deeper into the beds of flowers with no luck. “It’s like they don’t know me anymore.”

  “What if he can’t figure it out?” Lucia said. “What if no one can help us?”

  Willow moved away from the flowers and placed her hands in the pockets of her linen dress. “My accountant will know the exact hit we’ll take. I e-mailed her. Big. Very big. That’s not my concern.”

  “How’s that?” Lucia said. The loss of an entire year’s profit had to be more devastating than her mother suggested. It should be her only concern. Ben pulled a shrub out of the soil, the white roots dangling above the ground. He wrapped it in a cloth and cradled it in his arms as he walked out of the field.

  Willow watched Ben also, and then she said, “What if they never bloom again?”

  “Is that even possible?” Lucia said.

  “I don’t know; I never thought so, but I never imagined this either.”

  “That can’t happen.”

  Willow frowned. “I think it could.”

  All the years Lucia hadn’t concerned herself with the family business, she had still depended on the business’s being there for her to ignore. But those flowers mattered, and everything Great-Grandmother Serena had worked for mattered—she’d always known that, but it was especially clear now with her mother’s retirement looming. Their family was the business, the business their family. If the roots failed, the fields would never grow again and Lenore Incorporated would have no product to sell. They could keep the factory open, probably, but they’d be a middleman business forever, and that’s not what Great-Grandmother Serena intended. The profits from that new business model would be significantly lower. Any fool could foresee that.

  Ben came out of the field, sweat dripping from his forehead and cheekbones. He held a flower in his hand. “Willow,” he said. “Will you look at this?”

  Willow stepped closer to Ben.

  “When I went in deeper, I saw this. You see here? These yellowing leaves indicate chlorosis.”

  Lucia wanted a better view, but Ben and Willow hunched over the plant like a shield.

  “There’s something wrong with the chlorophyll?” Willow said.

  “There isn’t enough, otherwise the leaves would be green. They aren’t producing any carbohydrates.”

  “Will that spread? Kill the entire crop?”

  “I should know something by tomorrow afternoon, Tuesday at the latest.” Ben shook his shaggy brown hair to the side to move the strands out of his eyes.

  “And the roots?” Willow said.

  “I’ll test it all.”

  “So then that’s it?”

  “For now.”

  “I think I need to go rest.” Willow turned to go by herself before they could respond. Ben and Lucia walked back to the cabin together in silence, close enough to keep an eye on Willow, and they all stopped at the back of the house.

  “I’m not too hungry,” Willow said before stepping into the house. “I hope you two don’t mind if I skip dinner.”

  “More for me,” Ben said, and rubbed Willow’s shoulder.

  Willow smiled, and Lucia could have hugged Ben just for that. Her mother had looked so hopeless back there. Willow said, “You used to eat an entire one of my pizzas. Remember that?”

  “I do,” he said. “Let’s hope Lucia makes a pizza half as good as yours.”

  “Suck-up,” Lucia said. He poked her in the ribs, and she wasn’t sure what to do about that.

  “Let me drop this off in the truck and I’ll be in.”

  Lucia walked through the back door with her mother, who said, “He’s such a sweetheart,” and stared at Lucia with that knowing look, like she should’ve never let him go in the first place. Willow went to her bedroom, and in the kitchen Lucia turned on the oven to its highest setting and placed the pizza stone inside to warm, then she pulled out the rolling pin to flatten her raised dough.

  Ben returned and picked a beer off the counter, then opened one for her.

  “Want to help me sauce this?” Lucia said. She pushed her fingertips into the sides to form a crust on the pizza. At least this part was easy.

  Ben came around the island to stand next to her. “I’ve never sauced anything before.”

  “Me either.” Lucia laughed and handed him a large spoon to get started. “Just use the back to spread it around, like this,” she said, and then placed his spoon in the glass bowl.

  “Got it.”

  Lucia gathered all the to
ppings and the mozzarella cheese from the refrigerator and peered past the door to watch Ben as he worked hard to make sure the sauce was even. No matter the task, he’d always been a meticulous worker, and that look of hooded concentration was one she hadn’t forgotten. Jonah had it too, when he painted.

  Ben had vowed to move to New York with her if that was what she wanted, but Lucia knew it wasn’t the place for him and didn’t want him to follow her for no other reason than to be with her. Ben needed trees and flowers and quiet, not traffic and concrete and stacked housing, and by that point nothing was the same between them, not after what happened with Mya. Then she met that first guy, and then another, and the city was so fast and the possibilities endless, or so it seemed, and she sped up and the idea of Ben faded away. It hurt him. He made that known in many handwritten letters. She was young. Maybe he should’ve come with her. Maybe that’s what people did for each other when they were in love, followed and were supportive, even if it seemed like the wrong choice at the time. Jonah had been serious and brooding and everything she thought an artist should be, and perhaps she thought that to be an artist she needed to be in love with one as well.

  Ben glanced up like he could feel her stare. “Ready,” he said. Lucia brought over her armload of ingredients and handed Ben a ball of fresh mozzarella cheese to grate. She removed the stone from the oven and placed the dough on it. Together they topped the pizza. Ben made a circle of pepperoni and sausage while Lucia dropped peppers, onions, and black olives from above. His forearm rubbed against hers, and she smiled. Ben carried the warm pizza stone to the oven, and Lucia held open the door. Ben said, “Done.” He high-fived her.

  Despite the years apart and the relationship they once had, he still felt like a good friend. Back then he’d been her only close friend. “Another beer?” Lucia asked.