by Celia Jerome
Now I was curious about Matt’s reaction. He laughed, said thank you, and we left. No comment that the librarian picked books for us. Not recommended, but selected, checked out to our names, and kept right by the desk as if she knew we’d be arriving. Both of us, which was far less likely since I’d had no plans to be in Paumanok Harbor until this morning.
“You don’t have to read my books, you know,” I told him when we went to put both sets of books into Matt’s car so we didn’t have to tote them around. “Mrs. T is always urging people to read local authors.”
“I asked her to save these two for me. They’ve been checked out for weeks. I’ve read all the rest.”
The writer in me couldn’t help wanting to know what he thought. The sniveling coward in me was afraid to ask.
I didn’t have to.
“I wouldn’t keep reading them if they weren’t fun and clever,” he offered. “I keep being amazed at your creativity and talent.”
Wow. And he liked dogs, too.
We headed for the hardware store.
I bought the yellow bug light for the front porch. Matt bought batteries. On our way out, Bill, the store’s owner, set the blanks at the key-making machine to playing “Getting to Know You,” from The King and I. Usually, no one but the locals—the talented locals—could make out the tune. Everyone else supposed the floor had shaken the keys to jangling, or the wind. When I visited as a kid from the big city, I thought a subway must run beneath the village main street. Funny how the mind rationalizes what it can’t explain. I guess I never recognized the songs.
Matt smiled as if he knew all the words.
At the drugstore, I got the medicated shampoo, after making certain Walter knew I had chiggers, not lice. At least chiggers weren’t contagious.
Matt bought Band-Aids. Occupational hazard, he told Walter. Trying not to be obvious about it, both of us peeked inside our bags as soon as we were out of the store, checking for condoms. I used to take it for granted that Walter simply believed in safe sex and gave them out to everyone. Nope. He put little tinfoil presents in the bags only when they’d be needed soon.
I was glad my bag had deodorant and lice shampoo, nothing else. I’d given up on men, or casual sex at least. I had scruples. And no rubbers in case I changed my mind.
Matt looked in his bag and stopped smiling.
We passed Big Eddie checking parking meters along Main Street. He was short for a police officer, but his nose made up for the lack of inches. He sniffed, then said, “Nice perfume, Willow. It almost covers up the smell of the bus exhaust and scared dog.”
He flared his nostrils at the air around Matt. “Lots of scared dogs, antiseptic, disinfectant, dog food, and cologne. Good effort, both of you. Want to know what kind of perfume and cologne? I need the practice.”
“No, thanks.” I shook my head, confused that Big Eddie talked about his knack in public. He always let outside people think his German Shepherd, Ranger, had the nose to sniff out drugs, lost hikers, bombs, and dead bodies. I glanced at Matt.
“You missed the rabbit that came in this morning.”
“Oh, I figured that was the one living under the boxwoods around the library.”
How could Matt not think that peculiar? On top of the keys and the condoms and the library books? If I didn’t know better, I’d guess he knew something.
Joanne handed us to-go cups, without our placing an order. An iced tea for me, sweetened. Coffee, black, for Matt. Then we decided we might as well get sandwiches to eat on the park benches since the day stayed so pleasant.
Joanne asked if I wanted my veggie burger on a bun or a roll. Considering I’d only recently decided to be a vegetarian, Joanne had no way of predicting my choice. I’d never, ever ordered a veggie burger from the deli that made the best roast beef sandwiches anywhere.
“A roll is fine.”
Matt read the menu board. “I think I’ll have a—”
“Ham and Swiss on rye with mustard, no mayo.”
“Yup.”
No raised eyebrow, no questions about how she had one waiting for him.
He knew?
We had to walk past the barber shop on our way to the village green. Vincent, the barber, was out closing his awning. He smiled at me, pointed to Matt and gave a thumbs-up sign. “But … but that means …”
I couldn’t finish.
Matt did. “That I have an aura.”
How could he know? “Everyone has an aura. That’s what the television psychics say, anyway.”
“Yes, but Vincent only sees the auras of talent.”
“You are a good veterinarian.”
“Not that kind of talent. I’m trying to show you that I’ve changed. The town has changed. Thanks to you.”
“No way.” I dragged him around the corner to Kelvin’s garage. Kelvin’s son, K-2, had a bag of potato chips and his schoolbooks open in the little office. I pulled Matt right up to the kid’s chair. “He has talent.”
K-2 didn’t sneeze, didn’t wipe his nose, the way he would if someone told a lie. He crammed another five potato chips in his mouth and swallowed. “So? Can he do algebra?”
Kelvin came out of the mechanic’s bay, wiping his hands.
“Matt has talent.”
Kelvin didn’t flinch, and didn’t try to rub one foot against the other, the way he itched at falsehoods.
“Seems so. He got you to come back, didn’t he?”
“I came back for his veterinary skill.” I looked around, saw no one but Matt and K-2, Matt wearing a grin, K-2 wearing a chocolate milk mustache. I lowered my voice anyway. “But I mean the other kind of talent. You know, Royce Institute stuff. Department of Unexplained Events talent.”
“Yup. Their agent Lou says some expert is coming next week to figure it out. They want to test you, too.”
“No way.”
“You did it.”
“No way.”
“That’s what we all think. Matt’s not a native, not related to one, never showed esper ability before. How else can you explain it?”
Matt told him. “She wished it.”
Kelvin smiled at me. “Well, you can wish me luck for the poker game tomorrow night. You coming, Matt?”
“Wouldn’t miss it.”
I led him outside. “They cheat.”
He knew.
CHAPTER 6
“SO HOW MUCH DO YOU KNOW?”
“Know or understand? There’s a world of difference.”
We were sitting on a bench, enjoying the lowering sun. His ham and Swiss looked and smelled a lot more inviting than my veggie burger. I’d lost my appetite, anyway. “No one I know understands much, including me. Just talk.”
“About the town or about us?”
“There is no us. What do you know about Paumanok Harbor?”
“Whatever I know is because of us. You. Before, I found some of the people odd, standoffish, cliquish. You know, like an old boys club or a secret society. And they were damned eccentric, too. Every time I went to a concert or a barbeque, I felt they were telling insider jokes the rest of us could never understand. I supposed it to be locals versus tourists, natives versus newcomers, even well-off versus those less fortunate. No one theory fit the facts, though, so I gave up wondering. Give them time, I figured. I had friends, my practice had patients, people were generally polite.”
I nodded. That sounded like Paumanok Harbor. When I summered here as a kid, I always felt like an interloper, too. I attributed the residents’ peculiarities to the Harbor’s isolation from the rest of the world, like Shangri-La or some unstudied tribe in the outback. “You didn’t notice the weird stuff that happens here all the time?”
“I forgot.”
“You forgot how it never rains on the Fourth of July or how the judge knows if someone is guilty or innocent before he opens his mouth?”
“I forgot. Everyone did, it seemed. Like when half the people in town had nightmares at the same time. Or that horse show you helped put on. No o
ne I talked to could remember the finale.”
“So what changed?”
“I didn’t forget our time in the salt marsh with the creature you called Mama at first.”
“I thought that’s what the fireflies were saying.”
He laughed. “I didn’t forget that Mrs. Tate’s pretty daughter talked to beetles either. I fully expected to lose the memory any minute.”
“The mayor knew you were helping me. He didn’t dare wipe away your recollection.”
“Then I expected to be fitted for a strait jacket when I started to believe you knew what you were doing. That you really could talk to bugs and half-dead blubbery things.”
“I begged you to trust me, and you did.”
“Because there is an Us.”
“No, you went along with me because you were curious and you felt sorry for the creature and wanted to help.”
“I wanted to help you, too, because you believed with all your heart that the beast could live.”
“I had to believe enough for the whole town. No one else could see M’ma for what he was, either.”
“Or talk to him the way you did. I know you tried to hide it, but I figured there had to be some kind of telepathy going on.”
“That’s how they communicate mostly. The troll, the night mares, the lightning bugs. I can’t speak their language, but they can use our words. That’s what M’ma did, in my head.”
“Right, the necrotic whale that turned into a flaming manlike figure in the night sky. Well, that sure as hell didn’t fit anything in my medical books or my mental almanac of the ordinary world.”
I took a bite of my veggie burger. At least the tomato came from a farm, not a refrigerator truck. “Not even close. The transformation, I mean.”
“I asked, later. All the people permitted to come out to help saw something different. Shooting stars, the aurora borealis, firecrackers. They heard different sounds, too. Some of the chosen—the talented ones, I know now—said they heard a symphony, the music of the spheres. I heard an impossible heartbeat. Colors? You saw rainbows; I saw dull skin, getting shinier, but still dark. Few of your special neighbors saw the colors or heard the music. They forgot about it afterward.”
He tossed a bit of crust to some sparrows near our feet. Six more arrived for the handouts. I crumbled my roll for them. At least someone could enjoy the meal. “Go on.”
“Something happened. M’ma’s final transformation, I supposed. I know it was magical, stupendous, amazing, and I wanted to see what you saw, to feel what you felt, more than I ever wanted anything in my life. And you wished I could experience it, too. Suddenly I could.”
“But M’ma granted the wish, not me, because you deserved to share the glory, when you worked hard for something you only half trusted.”
“Then you begged the mayor to leave me alone. So I remembered. More importantly, maybe, I suddenly understood what had been out of my reach. Like Mrs. Terwilliger said, I saw with different eyes. I can’t read minds or speak to dead relatives. I can’t tell anyone if their bitch will have more male or female pups. My only weather forecasting comes from a bad knee from a ski trip. I have no idea if what anyone says is a truth or a lie, or any of the other astounding abilities of some of the Harbor residents. But now I know my neighbors for what they are.”
“Wizards and witches.”
“No, extraordinary people who have to be protective of their gifts. And protected. I can understand why they’ve kept the truth hidden for generations.”
“So what is your talent? What gives you an aura of power?”
“No one is sure. Maybe that I changed simply by being there, in the shadow of true magic. Like getting dusted with stray pixie dust or something out of a fairy tale.”
“They wouldn’t let you remember so much, if that were all. Half the espers in town don’t fully recall what happened at the horse show or the night you say you changed. I think it’s built into their talents, to shield them.”
He studied the sparrows, squabbling over the crumbs. “You may be right. But I think your friends left me alone because of you. You told them not to mess with my head and they didn’t.”
“They never listened to me before.”
“Of course they did. They listened, but they couldn’t relate to what you told them.”
“So what changed for them?”
“I think, and don’t take this the wrong way, they’re a little afraid of you.”
I went “pfft.” The sparrows flew off.
“It’s true. The other stuff, the knowing the lottery numbers, the telekinetic keys, the telling time without a watch, those are everyday extrasensory traits, like well-practiced parlor tricks. But you?” He reached over and took a piece of my bun and held it out in his hand for the birds. “You can move worlds.”
“Not on purpose, I swear.”
He shrugged, still holding his hand, palm up, away from his body. “Things happen around you. That’s what everyone says. And now they think I can see what you do. That we’re tied together somehow. Like getting hit by lightning at the same time.”
“I don’t see how.”
“I know. I didn’t think so at first either. And no one wants to test the theory, because when you see things, things no one else sees, then mayhem follows in your wake.”
“It’s not my fault!”
“No one says it is, precisely. Half the people want you here, to see if you can expand our knowledge, broaden the base. The other half wishes you’d never step foot in Paumanok Harbor again.”
“Yeah, I got that from a couple of them. Did you see how fast the gallery owner locked up his shop when he saw us coming? He paints in his sleep, you know.”
“No, I didn’t know that, but I never liked his artwork. Anyway, that man Lou from the Department of Unexplained Events explained a little to me about a parallel universe where your, ah, friends are supposed to stay.”
“I can’t believe he told you. That’s the most dangerous secret of all. Only a handful of the psychics in town know about Unity.”
“I had to know, to help you. Lou thinks you need a watchdog.”
“That’s supposed to be your talent, helping me?”
“He and the others think it might be. Helping and protecting. They also think you have way more power than you believe, that you can bend events to your will. And share your talent. Imagine if you could tap anyone, and give them your insights.”
“I can’t! I did not do anything at all to help you, if help is the right term. The Others are very good at paying debts, is all. They give something back when we come to their aid. The lost colt’s sire let people see him, and left gifts of magic, too. The stallion made promises, some for the present, some for the future.” He’d promised my children would never be sick or hurt. I didn’t know if I wanted kids, ever. “There’s no way of knowing if they’ll come true. Like M’ma’s gift to you. It was a reward. And maybe it was only a one-time thing.” Except Vincent’s aura-sensing said no. “I had nothing to do with it.”
“It’s you, Willow. The Others come to you; they talk to you. They trust you. And you convince them to grant wishes. That’s a lot of power.”
“I never asked for it.”
“I bet your mother never asked to hold conversations with dogs.”
“You know about that?”
He looked up, at a chickadee bobbing around in the nearby evergreen the village used as a Christmas tree in December. “I’ve always known that. Just not how or why.”
“So you don’t think we’re all freaks?”
“I might be one of you now. Time will tell.”
“You can just accept all this?” I waved my hand around, toward the shops and offices. The chickadee flew off. Matt did not lower his hand, but he did frown at me.
“Accept what? That some people are better at certain skills than others? That you have a police markswoman who never misses, another whose nose is better than a bloodhound’s?”
“What about Pie
t the fireman whose presence put out fires, the plumber who can locate a person by looking in the toilet bowl water? It goes on and on.”
“If they did not think I could accept it, the town and the people, then my memory would be wiped clean, according to Lou, and I’d most likely be relocated far away.”
“Damn him.”
The chickadee came back, made a pass at the crumbs, but kept flying. “They’ll come for sunflower seeds. I guess this guy isn’t hungry enough.” Matt tossed the crumbs out for the sparrows, who were always hungry, it seemed, and brushed his hands off. “He’s right. People have already tried to expose Paumanok Harbor, make a Roswell out of it. That must never happen or we’ll lose a lot of the magic.”
I crumpled my napkin and waxed paper from the sandwich back into the deli bag and got up. “So what now?”
“Now we hope that you don’t conjure up any more disasters. And we hope that I can help if you do.”
“They’re trying to marry me off, you know,” I said on my way to the small grocery store at the other side of the village. I still needed dog biscuits. “That’s fair warning, and maybe why they let you slide.”
“It’s been mentioned, but it’s not on my calendar. I’ve been married and divorced, you know. I’m not exactly eager to jump into those waters anytime soon.”
“Shark-infested, huh?”
“Great whites. Man-eaters. She took the dog.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Oh, I’m well over it. We’re friends now. I still miss the dog, though.”
“You can borrow mine any time.”
We laughed. No one in his right mind would take Little Red.
Matt helped me pick out the best dog treats from the narrow selection in the pet food area. The sedentary old guys got a different kind from Little Red with his bad teeth and tiny throat, so he wouldn’t choke. He told me to buy a bag of those baby carrots, too. “Dogs love them and they’re non-fattening and healthy.”
Matt bought a box of cereal and a carton of orange juice.