All About Evie

by Cathy Lamb

  Pammy sneezed, then coughed. “I’m sorry. I’m allergic to dogs.”

  “I know, Pammy. I know.”

  We chatted for a while about everything, about nothing. I liked Pammy a lot.

  She sniffled, blew her nose. “Bye, Evie. You’re coming to Melissa’s shower, right? Saturday?”

  “Yes, we’ll be there.” Melissa was a classmate of ours. She had invited me, my mother, and my aunts to a bridal shower. She had promised “lots of wine. My new mother-in-law, the old jackhammer herself, will be there. I’ll need to be drunk. Get drunk with me.”

  The girls turned around to glare at me, but smiles broke through.

  Kimberly whispered, “I’m still mad about the doggy.”

  “Me too,” Kaitlyn said.

  I didn’t take offense. They were simply blaming the messenger who had denied them doggies.

  “I’ve had worse glares than that,” I said.

  They both started giggling.

  “But you are a witch,” Kimberly said. “I know that.”

  “A nice witch,” Kaitlyn said.

  Pammy, honking loudly, blew her nose.

  I was right about the dogs, that was for sure.

  * * *

  “You’re scaring me.”

  “How on earth can I be scaring you? I’m simply trying to help you find books that are not violent. The books that you’ve always read are all gruesomely violent.” It was Monday, and the bookstore was full. Probably because I put a sign on the door about the Dark Chocolate Honeycomb cake we were selling, which is like eating heaven. “Be sweet! Come on in and eat!” I also had my tea specials up: Rose Hip and Passion Flower.

  “But I like reading about violence.”

  “You should open your mind to something new.” This woman! Geez!

  “Why?”

  “So that you can learn about other people and their lives. You can read a memoir and see life through someone else. You can read a biography and learn about someone who changed the world. You can read fiction or fantasy or science fiction and be swept away to a whole new time and place.”

  “I don’t like being swept away.”

  “You don’t?”

  “No. I like to read about true life crimes.”

  “So I can’t show you any other books?” I was exasperated.

  “I’ll make you a deal, Evie. You can show me other books once you show me the new crime books you have in.”

  “I’m feeling frustrated,” I said to her.

  “Many crimes are committed when people have pent-up frustration and rage. They often hate themselves. Or they are sociopaths or psychopaths. That’s who I like to read about.”

  “And that’s what you want to continue to read? Forevermore? Tell me you’re kidding.”

  “I’ve never met a bookstore owner like you. It’s strange. But I like it.”

  My hands flew up as in, “I give up.” “I’m not strange. Well, I’m not that strange.” Yes I am. But choosing a variety of books is important!

  “You talk to people in a scary way sometimes, telling them to read this or that.”

  “I don’t think you’re scared.”

  “I’m not. I just felt like saying that. I like being scared when I read.”

  I looked down at the customer. Beatrice Winters. She had white hair wrapped in a bun. She was a nun for twenty years. Then she fell in love with a priest. They left their orders, and they’ve been married for thirty years. She was a kindergarten teacher for twenty years after her nun years. She was about five feet tall.

  “Okay. Let’s go find you more blood and gore and violence.”

  “And no more admonitions or reprimands, young lady,” she reprimanded me. “I can read whatever I damn well please.”

  “I know you can. I’m trying to broaden your literary horizons because you are so stubborn.”

  “The only thing I want to broaden is my ass. My husband says my ass is skinny like a plucked chicken’s.”

  She is petite. Mrs. Winters picked out three true crime books. I brought her a piece of Dulce de Leche cake with vanilla buttercream and cut myself a slice, and we ate it together at a table overlooking the bay. We both commented on the whales in the distance, a tail here, a fountain of water there.

  She gave me a hug on the way out. “That was fun. I enjoy a civilized argument.” She turned away, then back. “And tell your mother and aunts that I am looking forward to visiting them at their greenhouse shortly.”

  I groaned. “I didn’t hear that.”

  “Yes, you did, dear.”

  * * *

  There has not been a time in my life when I did not love books.

  My parents were readers, too. We would sit, altogether, or my mom and Jules and me if my dad was deployed, and we would read. Often we would read in their bed. We would eat popcorn, or have a slice of pie, or we would all pile in and have Spaghetti and Books Night.

  Books were my escape. I loved the stories. But I had an ulterior motive for reading: Books blocked the premonitions out. I loved being taken away to new worlds, where premonitions did not exist. As a child, as a teenager, the anxiety and depression, and the fear and dread, were so hard to battle. But books at least gave me a respite.

  I read almost everything. Almost all genres. I read before I sleep. I read when I wake up. I read when I take a break at the bookstore. I read on Sunday afternoons. I read on Friday nights. I listen to audio books. My life is filled with words.

  I understand people who are addicted to books. I have found that many people use books to escape life. To battle one problem, one challenge or another. Books keep the tears at bay. They also bring on the laughs, the wonder, the education.

  Yes, I love books. I love stories. Always have, always will.

  And I want other people to love books, too. Hence, I do get a teeny bit uptight with customers in my bookstore now and then....

  * * *

  I met Emily Medegna when I was eleven. My parents, Jules, and I had moved to San Orcanita Island and into Rose Bloom Cottage about two weeks prior.

  I remember a lot of hushed conversations in our Washington, DC, home right before we moved to the island. I remember my parents arguing, which they rarely did. The arguments, behind closed doors, always ended up with the two of them hugging, kissing, saying sorry, tears. There was a ringing tension in our house, though. Newspapers were put down when I walked in the room, the TV turned off when I got too close during the news.

  “Is something wrong?” I asked my mother. She kissed me, hugged me, and said, a little too brightly, “Nothing at all, sweetheart. Let’s go out for ice cream.”

  “Is something wrong?” I asked my father. He smiled, a tight smile, too tight, and said, “No, love, nothing at all. Hey. Do you want to go bowling this weekend?”

  “What were you and Daddy fighting about in the bedroom?” I asked my mother another day.

  “Oh, no, dear. We weren’t fighting. We were having a discussion.” She smiled, her voice too bright. “We were talking about Dad’s next move, what he wants to do with his career.”

  “What were you and Mom fighting about in the backyard?” I asked my father. His smile was too tight once again.

  “Nothing, honey. We were talking about . . . about . . . where we want to take you girls on vacation this year.”

  “What’s going on?” I asked both of them at another dinner when they wouldn’t talk. Our dinners were always noisy, chatty, filled with my dad’s humor and my mother’s laughter and Jules’s funny stories and my conversations about how I wanted another cat.

  “Nothing, Evie,” my father said, then his voice broke a tiny bit. “We sure love you two.”

  “All is well,” my mother said. “You are the light of our lives, girls. Have we told you that, Jules and Evie?”

  But Jules had noticed, too, and we started listening at my parents’ bedroom door. We couldn’t understand most of the words, but we did understand the heated tone, the whispers, our mother crying, our fathe
r upset.

  “I don’t understand what they’re mad about,” Jules said.

  “Me either,” I said. “But I think Dad is crying.”

  “Yep. He is.” So she started crying, too. And I did. What could be so bad that our dad would cry? He never cried. He was in the military!

  But one day, after school, in November, our parents said to us, “Jules and Evie, we’re going to move.”

  “What?” we both said, shocked and angry, at the same time.

  “We’re moving,” my father said.

  “Why? Where?” we said.

  “We’re moving to San Orcanita Island,” my mother said.

  “But I don’t want to move,” I said. “I like my friends. Bjourna just got two puppies!”

  “And I like the house,” Jules said. “I like hearing the army jets and playing Army Lady!”

  “I’m sorry, girls,” my mother said. “I know you’ll miss the house and your friends, but we’re going to move.”

  We cried, we fussed, and then our parents started talking about the island, which we had visited at least once a year for family vacations. Aunt Iris and Aunt Camille and their husband /current boyfriend would come to visit, too. All of us together.

  We loved the island. We loved running through Grandma Lucy’s intricate garden rooms, into the meadow, around our pond, and down to the beach where we could see the other islands and, sometimes, whales. We spied on coyotes and deer and raccoons, and we made dandelion crowns. We had even met some of the local kids during our vacations, and they’d come over to play.

  Jules and I thought about it.

  “I’ll go if you get me a dog,” Jules said. “A fluffy dog. A big one. Big, big dog.”

  “I’ll go if you promise me I can have three cats,” I said. “Not one. Not two. Three kitties.”

  Well, that did it. Our parents nodded. Bring on the pets, shut down the whining about the move.

  We moved to the island within the week. Things at home were still tense between my parents, but the move seemed to lighten things some. I still saw them hiding newspapers. They would also turn off the TV quickly if Jules or I walked into the living room and the news was on, but we saw them holding hands again, which made Jules and I feel better.

  We sold or gave away our furniture before we moved, as Rose Bloom Cottage already had furniture. We didn’t have much stuff anyhow; military families know how to travel light. My grandfather was no longer at the cottage. He had fallen in love with a tourist named Yvonne with bright red hair. Yvonne was a teacher. He had moved to Arizona. We loved funny, friendly Yvonne.

  So Rose Bloom Cottage was ours to stay in.

  I met Emily my first day of school. I sat right by her in class. Emily had brown curls, blue eyes like cornflowers, and a huge smile with a dimple in her left cheek. I met her mom, Patsy, after school the first day. She had brown curls, blue eyes like cornflowers, and a huge smile, too. Emily was an only child to a single mother.

  Emily liked cats, and when she met Cupcake and Turtle and Sir Eats A Lot, she liked them, too. She liked our dog, Mr. Whale. My mother, as a self-trained floral designer, and Emily’s mother, who was a potter, were friends, too. Both artists, my mom simply worked with flowers.

  Then I had a premonition and I forgot about it and something terrible happened and I have never, ever forgiven myself.

  * * *

  “What do you think of your maid of honor dress?”

  I was on Skype with Jules. She held up my dress.

  Wow.

  Whew.

  Unique.

  Daring, sort of scary.

  Breathe deeply.

  Okay!

  She was smiling, so sunny, so hopeful, her blonde hair swinging, Mack’s tattooed face staring right at me from her arm.

  “I love it!” I said, with as much gush and mush as I could, as my insides quivered. I was going to wear that?

  “I am soooo glad, Evie! You’re going to look spectacular in it! It’s perfect for that perfect figure of yours. I had the same woman make your maid of honor dress who made my wedding dress. They’re different, but they belong together, like you and I belong together, as sisters, as best friend sisters! As love-sisters. I’m so excited, Evie!” She burst into tears.

  “Jules, don’t cry, please. You’ll make me cry. You know when I cry I get carried away.” I started to cry. I don’t like seeing Jules cry even when she’s happy. She started to sob in front of the computer. I started to sob. Her nose got red. I had to blow my nose. Her makeup was smearing down her face. I grabbed tissue and wiped at my cheeks. She made funny sounds, choking on her happy tears. I made a gaspy sound, too, that sounded like a frog choking.

  “I’m so happy,” she squeaked out. “Mack and I were in the hot tub last night. He’s an intelligent man. He knows so much about creativity in the bedroom, well, in this case the hot tub, and he made sure I wasn’t getting too hot, and I didn’t make too much noise because of the neighbors, and then we talked about how we can’t wait to be Mr. Mack and Mrs. Jules!” She honked her nose into a tissue. “I’m getting married and you’re my maid of honor and Mom and the aunts will be there and Dad will be there from heaven and Mack’s family will be there and all our friends are coming on their motorcycles in leathers!”

  I burst into a fresh round of tears, so she did, too.

  “Look at your dress!” she semi-shouted, shaking it. “Look at it!”

  We both sobbed again.

  * * *

  The nonfiction book club met on Monday night. They read a book about Everest and invited me to join them, as usual. I had read the book. I will never climb Everest. I don’t want to be anywhere near Everest. The scenes during the snowstorm scared me even when I was at home in the bath reading the book. I was so freaked out, I had a piece of apple pie. Apples are fruits. Therefore the pie was healthy for me.

  The chess club came in later in the week. I played one game. I won. I had a croissant. Croissants are pretty, which means they add vitamins and nutrients to my day.

  A group of women came in for their weekly coffee and treat date. They invited me, as always, to come and chat, so I did. They bought coffee cake. I had a slice, too. Coffee beans are healthy, therefore the coffee cake probably boosted my immune system.

  I chatted with customers from all over the world. I sold books. I sold my mother’s bouquets. She had titled them, as usual. “This Bouquet Is for a Saucy Woman Who Takes No Crap” and “Love Monster” and “Tulip Titillation.”

  I sold my aunt Iris’s photographs of strange talking, laughing, sexy flowers and her cards. One that was selling especially well, which she’d had to reprint many times, was a purple flower that looked distinctly like a penis. Two red roses were clearly boobs.

  I sold Aunt Camellia’s lotions and potions. Her latest, which smelled like a blend of lemon and vanilla, was called You Light Me Up, Baby. It was selling well, too.

  I was surrounded by books, my forever friends, who have encouraged me since I was a little girl to escape from my premonitions between their pages, to dream, to travel to places in my head, to learn, to see through others’ eyes, and to imagine.

  Book nerds get this.

  They will understand me when I say that I love owning a bookstore.

  * * *

  A pretty, red-haired lady in her fifties came in the next morning. My bookstore was full of tourists and people from town. We were having a rare rainy summer day, which was excellent for me. We were selling salted caramel chocolate cake, and we had two popular tea specials: Jasmine and Peppermint.

  We were busy at the café, and we were busy at the cash register. I loved days like this and I couldn’t wait to go home. There are few things better than reading on a rainy day while drinking coffee and eating pie, which is what I wanted to do.

  The woman was striking, with light blue eyes and a lopsided smile that showed a lot of teeth. She was wearing jeans, a pink Windbreaker, and pink tennis shoes. I felt the oddest sensation when we started chattin
g about books, then I felt a premonition slide on through.... She was going to meet a man. I saw the man, slowly, coming into view in my mind. They were going to fall in love. They would be together for a long time . . . until they died. They would be old then.... I saw them with white hair, wrinkled.

  I kept chatting with her; she wanted nonfiction. I suggested a few . . . and then I saw a man in the science fiction section. He was about fifty, too. Windblown hair. Looked as if he’d spent a lifetime outside. He was taller than her, trim . . . yes, it was him. She would meet him.

  Was I supposed to help? Was it supposed to happen today?

  Well, I thought, why not?

  I couldn’t miss this chance. Maybe I was the catalyst. Maybe I was the fixer-upper. Maybe I was Cupid! Evie Cupid, that’s me.

  I chatted with her; she found her book. I chatted with him; he found three, and they both ended up at the register at the same time because of sneaky finagling by me. The gentleman let her go first; they smiled at each other. And I saw it, their gazes held for a smidgen longer than normal. It was interest.

  I rang her up and said to them both, “Well, one of you likes nonfiction and one of you likes science fiction.” It was an inane comment. A nothing comment. But it opened the door to conversation. Book lovers are all alike. They are always so interested in what other people are reading, and why.

  I finished her purchase while they were still talking about the nonfiction books she had chosen, then they moved on to his science fiction books. She had never read science fiction, but she would be willing to try. What was that book about? Oh, he was happy to tell her. But tell me about your interest in the Vietnam War. Why that time period?

  And I lied and said, “I have to get rid of this cake. It was made yesterday. Let me give you two a free slice.” All our cakes are fresh.

  Oh, no, they couldn’t, the man said. “I’ll pay for it. Would you care to join me?” He looked at the smiling woman.

  And she said, “I would be delighted. But let me pay.”

  “No, please,” he said firmly. He was a gentleman.