Cavanagh - Serenity Series, Vol I (Seeking Serenity)

by Eden Butler

  “Shit!” he says and I immediately feel guilty. Pulling him up, I touch the back of his head. There is already a small knot forming.

  “That was my fault.”

  His laugh is low, barely audible. “I’m the fucking clown with the flat balloon.”

  My own laughter is instantaneous. It’s just like him to bring me back to the past. As a surprise, when we were first dating, Tucker took me to the circus. I’d never been fond of clowns, they truly freaked me out and reminded me of horror novels and my father for inexplicable and ridiculous reasons—had since I was eight years old. Tucker seemed eager to show me the fun of the circus and how harmless clowns were.

  We’d gone in the afternoon and, at first, avoided the clowns, but typical of Tucker, he pulled me into the Big Top to watch the main event. There were lions and elephants being whipped around the Big Top, dirt and dust mingling with the fire rings and the ferocious sound of loud music and the “ohs” and “ahs” of the crowd and then, the clowns emerged. Dozens of them, running through the crowds, dosing everyone with glitter, their horns squeaking.

  There was one clown, with orange pants and a polka dotted shirt that was too tight across his round belly. His hair was purple, his make-up poorly brushed onto his face so that it seemed like his wide, fake smile was melting. He was sweaty and clearly new to his job. The clown caught my eye and must have sensed my ridiculous fear. He approached and I kept my face buried in Tucker’s shoulder. The guy kept throwing confetti on me, kept squeaking that damn horn.

  When I still wouldn’t pull my face off Tucker’s shoulder, the clown tried balloon animals. He tried and failed miserably. The giraffe he attempted to make looked like some perverse version of a crocodile. His snake looked like a swollen penis and suddenly, I started to laugh. The clown was god-awful and the louder my laughter got, the more nervous he became until, finally, every balloon he attempted to inflate raspberried into a flaccid mess. We left the circus laughing and my unwarranted fear of clowns stayed behind.

  Tucker nudges my shoulder and I return his smile, still thinking of the pathetic clown whose first day at the circus hadn’t gone very well. “Not everything was bad with us, was it?”

  “No. Not everything.” I help him to his feet and grab a towel from my file cabinet and two small cubes of ice from my mini-fridge. He flops in my chair and I hand him the ice. “But we can’t go back. There’s been too much that’s happened and I really don’t think you’d like who I’ve become.”

  “Will you let me find that out for myself?”

  Shoulders falling, I sit on my desk next to him. “God, Tucker, I don’t want to date you. I don’t want to date anyone.”

  “I never said I wanted to date you.” At my confused expression he laughs. “Okay, I totally want to date you, but since you seem to be opposed to that, do you think we could at least try being friends? We were good friends once.”

  We were. I remember that. We were undergrads screaming our heads off at McKinney’s at the New Zealand vs South Africa match. That night I drank him under the table and he told me that I was the perfect woman.

  “You wouldn’t be trying to distract me from the bet, would you?”

  “Would I do that?”

  “You would absolutely do that.”

  He reaches for my hand. This time, I don’t jerk away from him. “What about you and Fraser?”

  “What about us?”

  “You like him. I know you. I can tell you like him.” His eyes take on a small glaze, but I try not to focus on it. He’s trying to make me feel bad.

  My hand comes up, away from him and I cross my arms, not willing to let him touch me again. I don’t want him encouraged in the least. “Maybe, but it’s not anything serious.”

  The familiar hand-on-the-back-of-the-neck returns and I know Tucker is trying to calm himself. It annoys me that he has to purposefully calm himself.

  “Stop,” I say. “We’re getting along. Don’t start with the caveman, jealous ex-boyfriend shit.”

  “He’s a punk.”

  “And you’re an asshole. Under normal circumstances that would make you two the best of friends.”

  “You’re not funny.”

  “I’m honest.”

  “I’m serious, though. I want us to be friends again.”

  Could I be Tucker’s friend again? I don’t see how. That would lead to other things, to us talking like normal people, to us laughing together. That’s what friends do. But friends don’t punch guys you flirt with just because they don’t like them. Friends don’t also make you feel like an idiot for your opinion, or for the things that you enjoy.

  Sophomore year comes to mind. We were playing cards with some of his squadmates and someone mentioned Edgar Allan Poe. Tucker picked a fight with me over “Annabel Lee.” He claimed Lovecraft wrote it. I stared at him for two full minutes, then politely explained that, no, it was Poe.

  When he shook his head and looked down at me as though I was an insipid dumbass, I quoted the full poem.

  Flustered and clearly embarrassed that I’d proven him wrong, he said “Whatever, Autumn. It’s not like it matters anyway.”

  “It matters to me,” I’d said, annoyed that he’d dismiss me so quickly.

  “It doesn’t matter to people who count.”

  Tucker always had a way of ridiculing everything I did, the books I read, the movies I liked. And, he refused to watch “Doctor Who”. How could I be friends with anyone like that?

  When I don’t immediately answer his query about us being friends, Tucker stands up, throws the impromptu ice pack on my desk. “I know that things with us got bad. I know I didn’t always treat you the best and I’ll be honest, I came back hoping that we could give it another shot.” Tucker pulls my hands apart, rubs his thumb over my wrist. “I’m not going to lie to you and tell you I don’t want you when you know I do, but if all you can give me right now is your friendship, then I can wait.”

  If I’m not perfectly frank, then he will persist. Tucker is many things: confident, independent, fiercely diligent and above all else, stubborn beyond belief. Letting him believe that I will simply get over being angry with him won’t be enough. Brutal honesty is essential. I straighten my shoulders and force myself to keep my face indifferent.

  “You don’t get it, do you? I’m not the same. You left me and I thought I’d die from it. But other things happened to me. More important things. I stopped focusing on you, on what you did because I was trying to heal, from the wreck, from my mother’s death.” I don’t smile when his fingers squeeze against my hand, don’t give him any indication that I’m touched by his sympathy. “You weren’t the most important thing in my life anymore and I realized that was a good thing.” I pull my hand away. “I spent this past year putting myself first, something I never did when we were together.” He starts to argue, but I shake my head. “It was something you never did for me either.”

  There is a moment, a brief second where I see all that runs through his mind fracture across his face. He is shocked. His eyelids curve. Then, by the slope of his bottom lip and the paling of his cheeks, I know that what I said has usurped everything he believed was true about our relationship. A small voice whispers against the firmly guarded emotions in my mind. It tells me I’ve hurt him, I have been cruel, but then I close my eyes and ignore the guilt I feel.

  “I didn’t know…did you…did you always feel that way?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Why didn’t you say anything?” This, he speaks in a whisper, as though he can’t wrap his mind around my honest revelation.

  “I didn’t know how, not back then.”

  The shock leaves Tucker’s face and a new expression captures his features, as though he is seeing me, really seeing me for the first time. I don’t know what to make of that expression. It is new, unfamiliar and a small part of me is glad to see him appreciate this new revelation.

  I am caught unexpected by his somber expression. “I’m sorry. I really am. I
thought about you so much while I was gone. And when I heard about your mom…God, Autumn, I wanted to see you so badly.” He touches my face and idly I wonder why I am not backing up, why I don’t pull away from him when his touch is so familiar. But then something shifts in my brain and I replace that nostalgia with indifference. “I can’t believe you went through that alone.”

  Clearing my throat, I finally take a step back. “I didn’t. I had Ava, my girls.”

  He nods, then his shoulders lower and Tucker walks into the corridor. “I spent two years with you, Autumn and before that we were friends. I really hope we can get back to that one day.”

  I can’t answer him, don’t want to give him any hope. He never gave me any. I turn around, flop back in my chair as Tucker’s leaves my office.

  At its founding, Cavanagh’s earliest settlers brought with them the superstitions of Ireland. Our cemeteries were small because many of the most fiercely traditional townsfolk didn’t believe in burying their dead in America. It was thought that they could not rest, could not find peace, until they lay beneath the cold earth next to their forefathers under Ireland’s breast. I’ve seen many old men and women spitting through triangles made with their thumbs and forefingers when a black cat crosses their path or they walk accidently under a ladder.

  During Halloween, or Oíche Shamhna in the old tongue, these superstitions cannot be ignored and many of them are forced upon even the youngest of Cavanagh. It’s why I’m sitting at a table in front of McKinney’s pub, waiting for Layla to choose her slice of fruit bread. If she manages to pick a piece with the gold coin, then our traditions tell us that the next year will be prosperous for Layla. Sayo and Mollie had no luck, but Layla is determined and her fingers hover over the small plate, waggling before she chooses her piece. She picks a slice, crumbles it on her plate then squeals like a second grader drunk on Yoo-Hoos and Gummy Worms.

  “Yes! Got it.” Layla dangles the gold coin between her fingers, winking at Mollie when she flips her off. “Don’t be mad. It’s just good luck.”

  “Dumb luck, more like,” Mollie says.

  Layla’s fortune for the next year seems to be set and I watch the crowd inside through the window buzz with loud, ridiculous laughter and versions of slutty witches, slutty nurses, a few Iron Mans and more slutty variations of comic book and film figures as they float in and out of the pub.

  We, at least, don’t look like anyone else tonight.

  Sayo wasn’t kidding when she said she wanted to honor her favorite steampunk series. As the beautiful Italian assassin Sophia del Morte, her small chest is wrapped tight in a leather corset with hundreds of small clockwork gears covering the bodice. The corset covers a long, crisp white button up which is tucked into skintight, gray riding pants, set off with gray gloves and a riding cap over a jet black wig. She looks positively perfect. The dark wig enhances her complexion beautifully and she’s even taken on her terrible attempted version of an Italian accent.

  When Layla dips her fingers into the crumbs of her fruit bread, small bits fall between her cleavage. She is Chandi Culpepper, a secret villain, from the Ministry’s Research and Design Department. Her corset is paisley and perfectly accentuates her slight chest. She wears a long brown silk skirt, and a gold pocket watch drapes across the corset. Sitting next to her is Mollie, suited up like Charlotte Lawrence, captain of the Protectors in simple black men’s trousers, black corset and bandoliers on her back. Mollie insisted on the Pepperbox revolver, though it was not authentic to the novels. She simply thought the revolver was cool with its clockwork gears and a beautiful rustic patina.

  I am decked out as Ministry operative Eliza Braun, New Zealand expat with a penchant for rule breaking and large quantities of whiskey. Braun’s not so different from me, but I generally wouldn’t be caught dead in a brown leather corset, not the way my size Cs are pushed up and my cleavage is visible despite the white button up under the steel-boned leather. I have to admit, though, that I like the pistols holstered in my garters, hidden beneath the long skirt I wear and the cute little half boots.

  Eliza makes me walk a little taller, makes my shoulders set a bit straighter. But the way Sayo keeps looking behind me, eyes on the courtyard, has me nervous. All three of my friends, in fact, haven’t acted like themselves tonight and I’m convinced it has something to do with Eliza’s missing partner, Wellington Books. They come as a pair and since none of my friends are sporting a suit, bowler or round rimmed glasses, I have a feeling I will go Wellington-less or the little secret they’ve been harboring for weeks is about to be revealed. They really must think I’m an idiot if they believe I won’t guess who will be sporting the Wellington costume.

  When Mollie and Layla join Sayo in mimicking glances, I slap my hand on the tabletop and pull their attention back to me.

  “Okay. Enough. What the hell are you hiding?”

  Layla pretends to be concentrating on the small remains of her bread, while Mollie takes out her pistol, aims and taps back the hammer, squints down the barrel as though she’s seeking a target. Sayo is the only one who is brave enough to look me in the eye. “What do you mean, Autumn?”

  “I know you guys are up to something. You said Books was handled. You never said who. I have ideas, but why don’t you tell me?”

  Sayo’s smile is barely contained. She nibbles on her top lip, but her cheeks quiver as though it’s taking all her strength to withhold her laughter. “I never said that was a sure thing, Autumn.”

  “Sayo, don’t give me that. I know you.” Again, I slap my hand in front of Mollie and Layla, forcing their attention. “All of you.” When they only offer shy smiles, my hand pounds against the table again. “Spill it.”

  Behind me a large shadow blocks out the sunset, shifts over the table and a gruff rumble of a throat being cleared sounds. I don’t have to turn around to see who it is.

  “Ahem,” he starts. “Wellington Books, Esquire, at your service. Agent Braun, are you ready for our mission?”

  When my supposed friends’ laughter shakes their shoulders, has them giggling like a pack of fourteen year-olds, I close my eyes. Declan clears his throat again and my own shoulders slouch. I’m resigned. I’m betrayed and not in the least surprised by the purported shock, but resigned all the same.

  My chair scratches against the pavement below as I back up and stand, coming face to face with a very dapper, mildly impressive Declan Fraser looking every bit the part of Wellington Books. There isn’t the slightest hint of the gruff, tattooed rugby player in front of me. He wears the brown suit very, very well. His glasses are, of course, round and his pocket watch is a beautiful shined brass. He towers above me, smug as usual, but gives me a sweet smile when he bows, tipping his chestnut bowler in greeting. When he straightens up from his bow, his eyes linger, right on my cleavage and instantly the Declan I know peeks out behind the Books mask. His ever-present smirk is lewd, but he doesn’t comment on my ridiculous, obvious breasts and his attention shifts to my friends.

  “Lovely evening, isn’t it ladies?” Declan says. Layla and Mollie giggle, ridiculous and Sayo stands, nodding once to Declan. “Well then, we must away. Ne’er-do-wells to contain and all.” He offers me his elbow, but I ignore him.

  “Books would never.” I slap his arm down. It would be easy for me to protest. My friends have ideas about me and Declan. They have ideas about me and anyone, but particularly about me getting naked with the Irishman. I could walk away. I could turn around and cradle the warmth of my anger that has held me stable for the past year. But last year I ruined the holiday for them. I can’t do that again. I knew they were planning something, seeking an excuse to get me alone with Declan, despite my constant declarations that I wasn’t interested. Instead of letting my anger lead me back home alone, I stand, take hold of my pistol and cock back the hammer. “Jolly good then,” I say, channeling Eliza Braun. “Let’s be off.”

  Eleven p.m. and Fubar’s is already ridiculous. And, clearly, the theme of this night for many
of Cavanagh’s female co-ed population is “look as whorish as possible.” There are various expected costumes: sexy nurse, sexy cop lady, sexy nun, sexy Red Riding Hood. Halloween is, apparently, simply an excuse for inhibitions to fly out of the window and for the close embrace of the most decadent, inappropriate fantasies. The men aren’t much better. There are about ten Obama’s, five Bush’s and I see at least two couples dressed as Marilyn and JFK. There are a few originals; several Wolverines, many Tony Starks, Captain Americas, one Thor who I swore was Sayo’s fella Sam, which she assured me it wasn’t. “The Avengers” clearly left its mark on our little town.

  But as my friends and I navigate the crowd, I get an instant thrill. No one knows who we are, exactly. Many stop and stare, a few offer wide, approving smiles and others openly gawk as though they are trying to figure us out.

  We find a table and after Layla and Mollie convince Declan that we didn’t really eat any of the fruit bread and therefore didn’t break his stringent diet, they head to the bar to get our drinks.

  When Sayo and I are alone, I immediately grill her.

  “How did you get him to do this? Has he even read the books?”

  She moves her shoulders, as if to say ‘I have my ways,’ but she knows I won’t buy that. “He hadn’t, but he has now. Loves the series.”

  I find this impossible. “But he’s all…dudeish. You couldn’t have known he’d like it.”

  My best friend scoots her chair closer to me, trying to be heard over the loud thump of the music and the constant noise of the crowd. “Last weekend when you worked on your thesis instead of coming to the library?” I nod. “Declan walked past my ‘Silence in the Library’ sign and chuckled—he got the “Doctor Who” reference immediately. Then when he took off his jacket he was wearing an Ironman shirt.”

  “So?”

  “A vintage Ironman shirt, not one of those reprints they started selling after the movies were released, but an honest to God threadbare, vintage shirt. He’s in the Geek Tribe. I have a feeling.”