Flower Moon

by Gina Linko

  It was then I noticed Digger, sitting cross-legged on the seashell-gravel of the midway, playing tug-of-war with a healthy looking Pork Chop. I called Digger’s name, but he didn’t answer. The music from the rides, the chug and clang of the engines, the yelping and laughing of the carnival-goers, all of that noise drowned out my voice.

  Then, across the midway, near her numbers booth, I spotted Tempest. She stood ramrod straight, and she looked right toward me. She knew too.

  In that moment, we both knew.

  And I’m not going to lie. It sparked between us. Whatever we were creating in the air, it lit up blue and green between my sister and me, like a bolt of lightning, an electrical charge on the midway.

  I froze for a second, feeling the ba-dum-clunk of the Iron Witch, knowing something was dead wrong.

  Digger looked up from his lap, Pork Chop still focused on chewing a hole through the hem of his shirt.

  Some decisions you don’t make consciously.

  I began to run. But it was like I was in a dream, moving through quicksand, slow and burdened.

  And suddenly, the noise was more than a ba-dum-clunk. It was a clinking and clanking, a jangling of things that were coming apart, metal from metal, rust giving way. A screeching, creaking scream of a sound.

  The music of the Iron Witch rose to a fever pitch. Its speed did the same. “Stop the ride!” I yelled to Fat Sam. I ran, as fast as I could. I pushed past people on the midway. “Stop the ride!”

  And Fat Sam looked up. Thank God for small favors. “It’s going to break off! One of the cars! You gotta stop it, Sam!”

  He turned toward his control board, and I watched as he pulled the gearshift, yanking it to the full stop position. Suddenly I was next to him, and we were both looking up at the ride itself. It stuttered and hissed, the metal gears and mechanisms slowing. Something creaked and sputtered and, as if in slow motion, I watched one of the empty cars rock back and forth—thank the jelly donut that it was one of the empty ones—and then it came loose, tearing off its track. It flew through the air, like something from a cheap science-fiction movie.

  And it headed right across the midway, toward Digger and Pork Chop. Digger threw his arms up, as if he could shield himself and protect the pup from the ton of screeching metal careening toward him at breakneck speed.

  I moved before I decided to do so. But I was too far away. I couldn’t get to him.

  And then I heard Tempest. We can stop it.

  And I knew she was right.

  Together.

  Fear shimmied its way down my neck. This wasn’t us just messing around with metallic bugs. We were going to have to use the full force of our power.

  Believe, Tally.

  In that split second, that blip of time, I understood. What this was all about. All of this.

  Every last thing.

  Life.

  It’s as simple as this: Life is good; life is bad. Sometimes it’s really good; sometimes it’s really bad.

  You can’t always save the ones you love from being hurt.

  But sometimes … sometimes when the moon is big and round and you’re full of magic and you’re extra brave, maybe you have a chance.

  So I believed.

  I closed my eyes, and I dug deep. I let that spark inside me take flight. I funneled my energy, let it spin and swirl, shuffle and spout from inside me, stronger than I’d ever dared. But I didn’t just let it loose; I searched for Tempest’s energy and found it.

  Always there.

  That’s what Tempest was to me, the baseline of my life, my touchstone.

  Inside me, that ever-present, live-wire thrum clicked into an easier rhythm, latching on to Tempest’s, settling into something calm and right.

  I focused my energy with hers, and together … it was like we stopped time. Suspended it. And just like those dragonflies and copper ants and butterflies, we moved the car.

  It was a monstrous task. I broke out in a sweat, cold and full of terror. Adrenaline shot through my veins, and every muscle in my body tensed. But I held my energy, pushed when Tempest pulled. Pulled when she pushed. And we got ahold of the runaway car as it sailed straight for Digger. We couldn’t move it much. But we moved it enough, just enough, mere inches from disaster, the gold-painted door handle skimming past, only a breath from the brim of Digger’s baseball hat.

  The air from the car, the motion of it, blew Digger back, his body pushed flat on the asphalt, Pork Chop curled into his arms. But that car landed with a screech and groan, sparks flying, only a foot or so away, throwing up shells and gravel. Missing Digger so very nearly, but missing him nonetheless. The car from the Iron Witch skidded and turned over itself. The metal hissed and bent, twisting and sparking, finally coming to a stop as I watched in awe.

  Then I was running toward my friend. And in an instant, I was bent over him. “Digger!”

  Tempest stood at my shoulder.

  Digger sat up. “You know?” he said, his voice cracking. “Close only counts in horseshoes.”

  I let out a yelp of hysterical laughter, punching him in the shoulder. He lifted one free hand from Pork Chop and rubbed at the spot. “Ow, Tally.”

  I knelt on the ground and I threw my arms around him, darn near squashing Pork Chop, whose little tail wagged so hard it hit me in the eye and made it water. But I didn’t let go of Digger’s shoulders. If anything, I held him tighter to me, my face buried in his neck. “Digger,” I said, and I kept saying it, so very relieved. “Digger.”

  And then I looked up, and there was Tempest hovering over us. I hesitated, unsure of the risk, but then I grabbed my sister. I pulled her into the hug too, all three of us collapsing in a heap. And I was fighting tears, and there was a pressure in my throat, and I couldn’t seem to say anything, and I couldn’t get a breath.

  Digger—I wanted to tell him. Tempest—I needed to tell her. Did they know? Did they have any idea what they meant to me? The words were too big in my throat, choking me, the feelings too buoyant in my heart, like I could float away.

  “Girls!”

  It was Mama’s voice, and Tempest and I turned around to see our mama and daddy coming from the direction of the Candy Wagon. Mama running, Daddy on her heels.

  “Girls!” she yelled again. “What’s happened?”

  The Iron Witch’s car took that as its cue to burst into half-hearted flames.

  “Mom,” Tempest yelped.

  “Girls!” she said a third time, and Tempest and I tried to get out some explanation, but Mama wasn’t listening. She was pulling us away from the car, and then in for hugs. Daddy joined her, and he held up my wrist cuff. They both talked at once. Didn’t we know we were supposed to call them if anything weird happened? Why hadn’t we listened to them?

  Didn’t we realize how precious we were to them?

  What had we been thinking?

  Did we like giving them gray hair?

  Were we hurt?

  Was there a doctor in town?

  Was Digger okay?

  Tempest and I answered the questions, took the lectures. Endured the hugs.

  Together.

  We were together.

  Butter on toast. Sea to shore. Both sides of the moon.

  We were sisters again.

  But then Mama stiffened in my arms. And she pulled away. She gasped with her whole body. “Grania?”

  22

  “Don’t come any closer!” Aunt Grania yelled as she stepped out from behind the port-o-johns, followed by Molly-Mae and Licorice. “Genevieve!” Aunt Grania cried, and her voice broke. She put her hand over her mouth, a sob racking her shoulders.

  “Wait! It’s okay,” Tempest said to Mama. “I’ve been working on something.” Tempest stuck her hand into one of the pockets of her cargo shorts.

  “Girls!” Mama said again, and she was crying now. Surely we had scared the bejesus out of her with what she’d just seen. And now this! Aunt Grania here.

  How many years had it been for them?

 
; Tempest opened her fist, and I expected a bracelet, of course. But with Tempest, you just couldn’t assume anything.

  What she handed to Mama was the most delicate gold chain I’d ever seen, with a large silver locket dangling from it, decorated with tiny filigree flowers and geometric shapes. Tempest popped it open to show Mama, and instead of a clock or a photo of a loved one, there was some kind of a tiny, complicated mechanism inside. No dials. No face of any sort, just a mess of gears on one side, and a shiny, flat, metallic surface on the other.

  “A magnet, magnified,” Tempest said, as if this explained everything.

  I nodded, and Mama took the chain from her, let it dangle from her hand. “What …?”

  “Put it on,” Tempest told her.

  “When you called and told us to come today, you said Grania was gone,” Mama said.

  “I lied.”

  “Tempest!” Mama gasped.

  “I needed you to come today, so that we could test this. And I know it’s reckless, but it’s too important—”

  “Girls,” Mama said again. I could tell she was trying to admonish us, to sound stern and angry, but the relief in her voice won out. I pulled her into a hug.

  “We’re okay, Mama. We’re okay.” I took the locket from her hand and I unlatched it. “Is it going to be enough?” I asked Tempest.

  “I don’t know, Tally.”

  “We have to try,” I said. And that right there was another example of the real magic in this world: finding it inside yourself to be brave.

  Mama pulled me into another hug then, before we had a chance to explain anything more. She grabbed Tempest too, and we all stood there, hugging and crying. “You girls! You’re foolish. You should be punished. This is—”

  “I know, Mama,” I said, and I backed away from the hug. I put the necklace over her head, and I watched her tear-stricken face freeze as she registered something, some change. Was it the same feeling between Tempest and me when I slid on the cuff?

  Did she understand?

  But before I could open my mouth to explain, before I could do anything more, Digger was pulling a hesitant Aunt Grania by the hand toward Mama.

  The Greenly sisters stood a few yards apart. They took tentative steps toward each other.

  Tempest explained, “Aunt Grania said what you two have, it isn’t as powerful as ours. Maybe the necklace—”

  But then it didn’t matter, because Mama and Aunt Grania were in each other’s arms, and they were bawling. The whole place went nuts. Pa Charlie and Daddy, Fat Sam and Molly-Mae, everyone. Suddenly, Digger was hugging me, and I was hugging him back.

  This was magic. Right here. The real kind.

  And, wouldn’t you know it? Digger wrapped an arm around my shoulders, and I leaned into it. He smelled like sweat and I didn’t mind, and I squeezed his bird-bone ribs a little tighter, and I cried.

  Me, tough Tally Jo Trimble, cried in front of everyone. Tears of relief. And hope—I guess there was some of that too.

  And there was this thought. Well, maybe it was more than a thought; it was a feeling, a premonition, a knowing. We were powerful. Tempest and me. And that was a good thing.

  We could do anything.

  23

  We hadn’t beaten this thing for good—I knew that. But with the cuff and with the necklace, we’d reversed the polarity. We’d done enough for right now, anyway.

  And maybe it wouldn’t always be so easy, but that night, we danced our copper bugs for everyone, to the tune of Fat Sam’s banjo. We watched as Mama and Aunt Grania linked hands, their heads bent together, deep in conversation, looking so much like the girls in our red-framed silhouette garland.

  We sang country songs and roasted marshmallows. We heated Molly-Mae’s apple pocket-pies over the fire, and we celebrated. Mama and Daddy asked us a thousand and one questions about what we figured out, barely any of which we could truly answer. But in the end, they chose to believe in what we had done.

  To believe in our magic.

  And now, back in our little pod, it was just us.

  TallyandTempest. No spaces. Like it used to be.

  No, that wasn’t right. We were better than that.

  We were Tally and Tempest. Fierce and brave and powerful on our own. And together.

  We were new, evolved.

  My sister and I sat on the floor of our pod, cross-legged, knee to knee, even though we were on the road. And being in the pod while Pa Charlie was driving was technically illegal, but Pa Charlie overlooked it tonight, with all the happiness going on.

  Tempest and I were going through a heap of pictures Aunt Grania had given us. They were of Mama and her when they were younger, but there were pictures of us too, through the years, a chronicle of the time she had missed with us. The years Mama had lived without her sister. We were too awake to sleep. “We’re thirteen tonight exactly at 11:47,” I said.

  “Can you believe it?”

  I played with the cuff on my wrist. “No.”

  Tempest asked, “Do you really think Mama and Aunt Grania will take over Peachtree, like they were saying tonight? When Pa retires?”

  “I doubt Pa Charlie will ever leave the carnival.”

  “That’s true. But now Aunt Grania and Mama don’t have to, either.” Tempest smiled so wide.

  “We could travel every summer with them,” I said. “We could really think up some cool stuff. Serious magic shows.” And I shot her a mental picture of what I was thinking: Snowflakes. Real, icy snowflakes falling inside a large, silver tent, delighting a bewildered crowd. Constellations lighting up the ceiling, a large Flower Moon sitting on the makeshift horizon of the tent walls. I didn’t know how we’d do it exactly, but I knew better than to question it.

  Tempest flashed me an image right back. It was of Digger walking into that silver tent and sweeping me up in a sloppy, movie star–style kiss.

  “Tempest Jean!” I yelped, and I stood up and grabbed the nearest thing, which happened to be a stuffed alligator, and I threw it at her as hard as I could. But Pa Charlie always warned us about standing in the pod while traveling, and the gods of traffic were not kind to me at that moment. Pa Charlie hit the brakes, and I went flying into the window right between our beds. I felt a thump and heard a crack as my elbow hit the windowsill, and next thing I knew I was sitting on my rump on the floor, blood dripping down my arm.

  “Holy cow,” Tempest said. “You okay?”

  I touched my elbow, looked at my fingers and saw the blood there. Tempest handed me a tissue. We jerked forward and accelerated at a steady pace. I looked at the window, and it didn’t seem cracked. But then I noticed that only half of the lady bug suncatcher still hung there. The other half was on the floor at my feet. I picked that one up, and Tempest took it from me, tossing it into her box of junk.

  I dabbed my elbow with the tissue. “You okay?” she asked again.

  “I’m fine.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  “Nah,” I said.

  “You’re lying.”

  “Yeah.” I laughed.

  She smiled back, and then we fell into a hug. It was more than a hug though; it was a reunion, and I stifled a little sob.

  It felt real good to hug Tempest.

  Tempest grabbed something from the nightstand drawer then, and I saw it was her yearbook. “Here,” she said. “Look at what Bradley wrote.”

  She flipped it open and handed it over to me. That day, our last day at school, it seemed like forever ago. Tempest pointed to a small handwritten note in red ink: YOU’RE STUPID.

  I smiled in spite of myself. I giggled, and when I looked up at Tempest I saw that she was grinning too. Then we both laughed. “You’re stupid,” I said, all matter-of-factly, sending us into a new fit of laughter. I had tears in my eyes when I finally settled down.

  “Okay,” I said. “I admit it. Maybe he’s not worth the effort.”

  “Sometimes I can handle myself.”

  “I know you can.”

  “It’s
been hard … to grow up, I think. I could’ve spent my whole life just being your shadow.”

  “You’re so much more than that, Tempest.”

  “I know.” She leaned over and pulled something out of her pillowcase. “Happy birthday,” she told me. “Just a bit early.”

  I took the small envelope from her hand. “I got you something too, from the shell shop by the pier, but it’s wrapped and in Pa’s trailer …”

  Tempest shook her head. “Just open it.”

  I opened the cream-colored envelope, and in there was a yellow index card, folded in half. And before I had unfolded it, I knew what it was. The nail polish had chipped and cracked over the years, but it was the same. “Our fingerprints.”

  “We can be different. But we’re still together. We’ll always be together.”

  “Tempest, that’s all I need. Because you’re you, and I love you. I’m sorry if I ever made you think you had to be something else. I’m sorry I was ever embarrassed by your pigtails.”

  “They keep the flyaways away from your face much better than a ponytail.”

  I considered this. “I suppose that’s true.”

  Tempest smiled then, but she didn’t meet my eyes. Whatever she was about to say, I could see it was hard for her. “I know I’m not the easiest to have around at school. I don’t make friends easily, like you do, and I’m always shy and … you know.”

  “Tempest, no. I tried to blame you for so long, for us growing apart. But it was both of us, I think. I was just the one being mean about it.”

  “We can grow apart in some ways, but we’ll still always be us. Together in the way that matters.”

  I nodded. “I was a wreck, thinking we would have to split up like Mama and Aunt Grania. I could never, ever want that.”

  Tempest nodded. “We are strong. Together and alone.”

  “Thank you,” I said, folding the fingerprint paper, and setting it on my pillow. “Hey, Tempest?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Is Ambersville the place where we set up right next to that milkweed field?”

  “Yeah, I think so,” she answered. “Right near the church. Just think of it, Tally. Mama and Aunt Grania will both get to be there for Pa Charlie’s wedding.”