by Kitty Margo
“That’s all behind me now.” I had no desire to travel down that road again. “And honestly, I feel like a new woman. Like a tremendous load has been lifted from my shoulders. At least, I did until all this weird stuff started happening. If the man of my dreams comes along, fine. If not, that’s fine too. Being alone doesn’t terrify me anymore.”
“Well, right now I am terrified enough for both of us.” Mallory said, showing us her ample backside again.
“Well girls, it’s almost midnight and my fake ass needs some beauty sleep,” Teri said pointedly to Mallory’s back, but Mallory refused to acknowledge the comment. “Do you want me to turn off the lanterns?”
“Do you want to lose a finger?” Mallory snapped, flipping over and raising up on an elbow to glare at her.
Surprisingly, Teri only chuckled and left the lanterns on. I had to giggle as I envisioned Mallory tackling Teri to the floor if she tried to extinguish one of the two blazing lanterns that bathed the room in a soft glow.
“Whath tho funny?”
“Oh, nothing.” I yawned loudly. “Good night.”
The next morning I was jerked roughly from a pleasant dream of Robert Pattinson (so what if he’s too young for me it was just a freaking dream!) by the most God awful, bloodcurdling screams I had ever heard. Immediately, I felt all the breath forced from my lungs in a painful “whoosh” as Mallory landed square on my back and scurried under the cover to lay whimpering and trembling beside me. She proceeded to jerk the cover off me as she pulled it over her head. What now?
I was still struggling to force air back into my lungs when I heard, “Thweet Jethuth!”
I sat up and gasped, looked around the room and took deep breaths to still my racing heart. Sweet Jesus was right!
Every glass, cup, bowl, pot and pan in the cabin was filled to overflowing with exquisite buttercups, and scattered around the room. The makeshift vases sat on the table, on the wood stove, on top of the refrigerator and stove, and on every chair.
I had brought a pack of twenty red plastic disposable cups. They were now filled with stunning arrangements of buttercups and lined in perfect little rows on the windowsills, even the windowsills behind our beds. I shivered involuntarily realizing that he had to climb over our beds to get to those windowsills.
“He was in here last night! With us! Wasn’t he?” Mallory’s muffled wail rose from under the covers.
“I believe that would be an accurate assessment.” I had to agree.
“Why are you so scared?” Teri chirped, laughing and spinning gaily around the room. “I think it was a sweet gesture. And aren’t they the most beautiful flowers you ever did see?”
“I thought you detested flowers?” I reminded her.
“Not anymore.”
“Honeth to God, Teri,” Tammy screeched barely poking her head out from under the cover. “You are a certifiable nut cathe. You thould be locked up and adminithered weekly thock therapy.”
With an agitated frown, Teri waited for me to interpret her words.
“You’re a nut case and should be locked up and administered hourly shock therapy,” I translated.
“Don’t ad lib, Eve. She couldn’t have said weekly any plainer.” Then she glanced at Tammy and said, “Or you could grow a spine.”
“So Teri,” I asked scared out of my wits, but hoping to diffuse the argument before they pounced on her. “In your lofty opinion, what does this mean?”
“Well, that’s obvious to anyone with half a brain.”
“What about those of us with a whole brain?”
“He likes us.” She marveled, waving her arms and still spinning around the floral room. “This can only be taken as a grand gesture of affection.”
“Affection my ass! He likes us all right!” Mallory yelped. “A near death experience from a head injury was tangible proof of that!”
“And,” Teri continued, choosing to ignore Mallory’s tirade entirely, “he is also confirming that my observation last night was correct. Whatever he wants to show us has something to do with the Buttercup House, hence the buttercups.”
I didn’t bother to correct her anymore. “Dare I ask what you think he wants us to do next?”
“Go to the Buttercup House, of course.”
“Of course. Please forgive my obvious brain fart.”
“Well, I’m going home,” Mallory announced with no small amount of conviction and finally removed the cover from her head. Although, she kept her eyes squeezed shut so she wouldn’t have to look at the flowers. “Teri, you can follow that little demon straight back to hell if you want to, but I am going home. Are you coming with me Tammy?”
“You better believe I am!”
“Are you coming, Eve?”
“No, I guess I’m going back to the Buttercup House. But I have to warn you. It’s a long walk out and it gets a little spooky in the cornfields.”
“I don’t care how long the walk is or how spooky it gets,” Mallory said leaping from the bed to the door in a single bound. “I’m going home before he turns me into a buttercup! Do you want me to send your dad back for you?” Then, she looked at Teri and snapped, “You can stay here and rot for all I care.”
“Huh!” Teri chortled. “If anything rots it will be the area between your legs with the vast array of semen it soaks in.”
“You’re a fine one to talk.” Mallory sneered. “At least I’m not married.”
Even Teri didn’t have a comeback for that.
“Yes,” I quickly said, “ask him to ride down later and check on us.”
Tammy almost reached out to touch one of the beautiful flowers, thought better of it, and joined Mallory on the stairs.
“If you see the child ask him what he wants,” Teri called as we followed them outside. “Sylvia Browne says if you see a spirit just ask what it wants and it will show you.”
Mallory gave Teri a murderous glare and stormed down the stairs with Tammy close on her heels.
“Do you think they’ll be okay?” I asked, watching them trudge up the long, dusty road.
“Oh yeah, it’s you he’s after. He knows those two are useless.”
“Gee, thanks. I feel much better now.”
We fried bacon and eggs and made coffee. Thankfully, I had remembered to bring Coffee Mate. I
was totally addicted to it and found it hard to drink a cup of coffee without it anymore. We sat beside the river sipping the last of the coffee.
An hour later, with great trepidation, we stood before the glorious array of buttercups. I was terrified beyond words that if I stepped a foot into them some horrible act of nature would befall us. Yet, Teri plowed right through them without a care for how many she trampled, and on into the house. I had to admire the girl’s warped determination.
The house had been magnificent in its day. To the right was, or had once been, a mahogany staircase judging from the decaying remains. I was picturing the plantation house, as it must have looked in all its glory in the early 1800's, when Teri quickly jerked me out of my reverie.
“Quit woolgathering and get in here and help me look, would you!”
Mallory was right about one thing. The girl could be a certifiable bitch at times.
We searched the house from room to room upstairs and downstairs. We searched inside every cupboard and every cabinet. Nothing. Teri even lifted loose boards from the floor hoping to find a secret hiding place. Then she went room to room again, staring at the ceiling and searching for anything out the ordinary. Nothing.
We had searched for two hours and had gotten filthy in the process. Amazingly, the diva didn’t even seem to notice, even though she had long strands of cobwebs trailing from her hair and was covered with soot from the fireplaces. We were still searching when I heard a truck pull up outside. It was Dad. Finally!
“Did y’all find anything?” he asked, tromping through the flowers. He put his hand on his forehead to shield his eyes from the blazing sun as he gazed out across the sea of yellow. “I’ve
lived him 80 year and I ain’t never seen nothing like this in all my born days! Buttercups bloom in the spring of the year, not in late July.”
“Me either and no, we didn’t find anything. What do you make of all this, Dad?”
“I would say the child loves his buttercups. I’m sure they’s a message here that you girls will have to figure out. Good luck. I would stay and help, but I’m headed to the garden to pick cucumbers so Evelyn can put up some dill pickles.”
“Did Mallory and Tammy tell you what happened?”
“Yep. Them girls looked about as beat up as the two of you. They both swear they heard something running along beside them and giggling in the cornfield.” He motioned toward the buttercups and asked, “I wonder if it’s the same little boy I seen years ago?”
“I’m sure it is,” Teri said. “But we can’t find a single clue as to why he’s still roaming these woods.”
“You gals gonna snoop around some more or do you want to ride home with me?”
“I’m ready to go home and take a bath,” I said. “What about you, Teri?”
For the first time, Teri glanced down at her filthy clothes and body and cringed. “I guess I do need a bath, don’t I? And I promised the husband I would be home tonight.”
We rode with him to the cabin and, amazingly, when Dad turned the switch on his old truck it roared to life. He helped us load our supplies and I, for one, was eternally grateful to finally be heading home.
Sixteen
A week later, just as I had turned off the lamp and was about to get comfortable, Teri called. “How are you holding up, Eve?”
“Tired. The new contract is whipping my butt.” Don’t mention the little boy! Don’t mention the little boy! I desperately tried to channel these words into her brain. But, evidently, the girl has no psychic ability whatsoever.
“That. And the little boy,” she said.
I had been afraid she wouldn’t allow the subject to drop. “What do you have in mind?” I asked around the painful knot that had formed in the back of my throat. “You wouldn’t have bothered to bring it up if you didn’t have something spinning around in that salad spinner you call a brain.”
“I told the husband I was coming to spend this weekend with you. I didn’t mention the child last weekend if you will recall. I thought you needed a break from all the madness.”
For Teri, that had been a thoughtful gesture. “Great, we’ll go shopping and out to eat and to the movies,” I tried, unsuccessfully, to change the topic.
“And to the Buttercup House.”
“I’ll go if you can convince Tammy and Mallory to go.”
It was a joke and we both knew it. Just imagining their reaction if we even suggested they go near the house, caused Teri to laugh until she almost lost her breath. “I should call just to piss Mallory off. But I simply cannot tolerate the girl’s perpetual whining. It’s just going to be you and me, kid. We need to finish this, Eve. That child is all I think about.”
“I know. Me too.”
Against my better judgment, Teri arrived at my house Friday night for another trip to the cabin. We went to Sagebrush for a great steak supper and then came home and popped popcorn and watched Signs on TV. That’s a great movie and still never fails to scare the bejesus out of me! And I still do some serious boo hooing with Mel Gibson at the end, especially when little Morgan gasps air into his asthmatic lungs and says, “Did somebody save me?”
After a huge breakfast at Mom’s the following morning, we hopped into Dad's old beat up river truck.
“That woman can cook!” Teri smiled and rubbed a stomach filled with milk gravy, biscuits, grits, country ham, scrambled eggs, sliced cantaloupe and coffee.
“That’s pretty much an understatement, but come on. Let’s just get this over with.”
Hopping in the truck I drove until we parked the truck in front of what I now referred to as the Buttercup House.
We waded through the buttercups and took another tour of the house. Again we came up empty handed. I was sure the child could speak. He could very easily control the weather and that couldn’t be an easy task. So, speaking shouldn’t be all that difficult an accomplishment for him to achieve. Why didn’t he just tell us what he wanted?
“Okay, so we didn’t find anything in the house, although, I was sure he wanted us to,” Teri begrudgingly admitted. “Maybe we missed something at the graveyard.”
Once more we struck out through the dazzling field of buttercups, but had only taken a few steps when we were stopped dead in our tracks as childish laughter floated from the uppermost part of a 30-feet tall pine tree.
“He’s here, Teri,” I whispered. “Did you hear him laugh?”
“Yes.”
“Lord, please watch over us and keep us safe through whatever happens,” I prayed fervently. “And forgive Teri, for she knows not what she does.”
“Amen!” she said and glared sideways at me.
We turned and nervously glanced toward the tree, but didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. I shifted my gaze upward to take an apprehensive glance at the sky. Whew! Only clear blue sky filled with white, fluffy clouds floated above us. However, I knew how rapidly that could change and, unfortunately, the child was present and accounted for.
“Teri, do not say or do anything to piss him off,” I warned. “You know how temperamental he is.”
“Okay, okay calm down.”
We were carefully placing our feet between bunches of flowers when the little shit threw something and hit me on my head. I gasped and cried, “Ouch! Why does it always have to be me that gets abused? I wish he would terrorize you for a change!”
Again the child giggled, seemingly from the top of the tallest tree.
“He seems to be in a cheerful mood, Eve! Don’t ruin it!”
“Yeah, for now. We’ll see how long that lasts. I just wish he would direct his attention to somebody besides me for once,” I whispered, rubbing my head and peering anxiously into the pine tree. “Maybe he was aiming for you and hit me by mistake.” Lord knows, I was eager to humor the child and not bring his wrath down upon us again. I remembered all too well his penchant for wind, lightening, hail and bugs.
“Maybe, but I think he drew our attention to keep us from leaving. I knew whatever he wanted us to find was here, at the house. I wonder if he’ll come down and let us see him? There’s only one way to find out,” she said as she moved toward his tree. “Seth, can you come down her for a second, hon?” He chose to ignore her. “What did he throw at you anyway? A pinecone?”
“I’m not sure what it was. Come help me look through the flowers and find it.”
On our hands and knees we rooted around the ground under the magnificent buttercups. “I found it, Teri!”
“What is it?”
It was a very old and raggedy handmade book, the pages held together with yarn. “It looks like a journal of some sort.” Then, she glanced up into the tree and asked, “Is this what you wanted us to find?” We heard leaves shaking in the top of the tree.
“Evidently, he got tired of waiting and finally decided to give us a little assistance.”
I opened the book as gently as possible, but the cover still fell off and landed at my feet. “These pages are so old and fragile they’re going to crumble if we try to turn them.” Glancing at the first page I could tell there was writing on it, but without my glasses I couldn’t read a word. Neither could Teri. “Damn, I wish we could read it. Why does a person have to start going blind the instant they turn 40?”
“I know, girl. Not being able to see what is in front of you is a royal pain in the ass. Let’s go home and get your glasses.”
“We’ll be back,” she shouted to the top of the tree as we climbed in the truck.
At home, side by side on the couch with my ugly reading glasses situated on my nose, I took a deep breath and read the first page:
Property of Mary Beth Almond, May 12, 1854.
“It’s Mary Beth Almond’
s diary. Wasn’t she Delbert Almond’s wife? What does it say?” Teri asked. She was so excited she had pulled an emergency cigarette out of her purse, one she had stashed there two years ago when she’d quit smoking, for just such an emergency.
Taking a deep breath, I began to read from the journal.
As I sit here writing this I feel obliged to question whether I ever knew my dear husband at all. The man for whom I left my devoted family in Charleston and came to live in these Godforsaken back woods of North Carolina with. The man I labored and bore four daughters for. He should thank the Good Lord above for his daughters and be eternally grateful that I chose to spend the remainder of my days here, even after I found out about her!”
“I wonder who she’s talking about,” Teri asked in between severe fits of coughing. “Keep reading.”
“For crying out loud put that nasty thing out before you cough up a lung.”
“Would you please just read the journal Miss Surgeon General?” she said puffing away.
May 17, 1854
Today I met her for the first time, the darkie who bore my husbands illegitimate offspring. As much as it pains me to admit, my dear husband has confessed feelings of love for the whore of a slave woman and her bastard child.
“The little boy!” Teri cried. “He is the son of Delbert Almond.”
“I should have guessed that when he placed the buttercup on his grave.” I berated myself for having failed to come to such a logical conclusion. “Plus the fact that when I saw the little boy my first thought was that one of his parents must have been white.”
The next few pages were about the general running of the plantation. I gently flipped through the pages looking for more about Delbert's son.
June 3, 1854
Unfortunately, Yellow Fever is sweeping the land. The darkies are dropping like flies. I fear my Almighty God will strike me dead for even thinking such a thought, however, my most fervent prayer is for my husbands whore, Buttercup, to be the very next to drop.