by Faith Harkey
A pain imp over Nina’s heart, already deep red, darkened to nearly black. Her good hand trembled as she seemed to search the tabletop for a thing she couldn’t find.
“I came here to say sorry, and I reckon maybe I am!” I was surprised to find myself back on my feet, gripping the imp jar. “Not for you, but just for the fact that you’re a human being who got hurt because of my gaum-up. Truth is, if there was any justice in this world, I’d dump this jar of pain imps over your head and you’d keep them all!”
Nina’s eyes flicked toward the jar, which looked empty to her, of course.
“I ain’t crazy!” I told her. “I’m just a little magical! You can’t see them, but what’s in this jar is pieces of pain. Yours plus other people’s. I plucked some off of you before you told off Baron Ramey. That’s why you felt so good. That’s why you got beat up!”
Nina muttered something I couldn’t hear.
“What?” I demanded in a half shout.
“I said I know you’re not crazy,” she replied. “I can see them, too.”
A shock of white passed across my vision. “What?”
“I can see them. In the jar. On people. On you.” She pointed a wobbly finger at my chest. “I just never knew what they was.”
Maybe it was because I didn’t want to be anything like Nina. Or it might have been knowing that we could have had something special to share, if only she’d been less harsh. But whatever it was, her words just froze me up.
“Excuse me.” I headed for the door and slammed it behind me.
Outside, on her bench, Mabel scooted around so she could see me. Her expression of alarm told me just how strained I must have looked.
“Are you— Belle, what happened?”
“Nothing!” I threw my setter down on the bench. “That’s not true. I didn’t mean to lie. Something did happen.”
She waited until I was ready to tell her.
“She can see them. The pain imps. She can see them, but she never knew what they were,” I finally explained.
Mabel put an arm around my shoulders and gave me a squeeze.
“I hollered at her. A lot.”
A wren landed at our feet and picked at a crumb.
“Can I do anything?” Mabel asked. “Did you want me to talk to her?”
I didn’t answer her. Instead, I said, “I got to ask you something.”
“Sure.” Her arm was still around me.
Bracing myself for the worst, I asked, “What you said about me, to Jimmy and Ham and the sheriff. ‘What did you expect?’ What did you mean by that?”
I could see her trying to recall the moment. Her expression cleared and she explained, “I meant that we had pulled you out of your house, gave you no contact with your mother, surrounded you with strangers, and asked you to change your whole life in the blink of an eye. What did we expect? Of course you went to see Nina. Of course you wanted to make things right.”
I thought about that, and I desperately wanted to believe her, but I had to be sure. “So, it weren’t nothing about me being trailer trash and you expecting no better?”
“Oh, God! Belle! Is that what you thought?” Her eyes brimmed with water and her heart imp flared. “Never! Never did I ever think such things about you! From day one, I have admired your strength and your good heart! If only we wouldn’t fail you, I knew you’d do beautiful things with your life.” She gave me a hard squeeze. “You already have.”
I reckon I was getting better at hearing folks say nice things about me, because I didn’t change the subject like I had at Desiree’s. Instead, I leaned my head on her shoulder.
If there was an award for best pretend ma, Mabel would surely win top prize.
After a time, I told her, “It ain’t finished. I still have to go back in.”
* * *
—
I was a little more businesslike this time.
“So, what I got here, Nina, are the pain imps I stole while you were sleeping.” I softly slapped the jar. “There were a lot of them, but you can have every one back, right here, right now. It’s up to you. Either way, I vow to never pluck an imp from you, without your permission, again.”
She nodded to let me know she understood.
“You just say the word,” I told her.
She took the jar and gave it a little shake. The imps wobbled.
“Curious, how these little things made me so…well, made me what I was.”
I confess, she did seem like a different person.
Even so, what she said surprised me. “I want to earn you back, Hush. Belle! I know I don’t deserve you. And it’s crazy, because you’re right. I’ve never been anything like a mother to you, so why would I want to start now? But something in me—like a heart urge, if that makes any sense—it says I got to try.”
Her hands were fists as she said that.
“So, no, I don’t think I can take those pain imps back. Because, with them on me, I’m— You’re right, I’m despisable.” She looked at me full-on. “I’d even ask you to pluck these ones off me—I can’t see them, but you can—if not for the fact that I’m afraid to change anything! Afraid I’ll go back to what I was!”
She dropped her chin to her chest and breathed a time or few.
“I accept your apology,” she said once she’d picked up her head. “And I’d even like to make one of my own, except I know it’d be a drop in a big old sea. I reckon I’m going to have to spend the rest of my life making things up to you.”
She had no right to the hope that might’ve flickered in my eyes, so I looked down at my shoes.
“I am so sorry!” Her voice cracked. “And I do so want you back. I know I can’t make you come, though. Can’t make you give me another chance. But I do want you to know, there’s room for you here, and Brandy says we can stay as long as we need to. We’ll never live in that motor home again! And, I swear, we’ll always have toilet paper. Always!” She touched my arm ever so lightly. “Please at least think about it.”
I moved so she couldn’t reach my arm. Not out of spite, but because it hurt to feel her affection.
“Uh.” I cleared my throat. “Thank you for, uh, for your offer. And your apology. I don’t think I can give you an answer right now.”
“Sure. Of course not,” she said.
“I’ll just take my jar and go.”
“That’s fine. Thanks for stopping by.” She meant it. She was glad I’d come.
* * *
—
By the time I’d finished crying on Mabel’s shoulder, her shirt was soaked through.
The next batch of amends was both easier and harder. Back when I’d got caught thieving at Dress Up, I’d made that whole list of all the things I ever stole. All I had to do was go ask JoBeth for it, and there was my list of wrongs right before me. Problem was, it was a fairly long list, years and years of borrowing. Even with my yoga earnings, I didn’t have anywhere near the amount of money it would take to pay it all back.
I recalled Jimmy saying that a body could repay a debt by working it off. That sounded more hopeful to me. I mean, sure, there were only twenty-four hours in a day, and a person could only work off so much wrongdoing in that amount of time. But I was youngish, with lots of fit years ahead of me. Paying folks back with sweat equity, as Mabel might call it, seemed like a fairly good choice.
Desiree was right on top of things, typing my list of thievery into her little computer.
“See?” She pointed to her tablet. “When it’s all laid out, it really isn’t that much.”
“Compared to who?” I laughed. “Jesse James? And I couldn’t help noticing your own list of wrongdoings is a whopping three items long.”
“Well, yeah,” she agreed. “But they’re dense! Really, really bad!”
“Like what? Read me one of them bad t
hings you done.”
She tapped the screen, flinging pages all around. “Here it is. Okay. I cheated on a test. See? Cheating is so wrong! Now you, in your case, a person could argue you might have been stealing to live. But nobody has to cheat. It’s just wrong-wrong-wrong, no matter which way you cut it.”
“Let me see that.” I snatched up the tablet and read aloud, “ ‘I accidentally looked up and saw that the teacher forgot to erase one of the answers from the board. I wrote the answer on my test sheet, even though I knew it was cheating.’ Are you joshing me?”
“What? No!”
“Tell me something,” I said, handing the tablet back.
“Okay.”
“Did you know the right answer to the question, even without seeing it on the board?”
She looked off to the side. “Ye-ah.”
I barked a laugh. “And this is the worst you got, huh?”
She blushed. “I have been very sheltered.”
“Oh, Desiree. We have to dirty up them hands of yours! Just a little! Just so you can say you’ve lived!”
She leapt off her chair. “I would love that! Martin raises hell all the time, but I can’t ever think of anything even remotely rascally!”
“I’ll study on it,” I promised. “See if we can’t come up with something just a mite shady for you to do.”
“Great! Could you just make sure it’s after my chores are done?”
* * *
—
I figured it made the most sense to begin with the biggest borrow debt, then work my way down to the littler things. That meant starting with Beezer’s.
“Miz Peggy,” I began. “I need to talk to you about something.”
We were standing on either side of the cash register while she counted the cash in her drawer. Considering my past, that there’s what you call trust.
“Yeah? Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen—”
“I’ll wait till you’re done.”
She finished up the counting and closed the drawer. “What is it, sugar?”
I filled my lungs and spilled it out. “I am embarrassed to call your attention to it, but the truth is, over the years, I have stolen a great many things from your store. I would like to make amends for all that thieving by paying you back in sweat equity.”
Then I had to explain what sweat equity meant.
“Oh, Hush.” She shook her head. “Please, don’t worry about it. I know you’ve been working hard to turn over a new leaf. Let’s call it water under the bridge. I mean, how much could you possibly owe me?”
Thanks to Desiree’s database, I had the number handy. “One thousand seven hundred sixty-two dollars. Give or take.”
Her jaw dropped.
“As—as I said, I’d be glad to work off the debt! I have to give Mabel Holt four hours a day, then my yoga classes, but that leaves a couple hours every day before you close.” I glanced around. “There’s got to be tons of things that need doing! Those shelves are awful dusty, for instance. And that soap display, so close to the door the way it is, you’re practically asking for folks to steal from you.”
She was still collecting herself, but she did manage to say, “I am, am I?”
“Yes, ma’am. Actually, there’s a heap of things I could tell you about thief-proofing this place.” I pointed to the Fine Gifts case. “I mean, you can’t tell me those earbobs ain’t been walking out of here right and left. And it’s not me, I swear! I only took the one set.”
She walked over to the earbobs and gave them a quick count. “I do seem to be missing a few pair. And those kids from Dietz were in here twice last week….”
“See what I mean?” I asked.
“I think I do,” Peggy replied. “Hush, I think I would like to have you work off some of your debt.”
I let out a whoosh of relief. “Thank you. Making up for this stuff really does lift a weight off a person. So, where do you want me to start? Dusting those shelves?”
“No, nothing like that.” She walked away and came back with two folding chairs. “Sit down, sugar. I’m hiring you as my anti-theft consultant.”
* * *
—
After only a week of work, Peggy felt I’d more than repaid her, considering the money she’d save with her new thief-foiling strategies. Word got around, too, and three other stores I’d stolen from wanted me to consult for them. It wasn’t long before the whole Sass retail district was locked down tighter than your skinny sister’s underpants.
The amends list was emptying out very nicely, and I was getting down to the petty steals, the things I took from lone people instead of stores. Lots of these things were pickpockety stuff, small, but probably more meaningful to a person than a can of tuna was to Mister Hopps down at Sass Foods.
I was thinking of one particular item, a broken watch I once pinched from a man’s pocket. It was the round kind with a chain, and inside it, it said “From one old dingo to another, yuk-yuk-yuk!” Now, I hadn’t known who the man was then, but having spent more time in town, getting to know folks, I was fairly sure the old dingo was named Mister Barker. And from the silliness of the engraved words, I had a good feeling that Mister Barker would prefer to have the watch back, instead of some cold lump of dollars, or me mowing his lawn for a month.
Problem was, the watch—along with a number of other things like it—was back in ’Bagoville, in one of my stashes.
But was it a problem? After all, it wasn’t like Nina was staying at the RV anymore, so I wasn’t prohibited from going on that account. And it was my own house. Besides, I was supposed to be able to go where I pleased, as long as I didn’t do it alone. Now that I thought on it, there was no good reason why I shouldn’t go clear out my stashes and return every single borrow to its proper owner. Plus—and I couldn’t help smiling at the notion—here was a great chance to give Desiree her little sashay on the wild side. I could teach her how to pick the RV lock! And since it was my motor home, and I was giving her permission, she wouldn’t have really done anything wrong at all.
* * *
—
I planned the ’Bagoville run for early the next morning, so it didn’t conflict with Desiree’s chores or one of my umpteen jobs. I meant to tell Mabel and Jimmy all about it that night, even down to the bit of lock-picking tomfoolery, but we got caught up in some sober talk about Nina’s new place and what might happen when the summer was over. Things turned so serious and upsetting, I forgot to mention my stash grab.
* * *
—
That morning, the sunlight shone nearly white, so the world even looked hot.
Desiree and I ate breakfast on the porch while Mabel fiddled with a new recipe she was thinking of serving for Travis and Tom’s homecoming. I tried not to cogitate much on that, as it meant the end of summer was coming up fast.
“If I lived at Brandy’s Lodge,” I asked Desiree, “would you visit me?”
Mouth full of raisin toast, she nodded her reply. She swallowed and added, “And it’s on my way to school. We could walk together.”
For the first time, it struck me. School! With a whole town’s eyes upon me, there’d be no way to shirk my education now!
“I reckon we could,” I agreed. “But I don’t think I’d be in your class, having missed two years and all.” The notion of sitting in a room filled with younger kids pinked me up with shame.
“Hmm,” Desiree mused. “We’ve got a little while before school starts. I wonder if I could help you catch up.”
I couldn’t help feeling that wasn’t too likely.
* * *
—
Though I had no particular need of it, I left Mabel’s place with my imp jar under my arm. I guess I’d become accustomed to having it with me. Desiree chatter-peeped like a happy bird as we walked, all aflutter about her upcoming “hoodlumism,” a
s she was calling it.
“Martin will be so jealous! He can’t pick a lock!”
I couldn’t help admiring the glint of sweet mischief in her eye.
“I know because I found him swearing at Dad’s file cabinet, trying to jam his driver’s license into one of the drawer gaps.”
“What was he looking for?” I asked.
“His music. Dad confiscates it when Martin’s on restriction.”
We rounded a corner and turned onto the dirt road that ran by ’Bagoville. In the glaring sun—especially now that I’d become accustomed to the niceties of town—even the trees looked tired and poor.
“You reckon you really want to see this?” I asked before we got too close.
“I’ve seen ’Bagoville before, Hush!”
“Yeah, but you ain’t seen it knowing I lived there.”
She stepped in front of me, walking backward, and poked my shoulder with each word: “I. Like. You. No. Matter. What!”
“All right,” I chuckled. “I hear ya.”
With Nina gone, the old place looked more forlorn than ever. A full-on mosquito farm was growing in the puddle that had collected in Nina’s ash can. The black-water stench carried a fair piece farther.
Things were too quiet.
All at once, I wanted to quick-finish the job and get us back to Mabel’s.
“All right, Mizzy Lockpick Lady, let’s get it done!” I took Desiree by the shoulders and set her before the door lock.
It didn’t take long. The flash of an unbent paper clip, the wiggle of a tumbler, and we were in.
“I did it!” Desiree spun around and grabbed me. “I feel so bad! In a good way!”
I enjoyed her smile for the breadth of a gnat’s hair, then flung open the door and led her inside.
“I won’t be but a minute.” I set down the imp jar and dumped out a box of junk.