Rosemary said, “I’m fairly used to getting my way too. Maybe Cloda’s in for a surprise.”
Ardelia turned sideways and examined Rosemary more closely. “You’re too pretty for your own good, ain’t you? Your fella there, he says you grew up with brothers and sisters.”
Rosemary gave a quick summary of Tory and Eleanor, both always enviably older and wiser than herself.
“Was they mean to you? Bully and boss you around?”
Should she lie and say yes? Try to form a connection that way? It seemed like a bad idea; Ardelia was quite sharp. “No, ma’am. The worst they ever did was just exclude me from things I was too young for, and that didn’t happen often. I had a great family. They spoiled me. They doted on me. I was the baby and treated like something special almost every day. I’m not trying to boast about it, it’s just that I got very lucky.”
“Tell me something they did for you. What did they do?”
Rosemary thought about it. As she did so she felt Andrew come close, to listen. He seldom spoke about his family. He had been a sadly neglected child, raised mostly by his oldest sister in an impoverished household. When Rosemary spoke of her own wealthy, happy family, he reacted as if she was telling some fantastic fairy tale. But Andrew always wanted to hear about parents who nurtured their children with adoration, and Ardelia seemed to be speaking of siblings alone.
Rosemary began, thoughtfully, reaching way back to long summer afternoons in their Michigan lake-house’s clean, airy attic space, whitewashed floorboards and sunlit walls. “They would put on plays for me. I was a morbid little beast and they’d act out Edgar Allen Poe stories and make me scream, but I just loved it. Have you ever read them? Eleanor would pretend to wall Tory up behind bricks, or Tory would make heartbeat noises with his drum set while Eleanor mimed tearing up floorboards, and I’m telling you, Eleanor is a great actress, as long as her motivation is to make her baby sister shriek. Daddy would sometimes get irritated with them for scaring me - but I wasn’t scared in a bad way. Mom didn’t mind, you know, she was a fan of scary stories herself, and she’d sometimes watch the plays and scream with me.”
Ardelia cocked her head. “They’d put on a show for you, whenever you asked?”
“Actually, I don’t remember having to ask. I think they just liked doing that for me.” Rosemary caught her own words and thought about them, wondering.
Her audience thought she was reminiscing. Ardelia surmised, “Then you was a lucky girl just like you said. I don’t know what that feels like, but Miss Fancy Cloda would tell me to stop feeling sorry for myself, wouldn’t she?” Abruptly she wrapped her bony arms around herself and gave a hard shake. “I’m cold to the bone. Ain’t it summertime? I feel like winter’s just on the doorstep.”
She trudged away from the door, down her short hallway and into her tiny little bathroom, the door closing behind her with a defeated snick of the latch. After a moment they heard the water running in the bathtub and a faint cloud of steam seeped from under the bathroom door.
Rosemary untangled herself from her thoughts to find Andrew standing close behind her. When she turned to face him, they were near enough to embrace. He reached around her to close the front door. Ardelia wasn’t cold for no reason. The wind from the storm carried a heartless chill in it.
“I was just wondering if my poor brother and sister were my victims,” Rosemary said with a faint laugh. “Before I really understood what it meant to have this sort of telepathy, maybe I wished myself a couple of minions to act out stories for me. They would rather have been on the beach with their friends. Instead? Irresistible compulsion to perform for their ghoulish little sister. I hope I didn’t do that to them.”
Andrew made no attempts to deny that possibility, but he spoke kindly, “Even if you did, they remember it as a fun time, and they wouldn’t resent you for it. How can you hold yourself responsible for something you did when you were too young to know better?”
“Well I don’t know,” countered Rosemary. “Everybody else seems to do it.”
He didn’t rise to the bait of her words. There was something else on his mind. He said, “It was a lie.” At her questioning look, he said, “About ignoring you, when we’re in close quarters and half undressed. You’re standing there in six layers of flannel and I can’t ignore you. I’ve never been able to.”
“I was lying too.”
He stood so close now, possessively close, with his lips brushing against her forehead, over her neatly cropped hair, and one hand making a pass over her thoroughly covered shoulder, down her thoroughly covered arm, that she could feel as plainly as a naked touch. His voice against her hair: “I’ve always wanted you. That’s the obvious part. Mainly that’s why you made me so angry for so long. When you walked into my store and threw your book and all your money at me, I would have taken you upstairs that very day, if you’d have offered.”
Regret swamped her. “Well sonofabitch, I should have offered. I wanted to, myself.”
“I’ve just learned to live with it. I’ve just learned how it feels to be in this constant, pathetic state of unrequited lust. I’m obsessed with you. That book of yours, I don’t keep it under my pillow because I miss you, Romy, it’s nothing quite that romantic or dignified.”
“Andy, why—” she tried to say, but his mouth was on hers and before she could think straight they thumped against the dingy wall of Ardelia’s front hall, a kiss so hot it was senseless, graceless, as if it burned them both and seared them together. The helplessness of the moment rocked her: he couldn’t try to read her thoughts, and she needn’t worry about pushing her own wishes into him. They were in a spell-protected space where they had no power but unencumbered desire, and one very strict hostess less than fifteen feet away, separated only by a thin door and hot bathwater.
Andrew’s arms lifted her against him as she clutched his shoulders, he turned them and with his back against the wall he slid to the floor, Rosemary on his lap barely able to resist the urge to grind against him like a pole dancer. If he thought his own desire was out of control, he had yet to understand the extent of hers. Men might focus on the visual, visceral aspects of sex all day long; but women think it through. She’d already devised a dozen plans on how to lock him up in a sex dungeon. Now she needed only to procure a sex dungeon.
“What on earth is so funny,” he demanded of her, biting her throat with a fair amount of pressure.
“I’m a naturally happy person,” she dodged. “Here, can we - oh, let me.” She guided his hand inside her robe, inside her skewed pajama top, drawing a sharp intake of breath when his palm landed on her bare breast. She wasn’t exactly a Princess Vampessa gifted with buxomness, but she was round and firm and deeply sensitive there, and the unexpected pleasure of having his hand on her made her curse softly and smack the wall behind them with her free hand, needing to release some kind of tension.
“Ooookay,” said Andrew shakily. “Okay. Now. We should stop now.”
“You started it,” she accused in distress. His fingers were still on her naked skin though he had not dared to move or explore.
With frustration he exhaled. “I know. I know that. It’s very hard.”
She refrained from making a joke about the clear evidence in favor of that remark. By her calculations, they had about ten minutes before Ardelia was out of the bathroom. She felt that a lot could be accomplished in ten minutes.
“Not here, Romy, not on the floor in this awful place.”
“Well you need to start kissing me in better places, then, because this is tough for me.” She kissed him again, undulating snakelike so that his hand brushed over her sensitive skin whether he meant to or not, and the groan it elicited from him made her want to wring his neck for his damned sense of honor and propriety. He wanted to do this right, he wanted to be a noble suitor, he wanted them both to get the good relationship they’d never had before, but she was going to lose her mind.
Silly spoiled girl. Hadn’t she been losing he
r mind over him already?
When Ardelia emerged from her bath a few minutes later, just like Rosemary, she was bundled into layers of flannel to ward off the chill. She found the pair of them sitting in her front room, decently apart: Andrew on the couch, Rosemary on her chair, both looking out the window into the storm. The endless tempest was calmer now than it had been in hours.
Ardelia made as if to leave them, then hesitated. “It’s time for bed. You come along now, little miss. I shouldn’t have the pair of you out here with no chaperone. This is a Christian home.”
Chapter Nine
Othernaturals Season 6, Episode 5
Eyeteeth Mountain, Missouri; June 2015
In the flooding town of Gully, a victim to new streams of water that rushed off the mountainside into their sewers, the Othernaturals, sans Rosemary and Andrew, were seated around a heavy kitchen table in the lobby of their motel, finishing a breakfast that was simple but enormous. Their host, the middle-aged man who ran the motel, was the rotund and flirtatious Joey Baker, who admitted to being a distant relation to the Eyeteeth Mountain Bakers. Joey Baker had been most gracious about cooking for them, once he’d seen Kaye Whittington and Sally Friend, both of whom he was obviously trying to impress. He brought them platter after platter of food that reminded Sally of cookouts she’d seen on television, things cowboys ate around campfires. Bacon, biscuits, strong coffee. He brought helping after helping of bacon in a huge skillet, big around as a bike wheel, a thing of black iron so heavy that Sally could not lift it.
About the spread, Stefan had said, “I’m flashing back to Scout camp breakfasts. Every spring and fall Brentley and I would be sent off to spend a weekend in the forest with our troops, and breakfast was always cookout style. We had a couple old guys who could cook anything over a fire.”
“I hope it’s all right,” Joey Baker had told them. He said pointedly to the women, “I’m not used to cooking for other people as I’m a bachelor.”
“We’ve eaten nothing but sandwiches out of a cooler for the past 48 hours,” said Greg. He spoke as he chewed. “This is heaven.”
Judge had eyed the bacon a bit wistfully but then went on with his own breakfast – oatmeal – without complaint. Mr. Joey Baker was a little perplexed at what to do with vegan Judge, until Judge produced the instant-oatmeal packets from his own backpack and said, “Just some hot water, and I’m good to go.”
Sally approached Greg as soon as she thought he’d eaten enough bacon to be cheerful. “I want to direct the segment with the sheriff. I’ll do the camera work and Judge can conduct the interview.”
Judge concurred at once. “That’s a great idea. I am incredibly charming.”
“Then it’s settled,” said Sally. “I’ll direct the segment. Right?” She looked hopefully at Greg, who did not look as pleased as she’d like, and she bristled a little. “Don’t you think I can do it all right?”
“Well of course, Sal. I’m just wondering if you’d have better luck conducting the interview.”
Judge reacted fast. “Better than me? Why would she do better than me?”
“Why wouldn’t I do better than you?” Sally shot back.
“That’s not what I meant,” said Judge. “Any yahoo can interview somebody; I want to know why Greg seems to think you’re better at it than me.” This was typical – Judge was one of Sally’s best friends but he could also be a competitive butthead.
“I take it that I’m the yahoo?” Sally asked him sharply. “At least I’m not a diva.”
“I’m a diva? I’m the humblest person I know.” He looked around at everyone, astonished at their skeptical expressions. “Half the time on this show I’m behind a camera – and don’t tell me it’s just because you like to get a low angle viewpoint.”
“What are you arguing about, Judge?” asked a merry Stefan. “You’re getting your way; you get to do this interview.”
“But Greg said Sally was better at it and I want to know why.”
Stefan teased, “Are you being a sexist pig, or are you just being a diva?”
“I’m a first-class studmuffin, not a diva. You people and your bacon and your envy. You’re lucky I’m so even-tempered.”
Kaye interrupted them all, her low-pitched voice quite a difference from the rising sounds of whining. “As entertaining as this is, I think Greg means that you, Judge, are still recovering from your injuries and you’re on some medications that make you a little tired. Isn’t that right, Greg?”
Greg had been watching the discussion with amusement and seemed reluctant to relent. “That’s what I meant. I was only thinking Sally might be livelier on camera.”
“You could have just said so,” Judge groused. “Of course you’re not a yahoo, Sally. I am an actor, Gregory, and I will rise to the occasion.”
“Here,” said Sally, handing her last slab of bacon to Judge as a peace offering. “Take this to Vladimir from his Aunt Sally.”
“Oh, a treat!” Distracted by the prospect of feeding his cat, Judge slipped away from the table and out the front door.
“Come, everyone up,” said Kaye in her mother-tone. “We’re going to help Mr. Baker do the dishes. Don’t give me that look; we have plenty of time.”
“I need to call Rosemary,” said Greg with an officious tone.
“You need to get into that kitchen,” replied Kaye, “and roll up your sleeves, Hercules.”
*****
In Slope on Tuesday morning, the storm seemed to come alive with destruction on its mind. Rosemary woke thinking at first that she was drowning. She had a bad moment of disorientation, scrabbling at her face, at some imaginary coating there that smothered her. Soon she realized that she was holding her own breath out of some kind of fear – fear of what? And then a clap of thunder sounded loudly enough to hurt her eardrums; she shrieked and dove down into her pillow, hands over her head. This was primal and deep, this response, some fear pulled out of an ancestor who had huddled under meager shelter in the middle of a typhoon.
Then she laughed outright at herself: she was under meager shelter in the middle of a typhoon – or near enough. Not much primitive about it.
From the sound of it, Eyeteeth Mountain was smashing to bits under an onslaught of weather. If the only thing preventing Rosemary from perishing was Miss Ardelia’s dilapidated house, then Rosemary might have been better off huddling with that ancestor under a pile of twigs.
Fingers in her ears, she sat up in the faint light, unable to tell what time it was – it felt like morning but was dark as sin outside except for the snaps and flashes of lightning. The rushing of water made her think a river had punched through the house to carry on its course. She was alone in Ardelia’s small and crowded room, the door closed.
After quickly dressing herself Rosemary went to the kitchen where she found Ardelia, visible only by outline in darkness.
“Everything okay?” Rosemary asked.
“Power’s gone,” said Ardelia.
“Oh Ardelia, you’re soaking wet!”
“Had to go tend to my chickies. They’re scared senseless. Haven’t laid in three days.”
“Can I get you a towel? Anything?”
“Stop your fussing. I’d as soon have a cup of coffee but ain’t no power on.”
“Sit tight. I’ll be back in just a second with something even better.” Rosemary went to the front porch where Stefan had placed the last of the drinks in the cooler last night. All the ice was gone of course, but the water was still fairly cool. Rosemary withdrew the last bottles of mocha coffee drinks. Three bottles, one for each of them. Standing, she was blasted in the face by a gust of wind that carried with it a hefty splash of the rain. Rosemary gasped, choked half in laughter and half in shock, then sluiced the water off her face with her sleeve. Hurrying back inside just as another violent clap of thunder shook the house to its foundation, she collided with Andrew in the hallway.
“Careful, careful,” he said, righting her with gentle hands. “We don’t want that
coffee to get hurt. Good morning.”
“Good morning.”
“There’s an etiquette to this,” said Andrew. “Let’s see if I get it right.” He bent his head to hers and kissed her temple, firmly, then tilted his head and lightly kissed her lips.
She lost track of her thoughts, staring up at him. He appeared a little sleep-deprived, her Andrew, with faint blue circles under his eyes. She hoped that sweaty skin-filled dreams had tormented him through the night.
He asked, “What would you accept in trade for one of those coffees?”
“A kiss in the morning is easily worth a coffee.” She handed a bottle to him. “The power’s out. Come to the kitchen with me.”
They sat at the table with Ardelia. Rosemary poured a coffee into the woman’s heavy old ceramic mug. “This is cold coffee,” Rosemary explained.
“Sure it’s cold; power’s out.”
“Ah, but this coffee is meant to be cold. It has a lot of cream and sugar and chocolate. More like a milkshake.”
Ardelia tried it, wrinkled up her face. “Cold coffee – pah.” Despite her dismissal, she drained about half her mug and then said, “Coffee’s a sin as bad as smoking, but seems I can only ever repent it at night.”
The old woman started when Rosemary and Andrew simultaneously dissolved into laughter, Andrew toasting her with an “Amen,” and Rosemary giving Ardelia’s papery hand a squeeze. Living as much alone as she did, maybe Ardelia was unaccustomed to making jokes or having them laughed at.
“I can’t believe this weather,” Rosemary said after her giggles had died down. “Barely six a.m., but who could sleep with all the noise? Does this happen every year?”
“I ain’t never seen the like,” said Ardelia. “We has storms every year but nothing like this, to carry on fer so long, and to be this close.”
Andrew said, “Close is an excellent word for it. I feel like I could go outside and touch the sky.”
Witches Page 18