The Owl & Moon Cafe: A Novel (No Series) (24 page)

“First chance I get I’m going to tell.”

“Go ahead. I never said I did it.”

“You asked about my backpack. That proves—”

“Exactly nothing,” Lindsay said. “Move over. I want to get out of here.”

Taylor focused her hate ray on Sally. “I hate you, Sally. I can’t believe I was ever stupid enough to think we were friends. This party sucks and so do you.” Taylor turned to stomp off toward her friends, who were all dressed like glam queens.

Sally pulled Taylor back by the strap of her purse and the toy dog teetered precariously. “Right down there past the fields is Bad Girl Creek,” Sally said. “Our old ranch foreman’s daughter drowned in it when she was little. She haunts the place. I double-dog-dare you to go down there and put your hand in the water, Taylor.”

“Please,” Taylor said. “Like there’s such a thing as ghosts.”

Sally pointed toward the greenhouses, where a flickering light moved around the rows of plants. “Then what do you call that?”

Taylor squinted. “Maybe your mom didn’t have enough money to pay the light bill.”

“I triple-dog-dare you.”

“Don’t talk to her anymore,” Lindsay said. “Let’s go help Savannah bob for apples.”

Sally shook her head no, pulled her cape higher—she was the headless horseman—and stalked off toward the stables, where the entrance to the haunted house was attracting a line of giggling girls. “When can we go in?” they asked.

“When it’s time,” Sally said, disappearing into the barn.

“Lindsay?” Sally’s mother asked from her wheelchair, which she’d decorated with cellophane to look like Professor Xavier’s in
X-Men,
the movie. “Don’t you want something to eat?”

“No, thanks,” Lindsay said. “I’m not really hungry.”

Mrs. DeThomas-Callahan rolled forward. “I’ve noticed that you don’t eat much. Sally’s aunt Nance used to be like that. Are you afraid you’ll gain weight? You shouldn’t be. Girls your age burn calories right and left.”

“I just don’t like eating,” Lindsay said.

“Not even hamburgers?”

Lindsay shuddered. “Especially hamburgers.”

“Why’s that?”

“The rain forest depletion due to grazing cattle, fat clogging arteries, and I like cows.”

“What do you like to eat?”

No one had ever really asked her to make a list. “Salad, artichokes, broccoli, pasta, nuts and fruit, especially pears. I like whole-grain crackers and sun-dried tomatoes and olives with the pits still in them.”

“Come on along with me into the kitchen,” Mrs. DeThomas-Callahan said. “Let’s find you something in the fridge.”

“What have we here?” Fergus said, sliding into bed, effectively pushing Mariah toward the wall with the porthole, and leaving no escape route. “Not a trick, I hope.” He peeked under the sheets. “No, that’s definitely a treat.”

Mariah felt a little woozy from the whiskey, the lack of headroom, and the nerves jangling through her like static electricity. She let herself be kissed, felt all her muscles surrender and turn limp. She even attempted kissing back, taking herself back over a decade and then some, aiming for simply feeling good and praying not to worry about it, but the memories pressed on her all the same. She opened her eyes and watched this man tear off his clothes, fight with them, really, until he was sitting there in his briefs, his hair a mess, and out of breath—all because of her. She grinned, but tears lurked right behind her smile, and she prayed they did not show.

“What?” he said. “Do I look a fright?”

“No,” she said. “You look like a man in a hurry. Come over here.”

Lying alongside him, she ran her hands across skin formerly covered with clothing, felt each individual hair push forth from its root. He did the same to her. She got the plain old-fashioned shivers, and closed her eyes, hoping to prolong the sensation. Fergus pulled her bra strap aside and Mariah felt the chill of air on her breast. She wasn’t going to think about whether they were big enough or perky enough. She lay back against the pillow, letting Fergus explore. He cradled her small breast in his hand, kissed it, and then bumped his head on the low ceiling. “Ouch,” he said. “That smarted.”

She snickered.

“Find that amusing, do you?” he said, and began to tickle her. She laughed and tried to scoot away, and when Theodora barked, he stopped. “Theo, fear not. You’ll always be my true love. You’ve nothing to fear from this wench in my bed. ’Tis purely carnal love I have for her. Ours is chaste and above all that fleshy nonsense.”

Mariah gave him a little slap. “That cuts both ways, buddy,” she said, climbing over so she was on the side away from the wall. She kissed his chest, raked her fingers down his skin, and slid her hands down to the underwear elastic. Fergus drew in a breath. “What?” she said. “Don’t tell me you’re the one having second thoughts, because that will break my heart. I swear, I’m serious.”

He stilled her hand with his own. “God, no. It’s just, well, wouldn’t all this…first time business…be easier in the dark?”

She looked into his eyes, trying to ferret out what was behind this attack of shyness. “It is dark. Outside anyway.” She reached up and turned off the light near the bed, so that there was only the glimmer of the night-light in the boat’s head. “Is that better?”

“Somewhat,” he said, but she could tell they were going to have to start all over to get back to where they were.

“Oh, my God. You’re shy. Listen, Fergus. I haven’t had sex in nearly thirteen years. I don’t even remember what a penis looks like. If you’re worried about performance, don’t be, because I won’t know the difference. Since my grandmother has already branded me a hussy, we’re not in any hurry. Lindsay’s got a sleepover. I can stay all night.”

He popped the latch of the porthole. Cool air and the sound of lapping water seeped in. “Well, I’ve told you I was married.”

“And that you were too young, it was the wrong woman, and that you’re gun-shy when it comes to marriage. It’s okay. I’m not expecting anything else.”

He turned onto his back and touched her cheek. “That’s the rub of it, Mariah. I am. Us making love. I expect it will be wonderful, how could it not, but I don’t know how to say this. I’m afraid I’ll expect you to be somehow more mine than before.”

She thought it over, then kissed him five or six times. “Every time I think you’ve said the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me, you say something to top it.”

She tucked her thumb back into the elastic of his briefs.

He slid the other bra strap down her shoulder.

The skin there, where his leg met the fold of skin, was ridiculously soft.

His mouth on her neck was waking up nerves she’d forgotten existed.

She felt him stirring, and began to remember what a penis looked like.

Then, everything stopped. “Mariah?”

“Yes?”

“I have a large family. A few of them are a bit strange.”

Determined not to lose her stride, she pulled at his underwear and waited for him to awkwardly wriggle out of them before answering. “How could yours be any worse than mine?”

“Well, my brother, for one.”

“Do we really need to talk about this right now?”

“I suppose not.”

“Then we’ll talk—” she began, and then Fergus pressed his body against hers and she swore her panties melted. They were simply there one minute and not there the next. “Later,” she managed to say, though words seemed half-baked things, unable to communicate. She looked into his eyes, startled by the deep blue of his iris. Whenever one of them made a noise, Theo whined. Fergus shushed her, but Mariah laughed, and said, “She has a right to her opinion.” Deep inside her it felt as if someone had blown on embers that had been covered for years in ash. Blown sweet and steadily, and here came this small blaze. She had missed this. No, she had forgotten this. And in remembering this, she forgot to worry about Allegra’s not eating, Gammy’s hellfire and brimstone, and whether Lindsay could handle a party without her mother’s fretting. In fact, she was so grateful to remember the simple ways bodies could fit together that she wrapped her legs around him as if she would never let him go.

Most of the snacks were gone by the time the lights went down. Lindsay recognized Sally’s uncle James, dressed up like Bigfoot, as the one operating the sound effects. It was time for the Haunted House to open, and here came Sally riding on Soul Man, her cape flying out behind her, the thudding of horse hooves hitting the dirt. She had her cape up on top of her head, and held a pumpkin under one arm. Saying nothing, she used her free arm to gesture to the barn.

Her uncle James’s voice rang out. “The Haunted House is now open…for those brave enough to dare.”

Sally rode off in the direction of the creek, and Lindsay wondered again if the prank she hinted at would end badly. “I’ll go first,” she said, figuring maybe she could get there first and defuse the bomb.

Lindsay didn’t see the owls that lived in the rafters. All this noise would interrupt their hunting. She pushed aside a curtain and heard a squeak. Then something brushed her foot, and she jumped out of the way.

“Watch out for rats,” Uncle James intoned.

Next a spider jumped out of the dark, trailing against Lindsay’s face. She brushed it away, and saw on a table three bowls labeled “eyes of newt,” “human brains,” and simply “guts.” Behind them dry ice emitted smoke. Lindsay heard the screams of other girls as they fell for the rat trick, too.

“Will you dare to touch the guts?” Uncle James said breathlessly, “or will you take the easy way out?”

“I’m not afraid,” Lindsay said, and plunged her hands into what felt like Jell-O. The brains were spaghetti, and the eyes of newt felt like gumdrops, so maybe Sally had changed her mind, and undone the prank. Lindsay wiped her hands on the towel offered by a skeleton wearing a pirate hat. Only a little more to the haunted stuff and she’d be back outside at the party. She forged ahead, determined to check out every item in order to keep Sally from getting in trouble. The witch on a broomstick cackled. The sound of chains clanking was punctuated by a horrible laugh that turned to a cough and then a groan.

“Can you help me find my brain?” Sally said, standing at the barn exit, holding a pumpkin in her arms. “Reach into the pumpkin for me. I know it’s there somewhere. Find it and you’ll win a treat.”

But when Lindsay tried to reach in, Sally turned away. “Out of the barn—I mean house—before I take your brain for my own!”

So the prank had to be in the pumpkin. Lindsay figured it was pumpkin guts, which did feel gross, but you could always wash that off. She exited the barn and waited for everyone else to come out. Belva Satterly came after her. She was dressed like a nurse, and Lindsay felt sorry for her. Her hand was covered in the spaghetti. Lindsay handed her the towel that hung over the corral railing. “Here, Belva.”

Belva took the towel and wiped her hand thoroughly. “That wasn’t very scary.”

“I agree,” Lindsay said. “But it might be for younger kids.”

“How’s your science project going? The Thanksgiving deadline is only twenty-seven days and thirteen hours away.”

“We have more research to do. Our paper’s not very good.”

“With Sally as your partner you’ll win first place,” Belva said.

“I don’t know,” Lindsay said, as three more girls screeched and reached for the towel. “There’s lots of competition. What’s yours about?”

Belva inched backward until she felt the corral rail against her back. “Fast food and nutrition.”

Lindsay felt sorry for her. What was new or pertinent about fast food when Belva couldn’t eat it anyway? Wheat being in practically everything.

Then they heard a scream that was above and beyond pumpkin guts. “Out of my way,” they heard Taylor Foster yell. “Sally DeThomas, you are dead meat!”

Taylor emerged from behind the barn with her hand covered in brown goo, which Lindsay worried was probably dog poop. Taylor was gagging in between yelling, and Sally’s aunt came running. “Whatever is the matter?” she said. “Did you fall down and hurt yourself?”

“No, your bitch of a niece made me stick my hand in dog shit!”

Sally’s aunt lifted the gooey hand and sniffed. “Sugar, that’s peanut butter! It’ll wash right off. Come on, we’ll get you cleaned up. You look adorable in that dress. Are y’all supposed to be Barbie?”