The Secret Ingredient of Wishes (26 page)

 

26

The kitchen was empty when Rachel went down to start a pot of coffee before Mary Beth hit the road. A pie was already baking in the oven, and the scent of blueberries and vanilla made her stomach growl. A bowl of fluffy white cream sat on the counter covered in plastic wrap next to another bowl containing plump, dark blueberries.

The first hint of sunrise was just visible through the trees outside as Rachel scooped coffee grounds into the filter. The yard was still, no breeze shaking the leaves or birds pecking at the fruit. When something thudded on the back porch, she almost poured the water on the floor instead of into the coffeemaker. She whipped around and accidentally banged the pot against the side of the counter. She hugged it to her chest as Ashe pushed through the door.

“God, you scared the shit out of me,” Rachel said. She threw him an annoyed look, then inspected the pot for cracks and, finding none, dumped the water into the reserve and powered on the coffeemaker.

“Sorry. Didn't realize you'd be down here so early,” he said. He shut the door and set a thick bundle of yellowing envelopes on the island. “I brought those letters over for Mary Beth.”

“Oh, thanks. I meant to stop by and get them last night after Lola said it was okay, but I kinda just wanted a night alone with Mary Beth.”

“Good visit, then?”

“Really good.”

Smiling at her, he dunked a blueberry in the bowl of cream, then popped it in his mouth. “Want one?”

Rachel raised an eyebrow at him and settled onto a stool at the island across from him. “What if Catch has plans for those?”

“She doesn't.” He grinned at her and ate another one.

“What makes you so sure?”

“She knows better than to leave stuff on the counter unattended if it's not fair game. You should know that by now.”

“Very true.” Rachel took the berry he held out to her and swiped it through the cream. It tasted almost as decadent as the sweet, fruity scent pumping from the oven.

Resting his elbows on the counter, Ashe stretched across it so his face was a foot away from hers. He slid his hand beneath hers, trailing his fingers along her palm, down to her wrist, and back up again. “Mary Beth didn't convince you to go back to Tennessee with her, did she?”

A rush of heat spread up her arm from his touch. She flicked her fingers over the underside of his wrist and lifted her gaze to meet his. That confident smile she'd grown so used to over the past two months drew her attention down to his lips. “Is this your way of saying you agree with the town and don't want me to go?”

“Well, it'd be much harder to kiss you if you left.” He closed the distance between them, cutting off whatever reply she might've had with his mouth.

Rachel's bare feet pressed into the bottom rung of the stool as she leaned even closer to him.

“Oh, I see how it is,” Mary Beth said from the darkened dining-room doorway. Rachel jumped and had to steady herself with a hand on Ashe's shoulder to keep from slipping off the stool. “You sneak out of your room at zero-dark-thirty so you can make out with a cute guy in the kitchen instead of seeing me off?”

“It's almost seven, Mae. And I came down to make you coffee.” She stroked her hand down Ashe's neck, smiling at him, then sat back down. “This was just a perk.”

Shuffling into the room, Mary Beth hugged Rachel from behind. “Coffee? You're the best.”

“I'm pretty sure you own that title. By the time you get home, you'll have spent half as much time on the road as you did in Nowhere.”

“Yeah, but I got to see you, so it'll be totally worth it.”

Ashe poured three mugs and held one out to Mary Beth. “Sugar's on the counter in the blue canister and cream's on the top shelf of the fridge.”

She wrapped both hands around the mug and inhaled the steam rolling off her coffee. “Black's good.” She slid onto the stool next to Rachel at the island where the stack of letters Ashe had brought over waited. She lifted her eyes to Ashe, who leaned against the counter on the other side. “So, you're my brother-in-law.”

Ashe shrugged, the corners of his mouth tugging down. “At least for a little while longer.”

“I'm sorry about that. I know it can't be an easy thing to go through.”

Rachel rubbed circles on Mary Beth's back, offering what support she could for the awkward conversation happening around her.

“Can't say I'd recommend it,” he said.

“I know it's really none of my business, but is there any way Lola deserves a second chance?” Mary Beth asked.

With all the trust issues Mary Beth had with her own family, Rachel knew she wouldn't even be asking if she'd known Lola had cheated on Ashe with his dad. But that was something she hoped neither of them ever found out. That knowledge could cut the final thread holding together Ashe's relationship with his dad and sever any chance of Mary Beth and Lola building any sort of real connection again.

“Not from me, not for what she did. But that doesn't mean you should write her off.” Ashe straightened and pushed off the counter to lean closer to her. “Listen, I'm sure it must be weird for you to suddenly find her after all this time. And to not know what kind of person she's turned into. But the only way you're going to get to know her again is to try. For what it's worth, I think that's something you both deserve a shot at.”

Rachel mouthed
thank you
when he smiled at her. She rubbed the ribbon binding the envelopes between her fingers and pulled the stack toward Mary Beth. “And if you say something you wish you hadn't, just let Catch know and she'll take care of Lola.”

Ashe tossed Rachel the oven mitt seconds before the timer buzzed. “Is that what this pie is for?”

“No, we made that one yesterday. Seeing Lola I could handle. My parents, not so much,” Mary Beth said.

Rachel pulled the pie from the oven and set it on the wire cooling rack just out of Ashe's reach. The top crust was gold with a ring of darker brown covering the scalloped edges. Dark purple filling bubbled out of slits in the top. She looked up and caught Mary Beth watching her, a small smile playing on her lips.

“What?” she asked.

“You just seem so at home here. Not just in Catch's kitchen, but in Nowhere in general,” Mary Beth said. “I feel tons better about going home knowing that you're happy here.”

Rachel pressed her knuckles to her chest, the thought of not being able to stay in Nowhere making her heart beat faster.

*   *   *

Work had been slower than usual with people purposely doing their shopping on Rachel's days off. Not that she minded the break from unwanted wishes and glares. But the monotony of cleaning and straightening day after day without the social interaction she'd come to love was wearing thin.

She looked up as the bell jangled and a woman entered. Her faded brown dress was at least two sizes too big and hung on her bony frame like an unwanted hand-me-down. Dirt and years of wear had turned her sneakers gray. She jolted when the door clicked shut behind her. “Hi, Everley,” she said.

“Hi, Helen,” Everley replied.

Helen twisted her fingers together and wouldn't look either of them in the eye. “Um, could I have a minute alone with Rachel?”

“Sure. Rachel, I'm gonna go check in with Ashe. Holler if you need me.” Everley eyed Rachel and slipped into the other side, only looking back once with her eyes narrowed in an are-you-okay kind of way.

Turning back to the woman, Rachel stuck her hands in her back pockets, and feeling the wishes she'd stashed there, immediately removed them. “I'm not really able to help you with much unless you want me to ring you up. For everything else, Everley's your girl.”

“No, it's not a cream or anything.” The woman looked around and, seeing they were alone, she continued in a hushed voice, “I heard you can … can make things happen. Is that true?”

“I'm sorry, but—”

“Please, before you say no, I can pay you. Not much, but I have a little set aside for emergencies, and I think this would qualify as one, don't you?”

“I'm not even sure what we're talking about, Helen,” Rachel said.
Please don't do this. Just walk away.
She attempted a smile but wouldn't meet Helen's pleading stare.

Helen pulled a wad of bills from her pocket and thrust it at Rachel. “Please help me. I just wish we weren't losing our home. My husband, Ricky, made a deal to sell our farm—the land, the animals, the house—all of it. He didn't even tell me before he did it.”

“I'm sorry.”

“It's my fault he did it. I got sick and the medical bills were too much and the bank wouldn't let us take out any more loans. But that land's been in his family for generations. Farming is all he's ever known. We can't survive without it. Can you do whatever it is you do and help us get it back? Or at least keep it tied up legally for long enough that we can find a way to afford to get it back ourselves?”

Rachel pressed the money back into Helen's clammy hands. She bumped into the display table and a bar of soap tumbled to the floor with a slap. They both jumped back a step. “You don't know what you're asking,” she said.

“Please. If it's not enough money I can try to get some more. I'm not asking for you to fix everything that's gone wrong for us. Just this one thing. I'll never ask you for anything again. Cross my heart.”

“It's not that simple, Helen. It might not work out the way you want. You'll be better off saving that money so you can find a new house, new jobs.”

Helen's eyes were glassy when she looked at Rachel. “I'll save it in case you change your mind.” She clenched the money in one fist as she left.

The bell warbled as a piece of paper dislodged and fell out. When Rachel picked it up, there were tiny black words bleeding into the soft fibers of the paper. She flipped the lock on the door and stuffed the paper in her pocket with the rest.

Everley came back in a few minutes later. “Is Helen okay? She looked upset.”

“She's worried about her family,” Rachel said.

“Yeah, she's been a mess since Ricky sold the farm. Worried herself sick and lost a good ten pounds. Doc Jensen tried to put her on antidepressants, but she refused to take them. Said she'd be fine once the lawyers worked things out and they got their deed back. What did she think you could do for her?”

Rachel shrugged.

“Don't do that. She obviously came to you for a reason.”

“She wanted me to grant a wish. And I told her I couldn't help her,” Rachel said, staring out the window in the direction Helen had gone. The street was bare but for the heat vapor that rose from the asphalt distorting the road.

*   *   *

No matter what Rachel did, she couldn't get Helen's plea to save her farm out of her head. She was so distracted at dinner that Catch got fed up with her and took her bowl of bow tie pasta and chicken to her bedroom. Rachel left her half-eaten dinner on the counter.

Something flashed white outside the kitchen window. The sky was growing darker blue, but there was still enough light for her to see. Her car's windshield was covered in what looked like feathers. The small strips of white fluttered and danced in the wind. When she walked out on the back porch, she heard a faint rustling, like wind through leaves, but scratchier.

Rachel tripped over a rock, but the fist-sized gray stone didn't budge. Catching herself on the railing, she noticed a scrap of paper sticking out from beneath it. She bent and tugged the paper out. She nudged the rock with the toe of her shoe and it fell off the side of the deck as if it weighed nothing. The note read:
I wish my parents would get back together
.

The paper slipped from her fingers. Like the rock, it refused to move despite a strong gust of wind that rattled the papers clinging to her car.

“What do you want?” she shouted at the empty yard. “Why are you doing this?”

Rachel charged down the steps, the wishes buzzing like a swarm of cicadas. She lifted the wipers and swept her arm over the slips of paper. A few of the less desperate wishes dislodged and took flight. They flitted through the air and landed in a neat pile at the back door. The rest remained glued to the glass.

She pinched one between thumb and forefinger and peeled it off.
I wish my Grams was still alive
. She pulled off another.
I wish I knew why my friends don't like me anymore
. And another.
I wish everyone could see through his charm to the amoral creep beneath.
And another.
I wish I didn't resent the baby for taking over everything in our lives
.

Grabbing them by the fistful, she stuffed them in her pockets. When her pockets bulged, she cupped her shirt and dumped the rest into it.

“Okay, okay,” she said when a half dozen more floated down from the gutters and settled on top of the rest. “I'll try to help.”

She remembered the desperate twist of Helen's mouth when she begged for Rachel's help.
I wish Helen's farm belonged to her family again
. She hugged her arms across her chest and closed her eyes.
Oh, God, please let me help her. Please, please, please don't let this wish go wrong.

Rachel stopped at the back door, scooped up the last stack of wishes, and locked the door behind her, hoping she wouldn't end up regretting what she had started.

 

27

Catch had two pies completed and another one in the oven by the time Rachel made it downstairs for breakfast. With the ceiling fan off again and the oven going full tilt, the kitchen was stifling. Despite that, Catch wore a cardigan over her fruit-stained apron. She was still pale and grimaced every third step as she moved around the kitchen collecting ingredients for the next pie.