Season of the Dragonflies (28 page)

“I didn't know it would do that. She must have used too much too fast.”

“Can we just figure out what's next, please?” Lucia massaged her left temple.

“Peter Sable will call me,” Willow said.

“I just hope they find drugs in her system,” Mya said. Lucia looked at her like she'd said something heretical, but Willow actually agreed with Mya on that point: it would make all of this go away without a fuss.

“And until then?” Lucia asked.

“Just wait,” Willow said. “We'll hear about it as soon as they know.”

“What if Peter exposes us?” Lucia said.

“Might not be much to expose,” Mya replied. “With the crop dying and all.”

Of all the things Mya could've said, she didn't need to bring that up.

“I never meant for this to happen.” Mya sounded as low and guilty as she had when she ran over Spots.

Willow said, “Maybe I didn't like Zoe, but I didn't want her dead.” She looked for Mya to agree with this sentiment, but her daughter's face showed little remorse.

“Zoe disappeared,” Mya said softly, as if it had just occurred to her, and she looked at Lucia. “I'm next, aren't I?”

“Stop talking like that,” Willow said.

“I mean it.” Mya sounded desperate. “Great-Grandmother Serena promised this, you know she did. Maybe not this exactly. But this is how badly she didn't want the formula changed.”

“She promised grave consequences,” Willow said. “She felt she had to protect the formula from anyone who wished to do harm.”

Lucia said, “We know the story.”

“But exactly how severe are those consequences?” Mya said to Willow. “She left that part out.”

“She did,” Willow admitted. “Frankly, I never wanted to find out.”

“I'm hungry,” Lucia said. “Sausage biscuits?”

Mya shrugged and Willow said, “Whatever you want.”

Lucia fried sausage patties with extra sage in the cast-iron skillet and baked frozen biscuits in the oven. The fat sizzled, and Lucia slammed drawers and banged plates together.

Willow said, “Look at me.” And Mya did. “No matter what happens, you have to promise me, absolutely promise me, to never use hair in another spell ever again, for the rest of your life. Not your hair or anyone's. Will you promise me that?”

Mya nodded and paused before she said, “Could the curse kill me?”

Lucia quieted her movements in the kitchen.

Mya covered her face with her hands and massaged her temples. “It'll drive me away, won't it? I'll end up like Iris.”

“I just don't know,” Willow said, and she felt heartbroken by this answer. She wished she could promise Mya some other outcome.

Lucia placed a platter of sausage biscuits before Willow and then said, “I'm not hungry. I think I'll shower.”

“Go ahead,” Willow said.

Lucia returned her clean plate to the cabinet, but before she left the kitchen, she turned and said, “This is serious.”

“I'm aware,” Willow said. She helped herself to the breakfast Lucia had made without saying another word. Willow willed herself to forget that beautiful girl's dead body on the other side of the country.

Mya said, “It's a moonshine morning.”

“What about your snakebites?” Willow said.

“Some things bite worse.” Mya opened up the liquor cabinet where they stored the cinnamon-infused moonshine. She brought out the Mason jar, poured some moonshine into her coffee, took a deep gulp, and then tightened her mouth.

Willow nodded at Mya's coffee cup. “Fix me one, will you?”

“Gladly,” Mya said, and took Willow's mug to the counter. She watched Mya pour in a generous amount of the clear liquid, leaving little room to top it off with coffee. Her daughter's hands shook; the alcohol spilled down the side of the glass, and she wiped it off with her bare hand. Mya returned the cup to Willow but wouldn't sit down.

“I'm freaking out,” Mya said. Willow didn't reply. “
Should
I be freaking out, Mom?”

Willow drank her coffee. It was strong as an unbroken horse. The fire in her throat subsided and Willow again answered “I don't know.” What else was there to say? “Just stay close to the house for a while.”

“How long?” Mya finally seated herself next to Willow.

Willow said, “Until we know for sure it has all passed.”

“That could be the rest of my life,” Mya said. “And the way things are going, that might be a very, very short wait.”

“Please don't panic.” Willow put one hand on her daughter's arm.

“I
mean
it,” Mya said. “I'm not being dramatic, I can feel it.” She walked to the sink to wash off her hands. Willow waited for her to return to the table, but Mya continued to stare out the window above the sink even after she turned off the water.

“What's wrong?” Willow said.

“It's just . . . ,” Mya said, but trailed off.

Willow hurried to the sink and looked over Mya's shoulder to the driveway out front.

A black town car parked in front of the cabin and Mya said, “Is that from Quartz Hollow?”

“Out of town,” Willow said, and she waited for it. As soon as the driver opened the back door and one shiny black brogue hit the grass, she knew exactly who'd arrived.

In a sudden panic, Mya said, “Is that a cop?”

“No,” Willow said.

“Who the hell, then?”

Willow walked out the front door, coffee mug in hand. Her desire was to speed down the steps to him, but she knew for certain this time that the visit was for business, not pleasure.

Mya came outside on the porch and stood behind Willow like her mother was a human shield. “Mom?” Mya said.

“James Stein.” Willow walked down a few steps. “What brings you all this way, and so early?”

James smiled at Willow and pointed a finger at her, his seersucker suit perfectly tailored and without a single wrinkle. His driver brought one small bag to him, and James put one hand on the driver's shoulder and said, “Go back to town and check in, and I'll call you shortly.” His driver nodded and returned to the car.

James walked over slowly and stood at the bottom of the steps. Willow met him down there, and he took the coffee from her and said, “You read my mind.” She let him taste it, since he was being so forward. Who doesn't call before showing up, at least to give a woman a chance to shower? His mouth twisted and he would've spat it out, she was sure, if Willow and Mya hadn't been standing there.

“You ladies like your coffee with a punch,” he said, and he handed the mug back to Willow and wiped his mouth with a white pocket square.

Willow laughed. “It's the mountain way.”

“That's new to me, I'll admit,” James said.

“It's been that kind of morning.”

“That I understand.” James leaned to the side to look past Willow.

Willow turned. “This is my older daughter, Mya. Mya, this is James Stein, head of AGM Studios.”

“Nice to meet you,” James said.

Mya walked down the steps. “Did you know he was coming?”

Willow could tell the truth to Mya and say she had no idea, or she could apologize to James for her daughter being so rude, but neither sounded great. She decided to say nothing at all.

“I don't usually do this, drop in on people,” James said.

“Well, now you have,” Mya pointed out.

Willow frowned. “Go inside if you can't be pleasant.”

“It's not a problem.” James placed his black bag on the step. “I believe I've brought something you might want, Mya.”

“Me?” Her eyes flared opened and she nudged Willow. Mya leaned over and whispered, “
Do
something.” But by that time James had retrieved a small leather box and opened it. Wrapped inside in terry cloth and bubble wrap was the vial of perfume Mya had sent Zoe.

Mya snatched it from his hand. “How'd you get this?”

Willow examined the bottle and saw that her daughter must have been right about Zoe using too much: it was half-empty.

He closed his bag and said, “May I come in first?”

“Yes, of course,” Willow said. As she passed by Mya she whispered, “Destroy it.”

L
UCIA RETURNED TO
her bedroom after a scorching-hot shower, so hot her shoulders were still bright red, hot enough to wash away any responsibility she might've had for the death of Zoe Bennett. She had told Mya not to do it. Lucia had protested the decision. But she'd also encouraged her mother to hear Mya's plan, and how could she have known Willow would actually agree to it? Lucia stopped a moment to look at the stickers on her dresser, remnants of who she was in her middle and high school years:
J
/
K
,
BESTIES
,
RED
HOT
CHILI
PEPPERS
,
OASIS
,
HERBAL
ESSENCES
. A collection of the trivial things she'd collected and cared about. She pushed her earrings aside to look at a Beatles song lyric she'd written in permanent marker, but she accidentally knocked the jewelry behind the dresser. She pulled out the dresser and found her earrings caught in cobwebs and dirt. She also found a grimy framed photograph of herself and Ben at their junior prom.

She wiped it off with her bath towel. Ben was so much lankier then; his time working in the fields and hiking had filled out his upper body. But his big smile hadn't changed, and the cowlick at the top of his head was still there. He held Lucia like a wind might blow her away, and she looked happy. A big smile to match Ben's. A ridiculous poufy yellow-and-white empire dress she'd never wear again. A single red rose corsage he'd bought for her and placed on her wrist. On this night he'd tell her he loved her for the first time, and she'd say it back without hesitation. Days after this they gave each other their virginities—prom night would've been too clichéd for a love like theirs—and then they couldn't be stopped. They missed school sometimes because they were too impatient. Jonah had been a good partner when their marriage was happy, very giving, very eager to please her, much more experienced than Ben, of course. But now Lucia was experienced too, and she wondered just how different sex would be with Ben all grown up. She positioned the framed picture on top of her dresser, and then she put on a purple broomstick skirt and black tank top and braided her wet hair in one thick rope down her back.

Her cell phone vibrated on the bed. She knew who it was before she even saw his name. She couldn't avoid him any longer.

“Hey,” Jonah said, his voice shaky, like he'd just woken up.

“Hi.”

“Thanks for finally answering.”

“I've been busy.” That's all she owed him. She wanted him to wonder. She might not have art openings and meetings with corporate dealers, but she did have stuff to do.

“I saw Nina and she said you never came by, but your stuff was gone. Were you ever planning on calling me?”

“I'm home,” Lucia said.

“I know. I talked to Mya.”

“She told me. So what do I need to do?”

“What do you mean?”

Jonah always blamed this kind of flightiness on his artistic bent, but it still annoyed Lucia. “The issue. Mya said something about an issue. Do I need to sign something or pay something?”

He remained silent. She listened to his raspy breathing and wondered if he'd started smoking again in her absence.

“You did rent the place, right?” Lucia sat down on her daybed.

“Are you considering coming back?” he asked.

This wasn't his business. Why couldn't she say that to him? “I don't think so.” It was the first time she'd affirmed this aloud.

“You're just giving up?” he said. “Shame.”

“Excuse me?” She couldn't believe he had the nerve to talk to her like they were still married.

“Don't get mad,” he said. “I was just asking.”

“You know just like I do that my acting career wasn't working out,” she said. And just to spite him she added, “A single girl's gotta eat, Jonah, except, I suppose, the anorexic ones.” She pinched her leg for this one; she had promised herself she wouldn't be childish and bitter about their divorce.

“I guess your family's feeding you now,” he said, his tone flat.

Now she wanted to hang up on him. She wished she hadn't answered the phone to begin with. “I'm working here,” Lucia said.

“In Quartz Hollow?”

“Yes, in Quartz Hollow.”

“They've got a good community theater?”

“Don't be an asshole.” It officially sounded like they were still married, and that needed to end here. “Just tell me about the apartment.”

“A banker and his boyfriend might move in next week.”

“Might?” She needed more than this: she needed to know they'd no longer have a reason to communicate. Officially.

“If you don't come back, then yes.”

“I'm not coming back,” Lucia told him.

“Martin called me,” Jonah said, “and I think you should consider taking that role. I know it's television, but it sounds steady.”

Lucia laughed out loud. Yesterday had been an absurd day, but now this? “I haven't spoken to Martin in months.”

“He mentioned that. You should check your messages. That lead for the kids' show you auditioned for back in November opened up.”

Eco 1-2-3.
An education show for preschoolers about the environment and climate change: nothing she was super passionate about at the time, but she would've taken it on the spot and called her mother to brag about the role she'd landed. It had potential to be long running and had a high pay rate per episode. It would've offered some security and validation. “Are you serious?”