“Is there something out there more interesting than me, ladies?” Mr. Walker called to us.
“More interesting than you, never!” Clarissa assured.
We turned our heads and did well at not sneaking too many glances for the rest of the period. Where was he? Did he have a long party weekend or something? Maybe first period started too early for him.
On my way to second period art, Clarissa told me to keep her option in mind. I crossed the room and sat down at my easel. I had a blank canvas that needed attention. So I picked up my pallet and squirted a few dabs of oil paint on it. I looked toward the door as the bell rang, but Jaron was missing in that class too. Maybe he was embarrassed about the way it had gone down, and he didn’t want to see me. What was he going to do, just show up at third period every day and hope no one noticed? I put my brush to the canvas and let my mind run circles around what I’d say to him if he showed up late. I would be strong and wouldn’t let him see how much his rejection had affected me.
Running my brush over the canvas and loading it with paint was therapeutic. Class was almost over and all hope of a confrontation with him died out. That was my last class with him.
“Is that…” a voice pulled me out of my thoughts.
“What?” I asked, leaning away from my canvas. It was the class gossip, and I had to try not to roll my eyes.
“Is that the new kid?”
“Huh?” I looked at my painting, and the brush dropped from my fingers. It was a dark portrait of Jaron; his tan face was emerging from a swirl of dark grays and blues. “No, of course not,” I said.
“Well it looks an awful lot like him,” she said in a teasing voice.
“It didn’t turn out right.” I covered the canvas before anyone else could see. The bell rang and I bolted for the door.
The next day after second period, when Jaron still hadn’t shown up, I went into history class during lunch period and took my test early. I needed to go to the lake and forget about him. I hated staring at the door for an hour just hoping he’d walk through it. I wasn’t even sure if I was waiting for him to walk through so I could yell at him, or wanted him to show up just so I knew that he wasn’t a figment of my imagination. I hoped my imagination would be kinder than to invent the perfect guy and then have him be uninterested. The only thing that kept me one hundred percent sure Jaron wasn’t a dream was Clarissa’s constant anger at him for not showing up for her tongue-lashing. He was real all right. I was beginning to wonder if he was okay though. The night at the movies was creepy, and with his continued absence, I couldn’t stop myself from wondering if something might have happened to him.
THE PRIUS QUIETLY HUMMED along highway one sixty-seven on our way to Catahoula Lake. We were driving though the Kisatchie National Forest, which was the reason we took this route over the others although it was a bit longer of a drive. I looked out my window and watched as the longleaf pine trees passed so quickly they formed an impenetrable wall of bark.
“Did you want to stop at the end of the forest and go to the reptile museum?” Dylan asked.
“I don’t know if museum is the right word for a pit stop with a three fingered man sticking his hand into an alligator every hour,” I said. Dylan was joking anyway, we all hated the place.
“What would you like to do, honey? Are there any stops you want to make before we nestle into the house for a long weekend?” Sylvia asked.
I thought for a minute. The only thing I could think of that was worth taking any time away from relaxing in the lake house was eating at our favorite restaurant. “Well it will be early for dinner, so it won’t be too packed, can we stop at Bayou Baby?”
Sylvia squealed. “Oh I was hoping you’d be up for it. I know you’re still feeling down and didn’t want to go out unless you wanted to. Bayou Baby, here we come.”
“I’ll admit their chef is amazing. She even cooks better than me,” Dylan grumbled. He was an amazing chef and hated that he couldn’t find one thing at Bayou Baby that he didn’t like. After all, it looked anything but gourmet, built on a dock hovering over the bayou on the outskirts of town. The inside wasn’t any better, and the only thing that could be called decor were the many fish tanks that littered the place. When I had first gone there as a child, I loved the colorful tanks and begged my aunt and uncle to get one for my bedroom. But they'd said fish weren’t happy in a tank. I guessed that might be true since I wouldn’t have liked living in there either.
We pulled into the dirt plot that doubled as a parking lot and Dylan cut the engine. “Okay now we are all going to order something new, right? I have to find one thing that I could have improved upon,” he said.
“Well I’ll order something new, as long as I get to have the usual as well. There is nothing like their fried catfish and crawfish platter.” Sylvia’s words were making my mouth water.
I walked out onto the dock behind my aunt and uncle and watched the still water as I went. It seemed more moss than water, so murky and green. Trees sprung up here and there, knotty towering things that created a mystical backdrop for the large round hut. The circular restaurant had few windows, and fishing nets clung to the façade like tinsel on a Christmas tree. No plastic marine shapes hung anywhere; there was nothing synthetic about the place. It was a real Bayou eatery. The middle of a swamp was a strange place for a restaurant, and I wasn’t sure what had made Sylvia and Dylan decide to stop the first time all of those years ago, but I was glad they took a chance. Dylan cleared his throat, and I noticed he was holding the door open for me. I grinned and stepped inside.
The place hadn’t changed a bit since my first memory of it over a decade ago. We got in at four but still didn’t beat the dinner rush. The lobby was packed. Sylvia and I sat at a red bench perched in front of one of the massive fish tanks while Dylan gave the hostess our name. The tank made my back cold and I shrugged on my cardigan. A giggle made me look up. On the other side of the lobby a little black girl of about seven was grinning at me, her smile was missing a few teeth. Her hair was done in tight braids with little pink scrunchies tying the ends. I smiled at her. She pointed behind me and I glance over my shoulder, wondering what she wanted me to see. Then I realized that she was about the age I was when I had been captivated by the tanks.
“They’re pretty cool, huh?” I said.
She nodded. I looked at Sylvia to see if she had seen the cutie, but she was watching Dylan impatiently. She must have been hungry.
“Look, Mama,” the little girl said.
The girl‘s mother followed the direction her daughter’s finger was pointing and tilted her head to the side. “Well I’ll be.”
Dylan was glancing at his cell phone. “It’s going to be about ten minutes,” he said before freezing in place.
“The fishies really like her, huh, Mama?” the girl said.
Sylvia turned around and gasped. I glanced at what was causing the fuss. Every fish in the tank was right behind me, staring out at me while floating in a strange melting pot of a school. I jumped back and they followed my movements as one, keeping their eyes on me. “What the heck?”
Sylvia took me by the elbow to the hostess. “We are in a hurry and would like a table now please,” Sylvia said quickly and slid the girl a fifty.
The young woman looked shocked momentarily, and I wasn’t sure if it was because she saw the fishes’ interest in me or if she had never been bribed that much for a table. Whatever the reason, she shook it off. “Of course, right this way.”
“Dylan!” Sylvia called. He was still frozen in front of the bench we had occupied.
“Oh, I’m coming,” he said and turned to follow.
We wound our way through the place and the inhabitants of each fish tank we passed would follow alongside me, and I wondered if someone had inadvertently thrown fish pheromones on me. The hostess stopped at a booth against a wall that had a curtain wrapped around it. We slid into our seats, and I was glad to be out of sight.
“Your waitress will be with
you shortly,” she said.
“Wait,” Dylan interjected. “If Cala’s in, we’d love for her stop by the table.” The waitress’s eyes grew wide and she nodded once and walked away, closing the curtain behind her.
“Well, I'm starving!” Sylvia chimed, donning a winning smile.
“What? Are you really going to pretend that nothing happened? Out there in the lobby, that was weird.”
Dylan opened his mouth to speak but the curtain parted before he could say anything, a portly black woman in long flowing robes stepped into the booth. Her knuckles were knobby and swollen with arthritis and every finger bore a shiny ring that I was sure she hadn’t been able to remove in years. Her face was so wrinkled I thought it was a miracle she could see out of her drooping eyes. She looked warm and kind, but I was annoyed at her for interrupting. Between them freaking out about a simple dream, whispering about voodoo Sunday morning, and now trying to prevent me from noticing the strange fish phenomenon, one thing was for sure—my aunt and uncle had been keeping something from me and it was about time we talked.
“Oh, Dylan and Sylvia, how great it is to see you!” she bellowed in a strong voice. “And look at the child! My, she is grown. The first time I laid eyes on you, you was knee high to a crawfish. That is, you would have been if crawfish had knees, which they don’t.”
“Cala, you are a sight for sore eyes.” Sylvia smiled up at her.
“You sure? Usually people say I’m a sight that makes eyes sore!” She barked a hearty laugh. “Oh, honey child, I love that one. So what bring you darling people to the bayou?” Her voice carried a thick Cajun accent.
“We're just on our way to the lake. We haven’t been since after Maribel’s seventeenth birthday, that was last year around this time.” Dylan said in an odd voice.
The woman stepped back and looked at me. “My child, that makes you in your eighteenth year? Time does the strangest things here on the bayou, sometimes it seems to freeze, other times I see it reeling on by.” She paused, glancing into space. “But I use any old excuse to party. Celebration drinks are in order, Dylan and Sylvia’s little Maribel is a woman. I’ll be right back, y’all.”
She stepped out and I turned to face my aunt and uncle. “How do you know her?”
“We've been coming here for years, dear. She’s the owner and a good friend,” Sylvia said.
“Not too bad at poker either,” Dylan added.
I looked back and forth between them. They made it sound like they came and saw her on a regular basis. “Okay, I don’t care!” I said, putting my hands up. “What happened in the lobby was insane, and you two know something strange is going on. I feel it. I know it. Just tell me,” I begged.
“Honey, I’m not sure what you mean. The fish thing was strange—I’ll give you that—but you are wearing a bright color. They could have just been attracted to it.”
“It’s not just the fishes, and I’m not about to believe—”
Cala stepped into the room with a tray full of drinks precariously perched on one upturned hand. Sylvia jumped up to help her. “I got it, child. I’m not dead, you know.” She set the tray down as Sylvia took her seat. Cala handed me a silver cup that was ornately carved to look like a shell. The drink was gold and smelled amazing, right away brightening my mood.
She finished handing out the drinks and raised her cup. “To Maribel, you survived childhood with its bumps and bruises and made it through your teenage years, now you’re all but guaranteed to grow as old as me one day. Sorry about that.” She chuckled softly and took a drink.
I put the cup to my lips and drank the rich fluid. It was like nothing I had ever tasted. It was salty with a hint of honey and something else that I couldn’t pinpoint. It was very delicious, and I drained it quickly, hoping that after drinks, I would be alone with Sylvia and Dylan to, to… I looked down and the cup was out of my hands and Cala was nowhere to be seen. “Where did Cala go?”
“Who, darling?” Sylvia asked.
I closed my eyes and shook my head. I felt so tired.
“What are you going to order, Mari?” Dylan asked.
I was surprised to find a menu in my hand. While reading the entrees, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I should be upset about something. Then I remembered Jaron. The night at the movies was trying to follow me on my mini-vacation. Well I wasn’t about to let it bring me down. “I think I’m going to have the oyster basket and a side of gumbo.”
“Think it will be better than my gumbo?” Dylan asked, wiggling his eyebrows.
“I’d never tell you if it was.” I laughed and looked over at Sylvia, her head was turned away from me and the way her tight fist was clutching her chest made me think she was crying. “Are you all right, Aunt Sylvia?” I asked, getting out of my chair.
“I’m fine,” she choked out. She had a tear running down her left cheek. “Just had my drink go down the wrong tube.” She cleared her throat a couple times and wiped away the tear. “There, all better.”
I glanced at the table. There were no cups. “What drink?”
She bent down and pulled a bottle of water from her purse.
I shrugged. “Well what are you getting besides catfish?”
Dinner was great, as it always was there, and I was feeling better. On my way out of the restaurant, I paused to look through one of the fish tanks where a cute little girl was making funny faces at me. I blew at my cheeks out like a blowfish and she giggled.
“They don’t like you anymore!” she said.
“What?” I asked.
She pointed at the tank between us where different types of fish swam back and forth in their glass walled house. “The fishies, they don’t like you anymore.”
I stared down at her in confusion and waved goodbye. My aunt went straight to the lobby, but Dylan paused and turned his head to the left. He nodded and mouthed the words thank you.
When I caught up to him, I saw a sweet, albeit strange looking, old woman. “Who’s she?”
“Her name is Cala. She owns the place,” he said as we turned to leave. “I'm stuffed. Let’s go crash at the house.”
I glanced over my shoulder. For a moment, I pictured the old woman holding up a silver cup.
6
THE NEXT DAY, I woke up confused. I had fallen asleep almost as soon as I'd walked into the lake house, crashing on the plush tufted sofa that overlooked a wall of windows on the south side of the house. I remembered watching the bright Louisiana sun reflect off of the water, it was still high in the sky when my eyelids had surrendered to the weight holding them down. But when I cleared the sleep from my eyes, I was in my room. Dylan must have carried me up the stairs. I couldn’t believe he could move me that far without waking me. It was nice to wake in my room though. Sylvia and I had redecorated it two summers earlier, and it was mostly white and silver with bright accents of turquoise and mint. I loved it so much, I'd brought the theme back to my room at our home.
I jumped out of bed and grabbed the robe that was hanging on the drift wood headboard. There was a window seat in the room where I liked to curl up with a good book. But I wasn't in the mood for reading. Coming here hadn’t helped. Even miles away, I was still thinking about Jaron. And wondering why I couldn’t get him out of my mind. I had known him far too short a time to have his every detail memorized, but inexplicably, I did.
I closed my eyes and let the sun warm my eyelids while I tried to think about anything other than him. He was literally the man of my dreams, I had dreamed about him again last night, and in my dream he was alone and hurting. It was almost more terrifying seeing him in pain than my nightmare had been. It cut through my core the same way the shrieking had. I shuddered. How was I supposed forget about him if I kept having those dreams?
It was getting harder for me to remember that he was the one who had hurt me, not the other way around. I shouldn’t want to console him or protect him from anything. I heard a knock at the door and turned to look. Sylvia popped her head into the room. I wasn’t
in her eye line and she ran to my bed flipping back the covers with panic in her eyes.
“Maribel!” she shouted.
“Over here.”
She looked over and her shoulders drooped in relief.
“Are you worried someone climbed through the window and snatched me up?” I teased.
She walked over and hugged me close. “You are a rare and precious gem and there are plenty of jewelry thieves out there.”
Sylvia could be so ridiculous sometimes. “Why don’t we get out of the house today? I need to be out in the world to make sure that your influence doesn’t turn me into a narcissist…” I snorted and shook my head. “A rare and precious gem.”
“Well you are, so get over it,” Sylvia said before smoothing out the cover on my bed. “What do you want to do today?”
There was something that Sylvia had told me she would do a long time ago, and even though I was a little bit worried about bringing it up, it was probably the only thing that could take my mind off of Jaron and my dreams.
“Could we maybe find an art supply shop?” I asked.
“Of course!” she said, her face lighting up. “We can paint all day, a peaceful day before Clarissa comes tomorrow and we shop till we drop. The two of us need to start planning our annual spring break party as well. Remind me to stop by that party supply store… and I still haven’t found material for your prom dress. Maybe I’ll work on that while you paint—”
“Well…” I started, not sure how to continue. “I was actually hoping that you could do a portrait of my mother…”I trailed off when I saw the horror on her face. “I know it might take longer than just today, and you don’t have to unless you want to. I just thought… I don’t know, it would be nice to see her, you know. Just see her.” I turned away, choking on emotion. I was never one to get upset if someone saw me crying, but I wouldn’t pressure Sylvia into doing something she didn’t want to do with tears. Her hand gently squeezed my shoulder and I faced her.
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