The Bobcat's Tate

by Georgette St. Clair

  “Tate asked me to stay, and I’m going to tell him yes.” Lainey met her mother’s eyes with an unwavering gaze, staring into their black depths.

  “We’ll see about that.” Renee left the room, her heels clacking angrily on the floor.

  Marigold began singing “Ding, dong, the witch is dead,” using her feather duster as a microphone and dancing around the room.

  Lainey turned back to her sweeping with a grimace.

  “What, is my singing that bad?” Marigold asked, in a fake-hurt tone.

  “Well, yes, actually,” Lainey managed a smile. “But you also don’t know how determined my mother is, and how low she’ll stoop to get what she wants. She’ll come up with something.”

  “Chillax. There’s nothing she can do now. She’ll have to hop on her broomstick and fly away home. Let’s go drink some mint juleps on the back porch and relax.”

  “You just said the magic word.” Lainey leaned her broom on the wall.

  “Which one? Mint julep? That’s two words.”

  “All of the words, actually. Back porch. Relax. Mint Juleps.” She followed Marigold into the kitchen, where Marigold poured two very generous portions of mint julep into mason jars and dumped in ice.

  She handled one to Lainey, and grinned wickedly. “So, speaking of back porches, does Tate like yours?”

  “Marigold, that is personal information!” Lainey gasped. “What is it with you people from New York? You have no filter.”

  “Because Henry loves mine, even though my back porch unfortunately is not as generously sized as your back porch. Want to know our favorite thing to do?”

  “No.” Lainey ran for the back porch, with Marigold following at her footsteps, calling out far more detail than Lainey ever need to know.

  “How is that even anatomically possible?” Lainey asked, as she settled into the porch swing. “No. Don’t tell me. I’m going to drink away the memory.”

  “Cheers,” Marigold said, toasting her with her glass. “And I do yoga, that’s how.”

  * * *

  “I’m not so sure about this.” Lainey patted the curlers in her hair nervously.

  This morning, Imogen, Emma and Alma had dragged Lainey to the Kurl Up And Dye, and she’d agreed to let Hepzibah set her hair in rollers. She hoped against hope that it didn’t look dreadful, because she was meeting Tate for lunch and she wouldn’t have time to fix it if they ended up making her look like Shirley Temple.

  There was something charming about the old-timey feel of the hair salon with its row of women with their hair rolled up in pink rollers, giant plastic bubble dryers lowered over their heads as they read magazines and gossiped.

  “It’s going to be stunning,” Emma said. “Your young man will love it.”

  “Well, I don’t know if technically I have a young man…”

  “Oh, pish tosh. Of course you do.” Alma and Emma spoke at the same time.

  The plastic bubble shut off with a loud ding, and the warm air vanished. Hepzibah tipped the plastic bubble back, freeing Lainey’s head.

  “What are you all going to do on the day of the wedding?” Lainey asked.

  “We’re going to the reception, not the actual wedding,” Alma said. “The salon is closed on the wedding day, because all the stylists will be at the Beaudreau mansion, styling Ginger and the ladies in the wedding party.” Hepzibah began unrolling the pink rollers and dropping them into a round wicker basket on the countertop. She’d used giant-sized rollers for Lainey, to give her big, loose curls.

  The old landline phone rang. It was a shiny black contraption that was actually connected to the wall like the one at the boarding house. Imogen walked over and picked it up as if she owned the joint. “Kurl Up And Dye,” she said. “Well, hello, Beatrice, yes, it’s me. Getting my rinse and set. You don’t say. She did, really?”

  Hepzibah carefully brushed out the curls as Imogen chattered away, and then she spun Lainey around to admire her hair, which now flowed in a Veronica Lake style, dipping in a wave over one eye.

  “That is amazing,” Lainey said happily. “It looks perfect.”

  Imogen strolled up, and Hepzibah turned to her impatiently. “Well? Spill it!”

  Lainey wondered idly what the people in this town would do if they were deprived of gossip. She suspected that the withdrawal symptoms would be immediate and severe, and treatable only by the copious consumption of mint juleps.

  “Portia’s mother has apparently hired some big shot psychic from California named Rainbow Moonchild, who is going to help her track down her daughter, who definitely has skipped town and possibly may have stolen the wedding tiara. Portia did that, not the psychic.”

  All the ladies in the beauty parlor began buzzing with excitement, peppering Imogen with questions.

  “This is terrible, all this happening right before the wedding,” Lainey said, shaking her head. “Poor Ginger.”

  “Oh, she’s lived in Blue Moon County for a year, so she’s used to it,” Imogen said. “There’s always some commotion going on around here.”

  “Well, I hope they find the woman. I have to head out to get some lunch now.”

  “Tell Tate we say hey!” Emma said.

  “Yes, he’s welcome to stop by for some pie any time,” Imogen added, and then she turned back to the group of ladies who were crowded around her, pressing her for more details.

  Lainey headed out into the hot, bright day to meet Tate for lunch. She paused by a magnolia tree, breathing in the sweet perfume that drifted from the fat white blossoms. Heaven. She’d never smelled magnolia blossoms before she’d come to Blue Moon Junction.

  Then she walked to the Henhouse, which she knew would be bustling with the lunchtime crowd and bathed in its own kind of perfume, the coffee beans and the sizzling meat on the griddle swirling together in the unique scent of the small town diner. Her stomach rumbled at the thought.

  When she reached the Henhouse, she paused to look at her reflection in the picture window, admiring the big silky waves of her chestnut hair. The retro look really works for me, if I do say so myself.

  Tate was already at the restaurant. She could see him through the window, standing by the countertop where customers sat on round spinning stools, and arguing with a slim woman with a big bouffant of frosted hair.

  Her mother.

  Her heart sank. What had her mother done now?

  She took a deep breath, steeled herself, and walked in the door and up to the counter. Tate turned to her and put his arm around her protectively.

  The din of conversation had died down when Lainey had walked in. Lainey glanced around. The diner was, as she expected, packed with customers. There was nowhere for her to hide. She felt dizzy and sick.

  Tate glared at her mother. “Babe, your mother is making the claim that you’re a thief, and I was just about to tell her that she better get in her car and head out of town.”

  “A thief?” Lainey echoed.

  Her mother smiled, a pitying smile that clashed jarringly with the gleam of triumph flashing in her eyes. “I was just informing this man that he’ll need to watch the books very closely if you’re going to be working for his family business. After all, if you’d embezzle from your own family…” She shook her head. “I do wish you’d sought help like we asked you to, dear.”

  Lainey froze where she stood. Her mother hadn’t. She couldn’t have. And yet, she had. When Lainey thought that her mother couldn’t stoop any lower, she found a way.

  Tate turned to her, looking puzzled. “Lainey, this isn’t true. I know it can’t be. You don’t have a criminal record.”

  Her mother pulled a manila file folder out of her purse. “We do have some influence in our town. We worked out a deal with the district attorney’s office. We agreed to drop all charges and have her file sealed, in exchange for her doing community service. She chose to do it at some dreadful facility full of juvenile delinquents. She’d been planning to work as an art teacher, but we had to tell her we’d put
a stop to that if she tried. Once we knew she was a thief, we couldn’t trust her around children.”

  Every word from her mother’s mouth, every poisonous lie, was like a dagger blow to Lainey’s heart. She slid out of Tate’s embrace and took a step back; she could feel the blood draining from her face.

  “Tell me this isn’t true,” Tate pleaded.

  She couldn’t. She couldn’t talk about what had happened, and she couldn’t tell him why.

  “I can’t talk about this, Tate,” she said. “I wish I could explain, but I just can’t. Please tell your brothers and sisters I got called away on an emergency, and I’ll always be thinking of them.”

  The diner had fallen silent now, and customers were openly staring at them. Word would be all over town. Her mother was quite clever. Every word that she’d said was a lie, but it was the one lie Lainey couldn’t fight.

  Her mother reached out to pat Lainey’s arm. Lainey angrily shook her off.

  “You’ll see this is all for the best, dear,” her mother said in a soothing voice. “You’ll come back home and marry Miles, and live in a beautiful house right down the street from your father and me. These aren’t your kind of people. You don’t fit in here.”

  But that was just it. For the first time, ever, Lainey had started to feel like she fit in, and now her mother had made sure that she’d be about as welcome as a leper at a hot tub party.

  Tears burned in her eyes, and she rushed from the restaurant, with her mother following behind her, calling her name.

  Crying so hard she could barely see straight, Lainey scrambled into her rental car and slammed the door shut. Her hands shook, but she managed to drive back to the boarding house, where she rushed up the stairs without saying a word to anybody and locked herself in her room.

  Tate hadn’t tried to call out to her as she’d run from the restaurant. She didn’t expect him to. He couldn’t let a criminal be part of his life. He’d made it clear from the beginning that his duty to his brothers and sisters came before all else, and she would expect no less of him.

  Misery coiled inside her, and she crawled into her bed and pulled her blanket over her head. She felt as if the brightness of the day had vanished, and a black cloud clung to her.

  She couldn’t sleep, and she didn’t want to wake up. Finally, tired of lying there with the covers pulled over her head, she got up and took a shower. She pulled all of her clothing out of the wooden chest of drawers and put them back in her suitcase. She stared at the suitcase.

  Then she heaved a great sigh and stood up.

  The past week she’d spent here in Blue Moon Junction had changed her. She’d been treated like a friend, a lover, a person who didn’t need to be hidden away in some back office like an embarrassment. She’d been included, made to feel worthwhile and desirable and worthy of being loved.

  Even if she couldn’t stay here, she’d take a bit of Blue Moon Junction with her, wherever she went.

  Her parents had knocked her down, but she would get back up again. This was not the end. She’d find a way to start over again, somewhere, anywhere but Philly. She would never go back there.

  She was startled by a pounding on the door. A tiny bloom of hope flared inside her. Could it possibly be Tate?

  “Open up,” Marigold called out. “I brought lunch.”

  Lainey tried not to feel let down. Tate had let her walk away, and he’d been right to do so.

  “I’m not hungry,” she called back. It wasn’t true, but she didn’t feel up to facing anybody.

  “Now, see, when you say you’re not hungry I start to worry. Open up, or I’ll think you’re about to jump out the window.”

  Exasperated, Lainey walked over to the door and opened it.

  Marigold walked in, carrying a tray with two plates on it.

  “There are hedges underneath my window, and if I jumped I’d automatically shift into bobcat form and land on my feet,” Lainey said.

  “So you’ve thought this through? And I shouldn’t worry about that?” Marigold set the tray down on the nightstand and grabbed one of the plates.

  “Don’t steal my food, thief,” she added. “Oh, too soon?”

  “Oh, shut up.” Lainey couldn’t help herself; she was smiling. She forced the smile off her face and frowned at Marigold. “You’re not even funny.”

  “No, I’m downright hilarious. My fiancé says so all the time.”

  “Of course he does. You make the final decision on whether he’s getting any nookie. And you do yoga and let him play with your back porch.”

  The pot roast on the plate smelled delicious, and as she sat there trying to ignore it, her stomach rumbled.

  “You’re the devil,” Lainey protested half-heartedly, but she grabbed the plate and took a big bite. “And don’t worry, I’m leaving in the morning.”

  “Why?” Marigold looked shocked.

  “Well, now that the whole town thinks I’m a thief…”

  “You know, give people here some credit, will you? Most of the people here are pretty decent judges of character. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that you’re a good person and your mother’s a manipulative, self-serving bitch.”

  “But what else could they think?” Lainey protested. “When she accused me, in front of Tate and the whole diner, I didn’t say a word to defend myself.”

  “So I heard. You eat fast for a person who’s not hungry. Chew your food.”

  Lainey ate a few more bites. “Aren’t you going to ask me about it? Not that I can answer.”

  “Nope. I assume when you’re ready to tell me, you’ll tell me.”

  Lainey chewed in silence for a moment, then asked the question she’d been dreading. “What did Tate do after I left?”

  “Left town.”

  That news hit Lainey like a thunderbolt. “I’m sorry, what? He went back home?”

  “Nope, he told Kyle he’d be gone a couple days, and he couldn’t say where he was going. Anyway, don’t worry about it. It’ll all work out the way it’s supposed to.”

  “Why are you always so optimistic?”

  “Because I’m psychic. So you should listen to me. Now quit hiding and come downstairs. We’re playing poker, and I need to win some money. Unfortunately, Imogen only lets us play for quarters, but that’ll do.”

  “Is it fair for a psychic to play poker?”

  “I’m only a love psychic.”

  Lainey followed Marigold down the steps, carrying her plate.

  Her mind was reeling. Tate was too upset to even stay in town. He’d probably just gone back to his home in Anhinga County, so he wouldn’t have to see her. Would he still come to the wedding?

  Chapter Eleven

  Two days later

  The Golden Years Nursing Home was a sunny, cheery place that reeked of citrus air freshener and Pine-Sol.

  Myrtle sat at a small table in the visitor’s room by the front door. It was a pleasant room, with chess tables and wooden shelves holding puzzles and games and boxes of playing cards, decorated in overstuffed floral furniture in tones of pink and mauve which were echoed in the mauve curtains on the big picture windows. The curtains were open wide and the sunbeams were reflected in giant rectangles on the scuffed but gleaming wooden floor.

  “It must be time for tea.”

  “I don’t know why I’m here,” Lainey sighed.

  Myrtle was wearing a security bracelet now, one that was supposed to go off if she left the Golden Years Nursing Home. Lainey suspected that if Myrtle were visited by the spirit of the Cypress Woods Witch again, the security bracelet wouldn’t help.

  This morning, however, Myrtle was just Myrtle. Her white hair was brushed and pulled back in a bun, and she wore a flowery dress and pink slippers. She had a pleasantly bemused expression on her face, and apparently had no desire to bust out any omens today.

  “Here’s your tea.” Lainey set the cup of tea in front of her. She’d picked it up at a coffee shop on the way over.

  “Milk and s
ugar,” Myrtle said. Lainey put little plastic cups of creamer and a pile of sugar next to the tea, and watched while Myrtle poured it all into the tea and stirred.

  “It’s just that Tate is supposed to be my fated mate, and I don’t even understand how this whole fated mate thing works. He must be the one, because I’ve never felt the way I did before I met him. But what if you meet your fated mate and then you have to break up? Does that happen?”

  Myrtle sipped her tea.

  “You see visions. Do you see any visions with me in them? Is there any way I could patch things up with Tate without, you know, telling what I can’t tell? There isn’t, is there?”

  Myrtle took another big sip.

  Lainey let out a deep sigh. “I don’t know why I came here. I should go. Thanks for listening, Myrtle. Enjoy your tea.” She stood up to leave.

  Myrtle looked up at her. “Double stack of flapjacks.”

  Lainey was startled. “You want me to get you a double stack of flapjacks?”

  Myrtle’s eyes briefly turned milky white, and she repeated firmly “Double stack of flapjacks.”

  “Uhhh…okay. I’ll be right back with that. Do you want syrup and butter?” Lainey asked, but Myrtle’s eyes looked normal again, and she was staring off at something far, far away.

  Lainey turned to leave. A double stack of flapjacks? That was a menu item at the Henhouse. What the heck, why not?

  She signed out at the visitor’s desk, and carefully shut the front door, making sure that the lock caught. The last thing she needed was to be responsible for dozens of wandering nursing home residents drifting through the streets.

  Sighing, she got in her car and headed towards the diner. As she parked and walked into the Henhouse, she felt like she’d tumbled down the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland, batted about this way and that by the bizarre denizens of this strange little world unto itself. She hadn’t really minded, up until the day her mother and Miles had shown up.

  And, speak of the devils, there they were, sitting at a booth, looking at menus. Ergh. Would she never be free of them?

  She stopped in her tracks, and quickly turned to go, praying they wouldn’t see her.