A story Lila had heard from Ada flashed through her mind, of a farmer who had died of natural causes while plowing his field. His wife had driven by and seen his tractor making graceful, repetitive circles. Around and around. The image was beautiful in a way.
She checked herself. If she didn’t watch it she would be a member of the society within weeks. Perhaps she was one of those awkward types too, come to think of it. Maybe that would explain why she and Max could never seem to have a normal conversation.
Lila blocked the door. “Where is Juniper today?”
“Sleepover,” he answered. “With an actual friend. Apparently this one doesn’t mind being told what to do.”
“You must be proud.” She smiled, then paused, tilting her head toward the door. “Hey, today’s not a good day—in there. Oven troubles.”
“Okay.” He nodded as if he fully understood.
“But could you—I've been thinking it over, and I don't think lending me your shoes counts as a date.”
“Sorry?”
“Yeah, are you available, say, now?”
“S-sure. What did you have in mind?”
“I have to make an emergency trip to the grocery store.”
“Oh.” His mouth turned down slightly. “And that counts as a date?”
“It's just, I don’t want to drive that beast through town again.”
“I fully support that decision,” Max said. Lila handed him the keys, and he looked down at them. “We could take my truck.”
“If you don't mind . . . it might help if I watched you. This may come as a surprise, but it's been a very long time since I drove a stick, and I have a feeling there's no escaping this old beast. Our fates are intertwined.”
He shrugged. “Okay. I just hope Owen's is open.”
They climbed into the truck and slammed the heavy doors. Dust hung in the air and settled on the old vinyl seats. For a long minute they sat in silence, listening to the loud rumble of the engine and the crackle of the driveway. Then Max leaned forward, his fingers fumbling with the radio dial until it settled on Lynard Skynard. She wouldn't have known except that he asked her if it was okay.
“Ada's lost without her oven.” Lila raised her voice to compensate for the loud engine. “I told her I'd make something for the bake sale without actually baking.”
The bake sale is serious business around here.” Max's tone suggested this was territory he knew well. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing? I mean, these women can smell “store-bought” goods from a mile away. My grandma's that way too.”
“That seems to be an offensive term around here. It won’t exactly be store-bought,” she said, tipping up her chin and turning toward the window. She stared at the flags that hung from every lamp post along main street. “I'm going to buy some of the ingredients, but Ada’s strawberries are home grown. Does that count for something?” Her confidence was waning, and she was beginning to sound desperate. “I have to pull this off.”
They parked at Owen's Grocery and Lila nearly fell out of the truck. She flew into the store, Max striding along behind her, his hands in his pockets.
Okay, a friend of mine used to make this strawberry dessert. You just chop the strawberries up and add Cool-Whip, then put it in a crust and freeze it.” Her hands made the chopping and mixing actions as she spoke. She was talking to herself more than anything, but she caught a look of doubt on Max’s face she didn’t care for.
“If I hurry, it could freeze by the time the booth's up, right?”
She found the coolers at the back, opened a glass case, and grabbed a tub of Cool-Whip. Max grabbed her arm with a curious sense of urgency, as if she were about to pull the red wire instead of the green. She froze, her eyes locked onto his hand wrapped around her arm, and the tub of Cool-Whip clattered to the floor.
He dropped his hand, eyes darting as he apologized under his breath, then picked up the container and put it back.
“What was that about?” she asked.
He gestured for her to follow and led the way to the dairy section, where he chose a carton of heavy whipping cream. “Trust me.”
“But I don’t know what to do with this.”
He raised a brow, then said with some reluctance, “I got it.”
Lila hesitated, then nodded and rushed to look for the pre-made graham cracker crusts. She walked down the baking aisle, her anxiety building as she scanned and re-scanned the shelves.
“Where are they?” she asked, unable to control the panic in her voice. “The pie crusts. The pre-made kind, made out of graham crackers or cookies.”
Max stood at the end of the aisle watching her. “They don’t carry anything like that here. People make their own crusts.”
Lila’s jaw dropped, and she considered launching a retaliatory assault on Max. If he wasn’t directly behind this lack of convenient kitchen necessity for non-bakers, surely his tone warranted the attack.
He held his hands out in defense. “Hey. I—I can help you.”
“How,” Lila asked, her voice screeching an octave higher. She wondered if she looked like the dragon now.
“I’ll make them for you.” The words sounded as if they had been forced out of him.
“You?” she asked, incredulous.
“Yes. I can handle this.” He sighed. “Follow me.”
It was Lila’s turn to put her trust in another—one who’s capabilities she was uncertain of. What would Ada say if she knew her reputation was being handed to a computer-nerd single Dad who purchased Captain Crunch? Her foamy flip-flops shuffled along the tile floor behind him as he selected a bag of pecans and a box of graham crackers.
Lila’s eyes widened. “Wait! Will this require an oven? We don’t have an oven.”
“I have an oven.”
Lila’s eyes narrowed. “But Ada is adamant about not borrowing one.”
“If she says something, tell her it was my idea.”
Lila exhaled and nodded.
As they approached the checkout Lila couldn’t help but notice the significantly raised, penciled eyebrow of the middle-aged woman behind the counter. She looked back and forth between Max and Lila before smiling.
“Hello, Max. What are you up to this morning? Aren’t you going to the breakfast?” Red plastic nails clicked on the counter as she spoke.
Max offered a self-conscious smile in return. Lila guessed he had noticed the eyebrow too. “Hello, Jen. Yes, we just needed to pick up a few things first. This is Lila, by the way, Ada Foster's niece.” Again Lila felt a tug of pride and belonging.
“Oh, of course. Hi, sweetie.”
“I was relieved to see you were open,” Max said. “But is Owen making you work all day today?”
“Naw. I’m off at noon. Owen says people tend to get crazy on holidays, so he thought it best if someone were here this morning for last minute emergencies.”
Max grinned and scratched his chin. “Oh, I don’t know anyone around here that fits that description.”
Lila bit her lip and stayed quiet.
Max pulled out his wallet and Lila held out her hand to let him know it wasn't necessary. This situation was weird enough.
After she paid, Jen handed her the grocery bag. “You take good care of Max. We're pretty protective of him around here.”
Max blushed and ducked his head, then hurried out of the store with Lila following behind.
April 1978
Ada hurried down the porch steps, her head jerking one way, then the other. She'd brought dinner all week, since Isaac and Phoebe were away. Without Mom around, Dad didn't eat right if they didn't watch. But today the house was empty. He hadn't left a note. It probably wasn't anything to be concerned about. It was just that he'd forgotten things lately. Little things. Enough to worry her.
Ada glanced toward the driveway, and her eye caught movement in her dad's green Chevy truck. She walked over to it, squinting hard. It was Phillip all right, sitting in the front seat.
Ada knocked on the
window and he jumped. His finger flew to his lip. He gestured urgently for her to get in.
She went around to the other side and climbed in. “Dad, what are you doing out here.” Her voice was weak. “Come inside. I've made chicken noodle soup. It'll get cold if you don't get to it soon. Besides, it's going to rain.”
“Shhhh. I don't want anyone to know. It's safer here, you know.”
Ada stared at him, her mouth turned down, nodding slowly.
“Promise you won't tell him. It's safer here,” he repeated.
She put her arm around him, and dropped her head onto his shoulder as rain splattered against the windshield.
Chapter 10
Gypsy Blood
Lila studied how smoothly Max raised his foot off the clutch, and how carefully he eased it into gear. She knew the technical aspects, but wasn't sure she'd ever make peace with this truck.
They listened to Tom Petty on the radio (she knew this one: 'Don't do me like that'). It was an awkward first date, with both of them looking uncomfortable about the silence but neither opening their mouth. Lila always hated that. She'd been set up on a lot of mismatched dates. Usually she overcompensated, talking loudly about anything to try to ease the tension. She didn't feel like she could do that with Max. She got the impression he'd see through any falseness. Maybe he got that from Gladys.
Max turned left three blocks before Ada's house. “I have to stop and get Juniper first.”
They rolled to a stop in front of a tidy white house. Max jumped out of the truck and walked around to the sidewalk. He stopped suddenly and looked up and to the right. Lila craned her neck out the window of the truck to see what he was looking at. She spotted Juniper wrapped around a thick tree branch.
“Junie,” Max said.
“What?”
“Where's your friend?”
She dangled a tightly-bound dolly from the tree.
“She didn't want to play rescue mission.”
Max sighed, staring into the face of the one-eyed baby doll. “Climb down from there. I need you to help us pick strawberries.”
She rolled around the branch and hung from it like a sloth, turning her head to discover who the other part of “us” was. She made eye contact with Lila, then dropped her feet and waited for her dad to get into position to catch her, which he promptly did.
“Can I ride in the back?”
“I guess. It's a short drive.”
Juniper climbed into the back of the truck. She and the doll stared at Lila through the window while Max shuffled to the front door and hesitantly knocked. Lila heard clips of an apology before he collected a pillow and red backpack and returned to the truck.
“So much for the new friend,” he muttered, smirking and shaking his head.
“She made it through the night, though.” Lila offered. “That's pretty good, right?”
“Yeah. She held out a long time, really. And as far as I can tell nobody's crying, and nobody got an unexpected haircut or a doll dissected. I call it a success.”
He drove quietly for a moment, then continued. “It's just . . . she's got a lot of ideas. And she thinks differently than other people.”
“From what I've seen she thinks more than other people,” Lila said.
He nodded and smiled. “But sooner or later she has to learn to get along with them.” Gravel crunched under the tires as they pulled into Ada's driveway. “Maybe I'm not one to talk.”
Lila slid out of her seat, turning just in time to see Juniper leap off the side of the truck bed. Her pink boot heels dug into the grass and her bent, knobbly knees and beanpole legs looked like they could not possibly support such an endeavor. Without instruction, she ran to the side of the house, found a tin pail, and began filling it with berries from Ada's sprawling strawberry patch.
“She's done this before?” Lila asked.
“Ada's like a second grandma to her. All of Grandma's friends, mostly the Society ladies, have been a big support since . . . you know.”
Lila nodded, keeping her eyes steadily on Juniper. She didn't know anything about what had happened with Juniper's mother, and she didn't want to risk stuffing her foot in her mouth like she had in the store the other day.
Juniper put at least as many strawberries in her mouth as she dropped into the pail. She sang chorus after chorus of “What if all the dirt clods were candy bars and hot dogs.” The last variation went something like: what if all the raindrops were artificially-flavored carbonated water.
Lila went inside to check on Ada, and quickly returned with two 9x14 pans. “Ada's okay, I think,” she told Max as they climbed into the truck. “I can tell she's nervous about the bake sale, but she's calmed down considerably. Her hair's all fixed and your grandma is going to pick her up in a few minutes.”
Max's house was only a mile away. It was a charming little craftsman, with stained shingles, mossy green paint, and white trim. Juniper ran ahead, flinging the red front door open and disappearing into the house.
By the time Max and Lila caught up with her in the kitchen, she'd gathered an odd assortment of cooking supplies and utensils and laid them out on the butcher-block island. Lila's eyes widened as Juniper brandished a sharp paring knife. Max strode over to her, then took the knife from her tiny hand with a deliberately casual motion.
“She knows,” he said under his breath. “Big reactions just encourage her.”
“I'm sure attention is something she is desperate for right now,” Lila said when Juniper was distracted with making towers out of all the bowls and utensils she could reach. “Not that you're not att—Never mind. I swear I don't make a habit out of critiquing people's parenting, or other things I know absolutely nothing about. Just of not clearing my words with my brain before I say them.”
Max didn't answer, but she thought she heard something like a chuckle as he threw pecans into a blender.
Lila kept her distance and took in her surroundings, wondering what the house would tell her about Max. She could see that a woman once lived there. Yellow cafe curtains hung over the large window above the sink. There were a few wall hangings, including an ornate clock and a large painting featuring dancing bears.
The space opened up to the dining room, with dark wood trim framing the transition. There was a built-in at the far end of the room. The glass doors displayed a motley assortment of items that had obviously been placed in there for storage rather than display. Most of the dining room had been overtaken with computer parts and tangled cords, and several file boxes sat on the table. Aside from a small section presumably reserved for eating, it was clear that the dining room had become an office.
A photograph taped to the glass cabinet door caught her eye. It showed Juniper sitting on Max's shoulders and grinning, her hands wrapped around his head.
It wasn't a bachelor pad. Max had his own system for order, and there wasn't trash or fast food packaging lying around. Juniper had left her mark, in the form of crayon-colored box creations and dress-up accessories, such as a tiara and an astronaut helmet that hung from a dining chair. It looked comfortable and lived in, but not particularly loved.
Lila had spent so much time looking through design books and thinking about her new project that she couldn't help imagining the possibilities of a house like this. She found herself doing it all the time now; noticing a house that could be transformed with the addition of black shutters and a larger porch light, or how a space would benefit from knocking down a wall.
She had majored in art, but never felt that she'd found the right niche. Now creativity was stirring inside her, and the concepts she'd learned in college were coming back to life in a completely new form. In her enthusiasm, even taking measurements, hiring contractors, dealing with unexpected problems, budgeting, and filing taxes began to seem manageable.
“It's okay, you know.” Max said, interrupting her thoughts. He handed her a colander, then pulled melted butter out of the microwave and began mixing the ingredients for the crust.
&nbs
p; “Junie, go grab us some more paper towels from the basement.”
Juniper scuttled off and he continued. “The whole town pretty much knows the story, you might as well too.”
He ran his knuckles along his jawline. “Erica and I were married straight out of high school. She left six months ago. Said she never got the chance to experience life. Apparently she couldn't do that with us.”
Afraid she'd say something wrong again, Lila just nodded as she rinsed the berries.
“Fine. Not everybody's happy in a place like this. She always said it creeped her out. Not that I wouldn't have packed up and left with her if she'd wanted me to. What I don't get is that.” He nodded in the direction Juniper had run. “How can you leave that behind? She said it was just temporary. But she got a job as a Pharmacy tech there . . . kept saying it wasn't a good time to leave.”
Their conversation ended when Juniper ran in, peeling the plastic off a roll of paper towels. A pair of flip-flops were strung around her fingers. She handed them to Lila.
“Those are the shoes I lost at the pond.” Her eyes darted to Max. If Juniper had returned to the pond, she was probably in big trouble. Considering what had happened there, she wouldn't blame him for being mad.
Max tipped the mixture into a pan, pressing and smoothing it with his fingers. “It's all right. It was really important to her to go back and get your shoes. I told her we'd try. They'd floated off to the side, all covered in gunk. I should have known we'd find them, though. Juniper has a knack for finding things.”
“It's our gypsy blood,” Juniper said, beaming.
“Ooh, tell me more,” Lila said.
“Grandma Gladys says when our ancestors immigrated here, they roamed the land until they found a place where the veil between this world and the next was thin.” She spoke dramatically, as if she were reciting a familiar ghost story.
Max half-smiled, as if he was embarrassed. “Well, I don't know about gypsy blood, but she can find just about anything if she puts her mind to it. I guess she found you the other day. Not that you were lost, but it looked like you needed finding.”
The Obituary Society Page 6
