by Paisley Ray
Holding his keychain, Dad knocked. “No, we’d hear them, and a light would be on. Maeve? Are you in there?” he called as he unlocked the door and switched a light.
A patchwork quilt had been pulled taut under the pillows. The apartment air was muggy, but smelled lemony. Someone had recently cleaned. There weren’t any suitcases or personal items. Two notes rested on top of the pillows, one to me and one to Dad. We sat on the bed, each with an unopened note.
“They’ve left,” Dad said.
“I figured that one out,” I said.
Dad hugged me. When he released, he wiped a strand of hair from my face and lifted up his note. “Shall we?”
I nodded, and we both opened our Dear Johns. Mine took seconds to read. I put in my lap.
“What did yours say?” I asked
“It was vague. Said she’s glad to see we’re doing well, thanked me for letting her stay, and said she’d be in touch. What about yours?”
“It’s an impersonal apology. Said she’s sorry Betts and I didn’t have a more agreeable meeting.”
Dad scowled. “That’s it?”
“She said she came to town with righteous intention, and that she hopes someday I’ll understand.”
“What?” Dad asked.
I handed him the note and he read over it, twice. “Rachael, something we don’t understand is going on inside your mother’s head.”
“You think?”
“I’m serious.”
“I didn’t spend enough time with her to notice.”
The two of us walked around the apartment. They hadn’t forgotten any belongings. I opened the drawers, checked the medicine cabinet, and the shower stall. The space was cleaner than when they’d arrived. Dad stood in front of the window near the buckeye tree, and took out the bent screen. Outside rockets began to pop and whistle.
The garbage can was a bust. Just some food wrappers and an empty Pert shampoo bottle. I sat at the small secretary desk in the corner, opening the stacked drawers. The piece used to be in our house and I remembered the hidden drawer across the bottom. I tapped at the corner and it opened. It was empty except for a yellowed piece of parchment paper with a black and white astrological drawing. I tapped Dad on the shoulder and handed it to him.
He moved toward the light. “It’s a constellation.” He dragged his finger across the page. “The center is Ophiuchus. Below are Sagittarius, Scorpios, and Libra.”
“Ophiuchus? The thirteenth sign of the zodiac? Mrs. Curtis mentioned it.”
“Who is Mrs. Curtis?”
“Trudy’s neighbor. Do you think Betts left it behind?”
“Probably.”
“That’s weird.”
Dad grimaced. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
Back in the shop, Travis bent over a work table and rubbed his fingers over a pile of metal beads that had been melted by a solder gun. “Find anything?” he asked.
I shook my head. “Just Ophiuchus.”
“Who?”
Dad opened a desk drawer, and lifted out a pair of reading glasses. I turned on the banker’s glass lamp, and he nodded thanks. “The vellum’s not singed. I can make some inquiries at the planetarium. Ophiuchus. Serpent-bearer,” Dad whispered. “The 69th plate in the lost book of Nostradamus.”
Inside my brain resistors, transistors, capacitors, inductors, and diodes surged. “Dad, you and I both know that book isn’t lost.”
In dead silence I heard him swallow.
“The Age of Spiritualism has transcended into Canton,” Travis said.
Dad’s head popped up. He walked across the shop, and tugged a cloth off an easel. Geneva’s painting, Cassandra of Troy, was gone.
NOTE TO SELF
Holy shit, my Mom and Betts ripped us off. I hope there’s another explanation, but I can’t think of one.
CHAPTER 11
Parallels
I’d been awake for hours when sunlight began to streak under my bedroom shade, and the morning air that accompanied it sent crisp snaps into my head. It was going to be the kind of day that I should spend at a lake working on my tan. But that wasn’t going to happen. The bottoms of my bare feet rested on the wall, and I searched the plaster ceiling for answers. My head buzzed with implausible scenarios. Mom and Betts, art thieves? Had they planned to rip Dad off all along? Betts said she liked to live an unmaterialistic life and that she wasn’t a collector. What a crock of swamp shit. Betts was capable of theft. But Mom? I couldn’t wrap my head around that. I wanted to believe that she was a victim.
Assuring me it wasn’t my company, Travis decided on an early start home. Wanting to see him before he left, I got out of bed and slipped on the pair of knee-torn Levi jeans. Something inside a pocket dug into my hip. It was the crystal Mrs. Curtis had given me, and it sparked an idea. I knew where to go to get answers. Travis and I needed to visit the Psychic expo to prove Mom’s innocence.
A nutty aroma wafted its way upstairs. Dad was the only coffee drinker in the house. Downstairs, the sofa was empty and I fumed. Had last night’s drama opened Dad’s bedroom door for Trudy? I knew they had to be doing it, but I preferred the curtain of innocence they’d kept in front of me. Inside the kitchen, I sighed. Dad was wrapped behind a newspaper. He tipped the remnants from his empty cup. I looked at the empty twelve-cup coffee maker pot. Sliding in the seat next to him, I asked, “Where’s Trudy?”
Resting the paper on the table, he moved to the counter and began measuring grounds into a new filter. “She’s subbing for the seven thirty class.”
Dad’s tone was distant. His mood had been teeter-tottering between polite and pissed. I knew it was the waiting that bothered him. It bothered me too.
“Did you leave Edmond a message?” I asked.
He nodded.
Edmond was the only person who may have a reasonable explanation for the missing Cassandra painting. Unfortunately, he was camping in his tin can on wheels and wouldn’t be back until tonight.
“Geneva asked me if I’d catalogue her library books. I’m supposed to go over Monday morning.”
Dad’s hand slammed to counter. “Why didn’t I know about this?”
Jeez, he was edgy. “She asked me when Edmond and I picked up the Cassandra. Her library’s been painted. She has a bunch of first editions. Dynasty Asian and early European-bound manuscripts in boxes on the floor. I thought it would be kind of fun. She said she’d pay me double what you do.”
Dad scoffed. “Did she?”
“Should I cancel?”
Rubbing newly formed creases in his forehead, he said, “I don’t want you working for Geneva.”
“Why?” It’s not your fault the painting was stolen.
He poured water into the Mr. Coffee and the machine sputtered. “We won’t know if the painting is actually missing until I speak to Edmond.”
“Maybe Edmond delivered it early. Why not call Geneva and ask?”
Dad winced. “I don’t want to concern her until I’m sure of what we’re dealing with. If Edmond doesn’t know where it is, then I’ll file a police report, and call the insurance company Monday morning.”
Words came out of Dad’s mouth, but his mind seemed adrift. I got the feeling there was something else going on, but didn’t know what.
I plucked Dad’s truck keys from the hook next to the kitchen pocket door. “I’m going over to Trudy’s apartment to hang with Travis before he leaves. Probably get some breakfast.”
Moving toward the picture window behind the kitchen table, he stared out at the morning.
“I may run an errand,” I said. “See if I can catch a con.”
“Have a good time, and tell Travis it was a pleasure meeting him. He’s welcome back anytime.”
WE’D DRIVEN SEPARATELY. In the expo parking lot I slid into Travis’s Volvo passenger seat, and I handed him a fast food bag. He stared at my breakfast sandwich. “You don’t have egg on your Egg McMuffin?”
“I order it without. Otherwise, it falls on my lap w
hen I’m driving.”
“But it’s an Egg McMuffin. It should have egg.”
“The egg drips when I bite into it, so I order without.”
Travis contorted his mouth, flexing his sex appeal. Sometimes I forgot he was gay. My hormones are out of control.
“Some night,” he said.
“Life is full of surprises. I’d never have pegged my mom a lesbian who’d rip off my dad’s restoration artwork.”
“Hey now,” he said.
“You know what I mean. She lived a quiet heterosexual life for twenty years, and then goes all experimental.”
“She may have been experimental all her life and just kept it hidden.”
Travis was right. I didn’t know.
“Do you really think your mom and Betts stole the Cassandra painting?”
“I don’t want to believe they did, but we’re dealing with a woman who created a business model to take people’s money by reading ‘auras.’”
We walked through the convention center parking lot toward the entrance. Travis told me, “This is America, birthplace of the pet rock, Mexican jumping bean, and all things gimmicky. If someone is willing to pay for her service, then who can blame her? Betts is an entrepreneur.”
I threw my paper bag in the garbage can, and drained my Diet Coke. Twirling the talisman I wore around my neck between my fingers, I said, “Betts isn’t an entrepreneur. She’s a crook, and I don’t like her. Let’s see what’s going on at their booth.”
Travis stopped walking. “That’s it, that’s your plan?”
“Do you have a better idea?”
“No.”
The two of us followed a worker who pushed a metal cart on wheels, toward the front door of the building. He held the door and we both slipped inside.
“Rachael, we need to think this through. I mean you don’t just think that your mom and Betts will be in the booth, and that they’ll confess to taking the Cassandra.”
I grimaced.
“You think you can talk them into handing the painting over to you?”
Travis exposed my non-planned plan. I didn’t have a speech prepared. If they were here, I’d keep a stick’s length away from Betts and and ask Mom for answers.
We passed a booth selling runes and another one specializing in Feng Shui home consultations. I could see the neighboring booth I’d crawled into last week. The assorted whimsical angels hung from a twinkling ceiling. My egg McMuffin without the egg lodged inside my chest. “I just want to see if they’re here…doing anything unusual.”
“Unusual? Rachael, have you forgotten we’re at a Psychic expo.”
The convention didn’t open until nine. Only a handful of people, mostly employees, walked around vacuuming the aisles and collecting garbage.
Travis and I stared at the backside of someone dressed in black, stacking cans into a pyramid on a table. A banner read Energy Boost, Exclusive Offer. “Sky, what are you doing here?” Travis asked.
I knew exactly what she was doing here.
“Can you open that case?” she asked.
“Did you get permission to set up?” I asked.
“I told Betts and your mom all about Energy Boost. Betts said I could set up on the last day.
“Really?” my voice squeaked.
“Do you know what kind of foot traffic this place gets? Thousands. I had this banner made,” she said flicking it.
“Don’t you think the expo police are going to notice that you commandeered the Aura reading booth?” Travis asked.
Sky cracked her gum and twirled the orange piece of hair near her face. “I thought Rachael’s mom and Betts would be here. Where are they?”
Travis kicked a black plastic garbage can in the back of the booth. “They sure cleared out of here fast.”
When the can tipped over onto the carpet mat, tea spilled out of a cup, and an empty plastic bag stuck to it. I recognized the stamped logo. Herbal-U and beneath it was printed African Ginger Powder. Maybe this visit wouldn’t be a total bust.
CONVENTION PATRONS WHO HADN’T OVERDONE the Fourth drizzled into the parking lot. Travis stood next to his car and I hugged him, letting my arms linger on his broad back. I fantasized he’d drop his gaydom, probably as likely as Simon Le Bon calling me on stage at a Duran Duran concert. Travis turned the Volvo engine over and wound down his window. With Dad’s car keys in my hand, I waved as he pulled out. “Call me when you get home.”
My eggless McMuffin sat heavy as it descended toward my stomach. My heart pumped and my palms were clammy. Zorro, i.e. Jackson Kimball, knew more than he’d let on about Betts, I was sure of it.
Parking lot spaces began to fill up. Entry was free until noon. I was surprised how many people wanted to know how to avoid misfortunes in their lives. Personally, I lived by a trial and error instinct, and my instinct told me that Jackson Kimball’s cute ass had a tale to tell.
WATCHING SOMEONE BENT OVER a case of sealed herbal bags reveals a lot. For instance, Jackson wore boxers, not briefs. I knew this from the green and blue plaid tartan fabric that poked out of his pants. Jackson wasn’t wearing his Zorro get up, but a more relaxed jeans and tee. His butt was square-ish firm, not melon-esque, and not old man flat. There was a faded circle, the size of a biscuit cutter, on his back pocket. On a scale of ten, I’d score the rear view of his 506 Levis jean a nine.
I walked behind him and cleared my throat.
He swiveled his head, and a playful smile twisted the corners of his mouth. “Rachael O’Brien.”
“I was just passing by and thought I’d say hi.”
His lingering eyes made me fidget, and I kicked at imaginary ants with the toe of my shoe.
“Have you been staying out of trouble?” he asked.
“I haven’t been in any girl fights since I last saw you.”
He moved close and I stepped back. “May I?” he asked. Tilting my head in his hands, he examined the area where Betts had slapped me. I drank in his sweet cologne, and felt warm under his touch. “I don’t see bruising. Did you use the lavender oil?”
“I did. Thanks for the sample.”
“So what can I do for you? Or is this a social call?”
Leaning my fists and backside against a table stacked with boxes. I said, “African Ginger.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Powder or root?”
“Powder. I want to buy some.”
“What symptoms are you havin’?”
“It’s not me, it’s my dad’s girlfriend. She’s been staying with us and,” I looked left then right and whispered, “her intestinal tract is not right.” I waved my hand in front of my face. “She’s a health nut. Drinks sardine and seaweed smoothies. Won’t take anything over the counter. I remember you mentioning the African Ginger. I thought it would sort her out.”
Jackson stepped in close. He twisted a lock from my ponytail. “I can help you with that but not right now. I sold out before dinner last night. I have another shipment being overnighted.”
I looked up into his eyes. “How much will that cost?”
“I’ll give you a good price. Three ounces, eighty-five grams for—” he said, and kissed me.
His kiss was like a hot brain freeze that caught me off guard in a good way. His hand slid down my neck. My hands didn’t know where to go, and gripped the table edge. I probably should’ve pushed him back. Told him how inappropriate kissing a complete stranger was. But I forget all that, as well as my middle name, my age, and why I was here.
“Excuse me,” some inconsiderate stranger interrupted. “Do you have waterhyssop?”
Jackson stepped back and I gawked at him. His face. His coffee eyes. He caught my glance, and I dropped my eyes to his t-shirt logo. It was a faded picture of a store on the end of a dock, an ice machine resting beside the front door. Below the scene, it said, “Marina Supply.” I squinted at the next line, a letter missing. “New -ern, NC.”
“Bacopa monnieri,” Jackson said. “Also called, Brahmi, and thyme-leafed gratio
la.”
My mind whirled in a cranium explosion. Holy do-do, I’d just swapped spit with freakin’ Bubba Jackson whose specialty, besides being a complete hottie, was running a drug ring. And as a hobby, he moved forged paintings for his fucked-up friend, Billy Ray.
Hopping to my feet, I tapped my Swatch and motioned to leave. Jackson stretched his arm, and his fingers handcuffed my wrist. My eyes trailed up his shapely biceps. A small tattoo of a leaf with jagged edges crept out of his sleeve. He whispered, “Don’t leave.”
“I have an errand to run. I’ll be back.”
The customer in the booth asked Jackson if he knew for certain that the waterhyssop was Sri Lankan. Jackson released my wrist, and I slipped out. I willed myself not to run, until I turned a corner. Then I sprinted out the nearest exit and didn’t stop until I sat inside Dad’s truck. I flinched my eyes up and scanned the rear view mirror wondering if he had followed me.
I PANTED LIKE A DOG as I hustled to get inside my house. Dad’s voice and others echoed from the kitchen. Edmond and Trudy stood in front of the island as Dad paced, with a phone cord trailing behind him. “This is John O’Brien,” he said into the phone. “I own How’s Your Art, O’Brien’s Fine Restoration. I want to report a theft.”
“You’re back early,” I told Edmond.
He held a mug of coffee and took a sip. “Left this morning. Wanted to beat holiday traffic.”
“You got Dad’s message?”
He nodded.
“So what’s going on?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
“Cassandra is gone,” Trudy said.
Edmond cleared his throat. “After you left with Travis, I cleaned the canvas, and touched up some frame nicks with gold leaf. I put her on the easel to dry before I left for the weekend.”
Trudy whispered, “John’s reporting the theft to the police.”
“Did you set the alarm?” I asked.
“I did after I spoke to your mom and Betts.”
“What?” I asked.
“They drove up as I wheeled my bike out front. I started talking with them, and they followed me inside the shop.”
