Loxley Belle

by M. L. Bullock

  “That’s Harmon! That’s my friend from school,” I confessed as I swiveled around in the seat with the cloth pressed to my head. I don’t know why, but I waved like an idiot. He waved back and flicked his cigarette out the window as he eased past us.

  Aunt Dot frowned at him and then at me, but she didn’t scold me as she shifted into gear and took us home. We practically crawled down the highway; she was gun-shy about the near accident now. I assured her that I was fine and didn’t need stitches.

  “If you change your mind, we can go right up to Dr. Lamb’s office. I’m sure he’d stitch you up in no time.”

  “No, thank you. I don’t want to go to the dance with stitches in my forehead.” Just as the words came out of my mouth, I knew that I would go to the dance. For the first time ever, I would attend a dance, and I would go with Harmon Gates. He was going to ask me—I was sure of that. And if he didn’t, I would ask him. Aunt Dot’s enthusiasm concerning the dance had clearly waned since she got a peek at my intended date. She didn’t openly object, but she began making excuses for me.

  “If you don’t want to go, I understand, dear. It’s been a very difficult time, and the grieving process takes a while. It’s different for everyone.”

  “I’m sure it is, Aunt Dot, but I’m going to the dance. All the seniors go.”

  We drove the rest of the way very slowly and in complete silence.

  Chapter Eight—Jerica

  “Jordan, please go to sleep,” I pleaded with my child as I rubbed his back and paced the downstairs hallway. A major storm raged above us, complete with house-rattling thunderclaps and the occasional pop of lightning. I thought lightning had struck one of the peach trees in the backyard, but I wasn’t brave enough to stand by the window yet to check. As soon as the lights went out, I was up. My tiny nightstand fan quit blowing, and I could hear every creak of the house. And then Jordan woke up too. At least I’d gotten in a few hours of sleep before all hell broke loose over the house.

  “It’s okay, baby. It’s just a storm. It will pass soon. I promise,” I whispered hopefully as I took another lap up and down the hall. The room filled with blue light as the thunder rolled again. The LED candles I’d switched on were enough to make the downstairs parlor less frightening, but the rest of the house was completely black. I prayed the power would come back on soon. My cell phone had been charging in the bedroom, but I couldn’t manage to bring it with me while I held a wiggling child in my arms. Oh well, who was I going to call? Jesse would be sound asleep right now. He was away overnight at a book signing, but he’d be asleep even if he were here, unless I purposefully woke him up. It was surprising how heavily men could sleep. Eddie was much the same way when Marisol was a baby.

  Oh, Marisol, baby girl. I miss you so much.

  I held Jordan a little tighter and kissed his cheek. He’d worked himself up into a sweat and would be ready to crash soon. Hopefully. Maybe I’d get a few hours in too. At least there was no screaming woman roaming the halls tonight. I couldn’t believe I’d heard such a horrible, bloodcurdling sound in my own home, but I had found nothing to account for it. I’d looked everywhere to find the source, but there was no one about, not in the house or outside, and the closest neighbor was a half a mile away. Whatever had caused it, I would never forget it. I decided to try the recliner again. Jordan much preferred walking, but I was exhausted. After a few minutes of singing and humming, he began to settle down. He yawned a few times and then got quiet despite the warm temperature. I wanted to drift off too and enjoy at least a nap, but I had an odd, uncomfortable feeling. Like someone was watching me. Grinning at me.

  You’re just being weird, Jerica.

  The feeling didn’t go away. Not at all. In fact, the longer I sat in the darkness, the more intensely I experienced it. I could see right through the parlor and had a straight shot to the back door, but it was so dark out that I couldn’t make out a thing.

  Don’t be a child. Go take a look.

  My arms tingled a bit; I’d been holding my son for an hour. Time to give my arms and eyes a break, but first I had to know if someone was out there. I had to be sure.

  There! I saw a shadow move past the back window. I know I saw it. I froze and waited to see if the figure would return. If I saw the shadow again, I’d have to call someone. Jordan didn’t stir at all as I tiptoed toward the back door ever so slowly. Even though it was nearly pitch black in this section of the house, I managed not to kick the coffee table or any other furniture. I stood in the doorway of the kitchen and waited.

  Nothing. I didn’t see anything at all now except for darkness. After a minute of hovering in the doorway, I stepped into the kitchen. There was no one in here except Jordan and me. Everything was as I left it. The kitchen was tidy with a few clean dishes in the drain. I had some flameless candles in here too, but I couldn’t manage flicking those on with my baby in my arms. I blinked against the darkness, and my eyes began adjusting to the lack of light. No, everything was as it should be.

  Except for the recipe box. The one I’d found in the flowerbed yesterday.

  I’d had every intention of reopening the recipe box, but that scream… That horrible scream had shaken me so badly that I’d been forced to put it away. For reasons unknown to me, I actually hid the thing instead of sharing it with Jesse. That’s right. I’d hidden it! Why was it here? Nobody had been in here except the baby and me. Jesse had left this morning and didn’t know anything about it. I hadn’t mentioned it to him, and then he got the sudden phone call inviting him to participate in the book signing. Those were rare for him nowadays, so I had encouraged him to go.

  And now the recipe box was open. It was open and on the table. Jordan whimpered in his sleep but didn’t wake up fully. I stepped back and away from the table. I didn’t want to be in here. Not anymore. I had to call someone. Who? I had to tell someone about this. I should have already told Jesse about the recipe box. Okay, think reasonably, Jerica.

  Maybe Renee had come over earlier. She’d promised she was going to help me get ready for this weekend. That was probably it. Renee must have found the recipe box, gotten curious about it and opened it up.

  That’s a lie, Jerica Clarke, and you know it. Renee would never just come inside without saying anything to you. She wouldn’t do that. Never ever.

  Lightning snapped again but without the thunder. “That’s odd,” I said, feeling confused about everything that was happening. And then a flurry of shadows rushed past the door. Clutching the baby in my arms, I hurried out of the kitchen and with a pounding heart began climbing the stairs. As soon as I reached the second-floor landing, I glanced behind me in the dark. I didn’t see anything at all, but that horrible feeling of being watched was slow to leave me. By the time I made it halfway down the hall, I felt better…like I’d left whatever it was downstairs. It wasn’t inside the house, at least. It must have just been shadows! I carefully navigated the dim hallway and went into Jordan’s room. Breathe, Jerica. Just breathe. I didn’t hear anything, no sound of breaking glass. Nothing to indicate that anything I saw was more than just the odd grouping of shadows. What to compare that experience to? The shadow wasn’t just an anomalous blob of darkness. Not the waving of a tree branch or even the shadow of a single person. It was like several people were lumped together, but there were no defining features. No arms and legs. More like three lumps, three people with sheets over their heads. Black sheets. I put the baby down and toyed with the idea of opening a window, but I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t. What if the shadow things could crawl up the side of the house and come through a window? Clearly, it couldn’t come inside. Or else it would have, right? What time was it, anyway? God, it was hot. But I had to go back downstairs and check it out, just in case. I felt my way back to the door when suddenly the lights flickered back on.

  Breathing a sigh of relief, I took a peek at Jordan and went back to the staircase. No. I had no weird feeling here. Maybe I’d been hallucinating. The recipe box was tucked in the
cabinet. There had been no shadow peeking in my back door. Lack of sleep could make you see weird things, right? And it had been so dark. So very dark.

  I headed back down the stairs to verify what I’d seen. There was the memory of that feeling, but I didn’t sense anyone grinning at me now. Passing through the parlor, I returned to the kitchen to find that the recipe box was open. All of the contents had been poured out on the counter. The barrette, the paper clip and all the other odd things were right here. No, wait a second… I picked up the dirty tin to verify that it was empty. Not everything was here; one thing was missing. The most valuable item in the recipe box.

  The charm bracelet had vanished.

  Chapter Nine—Loxley

  “You know, they say lots of intelligent people had seizures. Julius Caesar, for one,” I said awkwardly as Harper tied my ribbon. If she’d asked, I wouldn’t have been able to drum up another name. Harper never made eye contact with me, but I wanted to talk about so many things. Aunt Dot was in her room putting the finishing touches on her hair and makeup; I was quite glad she would be a chaperone tonight even though some people thought it a tad scandalous for me to go to a dance so soon after Momma’s funeral. Then again, people were always talking about us. Or at least me. I would think it strange if they didn’t at this point.

  “Harper, did you hear me? Having a seizure isn’t the end of the world. This isn’t the nineteenth century, you know,” I commented as I tried to catch her attention in the mirror. She moved slowly, and her face and lips were pale. I’m sure I was being rude, but I didn’t know how else to bring up the subject. I needed to talk about something besides my own crimes and Momma’s death. My sister wasn’t herself anymore; at first, I blamed it on the medication, but now I wasn’t so sure it was merely that. Harper was unusually quiet tonight. She was leaving on Sunday, which gave us only a couple more days to spend time together. At least she had stayed longer than she first planned. Maybe this dance was a selfish idea, but I couldn’t let Harmon down now that I’d promised to go with him. I’d been right, of course. He’d asked me to go just two days after I’d taken that first walk with him.

  To my surprise, my sister tiptoed to the door and closed it. Then she turned the radio on low. Some goofy commercial played as I spun around just in time for her to catch my hands and pull me down from the stool. We sat together on the round cushioned seat. It had seemed a strange idea to have this particular piece of furniture in my room when Aunt Dot first suggested it, but now it just seemed right. It belonged here.

  “I have to find Jeopardy. I promised I would find her. Is she at Summerleigh? Have you seen her? I don’t want you to go without me. We have to stick together. Don’t go without me, okay?” Harper said through dry lips. Her eyes still had that glassy look about them, but she was serious. Dead serious. Clearly, Jeopardy weighed on her mind. Harper had barely spoken two words to me since her seizure after Momma’s funeral, and now she wanted to go home? This wasn’t what I expected from her. I thought perhaps she was going to warn me about Harmon, about not kissing him or letting him get to first base, and I wouldn’t have minded if she had warned me. Someone needed to. My life was threatening to spin out of control, and I was already feeling the need to regain some power over it in the only way I knew how. What would I find next to add to my treasure collection?

  “You can go with me, Harper. We have every right to be there—it is our home. Summerleigh will always be home to us. I know bad things happened from time to time, I remember some of it, but we had some happy times too. Remember the kittens and Jeopardy’s castle room? Don’t you remember?”

  “Have you seen Jep? Please tell me the truth.” Harper’s eyes narrowed and her lips quivered at the mention of our lost sister’s name.

  “I have never seen her, Harper. Never. I saw a girl once, but she was transparent. She didn’t have any color to her at all and disappeared in the hallway. I don’t think it was Jeopardy.”

  Harper collapsed on the round couch and rocked back and forth with tears in her eyes. To this day, she couldn’t let Jeopardy go. She was obsessed with finding our sister and bringing her home. I wanted Jeopardy home too, but that wouldn’t fix things. Our family was broken, too broken for anything to be right ever again.

  Desperation kindled spontaneous tears of sympathy. “Harper, please. Don’t leave me. Don’t go back to Birmingham. I think I’ll die if you leave me again. You don’t know what I’ve done, Harper. You just don’t know.” My sister smoothed my hair with her hand. “Jeopardy is gone, probably ran off with that boy from the carnival, you know it’s true. And then Addison married Skinny Frank, and I don’t have anyone. I’ll die if you leave me, Harper.”

  Panicked now, Harper hugged me tightly and whispered, “You won’t die. I’m not leaving forever. Just a little while. You’re doing so well, Loxley. I used to feel guilty that I left you with Aunt Dot, but now I see that it really is for the best. She loves you. She loves you better than any of us, I think.”

  “Why are you crying? What’s happened?” Aunt Dot barreled into my room without knocking, and that’s when I realized she’d been crying too. She crouched down beside us and held us both, and although I’m sure she would have loved an answer to her question, we didn’t have one to give her. “Just look at you, Loxley. You look like a model out of a magazine. You’re just lovely. Isn’t she beautiful, Harper?”

  Before my sister could answer, a car honked in the driveway. I couldn’t imagine who it was. Aunt Dot didn’t date, and Harper didn’t seem interested in anyone, much to the dismay of one Ben Hartley, who hung the moon and stars on her every look in his direction. Imagine attending a funeral just to stare at her? I wiped my eyes as I watched the big blue car pull into the driveway. I guess Harmon had gotten that car after all.

  But how in the world did he know where Aunt Dot and I lived? I never asked him to pick me up, not once. I just assumed he and I would meet up at the dance. Yes, I couldn’t help but smile at seeing tall, lean Harmon step out of the car and button his black jacket. I hardly recognized him with his slicked-back hair and proper suit. Mind you, he never looked a slouch, but he never really dressed up either. We’d gotten to know one another pretty well in the two weeks since Momma’s funeral. We ate all our lunches together, he helped me with a paper for Givens’ class, and I helped him with math. He was as secretive as he always was…I felt so comfortable with him that it didn’t really matter. But I was curious, for sure. Maybe a little more than curious, to be honest. He never talked about his parents; he did mention his brother-in-law and sister a few times, but I got the feeling he wasn’t too connected with either of them.

  “Good evening, Miss Daughdrill. Miss Belle. My name is Harmon. I’m very pleased to meet you. You look a sight, Loxley Belle. I am a lucky fellow. May I drive you to the dance? With your permission, of course, Miss Daughdrill?” Harmon’s polite tone caught my aunt off-kilter. I could see that she was prepared to go full tilt on him for presuming to honk in the driveway. Thankfully, my sweet aunt wasn’t one to embarrass me, but she had her hand on her hip—a sure sign that she didn’t like this at all.

  “I don’t know, Harmon. I am a chaperone for the school dance. I had planned on taking my niece and bringing her home.”

  “I certainly don’t mean to make trouble, ma’am.” Harmon bowed his head slightly and turned to leave. “I came by early to ask if Loxley might go for a soda with me before the dance. A few of the other kids are going.”

  “Aunt Dot,” I whispered like a freight train. “Please,” I added with a pitiful expression and a voice that reminded her that this had been what she wanted. My aunt was always on me to turn off the radio and go be with people my own age, make new friends.

  “Alright, young man, but you must have my niece home by eleven o’clock. No later than that, and I do not like young men honking their car horns in the driveway. Next time, please walk to the door. That is what a gentleman would do.” Aunt Dot flushed beneath her thick layer of makeup. She wore it j
ust for the occasion, and I suddenly felt a little guilty about not riding with her to the dance.

  “Yes, ma’am. I do apologize for my behavior. I suppose I was just a little excited. Please accept my apologies. Loxley? May I?” Harmon extended his hand, and I couldn’t help but melt at the gesture. Nobody had ever taken me to a dance before or offered me their hand or anything else romantic like that. I suddenly felt very afraid about riding with Harmon, who wasn’t much more than a stranger.

  “I will see you at the dance.” My aunt smiled, but it wasn’t a trusting smile. It was the same kind of smile she used whenever she thought the man behind the meat counter shorted her on her roast beef order. My sister stared at me like a life-size doll and slid her arm through our aunt’s arm. Was she crying again?

  “Bye, Loxley. I’ll wait up for you,” Harper said sweetly in her dreamy voice.

  “Bye, Harper! Bye, Aunt Dot!”

  Harmon swung the car door open elegantly and waited for me to ease my fluffy skirt inside and spread it out before he closed the door. I could hardly believe this was happening. I had never imagined that I would be escorted to the dance in such beautiful style. With waves and smiles, we left the driveway and headed toward our high school.

  Chapter Ten—Jerica

  “I knew you were holding out on me, Jerica Clarke. What’s been going on? The energy here at Summerleigh has shifted, seriously shifted. It’s almost frenetic. Have you seen Harper? Why would she come back?” Renee arranged the guest towels on the freshly made bed as I moved the jar of fresh-cut flowers from the nightstand to the dresser. Some people had flower allergies, and I didn’t want to risk a guest having an allergy attack. They were supposed to tell us about those sorts of things when they made their reservations, but people didn’t always think about it. The nagging ache in my back returned as I bent over to arrange the throw pillows. I had my son in his baby backpack carrier, only he was on the front of my body, not my back. I wanted to keep my eyes on him. I hadn’t put him back in that car carrier since the incident in the kitchen.