In my dream, I reach for her, take her slender shoulders in my hands. Her long black hair twines between my fingers. Who are you? I plead with her. She tilts her head to one side, revealing the graceful curve of her throat. I want to touch her—I want—
I wake up with a jolt, my heart racing, my head full of confusion. Why am I dreaming about a girl other than my girlfriend—a girl I don't even know?
Sitting up, I scrub my hands across my face. Jenny is coming over today. We're having lunch at my mom's house, even though Jenny and my mom can't stand each other. Ironic, since my mom helped set us up, through her girlfriend, Marianne. Jenny teaches piano to Marianne's kids. It all seemed like a good idea at the time.
I spend the morning in my workshop, trying to sand away the memory of that dream. When my doorbell rings, I sigh and run a hand through my hair and tell myself lunch will be fine.
Jenny stands on my front stoop, her arms hugged tight to her chest.
"Ready?" she says, instead of hello.
"Sure." Sometimes, I invite her in, and sometimes, she accepts. But I can never quite shake the feeling that she doesn't like being alone with me in my house. She knows the whole story—everyone in Bellisle does, pretty much, just like everyone on Fall Island does. I think Marianne must have convinced her to give me a chance. It's been months. I wonder if she will ever believe me. I suppose this is the best I can hope for.
I open the screen door, and an envelope falls from the door to the stoop.
"What is that?" Jenny snatches it up before I can grab it. She tears it open while I look on, trying to summon the energy to care about what will inevitably be inside.
"Owen," Jenny says sternly. "Another one?"
As usual, the letter is made of words cut out from magazines. It says a lot of garbage about what a monster I am and how I will wake up one night to find a knife in my chest. It doesn't make a lot of sense. They never do. They're like something a twisted little kid who watches too many scary movies would write.
I take the letter from her, ignoring her angry frown, and toss it behind me onto my kitchen table.
"Aren't you going to deal with it?" Jenny demands.
"No."
"Why not? You aren't even going to call Lacroix?"
"What's he going to do? He's got dozens of them at the station already."
We start walking, cutting through the forest to my mom's house. I know Jenny would rather be on a road than alone with me in the woods, but she won't risk being seen with me on the island. She says she doesn't like being stared at.
"I can't believe you're not going to go to the police," Jenny snaps suddenly.
"Jenny—" My tone must be annoyed, because she flinches. "Sorry," I say quietly.
She just shakes her head.
We cross into the coffee shop's parking lot, where pale midday sunshine glitters on the frost clinging to the gravel. The low murmur of conversation comes from the dirt driveway just past the shop, including my mom's voice, and I wonder if Marianne has stopped by for lunch, too. That would be a huge help, and I'm praying for the sight of Marianne's steel-gray hair and rosy face as we walk to the driveway.
Instead, it's her. Miranda. Walking with my mom towards the top of the hill. She's wearing a short, dark blue dress and--my favorite--black stockings that highlight every full curve in her legs. She turns to face me, her dark skin flushing prettily. The strange dream I had this morning flares to life. Would she let me touch her like that? Would she be so vulnerable with me—let me kiss her throat, wrap her gorgeous hair around my hand and pull it, just a little, just enough to say mine?
I shake the dream away. She's not mine—she never will be.
When the dream fades, I notice, for the first time, that she's holding the biggest pie box I've ever seen.
"What is that?" I say, bewildered.
"It's a pie," she says, with a little smile, "that your mom made?"
Of course. God bless her, but my mom is not a cook. Meanwhile poor Miranda is stuck carrying a pie that weighs as much as a horse.
I close the distance between us without thinking. Our eyes meet. Hers are wide with curiosity. I feel that pull towards her again, and I don't know why but I'm suddenly restless, almost crazy with restlessness. I take the pie before I can say or do something stupid and walk away, towards my mom's house. Behind me, I hear my mom ask Jenny if I'm all right, and Jenny says, treacherously: "He got another death threat this morning."
It will only worry my mother. She's done enough worrying about me already.
I shoulder my way through the gate into the backyard, where the dogs are running around, playing with a tire. Setting the pie on the deck railing, I sink down on the deck steps. My mom's Harlequin Great Dane, Keats, trots up to me. I pat my leg, and he rests his head on my knee. He's my favorite. Unlike me, he has an excellent temperament.
The gate opens, and this time, the girl steps through. The dogs, excited to meet a stranger, go pelting towards her. She freezes, pressing her hands to her mouth.
"Byron, sit," I tell the ringleader, and he skids to a stop in front of her, still wriggling. She stares down at him.
"Byron, shake," I say, trying not to smile.
The dog lifts a paw, and she shakes it very carefully with both hands. He wriggles again and gives her a big slobbery kiss, making her laugh. I've never seen her laugh before.
"How do you get them to listen to you like that?" she asks, wiping her face. "It's amazing."
I shrug. I've had years to get used to my mom's menagerie of pets. It's nothing special.
The gate opens again. My heart sinks as Jenny and my mom walk past me into the kitchen. Jenny shoots me an icy glare. I wonder, with a rush of shame, if she noticed the way I looked at Miranda earlier. Maybe it's not working with Jenny—maybe it never did—but she doesn't deserve to be treated like that.
"Why do you get death threats?" Miranda says all of the sudden, then claps her hand to her forehead. "I am so sorry, that was an incredibly awful thing to ask you--"
"No," I say, looking up at her. "It's all right." Nobody's ever asked me that, because everybody's always known exactly why. And they're equally sure I deserve it.
"I feel like I know you," she says. "I mean... your mum talks about you a lot."
There's that little flicker of an accent again—British, maybe, but mixed with other tones that remind me of Spanish. It's... sexy. Really sexy.
She asked you a question, idiot, I remind myself. "I'll tell you about it sometime," is what I find myself saying. When on earth would I do that—and why? Someone will tell her soon enough, and then she won't want anything to do with me.
"I got that job at the Widow's Walk, you know," she says. "Thank you for the tip."
"Glad I could help." I am glad--gladder than I can let on. "Andy's a great guy."
"He is." She smiles wryly. "He might be the most high-energy person I've ever met."
"You know he does triathlons?" I'm smiling, too.
"I thought it was half-marathons?"
"It's both," I assure her. Her smile widens, but before I can tell her about Andy signing up to do Tough Mudder, the sliding door opens, and Jenny pokes her head outside.
"Your mom is confused about salad dressing," she says, glancing from me to Miranda and scowling.
"I was just thanking Owen for giving me a tip on getting a job here," Miranda says lightly. "At the Widow's Walk. I'm sure you know it."
"No, I don't. What is it?"
"It's a pub, downtown?"
"A bar. I never go to bars." Her voice is full of scorn. She is better than this. It's like I bring out the worst in her.
I stand up, suppressing another sigh, and head inside. My mom is standing at the kitchen counter, peering at a cookbook through her reading glasses while smoke pours out of the oven. The thing about my mom is that she's always focused and on-task at the shop, but she doesn't save any of that for her own life. I'm always worried she's going to burn the house down.
"Oh, thank you, sweetie," she says distractedly as I take the smoking casserole out of the oven. It looks all right. I set about making some garlic bread and a salad and am finished with both before my mom has figured out what kind of dressing to make. "I've got it," I tell her gently as I dig the olive oil out of a cupboard.
"You're so good," she says, smiling, which makes me laugh.
Lunch is awkward. My mom keeps up a steady stream of talk. She tries asking Jenny about her piano lessons, but when that goes nowhere, she ends up talking to Miranda about poetry. Miranda's lovely face lights up when she talks about Shakespeare and her Shakespeare professor dad. And that alone makes this whole day worthwhile.
Just as lunch is almost over, Miranda's phone rings. She jumps about half a foot, her face stark with fear. When she looks at the screen, her expression shades into puzzlement. She excuses herself and goes outside to take the call.
A moment later, I go into the kitchen myself, ignoring Jenny's look of irritation. Through the glass sliding door, I can see Miranda standing in the middle of the deck, facing away from the house, her shoulders tense and shivering through the thin fabric of her dress.
As intensely curious as I am, I don't want to listen in. I turn on the dishwasher and go back into the dining room. But at the table, I can't sit still, thinking of her.
I get up again, pluck her leather jacket off her chair, and walk back to the sliding door again. She's off the phone now and is petting Byron tentatively while he wags his tail, all gentleness. She looks very small next to him.
Stepping outside, I draw the door shut after me. She glances sidelong at me, her eyes big and solemn and rimmed with red, as if she's been crying. I want to know who made her cry so I can beat his face in.
Wordless, I offer the jacket to her. She stares at it as if she's forgotten what it is.
"Cold out here," I say.
She licks her lips, swollen with tears, and ducks her head in a nod. "Thank you," she murmurs, as she shrugs her jacket on. "It's been... kind of an awkward lunch, hasn't it?"
"Guess so." How could it have been anything else, with both Jenny and Miranda here? I'll never understand my mother.
"So... you guys heard all of that?" she asks softly.
"It was pretty loud in the kitchen," I tell her. "I put the dishwasher on the pots and pans cycle."
She laughs a little. A single tear slips from her lashes, falling onto her collar.
I can't help stepping closer, wishing I could touch her. "You okay?"
I recognize the lost expression in her eyes--I have seen it, many times, in the mirror.
For a second, I think she might speak: her lips part, and she moves even a little bit closer to me, as if I'm a comfort. But then she looks away, past me, and her dark eyebrows draw together with dismay.
"I think Jenny wants you."
"What?" I glance over my shoulder to where Jenny is frowning at me through the glass. "Oh. Right."
Miranda and I shuffle away from each other.
My mom opens the door. "Leaving already, Miranda?"
"Afraid so." She manages a smile. "Thanks so much for lunch. It was delicious."
"I almost forgot the pie!" Claire says. "You have to take a slice with you."
Miranda follows my mom inside, while Jenny slips outside onto the deck. "So," Jenny says, frowning at the wooden planks under her feet.
I feel like I should apologize, but I don't know where to begin.
"Your mom agrees with me about the death threat," Jenny says. "That we should take it to the police."
Despite her tone, I can't help noticing that she used the word "we". She included herself in this. She does care for me, I am sure of it, even if I don't understand how she can care for someone she thinks may be a monster.
I look, just for a second, into the house, as if Miranda will still be in my line of sight. But of course she isn't. Swallowing, I nod, too worn out to argue. "Okay, Jen. If that's what you want."
******
I swear I intended to show a more likeable side of Jenny in this scene.... but I don't think I succeeded! :-) What did you guys think of this scene from Owen's point of view? He's so closed off, isn't he?? Good thing Miranda shows up to (eventually) rattle him out of his shell.
There's only one short scene left now, to be posted next Friday! As always, thank you SO much for reading! It has been so fun sharing these scenes with you guys.
xoxo,
London