Shadowed Summer (15 page)

Collette swiped a curl from her eyes, marveling at this message from the past. “He called himself Eli.”

“That’s what Uncle Lee called him, too,” I said with a shrug.

Searching there felt like a waste of time once I found out that Ben’s daddy barely knew Elijah and, worse yet, hadn’t saved anything personal.

We’d found a couple of pictures and an old letterman jacket that smelled like mothballs, but most of the treasure consisted of old trophies and report cards. Collette had fun teasing Ben about his daddy’s D in economics, but that was about it.

I was ready to call it off, and not just because we hadn’t found anything. The only way that attic could have been hotter was if it caught fire. In secret, I wished I would faint, first, because I’d never done it before and wondered what it would be like, and second, because I thought passing out would be a real good way to end the attic search.

It didn’t happen, though. I got hotter and sweatier, but my brain stayed awake, like it was determined to thwart me. I dumped a pile of English papers back in the box and stood up. “There’s nothing up here.”

“We still have four more boxes,” Collette said with a whine. She gestured at a collection of milk crates that anybody could see had nothing in them but a bunch more papers.

Since I couldn’t convince myself to faint, I said the first thing I thought. “Well, then you stay here. I’m going to Old Mrs. Landry’s.”

I sounded so sure that Ben and Collette both scrambled to their feet and followed me like rats after a piper. Of course, I got halfway down the street and wanted to change my mind. It would be a horrible thing to mess with an old lady, especially one who wasn’t right in the head. My heart beat fast, then slowly, mixing up dread with shame, but I forced myself to walk. I’d made my first big move toward being the boss, or at least not being bossed anymore, and backing down would have ruined that.

My stomach got tight when we turned the corner. Old Mrs. Landry’s house stood off from the others, its white paint peeling down to gray, the front screen pocked with holes.

The yard might have been tidy once. There was evidence of that, because flowers still grew along the paths, but they’d gone wild. Orange freckled tiger lilies nodded their heavy heads, and their green sword leaves scratched at the front steps, spilling into grass that needed mowing.

I rubbed my dirty hands on my jeans as I approached the front step. On a nail next to the door, a crucifix swayed, the pained, bleeding Jesus looking at me with sadness even though his eyes were closed.

Guilt rose up to choke me, and for a brief, hysterical minute, I thought I might faint after all. I could hear the tiger lilies sanding the porch, Ben and Collette breathing behind me, and my own heartbeat.

Somehow I made myself knock, but I was so wound up listening to the tiniest things that I nearly screamed when Old Mrs. Landry appeared in the door.

Her face was pale, round as the moon, and she looked out at us as if she didn’t understand something. Instead of opening the door, she grabbed the handle and held it closed. She blinked slowly, then asked in a dry, powdery voice, “What do you want?”

Somebody, most likely Collette, jabbed me in the back. I’d turned into some kind of puppet, because that nudge woke my tongue, and I heard myself talking from far away. “We wanted to ask you about Elijah, ma’am, if you wouldn’t mind.”

Old Mrs. Landry narrowed her eyes. “Who sent you over here?”

That wasn’t what I expected her to say, so I looked back at Ben and Collette for guidance. Ben just shrugged, and Collette made a face like she was sorry. Before I turned back, I saw Collette reach for Ben’s hand. He didn’t push it away, and my heart sank. They were useless.

Facing Old Mrs. Landry again, I tried to meet her gaze, but the screen played tricks on my eyes. She looked close, then far away; then all I could see was a net of tiny gray squares.

Shaking my head to get my focus to behave, I shoved my hands in my pockets and said, “Nobody, ma’am. We’re just interested.”

“Oh, are you, now?”

I didn’t recognize this Old Mrs. Landry; she was hard—not like the woman who traded candies for prayers on the church steps. Her teeth flashed when she talked, and her head twitched with each word, like it took her whole body just to say something.

Flattening herself against the screen, she raised her voice to a shout. “I guess you want a tour of his room, too? And if I wouldn’t mind, could you have a drink out of his favorite cup? And if I’d be so kind as to give you something that belonged to him? That kind of interested?”

“No, ma’am, no. I just—”

“I know what you just!” Old Mrs. Landry swung the door open. Its rusted hinges screamed, and the frame hit my shoulder, knocking me down.

Struggling to my feet, I cringed when Old Mrs. Landry came down on me. Her fingers dug hard into my chin; she forced me to meet her eyes. Even in the heat of summer, her touch was cold.

“Jackie didn’t take enough of my boy? Now he’s sending his brat after a piece, too?”

I felt hands on my shoulders—Ben and Collette trying to drag me back. Ben kept whispering, “Come on,” urgent and strained. My feet were stuck in place, though, and I think I would have stood there all day and all night if Old Mrs. Landry hadn’t shoved me.

She didn’t push hard, but it was enough to knock me off balance. I fell past Ben and slid against the walk, scraping my hands on the concrete. Collette hauled me to my feet again.

With her eyes open so wide that white showed all the way around the brown irises, Old Mrs. Landry raised a hand high over her head and screamed, “You get the hell away from my house!”

Collette yanked my wrist, dragging me down the walk. She didn’t even look both ways as she shoved me across the street; she was too busy looking back to make sure Old Mrs. Landry wasn’t following us. If walking up to the house had been in slow motion, running away from it was in fast-forward.

Everything blurred; I knew we’d started running, but we moved so fast I couldn’t think or talk. I didn’t feel sick until we collapsed at Collette’s.

Angry, embarrassed tears stung my eyes, and I trembled when Ben and Collette crowded around me. Ben turned my hands over in his own, his touch soft as butterflies. That distracted me; it seemed wrong. His hands should have been rough and bandaged like my daddy’s.

He slipped away from me, and I heard him say something about asking Mrs. Lanoux for some peroxide before the door wheezed shut. Rubbing my back, Collette leaned her head against mine and whispered comfort to me. She smelled like honey. “She’s crazy, Iris. She’s crazy.”

I nodded but didn’t say anything. I could still see Old Mrs. Landry’s eyes, her hand rising to hit me, and that stole all the sound from my throat.

She wasn’t just a little funny in the head. She
was
crazy, and still, I almost wanted to go back—
almost
—just to ask what pieces my daddy still had.

Collette sat beside me on the front porch. A brown bottle of peroxide was tucked between her knees. Pulling paper towels from her pocket, she snapped her fingers lightly at me, and I held out my hands.

“Told Mrs. Lanoux you got a splinter,” Ben said.

Rooster ran circles around us. “That don’t look like a splinter to me.” He stuck his head down to peer at my hands, then bounced away when Collette shoved him. “I’m gonna have to tell Mama you lied.”

“He didn’t either,” Collette said, indignant. “There’s some splinters in there.” Threatening Rooster with a half-raised hand, she glowered until he pinballed as far from me as he could go without leaving.

He picked a board in the porch and pretended to balance on it, putting one foot in front of the other with careful concentration. “I’m probably gonna have to tell.”

Frowning, Ben caught him by the belt to hold him still. “How about you go inside and get us a soda? I’ll give you a dollar.”

“Dollar fifty,” Rooster countered, swinging his arms in circles so wide he nearly hit Collette in the nose. “Plus tax.”

Ben dug into his pocket and shoved crumpled green into Rooster’s hand. “That’s two. Now go on.”

“You better not do that again,” Collette said, though it didn’t sound like she disapproved. “I can’t afford to pay him every time I want him to go away.”

I picked flecks of dirt out of my hand, then gritted my teeth as Collette poured peroxide over the scrapes again. White froth bubbled up instantly and stung. “Maybe we could save up and send him away for good.”

Collette nodded. “I like that plan.”

“I bet he’d walk to Sorrento for ten dollars.” Ben grinned, then reached in to pat my hand with a paper towel.

Suddenly, Rooster came running back, tripping over his own feet. “The police are at your house, Iris!”

“That’s not funny,” Collette snapped.

“I’m serious!” Rooster jabbed a finger in the direction of my house. “There’s two cars out front, with the lights on and everything!”

“Are you sure it’s mine and not the Delancies’?”

When Rooster nodded, my insides ground to a halt. I stood and got my feet moving, though I wasn’t sure how. Almost everywhere, I was numb, and where I wasn’t numb, I was afraid. A single, awful thought repeated over and over again:

What have you done now, Elijah?

chapter eleven

A
lmost in tears, I burst into the house and nearly fell to my knees when I saw Daddy whole and healthy standing in the living room. Deputy Wood was there, with the same trooper who’d come when I called about the rocks. When they saw me, their smiles dimmed.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Where have you been?” Daddy asked, his mouth a flat white line as he waited for an answer.

I could tell he wanted to fly up on me, his temper kept in check only because the police were there. Swallowing, I shrank. My voice cracked and I said, “Collette’s.”

Daddy’s eyes turned darker. “Don’t you lie to me, Iris.”

“I’m not!” I exploded with a little more righteous indignation than I was due, but I hadn’t lied. I
had
just come from Collette’s. Pointing at the door I said, “Ask her!”

“Babette Landry says you were trespassing in her yard.” Deputy Wood raised a brow, waiting for me to deny it. Then he added, “And throwing rocks at her windows.”

“I did not! All I did was knock on her door! I didn’t throw anything!”

Daddy got harder by the second. “You’re not helping yourself.”

“I didn’t throw any rocks!” Crossing my arms, I glared at all three of them and churned with hatred for Old Mrs. Landry. I wanted to throw up every cinnamon she’d ever given me. “Me and Ben and Collette walked up on her porch to ask her about Elijah! She’s the one who went crazy!”

Instead of getting me out of trouble, that got me into more. Daddy looked at me in disbelief. “Now, why would you go and do something like that? What on earth is wrong with you?”

I thrust my hands up for him to see the scrapes, waiting for him to realize I was the victim, not Old Mrs. Landry. “I just wanted to ask what he was like, and she pushed me off her porch!”

Daddy turned cold. “Go to your room.”

“But I didn’t do anything!”

“I said go to your room!” Daddy roared so loud I could have sworn the pictures rattled on the walls.