The Edge of Juniper (3 page)

She gave me a look to let me know what she thought of my joke, but I had been serious.  It was true that Celia tended toward the dramatic and often saw problems where none existed. And it sounded to me like Mr. Dearing wasn’t the problem—her parents’ fighting was.  But avoiding a couple of people was easy enough to do, and if it made Celia and my aunt feel like they had some sort of control over the situation, I figured I could play along. I did not want to cause any disturbance in the Young family while I was their guest.  I’d had enough of that last night.

“Of course you can,” Celia said.  “It’s your job, so you don’t have a choice.”

I walked over to the table where the boys still hovered.  “Excuse me, Malcolm.  Step back and I’ll clear this table for you.”

Malcolm stepped back a bit, and I moved in.  I could feel him looking at my profile.  I tried not to like it, but I could see his easy grin out of the corner of my eye.  What a shame that such a handsome boy was off-limits!

“You know my name; I think it’s only fair I learn yours.”

Realizing my mistake in calling him by name, I stalled by putting a stack of dirty plates in the tub.  Celia wouldn’t like that he was trying to talk to me.  No matter how silly it was, I wanted to keep the peace, and my parents
had
told me to do my best to follow the rules.

I shook my head solemnly at Malcolm, figuring I might as well set him straight.  “I’m afraid there’s no point in telling you my name.  I’ve been told that we are not to associate.”  I gave the table one last swipe and walked away.

At three that afternoon, Celia told me we were off duty.  Heidi hadn’t given me any sort of schedule or anything, so I figured I’d just follow Celia around until I was told otherwise.  My feet were sore from being on them all day, and protested about the walk home.  We took the same route we had that morning, and I was sad to see the bucket on the Dearings’ porch was unoccupied.  I wouldn’t have minded another glimpse of Malcolm.

“What’s on the agenda for tonight?” I asked.

“Nothing.  We have to stay home.”

“Are we grounded?”

“No, my parents don’t usually ground us.  They just yell until they aren’t mad anymore, which works in my favor, if you ask me.  But I’ve been through this enough times to know that if we stay in tonight and don’t anger the beast, we can go out tomorrow.”

I fiddled with my hair, braiding it and unbraiding it, while Celia painted my toenails bright red.  She didn’t trust me to paint her toenails, with good reason, so she had painted them herself.  She used a soft pink.

“Ronan hates when I use red on my nails.”

“That’s ridiculous.”  I wiggled my red toes.  I’d probably meet Ronan soon, and I didn’t care one bit if he liked my nails.

“His mom never uses anything but red, that’s why.  Who wants to be reminded of their mom when they’re on a date?”

“Still seems dumb to me.  Lots of women choose red.  I don’t see why he should care.”

“If you met his mom, you’d understand.”

Arguing with Celia about anything concerning Ronan was useless.  We’d been down that road at least five times already since I’d arrived.  She’d just tell me I’d understand when I had a boyfriend, and I’d tell her no boyfriend of mine would behave like that. Then she’d tell me putting up with some lousy stuff in order to get along was part of being in a relationship, and I’d fume.

So I let it go, and instead, I let her show me how to put on eyeliner, the one makeup item that had always daunted me.  After the lesson, my lines weren’t perfect, but I still liked the way it looked.

Celia stepped back and looked from one of my eyes to the other.  “You should keep that pencil.”

“No, that’s okay.  I can get one of my own next time we go to the store.”

She waved my comment away.  “Keep it. I don’t even know why I bought the brown one. I prefer black.”

I put it with the other things she’d given me—a three-quarters full bottle of perfume she thought clashed with her strawberry-scented body lotion, and a pair of rose earrings she’d received as a gift and had never worn.

“Ronan says I have the most beautiful eyes he’s ever seen.  And not just because I’m so good at makeup.”

I couldn’t figure them out.  One minute he seemed like the worst boyfriend ever, and the next it seemed like maybe he was okay.  And he was right about her eyes.

After dinner, we sat in lawn chairs around Uncle Todd’s fire pit.  Celia lounged in the chair next to me, her head lolled to the side.  I wondered if she was asleep.  The flames whipped around in the breeze, and my cheeks were warm from sitting too close.  I leaned closer and shut my eyes, feeling my eyelids bake.

“You’re going to singe your eyelashes,” Uncle Todd said, his voice slow and easy.

I opened my eyes and watched him take a drink of his beer.  He’d always been a beer drinker, but this summer I noticed he had a bottle or can in hand from the moment he walked in from work until he said good night.  I figured it was a fortunate thing he worked a lot of overtime and didn’t get home until after eight most nights.  “Has that happened to you?”

He laughed softly.  “Yeah. One time I lost both eyebrows and a great many eyelashes lighting the grill.  You don’t realize how important those little hairs are until you look at your face in the mirror without them.  I looked like a damn alien.”

Beside me, Celia laughed but kept her eyes closed and her neck limp.  She was a picture of tranquility.  “You’re not wrong, Dad.  You looked really funny.”

We all laughed and I nestled down into my chair, a folding canvas type that cradled me like a hammock.  As I zoned out staring into the fire, the bugs ramped up their nightly communication, screaming out their lust for each other.  Or maybe they were talking business. 
Hey Lenny, there’s a huge rotten log over here you’ve got to see!  
I smiled to myself at the thought.

Abe dashed out the back door carrying a bag of marshmallows.  He tossed it into my lap triumphantly.  “We got these, special for your visit.”

I didn’t mind the disruption of peace.  Abe had a way of shaking me out of a stupor and making me pay attention to my life.  “Well, all right then.  We better toast these suckers.  Get me a stick?”

Abe dashed away to the edge of the woods, and bent over to peer at the ground for a good roasting stick.  Abe dashed everywhere.  I’d noticed some boys lope, some strut, some simply walk.  Abe was a dasher.

Donna came outside, carrying the rest of the ingredients for S’mores.  She handed Todd some metal roasting rods.  Abe trotted back to me, and proudly displayed the stick he’d found.  “Here, Fay, this one will be perfect.  It’s still green so it won’t burn up.”

Todd reached out and knocked the stick out of Abe’s hand.  “We’re not completely uncivilized around here, young man,” he snapped.

I’d have laughed at the unintentional pun, Abe’s last name being Young, if it weren’t for the apprehension spreading through my body.  Something about my uncle’s tone didn’t sit right.  I poked Celia on the arm, and she sat up.

“But we use sticks all the time for hot dogs, and it’s more fun, anyway,” Abe said.

“You mean to say, ‘Sorry, Sir,’ and to sit your ass down.” Uncle Todd kicked the green stick into the fire, handed me a metal roasting rod, and sank back into his lawn chair.  Abe sat.  Through it all, Celia stared glassy-eyed at the fire.

For about two seconds, I felt guilty and wished I hadn’t asked Abe to find me a stick.  Then I got mad, because neither Abe nor I had done anything wrong.  I swallowed the urge to say something, though it felt terrible going down and sat like a lump in my gut.

A silence pressed down on us.  After an interminable minute or two, Aunt Donna delivered the cure.  “Well, what are you kids waiting on?  Anybody want to roast one for me?”

I loaded my metal stick with marshmallows and passed the bag to Abe.

“I like mine brown as a bear,” Abe said, extracting a marshmallow from the bag.

“It’s brown as a
berry,
not brown as a bear,” Celia told him, and opened the box of graham crackers.

“That’s stupid.  Berries aren’t even brown, they’re red.  Bears are brown.”

Donna smoothed her hands over Abe’s hair and then sat in the chair between him and Todd.  “Celia may be right, but bear does make more sense, if you ask me.”

We ate half the bag of marshmallows, and I was lulled back into a trance by the fire and a full stomach.  The crackling fire, screaming bugs, and sugar coated lips didn’t appear to have a calming effect on my uncle, however.

“Listen to this, Donna.” He spoke deliberately, as though he was trying not to slur his words.  “Lyle Dearing told me today I won’t be training the summer kids this year.”  At that remark, Celia sat up straight and chewed on her lip.  “I’ve trained the summer kids every year for the past five years, and now he goes and gives the job to Artie Torvel.”

“Artie?  Isn’t he just out of high school?” Donna leaned forward, matching Celia’s posture.

“Yes he is, and he can’t handle the job.  Those summer kids are headstrong, and they’ll test him every chance they get.  Artie was just sitting with them in study hall a month ago and now Lyle thinks he can be their boss?  He’s not going to be able to handle it, but that’s what you get when you put a Dearing in charge.”

“Dad,” Celia said, and I didn’t miss the note of anxiety in her voice, “Ronan will make sure the other guys listen.”  Ronan was going to be working with Celia’s dad this summer, a fact which thoroughly impressed her.  It wasn’t easy to snag a full-time summer job in the factories out here.

“Well that’s just the point isn’t it, Celia?  If they need some kid to keep them in line, their manager must be worthless.  And Artie Torvel is a good-for-nothing kid.  It’s another stupid decision made by Dearing, and I’m losing the three-dollar-an-hour bonus that comes with the summer training.”  He took a long swallow of his beer.

Uncle Todd had cast out many remarks over the years alluding to the fact that he did not find it fair that my parents made decent money.  He’d say things like, “Another vacation, Gill?  Didn’t you just get away last year?” and, “Those are nice shoes.  Bet they cost you a pretty penny.”  In a way I understood it.  It’s not like my dad worked harder than Uncle Todd.  They both worked hard.  My dad grew up in the sort of family that was able to send him to college.  Uncle Todd grew up in the sort of family that was happy to be able to buy the kids new socks when they needed them.

“Well, I told Ronan all about what an idiot Mr. Dearing is.  He won’t be listening to a word he says.”  Celia sat back, looking pleased with herself.  She glanced at me.  “I still never say a word to any of them when I see them, and I told Fay to do the same.”

Her remark had the desired effect.  Uncle Todd raised his beer bottle at her and winked.  “There’s a good girl.”  She beamed.

It seemed as though Celia inherited her drama gene from her father.  She may have come by it honestly, but the whole thing still seemed bizarre to me.  I was learning Uncle Todd was the kind of person who never found any fault on his own side of the fence.

The part of me that doesn’t like to be told what to do was hatching plans to find a Dearing, any Dearing, and become best friends.  Then I thought about my parents, plastering and painting walls for children eager to learn.  I imagined them wearing dirty clothes and laughing and working and talking and saving their marriage.  I knew I needed to toe the line.

3

C
elia came out
of the bathroom with a swimsuit slung over her arm and a towel draped around her neck.  I perked up, hoping she was planning to walk through their woods to the creek, to catch crawdads and search for crinoid fossils like we’ve done a hundred times before.  Something about the cool water tickling our ankles soothed us and loosened us up, and we’d talk about anything that came to mind.  Celia and I had very few barriers between us, and that was never as true as when we were in nature together.  She used to love the muddy creek, but the last couple of years we hadn’t gone there much.

“We don’t work today,” she said. “I’m going to hang out with Esta.  You want to come?”

The idea of cool water had me considering it.  The Youngs didn’t have air conditioning, and I was beyond tired of sticky, sweaty skin.  “You’re going swimming?”

“Probably, later in the afternoon, when we’re bored and too hot to breathe.  I want to get some sun; Ronan likes my tan.”

“Do I get a vote?  I like you pale.”

She stuck her tongue out at me, but smiled.  “So, you coming?”

The lure of the water was strong, but not strong enough to convince me to spend the
entire
day with Esta.  I planned to endear myself to her in smaller chunks of time.  I burrowed further down into my pillow.  “I think I’ll just hang out here today.”

Celia narrowed her eyes at me.  “Why?  Mom’s going to be home all day.  There’s nothing to do but rot on the couch.”

Esta wouldn’t want me to come, and I figured Celia knew that too, but I didn’t want to put that into words.  I went with a different explanation, also true.  “I still feel weird about upsetting your mom.  I want to stay here and let her lay eyes on me, as proof that I’m not causing trouble.”

Celia lifted her chin.  “You don’t have to do that.  We stayed home last night, and Mom never did tell Dad we snuck out.”

I felt squeezed tight.  Celia could tell that her parents were making me nervous, and
I
could tell she didn’t like that I felt that way.  “I know, but…I just want to stick around here.  Maybe spend some time with Abe.”

She shrugged.  “Alright, but if you change your mind, call me on Esta’s cell.”  Neither Celia nor I had a cell phone.  Celia’s family couldn’t afford it.  Mine could, but they thought it was another thing that shouldn’t be handed to me.  A car was far more valuable to me, so I was working for that, not a phone.

Celia left, and I wandered to the kitchen to find something to eat.  I stood looking into the fridge when Aunt Donna walked in.  “Breakfast was an hour ago.  Kitchen’s closed.”

I straightened up.  “Oh.  I’m sorry.  I didn’t know.”  Who ever heard of a closed kitchen?

She waved her hand dismissively.  “We started a new policy this year.  Your uncle likes us to eat meals together when we’re home, so we eat at seven o’clock, seven days a week.  Tomorrow you’ll be up earlier, I’m guessing.”  She tied an apron around her middle, and set to work filling a bucket with hot water.  “I’m also guessing Olive doesn’t make you do chores at home?”

Her voice was pleasant, but I felt the barb.  Usually when I visited, it was treated like a vacation.  Well, for me anyway—probably my parents helped with the chores.  I had never been a long-term houseguest before.  I’d been careful to clean up after myself, not get in the way, and not let my mouth run away with me.  That in itself had seemed like a lot of work, but it was true I hadn’t done any chores since I’d arrived.  My face burned and my tongue froze.

“No sense worrying about it.  You can help me this morning.”

Abe walked into the kitchen then.  He gave me an apologetic look, and handed me a can of Pledge and a dust rag.

I squeezed the can, my embarrassment quickly giving way to frustration.  Aunt Donna could have just asked me to help out, without insinuating that my mother spoiled me.  They were an extremely close pair of sisters, and just as competitive as they were close.  She’d probably tell my mom I wasn’t being helpful around the house.

Abe went to a cabinet and pulled out a broom.  “Put on the cleaning music, Mom.”

Donna smiled warmly at Abe, and turned on the kitchen radio loud enough so it could be heard through the house.

“Yes, I do chores at home,” I mumbled quietly, so only Abe could hear, and followed him into the living room.

Once we were clear of Donna’s ears, I said, “Well, I feel like an idiot.” I hated not knowing what was expected of me.

“You’re not an idiot.”  He pulled the couch out from the wall and began sweeping behind it. 

I squirted the end table and wiped it down.  “She’s right that I haven’t done any housework up to this point.”

“Neither has anyone.  Friday is cleaning day, and that’s today.”

I sighed, letting go of my frustration.  Maybe by the end of my time here I’d have the place figured out.  “Abe, I have decided, starting right now, I’m going to pay more attention when the grown-ups are talking.”

He made a disgusted face.  “I don’t know; that’s pretty boring.  You should probably keep on ignoring them.  Trust me; they’ll let you know if you missed something important.”

“True.”  I sank down behind the couch where he had finished sweeping, and wiped the baseboard back there.  “Hey, Celia skipped out on cleaning day.  That hardly seems fair.”

“Nah.  She has different chores.  She has to cook dinner three times a week and wash the sheets and towels.”

“Oh.”  There were several dead moths in the corner that Abe had missed with the broom, so I folded them into my rag.  “So, Celia’s been with Ronan a while now, huh?”  I was fishing, though I didn’t know what I hoped to catch.  I wanted to figure out why, when Celia tried to explain why Ronan was perfect, I came away liking him less.

“Yeah, I guess.”  His voice came from up high, and I crawled out from behind the couch to see him standing on the end table knocking cobwebs from the corner with the broom.

I pushed the couch back where it belonged.  “What do you think of him?”

Abe shrugged.  “He doesn’t come around much, and when he does, Celia tells me to get lost.”

I laughed.  “I suppose she does.”

Donna came into the living room and shooed Abe off the end table.  “When you’re done sweeping, you better get started on those sticks.  It might take a while.  Be sure you double check, to make certain you’ve got them all.”  She handed Abe a trash bag before heading back to the kitchen.

Abe looked at me sheepishly.  “At breakfast, Dad told me to pick up the sticks in the yard.”

“Oh.”  I mulled that over, not liking the way it clunked around my mind.  “I’ll help you, when I’m done with the dusting.”

“No, he told me to do it, and I will.  Besides, usually I have to clean the hall bathroom, and I’d rather pick up sticks, if I’m honest.”  He grinned at me, finished sweeping, and left through the front door.

After I dusted the furniture in the bedrooms and dining room, I cleaned the hall bathroom—in case Donna planned to ask Abe to do that after he finished with the sticks.

I still hadn’t eaten, and my stomach rioted against me.  I went to the kitchen to wash my hands, and asked Donna what was next.

She grabbed a banana off the counter and handed it to me.  “That’s plenty, I’ll finish up.  I appreciate your help.”

The banana felt like a blessing.  I went to Celia’s room, which didn’t yet feel like my room too, and sat on my bed to eat it.  After a shower and a little practice with my new eyeliner, I grabbed a random book off Celia’s shelf and headed out to the back yard.  Maybe I could hang out with Abe for a while.

When I got out there, he was closing up the trash bag.  Several sticks were poking holes through the plastic.  “Hey, Abe, want to hang out with me?”

“I would, but Mom told me I could go to Jeremy’s house.”

“You’re deserting me, too?”  I tucked my book under my arm and took the bag from him, gingerly carrying the thoroughly punctured thing to the trash bin.

“Yeah.  Jeremy’s mom doesn’t care how long we play video games.”

“Well, have fun.  I’ll just have to find something else to do.”

“Just don’t do anything with a stick,” he said, in a voice much like Uncle Todd’s.  “It’s uncivilized.”  He laughed at his own joke, and then walked around the side of the house.  When I couldn’t see him anymore, I heard him shout, “Bye Fayby!”

I dragged a lounge chair into a patch of shade in the middle of the back yard.  The shade was a great deal cooler than the sun, but still hot enough to make me wish I’d gone with Celia.  I settled back into the chair and looked at the book I’d grabbed.  The cover had a picture of a bosomy woman and a man whose pecs were nearly as big as the woman’s boobs.  I was fascinated. I looked around.  Hardly anyone had a privacy fence in Juniper.  I could look right and see the back yards of four houses before a strategically placed garden shed blocked the view.  To the left was just woods.  I didn’t see anyone, so I dove into the naughty book.

An hour later, I was lost in the 1700s, with a man named Claudio and his barbaric and sexy ways.  I was so engrossed, in fact, that I barely registered the sound of a lawn mower starting up next door.  Claudio was about to kiss Jasmina for the first time, when someone spoke from my right. “Good book you have there?”

I jumped and slammed the cover closed.  “Holy dang!  Do
not
sneak up on me like that!”  I looked up into the grinning face of Malcolm Dearing.

“Holy dang?”  His impossibly wide grin grew even wider.

I looked nervously toward the kitchen window, hoping Aunt Donna had finished the dishes and moved on to the laundry, which was in the basement.  “What are you doing here?”

“Just thought I’d say hi.  We’re mowing next door.”

“Oh.  Hi.  But I don’t think you should come over here, Malcolm.”

He shifted the Weed Eater he was holding to the other arm.  My weed whacker fantasy from yesterday had come to life. Lying there like that made me feel vulnerable, so I swung my legs over the side of the lounge chair and stood facing him.  He had grass clippings in his hair and stuck to his forearms.  He made no move to leave.

“Really, though.  You can’t be in this yard.”

“Why not?”

“This is the Young house.”

“Okay?”

“Todd Young.  He works for your father?”

Malcolm furrowed his brow.  He had very nice, thick eyebrows.  “I know who the Youngs are.  Everybody knows everybody, here.  But why am I not welcome in their yard?”

I stared at the ground, puzzling over the fact that he didn’t seem to know.  “I think it’s a personal thing between your dad and my uncle.” I whispered, even though no one else was around to hear.  “You didn’t know this?”

“My dad keeps business and family separate.”

I shifted my weight from one foot to the other, thinking that over.  I didn’t want to reveal anything Celia would want me to keep quiet.  “Okay, but this family is different.  If you stay in this yard, and my aunt sees you, she’ll come flying out that back door screaming at you.”

His eyes widened in surprise for a moment, then he smiled slyly.  “So you’re protecting me?”

I squinted at him.  “I’m just trying to keep the peace.”  I heard my heartbeat in my ears, and I kept glancing at the kitchen window, searching for any sign of Aunt Donna.  Keeping other people’s secrets wasn’t good for my cortisol levels.

He didn’t move.  The sun glinted off his hair, revealing red highlights hidden within the messy, nut-brown mass.  “Is this why Celia’s always giving me death glares?”

I nearly laughed, but stopped myself.  “Malcolm, I really shouldn’t talk to you about this.”  I hated how pleading my voice sounded.

Malcolm studied my face, his features easing from confusion to compassion.  He clearly didn’t understand what was going on, but he understood I was uncomfortable.  I watched as he walked backwards until he was ten feet away from me, effectively past the property line and in the neighbor’s yard.  “How’s this?  Am I safe?”

My aim was to be serious, but a traitorous smile found my lips.  “That’ll do.”

“So, can I get your name today?”

“No.  I can’t encourage this consorting.”  Apparently part of my brain was still stuck in the 1700s with Claudio and Jasmina.

He shook his head and laughed.  “Alright, then.  Enjoy that book.” He hitched up the Weed Eater and turned away from me.

I lay back down and tried to get reabsorbed into Jasmina’s world.  I found myself sneaking peeks at the yard next door.  I watched Malcolm trim the grass around a swing set.  I read a whole page before I allowed myself another glance.  He had moved on to the propane tank.  When my eyes reached his face, he turned his head and noticed me.  Caught!  I turned my face back to my book, grinning.

A bit later, the lawn mower stopped, and the sudden silence numbed my ears.  I peered over the top of the book, and saw another guy walking my way. It was the same one who’d come into the restaurant with Malcolm yesterday.

“Hi,” he said.  He had ash blond hair and was tall and lanky, stretching in every direction.  He even walked loose, like he was made of springs.