Circle of Secrets (13 page)

Gwen sits up. “And there’s a key. It looks jest like my key —” She goes to her dresser and pulls out a jewelry box, then gives me a meaningful look.

“Do you really think it will fit?” I ask, unclasping the bracelet and holding out the key separate from the rest of the charms.

Gwen inserts the key into the jewelry box lock and instantly the lid pops open.

The room tilts and whirls like a ride at a carnival. “How can
my
key open
your
jewelry box?”

From the depths of the jewelry box, Gwen pulls out her own charm bracelet. Without a word, she lays it across her yellow bedspread.

“See, Shelby?” she says. “My bracelet has a carved box and a French fleur-de-lis and an owl and a key and a locket —”

“And,” I add, my throat dry as dust,
“we both have a blue bottle charm
”

C
HAPTER
E
LEVEN

M
Y VOICE PRACTICALLY GASPS OUT THE NEXT WORDS, “Do
you have a birthstone charm, too?”

Gwen picks out a charm and holds it apart so I can see the sparkly gold-colored stone. “Topaz for November. I’ll be twelve in a couple of months.”

“What’s inside your little carved box?” Gwen cracks it open with a fingernail and shows me a few dark bits of green leaf flakes. “Herbs. My mamma is a
traiteur.
She gave me the bracelet and a couple charms to start and I get to add to it every now and then.”

Goose bumps rise like braille on my arms. “Your mamma is a
traiteur? My
mamma is a
traiteur
!
Look,”
I whisper, holding out my arm so she can see the goose bumps on my skin.

Gwen holds out her own arms to show me the goose bumps she has, too. “We’re twins!”

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

“What are you thinking?”

I shake my head. “I’m not sure, but I got the strangest feeling. Something really weird is going on.”

“That is
for sure,”
Gwen says, and her voice is low and spooked.

The next instant, I grab at her hand again. “We both have a baby gator charm! Your gator has black eyes, mine has red eyes. Almost just alike.”

Gwen counts the charms dangling from both bracelets. “We have exactly eight charms each.”

I study the two bracelets side by side. “I wonder what that means.” It’d be impossible to believe if I didn’t see it with my own eyes. Then I think of something else. “Gwen, do you have any pictures inside your locket?”

“’Course, I do. Me and my best friend in the whole world.” She snaps open the locket and shows me the tiny cut-out photos of herself and a dark-haired girl.

Gwen and her friend are complete opposites, one golden blond and the other girl with long dark hair and a solemn expression. Her chin is sort of down like she’s shy, but her big black eyes are looking upward, like she suddenly got curious and stared right into the camera.

“My locket is exactly the same,” I say, digging into the edge of the gold oval and snapping it open. “But I only have plain pieces of yellowish paper where the photos should be.”

“Probably these charms were bought at the very same charm store right here in Bayou Bridge.” Gwen lies back against the bed and gazes at the ceiling. “Strangest day I ever had in my whole life.”

“What time is it?” I ask, still studying the nearly identical twin charm bracelets. I feel like I’m inside a snow globe and someone shook the world so hard I’m floating upside down.

“’Bout three o’clock.”

“Can you take me home? I mean, back across the bayou? I need to get to the town docks.”

“’Course I can.”

I can tell we’re both thinking lots of strange thoughts as we head toward the bedroom door. I take one last look at Anna Marie, the porcelain doll sitting with her serene smile in the glass cabinet case, then we climb down the stairs, down the porch, and get into the pirogue to paddle back across.

The sun is pounding hot now and by the time we hit the opposite shore I’m sweating bullets. In New Iberia, summer never really ends until sometime in October. Guess not in Bayou Bridge, either.

I climb out of the boat and jump onto the mushy bank,
standing in the elephant ears while Gwen turns the boat around. “See you tomorrow,” I tell her reluctantly.

“’Bye, Shelby,” she says, and her eyes are sad and dark again. “Wish you didn’t have to leave.”

“Me neither.” I watch her paddle away until she reaches the swamp island safely. Then we wave to each other far across the water, she a tiny blonde dot, one arm in the air, before disappearing into the cypress trees.

I bite my lips, worried about Gwen out there all by herself. Maybe I should have invited her to stay with me and Mirage until her parents return.

But I’m embarrassed by Mirage and the pet birds and my ugly room.

I get the most peculiar feeling Gwen’s parents have been gone a long time, maybe weeks already. And I get an even more peculiar feeling that they’re not coming back.

I guess kids like Gwen would get put into a foster home. That would be worse for her than living by herself. At least she could stay in her own house. Wish I coulda done that while Daddy was gone.

Gwen’s days are probably numbered. She can’t live out there forever by herself. One day someone is going to go out there with a big boat and take her away. She’s probably got a relative, an aunt or uncle, who will take her to live with them.

What will happen to that little house? Her clothes and books and bed — and the porcelain doll? How did that doll end up at Bayou Bridge Antique Store? Maybe my eyes were playing tricks on me or my memory is all wrong.

I rub the back of my hand against my nose as I pass the end of the pier anchored into the bank just off the road.

Sinister images fill up my brain.

No wonder Gwen prefers her boat to walking across the bridge.

Suddenly, this road is too quiet, too lonely, too deserted.

My heart starts to chatter inside my chest as I search around the bushes and trees for my backpack. For a moment, I’m certain that Tara stole it, but then I finally find it peeking under a large elephant ear.

I take off for Main Street fast as I can, looking for Sweet Ellen’s Bakery on the corner, even as the late afternoon sun starts to slant across the sky.

All the kids from school have long disappeared and there are only a few houses set back off the road, quiet and sedate like old ladies. As I glance over, some of the houses are dark under the oak trees, and the black empty windows stare at me like haunted eyes.

I start running toward town so fast, I’m sucking in air like I’m drowning by the time I reach the docks. An ache in my side makes me bend over in pain. Then I see Mirage.

She’s sitting on a tree stump, waiting for me, studying some papers and frowning. She’s taken off those ugly boots and her bare toes rub against the dirt while she reads.

“Hey,” I say, and she looks up, startled.

“Well, hey, back, Shelby Jayne,” she says. “Where you been? Heard school had a fire drill.”

“Yeah.” I figure it’s better not to elaborate on the details.

Mirage folds up the papers, tucks them into an envelope, and then stuffs it into her backpack. “And?” she asks. “Found your note, but it was skimpy on the details. So where you been all this time?”

“Just up that road. Playing some games with kids in my class. Then I explored the cemetery for a while.”

“You did?” Her eyes go big and she jumps up from her tree stump to pace the ground.

I cross my fingers behind my back and play dumb. “Did the school call you? They was supposed to.”

“Promise you won’t go down that road no more,” Mirage tells me, ignoring my question. “Nobody I know lives down there. That part of town is too lonely and dangerous — and cemeteries ain’t for playin’. It’s disrespectful to the dead.”

She’s bossing me and I can feel the hairs rise on my neck. I want to revolt against her stupid rules. Besides, if I obey her, I’ll never see Gwen again. “I’m fine. You can see that I’m perfectly and totally
fine
!”

She swings her arms around, throwing her pack into the boat, acting all agitated and growling under her breath like I just did the worst thing in the whole world. “Promise me, Shelby Jayne. Never go down there again. Never.”

I fold my arms across my chest. “No, I ain’t gonna promise you.”

The rope for the boat drops at her feet and she looks up, stunned. “You ain’t goin’ to promise even though I jest asked you to?”

“You’re tellin’ me to do somethin’ with no good reason.”

“Oh, lorda mighty, I got my reasons. And dern good ones. That bayou down there is dangerous. Water’s deep, could pull you under, and there’s gators — and — all kind a things. You don’t know all my reasons. Heck, you don’t
want
to know my reasons —”

All of a sudden, she spins around so I can’t see her face and there’s red splotches along her neck like she’s about to cry. To pretend she’s busy, Mirage picks up the boat line and checks the knots.

My throat is dry and scratchy and I wish I had a drink of water. “A bunch of kids from school were down there playing games but nobody got hurt.”

She stares at me, and this time there’s a different kind of look in her eyes. More than worry. More than anxiety. It’s close to terror. “What kind a games?” she asks slowly.

I shrug. “They call it Truth or Dare. And they’re just dyin’ to push somebody in the water. But it’s all supposed to be just for fun.”

Her face gets a pained expression and she wipes at her eyes real quick. “Yeah, I’ve heard ’bout that. That game’s been around a lotta years in this town. If I was their mamma and knew they were down there playing on that broken pier, I’d —” She stops, and her lips are trembling. “Well, they’d be in big trouble, that is for sure.”

I’ve noticed that when she gets excited or upset, her accent gets thicker, too.

I’m sort of noticing that I’ve been doing the same thing. Grandmother Phoebe’s training the past year is fast becoming extinct, all the words and phrases from when I was younger jumping right off my tongue again.

“What would
you
do?” I ask, a funny feeling rising in my stomach. When I think about those kids playing tricks on me, trying to get me to fall into the bayou — or
jump
in — I get mad all over again. I coulda drowned and that makes me go cold all over.

Then I’m afraid. I don’t want to go back to school tomorrow. I want to go back to my real home, and I want my daddy so bad I could spit and cry at the same time. A rush of sadness comes over me so strong, it’s all I can do not to start
bawling right there on the docks. It’s the most unfair thing in the whole world that I have to be here.

“Well, back in the old days, kids’d get a good lickin’,” Mirage tells me, her eyes locking on to mine. “Might have to stay home and do chores for a month. Get their boat taken away. No supper. Stuff like that.” She pauses and glances at me. “So what should I do to you?”

She’s going to punish
me
for all those stupid kids scaring me? I take a shaky breath so I don’t start crying with the injustice of it. “You aren’t Grandmother Phoebe and this isn’t my house so you don’t get to give me all these rules.”

Mirage blinks like she can’t believe I actually said what I just did. “No, I ain’t your grandmother Phoebe. I’m your mamma. And mammas can give any orders they want to. And expect their children to obey.”

She picks up her boots, sticks her feet into them, then plops herself into the boat. She’s such an expert, the craft hardly moves.

There’s a long, stretched-out silence while we don’t look at each other.

I sniff, my nose running again even though my eyes are dry. Then I glance down at the water and think about Gwen in that house all alone, without her family or anyone at all.

In the distance there’s the sound of cars on Main Street. Cicadas and gnats start buzzing the air like they want their supper.

Mirage finally clears her throat. “If you don’t want to stay out here all night you better get in.”

I purposely don’t answer, just slowly, slowly, slowly get in the boat and sit on my plank.

“Once I get us off the bank, dig left,” Mirage adds.

I don’t answer, but once we’re away from the pier piling, I dig left. And keep digging and digging as we head the opposite direction of the broken pier and Gwen and her little island house.

It’s the longest ride ever, and we don’t say a single word.

“Supper’s in half an hour,” she says as the boat bumps the bank of the swamp house at last.

Mirage ties up the rope and I carefully get out, stiff and achy after sitting and digging that oar for so long. I swear I won’t be able to move my arms tomorrow. They’ve been sore ever since I got here.

“Didn’t think I was getting any supper,” I muttered.

“Shelby, I was sayin’ what I’d do if you purposely disobeyed. But you didn’t know about that old broken-down pier and that stupid game of Truth or Dare. So you’re not being punished. Not yet.”

Now she’s trying to be nice to me, and I’m not ready for that after our fight. She keeps acting all sweet, but then something happens and she gets agitated and gloomy like living out here is my fault. Like she hates it and loves it, always contradicting herself.

I want something from her that I can’t even figure out myself.

I run up the rickety steps of the porch and go straight to my room — after I throw my backpack on the floor and bang the door.

Flinging myself on the bed, I bury my face in my pillow. All the hurt and aching and sadness is so full up inside me I can’t stand it. But ten minutes go by and the tears still don’t come. I squeeze my eyes tighter. Hardly even any watering.

Rolling on my back, I hold up my arm and touch every single charm on the bracelet, studying them for clues. Or information. Or something.

I think about the pier, the cemetery, the porcelain doll, and the identical charm bracelets and feel the hair rise on the back of my neck like I’m inside a scary movie.

Meeting Gwen felt almost like a dream, and now that I’m back with Mirage in the swamp house, I wonder if it was all real.