Monster in My Closet (9 page)

As I slipped the chain over my head, the door opened and a dark cloud—strike that—two dark clouds rolled into my office in the form of Spider and her mother.

Chapter Nine

Amanda “Spider” Talbot was a Goth stereotype. I doubted that she realized it or intended to come off that way, but she’d hit overkill about three layers of eyeliner ago. Her hair was a bottled black that had no shine and looked like an uneven, dried ink splotch. Dark lace and satin engulfed her small frame and dripped from her hands, allowing the tips of her chipped black polish to peek out. Her expression, as always, was dour. No doubt she was contemplating her own death scene some years hence.

As if at war with her dark daughter, Mrs. Talbot was dressed as a ray of sunshine—if sunshine came in a medicine bottle and smelled like stale crackers. Her yellow hair was frizzy and dried out, obviously a home job. The two might benefit from a little cooperation in the bathroom come dye-time. Neither was doing well on her own. Mama Talbot wore a yellow sundress so bright even I wouldn’t have dared wear it. She had artfully applied the orange lipstick of my cosmetic nightmares. I felt vindicated; it looked like crap on her, too.

Despite her sunshiney outfit, Mrs. Talbot shared her daughter’s gloomy demeanor. Hers, however, was the genuine article. It was neither for pretense, nor a fashion accessory.

I braced myself and stood up to greet them.

“Ladies,” I said, waving them in. I stepped out from behind my desk and met them near the door. “You both look lovely. Have a seat, please. Can I get you something to drink?”

Spider asked for tea and her mother said she’d like some, too. This, of course, prompted Spider to ask for coffee instead. Black.

This was their second visit to my office, so I was prepared for their mutual hostility. The initial consultation had also included Mr. Talbot, so there hadn’t been any bloodshed. Daddy Talbot had a knack for keeping the two in line—or at least separated. After a brief interview, they all went home to discuss whether Happily Ever After was the right fit for the job. The fact that mother and daughter returned for a second consult was a positive note for the business, but I’d still have to earn their final approval. Difficult clients were my specialty. I would pull this off if it killed me.

I kept my smile steady and went to get drinks for them. It was already a rough start, and they’d only been there for thirty seconds.

The room wasn’t large. From the coffee corner, I could hear everything the two women were saying to each other, and it didn’t bode well for the rest of the appointment.

“Absolutely not,” Mrs. Spider said. “A black wedding dress is inappropriate, in poor taste, and rude to your guests.”

“Mother, it’s appropriate for me. Our tastes are vastly different, and my guests will applaud me for being true to myself.”

“It’s morbid and creepy.”

“That’s ridiculous. Black is elegant. Besides, it’s perfectly appropriate for a graveyard ceremony.”

I was focused on the drink prep, pointedly staying out of it until either the coffee and tea were ready or I was forced to spray them with a fire hose to separate them, but I’m fairly certain Spider’s mother choked on a mint. It was probably the kind stuck to the bottom of her purse. With lint on it.

“There is no way in hell you’re getting married in a graveyard. You’ll get married in a church like a normal person. I won’t have it. Getting married surrounded by dead people. What is
wrong
with you?”

Spider gave her mother a dramatic, condescending sigh. “Death is the ultimate expression of love, Mother.”

And this is when I decided I’d better intervene before Mama throttled my bride to show her exactly how much she loved her.

“Here we are, ladies,” I said. I carried the cups on a silver tray which I placed on my desk. “I highly recommend the shortbread cookies. My partner picked them up from the bakery this morning. She said she watched them come out of the oven. Shall we get started?”

“Your partner?” Mrs. Talbot looked uncomfortable.

Oh, good Lord, she thinks I’m gay and she has a problem with it.
I blinked at her, my smile unwavering. “Yes, of course. My business partner, Sara. You spoke with her on the phone to make the appointment.”
I need more sleep to deal with this.

The bickering continued throughout the next half hour. Spider was doing her best to antagonize her mother at every turn. Her mother continued to speak in a condescending tone and tell her what was best for her.

Flowers, music, venue, décor—all of it was a tug-of-war between Mary Sunshine and Dracula’s Bride. I had lost all control of the situation. This was not normal for me.

While they argued over the proper wedding shoes for bridesmaids, Mom making the case for dyed-to-match heels while daughter championed army boots, I took a moment to pull myself together. My hand strayed to my new amulet, fingers tracing the dragon. I thought this through.

I wasn’t getting anywhere because I had them blocked. I pulled my attention inside myself and examined my bubble. I’d become pretty good at building and maintaining it over the last few days. It was time for a new exercise.

I inhaled deeply through my nose and let the breath out through my mouth. Had the two women across from me not been so engrossed in their own performance, mine would’ve caused them to wonder what sort of new-age hippie they were hiring. I ignored them as much as they were ignoring me.

In my mind, I examined my wall and traced my finger in a small circle, slicing through the material like a laser. A gentle shove from my fingertips sent the loose piece floating out to the ceiling, leaving me a small window to pass information in and out. It probably wasn’t the best solution in the world, but for the moment, it would have to do.

I opened my eyes and examined each of the sniping harpies. I took in the older woman first, reaching out with my heart and mind, searching for what she was feeling.

Anger. Fear.

Helplessness. Loss.

Loss. Ah. There it was. Buried beneath the anger and fear, this woman was terrified of losing her daughter. Once I’d located the underlying emotion pushing at her, it was simple enough to put together why she was acting this way.

Spider was a little more complicated.

First of all, she wasn’t in the least bit pissed off, contrary to her attitude. She was absolutely delighted with the showdown. Tickled. Spider baited her mother intentionally, with little or no conviction behind any of her outrageous wedding demands. Where there should have been some sort of passion, there was a void. The only real emotion I was feeling from her was a twisted kind of joy each time her mother’s voice broke.

Interesting.

I cleared my throat, preparing to jump into the fray. “Ladies, if I can direct us back to the worksheet, we’ll see if we can find a few things we agree on.”

I took it slowly with them. “Let’s start with the guest list. Do we have an estimate?”

They answered simultaneously.

“Five hundred,” Spider said.

“One fifty,” her mother said.

There was a short pause before they started chittering at each other like angry monkeys fighting over the last banana. Any second, they might start the poo flinging, and I was pretty sure Sara wouldn’t be amused by the carpet stains that would leave behind.

Mrs. Talbot’s face turned an unhealthy pink. “That’s a preposterous number you pulled out of thin air. You don’t know that many people.”

“I’ve already posted an open invitation to everyone who hangs at Coffins.”

“You are not inviting a bunch of death-worshippers you just met in some club.”

I could feel the tension in Mama Talbot building to a new level. She was winding so tight I expected an audible
sproing
as she shot out of her chair and hit the far wall. I hoped when she snapped she wouldn’t take anyone’s eye out. I knew I should stop it from happening, but my instincts are solid for this sort of thing. I let it run its course.

“It’s my wedding, Mother.” Spider had gone still, her voice low.

“Why can’t you be normal, for once in your life?”

“Why can’t you let me be myself?”

“You haven’t been yourself for years. I hardly know who you are.”

“Just because you were eight months pregnant and had a civil ceremony at City Hall, doesn’t mean you get a do-over with my wedding. I don’t have to pay for your mistakes.”

And that did it. The camel’s back collapsed in a heap of broken vertebrae. Mrs. Talbot was up and out of her chair, heading for the door before I could uncross my legs.

At the threshold, her head snapped around and she fixed her attention on me. “I’ll be in the car. Do whatever the hell she wants. It’s not my business.”

The door slammed behind her. Her pain lingered for a moment, poking at the back of my neck like a sharp stick. Once that had dissipated, I was left with Spider’s thinly veiled glee. She looked and felt like a marathon runner who’d just crossed the finish line to victory.

It was the ugliest thing I’d ever felt.

“She can be such a trial,” Spider said. She stretched her legs in front of her and got more comfortable.

“Cut the crap, Amanda.” I wasn’t loud. I wasn’t accusatory. My voice was calm and steady.

She blinked and sat up a little straighter. “Excuse me?”

“She’s gone. You can put down the mask and let’s talk.”

“I don’t think I like how you’re speaking to me.”

“I don’t really care. If you don’t fire me, and if I decide to stick with you, you’re going to be honest with me and with yourself. Otherwise, I can’t do my job. Are we clear?”

She nodded once, but looked wary.

“I have no idea what the problem is between you and your mother, but it has nothing to do with your wedding. You want this to be
your
wedding or hers?”

Her voice was small and quivery. “Mine.”

“Then act like it. Every decision you’ve made so far has been based on what would piss her off the most. This is your wedding day—your first wedding day. We hope it’s the only one, but even if you had ten more weddings, there’s only one first. It is not a body piercing you can take out and heal over if you change your mind. It’s more like a tattoo. Permanent. Do you want to be forty-five years old and look back at pictures of you looking somber in a graveyard? Do you want to think about your wedding as the day you got a major one over on your mom? Or do you want to remember a beautiful, perfect day in which you were joined together with the love of your life?”

I’m not a monster—maybe under my current circumstances I shouldn’t throw that word around so lightly—but I will admit to the warm flash of pride that overcame me when I felt her deflate.

“I like the Goth style.” Her voice was still weak and timid.

I relaxed. “I like it, too. We can work with it. Let’s start with that. How long have you been part of the Goth community?”

“About a month.”

Great. Excellent. I knew I’d spotted a wannabe the minute she walked in.
With
my shields up.

“And Eric is part of it, too?”

“He’s okay with it. He wants whatever I want.”

That was all I needed to hear. The entire catastrophe was instantly made moot. I do love my job.

Her appointment ran over by about a half hour—a fact I noted in the books and would be sure to charge Daddy for—but progress was made. Against my own financial best interests, I talked her down to two hundred twenty-five guests. She agreed to tour a gothic mansion as a possible venue, and we discussed wedding dresses that had a gothic flair with splashes of black, red or purple.

In the end, it was a good first meeting. We had nine months to pull it together. I was pleased with myself.

We made an appointment for the following week, and I walked her to the door.

“Do you think my mom will be okay with what we’re doing?”

“Does it matter?”

She looked at her shoes for a moment. “Yeah. I guess it does.”

“She’s been stuck in the car for forty-five minutes. Maybe you should take her for ice cream and talk about it.”

“Maybe I will.” And then Spider, the morbid, undead girl from Transylvania, smiled at me before she left.

Under all that black gook, I was betting she was beautiful.

It was a good day.

I went inside humming one of Maurice’s nonsense songs and cleared up the cups of nearly untouched coffee and tea. An hour later, I was finishing the last of the birdseed bags when the phone rang.

“Happily Ever After, this is Zoey.” I cringed. I hated the name we’d agreed on, but none of my ideas had gone over well with Sara. I had caved, and now I was stuck with it. Even after five years, I still winced.

“Zoey, this is Gail Dickson. I need to talk to Sara.”

Through the phone, the panic pattered at my cheek like hot drops of cooking oil.

“Sara’s out of the office, Gail. I can help. What do you need?”

She must’ve pulled the phone away because the wail of frustration sounded like it came from a distance.

“The linens are wrong! My bridesmaids bailed on me, and I have to do the birdseed thingies all by myself, my mother-in-law hates the color scheme, and the caterers left the vegetarian choice off the menu!” She took a choking gulp of air. “The whole thing is ruined.”

I glanced at Sara’s notes. “Gail, deep breaths, honey. Sara’s gone to take care of the caterers and the linens. I’ve already finished the seed bags. Your mother-in-law is not the one getting married, and no matter how much she hates the colors, it doesn’t mean she hates you. It’s also far too late in the game to do anything about it anyway.”

“It’s all falling apart.” She sounded tired. Less than two weeks before the wedding, brides often hit panic mode and have a meltdown. This bride was especially prone. Growing up with an overbearing mother had undermined Gail’s confidence and left her brittle and overly dramatic.

“Not at all. You have us to take care of things. That’s what you pay us for. The only thing you need to concentrate on right now is looking good. Stress is counterproductive. We stress for you.”

“I want it to be perfect.”

“It will be. We’ll be there to make sure of it. Just breathe, let us know if anything comes up that needs handling. And go get a massage.”