Pilgrims Don't Wear Pink (10 page)

I tried to read but couldn't concentrate. What was Garrett's problem with Cam? He had gotten all weird and shifty, and we'd been having a perfectly pleasant conversation about Jane Austen and history and stuff. Cam was such a nice guy. I mean, hello, he carried my duffle and he wanted me to “come with” to the Sea Shanty Showdown! That definitely meant something. Plus, I'm sorry, Garrett, sci-fi
is
lame. Fact.

Several hours of sort of reading later, the door to the fo'c's'le slowly creaked open. I screamed so loudly that it was a wonder the camping lantern didn't shatter. An ominous disembodied voice rumbled through from the other side: “Hello, Kitty.”

The door swung open the rest of the way to reveal Garrett.

“You are a jerk!” I yelled, chucking my pillow at him. “I almost had a freaking heart attack!”

“Sorry, sorry.” He laughed. “I couldn't resist.”

“Jerk!” I yelled again. “Now give me my goddamn pillow back so I can keep beating you!”

“I think, no.” He set up his camping lantern next to his bed. “That is not in my best interest.”

“Fine. You know what? Fine.” I huffed. “Whatever. We're done with this.” I shut off my lamp and pulled the blanket over my head.

“Good night, Kitty.”

Garrett softly lobbed the pillow onto my bed, turned out his lamp, and went to sleep.

“Good morrow, good woman.”

I looked up from the bed of pansies I'd been mucking around in. “Hey, Ashling.” I gritted my teeth.

“I know not what means this ‘Ashling'!” she shouted, nostrils flaring. “What creature or species or man or beast an ‘Ashling' may be, know not I! I am Susannah Fennyweather, daughter of Horatio Fennyweather, a gentlewoman of Camden Towne!”

She pronounced the “e” in the old-fashioned spelling of town, making it sound like “townie.” I had never before encountered Ashling in full Susannah Fennyweather mode, and it was a sight to behold. She was brass-buttoned up to her neck in a mud-brown gown, her hat had so many feathers it looked like it was about to take flight, and she brandished a parasol like a weapon.

“Mith Libby”—Amanda popped up from somewhere in the general vicinity of my knees—“whoth thith?” The other girls stopped picking flowers and came over to join me by the fence that separated the homestead garden from the lane. Now that the samplers were done, I'd decided to move on to pressed flowers, so today we were out picking. This decision obviously had nothing to do with the fact that Cam had stopped by again to chop wood. Well, at the moment, he was leaning against the house, eating a piece of the applesauce molasses spice cake we'd made that morning, but he had been chopping wood.

“Well, girls, this is Susannah Fennyweather, daughter of Horatio Fennyweather, gentlewoman of Camden
Town.
” I made it a point to markedly
not
pronounce an “e.” “Susannah, this is Amanda and Robin and—”

“I care not.” She cut me off. “And you shall address me as Miss Fennyweather, not presume to condone the usage of my Christian name.”

“Um, eeuw,” said one of the girls, and a few others giggled.

“Miss . . . ‘Libby' . . . is it?” She sniffed disdainfully. “I carry a message to ye from the milliner and haberdasher of ye olde Camden Harbor Towne. Tonight, as well may ye know, is the festivities and frolicks of a musical entertainment of songs and shanties of the sea. Madam milliner and haberdasher requests that ye stop by her shoppe”—again, pronounced like “shoppie”—“in order to be outfitted especially for the evening's events, in a frock more befitting of thy general demeanor and the spirit of the evening, as a ‘wench,' indeed I believe she said.”

Okay. Now time to figure this out. One, I was pretty sure Ashling had just called me a wench, but I'd let that slide. Two, I think I was supposed to stop by the costume shack to pick up something to wear to the Sea Shanty Showdown tonight. I felt like I'd just cracked the Rosetta stone.

Gradually, as I was thinking, Ashling had leaned closer and closer to my cheek, until I finally noticed she was freakishly close.

“Are you examining my pores?” I asked, befuddled.

“I know not what means ‘pores.'” She drew back slightly. “Rather that I only suspicioned that one might have bedecked one's complexion with paint as one hears tell of in the brothels and bawdyhouses be seen on ladies of ill repute. One feared that one mayhap had chanced upon a common whore.”

Ugh! My jaw dropped, but only for a moment.

“Well, one would really appreciate it if one didn't use language like that in front of the children.”

“I know what a ‘whore' is,” one of the girls piped up. “It's a dental hygienist. Like my dad's girlfriend.”

“That actually wasn't what I meant. I was referring to your completely unintelligible syntax, Miss Fennyweather.” I mean really, she sounded like Yoda. I wanted my girls to be grammatically correct. “Good day.”

I waved her off and returned to the pansies, leaving Miss Fennyweather to shut her parasol briskly and walk, mouth opening and closing like a fish, away down the lane. And the other thing: “Robin, that's not a nice word. I'm sure your dad's girlfriend isn't a whore.”

“But my mom
said.
”

I dealt with this the rest of our flower-picking excursion, trying not to dissolve into giggles every time my eyes met Cam's, as Cam tried not to choke on his cake, shaking as he was with suppressed laughter. Once the girls had picked enough flowers, they filed inside.

“Hey.” Cam straightened and dusted the cake crumbs off his hands, making his way over to me. “I should really get back to the ship. I'll see you at the Showdown tonight. You know where the beach is?”

“Nope.” I shook my head.

“Then I'll pick you up outside your ship—the
Lettie Mae,
right?”

“Right.” I nodded.

“Sweet.” Checking that the girls were inside, he kissed me quickly. “Until tonight,” he said, making it sound like a promise—a promise of what, I wasn't sure, but I couldn't wait to find out.

“Tonight.” I breathed in the beautiful words, magical
West Side Story
orchestra popping back into my head. “Tonight, tonight, there's only you tonight,” I sang softly as I ducked back into the house and Cam hopped the fence.

 

We had just enough time to get everyone's flowers in the heavy wooden press before two o'clock rolled around and it was drop-off time at the Welcome Center. On my way back, I heard a familiar voice flagging me down.

“Libby! Libby!” I turned. It was Roger, the museum publicist. “It
is
Libby, right?” He caught up with me, wheezing slightly as he placed his hands on his knees to catch his breath.

“Yes, hi, I'm Libby,” I introduced myself.

“One of Maddie's interns, right?” I nodded. “I thought so. But I left a message for you with the other one and I had no idea what she was saying, so I wasn't sure if you got it.”

“You mean Ash—uh, Susannah Fennyweather?”

“Yeah.” I detected the hint of an eye roll. “Did she tell you about the costumes? For the Sea Shanty Showdown?”

“Sort of. I mean, she told me but in her own special way.”

“That's what I was afraid of.” Definite eye roll. “We've got a pirate wench costume waiting for you down at the shack. I thought we could take some nice publicity shots, for some promotional literature—brochures and stuff—and kind of work the pirate angle. Pirates are fun. People see pirates, they think fun, they think the museum is fun, yadda, yadda, yadda. And the
Camden Crier
is coming to do a piece on it too, so we can get a nice color shot of you in there. You don't mind, right?”

“Um, no, I guess not.”

“Thank God.” He mopped some sweat off his brow. “I was afraid I wasn't gonna get a wench. The other one wouldn't do it, but she told me ‘wenching' would be ‘just your cup of tea.'”

Jesus. Thanks, Ashling. “Um, just so you know, Roger, I'm doing this to help the museum, not because I have a particular affinity for ‘wenching' or sundry related activities.”

“Yep, yep, got it, thanks—you're a doll.” He was scanning the town green over my head, looking for someone else. “Thanks a mil. See you at the Showdown.” He hurried off.

The costume shack lady was waiting outside the door for me.

“You”—she waved me in excitedly—“are going to
love
this! Saucy with a capital ‘S,' missy!” She bulldozed me into the shack and started energetically dressing me.

You know in
Pirates of the Caribbean
when Johnny Depp goes to that tavern in Tortuga, and all the prostitutes slap him? That's what I looked like. Except with less clothing. If I had thought my boobs were out of control in my normal museum gear, they were now practically up to my chin, exploding out of a scarlet satin corset and chemise with two wisps of sleeves. The skirt was ripped and tied up on one side, revealing layers of lacy petticoats, laced-up high-heeled boots, and more leg than had probably ever been seen in the Museum of Maine and the Sea. I felt like I was about to go hawk Captain Morgan rum and wondered if there were any documented cases of spontaneous combustion from embarrassment.

“Aaay!” shrieked the costume lady. “I love it!”

I got the feeling she'd been sort of limited in her costuming options all these years and had quashed a secret desire to design for Vegas showgirls. Or drag queens. She fussed around like a kid in a candy store, pinning up my hair into two messy buns with a bandanna, like a slutty blond pirate Mrs. Lovett from
Sweeney Todd,
and she even busted out an illegal stash of makeup to rouge my cheeks and line my eyes with kohl.

It's all for the good of the museum, I reminded myself over and over again, as I tried unsuccessfully to cover myself up a little bit more. If I had to whore myself out, literally, to save our nation's cultural institutions, then so be it. Future generations would thank me for my sacrifice.

I decided to go hang out onboard the
Lettie Mae
until the Sea Shanty Showdown, as I definitely wasn't leaving the museum grounds dressed like a pirate queen. Plus, ever since Garrett had colonized the ship with his treasure trove of electronic devices, it was officially a cell phone–safe zone. I figured if he had the laptop and the video camera and the voice recorder and God knows what else, one teeny little cell phone more couldn't hurt.

As if my phone could somehow sense that we'd entered neutral territory, the minute I hit the deck, it vibrated.

“Hello?” I answered.

“Libby? Is this Libby? The real Libby?” someone whispered frantically. After a second I recognized Dev's voice.

“Of course it's the real Libby, who else would it be?” I asked quizzically.

“I don't know anymore,” he whispered, paranoid. “I don't know anything anymore!”

“Dev, where are you?”

“In a closet.” Sniffle. “I never wanted to go back in one, but here I am.” Double sniffle.

“Can you speak up? It's really hard to hear you.”

“Noooooooooooooooooooo!” he howled.

“Dev, calm down. Tell me what's going on,” I prompted patiently.

“I can't,” he said, sobbing quietly. “I can't tell you anything. Libby, I
think they tapped my phone.
” His voice went so low, it was barely audible.

“What? That's ridiculous. Who are ‘they,' anyway? Who do you think tapped your phone?”

“Ono-may Orps-cay Ublications-pay.”

“What? Who?” I had no idea what he was talking about.

“Mono Corps Publications!” he whisper-screamed. “
Teen Mode
's parent company! Libby, they're
everywhere.
”

“Okay, Dev, you need to calm down and start breathing.” I could hear a panic attack coming on over the phone. “Take a few breaths. Nice, long, deep breaths.” He took several. “There you go! Good job.”

“I did a good job. For once, I did a good job,” he said sadly.

“Go to your happy place, Dev. Kelly Clarkson. Happy place. Kelly Clarkson.”

“Oh, no, I do not hook up, up, I go slow,” he sang softly.

“There you go!” I encouraged him. “Now, whenever you get scared, just sing that song and think of me, and it's like I'm right there with you.”

Dev had dubbed Kelly Clarkson's “I Do Not Hook Up” the “Official Libby Kelting Anthem.” He took especial delight in singing this whenever we were at parties or dances, as a warning to potential suitors. So maybe I'm a little picky. Sue me. I don't think that's the worst thing in the world.

“Libby,” he whispered, “I'm scared.”

Click. The line went dead. Yikes. An international publishing conglomerate might have just taken a hit out on my best friend. I tried to call him back several times, but to no avail. Garrett wasn't on the boat, so I paced and thought about Dev until the sun set and it was time for the Showdown. A loud whistle pierced the air. I leaned over the side of the boat; Cam was waiting down on shore, looking up at me. He whistled again. I scurried down the gangplank.

“Damn,” Cam said as I hit solid ground. “You look . . .” He was at a loss for words.

“Like a prostitute? I know,” I moaned.

“Hot.” He shook his head. “I was gonna say hot.” He put his arm around me and started steering me toward the boathouse.

“They're making me. The museum. I swear to God, I did not pick this outfit. Roger thinks pirates are ‘fun' and wants to put pirate pictures in the
Camden Crier.
He thinks it'll make more people come to the museum.”

“It'd certainly make me come.” He smirked.

“So where are we going?” I changed topics quickly, blushing. If I was gonna keep hanging out with Cam, I needed to stop embarrassing so easily.