The May Queen Murders (5 page)

back to normal. My pops told my mama he owes it to Dr. Timothy to

keep you safe and is ridin’ me about it.”

Keep me safe? Why would Sheriff owe that to my father? I didn’t

want Rook escorting me only because Sheriff didn’t give him a

choice. Besides, everywhere I went, Heather went too.

“Folks say it’s Birch Markle come back. What do you think?” I

asked, taking a few more steps.

Rook gave a heavy sigh. “I think people run their mouths.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Nothin’.” He pressed his back to the door for the art hal way so we

faced one another.

“Rook, come on.”

“Just bothers me when rollers talk shit.” His mouth twitched into a

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frown. “They were saying stuff in history. They’re clueless about the

Glen.”

He rolled his eyes and leaned his head against the door. I stared

at him harder, like I could will him into speaking. “What’d they say?

Something about Heather?”

He looked down.

“About
me?
” I asked.

He hesitated. “All right, I’ll tell you. They were talking about how

your daddy’s the vet, and if someone’s killing animals, then it’s some-

one who’s done it before. Like Dr. Timothy. Because as a vet, he puts

animals to sleep.”

The hair on the nape of my neck tightened, and a prickle crawled

over my scalp until my hair and skin were a weave of dread. “My

father wouldn’t.”

“That’s what Heather told them, and they went after her instead.”

Would Heather have told me that if Rook hadn’t? She’d stood up

like Dahlia had. Their cruelty was for me, and she’d smothered it. She

did what a sister would. A bitter-tasting guilt puckered my mouth.

I wanted to believe I’d do the same for Heather, but the truth was I

didn’t know. I wasn’t that brave.

Once we reached the art room, I settled into my usual spot. The

room smelled chemical — glue and acrylic paint — mixing with the

earthen slop of clay. The art room was safe. Everyone was too into

their projects to bother with us but for a few wary glances when

Rook wandered over to the bin loaded with red mud. The townies’

cluster went silent as he neared. Then they veered inward, whispers

floating above their sacred circle.

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“ . . . dog . . . in pieces . . . You think they were there?”

Rook shot them a dirty look before claiming his seat beside me. I

broke apart some clay to roll out snakes for a coil vase with a perilous

tilt to the left. I had no il usions — it was ugly as sin. While drawing

came natural, sculpture wasn’t my gift of the spirit.

A glop of clay squished between my fingers. “What do you think

that guy Milo wanted with Heather?”

“It’s always Heather, isn’t it?” Rook grunted and rolled out the clay

for his own vase. “Milo’s scum. If Heather’s got some deal with him,

she’ll tell you, but from what I know, nothing good comes when that

guy’s around.”

“How do you know?” I asked. “It ain’t like you run with any rol ers.”

“No, but I know trouble when I see it.”

Crash!

The bang ended with the shatter of glass. I jumped from my seat,

and all around, the other students searched the wal s with startled

expressions to see what had fallen.

“What was that?” Rook asked.

I spied a broken picture frame on the ground. My stomach

dropped as I knelt beside the shards of glass covering my pencil

drawing of Whimsy from last year. Mrs. Fenton had liked it so much

she entered it into several contests. I won a couple. Now the rem-

nants were splintered on the floor, and I stooped to clear away the

broken pieces. It shouldn’t have fallen. That was bad luck.

Worse than bad. Fatal.

“Miss Templeton,” Mrs. Fenton said as she rushed over. “Are you

okay? Oh, your picture!”

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Rook approached with a broom and dustpan. “I bet it can be re-

framed.”

“It ain’t the picture.” I tamped the grains of glass into the dust-

pan and waited until another student distracted Mrs. Fenton before

I whispered to Rook, “Mamie says a picture that fal s without warnin’

brings death in the mornin’.”

His expression stayed neutral, and even though he didn’t tell me

I was off my rocker, heat circled around my neck and spread to my

jaw. Rook dumped the glass into the trash, returned the broom and

dustpan to their place, and found his seat. God, I must’ve sounded

so insane he didn’t know how to respond. Yet he crooked his finger

to beckon me to our table.

He murmured, “My pops gets wily if a bird flies into our house.”

A bird in a house means death is flyin’ about.
Mamie’s once-strong

voice echoed in my memory. She’d comb my hair with one hundred

strokes and tell me the hillfolks’ lore, stories of the backwoods. Ma-

mie went quiet when Gramps died, but when I was small and needed

coaxing to sleep, she recited the tales. The words she spoke wove

themselves into the ribbons of my veins and knitted together my

very soul.

Rook knew the stories too, and he didn’t outright dismiss them.

Not the way Heather did.

The front of his throat bobbed. I didn’t want to look like I was

studying him, but I was. Because I drew everything I remembered,

there’d be more pages of him in my sketchbook.

A loud laugh broke my focus. Heather beamed under the unfor-

giving hal way lights, laughing with someone away from the door’s

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view. She was willowy in a green halter laced to show off her slim

waist and small breasts. A gauzy black shirt beneath was painted on

like a second skin. When she lifted her arm to push away whomever

she talked with, she was like a cattail bending from the breeze.

I looked at my layers of shirts — a blue peasant top. Heavier with

hips and breasts, I was dowdy and cloaked, nothing like the bright

star of my cousin. Papa and my aunt Rue were Templetons, Mamie’s

children, and Heather had Mamie’s once-scarlet hair, our grand-

mother’s hair so red she’d even been named Ginger at birth. I was

darker, with wide lips and shadows under my walnut-black eyes. On

the surface, there was nothing proving Heather and I shared blood. I

was three weeks older than she, the only days I’d lived without her.

A boy’s hand, all I saw of him, brushed his fingertips along Heath-

er’s arm. Milo? I couldn’t be sure. With a giggle, she tossed her curls.

His hand lingered in the air as if the touch was unfinished. Whatever

had upset her had dissolved. I was mesmerized and unblinking, not

from envy or anger but because she was magic and life and joy.

“Hey, you all right?” I asked once she joined our table. “I heard

what happened. Thank you.”

She pushed my hair from my face. “It’s fine, Ivy. Like I’m gonna let

anyone talk bad about my kinfolk. Those kind of guys are what’s left

after Uncle Timothy castrates the bul s — useless dicks.”

Rook snickered, but I tilted my head. How could she be cavalier?

She wore a brave face, but I had to wonder if she was so brave when

alone.

“Who was that?” I asked. “Out in the hal .”

“Some roller.” She lifted her bag off her shoulder and opened the

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flap. Inside was a paper bag with the top parted to reveal a dried

lump of herbs.

I squished some clay between my fingers, sighing. “Rose Connel y

has a whole pot field growing behind her house. If you want weed,

don’t go buyin’ it off that Milo creep.”

“Milo?” Heather’s eyes widened, and she slapped her bag shut.

“What do you know? Were you spying on me?”

“He cornered Ivy in the stairs,” Rook intervened.

“He say something about me?” She circled her fingers around my

wrist. I pulled back, but she squeezed harder. The half-moons of her

fingernails paled my skin. What a sudden shift in her.

“Heather, what’s your problem?” I asked. “He only said he was

looking for you.”

She dropped my hand, then wiped her palm on her shirt. “Wel , I

guess he found me.”

Her ass wiggled in her seat as if she was contemplating bolting

from class. Before Heather could get up, Mrs. Fenton came around to

survey our work and take attendance. The teacher took one gander

at my leaning vase and huffed before moving to the next table.

“Heather,” I pressed.

“Ivy, not now.”

Her bag lay on the floor between my shoes and hers. She nudged

it beneath her chair, the toes of her sneakers bumping mine as she

kicked it back.

Kept it away from me.

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Chapter Three

Animals ’round the Glen started missin’. First, the barn

cats. Jackdaw Meriweather’d find ’em in the dirt road.

Maybe one got under a wagon’s wheels, but two? Six?

No one knew how many. Then folks noticed birds and fur

’round the Markle house and the bones hangin’ in the trees.

My hands dove into soapy water. Warmth swirled around my fore-

arms while I drew the washrag in circles over the plate. My parents

and I had arrived at Mamie’s home before the skies cracked and

gushed rain, bellows of thunder rattling the windows.

From the sink, I had a view into the dining room where the

grownups relaxed around the table. Mama, Papa, and Heather’s step-

father, a hillman named Marsh Freeman, sipped wine, while Aunt

Rue rubbed her bel y, round with a June baby. Taking the evening

meal with kin was common in the Glen. I liked the closeness of our

families. For some folks, there were so many members, they dined in

a barn around a harvest table filled with dishes of mashed potatoes,

cornbread, roasted chickens, and salad greens piled high in bowls.

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Most years, the Glen’s growing season was good, and we shared the

bounty.

Mama’s fingers walked across the knotted pine to rub Papa’s arm,

her bracelets singing as she moved. He’d been in a quiet mood since

examining Bart’s remains. Mama exchanged a nervous glance with

Marsh. Few people read Papa’s moods like Marsh — he’d been read-

ing them since they were ten-year-olds with Sheriff trying to hook a

catfish that supposedly ate a pony in the river.

“Rue and I had tea with Iris Crenshaw.” Mama ventured a conver-

sation. “
Señoras
are planning a May Day celebration for the Glen.

Iris says it’s ’cause of all the horrible things happening, that it might

bring some joy.”

“Luz, you have no idea how wonderful the old May Days were.”

Aunt Rue beamed. “The parties went all night. There was singing

and dancing. We haven’t had one in over twenty years, but I can’t

wait! It’ll be such fun!”

Mama nodded. “
Sí,
sí.
Sounds very sweet.”

Aunt Rue continued. “We hung flowers on the houses. Oh! And

there was a maypole and a parade!”

I dried my hands on my apron and met Heather’s eyes. She

stopped braiding her mother’s hair and shrugged. We’d heard tales

about the May Days of Rowan’s Glen, but al that ended because of

Birch Markle. Maybe though, enough time had passed that folks

were wil ing to try again without the specter of murder haunting the

celebration.

“Ivy and Heather, you
señoritas
will have a good time,” my mother

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said. “Iris said she was May Queen one year. Maybe one of you will

be queen.”

Aunt Rue gave a stiff smile. “Maybe so. Either way, you’ll both be

in the parade. We have Mamie’s old dress. One of you should wear it.”

The May Queen. I’d seen old photographs in Mamie’s album, girls

in long dresses with flowers in their hair, girls dancing with spring

mud between their toes. They were new growth. The one chosen as

queen was the Glen’s very best, the embodiment of hope for prosper-

ity and harvest. With death haunting the fields, maybe a prayer and

dance for life would chase off the sorrow.

Perhaps I could be May Queen. Maybe. It’d be nice to be chosen.

I’d come out from my shadow and show how green and vivid I could

be.

Heather twisted a curl around her finger and asked, “Do you ran-

domly pick someone to be May Queen?”

Aunt Rue sipped from a mug of tea. “Any girl sixteen and older,

not yet married, can be May Queen. The women choose by a secret