The Wicked Garden (5 page)

CHAPTER SIX

Irvine, 2010s

The country club was right around the corner—it was just like Troy to drive instead of walk—but, by the time they reached the parking lot, Gretchel could swear steam was shooting out her ears. Her outrage sounded like surf crashing inside her head. The voices mumbled above its steady throb.

The windaelicker’s bluffin’

Aye, he’s jus lookin’ for a nasty shag, love.

Troy parked behind the building, and tried to make it to the other side of the car to open the door for Gretchel just in case anyone was watching, pretenses being of utmost importance. Gretchel was still fuming. She swung the door open, just grazing his testicles.

“Knock it off,” he growled nervously, and then shot an anxious wave to some acquaintances that were walking past. “Evening. How’s that new SUV suiting you in this weather, Jim?” Gretchel could not have been less interested in the response.

They rounded the corner, and Gretchel noticed a figure sitting on the stone bench just outside the country club door. She fell to her knees.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Troy hissed as he grabbed her elbow. Gretchel was shaking uncontrollably. Troy looked in the direction of her fixed gaze, and then turned to survey the pristine, snow-covered grass surrounding them. “What the fuck are you looking at? Get up, you crazy bitch.” Troy’s low, angry voice was barely audible above the noises inside Gretchel’s head.

He dug his fingers into her arm, reaching through coat and clothes to crush the flesh beneath. Troy pulled Gretchel from the ground. “Careful now. It’s slick,” he told a couple walking toward them.

Gretchel kept staring at the bench, shaking, and clutching at her throat, while the Woman in Wool eyed her eagerly.

As Troy opened the door to the country club, Gretchel pushed passed him and ran for the bathroom.

“What’s wrong with Gretchel?” Cody Brown—Troy’s best friend and Michelle's husband—asked.

Troy rolled his eyes, and motioned for the bartender to get him his usual Scotch. “On her period.”

Cody knew that couldn't be true. Gretchel hadn’t had a cycle in three years.

∞

“No. Oh, no.” Staring into the ladies’ room mirror, Gretchel panicked as discreetly as she could. She felt like she was going to vomit. She opened a stall door and knelt down, waiting for something to come rushing out. Nothing came. She turned herself around and sat on the floor, her back against the toilet.

She reached into her purse and fished around for her cell. She started talking as soon as she heard the click on the other end. “Teddy, she’s back!”

“Where did you see her?”

“Outside the country club.”

Teddy was quiet for a moment. “I’m coming to get you,” he said.

“No. You can’t,” she cried.

Teddy sighed. “Gretchel, you’re dealing with a pretty major trauma, and you’re still adjusting to life without the amethyst. You’re in a state of shock. If you insist upon enduring this evening, my advice is: Breathe mindfully, eat something, and think pleasant thoughts.”

“Why is she here? Why do they keep punishing me?” she cried.

“Gretchel, enough! If you’re going to spend the evening with Troy and Michelle, you need to pull yourself together. I’ll come to your place first thing tomorrow morning.”

“Yes. Please. I’m freaking."

You should be
, he thought.

∞

Gretchel sat down at the table. Michelle grabbed the chair across from her. Gretchel avoided eye contact by pretending to take an interest in her husband, who was bantering with several couples at the bar.

She thought about how easy it had been for Troy
to make friends when he had moved here to her hometown. He fit right in to the country club set. She did, too—at least on the outside. Everything she despised about the town, she had become a part of.

When they moved to Irvine from Carbondale, she had assumed that Troy, being from a posh suburb of Chicago, would hate it, but it was quite the opposite. He had become a big fish in a little pond. He quickly found a job at Sunset Automotive. Michelle’s father owned the dealership, and while Gretchel hated the fact that he was working there, they were broke, about to have a baby, and needed the money.

As the world’s greatest liar and a practiced charmer, Troy was able to surround himself with an adoring clique in no time. They all treated him like a god. Even Cody—who Gretchel knew to be so much smarter than the rest of them—had fallen for Troy's nauseating charisma.

She sat quietly, sipping a glass of water and trying to push back the resentment. She was afraid if Michelle said the wrong thing she would reach across the table and stab her with a butter knife.

“You look tense. Why don’t you order a Scotch,” Michelle smiled. She flipped back her naturally blonde, spiral-curled hair. Gretchel twitched. She detested this woman. Loathed her. It was so much easier to ignore her when she had the comforting weight of her talisman against her throat. Now the intense feelings of abhorrence were bubbling up to the surface.

“I’m fine,” Gretchel said flatly.

“Oh come on, Gretch. Lighten up a little. One drink won’t hurt you,” Michelle chuckled, and sipped at a glass of wine.

Gretchel
raised her hand to her neck by instinct, clutching at the amethyst that wasn’t there.

“You know, don’t you?” Michelle asked. “I can tell. It’s about time you figured it out. Looks like the ball’s in your court yet again… Gretch.”

Gretchel clawed at her own legs to keep herself from committing murder. She took a deep breath, and stared the woman down. “It’s not over yet…
Chelle
,” she whispered.

“It wouldn’t be any fun if it were,” Michelle smiled, and then turned to welcome her husband and Troy back to their table.

“Next shotgun season I’m hunting at the cottage, are you in?” Troy asked Cody. Gretchel’s eyes grew wide at the realization of what he’d said. He wasn’t just going to destroy her; he was going to try to take away the one and only home she had left in the world.

Cody furrowed his brow. “I thought you weren’t welcome at Snyder Farms.”

“The old hag’s out of her mind. I’ve heard she never leaves her rocking chair these days,” Troy said.

Cody glanced at Gretchel. He noticed her trembling lips and the tears quivering at the corner of her eyes. “I don’t think it’s a good idea. It’s in the will, Troy. If you hunt there, Gretchel loses the cottage. Miss Poni was dead serious,” Cody said.

“To hell with her and the broomstick she flew in on,” Troy growled.

Cody shook his head. “I’m not going down there.”

“Why, you afraid of ghosts?” Troy snickered.

Cody and Michelle both looked at Gretchel, who was trying to hide behind the menu. Cody had a sad, sympathetic look in his eye. Michelle giggled.

“Well, I’m not afraid of ghosts… or witches,” Troy said and grabbed Gretchel’s hand under the table, bending back her fingers until she nearly screamed.

As soon as he let go, she grabbed her purse and coat and stomped out of the club. She had reached her limit.

It was bitterly cold outside, but it felt like heaven. Gretchel was burning up from the inside. She turned to see if Troy had followed her, but the only person she saw was the Woman in Wool sitting underneath an oak tree.

“Leave me alone!” Gretchel screamed.

“Baby Girl, I’m taking you home?”

She zipped around to see Cody. She turned back to the tree. There was no one there.

“This isn’t happening,” she whispered to herself.

“You don’t look good. Is something going on?” Cody put his hands on her shoulders. They were warm and comforting. “Are you hearing things again?”

“Just leave me alone,” she whimpered, but she didn’t push him away. He embraced her, and she buried her head in his chest.

“Look, Troy’s pissed, and he told me to take you home,” he paused. “Are you aware of what’s going on, Gretchel?”

She started looking around for the Woman in Wool. It was all in her head, she tried to convince herself. Then she tried to focus on what Cody had said.

“Yes, I know. Just take me home. I’ve got to get out of here. I’m sick. I’ve got a migraine, the flu, whatever you want to tell them. I’ve just got to get out of here.”

Cody led her to his huge truck, but she hesitated at the door. The sense of
déjà vu
was almost overwhelming. Before she could stop herself, she screamed as loudly as she could.

∞

By the time she got home, Gretchel felt a little less crazy. She’d jumped out of the truck in the middle of Cody’s tirade against their cheating spouses. Inside, the boys were still in the living room playing video games. She informed them she was sick, and going to bed.

“She’s not sick. She’s just pissed at my dad,” Zach said.

Gretchel froze at the top stair landing, listening.

“Well maybe your dad shouldn't be messing around with my mom. He’s a jerk.” Ben retorted.

“Yeah, well your mom’s a bitch. They deserve each other.”

“I bet Troy’s trying to get control of the dealership. Why else would he cheat on your mom? She’s hot. Every guy in town wants her.”

              “My mom’s an insane train wreck,” Zach spat.

“Still hot, bro.”

“C’mon, man. You’re talking about my
mom
,” Zach mumbled. Then he looked around for his mom, and pulled the missing bottle of Scotch from between the couch cushions.

Gretchel sighed, shook her head, and continued her way up the stairs. She couldn’t cope with her son’s drinking. Not right now. Resisting the urge to join him was taking all the strength she had. She continued to the master bath, struggling to make sense of everything that had happened in the last few days. After years of maintaining a perfect veneer of anesthetized normalcy, Gretchel felt her life spinning out of her control.

She ran a hot bath. This ablution and her habit of rising early to greet the goddess of dawn were the only rituals she had left. Had Troy known what these practices meant to her, he would have found them incompatible with their upwardly-mobile, gated-community lifestyle, but he just thought that his wife enjoyed a long, steamy soak and an early-morning run.

             
As she eased herself into the water, Gretchel was reminded of the dream that had come to her in the cottage. She returned to the scene before the Woman in Wool had arrived. She willed herself to feel that sense of safety again. Yes, her life was spinning out of her control, but maybe she could trust that fate had something in mind for her besides an endless cycle of silent pain and carefully sustained numbness. Gretchel let the warm water hold her, and allowed herself to indulge in a memory that she’d been afraid to revisit for ages. Once, long ago, she had heard the voice of fate incarnate. She had heeded that voice, and it had led her to the boy with the aquamarine eyes.

∞

Carbondale, 1990s

             
The end of her freshman year of college was quickly approaching. She had barely passed all her classes, what with the hangovers, her job, and Troy. He had announced he was going home to Chicago for the summer. They had been dating–if one could call it that—since Halloween. She was going to be glad to be rid of him and his horrible friends. But she couldn’t go home herself. Not yet.

She didn’t know how she would be able to afford to stay in Carbondale for the summer, but she was determined to find a way. Otherwise she would be back in Irvine working on the farm. She didn’t mind the work; she just wasn’t ready to go back. Even though she desperately missed the countryside and the cottage, Carbondale had been a fresh start for her.

She told herself it was also the perfect opportunity to break away from Troy. Teddy had been right. He was a predator, and nobody would ever believe how evil he could really be.

Her plan had three steps: Find a cheap place to live, work hard all summer, and disappear from Troy’s life forever. It was a big campus, and even when she returned to the dorms in the fall, she would find a way to steer clear of him.

But it was May already, and she was running out of time to complete the first part of her plan. She was at Mary Lou’s, reading
The Daily Egyptian
, when the ad caught her eye. “
room opening
: Free rent and utilities. Minimal household tasks required.” followed by a phone number. Gretchel couldn’t believe it; it just seemed too good to be true. She ran to a pay phone as fast as she could.

A man answered, and she remembered how the voice had made her feel blissfully loved—safe, even. She didn’t know that hers was the nineteenth call. She didn’t know that the nineteenth call was the one the man on the other end of the line had been waiting for, or that he’d gotten the message to wait for the nineteenth caller in a dream.

“I’m calling about the room in the house on Pringle.”