The Wild Ways (8 page)
Charlie hadn’t felt it. Third circle clearly wasn’t connected enough and that was fine with her.
It was dark when it ended. Darker than it should have been in the center of a major city under a full moon.
Charlie felt it end. Through her bare feet and legs pressed against the dirt, through her back pressed up against the rock, through all places she and Allie were touching.
Breathing heavily, she turned when Allie did and saw David silhouetted against the light bleed from the city. It was exactly what she’d been looking for driving in from Tony’s house, although she wouldn’t have felt such a wave of irrational relief had she seen him then. He stood for a moment, sides heaving, pelt streaked dark with sweat, then he half reared and ran for the trees.
Allie let out a breath she’d probably been holding the entire time.
They didn’t speak on their way down to the car. There wasn’t a lot to say. Charlie’s stomach growled. They both ignored it.
“You okay to drive?” Charlie asked as they stepped over the low barrier into the gravel parking lot.
Allie threw her the keys.
“I wonder who . . . ?”
“Probably Uncle Evan,” Allie answered before Charlie could finish.
Uncle Evan had the Canada Post contracts for two rural routes. Someone else would be covering them now.
“You know . . .” Leaning on the open door, Charlie frowned into the shadows at the edges of the wood. “ . . . we only have the aunties’ word that Uncle Edward wavered.You ever wonder?”
“If they lie?” The quiet question drew Charlie’s gaze across the top of the car to meet Allie’s, the pale gray of her eyes darker in the moonlight. “We’ll be aunties one day.”
To anyone outside the family, that wouldn’t have sounded much like an answer.
“Evan,” Auntie Gwen confirmed the next morning. She’d stumbled in at five past eight, brushed her teeth twice, then had three glasses of water and a glass of orange juice. Her eyes were still mostly dark from lid to lid; there were unidentifiable stains on her sleeveless blouse, and a scratch up the length of her right arm. Graham had taken one look at her, and his fingers had twitched toward the weapons he no longer carried. Jack had taken a slightly faster look and decided to go into the office with Graham even though the job sucked and Tuesdays were usually a day off. Joe had come over from the apartment but stayed in the store.
“She knows where I am if she wants me,”
he’d pointed out when Charlie’d gone down to ask if he was coming upstairs.
“And if she doesn’t want me, I’d rather not be in her way.”
Joe, Charlie decided, was smarter than he looked.
he’d pointed out when Charlie’d gone down to ask if he was coming upstairs.
“And if she doesn’t want me, I’d rather not be in her way.”
Joe, Charlie decided, was smarter than he looked.
“Turn the pancakes, Alysha, or they’ll be overcooked on that side.”
Auntie Gwen had poured the pancakes herself, charms were too easy with a ladle of batter and a hot grill, but she’d seen no point in standing over the stove in midsummer when there were younger members of the family available.
Any other morning, Charlie knew Allie would have turned the command into a test of will; this morning, she flipped the pancakes.
When they came to the table, Auntie Gwen buttered each one carefully, poured syrup over the whole stack, chewed and swallowed two dripping forkfuls, and pushed the plate away.
Cradling a mug of coffee between both hands, Charlie could feel the buzz traveling under her skin, trying to get out. She’d spent the night sitting cross-legged on the sofa bed, quietly picking out the melody lines to songs she couldn’t quite hear. A glance at the abandoned pancakes, and she heard herself say, “Still full?”
Allie gasped. Charlie thought she caught a whiff of decaying leaves, saw Auntie Gwen lift her head, and was most definitely not feeling reckless enough to look her in the eye. After a long moment of weighted silence, Auntie Gwen’s fork hit the table at the edge of Charlie’s peripheral vision.
“I’m sorry, Charlotte, I didn’t quite catch that. Would you care to repeat it?”
“Not fucking likely.” When the silence grew more weighted still, she realized she’d answered out loud.
But Auntie Gwen merely sighed and said, “I could use a coffee, Alysha.”
Charlie watched Allie move around the kitchen, watched her walk up and set a full mug on the table, and finally looked at Auntie Gwen because Allie’s path had put the older woman in her direct line of sight. “Are you okay?”
“Me?” Allie asked, frowning.
Charlie shook her head and watched Auntie Gwen wrap her fingers around the mug. They all pretended to not see them shake.
“It was hard not to be there,” she said at last. “Bea and Carmen and I, we have years of ritual tying us to Edward.” She took a long swallow of coffee and added another spoonful of sugar, the spoon rattling against the sides of the mug. “And we lost Janet, Abby, Betty, and Dot.”
“Those horns aren’t just for show,” Allie said softly.
Charlie stared at her cousin. “Well, duh! You knew we lost four aunties and you didn’t mention it?”
“We didn’t lose four. They did.”
“We are them!”
“We were them.”
“Is she still them?” Charlie demanded, nodding at Auntie Gwen.
“She is the cat’s mother.” Auntie Gwen flinched. “Oh, dear God, I sound like Jane.” She took a deep breath and stared at her coffee. Charlie had to bite her tongue to keep from asking if she was scrying, maybe checking the box scores while she gathered her thoughts. Auntie Gwen had a touching belief that the Jays would pull it out of their collective asses after the All Star Break. A long moment later, she exhaled and squared her shoulders, clearly having come to a decision. “New branches of the family separate, Charlotte. Given modern technology, connections won’t be entirely severed this time—beads on a string is the inane analogy Meredith is using given that there’s only two beads.”
“This time?”
“Don’t be stupid. You don’t honestly think the entire family, from the bright beginning, is there in rural Ontario?”
Charlie glanced up at Allie who didn’t seem surprised. “You knew?”
She shrugged. “Seemed kind of obvious.”
Auntie Gwen sighed. “You haven’t thought about it at all, have you?”
“Why would I?”
“Why, indeed.” This second sigh held subtext Charlie ignored. “To answer your question, Carmen, Bea, and I will always be at heart a part of
them
—we have too much history there to ever break entirely free. As for the younger members, with every ritual the emphasis will shift until their ties are entirely here. As for you, Charlotte . . .”
them
—we have too much history there to ever break entirely free. As for the younger members, with every ritual the emphasis will shift until their ties are entirely here. As for you, Charlotte . . .”
“Me?”
“The assumption was that you were too wild to settle. We’ve been reassessing.”
“I haven’t settled!”
“Easy to say.” She smiled a familiar self-satisfied smile and finished her coffee as Allie made faces at Charlie suggesting she disengage. “Bea’s right. Evan isn’t strong enough to hold for long,” she said, putting her mug down.
The aunties didn’t bother with graceful segues.
“There will be challenges. Multiple challenges. We’ll have to tell the county we’re extending the family plot—Ruby’s talking dahlias. Things will be topsy-turvy for a while.”
“Topsy-turvy?”
“Jane again. Remind me to fight that. The point is, we’re looking at uncertain weather patterns, more boys being born, cakes not rising, unnaturally tough pastry, and cabbages shaped like Elvis.”
“Elvis? Seriously?”
“Oh, for pity’s sake, Charlotte, why would we get cabbages shaped like Elvis?” She stood and stretched, her shirt riding up enough to show a bruise just above her hip and a scrape rising up from the blotch of purple-green.
Charlie scratched at the buzzing under her left forearm and showed teeth in what wasn’t even trying to be a smile. “So, since you couldn’t go home, what
were
you hunting last night, Auntie Gwen?”
were
you hunting last night, Auntie Gwen?”
“None of your business, Charlotte. Alysha, you’ll need to cover the store. Joe’s leaving.”
Allie paused, about to remove the rejected pancakes. “Auntie Gwen, we talked about this. He’s my employee.”
“And he’s my . . .”
“Never mind.” When Allie cut her off, Charlie nearly applauded. Auntie Gwen’s descriptions of what Joe was to her made it difficult to look Joe in the eye. And Gales weren’t exactly shy. “I’ll be right down.”
“Good.” She paused at the door and swept a dark gaze over both of them. “There’s a chance Jane engineered this whole thing because she’s afraid Catherine might decide to spend some time at home. Your grandmother always had a frightening amount of influence on your grandfather. The last thing we need is a Wild Power playing at being domestic.”
“Worked out the last time,” Allie muttered at the closed door.
“She wasn’t talking about your grandmother.” The buzzing under Charlie skin revved up.
“Yes, she was. She said . . .”
“She meant me. She thinks I’ve settled.”
Allie smiled, the curve of her mouth an invitation. “Would that be so bad?”
Before Charlie could respond in a way that wouldn’t get her cut off—the sofa bed was a choice not a necessity—she remembered Auntie Catherine’s call. “So, a funny thing happened . . .”
“It could be a coincidence,” Allie allowed a few minutes later, leading the way downstairs.
Charlie snorted. “We don’t believe in coincidence.”
Their reflection showed them joined at the hip.
“Still not double-jointed,” Charlie muttered as they passed.
The store was empty, the door was locked, and there was a note from Joe on the counter.
“I sold a yoyo. We’re going to need another box of rhinestone p . . .”
The shape of the “p” suggested Auntie Gwen had waited as long as she intended to.
“I sold a yoyo. We’re going to need another box of rhinestone p . . .”
The shape of the “p” suggested Auntie Gwen had waited as long as she intended to.
“So . . .” Allie unlocked the door, flipped the sign, and turned to stare measuringly at Charlie. Charlie had no idea what was being measured but had a funny feeling she was coming up short. “Are you going to take the apartment over the coffee shop? It wouldn’t be hard to put in a connecting door.”
Charlie clenched her jaw to keep her teeth from chattering as the buzz reached a crescendo. Before she could answer, before she knew what she was going to answer, her phone ran. “Looks like things are getting back to normal,” she muttered digging it out of the pocket of her shorts. Normal in the Gale family
wasn’t
over twenty-four hours of phone silence.
wasn’t
over twenty-four hours of phone silence.
“Hey, Chuck! Got a minute?”
“Mark?”
It’s Mark
, she mouthed at Allie who mouthed back
no shit
as Charlie moved in between two sets of shelves and made herself comfortable. Back before Calgary, and
Dun Good
, she and Mark had spent the Nova Scotia summer festival circuit in a band called
Wylde Chylde.
The spelling had made Charlie’s eyeballs ache and the band itself had been a high-energy mix of styles that had never quite jelled. When
Wylde Chylde
blew apart, Charlie and the bass player had headed for Toronto and the
blink-and-you-miss-it
punk revival movement while Mark had formed and re-formed the remaining pieces into something closer to east coast traditional. Their friendship had survived time and distance and step dancing. “What’s up?”
It’s Mark
, she mouthed at Allie who mouthed back
no shit
as Charlie moved in between two sets of shelves and made herself comfortable. Back before Calgary, and
Dun Good
, she and Mark had spent the Nova Scotia summer festival circuit in a band called
Wylde Chylde.
The spelling had made Charlie’s eyeballs ache and the band itself had been a high-energy mix of styles that had never quite jelled. When
Wylde Chylde
blew apart, Charlie and the bass player had headed for Toronto and the
blink-and-you-miss-it
punk revival movement while Mark had formed and re-formed the remaining pieces into something closer to east coast traditional. Their friendship had survived time and distance and step dancing. “What’s up?”
“Aston got bit by a seal.”
“He what?”
“He was out in his cousin’s boat, saw a seal swimming by, and reached overboard to pet it.”
About to poke her finger into a box of plush toys, Charlie reconsidered. “He’s an idiot.”
“Way to state the obvious, Chuck. Fucking seal bit off two of his fingers. Clearly the stupid fucker isn’t going to be playing much for a while.” Mark seldom swore. He considered it the sign of a weak vocabulary. Things must be bad back east. “We need you.”
“I’m already in a band.”
His sigh was deep enough she nearly felt it against her cheek. “Look, Chuck, I wouldn’t ask, but we’ve got five weeks of festival coming up, a good chance of taking top prize, and I know you’ll mesh.You’re at the same e-mail, right? I’ll send you the set list; you’ll be covering guitar and mandolin and you’ve got range enough to sing backup vocals without key changes left, right, and center. You take Aston’s lead; we can change the pronouns on the fly.”
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