The Witch of Belladonna Bay (5 page)

I don't pay no mind to rules. Seems to me, rules are things made up by scared people too afraid to die, so they can't live. Or too lazy to make their own decisions. Rules are for breakin', as far as I'm concerned.

No, it wasn't because of a silly old rule. I never went over there because I never met a mystery I didn't like, and Belladonna Bay was the best mystery of all. Jamie and me, we'd grown up believing all sorts of things about that place. None of which were good.

Anyway, the mystery goes like this: the Old-timers say that those people who came on over from England, the ones at Roanoke that disappeared (and if that ain't the biggest ambiguity of all time, I don't know what is), well, the Old-timers reckon those people didn't go missing after all.

Nope. They just got cold.

So they up and moved. And where do you suppose they found themselves? Right here in Magnolia Creek. Well, it wasn't a creek back then. Back then, it was a wild and raging river. And Belladonna Bay was a tempting piece of forest that sat smack-dab in its center. Why they chose to end up there isn't known, but the Old-timers say there was already a curse on that place. A beautiful, sad sort of somethin' that drew people there like moths to flame.

When the people began to build their new settlement a mighty ruckus started. You see, some of the people wanted to live in the forest like the Indians, all natural like, but some wanted a real village with English houses and
rules
. They fought, and in the end, part of the colony fled. But it was the wild ones who stayed. And then, after a spell, they just disappeared inside that forest and became shafts of light. Ghosts who never died. And if anyone from the outside comes on over to that place, this mist (or miasma as Jackson likes to call it, always saying it like “my asthma”) creeps in their minds and lungs and right into the bloodstream. Makes it so they can't tell what they seen or can't never go back to how they were before.

Miasma
. That's one of my favorite words, too.

Every person that goes on over there comes back changed. At least that's what they say. And I believe 'em because I've seen a lot of things that just ain't possible. (And that's sayin' something when you consider the source. Me.)

They say Naomi went over chasing some silly ginger cat across the creek. Skipping over the stones like a ballerina. See, she'd fallen into some kind of mental distress a few months after giving birth to my aunt Bronwyn, and Jackson says that cat kept the sadness at bay. But the animal was drawn to the sick sweetness of Belladonna Bay and ran right over, and Naomi, havin' a bit of magic livin' in her own self, didn't think nothin' of it.

But when she came back she fell deeper into the sad. And no one can recall what came first, the opium or her jaunt across the creek.

My own mama went over there, too. My mama was Italian, see. Not from the country but in her blood. Her last name was Amore. It means
love.
She came down here lookin' for her history and found my daddy instead. She went over there pregnant with me, to find the Belladonna that she expected grew there. My mama had magic in her too, see. It's why I'm
extra
odd, I suppose. She died right when I was born, and I'm sure that little trip had something to do with it.

I miss her sometimes.

And there's story after story just like those. Everyone in Magnolia Creek has a story about someone who defied instinct and fell prey to the mystery. Someone who they loved who came back a different person. All filled up with miasma.

I seen it firsthand. Carter,
he
went over. I saw him crossing back. It was the night they say my daddy did the killin'. The moon was high and I was staring at it out my bedroom window, and there he was, Carter coming out from behind that curtain of mist, his white shirt covered in blood.

I ran outside thinkin' he was hurt.

“Carter, Carter!” I yelled. “What's wrong? Where are you hurt? Why'd you go on over there?”

His silver hair shone bright in the nights light. For a second I didn't think he recognized me, his eyes were so wild. Then he said something I didn't understand.

“Don't worry, honey, everything's gonna be all right. Carter's gonna take care of everything. I been takin' care of this family for years, and I don't plan on stoppin' now. Don't you worry.”

He said those words to calm me, but they didn't. Because he said them while he held me too tight, through tears. And not once, in my whole life, had I heard or seen him cry. Not Carter. He's a “man's man” if there ever was one. It makes me almost faint just thinkin' on it.

And later on, when I heard my daddy and Carter talkin', I couldn't make out exactly what they were sayin', but it sounded to me like my daddy, my dear sweet daddy, was tellin' Carter that he did it.
Did what?
I wondered.

Then my daddy said he wasn't goin' to even fight about it. And Carter kept on arguin' with him. I couldn't figure any of it out.

By the next morning everything started to make an evil sort of sense.

And you know what? I blame it on Belladonna Bay and the mist around it. Nothin's been the same since that night. Not one thing. Because that night the miasma crept into all of us.

The next morning, Stick (or Sheriff Croft if you want to get fancy) came round to pick up my daddy as soon as the sun hit the sky. And he was quiet about it, my daddy. He walked out the front door like a prince; his back straight and his golden hair shinin' like a crown. “Come on, Stick,” he said. “Take me in.”

(Everyone calls him Stick 'cause he's so thin.)

Anyway, Stick didn't want to take my daddy in. They were friends. Hell, my daddy was friends with every Towner. No one didn't like Patrick Whalen.

“I'm sure it's all a misunderstanding, Paddy,” he'd said as he put cuffs around my daddy's wrists. I remember he went and carefully rolled up the cuffs of Daddy's starched white shirt. (Minerva sure knows how to make a man look handsome.)

As the cuffs clicked closed, my daddy looked back at me and did the oddest thing. He winked. “Nope, ain't no mistake. I killed 'em, Stick. I was drunk and angry. Now take me in and hear my confession.”

“Jaysus, Paddy! Ain't you gonna wait for me to read you your rights? Shit!”

“I don't have no rights. I gave those up last night.”

I was screamin' and cryin and carryin' on like a baby. Carter had to hold me back. Jackson was already drinkin' in his study. The air was thick with a secret bein' kept from me.

So Stick put my daddy in the back of his police car and drove him down that long driveway leadin' off our property and straight into town. One straight line down Main Street. The same road my aunt Bronwyn took the day she made her homecoming.

And both days I stood out on the steps waiting and watching. Watching him leave, then watchin' her come, murmuring to myself, “He didn't do it. I know he didn't do it.”

My daddy might'a confessed, but it was Carter who was covered in blood. I didn't want to throw blame around like that though. I mean, a girl has to be
sure
of a thing.

And sooner than I wanted, another, more troublin' idea came into my mind. One that shook everything up like a rattlesnake in a chicken coop.

*   *   *

My aunt Bronwyn drove up to the Big House in the shiny black car Jackson sent for her like she was the queen of the world. I stood there frownin'.
You might think you're the queen returning for your crown, only that ain't never gonna happen. I'm the queen of the Big House now.

I know it was a childish thing to think, but
I'm a child
. Most days anyway.

I came right out onto the front porch and made sure I was three steps above her so I could look her straight in the eye. Jamie always said you gotta look your opponent straight in the eyes. Said because we're human we can't rightly piss on our territory like the animals do (manners were important to my Little Prince), but looking at people straight worked
almost
just as well.

Jamie liked to study the animals. We like nature and outdoor stuff, me an' Jamie. And the day Aunt Bronwyn showed up, I was missing Jamie so damn much I thought my fingers and toes would turn blue.

Then it all went to hell in a handbasket. I was simply not prepared for how she looked and moved just like my daddy.

“Hey, Byrd,” she said, all soft like cotton. She was wearing a gypsy-style green shirt over faded jeans, and her hair was pulled back, but the sticky hot of the day had set it free, curling it around her face. That Whalen towhead hair has a wildness all its own, and I'm jealous of it. And she had this big, fancy camera around her neck on a colorful strap. Boy, did I want to get my hands on that. I like taking pictures.

My heart melted right away because of her likeness to my daddy, and something else I couldn't quite figure out. I wanted to run to her. I wanted to say all the things I couldn't say.

They say my daddy killed Jamie and his mama. But he didn't. No matter he says he did it. He's liy'n.
But my lips wouldn't budge. My hand wouldn't even come out to shake hers. Sometimes I can be more stubborn than I oughta be.

“Hey there,” she repeated.

Jackson was watchin' us. Waitin' to see if we'd hit it off or not. Either way, it wouldn't a mattered to him. Nothin' life hands that man, good or bad, can hold sway over him. Minerva calls him an “eternal optimist.” Hell, if that's what the bourbon gives you, more power to it. But him watchin' me was annoyin', so I guess I might have said, “I heard ya the first time,” or somethin' a touch rude like that.

Next thing she did was ask me about Dolores. Dolores is my dog. She was at my side like always. And even though Dolores seemed to like her fine, I still couldn't speak to Bronwyn of Magnolia Creek. I could list the ways she'd hurt the ones I loved most. Leavin' like she did. Makin' Jackson and my daddy miss her an' worry over her. But I do have to admit it, she was damn pretty, with a soft bit underneath … so instead of just walkin' away from her, as I'd planned, I muttered some kind of answer, I think.

Then she did the strangest thing.

She thanked me for watching out for her brother … in
French
. And I thought I'd faint. So I said, “You're welcome” (in French, of course … I mean I'm tryin' not to be too rude), and ran off. 'Cause I didn't know what to say next. And nothing, not one thing was coming out right or feeling the way I'd figured it would.

I ran off into the side yard and climbed up into Esther. She's the biggest Southern magnolia in more than fifteen counties. And she's the oldest on our property. I love her.

I sat in her branches so I could watch what would happen next from way up high. Would my aunt turn around and leave again? It's what I'd expected.… No matter how much preparation I'd done for her arrival, I didn't think she'd actually
stay
. I figure it's the same for most folks. You plan and you make things all pretty for your guests, but in the end you want them to come for a bit, ooh and aah, and then go on home thinking about how
amazing
you are.

But sitting there in that tree, I changed my mind.

Because everything wasn't fine. And I thought maybe I needed her.

And I never thought I'd feel that way about no one, 'cept for Jamie.

I was relieved when Jackson finally went into the house and Aunt Bronwyn set herself right down on the front steps lookin' off into the distance. She hadn't come after me. Maybe she understood. Maybe she'd be the one to solve the mystery. Maybe she'd love me and stay forever.

These kinds of thoughts I have, that go one way first and then the other so quick I can't keep track, are the thoughts my daddy calls “the crazy fuckalls.” I'm not supposed to say it 'cause there's a curse word in there. But it's a good way to describe curvy thoughts.

“Byrd,” he'd say—laughing at me because I'd said I didn't want ice cream because I hated it and then I did want ice cream because I like rum raisin and ain't it the best thing ever?—“you got a case of the crazy fuckalls,” then we'd laugh and eat a whole carton of rum raisin.

I'd almost forgot his smiling ways and eyes and hands.

My daddy's got the smoothest palms. Rich man hands. Not like Jackson. Jackson doesn't live like he's rich. He did hard work next to the farmhands when he was young and prefers the outdoors—like me. At least he did, until the drink made him escape into the universe inside his chest. That big ol' place where he still lives all twisted up with Naomi. Beautiful Naomi who still dances across the floor of her rooms in the east wing of the Big House. Jackson keeps them locked up, and Minerva cleans them, then locks them up again. But I get in, always have. I go visit her.

Naomi throws fine tea parties. For a dead lady, that is.

 

5

Bronwyn

 

BROWNWYN WHALEN.

I saw the sign as soon as I got off the plane, but I ignored the man holding it.

And I'll be damned if he didn't follow me down to baggage claim anyway. Every last person in Alabama seems to know a Whalen when they see one.

Grabbing my bags off the luggage carousel, I made my way to the exit. I could see him roll his eyes and follow me, but I didn't care. I'd been making eyes roll all over the East Coast for fourteen years. BitsyWyn Whalen was surfacing far too quickly for my liking.

Walking into the heat, I felt more than the heavy air. I felt the weight of my memories. The ones I'd hoped would come back slowly—drip by drip, moment by moment—only they weren't cooperating. Instead, they tried to ambush me from behind the air, so I held my breath because I was sure the minute I inhaled, BitsyWyn would wake up and snatch my quiet soul.