A Coat Red as Holly Read online

Lyall flinched at the mention of Grandma. His complexion grew splotchy as if he couldn’t decide whether to blanch or blush. I choked on a laugh, remembering his reaction when we walked into her backyard last June to find her rolling naked in the morning dew.

  "Your eyes are big as saucers, boy. If you don't like what you see I suggest you tuck 'em back into your head." Lyall 's mouth hung open like the hinge had come loose.

  "Grandma!" I ran to her plastic patio chair and snatched up her house coat. She sat up with a stately expression, hugging her knees to cover her chest.

  "Don't you know a roll in the dew on the Summer Solstice is good for the health? Keeps a body feeling young. It's what they used to do in the old days."

  "But not your old days," I told her, averting my face to keep the mental scarring to a minimum. When Grandma referred to ‘the old days’ it was usually something from centuries ago that she found in her books of herbal remedies and folk healing.

  She smiled at Lyall, pleased as a cat with a mouse caught between its paws.

  "You see? It works. I'm nearly seventy, and I can still make the boys blush."

  "I don't like you walking by yourself in this weather," Mom said, breaking into the memory.

  "She's right, you could fall," Lyall threw in. I rolled my eyes.

  "Nobody stopped me from walking over here in the first place." I jammed my other hand defiantly into my glove. Mom's mouth pinched into a thin, frustrated line.

  I picked up my scarf to wind around my neck and almost missed the pointed look she shot Lyall’s way. He jolted into motion as though she'd poked him with a cattle prod.

  "Let me walk you back." He stepped closer, and I nearly gagged in the cloud of wintergreen cologne. He must have tapped into his brother’s supply, because I've never noticed such a strong scent on him before. Or maybe it was my nose. Pregnancy came with some strange side effects. The heightened sense of smell had been unexpected—and unpleasant. The amount of pungent aromas I ran across on a daily basis far outnumbered the fragrant ones.

  "No," I said flatly.

  Mom's patience snapped, and she opened her mouth to scold me for being rude, or maybe I was ruining whatever plot she was trying to hatch. There was definitely something going on. It was entirely too convenient that she’d invited me over the same night Lyall just happened to be coming by to do her a favor.

  Before she could get a word out though, Lyall picked up my coat and held it up so I could slip my arms in.

  "It's okay. I can talk to Gwen some other time." Those words carried a weight that I didn’t trust. Talk about what? And why was Mom going to so much trouble to get us into the same room?

  The sleeves of my sweater dress bunched up around my elbows, making it hard to move my arms as I tied the coat's matching crimson belt. The belt could barely reached all the way around me. There wasn’t enough to secure it with a double knot.

  "Well, call me when you get home at least," Mom said in a tight voice as she swung to face the table and began stabbing noodles onto her plate with more force than she needed. I glared at the back of her neck.

  Home? Grandma’s house wasn't home. Not mine anyway. It was the house she and Grandpa bought when they first got married, the house Mom grew up in, and it looked like it was going to be the house where my daughter grew up too. But it sure wasn’t home to me.

  I put my hand on the dark wood paneled wall to hold my balance as I shoved my foot into my boot. The paneling wobbled. Truth be told, it amazed me the old house was still standing after the way Mom blew up the night she threw me out. If I put my ear to the wall I bet I could still hear the echoes of her yelling.

  "This is his responsibility, Gwen! You owe it to yourself and to that baby to make him pay his share of her way through the world!"

  "You mean like Dad did when he left us?"

  Shock sucked the color out of Mom's cheeks. It shriveled her up right in front of my eyes. After a few deep, shaky breaths she caught my chin in her hand.

  "Your father is gone, Gwen. Leave his memory in peace."

  I should have, but I’d found a scab I could pick so I tore it open like I was mining for blood.

  “Stop acting like he died, Mom! He left us. Just say it! And that’s what you're so upset about, isn't it? He's gone and you're stuck footing the bill for a mistake the both of you made!”

  Me going to live with Grandma was more of a mutual decision after that.

  "If you're going, you'd better hurry.” Lyall sent a quick glance at the sky through the window. "It'll be dark soon." I think he said it to scare me into changing my mind. A mile and a half up and down hills covered in two-day old snow was a trek even without being nine months pregnant.

  I snatched up the brown plastic bag hanging beside the sink. No way was I giving Mom an excuse to ask me to come over again. Next time, I’d send Grandma to pick up whatever she dragged out of the attic.

  With my center of gravity thrown off by the baby, trying to get out through the mudroom was probably more dangerous than walking home through the snow. The rubber door liner caught on the rug where Mom arranged her shoes, and high heels and boots still lay scattered everywhere from when I’d come in an hour ago.

  I nearly rolled an ankle stepping on a thick snow boot, but before I fell into the side of the washing machine, Lyall sprang up behind me to catch my wrist and hold me up with his other hand. I looked around in surprise that he was agile enough to catch me. The baby kicked her displeasure at the unexpectedly bumpy ride.

  Lyall’s light brown eyes held a splash of green that was only noticeable up close. Either I'd never been this close to notice, or more likely I never paid enough attention to look. His cologne clogged my nose, and I closed my eyes.

  "Ian must be home for the holidays. You've been borrowing his cologne."

  All the warmth melted from his eyes the moment I said his older brother’s name. His breath whistled out through his nose, and he slowly shook his head.

  "He's spending Christmas with his girlfriend and her family. From the way things are headed he'll probably ask her to marry him soon."

  There wasn't much I could do against that first rush of disappointment, but I could've kicked myself for feeling it when I had no reason to expect anything less.

  Lyall stared down his nose and didn’t say a word.

  Trying to salvage my dignity, I tried to leave, but in moving to catch me he now blocked the door. He wasn't in any hurry to move.

  "Seriously, Gwen, we need to talk. Let me get my sweatshirt and I can walk you home."

  My patience snapped.

  "Stop making such a big deal out of it! I do it all the time." A muscle flexed in his jaw a half second before he blew his bangs out of his eyes.

  "Only because you’re too hard-headed to admit you need help."

  Maybe that was true, but I turned my back and reached for the iron railing to steady me down the rough stone steps anyway.

  As soon as I stepped through the door, a breeze hit me right in the chest like two open palms, nearly knocking me over backwards. The feeling of actual hands was so strong that I scanned the yard, half-expecting to see some brat from the neighborhood smirking from behind the bushes.

  The lawn between Mom's house and the neighbors' was empty, but I knew better than anyone that just because I couldn’t see anybody didn’t mean no one was there.

  II.

  The flag pole out front rattled in the wind as I made my way down the white gravel drive. It was a lonely sound, like a broken bell that couldn’t ring.

  I pulled up the hood on my coat and dragged my hair forward to keep out the worst of the cold. I didn't check to see if Mom watched from the kitchen window. Her eyes burned holes in the back of my neck, daring me to turn and let her see how much I wanted to stay.

  It wasn't that far to Grandma's house, but I’m not going to lie and say it was an easy walk. First, I had to get to the top of the hill, then go through the roundabout to make my way down Main Street. From there, I turned up Miles
Way that skirted the edge of the park before taking Alderberry Lane to the end where Grandma lived.

  I sighed thinking about Grandma’s house. To keep the place after Grandpa died, she sold all her memories one at a time until the only things left were too faded by age and riddled with holes to mean anything to anyone. The old farmhouse was falling apart. Spiders built cities in the ceiling corners. Rodents scurried through the walls, squeaking and scratching at all hours of the night. The roof sagged in the middle from sponging up all of the moisture from years of rain and snow. It was only a matter of time before the town declared the place condemned.

  It didn’t help that Grandma was getting eccentric in her old age. Her naked roll in the dew last summer was more shocking than surprising. Luckily, the trees on her property blocked the view from her neighbors, otherwise I’m sure the cops would’ve gotten called in on that one.

  Sometimes, I think Mom kicked me out as a way to kill two birds with one stone. Once I moved in with Grandma she didn't have to hire someone to keep an eye on her.

  I studied what remained of the three-inch snow that fell a couple days before. While it made my already long walk more precarious, it also meant I didn’t have to worry about Grandma crawling around in the creek bed behind her house searching for hag stones or whatever she called them. They were like finding four-leaf clovers, she told me when she picked up the hobby a year or so ago, rocks that came with natural holes. She used them in the pendants and bracelets she sold at yard sales. I reached up to my throat and felt the leather cord that secured the flat river stone she'd given me last Christmas.

  "Keep it close to your heart, Gwen my dear," she said as she tied the cord behind my neck. "It'll guard you from witches and let you see through their spells." Perfect. Because there were so many of those wandering around. Still, I wore it to make her happy, and after the accident, when I found out that magic was real, I made sure that I never took it off again.

  I still don’t believe in witches, but faeries, now those are real.

  Another gust of wind pushed at the back of my legs like an oversized puppy urging me along. Something silver shifted at the edge of my peripheral vision, but as soon as I turned to look I saw nothing but shadows playing tricks with the leaves. Even as I shook my head and warned myself not to be silly, the hairs on my neck rippled as a shiver ran down my spine.

  Another whistling breeze blew at my back. The smell of snow perfumed the air, and tiny flurries sailed past me. I put my hand on my belly and planted my feet. If I didn't know any better I'd say the weather was trying to tell me where to go.

  The moment I stopped walking, the wind whipped up with a shrill howl. The cold bit at my cheeks, and I turned my head into my hood seeking a warm place to hide. For no reason that I could think of, my heart started to pound.

  I was being silly. It was winter and perfectly normal for the wind to blow.

  I glanced at Mom's house. The yellow glow of the kitchen window stood out like a square of life on the otherwise bleak street. Maybe walking alone to Grandma’s was stupid. I should probably wait for Mom to give me a ride.

  Before I could turn around though, the wind slammed into my back, driving me forward as it pulled and tugged at my coat.

  I drew level with the large, white house with bright red shutters two doors down from Mom's. It used to belong to Bob and Trudy Rowe before they moved into the local nursing home and left it to their son, Mark and his new wife, Heather. Straifield was a small town where everyone had ties to everybody else. Heather was only six years older than I was. She used to babysit me during the summers when Mom went to work.

  The door to the enclosed porch swung open to reveal Heather wearing a thick, hound's-tooth coat. She turned her cheek against the wind and put her hand on her baby bump that was almost as round as mine. I hunched my shoulders and stopped walking, hoping she wouldn't see me. Surrounded by the gray-white landscape left behind by the last snow, my bright red jacket was hard to miss.

  Almost as if she’d been waiting for me, her head swung around and a toothy smile lit up her face.

  "Gwen, how good to see you! I've been hoping to run into you." She made short work of her salted walkway and came toward me with long, sure strides in spite of the tall boots she wore with their sturdy wedged heels.

  "Hi, Heather," I mumbled, grateful the wind chose that moment to blow my hair into my face like a screen. A string of pearls stood out against her black turtleneck, and a plaid skirt peeked from beneath her coat when she moved. When people talked about the glow of motherhood they were talking about girls like Heather, whose round, rosy cheeks glowed without any trace of blush.

  All that new-mother radiance skipped right over me. Blooms withered on my cheeks, and there was more grease than gloss to my stringy, black hair. Being pregnant should have made me feel more like a woman, but standing next to Heather reminded me I was just a sixteen-year-old kid.

  Despite maneuvering her front walk like a pro, Heather reached for me like she needed help to keep her balance. Her surprisingly strong hands latched onto my arm, and I couldn’t help but feel like a small animal caught in a trap.

  "Ooh, it's chilly out tonight! Where are you headed?" Her lips peeled away from her teeth in a smile that set me on my guard. The shade of lipstick she wore matched the cluster of holly pinned just above her left ear.

  "Home," I replied shortly. She fluttered her lashes and cocked her head in an stage-worthy display of innocent confusion. Practically the whole town knew that Mom kicked me out, and living only two doors down gave Heather a front row seat to watch the drama unfold. Seeing that I wasn't buying her ignorant act, a slow blush rose up her neck into her cheeks. Her expressions smoothed so gracefully from one to another I knew she spent time practicing them in front of a mirror.

  She tightened her grip on my arm and hugged it against her side.

  "I was on my way to the drug store for some Tylenol." She giggled and touched her stomach in a gesture designed to remind me that she was about to have a baby too. "Plus, Little Miss is insisting on chocolate for dinner. Mark said he'd pick some up, but he won't be home for another hour."

  I didn’t have anything to say to that. It must be nice to have a husband who regularly went on chocolate runs for her. Grandma pretty much ignored my preferences when a craving came along. The last time I asked for chicken wings she shot me a scandalized look and gave me a bowl of homemade oatmeal and honey instead. She didn’t let it cook long enough so the oats felt hard and lumpy unless my tongue slid into a gooey strip of honey. I didn't have to try hard to fake morning sickness to keep from having to finish it, so she gave me a few slices of buttered bread covered with sprinkles instead. It tasted better than I expected, but that night after she went to bed I microwaved a bowl of canned chicken noodle soup.

  "Would you mind some company?" Heather hugged my arm tighter, giving me no polite way to turn her down. The drug store stood on the corner at the top of the hill, so we were headed in the same direction anyway.

  Another fierce blast of wind swirled around us. Instinctively, we huddled together. Heather clapped a hand to her knit cap to keep it from blowing away. She wrinkled her nose at the sky.

  “I thought we’d have a milder winter this year.” Her eyes snapped to my face, almost accusatory. No doubt she was still upset about the wind trying to steal her hat.

  “Winter is winter.” I shrugged, tugging my hood tighter against my head. “Everything will be miserable until spring comes again.”

  “Ha! Is that what you think?” She laughed like she knew something I didn’t. I clenched my teeth to keep from arguing the point. For her, Winter meant magic and wonder. She could afford that luxury married to a man who made more in a month than Grandma, Mom, and I would scrape together in a year. She filled her home with Christmas music and garlands, curled up in front of her fireplace with armadas of marshmallows bobbing in her hot cocoa.

  It probably never crossed her mind to wonder if the city would shut off her elect
ricity. She kept her house warmed by an oven that cranked out tray after tray of baked goods.

  The smell of gingerbread clung to her, filling my nose and reminding my belly of the meal I turned down at Mom’s. Heather swung her head so her curls swooped in a white-blonde arc across one shoulder.

  "Oh, are you hungry? Here, have a cookie." She reached into her pocket and pulled out a pair of gingerbread cookies wrapped in a paper towel. As much as her two-faced personality got under my skin, I'd never turn down any of Heather's baking. She was a wizard in the kitchen.

  She let me choose which one I wanted, the one shaped like a reindeer with a wreath of holly piped in green icing around his neck, or the girl who wore a red dress and had red hots for eyes. I chose the girl.

  The cookie was still warm from the oven, and it crumbled on my tongue. I closed my eyes with an involuntary hum. Heather watched me with a strange, predatory satisfaction.

  "Have you picked out a name yet?"

  I nearly choked, but managed to turn it into a single cough instead.

  When I didn't say anything right away she canted her head and squinted at my face.

  "Oh, I see. Keeping it a secret? That’s fun! Let me try and guess. If I get it right you'll have to tell me though. What about Holly? Or Rose?" I must have made a face because she unleashed the highest register of her cheerleader laugh. "You're right. That's definitely more my style than yours. But you do have a name, don't you?"

  I took my time chewing, keeping my eyes on the cookie that was now missing both legs.

  Honestly, she was the first person to come up and ask what I planned to name the baby. I don’t think Mom wanted to hear about it, and Grandma…well in true Grandma fashion, she surprised me by telling me she didn’t want to know.

  “Names have power, dear. You don’t go whispering a name to just anybody. You never know what mischief they might use it to get up to.” I’ve pretty much given up on trying to make sense of anything she says anymore. That left me with no one who really shared my excitement. Until that moment, I hadn’t realized that I felt left out.