Goddess Girl Prophecy Page 13

  I knew what they were discussing. “I thought we weren’t going to talk about this at school?” I scolded.

  Kanaan raised his eyebrows at Amaya. “She’s right. We’re done here.”

  Amaya scowled at him and opened her sack lunch.

  “The good news is”—Kanaan read a text on his phone —“the elders will be in Manitou Friday night.”

  I stabbed a fork into the salad. I wished the elders could be here right now and take the things off my hands. That day at lunch was when I decided to give them the stone in MawMaw’s bedpost. Though I hadn’t experimented with it yet, I was fairly sure it was the same material and that it belonged to someone else. I would have to steal it, though, and the idea of stealing from MawMaw made me cringe both mentally and physically. I was ashamed that I had even thought it.

  Misunderstanding my body language, Kanaan took my hand. “It’ll be over soon.”

  I wanted to tell them that it’d never be over for me, not with my quirks. I can’t tell them that, I thought and blew out a breath.

  “You can tell us anything.” Amaya, about to bite into her sandwich, looked up at me wide-eyed. “I just heard your thought.”

  Kanaan looked back and forth between us for a few shocked seconds. “I heard you too.” He threw his burger down on his tray and sat back. “Evil use, exhibit A.”

  He was wrong, of course. The first theory that popped into my thoughts was that Amaya could hear me because we both had sparkly healing dust in our bodies. But since Kanaan didn’t have any in his system...

  I must be putting my thoughts out there. How?

  Kanaan shrugged. “You tell us.”

  Amaya, too, looked at me with eyebrows raised.

  “Stop it,” I insisted.

  Luckily the students around us didn’t seem to hear anything. Oh, joy, joy, joy. A new quirk, and one that promised me a life of a hermit. I breathed in through my nose and out through my mouth, trying not to hyperventilate. Both Amaya and Kanaan stared at me. Rather than dwell on quirks I’d rather keep to myself, I forced my mind to think about Founders Day.

  The small-town feel of the event was what I loved most, even if it was a white-man invention. It started off with one of those hometown parades where the high school marching band and fire department were the stars. No big fancy floats or celebrities here, just real people attached to the town in some way.

  Can you hear me, Amaya? Kanaan? No big fancy floats here, I thought it again.

  Neither Amaya nor Kanaan responded that time. I could not let people hear my thoughts, especially about the skull or the object in MawMaw’s bedpost. Fear twisted my stomach into more knots than an acrobat’s safety net. I didn’t take any chances.

  For the rest of the day, I concentrated on nothing but school—all my thoughts were on what the teachers said and the lesson of the moment. While the skull tried to creep into my thoughts here and there, I deliberately focused my brain on those benign thoughts. Who knew that MawMaw’s insistence that I learn how to meditate would be such a gift?

  That’s not to say it started out easy. Nope. It was exhausting at first. By the end of the school day, though, it was strangely satisfying. Overall, thinking about what I wanted to think about lowered my stress level.

  Outside, Kanaan and Amaya were waiting for me. We walked down the steep hill together.

  “Is anyone following us this time?” I questioned Kanaan.

  He turned around. “Doesn’t look like it.”

  “Still, we’ll leave it where it is for now.” I looked at Amaya. “If that’s okay with you.”

  She shrugged. “Yeah. If someone does hear your thoughts, they won’t come into the main house, right?” She smiled at her rationality. “They’ll just trash the garage.”

  I cringed at the possibility of it.

  Kanaan nodded at Amaya. “Good point.”

  “We keep the status quo for two days, right?” I added just to reassure myself, relieved when they both nodded.

  We parted ways on Manitou Avenue. Amaya headed home and Kanaan, insisting he walk me to work, stuck with me. Every other step or so, I smelled perfume.

  “Are you wearing cologne?”

  He looked sideways at me. “Aftershave.”

  He pulled his hoodie sleeve, which rode halfway up his forearm, back down to his wrist.

  “You like it?” he asked.

  It smelled like something an old man would wear. Besides, why aftershave? Given his Native American DNA, he’d most likely never grow much facial hair. Geez. I hoped he didn’t hear any of those thoughts. I peeked at him from the corner of my eye. He didn’t seem to.

  I shrugged and answered his question. “Not really.”

  His lips pulled sideways. “Noted.” He tugged on his other sleeve.

  “Forget fragrance.” I grinned. “You need bigger clothes.”

  He nodded. “Also noted.”

  We walked the rest of the way in silence. As we neared the parking lot of T-Shirt Tom’s, I took deeper, meditative breaths and put my thoughts on work.

  That past summer, I started working part-time at T-Shirt Tom’s, a shop that made and sold, among other things, screen printed t-shirts. I entered, and won, their annual art contest for Founders Day. When I went to pick up my winnings, they had a HELP WANTED sign in the window. Since I wanted to buy my own car, I applied. I didn’t know who was more surprised that I got the job—MawMaw or me.

  Almost full-time during the busy summer tourist season, it dwindled to just a few hours the rest of the year, which worked great with school. The weeks leading up to Founders Day was the exception. Founders Day was a nice off-season boost for all the shops in town. The annual commemorative shirts always became collector’s items. Even the ones from decades ago were highly coveted by visitors and collectors from around the world. I hoped that my design would be a favorite.

  “Have fun at work.” Kanaan had his hands in the hoodie pouch.

  “Thanks.”

  He started to back away.

  “And thanks for walking me.” I smiled at him.

  That got a grin from him. “Anytime.”

  Deep breath and my mind on nothing but T-shirt design, I opened the door. The bell at the top of the door chimed.

  “Hey, Wray,” one of the owners said, greeting me with a welcoming smile.

  I smiled back. “Hi, Christy. Where do you want me today?”

  “You take the counter. I’ll go help Mike print.”

  “Okay.” I slipped my phone into my pack, zipped it completely and shoved it under the counter behind me.

  Once I had successfully signed in to the register, Christy went in back.

  The aroma inside T-Shirt Tom’s was heaven. I loved the scent of organic cotton combined with crisp odor of the ink. The smell was an amped up version of a brand-new book. My imagination decided that old print shops and newspapers probably had a similar fragrance. I inhaled while I put on my employee apron.

  I opened the order file to see what else we’d be working on in the near future. Mike and Christy allowed me to design some of the art and paid me extra for it. I leafed through the orders to see if any of them appealed to me.

  The bell chimed on the door. I glanced up to see Mr. Smith making his fake smile at me.

  “Wray,” he said. “Fancy meeting you here.”

  Everyone in town knew that I would be working here after school this week. Mr. Smith’s visit wasn’t a coincidence and for him to lie about it…

  “What can I do for you, Mr. Smith?” I said warily.

  “I am here”—he slid hangers of shirts along the circular rack just inside the door—“to get Founders Day shirts for my family. My wife complains that we get them too late.”

  That’s because he bought whatever shirts were left on clearance weeks after the fact.

  “When are they going to be discounted this year?” He said it as though he heard me, but I couldn’t be sure.

  I decided to test it.

  I don’t kn
ow, I thought and waited for his reaction.

  “Wray?” He stopped sliding shirts to look at me. “I asked when they’ll be going on sale this year.”

  “I don’t know,” I answered out loud, still not certain whether he heard me before.

  “Well, let me get a few at full price for my immediate family,” he said reluctantly. “Then, I’ll come back to stock up on this year’s version when they go on clearance.”

  “Okay. How many and what sizes do you want right now?” I went to the rack he had been sliding shirts on.

  “Two extra large, three large, one child’s medium and two child’s smalls,” he rattled off the sizes without missing a beat.

  Maybe he was there for the shirts, and he wasn’t stalking me. I pulled all the sizes he needed off the rack, except for the large sizes.

  “We’re out of large up here. Let me go in the back and get some more.” I laid the shirts on the counter and went to the back for the others.

  Tom and Christy were hard at work on two old-fashioned screen printers set up side-by-side in the huge workroom. Lining one wall, ink-stained wooden shelves held bottles upon bottles of screen-printing ink in every color you could imagine. T-shirts, waiting to be printed, were on a table between the two printers. Behind them were huge racks where freshly minted collectible shirts dried.

  Closest to me was a rod hung with shirts that were ready for the floor. I quickly scooted the hangers, looking at the size tags. “Do you have any more large Founders’ shirts?” I said, not finding any on the rod.

  Christy pointed to a box on the floor under the drying table. “Oh, they’re here. I haven’t hung them yet.”

  “I’ll do it.” I heaved the box into my arms.

  It was difficult to see over it on my way back to the front.

  “Here, let me take that.” Mr. Smith took the box from my hands and put it on the counter.

  “Thank you.”

  I rummaged through the box to find a stack of large shirts. I pulled out the shirts I needed, then slid the box to the floor and pushed it out of the way of the register. Mr. Smith watched me as I took the other shirts off their hangers and neatly folded them in a pile.

  “So, about the burglary,” he said.

  “It was a home invasion,” I corrected him. “By men wearing ski masks and carrying big guns that they used to shoot up my grandmother’s house.”

  “That’s just terrible, Wray,” he said. “You must have been very frightened.”

  I rang up his shirts, placing each in a bag as I did. “Actually,” I said rather boldly, “we were more angry than scared. That’ll be one hundred forty-four dollars and fifty-three cents with tax.”

  “I bet. But it sounds like you won after all.”

  I cocked my head sideways trying to figure out his meaning, which he supplied while handing me his credit card.

  “They didn’t get what they wanted, right?”

  “How should I know?” I hedged and swiped his card for payment. “I’m not sure what they were after.” And I wasn’t.

  In my mind, I made sure to picture an apple, just in case.

  “Oh, I think you know what they wanted,” he said boldly right back.

  I handed him a pen from the cup next to the register and the credit card slip to sign.

  “You’re a smart girl, smart enough to figure it out.” He stuck the pen back in the cup and looked pointedly at me. “Just as you’re too smart to throw away your so-called craft project.”

  I icily handed him his bag of shirts. “Thank you for shopping local. Have a nice day, Mr. Smith.”

  He gave me a sideways nod and took the bag. At the door he paused and turned back to face me. “Be very careful, Wray.”

  I watched as the door chimed close behind him. Was that a threat?

  My anger at the men in black rose to the surface again, and, by extension, onto Mr. Smith. I supposed I should have been frightened by what sounded like a threat, and I was on some level. The anger was stronger than fear, though.

  If Mr. Smith was in cahoots with tattooed man, that meant that Mr. Smith had something to do with my parents’ murder. That was only if Mr. Smith knew about the piece in the bed, I realized, which was unlikely. I’d lived with that bed all my life, and I had just discovered it. One thing that I knew for certain was that the fury from having my parents taken from me was on the rise.

  How dare someone walk into our lives—into our home—and take my family from me. What gall, what evil must be in a person to kill two loving parents. I don’t know how long I had been staring out the door, but when the phone rang it made me jump and pulled me out of my memories and into the present.

  “Hello, T-Shirt Tom’s,” I said as calmly as I could.

  The out-of-state caller wanted to know if we had this year’s shirt available yet. I sold the excited caller two shirts and processed her payment. After I hung up, I folded the order and wrapped it in our branded tissue paper. To get to the cabinet that held the shipping supplies, I needed to hang up the freshly printed shirts. I reached for the box I had slipped to the floor earlier.

  That’s when I noticed that my backpack was slightly unzipped. I had securely closed it. I set the box of shirts on the counter to investigate. The contents of my pack were in disarray with papers stuffed in wherever. Still sealed, the envelope from Ms. Savage was unopened, but crinkled and wedged into a different section of the bag. As far as I could tell everything was still there, including my wallet and phone.

  “Guess you didn’t find what you were looking for either, Mr. Smith,” I said.

  I straightened everything and rezipped it. I gathered a handful of empty hangers from under the register to hang up the rest of the shirts. Work was normal for the rest of the afternoon, which was a welcomed relief. I packaged several telephone orders, organized a few shelves, and worked on the front window displays. Before the end of my shift, I also completed two rough drafts of art for the order book.

  “Can we give you a ride home?” Tom asked as we locked up at six.

  “Nope,” I said automatically. Unless it was blizzarding or raining, I preferred to walk.

  Tom and Christy drove off to the west and I crossed Manitou Avenue headed for home. Instantly, I regretted the decision to walk by myself. I couldn’t help but keep an eye on every car and scrutinize every person, wondering if they were following me.

  I had crossed over to being paranoid. That made me even angrier with the men in black and Mr. Smith. That I should get the skull, plus MawMaw’s chunk, and bury both in the Garden of the Gods rushed through my mind for the umpteenth time.

  The problem was they’d assume we still had them, and so burying them wouldn’t removed the danger MawMaw and I were in.

  I could make a public display of turning them over to the elders. But then the entire world would know that the pieces existed and exactly where to find them. I took a deep breath. Maybe the world knowing wouldn’t be so bad after all. Then, it would be up to the world to keep the objects secure and away from bad people.

  I mulled over the scenarios and solutions.

  “Hey,” Kanaan called from behind me. “Wait up.”

  I stopped walking and turned to watch him run toward me. Oh my goodness. He really was getting bigger every single day. When he reached me, he smiled and offered me his hand to hold, which I gladly accepted.

  We walked together in silence. In my thoughts, I continued to picture an apple and even tested whether Kanaan heard it. He didn’t. I stopped walking and let go of his hand outside the neighbor’s house. Her hedges blocked the view from MawMaw’s windows.

  “Thanks for walking me home.”

  “MawMaw still mad that I touched your butt?” He cocked his head.

  I nodded.

  “I, um…” He swallowed and kicked at a pebble “I’m sorry for that.”

  I smiled. “I know.”

  He smiled back sheepishly rolling his lips in. “It was pretty soft, though.”

  I play-slapped
him in the gut, which was anything but soft. “Go.”

  Smile gone, he raised his chin. “You first.”

  I walked around the neighbor’s hedges and said hi to the police officer.

  Inside the barn, I cooed at Ella and watched Kanaan walk down the middle of the road toward his street. Walk isn’t the right word. His long gait was more of a swaggering strut. Not pompous mind you, just assured and—mature.

  I rolled my eyes at myself, one for staring and two for using MawMaw’s word.

  Ella nudged me.

  “Want to go on an evening ride?” She neighed and nuzzled me again. “Okay.” I dumped a few oats in her feed. “You eat your snack and let me put my stuff away.”

  I walked into the house and dropped my pack on the back door bench.

  “MawMaw, I’m home,” I called.

  No answer. I walked into the living room and there she sat, stock-still in her easy chair. The knitting forgotten in her lap.

  “Oh, MawMaw.” I sat on the edge of the ottoman and quietly stroked her bandaged cheek.

  She turned and saw me, but through the haze of her trance. “My darling girl.” She cocked her head sideways. “I’m so glad you’re home and safe.”

  “Do you want me to start dinner before I ride Ella?” I asked softly.

  “No,” she said, a bit more alert and on her way back to reality. “I ordered pizza for tonight.”

  I raised my eyebrows. MawMaw hated pizza. It was nutritiously barren, she maintained, so she rarely let me have it while in her presence.

  She didn’t quite make it all the way out of the trance. Slipping back to WooWoo Land, she took my hands to trace the triangles on my palms.

  “You’re rising to your destiny, Wray. Soon. Very soon.” She patted my hand. “I’m so proud of you, and you deserve a treat.”

  I kissed her good cheek.

  “Okay.” I stood and ignored woo-woo MawMaw’s worship of me.

  During her trances, MawMaw spoke as though I were the Second Coming of Christ. I never really paid her words much attention. I just attributed it to the fact that I looked so different from her and her people.

  I imagined the shock she must have had when her eldest son decided to adopt an abandoned Scandinavian infant. Maybe thinking of me as a savior of sorts helped her deal with getting a paleface for a granddaughter.