My heart jumped like it was trying to climb out of my body. I swallowed twice to keep it down where it should be.
“Aunt Odie, does this have to do with my Gift?”
Aunt Odie pulled her dress up above her knees where I could see the girdle. Flesh poked out of every tiny hole. It looked like a million little balls of white bread, risen and ready to be thrown in the oven.
“I can’t get it off,” she said.
All the way up, like a pair of terrible living shorts.
The sight woke me right up.
“Why?” I said. “I mean, what? I mean, how did that happen?”
“Humidity, I am sure,” she said with a sniff.
It took me two hours to cut the thing off.
17
It was almost midnight when Aunt Odie, red-faced and no longer limping, left for home.
“Girl,” she said when I stood on the porch with her, “I hope you have learned a lesson.”
“Ummm,” I said.
The moon was fat in the sky, truly made of cheese and close enough to touch. It was the color of a block of cheddar and just as shiny.
She whispered, “Never wear a girdle.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And here’s more advice.”
I yawned.
“You’ve never heard me talk about Auntie Doris, not your whole life.”
Tree frogs called out in the night. Singing. Begging for more rain.
“Not that I can remember.”
Aunt Odie pointed at me. “And here’s why. She gave up her last name on her wedding day.”
Me and Aunt Odie stood there, eye to eye.
“Accepted the common last name of Smith, and the rest is history.”
“She lost her name . . .”
“And her power.”
Big deal. I didn’t even get a power. I didn’t dare say those words out loud, though, but so what?
“She could make flowers bloom in midwinter. Then she let some man come in and convince her to change her last name. And take her off to Indiana.”
“What does that have to do with my Gift?” I said.
Aunt Odie hesitated. “It was too much for her. A burden.”
“Doesn’t seem like a burden.”
“A professional makes things look easy,” Aunt Odie said.
“Okay.”
She leaned close. “My auntie quit believing in herself. In her abilities.”
Behind me, Momma’s momma’s papa’s clock chimed out midnight.
“And her life went from bad to worse.”
“What do you mean worse?”
“She lost her happiness. That core what makes a Messenger a Messenger.” Aunt Odie put her hand on my shoulder. “We’re here to help, dumpling.”
I nodded. “I see,” I said, though it was like looking through a glass darkly, like the Scriptures say.
“Gotta get,” Aunt Odie said with a fresh breath. “See you at the house to help me with a new mix recipe I wanna to try.” She got in her car and drove off down the street. I saw her turn into her drive. She waved from her porch, then flashed the light at me.
“Hey, Evie.”
I jumped, nearly tearing the door handle off as I went to walk back inside.
“Buddy.” My voice was harsh. “What are you doing here?”
“Hush now,” he said, stepping out of the the azalea bushes and up onto the porch. “Just making sure you get in your place all right.”
I raised my eyebrows at him.
“You look awful . . .” Buddy paused. I heard him swallow from six feet away.
“What?” I said. “Jeez, Buddy, it’s my birthday. I don’t think you should be saying things like that to the birthday girl.”
“I meant,” he said, taking in a deep breath, “you look awful pretty, Evie. In this weak light, for a second there, you looked like someone I used to know. Got me a little tongue-tied.”
I put a fake smile on my face.
Placed my hands on my hips.
Someone else, huh?
We stood there glaring at each other. At least I was glaring.
“I pitch for our high school baseball team,” Buddy said at last. “Starting pitcher.”
I couldn’t think of a thing to say.
He hopped up on the porch with me. “I might play professional ball,” he said, taking a step closer. I backed up till I touched the doorknob. “That’s the goal. What about you?”
“I’m not that interested in playing baseball,” I said.
Buddy dipped his head and laughed. The sound was fat and full. A real laugh. One that woulda made Aunt Odie proud.
He smiled at me.
“That’s not all, Evie,” Buddy said. “I still want to kiss you.”
He looked awful himself, standing in that flood of cheesy moonlight.
“I’m not so sure,” I said, swallowing, “that I ought to do that.”
In one step he stood next to me. I had to look up to see into his eyes. He put his hands on my shoulders. I could feel his fingers shaking where he touched me.
“You can’t turn fifteen,” he said, leaning closer, “without a kiss.”
I could, I thought. Then I said it out loud. “I could.”
A voice in my head, somewhere near my left ear, told me I was already done turning fifteen. August 25 was over. Had chimed away as I walked Aunt Odie out the door.
How did Buddy smell so good? Not a thing like cake and root beer and ice cream. More like something citrusy. Soapy citrusy.
“I’m gonna do it,” he said. Then pressed his lips to mine. Soft, almost not there.
The kiss was finished before it began, almost, and there went Buddy, off across the front yard, leaving his parting path in the dewy grass.
I could see the moon shining on his T-shirt.
Could see the words, LIVING ON A PRAYER, floating away in the dark like a spirit.
18
In my room, long after I was settled under the covers, I thought about Buddy and his kiss, and each time my stomach folded over on itself like I was putting beaten egg white into a batter.
“I should have kissed him, straight up,” I said to my darkened room. My eyes grew heavy.
A breeze, light as a breath, moved the curtains. Pushed them away from the window like someone wanted to sneak in.
It had been a good day.
A long day.
A tiring day.
With Aunt Odie starting and almost ending it.
My aunt.
Who took care of us.
Then when me and Momma moved in with JimDaddy, Aunt Odie bought the first house that went up for sale on the street and moved there.
My aunt close.
Too sleepy to open my eyes.
Her auntie Doris no longer a Messenger.
Sounds from down the hall.
In Indiana where maybe no one believed in the dead helping you out.
And JimDaddy melancholy all the time. I didn’t know that till right now. And Baby Lucy. And my daddy died when I was just two and Momma and me with Aunt Odie till Momma met up again with my stepfather on a dating website and there was a light in the room. Bouncing, fluttering like Tinker Bell. Pausing at the closet. Moving close to where I lay in bed. Right by my face.
Then.
Sleep.
And
that
low
cry
sad enough to peel paint off the walls.
19
“Here I am,” she says.
And if I weren’t so tired, I’d answer.
“Right here.”
20
“What took you so long?” My aunt rested a hand on her hip and stared out at me.
“Do you have to do it
through the screen door? Let me in,” I said. “It’s hot as fire out here.”
“What do you expect when you sleep till noon in the South?”
“Air-conditioning,” I said, and pushed past Aunt Odie.
I headed toward the room Aunt Odie had built into a specialty kitchen, walking the long way through a large living room and then the enormous dining room. Everything was cool in here. Cool and clean and ready for us to get to working. My face was a blur in the stainless double-door fridge.
Ingredients were spread out on the counter. A bag of flour. A half-dozen pale-pink eggs. Cream. Milk. Butter. Spices like curry and cinnamon and cardamom.
“Sit, please, Evie.”
I flapped my T-shirt against my body some, letting the cool air of the house dry me off a little.
That’s how hot it is in Florida in August. Go on a hike just eight houses down the street and you had to shower again. My hair was still straight on accounta Aunt Carol’s Gift. Plus, I still had on a glimmer of eye shadow. But neither of those things helped with the heat.
“Yes, ma’am.” I sat on the stool and swiveled this way and that while Aunt Odie lowered herself onto her own stool.
“How’re you feeling since the girdle incident?” I asked.
“Bumpy still.” Aunt Odie hiked at her dress a little. “Wanna see? I even got bruises. . . .”
I shook my head. “I believe you. No need in proving it.”
Aunt Odie let her dress drop, then took my hands in both of hers. “The living,” she said, “ain’t far from the dead.”
I glanced around the room. I couldn’t see anyone . . . lingering.
“The veil between our world and theirs is thin. Keep that in mind. Always.”
“Okay.”
“It’s easy to slip up with the dead,” Aunt Odie. Her face was so serious I couldn’t look away even though I wanted to. “You wanna end up like my auntie?”
I shook my head.
“Good. Now, first things first,” she said. “Anything happen last night?”
My cheeks turned warm. “I . . .” Should I tell her about the kiss—though it was barely a kiss—before I told my very own momma what had happened? I couldn’t see Momma liking what I had done at all.
“Well . . .”
“Any visions? Burning bushes? Voices?”
I let out air I didn’t know I had been holding.
That. Oh.
“No, Aunt Odie,” I said. “Nothing.”
She nodded. Tapped her finger against her lips. There was a flour handprint on her apron. I hoped it was her own. “But,” she said, almost to herself, like she was thinking so hard she had forgotten I was in the room, “but it was a full-moon night. I know she’s the right one. It couldn’t be the baby. I dreamed Evie.”
Who was she talking to?
“Aunt Odie?”
She looked at me and I saw her see me. “Nothing out of the ordinary?”
“No, ma’am.”
Except for my first kiss.
I smiled politely.
My stomach folded over.
Aunt Odie leaned close to me so that she tipped on two legs of her stool. “Something’s different about you.” She let all four stool legs, plus her own two feet, rest on the floor.
I glanced at the ingredients. Back at her.
“Should I . . .” I said. Then stopped. Could Aunt Odie see, if she walked all the way around viewing my whole body, that I had let Buddy kiss me? Could she see I had wanted him to do it again? And again?
Now Aunt Odie stood and went to the counter. She plucked up a recipe card. I could see the ink from here. It looked like the kind that came from a calligraphy pen. I imagined that ghosty hand, writing.
“So what are we working on today?” I asked. My voice sounded wimpy. Scared. Even I heard that. “You said something about getting a new recipe you wanted to try?”
“No,” Aunt Odie said. “What’s going on with you?” She was back again. Walking around me as best she could, considering I was slid up close to the table, looking me over from top to bottom, sliding my stool out so she could circle me—and give me a thorough once-over.
Did the Gift leave a mark? I sure hoped not.
Did kisses?
She put her face close to mine.
“Something is going on,” she said. Her voice was church-toned.
I pretended to look her in the eye but stared at the bridge of her nose instead.
And I kept my lips tight, no matter how she questioned. Then we set to working on a new Bundt cake recipe that tasted so good, once it was mixed and baked (with love), I wanted to cry.
21
Aunt Odie and I worked all afternoon.
Stirring, sifting, baking, adding ingredients (“Not everything comes perfect from the dead. Adjustments must be made.”), baking some more. Pouring, measuring, mixing. Baking even more. Tasting, scraping, and at last, at last her saying, “Done!” with a smack of her lips.
“We’ll get this on the market after all the approvals are met.” Aunt Odie looked sort of business-y now. Even though her hair fought to get out from under a hairnet and she’d splattered flour all over when she opened the bag. “Our job is to perfect, considering what we have been given. I wouldn’t do anything less.”
During a break, I stood at the front door watching Buddy’s house.
Heat shimmered off the blacktop. When a car drove through or someone walked down the street, they looked like part of a mirage.
I took a deep breath.
“You sure there wasn’t something?” Aunt Odie asked my back.
What did ghosts whisper? Tattletale things? I didn’t dare look at my aunt. A feather of a kiss changes a girl. I knew that now.
“I’m sure,” I said. Relieved and not.
And Aunt Odie said under her breath, “I will be cat-kicked.”
22
It felt like my skin was getting a good steaming when I stepped outside.
I carried Aunt Odie’s newest creation. Almond Bundt cake with vanilla icing. Crispy. Buttery. Just the right amount of sweet.
Made with love.
“So you see a ghost?” I had asked her.
“No.”
“Does one help you measure the ingredients?”
“Don’t make fun now, honey. You know they don’t. You do.”
“I’m not making fun,” I had said, and ran a knife across a full cup of flour, making it smooth. Flour needs to be exact.
Aunt Odie had set aside the sifter. “It happens between being awake and going to sleep. That’s when I see it. But not always.” She raised a finger to me. “I have to be worthy. I have to have made the best of the last recipe. I’ve learned that over the years. So the recipes come in waves. Sometimes nothing. Then, when I have made the most of the last gift, that blank three-by-five. A hand—it looks different every time, I’m guessing because it’s a new person with a recipe—writes out the words.” She raised her other pointer finger at me. “And, voilà!”
Only she said it Vo-la.
Now I stepped on the porch, remembering.
Seemed like a lot of work for getting a new recipe. Of course, sometimes you have to work for a Gift. Momma and Aunt Odie and the rest of the Messengers all say that.
Sheesh.
It’s a Gift, I thought, walking home. Something should be easy about a Gift.
Heat rose off the street. Did I look like a mirage going in the middle of the road carrying a delicious Bundt cake like this? The light scent of vanilla floated around me.
Eight houses down and I was home.
“Momma?” I called when I got inside.
The place was silent.
A note waited for me on the kitchen table. I set Aunt Odie’s newest creation down and read,
Off with Baby Lucy.
Someone called for you.
I gave him your number.
Be back after the show.
Him?
My heart pitter-pattered.
I opened the fridge, pulled out the OJ, and drank from the pitcher. Momma couldn’t stop me, seeing she wasn’t here. I patted my hip pocket. Where was my phone?
I pulled off my dirty-slash-sweaty T-shirt and headed down the hall toward the laundry room.
Stripped off my shorts and underclothing. Hurried to my bedroom, cooling off with the AC and my nakedness.
In my room, I pulled new stuff outta the dresser. (Oh, there it was. My phone sat next to the mirror. I’d forgotten to take it. And it looked like I had four text messages and had even missed a few phone calls. I would shower, then check.)
Did Buddy call? I thought as I stepped into the lukewarm water.
Soaped up.
Rinsed off.
Thought of that ghostlike kiss on my lips.
Dried off.
Got dressed and walked right back to where Tommie sat on the edge of my bed.
23
I let out a scream that could have shattered glass.
Nope, the mirror was still intact. Window, too.
“What are you doing in here?” I asked, covering my breasts, though I was dressed.
“Nothing you wouldn’t do,” Tommie said.
“Excuse me?” I stood in the doorway, staring at her. Was she still crying? Well, I didn’t care. You don’t just barge into someone’s room. . . . Hold on. “How do you keep getting in here?”
She rolled her eyes. She was acting awful snooty, seeing she was in my house. “Through the back. You know you can jimmy the lock coming into the laundry room.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Now you do.”
We stared at each other. For a moment I didn’t know how to answer. I was too surprised for words.
“I like the color in here,” Tommie said.
“This tired color? Whatever. Thanks. I think. Considering you shouldn’t be here.”
We stood a moment longer.
“You have to leave,” came out of my mouth without me thinking the words, but I knew they were right once I heard them. “You can call me on my new phone, if you want. I’ll text you the number. But you can’t just show up unannounced like this.”