Page 26 of The Devil Knows Her Name

“Beautiful view from up there,” he said. “When we were driving into town the first time, I had to pull over for a minute, just to take in the glory of God’s creation. How long have you lived there, Tess?”

“My whole life,” I said, my standard answer. “It was my grandmother’s house.”

“A real Burrsville native, then. I think it’s great when young people put down roots and stay in their family homes. Too many of them go running off now, need to do their own thing, make their own way, like what their parents did isn’t good enough for them. Hard to keep small towns thriving that way.”

“Amen,” Evelyn said fervently.

I glanced at David, wondering how much of that speech was for his benefit. He was studying the dry chicken like he might find the cure for cancer in it.

“I might be something of a rarity, but even so, I made choices my mother hated. Sometimes we make a new way even in the same place.”

“Are you on good terms with her now?”

“She passed when I was young.”

I heard my mistake as it was coming out of my mouth. I didn’t know what possessed me to add those last four words; I avoided dates and even time frames whenever possible, carefully crafting stock responses to questions I couldn’t truthfully answer. When people heard the same answer every time, their brains started to fill it in for them, which made it feel like the truth.

But I still looked young, and if I wasn’t young now, I certainly should’ve been just a few years ago, when my friends had known me. They remembered things that happened a few years ago—the last independent local bakery closing, the winter we got four feet of snow overnight, the time a full manure tanker was obliterated by a freight train at the railroad crossing right outside the village. If my mother died a few years ago, they would have known her. They would remember the funeral.

Paul’s brow creased, his crow’s feet deepening. Christine inhaled as if she would ask a question, but then she stopped. Evelyn searched my face, her eyes going bright and suspicious.

I racked my brain for a way to explain what I’d just said, grasping for a plausible correction or a way to change the subject, but with each heartbeat that passed, the silence grew colder and heavier. With fear climbing my throat, I reached for weapons; the table charm from my Mabon gathering still sat on Paul’s counter, the wax seal burning like a coal in my awareness. I could also feel the apple tree behind the house, the one I helped plant eight years ago and into whose roots I slipped a bundle of ash and hair and crystal. More distant was the ward rose at the northernmost point of Burrsville; fainter still were the sentinel trees in the sanctuary. I drew on all of them, and the magic tightened and coiled, wrapping around the table like spider silk.

“But that’s not important,” I said. After a moment, my friends nodded in agreement, and I could feel each movement through the threads of influence. The pastor glanced between them, lids heavy, the lines around his mouth going slack.

“It was some time ago,” I went on, which was what I should’ve said in the first place. More nodding, vacant smiles on their faces. Max seemed to be the most affected, his eyes sliding out of focus, his lips going crooked.

“Some time,” Zeke echoed, his voice thick and slow. Beside him, Rachel’s head bobbed, as though her neck could no longer support it. The shadows in the corners of the room roiled and spread like ink diffusing through water.

“What’s important is that Paul is leaving, and we need to give him a good send-off,” I said. My grip on the magic wavered, sweat beading at my hairline. But I held on to it grimly; I couldn’t release them until their minds had settled elsewhere.

“A good send-off,” Evelyn repeated, the idea taking root. It would’ve been the most important to her.

“Everyone should share their favorite memories with Paul,” I said.

They all nodded again—even David, whose only memory of Paul was a strangely competitive handshake. I loosened my hold on the magic, but didn’t let it go completely.

“My favorite memory of Paul is when he bought his first cows,” Georgie said. “He told us to come up and see them, and when we got here he looked like he’d been through the ringer—split lip, big streak of cow shit all down his front, rip in the ass of his jeans, and he was beaming like a kid in a candy store.”

There was a ripple of laughter around the table. I let the lines of the magic slip through my fingers even more, and the lights in the house brightened; I hadn’t realized how dim they’d become. I saw Georgie blinking dry eyes, Max subtly stretching stiff muscles. But my redirection had worked, and Christine piped up.

“My favorite memory of Paul is from, oh, must’ve been your second or third year here, Paul. It was my first time actually running the harvest festival, and everything was a wreck. I’d completely forgotten to order hay for the hay bale maze, and it was the day before and I was calling every farm I could find asking if they could bring down a truckload. Well, doesn’t Paul show up with a full hay wagon and save the day.”

There was another wave of merriment around the table, Zeke grinning broadly and leaning back to sling a casual arm over his wife’s chair. He didn’t seem to have noticed the effect of the magic in the least, but Rachel looked like she still hadn’t recovered. She glanced over to give her husband a watery smile at his gesture, but then her face settled back into a stony mask.

The stories went on, Georgie chiming in another of hers, Evelyn’s a long ramble of several anecdotes complete with brimming eyes. No one seemed to notice that I hadn’t given mine, but several times I felt David’s eyes settle on me. He sat hunched in his chair, gaze flicking between my friends and his parents distractedly, his fingers twisting constantly in his napkin.

It was another half an hour before Rachel sent a pleading look at her husband, and he deigned to push his chair back and slap his knees. “Well, we better get on home,” he said. “Still trying to get settled in down there—don’t think David’s even finished unpacking yet.”

David practically leaped to his feet, looking grateful for what his father intended to be a slight. “That’s true, I’ve just been wearing my clothes out of the box,” he said.

Evelyn gave a hearty laugh. “Ah, teenagers.”

You have no children, I almost said. What do you know?

Everyone trailed behind the pastor’s family to the door, and Zeke gave Paul a final handshake. “Safe travels, and God bless your new endeavor,” he said.

When the door finally closed behind them, Evelyn sighed happily. “What a great family,” she said. “It’s like they were sent here to make it a little easier to accept you leaving.”