Page 14 of Play Nice

I wave him off. “I don’t get nervous.”

“I do,” he says. “Did I lock the car?”

The door opens before we can get to it. A woman wearing a long red satin dressing gown and a black mourning veil stretches out her arms to me, wailing.

“Darling,” she says, drawing me into her. I’m too shocked to resist. I allow her to hug me. She smells like vinegar. “Oh, you angel. She’s so happy you’re here.”

The woman steps back to look at me. I don’t recognize her, her features obscured by the veil. She has on costume jewelry, magnificently gaudy. Sheer black opera gloves. Her long white hair falls in glamorous waves. I admire the look she was going for. She’s just shy of pulling it off.

There are stains on her gown, all along the collar. She’s crying now, but she’s cried in this gown before. There’s clear evidence. Phantom slicks of saline and black mascara. So even with the veil, I can see her well enough. This woman isn’t sad about my mother. This woman is just sad.

“You look just like her, Clio,” she howls, clutching her chest.

I may not know who she is, but she knows who I am. I take a step back and introduce Tommy before she makes any awkward assumptions. “This is my brother-in-law, Leda’s husband, Tom.”

Tommy offers his hand. “I’m so sorry for your loss.”

The woman ignores his hand and hugs him, too. He embraces the stranger with genuine empathy because that’s who he is. I doubt he notices the tear stains or her balsamic fragrance.

“Come in, come in,” the woman says, retreating into the house and beckoning us forward with a gloved hand.

We step into the foyer. The whole place reeks of incense, with subtle notes of vinegar. It’s crowded with antiques, multiple grandfather clocks, dusty knickknacks like teacups and porcelain figurines. Crowded with people. More people than I anticipated. My eyes ping-pong around. There’s a lot to look at. Framed Ouija boards hung on the walls, sepia-toned photos of cemeteries and séances.

“My grandmother was at the forefront of the spiritualist movement,” the woman says. “She knew the Fox sisters.”

She leans into me and whispers in my ear. “They were drunks.”

“No,” I say, pretending to be scandalized. I have no idea who the Fox sisters are. “This is your house?”

“Yes, of course,” she says. Her brow furrows. “I’m Mariella, darling.”

She expects me to know her, so I continue to play along. “The one and only. I love your jewelry. You’re so beautiful.”

I mean it. She is. I want to get champagne drunk with her and have her tell me all her wild bullshit stories and give me compliment after compliment and let me rummage through her closet. I just know she must have the most incredible collection of silk scarves. And a stash of good pills in a vintage hatbox.

“An angel, you are. Truly,” she says. “I suppose it’s been quite some time since you’ve seen my nephew. Roy is just devastated. He loved your mother very much. Roy? Roy!”

Mariella puts her hands on my shoulders and guides me into the parlor. I look behind me to make sure Tommy is following. He’s not, he’s distracted by the artwork in the foyer, studying it with his hands on his hips.

Mariella delivers me to Roy, who stands in the corner of the room holding a glass of red wine. He’s handsome for someone who is so obviously a demonologist. His silver hair is tied back in a low ponytail. He wears a billowy black blouse tucked into leather pants, a belt with a big buckle that has some kind of symbol on it. The same symbol hangs from a chain around his neck. His ears are pierced. I understand why my mother was attracted to him. He’s the polar opposite of my father.

I know I’ve met him before, when I was a kid, but that memory is hazy. He came to the house at some point. A lot of paranormal experts came through Edgewood Drive; their faces blur together. And my exposure to them was limited. Sometimes I was at dance class or doing homework or at Dad’s house or camping out on the deck in protest of having strangers in my room, sticking their heads in my closet to confirm that a monster lived there.

I don’t spend a whole lot of time pawing around my memory. A childhood like mine doesn’t exactly invite reminiscing. But sometimes it eats at me. Wondering what memories are beyond retrieval, are totally lost. Wondering what hides in the haze.

Roy takes one look at me and sets his wine down on the nearest coaster, which happens to be on top of a truly spectacular antique organ. He takes my hands in his and gazes deep into my eyes. His are disarmingly blue.

“Clio,” he says, his eye contact too intense.

“Roy,” I say, wanting to look away but refusing to yield.

“She was so proud of you. And of your sisters…” He has a very pretty speaking voice. I bet he can sing. I bet he plays guitar. I bet if he were more talented, he’d be doing that instead of chasing demons. Demonologist is a strange fallback career, but I suppose it’d be an even stranger first choice. And there are worse plan Bs. Charlie Manson was a failed musician, too.

Wow. He’s still talking. “She sacrificed so much for your happiness. For your safety.”

I don’t know what to say to that. To agree would be a betrayal of my sisters, of the truth.

“I’m glad she found you,” I say finally, diplomatically. Honestly. A good-looking freak she could cuddle up to at night, who would believe her, who she could talk demons with. I’m grateful she wasn’t alone.