Chapter 5 #2
Teal: Let me get back to you later tonight, Sky. I have to finish up this belt.
I stare at the conversation, trying to put all of these weird pieces together in a way that makes sense.
Like how many times I’ve offered to watch Oak, my baby nephew who is an adorable chunk at almost four months old, and Sage has always turned me down.
I could let her nap, but busy-bee Teal watched the baby instead?
How does that make sense? And I know Teal’s getting ready to debut her leather accessory collection at an artisan co-op downtown, which means she has a zillion deadlines, and I get that but… surely she has to eat sometime? Right?
I think about the last time I saw Sage, three or maybe four weeks ago, when she came over to Nadia’s with Oak and I made her a half dozen corn flour quesadillas filled with grilled onions and peppers and mushrooms.
“You know, maybe you should stay away from the woods,” she’d said, her tone kind of weird, like it was something she’d been rehearsing. “Go out with friends instead. Let people see you differently. Once they see you differently, they’ll treat you differently.”
Go out with friends instead? What friends? I had wanted to demand. But instead I just hummed a sound of agreement and changed the subject to Oak.
Her suggestions still don’t sit right with my spirit, even weeks later. It’s like she was keeping something from me, though I don’t know what.
I close my eyes and lean back in my old wooden chair.
Even without that weird conversation with Sage, I keep getting the feeling like I’m drifting away from my sisters, and I have no idea how I’m supposed to stop us from becoming virtual strangers.
When I first came back to the Land of the Living, we all hung out a lot.
We would grab meals and drink moonshine at Nadia’s and go swimming at the beach.
It was awesome, like the old days, before I fell.
But then Sage got engaged and pregnant, and Teal got married and is starting her own business…and ever since, I keep getting overwhelmed with the sensation that my sisters, my best friends, my only friends, are leaving me in the dust.
I guess it’s to be expected. Their lives weren’t interrupted like mine was. They’re not ostracized wherever they go in Cranberry. So now they are…you know, living. Meanwhile I feel like I’m only half living, and really struggling with just that amount.
I grab my key ring from my work tote and pull up my desk key, the one that opens the top secret drawer on the lower right side of my desk. I have officially gone from mildly pissed off to full-blown grumpy, which means I need my emergency stash of distractions.
Sliding the drawer open, it contains one Halloween-sized bag of various dark chocolates, a few romance novels “borrowed” from Nadia (she doesn’t know I’m borrowing them, is all), and finally, one banged-up sketchbook in the color of mint green.
The sketchbook is what I pull out. First, I mean.
I definitely grab a handful of chocolates right after.
I flip open the book to a random page, and it lands on a cutout of an old newspaper article, one I’d found in this very room. I copied it and pasted it here not one month ago.
INEbrIATED WOMEN ARRESTED DOWNTOWN, it reads.
Thirteen elderly women were arrested for public intoxication behind Gerald’s, the general store.
I flip to another page, where another pasted headline announces: NUDE WOMEN FOUND DANCING IN CRANBERRY FALLS STATE PARK.
Officers report that the women dispersed with a quickness and none could be caught for questioning.
It is estimated that there were at least ten, and no more than fifteen.
Finally, I land on the last page, the one I’d updated a couple of days ago: WITCHCRAFT ACCUSATIONS DISMISSED BY CITY COURTS.
This one is much more vague: Judge Stateson has dismissed the accusations against several Cranberry City residents, stating that the evidence is purely circumstantial.
Since I started this position, I’ve noticed a pattern while going through some of the old records in here. Stories of groups of women gathering, often in the wilderness. Locals complaining about “strange sightings” near St. Theresa’s. Things like that.
To make a long story short, the city of Cranberry had some kind of weird matriarchal cult back in the day. And I kinda think it’s still happening.
What I’m going to do with this information…I haven’t a clue. But having my own little harmless mystery to solve is way more fun than dealing with people. [Shudders.]
And also…maybe figuring out the origins of this cult can somehow help me feel like I belong in this town, you know?
If somewhere along the way, a Flores woman was involved in these shenanigans.
Even if I’m never accepted, I can stand strong knowing that I have deep ancestral connections. Magical ones, even.
So instead of reading the boring old terrain map book on my desk, I go over the articles again and again, taking notes of the similarities between them.
After all that, I go back to the pile of old newspapers, using my gloved hands to smooth them out to see if I can find another to add to my sketchbook scrapbook.
My alarm goes off to let me know I only have five minutes till my shift ends.
I began setting alarms because without them, I’ve accidentally stayed here up to an hour later, so absorbed in my research and reading and chocolate-popping.
I sigh at the pile of gold foil candy wrappers at my desk and begin to clean up.
I lock the front doors, since Anise’s shift ended about four hours ago, and marvel at how strange it feels, being alone in a parking lot in the dark with absolutely no fear. I could call security to escort me to my car, but I’m not in danger, thanks to all the animals who are always near.
Even now, I can sense the hum of their bodies surrounding me: the slate gray and dried-leaf brown coyotes in the woods behind the old building; the sleeping, sweet wrens in the pine trees to my right; the distant bear mama and her two babies, asleep under the porch of an abandoned home in the neighborhood behind the building.
I am always with family. That’s what animals are to me.
It’s a privilege I will never take for granted: the fact that I know if any man tried to hurt me, he would find himself mangled without my having to lift a single finger.
It’s only after I’ve gotten home, showered, and braided my hair that I realize Teal never wrote me back like she said she would. My stomach feels as though it is filled with rocks when I check the group chat, refreshing it a few times as though somehow a message from her will magically appear.
I know she didn’t intend to forget about me…but she did.
And the old gods know I hate being forgotten like I’m just a ghost.