Chapter 10 #2
‘Probably just the name of one of those dogs.’ Ainsley picked a sprig of lavender and inhaled its aroma. ‘Ah, smells like Grandma’s. Speaking of brains, you know that Wall of Knobs was almost called Frontal Lobe, right?’
Zoey wasn’t sure whether this counted as a near miss or a missed opportunity.
‘Oh, I meant to tell you,’ she said, running a hand over a pom-pom-shaped hedge, ‘we saw Celeste last night.’
Ainsley, who’d been taking a photo of a Home Depot giant skeleton in a bright yellow sun lounger, fumbled her phone. ‘We? You’re a we? And also … Celeste?’
Zoey blushed. Were she and Nick a we? She wasn’t sure yet, although she didn’t mind the idea.
‘Celeste isn’t part of the we,’ clarified Zoey. Although she probably didn’t need to. ‘She was at First Thursday last night – she has a place in the Pearl now.’
‘The Pearl? La-di-dah,’ said Ainsley, making a frolicking motion. ‘I wonder how she did that on Wall of Knobs income. They’re not that …’
‘Good?’ offered Zoey.
Ainsley guffawed. ‘I was going to say appreciated by the mainstream, but sure.’
‘She was really stoked that you’ll be doing the art for InkWell.’
Ainsley pulled at her lower lip, which was painted a sparkly purple. Well, had been before the cookie and the protein bar. ‘No, no way. We’re broken up. I drew a line.’
She scored a line in the air to prove her point.
‘I mean, to be fair, you guys – gals – have broken up like half a dozen times before.’
‘And each time was more permanent than the last,’ said Ainsley. ‘Musicians are just too … flighty. And they write songs about you! That has to be the worst bit.’
‘But Wall of Knobs barely has lyrics,’ pointed out Zoey. ‘Their biggest hit just repeats sunshine over and over with different voice-changer effects. They make Kraftwerk look like Bob Dylan.’
‘Point taken,’ said Ainsley, thoughtfully. ‘Assuming your point is that I should absolutely date hot musicians so long as their lyrics are terrible.’
‘Sure, let’s go with that,’ said Zoey, trying not to laugh.
Ainsley paused outside the scooter house, counting the scooters in the stack. ‘Sorry, babe, no free Lardo for you today. But look, someone’s set up a Barbie Playhouse with Calico Critters inside … no wait, those are taxidermied mice. Let’s keep moving and pretend we didn’t see that.’
Zoey didn’t need to be told twice.
Up the front steps they went, and over the sharehouse’s wide front porch, which was drowning under Ainsley’s art materials and Peta’s half-completed Little Free Library shaped like a storm cloud. The vision was that you’d push aside a beaded curtain of rain to grab your books.
‘I guess it’s better than the fridge.’ Zoey stepped over said beaded curtain, which was draped over the welcome mat. A Little Free Library was at least good for community literacy, and gave Zoey a handy means of disposing of her guilty-pleasure reads.
Ainsley shrugged. ‘Apparently there’s been a major LEGO minifig situation going down, so that’s been the priority. Peta had to make an emergency run out to Gresham today for a Batman or something.’
Selling LEGO minifigures was one of the many ways that Peta made money. And there was also something to do with storage units that Zoey hadn’t quite wrapped her head around. As long as she paid her share of the rent (and the cops didn’t show up), Zoey wasn’t going to complain.
The house was quiet. Joaquin was at the tattoo shop, and from the glow beneath his bedroom door, it looked like Winslow was gaming. Zombie-like moans and groans could be heard at intervals: he must have been playing The Walking Dead again.
‘Snacks, snacks …’ Ainsley immediately ran to the fridge, as she always did when they got home. ‘Oh my God, Zo. Ew.’
‘What?’ Zoey peeked her head out from the bathroom, where she was touching up her makeup in the tarnished mirror.
She looked practically dead after the long shift – there was next to no colour in her cheeks, which were ordinarily her best feature.
And her lips were chapped. How was she supposed to kiss Nick with skin that rivalled Rameses II for moisture?
Still, at least she’d dealt with the carrot guts and chlorophyll grime.
As Zoey came over, Ainsley pointed squeamishly with a pair of tongs. ‘There’s offal in here.’
Zoey shrugged. ‘So? Offal’s standard fare in most cuisines. It’s nutritious, affordable …’
Ainsley took a step back. ‘Yes, but there’s also the mad-cow-disease factor.’
Hang on, the what?
‘What exactly are we talking about here?’ Zoey came over to see precisely what had grossed Ainsley out so much. As the cling-wrapped items in the fridge came into focus, Zoey dropped her lipstick. The tube clattered to the ground, then rolled away, leaving a line of red all over the kitchen tiles.
Brains.
In the fridge was container after container of plastic-wrapped brains.
Nick’s truck chugged up to the sharehouse with the clattering roar that Zoey was starting to recognise – although it was Alice’s cheerful yips that actually drew her out from the house.
Nick climbed out and gave the hood a hearty pat. ‘Your chariot.’
Zoey and Ainsley were more than ready. They’d been sitting out on the porch rocking chairs for the past twenty minutes, trying not to be crushed by the twenty or so Romero for Mayor signs that Ainsley had spent the entire day making.
‘Anything can happen when I’ve got an hourglass timer in front of me and a Bob Ross video going in the background,’ Ainsley said proudly. ‘Oh shit, the power bill. Let me pay that now.’
‘Lovely day to be out on the porch,’ said Nick, as he came up to help them haul the signs over to the truck bed. Sweet baby Beelzebub (to take a line from Opal the barber), he was a good-looking man. He could be a model for peppermint soap. Or beard oil. Or positive masculinity.
Alice greeted Zoey and Ainsley with tail wags and a nudging nose. Ainsley tossed a bedazzled frisbee (a discarded art project) for her, and Alice raced off to catch it.
Zoey bit her lip. How was she supposed to greet Nick, in daylight, and with Ainsley around? A kiss seemed … inappropriate. A hug seemed … too collegial.
She settled for an awkward wave.
Brilliant, Zoey. Who said romance was dead?
‘We’re out here because there are brains inside.’ Zoey gestured in the direction of the kitchen.
Nick hesitated. ‘Are we talking murder scene? Because I’m not one for calling the cops, but that’s the one time you probably should call the cops.’
‘They’re in the fridge,’ said Zoey. ‘In bulk.’
‘Well, it’s hard to go past a good bulk discount in this economic climate.’ Nick, who was so much better than Zoey at these things, gave Zoey a gentle kiss on the forehead in greeting. ‘Although you were right about the whole zeitgeist thing. Are brains … hot?’
Her own brain was certainly feeling a bit that way after that kiss.
‘Terriffany is charting Google search activity. She’ll let us know.’ Zoey looked down at her vintage loafers, then up again, meeting his warm, dark-eyed gaze: ‘Thanks for the whole … truck thing. Again.’
Nick beamed, that crooked, boyish smile spreading across his whole face. ‘Any time, babe. It’s part of the truck-owner code. You and Ainsley hop in. There’s not enough room for Alice, so we’ll pop her in her crate in the back. It’s secured – she’ll be safe.’
While Nick coaxed Alice into her crate with some murmured words and a pocket treat, Zoey and Ainsley squeezed in on the bench seat.
‘He’s a keeper, sweets,’ whispered Ainsley out of the corner of her mouth.
‘Sweets? What is this? His Girl Friday?’
‘Yah, yah, toots.’ Ainsley grinned. She jabbed Zoey with her seatbelt buckle. ‘Don’t scare this gentleman away with your fear of commitment.’
‘Shut up.’ Zoey whacked her right back with her own buckle.
Nick climbed into the driver’s seat and started the engine. ‘All right, where to?’
Ainsley directed him along the lushly planted street until they came to a hammered-in banner that displayed a furious cat depicted in Roy Lichtenstein style.
Over one of the cat’s eyes was a lightning bolt.
Below the image of the cat, the phrase THE SOUND AND THE FURRY had been block-printed in a massive font.
‘Our main opponent is Mean George,’ Ainsley said. ‘He’s a one-eyed Maine Coon, and he’s going to get the … what’s the opposite of a sympathy vote?’
‘Amusement vote?’ suggested Zoey.
‘Malevolence vote?’ offered Nick.
‘Sure. Those.’ Ainsley’s eyes narrowed. ‘But Romero is mean at heart. And I think that’s what it’s going to take.’
‘Hence the uniquely styled portraits, huh?’ said Nick, jabbing a thumb at the rear window, where the Romero signs bobbed and bounced.
‘Exactly.’ Ainsley dragged Zoey out of the truck, and together they hammered in a ROMERO: CAT NIP sign beneath a set of wind chimes hanging from a massive silverleaf oak.
‘Take that, Mean George.’ Zoey wiped her brow with the back of her hand.
‘What are you doing?’ came a voice like wet cement.
Ugh, Zoey would know that voice anywhere: Beryl, an old biddy who came into her work and took wheatgrass shots with a side of colloidal silver.
Zoey would also know Beryl’s face anywhere, mostly because Beryl’s skin had a distinctive blue tint as a side effect of swigging all that sterling in a bottle.
‘Hi, Beryl! Just putting up signs for the Cat Mayor campaign,’ said Zoey, as cheerfully as she could muster. Which was not very.
‘But I’m a dog person,’ snapped Beryl. ‘Adding cats will just confuse things.’
With whom, exactly? Zoey wanted to ask.
‘Here.’ Digging in his wallet, Nick handed Beryl a loyalty card from the Smoothie Maven.
Huh, he must’ve picked one up when he’d visited the shop that first time.
‘It’s good for a half-price mushroom smoothie,’ he improvised.
‘But that’s not what it says,’ huffed Beryl, leaning on her walking frame as she read the card’s fine print.
‘I’ll remember,’ promised Zoey. ‘I own the shop. I make my own rules.’
Beryl recoiled. ‘Make your own rules?’