Spells for Forgetting(10)

“Hey, Em!” Etzel lifted a hand in the air to greet me before she went back to wrapping up a wedge of cheese in a square of brown paper.

“Hey,” I answered automatically, wiping my boots on the mat.

The register was her usual spot, but her husband Rupert was missing from the short counter in the back corner where he used to stand in a white apron. He’d stopped making his famous fish and chips for an entire year after a magazine in Seattle named Adelman’s Market one of the best stops in the Pacific Northwest for the coastal delicacy. For months, droves of people made the pilgrimage across Puget Sound to the market until the line reached all the way down Main Street to the harbor. Now, Rupert only turned on the fryer after the evening ferry left.

I followed the low shelf to the end of the wall and turned down the next aisle. Every square inch of the tiny market was stuffed with teetering baskets of pears and squash, loaves of bread, and jars of jam. A few of them bore my grandmother’s handwriting on their paper labels.

I put a crate of eggs on my hip and plucked a baguette from the stack, my hand freezing midair when I felt the weight of eyes dance over my skin. I looked up, scanning the market until I spotted Molly Tulles and Sarah Halsted drawn together in the corner, their sharp gazes fixed on me.

Molly bounced a blond-headed toddler on her hip and Sarah folded her hands over the top of her full, round belly. I’d gone to school with both of them, but they’d kept their distance from me since graduation. Most people had.

I ignored them, tucking the baguette under my arm and going to the counter, where Etzel was already waiting.

“Saw Jake tear up the street this morning.” She gestured to the wide window beside us.

“Oh?”

“That man’s always up to somethin’, I guess.” She smirked, playing off her nosiness.

With a view that overlooked the whole of Main Street, she was usually the first to catch wind of things, and the marshal being my uncle meant I bore the brunt of the town’s curiosity when something was awry.

“All right, anything else?” She rang me up and the register dinged as the drawer flew open.

“That’s it.” I slid a five-dollar bill across the counter, chancing another look in Molly’s direction.

The sound of their whispers disappeared in the chatter out on the sidewalk, likely carrying gossip about Dutch’s proposals or how I was going to be too old to have children soon. But I was used to being talked about and there wasn’t a soul on the island who didn’t have a theory about me and Dutch. The truth was worse than what any of them imagined.

“All right, have a good one, honey.” Etzel gave me a wrinkled smile as she tucked the strands of silver curls behind her ears. Her attention was already on the next person in line.

I fit the eggs and bread into my jacket and stepped back out into the rain. There had been a time when whispers and stares had followed me everywhere I went, when the ferries were empty and the orchard was half-filled with blackened trees. Back then, Saoirse had been forced to welcome a different kind of stranger—police and detectives and forensic investigators.

It had taken years to feel as if the entire town wasn’t watching me. Waiting.

I could still smell the smoke of that night and see the flames, so tall, reaching up against the black sky like writhing, angry beasts. I could still hear the sound of shouting that echoed through the woods and feel the cold that stayed in my hands for weeks after. But the worst of it all was the loneliness of the years that followed.

I put it out of my mind, taking the winding sidewalk down the hill. The faded sign of Saoirse’s harbor reached out over the entrance to the empty docks, where some of the fishing boats were still missing from their slips. The windows of the ferry ticket booth were beaded with condensation, where the attendant’s shape was no more than a smudge behind the glass. Beside it, my father’s pub was sitting at the end of the long line of shops.

The tarnished brass handle was ice-cold in my hand as I pulled the heavy door open, and I squinted as I came inside, letting my eyes adjust to the low light. Milk glass pendants hung over wooden booths fit with worn leather seats, but the gray light of day was the only thing illuminating the pub. Behind the carved wooden bar, Dad turned a pint glass in his hand, wiping its rim before he stacked it beside the taps.

“Morning, Daddy.” I wove in and out of the tables, unwinding the scarf around my neck.

He smirked, taking another dripping glass from the sink. “Don’t have anything better to do on your break?”

I came to stand behind him, lifting up on my toes so I could set my chin on his shoulder. “Someone’s gotta make sure you don’t live on grilled cheese and coffee.”

A crooked smile lifted the right side of his mouth. The scarring that reached up out of the collar of his shirt and covered half of his face was familiar now. I could hardly remember anymore what my father’s face looked like without it.

The pink, puckered pattern of his skin was nothing compared to the way he’d looked lying in the hospital bed. I’d hardly been able to stomach seeing him. Not because of the wounds that covered nearly half of his body but because of the pain I knew he was in. Getting him well had been the only thing that kept me going in those days.

I set the eggs and bread on the counter and I pulled the tea from my jacket pocket. “Leoda says at least twice a day until that cough is gone.”