Part 14 (1/2)
It took a moment to process what she was seeing. The woman who turned from the cupboards, one hand still reaching up to take down the sugar, looked as incredulous and frightened as if Alison had burst in on her in her very own kitchen. She was tall and had long, dark blonde hair which she was wearing in two braids. The ends were tied with beaded leather thongs and a feather was stuck into one. Had they met elsewhere, Alison would have immediately cla.s.sified her as either a G.o.ddess-wors.h.i.+pping d.y.k.e or an old hippie. So what was she doing pilfering her cupboards?
The other woman was squatted down on the floor sorting through her pans. From the back her appearance with purple drawstring pants and tie-dyed rainbow top, agreed with that of her companion. There was, however, something strangely familiar about her multicolored spiky hair... Alison dropped the gun. ”h.e.l.lo, Lydia,” she said.
Lydia straightened and turned around. ”Hi!” she said in cheerful voice that told Alison she not only missed the fact that Alison had drawn her gun, but also had not noticed her friend leaning against the counter clutching her throat. ”Lavender. My name is Lavender now. I thought you were probably at work.”
”No, I'm on vacation.” Alison was surprised at how calm her voice sounded.
”Great! Perfect! You're just in time for breakfast. Pull up a chair.” Lydia had the habit of falling immediately into the hostess role wherever she happened to be cras.h.i.+ng. ”This is Seven Yellow Moons.” Without looking she gesture towards the tall woman who, still terrified, managed to give Alison a nod. Lydia had probably not, thought Alison, informed her either of her vocation or that they were unexpected.
”Excuse me for a moment,” Alison said politely, backing out of the room while she put away her gun. She hoped that Lydia's friend would rake her over the coals for letting them into a cop's house without advance warning.
As she strode back through the living room she saw the sleeping bags and packs piled up behind the couch. Great, a long stay. She stuck her head out the front door.
”It's okay,” she said. ”False alarm.”
”What are you talking about, 'false alarm?” Stacy was the first one in, talking in the loud, querulous voice that Alison had by now come to recognize as representing any excitement or upset. ”I saw you lock that door when we left! You going to tell me that the cat did that?”
”No.” Alison turned her head to address everyone so that she would not have to say it again. Carla and Janka were coming back up the steps, Carla's eyes bright with interest. She probably thinks she's walked into a TV show, thought Alison sourly. We're never going to get her to leave. Janka was holding her left arm with her right hand.
”Mich.e.l.le!” Her friend appeared from around the corner of the house, brandis.h.i.+ng a rake. Good old Mich.e.l.le, guarding the back escape.
”What is going on?!” Stacy demanded. Mich.e.l.le exchanged a look with Janka that said plainly, 'Oh, bad temper as well as being kinky. Definitely not the girl for our Alison.' For a moment Alison wished that she were a friendless orphan.
”It's a misunderstanding. An old-” she almost tried to get away with 'friend'. But, h.e.l.l, Stacy was going to have to learn about the embarra.s.sments of her past eventually, ”-lover dropped by to visit. Come on in.” She gestured, but only Carla, eager to see the next installment, sprang up to the door.
”Who?” asked Mich.e.l.le.
”How did she get in?” asked Stacy at the same time.
”Lydia. And I presume she kept a key when she left.” Actually, the amazing part was not that she had kept her key, but that she had been able to locate it on her jailer's key ring. Lydia could let herself into crash pads all over the U.S.
”Oh.” said Mich.e.l.le. She did not put the rake down, and Alison got the distinct impression that she was rather sorry that Lydia had not tried to escape out the back door so that she could have hit her over the head.
”No killers?” asked Stacy, calmer. Alison took her by the hand and pulled her inside. Carla was already in the kitchen, from where came once again the sounds of water running, dishes clattering and eggs being broken. Alison closed her eyes. Lydia was an excellent cook, but she regarded cleaning up as someone else's job. Behind them Alison thought she heard Janka say, ”I think I've broken my arm,” but she chose to believe that she had misunderstood.
Carla was standing by the door with a huge smile on her face, staring at Lydia's hair. Alison, who had not really had time to appreciate it fully before, gave it a look herself. It was cut off no longer than an inch long all over her head, except for a tag in the back, and had been bleached and then rain-bowed in the same brilliant colors as Lydia's wide-sleeved s.h.i.+rt.
”Carla, Stacy, this is Lydia. And this is Lydia's friend.” She wasn't even going to attempt the other woman's name; she was sure she would get the combinations of numbers, planets and colors wrong. The woman still looked as if she were going to jump out of her skin. Out of pity, since Lydia had obviously not explained a thing, Alison said to her, ”My name is Alison. I live here. I'm a cop. I thought someone had broken in. I didn't have any idea that I was expecting company.”
”Oh.” The woman breathed out a long sigh and relaxed visibly. She was wearing a pair of drawstring pants the same style as Lydia's-cotton, gathered at the ankles-only hers were red. Over a matching turtleneck that had seen better days, she had on a short vest that looked as if it had been hand-woven. Maybe she would enjoy talking to Janka.
”Lavender,” said Lydia to Carla and Stacy. ”Seven Yellow Moons.” She pointed to the other woman. Stacy glanced quickly at Alison as if asking what the woman was called for short?
”I did contact you, Alison. Is that still your name?” She turned from ransacking the refrigerator to peer at Alison hopefully.
”Yeah. I think I'm going to keep it for a while.”
Behind their conversation Alison heard Seven Yellow Moons say to Stacy, ”Boy, you look just like someone I used to know.”
”Oh. I had hoped since renaming usually signifies change....” Lydia turned back to contemplate the refrigerator. ”Three days ago our family had a circle and sent you an image of our arrival. I know we reached you while you were sleeping. I felt your presence leap up to greet mine, and sleep is the only time that you relax enough to allow it that freedom. But you probably decided it was just a dream, right?” She spoke wearily, as if reminding Alison for the thousandth time that she had to look into her mailbox if she expected to get postcards. ”Did you know that you have a flat tire?”
”No doubt,” Alison replied to the first question. As far as Lydia was concerned the explanation was over and done with, and if she hadn't gotten the message it was Alison's fault for being such a tighta.s.s. There was no use arguing. ”Did you tell me why you were here and how long you're planning on staying, too?... What?” Only now did the second question sink in.
”I noticed that, too,” Carla volunteered, happy to be given a speaking role at last. ”When we came in. Right front. I was about to tell you when you pulled your gun. Alison almost shot me in the foot the other night,” she told Lydia and Seven Yellow Moons proudly, making it sound as if Alison frequently rode into Dodge and shot things up.
Lydia raised her eyebrows, but before she could comment on the politics of violence, Mich.e.l.le stepped into the kitchen with Janka in tow. ”Janka thinks she's broken her arm,” she announced with a dark look at Lydia. ”h.e.l.lo, Lydia.”
”Lavender,” Lydia corrected. ”Do you know what kind of disharmony you were feeling in order for you to need to hurt yourself?” she asked Janka.
”She fell off the porch because Alison thought the d.y.k.e-killer had broken into her house!” said Mich.e.l.le heatedly. She looked back over her shoulder as if wondering where she had left the rake.
”Well, we all make our choices, don't we?” Lydia replied somewhat mysteriously.
Seven Yellow Moons asked, ”May I look at it?”
Mich.e.l.le looked as if she would rather receive the a.s.sistance of anyone else, even one of the dreaded leatherd.y.k.es-she did, in fact, glance at Stacy for a moment as if hoping to form an alliance-but Janka quelled her with a glance. Lydia turned back to her eggs; presumably if Janka chose to be injured it was her own problem, but not before she said, ”Seven Yellow Moons is a healer. She does wonderful things with crystals.”
Alison thought it was very inopportune for the phone to ring at that moment, for she wanted to be there to catch Mich.e.l.le's expression if Seven Yellow Moons decided to whip out a crystal and slap it on Janka's arm. She even debated, for a moment, letting the answering machine pick it up, but before she could commit herself, Stacy leaned back into the living room and snagged the extension off her desk.
”It's for you,” she told Alison. The receiver still pressed to her chest she asked, ”Am I hallucinating, or is this place turning into a nuthouse?”
”Different strokes,” answered Alison. ”But do try to keep Carla from cornering Lydia for a quickie unless you want to hear a very long lecture about the importance of pure s.e.x for spiritual power.... h.e.l.lo?”
She heard the words with a feeling of deja vu. ”We need to talk to you right away!” said a woman without identifying herself. ”Why didn't you call us?”
Oh, s.h.i.+t. Beth. She had totally forgotten her. ”Oh, the machine must not be working,” she lied. ”What's happening?”
”We need to talk to you! The police have been here! We think they may be coming back!” Obviously this was as close to coherency she was going to get over the phone.
”Look, I'll be right there, okay? Just stay put.”
”You have a flat tire,” Lydia sang out from the other room. ”And I'll bet your spare is flat, too.”
It was an accurate guess, one that Alison would have preferred not to have confirmed in front of Mich.e.l.le. Okay, all right, she could handle the fact that she wasn't Wonder Woman, that car maintenance happened to be down low on her list of priorities and skills. ”There may be a slight problem,” she told Beth, trying to calculate rapidly how many buses would be involved in the trip and what the estimated time would be.
”I can give you a ride,” said Stacy who, like the rest of the household, seemed to have decided to take time off from the personal drama in order to give full attention to the phone call.
At the same moment Seven Yellow Moons announced, ”She's going to need an X-ray.”
And Mich.e.l.le said, ”Oh, Alison,” in the sad, sad voice of a disappointed teacher who can't believe her student's very best has not been enough.
Twelve.
”This is it.” Alison pointed to the well-kept little house, opening the car door even before they were at a full stop. ”You can't come in.” She was too on edge to try for tact, even if it had been a strong point. It had taken forever to decide that while Stacy was delivering her to Beth and Denise's, Seven Yellow Moons would take Janka to a Med Express Clinic in her van, Carla would stay with Lydia, and Mich.e.l.le would change the spare tire. This last task was insisted upon by Janka. Alison, who had once herself suffered from Mich.e.l.le's protective belligerence in an emergency room, totally approved. Janka and Seven Yellow Moons had been chatting about weaving as they went out the door, an ice pack on Janka's splinted arm. Alison had been so amazed to see this instead of a crystal bracelet or a healing circle that she had let it show on her face. Seven Yellow Moons had said to her in a voice that managed to be serene and withering at the same time, ”I practice cross-disciplines. I'm a nurse pract.i.tioner as well as working with physic healing.” She had lost the serenity altogether when she put her hand on her hip and said, ”And who hasn't taken a multi-media first aid course these days?”
”You can just drop me off. I can catch a bus back.”