Jodie Picoult - Salem Falls

“What the hell are you doing?” Addie’s voice throbbed, as if she’d taken a punch.

“Cleaning up. I thought that if you didn’t have to look at this every day-”

“That I wouldn’t see her face first thing when I wake up in the morning anyway? That I don’t know her by heart? Do you think that I have to look at a . . . a hair clip to remember the person I love the most in the world?”

“Loved,” Jack said quietly.

“That doesn’t stop just because she’s not here anymore.” Addie sank into the tousled sheets, the fabric floating up around her like the petals of a tulip.

“Addie, I didn’t do this to hurt you. If what we’ve got means anything . . .”

She turned her face to his. “You will never, ever mean more to me than my daughter does.”

Jack reeled back, her words more painful than any blow he’d felt that night. He watched her fold herself into the pool of linens, her spine rounding. “What did you do with it?” she said, suddenly lifting her tearstained face.

“With what?”

“The smell of her. Of Chloe.” Addie scrabbled through the sheets and pillows. “It was here; it was here just this morning . . . but it’s gone now.”

“Sweetheart,” Jack said gently. “Those sheets don’t smell like Chloe. They haven’t in a very long time.”

Her hands made fists in the fabric. “Get out,” she sobbed, turning her face away as Jack shut the door softly behind him.

The Rooster’s Spit had never, in anyone’s recollection, had anything to do with either chickens or expectorating, but a few old-timers could have told you that the bar tucked at the far edge of town had been a Knights of Columbus hall in a past life, and a Baptist church in another. Now, it was a dark, close space where a man could fall into a puddle of his own troubles, or a tumbler of whiskey, which was just as good.

Roy Peabody nuzzled the lip of his drink, closing his eyes at the sweet heat that rolled down his throat to bloom in his belly. After weeks of being hounded by Addie, or kept watch over by Jack St. Bride, he was in a bar again. He was alone, with the exception of Marlon, the barkeep, who was polishing glasses until they squeaked. Unlike some bartenders Roy had known-and Roy had known many-Marlon was gifted at simply staying quiet and letting a fellow savor his alcohol. In fact, Roy felt more at home in this bar, where no one expected a goddamn thing of him, than in his apartment.

When the door to the Rooster’s Spit swung open, both Roy and Marlon looked up in surprise. It was rare for people in Salem Falls to be out drinking at 10 P.M. on a weeknight, and Roy felt a small needle of resentment at the thought that now he would have to share this wonderful moment with someone else.

It was hard to say who was more stunned when each first saw the other: Jack or Roy.

“What are you doing here?”

“What does it look like?” Roy grimaced. “Run along now; go tell my daughter.”

But Jack just sat heavily down on the barstool beside him. “I’ll have whatever he’s having,” he said to Marlon.

The whiskey was stamped before him like a seal of approval. Jack could feel Roy’s eyes on him as he took his first long swallow. “You going to watch me the whole time?”

“I didn’t figure you for a drinking man,” Roy admitted.

Jack laughed softly. “People aren’t always what they seem.”

Roy accepted this, and nodded. “You look like shit.”

“Thanks so very much.”

The old man reached out and gingerly touched the cut over Jack’s eye. “You walk into a wall?”

Jack glanced at him sidelong. “You drinking lemonade?”

At that, Roy hesitated. “I take it Addie knows you’re here.”

“ ’Bout as much as she knows you are.”

“I told you, St. Bride, if you break her heart-”

“How about when she breaks mine, Roy?” Jack interrupted bitterly. “What are you going to do for me in that case?”

Roy took one look at the deep grooves carved beside Jack’s mouth and saw in his face something too, too familiar. “I’ll buy you a drink,” he said.

Once, on a Girl Scout campout, Gillian had built a fire. While the other kids were busy making their s’mores and singing “Kum ba Yah,” Gilly had fed things to the flame: sticks and pine needles and shoelaces, bits of bread and pennies and even a hapless toad. She had been mesmerized by its greed, by the way it devoured everything in its path. She’d stared at the bonfire and thought: I don’t have a heart. I have one of these inside of me.

Tonight’s bonfire was smaller . . . or maybe she was bigger. She stood holding hands with the others around it. But they were no longer Gillian, Chelsea, Whitney, and Meg. Goddesses all, they were a coven. And she was their high priestess.

The wind, ripe with spring, slipped between Gillian’s thighs like a lover. It was her only covering; her clothes lay in a pile by the dogwood. When she’d said that she wanted to be as pure as possible, the others had been surprised. But Whitney had whipped off her shirt. Chelsea shivered in her bra and panties. Only Meg, self-conscious, was fully dressed.

Gilly met the eyes of each of the others. Did they feel it? Never had her body buzzed like this. She tilted her head back, casting her voice into the night sky. “Guardians of the watchtowers of the east, where sun, moon, and stars are born, I do summon, stir, and call you up!”

The words wrote themselves, drawn from her heart like a ribbon, and for the first time Gilly understood what Starshine had meant about the power of writing your own spells. “Travel over our skin like a whisper, caress us. Bring us imagination; teach us to dance. Blessed be.”

The others swayed slightly. “Blessed be,” they repeated.

Whitney turned, her face glowing. “Guardians of the watchtowers of the south, passionate and hot, I do summon, stir, and call you up. Share your heat with us; make us burn inside. Blessed be!”

“Blessed be!”

“Guardians of the watchtowers of the west,” Chelsea continued, “the blood of the earth, I do summon, stir, and call you up. Let your mystery flow over us. Blessed be!”

“Blessed be!”

Finally, Meg spoke. “Guardians of the watchtowers of the north, night of cool magick, I do summon, stir, and call you up. Bury us deep in your soil; give us the power of earth and stone. Blessed be!”

“Blessed be!”

“Spirit,” Gilly cried, “come play with us as we weave our ribbons; sing with us as we light the fire. Take us to a world without words. Make this night magick . . . blessed be!”

“Blessed be!”

She knelt before the altar, her breasts swaying, and touched the incense burner, the water, the earth, and then sliced her hand through the flames of the bonfire. “I do cast out any and all impurities both of the spirit and the world. As I will it, so mote it be.” Gillian cast the circle three times-with water and earth, with incense, and finally with energy. Then she smiled. “The circle is perfect.”

Gillian brushed a branch of the dogwood tree, and a festival of delicate white petals rained over her shoulders. She raised her hands, her body slender and blued by the moon. “Mother Goddess, Queen of the night, Father God, King of the day, we celebrate your union. Accept these gifts.” Digging into the L.L. Bean canvas bag, she pulled out a sachet filled with the herbs she’d bought at the Wiccan Read. There were twenty in there, all crafted by Whitney. “You do it,” Gilly suggested, and she handed the sachet to her friend.

Whitney strung it on a branch, a poppy red ornament. She reached into the bag and handed out the rest of the sachets to the others, who began to trim the tree. Their gifts winked out from the thick profusion of blooms, a rainbow of offerings.