Spin a Wicked Web

NINETEEN

I MANAGED TO RETURN the high school yearbooks to the dresser drawer. When I pushed the drawer back in, it shrieked as if in agony. Slowly, I pulled it back out and tried to re-align the gliders. This time it slid on the track with only a low moan, but wouldn't go all the way in. I removed the drawer completely and, on my hands and knees, peered into the dark recesses under the dresser.

Something on the floor, way back there.

I leaned in, cheek to the floor and butt up in the air, and scrabbled among the dust bunnies with my fingertips. Finally, I grasped hold of the edge of whatever it was and dragged it out to the light of day.

A book, fabric covered, with one corner all bent up from having the drawer jam into it. It was filthy, and one edge had yellowed after obvious water damage. I opened it and recognized Ariel's spiky handwriting from the few times I'd seen it at the co-op.

Footsteps in the hallway paused outside my door. I froze.

An eon later, they moved on and went downstairs. Hurriedly, I pushed the drawer back in. It moaned like a wounded animal again. Standing, I took the book and stuffed it into the bottom recesses of my tote bag. Then I pulled the covers up, tidied the bed, grabbed the toothbrush Gabi had given me the night before, and opened the door.

Noah and Evan hurtled past me and down the stairs, calling, "Hi!" and "Hello!" over each other. And then, from the kitchen I heard, "Hey Mom, can we have pancakes?"

I turned to see Rocky come out of his and Gabi's bedroom. He paused when he saw me, surprised.

"Good morning," I said, trying to sound cheery.

"Uh, morning." He walked down the hall barefoot, carrying a pair of tube socks in his hand. "Everything all right?"

Meaning, why are you still here?

"Oh, sure. Time just got away from us last night, talking yarn and stuff, and Gabi offered to let me stay." His face remained impassive. "So, I took her up on it," I finished in a more subdued tone.

"I see. Well, I hope you slept well." He didn't wait to find out if, in fact, I had slept well, but walked past me and down the stairs without another word.

Maybe he resented my spending the night in his sister's bed. I had to admit it was a little weird.

I strode down the hallway to the bathroom where I splashed water on my face, brushed my teeth and futzed a little with my hair. It looked like I'd just rolled out of bed, which I had, but it always looked like that now, so there wasn't much help for it. I grabbed my bag and followed in Rocky's footsteps.

In the living room, I paused. Even with the gluttony of fiber caressing and fondling the evening before, we'd never looked at the wonderful stuff spilling out of the basket by Gabi's spinning wheel. The rattle of pans and clamor of voices carried out from the kitchen. I tiptoed over to the basket, went down on one knee, and plunged both hands into the beautiful fluffy goodness.

I just wanted a quick hit, and would have stopped there, but when I separated the batts and slivers waiting their turn on the wheel, I saw the familiar sunset pastels of my new favorite fiber.

It wasn't mine, of course. It was Gabi's. But it was the same hand-painted bamboo Ruth had left for me when she brought her wheel over to the house. The same delicious softness that had soothed my soul in the middle of the night and made me completely forget about Barr, Hannah, and Ariel et al. And right next to it, another batt with Thea Hawke's label attached, this one an ethereal mixture of blue and green and pink.

Gently, I ran my fingertips over it and smiled. Something tickled my memory. Hadn't I seen this color combination before?

"What are you doing?"

My head jerked up and I saw Gabi, looking disheveled and tired, standing in the doorway to the living room.

"I, uh, never got a chance to look at what's in here," I said. "Sorry. Didn't mean to presume."

Gabi flushed. "No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap. I guess I'm a little cranky this morning-not used to late nights, especially not involving wine."

Standing, I said, "Oh, gosh, that's okay. I sure appreciate you putting me up for the night, but I'll go ahead and get out of your hair."

I was dying to see what Ariel had written in that book.

A book I was essentially stealing. Not good. If there was anything important in there, I'd bungled things. Would it be admissible in court? Maybe I should put it back. But then no one would know what was in it, important or not. Could Barr and Robin get a warrant for an old journal? Unlikely. I couldn't think of another way to see what Ariel had written. Swallowing my doubt, I decided to take the chance.

I pointed to the basket. "Isn't Thea's stuff great? I just finished spinning a few ounces of it. Amazing."

Gabi frowned.

"The pastel bamboo."

She came over and stood beside me, and I reached down and pulled the batt out, to show her what I was talking about.

"Oh, that. Yes, it's pretty, isn't it? I think I got it online."

"Uh oh. Don't tell me that. I could develop a serious Internet shopping illness for this kind of stuff," I said.

"Every once in awhile I can't help but order something." She bent her head. "Pretty self-indulgent, I know."

I handed her the batt. "Good for you."

She stroked it a couple times, as if it were a baby animal, and returned it to the basket. "What would you like for breakfast?"

"Oh, no. Nothing for me. I can't impose on your wonderful hospitality anymore. Besides, I have to get back."

"Are you sure?" But she couldn't quite hide her relief.

"I'm sure." I stripped off the sweatshirt and handed it to her, then went over and leaned into the kitchen.

The twins sat at the table, slurping their orange juice and making play plans for their day. Beside them Rocky listened with a half-smile and sipped coffee from a mug advertising the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival from six years before.

"Goodbye," I said. "And thanks for everything."

"Bye!" the twins said in unison.

"You drive safe now, Sophie Mae," Rocky said. "And thank you for bringing up the pictures."

"I'm glad I could help. I'll be thinking about you."

He inclined his head in acknowledgment.

As I turned to pull the door closed behind me, I saw Gabi pop a couple of aspirin in her mouth and chase them with a swallow of coffee.

I wanted to go home, actually feeling a little homesick. Maybe it was silly to feel that way after just one night, but the atmosphere at the Kaminskis in the cold light of day made me miss my morning routine with Meghan and Erin. And if I missed it after one pleasant evening out of town, how much would I miss it if I moved? Would it be so bad, not moving in with Barr?

He'd understand.

Wouldn't he?

But homesick or not, I was starving, not to mention intensely curious. I stopped at the Calico Cupboard Bakery in La Conner, mouth watering the second I hit the doorway. A serving of their famous bread pudding and large cup of coffee in hand, I sat at a little table by the window and dug the handwritten book I'd found in Ariel's room out of my bag.

It smelled like old library books do, the ones in the back room that no one ever checks out. Musty and dusty. I took a bite of pudding and opened it to the first page.

I hadn't dared to hope, sure that would jinx it, but there it was, right in front of me. An honest-to-Pete diary. Ha! Elation hit my bloodstream at the same time as the caffeine, and I had to keep from grinning to myself so the locals wouldn't think they had a raving lunatic in their midst.

Ten pages later, I sighed. It was the most boring diary I'd ever seen. Oh sure, there were things in it that were telling. She recorded every single thing she ate, complete with calorie content. She also wrote down whenever anyone said anything about her weight, good or bad. I remembered wondering what her last meal had been before she was killed; now I tried and couldn't remember ever seeing her eat. Maybe she hadn't had a last meal at all.

She also kept track of things that the other students did and said at school, musing on the reactions they engendered in other people. It was as if she were creating a roadmap of behavior, with a particular effect as the goal. Her writing voice was cold, almost mercenary. As I read on I was struck by the lack of information about Ariel's own feelings, which I found odd given the usual teenaged girl's abundance of angst about everything from a broken fingernail to world hunger.

I munched and sipped and read on, skimming a lot of the content. But when I reached the final entry, I swallowed and slowly returned my cup to the table.

Today I lost a button on my shirt, and I caught Mr. Blankenship looking at the side of my boob. At first I was embar rassed, but then he seemed more embarrassed than me. So I let him do it some more. He didn't turn away. He kept looking. And that was when I realized that all those girls with the fancy clothes and snotty attitudes weren't going to get their way. They're too scary. But if you're not scary, if you smile and are nice to men, they start getting all stupid and let you do anything. I read once boys think about sex every seventeen seconds and that men think about it almost that much. When Mr. Blankenship was looking down my shirt I finally got it. And now I'm going to get whatever I want.

The rest of the pages in the book were torn out. A part of me was glad I couldn't read them. I sat and looked out the window at the tourist traffic beginning to parade down the street outside of the bakery. Sadness mingled with distaste as I digested what Ariel had written about the discovery of her sexual power.

It could be a dangerous thing, to intentionally manipulate with that power. I hoped it hadn't burned her, as she apparently brandished it, no doubt awkwardly, in her teen years.

And then later? As a young woman, somewhat more refined and practiced? Had it been the reason she'd been murdered?