The Girl Who Chased the Moon

Chapter 2

When Emily woke, her hairline was wet with sweat and she felt bone tired. She also had absolutely no idea where she was. She sat up quickly and pulled the earbuds of her MP3 player out of her ears. She looked around the room-the lilac wallpaper, the tattered princess furniture. That’s when she remembered. She was in her mother’s old bedroom.

She’d never slept in a place that felt so hollow. Even though she knew her grandfather was downstairs, having the entire upstairs to herself made her uneasy. All night, there had been long periods of quiet punctuated by loud wooden pops of the house settling. And leaves kept rattling outside her balcony door. She’d finally turned on her MP3 player and tried to imagine herself someplace else. Someplace not so humid.

Scared or not, tonight she was going to have to sleep with the balcony doors open, or else perish into a puddle of perspiration. At some point last night, she’d kicked the bedsheet aside. And she’d started out in pajamas, but she’d wiggled out of the bottom part soon after turning in, and was now in only the top. Her mother might have been the most politically correct person on the planet-an activist, an environmentalist, a crusader for the underdog-but even she ran the air conditioner when it got too hot.

She made her way to the antiquated bathroom and took a bath because there was no shower. And she was momentarily stumped by the fact that there were separate faucets for hot and cold water instead of both coming out of the same faucet like in a normal bathroom.

Afterward she dressed in shorts and a racer-back tank, then went downstairs.

She noticed the note taped to the inside of the screen door right away.

Emily: This is Grandpa Vance writing you. I forgot to tell you that I go out for breakfast every morning. Didn’t want to wake you. I’ll bring you something back, but there’s also teenager food in the kitchen. The note was written in large block letters that slanted off the lines of the paper, as if he couldn’t see around his hand as he was writing.

She took a deep breath, still trying to rearrange her expectations. Her first day here, and he didn’t want to spend it with her.

Standing at the screen door, Emily heard a swish of leaves and, startled, looked up to see a woman in her thirties walking up the front porch steps. She had light brown hair that was cut into a beautiful swinging bob just below her ears. Emily could never get her own bobbed hair to look like that. She’d been trying to grow it out forever, and could only manage a short ponytail with it. And even then, it fell out of the tail and around her face most of the time.

The woman didn’t see Emily standing there until she reached the top step. She instantly smiled. “Hello! You must be Vance’s granddaughter,” she said as she came to a stop at the door. She had pretty, dark brown eyes.

“Yes, I’m Emily Benedict.”

“I’m Julia Winterson. I live over there.” She turned her head slightly, indicating the yellow and white house next door. That’s when Emily noticed the pink streak in Julia’s hair, tucked behind her ear. It wasn’t something she expected from someone so fresh-faced, in flour-stained jeans and a white peasant blouse. “I brought you an apple stack cake.” She opened the white box she was holding and showed Emily what looked like a stack of very large brown pancakes with some sort of filling in between each one. “It means…” she struggled with the word, then finally said, “welcome. I know Mullaby has its faults, as I’m sure your mother told you, but it’s also a town of great food. You’re going to eat very well while you’re here. At least there’s that.”

Emily couldn’t remember the last time she’d had an appetite for anything, much less food, but she didn’t tell Julia that. “My mother didn’t tell me anything about Mullaby,” Emily said, staring at the cake.

“Nothing?”

“No.”

Julia seemed shocked into silence.

“What?” Emily looked up from the cake.

“It’s nothing,” Julia said, shaking her head. She closed the lid on the box. “Do you want me to put this in the kitchen?”

“Sure. Come in,” Emily said as she opened the screen door for her.

As Julia walked in, she noticed the note from Grandpa Vance still on the screen. “Vance asked me to take him grocery shopping yesterday morning so he could get some things for you,” she said, nodding toward the note. “His idea of teenager food was Kool-Aid, fruit roll-ups, and gum. I convinced him to buy chips, bagels, and cereal, too.”

“That was nice of you,” Emily said. “To take him shopping, I mean.”

“I was a big fan of the Giant of Mullaby when I was a kid.” When Emily looked at her, not understanding, Julia explained, “That’s what people around here call your grandfather.”

“How tall is he?” Emily asked, her voice hushed, as if he might hear.

Julia laughed. It was a great laugh, and hearing it was like stepping into a spot of sunshine. That she came bearing cake seemed oddly fitting. It was like she was made of cake, light and pretty and decorated on the outside-with her sweet laugh and pink streak to her hair-but it was anyone’s guess what was on the inside. Emily suspected it might be something dark. “Tall enough to see into tomorrow. That’s what he tells everyone. He’s over eight feet tall. I know that much. World record keepers came nosing around here once, but Vance wouldn’t have anything to do with them.”

Julia knew the way to the kitchen, so Emily followed. The kitchen was large and kitschy, like something straight out of the 1950s. Years ago, it must have been a showplace. It was overwhelmingly red-red countertops, red and white tile floor, and a large red refrigerator that had a sliver pull handle, like a meat locker. Julia put the cake box on the counter, then turned to stare at Emily for a moment. “You look a lot like your mother,” she finally said.

“You knew her?” Emily asked, perking up at the thought of finding someone willing to talk about her mother.

“We were in the same class in school. But we weren’t close.” Julia stuffed her hands into her jeans pockets. “She didn’t tell you anything?”

“I knew she was born in North Carolina, but I didn’t know where. I didn’t even know I had a grandfather.” Julia’s eyebrows rose and Emily found herself rushing to explain. “She never said I didn’t have one, she just never talked about him and I always assumed it was because he had passed away. Mom didn’t like to talk about her past, and I respected that. She always said there was no use dwelling on the unfixable past when there was so much you could do to fix the future. She devoted all her time to her causes.”

“Her causes?”

“Amnesty International. Oxfam. Greenpeace. The Nature Conservancy. She traveled a lot when she was younger. After I was born, she settled down in Boston. She was very involved locally there.”

“Well. That’s… not what I expected.”

“Was she like that here? Was she involved in a lot of causes?”

Julia quickly took her hands out of her pockets. “I should be going.”

“Oh,” Emily said, confused. “Well, thank you for the cake.”

“No problem. My restaurant is called J’s Barbecue, on Main Street. Come by anytime for the best cake in Mullaby. The barbecue is really good, too, but I can’t take credit for it. That’s where your grandfather is right now, by the way. He walks there every morning for breakfast.”

Emily followed Julia to the front door. “Where is Main Street?”

As they stepped onto the porch, Julia pointed. “At the end of Shelby Road here, turn left onto Dogwood. About a half-mile later, turn right. You can’t miss it.” Julia started toward the steps, but Emily stopped her.

“Wait, Julia. I saw some sort of light in the backyard last night. Did you see it?”

Julia turned. “You’ve seen the Mullaby lights already?”

“What are the Mullaby lights?”

Julia scratched her head and tucked her hair behind her ears, as if deciding what to say. “They’re white lights that sometimes dart through the woods and fields around here. Some say it’s a ghost that haunts the town. It’s just another town oddity,” she said, as if there were many. “Don’t pay any attention to it and it will go away.”

Emily nodded.

Julia turned to leave again, but stopped with her back to Emily. She finally turned back around and said, “Listen, I’ll be next door if you ever need me, at least for the next six months. This place takes some getting used to. Believe me, I know.”

Emily smiled and she felt her shoulders lose some tension. “Thanks.”

IT DIDN’T take Emily long to decide to walk to Main Street and greet her grandfather. She thought it would be nice to walk home with him, establish some sort of routine. He’d obviously lived alone for a long time, so maybe his hesitancy around her came from simply not knowing how to act. Don’t wait for the world to change, Emily, her mother used to say to her, sometimes in a frustrated voice. Change it yourself!

Emily wondered if her mother had been disappointed in her. She didn’t have her mother’s passion, her courage, her drive. Emily was cautious, but her mother had never met a person she didn’t want to help. It had been an awkward dynamic. Emily had always been in awe of her mother, but it had been hard to get close to her. Dulcie had wanted to help, but never be helped.

She found Main Street easily. Just like Julia said, there really was no missing it. Once she turned the corner off Dogwood, there was an enormous sign declaring that she was now on “ Historic Main Street.” It was a long, beautiful street, different from the comfortable neighborhoods she’d walked through to get there. The street began with brick mansions in grand Federal style, sitting close to the sidewalk with almost no front yards to speak of. Across the street from the mansions was a park with a bandstand that had a lovely silver crescent-moon weathervane on top of it. Past the houses and the park, the street turned commercial, with a series of touristy shops and restaurants squeezed side by side into old brick buildings. Emily counted seven barbecue restaurants, and she was only halfway down the business end of street. Seven. They were obviously the source of the smell that settled over the town like a veil. Woody, sweet smoke was rising from behind some of the restaurants in wisps and curls.

There were a lot tourists around, mesmerized, as she was, by Mullaby’s old-fashioned beauty. The sidewalks were crowded, more crowded than she’d expected at that time of morning. She kept looking, but she couldn’t see J’s Barbecue and, out of nowhere, panic set in. One moment she was feeling happy and proactive, walking along this beautiful street, and the next moment she was terrified that she couldn’t find the restaurant she was looking for. What if Julia had been wrong? What if Grandpa Vance wasn’t here? What if she couldn’t find her way back?

She started to feel light-headed. It was like being underwater, this pressure against her eyes and ears, always followed by sparkling confetti swimming along her periphery.

She’d been having these anxiety attacks ever since her mother died. It was easy enough to hide them from Merry, her mother’s best friend, with whom Emily had lived for the past four months. All she had to do was close her bedroom door. And at school, her teachers would turn a blind eye when she stayed in the girls’ restroom, sitting on the floor by the sinks trying to catch her breath, instead of coming to class.

The business end of Main Street was lined with benches, so she made it to the nearest one and sat. She’d broken out into a cold sweat. She wouldn’t faint. She wouldn’t.

She leaned forward and rested her chest against her thighs, her head down. The length of the thighbone is indicative of overall height. It was a random thought, something she remembered from physiology class.

A pair of expensive men’s loafers suddenly appeared on the sidewalk in front of her.

She slowly looked up. It was a young man about her age, wearing a white summer linen suit, the jacket pushed away from his hips by his hands resting casually in his trouser pockets. He had on a red bow tie and his dark hair was curling around his starched collar. He was handsome in a well-bred kind of way, like something out of a Tennessee Williams play. She unexpectedly felt self-conscious in her shorts and racer-back tank top. Compared to him, she looked like she’d just come from a spin class.

He didn’t say anything to her at first, just stared at her. Then he finally, almost reluctantly, asked, “Are you all right?”

She didn’t understand. Everyone she’d met here so far treated her as if associating with her was going to hurt. She took a deep breath, the oxygen going to her head with the force of floodwater. “Fine, thanks,” she said.

“Are you sick?”

“Just light-headed.” She looked down at her feet, in ankle socks and cross-trainers, and seemed strangely detached from herself. Socks that only cover the ankle are not acceptable. Socks must be crew or knee socks only. So said the Roxley School for Girls handbook. She’d been at Roxley School all her school career. Her mother had helped found it, a school to empower girls, encouraging activism and volunteerism.

Silence. She looked up again and the young man was gone, like smoke. Had she been hallucinating? Maybe she’d conjured up some out-of-time Southern archetype to go along with her surroundings. After a few minutes, she put her elbows on her knees and lifted herself just slightly.

She felt someone take a seat beside her on the bench and she caught a nice, clean scent of cologne. The loud aluminum crack of a soda can being opened startled her, and she sat all the way up with a jerk.

The young man in the white linen suit had returned. He was sitting beside her now, extending a can of Coke.

“Go on,” he said. “Take it.”

She reached for the can, her hand shaking slightly. She took a long drink and it was cold, sweet, and so sharp it made her tongue burn. She couldn’t remember the last time something had tasted this good. She couldn’t stop drinking. In no time she had emptied the can.

When she finished, breathless, she closed her eyes and pressed the cold can against her forehead. When was the last time she’d had something to drink? When she thought back, it was long before she’d gotten on the bus in Boston yesterday.

She heard a crackling of paper. The young man said, “Don’t be alarmed,” and she felt something cold on the back of her neck. Freezing. Her hand went instantly to her neck, covering his hand with hers.

“What is that?” she demanded.

“I believe it’s a Creamsicle,” he said, leaning back to look at it. “It was the first thing I grabbed from the freezer in the general store.”

For the first time, she noticed that they were sitting in front of a deliberately old-fashioned place called Zim’s General Store. The door was propped open and Emily could see large barrels of candy near the cash register, and an entire wall of vintage reproduction tin signs in the back.

“It’s mostly for the tourists, so it’s been a long time since I’ve been in there,” he said. “But it still smells like cinnamon and floor polish. Are you still with me? How are you feeling?”

She turned back to him and realized just how close he was, close enough to see that his ivy-green irises were rimmed in black. Strangely, she thought she could actually feel him, feel a sort of energy emanating from him, like heat from a fire. He was so odd and lovely. For a moment, she was completely under his spell. She’d been staring at him for a while before she realized what she was doing. Then she also realized her hand was still on his on her neck. She slowly moved her hand and shifted away. “I’m fine now. Thank you.”

He took the paper-covered Creamsicle off her neck and held it out to her, but she shook her head. He shrugged and unwrapped it. He took a bite as he sat back and crossed his legs, studying the store in front of them. She almost wished she’d taken the Creamsicle now. It looked delicious-cool vanilla and sharp bright orange.

“I’m Emily Benedict,” she said, extending her hand.

He didn’t turn to her, nor did he take her hand. “I know who you are.” He took another bite of the Creamsicle.

Emily’s hand fell to her lap. “You do?”

“I’m Win Coffey. My uncle was Logan Coffey.”

She looked at him blankly. This was obviously something he thought she should know. “I just moved here.”

“Your mother didn’t tell you?”

Her mother? What did her mother have to do with this? “Tell me what?”

He finally turned to her. “Good God. You really don’t know.”

“Know what?” This was beginning to concern her.

He stared at her for an uncomfortably long time. “Nothing,” he finally said as he threw away what was left of the Creamsicle in a receptacle by the bench, then stood. “If you’re not feeling well enough to walk home on your own, I can call our driver to take you.”

“I’ll be fine.” She lifted the can slightly. “Thank you for the Coke.”

He hesitated. “I’m sorry I refused to shake your hand. Forgive me.” He held out his hand. Confused, she took it. She was immediately shocked by the warmth of him, stretching out to her like wandering vines. He made her feel tangled in him, somehow. It wasn’t exactly a bad feeling, just strange.

He released her hand and she watched him walk down the sidewalk. His skin almost glowed in the morning summer sun, which was slanting across the buildings in blinding golds and tangerines. He looked so alive, shining with it.

For a moment, she couldn’t look away.

“Emily?”

She turned and saw her giant grandfather walking toward her carrying a paper bag. People were parting on the sidewalk, watching him in awe. She could tell he was trying not to notice, but his enormous shoulders were hunched, as if attempting to make himself smaller.

She stood and tossed the can of Coke into a nearby recycling container. Vance came to a stop in front of her. “What are you doing here?” he asked.

“I thought I’d meet you so we could walk home together.”

The look on his face was almost indecipherable, but if she had to guess, she’d just made him sad. She was horrified.

“I’m sorry,” she immediately said. “I didn’t mean to-”

“Was that Win Coffey you were talking to?”

“Do you know him?”

Vance stared down the sidewalk. Emily couldn’t see Win anymore, but Vance’s height obviously gave him an advantage. “Yes, I know him,” he said. “Let’s go home.”

“I’m sorry, Grandpa Vance.”

“Don’t apologize, child. You did nothing wrong. Here, I brought you an egg sandwich from the restaurant.” He handed the bag to her.

“Thank you.”

He nodded and put one impossibly long arm around her, then walked her home in silence.