LITMIR.BIZ

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into the kitchen.

      His frown turned into a scowl when he saw Alice and me facing off. “What’s going on?” He crossed to Alice. “You all right?”

      Of course she immediately burst into tears.

      I rolled my eyes. Alice didn’t like the way I used my sexuality to get what I wanted. But how were her phony tears and feminine helplessness any different? Naturally Carl leaped to her defense in the same way a hundred men had leaped to mine in the past. Rockers or preachers, they were all the same. They flexed their muscles, pounded their chests, leaped to the little lady’s defense and hoped like hell that would get them a free ticket into her pants.

      I’d become very adept at using men yet keeping them out of my pants. I wondered if Alice was as adept at it. Or was she already sleeping with good ol’ Carl?

      “What did you do to her?” he shouted at me.

      “Caught her in a crime that could land her in jail,” I said. Then with a glib wave of my fingers, I waltzed out the back door. I didn’t slam it. That would only signal that I’d lost control, and I wasn’t about to let Alice and that creep ever think that. But boy, I wanted to slam it.

      Instead I stood on the bottom step and made myself take deep, calming breaths. I stared at the sky. The sun had set and a half moon rose, skimming the tops of the pines. Down by the creek the frogs were calling back and forth, tempting any lady frogs within distance with their macho bluster. Were there no worthwhile males anywhere in the animal kingdom? Or were they all just swagger and smoke?

      From upstairs I heard the sudden thump of hard-driving music. Nothing I recognized. I stepped into the yard and looked up at Daniel’s window, its drapes drawn tight against the night. How long till he, too, became an absolute asshole?

      Then Tripod came galloping toward me, tongue lolling and tail whacking from side to side. “At least you love me,” I said, squatting down to rub his ears. “And I love you, you ugly, old thing. Looks like you’re the only one around here having a good time.”

      He rewarded me with a slap of his tongue that my face only partially avoided. “Okay, okay.” Then he was off again, happy as I hadn’t ever seen him. I started after him, I guess because I didn’t really feel like being alone. He might be at home in the country, but I wasn’t. A condo in Miami was more my speed. Or Austin, Texas. Some place with a good music scene. But not L.A. or New York.

      New Orleans would be perfect.

      I shook my head against the thought. Too close to this place. Besides, what did I want with a good music scene? Certainly not a musician for a boyfriend. I was giving up the Red Vidrine lifestyle for a quieter, calmer one. Zoe Vidrine, soccer mom.

      I stopped at the outer edges of the mowed yard and stared into the wild thicket that carpeted the woodlot, on down to the creek. Where I moved to would depend on how much money I could get from selling this place. All I needed was a nice little condo—two bedrooms—in a neighborhood with a good school.

      With my left hand I made a slow circle over my deceptively flat stomach. “I’m doing this for you,” I whispered into the night. “So I can stay at home a couple of years and devote myself to you. We come from a long line of motherless women, but that’s going to change with you.” All I needed was a small home, a few writing gigs a month—music reviews, band interviews—and the two of us could get by.

      The three of us, I amended when Tripod came crashing through the undergrowth, wet this time. “The three of us,” I said, fondling his ugly mug. “Come on, let’s go inside and get you your dinner, unless you’ve already eaten Angel.”

      Though I didn’t want to deal with Alice and her other lapdog, Carl, no way was I letting them think they could intimidate me. Alice had cheated me out of a lot of money. She knew it and I wasn’t going to let her forget it. So I strode into the kitchen—only to find it empty.

      Just as well.

      I fed Tripod, all the while conscious of the heavy rhythm of Daniel’s music shuddering through the ceiling. I was up on all kinds of music, from hardcore punk to ambient noise, to hip hop, to grind core. But I didn’t recognize this band. As I started up the stairs, though, I got a brilliant idea. Daniel was fourteen or so, just coming into his own when it came to musical preferences. If I chatted him up about his music, it would probably piss the hell out of Alice. But it could also be the start of a great article: Tomorrow’s Music Connoisseurs—What They’re Listening To Today. Plus, I needed to learn how to relate to kids.

      I knocked twice before Daniel cracked the door. He looked like a younger version of G.G. when he was in a foul mood. Lowered brow, downturned mouth.

      “What?” he asked. I couldn’t hear the actual word due to the volume of his music, but I could read his lips.

      I smiled. “I was wondering who that was. I don’t recognize the band.”

      “What?”

      “The band!” I shouted. “Who is it?”

      “Oh.” He opened the door to let me in. Then he lowered the volume and handed me the CD cover. Power of Odd.

      “Never heard of them. Are they local?”

      “Sort of. One of them went to Covington High School and they’ve played at a couple of youth revivals.”

      “Youth revivals? You mean they’re Christian rock?”

      “Yeah.” He gestured me to sit on his bed, then picked up a handful of CDs for me to look though. As I checked them out I listened to Power of Odd. No reference to Jesus in the lyrics, at least not directly. No wonder I hadn’t pegged it. With the pounding drums—it sounded like a double set—and the howl of angst delivering the lyrics, it had more in common with Metallica or White Snake than what I thought of as saccharine church music. Debbie Boone it was not.

      “These guys aren’t as fierce,” he said, as he reloaded the CD player with a different group. “More lyrical. Good for relaxing.”

      “While Power of Odd is better for raging?”

      He ducked his head and shrugged. “It’s been a weird day, you know?”

      “Tell me about it.”

      We listened to the beginning of the first song, about temptation and love and getting your strength from above.

      “Why’d you come back here?” he asked me.

      I straightened up. No way was I discussing this house and my half of Mom’s inheritance. “Doesn’t it make more sense to ask why I left?” Another bad subject but not quite so dangerous.

      “Okay. Why’d you leave? How old were you, anyway?”

      “Seventeen. And this place was nothing like it is now.” What a monumental understatement.

      “You ran away?”

      “Yep.”

      “How come?”

      I laughed. “My mother, of course. She was crazy. And cruel. And selfish.”

      “Just like mine,” he muttered.

      “Oh, no, buddy boy. No way. Your mother is nothing like our mom.”

      “Oh, yeah? Well you never had to live with a religious fanatic who thinks you’re five years old!”

      “That’s true,” I admitted. “But at least you know she loves you. Cares about you. My mother treated us like we were adults. We had to feed ourselves, clean ourselves, take care of the house and pets—and her while she was loaded, which was most of the time. It was up to us to keep this place functioning while a bunch of pothead dopers crashed here whenever they wanted to.”

      He stared at me in shock. “Grandma was a drug user?”

      He didn’t know? If Alice hadn’t told him that, it stood to reason that she would be furious when she found out I had. Digging up

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