The Peach Keeper (6 page)

She put on her sunglasses and walked outside into the razor-sharp sunshine, crossing the wide brick patio toward the parking lot. The sun was already glinting in hot metallic waves off car windshields, which was why she didn’t see that someone was approaching her until she was only a few steps away.

It was Paxton Osgood, wearing a cute pink dress and gorgeous shoes. She was tall like her brother, but had wide curves, as if one of her angular French ancestors had scandalized everyone by marrying a pretty stout milkmaid, and several generations later, Paxton was the result. Beside her was a man with blond hair and fair skin. He was in a tailored suit that shouldn’t have looked so good on someone that slim. But it did. He was beautiful in the most unusual way, one of those people you couldn’t quite figure out which side of masculine or feminine they fell on.

Not knowing what Colin had told his sister about last night, or what hard feelings Paxton still harbored for that time Willa faked a love letter from Paxton to Robbie Roberts, Willa wasn’t exactly sure what to expect from her by way of greeting, or even if she was going to greet her at all.

She definitely wasn’t expecting Paxton to smile and say, “Willa! Hello! I’m so glad I ran into you. Are you here in the mornings, then? That’s why I never see you. Did you get my note about wanting to do something special for our grandmothers at the gala?”

Willa self-consciously patted at her wild, wavy hair
because Paxton’s hair was in her trademark chignon. She was always so polished. “My grandmother isn’t well enough to attend,” Willa said. “She doesn’t even remember me, much less the club.”

“Yes, I know. And I’m sorry,” Paxton said. “What I was thinking of doing was honoring her through you. That you could accept a gift for her.”

“I … think I have a previous engagement that evening,” Willa said.

“Oh,” Paxton said, obviously surprised. There was an awkward pause.

Sebastian cleared his throat. “Hello, Willa. Nice to see you again. It’s been a while.”

“Sebastian. I heard you’d taken over Dr. Kostovo’s practice.” Sebastian Rogers reinforced her belief that reinvention was not just a nice theory. It really did happen. Back in high school, her peers would sometimes forget she was there because she was normally so quiet during school, but Sebastian wasn’t nearly as lucky. Willa had the power to be invisible, something someone who looked like Sebastian could never be. He had endured constant taunts. And yet here he was, a DMD in a suit that probably cost more than a year’s worth of her Jeep payments. “The last time I saw you, you had on eyeliner and a purple trench coat.”

“The last time I saw you, you were being arrested for pulling the fire alarm.”

“Touché. Come by Au Naturel on National Street sometime. You can have coffee on the house.”

“Perhaps I will. You were a patient of Dr. Kostovo’s,
weren’t you? I expect you to continue to come for regular cleanings.”

“You’re the dental police now?”

He lifted one eyebrow seriously. “Yes, I am.”

Willa laughed, then realized Paxton was looking at her curiously. Her laughter fading, Willa looked from Paxton to Sebastian, then back again.

“Well, I’ve got to go,” she finally said.

“Goodbye, Willa,” Sebastian said as she walked away.

Paxton didn’t say anything.

Paxton watched Sebastian from the corner of her eye as they walked down the hallway toward her grandmother’s room. Her steps were heavy in her heels, but his were whisper-light in his Italian loafers. Even the bouquet of hydrangeas he was carrying didn’t crinkle. “I don’t remember you and Willa being particularly close in high school. Were you?”

“No,” he said simply.

“She seemed happier to see you than me.”

“The code of outcasts,” he said with a smile. “You wouldn’t understand.” Before Paxton could ask, they reached her grandmother’s door. “Ready to see the dragon lady?”

“No,” Paxton said.

“I’m here for you.” Sebastian put his arm around her waist and gave her a comforting squeeze before dropping his arm.

They walked in together, and Paxton cautiously approached
her grandmother’s bed. Every time she got near her, she could feel her skin start to burn. She’d been afraid of this woman all her life, something she’d never told anyone. She would look at her grandmother and feel absolute terror that she was going to turn into her one day. “Nana Osgood?” she said gently. “It’s me, Paxton. Are you awake?”

Without opening her eyes, Agatha said, “The fact that you had to ask should have given you a clue.”

“I’m here with Sebastian this morning.”

She finally opened her eyes. “Oh, the fancy man.”

Paxton sighed, but Sebastian smiled and winked at her. “I brought you some hydrangeas, Agatha,” he said. “Your favorite.”

“You don’t have to tell me they’re my favorite. I know they’re my favorite. But my question is, why are you bringing flowers to a blind woman? I can’t see them. I keep telling you, I want chocolates. Food is my last remaining pleasure.”

“Nana, you know Mama doesn’t want you to have too many sweets.”

“Your mama doesn’t know anything. Give me my teeth.”

“Where are they?” Paxton asked.

“On the table where they always are,” Agatha said as she sat up. “Honestly, it’s not like we don’t do this every time you visit. Why are you here so early, anyway? This isn’t even your day to come see me.”

“I have something wonderful to tell you about the Blue Ridge Madam,” Paxton said, looking to the bedside table for her grandmother’s teeth.

“There’s nothing wonderful about the Blue Ridge Madam. Stay away from it. It’s haunted. Give me my teeth.”

Paxton started to panic. “Your teeth aren’t here.”

“Of course they are.” Agatha threw her covers off as she stood and nudged Paxton out of the way. She patted the tabletop with her hands, her gummy mouth agape. “Where are they? Someone stole my teeth! Thieves!” she screamed. “Thieves!”

“I’ll just put these in some water,” Sebastian said as he took a Waterford crystal vase from the bureau and went into the attached bathroom. Seconds later, he leaned out and said, “Darling?”

Paxton was now on her knees, looking under her grandmother’s bed, while Agatha continued to scream. She looked up to find him desperately trying to suppress a laugh. She loved that he didn’t let her grandmother get to him. She loved that he was willing to go through this with her, that she didn’t have to hide how horrible Agatha was. If he could live with her secret, then she could live with him knowing. Nothing was going to happen between them. If they just carried on like always, everything would be okay.

“I believe I’ve located Agatha’s teeth,” he said.

After Paxton and the fancy man left, Agatha Osgood sat in her chair in her room, her lips set, her fingers pinching nervously at her cardigan, which she could only assume matched her dress. Macular degeneration had all but taken her eyesight. But she knew where all her furniture
was in her room, and it was soft and comfortable. Someone told her the upholstery was in a blue hydrangea pattern, which, when the light hit it right, she could almost make out. She also had her own miniature refrigerator that her family kept stocked with things she liked. She still enjoyed food, so that helped a little, even if they didn’t give her as much chocolate as she wanted. This wasn’t such a bad place, she supposed. It was, in fact, the best facility around, as was reflected in the cost. Not that Agatha minded anything about money. That’s what happens when you have too much of it. It becomes like dust, something that constantly moves around you but that you never actually touch.

She’d thought her family consulted her on things. She’d thought that, as matriarch, her opinion was still relevant. That was the impression they gave her when they visited. But she realized now just how coddled she was. This place lulled its residents into thinking that this was all there was to the world anymore. It shrank everything down, Alice in Wonderlandly. It was startling to her that there was still a world outside these walls, one that went on turning even when she wasn’t in it.

She couldn’t believe her family had actually bought the Blue Ridge Madam. All those years of carefully constructing the rumors of ghosts, of making every child, and most adults, afraid of the Madam, of watching it crumble, year after year, waiting for the time when it would finally collapse and it and everything that had happened there would disappear, had been for naught.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, Paxton was planning a big gala there, celebrating the formation of the Women’s Society Club. Agatha had tried everything she could to get Paxton to stop it, to cancel it. She’d said hateful things she didn’t mean and made threats she couldn’t keep, but nothing was going to stop it. Paxton was in control of the club now, and Agatha felt her lack of power acutely.

Those silly girls had no idea what they were really celebrating. They had no idea what it took to bring Agatha and her friends together seventy-five years ago. The Women’s Society Club had been about supporting one another, about banding together to protect one another because no one else would. But it had turned into an ugly beast, a means by which rich ladies could congratulate themselves by giving money to the poor. And Agatha had let it happen. All her life, it seemed, she was making up for things she let happen.

She knew it wasn’t a coincidence that the club would be celebrating in the Madam. There was no such thing as coincidence. It was fate. Looking at it objectively, it even had a cruel sort of symmetry. The reason they’d started the club in the first place had to do with the Madam. It was just a matter of time now before it was all going to come to light. Secrets never stay buried, no matter how hard you try. That’s what Georgie had always been afraid of.

She got up and walked out of her room, counting her steps to the nurses’ station. She could hear the morning nurse’s voice there as she approached. She was
young. Too young. She sounded like she should still be playing hopscotch with her best friends. Why were girls in such a hurry to grow up? Agatha would never understand. Childhood was magical. Leaving it behind was a magnificent loss.

“Hello, Mrs. Osgood,” the nurse said, in a tone that tried but fell short of pleasant. Agatha inspired this in all the help here. She wasn’t sure when it had happened, but sometime in the past ten years, she’d discovered that it made her feel better to make other people as miserable as she was. It was the help who hid her teeth in the bathroom this morning, where the fancy man had found them. She was sure of it. It was a give-and-take she’d played with the staff for years now. “What can I do for you?”

“If I need your help, I’ll ask for it,” Agatha snapped as she walked by. She walked to the third hallway, her papery fingertips trailing along the walls as she counted the doors to Georgie Jackson’s room. When Georgie’s son Ham had come to her and asked for Agatha’s help in getting Georgie a place here in the home, Agatha had given him the money without hesitation. All she’d ever wanted was to help Georgie, to make up for the one time when Georgie had needed her the most and Agatha had turned her back on her … the one time that had changed everything. Agatha kept tabs on how Georgie was being treated, but she rarely visited Georgie here. Georgie wouldn’t have liked it. She would have said,
You have your side, I have mine. That’s the way it has to be now
.

When she reached the room, all Agatha could make out was a dark form haloed by the morning sun. Georgie looked like a hole Agatha could fall into.

Agatha mourned for a lot of things she’d lost, but lately this was the loss she felt the most—the loss of friendship. She missed her eyesight. She missed her husband. She missed her mother and father. But those girls she grew up with were such an important part of her life. If her old friends all appeared to her now, she would protect them with her last breath, which of course was too little, too late. The way it had always been. They were gone, all except for Georgie, who was suspended here in life only by a thin, glittering thread.

She walked over to Georgie and sat beside her. “It’s finally happening,” Agatha whispered.

Georgie—sweet, innocent Georgie—turned to her and said, “Peach.”