I, Richard Part 5

"Jasmine."

"p.o.o.p." She stuck out her tongue. She'd cut her bangs again, Willow saw, and she sighed. She felt defeated by her strong-willed daughter on the fast path to adolescence, and she hoped that little Blythe or Cooper-with whom she was finally and blessedly pregnant-might be more the sort of child she'd had in mind to bring into the world.

It was clear to Willow that she wasn't going to receive Scott's acknowledgment of-much less his benediction on-her plan for the drop-dead brownies unless and until she made it clear why she thought a neighborly gesture was called for at this point. She waited to do so until the kids were off to school, safely escorted to the bus stop at the end of the street and attended there-despite Jasmine's protests-until the yellow doors closed upon them. Then she returned to the house and found her husband preparing for the daily five hours of sleep he allotted himself prior to sitting down to work on the six consulting accounts that so far described what went for McKenna Computing Designs. Nine more accounts and he would be able to leave TriOptics and maybe then their lives would be a little more normal. No more regimented s.e.x in the hours between the kids' going to bed and Scott's leaving for work. No more long nights alone listening to the creaking floorboards and trying to convince herself it was only the house settling.

Scott was in the bedroom, casting his clothes off. He left everything where it fell and fell himself onto the mattress, where he turned on his side and pulled the blankets over his shoulder. He was twenty-seven seconds away from snoring, when Willow spoke.

"I've been thinking, hon."

No response.

"Scott?"

"Hmmm?"

"I've been thinking about Miss Telyegin." Or Mrs. Telyegin, Willow supposed. She'd not yet learned if the woman next door was married, single, divorced, or widowed. Single seemed most likely to Willow for some reason that she couldn't quite explain. Maybe it had to do with the woman's habits, which were becoming more apparent-and patently stranger-as the days and weeks pa.s.sed. Most notable were the hours she kept, which were almost entirely nocturnal. But beyond that, there was the oddity of things like the venetian blinds on 1420 being always closed against the light; of Miss Telyegin wearing rubber boots rain or shine whenever she did emerge from her house; of the fact that she not only never entertained visitors, but she never went anywhere besides to work and home again precisely at the same time each day.

"When does she buy her groceries?" Ava Downey asked.

"She has them delivered," Willow replied.

"I've seen the truck," Leslie Gilbert confirmed.

"So she never goes out in the daytime at all?"

"Never before dusk," Willow said.

Thus was vampire vampire added to added to witch, witch, but only the children took that sobriquet seriously. Nonetheless, the other neighbors began to shy away from Anfisa Telyegin, which prompted Willow's additional sympathy and made Anfisa Telyegin's effort at the Veterans' Day Chili Cook-off even more worthy of admiration and reciprocation. but only the children took that sobriquet seriously. Nonetheless, the other neighbors began to shy away from Anfisa Telyegin, which prompted Willow's additional sympathy and made Anfisa Telyegin's effort at the Veterans' Day Chili Cook-off even more worthy of admiration and reciprocation.

"Scott," she said to her drowsy husband, "are you listening to me?"

"Can we talk later, Will?"

"This'll only take a minute. I've been thinking about Anfisa."

He sighed and flipped onto his back, putting his arms behind his head and exposing what Willow least liked to see when she looked upon her spouse: armpits as hairy as Abraham's beard.

"Okay," he said without a display of anything resembling marital patience. "What about about Anfisa?" Anfisa?"

Willow sat on the edge of the bed. She placed her hand on Scott's chest to feel his heart. Despite his present impatience, he had one. A very big one. She'd seen it first at the high school sock hop where he'd claimed her for a partner, rescuing her from life among the wallflowers, and she depended now upon its ability to open wide and embrace her idea.

"It's been tough with your parents so far away," Willow said. "Don't you agree?"

Scott's eyes narrowed with the suspicion of a man who'd suffered comparisons to his older brother from childhood and who'd only too happily moved his family to a different state to put an end to them. "What d'you mean, tough?"

"Five hundred miles," Willow said. "That's a long way."

Not long enough, Scott thought, to still the echoes of "Your brother the cardiologist" which followed him everywhere.

"I know you want the distance," Willow continued, "but the children could benefit from their grandparents, Scott."

"Not from these grandparents," Scott informed her.

Which was what she expected her husband to say. So it was no difficult feat to segue from there into her idea. It seemed to her, she told Scott, that Anfisa Telyegin had extended a hand of friendship to the neighborhood at the Chili Cook-off and she wanted to reciprocate. Indeed, wouldn't it be lovely to get to know the woman on the chance that she might become a foster grandparent to their children? She-Willow-had no parents whose wisdom and life experience she could offer to Jasmine, Max, and little Blythe-or-Cooper. And with Scott's family so far away...

"Family doesn't have to be defined as blood relations,"

Willow pointed out. "Leslie's like an aunt to the children. Anfisa could be like a grandmother. And anyway, I hate to see her alone the way she is. With the holidays coming... I don't know. It seems so sad."

Scott's expression changed to show the relief he felt at not having Willow suggest they move back to be near his loathsome parents. She sympathized with-if she didn't understand-his unwillingness to expose himself to any more comparisons to his vastly more successful sibling. And that empathy of hers, which he'd always seen as her finest quality, was something he accepted as not being limited to an application only to himself. She cared cared about people, his wife Willow. It was one of the reasons he loved her. He said, "I don't think she wants to mix in with us, Will." about people, his wife Willow. It was one of the reasons he loved her. He said, "I don't think she wants to mix in with us, Will."

"She came to the cook-off. I think she wants to try."

Scott smiled, reached up and caressed his wife's cheek. "Always rescuing strays."

"Only with your blessing."

He yawned. "Okay. But don't expect much. She's a dark horse, I think."

"She just needs some friendship extended to her."

And Willow set about doing exactly that the very same day. She made a double batch of drop-dead brownies and arranged a dozen artfully on a green plate of Depression gla.s.s. She covered them carefully in Saran Wrap and fixed this in place with a jaunty plaid ribbon. As carefully as if she were bearing myrrh, she carried her offering next door to 1420.

It was a cold day. It didn't snow in this part of the country and while autumns were generally long and colorful, they could also be icy and gray. That was the case when Willow left the house.

Frost still lay on her neat front lawn, on the pristine fence, on the crimson leaves of the liquidambar at the edge of the sidewalk, and a bank of fog was rolling determinedly down the street like a fat man looking for a meal.

Willow stepped watchfully along the brick path that led from her front door to the gate, and she held the drop-dead brownies against her chest as if exposure to the air might somehow harm them. She shivered and wondered what winter would be like if this was what a day in autumn could do.

She had to set her plate of brownies on the sidewalk for a moment when she reached the front of Anfisa's house. The old picket gate was off one hinge and instead of pushing it open, one needed to lift it, swing it, and set it down again. And even then, it wasn't an easy maneuver with the ivy now thickly overgrowing the front yard path.

Indeed, as Willow approached the house, she noticed what she hadn't before. The ivy that flourished under Anfisa's care had begun to twine itself up the front steps and was crawling along the wide front porch and twisting up the rails. If Anfisa didn't trim it soon, the house would disappear beneath it.

On the porch, where Willow hadn't stood since the last inhabitants of 1420 had given up the effort at DIY and moved to a brand-new-and flavorless-development just outside of town, Willow saw that Anfisa had made another alteration to the home in addition to what she'd done with the yard. Sitting next to the front door was a large metal chest with grocery delivery grocery delivery stenciled in neat white letters across its lid. stenciled in neat white letters across its lid.

Odd, Willow thought. It was one thing to have your groceries delivered... Wouldn't she she like to have that service if she could ever bear the thought of someone other than herself selecting her family's food. But it was quite another thing to leave it outside where it could spoil if you weren't careful. like to have that service if she could ever bear the thought of someone other than herself selecting her family's food. But it was quite another thing to leave it outside where it could spoil if you weren't careful.

Nonetheless, Anfisa Telyegin had lived to the ripe old age of ... whatever it was. She must, Willow decided, know what she was doing.

She rang the front bell. She had no doubt that Anfisa was at home and would be home for many hours still. It was daylight, after all.

But no one answered. Yet Willow had the distinct impression that there was was someone quite nearby, listening just behind the door. So she called out, "Miss Telyegin? It's Willow McKenna. It was such a nice thing to see you at the Chili Cook-off the other night. I've brought you some brownies. They're my specialty. Miss Telyegin? It's Willow McKenna. From next door? 1418 Napier Lane? To your left?" someone quite nearby, listening just behind the door. So she called out, "Miss Telyegin? It's Willow McKenna. It was such a nice thing to see you at the Chili Cook-off the other night. I've brought you some brownies. They're my specialty. Miss Telyegin? It's Willow McKenna. From next door? 1418 Napier Lane? To your left?"

Again, nothing. Willow looked to the windows but saw that they were, as always, covered by their venetian blinds. She decided that the front bell had not worked, and she knocked instead on the green front door. She called out, "Miss Telyegin?" once more before she began to feel silly. She realized that she was making something of a fool of herself in front of the whole neighborhood.

"There was our Willow bangin' away on that woman's front door like an orphan of the storm," Ava Downey would say over her gin and tonic that afternoon. And her husband Beau, who was always at home from the real estate office in time to mix the Beefeaters and vermouth for his wife just the way she liked it, would pa.s.s along that information to his pals at the weekly poker game, from which those men would carry it home to their wives till everyone knew without a doubt how needy Willow McKenna was to forge connections in her little world.

She felt embarra.s.sment creep up on her like the secret police. She decided to leave her offering and phone Anfisa Telyegin about it. So she lifted the lid of the grocery box and set the drop-dead brownies inside.

She was lowering the heavy lid when she heard a rustling in the ivy behind her. She didn't think much about it till a skittering sounded against the worn wood of the old front porch. She turned then, and gave out a shriek that she smothered with her hand. A large rat with glittering eyes and scaly tail was observing her. The rodent was not three feet away, at the edge of the porch and about to dive into the protection of the ivy.

"Oh my G.o.d!" Willow leapt onto the metal food box without a thought of Ava Downey, Beau, the poker game, or the neighborhood seeing her. Rats were terrifying-she couldn't have said why- and she looked around for something to drive the creature off.

But he took himself into the ivy without her encouragement. And as the last of his gray bulk disappeared, Willow McKenna didn't hesitate to do so herself. She leapt from the food box and ran all the way home.

"It was was a rat," Willow insisted. a rat," Willow insisted.

Leslie Gilbert took her gaze away from the television. She'd muted the sound upon Willow's arrival but hadn't completely torn herself away from the confrontation going on there. My Father Had s.e.x With My Boyfriend My Father Had s.e.x With My Boyfriend was printed on the bottom of the screen, announcing the day's topic among the combatants. was printed on the bottom of the screen, announcing the day's topic among the combatants.

"I know a rat when I see one," Willow said.

Leslie reached for a Dorito and munched thoughtfully. "Did you let her know?"

"I phoned her right away. But she didn't answer and she doesn't have a machine."

"You could leave her a note."

Willow shivered. "I don't even want to go into the yard again."

"It's all that ivy," Leslie pointed out. "Bad thing to have ivy like that."

"Maybe she doesn't know they like ivy. I mean, in Russia, it'd be too cold for rats, wouldn't it?"

Leslie took another Dorito. "Rats're like c.o.c.kroaches, Will," she said. "It's never too anything for them." She fastened her eyes to the television screen. "Least we know why she has that box for her groceries. Rats bite through anything. But they don't bite through steel."

There seemed nothing for it but to write a note to Anfisa Telyegin. Willow did this promptly but felt that she couldn't deliver such news to the reclusive woman without also proffering a solution to the problem. So she added the words, "I'm doing something to help out," and she bought a trap, baited it with peanut b.u.t.ter, and bore it with her to 1420.

The next morning at breakfast, she told her husband what she had done, and he nodded thoughtfully over his newspaper. She said, "I put our phone number in the note, and I thought she'd call, but she hasn't. I hope she doesn't think I think it's a reflection on her that there's a rat on her property. Obviously, I didn't mean to insult her."

"Hmm," Scott said and rattled his paper.

Jasmine said, "Rats? Rats? Rats? Yucky yuck, Mom." Yucky yuck, Mom."

And Max said, "Yucky yucky yuck."

Having started something with the deposit of the trap on Anfisa Telyegin's front porch, Willow felt duty bound to finish it. So she returned to 1420 when Scott was asleep and the children had gone off to school.

She walked up the path with far more trepidation than she'd felt on her first visit. Every rustle in the ivy was the movement of the rat, and surely the scritching scritching sound she could hear was the rodent creeping up behind her, ready to pounce on her ankles. sound she could hear was the rodent creeping up behind her, ready to pounce on her ankles.

Her fears came to nothing, though. When she mounted the porch, she saw that her effort at trapping the critter had been successful. The trap held the rat's broken body. Willow shuddered when she saw it, and hardly registered the fact that the rodent looked somewhat surprised to find his neck broken right when he was helping himself to breakfast.

She wanted Scott there to help her, then. But realizing that he needed his sleep, she'd come prepared. She'd carried with her a shovel and a garbage bag in the hope that her first venture in vermin extermination would have been successful.

She knocked on the door to let Anfisa Telyegin know what she was doing, but as before there was no answer. As she turned to face her task with the rat, though, she saw the venetian blinds move a fraction. She called out, "Miss Telyegin? I've put a trap down for the rat. I've got him. You don't need to worry about it," and she felt a bit put out that her neighbor didn't open the front door and thank her.

She steeled herself to the job before her-she'd never liked coming across dead animals, and this occasion was no different from finding roadkill adhering to the treads of her tires-and she scooped the rat up with the shovel. She was just about to deposit the stiffened body into the garbage sack, when a susurration of the ivy leaves distracted her, followed by a skittering that she recognized at once.

She whirled. Two rats were on the edge of the porch, eyes glittering, tails swishing against the wood.

Willow McKenna dropped the shovel with a clatter. She made a wild dash for the street.

"Two more?" Ava Downey sounded doubtful. She rattled the ice in her gla.s.s and her husband Beau took it for the signal it was and went to refresh her gin and tonic. "Darlin', you sure you're not sufferin' from somethin'?"

"I know what I saw," Willow told her neighbor. "I let Leslie know and now I'm telling you. I killed one, but I saw two more. And I swear to G.o.d, they knew knew what I was doing." what I was doing."

"Intelligent rats, then?" Ava Downey asked. "My Lord, what a perplexin' situation." She p.r.o.nounced it perplexing perplexing in her southern drawl, Miss North Carolina come to live among the mortals. in her southern drawl, Miss North Carolina come to live among the mortals.

"It's a neighborhood problem," Willow said. "Rats carry disease. They breed like... well, they breed..."

"Like rats," Beau Downey said. He gave his wife her drink and joined the ladies in Ava Downey's well-appointed living room. Ava was an interior decorator by avocation if not by career, and everything she touched was instantly transformed into a suitable vignette for Architectural Digest. Architectural Digest.

"Very amusin', darlin'," Ava said to her husband, without smiling. "My oh my. Married all these years and I had no idea you have such a quick wit."

Willow said, "They're going to infest the neighborhood. I've tried to talk to Anfisa about it, but she's not answering the phone. Or she's not at home. Except there're lights on, so I think she's home and... Look. We need to do something. There're children to consider."

Willow hadn't thought of the children till earlier that afternoon, after Scott had risen from his daily five hours. She'd been in the backyard in her vegetable garden, picking the last of the autumn squash. She'd reached for one and in doing so had dug her fingers into a pile of animal droppings. She'd recoiled from the sensation and pulled the squash out hastily from the tangle of its vine. The vegetable, she saw, had been scarred with tooth marks.

The droppings and tooth marks had told the tale. There weren't just rats in the yard next door. There were rats on the move. Every yard was vulnerable.

Children played in those yards. Families held their summer barbecues there. Teenagers sunned themselves there in the summer and men smoked cigars on warm spring nights. These yards weren't meant to be shared with rodents. Rodents were dangerous to everyone's health.

"The problem's not rats," Beau Downey said. "The problem's the woman, Willow. She probably thinks having rats is normal. h.e.l.l, she's from Russia. What d'you want?"

What Willow wanted was peace of mind. She wanted to know that her children were safe, that she could let Blythe-or-Cooper crawl on the lawn without having to worry that a rat-or rats' droppings-would be out there.

"Call an exterminator," Scott told her.

"Burn a cross on her lawn," Beau Downey advised.

She phoned Home Safety Exterminators, and in short order a professional came to call. He verified the evidence in Willow's vegetable plot, and for good measure, he paid a call on the Gilberts on the other side of 1420 and did much the same there. This, at least, got Leslie off the sofa. She dragged a set of kitchen steps to the fence and peered over at 1420's backyard.

Aside from a path to the chicken coop, ivy grew everywhere, even up the trunks of the fast-growing trees.

"This," Home Safety Exterminator p.r.o.nounced, "is a real problem, lady. The ivy's got to go. But the rats have to go first."

"Let's do it," Willow said.

But there was a problem as things turned out. Home Safety Exterminators could trap rats on the McKennas' property. They could trap rats in the Gilberts' yard. They could walk down the street and see to the Downeys' and even cross over and deal with the Harts'. But they couldn't enter a yard without permission, without contracts being signed and agreements reached. And that couldn't happen unless and until someone made contact with Anfisa Telyegin.

The only way to manage this was to waylay the woman when she left one night to teach one of her cla.s.ses at the local college. Willow appointed herself neighborhood liaison, and she took up watch at her kitchen window, feeding her family take-out Chinese and pizzas for several days so as not to miss the moment when the Russian woman set off for the bus stop at the end of Napier Lane. When that finally happened, Willow grabbed her parka and dashed out after her.

She caught up to her in front of the Downeys' house which, as always, was already ablaze with Christmas lights despite the fact that Thanksgiving had not yet arrived. In the glow from the Santa and reindeer on the roof, Willow explained the situation.

Anfisa's back was to the light, so Willow couldn't see her reaction. Indeed, she couldn't see the Russian woman's face at all, so shrouded was she in a head scarf and a wide-brimmed hat. It seemed reasonable enough to Willow to a.s.sume that a pa.s.sing along of information would be all that the unpleasant situation required. But she was surprised.

"There are no rats in the yard," Anfisa Telyegin said with considerable dignity, all things considered. "I fear you are mistaken, Mrs. McKenna."

"Oh no," Willow contradicted her. "I'm not, Miss Telyegin. Truly, I'm not. Not only did I see one when I brought you those brownies... Did you get them, by the way? They're my specialty ... But when I set a trap, I actually caught it. And then I saw two more. And then when I found the droppings in my yard and called the exterminator and he he looked around..." looked around..."