Jane's folks

Jane stood in her bedroom, looking at the framed photographs on the wall. Her mom and dad at her high school graduation. Jane as a child surrounded by kittens, a look of horror on her face. Her parents at the altar saying their wedding vows. Jane's adoption certificate was framed along with the photos.

Jane and her adoptive parents had no idea who her biological parents were. All three of them had done research for years, but the paperwork was nowhere to be found. Private investigators and former Department of Records employees had been unable to find one scrap of evidence about Jane's genetic donors.

Not that she needed the information, it was just something she'd felt she needed to do at the time. Now, she was very happy to have her parents. They were living in a cabin outside Nashville. They regularly went into the city to the Grand Old Opry. Old time country music was something they both loved. Being so close to so much of it made them giddy. They'd collected autographs of just about every performer they'd ever seen.

They emailed her pictures of themselves standing with musicians and singers or standing in front of historic honky-tonks. They hung the paintings she sent them in their cabin and proudly told their friends their daughter was a painter.

Her father, Carson, had been a professor of music at the university for decades before retiring to Tennessee. Her mother, Diane, ran a small business doing alterations and custom sewing out of their spare bedroom.

Jane loved to sew. She'd helped her mom every chance she got. She could whip up anything she liked on a sewing machine. She had an old pedal operated machine. She'd never gotten the hang of an electric machine. She didn't like not being in control of the needle. Embroidery, knitting, crocheting, needlepoint and even weaving were all things she'd mastered. Her fingers simply knew what to do when they held a needle.

Jane and her mother had spent hours together making Halloween costumes, graduation dress, suits, shirts and anything else they fancied. Jane had made prom dresses for five of her friends. Copied them right out of magazines and took great pride in watching her girlfriends twirl in front of the full length mirror in the sewing room.

Jane never went to any formals. But she loved making the dresses for her friends. She never once felt that she was missing out on anything. She much preferred to stay at home. Listening to her dad play piano and her mom's sewing machine hum.

Jane's dishes

Jane was home doing dishes. They had to be done by hand as the house had no dishwasher.

She loathed doing dishes. They tended to pile up until she was eating out of mixing bowls and empty yogurt containers.

Or, until they started to smell and Robert would refuse to come over until she'd done something about it. He said he could smell them from the porch no matter how many scented candle she lit or how much rosemary she hung over the kitchen sink.

“Why don't you come over and dry? It'd be easier for me if you were here.”

Robert snorted “I will help dry the dishes if they are done right after the meal. Not just tossed next to the sink to ferment.”

“You're mean.” Jane pouted.

“No. I don't want to lift a plate off a pot and find maggots in the last of the macaroni and cheese.”

So Jane was in her apron with blue rubber gloves on, scrubbing dishes when the windchimes announced a visitor.

She cursed under her breath for forgetting to close the front door. Dishes took a long time and involved taking dirty dishes out of the sink before it could be filled with hot, soapy water.

Jane pulled her hands out of the water and went to the front door, dripping on the wood floor.

A somewhat disheveled young woman was on the porch.

“Hi. Um, my friend told me you might be able to help me.”

Jane cocked her head to the side, frowning a little. “What do you need help with?”

“Ah. I need to know if I'm pregnant.”

Jane could smell that she was. A low, fruity scent signaled this girl was definitely with child.

“What if you are?”

“I heard you could make teas and stuff to help with the morning sickness.”

“Yeah, I do. Come on in.” Jane pushed the door open and stepped back into the living room.”

Before the girl could step over the threshold, the front door slammed in her face. At the same time, the back door banged shut and every blind on every window dropped.

Jane coolly pulled the blackout drapes shut and went back into the kitchen. She sat down on her step stool and listened to the girl bang on the screen door.

Jane heard a car door slam and a male voice say “What the fuck?”. His tone was bewildered rather than angry.

“The door just slammed in my face. I couldn't get in.”

“But she opened the screen. “ 

“I know, but the door closed.”

“Let's go try around back.”

Jane listened to them go around the back and the resulting noises from the cats jumping over the fences. The two voices began to speak in lower voices, it sounded like they were sitting on the back porch steps.

She didn't know what would have happened if they'd come in the house. They probably had every intention of just getting some ginger tea and taking some of the pamphlets Jane would give them about Planned Parenthood. If the girl's parents didn't know she was pregnant, she'd want to hide the morning sickness. But, had they come in, something very bad would have happened.

Jane went back to her dishes, listening to the girl cry on the back steps.

Jane and the cats

Robert found Jane in the backyard smoking the bee boxes with the regular population of cats. They didn't belong to anyone in particular, they just showed up to lounge in the trees in the backyard or drape themselves on the porch. Jane didn't feed them or let them inside. She always told them sternly to stay away from her whenever she ventured outdoors.

They would line up and watch whatever she was doing until she turned and said “Stop STARING you freaky things!” Then the cats would wander away to hunt for mice or lay in the grass.

They had kittens in the crawl space under the house. They clawed the trees. They ate the grass when they felt sick. They threw up hairballs on the mat outside the back door and the front door. They shat in the garden and fought in the middle of the night.

Jane always wanted them to go away, but they never did

Robert stooped to pet a particularly friendly calico he liked while he waited for Jane to finish with the smoker. Once she had that put away he'd help her pull up the slats to harvest the honey.

She headed for the back steps with her smoker. “Oh Jesus, don't encourage them! What's wrong with you?”

Robert sat down on the grass and pulled up a long blade to use as a cat toy. “I like cats. I like all these cats around. It's neat. If you're in a bad mood I can come out here and get a little affection.”

“I know, you come in covered in cat hair and make me sneeze.” Jane said taking the netting off her wide brimmed hat. That was another thing. Jane was allergic to cats.

The calico rolled over to have her tummy rubbed. Robert obliged and made little kissin noises. “Izzum you a puddin'? Yes you is! Youz a widdle puddums. “ he cooed to the kitty.

“You're phone's ringing.” he stated. “Sounds like it's in your pocket.”

Jane looked down at her apron. “Oh no.” She reached her hand inside and rooted around. Out came an empty soda can, a pair of gardening shears, a spool of thread, a tampon, a balled up tissue, a pair of knitting needles and still the phone beeped cheerfully. Robert leaned back against the tree, amused by the whole production. The calico rubbed against his hand purring.

As Jane tossed things out of her pocket the other cats ran up to see what was going on. They lined up in front of the toilet planters and twitched their ears.

“DANG it!” Jane held her pocket open and reached her hand in halfway to her elbow. The fabric bulged and rippled and she tried to find her phone.

“Great, it's caught on something.” she pursed her lips and pulled.

Robert leaned against one of the trees. “Don't you ever clean that thing out? It would make things easier on you.”

Jane's hand flew out of the pocket, the phone clutched in her fingers. She pushed a button, “Hello?....Hi mom.”

Robert threw his head back and laughed. The cats scattered at the sound.

Jane and Bobby

Jane sat at her vanity putting on her makeup while Robert lounged on her bed.

“You know what I miss?” he asked, looking at the ceiling.

“What?”

“I miss traveling with the carnival. Wasn't that fun? Trains. Animals. Different towns every week. Hootchie coochie girls. All that good diner food.” Robert sighed.

“Oh god, Bobby! For the last time, Ray Bradbury did not base the character Dark in Something Wicked This Way Comes on YOU.” Jane said without pausing in her mascara application.

“He did so! You're just too stubborn to admit it. I'm Dark and you're the Dust Witch. It couldn't be clearer. We were living in that fantastic wagon with the velvet drapes and the feather bed. I KNOW you remember the feather bed.” Robert waggled his eyebrows around.

“Don't change the subject. You were not the tattooed man and you weren't the magician so how could Dark be based on you? The Dust Witch never speaks and, as you enjoy pointing out to me, I never shut up. And I don't remember the outhouse being particularly luxurious.” Jane started rooting through her jewelry box, looking for earrings.

“You're such a snob. How about the part where the Dust Witch goes up in the hot air balloon? You know that came from our show. And you wore that whole get-up with the mantilla. You looked good too. You should go back to black hair, it makes you look exotic and mysterious.” Robert rolled onto his side and propped his head on his right hand. “For me? Please?”

“You told me you couldn't wait for that time to be over so you didn't have to live with that smelly costume. I sweated like a horse in that thing and I couldn't wash it. It practically stood up by itself. Anyway, I wanted to be the mermaid.”

“Too bad you couldn't hold your breath like Alice could. I told you to practice and you'd get it eventually. But nooooooo, you had to go spend time with the pinheads.”

“Well, you'd certainly know if Alice could hold her breath. Michael wasn't going to let me do anything but be a psychic. If I goofed the readings he cut my pay because I wasn't accurate and if I was too accurate he cut my pay because I scared away the marks. “ Jane found the earrings she was looking for and put them on her ears.

“And he ALSO told you to speak as little as possible so no one would hear that Marie Provost accent you had. That goes to MY story that I'm Dark and you're the Dust Witch.”

“Ray Bradbury is still alive you know. Why don't you ask him?” Jane applied more lipstick.

“Oh, sure. I'm sure he's listed in the phone book. And I hate telling people I'm my own grandson.” Robert leaned down to retrieve his shoes.

“Give me a break. “ Jane leaned back to inspect herself in the mirror.

“Jim Morrison agreed with me.”

“Jim Morrison was stoned all the time. If you had gotten Ray Manzerek to agree with you then I'd listen. Are you ready?”

“I've been ready. I'm waiting on you. As usual. That's all I do is wait on you. Here, I'll help you with your coat.”

The Devil

Annie was approaching Jane's house, hoping to get some of her tea that cleared up your sinuses. It worked just like Sudafed and lasted for a whole day and night. Wonderful stuff. Annie's little brother had horrible allergies that kept him from sleeping at night but Jane's tea cleared the little guy right up. It didn't taste very good, but he was good about drinking it fast once he figured out that he felt better afterwards.

Annie heard a woman's raised voice from around the corner. “You've got to do this for me!”

When the house came into view, Annie saw a young woman standing on the porch, her hand on the handle of the screen door, tugging on it. “Let me in and help me!” she was wearing a long flowered dress and had two books in her other hand. One was unmistakably a Bible, the other must be the Book of Mormon. Annie stopped just beyond the edge of the lawn.

Jane's voice drifted out “I don't do that. I don't even know how. I can tell you what herbs to use but I don't grow them. You've got to help yourself.”

“But it's a sin. If you do it then the Devil acted on me. Please, I can't do it on my own.”

“Did someone take advantage of you? Did someone trick you? You need to go to the police if that happened. You can go to Planned Parenthood. It's right across the street from the high school. They'll help you understand your choices. They'll help you if you weren't willing. But there's nothing I can do for you.” Jane's voice sounded concerned and sad. “DID someone take advantage of you?”

“Open the door you WITCH!” the girl began to bang on the screen, crying now. “I know you're the Devil's whore. Why won't you DO WHAT I SAY?! I'm a child of GOD! OPEN THE DOOR! ” her voice lowered “Please, I have to be clean so I can be married in the Temple. Please, please make me clean.”

“I'm so sorry, I can't. I don't do that. I don't know how. There's a handkerchief in your pocket. That's for you.” Jane slowly shut the front door, leaving the sobbing woman on the porch.

Annie turned and headed for home.

Witch

Jane and Robert were riding back from a picnic at the small lake on the university campus. They'd had a good time. Lounging in the shade, eating bread and honey and making up ailments they hoped would be cured by Jane's honey. A couple of students had stopped by to say hello to Jane. Robert had tickled Jane with a blade of grass until she screamed in frustration. They'd made out a little and felt very much in love.

As they pulled up to the house Jane braked suddenly, her eyes wide. Written on the front walk in chalk were the words “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live. Ex 22:18” Robert got off his bike and walked up the porch steps. A streak of water was still drying on the threshold, a Bible propped against the screen door. A cross had been painted on the screen itself with spray paint.

He looked back at Jane. “They tried to block you from going in again.” Jane got off her bike and walked it up to the porch.

“Let's hope they didn't rip up the herb garden again.” Jane sighed. “I think I'll leave it out this time. Until it rains anyway. Why do people hate me?”

“Not everyone hates you and you know it. Harry Houdini loved you.”

“Harry Houdini was a megalomaniac with an Oedipus complex. He wasn't trying to get in touch with his mother. He was trying to talk to God to find out how he staged a hostile take over.”

Robert smirked. “Try not to let it get to you. You know this happens once in a while. The person who did it has probably been to see you. We know it's not the Unitarian Universalists, they've invited you to church a bunch of times.”

Jane popped the kickstand down on her bike. She blinked hard. “It still hurts my feelings. I don't hurt anybody. I make tea and I keep bees. “ She suddenly burst into tears.

Tea and honey

“Can you make me that tea to help me sleep?” the woman at Jane's table asked.

Jane blew out and exasperated breath. “Of course I can. But aren't you sleeping plenty now?” There were cards laid out in front of her on the table.

“Not really.” She squirmed around, pulling at her expensive t-shirt before reaching for her Coach purse. She rooted around in it looking for something.

“There's a handkerchief in your pocket. That's for you.” Jane said, irritated.

The woman pulled a hankie out of the pocket of her jeans and wiped her face with it, she was sweating.

“So, what do the cards say? Should I sue for more child support?” She leaned on her elbows and looked at Jane expectantly.

“The cards say you should go to rehab. The cards said you should go to rehab last time you were here. The cards will say you need to go to rehab the next time you're here. I can read them again, but they'll just be same. Here, I'll show you, you shuffle.” Jane gathered the playing cards up into a tidy stack and pushed them across the table.

The woman picked them up uncertainly. “Go ahead. Mix ém up.” Jane took a drink of her iced tea and watched her shuffle clumsily, a difficult task with her long nails.

“These are trick cards aren't they?”

“No Madison, they are not trick cards. They're just playing cards. When these wear out I'll buy a new box at the dollar store. No, don't give them to me, you're going to lay them out.” Jane showed Madison the pattern to arrange the cards in.

They fell in exactly the same order as when Jane had laid them out three minutes before.

Madison looked up sharply. “You're a fucking liar and a thief. You've been taking my money and you just have a trick deck. My ex put you up to this didn't he? Didn't he?”

Jane looked at her with sympathy. “Madison, I don't even know who your ex-husband is. I know that you don't have your kids. I know that you have a problem and you need to go to rehab.”

“I take my medication as prescribed.” Madison tapped the table with her first finger for emphasis.

Jane sighed. “Okay. Look, if you keep coming back here the cards are just going to say the same thing. I can give you some tea to help you through some of the withdrawls but you really need to go to a medical detox center. “

“Give me some honey then.”

“Honey is not going to cure anything. You want some honey for your toast? Fine. I'll give you some honey. But you can't keep coming back here. “


“I suppose you want me to pay you?” Madison picked up her purse. Pills rattled inside.

“Whatever you think it's worth.” Jane replied.

Madison reached into her handbag, tossed a quarter on the table and left the house. The windchimes sang her a good-bye song.