“But the file on our family, the file by the Talamasca …” Celia had pressed. “They did give it to you at the clinic?”
“Oh, yeah, Bea and Paige brought that stuff to me,” said Mary Jane. “Look here.” She pointed to the Band-Aid on her arm that was just like the Band-Aid on her knee. “This is where they stuck me! Took enough blood to sacrifice to the devil. I understand the entire situation. Some of us have a whole string of extra genes. You breed two close kins with the double dose of double helix, and wham, you’ve got a Taltos. Maybe! Maybe! After all, think about it, how many cousins have married and married, and it never happened, did it, till … Look, we shouldn’t talk about it in front of her, you’re right.”
Michael had given a weary little smile of gratitude.
Mary Jane again squinted at Rowan. Mary Jane blew a big bubble with her gum, sucked it in, and popped it.
Mona laughed. “Now that’s some trick,” she said. “I could never do that.”
“Oh, well, that might be a blessing,” said Bea.
“But you did read the file,” Celia had pressed. “It’s very important that you know everything.”
“Oh, yeah, I read every word of it,” Mary Jane had confessed, “even the ones I had to look up.” She slapped her slender, tanned little thigh and shrieked with laughter. “Y’all talking about giving me things. Help me get some education, that’s about the only thing I could really use. You know, the worst thing that ever happened to me was my mama taking me out of school. ’Course, I didn’t want to go to school then. I had much more fun in the public library, but-”
“I think you’re right about the extra genes,” Mona said. And right about needing the education.
Many, many of the family had the extra chromosomes which could make monsters, but none had ever been born to the clan, no matter what the coupling, until this terrible time.
And what of the ghost this monster had been for so long, a phantom to drive young women mad, to keep First Street under a cloud of thorns and gloom? There was something poetic about the strange bodies lying right here, beneath the oak, under the very grass where Mary Jane stood in her short denim skirt with her flesh-colored Band-Aid on her little knee, and her hands on her little hips, and her little filthy white patent leather buckle shoe rolled to one side and smeared with fresh mud-with her little dirty sock half down in her heel.
Maybe Bayou witches are just plain dumb, Mona thought. They can stand over the graves of monsters and never know it. Of course, none of the other witches in this family knew it either. Only the woman who won’t talk, and Michael, the big hunk of Celtic muscle and charm standing beside Rowan.
“You and I are second cousins,” Mary Jane had said to Mona, renewing her approach. “Isn’t that something? You weren’t born when I came to Ancient Evelyn’s house and ate her homemade ice cream.”
“I don’t recall Ancient Evelyn ever making homemade ice cream.”
“Darlin’, she made the best homemade ice cream that I ever tasted. My mama brought me into New Orleans to-”
“You’ve got the wrong person,” said Mona. Maybe this girl was an impostor. Maybe she wasn’t even a Mayfair. No, no such luck on that. And there was something about her eyes that reminded Mona a little of Ancient Evelyn.
“No, I got the right person,” Mary Jane had insisted. “But we didn’t really come on account of the ice cream. Let me see your hands. Your hands are normal.”
“So what?”
“Mona, be nice, dear,” said Beatrice. “Your cousin is just sort of outspoken.”
“Well, see these hands?” said Mary Jane. “I had a sixth finger when I was little, on both hands? Not a real finger? You know? I mean just a little one. And that’s why my mother brought me to see Ancient Evelyn, because Ancient Evelyn has just such a finger herself.”
“Don’t you think I know that?” asked Mona. “I grew up with Ancient Evelyn.”
“I know you did. I know all about you. Just cool off, honey. I’m not trying to be rude, it’s just I am a Mayfair, same as you, and I’ll pit my genes against your genes anytime.”
“Who told you all about me?” Mona asked.
“Mona,” said Michael softly.
“How come I never met you before?” said Mona, “I’m a Fontevrault Mayfair. Your second cousin, as you just said. And how come you talk like you’re from Mississippi when you say you lived all that time in California?”
“Oh, listen, there’s a story to it,” said Mary Jane. “I’ve done my time in Mississippi, believe you me, couldn’t have been any worse on Parchman Farm.” It had been impossible to crack the kid’s patience. She had shrugged. “You got any iced tea?”
“ ’Course we do, dear, I’m so sorry.” Off Beatrice had gone to get it. Celia had shaken her head with shame. Even Mona had felt negligent, and Michael had quickly apologized.
“No, I’ll git it myself, tell me where it is,” Mary Jane had cried.
But Bea had disappeared already, conveniently enough. Mary Jane popped her gum again, and then again in a whole side-mouth series of little pops.
“Awesome,” said Mona.
“Like I said, there’s a story to it all. I could tell you some terrible things about my time in Florida. Yeah, I been there, and in Alabama for a while, too. I had to sort of work my way back down here.”
“No lie,” said Mona.
“Mona, don’t be sarcastic.”
“I seen you before,” Mary Jane had said, going on as if nothing at all had happened. “I remembered you when you and Gifford Mayfair came out to L.A. to go to Hawaii. That’s the first time I was ever in an airport. You were sleeping right there by the table, stretched out on two chairs, under Gifford’s coat, and Gifford Mayfair bought us the best meal???”
Don’t describe it, Mona had thought. But Mona did have some hazy memory of that trip, and waking up with a crick in her neck in the Los Angeles airport, known by the snappy name of LAX, and Gifford saying to Alicia that they had to bring “Mary Jane” back home someday.
Only thing, Mona had no memory of any other little girl there. So this was Mary Jane. And now she was back home. Gifford must be working miracles from heaven.
Bea had returned with the iced tea. “Here it is, precious, lots of lemon and sugar, the way you like it, isn’t that right? Yes, darling.”
“I don’t remember seeing you at Michael and Rowan’s wedding,” said Mona.
“That’s ’cause I never came in,” said Mary Jane, who took the iced tea from Bea as soon as it entered the nearest orbit, and drank half of it, slurping it and wiping it off her chin with the back of her hand. Chipped nail polish, but what a gorgeous shade of crape myrtle purple.
“I told you to come,” said Bea. “I called you. I left a message for you three times at the drugstore.”
“I know you did, Aunt Beatrice, ain’t nobody who could say that you didn’t do your level best to get us to that wedding. But, Aunt Beatrice, I didn’t have shoes! I didn’t have a dress? I didn’t have a hat? See these shoes? I found these shoes. These are the first shoes that are not tennis shoes that I have worn in a decade! Besides, I could see perfect from across the street. And hear the music. That was fine music you had at your wedding, Michael Curry. Are you sure you aren’t a Mayfair? You look like a Mayfair to me; I could make let’s say seven different points about your appearance that’s Mayfair.”
“Thank you, sweetheart. I’m not a Mayfair.”
“Oh, you are in your heart,” said Celia.
“Well, of course,” said Michael, never taking his eyes off the girl even once, no matter who spoke to him. And what do men see when they look at bundles of charm like this?