Lily of the Springs Read Free

Taylor. That’s what a lot of people said, anyhow. I gingerly touched my bobby-pinned curls. Still damp. That was okay. I had hours yet before I had to get ready.
    Somehow, I’d managed to get through a simmering-hot graduation this morning in the high school gym. And only Landry and Edsel had been there to watch me receive my diploma. Twelve-year-old Edsel had done his best to try to make me laugh as he crossed his eyes and stuck out his tongue in a grotesque imitation of “Radar Men from the Moon” which he’d seen at the Star Theater a few weeks ago.
    Next to him, Landry, at 20, was as sober-faced as a preacher giving the eulogy at the graveside of his beloved mother. There had always been a special bond between me and Landry, forged years ago when it was just the two of us living in the little house in Opal Springs, long before Edsel, Norry and Charles Alton arrived.
    I’d been glad my brothers had made it, but I’d sorely missed my parents.
    They’d taken my little two-year-old brother, Charles Alton, to old Dr. Scudder in Jamestown this morning because last night had been the worst one yet for the poor little thing. Up all night crying and feverish and vomiting like there was no tomorrow. But even not having my parents there wasn’t the worse thing about graduation. Chad and I had had a huge fight last night, parked out at Rock House Bottom—over the same old thing—because I wouldn’t go all the way with him. He hadn’t even spoken to me at graduation, and the one time I’d caught his eye, he’d looked away. The rat! Well, I’d see him tonight, and he’d be singing a different tune because I was going to look so daggone good, he’d be falling all over me.
    I glanced at Norry’s reflection in the mirror. “I’d rather look like Marilyn.”
    Her laughter reminded me of Tucker Creek in high summer as the water gurgled over the flat slabs of rock just above the swimming hole. “Lord forbid!” she said, still giggling. “Mother and Daddy wouldn’t let you out of the house if you looked like Marilyn!”
    I grinned, glancing at her. “Well, it’s obvious you’re getting back to your ornery self, Miss Smarty-Pants.”
    I still felt ashamed of myself for thinking she’d been playing possum yesterday. The poor thing had been really sick last night. Thank the Lord she was on the mend; I just wished Charles Alton was, too.
    Mother and Daddy hadn’t returned from the doctor when we got home from graduation. Here it was, near four o’clock, and we hadn’t heard a word from them. What the dickens was taking so long?
    I got up from the chair. “You hungry, Norry? How about I heat up some of this morning’s biscuits? We’ll have ‘em with butter and molasses.”
    Just as we reached the threshold of the kitchen, a knock came at the front door. “ Yoo hoo , Lily Rae !” a high-pitched feminine voice called out. “It’s me, Sylvie Lou.”
    I frowned. What, for Pete’s sake, was Sylvie Lou Blankenship doing here? I headed for the door. “It’s open. Come on in!”
    The door opened, and a large woman with salt-and-pepper hair stepped inside, wearing a flowered housedress under an apron soiled with what looked like blood. Killing chickens for Sunday supper, I suspected.
    “Excuse my appearance, child.” Sylvie Lou rubbed restless, knobby hands down her stained apron. Her gaze darted nervously around the room. And that was when I felt the first stirrings of uneasiness.
    Sylvie Lou was our nearest neighbor, living just down the road a piece. She was a widow-woman who kept mostly to herself. Friendly enough, but not the kind of person who made a habit of dropping in on folks to share a cup of coffee and some gossip. And did she always have that pinched look on her face, or was something really wrong?
    My stomach muscles tightened. But before I could say a word, Sylvie Lou spoke again, “Your papa just rang and told me to get you a message.”
    Sylvie Lou was one of the few neighbors here on the ridge