"Don't go yet," Claudine called. "Come out here and talk for a few minutes."
No. Mary-Lynnette knew it was a childish and stupid reaction, but she couldn't help it. She banged a bottle of apricot juice against a bottle of Calistoga sparkling water.
"Come meet Mrs. Burdock's nephew," Claudine called.
Mary-Lynnette went still.
She stood in the cold air of the refrigerator, lookingsightlessly at the temperature dial in the back. Then she put the bottle of apricot juice down. She twisted a Coke out of a six-pack without seeing it.
What nephew? I don't remember hearing about any nephew.
But then, she'd never heard much about Mrs. B.'s nieces either, not until they were coming out. Mrs. B.
just didn't talk about her familymuch.
So he's her nephew. . . that's why he's askingabout her. But does he know? Ishe in on it with those girls?
Or is he after them? Or .. .
Thoroughly confused, she walked into the living room.
"Mary-Lynnette, this is Ash. He's here to visit withhis aunt and his sisters," Claudine said. "Ash, this isMary-Lynnette. The one who's such good friends with your aunt."
Ash gotup, all in one lovely, lazy motion. Just like a cat, including the stretch in the middle. "Hi."
He offered a hand. Mary-Lynnette touched it withfingers damp and cold from the Coke can, glanced up at his face, and said "Hi."
Except that it didn't happen that way.
If happened like this: Mary-Lynnette had her eyeson the carpet as she came in, which gave her a good view of his Nike tennis shoes and the ripped kneesof his jeans. When he stood up she looked at his T-shirt, which had an obscure design-a black floweron a white background. Probably the emblem of some rock group. And then when his hand entered her field of vision, she reached for it automatically, muttering a greeting and looking up at his face justas she touched it. And This was the part that was hard to describe.
Contact.
Somethinghappened.
Hey, don't I know you?
She didn't. That was the thing. She didn't know him-but she felt that she should. She also felt as if somebody had reached inside her and touched herspine with a live electric wire. It was extremely not enjoyable. The room turned vaguely pink. Her throat swelled and she could feel her heart beating there.
Also not-enjoyable. But somehow when you put it alltogether, it made a kind of trembly dizziness like ...
Like what she felt when she looked at the Lagoon Nebula. Or imagined galaxies gathered into dusters and superclusters, bigger and bigger, until size lost any meaning and she felt herself falling.
She was falling now. She couldn't see anything except his eyes. And those eyes were strange, prismlike, changing color like a star seen throughheavy atmosphere. Now blue, now gold, now violet.
Oh, take this away. Please, I don't want it.
"It's so good to see a new face around here, isn'tit? We're very boring out here by ourselves,"
Claudine said, in completely normal and slightly flustered tones. Mary-Lynnette was snapped out of her trance, and she reacted as if Ash had just offered her a mongoose instead of his hand. She jumped backward,looking anywhere but at him. She had the feeling of being saved from falling down a mine shaft.
"O-kay," Claudine _ said in her cute accent."Hmm." She was twisting a strand of curly dark hair, something she only did when she was extremely ner vous. "Maybe you guys know each other already?"
There was a silence.
I should say something, Mary-Lynnette thoughtdazedly, staring at the fieldstone fireplace. I'm acting crazy and humiliating Claudine.
But what just happened here?
Doesn't matter. Worry later. She swallowed, plastered a smile on her face, and said, "So, how long are you here for?"
Her mistake was that then she looked at him. Andit all happened again. Not quite as vividly as before, maybe because she wasn't touching him. But the electric shock feeling was the same.
Andhelooked like a cat who's had a shock. Bristling. Unhappy. Astonished. Well, at least he wasawake, Mary-Lynnette thought. He and Mary-Lynnettestared at each other while the room spun andturned pink.
"Whoare you?" Mary-Lynnette said, abandoning any vestige of politeness.
"Who areyou?" he said, in just about exactly the same tone.
They both glared.
Claudine was making little clicking noises with her tongue and clearing away the tomato juice. Mary Lynnette felt distantly sorry for her, but couldn'tspare her any attention. Mary-Lynnette's whole consciousness was focused on the guy in front of her; on fighting him, on blocking him out. On getting rid of this bizarre feeling that she was one of two puzzle pieces that had just been snapped together.
"Now, look," she said tensely, at the precise moment that he began brusquely, "Look-"
They both stopped and glared again. Then Mary-Lynnette managed to tear her eyes away. Something was tugging at her mind... .
"Ash," she said, getting hold of it."Ash. Mrs. Burdockdid say something about you ... about a littleboy named Ash. I didn't know she was talking abouther nephew."
"Great-nephew," Ash said, his voice not quite steady. "What did she say?"
"She said that you were a bad little boy, and that you were probably going to grow up even worse."
"Well, she had thatright," Ash said, and his ex pression softened a bit-as if he were on more familiar ground.
Mary-Lynnette's heart was slowing. She found thatif she concentrated, she could make the strange feel ings recede. It helped if she looked away from Ash.
Deep breath, she told herself. And another. Okay,now let's get things straight. Let go of what just hap pened; forget all that; think about it later. What's important now?