Stranger Things Happen

8. Rose Read on young lovers.

It's all the fault of that damned perfume, and that mooning, meddling, milky-faced perfumer. He could have had it back and no harm done, if he didn't love mischief more than his mother. So it might have been my idea – it might have been an accident. Or maybe it was Fate. If I'm still around, so is that tired old hag. Do you think that I have the time to see to every love affair in the world personally?

Those hesitating kisses, the tender fumbles and stumbles and awkward meetings of body parts give me indigestion. Heartburn. Give me two knowledgeable parties who know what is up and what fits where; give me Helen of Troy, fornicating her way across the ancient world, Achilles and Patroclos amusing themselves in a sweaty tent.

A swan, a bull, a shower of gold, something new, something old, something borrowed, something blue. He seduced Sarah Stoneking in an empty movie house, stepped right off of the screen during the matinee and lisped "Shweetheart" at her. She fell into the old goat's arms. I know, I was there.

9. In which a discovery is made.

The sky stayed clear and pale all night long. When they were cold again, they wrapped themselves in Humphrey's coat, and leaned back against the wall. June took out the box of chocolates and ate them as Humphrey explored her pack. He pulled out the perfume. "Where'd you get this?"

"I nicked it from a perfume shop off Market Street."

"I should have known." He pulled out the book. "Aunt Rose," he said.

"She's your aunt?" June said. "I guess I should give it to you to give back."

He shook his head. "If she didn't mean for you to have it, you wouldn't even have thought of taking it. Might as well keep it now. She probably set this whole thing up."

"How?" June said. "Is she psychic or something?"

"This must be how they're pla

"Right." June said, affronted. "It was nice to meet you too. I don't usually go around doing this."

"Wait," he said, catching at her pack as she stood up. "I didn't mean it that way. You're right. This is a complete coincidence. And I didn't think that you did."

He smiled up at her. June sat back down, mollified, stretching her legs out in front of her. "Why are you taking flying lessons?"

"I've been saving up for it," he said. "I went to see a psychologist about a year ago, and he suggested that flying lessons might make me less afraid of birds. Besides, I've always wanted to. I used to dream about it. The aunts say it's a bad idea, but they're just superstitious. I have my first lesson tomorrow. Today, actually."

"I think flying would be wonderful," June said. She was shivering. It was because she was cold. It wasn't because she was cold. She slipped her hands up inside his shirt. "But I know something just as nice."

"What?" he said. So she showed him. His mouth was so sweet.

10. Going to hell. Instructions and advice.

As the others step over the dog he doesn't wake. If you step over him, he will smell live flesh and he will tear you to pieces.

Take this perfume with you and when you come to Bonehouse, dab it behind your ears, at your wrists and elbows, at the back of your knees. Stroke it into the vee of your sex, as you would for a lover. The scent is heavy and rich, like the first cold handful of dirt tossed into the dug grave. It will trick the dog's nose.

Inside the door, there is no light but the foxfire glow of your own body. The dead flicker like candles around you. They are burning their memories for warmth. They may brush up against you, drawn to what is stronger and hotter and brighter in you. Don't speak to them.

There are no walls, no roof above you except darkness. There are no doors, only the luminous windows that the dead have become. Unravel the left arm of his sweater and let it fall to the ground.

11. In the All-Night Bakery at dawn.

June and Humphrey went around the corner of the bulwark, down over an outcropping of rocks, slick with gray light, down to the beach. A seagull, perched like a lantern upon the castle wall, watched them go.

They walked down Market Street, the heavy, wet air clinging like ghosts to their hair and skin. The sound of their feet, hollow and sharp, rang like bells on the cobblestones. They came to the All-Night Bakery and June could hear someone singing inside.

Behind the counter there were long rows of white ovens and cooling racks, as tall as June. A woman stood with her strong back to them, sliding trays stacked with half-moon loaves into an oven, like a mother tucking her children into warm sheets.

She was singing to herself, low and deep, and as June watched and listened, the fat loaves, the ovens, the woman and her lullaby threw out light, warmth. The ovens, the loaves, the woman grew brighter and larger and crowded the bakery and June's senses so that she began to doubt there was room for herself, for the houses and street, the dawn outside to exist. The woman shut the oven door, and June was afraid that presently she would turn around and show June her face, flickering pale and enormous as the moon.

She stumbled back outside. Humphrey followed her, his pockets stuffed with doughnuts and meat pies.

"My Aunt Di," he said. He handed June a pastry. "Some nights I work here with her."

He went with her to the station, and wrapped up two greasy bacon pies and gave them to her. She wrote her address and telephone on a corner of the napkin, and then reached into her pocket. She took out the crumpled banknotes, the small, heavy coins. "Here," she said. "For your flying lesson."

She dumped them into his cupped hands, and then before she could decide if the blush on his face was one of pleasure or embarrassment, the train was coming into the station. She got on and didn't look back.

She slept on the train and dreamed about birds.

Home again, and Lily and Walter were finishing the breakfast cleanup. June handed the book and the perfume to her mother. "Happy birthday, Lily."

"Where were you last night?" Lily said. She held the perfume bottle between her thumb and middle finger as if it were a dead rat.

"With a friend," June said vaguely, and pretended not to see Lily's frown. She went up the stairs to the top of the house, to her room in the attic. The honeymooners' door was shut, but she could hear them as she went past in the hall. It sounded just like pigeons, soft little noises and gasps. She slammed her door shut and went straight to sleep. What did she dream about? More birds? When she woke up, she couldn't remember, but her hands hurt as if she had been holding on to something.

When she came down again – hands and face washed, hair combed back neat – the cake that Walter had made, square and plain, with a dozen pink candles spelling out Lily's name, was on the table. Lily was looking at it as if it might explode. June said, "How do you like the perfume?"

"I don't," Lily said. She clattered the knives and forks down. "It smells cheap and too sweet. Not subtle at all."

Walter came up behind Lily and squeezed her around the middle. She pushed at him, but not hard. "I quite liked it," he said. "Your mother's been sitting with her feet up in the parlor all day, reading the rubbishy romance you got her. Very subtle, that."

"Rubbish is right," Lily said. She blew out the candles with one efficient breath, a tiny smile on her face.

12. The occupant in room five.

Two days later the honeymooners left. When June went into the room, she could smell sex, reeky and insistent. She flung open the windows and stripped the ravaged bed, but the smell lingered in the walls and in the carpet.

In the afternoon, a woman dressed in expensive dark clothing came looking for a room. "It would be for some time," the woman said. She spoke very carefully, as if she was used to being misunderstood. June, sitting in the parlor, idly leafing through sex advice columns in American magazines left behind by the honeymooners, looked up for a second. She thought the woman in black had an antique look about her, precise and hard, like a face on a cameo.