The Wild Ways (12 page)
Shelly snorted as the remaining spaces began to fill. “Good thing Bo travels light.”
“And speaking of the one man we can’t do without because Lord knows an accordion, a bodhran and a pennywhistle can walk into as many bars as they want, but they won’t win shit in a Celtic festival without a fiddle. Where the hell is Bo?”
Tim smacked Mark on the shoulder and pointed at the ancient pickup truck pulling into the parking lot. It paused long enough to disgorge their missing fiddler and an old hockey bag before roaring off in a cloud of dust.
It wasn’t Bo’s girlfriend behind the wheel, unless she had what looked like a ’70s pornstache attached to her upper lip. Not that Charlie was judging.
While Shelly, Tim, and Mark argued over who was to ride with whom—although as usual Shelly and Mark were making most of the noise—Charlie joined Bo, who’d taken over Shelly’s spot slumped against the hood of the car.
“You look like shit.”
He scratched at stubble and yawned. “Gee. Thanks.”
“You get any sleep last night?” They’d closed up the ceilidh around three when the poor women who’d had to lock the Center behind them had finally kicked the last musicians out. Charlie’d crashed in a cheap motel room walking distance from the Center with the other three but Bo lived in Port Hastings, close enough to go home.
He yawned again. “Not much.”
“Girlfriend still upset?”
His fingers drummed out a tune Charlie nearly recognized. “You know the phrase weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth? Multiply by ten.”
“By ten? What the hell did she lose?”
“It’s a . . . thing. A family heirloom . . . thing.”
To Bo’s credit, he was a terrible liar. He knew exactly what the “thing” was. Charlie wondered if he was embarrassed about the actual object or embarrassed because he’d agreed not to identify it to anyone and that made venting awkward.
“She actually thought I’d taken it. I mean, I was there the night she lost it. With her the night she lost it, so how . . .” He slapped his hand down against the hood, loud enough for Shelly to turn and yell at him to fuck off or he’d be riding with Tim and Mark. “Okay, she didn’t mean it, not really, but her and her sisters, they’re talking Gaelic now, like they don’t want me to know they’re still suspicious of me, but I feel like I . . .” He sighed, shoulders sagging. “Fuck it.”
Charlie filled in the next bit of the lyric line. Who knew that year playing country music would come in so handy. “You feel like you failed her even if she doesn’t blame you.”
“You don’t know her.” Both hands pushed thick, dark hair up into spikes. “How do you know she doesn’t blame me?”
“Dude, you’re here while Tanis is still freaking about what she lost, so she obviously told you to go. She gets that the festival is important to you. If she really blamed you for taking her . . .” Air quotes. “. . . thing, she wouldn’t care how important it was to you. And, while she might have told you to get out, you’d have shown up acting all defensive.” Charlie slapped him in the chest. “Which you’re not.”
Bo’s eyes widened theatrically. “I’m not? Okay,” he added after a moment, “I’m not. I feel guilty for leaving, though. Even if she didn’t want me there.” He managed half a grin. “I miss her, you know? I just left her an hour ago, but I really miss her. Is that pathetic? Because it sounds pathetic. She says she’ll join us up coast,” he continued before Charlie could agree that, yeah, it sounded pathetic. “She has more family up there and . . .” His laugh held little humor. “I think she thinks she’s going to need to defend me when they find out.”
“Even though you didn’t take and/or lose the thing?”
He snorted. “Even though. It’s just . . . we’re amazing together, but it hasn’t been that long and maybe her family disapproves of the brown. Or the itinerant musician thing. Or that my family moved here from Toronto.”
“Toronto? Damn. Around here, that’s definitely going to count against you.”
“Tell me about it.”
“She have overprotective parents?”
“I don’t think so but lots of cousins. And her family, it’s tight.”
“I hear you.” Charlie stared down at her bare toes for a moment. The raised voices across the parking lot blended with the cries of the gulls wheeling overhead and came out sounding like half a dozen aunties arguing in the kitchen. “Could it have been stolen?”
“What would be the point in someone who wasn’t family stealing a family heirloom? And it sure as hell wasn’t someone in her family.”
“You sure?”
He was staring out toward the sea now, never very far away in this part of the world. She could feel the force of his gaze reaching for the distant horizon. “I’m sure.”
And
that
was no lie.
that
was no lie.
“They’re my cousins, right? You like spent all your time with your cousins growing up; that’s a Gale thing. Family. The cousins out here, they think I’m pretty cool and it’s not like I’m going to be playing soccer with them or anything.” Jack still didn’t understand the point of chasing something and not getting a meal out of it. Sure, let it go a few times, have a little fun running it down, but in the end, eat it.
Soccer balls tasted like farts.
And the yelling afterward had gone so long, he’d gotten bored and flown away.
“Anyway . . .” He folded his arms, looked Allie right in the eye, and tried very hard not to smoke. “Either I’m a Gale, or I’m not.”
“He’s got you there.” Graham sounded like he was smiling around a mouthful of cereal, but Jack didn’t dare check. Gale girls were tricky. He’d learned that in his first twenty-four hours here. If Allie had a countermove, he needed to stay on top of it.
But Allie only looked thoughtful. “What did you have in mind?”
“Just, you know, spending time with my cousins. Like a Gale.”
“I had no idea you were interested in doing that.”
“I wasn’t.” Dragons spent time with relatives for two reasons, politics or food. Okay, technically, one reason. “Now, I am.”
Allie wanted him to be interested. That helped convince her. “No sorcery.”
Jack snorted. “Gales don’t do sorcery.”
“Not and survive it,” Graham muttered from the other side of the smoke.
“All right, this is ridiculous.” Charlie grabbed Bo’s arm and dragged him over to the van. She had no idea what Shelly and Mark were arguing about beyond passenger seating, but it clearly went deeper and just as clearly had no resolution. Odds were, it was left over from Aston, his love of cheese, and his lactose intolerance. “It’s past noon, we’re playing at four, and we’re still not on the road. Bo!” When he pivoted to face her, she held out her fist. “On three.”
“The original or liz . . .”
“The original. One. Two. Three. Scissors cuts paper, I ride with Shelly. Let’s go!”
“Well, that works, too,” Mark observed philosophically.
Riding with Mark and Tim meant listening to Mark expound constantly about nothing much for the duration of the trip. But the odds of arriving in one piece were higher. Charlie settled in with her bare toes on the dashboard and a bottle of ice-cool plum nail polish in her hand. Between the aunties and
Dun Good
’s old school bus, she’d used up all fear of dying in a fiery car crash.
Dun Good
’s old school bus, she’d used up all fear of dying in a fiery car crash.
“Uh, Shelly, it’s a twenty-minute drive to Port Hood. Is warp drive really necessary?”
“You wouldn’t ask that if you were hauling Moby Bass. I want parking as close to the stage as possible and there’s eight other bands who want the same thing. Bump.”
“Thanks.” Charlie lifted the brush as the car went momentarily airborne. The flight wouldn’t mess things up, it was the landing. Good shocks, though. However, since the car was pre door airbags, she painted a quick plum charm on the gray vinyl interior.
“What’re you doing?”
“Just a little insurance.”
“Right, Mark says you’re into something like that Wicca thing.”
“Like,” Charlie allowed, “but not.” Wicca was a religion. The Gales were a family. “We’ve gotten kind of far ahead of the van.”
“Yeah, that’s because the van’s so top-heavy. Mark gets up any kind of speed and he splats the curves.” Yanking the wheel hard to the right, Shelly tucked in front of a trailer of openmouthed tourists just before a slightly larger trailer filled the space they’d been occupying in the other lane. She fishtailed on the gravel shoulder for a moment, then got all four wheels back on the asphalt and accelerated.
Port Hood, the self-proclaimed step-dancing capital of Cape Breton, was the first stop on a festival circuit that would, over the last of July and through all of August, cover the island, knitting together various fairs and community celebrations, as well as the varying and ubiquitous Highland Games. Music was a huge part of the Cape Breton lifestyle, and every summer it became a huge part of the Cape Breton economy as tourists flocked to the island to tap along to the jigs and reels, gawk at the men in kilts, buy tartan-covered kitsch, and create traffic jams that made some of the most scenic coastline in the world the most frustrating to drive. With the mines closed and the fishing heavily regulated, the locals were well aware they needed tourist dollars to survive, but most of them would prefer said tourists stop about midpoint on the causeway, toss their wallets over, and then go the hell home.
And speaking of home . . .
Charlie fished her ringing phone out of her bag and checked the caller ID. “My mother. . . .”
“Say no more.” Shelly turned the radio up. “I’ll be listening to the local maritime weather report.”
“Thanks.” Years spent with bands that never quite made it big enough to get out of each others’ space, made faking privacy a necessary skill. Charms not needed. Charlie thumbed the connect and pitched her voice below the earnest CBC announcer listing wind speeds coming in off the Northumberland Strait. “Mom?”
“The twins want to spend three weeks traveling through Europe before school starts.”
“Okay.” If they wanted to go badly enough, there’d be a last minute seat sale for exactly what they had saved; that was how the family worked. “So they go after the second of the month; what’s the harm?”
“Do you honestly think it’s safe?”
“Mom, it’s Europe.”
“Cultural differences . . . ”
Personally, Charlie thought Europe could handle it. However, based on the way Montreal had survived the twins’ freshman year at McGill . . . “You want me to check on them occasionally, don’t you?”
“If you wouldn’t mind popping in and out. Don’t tell them I sent you. And speaking of the second . . .”
Had they been?
“. . . I know you’re based in Calgary now, with Allie, but her circles are very small and Cameron will likely have at least a dozen girls to cover . . .”
“He’s young. He’ll survive.”
“It’s just that you won’t have many options, not for years, and . . .”
“Maybe.”
“And the aunties say you’re traveling again, so . . .”
“I said,
maybe
, Mom. Gotta go.” She cupped the phone in her left hand and said, “My mother wants me home for a family thing.” Faking privacy included sharing enough information to soothe unavoidable curiosity.
maybe
, Mom. Gotta go.” She cupped the phone in her left hand and said, “My mother wants me home for a family thing.” Faking privacy included sharing enough information to soothe unavoidable curiosity.
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