Ladybird, Ladybird . . .

  Ladybird, Ladybird

  By Abra Ebner

  Published by Abra Ebner at Smashwords

  Copyright © 2011 Abra Ebner

  PREFACE

  My name is Samantha, and I was born to a mother already dead. They say that it’s bad luck to be born under a full moon, that you’re cursed by the fires of Hell and the Devil himself, but I’ve never seen the Devil, unless the Devil is me.

  Father considers me as such, and I’ve never been able to convince him otherwise. He avoids me, and though avoidance to him comes across in angry bouts of confusion and hate, I know that at the root of it all, he’s just afraid to love me. He sees me as a murderer, the destroyer of the last thing that made him feel alive in this world—my mother. I don’t know what my father was like before, but there must have been a happy man in there, a smile.

  People pity me because I never met my mother but they shouldn’t. For nine months I was closer to her than any of them could ever be. We forged a connection that transcends death, and if you pay close attention, you’ll see she’s always there.

  I know because in her own way, she still talks to me.

  ONE

  Guns and Roses played softly in the background.

  “Yeah, headed off at the end of this summer.” He tried to act smug about it, but I easily noted the small shake of his tongue as he spoke. “I’m not too excited about the idea of conceding to some army general’s every command, but at the same time, it’s better than here . . . even if I can’t always see myself actually being that kind of person.”

  I laced my fingers through and around each other in the seat beside him, knowing that any second this moment could end. I needed to say something. I needed to make myself worth fighting for because that was what he was going to have to do. “Just hearing you say that makes my stomach sink. How can you handle that pressure?” I managed. It was forced—typical. I wasn’t gaining any ground.

  He shrugged. “Easy. It’s all I’ve ever been raised to do.” He puffed out his chest and dropped his voice an octave, presumably impersonating his father. “Fight for our country. Be a prideful man.” His voice returned to normal and his shoulders slumped. “Besides, it gets me out of here, like I was saying.” He looked out the window to the wheat field beside us. The crop was really wheat-to-be, so early in the spring, appearing to me no more than tall grass. “It’s either that or farm. I can’t farm.”

  I pressed my lips together and dropped my head. Out of here. Those words were sweet but depressing at the same time. Though I’d just met David, a part of me wanted to keep him. A part of me wanted to keep something. Though I still wasn’t sure to what degree I really liked David, we did have some similarities. There was the fact that I could sense pain in him, a pain that was similar to my own. I liked that his choice of music wasn’t mainstream. I was happy he was new to our school, having transferred from the next town over when his father’s farm was rezoned. He didn’t know the extent of the rumors about me, and in his mind they were just that, rumors. Bottom line was that I wanted to make him mine. I thought maybe for once I could, but as facts continued to trickle in, I feared otherwise.

  Even if I hooked him, even if he did decide to fight for me, there was now the actuality that, in three short months, he’d be gone on a mission for his country, and surely I could not follow. I’d be left alone. I was as certain of this as I was certain the wheat would be harvested in late summer. Three months wasn’t going to be enough for me, even if I were able to keep his existence from my father. And what if David didn’t like me as much as I sort of liked him? Why would he? I was just a farm girl with a fable attached to her back that may as well scream, “Stay away!”

  “So . . .” He looked at me.

  I knew that look all too well. It was a look of pity. There were two looks people gave me: pity or hate. And I guess a few sad saps mixed interest with the pity—at least until they learned of the fire in me.

  “Yeah,” I said because it seemed like something needed to be said, even if it was a useless word.

  He continued to stare pathetically.

  People called me a witch, but as far as I was concerned, I’d never done anything to classify me as a textbook witch. I’m not green or tall. I don’t own any pointy hats, and I don’t possess any real magical talent—unless you count the flash fevers, which were hardly a talent, more of a curse. Still, even if I were to say, “Yes, I’m cursed,” I didn’t look like the type to be cursed. I’m blonde, love the color peach, and ride my horse, Axon, in the county fair. I have an average body with curves that attract all the right thoughts from a boy’s mind, such as: sweet, cute, and sometimes sexy, though my experience in that area was slim to none.

  Perhaps it’s my eyes that scare everyone so much: so blue that they’re a reflection of the full moon on a cold, spring night. As if those eyes weren’t rare enough around here, I hadn’t heard of anyone whose eyes burned umber when a person was angry or nervous. Not like mine did. That sort of thing was a clear sign of a monster lurking within. Luckily for me, the car was dark. The only light came from the few working bulbs in the truck’s dash.

  Bottom line is: I’m different. Most of the townspeople around here are bland, tired, and heavy featured. I was soft, pale, and what seemed this town’s epitome of frightening. They had loved my mother, and I was the one who had killed her.

  David touched my arm softly, as though imagining that touching me might burn him, as it had a hundred others. But my emotion had been subdued by my thinking. I was cool to the touch. “I’m glad I took you out tonight. You’re much more than . . .” His voice trailed off, and if the moon had been brighter, I was certain I would have seen him blush.

  “More than they say, right?”

  David grinned at me, his touch on my arm growing brave and firm.

  I shook my head and smiled, trying my best to keep my nerves at bay, though his grasp on me forced my heart to start beating just a little bit faster. “It’s amazing what a small town can do to your reputation,” I commented bitterly.

  He nodded slowly. “I don’t really buy into all that. That’s just one reason I can’t wait to get out of here. There’s no such thing as a curse. It’s all a bunch of hoopla and small-town bull.”

  Hearing him say that was like a dream. He was perfect for me, but then there was the can’t-wait-to-get-out-of-here part. “But then you’ll be gone along with my last hope of proving them all wrong. I’ll be stuck here for another year until I’m old enough to go to college, and even then there’s no guarantee I’ll have the money to go. I’ll end up the town legend and the old lady with a million cats one day. Just you wait. I’ll rival Mr. Buckhead on Chatterley Lane,” I finished in a rush.

  David laughed loudly. It echoed through the car. “No one could rival Mr. Buckhead or his kid.”

  I lifted my brow. “Just you wait, David Lane. One day I’ll prove you wrong. One day you’ll turn on me as though this whole conversation had never happened. I’ve seen it a million times.”

  He shook his head decisively. “We’ll see.” But as expected, his touch slipped from my arm and he recoiled. Maybe he didn’t have the bravery I’d hoped for after all.

  As though on cue, two large lights crested the hill in front of us. I shut my eyes to them. My already speedy heart rate peaked and my back steeled, body heat rising without a means to control it. I could never quell the way I felt toward such actions—the actions of my controlling father.

  David shielded his eyes. “What the . . . ?”

  A feverish hate overcame me, and the air in the car surged a couple more degrees. I clenched my jaw and held tight to my sanity. “It’s my father.” I opened my now fiery eyes to the light, seeing the horrified look on David’s
face and feeling the dread in my stomach. I reached out to David in a foolish attempt to defuse his growing apprehensions. As my hand touched his skin, I did just as I expected: I burned him.

  He jerked away, his face filled with a mix of anger and confusion, the smell of lightly singed skin filling the car. “Get away from me!” he gasped.

  His reaction was genuine. From his gut to his lips, his conscience had changed his mind. I had lost David long before I’d gotten a real chance at having him.

  I exhaled away my losses as the sound of the machine grew louder. Lights barreled toward us through the wheat-to-be. I leaned back. “I’m sorry,” I whispered and shook my head. I knew he couldn’t hear me but Mother could. David wasn’t the one for me after all. “I think you should go,” I yelled over the grinding of gears, assuming it was the thing to say, though I was in his car. He looked at me in clear agreement.

  Feeling flustered, I quickly reached for my sweater and got out of David’s truck. “Thanks again,” I yelled out of habit, not too sure what I was thinking. Manners no longer had merit. I was biting back the urge to cry, the fibers of the sweater in my hand twisting under my blistering grip. Considering the circumstances, manners were all I could cling to.

  The combine stopped just inches from the hood of David’s truck, letting out a loud moan. David’s truck clicked into reverse and pulled away fast. I waited, staring angrily at the lights of the machine before me. There was a cry of metal hinges, and a shadow hopped down onto the side of the combine. “Girl!” The anger in my father’s voice swept effortlessly over the noise of the machine. “Get on over here, right now!”

  I inched my way over the dirt road. David and his truck were long gone, and there was no telling what he thought of me now, though I had a good idea. I’d made another believer out of him. How stupid of me. This was how it always started. This was why the rumors even existed. So many boys found my beauty irresistible—until they met my father and my fury, a dangerous combination.

  Father marched across the distance between us. I braced myself for the worst. Without hesitation, he grabbed my arm with his gloved hand, dragging me back to the machine. He let go and climbed on before turning back and easily lifting me onto the combine. My feet searched for footing until he tossed me down onto the decking beside him. “Whadya doin’ with that boy? You gonna get yerself knocked up, and I ain’t keepin’ you in no state like that. Yer enough trouble already,” he grumbled.

  I rubbed my wrist, knowing that it was destined to bruise. Had he not been wearing gloves, I would have been able to hurt him back, but tonight he seemed a little more in tune with the world. He must have been out of beer.

  “I see ya with that boy again, and I’ll hit ya till there’s nothin’ left,” he warned.

  I squeezed my eyes shut, wishing he were joking but knowing he wasn’t. Despite how hard he was on me, I really couldn’t blame him for being that way. He had no idea how to raise a child, let alone one like me. I had killed his wife and brought shame upon him. Tears formed in my eyes. To my relief, he’d had his fill of punishing me and climbed back into the cabin of the combine. I was left on the decking where I would stay, just to be away from him.

  The machine lurched forward, the blades stationary. He’d done this for the sole reason of making a point, as he always did. Showing up with a shotgun in his hand wasn’t drama enough for him. My father had to bring his ten-ton combine to the dance. Why couldn’t he be more traditional? Why couldn’t he leave me alone? But most of all, why couldn’t he love me?

  I rocked along with the swaying of the combine. Minutes passed as we swept over the green hills that led back to the house in the gully of the fifty-acre field. I shut my eyes and listened to the sound of the grass brushing over the machine, the engine’s roar putting me in a trance. I jolted out of it as I felt a tickle on my arm. At first, I was tempted to swat at it, thinking it was a spider or small grasshopper, but it was a ladybug. In the dimness of the combine lights, it sat, its red coat heavily contrasted against the pale color of my skin. The corner of my mouth curled, despite my sadness, and I soaked in the bit of good luck the creature could give me.

  It remained motionless, as though watching me in return. Its wings were without spots, a rarity, and surely a sign of even more good luck, a thing I lacked more than anything else. Wings parting, it fluttered and fluffed before repositioning itself, tiny legs grasping me. It was not bothered by the slowly dying heat of my fever. In fact, it seemed to draw from my heat and grow brighter. At least it didn’t recoil from touching me as most people did. Maybe it could love me. At last, the combine came to a jolting stop beside the barn. The engine shut off, and my ears rang. As the door to the cabin swung open, the ladybug left. A chill replaced the brief happiness I had felt.

  I looked up at my father, but he did not look at me. He jumped down from the combine and walked off without another word. Though I longed for anything from him besides hate, I gladly accepted his silence instead. Silence was good.

  I waited for him to enter the house through the side door where I kept my young chickens in a box on the screened-in porch. I heard him feed them and talk to them gently. I was jealous—jealous of a chicken that, in six weeks, would grace my supper plate. He showed them affection where he showed me none. I guess they had more of a menial purpose.

  I sighed and wrinkled my brow. Pushing myself off the decking of the combine, I jumped to the ground and found refuge in the barn, figuring I’d wait for Father to find his place in front of the TV with a Pabst in his hand before sneaking in behind him and up to my room.

  In the barn, Axon murmured gently, tapping his hooves against the stall floor. Axon had been a guilt gift from my father. There had been a point in my young life when my father acknowledged his abusive behavior by presenting me with such a gift. But that was a long time ago. Aside from the necessary things my father bought me like clothes for school and food, Axon was the only thing I considered a real gift, the only thing I had to suggest that under it all, my father did love me. Unfortunately, that love was buried deep. It would take a miracle to bring it out for good.

  I guess you could also wonder why I haven’t just run away to be placed in foster care. The truth is: Foster care frightens me. Someone like me, with my curse, would bounce around in a system like that. I was happier to stay here with my horse and what little family I had. At least this way I felt some semblance of stability in my otherwise chaotic life. Most of all, there was an attachment to my mother here.

  I walked up to Axon, kissing him on the nose as he huffed and whinnied more loudly. Cutting open a fresh bale of hay, I tossed him his evening flake and listened to him eat. I sat on a stool and leaned against the stall door, looking at the ground. I swept my foot across the dirt, digging at an embedded rock with the tip of my boot. The smell of dried hay mixing with Axon’s saliva seeped through the cracks in the stall door. I liked the smell. It reminded me of something happy, though I knew little of happiness.

  As I continued to dig away at the small rock, it soon began to glint and glitter. I stopped, wrinkling my brow and leaning forward. I touched the small rock and felt metal instead. Quickly I grabbed a bale hook and dug away at the dirt surrounding the metallic object until a half circle peeked out from the ground. I threaded the tip of the bale hook through the circle and tugged until the object pulled free from the earth.

  It was a key.

  I smiled brightly because I knew this wasn’t just any key, but a key from my mother. I hadn’t gotten one in what seemed months, and I was beginning to fear that she was forgetting about me. I polished the key with the hem of my shirt.

  Each key was different, each hinting at whatever the box would contain. Tonight the key was simple and made of brass. The ring that topped it was perfectly round in both shape and design. The barrel of the key was a little thicker than the ring, the nose shaped squarely with a simple notch, like a multi-purpose skeleton key.

  Once I had cleaned it of the tarnish and dirt, I sl
id it into the pocket of my jeans and stood. I found the hose and filled Axon’s water before shutting off the lights in the barn and securing the door with a lock to keep out the coyotes. As I walked across the yard, gravel crunched beneath my feet. Though the night wanted to make me feel more alone than ever, the continuing truth was that I wasn’t alone—at least not in spirit.

  Reaching the house, I quietly allowed my feet to roll over each step up to the screened-in porch. I peeled open the outer door. The chickens rustled as the door squealed and squeaked. I twisted the knob to the main door and sneaked into the front hall. I could hear the baseball game on the TV in the other room, my father murmuring something in reply to whatever the announcer was saying. I slid out of my boots and left them in the bin beside the front hall bench. Biting my lip, I slipped around the corner and up the stairs, running as though being chased by a ghost, though the only ghost seemed to be me.

  Once in my room, I shut the door and bolted it with the lock I had installed when I was thirteen. Leaning against the handle, I took a deep breath. I was happy to be someplace familiar, someplace safe. I sank to the floor and sat with my back against the door for a moment, letting the night’s trial and failure roll off my back and be forgotten, as I’d forced myself to do a hundred times. Feeling more at peace a moment later, I fell forward and threw my arms under my bed, searching for a box, the only thing my mother had left me.

  Everything my mother had once owned had been destroyed by my father. His pain at her death turned him bitter. Avoidance was the only way he could cope. He hated the fact that I had been able to keep this box, but there really wasn’t much he could do about it. He’d taken it from me, smashed it, hid it, burned it, done everything he could think of, but no matter what, it always ended up back under my bed, right where I had found it years and years ago. I slid it out and set it on my lap, opening the lid to reveal nothing but four walls made of dark, stained wood, tattered with age. Its hinges were made of thick steel and often whined. The lock, which matched the hinges, was pierced with a hole that fed to a hidden clasp that secured it. The box was empty for now but not for long.