I head out the door without another word.
“Well,” Dr. Colson holds the duckling in the palm of his hand, nudging his glasses up his nose with his knuckles. “It’s a duckling, alright.”
I shift on my feet and fight the urge to roll my eyes. I am pushing my capacity for socialization today and it’s not even noon. I still have dinner with my family tonight and my sisters aren’t exactly known for their calm and quiet demeanor.
“Sure is,” I manage instead, clenching my teeth when Dr. Colson peers up at me from above his glasses. He swivels on his chair and places the duck carefully back into the cardboard box I bundled him up in. The little guy quacks and waddles closer to me, settling down in a corner and mouthing at my hand with his tiny bill.
Do not name him, I tell myself. If I give him a name, I’ll bring him home, and I’m not sure a pack of kittens and a baby duck would make good roommates. Don’t you dare give him a name.
“I’ll make some calls and see if there is a rescue nearby that will take him in, but ducks are tricky. He’ll have to be accepted by a new mother.”
I breathe in deep through my nose. “And if he isn’t?”
“If he isn’t, I’m afraid the little guy won’t make it. Not unless someone adopts him as a pet.”
He gives me a significant look.
Fuck. “Is that a possibility?”
Dr. Colson nods. “With the proper care and attention, absolutely. It’ll be time-consuming at first, but ducks can make great pets.” He looks up at me with a sly grin. “Farms are a great environment.”
“Not sure farms with a family of bloodthirsty cats are a great environment,” I grumble. Prancer brought me three mice last weekend. She lined them up in front of my door like a sacrificial offering. It was both disgusting and endearing.
“Remind me to send you one of those Toks all the kids are sharing,” Dr. Colson says. He stands with a wince and claps me on the back. His knees have been bothering him since he turned sixty. “Sheila at the front is always showing me new ones. I think there’s a whole account dedicated to cats and ducks.”
I wouldn’t know. I have no interest in social media.
I haven’t looked Evelyn up again, not since that first time. Not even after she posted her now-viral video of Luka and Stella pretending to love each other while also desperately pretending not to love each other. Luka had been so pleased with his internet celebrity, he walked around autographing everything within reach for weeks. The third time he signed a potato with a sharpie, I snapped the marker in half right in front of his face.
“I can’t adopt a duck,” I say. Maybe if I vocalize my intentions, they’ll manifest. My sister Nessa has told me that no less than seventy-five times. I sigh. “You’ll keep him here for a bit? Give me a call when you hear from the rescue?”
Dr. Colson nods. The duck lets out a quack. I pinch the bridge of my nose.
I cannot adopt this duck.
“Are you adopting a duck?”
“Fuck,” I curse under my breath as Nova pops up in my window. She hops up on the side bar and loops her arm through my open window before I even manage to slow my truck to a stop. At five-foot-nothing and wearing her standard head to toe black, it’s a wonder I didn’t run her right over.
She pokes me once in the cheek as I shift into park. I swat her hand away and grab the pie from the passenger seat.
“How do you know about the duck?”
Do not name the duck. You will not name the duck.
“The phone tree.”
The Inglewild phone tree is only supposed to be used in case of emergency, but in the last six months, it’s turned into a town gossip distribution chain. Two weeks ago, Alex Alvarez from the bookstore called to tell me Sheriff Jones and Matty were seen picking out tulip bulbs at the greenhouse for their back garden. When I asked him why the fuck he was calling me about tulip bulbs, he muttered phone tree and hung up.
I did not continue the phone tree that day. I haven’t had a single phone call since. I’m assuming I’ve been removed.
“Is he adopting a duck?” Harper shouts from the door, hanging over the banister on the front porch, a dish towel slung over her shoulder and a wooden spoon in her hand. I climb out of my truck with a sigh, careful not to send Nova flying off the door.
“I’m not adopting a duck.” I sling my arm over Nova’s shoulder and ruffle her hair as we walk up the ramp that leads to the porch. Some of the boards creak under my boots and I pause, considering. I reach out and push at the handrail, the wood wobbling slightly under my grip.
“I’ll help you fix it this week, if you want,” Nova tells me, urging me forward and gently guiding me towards the house. She probably knows I’m about three seconds away from getting the toolbox out of my truck and reconstructing the whole thing. Guilt pricks at me. It’s been too long since I’ve asked my parents if they need anything.
“Stop,” Harper admonishes as soon as we step onto the porch. She smacks me once with her spoon. Of all my sisters, she’s the one that looks most like me. Dark blonde hair, blue-green eyes, an almost permanent frown. She’s two years younger but she might as well be my twin. “You’re beating yourself up before you even enter the house. That must be a new record.”
“No. Remember Christmas Eve two years ago? He forgot the stick of butter mom asked him to bring and he almost took out the mailbox heading to the grocery store. He didn’t even make it out of the driver’s seat before he started beating himself up.”
“Or when he forgot about Nessa’s dance recital. I thought he was going to sink through the floor.” Harper’s lips curl up at the edges and her gaze cuts to me. “You didn’t even miss it. You just got the date wrong. You were feeling guilty about potentially missing something.”
They dissolve into a fit of giggles and I push through the both of them into the house. It doesn’t bode well for me that the teasing has already started. I can usually count on Nova to be on my side but not tonight, apparently.
Garlic and rosemary drift down the hallway from the kitchen as I toe off my boots. Fresh baked bread and a hint of honey. I can hear the low murmur of my mom and Nessa chatting, my dad wheeling backward in his chair to poke his head around the corner as Nova and Harper follow me in.
“You adopting a duck?”
I roll my eyes and shrug out of my jacket. I contemplate returning to my truck and asking my mom to bring dinner out to me. She probably would. Nova loops her hand around my wrist before I can turn for the door and tugs me down the hallway into the kitchen, directing me to the island in the center. Her grip is scary strong for someone so small. She manhandles me until my arm is exposed under the light, the cuff of my sleeve rolled up so she can see the ink that decorates every inch of my skin.
“Can I get a drink first?”
“No.”
She doesn’t bother looking up as she traces one of the vines that starts at my elbow and curls down over my wrist. She added some flower buds to it about two weeks ago, and they’re almost fully healed.
“They look good,” she tells me, flipping my wrist and poking around at my skin with almost clinical detachment. She started tattooing me when she was sixteen and decided she wanted to be an artist. She apprenticed at a shop down the coast, but no one would let a teenager practice on their skin. So I volunteered. Every tattoo on my arms is by her, an interesting progression from my left arm to my right. Now that she’s one of the most sought after artists on the East Coast, she’s been going back over her work, adding detail and cleaning up old missteps.