“I don’t know about that,” Jet responded. “He could always find anything. He had that talent.”
“When he wanted to use it,” Franny sniffed. Her brother’s absence still pained her. “He never found us.”
“He couldn’t, darling,” Jet said. “There was the curse. He had William to think of.”
On the fifth day, after Sally had gone off to the library, Jet turned on the porch light and threw open the door. When the news got out that Jet was available to her neighbors, a line formed along the path and down the street. People wanted cures for rashes and indigestion, enchantments for runaway daughters and for sons who had made a wrong turn, tinctures for forgetfulness and for mean-spirited husbands, and, as always, they came for love. Jet was so busy that she enlisted Franny, who grumbled but set about gathering ingredients from the garden: leaves from their ginkgo tree, one of the oldest varieties on earth, for anxiety; turmeric as an anti-inflammatory; primrose, whose essence would be pressed into an oil that helped skin conditions and lifted the spirts; echinacea, best for the common cold; lavender, to bring wayward children home. In tall glass jars in the pantry there was mandrake, belladonna, mushrooms of all sorts, blue beads, black feathers, apple seeds, the hollow bones of birds, dove’s hearts. The rush lasted until five, and by the time it was through most of the daffodils had been trampled by people who wanted to make certain they got their turn bringing their problems to Jet. Before Sally arrived home to chastise them for practicing magic, Franny chased the last of the visitors from the path and once they were gone, she switched off the light. She agreed with Sally; let the porch light be turned down forevermore.
Jet sat at the table, exhausted, in need herself of a cup of Courage Tea.
“I hope you’re happy,” Franny said. “Half the neighborhood has been here today.”
Jet smiled and poured more tea. She was, indeed, happy, and because Franny couldn’t fight that, she had a cup of tea as well, for courage was what they both needed now.
* * *
On the sixth day, the aunts fell silent, in a haze of disbelief. The future was less than forty-eight hours away. Still, no one had ever called them lazy, and they made good use of their time, setting about cleaning the house, which, frankly, had not been seen to for some time, so that the woodwork and drapes were dusty and the carpets had to be taken out to the porch and beaten with a broom. It was traditional to do so after a death, to prepare for the mourners and clear out anything the deceased might wish to keep private, but knowing what they knew, they had the opportunity to complete the task together before the funeral. They covered the mirrors and opened the windows to let in fresh air. Sparrows were nesting in the shrubbery and buds had appeared on the magnolias that lined the street. The sisters packed up Jet’s clothing and her collection of novels, along with the batch of letters Levi had sent her when she was a girl, mostly concerning how they might manage to meet without the Reverend catching on. There was another correspondence that Jet treasured, letters tied up with blue ribbon. These were Rafael’s. She gazed at them, on the brink of tears.
“His?” Franny said. She’d never questioned Jet about her love life. Still, she’d been curious.
Jet nodded. She thought about what might have happened if Rafael hadn’t taken a part-time job as a bellman while he was going to college. “Life is luck.”
“That it is,” Franny agreed.
When they were through with the house, and the woodwork shone and the cobwebs were all swept away with a broom, they had a picnic lunch that included splurging on all of their favorite childhood foods which were too rich for them now: jam sandwiches, scones with lavender honey, cheese and chive biscuits, sliced apples with cream. Later, they walked to the cemetery where Jet wrote out a check, the final payment for the plot beside Levi Willard, whom she had loved when she was so young and hadn’t any idea of what love meant. Then they went out grocery shopping for the ingredients they needed. In the morning, when Sally came into the kitchen, ready to head to the library, her aunts were baking a Chocolate Tipsy Cake, a family tradition for birthdays, weddings, and funerals ever since Maria Owens’s time.