Fiji saw something slithering off into the shelter of a rock just at that moment, and she snarled at it. She was not a happy camper. She was not any kind of camper at all.
“You okay?” said Bobo, and she looked up. He’d walked back to check on her. Goddess bless him, he was a kind man.
“I’m fine,” she lied, feeling the blush on her cheeks. “I’m not a great hiker. I’m kinda slow. But steady!” she added brightly. Briefly, she considered apologizing for intruding on him the other night, but she concluded that she had nothing to apologize for.
“You don’t have to be fast,” he said, falling into step with her. “You got nothing to prove.”
“No, I don’t,” she agreed, glad to look at it that way. “Not a damn thing.”
“Where are you from, originally?” Bobo asked. “I can’t believe we’ve never talked about it. Shared our origin story, as they say.” Sharing personal data was not a casual thing in Midnight. As if he feared his question might be too intrusive, he volunteered, “I’m from Arkansas.”
“I grew up outside Houston,” Fiji said. “But my mom’s folks were originally from this general area. West of Fort Worth. My great-aunt, who was way older than my grandmother, married Wesley Loeffler, who had settled here. They met at a dance, Aunt Mildred told me.” She smiled. Quite a few people had thought Mildred Loeffler was cross and crotchety, and a few more had feared her. But Fiji had loved the old woman.
“And what did Wesley do?”
“He ran the five-and-dime, the one that’s boarded up just north of the filling station. Back then, they all thought that Midnight would grow, that it would outshine Davy.”
“What happened to Wesley?” Bobo asked.
“He died pretty young; at least, what we would think of as young. I believe he had complications from a ruptured appendix. He and Great-Aunt Mildred never had any kids, and she never married again.”
“Tough,” Bobo said. “How’d she make a living?”
“She ran the five-and-dime herself until it wasn’t making any money, and then she sold the building and the business to a Mr. Wilcox. He went under in two years. So she had that money and what she made as a—well, as a wise woman, I guess you’d call it. She sold potions and herbs. And she could cook and was willing to cater a bit, so she was hired for weddings and so on. Aunt Mildred always took care to go to church every single Sunday, though.” Fiji grinned. “When I was a kid, we’d come to visit her about every other year. She took a shine to me. Since I’m the youngest, my sister was pretty mad when Mildred left me the house. If she’d had an idea the house was worth anything, I think she might have contested Great-Aunt Mildred’s will. But since I wanted to live in it, not sell it, she’s left me in peace.” Mostly.
“Your folks ever come to see you?” Bobo was frowning. “I don’t remember meeting them.”
“They haven’t come yet,” she said briefly. She’d been in Great-Aunt Mildred’s house for over three years. “What about you?”
She realized they were covering ground literally, as well as figuratively. This walking business went so much better when she had someone to talk to, a point she made a note to remember.
“I’m the oldest of three. I have a brother and sister,” he said.
From his unhappy expression, Fiji knew there was a story behind that.
“And now they’re . . . ?” she prompted.
“Oh. Amber Jean graduated from the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. She’s a registered nurse, and she’s married to a pharmaceutical supplier. Howell Three, my brother, he got out of college and got a job with Walmart.”
“With Walmart?” She tried not to sound surprised. “Stocking shelves and so on?” She remembered meeting Howell Three briefly, and he hadn’t seemed the manual labor kind of guy.
Bobo laughed. “No, he works at the headquarters. In Bentonville. He’s engaged to another guy.” His smile lingered, as if that had been a good joke on someone else. “Amber Jean has two kids, both girls.”
“Has she come here?”
He laughed. “Touché. No, and I don’t expect her to. And Howell Three only came the once, when you met him. Wasn’t that about seven months ago? I wanted him to meet Aubrey. He thought I was living in the ass end of nowhere.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That I liked it here. Which I do.”
“What do you like about it?” She hadn’t meant to sound coquettish, but she was afraid her words had come out that way. She risked a glance up. Bobo was looking ahead without a hint of self-consciousness, and she breathed a sigh of relief.
“I like being my own boss,” he said. “I like the old building and all the pawned stuff that’s been there forever. I like the random way people come in, bringing me strange things they’re sure are worth big bucks.”
“What do you do if you can’t tell them one way or another?”
“Look the item up online. Call another dealer. Check some of my reference books.” There was a laden shelf right by the cash register, and Fiji felt ashamed she’d never asked what the thick volumes were for.
“How about you?” he asked in return. “Do you like selling charms and candles to women? Though,” he added hastily, “I know you make a lot of them happier.”
Fiji smiled, though it made her face hurt a little. “Bobo, that sounds like you believe I’m all bells and chimes and New Age spirituality,” she said.
Apparently that was exactly what Bobo believed. For a long moment, he didn’t say a thing.
Taking pity on him, Fiji said, “I’m showing them that going to church and praying on your knees to a male deity isn’t all there is. There’s another path, one that will put women in tune with their own spirit and truth.”
“And I’m sure that helps a lot of the ladies,” he said quickly. “Hey, look, we’re almost there.” He strode forward.
The edge of the cliff was thick with stubborn growth: yucca, small live oaks, firs, cactus, a huge variety of grasses . . . interspersed with rocks ranging in size from babies’ fists to giants’ feet. A haze of tiny yellow blooms lent the scene an almost fairy-tale effect, though the weed that bore them was about a foot tall. The wind tossed the blooms about cheerfully, and the leaves on the trees shivered, some of them loose enough to fly off and flutter through the air.