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The Eyes Have It
“Oh my God, Gracey. You’re completely crushed out.”
Gracey looked up from her newspaper and offered her sister an innocent look. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Tiny, ambling into the kitchen in her nightie, motioned toward the vase of pink peonies on the kitchen table. “What’s with the flowers? You’ve got them in here, in the bathroom…where did you even find peonies this time of year?”
Gracey shrugged, looking back down at her newspaper to hide her grin. “Simon left them.”
Tiny raised an eyebrow. “Simon left them,” she repeated.
Gracey bit her lip, pretended to be reading. “I found them on the porch this morning when I set the pie out to cool. Oh, there’s cranberry apple fig on the counter.”
Tiny shuffled to the sideboard, pulled a plate from the cupboard. “You had time to bake a pie already? How long have you been awake?”
“Couldn’t sleep.”
Tiny cut herself a healthy slice of pie and poured a mug of lukewarm coffee. “So your freaky friend left two dozen peonies — which are not even in season — on the porch, and you made pie.” Tiny’s eyes flew open in bewilderment. “Oh my God, Gracey, you guys didn’t…bow chicka wow wow?” Tiny pumped her hips in a suggestive movement.
“Tiny!”
“Well what am I supposed to think?” With her pie and her coffee, Tiny slid into the chair across from her sister. “I love you, Gracey, and I love to see you happy but I really don’t know what you see in that guy.”
Gracey sighed. “He’s intelligent, he’s charming, he’s polite — ”
“He’s corny as hell,” Tiny cut in, scooping a bite of pie into her mouth. “What is up with the hat? And the way he talks?”
“He’s old fashioned,” Gracey sighed. “There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” Tiny echoed. “So you really don’t think that guy’s even, like, a little…” She swiveled her index finger near her temple, making the universal crazy sign. “…Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs? Froot Loops?”
Gracey grimaced. “Love the cereal references. Very mature.”
Tiny cocked an eyebrow at her sister.
Gracey threw up her hands in exasperation. “Well, what do you want me to say, Tiny? He’s different! I noticed! But that doesn’t make him crazy. I mean, Tiny.” She shook her head, sighing. “I am the last person who could condemn someone for being a little different.”
Tiny shrugged in tacit agreement, chewing her pie thoughtfully. “But it’s not just how he talks and dresses. There’s just something off about him. He kinda gives me the creeps.”
“Just drop it, Tiny. He makes me feel really good about myself. When I’m with him, I feel normal. And I don’t mean by comparison,” she explained before Tiny could interrupt. “I just mean, I feel like I can be myself. It’s very liberating.”
Tiny took a sip of coffee. “You don’t feel like you can do that with me? Or Bibi? Or Darkness?”
“Darkness!” Gracey laughed, rolling her eyes. “Nothing—nothing—about Darkness makes me feel normal. Where is he anyway?”
“Don’t know. I just woke up. Answer my question.”
Gracey sighed. “I’m talking about feeling normal with a man. A real man, not a demon that looks…sort of like a man. I’m talking about a man that I could love.”
Tiny’s jaw dropped, eyes practically bugging out of her head. “Wait, you’re falling in love with Simon St. Laine? Are you kidding me? You’ve been on one date!”
“I didn’t say I was in love, I said…” Gracey shook her head, standing up and clearing her place. She took the dishes to the sink. “You’re right, it’s silly to keep a bouquet of flowers in the bathroom. Let’s take them to the cemetery so more people can enjoy them.”
Tiny licked her fork. “What people? The dead dudes? I don’t know, I kind of like having something pretty to look at while I pee.”
Gracey walked over to the table and kissed the crown of her sister’s head. “Aw. Then you can just look in the mirror.”
Tiny wrinkled her nose. “While I pee? Seriously, Gracey. You are so weird.”
The cemetery was a short walk from the Daylittle house. It had been a long time since Gracey had been there, and she was surprised to see so many fresh graves. She’d known that Rubio Bautista had been recently buried, of course, but as she walked up and down the rows she noticed three graves that had only recently been dug. Two were on the Galina family plot, and the other was a single for Buddy Heffman.
Walking over the Buddy’s grave, Gracey threw her sister a look over her shoulder. “What on earth…? When did Buddy Heffman die?”
Tiny stood, arms akimbo, surveying the cemetery. In the year she’d lived in Love & War, she’d never set foot in it. “Like a week ago, I think? I heard about it when I was visiting Darkness at the salon.”
Gracey separated out one of the peonies she was clutching and laid it on Buddy’s grave. “And you didn’t tell me about it?”
Tiny kicked at a stone lodged in the dirt, shrugged a shoulder. “I’m telling you about it now.” She ignored the look Gracey threw her. “I heard he didn’t have any family left, so there wasn’t much of a funeral. That’s kind of sad, to die alone?”
Gracey knelt down, nodded. “He lived with his sister Evangeline on the far edge of town, but she died a couple three years back. Emphysema, I think. Neither of them ever got married or had any kids.” Gracey chuckled to herself, shaking her head. “When I first moved to town Buddy used to find all sorts of reasons to show up at my house, fix things. Used to hint about how he wouldn’t mind seeing me in a swimsuit.”
Tiny made a face. “You moved here eleven years ago, so Buddy must have been…what, seventy?”
Gracey smiled at the memory. “Randy old fart,” she agreed. “It’s sad he never had kids. I think the Heffmans were one of the original settlers of Love & War. His death is…mildly historical, I guess.”
Tiny looked around, noticed there were no other Heffmans buried nearby. “Where are the others buried?”
Gracey shrugged. “I don’t know; fair question. Lots of families are buried on their own land. I’ve never been out to the Heffman place, but that could be it.”
“I heard Mr. Heffman’s eyes were missing when they found him.”
Startled, Gracey and Tiny looked around and found Lakmei standing behind them, arms crossed over her chest, her porcelain face drawn, hiding behind a curtain of white hair. She was wearing an oversized rugby shirt and jeans. Gracey had never seen her dressed so casually. For that matter, Gracey had never seen her without Lilac at her side. Seeing only one of the two identical women temporarily threw Gracey for a loop.
“Lakmei.” Gracey stood, dusted herself off. “I didn’t see you come up. You look…What was that about Buddy’s eyes?”
Lakmei remained stoic, slid her hands into the back pockets of her jeans. “Horace Green found Mr. Heffman dead on the floor of his garage. His eyes were missing. Not ripped out or dug out. More like burned out. I heard he had a black hole in his face where his eyes should have been.” She paused a moment, shrugging. “I can’t say for sure. The only people to see Mr. Heffman were Mr. Green and the coroner. But it’s what I heard.”
Tiny looked from Lakmei, to Gracey, and back to Lamkei. “I suspect Mr. Green in the garage with the tire wrench.” When Gracey snapped her head around and gave Tiny a horrified look, she changed tactics. “Well, I didn’t hear that,” she said. “How come I didn’t hear that? That’s the kind of thing people would be talking about, isn’t it?”
Gracey returned her attention to Lakmei, her horror still evident in the lines of her face. “Where did you hear such a nasty rumor?”
Lakmei shook her head, clear, blue eyes locking on Gracey’s. “I don’t remember,” she said. “But I heard that’s why he wasn’t buried with the other Heffmans. They’re Catholic,” Lakmei explained. “And what happened to his face was the work of the devil.”
Gracey’s mouth dropped open as she glanced anxiously from the angel to her sister. Finally she asked, “Well…was it?”
It wasn’t what she had planned to say. Until a year ago, Gracey had no reason to believe in Hell or devils or angels for that matter. But the night she and Tiny had found the Prime of Darkness lying on the side of the road, everything had changed. Gracey wasn’t sure what to believe in anymore.
But Lakmei only shook her head, unblinking eyes never breaking contact. “Probably not,” she said simply. “I thought you didn’t believe the Prime of Darkness was dangerous.”
The slight mocking in Lakmei’s voice wasn’t lost on the pie baker. “I never said I didn’t think he was dangerous,” Gracey said carefully. “But I have no reason to think Buddy Heffman would be Darkness’s enemy. Besides. I assume Darkness doesn’t have a monopoly on diabolic acts.”
Lakmei, chagrined, said nothing for a moment as she watched Gracey work through her own inner conflicts. It was no secret to either of the angels that Gracey’s feelings toward the demon were not altogether logical. Lakmei cocked her head to the side, expression evaluative. “There’s something different about you, Gracey.”
Gracey blinked. “Different how?”
Lakmei watched her a second, then shook her head slowly. “I don’t know exactly.”
Breathing an agitated sigh, Gracey nodded toward the other two graves. “Do you know what happened over there?”
Lakmei followed her gaze and sighed. “Car accident,” she said. “Carmen Olaya and her son, ah…”
“David,” Gracey whispered.
“That’s the one.”
“David was just a baby,” Gracey said. A wild shudder ran through her and she wrapped her arms across her chest in the same manner as Lakmei.
“But why is she buried with the Galinas if her last name is Olaya?” Tiny asked.
“Olaya was her married name,” Gracey said. “The Olayas and the Galinas don’t get along. Most of the Olayas have left Love & War by now; they came into money about twenty years ago, I think. Carmen’s husband Christopher was the last of them, if you don’t count the baby, of course, and he left about a year ago when he and Carmen divorced.”
Lakmei glanced down to the flowers Gracey was still holding. “Were you going to lay those anywhere in particular?”
Gracey had forgotten all about the peonies. She glanced at them, suddenly feeling foolish. She shook her head. “No, I just thought…” she shrugged, letting her words trail off.
“Do you mind if I..?” Lakmei reach for the flowers, and as though jarred out of a daydream, Gracey shook herself, handing the small bouquet to the angel.
“Not at all, please.” She handed the flowers over to Lakmei and for a brief moment, their hands brushed against each other. Lakmei drew in a sharp breath, eyes popping wide as saucers. Her lips parted, drew close in a round little O. She caught hold of Gracey’s hand, closing her delicate fingers around Gracey’s strong ones. She leaned in, pulling Gracey to her in a furtive embrace. “Is that what’s different?” She shook her head, blue eyes filling with tears. “Oh, Gracey! Whoever he is, I hope he doesn’t break your heart.”
