Midnight Crossroad

3

Manfred worked every waking hour for the next few days to make up for the time he’d lost moving. He didn’t know why he felt impelled to work so hard, but when he realized he felt like a squirrel at the approach of winter, he dove into making the bucks. He’d found it paid to heed warnings like that.

Because he was absorbed in his work and had promised himself to unpack three boxes every night, he didn’t mingle in Midnight society for a while after that first lunch with Bobo, Joe, and Chuy. He made a couple more grocery and supply runs up to Davy, which was a dusty courthouse town—as bare and baked as Midnight but far more bustling. There was a lake at Davy, a lake fed by the Río Roca Fría, the slow-moving, narrow river that ran northwest–southeast about two miles north of the pawnshop. The river had once been much wider, and its banks reflected its former size. Now they sloped down for many feet on either side, an overly dramatic prelude to the lazy water that glided over the round rocks forming the bottom of the bed.

North of the pawnshop, the river angled up to hug the western side of Davy and broadened into a lake. Lakes meant swimmers and boaters and fishermen and rental cottages, so Davy was busy most weekends year-round and throughout the week in the summer. Manfred had learned this from reading his Texas guidebook.

Manfred had promised himself that when he felt able to take some time off, he’d hike up to the Roca Fría and have a picnic, which the guidebook (and Bobo) had promised him was a pleasant outing. It was possible to wade the shallows of the river in the summer, he’d read. To cook out on the sandbars. That actually sounded pretty cool.

Manfred’s mother, Rain, called on a Sunday afternoon. He should have expected her call, he realized, when he checked the caller ID.

“Hi, Son,” she said brightly. “How’s the new place?”

“It’s good, Mom. I’m mostly unpacked,” Manfred said, looking around him. To his surprise, that was true.

“Got your computers up and running?” she asked, as though she were saying, “Have you got your transmogrifinders working?” That shade of awe. Though Manfred knew for certain that Rain used a computer every day at work, she regarded his Internet business as very specialized and difficult.

“Yep, it’s all working,” he said. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, the job is going all right.” A pause. “I’m still seeing Gary.”

“That’s good, Mom. You need someone.”

“I still miss you,” she said suddenly. “I mean, I know you’ve been gone for a while . . . but even so.”

“I lived with Xylda for the past five years,” Manfred said evenly. “I don’t see how much you could miss me now.” His fingers drummed against the computer table. He knew he was too impatient with his mother’s bursts of sentimentality, but this was a conversation they’d had more than once, and he hadn’t enjoyed it the first time.

“You asked to live with her. You said she needed you!” his mother said. Her own hurt was never far below the surface.

“She did. More than you. I was weird, she was weird. I figured it would suit you better if I was with her.”

There was a long silence, and he was very tempted to hang up. But he waited. He loved his mother. He just had a hard time remembering that some days.

“I understand,” she said. She sounded tired and resigned. “Okay, call me in a week. Just to check in.”

“I will,” he said, relieved. “Bye, Mom. Stay well.” He hung up and went back to work. He was glad to answer another e-mail, to respond to a woman who was convinced that he was both talented and discerning, a woman who didn’t blame him forever for doing the obvious thing. In his job, he was nearly omnipotent—he was taken seriously, and his word was seldom questioned.

Real life was so different from his job, and not always in a good way. Manfred tugged absently on his most-pierced ear, the left. It was strange that he seldom got a reading on his mother. And really strange that he’d never realized it before. That was probably significant, and he should devote some time to figuring it out. But not today.

Today, he had money to make.

After another hour at his desk, Manfred became aware he was hungry. His mouth started to water when he wondered what was on the restaurant menu this evening. He’d checked the Home Cookin sign, so he knew the place was open on Sundays. Yep, time to eat out. He locked up the house as he left. As he did so, he wondered if he was the only one in Midnight who locked doors.

Before he could give himself the treat of a dinner he hadn’t cooked, he had to perform his social duty. He looked both ways on Witch Light (nothing coming, as usual) and crossed to Fiji’s house. He’d been eyeing her pink-flowered china plate and her clear plastic pitcher in a guilty way since he’d washed them. He’d enjoyed the cookies and lemonade, and the least he could do was walk across the street to return Fiji’s dishes.

The previous Thursday evening, he’d taken a break from work to watch the small group of women who came to Fiji’s “self-discovery” evening. Manfred had recognized the type from his own clientele: women dissatisfied with their humdrum lives, women seeking some power, some distinction. There was nothing wrong with such a search—in fact, people searching for something above and beyond the humdrum world were his bread and butter—but he doubted any of them had the talent he’d seen lurking in Fiji when he’d opened the door to find her standing there in jeans and a peasant blouse, a plate in her left hand and a pitcher in her right.

Fiji was not what he thought of as his “type.” It didn’t bother him at all that she was older than he was; he found that suited him just fine, as a rule. But Fiji was too curvy and fluffy. Manfred tended to like hard, lean women—tough chicks. However, he had to appreciate the home Fiji had made for herself. The closer you got to the stone cottage with its patterned-brick trim, the more charming it was. He admired the flowers that were still burgeoning in the pots and barrels in Fiji’s yard, despite the fact that it was late September. The striped marmalade cat known as Mr. Snuggly displayed himself elegantly under a photinia. Even the irregular paving stones leading to the porch were laid in an attractive pattern.

He knocked, since Fiji’s place wasn’t open on Sunday.

“Come in!” she called. “Door’s open.”

A bell over the door tinkled delicately as he went in, and he saw Fiji’s unruly head suddenly appear over the top of the counter.

“Hi, neighbor,” he said. “I came to return your stuff. Thanks again for the cookies and the lemonade.” He held out the plate and pitcher, as if he had to provide evidence of his good intentions. He tried not to stare too obviously at the shelves in the shop, which were laden with things he considered absolute junk: books about the supernatural, ghost stories, and guides to tarot readings and dream interpretation. There were hanging sun catchers and dream catchers. There were two mortar-and-pestle sets that were pretty nice, some herb-gardening guides, alleged athames, tarot cards, Ouija boards, and other accoutrements of the New Age occultist.

On the other hand, Manfred liked the two squashy flowered armchairs sitting opposite each other in the center of the floor, a magazine or two on the small table between them. Fiji stood up, and he saw she was flushed. It didn’t take a psychic to tell she was really irritated about something.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Oh, this damn spell,” she said, as if she were talking about the weather. “My great-aunt left it to me, but her handwriting was atrocious, and I’ve tried three different ingredients because I can’t figure out what she meant.”

Manfred had not realized that Fiji openly admitted she was a witch, and for a second he was surprised. But she had the talent, and if she wanted to lay herself open to judgment like that, okay. He’d encountered much weirder shit. He set down the plate and the pitcher on the counter. “Let me see,” he offered.

“Oh, I don’t mean to trouble you,” she said, obviously flustered. She had on reading glasses, and her brown eyes looked large and innocent behind the lenses.

“Think of it as a thank-you note for the cookies.” He smiled, and she handed over the paper.

“Damn,” he said, after a moment’s examination. Her great-aunt’s handwriting looked like a dirty-footed chicken had danced across the page. “Okay, which word?”

She pointed to the scribble that was third on the list. He looked at it carefully. “Comfrey,” he said. “Is that an herb?”

Her eyes closed with relief. “Oh, yes, and I have some growing out back,” she said. “Thanks so much!” She beamed at him.

“No problem.” He smiled back. “I’m going down to Home Cookin for dinner. You want to come?”

He’d had no intention of asking her, and he hoped he wasn’t sending the wrong message (if a casual dinner invitation could be the wrong message), but there was something vulnerable about Fiji that invited kindness.

“Yeah,” she said. “I’m out of anything remotely interesting to eat. And it’s Sunday, right? That’s fried chicken or meat loaf day.”

After she locked the shop (now Manfred knew he was not the only one who continued his city ways) and patted the cat on its head, they walked west. Manfred had gotten into the habit of casting a glance down the driveway that ran to the back of the pawnshop. Though his view wasn’t as good from the south side of the street, he did it now.

Because he was an observant kind of guy, Manfred had noticed soon after he’d moved in that there were usually three vehicles parked behind Midnight Pawn. Bobo Winthrop drove a blue Ford F-150 pickup, probably three years old. The second car was a Corvette. Manfred was no car buff, but he was sure this was a classic car, and he was sure it was worth huge bucks. It was usually covered with a tarp, but Manfred had caught a glimpse of it one night when he was putting out the trash. The Vette was sweet. The third car was relatively anonymous. Maybe a Honda Civic? Something small and four-door and silver. It wasn’t shiny new, and it wasn’t old.

Manfred hoped the hot chick, Olivia, drove the Vette. But that would be almost too good, like pancakes with real maple syrup and real butter. And who was the second tenant? Manfred thought the smart thing to do would be to wait until someone volunteered the information.

“How do you get enough traffic through the store?” he asked Fiji, because he’d been silent long enough. “For that matter, how does anyone in Midnight keep a business open? The only busy place is the Gas N Go.”

“This is Texas,” she said. “People are used to driving a long way for anything. I’m the only magical-type place for—well, I don’t know how big an area, but big. And people crave something different. I always get a decent crowd on my Thursday nights. They come from forty or fifty miles away, some of ’em. I do some Internet business, too.”

“You don’t sell love charms or fertility charms out your back door?” he asked, teasing.

“Great-Aunt Mildred did something like that.” She looked at him with an expression that dared him to make something of it.

“I’m cool with that,” Manfred said immediately.

She only nodded, and then they were at the restaurant. He opened the door for her, and she went in ahead of him, her expression somewhat chilly, as far as Manfred could interpret it.

Home Cookin was almost bursting with activity this evening. Joe and Chuy were sitting at the big round table. There was a husky man with them, someone he hadn’t met, jiggling a fussy baby. Manfred noticed cars far more than he did babies (and shoes and fingernails), but he thought this infant was the same size as the one he’d seen the first time he’d been in Home Cookin. That made the chances good that this was Madonna’s baby; he figured the man was Madonna’s, too.

As the electronic chime sounded and the door swung shut behind them, Manfred looked to his right. The two tables for two by the front window were occupied, and one of the four booths on the west wall. Reverend Emilio Sheehan (the Rev) sat by himself at his usual table, not the one next to the door but the second one. And his back was to the entrance, a placement that practically screamed “leave me alone.” This evening he had brought a Bible to read. It lay open on the table before him. Two men, not natives of Midnight, were at the table closest to the door. They were preoccupied with their drinks and menus.

Though Manfred was sure he hadn’t met all the townspeople, he knew the family sitting in the U-shaped booth was also just passing through. The four of them looked too . . . too shiny to be residents. Mama had subtly streaked hair, breast implants, and expensive-casual slacks and sweater. Dad was wearing rich-rancher clothes (gleaming leather boots and a pristine cowboy hat). The kids—a boy about three or four, a girl maybe two years older—were looking around them for something to do.

“Excuse me!” the mother called to Madonna, who was pouring tea for Chuy. “Do you have some colors or games for the children?”

Madonna turned to regard her with astonishment. “No,” she said. After she put the tea up on the counter, she vanished into the kitchen.

The mom gave the dad a significant look, as if to say, I don’t like this, but I’m not going to rile the natives. Manfred deduced it was some planning error on the dad’s part that had led to this unlikely family eating dinner at Home Cookin. He did not think the dad was going to get to forget about it for a couple of days. However, the family cheered up when Madonna brought out their dinner plates on a huge tray. The food looked good and smelled wonderful. Madonna had help tonight: Manfred caught a glimpse of someone moving around in the kitchen when the swinging doors were open. As the family began to eat, the restaurant grew quieter.

Manfred and Fiji had taken seats at the big round table—he in the same chair he’d had before, facing the front door, and Fiji by the man holding the baby, with an empty chair or two between her and Manfred. Maybe she was more steamed about his selling-spells remark than he’d thought. Joe and Chuy said hello to Manfred, but they could hardly wait to tell Fiji about a woman who’d brought in an old book for Joe to look at. Manfred gathered that the book was an account of witches in Texas in the early part of the twentieth century.

Madonna’s man was putting a bib on the baby and seemed pretty busy with the process, so Manfred put off introducing himself. While he waited, he evaluated the newcomers by the door. The two strangers at the small table fit in a bit better than the affluent family. They were both wearing worn jeans and T-shirts. Their boots were scuffed. The taller of the two, a dark-haired man, was wearing an open plaid sport shirt over his tee. His beard and mustache were neatly trimmed. The smaller man had medium brown hair; he was clean-shaven. Manfred set them in their early thirties.

The opening of the two swinging doors into the kitchen attracted Manfred’s gaze. He only had to turn his head to the right to see the girl who emerged from the kitchen carrying two salads. Manfred’s attention was instantly riveted. His eyes followed her as she crossed the room to the two men by the door. She set the salads in front of them, returned to the counter to get two packages of dressing, and took the packages back to the table along with a basket of crackers. Manfred knew the people at his table were talking, but they might as well have been making paper chains for all he knew.

Fiji was talking baby talk to the child, so Manfred leaned to his left. “Chuy, excuse me. Who’s that? The girl serving?”

After a moment, it dawned on Manfred that the conversation at his table had stopped. He looked at Chuy, beside him, then at Fiji, Joe, and the dark man with the baby. They were all regarding him with some amusement.

“That’s Creek Lovell,” Chuy said, his grin broadening.

“Her dad owns the Gas N Go on the other corner,” Fiji said. “By the way—Manfred, meet Teacher.” She nodded at the dark man.

“Good to meet you. How’s the little . . .” And he stopped dead. For the life of him, he couldn’t remember if the baby was a boy or girl. “Grady!” he said triumphantly.

“Good save, man,” Teacher said. “Till you have ’em, they’re hardly top of your list. Yeah, this is Grady, he’s eight months old, and I do handyman work. So if you need some home repairs, give me a call.”

“Teacher can do anything,” Joe said. “Plumbing, electric, carpentry.”

“Thank you, my friend,” Teacher said, with a blinding smile. “Yes, I’m a handy guy to have around. I help Madonna out here, and every now and then I work for Shawn Lovell over at the gas station, when he just has to have a night off. And I fill in for Bobo, too. Call me if you need me.” He fished a card out of his pocket and slid it across the table to Manfred, who pocketed it.

“I’m not good with anything but the most basic hammer jobs myself, so I’ll be doing that,” Manfred said, and then reverted to a more interesting topic. “So, how old is Creek?” he asked. His attempt to sound casual was a dismal failure; even he knew that.

Joe laughed. “Not old enough,” he said. “Or, wait, maybe she is. Yeah, she graduated from high school last May. We gave her a gift certificate to Bed Bath and Beyond, so she could get stuff for her dorm room. But apparently she’s not going to college, at least not this semester. You know why, Fiji?”

Fiji’s forehead wrinkled. “Something was wrong with their loan application, I think,” she said, shaking her head. “Something didn’t come through with the financing. She’s still hoping that’ll get straightened out, even if her dad’s lukewarm about her leaving. I feel bad for Creek; she didn’t go to college, her puppy got killed, and her dad watches every move those kids make. A girl as young and smart as Creek doesn’t need to be hanging around Midnight.”

“True,” Manfred said. Though height was not a major issue with Manfred, he was pleased to note that Creek was at least two inches shorter than he was. Her black hair was just down past her jawline, all one length, and it swung forward and backward with every step she took. Her skin was apparently poreless and clear, her eyebrows smooth dark strokes, her eyes light blue.

She was not really thin. She was not really curvy. She was just right.

“A word to the wise,” Chuy said. “Don’t let Shawn see you looking at his baby girl that way. He takes his job as her dad pretty seriously.” All the men at the table were smiling, and even Fiji looked amused.

“Of course he does,” Manfred said, breaking himself out of his trance. “And I don’t mean any disrespect,” he added. Was it disrespectful to hope someday he would be naked with Creek Lovell? And was it even more disrespectful to pray that it would be sooner rather than later?

“How old are you?” Joe asked.

“Twenty-two.” Almost twenty-three, and it felt strange to try to minimize his age, rather than stretch it.

“Oh.” Joe digested that. “You’re closer to her age than anyone in town.” He met his partner’s eye. Chuy shrugged. “May be a good thing,” he said. “Manfred, keep in the front of your mind the fact that all of us like the girl and none of us want her hurt.”

“It’s at the top of my list,” Manfred said, which was not completely true. The way she walked, smooth and even, that was at the top of his list of things he noted about Creek Lovell. He reminded himself that she could have attended her senior prom only months ago . . . which went some way to quell the involuntary physical reaction he had when he watched her cross the room. Some way.

It was not quite full dark outside, and the family of outsiders had finished their meat loaf and fried chicken. The little girl was beginning to pick on her younger sibling, and the mom was casting desperate looks toward the kitchen. Madonna was cooking, to judge from the sounds of pots and pans and the sizzle of frying, and Creek hurried out with the plates for the two men sitting together. She put them down, gave the men an impersonal smile, and scurried over to the booth to take the payment tucked into the black plastic folder the dad was extending.

Just after the sun set, the bell over the door chimed as Bobo walked in with a man Manfred had never seen. As Manfred had noted before, his landlord was lucky enough to have a pleasing color palette; his hair was golden blond, his eyes were bright blue, his skin was a golden dusky tan. And he was tall, robust. His companion was more like—Bobo bleached and dried and shrunken. Instead of blond, his hair was platinum: the same shade as Manfred’s, but the newcomer’s hair was natural. His eyes were a pale, pale gray. His skin was . . .

“White as snow,” Manfred whispered, remembering the old fairy tale Xylda had read to him. “His skin was white as snow.”

Joe glanced at Manfred and nodded. “Be cool,” he said, very quietly. “That’s Lemuel.”

Manfred planned on being cool as cool could be, since he wasn’t sure exactly what Lemuel was—but no one had given Nice Normal Family the same memo. The children fell silent as the newcomer glanced around the room. He smiled at the children, who looked terrified. At least they were too frightened to speak, which was almost certainly a good thing. The two visitors kept their eyes down on their plates after a quick glance upward, and they very deliberately did not look up.

The Rev didn’t even stop reading his Bible.

“This is beyond weird,” Manfred said in a voice no louder than a whisper, but the bleached man looked at him with a smile.

Good God, Manfred thought. He had a ridiculous impulse to jump to his feet and interpose himself between the bleached man and Creek Lovell, but it was really fortunate he didn’t act on that. Creek returned with the family’s change, and after she placed it on their table, she flung her arms around the bleached man’s neck—which Manfred wouldn’t have done for any amount of money—and said, “I haven’t seen you in so long, Uncle Lemuel! How are you?”

Released from their table by Creek’s return, the mom and dad gathered all their belongings and shepherded the two kids, still openmouthed and staring, out the door of the Home Cookin Restaurant as quickly as possible. Manfred followed them with his eyes. Once outside, the mom stood on one side of the car, gripping the daughter’s hand, the dad on the other side with the boy in his arms. They spoke to each other briefly and intensely across the hood of the car before piling in and speeding away.

“Uncle” Lemuel (if he was Creek’s uncle, Manfred was an insurance salesman) gingerly embraced the girl and gave her a kiss on the hair. Lemuel was not any taller than Manfred, and even more slightly built, but his presence was bigger than his body. The eye could not pass over Lemuel; it was caught and fascinated. Manfred thought, I could have skipped getting all this body art if I’d dyed myself dead white, but he knew that he was simplifying.

The two strangers by the window had finally looked up now that Lemuel’s back was to them. They looked determined not to flee or flinch. The scene seemed frozen for a long moment, and then Lemuel’s eyes met Manfred’s and held. It was like being fixed in place by an icicle.

Bobo started forward, gently nudging his companion, and the connection was broken. Thank God, Manfred thought, an acknowledgment he didn’t make very often.

In seconds Bobo and Lemuel had seated themselves, Lemuel at Manfred’s right and Bobo in the seat between Lemuel and Fiji. I can almost feel the cold coming off him, Manfred thought, and turned to look welcoming. He registered that the girl Creek had hustled over to ask the two men by the door if they needed anything, before pausing by the Rev’s table. After that, she buzzed over to find out what Bobo would like to drink, and Manfred got to enjoy her nearness, but his pleasure was muted by Lemuel’s proximity.

After opting for sweetened iced tea, Bobo said, “Lemuel, meet the newest guy in town. Manfred Bernardo, meet my basement tenant, Lemuel Bridger.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Manfred said, extending his hand. After a slight pause, Lemuel Bridger gripped it. An icy chill ran up Manfred’s arm. He had to fight an impulse to yank his hand from Lemuel’s and cringe back in his chair. Out of sheer pride, Manfred managed to smile. “Have you lived here long, Lemuel?”

“Almost forever,” the pale man answered. His eyes were fixed on Manfred, intense with interest. “A real long time.”

His voice was not anything like Manfred had expected. It was deep and rough, and Lemuel’s accent was just a bit unfamiliar. It was definitely a western accent, but it was like a western accent interpreted by someone from another country. Manfred was on the verge of asking Lemuel if he’d been born in America, when he remembered that asking personal questions was not the style in Midnight—and he’d already asked one. Lemuel released his hand and Manfred lowered it into his lap casually, hoping the feeling would come back soon.

“How are you going with your box schedule?” Bobo asked Manfred. “Still opening three a day?” He was smiling a nice warm smile, but Manfred knew that Bobo was not a happy man in his heart.

“I have a day left,” Manfred said. (He’d realized long ago that most often you had to react to what was on the surface.) “Then I’ll be done. My bad luck that all my files and paper stuff must be in one of the last three boxes.”

“You don’t go by what’s in them?” Joe said. Creek was smiling, just a little, to Manfred’s pleasure.

“Nope. I just open the next three boxes in the stack,” Manfred confessed. He could read the complex of thoughts on Fiji’s face: She had the impulse to tell him she would have helped; she had the awareness he didn’t need or want her help; she made the decision to keep her mouth shut.

His grandmother had taught him how to read faces, and because of his natural aptitude, it hadn’t taken long to develop his skills. While Fiji was an easy subject, and Bobo, too, Creek had depths and undercurrents. Joe and Chuy registered as agreeable and warm, but reserved. Lemuel was as opaque as a wall. Manfred struggled not to turn to his right to stare at his new acquaintance.

Lemuel, meantime, seemed just as interested in Manfred as Manfred was in him. He stared at Manfred’s eyebrow, the one that had so many rings in it that the hair was hard to see. Since a few of Manfred’s tattoos were visible in his short-sleeved T-shirt, Lemuel spent some time examining those, too. Manfred’s right arm was decorated with a large ankh, and his left with a lightning bolt, his newest embellishment.

“Did that hurt?” Lemuel asked Manfred when the conversation about the weather and Manfred’s move had been exhausted.

“Absolutely,” Manfred said.

“Did you need to get ’em for your job, or you just like ’em?” The pale gray eyes in the snow-white face were fixed on him with curiosity.

“A combination,” Manfred said. He felt compelled to be honest. “They’re not exactly necessary for my job, but they make me stand out more, seem more interesting and alien, to the people who hire me. I’m not just another smooth con man in a suit.” It felt strange to be telling so much truth.

Lemuel waited, obviously aware he’d not gotten the whole answer. Manfred felt like he’d lost the brakes on his conversational car as he continued, “But I did pick symbols I liked, ones that had a personal meaning. No point in getting tattooed with dolphins and rainbows.”

From Fiji’s sudden, deep flush, Manfred was sure she had a little dolphin tattooed somewhere and that she had felt very dashing at getting inked. He liked the witch a lot, but he couldn’t seem to avoid stepping on her toes.

To Manfred’s relief, Creek came to take their order, and not only did he get to break eye contact with Lemuel, he got to look at Creek some more: a win-win situation.

Like everyone else, he glanced at the door when the bell tinkled.

Olivia Charity had arrived. It was interesting, when Manfred thought about it later, the difference between Olivia’s entrance and Lemuel’s. Or maybe it was not the entrance that made the difference—both of them had just walked in, no posing, no attitude. It was the reaction of the Home Cookin patrons. When Lemuel had joined them, wildness and death had walked in the door, though the drama inherent in that statement made Manfred uncomfortable. When Olivia stepped inside, it was sort of like the first appearance of Lauren Bacall in an old movie. You knew someone amazing and interesting had entered the room, and you knew she didn’t suffer fools gladly.

Olivia registered everyone in the diner as she strode to the round table. Manfred didn’t think she missed a thing. As she took the chair opposite him, the one between Chuy and Teacher, he stared. It was the first time he’d seen her up close. Her hair was a reddish brown, almost auburn, but he suspected that was not her natural color. Her eyes were green, and he was sure they were colored by contact lenses. She was wearing ripped jeans and a brown leather bomber jacket that looked as soft as a baby’s cheek, and underneath it she wore an olive green T-shirt. No jewelry today.

“You’re the new guy, right?” she said. “Manfred?” Her voice was not a western voice; if he’d had to guess, he’d have said Oregon or California.

“Yep. You must be Olivia,” Manfred said. “We’re next-door neighbors.”

She smiled and immediately looked five years younger. Before the smile, Manfred would have estimated her age at maybe thirty-six, but she was not that old, not at all. “Midnight is so small that everyone here is a neighbor,” she said, “even the Rev.” She inclined her head toward the old man, who had not turned to look to see who had come in.

“I’ve never talked to him.” Manfred glanced at the Rev. The small man had put his big hat on the other side of his table while he ate, and the overhead lights glinted off his scalp. But there were only a few strands of gray in the remaining hair.

“You may never talk to him,” she said. “He likes to keep his thoughts and words to himself.” And because Manfred was watching Olivia so closely, he noticed that while her head was turned in the Rev’s direction, she was actually looking at the two men by the door. Then she glanced at Lemuel. Their eyes met, and she gave a tiny tilt of her head in the direction of the strangers’ table.

The strangers were studiously minding their own business, but in a way that seemed a little too obvious to Manfred.

Creek hustled out of the kitchen then. “Sorry, Olivia, I was getting another meat loaf out of the oven,” the girl said. While Olivia was choosing her food, Manfred realized that while everyone else at the table had ordered, Creek had not asked for Lemuel’s selection. Manfred opened his mouth to say something about the omission, then thought the better of it. Lemuel would speak up if he wanted something. Manfred was fairly sure Lemuel did not eat, anyway.

It wasn’t long before Madonna and Creek brought out the plates. Teacher had finished feeding Grady some plums from a Gerber jar, and he handed the child over to Madonna, who carried him off into the kitchen while the people of Midnight enjoyed their meal. Manfred, who had never been too particular about food, was deeply impressed with Madonna’s cooking. After a lot of meals spent by himself, he actually enjoyed passing salt and pepper, butter, and rolls. The flurry of little activities that constituted a communal meal felt pleasant.

He also liked watching Creek move around the room, though he warned himself not to look at her too often. He didn’t want to be creepy.

Olivia talked about an earthquake in East Texas, Fiji commented on how late the county garbage truck had been this past week, and Bobo told them a man had come in the afternoon before, trying to pawn a toilet. A used one.

Because he was curious about the two strangers, Manfred cast a glance in their direction several times during the meal. Since he was facing their table, he could do that without being obvious. They had ordered coffee and dessert (cherry pie or coconut cream pie), and they were lingering. In Manfred’s experience, silent men didn’t dawdle over food. Talking women might, talking men maybe. Silent men paid and left.

“They’re watching someone here, or they’re waiting for something to happen,” he murmured.

“Yes, but which?” Lemuel replied, in a voice so low it was almost inaudible.

Manfred hadn’t been aware he was speaking out loud, and he had to check his startle reflex. He choked on a bite of yeast roll, and Lemuel offered him a drink of water, his eyes distantly amused.

Everyone at the table tried to look away discreetly while Manfred recovered himself. It was a relief when he could say, “Went down wrong. Fine in a second!” so they could all relax and resume their conversations. A cold hand against the back of his neck was a help, oddly, and the fact that Creek looked concerned as she carried the empty bread basket back to the kitchen.

Yeah, Manfred thought. ’Cause choking guys look soooo cool.

“What do you think?” Lemuel said, in the voice that nearly wasn’t there.

Manfred turned his head a little to look into the eyes that were exactly the color of—wait, he nearly had it—the color of snow and ice melting over asphalt, a cold gray. “I thought they must be watching you or Olivia,” he said, though he couldn’t get as close to silent as the creature next to him. He managed well enough that Joe (to his left) didn’t hear him but kept up his conversation with Chuy about Chuy’s cousin’s upcoming visit.

“That’s what I thought, too,” said Lemuel. “Which one of us is the target, do you reckon?”

“Neither,” Manfred said, in a normal voice, and then hastily looked away and brought his volume down to extra-low. “They’re watching Bobo. They’re interested in you and Olivia because you’re his tenants.”

Lemuel did not reply. Manfred was sure he was chewing over this idea, seeing if it could be digested.

“Because of Aubrey, maybe,” Lemuel said, just when Manfred was sure the topic was concluded.

“Who’s Aubrey?” Manfred asked blankly.

“Not now,” Lemuel said. He tilted his head very slightly toward Bobo. “Some later time.”

Manfred patted his lips with his napkin and put it by his plate, which was still half full. He’d eaten enough. He wondered if Lemuel would suddenly pounce on the two strangers and kill them in some horrific way. Or maybe Madonna would charge out of the kitchen with a cleaver in her hand and fall upon them.

It seemed possible in Midnight.

“Ridiculous,” he muttered.

“What?” said Chuy, across Joe.

“The amount I’ve eaten is ridiculous,” Manfred said. “You’d think I was a starving dog.” Too late, he noticed his half-full plate contrasted with Chuy’s empty one.

Chuy laughed. “I always figure if I only eat here two or three times a week and I’m careful all my other meals, I’m okay,” he said. “And you’d be surprised how many times I have to lift things in the store . . . plus, taking turns with Joe walking the dog, and doing yard work. I keep telling myself I need to start jogging, but Rasta won’t pick up the pace when we’re out.” And Chuy was off and running . . . about the dog.

Once Rasta was the topic of conversation, Manfred didn’t have to say a word. He’d observed that a small percentage of pet owners are simply silly about their pets, especially the owners who don’t have human kids in residence. Part of that silliness lay in assuming other people would find stories about the pet as fascinating as the owner did. But (Manfred had always figured) there were a lot worse things to make false assumptions about.

For example, he found it far more pleasant to think about a little fluffy dog than to wonder what two strangers were doing at Home Cookin. Two lurking strangers. And it was far better to consider Rasta’s history of constipation than the cold hand gripping his own under the table. When Joe turned to ask Chuy a question about a television show they’d watched, Manfred was left alone with his acute anxiety.

He didn’t want to offend the terrifying Lemuel, but he wasn’t used to holding hands with a guy. Manfred liked to think of himself as cool and comfortable with all sexual orientations, but the grip Lemuel had on his fingers was hard to interpret. It was not a caress, but it didn’t seem like a restraint, either.

So Manfred took a sip of his water left-handed and hoped his face wasn’t all weird.

“Manfred,” Fiji said, “do you watch a lot of television?”

She was trying, very kindly, to draw him back into the conversation, since Joe and Chuy had transitioned from the dog’s bowels to an argument about Survivor with Teacher.

“I have one,” Manfred said.

Even Olivia laughed, though Manfred noticed that while he’d been preoccupied with Lemuel, she’d edged her chair out from the table, perhaps so she could rise quickly. She’d also told Joe and Chuy she sided with Teacher on the Survivor issue (whatever it was), and she’d angled her chair to align with Teacher’s, so she could see the men by the door without turning her head too much.

“She has a gun,” Lemuel said in that voice that was audible to Manfred alone.

“I figured,” Manfred said. He was feeling unaccountably tired. Suddenly he figured it out. “You leeching?”

“I’m sorry, yes.” Lemuel turned his head to look at Manfred. His flaxen hair brushed his collar. “I am a bit unusual.”

“No shit,” Manfred muttered.

Lemuel smiled. “Absolutely none.”

“Don’t they have a bottle of blood here for you? Wouldn’t that help?”

“I can’t tolerate the synthetics. They come up as fast as they go down. I can drink the real stuff in any method of delivery. Energy is just as good.”

“You got enough, now? Think you can let go?”

“Sorry, fellow,” Lemuel whispered, and the cold hand slid away.

Manfred thought, I feel like a pancake that’s been run over by a tank. He wasn’t sure he could get up and walk out of the restaurant. He decided it would be a sound idea to sit right where he was for a few minutes.

“Drink,” said the sepulchral whisper, and Manfred carefully reached for his glass of water. But the white hand interposed a glass of a dark beverage full of ice. Manfred put it to his lips, discovering the glass contained sweet tea, very sweet tea. Normally he would not have been interested, but suddenly that seemed like exactly what he’d been longing for. He drank the whole thing. When he put down his empty glass, he caught sight of Joe’s startled face.

“Thirsty,” he said brusquely.

“I guess so,” Joe said, looking a little puzzled and concerned.

Manfred felt much better after a moment or two.

“Eat,” whispered Lemuel. Though his hands were still a little shaky, Manfred now finished his dinner completely. His plate was as bare as Chuy’s.

“I got my second wind,” he said sociably to Chuy and Joe (though why he had to cover for Lemuel, he couldn’t have expressed in words). “I think I missed lunch, too. I’m going to have to watch that.”

“I wish skipping meals was my problem,” Joe said, patting his gut. “The older I get, the more my metabolism slows down.”

That sparked a discussion about treadmills that engaged the whole table. Manfred was only obliged to look attentive. He wanted to leave, so he could get back to his house and think about what had just happened—decide if he was angry at Lemuel “borrowing” from him, if he was cool with it, or if he should make an “okay for one time but don’t do it again” speech. At the same time, he was sure he needed to sit for a while longer.

Everyone at the table had finished eating now, and only Bobo ordered coffee. Teacher ordered cherry pie, and at Lemuel’s urging Manfred got the coconut pie. Creek brought it to him. She was as pleasant with him as she was with everyone else—no more. But no less, he told himself.

Well, he hadn’t ever imagined it would be easy to make an impression on her, even though he was the only male close to her age in Midnight. A girl as amazing as Creek would know she had plenty of options just down the road.

And that was what flipped him over to the “cool with it” option about the incident with Lemuel. Creek liked Lemuel well enough to call him “Uncle.” So she wouldn’t be disposed to date anyone who publicly freaked out about Lemuel being an energy-sucking vampire.

Manfred was relieved to find a practical reason for doing what he instinctively felt was the right thing. After all, if you live next door to an apex predator, you shouldn’t go around poking him with a stick.

Fiji rose to depart, and a chorus of protests went up. (This group was as clannish as it was disparate, Manfred thought.) “Guys, I have to get home and feed Mr. Snuggly,” she said, and there was a collective groan. She raised her hands, laughing. “Okay, it’s a silly name, but I inherited the name along with the cat,” she said. “I think he’s gonna live forever.”

Bobo, Chuy, and Joe began a mild argument about how long Mildred Loeffler had owned Mr. Snuggly before she passed away. Fiji lingered long enough to chip in some solid information. The vet’s records indicated that Mr. Snuggly had lived with Mildred for a year before her demise, that he had been a kitten when Aunt Mildred had taken him in for his first shots; that set the cat’s age at four years. “So Mr. Snuggly’s in the prime of his life,” she finished, and putting a careful ten dollars by her plate, she left.

There seemed to be no moon that night. The plate glass windows were filled with blackness. “Should I walk back with her?” Manfred asked in a low voice. “Or would that be, you know, sexist?”

“That would be sexist,” Olivia said. She smiled around the table. “But I’ll step outside to watch until she gets to her house.”

Manfred didn’t believe for one minute that Olivia’s real purpose was to ensure Fiji’s safe journey back to her cottage. Fiji was safe, and Olivia knew it. Manfred was sure Olivia was going to the door to examine the two strangers more closely.

What a complicated evening it had turned out to be. “Is every evening here like this?” he asked Lemuel.

“Oh, no, never before,” Lemuel said. He seemed quite serious.

Joe and Chuy had been arguing over whose turn it was to walk Rasta, whom they’d left at home, so they didn’t hear Lemuel’s remark. But Bobo looked at him quizzically. “Something wrong?” he asked.

“Don’t worry,” Lemuel said. He smiled at Bobo. Most people would have found this terrifying, but Bobo smiled back, perfect white teeth flashing in a tan face. Bobo would be comfortably handsome the rest of his life, Manfred realized, and tried not to be envious.

The Rev made a silent departure, leaving his plate quite clean and not waving good-bye to anyone. As he passed Olivia at the door, he patted her shoulder. Olivia did not speak, nor did he. After she’d stood in the doorway for approximately the time it would take for a woman to get to her cottage after crossing the Davy highway, Olivia returned to the table.

The two men by the door had eaten all their pie and drunk all their coffee. Creek had come by the table twice to see if they needed anything else, and she’d left the bill between them on her second pass. Still the two were exchanging idle comments, as if they’d realized they had to justify their presence at the table.

Finally, Madonna came out of the kitchen and rang the bell on the counter. “Guys and gals, I love being a social center for this little town, but I need to get Grady and Teacher home, and I need to watch me some television. So you all clear out and let us close up.”

You can’t get any more straightforward than that, Manfred thought.

Those who hadn’t paid got out their wallets. Manfred noticed that the two strangers paid Creek in cash before they slipped out the door, watched closely by Olivia, Lemuel, and Manfred.

“They’re all wrong,” Manfred said to Lemuel. He watched as Olivia left the diner by herself, moving quickly and neatly.

Lemuel’s snow-slush eyes regarded him briefly. “Yes, young man, they are.” Madonna was standing by Teacher, holding Grady, who was heavy-eyed. Lemuel rose and stepped away to pat the baby on the head. Grady didn’t seem to mind Lemuel’s chilly touch; a pat on the head and a smile was all it took to make the baby gleeful. He stretched out a little hand to Lemuel, who bent to give it a quick kiss. Grady waved his arms enthusiastically. Lemuel drifted closer to the door. Though Manfred hadn’t noticed Madonna and Grady tense at Lemuel’s attentions, he did notice when they relaxed.

Abruptly, Manfred felt foolish. Why had he been so concerned? Two men he’d never seen had eaten in a restaurant and lingered in a somewhat odd way. Lemuel had held his hand. Why should he worry about either of those things?

As Manfred rose to take his own departure, a bit shakily, he thought about his sudden change in attitude. Had his physical proximity to Lemuel affected his judgment? Was his reversion to “everything is probably okay” a valid viewpoint or some kind of mild euphoria induced by Lemuel’s leeching?

Lemuel turned to give Manfred one last enigmatic look before he left the Home Cookin Restaurant.

Bobo, exchanging good nights with Joe and Chuy, seemed oblivious to any undercurrent in the evening . . . and so did the rest of the Midnight people. The strangers had (Manfred assumed) piled into their pickup and driven off, never to be seen again. But as Manfred walked past the area between his house and the pawnshop, he saw that the anonymous silver car was gone.

He suspected strongly that Olivia Charity was following the strangers.

And he thought, It would be interesting to know why they were here. And why Lemuel is different from other bloodsuckers. And—who’s Aubrey?

Then Manfred reminded himself that he was here to work, and to work hard. He was planning for his future. The problems of these people were not his problems.

But he thought about those people until he went to sleep that night, all the same.