This was true on multiple counts.
She did not see the squash god or the roadrunner. She saw a scorpion and shut Copper in the house, then scooped it up with the shovel and carried it out of the garden.
Afterward she thought,I just took care of that and nobody helped. My hands didn’t shake at all. I am a person who can roust scorpions by myself.
Walter couldn’t have done that without freaking out.
She cooked herself dinner and ate it all while Copper crunched her dog food under the table. She washed the dishes and dried them, then dropped onto the couch and stared at the bookcase. She’d been trying to ration out her aunt’s journals, since when she finished those, she was down to such page-turners asField Guide to Minerals of the Southwest, but it occurred to her that if Amelia had been involved with Snake-Eater, she might have written about it. She began pulling down journals and checking dates, wishing that her aunt had been a bit better about shelving things in order.
The stars came out over the garden wall. Insects made skittery, chattery noises. DJ Raven announced that they had been personally contacted by aliens, who had said that the invasion was underway and, in the meantime, the alien government had some requests, which Raven was choosing to ignore because the aliens had lousy taste. Instead Raven played Black Sabbath, Hank Williams, and Handel in that order, then did a dramatic reading fromOld Possum’s Book of Practical Cats.
Halfway through “Growltiger’s Last Stand,” Selena had located the last three journals. She started with the earliest one, flipped past a trip to Iceland, which looked spectacular, and found several pages of sketches of mountains.
Been in a hiking mood lately,Amelia had written next to one.Went down to the Superstitions last week, but hate that arcology looming like it’s going to fall on you. Headed north instead. This is more like it. The mountains aren’t as good but at least the sky’s clear. Thank god for historic zones.
From what Selena could gather, scanning the pages, her aunt had been in the habit of taking water, a compass, and a backpack and simplystrolling out into the desert, often for several days at a time. It seemed wildly dangerous to Selena, but Amelia treated it as if it was a perfectly ordinary pastime.
She was almost at the end when she found a note, above a drawing of three rocks leaning together, that said,Came across a local while out hiking. S was grumpy at first, but warmed up after we talked a bit.
Could it be? Selena held her breath, turned the page ... and found a drawing of a roadrunner.
That’s him! S has to stand for Snake-Eater! But ... grumpy?Selena had had plenty of grumpy customers at the deli. She’d never had one send monsters to stare in her windows.
Also, her aunt was awfully blasé about meeting a local that happened to be a minor god.
It seems you had hidden depths, Aunt Amelia.
She kept reading, hoping for more information, but there wasn’t anything of interest. Just more drawings of mountains, and some notes on the weather, and a pasted-in photo of a sunset. DJ Raven spun up a mournful gothic cover of “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.”
Frustrated, Selena grabbed the next journal. Her aunt went to Mexico, drew pyramids, drank tequila, got food poisoning. It wasn’t until the two-third mark that she wrote,Went to see S today. He was very happy to see me. I think he’s lonely. I should come back more often.
“Don’t do it,” Selena groaned, feeling like an audience member watching a horror movie.
But Amelia did. She went back multiple times, and then apparently it became so common that she stopped writing it down. Selena saw pictures of the same three rocks, and dozens of little roadrunners, along with comments on the weather.
When she came across a doodled cartoon of a roadrunner with heart eyes and the commentSpent the night with S. Wow!she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
It wasn’t until the third journal that the tone began to shift.Haven’t been traveling much,her aunt noted.S gets very anxious when I leave. Itell him I’m fine but he still just freaks out. I know he’s just afraid to lose me, but it’s a good thing he’s cute.
Then:S came to visit the house today.
Then:Needed a nap again today. Must be from S keeping me up all night.
Then:So tired these days. All I want to do is sleep. GB keeps nagging me to see a doctor. Even if she’s right, I’m tired of it. S has been very sweet, though.
Then Selena turned the page and found the next one blank.
She sat on the couch, the blank book in her lap, and wept the last few tears that she had left for Aunt Amelia. Then she carefully slid it back among the other journals on the shelf.
“Well,” she said. “Well.”
On the radio, a song was abruptly interrupted by DJ Raven announcing that the aliens had been in contact again and they had agreed to postpone the invasion if Raven played more Alice Cooper. “I have agreed to this deal for the good of civilization,” DJ Raven announced. “Here’s ‘Poison.’ You’re welcome, Earth.”
Selena snorted and stood up. “Tomorrow I’ll go borrow a book from Grandma,” she told Copper. “I bet she’s got romances full of dirty bits.”
Copper opened one eye, moved her tail a few inches, and closed her eyes again. In a few minutes she began to snore.
I just had a normal day,Selena thought, with a deep sense of relief. She locked the doors to Jackrabbit Hole House and went to sleep.
