Read Online The Readaholics and the Falcon Fiasco by Laura Disilverio - Free Book Online
Authors: Laura Disilverio
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the first idea unlikely because breaking into someone’s house is tricky, thought the second idea was a bit contrived (although doable if someone took the time to create a flyer about the “new” tea and some kind of interesting packaging), and were not inclined to go with the third one because we couldn’t visualize someone pulling a Baggie of chopped oleander from their pocket at Starbucks and sprinkling it on Ivy’s beverage unnoticed. I suggested someone might have a Borgia-ish ring for administering poison and Lola shot me down with a look. She said she’d research how much oleander it would take to kill a woman. We carefully steered away from any discussion of who might have wanted to poison Ivy.
Feeling weighted down by Ivy’s death and themystery surrounding it, I left Lola’s and headed back toward town. Passing a familiar turnoff, I suddenly slewed the car to the right. Ivy’s old house, the one where she’d grown up, was at the end of this lane. I hadn’t been down here for ages, maybe not since Ivy sold the family home after her parents died when we were college sophomores. The road turned to gravel after a quarter mile, still corrugated from the winter’s frost heaves and lack of maintenance. I supposed the county was responsible for roads out this way. The road climbed a steep incline and then curved sharply before spitting me out in the small neighborhood where Ivy had lived.
Each house sat on at least two acres and was separated from its neighbors by enough distance that borrowing a cup of milk would have meant a ten-minute round-trip hike. That made it sound like the neighborhood consisted of spacious, custom-built homes, but it was actually composed of older houses, most with large garden plots, some with horses, one with a large chicken coop and a noisy rooster I could hear even from inside the car. I pulled over on the grass verge in front of Ivy’s former home and got out slowly, not sure why I was here, but going with the urge, probably prompted by Ham’s mention of the tree house.
The house had been a dilapidated two-story, weathered gray, when I used to hang out here. Now it sported a vibrant turquoise paint with yellow trim. An entire flock of pink flamingos stood stiffly in the front yard, and garden gnomes peeked from behind every rock and tree. Iremembered Ivy complaining, back when the people she eventually sold the house to were only renters and she’d had to visit to replace a lock, that the woman renter had “never met a piece of kitsch she didn’t buy.” She had vented about doilies and Hummels and cross-stitched pillows and tables made to look like butlers holding trays. We’d laughed about it, but I could tell she’d been a bit sad about all the changes in her childhood home.
Now I avoided the yard and walked around the side of the property to the woods behind it. Unless it had been torn down, there was a tree house back here, far enough not to be seen from the kitchen window, but close enough to hear a mom calling. Ivy’s dad and Ham had built it the summer they moved into the house, and Ivy had claimed it as her special clubhouse. Sometimes I was the favored friend who lolled on the beanbags and read fashion mags and giggled about boys with Ivy, and sometimes it was Brooke or Jennifer or Edith. Ivy had been a one-friend-at-a-time kind of girl, for the most part.
My low-heeled pumps were not intended for hiking, and the layers of damp, molding leaves from autumns past were not improving them, but a glimpse of the tree house made me forget about my shoes. I wondered if maybe another generation of kids had claimed it. I kind of liked that idea, although I thought it was unlikely since it was an older couple who had bought Ivy’s house. If I saw signs of recent habitation, I’d just take a peek and leave without invading their privacy. In thirty more seconds I stood beneath the tree house,looking up at the broad boards that formed its floor. Gaps in the wood that
Feeling weighted down by Ivy’s death and themystery surrounding it, I left Lola’s and headed back toward town. Passing a familiar turnoff, I suddenly slewed the car to the right. Ivy’s old house, the one where she’d grown up, was at the end of this lane. I hadn’t been down here for ages, maybe not since Ivy sold the family home after her parents died when we were college sophomores. The road turned to gravel after a quarter mile, still corrugated from the winter’s frost heaves and lack of maintenance. I supposed the county was responsible for roads out this way. The road climbed a steep incline and then curved sharply before spitting me out in the small neighborhood where Ivy had lived.
Each house sat on at least two acres and was separated from its neighbors by enough distance that borrowing a cup of milk would have meant a ten-minute round-trip hike. That made it sound like the neighborhood consisted of spacious, custom-built homes, but it was actually composed of older houses, most with large garden plots, some with horses, one with a large chicken coop and a noisy rooster I could hear even from inside the car. I pulled over on the grass verge in front of Ivy’s former home and got out slowly, not sure why I was here, but going with the urge, probably prompted by Ham’s mention of the tree house.
The house had been a dilapidated two-story, weathered gray, when I used to hang out here. Now it sported a vibrant turquoise paint with yellow trim. An entire flock of pink flamingos stood stiffly in the front yard, and garden gnomes peeked from behind every rock and tree. Iremembered Ivy complaining, back when the people she eventually sold the house to were only renters and she’d had to visit to replace a lock, that the woman renter had “never met a piece of kitsch she didn’t buy.” She had vented about doilies and Hummels and cross-stitched pillows and tables made to look like butlers holding trays. We’d laughed about it, but I could tell she’d been a bit sad about all the changes in her childhood home.
Now I avoided the yard and walked around the side of the property to the woods behind it. Unless it had been torn down, there was a tree house back here, far enough not to be seen from the kitchen window, but close enough to hear a mom calling. Ivy’s dad and Ham had built it the summer they moved into the house, and Ivy had claimed it as her special clubhouse. Sometimes I was the favored friend who lolled on the beanbags and read fashion mags and giggled about boys with Ivy, and sometimes it was Brooke or Jennifer or Edith. Ivy had been a one-friend-at-a-time kind of girl, for the most part.
My low-heeled pumps were not intended for hiking, and the layers of damp, molding leaves from autumns past were not improving them, but a glimpse of the tree house made me forget about my shoes. I wondered if maybe another generation of kids had claimed it. I kind of liked that idea, although I thought it was unlikely since it was an older couple who had bought Ivy’s house. If I saw signs of recent habitation, I’d just take a peek and leave without invading their privacy. In thirty more seconds I stood beneath the tree house,looking up at the broad boards that formed its floor. Gaps in the wood that
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