sweet intensity of the perfume.
“See,” said Lenora.
I dabbed a touch on my wrist and another drop or two behind my ears.
I actually felt a little bad about taking a wedding gift knowing full well I didn’t intend on getting married at all. Then I got another whiff of the ancient sea lilies, and I didn’t feel that bad at all. Not at all.
I should have listened to the little voice inside me that told me nothing involving the Furies could possibly come to good. But I ignored that voice. I ignored a lot of things I should have paid more attention to….
Oh, Thalia, you make this much too easy for us,
To fool you and your sisters wasn’t much fuss.
We put a minor spell on old Lenora, you see,
Then she backed us up like a faithful chimpanzee.
That perfume you think smells so divine
Is filled with a mutant form of ol’ strychnine.
Like we said before, Scyllia will befall
the first person Thalia touches at her very fine ball.
All thanks to the ancient sea lily perfume,
Tomorrow she’ll have a forever green groom!
One that slobbers and oozes and drips, don’t you know,
With an ugly third eye where there should be a nose!
And who will the finger of blame be pointed at?
Our own little Thalia—a tit for a tat!
THIRTEEN
B ack in our little house in Georgia, Polly tiptoed into my room. All quiet, like a castle mouse hiding from a guard. But I wasn’t sleeping. I was wondering if Tim really liked that evil Backroom Betty and how life on earth wasn’t all adventure and escapades; it was a whole lotta headache.
“I’m awake,” I said in a whisper.
“Oh, good. I wanted to talk. Can I get in bed with you?”
“Well, it’s not that I don’t want you to, but have you noticed where I sleep, Polly? This tub isn’t exactly big enough for the both of us.”
“But I need some sisterly bonding,” she said in her sweetest, most sugary voice.
“Okay, okay, get in.”
She climbed into my tub, her feet to my head and my head to her feet, and got under the comforter I had stolen from Era’s bed. My little sister is hot-blooded; she didn’t really need much in the way of blankets, anyway.
“I just wanted to thank you for your support with this whole Tim thing. I know I pooh-poohed you at first and told you not to bother, but…”
“You did more than tell me not to bother—you threatened me. But that’s cool.”
“Yeah, that; I’m sorry. I really, truly appreciate what you’ve done, helping out. I really think I, well, perhaps I do like him. Can you believe it? He askedme to write this song with him. I’ve put a lot of time into it, and I think it’s going to be really quite good. We’re going to perform it at open-mike night at the Grit. Isn’t that wonderful?”
“Yeah, Polly, that’s great.”
But I wasn’t so sure. I couldn’t shake the sinking feeling that Tim was gonna turn out to be a low-down, dirty perpetrator in need of a swift kick in the…Whoa. I was getting carried away. Polly really liked him, and they were spending some quality time together. She knew him better than I. Yes, I thought, she did know him better, and there was easily, surely, positively a reasonable explanation for what I had seen the other night. Flirting shmirting—Tim was probably just a seriously social guy. The kind of person who gets along with anyone and everyone. He was just being friendly.
“So, last night, late, I wrote a poem. A sort of, well, maybe like a love poem.”
I didn’t say anything. The word speechless came to mind.
“Thalia, what is it? Do you think I’m insane? I don’t know, he tells me all sorts of things, like how beautiful he thinks my voice is and how smart I am, and, well, I just love the way I feel when I am with him—it’s wildly new and…”
“You are all those things and more, and you don’t need to hear them from other people to feel goodabout yourself, Polly.”
“It’s not that,” she said. “I just, well, I like to hear them from
“See,” said Lenora.
I dabbed a touch on my wrist and another drop or two behind my ears.
I actually felt a little bad about taking a wedding gift knowing full well I didn’t intend on getting married at all. Then I got another whiff of the ancient sea lilies, and I didn’t feel that bad at all. Not at all.
I should have listened to the little voice inside me that told me nothing involving the Furies could possibly come to good. But I ignored that voice. I ignored a lot of things I should have paid more attention to….
Oh, Thalia, you make this much too easy for us,
To fool you and your sisters wasn’t much fuss.
We put a minor spell on old Lenora, you see,
Then she backed us up like a faithful chimpanzee.
That perfume you think smells so divine
Is filled with a mutant form of ol’ strychnine.
Like we said before, Scyllia will befall
the first person Thalia touches at her very fine ball.
All thanks to the ancient sea lily perfume,
Tomorrow she’ll have a forever green groom!
One that slobbers and oozes and drips, don’t you know,
With an ugly third eye where there should be a nose!
And who will the finger of blame be pointed at?
Our own little Thalia—a tit for a tat!
THIRTEEN
B ack in our little house in Georgia, Polly tiptoed into my room. All quiet, like a castle mouse hiding from a guard. But I wasn’t sleeping. I was wondering if Tim really liked that evil Backroom Betty and how life on earth wasn’t all adventure and escapades; it was a whole lotta headache.
“I’m awake,” I said in a whisper.
“Oh, good. I wanted to talk. Can I get in bed with you?”
“Well, it’s not that I don’t want you to, but have you noticed where I sleep, Polly? This tub isn’t exactly big enough for the both of us.”
“But I need some sisterly bonding,” she said in her sweetest, most sugary voice.
“Okay, okay, get in.”
She climbed into my tub, her feet to my head and my head to her feet, and got under the comforter I had stolen from Era’s bed. My little sister is hot-blooded; she didn’t really need much in the way of blankets, anyway.
“I just wanted to thank you for your support with this whole Tim thing. I know I pooh-poohed you at first and told you not to bother, but…”
“You did more than tell me not to bother—you threatened me. But that’s cool.”
“Yeah, that; I’m sorry. I really, truly appreciate what you’ve done, helping out. I really think I, well, perhaps I do like him. Can you believe it? He askedme to write this song with him. I’ve put a lot of time into it, and I think it’s going to be really quite good. We’re going to perform it at open-mike night at the Grit. Isn’t that wonderful?”
“Yeah, Polly, that’s great.”
But I wasn’t so sure. I couldn’t shake the sinking feeling that Tim was gonna turn out to be a low-down, dirty perpetrator in need of a swift kick in the…Whoa. I was getting carried away. Polly really liked him, and they were spending some quality time together. She knew him better than I. Yes, I thought, she did know him better, and there was easily, surely, positively a reasonable explanation for what I had seen the other night. Flirting shmirting—Tim was probably just a seriously social guy. The kind of person who gets along with anyone and everyone. He was just being friendly.
“So, last night, late, I wrote a poem. A sort of, well, maybe like a love poem.”
I didn’t say anything. The word speechless came to mind.
“Thalia, what is it? Do you think I’m insane? I don’t know, he tells me all sorts of things, like how beautiful he thinks my voice is and how smart I am, and, well, I just love the way I feel when I am with him—it’s wildly new and…”
“You are all those things and more, and you don’t need to hear them from other people to feel goodabout yourself, Polly.”
“It’s not that,” she said. “I just, well, I like to hear them from
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