Unthinkable by Nancy Werlin

had had to scrounge for financial help
for nursing school. “Money is how you trade for the things
that you need. A few people have lots of it. Most people
have little.”
“I suppose money is one of those things that never really
changes.” Soledad put another piece of paper on the refrigerator. Monthly Food Budget, it said. Fenella looked without
comprehension at the number at the top of the page, and
then turned away.
In general, Ryland was behaving himself, at least. Most
days, he padded behind Fenella from room to room, watching and listening attentively and acting cat-like. He was
adorable, as he had promised, but Fenella was privy to his
thoughts, which were not adorable. He poked fun at the
ragged way Leo dressed, opined that Soledad was too bossy
and that Dawn was spoiled, and, moreover, if the child
didn’t begin to talk soon, he would wonder about her intelligence. He also let Fenella know what his sharp ears had
picked up about Lucy and Zach. She sings to him in bed. She
makes up ridiculous songs about—
“Too much information!” Fenella had picked up this useful phrase from Lucy.
Actually, it’s not. We don’t know yet what will and won’t
be useful.
“I suppose.”
Fenella had to admit that in the absence of the dog
Pierre, Ryland was blending well into the household. He
bestowed irresistibly silky ankle caresses on everyone, was
praised for his neatness at the litter box, and especially
endeared himself by being sweet and patient when Dawn
petted him too enthusiastically. Also, though nobody but
Fenella knew about it, he managed to keep away from the
yarn in Soledad’s knitting basket.
I deserve a medal. I wonder if my sister knew I was going
to be beset by all the normal cat urges.
At this, Fenella smiled despite herself. She didn’t think
the cat’s obsession with yarn was entirely normal. She was
grateful for his presence, though, she realized. Watching
Ryland insinuate his way into the good graces of the family while she listened to his acid commentary helped her to
maintain the assessing distance she badly needed.
She could not afford to love them. She needed to be hard
as stone. She needed to remember she was not one of them.
The next evening, in the living room, something happened to help. Leo had his guitar, and Lucy was singing.
Then suddenly the two of them exchanged glances, nodded
at each other, and launched into a new song. It was a ballad
called “Tam Lin,” and it was plain that this moment was
planned.
Fenella knew “Tam Lin.” She knew it very well indeed.
Her fist clenched as Lucy sang the familiar opening, in
which a young girl named Janet is warned against meddling
with handsome Tam Lin.
Of course Janet does not listen.
Ryland was on Fenella’s lap. She felt him turning his head
to stare at her as her entire body stiffened. She thought
about pushing the cat away, about making an excuse and
leaving the room. Leaving the song. But instead she sat,
thrown back in time by the music, waiting with dread for
the moment in which it would become clear to Janet that
her hot new lover, Tam Lin, was the property of the faeries.
Then she knew she could not stand to hear it.
“Stop!” she shouted. “Stop this song right now!”
The music ceased so abruptly that Fenella’s ears seemed
to ring.
Everyone was staring, but it was Leo who spoke. “It’s
not ‘Scarborough Fair.’ It’s a different Child ballad. We
thought—we hoped—that it would be all right.”
“It’s not,” said Fenella. She turned jerkily to Miranda.
“Miranda, you don’t want to hear this either, do you?”
She was shaking. In her inner ear, the song continued
inexorably, the verses spinning onward.
Janet holding up her head before all the knights and ladies
in her father’s castle and proudly declaring her pregnancy.
Janet listening to Tam Lin’s precise and clear instructions
for how she could use that pregnancy to save him from the
faeries on All Hallows’