“BRB, gorgeous.” Granny Mavis winks. “Gonna go get my shotgun.”
54
JENNA
“You can’t be serious.”
“They have a gizzard,” McCarthy tells me as Edwina clucks at my feet. “Edwina does nothing except eat rocks, so the ring was ground up. You should have let me turn her into Sunday dinner.”
“I protected you, and this is how you repay me?” I scold the bird.
“You’re the one who wants to keep these things as pets.”
“Where’s my Stanley cup?” Bleary-eyed, I peer around. “I’m dehydrated.”
McCarthy sighs and hands it to me.
I fish a Benadryl out of the little pouch.
“Your mom made more mint poultice for you.” Hannah comes over with a jar of goopy, oily green sludge.
I empty the liquid gel in my mouth as Hannah smears the foul-smelling poultice on my rashy face.
“Don’t look at me,” I say to McCarthy with a groan.
“In sickness and in mildly okay health.” He kisses my forehead. “I think you’re the only person I’ve ever met who’s allergic to salmonberries.”
“Why would anyone even test for that? It’s not a common fruit.”
“I like salmonberry jam.”
I glare at McCarthy through puffy eyes. “Not anymore, you don’t.”
“At least you didn’t put it in your vagina.” Hannah pats my shoulder gingerly. Very gingerly because running around outdoors in the buff leads to sunburns in inopportune places.
“Aloe vera.” Zephyr offers me a wedge of the sticky, goopy plant.
“Jenna, you should bring your PR clients here more often!” my mother exclaims, draping a string of flowers around Salinger’s girlfriend.
“No, Mom. Mandy’s not here as a client. She’s here under duress.”
“This is so lovely!” Mandy admires the compound. “You should host weddings here.”
“We should!” Willow beams at me.
“You all really didn’t have to come, but it’s really nice of you to do so,” I tell McCarthy’s brothers.
“Damn right they needed to come,” Granny Mavis declares. “There’s a severe lack of testosterone in this commune.”
“They’re all family now.” My mom buzzes around.
“I’ll sleep with family if they look like that.” Granny Mavis passes out mead.
Mom looks every bit the bride with flowers woven in her honey hair and a handmade dress with just a sheer slipunderneath it. No bra, no undies, because this is a commune, after all.
Meanwhile, I look like Shrek’s older, puffier sister.
“You said you were going to a cult wedding,” Salinger says flatly. “I’m not letting you get kidnapped.”
