Page 25 of Paper Ghosts

This time she did smile. “What? No. Your father was teasing me when he said I spy. I simply watch time go by, and people are a part of time.”

“I’ve met people. I met a girl named Tasha Keller. We play in the park, and we’re going to be in kindergarten together.”

“Keller?” Mim’s smile dropped, and the tea in Bailey’s hands suddenly grew cool. She looked down at it, surprised. She knew, before Mim ever said a word, that she’d said something wrong. But she couldn’t imagine what it was. She was being so agreeable. “I believe we’ve covered all we need to cover. You may go now.”

“Can I come back?”

“We’ll see.”

When her dad said that, it always meant no. Dejected, Bailey set her cup down, careful not to spill any of the untasted tea inside. She stood and extended her hand to Mim. Mim seemed to think she wanted to shake hands, but when she reached out, Bailey placed the jelly beans from her dress pocket in Mim’s cool, dry palm.

Mim was still staring at them as Bailey walked away.

“Come here, child.” Bailey backtracked and stood in front of her, struggling not to cry. “You’ll need help navigating some things while you’re here, things your father doesn’t understand. So I will do it. But I’m not going to tell you what to do. I’m not going to give you ultimatums. I’m not going to tell you my secrets. I will do my best to avoid mistakes my grandmother made, but if I fail, I’m sorry. Will you remember that?”

Bailey nodded.

“All right. We’ll have tea together again soon.”

Bailey was so overcome that she hugged her. Mim hesitated before slowly putting her arms around her and holding her tight, her nose to Bailey’s hair. Then she quickly disengaged herself and dismissed Bailey with a look that Bailey wouldn’t understand for many years. It was like she had just taken on the weight of something she knew she wasn’t strong enough to bear.

But she was going to try anyway.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Sunday afternoon Mim did something Bailey had never seen her do.

She actually left the house.

And Bailey wasn’t the only one startled by it. People immediately got on their phones and called their neighbors, tracking her movements across town the way they might have tracked a grizzly bear that wandered out of the woods. She walked by Mr. Cranston’s house, where he stood stock-still while watering his begonias, hoping she wouldn’t see him. Regina Olmstead said she knew Willamena had walked by a few minutes later because her lights flickered (but, to be fair, her children frequently overloaded her outlets with their chargers); then she came to a stop in front of the house belonging to the principal of the elementary school. She just stood there, nodding slightly as if listening to someone, though no one was around. The principal was watching from his bedroom window, telling the woman behind him to stand back, lest she be seen.

Then Mim walked home.

One of the stories Tasha told Bailey was that Mim only went to church on holidays, and to the hair salon every three months. But the moment someone got too vocal about why she, who almost never showed her face, was given such deference when she did, Mim would quietly pull that person aside and say something that made them look terrified.

Bailey witnessed this herself on her first day of kindergarten.

On Monday morning, just as she and her dad were leaving for school, Mim walked down the hall and informed Tug that she would like to join them.

Tug hesitated by the front door. “Why?”

“Your father was always the one to take you to school. Perhaps I just want to experience it myself.”

“No, really,” he said, as if she were joking. “Why?”

“You wound me, Tug.”

“That’s impossible.”

“What if I ask nicely?”

“You could have asked nicely days ago, and not in front of Bailey.” Then, as if not wanting to argue because he knew Bailey hung on every word when it came to Mim, he said, “We’ll wait for you outside.”

This was even better than Bailey expected. Mim was walking her to school, too! She wondered if this was what Mim meant by helping her navigate things. Maybe Tug would have gotten them lost.

Several minutes passed as Bailey and Tug stood on the sidewalk, misty morning air curling around them like string. Tug kept checking his watch. Finally, he said, “Go tell your grandmother if she doesn’t hurry, we’ll be late.”

Bailey immediately stopped hopping across the sidewalk to feel the satisfying bounce of her new backpack, and ran back up the steps to the front door. Tug had left it slightly ajar, and she could hear Mim talking as she approached.