Fortunately, she only had three guests this Sunday morning— a couple from the mainland celebrating their twenty-sixth wedding anniversary, and the Mormon boy who dropped in unexpectedly late yesterday afternoon inquiring about a room. Thank goodness BobDan told Shirlene, who told Lady Judy, who called Pearl to warn her that he was in town. She also thought, in general, it was quite considerate of them to wear those short-sleeved white shirts, so they were immediately recognizable.
Proselytizers rarely made the trip out to Frick Island, mostly because, Pearl thought, ninety-nine percent of the island was already Christian, belonging to the Methodist church, even if they didn’t all make it to the Sunday service as often as Pearl thought they should. In fact, Pearl couldn’t remember ever meeting one, but she did open the door to a World Book Encyclopedia seller years ago, and that was three hours of her life and nine hundred dollars she would never get back. That was why she made Harold check the boy in and give him the short welcome spiel and tour of the house, just to be on the safe side. She didn’t know how much he was selling those Books of Mormon for, but she knew she couldn’t afford them.
The one thing she did know about Mormons was that they didn’t drink coffee. She couldn’t remember where she had read that—probably in one of those expensive encyclopedias. Either way, she was proud to show her sensitivity to his religion by not even offering it that morning when she was pouring for the anniversary couple.
Piper banged in the back door. “Sorry I’m late,” she said, hurrying over to where her apron hung on the wall. “Tom likes to sleep in on Sundays, and I forgot to set my alarm.”
“It’s alright,” Mrs. Olecki said, still whisking vigorously, and not batting an eye at the mention of Tom. Not anymore, anyway.
“Mrs. Olecki?”
“Yes, dear?”
“I think that batter is . . . mixed.”
“Oh! Well, it sure is,” she said, pulling the whisk out and tapping it on the side of the bowl. The waffles certainly wouldn’t be as fluffy as usual, but she hoped they didn’t come out like bricks. “Could you warm up the vanilla maple syrup?” she said, looking over her shoulder only to realize Piper was already headfirst in the fridge, pulling out the fresh berries and then the syrup.
Pearl turned back to her batter, opening the waffle iron next to the bowl, the metal hot and ready. But just as she lifted the ladle to pour the first scoop, she heard it.
A scream.
And not just any scream. A high-pitched, toe-curling shriek that forced her hand to drop the ladle back into the bowl and her feet to sprint out into the dining room, where she half expected to find a young girl being hacked to death with an ax, blood everywhere—some kind of scene from those awful horror films Harold loved to watch every Halloween.
What she saw instead when she burst into the room, Piper at her heels, was the Mormon, his face white as his shirt, standing feet away from where he had been sitting at the table, his chair toppled over behind him. The two other guests sat at the table, eyes wide, toggling their gaze between the man and his empty plate. Well, not quite empty.
Mrs. Olecki bent at the waist and narrowed her eyes. And upon this closer inspection, she saw what looked like a small bug.
“What the devil?” Mr. Olecki said, drawing everyone’s attention as he, too, appeared through the swinging door into the dining room and nearly collided with Piper.
“Everything’s fine,” Mrs. Olecki said, waving generally in Mr. Olecki’s direction and closing the gap to the table in two long strides, quickly grabbing the nearest juice glass and flipping it on top of the critter to confine it. “We just had a little visitor at the table this morning.”
“A visitor?”
Piper and Mr. Olecki both leaned closer for a better look. Trapped in the clear tumbler was an insect the size of a quarter, its gray wings freckled with black dots.
“Well, Pearl, that’s just a little ol’ moth,” Mr. Olecki said. “What are you screamin’ and carryin’ on for?”
Mrs. Olecki cleared her throat, her eyes darting to the man, still standing.
As if on cue, the bug fluttered its wings, clearly trying to escape its enclosure, and the man flinched. And Mr. Olecki’s eyebrows climbed closer to his receding hairline, as it dawned on him who had been doing the screaming. He shook his head and mumbled under his breath, “Coulda sworn that was a woman.”
“It landed on my plate,” the man said defensively. “I wasn’t . . . It was . . . unexpected.”
But Mrs. Olecki noticed that his pallor had quickly transitioned from ghost white to a few shades past the pink Double Knock Out roses she worked hard to keep alive on the bushes out front. And his gaze was no longer locked on the bug—it was locked on Piper.
—
Anders stood there, not believing the clash of his fortune and misfortune
