Spindle(54)

Briar froze in the doorway. She’d forgotten he was stopping in. It was so strange to see him here. He and Sadie usually went out instead of hanging around the parlor where he and Briar once spent all their time. Ethel started right in, passing out the leaflets while Briar stood in the doorway. Wheeler looked up and waved before concentrating back on the game.

Ethel was quick to pass out the leaflets as she’d already spoken to each of the girls about the WCTU before. She saw who Briar was fixated on, then stood in her way. “Let’s go.”

Once outside, Ethel marched to the next house. Then she stopped. “You’re not thinking about Wheeler again, are you?”

“No,” she was quick to answer back. Too quick.

Ethel cocked her head. “What if I told you Sadie was going back home to her parents? Would you still not be thinking about Wheeler?”

“She is?”

“They want her to recuperate on the farm. Wheeler’s moving north; she’s moving south. They’re never going to see each other again.”

“Oh.” Briar’s heart took the news with mixed emotions. As long as Sadie was still around, it meant she didn’t have to decide on her true feelings about Wheeler. She’d been trying so hard to move on and in that process had noticed things about Wheeler and her that she didn’t necessarily like. Not that she was comparing him to Henry, but Henry was so steady. She always knew where she stood with him, and that accounted for a lot. Could she ever trust Wheeler again?

Ethel led the way up the walk. “This is our last house. Why don’t you do the talking this time? You’ve heard me plenty.”

“But I couldn’t. I’d get all tongue-tied.”

“You have to start somewhere, Briar. If you’re afraid to try, you won’t get anywhere. Weren’t you scared when you first applied at the mill? Yet you still did it.”

“I had no choice,” she said. It was easy to do something when it was for the children.

“Consider this your first lesson in proactivity. I know you want to keep your family together, but to do so, you’re going to have to learn to advocate for others. It’s not about you, it’s about them. Tell these operatives how meetings like these can help us all. We can go from feeling helpless and powerless to hopeful and powerful.”

Briar gave Ethel a skeptical look.

“Baby steps. You’re still finding your voice. Read the leaflet out loud and invite them to come.”

“I can do that.”

Ethel held back, making Briar open the door. The parlor was half-empty and when Briar stepped in she had everyone’s attention. They were all clearly looking for some excitement to walk through the door.

Briar gave them a shaky smile. “I’m distributing leaflets for the WCTU meeting this week.” She thrust a paper at the closest girl. “We have a special speaker coming in to teach us all how we can band together to make a difference.” She continued around the room, handing out the leaflets while Ethel stood quietly by the door. Briar answered a few questions, checking with Ethel for accuracy, then said good-bye.

Outside, Briar breathed a sigh of relief.

“Wasn’t so bad, was it?” asked Ethel. “It won’t always be so easy. These ladies weren’t carrying rotten vegetables to hurl at us.”

“People do that?” Briar asked, aghast.

Ethel nodded. “Not often. But you should be prepared.”

All their leaflets were gone with half an hour to spare before the curfew bell. When they returned home, the parlor games were still going on. The group was pushing chairs into a circle around the room, setting up for another game.

“Got a new one,” called Lizbeth as they entered the room. “Join us. It’s called Crossed and Uncrossed.”

Once everyone was settled, Briar between Ethel and Wheeler, Nell supervised as they passed a pair of scissors to their neighbor, and said either crossed or uncrossed. Nell would then tell you if you were correct. The purpose was to discover the secret about what made the pass a crossed or uncrossed pass.

Briar was among the first to figure it out and tried to give Wheeler hints. Each time she spoke was like a test, asking can we go back to the way we were?

By the end of the night, all the girls knew the trick but several of the boys left the game baffled. And Wheeler hadn’t answered her silent test.

“I don’t understand,” said a new boy named George, shaking his head and grinning. “But I’m determined to figure out if I’m crossed or uncrossed. Tomorrow night?”

“Yes, yes!” Lizbeth said. “Everyone, let’s meet here again tomorrow night. No telling the secret.”

“I’m going to get it out of Briar by then,” joked Wheeler.

She shook her head. “Only hints. You’ve got to figure it out yourself.” Her words held a double meaning. He did need to figure out what he wanted. And so did she.

Nell and Lizbeth, the spontaneous organizers, stood at the door to the parlor saying good-bye to everyone.

Mim slipped in just before the curfew bell sounded, and she gave Briar a wave on her way to the stairs. George paused in the doorway and watched Mim pass.

Briar smiled. Another one smitten. He’d be back for sure, hoping Mim would join in the games. “Good night, all,” Briar said.

She missed nights like this: fun and carefree, like a few months ago when her deepest concern was getting to work on time. Back when her seventeenth birthday felt so far away and it looked like she knew where her future was going. Suddenly her birthday was looming and her future was tied to a fairy-tale spindle and an evil fairy who wanted her dead.