The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires(47)

“Jesse?” Mrs. Greene called back into her house. “Look after your brother. I’m going across the way.”

She closed and locked her door behind her, the plastic holly wreath scratching against the aluminum door as it swung from side to side.

“This way,” Mrs. Greene said, leading her down the sandy path in front of her house.

They walked onto the dirt road that circled the little church, then stepped over the ankle-high railing in front of Mt. Zion A.M.E., cutting through the center of Six Mile. They crunched over the sandy soil, their footsteps loud in the night. No one sat outside on their porch, no one called to their friends, no one passed them on the way home. The dirt roads of Six Mile were deserted. Patricia saw curtains drawn over most of the windows. Others had cardboard or bedsheets tacked up over them instead. From behind all of them came the cold, blue shifting light of television.

“No one goes out after dark around here anymore,” Mrs. Greene said.

“What should we say to Mrs. Taylor so we don’t upset her?” Patricia asked.

“Wanda Taylor gets out of bed upset,” Mrs. Greene said.

Patricia wondered how she’d react if someone showed up on her doorstep to tell her Blue was on drugs.

“Do you think she’ll be angry?” she asked.

“Probably,” Mrs. Greene said.

“Maybe this is a bad idea,” Patricia said.

“It is a bad idea,” Mrs. Greene said, turning to face her. “But you told me you were worried about her little girl and now I can’t stop thinking about that. She may not roll out the welcome wagon, but you convinced me we’re doing what’s right. Don’t convince me to come out halfway and then go back in.”

A yellow bulb burned over the door of Wanda Taylor’s trailer, and before Patricia could ask for a moment to gather herself, they had walked up the rotten front porch and Mrs. Greene was knocking on the rattling metal door. The rickety porch swayed back and forth beneath their feet. Moths tapped at the yellow lightbulb. Patricia could feel heat radiating off it, making her scalp and forehead prickle. Just when she couldn’t stand the warmth anymore, the door opened and Wanda Taylor stared out at them. She wore a drug company T-shirt and stonewashed blue jeans and hadn’t done her hair. Behind her, Patricia heard a TV playing.

“Evening, Wanda,” Mrs. Greene said.

“It’s late,” Wanda said, then took in Patricia. “Who’s that?”

She spoke to Mrs. Greene as if Patricia weren’t there.

“Can we come inside?” Mrs. Greene asked.

“No,” Wanda Taylor said. “It’s almost ten o’clock. Some people have to get up in the morning.”

“You came to me about Destiny and I thought you might have a few minutes to discuss the health of your little girl,” Mrs. Greene said, her voice prickly.

Wanda screwed her face up in disbelief.

“I came to you about Destiny and you told me to go to the doctor if I was so worried,” she said. “That’s what I’m doing, first thing tomorrow morning, we’re going to the clinic.”

“Mrs. Taylor,” Patricia said. “I’m a nurse from the clinic. I thought Destiny’s condition might be urgent so I came to see you tonight. How old is she?”

Wanda and Mrs. Greene stared at Patricia, both for different reasons.

“Nine,” Wanda finally said. “You have some ID?”

“She works at the clinic,” Mrs. Greene said. “She’s not the police. She’s not from DSS. She doesn’t have a badge.”

Wanda studied Patricia, her face shadowed by the yellow light.

“All right,” she finally said, used to doing what people in authority told her. She stepped backward into her trailer. “But she’s sleeping right now, so keep your voices low.”

They followed her inside. It felt crowded and smelled like cooked hamburger meat. A black plastic sofa sat across from a television with a built-in VCR resting on top of a cardboard box. A window-unit air conditioner chuffed out frozen air beneath the venetian blinds. Wanda gestured to a rickety table in the kitchen alcove and Patricia and Mrs. Greene sat down in its padded, thrift-store chairs.

“Do you want some Kool-Aid?” she asked. “Lite beer?”

“No, thank you,” Patricia said.

Wanda turned to her kitchen cabinets, took out two snack packs of Fritos, pulled them open, and poured them into a Styrofoam cereal bowl.

“Help yourselves,” she said, putting it on the table between them.

“We really should see Destiny for a minute,” Patricia said. “I’d like to ask her some questions about her condition.”

“You have to talk to her now?” Wanda asked.

“Wanda,” Mrs. Greene said. “You need to do what the nurse tells you.”

Wanda took three steps down the hall and scratched on a beige, plastic accordion door.

“Dessy,” she whispered in a singsong.

The window-unit air conditioner froze the air. Patricia’s skin prickled with goose bumps. The top of the table felt sticky. She kept her hands in her lap.

“Dessy, wakey wakey,” Wanda sang, sliding open the partition.

She clicked on a lamp in the bedroom.

“Dessy?” Wanda said.

She stepped into the hall and opened another door, this one revealing the bathroom.