The Shop by J. Carson Black Read Free Book Online Page A

happen.”
    “No. Zoe’s a cool kid—waaaaay too smart for that. But I’ll feel a hell of a lot better when she’s in the dorm. I’ll finally be able to breathe.”
    Kay wasn’t happy that her daughter was spending the summer at Indigo. She was sure Zoe’s cousin Riley was a bad influence. But Zoe had lobbied so hard, wanted it so badly, that Kay had given in. It was only for the summer. After that, Zoe would be safely in Rhode Island.
    “So did you go see the house?” Kay asked.
    “I did.” Jolie went to turn off the tap. She felt dirty and tired, and hoped the bathwater wouldn’t cool off too quickly.
    “I was right, wasn’t I? Depressing.”
    “A little,” Jolie said. “But maybe it wasn’t back then. I remember my first apartment—what a dump that was. But I was too young to know any better. I can see a young couple just starting out being happy there.”
    “Young people in love,” Kay said. “They’ll live anywhere. You remember anything?”
    “How could I? I wasn’t even two years old. I took some pics, though.”
    “Well, good, you have a record of it, then. I’m glad it’s not listed with us—that place is going to be a hard sell, even if it is the ancestral home of the Petal Soft Soap Baby.”
    Jolie smiled. Her big claim to fame.
    Kay had made no bones about it; she wasn’t thrilled about the idea of Jolie going back to her parents’ house. She’d warned Jolie it would be disappointing. And it was. Jolie had hoped for some resonance, something that connected her to her parents during a happy time in their lives. But there was nothing.
    They talked for a while longer, mostly about Zoe and her cousin Riley, Franklin Haddox’s daughter. Riley was spoiled, and Kay suspected she was sexually active. “I wish I hadn’t let Zoe stay with her.”
    “She’s got common sense,” Jolie said. “She’ll be all right.”
    “Easy for you to say.”

    The water in the tub was cold. Jolie drained it and started filling it up again. In the meantime, she clicked through her photos of the house. A saltbox cottage, faded yellow. Sunny kitchen, linoleum floors, tiny nursery. The pocket yard, the canal out back. The canal looked a lot like the canal behind the house she lived in now.
    Home of the Petal Soft Soap Baby.
    Jolie clicked through the photos and tried to picture her parents living as newlyweds there.
    As Kay said, they were young and in love. They didn’t have much money. They were about to have their first and only child. But the place was too old. The story was too old. Whatever had breathed life into the love story between her mother and father was gone.

    She must have dozed off, because the bathwater was stone cold. Jolie hitched herself up a little; she’d slipped down so her chin was almost in the water. The candle had burned low.
    She looked across the tub at her knees, rising up like islands. That was when it hit. A hurtling torrent of stark, raving fear. Her heart wanted to burst. Heat suffused her face. The fight-or-flight mechanism kicked in. She couldn’t stand to be in the tub another minute. She grabbed the sides and hoisted herself up. Her shin bumped and scraped the side as she scrambled out of the tub. Slipping, almost going down.
    She grabbed the towel from the rack. Made it out the doorway. Shaking so hard she could barely work her legs. Her brain buzzed and stuttered. She couldn’t think.
    The chasm opened. She felt the pull. Step in and disappear for good.
    Go! One foot after the other.
    She made it to the kitchen. Shivered in the sun streaming through the window.
    Twenty minutes later, she went back in the bathroom. The sight of the full tub threw her heart into overdrive. She punched the drain fixture and retreated to the kitchen.
    Something was very wrong with her. Mental-illness wrong. First the pond, scaring her for no reason. And now the tub. Jolie knew she would not fill that tub again. Forget the lighted candles, the bath salts. She hoped she wouldn’t