A Teeny Bit of Trouble Read Online Free PDF

over me like warm pear juice. “I’m okay,” I whispered.
    “No, you’re not, baby. You’re hurt and confused—”
    His strained voice worried me, but I was even more concerned about the endearment. Baby? What did that mean? He’d always called me sweetheart.
    I pressed the heel of my hand against my eyes. “Any news about Barb?”
    “No.”
    “I was just about to nod off when you called. I’ll talk to you later, okay?” I didn’t trust myself to wait for his answer, so I hung up. A few seconds ticked by, and the phone trilled again. My hand closed on the receiver. No, let it ring. I’d speak to him in a few days, after I’d had time to sort a few things on my own.
    I unplugged the cord from the jack. Sir’s bottom teeth jutted into his muzzle. This was his “don’t be cruel” look. He didn’t know the half of it. We Templetons specialized in peaches and poisoned recipes. The fruit was real, but our recipes were a harmless method to relieve tension—like a punching bag, but with imaginary food. If someone pissed us off, we wouldn’t spit or pull hair; we’d just mentally cook a deadly meal and pretend to feed it to the enemy. My aunts had written these lethal concoctions in the back of a spiral-bound church cookbook. Some of the dishes were paired with music and Bible verses. That had been Mama’s special touch. At Coop’s suggestion, I’d hidden the tome in a Charleston lockbox—after I’d memorized every last formula, of course.
    If only I’d cooked a pie for Barb, a Get-Rid-of-the-Bitch Pie. The key ingredient is hydrangeas. The flowers and buds are poisonous, similar to cyanide, causing acute gastrointestinal distress. I wouldn’t have fed it to her; I would have thrown it in her face. Take that, you man-stealing, child-leaving hussy.
    I felt sad. I shouldn’t vicariously poison a missing woman. Because long ago, for a brief time, we’d been friends.
    Pink hydrangeas had bloomed in the front yard of Barb’s childhood home. She’d lived in Bonaventure’s historic district, and her family’s white wooden house had faced Newgate Square, with views of tiered fountains and manicured gardens.
    My house had also been white, but it stood at the end of a long gravel road, smack in the middle of a peach orchard. Barb had bought her clothes at the mall. I’d shopped at Tractor Farm Supply. My family was uneducated. Barb’s parents were college professors. My forebears were Irish convicts and farmers. Barb traced her lineage back to Atilla the Hun. My aunt was a professional clown; Barb’s great-great-aunt had worked as a cryptologist during World War II. Barb wrote encrypted love letters to Coop, and I wrote recipes to myself.
    In high school, Barb had been the head majorette—poised and focused, with perfect eye-hand coordination. Never dropped her baton stick, never stumbled, never failed to dazzle the audience with her gold sequins and vertical figure eights.
    Every Friday night, I’d marched behind her in the band, pretending to blow into my clarinet. During one homecoming ceremony, someone tied my shoelaces together, and I didn’t have time to unravel them. I lurched across the football field and tripped face-first into the grass. The audience let out a collective gasp when the tuba player stumbled over me, followed by a jarring crash of wind instruments and drums. Barb didn’t seem to notice; she kept doing arm rolls, her luscious cleavage spilling out of the sequins.
    When she was a junior in high school, she talked her way into my sophomore Home Economics class. She ended up sharing a desk with me. While I read about the history of onions, she held out her hand, showing off Coop’s class ring.
    “Would you like to touch it?” she asked.
    I shook my head.
    “But you like him, don’t you?” she persisted.
    “He’s a friend,” I said, struggling to control my telltale face.
    “Is that why he went fishing with you last week?” she asked
    I shrugged.
    “He told me all about