wasn’t fair. She had devoted her life to the bakery!
It was Rose who woke up early to help her parents prepare for the day while other kids her age were still sleeping. It was Rose who came home straight after school because she was needed to help clean the bakery in the afternoons. And Rose did it all without complaining in the hope that one day she too would become a kitchen magician. And now her parents were denying her the only thing she’d ever wanted: to bake something magical.
And it was Rose who got stuck helping her little sister when no one else wanted the job. Rose looked down at Leigh, who was digging a hole with her hands in which to bury the fallen slug.
“I’m not in the mood for a funeral,” said Rose. “I’ll push you on the swing. Come on.”
Leigh left the slug and bounded over to the swing, a wooden contraption that Albert had erected a year earlier. The wood was wet and green with mould, and the rusty chains creaked as Rose heaved her little sister back and forth.
“Push!” Leigh pumped at the air as hard as she could by swinging her knobby knees. “Higher, Rosie, higher!”
Leigh was wearing her filthy red-and-white-striped shirt and red-and-white-striped headband, the same ones she insisted on wearing every day. When they were absolutely covered with mud stains and juice spills and marker mishaps, Rose stole them from Leigh’s room while she was asleep and popped them in the wash.
Haven’t I earned the right to try a little magic? thought Rose. When is all of this errand running and babysitting going to get me anywhere?
A minute later, Rose heard the faint buzzing of a motorcycle. The sound drew closer and closer to the house. Rose’s heart thumped in her chest like an angry bullfrog trapped in a shoebox. She only knew one person in town who rode a motorcycle (or moped, anyway), and his name was Devin Stetson.
Her mind raced to throw together a few things to say if he were to stop in her driveway and stroll into the back garden.
Hi. How are you? My name is Rose. Have we met? Why are you in my back garden?
He would say that he saw that caravan of police cars and was worried about her. Then he would say that he needed to get to Poplar’s Open-air Market because his father wanted to start making blueberry doughnuts, but he didn’t know where it was.
I know where it is, she’d say. Let me show you.
Then she’d climb on to the back of his moped, and her knees would brush against his dark denim jeans. She would rest her chin on his shoulder for the entire ride and feel the sting of his blond hair whipping her cheeks in the wind. Even if they hit a rock and she was tossed into a ditch and broke both legs, it would be worth it.
But Rose wasn’t like other girls her age. Rose had responsibilities.
The frantic whirring of the motorcycle slowed a bit as it pulled into the driveway. But this was not Devin Stetson’s rusty red moped – this was a gleaming black beast with a head shaped like a bull, with a silver saddle and sharp silver horns for handlebars. A figure sheathed entirely in black leather hopped off the saddle and leaned against the body of the motorcycle.
Rose’s heart raced. There had already been too many ominous people in her driveway that day.
She turned to see if Chip was still watching from the kitchen window – Chip would be able to tackle this person, whoever it was, if it came to that – but he was nowhere to be found.
Rose stepped in front of Leigh to guard her.
The figure removed its black helmet with gloved hands coated in silver spikes.
The rider was a young woman – the tallest, most sensational-looking woman Rose had ever seen outside of a movie screen. She had strong black eyebrows, a long Roman nose and short black hair cropped close to her scalp in a chic pixie cut. Her full lips were painted red, and her big white teeth glinted in the sun. She was the kind of woman who looked like she belonged in the pages of a magazine – the kind of woman Rose secretly wished she would grow up to become.
“Ahhhhh!!!” the woman exclaimed. “Fresh air! A small town! I love a small town!” She tossed a throaty laugh to the sky, then undid the metal clasps on her black leather jacket and tossed it on to the bike. She was wearing a lacy blue shirt underneath, much like the one Rose was wearing.
“You must be Rosemary!” she said, sauntering towards the swing. She indicated her shirt. “Look at us! We’re twins!”
When the woman in the black leather got close enough, Leigh bolted into the kitchen, leaving Rose clutching the rusty metal chains of the swing.
“Don’t look so frightened, pet! I’m your aunt Lily!”
This woman, whoever she was, was smiling from ear to ear with all of her gleaming fancy white teeth. Could Rose really be related to someone so… beautiful? She looked more like a fashion model than an aunt.
Rose conjured up a mental image of the Bliss family tree she’d made for an assignment on genealogy back in the third grade – it was a short, very wide piece of white poster board on which she’d drawn her and her siblings’ names: Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, Thyme; and above that, her parents’ names: Albert Hogswaddle, Purdy Bliss. Her aunts and uncles on her father’s side were Aunt Alice, Aunt Janine and weird Uncle Lewis. On her mother’s side: no one. There was no Lily. The name did ring a bell, but Rose couldn’t remember why.
“Is your mother here?” she asked. “Oh, I hope I came at a good time! I miss old Purdy Bliss!”
Rose spoke cautiously. “My mother never told me she had a younger sister.”
Lily laughed again, her long neck arched back. “She doesn’t!”
Rose must have looked confused. “I’m not your aunt, per se,” Lily said. “Your mother’s great-great-great-grandfather Filbert Bliss had a brother named Albatross, and that was my great-great-great-grandfather, so I believe that makes us… fifth cousins once removed! But Aunt Lily has such a nice ring to it, don’t you think?”
Rose pictured the family tree in her mind’s eye, trying to remember if there were any Albatrosses or Filberts, but the tree morphed into a twisted, overgrown thicket.
“Anyway, I heard my dear Purdy had a baby! And started a bakery!”
“Four babies,” said Rose, shielding her eyes from the sun with her hand.
“Well! Seems I’m a little late!”
Lily sauntered back to the motorcycle and began removing her gloves, finger by finger. “You see, I am a baker as well! I’ve published a cookbook – well, I published it myself. But it’s the same difference! I even had my own radio show for a few months – Lily’s Ladle! Surely you heard about it!”
Rose had never heard of a radio show called Lily’s Ladle, but she suddenly remembered where she’d heard the name Lily. It was several years ago. One night after dinner, Rose was helping her father clear the dishes while Purdy took a phone call. It was the kind of phone call where her mother didn’t do much talking, but just leaned against the kitchen counter, speechless, wrapping the cord round her finger, then unwrapping.
When she hung up, Rose and Albert stared at her, waiting.
“It was Lily,” she said. Albert’s eyes went wide. “She found us. She wants to come for a visit.”
Albert winced. “You said no, right?”
“Of course,” said Purdy.
“Who is Lily?” asked Rose.
“No one,” said Purdy, heading upstairs.
Rose snapped out of her memory, then walked up to Lily and tapped her on the shoulder. “Come to think of it, I have heard of you. My mother talked to you on the phone a while back. She didn’t want you to come for a visit,” Rose said, her heart beating thunderously. “Why didn’t she want you to come for a visit?”
Lily