Tabitha - Sunflowers Blooming Book One

By Irene Wendy Wode

Tabitha is a simple country girl in a simple country town—or so she tries to make everyone believe. But when a boy with a quiet confidence and appealing edge shows up in town looking to collect beautiful images, it's Tabitha he ends up most drawn to. Life is never simple, and the complications aren't only on her side. There are mysteries to be solved, and Tabitha fears all of her questions will lead only to bad news.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Sep 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9780359909520

Book preview

Tabitha

Sunflowers Blooming Book One

Irene Wendy Wode

Tabitha is a simple country girl in a simple country town—or so she tries to make everyone believe. But when a boy with a quiet confidence and appealing edge shows up in town looking to collect beautiful images, it's Tabitha he ends up most drawn to.

Life is never simple, and the complications aren't only on her side. There are mysteries to be solved, and Tabitha fears all of her questions will lead only to bad news.

Tabitha

By Irene Wendy Wode

Edited by Amanda Jean

Cover designed by Natasha Snow

This book is a work of fiction and all names, characters, places, and incidents are fictional or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people, places, or events is coincidental.

First Edition published by Less Than Three Press, LLC, August 2017

Second Edition published with Lulu, September 2019

Copyright © 2017 by Irene Wendy Wode. All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-359-90952-0

The most thanks ever go to Melanie Odhner, just about the best and most patient roommate/sister/developmental editor a writer could have. Thanks for teaching me how to write and explaining to me how neurotypical people work. Without you, this book would have been a much smaller, flatter thing.

Thanks as well go to everyone I've worked with at Less Than Three Press for giving Tabitha a chance and for continuing to push me to write a better book.

Chapter One

Tabitha’s body lay curled up at the bottom of the lake for most of the night.

It didn’t settle her the way it usually did.

The water was blind. It had no eyes to gawk at her, the way the rest of the world sometimes could. That was usually a comfort. She usually needed the escape. But—and this went against everything she’d ever known about survival—lately, Tabitha had just wanted to be seen.

She got no shortage of attention in Sunflower, when it came down to it. She was considered something of a character in the small, country college town. But that character, that was an act. That was a façade to cover up who she was down here in the dark.

She’d left the sunfish of the shallows behind at this depth, and the bigger fish stayed away. They could taste her, smell her, tell that she was predatory. Perhaps they’d adapted to her kind a long time ago. If they’d been curious, it would have been so easy to consume them and make the lake truly empty.

There was nothing to see at the bottom of the lake. Little to feel but the steady pressure of water. Little to hear but the faint, rhythmic shifts in the lake’s surface. The sensory deprivation left Tabitha alone with herself. Alone, she could be anything and anyone she wished.

Tonight, it only brought home the differences between wish and reality and made her miss all the things she denied herself by the light of day. She wished that she could be truly herself for once, out in the open, in the light.

When she’d had enough of that cradling nothingness, she got up and walked across the lake bottom, up its uneven slope and through the surface, to the little patch of beach by the lake where she’d set her things on a rock. Her internal time sense told her it was around 3:30 A.M.

She dried and dressed quickly in her plain work clothes. She was careful to brush away her footprints in the sand before leaving.

The gravel drive was rough under her bare feet, but it didn’t bother her—in fact, it was friendly, familiar, like the lack of breath under the surface of the water. Like her ability to see in crystalline detail in the darkness of the night. But it was another thing separating her from everyone else.

She pushed that thought aside in favor of the practicalities of the day. Milking was next, she reminded herself, and then she’d bake fresh bread. She always sold a lot of bread and sandwiches on days when the local college had a term just beginning and the new students were figuring out how to feed themselves.

Tabitha dried her short hair as she walked home in the darkness then quickly settled one of her older wigs onto her head, clipping it fast. She didn’t like to be without one for too long, even when she was by herself. It was one thing to not be presentable. It was another thing to know she looked so entirely unlike herself as she did without her wigs.

With her wig on, Tabitha was herself again, though she certainly wasn’t presentable. She still smelled of the lake, for one thing, but the sheep and goats wouldn’t care—they smelled of sheep and goats, after all. She’d shower properly once bread was in the oven.

In the middle of the night, at the bottom of the lake, with her sheep and goats, these were the parts of her life no one saw. No one ever could. It could compromise everything: her business, her place here, and her very life.

Silent on her bare feet, Tabitha slipped into the barn, put on her heavy leather milking apron, and greeted the first sleepy animal of the day with a scratch behind the ears.

She’d be lost without these creatures. They gave her what she needed to live. She had so much to be grateful for.

But some mornings, that just wasn’t enough.

Nights and mornings, those were the worst times. When everyone else was sleeping. When everyone else could be vulnerable beside their lovers and families. Unguarded.

Running the shop during business hours was good, she reminded herself. Evenings were better, often, between the classes she took at the college, Blue’s social invitations, and sewing club in the library twice a week.

Tabitha showered thoroughly, washing the smell of the lake off, and began donning her armor in layers. Thick, structured undergarments, petticoats, and padding. Some ruffled confection of a dress over top. An apron to coordinate, if she were manning the store, or a parasol for outdoors.

Her shoes really did need to be practical, but there she paid the money saved from making everything else herself to have sturdy shoes in styles that went with her dresses and in enough colors to match. High, laced boots, cowboy boots, and Mary Janes were her favorites.

Makeup, of course; one of her good wigs; hair accessories; and just a piece or two of jewelry. She loved ribbon chokers for more than just the fact that they obscured the line of her throat. She always wore one on a day when she felt the need to be put-together, extra-shiny and invulnerable.

She was going to need one today. She was already unbalanced and the crowds were going to be fierce.

The fantastic cowboy boots with sunflowers embroidered on them were the basis of today’s outfit. Yellow and blue: a yellow dress and classic blue gingham apron, a blue-ribbon choker with a tiny sun pendant, and blue bows in her curled and pulled-back hair.

She looked at herself in the mirror, cheerful and radiant. The way she wished she felt. At least the clothes got her in the right frame of mind.

She smiled, closed the door on her tiny, half-bare apartment, and went downstairs to open the shop.

Every morning, the shop smelled like the baking and like the wood of the building and like coffee and tea, like the night before had been scrubbed away. As the day wore on and people came in and out, it got messy and full of life.

There were advantages to the noise, as well as the clean quiet. She lost herself to the flow of it. Things were busy, and before she knew it, half the day was gone.

In the afternoon light, sun shone on the bright white window frames, on the twinkling wind chimes and bright porch railings outside, on the odd sliver of wall, making the space bright and cheerful. But no sunlight fell anywhere near the counter, the chairs, or the tables.

Two very familiar women were next in line: Blue, with her masses of curly black hair falling over an equally massive fuzzy magenta sweater, and Ellie, with her sleek blonde ponytail, peach button-down, and the patchwork bag hung over her shoulder. Tabitha still remembered how Blue had agonized over each scrap of fabric on its crazy-quilt surface.

It’s lively in here today! Blue commented with a grin, gesturing to two college boys who seemed to be starting an impromptu wrestling match in one corner.

Tabitha shrugged. The shop’s seen worse.

What does it even take to ruffle your feathers, Tazz? Blue asked.

Not as much as you think. I hope you never have to find out.

But I wanna know! Blue whined.

Tabitha shook her head. What is your obsession with getting under calm people’s skin?

Blue reached over to tickle Ellie. Someone’s gotta do it, she said.

Ellie swatted her, but she was smiling.

If you say so, Tabitha replied. What’s your next play, then?

Blue looked at her thoughtfully. I’ve got your number, she said. I’m halfway to knowing all your secrets. I’ll figure it out.

Tabitha didn’t let her smile slip as she insisted, I have no secrets.

Oh, Blue said, everyone’s got secrets. And you’ve got some doozies. I can tell.

Ignore her, said Ellie with casual good humor, elbowing Blue gently in the side. She doesn’t know anything, not for sure.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, rat me out, why don’t you? Blue said. You can pay for the grilled cheese today.

You can’t alienate Tazz. Ellie’s hands were folded primly in front of her as she stood next to Blue, showing no sign of being the type to throw an elbow someone’s way. She makes the only interesting food in town.

Ellie was going to school for nursing, and it was a good fit, too, because she seemed to be almost all solid sensible brains and charming bedside manner. Blue, beside her, was the quintessential theater major—although, officially, she was still undecided.

Fine. Blue sighed and dug out her wallet. She turned puppy eyes on Tabitha. You know we love you deeply and would never stick our noses too far in your personal business, right, Tazz?

Tabitha graced them with a small smile. I know that about at least one of you.

Blue, of course, just winked in response.

Internally, Tazz sighed. They had wits and determination enough for ten girls, and they would eventually figure her out.

Some days, Tazz was deeply worried about herself that she considered these girls her friends.

~❁~

Tabitha’s hands were large, knobby, and work-hardened, and sometimes it seemed they always had been. Most days she didn’t mind. Her hands could do the tasks she put before them, and that was what mattered. They were good hands that way.

Some days she envied the slim, delicate fingers of the girls who came to her shop after school. She watched them, wishing her hands had that same grace. Wishing they didn’t look so alien beside feminine things like lace and the intricate silver charm bracelets that were all the rage with the young girls of the town.

Things were busy that day, with the start of the new school year; college kids newly moved to campus and out exploring the town came into her little shop in a near-constant stream. She didn’t have time to register much detail about any of them. So when a pair of hands passed her a credit card over the counter, long and graceful but sturdy, with the twinkle of purple nail polish standing boldly on them, she almost didn’t see that the card bore the name Benedict Rollins.

When her brain caught up, her head snapped up to look at them, but they were halfway out the door with their purchases, long black hair sweeping across their shoulders.

Tazz knew most everybody in town, except for the new students. But they were just usually… small-town people, local people. People embedded in the same kind of culture that had been growing here for years, like the Birch farmhouse. Sunflower Community College didn’t have much to attract people from far away.

This person, they were something new.

She couldn’t help probing her memory for the details that made her think so: the style of their clothes, mostly black and possibly practical for a life entirely different than one lived on a farm. An accent that was more like what she heard on TV than those of the people around her, missing the familiar hint of Northern Appalachian twang.

It was a small thing, but throughout the day it slowly ate at Tazz’s mind. She watched her parade of usuals come through the café, and she milked the goats as she did every evening. But all the while, the line of their jaw and the swish of their hair replayed themselves in her mind over and over. The sparkle of their fingernails haunted her field of vision.

Were they—was he he? Something in her gut told her that that pronoun was right, and that the name Benedict was right. That frame of reference suited him. She didn’t like to assume his appearance could tell his story, but for now, in the privacy of her own head, she thought of him as male and she used the name from the card, Benedict.

His frame had been wide and somewhat lanky, his walk more swagger than sway, and every sparkle and the refinement of his appearance sat opposed to that but didn’t overwhelm it. It fascinated Tabitha, in a way her own appearance never had. And she’d only caught a glimpse today.

Part of her hoped she got a chance to see more, but then, he might have just been passing through. There was no reason to think that there might be more to their paths crossing.

Either way, the small silver bracelet she’d seen around his wrist worried her. She didn’t know what it said, but she’d seen enough to know what it meant. Something was wrong with his body, something serious enough that anyone caring for him would need to know about it immediately so as not to hurt him further.

He fascinated her, but she knew it was a terrible idea for her to get close to anyone as fragile as that.

Why was she even thinking about it? The hot summer air of the past months must have been baking her brain. Fall, and heavier business, would eventually bring her back down to Earth.

~❁~

Making human friends was a dangerous prospect, and she tried to keep things in the realm of casual acquaintances. Of course, she failed. Tabitha liked people. She didn’t know any other vampires, not anymore, but some of them, she suspected, were hunters by nature. Not Tabitha. Tabitha bred goats.

She liked to think she was like any other farmer with livestock. She took what she needed from them. The only real difference was that what she needed was blood.

She also milked them, made artisanal cheeses, and sold those along with baked goods and teas in her café. And she tried her utmost to remember that there was a great deal of difference between the rich but quiet social lives of the goat herds in her barns and the deeper, more important lives of the herds of college students tromping through Tabitha’s Tea House.

Occasionally, one of the new students ordered something containing an earthier cheese, spat it out, and said it tasted like goat guts. Occasionally, she had the desire to eat something herself that, for once, didn’t taste of goat guts. Like a mouthy college student.

But fortunately, not very often.

Given the options, goat guts really weren’t so bad.

~❁~

The next day, she found that Ellie and Blue were smirking at her from their usual table.

What? she asked them, in lieu of taking their order.

You seem… different today, Blue commented, her smile only widening.

Different how? A little nervousness shot through her.

A little distracted, Ellie said.

And you’ve got these little smiles at odd times, continued Blue. Did you meet someone, Tazz?

Damn them and their perceptiveness. But then, they wouldn’t have wiggled their way into their status as her friends without a lot of perceptiveness and persistence. Tabitha certainly hadn’t been looking for friends. Friends were dangerous. Friends got under your skin and learned all your secrets and made you feel things.

But here she was, distracted, dwelling on the simple memory of a man’s hands. It was distinctly possible that isolation was just as dangerous.

No? Tazz said unconvincingly.

Ooh, was it one of the new students? Blue asked, heedless of her answer. You should come to the party tomorrow night. Everyone’s invited. I put flyers up at the dorms. Should go on for most of the night. Blue winked. So if you’re looking for someone who likes the night life…

Damn their perceptiveness to the depths. Even if they knew nothing for certain, they knew too much. Bluebell, you know I’m a morning girl. Got to be up to milk the goats and bake the bread and mind the store. When’s a girl expected to sleep?

Don’t you call me that, Tazz! You know I hate it!

Tabitha just gave her a pointed look.

All right, okay, I’ll stop! You are a perfectly normal girl with a perfectly normal sleep schedule. Just… think about the party? We’d love to see you there.

Tabitha sighed, considering them. Okay, I’ll think about it, but don’t hold your breath. Now are you going to order, or are you just in my shop to look decorative?

~❁~

That night was sewing club.

Sewing club was always interesting. Not all the old ladies of the core group had welcomed her when she’d joined, with her over-the-top ruffled dresses and ever-present parasols. They seemed to take her style as an affront, some kind of mockery. They weren’t outright rude about it, but they were cold. But Cynthia, the sweet owner of the town’s only florist’s shop, had always seemed to see that Tabitha made and wore the clothes she did because she genuinely loved them. And so Cynthia was always ready with a little help or advice any time Tabitha asked.

Things had gotten better when Blue had joined the club—one other girl making dramatic dresses and costumes for the pure fun of it (although Bluebell tended to change styles every day rather than stick with one