This Month's Book

This month I have Bones of Connection on sale, here. For those who aren’t familiar with it, I’m putting the first chapter in this week’s newsletter. Enjoy.

If I had known what taking the job on Jewel Island would have gotten me into, I might have stayed in my sister’s basement. As a forty-three-year-old divorced, fat woman I didn’t exactly have my pick of jobs. Jewel had felt like my last hope. But a line has to be drawn even at last hopes.

The day I left for the interview, I had my sister drop me at the ferry terminal. The bright sunny day had boded well. Jewel wasn’t an island I could find on a map, which was weird. A ticket to the ferry had been left for me, and despite my misgivings, I figured the worst that would happen was I had to buy a ticket back from Milwaukee when the ferry landed across the lake, even if the creepy guy who sat in on the interview glowering at me was there in person.

I hung out on the top deck, enjoying the blue sky and the cool breeze. A few young girls laughed and giggled when I moved my chair slightly away so that I could sit, my heavy hips and thighs hanging over the edge. I set my overnight bag at my feet and pulled my arms through my sweater, despite the sun.

Just as I was starting to relax, the girls’ giggles subsiding into conversations about other things and no longer making me uncomfortable, fog started to come up. I’ve been in heavy fog. I’ve watched the days change quickly, but never this quickly. Perhaps it wasn’t unusual for a lake but I didn’t live on Lake Michigan, although it was an easy drive from my home town.

The girls and the other passengers all headed inside, leaving me alone out there, smelling the soggy odor of garbage and gasoline that permeated the fog. It felt as bad as it smelled.

Fortunately, the ferry slowed sooner than I expected, the baritone honking of the horn warning all in its path where it was. I hoped this was the island, though as it slowed more, I wasn’t so sure. I couldn’t see much of anything, although I had gotten up and moved to the rail. The fog was so thick I could barely see my hand in front of my face.

The stink of dead fish rising up around me was enough to put me off seafood for the rest of my life. I began to wonder if this job was for me, no matter how desperate I might be. I’d been so thrilled to finally get an in-person interview and at a job that might actually pay decently. If putting up with the stink was part of the job, no wonder they had to pay so well.

An older woman and an emaciated man had interviewed me online. She’d called herself the mayor of Jewel Island. When they’d offered me an in-person interview, I’d accepted, which led to the tickets and ferry ride.

The eerie feeling I’d had when I hadn’t been able to find the island on the map returned. A small island between Michigan and Wisconsin, right on the ferry run should have been a major place for tourists. Instead, it was as if the island didn’t exist. Even Google earth images of Lake Michigan showed no island in the vicinity of where it must be based on the information I had.

Once again, I pushed away my unease. I could handle this. It was only an overnight. My sisters knew where I was, though they, too, had concerns about not finding the island. If I were lost, my sisters would help. We’d keep in touch by cell phone and my youngest sister had put an app on mine to let her know where I was, just in case.

We’d laughed about it because last year on my birthday they’d taken me axe throwing. I’d been surprisingly good, the best of all of us when I’d done it. There was just the small matter of finding an axe if I needed one. After we’d laughed, she’d showed me the app and how it worked so that if I wanted to turn it off, I could.

I might not have a husband and children, but I had sisters who loved me. I wasn’t alone in the world, nor was I destitute, thanks to Charlene letting me live in her basement.

Unsurprisingly, I was the only one to get off. At least the giggling girls weren’t following me down the gang plank. I appreciated the warmth of my heavy sweater but could have wished for a light jacket to keep the dampness from my skin. I usually appreciate the insulation my fat gives me in Michigan winters, but even I’m not impervious to damp. Chances were, the soft yarn of my sweater was picking up the dead fish stink and I’d smell through my interview, though that wasn’t until the next day.

I sighed. I turned around, as if the fog would let me see the ferry, perhaps raise a hand to flag it back down to return and get me, but I was buried in the cloud bank along with the rest of the island. Maybe the island would look better not framed in gray and dampness.

The sound of the ferry chugging through the waters receded and I was left with the sound of the small waves lapping against the rocky beach on this side of the island. I breathed out, trying to calm myself.

Someone had built a parking lot, albeit one designed for about four cars. A bleached wood shack sat in one corner. I could almost make out a blue design on the side. Probably a fish. I walked closer. The shack was shuttered and closed, but it suggested that someone might run the place.

I shouldered the overnight bag and walked towards what ought to be the road. As I moved, the fog seemed to lift. The road became clearer, a concrete path wide enough for a single car. To my left the road appeared flat for the short distance I could see. Small scrub trees lined it on one side. Rocks lined the lake side, except for a few hardy stragglers holding on for dear life between the boulders.

Two parts of the road headed to the right, one making a hard right, following the beach but angling up a hill, another angling down behind the hill into what might be a valley, although I couldn’t begin to tell for certain, given the fog.

From the direction of the hill, I heard a sudden blast of music that was cut off as quickly as it had come, rather as if a door had opened and then closed. At least the music indicated people. It’d been too short a burst for me to catch the tune, but the intuitive part of my brain said it sounded modern.

That small comfort had all the warmth of the fog that wrapped around me. I’d read enough spooky stories about someone lost and finding a ghost town, being wined and dined only to wake up and find themselves in a shack. The island had that feel to it.

I stepped out onto the concrete after looking both ways. I didn’t hear any cars and hopefully one wouldn’t come silently racing around a corner I didn’t know about and hit me as I tried to get my bearings.

There were buildings both up the hill and on the angled road that curved deeper into the island. Lights shone from a low building along the straighter path. I wanted to head that way, but something prodded me to walk up the hill.

Sharon, the woman who had interviewed me, said that they’d put me up at the Jewel B&B.

“It’s the only place on the island, really, unless you have family here,” she’d said happily.

I said I didn’t.

Sharon had replied she knew. Damien, the man with her had almost glowered as if he hated being on the call.

Sharon was bright and warm, her hair gray, her face lined. She was heavy enough to look like a grandmother that baked and cooked and gave hugs that would take away even the worst of hurts. In fact, I had sort of longed to hug her.

The man, though…he could have starred in just about any horror movie he wanted, though I’d have pegged him for a vampire. Or at the very least a serial killer. Dark hair, a long narrow face, and a mouth with corners that naturally turned down, he looked imposing enough. Worse, he had the palest skin I’d ever seen. I’d been able to see blue veins beneath it when he leaned forward to adjust something on his computer with fingers spiderlike in their thinness.

With a name like Damien Bain he’d have no problems getting the part even if he didn’t look like such a stereotypical monster.

Damien had let Sharon talk. He’d sat and watched, as still as a corpse, which, if he were a vampire, he’d be. His face had just enough lines for me to believe he was older than his dark hair suggested and I had wondered if he dyed it to look younger.

If he’d been the one interviewing me, no matter the job title and salary, I’d have told them I couldn’t possibly live on an island and hope that my sister Charlene didn’t kill me for not accepting the job. She did want her basement back but not at the expense of me dying, or becoming undead if Damien were actually a vampire.

I continued to listen for a car and then turned and started up the hill. The fog seemed to be even thinner, now. In fact, I noted traces of blue sky above me, though the fog still softened the edges of the day.

The buildings around me were mostly wood, though some had brick façades. A larger building with plenty of brown paper taped over the windows highlighting sales—apples were on sale that week—Don’t miss out!—had a single glass door leading inside. Lights flooded out onto the gray street. A grocery store, though it wasn’t all that much larger than a convenience store.

Across the way I saw a shop that said clothing. It looked like a little gray house. The angle of the hill made it look like it was leaning ever so slightly to the side.

I was immediately taken back to the nightmare story of the woman stuck in a ghost town, waking to find herself in a shack. With Damien around, perhaps I’d never wake up, or if I did, I’d be a vampire.

Maybe as a vampire, I’d be thin.

I’d never been thin in my life and I often felt ashamed of my body. I worked towards body positivity. I wanted to love myself as I was. I mean, it wasn’t like I hadn’t dieted all my life, trying to fit in, but apparently, that wasn’t to be. I wore a size 28 or sometimes a 26. Even if the little island clothing store had clothing, I doubted anything would fit me.

I sighed and continued up the hill. Rich and savory smells came from a narrow door labeled just “Derry’s.” It might have been a restaurant but the building was hardly wider than the glass door which looked almost too narrow to admit me. They wouldn’t be feeding many people if I couldn’t even get inside. Even thin people needed a bit of space to eat.

The hill was steep, but I walked a lot. I liked going out for nature walks. Other people might call them hikes, but living in Michigan, I thought of them as walks. When I’d been younger and fully employed and married, I’d traveled out to the west coast and did some real hikes on trails up the lower portion of real mountains.

But all that was in the past. My ex-husband’s family owned the company that I’d done the accounting for and when he’d left me, he’d suggested it would be best for everyone if I didn’t work there any longer. I’d gotten a good severance package and a decent amount from the sale of the house we’d shared for nearly twenty years, but a forty-three year old fat woman had two strikes against her in the job world as soon as she showed up, no matter what her experience was.

I’d been relegated to applying for bookkeeping positions and even those didn’t want me despite being overqualified. I’d get the first interview, the employer would see me, and then decide to “go another way.” This was one of the rare second interviews and it was for the position of accountant. Sharon had been so nice that I had my fingers crossed for this one even if the job did include living on an island with a vampirish man named Damien Bain.

On the side of the street that overlooked the lake, I noticed the sign for Jewel Accounting and Bookkeeping on a building that looked a bit like a remodeled house. Long and low, with only a narrow front porch to break up the line, it sat back from the street, the front area all concrete as if it were a parking lot waiting for the cars I had yet to see.

The building was gray and looked sturdier than some of the buildings further down the hill, or maybe it was the perspective. Instead of looking up at it and seeing it at an angle, I was across the street.

I had yet to see any people wandering around. Outside of the blast of music, I hadn’t heard anything either. I could have been alone on the entire island. Despite the fog having thinned even further and the blue sky brightening overhead, the feeling of being alone sent a chill down my spine.

I continued up the hill, hoping for something that looked like a B&B. On the left side, away from the lake was a large Victorian house painted pink and green, the brightest colors I’d seen since I left the ferry. A small wood sign outside held the words bed and breakfast. Nothing else. In a car, driving by, even at a mere fifteen miles an hour, the words would have been easy to miss.

The Victorian had no parking area, unlike some of the other buildings. Instead, it had an overflowing garden with a narrow walk to the door. Though many of the plants were beginning their dormancy—the calendar showing early October—there were plenty of green leaves and a few hardier flowers of sorts that I couldn’t name. Gardening had never been an interest of mine.

A small tree, less twisted and scraggly than the ones I’d seen upon arriving stood to one side of the walk. Even so it remained bent over with its branches reaching out towards the building like an old woman reaching for help to stand up.

I passed it as I went up the walk, noticing three cats, one black, one orange striped, and one pure white, sitting beneath the tree. I paused and squatted down. They were the first living things I’d seen since leaving the ferry. The relief I felt was more pronounced than I would have expected.

I held out my hand and the golden-eyed black cat stood up and stretched, staring at me. The others didn’t move. I might have been a ghost, or perhaps a human in a ghost world, though I could easily see the rise and fall of the feline’s chests and the movement of their eyes.

I sighed and stood up.

As I did so, I nearly jumped a foot backwards, I was so startled to see Sharon standing on the porch of the Victorian as if she’d been there all along.