Chapter Text
It’s an unusually hot summer’s day in Minnesota. Toni Shalifoe wipes the sweat off her forehead as she finishes mowing the lawn for Bernice Blackburn, her best friend Martha's mother. Shielding her eyes, she looks up at the cloudless sky. “This heat is going to kill me,” she says to Martha, who is in the corner of the yard, yanking out overgrown weeds.
Martha throws the pile of weeds she’s holding into a large trash bag. “Mom said she has some fresh lemonade inside when we’re through,” Martha says. “So, there’s that!”
“Always leave it to Mrs. B,” Toni grins. She pushes the beat-up lawn mower to the side of the house and hoists the bag of grass over her shoulder, dragging it to the garbage can. She throws it in the bin, dusting her hands on her shorts after. Toni does a quick survey of the yard; it still needs lots of work. Her and Martha are no professional gardeners, but it looks better than it did this morning. “How’re the weeds going?” Toni asks, walking across the freshly mowed grass to where Martha is.
“Almost done,” Martha says, tugging a few more loose weeds out of the ground. “They’re super long.” She holds a pile to Toni.
Toni takes the weeds from her and twists them around in her hands. “It’s because summer’s almost over, they’ve had all summer to grow. The extra sunshine made the grass look like a fucking corn maze, felt like I’d never be done mowing.”
Toni continues twisting the weeds in her hands until she weaves together two tiny wreaths, big enough to fit around her wrist. She twirls and tosses them around a few times until they both end up bouncing over the fence into their new neighbor's back yard. “Shit, oops." Toni shrugs. She grabs another pile of weeds near Martha and starts messing with those instead.
“Toni, this will go faster if you’d help me instead of – what are you even doing?” Martha chastises. She tilts her head as Toni makes a tiny ball.
“It’s a small basketball, duh," Toni states like it's obvious. She throws it in the air and jumps back and forth, acting like she’s playing against an invisible person.
Martha rolls her eyes and throws her last pile into the trash. “Well, I think we’re done out here, because nothing is getting done now.” Martha laughs and grabs the tiny ball from Toni, throwing it in the trash.
“Hey!” Toni yells, half pouting.
“C’mon, let’s get some lemonade.” Martha drags her trash bag over to the garbage bin and tosses it in. Toni looks toward the fence between their yard and the neighbor’s. She walks forward and hastily tries to hoist herself over with a jump. “What are you doing now?” Martha gapes at her, hands firmly on her hips.
“I’m trying to see if I can get the wreaths I made, since you threw away my ball,” Toni grumbles. She’s sitting on top of the brick fence with a leg dangling on each side.
“I don’t think you wanna go into their yard, Toni. You’ve seen their front yard, right?” Martha quirks an eyebrow. “Make a new wreath and let’s go inside.”
“No, why? What’s in their front yard?” Toni leaps off the fence, landing on her feet and striding to the back gate. She yanks it open, walking to the front of the Blackburn house where she can see a clear view of the yard next door. “Oh, you’ve gotta be fucking kidding me, Marty,” she shouts. “Why didn’t you tell me we had a bunch of bigots living next door?”
Martha hurries after Toni and quickly grabs her arm. “Toni, shh! They could hear you and we shouldn’t judge them without any reason. I just didn’t think you’d want to be climbing into their yard, what with the 'God Bless America' sign on their front porch, the 'Jesus Loves You' sign on their lawn and the large American flag in their driveway. I don’t think they’d take kindly to you jumping the fence to get a pile of weeds out of their yard. Just make a new ball.”
“It was a wreath, two of them. Not a ball,” Toni huffs. "Whatever, I’m over it,” she says, gaze not leaving the neighbor’s yard. Martha ends up dragging her by the elbow inside to get some lemonade.
The next morning, Toni’s alarm goes off bright and early, waking both her and Martha up for school. Toni grumbles and turns over, smacking the alarm before pulling her blue comforter over her head. Toni hears Martha jump out of bed and head for the shower.
Toni has been living with the Blackburn's for the past year. She’s been in and out of foster homes all her life, her own mother chasing the next high instead of taking care of her own daughter. Martha has been her best friend since they were in first grade, and she’s always seen the Blackburn's as her second family. After her mother ended up in the hospital for the third time in her junior year last year, Bernice Blackburn pulled Toni aside and told her she was welcome to stay with them. Ever since then, she’s been living in Martha’s room with her, her own mattress pushed to the opposite side of Martha’s room. They were living like sisters now.
Toni hears Bernice in the kitchen, making them breakfast. She sighs, knowing she’s only delaying the inevitable. Throwing off her blanket, she gets up and goes to the bathroom. She showers and dresses for school, putting on some camo pants and a red shirt. She hurries into the kitchen to grab a quick bite and wishes Bernice a good morning. Her school bag sits by the front door next to her vans. She slides her shoes on easily, slings her bag over her shoulder and goes outside. She knows Martha will join her soon and they'll walk to school together.
The weather is warm again today and Toni enjoys the feel of it on her skin. She knows it won’t last long and soon autumn will be here. Leaning against the side of the house, she bites into the green apple she’d taken from Bernice. Schools only just started up and she’s still getting used to having to get up early again. She misses summer break already. Taking another bite of her apple, she hears a sliding door crack open. It takes her a moment to realize it's come from the neighbor's backyard.
She instantly hears two voices. Toni can't make out what they’re saying so she moves a few inches closer toward their back gate. She hates herself for being curious about what her new Jesus-loving neighbors are like. She can make out a deep voice and a soft voice. A husband and wife? The two voices speak in hushed tones, and Toni can hear movement around the yard, but still can’t make out what they’re saying. Pressing her ear to the gate and crouching low so they won’t see her, Toni listens. After a few moments, she hears the man speak again.
“What is this, Jobeth?” the deeper voice demands.
“I don’t know, Dave, what is it?” Jobeth asks.
“These look like somethin’ one would use in a pagan ritual,” Dave says. “This wasn’t here when we moved in, was it? I swear, if we’ve moved into a neighborhood with weirdos who practice satanic witchcraft-”
“I doubt that’s what it is. Come back inside. I’ve got to take the kids to school. Show me inside,” Jobeth says hurriedly. Toni hears more hushed bickering before the two voices go inside and the back door is closed.
“What the hell was that all about?”
“What was what all about?” Martha says, causing Toni to jump and drop her apple in the grass.
“Jesus, Marty! Do not sneak up on people,” Toni hisses, reaching down to pick up her apple.
“Weren’t you just sneaking on the neighbors?” Martha crosses her arms, leveling Toni with a sharp look.
Toni tosses her apple into the garbage bin and follows Martha back to the front of the house. “No,” Toni lies.
“Whatever you say, Toni.” Martha grabs her bag from the front porch.
As the two head toward the sidewalk, the neighbor's front door opens and a group of five blondes briskly walk out, heading for a large white SUV in their driveway. The two adults Toni assumes she heard moments ago climb into the front and what she can only assume are their three children – a young girl who looks about 10, a boy who looks about 12 and an older girl who looks the same age as her and Martha – clamber into the back.
“Of course, they’re all blonde,” Toni mutters, eyes glued to their car.
“Toni, shh,” Martha nudges her. Toni watches as the SUV pulls out of the driveway. The father, Dave, rolls down one of his darkened windows and tosses something out of the car window into one of two large trash cans on the side of the street.
It takes Toni a second before she realizes what it is. The SUV is already down the street before she has a chance to react. “Hey! Those are my wreaths! He threw my wreaths away!” Toni runs to the garbage cans.
“Toni, we’re going to be late for school,” Martha sighs, still standing on the sidewalk.
Toni opens the trash can and pulls out her two wreaths. “Ah haa! See, I was right.” She tries to spruce them up with her hands. “The bastard crumpled them.” She glares down the street, where their car is now long gone. “Wait a minute. Was this what he was talking about in their backyard just now?” Toni looks toward the neighbor's house.
“I thought you said you weren’t snooping on the neighbors,” Martha says in a clipped voice.
“Well, I lied,” Toni admits sheepishly. “But he said something about a ritual? He mentioned witchcraft! What the fuck?” Toni looks down at the harmless little wreaths she made. She frowns. “Is he stupid? Don’t answer that, I know he is. Look at his yard.” She motions to all the Jesus signs.
“Toni, can we discuss this after school? We’re going to be late,” Martha warns, rather serious now. Toni knows that tone and knows she must drop it. For now.
“Yeah, yeah," Toni says, “but first,” she chucks the wreaths back into the neighbor's backyard over their metal gate. Martha rolls her eyes as Toni jogs back over to her. “Now we can go.”
Toni’s leaning back in her chair in her third period class, chewing on the end of her pencil and staring out the window absently. She’s watching two finches fly from tree to tree, when their teacher announces they have a new student. Twisting her head toward the front of class, Toni's pencil drops from her mouth. It’s her neighbor’s eldest daughter. Their teacher introduces her as Shelby Goodkind.
She has long, straight golden blonde hair and she’s wearing faded blue jeans with a form fitting white top with daisies on it. Holding a gray bag on her shoulder, her eyes dart around the room, taking in her fellow students. She looks a little nervous, but it doesn’t show when she speaks.
“Hi, y’all. I’m Shelby,” Shelby says with a sweet-sounding drawl, smiling brightly. Ton sinks in her seat a little.
“Shelby and her family just moved from Texas,” their teacher announces to the class. “You’ll sit next to Miss Jadmani." He points Shelby toward Fatin Jadmani, one of the more popular girls in their year who only moved here last year. Shelby moves down the line of desks until she’s next to Fatin’s and sits beside her. The two strike up an easy conversation.
Of course, her weird new neighbors who think she’s a witch are from Texas. Grinding her teeth, Toni turns her focus to her notebook in front of her. She picks up her pencil again and tries to push everything about them from her mind for the remainder of the day.
It’s impossible. Shelby Goodkind is in three of her classes, and she has the sunniest, brightest personality imaginable. She’s always raising her hand. Always eager to help if the teacher needs something. She sits directly behind Toni during their sixth period and she feels more than sees her bouncing behind her, trying to get the teacher's attention so she can tell them the answer they asked.
Toni finally gets a break during her last period of the day, because Shelby isn’t in that one. When the last bell rings, Toni rushes out the door, eager to get home and put this day behind her. She waits in front of the school for Martha, by the front fence near the parking lot, where they usually meet up to walk home together.
“Toni!” Martha runs across the parking lot when she spots her, bag slung low on her shoulder. “You won’t believe it, but I met our new neighbor! Her name is Shelby. She was just in my last period, and she’s so nice, Toni. I don't know what you thought you heard her dad saying this morning. But she’s so sweet."
Toni’s jaw drops. “Marty, no. Not you.” She sighs and leans against the school fence, fingers digging into the metal panels in annoyance. “Please, let's just go home.” Martha pays her outburst little mind and continues waxing poetic about Shelby freaking Goodkind on their walk home.
Today has not been her day.
Toni practices basketball outside once she’s finished with homework. Bernice mounted a used basketball hoop above their garage when she moved in last year and Toni often spends her after hours shooting hoops, especially when she needs to let off steam. Between shots, she finds her attention drawn to the Goodkind yard. It’s hard not to with their flashy Jesus signs. She wonders if Dave Goodkind found the two wreaths she threw back in his yard that morning.
After making another basket, she picks her ball off the grass and moves to rest it on her hip under her arm, strolling down to the two garbage cans on the street Dave had thrown them in that morning. With her free hand, she lifts the lid and peers inside: right on top are the two wreaths she made. He threw them away again.
Toni feels a surge of annoyance, followed by a weird kind of glee. She kind of wishes she had been here when he’d found them again so she could hear more of his insane ramblings about satanic rituals.
Walking back, Toni jiggles her back gate open and drops her basketball near the patio, done practicing for the day. The sky is starting to darken and she knows Bernice is making food. She turns to head inside but something twists in her stomach that stops her. Chewing on her thumbnail, she looks back at the Goodkind house. She knows she shouldn’t do it. But the temptation is too great.
Toni walks over to where Martha had been pulling weeds the day before. There's still plenty of them to make more. She begins pulling some out, making a pile and adding twigs and leaves to it. Deciding to make five of them this time, she makes each one distinct but enough like her first two in the hopes Dave Goodkind will think they’re from the same person. The same witch. She scatters all five of them in the Goodkind's front yard, purposely placing them near the Jesus signs. Grinning to herself, she dusts her hands on her camo pants after and heads inside for some of Bernice’s homecooked dinner, which she can already smell before even stepping inside.
The next morning, while waiting outside for Martha to join her so they can walk to school, Toni's eyes never leave the Goodkind yard. So far, they haven’t noticed her little gifts. She’s so busy snooping she doesn’t notice Martha pop up beside her. “What are you doing, Toni?”
Toni jumps. “Fuck! Marty. Stop sneaking up on me. Also, I’m doing... nothing,” Toni says sheepishly. She rubs the back of her neck and lifts her head toward the sky, acting like she hadn’t just been staring at the neighbor’s yard for ten minutes. Martha eyes her suspiciously. Before Toni has to come up with an excuse, the five Goodkind family members exit their house and head to their white SUV, much like they had the previous morning. Martha turns her suspicious gaze away from Toni to look toward them. A smile spreads across her face and she waves. Shelby spots Martha’s enthusiastic greeting and waves back.
Today Shelby’s wearing a pastel pink top tucked into a white skirt, cropped just above her knees and her long blonde hair is in a high ponytail. It’s another warm day and Shelby is dressed for it. Toni bites her lip, feeling Shelby’s eyes on her. Shelby smiles at her and waves in her direction, just like she’d done to Martha. Toni blinks. Martha nudges her. Toni waves back with reluctance. Once their SUV is driving away, Martha rolls her eyes.
“Would it hurt you to be nice? I don’t know what you have against her dad, but Shelby’s really nice.”
Toni cranes her neck toward the Goodkind yard, disappointed Dave hadn’t noticed her presents. “She’s too... happy,” is all Toni can find herself saying. She knows it’s a lame reason, but she can’t help it. She has a grudge because her stupid dad said her harmless wreaths were evil.
“Too happy? I’m a happy person, Toni, and you love me.” Martha follows Toni’s watchful eyes.
“It’s different, Marty. You’re different,” Toni sighs heavily, still looking at their yard in disappointment.
Martha is now looking at the Goodkind yard. “Toni, what did you do?”
Toni, suddenly interested in her fingernails, picks at her cuticle. “Hmm?”
“Did you put more of your little weeds in their yard?” Martha asks sharply. Toni doesn't answer, which Martha takes as a ‘yes’. “Toni, don’t be stupid. They could have a camera in their yard. What if they see you? And even if they don’t, you’re just making an enemy of our neighbors.” Martha swats at Toni’s arm.
Toni groans, having not thought about that. They would be the type to have an entire camera system hooked up. But they hadn’t noticed anything or said anything this morning or last night, so maybe they didn’t. “Fine, Marty. I won’t do it again. It’s not like he noticed this morning, anyway,” Toni sighs.
Martha smiles, dragging Toni down the sidewalk toward school. “Good.”
Toni is on her best behavior through most of the school day, trying to ignore Shelby. Once again, Shelby makes that impossible. Maybe Martha was right, Shelby is nice. Too nice. That was her problem. No one is that nice all the time.
Biting her tongue, she shakes her head and wishes the day to go faster so she doesn’t have to hear Shelby’s Texan accent yelling out an answer in class one more time. Or hear her talking about how lovely a day it is outside. Or about how much she wishes her Daddy would let her adopt a dog.
After what feels like an eternity, the bell rings signaling the last of her classes with Shelby for the day; Toni dashes to her last period in record speed, which is thankfully Shelby Goodkind free.
The Goodkind reprieve only lasts until around 5pm. Toni and Martha are in their backyard on some old patio chairs, enjoying the evening summer breeze and working on their homework, when Toni hears shouting coming from the front of the house. She looks up, pencil still in hand, when she realizes the yelling is coming from Dave Goodkind.
Toni jumps up from the patio table her and Martha are sitting at and runs to their back gate. She jumps up and down on the grass, trying to see over the top. She makes out Dave in his front yard, holding one of the wreaths Toni had left last night and yelling at someone in the direction of his front door. She hears him shouting about witchcraft and satanic magic again. Toni can’t help but smirk. Turning around and trying to look inconspicuous, she walks back to the patio table. Martha squints her eyes from where she's sitting. Toni shrugs innocently but can’t quite hide the shit eating grin on her face as Dave Goodkind continues screaming.
Toni ends up breaking her promise to Martha about not meddling with the Goodkind family – notably Dave. She waits a day or two, making sure she wasn't caught on any kind of camera, before she spends the next week making more miniature wreaths. The following Monday, after she’s made about ten, she distributes a few on the sidewalk leading up to his house, careful not to go into anyone else’s yard but theirs. She smushes one down on the corner edge of the "Jesus Loves You" sign, happily lodging it in place.
She does that for three days until Dave Goodkind catches on to the fact that someone is leaving them every day. After that, he makes sure to get up at the crack of dawn so he can throw the offending "pagan ritual nonsense” away. Much to Toni’s annoyance, she hasn’t witnessed any more of his outbursts because she’s always asleep when he finds them.
Toni decides to change course and pauses until the following Sunday, when she knows the Goodkind family will be at church. She waits until the five family members drive away in their SUV before wandering over to their house and leaving five more presents around their yard.
She sits inside Martha’s house by the front living room window, waiting for the time she's noticed they tend to arrive back from church. Martha has gone grocery shopping with Bernice, so she doesn’t have to deal with Martha scolding her for bothering the neighbors again. She has her math homework on the floor in front of her and is busying herself with that until they return home.
The second she hears a car door shut, she crouches on her knees and pushes the curtain aside, peering out the window. Instead of Dave Goodkind, she sees Shelby Goodkind and her younger siblings. Even their mother isn’t there. Toni in her curiosity, stands up from where she’s crouched and cracks open the Blackburn front door, looking on as the two younger Goodkind children go inside their house.
Shelby stays outside, having noticed the wreaths Toni left in the yard. She’s wearing a bright yellow dress today with a white headband in her hair. Toni hates how lovely she always manages to look. Rubbing the sides of her head with her fingers to try and stop a headache from forming, she watches as Shelby walks across their perfectly mowed lawn and picks up the one she’d lodged on their Jesus sign. Shelby looks at it, head tilted to the side, almost as if she’s admiring it.
Before she can stop herself, Toni pushes the screen door open and steps onto the front porch. “Hey, be careful. I hear those are made by witches,” she yells in her direction. She steps off the porch, walking toward Shelby’s yard.
Shelby startles at Toni and the wreath drops from her hands. But she swiftly recovers and picks it back up, holding it firmly. She holds it up for inspection again. “My Daddy has been havin’ a fit over these the past two weeks. You’ve heard him, I take it?” Shelby laughs. Toni crosses her arms and nods. “Mama keeps tellin’ him it is probably just kids havin’ a laugh, but he insists it’s witches leaving them around to put some evil magic curse on him. I tend to agree with Mama,” she remarks. “I think they’re kinda pretty, actually, like little bracelets. But they could use a pop of color. Maybe some flowers in them.” Shelby smiles at the one in her hands. Toni gapes, mouth hanging open. Shelby turns her smile toward her, and Toni quickly closes her mouth.
“I–yeah, totally." Toni is aware she must sound dumb. She’s been caught off guard by Shelby Goodkind not only liking her creations but commenting that they could be better.
Shelby smiles again at Toni before gathering the rest Toni had left that morning. “I think we’d all rather not hear his yellin’. He and Mama are still at church, but they should be back soon.” Shelby tosses the wreaths in the garbage cans by the street.
“I wondered where they were,” Toni comments. Then she realizes that sounds like she was waiting for them. Which she was. But Shelby can’t know that. “I mean, I saw you while I was washing dishes from our kitchen window and noticed it was only you three,” Toni lies quickly.
Shelby doesn’t seem to catch Toni’s obvious lie. “My Daddy’s the pastor, so he has to stay longer sometimes. To talk with the other people who help run the church. We moved here to help expand the church here,” Shelby says. “Our church has had a boom up in this area recently and he wanted to be here to help.”
Toni hates talking about religion, especially with white people, but Shelby hasn’t done anything to offend her, so she keeps her opinions to herself and just nods.
Shelby seems to notice Toni doesn’t have much to add, so she clasps her hands together and moves toward her front door. “Well, anyway. Nice seein’ you this afternoon, Toni. See you at school tomorrow,” she smiles. Toni can’t help herself – she smiles back.
Caught off guard by the whole exchange, it’s not until she sees Martha and Bernice pulling up in their driveway that Toni hurries back inside their house.
Now back in her room, Toni lays on her bed, thoughts running a mile a minute about what her next plan of action should be regarding Operation Bother Dave Goodkind. Shelby threw a tiny wrench in her plans. Or maybe not...
A few days later, after school, Toni is weaving together a few more wreaths in the Blackburn’s backyard. She hasn’t put any new ones in the Goodkind yard since Sunday. She can’t stop thinking about what Shelby said to her. Add a bit of color? Should she do that? Would Shelby notice?
Toni has found Shelby less bothersome in school since they spoke to each other on Sunday. Every time she raises her hand to answer a question, Toni finds herself amused now rather than annoyed. Maybe Martha was right about her. But she is still super religious with a fanatic father, so she's still slightly wary. Toni knows she can’t trust religious fanatics, they’re nine times out of ten bigoted, crazy and homophobic. She already knows Dave Goodkind is crazy, he’s sure to be the other two.
Toni sucks her bottom lip between her teeth in concentration, turning her attention back to the wreaths she’s working on. Her eyes scan the backyard, spotting one of Bernice’s rose bushes in the corner of the yard. There are some red petals on the ground. The bush needs trimming, but Toni can’t focus on that right now. Instead, she gathers the fallen petals she can find and adds them to her wreaths, making them – what was Shelby’s word? – pop. Pleased with the results, Toni admires her new creations. They do look nicer.
To avoid being seen, Toni waits until night fall before she leaves a few around the Goodkind yard.
The next morning, Dave once again throws them all away before Toni has a chance to witness his reaction. Toni had hoped he’d stop waking up early since it’d been more than a week since he last found them, but the man remains a lunatic. Toni decides she doesn’t care about missing Dave’s ranting, but she did want to see if Shelby had noticed she added rose petals. She knows Shelby won't see them on the weekdays, not with Dave determined to wake up before any sane person does and throw them away, so Toni decides to wait until Sunday again. She knows Shelby will see them then.
On Sunday morning, Toni waits again until the Goodkind family leaves for church before going out and dropping more of her presents in their yard, red rose petals woven in between the weeds.
The plan almost backfires. Dave arrives home with the rest of the family after church and the minute he’s parked the car, he’s storming into their yard, picking up one of the wreaths Toni had left by one of their yard signs. Peeking from the curtain window, Toni watches it all take place from the Blackburn’s living room.
Jobeth, Shelby and her two younger siblings follow Dave. The two younger siblings seem in a hurry to avoid their father’s ranting and head inside the house at record speed. Jobeth and Shelby help Dave pick up the remaining ones in the yard.
Toni's attention remains on Shelby, who looks lovely in a long sleeved light green dress with tall black boots. She's currently looking down at one of the wreaths she'd plucked from the ground. Toni's eyes follow as she runs one of her fingers along the weeds, pulling out one of the rose petals. She brings it to her nose to smell, smiling and closing her eyes as she does. Toni can’t hear what she’s saying, but she’s talking to her dad. He ends up yelling at her and Jobeth, causing Shelby to frown. Toni feels her fists clench at her sides. She watches as he yanks the wreath from Shelby’s hand and tosses it in the garbage can by the street along with the rest he’d gathered. He then storms inside, Jobeth on his heels.
Toni is still gawking at the closed front door where Dave and Jobeth have just stormed in that she doesn’t notice Shelby staring toward the Blackburn house, directly at the window Toni is in front of, until a second too late. Toni gasps and ducks under the window. She feels her heart beating fast in her chest, threatening to burst. She doesn’t look up for a solid five minutes. Once she does, Shelby is no longer outside; she must’ve gone inside too. Toni slumps against the wall, heart still beating hard and fast.
Had Shelby seen her staring at them? Toni wonders if she should stop putting them out. She doesn’t want Dave to yell at his family. She wants to piss him off, but not at the expense of his family getting the brunt of it. Toni digs her teeth into her lip, feeling her heart finally start to even out. She decides she’ll hold off with Operation Bother Dave Goodkind. For now.