A handful of papers were flashed angrily causing Tilly to take a step back.
"Dustin filed. He served me with divorce papers!"
Fae was many things, and dramatic was one of them.
Though, this volume of rage...Tilly could feel its concrete weight.
This wild woman, with her unkempt appearance and wide eyes, shaking arm holding lightweight papers that carried too much weight for her...this was a new version of her sister she wasn't entirely sure what to do with.
"Fae, I," she shook her head. "Why don't you go into the kitchen and I'll make us tea?"
"Tea is not going to fix this."
Her words were sharp, and Tilly was about to take it back when Fae turned and walked toward the kitchen. She closed her eyes for a moment gathering herself when the sound of the grandmother clock chimed.
She walked closer to where it sat tucked in the hallway. The hands were pointing down and looked like they were holding between them an upside-down cart with horses, a sunburst above it. She knew what it meant as an eerie feeling settled over her. And then she made her prickly sister tea. She expected the act of service to be met with pinched anger, complaints, no gratitude, and no warm exchange of sisterly love.
What she didn't expect was to find her sister bent over the worn island with her face buried in her folded arms and her shoulders shaking as small sounds escaped in little cries.
Tilly watched with horror, unsure of how to approach and handle this Fae. She couldn't find a memory of her sister crying, not like this.
So she quietly made her tea. It was a roasted chestnut herbal tea, slightly smoky in flavor that calmed the senses and warmed you as you drank it. She put a lemon rosemary shortbread cookie on the tea saucer setting it next to where her sister sat crying.
The thought of running a hand over her back in a soothing gesture occurred to her, but then the thought of her sister being angry with the kindness, turning it into an act of pitying her, kept her hand to herself.
She opened her mouth to say something, unsure what, when Freida opened the swinging door, looked at the crying Fae with a frown then to Tilly, and said in a curt voice, "There's something you need to come see."
And then she was gone, leaving the door swinging behind her.
"Fae, I need to-'"Oh go!" she cried into her arms. "I'm fine. Just leave the tea."
But even as she wasn't sure what she would be walking into, she was relieved to be leaving that behind for a few moments.
Frieda was standing in the living room, arms crossed, legs in a wide stance staring out the window. She was beginning to feel overwhelmed by not being wanted or welcome. From her sister, from Frieda, from people she knew in passing in town, and the signs that had started in the center of town and then bled out into yards and hung from mailboxes.
But she was responsible for this inn.
"Alright, what is going on, Freida?"
She didn't answer with words but pointed to words that had been painted across the windows in bright red paint- too bright for blood-too bright not to see whenever she closed her eyes.
WITCH BITCH
That overwhelming feeling started tingling in her fingertips, along her legs, her shoulders. She felt that heat that started in her chest and knew that it would end with feeling like she was on fire. Amid everything inside of her, she could feel an uneasecoming from Freida, but she didn't dare look at the woman as her scorn was not something she could take on. So, she shed her black cardigan, slipping it from her hot shoulders, and balled it up with a vigor that was bursting through her movements.
"What are you planning to do?"
Freida's question wasn't mere curiosity but laced with derision and Tilly had enough. When she turned around, holding her balled-up cardigan in one fist she set the night manager with a glare that felt like fire.
And the manager had a crack in her usual air of disdainful armor as Tilly's look hit her. She took one step back, her face sliding into a look of uncertainty and Tilly could feel that uncertainty pulsing between them. It felt good, like a balm to her raging heat inside.
"Call the non-emergency police number. Tell them we've had vandalism at the inn. I am going to take pictures, get my sister upstairs, and then I want you to go and check on all of the guests."
"We only have two including your sister," she replied, the snark in her tone less sharp but still there.
Tilly took one daunting step toward Freida, the sudden fear jumping in the woman's eyes feeding Tilly's rage. She spoke slowly, clearly, and punctually so that the message was clear. "Then check on the other guest."
Silence between the two women ticked a warring of what each of them would do next, but to Tilly's relief, she nodded once. Her movements were stiff and she wasn't exactly a joyful participant, but she was a participant.
