Chapter Thirty-one

Emma

I walked beside Jezebel down the long hallway and toward the screen door to the porch. Before we made it to the door, she led me into a sitting room. In a basket were blankets. Jezebel lifted one and handed it my direction.

“It has to be eighty-five degrees,” I said as I took the wool blanket.

“It’s not for the temperature. Sitting outside, there will be mosquitoes. Wrap up and they won’t get you.”

The scratchy blanket was in my grasp. “Do you have any bug repellent?”

Jezebel shook her head. “I don’t believe in chemicals.”

“You gave me tablets to sleep.”

Her blue eyes met mine as a smile came to her lips. “There was nothing in them.”

We both wrapped the blankets around our shoulders and settled into two big rocking chairs. The hum of flying bugs began the chorus of night noises. Crickets and toads added their sounds until the dark world beyond the porch was vibrantly alive in my mind. Not all the creatures I imagined were capable of being kept away with a wool blanket.