Holly Fever (Mondamin Court #1)

Chapter 24

The next morning they crossed the street and headed for the house next to the Hillcrests'. The weather was cold again, but there was no snow. Zoey dug an old red wagon out of the garage to help haul home whatever loot they found.

They checked all the doors and windows. Finding none open, Darren used a crowbar to jimmy the back door. Zoey slipped inside and looked around. The entire house was empty, and there was none of the sickly odor of decomposition. "They must have left before things collapsed," she said as she returned and ushered them in.

The kitchen was a windfall, and they found more than a dozen bottles of wine in the basement.

"Are you sure you're of age?" Darren joked as Zoey packed a couple bottles of wine in with the food.

"The cops don't come out here anymore. So, yes."

"God, I wish they had beer," he said, looking in the dark fridge.

There was little else in the house that was of any use to them. The closet overflowed in women's clothes, but they were mostly too big for the girls and not styles that Zoey preferred. Besides, she had clothes of her own.

Zoey found one teddy in the lingerie drawer and shoved it down her shirt, embarrassed to let the others, especially Darren, know that she had even taken it.

As she came out of the bedroom, she found Darren staring at a picture he'd taken off an end table in the main room. "It was two chicks," he said, holding the picture out for her. "Two chicks that were married."

Two women in their mid-twenties stared out of the picture at Zoey. One was in a long white gown, and the other in a white tux. Both were smiling.

"Oh yeah," Zoey said. "I remember mom talking about it when they first moved in. She was kind of excited to have a lesbian couple on the block, I think. Diversity and all that."

Darren snorted. "They were kind of cute," he said and waggled his eyebrows. .

Zoey rolled her eyes. "Men," she muttered.

"Mom didn't like them," Ruth said. "Said they were sinning . . . really bad too. She said God would punish them."

"God punished all of us," Darren said. "Fucked us good."

"It's not like that anyway," Zoey said. "I know a lot of churches say God doesn't like gay people, but . . ."

"But it's in the Bible, black and white," Ruth insisted.

"Do you know the story of Ruth?" Zoey challenged.

The young girl looked suspicious. "What story?"

"In the Bible, the story of Ruth, your namesake."

"No. What about it?"

"They say the Bible is against gay people, but Ruth and Naomi loved each other, and the Bible celebrated it." Zoey stared off into space and began reciting, "'Where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die—there will I be buried.' That was Ruth's vow to Naomi."

Darren snorted. "So? That doesn't mean they were gay for each other."

"Some people think it does mean that," Zoey said.

"Huh uh," Ruth insisted. "It's a sin, and God will punish them. That's what Mom always said."

"Yeah well, how come Mom died then?" Esther demanded. "They didn't do nothing, not Mom, Dad, or Ethan. And they're dead too."