I’d left the bearskin back at the shop. Mr. Gennaro had done a fantastic job with the cleaning, though he’d threatened to charge me double if I ever brought in an animal again. The head was fluffy, coat so shiny it barely looked real. Even the teeth looked brighter.
Whitening toothpaste. He’d cleared his throat and busied himself with some receipts lined up on the countertop. Tell your mother I said hello.
I brought him up while I explained the bearskin, and she looked away too, stroking one of the soft rabbit ears between her fingers.
“What do we do with all this?” she asked. The boxes were spread around us, open, bits collected on the floor and on the coffee table next to our mugs.
“Honestly? I don’t know.” It was only pieces, a puzzle laid out, waiting for us to solve it. “I just . . . wanted to give you back some of it. Show you that I want you to be happy, even if I don’t understand what you’re doing.”
She took my hand. I looked away, down into an open box, to stare at the body of a platypus, legs twisted and broiled, but the face still sweet and earnest. “I appreciate that,” she said. “I mean it.”
“I don’t know what that means. I don’t know what I feel willing to help with. But I want to try.” I lifted up the smallest box and held it in my lap. It held baby animal parts: raccoons’ paws, singed feathers, and small, bristled tails.
“Try what?”
I patted the duck beaks and cow hooves, combed my fingers through part of a horse’s mane. “Something. Anything.”
My mother brushed the hair from my temple and curled it behind my ear. “I think that sounds nice.”
Milo and I went to check out the empty building next to the shop. The property had been used for a lot of things, but in its last life, it had been a restaurant. When we got inside, it still smelled like one. There was a sweet, spoiled odor like milk gone sour.
A bar ran along the right wall with liquor bottles strewn across its top. Milo picked one up and shook it.
“Nada.” He picked up another, then another. “Shit. You’d at least think I’d get a drink out of this.”
Booths took up the front, slick menus still scattered over paper place-mats, ketchup bottles with tacky red rings at their bottoms twinned with little jars full of yellowed peppers soaking up juice.
“Let’s check out the back,” I said. “This isn’t what we’re here for.”
There was a bank of freezers, stoves, and fryers. The heavy smell of rancid grease hung thick in the air. A stairwell stood at the back wall, a spiral that led up to the second floor. “Come on,” I said, pulling Milo away from the refrigerators. He’d opened one of the doors and a rank funk emerged that reminded me of the Dumpster smell at an amusement park.
He put a hand over his nose and gagged. “Holy shit. I think there might be a dead body inside.”
We proceeded upstairs single file. It was slow going. The stairs were rusty and creaked under our combined weight. The higher we rose, the more oppressive the heat became. When we reached the top, I was happy to see that all the stuff was still there.
“What the hell is this?” Milo walked ahead, boots marking tracks on the dusty linoleum.
It was an exhibition space. Dozens of glass cases formed pathways through the mess. Faded, ancient mannequins stood in some of them. None wore clothes, aside from a solitary figure in the first display. That one was dressed in a leafy loincloth and held a wooden club made from papier-mâché.
“They had that Christian historical museum here,” I said, leaning down to look into a display full of old Bibles. “You remember. The anti-evolution stuff?” We walked around another case that contained oversized plastic dinosaurs and a dusty tree full of shiny, fake apples. “We had to come for a field trip.”
Milo stopped in front of one that held remnants of palm trees. Wax animal figurines stood beside them, half melted from the heat. “I never did that. It was just you and Brynn.”
One of the cases stood open. I reached inside to pluck a wreath of flowers. Its petals spilled clumps of dust when I shook it. “Only happened that one year. They got into a bunch of trouble for it.”
Milo tapped an empty case. It made a hollow sound that reverberated off the walls. “What are we doing here, Jessa?”
“Looking to see if we’re interested.”
He turned in a circle, taking in the strange menagerie of creepy mannequins and faux greenery. “Interested in what?”
The whole place would have to be scrubbed down and disinfected, downstairs completely gutted. We could break through the walls of the shop and expand into the first floor, but that would take a lot more time and money. “We’re going to rent this space. For Mom.”
Milo sighed, long and heavy. His “exhausted with Jessa” sound. “Why?”
“It’s right next door, it’s cheap, and it’ll make her happy.”
“Couldn’t we just give her the window display?”
I could have brought up the fact that he’d shit on that idea before, but I ignored that instinct and took my time answering. I set the wreath down on a mannequin’s head like a crown. “It’s a good location. It’ll be a smart investment.”
“You mean financially?”
“Yes. Maybe.” I paused and thought for a second. “Also . . . artistically. I’ve got work I could display. I’m creative.”
I picked up the wreath again, touching each of the flowers individually, counting them. Calming myself. “You could have some space too.”
“I’m not an artist and I don’t do taxidermy.” His body language told me he was looking for a fight: chest outthrust, hands fisted. His jaw clenched rhythmically; it was something I’d never seen on him before. It reminded me of our father. “What the hell would I put on display?”
“I don’t know. Something. It could be meaningful.”
He looked confused, as if I’d spoken to him in a different language. “Meaningful? The fuck are you talking about?”
“I’m just saying we could get some closure.”
The floor was so covered in grit that my feet slid every time I took a step. It was messy and would need a ton of work, but I could see it. Creating displays and putting together the lighting. Assisting with the mounts, making backgrounds, crafting scenery. There could be spaces for me, for Mom. New work from Lolee and Bastien.
“I don’t need closure. I’ve got closure!” Milo slapped his hand down on one of the cases. It made a sharp, clinking sound.
“Jesus, don’t break them. They’re not ours yet.”
“You’re not listening to me!” He grunted, throwing up his hands. “But you never listen. It’s always about what you want. What’s best for Jessa.”
The sheer nerve it must have taken for him to say something like that. I was almost impressed. “That’s not remotely true,” I replied, pacing my words until each was nearly its own sentence. My face and neck felt hot, blistering. “Everything I do is for this family.”
“You’re completely selfish, and the worst part is you have a savior complex about it! Like any of us need you to save us? You’re not God, Jessa. You’re not in charge.”