THE RAINY SEASON, Laura Sanger Kelly, 5/11
5.
“Ask.”
"I'm going away, on a small tour," Barb told Rachel the next time he saw her.
He was slipping outgoing mail in his aunt's mailbox.
Don't say anything, she ordered herself. Then everything will be sane again.
"Will you be gone long?"
"A few weeks."
"What's your band's name?" Perhaps she could track them on the Internet, make sure he really was far away.
"Nine Tab."
“Like your shirt?"
"It's a clever word game."
She didn’t understand.
"Ixtab is the Mayan goddess of suicide. We made the “Ix” the Roman numeral,IX, and the translated it as “Nine.” Then we added T-A-B to complete the name. All of us in the band, we've got suicide in the family. Figured we'd make it pay."
"You don't think that's unlucky? Like tempting fate?"
He laughed, cheeks cherry with glee. "I don't think so." He gave her a wicked stare, clearly enjoying causing her discomfort. "The counselors would tell you not to say things like that. You'd make a bad shrink. By the way, can you pick the mail up while gone?"
“Sure,” she nodded, as he walked back into his little blue house.
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