Until There Was You

“I’m not looking, Mom.”

“You must want to know your roots. It would be fine. We know you love us,” Max said, sounding as if he was reciting from a pamphlet on When Your Adopted Child Wants Answers. “I’m not looking. James left his book at Irreplaceable a while ago, I brought it home and just forgot about it.”

“I’m so sorry I brought it up. Posey, really. So sorry.” Gretchen gave Posey a little wink, and Posey thought, for one deeply satisfying moment, how fun it would be to see her cousin fending off a couple dozen angry raccoons. Ever since the night at the casino, Gretchen had been more and more hostile—and clever. Nothing could be held against her, but it was malicious just the same.

“Well,” Stacia said, still staring suspiciously at Posey, “it’s time to get dressed for the parade. Come on, girls. Posey, where’s that poor Brianna? Is she coming?”

“I’m here, Mrs. O,” poor Brianna replied, rolling her eyes at Posey.

“Good. Your costumes are in the back. Gretchen, darling, wait till you see yours! It just came in yesterday!”

“I HATE YOU. I’M calling Big Brothers tomorrow and having you fired.”

“Shush,” Posey said. “At least no one can see your face. I’m the evil serving wench. Would you rather be dressed like me, young lady?”

“No. I’d kill myself if I was dressed like you.”

Brie had a point. Posey’s costume wasn’t really a costume—it was just her waitressing outfit from the restaurant, the same one she’d worn when waiting tables at Guten Tag when she was seventeen. Ruffled white blouse (well, once-white, now yellowing). Green dwarf-embroidered vest that ended just below the bustline, ruffled skirt, green tights, painted clogs.

“It’ll be fun, Brianna,” she said. “You asked to come, remember? Beats sitting at home.”

“No, it doesn’t! I’m a goose, Posey! I’m dressed like a goose! You left the goose part out!”

“Sue me,” Posey said. “Here, have a marzipan. They’re not bad. Just suck on them long enough to soften the shell. The parade starts in ten minutes, so get in the spirit of things, kid.”

“Hate you,” Brianna grumbled, but she took a candy.

When Posey and Henry were three and nine, the Osterhagens decided to do a float for the Founders’ Day parade. They’d chosen to depict Hansel and Gretel, Henry and Posey holding hands and waving, Henry dropping bread crumbs from time to time. It had been a big hit. From then on, the elder Osterhagens had run with the Brothers Grimm theme. After all, as Jon pointed out, it beat the other thing Germany was rather famous for: the Nazi party. The back room of Guten Tag was full of aging animal costumes—mice, horses, a wolf or two, and, yes, geese. Those roped into duty tossed bulletlike marzipan to the crowd, who had the tendency to flinch and shield themselves.

Getting out of float duty was akin to high treason, though just about every staff member came up with some dire emergency to dodge their duty. Henry always managed to be on call and was forgiven, as he was a brilliant surgeon. Only Jon and Posey really enjoyed it…and now Gretchen. In the past few years, Irreplaceable cosponsored the float; Posey had found an enormous sleigh from a decrepit Santa’s Village in Lake George. The sleigh was mounted on a trailer and pulled by a stately old Farmall tractor driven by Mac. And this year, on the side of the float was something Posey had never seen, a banner that read The Goose Girl by the Brothers Grimm and featuring the Barefoot Fraulein Herself, Gretchen Heidelberg! Brought to you by your friends at Guten Tag and Irreplaceable Artifacts.

There were other floats, as well—the library had one shaped like an open book, the 4-H kids usually had one with a goat or a calf, and the marina always pulled some gorgeous sailboat. Rick Balin would sit on the deck, waving in boozy noblesse oblige, some unfortunate young woman shivering in a bikini next to him. Then there were the school bands, the Little League teams and a handful of veterans. But Guten Tag’s float was something of an icon and always came last.

“Oh, man! This is so fun? Right? Thanks for inviting me, Mrs. Osterhagen!” Elise, also dressed as a goose, waddled up to Mac and honked at him. He swallowed and ignored her.

“If I see someone I know, I’m throwing myself in front of the nursery school float, and all those kids will have to watch me die,” Brianna said.

“When you close your beak, no one will see your face. And please. I’ve been doing this since I was three years old. I have no sympathy for you. None. You asked to come, and here you are.”

“Oh, Brie, you look so cute!” Jon leaped lightly onto the float. “Wherefore is my true princess?” he cried.

“He’s hiding in an O.R. somewhere,” Posey said.

“I wish I was in the O.R. I’d break a leg to get out of this,” Brianna muttered.

“You’re late, Jon,” Stacia called.

“I had to get my hair perfect. And didn’t I? Am I not the very picture of a proper Prussian prince?” He glanced at Posey and lowered his voice. “Speaking of gorgeous men, heard from you-know-who?”

“Nope,” Posey murmured. “But it’s fine. I think we have plans for tomorrow.” Still, it would’ve been nice if he’d called. Dang it! She was just not the type to sit around mooning near the phone, yet that was exactly what she’d done last night. Loser.

Jon gave her a knowing look, then mercifully changed the subject. “Where did that banner come from?” he asked.

“Gretchen had it done herself!” Stacia said from the front, where she sat in her role as the queen. “Wasn’t that so sweet of her? Now everyone will know a celebrity chef is working at Guten Tag!”

“Just in case they dodged that fact somehow,” Jon said, winking at Posey and Brianna.

“So, what do we have to do, exactly?” Brie asked.

“Just wave and throw marzipan,” Posey said. “Try not to hit anyone, though. It hurts.”

“Could you be quiet, please?” Gretchen said. “We need to get into character.”

“Is she for real?” Brianna muttered.

“I don’t know the story,” Jon said. “All I was told is that I need to look handsome, so here I am, handsome.”

The float was just about to enter the official parade route, which wound for a mile and a half through town before ending at Memorial Bridge Park for the ceremonies. People from other floats milled around, kids dressed in their band uniforms scampered and warmed up, the Pedersen boys got ready to fire off the cannon that would mark the start of the parade.

Gretchen turned around from her seat on the front of the sleigh, where she sat with Max and Stacia. “The story is, Jon, that I’m the true princess, and Posey—”

“The evil serving wench,” Posey supplied.

“Not quite, and I was getting to that,” Gretchen said coolly. “Posey, my jealous maid, and I are on the way to the neighboring kingdom so I can marry the prince. But she steals my clothes and tries to pass herself off as me. In the meantime, I tend the castle geese, but the king—that’s Papa, of course—the king can tell that I’m the true princess, and I’m reinstated and marry you, Jon.”

“You lucky thing,” Posey murmured.

“What happens to the maid?” Brie asked.

“Oh, I’m put into a barrel lined with nails and dragged through town until I’m dead,” Posey said. “Fun, huh? Gotta make sure I read those fairy tales to my kids someday.”

“Why isn’t Posey the true princess?” Brie asked, her voice loud and defensive, and Posey felt a rush of love. Tough-girl act aside, Brianna was a sweetheart.

“It’s really not my thing,” she said. “I’d rather be the evil wench. More character.”

“So Lady Boobs-a-Plenty got the job,” Brianna said.

It was true. Gretchen’s generous cl**vage spilled out in levels not seen in New Hampshire since prostitution was outlawed. The true princess costume was low, tight and white, complete with sparkles, a staff and crown—Glinda the Good Witch, Vegas-style—and since Posey wasn’t the dress-up type, she didn’t really mind. Not much.

Max turned around and smiled. “Well, you’re still my princess, honey.”

“Aw. Thanks, Dad.”

“Can we stop the chatter? Places, everyone!” Gretchen commanded. Elise waddled obediently to the back of the float.

“This is so awesome, right?” she said to Brianna. “Don’t you, like, love being a goose?”

“If I had a gun—” Brianna began, but Posey snapped her beak closed.

“Okay, people, let’s make this a great show!” Gretchen said, her voice loud, her smile ferocious. “Brianna, if that’s your name, and Elise, would you mind honking once in a while? Not too loud. And in five, four, three…” She counted down on her fingers, going silent for two and one, as if the cameras were about to start broadcasting. The float rolled into motion. “Hello there!” Gretchen called. “So nice to see you! Happy Founders’ Day! Thank you!”

“Can I whip this candy at the back of her head?” Brianna asked, her voice muffled.

“No,” Posey said as Jon snorted. “Just toss it—gently—at the crowd.”

Posey loved the parade, roles aside. She knew plenty of people, of course, and Gretchen’s small fame had a couple of tweenie girls run out to the sleigh for an autograph, which Gretchen demurely gave. Brianna proved to have unerring aim, winging her classmates with the hard lumps of marzipan under the cover of goose. There were Kate and James, Kate blowing her nose loudly. Brie whipped about fifteen pieces of marzipan at James, and he gave her a peace sign in return. Kids yelled out to Jon, who responded by singing phrases of Gilbert and Sullivan. Elise was having a marvelous time, laughing and honking and occasionally leaning off the float for a glimpse of Mac’s solid back. They passed a group of familiar faces—Vivian and her geriatric peeps. “Hi, Vivian!” Posey called, laughing as Viv covered her mouth in horror. “Laugh all you want.” Vivian pulled out her phone, held it up, and Posey knew her picture would be on Facebook in seconds.

Unfortunately, a bank of solid gray clouds rolled in, dropping the temperature by a good five degrees. In her short-sleeved dirndl, which was thin with age, Posey was freezing. She looked enviously at the well-padded Gretchen, sitting snugly between her well-padded parents, and shivered.

The parade turned onto Miner Street, and people clapped and pointed at the Barefoot Fraulein, who was eating it up. “Thank you so much! It’s so nice to see everyone! Happy Founders’ Day!”

There was Inferno. The restaurant really was gorgeous, an old brick-and-stone building. The window boxes overflowed with trailing ivy and deep purple viburnum, and the paned windows gleamed. The staff wore all black. Max and Stacia studiously ignored the restaurant, waving to the folks on the other side of the street.

And there was Dante, just coming out of Inferno now, his trademark white suit a stark contrast to the black-clad staff. The sight of him caused a pang of anxiety in her stomach—that or the four pieces of marzipan she’d eaten. Again, the similarities between Dante and Liam leaped out at her. Two good-looking guys, neither of them interested in a real relationship. But she was on a float, and to compensate for the cold shoulder from her parents, she waved at the Inferno staff.

Dante folded his arms and shook his head. “Those geese look like they’re on their last legs,” he said, loud enough to be easily heard on the float. “I bet we’ll be seeing them on Guten Tag’s menu any day now.” He grinned, and his staff guffawed with mean laughter.

Posey’s head whipped around to look at her parents. Stacia’s mouth hung open, and Max’s face went white, then red. Gretchen stared ahead, her face red as well.

Posey looked back at Dante. They were almost past the restaurant now, and getting closer to Guten Tag. “You know, Dante,” she found herself calling, a sweet smile on her face, “you might be able to get some decent spaghetti at Inferno. But you can never seem to have any fun.” She let that sit a beat, then yelled as loudly as she could, “Zicke zacke, zicke zacke!”

“Hoi, hoi, hoi!” the crowd called back. After all, most of Bellsford had been to Guten Tag—once, at least—and if they hadn’t had a gourmet meal, they’d had fun. They’d had a night to remember. They’d been treated like family.

“Zicke zacke, zicke zacke!” Jon yelled this time, and again, the crowd chorused back.

Posey stood on a sleigh runner so she could squeeze her mother’s hand. “You guys okay?”

“Thank you, dear,” Stacia said.

“Good job, baby,” Max echoed. Gretchen had pasted a smile on her face and was waving robotically. Her face was scarlet.

Posey turned back to look at Dante. Even from half a block, she could see his look of contempt. “Love what you’re wearing,” he called, pointing to his chest.

Posey looked down at her own.

Oh, no. Her blouse was torn. A lot. The aging fabric had caught on the sleigh, apparently, and had split right down to the vest, the edges flopping out on either side. She grabbed the edges and pulled them closed, but the fabric tore right off in her hands. “Dang it!”

“Wardrobe malfunction,” Brianna murmured. “Hey, at least you wore a bra.”

Yeah. A graying, elderly bra with a safety pin. Posey had been forced to dig it out of the back of her drawer this morning, as Gretchen had forgotten to put their laundry in the dryer.