Free For Love or Magic by Lucy March

gentle rhythm of walking, with Seamus on one side of me and Desmond on the other, was helping me even out emotionally. Still, every few steps, I’d feel it rise up again … the panic, the sadness, the anger … and keeping it in check was exhausting me. I had to have a distraction.
    â€œTalk to me,” I said after a few moments, and he glanced around us again. There weren’t many people on the street, but it was a summer day in a village, so there were enough, and he said, “I’d like to wait until we’re in private.”
    â€œNot about … that, ” I said. “Tell me a story. Get my mind off things. Believe it or not, the thing with your mother and the handkerchiefs was kind of working.”
    â€œOh. Right.” He gently took my elbow and led me across the street, and we headed in the direction of my new home.
    â€œI’m afraid there isn’t much more to the story of my mother and handkerchiefs,” he said after we’d crossed. “It really was just an absurd obsession of hers.”
    â€œSo, tell me something else. Where are you from?”
    â€œSouthern Kentucky,” he said, without missing a beat, and I laughed.
    It wasn’t quite a full smile, but there was a glint of humor in his eye as he looked down at me. “Is there something funny about that?”
    â€œMy apologies,” I said. “So, what does your family do in Kentucky?”
    â€œBourbon, naturally.”
    â€œOh, naturally,” I repeated.
    â€œAnd grudge feuds,” he added.
    â€œProfessionally?”
    â€œNo, we were more grudge feud hobbyists. Cousin Hamish once—”
    â€œWait!” I said, holding up my hand. “Hamish? Seriously?”
    Desmond blinked at me, all innocence. “Kentucky has a rich Scottish heritage.”
    â€œMaybe, but it breaks the fiction,” I said. “Kentucky’s more a Billy-Bob, Bobby-Jack, Jethro, Cletus kind of place.”
    â€œIs it your contention that there are no Hamishes in all of Kentucky?”
    â€œI’m sure there are, but it’s just not believable,” I said. “It kicks me out of the story and then I have to come back to reality where my own crappy life awaits, like a pile of dog poop that’s so big you can’t help but step in it.”
    â€œThat’s quite the poetic imagery.”
    â€œI’m goddamn Yeats, Jethro.”
    The almost-smile played again in his eyes. “All right. May I continue with the story of my cousin Hamish…” He paused for a moment, then added, “Bobby-Jack?”
    â€œYour cousin is named Hamish-Bobby-Jack?”
    â€œMy family’s naming conventions are no concern of yours,” he said, with an air of haughty dignity. “Cousin Hamish-Bobby-Jack … nickname, Cletus…”
    â€œThank you,” I said.
    â€œCletus is a name of English origin, by the way.”
    â€œIt is not!” I laughed.
    He slid sideways eyes at me. “Who is telling this story?”
    â€œI’m sorry,” I said, leading us out of the village and onto the county road that led toward home. “Please continue.”
    â€œWell, Cousin Cletus was a drunkard of legend, which is a thing that happens from time to time in the bourbon-making families…”
    â€œOccupational hazard,” I added supportively.
    â€œYes, quite.” He cleared his throat and went on. “As fate would have it, Cletus fell in love with a woman from a family of religious teetotaling Mennonites, a Miss…” His eyes narrowed and he looked at me as he decided on a name. “Miss … Hazel … Brown?”
    I nodded. “Acceptable.”
    â€œYou’re very kind. Well, Miss Hazel would not accept Cletus’s flurry of proposals until he gave up the drink, and Cletus, while being a burly man of great physical prowess, was sadly powerless over his addiction.”
    â€œWow. Sad