Page 37 of Half Blind

Lemon stood immobile, staring at the woman. “By nectar... huh? Please tell me what I’m thinking isn’t what you are doing!”

Helen raised her head, looking at the woman as if she were pissed at the interruption in her scientific work. “Depends on what you’re thinking.”

Lemon’s eyebrows went up as she asked the question of which she was afraid to hear the answer. “Helen, are you pleasuring yourself to create this nectar?”

Helen scowled at her. “How else would I manufacture enough to go into my potion?”

Although Dr. Myrtle Kainker worked with students whose brains were still in development, this was a new one to her. She sighed deeply, concerned yet intrigued in the same breath. “Why in the name of Merlin’s beard are you putting coochie juice in a love potion? Or do I want to know?

Helen stared at Lemon as if the woman had asked the dumbest question in history. “Muscle memory.”

Lemon blinked several times, fascinated and terrified at the same time, “Explain please?”

“The strongest emotions tied to memory are taste and smell,” Helen said. “It’s like walking into the house after a hard day at the office and an apple pie comes out of the oven. Your brain recognizes the smell of baked apples, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Depending on whose recipe you use, there may be ginger or cardamon in the bake. Your brain equates the smell with yumminess, and you want some pie.”

Lemon walked all the way into the lab and took a seat. In her lifetime, she'd sat at tables and worked alongside some of the most brilliant minds in the world. She also considered herself blessed to be in a position to teach and train the next generation of chemists and scientists. However, never in her life had she met and worked alongside a thinker like the Cranberry.

“Putting your nectar in the formula—I assume for the man in your life—this love potion is supposed to do what, if I might ask?” Lemon said, waiting for the hilarity to roll off Helen's tongue.

“I'm going to make that sexy son of a gun want a mouthwatering slice of this pie,” Helen said, thrusting her hips forward. Lemon wasn't surprised to see the woman wearing a pair of pink cotton undies which came out of one of those packs purchased in a big box store.

Helen began to perform a suggestive wiggle about the floor, making Lemon create the sign of the cross with her fingers. She laughed as she said, “I rebuke you, Satan's little sister. What in the world is wrong with you?”

“That man knows how I smell; he also knows the taste of my pie,” she said, winking at Lemon. “My love potion is going to have the same effect on him as when you open a jar of banana peppers. His mouth is going to water.”

“Water finds its own level, Helen. Careful with that stuff,” Lemon cautioned.

“Hey, speaking of stuff, when is Mr. Bane, or the bane of your existence, coming back to get that pie? You know he wants it,” Helen offered, laughing. She also put on her pants.

Lemon was still staring at Helen, who looked so normal, sweet, and kind. Inside the conundrum of wily hair and cute little kitten covered sneakers was a woman whose brain also found its own level. The fascination with the way Helen's mind worked kept Lemon on the hook. Looking at the lab, Lemon softly said, “I am still stuck on you out here pleasuring yourself to extract bodily fluids.”

“Bodily fluids outside of the body tend to crust and harden, you know like snot or a booger,” Helen said, pouring the liquid into a glass bottle with a roll-on stopper. “If I use it in liquid form and add it to a lightweight oil, it will bind to the oils. I read that in a book you wrote that I found on the shelf over there. You're really like genius-level smart. Half of that stuff in the book, I had to bypass, because I was like, duh? So, I went with what I could comprehend. I know the simple actions of making scented body oil. I plan to roll this potion on my pulse points, then reheat it to 98.6 degrees as I move about. My man will catch the scent, go all caveman, drag me off, and wear me out. I'm looking forward to that this weekend. I miss him. I assume giving me the weekend off means similar plans for you two.”

Lemon was in her own thoughts. She wanted to speak to Helen but wasn't sure how much to divulge. Lemon didn't have many close friends to share such a conflicting detail about her life. However, she had Helen. A loud sigh left her mouth.

“Oh, spit it out,” Helen said.

“The Archangel picked him as my husband,” Lemon said.

Helen turned to look at her. “You know, I can see it.”

“You don't sound surprised.”

“Lemon, Myrtle, Dr. Kainker, come on. He is dropped in your lap by a tornado, stays ten days, the girls like him, and he's not eyeballing them like a snack he plans to sneak in to nibble on after everyone has gone to bed. He steers clear of you and his first clarification of whom he could be was a phone call to the Archangel where he told us the man says hello. Then there was Delgado bringing you what you needed for your experiments based loosely on a suggestion by Mr. Bane,” Helen said. “He speaks to the nerd in you, but he also speaks to the woman in you.”

“You know about the Delgados?”

“No, I looked him up on my handy dandy Technician laptop. You know that laptop even gave me that boy's blood type. His Daddy, the Lance man, that dude is finer that spider silk and all dangerous looking with some kissable lips,” Helen said, moving on in the conversation. “So, when's the wedding?”

“This is really blowing my mind right now,” Lemon replied. “You're so nonplussed by all of this as if you've seen it before. And Micah’s father is TheFer de Lance.”

“Because I have. More than likely, when Mr. Bane arrives, he will come with documentation of your name change,” Helen chuckled. “You get a husband and he gets the family he wants. Didn't that Delgado kid say the same thing?”

“Seems like everybody knows what's best for me, but me,” Lemon stated, looking at her feet.

Helen had spent too many years nursing her cousin Cherry's fragile inner child. The last thing she needed was to spend the next two months being the crying shoulder for a woman who played with snake venom. Evidently the Archangel knew Lemon well enough to select a man for her, the question was, how well did Lemon know the Archangel?

She asked, to ease into the conversation Lemon didn't want to have, “How long have you known The Archangel?”

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