"It's the fall harvest dance," Josh explained. "It's a Roseville tradition from back when almost everyone farmed. But now it's just an excuse for everyone to get drunk and dance with people they're not married to." He stopped and looked at me. "We can do whatever you want to do, but when I heard this was tonight I kinda thought you might want to come," he said. "I mean…it's okay if you want to go do something else. We could…"
I shut him up with a kiss (a basic technique that, I've been told, even non-spy girls have used with great success). "Let's dance."
Can I just say that doing the tango with Madame Dabney had totally not prepared me for what actual dances are like? Sure, if I ever have to infiltrate an embassy party, I'll probably be glad I've had C&A, but I could tell as soon as we walked into the barn that I didn't have the training for this. Streamers hung from the rafters above us. Twinkling lights formed a tentlike dome. A flatbed trailer sat along the south wall, and a band was playing an old country song while what looked like the entire population of Roseville danced around in circles. I saw a hayloft above us at the far end of the barn, but where we stood there was nothing above us but rafters and lights. Old women sat on bales of straw, clapping, keeping rhythm as the deputy chief of police (I recognized him from the dunk tank) picked up a fiddle and started to play.
Little girls danced by, standing on their fathers' feet, and Josh led me to a folding table that was draped with crepe paper. "Well, hi there, honey," said the woman sitting behind it.
"Hi, Shirley," Josh replied as he reached for his wallet. "Two, please," he said.
"Oh, honey," she said, "your momma already took care of that."
Josh looked at me, panic in his eyes, as every ounce of blood in my body turned cold.
"They're here already?" Josh asked, but before Shirley could answer, I heard someone cry, "Josh! Cammie!"
The deputy chief of police put down his fiddle, and everyone clapped as the kid who works the ticket booth at the movie theater picked up a saxophone. Everyone on the floor picked up their tempo—especially the thin, immaculate woman who was rushing toward us with her arms outstretched.
"Josh! Cammie!" Her ivory sweater set and light-colored trousers were just begging for a stain in the dusty barn, but she didn't act like she cared as she pushed her way through the tide of dancing couples—a tall, thin man trailing dutifully behind her.
"I'm sorry," Josh whispered as he pulled me away from Shirley and toward the stampeding couple. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. We only have to say hi to them. I thought I'd have time to warn—"
"Cammie, darling!" the woman cried. "Well, if you aren't just the cutest thing?" And then she hugged me. Oh, yeah, a complete stranger actually hugged me—something the Gallagher Academy had totally not prepared me for. She gripped me by the shoulders and stared into my eyes. "I'm Mrs. Abrams. It is so nice to finally meet you!"
And then she hugged me again!
Once deep inside enemy territory, The Operative met with high-ranking officials in the organization. She was NOT prepared for this development, but any diversionary tactics would SERIOUSLY compromise the entire operation!
"Oh," Mrs. Abrams said, "I see you're wearing your corsage." And then she fingered the flowers. "Isn't that lovely?"
I looked at Josh in his neatly pressed khakis and his button-down shirt, and I suddenly understood why he always dressed less like a high school boy and more like a … pharmacist.
"Hello, young lady," the man said, once his wife released me. "I'm Joshua's father, Mr. Abrams. And how are you finding our fair town?"
This isn't good, I thought, realizing I was surrounded. I didn't belong here, and it wasn't going to take Josh's parents long to realize it.
I thought about my options: A) fake a medical condition and rush outside, B) pick up the pen with which Shirley was writing receipts and do some damage before getting gang tackled by some well-meaning townspeople, or C) think of this as my most deep-cover assignment yet and milk it for all it was worth.
"It's a very nice town," I said, extending my hand to the man. "Mr. Abrams, so nice to meet you."
He was tall and had wavy hair like Josh's. He wore wire-rimmed glasses and relished in waving at the people who passed by. "Hi, Carl, Betty," he said to one couple. "Got those new bunion-removing pads you like, Pat."
"Our family's run this town's pharmacy since 1938," Mrs. Abrams told me proudly.
Then Mr. Abrams asked, "Has Josh told you about our little business?"
"Yes," I said. "He has."
"There's not a person in this room I haven't medicated," Mr. Abrams said, and beside me, I felt Josh choke on the punch his mother had handed him.
"That's …" I struggled for words. "…impressive."
He clamped a hand onto his son's shoulder. "And some day, it's all going to belong to this guy."
"Oh, Jacob," Mrs. Abrams said, "give the poor kid a break." An air of perfection floated all around her even in that dusty barn, and I knew that she'd never been stained, wrinkled, or unaccessorized in her life.
I tugged at the hem of my skirt and fingered my corsage, feeling naked since I hadn't known to wear my mother's pearls. (Even the ones without the microfilm reader could have come in handy.) There were a lot of things I wanted to ask, like How do you stay so clean? and Does that tooth-whitening gum really work? but I couldn't say any of that, so I just stood there like an idiot, smiling at her, clinging to my cover.
"Are your parents here, darling?" she asked, and then started scanning the crowd.