Soul of Cole

by Micheal Maxwell

  After her call Kelly and Becca sat quietly sipping their tea, lost in their thoughts. About fifteen minutes later Cassie arrived.

  “So what’s this about the cops thinking something’s wrong?”

  “They seem to think somebody was embezzling money from the Center’s accounts. Their Financial Crimes guy seemed to think there were double entries and irregularities in deposits.” As Kelly explained, she watched Cassie close for a reaction.

  “We were hoping that since you helped dad with the books you could either find the mistake or find out what’s going on. You know how bad I am with numbers,” continued Becca.

  “I would call what I did, help. I totaled and double checked long columns of numbers. I didn’t really even know what they were. Just a fresh pair of eyes.” Cassie looked back at Kelly. “I thought you were in second command around here. Can’t you do it?” She turned back to Becca. “Can I talk to you alone?”

  Becca looked at Kelly as if to say ‘what do I do?’

  “No problem, I’ll finish my tea in the main room. This is a family thing, anyway.” Kelly left the room and closed the door behind her.

  “I don’t trust that woman, Becca. Who is she anyway? She’s a total stranger. We don’t really know her; she’s only been here a couple years. She could be the one stealing the money.”

  “I don’t think that could be. Daddy had full confidence in her.”

  “He saw good in everybody. He was too gullible for his own good. He was always getting taken advantage of. I say we send her packing.”

  “I don’t think that’s fair, Cassie. Whatever happened to ‘innocent until proven guilty’? If you go over the books and find something wrong, we’ll decide what to do then. But, she doesn’t write checks, she doesn’t make deposits, she’s just a volunteer.”

  “Oh, so now I’m a suspect.”

  “I didn’t say that!” Becca was surprised at her sister’s reaction.

  “Well I’m the only one besides dad who made deposits and wrote checks.”

  “Well, you certainly wouldn’t steal from the Center.” Becca tried to reassure her sister and calm her ruffled feathers.

  “So what do you want me to do exactly?” Cassie huffed and plopped down in her father’s desk chair.

  “Just go over this stuff, you know, checks and balances, and see what the police could be talking about. And then, explain it to us.”

  “So you’re gonna keep that woman around?”

  “Well, she does seem to have the confidence of everybody that works here. They all seem to look to her for guidance. I like her and I trust her.”

  “Whatever. But if you’re wrong, it’s on you.”

  “If I’m wrong, sure, I’ll take responsibility.”

  Becca moved to the door. “Kelly?”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  As Kelly entered the room, Becca smiled reassuringly. “We’ve come up with a plan. We just need to have some family understanding.”

  “I think that’s a wonderful idea. How long do you suppose something like this will take, Cassie?”

  “I don’t know, a couple days.” Cassie didn’t look up from the papers she shuffled on the desk.

  “That’s great. So we’ll be able to start the new week with a plan of action.”

  “I’m not doing it over the weekend.” Cassie sneered. “I have plans.”

  Becca, always the peacemaker, said, “That’s fine, just the sooner you can get it done, the sooner we can put this black cloud over the Center behind us.”

  “So I guess we’re done here.” Kelly pulled her phone from her purse. “I’ll have my husband come and get me.”

  As the girls gathered their things to leave, Becca’s phone rang. “Oh, hi Matt.”

  “I have to run out to Mattson Ranch again. I was wondering if you’d like to ride along and we can have lunch on the way back.”

  “Where are you now?”

  “I’m at my friend Aaron’s house. Are you home?”

  “I’m at the Center. I was just getting ready to leave.”

  “I’m five minutes away. I’ll be right there.”

  “Well, aren’t you two the lovey-dovey pair.” Cassie’s words were coy and teasing but her tone was sarcastic.

  “It’s nice to get reacquainted. He’s nothing like I remembered. We seem to have a lot in common, and it’s fun to talk to him.”

  “Doesn’t hurt that he’s a tall hunk either, does it?”

  “It certainly doesn’t hurt.” Becca giggled and glanced over at Kelly. Kelly winked at her and gave her an approving smile.

  “I think I’ll wait outside. Matt said he’d be here shortly. See you guys later.” Becca left the office and the building.

  “It’s nice your sister has found somebody. It must be hard coming back to town when everyone you know is getting older, married, and connected.”

  “Yeah sure, leave it to her. She always wins the prize, finds the Easter egg with five dollars in it, and does all the right things.”

  “What’s eating at you, Cassie? Becca is trying really hard to get through this and you go around looking like you’ve been sucking on lemons. Have you two always been at each other? You know, it makes people around you very uncomfortable to be in the middle of it.”

  “Then maybe you shouldn’t be in the middle,” Cassie snapped. She snatched her purse off the desk and left Kelly standing alone in the office.

  Kelly blew out an exasperated breath. “Well you certainly handled that well.” She moved toward the door and turned out the lights. Leaving the Center, Kelly wished she didn’t have to go back. Cole was right, it’s not her responsibility. Out on the sidewalk there was no sign of Cassie, but Becca was sitting on the bench nearby.

  “Well, lucky you.” Kelly moved closer to her.

  “I know, right? I certainly wasn’t expecting Matt to be so sweet and friendly.”

  “He’s a great catch, Becca.”

  “Oh, no, it’s nothing like that, we’re just friends.”

  “Oh, is that right?” Kelly smiled. “Let’s see how long that lasts. All the same, I think you’re a pretty lucky girl.”

  “I think so too, but I’m not going to read anything into it. I’m a little too fragile at the moment for any more big disappointments.”

  “This doesn’t look like a disappointment to me.” Kelly pointed up the street at Matt’s approaching truck. As Matt parked in front of the bench, Becca gave a coy wave.

  “I hope you have a wonderful time. I’ll be in touch.”

  “Thank you.” Becca stood clutching her purse in front of her.

  The door opened and Matt jumped out of the truck. “Hey, ready to go?”

  Matt looked over at Kelly. “Kelly, right? I’ve heard nice things about you.”

  “You, too.”

  Matt looked at Becca and shyly looked down at the curb.

  “This should be fun.” Becca moved toward the truck.

  “If driving back out to the ranch excites you, you’ve got a strange sense of fun.” Matt gave Becca a big grin. “I can guarantee you are going to love lunch though.”

  “Is that so?”

  “I’ve got a table all reserved.”

  “You’re kidding, where?”

  “Big Pete’s Barbecue of course, best place in town.”

  “Very funny,” Becca laughed.

  Matt opened her door. “Your chariot awaits.”

  Becca turned and smiled at Kelly as she hopped into the truck.

  “Drive careful Matt, you have a precious cargo,” Kelly said as Matt closed the door and hurried to the other side.

  “Don’t I know it.” He gave Kelly a thumbs up.

  CHAPTER 15

  “What are you so busy doing?” Kelly stood in the archway into the den. Cole always referred to the room off the front door as his office, but Kelly loved the couch, fireplace, and the bookcase that gave her a place to relax, read and reflect.

  “New book.” Cole looked up and smiled wit
h a cat-that-ate-the-canary grin.

  “Really?” That’s exciting. What’s it about? Is it a biography kind of thing, or something you wrote about, or…?

  “Nope.” Cole interrupted. “It’s a history mystery.”

  “Really?”

  “Don’t sound so shocked.”

  “No, it’s not that, it’s just, I didn’t, I mean…” Kelly tried to find a way out of her poor choice of words. “When did you come up with this idea?”

  “In the shower.”

  “Really?”

  “That’s three, Kelly. I can write fiction.” Cole’s sudden defensiveness took Kelly off guard.

  “I’m just surprised. You’ve talked about all kinds of books, their stories, and stuff like that. This is a totally new idea? I was just kind of surprised, that’s all.” She crossed the room, put a big toss pillow behind her, and lay back on the couch.

  “What are you doing?” Cole looked at her in wonder.

  “I want to hear the story. I want to be comfy. So, let ’er rip. You have my undivided attention.”

  “It’s just a seed. A bunch of random thoughts still wet from the shower.” Cole chuckled in half embarrassment and half amusement at Kelly’s interest.

  “Yeah, so?”

  “So? So, nothing. It’s rough and some of the plot might be kind of disjointed.”

  “Ok, I get it. Not perfect. Not a book. Not ready for public exposure.” Kelly shrugged. “No excuses. You’ve been typing for the better part of an hour. So read to me already!”

  Cole laughed merrily and began to read. “OK, the working title is The Tears of an Angel.”

  “Like it.”

  “I can hear the boots crushing the gravel up to the steps of my parent’s house. Like the heartbeat of demons steadily coming closer. All through June and July 1942, people, Jews, have been taken away in trucks. Now it was our turn. Someone turned us in for harboring Jews, sharing our food, our home.

  “This part is still a work in progress. In the truck a mother gives her girl The Tears of an Angel diamond. She tells her that it will help her. She does not explain or offer how, but she tells the girl it is very valuable. She tells her that children are not usually searched.” Cole paused to think. “I’ll have to figure out how the mom knows this. She tells the girl if it appears they will do a search, to stick the diamond up inside her.”

  “I’m not sure about that part.” Kelly interrupted.

  “History, not Sage.”

  “OK, go on.”

  “They’re all taken to a concentration camp. Mother and daughter never see father and two brothers again. Later, weeks, months maybe, whatever, Mother and daughter are loaded on a train, and moved to a Concentration camp in Poland.

  “They are able to stay together, but the second year, mother and daughter are separated. The girl goes to a children’s home. The kids are used as child labor in a factory, what kind, I don’t know yet. The mother is gone forever.

  “Because she is so small, she’s like ten or twelve and small for her age, the girl spends the war in a factory going under machines cleaning up. She befriends an older woman that sneaks her food every day from her plate, and gives her a pair of socks she steals from somewhere.

  “All the time she keeps the diamond, through community showers, de-lousing, all kinds of stuff. Only once does she have to, you know.” Cole used two fingers to motion her inserting the diamond.

  “Near the end of the war the factories are one by one shut down, she is moved from camp to camp, factory to factory. Finally she is moved to Auschwitz main camp and endures hunger and the terror of death. She watches skeletal people sent to the gas chambers, at one point she is forced to sort their clothes. She gets sick, malnutrition-ed…”

  “Malnutrition-ed? That’s not a word.” Kelly teased.

  “I know, but these are notes. I needed a word, and I grabbed that one. Anyway, she survives and the camp is liberated. Not wanting to be the captives of the Americans or Brits, she sneaks off the transport truck and hides in a truck carrying crates of some kind. The truck goes to France. There she heads for Paris, on the road, trains, trucks, walking. She steals from farmers, nearly gets raped by German deserters.

  “Then she gets caught by a farmer’s wife, a widow, trying to get milk from one of their cows. It’s snowing and she’s starving. The woman takes pity on her and gives her a job milking cows on the farm through the winter. She finally reaches Paris, finds school friend.”

  “Where is she from?” Kelly was finding the whole thing a bit farfetched, but was trying to stay engaged.

  “I don’t know. Can’t be Holland, too Anne Frank-ish.”

  “Got it. How’s she find a friend in Paris? I don’t get it.”

  “I don’t know, at the Louvre, Eiffel tower.” Cole was showing signs of frustration.

  “No. She’s a refugee, not a tourist. Where would she get money for a ticket?”

  “If I might continue,” Cole sighed showing his rising frustration, “She sells the diamond and leaves for America with the aunt of the school friend. The woman is wealthy and needs a companion.”

  “Then why would she sell the diamond to go? Wouldn’t the aunt buy her a ticket?” Kelly’s excitement about helping tell the story was growing, as Cole’s feeling of enthusiasm was sinking.

  After a pause that was a bit too long, Cole continued. “The woman introduces her to a family from their country that lost a son in the war, and they adopt her, send her to school. Goes to Sarah Lawrence. She meets the grandfather, a professor at the college. He hooks her up with the son of his eldest daughter. The girl marries the guy, who’s rich, yada yada.

  “Husband finds diamond, buys it back. They live happily ever after. Our girl, now a Grandmother, gives it to her granddaughter who is getting married. She is the one that our girl/grandmother is telling the story to. The end.”

  Cole leaned back from his laptop and closed the lid. Kelly didn’t speak for a long time. She watched as Cole pretended to plug in the mouse.

  “It’s a nice story,” Kelly finally said.

  “You hate it.”

  “What’s going on, Cole?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Why are you writing this book? Or any other for that matter?” Kelly sat up and faced the desk.

  “I’m a writer. It’s what I do.”

  “Did. You were a newspaper man, a journalist. You wrote non-fiction, the news, your opinion and insights. You didn’t write novels.”

  “So?”

  “How long has it been since you quit the Chronicle?”

  “I don’t—”

  “Four years. Let me rephrase the question. Why are you doing this?”

  “The money.”

  “We don’t need the money. Fame? Limelight? A return to your former glory days?”

  “I don’t need that.” Cole was lying, and he prayed Kelly wasn’t seeing through his desire to write again.

  “I’m worried about you. Do you realize you just read me a Harlequin romance fairy story with World War Two thrown in?” Kelly was beginning to see Cole’s veneer cracking. She hit the nail on the head. He found himself living at a snail’s pace when he was used to running, going, doing, chasing a story, a lead, doing interviews and being at the very heart of the news of the day.

  “I don’t know what to do with myself.”

  There it was, Kelly thought. She gazed at Cole sitting in the chair at the desk and realized he was defeated. He looked old, sad, and lost. Her heart was breaking.

  Kelly leaned forward. “What do you mean, sweetie?”

  “I don’t know what to do with myself!” Cole eye’s flared as he looked up at Kelly. “You do all your volunteer stuff, ladies Bible studies, whatever else you do, I got nuthin’.”

  “You could volunteer. There are men’s Bible studies, there are places to help.”

  “That’s you, Kelly. Not me. I go to church. The people there are not like me. We have nothing in common. What am I going to volun
teer to do, plant daisies downtown, hand out candy at the Christmas parade? I’d kill myself.” Cole tried to sound sarcastic with a twist of humor, but the pathos of his voice could not bury the truth just beneath the surface.”

  “What you’re saying is you hate it here.”

  “What I’m saying is I have no one but you to talk to. As much as I love you, I need people. People with interests other than Friday Night Football at the high school, and drinking beer at the Legion Hall.” Cole was getting wound up. “I don’t give a royal rip about corn prices, the weather, or the Dallas Cowboys, or whoever it is they cheer around here. And, my gosh, other than the ribs at Big Pete’s and a sandwich at Ernie’s I haven’t had a decent meal since we moved here.

  “Well thank you very much!” Kelly said indignantly.

  “Not your cooking. You know what I mean. Don’t you miss real Italian Mia Sophia’s raviolis? Kowloon’s Dim Sum in China town? Korean BBQ, Rosenberg’s Deli? I’d kill about now for a Chicago style hot dog. I miss buildings more than two stories high. I miss Mick Brennan, I miss Chris Ramos and Chuck Waddell, I miss Olajean, I miss Hanna.” Cole’s voice cracked, he looked down. “I miss the kids, and I miss my Jenny.” Cole put his hands over his face.

  Kelly fell silent. She didn’t know what to do. She didn’t know what to say. She crossed the room and stood behind Cole. She put her hands on his shoulders.

  “Don’t.”

  “I had no idea you were hurting so.” Kelly spun the chair around and hugged Cole.

  “I feel like a fool. I don’t know what has come over me. I have you, what else could I want?”

  “All the things you mentioned. I’m so sorry. Let’s go. Let’s go for a trip. Anywhere you want. You know I’d love some Chicago deep dish Pizza, some Memphis barbecue, or maybe we should just get on a plane for Paris.”

  “We have to do something.” Cole squeezed Kelly tightly.

  Michael Blackbear gently pulled off the bandage from his wound. There was a yellowish tinge to the blood in the salt and aspirin packing. I hope that’s not infection, he thought, as he examined the bandage closer. Not being able to make a clear determination, he applied a new bandage and repeated the process on the exit wound. He wrapped the Ace Bandage around his middle tightly. The burning pain seemed to recede the tighter he wrapped it.