“There’s more money in music than pigs, so I’ve been told.” Barb studied the amber liquid in the glass and started her story, about the grandsons and the wine. It was a rambling story, even to Barb’s ear.
“High taxes up there, I hear,” Alice finally said.
The drink, and the hospitality of a stranger, had loosened her tongue, but Barb could not admit everything; it was too embarrassing—the jail cell, the irrevocability of being locked up, the ugly finality to the personal story she’d been weaving as she drove and camped, saw vistas and sunsets, visited family, laughed with strangers, made up stories. She wiped her cheeks.
“Now, now,” soothed Alice, dropping dough onto a cookie sheet. “You might be a liar, but your timing was good. Some things seem predetermined to happen. You showing up when you did.”
A wind rustled the leaves outside. “What will you do with the BB gun?”
Alice frowned. “Do with it? You think that’s the only gun in the house?”
Strange how matter-of-fact Americans were about guns. Americans had encouraged her to carry a gun in the first place.
Alice said, “We live in the country.”As though that would be reason enough.
“Oh.” The explanation sounded rational in Idaho but didn’t make sense across the border.
“My dear, he didn’t mean any harm. His parents were in the military, both killed in Iraq. Didn’t used to take women for combat duty. This is my daughter’s third anniversary. Killed fighting for her country. It’s not what we raised her for, but Henry and I were both proud of her.” The cookies slid into the oven.
Barb sipped her drink. “I’m sorry about your daughter.”
“And sorry about the war too, I take it, you being from Canada who didn’t go.”
The pig salt-and-pepper shakers on the white doily were both pink and had smiles. Barb wondered if Louis and Rodney had such easy access to guns. Would her son-in-law allow it in Flagstaff?
“You weren’t worried?”
“Naturally I was worried. You don’t like to see a boy that upset. He had his reasons.” Alice opened the oven to check on the cookies, turned and peered at Barb over the rims of her glasses. “They fingerprint you just for wine?”
Reality twisted like a knife in the heart and it was painful. Barb stumbled through the story of the gun.
“Oh, isn’t that ridiculous,” Alice Cavender snorted. “To treat you like that, as though you were a common criminal. As though a woman your age would be a danger to anyone.” She removed the cookies from the oven, slipped them loose with a spatula. “Here now.”
The kitchen smelled sweet and homey. Barb reached for a cookie, let it warm her palms. When she had entered the house, she’d witnessed a boy boiling with rage and nearly out of control. Mall shootings, theatre shootings—it was a criminal act to bring a handgun into Canada. That was a fact. She should have known better. She hadn’t even known where to keep it—in sight or out of sight, the gun was always on her mind. Barb said, “Actually, I’m glad they found it.”
Alice shook her head “To each his own. You can camp here tonight, there’s an empty hay shed, nice and clean, where you can sort through your things, if you like.”
“Thank you.” Barb sighed with relief. One short walk to her bed, one short walk to her home on the road.
Alice lifted her apron over her head, hung it on a hook. She came back to the table, the Jack Daniel’s in hand. “Canadians,” she said, in her tone something both sorrowful and accepting, as she poured another shot for each of them.
Delilah
If Sheila’s companion, Delilah, were a colour, she would be orange. A dusky orange that sends out occasional flares, but mostly the colour of kindling burnt to embers. Sheila construes that Delilah is this colour partly by what she says, but also by the way she speaks, with the modern artifice many women in broadcasting have, front teeth biting off words, lips softly chewing them. Sheila notices these women on TV and listens to them on the radio; the way they speak seems contrived and unnatural. She doesn’t know about Delilah’s tongue or lips or what she looks like. Delilah speaks to her on 94.9 MIX FM, beginning at 9:00 PM. Delilah is the voice of lovelorn southeast Arizona.
In Sheila’s experience, neighbours in Arizona aren’t so much visited as observed. If seen at all. She’s more likely to see a feral cat skulking about than a human taking a stroll. Even here, in what calls itself a village, people drive cars from one end to the other, and except for the people who work in the retail shops, everyone else seems to have gone on holiday. You never see anyone sitting in gardens or on patios. You seldom hear a thing. Twice a day the train goes by, and the birds, cactus wrens and quail, carry on conversations among themselves.
Thank goodness for her only real neighbours, the young couple from Michigan, Amanda and Vincent, with their baby, Josephine, who live across the road. They built their adobe house on land inherited from a travelling grandparent. Josephine has a mop of very black hair that the blondish father jokes about. Sheila likes to imagine why; she’s being preposterous, of course, but there are so many sweet-faced Mexican boys around here.
From her balcony, Sheila sees their window aglow with candlelight. The candlelight in the golden room reminds Sheila of when she helped Amanda sort through paint chips to create just that lovely effect. She was part of the house project since its inception—offered advice on window placement and flooring and watched over tools left in the yard by workers. Consequently, her neighbours’ house—real adobe, a Southwest tradition—is a pleasure that feels like her own.
Yet there’s that eucalyptus tree, far too tall for a house that lies so low to the ground. The couple built around the tree, to save it, but Sheila objects to it. From her second-floor balcony, looking across the dirt road from her apartment above a jewellery shop —chunks of turquoise and the work of Navaho silversmiths—the tree spoils her view of the mountains to the east.
Amanda and Vincent’s most recent concern was the impending visit of an uncle from England. After visiting friends in San Diego, he would be hopping over to Tucson on a commuter flight. The uncle, a bachelor, was a concierge at a posh English hotel. Sheila looked up the hotel online. Nice, not showy, established, discreet. Due to Josephine, he couldn’t stay with them; he’d have been driven mad by the fretful crying and early dawns.
“Of course your uncle can stay at my place,” she’d said, handing them a jar of her homemade jalapeno jelly. “What’s his name?”
Sheila’s apartment, a two-bedroom, made it easy for her to move the unopened boxes—a testament to her inability to commit to a place—from her room to the spare bedroom. When that was done, she drove into Tucson and bought a cot and some sheets for it. The cot-sized sheets weren’t very nice sheets; she found them at Ross, and the colour of the top and bottom didn’t quite match. But it wouldn’t matter. She would be in the spare bedroom on the cot, and he, the English bachelor named Earl, would have the master bedroom with its expensive, queen-sized bed, solid mesquite. It had been outrageous to spend so much on a bed, but she’d thought that she would find a new man, a new life. Daunting to realize how hopeful she’d been. The cot, now that she had it, seemed sensible.
She’d driven into Tucson to meet Earl at the airport, taking the I-19 to the Valencia cut-off. She was picking him up because Amanda and Vincent were occupied by baby worries—a little diarrhea that was soon corrected. And Sheila was willing. She had recognized Earl right away, based on advance description. He was a short man, the sturdy type Sheila liked, squarely built and nearly bald. She could imagine him in a kilt; his legs were bandy and strong. She wore the emerald green silk scarf that went nicely with her curly red hair. They shook hands in the arrivals level and waited at the luggage carousel, each intent on spotting his checked bag. From the freeway, as they drove past the Indian reservation, he admired the San Xavier mission.
In her living room—she thought it best if he brought his things inside before going over to spend time with Amanda and Vinc
ent—Earl presented her with two slim cans of Marks & Spencer gin and tonic. “I wouldn’t normally bring such a wee token for my host or hostess,” he said, “but this is so good—and not available here, I gather—and they told me you’re fond of G&Ts. As I am myself.”
At that moment she was out of Gordon’s gin—she saw herself flying to Safeway to get a big bottle even as she blushed. In Australia, a sheila refers to a girl or young woman, and while Sheila was neither—she was in her fifties, her prime—she still flushed when flustered.
“It’s delightful of you.” She reached for his hand. He was confused by the gesture—she hadn’t known what she was thinking, either, so they shook hands again before she ducked onto the balcony. From there she showed him how to get to his nephew’s house. She pointed out the entrance, just beyond the lowest branch of the too-tall eucalyptus.
Later, watching the candlelight in her neighbours’ window, she sits with her Gordon’s and Schweppes tonic (more British, she thinks, than Canada Dry), tucked farther back on her balcony than usual so she can’t be seen. A full moon is just rising over the flat-topped buildings to the east and shines through the branches of the eucalyptus, its leaves rattling in the wind. It has been dry; no rain for too long. The radio in the room behind her is turned low, to Delilah’s show. A girl with a sweet voice, a young mother with a live-in boyfriend, phones Delilah and says, “I just love him with everything I am.”
Though Sheila can’t say she’s actually experienced loving someone with everything she is, she’s sure she would know were it to happen.
Delilah deftly moves in on the sweet girl like a coyote to a kill. “You’re grateful because he’s living with you? Has he asked you to marry him? He’s living with you and not willing to make the commitment to you and your two-year-old daughter? What kind of example do you think this is for your little girl? She takes him into her heart and life with no guarantee he’ll always be there for her?” The sweet-voiced mother collapses in tears. She hadn’t thought about her boyfriend in that way before.
Now Delilah softens and murmurs to the girl, “Sometimes we don’t always make good choices,” and then plays “My Prayer” by The Platters. The tender old song causes Sheila’s eyes to smart.
She can’t help but notice that Amanda and Vincent seem to be having a party. Some people she recognizes—gallery and restaurant owners—arrive by foot. She sips her drink and listens to the wind and the rattle of the eucalyptus leaves as the moon climbs. Someone strums a guitar.
She puts down her G&T to photograph the moon, a long exposure. She’s recently bought a tripod for her digital camera and is thinking of joining a local photography group.
There is nothing more beautiful than an Arizona sky, she’d e-mailed friends back in Portland, where she used to live. She made the sky the reason she’d stayed, made the sky worth all the disappointments. She’d joined a walking group that met early every Sunday and went for big breakfasts afterwards. They often chose the Longhorn Café at the Arivaca junction, where you could order the most exotic thing—chilaquiles, eggs scrambled with green chiles and fried tortillas—so scrumptious, they were practically indecent—all that grease! Sometimes the group went south, for huevos rancheros at a Mexican café that smelled like simmering pork. She’d joined a book club at the library because there were widowers around, or so her bridge group told her, all of them married, except for the happy solo player. Then she’d joined the country club to learn to golf—men were golfers in Arizona—but that hadn’t worked out; she’d damaged her rotator cuff.
She’s still sitting, watching, when she sees Earl leave the neighbours’ and make his way back to her. She has the Gordon’s in the freezer but wonders if she’s made a mistake; being British he might prefer his drink tepid. She opens the door before he has a chance to knock, her drink in hand. “Come sit on the balcony,” she says. “It’s windy out, but rather pretty. Quite a wonderful moon. Would you care to join me for a G&T?”
He wouldn’t; he’s had beer and a Caesar salad with too much garlic. He explains the way a Caesar salad should be made—slivered egg, shaved Parmesan, freshly baked croutons. Earl uses his hands as he talks, describing the sort of garlic a good chef uses. He tells her the chef in his hotel is top-notch. She admits to loving perfection in food. He sits a few moments in silence and then checks his watch. He says, “Travel tires one, even short-haul flights, indeed it does. I wish you good night.”
On the cot, Sheila wears earphones to listen to the radio so as not to disturb her guest. Delilah is married for the second time and believes in God. She has a little boy now and a loving husband. She says, “God bless you” when people are in dire straits and she says, “Let’s pray” when things are worse than dire. Every night, Delilah speaks comforting words. It’s Sheila’s second spring in this particular desert, the fulsome season preceding godawful heat and monsoons, a time of grace, the mammals pregnant or nursing, babies birthed; eggs hatched, chicks feeding. There’s tranquility in the Sonoran desert, a sense of plenty. But Delilah knows her audience isn’t living a natural, seasonal cycle. Tonight she says a variation of her usual: “Some of you are sad over a lost love, someone you thought would be with you forever, and I’m here to help you, ease your hearts, make your evening just a little brighter. Call me with your stories and let me play something special for you and the person you’re thinking of.” Around eleven, heading toward midnight, Delilah reminds her audience to love someone tonight.
Sheila turns off the radio and places the earphones on the table. She settles in. Wonders if he snores.
In the morning her guest emerges from the bedroom wearing a satin dressing gown and carrying his own shampoo. “Very comfortable bed,” he says. “Quite good of you to let me use it.”
“My pleasure.” She’s making coffee, which he doesn’t drink, but tea would be welcome.
“I need no breakfast, thank you. We’re going out and then will carry on, spending the day in wine country. Though it is hard to believe that grapes grow in the desert.”
Sheila says, “Oh, yes, they do! Around Elgin and Sonoita there are beautiful wineries. Lovely area! I just so enjoy a day in the high desert.”
The phone rings. Sheila flutters her fingers at her guest. “Excuse me.”
The call is from Amanda. “Hey. Hi. If you’d like to meet us for breakfast, that would be great. You’ll have to bring your own car. The Nissan’s so small, what with the car seat . . .”
Sheila gives the words a moment.
Amanda says, “We’re going to that place near the border that makes the fabulous huevos rancheros. The place you like so much. Then we’ll play it by ear, maybe take Earl for a drive.”
Sheila thinks about the party the night before. Thinks about her comment just now to Earl about a day in the high desert. Thinks about how foolish she is. She hesitates, glances at the back of the man in his dressing gown as he shuts the bathroom door, and turns toward the phone. She’s effusive with her thanks for the invitation—“Jam-packed day planned,” she says, and, gushing, declines.
Driving that night down through Yuma and into the Laguna Mountains on a spontaneous visit to San Diego—she will keep driving west until the road runs out—she discovers there’s more to Delilah than she knew. In fact, there is another Delilah entirely. This woman’s voice is a little huskier. This new Delilah speaks the same words, and she, too, wants to help. This Delilah says, “I know you’re a little tired, and I know you’ve had a long day today, and that’s why I’m here.”
Sheila is more than a little tired. She left a key in an envelope with Earl’s name on it, on the welcome mat, and has been driving for nine hours, dealing with bouts of weeping along the way. It was idiotic to set out at the time of day she did, but she couldn’t stand the sight of her neighbours’ empty house and the silence in her own. Now she’s tearing along in the dark at seventy miles an hour on a deserted highway, clinging to the murmuring predictability of Delilah and the emotional wrench of desolation that she expec
ts will well up at the next song. Delilah, she thinks, is as addictive as Facebook and just about as productive. Sheila’s heart is not eased when she listens to Delilah: the romantic dirges she plays make Sheila want to send out flares—“Over here! Over here!” Dance like crazy or sink into simplistic self-pity.
That’s it. That’s precisely it. Simplistic self-pity.
She asks herself, speaking out loud, “Are you tired of it?” Her foot eases on the pedal. Yes, I am tired of it, she answers. Would you have wanted to spend a whole day in the heat, tight in the back seat with Earl and a fussy baby? Heavens no. But the next time someone asks her for breakfast, she might just take that person up on the offer because it is, after all, breakfast, not her life. She has her life—she’s a woman in pursuit of a partner. But what if she were a woman in pursuit of adventure? Like now, for instance, the adventure of driving into the mountains in the dark, not sure where she’ll stay on the other side? What if she isn’t running from anything or running at all? What if she secretly enjoys the freedom of being a single person, acting on a whim to see what happens next?
She slows, opens the window to the rushing wind that embraces her skin, blows her hair, brings with it the refreshing fragrance of pine. And she sees a star. The star—why not—sees her, a driver working her way through the mountains to the sea. All the while, like a whisper in the back of her mind, the radio aches on and on. She listens longingly for a few minutes more, and then, in a surprise move, her hand reaches out, pushes the button. The antenna recedes. She closes the window. Her tears dry. She’s all right; there’s nothing terrible or sad up ahead. Her headlights know the road.
South of Elfrida Page 15