Talk of the Town

by Lisa Wingate

  In the bathroom, I heard Andy talking to his granddad real gentle-like, helping him get undressed and climb into the bath, taking care of him just like Verl was a little baby. It was pretty clear that Andy did that a lot. Amber probably had, too, before she left. I couldn’t imagine being just a youngster, having to take care of the person who was supposed to be taking care of you. Widow or not, I’d lived a pretty fortunate life. Maybe that was why the Lord had let me lose Jack sooner than I planned—so I’d have a few years to learn about struggles on my own.

  When Verl sobered up, maybe I’d have a talk with him. Maybe there was something I could do or say that might make a difference.

  I thought on the problem as I went down the hall and into our closet. All Jack’s things were still lined up in neat rows. I could picture him in that closet, could say what day of the week he might wear each outfit—suit for Sunday, trousers and a shirt on the weekends. If he planned to take a ride on our old horse, Magnolia, or if the rodeo was in town, he’d wear his plaid cowboy shirt and those black polyester western pants he’d bought at the Cheyenne Frontier Days in 1974. The kids were ashamed to be seen with him in those.

  Thinking back to the old times, I chuckled to myself. Seemed like it was only yesterday. A life goes by fast. Maybe that was what I’d tell Verl. Maybe I could make him see that those three little boys outside would be grown and gone before he knew it, and the way things were going, none of them would have much worth remembering.

  Maybe after the rodeo today I’d keep old Magnolia at home instead of taking her back to the neighbor’s house. It’d be good to see her in the pasture again, and maybe the Anderson boys would like to come over and feed her and take her for rides. Every boy ought to have the chance to get on a horse and head out to pasture and pretend he’s a cowboy or a Knight of the Round Table.

  I started to pull out a pair of overalls, but then I thought about that article in The National Examiner and the picture of the bearded gun-toting hillbilly they wanted everyone to think was Amber’s grandpa. I thought of that spiky-haired reporter in town asking nasty questions about Amber. It wouldn’t do for Verl to go on TV today in old gardening clothes. I was going to pick out the best thing Jack had that might fit. By the time I got done with Verl, those reporters wouldn’t know him from the justice of the peace. If I had to put ten gallons of coffee down him, I’d get him sober, as well. After the boys finished with the flower bed, I’d give them a little spit-shine, too. When Amber got here, they’d look just as respectable as the Downtown Browns. Then let those reporters try to say what backwater white trash Amber came from.

  I pulled out a suit first, a black one Jack wore for weddings, funerals, and Easter Sunday. Even if I could get Verl into that, with his old wrinkled face and pasty skin, he’d look like a corpse in need of a coffin. He should have something with some color … something bright that would make him look lively.

  Lord have mercy, was there anything that could make Verl look lively? Maybe I was expecting too much from a change of clothes.

  I settled on the pastel-colored golf shirt and pants the girls at the office gave to Jack for a joke at his retirement party. Taking the clothes with me, I went and knocked on the bathroom door. “Andy, just let your granddad soak in there a minute, and I’ll have some clean clothes for him to wear,” I said. “What size shoe does he take?” Shoes might be a problem. Jack was a size twelve, double E. No way Verl was a twelve.

  “He says about a nine,” Andy answered, then he asked something else of his grandpa. I tried to hear Verl’s answer, to decide if he was getting any more sober, but I couldn’t make it out clear enough. I’d just have to hope for the best. There might be some old tennis shoes in the closets of the boys’ rooms. Grabbing Verl’s coveralls, I measured up the inseam, then hurried to my sewing machine and tacked up the new pants.

  When I came back to the bathroom door, Andy told me that sometime while Verl was passed out, he’d soiled his underwear and he’d need a new pair. Andy said it just like it was an everyday matter. As I went to Jack’s bureau for some clean socks and underwear, I thought about poor Andy. I bet sometimes he wished he could just do the things a normal fifteen-year-old boy did.

  No wonder Amber was trying so hard to win American Megastar. There wasn’t much waiting for her here. All these years, I’d let myself believe it was charity enough to buy blackberries from the Anderson kids, or teach them in vacation Bible school, or offer a ride home when their granddad left them stranded at a football game. What a lazy, foolish notion that was.

  When I brought Andy the clean underwear, Verl started to get ugly. He wanted boxers instead of briefs, of all things. The thought of seeing Verl Anderson’s pickled body in either one was enough to give me the hives, but I cracked the door a bit anyhow and poked my nose close to the opening. “Verl Anderson, you stop giving that boy trouble and put them clothes on right now, you hear me? You don’t have them clothes on in three minutes, I’m gonna come in there and put ’em on you myself. And you ain’t gonna like it.”

  Verl sputtered, then stood up and thumped around the bathroom. He hacked up a big nasty cough, then I heard him sit back down on the pot. “Them ain’t ssshmy drrrawers!” he roared. “I ain’t wearrr-rin’ shomeone elshe’s drrrawers.”

  Well, heaven’s gates, there was Verl Anderson in my bathroom, worried about hygiene. “Them drawers are clean, Verl. Now you get them on or I’m comin’ in there.” I wanted to add, You soiled your drawers, Verl. You got fallin’-out drunk and soiled your drawers like a little child. Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?

  Verl muttered something to Andy, and I rattled the doorknob just to give him a good scare. “I mean it. This is your last warnin’.” I felt like it was thirty years ago and I was trying to get the boys out the door for church.

  Verl grumbled some more, but I could hear Andy helping his grandpa into the clothes. Finally, the door opened and there sat Verl atop the pot, red in the face from all the work but looking almost human. The shirt hung over his frame like a coat on a rack, and the pants were too big, but it wasn’t so bad. A belt, some shoes, a shave, and about ten cups of coffee, and we’d be in business.

  I reached in the drawer and grabbed a comb to do something with Verl’s hair. I’d long since thrown away Jack’s old tubes of fixative, so I took my Aqua Net out of the cabinet instead.

  Verl shied away. “You ain’t shprayin’ that shtuff in my hair!”

  He couldn’t go far, being hemmed in between the toilet and tub, so I just went on with what I was doing. “Oh, yes I am. You might as well shut your mouth or it’s gonna get in there, too, and your teeth’ll stick shut.” Not a bad idea, actually. “I get done with you, Verl Anderson, you’re gonna make Amber proud.” Dousing Verl’s head, I started through his thick gray hair with the comb. “Land sakes, Verl, when’s the last time you had a real haircut? You need to come by the Hair and Body.”

  Verl’s head flopped back and he gave me a hateful look through one glassy blue-gray eye. “I ain’t got no monnn-ey for no hairrrcut.” The words hung in a cloud of whiskey breath that was at least eighty proof.

  I wanted to say, Well, if you’d stay away from The Junction, you’d have enough for a cut and shave, now wouldn’t ya? But instead, I said, “I’m sure Donetta would trade it out for some more work around the building. There’s a lot still needs to be done there.”

  Verl opened both eyes and looked at me like somewhere in that foggy brain of his, the idea was trying to take root.

  “There’s lots of folks need work done.” I gave Verl a few more sprays with the Aqua Net. Verl had a nice head of hair, actually. “Like me, just as a for instance. All this mess around the yard and the barn, not to mention keeping up the flower beds. I can’t do all that at my age. Maybe Andy, Amos, and Avery could come and help me some. Maybe you could, too. I want to plow and plant the garden patch this year. I miss having my fresh vegetables. Maybe you and the boys could come do that for me, and then when the vegetables come up, I’d
do the canning and we’d split what we get. Maybe we could do that.”

  Verl blinked hard. “I like themmm home-canned tom-maters. Shhhtore-bought ain’t the same thhh-ing.”

  “That’s a fact,” I said, and a little lightness came over me. I could picture how me and the boys, and even Verl, could grow a garden this summer.

  “Merna cannn-ed them to-mmmaters real good.” Merna, Verl’s wife, had run off with another man way back when Amber’s daddy was a teenager. Verl fell apart after she took off and left him with a child to raise.

  “I’d sure can some tomatoes for you,” I told Verl. He tipped his head back, and I wagged the comb in his face. “But I’ll tell you somethin’ else. You start that garden and don’t keep it tended, you’re gonna have one mad woman on your hands.” Setting down the comb, I fished a plastic razor out of the drawer and held it ready. “If you’re coming here, you clean yourself up and shave. You ever show up at my house in this kind of condition again, you’re gonna think them boiled, skinned, and packed tomatoes has a pretty easy life.”

  Verl’s jaw dropped open, and I took advantage of the opportunity to throw some soap on there and start shaving. By the time I finished, he didn’t look half bad.

  “Help me get him downstairs for some food and coffee,” I told Andy. He’d been standing quiet the whole time, leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets and his chin ducked. I wanted to tell him to hold his head up. All this trouble with Verl wasn’t his fault, but you can’t convince a kid of that.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Andy said, then moved around me and got under Verl’s shoulder. “In the kitchen?”

  “That’ll be fine,” I answered, and checked my watch. In a little over an hour, the TV crew was supposed to be showing up. I hoped the mail wagon would get here soon with Amanda-Lee, and I hoped Donetta had found us a driver for the horse rig. With everyone busy at the Reunion Days, it wouldn’t be so easy.

  While I rustled up a belt and some shoes, Andy helped Verl, smelling better and not weaving around as much as before, down the stairs. By the time I got to the kitchen, he was slumped in a chair, his eyes closed like he was all wore out.

  Andy put his hands back in his pockets, looked at the floor, and frowned. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Doll.”

  “Andy”—the word come out so sharp that Andy jerked upright—“this ain’t your fault one little bit, and don’t you forget that. Your granddad’s a grown man, and he ought to know better than to get like this.” I glared at Verl, but he just rolled his head to one side, so I focused on Andy instead. “You don’t worry about a thing. I’ll get him woke up and acting like he should. You just go on outside and help Brother Harve and Otis Charles with the flower beds. When those Hollywood people get here, you hold your head up, you hear? You’re a good boy. Not every young man would take care of his granddad the way you do, and look after his brothers, and help an old woman with her flower bed without a complaint. Lots of those kids you go to school with that come drivin’ in with the fancy cars their daddies bought, if they got asked to do something for somebody else, they’d act like it was the end of the world.”

  Andy looked at me for a minute, chewing his lip, his blue eyes thoughtful under the mop of blond hair. “It ain’t hard fixing flower beds,” he said finally. “I’d help you with the garden this summer. I’m getting my driver’s license next month. I could bring Amos and Avery.” He gave a glance toward his granddad—sort of a sad, hopeless look, like he knew Verl wouldn’t be sobering up and appearing at my door with a rake and a hoe anytime soon.

  “Andy, we’re all gonna work on that garden this summer,” I told him, and I meant it. If I had to sit on Verl’s head and drive him by the ears until he sweated ninety proof all over my yard, I was gonna make it happen. “Just don’t you worry. I’ll see to it.”

  Andy smiled like he believed maybe I could, then he turned and went out the door, whistling a little tune under his breath.

  Chapter 19

  Mandalay Florentino

  The mail wagon was clearly not built for passengers. The cargo compartment of the remodeled army jeep was filled with mail containers, packages of all sizes, two huge rolls of what appeared to be plastic sheeting, aluminum cans gathered from the side of the road, and a supply of dog biscuits in blue buckets marked Small and Large. Some of the dog biscuits had spilled, so that the floor was a crunchy mixture of dog food and dribbled soda pop. A skinny black kitten was moving warily around the compartment, licking dried soda and eating crumbles of dog biscuit. In the cab up front, a basset hound scratched at the sliding window and licked his chops, hoping to make a meal of the kitten. When it wasn’t searching for food, the kitten arched and hissed at the dog.

  “Sorry about the animals,” the postman, Harlan Hanson, apologized as he ushered Carter and me into the back with the kitten. “Sheriff’s wife called and said her dog, Flash, was on the lam again, and if I saw him, could I pick him up and drop him back at home? The little cat was stuck in a cardboard box out by the county line. So far he and Flash ain’t gettin’ along too good.”

  Picking up the kitten as Carter and I climbed into the cargo area, the mailman examined it momentarily, then handed it to me, saying, “Here. He’s a skittish little thing.” Then he shut the tailgate as we perched atop the plastic mail containers. Checking the lock, he rapped twice on the window, which was opaque with dust. “Stay down and hang on,” he ordered before moving to the driver’s seat. The vehicle started with a cough and a wheeze, and muted light flooded the compartment as the auto shop owner threw open the garage door. We squealed backward onto the street, did a Miami Vice–style one-eighty, and sped down the alley, honking while dodging obstacles and news crews. A hail of obscenities flew after us, and in the cab, Harlan yelled, “Yeeeeeee-haw! Take that, you nosy buggers!” as we fishtailed onto the street.

  The kitten dug into my arm until finally I pulled him loose and tucked him in my lap atop the Prada handbag that only days ago had been one of my major concerns. Now the Prada seemed like a shallow symbol, a trapping I’d hoped would make me into something I wasn’t.

  The mail wagon whipped around a corner and flew over what felt like a speed bump. The cat, the Prada, and I went airborne and landed mostly in Carter’s lap. A second turn sent the Prada rolling to the floor, where it fell with a dull thud into a puddle of goo. Carter’s arm caught my waist, saving me from the floor, and we hovered in what might have been a romantic clutch if not for the cat squalling between us.

  The postman opened the sliding window, and Flash stuck his head through, barking. Cat claws went through my bra, into my skin.

  “We got a few on our tail,” the postman hollered over Flash’s barking. “I’m gonna slow down and do some deliveries. By the time we run the riverside loop and drop Flash at home, they’ll git bored and move on. Y’all just lay low back there and keep out of sight.”

  Both Carter and I glanced at the dust-coated back window. Not much chance of anyone seeing through that.

  “Hit the deck!” the postman hollered. “They’re comin’ around the front.”

  Carter and I fell back against the rolls of plastic, with the cat suspended spread-eagle between us.

  Sucking in a breath, Carter pulled his shirt, and the cat’s claws, away from his chest. Overhead, the window slid shut, Flash quieted to a dull whine behind the glass, and the vehicle slowed.

  “I bet you’re wondering what you’ve gotten yourself into,” I said, carefully unhooking the kitten from my beautiful periwinkle silk summer sweater, another designer leftover from Wardrobe. The vehicle rolled along the roadside, moving in the slow stop and go of mail delivery.

  “The thought did cross my mind.” Carter’s attention strayed to the kitten. Holding it and his shirt suspended in one hand, he rolled onto his side and braced an elbow, waiting patiently for me to break the link between us or for the kitten to relax, whichever came first. “All I caught on the way downstairs was that Amber Anderson’s on her way to town and we’re headed s
omewhere to meet up with her before the horde of reporters finds her. Somehow, there’s a gravel truck and a horse trailer involved. I don’t quite have that part figured out yet.”

  “You’re probably better off not knowing,” I said, and he chuckled. I felt the warmth of his breath on my neck, and a tingle slid over my skin. Our position suddenly seemed intimate, cozy despite the bouncing packages and the kitten. It should have felt strange being here with him, but it didn’t. “If I told you the plan, I’d have to kill you.”

  Repositioning his hand, he held the cat a little closer to me. “You could just swear me to secrecy.” The words were warm and comforting, like a promise. Somehow, even lying on a roll of sheeting in the back of a mail truck, not knowing where he was headed, he oozed confidence—not the arrogant sort, but the kind that made me feel like the day would somehow turn out all right.

  The next thing I knew, I was sharing the plan, including the fact that, right now, Amber was AWOL and my tyrannical boss was headed this way. “So now my life is in the hands of a twenty-four-yearold college intern who’s been fired once already and thinks he knows where Amber might be,” I finished, thinking that for all any of us knew, Amber could be halfway across the country right now, or halfway across the world, getting married to Justin Shay in Paris, Rome, or back in Vegas at the Love Me Tender Chapel, tying the knot as an Elvis impersonator crooned “Wedding Song.” They could honeymoon in the Beulah suite, all three of them. I wouldn’t need it once Ursula—

  “It’s not your life, Mandalay.” I felt Carter’s words as much as I heard them. “It’s just your job. There’s a difference.”

  The tide of my emotions turned abruptly, like a rogue wave striking shore, then slowly draining back out to sea. Carter was right. Whether we bagged the Amber Anderson segment today or not, the sun would still rise tomorrow. “You’re right,” I said, feeling shallow and artificial, a Hollywood girl who’d built the core of my existence on superficial things. Compared to what Carter’s family was going through, a job failure didn’t amount to much.