by Mav Skye
Chloe finally spoke, “That would be…” She struggled for the word while Sara waited with a kind smile. “Perfect.”
“Coming right up, then.”
Chloe dried herself off.
Erin scooted back into the booth, and Chloe followed her. This time Sharon grabbed a chair from a table and sat at the end of the table. “I think this works out a little better.”
Soon, Sara had a cup of coffee in front of Chloe and had refilled everyone’s drinks at the table.
Chloe sneaked occasional glances at Donny. He had remained seated the whole time since the mess had been on Chloe’s side, not his. Diana had helped clear and dry the table, but she had a little smile on her face—as if she had spilled the ice water on purpose.
And what if she hadn’t? Chloe would still be sitting there staring at Donny, dumbstruck.
With the table dry again, Diana replaced the plates and glasses. “So, Chloe, before clumsy me spilled over that ice water, I was introducing you to Donny here. Do you know each other?”
Donny smiled a reassuring smile at Chloe. “Of course, we do. Went to high school together. Chloe Sevenstars, right?”
Chloe nodded. She felt a shy smile form on her face.
“Oh my,” said Diana. “So that’s how it was?”
“No, no,” said Donny. “Chloe was a year or two behind me, and you liked that one guy. What was his name?”
Chloe shook her head, dumbstruck for words. Erin spoke for her. “Are you thinking of Joey Parker?”
There was his name again. Joey.
Donny pointed a finger at Erin. “That’s it. I think he left about the same time you did, Chloe.”
Erin shook her head. “He didn’t leave.”
“Didn’t he?”
Sharon piped in. “He ran away.”
“Oh.” Donny touched his forehead and raised his hand in the air. “That’s right.”
He and Sharon exchanged looks.
Chloe opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. Here she was sitting at a table with a group of people who knew her, but she didn’t know them. She had flashes of memories and emotions, but not much more. They were all so casual about it.
At the same time, she felt that this was what she needed. To know people from before, to be surrounded by their positive energy, this is how she wanted to remember. What she wanted to remember.
Chloe felt as if the path split in front of her, one took her to a numb state where she floated like a bubble above a black abyss where nothing could get out or in. The other path lead to extreme emotions, memories… but also friendship.
Speak, she told herself, and she opened her mouth. She knew she would take the hard path, the right path this time. “Joey, he was the boy next door?” It was meant to be a statement, but it came out like a question.
Erin patted her on the shoulder. “That’s it. But he was more Chloe. He was your best friend, your brother.
“Possibly more. Joey and Chloe sitting in a tree…” Sharon waggled her eyebrows at Donny, and he laughed.
Chloe remembered the rest from that day, when Erin almost drowned and she saw the clown. She could almost hear their voices now.
Joey and Chloe sitting in the tree
K-I-S-S-I-N-G
First comes love
Then comes the hatchet
Joey hacks up Chloe
And sews her skin into a jacket
Erin said, “He was such a nice guy. Remember when he showed me how to play baseball in the school yard that one day? I popped that ball just like he showed me and the ball nailed him square between the eyes.” They all laughed.
Chloe said, “I remember that.” And she did, it was a warm summer day. Erin was obsessed with learning how to play baseball, so Joey and Chloe walked them to the elementary school yard. Chloe taught Sharon how to throw and catch while Joey taught Erin how to swing a bat.
Joey with his teal eyes, freckles and copper hair. The vision of him in her mind’s eye was like a balm.
Erin said, “Good, Chloe. I’m glad you do.”
It was silent for a moment, and Chloe sipped her coffee.
Donny said, “I remember Joey from school. I didn’t know him like you all did, but he was quiet. I remember once this girl was walking down the hallway with an arm full of books. She was a well-hated geek. My crowd didn’t like her because she was so smart. Didn’t matter how much you bribed her, she wouldn’t do our papers. Anyway, she was walking down the hall with all these books, and heaven help me, Kara Leigh tripped her.”
Erin paused while sipping her milkshake to say, “Mean!”
Chloe had a vision of a beautiful leggy blonde in a school hall. The blonde had a cruel smile when she said, What crawled up your ass and died?
Donny continued, “This girl fell hard, man. She went sprawling across the hall; everyone was shuffling out of her way, and she slammed into a table with all these pamphlets for voting for school president. The table collapsed, and the papers went flying everywhere—along with her books.”
Erin said, “You helped her, right?”
Donny shook his head.
“And you call yourself a Police Officer?”
“I hadn’t grown a pair yet.”
Diana giggled.
“Kara Leigh and the rest of the gang laughed. I felt really bad for the girl. I was too much of a coward to help her out in front of my friends.”
“Aw,” Sharon reached across the table and patted Donny on the hand.
Sara leaned over the table and topped off Chloe’s coffee. “Nobody is born a hero. We are born cowards. It isn’t until there is a purpose larger than ourselves that gives us the courage to act otherwise.”
Surprised, everyone looked at Sara, including Sharon, who picked up her milkshake and toasted the small Irish woman. “I’ll drink to that.”
“Me, too!” said Diana, and picked up her coffee. They all picked up their drinks and held them up to Sara who blushed and saluted them before turning and hustling away.
Donny turned back to the twins. “Sara is right. Only I didn’t learn that ‘til much, much later.”
The question hung in the air; what had happened that had changed him? It was a story as old as time, a coward’s path to becoming a hero. It was a story no one ever grew tired of, because they all wanted to be that person. They all wanted to be heroes, but most stayed content with cowardice.
Chloe cringed, and searched inside herself. She felt a coward hiding from her past all this time. She didn’t want to be a coward anymore, but at what expense? Would she lose her Aunt, her husband, her kids maybe at the expense of being brave? What was her higher purpose?
These were questions she couldn’t answer right away.
Donny started talking again, and she listened.
“Anyway, so there’s papers everywhere. She’s sitting up, and there’s blood pouring out her mouth. Her jeans are split at the knees. All my friends keep laughing and pointing until the bell rings. Everyone had scattered. We had a minute to get to our classes. I hadn’t switched out my books from my locker yet, so my group left before I did. I got all my things and kept looking over my shoulder at the girl. She was wiping the blood away from her mouth and crying. I’ll never forget the sound of her voice, the misery in it…” Donny swallowed, and the group paused before he continued. “I shut my locker door and turned around. The hallway was mostly empty, and I saw Joey come around the corner, and spot her crying on the floor. He dropped his backpack and ran to her. He helped her stand up, collected all her books and handed them to her. I wished at that moment that I was like him. That I could see someone in trouble and be willing to drop everything just to help, not because I knew them or because they were cool, but because someone needed it, and I could do it. And she…”
The twins murmured in agreement.
Diana asked, “What did she do?”
Donny looked down at his coke and frowned. He shook his head. “She slapped him.”
“What?” the twins
both asked.
He shrugged and glanced up. “She slapped him across the face so hard, it just about took him off his feet, then she stomped away with her books.
“Joey didn’t reel or even seem surprised. He just leaned down and started scraping the flyers together. I set my books down and helped him. Then we picked up the table and spread the pamphlets out as they were before. We didn’t speak to each other, but I remember wishing that I had the balls to be like him. He was kind even when slapped across the face for it.” Donny shook his head. “It was a pity he didn’t have many friends, and I always wondered why.”
Chloe felt a fond warmth as Donny told his story, for both him and Joey.
Donny glanced at Chloe. “He had you, though, and Mama Nola. I don’t suppose a person needs much more than that.”
Mama Nola…
At the name, a gentle face of an elderly woman came to Chloe’s mind. She had long peppered hair braided to the side. She sat at a table sipping tea, her tender voice telling Chloe a story in her native tongue. In her mind’s eye, she saw the old woman working in her garden and flipping fry bread on the stove top.
Sharon said, “Chloe?”
“Mama Nola.” Chloe turned to Sharon with an incredulous look on her face.
Erin said, “Yeah, Mama Nola. You don’t remember your own mother?” Erin didn’t say this in a mean way, but one of genuine surprise.
Sharon put her hand on Chloe’s shoulder. “I’m so sorry, Chloe. You must have felt sad to not remember her.”
Chloe put her hand over Sharon’s and said, “I do now, and that’s what counts.”
Diana said, “Well, well, tonight is full of surprises, is it not?”
Chloe shook her head. “I can’t believe you are all here.” She glanced from one face to another. Then said, “Why are you all here?”
Diana said, “It’s book club night remember?”
“I thought that was at the library.”
“Yes, then we come here for drinks and milkshakes.”
Erin said, “You’d think it was almost fate that drew us here this night.”
Sara interrupted them. “Nah, it’s just my coffee.”
They all laughed as Sara refilled coffees and topped off milkshakes. “Although, I will say that this place is special. It brings people together that otherwise would not have met, the good and the…not-so-good. It’s almost as if this very spot was a battleground between dark and light.”
Diana sipped her coffee. “That would make you an angel, Sara.”
Sara laughed and wiped her hands on her apron out of habit. “Or the devil, Ms. Hacksworthy.”
“Oh, please.”
“It’s true,” said Sara. “Often the angel and the devil inhabit a body. We see the face we want to see.”
A deep voice behind her said, “And I assure you this woman has a face of an angel, but she’s the devil in the kitchen.” Sara laughed and stepped aside as Thomas put two plates of nachos on the tables.”
“Oh yum!” said Diana. “Sara, I’ve changed my mind. Get me a Coke, after all, please. That goes better with nachos.”
“Thomas,” Chloe said from surprise.
He nodded at her.
“She’s moved you up to cook?”
He said, “Just appetizers, but I’m working my way up the menu.”
Sara laughed and wrapped her arm about Thomas all motherly. “He’s doing good. After you’ve tried those nachos, tell me if I should keep him on or let him go.”
Donny was the first to dip in. “No good. Send him back to hell.”
They all laughed, and he said, “Nah, this is delicious.”
Everyone agreed as they filled their mouths full of cheese and tortilla chips. Everybody that was, except for Chloe. She watched every single one of them as if she were discovering them for the first time.
Sara grabbed another chair and set it beside Erin at the table. “Thomas, I’ve got Vern in the kitchen washing dishes, and no one else is in the café. Sit down and talk some sense into these people, will you? I’ll get everyone more napkins.”
Erin turned to Diana and asked her a question about criminal rights in Canada.
Thomas sat in the chair near Chloe in the booth. He said, “I was just wondering if—you know—you’d found anything else about…”
“Oh,” Chloe said, feeling more rooted to reality when recalling her work. “I did, in fact. I’m not any closer to knowing where Alicia and Serene are.”
“Oh,” he said glancing down at the table, then looked up. “You know their names.”
“Found in the detective notes.”
Thomas nodded with something akin to hope in his eyes.
Chloe continued, “I talked to her parents, and they gave me a tip no one ever followed up on.”
“What’s that?”
The table broke out in laughter as Diana told a story about a Canadian gangster named John Hamilton and how he earned the nick name Three-Fingered Jack.
Chloe lowered her voice. “The evening Alicia left, she stopped by a gas station and robbed it.”
“Alicia would never…”
“She dated a guy from Night Devils, didn’t she?”
Thomas quieted at this.
“Anyway, no one has been able to get ahold of the gas station attendant who was working that night. The employee was fired a few days later, then called in his tip to the police. I think I can find him and talk to him.”
Thomas’s face brightened at this. “Do you think he’d have a clue to where she is?”
Chloe said, “Maybe. Never know until you ask.”
He said, “Thank you for this, Officer Jackson. You’re the first person to give a shit.”
Chloe smiled at him, and became aware of the quiet table.
Donny said, “Officer Jackson?”
Chloe turned at her name.
And Diana said, “Oh yeah, Chloe is a cop.”
Chloe said, “Formerly a cop, just a parole officer now.”
“Well,” Donny said, “What do you know?”
Erin said, “Not just any parole officer, but our parole officer!” She pointed to Sharon.
“Mine, too,” said Thomas.
“Well,” said Diana. “Ain’t this a small world?”
“I can’t believe this.” Donny glanced from one person to another and shook his head. “I’m sitting at a table full of criminals.”
They all burst out laughing.
Erin said, “Give me a break. You already knew my sis and I were rebels.”
“That, I did.”
Sharon said, “Officer Jackson is much nicer than you are Trooper Hanks.”
He pointed at Chloe, and couldn’t help the grin spreading across his face. “Now let me tell you about Chloe Sevenstars, she kicked my girlfriend’s ass when she was a sophomore.”
Sharon shook her head. “Will you stop changing the subject? My car broke down three times on the highway and every time, a ticket and towing from Trooper Hanks.” Sharon stuck her tongue out at Donny. “He even drew a smiley face on it.”
He turned his palms up. “I rule with no mercy and a smile.”
“I don’t believe a word of it.” Sara chuckled as she sat down a coke in front of Thomas and another tray of Nachos. The Pratt sisters cheered at the site of yet another heaping pile of goodness.
Sara cleared the other trays away.
That was when the bells on the door jingled.
And the clowns walked in.
15
Juggling Species
CHLOE HAD JUST BITTEN DOWN ON a chip full of nacho cheese when the three clowns entered the diner. The table hushed and everyone stared.
The first was unusually tall and wore a black top hat. Flaming orange hair spread like fire from beneath the hat’s brim, framing its giant painted on grin. The second was as short and fat as the first was tall. He had neon green hair in two tufts sticking straight out from above his ears. He squeaked his nose and twinkled his fingers at Chloe’s table.
No one waved back.
The third had a muscular build and a bald head. Black diamonds were painted over his dark eyes. He had a black rubber nose, and a turned down frown—painted in black, of course. Top Hat and Green Tufts wore the same colorful jumpsuit. Black Frown wore black pants with a wife beater and a pair of suspenders with tiny red balloons.
Top Hat pointed at someone at their booth.
Chloe frowned. Had he pointed at her?
The clown smiled and tapped on the Green Tufts shoulder.
Green Tufts put his finger beside his nose and waggled all his fingers as if saying, Prepare for magic! He put his hand to his chin, thinking, then snapped. He held up a finger—give me one second! After making a big deal of reaching into the pocket of his brightly colored outfit, he drew three juggling balls from his pocket.
Black Frown glanced out the door they had just walked through, tapping his fingers on his thighs.
Green Tufts tapped him on the shoulder. When Black Frown turned to him, Green Tufts squeaked his black nose and giggled. Black Frown knocked Green Tufts’ hand away and turned back to the door.
Top Hat clapped and Green Tufts tossed the balls at him. Top Hat caught all three and began to juggle.
Green Tufts started clapping and motioned for Chloe’s group to clap with them. Sara was the first to clap, then Diana, Erin, and so on… it was a half-hearted clap.
Chloe hadn’t bothered to raise her hands; she noticed Sharon hadn’t, either. Chloe watched, pushing away the panic that climbed her esophagus.
Green Tufts kept reaching into his pocket and tossing more and more balls at Top Hat.
Top Hat kept catching them and adding them to the juggle. When he got up to eight, he motioned for more.
Green Tufts pulled out the inside of his pockets and showed it to Chloe’s table. Empty.
Green Tufts shrugged, leaned over and beeped Top Hat’s nose. He was so surprised he dropped all eight of the balls.
Erin giggled.
Both pointed at each other and feigned laughing, and the table clapped harder.