Mutiny on the Bayou

by Hearn, Shari

  “How the heck did you end up caught on a flagpole?”

  “Can we let it go?” Gertie said, rolling her eyes. “C’mon, let’s pick up the pace. We don’t have all night.”

  Soon we stepped into a clearing, the back of the administration building a few yards away. “Left side, second window from the front,” I whispered. “The lock is broken.”

  Ida Belle led the way and we inched around the building after checking the area was all clear. I had earlier greased the inside of the window fitting with a tube of lip balm, so it slid open easily. It sat three feet off the ground, making it easy to pull ourselves up and into the big therapy room. Once inside we padded across the room and hallway and into the office.

  “What’s that smell?” Ida Belle asked.

  “Bleach,” Gertie said. “Some nitwit used it to clean a wine stain in front of the door.”

  “That’s overkill.”

  “Welcome to Camp Happy Frog.”

  If I could access them, my job was to copy all the computer files onto an external hard drive. Gertie and Ida Belle were responsible for checking paper files and searching for clues in the office linking the judge or any other public official to the company owning the camp.

  The computer monitor appeared to be in “sleep” mode, so I tapped on a key to wake it. I expected a log-in screen. Instead, I saw several windows minimized at the bottom of the desktop.

  “This is odd,” I said, inspecting the screen. “Whoever used the computer last didn’t log out. In fact, there are some open windows on the computer desktop. Starlight’s the only worker who would have used it.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Gertie said. “She seems pretty flighty.”

  I clicked on one of the windows and saw an e-mail Starlight had been in the middle of writing. “Jackpot. She has her e-mail account opened.”

  “Copy away,” Ida Belle said.

  I noticed several e-mails from company accounts and began copying, though it still puzzled me why Starlight would leave without closing her computer programs.

  Gertie withdrew a folder from the file cabinet. “Here are the info cards we had to fill out. This file has the last six months’ worth of cards, including the ones from our group.” She glanced at one and handed it to Ida Belle for her to photograph. “Oh, please,” Gertie said, reading another card, “the gal who stabbed her boyfriend with a fork? She lists her weight on her info card as one hundred seventeen. In what lifetime?” She flipped through more of the info cards. “Isn’t this odd. Millie doesn’t have a card.”

  “Maybe it got misfiled.”

  “Who’s Millie?” Ida Belle asked.

  “Someone Fortune has a granny crush on.”

  I could feel my face getting red as I looked up from the e-mails. “I just said she’d make a nice grandma.”

  Ida Belle nodded. “Granny crush. Don’t be embarrassed. I had a granny crush once on old Mrs. Lemieux, my third-grade teacher. I used to dream about her baking me cookies because my own grandma was such a witch.”

  “I think Millie is totally into the grandma thing,” Gertie said. “I swear, if Fortune hadn’t wiped that little dab of peanut butter off her cheek, Millie would have spit on her napkin and cleaned it off for her.”

  “Can we please focus?” I said.

  Ida Belle picked up a small digital photo frame from the desk and handed it to me. Photos changed about every thirty seconds. “I noticed several photos flip by that appeared to be taken at company events,” she said.

  I held it up and showed it to Gertie.

  “Well, guess what?” Gertie said, smiling, “there’s one of our friendly judge.”

  “We need to download the pictures,” I said. “I’m almost done with copying her e-mails. I’ll download the digital frame next.”

  Gertie pulled out another info card. “Oh, this is sad. The psycho who popped wheelies on her neighbor’s lawn? Her in-case-of-emergency contact is her boss.”

  “What’s so sad about that?” I asked.

  “She has no friends or family she could list?” She flipped to another info card. “Even you listed your Uncle Morrow.”

  An awkward silence fell over the room.

  “Oh,” Gertie said as the realization hit her. Uncle Morrow was my boss, the real Sandy-Sue Morrow’s uncle.

  “You were probably required to write his name and number, right?” Ida Belle asked.

  I nodded. “It’s a dedicated phone line for that purpose.”

  “Back in DC you probably had a close friend or a relative as an emergency contact, didn’t you?” Ida Belle asked.

  “I had my partner, Harrison’s number.”

  Gertie and Ida Belle exchanged sad glances.

  “When your life goes back to normal, you can list me,” Gertie said.

  “Or me,” Ida Belle added. “Hell, half the time I could swear we’re long-lost relatives. We both like to crumble potato chips on our ice cream. You’re the only one I’ve ever met who does that.”

  “Hey, speaking of food,” I said after moving on to a second page of e-mails to copy, “Gertie and I are going to ‘borrow’ a boat tomorrow and go hunting for a place to eat along the bayou. You up for an adventure?”

  “Sure.”

  Gertie glared at me. “Ribbit, ribbit, ribbit.”

  Ida Belle stared at Gertie. “Why are you croaking like a frog?”

  “Just trying a Camp Happy Frog technique.” She thought for a beat, then shot me a look. “It’s not working.”

  I had no idea what was going on with her and there was no time to ask. The creaking sound out front signaled someone was making her way up the staircase and onto the porch.

  “Crap. It must be Starlight. We need to get the hell out of here.” I disengaged the external drive from the computer and handed it to Ida Belle, who stashed it in her duffel bag. Gertie shoved a few files her way and closed the file drawer. The sound of a key inserted into the front-door lock kicked us into high gear.

  “You take this stuff back to your hotel room and go through it,” I whispered to Ida Belle while scrambling out of the office and into the hallway. I knew Starlight would probably see us sneaking out the window, so I told Ida Belle, “You leave through the window. We’ll create a distraction.”

  She nodded and hurried to it.

  “To the dining room,” Gertie said, pushing me toward the kitchen area. “Be loud about it.”

  The front door opened seconds after Gertie and I skidded into the dining room. Gertie raced to the refrigerator and pulled the door open.

  “I am so hungry!” she screamed.

  “Pass me some lunch meat!”

  Hopefully Starlight would come straight to the kitchen and not notice Ida Belle sneaking out the side window.

  Starlight yelled, “What’s going on back there?”

  I cursed and whispered to Gertie. “I forgot to give Ida Belle the digital frame.”

  She grabbed it from my hand. “It’s small. I’ll stick it under my shirt between my boobs.”

  “Good idea.”

  Seconds later Starlight stormed into the dining room and flipped on the light to find Gertie with a piece of bologna hanging from her mouth and me diving into a loaf of bread.

  “Busted,” Gertie mumbled, though it sounded more like, “buffded” with her mouth full.

  “We got hungry,” I said to Starlight, taking a bite out of a piece of bread.

  Starlight folded her arms. The look on her face didn’t match the calm and peaceful face she presented earlier in the day. “I believe I mentioned you were to eat in the time allotted, did I not?”

  “You might have mentioned that,” Gertie said, stuffing another piece of bologna in her mouth.

  “Yet you disregarded what I said and thought you’d come and help yourselves.”

  I hung my head. “You’re right. That was a very disrespectful thing to do. I guess we’ll deal with it tomorrow in therapy.” I glanced at Gertie. “We should go back to our cabin now.”


  I returned the loaf of bread to the refrigerator and shut the door.

  “Not so fast,” Starlight said, her voice low, growly almost. “I think I mentioned anger sometimes has its consequences. You disrespecting my authority is another expression of your anger. Now you’re going to feel the consequences.” She pointed to the hallway. “We’ll all go back to your cabin together.”

  Starlight didn’t say a word during the walk back to our cabin. The only sounds were tens of thousands of frogs croaking pickup lines to one another. When we returned to our room Starlight instructed us to hand over our cell phones.

  “From now on, you will be denied the privilege of communicating with the outside world,” she said. “It’s also come to my attention you supplied the other women with moonshine. Another direct violation of the rules.”

  “Is that stuff moonshine?” Gertie asked, slapping her hand to her chest. “Well, for heaven’s sake. The gal I got it from said it was cough syrup. I heard there was a cough making its way through the parishes and thought I’d give it away as a prophylactic measure.” Gertie turned to me. “No wonder that tickle in my throat never went away.”

  Starlight held our cell phones up. “You two are lucky having your cell phones confiscated is your only punishment. I could report you. From here on out I want you to get with the program.” Her face took on an ugly shade of red while her hands clutched our phones so tight I thought they’d break. “Understood?”

  We nodded as Starlight stormed out of our cabin, slamming the door so hard the I’m in Control of My Emotions poster slid off the wall.

  “She’s a bit high strung,” Gertie said, sitting on the edge of her bed.

  “Now what are we going to do? We don’t have our cell phones. We’re cut off from any information Ida Belle uncovers. And how will she know where to meet us for dinner tomorrow?”

  “Oh, now you remember dinner.” She folded her arms and let loose a string of ribbits.

  I plopped on my bed. “What’s wrong with you tonight?”

  Gertie sprung to her feet and stomped to her bureau. “I’m going to get ready for bed.” She pulled open the drawer so forcefully the handle came off in her hand.

  “Stupid handle!”

  “Gertie…” I got up from my bed and went to her.

  “Well, what numskull put this crappy piece of furniture together, anyway?”

  I placed my hand on her shoulder. “All I said was we couldn’t reach Ida Belle about dinner tomorrow. Why are you getting so upset about it?”

  She turned to me, pissed. “Because dinner out tomorrow night was supposed to be just the two of us.” She took a deep breath, then let it out. “You and Ida Belle share a special bond, I get that. You’re similar in the way you handle things, and you share some of the same background. You and I are kinda worlds apart. I thought maybe this whole anger management thing and sneaking out for dinner tomorrow would be something we could share.” She dropped her head. “Before you have to go away and we don’t see as much of one another.”

  I felt a knot in my stomach. She was right. What a crappy friend I’d been.

  She looked back up at me. “And while I’m on a roll—would it kill you once in a while to think I would make a good grandma? Especially since I know how to make a better peanut butter sandwich than Millie. Her peanut butter to jelly ratio was totally off, and it’s been scientifically proven that cutting a sandwich on the diagonal is just plain wrong.”

  She stuck her hand in her blouse and pulled out the small digital photo frame wedged inside her bra. “I’m going to study these photos now if you don’t mind.”

  She shuffled to the bed and sat. I stood awkwardly in front of the bureau, seeing her reflection in the wall mirror. In the five weeks I’d known her, I hadn’t seen her look so small, sitting on her bed with her knees drawn up to her chest, studying the frame. I pried open her drawer. “What nightie do you want? Your coffee cups or polka dots?”

  “Coffee cups.”

  I grabbed her coffee-cup print nightie and brought it over. “Can I sit?”

  She patted the bed next to her and I sat. We watched the photos fade in and out of Starlight and others taken at Camp Happy Frog.

  “That lady is the judge,” Gertie said, pointing to a woman in khaki pants and polo shirt. “She’s in a lot of the pictures. Seems the judge made frequent visits here. There are also some taken at a beach where the company had a get-together. Looks tropical. The judge is there too.”

  “Tropical, as in Caribbean?”

  Gertie nodded. “The sign in the background gives a business address on Saint Lucia.”

  “Sounds like the judge has some perks.”

  Gertie nodded again.

  I cleared my throat. “Ribbit. Ribbit.”

  The corners of her mouth turned up. She forced her almost-smile into a frown. “I’d rather stew in my anger. I don’t know if I’m ready to ribbit just yet.”

  I nodded. “I’m sorry I screwed up about dinner. I should have been paying more attention.” I sighed. “Look, Gertie, you were the first friendly face I saw in Sinful. You made sure I got in with the right crowd. You bring over dinner. You clean my house. You’re the best grandma I never had. And I admire you. A lot. A really, really lot.” I shifted on the bed. I hated this sappy stuff. And she knew it. And her quivering lip told me she enjoyed seeing me drown in my sappiness. “I’m no good at this, am I?”

  She patted my hand. “You were squirming. That says a lot. If you were lying to me, it would have come easy. I appreciate that. That’s where you and Ida Belle are alike. You both can be so stoic.”

  She was right. Another occupational hazard.

  I nodded, took a breath and exhaled. “And I apologize for blaming you for our being here. My mouthing off to Celia was my fault.”

  “Those were some colorful cuss words you called Celia,” she said, laughing. “Now that’s where you take after me.”

  Gertie screwed up her face in her best imitation of me and let lose a stream of curse words. I fell on her bed in hysterics, tears gushing down my face. “I think you added some,” I said, catching my breath.

  “Ribbit,” she said, wiping the laugh tears from her eyes. “I stuck in some real nasty Cajun ones. Thank God it’s not Sunday or I’d be struck by lightning by now.”

  We stayed up another hour making each other laugh about dumb things we’d done in our lives, the kinds of things that felt horrible at the time but made great stories later. We agreed these three days at Camp Happy Frog would end up being one of those stories. A shared joke between us. And it was fun getting to know one another better, though I could have done without knowing how she felt about fraternization between bras and panties. Definitely TMI.

  When we finally turned off the light and my head hit the pillow, I quickly began to nod off, the events of our first day at Camp Happy Frog running through my head. We had evidence of a cozy relationship between the judge and the company running Camp Happy Frog, and Gertie and I were on good terms again. We just needed to fake it through two more days of anger management classes and we were good to go.

  Then why did something feel a little off?

  My doubts invaded my dreams. But it wouldn’t be until a few hours later my dream world would remind me there was something I had overlooked. Things were more than a little off. They were very wrong.

  Chapter Six

  As usual, it was the last dream in the early morning that would be my wake-up call.

  I didn’t know how I got there, but I found Millie in the kitchen baking a coffee cake, streaks of flour clinging to the oversized apron she wore over her robe. The words, “I heart my granddaughter” were printed on the front of the pink apron.

  “I was wondering when the smell of my coffee cake would bring you in here, Fortune,” she said, setting the pan on top of the stove. She kicked the oven door shut with her foot and asked, “Can I cut you a piece?”

  It was tempting. When I was a little girl my mom used to make coffee ca
ke. Before she got sick. After she got sick my dad used to buy them at the store and I’d take a piece into her room and tell her I baked it. She knew I hadn’t. I was too little to bake. She’d gush over it anyway. Some days it had taken all her strength to do even that.

  “Not today,” I told her.

  “Are you sure? It has a cinnamon-nut crumble topping. The kind your mom used to make. I taught her how to make the crumble, you know.”

  “Actually, you didn’t, Millie. You’re not my grandmother.”

  “Nonsense. Sit down, dear while I get you a glass of milk.”

  “No thanks.”

  “Coffee?”

  “No. In fact, I’m here to return the peanut butter and jelly sandwich you made me yesterday.”

  I held out a plate topped with a sandwich. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to break up with you, Millie. You’re no longer my grandmother.”

  “Oh dear,” she said, hurt washing over her face. She grabbed a book off the counter. “Are you sure? I could read Cat in the Hat to you this morning.”

  That had been my mom’s favorite book, both when I was growing up and when she’d been my age. Her mother, my grandmother, used to read it to her. The night before my mom passed she had been too weak to hold the book, so I read to her. I was eight and read it like an eight-year-old, but it didn’t seem to bother my mom. In fact, it made her cry and smile at the same time.

  Millie waved the book in front of my face.

  “No, Millie, it has to end. Truth is, I have Gertie and Ida Belle. More friends than grandmas, really, but I’m set. And they can be a handful. That doesn’t mean I’ll forget you. I still want to have it out with your ex-husband. No woman should be bullied.”

  “Oh, you’re a doll,” she said. She looked closely at my face, then pulled out a hankie from her robe pocket, spit on it and wiped something from my face. “Goodbye, then.”

  Suddenly Millie morphed into a human-sized frog standing on her hind legs, much like the grinning statue outside the administration building, except she had Millie’s hair and wore her apron.

  “Walk me out, would you?” I said to Froggy. “I don’t like this building. There’s something here that’s not quite right.”