Maple Dale ~ My Forever Home (Maple Dale Series)

by MaryAnn Myers

  Big Dave shook his head. “She’s always quoting the Methodists.”

  Mindy smiled. She knew for a fact they were both devout Methodists.

  “I tell her there’s heathens in every religion. She can’t be believing everything she hears.”

  “Don’t you be talking behind my back,” Susie said.

  Mindy laughed. “He wasn’t. He’s telling me a story.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Susie waved them off. “When you two get together, I can’t believe either one of you.”

  Shane held open the screen door for the three of them. Mindy smiled at him.

  “Do you think she might have a hair dryer?” he whispered, motioning to his pants. “Two hours in the truck I’m going to be pretty ripe.”

  “She does. We use it when we’re here for visits.” She pointed to the bathroom just down from the kitchen. Susie busied herself with setting out cookies while Dave made the coffee. When Susie heard an odd noise, she turned.

  “What is that sound?” she asked.

  “The hair dryer,” Mindy said. “He’s drying his pants.”

  “Oh….” She listened for another second or two. “It kinda sounds like a freight train.”

  When Shane emerged from the bathroom, he was relatively dry. “Hope you don’t mind, I borrowed some talcum powder.” The front of his jeans was distinctly whiter.

  Susie motioned for them to have a seat at the table. “While the coffee’s making….” She plopped down a pile of papers and sat down. Dave reached into the fridge for a hunk of cheese made by a local dairy and sliced it into pieces.

  “Ya’ll want some jalapeño jam to go with it?”

  Shane nodded. He recognized the label on the jar. “That’s my Uncle Jake.”

  “The one that drinks too much moonshine?” Mindy asked.

  “Hooch. He calls it hooch.”

  Susie looked over the rim of her eyeglasses at Big Dave. “You’d better not be bringing out any. This young man’s driving.”

  “Maybe just a shot?”

  “No,” Susie said.

  “I’m just kidding, old woman. Besides, I drank it all months ago.”

  They all laughed at that, even Sassie Susie. She pushed the stack of articles in front of Mindy and Shane. “I don’t want anything to do with fracking. According to all this data, nothing good can come of this.”

  “Aside from us being able to pay our bills and go to the doctor,” Dave said, placing the coffee pot on a trivet in the middle of the table. “What’s wrong with being able to make a little money off this land for a change instead of pouring money into it?”

  “That’s not our land down there,” Susie said. “That’s everybody’s land. It’s the people’s land. It’s our animals’ land. It’s all our water.” She filed through the stack. “Here, read this. Read it out loud.”

  Mindy handed it to Shane. Smooth move, he thought, and started reading. “Hydraulic fracturing or fracking as it is most commonly referred to, is the process of drilling and injecting fluid into the ground at a high pressure in order to fracture shale rocks to release natural gas inside.”

  Big Dave placed the plate of cheese and a bowl of jalapeño jam in front of them.

  “Each gas well requires an average of four hundred tanker trucks to carry water and supplies to and from the sight.”

  “Just think what that’s going to do to our roads that are already full of potholes,” Susie said.

  “The oil companies will fix the roads,” Dave said while sitting down.

  Susie frowned at him and urged Shane to keep reading.

  “It takes one to eight million gallons of water to complete each fracturing job.”

  “Now does that make sense?” Susie asked. “With water so scarce here lately the last couple of years. Where’s that water going to come from? The city? I don’t want city water in my well.”

  “Would you rather no water?” Dave asked.

  Susie dismissed him again. “Keep reading.”

  Mindy had helped herself to the cookies and cheese. Dave poured the coffee. Mindy tried a taste of the jelly. “Dip the cheese right into it.”

  Mindy got brave, tried it, and had some more.

  “The water brought in is mixed with sand and chemicals to create the fracking fluid. Approximately forty thousand gallons of chemicals are used per fracturing.”

  Susie sat back and crossed her arms. “Just like I said, chemicals.”

  Shane made a cookie sandwich, cheese and jam in the middle, and popped it into his mouth. Two chews, a smile of appreciation, a sip of coffee and he continued. “Up to six hundred chemicals….”

  “Six hundred,” Susie echoed.

  “Up to six hundred chemicals are used in the fracking fluid, including known carcinogens and toxins such as lead, uranium, mercury, ethylene glycol, radium, methanol, hydrochloric acid and formaldehyde.” Now it was Shane who sat back. He looked around at everyone.

  Susie motioned. “Read.”

  He made another cookie sandwich first, popped it into his mouth, and downed a swig of coffee. “Down ten thousand feet, the fracking fluid is then pressure injected into the ground though a drilled pipeline. Here’s the math. Five hundred thousand active gas wells in the US times eight million gallons of water per fracking times eighteen times a well can be fractured…that’s seventy-two trillion gallons of water and three-hundred and sixty billion gallons of chemicals needed to run our current gas wells.”

  Mindy poured Shane some more coffee.

  “The mixture reaches the end of the well where the high pressure causes the nearby shale rock to crack, creating fissures where natural gas flows into the well. During this process the methane gas and toxic chemicals leach out from the system and contaminate nearby groundwater.”

  Susie nodded emphatically and glanced at her husband of fifty-two years.

  “Methane concentrations are seventeen times higher in drinking wells near fracturing sites than in normal wells.” Shane looked at Mindy.

  “Told you,” she said.

  Shane sat back and then leaned forward. “Contaminated well water is used for drinking water for nearby cities and towns. There have been over one thousand documented cases of water contamination next to areas of gas drilling as well as cases of sensory, respiratory, and neurological damage due to ingested contaminated water.”

  Now it was Big Dave who was motioning for him to keep reading.

  “Only thirty to fifty percent of the fracturing fluid is recovered. The rest of the toxic fluid is left in the ground and is not biodegradable.”

  “Now that’s just wrong,” Dave said.

  “I’ve been telling you this for months,” Susie said.

  “Yeah, but it’s a heck of lot different listening to someone reading it in a normal tone of voice and not yelling it at me.”

  “Why didn’t you just read it yourself?”

  Dave shrugged. Guilty as charged.

  Shane took advantage of this exchange to help himself to another cookie sandwich and glanced at Mindy. He’d expected her to be looking rather smug at the moment, but she wasn’t. She hadn’t outted him on his job and thrown him under the bus again either.

  “The waste fluid is left in open air pits to evaporate, releasing harmful VOC’s–volatile organic compounds-into the atmosphere, creating contaminated air, acid rain, and ground level ozone.” Shane glanced around the table at everyone. “In the end, hydraulic fracking produces approximately thirty thousand barrels of natural gas per day, but at the price of numerous environmental, safety, and health hazards.”

  Mindy finished her coffee and sat back, waiting. “Is that it? Is there more?”

  “Yes.” Shane said and read, “Don’t think it’s worth it? Help support the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act which would require the energy industry to disclose all chemicals used in fracturing fluid as well as repeal fracking’s exemption from the Safe Drinking Water Act. Contact your local officials. Join or support your local o
rganization.” He paused and looked at Mindy as he added a last line of his own. “Attend your local council meeting, ask questions, and hold them accountable.”

  Nourished, educated, and committed, when the four of them said good-bye to one another, Big Dave hitched a ride to the end of their driveway on the back of Shane’s pickup. With his feet firmly on the ground, tailgate up and secure, he removed his FRACK ON! sign and waved.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Mindy phoned her mother on the way home, happy her cellphone was still working, happy to relieve her mother’s worrying. “We’ll be back in about an hour. We’re about half way. Yes, a perfect gentleman.”

  Shane shook his head.

  “Love you, Mom, Love you, Dad!”

  “Your dad?” Shane asked, when she hung up.

  “He was on the extension. He’s just as much a worrier as my mom, only he doesn’t let it show.”

  When her cellphone rang a few minutes later, she checked the Caller ID. It was Mrs. Butchling. “Can you meet us at the sale?”

  Mindy glanced at the time on Shane’s truck radio. “Why?”

  “I’ll tell you when you get here. Hurry.”

  “Hurry?”

  “You know what I mean. Hillary will be here too, but you know she can’t go in the sale arena or near the horses. Particularly the Tennessee Walker. He’s in a lot of pain.”

  Mindy held the phone to her chest. “Do you have plans for tonight?” she asked.

  “Big ones,” he said.

  Mindy smiled. “Cool! I have a feeling we’re going to steal another horse.”

  “I’m in,” he said.

  “All right. We’ll be there as soon as we can. How are things at the barn?”

  “Good. I took Rex and Dew Drop for a walk and grazed them.”

  “That horse is going to be so spoiled.”

  “Oh, and are you ready? Julia rode Ichabod in the arena with me.”

  “Wow! Another milestone.”

  “I know! It’s like all of a sudden she’s coming into her own. Oh, and me and Finney are going to an art show in Chagrin Falls tomorrow. It’s for a metalsmith jeweler he knows that lives just down the street. She’s a regular customer of his.”

  “He asked you on a date?”

  “No. When he told me about it, I asked him.”

  “Good for you. I’ll see you later.”

  Mindy hung up, relayed the news, and Shane smiled. It wasn’t particularly newsworthy to him, not knowing either Julia or Mrs. Butchling all that well. But it seemed to make Mindy very happy and that made him happy.

  “It’s like the day Julia decided she could leave the house on her own and not have her mom drive her everywhere, she changed.” Mindy pointed up ahead. “Ooh, rest area.”

  “Is it potty time?”

  She chuckled. “Yes.”

  Shane took advantage of the stop, gassed up the truck, and while waiting for Mindy, received a phone call from his mother. “I just wanted to thank you and Mindy again for the scarf. I love it. Dad’s taking me to Dairy Queen for a banana split and I’m wearing it. Thanks for bringing Mindy to meet us too. She seems very nice.”

  Shane watched Mindy walk out of the rest area, glance around and smile when she saw him. “Yes, she is.”

  “Drive carefully,” his mom said.

  “I will.”

  Mindy piled in, took off her boots and propped her feet on the dash. “Wake me when we get there.” It was about an hour’s drive to the sale and she had a feeling it was going to be a long night. Shane had never been there before, but it was on the main road and easy to find. He woke Mindy as they pulled through the gateway. She yawned and pulled on her boots, fluffed her hair, and scanned the parking lot for a familiar vehicle. Mrs. Butchling said they’d park near the back of the lot so Hillary could be far enough away to not pick up on the horses’ emotions and feelings.

  Matthew waved them down. Their two vehicles were parked right next to one another. Mrs. Butchling pointed. “Look who’s here.” The killer guy’s truck and rickety trailer were parked right up front.

  Mindy looked at her.

  “I’m taking him down,” she said.

  Mindy laughed. Mrs. Butchling had such a strange sense of humor. But with her mood lately, who knew what she’d do.

  “Go keep him busy.”

  “Where’s Veronica and Karen?”

  “They’re inside.”

  “How am I supposed to know what the guy looks like? You had us hide, remember?”

  “Didn’t you say you saw him on surveillance?”

  Shane and Matthew greeted one another and shook hands. Hillary was sitting cross-legged in the grass between the cars. “You okay?” Shane asked.

  She shook her head. “I can’t stand. I thought I was far enough away.”

  “Come on,” Mrs. Butchling said, tugging on Mindy’s arm. “I’ll point him out to you.”

  Shane went with them. It wasn’t a huge crowd, but there were at least fifty or sixty people and quite a few “good ole boys” as Mrs. Butchling called them. “There,” she said, hiding behind Shane. The man was sitting in the third row, arms crossed and legs spread.

  “I wish I had a B-B gun,” she said.

  Shane laughed.

  “Do you have your knife?”

  “Why?” Mindy asked. “What are you going to do?”

  “Nothing,” she replied. “You don’t need to know.” She took Mindy’s pocket knife and told them to wait a minute. “I’ll be right back.” She returned quickly with the man’s license plate number written on a piece of paper. “Give me about ten minutes and have the auctioneer announce he needs to move his truck. Say he’s blocking somebody. Don’t let him come out until then. Hopefully they won’t auction off the Tennessee Walker first.” She pointed to where Veronica and Karen were seated and vanished.

  “I’ll go sit with them. You go over by the guy,” Mindy said.

  “And what am I supposed to do?” Shane asked.

  Mindy grinned and gave him a kiss. “I think it’s time to get your redneck on.”

  Shane laughed, and with that, walked to the stands and climbed the stairs. “Anyone sitting here?” he asked the man.

  “No. Go ahead.”

  Shane took the can of Skoal out of his back pocket and offered the man some.

  “No. No thanks. I’ll be heading out for a cigarette soon.”

  Shane put a pinch of Skoal between his cheek and gum and sat down and stretched his legs. “So what are you here for?”

  “A vendetta,” the man said.

  “Really?”

  The man nodded. “I’m going to buy that Tennessee Walker and drop what’s left of it in somebody’s driveway. What the hell’s that smell?”

  Shane sighed. “Sheep piss. It’s been that kind of day.”

  “I hear ya.”

  Shane crossed his arms and spit down between the seats. “Why the Tennessee Walker?”

  “He’s in bad shape. That’ll bring that do-gooder out in the open. Pretty sure I’ve seen her here before.”

  Shane nodded.

  “Attention. Would the owner of a 1994 Ford350, license plate number G527RM move your truck please. You’ve got somebody blocked in.”

  “I don’t have anybody blocked in. If they’re blocked in, they’re blocking me in. Let them move.”

  Shane sat quietly next to the man for a few minutes, watched a few ponies get auctioned off, and took out his cellphone. “Page him again,” he texted. “My girlfriend,” he said to the man. “She’s such a bitch.”

  Another pony got auctioned off. The man wasn’t bidding and he wasn’t budging.

  “Second time announcing this - Would the owner of a 1994 Ford350, license plate number G527RM please move your truck. You have somebody blocked in and a tow truck has been called.”

  “Shit!” the man said.

  Shane leaned back so the man could get by and a few seconds later followed him. When the man got near his truck and stood looking all
around, Shane ducked behind a van. There wasn’t a car or truck anywhere near the man’s rig.

  “What the hell?” The man turned to head back inside and caught sight of a woman just beyond a scrub of trees. It was then that his eyes fell upon the front tire of his truck. Flat. The back tire too. He hurried around to the other side. Both of those were flat also. He tore off his cowboy hat and threw it to the ground and again caught sight of a woman moving through the brush. When he leaned over to pick up his hat, he saw that all four of his trailer tires were flat as well.

  He took off running toward the brush, spitting and cussing. Shane took off after him and was just shy of making his presence known, when the man stopped dead in his tracks at the sound of a woman wailing.

  It was the same wailing he’d heard that night at Maple Dale. He turned, hurrying back toward his truck, but then stopped, and literally turned around in a complete circle, looking every bit like a man who’d just seen a ghost and didn’t know which way to turn.

  “I’ll get it tomorrow. I’ll get it tomorrow,” he said, gasping for breath.

  Shane watched him take out his cellphone and head for the front gate. When Mrs. Butchling tapped Shane on the shoulder he jumped. “Shhhh…” she said. “It’s me.”

  Mindy appeared at their side. “What’s going on?” She looked at the man’s rig. “Did you slash his tires?”

  “No, I just let the air out. I used to have to let the air out of my husband’s tires all the time to keep him from driving.”

  “Alzheimer’s,” Mindy said, to Shane, explaining.

  The man paced back and forth, flailing his arms, either talking to himself or talking to someone on his cellphone. A few minutes later, a car pulled up, he got in, and was gone.

  Mindy, Mrs. Butchling, and Shane stepped out from behind the van “Your howling’s what scared him. Hell, it would scare anybody. It scared me, that’s for sure,” Shane said.

  “I didn’t howl.”

  Shane looked at the woman.

  “Honest. I heard it too. I wasn’t anywhere near there. I was hiding over by the office.”

  “I’m going back inside,” Mindy said. “I think the Tennessee Walker’s up next. Karen’s trying to get the owner to sell him before he goes into the ring. Poor thing can hardly walk.”