by D. Gideon
Mark clapped his hands together and grinned. “Sweet. Let me take this rack into the cooler and I’ll box that chicken up for you. It’ll just be a few minutes.” Before she could change her mind, he and his rack disappeared through the swinging doors.
Dotty fingered her cross again, shaking her head. It was amazing how one little lie could grow. Sure, she was getting a great deal, but now she’d have to go over to the hardware store and buy more canning jars, rings, and lids. She didn’t think she’d have enough cash for that, but maybe Teddy would let her put the rest on a tab until Tuesday. And what if Mark checked in with Pastor Bill? He’d know she’d lied. Pastor Bill would know she’d lied.
“I’ll buy all the jars I can, I’ll put away as much as I can, and anything left over I’ll take to the church,” she said, settling the issue. “Lord Jesus forgive me for lyin’. I promise you, if this ends up being nothing, I’ll take every bit of that chicken I canned over to the church. I’ll take everything else that comes out of both of the gardens, too. I’m scared, Lord. Please help see me through this. Help me keep my promise to Thomas and Corey. Thank you, Jesus. Amen.”
From the front of the store, she heard a woman’s voice raised in anger. She recognized it as the lady she’d been talking to a few minutes ago.
“What do you mean you can’t take my debit card? Well I walked in here as soon as those doors were open and that sign wasn’t there! How am I supposed to pay for all of this food? Cash? Who the hell carries cash anymore?”
“Get your manager out here, now,” the husband’s voice bellowed. “Now!”
As Abe’s voice joined in the fray, Dotty was suddenly glad to be waiting an extra few minutes before she could go to the registers. Between the yelling up front and Abe’s announcement about the gas lines, she thought the safest place to be right now might be right back here, out of sight, until things calmed down.
“Or maybe this is just the start of it, and things ain’t gonna calm down,” she said. She dearly hoped she was wrong.
CHAPTER 9
Saturday, September 1st
Snow Hill, Maryland
“I don’t have enough,” Dotty said, fanning through the remainder of her bills. “I’m sorry Teddy, I’m so flustered after that scene at the gas pumps that I wasn’t adding stuff up right. I’m gonna have to put some of it back.”
Her old boss held a hand up. “Now hold on, girl. Let’s see. How much you got there?”
“An even hundred,” Dotty said, looking at the price on the old manual cash register that Teddy pulled out for power outages, and shaking her head. Her total for eight packs of pint canning jars and eight boxes of lids and rings came up to $128.40 with tax.
“Well, with a 10% senior citizen discount, and a 15% employee discount, that’ll bring your total down to ninety-“ Teddy said, pushing buttons on the register.
“Theodore you know darn well I won’t be a senior citizen for another five years-“
“And with the state’s theft added on, that comes to ninety-six dollars-” Teddy continued, ignoring her.
“And I haven’t been an employee for five months!” Dotty said.
“And thirty cents, please,” Teddy finished, holding out his hand and grinning. He wiggled his gnarled old fingers. “Hand it over.”
“I won’t pay it,” Dotty said, shoving the cash back into her wallet. “That’s two lies you’re tellin’ about me, and I’ve done had enough of lies this morning.” Setting her purse on the counter, she lifted a box of jars from her cart. “I’ll put back one box of jars and two boxes of lids and rings, and you can do it over.” She put the small boxes of lids and rings on top of the jars and practically stomped towards the back of the store, where the canning items were.
As soon as she reached the end of the aisle she heard a loud ding and the sound of the register’s drawer sliding open. A heartbeat later, the drawer slammed shut.
“You need to bring that stuff back up here, Dotty. I won’t have you leaving things you already paid for,” Teddy called.
Dotty spun and went back to the counter, mouth set in a firm line. Her wallet was laying next to her purse, and sitting on it were three dollars, seventy cents, and a receipt. She glared at the little man behind the counter, standing with his arms crossed and a crooked grin on his wrinkled face.
“Don’t you give me that look, young lady,” Teddy said. “Didn’t your mama teach you to respect your elders?”
Dotty set the boxes back into the cart and pointed at him, one hand on her hip. “You will cancel out that transaction right now, Teddy. I won’t be the cause of the IRS coming down on you-“
“Now why you think the taxman’s gonna come down on me?”
“Because you had to let all of your employees go! How can you give an employee discount when you ain’t got no employees?”
Teddy waved a hand. “You’re listed as an employee for this fiscal year. Technically, I can give you a discount all the way up until New Years.”
“And a senior discount when I don’t qualify? How you gonna explain that to Bree when she’s balancing the books? The tax man can get you for that, too.”
“I don’t see a picture of your ID on that receipt, do you? What the tax man don’t know, the tax man don’t need to know. And Bree, neither.” Bree was Teddy’s daughter, who lived in Salisbury but came down to Snow Hill every two weeks to balance her father’s books and keep him up-to-date for his tax filings.
Dotty mirrored him, crossing her arms. With a huff, Teddy picked up her wallet and shoved her money and the receipt inside, then dropped it into her purse.
“Listen, Dotty. It’s the end of the month and with the federal holiday, I know you ain’t gettin’ money from your daughter until Tuesday.”
“And?” Dotty asked.
“Point is, I know things are tight for you and I hate that I had to let you go. Bow season’s coming up next week. If you’re still pissed about it by then, and things ain’t gone to hell in a hand basket, come in and help me out for a couple hours on Opening Day. You know how busy it is every year; I could use the help.” Teddy said.
Dotty cocked her head. “What do you mean if things ain’t gone-“
The door opened with a jingle of bells and a gruff voice called out.
“Teddy, I’m gonna need every canning jar and lid you’ve got. All the stuff in the back, too. Oh, hey Miss Dotty! Long time no see.”
It was John, or Farmer John as Dotty called him due to his coveralls and his John Deere hat. He came right up to Dotty and slung his arm around her in a sideways bear hug that crushed her shoulders into his ribcage. The man was so big that her head didn’t even reach his bicep, but there wasn’t an ounce of fat on him.
“Hi John! Nice to see you again,” she said as he let her go and thumped his big paw on her shoulder.
“Speak of the devil,” Teddy said, one side of his mouth quirked up in a smirk.
“Y’all were talking about me?” John asked.
“Well, Dotty here was just telling me about some big fool up at the Food Rite gas pumps shoving everyone around and shouting. Going by that description, I figured it had to be you.”
John snorted and shook his head. “Shoulda known you’d take the piss outta me straight off,” he said.
“People were just frustrated from sittin’ in line for so long,” Dotty said. “Didn’t turn out to be nothin’. Abe got him settled down.”
John stepped back and looked at Dotty’s cart. “Looks like you and I have the same idea,” he said. “I hope there’s more jars where those came from, or I’m gonna have to make you an offer you can’t refuse, Miss Dotty.”
“There’s more,” Teddy said. “I just got in the first part of my stock for fall canning. Got most of a pallet on the floor and two more in the back. Pints and quarts—the jelly jars won’t be here ‘till Tuesday.”
“I’ll take ‘em all,” John said. He lifted his cap and ran his fingers through his short blonde hair. “You got a pallet jack or you nee
d me to get my dolly out of the truck?”
Teddy leaned his hands onto the counter again. “I’ve got a jack, but if you want ‘em, you’re gonna pull ‘em.”
“Yes sir,” John said, nodding. “Don’t want you straining your sarcasm muscle at your advanced age.”
Teddy’s eyes narrowed and he opened his mouth to retort, but the bells over the door tinkled again and a couple walked in, looking a little lost.
“Dotty, can you-“ Teddy started.
“I’ll show him,” Dotty said, pushing her cart to the side of the long counter. “Put my purse out of sight. C’mon, John.”
The big man followed her down the aisle, the old wooden floorboards creaking under his heavy steps.
“Somethin’ I can help you folks find?” They heard Teddy ask.
“We’re looking for just a small BBQ grill, if you’ve got one,” the man said. “Like the kind you’d put on a picnic table?”
“I’ve got a couple. Let me show you,” Teddy answered.
Dotty led John to the big swinging door in the back and pushed through it. The storeroom was pitch dark, having no windows. Out of habit, Dotty’s hand went to the light switch and flicked it on.
“Shoot,” she said when nothing happened. “Forgot about that.”
“Don’t feel bad. I’ve done it about two dozen times this morning,” John said.
“If the old codger hasn’t moved it, there should be a flashlight right about-“ She felt around on the wall just past the light switch and found the big flashlight in its recharging cradle mounted on the wall.
“Here,” she said, pulling it down and turning it on. Dust motes drifted through the beam as she swung it around. “Let me open the back door and get us some more light.”
She crossed to the back wall and unlatched the multiple deadbolts, then pushed the door open and kicked a tire chock in front of it to keep it open. Light flooded the small store room, and Dotty sighed. She missed working here.
“Wow,” John said, looking around. “I always thought it would be bigger back here. It’s more like a wide hallway than a store room.”
“They didn’t make these old buildings with lots of stock and forklifts in mind,” Dotty said, snapping the flashlight back into its cradle. “Whatever stock you had, it was out on the floor. Back here was just a space to do your book keeping and hang up your coat. Teddy’s lucky the historic society let him widen the back door enough to get a pallet jack through. Speaking of…”
She turned to the left and walked down the line of pallets stacked against the wall, stopping about midway down.
“Here’s your jack, and here’s your jars, right next to it,” she said, wrestling the noisy tool out of the pallet it was tucked into. John stepped up behind her.
“Let me do that, Miss Dotty. I’ve handled one of these once or twice.”
She moved out of the way. “If you break ‘em, you buy ‘em,” she said, shrugging.
John quickly maneuvered the jack under the first pallet of jars and pumped it up, just lifting the pallet off of the ground before whipping it out of its spot and heading towards the back door with it. She followed. He stopped and squeezed the handle, letting the pallet settle back down onto the ground.
“Once or twice, huh?” She said.
John shrugged. “I wish Teddy had a forklift,” he said. “I’d just slide the whole thing into the back of my truck. Like this, I’ll have to move each box into the bed by hand.”
“You don’t know how many times I wished for a forklift, even though I’ve got no idea how to drive one,” Dotty said. She pulled a little folding knife out of her pocket and pulled up the edge of the plastic shrink-wrapped around the jars.
John held up a hand to stop her. “Let me do that, Miss Dotty. Could you go out front and bring Charlotte’s truck around back? Keys are in it.”
“And leave you back here alone? Teddy would have my hide,” she said, half joking. John had been coming to the store for longer than she’d been working there, and she’d been out to his farm to drop off something or pick up some fresh chicken eggs dozens of times.
“I ain’t gonna pick up an entire pallet and take off down the street,” John said, grinning. “I mean, normally I’d consider it, but you know where I live. All it would take is one word from you and Charlotte would be chasin’ me around with a cast iron skillet.”
“Charlotte’s smarter than that, John. She’d get the shotgun. I’ll be right back.”
She pushed back into the store to the sound of John’s chuckling, a smile on her own face. In just those few minutes, Teddy had upsold the customer from a simple tabletop charcoal grill to a nice propane unit. He was already ringing up the sale when Dotty walked past.
“Pulling his truck around back to load it up,” she said, and Teddy nodded and waved her off.
Outside the temperature was already close to eighty and the humidity made it feel even hotter. Dotty paused, closing her eyes and letting the heat relax her. The smell of smoke hung heavy in the air, even though Thomas had told her they’d stopped the five house fires that had flared up last night. The first three that they’d gotten to, they’d been able to save the houses without too much damage thanks to the homeowners being awake and taking quick action. The fourth, however, had burned long enough before they could get to it that they’d lost much of the second floor. The small family living there would have to stay with in-laws until they could get the insurance company to repair the water damage and rebuild. The last house, one of the new big models out by the highway, had burned right down to the basement. Luckily that new community built their houses on parcels of an acre each, so the fire hadn’t been able to jump to the next house over. It had been vacant, sitting on the market for the entire year; just another victim of the economy. Those houses sat well back from the road, and Thomas said it looked like the long power lines strung from the road had caught on fire. The flames had just walked themselves along the line until they got to the house, where the trendy cedar siding had provided ample fuel. They’d tried using their radios to call for units from the next town over, but had gotten nothing but static.
Dotty was familiar with that house; Seth Miller, Ripley’s father, had helped build it. He’d complained more than once about the “transplanted” New England couple that insisted on that cedar siding, and how foolish it was here in the south with all the termites. She wondered what he’d say about it when he got back from Rehoboth Beach and found out it had burned down.
She opened her eyes and sighed. At least all the families involved had been unharmed. That was a blessing.
Thomas’ truck looked like a toy sitting next to John’s big pickup. Dotty had left the Ranger running so the air conditioner could keep the cab cool while she was inside. Mark had packed the boxes of chicken with plenty of ice, but the oppressive heat would have turned the cab into an oven without the A/C on. Besides, she had only meant to be inside for five minutes, at the most. Now she was even happier she’d left it running. Idling for another fifteen minutes or so wouldn’t use up enough gas to worry about.
As she climbed up into the cab of John’s big dual-wheel diesel, the couple exited the hardware store and headed for the small car parked on the other side of Thomas’ Ranger. The man walked to the far side of the car and started trying to stuff the grill’s box through the rear passenger door. The woman stood at the driver’s door, watching him and shaking her head. Teddy stepped out of the store, flipping through a large keyring and heading for the propane tank cage sitting at the end of the building.
Dotty found John’s keys hanging from the ignition and fired up the big truck. It roared and then settled into a throaty rumble, startling the woman and causing her to turn and look. Dotty smiled and gave her a little wave. The woman smiled, and as she started to turn back, her eyes dropped to the boxes sitting on the bench seat in the Ranger.
Her husband—well, Dotty assumed it was her husband—got the grill into the back seat and then trotted over to Teddy. Teddy
pointed to a tank and the husband lifted it out of the bottom of the cage, and waddled with it back over to the car.
Dotty put the big truck in reverse and was about to back out of the parking space, but stopped when the woman walked around the car and started talking close to her husband’s ear. She lifted a hand and pointed at the Ranger. The man got the big 40lb tank into the back seat and straightened, looking over the roof of his car at the little truck.
Dotty waited, fiddling with the truck’s A/C vents and watching the couple from the corner of her eye. Teddy had closed and locked the propane cage, and now he walked back towards the door. His normal brisk gait had become an old man’s slow shuffle.
Dotty couldn’t hear what the woman was saying, but she seemed very insistent. Her husband was shaking his head and arguing with her. The woman, her back to Teddy, pointed at the Ranger again.
Dotty put the diesel into park, ready to get out of the truck and say something, but Teddy made a sharp turn and walked straight over to the Ranger. He opened up the driver’s door and leaned inside. Dotty couldn’t see what he was doing from this angle; the diesel sat at least a foot higher than Thomas’ truck.
The husband, seeing this, waved his hands at his wife and jerked his head towards the truck. She looked over, saw Teddy in the Ranger, and frowned. She trotted back around her car and got into the driver’s seat. The husband got into the passenger side, and in a moment they had pulled out.
“Don’t tell me they were actually thinking about taking my chicken,” Dotty said. “Out here in broad daylight?”
Teddy stood up and shut the Ranger’s door. He turned and knocked on the window. Dotty fumbled with the door controls until she found the button that rolled the passenger window down.
“I locked it but left it running. Here’s the door key,” Teddy said, tossing a key at her. She grabbed for it and missed, and it dropped into her lap.
“I’ll meet ya ‘round back to help y’all load. Then we need to talk,” Teddy said, then turned and walked back to the store without waiting for a reply.