All About Evie

by Cathy Lamb

  “We can still talk, Olec, don’t worry.” Sure we could. I liked Olec.

  His shoulders sagged in relief. “Thank you for your graciousness. Here is my quandary: I have met a woman in Seattle.”

  “I’m happy to hear that.” I smiled at him. “I hope she is brilliant enough for you.”

  “She is . . . I believe the correct word is lovely. Extremely friendly. She is talkative and complimentary of me. She is affectionate, although we have not had intercourse. Excuse me, perhaps that was too forward? Too much information, as the modern saying goes.”

  “It’s okay, Olec. I’ve heard more personal stuff than that.”

  “Thank you for understanding.” He twisted his hands together. “There is a concern: She does need money now and then.”

  “For what?” Ah, no. Bad news.

  “Sick father in Texas. Sick grandma in Mexico. Another sick grandma in Louisiana. They couldn’t afford health insurance and they fell on hard times, so she, being a generous and kind soul, stepped up for them.”

  “You mean, you stepped up for them by giving her money.”

  He squirmed. “We love each other.”

  “You love her? How long have you known her?”

  “Three months. One week. Four days.” Checked his watch. “Six hours. Twenty minutes. We met online. We talked on Facebook.”

  “And then you met her face-to-face in Seattle?”

  “Yes. We have been together, face-to-face, two times. Once commencing at one o’clock on a Saturday, at a Russian restaurant with forty-two types of vodka. But there was a Thursday meeting also, in a coffee shop that sold twelve types of pastries. She says we are soul mates. I am still exploring that possibility.”

  Yeah. Sounds like they’re “money mates,” with the money going in one direction. “How much money have you given her?”

  “So far? Precisely to this date? Twelve thousand one hundred sixty-four dollars.”

  I tried to keep my face expressionless. I wanted to slap him upside the head and knock some sense into him, but I also wanted to bang her face into a bookshelf for taking advantage of a brilliant but vulnerable man.

  “What I need to know, Evie, is if we have a future together.”

  Olec was eager. He was sweet. He spent way too much time flapping around in his billions and billions of extrabrilliant brain cells and didn’t have a clue about women or social dynamics.

  “Let me think.” I had zero premonitions on Olec. I stared into the air. I raised my eyebrows. I tried to drum up a faraway expression in my eyes. I frowned. I looked mad, then sad. “Yes. I see it. I do have a premonition about this situation. Now, don’t tell anyone, do you promise?”

  “I promise.” His eyes were open wide, waiting for my miraculous wisdom.

  “It doesn’t work out. You keep dating her and she keeps taking your money. It’s a request for money here and there at first, like with all the relatives you’ve helped, and she kisses you and gets you all steamed up and says all sorts of romantic things, but then it’s more and more money. You believe her because you have a warm heart, Olec, and you marry her and you lose almost everything in the divorce, even your log cabin and all your land,” I shook my head, so sad. “You lose half your dogs.”

  His face twisted in pain. “No. No, not the dogs!”

  “And she leaves you and moves out of the country.”

  He gasped. “She is from Russia!”

  “Does that make sense then, Olec, for her to have a sick father in Texas and a sick grandma in Mexico?”

  “And a sick grandma in Louisiana.” His shoulders sagged.

  “Lotta sick family members.”

  “I knew it.” He shook his head, balding, but in a cute way. “I knew it in my brain, but I let my heart do the talking and the believing.”

  “I’m sorry, Olec.”

  “Me too.”

  I gave him a hug.

  “I will stop thinking with my heart.”

  He went on Facebook on his phone.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m telling her I don’t want to speak with her any further because she is going to near-bankrupt me in the divorce and take my log cabin and half of the dogs, then I am blocking her.”

  “Decisive.”

  “I know you would never lie to me, Evie.”

  “Never.”

  And that is where ethics and morals and decision making comes in again, but I knew I did right by Olec.

  * * *

  A new chief came to our island. He was about five years older than me. He’d been an assistant chief in Seattle.

  His name was Reginald Ashburn III. Not Reggie. Not Reg. Reginald. Don’t forget the III.

  “Fancy pancy,” Gracie said.

  “Too good for us,” Mr. Jamon said, leaning on his cane.

  “He’s not an islander,” Koo said. “How did he get the job?”

  I had no idea. The islands have an assistant police chief, Mandy Lass. She’s smart and tough and brave, and she should have been named as the temporary police chief. Chief Allroy himself had told me that she was “definitely my successor. She’s smart as a whip and knows how to deescalate situations, which many don’t. She’s tough, too. Black belt and military training.”

  “She’s a woman,” my mother drawled. “That’s why she didn’t get the job as chief.”

  “Because of her femaleness she is judged harshly, seen as weak,” Aunt Camellia said. “Weak like a flower. This was sexism. Discrimination. Mandy should have been chief.”

  “For God’s sakes,” Aunt Iris huffed. “Will misogyny never die?”

  The new chief, quickly earning the nickname Reginald Ass Burn, did not fit in. He was rigid and unsmiling. He actually gave out jaywalking tickets in our tiny town. He walked into businesses and stood with his arms crossed over his chest. He was immediately way too hard on the teenagers, arresting them for drinking or being out past curfew. He gave out parking tickets and driving tickets for minor infractions by the dozens. He harangued people about their dogs in town, reminding them of the poop laws, which offended all dog owners. Did they look environmentally unconscious? Of course they would pick up the dog poo.

  Chief Ass Burn looked at everyone as if we were potential criminals. He glared. He stared. He was one of those men who had to throw his weight around. He had to display his power.

  “This isn’t the middle of a prison,” Jolla muttered, Bella Mae beside her holding Mr. Pitto, the aggrieved iguana. “We’re islanders. Proud of it. And we don’t need this outsider coming in and making us miserable.”

  “Not even Mr. Pitto likes him,” Bella Mae said. She swung Mr. Pitto around in the air, poor thing, his little feet trying to run.

  * * *

  We learned later that the new chief was the brother-in-law of Chief Turner in Seattle.

  For revenge, most everyone on San Orcanita Island wrote a letter to Chief Turner and mailed it over.

  It said, “NEPOTISM SUCKS.”

  We signed our names.

  * * *

  Going to bed at night is like going to bed with a dog and cat zoo. Butch the dog is close friends with Mars the cat. They play together all the time, wrestling and rolling and chasing each other. Butch and Mars curl up on the end of my king-sized bed, bought because I knew I’d end up sleeping with my dogs and cats. Sundance sleeps on the other side of me, on his own yellow pillow. Yes, I know. That’s ridiculous that Sundance has his own pillow, but whatever. Dog lovers unite! He also has his pink blankie and his stuffed lizard, which I’ve had to sew up and restuff several times over the years. Cassidy sleeps with her head on Sundance’s back.

  Jupiter and Venus sleep on a thick blue blanket all swirled up together on the floor, but if they get cold they crawl in bed, too. Ghost sleeps in a cat bed on the dresser right near me. It seems like whenever I wake up, Ghost is awake, too. The cats go in and out of the bedroom at night, but the dogs are pretty much down for the count.

  Every night, after the dogs and
I take our last walk, saying good night to the alpacas, the lambs, the goats, and the horses, we head home. I say, “Okay, everybody, it’s time for bed,” and off we go. I go to bed and read, they come up on the bed and play and roll around, but when I’m done reading, and that can take a while, especially if I’m reading a scary thriller or a biography that is particular intriguing, it’s time for quiet.

  I shut out the light and say, “Good night, everyone,” and they settle down. Listening to them snoring on my white comforter with the red and purple embroidered roses makes me laugh. I mean, who does this? Three dogs, four cats on a rose comforter? I am an odd, odd woman.

  * * *

  “Evie, are your mother and aunts home?”

  “Yes, they all are.”

  Mrs. Gaddo’s face lit up. She was wearing her best Sunday church outfit, as it was Sunday and she was trotting off to church. I was in town, quiet at this early hour, my insomnia a plague last night, to check on my bookstore and to grab a piece of Kick-Quick Cowboy Coffeecake and a mocha. It’s always wise to start off the day with a healthy breakfast. I had Butch, Cassidy, and Sundance on their leashes beside me.

  “Splendid. I need a tad bit of”—she leaned in and whispered—“the la la cigarette.”

  Oh my goodness. Even churchgoing Mrs. Gaddo? What was the world coming to? “Ah. I understand. Well. They’re probably still sleeping.”

  “Fine. I’m off to God’s home—church. You know I’m leading the choir, right? We sound like a choir of angels.”

  “I’ve heard it’s a talented choir under your direction.” No, I hadn’t heard that. That was a lie. I heard that the choir sounded like frogs choking, but I liked Mrs. Gaddo.

  “We lift our words up to the Lord in prayer and thankfulness.”

  They also lifted up torturous noise. I was being uncharitable, and I told myself to shut the heck up, so help me God.

  “I’ll come for my la la cigarette after church, then,” she said, still smiling, her steel cross swinging on her neck.

  “I’ll tell them.” Sundance jumped up on my legs. Even with only three legs, he’s a fine jumper. He wanted a hug, so I hugged him. He licked my face.

  She leaned in and whispered, “The Good Lord made marijuana so my hips wouldn’t hurt, that he did. Blessings all to him!”

  “Blessings to Jesus.”

  “Praise be to God!” She gave me a squeezy hug. “I’ll be by your bookstore later to buy some of your coconut chiffon cake. I heard you have that in? It tastes so delicious with the . . .” She wiggled an invisible joint with her fingers and winked at me. “And I’ll need a juicy romance. You know my authors. Have any new ones? You do? Perfection. So, must go. God is waiting! And he doesn’t judge my la la la!”

  I would have to agree with her on that. I don’t think God judges pot smokers. Surely He has much better things to do.

  I did think of Chief Ass Burn. He might well sit in judgment of my mother and aunts, swinging his handcuffs.

  This was not a safe situation.

  I warned my mother and aunts that night. “Chief Ass Burn will most likely arrest you if he finds out what you’re growing in the greenhouse.”

  They laughed. They were making new hats. They were sending them to a hospital on the mainland for a fund-raiser for kids. They were using faux flowers so the “hats will last until Kingdom Come and beyond that into eternity,” Aunt Camellia said.

  “You have to take this seriously,” I begged.

  They pshawed me and attached more faux daffodils, wisteria, and tulips, a tiny lizard (clearly, faux), a yellow parakeet, and three butterflies on wires so they wiggled about. It sounds silly, but the Dr. Seuss–like hats were a creative, moving, colorful sight to behold.

  “We are healing others,” my mother said. “Physically and mentally. We should call ourselves The Hat Healers.”

  “We are simply selling happy sticks,” Aunt Camellia said. “Everyone likes to be happy.”

  “We have a side business, and we’re going to Antarctica,” Aunt Iris muttered. “It’s purely, practically economically driven.”

  What I felt purely, practically? Alarm.

  * * *

  The next morning, early, before I went to work, I grabbed coffee and sat down at our cozy beach on a log and stared at the other islands across the white bubbles of the waves. The sun was coming up, a soft yellow, slashes of cotton candy pink and a deep orange spreading across a few puffy clouds. The birds were busy, a song here and there, the trees whispering in a slight wind.

  Sundance sat right next to me on my left while Butch and Cassidy wrestled and ran. Mars and Ghost were exploring the trees. In the distance I could hear Shakespeare and Jane Austen whinnying.

  I had woken up deeply sad.

  This periodic morning sadness has happened to me my whole life, but always on my birthday. I remember when I turned four, I had woken up sad and cried my eyes out. My parents were so worried as they were having a birthday party for me and had bought me a pink princess dress.

  Over the years I have tried different things to bring me out of that morning sadness, which I have nicknamed Sucky Sally Sadness to give it some humor and me some control.

  I have told myself, “It’s hormones. You’re fine.”

  I have told myself, “Get up. The longer you stay in bed and wallow in self-pity, the worse it will get.”

  And, “Suck it up. Stop whining. There are billions of people on this planet far worse off than you.”

  I have made myself list ten things that I loved or that I was looking forward to while lying in bed, that sadness a weight like a blanket of rocks, suffocating all light and air.

  “In the morning, our nightmares might still be with us,” Aunt Camellia said, trying to help. “Turn it around and embrace your daydreams, your hopes.”

  “If you wake up sad, kid, get your buttocks up,” Aunt Iris said. “Start moving. Get something done.”

  “Pull your red gardening boots on and head to the garden,” my mother told me. “You know you find your peace there.”

  What causes that morning sadness? I don’t know exactly. The truth is that I have often felt a lost aloneness, as if I didn’t belong, as if I was in the wrong place. I love my parents, love Jules, love my aunts, but I have always felt different.

  I thought, even as a child, that I felt alone because of the premonitions. That it was the premonitions that were making me feel isolated. No one else in my family had them, so that right there, plus the fear and stress they brought on, set me apart in a terrifying way.

  And yet.

  There was always something else there, too. Something I couldn’t put my finger on. It was a loneliness, a tearful well, a hole that was unfillable, settled deep in my soul.

  I never understood it, but I’ve come to terms with it.

  I ignore it, put it aside as best I can, and try not to think about it, because there’s nothing to do about it. There’s no way to fix it, so to speak. That’s the hard thing I’ve learned: Sometimes we have a problem, but it’s not fixable. It won’t be fixable.

  It is there. Always.

  Over the years I finally realized that I must accept the hole I sometimes feel within myself and not dwell in it. Why let it take any more time out of my day than it already does? Why try to figure it out? There is no answer.

  I finished my coffee. I stood and put my toes in the ocean, as did Sundance, my faithful, furry friend. I listed ten things that I loved, including my family, the ocean, the islands, my animals, and Marco. I pulled myself together and went to work, because this is what we do when life falls apart: We buck up and we go to work and we take care of people and our responsibilities.

  Why? Because we must.

  And maybe that answer is, boringly, dully . . . perfect.

  * * *

  The new chief, Reginald Ass Burn, came to my bookstore on Monday, his stomach tightly pulled in by his bulletproof vest. His eyes were narrow and squinty like pinto beans, his face puffy like a smashed mars
hmallow.

  “Hello. I am Chief Reginald Ashburn the third, and I understand that you are Evie Lindsay.”

  “Hello,” I said. I put out my hand, and he shook it. He squeezed my hand too tight, held it too long, stared at me too intently. His eyes dropped up and down my body quickly, but enough so that he knew I would see it. He wanted to make me feel checked out. Evaluated. Inwardly I said a bad word that started with an F, slowly.

  I hadn’t wanted to prejudge him simply because other islanders said he was arrogant, sarcastic, sour, unsmiling, and petty with his raft of tickets. But here he was, and it looked like people were right.

  “It’s nice to meet you.” I disentangled my hand from his sweaty clutch. “Can I help you find a book to read?”

  “As you can see, I’m on duty, so I can’t look now, young lady.” He puffed out his chest.

  It was the tone. Condescension. Superiority. He was correcting me by saying As you can see, I’m on duty, I have things to do, busy me, and yet. There he was. In my bookstore.

  “Oh. Well, I won’t disturb you when you’re on duty and searching for criminals in my bookstore. Have a nice day.” I turned away, but not before I saw a slightly surprised expression cross his face, followed by irritation at my sarcasm.

  He stayed, standing in the middle of my yellow bookstore with a scowl on his face, in the midst of my white shelves, my nonfiction and fiction and biographies and mysteries, my beloved books. He walked to the café and examined it, unsmiling, as if he were expecting to find a criminal between the purple tables, then he walked out to the deck and checked out everyone there, too. Apparently there were no criminals or potential crimes taking place among the townspeople and tourists, the families and couples, and the grandparents, who you really have to keep an eye on. The whales and seagulls were behaving, so he had nothing further to do.

  He headed back in and stopped at the cash register where I was working.

  “You are the owner of this place?”

  This place. It’s a bookstore, you idiot. He already knew I was the owner. “Yes. This place is called Evie’s Books, Cake, and Tea. I am Evie.” Too bad I didn’t get a premonition about him. I don’t get premonitions for the vast majority of people I meet, but it would be nice to see him working at a cat litter factory instead of staying here.