Rejected Writers Take the Stage

by Suzanne Kelman

  She sighed and wondered when she would see him again.

  The florist owner appeared at the counter.

  “Okay, I’m here. You can go now. Could you bring me back a tuna sandwich?” she inquired as she rummaged in her bag, pulled out a twenty-dollar bill, and handed it to Flora. Flora nodded and put the money into her embroidered Victorian purse. “White bread with Swiss cheese.” Then, as a second thought, she added, “If they have any of those slices of pumpkin spice tea bread, throw in one of those for me too. Keep me going through the afternoon.”

  Flora nodded and made her way to the door. As she opened it, thunder rumbled overhead. She automatically pulled her collar up closely around her ears and put up her umbrella as she ventured out into the street.

  Inside the warm, cinnamon-fragrant ambience of the Crab, Doris, Ethel, and Gracie sat on the squeaky red-buttoned booth, huddled over their menus. I noticed them as I entered. I eyed their choice of table with concern. I had learned the hard way that you didn’t want to be trapped in the center of Doris’s favorite horseshoe-shaped booth. It just became nothing but a jumble of limbs once everyone arrived. As I sat down at the end of the table, I heard the strong “no” in my head again. I was ready this time to stop myself from any crazy entanglements. I would make all the right sympathetic noises but would be firm about not being involved. I probably shouldn’t have come at all, I chided myself. But I had to admit my interest had been piqued.

  Gladys pulled out her notebook from her bra and huffed as she eyed the ever-growing number of bodies at the table.

  “Is that knitter and the hippie and the rest of your brood joining you?” she sniffed as she folded her arms.

  Doris responded curtly, “Yes, you should expect five more.”

  Gladys sucked herself in and girded herself before responding. “Well, I won’t bother wasting my breath telling you about the lunch specials until all of the Addams family is here. Drinks?” she inquired, eyeing the rest of us pointedly.

  Doris eventually slammed her menu shut. “A hot black tea,” she said.

  Ethel closed her menu firmly as well, saying decisively, “The same for me.”

  “Big surprise there, then,” mumbled Gladys sarcastically, flashing a look of all-knowingness at Ethel over the half-rim of her spectacles.

  “A Shirley Temple with two cherries,” said Gracie buoyantly, enthusiastically clasping her hands together in anticipation.

  I ordered a cup of tea. Gladys scribbled it all down and ambled off to fulfill the order.

  Flora arrived. She was wearing her usual abundance of ruffles and velvet. A true romantic, an adamant Jane Austen fan, and a poet, she was an old Victorianesque soul even though she was barely in her twenties. From a young age, she had rebelled against being a modern millennial and instead preferred wearing clothes and living a life that reflected a slower and more cordial time. Right behind her, Lavinia and Lottie arrived. They were dressed identically, as usual. Today they were in black pantsuits, white blouses, and little black felt hats. They greeted everyone at the table like long-lost family, even though the group had only just been together a couple of days before.

  “Darrrlings,” said Lavinia, throwing her hands into the air and drawing out the word in her overextended, Southern way. “So glad you all made it through this weather. First that horrible ice and fog this morning and now it’s pouring down small animals out there. Lottie and I nearly had to run from the car. And we haven’t done that since 1987.”

  Everybody took a minute to hug and settle as the twins slid into the booth, just as Ruby arrived. The radical hippie of the group was a very vibrant seventy-year-old woman who was mad into hot yoga and swimming in the chilly Puget Sound for exercise. She ran a little wool and hippie store next to Stems, a mixture of yarn, joss sticks, and goddesses. The store was named Ruby-Skye’s Knitting Emporium. She was also renowned on the island for her very eclectic style of dress. She had once been photographed for a fashion magazine, wearing one of her clothing creations as she pouted Twiggy-style over the counter of her shop.

  As she grabbed a chair and joined me at the end of the booth, it was obvious from what she was wearing that she had just come from one of her yoga classes. Twice a week she taught classes on little pink rollout foam mats right there in her store. Everyone else in the village just knew that if you needed a ball of wool or a knitting pattern on those days, you would have to stretch around protruding arms and legs in warrior pose to reach things. Then leave cash on the counter next to a note signed “Namaste” with a hand-drawn daisy as punctuation.

  Gladys shrunk back and took in what Ruby was wearing. She put down the drink order and clicked her tongue in disbelief.

  It was mild for Ruby. She had opted for an ensemble she was calling “prism joy,” if people asked, with inspiration from the rainbow colors that bounced around her shop from the crystals hanging in her windows.

  As she unbuttoned her coat, I noted she had on green-and-yellow striped tights and red patent Mary Janes. Stretched over her slender figure was a yellow leotard from her eighties “Let’s Get Physical” days. It was still in great shape, due mainly to the fact she had quickly become bored with “going for the burn,” as she had told me once. She had scoffed that it might have worked for Olivia Newton-John and Jane Fonda, but all that marching in place and bouncing around hadn’t done a thing for her. Over her leotard, she wore a much-needed multicolored stripy cardigan, which was crossed at her waist and tied at the back.

  Her neck was adorned with a handmade fabric daisy chain that a friend had made for her, daisies being her favorite flower. She loved to accessorize, but downward dog didn’t work with the clunky chains, as she was fond of telling people.

  She had pulled her white hair into a dozen tidy little bunches all over her head and secured each one with a colored elastic band. Each bunch had then been sprayed a different color: red, yellow, blue, and green. She also had an ostrich boa of luminous green plumes wrapped around her throat multiple times, the ends hanging down her sides in two long, feathery strands. Over her bright ensemble, she wore a thick hot-pink poodle-wool coat to keep her warm, and she now tossed it across the booth as she seated herself at the end of the table.

  “I see the clowns are back in town,” quipped Gladys, handing Ruby a menu. Before Ruby could respond, the last of the group, Annie, arrived at the table.

  Annie’s appearance instantly caught everyone’s attention; it was obvious to all of us that something was very wrong. Her usual clean, well-kempt appearance had an air of mismatch about it. Her curly white hair looked like it hadn’t been combed, and her eyes were red and swollen from crying. Never without her latest knitting project to work on, her hands were empty and her face bereft of joy.

  All a little taken aback, no one said anything—no one except Gladys, of course. She took one look at Annie and said, “I guess you won’t be wanting tea. Something stronger, I think, judging by the looks of you.”

  Annie became flustered, took out a tissue that was tucked in her sleeve, and blew her nose. “Just a black coffee please, Gladys.”

  As Gladys walked away, an awkward silence fell across the table.

  Finally, Doris stepped up. “Let’s all order, then Annie and I can let you know what’s going on.” Then, taking Annie’s hand firmly and squeezing it, she continued with determination. “And how we are going to fix it.”

  I was suddenly struck by Doris’s kindness. Even though she had the sensitivity of an anvil and the tact of a typhoon, she was made of that pioneer spirit. You could imagine a whole horde of Dorises moving through the wild plains of Nebraska, leading the weak and infirm to higher ground.

  Gladys shuffled back with Annie’s coffee and went into waitress automatic pilot: “We have a happily apple-y tuna melt blue-plate special with anchovies, oriental pickles, and some sort of weird-smelling orange sauce, so I wouldn’t recommend it. Our usual cook is out with his lumbago. The replacement cook has got this book on unusual cuisine, so she’s be
en messing with the food all day. And even though I told her tuna’s not supposed to be orange, she’s still heaping that goop on top of it. So, I’m supposed to tell you about it. Also, the soup is black bean. The other chef made that, so you’re safe. It hasn’t been foofed with, if you know what I mean.”

  Gladys pulled her yellow pencil from behind her ear and stood poised.

  “Ice cream,” said Gracie, as if she were at a five-year-old’s birthday party.

  “She’ll have the soup,” stated Doris sternly.

  Gracie frowned.

  Doris added, “You can have ice cream after if you want, Momma, but you love the Crab’s black bean soup.”

  Gracie sighed and nodded reluctantly. “I will have ice cream . . . after the soup.”

  Gladys scribbled it on her pad and took down the rest of our orders before fixing her gaze on Ruby, who was daydreaming and finally looked up.

  “I’m on a detox,” stated Ruby. “I’m not eating anything until five p.m. each day. I don’t suppose you have some ironized water?”

  “Ironed what?” spat out Gladys, breaking the nib of her pencil and giving Ruby the hairy eyeball at the same time. She added dryly, “We might have some iron filings out the back. Would that work?”

  Ruby shook her head, which became a multicolored blur as she did. Gladys watched her, mesmerized.

  “I’ll just have warm water, then, and could you squeeze a lemon into it?”

  Gladys adjusted her bosom.

  “I can bring you a lemon, but you will have to squeeze it yourself. Squeezing lemons for people who don’t have the strength because they are not eating is not in my job description.”

  They were waiting on Annie. She seemed unfocused and was just staring at the menu, as if waiting for it to come to life and tell her what she wanted. Finally she said, “I’m not sure I’m hungry.”

  “Nonsense,” said Doris. “Get her a large bowl of the soup. That’s exactly what she needs.”

  Annie nodded absently. Doris gathered up all our menus and handed them to Gladys, who sauntered off in her usual manner.

  “Okay,” said Doris. “Do you mind if I share what’s going on with the group, Annie?”

  Annie shook her head. “No. Everyone is going to know soon anyway.”

  Doris cleared her throat, then beckoned us all in closer. But before she could say anything, Gladys was back, making us jump.

  “Before you all swap military codes,” she said sarcastically, “I need to know what bread Janet wants her club sandwich on: white or wheat.”

  “Wheat,” I said in response. Gladys left again, and we resumed the huddle.

  Doris continued, “Our dear friend Annie is in trouble, and she needs our help. As you know, she runs a boarding kennel out on Fremont Road.”

  “The best on the island,” added Lottie proudly as she tapped Annie’s hand.

  Annie allowed herself a tight smile as she pulled out another tissue.

  Doris said, “And as we know, she also provides a great service to our community, as half of those dogs living over there are strays that she has taken in, and they live in the lap of luxury.”

  We all nodded, looking at Annie, whose head was down, staring at her hands locked in front of her on the table.

  Doris continued, “Annie has fallen on hard times. With this recession, people have been having friends take in their dogs, or they are staying home. Things have become serious.”

  Suddenly, Annie burst out, “The bank is going to take the farm unless I come up with twenty thousand dollars by the end of next month.” She punctuated the end of her sentence by bursting into tears. Everyone took a minute to digest the news.

  Flora, who was seated next to Annie, automatically took her hand as Doris picked up the conversation.

  “So, we are going to raise the money. We have to. We can’t have Annie lose her farm. It’s been in her family for generations.”

  “My mother would be so disappointed in me,” continued Annie despondently through her sobs.

  “How long have you known about this?” I asked.

  “A few months,” said Annie as she squirmed in her seat and dabbed at her eyes, “but I kept hoping something would come up. I did the lottery every week, just in case. A few good boarding months, and I would have got caught up, but this recession has just dragged on and on, and I never thought the bank would do such a thing.”

  “You still have a mortgage on the place?” asked Ruby, handing Annie another tissue.

  Annie blew her nose. “It was paid and cleared after my parents died, but with the modifications to get it up to code for the dogs, plus all the conversions I had to do, it just made sense to take out a loan. Up until a couple of years ago, things were doing fine. I knew I was never going to be a millionaire, but I loved the dogs, and I’m so happy there. It was enough for my needs.”

  As she spoke, she rolled the tissue into knotted strings in her fingers and took in a deep breath before saying, “Now it looks like I’m going to lose everything, and I’m not only heartbroken about losing my childhood home, but also about the dogs. What will happen to them if I’m thrown off the farm? There’s no one I know who has the space to take them in, so we would all be homeless.”

  She burst into tears again just as Gladys shuffled back to the table and placed down the food.

  She muttered to herself, “I tend to cry after I’ve eaten the food here, not before. You haven’t even tasted it yet.”

  She ambled away to get the rest of the lunch order.

  I automatically went into problem-solving mode. “Is there no one you can ask for a loan?” I asked, my fork dangling in midair. I was unable to start eating. This news weighed heavy on me.

  Annie answered by shaking her head. “I’m an only child. My mom wanted more but was unable to have any. I have an elderly spinster aunt on my mother’s side, but my dad was an orphan, so there really is no one.”

  Doris picked up the thread. “It’s up to us. Come on, let’s eat and brainstorm. We have to figure a way out for Annie. There is no way she is going to lose her farm and her home.”

  “The problem is . . . ,” Flora said wistfully as she toyed with her salad. Not unlike most of the rest of them, she seemed to have lost her appetite. “It’s such a short amount of time to come up with so much money. I mean, what can you do in eight weeks?”

  The rest of the ladies nodded sadly in agreement, staring blankly at their plates.

  Everyone except Doris, who heaped a pile of French fries into her mouth, her appetite apparently unaffected by the situation. Through a mouthful of fried potato, she boomed, “We are going to do it, so start thinking.”

  Very slowly, everyone started to eat as they thought.

  “I will go door-to-door if I have to,” said Ruby, her old hippie rallying spirit tweaked into life, “and I will put jars on all the counters of the stores here in town.”

  Doris shook her head. “Not enough time. Besides, those jars never collect more than a couple of hundred dollars when they go out for the displaced orphans.”

  “A bake sale,” said Ethel out of nowhere. Doris’s sidekick was always so quiet it was easy for the group to forget she was even there.

  “Too much work for too little money,” said Doris dismissively. “Besides, you’d have to bake twenty thousand cookies just to raise that kind of money.”

  “What about a fashion show?” suggested Lavinia, her eyes blazing with excitement. “Lottie and I could be your runway models.”

  “Lavinia!” cried Lottie in her usual singsong way of admonishing her sister when she was most exasperated. “Whoever heard of such a thing? I couldn’t go around parading like a peacock.”

  Doris dismissed that right away. “What would we show? The secondhand fashion at the secondhand shop?”

  “I was actually thinking of Claudette’s. Her stuff is swanky and a good, high price,” added Lavinia.

  Ruby shook her head. “Claudette would never let her clothes out of her shop. She
keeps the door locked as it is. Besides, who could afford her prices?”

  “What about a large garage sale?” I suggested hopefully.

  Doris dismissed it again with a sweep of her hand. “Whoever heard of a garage sale raising more than three hundred dollars? It would never be enough, no matter how much we all pulled together.”

  “The doggies could come and live with me,” whispered Gracie, gently stroking Annie’s hand. Annie squeezed Gracie’s hand, acknowledging her kind gesture.

  We all fell silent to think, our communal attention focused on the condiment rack in the middle of the table.

  Gladys came back to top off our water glasses. She observed us all apparently hypnotized by the ketchup bottle and snorted, “Did you find the answer to world peace in there yet?” Deep in thought, no one answered her, so she continued. “Will any of you be wanting dessert before you transcend to another plane?”

  No one spoke.

  “Anyone want pie?”

  That broke the deadlock; there was a general nod around the table as eyes fell upon dessert menus with grateful sighs for a problem they could actually solve.

  We all decided on our desserts, closed our menus, and looked up at Gladys in anticipation. Gladys put her hand behind her ear for her pencil. When she realized it wasn’t there, she tutted and fished into her bra, first on the left side, then the right.

  We all watched in amazement as she navigated all the tucks and folds of her brassiere, and I wondered if maybe she was going to pull out a rabbit or something. Finally, somewhere at the bottom of her left breast, Gladys located what she was looking for and pulled out her small yellow pencil. I just managed to stop myself from clapping and cheering.

  Totally unruffled, Gladys stood, pencil in hand, waiting for the order, as if fishing through your underwear in company were the most natural thing in the world to do.