Rejected Writers Take the Stage

by Suzanne Kelman

  He reflected on the conversation. He just wasn’t sure how he felt about tying himself up with Marcy again, having just freed himself from her clutches. But was he being selfish? She didn’t know many people in town. How much would it cost him just to spend an hour with her the next day? He was sure Flora would understand. Maybe they could visit Marcy together. He cheered up at the thought of that. He liked thinking about doing things with Flora.

  He pushed through the double doors into the waiting room, and Flora was there, smiling at him.

  “How is she?”

  “Okay,” he answered. “Groggy, but she seems okay.”

  The whole group all looked relieved. Doris took control. “There’s nothing more we can do here. I suggest we go home and try to get some sleep. We’ve got a lot to talk about in the morning. We have to decide what we’re going to do, and who knows, maybe the damage to the theater is only superficial, and we can still open as scheduled.”

  Everyone nodded, but it was obvious that no one appeared to share her optimism.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  WRECKING BALLS & FREEDOM FIGHTERS

  Doris called me the morning after the fire to say we needed to meet at Annie’s because there was an emergency to deal with and to wear warm clothes and bring water. Apparently Annie had received an alarming visit from the bank that she hadn’t wanted to tell anybody about before the show, but now it seemed the farm could go up for auction very soon. Doris was also concerned that something underhand was afoot, because even though the house was still Annie’s, the bank appeared to be proceeding as if the farm had already been sold.

  “We are putting Plan B into action,” she stated in her getting-things-done tone. “You need to meet us all at the farm this morning.”

  Martin met me in the kitchen as I poured tea into a flask. I was wearing two layers of fleece and my thick socks and boots.

  “Leaving me to live in the woods?” he inquired, looking at my getup.

  “I’ve been summoned by Doris,” I stated flatly as I secured the thermos flask stopper.

  “Don’t tell me,” he said. “You’re off to the Arctic to scout for polar bear or maybe trekking up Mount Hood to sing together in an ice house Doris plans to build by hand.”

  I shook my head as I pulled a pair of warm woolen gloves out of a drawer. “Apparently we are moving to her secret Plan B.”

  “Ahh,” Martin nodded in response, as if acknowledging a secret society. “The infamous Plan B, which could be any of the above or worse.”

  I raised my eyebrows in response, grabbed two bottles of water, and trudged out the door.

  I arrived at Annie’s and couldn’t believe what I saw as I drove up. What had once been a sweet and peaceful avenue of trees was now surrounded by a line of heavy construction equipment. I knocked on the front door and set off a cacophony of desperate barking from inside.

  While I was still on the doorstep, I noted that many of the other rejected writers’ cars were parked in the driveway. Ethel opened the door. The woman always seemed to be opening doors.

  She clicked her tongue and said, “You’d better come in.”

  Inside was a zoo. Every single one of Annie’s dogs was in the house, all fifty of them. And they all decided to greet me at once. After about ten minutes of furry love, I finally waded my way through hairy bodies and into the front room, where the rest of the group was gathered.

  Annie stood at the table. Exhaustion showed on her pale face. She was using her nervous energy to wrap newspaper around blue china plates. As she did, she mumbled to herself, “I don’t even know where I’m going to keep them until I move. But it’s all got to be packed.”

  Also at the table was Doris, her infamous clipboard in front of her. I greeted everybody. They all moved somberly around the room, deep in thought as they gathered things to be packed. There was another knock at the door, setting the alarm dogs off once more. The barking was deafening.

  “Are all the dogs in here for a reason?” I shouted, trying to be tactful.

  Annie wiped stray tears from her face. “They couldn’t stay outside. They were too upset with all the noise that’s going on out there with that equipment. I had to bring them in,” she sniffed. “And besides, we all want to be a family together.”

  I looked at the dogs that were now returning to lie down in the sitting room and noted that they all hung their heads and seemed to have the same despondent expression. They obviously sensed something wasn’t right.

  Ruby appeared in the room with an energetic crew of odd-looking people, some with short hair, some in military jackets, some wearing peace signs and peace T-shirts. They strolled in like an army of freedom fighters from the retirement home.

  “I’m here,” she said. “We’re going to build a picket line. A human chain against injustice.”

  I looked at the scrappy, wiry mess of them and hoped a large wind didn’t blow them all away.

  Doris jumped to her feet. “Perfect,” she said. “Follow me.”

  I was intrigued. I followed them outside.

  In the driveway, Ruby pulled out a megaphone and a huge bundle of brightly colored material. She had it all hoarded up in a Mary Poppins–sized bag that had “Save the Whales” on the outside and that was big enough to actually keep a saved whale in it.

  She handed one line of the jumble of colorful pieces of cloth to a stocky woman with short, white, spiky hair. She was wearing a green quilted bomber jacket, and the pieces started to unravel. As they did, I realized what they were.

  “Tibetan prayer flags?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she said. “This is going to be a holy picket line. Let’s see if they’ll have the gall to break this.”

  I tried to imagine the burly guy I had just witnessed hanging off a tractor at the bottom of the drive and smoking a cigarette being confronted by a bunch of gray-haired old ladies in freedom fighting gear with a picket line of brightly colored flags. I wasn’t sure he was going to be too worried about it; all he would probably need was a pair of scissors.

  Once their line of defense was unraveled, the spritely group jumped into action. Picking up her megaphone, Ruby started chanting, setting all the dogs off once more.

  “Hell no, we won’t go. Hell no, we won’t go.”

  The woman with the spiky hair pumped a fist into the air as the group started to follow suit, striking out in strained, tinny voices as they carried their flags high and started to pin them on posts at the end of Annie’s driveway.

  In the midst of this display, the twins arrived, dressed differently from one another for once. Lavinia jumped out in a pair of jeans and a sweater, while Lottie was in her usual skirt and blouse.

  “I’m here!” said Lavinia. “I’m here to lie in front of a bulldozer if I need to.”

  “And I’m here to pray that it doesn’t run over her,” said Lottie, shaking her head.

  Lottie made her way into the house while Lavinia took up the cry, “Hell no, we won’t go.”

  I shook my head. If Martin were here, he’d be laughing his head off.

  Doris started handing out emergency supplies. She had water bottles, granola bars, and of course, her famous concoctions, all packed into little white plastic containers. This particular recipe, she told me, was called Freedom Pie, followed by Sit-In Scones. “They have extra ginger in them,” she informed me as she handed out boxes. “Keep the group spiced-up and peppy. We’re all good. We can go all night if we have to. I’ve got candles too.”

  As some sat on the ground, the rest of the rejected writers filed outside, apparently ready to do their duty. Ethel climbed inside the bucket of the bulldozer, and Doris chained her to it.

  Within an hour, the rest of the construction crew arrived. It sent quite a bit of excitement through the troops, and the dogs started barking again. The head construction honcho walked toward us. He was an overweight man with a stubbly chin and a pair of jeans that were so dirty it looked as if water was against his religion.

  �
�Look, you lot,” he said, rubbing a club-like fist through his graying, greasy hair. “We’re just here to do our jobs.”

  “And so are we,” responded Ruby, shouting through her megaphone very loudly, right in his face. “We are not going to let you near the farm.” And then, with that, the entire group surrounded the bulldozer.

  “So, it’s going to be one of those days,” he said as he jumped up onto his truck.

  “You have no weapons that work against injustice,” shouted Ruby through her megaphone again as the group of freedom fighters paraded around in a little circle, donning banners and flags they had made.

  “Oh, I do,” he said as he pulled out a mobile phone. “I have this.”

  Twenty minutes later, Sheriff Brown arrived and, pulling up at the farm gates, stepped out of his patrol car and shook his head. “Doris Newberry,” he said with the tone he reserved for finding criminals in expected places. “What are you getting yourself into now?”

  Doris stepped forward and pulled herself up to her full height.

  “Sheriff Brown,” she responded respectfully, “we are saving this beautiful farm from being bulldozed. These men are here to start taking down trees and digging up land that doesn’t belong to them.”

  The guy in the bulldozer jumped down and passed a work order to the sheriff, who then huffed and puffed his way through reading it.

  He finished the document, then eyeballed the ladies, saying, “So, this man has a right to be here. What do you want me to do about it?”

  “We will fight to the death,” Ruby shouted back through her megaphone.

  “Well, that might not be so long,” stated Sheriff Brown. “I hear we have a storm blowing in tonight that threatens to take you all with it. Now, come on, ladies. You know I only have two cells, and my deputy had a baby, so he’s over on the mainland with his wife today. Please don’t make this hard for me.”

  Doris straightened up again and looked him squarely in the face.

  “Robert Brown, we have known each other since high school. Have you ever known me to back down on anything?”

  The sheriff took in a long, slow breath and shook his head. Handing the work order back to the site manager, he said, “Looks like there is no work for you here today, and with a storm brewing, that might give you another couple of days on top of that. My advice would be take off now, give them all a chance to get pneumonia or chain-chafed, and come back next week.”

  The guy nodded and stood toe-to-toe with Doris. “We will be back. Don’t you worry.”

  “And we will be here,” boomed back Doris.

  The crew filed out, got into their cars, and left the farm as the band of freedom fighters cheered.

  “End of round one,” shouted Doris. “Now, let’s leave one person to keep guard and the rest of us can go up to the farmhouse. I’ll make us some tea, and we can eat our Sit-In Scones in comfort.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  TWO BABIES, THREE WISE MONKEYS & A WHALE

  The next day, Doris summoned the whole cast to meet in the evening to discuss possibly changing the location of the show. They had to gather at Annie’s instead of Doris’s, as the majority of the Rejected Writers’ Book Club was still manning an active picket line there against the bulldozer crew.

  Flora looked out the side window as she and Dan drove to pick up Marcy, who had insisted on coming but felt too fragile to drive herself. Marcy’s parents had returned to Medford once she was out of the woods, but Marcy had insisted on staying. Flora wondered what possible reason she could have for staying, except continuing to pursue Dan. Flora noticed that the clouds were darkening, and because the island was under a storm watch, she felt some concern. But Doris had classed this emergency meeting as imperative, and no one dared cross Doris when it was imperative.

  They arrived at Marcy’s, and she dragged herself out of the house, looking very pathetic indeed. Gone were the swishy curls and the poodle trot. She was dressed all in white, her hair was pulled back in a sad-looking rubber band and she was wearing hardly any makeup. She carried a pillow and a bottle of water. She had apparently given up playing vixen and was now going for Mother Teresa, Flora mused to herself.

  Marcy arrived at the car and stood there waiting for Dan to open the door. He glanced at Flora and rolled his eyes. Eying Flora in the front seat, she placed her hand on her neck, whining, “Dan, I wonder if it’s possible that I could travel in the front seat. My back is still not quite right, and I need to stretch my legs forward.”

  She then pouted like a small child. As if on cue, there was a crack of thunder, and the heavens opened. Flora huffed loudly, opened the passenger door, and climbed into the back seat.

  Marcy climbed delicately into the car, making wincing noises as she placed her pillow carefully behind her neck. She turned her head toward her driver and fluttered her eyelashes, saying feebly, “Thank you, Dan.”

  His hand was resting on the gearstick, and she reached out and grabbed it. Dan responded by pulling it quickly away and starting the car.

  Annie lived on a remote part of the island. To reach her farm, they had quite a trip through the rain and the wind. In other parts of the world, wind was not a big deal, but in a place covered with hundreds of thirty- to forty-foot evergreen trees, wind was not only frightening but also dangerous.

  The storm was really starting to ramp up as the rain lashed down hard on the windshield. Dan’s wipers could barely keep up with the deluge, which was accompanied by significant wind gusts that blew loose branches and limbs across the road in front of the headlights.

  Flora gripped tightly on the sleeve of her cardigan for comfort as they wound their way through the darkest parts of the island. They were all more than a little relieved to see Annie’s cheerful little farm sign swing into view as it rocked back and forth in the wind.

  Dan drove carefully up Annie’s long, winding driveway, which was also lined with huge fir trees, and parked next to the long line of cars that signified that the rest of the main cast and production team were already there.

  Dashing from the car, Flora raced to the farm door, accompanied by Dan. Marcy refused to budge until Dan returned from Annie’s with an umbrella to shelter her.

  Inside was a hive of activity. Everyone had gathered in Annie’s front room. They all discussed different ideas to move forward now that the theater was not useable. The room was filled with an air of urgency, given the enemy looming so close in their bulldozers. With the storm, the workers had left for the night. The picket line had been keeping them at bay, but everyone realized it was only a matter of time before the court would rule in the developer’s favor and have the ladies removed by force. Doris ended the meeting by telling Annie that they were going to do everything they could to help her keep her home.

  I was glad when the meeting was over, as I really wanted to get Stacy home. She had insisted on coming with me but had been unusually quiet the whole evening. We were just winding up when Ernie returned from putting something out in his car.

  “It sure is windy out there. We should probably get ourselves home quickly,” he said with a shudder as he entered the house and started all the dogs barking again.

  I hurried to pack up my things and made my way into the hallway. Grabbing one of Annie’s umbrellas, I accompanied Stacy to the front door. She had been complaining about a backache all day, and I had wanted to take her to the doctor, but she was having none of it. She insisted she was okay and just needed to rest. At thirty-four weeks pregnant, she was flying back to San Francisco in the morning. Chris had called the night before to tell her he was finally home to take care of her again after visiting his mother and taking an overseas trip.

  The storm was whipping up into a frenzy as we stepped out into the night. Placing my arm around her shoulders, I pulled her close to me and guided her quickly to the car. She flinched as she seated herself in the front seat, and I informed her in my most superior motherly tone that if she was still in pain in the morning, I was taking her
to the doctor.

  I joined her in the car and drove slowly down Annie’s long, winding driveway, trying not to jostle Stacy. She seemed to wince at every pothole in the drive. I carefully wove around the tree limbs that littered our path, trying to control my rising panic at the weather and Stacy’s condition. I decided to concentrate on the long trail of red lights in front of me that belonged to the other cast members’ cars.

  About halfway down the driveway, the line of cars stopped in front of me. I waited apprehensively and looked out my side window. The wind was roaring around us, and it had started to rain again with a vengeance. All I could think of was getting Stacy home as soon as possible and settling her comfortably in her bed.

  James, who had been ahead of us at the end of the driveway, approached me. He was wearing a yellow sou’wester and slicker, and as he clung on desperately to his hat, any strands of hair that worked themselves loose in the wind whipped around his face in a candy-flossed frenzy. The side gusts were so forceful, he was having to walk with his head cocked to one side just to get to us. As he reached the car, he used his spare hand to gather his yellow slicker tightly around himself.

  I opened the window just a crack to talk to him.

  “Hey,” he yelled over the escalating clamor of the storm. “We’ve got a problem. An enormous tree fell and cut off the driveway, and I can see another one down on the road too. There’s just no way around it. You’re going to have to drive back to the farm so we can call the authorities.”

  I nodded and backed the car up the driveway. Soon we were all parked back outside the farmhouse. I looked at the trees closest to Annie’s house, and it appeared we would be safe inside. She had apparently kept up on limbing the low, heavy branches and topping off the high trees. As I looked through the driving rain, my thoughts matched the weather exactly—dark and dreary. To my left, the pasture was practically a lake, and to the right, the dense forest loomed ominously as the lightning periodically lit up the trees.

  There was a knock on my side window, and James was back. “Can I help you inside with Stacy?” he shouted over the raging storm.