The Rejected Writers' Book Club (Southlea Bay)

by Suzanne Kelman

  Doris yelled from the kitchen as she removed her apron, “Get it while it’s hot!”

  We gathered around the table like a happy family. It was chock-full with bacon, sausage, eggs, and toast, not to mention hot, steaming cinnamon rolls. Doris heaped delicious hot food onto our plates and placed a basket of warm bread rolls in the center. I inhaled the delightful aroma and realized I was ravenous.

  Dan lifted up his glass of orange juice to us in a toast.

  “To all the wonderful ladies of the Rejected Writers’ Book Club for being brave and determined. May all your letters be rejections and all your manuscripts be duds.”

  We all laughed, and Doris echoed, “Hear, hear.”

  As he polished off his second helping of bacon and toast, Ernie commented, “I don’t think I’ve seen a spread like this since last Thanksgiving. I sure hope you’re planning on staying around awhile!”

  “Actually, we’re on our way today,” said Doris, tapping Ernie’s hand as he tried to reach for his third cinnamon roll. “You’ve had enough of those, mister!” she added sternly.

  Ernie was jovial. “Oh, you don’t miss a trick,” he quipped back. “I like a woman who’s not only on her toes, but is also on mine.”

  He brushed her leg under the table playfully. Doris was obviously taken aback but recovered quickly. “And don’t think you’ll be getting around me playing footsie like that. I’m not sixteen anymore.”

  “You might not be in your teens,” he poked back at her, “but everyone knows the sweetest peaches take longer to mature.”

  I was amazed they were flirting. Something about this area had brought Cupid out in force, with a stack of arrows to boot.

  We washed the dishes all together, like the Waltons. “Here’s a spoon, Jim-Bob. Thanks, John-Boy. Into the drawer, Mary Ellen.”

  Soon after, Ian walked in.

  “Your car is all ready to roll and . . .” Then he stopped in midsentence as his nose caught up with him. “Wow,” he said, sniffing the air. “Looks like I missed a good brunch, by the smell of it.”

  “There’s one last cinnamon roll I managed to wrestle away from Ernie,” shouted Doris from the kitchen, “and the coffee is still hot!”

  “So, you’re the young man who fixed their car, are you?” Ernie said. “Could I pay you to unfix it? I can’t bear to see the back of the chili pepper and her beans. That is the best dang brunch I’ve had in a long while.”

  Ian beamed and swallowed a mouthful of cinnamon roll, saying, “It’ll cost you. But you’re on if this cinnamon roll’s anything to go on.”

  I stepped out for one last look at the lake before we left. It was magical. The frost was still heavy on the ground and glistening on the grass like frosted diamonds through muted sunlight. A lazy fog was just starting to roll out across the water. It gave the loons an eerie sound as it muffled their cries.

  As I walked back toward the house, I noticed Flora sitting on a bench, staring pensively at the water, no doubt thinking about her new relationship. If I were a painter, I would have wanted to capture that moment on canvas.

  We were all a little somber as we assembled in the driveway, each one of us quiet with our own thoughts.

  Ernie broke the silence by admiring the limousine. “Nice wheels.”

  “Thank you,” said Ian. “That’s our transportation back to the garage today.”

  Ernie’s eyes twinkled as he asked, “Would you mind dropping me on the way? I would love to get under the skin of that old woman who lives across the road from me. ‘The curtain twitcher,’ I call her. She’ll bite her hand off at the wrist just to find out why I’m coming home in a limousine on a Sunday morning.”

  “I would be delighted.” Ian laughed. “I’ll even wear my chauffeur’s hat if you want!”

  Ernie smacked his hand across his knee. “That’s the spirit. That should keep her wringing herself in knots for weeks.”

  We got into the car. Everyone piled in except Dan and Flora, who were in each other’s arms, saying their final good-byes. Eventually, climbing in, she sank into the corner of the backseat.

  “It’s been wonderful meeting you all,” said Dan. “Maybe I’ll see you on your way back through Medford.”

  Ian added, “You’re all welcome to stay here again if you want.”

  We voiced our thanks and appreciation.

  Then, suddenly, Ernie stuck his head in as well. “I can always do with a good feeding if ever you’re passing this way again.”

  Doris thumped him playfully on the arm, saying, “You shouldn’t need feeding again until we come back in a week! But you have my phone number in case you need to remember me.”

  “I’ll remember you whenever I pass a cinnamon roll,” he joked back.

  Dan reached in and grabbed Flora’s hand for the last time. She thrust a piece of paper into his, which I surmised was probably one of her poems, and we drove away.

  I looked in the rearview mirror as we did; the men were all lined up on the driveway, smiling and waving to us, all except Dan, who looked crestfallen. As soon as we rounded the corner, Flora burst into tears.

  We all tried to cheer her up, but everything seemed to fall flat. It was like having a lovesick teenager. When we stopped for a bathroom break two hours later, Flora inside, Doris pulled us into a huddle.

  “You know that girl has never been in love before. That’s what the problem is. She’s going to be hard work for a few days, no doubt.”

  When Flora came back, Ethel suddenly sneezed. “I don’t feel so good,” she said, blowing her nose on a coffee shop napkin.

  “I hope you haven’t got the Lurgy,” said Doris unsympathetically.

  “I have an aspirin,” said Annie, fishing one out of her purse.

  Ethel eyed it distrustfully before eventually giving in and taking it as she sneezed again.

  Doris offered to drive, and as we started up again, I must admit I was relieved. I hated mountain driving, and I knew that would be the next leg of our journey.

  We got underway again. Ethel sniffed and Flora sobbed. I personally couldn’t think of anything better for a poet’s work than a little pining. Doris tried to find a country music channel, which was almost impossible as we started to climb into the mountains. Next to me, Annie flipped on her soap. I didn’t want to admit it, but secretly I couldn’t wait to find out what would happen next.

  The doctor’s wife had arranged a secret meeting with the guy she’d hired to put the hit on her husband, who coincidently just happened to be the same guy back from the war, who now believed he was an assassin. He, the assassin, was unaware that his girlfriend, the secretary, was having an affair with the doctor he was being hired to kill. In the meantime, the doctor had mysteriously gone missing, and the big clincher to the episode was . . . that the baby the secretary was carrying may or may not be even human at all. Apparently, the secretary may have been impregnated during an alien abduction in which her memory had been wiped clean.

  Annie and I watched intently as the envelope containing the test results of the baby was slowly opened. The camera closed in on her shocked face, and as she opened her mouth to speak . . .

  A loud bell rang out. Both Annie and I screamed. It was the FaceTime alert.

  Annie hit the “Accept” button, and the faces of the other ladies from the Rejection Club swam into view.

  “Hi, y’all,” said Lavinia. “Here we are again.”

  Ruby’s face popped onto the screen. She still looked a little under the weather. She was wearing what appeared to be a white turban adorned with gold-sprayed fruit and looked like a red-nosed Christmas Carmen Miranda.

  “Look, it’s me, back in the land of the living.”

  We all shouted our hellos.

  It was hard to hear very well, as the car was starting to climb, and the strain of the engine noise was drowning out all other sound. Ruby was waving at us, as were Lottie and Gracie, who was still wearing her pink sparkly boa. I made out that they were having an impromptu meeting of
the Rejection Club and were going to share some stories. The engine roared.

  “What are they saying?” bellowed Doris from the front.

  “They’re having a Rejection Club meeting,” I shouted back.

  “How are the dogs?” she yelled. “Ask how they are.”

  All I could see were moving heads on the screen, but I couldn’t hear a thing over the engine.

  Annie laughed at something Lottie had said, then shouted back, “Okay, have fun!”

  The picture went dark.

  “Darn, lost the signal,” said Annie. “That was fun, wasn’t it,” she said, putting her iPad away in her bag.

  We kept on climbing. As I looked out the window, the scenery around me was beginning to change significantly, as well as the temperature. Doris shouted back to us, “We should be getting to the top soon, and then we’ll hit three thousand feet.”

  We journeyed on for another twenty minutes. All we had to listen to was the high-pitched strain of the engine as it climbed higher and higher.

  As I looked out on the view, I was overwhelmed by the sheer majesty of it all. Thick forests of emerald-green trees reached skyward from snow-laden peaks. In between, forging their way through jagged gray granite, craggy brooks and waterfalls frothed and spluttered down the mountainsides.

  “Isn’t it pretty!” said Annie.

  I nodded. It truly was an awe-inspiring sight, nature at its finest, unspoiled and raw, without any footprints of civilization for miles around, and that made me just a little nervous. My ears started to pop as we adjusted to the altitude. The car clock read 3:30 p.m. It would soon be getting dark.

  As we started to crest the top, a battered sign marked the entrance to a desolate rest stop. Doris pulled in.

  “Oh, good. Potty break!” said Annie, putting down her knitting and grabbing her roll of toilet paper. Flora had used most of hers up sobbing quietly in her corner.

  I stepped out and took a deep, slow breath of the frigid air. It was silent and isolated, as if we were the only people left on the planet.

  “It’s cold enough to snow, don’t you think?” noted Annie, joining me as I stood looking out at the incredible view.

  Doris brought out some sandwiches she’d made that morning, and Ethel sat blowing her nose as she fed a group of chipmunks right under the “Do Not Feed the Wild Animals” sign.

  “How long till we hit a town?” I asked Doris. The anxiety was obvious in my tone.

  Doris fetched her map and took the opportunity to spread it out on the picnic bench.

  “As far as I can see, we have about another twenty miles of mountain driving, and we should make it into northern California before six o’clock. There are lots of nice hotels there, and we should easily be in San Francisco by tomorrow afternoon.”

  I took another deep breath. Just thinking about a large city made me feel as if we were close to safety.

  “Right,” said Doris decisively. “If we want to get over this pass before dark, we should get moving again.”

  Back in the car, Annie remarked absently, “It sounds like the stories Lavinia found will be an interesting read.”

  I went ice-cold.

  “What did you say?” I asked, shouting over the whine of the engine.

  Annie raised her voice. “Lavinia found some stories that she’s going to read to the group and said they’re pretty raunchy.”

  “What!” Doris and I shrieked in unison.

  Doris slammed on the brakes. Behind us, drivers skidded to emergency stops and honked their displeasure as they pulled around us.

  Doris was bearing down on Annie, who was looking from one of us to the other in bewilderment.

  Doris found her voice. “What did you say?”

  “That Lavinia said she’d found some raunchy stories that she was going to share with the group.”

  “What kind of stories?” demanded Doris.

  “I don’t know,” said Annie weakly. “It was hard to hear.”

  “Where did she find them?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Get them back on!”

  “I can’t. We don’t have a signal.”

  “Try, dammit!” bellowed Doris.

  “Don’t shout at me!” screamed back Annie. “I haven’t done anything wrong.”

  Doris matched Annie’s pitch. “You should have told me about the stories. Why didn’t you tell me straightaway?”

  “Why?” yelled back Annie. “What’s the big deal about some racy stories of Lavinia’s?”

  Annie’s voice was starting to crack as Doris delivered the final blow. “Because they could be about my momma, that’s why!”

  The car became deadly quiet as the reality of what Doris had just said sank in. Annie burst into tears, and she and Flora started to sob in unity; then, right on cue, Ethel sprayed the car with an immense sneeze, causing Doris to swear and smack the steering wheel.

  “Why don’t we all just calm down?” I said, trying to be the voice of reason.

  Doris swung open her door and jumped out of the car.

  I got out to talk to her. “Doris, I know this is hard, but you don’t know what stories Lavinia is talking about. For all we know, they could be from one of her romance magazines.”

  “But if they’re from that terrible journal I hid in the attic, then they’re about Momma. Horrible lies about her. I just don’t know what she’ll do if she hears them.”

  “Look, there’s nothing we can do here. Once we get to the other side of the pass, we’ll get a signal again. It’s still early. We can ring the twins and warn them not to read them.”

  Doris nodded. Her face reflected all the fear and worry she felt.

  She was in no condition to drive, so I climbed into the driver’s seat. I started the car and, gripping the steering wheel, desperately tried to focus on the road ahead.

  The one thing I hated above traveling through the mountains was actually driving the passes. I looked at the group in my rearview mirror. We were a mess. Annie and Flora sobbed; Ethel, red-eyed, sniffed; and beside me, Doris seethed. So much for the fifties fantasy, because compared to this road trip, Thelma & Louise was starting to look like a soppy love story.

  Chapter Eleven

  A ROCKSLIDE & A HAUNTED HOUSE

  We drove for another twenty nail-biting minutes, and the silence in the car was eerie, only punctuated from time to time with a sob or a sniff. Out of nowhere, we suddenly hit traffic. As we started to inch along, I noticed cars and trucks appeared to be turning back toward us.

  “Looks like trouble,” said Ethel as she blew her nose again.

  This new turn of events seemed to break the deadlock in the car.

  Doris turned to Annie, squeezed her hand, and apologized.

  “What do you mean about your momma?” croaked Annie, her voice hoarse from crying.

  “I can’t talk about it right now. It’s just too hard.”

  Flora nodded, took Doris’s hand, and squeezed it too.

  After a one-hour crawl, we hadn’t even gone ten miles. As we crept forward, we could see a state trooper ahead waving a flashlight and turning drivers back. By the time we inched to the front of the line, it was almost 5:30 p.m., way past dusk, and a damp, heavy fog was starting to swirl ominously around the car.

  Rolling down my window, I asked, “What’s going on, officer?”

  “Landslide. We have heavy equipment down there right now moving it as best we can, but it was a doozy. There’s no way we’re going to be able to secure the road tonight. Your best bet is to make it back to Ashland or Medford for the evening.”

  “Medford,” I repeated, a note of hysteria creeping into my tone.

  “Sorry. There’s no way I can let you through here this evening. It’s just not safe.”

  Before I could say anything else, he was waving us on with his light and walking toward an RV behind us.

  Wheeling the car around, I started to double back. I looked at the gas gauge. We were nearly on empty. I’d meant to r
emind Doris to fill up when we’d left the coffee shop, but with the upset with Flora and Ethel being sick, I had quite forgotten. It would be touch and go whether we would make it back anywhere close to civilization. We would be coasting on fumes before we hit the bottom of the mountains.

  “What’s it going to be, then?” asked Annie, as if we were making a decision about dessert.

  “The first thing we need to do is find a gas station.”

  Trucks along the route had pulled over onto the hard shoulder, settling down for the night.

  “You know, there was a little convenience store about five miles back,” mentioned Annie optimistically.

  “Yes, they may know where we could get gas.” I recalled the place; my spirits lifted.

  “And maybe they have a phone I can use too,” Doris added.

  We drove back and pulled over. The store appeared to be closed, so Doris and I peered in a window and saw a hodgepodge of camping and fishing paraphernalia. Way in the back, there was a light shining from what seemed to be a back office. The faint strains of a TV floated from it. I rapped on the door. Nothing. I rapped again harder. The TV turned off.

  A dark head poked out from the back office door, and a man shuffled toward us. He was older, with a leathery, weathered face and heavy wrinkles that seemed to roll over each other. He was wearing an oversized woolen sweater and khaki pants. On his feet were well-worn hiking boots. As he looked up at us, I thought I caught a wry twinkle in his gray eyes, as he gently unlocked the door.

  “Did you want some bait or something? Because officially we close at five o’clock.”

  “We don’t need anything except some help.”

  He nodded as if he’d known that all along and that digging people out of trouble on the mountainside was his real life vocation.

  “I need to use a phone,” demanded Doris urgently. “We don’t have a signal up here.”

  “Then I suppose you’d better come in.”

  He pointed to a payphone just inside the door. Putting on lights as he went, he eventually positioned himself behind his counter, which was stocked with a dusty display of fishhooks, chocolate mints, and Beanie Babies.