by Erynn Mangum
“How was school?” Dad asked, the first normal question I’d gotten all day.
I opened my mouth to respond.
“Oh, and I looked into getting you in some self-defense and gun handling classes. You’re too young to carry a concealed weapon, but your self-defense class starts on Tuesday night at seven. You and your mother are both signed up to go.”
So, it started out normal.
I nodded. “Okay.” At this point, it was better not to argue.
We went into the kitchen, and Mom guilted DJ into sitting in Mike’s empty chair. “I made enough for you to eat, so if you don’t, I’m going to be very hurt,” Mom said, putting a platter of what looked like salmon on the table.
“Okay, ma’am. If you say so.”
Mom may not be able to do the sweet stuff well, but she usually made awesome dinners. The salmon smelled so good, and we all sat at the table, drooling.
Lolly was lounging on the floor, waiting for someone to drop a bite.
As was custom, Mom held out her hands and Dad made a gruffly noise in the back of his throat.
“Bless the food. Amen,” he muttered, barely bothering to close his eyes.
Well. Some things hadn’t changed.
Dad, DJ, and I all dug into our salmon, but Mom was more reluctant. I could tell she was trying to decide if she should say something or not.
“Guys?” she said, finally, putting her unused fork down. “We are going to church this Sunday.”
Everyone just kind of stared at her in a chewing silence.
“What?” Dad said.
“Why?” I asked.
“Sounds like a plan.” DJ nodded. “Great salmon, Mrs. Carter.”
Mom said thank you to DJ and then looked at me and my dad. “Because it has been a long time since we were there, and I just feel like we need all the help we can get right now.”
She picked up her fork and took a bite of salmon. I looked across the table at Dad, who shrugged and started on his rice.
So it looked like I wasn’t going to be sleeping in on Sunday.
“What did you do in school today?” Dad asked me.
“I took a geography exam.”
“Did you pass it?”
“Yes, sir.”
Dad nodded, content.
A few minutes of quiet chewing took place. Lolly stirred under the table, reminding us that she was still there.
“I talked to Mike today,” Mom said, and both Dad and I immediately snapped to attention.
“Is he okay?” I asked.
“Did he total his car or something?” Dad said.
Mom sent us both a glare. “He’s fine.”
“How’s his car, though?” Dad asked.
“He’s fine, his car is fine, his grades are fine, and he was just calling because he heard about Kate on the radio this morning, and he wanted to know if it was our Kate or a different one.”
My brother moved out to go to college in California almost three years ago. In that time, he had only made it home for the two Christmas breaks he had and opted to stay out there for both Thanksgivings.
As for me, I hadn’t talked to him on the phone the entire time he’d been gone. There’s five years and personality issues between us — his personality issues, not mine.
So the fact that he called of his own free will was something of a miracle. I think that Mom tried to call him about once a week, but she only ended up getting through to him about once a month.
Mom would never admit to it, but I did see her crying a little last month when she once again got my brother’s voicemail.
It made me mad at Mike. The woman went through thirty-two hours of labor and eighteen years of feeding and caring for him. You’d think he could spare a few minutes to talk to his mother on the phone.
Dad always said that an engineering degree was one of the toughest degrees out there, and we should just let Mike study.
I thought it was just another excuse for my brother.
“So, he’s doing okay?” I asked. Mad or not, Mike was still my brother.
Mom nodded. “He only had a minute to talk, but he said he’s doing good. Said classes are hard, but the weather is nice.”
So, pretty much, he got through the perfunctory stuff and then hung up.
I shook my head slightly and kept working on my salmon and rice. DJ had already finished his plate.
At nine, DJ’s night replacement rang the doorbell. Only this time it wasn’t the silent Officer Colton, it was Detective Masterson at the door.
I looked up from the rerun of Gilmore Girls I was watching.
“You’re staying tonight?” I asked, surprised when he walked in. Mom and Dad were back in their bedroom talking, and I’d heard the word UCLA used, so I figured it was about Mike.
DJ closed and locked the door behind Detective Masterson, and they both sat on the sofa beside me.
“What’s this?” the detective asked.
“Gilmore Girls,” DJ answered before I could.
Detective Masterson looked at DJ and then snorted.
“Excuse me,” I said. “This show is a wonderful satire on life and women and small towns, and I happen to love it.”
“Sure, sure,” Detective Masterson said. “Whatever you say, Kate.”
“I can pick a girlier show,” I threatened, waving the remote. “I think that Barefoot Contessa is on right now.”
DJ almost jumped at me. “No!”
“No more mocking my show?”
DJ shook his head violently. “No more mocking your show. Kent?” He elbowed Detective Masterson.
There was the Kent thing again. My brain could not process that Detective Masterson’s name was Kent to his friends.
Kent.
He grinned. “Consider the mocking over and done with.” He leaned back against the sofa cushions. “So, what does the famous Kate Carter have going on this weekend? I mean, aside from the parade with the governor and dinner with the mayor?”
“A parade?” I moaned, muting the TV right in the middle of one of Lorelai Gilmore’s famous word battles with Rory.
“Just a short one.” Detective Masterson grinned at me. “Just around Main Street and up to Cherry Road.”
I growled under my breath. “And what am I supposed to do on this parade?”
“Oh, you know, the usual. Smile, wave, blow kisses to the eligible young bachelors in town, and toss candy to the babies.”
Detective Masterson was grinning ear to ear and enjoying this entirely too much.
“Do I have to?” I asked.
“You have to.” Detective Masterson picked up the remote and changed the channel to KCL, where the too-white-toothed Ted Deffle was doing the evening news.
“A six-pack of Diet Coke was found to be missing from McSweeny’s earlier today,” he was saying.
I looked at DJ and the detective. “Do you guys ever worry about your job security in this town?”
DJ nodded. “Every day.”
“I used to,” Detective Masterson said. “But then I realized that without me, the three guys who drink the weekend away at Barney’s would be out there driving drunk, Mrs. Lainger would have no one to call whenever she thought her house was getting broken into, and little Lacey Cutler’s kitten would have been eaten by the next-door neighbor’s dog on a daily basis for the last three years.”
DJ looked over Detective Masterson to me again. “Like I said, every day.”
Chapter Eight
SATURDAY MORNING DAWNED BRIGHT AND BEAUTIFUL, and I woke up to the smell of pancakes.
Pancakes?
I sniffed confusedly and stumbled out of bed, grabbing my change of clothes and heading for the bathroom. Five minutes later, I had on presentable sweats and my teeth were brushed.
So long, Saturday mornings in my pajamas.
I made it to the kitchen, yawning. Mom and Dad were nowhere to be found, but DJ was blissfully eating a huge stack of pancakes, and Detective Masterson was busy flipping more.
Miss Yeager, should she be the one, was turning out to be a lucky girl. I nodded and sat down at the table next to DJ.
“Sleep good?” DJ asked me.
“Yes,” I lied. Truthfully, I dreamt that John X’s mug shot had been chasing me in the governor’s parade car. He kept catching all the candy I threw and knocking over my parents and Maddy, trying to catch up to me.
“You didn’t sound like you slept well,” the detective said, coming over with a plate stacked three pancakes high and setting it in front of me. “You were mewling all night.”
Well, this was embarrassing. I wanted my door closed at night like before this whole fiasco, so the only person who knew whether I made noise when I slept was Lolly, who usually slept on the floor by my bed.
I glared at the detective and then dug into the pancakes.
They were delicious and try as I might, I couldn’t stay mad at someone who created such fluffy, tasty delights.
“Good?” he asked, sitting in one of the empty chairs, sipping from a cup of coffee.
“Kent, if I’d known you were such a good wife, I would have married you years ago.” DJ grinned, shoving another forkful of pancakes in his mouth.
Detective Masterson took another sip of coffee and pulled the morning paper over. “Sadly, you’re not my type. But thank you for the proposal.”
“Who is your type?” I asked, squirting more syrup on my stack. “Miss Yeager?”
DJ perked up at that one. “The woman at the school?” He looked at me. “Your art teacher?”
I nodded.
“Oh, look at the headline,” the detective said, not answering DJ’s question.
DJ winked at me.
“ ‘Local Hero to Be Featured in Tomorrow’s May Day Parade’,” Detective Masterson read.
I yanked the paper from him. There was my horrific yearbook picture slathered all over the front page.
It was like other pictures of me just didn’t exist. I groaned.
“Now, now. Let me see your smile for the adoring public, Kate.” Detective Masterson grinned over his coffee.
“Look at this picture,” I said, pointing to the front page. “Do I really look like that in person?”
DJ studied it for a minute. “You are kind of squinting all weird there.”
Mom walked in the kitchen, hair styled, makeup on, and wearing jeans and a Western button-down shirt. “Good morning, Katie-Kin,” she said, ruffling her hand through my hair.
I suddenly realized why Lolly always leaned into us whenever we petted her.
“Morning, guys,” Mom said, nodding to the policemen.
“Morning,” they chimed simultaneously.
Detective Masterson stood. “Pancakes, ma’am?” he asked, pouring batter onto the griddle.
Mom nodded and sat beside me. “Thanks, Detective.”
I almost laughed. Here it was Saturday morning. My mother was completely dressed before ten, I had a detective in the police force serving pancakes and coffee to my family, and a police officer sleeping outside my bedroom on an air mattress.
Life could not get weirder.
Dad walked in then, 9mm strapped to his waist.
Then again, perhaps I spoke too soon.
Dad started squinting through the barely cracked kitchen blinds, and DJ elbowed me.
“That’s the expression you’ve got right here,” he whispered, pointing to the newspaper.
I sighed.
“Anything happen last night?” Dad asked the detective.
Detective Masterson shook his head, flipping the pancakes. “No, sir. It was very quiet.” He looked toward the front door. “Although we did get something this morning.”
Dad immediately walked out of the kitchen and came back holding the hugest bouquet of flowers I’d ever seen in my life.
“Wow,” Mom and I chimed together.
“Who’s it from?” I asked, clambering off my chair and over to where Dad was struggling to set it down on the counter. I ended up needing to get my chair and stand on it to see the top of the arrangement.
“See a card?” Dad asked.
“No. Oh wait,” I said, pulling the tiniest white envelope from the huge monstrosity of tulips, daisies, roses, violets, and lilies.
It simply said Kate on the front.
I was just about to open it when Detective Masterson took it from me. “Sorry, Kate. I have to inspect everything that comes through that front door.”
He opened it, read it, snorted, and then passed it to me.
I stood on the chair and started reading.
Dearest Kate —
“What’s it say?” Mom asked. “Read it out loud.”
I was suddenly very happy that we didn’t live in the time of that Pride and Prejudice book. I was only imagining what it would be like to get a romantic letter from Mr. Darcy and then have to read it out loud to my mother.
I hopped off the chair. In this case, Detective Masterson had already read it. It couldn’t get much worse than that.
“ ‘Dearest Kate,’ “ I started again.
Dad frowned at me and Mom started getting all sappy.
DJ was snickering behind his coffee cup, I was pretty sure.
“ ‘In gratitude for your civic service, thankfulness for your generous spirit, and hopefulness for our eventual meeting, I trust you are as overwhelmed by this bouquet as I am by your bravery. Thank you.’ “
It was signed Sincerely, Ted Deffle, KCL News.
I felt my nose wrinkling up.
“Ted Deffle?” Dad choked on his coffee. “He’s like twenty years older than you! Is that even legal?” He looked at DJ.
“To send a girl a bouquet of roses out of thankfulness?” DJ asked. He looked at Detective Masterson and shrugged. “I guess so.”
“I would imagine the honorable Ted just wants to secure an interview spot with Kate,” Detective Masterson said, handing Mom and Dad their pancakes. “Coffee?”
I sat back down at the table. Ted Deffle sent me flowers.
Ugh.
Maddy was not going to believe this.
“Another pancake, Kate?” Detective Masterson asked.
“Please.” And keep them coming.
By the time we were heading to the mayor’s house that night, I’d received another three bouquets. One from the local paper, one from the South Woodhaven Falls Rotary Club, and another one from the KCL staff.
I’d also gotten seventeen thank-you notes in the mailbox from people all over the St. Louis area. One lady claimed that she’d seen a man who matched my drawing in her grocery store last week buying processed cheese crackers.
“I wondered at the time, but it makes sense now,” she’d written.
I figured that meant criminals must eat processed cheese crackers, and I asked DJ if I should add that to my Jailbird’s menu.
He said that in his experience, most of them seemed to prefer the peanut butter crackers over the cheese, but he’d also known of at least three high-profile crooks who were lactose intolerant, so maybe that threw off the count.
I added both cheese and peanut butter crackers to the menu.
DJ was driving us over in an unmarked black Tahoe, but it was definitely a police vehicle on the inside. Mom and I sat in the back, and Dad sat up front with DJ.
I was wearing a light blue and brown dress that was entirely too summery for the spring weather. My shins were getting cold. I’d put a brown sweater over my arms, but now I was wishing there was a way to put sweater sleeves over my legs without looking like a complete fashion accident.
I think those are called leg warmers, but in my experience, those were better left to the girls who thought Britney Spears was a style icon and it was best for me to leave those alone. Particularly with a summer dress.
I’d never been to the mayor’s house before, but as we pulled through the gate leading to the huge front lawn, I was suddenly overwhelmed by the money to be made in politics
.
“I had no idea he lived in such a huge house,” I said. “Tax dollars?”
“Family money,” Dad answered me.
Maybe it’s a life of schmoozing that pays off in the end. Mayor Arnold Walinski was a world-class butter-upper.
If that was a word.
DJ parked the car in front of the mansion and we all piled out, greeted by two guys whom I assumed were security and two dogs that I assumed were part pit bull.
“Miss Carter?” one of them said to me, putting out his hand. “Pleased to meet you. The mayor and his family have been looking forward to meeting you.”
We followed the man into the house and into a huge dining room. Mayor Walinski was standing there next to a bleached-blonde woman and two dark-haired kids who were probably in elementary school.
“Greetings!” Arnold Walinski said. “Welcome to my home!”
It was all very awkward. The bleached lady looked bored to tears, the kids were too busy poking each other for me to remember their names or them to remember mine, and dinner salads were busy wilting on the gold-circled china plates.
“Please, sit,” Arnold said, motioning to the table.
DJ stayed in the room, but he didn’t sit down, since there wasn’t a place setting for him. I started wondering if he felt like hired help.
“So, Kate, once again, I just want to say thank you for everything that you’ve done to keep our fair town in its safe environment,” Arnold said, while his wife picked at her salad and the kids threw olives at each other.
I’m not sure when people will finally realize that this was all a big accident and all I did was draw what I was told to draw.
“You are welcome,” I said, because it was starting to get old protesting.
And then we sat there in silence. Dad was done with his salad and Mom was finishing the last couple of bites. I was pretending to eat, but pushing it around instead. It was made with that bitter lettuce stuff and I was an iceberg kind of a girl.
Tasteless and crunchy. That was how I liked my lettuce.
A lady brought out the next course, which Arnold declared to be lamb.
And it looked like I was going hungry tonight, alongside DJ. There was no way I was going to eat a cute fluffy lamb, I don’t care how tender it was.
“Isn’t this amazing?” Arnold said, breaking the silence, chomping away. “Our cook is Grecian and she makes the most excellent lamb dishes.”