The Crossroads Cafe

by Deborah Smith

  “Yes, a standard residential roof.”

  “A roof for Tinkerbell’s house,” Cora put in. “That’s a fairy house.”

  “You betcha. Okay, what are these areas on the sides called?”

  Ivy frowned a moment, then brightened. “The gables!”

  “Where the fairies sit to get out of the sun,” Cora added.

  “Right! Now let’s add something to the roof design for more interest.” I dabbed some homemade glue on the roof and stuck two sugar cubes there. Using an olive fork as a tool, I molded a dab of raw biscuit dough atop each cube, forming tiny, peaked roofs. “What are these structures called?”

  “Houses for the fairy’s pet birds,” Cora said.

  “Dormers!” Ivy said.

  I nodded. “Right on both counts.”

  The girls and I studied the strange little house. It would need a lot of glitter and miniature plastic holly to approximate some kind of Christmas ornament, assuming it didn’t fall apart, first. But even grim-faced Ivy looked pleased when I said, “I hereby declare that Ivy and Cora’s first house design has met all the building codes for cardboard, egg paste, and sugar cubes.” I set it aside with a flourish. “Next,” I said solemnly, taking more cardboard in hand, “I’ll show you how to build a miniature Craftsman bungalow just like the one up on Wild Woman—”

  “Speakin’ of the Nettie house, Thomas, I need to talk to you right now, please.”

  I looked up quickly. Delta stood at the door to the kitchen, her face pale, a phone in hand. She pointed to it then gestured for me to keep quiet and come quickly. “You girls practice your pitched roofs,” I said. When I entered the kitchen Delta grabbed me by one arm. “Cathy’s housekeeper called from California. She’s scared to death, so she confessed everything. How could you not tell me Cathy’s been up here at her granny’s place all week! I ought to skin you alive and fry you for bacon! Thomas, Cathy didn’t call the housekeeper this morning! They have a strict routine where they talk at the same time every day! Something’s wrong!”

  A chill went down my spine. “Keep the girls occupied. I’m going to the Nettie place.”

  “I’m calling Pike. He’ll organize a search and rescue—”

  “Not yet,” I said as I headed out the kitchen’s back door. “Keep it to yourself until I have a chance to search the farm. If we spook Cathy by over-reacting she’ll never trust us again.”

  “But she might be hurt or—”

  “Don’t say it,” I ordered, then ran for my truck.

  I called Cathy’s name until my throat was sore. I went through the cottage, the woods, the barn—nothing. In the Hummer I found empty protein-bar wrappers, empty water bottles, a jumble of blankets, and the keys still in the ignition. A quick try confirmed that the Hummer wouldn’t crank.

  God. I pounded a hand on the hood. “What were you doing out here, Cathy? Did something or someone scare you out of the house?”

  I made one more circuit of the farm, calling her name hoarsely. This time, as I went past the barn, my attention fell on the iced-over pond. Something odd caught my eye. I dropped to my heels beside an area where new ice hadn’t quite thickened to an opaque sheet. Something—or someone—had made a large hole in the ice within the past twenty-four hours. Now it was slowly re-freezing. A limp brown finger protruded from the white surface. I grabbed it and tugged.

  One of Cathy’s leather gloves pulled free.

  She’s in the pond.

  I cannonballed into the pond’s center, shattering the inch-thick ice and landing on the mushy bottom in waist-deep water. The pond was only a few strides across and shallow around the rim. I broke up the ice with my fists, dropped to a crouch, and searched every square foot with methodical sweeps of my arms and feet.

  No corpse. Thank God.

  Gasping, already numb from the cold, I crawled out and searched the area around the pond and barn for more clues. As I staggered, teeth chattering, into the farm’s graceful old driveway, where a hummock of brown winter grass made a median in soft, sandy loam, I saw a footprint heading away from the farm. It was the smallish track of a shoe with a heavy grid. Like a hiking boot. A woman-sized hiking boot.

  Heading down the driveway.

  Dripping icy water, I stumbled to my heater-less truck. My fingers were too stiff to close around the steering wheel. Once I reached the hollow where the farm’s drive intersected Ruby Creek Trail, I got out and searched the dirt again. There. A footprint. And there.

  She had left the farm on foot. I found tracks along the trail for nearly a mile, then none after that. She turned off the trail, but which way? Toward the Cove? Was she trying to take a short cut? Or had someone chased her into the woods? She was probably lost at best, and at worst . . .

  Driving with my palms, shivering so hard I had trouble keeping my foot on the gas pedal, I headed back to the Cove as fast I could push the old truck without bouncing down an embankment into the creek. I needed dry clothes and warm hands, then I’d call in reinforcements and head back to the woods.

  Hang in there, Cathy.

  Cathy

  When I wandered out of the woods and saw the café in the distance, framed by huge mountains in the crisp winter sunshine, its roof welcoming me with funny, life-sized cutouts of prancing reindeer, tears welled in my eyes and I patted myself over the heart. I had a sense of direction. Finally.

  “Heat up some biscuits, Delta,” I shouted into the wind. “The prodigal actress is home from the hills!” My feet were wet and freezing, my legs wobbled, the straps of the gas can and backpack had rubbed sore spots on my shoulders, but by God I’d survived a journey across a thousand miles of uncharted wilderness—or at least seven miles up and down along the steep skirts of Hog Back—without falling off a cliff, getting lost or having to cannibalize a finger or two for food.

  Now if I could just sidle up to the café without anyone noticing, slip inside and talk to Delta in private, I’d preserve some shred of dignity. Delta wouldn’t tell anyone I’d been an idiot.

  I made my way with soggy, shivering stealth along a privet hedge bordering a large garden plot decorated with last season’s scarecrows. I hurried behind some sheds and an old barn where a sign offered SWAP AND THRIFT, then under magnificent old oaks as big as the ones at my house. I spied a few cars in the café’s parking lot and several pick-up trucks out back. No sign of Thomas’s ancient, bottle-nosed rust-hog. Good. While I was proud to show off my hiking instincts, I didn’t want him to know about the Hummer and the cell phone.

  Creeping up behind a storage shed, I peeked at the back doors and windows and delivery porch of the café. What a gently cluttered, friendly and serviceable place. The yard included an old picnic table and weathered Adirondack chairs, the porch was stacked with old vegetable crates, and a fading Drink Coca Cola sign hung over the main kitchen door. Several fat cats appeared from behind shrubs, purr-owing at me sweetly, and a couple of fat dogs peeked out a dog entrance in one of the back doors of the buildings that bordered the café, and then . . .

  The goat arrived.

  He came trotting from the general vicinity of the shade oaks to my left, a shaggy white menace wearing a leather collar like a dog. Banger! Thomas had sent pictures of him. But he never mentioned Banger was a guard goat. Banger glared at me with sinister, marble-glass goat eyes. His jaunty goatee bobbed as he broke into a lope. Stubby horns curled back from his forehead like rockers on an up-ended rocking chair. He lowered his head as he neared me, shaking that horny pompadour at me.

  “Oh, shit,” I whispered.

  I dropped my gas can and ran for the café’s back doors. He cut me off. I dodged between two trucks. He followed at a gallop. I sprinted along one side of the café, hoping to find a side door or maybe a trellis to climb. I rounded a corner and saw a bump-out on the side of the building—some added-on little storage room or something. To my delight, when I reached it, a large, colorful sign on the door welcomed me.

  THE PRIVY OF FINE ART

  Sit Down
, Wash Up, Open Your Mind

  The Privy. Thomas had sent pictures of it, too. A bathroom and a sanctuary. Thank you, God.

  I jumped inside and slammed the door shut behind me just as Banger reached it. Wham. Fumbling in the shadows, I found a light switch. Flick. I spotted an aged hook-and-eye latch. Click. The door was rickety, and the latch was none too reassuring, but I felt safe enough to utter threats. “Beat it, Goat of Satan,” I said through the door. “Or I’ll turn you into a gyro sandwich.”

  Banger butted the door another time or two, then stopped. I listened until I heard his evil little cloven hooves wandering away on the pea gravel. Sagging with relief, I turned around.

  Wildly colored trout and turkeys gazed back at me.

  “This is Noah’s Ark on drugs,” I said in awe. Then my attention went to the electric heater gushing warmth high on the wall, the sink with plenty of paper towels, soap, hot and cold water faucets, and—in a narrow, purple-turkey endowed nook to one side, the beautiful, wonderful flush toilet. With plenty of toilet paper.

  Warmth, warm water, soap, a comfortable place to pee. Heaven.

  I’d be recuperated and presentable when I defied Banger again on my way to find Delta. I allowed myself one glance in the mirror over the sink, winced, then hung my coat over the glass. I laid out a pair of sunglasses and a long wool scarf on the counter next to the sink. I’d don the dark glasses and wrap my head and neck decorously, aiming for a sophisticated look circa 1960, say, Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, only showing a hint of my Phantom of the Opera scars.

  I shucked boots, socks, wool pants, heavy undershirt, flannel overshirt and mink earmuffs. Dressed in a lacy white bra and the snug, stretchy bottoms of my gray longjohns—which sported a handy removable crotch with Velcro fasteners—I grabbed a handful of paper towels. With one raucous tug the crotch piece of my longjohns joined the pile of clothes in the floor. I glanced down at my small brunette triangle framed in a gray cloth keyhole. My pubes had a front seat window at the car wash.

  I filled the sink basin with delicious, warm, soapy water then washed myself as contentedly as a wren in a birdbath. Except for avoiding the scars down the right side of my body—a habit I’d perfected—I almost felt relaxed.

  Afterwards I lounged on the trout-decorated commode seat, still dressed in nothing but the bra and crotchless longjohns’ bottoms, with one chilled foot propped on the opposite knee. I rubbed some pink back into my toes while I let my socks dry a little more. Suddenly I heard several sounds outside in quick succession: A loud engine, silence, a slammed car door, and heavy feet on gravel, heading my way.

  I didn’t even have time to yell. My invader slammed into the bathroom door. The latch popped out of the frame. The door swung inward and bounced off the opposite wall.

  Thomas nearly fell inside.

  Soaked, shivering, dripping water from his beard, his hair, and all his clothing, he brought a whirl of icy air with him. He kicked the door shut then hunched over the sink, trying to grip the rim with splayed hands.

  By then I was frantically scrambling for my gray stretch top and flannel shirt. Not to mention the crotch piece of my longjohns. A dilemma—what should I cover first—my exposed groin or the scars that framed the right side of my body from head to foot? Thankfully, since I was tucked in the folk-art nook of the commode, I was the last thing he noticed.

  When he finally turned and saw me, he uttered a hoarse sound that was either pure frustration or relief or both. His teeth were chattering too hard to let him speak. He flung a bare hand atop my bare shoulder. I didn’t know if he was patting me in appreciation or thumping me in disgust. Either way, the icy stiffness of his hand alarmed me. Clutching my clothes to my flimsy bra and naked groin, I stared at him in dawning fear. “What did you do?” I asked. “Take a dive in the creek? Your skin is blue.”

  He studied me as if I were a mirage while struggling to tug something from his coat pocket. Finally he produced a sodden brown glove. My heart sank as I recognized it. “Oh, no. You went to the farm to look for me. You thought I drowned in the pond?”

  He nodded.

  Screw modesty. I tied my flannel shirt around my waist like a skirt to hide my pubes. Trying to ignore the fact that my breasts were barely covered by the bra and that every ugly rivulet of scar tissue could easily be seen along the right side of my face, neck, arm and torso, I used my undershirt to towel Thomas’s wet hair. He hunched forward helpfully, his face inches from my breasts, and when I muttered, “Enjoying the view?” he chuckled. The castanet rhythm of his teeth made an interesting accompaniment.

  I shoved his coat off his shoulders, revealing an old New York Giants football jersey underneath. The coat landed with a heavy, wet thud. I jerked my coat off the bathroom mirror and flung it around his shoulders. Then I grabbed his shaking hands and guided them into the basin full of warm water. “When you’re warm enough to talk, you can yell at me for causing you even more trouble,” I told him. “But I didn’t ask you to worry about me. Ever.” He pulled his hands from the water, holding mine, then brought my hands to his chest and shook his head at me.

  Sign language. It’s hopeless. I can’t help myself.

  I looked up at him in abject wonder. Where had he been all my life, and why couldn’t I have found him before I turned into a scarred bundle of neuroses? Ice-cold water dripped off his beard onto my fingers. I wound my hands around the beard’s soggy mass and tugged hard. “It’s a marvel you didn’t drown from the weight of this . . . pelt. I gave up my ski mask at your request. Now you give up this furry albatross. You might as well. It’s going to turn into a chunk of hairy ice if you don’t.”

  He frowned, shivered, shook his head, but I tugged on the beard again and he finally shrugged. I squatted by my back pack, prowled through the protein bars, then stood holding a huge pocket knife. I flicked a six-inch steel blade open. “Boy Scouts would knock over old ladies for this baby,” I intoned. I twisted his beard into a fat tourniquet just below his chin and sawed it like a thick rope. When the last strands parted I raised eighteen inches of sodden brown beard like a victory scalp. He looked at it forlornly.

  I snorted. “If it’s any consolation, you still have plenty of beard left. Shape it up, give it a nice henna rinse, and you could pass for a liberal arts professor or a roadie for Lynyrd Skynyrd. Especially with the ponytail.”

  “‘F-Freebird’ r-rocks.”

  “Ah hah. A Lynyrd Skynyrd aficionado, I see. I’m impressed, Yankee.”

  After tossing a pile of wet beard in the trash can I ran more hot water in the sink. “Keep your hands in that. I’m going for help at the cafe. I’ll be right back.”

  His gaze went to my bra, then back to my face. He was very good at pretending not to look at my scarred arm or the puckered, discolored flesh that swarmed from my armpit downward, disappearing where my right hip was covered by the longjohns.

  “Yes, I really should put my shirt on before heading into the café,” I said grimly. “In the meantime—” I waggled my pronged fingers from his eyes to mine—“Put your eyes right up here, buddy. Right here.” He arched a brow but complied. I whipped the flannel shirt from around my waist, put it on, buttoned it, grabbed my trousers, pulled them on, jammed my bare feet into my damp hiking boots, then plucked my crotchpiece from the floor. I tucked it like a bib into the collar of his drenched football jersey. “A souvenir for you. Maybe it’ll wick up some of the water dripping off what’s left of your beard.”

  Just a hint of a wry smile began to pull at one corner of his mouth. His lips were starting to lose their blue tinge. He had a good, wide, full mouth. “This would be more fun . . .” he said slowly, his teeth clicking, “if it was one of those movies . . . where we get naked to share . . . body heat.”

  I picked up my scarf, the scarf I had planned to use to hide the scarred side of my face when I met Delta. Instead I dried Thomas’s face with the soft woolen ends, then wrapped the scarf around his neck. He was gallant to flirt, but then he was a
gallant man. I shrank back inside my ugly skin. “Sorry, but this is one of those movies where I have to out-maneuver a crazed goat to bring you some towels and dry clothes instead.”

  “D-damn,” he said.

  Banger gave the chase his best effort, but I made it to the back steps of the café a good stride ahead of his evil little horns. Bounding onto the cluttered porch with him right behind me, I jerked the kitchen’s screen door open then the white-washed wooden door behind it. With no warning and not so much as a ‘May I come in?’ I bolted inside. The door slammed shut behind me, and Banger’s head thudded on its bottom panel.

  Three people popped their heads over the top shelf of a prep bar, gaping at me. It’s not as if a coatless, disheveled stranger in rumpled hiking clothes should provoke alarm when she leaps into a kitchen unannounced. I stared back at them while I caught my breath. Thomas had sent me so many pictures of Delta’s family that I knew all three of them on sight: Little, brown-haired Cleo, fortyish and freckled, with her gold cross pendant and ‘What Would Jesus Do’ bracelets; big, solemn Jeb, with a military tattoo on one forearm and a head full of dark hair he wore in an unashamed mullet; and his wife Becka, a tall redhead with four tiny gold hoops in one year and three diamond studs in the other.

  But from their startled looks they not only didn’t know who I might be, they expected me to pull a gun and rob the place. “Hello,” I finally managed between breaths. “I know this may come as a surprise, but I’m—”

  My voice trailed off as Delta rushed into the kitchen. She didn’t see me at first. Her head was cocked to one side and she was deep in conversation on a portable phone. “I told Thomas I’d give him time to go look for her up at Mary Eve’s place,” she was saying, “but he’s been gone too long and I’m not waiting another second. Pike, she may have fallen off a cliff for all we know. She might be lost in the woods, freezing! You call out everybody you can muster. Get the forestry service helicopter! Get the tracking dogs! Cathy’s a city girl, and she’s about as helpless as a kitten, a little, newborn kitten—”