Willow didn’t seem to mind; in fact, if he remembered right, she’d been pretty forward about making sure he was going to be there for her party. Sure, she’d pulled the coy act, but he’d caught on to her when he saw how she kept peeking at him from the corner of her eye, sending him those ‘come hither’ smiles. And when he showed up with the flowers? Oh yeah. That was a little more than gratitude in her eyes. She was thrilled, and flattered, and she made sure everyone knew it by announcing his gift to the whole crowd. When he was sensitive enough to put the beer in her fridge instead of the cooler, she’d been very, very grateful, and her throaty “thank you” sent a chill of anticipation rippling over his skin, even now.
He took a long swig off the cold bottle in his hand, then pressed the curve of it to his neck, his cheek. Just thinking about her had him working up a sweat.
Not long after the fireworks—amateur, but admittedly fun to watch—Doc, Al, and Ma made their way across the bridge, still jabbering away. They didn’t notice him sitting there in the dark until they were at the steps.
“Donny-boy.”
What a jerk. Doc knew he hated to be called that. One of these days, when Doc wasn’t looking, Donny might just alter his whiskey. Nothing serious, but he would get a kick out of knowing why the old soldier-boy kept making a beeline to the bathroom.
“Ma.” He wouldn’t even acknowledge the two men flanking her.
“Hi, Honey. Sorry you missed the fireworks.” She didn’t sound like she was too sorry about it.
“Didn’t miss them. I sat right here and watched them.”
“Good. I’m glad.” Why was she just standing there at the bottom of the steps?
“I see you didn’t miss your beer, either” Doc drawled, pointing at the bottle in Donny’s hand.
He held it up, brandishing it like a trophy. “You mean, because I had this?” In the light of the lamppost on the driveway, Donny realized that the once-full bottle was nearly half-gone. He’d had more than he’d thought.
“Yep. Think it’s time to put a lid on that one, too.”
“Back off, Doc. This is my house and you’re standing on my property. Maybe you should go on home yourself.” He spoke slowly, but even he heard the slur in his words, each s turned to sh.
Suddenly, Ma was marching up the steps, her finger out, pointing at him. “This is not your house, Donny, and this is not your property. This is my house, and my property. These are my friends, and I don’t want you talking that way to them.”
Her head, backlit from the streetlight, glowed like she wore a halo, but her plump stature denied her efforts to be some kind of an angel of wrath. A gurgling laugh slipped out of his mouth, and the minute it did, he knew he’d made a mistake.
“Give me your keys, Donny.” Ma held out her hand.
“I don’t have them. They’re in the house on the coffee table.” What was she going to do? Lock him inside for the night?
“Perfect.” Edith turned to face the two men waiting and ready to intervene on her behalf. “Gentlemen, thank you for bringing me home. I’m going inside now. Donny, on the other hand, is going to have sleep this off out here. I’m letting you know, just in case I need to call one of you or Eddie to report a break-in.” And with that, Ma spun on her heels, walked inside, and locked the door behind her.
Stunned, Donny stared at the door, waiting for it to open again, for her to tell him she was just trying to teach him a lesson, but it stayed closed. The porch light suddenly flickered on, blinding him so that he had to squeeze his eyes shut for a moment.
Doc waited until Donny opened his eyes again. “I didn’t have any trouble understanding what your mom was saying, did you?” Without waiting for a response, he turned to Al. “Did you understand Edith, Al?”
“Sure did. Looks like Donny’s sleeping out here on the front porch tonight.” Al, not one for confrontation, but one who tried to stand on the right side of things, nodded at the end of his statement, as if adding a visual punctuation mark to his words.
“Yep. That’s what I heard. How about you, Donny?” At least he didn’t call him Donny-boy.
“I heard her.” Besides, he really wasn’t sleepy. His 3-hour nap had given him a second wind, and he was just starting to cool off in the night air. It wouldn’t get below 68 degrees tonight, so he wasn’t worried about being too cold.
“Good. Just making sure we’re all clear on this.” Then Doc and Al, as one unit, turned and walked away.
Donny glared after them, wishing he had a pellet gun so he could pop them both in the backs of their heads. That would teach them to meddle in affairs that weren’t any of their business.
An hour later, the park was quiet. The last of the party-goers had cleared out, and he saw Willow’s patio lights wink off between the trees. Eddie had strolled by about half an hour ago and waved, apparently not surprised to see Donny sprawled in the lounger. Ma must have called him to let him know what was going on.
Feeling restless and a little nauseous, the bottle of Schnapps nearly empty, he decided to take a walk of his own. He stumbled down the steps and turned on the driveway to walk along the front of the original building around which the park was built, The Coach House. It was a huge structure that hovered over the surrounding trailers like a mother hen, but most of it was used for storage or simply left empty, either because it was in disrepair, or because it didn’t have the necessary accoutrements to convert into a living space. But there were two apartments on one side that housed the couple who both worked at the post office—he still couldn’t remember their names—upstairs, and the beautician who lived on the ground floor apartment. She had a partially-enclosed patio right on the stream, and he knew, because he’d made it his business to know, that she had quite a green thumb, too. He hadn’t seen her at the party today, but she had a boyfriend, and her parents lived close by, so maybe she had other plans. She was several years older than he, probably mid-fifties, and he didn’t go for old ladies, but in her younger years, she must have been something else. She still wore big hair, shiny lip gloss, and he was pretty sure her eyelashes, and perhaps a few other body parts, were fake. Nothing wrong with that.
The house was quiet, dark, and the shadows that loitered under the expansive overhang where stagecoaches and horse-drawn buggies, and later cars, pulled under to unload for the evening, seemed to shift and whisper menacingly. Donny picked up his pace, his feet making too much noise on the gravel. He moved to the side of the driveway where weeds turned to grass, and ambled along.
Myra’s place was dark, except for a hanging lamp glowing softly in her front window. There were no lights at Eddie’s trailer, and Donny was glad for the lampposts along the drive giving off some illumination. He’d stumbled along this way many a night before, but tonight, the silent shadows bugged him. Following the curve of the driveway past Eddie’s, Donny crossed the bridge at that end of the park, pausing to listen to the seasonably low water as it gurgled along below him.
There were more lights on at Shelly’s house, the front porch and inside as well, and from his vantage point on the bridge, Donny could see through her half-open blinds. Eddie sat across from Shelly at the round table in her kitchen, a glass of milk in front of each of them, and a plate of cookies between them. They were talking animatedly, and the stupid grin on Eddie’s face told Donny that he was enjoying himself immensely.
He couldn’t stand to look a minute longer. Keeping his footsteps as light as possible, he made his way past her house, turning the bend toward Joe’s. The driveway along the back of the property ran almost parallel to the one up front, forming a large oval that circled around to the other end of the park where the east bridge crossed the stream right past Kathy and Willow’s places to the front again.
Joe’s car was gone, so he must have gone home with his wife. That was a strange set-up, her living in Los Angeles with her kids, him all the way out here. But they insisted it worked just fine for them for now.
The Davis’ always left their porch light
on, but the house was quiet, and Ivan’s truck was parked in the driveway behind his folks’ car. Maybe he was moving back home.
Even Kathy’s place was quiet tonight. The afternoon’s activities must have worn her out. He’d been hoping she was still awake—she may not be very smart, but she was always good for a smoke and some meaningless conversation.
Then he was at Willow’s Elderberry Croft. Stupid name, but he had to admit, it suited her. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine her standing in front of him, but he started to lose his balance and stumbled a little. “Note to self. Don’t close your eyes,” he mumbled.
Making his way to the laundry shed, he dropped down on the step and took another drag off the bottle. He had to squint to make the front steps leading up to her patio come into focus. He was staring intently at them when her kitchen light flipped on. The curtains were drawn, but he could see her silhouette moving around the place.
He and Ms. Willow Goodhope appeared to be the only ones awake on this end of the park. He couldn’t sleep. She apparently couldn’t sleep. Maybe they could not sleep together. Talk about good hope!
Chuckling at his brilliant wit, he pushed himself up, waited for the ground to steady beneath his feet, and made his way slowly across the gravel drive toward her patio. The light flipped off, and another, softer one came on somewhere else in the place. He liked soft lighting just as much as the next guy.
At the front door, he pondered momentarily if he should knock, call her name, or just go on in. He tentatively tried the knob, but found it locked, so he raised his fist and banged on her door so hard it even startled him.
Nothing but silence answered him. He knocked again, a little firmer this time. Maybe she was in the bathroom, and didn’t hear him. “Willow?” he called out. He backed up until he stood in front of the kitchen window and called through the screen. “I know you’re in there. It’s me, Donny.” Maybe she knew some other Donny. “Your neighbor.”
Silence. Now he was getting mad. He hadn’t come all this way–the long way around, to boot–in the middle of the night just to have her ignore him. He knocked again, then leaned his forehead against the door to make it stop moving. “Willowillowillowillow,” he murmured, her name rippling off his tongue in one long word. It sounded to his ears like the water flowing under the bridge, soothing, mysterious. “It’s just me, Willowillowillow. Let me in.”
“Go away, Donny.” Her voice, directly on the other side of the door, startled him, not just because she was so close, but because she spoke firmly, loudly, pulling him up short in the middle of his seduction. Then the porch light switched on, just like Ma’s, blinding him. He covered his eyes and tried again.
“Come on. Ma’s making me sleep on the porch tonight, and I don’t wanna be alone. You’re awake. I’m awake. We can—” His words were cut off by the weight of a thick hand on his shoulder, and then he was spinning, falling, his jaw on fire. Somewhere, he heard the sound of breaking glass, and he wondered how much of the Schnapps had just been wasted on the stone patio.
“Are you all right, Willow? It’s me, Eddie.”
Eddie. Eddie hit him! Donny lay on the ground, his head throbbing. He cracked it pretty hard when he landed, but not enough to knock him out, thanks to the alcohol in his system keeping him loose-limbed and limber. But when he tried to sit up, he thought he might be sick, so he lay back again, keeping his eyes open and focused on the bulk of his big brother standing in the doorway of Willow’s place, talking quietly with her. She’d opened the door to him, the little player.
“Hey!” Another male voice, and footsteps. Donny turned his head slowly to see Doc clomping across the bridge toward him. He snickered at the picture Doc made, walking on his side like that.
A few moments later, Doc and Eddie were hauling him up by his arms, half-leading, half-dragging him off the patio. He threw up in the bushes just on the other side of the stream, in the middle of the driveway right in front of the main house, then again in the dumpster near Eddie’s place. His head was spinning so badly, he couldn’t even tell if he was holding it upright or not. Dropping him unceremoniously on the bottom step of Eddie’s stoop, Eddie and Doc muttered between themselves, and Donny let his head loll against the metal rail.
A few moments later, a police cruiser pulled up into the driveway between Eddie’s place and Myra’s. Doc and Eddie spoke briefly to the officer, then helped maneuver Donny’s limp and uncooperative body into the back of the car. Eddie disappeared, then came back with a trashcan and handed it to him. He also gave him several damp paper towels folded into a neat square.
“Here. To wash your face. I don’t want to give you any water ‘til you get to the station, just in case it makes you hurl again.” Donny lifted his half-shut eyes to his brother’s tolerant face and smiled, several other instances of being in this exact position flashing through his mind.
“I love you, Eddie. Thanks.” Suddenly overwhelmed by emotions, Donny felt tears welling up in his eyes, and his stomach clenched simultaneously. Eddie backed out while Donny dry-heaved over the bucket. There wasn’t much left inside him at this point.
The officer climbed in behind the wheel, turned to eye him over his shoulder, then waved at Doc and Eddie. The cruiser took off, no lights, no sirens, just gravel grinding beneath the wide tires. Donny pressed his cheek to the cool glass of the window and knew nothing more.
~ ~ ~ ~
Chapter 8
Edith sat across the table from Eddie, the growing pile of tissues in her lap a testament to how painful this whole situation was for her. She knew it was the right thing to do. She knew she couldn’t allow him back the way things were. She knew she had to stay firm; but Donny was her baby, and this whole terrible development was breaking her heart.
“Mom, he’s not a little boy anymore. You always say that, but you treat him as though he still is. And a spoiled one at that.” Eddie’s voice was quiet, kind, and Edith nodded. She was glad that he’d been there to handle everything for her.
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“Stop apologizing, Mom. This isn’t your fault, him being in trouble like this.” Eddie reached across the table and patted her hand, awkward with his affection. “Willow isn’t pressing charges, and you aren’t involved either. As the park manager, it all falls on my shoulders, and Doc was a witness to it. Donny made so much noise it even woke Doc up.”
“I’m so glad you made that last walk around the park, Eddie. I can’t—can’t imagine what might have happened if no one stopped him.” She gulped back a sob. “I didn’t realize he’d gotten so bad….” Her voice drifted off and she closed her eyes, shaking her head. “No, that’s not true. I saw it. I just didn’t want to face it.” She sighed again. “No wonder Sheena kicked him out. No wonder.” She plucked another tissue out of the box in front of her and dabbed at the corner of her eyes. “But oh, Eddie, I hope they treat him well. I’ve heard such terrible things about those places.”
“It’s time, Mom. This is the best thing for him. Besides, he could probably use a little rough handling, anyway.”
“No!” Edith gasped, but Eddie laughed.
“You watch too much television, Mom. They’re not going to hurt him, or rough him up, or do anything else besides clean him up and give him the opportunity to make some different decisions.” Eddie stood and returned his Flying J cap to his head, curling the bill absentmindedly, a habit he’d had since he was a little boy. “When he comes out of this, he’ll either thank us, or go back to the way he was, but he won’t be able to blame it on anyone but himself.”
“Well, I’m praying for him every waking moment.” Edith blew her nose and took a deep breath. Then she smiled softly and looked up at Eddie. “You’ve turned into such a fine young man, and I think a certain fine young woman is noticing.”
“Mom. Willow’s—”
“I wasn’t talking about Willow,” she interrupted. “Although she’s a fine young woman, too.”
“Oh.” This time, Eddie’s face li
t up like a beacon, and Edith laughed out loud at his uncharacteristic embarrassment. Maybe there was hope for this little family of hers, after all. Just maybe.
~ ~ ~ ~
AUGUST MEMORIES
Episode 8
~ ~ ~ ~
Chapter 1
Al returned the phone to its cradle on the wall, his other hand clutching the worn fabric of his shirt over his heart. The organ thumped so hard against his ribcage he was sure it was making ready to beat its way out of his body.
But then, maybe that would be better.
We regret to inform you that your wife, Margaret Sue Tanner, passed away in her sleep….
Nothing else the man said—the details, the date, the time of death—none of it really mattered. All he needed to know was that Maggie was gone.
For twenty-six years, he’d lived here in this dive trailer, working his fingers to the bone at the furniture factory, just waiting for his wife to die. Twenty-six years.
It should have taken less than one.
And now, at sixty-nine, there wasn’t much living left in him, either. He’d spent it all on her: his money, his days, his years, his health, and whatever happiness he might have had in life.
A factory worker, that’s all he was. Unskilled, uneducated, and unappreciated by the company he’d given most of his life to. Granted, he hadn’t really given them anything at all. They’d paid him for his time, he made sure of it, and he didn’t come early or stay late, but he showed up every weekday, barring illness or injury, and they knew they could count on him.
Unfortunately, over the years, he’d become ill more often, but with a factory job and his advancing age, coupled with his daily intake of alcohol and cigarettes, no insurance company would look at him, at least not for what he could afford. He lived in a catch-22 world: if he worked, he made too much money for state-funded health care. If he didn’t work, he could qualify for healthcare, but he couldn’t pay his—or Maggie’s—monthly bills. Well, he had to eat, and he needed gas and electricity, and there was always Maggie—always Maggie. So he opted to work.
Elderberry Croft: Volume 3 Page 4