by Ashlyn Chase
Dawn asked Luca if she could borrow his car. He wanted to go with her, and it was all she could do, short of tying him up, to get him to stay in bed. He was nearly healed, thanks to his paranormal abilities, but his parents insisted he stay home for the rest of the week, since recovering so quickly would raise red flags. The police department’s doctor had prescribed bed rest and told him he wanted to see him in a week’s time.
Over breakfast, when Luca worried about getting fired after only a few weeks on the job, Gabriella wisely changed the subject before Antonio could launch into another diatribe against Butts and the police department. His parents had been vocally against Luca’s getting involved in law enforcement, but now that he was there—and saying he loved the job—they were trying to be supportive. Some times with more success than other times.
Before Dawn drove to the prison, she thought about what she’d say to her mom. Would she tell her about Luca being a cop or just say she was dating someone? Better to keep things in as general terms as possible.
She stopped off to see Annette at the rehab before hitting the highway. Framingham wasn’t far, only about forty minutes depending on traffic, but she wanted to make sure her grandmother was okay, and she wanted to tell her where she was heading.
Annette said, “Give my love to Lissie, and tell her I’m fine. She’s been calling here whenever she can to check on me, poor thing. She blames herself for our circumstances.” Annette stopped talking to wipe her tears and blow her nose. “Told me when she gets out, she’ll get a good job and work to make our lives better.”
Dawn reserved judgment on that one. Her mother had said stuff like that in the past. Many times. But her jobs never lasted more than a few weeks before she started using again or she fell into some big scam or drug deal. This was her second stint at Framingham, and this time, she was actually getting somewhere with counselling. It was one thing to detox, another to actually own your shit and right your wrongs.
Dawn hugged her grandmother and told her she’d text her when she got there. When she got to Luca’s car, a familiar figure was leaning against the driver’s side door.
“Hiya!”
“Lynda. What are you doing here? My appointment with you isn’t until Friday.”
“Well, I thought I’d just pop by to see how you’re doing.”
Lynda was in full regalia—skinny jeans with bling up and down the seams, a red sweater, and a sleek black jacket. Not to mention the sky-high stacked black boots she had on.
“Wow! You look…” Dawn grinned.
“Thanks! I thought I’d go along with you for the drive at least.” Lynda grinned back.
“Hop in.”
Dawn filled Lynda in on her vision of Mandy at the zoo and then Luca getting hit on the head.
“Do you think it was that Ice Spider and his gang?” Lynda asked, offering her a crinkly chip bag. Dawn grabbed one and popped it into her mouth.
After munching and swallowing the chip, she said, “I’m positive it was them. They obviously moved her, and I don’t know where they’ve taken her—yet, that is. It seems like they’re always one step ahead.”
Lynda seemed to ponder that one for a moment. “Do you think Ice will come after you?”
“He hasn’t so far. Just a couple of warnings. I think he’s lying low. Trying to figure out how to deal with this one. He could have killed Mandy right off the bat, but he didn’t.” Dawn shuddered at the thought of the child being murdered. “Maybe she’s his insurance policy if the cops catch him? Who knows. But the sooner I figure out where she is, the better I’ll feel.”
“You’ve got a lot on your plate, Dawn.”
“Yeah, what else is new? I’ve got Gran in the hospital, my mom in prison, Luca stuck at his home with a concussion, and I still need to find Mandy.” Dawn blew out a breath.
“Didn’t Minerva give you advice on destressing?”
“Yeah, but that doesn’t change anything.”
“Of course it changes everything.” Lynda shook her finger. “No matter what happens, you need to take care of you. Your center, your core is the light. Don’t let it go out. That’s why you need to meditate every day, morning and night. Have you been doing that?”
Dawn cringed. “Not really. At least not since Luca got hurt. I’ve been staying at the Fierros’ place all week.”
“You can still meditate. You can get up a few minutes early. Excuse yourself for a few minutes before you go to bed. You have to commit to it.”
“I am committed to it,” Dawn said indignantly. “I volunteer at the Youth Community Center, I am trying to help find Mandy, and I’m trying my best to be a good person.”
“You are a good person, Dawn,” Lynda said gently, patting her knee. “But it’s not just about doing good deeds. Lots of people do good deeds, and they lead miserable lives. You have to find a way to balance your deeds with who you are and how you feel. No matter what happens in your life, you need to know that inside, your soul will not change. You are constant.”
“Okay, I get it. Being centered and all that. The difference between intention and actually doing and being. That’s always been my mom’s problem.”
“The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”
Dawn glanced at Lynda. “My gran always says that. Do you believe in heaven and hell? Or good and evil?”
“You mean the big guy upstairs and the hottie in the basement?” Lynda grinned. “I can’t tell you about the afterlife. We’re all sworn to secrecy, but I can tell you the battle between good and evil isn’t like the ongoing battle between Coca-Cola and Pepsi.”
Dawn chuckled at that. Lynda’s humor was a welcome relief.
“By the way, you’re doing great at the community center. Tansy gave me a glowing report about you.”
“She did?”
“Yes, she did.”
“So why were you yelling at me about meditating a few minutes ago?”
“I don’t yell. I never yell. I just gently reminded you to stay on track.”
“Am I really making a difference?”
“You are. You can’t imagine the impact you’ve had on Rita.”
“I really like her. She’s a good kid.”
“More important, she’s going to pay it forward and be there for Joanie when Joanie needs a good friend.”
Dawn’s eyes widened. “You mean the tough girl with the tats and the skull earrings?”
Lynda nodded. “Yes. Joanie was the one who needed help. And your support of Rita gave her the confidence to reach out.”
“Well, I’ll be damned. I told her to be careful around Joanie.”
Lynda chuckled. “You also reassured her about her own strengths. Joanie confided in her about something very traumatic, and Rita spoke with Tansy. They’re getting Joanie the help she needs.”
“But that wasn’t my doing.” Dawn swallowed the lump in her throat. “I thought Joanie was bad news.”
“You set everything in motion. You were an agent of karmic change, and that is truly a feat. Sometimes you’ll never know what little things you did or said that made a difference.”
A tear streamed down Dawn’s cheek. “If I’m so psychically centered, how come I couldn’t see that about Joanie?”
“Maybe because you were a lot like Joanie? You couldn’t sense what she was going through, but you projected your fears about what your life could have been. You just saw a tough girl, like the tough girl you used to be?”
Dawn blew out a breath. “Okay, I get it. I get it.”
“So that’s why I need you to stay focused and keep doing your meditation. If you’re in a good place, the impact you have on others is unique and positive.”
Dawn didn’t say anything to that. But it sure felt good.
A few minutes later, she pulled into the visitor parking lot at the prison.
“Well, this is my cue to leave.”
“You don’t want to come into the prison? You might get some fashion ideas…orange is the new black and all that.”
“I have too many former and future clients in there,” Lynda said with a sigh.
“Shoot. I never thought of that. You probably get a lot of business from places like this.”
“I wish even more of them asked for help and meant it with all their hearts.”
“Can you tell me if my mom—”
Lynda held up one hand to stop her. “That’s up to her, and don’t forget your own sworn secrecy. The best thing you can do is to continue the power of your example.”
“Understood.”
They got out of the car, and Lynda wrapped her arms around Dawn for a tight hug. “You’ve got this.”
Dawn hugged her back and walked to the entrance. As she approached the sliding doors, she turned to wave at Lynda, but her karma caseworker had already disappeared.
* * *
“You’re just in time for birthday cake,” Dawn’s mother said.
“Seriously? They give you birthday cakes?”
She smirked. “No, sweetie. I’m sorry. I’m just being a smart-ass. See Thomasina? She’s the young woman over there.”
Dawn glanced in the direction her mom was pointing. A petite African-American girl was chatting animatedly with her visitor.
“She looks like a teenager.”
“She just turned nineteen today.”
“Oh no. What’s she in for?” Dawn turned back to face her mom. They were seated at a corner table by the window. The sun was streaming in through the glass pane, giving her mother’s brown hair a soft halo effect. Dawn sometimes forgot just how young her mom truly was. Only sixteen when she had Dawn, Lissie was now thirty-eight. Dawn didn’t think prison would have such a positive impact on her mom, or was it that her mother was actually clean and coherent for the first time in, like, ever?
“She stabbed and killed her pimp. She’s kind of a hero around here, but she’s not a violent person. He raped and beat her one too many times. Everyone has a breaking point. And get this…she wants to become a pastor.”
“Wow, that’s amazing.”
“Yeah, it is pretty amazing. She’s been counselling me as part of her experiment…to see if she’s any good at it.”
“Is it going well?”
Lissie nodded. “That girl is only nineteen, but she’s an old soul. She’s getting me to admit things I knew were wrong and remember things I blocked out.”
“Like what?” Dawn really wanted to know. A part of her had held onto her anger toward her mother for a long time. But maybe it was time to let go of that anger, if her mom was ready to meet her halfway.
“I blamed my circumstances on you and Annette. I felt sorry for myself. I couldn’t stay at any job longer than a few days, because I didn’t want to…and not because I lacked an education. I always ended up back on the street, dealing. I’m ashamed of what I did, but most of all, I’m ashamed of how I treated you, my own daughter and my mother. I let you both down so many times. For that, I am so very sorry.”
Dawn wanted to wrap her arm around her mom’s slender shoulders, but on opposite sides of the table, it would have to wait until they said goodbye. She could see her mother trembling, the emotion overtaking her.
“Has the drug counseling helped you?”
Lissie’s eyes filled with tears. “Yes. It’s helped me now that I’m taking it seriously. I doubt I’d have lived much longer going the way I was… I’m so glad you’re here, punkin.”
Punkin was what Lissie had called Dawn for as long as Dawn could remember. Lissie said she’d started calling her that after they went to a pumpkin patch when Dawn was five years old and Dawn kept saying she wanted the biggest punkin they could find—even though they couldn’t put it on their doorstep. It would have been smashed in minutes.
“What about the other stuff? Are you doing okay with that?”
Lissie nodded. “Better than I thought I would. It’s hard, don’t get me wrong. The psychologist has me doing the journaling thing, but I have to keep the notebook in her office. Nobody wants those thoughts shared with the whole cell block if the journal got stolen. It’s helping, I think. Plus they have an AA and NA group here. They call me on my bullshit. It takes one to know one, as they say. I guess I needed that.”
“I’m so glad, Mom.”
“Punkin, I know I’ve said this before, but I really mean it now. When I get out of here, I’m going to make some major changes.”
“I know. Gran believes in you, and I believe in you too.” Dawn surprised herself. She actually did believe her mom this time. Some kind of shift in her mother’s eyes. They used to look like nobody was home. Now, she was present. Also the way she sat, relaxed instead of half listening and fidgeting in place like she was itching for a fix.
“I’m worried about my mother. Is she really okay?”
“Gran told me you’ve been calling her. She’s doing great. She’s the most popular old lady on the rehab floor and is knitting baby booties for one of the pregnant nurses.”
Lissie giggled and shook her head. “That’s my mother for you. Knitting her way into everyone’s heart.”
“She’s—well, just a good person.” Dawn was about to say something about her gran’s good karma but didn’t want to accidentally give away something she shouldn’t.
“And this young man you’re dating? Is he a good guy?”
“Yes. He has Gran’s stamp of approval.”
“Good. I can’t wait to meet him.”
“You will.” Dawn didn’t say any more than that. Despite her mom’s progress, some ghosts continued to linger. Lynda was right. She did need to meditate and concentrate more on her inner self. Changing karma wasn’t just about doing good deeds. She did feel like she’d turned a corner with Lissie, and that was a relief. One that she hadn’t felt in a long time.
* * *
“Hey you!”
Dawn turned toward the voice shouting at her. She’d just parked Luca’s car on a side street and was making her way back to the Fierros’ home.
“I know you. You’re Luca’s girl, right?”
Dawn recognized Jack Richardson, Mandy’s father, walking toward her. “Yeah. Can I help you with something?”
“Uh, yeah. You still have my daughter’s unicorn.”
Dawn worried her lip.
Dressed in wrinkled jeans and jacket, he looked like he’d slept in his clothes, at least what little sleep he did get. The poor man had bags under his eyes the size of craters.
“Yes, I still have it. Would you like it back?”
“You were supposed to find her. That’s why I gave Fierro the unicorn. He said you could help. That was two weeks ago. What happened?” He looked anxious and hurt, his eyes holding the pain of a man who’d lost far too much and couldn’t afford to lose anything more.
Dawn blew out a breath. “Can we go somewhere to talk?”
Mandy’s father ran his hands through his unkempt hair. “Yeah, I live just around the corner.”
Dawn nodded. This is it. I finally get a chance to go inside Mandy’s home.
A few minutes later, Dawn was sitting in the Richardsons’ kitchen. For all of Jack’s rumpled state, his house was immaculate, as though he was channeling all his grief into cleaning—or maybe he had a housekeeper.
Dawn could feel the energy swirling around her. Could she convince Mr. Richardson to let her into Mandy’s room? Sometimes a chance presented itself, and she had to go with her gut. This was one of those times.
“Can I get you a coffee?”
Mr. Richardson was already popping a K-Cup into a Keurig machine.
“Thanks, Mr. Richardson.”
“I only have milk.”
“That’s great, thank
s.”
“Sugar?”
“Yes, please.”
“One or two?”
“Two.”
He finished making her cup and set it down on the table, then sat across from her. “Jack.”
Dawn took a sip of the brew and glanced at him, a question in her eyes.
“My name is Jack. You can call me Jack.”
“Thanks, Jack. My name is Dawn.”
“Dawn, I know Mandy is out there somewhere. Can you help me find her?”
She took another sip of coffee to steel her nerves. “I can only try. This is not an exact science, but being in her home,” she said, glancing around, “is helpful. I can feel Mandy’s energy.”
Jack leaned forward, his eyes alight, like a starving man being offered a steak dinner. “Can you see her?”
“I can sense her but—would you let me into her bedroom?”
He didn’t hesitate. “Come with me.”
Leading her down a hall, he opened the second to last door on the right. “This is Mandy’s room.”
“May I?”
He nodded, and Dawn stepped into the room. She felt light-headed as soon as she crossed the threshold. Turning to him, she whispered, “Can you leave me in here for a few minutes with the door closed?”
Jack hesitated.
“I know you don’t know me, but I swear I won’t take anything.”
“Of course. Forgive me for my city cynicism.” He closed the door, and she heard his footsteps retreat down the hall.
Dawn turned in a slow circle, her eyes taking in everything in the room, from the princess quilt on the bed, to the pink walls, to the large number of stuffed toys lovingly sitting on a shelf, waiting patiently for the little girl whose imagination could bring them to life.
Everything she’d previously seen in her mind was right in front of her.
Dawn sat down on Mandy’s bed and closed her eyes. She began to breathe deeply, in and out… “C’mon, Mandy, show me something.”
A series of images flashed in her mind. A bedroom. A dump, really…drug paraphernalia scattered on the nightstand. A woman was sitting hunched over on a chair. She looked familiar, dirty blonde hair, skinny. She had a badge pinned to her shirt that said HOUSECLEANING STAFF, and below it the name SUZIE BAXTER. Mick’s girlfriend…but where are you, Mandy? Show me.