by Destiny Ford
Annie shook her head slightly. “He has a pulse, but barely. And he’s not breathing well. I think he had a heart attack.”
They loaded him into the back of the ambulance and took off.
I got pictures of the aftermath and asked what the eyewitnesses had seen. “He plum lost control!” Lee Paulson said. “Just slumped over and drove right into the lemonade stand. Thank the good Lord my little LarLee was in getting drink refills, or she would have been plowed straight over.”
I nodded, thinking that LarLee was seriously going to hate that name when she grew up—if she didn’t already. I silently thanked my parents for giving me a normal moniker, and not some weird name combination. I suspected that like many kids in Utah, LarLee came from a combination of her parents’ names: Lee, and his wife Skylar. “I’m glad LarLee is safe. Did you see anything else strange?”
He shook his head. “He was clutchin’ his chest before he drove into the stand. Looked like a heart problem to me.”
The other eyewitnesses concurred.
After the commotion was over, the parade ended abruptly. On my walk back to the Tribune office, where my car was parked, I heard some people commenting on Opie’s condition, but most were just expressing their concern over his health and hoping he’d be okay. I agreed. My grandpa had died from a heart attack, so I understood their worry, and hoped the doctors would be able to help him.
The parade is the kick-off for the county fair celebrations. There’s a rodeo, carnival rides, livestock auctions, booths to peruse, and enough greasy fair food to make your internal organs run away in terror. One of the more popular events is always the fair competitions. People enter everything from pies, to quilts, to artwork. The items are judged, and winners sent on to compete at the state fair level.
I always enjoyed walking through the buildings to see what people with far more talent than me had made. My mom usually walked around with me. I think she secretly hoped I’d acquire everyone’s domestic and crafting abilities by osmosis.
I stood outside the building where the food was being judged, waiting for her. We usually went there first because she wanted to chat with everyone about her lemon-drop cookies, the legendary, grand prize fair cookie winner every year for the past ten years. She was the queen of cookies, and she loved the attention.
I checked my watch. The heart attack story had put me behind by about thirty minutes, but I’d texted her to let her know. Even with my text, she was fifteen minutes late. That was unlike her . . . unless there’d been an incident. I took a long, deep breath. I really hoped there hadn’t been an incident.
There hadn’t.
Yet.
But there was about to be.
When I was nine, Mary Ann Boggs had written, “Rosses are red, violets are blue, I turned out perfict what happened to you” in my yearbook. I’d returned the favor by writing, “At least I can spell, you stupid butthole.”
That had resulted in a phone call from Mary Ann’s mom berating my dirty mouth and questioning my mom’s parenting abilities. Despite my attempts to show my mom the yearbook signature to prove I had just cause for my profanity, and Mary Ann actually was a stupid butthole, my mom didn’t see things my way. She’d turned into a red-faced, female fury in a pink checkered skirt and pantyhose. I maintained that the pantyhose were probably the biggest part of the reason she was so angry, and had she not been wearing them, my sentence might have been less harsh. But, thanks to the demon who invented hosiery, she’d washed my mouth out with soap—I still hadn’t forgiven her—and told me never to use that word again. I had, and much worse, but I tried to be careful about swearing in her presence. It was the one time I’d seen her truly out of her mind with rage in my whole life.
Until now.
Sophie Saxee, whose adventures entertained Branson residents almost as much as my love life, was stalking across the fairgrounds like a female Moses, parting crowds with her expression alone. People knew what she was capable of, and didn’t want to be caught in the crosshairs. Frankly, I didn’t blame them.
She caught my eye, and started stomping in my direction. I measured the merits of leaving and pretending I didn’t see her with what would surely be a lecture—and probably attempted spanking—when she eventually found me. I was fairly certain I could outrun her, but I decided to hold my ground, mostly because I was intensely curious at what could have caused a butthole-grade expression. I was pretty sure it wasn’t me . . . at least, I hoped not. I mentally reviewed the previous week and couldn’t think of anything exceedingly heinous.
“In all my years,” she fumed, coming to a sudden stop in front of me. Her face was bright red and she was shifting back and forth on her feet like a barely contained bomb. “I’ve never dealt with such horrid manners.”
I narrowed my eyes. “What’s going on, Mom?”
“Ridiculous nonsense! That man is a . . . a . . .” She looked to me, her eyes pleading for help. I had plenty of words to offer, but didn’t want my mouth washed out with soap again. “A NINCOMPOOP!” she yelled, happy to have found a sufficient descriptor. “He doesn’t know cookies from toilet paper!”
“Who?” I asked, completely befuddled.
“That gosh darn idiot judging the cookies!”
I stepped back, out of her rage circumference. “Gosh” and “darn” were big words for my mom. They were imitation swears that, when combined, imitated the worst possible swear next to the F word. Mom rarely used the imitators, and never used the actual words. She’d just put two imitators together. This was the word equivalent of an explosion. “What happened?” I asked, putting my hand on her shoulder, trying to soothe her.
“I’ll tell you what happened,” she said, her eyes squinting as she folded her arms over her chest, shoulders back and head high. “Ryan Miles, and all the other dumb judges, have no taste buds. That’s what happened.”
I stared at her, everything suddenly sinking in. “Are you saying your cookies didn’t win?”
“My. Cookies. Didn’t. Win.” She ground out. “And the gosh darn ones that did win are a new entry!” She was so angry, she sputtered the words. “A new entry! Can you believe that nonsense?”
A debutante winning was almost as much of a travesty as my mom’s loss. If there’s one thing that can always be counted on in small towns, it’s tradition and heritage. To have a newcomer overtake the reigning ten year champion was unheard of. She was a legacy, and her legacy had just been squashed. If I didn’t calm her down soon, there was no telling what she’d do next.
I didn’t think it was possible, but my mom’s face seemed to be getting even redder. “Maybe we should leave,” I said, really hoping she’d agree to go home and relax in the shade of their beautiful, red-hued garden with a nice iced tea.
Her eyes darted around the fairgrounds like a laser looking for its target. “Leave?” she said, her voice getting more and more shrill with each syllable, “Leave?” She stomped her foot. “Leaving is the last thing I’ll do. I’m staying right here, and I’m going to find those usurpers!” She grabbed my hand and started dragging me into the building with all of the vendor displays.
The building was packed. At first, I thought it was just busy in general. The mostly empty booths told me otherwise. The commotion, and all of the traffic, seemed to be centered on one area. And my mom was dragging me straight to it. I looked at the festive blue sign above the booth: Saints and Sinners Cookies. So good, you’ll think they’re a sin.
My mom saw the tag line at the same time I did. “Saints and Sinners? So good you’ll think they’re a sin? Sin!!!” she shrieked. My eyes widened. This had escalated way past a butthole reaction. I didn’t think I would have gotten this level of anger even if I’d called Mary Ann the F word. “I’m not a sinner! And my cookies are far better than this doo-doo!”
People toward the back of the crowd turned to stare at her like she was nuts. Given the crazed look in her eyes, I’d probably have agreed with them. “Mom, why don’t we go outside and get some
air. Maybe even go home and see how Dad’s doing?” And, I thought privately, find a valium, or tranquilizer—anything to calm her down.
“These people stole your heritage, Kate! They’re the cookie prize thieves! They entered their horrible treats in the fair, and,” she screeched, flailing her hands in all directions, “they got a gosh darn booth!” A vein on my mom’s neck looked like it might pop. “The lemon-drop recipe has been in our family for years! These…ninnies,” she hissed, waving a hand in the general direction of the booth, “don’t know who they’re messing with! They’re evil. Eeevvviiill!”
Judging by the size of the line, and the glares my mom was getting for insulting the cookies, it was clear not everyone shared my mom’s sentiments. Some seemed ready to defend the Saints and Sinners Cookies. I tried to pull her away before something unfortunate happened. “Mom, maybe we should go. There’s nothing you can do here.”
“Heya, Katie!”
I turned and saw Ella, the volunteer archivist for the Tribune. She was seventy-five, but had the mind of a fourteen-year old. She was holding a bag of Saints and Sinners Cookies in one hand, and a chocolate covered cookie in the other. Judging by the gleam in her amber colored eyes, she looked mighty happy about her purchase. “Hey, Ella.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my mom staring at Ella’s cookies, and I swear steam started coming out of her nose like she was about to turn into a real-life cookie scorching dragon. I grabbed my mom’s upper arm to try to hold her in place, and then turned back to Ella. “How are you?”
“Great, now! Finally got my cookies.” She held up a bag that looked heavy enough to make her fall over. I had no idea what she planned to do with all of those cookies, but I hoped the answer wasn’t eat them, or she’d probably end up in the hospital. “Best darn cookies I’ve ever had.”
My mom had been maintaining until that point—to a degree—but with Ella’s declaration, Mom lunged straight for Ella. Ella yelped as my mom grabbed the cookie bag from Ella’s hand, threw it on the ground, and started jumping around, stomping it to a hundred little pieces.
“Hey!” Ella cried, looking at the cookie destruction.
“Mom!” I yelled.
Using her crazy eyes again, she parted the crowd, an impressive feat. “What are you going to do?” I asked.
She looked at me over her shoulder, her face screwed up in fury. “What am I going to do?” she asked, her voice rising with each word. “I’ll tell you what I’m going to do! I’m going to buy some of those cookies, and figure out what the fudge everyone sees in them!”
My mouth fell open at the word “fudge” and what swear it represented. She’d never used such an aggressive imitation swear in my whole life. She marched to the front of the booth, and demanded her gosh darn cookies.
After some whispers and flat out insults from people on the way back to the car—I swear I heard the word “hussy” in there, which really wasn’t fair considering a. I hadn’t been involved in the cookie debacle at all, b. hussy didn’t apply to the situation, and c. I wasn’t a hussy, despite what everyone said—I got my mom to her car without further incident. Although she refused to let me take her bag of cookies from her. Demanding to know what would put them above her status as cookie queen, she was determined to go home and dissect them, piece by little piece.
I gave up, and texted my dad to give him a summary of the events. Thanks to his police scanner, he’d already heard about his wife trying to kill cookies. I imagined he was probably making a strong drink. Which was a totally unapproved coping mechanism for most people in Branson, but my parents weren’t Mormon, so they could get away with it. Plus, even if they had been, I was fairly certain God would forgive my dad the alcohol since my dad was the one who routinely had to deal with my mom.
After I dropped my mom off, leaving her ‘crazy’ in my dad’s capable hands, I stopped and got some cheese smothered breadsticks from Sticks and Pie. I drove home, looking forward to my couch. It had been a long day, and I had cherry chocolate chip ice cream in the freezer, and a Sons of Anarchy episode waiting for me on my Netflix queue. The thought of bad boy Jax made me think of the bad boy in my own life and I shivered, despite the heat. I could totally justify Hawke’s potential contract killing if he had an ass like Jax Teller’s—and he did. Situational ethics at its best.
I’d just turned on the episode and grabbed my first gooey breadstick when my phone started playing “Forever in Blue Jeans.” It wasn’t my night to be on call for breaking news—which rarely happened unless it involved my mom—so whatever reason Spence was calling for must be important. I muttered a string of swear words—not the imitation kind—and answered. “Hey, Spence.”
“I’m sorry to bug you, but there’s a pile up on Main Street.”
I took my phone from my ear and stared at it, sure I hadn’t heard him right. “Do you mean a pile up on the freeway? Because that would actually make sense.”
“Nope. Main Street. Can you cover it?”
My eyes went from my breadsticks to the TV longingly, and I sighed. “Yeah, I can. You okay?” Spence was the person on call tonight.
“Yeah,” he said, the hint of a smile in his tone. “I’m just busy at the moment.”
That got my attention. “Busy with what?” I asked, genuinely curious. Spence didn’t have a lot of friends in town. I think it was partly because he was nervous to let his guard down. He wouldn’t be looked on kindly if anyone else found out he was gay.
“Nothing you need to know about right now.”
I heard a low laugh in the background and narrowed my eyes. I’d be interrogating him more about that later. “Fine. Where on Main Street?” Main Street ran the entire length of town and encompassed everything from businesses to farms.
“By the four-way stop. It will be hard to miss.”
That sounded promising. “Okay. I’ll take care of it.” I swiped my phone off and gave one last yearning look at Jax before hitting the power button on the TV, putting my remaining breadsticks in the fridge, and leaving for the four-way stop.
Spence was right. I couldn’t have missed it if I’d tried. A giant piece of brightly colored fabric was draped across both lanes of traffic, and over the field next to it. Based on the fire trucks spraying it down, and the smoke coming off of it, the fabric had recently been on fire. In the midst of that, four cars were piled up on one side of the fabric, crushed together like a demolition derby, and three more cars were smashed in a similar manner on the other side.
I stared at the scene, trying to piece it together. It looked like a circus tent had spontaneously combusted on the road. I checked the cars for my mom’s make and model. This looked like something she could have caused if she’d escaped my dad’s watch. Luckily, I didn’t see her truck. I finally gave up trying to deconstruct the scene, and went to find Officer Bob. I was sure he’d be there, he always was. I was right.
“What in the world happened, Bobby?” I asked, walking up to him and snapping some pictures.
“Chaos,” he answered, looking over the scene. “As usual.”
I gave another wary look around as I kept taking photos. “My mom’s not here, is she?” My mom had a reputation for getting in the strangest predicaments and causing all kinds of trouble. People in town even had a nickname for her: Catasophie, a combination of “Catastrophe” and “Sophie.”
“Nope. Not this time. Too bad, though. She usually has treats for us. And I could really use a treat.”
I heard a noise that sounded like a cross between a hyena and a bird, and looked around trying to identify it. I saw plenty of people, but no species hybrids. I turned my attention back to Bobby. “What’s the fabric doing on the ground?”
“Not flyin’, that’s for sure.”
I looked at it again. In front of one of the cars, I saw a large lump under the fabric and realized what I was seeing. My eyes widened with the knowledge. “A hot air balloon crashed?”
“And burned.”
I didn’t even
think we had hot air balloons in Branson. “Where did it come from?”
“The fair.”
That made a little more sense. “Why did it crash?”
He made a hmmph noise like he was utterly disgusted. “Because the darn pilot didn’t know diddly-squat about flyin’ a hot air balloon.”
Bob’s answer implied he did know diddly about flying a hot air balloon. I questioned whether or not that was actually the case. “So what went wrong?”
He hitched up his pants before crossing his arms over his chest. “We got a call that one of the hot air balloons at the fair had been stolen. Bunch a nutballs think watchin’ a couple episodes about balloon flyin’ on TV gives them enough knowledge to pilot a balloon.” I suspected that’s exactly where Bob’s balloon knowledge had come from, but didn’t say so. “The thief learned quick that it’s not as easy as it seems. We got calls about a balloon flyin’ real low. Near as we can tell, he must’ve released the hot air too fast from the parachute valve and came down like a sack of flour.”
I widened my eyes. “Was anyone hurt?”
“The balloon was flyin’ low enough that it wasn’t a huge drop. And crops in the field helped cushion the fall. The people in cars that had to swerve to miss the balloon were worse-off than the balloon thief, but no one’s seriously hurt.”
That was a relief. And I already had a working headline: Balloon Bandit. I heard the hyena noise again and wondered if I was hearing things. Last I checked, we didn’t have hyenas in rural Utah. I shook my head and turned back to Bob. “Who stole the balloon?”
“Well,” Bob said, his jaw shifting to the side as he bit his lip, looking confused, “that’s the funny thing. It was Fred Young.”
My eyes went as wide as saucers. “The Third Ward bishop?” Members of the Mormon Church are divided into wards based on where their homes are located, and every ward is presided over by a male bishop—the man who’s supposed to be a shining example of righteousness to all other ward members. Fred Young was one of them. And he was one of the most serious, soft-spoken men I’d ever met. He definitely didn’t seem like the Balloon Bandit type.