Sunset Over Misty Lake

by Margaret Standafer

  She heard the defensiveness, and the hurt, in his voice.

  “Joe. This is exactly what I didn’t want to happen. I’m not saying these things to put more pressure on you or to make you feel somehow inadequate. We’re in this together. We’re a team. That means the responsibility for our family falls equally on both our shoulders. I meant it when I said considering the job is about more than just money. If our attending thinks I should apply, well, that’s flattering.”

  Joe didn’t look convinced. “I still think we should talk about the coaching jobs. The tutoring seems like a no-brainer. I can work out a schedule with the families that’s convenient.”

  Somehow the conversation had gotten away from her and had taken off on a tangent she hadn’t anticipated. She needed to reel it in.

  “Tutoring sounds like a good idea. I remember when you tutored me in physics.” Karen smiled at the memory. “I aced the class, and it meant even more time together.”

  “Seems like a long time ago, doesn’t it? But then again, like yesterday.”

  Karen nodded, but didn’t allow nostalgia to sidetrack her thoughts.

  “If I’m going to consider the position, and I really want to consider it, then I’ll need to prepare. The interview process won’t be easy and just because Dr. Westrum talked to me about it, that doesn’t mean he didn’t talk to others or that there won’t be outside applicants. I need to have things in order, and I think some further education would help. There’s a nursing conference, a good one, that would be very beneficial. What would you say if I attended? It would mean three days away, but it’s just after school’s out so you’d be home. I’ll talk to my mom and your mom about helping out. Maybe even staying overnight if you think you’d want that. The twins are doing so much better with bottles and they’re actually starting to have something resembling a schedule. I’ll get everything as organized as I can to make it as easy as possible. I know it’s asking a lot, but I really want to do this.” I really need to do this, she added silently.

  Then she held her breath and waited. She watched Joe’s eyes move from side to side and could almost hear his thoughts as he considered, accepted, and rejected. Just when she thought she couldn’t stand it any longer, he broke the silence.

  “I think you should go. If this job is what you want, then you should go.”

  Air whooshed out of her lungs. She couldn’t stop it. And she couldn’t stop from running to Joe and throwing her arms around him.

  “Oh, Joe. Thank you. This is what we need. It will be good for us, I just know it.”

  Joe responded, reassured, but Karen barely heard him and definitely couldn’t answer him.

  She was going back to Las Vegas.

  The next few weeks seemed to fly by. Joe wrapped up the school year, submitted grades, cleaned up his office for the summer hiatus, and scheduled tutoring sessions for eleven students. Once word got out that he was tutoring, more calls and emails had come from parents hoping to get their children some extra help over the summer. Since four were looking for help with AP Chemistry and seven for help with AP Physics, he’d managed to juggle the students’ work schedules and sports schedules and get the four chemistry students in one time slot and fit the seven physics students into one of two time slots. He still needed to work out his lesson plans before the tutoring started the following week. He’d also thrown in his hat for two coaching positions. The assistant coach position with the football team was a job he’d held for three years when he’d first started teaching. He was confident he’d get that job and confident he could do that job. Head coach of the baseball team was another story. While he’d played baseball throughout high school and had spent a year as an assistant with the team, the head coach position was new to him and came with a great deal of responsibility and pressure. He still hadn’t decided if he hoped he’d get that one.

  Now, he was three hours and twelve minutes into his seventy-six hour stretch without Karen. Not that he was counting. Okay, he was counting, but not for the reason he’d expected. He knew he’d miss Karen, and he had no problem admitting she was light years ahead of him when it came to caring for the kids, yet he was eager for his time alone with them. Or, mostly alone with them. He wasn’t a fool. He’d take the help offered him.

  With Dylan napping, Joe had the rare opportunity to do nothing but sit and watch his twins. They were in the living room, the twins on the bright blue and yellow quilt Karen’s grandmother had made for them and that boasted Evan’s name carefully embroidered in one corner, Julia’s in the other. Their feet kicked, their hands waved, and Joe swore they grunted and squeaked back and forth to one another, already working on their twin language.

  How much they’d changed and grown in a couple of months. He’d never admitted it to anyone, but he’d been a little afraid of them at first. So much smaller than Dylan, at least as he remembered Dylan, Joe’d been secretly terrified of handling them wrong, of hurting them. Sure, it hadn’t taken long for those fears to subside, but already they seemed so much stronger and sturdier, it was a relief.

  Julia’s fist swung upward and connected with a toy dangling from the activity gym. She blinked and jerked, as surprised as he was, Joe guessed, by the contact.

  “What happened?” Joe said then batted the toy again to keep it swinging.

  His heart soared when Julia turned to look at him. Her deep blue eyes seemed to soak in the details as they roamed over his face.

  “Oh, my sweet girl. You are going to be as beautiful as your mommy, aren’t you?”

  He stroked a tender finger over her feathery blonde hair then down over her round cheek. She was perfect from head to toe. They all were, and at times the realization that he had three healthy, perfect-to-him children threatened to overwhelm him.

  He turned to Evan. “And you. Look at those lashes.”

  Like Dylan, Evan had eyelashes so long they seemed to require extra time to open all the way. Even now, as an infant, those lashes gave him a lazy, laid-back look. Joe could only imagine the effect they’d have when Evan got to his teen years.

  “And here I thought I’d just have to worry about a daughter,” he said as he tickled Evan’s tummy. “You two and your brother are going to keep me on my toes, aren’t you?”

  Joe got another ten minutes to play with Julia and Evan before the call sounded from down the hall letting him know nap time was over and Dylan was ready to join the party.

  “Mommy!”

  “Here’s hoping Daddy will do,” Joe mumbled as he headed for Dylan’s room.

  CHAPTER NINE

  THE HEAT SMACKED her like a punch from a heavyweight champ when she stepped off the shuttle and onto the sidewalk in front of the soaring, gleaming hotel. Vegas sure knew how to do big. Big hotels, big noise, big heat, and according to the ads she’d seen plastered everywhere on the drive from the airport, big fights. How anyone actually lived in the middle of all of it was a mystery to Karen. She’d lose her mind within the first week.

  She retrieved her bag from the driver then took a minute to look up and down the strip. A person could disappear here in all that big noise and even bigger chaos. For a moment—just a moment—she let fantasy take over. She could pretend to be in Paris, in New York, in Venice. She could travel back in time to ancient Rome or to King Arthur’s court. She could be anybody, anywhere, and forget about Karen McCabe and all that entailed.

  But she knew she’d never do that. She’d never want to do that. Instead, she’d do what she came to do and get back to being Karen McCabe from Misty Lake, Minnesota. The Karen McCabe that disappeared the last time she’d walked the blistering sidewalks, navigated through the endless casinos, and made the biggest mistake of her life. If that meant going twelve rounds with anyone who tried to stand in her way, so be it.

  Karen checked in to her room but didn’t bother to unpack. She took a minute to tuck her hair into a wide-brimmed hat and don a pair of oversized sunglasses and was back on the sidewalk in under ten minutes.

  S
he’d studied maps of the Vegas Strip before leaving home and again on the flight to be certain she’d have her bearings and wouldn’t waste any time once she arrived, so she put her head down and started walking. She elbowed her way through raucous groups celebrating bachelors and bachelorettes. She twisted and ducked around Elvis, Batman, barely dressed women in sequins and feathers, almost as many barely dressed men in sequins and feathers, and a countless number of gravity-defying human statues. She tried to tune out the man standing on the corner and shouting through his megaphone that she, along with everyone else within range, was certainly going to hell. Difficult, because most of her brain believed him. Through it all, she kept one hand wound around her purse strap and the other in her pocket and did her best to avoid the cards forced on her every few feet.

  She was exhausted by the time she ducked into the casino she’d marked on her map. The Ivory Palm. Keeping the sunglasses in place, she let her eyes scan the room. The carpet was as gaudy, and the lights as bright as she remembered. It wasn’t crowded, but people sat in front of several of the slot machines and some of the tables were ringed with small groups. The rest of the people inside seemed to be interested only in looking around and trying to snap a photo or two without being noticed by a security guard.

  Karen wasn’t interested in any of it. She headed straight for the bar. She didn’t take a seat right away, instead circled and searched for a familiar face. There was a woman with short, spiky, neon green hair behind the bar. While she wore the same black vest over the same white shirt Karen remembered the bartenders all wearing, that was the only thing familiar about her.

  Undeterred, Karen took a seat. It took a few minutes, but eventually the bartender made her way over.

  “Can I get you something, honey?”

  The scratchy voice came as a shock. The wrinkles around the woman’s eyes and mouth as well as the peeks of grey roots upped the shock level. Based on the choice of hair color and the fact that the woman had the body of a twenty-two-year-old, Karen had expected someone far younger than herself. This woman, Opal according to her name tag, looked to be in her sixties.

  “Do you want something to drink?”

  “Oh, yes, um a vodka tonic please. And a glass of water, if possible.”

  “Sure, honey.”

  Opal mixed the drink, then filled a glass with water and ice and set both on napkins in front of Karen next to the bills waiting on the bar. While she had no intention of drinking the vodka, Karen couldn’t stop herself from grabbing the water and downing half of it before pausing for a breath.

  “Everything okay?”

  “Yes, yes, fine, thank you. Just a little warm from walking. It’s hot out there today.”

  “It’s always hot out there. Where are you from? No, wait, let me guess. Not a southern accent, not New York or Boston, polite and looking like you haven’t seen the sun in a good long time. Gotta be upper Midwest, Minnesota or Wisconsin.”

  Despite everything, Karen smiled. “Minnesota. Are you always right?”

  Opal nodded. “Do this as long as I have, and you get pretty good at guessing.”

  Karen zeroed in on her comment. “You’ve worked here a long time?”

  “Here? No. Around? Yeah, a long time.”

  An older couple took seats about half way down the bar. Opal spotted them and gave them a wave.

  “Gotta run. Let me know if I can get you anything else.”

  Karen watched Opal serve the couple and chat with them for a few minutes. From their smiles, Karen guessed Opal impressed them, as well, with her powers of deduction. When Opal moved away from them and began stacking clean glasses, Karen motioned to her.

  Opal glanced at Karen’s untouched drink. “Don’t like the drink?”

  “It’s fine, I’m sure, I just wanted to ask you a question, if that’s okay?”

  “Shoot, honey.”

  “You said you’ve worked here a long time. Well, not here, but around. How long, exactly, have you been here?”

  “Is there a reason you’re so interested in my work history?”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to pry, it’s just that I’m looking for someone and thought you might be able to help. He works here. Or, at least he did.”

  “I see.”

  Opal glanced at Karen’s left hand and Karen braced herself for the judgment she knew was coming. What she got was just the opposite.

  “You’ve been hurt, and you’re scared.”

  Karen drew back a bit in surprise.

  “Along with the ability to guess a person’s hometown comes the ability to know when that person is in trouble or in need of an ear to bend. Now, I’m getting the feeling you don’t particularly want to talk, but you need help.”

  Karen found herself nodding.

  “Then how can I help?”

  “You said you haven’t worked here long, so I don’t know if you can help. The person I’m looking for was working here about a year ago. I have no way of knowing if he’s still here, and if not, when he may have left, but I’d really like to find him.”

  “Let’s see. My second grandbaby just turned two months so that means I’ve been here about five months.”

  “Grandbaby? Your second?”

  Opal chuckled. “What? You’ve never seen a grandma with green hair before?” She gave her head a little shake and the rest of her lithe body followed.

  “I guess I haven’t. It suits you.”

  “I’m not so sure about that, but when your daughter—the mother of those two little grandbabies and the wife of a mostly worthless man who claims he’s always on the brink of making it big—decides to go to school to learn hair and makeup and wants you to be her model, you agree. And you go back to work to help support those babies.” Opal sighed. “The things we do for our kids.”

  A sharp pang struck Karen straight in the heart. The things we do for our kids, she thought. You got that right, Opal.

  “They’re lucky to have you,” Karen said.

  “That’s what I keep telling them,” Opal answered with a wink. “Now, tell me who you’re looking for and let’s see if I can do something for you.”

  Karen couldn’t help but look over her shoulder and lower her voice. She’d planned and run through countless scenarios in her head, but she hadn’t planned for someone like Opal. She felt like she was about to disappoint her own grandmother.

  Karen’s cheeks were on fire and she found it impossible to meet Opal’s eyes. “A bartender. His name is Joshua. I don’t know his last name.”

  “Joshua. No, there’s no bartender here named Joshua. I’d remember as that’s the name of my mostly worthless son-in-law. I’m sorry, honey, I’m afraid I can’t help you.”

  “You’re sure? Maybe he works different shifts and you haven’t met him yet. Is that possible?”

  “After five months I’ve crossed paths with all the bartenders. We have monthly meetings we’re all required to attend. They round up some of the managers or security guys to cover the bar for a half hour while we all sit together and listen to warnings on the latest scams and get our pep talks. No, I’d know if we had a Joshua here.”

  Karen had considered the possibility that he would no longer work there but hadn’t let herself dwell on it. Now she had to shift tactics or risk sinking into despair.

  “How about someone who’s worked here longer? Is there someone else I could ask?”

  “Even though I have only five months on the job, this afternoon I’m the senior bartender. Monday afternoons are quiet, so the newbies get the shift. Fewer tips, you know. You could try stopping by later tonight. Juan will be working. He’s been here forever and would be the one to talk to.”

  “Okay. I’ll try that. Thank you.” Karen turned to leave, but Opal stopped her.

  “Hold on, honey. Are you sure there’s nothing else I can do for you? Did you make the trip here just to find this Joshua or is there more to it?”

  Karen sat back down and looked Opal in the eye. Maybe this woman
she’d just met did want to help, maybe everyone wanted to help, but at that moment, Karen was sick of it all. Sick of the questions, sick of the pitying looks, sick of the offers of help, and above all, sick of her life. She may have been holding it together, at least on the outside, for months, but at that moment, something snapped.

  “Everyone thinks I travelled here to attend a nursing convention. You know why they think that? Because I’ve become the best liar I know. A year ago, I could have counted the number of lies I’d told in my entire life on one hand. Now, my whole life is a lie. I’m in so deep, I don’t know myself anymore what’s the truth and what’s a lie. I left my husband and my children to come here and chase after a way to get my life back and yes, that means finding Joshua. But even if I do, what then? How do I recover from everything that’s happened, everything I’ve done? How do I right what’s so wrong? How do I make it up to those I’ve hurt? How do I make it up to my children?”

  Karen was vaguely aware of Opal making a move as if to try to calm her, but Karen wasn’t done.

  “I don’t even know who I am anymore. I told my husband I want to pursue a new position at the hospital, that I needed to attend this conference to help my chances of getting that position, but do you know what? I don’t care if I go to the conference, I don’t even care if I ever go back to nursing, let alone apply for a promotion. But Joe doesn’t know that. He thinks I want to further my career, and I let him believe that. Because that’s what it’s come to. I let him believe—no, I make him believe—whatever he needs to believe to ensure I can do what I need to do. I’ve been doing it for months.” At this, Karen felt her composure start to crumble. “I don’t deserve him.” With one hitching breath, it shattered. “And I cer-certainly don’t deserve my, my children.”

  Karen choked out a sob, then spun in her seat wanting only to put as much distance between herself and all the curious eyes as possible. A firm hand grasped her forearm and any thoughts of escape disappeared.