Dearest Dorothy, If Not Now, When?

by Charlene Baumbich

  “Oh, I’m glad you rustled me up!” Edward Showalter said. “I was planning on telling the guys to take off at seven-thirty! Kinda lost track of time.” He gave her a salute, a habit he’d slipped into when she uttered what he perceived to be an order, and off he went. Within five minutes the place was cleared out.

  She retreated to what would one day look like an office worthy of her position as Mall Director but that was now nothing more than a framed-in square room with two saw-horses and a leftover TANINGER FURNITURE sign spanning the distance between them forming a makeshift desk. Funny, she thought, how she’d become oddly attached to that old sign, which read FAMILY OWNED AND OPERATED SINCE 1923. The boom of Hethrow’s metropolis eventually drove the Taningers out of business.

  Katie selected the rear second-floor corner location for her office because it felt like the best place from which to oversee the building project. After the mall opened, it would be the perfect lookout post. Rather than walling it up for total privacy, she’d ordered a full window to the mall side of the office that would enable her to view the second-floor shops from her desk. She could step outside her door to the atrium railing and see not only the shops on the first floor, but all the way down to the lower-level space located smack in the center of the floor plan.

  She’d originally hoped to rent out more stores in that lower level, but after weighing several structural considerations, she tended to agree with the architect: put the money up toward the natural light in the tall building and save that center lower-level space for a store that can best be served by the exterior entrance on the side of the building leading down to it. Besides, most of the rest of that lower level was usurped by the heating system and utilities. The new phone and computer lines alone ended up needing their own control central, so what little space was left would be used for storage and for Edward Showalter’s office, as Katie cut a deal for him to serve as permanent maintenance man and Building Manager once the mall opened. (“You’ll know the building better than anyone else.”) But what type of place would showcase well in that lower-level space from the balconies? She thought about locating the tea room down there but decided the openness wouldn’t lend itself well to the cozy feeling she wanted for the tea room. And who would operate the tea room? Dilemmas like this seized her mind and kept her awake at night.

  Then lo and behold, a new-to-the-business confectioner who’d heard about the mall through word-of-mouth contacted her. He said he needed a location that would allow him to split his store between penny (“well, nickel, dime, quarter, dollar”) candies for the kids, fine chocolates and fudges for the adults, and a coffee bar specializing in chocolate coffees. He also needed room for a few tables so people could sit and enjoy his offerings. This answered another problem Katie’d been pondering: what to have in the mall for kids? It was the best of all worlds since they’d not only have a candy store they could afford and a place to hang out—but it would also give the kids their own side entrance, which would keep them from traipsing through the mall just for a piece of candy. Her hawk-eye view from just outside her office would allow her to oversee their behavior as well. The final plus: the heavenly smell of chocolate would no doubt waft up the atrium, enticing shoppers to make their way down. Perfect. Now if she could just land someone for the tea room. . . .

  Walking her way around the atrium until she arrived catty-cornered to her office, Katie looked down the empty shaft that would soon house a very expensive elevator. She hadn’t thought about an elevator until Carl Jimson, the architect she’d brought in from Chicago, queried her about a preferential location for the elevator, since a facility like this needed to be handicap accessible. After calling Jessica, Dorothy and May Belle (pregnant, older and bad back, in that order), they all agreed an elevator should be as close to the front entryway as possible in case a shopper needing to use it just wanted to pop into a store on the second floor or lower level. Katie’s first inclination was to locate it at the back of the mall (anything to draw shoppers throughout), but her friends made perfect sense.

  She rubbed her back as she tried to remember what she’d been told about fire codes. So many details. . . . Sometimes it was difficult to remember how she’d gotten involved in such a project to begin with. No doubt lack of estrogen! Retailing wasn’t her thing. Buying and selling land for development was how she made her money. But now here she was. It just had to work. Partonville had to find new life, if for no other reason than to cause Colton Craig, the man whose goading had partially pushed her into this undertaking, to swallow his own smug face.

  She walked into her office and grabbed her coat, then headed down the open stairs and made her way to the front window where she stretched again and panned the Partonville square, her eyes migrating toward Jacob’s second-floor office. The two of them got off to a rocky start when they’d first met, but since she’d gotten to know him a little better over the Christmas holiday, she was surprised to find herself looking forward to his move to Partonville. Just when she glanced at his window, she noticed his office light go off. She stared at his street-level door and thought about trotting over to say hello before he took off again tomorrow but quickly became distracted by a commotion inside Hornsby’s Shoe Emporium.

  Although the store was closed, a small gathering of people milled about inside. What in the world? Sam Vitner stepped to the foreground and then . . . right up into the display window! He fussed around with something, but due to the angle of her view, she couldn’t tell what. Then the entire group, except for Sam who stayed in the window, walked out onto the sidewalk. One by one Katie made out their faces but she couldn’t tell what they were clapping about, although it appeared to be a poster near which Sam was preening. DARN! She must have lost Jacob in the crowd. Since he drove a different rental car each time he came into town, she didn’t even know what vehicle to look for, but then again he often walked to his office from his mom’s. When she thought she’d missed him, a pang of regret ran through her already tired mind. She turned off her main interior lights, leaving a few work lights glowing, and watched out her window a couple of more moments in case Jacob was still around. A short conversation with someone who could understand her city brain would feel so good. . . . Oh, well. The small crowd of people made their way back into Hornsby’s, Sam stepped out of the window and they all disappeared toward the back of the store, turning off the showroom lights as they went. Curiosity getting the best of her, Katie swung on her coat and decided to take a stroll by Hornsby’s window for a look-see before getting into her SUV and heading home. When she got there, her mouth flew open.

  There was a poster with a picture of Sam Vitner, the owner of Swappin’ Sam’s, who had, over the holidays, tried to start a rebellion against her mini mall. Under his picture in large block letters it said McKERN’S HAD HER TURN! / TIME TO SWAP! / VITNER FOR MAYOR! One by one her mind sifted through the gathering of faces, then it struck her: Sam Vitner, Cora Davis, George Gustafson . . . the very people who’d previously aligned with Sam to try and stop her development! But thankfully she’d maneuvered them around to her side.

  A prickle ran up the back of her neck. Or did I?

  “I buy everything I can from Richardson’s Rexall Drugs down on the square,” Dorothy said as she quickly ushered Jacob through the cosmetics and drug departments at Wal-Mart. “I still get my prescriptions filled there too. The only time I came here for a prescription was for May Belle. It was a Sunday—the Rexall is closed on Sundays and evenings, you know,” she said, pointing at her wristwatch, reminding Jacob it was 8:30 P.M., “and good for them!—but she was in terrible pain. Somebody told me I could get things cheaper here, but to be honest, I’ve known T.J. Winslow since he was born,” she continued, stopping to study the price tag on her brand of denture soak. She raised her eyebrows at the difference in price from the Rexall but then moved right along. “I still remember how proud his dad was after T.J. went off to the school of pharmacy, came back and took ov
er the business. It was hard enough to watch the Taningers close their doors, but I could only buy so much furniture to help support them!” she said, followed by a sad chuckle. “But I always need one thing or another from the Rexall. Besides, I don’t have The Tank any more and Wal-Mart’s too far on the outskirts for me to walk.” Dorothy drove The Tank, her battle-worn 1976 Lincoln Continental, until it finally bit the dust after an accident a year earlier. That was that—although she still kept her driver’s license, just in case. “And Partonville doesn’t have any public transportation. And I’ll tell you what, it takes the cab service from Hethrow way too long to get here and they charge way too much and they don’t want to wait for you while you shop either unless they let their meter run. Ask me how I know that!

  “Hey!” she said, suddenly halting the cart again. A look of mischievousness crossed her face. “If your lawyering business doesn’t work out, maybe you could start a taxi service!” Jacob raised his eyebrows. “Just kidding!” He laughed while she started racing the cart forward again. “But seriously, I hate to bother Arthur or Katie or Jessica for a ride for every little thing, so I’d just as soon walk the couple blocks to the Rexall on the square—and walking is good for me anyway—pay the price difference and support our longtime local.

  “And another thing about shopping at the Rexall,” she said, barreling them toward kitchen appliances, a personal mission in mind. “I can still look T.J. in the eye during band practice without feeling guilty. You know I taught that boy how to play the clarinet when he was in grammar school, don’t you?”

  Jacob laughed inside himself at his mom’s use of the word “boy” for someone who was probably at least in his late sixties. “I’m not sure if I knew that or not, Mom, but I’ll try to remember.” For such a little town, he felt like he had a lot of personal things to learn about people.

  Jacob was glad the sale of Crooked Creek Farm rendered his mom financially secure. But as much as he hated to admit it, he also understood why this store was so busy, although he was surprised by the huge amount of shoppers at this late hour. Times were hard here and people like the Joys—including many of the farmers—often worked more than one job just to make ends meet. They had to be careful with their dollars. The rub was, of course, that the lure of the lower prices, especially during hard times, made it even harder times for the local merchants who needed the people’s spending dollars to stay in business. Yes, the friction between loyalties and finances was a complicated issue, one Jacob and his mom would discuss at length later that evening.

  Dorothy stopped her cart in front of the coffeemakers and turned to face her son. “Now that you’re moving back home, you can come to our community band concerts! We’ve been practicing Irish tunes for our St. Patrick’s Day performance out at the Park District building on the Saturday before the holiday, which I believe is actually on a Monday this year. But if you listen carefully, don’t take T.J.’s talent, or lack thereof, as an indicator of my ability to teach, okay? He played the most horrid clarinet all through school, and he still sounds terrible. But you can’t fault a heart that loves music,” she said, turning to face the small kitchen appliances.

  “Now, let’s get you a new coffeemaker for your office. I reckon you can make your own coffee and still support business on the square by buying your lunches at Harry’s!” she said with a wink.

  “How did you know I needed a coffeemaker at the office? I don’t recall mentioning that.”

  “I stopped in the grill today.”

  Jacob shook his head. Yes, everyone certainly did know everybody’s business, including his already.

  5

  Jessica leaned into Sarah Sue’s crib and gave her sleeping beauty a soft kiss on the cheek. She tiptoed out of the room, then scurried to the front office window, which had the best view of the street. Paul’d been gone nearly an hour-and-a-half now. It wasn’t like him to leave her fretting. Best she could figure, it shouldn’t have taken him more than twenty-five minutes max to get to the Press and back, even if he’d stopped to chat with someone. Harry’s closed promptly at 6 P.M., so he wasn’t there. She phoned the Press. No answer. But they’d said right there in the newspaper that they weren’t going to be answering the phones after their regular hours. She went to the bedroom window just to make sure Paul hadn’t taken the car. Maybe he’d been home and decided to run an errand or something. Nope, both cars were parked in their usual places. Honestly, if he didn’t get home in the next ten minutes, she was going to rouse Sarah Sue, put her in her stroller and go looking for him.

  Just then the buzzer in the office rang. She hurried to the lobby to find Harold Crab standing there, a serious look on his face.

  “Good evening, Jessica.”

  “It’s Paul, isn’t it? Something’s happened to him,” she said, her voice cracking and rising an octave.

  “Now, Jessica, don’t you worry. I’m sure Paul’s going to be just fine.”

  “Going to be?” Tears were already pooling in her eyes.

  “He was in such a hurry to get your entry in that he sort of made a crash landing near the box.”

  “Oh, NO! OH! What’s happened to him? Oh, it’s all my FAULT! I asked him to hurry. . . .”

  Her emotional frenzy obviously escalating, Harold said, “Jessica, honey, let’s go sit down.”

  “I need to sit down to hear this?” she squeaked out. “Oh, no,” she moaned, as she began to rock herself. But she shucked him off when he tried to lead her to a seat behind the check-in counter.

  “Jessica, honey, Paul is fine. Well, he has a broken leg, a couple stitches and a slight concussion, but other than that, he is just fine, honey,” Harold said as he wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

  “A concussion? A broken leg? What on earth. . . .”

  “He was running and tripped on a crack in the sidewalk, right there in front of our building. I’m the one who should apologize, Jessica. That crack should have been fixed long ago.” It was the first time it occurred to Harold he was ripe for a lawsuit here and that a big-city attorney had just moved to town. “Don’t you worry, Jessica, the Press will cover all of his medical expenses.” He hated thinking like that, but after all, what did he pay liability insurance for if not an occasion such as this? He’d already talked to Ben Malone about getting that sidewalk fixed—by tomorrow, if possible.

  “Can you take me to him? Let me just wake up Sarah Sue.” She was already turning on her heels but Harold grabbed her arm.

  “Paul instructed me to sit with you until he gets home and to make sure you stay put. And stay calm. Maggie and Ben Malone went to the hospital to see how he was doing— he fell right at Maggie’s feet—and they’re with him now. They’re going to bring him right home as soon as he’s released. He would have been home a little sooner but Doctor Nielson wanted to keep an eye on him for a spell on account of the concussion. It was astute of Doctor Nielson to pick that up, considering we were all so worried about his leg.” Jessica moved behind the counter and finally sat down. “That’s a girl,” Harold said, following her and patting her arm. “He’ll be fine and he’ll be here before you know it.”

  Jessica blew her nose, then steeled herself, swiped under her eyes and looked hard at Harold. “If he’s not here in fifteen minutes, you’re taking me to the hospital, do you hear me?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I promise.” It was clear Jessica was not going to truly calm down until she saw her husband with her own eyes. Thankfully, ten minutes later the Malones’ big black Cadillac pulled up. Jessica was opening the back door of the car before Paul could even reach for the handle.

  “Paul!” she whimpered as she leaned in and grabbed his face with both hands, her eyes taking note of the bandage. “Oh, honey! Are you okay? How’s your head? And your poor leg,” she said. As soon as he was settled into his recliner, Ben told Maggie they should be going and Harold said the same, then added, “We’ll let you get some
much deserved rest now, Paul. And again, I’m sorry for that crack in the sidewalk. I’m seeing to it tomorrow. The Press will clear things with the hospital and I know Jessica here will take good care of you now that you’re home.”

  “You let us know if you need anything, you two,” Maggie said. “I’ll call Dorothy first thing in the morning and have her get your Care Committee at church right on this.” Although Maggie didn’t attend First United Methodist, their Care Committee’s reputation was known throughout town. “I’m sure you won’t need to be cooking for a week or two, Jessica. You just save your energy to take care of your business, your husband, that beautiful daughter and yourself.”

  “And Harold,” Ben said, “I will be by tomorrow to fix that sidewalk.” Ben owned his own hauling business and small cement jobs were right up his alley.

  “Thank you,” Jessica said, anxious for everyone to leave so she could hear from Paul how he really felt. As soon as the door closed behind their last visitor, she sat down on the floor next to the foot of his recliner and rested her head on his unbroken leg while she gently stroked the cast on the other.

  “Oh, Paul, this is all my fault! Me and my dumb mini-mall entry, and asking you to hurry! I am so sorry.” She began to weep again.

  Paul reached his hand down and rested it on the top of her head. “Sweetheart,” he said somewhat weakly due to the medications, “I’m going to tell you something now and I’m only going to say it once, and then I don’t want to ever hear another word about it. Ever. Are you listening?”