by Laurel Dewey
“Because I hid them in the drawer for too many years. He wants…he needs to be celebrated and not denied.”
Renée silently took in several of the shots. She peered closely at the one on the credenza that Betty had taken an eraser to so long ago. “Is that a –”
“Joint? Yes. That’s a joint between his fingers.”
Renée picked up the photo and gazed at it with what looked like trepidation. “How do you stand it? Look at him. So much heartache. Like a wall that can never be climbed.” She turned to Betty. “You need to put all of these away. Why voluntarily put yourself through hell again?” Renée set the photo facedown and walked to the front door. “He could never be enough, could he? I know the feeling.”
Betty stood there for several minutes after she left. Emotion balled in her throat as she moved to the credenza and turned over the photo of Frankie. The familiar grief began to swell again, but right before it overtook her, the phone rang. She walked into the kitchen and checked the Caller ID. There was that damned Private staring back at her. She started to pick up the phone, but let it go to voicemail. And on cue, whoever was on the other end of the line quickly hung up.
Chapter 27
“As I’ve grown older, I prefer to state my age in Celsius.”
“Our girls are becoming women!” Betty enthusiastically told Peyton. He was the first person she called, right after opening the bloom room door and spying a spray of white tendrils a little over a quarter inch tall. They only appeared on the Kushberry plants, but they’d always been ahead of the curve, towering in height nearly twelve inches over the other girls in the bloom room. But then Betty noticed the telltale sign of an emerging series of buds along the top nodes of the Centennial Blueberry plants.
It was official. The cannabis’ plain-Jane, weed-like, vegetative appearance was beginning its powerful transformation into a potent, budding plant. Betty marked the momentous day on her High Times calendar. And as she said to herself, one never forgets the first time they see the buds forming on their first homegrown cannabis plant. She desperately wanted to capture the moment on film but reminded herself of Peyton’s warning about taking photos of her girls. Instead, she would etch the moment into her mind’s eye and hope that age and mental decline later in life would not erase it from her memory bank.
It was the Wednesday before her birthday weekend, and she had a lot to do before Saturday, when she’d meet Jeff at his house for a two-night visit. She started out mixing up a new trashcan full of llama bean tea. Then, she transplanted her young clones into two-gallon pots and foliar sprayed them with B-vitamins, kelp and a wee bit of enzymes. After that, she fed her blooming girls with the phosphorus-rich bat guano liquid and blackstrap molasses. Betty mused she was busier than a cat trying to cover up its crap on a marble floor. The remainder of the day was spent making sixty of her gourmet chocolates, each with their trademark decorative silver and gold swirls she’d perfected with artistic precision. Thankfully, Peyton gave her nearly four ounces of potent, sweet leaf shake in exchange for her long hours of dutiful, trimming labor. With almost three ounces left of the valuable L.A. Confidential bud she found in the attic, Betty felt confident she’d have enough to fulfill her patients’ needs until her first crop of girls matured.
Buddy dropped by early in the day to continue work on the initial roof project that seemed to be going on ad infinitum. Finding several more integrity issues in the roof near the front of the house, Betty came to the conclusion that her aging house was quickly becoming a dark hole into which she threw money – or in Buddy’s case, cannabis chocolates. As John Muir stated, “When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world.” Similarly, tug on one thing in an old, deteriorating house like Betty’s, and you’d easily trip over ten more things that needed to be upgraded. She boxed up twenty-five of the chocolates, all fully decorated, and handed them to Buddy as he left.
“You don’t have to waste one of your fancy boxes and ribbons on me, Mrs. Craven.”
“Betty,” she insisted. “Please call me Betty from now on.”
He looked a little uncomfortable. “Uh…okay…Betty.”
“And that box and ribbon is not wasted on you, Buddy. Everyone deserves to be given something that helps to remind them there’s still elegance and graciousness in this unsettling world. It’s like a cup of chamomile tea in the middle of a battle zone.”
The next day, she arrived at Jean’s house as requested, with a cooler full of fourteen chocolates. Arthur met Betty at the door and told her that Jean wasn’t having a good day and had retired to bed. Then Jean called out to Betty from the upstairs bedroom and asked her to come and see her. Betty would have normally bowed out, but found herself walking up the stairs, in spite of her unease.
Jean sat up in bed, her head covered with her jaunty purple scarf, and held her arms out to Betty. “Betty! I’m so glad to see you!”
They hugged, and Betty sat on the edge of the bed. “You just like me for my chocolates,” she joked.
“I like you both.” She looked over Betty’s shoulder, where Arthur hovered in the doorway. “It’s okay, hon. Why don’t you lie down? Betty can keep me company.”
Arthur smiled a sad smile and walked downstairs.
Jean teared up. “He’s trying so hard to stay strong.” Wiping her eyes with the bed sheet, she sat up a bit more in bed. “I’m not having a good day.”
Betty tapped the bed. “I can go and come back later –”
“No, no, no!” She held her arm. “You’re afraid. I get it. But it’s okay. I’m not dying today, Betty.” Jean released Betty’s arm. “You can double the strength on the next batch. I’m doing two of your candies now to get the same pain relief.”
Betty helped Jean with the pillows behind her back. “We should contact your doctor.”
“What’s my doctor going to do? Pump me full of morphine so I’m constipated for a week? No, thanks. Your chocolates are working beautifully, and they don’t shut off my plumbing!” She nestled comfortably into the soft pillows. “I don’t want to be out of it. Even when it’s time, I don’t want to be pumped full of anything. I want to feel the ride at the end. That way, I can open my eyes on the other side and know it’s not a hallucination…that I really, truly finally cut the cord and took the leap.”
Betty did everything to maintain her composure. “You’re so very brave.”
“This is not bravery, Betty. This is just part of life. Do you tell a mother who just gave birth how brave her baby is? Birth and death, it’s all part of the deal each time we agree to give it another shot.” She reflected for a moment. “It’s not the dying, you know? It’s the living…that’s when you’ve got to be brave. I should not have been so afraid. I should have spoken up more. I shouldn’t have cared so much about what people thought of me. When you’re forced to lie in a bed like this, all you do is think. And that’s what you think about. All the ‘should have’s.”
Betty rested her hand on Jean’s arm. “Don’t ‘should’ all over yourself. That’s what my friend…Jeff…that’s what he tells me all the time.”
Jean smiled. “You’re right.” She smiled a mischievous grin. “And I know that Jeff is more than a ‘friend.’ When the two of you came by here the first time? It was clear as a bell. You two make a great couple. You and he have an extraordinary connection.”
Betty felt somewhat overexposed. “Well…uh…” She traced the carpet with her foot, unable to put two intelligible words together.
“Look at you! You’re like a schoolgirl. I love it! That’s beautiful, Betty. Hey,” she tapped her on the leg to make eye contact. “Don’t ever lose that. It’s worth more than all the money in the world.”
“He and I come from very different walks of life,” Betty said with a self-conscious shrug of her shoulders.
“So? Who cares? Arthur and I came from opposite sides of the fence. He was very straight-laced and I was a free spirit. But over time, he grounded me and I lifte
d him up. So it was a good pairing. We have the same deep connection you and Jeff have. That’s why I worry about Arthur after I’m gone.” She lost herself momentarily before shifting her focus. “You know, I was reading this article the other day about the top five regrets of the dying. The number one regret? Wishing they had more courage to live life true to themselves and not the life others expected them to live.”
The comment hit Betty hard. “Is that right?”
“And I emphatically agree. We need to be the gatekeeper of our own destiny. To waste one’s life doing what others expect of them and denying one’s own dreams…” Jean paused, reflecting on her thoughts. “No one ever understands how the soul can hurt when you’re pushing yourself into shoes that don’t fit.”
Betty nodded. “Amen.”
Jean turned and looked out the window, as sunlight washed the bedroom in a soft glow. “When you’re young, you pray for material things. Then when you’re a little older, you pray for money, success and to find love. Then life happens and you get sick or have an accident, and you pray for health. And then, if it all turns to hell, you have your dark night of the soul. You feel outside of yourself and fear rules your every move…that’s if you can even make a move, because you’re so paralyzed with apprehension. And so you pray again. But this time you pray to feel peace. Just sweet peace. If you’re smart, you realize you should have been praying for that since the beginning, because without peace, there is no success or good love or health. And all the ‘stuff’ you started out praying for? That’s pointless. But you only really understand this when the world falls apart around you. Enlightenment, Betty. Too bad it usually has to come with such a steep price.”
~~~
Friday night, Jeff called Betty to tell her he had a surprise for her birthday weekend. “Pack comfortable, casual clothes and shoes,” he advised her. Jeff then emailed her a remote address, along with a MapQuest link to the location. She was to meet him there at 11:00 in the morning the following day. After studying the directions, Betty had no idea where she was going. All she knew was that it was nearly thirty miles southwest of Paradox and appeared to be nestled in a semi-rural, mountainous area. Part of her wished they could just keep the birthday festivities at his house, but another part of her wondered what in the hell he had planned.
She’d already arranged with Peyton to check in twice a day to feed and pet Ronald and take care of her girls. It was one thing to have a pet that needed to be cared for when one went on a vacation; it was certainly another hurdle altogether when you also had a bevy of thriving cannabis plants needing constant attention. Clearly, this commitment put the kibosh on lengthy vacations, unless one had a trusted friend to take care of the green beauties. “Thank God for Peyton,” Betty said to herself, realizing other people in her situation weren’t as lucky to have someone so faithful and discreet. After handing Peyton a spare house key Saturday morning, she tossed her two bags into the Taurus and set off to destinations yet unknown. Even without the benefit of visiting the location for a dry run, Betty still arrived five minutes early. But when she put the Taurus in park, she wondered if she’d made a wrong turn. After ascending a two-lane, asphalt road for nearly two miles and only passing four houses, the road turned to dirt and ended in a cul-de-sac that overlooked an astonishing, panoramic, mountainous landscape. The air was sweet and warm and so still that Betty could hear the sound of a creek in the distance. Within a few minutes, another sound fused into the silence, growing with intensity as it moved closer. She turned to see Jeff on his motorcycle, driving down a narrow, one-lane road that fed into the cul-de-sac. Behind his seat was a hard-shell saddle trunk.
“I should have known you’d beat me here,” he said, leaning over and kissing Betty. “Where are your bags?”
“In the backseat,” she said apprehensively.
He got off the bike to retrieve her luggage.
“Hang on!” she said with hesitation. “Where are we going?”
“Up the dirt road I just came down.”
She peered toward the road. “That’s driveable. Come on, let’s take the Taurus.”
Jeff locked the Taurus and was already halfway to his bike with her two bags. “Nah, it can get kinda soupy where the shade hits the wet dirt.” He attached her bags to the back of the trunk with a bungee cord. “Get on,” he said, motioning to the Harley.
“I’m not getting on that, Jeff.” She held her ground.
“Well, if you don’t, you won’t experience the next great adventure in your life.”
She peered up the desolate road. “Unless there’s a five-star resort perched at the top of that hill, with linen tablecloths, napkins and monogrammed fluffy towels, I don’t see this progressing any further.”
He screwed his face into an extremely pensive expression. “Hmmm. Linen tablecloths and fluffy towels – that’s a pretty unlikely possibility given this territory. I’ll tell you this: there’s no five-star resort up there, but there’s a ten-star view.” He got on the bike. “Elizabeth Cragen doesn’t ride bikes. Betty Craven tries it at least once.” He tipped his head toward the roomy seat. “Come on, Betty. Give it a shot.”
Anyone else…anyone else, and she would have said a resounding “no.” But his subtle charm and calming manner drew her in each time. It was pointless to fight it. With great care and anxiety edging close, she straddled the sun-blasted, black leather seat and wrapped her arms tightly around his waist. “Go slowly, please.”
“Aw, can’t I do some cool stunts I’ve been practicing?” he asked her, his voice obviously dripping with sarcasm.
They drove up the dirt road softened by a top layer of decomposed aspen leaves. The densely packed forest featured chalky-barked aspens that stood like thin sentinels and co-mingled with the occasional aromatic spruce tree. The scent of the high mountain woods intoxicated Betty’s senses. Above her head, the brilliant, cloudless summer sky shone like a sapphire. She held tighter onto Jeff’s waist and rested her head against his back. There was something so terrifyingly calm about it. God, it was comfortable. So exquisitely natural. However, just as she was falling into the moment, Betty wondered if it was okay. Where was the struggle in this relationship? Isn’t that what life was all about? Continuous struggles that had to be overcome, and once conquered, the next challenge was introduced? How could this much happiness be self-sustaining? She was about to leap into the next level of anxiety, when he interrupted her dark projections.
“Hey, I came up with a couple riddles. What do you call a pre-owned Prius?”
The distraction was enough to bring her back to her senses. “No idea.”
“A Previous!”
Betty smiled. “Well done!”
“What’s another way to describe a really loud, protest march?”
Betty tried to figure it out and gave up. “Tell me.”
“A din of inequity!”
She laughed. “I love it!” And she relaxed. All the conflicting voices in her head shut up, and the peace and quiet allowed Betty to take a breath and rest in that moment with abandon.
About one mile up the road, Jeff slowed and crossed a wooden bridge on the right hand side that sheltered a twenty-foot-wide, slow-moving creek. The landscape quickly opened, as they drove up a short hill and then came to a stop. There before her was a secluded expanse of nearly two grassy acres, edged with the meandering creek. A large tent, big enough to fit six adults, stood thirty feet from the water. In front of the tent, a stone barbeque pit waited patiently, along with two cushioned, Adirondack chairs. A pair of fishing poles tilted against the tent, next to two creels and hats. Next to the tent was a brass towel rack that looked completely out of place in this rustic setting. Draped over it, were two fluffy, monogrammed towels. On a flat piece of grassy ground closer to the creek, a small, round table sat covered in a crisp, linen tablecloth and two sharply folded linen napkins. A single copper lantern graced the center of the table, along with a bottle of unopened wine.
Betty was in awe, as sh
e slid off the Harley. “What is all this?”
“Happy birthday, babe,” he replied, moving around the bike and planting a passionate kiss on her lips. “I’ve got three coolers of food and drinks sitting in a cold mountain spring up on that ridge,” he said, pointing to a shaded spot on the north side of the property. “There’s a king-size, blow-up mattress inside the tent, that’s more comfortable than the bed at your house. And if we get rain, there’s a covered wooden shelter over that ridge we can retreat to. Did I forget anything?”
She couldn’t stop taking it all in. “Nobody has ever taken the time to do something like this for me. I’m speechless.”
“Are you happy?”
Betty nodded. “Beyond happy, if that’s possible.” She suddenly realized something. “How on earth did you get everything up here with only your bike?”
“I used my truck.”
She pointed back to the road they just traversed. “But you told me –”
“I know exactly what I said. Now you can always say you rode a Harley for the first time, on the day before your fifty-ninth birthday. And best of all, nothing bad happened to you.”
The old Betty would have become piqued by his sneaky strategy. But the new Betty was overwhelmed by his creativity and tasteful élan.
The property, he related, belonged to a friend who owned a summer retreat about a half-mile away. It was a homestead in the late 1800s, which morphed into a popular hunting camp, until twenty-five years ago when his friend purchased the land. Betty could easily see how anyone could fall in love with this exceptional slice of heaven.
“You hungry?” Jeff asked, moving toward a cooler on the other side of the tent.
“Not really.”
“Okay, then.” He brought two large water bottles out of the cooler and held his hand out to her. “Come on. Follow me.”
