by Laura Alden
Even more terrifying was that her favorite thing in life was to catch people lying. It was the very real possibility of hearing Auntie May’s cackle of “Liar, liar, pants on fire!” that had kept falsehoods in the entire town to a minimum for decades.
It hadn’t been an easy decision to call Sunny Rest Assisted Living and ask Auntie May if she’d talk about the first two decades of the Tarver PTA, but, really, there wasn’t anyone else. Auntie May might be ninety-two, but her mind was sharper than mine.
Two PTA fathers, Todd Wietzel and Kirk Olsen, had carried the bird-light woman and her bright purple wheelchair up onto the stage and she was now circling around the other presenters like a border collie rounding up cattle. “Almost time, chicks. Look at that crowd!” she crowed. “I haven’t had that big an audience since I got up in church at Raymond Pratley’s funeral.”
“Who’s Ray Pratley?” Erica Hale asked. Erica had been the PTA president before me. I knew I could never measure up to what she’d done during her tenure, but she reassured me I was doing just fine.
Auntie May snorted. “Some good-for-nothing lawyer. He was my cousin, died young from not enough fun, if you ask me. He was okay when he was a kid, though.” She smirked. “Want to know what he did under the bleachers with Dolly Duncan in eleventh grade?”
“No,” the rest of us said.
But I had the crawly feeling that Auntie May had told that story at her cousin’s funeral. If she’d done that in a church, what was she going to say tonight? Frantically, I tried to think of a reason to call Todd and Kirk and haul her bodily off the stage. Could I pretend she was sick? Say she’d had a fainting spell? Fake an emergency phone call for her?
“Beth?” Isabel was at my side, a clipboard in her hand. “It’s time to start.”
I approached the podium, tapped the microphone to make sure it was on, and started. Not so very long ago, I wouldn’t have dared to stand in front of a large audience without a word-by-word script to read verbatim. Today, I was fine just winging it. Who would have guessed?
“Good evening,” I said. “If you’re here for the seminar on analytical auditing procedures, you’re in the wrong room.” Smiling, I waited for the chuckles to die down. “We’re here tonight to celebrate the eighty years of the Tarver PTA’s existence. Eighty years, folks. There’s been a PTA in this elementary school for eighty straight years.”
There was a smattering of applause, and I nodded. “It is something to applaud and I’d like to salute all those who came before us.” I turned and looked at the group of women sitting to my left and clapped my hands hard and loud. The audience joined in. Then, in what felt like a single surge, they all got to their feet, giving these women the recognition they deserved.
I sniffled back some unexpected tears and turned back to the podium as the audience sat back down. “Sadly,” I said, “we don’t have anyone who can talk to us about the Tarver PTA’s first decade, but we do have a Rynwood resident who knew women from that first decade. The same woman was a PTA member in its second decade, from the end of World War Two to the boom years when Rynwood almost doubled in size. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Auntie May Werner.”
The audience clapped politely as Auntie May wheeled herself to the podium. I handed her the microphone, sat down, and thought positive thoughts. There was no reason to think Auntie May would spend her allotted twenty minutes—ten minutes per decade—dredging up ancient gossip. I’d told her to stick to PTA agenda items and she’d agreed easily enough. She had no reason to slide sideways from straightforward history to sixty-year-old scandal.
Did she?
“Thanks, Bethie,” Auntie May said. “You’re a sweetie for inviting me. Lots of people wouldn’t, you know. But just because I’m old don’t mean I don’t remember things.”
I tensed. Not the story about catching Flossie’s younger sister running around without any clothes on—please, not that. She’d been all of four years old, and it had been ninety degrees; who could blame her? But the poor woman was still carrying that story around with her.
“Like when the first Tarver PTA came about,” Auntie May went on. “My momma’s friend, Ethel, she’d moved here from out east and brought with her this idea about a group of parents getting together and trying to help the teachers.”
Perfect. I relaxed. This would be fine. At last, Auntie May’s prodigious memory was being put to productive use. Long may it reign.
We listened to Auntie May’s tale of the first bake sale. “Made all of two dollars and thirteen cents and they were happy to get that much.” Listened to her heartbreaking stories of children losing fathers to the war and the PTA doing what they could to help, and her account of the PTA’s growing pains.
I glanced at the clock on the gym wall. She was right at the twenty-minute mark, but it sounded as though she was wrapping it up.
“And that’s how that second PTA decade ended,” Auntie May said. “Not only had Rynwood doubled in size, but Tarver had nearly tripled.”
Assuming she was done, I started to stand so I could introduce the next speaker.
“Which reminds me of a story.” Auntie May cackled, a high, scratchy noise that was nearly inaudible to the human ear. “Did I ever tell any of you about the time Walter Trommler was seeing three girls at the same time? It turns out that—”
I snatched the microphone from her hand. “Thanks for your memories, Auntie May.” Smiling grimly, I gave her wheelchair a gentle push with my free hand. I had no great love for my former employee Marcia Trommler, but she didn’t deserve to have stories about her father running all over town. Light applause followed a glowering Auntie May back to her place at the end of the row.
“We’ll take a short break,” I said, “and ten minutes from now, we’ll have the great pleasure of hearing Maude Hoffman talk to us about the PTA’s third decade.” I clicked off the microphone and immediately entered a staring contest with Auntie May. My chin was up and hers was down, which made the angle difficult, but we were managing nicely.
Mary Margaret saved us from staying frozen like that forever. “Nice job, Auntie May,” she said, leaning on the edge of the stage. “I’d love to hear that story about Walter Trommler. What say I stop by your place tomorrow and hear all about it?”
Auntie May sent me a dagger-laden look. “At least some people appreciate my stories.”
Pick your battles, I told myself, and escaped.
• • •
The rest of the speakers didn’t present any problems. We laughed at Maude’s anecdotes about fallen angel food cakes and were moved to tears at her story of the entire student body singing “My Country ’Tis of Thee” to a packed gymnasium—the very room we were in—the Monday after JFK’s assassination.
A woman I didn’t know spoke about the PTA during the end of the civil rights movement and the Vietnam War. I tried to listen while Cookie Van Doorne, a longtime teller at the local bank, talked about the late seventies and the early eighties, but I spent more time wondering why Cookie and I had never progressed beyond the acquaintance stage. Though I’d known her via the bank for almost twenty years, I knew nothing about her, besides the bare bones of widowed with two children moved out of state. Well, that and the fact that she was rarely more than five feet from a cup of coffee, morning, noon or night.
While I pondered the chemistry that makes up a friendship, other women described the PTA through to the twenty-first century. The always-elegant Erica Hale spoke about the most recent decade, and then it was my turn again.
I named each of the speakers, thanking them one by one. Auntie May grinned and waved, Maude Hoffman blushed prettily, Erica looked as regal as ever . . . but Cookie looked pale and unsteady.
I’d planned on talking about the projects the next eighty years might bring, but I skipped that and finished with “And I can only hope that the next eighty years of the Tarver PTA will be as productive as the last. Thank you and good night.”
The applause was enthusiastic. I nodded, smili
ng, then went to Cookie’s side. I crouched in front of her. “Are you all right?” I asked softly.
“No.” She closed her eyes and swayed in her chair. “I really don’t think I am. Beth, could you take me home, please?”
• • •
When I said I was driving Cookie home, one of the PTA fathers said he’d drive Cookie’s car to her house and leave it in the driveway. Kirk Olsen offered to pick him up. “Got a hot new ride to show you,” he said, grinning. “Nothing like heated leather seats this time of year.”
Cookie gave a wan thank-you and I helped her into my car.
“I’m sure I’m just coming down with a little something,” she said. “I thought a few cups of decaf would help, but they didn’t seem to.”
Light from the dashboard let me see Cookie push at her shortish gray hair, then see her thin hand fall to her lap. “It’s that time of year,” I said. If you can’t make interesting conversation, that’s no reason not to make inane remarks. “There’s a flu thing going around.” There always was, if you looked hard enough.
“Yes, I’ve heard that.” Cookie sighed and I felt, more than saw, her relax into a slouch. Which was unusual since Cookie had been raised in the era of good posture makes for good girls. “I’m sure that’s it.”
Since I couldn’t think of anything else to say, I kept quiet and reflected that this was always the case regarding conversations with Cookie. Once she’d finished whatever banking transaction I’d slid over to her, we had nothing left to say. She didn’t read, didn’t follow sports, not even the Green Bay Packers, didn’t attend church, didn’t garden. I wasn’t sure what she did in her spare time. Maybe she cooked. Or knitted.
I was busy envisioning every shelf in Cookie’s house crowded with adorable knitted animals when she said, “Beth, I’ve been meaning to talk to you for some time.”
“You . . . have?” I tried to the keep the surprise out of my voice, but I was pretty sure I hadn’t done a very good job.
“It’s all those murders you’ve solved.”
I stifled a sigh. For a number of odd reasons, I’d made contributions to tracking down a number of killers, and each time I’d vowed it would never happen again. Too dangerous and too stupid. That’s why we had law enforcement. They hadn’t needed my help then and they wouldn’t in the future.
What Cookie probably wanted to know was one of three questions people typically asked me about those experiences. One: had I been scared? Absolutely. Two: what did a dead person look like? Sorry, but that’s something I try not to remember. Three: were they going to make a movie about my life? Not a chance. But if they did, I’d like Sandra Bullock to play me.
“Don’t you think,” Cookie went on, “that the punishment doesn’t always match the crime?”
“Excuse me?”
“I mean, if someone kills someone, premeditated, in cold blood, shouldn’t they be killed, too? Isn’t that the fair thing?”
“Um . . .” Getting into an argument about capital punishment was not high on my list of things to do with good friends and relatives, let alone with someone I barely knew.
“I know life isn’t fair,” she went on, “but shouldn’t we be trying to make sure life is as fair as we can make it?”
“That’s a good point,” I said, trying to find a comfortable fence to sit on. “My children are always telling me what’s fair and what isn’t.”
“Yes, I knew you’d agree,” she said with satisfaction.
I hadn’t, not exactly. Not at all, in fact, but since there is a strong tendency among humans to believe what they want to believe, I decided not to fight this particular battle. Skirmish. Whatever it was.
“I’m glad we had this talk, Beth,” Cookie said. “My mind is at ease now, truly.”
Fever, I figured. She was probably running a slight temperature and it was steering her to say things that didn’t make a lot of sense. “We’ll get you home in a jiffy,” I told her. “Do you need anything? Aspirin?”
“Don’t you worry about me,” she said. “I have everything I need.”
Soon, we pulled into her driveway. I steadied her as we tromped through the thin snow to the back door, asked if she needed me to help her to bed, was told no, waited until the kitchen light went on, and went back to my warm car.
I drove home and didn’t even once worry about Cookie.
• • •
The next morning I was in the store kitchenette making the first crucial decision of the day—Earl Grey or Irish Breakfast Blend—when the phone rang. Lois snatched it up before I even turned my head.
“Good morning, Children’s Bookshelf . . . Yes, she is. One moment please.” After a short pause came her call. “Yo, Beth! It’s for you.”
I abandoned the tea choices and picked up my office phone. “Good morning. This is Beth.”
“Oh, Beth,” said the faint female voice. “I’m so glad I got hold of you.”
It took me a moment to place the voice. “Cookie?” I frowned and sat down. “You sound awful. Don’t tell me you went to work today.”
“No, no . . .” There was a loud swallow. “I have a horrible upset stomach, and I’m so afraid that I have . . .” Another swallow. “Food poisoning.”
“Oh, that’s too bad,” I said sympathetically. “And food poisoning can be dangerous. Make sure you get enough fluids and . . .” The reason that Cookie Van Doorne was calling me about her health sank in. “Are you saying you think you ate something last night that made you sick?” My mental mom manual was telling me that it usually took twenty-four hours for the nasty effects of food poisoning to make themselves known, but “usually” isn’t “always.”
“I’m not sure,” she said, “but I thought you should know.”
“Yes. Thank you. I’ll starting making calls right away and—” But I was talking to empty air. Cookie had hung up the phone.
Hoping that Cookie was wrong about the food poisoning, and hoping—selfishly—that if she did have food poisoning, it wasn’t because of anything she ate at the PTA event, I dialed a phone number I’d only recently memorized.
“Mary Margaret? It’s Beth. We might have a problem.”
Mary Margaret told me she’d take care of all the phone calls that suddenly had to be made. “I know just what to do, so don’t you worry about a thing. Say, how do you feel?”
In my worry about sickening half of Rynwood, I hadn’t once considered that I myself might get sick. “Fine. How about you?”
“Healthy as a horse. Let’s hope I stay that way, eh?”
For a long, long time.
• • •
The phone tree that Mary Margaret quickly set up worked like a charm. Within a few hours, everyone who’d been at last night’s event had been contacted. Some people had been contacted more than once, but better too often than not at all, Mary Margaret reported, and I agreed.
“And now we wait,” she said. “I told all my callers to have anyone who got sick call me. That way we can track what’s going on.”
“Let me know if anyone calls,” I told her. “Morning, noon, or night.”
“You bet. Now, don’t worry, okay? It’ll be fine.”
We hung up. “Don’t worry,” I muttered. “I can’t believe she said not to worry.”
• • •
I spent the rest of the day and evening waiting for a phone call from Mary Margaret. All through dinner, no phone call. All through evening chores and dog walking, no phone call. Through bedtime, no phone call. Twice, I started to pick up the phone to call her but stopped. She’d said she’d call if she heard anything, and she would.
The next morning I waited and worried some more. To alleviate some of that worry, I called Cookie. She sounded almost like her normal self and thought she’d be back to work in a day or two. “Must have been one of those stomach viruses,” she said. “Thanks for all you did, Beth. It meant a lot to me.”
“It was nothing,” I said, a little itchy at her gratitude. “Just get better, okay?”
At lunchtime, I couldn’t take it any longer and picked up the phone.
“Hey, Beth,” Mary Margaret said. “The only calls we got were a kid with a sore throat who wasn’t even there. Oh, and Randy Jarvis twisted his knee out shoveling snow.”
I heaved a huge sigh of relief. “And I called Cookie a little bit ago. She said she’s feeling much better.”
“False alarm, then,” Mary Margaret said cheerily. “Well, all’s well that ends well, right?”
“Right,” I said. Sometimes things really did work out.
• • •
But a few days later Glenn Kettunen stopped by the store ready to share the unwelcome news. “Say, did you hear about Cookie? She’s in the hospital.”
Less than half an hour later, I was in Cookie’s room, accepting her thanks for the flowers I’d brought.
“How sweet,” she said weakly, watching as I arranged the bouquet. “I’ve never been one for wasting money on fresh flowers, but carnations last a nice long time.”
Since “You’re welcome” didn’t seem to fit, I smiled and drew the guest chair close to the bed. “Is there anything I can get you?” I asked. “Water? Ice?”
“No, thank you.” She closed her eyes and laid her head back against the pillow. Her gray hair hung limply against her head, her skin was an odd shade of white, and the lines on her face were drawn long and deep. She looked . . . sick.
I reached out to pat her arm and was surprised at how thin and frail she felt. “If you’re too tired to talk, I can come back later.”
Her eyes fluttered open. “Momma? Is that you?”
Oh, dear.
I touched her hand and started to say something generically comforting, but her eyes closed, and stayed closed. When I saw that her chest was still rising and falling with reassuring regularity, I sat back in the chair. Out in the hallway, footsteps stepped past, some fast, some slow, some loud, some so soft they could barely be heard. Smells that weren’t of home or bookstore wafted in. Voices murmured. Faint beeps beeped.
