by Paula Boyd
That stopped me in my tracks.
"Why, I guess he just can’t go anywhere in peace anymore. Mothers even pushing their nearly teenage daughters on him, if you can imagine," she said, implying that she could very well imagine it. "Suppose it’s to be expected, him being the sheriff and available and all, not to mention real good-looking ..."
Having deftly set the hook, she swiveled around and pranced off to the kitchen.
My mother had no doubts that I would follow her. All catfish are drawn to stink bait--they just can’t help themselves and neither could I.
With my heart thundering in my chest and my teeth clenching spasmodically, I watched her fill a glass of water from her special purified jug in the fridge and suddenly decided I could use a little drink myself. Water wasn’t my first choice at the moment, but I really don’t like liquor and my beloved Dr Pepper would keep me wired all night--no matter how tired I was. Imagining hordes of women slobbering after Jerry wasn’t going to help either.
As Mother reeled me in with a knowing smirk, she also grabbed a fresh glass from the cabinet and filled it from the jug. Holding it out to me, she said, "I wasn’t implying that Jerry Don was taken with any of the girls or anything, mind you, just that he’s being pursued."
I snatched the cold glass of water and was a little surprised it didn’t start boiling in my hand. I took a sip. "Nice try, Mother, but I’m not biting. I don’t care who’s drooling after Jerry. It doesn’t have a thing at all to do with me."
It was a lie, of course, and she knew it as well as I did. If indeed women were falling at his feet--and I fully suspected they were--I darn well wanted to know every single one of their names and home addresses--not to mention dates of birth and bra sizes.
Lucille flicked her acrylic claws as if shooing flies. "Well, he is quite a catch, and I’m sure there are plenty of women that would be more than happy to take care of his children if they got Jerry Don in the bargain."
She paused for effect and took another sip of water. When she was darned good and ready, she said, "Really, Jolene, under the unfortunate circumstances, it wouldn’t hurt you to befriend his children. Those poor little things could use a good role model."
Me? A role model? This was definitely a new development since I couldn’t recall a single time I’d ever made a parenting decision that the Queen Mother had agreed with. I don’t think she’d ever been straightforward in saying so, but it was clearly implied that Matt and Sarah had turned out to be intelligent and decent human beings, because of their grandmother’s remote influence, and in spite of my daily one.
"Jerry’s kids have their mother," I said, pointing out the obvious and ignoring the fact that I had to actually have a relationship with Sheriff Parker for any of this to even matter. "Besides, I’m sure you’ll cheerfully agree that compared to me, Amy Parker is a saint."
"Well, yes," Lucille said, not even bothering to try to placate me. "Amy’s a sweet, good-natured, darling girl." She looked at me and fluttered her eyelashes.
I fluttered back. "What’s your point?"
Lucille toyed with a dangly earring of multi-colored beads. "Well, it’s just that I heard Amy has herself another girlfriend now…"
She left the sentence hanging there, just begging me to pick it up, but I was not about to get into that conversation--not no way, not no how. I let her stew for a bit as I slowly sipped down the rest of the nice cool water, which had amazingly simmered me down to just barely "hot under the collar" and slipping toward "merely amused."
"Well," I said, setting the glass on the counter. "Sounds like every woman in the county is either after Jerry or his ex-wife. Statistically speaking, that’s pretty darned amazing. But, I don’t see that Amy’s love life is any of my business." Or yours, Mother, I conveyed with a pointed look. "Ready for bed?"
Lucille put the jug of water away. "Have you talked to him much?"
Him obviously meaning Sheriff Jerry Don Parker. I like to call him my Texas James Bond, kind of a Pierce Brosnan with a rumbling twang, but not to his face, of course. I couldn’t help but smile at the image. And yes, oh yes, I’d talked to him--a lot. "He called a few times to see how I was doing."
The truth of the matter was that Jerry and I had talked at least twice a week and sometimes twice a day. We chatted about old times, new times, personal things, family things, and other things, but he hadn’t mentioned women falling at his feet, Amy’s new girlfriend, the big city celebration or the new waterfall. Probably because he knew I wouldn’t care--at least about the falls.
I hadn’t made a point of telling him that I’d be in town for my mother’s birthday either, for a similar reason. Not that he wouldn’t care, exactly, I just didn’t want him to feel obligated to see me. A long-distance phone friend was one thing. Showing up back in town as a face-to-face friend was quite another, and I wanted to do that privately.
"Well then," Lucille said, rather smugly. "I’m sure he’ll be anxious to see for himself that you’re doing okay. Why, you absolutely must give him a call in the morning and let him know you’ll see him at the falls."
The trap, like a snare around a rabbit’s foot, came full circle and yanked shut. Lucille Jackson is very good at this sort of thing, but I’m not that easy to manipulate. She knew I wanted to see Jerry, but I’d chew off my leg before I let her think she could tell me what to do.
"I’ll see him later," I said, quite nonchalantly. "Besides, this is such a special event, I wouldn’t want to intrude on his time with his kids."
She frowned a little and pursed her lips, but having been trained by the master, I continued with my rebuttal before she could respond. "I’ll just stay here at the house, out of the way. Merline and Agnes won’t know what to do if you’re not right there with them, so you just go on and have a good time. Don’t worry about me. I need to get things ready for your party anyway, you know, and that’s going to take quite a while. Yes, this year’s going to be a doozy. I need some time to pull things together, pick up the cake, that sort of thing."
Lucille gave me a stern look, apparently unimpressed by either my enthusiasm for her party or my lame attempts at playing her game. I might have studied at the feet of the passive-aggressive master, but I was not an adept student.
"I’m going to the celebration tomorrow, Jolene, and you’re going to take me," she said, cutting to the chase.
I moved my jaw up and down a few times, searching for some really clever refusal-type words, but managed only gurgled moans.
"Now, listen, missy, I’ve already told Agnes and Merline that I couldn’t go with them because you were going to be here and I knew you’d want the two of us to go together. Everyone is expecting you to be there with me and you darn well will be."
Beads of sweat suffused my skin in a mighty hot flash, and I swallowed a very un-daughterly groan. This was not good. Not good at all. I knew better than to take the upfront approach and "just say no." That would earn me the cold shoulder for the entire time I had to be here. Of course, I could just leave and go back to Colorado, always a lovely idea, but that would earn me a cold shoulder for the rest of my life--yes, I fully expected to die first as Lucille will live to be at least 143. Besides, I am an only child and she is my only living relative other than my children. Damn.
With another gurgle of my stomach, inspiration struck. "Well, I suppose I can try to take you to the big event tomorrow, if I’m up to it. That long trip down from Colorado is a killer, you know. I’m really not feeling all that great." I rubbed my temples. "Headache, stomachache…" I wasn’t lying either.
"I’m sure you’ll feel just fine in the morning," she said, entirely too sure of the matter. "Now, get some sleep. We’ve got a big day ahead of us."
I tried to smile encouragingly while looking as sickly as I could. "Maybe a good night’s rest will help. I just hope I can sleep." I stopped and frowned. That sounded like my mother’s voice coming out of my mouth, and it did not have a melodious ring to it. Maybe I’d learned more from Mother d
ear than I’d thought--and that was not a good thing. "See you in the morning," I said, but not with enthusiasm.
Lucille flicked off the kitchen light and trotted to her bedroom, no doubt grinning smugly.
I did my own about-face, turned out the light in the living room and marched back to my corner, giving myself a scathing what-for every step of the way. I was an adult, for godsakes. I didn’t have to do what my mother told me to anymore. If I didn’t want to go to the stupid fake-rocks-and-fire-hose show tomorrow I darn well didn’t have to. And I’d tell her just exactly that first thing in the morning.
I could be sick if I wanted to. So there.
Chapter 2
It had been a good theory, the one about being an adult and doing whatever I pleased. In practice, however, it left a lot to be desired. The pretending-to-be-sick thing hadn’t worked out so well either.
I’d given it my best effort, really I had, but I discovered I was no better at playing dead now than when I’d been ten years old. And here I thought I’d learned something in the last thirty years. If I have, it apparently has nothing at all to do with dealing with my mother.
Okay, if you must know the unpleasant details, I might have whined a little, moaned and/or groaned a lot, and even seriously considered writhing on the floor for dramatic effect. I eventually conjured up a pretty good whimper and produced a few real tears as I presented my complaints of sleep deprivation, nausea, headache, diarrhea and a couple of long shots like kidney stones and an aneurysm.
Lucille was not moved. I’m not even sure she noticed.
Apparently, I shouldn’t have forewarned her that I was planning to be sick in the morning. Even so, she would have seen right through my semi-fake illness just as she had when I was in grade school. I don’t think I ever got away with cutting class even once. I’m not very good at deviousness and deceit. However, I do excel at compulsive sarcasm and the ability to insert my foot into my mouth at any given moment.
Actually, Lucille didn’t stomp and rant and demand that I go to the big celebration with her. She just wondered aloud, over and over and over again, what would happen to her if she went alone and had a heat stroke, a frail old woman out there all by herself, alone and at the mercy of strangers. When she began her dramatic interpretation of a mother’s heart being ripped from her chest and stomped on--we are a theatrical pair--I gave in, but not gracefully.
Negotiations--and I use the term loosely--for the conditions of the outing were neither subtle nor fair on either side. Despite Lucille’s efforts to shame me into it, I refused to dress as if we were going to a funeral, regardless of how similar the events would be. I opted instead for a comfy pair of denim shorts, a tee shirt and sandals, my standard uniform of choice when sweltering is expected.
I also did not let myself get coerced into putting on a bunch of make-up. Lucille wears enough for both of us. Besides, it’s common knowledge that the beauty-queen thing never appealed to me. All the cosmetics I own can fit into a sandwich bag--with the sandwich. My mother’s collection, however, requires a tackle box worthy of a pro bass fishing champion. You open the top and all those little trays unfold like bleachers in a gymnasium. But I digress.
The trip into Redwater Falls had been both silent and uneventful, but now that we were on the highway by the falls, I could feel the excitement bubbling forth from the passenger seat. In true funeral procession style, we took our place in the queue of cars snaking along the access road at the edge of the river. We could see into the main parking area, which had a bit of a carnival atmosphere. Various food and beverage carts dotted the perimeter of the parking lot, all festooned with bunches of frolicsome balloons and surrounded by lines of people. Finding a close-in place to park was looking highly unlikely.
The city, knowing a hot tourist attraction when it built one, had cleared an ambitious area of trees and grass--and paved and striped it admirably. This grandiose parking area would no doubt hold several thousand cars. Unfortunately, there were about ten times that number trying to get in.
"Park right over there, Jolene," Lucille said, pointing up ahead to a grassy patch under a huge cottonwood tree to the far right of where the big new falls had been erected. "It’ll be real cool in the shade there. Just pull up on the grass. It won’t hurt anything."
"Nah, won’t hurt a thing except that we’ll have to call a taxi when my car is towed away for illegal parking."
"Oh, for crying out loud, Jolene, everybody will be parking everywhere. Besides, we know the Bowman County sheriff and that cute little blond Redwater detective. What was his name?"
I did not volunteer his name, although I did remember it. How could I forget? Rick, aka Surfer Dude, was not little, but he was very cute and very blond. Tanned and lean, he looked like he belonged on a beach in California instead of sporting a detective’s badge in Redwater Falls, Texas. He was also a part of a very bad time that I preferred to forget. I shook off a shudder at the still-fresh memories, reflexively rubbed my arm and studied the parking options for a few more seconds.
While Mother’s frequent and energetic marathons at the mall are the stuff of legends, I decided it really would be best if she didn’t have to walk too far in the impending heat. The temperature had already ripened to ninety-four degrees with a similar number on the humidity scale, and Mother wasn’t as young as she used to be. The shade might also prove helpful if perchance I discovered a way to enjoy the festivities from my Tahoe--my dark blue, sun-sucking Tahoe. So, with mostly selfless motivations, I hopped the curb and drove carefully toward the designated tree.
Pulling to a stop under the thickest spot of shade, I glanced around and noticed that my trailblazing had started a trend. Cars and trucks were packing in around us like frogs in a shrinking mud hole. There was some safety in numbers, I supposed, since it was doubtful they could haul us all off. I just hoped none of our new vehicular neighbors were setting up for a rousing tailgate party that would impede my solitude should I actually find a way to escape back here.
Mother unhooked her seatbelt and grabbed her tackle box from the back seat. She set the box on the console, snapped open the latches, and spread out all the little trays. After some deliberation, she selected a long brown pencil, flipped up the passenger side mirror, and expertly began embellishing her brows. That was only the beginning, of course, and I kept the car--and the all-important air conditioner--running while she re-based, re-powered and re-blushed. A swipe of mascara and an artful lip painting completed the cosmetic process. But she wasn’t done yet. From the bottom of the tackle box she pulled out an industrial-sized can of hairspray and shook it.
Heat or no heat, I rolled down the windows fast.
"What do you think about my new color, Jolene?" she said, spraying and patting her helmet of pale mauve hair. "I was getting a little tired of Frivolous Fawn and decided to try something new. It’s called Reticent Rose."
Painfully Pink would have been my guess. Obviously, I did not verbalize my opinion. Nope, I just smiled, very nicely, mind you, and coughed discreetly at the fog of hairspray engulfing me, then pointed all the air conditioner vents in her direction. "It does have quite a bit of reddish tint to it," I said, tactfully, and with not a hint of sarcasm. Honest.
"That’s what I thought." Lucille leaned back from the visor mirror so she could take in the full head view. "Of course, it could just be my natural color coming through. I was auburn like you when I was younger, you know. When I’d get out in the sun, my hair would glow just like the burner on an electric stove."
Lovely visual, just lovely. "Well," I said, still very kindly. "You can keep trying different colors until you find one you really like."
Lucille finished with the spray can, reloaded the tackle box and snapped the visor up, ready to venture out into the masses. For the festivities, she had chosen a purple pantsuit with matching earrings that dangled in strings of little purple balls, which matched the purple nail polish on her acrylic fingernails and non-acrylic toes. To complete her ensemble
, she had opted to wear her favorite gold glitter sandals--presumably to show off the coordinating toe polish. As strange as it sounds, on Lucille, the look worked--very well. She looked rather fetching and certainly blended into the local crowd better than Plain Jane Jolene, who was starting to wish she had dressed for a funeral.
As more and more people flocked past the car, I began to surmise that everyone in Redwater Falls and the surrounding counties was here to see the unveiling of the new fake waterfall. Most, if not all, were dressed in their Sunday best, which does not mean shorts and a tee shirt. People around here dress to be seen, and one’s image is not something to be taken lightly. I know this, but I try to pretend it doesn’t matter, and it doesn’t--shouldn’t. But no matter what I tell myself, when I get around this mentality, I start worrying about what other people think of me. It’s just plain weird.
"Hurry, up, Jolene." Lucille swung the car door open wide and grabbed the overhead handhold to help herself to the ground. She didn’t make any ugly comments about my "monster truck" as she shimmied down, but the tooth marks in her fresh lipstick said she’d surely thought about it. She huffed a little as she smoothed away the wrinkles from her pantsuit. "We’d better hurry if we want to get a good place where we can see the water when it comes over."
I rolled up the windows, killed the engine and covered my mouth to hide my yawn. The heat does that to me--makes me want to just lie right down and take a nap. If I’ve just had a nice big chicken-fried steak with gravy and a tall glass of iced tea, so much the better. My mother--unlike most of the local populace--did not appear to be afflicted by this problem. As sleek and restless as a caged cougar, Lucille Jackson was neither dreaming of fatty foods nor yawning. She was, in fact, abuzz with energy. Before I could tell her to calm down, that we had plenty of time, a band--I’m guessing the high school marching variety--began to play what I hoped were just warm-up notes.
"Hurry up, Jolene, they’re starting the ceremony!" She slammed the car door shut and took off like a shot.
