Dakota Blues Box Set

by Lynne M Spreen

  “You’re helping with Eleanor?” Karen set her briefcase on the counter.

  “We all take turns. I don’t think Sunshine will wake up for a while. The ladies wore her out this morning.” Jessie folded up her sewing and stuck it in a bag. “So is it okay?”

  “I guess I could. Since she’s sleeping.”

  “Thanks! Her diapers and everything are right here. I use these wipes because she has a little rash. She might be hungry, so you could give her some chopped-up bits of cheese and blueberries. Her apple juice is in her sippy cup, in the fridge. Her toys are in this box over here, and I’ll have my phone close by if anything happens.”

  She slipped out the door. Karen was tired already.

  After Jessie left, Karen tiptoed over to the playpen, which was covered with a lightweight blanket. She lifted one corner. Sunshine lay on her tummy, knees drawn up underneath her, her bottom in the air. Karen fought the urge to reach down and touch the cherubic curls around the nape of the baby’s neck. Better she sleep.

  Karen got comfortable in the recliner and began reading a novel. Outside, the campground was quiet. Peace settled over her, and she was able to imagine what it would be like to be a grandmother. She was reconciled with her own childlessness, the pain receding years ago in the normal course of life. At times, it reoccurred, but at the moment she was content.

  The baby rolled over and mumbled in her sleep. Karen froze. Sunshine coughed, whimpered a little, and struggled to her feet, trying to look around in spite of the blanket. She whimpered, and Karen jumped up. “It’s okay, honey.” She pulled back the sheet and reached for the child, who hesitated and then went into Karen’s arms.

  Karen circled the trailer, jiggling the baby, rubbing her back and cooing. Then Sunshine got restless.

  Now what?

  She opened the fridge and handed the sippy cup to Sunshine, who took it in both hands, raising the cup and tilting her head backward to drink. Karen sat in the recliner and let the baby stretch out in her lap. The child studied Karen while she drank, even reaching up with one hand, her little fingers exploring Karen’s face. As any human would naturally do, Karen smiled and tried some baby talk.

  Sunshine emptied the cup and threw it across the room. Then she smiled, shimmied off Karen’s lap to the floor, and crawled to get the cup, her soggy diaper sagging on her backside. She picked up the cup and threw it again. This time, it flew behind her, whacking the window.

  “Come on, let’s change you.” Karen knelt on the floor, laid the baby on a blanket, and took care of business, pleased that she was able to manage without any special training. When she finished, Sunshine didn’t jump up right away, so Karen leaned over and blew a raspberry on her bare belly. Sunshine giggled, so Karen did it again. They played that game until the baby rolled over and went into the bedroom to explore.

  Karen followed her, removing breakable or unsafe objects just in time or, if too late, convincing Sunshine to relinquish her hold. They played peekaboo, rolled a ball, and tossed stuffed animals around the room. When the baby giggled, it struck Karen as funny, so she laughed, making the baby giggle more. By the time Jessie returned in late afternoon, the trailer was a mess and Karen was exhausted.

  But she’d had fun.

  While Jessie distracted Sunshine, Karen dragged herself into her bedroom and pulled the divider closed. She hoped the baby wouldn’t come looking for her. Feeling grateful for this small amount of privacy, Karen closed her eyes, hoping Fern delivered on her promise, and soon.

  CHAPTER 38

  THE NEXT MORNING, KAREN washed down a piece of toast with coffee as the big Chevy dually backed into the driveway, a large roll of canvas in the truck bed along with Doc and Patti.

  Jessie looked up from the floor where she was playing with the baby. “What’s happening?”

  “Moving day.” Karen hurried outside. A man rode in the cab with Fern and Belle. When everybody piled out, Fern said, “This is Mack. He says we’re good until he and his wife leave in April.”

  The short, well-fed man reached out to shake Karen’s hand.

  “I appreciate the loan,” Karen said. “We won’t need it that long, though.”

  “Karen, you and Patti get one side,” said Fern. “Mack and I’ll get the other. Belle, you get the poles. Doc, you’re on glue, Velcro, and side skirting.”

  “I brought an air mattress and pump,” said Candace, walking up with Margo.

  “Good thinking.” The women hefted the canvas out of the truck and onto the ground. With Mack directing, they began unrolling the canvas and laying out the hardware.

  “What is it?” Jessie came outside, holding Sunshine on one hip.

  “It’s a screen porch,” said Karen. “This way, you and the baby can have the bedroom.”

  “Awesome!”

  “But I’m not going to bunk outside forever.”

  “I’m doing the best I can.”

  “There must be apartments all over the place.”

  “I was hoping for something with a yard.” Jessie blew a strand of hair off her face and went back in the trailer.

  Whatever Jessie’s best was, she was still here. Karen dashed over to steady an upright as Doc pounded the stabilizing stakes into the ground. Soon the canvas walls were in place and the ceiling panel secured. Velcro strips were affixed to the side of the RV, to which skirting was attached. The screen porch took shape quickly. In less than two hours, the trailer had expanded with what amounted to a small bedroom.

  After she had thanked everyone and promised to return it in a month, Karen moved in. She inflated the mattress, tested it, and propped it out of the way against the back wall. A stack of boxes served as a dresser, and a lamp was connected via a heavy-duty cord snaking under the RV to the electrical outlet. All the while, Jessie remained inside with the baby.

  It was lunchtime, and Karen was hungry, but she didn’t want to go inside and hassle with the closeness of the RV. Instead, she stuck her head inside the door. “I’m off to run errands.”

  Jessie nodded, a flash of understanding in her eyes. “See you later.”

  Karen hopped on her scooter and headed for the local deli for a sandwich. She had them double wrap it with a bag of ice and went to Pennekamp to rent a kayak. Out in the mangroves, she stashed the paddle and unwrapped her lunch, chicken salad with nuts and dried cranberries. She closed her eyes, tilted her face to the sky, and filled her lungs with the clean salt air. What a relief to be able to escape for a while into such beauty. With a bottle of iced tea propped between her knees, she ate in the silence. Karen wasn’t a hermit, but after all that had happened in the past few days, she needed this—needed time alone and quiet. By the time she’d finished her dessert, a white chocolate–chip cookie with macadamia nuts, she felt more settled, but still weighed down with the sense of loss.

  She tried to put it into context. In spite of her hopes and aspirations, one of the cruelest lessons of her life was it wasn’t possible to have it all—that a person sometimes had to choose—and the choosing sometimes required sacrifice. Losing Curt felt like the biggest sacrifice she would ever make, and she had to reassure herself constantly that it was the right decision.

  That night, in the screen porch with the lights off, Karen changed into her nightie and slipped into bed. It was weird sleeping outside, but she thought she would like it. The enclosure kept the bugs out but let in enough air that she didn’t feel closed in. The campground was quiet tonight. In the distance, she heard a bullfrog sing. She drifted off, feeling more settled than before.

  The next morning, Karen went into the trailer to use the restroom and make breakfast.

  “There’s coffee.” Jessie was trying to cut up a pancake while keeping Sunshine from climbing on a shelf.

  Karen grabbed the baby and steadied her. “Go ahead. Finish up. I’ll watch her.”

  Jessie ate while Karen played with Sunshine, and then they switched. Or tried to. Sunshine wanted to be in Karen’s lap constantly, fussing when she put her d
own.

  Jessie rinsed her dish. “I know it’s not really fair to you that we’re here, crowding into your trailer.” She prepared Sunshine’s breakfast, chopping up mangoes and little squares of cheese along with Cheerios.

  “It’s not a question of fairness. We don’t have any other choice.”

  “Still, I have a suggestion.” Jessie lifted the baby into her high chair, but Sunshine balked, screaming. Karen offered to hold her in her lap and feed her.

  “I’m not sure that’s a good habit to start,” said Jessie.

  “Who cares?” Karen took the baby and chuckled at Sunshine’s joyful reaction to being held. “It’s only temporary.”

  “I’m sorry, but no.” Jessie shook her head and stuck the baby into the chair anyway. In spite of the screaming, she explained, “According to my textbooks, babies have to start feeling independent, and mealtime is a perfect setting for them to explore.”

  “It’s not going to kill her this one time.”

  Jessie finally got the baby to quiet down and start eating. “One time leads to two times, and then where are you? You completely lose control of the situation.”

  “You’re a psych student?”

  “I’m halfway through my degree in social work.”

  “Good for you. What did you want to ask me?”

  “If you’d accept rent. I’d like to give you a hundred dollars for the month.”

  “Your grandmother would kill me, so no.”

  “I want to pay my way. I’ve been working.”

  “Doing what?”

  Jessie’s phone beeped, and she glanced at it. In that annoying way kids have, she read it in front of Karen. When she looked up, her face was pale. She set the phone aside and went back to feeding the baby.

  “Doing what?” Karen repeated.

  “Huh? Oh, um, I do alterations for the ladies. Gina got me started.”

  “She tried that on me,” Karen said. “I kept telling her no. You have to be careful. She can take advantage.”

  “I’m aware of that,” Jessie said. “I charge all of them ten dollars for simple hemming and mending, but anything more complicated is twenty-five dollars an hour. And I’m as busy as I can stand.”

  Karen admired Jessie for that. “You’re handling them better than I ever did.”

  “So can we agree on rent?”

  “No.” It was time for Karen’s second idea. “But you can agree to go apartment hunting with me.”

  Jessie shrugged. “If you think you can find something, let’s look. But I still wish you’d let me contribute.”

  Karen shook her head. If she let Jessie pay, the girl would feel more entitled to stay.

  The psychology student had probably already figured that out.

  “I’m going to the library,” Karen said.

  Jessie bowed her head toward Sunshine. She didn’t answer.

  CHAPTER 39

  THE NEXT MORNING, JESSIE was resigned, but Karen was determined. They would find an apartment, and Jessie could begin making plans to move.

  After leaving Sunshine with Belle, Karen and Jessie headed north to the mainland. They exchanged a few pleasantries and then fell silent. Karen drove, while Jessie bent to her phone, nimble thumbs flying. The tide was out, leaving mud flats baking on both sides of the roadway. The sky was hazy, a southerly wind blowing the crud from Miami toward the Keys. To break up the silence, Karen rolled the window partway down, letting in road noise. Jessie spoke only to give her directions from GPS.

  At the first address, a guard waved them through gates. Karen parked in front of the office. “Looks expensive.”

  “That’s because it has a yard. I hope it’s big. I might have to find a roommate.” Jessie hopped out of the cab. The manager, a thin woman with a strong jaw, said, “You’re lucky. We have one apartment available.” They hurried after her as she marched toward the back end of the property. “We don’t get many vacancies, so you caught us on a good day.” She unlocked the entry door, located under the stairs to the upper residence. The porch-light fixture lacked a bulb and was covered in spider webs.

  The unit, shaped like a shoe box, consisted of a bathroom and a combination kitchen-living room with a Murphy bed. A slider opened to a slab of cement that ended in a wooden fence.

  “That’s the yard?” Jessie asked.

  “Perfect for relaxing outside,” the manager said.

  The fence was broken in places, and on the other side, a backyard skateboard ramp rose above the fence line. Several young men sat smoking at the top of the ramp. They stared at the women. One of them scratched his crotch, and another laughed.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Karen muttered.

  Jessie swallowed. “How much?”

  The manager told them.

  “That’s outrageous,” Karen said.

  “It’s the going rate. This one won’t last.”

  “Thanks anyway.” They returned to the truck. Jessie consulted her phone. “The next one is an apartment on the ground floor and has a little yard.” She grimaced. “I hope it’s better than this one.”

  “What’s the area like?”

  “Affordable.”

  The Richelieu Apartments were painted bright pumpkin. The windows of the rental office were painted over, and the air stank of fried fish. When a cockroach ran across the manager’s desk, Jessie stifled a shriek.

  The man laughed, exposing three missing teeth.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Karen said.

  The third apartment complex looked clean enough on the outside, but as the manager led them through the courtyard and past the pool, Karen saw that it was drained, the bloated carcass of a rabbit half in the puddle of muddy rainwater in the deep end. She grabbed Jessie’s arm and headed back to the truck.

  They kept looking until it was dark, but everything affordable ranged from disgusting to frightening. Dejected, they headed back to Key Largo.

  “Something will turn up,” Karen said, but she couldn’t imagine Sunshine toddling around in such places.

  “I’ll keep looking,” said Jessie.

  That evening, Karen went to get a bite at Lorelei’s. Out on the patio, she finished her drink and sat, her thoughts morose in spite of the peaches and pinks of sunset over the sound. When she got back to the trailer, Jessie had just finished bathing Sunshine in a little rubber washtub on the shower floor. She put the baby to bed and came to the door of the screen porch. Karen sat in darkness, lit only by a distant streetlight.

  “Can I come out?”

  “Sure.” Karen unfolded a second camp chair.

  “Today was such a bust. I never saw so much filth.”

  “Horrible,” said Karen. “Hard to believe some people live that way.”

  “Even when I was living in a single-wide in backcountry Georgia, it wasn’t dirty. Those people were horrible.”

  Karen was still trying to get her brain around the idea of Sunshine living on the other side of the fence from the skateboarding ramp. Jessie would be a prime target. They’d both seen the way the young men raked her over with hungry eyes. Still, she had to help Jessie find a place, or she would never be able to sell the RV. “Have you looked at the flyers at the grocery store?”

  “I don’t even know why they print new ones. There’s nothing.”

  “Things can change.” Karen hoped.

  A car went by, and the women fell silent as it traveled slowly past.

  “You want a beer?” asked Jessie.

  “Sure.”

  Jessie came back out with two bottles and handed one to Karen. “It’s actually kind of nice out here.”

  “It is. I feel like I’m camping,” said Karen. “Your grandmother got me started. If it hadn’t been for her, I’d never be here.”

  “What would you be doing?”

  Karen took a swig of beer. “I might have gone back to California eventually and tried to start over there, working for some big corporation again.”

  “Might have been a little m
ore secure.”

  “That’s always the gamble, isn’t it?” There were no answers in life, Karen thought. You were constantly making them up for yourself and might never know whether or not you were right. “I’m pretty happy, all in all. But nothing’s perfect.”

  “Um. Along those lines.” Jessie took a sip of beer and then put the bottle down on her knees, playing with the condensation and studying the cold beads.

  Karen waited.

  “So I talked to Lenny a little while ago.”

  “Today?”

  “A few minutes ago.”

  “I didn’t know the two of you were in contact.”

  “We have been, a little.” Jessie sighed. “He sounds sorry.”

  Karen clamped her mouth shut. It wasn’t her business, she repeated in her head. Not her business. Not her business. “Just be careful, okay?”

  “Of course.” Jessie finished her beer and went back inside.

  Karen sat in the dark for a long time after that. No sense trying to sleep yet. Her mind was a jumble of anger and fear. The night fell quiet, and the campground grew dark. After a while, she went to bed, but she didn’t sleep for a long time.

  CHAPTER 40

  THE ROAR OF A BOAT motor woke Karen. She tried to go back to sleep, but Jessie’s revelation made it impossible. In the darkness, Karen turned on her reader, but she was too sleepy, and the words were wasted. She set it aside and lay in the dark, waiting for dawn.

  Instead, flashing lights lit up the night, and an ambulance appeared, rolling quietly down the road through the campground. As it passed Karen, she sat up.

  Eleanor.

  Karen slipped into her clothes and flip-flops and quietly unzipped her door flap. In the damp cold, she walked quickly down the roadway toward the back edge of the campground, following the vehicle. Fern and Belle came out of the darkness and joined her. Their anxious whispers increased Karen’s concern.

  Doc and Patti were already at the campsite. Margo and Candace appeared. They stood and waited, but then Fern couldn’t stand it anymore and elbowed her way inside. When she returned, her face was grim. “She’s not breathing. They’re trying to revive her.”