Scandal

by Patsy Brookshire

  "Oh, Magda," a second unseen woman said, "Of course you'd say that, though I must agree. Our Willamina women do up a quilt show proud." The words became less distinct as they moved away. Probably going to the Jackman Long Hall, where quilts lined the wall, enchanting fairgoers with fabrics from flannel to silk, patterns from colorful geometric designs to abstracts. Each one different but each a demonstration of the love of quilts.

  Several of my aunts quilted, but I didn't. I sew, but quilt? No. Too complicated for me.

  Willamina? When I was an alcohol and drug counselor for the state, I'd had a client, a logger, from Willamina, a town somewhere just in off the coast. He'd snagged a Driving Under the Influence of Intoxicants--DUII. I do hope that poor Willamina drunk decided on a better life than the disaster he'd been working on at the time, starting with getting rid of that fridge in his garage stocked with quarts of cheap beer.

  I'm taking a year off to assess what I want to do with myself when I grow up. The time off is the benefit of my late husband, Roger's, insurance policy. I shuddered and let it all roll away.

  Magda's strong voice rose above the crowd's chatter. "This is a quilter's paradise. I always get lots of great ideas. I can't wait to see who wins Best of Show this year. Judy's art piece of Haystack Rock just stunned me and I know..."

  Why she was stunned and what she knows was lost to me as their voices blended into the noise around the Unusual Bugs exhibit.

  Tired of the crush and of holding myself in against the crowd, I flexed my thighs in the new blue jeans that fit so nice after all my workouts. The quick shopping this morning had landed me the Wranglers, red Crocs, and a red silk camp shirt. I wanted to look casual but sharp, just in case I saw Len, who I didn't know if I even wanted to see, but if I did, I wanted to look my best, casually.

  "That danged Len," Aunt Sophie had called him. I hear her voice of caution still. Many years since I last saw him.

  Boy, it felt good to be smiling in spite of that photo in this morning's paper!

  The photo. I couldn't let myself be distracted. Focus. A quick one of that little boy with the fuzzy yellow chick in his hands, his eyes alight. Who could resist? Back to the cages, and a highlight of the ribbon. The blue color is nice but, I doubted it would make front page.

  I wanted a photo of the way the cockroaches' feelers branch about like teeny fingers, to show how "personable" they can be. Their value as pets.

  The women's words returned to me: Haystack Rock? An art quilt of Haystack Rock? Did they mean the Haystack Rock of Cannon Beach, or Haystack rock at Pacific City? Both mammoth "stack" rocks were formed from boiling lava pushing up through a crack in the ocean floor to stack up, millions of years ago.

  Ouch. My head hurts with the weight of the thought of it all...the agony of researching that paper for my college geology class. I'm seldom able to sit on the beach, peacefully sifting dry sand through my fingers, without thinking how deceptive all this serenity is. That my lovely Oregon has her sturdy haunches spread above the Ring of Fire; that underneath all the green trees and blue skies bubbles a volcanic hotbed.

  From the corner of the wire cage I picked off a bit of black and red checked cloth. It looked to be a piece of Dave's shirt. Winning the blue ribbon was a Big Deal for the school, but the chaos these skittery little critters had caused yesterday for the Fair had become the real story. I hoped my photo, plus the ribbon, would counterbalance the drama these bugs had made in this morning's papers.

  I checked the picture I'd just taken, a clear shot of the padlock on the dented cage, and the surviving bugs, secured within. Satisfied, I worked my way out of the crowd. My stomach growled, talking to me.

  Food. When a person is at the State Fair she must eat something bad-for-her, something one can only get at a fair. A deep-fried Twinkie? Maybe later, with the family. A corn dog was my first requirement. I headed for the nearest exit, hoping it would lead to the stall that sold the dogs.

  Outside, the heat beaded up sweat on my hairline. The ground cover of dampened sawdust reflected the glare of the sun. Wincing, I put on my sunglasses. I walked past the olives on a stick, admired the various whirligigs turning every which way in the slight wind. All the while my ears were being pounded by the sound of screaming people on the Atomic Rocket.

  Roger had loved the dang thing--he'd been gone over two years, to a disease that just wouldn't go away. I only had to dig my fingernails into my palm for a few seconds to short circuit the sudden, sharp gut pain. I moved it to the later part of my brain.

  The enticing aroma of frying onions cut through the dust and heat. I turned to the nearest stall and saw a grill spread evenly with onions and sauerkraut for hot dogs. Beside it was a fryer for corn dogs. Fated.

  My mind tickled me back to the Authors table. Len?

  Maybe?

  Perhaps I should let sleeping dogs lie. That would certainly be Aunt Sophie's advice. Best to check out the quilts back at the Jackman Long Building. Willamina Quilt Show? Maybe I'd find info there about it. I must see that quilt of Haystack Rock. I wonder if it is anything like the one Aunt Sophie made?

  The line for corn dogs was long; I spent the time thinking about the problem facing me, at home, with another of Aunt Sophie's quilts.

  And Len.

  Chapter 3

  Meeting Len

  Aunt Sophie made many quilts but the one that the family treasured the most was the one depicting Haystack Rock at Cannon Beach. She had used the technique called appliqué, sewing cut-out pieces atop a base piece of cloth, to make a design. Upon a large, blue piece as background of the Pacific Ocean, she had created, with many other pieces, the rock and its surroundings.

  Aunt Sophie's quilt, which now belongs to her son, my cousin Sam, has stood the test of time. It's still appealing to look at and cozy to wrap up in.

  "Want your dog, Lady?"

  I came out of my reverie to see the vendor handing me the corn dog on a paper tray. I fumbled for cash from my shoulder bag, took the dog. He pointed to the condiments on a small ledge by the window. I thought about mustard and decided against it--too dicey. Yellow against red silk would be awful.

  I wandered among masses of people fanning themselves until I found the cool picnic grove of oaks and maples. From my bag I pulled a bottle of water I'd bought earlier and a small pack of chips.

  While I ate my corndog and chips, I thought about the unfinished job waiting at home. I'd recently begun to go through the boxes into which I'd placed Roger's model ships. After he died, I couldn't stand looking at them. All those hours he'd spent on them, and I'd been jealous of the time. Now I just felt guilty. Why had I been so petty?

  When I packed them I'd needed soft cushioning. In the chest Aunt Sophie had left to me when she passed, I'd found enough old blankets for the job. Ship number seven was the last one Roger had worked on and he hadn't finished it. All that was left in the bottom of the chest was a quilt. Aunt Sophie's last project, unfinished.

  Great, an unfinished quilt, an unfinished ship. All the people I love leave things undone for me to take care of. I'd wrapped myself in self-pity while folding her quilt, pins and all, around Roger's last ship.

  Now I wanted the space and didn't need to hang onto the ships anymore. A new maritime museum in Newport had expressed interest in ship models for display, so it would be the perfect place for them. They were all true miniatures of real ships that had sailed the seas. The completed models were all in a box, waiting to be transported to Newport. The partial quilt remained in the chest, wrapped around the unfinished ship.

  What was I going to do with the ship? Or the quilt?

  I threw away the lunch remains and walked to the Jackman Long Building, passing the Oregon Authors Table. Giving it a quick glance, I didn't see anyone I knew and went on to the Quilt Display.

  The display dominated the whole room, with quilts hanging from all four walls, as well as being on frames on the floor in the main fabric crafts area. On the walls the quilts were high enough so they couldn't
be touched, but low enough to read the tag attached to each one. In bold black letters was the name of the quilt and quilt maker, and from which Oregon county it came. Blue or white or red ribbons were attached to winners of the County Fairs around the state, and most of them had garnered more awards in the statewide judging.

  They were beautiful, all sizes, shapes and designs.

  My neck was getting a crick in it as I stared at a particularly intriguing one, labeled Tumbling Blocks. It was the illusion of three-dimensional blocks made by the piecing of dark triangles against lighter colored ones, that amazed me. Now just how was that done?

  Impressed, I had pulled out my camera to take a photo, when I felt the weight of a hand upon my shoulder.

  "Are you sure you want to do that?"

  I turned to shake off the hand and stared into Len Bolder's face. Older than the face in my memory, but the same dark eyes with extra long lashes. Face tan and weathered.

  Len. I swallowed and gathered my cool. And took the photo. "Len. It is you."

  His eyes swept me in a frank once-over, his smile lifted his sharp cheeks and deepened the dimple beside his mouth.

  I restrained the impulse to put my hand to his lips and then to the dimple. I'd forgotten just how cute he really was, or is. I felt my face freeze into a wide-open stare, let out the deep breath I'd been holding, and grabbed his hand.

  His fingers curled over mine, lingering upon and then leaving my ring. "Hey!" He pulled me to him in a hug that I returned.

  Inside me there was a loosening, but with the tiniest pulling of hairs, like when you pull off the rubber band you put on your wrist to store it for a while.

  "How in the heck are you! I've been over here at the Authors Table--Oh, have you seen my book?--and I thought I saw someone who looked like you pass by our table and go into the quilts. I talked the guy next to me into watching my place while I came looking."

  His top lip covered his bottom one for just a second, in a manner that I fondly remembered meant he was thinking about what he was going to say next. "Are you here alone? 'Cause I could be gone long enough for us to have a cup of coffee and catch up...if you could?" He was obviously wondering about my marital state.

  I told myself I shouldn't be judgmental. I'd had a flash of regret of having the ring on when I realized he would have the wrong idea. I had left it on at first for reasons of love, and then sentimentality. I was still wearing it now because it kept men at bay.

  "Uh, sure. There's a place outside."

  "Oh, I know where it is. I have a Thermos. I'll grab it and a couple of cups."

  I was full of questions, and I felt the trepidation I always felt when I had to tell someone about being a widow and how I'd become one. I didn't like talking about it.

  He led me back to the Authors table, grabbed the jug and two cups from the center area that had been neatened up from last night's debacle. He also grabbed a copy of his book. I caught a quick flash of the title, Hunting For The Perfect Photo, with a photo of him sitting in a duck blind wearing camouflage, camera raised.

  I wondered if we'd have enough time to talk about both his book and my widowhood. We had bugs and the photo to talk about too. He wasn't wearing a ring. Some men don't wear one because they work with machinery.

  He introduced me to the man next to his spot, Joe, who said, "Didn't I see you last night in the bug mess?"

  "You were here for that?" Len said.

  I told Joe that yes, I'd been there last night. We chatted a moment until Len lightly took my arm.

  "I'll be back. I just need to catch up with this lady. Been a long time." I pulled my arm from his hand and moved from leading to watching him walk in front of me. His butt cheeks shifted nicely against the thin cloth of his brown cotton trousers.

  The flame began then to rise within me, a heat I'd not felt for some long time. I remembered my fingers on the sweet place under his lip, touching and tracing and kissing it. With that small heat began the seeds of the scandal that was in time to overtake me and the Willamina Quilt Show women.

  Aunt Sophie was surely looking at me from the ether with that knowing shake of her head. I ignored the hint of my own caution, and plunged ahead.

  Chapter 4

  Len and The Willamina Women

  "Married?" I asked him as he poured coffee into our cups.

  "I'm not cut out for marriage. Things have been better since Lin and I straightened that out. But..." He looked at me with a wry grin. "...we see each other a lot. We have a business and we work together. You're wearing a ring, so where's the lucky guy?" He looked around as if expecting to see him stroll up.

  "Not here." I fumbled at my wedding ring. "Not anywhere nearby." Plunging into the present, I twisted the ring, and pulled it off. "You remember Roger Straw?"

  His nostrils flared. "How could I forget?"

  "I don't think he ever forgot you, either." I said, with a short laugh. "We were married for twenty-three years, and he died a little over two years ago." I shrugged as he watched me playing with my ring, turning it and putting it on my middle finger, pulling it off, admiring the diamonds in the simple round of the wedding circle as they flashed. "Haven't felt like taking it off." I returned it to my finger. "It's silly and sentimental to still wear it."

  "Sorry to hear it. Nice to know you two lasted. Kids?" He took a big gulp of his coffee.

  "No. Just never happened. Neither of us really cared, though. Not enough," I amended, "to do anything serious about it." I felt no need to recount the yearning years. They had passed with time. "I have nieces and nephews. That's enough for me. You?"

  "A son and a daughter. The perfect family, though somehow we could never hit the mark--Linda and I, I mean. The kids are great. It was a relief for both of us when we went our separate ways." He shrugged his shoulders at the modern term for divorce.

  "The kids were young. Harry and Sandra stayed with Linda most of the time but we did a lot of stuff together, camping, weekends, and, you know, stuff. Our relationship is mostly through the business."

  "Business?"

  "You'll never believe it. I write and take photos of events. Like the Fair here."

  He smiled ruefully as I shook my head. He'd hated that when we were together I was aiming to be a professional photographer. It took time away from him and I'd smelled of developer chemicals. He'd said that when we got married I'd have to give it up because he "...wasn't going to have a wife who smelled like a chemist."

  "I know. But it just happened."

  "Does she develop the prints?" I couldn't help it.

  "Ah, she did." He rushed past that, "We do most of it digital now, on computer. You know. It's different."

  Most? I wondered just how gone she was.

  Aloud I said, "Yes, I do know. I'm in the business, too. I'm still taking pictures and shopping them out. Makes us in competition, huh? Funny."

  "Yeah, funny." He raised his eyebrows at me, shook his head. "We also buy and sell arts and crafts, sort of an import-export business, except we don't go beyond the U.S. borders. She's off in Alaska right now, visiting her sister who's married to one of the native guys there, head chief of the village, or something.

  "Say! They're both quilters, Linda and her sister, Pam. They got me into it, which is why I'm wondering just what you were doing looking at the quilts? You one of us?"

  "'Us? You quilt?"

  "Sure. Doesn't everybody?"

  I pulled the remaining water and chips from my bag. This quilting thing was like a curse that was following me around. "My Aunt Sophie quilted."

  "I remember that. A house full of them if I remember right."

  "I sew."

  "Therefore, you are."

  "Don't be silly. I don't quilt." The noise of the Fair seemed exceptionally loud, even here in the little picnic grove.

  "Speaking of photos--" I'd suddenly remembered just why I'd looked him up, "You took that one of the woman on the table last night. It's great but I wasn't happy with the attention to our little ac
cident."

  He'd just started to peel a banana he'd pulled from his own small bag, and his grin transformed his face into happiness. "Yes. Wow, wasn't that a hoo-rah! That woman made a mess of our table and didn't even buy a book." He finished peeling the banana, offered me half, which I took. "But what do you mean, 'our' little accident. How were you mixed up in all that?"

  I told him the whole bug story. "So you see, 'our' is practically my whole family. Connor just about had a kid coronary when he saw that photo and the headline this morning. As did we all."

  "Well, don't that beat it! My little snapshot is what brought us together." Somehow he is always the focus, the main deal.

  I'd wondered if the world still revolved around him. Apparently it does.

  "I'm glad I caught your eye, however it happened. Did I tell you that you are looking fine? You were always sweet, but you've grown up real nice. That red shirt does fit you, and you always were a good blue jeans gal. I've often wondered... Hey!" He shifted gears. "Dinner, on me, tonight. Heck, bring everybody. Corn dogs, my treat."

  I love his laugh. It comes from his whole body, beginning with deep rumbles from his belly, rolling up his esophagus, pouring out his throat. It bounced around the grove. People around us looked our way and smiled. He has shorter laughs but this was the best, his completely happy laugh.

  "And then we can talk about quilting!"

  At least a new line. Gotta give the guy credit.

  "I'd love to, but tonight I'm going home, taking Sam with me."

  His expression darkened. "Sam?"

  "My cousin, Aunt Sophie's boy." Did he remember the family relationships?

  "Oh, Sam." He smiled, nodding in remembrance. "Sampson. He's an old guy, right? You met him when she told you about him? Her baby." He gave his shoulders a quick shrug, dismissing Sam.

  "Say, where do you live, anyway?"

  The tables in the grove were all filled, and I could see a family looking for a table. "How about going back in and looking at the quilts? I was looking for one in particular, from Willamina. We can talk where I live, and all that, inside where it's cooler."