Katie smiled.
"That sounds fair," Katie said. She paused for a moment as more college students, two highly attentive men, walked by. "We should be careful though."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean we're interlopers, Gin. We're intruders. We don't belong here. We were never meant to meet these people, much less date them. We have no business messing with their lives."
"You mean like Dad messed with Mom's?" Ginny asked. "Chew on that for a minute, Sis. If Dad had minded his own business in 1941, we wouldn't be here."
"I know. I just think we should be careful."
Ginny gave her sister a disapproving stare.
"We will be careful. We'll be fine. They'll be fine."
"I guess you're right."
"Of course I'm right," Ginny said. She smiled smugly. "Look, Katie. There's no law that says we can't have fun while we're here. If we have the opportunity to date some guys, we should take it. Then we can go back to 2020 and date them again when they're like . . . seventy-five!"
"Yuck! Now you are crossing lines."
Ginny laughed.
"Someone has to do it," Ginny said.
Katie shook her head.
"Well, that someone can be you. I prefer guys that aren't as old as Grandpa."
Ginny smiled. She preferred younger guys, too, though she didn't have a specific aversion to college men two or three years her senior. She thought of Steve Carrington as she dragged a French fry through a puddle of ketchup.
"What do you think Steve is going to say to Mr. Greer?"
"What did you tell him to say?" Katie asked.
"I just told him to use his imagination and make us look good."
"In other words, we'll have to add another chapter to our colorful past."
"There's nothing wrong with that."
"Yeah, there is. We're living a lie, Gin. Sooner or later, lies catch up to people."
Ginny looked away for a moment as the sun, in hiding for most of the day, finally broke through an assemblage of puffy clouds to the south. She knew Katie was right, at least in principle. They would probably best serve their interests by telling the truth as often as possible.
When she returned to Katie, she found her staring at the main library, a Collegiate Gothic colossus that loomed over the center of the campus like a Roman cathedral. Named after a former university president, the facility had changed little since its construction in the 1920s.
"What are you thinking?" Ginny asked.
"I'm thinking that even if we somehow find our way home, going to college won't quite be the same as we had planned."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean we'll be different people," Katie said. "Did you really listen to Mom and Dad when they talked to us at the beach? They didn't describe their time travels in glowing terms. Dad still refuses to go into mines – and he's a geologist, for God's sake. Mom still has a thing about theaters. By their own admission, they're not the same as they used to be. That's sad."
"It is sad," Ginny said, "but it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with our situation. Dad's best friend in 1941 was killed in World War II. Mom left her two best friends to find him and then got separated from Dad – and us – for five months. I don't expect to do anything but return to the same life we had and pick up where we left off."
"I wish I had your confidence."
"You can have it. You just need to change the way you look at all this."
"Really?" Katie asked. "And just how should I look at this? We're in 1964, Ginny. Nineteen sixty-four! We have no reason to believe we'll ever see home again. That's just a lie you tell yourself to keep from turning into a blubbering mess like me. Am I right?"
"No. You're not right."
"We'll see. You don't even know if that blasted fair is still around."
Ginny dug in. She understood Katie's frustration, but she was tired of being second-guessed. She was as confident of seeing home again as she was of seeing the next sunset.
"That's where you're wrong, Katie. I happen to know for a fact that that 'blasted fair,' as you call it, is coming back."
Katie glared at her sister.
"Is that so?"
"That's so," Ginny said. "When you were in the shower this morning, I did some information gathering in the motel office. There's a rack in there full of fliers and pamphlets on coming events in western Washington – a whole bunch of them. One of those fliers just happened to advertise the Cedar River Country Fair. Ever heard of that? The fair runs September 6 through September 12, Sunday through Saturday. The dates and days match up exactly with 2020."
Ginny hated being blunt, but she was growing weary of her sister's pessimism. She stared at Katie as she looked away and began to get misty. Miss Waterworks was starting up again.
"There's more too," Ginny said.
"What do you mean?"
"The fair flier listed all of the major attractions, including the House of Mirrors."
Ginny reached across the table and put her hand on Katie's.
"Everything is coming together just the way it should. We will go home. I know it. We just have to be patient," Ginny said. She smiled. "Until then, let's settle in and enjoy the ride."
CHAPTER 13: KATIE
When the twins spoke to the desk clerk at the Coed Court, after four hours of clothes shopping, they learned that two men had called for them while they were away: Wade Greer and "a guy named Steve." At Katie's insistence, they went back to Room 17 and called the former first.
As the sister who was "better with people," Ginny did the honors with Greer. She called the manager and learned in the first minute that the big man wanted the little women to work as courtesy clerks. When Ginny finished jumping up and down, she told Greer that she and Katie would accept the job offers and report to the store, as requested, at eight thirty the next morning.
"This is cause for celebration," Ginny said after hanging up the phone. She hugged her twin. "It's time to break out the Nehi!"
Katie laughed.
"What did he say? What did he say?"
Ginny took a second to catch her breath and then looked at her sister thoughtfully, as if preparing herself for an important speech. In some respects, she was.
"If you give me a minute, I'll tell you. Mr. Greer said a lot of things. He said he liked how we conducted ourselves and answered all of his questions. He loved our enthusiasm," Ginny said. "Oh, yeah. He also loved your 'sweet-potato seminar.' That's an exact quote."
Katie beamed.
"What else? Did he say what our hours would be?"
"He did, sort of. He wants us to work a variety of shifts in the next two weeks – to learn the job and see different people – and then work mostly afternoons and evenings."
Ginny looked at Katie more closely.
"Are you OK with that?" Ginny asked.
"I am."
Katie was too. Never in a million years did she think she'd be OK with a job that paid a buck twenty-five an hour, but never in a million years did she think she'd have to find work in 1964.
"If it's any consolation, the store closes at nine. So we won't have to work late-night shifts or graveyard or anything crazy. Mr. Greer also said he'd do his best to schedule us at the same time, though he couldn't make any promises."
"That's OK. It's not like we didn't work different shifts at Pennington's," Katie said, referring to the siblings' employer in 2020.
"I agree, but that was still nice of him."
"Did he call our one and only reference?" Katie asked.
Ginny grinned.
"He did. That's the best part."
"What do you mean? What did Steve say?"
"Oh, you'll love this," Ginny said. "Steve said he met us last year, when we all worked at a summer camp for crippled children. He told Mr. Greer that we were the hardest-working, most compassionate people he'd ever known. He said he'd be a fool not to hire us on the spot."
Katie laughed.
"Well, it's a good t
hing we didn't tell Mr. Greer a different story. That would have been kind of awkward. I guess we owe Steve a thank you."
"No, Katie. I owe him a thank you. I'm going to call him right now, while you walk around the block or check out the exciting travel brochures in the office. Now, shoo!"
Katie smiled. She didn't need a bigger hint. She knew Ginny had been looking for an excuse to contact Steve again, and now she had one. Katie waved goodbye, grabbed a white sweater off the back of a chair, and headed out the door.
When she reached the parking lot, she buttoned her sweater as she felt the first bite of a breeze blowing in from Puget Sound. It was still cool for early May but not uncomfortably so.
Katie walked out of the lot and started down Brooklyn Avenue, a secondary commercial strip about three blocks west of the university. It wasn't the most scenic street in Seattle, but like all the rest in 1964 it offered sights she hadn't seen before.
As she walked past a used-book store and a barbershop, Katie thought again about her recent promotion from unemployed time traveler to grocery clerk and marveled at the turn of events. Two days earlier, she and Ginny were jobless, homeless, and hopeless. Now they had an income, a roof over their heads, and new clothes to wear. She could see a light at the end of the tunnel, even if that light was four months away.
That didn't mean she liked her predicament. She didn't like it at all. She had a family she missed dearly and a life she wanted back.
When Katie reached Forty-First Street, she turned the corner and walked a short distance to a Cape Cod house at 4125 Baltic Avenue. With a freshly painted exterior and a meticulously landscaped yard, the property was as impressive as any on the street.
What made the residence notable, however, was not its appearance but rather its history. For four months in the spring and summer of 1941, it had been the home of a man who'd been born in 1978. It had been the place where Joel Smith had adopted a family and made new friends, including a shy education major named Grace Vandenberg.
Katie looked for signs of life in the house but saw none. Mel and Sandra Carter, the couple that had taken Joel in, would be in their seventies now – if they were still around at all. Their daughter Brenda, eighteen in 1941, would be long gone, though not as gone as their son Tom. Thomas Carter, Joel's best friend in 1941 and one-time fiancé to Joel's maternal grandmother, had died in combat in World War II.
Katie gave the residence one last look and moved on. As she continued her circuitous journey back to the Coed Court, she thought of her father. She thought of his vow to leave the past unchanged and how he had broken that vow repeatedly to pursue the love of his life.
She believed that the past – like a sleeping dog – should be left undisturbed, but she wondered whether leaving it undisturbed was even possible when you had frequent contact with people you were never supposed to meet. She wondered what life would have been like for Joel and Grace had they never met – or at least reunited. It certainly would have been problematic for their six children.
When Katie reached Room 17 ten minutes later, she opened the door and saw Ginny sitting on the end of the bed wearing the biggest grin she had ever seen.
"I take it the phone call went well," Katie said.
"Oh, yeah," Ginny said.
"What does that mean?"
Ginny sighed.
"It means, dear sister, that Steve and I are going out to dinner Saturday night."
"Dinner?"
"Dinner. He's taking me to Mon Refuge, a four-star French restaurant on the lake," Ginny said. "He's picking me up at six."
Katie smiled sadly at her twin, shut the door, and walked to the bed. She sat next to Ginny and threw an arm around her shoulder as she revisited her thoughts on the walk. The remake of 1964 was no longer on the drawing boards. The meddling with the past had begun.
CHAPTER 14: GINNY
Tuesday, May 5, 1964
The introductions began where the pears met the peaches. Ginny and Katie met produce manager Dave Walters, exchanged the usual pleasantries, and followed Mr. Greer around a rack of packaged cupcakes and fruit pies to the front of the store, where another authority type, two checkers, and four courtesy clerks waited to meet the girls from Thousand Oaks.
"Ginny and Katie," Greer said, "this is Butch Pearson. He runs the meat department. Butch, this is Ginny and Katie Smith."
"Ladies, it's a pleasure," he said."
"Likewise," Ginny said as she shook his hand.
Ginny laughed as she watched the butcher practically shake Katie's arm off. At six feet two, two hundred eighty pounds, he looked more like a Green Bay Packer than a meat packer, but he seemed no more intimidating than a life-size teddy bear.
From the meat man, Greer and the girls moved on to two checkers who happened to be husband and wife. Pete and Paula Benson, explained the manager, had worked at Greer's since moving to Seattle from Corpus Christi, Texas, in 1956.
"Pete is our assistant manager and lead checker. He will supervise most of your training, at least this week," Greer said. "If you have any questions about how we operate, particularly on the customer-service side, please ask him."
"It's nice to meet you," Pete said.
The twins again went through the motions.
"Paula is our go-to girl on inventory," Greer said. "When she's not ringing up orders, she can usually be found in back with a clipboard. If you need to know where something's at, or where you can find some more, she's the person to talk to."
Paula, a pretty brunette with bouffant hair and the demeanor of a cheerleader, seemed particularly eager to meet the newcomers. She gave each a hug instead of a handshake.
"As you can see, the girls are a little outnumbered here," Paula said with a laugh. "If you two have any problems or just need someone to talk to, you come to me. You hear?"
"We hear," Ginny said.
"I hear too," Katie added.
Ginny laughed. She could just see her sister picking up that southern accent, or at least a Texas twang, after a few heart-to-heart sessions with Mrs. Benson.
Greer used the next minute to mention four other checkers and courtesy clerks, who typically worked evenings and weekends. He said he would introduce the girls to the remainder of the staff by the end of the week.
Ginny didn't care one way or the other about the absentees. She did, however, care about the handsome males standing between Checkout 1 and Checkout 2. Wearing ties and button-down shirts under their blue store aprons, the four young men looked positively yummy.
"These are our clerks," Greer said. "Each of these boys has been here at least two years and has a thorough understanding of store operations."
The manager stepped to the side as the girls moved closer to their peers.
"Ginny and Katie, this is Randy Templeton, Greg Reynolds, Mike Hayes, and James Green," Greer said as he extended an arm. "Randy and Greg work mornings and afternoons. They stock most of the canned and packaged goods. Mike and James usually work afternoons and evenings. They manage the dairy section and the soft drinks."
Greer turned toward the girls.
"Gentlemen, these are the Smith sisters. They just moved here from California."
The six young adults shook hands and exchanged a variety of pleasantries.
When the meeting and greeting was done, Greer led the six clerks from the front of the store to a wide spot in the produce aisle. He checked his watch, noted that he still had fifteen minutes before the store opened at nine, and then began a ten-minute monologue on revised schedules, training responsibilities, and upcoming promotions.
Ginny caught the gist of the boss-man's speech but tuned out the particulars. She instead did a detailed assessment of her fellow clerks.
Randy was easy on the eyes. Tall, blond, and tanned, he looked like a younger brother of the water-polo captain who was treating her to ratatouille and crepes Saturday night. Ginny could tell by his salesman-type greeting that he was a confident sort who was probably used to getting his way. He smiled wa
rmly when she looked his way.
Greg was different but no less attractive. Shorter and slighter with jet-black hair, he looked like the president of the local Future Business Leaders of America chapter. Ginny didn't care much for his G-Man glasses – which seemed to be all the rage in 1964 – but she did like his dimples and sparkling green peepers.
Then there was the young man she had dubbed Cantaloupe Boy. Mike was a blend of Randy and Greg, a muscular brunette who resembled a baseball player Ginny had dated at Westlake. Though Mike had greeted her warmly, he hadn't given her a second look after Greer had directed the clerks to the produce aisle. He had instead focused his attention on one Katherine Smith, who had begun to return his glances with increasing regularity.
James was the most difficult to figure. The least talkative and flirtatious, he had mostly kept to himself after the introductions. Ginny, however, didn't hold that against him. She found his reserve almost as appealing as his warm smile and big brown eyes that perfectly complemented his cherubic face and dark brown skin.
When she was done sizing up the male clerks at Greer's Grocery, Ginny turned to face her better half. What she saw was someone who seemed to be paying attention to the manager's monologue.
Good for you. At least one of us is taking notes.
When Greer saw Pete Benson open the doors to the public five minutes later, he dispatched Randy and Greg to the front of the store and Mike and James to the back. Within seconds women wearing sunglasses, headscarves, and bright red lipstick began flooding the aisles in pursuit of canned salmon, Idaho potatoes, and cantaloupes that were now four for a dollar.
"You ladies will need to fill out some papers before you get started," Greer said. "It won't take long. Then when you're done, you can help Pete and Paula at the registers and spend some time with Mike and James moving new inventory to the shelves. That should take up most of your morning. Does that sound good?"
"It sounds good to me," Katie said.
Greer turned his head.
"Ginny?"
The Mirror (Northwest Passage Book 5) Page 7
