Electric Blue

by Nancy Bush

  Recriminations, anger and growing fear fueled the heated discussion, but nothing was decided. I couldn’t stand it and went outside and patrolled the grounds myself, checking the playhouse as well, though I still felt averse to the place, but it was to no avail. When I returned to the salon, everyone looked at me hopefully but I shook my head. Jazz came and stood by me, which was heartening, but when I suggested alerting the authorities, nobody seemed to want to place the call.

  Time crawled by. They were literally and figuratively wringing their hands. At a stalemate, I finally announced I was going home. I was tired and hungry, and it was past dinner time, fully dark by now. But I wouldn’t leave until they phoned the police, so more as a means to get rid of me than deciding on a positive plan of action, Garrett placed the call.

  There was nothing further to be gained by hanging around, so I headed toward the back doors. When I got outside, Reyna was waiting for me, her dark eyes full of worry and questions. She had her coat on as the day’s heat was completely gone but she was still shivering. I said, “I’m sure Orchid’s fine. Maybe a friend picked her up?”

  “She is not on the grounds?”

  “Doesn’t seem to be.”

  She glanced back at the door. We could faintly hear the voices of the family. “I hope she is okay.”

  There was something about her unconvinced tone and her stolid, careful expression that said she didn’t trust the other Purcells. Did she think they had something to do with Orchid’s disappearance? I seriously doubted that, not because I would put it past any of them, but the last I knew Orchid hadn’t signed the POA, and until that was accomplished I didn’t see how anyone would mess with her.

  Well…unless they wanted to coerce her…somewhere away from the rest of the family?

  Jazz stepped outside as I entertained these unsettling thoughts. How did Orchid’s will read? I wondered if the estate was evenly divided. What would happen if she up and kicked off right now? Who would win out?

  Jazz caught up with me at my car. I smiled wanly at him, then glanced inside my passenger window. Binkster was curled up into a little ball, her chin on the edge of the bed. She looked up at me and wagged her tail.

  “This isn’t like Nana at all,” Jazz said. “This has never happened before.”

  My whole chest was heavy with dread. It felt like it was my fault, even though I knew it wasn’t.

  “The police are coming over,” Jazz said. “I hope it’s not too early for them. What’s that rule about how many hours a person has to be missing?”

  “With Alzheimer’s or dementia patients, I’m betting that rule doesn’t apply.”

  “I hope they find her.” He looked at me. The outdoor lights sent ribbons of light across his face. He was like a luscious candy. Something rich and beautiful where you wonder if you should really bite in and destroy its beauty, but yet you can’t help yourself. My thoughts were bouncing all over the place—a means to try keeping ahead of my own fear.

  “What if she spends the night outdoors?” Jazz asked.

  “It’s not too cold.” But it wasn’t exactly red-hot, either. A night outside without protection would be really uncomfortable. For someone Orchid’s age, it would definitely be ill-advised, maybe dangerous.

  “What if something bad’s happened to her?”

  “Keep good thoughts. She can be very lucid, very aware. In fact, most of the time she seems fine. Better than fine, actually.”

  “You think so?”

  Right up until the time she called me Eileen. “Do you want me to stay?”

  “Yes. For me.” He almost smiled. “But no…go home. Get some rest.” He didn’t say it but I saw he thought we might be in for a long siege.

  It felt like some kind of action was called for, but for the life of me I didn’t know what it would be. The police were on their way.

  I opened my car door. Binks stretched and blinked. Then Jazz placed a hand on my forearm. I could feel the heat of his palm against my skin and my heart fluttered a bit as I turned toward him. Even though it was late, his jaw looked freshly shaved, and his clothes were crisp and clean. He wore a tan cotton sweater pushed up his forearms and khakis. Casual chic. The guy knew how to dress, that’s for sure. I was in my usual work uniform: jeans, Nikes and a black V-necked T-shirt.

  “You want to come to my place?” he invited.

  “You mean…now?”

  “I’ve got a house in the West Hills—Portland Heights, actually. It’s got a great view. Jennifer picked it out but now it’s just Logan and me. We could wait for news together. It would be great to show it to you…and…”

  My phone vibrated again, cutting off that tantalizing “and.” I wasn’t quite sure what Jazz was asking. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know, but adrenaline kicked in as my mind buzzed with thoughts.

  “I could order dinner in,” he said. “I’m worried about Nana. And I don’t want to be alone.”

  “What about Logan?” I asked.

  “Well, yeah, he’s around, of course, but I’d like to be with another adult. I’d like to be with you, Jane.” He sounded hopeful.

  The thought of Logan really put a damper on things as far as I was concerned. But I understood wanting to wait out the hours of Orchid’s disappearance in the company of friends; the same feeling tugged at me. And it would be nice to be with Jazz and learn more about him.

  Still, I sensed something inside myself…an unsettled loneliness…maybe even a need to prove my own attractiveness…and I knew I would be in dangerous territory. Jazz was wonderful to look at, and he’d been nothing but nice to me, but was I ready to get to know him better? Was now the time? I felt so bad about Orchid that I could picture myself jumping into bed with Jazz, searching for the kind of transitory comfort that could come back to bite me in the ass.

  Sometimes my own self-awareness pisses me off.

  “I think I’ll have to take a rain check,” I said regretfully.

  He seemed crestfallen, but he nodded.

  “Call me if you hear anything.”

  “I will.” He moved away from me.

  All the way back to Lake Chinook I silently railed at myself for chickening out. I would have liked to be with him. I would have liked to hold his hand and allay my fears. I would have liked to be there when—if—the call came through about Orchid. I’d even had The Binkster with me, so we could have all settled in for an evening together.

  What do you want, Jane?

  The question circled my brain. I felt frustrated, tentative. On the verge of turning around and heading back toward Portland Heights. I could call Jazz on his cell. I could be with him in twenty minutes and let whatever might happen between us, happen. We could commiserate, worry and talk. And though Logan wasn’t exactly part of my ideal “date package,” he would probably be off playing video games or talking to friends via the Internet or whatever kids his age did.

  I actually nosed into a side street, intending to circle around. Then I hesitated, tapping my fingers on the steering wheel. Damn it all. I yanked the wheel back toward Lake Chinook, a sound of frustration rumbling in my throat. Binks lifted her ears and looked at me.

  “What?” I asked her belligerently.

  At my cottage, I poured her a small bowl of delicious, local kiblets, then listened distractedly to my message from Mom. Actually, she’d left three messages. I wasn’t sure how I’d missed the rest of them, but I don’t really understand cell phone intricacies and I don’t care to learn. Each Mom message was progressively longer, as if she’d decided I would never answer my phone or call her back so she might as well have a one-way conversation that took care of everything.

  The gist of it was, she was coming to Lake Chinook. She’d made her flight reservations for next week. There was no more putting her off. There was no more talking about it. She was on her way and that was that.

  I scrambled to call her back. It’s not that I don’t want to see her. I love my mother, but family can be so tricky—the Purcell family a case in
point. And the warmth of my relationship with my brother Booth ebbs and flows; with my mother it’s just a certain amount of stress and responsibility. And now with Orchid missing…

  “Mom!” I said when she answered her phone. She is not a cell phone user but she hangs by her landline pretty closely.

  “Jane? Is that you?”

  Since I’m her only daughter I’m pretty sure that’s the kind of thing that doesn’t require an answer, but I always feel compelled to make a joke. “No. It’s the Dalai Lama.”

  “The Dalai Lama’s a man, so I guess it’s you, Jane.”

  I grimaced. Okay, I wasn’t really in a joking mood and it showed. “I listened to your messages. You’ve got a flight for next week?”

  “Yes.” And she proceeded to give me all kinds of information about how she’d chosen the airline, and where the seat was, and how much luggage it would require, and she wasn’t sure if she needed those Sky-Cap people to help her or not. I wrote down her flight information and told her I’d pick her up.

  “I can’t believe Booth’s getting married,” she said at the end of her report.

  “I know.”

  “And she’s black.” She said the word tentatively, as if afraid the politically correct police would haul her in for not using African American. Personally, I don’t care whether someone calls me white, Caucasian, or sickly pale. It’s all fairly accurate about my flesh tone. Which reminds me, I’m still not over the fact that Crayola got rid of the crayon “flesh” apparently because it only portrayed white flesh. They changed to peach back in the sixties, but I had an ancient box of crayons that my mother had possessed from when she was a girl. For years I didn’t recognize the switch. Now, I wondered why it couldn’t be called white flesh. Or Caucasian flesh. I colored with that crayon a lot when I was a kid, depicting friends and family, and it just didn’t seem like peach.

  I closed my eyes. It was easier to mourn for something dumb than think about Orchid, maybe lost, scared, crying. I felt so damn helpless.

  With an effort, I struggled hard to stay on track with Mom. In the beginning my brother had been cagey about his engagement to Sharona. I think he’d hoped that I would spill the beans to Mom and save him that little drama. But I’d been really careful about steering clear of the whole thing. There were pitfalls I was simply not going to trip into if I could help it. My mother had been insistent about making the trip to Oregon, however, and eventually Booth had broken down and had a long, long talk with her. Sharona is tall, black, beautiful and possessed of a steely determination that awes me. I just don’t think I’ll ever have that power of conviction. But apparently Booth gave Mom a fairly accurate depiction of his soon-to-be wife, because my mother sounded like she was still processing.

  “She’s a lawyer,” Mom said, as if trying the word out on her tongue. “She practices criminal law.”

  “I know, Mom.”

  “She deals with criminals, I guess.”

  “Or innocent victims. Booth’s with the police,” I pointed out.

  “I guess that’s how they got to know each other?”

  She’d learned all of this information weeks ago. I wasn’t sure why I was called upon to ensure its veracity. Maybe she thought that upon first meeting her, Sharona would give her a test.

  “Do you like her?”

  I heard the hope in my mother’s voice, and though my immediate response was to answer “yes,” I honestly wasn’t sure if I liked Sharona or not. I don’t know Sharona that well yet, and she’s kind of prickly. I’m sure it was her idea to get me the baby blue jogging suit.

  I was afraid she would question me further, but apparently there was more on my mother’s mind. She moved on to other topics without waiting for my response. There appears to be a ritual only she understands, so we chatted away about nothing while I kept one eye on the clock. I was hungry. The little fairy cakes and tea hadn’t come my way after all. No one had the decency to grab for one. A damn shame and a terrible waste. Now, I was in desperate need of food. I wanted to call Dwayne back. I wanted to see Dwayne and have a debriefing.

  Finally, she came around to what she wanted. “Booth and Sharona are planning to get married in Oregon. Not in a church. At some hall or something.”

  “Yeah, but not for six months or so.”

  “Next summer, but these things take so much planning.”

  I had no idea how involved Booth’s wedding plans were. My brother wasn’t the type to make it a big deal, but maybe Sharona wanted the whole enchilada. I had a sudden gaggy thought about bridesmaids and bridal gowns and where I fit into the scheme of things. “Seems to me that sounds like enough time.”

  “I was just thinking about the guest list.” Another pause. “Do you think Booth will invite your father?”

  Her words stopped me cold. Of all the things I’d expected, this wasn’t one. My mother and father had divorced when Booth and I were two, and he’d stayed away from us like we were a bad smell, so it wasn’t like we had any real connection to him. He’d been a deadbeat dad; barely managing child support, though by all accounts he was a successful lawyer. He’d married his secretary at some point and pumped out a trio of kids. Maybe more by now. I had no idea. I’d never had anything to do with any of them. Neither had Booth, as far as I knew. “I doubt it. Geez, Mom. I’m surprised you even thought so. We don’t talk to him.”

  “Oh, good.” She was relieved. “I didn’t want to impose my wishes, but it would be awkward.”

  No shit. I couldn’t picture what I would say to the man who’d run away from his first marriage and children as if they had leprosy. The idea that he’d fathered a new family and found his way to love and cherish them bugged me in a way that would probably send a smarter person than I to the psychiatrist’s couch. As it was, I was in complete denial and glad to be there.

  “I’ll see you soon,” Mom said as she hung up.

  I called Dwayne, again, and left a blistering message on his voice mail about people who never answer their cell. Frustrated, I dug through my refrigerator. Failing there, I opened the freezer door and grabbed a small frozen meal of pasta, chicken and Alfredo sauce, refusing to look at the pull date. I microwaved it. As soon as it was cool enough for me to test my tongue on it, I gave it a taste. Not much to recommend it except that it was right in front of me. In that it met the only criteria I cared about. I dug in with gusto.

  I put in a couple more calls to Dwayne, just to bug him. It felt good to transfer my worry over Orchid to annoyance with Dwayne. I sang the first few bars of a camp song on the second call, a dirty ditty that I’d learned from an older boy who’d tried hard to get into my pants when I was about thirteen. He’d pretty much struck out with everyone of the female sex; I’d been way down the list. He didn’t score with me, either, as I had ideas about love, marriage, and happily ever after that didn’t jibe with stolen moments of fumbled and hurried sexual encounters in the great outdoors. Also, he didn’t brush his teeth well.

  I wondered if I should call Jazz. Or go to his house. I’m a terrible, terrible waiter. To distract myself I called Cynthia. She answered but said in hushed tones that she was on a date with Ernst.

  “A date?” I questioned.

  “Stop by the gallery and meet him later this week,” she urged.

  “Okay.”

  A date…The very idea made me feel blue. I picked up my keys. I would go to Jazz’s. Why not?

  “Damn,” I muttered through my teeth, placing a call instead. He answered on the second ring.

  “Oh, I’m glad you called,” he said, and my spirits lifted a bit. We talked about Orchid’s disappearance at length, well, Jazz did the talking/worrying and I just hung onto the phone for human contact. Hearing Logan in the background, complaining about something, made me relieved I’d stayed home after all. Jazz was just warming up on the fretting, and I listened quietly, inwardly stewing and worrying myself. Instead of making me feel better, it made me feel worse, and pretty soon I pretended exhaustion and hung up. I grabb
ed my living room/TV watching green quilt, cocooned myself inside and curled up on the couch. Binks came up to me and scratched at me with one paw. I scooted back to give her room and she jumped up and nosed her way under the blanket. We adjusted into sleep mode with me trying to shut my brain down and Binks snorting and snuffling as she settled down by my feet.

  I thought it would never happen, but we were both asleep inside of ten minutes.

  Bang. Bang. Bang.

  I shot to my feet, disoriented. It sounded like the roof was caving in. Stumbling around, I tried to get my brain to catch up. Where was I? What time was it? Two A.M.? Three? I squinted at the clock above the fireplace. Nine-thirty? Impossible. I looked again. Nine twenty-five, actually.

  Binkster woofed a couple of times, and dug herself from beneath the blanket. She must have been convinced I was in no mortal danger; otherwise she would have trotted after me. She’s a notorious chicken, but in the face of a real threat she can rise to the occasion. She looked toward the kitchen with dark, liquid eyes as I realized someone was pounding on my back door.

  It felt like all the hair on my body had lifted. My skin tingled. Unlike Binks, I wasn’t sure who or what had come to visit. Was this related to Orchid’s disappearance? I tiptoed forward, my mind casting about for a weapon, just in case. I’d dragged my feet to get licensed to own a gun. I can’t quite make myself carry one. Now, I sternly reprimanded myself. It would just make me feel better to think I had protection from anything that came my way.

  I peeked around the corner to the kitchen. A man was framed in the glass of my back door. My heart clenched and I made an involuntary squeak of fear. Binkster jumped from the couch and came to my aid, a growl beginning in the back of her throat.

  The growl turned to a yip of joy as Dwayne rattled the lock and peered inside at me. He was holding two bottles of wine. “Are you going to open the damn thing?” he demanded.

  Muttering under my breath, I flipped the lock. Damn Dwayne. “You could give me a heart attack. It’s late,” I groused, as I switched on the light. I blinked in the blast of illumination that followed.