by Paula Boyd
Gilbert Moore might be leaning against his truck as if he didn’t have a care in the world, but he too had checked himself out of the hospital AMA—against medical advice. The gunshot wound from the fiasco at the cabin had been serious and he was lucky he lived to tell about it. But if he kept pushing himself, his luck was liable to run out. So as good as he might be at his job, he was still a ticking time bomb for a health crisis.
Phillip Finch stood under the canopy, wearing his hard hat, holding a clipboard and smiling. “Gilbert’s already explained the changes,” he said as I walked up. “I’m sure Doctor Waverman will understand why you’re choosing to go in this direction.”
“Yes, I’m sure he will, especially now that he’s alive,” I said, pointedly.
Finch’s face bloomed with embarrassment. “It was such a shock, seeing him like that. And then to find out he was okay, well, it felt like a miracle.”
I looked at Gilbert. “Is there anything I need to know?”
Gilbert shook his head. “We’ll work out contract details later. I know you’re good for it.”
“Indeed I am.” I looked back to Finch, a little unsettled at how easily it was all going. “You know what needs to be done as well?” When he nodded, I said, “Do you need any clarification or have any questions for me?”
“No, no, everything is fine,” Finch said, smiling brightly. “I completely understand why you’d want Gilbert to take the lead on finishing this part of the project and I am happy to work with him as you’ve outlined.”
Gilbert Moore pushed away from his truck and stepped forward. “Finch will make sure all the environmental requirements are met and I’ll make sure the holes get punched and everything keeps moving.” He grinned and nodded to Finch. “We know what we’re doing.”
Finch beamed as he’d been given an atta-boy by daddy.
It sure looked like my work here was done, not that I’d actually done anything. “I’ll stop by later this afternoon.”
“Do what you want,” Gilbert said. “But there’s not much point. If there’s a problem, I’ll call.”
It was really throwing me off balance to think I might not have to worry about the project.
“If you’re going to be onsite,” Finch said, scurrying behind the table, “you’ll need these.” He held out a hardhat and safety glasses. You’ll also have to have a card showing you’ve been trained. That won’t take long, especially if you’ve read the manual.”
“Yes, the manual,” I said, remembering it’s resting place in the seat of the Tahoe. “Yeah, burned right through that baby, so I figure I’m good to go.”
Finch grinned wider. “Good. I’ll be happy to get you certified any time.”
“I’ll walk you to your car,” Gilbert said, leading the way.
“Ordering me around is not a good start here, Gilbert,” I said following behind him.
“Yeah, you’re probably not happy you didn’t get to tell Finch he wasn’t in charge either.”
No, I was actually relieved, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. “It’s still my project, my responsibility.”
He opened my car door, which seemed totally out of character and made me suspicious. “I’ve got this,” he said. “Just forget about it for a while and go do whatever it is an heiress-in-training does.”
“You condescending jackass!”
“Hey, stop,” he said, and without a grin. “It was a joke. I know you’ve got a shitload going on besides this. What’s left to do here is straightforward. Finch is pissed about being knocked down, don’t doubt it, but he’s not going to screw up, he’s too afraid to.” Gilbert motioned me to get in the car. “You hired me, now go on and let me do my job.”
I climbed in the car and looked back at him. “You’re still a jackass.”
Gilbert grinned. “Never said I wasn’t.”
As he closed the door, I almost smiled—okay, I smiled a little. But it didn’t last long, because once I put the key in the ignition, I remembered where I had to go next—the cemetery. This little meeting had been brief and reasonably uneventful. I hoped I could count on the same when I was standing in the graveyard.
I headed the Buick back down the rutted red dirt road toward the highway, finally allowing myself to wonder about the four bunches of flowers business. One for Dad was obvious, but why three more? Even if I did wander around the massive grounds long enough to find Bob and Glenda’s plot, why three bunches? Then, I had a strange thought. Maybe I’d had a brother or sister I didn’t know about? And they’d died before I was born. Maybe that was it. Still didn’t mean I’d be able to find the markers. Although, I could if I stopped at the office and asked. I didn’t want to do that, but I might have to. And what was the point in it all anyway?
Thump. Thud. Bang.
I slammed on the brakes. “What the hell!”
Before I could get my thoughts together on what had just happened, Gilbert Moore had pulled up beside me in his truck. I rolled down my window and he rolled down his passenger window.
“You just drug the bottom off the car.”
“What?”
“Going thirty-five or forty on a cow trail will do that.”
I took my foot off the brake and pushed the gas. The car lurched and a loud roar and clanging followed. Glancing in the rearview mirror, I saw a few bits of debris on the road. “Shit!”
Gilbert eased up beside me. “Park it and get in.”
Dammit! What had I been thinking? Not about driving, obviously. I eased the car off to the side as far as I could and slammed the gearshift into park. I’ll spare you the cursing and self-flagellation that followed as I rolled up the window, grabbed my stuff and marched myself to Gilbert’s pickup. “Dammit!” I said, climbing in and slamming the door. “I don’t know what happened. Was I really going that fast?”
“Yeah. That’s why I followed you. The car was slinging dirt and bouncing like a son of a bitch. I honked and flashed my lights.”
God help me, I hadn’t noticed. “I...I...”
“The stress is getting to you. You’ve got to get a handle on it.”
I glared at him. “I’ll get right on that.”
He laughed. “Want me to get some gravel out here and fix the road?”
“That would be dandy.” I didn’t bother asking how much it would cost because I really didn’t care. It had already cost me a Buick—and the fallout thereof—so whatever he charged me would be cheap in comparison. “Just send me the bill.”
In the distance, I saw a car turn off the highway and head through the gate. For a fleeting moment I thought it was the ghost of my mother’s car, coming back to haunt me for my negligence. As we got closer to it, however, I noticed the license plate. “Hey, that’s Waverman’s wife. What’s she doing out here?” I leaned up on the dash to get a better look, but I couldn’t see down into the car. “Stop. I want to talk to her.”
Gilbert did not stop. Instead, he swerved off the road onto the even rougher area to let her pass. “I can do asphalt up to the tents if you prefer.”
“What?” I said, looking in the truck’s side mirror as the car faded behind a cloud of dust. “She doesn’t have any business out here. If Waverman thinks he can have her run things by proxy, well, he better think again.”
“Chill, Jolene,” Gilbert said, pulling through the gate onto the highway. “She’s probably just coming to get something he left here. But so what if she’s bringing Finch something. He does still work for Waverman.”
Sometimes, logic and reason are just stupid. “I still don’t like it.”
“From one control freak to another,” he said, “you might want to think about why that is.”
I started to vehemently rebut his judgment of me, but I really couldn’t. So, unable to think of a response—clever or otherwise—I kept my mouth shut.
Pulling through the gate to the house, he said, “If you come back onsite, I’m calling the sheriff.”
“Very funny.”
I’d cooled of
f enough that I no longer wanted to go back and rip Mrs. Waverman from her car and beat her senseless. I’d also come to the conclusion it wasn’t really her I wanted to mangle—it was that damned license plate. The boast was demeaning and a betrayal of women everywhere—“Look at me! I’m important because I’m somebody’s wife!” You wouldn’t catch some man defining himself by his marital status. But stupid women will give up everything for it. They’ll turn their backs on friends and family, give up their names, identities and even their souls for some lying man who’ll leave them for a teenager in heartbeat. Oh, crap, this was sounding suspiciously familiar. I thought I’d dealt with my anger over my own stupid woman story, but apparently not. Now wasn’t the time to open that can of worms, so I focused on something that I could deal with. “How much damage do you think I did to the car?”
“Considering the age and make, I’d say you totaled it.”
“Perfect.”
As we pulled up on the back side of the house, I saw Clove speeding toward us on the four-wheeler. “I really don’t want to explain this to him, really I don’t.”
“Go on,” Gilbert said. “I’ll let him know I’ve got a trailer onsite and can help him load the Buick.”
I hopped out of the truck then looked back in at him. “Thanks, Gilbert.”
Clove zipped up and jerked to a stop, bellowing, “What the hell happened now?”
I nodded to Gilbert then took myself into the house.
Emmajean stood by the kitchen sink. Melody and Doris sat at the dining table. They all looked at me expectantly and with more than a little concern, but I just waved and kept walking. Not fast enough though, because I still saw the blip in the light over the table. “I said I’d go to the cemetery and I will,” I muttered under my breath.
After availing myself of the facilities, washing my hands and face, brushing my hair and changing shirts—mostly just pointless exercises in procrastination—I ventured out the door from my bedroom into the garage to find something to drive. There were four choices on this side of the house, although not really since I wasn’t touching the Mustang with a ten-foot pole and the Buick now just become a replacement vehicle for my mother. That left the convertible and the BMW. Since the only wind I wanted blowing in my hair today was from an air conditioner, I moseyed over to the sparkling sporty BMW sedan and introduced myself.
Considering my track record with vehicles, I hated to throw caution to the wind with a hundred-thousand-dollar automobile. However, it had called to me and I was answering.
Settling myself in the driver’s seat, I rubbed my hands across the soft leather and inhaled the new-car smell. I admit I felt a little giddy. I fiddled around with the electric seat and adjusted the mirrors, getting things all set to my liking. Then, I contemplated the dashboard, which was not so easy to figure out, and I could have used some bigger hints on what all the buttons were for. I hoped more enlightenment was forthcoming, so I hit the garage door opener and then pushed the button to start the engine.
The hi-tech gadgetry glowed to life, which just made it more intimidating, but I managed to figure out how to wipe the windows and turn on the air conditioners—the one for my face and the one for my seat. All in all, I got the hang of things quickly and managed to pull out of the garage and glide down the hill without incident. I still wanted a little more time to get comfortable with my new ride, so I made the risky decision to forego the whole flower business and took the back roads directly to the cemetery.
The drive was quick and easy, but as I pulled through the familiar cemetery gates and wound my way to the far side, I felt the tension start to build. The cemetery was huge, and the only reason I could ever find my dad’s plot was because it was near the white stone mausoleum. I’d never paid much attention to it for any other reason, but now I wondered if I needed to. Maybe that’s where Bob and Glenda were. “First things first, Jolene.”
I parked by the walkway up to my dad’s spot, thinking and wondering. About two seconds of that and the general uneasiness had turned to a lump in my throat and a knot in my chest. These visits were never easy for me—I really missed my dad—but today was somehow different. Turning off the car, I opened the door and stepped out into the always blowing wind.
A few steps up the path, I heard myself start talking. I also sensed lightning fast answers and saw images. I’m very tolerant of my own craziness, but this didn’t feel crazy and somehow that was worse. I talked to my dad, begging him for help in dealing with Lucille. What I got in response was the distinct feeling that he was laughing. I also saw a flash of my dad dancing a little jig he used to do for the kids. “Not nearly as funny when you’re having to deal with it, Dad,” I said.
I also covered my conflicting emotions over the adoption thing—the good, the bad and the ugly—and then I felt guilty for it. One guilty thought led to another, and it wasn’t long before I found myself apologizing for everything under the sun, including car carnage and not bringing flowers as I’d been told.
Since I didn’t have a new floral arrangement, I knelt down and started straightening what Mother and I had put out not long ago. A few stems had blown out, so I stood to retrieve them. The closest one was lying on the marker across from Dad’s, but I was hesitant to go get it. The patch of bare dirt signaled a recent interment—a freshly dug grave—and those always bothered me most. The stark contrast of the blank red dirt against the green grass was so appropriately raw. I could feel the loss just by looking at it. It wouldn’t take long for the creeping vines of the Bermuda grass to cover the barren space, but the recovery of the hearts left behind was a different matter.
Thinking of how the years had only touched at the edge of my own grief, I walked over to get the stray flower. I quickly plucked it from the large bronze marker, turned around, and then I froze. “No…” I looked back. LITTLE. The name on the marker read LITTLE. I sucked in my breath. “It can’t be…”
But it was.
The marker had a big heart connecting the sides with the names: Robert John and Glenda Inez Hicks. There was no inscription under Bob’s name. Below Glenda’s were the words: Beloved wife and eternal mother.” I understood that part, however, there were a million other things I didn’t.
And then my eyes drifted to a small bronze plate below the main marker that I hadn’t noticed at first. It read, “Baby Little.” It was a jolt to realize there could have been other children before me. Did I have siblings somewhere? I couldn’t have or I wouldn’t be the sole heir. I shook that thought off and went back to the small marker. The baby hadn’t been named, so it obviously hadn’t lived long. I read the date of birth and the ground beneath my feet began to roll—it was my birthdate.
A storm of new questions and feelings bombarded me. Had I been a twin? Was it a boy or a girl? How long did it live? The world seemed to heave and fold around me, but I focused my eyes back on the marker. The date of death was a few days after birth…and the same date as Glenda’s. There was also an inscription: “Someday this will all make sense.”
“No, really it won’t,” I said, feeling my body wobble and sway, ready to crumple. And then, I knew. “Oh, shit, it’s me.”
Solid ground turned to rolling waves and I lost my balance. Still, I had enough conscious awareness to know I couldn’t let myself fall, not with fire ants everywhere, and it was the fear of being eaten alive that kept me upright as I stumbled to the bench under the tree.
Slumping down, I pulled my legs up, wrapped my arms around them and rested my head on my knees. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to stop the world from spinning. All I could think of was, “But I’m not dead.”
More waves and images rippled through me. I felt like I was being flung up and down on a roller coaster, the twists and turns interrupted by occasional dark tunnels that blasted information I couldn’t process. After a few minutes, the imaginary ride slowed and I managed to grab on to some of the thoughts as they shot past. “That baby didn’t die.”
As the words left my lips,
I realized it wasn’t really true—that life had died. A part of me—a different name, identity and history—had been buried right along with Glenda, yet death wasn’t the right word for it. Baby Little was gone and the marker was a way of validating that. Maybe it had been Bob’s way of dealing with his own overwhelming loss. Or maybe it was a way to protect everyone involved from the probing questions of others, including me…especially me. The small bronze plate was indisputable proof of an ending. But, wasn’t it also an ending that also brought a beginning?
A gust of wind blasted my face and rustled the branches of the tree behind me. The tinkling of wind chimes filled the air. A chill rippled throughout my body and I pulled my legs tighter, rubbing my arms as best I could. “I’m going to pretend that didn’t just happen,” I said to no one, or maybe everyone. My statement didn’t make my goose bumps go away, but it did help me focus my thoughts on the tree—The Chime Tree, as I called it.
The tree was an ornamental of some sort, with a full rounded shape and lush leaves that turned deep purple in the fall. Wind chimes of all kinds, shapes and sizes hung from the branches. The musical mementos were left by grieving loved ones, including me. I don’t know why others did it. I don’t even know why I did. But the combined effort had given the area a gentle background noise that was both soothing and cheerful. Today, however, the fluttery chimes were more of a transcendent confirmation, and it was a bit disconcerting. Another chill shivered through me. “Time to go.”
I took a deep breath, unfolded my legs, put my feet on the ground and slowly stood. Turning around to walk back to the car, I saw Jerry standing there, watching me. Dread and apprehension washed over me. What was he doing there? Not that he wouldn’t be thoughtful and supportive—he would, was, did… That wasn’t what was going on now though.
“Nice ride,” he said as I walked up.
I brushed back the wind-blown hair from my face. “I suppose you heard about the little issue with the Buick.”
