“No, but wait. I’ve got it figured out—how to be in two places at once.” The volume started in a whisper and inched upward. “My iPhone. If I have it with me this summer, I’ll be able to keep in touch with Jake. It won’t be the same as getting to see him, but I’m telling you, Allie, I don’t want to lose this guy. I can’t explain to you how I know he’s the one, but I know this is it. I really do.”
Poor Kim. I hated to remind her of the obvious, but somebody needed to. “Remember the techno-turn-in that’s scheduled to happen as we move to the set? No driver’s licenses, no folding wallets, no cigarettes, no plastic anything. They’re not going to let you take an iPhone. It’s all in your contract. The only communication is the village post office—remember that? You and Mr. Right will be courtin’ the old-fashioned way. It’s kind of romantic, if you think about it.”
“It’s barbaric.” Kim held out her beloved iPhone. “I can’t take my cell phone, but you can take it for me. Even if we’re so far out in the boonies that there’s no cell phone signal, they’re bound to have some kind of satellite Internet and wireless in the crew camp. These are important people. They have to do business. There’s no way they’re going to be out of touch all summer.”
I pushed the phone away gently, pressing it against her body. “Kim, they’ve already told us no cell phones unless it’s company-issued. Randy is about to have a heart attack, and he’s only going to be up there for the first month or so to help with any dressing disasters.” Actually, the communications blackout bothered me too. But when the opportunity is huge, so are the sacrifices.
Kim extended the phone my way again, and we played a quick game of push-me-pull-you.
“You could hide it,” she said finally. “You’ll be traveling up there with mountains of . . . production stuff. How hard can it be to smuggle in one itty-bitty gadget? I won’t use it that much, I promise. I’ll just sneak off in the woods to text, email, or talk to Jake every few days. The battery will last a long time. You’ll only have to recharge it for me once in a . . .”
“No way!” I protested, my surprise escaping into the stairwell and echoing off the nearby apartments. No lights came on, thank goodness. “Kim, I am not getting involved in this, even for you. You know how quickly this could get me fired? Both of us, for that matter. They’ll make you into one of those nameless citizens who jumped off the cliffs into the river. You know, that’s what they do when cast members break the rules. They kill off your character.”
“Allie . . . please . . .”
“No. No way. No how. Nada. Nope. I’m not doing it. You and Mr. Wonderful will just have to keep in touch long distance, like our ancestors. It’ll be a great story to tell your grandchildren someday. I have to go to work. Good-bye.”
I turned away and left Kim there in the stairwell—mad, sad, or whatever she was right now.
The love bug was one of those things I was afraid I’d never really understand. I wanted to, but I just didn’t. Maybe there was something wrong with me. Maybe I was so damaged by my father’s death, by everything that happened afterward, that I’d always be living solo in a world full of people, always keeping up my defenses, hiding behind the mask. What if I never found a place, a person, a life that . . . fit?
It was too hard to think about, so I shook it off during the short drive to work. In my mind, Grandma Rita offered one of her famous Texas wisdoms: Can’t never could, won’t never would, and shan’t probably should. Basically, it meant, stop whining and get busy doing. God gives every bird his worm, but He doesn’t drop it in their mouths once they’re big enough to fly.
Grandma Rita had a saying for pretty much any occasion.
By the time I walked into the Berman, I was feeling good. I took the back stairs and ducked into the assembly room, where the stitchers had not yet arrived at their sewing machines. The scents of fabric, and machine oil, and thread surrounded me, familiar and comforting.
A little tingle passed through me, and I had the bittersweet anticipation of a parent realizing it’s almost graduation time for a beloved child. In three days all the costumes would leave the Berman and through them, a bygone world would emerge. I’d never been part of anything this massive before, and just thinking about it filled me with gratitude and a sense of wonder. My coming here wasn’t an accident. This was a gift, but if I wanted this new life, I was going to have to be bold enough to work for it.
“Hey, rojito, you better not let the big kahuna find you there looking all tranquil.” Randy stopped in the hallway outside the door. “Some kind of edict came down from on high this morning, and our fair production supervisor is not in a good mood. She’s looking for you, in particular.”
I groaned, my little bubbles bursting one by one, swatted out of the sky by the ugly claws of reality. “Am I in trouble?”
Randy gave me a smile and a wink. “I think she’s got an errand for you. She’s in her office now. I heard her on the phone a minute ago.” As if on cue, Tova’s voice echoed down the hall. I couldn’t make out the words, just the rapid pulse of aggressive sound waves in her particular range.
Randy frowned. “That’s . . . the familiar noise of something unexpected coming up. With any luck, that errand she has for you will be off-site.”
“Guess I might as well find out.” I took a deep breath and headed down the hall. In the office, Tova was still engaged in a phone conversation. I waited near the door, out of sight.
“What do you mean you are sending him down here? Do you realize we are on the verge of moving to location? Randy’s crew is packing everything for transport today, not creating garments for . . .” Short pause, and then, “But . . . there’s no possible . . .” Pause. “He cannot just . . .” Pause, a little longer this time. “Yes. Yes. Yes, of course they are capable of it, but . . . Very well. Yes, I will see to it myself, of course.”
I stepped in the door just as she was ripping the Blake Fulton scrap of paper from the wall and giving it a look that could have fried an egg. So, the mystery cowboy had somehow reemerged. Had she finally called the number he’d given me in the deli, or had someone called her?
I didn’t even want to know . . . and then again, I did. I found myself hoping my unnamed errand had something to do with finally learning the truth behind that piece of paper and the guy in the grocery store. Who was he, really?
“There you are. Finally.” Tova snatched a shoebox-size container off her desk. “Someone must do advance placement work at the set today. Delivery locations for materials from the costume shop and props not already in place must be clearly marked with the labels enclosed in this folder, and even then we will be fortunate if the transport service gets half of it right. It was my intention to go myself, so as to label things clearly, but it looks as though I will be . . . otherwise occupied. Since I can spare no one at this point, I am sending you. Here are the markers.”
She thrust the box into my hands, and I grabbed it just in time to keep it from landing on the floor. “These are directions to the location, maps of the set, and detailed instructions.” She slapped an overstuffed accordion folder on top of the cardboard box, and it slid sideways, landing against the crook of my arm. I shifted and clamped my chin to the stack to keep from losing it. “The keys to a production vehicle should be waiting with the guard at the box office. I have already signed for it.”
When I looked up again, Tova was staring at me like a serial killer about to go on a rampage. “Do not screw this up, Allison. If you do, I will make certain that not so much as the smallest community theater in the minutest backwash at the farthest corner of the map will even consider hiring you in this business. Do you understand?”
I felt my life flashing before my eyes. I hoped it didn’t show. “Yes, of course. You can count on me. I mean it. Whatever it takes,” I babbled out. A muscle knotted in my neck, and I realized that I was unconsciously recoiling from Tova’s murderous gaze, dragging the folder with me.
“If I had anyone else to send, Allison, I would
not be sending you.”
“Yes, of course, I know that.” Wrong thing to say. Now she thought I was being a smart aleck. Her mouth twitched on one side, nerves and sinew straining for control.
“Follow the instructions to the letter. Do not deviate. Do not stop to admire the wildflowers. Do not linger over the blue, blue sky. Do not even consider sharing the information in that folder with anyone, or taking any stowaways along with you.” Of course, by stowaways, she meant a certain roommate, whose name we would not mention. “Are we clear?”
“Absolutely.” Holy cow! She was sending me to the set. Me! Through the haze of fear and the wild static of nervous adrenaline, it was just starting to dawn on me as I glanced down at the label on the folder.
I’d just been slated for the granddaddy of all production assistant errands.
A batch of butterflies hatched in my stomach, and it was all I could do to keep from grinning ear to ear. I struggled to appear appropriately miserable until Tova finished threatening me one last time, then left the room.
A muffled gasp slid out once she was gone.
I was headed to Wildwood!
Chapter 12
BONNIE ROSE
MAY 1861
I find myself longing now for my first sight of Wildwood, no matter how great my uncertainty of the conditions that will be meeting us there on our arrivin’. There’s not a soul in our party can tell me what we’re to be expecting, save for the master of our wagon guard, Grayson Hardwick, who travels with shipments being brought to Wildwood and other settlements on the Texas frontier. Other than Mr. Hardwick, the whole of the party are like myself, never havin’ seen such country as this before. Even the territory up Weatherford way, where we’d settled with Ma and Da, was not so rugged and uncivilized as this land west of Waco Village. The sharp hills of limestone rock and live oak have a beauty, to be sure, but there is also a lonely desolation and far too much cover for a raiding party to lie in wait.
Altogether, twelve men accomplish the drivin’ of the wagons, seven working as a way of providing for passage to Wildwood. It’s clear enough this is an arrangement that’s been employed by Mr. Delevan many times before—the trading of passage for labor. Upon arrivin’ at Wildwood, the men who haven’t money to purchase land will work mining claims for Mr. Delevan, in hopes of earning their way to a stake in the gold strike area.
In our travels thus far, we’ve made our way past only a small village or two, and thrice, we’ve been visited by Indians as we went. They were Tonkawas each time, and friendly, but Mr. Hardwick kept Maggie, me, and Essie Jane under canvas in a wagon during his communication with them. I’m gathering that it’s not the first time there’ve been women along with the ox carts and the mule wagons for this journey, but Mr. Hardwick is not one for talking. He is a tall, lean, and hard-edged man who seems to know his work and keep to the business of it.
Now his patience is worn thin, as we’ve been camped here for days along the banks of the rain-swollen Brazos, near the ferry landin’ at the home of Samuel Barnes and his wife, Elizabeth. There was talk in the house last night that the Tonkawa have seen parties of Comanche about the area. “It’s the ones you don’t see you’ll favor yourself to worry about,” said Mr. Hardwick as he finished the coffee and sweet biscuit Mrs. Barnes had offered up. He seems not perturbed by the news, but today I’m noticing that he wants to be across the river and so do the other men. Having only just come west, they’ve no experience with hostiles, and they’re not lookin’ for any. Four of them have wives and children they hope to bring at a later time, and the other three are brothers—Ryan, Jack, and Sean, only a few months off the boat from Dublin.
The river’s currents swirl wicked, but it’s the mood of the men that’s concerning me most. Mr. Hardwick seems the type to fear nothing of man nor beast in this world, yet it’s clear enough he’s troubled. He’s paid the ferryman extra to bring us across, against the better judgment of Mrs. Barnes, who’s lived by the river many a year now, after starting the ferry with her first husband, a man who died in the river when a boat swept over, spilling a wagon and a team of mules, as well as all on board.
But Mr. Hardwick has his mind set on it today. There’s no more time for delay, he insists. The weather looks ill off in the distance and despite the dry and brick-hard ground, if rain falls upstream, we could be held here a week or more, yet. Mr. Delevan won’t have it, is Mr. Hardwick’s final reasoning, as if he believes that even the river would not dare overtake something belongin’ to Mr. Delevan. If we can accomplish this crossin’, we’ll push hard and make Wildwood in four days or less, regaining a bit of the schedule we’ve lost.
So our decision’s been made, and while we’re gathering up the last of the camp, Maggie May says her good-byes to two of the Barnes children she’s come to fancy as friends. I find Big Neb hiding in the shade of the live oak grove, down on his knees in the leaves. His eyes are closed, and his lips are movin’. Beads of moisture glitter on his mahogany skin. He’s praying, I see, so I wait. He hears my footsteps and climbs quickly upright, fearful that I’ve found him here, off to himself.
“I hope you’ve prayed for the both of us,” I say, and smile to let him know I wouldn’t speak a word of this to Mr. Hardwick.
“Yes’m,” he murmurs quietly and skirts me, like a horse that has known torment from one hand, and sees the self-same potential in all.
He stops at the edge of the brush, looking toward the river. The line of his jaw trembles like a wee little child’s.
“Mr. Hardwick intends you to cross on the raft with the bay mules, to hold them quiet,” I tell him. It was Mr. Hardwick who sent me to discern where Big Neb had gone off to. The second mule team has been difficult throughout the trip. Not so skittish as horses, but worse by far than oxen. My father taught me enough about mules that I know there’s no foolishness in them. They look after their own hides, despite what their masters ask of them. A mule won’t run himself to death under the whip, as will a horse. The bay mules won’t like the river crossing, I know it. They’ve too much sense for it.
Big Neb seems to feel this same way. The closer we walk to the ferry landin’, the more the quivering spreads over his body, until even his breath trembles in and out.
“We’ll make the crossin’ in fine shape.” I wish my words could bring a sureness of it, but there’s none to be had. The noise of the river has begun filling my ears, the rush working its way inside me. I wonder if Mr. Delevan would be having us risk our lives this way, if he knew of it. Would he be insisting that we hold to his schedule?
I stop along the bank, and Big Neb continues on. Mr. Hardwick has spied him now and calls for him. Maggie waits down by the landin’, watching the proceedings as the ramps are set and preparations made to bring across Mr. Hardwick, his saddle horse, and the three young Irishmen, Ryan, Jack, and Sean, along with various packets. Once across, they’ll help work the lines from the other side and manage the packets of provisions that’ve been taken off the wagons for transport on the ferry.
“Big Neb don’t swim none,” Essie Jane tells me. She’s come from nowhere, as she tends to do. “Got ’im a pow’ful fear a’ the river.”
“We’ll make the crossin’ well enough, all of us.” I feel the need of promising it again.
“I don’ swim none, neither, miss,” Essie Jane whispers, her voice little more than air passing. “Them what live in the house here say they’s bones un’er dat water. Bones a’ animals and men, hid down in the deep-dark. Bones a’ the missus’ firs’ husband, even.”
Her words sink through my skin, kindle the fear that’s been lit inside me for days now as I’ve watched the river. “I won’t be hearing talk of that sort, Essie Jane.” My voice comes out hard, and she ducks away as if I might strike.
I yearn to share words of comfort and prayer, of the God who shall protect us in the wilderness, but what good are lofty words from one soiled as myself? Despite all that the good reverend and the missionaries have said, I fear that God mu
st esteem that which men esteem, and despise that which men despise. That He, too, knowin’ of my shame, must surely despise me.
I slip my hand between us and wrap my fingers around Essie Jane’s, taking comfort in the bond of flesh to flesh. “We’ll cross on the same raft together. I’ll make certain of it. I’m a strong swimmer. Like a codfish, my da always told me, rest his soul.”
Essie Jane regards our fingers in surprise, a circle of white flesh over brown. Her hand remains rigid, unbending. Perhaps she’s only minding her place, or perhaps she knows that even a codfish would have trouble in this river.
We stand watching from the hill, while below the first raft makes it over, is unloaded, then returns empty with the ferryman. Mr. Hardwick returns, as well. He oversees the second load—the one with a wagon and the skittish bay mules. Big Neb stands at their heads, his hands wrapped in the harness reins, clinging on for the life of him. His fear creeps up the riverbank like the comin’ of a fog. I won’t catch a breath until he’s safe across, I think. It comes to my mind that Ma’s roses are travelin’ with him, tucked in the box of the wagon. I say a special prayer, biddin’ Ma and Da be asking the saints to watch over the roses and the men and the crossin’.
Beside me, Essie Jane whispers a prayer of her own. Some part of the Twenty-third Psalm, but it’s short by a few words. She repeats over and over again the parts she knows. “The Lord, He be my shepherd, He takin’ me to the green pasture. He makin’ me a place by the still water, and the water don’ overflow me. . . . The Lord, He be my shepherd, He takin’ me to the green pasture. He makin’ me a place by the still water. . . .” Her fingers tighten and cling to mine. I don’t think she knows it.
The raft bobs low in the water as it sets out, the current splashing over the mules’ feet. A parcel slides, and pushes them from behind. Mr. Hardwick catches the box, straining to stop it, then pulls hard on the reins to hold the mules from going over Big Neb and turning the raft in the water. The ferryman yells to the men onshore and the lines are tightened. The sun glistens against Big Neb’s head and the coats of the sweat-soaked mules. Muscles tremble beneath their hides as they’re forced back a step and the raft is righted again. All who are watching send up a cheer as the boat reaches its destination.
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