Then I said something I never thought I would ever say. “Want me to stay?”
She dried her eyes. “No, Mom, you need to go home and be with Dad. Chris has already talked to the lady who cleans for me. She has a college-aged daughter who’s studying childcare, and she wants to come help.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Wow, that’s great!” Inside I was shocked. Letting someone into her world and home was a big deal.
“And, of course, I have Chris. You’ve been great too, Mom. Annie really speaks so highly of you, and seeing you through her eyes has made me view you differently. I always just saw you as my mother, the person doing her best to control my life. But as I’ve talked to Annie and heard her talk about how great you’ve been with all the ladies, I’m really proud to call you my mom.”
You could have knocked me over with a feather. First, to hear Stacy talk this way and to know Annie thought so highly of me. I almost got teary myself.
Fortunately, Doris saved us. “Got any room in your case for my crockpot?” she asked, poking her head in the front door. “It’s just broken Annie’s zipper!”
Stacy and I burst out laughing, and she blew her nose.
I gathered myself up and kissed her on the forehead, just like I used to when she was a little girl. “See you soon.”
The traveling, rattling circus set off. Doris placed herself up front to help Chris navigate, never mind the fact that he’d lived in San Francisco his whole life.
I took my medication; two tablets to be on the safe side. As they started to take hold, I found myself in a happy place.
We arrived at the airport and clanked in, making our way to the check-in desk. Doris pulled her suitcase onto the scales.
“Ma’am, you’re going to have to redistribute. This is way too heavy.”
Doris’s face reddened. She was steamed. She pulled all of our suitcases onto the floor, and she conducted what could only be described as a three-ring circus. We were her performing animals. The comedy show was only made more entertaining as we helped each other with only half of our limbs in working order. The staff watched with amazement as she pulled out various pots and pans and cooking utensils and instructed us to redistribute them one by one into different suitcases, then demanded we weigh each one until they all eventually came under the weight. As she placed the last one on the scales after at least ten passes, the baggage handlers couldn’t contain themselves and burst into spontaneous applause.
Doris huffed and gave the ticket handler her “don’t you dare ask me to do anything else” stare.
The ticket handler responded with a plastic smile, saying, “Thank you for traveling with us today.” Then he handed us our tickets.
If we thought that was the end of our problems, we were totally wrong.
We made our way to the x-ray machine. Fifteen minutes later, we were all lined up without our shoes, coats, belts, or dignity, waiting for a hulking guy with the name “Al” printed on his name badge to wave us all through the x-ray machine. As our bags passed through, I heard one of the x-ray people whistle and call out a code word to Al, who jumped into action. This was hard to watch, as Al was about four hundred pounds of wobbling mass. I didn’t think he’d jumped since kindergarten. All at once, an alarm with a flashing light was activated. I thought maybe we were their millionth customers and would get free packets of airline nuts for life or something.
No such luck. The four of us were rushed off into a side bay faster than our little stocking feet could carry us. We were asked politely but firmly to identify our luggage. Then we were lined up in front of a table while Al and his sidekick, Betty—a skinny, scrappy blonde with too much red lipstick—asked if we were all together. We nodded, obviously. Standing there, I became aware that everything around me was spinning and moving unusually slowly. The drugs were clearly starting to kick in.
Doris spoke. “Young man, we have a plane to catch. I hope this isn’t going to take long.”
This obviously wasn’t the right thing to say to Al. His eyes blazed as he answered her, “Ma’am, I can keep you here till doomsday if I want to.”
“Oh, you wouldn’t want Doris for that long,” I said before I could stop myself.
I slammed my hand over my mouth, realizing I’d actually spoken my thoughts out loud.
Al thundered again. “Pardon, ma’am?” he asked, putting one hand on his hip.
“Don’t pay any attention to her,” said Doris. “She’s all drugged up!”
He looked at us, and Betty looked like the cat that got the canary. We were probably the most exciting thing to happen to her in her scrappy blonde life.
“Open your cases,” Al barked. His look lingered on me with intense interest.
We did what he said, and I managed to stop myself saluting him sarcastically, just in time.
These drugs were making me into a perfect floozy.
We opened our cases, and Betty and Al got to work. They started with Doris’s and pulled out a frying pan, a spatula, and a corkscrew. Al placed them on the table in front of her and asked in an accusing tone, “So, exactly what are you planning to do with those?”
Doris looked at him incredulously. She straightened up, matching him in weight and stature. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, what were you planning to do with them?”
Doris snapped back, “What do you think I was planning to do with a frying pan and a spatula? Cook, of course! That’s my best onion pan!”
“Likely story,” sneered Al.
“What, exactly, are you insinuating?” asked Doris, her eyes squinting.
“I think you were planning to hit some poor, defenseless stewardess over the head with it and try to highjack the plane.”
“And why would I want to do that? I want to get home, and I don’t know how to drive a 777. Plus, you might have noticed my spatula isn’t loaded!”
I couldn’t help myself. I burst out laughing.
Al scowled at me, then said, “And as for you, hashhead, what goodies do you have in your bag?”
He pulled out a bag of various spices and powders, nodding his head in a knowing way, then pulled out half a bag of flour that just wouldn’t fit in the main luggage.
“Aha! What do we have here?”
“Flour,” I said, bursting out laughing again. I just couldn’t seem to stop myself.
“Right,” he said in a sarcastic tone and handed it all to Betty, who took it away to check it for explosives.
Then he opened Annie’s case and pulled out fourteen balls of wool and three sets of knitting needles. He shook his head. Ultimately, he opened up Ethel’s bag. The first thing he pulled out were Doris’s “smalls.” Let’s just say they were very far from small. In fact, Ethel could have gone hang-gliding with them. Ethel blinked nervously as Al held them up, looking at the size of Doris’s underwear and the size of Ethel. He whistled. “You ladies are a piece of work.”
It took another thirty minutes, and a lot more explaining, but eventually it was evident, even to Al, no terrorist organization would be foolish enough to hire us. However, we did have to bag up Doris’s kitchen utensils and put them in the luggage hold, much to her chagrin. The whole event meant that we had to run as fast as we could to our gate to catch our plane. Not a pretty sight at the best of times, we were now a tangled herd of gray hair, wobbling fat, and polyester hobbling toward the gate. With the drugs, I felt as if I were running in a bubble of pink gummy happiness. We arrived just as they were about to shut the gate, and it looked as if the ground staff was about to tell us we were too late when they saw the hardened expression on our faces and waved us through.
Once on the plane, we panted down the aisle, looking for our seats. We were on one row of four. When we got there, a balding, elderly man was sitting on the end of our row. Doris scowled at him.
“Young man,” said Doris, who was way past nice as much as he was undoubtedly way past young, “I believe you are in our seat.”
He looked up at her and blin
ked, then beamed.
“I probably am,” he said in a perfect British accent, squinting at his ticket. “I always have a problem reading these numbers.”
Ethel huffed and took the ticket off him, saying, “You’re there.” She pointed at the seat behind hers.
“Oh. So sorry to take the seat of such a lovely lady.”
I heard Ethel make an inner grinding sound that was like catching her breath and snarling at the same time.
Annie giggled. “Why don’t you sit in my seat?” she said, obviously enjoying the fun of the whole thing. “I’ll take yours.”
Ethel about had a kitten, and if looks could kill, Annie would have slumped over that chair right there and then.
He smiled. “Well, that would be lovely,” he said. “I couldn’t think of a nicer thing than to have the opportunity to converse with such lovely ladies.”
“I want the window seat,” demanded Doris, like a small child.
I looked at my ticket and realized I had that seat.
“I don’t like slopping out into the aisle,” stated Doris indignantly, “and someone with my womanly figure would slop right out, and it’s just not ladylike!”
What could you say to that? I handed over my ticket like a dutiful child and sat between Doris and Ethel. Doris started huffing, puffing, and fighting like a two-year-old in the middle of a tantrum with her safety belt when another stewardess with the same plastic smile arrived to do her cabin check.
“I need you to take your seat and buckle up, ma’am,” she said in a singsong way to Doris.
Doris snapped back, “I would, but I seem to have some sort of child’s safety belt. Do you have one that fits a real woman? I am not one of those anorexic supermodels that you’re usually accustomed to have traveling on your airplanes!”
The flight attendant blinked twice and smiled again. Then, without a second’s hesitation, she said, “Let me get you an extender.” And whoosh, she was gone.
Even with the drugs, this flight was the longest I’d ever taken in my life. I dug my fingernails into the armrest on takeoff and never really relaxed the whole way, which wasn’t helped by Doris’s need to bounce up and down all the time. Also, though she wasn’t slopping into the aisle, she was slopping into me. Ethel, who was sitting on the other side of me, kept gravitating toward me like a scared rabbit to get away from the English guy sitting on the end. He kept chatting to her and showing her pictures of his family and especially his wife. He explained that she had passed away a few years before and then added with a smile that she had looked just like Ethel.
It was on Doris’s next bounce up that I felt extremely overwhelmed. It was hard enough for me to fly to begin with, without all this bouncing around. “I need to check out their kitchen facilities,” she said, noticing my annoyance. “I might want one of those stale sandwiches I hear they always serve now on airplanes. I want to see if they need some help to prepare them and if their kitchen is clean. I like my sandwich to come from a very meticulous environment.”
I huffed and got up for what felt like the thirtieth time. Then off she went, squeezing her bulk down the narrow aisle, taking wayward small children and anything not nailed down with her. She was like a snowplow; nothing stood a chance in her wake.
I was so happy to get to Seattle. I could see the relief in the flight attendants’ faces too when we left the plane. We all boarded a shuttle bus from the airport back to the island, and Doris insisted on sitting up front in case the bus driver, who had been doing the trip three times a day for ten years, needed any help navigating. I knew how long he had been doing the route because he announced it more than once to Doris on our journey home.
Soon we were there. Lavinia was waiting in her midnight-blue Cadillac to pick us up from the shuttle. She whistled as she watched us getting off the bus with our casts and canes.
“My goodness, you girls sure know how to party.” We clambered into her car as she added, “I need to make sure I come on the next road trip.”
“You can take my seat,” I whispered to her sarcastically.
“How’s Momma?” asked Doris.
“She’s okay,” said Lavinia quietly. “She’s resting right now, and Lottie’s with her. This thing sure knocked the wind out of her sails, that’s for sure.”
Lavinia dropped off the other ladies, and we said our good-byes and then made our way to my house. I was so happy to see my little cottage. Lavinia helped me into the house with my bags, and I looked around with joy. It had that “my husband’s been living alone” look. It wasn’t that it wasn’t tidy, just not cozy. I would enjoy spending the next day or so making my house my home again.
I was just surveying my kitchen when something brushed up against my leg. I screamed.
Lavinia came to my rescue. “It’s a cat,” she said laughing. “I didn’t know you had one.”
“I don’t,” I said, picking it up. Instantly, the cat snuggled down in my arms and started to purr contentedly.
“I think you do now,” Lavinia said, ruffling the fur on the top of its head.
Chapter Twenty-Three
GRACIE’S STORY
As I lay in the rapturous comfort of my own bed a week later, I found myself feeling nothing but grateful. Grateful for my cottage, my family, and all the gifts I’d been blessed with in my life. It was Saturday morning, and I had absolutely nowhere to be.
Our cat, Raccoon (short for “Raccoon Bait”), jumped up onto the bed and nestled in close to me as the smell of strong coffee being brewed found its way up the stairs and swirled around my senses. I was home.
Martin was whistling in the kitchen, preparing a drink, and I enjoyed the simple pleasure of listening to him until the telephone ringing jarred me from my sweet reverie. I leaned up on one elbow, wondering if it was Stacy again. She had called nearly every day this week to update me on her progress; she really seemed to be enjoying her pregnancy now. It was wonderful that she seemed to want to include us in it.
Martin picked it up, and I heard him have a muffled conversation before he came into the bedroom and looked in on me.
“It’s Doris. Do you want to speak to her? I could tell her you’re still asleep.”
“No, it’s okay,” I said as I yawned myself awake. “I’m coming.”
As I pulled the covers from the side of the bed, I noticed that I didn’t feel the usual sense of dread. In fact, when I looked back at the road trip now, it was with fondness. This group was much different than the world I’d known before in my prepackaged life in California. Days that had been filled with “doing lunch” and cocktail parties had been replaced by desperate phone calls on a Saturday morning, but there was something endearing about it all.
I pushed my feet into my slippers and pulled on my robe, saying to my husband as I passed him in the hallway, “I wonder what the crisis is today.”
I picked up the phone and was greeted on the other end by a very calm and subdued Doris with none of her usual brashness.
“Janet, it’s me. I have something very important I need to ask you.”
Doris’s dogs greeted me with their usual excitement, but this time I was prepared. I had on my full beach-walking coat that covered me completely and was washable. Ruffling their soft heads and stroking their sweet ears, I made my way up to the door.
Ethel opened it and just huffed when she saw it was me. Putting my hand in my pocket, I pulled out a gift-wrapped package and handed it to her. She looked taken aback.
“It’s for you, to say thank you for all your help with the group.”
She blinked twice and then opened it. It was a little pin I’d made for her. It said “Rejected Writers’ Book Club Helper.”
She didn’t say anything, but I could tell she was touched because she didn’t flank me up the hallway as usual. She just took the pin and pinned it onto her scarf.
Once inside the living room, I noticed all the other ladies were there, and the atmosphere was hushed and expectant, not unlike the final minutes before a
theater show is about to start, a feeling of anticipated excitement. The cake of the day was apparently carrot, but before Doris could push me down into a chair, I curled up in the orange bucket chair next to Lavinia, who greeted me like a long-lost friend.
“Oh my, Janet,” she said, gingerly touching my arm. “How are you holding up, honey?”
I smiled. “It’s not too bad. At least I can drive. How’s Gracie doing?”
Lavinia smiled. “Better, much better. This is the best thing that could have happened to her. She’s been holding all this in way too long.”
Doris handed us both a piece of carrot cake, and I placed mine next to Lavinia’s on the side table.
Everybody was now seated, except Gracie and Lottie.
Doris started the meeting. “As you know, this is a special meeting of the Rejected Writers’ Book Club. Thank you all for coming. Because of the circumstances, I would like us to keep other business till the end and get straight to the reason we’re here.”
Everybody nodded in agreement.
“This has been hard for Momma, but since she decided to do this, there has been a lightness in her that I haven’t seen in days. So let’s begin. Ethel, could you go and tell Lottie that we’re ready?”
Ethel disappeared, and two minutes later Gracie came into the room on Lottie’s arm.
“I’m okay,” she said buoyantly. “This is the best day of my life.”
Her eyes shone with tears of relief, and it was hard not to tear up myself. Soft, rippled laughter filtered through the group, more of relief than joy.
“I’ll take my usual place,” she said, pointing her finger toward her wicker chair. “But I would be so happy, Lottie dear, if you might sit right here in case I need the support.” She sat down and patted the empty chair next to her.
“That’s exactly where I was planning to sit,” said Lottie, finding her spot.
Gracie settled herself between the twins as they both took a hand and squeezed it. As if she had been strengthened by that one small gesture, she straightened up in her chair like a tiny teacher about to tell her class something very important. She cleared her throat and started to speak.
The Rejected Writers' Book Club (Southlea Bay) Page 23
