by Suzie Carr
“Okay,” she said, looking like she had to be coaxed into a happy mood. She pointed to a lock of my hair that escaped my knot. “Hmm, you have a little bit of hair hanging.”
“Does it really matter?” I asked.
She fixated on it. So, I tore out my knot and rebuilt it. I didn’t need her screwing up this opportunity by focusing on my hair instead of the camera. “There, better?”
“Much,” she said. “Okay, Fred, let’s have you swing over here near this wall with the pretty portraits. I’d like to have them right behind us.” On command, Fred carried himself and the enormous camera over to us. “Just follow my lead,” she said to me.
“I just want to make sure we’re on the same page. I really want to focus on the welfare of the animals and the influx of new ones being dropped off after being rescued. We need people to come out and adopt.”
She tilted her head to the side as if studying me. “Sure. I get it.”
Fred steadied himself in front of us, and when cued, the reporter dove into the segment like a well-trained national correspondent, precise and on-point with her words, her inflections, her timing. She summarized the last month and the financial distress of the town and how this distress negatively affected the flow of donations into the shelter. She briefed the audience on the struggles of non-profits when faced with disasters such as the hurricane and how it’s critical more than ever to get involved.
“What’s your biggest need right now?” The reporter asked, pointing the microphone at my mouth.
“Well, we’ve had an influx of animals come into the shelter, so we need blankets, food, beds, pillows. Any of that would help.” Ask for money! “Toys even.” Natalie and Trevor zeroed in on me, as if pleading with me to get out of my humble state and cut to the chase. “And people to consider fostering or adopting.”
The reporter smirked. “Okay, well, besides all of that, I also understand that your building is one of the few that has weathered the storm in this immediate area.”
“Yes, thankfully. We’ve had some damage, though.”
“Yes, of course,” she said. She looked around as if the thought had just caught up to her that she probably should have set up the shot to be in front of something other than Melanie’s pretty artistic wall display of beautiful pet portraits. “Tell us about that.”
“We’ve lost part of our roof, a wall is ready to collapse in the kennel area, and some of the grounds have washed away towards the back of the kennel runs.” We need money for repairs, money we normally needed to keep the place up and running. “We’re slowly trying to get it all worked out.”
“Any plans to relocate at this point?”
“Relocate?” What a dumb question. I briefed her on my needs and never did I mention relocating. Why was she not leading me where we needed to go? “We have a great spot here. It’s all fixable. Unfortunately, everyone else in town is going through much of the same and—” I paused to gather up the momentum I’d need to overcome this stupid need to stay humble. I looked over at my staff who urged me with a nod, with intent eyes, to carry onward with our plight. Our plight, not mine. “—the funding we rely on has stopped because everyone else is funneling it to rebuilding their homes and businesses. Because we’re double over our capacity, we’re low on supplies and food.” I smiled at the camera. I’m irresponsible. I know. I should’ve set up a trust fund like Josh advised me to do. Save for a rainy day and plan for the worse to happen. “We need help.”
“I also heard that you’ve had to turn away animals because you’re over capacity.”
In what universe? My face flushed. I would knock on every door and beg for foster help before I turned away an animal. Outrage seeped from my pores. “You heard wrong.”
She bypassed my answer. “And, I hear you’re getting requests from other neighboring counties to take on rehabilitation of more strays they’re finding.”
I snapped my eyes at her. “I’m not sure where you’re getting your information.”
She pressed on. “I understand that you are considering expanding the shelter if the funds can be secured. That would really be a win for the animal community. You had mentioned possibly sixty kennels in total?”
I tripped and stumbled over her lies. “Um.”
“So, what you really need are cash donations?”
She fed me with lies, lies that could help our cause, nonetheless. “That would be helpful, yes.”
“I know there are so many people affected financially by this disaster, and you’re worried to ask for their help. Is that right?” She pointed the microphone at me again.
“We’ll make due,” I said looking over at my trio who stared back at me with jaws dropped, weary frown lines on their foreheads. I turned back to her. “I know it’s not an easy time for the community right now.”
“It’s a beautiful thing you’re doing here. And, I’m sure I’m speaking for a lot of people when I say thank you.” She finally smiled.
I just nodded, lost for the right words.
The reporter stared into the camera and spoke like a fine-tuned instrument. “If you’d like to donate and help the Clark Family Shelter’s continued efforts to caring for defenseless, homeless animals, please visit our website to find out how. Stan, back to you.”
The cameraman backed away from his tripod. “That’s a wrap.”
I stood with my arms crossed, stunned. “What was that all about?” I asked her.
“I’m not here to waste my time,” she said, looping the extension cord around her thin arms. “Your story needs an emotional plea.” She turned to the cameraman. “Fred, I’ll need you to take some stills of the staff interacting with the dogs, cats, and any other animals you can find back there. Look for the most pathetic ones.” She turned to me. “You’re not done, yet. We’ve got to create a story worthy of landing a spot on the evening news.” She pointed to Fred. “Follow him.”
Thirty minutes later, and at least one hundred pictures snapped of all of us cuddling up to the animals, the reporter handed the extension cord to Fred, gathered her pocketbook and notepad from the counter, and headed out of the door. “You can thank me later when the donations start pouring in faster than you can blink.” She stopped midway through the front door. “Oh, and you can tell your brother that I said you’re welcome. Call me when you get some puppies. I get first dibs. Josh has my number.” She winked and walked away.
Chapter Six
Chloe
I listened to Olivia deliver a plea that wrapped around my heart and twisted it up into a knot. The anxiety in her tone, the desperate panic in her eyes, the twist of her mouth, all blended together, sweeping me up in a windstorm of emotions and blowing me off balance. My heart pounded as she submitted to the financial distress of her shelter. Her shelter. Pride swelled in me. She rose up to a grand and selfless pathway. Her eyes flickered whenever she addressed the reporter. I recognized the unease in the slight stretch to her upper lip. The reporter led her, taunted her to admit vulnerability. Olivia Clark did not beg.
She angled her eyes at the camera and spoke cautious words. Her lips, still pouty and bright, drew me in. Her cheeks still chiseled, shined under the camera’s light. Her hair still highlighted blonde and stretched back into a low ponytail, gleamed. A veil of worry shadowing her face marked the only difference since the last time I’d set eyes on her. She resisted the reporter’s aggressive questions, and turned them in her favor by remarking on the plights of others during such distressing times, on how others competed for basic necessities.
Olivia circled around her own troubles, disguising a loss of control with strength and a determined spirit.
After the report, they cut to a video montage of the staff adoring dogs, cats and even a pretty bird. Their hearts reached out through the camera and attached to mine. Olivia showed off a bulldog, lifting him in the air and kissing the tip of his nose. A young guy, with blonde spikey hair, traipsed alongside a fence with a Saint Bernard, stopping to pet the top of his head.
A pretty, heavy-set black girl with a pile of curls on top of her head, admired a beautiful yellow and green bird as it perched on her finger. The soft piano music combined with the emotional plea mesmerized me. Even after several days, I found myself sneaking into the living room to watch the news clip over and over again.
“You’re going to wear that segment right out,” Aunt Marie said, walking past me with a basket of laundry. She scooped down to pick up a sock that had fallen out.
“I want to help her,” I said.
She placed the basket down on the couch next to me and plopped down, too. “You really think she’ll let you?”
I looked back at the television, to Olivia’s blushed cheeks. I paused the recording on a shot of her sweeping a piece of her hair behind her ear and narrowing her eyes at the reporter. “Maybe enough time has passed.”
She stole the remote from my hand and pointed it at the television. “I’m going to erase it.”
“No,” I screamed knocking the remote from her hand.
We stared at the remote on the tiled floor. The battery popped out and landed a few inches away from it. The television screen, still paused on Olivia’s narrowed eyes, casted a crude reminder that Olivia had moved on with her life and forgotten all about me.
I plopped down on the couch, tossed my head in my hands and screamed. “I just wish things were different.”
Aunt Marie sat down and hugged me. I pulled away. She pulled me back and squeezed me to her. I wrestled. She wrestled. Finally I conceded and cried into the crocheted flower resting on the lapel of her cardigan sweater. “I still can’t get her out of my mind after all of this time.”
“You’re driving yourself crazy,” she said rocking me back and forth. “You really should erase the segment.”
“She needs help.”
“And people will come to her aid.”
They would come to her aid just like they did when I left her, when her childhood dog Floppy died, when her parents died, whenever some dramatic piece of life caught up to her. “I want to come to her aid.”
Aunt Marie patted my back. “What’s your plan? Go into town bearing envelopes stuffed with hundred bills and maybe a friendly dinner?”
“Something like that, yes.” I pulled back, kicked up my feet and reclined back against the leather. “If I don’t help her, I’ll be wasting my last chance to wipe the slate clean.”
Aunt Marie kicked up her feet, too, and lounged back. “What about Scott?”
I stared up at the chandelier. Dust grazed its brass and cobwebs formed a bridge between the arms. “We’re just dating.”
“He has a drawer in your bedroom.”
“I’m a liberated woman, Auntie.”
“I don’t get your generation.”
“This is my chance to do something good and balance things out.”
“I don’t think she’s going to be open to receiving your help, sweetheart.”
I rested my head on her shoulder and sighed. “You’re probably right.”
~ ~
People assumed because I earned a lot of money, my life was one big happy hoorah. I enjoyed money for the freedom it offered me, but it didn’t protect me from lonely nights. My happiness bloomed the most before the money, before my life tangled up into a big messy wad of lies and people tossing their flirty eyes and accolades at me like I had actually deserved them.
Before Ayla arrived in my life, I viewed myself as a decent human being with a shot at a good life if I had played my cards correctly. I never set out to hurt anyone. I never wanted to be that girl who blocked out everyone else but herself. I wanted to be far different than my mother, and in a different solar system altogether from my stepfather.
I had promised myself a long time ago, that I, Chloe Homestead, would always do my part in paying back those who served me in my time of need. I would one day go off to college, earn a degree, get a well-paying job, and pay back Olivia for all those times she raised me up to the level of a queen.
Broken promises looked an awful lot like litter. They repulsed, antagonized, and left a trail of ugliness too real to deny. To clean up the mess required getting down on the ground and plucking up one shattered piece at a time. Controlling damage this way would take forever, though. Thankfully, money offered me a shortcut. Because I invested in a shitload of mobile parks, I could pay to clean up the mess a whole lot quicker and without getting my hands and knees all scuffed and dirty.
I watched as my daughter shoveled Honey Bunches of Oats into her mouth. She sensed no clue of the sacrifices I’d endured to get her to this point in her life – a beautiful teenager with lots of cool friends, trendy clothes, and a stable, loving family that only a fool would run from. No messed up mother who would rather smoke cigarettes and walk in circles talking to herself on the terrace of a mental institution; no stepfather who would sneak into her room at night and try to fondle her; no excuses to fabricate so friends wouldn’t be annoyed at her for not reciprocating an invite to sleepover. No searching for love in the eyes of a stranger who only served to please him or herself by getting her to spread her legs and remedy a serious case of horniness.
No, Ayla would never go through any of this because Aunt Marie and I loved her, respected her, and molded her into a young lady who knew she deserved exactly what she put out into the world. Thankfully, Ayla wielded more sense than I did when it came to measuring choices. She analyzed the world through lenses more magnified than I ever did at her age. When she didn’t want something, she walked. When she did want something, she focused on it until it became hers. Thankfully, she also understood the concept of cause and effect. What she contributed, she received back a million times over. She offered to rake leaves for our neighbors for free and in return they set her up with beautiful saddles and delicious homemade cherry pies. She baked her friends cookies for no reason, and in return they never overlooked her in the school cafeteria or on carnation day. She served others and received blessings back in the way of friendship and goodwill. People naturally gravitated towards her because she brought out the best in them. She never faked. She’d never live a lonely day. I wished I’d have understood that at her early age.
I had no doubt that if genuine love presented itself to her, she would never disregard for the sake of conformity or weakness. Nope, my daughter would extend her delicate hands, take that love in and honor it. She’d never shit all over it like I did. She would’ve thanked the guy who risked his life for her with a dinner instead of a fuck.
“I’m taking a trip to my old hometown this weekend.”
“You’re not coming camping with us?” she asked.
“No.” I shook my head, and then sipped my coffee. Camping with Scott, his friends, and a bunch of teenagers didn’t sit at the top of my ideal list of things to do.
“Was that her on the news report?”
I placed my mug down. “Her?”
“The girl you loved,” she said without any judgment.
“That’s her, yes.” I didn’t keep my bisexuality a secret. I told her all about Olivia and my love for her. I only lied about how I left her. Instead of messing her up with the ugly truth, I buried my dark secret and told Ayla that we both just needed to go our separate ways.
“You’re going to see her, aren’t you?”
I exhaled. “Yeah.”
“Do you think you’ll get to kiss her?”
“I’m not going there to try and kiss her, Ayla. I’m going there to help her out with her shelter.”
“And what about my father?”
My skin fizzled in a moment of ridiculous panic over the impossible. “What about him?”
“Will you try to find him?”
“Not this time around.”
“When will it be time?”
“I’m not sure, sweetheart.”
She bit her lower lip. “I don’t feel like camping anymore.”
“Your friends are counting on you.”
“I wish my father would want to know me lik
e Scott likes to know Alexia.”
I wanted to hug her, protect her. She rarely allowed me to console her on this subject. I searched my mind for the proper words that would comfort her and make her feel less like an unwanted old dog and more like an irresistible puppy. I had nothing. I just gripped her wrist and squeezed, offering her a knowing smile. “I love you, sweetie.”
“I know.” She spooned in another mouthful of cereal. “I’ll go camping.”
“You’ll have fun. Just don’t let any anyone talk you into sneaking off on a walk in the dark. That never ends well. I always got bitten by a million mosquitoes and had nightmares for weeks that someone would grab my leg from under a bush and pull me into it.”
She placed the bowl up to her face and drank the remaining milk. She emptied the bowl and sighed. “You are so weird, mom.”
I pinched her side. “It’s true.” She trusted people too much, and I worried that one day that nightmare would become a reality.
“I’ll bring a boy along if I decide to go for a walk.” She peered up at me with a smirk.
“You love me too much to put me through this kind of worry already.”
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, I do.” She hopped off the stool and swung around the counter to the sink. Her long, golden curls flitted around her, reminding me of her little girl days when she enjoyed spinning around in circles with arms outstretched, chasing the elusive wind. “I’m going to tag along with you someday up there, and I’ll be old enough where you won’t be able to say no.”
“All in good time,” I said.
“Yep, all in good time,” she echoed our usual phrase, ending on a wink.
Chapter Seven
Olivia
When Tucker, a handsome Golden Retriever mix, had first arrived at the shelter a few weeks before the storm had hit, he had collapsed in a seizure right there on the waiting room floor. The owner had already cleared the parking lot. A little girl and her father stood in horror as I knelt beside the big guy and pressed against him until his body stopped twitching and the fear vanished from his big brown eyes.
