by Lynne Spreen
“I guess that’s why she never visits,” Frieda said to Karen. “Last time she came home, Jessie was a teenager. I took her down to the old pool and she found a bunch of kids to play with. I love that girl. If Jessie knew I was here, she would have come.”
“They’re coming. I told you.”
“Tell me this,” said Frieda. “What exactly do you do all day?”
Sandra stared at her mother, and Frieda stared back.
Karen inched her chair back. Maybe she could sneak up to her room and read.
“I’m busy all the time. For Pete’s sake.” Sandra crunched a cracker smeared with cheese. Part of the cheese stuck to her lip.
“Busy’s not important. Being happy is. Remember that time you and your friends went to Mexico for a week?”
“I was young and stupid back then. I’m lucky I didn’t get in trouble.” A timer sounded from inside the house and Sandra jumped up. “Dinner’s ready. Richard said to start without him.”
Karen pulled Frieda’s chair back and together they trudged toward the kitchen. Inside, they found chicken enchiladas in verde sauce, with black beans and sweet corn cake on the side. Nobody spoke as they loaded up their plates. Soon Sandra was off on some tangent about redecorating the master suite, something about the Renaissance period.
Frieda dawdled with her food, nodding as Sandra talked. Then she put down her fork. “So Jessie and the baby aren’t coming.”
“They are coming, I just don’t know when. We have a wonderful flan for dessert.” Sandra scooped up the last bits of tortilla from her plate.
Frieda gripped her plate. “What’s your best guess?”
“A couple weeks?” Sandra bolted toward the kitchen.
“Stop.” Frieda’s voice rang out across the room. She folded her napkin and threw it down on her plate. “Don’t play me for stupid. They’re not coming, are they?”
“It’s not on purpose. Jessie said she would try, and I can’t tell you any more than that.”
“You told me more than that to get me to come here.”
“I said Jessie might be here and you should come and visit. Show a little flexibility for once in your life.” The kitchen door swung shut behind her, sweeping back and forth and finally stopping.
Frieda folded her hands in her lap. “I feel like a fool.”
“I’m sorry.”
“All the crap I put you through, and your mother’s stuff and all…” Frieda shook her head.
“Don’t beat yourself up. Why don’t you make the best of it? Hang around for a few more days, smooth things out between you and Sandy, and then go home. Or if you’re too pissed off, I can take you to the airport tomorrow.”
“That’s what I was trying to tell you.”
Sandra interrupted, carrying a silver tray loaded with dessert. “Here we go. Coffee and flan with caramel sauce.”
“I’ll just have a little decaf,” said Karen.
Sandra set the tray on the table. “Why do you have to be so negative, Mom? No matter what, everything is always bad.”
“I was happy back home in North Dakota before you tricked me into coming out here.”
“I didn’t trick you.”
Karen wondered if she could make a move for the hallway unnoticed.
“How can you be happy? You’re all by yourself in the middle of nowhere. What if something happened?”
“Nothing’s going to happen.”
“If you lived here, I could help you.”
“I don’t need your help, or anybody’s. But if I did, I have neighbors in Dickinson, and lots of friends, too. It’s not like I’m a hermit. Which you would know if you ever came to see me.”
Sandra looked at Karen in frustration. “You know how it is. Tell her.”
Karen shrugged. “She does have a pretty good social network, and the people in Dickinson watch out for each other.”
“Great. Now you’re both against me.” Sandra turned back to Frieda. “This is the first time you’ve come to see me in fifteen years. You always say it’s too hard for you to travel but here you are, driving cross country and camping, for God’s sake.”
“Karen took real good care of me the whole way.”
“And how well do you even know her?”
Karen finished her coffee. “Think I’ll turn in.”
“You don’t have to go,” said Frieda.
“Maybe she should.”
Karen left the kitchen but their voices followed her up the staircase.
“Very hospitable of you, Sandra. Thank you very much for treating my friend so rudely.”
“She’s had three heart attacks,” Sandra hollered after Karen. “Did she tell you that?”
If those two didn’t back off, it would be four. Was Sandra trying to kill her or was she just plain stupid?
“Leave her out of this,” said Frieda. “My health is my own business.”
“It’s my business too, Mom. I care about you.”
“And you show it by tricking me into coming all this way to see you?”
“That’s right. That’s what I’m reduced to, tricking my own mother to get her to come see me. And you know what? I was stupid enough to think you might like it here and want to stay. But no, you’d rather live in the sticks and be all by yourself when you die.” Sandra began to cry.
“Don’t be so dramatic.”
“You’re ninety, goddammit.” Sandra’s sobs continued.
“So what? Nobody lives forever. I’m not afraid.” Frieda’s voice lowered. “Come on, Sandy, toughen up.”
“I’m not like you. You go where you want and do whatever you want. You always have.”
“You act like you’re half dead, and you’re only sixty. You’re a very capable girl, there’s no reason you can’t do whatever you want.”
Sandra broke into a wail.
Karen closed the door to her bedroom, wishing she were in Albuquerque. Morning couldn’t come soon enough. She put on her nightgown and checked her phone, shrugging off the disappointment over not finding a message from Curt. Peggy called, but Karen wasn’t in the mood to hear about the fabulous world cruise her old friend was taking. Maybe tomorrow.
She snagged a book from the bottom of her suitcase, a hot bestseller on corporate leadership in the new millennium. Propped up by pillows, she was soon immersed in new tips and tactics.
The knock on her door startled her. She’d lost track of time. It was late.
Frieda, wrapped in her ratty pink robe, closed the door behind her. “I saw the light.” She limped across the room and eased into a chair. “I’m so achy tonight. These old bones. What are you reading?”
Karen set the book aside. “It’s about work.”
“I imagine you’re excited to go home. What do you figure? Three, four days?”
“Or less.”
“Um hmm.”
Karen kept her finger in the book, wishing she could get back to it.
“Sandra could’ve gone into business herself. Richard offered to bankroll her if she wanted her own shop.” Frieda glanced around the room. “She’s good enough. She could’ve made a go at it.”
“You can’t control the way kids turn out.”
Frieda nodded, but she didn’t answer. Karen heard a branch claw against the window. The old woman’s head dipped, and for a minute she seemed to have dozed off in the big wingback. Karen stole a glance at her book. If she were careful, she could read without disturbing Frieda.
On the mantel, a clock began chiming the hour and Frieda flinched awake. Her head bobbed around unsteadily on her stick neck.
“You okay?” Karen asked.
“Never better.”
“Good.”
The old woman nodded, her gaze in the far distance. “I was thinking.”
“I think you were sleeping.”
“Very funny.” Frieda pointed a wavering finger at Karen, a thin smile on her old face. “No, I was thinking I’d like to see the ocean. I never have, and you’re going that direct
ion.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Karen set her book on the night stand, excused herself and went in the bathroom where she locked the door and sank down on the marble steps leading to the sunken tub.
This was not good.
Even if she wanted to take Frieda all the way home with her to California, which was a crazy idea in every way, the trip would probably kill her. How to say no without crushing her?
If she were Frieda, she would rather throw herself in front of a train than live with Sandra, even if only temporarily, but Frieda was very elderly and her choices were limited. She could stay here or go back to North Dakota and live alone until one morning she keeled over on the way to the bathroom, and how she’d get back to Dickinson wasn’t even clear.
Frieda was trapped, but it wasn’t Karen’s problem. She had to think about her own future. Dropping her head in her hands, she thanked God she was still young enough to have one. Frieda’s last days were becoming more tragic by the minute, but it wasn’t something Karen could fix. All she wanted to do was get in the van tomorrow morning and haul ass out of here. The feeling of guilt would fade in time, and she would never have to see Frieda or Sandra again.
It wouldn’t be nice, but she was tired of being nice. If the incident on the road out of Cheyenne had taught her anything, it was that here in middle-age, life was short and she’d better make the best of what was left. She splashed water on her face, flushed the toilet for cover, and opened the door.
Across the room, Frieda waited.
Karen walked slowly across the floor, hands jammed in the pockets of her robe. She sat down on the edge of the bed.
“Frieda, I’m sorry.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
“Fine.” The old woman started to get up.
“Wait. Think about it. Sandy means well. She’s proud, like you. Don’t let one argument run you off. Make your peace with her, and stick around so you can see the baby. You know that’s the thing to do.”
“Do you think it’s that simple?”
“Unless I’m missing something.”
“You’re too damn young to understand.”
“Okay, let’s say you came with me. Once you got to California, how would you get back home?”
Frieda’s gaze was direct. “Think about it.”
“Come on. You’ll be around for a long time yet. I don’t see you slowing down any.”
“Well, I am. You don’t know how bad it is because I fake it. That’s what you do when you’re old. You lie to yourself and keep going. Either that or give up.” She slumped in the chair.
“You’re a good actress.”
“Russ and I used to talk about what it was to get older, and that made it easier, but now with him gone there’s nobody as old as me, and I don’t want to do it alone anymore. Everything is harder. I feel like hell all the time. My body is falling apart in a million little ways. Like, look at this. See my right ear?” Frieda tilted her head toward Karen.
“The edges look red.”
“It’s irritated because if I lay on my right side for too long at night, the cartilage gets infected. But if I turn over and lay on my left, I get congested and can’t breathe. And I can’t lie on my back very long because my heels burn.”
“Isn’t there some kind of medicine you can take?”
“I’m already taking so many things they’re destroying my stomach.”
Karen didn’t know what to say. She felt guilty for being young.
“All my friends are dying or dead, Russell’s dead, my sisters are all dead. There’s nobody left.”
“You still have family.”
“That’s her, right there downstairs. There’s no one left and no point in living.”
Karen pushed her hair back over her forehead and exhaled. Common decency required a response. “A scientist friend of mine– she’s an atheist–once told me she thought the point of her life was to have fun and feel useful.”
“Back home I had a certain amount of fun, and up until a few years ago, I felt useful. Now, I don’t.”
“Never? Not one single minute of any of your days? What about when you let that kid mow your lawn and he was so proud he hugged you?”
Frieda nodded. “That was nice.”
“And at church. Weren’t you on the finance committee?”
“Still am.”
“Well, don’t you think they’re going to wonder where you are?”
“That’s pretty pathetic.” Frieda planted her cane and started to get up, but then stopped. She stared at Karen, her eyes watery and red. “All I’m saying is, I’d like to see the red rock country again, and the Pacific Ocean. After that, I don’t care. You can put me on a Greyhound bus and I’ll go quietly back to North Dakota. But if you leave me here you may as well kill me.”
Karen felt a tickle on her arm. The cuff of the robe was fraying. “How did you and Sandra leave it?”
“We hugged. She’s hurt and I feel bad, but that’s beside the point.” Frieda rubbed her eyes. “She used to be independent like you. Now she’s afraid of her own shadow and bored out of her skull.”
“She has Richard.”
“Where was he tonight? He had to know we were here. No, his work comes first. If something happened to him, I don’t know what she would do. She’s very unhappy, down deep.”
“Maybe you could help her. Show her how to be more independent.”
“Don’t be naïve. I came here to die.” She shrugged at Karen’s shock. “I figured I’d come here and wait, but I wanted to see the baby first.” Frieda pulled a paper out of the pocket of her robe. “Here. I signed the van over to you.”
“No, Frieda.”
“Go on. You need the money more than she does.”
Karen took the pink slip. “I’ll sell it and send you half.”
“Don’t bother.” The door closed and Frieda’s footsteps faded down the hall.
Chapter Thirty
Karen lay watching the walls lighten, until the first clang of a pan and slamming door freed her. After a quick shower, she collected her things and went downstairs to the kitchen, where Sandra bustled around in a black velvet track suit, her hair knotted on top of her head with ebony chopsticks. Frieda sat at the breakfast table, wearing yesterday’s clothes and reading the local paper. She didn’t look up when Karen sat down across from her. Sandra clattered and banged, pulling a sheet of breakfast pastries from the oven. “Richard had to leave early, Mom, but he said to meet him at Zen’s for lunch. It’s the hottest new restaurant in town. They have the best sushi.”
“I don’t eat raw fish.” Frieda’s eyes remained glued to the Denver Post.
“And he says afterwards I should take you to Saks. Our treat. About time you went on a big-city shopping trip.”
“What would I need from Saks?”
“There’s always something pretty to buy.” Sandra set the pastries on the table and put one in her mouth, licking the frosting from her fingers.
Frieda folded the paper. “I’ll probably just lie down after Karen leaves.”
Sandra bustled out of the kitchen. Karen tore apart a cinnamon roll and smeared a chunk of butter on the hot surface.
Sandra came back a few minutes later with a thick photo album, which she dropped on the table next to Frieda’s plate.
“What’m I supposed to do with that?” Frieda asked.
“I thought we could look at it later.” Sandra stood next to her mother’s elbow. “It might make you feel better. You can tell me all about the old days.”
“You were never interested before.” Frieda pushed the heavy album a half-inch away.
“Well, I am now.” Sandra sat down next to her mother. “Or we could look through my catalogs to find a wall color for the game room. I’m thinking something red with navy accents. Don’t you think that’d pop?”
Karen snuck a glance over the edge of her coffee cup at Frieda. Their eyes met. Karen looked away.
“And I
thought I’d have the housekeeper move one of the computers into your room. It’s crazy. We have five of them.” Sandra held up her hand, fingers spread like a starfish. “Five. Can you imagine? And I don’t use a single one. I’m so behind the times.”
“Frieda just learned how to do email,” said Karen.
“Fantastic. She can teach me.” Sandra’s acrylic nails tapped Frieda’s arm. “Earth to Mom. Hello in there.”
Frieda had been sipping coffee, her eyes frozen on an indeterminate point across the kitchen. “Oh. I don’t really know that much about computers, dear.”
Karen finished her coffee, set the mug down with a definite clunk, and sighed loudly.
“So soon?” Frieda asked.
“I’m kind of anxious to get going,” Karen said. “It’s a long way across the desert.”
Frieda looked down at her plate.
“Hey, Mom, I got a call from a gal yesterday at the club,” Sandra said from over at the sink. “Belinda something or other. The social committee needs volunteers to help with their big Fourth of July barbecue. I told her to count us in.”
“I don’t know, honey. I’m not much of a joiner.”
“But what a great way to meet people, doncha think?”
Frieda blew her nose on a cloth napkin.
“I’m always begging Richard to go with me but he’s so busy,” Sandy said. “But now I have you. We’re gonna have so much fun.” She glanced over at her mother. “What’s the matter? You haven’t touched your roll.”
“I’m not really that hungry, dear.”
“Well, we’re gonna change that in a hurry. I am going to fatten you up.”
Karen pushed her chair back, trying not to make any noise.
“You’re going to see some beautiful country,” said Frieda.
“Not really. It’s desert. Very boring. And it’ll be hot. You’re just as well off sticking around here.” Karen inched toward the door. “Thank you for breakfast. The pastries were delicious.”
“You are so welcome. I get most of my ideas from Rachael Ray. You know she has a house here, right on the ninth fairway? Maybe we’ll even run into her at the clubhouse.” Sandra danced back to the sink with the empty plates and began rinsing.
