Autumn Blue

by Karen Harter

  Jack pulled Sidney to her feet. “Come outside with me.”

  Sidney followed him outside, down the front steps to the back of his Suburban. He opened the hatch to reveal an antique oak chest. “A little present for you.”

  “Oh, Jack. Where did you get it?”

  He clicked his tongue. “Off the side of the road with a Free sign on it. It’s not perfect, but with a little sanding and some wood glue, I think you could paint it up to look pretty good.”

  There was no doubt in her mind. And she already knew exactly what she would do with it. “Is that why you were late?”

  “Yeah. I couldn’t maneuver the thing in there by myself. I had to call Petrie to come help.”

  A stiff breeze blew from the north, causing the golden arms of Millard’s trees across the street to wave triumphantly, strewing leaves into the air. It felt like a celebration, confetti and all. Sidney’s hair whipped wildly around her face. She pulled it back so that she could see Jack’s grin. This was good. Life was good. She beamed back at him. “You’re so sweet.”

  “Yeah, that’s what they say. I’m just a sweet guy.”

  She smirked at his sarcasm. “Okay, how about cool? Rad? What would be appropriate here?”

  “Sexy.” He posed with an inflated chest and hands on his hips.

  She put on a thoughtful expression, chin in hand. “Hmmm.” She studied him up and down, acknowledging to herself that the description fit. He wasn’t tall, and he had thick, stubby hands, broad shoulders, and a buzzed head that resembled a mailbox, but the whole package somehow worked together quite well. “Well, okay. I can see where you might get that.”

  He winked, brushing a wild strand of hair from her forehead. “Come on. Let’s get back in there before the third-quarter kickoff.”

  Micki’s SUV pulled into the gravel drive, Dennis at the wheel. They jumped out along with their son, Andy. “Hey, we came to get our beautifully painted buffet!” Micki said. “Dennis always falls asleep after the game, so we decided to get it at halftime.”

  Dennis scowled. “You decided to get it at halftime.” He put on a friendly face, reintroducing himself to Jack. They had met only briefly when Jack and Sidney dated before.

  Jack shook his hand. “Hey, let’s make a deal. I’ll help you get yours loaded and you help me unload mine.”

  They agreed, starting with the chest in Jack’s vehicle. “Do those duffel bags go in, too?” Dennis asked as they slid the furniture toward them.

  “Oh, that’s my laundry.”

  Sidney peered in. Both canvas bags were stuffed to overflowing. She wondered how long it took for one man to dirty that many clothes. “Jack, do you need help with your laundry?”

  He raised his brows. “Are you offering?”

  “Well, yes. I didn’t realize you don’t have laundry facilities in your apartment. I don’t mind at all.” Her subconscious feelings didn’t form words in her mind. There was just something about having his socks and underwear churning in her machine that seemed right. She couldn’t get it all done today, of course. He would have to come back for it. “Why don’t you put the chest on the back porch so that I can paint it even if it rains? You can toss the laundry bags just inside the door.”

  The men disappeared around the corner of the house with their burden. Micki leaned against the vehicle, arms locked across her chest, scrutinizing Sidney as she pushed the back hatch closed.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  Micki shook her head. “What are you doing, Sid?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Offering to do his laundry.”

  “Is that a bad thing?”

  “I don’t know. It seems a little early for all that. You’re barely even dating the guy. I suppose you’re going to string it all out on the clothesline so that Jack can enjoy the fresh scent of mountain breezes on his skivvies.”

  Sidney was perplexed by her friend’s disapproval. “I might if it wasn’t so darn windy and cold. I could get whipped to death by a gang of frozen T-shirts.” Sidney thought that was funny but Micki, for once, didn’t even smile.

  “Something just feels wrong here. You already do laundry for four. There’s only one of him and he has a lot more time on his hands than you do.” She sighed. “I think you’re trying too hard. Trying to please.”

  “Last time I checked, being nice was an attribute, not a crime.”

  Micki grabbed Sidney by the sleeve, pulling her toward the front of the car. She took Sidney’s head in her hands, forcing Sidney to look into the side-view mirror. “Take a good look, girlfriend. What do you see?”

  “Ooh. Fine lines around my eyes.”

  “Okay, so back up a couple of inches.” Sidney complied. “That’s Sidney Walker. Beautiful, intelligent, kind Sidney Walker. She is not desperate. She does not need to take in a man’s laundry or eat ground round to win his approval.”

  Sidney stared into her own green eyes. She knew what Micki said about her was true. She was pretty enough, not a genius but well read, and able to carry on a keen conversation. Micki was just being analytical again. Overly analytical. Sidney knew she was not desperate and she didn’t need to be told as much. Nor would she ever take up eating hamburger.

  She blinked. Trying too hard. Desperate. It was unusual for Micki to be so wrong.

  23

  THE AUDITORIUM of Ham Bone Elementary buzzed with the sounds of voices, chairs scraping the worn hardwood floors, and Mrs. Beatty warming up on the piano to the right of the stage. Rebecca and Sissy were backstage donning their costumes for the fall play. Sidney spotted two empty seats in the middle section. “Excuse me.” She sidestepped past four sets of knees, threw her coat over the back of one of the folding metal chairs, and sat in the other. Jack would be late. He had just gotten off work and still had to make the long drive from Dunbar.

  She glanced around looking for Micki and Dennis, finally spotting them in the first row. Micki turned, making eye contact with her and raising her hands in a helpless shrug. She had clearly tried to save Sidney some seats but failed miserably. Sidney gave her an understanding shake of the head. Parents of children in plays could be vicious when it came to securing front-row seats. She pulled her camera from her pocket and held it up until Micki understood, gesturing for Sidney to bring it up to her. Sidney inched past the two couples beside her toward the aisle. “Sorry.”

  Up front, Dennis grabbed the cheap little camera from her hand. “I’ll do it. She’s taking video.”

  “Put it on telephoto,” Sidney advised. “I want to see every dimple and the sparkle in their eyes. Sissy’s a pumpkin and Becca is the bus driver.” She already knew that Dennis and Micki’s son was one of the dancing scarecrows. “I want shots of Andy, too.”

  She headed back for her seat, surprised to see Alex Estrada enter the back of the auditorium in his stiff khaki and green uniform. What surprised her even more was the surge of adrenaline that this sighting triggered in her body.

  His presence there confused her until she remembered Amilia reminding him on the porch that day that his nephew had invited him to the play. They walked toward each other, meeting awkwardly midway down the aisle.

  “Hi, Alex.” She smiled casually. On one hand, he was her son’s arresting officer, breathing down Ty’s neck and watching almost expectantly for him to make another mistake; on the other, they had spent a sunny autumn afternoon together on Amilia’s porch. She had heard him sing.

  “Sidney.” He nodded. His proud, broad-chested posture and serious, piercing eyes gave him the look of an eagle. She had the sensation of his acute vision boring into her until she was as vulnerable as a mouse in an open field—but to what, she didn’t know. He paused for an uncomfortable moment. “Where’s Tyson tonight?”

  Didn’t the man ever take a night off? “He’s with Millard—Mr. Bradbury. Doing homework, I think.”

  “Good.”

  Another awkward pause. Sidney took a breath. “Well, enjoy the play.”

/>   He nodded. “You too.”

  She returned to her seat just as the piano began to play loudly and a gentleman walked onto the stage. He introduced himself and said something about the play, but she couldn’t really hear. Her heart was throbbing in her ears. In her peripheral vision she saw Alex slip into an aisle seat two rows ahead on the opposite side of the aisle. Why did that man do this to her? Was she afraid of him? No. Why should she be? He certainly couldn’t do anything to Ty that he hadn’t already done. Not if Tyson kept his nose clean, as her father used to say. But there was still the issue of the missing jewelry. Amilia’s and her own. Sidney certainly wouldn’t press charges against her own son, and she couldn’t imagine Amilia doing so. After all, Tyson reminded her of her darling Alex when he was just a boy. “Maybe that’s why I’m drawn to him so,” she had said about Ty. “He’s got that wounded look in his big brown eyes, like Alex did after his mother died. Sometimes I wondered if that boy’s heart would ever heal up.”

  If Alex’s heart was still broken over his mother’s death, Sidney was sorry. She really was. But it seemed that by the time a man had reached thirty or forty he might have gotten over it. Sidney’s father had died only a few years ago, but despite the waves of grief that still rose up from time to time, she didn’t keep all her smiles packed away in mothballs.

  The faded curtains parted in jerks, revealing a brightly painted backdrop of a farm scene with a red barn and receding rows of pumpkins narrowing to a V in the background. “The Pumpkin Patch” was painted in bold letters above the barn door. Stage left, two large crows sat atop a rail fence, dangling orange legs and three-toed crow’s-feet.

  “Maybe they’re not comin’ today,” one crow said. Judging by his size and voice, he must have been a fifth-grader.

  “Don’t get your tail feathers in a knot, Melvin,” the other crow answered. “They’ll be here. They’ve got to get their pumpkins, don’t they?”

  “Are you sure about the sack lunches?”

  “They bring them every year.”

  Sidney finally let her eyes wander to where Alex sat across the aisle. An attractive woman sat beside him, also Mexican, it appeared. His head began to turn toward the aisle and Sidney swiftly averted her eyes straight ahead.

  “Hope someone’s got tuna,” Melvin said.

  “I’m a bologna guy myself.”

  “Brownies are good, but you gotta have milk.” The crow shook his head. “I hate those boxes with the straws. A guy can hardly get his beak into them.”

  There were titters of laughter from the audience.

  “I once knew a guy who could open Tupperware with one wing tied behind his back.”

  More chuckles. Sidney snuck a look at Alex. He wasn’t laughing. Suddenly he glanced over his shoulder and their eyes met. Both sets of eyeballs jerked away. Her face went hot. Oh, how junior high was that? Her heart was racing again. What had made him crane his neck to look at her? She determined to focus on the crows and avoid making the same mistake again. The big black birds got another laugh, but she missed the cause of it. Who was that woman? Alex’s sister?

  She looked at the empty seat beside her and then her watch. Shouldn’t Jack be here by now? This silly fascination with the deputy sheriff made no sense at all, especially when she had the chance to have a meaningful relationship with Jack, who was not only positive and pleasant but the mentor she had asked God to provide for her kids. Alex Estrada, on the other hand, could hardly be called engaging. She had never heard him carry on a decent conversation with anyone—not in English, anyway. He and his dad had a somewhat enthusiastic exchange that Saturday they all sat together on Amilia’s porch; she was pretty sure it had something to with deer hunting from the bits and pieces she could understand. But he had hardly acknowledged her, and from what she observed, his dialogue with Ty had been clipped and limited to the construction project, their only common bond. She was pleased that her son was showing more respect for the sheriff, though that probably had more to do with Ty’s newfound pride in doing a man’s work than any personal connection.

  Bottom line: Alex Estrada was neither a decent companion nor a family man. She demanded that her mind accept this ridiculous attraction for what it was: naturally occurring sensual magnetism based on physical appearance and a certain aura of mystery. Nothing more.

  Pumpkins poured onto the stage from both sides. Sissy took her place in the front row. Her pudgy legs were a little shorter than most of the second-graders. The kids wore stuffed orange flannel sacks with holes for their green leotarded arms and legs. Their heads emerged through drawstring necklines and were topped with pumpkin-stem hats. The costumes were so easy to make that Sidney had volunteered to stitch up a half dozen of them. Sissy grinned out at the audience as comfortable, it seemed, as if she were in her own living room. Sidney leaned to the left, hoping to catch her daughter’s eye.

  The piano began to plink out the tune Sissy had hummed for three weeks straight and the pumpkins began to dance. Sissy had many attributes, but so far grace was not among them. Her legs couldn’t quite keep up with the choreographed steps; her arms shot out in jerky motions while others, but not all, swept theirs across their bodies in long, fluid strokes. What she had going for her, Sidney thought, was that she was the cutest, most enthusiastic pumpkin in the patch.

  The people to Sidney’s left adjusted their legs and pulled in purses as Jack made his way down the row. Sidney grinned up at him, whisking her coat from the back of his chair. “Sorry,” he whispered as he sat. “Traffic.”

  “Sissy’s up there now,” she whispered back.

  “Pick me!” a pumpkin shouted. “Pick me! Pick me!” others cried, jumping like popcorn from their squatting positions on the stage floor.

  Jack chortled, reaching over to take Sidney’s hand. His touch filled her with an instant sense of tranquillity. She threw her head back and laughed along with the crowd.

  Sissy waved good-bye to no one in particular when the pumpkins exited the stage. She probably had not been able to pick out her mother’s face in the crowd. Now a school bus entered stage right. It appeared to be made of huge panels of cardboard, and instead of wheels it had legs, lots of them, giving it the appearance of a monstrous yellow centipede. In each window was the face of a child. Rebecca was the driver, staring straight ahead, her dark blond hair stuffed inside a billed cap. She took her role very seriously. Sidney was sure that if there were a rearview mirror, her daughter would have been checking it. She’d probably go to Hollywood someday.

  Suddenly one set of legs stopped as a girl mid-bus waved at someone in the front row. Bodies compressed like an accordion. One boy fell to the floor and was immediately stepped on. The audience gasped. The back end of the school bus, apparently held up by handles mounted on the inside, dropped to the floor. The little boy on the stage curled up, holding his stomach and moaning.

  Several adults leapt up the side steps as the boy cried out in pain. Including Alex. He pushed his way to the boy’s side, his hands running over the child’s stomach and ribs. In all the commotion no one in the crowd could hear what he said to the boy as he scooped him into his arms. People parted as they left the stage. Sidney supposed that if there was not a doctor in the house, a sheriff was the next best thing. Certainly he must have some kind of training for medical emergencies.

  After the bus was righted and the play resumed, Sidney was surprised to see Alex return to his seat along with the dark-haired woman who had been at his side. The boy was still in his arms. The woman opened her arms, but the child shook his head, snuggling closer to Alex and resting against Alex’s broad chest. It must be his nephew, Sidney thought. Surely, Amilia would have mentioned if Alex had any children of his own. Alex rested his chin in the boy’s tousled hair, tenderly stroking his back. They looked so much alike. Could the woman beside him be Alex’s ex-wife?

  “She’s good,” Jack whispered in her ear.

  It was then that Sidney realized Rebecca was almost through her lines. Perhaps af
ter hearing her daughter practice so often, she had learned to tune the girl out.

  “And don’t forget your sack lunches,” Becca the bus driver announced. She drove the bus offstage with the help of one set of legs at the rear, leaving a crowd of kids behind. As the children sat on the hardwood stage and had an imaginary picnic, the two crows reappeared on the rail fence.

  “What a smorgasbord!” Melvin said. “I don’t know where to start.”

  “I’m going for the Twinkie,” the other crow answered.

  Melvin shook his head, crossing his black wings across his chest. “Oh, I don’t think you should. Dessert is supposed to be last.” Black-gloved fingers resembling the feathers dripping from his wing tapped an orange beak that was somehow strapped over the boy’s nose. “I think I see a couple of tunas, but do I want whole wheat or rye?”

  When the crows swooped down, children screamed, including some in the audience. There was havoc on the stage until a band of scarecrows came to the rescue. They waved their hay-stuffed arms in unison, chasing Melvin and his partner in crime in a circle around the picnicking children. The spectators guffawed and giggled; Jack whistled. A peal of laughter rang out from Sidney at the scarecrows’ hilarious antics. She rocked forward, holding her side, tears squeezing from the corners of her eyes.

  And then she looked at Alex. He too was laughing. The boy had twisted around in his lap to see the play but had not yet found the humor in it. Alex said something in his ear and tickled him until the little guy was writhing with giggles. The scene took her breath away. Was this the same austere deputy sheriff that had repelled her so? Alex’s beaming face was like the sun coming up over the mountains, his teeth as white as porcelain, shockingly so against his brown skin. She had known the man was physically attractive; that would be hard for anyone to miss. But this—this was almost too much to bear.

  “What’s wrong?” Jack said in her ear.

  She jerked her head away from Alex to the man on her other side. “Nothing!” It came out a little too adamant, a lot too guilty. She hadn’t realized that her laughter had frozen in her throat. “I saw my boss.” That was not a lie. Leon Schuman was in there somewhere; she hadn’t noticed where he sat. “Reminded me of some things I’ve got to do at work.”