Dearest Dorothy, Who Would Have Ever Thought?!

by Charlene Baumbich

“I’ve got a better idea. I’ve been having a hankerin’ for iced tea anyway, I don’t care if we have flipped our calendars to November. Iced tea is a year-round beverage in my book.” Dorothy picked up their glasses and set them in the sink. Then she pulled a dented, two-cup, aluminum sauce-pan from one of her cabinets. While she filled it with water and put it on her stove, Katie’s breath hitched at the sight of the pan. Dorothy rummaged through her cabinets and retrieved the box of Lipton’s tea bags. For the first time all day, she noticed the hands on her teapot-shaped, battery-operated kitchen wall clock. It was well past lunch. “Are you hungry? I can fix us a sandwich to go with this tea. I’m sorry I didn’t notice the time when you first dropped in.”

  Katie thought on it for a moment, then decided she would like a bite to eat. “Just something small would be nice, maybe a few crackers, if you have any. After all, I did drop in unannounced.”

  “Pish-posh on announcements! Since when does a friend need an appointment to see a friend? And, Katie, I know you better than to think a few teensy mice have turned your stomach enough to need soda crackers to settle it!” Katie chuckled at Dorothy’s dose of welcome perspective. “I have a brand-new loaf of rye bread and a half pound of that good smoked turkey from Your Store. It’ll just take me a minute to whip us up a quick lunch.”

  “I couldn’t believe it when I saw you get out that pan. Is that a Pardon-Me-Ville thing?”

  “This pan?” Dorothy asked, pointing to the pan on the stove, as though she had a dozen of them lined up on the counter. Katie nodded an affirmation. “Well, I don’t know about it being a Pardon-Me-Ville thing but it sure is my thing. This old pan is the one Mom used when she made her sweet tea. Even though ice was pretty sparse in the warmest months, after she’d brew and sweeten, she’d usually manage to have just enough ice to chill it. But when we were out of ice, our good, deep well water always ran a refreshing temperature. Although it wouldn’t be nice and cold the way I like it today, it sure did wet our whistles plenty fine.”

  “I have to admit,” Katie said, “that cold well water is one of the things I do love about the farm. The reason I asked if that pan was a Pardon-Me-Ville thing is because my mother used to make tea that exact same way, in a little beat-up pan that could be that one’s twin,” she said, pointing with her eyes and chin. “I hadn’t thought about it for years until I saw yours. She used to make me warm tea with honey when I wasn’t feeling well and iced tea in the summer, mostly. I wonder what happened to that old pan? So many pieces of her life I just gave away, let them go after she died.” Her face washed over with regret.

  “Don’t look back, honey. We do what we do, and then we move on. Sometimes we’ve got nothing more in us than to let go.” Dorothy put the tea bags in the water to steep, then went about making the sandwiches.

  “Thanks. I needed to hear that.” But even so, she couldn’t help but wonder briefly if her mom’s pan had gone to the garbage, the giveaway box or if it might even be in an antique or resale store somewhere. Although she wasn’t much for antique stores (they often smelled odd and her taste ran decidedly toward the contemporary), she pictured the little pan set proudly on a shelf with a price tag worthy of its memories.

  After a brief silence Katie said, “Hm, it’s kind of surprising.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I don’t recall noticing any antique stores around here.”

  “You mean to tell me you haven’t been to Swappin’ Sam’s yet?” Swappin’ Sam’s was one of Dorothy’s favorite haunts.

  “Hardly. Just driving by it is ghastly enough. What an eyesore right there at the mouth of town.” Her Realtor’s eye had cringed more than once at its location. “That’s just a junk store anyway, isn’t it?”

  “I’ll have you know that Sam Vitner considers himself to be quite the aficionado of all things, collectible or otherwise.” Dorothy lowered her chin and raised a playful eyebrow.

  “How long has his place been around? From the looks of the length of grass grown up around some of those things out in his yard, I’d say too long.”

  Dorothy cut the sandwiches in half, arranged them on paper plates and began to sprinkle a few potato chips first on her plate, then Katie’s.

  “No chips for me!”

  “Leaves more for me then,” Dorothy said smiling. She got out a jar of midget sweet pickles and set them on the table for Katie to open. “Your hands will deal with that easier than mine.” Dorothy flexed her arthritic fingers open and closed a few times. Soon they were both served and seated. “Would you mind if I say a quick prayer, honey?”

  “Go right ahead.” Katie bowed her head, took a deep breath and released it, readying herself for one of Dorothy’s earnest outpourings. Dorothy could switch between easy chatter with friends and talking to God as naturally as a lightning bug turns its glow pad on and off.

  “Dear God, THANK YOU! Amen.” Before Katie could lift her head, Dorothy had popped a chip in her mouth and was picking up a second. She noticed Katie’s hands were still folded. “Sometimes a hearty thank-you pretty much says it all!”

  Katie smiled and spread her paper napkin on her lap. “So how long has Vitner’s place been there?”

  “Oh, I’d say at least a good forty years or so. He was quite successful from the get-go, no matter what the economy. Like it says on his sign out front, ‘If you’ve got the time, you’ll make the find.’ I can tell you I sure have found some goodies! You might find this hard to believe, but folks come from miles around to prowl through his place, sometimes stopping there before heading on to the hardware store, just in case. He keeps his finer collectible pieces in that main building farthest from the road; what I’d call the good old stuff in the two smaller buildings to the side; hardware parts and such are in a couple of truck trailers out back—I’m sure you’ve noticed those. Of course, how could anybody miss those toilets out front! Most of the larger unrustable things just seem to end up sprawled around here and there outdoors.”

  “Thus the eyesore.”

  “Well now, Ms. Katie Durbin,” Dorothy said with a twinkle in her eye, “perhaps you forgot that my guest poster bed is partially made out of old dining room table legs from that eyesore of a place, and I’d say at least another six items in my house are either totally or partially fashioned from treasures I’ve found at Sam’s. One woman’s eyesore is another’s golden nugget.” She took a bite of her sandwich, chewed, swallowed. “I guess that’s how it is with all of life: it depends on how you look at it—whatever the it may be!”

  “Duly noted,” Katie said. “I remember you telling me Edward Showalter helped you create that beautiful poster bed. However, Ms. Dorothy Jean Wetstra, no matter how I might or might not be forced to look at a mouse—and believe you me, I do not want to look at a mouse—it will still look like a mouse.”

  “Here’s to a very astute woman!” Dorothy said, picking up her iced tea and holding it high in the air. It was hard to tell which was louder, the clink or the laughter.

  2

  As soon as Katie arrived back at Crooked Creek Farm she began to fuss with the rugs, temporarily ignoring the blinking light on the answering machine. Josh’s bus would soon be dropping him off at the end of the one-eighth-mile lane, which meant Josh would be barreling into the tiny enclosed back porch, then on into the kitchen. The rug with the bristles was aesthetically too large for the back porch area but Katie decided in some ways that was good since Josh would have to walk on it in order to reach the stairs. Although she liked the nubby texture of the other rug, which fit right in with her color scheme, the door wouldn’t clear over its lush pile. She scooted it this way and that with her foot, trying to decide how it might look away from the swing of the door. The more she looked at how well it matched her décor, the more she wanted it to work but the bottom line was that it didn’t, not even in front of the sink since she found herself tripping on it twice just moving it around. Disappointed, she rolled it up and shoved it back into the bag with the receipt.

&n
bsp; As annoying as it was to put the same task back on her to-do list, she was, truth be known, happy to have anything on her list lately. Even though she was financially secure—enough money in the bank so that she never really had to work again—the loss of her corporate job in commercial real estate development combined with the move from Chicago to Partonville had left her with lots of free time. Too much free time, she was beginning to realize. She’d never in her Type A life been idle enough for boredom to strike. Perhaps “the ‘B’ word,” as one of her clients had once referred to boredom when explaining why he was developing a huge amusement park at age sixty-seven, was quickly becoming a serious possibility. The simple fact was that she missed a good challenge.

  She approached the answering machine mounted on the wall, pushed the button and turned to get the scissors to cut the tag off the bristle rug she’d decided to keep. “Kathryn Durbin, Colton Craig here.” Katie stopped dead in her tracks and moved swiftly back in front of her machine to stare at it, even though his strong deep voice was plenty loud enough to hear all the way on the porch. “I’m sure you’re surprised to be hearing from me, but then again, maybe you’re wondering what’s taken me so long.” Surprised? Flat out stunned was more like it! “I’d like to get together for lunch soon. Perhaps next week? Give me a call at my office.” Katie was racing across the room to retrieve a pencil, irritated with Josh for always walking away with the pens, pencils and notepads she left near the machine. She whipped open the drawer just as he was reeling off the number but she didn’t hear a digit since what she saw was . . . yes, evidence. Mouse-in-the-house evidence. She winced as she struggled to jimmy shut the old wooden drawer that refused to glide.

  “I look forward to hearing from you soon,” Colton said, his voice as smooth as she remembered it. “I hope you’re having a good day.” Click.

  “If any two things could have turned my otherwise mediocre day bad,” she said aloud to the machine, “I’ve just received notice from both of them: the mouse and the rat!”

  Jessie Landers slammed the phone down in its cradle. “The nerve of them!” she shouted from the kitchen to Arthur who was sitting in his La-Z-Boy recliner in the living room. “The nerve of them.”

  “What are ya yelpin’ ’bout, woman?” Arthur had the television turned up so loudly it seemed to her it would have been impossible for him to hear a tornado had it been ripping through his own hair. Jessie came storming around the corner, grabbed the remote out of his hand and turned the annoying thing off.

  “Arthur Landers, you have got to get yourself some hearing aids.”

  “Is that what yur yelpin’ ’bout?”

  “It is now!”

  “What was it before—although I’m sure I don’t really wanna know.”

  “Your relatives.”

  “What relatives?”

  “Your Indiana cousin and his wife. At least that’s what you’ve been telling me he was all these years—although I’m beginning to suspect they both descended from a band of gypsies.”

  “Well then, so did I! Give me that remote, if that’s all yur crabbin’s ’bout. I can’t do nothin’ to change them kind of genetic details.”

  Jessie put the remote behind her back so he couldn’t snatch it out of her hand. She knew it would take an act of God to rouse him out of his ever-loving chair. “Herm and Vera said they’d like to come for Thanksgiving . . .”

  Arthur cut off her sentence. “You knew that. You invited ’em, woman. You goin’ daft?”

  “They said, Arthur,” and Jessie spoke through a tightening jaw as she worked to calm herself down, “they said they’d like to come a little early.”

  “Like how early?”

  “Like two weeks and three DAYS early, which means, Arthur, on MONDAY, which is only six days away!”

  “I thought ya liked Vera,” Arthur said, staring at the television like it was still on.

  “I do like Vera—in small doses. As you well know, I don’t like much of anybody if I have to be stuck with them over three days in a row.” What this implied about their nearly six decades of a mostly stormy marriage was not explored, but Arthur rolled his eyes to acknowledge he’d heard what she’d said, even though she hadn’t said it. At least this time.

  “Did ya jist tell ’em no? N-O? Jist come on Thanksgivin’ Eve?”

  “Have you ever tried talking to somebody who doesn’t stop to catch a breath?” she asked, hands on her hips. He raised an eyebrow at her; she replied with a defiant squint that dared him to say more. “There’s no way I can get this house clean by Monday, Arthur, unless you help me, and since it’s your relatives ...”

  “What’s ta clean?” he asked, lifting the television schedule up off the end table next to his chair and finding nothing. “See? Clean as a whistle under there!”

  “You are not funny. This place is a pigpen, thanks to you. It’s bad enough the Happy Hookers are coming to our house for bunco before Thanksgiving, but now to have to be ready for out-of-town company weeks ahead of schedule. . . . That means I now have to clean the back bedroom before bunco, too.” (That’s where she usually threw everything when she was cleaning for the Hookers.) She sighed and turned in a wide circle, taking in the challenge before her, already dreading the smell of cleaning products. She’d rather clean a horse stall than have to dust. She’d once seen a plaque that said “Nobody ever died from oven crud,” and she’d emitted a big A-MEN right out loud, right there in the department store. She’d wished on more than one occasion she’d have bought the dang thing and hung it on her front door, just for a fair warning.

  “Arthur, I’m putting you in charge of cobwebs. You can use some of your old shop rags to cover the head of the broom. How about you get right to it.”

  Arthur stretched back, reclined in his La-Z-Boy, cradled the back of his head in his hands and closed his eyes. “Right after my nap,” he said. Right after jackrabbits fly, he thought.

  Jessie looked at the digital clock on the video machine. It was 3:25. “I’ll give you until three-thirty, then I better see you moving, buster!”

  “You’ll see me movin’ alright, woman. Movin’ right out the back door, down the driveway all the way to Ca-li-for-nI-A!”

  “Well, don’t forget your precious La-Z-Boy when you go. One less thing I’ll have to clean around.”

  “Been shopping again, huh, Mom?” Josh hollered as he leapt over the new bristle rug onto the first step of the back porch, figuring his mom wouldn’t want him getting her new purchase all dirty. By the time Katie came down from her bedroom and got to the kitchen, Josh’s backside was already sticking out of the fridge. Mud smears dotted the floor. She sighed, counted to three and turned her internal hot-switch down a notch. “Look at the floor, son.” Josh, can of soda in his hand, backed out of the fridge, closed the door and turned to greet his mom’s disgusted face. “Sorry. Toss me the roll of paper towels. I’ll clean it up.”

  “Did you not see the new rug on the porch?” she asked as she tossed him the roll.

  “Yup. I didn’t figure you’d want me to mess it up.”

  Katie just shook her head. Oh, well. He was trying to be considerate. ‘One person’s golden nugget . . .’ Isn’t that what Dorothy’d said?

  Josh leaned over and dabbed at the mud smears with a huge wad of toweling. “You won’t believe what happened in biology today. See this black swirl right here?” he asked, pointing the toe of his shoe at a muddy dollop before wiping it up. “In a way misguided flirting attempt, Sasha Kramer, one of our entire class’s most brainiac students, dared Kevin Mooney to mix these two vials of chemicals together, and he was just showoff enough—and dumb enough—to do it. BLAMMO!” Josh simultaneously tossed the soiled paper towels into the air when he discharged the word. “This brownish-black swirl of foul-smelling stuff spewed everywhere.”

  “Oh, my! Was anyone hurt?”

  “No. Unless you count Sasha’s feelings when Kevin accused her of knowing exactly what she was doing, which of course she did since s
he’s never received anything less than an A+ in any class she’s ever taken.” He collected the toweling, bunched it up and tossed it in the garbage.

  “What did she say?” Katie asked, retrieving a towel wad he’d missed.

  “She said she was sorry, that she thought he could take a joke and that she didn’t know it would be that explosive.”

  “And he said?”

  “‘I can take a joke, when it’s funny.’ And then he asked for a hall pass to go to the bathroom to try to get the mess off his clothes. But the teacher made him use the lab sink, so we all got to watch the slimy circle over the OLD in his Old Navy sweatshirt get bigger and bigger and his face get redder and redder and he didn’t even attempt to get it off the front of his pants and then Sasha started crying and then the bell rang.”

  “Did anyone comfort Sasha? Poor girl.”

  Josh gave her a double take. He would never understand women. “I can tell you it wasn’t Kevin!” Josh said. “Anything that exciting happen with you today?”

  “Exciting would not be the correct word. Disturbing, perhaps. I stopped by Dorothy’s today and ended up having a bite of lunch with her.”

  “Since when is that disturbing?” He knit his eyebrows together in puzzlement.

  “It wasn’t the visit that was the issue; you know I enjoy Dorothy. It’s what I learned while I was there and then what was confirmed after I arrived home. Here, take a look.” She walked over to the drawer that held pencils, pens, paper clips—evidence—and other stuff people usually kept in their junk drawers, although she didn’t own any such junk and what she did keep around was organized with neat drawer dividers. “Go ahead. Open it.”

  Josh pulled open the drawer and stared. “What?”

  “Look closely, Josh, then go wash your hands.”

  He studied the drawer, then shrugged his shoulders. It occurred to her that her son might not have any idea what mouse evidence looked like. Before she spoke, she spent a quick moment, as disgusting a moment as it was, trying to recall why she did. That’s right. When she and Josh’s dad, her ex, had first gotten married, they were so broke they’d briefly—very briefly—rented a crummy place with mice and cockroaches. No wonder she doubly hated the squeaky things; they brought back all kinds of bad memories. She walked next to her five-foot ten-inch son, reached up to put her hands on his shoulders and moved him aside to stare in the drawer. With her index finger she pointed. “See that?” Josh stuck his head nearly in the drawer to see what could possibly be in the corner where her fingertip was aiming.