He smiles and responds with vague promises. I leave the meeting uncertain that anything will really change—except me. A sense of power and purpose has flooded through me.
And then, February 27, our AFT and WVEA union leaders say we are heading back to work on March 3 after a “cooling off” day. The deal? The governor promises a five percent raise and freeze on health insurance changes. The House passes the five percent raise. I tune in to Hoppy Kercheval’s radio show Talkline and hear Senate Majority Leader Mitch Carmichael sneer that he doesn’t think the governor’s proposal will pass. He has taken the pay raise off the senate’s agenda. Seriously?
Facebook posts roil with anger. I roil with anger. We are not going back to work after a “cooling off” day.
The strike becomes a wildcat in defiance of the governor and union leadership. In all fifty-five counties, schools are closed again.
Rebecca calls. “Guess what? Chad and my doctor think it will be okay if I come with you to the capital this time.”
“Hallelujah! After all the time you’ve devoted to AFT, you deserve to be in on the excitement now.”
“My moment on the battlefield,” she says.
“My doc said I can remove my ankle bootie, so I can drive. You can ride with me.” We plan to spend the night.
On the ride downstate, we listen to radio coverage of our strike.
We are inching through Charleston’s traffic when Rebecca’s voice reverberates through the car. “Hey, Angie, isn’t your brother-in-law a senator? Have you tried swaying him to our side?”
Somehow I manage not to wreck. My mother’s voice repeats in my inner ear: A car is a lethal weapon. Keep your mind clear and focused on your driving—lives depend on it.
“Really?” Mrs. Carstairs regards me through her eyeglasses. “If you have a personal connection, we should use it to our advantage.”
“We aren’t close.”
“Still, more deals get made over lunch than in meeting halls,” Seth says.
“A great idea,” Rebecca says. “Let’s take him to lunch.”
“He’s soon to be my ex-brother-in-law.”
I can feel Mrs. Carstairs frown—feel because I am keeping my eyes on the road.
With the wisdom that comes with age, she says, “That complicates matters.”
“Sure does,” I agree.
“Even so, it’s a personal connection,” Seth says. “Let’s work it, baby!”
“Is his phone number in your cell?” Rebecca wants to know.
“No.”
Rebecca pulls out her phone. “Piece of cake to get his offi ce number.”
I park. By the time Mrs. Carstairs and I climb out of the car, Rebecca has Ted’s office on the phone. She explains that Senator McNeil’s sister-in-law is in town and would like to meet him for lunch. Rebecca is laughing and charming Ted’s aide. Unbelievably, by the time we reach the capitol grounds, she has Ted on the line. She tries to hand her cell to me.
I push it back at her.
She insists.
Crap. Now what am I supposed to do?
“Hi, Ted.”
“Angela, always good to hear from you. My aide said something about wanting to meet me for lunch, but I’m afraid I’m tied up in meetings all day.”
Venom oozes beneath the smooth dismissal. On top of everything he’s doing to my sister, it boils my blood. Mac said he went ballistic over the photo. That’s what I want to provoke. Rage equal to mine. I have the power and I intend to use it.
“Perhaps you’ll reconsider, Ted. I know about The Photo.” I feel lightheaded and wonder if it is possible to faint from an amputated conscience. Am I as venal as Ted? He doesn’t respond and I wonder if he’s hung up, but then I hear footsteps and the click of a door closing.
“I’ll have my aide clear my schedule.”
“There will be four of us. I hope that’s okay.”
“Angela, the photo . . . they don’t know about . . . you haven’t shown . . .”
“No.”
“Excellent. Let’s keep it that way.”
We make arrangements to meet at The Block at 11:30.
Rebecca is ecstatic. “We have a chance to make a difference.”
Seth high fives her. “Change starts by flipping one senator at a time over to our side.”
I am unable to share their enthusiasm. I have just threatened my brother-in-law, an implied threat, anyway. The words poured out of some dark hole inside me without forethought. I’ve become as despicable as he is. What does Ted think I could do with knowledge of the photo anyway? I couldn’t expose it without hurting my sister.
We merge into the crowd. Today the chants in the rotunda are “Get Out of the Way, Mitch!” The sound seems to climb the white columns and echo off the white marble.
“They can’t get any business done up there with all this commotion,” Rebecca yells in my ear. “They have to give in soon.”
“Hope so.” Mitch is the problem right now, and Ted has his ear. We have one shot at persuading the snake to join our side. That pay raise has got to get back on the agenda.
~~~
Not far from the golden dome, The Block is an attractive restaurant. Brick interior walls, cushy booths and modern wood tables give the place a warm, welcoming feel, the kind of place you’d meet friends for lunch or share a drink on date night. We are here to meet the enemy. When we arrive, I give the hostess my name. She leads us to a private dining room. Good grief—it could hold at least fifty people.
From a table in a discreet corner, Ted hops up and greets us, shaking hands with everyone but me. I merit a hug. Ugh—he smells musky like a small furry animal.
“I reserved the private dining room so we’d have a quiet space to talk,” he says.
I suspect my smile resembles Wile E. Coyote’s. “How thoughtful. I hope meeting with us hasn’t upset your day too much.”
“Not at all. Got me out of boring meetings. I should be thanking you.”
“You can thank us by making sure we get that raise and decent health insurance rates,” Mrs. Carstairs says.
“And keeping charter schools out of West Virginia,” I add. “We can’t afford to drain our limited resources.”
Ted smiles and nods. “Let’s save the business part of lunch for later. I want to get to know you all better first.”
When a waiter appears, Ted tells us to order whatever we want; he’s picking up the tab. “These are important people,” he tells the waiter. “They are the teachers of our children.”
I order the most expensive item I can find: a salad with field greens, prawns, goat cheese, cinnamon toasted pecans, roasted beets, and dates with a fig balsamic glaze. Actually nothing is overly expensive, darn it. I hate to waste a chance to get even with this man who cleaned out my sister’s bank account and canceled her credit cards.
Once the orders are in, Ted continues to play an unctuous politician, asking pertinent questions around the table: what subjects everyone teaches, how long they’ve been working, what their spouses do for a living. They are all behaving oh so politely! I say very little. Every time I think of his ripping that ring from my sister’s finger I want to stick a knife between his eyes.
After we eat, Ted listens to my colleagues make their best pitch. He swears he hears their concerns.
He stands, signaling the end of our lunch. “I can’t promise anything, but I’ll try.”
“It’s all we can ask.” Seth engages in another handshake and seems quite charmed by my brother-in-law.
Ted suggests the others go back to the Capitol while he and I catch up on family news. “I’ll bring her over later.”
Like hell he will. I’ll catch a cab or walk.
We sit back down. I hold my arms stiffly in my lap, anchoring them. There are only dirty butter knives on the table, but I’m not taking any chances.
“How’s Mac?”
“She’s fabulous. Looks much better without you.”
“Let’s talk about the photo.”
>
“What about it?”
“What do you plan to do with it?”
I shrug. I hope the horrible photo has been erased from every dark corner of the Internet.
“If it fell into the wrong hands, became public, people would get hurt . . .”
“Come off it. You’re not worried about ‘people.’ You don’t want to hurt your career.”
“You always did cut right to the chase, Angela. What exactly do you want?”
“What do you mean?”
“If it’s the raise and all that stuff, you know it’s not up to me. The whole senate has to vote. Be reasonable. Natalie was really young when that photo was taken. She didn’t realize how it could be used against her . . . against me when we get married.”
Natalie—the girl Mac refers to as the future Child Bride! What photo is he talking about?
“Is it money—is that what you want?”
My brain seizes on the reference to money—Lord knows we need it, what with Dewey out of work, all the family squeezed up against each other, bumping elbows and knees. How much money is Ted talking about? I could do this for my family. We could aff ord a good memory care facility for Poppy, if it comes to that. Bella could get cochlear implants if she needs them down the road. Dewey and I could buy a house again and take a real vacation, one that didn’t involve a tent and beans heated over a campfire.
“How much are we talking about?” he prods.
My mouth feels as dry as snakeskin. All I have to do is pick a number. A thousand. Ten thousand. Fifty thousand.
“Don’t you have a number in mind?” he asks.
I shove away from the table and stand. “All I want is for my sister to be treated fairly. After raising your children and putting up with you all these years, she deserves a decent settlement.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
Geez—what had Natalie done in that photo? Not that I really want to know.
“And give my sister back that stupid ring so she can hock it or throw it in the Kanawha River or flush it down the commode where it belongs.”
The snake smiles. “You liked that ring, admit it.”
“That ring sucks, almost as much as you do.”
I stride out of the private dining room and leave the restaurant.
The air outside is brisk and refreshing.
~~~
By the time we return to Clarksburg around six the following night, I am weary yet exuberant. We are making progress in talks with individual senators. Some of the meetings were arranged by Ted.
As I turn down our road, I know immediately something is wrong. Every light in the farmhouse is on. My exuberance collapses.
Mom meets me at the door. “It’s Hambone. He wandered off again while Mac and I were at the beauty parlor.”
Which means Dewey was supposed to be watching him. How could a senile man in his eighties outfox him?
“When did you realize Poppy was gone?”
“Around two.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“Nothing you could do all the way down there in Charleston.”
“I would’ve come back sooner.” My sharp tone has only served to upset Mom. “Sorry, I’m just worried. Who’s looking for him?”
“Dewey, Mac, the minister, and a couple of neighbors.” She texts the others that I am on the hunt also. “Whoever finds him will notify the others by text. Dewey called the police to put out a Silver Alert.”
Poppy’s had four hours on his own. He could have walked a long way. It’s so cold. I hope he wore a coat this time. The others are searching the area near the farm, assuming he walked aimlessly. What if he had a goal, something from the past, motivating him? Last time it was feeding the horse.
I drive back toward town, making stops at the graveyard where Poppy’s family is buried, the closest convenience store where he used to stop on the way home from the restaurant, the house where his sister used to live. Finally I check the building where his first restaurant used to be. A police car sits in front of the boarded-up establishment. Poppy is in the back seat.
I pull in behind them and hop out. I start to introduce myself, but stop when I recognize the officer as a former student. “Johnny?”
“Mrs. Fisher, you remembered me.” He sounds surprised. As if I could forget the rascal who painted one of his lettuce plants turquoise and tried to convince me it happened because of a gemstone he had embedded in the soil.
“That’s my Poppy in your car. He wandered off .”
Moments before I arrived, Johnny had figured out Hamilton was the man in the Silver Alert. “He can’t tell me his name, but he remembers this restaurant was his.”
“How’d he get here? It’s miles from our place.”
“Hitched a ride, he says. Doesn’t know who with.”
I’m just thankful we’ve found Poppy and he’s safe. Johnny gets Mom on his phone and passes it to me. I let her know Poppy had on shoes and a warm coat and gloves this time.
I ask Johnny if he’s seen any turquoise lettuce lately. He grins and helps Poppy into my car.
When we get back to the farm, all the lights are still on. Mom is passing out cups of coffee and sandwiches to the search party. Finally the house empties out. As soon as the bedroom door closes behind Dewey and me, I unload.
“How’d you let this happen? Were you drunk? Playing video games? What?”
His lips part as if he is going to answer, but instead grabs his pillow and a blanket and stretches out on the floor, his back turned to me.
“We should talk about this, Dewey.”
He pulls one leg closer to his chest.
In the morning, his badass truck slings gravel before I am out of bed. Over breakfast, my mother tells me Dewey spent all afternoon combing the woods, searching the barn, the neighbors’ property, every place he could think of.
“I’ve tried to give you and Dewey space, to stay out of your marriage, but Angie, this time you are wrong. Last night even a blind person could have seen you were wound up and ready to unleash on him. Dewey felt terrible Poppy escaped, Angie, but it wasn’t his fault.”
My mother has rarely been this angry with me. Not since I was grown. I don’t get it. “Whose fault was it then?”
“No one’s. You jumped to the wrong conclusion. Poppy was napping when the phone rang. It was the FBI about that job Dewey wants. He couldn’t very well hang up on them. While he was looking up information on references they needed, Poppy slipped out. ”
I have stepped in it this time. My hand trembles as I phone my husband. My mother slips away to her bedroom so I can have a moment of privacy, something that’s been sorely missing from our lives.
“Dew, don’t hang up. I’m sorry. So, so sorry. I was wrong. I know how much stress you’ve been under and now I’ve added to it and I’m just so sorry. Please, please come home.”
“I don’t want to come home.”
“What can I do to make this right—please forgive me. I don’t want to lose you.”
“I don’t want to come home,” he repeats.
My chest hurts so bad I think it might burst. What else can I say or do? A slideshow flashes through my mind. The day we met at Arden. Our honeymoon hiking part of the Appalachian Trail—the tender flesh of the trout we pan-fried, my blistered heels, his ripped jeans when he stumbled over a root, making love in that stuff y tent that smelled of mildew and hormones by week’s end. The way his eyes lit up when he held Trish for the first time. The joy of our first grandchild. After all these years, are we at an end?
“Home’s a little crowded these days,” he says. “We can’t really talk there.” He pauses. “Or do anything else without everyone else listening in. How about we snuggle up in a cheap hotel room the rest of the morning instead?”
He doesn’t have to ask twice.
The manager pushes an electronic key across the front desk and informs me that Mr. Fisher has already arrived. I locate room 215 and fumble with the key card until I get it t
urned the right way. With curtains drawn, the room is dark. One small light on the desk is on. Just enough light to make out the bed, where Dewey is propped up with pillows, his upper torso exposed above the top sheet. A deep pink rose rests on my pillow. The romantic gesture, so unlike Dewey, amazes me. He even remembered my favorite color. I pick up the blossom and touch it to my nose, an instinct I can’t resist, even though it won’t share the heady fragrance of the Abraham Darby bush I had to leave behind when we sold our house. The memory of that sensual fragrance travels through my body.
“I’m sorry I’ve been such an ass lately,” he says.
“You’ve been under a lot of stress.”
“We’ve both been under a lot of stress.”
I toss the rose aside and kiss my husband. He pulls my sweater over my head and unhooks my bra. I can’t even remember the last time I didn’t undress myself when we made love, even before the clash concerning the strike.
In a very ordinary bed in a very ordinary hotel, we make extraordinary love, provoked by how close we came to losing each other. Losing what really matters.
Afterward, I stroke my fingers down the cleft created by his spine. It’s now or never. Time to have a serious talk. “I know it’s tough being out of work.”
“It is, but I shouldn’t take it out on you. It’s just . . . a business manager is who I am, not a car wash attendant.”
I don’t want to ruin our reconciliation, but the moment to speak my mind may never come again. I think of my ancestor Rosella and Susan B. Anthony, how they stood up for women. It’s time for me to stand up, too. I have to slough off the skin of inferiority that’s held me back. I am not the child who caused the accident. I am better than my grandmother’s ethnic slur. I am becoming a Mover and a Shaker.
Buried Seeds Page 29
