by Amy Simone
“Here, baby, you can play with my phone,” she said as she turned on an app she knew he liked. With the cheerful tunes of her kid’s game playing in the background, Cassie sat down near the front counter, slightly turned so she could still see Josh at the end of an aisle.
“Tell me about it,” she suggested. “I’m not offended. I’m just seeing this as one big experiment.”
Annie frowned. “It’s the money. The rent. He’s covering it and has been for quite a long time. Ever since Joyce—that’s my former partner—moved away. It’s just eating our lunch.” She began another crying jag. Cassie looked about for Kleenex and found some paper towels near a sink in a back hall.
“Take some deep breaths,” she told Annie.
“I’m here all the time,” Annie continued. “Sometimes I hire college students to help but they never last. Greg’s close to retirement. He wants to travel—for pleasure—and we can’t because I’m having to watch the store.”
“It didn’t start this way.” Her eyes were rimmed in red.
Cassie looked about the store. “What about your lease?”
Annie wailed, brought a hand to her mouth and squelched it. “Joyce left me in a pickle. She convinced me to sign a ten-year lease and there are eight years left.”
“My God,” Cassie said.
“I haven’t had a profitable month in like forever.” She hung her head and crumpled the paper towel to her eyes.
Cassie patted her back. “I brought my camera,” she said. “You have some white walls back there. Let me spread this cloth here.” She patted out a white bed sheet she’d brought with her. “I meant to ask you, is there anything here that you might sell like a loss leader or lagniappe?”
Annie sat back against her stool. She rested her hands on the small glass counter. “I don’t know. Maybe these alligator key chains?” She pointed below. Cassie saw a basket filled with hundreds of plastic miniature alligators.
“That’s it exactly,” Cassie said. She snapped away. “These are perfect. After I’m done, we’ll pick out fifteen prime items. Definitely need to include some food stuff, too.”
“Mayhaw jelly?”
“That’s right. And cookbooks,” Cassie told her. “Pull out several of those.”
As she drove home, Cassie considered how she would stage The Daze on line. Josh still played on her phone. She heard a call pinging.
“Josh, hand mommy the phone, please.”
Instead, he answered the phone.
“No, Josh.” Cassie pulled off the road, turned around and pulled the phone out of his hands. Josh started cried.
It was Ralph.
“Going to be late this evening,” he said. “I have to go to a breeding farm.”
“I’ll have you some dinner ready, hon,” she told him.
Once home she paced back and forth, planning what to do and how much of her time she’d devote to her new client. She wanted to treat it with strategic thinking. With a renewed fervor she pulled out a large planner and in large letters using a thick red pen, she wrote out her proposed time line. She loved making schedules. It always felt so productive. She’d seen her father keep a meticulous book calendar he kept with him. Like daughter, like father, she reasoned.
It relieved Caleb he didn’t have to do cardboard duty when he got home. He got to play on the big computer in his dad’s office while his mother zipped off several messages on eBay on her kitchen laptop. His mom seemed more happy than usual today. Sometimes she frowned a lot while she was on the computer. He hated it when she got like that. She complained and talked back to people on the screen. They couldn’t hear what she was saying but he could and he knew she was angry with some buyers. Sometimes she said terrible words. She got super mad whenever somebody forced her to take back an item. He’d hear her pounding on the little counter that made up her desk nook Then she’d scrap back the captain’s chair that went with their breakfast table and walk circles around the small kitchen island, pushing back her bangs and shaking her head. Josh knew what that meant. Mommy was mad. Good and mad. Then she’d sit back down, spread her legs out, grab the chair by the arms and jerk it forward towards the keyboard as if attacking the monitor and aggressively pound out a response.
“How dare you give me bad feedback,” she’d yell into the screen. Whatever this was, he decided he would sell nothing online if it made his mother this mad.
She kept a lot of her finds in a large storage shed near their back door. It had two fluorescent lights barely hung off the ceiling. Oversized metal shelves ringed the interior filled with plastic lidded bins. She’d run out there and pull out this or that pair of shoes or jewelry. At the start of each month she’d bring both him and Josh to the dollar Goodwill sales and speed from store to store during the early bird specials. She’d hunt and peck, throwing clothes into gargantuan plastic sacks she carried with her.
“It’s stock up time,” she’d cheer to the kids as she drive crazy, lane changing faster than he knew she should. If daddy was with them Caleb knew he’d be yelling at her to slow down. She drove like a cop on a chase. Caleb would grip Josh’s car seat for ballast. Mommy went coo-coo crazy on those days.
The wash machine was always going. He couldn’t recall a time it wasn’t rocking the utility room floor. Cassie believed in getting the stale Goodwill smell out of the clothes she purchased. Most of the time she used the master bedroom as a place to take pictures of things she planned to sell and yelled at her boys if they interfered or walked across her makeshift staging area.
Once, at Goodwill she turned to Caleb and asked, “don’t you like these shoes?”
He looked up from reading the comic book he’d found. Mindlessly he was fiddling with the corner of his shirt, rubbing the material in between his thumb and forefinger. His parents had forbidden to suck his thumb. He’d found this was the second best thing when he was younger and it was a habit he still preserved.
“What are they?”
Cassie shook the brilliantly pink and silver stiletto heels and then lifted them to her face and held them up like a bunch of grapes. “They call them ‘man killers,’” she told him with a laugh. “They’ll get me a pretty price for sure.”
Caleb shook his head. “Well I’m a boy and I don’t like them.” He went back to reading the comic book.
“Ha ha, funny,” she muttered then went on, elbowing her way among the throng of shoppers. Caleb had already learned how to find a quiet place in these stores, taking Josh with him so they’d stay out of the way. He wished daddy would stay home and them on days like this.
4
An Admission
As promised Cassie devised a whole new handle so she could sell Annie’s goods as “The Daze.” Annie had given her an inventory of fifteen things she thought would sell. All purchasers would also receive the free alligator key chain. Cassie put up her new listings later in the evening after the kids were in bed.
Her sister called and excitedly reported that Annie was feeling much better. She’d queried Annie that evening when she saw her in her driveway.
“It’s so sweet of you to help her,” she complimented Cassie. “Listen, sis, I have an idea.”
Cassie kept her eyes trained on her screen as she kept typing. “What?”
“Mom offered a spa day for us girls.”
“Catherine, you’re the last person who needs a makeover. You’re already perfect.”
“Quiet. Here’s what we can do. You bring Josh over here and I’ll get my nanny to watch him too, then we can go over to the Cabana. I’ll book my colorist to work on your hair.”
“My hair?”
“Yes. Mom thinks you need some highlights. Look, if you don’t like it, let it grow out. We can get a mani pedi and massage. It’d be fun. You’d enjoy it.”
Cassie paused. “When will we do all this?”
“How about Friday?”
“I’ll be back in time for Caleb getting home from school?”
“Yes.”
“Okay,�
�� Cassie said. “Why not? It’ll surprise Ralph, that’s for sure.”
“How do you think I keep my husband still interested in me?” Catherine asked.
They both laughed and said good night.
It was after ten.
Cassie texted her husband. “How‘s it going?”
He responded fifteen minutes later.
“Good. Two parishes away. Going to be a while before I get home.”
She left his food in the oven and went to bed.
The next morning, he left before she woke, leaving her an unusually long note explaining he had to meet with a contractor before work. That was the way their marriage seemed to go these days, they hardly saw each other. Preoccupied with her sales and the kids, Cassie didn‘t notice it at first but his note bothered her. Even his angular penmanship with its tall letters irked her this time. Why? It was almost formal, she thought, and for him rather wordy.
Meeting her sister and mother at the spa a few days later, Cassie decided relaxing was her best option. It tickled her youngest son to be with some of his cousins. The nail techs and aestheticians were pleasant. Catherine and Cassie lay on massage tables next to each other while Hayworth got a mud bath in another room.
“How’s it going, sis?” Catherine said, with her face turned towards Cassie.
“Fine.”
“Just fine? I mean, how’s it really going?” Catherine pressed.
Cassie sighed. “Your friend, Annie?”
“Yes?”
“She told me how her shop is losing money.”
Catherine groaned lightly. “I know.”
“It made me realize something about my situation.”
“Go on.”
“I had a bad year myself,” Cassie admitted.
“With Ralph?”
“No, my business. I bought too much stuff. It’s locked up in that shed out back.”
“I thought you were doing good,” Catherine said. Small delicate wrinkles formed between her brows.
“I fell behind and put a lot on plastic.”
“Yikes. Can’t you just say ‘no’?” Catherine asked her.
“I thought I needed fresh stuff, so I bought out a couple of retailers’ lines but they aren’t selling at all. Nobody likes their style of leggings or workout gear anymore.” Cassie sighed. “The public is so fickle.”
“How much behind?”
Cassie looked about. The two masseuses had retreated to get more warm oil from the other side of the room. She whispered, “Thirty.”
“Thirty…?” Catherine gulped. “Oh no. Thousand?”
Cassie nodded.
“That’s a lot.”
“I know. I’m trying as hard as I can to make up for it.”
Catherine pushed back her bangs. “Does Ralph know?”
“Not yet. I’m hoping to get it on an even keel in the next six months.”
“How?”
“I would aim at more fringe buyers—XXXL and things like that. People who live in more rural areas that can’t get out to shop,” Cassie informed her.
“Maybe that will work,” Catherine said. “If I think of anything that can help, I’ll let you know.”
“I’d appreciate it.”
5
Out in the Field
Ralph Owens’ vet clinic supported clients across five-parishes. He’d built a solid reputation among many livestock owners. The hours he worked were longer than he would have liked but so far he hadn’t felt he could take on a partner. The horse race track in Opelousas was a frequent stop for him. It’d helped that some folks had become boutique farmers dabbling in goat cheese or grass fed beef. The state had over a half a million cattle. He ensured the health of swine especially since there were massive herds of feral hogs that constantly tried to co-mingle with domestic hogs. Work in the field always brimmed with surprises.He considered his time at his actual office as peaceful although to most it probably appeared chaotic. He might have an emergency surgery—fixing a dog’s broken leg—then helping a mother cat through a difficult delivery or administering routine shots. His office visits seemed tame and rather routine as compared to the farm visits. The terrain, the owners, the condition of the facilities and even the sheer size of the animals he dealt with on his farm calls could be daunting. The massive volume of flesh on the hoof or claw, hectares of skin, mega pounds of tissue, miles of blood vessels… all were under his eye.
Lately his new assistant, Susan, had proven an asset. She applied for the job after working at a Lafayette small animal rescue. Now she rode along with him and got bitten and kicked just as much as he did. It amazed him she didn’t seem to mind. Some of his clients raised their eyebrows when they first met her. She had punkish purple hair and several tattoos. His office manager, Verna, didn’t like it when Susan rolled up her sleeves, exposing some younger woman’s tattoos but Verna kept quiet about it. Good help was hard to find.
The first six months Susan worked with him she hadn’t once complained and seemed to have the same attitude he did towards his work. They rode out in his truck, often returning covered in spit, blood and mucous yet she kept her equanimity.
“Get ‘er done,” she‘d say. Then she’d grow quiet, turn that pert nose of hers towards the passenger window and stare out. Ralph wanted to ask what was on her mind. She seemed mysterious.
He finally allowed her to choose the radio station in his truck. She usually chose country, which he found interesting because he thought she’d like more radical music.
“What can I say? I’m just a simple girl.” She say with a slightly lopsided grin.
She liked hamburgers and was easy to talk to. She originally wanted to go to vet school but found this line of work the second-best-thing. Vet school was one of the most difficult things he’d ever tackled. His dad, Charles, up in Wyoming insisted he go through with it. Ralph was more interested in art and film but his dad refused to hear of such talk. Once Ralph’s mom had died, his dream of going to L.A. for film school died. The closest he got to all that was the few times he’d seen Cassie’s mom, Hayworth, perform in plays at the Grand Opera House in Crowley or at local repertory productions in Lafayette. At first he made extensive videos of his young sons. He even started a video blog about them—just to keep his hand in—but all that fell by the wayside as he got busier with his medical work.
Ralph still dreamed that once he remodeled his clinic and took on a partner, he could take off so he could go back to making small films. It was his passion.
Two weeks earlier Susan had called into work explaining that she had a flat. Ralph needed to get on the road so he figured he could pick her up. He was vaguely familiar with the Saint Streets area, near the university, where she rented an apartment. As he drove his dually into her complex’s lot, he saw her disabled car.
He knocked on her door. She answered, already dressed in her scrubs.
“Let me get a mobile mechanic over here to fix that for you,” he offered. “They can do it while you’re at work.” He looked over her head. His eyes widened. The entire apartment white—the furniture, all the fixtures, even the wall hanging frames from what he could see from the doorway. A white Persian cat scraped against her jeans.
“Hello, kitty. What’s her name?” Ralph asked, kneeling down.
“It’s a boy. Pretty Boy,” she answered.
Ralph pet the cat, looked up and caught sight of a life-sized camera portrait of Susan done in black and white hanging over the mantle. “Wow,” he said inadvertently.
She stepped back so he could see it better. “From my old days,” she said resignedly.
“Heck, you’re not that old. May I see it?”
“Sure.” She held the door open further and allowed him to step inside. He turned his head, back and forth, taking in the apartment‘s monochrome theme. There were two sofas, white, with large over-sized fluffy matching pillows. An expensive-looking silver-framed coffee table had a thick glass top.
Ralph couldn’t help it—he kept walking
towards the gigantic portrait as if magnitized. Fully nude, she reclined on a white and black zebra rug. She leaned back on her elbows. Her head was tossed back, and she was laughing. From off camera a poured stream of fluid caught in mid-action arched towards her her lower belly. Her hair was long and blond, flowing in movement as she raised her chin yet her eyes held fast to the camera’s lens—almost daring the viewer to keep looking. Two tall-stemmed glasses rested on the floor near her shoulder. She wore nothing except a bracelet encrusted with diamonds and a matching choker. At the time she only had one tattoo—an elongated thin snake that stretched along the side of her ribcage, ending at the top of her leg with its head poised towards her pubic region.
Susan stood off to one side, watching her boss as his eyes traveled around the entire frame. “That was champagne,” she told him. “And no, I’m not a hooker. Those aren’t real stones and my former boyfriend was a photographer.” She said all these things quickly and by rote as if she had to answer such questions all the time.
“That’s quite a shot.” Ralph gulped slightly and instantly wished he hadn’t. He pivoted and took in the rest of the room. An expansive wine collection lay parked in a massive rack flanking the fireplace. Large oil paintings also hung in the room depicting desert scenes done in ochres and pale yellows. She had a large screened TV that tuned onto one of the early morning news shows. Pretty Boy pounced onto the coffee table. Susan waved him off.
