Olney Springs

by Claudia Hall Christian

  Sam Lipson strode through the kitchen to where they were standing. Valerie hugged him. Knowing it was what Aden needed, Sam gave him a report.

  “We will be with Jake for the duration,” Sam said. “Some genetic line something or another. The shamans will fast, taking clean water only. They gave Jill and Heather instructions for that. Val, me, Blane — we are to keep up our strength, especially since Blane is just out of the hospital. We need cushions to sit and sleep on. We need . . .”

  Sam looked up as Bambi walked in the door. He nodded to her.

  “Looks like we’ll be just fine.” Sam put his hand on Aden’s arm. “You’ve got this, son. You’re the only one who can lead now, and I thank you for it.”

  Aden allowed Sam to see the fear and insecurity in his eyes.

  “A great leader draws good people to him,” Sam repeated what he’d said to Aden many times.

  “Trust them,” Aden and Sam said together.

  Sam nodded.

  “Now, where is Delphie?” Sam asked. “I’d like to speak with her before we start.”

  “Upstairs,” Valerie said. “She’s . . .”

  “Aren’t we all?” Sam asked.

  With one last nod, he turned in place and went up the stairs. Aden put his hands on his hips and looked down at the floor.

  “What’s next, Boss?” Honey asked.

  Grinning, Aden nodded.

  “We need a place to work,” Aden said. “Can we get someone to . . .”

  He let out a breath and got to work.

  ~~~~~~~~

  Thursday evening — 8:17 p.m.

  “Have you seen Sarah?” Noelle asked Jill as they passed on the stairway to the Chapel.

  “Sarah?” Jill asked as she trotted down the stairs. Jill stopped short.

  “Tink and me . . .”

  “Tink and I,” Jill corrected.

  “Ivy, too,” Noelle said, without missing a beat. “We’re on dog and cat detail. We can’t find Sarah.”

  “Jake’s Labrador?” Jill asked. Her hand went to her chest. “Is she with Katy?”

  Noelle shook her head. There was a sound upstairs and Jill looked. Jill’s face pinched with panic.

  “Don’t worry,” Noelle said, to soothe Jill’s anxiety. “I’ll find her.”

  Jill nodded to Noelle and continued down the stairs.

  “Has she seen her?” Ivy asked Noelle from the top of the stairs.

  Noelle shook her head. They walked to the main living room where Tink was holding Buster, the ugly dog, on a leash.

  “Let’s take Buster for a walk,” Tink said. “When we get back, we’ll look for Sarah again.”

  “But . . .” Noelle’s eyes welled with tears. “What if something happened to her?”

  “Ivy?” Tink looked at the little girl. “Tell her what you told me.”

  “You know I’ve been working on my . . . you know, and stuff,” Ivy said.

  Noelle gave her a confused look and shook her head.

  “Yeah, that’s even a sentence,” Tink said with a snort and a roll of her eyes. “Ivy’s been taking classes with Delphie and Edie.”

  “With Katy,” Noelle said with a nod. “I’ve been to a few.”

  “Ivy’s Delphie’s niece?” Tink asked in a tone that meant that Noelle should know something.

  Noelle didn’t know what she meant.

  “She’s saying I might be kinda psychic, maybe,” Ivy said. “Family tradition and all.”

  “Are you?” Noelle asked with her characteristic directness.

  “No,” Ivy said at the same time Tink said, “Yes.”

  The girls looked at each other. Tink broke eye contact first.

  “She always was,” Tink said. “She’d know where to find coupons for food or who’d give us money. Jeffy always said she was, too.”

  “Jeffy said that?” Ivy blushed at the mention of her dead friend’s name.

  Tink nodded fiercely.

  “Well, if Jeffy said it, it must be true,” Noelle said, having no idea who “Jeffy” was or why they were talking about him.

  The girls looked at her for a minute. They laughed.

  “Tell her what you told me,” Tink said. “About Sarah.”

  Noelle and Tink looked at Ivy. Mortified, Ivy looked down.

  “Go ahead,” Tink said. She knocked Ivy with her shoulder.

  “Jake’s like a really powerful . . . uh . . . being, right?” Ivy asked. “I mean he can move objects with his mind — that’s a really, really, really rare gift — and he knows the future, and he . . .”

  Noelle and Tink nodded in agreement.

  “People like that draw strong helpers to them,” Ivy said. “It says that in a bunch of books.”

  Ivy stopped talking. Noelle and Tink looked at her expectantly.

  “And?” Noelle asked.

  “Delphie told me that he had Sarah before Jill and Katy and the boys and everything,” Ivy said. “I just went and asked her to make sure.”

  “You think Sarah’s with Jake?” Noelle asked.

  Terrified, Ivy gulped. Noelle and Tink looked off into the distance for a moment.

  “Sounds about right to me,” Tink said.

  “Me, too,” Noelle said. “But we need to keep an eye out, just in case.”

  “Why?” Ivy asked.

  “Because we’re on dog-and-cat duty,” Noelle said. The full weight of this important responsibility reflected in her voice. “Sarah might need help or food or pets or something so she can help Jake.”

  Tink and Ivy nodded.

  “Come on,” Tink said. “Let’s take Buster for a walk. Sandy said he needs a few miles of walking. I thought we could walk up to the park and see if they’ve turned the fountains on yet.”

  “I love the Thatcher Fountain,” Noelle said.

  “I know you do,” Tink said, nodding.

  “Then we take care of the cats,” Ivy said.

  “Cats?” Noelle asked. “I thought there was just Cleo, my mom’s cat.”

  “Doesn’t Aunt Delphie seem like a crazy cat lady?” Ivy asked in a quiet voice.

  Tink and Noelle giggled and nodded.

  “There’s got to be other cats here,” Ivy said. “Somewhere. Maybe a whole wing of cats. You never know.”

  Laughing, Tink picked up Buster’s leash, and they headed out for a walk.

  Chapter Four Hundred and Five

  Flushed

  Thursday night — 9:12 p.m.

  Erik Le Monde looked in the direction of Wanda’s laugh. She and her friends were playing with the ugliest dog he’d ever seen. The dog seemed to be in absolute heaven as the girls threw him a ball and then chased after the ball while the dog danced around them.

  “That’s what dogs are for,” Erik said, under his breath, “making girls happy.”

  He wondered for a moment if Wanda needed her own dog.

  “What do you think?” Bambi asked, breaking his thoughts.

  He looked up at her as she walked toward him. A tall, powerful woman, she walked with an air he could describe only as “shit kicking.” He smiled and she grinned at him. They were friends. He’d spent more than a couple nights on her basement couch when his wife had kicked him out for being an ass.

  “We can add at least two toilets here, maybe three,” Erik pointed to the edge of the carriage house. “Maybe. I don’t think we dare go more than four.”

  “You think male and female are okay?” Bambi asked.

  “I do,” Erik said. “We’ll put stalls around them.”

  “It’s just that . . .” Bambi shrugged.

  “Anyone ever had a complaint when we’ve done it on a job site?” Erik asked.

  “No, but they can’t, really,” Bambi said.

  “They can’t here, either,” Erik said.

  “Did you check inside?” Bambi asked.

  Erik nodded and looked across the garden, before looking at Bambi.

  “And?” Bambi asked.

  “They’ve got two big ones in that
medical office,” Erik said. “But they are medical toilets. They have the space to add to them, but it’s probably a bad idea.”

  “Is there a space for you to add some up there?” Bambi asked.

  “Mike showed me a big storage closet,” Erik said. “We could fit a couple of stalls and some urinals, two maybe. Sinks.”

  Erik looked down at the grass for a minute before looking up and shaking his head.

  “To tell the truth, I don’t think we have enough of a sewer to add much more,” Erik said.

  Bambi nodded to him. She turned and yelled, “Aden!”

  Aden looked up from where he was getting a report from one of the men running the barbecues.

  “Sewer?” Bambi asked.

  Aden nodded, trotted down the deck steps and jogged over to them.

  “Jake and Sam replaced it,” Aden said. “It’s one of the first things they did. They tapped in twice. There’s one beside the garage here and one off the second-0floor apartments. All spec’d for maximum capacity if they made condos or apartments out the entire building.”

  “To code?” Erik asked.

  “What do you think?” Aden asked.

  “Then we’re fine,” Erik said to Bambi.

  “That it?” Aden asked.

  “Gotcha, Boss,” Erik said with a grin.

  “Oh, God — not you too,” Aden said.

  He imitated Noelle’s exaggerated eye roll. Erik laughed. Aden jogged back to the house.

  “How many do you want?” Erik asked.

  “As many as you can give me,” Bambi said. She jogged away from him. Turning around to run backward, she said, “Sinks, too.”

  “Sinks, too?” Erik joked. “She asks for the world.”

  Bambi laughed.

  “Thanks, Erik. You’re really saving our butts,” Bambi said. “Literally.”

  Erik gave her an overhead wave and turned away from her to talk to his team. Most people would have rented portable toilets or told people to go inside. Bambi and Aden wanted new bathrooms put together in the next hour to accommodate their guests.

  Erik squinted to look up to the balcony outside the medical offices. Wanda told him that Jacob was sick and that they were doing some kind of Native American thing. Erik bit his lip. He couldn’t imagine his life without Jacob Marlowe. It’s not like he was romantically interested in Jacob. It was just that Jacob was a rock in the middle of Erik’s otherwise weird, and slightly chaotic, life. Jacob was the one he’d first told about his son’s “problem.” Jacob’s easy shrug and “Who cares? At least she’s healthy,” attitude affected Erik more than he’d ever admit. It was a year before Erik himself could take on that attitude, but it started with Jacob. When the time came, Jacob told Erik that he was a fool not to move back in with his wife. Erik felt his throat constrict. Where would he be without Jacob Marlowe?

  He shook his head to clear it, and then he went to update his team of plumbers. Erik’s guys didn’t hesitate to pick up a shovel and start to dig. Aden’s son Nash and his friend Teddy joined in the dig. By the time Erik had finished confirming that they had all the parts in the Lipson Construction supply, the men had hand-dug the trench to put the sewer for the new toilets. Erik panicked because their best sewer tapper hadn’t arrived. Just as he was pulling his phone from his pocket, the woman jogged down the driveway.

  “Sorry, I got stuck at a pre-school award show,” she said.

  “We’re ready for you,” Erik said.

  She grinned at him and jumped into the trench. A team of carpenters from Jacob’s rehabilitation project started framing the bathrooms beside the carriage house.

  “Hey, man, you gonna leave this floor like that?” one man asked, pointing to the plywood floor.

  “Hadn’t thought about it,” Erik said.

  “You could drop laminate tiles here,” another man offered. “Easy, fast, and usable right away.”

  “I’ll tell you what — I’ll call my cousin,” one of the men said. “He has a team of tilers. They are smokin’ fast. Compete against other teams and win. They could do this. No problem. I just talked to him, too. He’s home and sober, and he owes me big time.”

  “You’d use that here?” Erik asked.

  “I’d kill my mother, too, if Jake asked me,” the man said. “You know where I’d be without him? Nowhere.”

  The men and women within earshot nodded in agreement.

  “His cousin is good,” the first man said with a nod. “Did our house.”

  “Sounds perfect,” Erik said with a grin.

  The night continued like that. Every time Erik panicked, someone or something came through. The supplies were delivered at the exact moment they needed them. One of the other plumbing teams were out celebrating a completed job when they saw that something was going on at the Castle. They arrived at the exact moment that Erik needed more hands. The men and women worked together shoulder to shoulder. The carpenters slung hammers. The plumbers sweat copper and laid pipe. No one complained. No one argued. Everyone simply did his or her job.

  Erik had never had a project come together like this. The bathrooms came together as if by magic. In his heart, Erik believed that the Universe simply could not live without Jacob. The bathrooms were for him.

  The moment of truth was when he turned on the water. A hush came over them.

  “Should I get Aden?” Erik asked. He shuffled insecurely.

  “Go for it,” the man next to him said while the other said, “Nah, let’s do it ourselves!”

  Erik nodded. He held his breath and turned on the water.

  Nothing — not a single leak.

  “Wanda?” Erik yelled into the bathroom.

  She, Tink, Ivy, and Noelle flushed the toilets.

  Nothing happened.

  The men and women on the team cheered. Erik grinned. The team of tilers set to work laying laminate tile. Aden ran over from the house to thank them.

  “What’s next, Boss?” One of the plumbers asked.

  “Well, since you asked,” Erik said. “We need to convert a closet to a bathroom.”

  Without saying a word about the time or their exhaustion, the teams followed him inside.

  ~~~~~~~~

  Thursday night — 9:20 p.m.

  They had been instructed to sit together behind the shamans while they worked. Someone, probably Jill or Sandy, had set comfortable cushions and low chairs. There were plenty of blankets, some of which Valerie recognized, a few smelled like they were from the camping gear. Even though Valerie hadn’t been camping in more than 10 years, she knew the smell of old smoke and bacon. Wherever they came from, she was very glad these blankets were here.

  Valerie was freezing cold. She would have been colder, but she found chemical hand warmers tucked into the cushions. She’d helped her father put the hand warmers in his boots and his pockets. She’d checked on Blane, who had put them in his boots and pockets while she was helping Sam.

  Valerie shivered under layers of thick cotton blankets. Sam moved a little closer to her and put his arm around her. She held Blane’s hand tight in her lap. They sat on the cushions on the deck in the cold of night while the play of ancient ritual happened in front of them.

  The grandmother came to them. She smiled.

  “This is for you,” the grandmother said.

  “What is it?” Sam asked defensively.

  “It will bring to you what you need to have healed,” she said. “What lives between you and your son.”

  “Nothing lives between me and my son!” Sam said.

  The woman gave him a soft smile and said, “Nothing?”

  She touched her heart and Sam flushed with emotion.

  “Do not worry,” the grandmother said. “There is no peyote, no crazy drug. It is tea that will help you, soothe your worry. It may also bring up what needs to be healed.”

  She lifted a shoulder in a shrug.

  “If something comes, I will be here. I will take care of you, guide you, help you,” she said. “It’s wha
t my family has done for people since the First Woman was formed from the yellow and blue clouds. It is what I have done all of my life.”

  Sam gave her a suspicious look. Valerie let go of his and Blane’s hand to reach for the tea. The cup was more like a bowl than a cup. It was painted as well as carved with some Native American-looking symbols on the side. In Valerie’s hands, it felt very, very old. She looked up at the elderly woman.

  “You must finish the entire cup,” the grandmother said.

  The cup suddenly seemed enormous. Valerie smelled the tea. It smelled of herbs and something else. Certainly, it was not nearly as nasty as some of the concoctions Blane had made her drink. She gave him a sideways glance. As if he could hear her thoughts, he smiled. Desperate for warmth, she drank the entire bowl of tea. The grandmother looked at her face for a full minute.

  “Feel better?” the grandmother asked.

  “I… um…”

  Unable to think of the right words, Valerie nodded. The woman touched her head.

  “You are now a member of my family,” the grandmother said.

  The elderly woman disappeared for a moment. She returned with another full cup of tea. Without saying a word, Blane drank down the tea and thanked the woman for it. He shot Valerie a smirk, and she smiled. The grandmother watched him for a minute before saying, “Good; you are now a member of my family.” She disappeared again only to return with a cup for Sam. He opened his mouth to say something, but the grandmother beat him to it.

  “This is one of those moments where you must do something you do not want to do — but will do for your child,” the grandmother said. “Will you join my family to save your son, Samuel Lipson?”

  Sam took the cup and drank it down.

  “That’s not half bad,” Sam said with a smile.

  The woman watched him for a minute and then scowled.

  “You are very practical, very honest?” the grandmother asked. “No fooling around kind of guy? Like a tree — steadfast, solid.”

  “He is,” Valerie said.

  “What is it?” Sam said.

  “You need another cup,” she said.

  Sam nodded. When she returned, he drank the tea. The woman watched him for a minute again before nodding.