“That sounds ominous... .”
“Not at all, dear. We're just going off toâ”
“See the wizard?” Brandy raised a palm like a traffic cop. “Please. I don't want to hear your plans for meânot on an empty stomach.”
“Perhaps that's wise.”
She took a big bite of scrambled eggs, chewed, then muttered, “
These
sure weren't cooked for forty-five minutes.”
The child was clearly testing my patience.
And I was just about to launch into a lecture about feeling sorry for oneselfâusing the story about the man with no shoes who met a man with no feet (or was it a man with no gloves who met a man with no fingers?)âwhen I noticed (despite the smeary lipstick) Brandy's tiny upturned smile.
This signaled the end of her funk.
Brandy stabbed a hunk of coffee cake with her fork. “OkayâI'm ready for action. What's our mission? Where do we attack?”
“An auction, dear, at a storage facility. We'll be bidding for the contents of units in arrears of rental payment.”
Brandy put down her fork and gave me a long unblinking stare, waiting for me to explain myself further.
So I said nothing. I know well, from my years of the theater, of the power of silence. That less is more. That running things into the ground gets you nowhere. At all.
Finally, Brandy said, “I don't want to go.”
“Why ever not, dear?”
“Because that's
despicable
âtaking advantage of people who couldn't pay their rent! The last thing people like us should be doing, with the kind of financial hassles
we've
hadâthat Peggy Sue has right
now
âis going out preying upon ...”
But she ran out of steam. Or maybe gas.
So I said, “
I
don't think it's at
all
despicable, dear. Why, we'll be giving someone's possessions a new lease on life! Possessions that would otherwise languish forgotten, left to rot and mold and face the fate of an evitable landfill. Think of Planet Earth! Besides, who's to say these folks couldn't pay the rent? Maybe they
wished
to abandon the contents.”
“Why would they?”
I shrugged. “Some people simply don't want the items anymore, or they can't bring themselves to throw them away. Or perhaps moving to another locale, the expense of a rental truck or trailer is beyond their means. In any case, we are doing them a favor.”
“A favor? I don't think so. This doesn't feel ... right.”
Wherever did the child suddenly get such a conscience? Not from me. And certainly not the Vikings.
“My darling girl,” I said, “most of the contents of these units are junk.”
“Thenâwhy bid on one?”
“
Because,
” I said patiently, as if talking to a small child, “sometimes in all that trash? There's treasure to be found!”
A pause, and then a clap of thunder punctuated my point. If I'd known that thunderclap was coming, I might have added a nice Long John Silver “
Matey!
”
Brandy, looking at the rain beating against the window panes, whined, “But it's
lousy
outside.”
“All the better! You know what they sayâinclement weather today keeps bidders away!”
“Yeah, the smart ones.”
Tiring of the child's negative attitude, I pushed back from the table. “You know, you need to consider, as you grow older, that those frown lines will become permanent.”
She grinned broadly with her clowny lipstick emphasizing her sarcasm. “Better?”
“Ugggh! You look like Cesar Romero playing the Joker.”
“I was going for Heath Ledger,” Brandy sighed, then used her napkin to wipe the crimson color off her lips. “Okay. You win ... like
that's
a surprise. Let's go hunt for treasure in the trash.”
Thunder cracked again.
Matey.
“Now there's a good girl!” I enthused, standing, pushing farther away from the table. I ticked off on my fingers: “We'll need raincoats, umbrellas, and Wellies.”
“And a rowboat.”
But she was smiling. Looking not at all like Cesar Romero.
Â
Okay, Brandy taking over.
In previous books I usually have allowed Mother to write only one chapter, appearing around halfway through, when it's a little late for readers to bail. So I apologize for subjecting you to her so early. On the other hand, some people get a kick out of her. Trust meâit's more fun to read about than to live through.
Also, I do apologize for confusing Andy Griffin and Merv Griffith. Mother is right to give me a hard time on that account. But she was herself incorrect about Estée Lauderâthe woman built her empire on
face cream,
before expanding into cosmetics.
So there.
Anyway, I still wasn't convinced that what we were about to doâbid on past-due storage unitsâwas morally right, or at least that we weren't at real risk of earning some seriously bad karma.
Don't get me wrong, I'm no Miss Goody Two-ShoesâI was, after all, responsible for the bust-up of my marriage, losing custody of my twelve-year-old son, Jake, to my ex, Roger. Readers looking for perfection in their protagonists may have noticed, in Mother's preceding section, that they are in the wrong place.
But confiscating other people's possessionsâlegal or notâgave me a skin-crawly feeling. I wouldn't want a stranger pawing through my stuff, would you? (That is,
you
wouldn't want a stranger pawing through
your
stuff.)
And I couldn't very well ask Mother to go alone, because she can't drive. I don't mean she doesn't know
how
to drive, rather that she lost her licenseâand I don't mean misplaced it. Due to various vehicular infractionsâlittle things, like carving through a cornfield and hitting a cow, by way of inventing a shortcut to make community-theater curtain time (Mother, not the cow), or running over a mailbox and scattering letters like oversized snowflakes.
That Mother wouldn't be allowed behind the wheel for another three years was good news for Serenity. But it meant bad news for her chauffeur. Me.
After gathering our rain gear, Mother and I headed out to my gently dented burgundy Buick. For once Sushi hadn't begged to go with us, having headed upstairs to get back under the covers to sleep off breakfast. Smart doggie.
“Where to?” I asked, raising my voice above the rat-a-tat-tat of the rain on the car roof.
“Take the River Road north about three miles. To Lucky Four Leaf Clover Storage.”
I grunted. Not so lucky for certain renters today.
Traffic was light along the twisting, hilly two-lane highway, which really was lucky, because visibility was poor thanks to pounding rain (and worn-out windshield wipers). With the mighty Mississippi to our right, and limestone bluffs to our left, I had to concentrate on keeping the hydroplaning car on the road.
Mother, for a change, kept her chatter to a minimum, talking only now and then about the storage facility owner, one Big Jim Bob, whoâaccording to the all-knowing, all-seeing Motherâwas raised in Serenity, moved away some years later, then came back to take up the storage unit business.
Amid the intermittent chatter, Mother was saying, “Big Jim Bob gave me a tip on one of the units up for auction.”
“Why would he do that?”
And anyway, why would I believe a tip from anyone named Big Jim Bob? (Maybe Jim Bob, or Big Jim or even Big Bob ... but
not
Big Jim Bob. That was one good-ole-boy name too many.)
“We're
old
friends,” Mother said.
I had come to know that when Mother emphasized the word
old
in this fashion, it meant she and the man in question had once enjoyed an amorous relationship. Jonathan Borne had passed away nearly thirty years ago, shortly after I came along. And Mother, being a statuesque, attractive woman, was not content to become a wallflower. But she
was
content to remain a widow, and keep her independence.
Navigating a sharp curve, I asked, “So what's the tip?”
As if intoning the location of a pirate's map, she said, “I am informed that I should try to win the bid on unit number seven.”
“So, thenâyour old friend's been inside and knows what's in it. That
can't
be legal.”
“No, dear. Only the renter has a key to the padlock. But Big Jim Bob has reason to believe the unit may contain some nice antiques.”
“Why?”
“Because Big Jim Bob talked to the woman when she took out the unit, and she mentioned her collecting had gotten to the point of overflow. She even asked if the unit was climate controlled.”
“Well, that says antiques, all rightâ”
“Oh, I do hope we get it!”
Throwing a little water on Mother's fire, I asked, “What's to prevent Big Jim Bob from breaking the lock on the unit, helping himself to the good stuff, then putting on a
new
lock?”
Out of the corner of my eye I could see Mother frown. “Only the ruination of his reputation, and a charge of theft if caught,” she responded, adding quickly, “but I
know
Big Jim Bob, and I assure you he's a gentleman.”
Know
was further code for ... you know.
More water needed.
I risked a glance. “You mean, he
was
a gentleman, back when you âknew' him. But where has he been since? And why did he come back?”
Mother gazed at me, eyes narrowed to near normal size behind her large buggy lenses. “You seem awfully suspicious today, dear ...”
“Well, Iâ”
Then, to my surprise she chirped, “And I most
heartily
approve!”
A word about Mother and me, on the subject of renting a storage unit of our own. Four words, actually:
over my dead body!
Currently, our (mostly Mother's) overflow flea-market / yard-sale finds were stored in a stand-alone garage next to our three-story, 1920s-style house. And I have made it clear to Mother that, should the overflow keep flowing over, under no circumstances would I
ever
consider renting a storage unit. Because I knew what the inevitable would be: she'd die peacefully in her sleep, smiling like an angel, and leave
me
with all that garbage!
Okay, so maybe Mother was right on one point: some folks
do
abandon their units because they don't want the stuff. Or, anyway, want to deal with it.
“Pull in here, dear,” Mother said, pointing to a sign shaped like a shamrock, the words LUCKY FOUR LEAF CLOVER spaced cutely out on the four leafs. But what exactly was “lucky” or “cute” about having your possessions overwhelm you so much that you had to rent a sort of garage away from home to house the junk?
I drove into a gravel lot, dodging water-filled potholes, then pulled up to the white, boxy low-slung facility, home to several dozen units, each garage door shut and padlocked.
We exited the carâMother holding a red umbrella with enormous wingspan, and me sporting a 1970s vintage clear plastic number shaped like a bell, that covered me down to my waistâand joined the handful of bidders that had braved the weather, huddling under their umbrellas.
I couldn't see too clearly through my plastic bell (maybe that's why this type of umbrella went out of style), but I did recognize a lanky guy as a fellow dealer at the antiques mall, although I couldn't recall his name.
Next to him were a man and woman, sharing an orange umbrella, both middle-aged and maybe a little too fond of food. He had eyebrows in need of a trim, and she wore an ill-fitting short brown wig.
The other bidder was a muscular young man in a black Harley T-shirt, his arms exposed possibly to show off his biceps and formidable forearms. Too manly to carry an umbrella, he just stood there letting his dark hair get matted by the rain.
Mother's mouth was moving, and when I didn't respond due to my Maxwell Smart “cone of silence,” she kicked me. Kicked me!
“O www w!” I said, rubbing my shin with my other, uninjured leg. “Whatcha do
that
for?”
She ducked down, stuck her head under the umbrella, and her eyes gleamed up at me, like those of a coyote who smelled blood.
“Get rid of that thing,” she snarled. “I need you
sharp
âfront and center!”
She did her Sgt. Bilko troop-summoning
hey-harr-uppp
.