Just Past Oysterville: Shoalwater Book One

PERRYPERKINSBOOKS

Wilsonville, Oregon

PerryPerkinsBooks

PO Box 21

Wilsonville, Oregon 97070

JUST PAST OYSTERVILLE

Shoalwater Book One

3
^rd
Edition

Copyright © 2009 by Perry P. Perkins

All Rights Reserved

ISBN:
1449965717

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“
Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart:
so doth the sweetness of a man's friend by hearty
counsel.”
~Proverbs
27:9~

Far too many family and friends helped,
encouraged, and challenged, than I could ever thank in a single
page.

Here’s the top of the list:

Diane Anderson, Elizabeth Kirkham, Heather
Friesen, Jeni Bullis, & Melanie Zallee…my extra eyes

Pastor Doug Fairrington - my friend &
compass.

&

“
The Real Cassie” Hobbs,
even if

she won’t eat oysters…

Also by Perry P. Perkins

Shoalwater Voices: Shoalwater Book Two

Elk Hunters Don’t Cry

More of Perry’s work can be found at

www.perryperkinsbooks.com

and

www.pdxdads.com

Prologue

In the darkness, he feels the chill water
seeping through his boots with the rising tide. Frigid rain,
peppered with sleet, stings his face, numbing his fingers until he
can no longer feel the bottle as it slips from his grasp, draining
its last inch of bourbon into the sand. He stares, unseeing, into
the blackness, weeping in the bitter, salty air.

Thunder crashes, mingling with the distant
roar of the surf. The revolver comes from his pocket warm and heavy
in his hand, like a living thing. The man sways drunkenly in the
wind, caressing his cheek with the revolver. He curses, sobbing her
name into the wind as the barrel comes to rest against his
temple.

Then, with a sigh, he squeezes the trigger,
the shot echoing with the thunder as the hammer falls.

"I am an orphan," she whispered.

Cassie Belanger watched as her mother’s
casket was lowered into the sandy desert soil. The sky was blue,
bright and sharp at noon; already it was nearly seventy degrees and
still February in Bowie, Arizona. By June, Cassie knew, the heat at
midday would be unbearable.

A dry north wind whispered sand over the
toes of her shoes, carrying the faintest scents of juniper and
sage. It seemed very quiet, standing there on the wide
marble-pocked lawn listening to the squeak of the pulleys as they
brought the body of forty-two year old Kathy Belanger, clad in her
best purple only-for-church dress, to her final resting place.

A single blue carnation, from the high pile
of flowers heaped atop, slipped from the casket lid and fell softly
into the concrete lined grave below. Cassie watched as it tumbled
end over end into the darkness that waited to receive her mother’s
body. Her mind was still in free fall, her world had changed so
suddenly, so dramatically, and she couldn't, at least she hadn't
yet, been able to grasp the enormity of it.

The service had been brief. Pastor Williams
intoning the Lord’s blessing on Katherine Belanger, his voice
echoing flatly in the thin desert air. He spoke of her mother's
life, of her faith and her sudden tragic end.

A step from a dark curb; from the same
corner of the same street that she crossed five nights out of
seven, coming home in the early morning hours, her heavy wool
jacket hiding starched nurse’s whites. A mile-long walk from
Bowie’s Adventist Hospital to the Desert Rose trailer park where a
dozen and a half decaying trailers housed the most desperate rung
of Bowie's dwindling population.

“
A step from the curb and
into the arms of God” Guy Williams had said, as he stood at the
pulpit and addressed the handful of somber clad co-workers,
neighbors and friends.

Cassie had cringed at this; it wasn't the
arms of God that had awaited her mother as she stepped into the
street, not by a long shot. She heard again squealing tires and the
sickening crumple of metal on flesh, the sounds that haunted her
dreams.

She’d listened, dry-eyed. Her heart aching,
her eyes burning to weep, but it wouldn't happen.

*

Sheriff Pranger had knocked on the tin door
of the old singlewide that she and her mother shared. Cassie had
opened the door and there he’d stood, in the predawn darkness,
nervous hands turning his hat over and over, his eyes never meeting
her own as he mumbled an uncomfortable greeting.

“
Better go get your coat,
Honey,” he’d said, fighting the urge to look away, “and come with
us.”

Over his shoulder, Cassie had seen Guy and
Grace Williams in the shadows, clothing rumpled as though thrown on
in haste. Pastor Williams stood, tight-lipped and pale, as his wife
pressed her face into his shoulder and wept.

Cassie had known, as she turned to find a coat and shoes, that
her mother was dead. She had shed her tears, weeping silently into
her pillow, as she lay awake on the twin bed in the Williams’ spare
room. Then, this morning, she’d dashed from the arrangement office
of the mortuary and into the ladies room, overcome by a storm of
tears. She’d sat on the cushioned bench, her head lain against the
cool wall of the restroom, her small frame wracked with sobs, and
her face burning with tears until she felt as though she were
choking on them, drowning in her grief.

She was an orphan.

Could it have been only a week earlier that
she and her mother had been shopping together, chatting and
laughing as they searched for a new school outfit; the one that
Cassie would wear to her college orientation?

Portland, Oregon seemed a world away, a
cool, forested, rainy place far to the west. It was there that
Cassie had sent her transcripts, hoping to begin her dream of
writing at the University. Only a week before, she and her mother
had laughed and cried together at the thought of her leaving.

She had hoped to begin school with the
spring term, and orientation was just two weeks away, a frenzied
handful of days to pack and say goodbyes. Only a week before...

The days leading up to the service had been
a blur. Even in her grief, Cassie knew that if she stayed, if she
didn’t catch a bus, right now, and escape the confines of this
dusty little town, she might never escape at all. Her writing might
forever remain a dream.

So she had talked to their
Pastor, Guy, and to her mother’s best friend, his wife, Grace. Guy
had listened as Cassie poured out her hopes and dreams, her fears
and reasons, nodding silently throughout, and then assured her that
she
must
; in
fact, that she
would
be on that bus. Then
they’d packed up the Belanger’s few belongings, loading them into
the church van and hauling them to the Williams’ to be stored, as
Cassie filled a duffel bag with the few items she would need for
her trip.

*

The night before, after clearing the dishes
from the William's dining table, Grace had privately tried to talk
her out of going so soon. She’d begged her to wait until the
summer, or better, the fall, to give her grief some time to heal.
Cassie sat, listening to the length and breadth of Grace's
argument, but not for a moment considering it.

As she’d glanced around the warmth
of the Williams' home, her mind had flooded with the memories of
better times. How many nights had she and her mother eaten dinner
at that same table, or played board games, roaring with laughter at
Guy's flagrant attempts to cheat? How many movies had they watched,
piled onto the big, faded sectional in the living room, scattering
popcorn across the carpet?

How many times had the five of them
just sat and talked?

Talked about what was happening in
their little town, about Guy's latest sermon, who had listened and
who hadn't, or just about life, and what hand it was dealing each
of them.

Cassie had slept poorly that night, waiting
for her exhaustion to overwhelm her. The spare room had been
Kenneth's, Guy and Grace’s son, before he had joined the Air Force,
as evidenced by the posters of fighter jets and rock stars taped to
the walls. A battered stereo sat atop a child-sized roll top desk,
paperback novels and compact discs were scattered across the rest.
Grace had aired the room and it carried just the hint of Kenny’s
cologne. Cassie stared out the window at a great, yellow, harvest
moon and thought about the Williams family, who had been her
surrogate aunt, uncle, and cousin since before she could
remember.

Grace had offered her home and heart,
permanently, and as much as it had hurt Cassie to do so, she'd
turned her down. It wasn't just for fear of missing her
opportunity, though that was real enough. She knew she must leave
because of what she had found in the bottom drawer of her mother’s
dresser.

A faded manila envelope, buried beneath a
pile of faded sweaters, had contained an old, yellowing marriage
certificate.

The single page, heavily creased and water stained, had been
legible enough to decipher as being the record of her parent’s
marriage. It looked to be the original and included their places
and dates of birth, and occupations.

Cassie felt her eyes
stinging as she read her father’s name in print for the first
time.
William Alfred
Beckman
.

The second item nestled beneath her mother's
sweaters, shocked her even more. The handgun was a large caliber,
maybe a .38, or a .357; Cassie wasn't familiar enough with
revolvers to tell the difference.

The hole at the end of the short, blued
barrel seemed enormous, as she gingerly set the gun on the bed
beside her. She could see that it was loaded and a curious little
padlock filled the trigger space. The lock had a keyhole in the
center of it, but there was no key with the gun. Cassie was certain
the ring of keys that the hospital nurse had given her, the ones
from her mother's pocket, would have a key to fit that lock.

She had never known her mother to use a
handgun, and she had never touched one.

There was a small, framed certificate on
Cassie's bureau that she had earned years before at Girl Scout
camp. She’d been given the NRA Marksman award after proving her
competency with a .22 rifle on the camp's shooting range. In an
area with as many rattlesnakes as Bowie, it was wise to know how to
shoot a rifle safely. Cassie stared at the carved wooden grips of
the big revolver, and then called for Guy.

He had recognized the gun right away, and
smiled, carefully pointing the barrel at the floor and unloading
the fat cartridges from the cylinder.

"I helped your mom pick out this gun," he
had said. "I tried to talk her into something a little smaller,
like a .22 magnum, or a .380, but she wanted this one," Guy laughed
suddenly, "and boy-oh-boy could she shoot it! We must have killed a
thousand pop cans out past the quarry, your mother, Grace, and
I."

Cassie was shocked.

"
My
Mom
…
" she asked incredulously,
"shot
this
gun?"

"Sure," replied Guy, "she was an ace, I
never understood how she could shoot a big .357 like that with
those thin wrists of hers, but she did. Not long after she moved
here, we went up to Tucson and took a handgun class, got verified
and everything," the pastor sighed.

"We used to go out to the quarry 'most every
weekend and target shoot,” he said. “It was cheap entertainment
back then."

Cassie had stared at the revolver a little
fearfully.

"I guess," Guy continued, "that this old
hand-cannon is yours now, but I'm going to lock it up for
safekeeping. If you decide you want to shoot it let me know and
we'll go out to the quarry with Grace. If you like, sometime when
you're back from school, we can go up to Tucson and you can take
that safety course. After that, if you want it, it’s yours to
take."

"Well," Cassie said, still dazed at this
side of her mother that she had never known, "Let me think about
it, I'm sure I'll want it eventually, maybe after I get out of
school."