London Harmony: The Pike (5 page)

Zoey exchanged sarcastic barbs with Kimi Solomon like she was just an old friend and not an international superstar.

I was feeling sort of out of place before we could finish the rounds, I was a nobody who felt like I was intruding into the world of all of these powerful people.  That made my eyes dart to Leigh.  If I were feeling this way, then she...  dear lord, she looked about ready to pass out.  Her hands were almost cutting off the circulation in my arm, her knuckles white.

I looked at Zoey apologetically. “I'm sorry, this is just a little overwhelming.”  I nudged my eyes toward Leigh and asked, “Would it be terribly rude to take you up on your offer to use the kitchen to catch our breath?”

Her eyes widened when she looked at Leigh and she just nodded her head. “Not at all, by all means.  Take all the time you need.”

I smiled thanks at her as I laid my hand over Leigh's hands on my arm and said, “Come on, let's go check out the mixer to see what I need to bring tomorrow.”

She just stiffly nodded.  I knew her fight or flight instinct was kicking in and hers was locked permanently in the flight position.  She only stayed for me.

As soon as we passed through the little flimsy swinging door into the relative quiet of the kitchen, she seemed to deflate.  It was like a heavy load was taken off of her.  I couldn't imagine the anxiety my girl faces every day.  It isn't her fault, it is just how she is wired.

I feel privileged every day, that I am one of the few that has been able to get a peek under her shell at the amazingly dynamic girl underneath.  One that she has welcomed into her world.  The girl I seem to have no defenses against.  The girl I loved.

I grinned at her as she finally released her death grip on my arm.  I took both of her hands in mine, pulled her in front of me, and locked eyes with those impossible green ones of hers.  She smiled nervously back as I mouthed, “Better?”

Her grin turned into a blushing smile as she nodded and looked down.  I just pulled her into a hug and she seemed to draw strength off of me.  Then she mumbled into my shoulder in a disbelieving tone, “We met Mandy Fay Harris.”

I could tell she was smiling.

I had to chuff out a breathy chuckle as I nodded and kissed the top of her head then pulled back to sign, “Yes, we did.”

Then I tipped my head back and chuffed again when she said, “And we didn't get any autographs.”  Then she shot me one of her cute tight-lipped grins.

We sat in a couple chairs at the desk by a wall that Mrs. Z had used as her “office” and just chatted about all the amazing people we had met.  Talking with her always seemed to relieve the stress of the world pushing in on her from all directions.

When she was suitably relaxed, I stood and walked over the to huge floor mounted Kok Stjarna mixer.  She wandered over to watch, she was always curious about my knack for figuring things out.  I have never had any formal training or anything, I was just really good at seeing how things worked and fixing them.

When I was younger, mom would always find me in the garage or kitchen, tearing apart the vacuum or lawn mower to see how they worked.  She'd chastise me but I always got them put back together.  I fixed everything in our house whenever it broke down so she never had to call in a handyman.

When Bobbie hired me on during summer breaks in high school, all of her departments passed me around and I would do all the minor fixes that Vernon hadn't gotten to yet.  But Fran and Steve from the stables wound up winning me in some sort of silent lottery.  I keep everything in the stables running in tip top shape for them, freeing up Vernon for more pressing repairs around the property.

I fell in love with horses because of my exposure to them, and Steve says I am a natural and they use me as overflow when they need someone to act as a trail guide for tourists who came to ride in the mountains when they overbook.  That's the job they gave Itsy too, mounted guide.

She took to riding like a fish to water, she has this permanent smile when she is riding, and her confidence is boosted tenfold.  She seems to be able to interact with people so much better when she is on a horse like she pulls her strength from feeling so sure of herself when she is in the saddle.

It took Bobbie and Blake only a few minutes speaking with her before they nodded to each other and offered her the job.  Somehow they knew what my girl needed and I think part of it may be that they wanted to keep us together since we seemed to work so well as a team every time they saw us together.

I smiled at the memories and looked at the mixer and grinned at my girl and pressed the big green on button as I shrugged.  There was the humming of power and the oversize mixing blades in the giant stainless steel mixing bowl that came almost to my waist just sat there mocking us, doing nothing.

I signed, “It seems to be broken.”

She giggled and asked sarcastically, “You think?  Good thing they have you to tell them that Captain Obvious.”  She scrunched up her nose and stuck her tongue out at me.

I chuffed at her playfulness as I hit the red stop button and made an imperious shooing motion to her.  She moved aside and I removed the upper cover to look at the drive belt.  It was intact.  I pulled it with my hand and just barely got the clutch drive pulley turning and the blade moved.  It wasn't seized, so there wasn't any problem with the belt mechanism at that point.  So that left the drive system, the motor, or the electronics on the ancient mixer.

These professional Kok Stjarna mixers were revolutionary for their time, the first variable speed industrial mixers that didn't require you to move the belt from different sets of stacked pulleys to adjust the speed.  They had an odd hybrid combination of a pseudo transmission and variable resistance motor.  That, unfortunately, meant that they were extremely complex compared to the simplicity of the manual belt systems which were akin to the drive system on a drill press.

Over the years, this type of setup was replaced with direct drive variable resistance motors, eliminating the need for a lot of the electronics and that pseudo transmission.  That also had the favorable result of lowering the price and maintenance costs on the units, making them far more cost effective for bakeries and restaurants.

I popped the plug from the receptacle after I replaced the belt cover.  I wiggled my eyebrows at my girl, she just grinned back, fascinated to watch me.  With the power unplugged I removed another cover at the motor.  I traced the motor controller cabling from the power switch and to the electronics package then leaned in to smell.

I know that sounds silly, but with electronics, you can sometimes suss out a problem area by the smell of something overheating or even a sometimes subtle burning smell indicating a problem.  I got nothing.  So I grabbed a mixing spoon off a nearby stainless steel counter and used the handle to jam into the motor gear and pry.

It slowly started to move just a smidgen, so the motor turned, though that didn't eliminate the possibility of the motor brushes having contact problems, at least I knew it wasn't seized.  I needed to try this with the power off so the lower clutch assembly wasn't engaged. Otherwise, it would have taken herculean strength to get it to turn just the amount I was able to do.

I squinted my eyes at the transmission and pointed the spoon accusingly at it.  I signed at it, “It's you isn't it you evil box of gears and resistors?”  This got the chuckle from Itsy I was shooting for and I shot her a toothy grin.

She asked, from behind me as I turned back to my investigation, “You think that's the dohickey that is stopping all the flavorful goodness in the kitchen?”

I chuffed at the extent of her techno-speak.  I signed behind me as I looked for anything else obvious.  “Possibly, it seems the most likely suspect without my circuit tester and without bypassing everything to see if I can power the motor directly.  I'll do that tomorrow.  I already requested Tuesday for you and me to do this.  Bobbie had no problems with it, she likes Zoey.”

I smacked the transmission with the spoon.  Then jumped when the sound pressure in the room increased for a moment.  I turned back to see Max come in with a tray.  She put the empty glasses from it on a tray for the industrial dishwasher as she waved at us.

She did it in a systematic way and it made a clinking sound almost in time for each glass.  Leigh started to sway to it, tapping her leg in time and said, “Bip bap bop.”

Max grinned up at her and made an effort to keep her chore in time.

I started banging on the giant steel mixing bowl as my Itsy's smile bloomed and she began ad-libbing a song comparing fighting dragons to mixer transmissions. I found lots of surfaces to smack with the spoon for different tones and Max ran out of glasses so she just kept picking them back out of the washing tray and putting them back in to get the clinks.

We went full out, Leigh went back into her improvised chorus and Max lent harmony support to her as I thumped away on the wire racks and alternately the mixing bowl.  We were all grinning like fools as my girl finished up.

We all laughed and then froze when we realized that the sounds of the gathering outside the kitchen had stopped and it was deathly silent.  A woman we hadn't met yet was standing in the doorway just staring at us, and J8 was standing behind her!  Wait, Zoey's June was June Harris-West?!

I blushed and Leigh paled and made her way quickly to my side and buried her head in my sleeve.  She was trembling, it looked like she was about to pass out.  I looked between her and the door.  Everyone was trying to look in at us.

Zoey came to the rescue.  She physically moved J8 aside saying, “Move it Squirt.”  Then she horse-collared the other woman and pulled her to the side gently as she said, “Out of the way Vannie.”  Then she turned and looked back at the group and said, “Shoo, you all act like you've never heard music before.”

To my surprise, this got a lot of smiles from the people and she promptly shut the door in their faces.  She made a dusting motion, sliding her palms across each other like she had just thrown out the trash and she looked at us and said, “Sorry.  They just get so excitable at times, like unruly children.”

She looked over at Max, who gave a deer in headlights look then dashed out of the kitchen with her tray, I assumed to pick up another load of empties.

Then the redheaded woman turned her eyes to us and said as she signed, “Sorry, J-Dub and Vannie get a little excitable when they hear something new.  I suppose that just harshed your mellow?”  She cocked an eyebrow at Leigh.

My girl chuckled and almost squeaked shyly, “Harshed my mellow?”

This got Zoey almost giggling.  “Again, sorry, I've hung out with Aunt Mandy too much it seems.”  I knew what Zoey was doing and it made me smile.  She was silly on purpose to get Leigh calmed down and feeling comfortable again.  I appreciated that and shot her a thankful smile.

I looked down at Leigh, who seemed to be marshaling herself again. Then I changed the subject and nudged my chin to the mixer as I went about putting the motor cover back on then signed, “I did a preliminary look at the beast here, and without my tools I have it down to the motor controller drive system or the brushes in the motor itself.  I'll know more tomorrow with my tester.”

She made a sour face as she joined us at the mixer.  “The drive system again?  That's the third time in six months, I swear this dinosaur is almost not worth the trouble.  If we had the funds to buy a modern one, we would have long ago.”  She trailed off, I could see the pain in her eyes as she remembered that 'we' was one person less now.

I cocked my head and offered, “If you opt for just replacing the motor with a variable resistance motor and controller then we could just dump the drive system altogether.  I could cobble together a proper mounting system.  It would be immensely cheaper than buying a new unit.  This thing may have some shortcomings but it is a solid mixer.”

Leigh was feeling much better and was making fun of me by making a little mouth with her hand and making it babble as I went on.  I grinned at her and mouthed, “Smartass.”  Then I nudged my chin toward her as I signed to Zoey, “Sorry, I just get a little passionate about machines.”

She shook her head slowly and said as she smiled at us. “Not a problem.  That's an interesting idea.  I'd like to... well, ummm... I guess I'll have to ask McKenzie now if we should proceed.  I'll talk to her tomorrow about it after the reading of the will.  I'll call you before you come tomorrow afternoon to see if the Pike is still going to be here.”

I saw sadness and worry in her eyes.  I had always thought she was a partner here but it sounds as if I were mistaken and she was unsure of the fate of the Pike without Mrs. Z.  She loved this place it was plain to see.

I nodded then looked at Itsy again.  She was at the end of her ability to reign in her anxiety.  I looked at her as I signed to Zoey, “I think we've had enough excitement for one day.  We appreciate being included in this gathering and are really and truly sorry for your loss, Mrs. Z was one of the nicest ladies we have met.”

She had a reflective look with a shadow over her as she nodded, then straightened a little and looked at Itsy and said, “Stay for the toasts at least?  Things are winding down here anyway.”

My girl looked up at me like she was questing for permission in my eyes, I hated when she wasn't sure of herself.  I wasn't going to feed the monster, so I shrugged and looked at her expectantly, she deflated then nodded at Zoey, “O... ok.”