The Queen of Sleepy Eye (11 page)

Mom smoothed her hair. “I'm very sorry, Mrs. Clancy. Nothing like this will ever happen again. Isn't that right, Amy?”

“Sure.”

Mrs. Clancy's eyes stormed. “Mr. Peterson passed away this morning. Poor Luann has been waiting since six this morning to call. By the time she finally got a hold of me, she was hysterical, said if I hadn't answered she was going to call Garrison's down in Clearwater. She wants one of the newer stainless-steel caskets with the leak-proof liner. I can't afford to lose a sale like that, and who knows how many more.”

“It's my fault,” I said. “I went for a walk on the mesa. It was such a beautiful day. I lost track of time.”

“
And
you walked out of Sunday school with H,” she said with her arms crossed over her bosom.

Mom frowned, but she didn't know I held the ace in my hand. Mrs. Clancy couldn't know about the inappropriate material being taught in Sunday school. “The teacher read from an essay he'd written for a class. The essay didn't even mention Jesus.”

Mrs. Clancy blinked. “You can be sure I'll talk to Pastor Ted first thing in the morning.” She circled the rim of her coffee cup with her fingertip. “H and his parents don't see eye to eye about church and Sunday school attendance. Most Sundays, they arrive at church looking like they battled every inch of the way. H hasn't worn his suit in over a year. I don't think this being your first Sunday with us was a coincidence, Amy. He's had a terrible time adjusting to Cordial. As another newcomer, you may be just what he needs to acclimate to our way of life.”

I was about to tell her how tender H had been with Mrs. Masterson when she looked at me with the intensity of a she-lion protecting her cubs. “I won't have you breaking his heart.”

Blecch!
“Mrs. Clancy, I can assure—”

“H is older than you. He'll be eighteen in a week. His father
caught him drinking by himself. Tore Herbert up, I can tell you. All I ask of you is to use your influence over H for good.”

Mrs. Clancy looked to Mom who sat opening and closing a matchbook before she turned back to me with a look of pity. “Amy, I'm not an unreasonable woman,” Mrs. Clancy said. “You're still a young girl. You need time for walks and friends and time on your own, especially with the hours your mother works. If you need extra time, please let me know in advance so we can avoid these kinds of problems in the future.”

I would never make such a request, but I expressed gratitude for her thoughtfulness.

Mrs. Clancy pushed her cup to the center of the table. She spoke only to me. “I've been meaning to talk to you about an article I read in the
National Funeral Directors and Morticians Journal.
There's a new trend toward pre-need arrangements. I think it's a good idea. I've seen spouses, children, and parents crumble under the weight of the decisions they must make after the passing of a loved one. More times than I can count, they've looked to me with pleading eyes and begged me to take care of the decisions for them. Of course, I'm happy to do so, but then some of those people have insinuated that I took advantage of a difficult situation. Nothing could be further from the truth. The answer, then, is just as the article says—make those difficult decisions long before they're needed, when calmer minds prevail and without the pressure of time. Tell me, Amy, have you done any painting?”

Mom's head shot up. “Amy helped me paint the whole house last year—inside and out.”

Mrs. Clancy ignored Mom's comments.

Mom stood. “Excuse me. I have many things to do before work tomorrow.” That was the first and last time anyone had been able to
ignore Mom's presence in a room. I was both awestruck and angry. Who did Mrs. Clancy think she was, anyway?

“The article suggested meeting with clients in a bright, sunny room, decorated like a living room rather than an office. If the big desk is moved from my office and the writing table from your bedroom is moved in, there should be plenty of room for two upholstered chairs and a coffee table.” Mrs. Clancy held my gaze. “Whatever happened here today cannot happen again. Can I count on you, Amy?”

“I'll apologize to the youth director too.”

“I expect you to keep the place clean and remain current on all of your other duties whether I'm here or not.” Mrs. Clancy pushed her chair away from the table and stood, tugging her dress into place. “Now, go fix your hair and put on a clean dress. Mrs. Peterson will be here shortly to choose the finish for the casket. And Mr. Moberly will want his meatloaf sandwich.”

The outside of Lauren's package read,
“DO NOT OPEN THE
PRESENT UNTIL YOU READ THE LETTER … OR
ELSE!!!”

STOP TO OPEN GIFT NOW.

What a choice. Either forge ahead to read the juicy news or open a gift that was sure to be something Lauren had shoplifted. Since Lauren exaggerated more than most, I pulled the yellow ribbon off and tore through the red tissue paper to find two Mexican blouses, one with royal-blue cross-stitches and puffed sleeves, the other sleeveless with pink stitching. I hugged the blouses to my chest as I read the rest of Lauren's letter.

I recognized the fence of Underhill Manor homestead immediately. Made of cast-off windows, doors, and a collection of picket boards—some pointed, some blunt, all of them uneven—the fence mimicked a crazy quilt with doorknob charms and an ivy vine for the fancy stitches. Over the gate, a bundle of branches created a sort of arbor. A hand-painted sign with a border of white daisies leaned against the mailbox. “Feather's Fresh Eggs Sold Here.” It was the friendliness of the sign that bolstered my courage to go inside unannounced, a sin anyplace east of the Mississippi River.

I stood behind a tangle of trumpet vine before approaching the log cabin. Weather had stripped the barn of color, except where someone had patched holes with salvaged lumber. The barn's hayloft gaped open over the double doors. Goats grazed in a paddock that had been reinforced with rope. No one would accuse Feather's log cabin of being anything but function with four walls. There were several mismatched windows and a door made of thick plywood. This wasn't the Ponderosa, that was for sure. Sitting on the
door's threshold, a woman with flaxen hair breast-fed her baby as she sang,
“Hush little baby, don't say a word, Mama's going to buy you
a mockingbird.”
The woman had Feather's angled features, only softer. I knew immediately she was Feather's mother, although Feather called her by her adopted name, Butter.

A toddler leaned against Butter, watching his older brothers, twins from their bookend appearance, struggling to carry a split log. Had Feather not lamented being the only girl among four younger brothers, I might have puzzled over each child's sex. But not the twins. Even though they wore their hair cut as blunt as brooms below their collars, they swaggered with the importance of their task as only males can. The toddler's downy-white curls had yet to meet the scissors. Somewhere out of sight, the thwack of an axe against a wedge provided the beat for the humming bees around the lilacs and the chitter of birds in a lopsided tree.

I stepped into the sunlight. “Excuse me, is Feather home?” I held up the egg basket. “She left her basket at my house.”

Butter waved me closer. “She'll be glad to see you. I'm charging her rent to use my basket.”

“Butter,” demanded one of the twins, “tell Frog to walk faster.”

“Boys,” she said, “I'd hate to see you miss lunch because the wood isn't stacked, and I mean for you to stack the wood neatly.”

One boy dropped his end. His tongue thrust through the space where his front teeth used to be as he talked. “That's gonna take forever.”

“It's up to you and Frog how long it takes, but Straw will be in for lunch soon. There's stew on the stove, and the bread's about ready to come out of the oven.”

“Come on, Mule, I'm hungry,” complained Frog. Mule picked up his end and the boys trotted around the corner of the cabin.

I set the basket at Butter's feet. “Please tell Feather that Amy stopped by.”

She laughed. “The only time I get to sit down from sun up to sundown is when I'm feeding the baby and not always then. You're the only adult I've seen since breakfast. Don't make me beg you to sit in the shade and make pleasant conversation.” She patted the stoop. “It's not a fancy seat, but it's the coolest one in the house.”

Butter asked me questions about my family, how old I was, and how I liked Cordial. I told her about moving to California and the problems with the car.

“It sounds like your mom isn't all that excited about moving to California.”

“I'll be living in the dorms.” I said. “Mom's never lived alone before.” I resisted the urge to tell Butter about my mother's obsession with our Pontiac, because even with all of the craziness that hovers around Mom, I have always felt loved—and smothered and exploited—and lately, resentful.

“Be glad your mother loves you enough to care.” Butter bent to kiss the infant's head. “My husband's mother tells her friends that he died in a horrible car accident. She made a bonfire of his stuff on the driveway.” Butter swallowed hard. “Straw doesn't have one picture of his old man.”

I could have upstaged her with my dad story, but the light had left her face. “I'm sorry.”

“Here,” she said, handing over the infant. “I just learned a new braid. Let me try it out on you. Feather's hair is way too fine.”

Butter disappeared into the cabin. I held the baby at arms' length, his feet dangling over my lap. He didn't have a neck and his eyes crossed. He burped a stream of milk that dribbled off his chin and onto his bib.

“Great.”

The toddler leaned against me, just as he had with Butter. “Anybody will do?” I asked him, but he just continued sucking his thumb. From the cabin, Butter yelled, “The baby is Vernon. The toddler is Lamb.”

“Neckless Vernon and yet another name that will be difficult to explain on the schoolyard. I'd complain to the management, if I were you guys.” Before Vernon could spit up again, I laid him down the length of my thighs. He held my thumbs and pressed his pudgy feet into my stomach. “You better be careful, little man, you might end up with a name like Spit-Up or Fountain.” I hummed the melody of “Jesus Loves Me.” A fly landed on Vernon's forehead, and I blew it off.

Butter loosened my bun. “You have hair just like my sister. She absolutely hates it. She spent most of high school and college sleeping with her hair wrapped around orange juice cans. I envied her wild hair. Mine is so fine you can see my scalp.” Butter bent to show me her scalp under her wispy hair. “Oh well, Sis is married to a nice banker, so she can afford to have her hair done every week before her bridge game. And here I am, the wild one, baking bread and making babies. Life is funny.” Butter pulled the brush through my hair with deep, confident strokes. “Let me know if I hurt you.”

Once she was satisfied that every knot in my hair had been loosened, she stood up to part and pull strands from the top of my head into tight braids. She worked toward my neck, gathering strands of hair as she went. Vernon arched his back and stretched with his fists knotted, his toes splayed. He mewed a complaint.

“What should I do?”

“Bounce your knees, but don't move your head.”

“I don't know much about babies.”

“Hold this,” she said, guiding my hand to a clump of hair at my neck. “Now, I'll do the other side.”

Butter explained how she made cash for her family by braiding hair at summer Renaissance and craft fairs where Straw sold leather purses and belts. “We trade for most of what we need within our co-op, but we still need bread for the mortgage and taxes, and I'm hoping to get Feather back to the doctor to adjust her meds. They don't seem to be working as well as they had before.” She secured a braid with a rubber band. “Has she told you about her seizures?”

Sometimes Feather's eyes, nose, and mouth gathered as if they'd been lassoed with a rope and pulled tight. “When her face puckers?” I asked.

Butter laughed the way you do when something isn't funny at all. “Those are petit mal seizures. Feather puts on a brave face, but she cries when she thinks no one is around. It breaks my heart. They make fun of her at school, call her ‘prune face.' That bothers her a lot, but what she really hates is being in special-ed classes. I fought putting her in the self-contained classroom for a while, but she can hardly read, which makes sense since she's, like, tripping out all of the time. Doc Marty told us half of the kids with petit mals outgrow them. The rest go on to have grand mal seizures.” Butter's hands rested on the top of my head. “I don't know what we'll do if that happens.”

This part of being an adult made my skin itch. Butter had peeled back the layers of her heart to reveal its most tender landscape, and I had nothing to say, no salve or Band-Aid to offer. Vernon's eyes grew heavy. I slowed the bouncing, and his body went soft. “Are the drugs expensive?” I asked.

“Very.” She took Vernon from my lap and laid him in a cradle
lined with white fur. “Come to the mirror to have a look at your hair.”

I held a hand mirror and turned my back to the mirror over an enameled bowl that served as the kitchen sink.

“Do you see the heart?” she asked. “This is my best one yet. You look beautiful.”

I avoided mirrors. No matter how hard I concentrated on Butter's handiwork, my eyes only saw what I hated most about me, my nose. Long. Full-bodied. Definitely not a Gidget nose. Mom harped after me to leave my hair down to soften my features. “You don't think the braid is too severe?” I asked.

“Your bun makes your head seem odd, you know, misshapen. You're an exotic beauty, Amy, with those green eyes and full lips.” She took the mirror and returned it to a nail. Vernon sucked on his fist. “It looks like the little man is still hungry.”

Butter settled into a rocking chair and pulled up her blouse.

“Do you want me to go outside,” I asked.

“No way. Feather will be up from the henhouse soon to help with lunch. Why don't you help yourself to the cookies in the jar by the stove?”

Open shelves of jars, large and small, lined the kitchen walls. Some held things I recognized, like brown rice and brown sugar, but the dried leaves could have been anything.

“The big jar on the second shelf,” she prompted.

“Your kitchen, it's so …”
Primitive? Rustic? In the middle of your
bedroom and bathroom and dining room?

“Rough, isn't it? Two summers ago, Feather, the twins, Lamb, and I stayed in Kansas City until our house sold. But Straw couldn't wait to build the cabin. That was the longest summer of my life. Take it
from me: Never sell a house with twin boy toddlers running around. You'll shorten your lifespan by a decade.”

The one-room cabin wasn't worth a decade of anyone's life. A plank counter served as the kitchen, and a picnic table of sorts was the dining table. No two chairs matched in style or color. Crocks held cooking utensils. Beyond the counter, the space shifted toward bathroom functions. A camping toilet hung from a hook on the wall—I didn't want to know anything about that—and a galvanized metal bathtub leaned against the wall. On the opposite end of the cabin, a bed and two homemade bunk beds were separated from one another with curtains hung from the ceiling. In the middle of the room, a braided rug covered the floor in front of the wood-burning stove. Several chairs, recently rescued from someone's trash, no doubt, sat around a keg serving as an end table.

“Our neighbors helped Straw with the cabin when they could, but it was a mad dash to get the roof on and the wood-burning stove installed before winter set in. We expected to add things, like walls and doors, and a bathroom would be heavenly. It's been harder to get to the luxuries than we'd thought. I shouldn't complain. Most of our friends have to go outside for their water. Straw sold his car to drill a well before we built the house. He read every issue of
Mother Earth
News
before we left Missouri. Some of the information saved our lives. Other things made me wonder if the article was meant to be short fiction.” Butter squinted down on a memory. “I can still remember the first time I saw the cabin. Straw was so proud of himself.”

“Why don't you call him Woody?”

She smiled. “You'll know the answer when you see his beard.”

Butter excused herself to put Vernon down for a nap. Lamb followed his mother behind a fabric drape, gripping her skirt and glancing over his shoulder. I waved and his face disappeared into the folds
of her skirt. Butter spoke through the curtain. “I'm going to lay with Vernon for a while to get him to sleep. I'll be out in a minute.”

“No problem.”

I walked around the kitchen area with my hands behind my back, like I was in a store where the items were too expensive to buy. Only the open door and the windows allowed light to enter the cabin, so I instinctively looked for a light switch. There wasn't one. Instead, kerosene lanterns hung from the ceiling and sat on the dining table. No refrigerator, toaster, or television. I scanned the counters and shelves to see if I'd missed a radio, a music box, anything to fill the silence. I hummed the melody of “Softly and Tenderly, Jesus Is Calling.”

Straw's woodworking reminded me of the function and simplicity—not necessarily the craftsmanship—of the Amish farm museum I'd visited in elementary school. Straw relied on plywood and two-byfours, not the solid hardwoods of the northern forests. Finger holes worked as pulls for cabinets that opened on iron hinges. Butter kept food items in large jars. Some of the contents looked familiar but were definitely homemade—fruit leather, jerky, pickles, and cherry pie filling—while other jars held dried leaves. I screwed the lid off of one. The smell was familiar.
Oregano.
I shook my head. What was I expecting? Eye of newt? Marijuana?

When my stomach grumbled, I looked at my watch. 11:30. Six mismatched chairs stood around the table. I set a ceramic plate at each place and glasses cut from amber, brown, and green bottles. Flies buzzed in and out of the opened door, landing on the plates and glasses.
Eew.
I startled at the sound of boots on the front steps.

Unlike the other hippies I'd seen around Cordial, this man wore long sideburns tinged with red, but his face was clean-shaven. Sawdust clung to the hairs of his arms and his forehead. He stood
bare-chested with his flannel shirt in his hand. His jeans rode low on his hips to reveal the gathers of his boxer shorts. I considered looking away, but I couldn't. His blond hair pulled into a ponytail made him look more typically male to me, more like someone who could step out of an Austen novel—earthy yet regal, definitely not a hillbilly wannabe.

“You're not Straw, are you?” I asked, my voice breathy.

“Nope, I'm hungry,” he said and strode toward the sink.

I wanted to hear his voice again. “Is Butter expecting you?”