Chapter Six
In mid-July Mike told me one night that Mrs. Dodson’s oldest nephew was cleared. “He appears to have a good alibi—dinner with his family at the local country club where several people could testify they saw him. Conroy says he was distant and displeased but okay to deal with. The younger one spouted off about calling his lawyer, until Conroy told him he’d better call his lawyer to discuss a charge of possession of illegal substances. But he has no alibi—claims he was in a bar downtown, but no one in the bar has verified it.”
“What’s his name?” It struck me I’d been discussing these two men without knowing their names.
“Older one is Kenneth, younger is Mark. Last name is Dodson, so they must be the late husband’s kin.”
“Does he have a record?”
Mike shot me one of his resentful looks, like I’d ventured too far into police territory. “Yeah, a bust for possession of marijuana and one for drunk driving.”
Lovely fellow. “Did Conroy press charges for possession?”
Mike shook his head. “I would have if it’d been me, but Conroy’s focused on the murder.”
“Well, it’s his business, isn’t it, more than yours?” There I went again, a bull in a china shop when I should have been tiptoeing through the tulips.
Mike hung his head and then didn’t say anything for a long time, while I fidgeted and wished I could both take back the last three minutes and also learn to control my mouth. After a long, uncomfortable silence, he said, “Well, I care about what happens. I guess you know about that, don’t you, Kelly?” He stood up, grabbed his keys, and said, “Night, Kelly. I’ll let myself out.”
Okay. Now I had done it. I sat like stone in the chair. Should I call him and apologize? Let him get over it? Wait for him to call? Damn! I remembered that I never was good at the dating thing, and I guess I’d just shown it again. I cried—not sobbing or anything but tears running down my cheeks. Maggie came in, her sixth sense in full swing.
“I heard the door slam.”
“Mike didn’t mean to make that much noise. I guess he forgot that you girls were sleeping.”
“Mom, why are you crying? Did you and Mike have a fight?”
I smiled at her sweet concern, but I’m sure my smile didn’t reassure her. “No. I just said something I shouldn’t have.”
“Well, call Mike and tell him you’re sorry. That’s what you tell me. You say apology goes a long way, and you catch more flies with a teaspoon of honey than a cup of vinegar.”
“I’m not catching flies,” I said in a whisper. “Thanks, Maggie. Go on back to bed.”
She gave me a fierce hug and a whispered, “I love you,” and went down the hall.
I sat there and stewed some more. It was the problem that most worried me all along—our clashing over his police work. Maybe Mike and I were only drawn by physical urge and weren’t suited to each other at all. If we developed a permanent relationship, clashes like this would go on and on. I couldn’t see living that way, and I sure couldn’t see putting the girls in that kind of environment. They’d forgotten by now how their father and I used to argue and yell, and I wanted such scenes to remain a vague memory.
I stumbled off to bed and a sleepless night.
Next morning, Claire took one look at me and said, “You look like hell. You didn’t shoot Mike last night, did you?” Her mouth raised in a semi-smile.
“No, I think I shot myself in the foot,” I answered. But I didn’t tell her what happened. It would sound too trivial to someone in her situation. Besides, no one knew how involved my relationship to Mike had become.
Mike neither came by nor called for three days, and I was a basket case, sharp with the girls, short with Claire, and useless at the office. Keisha watched me twirl pencils in the air, stare out the window, and jump every time the phone rang.
“You doin’ a million dollars worth of business over there in that blue funk?” she asked.
Startled, I looked at her and wished she weren’t so darn perceptive. “I’m thinking,” I said. Truth be told, I focused on how miserable I was. I knew how much Mike was now a part of my life, but I didn’t know how I’d miss him if he dropped out. I didn’t think about it, didn’t expect it to happen. I guess that answered the question of whether or not I wanted a relationship. My independence didn’t seem so important at this point. I wondered if he was miserable too, and which one of us was stubborn—or was it both?
While I was in such a blue funk—Keisha hit it right on the head—my mom called to say that if we wanted her in Texas so badly, she’d decided to move right away. She’d like to live in the cottage I’d mentioned.
“Mom, you have to sell your house, first.”
“I’ll just list it with an agent and leave.”
“Mom, empty houses don’t sell well. They need to have furniture in them. And, you need to realize that your house will be a redo for anyone who buys it.”
“It’s a perfectly good house, Kelly. I’ve lived in it thirty-six years.”
“I know,” I said, picturing the outdated kitchen with its old, chipped porcelain sink, it’s electric stove with the those wide burners, and the refrigerator that had old-fashioned ice cube trays—no ice maker, no ice or water in the door. The rest of the house was about the same—and I thought of Mrs. Glenn’s house. That was what my childhood home looked like. “Talk to an agent—do you know one?”
“My friend Louise just sold her house in five days. I’m sure she’d recommend her agent.”
Five days? Lord, deliver me
. “Well, Mom, this house down here won’t be ready until late September.”
“Why can’t I stay in that apartment you told me about? The one where the young girl lived.”
I repeated that Claire was there now and would be indefinitely, and Mom suggested I just tell Claire, whoever she was, to move because my mother needed the apartment. I said I couldn’t do that, and she said, “I don’t know, Kelly. I think you take some questionable people into your life. You must watch out for the girls.”
I gritted my teeth and decided to ignore that comment. She would have a fit if she knew why Claire lived with us. “Mom, you’ll have to sort what you’ve accumulated in thirty-six years. You’ll have to pack and figure out what you’re bringing down here and what you’re not. This house is smaller, much smaller.”
“Oh, I’ll just pack everything and then sort when I get there.”
I envisioned an astronomical moving bill, and I could see a trip to Chicago looming in my future, but who would keep the girls? I couldn’t afford to fly all of us up there, and they’d be bored to tears. I talked to Mom a bit more, urging her to begin to sort and explaining how expensive it would be to move everything. Please God, I thought, let it take her months to do. It will keep her busy and give me time to plan.
Keisha was in my visitor’s chair by the time I hung up. “You got a problem, Kelly,” she pronounced.
“Yeah. Mom will be scared and want to stay with us all the time. I know she’s my mother, and she took good care of me until I flew the coop, but I didn’t know she would turn so…so helpless.”
Keisha, today wearing jeans, a loose, flowing top in bright pink, and matching spike heels, leaned back, stretched out her feet, yawned, and said, “Well, I been living with my mama too long. I guess I can go live with yours for a while.”
“Keisha, are you serious?” I was overwhelmed by the generosity of her offer, even as I wondered about Mom’s reaction to Keisha.
“Yeah, I can whip her into shape for you. Gently, of course. Didn’t you say there’s a garden? I got a green thumb a foot long and a mile wide.” She laughed, and the sound came from deep in her throat. “You tell Anthony to get on with it.” She got up to go back to her desk and then turned, “And if you have to go up north, I’ll stay with the girls. I know you ain’t quite comfortable ‘bout leaving them with Miss Claire for days.”
She really is psychic, I thought. “And Claire might not be comfortable either, but I pray it won’t come to that.”
I went to check progress on what would become Mom’s house. I reminded myself I’d have to have a serious financial discussion with Mom. I had no idea of her financial situation, and then I felt guilty. A child should know how to take care of an aging parent, and that circular thought made me even angrier because Mom wasn’t that old! That trip to Chicago looked more like a reality.
****
Anthony was building new cabinets in the kitchen he’d gutted. Together we’d redesigned the small space, creating what would be an efficient yet sparkling kitchen. We’d decided on natural wood cabinets, not quite as dark as they would have been in Victorian times. I vetoed glass-fronted cabinets, remembering my experience with them in the kitchen my ex-husband designed without consulting me. I figured Mom wouldn’t want to have to be that neat either. Chrome appliances, if not authentic to the period, would look good in there. I’d find some kind of blue-and-white ruffled feminine curtains. Oh, and faux Victorian fixtures. Maybe Mom would get back to cooking.
“Miss Kelly, once I get this kitchen done, rest of the house be a snap. I say six weeks.”
“My mom wants to move into it tomorrow.”
He shook his head. “Tomorrow? Impossible. Say six weeks.”
“Don’t worry. I’m going to be sure she sells her house and makes this move orderly, not something impulsive she’ll regret.”
He relaxed and grinned. “You like having your mom close by?”
“I’m not sure,” I admitted. I explored the rest of the house, making plans in my head, checking to see that the mold hadn’t spread. And then I wandered outside to see the garden again—I’d need a good yard guy, and I knew just the one. His name is appropriately Jake Green. I’d call him today.
“Anthony,” I said, once back in the kitchen, “I’m going to tell Mom late September. That will give us about six weeks.”
Back in the office, I called Jake Green, who promised to go by and give me a bid on installing a sprinkler system, cleaning out the yard to see what was weed and what was salvageable, and doing some minimal landscaping.
Then I sat and stewed about Mike. I was bursting to sound off about my mom but now I was shy about calling. I doodled on scratch paper—again—and then the idea came to me. I’d have one of those dinners we had the day we moved and include everybody—Anthony and his sons, Theresa and Joe, Claire, Mike—and Keisha. It was time she became more a part of the family. School started again in a week—so early!—and I’d call it a back-to-school celebration.
I’d get Mike to grill hamburgers, and I’d make a three-bean salad. I made grand plans and didn’t even think that I took Mike’s acceptance for granted. I pushed out of my mind the thought that he might not agree.
Mike was off on Sunday nights, and that was a logical time to do it. I started with Keisha. “I’m going to ask Mike to grill hamburgers Sunday night and get Joe and Theresa and Anthony and the boys and…would you join us?”
“You think Mike will come around by then?” she asked, raising one eyebrow and staring at me.
How did she know? Yes, I’d been in a blue funk, but I swear I never told her why. I guess I looked as surprised as I was, because she said,
“You think I can’t guess why you been moping around here? It ain’t your mama, and I know that.”
“Okay, you’re right. And I thought maybe by getting everyone together, it would be sort of a reconciliation party. You know….” My voice drifted off until I finished with, “a back-to-school party.”
“So you’re going to apologize by asking him to cook? That’s a new one! Sure, I’d love to come see this.”
I wondered how one could disinvite a dinner guest.
I called Theresa and Anthony on their cell phones, and they both sounded like they’d be delighted to come. “I don’t see enough of Theresa,” Anthony said, “and that Joe? He’s growing on me. Theresa’s made a man out of him.”
He’d been so vehement, forbidding Theresa to marry Joe, predicting a dire and dark future for his daughter if she stayed with him. Seeing him lighten up was worth the dinner party.
I didn’t worry about asking Claire—I’d talk to her tonight about a dessert. But if I hurried, I could catch Mike before he went on duty. My hands were so slippery and wet that I thought I’d drop the phone, and I knew my voice would squeak.
Mike must have looked at caller ID because he answered with, “Hey, Kelly.” I heard neither anger nor joy in his voice—it was flat.
“Hey,” I said, wondering where to go next. I couldn’t or wouldn’t blurt out, “I’ve missed you” or “the girls have been asking for you.”
He gave me a minute’s grace by saying, “Sorry I haven’t called. I’ve been busy.”
