A Storied Man

(Note: You may read the page with Part One and Part Two to get caught up, in case you’re just joining us. It will link you right back here when you’re finished.)

Herein are several people whose lives at first do not seem connected. Their paths converge unexpectedly. This is Part Three.

Parts: 1|2|3

Part Three

Doug sat in the end of a church pew, alone, ornate stained glass windows looming above from every stone wall. A raven smashed through the window behind the altar and lit on the offering table. Its black feathers shimmered in the sunlight pouring through the hole in the multi-colored glass.

“Consecrate me!” squawked the bird.

A window on the far wall shattered. A raven emerged and flapped away twinkling glass shards as it flew to the offering table.

The shaft of light brought up welts on Doug’s face. He covered his eyes and the backs of his hands started to boil. Shrieking, he struggled to tuck his face into his shirt.

Now all the windows seemed to be exploding at the same time, the oil-black birds bursting through them and joining their kind at the altar. “Consecrate me!” the birds squawked in a deafening chorus.

Sunlight filled the sanctuary. To escape it, Doug closed his eyes and sank to the floor to roll under the pew.

His shoulder smacked the floor hard. He opened his eyes. Room-darkening drapes, barely touching the tan carpet, swayed in the wake of his fall. Sunlight rolled like ocean waves over the baseboard, getting slower and smaller until finally the drapes hung still.

“Bad dream,” Doug said. His voice croaked, his throat dry from breathing through his mouth all night.

He pushed himself off the floor and climbed back into bed. The silk sheets still warm on his side, he slid his legs into a cool spot.

The drapes on the other bedroom window still were shut tight, too, with sunlight barely peeking out the tiny spaces between the drapes and the wall. The hallway seemed much brighter than usual.

He remembered the church, the smashing windows, and all that burning sunlight. “Better check the rest of them,” he mumbled.

Doug threw back the covers and grabbed a burgundy silk robe from the hook on the wall. The cool fabric enveloped him and quickly warmed up to his body temperature. He looked down at the robe and admired its glossy shine. “Thanks again, Uncle Curtis,” he said.

He got only a few steps into the bright hallway before retreating. Grumbling, he stormed over to his nightstand and picked up the phone. As he punched in a number on the cordless, he yanked open a drawer and pulled out a blue stress ball.

He took a few deep breaths. Three rings. “Come on, pick up, dammit.” Finally, after five rings, an answer.

“Hello?”

“Steve, it’s Doug. Can you come over here to my new place on your lunch hour?”

“What’s wrong? You sound pissed.”

“I am. One of the shades in the living room is up.”

“Your dead uncle’s cat again?” Steve asked.

“Yeah. Of all the things he left me, that damn cat was his favorite. I think I’m going to have to get rid of it.”

“Or get new skin.”

“As soon as you find that for sale, you let me know.”

Doug held the stress ball close for a better look. Blue silicone tubes of varying lengths were arranged in a spherical honeycomb pattern. He gave it a squeeze.

“What was that sound?” Steve said.

Doug read the white letters. “Jelly Smacker Stress Ball.”

“Sounds disgusting.”

Doug held it closer to the receiver and gave it a few more squeezes.

“Stop, man. Please,” Steve said.

“I figured it’s about the only way you’ll be hearing that sound.”

“You know what you need, Doug?”

“A girlfriend?”

“Besides that.”

Doug worked the stress ball rhythmically. “I got nothin’.”

“Come on, man. Remote control shades,” Steve said.

“That’s cheaper than new skin, but Uncle Curtis left me stuff, not money. You gonna pay?”

“Sure-sure, yeah-yeah. Look, I’ll be over after lunch. Just sit tight and keep squeezing your kooch.”

Doug kept at the gelatinous toy and, matching the rhythm, made three quick kiss noises. “Here, kitty-kitty.”

A large, black Persian cat flowed slowly around the corner into the short corridor.

“You’ve been messing with my shades again, haven’t you? Bring your black ass over here.”

The cat approached and purred loudly as it rubbed its face and body along his outstretched hand. Its tail lifted as it finished, revealing a tiny, puckered pink circle devoid of fur.

“Whatever you’re expecting when you do that, I’m not up to the call. Sorry.”

He turned on the viewer atop his armoire and pulled up the weather forecast.

“Shit.” He threw the stress ball, narrowly missing the cat. It made a wet smack as it hit the wall. “Sunny.”

——-

“Wow. You’re right. That was a weird dream,” Steve said.

“It isn’t the first time I’ve had it, but it’s the first time I’ve fallen out of bed,” Doug said.

“Silk sheets will do that to you.”

They sat at the kitchen table, fluourescent overhead light blazing, room-darkening shades pulled down tight.

“That’s a mighty fancy garment you’re wearing there, sir. Somehow I never pegged you as the silk robe type.”

“It belonged to Uncle Curtis.”

“Yeah, I know, just like everything else I’m looking at. Now, what’s this you’ve whipped up as the ‘perfect chaser’ to my meal?”

“Turkish coffee,” Doug said and picked up a small brass pot by its long handle.

Steve pointed at it. “What’s that?”

“An ibrik.”

Steve laughed. “Sure, you gotta have a good ibrik for your Turkish coffee. Everybody knows that.”

Doug carefully tilted the pot to fill a small porcelain cup decorated with blue and red flowers. He handed it to Steve on a matching saucer.

“Let that settle a minute before you drink it.”

“Why?”

“So the grounds can all go to the bottom.”

Steve peered into the cup, then looked at his friend. “So is it this condition of yours that’s turned you into such a freak, or is this inheritance going to your head?”

“It’s good coffee, ass face,” Doug said. “Trust me.”

They sat quietly, letting their grounds settle. The cat slinked into the kitchen and rubbed against Steve’s calves. Static electricity crackled as the long, black hairs clung to his tan slacks.

A car horn sounded from the street below. A woman screamed, “You coulda killed me, you meathead!”

Steve lifted his cup. “Here’s to the city.” He sipped cautiously, then swallowed. One corner of his mouth pulled up into a grin. “Not damn bad. Not damn bad at all.”

“You’ll start to notice the grounds as you go. Just stop when you can’t take them any more.”

“Okay, freak.”

(to be continued)

Bernie is a poverty-stricken woman whose life takes an unexpected turn when an old friend returns to town. This is The End.

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12|The End

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

The End

“Are you sure this is the first place you want to go?” Shonda said.

Their eyes were locked onto a computer’s LCD monitor displaying various trips that had been booked and, for as many reasons, had been canceled last-minute. Shopping around that way, with neither of them tied to an office job, they could save money with spontaneity.

“Yes. No doubt in my mind,” Bernie said.

It had been an arduous three months, but with physical therapy and Shonda’s encouragement, Bernie had recovered physically. Breathing independently of the vent or any supplemental oxygen had come slowly, and because it used so much air, she spoke only for short periods at first.

Speaking up against Jeff Stivins had taken more than just rehabilitation. It had taken all of her courage, but because she had committed to not being the victim again, she held her head up and — for her brother, her dad, and her mom, chose life.

Her testimony had helped put Jeff Stivins away for more than one life sentence. Because he was an unpopular public figure, local judges and attorneys wasted no time getting him to trial. The defense had an appeal planned, but that would not stop Bernie.

“But it’s where your father died.”

“Yes, but he never finished seeing everything. I want to do it for him.”

Shonda clicked the mouse and leaned back in her Herman Miller Mirra chair. “Okay, I just booked it. The U.S. Virgin Islands. No turning back now.”

Bernie sipped Coke from a can and nibbled a Keebler Grasshopper cookie. “Have you already arranged the donation?”

“Just like you said, twenty-five percent of what we spend on every trip goes to the home for battered women and children. That has to be the strangest demand I’ve ever heard someone make before accepting a job,” Shonda said.

“I’m a strange woman.”

Shonda threw her head back and downed the last of a can of Diet RC. “It’s a good thing I’m a rich woman racked with guilt.”

“You know, there’s one more person I didn’t get to say ‘goodbye’ to yet,” Bernie said.

They drove to Pop’s One Stop.

Shonda wore a full, knee-length cotton skirt with a large flower print, a matching pink tank top and flip-flops. She grabbed Bernie’s hand and burst through the front doors, the bells above them announcing their arrival.

Bernie, clad in khaki capri pants and a bright blue, fitted tee shirt, liked the way her feet felt in the tan canvas slip-ons. Although she had not exactly moped around the previous spring, this time around she was much more upbeat.

She had good reason.

During her recovery, doctors had told her that only 15% of patients in a coma due to oxygen deprivation come away able to live independently. They attributed some of her remarkable recovery to the constant exercise and spare eating habits of her former lifestyle. A person less fit most likely would not have fared so well.

Finally, Bernie had overcome the odds and believed that not only did she have nowhere to go but up, but she actually had a good shot at getting there.

From behind the counter, Pop looked up from the quarter-folded Sun-Times and smiled at their arrival. He climbed slowly from his barstool and leaned down behind the counter, out of sight. He stood back up and set on the counter two plastic, gallon milk jugs full of water. “I saved these for you, Little Bernie.”

“Thanks, Pop, but you can just hang onto them,” Bernie said.

He looked back down at the newspaper’s crossword puzzle. “Four letters, means ‘liberated.’ Starts with ‘F.’”

Bernie is a poverty-stricken woman whose life takes an unexpected turn when an old friend returns to town. This is Part Twelve.

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12|The End

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

Part Twelve

Bernie noticed that the nurse’s name badge said, “Judy.” She liked her, and even though she couldn’t say it, knowing her name took her one step closer to the real world. Right now, though, she wanted to know about someone else.

“Shonda?” Bernie wrote.

Judy nodded. “We all know Shonda. Tina should be calling her right now.”

Bernie smiled, then furrowed her brow. “Tina?” she wrote.

“Oh, Tina’s the other nurse on shift with me. Shonda wanted to know the minute you showed any sign of change, good or bad. She’s been real worried about you.”

Bernie let that sink in. It was a new feeling for her. Sure, she had a few people around town who helped her occasionally, but how many of them would worry about her if she just disappeared?

“She’s not the only one who’s been asking after you.” Judy opened a closet door to Bernie’s right; she hadn’t noticed it when it was closed. On the door hung what looked like a garment bag, but it was made of clear pockets large enough for greeting cards.

All of them were full. The cards bore messages ranging from “Get Well Soon” to “Thinking About You,” in greens, reds, blues, and other colors that helped add life to the room.

Bernie’s eyes watered. Her chin quivered and she shook enough to send tears spilling over her eyelids and streaming down her face.

A familiar voice came from the room door. “And you should have seen all the flowers at first.”

Bernie turned her head slowly. Shonda rushed over and set two cans of soda — a Coke and a Diet RC — on a table beside the bed. She laid a palm on Bernie’s forehead and pushed back a few straggling hairs. “I can’t believe you’re awake!” she said. “I tried to be calm, because they told us to if this happened, but dammit I want to jump around!”

“Go ahead, she seems fine,” Judy said.

Shonda stood and pumped her first while thrashing her head around. “Yeah! Yeah! Hell yeah!”

Bernie tried to laugh, but it didn’t work. She smiled wide instead.

Another nurse walked in. “Judy, the doctor is on her way.” Then, to Bernie, “Welcome back, Ms. Maven.”

Searching for some way to say, “Thanks,” from across the room, Bernie nodded and closed her eyes for a moment, then looked up at her and smiled.

Shonda straightened her blouse and pushed a few straggling hairs behind her ears. “Okay, I think that’s all of that for now.” She composed herself and her smile faded to a toothless grin. “You’ve been to Hell and back. As soon as you’re ready, we’re going to celebrate.”

“That’s going to be a while,” Judy said.

“Who saved me?” Bernie wrote.

“Our surgical team spent hours working on you, but no single person, really.”

Bernie shook her head and scribbled out more. “No. I was passed out in a shack.” She consciously wrote “a” instead of “my.” She motioned to Shonda to come read it.

“Who saved you from your shack?” Shonda said. “Glenda.”

Bernie’s eyes opened wide. “Not dead?” she wrote.

“Not even close. She was hurt, but she played possum. She figured if Nathan tried anything else on you, she would catch him by surprise, but after he left, she just picked you up and walked out to West Main to flag down a car. Tough lady.”

Nathan? Bernie’s heart raced. She tried to write a note saying it was Jeff.

“Calm down, Bernie. I can’t read that.”

“Her heart rate is 100 and her BP’s rising,” Judy said.

The other nurse rushed back into the room.

Bernie didn’t want to be drugged. She needed answers, so she tried to rein in her reaction. Why do they think it was Nathan?

“She’s leveling off,” Judy said. “There. I think she’s okay.”

Bernie fought to keep her hand still enough to write. “It was Jeff,” she wrote.

Shonda looked at it a moment, then seemed to comprehend. “No, sweetie, it was Nathan. Nathan Kern, from Pop Kern’s store. Glenda said she got a good look at him. Maybe you’re just getting confused because you’ve been out for so long, and Jeff was on your mind that night.”

“Confusion about the trauma is not unusual,” Judy said.

Bernie nodded and poked the notepad repeatedly. It was Jeff! It was Jeff!

“Jeff was with Jeremy at a movie,” Shonda said. “Look, I know I freaked you out a little bit when I told you all that stuff, but Jeff could never do that to you. He was into you. Besides, you know Nathan’s had it out for you since high school. When we saw him at the store that day and he saw you doing better, it must have pushed him over the edge.”

But you told me you thought staying away from Jeff was a good idea. Stupefied, Bernie closed her eyes.

“I can’t believe you almost died, Bernie,” Shonda said. “I died twice, but the doctors brought me back to life with toothpaste and extracted the devil from my rectum.”

“We do have excellent surgeons,” Judy said.

They both smiled with mouths somehow too wide, and sinister, unblinking eyes.

“Whatsa matter, Bernie, vent got your tongue?” Shonda said and laughed maniacally.

I must be dreaming. Please, somebody wake me up!

“Ms. Maven, can you hear me?” said a voice she did not recognize.

Bernie opened her eyes. A woman, maybe 50 years old, leaned over her and shined a penlight in her eyes. Bernie squinted.

Behind the woman, the same painting of a flowery field hung on the wall. “In case of emergency, press red call button,” was printed on the sign beneath it.

How much of that was a dream?

Her muscles tense, she turned her head. Shonda sat in a chair reading a book called Make Your Travel Dollars Worth a Fortune. On the table, next to two sodas, was another book, its cover advising, Fly Free, Stay Cheap.

Bernie tapped the bed rail.

Shonda looked up. “Hey, you’re awake,” she said and put both hands around one of Bernie’s. “You think you might stay awake this time? You’ve been in and out all day.”

Unsure how much had been real, Bernie looked over to the closet door. The greeting cards still were there.

“I wanted to tell you that I’m really sorry about what happened to you. I just can’t believe it.” Shonda said.

Bernie relaxed. “Glenda?” she wrote.

“You remember that Glenda was there? She saved you. Somehow dragged herself and you to the foreman’s trailer. Thank God he was there doing some paperwork. Glenda insisted he help you instead of her. So, he used whatever first aid and CPR skills he had and kept you alive until the EMT’s got there. By then, Glenda was dead. Poor thing.

“With her gone, the police had nothing to go on. Somebody told them there was animosity between you and her, so at first they thought you two had been in a fight. Do you remember what happened?”

“Jeff did it,” Bernie wrote.

Shonda jerked her hands away from Bernie and put them on her horrified face. “Oh my God. I’m so sorry. I never should have let you out of the car that night.” She grabbed Bernie’s hand again. “I tried to tell Jeremy it might have been Jeff, but he wouldn’t listen. He started to believe me a couple weeks later, though.

“After Jeff went back to Curtiston, he had a blowup with a man who was trying to force him out of office. The guy turned up dead and someone reported seeing somebody who looked like Jeff leaving the scene. Now he’s sitting in Lawson County Jail waiting to be transferred for trial. I’m sure the prosecution will want to hear your story, as soon as you feel up to it. That sick son of a bitch.”

Bernie squeezed Shonda’s hand and wrote, “I will tell them everything.”

Bernie is a poverty-stricken woman whose life takes an unexpected turn when an old friend returns to town. This is Part Eleven.

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12|…

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

Part Eleven

Bernie felt she was being carried, cradled like a baby. Warm air hit her face in short, rhythmic bursts — is that someone breathing? — but she couldn’t open her eyes. Cold and pain wracked her body, and then all feeling disappeared.

——-

Now she was lying on her back, dull pain in her chest and an unfamiliar fullness in her mouth and throat. She felt like she was suffocating.

Her arms felt like lead, and she realized when she tried to lift them that her wrists were restrained. Unable to draw her own breath, she broke out in sweat and her heart raced. She arched her back and then felt restraints on her ankles, too.

She tried to shout, “Help!” but got nothing, not even a hoarse yell. Her hearing aids were not in.

A nurse rushed over with a syringe and injected it into a tube leading into an IV. Bernie’s vision faded and everything went dark.

——-

A dull ache came from the base of her throat. Tiled drop ceiling loomed overhead. The unnatural smell of hospital washed over her, but when she tried to hold her breath, somehow she was still breathing.

Where am I? What’s going on?

She tried to speak, but nothing came out, not even her own voice vibrating inside her head. Her breathing was fast and she had no control over it. She just wanted to breathe. She reached up and grabbed the tube that seemed to be coming out of her throat, and yanked it hard.

Her lungs stopped filling without her consent, but something wasn’t right. She couldn’t get a full breath. A light flashed in her peripheral vision.

She sobbed and felt her heart pounding. Her mind raced with questions. Why did Jeff attack me? Is Glenda dead? Where is Shonda?

Suddenly three nurses surrounded her, two holding down Bernie’s arms. On all their faces she saw surprise, delight, concern, and determination. They were working quickly, apparently toward a common goal. One, who said more than the others and seemed to be in charge, re-attached the tube Bernie had pulled. The only thing Bernie could read from her lips was, “bee pee.”

The leader’s hand shot out and held open each of Bernie’s eyes in rapid succession, pausing only to flood each with blinding white light. She nodded to one of her colleagues and said something Bernie could not hear.

A nurse held up a syringe, pushed the air bubbles out, and turned her back to Bernie. No, not again. Her eyes fluttered closed.

——-

Bernie woke up uncomfortable and confused. She didn’t know if she had been dreaming. Did Jeff stab me? With a hazy memory from an earlier episode, she fought the urge to panic.

She couldn’t remember the medical term, but she knew there was a breathing tube inserted directly into her neck. Her mind pulled up George Clooney on “ER” blowing into the end of a Bic pen he had inserted into a boy’s neck.

She licked her lips. It had never felt so good.

Where is everybody? She tried to say, “Hello,” but nothing came out.

Her pulse quickened, but still she managed to keep herself from panicking.

In rushed a young woman, maybe 30 years old, with dirty blonde hair cropped level with her jawline. She wore dark green scrubs and white SAS shoes. A stethoscope draped over her neck.

She flashed Bernie a wide, welcoming smile. Clumps of mascara clung to her eyelashes and her rouge verged on clown makeup. Bernie read “Ms. Maven,” from her lips, but the rest was gibberish, so she just stared at her and tried to pick out her words.

The nurse grabbed her hand and started patting it. “Ms. Maven,” and then more words Bernie could not decipher. She put her hand under Bernie’s and pooched her lips out for what must have been a meaningful word, but looked silly in silence. Bernie just stared as the woman’s smile faded.

The nurse pulled out a stubby penlight from her scrubs chest pocket and punched a button on the end. She took aim, point blank, at Bernie’s eye and temporarily blinded her with white light. Then she did the other eye.

Again the woman moved her mouth as if speaking, and still Bernie had no idea what to do or say in response. Frustrated and aware that her caregiver was concerned, she lifted her arm and pointed to her own ear.

Relief swept over the nurse’s face. She walked over to a drawer and pulled out a zippered plastic bag that held Bernie’s hearing aids. She flipped the tiny switch on each and carefully inserted them into Bernie’s ears, then backed up so Bernie could see her face.

It was faint, but Bernie heard the ventilator as it inhaled.

“I forgot about those. Can you hear me?” she said.

Bernie nodded slightly, but this time resisted the urge to speak.

“Good. Now, don’t try to talk too much yet. We’ll see about unhooking the vent from that tracheostomy and getting you some water. That should help. Then, we’ll work on talking. Now, can you squeeze my hand?”

Bernie did.

“Good. What is one plus one?”

Bernie folded down all but two fingers on her right hand.

“Very good. You can hear me and you seem to understand me. I’m sure you have a million questions right now, but I can only tell you what I know about you medically. Do you want to hear it now?”

Bernie nodded.

“You were stabbed, and the knife hit a lung and an artery. You lost a lot of blood, but the surgeons were able to help. You’ve been out for about a month, and it’s good to finally see your eyes.”

The young woman bustled about checking monitors and charts. Despite all the technology in the room, she gently turned Bernie’s arm palm-up and laid two fingers on her wrist to check her pulse. She pulled a blood pressure cuff from a drawer and strapped it around her upper arm, then rapidly squeezed the black bulb. The cuff tightened.

Bernie’s memory flashed back to Jeff’s strong grip on her arm as she cocked it to throw a bottle at Glenda. He had been firm, but not malicious. Later, in her shack, although he had meant to kill her, he had not seemed angry. Instead, he was frighteningly calm as he worked to — what had he said? To add her soul to his collection?

“Oh, you have goosebumps. Are you cold?” the nurse said.

Bernie slowly shook her head. Recalling anything right now was like looking through thick fog. She heard the rip of Velcro as the nurse released the blood pressure cuff.

She thought she could move enough to write. She made a pinch gesture and mimed handwriting motion. The nurse stepped back over to the drawers.

Carefully, Bernie turned her head to the left. A door stood between two windows, drapes wide open to reveal a white hallway. To the right, painted white drywall stared back. In front of her was the same, except for a sign and a painting of a flowery field.

The flowers were yellow and orange and comprised the bottom half of the painting. Across the middle was a line of trees of varying heights, a white farmhouse among them. In the distance stood a mountain range of rolling hills. Above it all was a blue sky with soft white clouds.

The sign below it read, “In case of emergency, press red call button.”

She lay there thinking that she should have pushed a big red button a long time ago. Scared that nobody would answer, instead she had languished in her grief and lingered in a damaging environment. Leaving behind all that she had known, the good and the bad, had never seemed possible.

Then came Shonda. Where is she?

“Here’s that pen and paper. That’s what you wanted, right?”

Bernie nodded and opened her fingers to accept the pen. The nurse gently placed it in her hand and set down a pad of paper bearing the name University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences.

Bernie is a poverty-stricken woman whose life takes an unexpected turn when an old friend returns to town. This is Part Ten.

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|…

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

Part Ten

Bernie sighed, feeling frustrated and, for the first time since she had become homeless, devoid of control. Unless she wanted to risk severe injury, she was Shonda’s captive until the car stopped. Her life to that point hadn’t been ideal, but it had been hers.

If you work this right, then you won’t ever live on the streets again.

What did Shonda mean by that? What grand plan had she and her husband concocted? Was Jeff involved?

She wasn’t sure of anything, and that was what worried her. On top of everything else that had happened since she woke up that morning, it looked like it wouldn’t be Trout Day, after all. She hadn’t missed Trout Day in two years, since that time Glenda had ruined it.

She sat and wondered how crazy it would be to ask Shonda to turn the car around and drop her off at her shack on Searcy Street, or after they arrived at the Red Apple Inn, to politely thank her for the clothes, change back into her own, and walk away. Or should she have her date with Jeff and just see if it led anywhere?

The car glided along the two-lane highway, where an old familiar sight jarred Bernie into the past. Without any reason to travel that direction, and no easy way to get there, she had almost forgot about the cemetery that held her grandparents from her father’s side. Guilt washed over her as the headstones blurred past. She didn’t feel any closer to them at their graves than at their former home or on the opposite side of the world, but being there had been important to them, and not once had she gone to visit.

Bernie tried to think of nothing as they entered Eden Isle, the realm of mostly retirees who had moved there from out of state for the cheap taxes and low cost of living. It also served as home to The Red Apple Inn and its attached 18-hole golf course. Shonda slowed at the gatehouse and mumbled something to the man inside.

They turned left and headed up a forested hill. Undisturbed pine woods on the right stood in contrast to the opposite side of the road, where a break in the woods revealed a lush, finely manicured green. Golf carts flashed in and out of pine trees’ long shadows traversing the cross-cut fairway.

At the top of the hill the trees broke and Bernie saw more of the golf course on the left, the Red Apple Inn on the right.

“I wasn’t supposed to meet Jeff until seven,” Bernie said.

Shonda turned to Bernie as she pulled into the Inn’s pea gravel parking lot. “That’s okay. It’s 5:30 already. We can go to the bar and have a few drinks.”

“Is it a noisy bar? Because I won’t be able to hear you if it is.”

“No, it isn’t that kind of bar,” Shonda said. “Very laid back.”

“This is so weird,” Bernie said. “I haven’t been to the Red Apple since prom.”

Shonda guided the car into an open spot between two SUV’s. “I used to come here every Easter. After church my dad treated us and my cousins’ family to lunch. Then we all grew up and my grandmother couldn’t get comfortable at a restaurant. We just drove through Eddie’s Taco House and ate at her kitchen table.”

“That’s a switch,” Bernie said. “That was more my family’s speed.”

“Yeah, well, there were things I liked better about both. After I moved away and got married, I liked any chance I got to spend time in her house.”

Bernie thought of what would happen to her when she got older. As her body started to falter, wandering around town scrounging for survival would cease to be an option. Who would bother to bring food to her? Nobody would look forward to visiting whatever ramshackle place served as her home.

With those ideas filling her head and even darker thoughts lurking, she decided to see the evening through. She would go on her date with Jeff (is it really a date?) and hear what Shonda and Jeremy had to say. Waking up on a dirt floor started to feel a lifetime away.

Bernie at first had trouble walking, ankles wobbling as the new boots crunched the gravel.

“Those heels aren’t high, Bernie. Come on,” Shonda said.

“They’re pretty high when all you have are sneakers.”

Bernie remembered from school that the Inn was designed by a student of Frank Lloyd Wright. Built of large, lichen-mottled gray stones from the surrounding area and hugged by towering trees, it almost seemed to belong on the hillside. It fit Wright’s idea that a structure should be “of the hill, not on the hill.” Austere rather than ostentatious, the Inn’s design made it both notable in the field of architecture and a standout among its modern country club peers.

Or at least that’s what she remembered from class.

To Bernie, it looked like a structure at a state park. Functional, not fancy, and very attractive to native dirt dauber wasps. The perfect place to eat cold casseroles prepared by distant relatives seen once a year.

Though tables were available, they sat at the bar. Bernie was reminded of Whitaker’s soda fountain. Shonda ordered a Tom Collins, and after Bernie followed suit they caught each other up on what they had been doing since high school.

For his part, the bartender kept the drinks coming.

Shonda’s path, though much smoother than Bernie’s, sounded mind-numbingly boring. She got through most of her college education before finally giving in to Jeremy’s oft-repeated marriage proposals. Two years ahead of them in school, he already was out making good money when Shonda’s senior year started.

Bernie swallowed a big sip and held up one finger as she pulled her drink from her mouth. “Define ‘good money,’” she said.

“Don’t be one of those ‘root of all evil’ people. Earning a living is a worthy ambition. Besides, we see each other a lot. It’s not like he’s gone all the time.”

Shonda had finished college and established a successful career as a financial analyst, but recently quit her job. “I’m just not sure what I want to be when I grow up,” she said.

“So, you weren’t making ‘good money,’” said Bernie, making quotes with her fingers as she finished.

“Okay, okay. Point taken. Bartender! Two more Tom Collins, please.”

Bernie never had taken advantage of anyone who was drunk, but she figured this was a good time to start.

“So, tell me about Jeff. I could have sworn that you said the police didn’t believe he killed that man in self-defense.”

“Well, that’s a complex issue. Jeremy said that’s how it started, but by the time Jeff stopped stabbing, he could have killed the man 10 times over.”

Bernie set down her drink. “I never heard that.”

“Well, even though a cop saw Jeff and Jeremy coming out of the building, by the time the body was found nobody could be sure exactly when the man had been killed. But Jeremy told me everything. Jeff was defending him, alright, but he practically shredded that homeless man.”

The bartender set two new drinks in front of them. Shonda took two quick gulps while Bernie pushed hers away.

“Shredded?” Bernie said.

“He had brought along his favorite pocket knife, and even after he got the guy to let go of Jeremy with the first stab, Jeff pinned him down and just started hacking. Then he stayed there leaning over him for a couple minutes.”

“Maybe he panicked. You know? The adrenaline from seeing his brother in danger.”

“That’s what I prefer to believe.”

“He seems nice,” Bernie offered weakly.

“Perfect gentleman in all respects. Even got himself elected mayor of a small town in northwest Arkansas.”

“Still, I don’t think I can be alone with him after hearing that.”

“Good thinking,” Shonda said, then took a bite of the orange wedge from the side of her glass. “I believe I’m getting drunk.”

Bernie picked a peanut, still in its shell, from a nearby bowl. She cracked it between her thumb and index finger and peeled off the thin, red skin around one of the nuts. Although she wanted to hear more about Jeff, there was another important matter at hand.

“Please, tell me why you brought me here,” Bernie said.

Shonda turned her hand palm up. “I’ll need one of those first, please.”

Bernie’s rough, dry fingers set a nut in Shonda’s supple palm.

“Jeremy’s gonna be pissed.” Shonda sighed and tossed the peanut into her mouth. “At first I was just glad to see you, and it hurt me to see you living on the streets. I wanted to see an old friend, maybe feed you a nice meal.”

Bernie stood.

Shonda grabbed her arm. “No wait. That sounded bad. Sit back down. Okay, now. As soon as I got back in the car, I told Jeremy I had seen you. He remembered who you were. I wanted to do something that would really make a difference, because back in high school after Kenneth tried to –”

“You believed me?” Bernie recalled the knowing look on teenaged Shonda’s face.

“Believed you? My dear, I went through it myself. I just wish I had been on the edge of a cliff. Then he never could have tried the same thing with you.”

“He tried to rape you, too?”

“He succeeded, if you can call something like that a success. I didn’t tell anybody because I wasn’t sure that was what it was, and he was so popular I didn’t want to put my word against his.”

“How awful. I’m so sorry,” Bernie said.

“You’re the one who caught the worst of it. I felt guilty because I could have told you not to go out with him, but I didn’t.”

“We didn’t really hang out back then.”

“Stop being so sweet, Bernie. That was no excuse.” She took another swig. “He ruined your life, and I didn’t speak up to help you. I had worked for years to push it out of my mind. And then, today, to see you living like that… I just…”

Tears streamed down Shonda’s face and dripped into her drink.

Bernie laid a hand over Shonda’s. “Bartender, could we have some more bev naps over here, please?” she said.

Shonda mopped up her face. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m just so sorry for everything you’ve been through.”

“Don’t apologize. We were kids back then. Lots of things change. Not all of the right things sometimes, but we’re here talking now. That’s new.”

“We came up with a plan. Well, I did, but Jeremy seemed okay with it. I told him I want to start my own business, and I knew you had managed your husband’s company for a while.”

“But you said that you didn’t keep up with the hometown much.”

“When I heard you were married and running your husband’s business, I thought you were doing okay. I didn’t have anything else back here to worry about, and I kind of stopped asking about you. Part of me didn’t want to know if something had gone wrong again.

“Anyway,” Shonda continued, “I told Jeremy I thought I could hire you to be my business manager.”

“For a business doing what?” Bernie said.

Shonda drew the tiny plastic sword from her drink and sucked the cherry off the end. “Writing travel books. I’ve always wanted to travel, and I’ve published a few freelance articles on other topics. But mine would have a twist. I would write guides for people who don’t think they can afford to travel. I would help them tuck away money here and there, and then get by on as little money as possible once they arrive at their destination. That’s where you come in.”

“Well, I’m damn sure the expert on that. I live rent-free and I don’t pay utilities at all. Cable companies don’t know I exist, and I don’t have a car payment or insurance premiums. Everybody wants to be me.”

“Don’t make fun. I might be tipsy, but I can kick your ass. I listen to Mozart while I do Tae Bo.”

“Oh, God, I haven’t heard that song in ages. Please keep it that way. So, how does my hearing problem fit into all this?”

“I’ll do most of the talking. So, what do you say, Bernie? You want to be my business manager, slash research assistant, slash travel buddy?”

“What’s the catch?”

“You can’t have anything tying you down, and at first you have to be willing to work in exchange for having all your expenses paid.”

“Check, and check.” Bernie said.

“Does that mean you’ll do it?”

Bernie grabbed her drink and slid it closer. “Yes, I will. There are a few things I need to wrap up here, a few folks I need to say goodbye to. Almost everybody wants nothing to do with me, but a few have kept me going. I don’t want them to think I just died or something horrible like that. If you could take me to the fish hatchery, I can get started tonight.”

“The fish hatchery?”

“Long story.”

Shonda called Jeremy and told him they would have dinner later, and asked him to pass Bernie’s apology to Jeff for breaking their date. “Well, he’s just going to have to be disappointed,” she said.

Bernie told Shonda about Trout Day while they drove back through town and up to the north side, just across Greers Ferry Dam. “Bill pulls out a nice, big trout for me every time he works security out there. He never knows more than a week in advance where he’ll be working. Then I just go over to one of the campsites at Dam Site Park and cook it up. Delicious.”

“See, that’s the kind of thing I need for my guides.”

“It’s not exactly legal,” Bernie said.

“Well, we might have to adjust slightly, but the spirit’s there.”

Bernie started to see the potential of their partnership. She never thought that her experience living on the streets would turn out to be lucrative. A voice inside her head suggested she slow down and bit and consider everything more carefully, but it sounded a lot like the one that told her she never could survive if she left Heber Springs.

After bidding Bill and Trout Day goodbye, she rode with Shonda to Lockard’s, to thank Jim Flanagan for letting her eat in exchange for the occasional odd job. “I’d like to walk to my place from here,” Bernie said.

“Why?” Shonda said.

“I’d rather nobody see it.”

Reluctantly, Shonda agreed to meet her back at Lockard’s in an hour.

The night air was cold, but the borrowed sweater and the brisk walk warmed Bernie. Like a schoolgirl, she giddily crossed a steel conduit over Town Creek, arms outstretched to keep her balance. She saddened as she walked through the parking lot of the dilapidated shell of Town and Country, the first place she remembered going grocery shopping with her parents. Despite all the pain she had suffered through the years, the town held happy memories, too.

On the same side of the road were more buildings she once knew well but that for years had been filled with businesses quite different from those she had frequented. To one, her mother used to take her once a month to choose a ceramic figure to paint. She first rented a video in the place next door.

The first place she pumped gas, the first restaurant she remembered. The only place she ever bought a car.

After turning down Searcy Street, she almost skipped as she made her last walk to her last shack. The bulldozers had crept closer since that morning, their indifferent destruction now within 25 yards of her achingly humble abode.

Bernie opened the door and let the construction trailer’s yellow sulfur light shine on the opposite wall and her makeshift bed. It all seemed unbelievable. Would she really never sleep on the ground again, unless by choice?

She set a rock against the door to keep the spring from slamming it shut, and then stepped inside.

A strong arm wrapped around her from behind and pinned her arms while a hand clapped over her mouth. Something struck the back of her legs, buckling them and sending her to her knees. Her attacker followed her down.

A familiar man’s voice said, “You broke our date, so I had to drop in unannounced. You offer something unique, Bernice. You have killed, yet did so accidentally. Oh, the torment I will feel from your soul as it courses through me. It promises to be more rewarding than any of the others.”

Others?

He took his hand off her mouth.

Pain pierced her back and ran through to her chest.

She got one knee off the ground and pushed off with that foot. They both fell backward, Bernie landing on top.

“Oh, yes, fight it. That will only enhance my experience,” Jeff said.

Bathed in yellow light, Bernie saw a shadow move across the wall. She turned her head toward the door. There stood a tall, dark figure in perfect Silhouette. Behind it was the distinct shape of a wagon.

“Glenda, help!” Bernie screamed.

The large woman rushed in and easily picked up Bernie, then pushed her aside. She turned and squinted at the light to find Jeff, but jerked back suddenly and fell onto Bernie’s sleeping pad.

“Glenda!” Bernie shouted. Glenda twitched a few times and then stopped moving.

Bernie felt dizzy and weak, like the time she gave blood at noon without having a meal that morning. She tried to will her body to stand, but she could only slowly collapse next to her former nemesis.

“Oh, this is a nasty wrinkle. You shall help me press it out, Bernice.”

Bernie was too weak to move, and her vision was blurring.

Jeff grabbed a corner of Bernie’s tattered blanket and wiped the knife down. He used it to hold the knife as he pressed it into Glenda’s hand, and then left it in Bernie’s and closed her fingers around the handle.

He said something, but she couldn’t quite make it out and couldn’t read his lips. He sat there waiting, staring her down until her eyes blinked open only once every — how long was it? She couldn’t tell.

Jeff stood and walked to the door. His shadowed form waved as it kicked away Bernie’s doorstop.

The light went out.

(to be continued)

Bernie is a poverty-stricken woman whose life takes an unexpected turn when an old friend returns to town. This is Part Nine.

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|…

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

Part Nine

Leaning over, Bernie wedged her thumb and index finger into the denim-blue, square-toed Annie Kia ankle boot and pulled up the inside zipper. She stood up straight to look at herself in the dirty mirror, but also saw Shonda’s reflection stuffing filthy clothes into a plastic garbage bag. She couldn’t believe she had been wearing those less than an hour earlier.

Bernie loved her new look. Besides the spot between her eyebrows — the makeup thicker there to cover the redness caused by the plucking — her face looked natural. The bra provided a little lift that helped her fill out the gold sweater. The jeans, not an easy item to pick for someone else, fit almost perfectly.

“Now what’s that stuff you put in my hair?” Bernie asked.

“Shaping putty. Mainly at the roots. With your natural curl, you don’t need anything else.”

Shonda dropped the garbage bag and stepped over to the mirror. She handed Bernie a pair of small, gold hoop earrings, then turned on the faucet and started washing her hands. “You look great. The jeans are a little short, but the boots help hide that,” she said. “Your butt looks good. You can always tell an older woman from behind these days because you can actually find her butt. Teenagers have completely lost theirs.”

Bernie laughed. “I don’t understand those low-rider jeans, either. Most of them don’t need to be showing off their bellies, anyway.”

“See, Bernie, all these years separated, and we agree on fashion. We’re kindred spirits,” Shonda said as she yanked a paper towel from the dirty dispenser.

Bernie clipped the earrings onto her lobes and turned her head back and forth slowly to see how they looked. Her eyes were drawn to her hearing aids. “Since I got these, I haven’t had much reason to worry about the way I look,” she said.

“If I didn’t already know they were there, I wouldn’t notice,” Shonda said. She pulled the red handle-ties on the bag of Bernie’s old clothes and cinched it shut. “I’ll carry these. I think I’ve been in this room long enough. You ready?”

“Ready, Freddie,” Bernie said through a smile.

They strolled down the hall, past a handwritten sign that read, “Soaps and clean towels available on request. Deodorant available in store. Thx, Mgmt.”

Shonda turned right, around the end of the refrigerated drink cases. She slid open one of the glass doors and grabbed a 20-oz bottle of Diet Coke. “You want one?”

“Sure,” Bernie said. She couldn’t remember the last time she spent money on a soda. “But I prefer Dr. Pepper, regular.”

“Dr. Pepper it is.” She pulled one out and handed it to Bernie.

They approached the counter together and set their wares next to Pop’s crossword puzzle book.

Pop finished filling in a “G” and looked up. “Together?”

Both nodded, then looked at each other and smiled knowingly.

“That’ll be two American dollars and two bits, lovely ladies.”

Shonda handed him a five dollar bill. Pop made change.

“Thanks, Pop,” Bernie said.

Pop’s mouth opened slightly and his eyes brightened. “Is that you, Little Bernie?”

“A hundred percent. What do you think?”

“Well I’ll be dipped. You clean up real nice. What are you ladies up to?”

“Dinner at the Red Apple,” Bernie said.

Pop looked back down at his crossword puzzle. “Trouble. Starts with ‘t’ and ends with ‘e.’” He pointed his pencil at them, “And you be somewhere in the middle.”

——-

The radio in Jeremy’s 300zx showed 105.1, a station Bernie started listening to when she was 14. She had trouble making it out, but thought she heard the last few bars of Lynrd Skynrd’s “Freebird.” Any time that song was over, she was glad. Shonda took her hand off the gearshift to turn up the volume, and out of the speakers came the unforgettable opening to “Sweet Child O’Mine.”

Bernie had not heard it like that since the last time she and Greg had parked his truck near the lake. She and Shonda sang in unison, every word of every verse and chorus, until Bernie took the “where do we go” background to Shonda’s lead. Worry floated away with the words and freedom found a place in Bernie’s heart.

As they drove down Main Street, every corner held memories for her, but the former site of Whitaker’s Drug, along with the cold, sweet sips of Dr. Pepper, transported her back to 1977. Her first time buying her own soda also served as her first real-world lesson about money.

She sat atop a barstool with a padded red seat — the kind that spins. A skinny, severe-looking woman with short brown hair stood behind the rich, maple wood soda fountain bar, patiently waiting until the seven-year-old little girl finished turning circles.

Bernie stopped and let the dizziness fade, then looked up at the menu. “Cherry ice. Twenty-five cents. I’ll have that, please,” she said as she rubbed the shiny quarter in her pocket.

The woman flipped open a metal lid and scooped ice from under the counter into a glass. Next she poured thick red syrup that divided into thin strands that inched their way slowly over the ice cubes and joined back up at the bottom of the glass. Finally she pulled out a hose with a head that looked like a futuristic gun, aimed it into the glass, and pulled the trigger. Bubbly water filled the glass to make a bright red concoction that tasted like none Bernie had found anywhere since.

“That will be twenty-six cents,” the woman said and set the drink in front of Bernie.

Confused, Bernie pointed to the menu. “But it says twenty-five cents,” she said.

“Well, the extra penny is tax.”

“Tax?”

“Just give me what you have. Don’t worry about the penny.”

From that point on, cherry ice was the only thing she ordered from the soda fountain at Whitaker’s, and she always made sure she had a quarter and a penny.

Bernie wanted to live that way again. She wanted to know the cost, pay the price, and not worry where the money would come from the next time. Although she tried not to get her hopes up, she began to believe that perhaps Shonda was her doorway back into that world.

Beyond town to the west, however, along the same road, she was jarred forward to the day only one year after her first cherry ice. They passed the dentist’s office where she and her brother, Scott, had been playing when the bright blue 18-wheeler roared over a hill and took his life.

Less than a half mile farther along, she saw the hospital where she had undergone the rape exam. At the other end of town was Sugarloaf, where Kenneth Wymer had drawn his last breath. She wondered whether, with or without money, she ever could live happily in a town that evoked so many painful memories.

Shonda glanced at Bernie and then accelerated, slowing little as the road led them downhill, sharply to the right. Bernie’s head pressed back hard against the headrest as they reached one of the long earthen dikes bordering Greers Ferry Lake. The cool blue water that opened up on the right contrasted with the forest on the left. Hardwoods, still standing like gray skeletons, were interspersed with dark green pine trees.

Needing answers, Bernie grabbed the radio’s volume knob and turned down Dire Straits’ “Walk of Life.” Shonda looked over at her.

“You’ve done a lot for me already, Shonda, and I appreciate it.” She took a quick breath and let it out slowly. “I need to know what’s going on. I don’t know that my heart can take coming off the streets and then going back.”

“If you work this right, then you won’t ever live on the streets again.”

“Work what right?”

“I can’t tell you that yet. I want to, but I promised Jeremy I would wait.”

Bernie is a poverty-stricken woman whose life takes an unexpected turn when an old friend returns to town. This is Part Eight.

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|…

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

Part Eight

It felt great to be clean. Soap and hot water, taken for granted most of her life, had become a luxury for Bernie. Before life on the streets, a hot tub or a swimming pool caught her attention. Now, a simple chance to get clean comfortably became more than mere daily ablution. She remembered but could no longer relate to patting an alarm clock’s snooze bar and thinking, “I’ll just wash my hair this morning.”

She wrapped herself in the towel, covering from her underarms down to her knees, and pushed aside the shower curtain. Bernie stepped out and, despite the way she had been living, was scared to guess what might attach itself to her skin. She winced as each thickly calloused foot touched the damp cement floor.

The shower room door opened a few inches. Through it came a pair of jeans and a gold sweater on hangers, held up by a woman’s unadorned right hand. The scent of honeysuckle floated in with them.

“Shonda?” Bernie said. She pulled the door open. It was her new, old friend.

Shonda smiled and said, “Hi, you!”

Bernie reached out to the sweater, but stopped just short of touching it. Even in the dingy, dank space, it almost shimmered. “It’s beautiful. You brought this for me?”

“Yes. It reminded me of you. But I brought more, too,” Shonda said and held up a burgundy duffle bag and a clear plastic zippered pouch. The pouch bulged full of makeup, tweezers, a razor, an eyelash curler, and other tools Bernie hadn’t used regularly in years. “Now, you don’t have to use all of this, but I wanted to bring it just in case.” She pointed at the duffle bag. “Panties, bra, socks, and shoes.”

Bernie felt like she was 17 again, and her friend from down the street had come to help her prepare for a big date. It should be silly, she thought, but it wasn’t.

“Oh, God, hand me those tweezers. How did you get Nathan to tell you which shower I was in?”

“You know how he is.” Shonda crossed the room and hung the clothes on the shower curtain rod. “He puts on a show but can’t back it up with a spine.”

“Sometimes he’s pretty tough with me,” Bernie said.

Shonda laughed as she sat on a folding metal chair. “Because you wouldn’t go out with him back in school.”

“That little creep? You bet your ass I wouldn’t.” Bernie leaned near the mirror and used the tweezers to grab several hairs between her eyebrows. She yanked. “Ouch! But I don’t think that’s Nathan’s only problem with me.”

Shonda’s smile faded. “You mean… Kenneth?”

“Yeah. He was a jock, you know. Even though they never managed to win a game, those boys were close.” She plucked another bundle of hairs above the bridge of her nose, then tapped the metal tweezer on the ceramic sink. “Oh, my God. I was a sasquatch.”

“No, you weren’t,” Shonda said. “You should have seen my eyebrows in my wedding pictures. Pretty scary. I can’t believe nobody told me to do something with those before that.”

“As far as Nathan and Kenneth go,” Shonda continued, “just forget about all that. I thought you had moved on from it.”

“I did. I met a man from out of town. Greg Dumond. He bought out Smithson Ready-Mix and brought me on as his administrative assistant. Good timing, too, because nobody else here would hire me. I practically ran that place. We fell in love. Got married. Folks mostly ignored him at first, but they had depended on Smithson so much that they had to work with him. He made enough friends that they started working on him. He started saying he felt like he didn’t even know me. Like he married a stranger.”

“What did you do?”

“Tried to convince him I was innocent, that everybody was being unfair. You know what Greg said?”

“What?”

“That it didn’t really matter, because I was bad for business.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I wish.”

“That son of a bitch. But how did you end up on the streets?”

“He sold out and moved. Never paid a cent of alimony. I couldn’t find a decent job, but I didn’t want to leave here.”

“What about your folks? Couldn’t they take you in?”

“You didn’t know?” Bernie said.

“No, I really haven’t kept up with the old hometown.”

Bernie set down the tweezers, turned to face Shonda, and sat on the edge of the sink. She tried to make sure she left out nothing important.

——-

Her mother and father won a U.S. Virgin Islands trip by scrawling a quiz answer on a 3×5 index card. It was a bright spot after practically being shunned as the parents whose daughter had hurled a popular boy off a mountainside. Her father finally took some time off from the Aromatique plant, and off they went to island-hop around the Caribbean in a chartered sailboat.

Before leaving they took a short course in diving so they could take advantage of the clear water. While not as clear as that part of the sea, nearby Greers Ferry Lake was a popular spot for Scuba training. Although they were the oldest people in the class, they were in shape and quickly earned their certification.

On the yacht, they at first felt a bit out of their element, but soon discovered much in common with the wealthy vacationers aboard.

“They even met one of the Yarnells,” Bernie said.

“Of Yarnell’s Ice Cream?”

“Yep.”

“Cool.” Shonda pulled out a long black comb and started slowly pulling it through Bernie’s damp hair.

Bernie continued.

She and Greg had just left the high school band’s spring concert. They sat in his pickup, in the parking lot. “I don’t want you to stay there. Two weeks is too long,” Greg said.

“It’s my parents’ house, and they don’t want to leave it empty while they’re gone,” Bernie said.

“You’re my wife. You belong here with your husband.”

“You already told me you’re not sure you still love me. Why should you care?”

“It’s complicated. Look, Bernie, just don’t do this. I don’t want people talking about us more than they already do.”

“Screw them. I’ve learned to stop caring what most people think. There aren’t enough years in my life to please everybody else.”

“You killed that boy.”

“Defended myself, thank you.”

A knock came at Bernie’s window. She turned to see pastor Pete Gist, the man who had picked her up only moments after her frantic trip down Sugarloaf Mountain — the last time her feet touched ground anywhere near it. Her window squeaked in protest as she cranked it down to find out what Pete wanted.

“You two coming to couples’ class in the morning? Ruth has a real special lesson for us.”

“Ruth who?” Bernie said.

“Ruth, from the Bible,” Pete said. “You know, the book of Ruth?”

“Never heard of it,” Greg muttered. Then, louder and with a smile, “We’ll be there, brother Pete.”

“Good to hear it. Well, I’ll let you go on about your business. Have a good evening.”

They said nothing on the drive home. Greg gave a nod to all drivers who met his gaze, a behavior he had learned in the few years since moving there, but avoided looking at Bernie.

At home they remained silent. To pack her things for her two weeks away, Bernie dug out the big suitcase so she could avoid having to come back home. Her Bible sat in a stack of books next to the luggage. She thought again of Ruth. It seemed she remembered that name.

She opened the Bible and flipped the impossibly thin pages to the short book of Ruth. One passage was highlighted yellow. Ruth’s mother-in-law had instructed her and her sisters, whose husbands all had died, to return to their own mothers and remarry. The only one who stayed, Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the LORD deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me.”

That was the kind of devotion she and Greg had sworn to each other. Did promises mean anything? Bernie sat on the bed and cried.

Her first week at her childhood home went fine. Each day she drove into work at the ready-mix plant, and spoke to Greg barely enough to run the business. Back at the house she looked longingly through photo albums from her childhood. Her first Girl Scout cookie meeting, her first Bike-A-Thon for St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital. Nothing was that simple or that happy anymore.

On the tenth day, as Bernie rummaged through her father’s music collection, the phone rang. Figuring it was Greg, she left it alone, but after seven rings she knew it wasn’t him. Nobody waited seven rings. Something was wrong. She set down Carole King’s Tapestry, one of her father’s favorite records and walked to the phone table in the family room.

She took a deep breath and answered. “Hello?”

“Hello, Mrs. Dumond?”

“For now, yes.”

“Excuse me?”

“Nothing. How can I help you?”

“Well, Mrs. Dumond, I’m the captain of St. Martin’s Pride, and there’s been an accident.”

“What?” Bernie sat in her father’s old recliner. “What happened?”

“He had a mild heart attack during a dive and got into trouble under water. We got him back on board as quickly as possible and administered CPR, but he had gone without oxygen too long. The only hyperbaric chamber is in a hospital on St. Thomas. We tried our best to get him there in time, but the doctors couldn’t help him.”

“What do you mean ‘couldn’t help him?’ He’s… dead?”

“He didn’t make it.”

“Oh my God. Oh my God. Dad!” Bernie’s breath quickened. Her heart pounded. “No, no. This isn’t right. Someone put you up to this. This is one of you bastards playing a trick on me.”

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Dumond –”

“Stop calling me that!”

“I just… I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Wait. Mom. Where’s my mother?”

“She’s with your father right now. She wasn’t up to talking to anybody just yet. Will you help her make new travel arrangements? Right now their return flight isn’t for another four days, but we knew she probably wouldn’t want to wait that long.”

Shocked, Bernie steadied her hand enough to scribble down the information the captain gave her.

“How awful. I’m so sorry,” Shonda said, now holding the comb still against Bernie’s scalp.

“It was the worst, but I’ve had years to cry over that. You know, even with all the trouble I caused them, that church was full of people just off shift from Aromatique. It was the sweetest smelling funeral in history.”

Shonda continued combing. “So your mother’s still living in their house?”

“She did for a while, but she’s buried next to Dad now. Something about losing him made her lose her will to do anything. They had me when they were older, so by now she’d be about 75.”

“You’ve been through so much.”

“Let’s stop talking about the past,” Bernie said. “Give me that comb. You’re like one of Cinderella’s stepsisters with that thing.”

Bernie is a poverty-stricken woman whose life takes an unexpected turn when an old friend returns to town. This is Part Seven.

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|…

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

Part Seven

“Kenneth! Are you okay?” Bernie yelled. The terror in her voice frightened her.

She stayed there waiting to hear anything — a whimper, a cry, any human sound, waft up from the darkness below the cliff. The call of a distant whippoorwill was all she heard.

After several minutes without any response from Kenneth, she got on her hands and knees and crawled away from the edge. She awkwardly stood and pulled up her pants, tears splashing onto the backs of her hands as she worked to zip and button her shorts. It was then she first realized she was crying. Despite what Kenneth had tried to do, her intent was not to kill him.

She wanted to get away quickly to find help, but from Sugarloaf’s peak that would have meant flying.

Instead she had to carefully work her way back down the narrow crevasse most commonly used by casual climbers, a feat she never had accomplished alone. She jumped across a narrow gap to get to the spot where she could begin her descent. Wriggling backward toward the ledge felt unnatural and scary with nobody waiting below, but she scooted until her feet found toe-holds and only her arms and head remained above the ledge.

Breathing between sobs, she methodically worked her way down the 12-foot drop to an area about 10 feet wide and surrounded by rock. She stopped and took two deep breaths. The rest was almost as easy as walking down stairs.

Once she reached the bottom of the rock, the leaves blocked out most of the moonlight. Relying on her memory of many walks down that hill, she ran the smooth stretches and slowed only when it got rough. Switchback after switchback she did this, before nearly sprinting the final straight downhill stretch. As she emerged from the woods into the field below, the moon set ablaze the dual yellow stripes running up the hood of Kenneth’s Chevelle. They seemed to glow within the dark green paint, parallel beacons of hope.

But Bernie didn’t have the keys.

“Dammit!” She stopped and leaned on the car, her legs shaking and her left big toe throbbing.

Somewhere on the opposite side of the mountain, Kenneth lay dying or dead, and she had nothing but her legs to carry her. If he was hurt, she was sure there was no way she could get help in time.

Seeing no other choice, she ran along hardpan ruts in the dusty gravel road. With the back of her hands she wiped away the streaming tears. She ran a short distance along Highway 110 before Pete Gist, the youth minister at the local First United Methodist Church, picked her up and took her to the hospital. She closed her eyes as they drove past the spot where her brother was killed.

“Nurse, prep a Vitullo kit in exam four,” said Frank McLain. He had delivered Bernie and was the only family doctor she had known. Of all the people who could have been on emergency duty that night, Dr. McLain was there.

Bernie sat in a gray metal chair, a portable stainless steel tray beside her, trying to place the smell in the air. It was unnatural, like nowhere else in the world.

McLain handed her a tissue. “Here, Bernice, take this, but just pat your eyes, don’t wipe.”

“What’s a Vitullo?” Bernie asked. She dabbed her eyes with the tissue.

“It’s a rape kit,” McLain said.

She blew her nose, then set the tissue on the tray. “But he didn’t actually rape me.”

“It’s something we should do, to protect you and your family,” he said. “Barbara will be in there, too. You remember her, one of my nurses? You can wait with her while I call your parents.”

“My parents?” Fresh tears fell. Her tissue spent, she wiped her face with her hands.

“I want to clear the exam with them first. You’re still just 17, right?”

“Yes.”

McLain led her to exam four, which was just one of several hospital beds in the same room. Rings on what looked like a shower curtain jangled along a semicircular rod as he pulled the curtain around one of the beds to form a cramped space.

“You can sit or lie down here while I go call,” McLain said.

Although it was the same doctor, the exam was nothing like her usual gynecological visit. McLain seemed tense and unsure how to handle the instruments. Twice she felt sharp pain and he apologized. Nurse Barbara held her hand and spoke in comforting tones, but Bernie wasn’t listening.

She replayed the events over and over. After just a few minutes of that, questions pushed out everything else. Why had Kenneth turned on her? Had she done something wrong? Would she get in trouble?

When the exam was over, she had no time to think before the police and her parents showed up.

“Tell us exactly what happened, ma’am,” said the young officer. It was Dale Regan, a high school football star when Bernie was in grade school.

Bernie’s mother grabbed her hand. “Oh, my sweet girl,” she said. “It must have been just awful.”

“Now, let Dale do his job, dear,” Bernie’s father said. Then, to Bernie, “Go ahead, honey, tell them everything. We’re here for you.”

She told the truth about what happened that night, but only her parents seemed to believe it. Kenneth was very popular, an athlete talented in football, basketball, and baseball. He wasn’t a mean boy, consensus said.

Though no legal action was taken, for years almost the entire town blamed Bernie for his death. He had trapped her up there on that cliff, had pushed her down and hurt her. He tried to force himself on her, in her. Nobody wanted to hear that she had defended herself, and she didn’t dare suggest that maybe he deserved what he got.

It wasn’t just adults. Even at school she found no respite, reading accusation in all her friend’s eyes.

Everybody except Shonda. Although they never had spoken of it, Bernie thought she saw a look of understanding on Shonda’s face. As if she had some reason to believe.

Now, nearly 20 years after Kenneth’s death, as she dried off with a towel used before by countless truckers, she held out hope that she might finally get some answers.

Bernie is a poverty-stricken woman whose life takes an unexpected turn when an old friend returns to town. This is Part Six.

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|…

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

Part Six

As she ran past the tennis courts, Bernie again saw the couple with matching sweats, now playing tennis. They didn’t notice her.

Not far from them, a young woman aimed what looked like an expensive camera at a park bench. Next she held it so that the end of the lens was within inches of the chain link fence surrounding the courts. Bernie had no idea what the woman was trying to accomplish, but remembered what it was like to spend time doing things that seemed pointless to observers. For longer than she cared to admit to herself, her every action had a clear and practical purpose.

She picked up her two remaining water jugs and filled them, then walked along Main out of town and onto Highway 110. A bottle in each hand, the magnitude of Glenda’s trickery enraged her more with each step. Along with her wagon and two full bottles, Glenda had stolen the plastic crate that doubled as Bernie’s nightstand.

A few miles off sat Sugarloaf Mountain, its distinctive bare rock “loaf” perched atop its steep, tree-lined sides. One of Bernie’s favorite destinations as a little girl, she tried to remember the last time she had climbed it. It must have been that time with the Assembly of God youth group. More than that, she recalled the night she had sneaked out of her house to go there with Kenneth Wymer.

“Come on, baby, please. You’re giving me a rise in my Levi’s,” Kenneth said.

They sat next to each other, their legs hanging over the edge of the mountain’s highest sheer drop, about 100 feet. The moon shone half full in a cloudless sky, reflecting off the Little Red River in the valley below. In stark contrast, in the distance a greenish light reflected off the Greers Ferry Dam’s smooth concrete surface.

“I’m not going to have sex with you on this cliff, for God and everybody to see,” Bernie said.

“Ain’t nobody up here right now.” He unzipped his pants, leaving his desire’s manifestation bound only by tight white underwear. “See what you’re doin’ to me?”

“I haven’t done anything — yet.”

He turned and put his arms around her, his face close enough that beer breath made her crinkle her nose. “It’s so romantic up here. And I’m about to bust out of my BVD’s.”

“Let go, Kenneth.” She grabbed his hands and pulled them off her shoulders.

“Stop movin’ around or we’ll both fall,” he said.

“Shakespeare might think that’s romantic.”

“Hardy, har. Now, come on. We’ve been together almost a year and it’s time to move to the next level.”

“That’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever said, drunk or sober, and that’s saying something,” Bernie said.

Kenneth was on her before she could react. The back of her head smacked the rocks. Hard kisses bounced off her face as he tugged at the top button on her jeans.

“Kenneth, stop it!”

“I’m smart enough to know that you’re mine now! Stop movin’!”

His weight pressed her down against the unforgiving rock. Her feet still hung into nothing, leaving her with little leverage.

“No!” she screamed.

The button gave way and he grabbed jeans and panties in one fist and yanked. They moved down, but still didn’t reveal what he wanted. He raised up enough to lift her and pulled again, stripping her bare from her waist to just above her knees. With one hand on her hip, he used the other to free himself from his briefs.

Bernie pulled her legs up and put her knees on his chest and her hands on his head. She closed her eyes and pushed with everything she had.

She heard a shriek, but when she opened her eyes, nobody was there. Her pants still down, she wriggled onto her stomach and crawled to peer over the edge. Dirt and tiny pebbles ground into her thighs. She knew that large boulders, remnants of the mountain’s last sloughing, lay at the bottom, but she couldn’t see them. Blackness stared up at her.

She whispered, “Kenneth?”

Silence.

Louder this time. “Kenneth!”

She had heard of a boy surviving a fall from there, but he had been climbing and was less than half way up.

Bernie drew in the night air and screamed, “Kenneth!”

An 18-wheeler’s horn blew and Bernie looked down to see her right foot on the highway’s white borderline. She shook off the memory and continued on her way.

She crossed over to Pop’s One Stop, a trucker haven managed by another old friend. She feared ever moving from her hometown. If not for lifetime friendships, she wasn’t sure how she could have survived. Only those who had known her before her hardships talked to her like she was a person, and not all of those were dependable any more.

The automatic doorbell pealed loud enough for her to hear as she walked into the store. “Hey, Pop,” she said.

A man behind the counter, with a full head of gray hair and a matching scraggly beard that crawled down his neck, looked up at Bernie. He held a number 2 pencil, poised less than an inch above a newspaper’s crossword puzzle.

She plunked the full gallon jugs on the counter beside the cash register. “The Sun-Times still keeping your brain sharp?”

“As this pencil.” He said as he looked back down and pressed the lead inside a square.

“Okay, Pop, I’ll take your word for it.”

The lead broke. “Shit! They don’t make nothin’ like they used to.” He pulled a small pocket knife from the front of his faded blue Dickies overalls and started whittling the pencil’s tip.

Bernie sloshed the containers. “Mind stashing these back there for me, just for a little while? I can come back and get them tonight.”

“Sure, little Bernie.” He had called her that since her childhood, when he owned the convenience store down the road from her rural home. “You need any empties?”

“Yep. I’ll get them later, too. Is it okay if I use your showers in a little while?

A young man walked in through a door marked, “Employees Only.” He was shaking his head. “No more free showers, Bernie. I gotta follow the rules. Only for paying diesel customers or three dollars.”

Pop had carved away enough of the wood to reveal fresh lead. He pointed it at one of the tiny squares. “Help me with this one, little Bernie. Eight-letter word for ‘jerk.’ Starts with ‘d,’ ends with ‘head.’”

Bernie laughed. Pop was nothing if not crass. Her face quickly straightened. She needed that shower.

“The store might still be named after you, Pop, but I’m the owner now,” the young man said. He belched loudly and waved his hand in front of his face.

Bernie remembered earlier that day, at Lockard’s. “Fine, Nathan, I’ll pay,” she said and pulled out the five-dollar bill Jeannie had given her. “Now, can a paying customer use your phone?”

“No free calls.”

“Let’s see, seven-letter word, ending with ‘hole,’ means –”

“Okay, Pop, I get the hint,” Nathan said. Then, to Bernie, “I’m sure you know where it is.”

Bernie walked around the end of the counter, past the case of various fried foods kept warm by heat lamps. Potato skins, chicken strips, steak fingers. Chimichangas. Her stomach rumbled. She pulled a worn phone book from a slot beneath the register and flipped to the R’s. “Red Apple Inn,” she mumbled.

She cleared her throat and punched in the number. After the first ring, she read aloud a few labels on the impulse items. Started when she was a child learning to read, the habit of blurting out words had never faded. “Instant Energy. Packed with B-12. Alerticap.”

A faint voice came on the line. “Thank you for calling Red Apple Inn, how may I help you?

Bernie pushed a finger over her free ear. “I’ll need you to speak loud and slow, please,” she said.

“Okay, how may I help you?” the woman said, a little louder that time.

“Room 218, please.”

“I’ll transfer you. Thank you and have a nice day.”

“Thank you.” She glanced around to the displays in front of the register. “Ginseng Sammy. Slim Jim.”

“Excuse me, ma’am?”

“Oh, sorry, I thought you were gone.”

“I’m connecting you now.”

Bernie started figuring what food she could buy for two dollars.

“Hello?” came a woman’s voice.

“It’s Bernie. Is this Shonda?”

“Oh, Bernie, hi!” Shonda yelled.

Bernie picked up a bottle of Ginseng Sammy and turned it to read the ingredient list. “You can just speak up a little. I’m where it’s quiet now.”

“You’re not backing out on our night, are you?”

“No, I’m not. I just… well. I ran into Jeff at the park and — ”

“What did he say to you?” Shonda said, her tone heavier.

“Just that he would like to see me tonight. Why? Is everything okay?”

“Yes, we just have a little secret, and I wanted to be sure he didn’t ruin it.” Shonda sounded less severe. “What did you need?”

“I don’t really have anything that would be right to wear.”

“If you’re worried about it, don’t,” Shonda said, now back to her original level of enthusiasm. “I’ll have a friend lend you something.”

“Thanks.”

Bernie pulled a chimichanga from the glass case and handed Pop her five dollar bill. She wolfed it down and then went about the business of cleaning her dirty, worn body.

In the shower, with nothing to distract her mind, she couldn’t help thinking of Kenneth again. Since that night on the mountain, she hadn’t gone a day without being haunted by it.

(Continue to Part Seven)

Bernie is a poverty-stricken woman whose life takes an unexpected turn when an old friend returns to town. This is Part Five.

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|…

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

Part Five

She looked above the wall to see Glenda, all six-foot-four of her, wearing a red overcoat that somehow outshone her long, tangled, flame-orange hair. Paisley patterns drawn in ballpoint pen ran down her faded jeans to her tan work boots.

Glenda smiled and winked. She grabbed the wagon tongue and bolted for the nearest paved path.

“Dammit, Glenda, come back here!” Bernie shouted.

Bernie dropped the empty milk jugs and dashed up the stairs. Her heart already pounding in rage, she hit the sidewalk in a full sprint after Glenda.

On the flatter terrain of the park’s east side, the faster Glenda easily took a commanding lead, loaded Red Flyer in tow. Within seconds she was 30 feet away.

Bernie’s wagon was her only thing that had never been someone else’s. “Somebody help me!” she screamed.

The tennis courts lay just ahead to the left. A couple stretching in matching gray sweatsuits stopped to look. Bernie fixed her eyes on them. “Please! Do something! She has my wagon!” Bernie thought that sounded silly coming from a grown woman, but still wished someone would step in to help.

The couple leaned toward each other and moved their lips, then smiled, but never looked at Bernie. They held their rackets above their heads and continued stretching.

Bernie’s legs ached. Her lungs burned. She felt her feet slowing as she tried to pump them faster. Glenda turned back and smiled. She seemed tireless. She obviously had been getting plenty of food somehow.

Glenda turned and crossed the intersection of Main and Frauenthal toward a florist’s shop. Bernie knew she couldn’t catch her, so she scanned a shallow ditch for something to throw. An empty beer bottle lay near a rusty, collapsed culvert. She picked it up and cocked her arm to throw.

Someone grabbed her throwing hand. Confused, Bernie whirled around to see a man whose face looked familiar. “What are you doing? She’s getting away!” she shrieked.

“Whoa, easy,” he said. “If that bottle ends up in that florist’s window, then you will be worrying about much more than your quarrel with that Amazon woman.”

She could barely tell, but he sounded almost British. That confirmed that her instincts were right.

“Jeff Stivins?” she said. He still was as handsome as he had been in high school.

“Bernice? Bernice Maven? Is that you under all that filth?”

“Yes. I know I look a fright.”

“Nonsense. I can tell it’s you, the beauty queen of yesteryear.”

“I never won any contests like that.”

“Well, when I left here in high school, you were one of the prettiest in town. And your soul was pure. Now, what did that brute do that had you hurling litter at her?”

“Oh, that was Glenda. I was just here filling up my water bottles and she stole my wagon.”

Jeff tossed the beer bottle into a green metal trash can. It banged hard against the can’s walls, but did not shatter.

“That was inconsiderate of her. Perhaps I should not have grabbed your arm, after all.” He smiled. Bernie grew warmer.

She wondered whether to mention her evening plans. Would Jeff be there with Shonda and Jeremy? Maybe she shouldn’t go. No. Shonda wouldn’t have asked if she didn’t want her there.

She tried to sound calm instead of nervous. “Glenda’s like that. A bully.”

“Wait. You mean that was Glenda Sparks?” Jeff said.

Bernie picked up a twig and started breaking off its tiny branches. “In the rotting flesh.”

“How did you two end up on the streets?”

“I think her temper and the fact that she’s a crazy asshole did it for her. Me… well, that’s a longer story.”

“I would like to hear it. I must go now, but why don’t you join me at the Red Apple Inn tonight? Does seven o’clock sound good?”

Bernie suddenly became aware of how grimy she must look, and thought surely the breeze and the cold were the only things keeping Jeff from holding his nose. She had been willing to visit an old friend, but no way could she make herself look and smell good enough for a date that night. She turned her eyes downward. “You know, I kind of –”

“Nonsense. I want you there, unless you have something that must keep you away.”

Bernie looked up, her eyes brighter. “No, nothing too far from there,” she said. Two invitations to the Red Apple Inn in one day? She didn’t question it farther.

“Good news, Bernice. I look forward to it.”

Jeff walked to a blue Ford Taurus, probably a rental, and she saw the lights blink twice quickly. She could only imagine the familiar affirmative chirp of a car alarm disabling. As soon as he pulled away, she turned and ran. Different from when she was chasing Glenda, however, it was as if Bernie ran toward something good.

For the first time in years.

(Continue to Part Six)