“Yes, I think I do. I’d love to talk to you about Paris,” Jessica said warmly. “My door is always open to you, Dawn. I live on Marigold Lane—the yellow two-story cottage with the white shutters.”
“Yes, I know the house,” Dawn said.
“You’re welcome to come visit me any time.”
Dawn popped up from the bench, a broad smile pushing her cheeks into their rosy, round posture. “I will. Thanks! I have to go.”
“Bye,” Jessica said, watching Dawn’s cheerleader skirt swish as she jogged to her car. “Stop by anytime,” Jessica called out.
Dawn waved, slid into her snazzy car, and zipped away. Jessica watched her go and strained her eyes to see if Kyle was still in the front seat of his truck. She couldn’t tell. Now she had to make a decision. Should she leave, chancing an encounter with Kyle? Or should she stay here on this cold bench and wait to see where Kyle was?
Before she could decide, a rich, deep voice behind her said, “Hello, Jessica.”
Chapter Ten
Jessica involuntarily jumped up and turned to face Kyle. At the first sight of his rugged jawline and clear green eyes, Jessica felt like a schoolgirl, all tongue-tied and self-conscious.
“I noticed you were talking with Dawn, and I didn’t want to interrupt.” Kyle wore that timid, little-boy look he had the morning he had visited her in the hospital. “I won’t keep you. I just wanted to let you know that Ida asked me to come over and check that leak in your bathtub.”
“Oh,” Jessica said, picking up her purse and book bag as if she were about to make a dash for it. She remembered mentioning the leak briefly to Ida on Wednesday. Never had she guessed that Kyle would be the handyman assigned to look into the problem. “That’s fine.”
“Well, I wanted you to know that I can’t get to it for a few days, maybe even a week.”
“That’s fine. No problem. Whenever.” Jessica began to take a few steps backward.
“I’m going to Nevada for awhile.” Kyle threw out the words as if he had no confidence that she would receive them. “I’m on a hot-shot team of firefighters. We leave tonight at six. I’m not sure when we’ll be back.”
Jessica vaguely remembered hearing about a wildfire in Nevada, along with another raging in Wyoming. “Oh, is the Nevada fire getting bad?” Her heart was still pounding hard and Jessica felt awkward trying to form a sentence.
“It’s burned more than four hundred acres already. It’s coming close to the town of Fallon. They’ve called on the Oregon teams because all their local hotshots went to Wyoming a few days ago.” Kyle looked almost like a soldier going off to war who wasn’t sure of his return.
Jessica didn’t know what to say.
“So,” Kyle concluded, taking a breath, “I’ll look at your leaky bathtub when I come back.”
In contrast to the drama of going off to fight a fire, a leaky tub seemed trivial. Jessica said, “Well, don’t worry about it. It’s not that bad, really.”
A thick silence hung between them. The few sprinkles of rain that had escaped from the heavens during the past half hour were now joined by all their friends and relatives in a true drizzle. Jessica stood silently, the cold stone bench posted between her and Kyle. She wondered if he were going to ask if she wanted a ride home.
But he didn’t.
He left, awkwardly, and she walked home alone in the rain.
That night, in the silence of her bedroom, tucked under her warm covers, Jessica listened to the rain falling steadily on her roof and thought how strange it was that Kyle was now in a very hot, dry place fighting a fire, while here, everything was cool and wet.
She didn’t want to think about Kyle. She had done enough of that in the past three weeks to last her a lifetime. What she needed to do was think about Jessica. She had enough of her own problems to work out without adding Kyle.
Food, once again, rose to the top. Could she last until Tuesday when her paycheck would supposedly arrive? She fell asleep dreaming of pork chops, baked potatoes, and DoveBars.
Late Saturday afternoon Jessica heard a knock on her front door. She left her papers on the mahogany secretary and padded to the door in her stocking feet.
“Hi. Is this a good time to visit?” Dawn asked, her round face puckered with a hesitant expression.
“Sure, come on in.” Jessica motioned toward the living room. Dawn took a seat on the green couch, crossing and uncrossing her bare legs. It had rained off and on all day, but it wasn’t particularly cold. Still, Jessica had on leggings, a long sweatshirt, and socks. Dawn wore sandals, shorts, and a denim shirt. Jessica still thought like a Southern Californian, who, when it rained, dressed warm, built a fire, and stayed inside all day. Oregonians apparently saw it as just another day.
“I’m afraid I don’t have anything in the house to offer you to drink,” Jessica said.
“That’s okay. I’m not thirsty.” Dawn gazed around the room, taking in the details. Jessica hadn’t done much more decorating than to place a small vase of wild flowers on the dining room table.
“Were you writing letters?” Dawn asked, noticing the papers spread out on the secretary.
“Oh, no, it’s just some notes and things.” Jessica didn’t feel comfortable telling Dawn that she was working on her Under the Flowering Bush story. She wished she had closed the desk up before answering the door. “So, tell me about Paris,” she said, trying to change the conversation’s focus.
“It’s all right, I guess. The people are different from the people here. More private. It’s actually a lonely place for me. I think my mom is sort of lonely, too, only she would never admit that. She’s too proud. She would never admit that she made a mistake when she ran away from home.”
“Ran away?” Jessica asked, thinking it a humorous term to use in reference to a grown woman leaving her husband.
“She wanted the glamorous kind of life her sister had. My aunt married some rich guy, and my mom thought that was better than being married to a doctor, so she just left one day. We didn’t know where she was for about a month. Then my dad received this letter, and he told me they were getting a divorce. About six months later my mom called me and said she was remarried and wanted me to spend the summer on the Riviera with them on his yacht.”
“Did you have fun?”
“I didn’t go. I told her I already had my summer planned. The next summer I went, though. And this past summer I went, too. It’s like a movie in some ways, you know? The servants, the huge mansion, the yacht, and everything. But it’s really lonely.”
“I bet,” Jessica said, trying to sound as sympathetic as she felt.
“It’s just so false. I met this guy last summer. Giovanni. He was from Italy. He came to this party on the yacht one night and…” Dawn stopped and looked down at her knees. She didn’t say anything else.
“Did Giovanni make you do something you didn’t want to?” Jessica asked cautiously.
“Kind of,” Dawn said, tears beginning to fall onto her tanned thighs. “I wanted him to kiss me, but then when he did, he wouldn’t stop. I felt like such a baby. He was kissing me and touching me everywhere, and when he tried to unbutton my shirt, I ran away and locked myself in my room. It was so humiliating.”
“I think you did the right thing,” Jessica said softly. “You weren’t ready.”
“My mom thought I should be. She had a little talk with me the next morning,” Dawn said, looking up and blinking back the tears. “All about ‘protection’ and ‘being prepared.’ She even gave me some…, well, you know, some of those things to carry in my purse.”
Jessica waited for Dawn to continue.
“I’m just not ready,” Dawn said.
“That’s okay.”
“But see, everybody seems to think I already have, you know, slept around. The guys at school treat me differently than they do the other girls. To be honest with you, I almost feel like going out and…” Dawn seemed to be searching for the right word. “And just getting it over with.??
?
“You have to be true to who you really are, Dawn,” Jessica said. “Only you can decide who that is and who that is going to be.”
A hint of a smile pulled Dawn’s lip up on the left side. “That’s what I’m trying to figure out. And that’s what I’m hoping you can help me figure out. See, it’s like I said before, you don’t seem like the other people in this town. You’ve been places. You know things. I can tell. You’re experienced.”
“Well, maybe not exactly the way you think, Dawn. Besides, you can’t try to make your life like someone else’s. You have to live your own life.”
“I guess I’m looking for a model.”
“A model?” Jessica felt uncomfortable. “Look, Dawn, I can be your teacher and even a good listener on the side. But I’m not anybody’s role model, and I don’t want to be.” Jessica realized how abrupt and uncaring her words had come out. She wished she had formulated them better.
“Well, can I at least ask you one favor?”
“Of course,” Jessica said, hoping that whatever it was, she would be able to say yes to it and make up for the way she had just pushed Dawn aside.
“It’s kind of a big favor.” Dawn paused and looked into Jessica’s eyes. “Would you go on this trip to Mexico with the church group?”
Jessica laughed aloud. “Mexico? Why would you want me to go to Mexico?”
“It’s only for four days,” Dawn said. “And I’m going this year because I want to see what I’m made of.”
“I think that’s great, but you certainly don’t need me to go for you to find that out.”
“I don’t have a lot of friends,” Dawn said the words carefully. “I mean, a lot of people act like they want to hang out with me, but they don’t really understand me. You see, this trip is a pretty big deal for me, and I’d really like it if you were there.”
Jessica tried to understand what Dawn was saying, the unspoken message behind the words. She knew some of those insecure feelings of growing up and trying to make decisions when you’re the only child at home, when you live with a father who is too busy to notice you, and when you wish every day you had a mom to talk to. Yes, Jessica understood Dawn’s feelings. Still, it wasn’t enough to convince Jessica she should go to Mexico.
“Dawn, I appreciate you asking me to go to Mexico with you, but it’s just not possible.”
“Why not? The chaperons have their way paid for them. There’s no school on Friday, and Monday is a holiday. I know you would have a good time.”
Jessica shook her head. “Sorry. I can’t go.”
Dawn let out an exasperated puff of air. “Will you at least think about it and pray about it?”
Jessica pursed her lips together and felt the scar tissue on her top lip tighten as she did. “I’ll think about it.”
Dawn’s face lit up. “Thanks.”
She really is a pretty girl, Jessica thought. I’d hate to see her mess up her life.
Dawn changed the subject to school and told Jessica how their guys had won the football game last night. The two of them visited for another five or ten minutes before Jessica asked Dawn a question she didn’t think she could ask anyone else in town. “I happened to notice a grave yesterday across from where I was sitting. The name was Lindsey Atkins. Did you know her?”
“Lindsey? She was Thelma’s granddaughter. She came down from Spokane to take care of Thelma after Thelma got cancer. Lindsey was only here about five months, and then she got pneumonia or something, and she died. It was a big shock to everyone.”
Jessica nodded, hoping Dawn would continue.
“She was so pretty. Red hair and pale skin. She had the most beautiful voice. They had this dinner for the hospital that my dad took me to once, and after dinner Lindsey sang all these Irish songs. I was only in the seventh grade, but I remember it really well.”
“She sounds as if she were a lovely woman,” Jessica said. “How sad that she died when she was only twenty years old.”
“I think the saddest part was that she and Kyle had just gotten engaged. Do you know Kyle Buchanan? He’s a firefighter here.”
Jessica tried to keep her expression steady. “Yes, I’ve met Kyle.”
“They were totally in love, from what everybody says. When she died, Kyle took a leave of absence from his job and moved in with Thelma. He took care of her until the day she died, as if she were his own grandma.”
“Well,” was all Jessica could say. What a kind man to care for an elderly, dying woman. How deep his love for Lindsey must have been.
“My dad said once that the whole thing made Kyle paranoid, or something like that.”
“What did he mean?” Jessica asked.
“I don’t know. I guess Kyle hasn’t gone out with anybody since Lindsey died.”
After Dawn left, Jessica thought of how long she had gone on with her life and failed to mourn for the loss of her mother. Perhaps Dr. Laughlin would call her paranoid too, but for the opposite reason. Kyle had mourned too long, and she had just begun.
That evening she sat alone again with the old photo album and cried over her mother’s photos—not the painful, gut wrenching kind of tears she had cried a few weeks ago. This time her tears were like a steady, gentle rain that brought with it a cleansing and healing of the heart. And that was enough to get her through the weekend.
She thought constantly about Kyle and watched the news at six and eleven for updates on the fire. Was he safe? Would the fire be contained soon? The reports Sunday night said that more than a thousand acres had burned, the fire was twenty percent contained, and no homes had been destroyed.
How much longer would Kyle be there? She thought of his dark brown hair and the way it turned wavy on top. She thought of the way his steady hand had felt on her lip in the ambulance and the scent of his cinnamon gum. So her weekend went, with thoughts of Kyle and food filling most of it.
On Monday, she decided to give her students a writing assignment. She was too hungry to concentrate on lecturing. “Okay, take out a sheet of paper,” Jessica instructed, “and write a description of a person you know well. Use the five senses in your descriptions and give me at least three paragraphs.”
Jessica sat down, and her stomach grumbled loudly. She hoped no one heard. After class she planned to raid the faculty lounge for donuts, coffee, anything.
But all she found were rice cakes. With no one watching, Jessica ate the whole bag. She told herself that tomorrow she would have that paycheck and the first thing she would do was buy herself a DoveBar and some treats for the faculty to replace all she had consumed in the past few weeks.
However, on Tuesday, the check didn’t show up in her box. After school she made another dreaded trip to the office. She had listed her Aunt Bonnie as her nearest relative. Aunt Bonnie and Uncle John lived in Pennsylvania. She had little contact with them, but still, that was the best she could do for a relative.
“Looking for something?” Charlotte questioned when Jessica stepped into the office.
Jessica didn’t say anything. She just returned the stare Charlotte gave her.
“Here it is,” Charlotte said, producing the white envelope from behind her back. “Before I give this to you,” Charlotte said, drawing the envelope toward her face and tapping it against the side of her cheek, “I want you to know that I’m on to you, Ms. Morgan.”
Jessica’s heart froze. She mechanically covered up any emotion.
“I don’t know what little game you’re playing or who you are or what you’re doing here in Glenbrooke, but I’m on your trail, and I intend to find out. Because, you see, women who have a degree from Oxford don’t become high school English teachers in small towns unless they’re hiding from something. The law, maybe?”
Jessica snatched her check from Charlotte’s hand and turned to march off.
“You just wait. I’m going to find out what you’re hiding,” Charlotte called after her.
Jessica’s long strides took her through the front door and dow
n the steps two at a time. She heard a beep-beep. Teri’s car was parked at the curb.
“Hop in,” Teri called.
Jessica was too steamed to do anything else. She plopped down in the seat and shut the door hard. “Get your check?”
“Finally!” Jessica spouted. “What is that woman’s problem?”
“Oh, don’t let her get to you. Let’s go to the bank. Where’s your account?”
“I don’t have one yet,” Jessica said.
“I know just the place then.” Teri turned a corner and headed for the center of town. She turned on the radio and started to sing the pop song that filled the air around them.
Her cheery disposition had a diffusing effect on Jessica’s anger, and by the time they reached the bank, Jessica felt somewhat recovered from her encounter with Charlotte.
“I need two forms of ID,” the bank manager said as she began to type up Jessica’s form.
“Um, that’s kind of a problem,” Jessica said. “I don’t have any with me.”
“Not even a driver’s license? It can be out of state.”
“No, I don’t have anything with me.”
The woman stopped typing. “I’m sorry. I can’t complete this without some form of ID. Would you like to stop by tomorrow with your identification, and we can finish this up?”
“Okay,” Jessica said numbly. She hadn’t thought of this hitch. What would she tell Teri, who was over at a teller’s window talking to someone she knew?
“That was fast,” Teri said.
“I wasn’t able to open the account. I need a driver’s license first. Is the DMV nearby?”
“It’s not far, but they’ll be closed in a few minutes. We’ll have to come back tomorrow.”
As they walked to Teri’s car, a goblin of panic began to howl inside Jessica’s head. How was she going to wait until tomorrow to get some food? “Teri, do you have one of those check cashing stores here? You know, the kind where they charge you a fee, but they don’t require ID?”