Heart of Gold

  Ms. Lily turned to Devon. “What?”

  He wouldn’t meet her eyes.

  Zoey said, “He’s an idiot, Ms. Lily.”

  “Zoey . . . ,” her mom warned.

  “But he is! I should sue you for sexual harassment,” she told him.

  Her mother said, “You know how he is. Why didn’t you just ignore him?”

  “I tried, but he wouldn’t shut up. Idiot!”

  “Stop it,” her mom warned again.

  Fuming, Zoey sat back against her chair.

  Ms. Lily asked Devon, “What did you say to her?”

  He didn’t reply.

  “You were brave enough to say it earlier, so let’s hear it, and I do mean now.”

  He complied, although due to the toilet paper in his nose and the soft pitch of his voice, it was a bit hard to understand the words.

  Her mom sighed. “It’s just a silly old school rhyme, Zoey, not something to fight your friend over.”

  “The rhyme’s stupid, and so is he!”

  Ms. Lily asked with confusion, “Who’s Wyatt?”

  “A new student,” Mr. James explained.

  “Oh.” She eyed her son and shook her head in what appeared to be disbelief.

  Mr. James said, “I’m suspending them both for three days.”

  Neither mom appeared to have a problem with that.

  Zoey didn’t either. As long as she didn’t have to share air with Devon July, she could be suspended for the rest of her life.

  “I’ll be sending your assignments home by e-mail and expect them to be turned in on time.”

  Zoey nodded.

  “My head hurts, Mom,” Devon whined.

  “I’ll get you something when we get home. You’re going to have to stop picking at people, Devon.”

  “Nobody likes me.”

  “You think?” Zoey snapped.

  Her mother’s eyes flared with disapproval.

  “Is there anything else, Mr. James?” Ms. Lily asked.

  “No. You can take them home. Zoey, learn to control your temper.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And Devon?”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Grow up.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’ll see you both after suspension.”

  And with that, the moms stood and took their kids home.

  On the ride back to the house, Roni glanced over at her stone-faced child. “You know you were out of control, right?”

  Silence.

  “You and Devon used to be best buds.”

  “Not anymore. Can’t stand him. Nobody can.”

  “But nobody else is punching him out, so what does that tell you?”

  Silence.

  “Tell you what, I want you to have a sit-down with Reverend Paula. Since you won’t talk to me about what’s going on with you, maybe she can help. You can’t go through life knocking folks out just because they get on your nerves, Zoey. When you’re an adult, they put you in jail for that.”

  Silence.

  “So your lockdown is extended until you go back to school. No electronics. Just books. I’ll send your dad a text and let him know what’s going on.”

  “Can we just move to Paris so I never have to see Devon again?”

  “No.”

  Zoey went up to her room, and a disappointed Roni sent Reg a text. Zoey gave Devon beatdown. Again. 3 day school suspension. *sigh* Hope you’re having a good time.

  He came right back at her: Again?! *sigh* Home tomorrow. See you then.

  She noted he hadn’t mentioned missing her, but then again, she hadn’t mentioned missing him either. She ran a hand down her face. Her child was crazy. Her husband was crazy. She was crazy. Good thing she wasn’t a drinking woman. She walked to the piano and took a seat on the bench. For whatever reason her fingers began playing “Stormy Weather,” so she went with it and sang along.

  Up in her room, Zoey was mad at the world: Devon, her mom, Mr. James, Crystal, Amari. After witnessing her actions at lunch, Wyatt probably thought she was some crazy girl, and that made her mad as well. Why is life so hard? For the past couple of years life had been awesome. Reverend Paula helped her talk again. She went on tour with her mom. She fell in love with cars—got to work in the garage. Now? Life sucked. She’d had to whip Devon’s butt—again. People were all up in her business. Wyatt and her parents had her insides churned up. Life seemed to be raining bricks down on her head, and she felt like Dr. Bruce Banner right before he busted out of his shirt and turned into the Incredible Hulk. Maybe if she went for a ride on her bike, some of the Hulkness would go away.

  She grabbed her coat and went downstairs. “Can I go ride my bike? I need air.”

  Her mom was seated at the piano, scoring a chart. “No.”

  “But, Mom, I’m going to explode.”

  “Go out on the deck. Plenty of air out there.”

  “But, Mom!”

  “Or you can go back up to your room.”

  Zoey recognized that look. “That’s not fair!”

  “Keep talking, and the next time you see Danica Patrick she’ll be driving a walker.”

  Snapping her mouth closed, she turned and ran out of the room.

  “And don’t slam your door!”

  When Zoey reached her room, she wanted to slam the door so badly. But she was angry, not stupid, so she threw herself on the bed.

  A short while later her mom came to her room. “I’m going over to the store now. Do you remember what I told you?”

  “Yes,” she grumbled. “No electronics. Just books.”

  “Good. I’ll be back in a few hours.”

  Zoey didn’t tell her to have a good time.

  Standing in front of her window, she watched her mom drive off, then sat down to wait. When thirty minutes passed, she picked up her outdoor gear and got ready for her mission. She hated wearing her helmet—helmets were for babies—so she left it behind. In the kitchen, she cut a few slices of the chocolate cake she and her mom had had for dessert the day before and put them into a big ziplock bag. Making sure she had her keys and her phone in her coat pocket, she went to the garage for her bike. Because she was at home, the ride to Mr. Patterson’s would be much longer than had she been leaving from the school, but the bad day made her not care about that. She just wanted to ride, do something nice for somebody. Maybe it would make her feel better.

  C H A P T E R

  13

  At the reception, Bernadine listened as Trent greeted their guests and thanked them for coming. As always, his remarks were short and sweet, for which everyone was grateful. In attendance were local politicians, business owners, men and women of the cloth, and plain ol’ everyday folks. Most were walking around the airy new store, assessing its offerings and checking out the displays of fresh vegetables, bread, and meat. Crystal and Eli were offering face painting, and there was a line of eager children waiting for their turns. Sheila and her committee had done a bang-up job of dressing up the interior with balloons and festive banners, and there was free ice cream, punch, and bite-size samples of meat and cheese from the store’s deli for the guests to nibble on. Bernadine was proud to have gotten this project off the ground. With Gary’s help, it was a dream come true for both the community and for the Clarks. The residents of Henry Adams now had their very own grocery store, and the recently divorced Gary and his girls had a bright future.

  “This is quite a place you have here, Ms. Brown.”

  She turned to the speaker and plastered on a fake smile. “Hello, Mayor Wiggins. Thanks for coming.” The blonde standing with him wasn’t someone she’d met. From her artfully tousled hair and deep tan to her peasant-inspired white blouse and tight designer jeans, she could’ve just blown in from, oh, Palm Springs, but the pricey handbag was a knockoff, as was the gleaming black leather jacket lying so casually over her arm.

  “Let me introduce my wife, Astrid Franklin Wiggins.”

  “Pleased to meet you.”

  ?
??Same here.” The eyes told the lie as she looked Bernadine up and down like a boxer sizing up an opponent.

  Having had no idea that Wiggins was married or what his wife was about, Bernadine did her best to maintain a pleasant demeanor.

  The wife glanced around critically at the goings-on, then turned back. “All the hoopla you’ve been causing since you came to town is making Franklin’s residents somewhat jealous.” There was acid hidden beneath the mild tone.

  Bernadine shrugged. “Just doing what I feel is best for Henry Adams.”

  “My family founded Franklin, and we’ve always been the center of things. We built the first library and the school. Had the first gaslit house and the first telephone. Franklin money built the first municipal pool.”

  Bernadine wondered if she was supposed to be intimidated. “That’s a lot of firsts, but where’s this going, Ms. Wiggins?”

  “Because of you, our people are demanding the same level of services. They want a new senior center, movies on Friday nights, a new school. New roads downtown. If Henry Adams has something, they want it to. I need you to stop throwing your money around.”

  Wiggins’s eyes went big. “Um, honey . . .”

  “Shush!” his wife snarled softly. Red-faced, he complied.

  Bernadine found this very interesting. “Mrs. Wiggins, I will tell you what I told your husband last summer during the Big Box incident. This is my money. No one can make me spend it on what I don’t want, or stop me from spending it on what I do want.”

  That apparently made Astrid so angry that she lost her mind. “My ancestors were founding this country when you people were shoeless and picking cotton. I will not play second fiddle to a bunch of—”

  The wide-eyed Mayor Wiggins sucked in a shocked breath and grabbed his wife’s arm. Bernadine gave her a crocodile’s smile. “I can’t believe you went there, but because you did, this is what’s going to happen. The kids here want a pool, so in the spring I’m going to build the biggest, baddest swimming pool you’ve ever seen. It’ll have diving boards and slides and all the stuff kids like—and on the day it opens, the Franklin kids will get a personal invite, so they can enjoy it, too. And every time you drive by and see it, you’ll know that you and your nasty mouth are the reason it was built. Nice meeting you.”

  Bernadine threaded her way through the crowd to look for Mal. She was so hot she wanted to go back and sock Astrid Wiggins in her nose, but the swimming pool would put her nose out of joint in a far more powerful way, and that would have to do. What a bitch. She wanted the skinny on Astrid Franklin Wiggins and knew Mal could probably fill her in, but she hadn’t seen him since the reception began. She spotted Reverend Paula and Roni by the cookie aisle. Hoping they might have seen him, she made her way over.

  “He was by the meat counter when I last saw him,” Roni offered. The aftermath of the encounter with the Wigginses must have still been on her face, because Roni asked, “Are you okay, Bernadine?”

  “I am. Just a little drama.”

  “It’s not your sister, is it? How is she?”

  “The drama had nothing to do with her. She’s at home, doing her best impression of Blanche Dubois because her personal life is unraveling like an old sweater, and she’s clinging to denial rather than dealing with it.”

  “I can talk to her if she wants,” Paula said.

  “I doubt she’ll agree, but I’ll let her know. Okay. Let me go find Mal. See you later.”

  The store would officially open in the morning, and to help make sure people returned, door prizes of gift cards were being given away. In a little while, one lucky person would receive a hundred-dollar shopping spree. Bernadine had been tapped to draw the winning entry. Until then there was Mal to find, more folks to say hello to, and little kids with ice cream cones to lighten her mood and make her smile.

  Barrett stopped her. “I just escorted two underage teens off the property.”

  “Shoplifting?”

  “Yes, watched them slip a six-pack of beer into a backpack on the monitors. Told them next time it happens, I call the sheriff.”

  Bernadine approved of his largesse. “Good to know the cameras have proven themselves already.”

  “Yes, it is. The fact that they’re camouflaged makes people think we don’t have security, and that’s to our advantage.”

  Henry Adams was testing a new high-tech camera system that was cleverly embedded into the ceiling tiles. The company’s owner was one of Barrett’s marine buddies. Once again Bernadine was pleased that Barrett had discovered his niche. “Carry on, Mr. Homeland Security.”

  He saluted and melted back into the crowd.

  She finally found Mal helping Bing and Clay stock the meat cases. He greeted her with a kiss on the cheek. “Quite a crowd you have here, Ms. Brown.” He was stacking packaged hot dogs into one of the cold bins.

  “This is wonderful, isn’t it?” Streams of people flowed by. The store was one more item she could scratch off her Henry Adams wish list. “Tell me about Astrid Wiggins.”

  He studied her silently for a moment, and like Roni, he must’ve seen something. “What happened?”

  So she told him. When she’d finished, he nodded. “Sounds like her. Family had lots of money at one time, but now, not so much. She still thinks she’s queen though, and no one in Franklin blows his nose without her permission. Heads up the historical society, library board, school board. Her daddy was a vet back in the day. He handled the white farmers, and I handled our side. Pretty decent guy, died ten years ago, but his daddy—Astrid’s grandfather Walter—was a real bastard. Led the Klan here. He’s dead now, too. You’ve let folks around here know just what a tiny fish she is, and she’s not liking it.”

  “How long have she and the mayor been married?”

  “Probably fifteen years. Rumor at the time was that granddaddy paid August to marry her.”

  Her jaw dropped.

  “You met her. Between her hoity-toity attitude and that horse face, not even her money could get her a man.”

  With her wide jaw and large teeth, Astrid did resemble a horse.

  Mal stacked more hotdogs and added, “Growing up, the girls over in Franklin called her Seabiscuit behind her back.”

  “Wow.”

  “So you go ahead and build that pool. It’ll make her choke half to death every time she sees it, and that’ll be a good thing.”

  “Thanks for the history lesson.”

  “Always here for you.”

  “What are you doing after this is over?” she asked him. “Can I treat you to the movies tonight?”

  “Sure. What’s Tamar showing?”

  “The Princess Bride and The Green Pastures.”

  “Okay. And after it’s over, we can take the truck down to the creek and catch up on our smooching.”

  She laughed. “You are a mess.” Her fingers went to his promise necklace hanging from its delicate chain around her neck. Since he’d presented her with it, she’d been wearing it twenty-four/seven to remind herself that she was loved by an awesome and, yes, crazy man.

  Over the speaker system Gary announced more gift card winners. A squeal of delight sounded nearby. Bernadine turned to see an obviously giddy woman running toward the front of the store. Onlookers smiled.

  Gary’s voice came over the sound system again. “It’s now time to draw for the big $100 shopping spree. If Ms. Brown would please make her way to the front of the store, we’ll have her pick the winning ticket.”

  “Guess that’s me.”

  “It is indeed. I’ll see you in a bit.”

  “Love you, Mal.”

  “Love you too, Ms. Brown.”

  Everyone in the store was crowded around the area at the front of the store. Gary was standing on a large wooden crate. On the floor beside him stood Gemma Dahl, decked out in her snazzy indigo-toned employee vest. She was holding the large cardboard box that people had been putting their entries into. She gave Bernadine a smile of greeting.

  “Ms
. Brown, would you do the honors?” said Gary.

  Gemma removed the top. Bernadine reached in, stirred the slips around, and, one hand over her eyes, drew out the winner. “Pete Bantam!”

  A yell of “Yes!” shot up from the back of the crowd, and he came forward as the onlookers applauded wildly. She knew Pete. He was a pipefitter from Franklin. A big bear of a man who sported a graying waist-long ponytail, he’d worked on the Henry Adams construction crew her first summer in town. When he reached Bernadine, he gave her a huge hug and everyone cheered.

  Gary said, “Mr. Bantam, you can take advantage of your prize any time in the next thirty days.”

  “Got three growing boys. I’ll be here first thing in the morning!” he declared, to much laughter.

  He moved back into the crowd, and Bernadine watched him receive a happy welcome from his wife, Maria.

  Gary then announced, “Tomorrow the first one hundred people to arrive will get a chance at one of the three $50 and two $25 sprees up for grabs, so make sure you come on back.”

  The buzzing crowd began to disperse. Some people headed for the exits, while others who’d just arrived drifted away to check out the store.

  “This was great,” said Gemma. “Can’t wait to start work in the morning.”

  Before Bernadine could respond, she saw Gemma stiffen and her eyes widen, then narrow ominously. Curious, Bernadine turned to find the root of the reaction. There stood the Wigginses. Austin was speaking with someone, but Astrid was staring daggers. “You know her?”

  “Oh yeah,” Gemma said in a voice tinged with bitterness.

  “You sound as if there’s history there.”

  “There is. Remember the nasty remarks and whispers I told you I was getting? Astrid is the head witch in charge. She and I have been beefing since high school. My shift’s done, so I’m going to grab my coat. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  “Okay.” Gemma walked away, and Bernadine turned to Astrid, who stared back with eyes as cold as January on the plains.

  Zoey finally made it to Mr. Patterson’s place. Only in hindsight did she realize this had been a really bad idea. Her thighs were burning from all the pedaling, and it had taken her such a long time to get there, she just knew her mom would get back to the house first. She hopped off her bike and ran to the fence to leave the bag, then heard, “Stop right there!”