Betty's (Little Basement) Garden (4 page)

But there was always something else tugging at her heart. Even if she could sell the house, the emotional toll would be tremendous. It wasn't that the old, broken down domicile held beautiful memories. If anything, the walls still shuddered from her husband's alcoholic rages, the deafening silence of regret and the thunder of pain Betty suppressed her entire marriage. No, it wasn't the house. It was what surrounded the house. It was the show-stopping front yard, ablaze with botanical colors from April through October. And it was the large backyard with the swinging bench hanging on the large canopy elm with those words her son carved into its trunk the last time she saw him alive. When life became too difficult, Betty could always sit on that swinging bench and pretend Frankie was sitting beside her, sharing a story and hurriedly eating whatever she could whip up before his father got home and found him. Their visits had to be clandestine and so brief after Frank kicked his namesake out of the house when he was eighteen. She begged Frank to pay for rehab for their son but his chiseled pride would have none of it. “I don't invest in failures!” Frank would shout. “He got himself into this fucking mess, he can get himself out!

It killed Betty to watch Frankie's decline. Each time he'd show up for another stolen moment, the roadmap of pain was carved onto his face. It wasn't just the slaughter of hardcore addiction; it was his ache of feeling cast out and left to flounder in a world that had always been too harsh for a boy that sensitive, reflective and gentle. As macho and arrogant as Frank Sr. was, Frankie was the polar opposite.

He was different almost from the beginning. As a youngster, Frankie spent hours alone, playing with imaginary friends only he could see. Betty would observe him in the backyard and sense he was straddling between two distinct worlds. At times, Frankie appeared to have a deeper connection with things unseen than with the three dimensional world. His clear, hazel eyes held wisdom far beyond his years but that didn't garner popularity with his peers, especially when he would imprudently make what some of his friend's mothers called “a bizarre comment” about some event that was going to happen in their future. The odd thing was that many incidents young Frankie foresaw came true in one form or another. That just made him a freak in the eyes of his friends and his father, so he learned to keep his mouth shut. He was the epitome of that line from the song, “Vincent” – “And how you suffered for your sanity. And how you tried to set them free…” He was too tender for this world, and Frank Sr. never let an opportunity go by to remind his son of it. Even as the drugs began tearing at his soul, Frankie never became violent. If anything, he became more internalized, grasping daily for the meaning of life.

Frankie had been dead for five years, but his imprint remained in the house and always under the large canopy elm. No one ever knew it, but after his death and during the time Frank was sick and waiting for his liver transplant, Betty would wait until her husband was asleep and then creep out into the backyard. There, she would lie in the grass under the elm with the fragrant flowers around her and absorb the serenity. It was like a botanical IV that shot her full of just enough energy to get up and face another dreadful day. That tree, the grass, the flowers and the manicured bushes were her truest and most loyal companions. She couldn't express all that pent up anger and resentment to her friends, but the elm tree knew. The grass and the flowers never judged her. And those manicured bushes even relaxed enough to listen to her when she talked to Frankie and cried for all the reasons she failed him. Betty's connection with nature defied her upbringing and appearance. Looking at her, you'd never know that without her plants, she would be a shell of a person. They embraced her when nobody else did, and for that she would never forsake them.

So as she lay a little longer under the covers on this spring morning, Betty steeled herself against the dogged fears biting at her heels, and she slowly threw back the covers. Sleeping in, Betty still believed, was for people who hadn't planned their day correctly. She had to keep busy. God, that was imperative. Keep moving. Keep
doing
. “It is in the doing,” her father used to tell her as a child, “that progress begins.” And Betty had been praying at the altar of progress her entire existence.

As she moved around the bedroom, stretching and getting her bones to stop creaking, she planned her day to the minute. She would shower and select the appropriate outfit for the day. After breakfast and just one cup of coffee, she'd hoist the American flag outside her front door and set off in her fifteen-year-old green Ford Taurus, praying it would continue to run for just one more day. Her first stop would be the consignment store two towns south of her. Nobody knew her there, and that was vital in order to maintain a semblance of anonymity as she sold her cherished antiques to total strangers. Little by little, the house was losing a few more items, but she was able to cover it up by rearranging furniture and filling in the empty spaces with large vases of flowers from the yard. The lie she sold to Judi at the get together the day before about her needlepoint chair being fixed was unplanned, and she realized she'd have to come up with a better story if she was confronted with the same situation again. Like a boy scout, Betty would be prepared. None of this fly by the seat of her tailored dress crap for her.

After the consignment store, she'd drive back to town and visit Peggy. The chocolates she'd set aside for her dying friend were already wrapped in a
White Violet
gift box. She just hoped to God that Peggy wasn't moaning or throwing up when she arrived. That would be too much for Betty to handle. Her inexorable fear of death had become so persistent that it dominated her life now. It was strange in many ways, since for the past year, she really wasn't that invested in living. Death, in some ways, would be welcome, if anything just to break the daily boredom.

She was just about to lay out her outfit for the day when that familiar syncopated flutter began again in her right ear. It was enough to drive her crazy. She pressed her hand tightly against the ear and felt her jaw tighten and then
click
. That was followed by an uncomfortable
pop
in her jaw. Good God, this day was getting off to a helluva start. She dressed in a cheerful salmon colored dress and donned her favorite, off-white, springtime sweater with its jaunty embroidered collar. She'd parted with many of her cherished designer sweaters and coats over the past year when she found out they could fetch a decent price. But she couldn't part with this one and found herself wearing it more than ever before. Selecting the ideal brooch to doll up the outfit, she came upon Frank's gold wedding band in her jewelry box. Squinting, she read the inscription inside the ring: This We'll Defend. It was the motto of the U.S. Army. Ever the combatant, Frank somehow thought it was the most romantic thing to carve into his wedding ring. But to Betty, the dictum made her feel like she was a territory that needed to be secured and conquered. As she re-read those three words, the familiar tightness in her neck began to creep up. Setting the golden band in her palm, she assessed the possible weight of the metal. Last time she checked, gold was going for nearly twelve hundred dollars an ounce. She debated what to do. But then she could almost hear Frank's coarse voice telling her to put the goddamned ring back in the jewelry box. He wasn't even there, but he still had his thumb wedged on her spirit. She obliged his phantom order and slammed the gold band back into the drawer.

An hour later she headed out the door. She advised Ronald she would return shortly and to “keep watch.” His failing, fourteen-year-old eyes could hardly find his dish let alone an intruder, but he played along. Outside the front door, she raised the American Flag into its secure slot and gently unfurled its colors. Walking past the white wooden garden sign that simply stated, Betty's Garden, she heard footsteps coming from on top of her roof. Spinning around, she was shocked to see Buddy, her portly maintenance man securing a piece of insulation.

“Buddy! I wasn't aware you were working today. You realize it's Sunday?”

“Yes, ma'am,” Buddy replied, heaving his work belt lower on his overhanging gut. For a guy who wasn't even thirty-five, he moved like someone twice his age. “But my regular job has me doin' overtime and I just figured you needed to get this done before the end of summer.”

Betty regarded him with uncertainty. “Is that a joke, Buddy?”

He scratched his scraggly brown beard that still had specks of the morning's donut in it, complete with sprinkles. “Well, yes and no, ma'am. I always have to allow for my low back goin' out and gettin' me stove up.”

She furrowed her brow. “Stove up? What in the world is that?”

His jaw slacked and then came to attention. “Stove up,” Buddy countered, as if it was perfectly clear. “Stiff, sore, can't move. Stove up.”

“Well, of course,” Betty said with a slight Texas inflection. The poor man needed to lose the fifty pound barrel around his gut. That would certainly do wonders to lessen the strain on his back, but Betty sure as hell wasn't going to be the one to tell him that. “Listen, I have to go out and run errands. So, I might not be here at lunchtime to make you something to eat.”

“That's okay, Mrs. Craven. I'll figure it out.”

Betty observed Buddy's demeanor. He seemed saddened by the news. At least, that's what she believed. He could have just had gas. She started toward her car and then turned back, “Oh, Buddy, I'm running a bit tight this month. So, if you could –”

“Don't worry about it, Mrs. Craven. I know you'll pay up when you got it.”

Betty smiled, trying to hold her head high, but she was both appreciative and appalled by Buddy's seemingly lack of concern as to when his work would be compensated. His trust in her was something she took quite seriously, and even though she tended to speak to him in a tenor set aside for workmen and bathroom attendants, she was fond of the big, slack-jawed scalawag. She tried valiantly to introduce him to culture, once playing Tchaikovsky's “Nutcracker” while he worked. When he asked her what the “song” was called, she told him. He laughed so hard mucus ran from his nostrils, and from then on he called it “that ball-buster music.” Sadly, Betty surmised, the only culture some people experience is the mold growing on cheese in their refrigerator.

With Peggy's box of chocolates secured safely in a cooling bag – one of the many accessories left over from
The White Violet
– Betty locked the car doors and put on her seatbelt, making sure not to create any unsightly wrinkles in her dress. Then she did what she always did before starting the car. She prayed. If she were Catholic, she'd pray to St. Christopher, the Patron Saint of travelers. But since she was a Methodist, she silently bowed her head and prayed to God to make the car start and continue to run until she reached her destination. As the turned the key, God answered her prayer.

The Gilded Rose
was not exactly bustling when Betty arrived. There was only one man perusing the furniture section and a young girl waiting at the empty counter. Sure, it was Sunday but where were all the customers she was told adored this high-end antique store? As she moved closer to the counter, a wave of patchouli assaulted her senses. It appeared to emanate from the young girl now leaning on the counter and playing with the business card holder next to the cash register. Betty regarded the girl, who looked to be in her early twenties, with silent disparagement. Her fingers were painted in coal black polish, making it look to Betty as if she'd dipped her nails into Satan's burnt caldron. Hoop earrings adorned her right eyebrow and left nostril. Betty never understood this accessory, always picturing a leash attached to the hoops so the unrefined colt could be led around the paddock. To add another dose of chaos to this unfortunate young woman's appearance, a black streak of hair coloring extended down the middle of her bleached blond hair. The image of a cheap skunk materialized.

Betty erected a steel wall between herself and the girl, making a point to turn away and pretend to take an interest in a red velvet Victorian couch that looked like it belonged in the lobby of a brothel.

“Hi!” the girl said sweetly.

Betty turned to her. Even though she was appalled by the girl's appearance, her upbringing dictated that she posture politeness. “Hello.”

“I think Lily's in the back room. She'll probably be out any second.”

“All right.”

“Hey, um, can you crack a Benji?”

“A Benji?”

She held up a one hundred dollar bill. “Benjamin Franklin? I just came over to get some change. I work a couple doors down, and all we're getting is hundies.”

“No. I don't have change for your Benji.” Betty turned away but couldn't help but be curious as to what business had a problem of bringing in too many hundred dollar bills. “Where do you work?”

“At
The Green Wellness
dispensary. We've been slammed this weekend.”

A cold shudder iced Betty's spine. Well, that explained the appearance, she thought. What a waste of a good life. With marijuana dispensaries outnumbering Starbucks in Colorado, it was hard to believe they all were rolling in “Benjamins.” But the Colorado green rush was obviously a profitable endeavor. However, Betty told herself, so was being a high priced escort. The strain now between these two was thick. Well, it was thick for Betty anyway; the girl seemed completely oblivious and laid-back. Thankfully, Lily strode out from the back, and upon seeing the girl and Betty together, tensed up considerably. “Yarrow?” Lily said, her eyes jetting nervously to Betty. “This is not a great time to visit.”

Yarrow
, Betty thought. Who in the hell names their kid Yarrow? Hyssop was probably too hard to spell.

“I just need some change,” Yarrow said off-handedly.

“I don't have any. It's too early.”

“Bummer. Okay, I'll come back later. See ya!” She nearly skipped out of the store, clearly immune to the strain at the counter.

“She works –”

“At the dispensary,” Betty quickly said. “Yes, she told me. Do you have to deal with that type of intrusion a lot now?”

Lily looked ill at ease. “She's in here once or twice a day.”

“You don't have to put up with that. You should say something to her. She could attract the wrong clientele to your business.” Betty leaned forward, speaking in a confidential tone. “Criminals, if you get my drift.”

“Oh, I don't…most of the people over there are…” Lily smiled, clearly uncomfortable. “Anyway, you got my message about your chair.” Betty nodded. “I've got your check right here.” Lily opened the cash register and handed Betty the check.

Betty swallowed hard. “A hundred and fifty-two? I don't understand –”

“I had to mark it down. That's in our contract. After sixty days if it's not sold, I have the right to do that.”

Betty's head reeled, but she maintained her composure. “Well, somebody is sitting on a really good deal right now.”

“Betty, it's nothing against you or your beautiful items. Blame it on Ed.”

“Who's Ed?”

“Economic Downturn. Hey, you've still got plenty of incredible things here that haven't passed their expiration. In fact,” she furtively stole a glance behind Betty's back, “that gentleman over there is checking out your Biedermeier.”

Betty turned. The man she half-noticed when she walked in was indeed eyeing her historic, German walnut writing table, circa 1825. However, he certainly didn't appear to be someone who would ever own such a refined piece. He was probably in his early fifties, possibly younger, and wore a pair of black jeans and a well-worn leather motorcycle jacket. His reddish brown hair was pulled back into a neat ponytail that hung five inches down his back. A smartly trimmed goatee framed his healthy-looking face, which was tanned by the Colorado sun. No, this was not someone who would ever plunk a cent down for her cherished desk. Besides, Betty factored his height to be at least six foot three inches tall, which was certainly not a figure that would comfortably fit under that writing table. Still, he was spending a great deal of time examining the piece and reading the price tag. A sale was a sale, dammit, so she stepped forward to see if she could shrewdly close the deal.

Betty tried to appear as nonchalant as possible as she sashayed in the vicinity of the desk. Moving closer, she noticed a metal sign propped onto the piece with the quote: All a girl really wants is for one guy to prove to her that they are not all the same. It was apparently a direct quote from the pouting lips of Marilyn Monroe but it was certainly not something Betty Craven would ever dream of placing anywhere near her beloved Biedermeier. Like a fine hostess changing a place card in order to facilitate a better seating arrangement, she craftily removed the metal sign, placed it face down on another item and feigned great interest in the writing desk.

“Oh my,
a Biedermeier
!” she gushed in a low-key tone, brushing her palm against the wood. “You certainly don't see these every day.”

The man looked at her with his intensely blue eyes. A soft smile followed. “Really?”

“Oh, I mean it. It's quite a find! I don't remember the last time I saw a Biedermeier like this.”

He leaned over and checked the price tag. “I'd say the last time you saw it was shortly before April 11th.”

Betty's mouth went dry. “Excuse me?” She could feel that plastic smile forming on her face.

“The tag?” he noted, with a mischievous grin. “Lily always shorthands the name of the person who brought it in along with the date, right above the price. See? It says here: ‘B. Craven, 4/11.'”

Betty wasn't about to let some guy with a quick mind outfox her. “Yes, but, why on earth would you think that –”

“Betty, I've heard you speak at the town council meetings. You always sit on the right side of the aisle and I'm always on the left. Kind of like our politics.” He smiled again and extended his hand. “My name's Jeff Carroll. I'm glad to finally meet you.”

She stood there, momentarily speechless. But her manners quickly resurfaced. “Pleased to meet you too,” she replied, hoping her disingenuous tone wasn't too obvious. His handshake was firm, not like so many men who are afraid to demonstrate their spirit. On closer examination, Betty surmised that Jeff looked something like a healthier, more muscular version of General George Custer and a sexier, thinner, and far younger version of Colonel Sanders. With a ponytail. And a biker jacket.

“What part of Texas are you from?” he asked.

Betty wasn't aware she was letting her Texas inflection give her away. He was rather forward, Betty judged. But if a few moments of harmless banter sold her Biedermeier, she was willing to drop her guard just a bit. She'd pretend she was back on the pageant stage with her big bouffant, answering asinine questions about which world leader she most admired. “Houston. But we moved to Paradox in 1980, so I'm working toward becoming a semi-native.”

“We?” Jeff leaned against an oak chifferobe wardrobe in a relaxed posture.

“Uh, yes.” She realized she was rusty on the pageant
shtick
. “Well, my husband. But he's since passed away.”

“I'm sorry,” he said. But to Betty, it didn't appear he was sorry at all.

There was an uncomfortable pause before Betty turned to the desk. “You know, I bought this piece –”

“I live outside of Paradox, in the unincorporated part.” He chuckled. “
Paradox.
Sure is an odd name for a town, isn't it?”

Betty wasn't sure where in the hell this conversation was headed. “I'm sorry, but I don't follow you.”

“It means irony or contradiction.”

“Yes, I'm aware of the definition of the word, but I'm not clear on –”

“I think it just seems like a paradox in itself that somebody would give a town that name. ‘I live in Paradox.' It's like saying, ‘I live in an illogical place.'”

Betty actually pondered this concept. “I never really thought of it that way.”

“Really? I thought of it the first time I heard the name. That's why I chose to live outside the city line. I prefer to live outside the irony.”

Betty looked at Jeff, not sure what to make of him. He seemed to be someone who took time to actually
think
.
But he also appeared to spend time thinking of the most peculiar things. “Yes. Well, right.” She turned to the desk, but was pretty sure any possible sale was dead in the water. “I'm running late to see a sick friend.”

Jeff smiled. “Sure. A sick friend.”

She realized her reply sounded like a worn out excuse used to hasten a quick exit. “No, really. I am going to see a sick friend. A
very
sick friend.” Her right ear began to flutter once again as her neck joined in the spasm.

“You okay?”

She was bewildered. She didn't think she'd made any wincing facial movements or drawn attention to her annoying issue. “Yes, of course, I'm fine.”

Jeff cocked his head to the side. “You sure?”

Good Lord, this guy was persistent
. “Yes,” she replied, as her ear played “Babaloo.”

He walked out with her and said goodbye before straddling his black Harley and zooming off into the distance. Damned noisy modes of transport, she said to herself, which seemed so inadequate for comfortable travel. But it did seem to start right up quite well without the need of a prayer. One could call that a bit of a paradox.

Peggy's hospice nurse answered the door and solemnly ushered Betty inside. She was a black woman with a tidy bun of braids bundled in the crook of her neck. Betty lingered a tad too long in the front entrance, clutching the cooler that held the box of chocolates. The house smelled toxic, like dirty metal burning.

“How's she doing today?” Betty managed to say as her stomach churned.

“Not good, I'm afraid,” the nurse replied with the hint of a Caribbean accent. “She's got company right now but she's in a lot of pain.”

This was already too much for Betty. She removed the elegantly wrapped box of chocolates from the protective cooler. “Perhaps, I can leave these chocolates with you and I'll come back another time –”

“Another time?”

Betty looked at the woman, not sure what to say. Her reply suggested that time was of the essence if one wanted to see Peggy outside of a casket. With reluctance shading each step, Betty walked down the dim hallway and around the corner. The foul aroma grew more penetrating the closer she got to Peggy's bedroom. Betty knew it all too well; Frank Sr. reeked of the same odor just days before he died. Reaching the doorway, she stopped in her tracks. There was an older gentleman around eighty years old on one side of Peggy's bed. But the young man with his back to Betty, holding Peggy's hand looked like…Betty clutched at her heart, fixated. Peggy was clearly out of it, tossing her head to the side and mumbling incoherencies. But Betty couldn't take her eyes off the young man.

He gently rested Peggy's hand against the comforter and turned. Betty stared at him. He was about five feet eight inches tall, with a chaotic swath of dark brown hair that hadn't seen a comb in quite some time. His loose fitting t-shirt sported three large letters in black: G.Y.O. His jeans hung dangerously low on his slender frame, giving her concern that the slightest tug would force them down around his ankles.

The young man quietly moved away from Peggy's bed and stood next to Betty. Once there, she noted a peculiar scent that seemed to be attached to his clothing. It wasn't awful but it wouldn't fetch much at the cologne counter.

“Do I know you?” he asked.

Betty realized she must have stared far too long. “No. You just look like…” She peered down at her sweater. The cuff had obviously gotten caught on something and was beginning to unravel. This particular embarrassment had never happened before, and Betty blamed the regular wear and tear on this dreadful mishap. She quickly folded the cuff so as to conceal the unsightly damage.

He leaned forward and looked at her more intently. “Like what?”

Betty turned away. Yes, there was an eerie similarity but on closer inspection, his eyes were different and his lips were thinner. “Nothing. Never mind.”

“I'm Peyton.”

He waited but Betty remained silent, staring straight ahead but avoiding Peggy with every ounce she could muster.

“And you're….who?” he asked with an unusually purposeful manner.

“Betty,” she said in a hushed tone, never looking at him.

He checked out her dress. “Did you just come from church?”

“Church?” Now she turned. “No.”