Juliet in August (13 page)

The phone rings. Karla ignores it, but after seven or eight rings, Daisy appears in the doorway and says, “Your phone's ringing.”

“I know,” says Karla. “I'm ignoring it.”

“But the man wants someone to answer it.”

“Dad, you mean? Oh. Well, how would you like to answer it for me, then?” says Karla. “Find out who it is and say I'll call back.”

Daisy leaves, and then returns. “It's someone named Lou,” she says. “You can't call her back because she's going out. She says she needs to talk to you
right now
.”

“She's going out. Wouldn't you know it. Sorry,” Karla says to Vicki. “I'd better take it.”

While Karla is out of the room, Vicki plays I Spy with Lucille to keep her in the chair. As Lucille argues with her that the goldfish is orange, not gold, Vicki thinks about all the Norman family scandals. She shouldn't—Karla is really nice and good with the kids—but when you know things about a person you can't help it. Like when Karla's cousin Billy went crazy and stabbed his own mother and killed her. How can you not think about that? And Karla's father was an alcoholic and got his nickname TNT because of the time he was helping someone blow a granite boulder out of his new dugout and they blew out the side of the barn with the debris, lucky no one was killed. In spite of the picture of the barn demolition on the front page of the paper, people kept asking him for help with their blasting projects because he'd worked on the pipeline for years and actually knew what he was doing as long as he wasn't too drunk. Since the stroke, he couldn't drink anymore, but this was after a lifetime of spending all his money on booze and cars and making life hard for his wife until her death several years ago. After he had the stroke, Karla's older sister, Lou, refused to take him in with her, and Karla changed her plan to move to Calgary so that he wouldn't get sent to a nursing home in whatever small town had a bed for him because the one in Juliet had a two-year waiting list. Karla's planned move to Calgary had been to recover from being engaged to Dale Patterson three times—another scandal, or at least a subject for gossip. Vicki has heard that all the old ladies in town are secretly thankful for the stroke because they like the way Karla does their perms, and she'll even make house calls if they really need her to. And Vicki supposes that Karla looking after her dad the way she does gives them hope that if they were to suffer a debilitating illness, someone would come out of the woodwork to care for them.

“I spy with my little eye something that is puce,” Vicki says.

“What the heck is
puce
?” asks Lucille. That makes Vicki laugh.

She can now hear what Karla is saying on the phone because she's raised her voice. Vicki moves closer to the doorway so she can hear better.

“So a friggin' candle party is a priority for you, is it?” Karla says. Then after a pause, “That is not true. I hardly ever ask. I can't believe you said that.” Karla slams the phone down so hard it crashes to the floor, and she says, “Pretend you didn't hear that, kids,” and comes back up the hall to her salon.

“God damn that Lou,” she says to Vicki, then, “Pretend you didn't hear that,” to Lucille.

Lucille puts her hands over her ears.

“She's sharp as a tack, isn't she?” Karla says to Vicki.

“I can still hear you,” says Lucille.

“I'd better watch my language, then,” says Karla, picking up her scissors again. “So you know my sister, Lou,” she says to Vicki. Vicki nods. “Just once in a while—hardly ever—I ask her to watch Dad for a few hours so I can go out and have . . . you know . . . a bit of fun, for God's sake, so I can convince myself I'm not living in an old folks' home. And every time—every friggin' time—she gives me the third degree about where I'm going and who with, as though I'm asking for something unreasonable. He's her father, too, like she's forgotten that. So today is my birthday . . . no need for happy birthday, that's not why I'm telling you this . . . and I thought she would call and offer to take Dad, but no, so I call
her
, and she says she has to check something, and she calls me back just now and says she can't take Dad because she's going to Debbie Wells's candle party. Can you believe that? It's an obligation, she says. As though Dad isn't.”

Karla finally stops talking and remembers that she's supposed to be cutting Lucille's hair.
Snip
. A long lock of hair tumbles to the floor. Now Lucille is short on one side and long on the other. She studies herself intently in the mirror and when Karla goes to snip the other side, Lucille grabs the remaining lock of long hair and squirms away from Karla's scissors.

“What?” Karla asks her. “You want to leave that side long?”

Lucille nods.

“Lucille,” Vicki says, “don't be ridiculous.”

“It's cool,” Lucille says.

“Oh my God, she turned into a teenager while I was on the phone,” Karla says.

“Have you got the gum out?” Vicki asks.

“I think so. Honey, take your hand away so I can look for gum. I won't cut. Promise.”

Lucille takes her hand away and Karla does a quick check. “I think we got it,” she says. “Lucille, how about I snip that side off and even it up. Remember the pixie? Don't you want to look like a pixie?”

Lucille says no and grabs her hair again, all the while watching herself in the mirror.

Karla looks to Vicki for direction. “Never mind,” Vicki says. “I can try to fix it myself later.” She lifts Lucille down from the chair. “Okay, sweet pea,” she says. “Good enough for now, I guess. Thanks, Karla.” Then she says, “You know, I could sit with your dad sometime. I wouldn't mind.”

“Absolutely not. Not when Lou is just down the block and this is her father, too, we're talking about. But thanks anyway. That's really nice of you to offer.”

Vicki opens her purse so she can pay Karla and remembers that she has only a twenty and she'd better save that for the swimming pool and whatever else comes up over the course of the day. She'll have to write a check and hope it doesn't bounce like the last one did. That had been embarrassing, but luckily Blaine had just been paid and Vicki was able to give Karla cash before Blaine found out about the bounced check. Blaine thinks Vicki should just cut the kids' hair herself like his mother used to do, and Vicki's had to set him straight on kids' expectations for trendy haircuts these days. “Get used to it, Blaine,” she says. “When the girls get to high school, look out.” Even Shiloh asked recently if he could get his hair dyed blond. Vicki didn't tell Blaine about that. Anyway, she thought Shiloh was just testing her since he hasn't mentioned it since.

Vicki gets her checkbook out of her purse and says, “How much?” but Karla says, “That's okay. I didn't really do enough of a job to charge you.”

“No, really,” Vicki says, her checkbook poised and ready. “How much?”

“You don't want to write a check for five bucks,” she says. “How about I keep track and add it on next time you come?”

Vicki puts her checkbook back in her purse. “Okay,” she says. “That's fair, I guess. As long as you remember.”

“I'll write it down,” Karla promises.

In the living room, everyone looks contented sitting in front of the TV and watching cartoons, even Mr. Norman. Except for Shiloh, who has moved to the floor and isn't really watching. Maybe he's getting too old for cartoons, Vicki thinks. Maybe his thoughts have turned to a young man's thoughts.

“Do we have to go?” asks Daisy. “We're right in the middle.”

“Of course we have to go,” Vicki says. “Karla has other people coming for haircuts. Besides, we've got work to do, remember? Let's go. Toot sweet.”

“What are you up to?” Karla asks as the kids line up behind Vicki like a small brigade, all but Shiloh, who goes to the door and walks out without a word.

Vicki rolls her eyes at Karla (
See what I have to put up with?
), trying to look amused rather than worried. Then she says, “What are we up to?” to the rest of the kids.

“Beans,” they say in unison.

Karla laughs. “I can see you're full of beans, every one of you.”

“Not that kind of beans,” says Lucille, still playing with her lopsided lock of hair. “Green beans.”

“Oh, I see,” says Karla, although she doesn't.

Just as they're about to file out the door, the phone rings again and Vicki hears Karla answer and say, “Oh, it's you,” and then, “I said I would. Okay. Later.” Then she hangs up.

When Vicki and the kids get outside, Vicki sees Dale Patterson's red truck around the corner. Well, well, maybe that had been Dale on the phone, calling Karla from in front of her house. And maybe they're heading for a fourth engagement. Vicki has no real opinion on Dale Patterson and Karla Norman. Well, actually, she does. She thinks Karla is too good for Dale, but then what does her opinion or anyone else's matter when it comes to love?

As they pass by the three shiny cars, Vicki notices a scratch on the hood of the black one, the Trans Am, a fresh shiny scratch. The rooster is pecking at Mrs. Baxter's lawn nearby and Vicki wonders if he is responsible. She's pretty sure he would lose his head if he were caught in the act of damaging one of old TNT's prized possessions. Why in the world do they keep three cars? Vicki wonders. She's heard a story that Lou and Karla had a big fight over the cars, that Lou thought they should all be sold and the money used to help out with their father's care, but then Karla said the cars were his only pleasure and she went out and sold her own car and now drives one of her father's when she needs a vehicle, a different one every time she goes out. Imagine the cost of keeping the three of them licensed, Vicki thinks. She looks down the walk to her own rusty old Cutlass, expecting to see Shiloh, but he isn't there.

“Shotgun,” shouts one of the twins when he sees that Shiloh isn't in the car. He races to the street and yanks the passenger door open and gets in before his luck runs out and Shiloh appears to take control of the front seat. But then Martin says, “I'm older,” and tells him to get out and in the back, and he dutifully does.

Vicki notices that Shiloh's backpack is not in the car where he left it.

“Darn him anyway,” she says. “Well, get in, kids, I guess we have to go looking for your brother. Funny thing, when the oldest gets to be the most trouble.”

“Will Shiloh catch heck?” Daisy asks.

“I'm not sure,” Vicki says. “Probably not. He's likely walked over to Main Street. Although he should have said something.”

They drive the few blocks to Main, and Vicki looks up and down but can't see Shiloh. She angle-parks in front of the post office and tells the kids to stay in the car while she goes to collect the mail.

The mailboxes are open at the back to the inner workings of the post office, and as soon as Vicki has her box open, Mrs. Bulin, the postmistress, says, “Hi, Vicki. How's the day treating you so far?” She doesn't wait for an answer before she says, “I guess hell must be freezing over. They say it might rain.”

“Where'd you hear that?” Vicki says. “Doesn't look much like rain.” She can't see Mrs. Bulin, but she speaks to the voice. Mrs. Bulin talks to everyone who comes in for mail, but the whole town knows not to say too much back. Mrs. Bulin is approaching sixty-five and has expressed no interest in retiring. She likes her access to information too much, so the story goes.

When Vicki leaves the post office with a phone bill and a bank statement she doesn't care to open, she sees a middle-aged woman with red hair and green shoes talking to Martin through the car window.

“Hello,” the woman says to Vicki when she sees her. “Your kids and I have been having quite the conversation here.”

Just then they hear the sound of a cell phone ringtone coming from the open window of a truck piled high with furniture and packing boxes, and towing a trailer..

“My phone,” she says. “Best answer that.” She gets in the truck and flips open her phone, but it looks as though she's missed the call. She waves at Vicki and the kids as she pulls away. “Keep your eyes open for a gray horse,” she calls.

“Well, that was a funny business,” Vicki says to Martin after the woman is gone. “What was she talking about?”

“She lost her horse,” Martin says.

“Pretty stupid,” Vicki says. “How do you lose a horse? And I don't know why she'd be telling you.” She turns to look at the kids in the backseat and says, “What do you say we go buy Karla Norman a birthday cake?”

They all cross the street to the grocery store, where Vicki goes to the bakery section to check out the cakes. There's one devil's food cake but it looks as though it's been there for days. The chocolate icing is dry—the top of the cake resembles a bare field baked and cracking in the sun. She'd have to be desperate to buy Karla that cake, Vicki thinks, but then she sees it has a half-price sticker on it, so she buys it anyway. She pays with her debit card, holding her breath while the clerk rings in the sale, and it goes through. She should be getting her groceries and putting everything on one sale, but she has things to do and she doesn't want the groceries to sit in the car on such a hot day. Blaine's ham would be green by the time they got home.

“Hey,” Daisy says when they get back outside. “There's Shiloh.”

Vicki looks in the direction Daisy is pointing and sure enough, there he is at the end of the street, heading for the railway tracks.

“Good,” says Vicki. She reaches through the open car window and gives the horn a couple of blasts, but Shiloh doesn't turn around and look. She hands the cake to Martin, who has positioned himself once again in the front seat.

“All right,” she says. “Everyone in. We collect Shiloh, go for a quick swim, do our errands, and drop off the cake. Then home again, home again.”