Laura's Shadow, page 23
Trixie laughed. “I saw it, and I rode in it. And you are too, as soon as I get myself cleaned up to take you.”
“They’d never let me go in something like that.” GG pouted, taking a hundred years off her face.
“They don’t have to know. It can be our little secret. Sit tight.”
There was no time for a proper shampoo—much less time for a proper drying. After her shower, Trixie rubbed a towel through her damp tresses and pinned them in a loose twist. She kept her makeup light—just a bit of lip gloss and mascara. Finally, she double-knotted the halter top on her sundress, spurred by the unlikely scenario of the wind catching the strings and untying them.
Back in GG’s room, she performed a final check, straightening the buttons on the strawberry blouse and exchanging her bedroom slippers for a soft pair of worn Keds. “Wait right up here,” Trixie said, tying the laces, “and I’ll be back for you. We’ll take you wherever you want to go.”
“We?” GG questioned. “I don’t want the girls to go.”
Trixie smiled, thinking of her mother and grandmother as the girls. “Not the girls, GG. A guy. A friend. A guy … friend.” It was an easy enough label for the moment.
She slipped her feet into her favorite clogs and was coming downstairs just as Ron and Eugenie were coming in, both laughing at some shared joke.
“This place is great,” Ron said, closing the screen door behind him. “Have you seen the barn?”
“I have,” Trixie said. “Antiquers paradise, isn’t it?”
“I think it’s cleaner than my house,” he said. Then, at the shocked look on Alma’s face, “Of course that’s all on my roommate. I’m kind of a neat freak myself.”
Trixie, thinking of his cluttered office, the bulletin board jammed with yellowed, curled clippings, and the desk riddled with empty (and half-empty) pop cans, sent him a wry smile. Here they were, sharing a secret while he tried to impress her mother.
“Hey, Mom,” Trixie said, sidling close enough to Ron that the fabric of his T-shirt sleeve brushed against her arm, “Ron’s too shy to ask for himself, but he’s heard so much about your amazing grilled cheese sandwiches, and I know he’s a little hungry from the road …” Losing herself in the moment, she brought her hand across to pat his belly, as if they were so familiar with each other’s bodies that such a gesture was instinctive. Normal. Then, in the same vein, Ron put his arm around her, tucking her up to his side where—to her pleasant surprise—she fit perfectly.
“Yep,” he said. “Says they’re the best.”
He delivered the line with a little bit of a squeeze that sent a thrill through her not only because of its warm physicality but because he’d fallen so quickly into her improvisation.
“Well,” Alma said, obviously thrilled too for the accolade, “I can’t tell you the whole secret, but it’s a miracle that I learned to whip up a few years ago.”
“Mmm,” Ron said appreciatively. Trixie felt the rumble.
“So, would you mind? Making him a sandwich? I know it’s early for lunch—”
“Of course,” Alma said. “You two come on in and tell us more about”—she made a gesture encapsulating their cozy stance—”this.”
Trixie stood straight but did not take herself away. “I’m still super full from breakfast, and I never have much of an appetite after a run.” That last bit was a lie she hoped to get away with. “But maybe he could watch? So he could replicate it for himself? You know how hopeless I am in the kitchen.”
“She really is,” Ron said, and for that he got a bit of a jab.
“This is the first we’ve heard of her cooking for anybody,” Eugenie said, sending Trixie a sidelong look.
“I haven’t—” Trixie said.
“She doesn’t—” Ron said at the same time.
“You two,” Alma said with a wink. “Let’s go get this boy a snack.”
Alma took herself off to the kitchen, and Eugenie, after another long look, followed, leaving Ron and Trixie entwined and alone.
He leaned down and whispered, “What’s happening right now?”
“I need you to keep them busy while I sneak my GG down to your car.”
“Sneak?”
“I don’t know that they’d be one hundred percent on board with our little outing. And I know for sure that GG doesn’t want them to go along.”
“So I get to be a spy and get the world’s best grilled cheese sandwich? Which, by the way, you’ve never mentioned before, so you’ve been holding out on me. Or you’re wildly overselling.”
She stepped away and gave him a little push. “Go. And trust. Your life is about to change. Tell them I’m up visiting GG, and keep them in the kitchen. When you’re done, come straight out to your car. We’ll be waiting.”
There it was again, that inexplicable frisson that came with planning an escapade together, and its effervescence carried her up the stairs.
GG was waiting, perched on the edge of her bed. In the time that Trixie had been downstairs, she’d brushed and braided her hair into a plait that fell across her shoulder. Trixie paused, gripping the doorframe, mesmerized by the sight, unable to bring her great-grandmother into focus. She shimmered, seeming to appear every age she’d ever been all at once—a child, a girl, a woman. Youth and age passed intermittently across her face, defined by her wavering smile.
“Are we going now?”
“Yes,” Trixie said, brought into the moment by the familiar voice.
“And the girls?”
“Are busy in the kitchen. Come on.”
GG did the closest thing to hopping that a century-old woman could do and did not take Trixie’s arm until they came to the stairs. They walked carefully, quietly together, easing the screen door past its squeaking and closing it silently behind.
“Look at that,” GG said, accompanied by a low whistle.
“Have you ever ridden in a convertible before?”
“Does a buggy count?” She paused at the top of the front steps, then proceeded down them unaided. “Just kidding. Of course I have. I may have been born in a tar shack, but that don’t mean I was raised in one. My husband was probably one of the first people to own a car around these parts.”
As GG walked and talked, Trixie kept herself near, like a spotter, waiting for the woman’s steps to falter, but they never did. The moment they got to the car, however, GG extended her hand and ran her fingers along the length of it while she walked. Trixie followed, curious about the near reverence with which her great-grandmother approached the car. Trixie moved around her and opened the door. Knowing the older woman would never be able to maneuver herself into the back seat, she settled her into the front, gently drawing the seat belt over her and clicking it in place.
GG clasped her arm. “Are you driving?”
Trixie laughed. “No, GG. This isn’t my car.”
“Does that matter?”
Trixie considered for a moment and concluded that, no, it didn’t. She crossed to the driver’s side and climbed in. The keys were on the dash where Ron left them (after she’d assured him there were no car thieves lurking in the wheat field). When the engine roared to life, she and GG exchanged a look of pure delight, as if both were experiencing the phenomenon for the first time. Led Zeppelin poured from the speakers—”Ramble On”—and Trixie thought to herself: Just to the main road. To the main road and back, me and GG. She was adjusting the rearview mirror when the front door opened and Ron appeared, clutching what looked to be a grilled cheese sandwich in one hand and a can of pop in the other. Grape soda, she surmised, as he ran closer.
“Thief!” he shouted around a mouthful of sandwich. “You’re the thief in the wheat field!”
Trixie opened the door, hopped out, and folded the front seat down, saying, “Get in—quick! Before they stop us.”
“You’re driving?”
“Yep. I drive, you eat.” She held the can of pop while he settled in. Then she was back behind the wheel, and off they went. Even creeping along on the dirt-packed drive to the main road, she could feel the power of the engine waiting to spring to life. And when the road lay open before her, she whispered, “Let’s go, kids.”
The speedometer was nudged past 60 when she glanced over to see GG’s arms raised high and a look of pure joy on her face the likes of which Trixie had never seen before. Unguarded, girlish. This is who she would have been on a Sunday afternoon ride with cutters racing on the snow-packed street. Trixie let out a Whoop! and Ron attempted to match Robert Plant’s gritty falsetto.
They had a few miles of road behind them before it occurred to Trixie to ask exactly where they were going. She assumed town, which meant De Smet, but GG hadn’t actually named a destination. She asked her now, pitching her voice above the wind and the radio, to which GG replied, “I don’t care. Keep driving.”
“I’m with Grandma,” Ron said from the back.
“Town it is,” Trixie said before slowing down to a reasonable speed.
When the prairie grasses gave way to the wide, shop-lined streets, Trixie turned down the radio, reasoning that the muscle car would attract enough attention on its own.
“I’m sorry, but did you turn my car into a time machine?” Ron was leaning forward, speaking straight into the curve of her neck, making it a bit difficult to drive even though there were few cars on the street.
“What are you talking about?”
“This place. It looks frozen in time. Like we could turn a corner and run into a gunfight or something.”
“You’ve never been here?”
“Not unless it was a past life. Maybe I was a blacksmith or something.”
“Well, it’s perfectly modern. Drugstores, grocery stores, café.” A thought snapped. “Car repair places. Think I’m going to check on my guy.”
Failing to remember the name or address of the garage, Trixie pulled into a parking space along the street and asked the next passerby for information and directions. When she got back, Ron was standing by the open car door, clearly intending to take over the driving.
“So, this is like one of those small towns where people talk to each other? Strangers on the street?”
“Yep,” Trixie said, climbing into the back seat. “As long as you don’t think of them as strangers.”
Now it was her turn to lean forward. She rested her hand on his shoulder and brought her lips close enough to his ear that she could give him directions in a low enough voice that GG could remain blissfully ignorant beside them. Repeating the directions—turn left, one block, then right—she glanced intermittently over at GG, who seemed perfectly content to take in the sights as if she didn’t have the whole town memorized.
“Now, what are we doing here?” Ron asked. “Picking up your car?”
“No,” Trixie said, ducking behind him. “I want to know if my car really had a problem with the starter or if my mother and grandmother used it as a ruse to keep me in town.”
“Sounds perfectly reasonable.”
He slowed the car to a snail’s pace, and Trixie craned her neck. Half a dozen cars were parked in the lot next to the garage, and there her baby sat among them. She gasped.
“What?” Ron braked a little more aggressively than necessary, making Trixie brace herself to avoid tossing over the front of the seat. GG, thankfully, appeared nonplussed.
“See?” Trixie pointed. “It’s not even in the garage. It’s just … parked there.”
“Didn’t you say they had to order a part?”
“That’s what they said.”
“Well, if that’s the case, then, yeah. They’re not going to take up space in the bay if they don’t have the part.”
“The bay?”
“The bay. Yes. That’s where they fix the cars.”
“I’ve never been to a bay,” GG said dreamily. “Or the ocean. Or a boardwalk. And never will.”
Chagrinned, Trixie fell silent against the back of the seat. This was supposed to be GG’s outing after all, and she’d hijacked it with paranoia. But before she could say, Forget it, move on, Ron was parking the Mustang and getting out of the car.
Trixie reached out a futile hand. “What are you doing?”
“Getting some answers.”
He’d left the engine running and the radio station launched into a series of commercials, so Trixie stretched across the expanse of the front seat to turn it off.
“I like him,” GG said, fully present in the moment. “That man of yours.”
It was on the tip of Trixie’s lips to say, He’s not my man, but if GG liked him, what could be the harm of letting her hold the thought? It wasn’t such an unpleasant thought, after all. “I like him too,” she said, congratulating herself on speaking wholly appropriate truth.
“He seems like a good man.”
“He is.”
“I married a good man.”
“I know you did, GG.” The two couldn’t look directly at each other, but maybe that would make the conversation flow a little more smoothly. “I’m sure you loved him.”
GG shook her head, rolling it against the leather headrest. “I didn’t. At first. And by the time I did, he didn’t love me. And then it was too late for us to love each other.”
Trixie leaned closer. “But you loved somebody, didn’t you?”
GG pressed her lips together, holding back a response, closed her eyes, and shook her head again.
“It’s all right if you did. That’s the way it works. You love someone, and it doesn’t work out. So you find someone else. Or—maybe someone finds you?”
“Why are we here?” GG’s eyes fluttered open, and Trixie noticed a new agitation as she gripped at the hem of her shorts. “What are we doing? I don’t know this place. I don’t want to be here.”
Her voice became higher and thinner, almost childlike, and Trixie felt her own anxiety rise. They had to leave, now. Just as she was about to climb out of the car, Ron appeared, a new confidence to his step.
“Everything’s cool,” he said, getting in.
“Oh, is it? It’s cool? Groovy. Now, let’s get out of here.”
“To where, exactly?”
Trixie sighed. “I don’t know yet, exactly. Can we just—drive? Like, up and down streets for a while?”
“Can I parade my Mustang up and down the grand old neighborhoods of De Smet, South Dakota, and spark envy in the hearts of all? Why, yes, Prairie Girl, I think I can.”
Beside him, GG chuckled and muttered, “Prairie Girl. You have no idea what the prairie is, my girl. No idea.”
It was a relief to have GG back, and Trixie gave Ron’s shoulder a squeeze in gratitude. “What did they say about my car? Besides everything being cool.”
“I walked in there, told them my girlfriend had some urgent business back home in Minneapolis, and that my girlfriend needed to know when the car would be done so my girlfriend could make arrangements to come get it.”
“Hmm. Okay. And did you get a sense that they were on the up-and-up about the problem?”
“Yep. Laid it out the way you told me your grandmother told you.”
“You’re sure he wasn’t yanking your chain?”
“My chain remains unyanked.”
“And are you positive you used the word girlfriend three times?”
“At least.”
“Because you know, I am not, in fact, your girlfriend.”
“Well, I thought about calling you the ad builder for my neighborhood shopper newspaper, but that didn’t have the same zip.”
“So, you jumped straight to girlfriend?”
“I did.”
“Does that mean when I go to pick it up, I’ll have to call you my boyfriend?”
Ron signaled and executed a left-hand turn. “Maybe by then it will be true.”
Trixie fell back against the seat, and the three drove through the residential streets lined with houses of varying degrees of sprawl. Some looked like cabins that had been expanded with ill-conceived additions; others were grand multistory homes that must have been the culmination of somebody’s dream. Ancient trees stretched canopies of shade over trimmed lawns and proud front gardens. She watched as Ron pointed out interesting sights to GG—stained glass windows and flags and wrought iron works of art. She responded well and pointed out a few things on her own. On Third Street they drove by a simple, weather-worn white house with a sign posted in the yard. Trixie held her breath.
Ingalls Home & Museum
The House That Pa Built
Trixie watched GG’s hand reach over and touch Ron gently on his arm. “I been there, once,” she said. “Long time ago on a fool’s errand.”
“Oh yeah? Looks to be open to the public. Want to go in?”
“No,” GG said, sounding almost amused. “There’s nothing for me to see there now. There was nothing for me then either.”
“Where do you want to go, GG?” Trixie leaned forward. “You seemed pretty determined to get somewhere.”
“You won’t want to go.”
“Are you kidding? Would I miss a chance to go anywhere on a gorgeous summer day in a car like this?”
“Aw, thanks,” Ron said, patting the dashboard affectionately. “The feeling is mutual.”
“Tell me, GG,” Trixie said. “Name the place, and we’ll take you there. Like a magic carpet ride.”
Ron immediately joined in with the Steppenwolf lyric. “Close your eyes, girl.”
Trixie followed: “Look inside, girl.”
And together they sang, “Let the sound take you away.”
“Willow Lake,” GG said, ignoring their concert.
“Willow Lake?” Trixie knew the town—tiny even by Little Town on the Prairie standards—but couldn’t make a connection to the family. For all she knew, they didn’t have any relatives anywhere, let alone in a town so close by. She herself had been to the lake a few times, teenage parties with bonfires and beer, but never with her family. “Who do you know in Willow Lake?”
“Nobody,” GG said.
“Sounds like a good enough reason to go,” Ron said. “Shall we find another stranger to ask directions?”
“Not a stranger, no.” Trixie dug through her purse, found the business card, and talked Ron through the directions.
Cam’s office was a small building with a neat, green lawn behind a white picket fence. If not for the DR. CAMPBELL CARTER, PHYSICIAN signboard hanging on the porch, it might have been a delightful honeymoon cottage. As Ron brought the Mustang to a stop, Trixie noticed Samantha lounging on a blanket in the shade of a willow tree in the side yard. She had a thick coloring book and a shoebox full of crayons, all of which she abandoned on sight.
