Terrier Terror, page 23
Attending Alicia’s performance was the key objective of our road trip. Her boyfriend, Kurt Winston, had taken a Freshman History class from Susan six years ago and became one of her favorite students. With some egging on by Susan, Alicia and Kurt met each other. Their second semester, they wound up getting roles in a student theater production. They fell in love. After graduating from CU, they’d stayed in Boulder and moved in together. Kurt is from Branson, and his mother had arranged auditions for them for an oldies’ show. Ergo, two months ago, they moved to Branson. Wednesday—four days from now—we had primo tickets to their show.
Susan looked at Kate with an inscrutable expression; the two of them had done most of the planning for this trip, including getting us tickets to a couple of other shows. “That’d be great,” Susan said. “Fingers crossed.” She looked at her watch. “I can see why Alicia struggles a bit now that she’s attending meetings only virtually. It definitely feels a little like you’re an outcast.”
“You’re never an outcast to us!” Kate hastened to exclaim.
“Our unusual meeting time today conflicts with Alicia’s matinee,” I told Susan. “I was hoping to angle two iPads so you two could see and hear each other.”
Abby and Jane returned together and reclaimed their seats. I got a whiff of what smelled like alcohol on Jane’s breath. I studied her features. She’d had a nasty divorce from a husband over a year ago and was struggling. Recently, I’d tossed a piece of tinfoil into her recyclables and was stunned at the number of empty wine bottles. A prickle of worry ran up my spine.
“Red’s fine,” Abby said. “He was sound asleep in the driver’s seat until I woke him up. It’s still nice and cool in the car, with the windows rolled down a little.” She gave me a quick hug around the shoulders. “Leslie will be thrilled to hear that I also checked Siri. Basically, blind people’s other senses are heightened, so their dreams are about smells and people’s voices and the sensation of their touch. But they don’t have any visuals.”
I had no response. The waitress came over and gave us our check, but assured us there was no rush.
“So how was The First Four Years?” Abby asked Jane.
“Don’t get me started. Twice in a row now I’ve been forced to read first drafts of books by talented authors who never wanted their manuscripts to be published.”
“Laura Wilder didn’t want The First Four Years to be published?” I asked.
“Nobody forces us to read any of the books,” Susan pointed out. “But, yes. Laura Ingalls Wilder had already died by the time The First Four Years manuscript was discovered, and it was her weakest book, by a wide margin. Some readers think that’s because this is the only ‘Little House’ book her daughter didn’t rewrite for her. But others think it’s just not as good as the others because it was her first attempt at writing through an adult’s eyes, and she might have lost all her enthusiasm by then.”
“, it was probably the fault of some money-grubbing agent who found the first draft and published it without anyone’s consent,” Jane scoffed.
I groaned. (But quietly.) “You promised we weren’t going to discuss Harper Lee this week.”
Jane shrugged. “At least I didn’t say her name.”
“But you referred to a ‘money-grubbing agent’ for the hundredth time since we first put ‘Go Set a You-know-what’ on our book list.”
Jane spread her arms. “Somebody has to stand up for Atticus Finch.”
(As you’ve probably realized, Go Set a Watchman was our club’s previous book, which Jane had failed to object to when Susan sent the email list of suggested titles for the upcoming six months. As we discovered at last month’s meeting, however, Jane’s deep admiration for the character Atticus Finch was a major reason she had chosen to enter the field of law in the first place. In Jane’s personal opinion, publishing Go Set a Watchman was elderly abuse, something she cares about so deeply, she does pro bono legal work for senior citizens in Boulder County.)
“Should we continue our book club meeting,” Susan asked, “or are you eager to get to wherever you’re staying tonight?”
“Oh, it’s no problem. We’re less than four hours away from the ball—” Kate stopped, blushing slightly.
“Ooh,” I said, with a grin. “The cat’s out of the bag. We finally know where we’re going for tonight’s surprise destination. We’re going to the ball, where we can dance with the prince!”
“Goody,” Jane said. “I’ve been brushing up on my Fox Trot!”
“I meant to say we’re only four hours away from having a ball when we arrive,” Kate said.
That made little sense. Puzzled, I studied her attractive features. Kate has what poker players call a “tell.” Whenever she lies (next to never) she looks over your shoulder instead of meeting your gaze. Ever since we’d agreed on taking this trip to Branson, she’d spent quite a bit of time glancing over my shoulder.
My cellphone made a noise. I knew the noise signified something other than a phone call, but that’s as techno-savvy as I get regarding my phone. I looked at the screen and saw I’d gotten a text from my daughter. After a couple of swipes and screen touches, I was able to read:
Getting ready to go on stage. Can’t wait to see you!
So glad you’re finally meeting Kurt’s dad! Xoxo
“Huh,” I muttered. “Alicia says she’s happy that I’m going to meet Kurt’s divorced father. I sure hope she’s not trying to fix us up.”
“She probably just wants both families to enjoy each other’s company,” Kate replied. “Which brings up a good topic for discussion. The Ingalls were pretty isolated. Did you think that they had lonely lives?”
“Not for that time period,” I replied, too distracted to elaborate. Kate’s vision had been focused over my shoulder when she gave an excuse for Alicia being excited about my meeting Kurt’s father.
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Leslie O'Kane, Terrier Terror
