Betty's (Little Basement) Garden (24 page)

Carrying the clone out to her car, she got in and placed it on the front seat, securing a seat belt around the center of the two-gallon plastic pot. Once every window was open, she slowly backed out of her driveway and drove to a remote corner of Paradox, a few miles outside of town, where grassy, greenbelt fields lay next to an old asphalt road. She stopped the Taurus and remembered – it was the same place she'd secretly taken Frankie when he couldn't sleep at night as a child or when he suffered from his persistent nightmares. When she was certain that Frank Sr. was passed out or asleep, she'd bundle up her grade school son, put him on the front seat of the car and drive with all the windows down. Frankie would rest his head on the door, hold his arm outside and let the wind blow through his fingers. He wouldn't say a word as they drove up and down that asphalt road in the darkness, but his pain was tangible. And yet, after half an hour, the open air seemed to calm him and wash away his insomnia, until she could return to the house and covertly lay her sleeping son back in his bed.

While Betty sat there on that May night, as twilight succumbed to the darkness, she remembered how she wanted to keep driving on one of those nights so long ago. She had her son and some money, and she could have kept driving. But propriety kept her from doing it. What would people think of her? Somehow back then, the better choice was to endure and hope for happier times. But the happiness never arrived. It just kept being swallowed by resentment and ennui.

And so she drove up that asphalt road with the windows rolled down and watched how the cannabis leaves fluttered against the wind. With each flicker of motion, she hoped it could be washed clean of anything that was trying to destroy it. Without realizing it, she extended her arm outside her window. And she stayed just like that for another hour on that desolate road, even as the tears and regret took over.

The drive to Dottie's ranch was a much-needed diversion. Nestled on the front seat of Betty's car was a small cooler that held five beautifully decorated and wrapped chocolates. She didn't want to be too forward and bring Dottie a dozen, but two chocolates seemed inadequate. Dottie lived about forty miles south of Paradox in an unincorporated rural area. The landscape was fairly monotonous, until Betty drove up over a long, two-lane ribbon of highway and descended into a verdant valley. The warm May days and rains had quickly transformed the expanse into a rich tapestry of alfalfa and various grasses, creating an emerald and jade quilt that draped across the panorama for miles.

Betty arrived at the impressive, rusted, iron front gate precisely at 12:55 and punched the intercom button. As she waited for someone to answer, she admired the exquisite, curved, wrought-iron sign that graced the entrance: Happy Valley Herefords. Underneath, burnt into a slab of wood, the sign read: Happy & Healthy Grass-Fed Cows since 1980.

“Hello?” a male voice asked, crackling over the intercom.

“Hello,” Betty said in her best pageant voice. “This is Betty Craven. I'm here to see Dottie…about a horse?”

“Yes, ma'am. She's expecting you.”

The massive gate opened with a slow flourish. Betty drove her beat-up Taurus down the dirt road for nearly half a mile before turning into a cluster of shade trees, crossing a bridge and a slow creek, and arriving at a magnificent, two-story, log house. A large barn stood about a thousand feet past the house, and beyond that, stables and the enormous expanse of land where at least seven hundred cows and calves roamed freely. A stout man in his late fifties approached her, and she rolled down her window. He seemed to observe her with great care and a somewhat worried brow.

“Hello, ma'am,” he said, offering his hand. “I'm Hugh. I'm the ranch manager.”

“Nice to meet you, Hugh.”

He canvassed the inside of her car. “So, you're interested in one of the horses?”

“Yes,” Betty said, realizing she hadn't manufactured any suitable story to support this ruse. “But this is just an introductory meeting…with the horse.” He looked at her with a quizzical expression. “I don't like to take it too fast.” The minute she said that, she wished she hadn't. And before she could fall deeper in the bullshit, she heard the commanding voice of a woman, and saw her quickly walking toward the car.

“Hugh! I got this!” Dottie said with authority, as she approached the passenger side of Betty's car. She opened the door and got in, after Betty quickly moved the cooler into the backseat. “Drive up to the barn and go around the side,” Dottie instructed.

Betty complied, but she couldn't help noticing the grave look of concern on Hugh's face in her rearview mirror. “I said exactly what I was told to say,” Betty offered.

“Don't worry about it,” Dottie replied. “Hugh's a good guy. Just overprotective.”

Betty was taken by Dottie's authoritative manner. She had an aura of confidence about her but also gentleness in her eyes. She looked to be around Betty's age or a few years older. Dressed in a pair of sturdy blue jeans, a white ranch shirt and square toed work boots, Dottie softened her outfit with an elegant pair of diamond stud earrings, a turquoise and silver cuff bracelet, and a stunning diamond-and-sapphire wedding ring. Her brown hair was short and wavy with strands of grey. Betty parked around the back of the barn, out of view from anyone who could be watching. “I brought you some…chocolates?”

“Fabulous! Bring them inside.”

Betty followed Dottie into the spacious barn. The aroma was a mix of cedar, hay and horseshit but somehow, Betty found it pleasantly intoxicating. Large, open windows allowed the outside air to flow consistently, occasionally fluttering the stacks of papers attached to clipboards hanging from the row of horse stalls. Dottie led Betty to the farthest end of the barn, where a large stall and a huge horse stood.

“I figured if we're going to make this look real, I better bring in an actual horse,” Dottie commented, motioning for Betty to enter the stall.

“Do I really have to come in there?” Betty asked, clutching the small cooler to her waist. She realized she'd miscalculated her outfit
du jour
, when she chose a pink, twill dress with appropriate sleeves and matching soft pink pumps.

“If Hugh or one of the ranch hands walk in, it's going to look odd if you're standing out there and I'm in here. Besides, all this hay will muffle our conversation.”

Betty briefly flashed back to the indignity in her past when that damned horse rooted through her beautiful bouffant. Trusting that such an ignominy could not happen twice in one's life, and relieved she no longer favored a bouffant, Betty delicately made her way into the stall, closing the heavy door behind her.

Dottie quickly leaned outside the stall door, checking around one more time, before turning back to Betty. “I'm sorry this whole thing has to be carried out in this manner. But my late husband was really clear with all of our workers. No drugs. Period. If they're found with any illegal substances, they're fired immediately.”

“Do you let them drink beer when they're not working?”

“Sure. It's beer. It's acceptable.” Dottie raised her eyebrows, obviously well aware of the double standard in her succinct statement. “Marijuana is not acceptable.”

“I know it's none of my business, but given the way you feel, how do you rationalize what we're doing?”

Dottie bit her lip and studied the ground. “I don't. I'm a hypocrite. But I'm a hypocrite who's done her homework and due diligence.” She nervously picked up a pitchfork and traded one lump of hay for another, seemingly needing to keep moving. “I didn't want to believe there was any healing merit to marijuana. I wanted to keep believing I was right. That it was a dangerous drug that should be banned completely. I mean, Christ, I've donated over one hundred grand to the local anti-drug groups and rehab centers. One of them carved my name into a brass plate and nailed it to a bench sitting in the waiting room of an anti-drug awareness group.” She shook her head, obviously embarrassed. “There's a rumor floating around that they're going to name a room after me at one of the sober-living facilities just south of here.”

Betty looked at her, stunned. “Oh dear.”

“'Oh shit,' is more like it.” She stabbed a pile of hay with the pitchfork. “But there's the truth, and then there's what you choose to believe. After I started reading and researching the marijuana plant, I had to face the fact I'd been duped by propaganda and well meaning, but ignorant, ‘experts.' If you dig really deep, you'll start to see all the lies we've been told. They lie when the truth doesn't fit their agenda. God, I sound like a barefoot leftist, don't I?”

Betty was quickly growing fond of Dottie's no-nonsense demeanor. She set the cooler down and stole a look outside the stall. “What made you start investigating it?”

Dottie stopped shuffling the hay. A mournful cast fell over her face. “My late husband was a big strapping man who always seemed indestructible. But then nineteen years ago, he got MS. I watched the love of my life – my one and only – gradually go from two hundred fifty pounds down to one forty. He tried every cocktail of drugs, spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on experimental treatments that just left him sicker and weaker, until finally he became wheelchair bound. Last year, he fell out of his chair and broke his hip. Nothing touched the pain.
Nothing
. Not even the morphine. All it did was give him constipation. But don't worry. The bastards have a pill for that too.”

She leaned the pitchfork against the stall. “Then one day, he had an old friend show up and they hung out by themselves for about an hour. Later when I went upstairs to check on him, he was really calm and incredibly relaxed. I chalked it up to having his friend visit.” She smiled. “It wasn't until after he died that I found a jar of marijuana oil capsules hidden in the drawer next to his side of the bed.” Her eyes drifted into the distance, lost. “I was confused. Shocked. Bewildered.” Dottie turned back to Betty. “Angry! He obviously needed to keep it from me, because he was probably afraid of what I'd think or say. And what the hell, he was right. But I couldn't deny there was something different about him and his ability to get relief after those capsules showed up.” She shook off the memory and resumed fussing with the same pile of hay. “That's when I started spending every free moment on the Internet, researching the plant. I downloaded hundreds of pages of medical studies from all over the world, most of which I couldn't make heads or tails out of, but the continuing theme throughout all those dry treatises was that used correctly, marijuana had incredible healing potential.”

She walked to the front of the stall and checked to make sure they were still alone. “I hadn't enjoyed a decent night's sleep in almost twenty years.” Dottie struggled with her confession. “
Twenty
goddamned years. Do you have any idea what lack of deep sleep will do to your body over that period of time?”

“Yes. I'm acquainted with that issue.”

Dottie charted Betty's reaction. “You really
do
understand, don't you?”

Betty nodded.

“So…I tried one of his capsules. And I slept for twelve hours
straight
. Twelve hours of magical, marvelous, deeply restful
sleep
. I didn't think it was ever possible. Then I noticed my joints weren't hurting as much the next morning.” She let out a hard breath. “So there it is. I'm addicted to getting a good night's sleep. I'm addicted to pain relief. Welcome to my dilemma. On one hand, I've got a reputation to uphold. On the other hand, I've got to get a decent night's sleep. I D.A.R.E. to keep the kids off drugs, but then I dare myself to contact a kindred spirit like yourself to find a decent edible.” She slammed the pitchfork against the side of the stall. “Dammit, this stuff works, but you did
not
hear that from me.”

They heard a slight shuffle outside the barn.

“Shit,” Dottie muttered. “Hello?” she called out.

One of the ranch hands called out to her, asking a question. After sorting it out, Dottie suggested they go to her office attached to the barn. Once ensconced in the small but well-appointed room, Dottie relaxed. Leaning back in her weather-beaten leather chair, she rested her feet on the desk. Betty sat across from her with the cooler never far from her grasp.

“What else can you make besides chocolates?” Dottie asked in a subdued voice.

Betty wasn't prepared for that question. “I'm not quite sure.”

“Don't get me wrong. The chocolate I tried of yours was phenomenal. Better than any pot edible I've eaten.”

“It's the honey,” Betty offered.

“No, sweetie. It's the pot,” Dottie said with a wry smile. She swung her feet off the desk in a decisive manner. “You ought to look into making salves. Did you know the root of the marijuana plant can be ground up, boiled in oil and turned into a terrific topical ointment that dissolves muscle pain? And there's no THC in the root!”

“I didn't know that.”

“It's true. Look it up. But you didn't hear it from me.”

“Of course not.”

“You know what else I learned?” Dottie said leaning forward, eager to share. “If you eat a really ripe mango an hour before you ingest an edible or an oil capsule, the effect of the pot is even stronger.”

“My, my,” Betty said. “I had no idea.”

Dottie edged closer and spoke in a lower voice. “I was never a real fan of mangoes, but I am now. You don't want to overdo it though. After my husband died, I ate a ripe mango, waited an hour and knocked down two of his oil capsules. Whew. What a ride. I won't do that again, but I did learn something from the experience.”

“What's that?”

“Not important. You'll think I'm nuts,” she said, turning away.

“No I won't,” Betty assured her, remembering her own introductory experience that sent her for a loop.

Dottie considered her words and then leaned forward. “Time is bendable. I know that sounds crazy, but when I was over the top after I took too much, that's what I discovered. The past, the present and the future can fold over each other.” She paused, trying to come up with the right words. “And it's like you're witnessing things that haven't happened yet. But you can't remember them when you come out of it. And yet, when they happen…
if
they happen…you have this remote whisper of a memory that you've already experienced this in another place.” She looked at Betty. “Oh, Christ. I sound like someone on the lunatic fringe.”

Betty leaned forward. “No you don't. I believe you. My son had the gift of accurate intuition.”

“Accurate intuition? What in the hell is that? You mean psychic?”

Betty shrugged. “I don't know. He was very sensitive. He saw things other people couldn't or wouldn't see.”

Dottie relaxed “Really?” She thought for a long second. “Republican to Republican, how'd you handle that?”

“Not well. I never disbelieved him. But I didn't defend him either.” A wash of sadness intruded. “I should have defended him a lot more. I regret that deeply.”

Dottie sat back in her chair, clearly more at ease. “Well, I'll tell you one thing. There's a shit load more going on around us than what we think is ‘real.' Everything I've ever believed is out the window now.
Everything.
And it's all because of a little plant that I had always condemned. But you didn't hear that from me.”

Betty found herself relaxing too, settling back into her chair. “I said to a girlfriend the other day that often the very thing we fight or protest against is exactly the thing we actually need or lack.”