A Wedding Invitation (23 page)

M
om lets me have a dress from the clearance rack for my date tonight. She knows that I’ve been eyeing a short black one with spaghetti straps—a new item for the store, with a brand name that I could never afford. “Not for you, Samantha,” she told me one afternoon as I pressed its soft fabric against me and smiled into the mirror. “You don’t want to wear black. Black dresses are overrated.” From the curve of her mouth, I almost thought that she was ready to spout out a line she often whispers when we are out in public and she disapproves of what someone has on.
“Just because the model in the catalog is wearing it doesn’t mean you should.”
I found the phrase funny the first time I heard Mom say it when we saw a lady in a mini pumpkin orange smock with purple trim.

The dress I’ll be wearing is light blue, reminding me of a clear spring morning. It has a moderate neckline and zips in the back. Mom says my pearl earrings will go well with the dress and she lets me “borrow” a few bracelets to adorn my arms.

At home I take a long shower, lathering up with a bar of honeysuckle soap. I paint my fingernails a frosty coral and hum along with Crosby, Stills, and Nash as their song “Southern Cross” plays on the radio.

Taylor is just as cute as the last time I saw him. He asks about my day and how the shop is doing and if my mother has found her cat.

“No,” I say as we are seated at a table to the left of the bar.

“You never know. There’s still hope about that cat.”

It’s been over six months, so I doubt that Butterchurn is ever going to drink milk from the dish Mom has sitting out for him in the garage. That cat has found a new owner or been eaten by the proverbial wolves that lurk. I want to be hopeful, but my misgivings loom larger than hope.

We look over menus filled with tasty-sounding Italian specialties. When Taylor asks what I’d like to eat, I’m at a loss. I’ve been too busy concentrating on our conversation. He tells me he’s going to have a shrimp dish, Gamberi Alla Caprese, and by the time the waiter approaches our table, I realize my time is up so I order the same.

Over our dinner I ask him what I’ve been planning to. “Can you find anyone?”

He smiles. “Just about.”

I want to ask him all the tricks and tools he uses, so I can tell Carson what I’ve learned. For once, I’ll know more about something than him. “What made you want to be an investigator?”

“Too much TV.” Warmly, he says, “Now, tell me how you became a boutique owner.”

“I don’t own the shop. It belongs to my mom.”

“But do you like working there?” He lifts his fork filled with shrimp to his mouth and chews.

“I enjoy seeing the way the right clothes can make people happy, and finding items that fit them. My mom wanted a shop where tall and short women have a chance to get quality clothing that fits them in all the right places.”

“That’s right—you told me that she’s tall. Six feet?”

“Yep, and look at me, I’m only five-five. Her mom was short, so I guess I got that gene.” Wanting to steer the conversation back to finding missing people, I say, “Taylor, I really want to talk about you.” I make my voice flirty.

“Me?”

“Yep.” I sip from my water glass.

“Well, I’m not that interesting.”

“I think you are.” Lowering my lashes, I slowly raise my eyes to meet his soft glance.

“Really?”

“Oh, yes.” My Flirty Sam side has this habit of showing up at times like this. Natasha tells me this side of my personality is going to get me into trouble if I’m not careful. “Did I tell you that I was at a refugee camp years ago?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“But you already knew that, right? Since you’re a P.I., you probably did a background check on me.”

“Not yet.” His smile shows I am amusing him, and that is exactly what I want to do. “Do I need to do a check?”

“A thorough one. I’m wanted.”

“I bet you are.”

I turn the conversation back to where I want it. “So, I need to find a Vietnamese woman.”

“Okay.” His expression invites me to continue.

“Last we heard she was up north somewhere. Her name is Thuy. In Vietnam the last name goes first, and it’s Pham.” I make the
ph
sound like an
f
. “So Pham Thuy, or the American way, Thuy Pham.”

Taylor sips his Coke. “Thuy Pham,” he repeats.

“She was born in 1950. I think.”

“Friend from the past?”

“I’ve never met her.”

“Oh?”

I suppose I should tell him, so I begin with a little Amerasian girl who showed up in my classroom one day, and work my way through time to her upcoming wedding. “She’s asked for my help.” I still haven’t decided if this is a blessing or a curse. I suppose I should feel honored that Lien has confidence that I can find Thuy. “Lien hopes to find her in time to invite her to the wedding.”

Taylor nods. “Sure,” he says. “I can certainly try.”

When he reaches for my hand with his warm fingers, I am sent back to another time, half a world away.

thirty

January 1986

T
he moon was a globe the color of waxy butter that night. The air was moist and stirred by a faint breeze. Carson and I sat in the lounge of the admin building long after the video ended, talking. Our voices were sleepy, but we made no movement to leave the room.

Our knees touched. He told me how he missed iced tea and fried okra. “You know, Bojangles has great sweet tea. Have you ever eaten there?”

A surge of desire came over me. The next thing I knew I’d put my fingers on his jaw and leaned in to kiss his mouth. But before my lips met his, he jerked away. His eyes were like darts, artillery barricading the enemy forces.

Up until that moment, I was certain he dreamed to kiss me.

Yet here was his chance and he wasn’t interested. I didn’t know what to say, so I stood up and muttered, “Fine, be that way,” and stormed out of the room.

He ignored me after that. When he saw me walking toward him, he’d rush into the dorm. The rides to our neighborhood to teach consisted of empty stares out the window, at the floor, anywhere but at each other. During staff meetings, when he sang and played his sax with the other musicians in our group, his eyes never met mine. He quit stopping by my dorm room to ask if I wanted to walk through the neighborhoods with him and eat a Vietnamese sandwich or bowl of noodles at one of the outdoor cafés.

Thinking that we still got along so well, Dr. Rogers asked Carson and me to decorate the administration building and paint the front door, hoping that we could give the drab place a makeover. “You can put some of your photos of the camp on the walls,” he told me, making me feel good about my photography.

Dr. Rogers set a time for Carson and me to meet when the admin building would be vacant of staff. Getting there a little early that evening, I turned on the overhead light, anticipating time alone with Carson.

After fifteen minutes passed, I wondered where he was. I waited and waited, twisting my fingers and biting my lip.

When I was about to head over to Carson’s dorm to see what was taking him so long, one of the female Filipino teachers entered the building. With a tight smile she walked over to where I sat. “Sorry to be late. I just got out of another meeting in my dorm.”

I asked what she meant. That’s when she told me that Carson was off the project. “Carson asked me to replace him,” she said innocently.

As she and I hung the bright and happy posters we’d made, I felt far from bright and happy.

“Apparently,” Dr. Rogers told me in private, “Carson doesn’t feel the two of you work well together. I’m sorry, Samantha.”

I couldn’t believe that Carson wanted nothing to do with me and was letting others know that. Tears burned my eyes and I wanted to crawl into a hole.

I hated Carson after that. Actually, I wished I could hate him, but he occupied my heart—a constant reminder that you don’t always get what you want.

Eventually, we did talk to each other again. It was like a waterspout that has been blocked and is slowly freed from congestion—a trickle at a time. I asked to borrow a pen and he lent me one. He needed to know what time we’d been invited to a Laotian family’s billet for a Saturday dinner. I avoided his eyes but replied, “Six.” Seated around the wooden dinner table with the refugee family, Carson and I conversed, acting like we were still the close friends we’d been weeks ago.

But it was not the same. You can’t go back. What’s done is done. Unrequited love is never easy. Time heals all wounds. I kept repeating such clichés to myself, hoping that they, like medicine, would take away the sting.

They didn’t.

thirty-one

W
hen I get to the shop, out front are two police cars with their emergency light bars flashing red and blue. A stream of yellow caution tape is plastered around the vicinity. This is a scene right out of a TV detective show.

During the five-mile drive over, my mind pounded from Mom’s phone call. I’d stumbled out of bed. My digital clock read 12:49 a.m. Realizing the phone was ringing, I grabbed the receiver from the cordless on my bedside table, knocked over the stack of mysteries, and immediately heard Mom’s words: “Someone broke into the store.”

At the shop, I park my Honda beside one of the police cars and survey the situation. The door to Have a Fit has been broken with the force of some tool, and with the help of my criminal knowledge that comes from watching shows like
Magnum P.I.
, I know it was probably a crowbar.

Mom, dressed in a pair of gray sweat pants and a dark blue
Virginia is for Lovers
T-shirt, stands by the front door. I hear her say to a cop that she’s okay. Even so, my words tumble out as I hug her, “Mom, are you okay?”

She smells of cold cream. I wonder if she was sleeping when she was alerted that the boutique was in trouble. “We have been robbed,” she tells me.

I hate hearing the truth from her lips.

“The people from the security company called. I was in such a deep sleep.”

I don’t want to ask, but I must know. “What’s gone?”

“They took money out of the register—but only fifty dollars was in there.”

I’m relieved and yet frightened in the same breath.

Gripping her arm, I guide her into the boutique. Together, we scan the store in its disarray, and she notes more items that are no longer there.

Two gowns are gone, the black dress I wanted to wear, and some shirts. Whoever did this knocked over a clothes rack and hit the walls with something that put holes in the plaster.

“At least they didn’t set it on fire.” Mom leans against the one wall that is not damaged.

We watch as a gloved officer dusts the cash register with a powder. “I should be able to get some prints off of this,” she tells us.

The policeman who enters next is handsome. He reminds me of Starsky on
Starsky and Hutch
. “I’m Officer Garner. I’d like to ask you some questions,” he says to Mom and then smiles at me. “Shall we sit down?”

I pull a folding chair from the back room for her as the policeman grabs two more from the tiny cardboard table where Mom and I often sit at lunchtime, sharing a sandwich. We place the chairs near a rack of silk blouses.

Opening a large memo pad, he begins to write. “Now,” he says to us, “what time did you close the store last night?” He glances up at Mom. “It’s Mrs. Bravencourt, correct?”

“Yes, Officer Garner.” She clears her throat. True to form, she has remembered his name. “We closed at seven. Like we usually do.”

Although her tone is cordial, I note that her fingers are clenched into fists.

“And who closed the store?”

“We both did,” I answer. “We always walk out to the parking lot together.”

He scribbles on the pad, balancing it against his thigh. Looking up, he asks, “Does anyone else have a key or work with you?”

Mom shakes her head. Then she says, “Sometimes Natasha works here, but she doesn’t have a key.”

“Who is Natasha?”

“My friend,” I tell him.

He adds to his notes. “And you two are mother and daughter?”