Echoes (14 page)

It was Mindy. At least she thought it was Mindy. Her friend
was dressed as a country-western singer with the most ridiculous platinum blond wig Lauren had ever seen.

Lauren slapped her hand over her mouth.

“You forgot,” Mindy said, slipping inside the apartment.

Lauren winced and nodded.

“It’s only my husband’s surprise birthday party,” Mindy said with an exaggerated drawl. “Where did you get the cat?”

“This is Hawthorne. I bought him this afternoon at a garage sale. Mindy, I’m sorry. The time got away from me. I’ll be ready in five minutes. Seven minutes tops.”

“I don’t know if I can wait that long,” Mindy said, adjusting her voluptuous bosom.

Lauren couldn’t hold back the giggles any longer. “What do you have in there? No, never mind. I don’t want to know.”

“I’ll tell ya’ a little secret,” Mindy said, winking her long false eyelashes and moving closer to Lauren. “It’s a little more than what the good Lord endowed me with.”

“A little!”

Both women laughed, and Lauren wondered how she ever let Mindy talk her into this crazy scheme.

“I can’t wait for you, Lauren. Everyone will be arriving in a few minutes,” Mindy said, glancing at her watch over her protruding chest, which was draped in a tight, glittery silver dress.

“Go ahead. I’ll meet you there,” Lauren said. “I have Leon’s present wrapped and everything. I’ll be there as quickly as I can.”

“Remember to park away from the front of the restaurant so he won’t notice your car.”

“I will.”

“And hurry!”

“I will!” She shut the door as Mindy wiggled her way down the stairs. Then dashing to the bedroom closet, Lauren grabbed her costume and muttered to Hawthorne, “I can’t believe I’m
going to wear this in public!” She pulled on the simple blue, button-up-the-front dress she had picked up at the same thrift store in which she had found the “Don’t Mess With Texas” sweatshirt. Next came ankle socks and clod-hopper shoes. With a quick tuck of a few bobby pins, her hair was up. For the final touch, she reached for the hat waiting on the bathroom counter and adjusted it so that the gaudy flowers showed off the most and the long dangling price tag hung down on the right side. She gave herself a big smile and laughed aloud. “No need to bother with makeup,” she told herself. With a couple of quick squirts of Vanilla Fields perfume, she was out the door.

At the bottom of the stairs she remembered Leon’s gift. She took the stairs in her clunky shoes, two at a time, unlocked the door, and was greeted by Hawthorne’s questioning “meow.”

“I forgot his present!” she hollered, reaching onto the top shelf in the hall closet and pulling down a large wrapped box. “Okay, I’m really leaving now. You be a good boy, and I’ll be back before you have a chance to miss me.” She locked the door and hurried to the car.

Driving like a maniac, Lauren arrived in less than ten minutes and spotted an empty parking place right by the front. She whipped into the parking lot, not even noticing a customer who was walking out of the restaurant. She nearly hit him.

He jumped to the side and held up his hands as if surrendering. That’s when she noticed it was Justin. The easygoing smile spread across his jaw proved he wasn’t upset. Lauren rolled down her window and called out, “Sorry!” She pulled into the empty parking space and hopped out saying, “Are you okay, Justin?”

“I’m fine,” he said, coming closer with brows furrowed, trying to figure out who it was who had almost hit him and knew his name. “Lauren?”

“Yes, it’s me.” She felt self-conscious and silly. So she blurted out, “Pay no attention to the woman behind the funny hat with the dangling price tag.” Justin didn’t seem to get the joke.

“Are you eating here tonight?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said, aware of how ridiculous she must appear to him. “Mindy put together a birthday party for her husband, and we’re planning to surprise him.”

“I imagine you will.”

“Dinner is free, you know, if you dress up like a country-western star,” she explained.

“I didn’t know that,” he said.

“Well, it is. Are you eating here?”

“Yes. As a matter of fact, Amy was supposed to meet me here. I guess I’m a little early.”

Lauren felt her heart sink. Here she had planned to make dinner for Justin this weekend, but he had wasted no time in asking Amy out. With intense effort she tried to keep her emotions buoyed up. This was what she had promised herself, wasn’t it? No guy would have the power to control her emotions.

“Hey,” he said, “I got your message about dinner sometime. Umm, it wouldn’t work out for me tomorrow night. I’m not sure—”

“That’s okay,” Lauren answered quickly. “It was a fleeting thought. I wanted to say thanks, that’s all.”

“I appreciate it.” Justin’s dazzling smile led her to believe he had been asked out by more than a few women in his lifetime, and he had found a way to turn on the charm while turning them down. She wasn’t interested in being one of many on his long list.

Lauren smiled back and dropped the conversation. She reached back into her car to retrieve Leon’s gift off the passenger seat. A car stopped behind Lauren’s, and the driver leaned
his head and arm out the window and yelled, “Are you coming out?”

She peeked over her shoulder and saw that Leon was in the car.

“Mindy’s husband is in that car!” she whispered to Justin. “Tell the driver I’m not leaving. Don’t let Leon see me.”

“She’s not leaving,” Justin called out. “There’s more parking in the back.”

The car moved on. The next car was Amy’s.

“Justin!” she called out.

“Hey, Amy!” he answered, walking toward her. “You look really nice tonight.”

“I’ll go park and meet you at the entrance.”

“Okay, darlin’.”

Lauren still had her head inside the car. In the darkened quiet she thought,
Is it my imagination, or was Justin calling me “darlin’ ” only last week?

She backed out of the car, inwardly gratified she wasn’t part of this dating game. “I have to go.” She shut her car door with her foot, and with the gift in her arms, she marched past Justin in her orthopedic shoes, clomping her way into the restaurant. He followed right behind and at the door said, “I’m going to wait here for Amy. I’ll probably see you in there.”

Giving him a “Pearly” smile, she slipped into the lobby and was relieved to see Reba look-alikes and a bevy of Dolly-wannabes. The most humorous one of them all squeaked at her from the side hall that led to the restrooms. “Lauren, what took you so long?” Mindy’s wig was crooked, and her ebony hair stuck out from the fake platinum around her forehead. Lauren reached a free hand to straighten it, trying hard not to laugh.

Loud, funky country-western music blared from the belly of the restaurant. “Leon’s here!” Lauren said. “He’s going to
walk through that door any minute. Where’s everyone else?”

“In the back. Come on.”

They peeked around the corner, checking the front door, and as they did, it opened. In walked, not Leon, but Justin and Amy, hand in hand. Mindy stopped in her tracks and reached over to squeeze Lauren’s arm.

“I know,” Lauren said calmly. “I saw them in the parking lot. I introduced him to Amy at my apartment last Sunday afternoon. It’s okay. Come on, before Leon sees us.”

Mindy looked stunned.

Lauren nudged her toward the crowd inside the restaurant. “It’s like you always say, ‘God is in control,’ right?”

“How do you do that?” Mindy said, taking quick, tiny steps next to Lauren and yelling over the music. “You turn your emotions on and off like a faucet. That can’t be healthy.”

“Oh, so now that I’m trying to trust God, I’m not healthy. Make up your mind, Mindy!”

“Whatever you say, Cleopatra.”

“I’m not dressed like Cleopatra,” Lauren said.

“Oh, excuse me. I thought you were the queen of de Nile.”

“I’m not denying anything!” Lauren said furiously.

Mindy stopped, turned toward her, and said, “You’re right. I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair.”

“Just because my life isn’t like yours …,” Lauren began. She was stopped when the false eyelash on Mindy’s right eye came unglued and fluttered into her cleavage.

“There’s a bug in my dress!” Mindy shrieked, beginning to pull out wadded up panty hose and tossing them at Lauren.

Lauren found it difficult to remain upset with a person under such circumstances.

L
eon was more than surprised. Shocked wasn’t even quite strong enough a description. Mortified almost hit the mark. Lauren felt sorry for him. He couldn’t eat, socialize, or even think straight. He kept staring at his wife, obviously more embarrassed about her appearance than she had ever been about anything in her life.

Mindy moved through the evening undaunted. With her outfit restuffed, she carried the conversation around the table at dinner and was the first to ask the waiter if they had a dessert tray.

Lauren hadn’t spotted Justin and Amy the entire evening. The restaurant was large enough that they could have disappeared into some corner booth. Or perhaps they had decided the place was too noisy for a first date and went somewhere quieter. Like Clementine’s.

Don’t feed yourself that stuff. It’ll upset your stomach. And it’s not worth it, remember?

The desserts arrived. Leon opened his gifts and was appreciative of them all. He seemed as eager as Lauren to leave. Mindy had other plans. She wanted them all to join the line dancers out on the floor and have a real hoot. It was a hoot, all right. Mindy in her fancy dress and wild wig, Lauren in her clodhoppers and floppy hat, and the rest of the group, who all had chickened out and had come dressed as they normally did.

Lauren ended up in line with a Garth look-alike and two big-haired Rebas. What made the whole experience so fun and crazy was that the music at Jake’s was country-western hits from the ’50s and ’60s. Leon began to enjoy himself and actually ended up begging Mindy to stay for “just one more” about eight times.

Exhausted, but still smiling, Lauren arrived home after midnight. Hawthorne was curled up in his new bed by the fireplace and didn’t budge when she came in. However, he had obviously been busy while she was gone. Shredded papers were scattered on the floor, twisted blinds hung from the windows, his milk dish had been dumped, and the rose- colored cover on her easy chair had nearly been pulled off.

“So you had a wild party while I was out, did you?” She stroked his fur, and he began to purr. “I guess that’s all part of the deal. You keep me company, and I endure your rambunctious years. I can live with that. Just try to not break anything, okay?”

Even though she was tired, the computer beckoned her to turn it on and check her e-mail. She felt like a compulsive gambler, unable to walk past a slot machine without dropping in a nickel. She turned on the computer and went into the kitchen to heat up some water and make herself something hot to drink. The Irish Breakfast tea caught her eye, and she decided to try it. Something in her memory said to drink it with milk and sugar, so she placed those items on the kitchen counter. The microwave
beeped, signaling that her water was ready. She poured the steaming water over her tea bag, steeped it a few minutes, and then added the milk and sugar. It smelled wonderful.

“Okay,” Lauren said to her sleeping kitten as she headed to the computer with a cup of tea and a bowl of candy corns, “a little midnight snack and hopefully a letter.”

There it was. Just as she had hoped. She nibbled off the white tip of a candy corn and began to read:

Lauren found her heart pounding and a smile resting on her lips like a pink satin ribbon. KC’s words had a powerful effect on her. She sipped her tea, and then it came to her. KC
was the one who had recommended Irish Breakfast with milk and sugar.