Paper, Scissors, Death (7 page)

“Here’s what happened.” I peeped around the corner to make sure Anya wasn’t listening. “I was swollen, lumpy, and covered with globs of wet toilet paper when Mrs. Witherow introduced me to the women. One by one, they gave their names, then got real quiet when it was Roxanne’s turn.”

“What’d she say?”

___

I thought back over that day. Roxanne was tan and thin except for what looked like a pair of over-inflated beach balls popping out the top of her skimpy aquamarine sun dress. A chain of opals hung around her neck and nestled between her twin assets. Her eyes narrowed, and she gave me a wicked once-over before hissing, “So this is the famous Kiki. My, my, my.”

How bizarre. I wondered what was up. I could see all the other women suppressing any signs of emotion. I tried to be polite. “Your name sounds familiar, as well.”

She smirked.

Suddenly, I remembered. “Didn’t you used to date my late husband, George?”

She stared down her nose at me and sneered, “That’s one way of putting it.”

The other women hopped up and began chattering over their make ’n’ takes. Merrilee especially needed a lot of attention. I didn’t have the chance to say more to Roxanne because I was busy helping the women get started.

___

Their lack of dexterity had flummoxed me. As I told Mert, “You’d think they’d never handled a pair of scissors in their lives. Except for Roxanne and Tisha.”

“Comes from having other people do everything for you,” snorted Mert. “They’re all dang-near helpless. Can’t even find their own backsides with two hands. Who all was there?”

“Mrs. Witherow, her daughter Merrilee, Roxanne, Bill Ballard’s wife Tisha, Sally O’Brien, Markie Dorring, Jennifer Moore—the woman who organized the play date the same day George died—and Linda Kovaleski. Her daughter Claire is in the same grade as Anya. We used to sit beside each other in the carpool line.”

My turn to pour us both more ice tea. “The good news is that Merrilee was so thrilled with the make ’n’ takes that she wants me to make her wedding album. She’s stopping by tomorrow to work out the details. As a surprise, Dodie slipped the memory cards out of all the guests’ digital cameras while they were eating. She downloaded the images so I could make bridal shower albums. The women had no idea we could include pictures they’d been taking during the party.”

“And the bad news?”

“I blew it. Roxanne was really nasty to me, and I told her off.”

___

Dodie has convinced me my work is my best advertisement. As the women finished their make ’n’ takes, she brought out my albums for them to look through. Roxanne pointed a jubilant finger at an old picture of me and said in a loud voice, “What a porker.”

I cringed. My weight has been an issue much of my life.

“How could George stand being married to such a chubby?” Roxanne continued.

I turned away and bit my lip. My weight wasn’t the cause of my marital problems. George always told me it was fine, even though I didn’t believe him. Whenever something bothered me, I turned to food for comfort. Bad idea. A minute on the lips and a lifetime on the hips. Sure, food felt good going down, but after I swallowed, the guilt erased every smidgeon of satisfaction.

Ironically, after George’s death, even the thought of food made me sick. In a dark recess of my mind, I worried I wouldn’t be able to feed Anya, so I quit eating. I know that sounds silly, but I wasn’t thinking straight.

Before long, my pants sagged around my waist. That’s when Mert stepped in. “Either you start eating, or I’ll drag your scrawny self to the hospital psych ward.”

I forced myself to eat regular meals until my appetite returned.

So, yeah, I was skinny now. Whoop-de-do. Thin wasn’t near as much fun as I thought it would be. I liked having room in my clothes, but being svelte didn’t solve all life’s problems like I thought it would.

When Roxanne’s mean remark didn’t faze me, she struck again. “How does a person get that big? What did you do? Sit around and stuff your face all day?”

Well, duh.

Once after a fight with my mother, I went to Wal-Mart and filled a shopping cart with half-price Halloween candy. The check-out clerk asked, “You planning a party?” She was half-right. It was a pity party, and I was the guest of honor.

I ignored Roxanne’s comment and concentrated on gathering leftover paper. Thanks to my meager income, I was putting the “scrap” back into scrapbooking.

“Poor George,” said Roxanne. “He looks miserable in all these photos.”

He did not. The woman was either blind or a liar.

Tisha Ballard tried to change the subject. She said “I swear, Kiki, you are so creative. These layouts are gorgeous. Were they hard? Can you help me learn to scrapbook? Too bad my birthday was last month, or I’d ask Bill to give me lessons as a gift.”

Jennifer Moore turned to Tisha and said, “Nicci had so much fun at the scrapbooking play date. We should get the girls together and take a lesson.”

I responded to the cue for a sales pitch. “I’d be delighted to do a mother-daughter class. I don’t know if you’ve stopped by the store recently, but we’re getting new paper in all the time.”

Dodie took advantage of the compliments to hand coupons and goody bags to Sally, Markie, Jennifer, Linda, and Tisha.

Roxanne moved in and stood too close to me, invading my personal space, as I stacked adhesives in the Cropper Hopper. I could smell alcohol on her breath.

“Look, everybody.” She held up an album and pointed to a picture of me nine months pregnant with Anya. “She was as big as a whale—”

That was too much. Most of the guests were mothers themselves. They remembered being bigger than bread trucks. Roxanne’s remark struck pay dirt. The women recoiled. Even Merrilee pouted with concern and said, “Roxie, darling, let’s go upstairs. I want you to see the brochures I have from where Jeff and I are going for our honeymoon.”

But Roxanne was spoiling for a fight. “No. I don’t want to go upstairs,” she said, flicking her red hair over her shoulder with one exquisitely manicured hand. “I want to stay right here.”

Sally O’Brien took Roxanne’s hand and said, “Come on, honey, we’re done here. Let’s go—”

“No!” Roxanne jerked her hand away. She struggled for balance. Her stiletto heel gouged my foot. I grimaced in pain. Slamming into me, she came to rest with an arm draped over my shoulder. I eased her off. Sally helped Roxanne right herself. Roxanne stared into my face and homed in on me the way a cat does a field mouse, head swiveling to follow my every move.

Linda tried to distract her. “Roxanne, sweetie, can I see those pictures on your camera again? Let’s go over them together, okay?”

Roxanne bellowed at her, “Leave me alone!”

Merrilee and Sally each grabbed her by the arm. “Come on, Roxie.”

But Roxanne wouldn’t be deterred. She leaned close and shook a finger in my face. “George only took up with you back in college because I dumped him! What do you think of that? Huh? I dumped him! You got my leftovers!”

Now the women went silent, waiting for my response. I was too embarrassed to meet their eyes. I kept stacking supplies in the Cropper Hopper.

“Don’t you have anything to say? Anything?” A spray of Roxanne’s spittle landed on my face.

That did it. I turned to the evil woman beside me and said, “Leave me alone. Why don’t you just eat bugs and die?”

Kiki’s suggestions for paper crafting
with groups

1. Keep your project simple.

2. Provide your guests with stable, smooth, and clean work surfaces.

3. Choose a project with visual dazzle and a limited number of pieces. The more pieces you have the more potential problems you have. Gluing small pieces together in advance will help.

4. Think through your supplies/tools carefully. How many of them can be shared? How many will you need for each individual?

5. Break your paper down into parts of pages. For example: If each guest needs a half a sheet of red paper, you can save money and time by dividing a sheet of red paper in half and giving each person a portion rather than wasting a full sheet.

6. Package small items in individual zippered plastic bags. Put the small bags into larger bags so it’s easy to hand each person all the project pieces at once. (Be sure to have extra pieces on hand, but keep them separate so you don’t get them confused with complete sets.)

7. Show samples of your project in various stages of completion. Some folks are visual learners and need to see how things go together to follow your oral instructions.

Mert put Milton and Bradley, the Mexican jumping beans, in their travel carriers and paid me for three days of dog sitting. “That money’s hardly enough for Gracie’s dog chow, but at least it’s something. And the tenderizer is on me. I’ll take the rest home. Roger and I are having steaks tonight.”

At nineteen, Roger was a strapping young man, six feet tall and still growing. Anya had a big crush on him, and I could see why. He was as sweet as he was handsome.

“Hey, the cash is a big help. Gracie appreciates the ongoing contribution to her upkeep. She’s my favorite mistake, aren’t you, baby?” I reached down to stroke the big dog’s floppy ears.

The last thing I needed after George died was another mouth to feed. Gracie weighs one hundred twenty pounds. A smarter woman would have found a smaller dog. But the Great Dane and I had a common bond: no one wanted either of us because we were just too big.

So my finding Gracie was
bashert
. That’s Yiddish for “fated” or “meant to be,” and the term usually refers to finding the love of your life or your truest, best-est friend.

A week after George’s funeral, I was driving past a pet store with an adoption activity in progress. I paused to let a family with kids in tow navigate the crosswalk. One look at poor Gracie, her black-and-white body squashed inside a small pen, her uncropped ears falling softly around expressive eyes, and I was out of the car filling out forms.

The adoption volunteer quizzed me gently. “Ever own a Great Dane?”

“Nope.”

“Um, a dog this size could cause a lot of damage.”

“Yep.”

Sure, Gracie weighs more than Anya, but the soft light in her eyes told me she was a gentle giant. Once out of the tiny crate, she quickly proved herself to be a loving and patient companion. As I completed the paperwork, she leaned her body against mine, her weight nearly knocking me over. She gazed up at me, her eyes filled with adoration. My heart melted.

Although Gracie’s size is intimidating, her disposition is strictly low-key. If I’d wanted a watchdog, I was in big trouble. To date, we’ve never heard her bark. When Mert offered to subcontract the overflow from her dog-sitting business, Going to the Dogs, I worried how Gracie would take to furry rugrats sharing her home. Huh. Gracie ignores them the way a horse flicks away flies on a summer day. Even as Milton and Bradley clung to her legs and tugged on her ears for all they were worth, Gracie simply mustered a look of “whatcha gonna do?”

“I hope this heat breaks soon.” Mert paused at the front door, steeling herself for the blast furnace that waited outside. Her fake tennis bracelets and faux Rolex clattered as she hoisted a dog carrier in each hand.

“I bless the man or woman who created A/C every day in the summer. As long as our window units keep humming, we can breathe. On the other hand, just thinking about my electric bill makes me shiver. See you at the crop Monday night?”

“ ’Spect so.”

“I’m bringing my Lemon Poke Cake.”

“Yum, yum. I better not tell Roger. He’s liable to take up scrapbooking just to come eat.”

The rest of Saturday evening passed quickly. My priority was to safeguard the images Dodie downloaded from the guests’ memory cards. Much as I would have liked to stop and peruse the pictures, I’ve disciplined myself to first make backup CDs and label them. My fingers itched to examine closely the images from Roxanne’s camera, but all I could give them was a cursory once-over.

I was torn between wanting to view them and spending quality time with Anya. Really, there was no contest. My priority was my child.

The copying didn’t take long. There were only six memory cards with thirty-two images on each, because Merrilee and her mother hadn’t taken any photos.

Dodie had explained our procedure to the group. “Each of you probably snapped a few photos your friends would like. We’re making it easy to share. We’ve downloaded your memory cards to Kiki’s computer. Kiki will post the photos to a website called Snapfish. Log into Snapfish tomorrow. Use the room code I’ve written on the back of my business cards. My home and store phone numbers are also there in case you have questions. You’ll be able to view each other’s photos in a gallery. Select twenty-eight photos you like and write down their ID numbers. We’ll develop them and put them in a bridal shower album customized for each of you.”

“Each album will be different?” asked Tisha.

“That’s right,” said Dodie. “The basic page layouts will be the same, but you can choose your favorites from among the photos each of you took.”

Linda’s eyes were wide. “Everyone can see all our photos?”

“That’s right.”

“It’s my gift to each of you.” Mrs. Witherow weighed in with a smile. “Thank you for being such good friends to my darling daughter.”

My thoughts returned to the here and now as I turned off my computer and stashed my CD copies of the memory card images in my bedroom dresser. By separating the duplicates from my work area, I avoided the possibility of grabbing CDs by mistake and “writing” over them.

I checked on Anya. Her face scrunched in concentration as she worked on her father’s old laptop. She didn’t even look up when I came in. I eased myself down on the sofa and put my arm around her.

“Mom, will you quiz me tomorrow on geography? I have to know the names of countries in the Middle East. This will be the last geography test for the year, and I’m glad.”

“I know you’re looking forward to the end of school, honey.”

“Mrs. Carter has a countdown on her blackboard. Only fourteen more days, not counting the half-days for tests.”

I smiled to myself, thinking that poor Mrs. Carter was probably as excited about summer vacation as was her advisory group.

“A lot of country names and borders have changed since I was a kid, but I’ll try to help.” I wanted to grab my camera and take a picture of my daughter hard at work. Anya is the star of many of my pages, and rightfully so. My daughter is as lovely on the inside as she is on the outside. For this, I would forever be grateful to George. Not only had my husband been a very handsome man, but George insisted we raise a kind, thoughtful and decent child. “Going to CALA, she’ll always run with a privileged crowd,” he said, “but she needs to know money doesn’t grow on trees.”

Well, George, your daughter is learning how tough it is to make a dime the hard way, I said to his ghost. (I spent a lot of time talking to an ethereal version of my husband.) Oh, we’ll make it, Anya and I, but I really wonder, where was your head?

On second thought, George, don’t answer that.