Sisterchicks Down Under (5 page)

“There’s something Ray used to say about answered prayer: ‘If you feel a deep hunger but don’t know what you want, just ask God to order for you. That way you’ll always get whatever is the best on the menu.’ ”

I started to leak my own sorry tears and chased them with a silent confession. I had spent the last week so lost in myself and unresponsive to God that I hadn’t asked Him to order anything for me. Yet He still gave me exactly what I needed to fill the emptiness.

“God is so good to us,” I said in a whisper.

Jill’s nod was slow in coming, but when her head began to bob, a trickle of laughter followed. “I feel like we’re in high school again. I can’t control any of my emotions.”

“I know.” I fanned myself as I felt my temperature spiking. “And I think I’m starting to have hot flashes.” Lowering my voice I leaned closer and asked, “Forty-five is pretty young for this, isn’t it?”

“Not necessarily. Stress can really mess up your body’s rhythm.”

Our conversation turned to details about our bodies, and the pros and cons of hormone therapy. After that we slid into other girls-only topics. For the next hour, our heads were bent close as we did what clear-hearted women do so well. We opened the door, let each other come in, and warmed ourselves by the fire of our spirits.

That’s when I realized that my new “home” in this place of upside-down living wasn’t an ugly garage with a blazing bed-spread
and defiled bathtub. My home was my heart. And today, at last, my home was clean and ready for company.

As the afternoon light dimmed, Jill looked at her watch. “Do you need to get home soon?”

“No, not really What about you?”

Jill shook her head and in a thin voice said, “No one is at my house waiting for me.”

“I know what you mean. Tony hasn’t yet come home early enough for us to eat dinner together.” With a sigh I added, “I think I have a bad case of DENS.”

“What’s that?”

“Delayed Empty Nest Syndrome.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard of that,” Jill said.

“Me neither. I just made it up!”

We laughed, and I told Jill how our home had been Grand Central for many years. We had only one daughter, but she had many friends, and our place seemed to be the designated hangout.

“What about you? Do you and Ray have children?”

She held up three fingers. “All boys. Or I should say
men.
The two oldest are both married and settled in California. James, our youngest, is going to Victoria University here in Wellington, but he moved into student housing at the term change. It’s been very quiet around my house since he left.”

“I know what you mean. We had exchange students living with us the first two years Skyler was in high school, and her senior year my nephew moved in and stayed until this past Christmas. As soon as he moved out, we remodeled the kitchen, but that was barely done before we came here. I’m not used to being alone.”

“It’s not so great, is it?”

“The only advantage seems to be there’s a lot less laundry.” My quip reminded me of the clothes I’d left hanging on the line. I told Jill I’d better head back to take down the clothes before the sun set. I could imagine all of Tony’s jeans turning stiff in the cooling air.

“Is there anything you need to help you get settled? Groceries? Anything for your house?”

“No, our apartment is too small to even hold the things we shipped over.”

“Let me know if you think of anything. Anything at all.” She wrote down her phone number, and we agreed to meet here again next Tuesday for coffee.

“Unless,” Jill added, as we rose and were heading for the door, “you think of anything you want or need, and then we could squeeze in a shopping trip.”

“I actually wouldn’t mind a new bedspread.”

“Then let’s go find you a bedspread. What does tomorrow look like for you?”

Our plans were quickly formulated, and Jill asked if I wanted to look for anything besides a bedspread.

“I don’t think so. To be honest, I shouldn’t be making such a big deal about this bedspread. Tony thinks I should be able to endure this one for three months, but it’s really obnoxious.”

“Three months?” Jill stopped walking out of the café and looked at me. “Why do you only have to endure it for three months?”

“Tony’s position at the studio is for three months.”

“It is? Then what?”

“Then we go back to California.”

Jill looked surprised.

“Didn’t I say something earlier about this being a temporary position?”

“If you did, I didn’t catch it. And that is possible, with all the laughing and crying we were doing. But seriously, three months isn’t long enough.”

“Not long enough for what?” Ever since we arrived I’d been counting the days until we could leave, and now Jill was telling me our stay was going to be too short.

Before Jill could give me the answer that seemed to be formulating in her mind, we were interrupted by the sound of a long, flat car horn. We were standing outside the Chocolate Fish, and apparently we were blocking a prime parking spot. We hopped out of the way.

“Excuse us,” I muttered with plenty of sarcasm.

“Don’t worry.” Jill waved at the driver. “It’s Tracey. She’s a permanent fixture here at the café.”

A petite, energetic woman with very short, very red hair hopped out of a vehicle that made me stop and stare. The 1952 classic Chevy truck had a rounded hood and roof, and lots of shiny chrome on the front grille and bumper. The buffed-to-a-shine paint was sunshine yellow. Someone had taken good care of that little gem.

“Hallo!” The woman came toward us all smiles and gave Jill a hug.

“Tracey, this is Kathy Salerno. She just moved here. Her husband is at Jackamond. You won’t believe this, but it’s like we had parallel lives in high school, but we never met until today. We’ve spent the whole afternoon comparing our lives.”

Tracey greeted me with an unexpected hug. “You both had to come all the way to Kiwi Land before you could meet each other inside my little café. Lovely! Welcome, Kathy!”

I wasn’t used to being called Kathy. I’d always been Kathleen. The more lighthearted Kathy had never been activated, because I viewed that as a name reserved for the popular girls—the cheerleaders and homecoming queens.

With a lump in my throat, I realized that Jill had renamed me. In this new place of global turnabouts, I was being accepted as one of the popular girls by Jill, a former cheerleader, and Tracey a rich girl with a cool car.

“Your truck is gorgeous.” I felt a little nervous that I might say the wrong thing and be banished from the group. “My uncle used to refurbish old trucks. He would have loved this one.”

“We call her Beatrice the Dazzling Bumblebee,” Tracey said. “Bea for short.”

“She’s a honey, all right.” I hadn’t realized I’d made a bee-related pun, but Tracey laughed generously.

“Did your uncle let you drive his refurbished trucks?”

“No, never.”

Tracey glanced at Jill and then back at me with a mischievous glimmer in her eyes. “Then you’ll have to take Bea for a spin to make up for lost opportunities.” She held the car keys out to me and gave them a jingle.

I looked at Jill. Her expression told me that not every visitor to the Chocolate Fish was extended such an offer. I felt as if this was part of my initiation to the cool girls’ club.

“Are you sure?” I asked.

“Of course. Come on. It’s a perfect evening for a drive.”

I bravely headed for what my brain said was the driver’s side. Tracey was right behind me, chuckling and saying, “Other side. You’re the driver.”

“Oh, of course!” I laughed nervously, my American ways showing through.

I peered into the cab and saw the steering wheel was huge, and as soon as I settled in behind it, I discovered it had a lot of “play.”

I took my position with a thrill I don’t think I’d ever felt, even when I was in high school. I had been a goody-goody like Jill. I played it safe, taking very few risks. Driving someone’s “honey bee” down what felt was the wrong side of the road wasn’t a huge risk as opposed to, say, bungee jumping. But for me, this was a nerve-wracking leap into thin air.

My heart was pounding as Tracey pointed out the gears on the steering column and reminded me to put in the clutch with my left foot before shifting. A pullout button on the front panel adjusted the throttle.

“And you say you never drove one of your uncle’s vintage trucks? Not even when he wasn’t looking?”

“No, this is all new to me.”

“Well, Bob’s your uncle,” Tracey said.

“Actually, my uncle’s name was Harry.”

Tracey gave me a strange look, and then her face lit up and she laughed, as if I had just made another clever joke.

“No, Bob’s your uncle,” she repeated. “We say that here.
Bob’s your uncle.
You don’t say that?”

Jill leaned over with a dozen giggles sparkling in her eyes. “It took me a while to get used to that expression, too. It’s like we would say, ‘There you have it’ or ‘There you go.’ ”

“
Bob’s your uncle
?” I repeated. “That makes no sense. Where in the world do you suppose that saying came from?”

Tracey flicked away a giggle-tear. “Guess we can’t blame that one on the Americans. Go ahead and start up Bea. What’s the saying where you come from? Surf City, here we come.”

Jill applauded. “We will take credit for that saying, since we are a couple of California girls.”

Tracey sang off tune, “
I wish they all could be California girls!
”

We laughed again, but as soon as the merriment dissolved, I felt the return of my nervousness about being behind the wheel of this imposing Queen Bee. With the mirrors adjusted and my feet in position, I turned the key, and the eager engine rumbled to life. My left hand was in place, ready to shift gears with a lever on our car that I would have used for the windshield wipers.

“Go for it, Kathy!” Jill cheered.

“Stay to the left,” Tracey reminded me.

Easing off the clutch and giving Bea a thimbleful of nectar, I inched us away from the front of the café.

“Don’t be afraid of her. Go ahead, drive like you mean it,” Tracey said, as I picked up speed and headed for the right lane. “Stay left!”

“Oh, right”

“No, left,” Tracey repeated.

“Right,” I agreed. “Left.”

“Just drive,” Jill said with a giggle. “Keep the dividing line on your side of the car, and you’ll be fine.”

“Got it.” I attempted a less-than-smooth shift into second gear and could almost feel the startled engine working with me to make the adjustments.

“She doesn’t need much coaxing,” Tracey said. “You’re doing fine.”

In an effort to stay in my lane, I overcompensated with the large steering wheel and promptly rolled up over the curb. A burst of nervous laughter spilled out, and I turned too far to the right before veering back to where I should be.

“You have the feel for her now,” Tracey said. “Where to?”

“Why don’t you drive back to your place, Kathy?” Jill suggested. “That way I’ll know where to pick you up in the morning for our shopping trip.”

“Shopping plans already, girls? Good for you.”

“Do you want to come with us, Tracey?”

“Ask me another time. Tomorrow is a busy day at the café.”

I kept my hands at ten and two o’clock on the leather-wrapped steering wheel and felt confident I could find our place, since I knew it was on the same road. All I had to do was keep this buggy pointed in the same direction for less than a kilometer, and we’d be there.

“Third.” Tracey tapped my leg.

I knew she meant it was time to shift into third, and I did so with impressive smoothness.

“Well done!” Tracey praised.

I grinned. “Oh, yeah? Then where’s my chocolate fish?”

Tracey laughed. “Very good! She catches on quickly, doesn’t she?”

Jill laughed too, and somehow I knew I’d made it through this self-imposed initiation ceremony. I was cruising down the road like one of the cool girls now, head cheerleader, homecoming queen, brimming with glee and filled with pride.

And you know what they say pride comes before…

Exactly.

A
s we motored down the road.
I squinted to see out the window. In the glow of twilight, the houses I’d walked past earlier that afternoon now looked different. Just when I thought I recognized Mr. Barry’s house ahead on the left, Tracey spouted, “Look out for the pizza delivery boy!”

I spotted a guy on the right, steering his bike with one hand and precariously balancing a pizza box in his other hand.

“Hey, that’s—”

“Kathy, stay to the left!”

In an immediate response to Tracey’s shouted warning, I cranked the steering wheel to the left, then back to the right, and then way too far to the left. This time my overcorrection popped us up over the curb, heading for a garden of mums. I slammed on the brakes, but it was too little, too late. All three of us winced and then shrieked as we heard and felt the deep thud of obvious impact with something in our path.

“What did we hit?” Jill was the first one out of the car. Tracey and I were right behind her.