Spider Web (29 page)

Behind the shocked, sputtering girls, I started slowly clapping. In seconds two men in marine uniforms and a woman dressed in a World War II WAC uniform joined me. Then the rest of the small gathered crowd joined in. While we applauded Nurse Bennett, the young girls walked away, cursing under their breath.

“Good on you, as my grandma used to say,” one of the silver-haired marines said to the nurse.

I stepped closer to the nurse. “More people should hear those things.”

The expression on her face was rueful now. She fingered the stethoscope around her neck. “I’m kind of sorry I got so graphic. They’re just girls. I should know better than to go off like that.”

She peered at the badge around my neck that read Memory Festival Chairman. A hand came up to her mouth. “Shoot, are you the one in charge of this festival? I am so sorry. I guess that wasn’t exactly the kind of memories you were expecting . . .”

“Stop,” I said, holding up my hand. “It’s exactly the kind of memories this festival is about. This isn’t just the
good
memories festival. All memories are legitimate. Those girls were spoiled brats who needed to hear your story. And I totally agree that girl’s dad
was
an ass.”

She gave a sad smile. “You love someone who served in ’Nam.” It was a statement, not a question.

I nodded. “My husband was a marine. He was there in ’68 and ’69.”

“Where?” one of the marines asked.

“I don’t know all the places, but he’s mentioned Khe Sanh. He was there at the end of the siege. April of ’68, I think. He was only eighteen.”

“That was some bad shit,” the marine said.

“Is he okay?” the nurse asked.

“Mostly.” There seemed to be knowledge in her liquid brown eyes, as if she had seen through our closed window shades and witnessed his agony.

She took my hand and squeezed it. “Good luck. He’s fortunate to have you on his side.”

I stared into the face of someone who got it, who really understood. “He was injured there and because of a nurse, because of many nurses, he eventually came home. Thank you.”

“Semper fi,” she replied. “I’d do it again. All my guys, well, they were special.” She smiled. “I mean it. I’d go again, if only for them.”

During my rounds, I stopped to sign my name to the Memory Quilt, sponsored by the San Celina Quilt Guild and the Alzheimer’s Association. It was a huge Log Cabin design that had places for eight hundred people to sign their names, more if they used the plain muslin back. The Alzheimer’s Association booth was surprisingly upbeat with purple balloons and free grape Tootsie Roll pops. They sold greeting cards created by the memory impaired. I bought a set made from a painting by a man named Lefty. It showed a purple and red cowboy boot filled with brown flowers. The juxtaposition of the colors made me smile.

Next to their booth was the official Memory Painting, sponsored by the Central Coast Plein-Air Society. Using acrylic paints, people were encouraged to paint a two-inch section on the large six-foot-by-six-foot canvas. The finished painting would be displayed in the Arne Nybak wing of the San Celina Art Center. Arne Nybak had been one of our most famous regional artists. His daughter, Christine, owned Tea and Sympathy, where I’d given Elvia her bridal shower.

In one booth, sponsored by Deck Connors and promoting his newest business, Backdrops, people were photographed with their favorite object. They were given a free five-by-seven of the photograph and a discount coupon for a photo session at Backdrops. I expected to see Van Baxter there, but Tiffany Connors was helping in the booth, obviously pressed into service by her father.

The booths for each decade—1900 through 1990—were especially fascinating. They featured clothes, books, gadgets and advertising from each decade. A group of Cal Poly history students, those not working security, sponsored each booth.

The memory garden booth presented by our local nurseries and the Farm Supply made me want to start a memory garden filled with pansies, sunflowers and roses to remember my mother. There were booths promoting memory stones, flag cases and condolence lamps. One of my favorite booths was Kitchen Memories, which sold kitchen gadgets from every era. The Day of the Dead booth demonstrated how to make an altar in honor of your loved one. It even sold little sugar skulls and cookies in the shape of tombstones.

Though the Parkwell Mortuary’s tombstone booth should have been a little depressing, it was actually interesting with its clever display of funny tombstone sayings. Mel Blanc’s “That’s All, Folks!” and “Here Lies Ezekial Aikle. Age 102. The Good Die Young.” My favorite was “I Would Rather Be Here Than Texas” which I photographed so I could tease Hud with it. The explanation of the tombstone was the deceased’s ex-husband was buried in Texas.

It was no surprise that the booths celebrating the passing of pets were popular. They sold pet reliquaries and hand-blown glass urns gorgeous enough to sit on anyone’s mantel. In one booth, ashes, fur or a small photo could be sealed in silver and gold lockets. You could even have your dog or cat’s paw print made into a pendant or charm.

Along with our usual food vendors selling tri-tip steak sandwiches, hot dogs, turkey legs and pizza slices, we chose vendors that sold food the committee felt represented old-fashioned memories—a root beer float booth, cotton candy, a penny candy store filled with Walnettos, jelly mints, Fizzies, chicken bones, Necco Wafers, Bit-O-Honey, Mary Janes, wax bottles and sassafras drops. There was a popcorn ball vendor, a saltwater taffy booth and a booth selling hot chocolate and marshmallows.

The hot chocolate booth was also selling doughnuts made by the home economics department of San Celina High School. That was where I found Dove and Aunt Garnet.

“Put that back,” Aunt Garnet was saying to Dove, who was reaching for her favorite, a chocolate doughnut with sprinkles. Though they’d been getting along wonderfully up until now, the fact that Uncle WW was pretty much doing okay and Daddy was avoiding them and their matchmaking meant all they had left to do now that the festival was rolling along was pick at each other.

“Mind your own beeswax,” Dove said, taking a big bite. Aunt Garnet had been getting on Dove to lose a little weight. Dove, at five feet nothing, wasn’t fat but was definitely on the chubbier side of the equation. Aunt Garnet, despite being from the exact same gene pool, had four inches on Dove and weighed about twenty-five pounds less. The thing was, I had no doubt that Dove was in better shape. She’d worked on a farm or ranch since she’d been married to my grandpa, and once Aunt Garnet got married at eighteen, she had become pure city mouse. Truth be told, Dove could probably outrun, outride, outwork and certainly outlast Aunt Garnet.

“Do you realize how much fat and sugar is in one single doughnut?” Aunt Garnet said, pulling a banana out of her pocketbook.

“Do you realize that I don’t give a hootenanny?” Dove answered. No one stood between Dove and her doughnuts. “Wrap me up that orange one to go.” She contemplated the selection a moment, then added, “And two maple bars.”

“Dove!” Aunt Garnet exclaimed. “That’s just pure bingeing. I read about it in
Reader’s Digest
.” She gave the teenage girl selling the doughnuts a stern look. “Don’t you dare sell her one more doughnut.”

“Ignore the old biddy,” Dove told the girl. “Add that jelly one.”

Aunt Garnet’s face was horror-stricken, as if Dove had said, “Barbecue me that cute little bunny rabbit while you’re at it.”

“Sister,” Aunt Garnet said, “all I have to say is what would Jesus do?”

Without missing a beat Dove said, “Oh, please, God understands overeating. I’m betting Jesus binged once or twice in his life. We have no idea
how
much he ate at the Last Supper. Our Lord
was
under a lot of stress.”

With Aunt Garnet sputtering a shocked and incoherent reply, I decided it was time for me to move along. I walked the length of Lopez Street, found everything going smoothly, so I headed over to the Mission Plaza.

I stopped by Van Baxter’s booth to see if sales were going better than they had been the other night.

“How’s business today?” I asked.

“Much better,” he said. “I think the sun coming out might have loosened people’s hold on their wallets.” He grinned at me, then held up a finger that he’d be right back when a female customer asked him a question about a photograph showing the silhouette of a young woman on skis at the foot of a mountain. A rifle on her back mimicked the line of the skeleton trees.

“That’s my wife,” I heard him tell the customer. “She was training for a biathlon.” The woman decided to buy the photograph for her sister.

“How far did your wife get in her training?” I asked him after he finished the transaction.

He wiped one hand down the side of his brown cargo pants. “She was good. Probably could have gone to the Olympics.”

“What happened?”

“You know, her mom got sick, my job got hinky, money . . .” He shrugged.

“Life intervened,” I said. “I totally . . .”

Before I could finish, a loud rat-tat-tat made me jump. The screaming was like a horrible flashback from a few days ago. I froze in place, my head telling me to move but my body feeling thick and slow.

“Get down!” Van yelled, shoving me to the ground.

I hit the ground with a jarring thump, my hip sparking with pain. But the pain revived me, and I fumbled for my cell phone, punching 911. Two uniformed officers ran past Van’s booth. My mind went into overdrive—where were Dove and Aunt Garnet? Were the shots near the amphitheater? Was another officer shot? Would they catch the sniper this time?

“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?” the dispatcher said.

“Shots fired at the festival downtown.”

“Already reported, thanks,” she said, hanging up.

I started to stand. “I have to go see what’s—”

“No!” Van said, pulling me back down. “It’s safer here.”

In that moment I spotted a young girl, not more than four or five, running across the grass, screaming. I pulled away from Van and headed toward her. When I heard another pop-pop-pop, I slid across the wet grass, caught the girl’s heel and pulled her to the ground. I instinctively curled my body around hers.

“Ashley!” I heard a woman scream.

I lifted my head slightly, keeping the girl’s head pressed into my chest. People were running for cover into the mission gift shop, the chapel, behind walls and trees, though no one had any idea where the shots came from or if anyone had been hit.

Beneath me, the little girl trembled and whimpered. “Mommy. I want my mommy.”

“Lie still, sweetie,” I said, keeping my voice calm and steady, though I felt like crying myself. “We’ll find your mommy.”

Seconds later I heard D-Daddy’s voice over a handheld PA system. “It’s okay, folks. Just some kids and firecrackers. It’s okay.”

I slowly sat up, still holding the little girl, who was crying hysterically now. Her mother, a young woman who seemed barely out of her teens, dashed up to us. “Ashley, are you okay?

“Thank you, thank you,” the mother said while I helped her brush grass and dirt off Ashley’s pink corduroy. “We were at the cotton candy booth and I turned my back and then the shots started and she lost sight of me and ran and . . .” The mother herself was two seconds away from complete hysteria.

“It’s okay,” I said, putting my arm around her gangly shoulders. “She’s okay and so are you. It was just firecrackers. Look.”

I pointed to the activity about twenty feet away. Four plainclothes and two uniformed officers had surrounded three very scared-looking teenage boys. We watched while they handcuffed them and walked them toward a cruiser parked in front of the historical museum.

“Jerks,” the young woman said.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” I asked her.

The woman nodded, clutching her little girl to her. “Yes, we’re fine.”

“Okay, don’t let this ruin your day. Don’t forget to go paint a square on the Memory Painting.”

“We won’t,” the woman said. “Thank you again.”

I caught up with D-Daddy. “Walk through the festival with the PA system and reassure people for as long as you think necessary. I want to find Dove and Aunt Garnet, make sure they’re okay.”

“Saw them over at the historical museum,” D-Daddy said.

Trailing behind the officers and the boys, I circled wide around them and ran across the museum’s grass. Dove and Aunt Garnet stood on the top step rubbernecking.

“What in heaven’s name is going on?” Aunt Garnet said. She looked at the front of my sweater. “And what happened to your sweater?”

I looked down at the beautiful sweater she’d made me and felt sick. My slide to catch the fleeing girl had added mud and grass stains to the hot cocoa stain. “Some idiot teenagers decided to shake everyone up by setting off firecrackers, and I had a mishap with a cup of cocoa and a scared little girl.”

“Hooligans,” Aunt Garnet said, patting her hair. “I hope they send them right up the river. Give me the sweater. I’ll take it home and get the stains out.”

“Typical teenage boys,” Dove said, rolling her eyes as I pulled off my sweater. “They just don’t
think.
Or rather they think for about two seconds and not always with their brains.” Dove, having raised three teenage boys, was a little more tolerant of their craziness than Aunt Garnet, whose only son had been a mild-mannered boy whose favorite pastime was reading Isaac Asimov and playing chess.

“Still, they need to be severely reprimanded,” Aunt Garnet said.

“Oh, Sister, they will be, I’m sure, once their mamas hear about it.”

We watched as the boys, who looked around fourteen or fifteen, were helped into the backseat of the police car.

“I hope it doesn’t cause people to leave the festival,” I said with a sigh. “D-Daddy’s going around with his portable PA and reassuring everyone. Maybe I should go by all the booths and do the same.”

“I’ll come with you,” Dove said. She turned to her sister. “I’ll meet you back here in about an hour. Do you want me to bring anything from any of the food booths? A doughnut, perhaps?” She grinned wickedly.