Still Life in Shadows (17 page)

Gideon crouched in closer and helped by letting Kiki rest against his bent knees for support.

“I might throw up.” The small voice came from Kiki before she opened her eyes. “I don’t want to throw up, but I might.” With bleary eyes, she focused at the wall.

“Wanna go home?” asked Mari.

When Kiki shut her eyes again, Gideon nodded at Mari and gently lifted Kiki off the floor. Rising to his feet, he carried the girl out of the shop to the lot where Mari’s car was parked. Mari opened the back door, and Gideon laid Kiki on the seat.

“Do you …? Should I …?” He fumbled for the right words.

She understood him. “We’ll be fine.”

He then watched Mari drive away. Taking a deep breath, he wanted more assurance that Mari had the situation under control. As he hoped Kiki was okay, he paced the floor of his bay.
For someone I didn’t ever want to see again, I certainly am spending a lot of time worrying about her. And Mari.
He audibly sighed.
What if she needs some help, another adult to assist her?
Inside the shop, he emptied the lone cup still on the floor, pouring its bright orange contents into the sink. As the liquid disappeared,
he knew he needed to get out of here as well.

“I’m going to Kiki and Mari’s,” he said to Ormond as he grabbed his jacket from the peg by the door to the bays.

“You can take my car,” Ormond offered, scribbling Mari’s address on a scrap of paper.

G
ideon found the little house with the peeling paint on the front porch with no problem. He parked the Buick on the side of the road by the mailbox.

Once inside, Mari greeted him warmly. “You didn’t have to come. I know you’ve got work to do.”

He dismissed her concern. “How is she? I should have followed you and helped you carry her inside.” He guessed he had a way to go to get the title of Mr. Chivalry.

“She’s resting in her bedroom.”

“Is she okay?” He wished he’d brought flowers or some treat the girl would like. “How often does this happen to her?”

“Fainting? Once or twice a month. She told me she didn’t eat lunch today. That was a big mistake.” Mari was clearly displeased. “She has to eat at regular intervals. The school knows she has hypoglycemia.”

Mari sat on the plaid sofa, removing a lacy blue pillow from behind her back. She produced a weary smile, and Gideon was aware of the concern in her eyes.

“She’ll be fine,” he offered, immediately feeling stupid for the sentiment. What did he know about hypoglycemia? “How long has she had this …?”

“For about three years, I think. But when she was with Mama, I didn’t see her as much.”

“Why didn’t you see her?”

“I can’t stand to be at my mother’s.” She spat the words out, not coating them with any form of apology. “Ugly to say, I know. But true.”

Gideon recalled their conversation about her mother being a hoarder.

“Are you going to sit down?”

He grinned. When was the last time he’d been in a woman’s home? He wasn’t sure whether to take the spot next to her on the couch or the crimson La-Z-Boy recliner by the TV.

She patted the space beside her.

He sat as she said, “I know it sounds awful coming from such a sweet Southern gal like me, but Mama’s house suffocates me.”

“Sometimes honesty in sweet gals is the best.”

She did smile then.

And today, he found her dimples particularly endearing.

“Right before social services came over, Mama’s car was so stuffed with her cloth pets that there was no room for Kiki to ride.”

He wanted to change the subject. Wasn’t it enough that her sister had fainted? He didn’t want her to feel badly about her mother now, too.

“The Bible refers to thinking on things that are true and praiseworthy, but I doubt it’s referring to my mother and her collection of puppets.”

Just as she mentioned the Bible, he saw one on the coffee table, one covered in thin leather with gold writing on the cover. “You read the Bible often?” She must; the cover was dog-eared.

“I have to. It fuels me for this massive world.”

“Do you believe it?”

“You mean, do I believe that what’s inside is truth?”

“Yeah, that’s what I meant.” Talking about God make him squirm slightly.

“I do.” After a moment she raised her head to meet his eyes and asked, “What do you believe?”

Stretching out his legs, he wondered what to say to this question.

Hard work, wash your hands, go to church, live simply, respect your mother, respect your father, get up early, don’t be a slacker. Why? For what?
Nervously, he smiled. Mari was seated so close beside him. He could smell her hair, a fragrance of orange blossoms with a hint of something stronger like coconut.

“Should we make sure Kiki is okay?” He got to his feet.

“She’s probably sleeping. She was up late last night working on a project for school.” Patting the space he had occupied, she said, “Tell me why you don’t like to talk about God.”

He sat. This time he made sure that there was a little more distance between them. If he was going to have to discuss God, he didn’t need to be breathing in her aromatic shampoo.

Her eyes were not teasing but serious, smooth as the pebbles he used to toss across the creek behind the farm. “So you discarded God when you left Amish land?” Her smile softened the question.

He thought that sounded like a childish thing to do. He wanted Mari to know that his decision was much more complicated and calculated than the way she made it seem. Discarding God would never be in his capacity. God was ingrained in his thoughts; he just wasn’t sure that God was really for him. “Do you know anything about the Amish faith?”

“A little. I thought they were Christians.”

“Do you know Reginald Smithfield?”

He saw her shudder. “What has he got to do with Amish?” she asked.

“He despises them just as he does blacks, Native Americans, you know, the Cherokees around here, Jews …”

“And Asians,” she said, filling in his pause.

“He thinks nothing of all the minorities. We’re like trash to him.” Gideon hated the harshness of his words. “He makes himself feel better by cutting us down. He feels superior.”

“You mean he thinks if you aren’t Caucasian and born in these mountains, you are no good?”

“Exactly.”

He liked the way her face looked so serious when he tried to make a point. Her brow wrinkled a little and her top lip pressed into her bottom one.

Continuing, he said, “Would you call Reginald a bigot?”

“Oh, yes. The worst kind.”

“Did you know that the Amish look down on those who do not dress or live as they do?”

“Really?”

“Yes. They are close-minded. It’s their way and no other.”

She thought for a moment. Her brow wrinkled and she eyed him suspiciously. “What has this got to do with Christianity? You question their faith?”

“Jesus says to love everyone. He even said to think of others more highly than we think of ourselves. I don’t see that in the Old Order communities at all.”

“But they’re Amish! Amish are like the wholesome side of America. Aren’t they just about perfect?”

Gideon’s eyebrows shot up, but before he could reply to Mari’s outburst, a noise came from Kiki’s bedroom, and Mari stood to check in on her sister.

Gideon heard faint conversation. Looking around the sparsely decorated room, he wondered if Mari was so tired of her mother’s clutter that she preferred herself to deal with the bare minimum. Stretching, he yawned. Suddenly, his lack of sleep from the ordeal with Moriah early this morning was catching up with him. Taking his cell phone from his pants pocket he looked to see if there were any messages or missed calls. The screen showed there were none.

A moment later Mari returned to the sofa.

“Is she okay?”

“She’s hungry.”

“I can pick up something at the diner down the street.”

“Or … I could cook.”

Gideon remembered hearing Kiki talk about how her sister didn’t do cooking well. “Do you really want to cook?” To soften his question, he added, “I mean, you’ve had a busy day.”

Mari frowned. “And Kiki always complains about my food. But—”

Placing a hand on her arm, Gideon said, “What do you have? I can make us all dinner.”

“Really? You cook?”

“Surprised?”

“No. Well … well, maybe a little.” Mari stood and Gideon followed her into the kitchen.

Mari opened the fridge. “Let’s see. There’s some ground beef. I think I have a few chicken legs in the freezer.”

“Do you have enough beef for meatloaf?”

“Two pounds,” she said reading the label on the meat package.

Though excited to try his recipe for Mari, Gideon knew he had to ask one more pertinent question. “Do you like meatloaf?”

“Sure. Who doesn’t like meatloaf? It’s American, isn’t it?”

“Does Kiki?”

“She does. She also loves mac and cheese.”

He knew he had to please the little girl who was his reason for being at this house in the first place. “Do you have macaroni? Any cheese?”

Mari opened the fridge and took out a slab of cheddar cheese. From the pantry she brought out a box of elbow macaroni.

Gideon smiled as she placed it on the counter in front of him. “Looks like this is a start,” he said.

O
f course she had onions and green peppers for the meatloaf. With a slight twinge of embarrassment, she confessed that she bought those in large quantities to make her fried vegetables nearly every night. She hadn’t learned to cook, which was strange since she was the manager of a food establishment. “I make pies. That’s it.”

“And you are good at it,” he said.

She accepted the compliment and then asked what she could do to help with the meal preparation tonight. Gazing at her and then hoping he wouldn’t be accused of focusing for too long on her deep dark eyes, he told her to just sit and tell him about herself.

“Talk about myself?” she asked.

“Yes. What do you like to do?” Opening a cabinet, he found the spices and retrieved the salt, pepper, and garlic powder.

Hesitantly, she said, “I sing in the church choir. I love the Beatles. But I don’t sing Beatles songs in church.”

As he mixed the ground beef with chopped onions, green peppers, spices, tomato paste, and an egg in a bowl, Mari sat at the kitchen table
and talked. She said she liked art, but not modern; she’d once wanted to be a dancer, but she’d never had lessons. When he asked how it was being responsible for her sister, she winced. “Now how am I supposed to answer that?”

He thought of Moriah and decided that if someone asked him about what it was like being responsible for his sibling, he might have trouble coming up with an honest reply, too.

“Should we have biscuits?” she asked. “I have a few cans of Pillsbury.”

“That sounds great.”

Gideon popped the meatloaf onto the top rack of the oven. Adding water to a large pot, he turned on the heat and once the water boiled, he added the noodles for the mac and cheese. He’d been so concentrating on cooking and talking with Mari that he failed to realize all he was making was meatloaf, macaroni, and biscuits. Surely, the meal needed something else. “Do you have any potatoes?”

Mari pointed to a bin where there were dozens of russet potatoes.

“Mashed or baked?” he asked.

“I like them any way, but I think Kiki gets tired of them since we have them nearly every night.”

“Okay. We probably don’t need them anyway.” He thought of his waistline and sucked in his tummy for a second. “Already have enough starch in our meal tonight.” As soon as he said it, he felt like it was something his mother once said, years ago, miles away from here.

“I have carrots,” she said. “Want me to peel some for steamed carrots?”

“If you’d like.”

She grabbed the vegetable peeler and stood next to Gideon as he grated cheese for the macaroni and then greased a Pyrex dish. He found the strainer, drained the macaroni in it, added the pasta to the dish, tossed in the cheese and added some spices.

“Looks good,” she told him as he placed the macaroni into the oven.

As the kitchen warmed with the aroma of meatloaf and a cheesy
macaroni bake in the oven, Mari set the table. Pouring water over ice cubes in the glass tumblers, she asked, “Do you like ice?”

He looked at her, the oven mitt in one hand and the other lifted in mock questioning.