The Fame Equation (18 page)

I gave my truck a final glance, found room 217, held my breath, and knocked on the door. After a moment Brandyne opened it.

“You,” she said.

“May I come in?”

The expression on her face said she’d rather walk barefoot through a field of doggie doo, but she widened the opening in the door. Inside, the room was much as I had expected: stained carpet, dingy bedspread, a wall with streaks running down it from a past leak, and a smell that made me want to clamp a clothespin over my nose. There was a dorm sized fridge, and a microwave on top of a shelf that also held a coffeemaker, which I guessed allowed hotel management to advertise that their rooms came complete with a kitchenette. I didn’t look into the bathroom. Some things are best left to the imagination.

Claudine was sitting at a crooked little table near the window smoking a cigarette. She’d been at it a while, because the room was blue with stale smoke. Well that simplified things. My visit would definitely be short.

“Mrs. Potts, Brandyne,” I nodded to each of them and decided to ignore the fiasco that had happened at the reception. “I’m Cat Enright. We didn’t get to speak properly at the funeral, but I wanted to say how sorry I am about Melody. She was well-liked here in Nashville and had many friends. I was proud to call myself one of them.”

A “humpf,” was all I got from Claudine. Brandyne stood in the center of the room with her arms folded. I stared at her and finally her posture relaxed.

“Can’t say as I agree with you ’bout Raylene havin’ all those friends you’re talkin’ about, as you’re the only one’s come to call,” said Brandyne.

At first I didn’t know who she was talking about, then it dawned on me that Melody’s family must still have called her by her birth name. Raylene.

“We been sittin’ here for two days, waitin’ on the will, an’ not one person come to say boo to us,” she continued.

“Except me,” I reminded her. I was trying to hold my breath while I spoke. The smoke in the room was so thick I was certain that I could feel cancer cells multiplying in my lungs.

“’Cept you,” she conceded. “Look, I’m sorry about the other day. I was outta my mind with grief. If I ever get my hands on the slimeball who kilt Raylene I’ll kick his ass right on into next Tuesday.”

“Humpf,” commented Claudine.

At least it was better than her wailing.

“Apology accepted,” I said. It was another little white lie. By golly I was racking them up. I’m not sure I ever would forgive Brandyne, though. My head still hurt where she had pulled my hair. “Melody was special and I will really miss her.”

“I never could cotton to people callin’ my baby Melody,” Claudine said. “Her name was Raylene Claudette Potts.”

“Don’t matter what people called her, Momma,” said Brandyne. “She’s dead.”

At that, Claudine started to wail.

“Now look what you gone and done,” she said to me.

Me? Brandyne was the passive aggressive one here.

“Thank God this will all be over and done tomorrow and we can get outta Dodge,” Brandyne said, offering no comfort whatsoever to her mother. “Soon as we collect our money, we’re gone.”

I couldn’t help myself, even if it meant staying longer so I could grow a few hundred thousand more cancer cells. “What money is that, Brandyne?”

“From Raylene’s estate, stupid. My sister was a rich little girl, and we’re her family. That money is ours now, mine and Momma’s and Bodine’s. Well, it’ll be Bodine’s when he gets outta prison. I’ll take care of it for him until then.”

I just bet she would. I was just as sure that Bodine would never see a red cent of his sister’s estate.

“If she was gonna change her name, why’d she choose somethin’ as awful as Melody Cross?” This from Claudine, whose brain was apparently stuck on broken. I looked around and saw a trash can overflowing with beer bottles. Quart sized ones. Ah. That explained it.

“She wanted to get away from us, Momma. To ‘distance’ herself.” Brandyne made quote marks with her fingers when she said “distance.” “That’s why she changed her name. We weren’t good enough for the little princess.” This last part Brandyne said with a sneer.

“You know, I probably should go,” I said edging my way toward the door. But Claudine got there before me, blocking my way on her unsteady feet.

“I couldn’t help it if I wanted to have a little fun, could I?” she asked, waving a cigarette so close to my face I almost gagged. I don’t begrudge people the right to smoke. I just normally don’t choose to be around them when they do.

“I had them kids, Brandyne and Bodine, when I was just a kid. I was thirty when Raylene came along. Same daddy, in case you’re askin.’”

I wasn’t.

“By the time Raylene arrived I’d been a momma most half my life. When she got in kindy-garden, I was more than ready to party. This one,” she said, now waving her cigarette at Brandyne, “already had two young ’uns of her own by then, and Bodine had got hisself into prison––for the first time. You can’t blame me none for wantin’ to have a little fun, but I’ll never forgive them social service people who came and took my little Raylene from me. Not ever. Look where that got her. My baby’s done been kilt.”

With that, Claudine wavered, then slumped into a nearby chair. Looked to me as if she’d be out for a while. I should have picked Claudine’s burning cigarette up off the floor, but I couldn’t quite bring myself to do it. Instead, I said my goodbyes to Brandyne, and got the heck out of there.

I couldn’t believe that smart, sweet Melody had come from those people. No wonder she wanted to distance herself. The older church-going couple that had raised her had done an incredible job. I wondered what Melody had been like when they first welcomed her into their home, what she had been like when she was six.

Melody had worked hard to make a better life for herself, and it made me mad all over again to realize that someone had stolen that life from her. Brandyne, I thought, as I got into the truck, could have killed Melody in a heartbeat. There was no love lost there. I wondered where she had been last week. Maybe Martin would know.

Before I started up the truck I texted Darcy that I was safe, then rolled down the windows. The smell of Claudine’s cigarettes had gotten into my hair and clothes and I couldn’t stand to smell myself. First thing on the agenda when I got home was a shower.

I drove back down Old Hickory Boulevard and wove my way up Charlotte Pike and onto River Road. All the time I was trying to come up with a Plan B, just in case Martin wouldn’t let me be his shadow at the will reading the next day. I felt as dumb as Bodine, as I couldn’t come up with a thing.

I also wondered about the furniture that Melody had promised me. Not that it was a big deal. But Davis knew about it, and there was the note Melody had put on the table for the movers. I’d like to have the furniture for the sole reason that the pieces had meant something to my friend.

I kicked myself for not asking Davis about the furniture when I was in his office. But maybe that could be my excuse to pop in at the will reading tomorrow. I could arrive on the pretense of asking about the furniture. I didn’t know the time of the reading, but if I parked myself outside Scott Donelson’s office until I saw familiar faces . . . It was weak, I knew, but it was all I had. Hopefully Martin would agree with my Plan A.

On River Road, with a Keith Carson song blasting through my radio, Jon called.

“You close?” he asked.

“Ten minutes max. What’s up?”

“Sally’s acting weird again. Or I should say, weirder.”

“What now?”

“She was in the pasture and was facing the road, holding her right foreleg in front of her and waving it around.”

“Is she lame?”

“Nothing like that. She trotted out fine. I noticed it because Gigi was running circles around Sally while Sally stood with her foreleg like that.”

“I guess they should come in, then.”

“Already done. Sally walked in just fine.”

“I’ll be back in a few to do Ringo’s evaluation,” I said. “We can watch Sally for colic, but I’m thinking this is just Sally, and that she’s not really hurt.”

“We might get her a massage, or a chiropractic adjustment,” said Jon. “She’s been lying in such a strange position that she might have soreness, even though she isn’t lame.”

I asked Jon to schedule a massage first, and we’d evaluate after. I drove into my driveway a few minutes later and hustled upstairs for a shower. After, I filled Darcy in and asked if she wanted to check out Ringo with Jon and me.

“No. I thought I’d ride Petey in the front pasture, if that’s okay. I just saw Jon those horses in.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

Out in the barn, Sally was holding her leg up in her stall. I slid the stall door open and palpated the limb from the top of her shoulder to the sole of her hoof. There was no soreness that I could find. When Jon came by with a flake of hay, Sally put her foot down on the ground and ate like a normal horse. Or, as normal as a horse like Sally could be.

J
ON AND
I S
TARTED
R
INGO’S
eval by taking photos. Front, back, and sides, with close-ups of his legs. The photos would help us measure changes in his body as he progressed through training, and would serve as documentation that he arrived with certain blemishes on his body, such as the small scar on the fetlock of his right front leg.

We then filmed him moving, with side views of his walk and trot, and views of him walking and trotting straight to and away from the camera. If he ever developed lameness, these videos would help us see a normal gait for this horse. We could also slow the video down in the next few days to look for any existing gait abnormalities.

Next, we looked at Ringo’s body. We noted wide set eyes that allowed him to see far around himself. This was good, as his peripheral vision would be greater than a horse whose eyes were set on a narrow face. Those horses often were spooky, because their range of vision was not as good.

Ringo’s ears were a little large as compared to breed standard, but not overly so. He had large nostrils, which helped him bring air into his body and scent into his sinus cavities. His wither to shoulder angle, and hip to point of buttock angles matched, and his front pastern matched his shoulder angle. This was a well-balanced horse who should be athletic.

Other than the scar on his fetlock, his legs were clean. His back, loin, and croup were of even length, and standing from behind, we could see that his hips were even. The number of horses who went around with one hip higher than the other was amazing. Then owners wondered why their horses could not perform well. Ringo also carried his tail flat between his butt cheeks, an indication that he did not have major issues with his hips, pelvis, or lower spine.

Jon and I then turned our hands into claw-like shapes, and ran them over Ringo’s body to check for soreness. Ringo was touchy where the girth attached to the saddle on both the left and right sides of his body. This was a common place to find soreness, even with the light race and exercise saddles Ringo had worn. Jon made a note to do liniment rubs and light massage in those areas.

The last part of the ground evaluation involved stretches to test for flexibility. Ringo was more flexible in his neck going to the left than to the right, and we would be sure to pay special attention to that area.

I had not ridden Ringo before I agreed to take him on. That was unusual, but when Gusher and I had talked, Ringo was finishing up his race career. When Gusher approached me he had photos, video of his horse running at the track, and testimonials about the horse’s personality from his race trainer and groom. Then I’d done a little Internet research (more on Gusher than on Ringo) before I agreed to take the horse. Owners could be the bane of a trainer’s existence. Once I realized Gusher would stay out of my hair as long as I delivered the results he expected, I decided to give the horse a go.

Before I got on, Ringo and I did some round pen work. This is a matter of turning a horse loose in a pen that is round and sixty feet across. The sixty feet is important because the outer edge of a horse’s personal space is about thirty feet, which is the distance between the horse on the perimeter of the pen and the human in the center.

Today I wanted to establish leadership. In a horse’s mind, when two beings are together it creates a herd, and one of them must be the leader. By turning Ringo loose in the pen, I was showing him that I was responsible enough to be his leader, that he could trust me to keep him safe, and that I wanted the job.

I showed all of this to Ringo by controlling his movement. I got behind his center of gravity and urged him forward with my voice, arms, facial expression, and body. When he had gone around the pen a few times, and when his ear nearest to me was pointed toward me, I stepped in front of his center of gravity, and with my voice and body, asked him to turn around and go the other way.

This is how horses control each other. A dominant horse controls the movement of a more submissive one. Soon, I had Ringo stopping, going, and turning easily, and his ear, which is an indication of where the horse’s attention is focused, was pointed consistently at me.