The Lure of White Oak Lake (20 page)

“Okay.”

“Promise.”

“I promise to keep my head out of the clouds.”

“And out of the hayseed’s pants. Love you, bye.” Morgan heard Celeste say, “Oh, hell no, hooker,” before the call ended.

~~~

“Seriously, aren’t we a little old for this?”

Ida waved Betsy off. “It’s a blast, and I’ve never felt so free in all my life. Harlan and Clarke are at the bar watching football. It’s a full moon, don’t let it go to waste.”

“It’s time to celebrate.” Clarice took Betsy by the arm and led her deeper into the woods. “Just give it a try. You’ll love it.”

Betsy, who had not partaken of the marijuana that Ida and Clarice had enjoyed, saw no sense in taking off her clothes and running around in the dark. Had either of them been in their right minds, they wouldn’t have, either…well, maybe Clarice would because she was kinda crazy. The whole notion was downright stupid and senseless in her opinion. Women their age after all had no business running anywhere. “Why don’t I stand guard over your clothes?”

Ida giggled like a teen. “Where’re they gonna go?”

At times, they played bridge when the boys were at the bar, or they’d just gossip about things going on in town. Ever since Clarice started talking to the leaves, things got strange. Betsy couldn’t deny she enjoyed the whimsy of silly incantations and drinking whatever potion Clarice brewed up, but the more she indulged Ida and especially Clarice, the wilder her two friends became. “I’m not getting naked.”

~~~

Chet had all the beer and liquor one man could drink. Jaclyn let him take whatever he wanted when he pulled her out of a pinch at the store. But there was nothing like moonshine, and his last jug of the magical elixir had gone dry. He’d not fired up the old still in ages but decided to take advantage of the cool November evening. The ticking and gurgling of the still relaxed him as he sat beneath the stars and watched the fire beneath the kettle.

He’d dozed for a while when movement caused him to stir. Images in the pale light flashed before him as his sleepy eyes came into focus. One drew near screaming wildly like a banshee. Chet’s feet flew up as he tried to move and kicked the big boiler. Precious fluid drained out onto the ground, and Chet began to run as it rushed toward the fire. He wasn’t exactly sure of what he’d seen, but as his brain implored him to run, he thought that one of the banshees may’ve been wearing a girdle. Then came the big boom.

~~~

Morgan dropped the coffee cup she was rinsing into the sink as the panes in her windows rattled. The skies had been clear a few minutes earlier when she’d sat out on her deck, so the sound couldn’t have been thunder. She raced through the cabin and threw open the front door. Orange light filled the woods in the distance behind Clarice’s trailer. She jogged down the driveway, trying to imagine what had just exploded.

Jaclyn ran toward her with her cell phone pressed to her ear, Austin followed behind in his pajamas. “Are you okay?” she asked when Morgan met them on the road.

“I’m fine.” She pointed at the woods. “Are there houses back there?”

Jaclyn shook her head as she chewed her lip. “No, but Chet…” Jaclyn gave Austin a shake. “Stay with Morgan, go inside until I get back.”

Morgan grabbed Jaclyn’s arm before she could run away. “Wait a minute. Where are you going?”

“Chet, he could be hurt.” Jaclyn wrenched her arm from Morgan’s grasp and ran.

“Austin, go to my place,” Morgan yelled as she tried to keep up with Jaclyn.

He opened his mouth to argue, but his eyes flashed open wide as three figures ran out of the woods and onto the road. Ida and Clarice were racing along naked as the day they were born except for sneakers. Betsy trailed behind gasping for breath in nothing but a girdle and silky yellow panties that reflected the moon’s light. He saw Morgan skid to a stop for a second as she noticed the three, then took off again after his mother.

Sounds of sirens filled the air as Morgan chased Jaclyn into the woods. Whatever exploded had ignited the brush around it, and it was burning like an inferno. Morgan caught up with Jaclyn as she circled the flames screaming.

“Chet!”

Morgan wrestled Jaclyn away from the heat. She managed to get a firm grip and shook her to get her attention. “Think of Austin! This is too dangerous. You can’t get any closer.”

Jaclyn came to her senses and sagged against Morgan as she pulled her back from the flames. “I love that old man.” She sobbed, still looking into the fire.

A light in Morgan’s eyes blinded her for a second. “Son of a bitch!” a male voice that she didn’t recognize yelled nearby. “Damn it, Chet!”

Morgan caught a glimpse of a uniform and watched as the light swept the ground around them. “Charlie, he’s in there, I just know it,” Jaclyn said miserably.

“Get back, Jaclyn,” he ordered as fire began to swallow up the pine straw and twigs that covered the ground near their feet. Morgan pulled Jaclyn farther away as others came pouring into the woods around them. She coughed as the smoke billowed their way and watched as dozens of lights swept the forest floor.

Someone started yelling frantically, and most of the lights seemed to move in one direction. Others moved toward the fire. Jaclyn pulled away again and ran to where people began to gather. Chet lay face down, his clothes in rags. “Don’t touch me,” he bellowed as the people around him began to tend his injuries. “The banshees have come a calling for me, and I’m not even Irish.”

M
organ filled a paper cup with water and looked around at the clumps of people gathered together in the waiting room talking in hushed tones. It seemed that nearly all the residents of White Oak Lake were gathered at the hospital awaiting news on Chet. There were murmurs of moonshine and a still. Morgan walked over to where Jaclyn sat alone in the corner and pressed the cup in her hands. “Drink this. It’ll help clear your throat.”

“I hate this place,” Jaclyn said as she stared at the cup. “This is where Grandma died, and I’ve been here three times this week.”

Morgan looked at the soot on Jaclyn’s face and ash in her hair. “I kinda like this look you have going. The backward raccoon thing is working for you.”

Jaclyn laughed softly. “Thank you.”

Morgan rubbed her back soothingly. “He’s gonna be okay. He was talking when they loaded him into the ambulance, remember?”

“Cursing a blue streak was more like it.”

“Shit on a biscuit, what is taking so damn long?” Skip said loudly as he paced. “Chet’s supposed to help me with my duck blind, and we were gonna do some fishing this weekend.”

“Give ’em time, Skip.” A man in a police uniform put his hand on the back of Skip’s neck and gave him a gentle shake. “You two will be back on the water soon enough.”

“That’s our police chief, Charlie Rhodes,” Jaclyn explained as she watched the two. “The black man in the corner is Mayor Aubrey Givens. They’ve always turned a blind eye to Chet’s still, even the last time when it blew up, but I don’t think they’re gonna cut him slack anymore about it.”

A nurse waved Mayor Givens through the door separating the waiting room from the ER, and everyone went silent in anticipation. They stared at the door waiting for the mayor to re-emerge. Skip stopped pacing and cast Jaclyn a nervous glance.

“So Maddie went to be with Austin?” Morgan asked softly, needing to dispel some of the tension.

“Yeah, I talked to her a few minutes ago. Heath wouldn’t let her come up here because of her toe. She was so pissed when she called me. They’re at my house awaiting news.”

Morgan thought of Betsy and Ida, who were at her place sitting with Austin when she and Jaclyn went to get the Jeep. Both of the women looked disheveled, and Betsy was nearly inconsolable. “Did I imagine it, or did you see Betsy, Ida, and Clarice running down the street…kind of naked?”

A tiny line formed between Jaclyn’s brows as she regarded Morgan. “I asked myself that same question a minute ago, but you know, I noticed that Ida’s shirt was inside out when we went to your house.” Jaclyn looked back at the door when she heard the commotion begin.

“He’s gonna be okay,” the mayor said with a smile. He held up his hands to forestall all the questions being shot at him. “He’s got some mild burns on his back, but the most serious are the broken arm, and he’s got a couple of breaks in his right leg. Chet is stable, and they’re gonna take him into surgery for the leg. There isn’t anything we can do here now, except stop crowding the waiting room. I want all of you to go home. If you believe in prayer, then pray for a fast recovery for Chet and give thanks that this wasn’t more serious. Go on home now, please.”

Jaclyn didn’t want to comply. She wanted to be there when Chet came out of surgery, but Charlie and Mayor Givens were insistent and ushered everyone out. Charlie assured Jaclyn that he would stay and let her know that Chet made it through okay.

~~~

“Look what we’ve done. Oh, God,” Betsy said as she watched the firefighters in the distance put out the last of the blaze from Clarice’s kitchen window. “I told y’all it was stupid to run around like that.”

“It’s stupid to make moonshine. We’re not dry here in White Oak,” Ida shot back as she puffed the joint in her hand. “That shit will make you go blind and melt your brain.”

Betsy was incensed as she turned from the window. “You should know you…you…you pothead! After everything that has happened, you’re still smoking away on a marijuana cigarette!”

“It calms us,” Ida said evenly.

“Take Valium like every other respectable senior, you’re sixty-four years old, for crying out loud.” Betsy pointed at Clarice. “And you are past seventy and should know better than to streak through the woods.”

“I’ll have you know I ran a mile tonight. How many women my age can do that?” Clarice snatched the joint from Ida’s hand and inhaled deeply from it. She sounded almost like she’d taken in helium as she said, “That’s because I don’t take all of the shit the pharmaceutical companies peddle.” She waved the joint. “This is nature!”

“At its finest,” Ida agreed with a nod.

“I’ve had it!” Betsy stomped her foot and regretted it when every bone in her body cried out in pain. “I’m a grown woman who has been acting like a child as of late, and I’m done. We may’ve killed Chet tonight because we were doing something stupid. I’m leaving the trio.”

“No! You can’t do that,” Clarice said. “You made an oath, and the magic won’t work if you break the circle.”

Betsy was hysterical as she shouted, “There is no magic, there’s no power in the herbs that, by the way, your cats urinate on. There are no spells, no incantations that put those two together. They’re just two women that have met and are falling in love. We…the universe had nothing to do with that!” Betsy ripped open the back door and fled crying into the night.

Clarice and Ida sat in silence staring after her for a few minutes. Actually, ten passed before Ida spoke. “She’ll come around. I’m powerful hungry. What ya got to eat?”

J
aclyn was emotionally exhausted when she and Morgan walked into her kitchen. The TV was blaring, and Caleb and Dawn were chasing each other up and down the stairs as she went into the den. Maddie grabbed the remote and muted the TV where she lay in the recliner with her foot propped up. “How is he?”

“In surgery so they can repair his broken leg. He has some burns and a broken arm, but they say he’s stable,” Jaclyn said wearily.

Maddie breathed out a sigh of relief. “I can’t believe him. How could he be so stupid as to fool with that old still?”

Jaclyn looked at Maddie’s toe. “Some people don’t think before they act.”

Maddie got the point and turned her attention to Morgan. “You must think we’re all insane.”

“Pretty much,” Morgan said with a laugh.

Austin walked over to Morgan. “Thor looks good,” he said as he cuffed her on the shoulder. “Thanks for waiting on me.”

“I keep my word. Besides, it wouldn’t be any fun without you.”

Maddie watched the exchange, then smiled at Jaclyn. “We should go, so y’all can rest. Heath!”

Heath came out of the closet beneath the stairs with his phone on one ear and his finger in the other. “I gotta get Maddie and the kids home, Charlie, but keep me posted,” he said before ending the call. “You bellowed, my dear? Oh, hi, Morgan,” he said with a smile.

“Let’s get out of Jaclyn’s hair. She looks bushed.”

Morgan watched as Heath helped Maddie from the chair. “I should be going, too,” she said softly.

“Stay…if you don’t mind,” Jaclyn whispered.

Heath corralled the two cyclones as Maddie crutched her way to the back door. “Jac, let me know anything you hear about Chet, regardless of the time, and we’ll do the same.” She looked at Morgan with a coy smile. “It was really nice seeing you again. Let’s all get together when there isn’t a calamity.”

Jaclyn said her goodbyes, then turned to Austin when the house grew quiet. “Did you take your medicine?”

He nodded. “Uncle Heath saw to it. He bought some fried chicken and stuff, it’s all in the fridge. And I know, it’s time for bed.”

Jaclyn smiled and kissed him on the cheek and gave him a long hug. “I love you.”

“Love you, too, Mom.” Austin gave Morgan a fist bump before heading upstairs. “My snot is almost dried up. I’ll be ready to work on Thor tomorrow,” he called out.

“Don’t get your hopes up,” Jaclyn said. “Good night.” She turned to Morgan and took her by the hand. “I know it’s late and you probably want to shower and go to sleep, but would you sit with me for a while?”

“Something on your mind?”

Jaclyn shook her head. “I just want your company.”

“I’m more than happy to be that.” She let Jaclyn lead her to the couch and picked up the pillows that had been thrown on the floor. “Chet’s going to be okay.”

“I believe that.” Jaclyn sat and tugged Morgan down with her. “Did we take a long nap today?”

“It does seem like days ago.” The couch absorbed Morgan like a sponge. Jaclyn snuggled in and laid her head on her shoulder. “I think seeing Clarice Minden’s lily-white ass was a dream, though.”

“We had the same nightmare then.”