Whatever was in those okra pickles was like inhaling tear gas or pepper spray – and not something she’d ever faced before. Just before she could make a ‘I-Surrender-Sound’to the older woman whom she’d made an immediate enemy of – she felt hands touch her face, steadying her, as something cold was shoved to her mouth.
“Drink.”
Recognizing the voice, she immediately reared back, hating to give that arrogant officer the time of day, but the second something cold touched her lips again, her body’s desire for relief took over. She touched his hand, closing her eyes that were stinging, as she breathed through her noseand drank the most noxious stuff she’d ever tasted – but it blissfully cut the heat.
“Dottie, I told you last time to warn people before you…”
“Aww, Jack, you know that once people have Maw’s pickles – they’re converted. I just wanted her to like me, and I don’t think she does…”
“I think she’s been physically wounded,” Jack answered, and Heidi managed to nod her head as Jack held the container to her mouth. “Keep drinking and let it swish around your mouth. Those pickled eggs are noxious...”
“Okra,” she strangled out between fuming breaths.
“Even worse,” he said softly, pressing a paper towel to her forehead as she cracked an eye – and stepped away from him.
Heidi was embarrassed, wary, and needed a minute to compose herself now that she wasn’t in some Scoville-based attack on her person. Walking to the back of the store, still sweating and clutching a plastic container labeled buttermilk, she disappeared into the bathroom – and did a double-take at her reflection. Her entire face was mottled, ruddy, and glistening from sweat. She’d never sweated on her chin before, and it looked like there was a layer of oil seeping up from the pores. Her upper lip was covered in sweat, snot, and had a line of buttermilk. Her lips were purplish-red like some dark matte lipstick… and her hair was wet at the roots.
That stuff was lethal,she thought painfully, turning on the faucet so she could clean up her face with the cold water. Several minutes later, not a speck of makeup remained on her, and her eyes were still watering slightly – Heidi was able to emerge from the bathroom and saw their faces.
Dottie looked worried.
Jack looked concerned.
“Are you gonna make it?”
“That woman should put a biohazard label on anything she prepares,” Heidi rasped, causing both spectators at her ‘event’ to exchange a glance as they let out nervous laughs. “None of this is funny…” she began and felt something crack within her chest. This had to be the perfect and only way her nightmarish life finished – death by pickled okra.
After everything, leaving everything behind, her flat tires, her missing shoe, the threat of her pinky toe by those infernal Jellies…thiswas how it all ended. No money, no clothing unless she made it back to her car in time, and no hope. She was stranded in a small town that time forgot, with no cellular service, no shelter, no prospects, no friends – just nothing.
Heidi hadnothing.
She was broke – financially, mentally, emotionally, physically… all of it.
Jack must have seen something in her expression, because he was no longer smiling or exchanging an easy laugh with Dottie. No, he looked very alarmed. Shoving his hand in his pocket, he handed the older woman a few bills, grabbed the dreaded jellies, and put an arm around her shoulder, leading her out of the mini-mart. The streets were empty except for a lone car puttering along in the afternoon sun. His wipers slide across the windshield once, making a noise before resting again. She could feel the occasional sprinkle on her face, her hair, right before the rain – which seemed to match this sudden deflation to her soul as he walked her to the passenger door once more.
“Shh… c’mon,” he said gently to her as if she was fragile – and that only made her feel worse. “I promise things will be okay – I promise.”
“I’m not some child,” she growled angrily, feeling tears forming again – but not from the heat of the crazy picklesbut from sheer frustration. “I’m a perfectly capable woman who has been dropped in the middle of nowhere and…”
“You have been,” he agreed, shutting the door as the rain started to come down heavier. She watched as he circled the car, slid inside the driver’s seat, and then turned to look at her through the cage that separated any persons suspected of wrongdoing, and the officer on duty. “You’ve been dropped in the middle of a small town you don’t know, dealing with things you never thought would happen, but let me tell you – everything happens for a reason…”
“You’re one of those people,” she shot back flatly, glaring at him.
“Everything happens for a reason,” he repeated gently with iron conviction in his voice. “You’re here because you obviously need to disconnect for a moment, get your feet under you, and figure out something that only you can answer… so why not pick up what’s being laid at your feet right now.”
“Poverty? Isolation?”
“A chance to step back from the chaos, experience a simpler life, and make a few friends…”
“Like you?” she asked in a clipped voice, already assuming his response from his interaction with her earlier. “I should be friends with you, fall at your feet, prostrate myself happily before a man just because you’re a man…” her voice trailed off as his eyes widened in surprise before a smile curled his lips.
“We’re not that backward… but indulge me for a moment with an idea,” he offered, and she shrugged, leaning forward and patting the cage.
“Go ahead, big boy – you’ve got a captive audience. Shower me with yourmanlywisdoms…”
He chuckled and grinned before his smile faded, meeting her eyes.
“You’re here,” he said quietly. “You’ve never been here. I’m guessing you never intended to be here either – yet here you are. You’ve got your things in your car, you have no service, nothing but yourself… and you are healthy, whole. Any number of things could have brought you here – a wreck, a kidnapping, a friend – but you found your way here alone, down a road named Wishing Well to a town called Fate, where life ticks by a little slower, people just want you to like them, like Dottie and her insane addiction to those pickles…”
