Home Fires Read online

  “Hi, hon.” Mike moved in for a kiss. He spied the state of the dining room and lifted one eyebrow. “What’s all that?”

  “That,” said Cyndi, “is the ugly result of procrastination rearing its head. It’s all the papers that have come in the past I don’t know how many months. I’ve been putting off filing them, but with the new business starting up, I thought I should get on top of things. But there’s so much . . . It’s overwhelming. If I can’t keep my own files, how can I expect to run a business? Maybe I’m not up to the challenge.”

  “You’re just scared because it’s a new project. If filing is a problem, we’ll hire someone. It’s a huge undertaking. Let’s not give up before we’ve started. We’ll sort it all out after Christmas, when the strip mall is actually ours. In the meantime, let’s clear up this mess. How does takeout sound?”

  Christmas. That was the real problem. Holidays were always hard. They’d only had ten Christmases with Madeleine before the accident. This would be the fourth without her. It didn’t get any easier. Time erased the details of memories, stealing her child away again little by little, turning vivid moments into ghostly blurs. Half of it was mourning what she had, half what should have been. Life without Madi meant no slumber parties, no loud music, no pink-and-purple curtains, no reason to hang up stockings. It meant an eternity of silence that should have been filled with giggles and hugs.

  The insurance company had finally come through with the money that could never compensate for their loss. They were using the money to buy a strip mall. The project would be her rebirth, Cyndi’s chance to take the tragedy of Madi’s death and turn it into a reason to live again.

  Or at least a way to keep from counting the days.

  “I’ll run pick up teriyaki while you get the rest of this stuff filed. Do you want the chicken?” Mike asked.

  “That’s fine.” Cyndi picked up a stack of papers, copies of the contract they’d signed putting their house up as collateral on the real estate loan.

  “Are you sure?” she’d asked her husband before they signed the papers. “What if we can’t make a go of it? What if we lose the mall? Or even the house?”

  “I trust you,” he’d said.

  For Madi and for Mike, she had to make this work. If she failed . . .

  She couldn’t—wouldn’t—allow herself to finish the thought. If she didn’t make a go of it, why else should she wake up each morning?

  Chapter 6

  Joe parked his cart in front of Victoria’s Tea Garden and pulled out his blankets.

  “Where’s that dinner roll? I know it’s here somewhere.” He shook the blankets, but nothing fell out. He checked in the bottom of the cart without luck.

  “Where is it? Wolf, I brought you something from supper. I know how you like those rolls from the Fifth Street Mission. Now where is it?”

  Wolf looked at him, head cocked to one side.

  Joe scratched his beard.

  He pulled off his faded Dodgers cap—broken in was what he called it—and patted the top of his head, as if he would have put the roll there. Patting his pockets one more time, he finally found the roll, flattened but edible. He tossed it to Wolf. “Here you go, boy.”

  Wolf waited until the roll was on the ground before snatching it up. He was a good dog that way, never grabbing stuff out of your hand no matter how hungry he was.

  “They served up a good dinner tonight,” Joe said. “Stew. I like that. It sticks to your ribs and warms you right up.” He looked around at his feet for a suitable rock. When he found one, he wedged it behind the shopping cart’s back wheel to prevent everything he owned from rolling away in the night. Then he settled down in the doorway and wrapped his blankets around his shoulders. As soon as he got situated, Wolf curled up against him.

  “Of course, it is getting more crowded at those dinners. I can hardly find a place to sit anymore. It’s getting harder and harder to find a shelter bed, too. It’s hardly worth the trouble of looking. At least tonight’s a nice night. We’ll stay warm and dry tonight, won’t we, boy?”

  But Wolf didn’t answer.

  Of course he didn’t. He was just a dog.

  Chapter 7

  Cyndi sat on the second row, near the center aisle, the same place she’d sat at every church she’d ever attended.

  “Front row, center shows God and the church you’re serious,” her daddy used to say. While she no longer believed her proximity to the front of the sanctuary made her any closer to God, she was used to this view. Mike was at his regular post as usher, so he wouldn’t sit by her until the sermon began. Every time he walked to the front, she watched him, looking all spiffed up in his Sunday suit. Twenty-seven years with the same man—more than half her life. It had taken four or five of those to knock the rough edges off him, but now she couldn’t imagine life without him. She glanced over at him again. He stood in the aisle, scanning the room for empty seats, oblivious to her observation. His hair had thinned out years ago, but at least he hadn’t gone the comb-over route some of his friends were trying. Now he sported a laurel wreath of gray-brown hair around a shiny scalp. His cheeks hung a little lower than they used to, but he was still the handsomest man in the room, at least to her eyes.

  Watching Mike helped her ignore the empty space beside her. Not Mike’s spot to her right, but Madi’s space on the left. Ever since she died, church had been a lonely place.

  Cyndi tried to pray, but her heart wasn’t in it. Why ask for direction or wisdom or comfort if you knew none of them would come? Why ask anything of a God whose ears don’t work?

  She looked down at her program. All to Jesus I Surrender, None of Self and All of Thee.

  Giving Sunday.

  For the most part, Cascade Forest Community Church met their needs, but Giving Sunday was a tradition she could do without. Woven into the church’s Advent traditions before she and Mike had moved here, it was a blatant fund-raising effort. She squirmed to hear the preacher tying God’s gift of his son with the need for upgraded landscaping or a new roof. Of course, he didn’t actually come out and say it that way. He framed it in more spiritual terms, but even the densest in the kingdom could recognize the thinly disguised underlying message.

  Maybe she should have stayed home.

  “Let us stand.” The song leader started “I Surrender All.” Cyndi joined the singing, following along with the words projected on a screen up front though she’d had them memorized since childhood. Song followed song, each asking for some form of sacrifice.

  After the last rousing chorus of “I Gave My Life for Thee,” the pastor bounded to the pulpit in four giant steps. He always began his sermon like that, as if he couldn’t wait to get started. He set his Bible on the clear plastic podium and took his place beside it. One hand reached to his belt to turn on his cordless mic; the other picked up the remote control for PowerPoint.

  “God gave the ultimate Christmas gift of all time,” he began. His voice boomed, a little too loud. The speakers squawked.

  Cyndi cringed.

  He adjusted the volume on his microphone. “Sometimes the truth can be deafening,” he joked. The congregation gave a polite chuckle at his attempt at humor. When the services went high tech, they all learned to expect a few technical difficulties.

  “God gave us the ultimate Christmas gift, the Christ.” He pushed a button on his remote and a slide came up, a Renaissance painting of the nativity. A plump pink baby sat on the lap of a haloed blonde beauty. He pushed the button again and pulled up a stock photo of a busy mall. Bustling shoppers carried armloads of bags. The picture, taken with slow shutter speed, blurred the shoppers to emphasize their hurry.

  Mike slid in beside Cyndi. He gave her hand a squeeze.

  “Have any of you been here recently?” Pastor Jake asked. Cyndi raised her hand, and a rustle behind her told her that many others had too.

  Interesting that he’d chosen a picture of a mall. In the days since she’d signed papers on her own mall, Cyndi had driven pa
st it every time she was out. It was just a coincidence. After all, who wasn’t thinking about shopping at this time of year? Only a few more days until Christmas.

  Pastor Jake turned to Scriptures and read the story of the widow’s mite, the story of Abigail feeding David’s army, the story of the rich young ruler. Another push of the button brought up a picture of the church building. The new modern structure stood proud and strong beside the old white steepled chapel. Rolling lawns filled the foreground.

  It is a beautiful facility. We should be proud of it, Cyndi thought. But as the pastor talked about future development, her heart grew cold. She would never serve on the building committee or pick up a paintbrush. Her dreams pulled her elsewhere.

  We’re rich. Really, really rich. Not just compared to starving children in Africa or China or wherever. Of course we’re rich compared to them. But we have so much compared to the people around us.

  She didn’t need to look around her to know how people were dressed. Designer clothes, fancy jewelry, more makeup and hair gel than she could guess. And the men . . . the men had plenty to spend, too, with their fancy cars and expensive toys. And none of the money could buy anything important. If it could, wouldn’t she still have Madi?

  A picture of the church grounds remained on the screen. A list of proposed projects overlaid the background image. The air in the sanctuary suffocated her. Cyndi bolted down the center aisle for the door.

  She stood outside the entrance, under the eaves of the new addition, out of the rain. A few early leavers brushed past her. Cyndi forced herself to draw in deep breaths.

  She knew she ought to go back in, but she couldn’t. She’d wait outside until Mike was ready to go. He could put the check in without her, and then they could go back to their empty home.

  Cyndi dug in her purse for her car keys and let herself in on the passenger’s side. She tilted the seat back a little and stared out past the parking lot to the sidewalk.

  Cars rushed by on the busy street. A bus approached and pulled to a squeaky, hissing stop at a bus shelter. Its yawning doors opened and it disgorged a passenger.

  From the back, Cyndi could tell the woman was old. Her hunched back and the way she struggled to pull a luggage cart down the steps spoke of hardship. A layering of several coats rounded her shape. She turned around, revealing weathered skin and sunken cheeks.

  The bus pulled away.

  The old woman stood on the sidewalk for a minute, as if trying to figure out which direction to go. She finally overcame inertia and pushed, one step at a time, down the road.

  Cyndi startled at the sound of the car door opening.

  Mike slid into the driver’s seat and put his key in the ignition. “You feeling okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine. Did you see that?”

  “See what?”

  “That woman. The one who just got off the bus.”

  “Nah, I guess I missed it. What happened?”

  “Nothing. I don’t know, nothing.” Cyndi knew something important had just transpired. First the old guy with his dog, then the picture of the mall, now this woman. She tried to shake them out of her head, but she couldn’t. An idea started to form. Come on, hon,” she said. “Let’s go home. I think I know what I’m supposed to do.”

  All the pieces were falling into place. Madi’s money wasn’t supposed to just keep her busy. It was for a much bigger cause.

  She was surrounded with hungry people. She had a feeling she was supposed to feed them.

  Chapter 8

  Thursday afternoon. Only two more days until Christmas.

  The rain poured down.

  Instead of a normal misty Northwest drizzle, sheets of water pounded at an angle from the sky in a windy deluge.

  Cyndi navigated while Mike drove around the block scouting out a parking place. All the one-way streets confused him, but she kept him straight.

  “I don’t know. Maybe we should try this another day when it’s not so wet. What do you think?” Mike asked.

  “It’s pretty nasty out,” Cyndi agreed. “But we’re already down here. Maybe we can find an awning or something to stand under. If you don’t want to stay, you can drop me off, but I’m here to feed the homeless. They don’t have the luxury of going inside just because of a little rain. I’m not going to either.”

  “You know I’m not going to just leave you here,” Mike said. “Maybe we can set up under the bridge. I know that’s where a lot of them hang out.”

  “There’s a parking place up there on the left,” Cyndi said, indicating a space that was no more than three inches longer than the car. She never would have tried for it, but Mike took a perverse pride in his ability to parallel park. Even so, it took him a few tries working the sedan backward and forward to get lined up to his satisfaction.

  “That’s good enough, honey. Let’s go.” Cyndi clamored from the car before he had a chance to pull out and try again. Once on the sidewalk, Mike pulled his hood up over his head and opened the back hatch.

  “I’ll take the card table. Can you get the pots of soup?” Cyndi looked at the amount of stuff they’d brought. “We’ll have to take two trips.”

  She and Mike grabbed the table and the pots and started toward the main downtown hangout for the homeless, under the Humboldt Bridge. A popular farmer’s market and craft market was open only on weekends in the summer. The rest of the time, anyone seeking shelter from the elements or a little community could be found along the river under the bridge.

  The closer they got, the more people crowded the sidewalks.

  “Oh, you’re kidding. Is this a market day?” Cyndi stopped a stranger walking past. “Is the market open today?”

  “Every day until Christmas Eve,” the woman replied before hurrying on her way.

  “I thought I planned this out so we wouldn’t be here on a busy day. Shucks, now we’ll have to rethink how to do this.” Cyndi let the card table rest on her toes. “Let’s at least get into the shelter of the bridge, and then we can think about where to set up. No use moping in the rain.”

  The market rocked in full holiday swing. Rows of canvas-topped shelters hosted shoppers who browsed through tie-dyed T-shirts, hand-turned pottery, wind chimes, and jewelry made from cast-off silverware. Enticing smells from the international food court danced through the aisles—elephant ears, spring rolls, baklava—

  Mike took a deep breath. “Oh man, that smells good. We’ll have to get lunch when we’re all done. I haven’t been to this market in years.”

  “That’s because we never come to the city,” said Cyndi, glad to see he was in a better mood. “This could be kind of fun, a little adventure. Where should we set up?”

  Every inch of covered space was taken by a booth or a busker playing fiddle, bongo drums, or saxophone for extra cash.

  They moved down the aisles toward the river, hoping for an opening down on the other end, but the market was packed all the way down to Riverside Drive.

  Cyndi looked at her husband, already dripping wet and bedraggled. “You’ve got rain gear, right?” Like rain gear would do him any good at this point. They were both as wet as they were going to get.

  “Let’s do it.” Mike splashed across the street to a grassy greenbelt along the river’s edge. Cyndi chased after him, squealing each time cold water seeped into her shoes. They sploshed their way to a random spot in the middle of the grass. Mike unfolded the card table and Cyndi set pots of soup on it. Mike ran back to the car for a bag of hoagie rolls while Cyndi fished out her hand-lettered paper sign. She tried to tape it to the front of the card table, but the tape was too wet to stick. Besides, the paper already drooped in the rain. The ink blurred and ran like cheap mascara.

  “Forget the signs,” Mike said when he got back. “We’ll just round up some people while the food’s still warm, and then we’ll be on our way. Do you want to stand here or go drum up business?”

  “It was my idea. I can stay.”

  “I think you should go. I don’t mind
the rain. It’s not like it’s going to mess up my hairdo.” Water poured off the bill of his Mariners cap.

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m fine, hon. I’m not made of sugar,” Mike said. He wiped the rain off his face with both hands and flicked the water into the grass. He was a good sport to come out with her on a day like this on such a fool’s errand.

  “Go on, Cyn. Stir up some business for us before I drown.”

  Cyndi smiled at him and set off in search of someone needy.

  Chapter 9

  On rainy days like today, Joe liked to stay put. Early this morning, though, his favorite spot under the bridge was taken by a Chinese woman selling lucky bamboo. His other favorite place near the fountain was being used by a nutty old Santa singing Christmas songs and taking swigs of whatever Christmas spirits he had hidden in his paper sack. Joe made his way around the crowd to the river end of the bridge. Curse this constant rain.

  It was Thursday. Thursdays he could usually find a hot meal from a church group that served hot soup out of a mobile kitchen—“Soup for Lost Souls” or something like that—from a food truck three blocks away. He wasn’t sure he wanted to go that far in this downpour. He listened for his stomach to tell him if it was worth the trek or not.

  It grumbled back at him.

  Like an angel of mercy, a woman’s voice reached him through the din. “Free soup! Need a hot meal? Get some hot soup!” Something about her sounded familiar. Not too tall, friendly face, a green REI rain jacket. She was a little on the round side, but not fat.

  Nope. There was something familiar about her, but he couldn’t place her. Living on the streets, though, he saw a lot of faces every day.

  “Free soup over there,” the woman yelled to whoever was in range of her voice.

  Joe followed the finger’s direction with his eyes. A guy in a baseball hat stood tending a rickety card table with two saucepans on it. He probably had enough to feed six or eight. The bag of rolls on the table was soaked through, the bread fit only to feed to seagulls.