Home Fires Read online

  Small-timers. Kinda sweet of them to try, but he knew he could find a better meal down the block.

  “Come on, Wolf. Let’s go find us some real lunch.”

  Joe and his dog stepped out into the downpour and walked past the wobbly card table and soggy rolls.

  Chapter 10

  Despite the chill and rain, Cyndi glowed with the warmth of her good deeds. This was a great idea, coming down to feed the homeless. She finally felt like she was making a difference. Not like the man selling handmade wooden trains at the table to her right, or the women vending stained-glass garden decorations to her left. Or even the shoppers, wandering from booth to booth with no direction.

  She scanned the crowd for someone who might need a hot meal. Her eyes rested on an old woman stooped against one of the giant concrete bridge supports.

  She trotted out to the card table where Mike, bless his heart, waited to serve people. “How you holding up?” she asked.

  Mike grinned through purpling lips. “Great. We’ve only got a couple of servings left.”

  “Do you want to switch places for a while and dry off?”

  “I’m okay. Just send a couple more customers our way so we can go home and get dry.”

  “I’m gonna give some to that old lady over there. Serve me up a bowl.”

  Mike opened the pot with his gloved hands and served some barely hot meat, potatoes, and carrots into a plastic bowl. Cyndi went over to the old woman.

  The stranger didn’t look up.

  Cyndi tapped her foot lightly against the woman’s worn shoe. “Excuse me? Ma’am?”

  The face that looked up did not belong to an old woman after all. Smooth skin framed tired, bloodshot eyes, eyes that barely hid the pain of life. She raised her hands to take the soup.

  Cyndi placed the bowl in the cup of her palms. “Here’s a hot meal for you,” she stammered. How did someone so young end up so beaten down? What had she gone through to age her so fast? She couldn’t be more than thirty.

  “I hope you like it.”

  Before she turned her back, the moth-eaten castaway flashed her a thankful grin, revealing rotting and missing teeth and a remnant of humanness.

  Cyndi shuddered.

  Only one more and they were done. A whiff of wind pushed the scent of funnel cakes under her nose. She was getting hungry. After they gave away their last bowl of soup, she was going for an elephant ear. Or maybe some pad thai. Or maybe both.

  She only needed to find one other person. No other bums sat in her field of vision, either against posts or along the perimeter of the market. She searched faces in the crowd, looking for anyone with sallow cheeks or hungry eyes.

  A middle-aged couple, she with shopping bags and he with a cardboard tray of tamales.

  Nope.

  A young mother negotiating the obstacle course of an aisle with a double stroller.

  Still no.

  A teenaged girl decked out in cargo pants, black denim jacket, and heavy chain necklace, her purple hair showing dishwater blonde at the roots. She didn’t look weathered like the last woman, but her eyes hid a hundred stories.

  That’s the one.

  “Free soup! Homemade cookies!” Cyndi stepped in the girl’s path and pointed her toward the card table, which, after almost an hour in the downpour, drooped almost as much as Cyndi.

  The girl looked at the pathetic display and then at Mike. She sloshed across the grass toward him.

  Cyndi followed, ignoring the rain streaming down her face. Why was this girl out here by herself? And why not get hot food from one of the concession stands?

  “Whatcha got?” The edge of her voice was sharper than the spikes on her collar.

  “Minestrone soup, rolls, and chocolate chip cookies.” Mike started loading a plastic bowl and plate with the last of the food. “Would you like some? The rolls are kinda soggy.”

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  “Okay, well, this is the last of it. Enjoy!” Mike didn’t have to lift the food far off the table before the punk rocker—did they still call them that?— snatched it and scurried back under the concrete bridge. As Cyndi packed dishes into an Igloo cooler, she took a furtive glance toward the girl.

  She looked vulnerable now, damp and alone, eating her lukewarm soup.

  Cyndi folded the card table.

  As they passed her, the teen eyed them with disdain. She did not acknowledge Mike’s nod or Cyndi’s smile.

  Cyndi was already past her when the girl’s voice stopped her short.

  “Hey!”

  Cyndi turned around.

  “Are you for real?” She gestured toward the space the couple had just vacated.

  Cyndi followed the swing of her arm and stared at the empty plot of grass as if it would answer her question.

  “Do you know how many people hang out under this bridge that need a good meal?” The girl crossed her arms, waiting for a response.

  Cyndi was at a loss for words.

  “How many?” Mike asked. He set down his cooler and stepped back toward her.

  She lowered her voice as he approached. “There’s hundreds that show up for the Wednesday night meals. You seriously only brought two little pots?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And how many people did you feed?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe a dozen including you. Why?” He glanced back to see if Cyndi was still with him. She stood riveted, staring at him from less than ten feet away.

  The girl raised her voice to include Cyndi in her opinion. “It just seems pretty sad. Hundreds to feed every day and you only brought enough for twelve? What is this? Some kind of Christmas gesture? Feed the hungry and feel better about the hundreds you spend on Christmas garbage for your kids? Where will you be in March when we’re all still wet and cold? Or in July when we’re dying of heatstroke?” Her voice dripped with sarcasm. “Lame.”

  She dropped the plastic bowl and spoon on the ground, pushed past them, and walked down one of the aisles between booths. If they let her, she’d vanish into the crowd and they’d never see her again.

  They should just let her go, but something about her pulled at Cyndi’s heart.

  Cyndi raised her voice. “Hey, wait!”

  The girl turned her head but kept walking away.

  “What’s your name?” Cyndi cried. A simple question. She had so many more—Why are you so hungry? How old are you? Do you live out here?—but she couldn’t ask them.

  “Clark,” she called back, flashing a smile that looked more like a challenge to fight than a gesture of goodwill. “What’s yours?”

  “I’m Cyndi!” she called. “And this is Mike. I’ll be seeing you, Clark!”

  She didn’t know how, but she was going to find that girl again.

  “Wow, that was horrible,” Cyndi said as she peeled off her rain jacket. After shaking off the excess water, she hung the jacket on a rod above the clothes dryer. She grabbed a towel from a basket of clean clothes and rubbed at her hair. A glance at Mike showed her he was pretty done in. She tossed the towel over to him.

  “Yeah.” He caught it with one hand and dried his scalp and the back of his neck. “What miserable weather. I’m so sorry about you having to stand under shelter while I got soaked in the rain. I feel bad about that.”

  “Sure you do.” She would have been miffed if the roles were reversed, but he was a good sport. “You would have made a great carnival barker.”

  Mike peeked out from under the towel with a smirk on his face. “Are you saying I have a big mouth?”

  “Not in so many words.” Cyndi tried not to smile, but the corners of her mouth twitched and pulled until she gave in to the impish grin. “Big mouth,” she whispered and dove for the door. She tugged it open and scrambled into the kitchen, slammed the door, and sat against it.

  Bump! Bump! “Let me in!” Mike sweetened his words to make them singsongy, then whiney, then gruff, then playful again. When he exhausted all the ways to talk her into letting him in, he pushed o
n the door. That’s when the fun began. She dug her heels into the kitchen floor, but she couldn’t find purchase. Mike pushed slowly against her and she lost ground. Just when it felt like she couldn’t hold the door shut for another second, she jumped up and ran for the stove. Mike burst through the door but not before she grabbed the teapot. Cyndi fiddled with the knobs on the stove and tried to act casual.

  He stood behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. He bent his head to her neck. “Mmm, you smell so good. Like fresh rain and wind.” His breath on her ear drew her backward. “I’ve missed you, hon.”

  She relaxed back into him for a moment, finding the curve in his chest that she liked to imagine had been worn there by almost thirty years of leaning on each other. “Want some tea?”

  “No, thanks. I’ve still got some coffee. I’ll sit with you, though.”

  He went to the living room to wait for her while Cyndi went through the ritual of pouring a cup of tea. She walked with china cup in hand to her favorite chair, set down the cup, and picked up her coziest blanket to wrap around herself, the soft crocheted one Mike’s mom had made for Madi’s big-girl bed. She settled herself in her chair, pulled her feet up, and tucked the blanket in around her. Then she reached for her teacup and took a sip.

  Tea helped her put the world in perspective. Teatime was comfort time. She used to say the first sip of tea was like the first breath of a prayer, a pause to quiet the spirit before launching into something important. She didn’t say that anymore, not since God stopped hearing her prayers.

  She closed her eyes and savored the tea. When she opened them again, Mike was looking at her from his recliner. He had that look of bemusement that often crossed his face when he thought she wasn’t looking.

  “I love watching that, you know,” he said.

  “What?” she asked. She held the teacup in both hands, letting its warmth soak into her cold fingers.

  “The serenity of your tea ritual,” he said. “It’s nothing like watching someone desperately gulping the first coffee of the morning. It’s more like you’re smelling a lovely flower. I’m sorry about this afternoon, though. We really should have waited for better weather. Or had a better plan.”

  Cyndi set her cup on the lamp stand next to her. She looked Mike in the eye.

  “Honey,” she said, “when I said it was horrible, I wasn’t talking about us. I was talking about the people down there. They’re out in the rain all the time. They have to sit out there whether it’s sunny, windy, cold, sleet, snow, ice. I can’t complain about getting a little wet. I have a home and a husband and a teapot and friends and a loving church family to come back to. What do they have? Did you see that girl?”

  “The one who was yelling at us? Uh, yeah, I saw her.”

  “She’s a baby, Mike. She can’t be more than a year or two older than Madi. How can she be living on the streets? How is she getting by? Why isn’t she with her family?”

  “Were you looking at the same girl I was? The girl I saw looked tough—pierced nose and lip, tattoo on her neck. She was no baby. She’s been around the block.”

  “A block she never should have seen. Can you imagine if she was our little girl? I’m serious, Mike; we should do something to help.”

  “I thought that’s what we were doing today.”

  Cyndi sighed. “I don’t mean one meal. I’m talking about doing something big, something that really makes a difference.”

  “You’ve already signed up for a project. Remember the mall? I thought that was your dream.”

  “I know. It is. It’s just—I can feel my heart coming alive for these people.”

  “You can’t change the world, Cyndi. You’ve got to just take care of your little corner of it.”

  He was probably right.

  Still, that night, Cyndi dreamed of Clark and Madi finger painting a mural on the wall of the strip mall.

  Chapter 11

  Christmas, despite Cyndi’s hopes, turned out no less painful than the previous years. She gave Mike his book. He gave her a briefcase. She pretended to be grateful, but as soon as she could, she snuck away to Madi’s room to cry.

  She knew Mike knew she was in here, but he didn’t come comfort her. She lay on the bed and clutched Madi’s pillow, the one with the horses on it, letting her tears soak into its soft fabric.

  “Why did you have to go?” she asked, but what she really meant was, Why did he take you away? It was so hard to keep her promise not to live a life of what-ifs.

  Tomorrow she’d feel better. Tomorrow she’d fill her new briefcase with papers and files and brand-new business cards, but today belonged to Madi.

  With the holiday behind her, Cyndi’s mood improved. Three weeks later, Cyndi stood by her car in the parking lot, looking at the mall—her mall.

  How surreal.

  “Who actually owns a mall, anyway?” she’d asked Mike last night over dinner. She’d sat at the table with the deed in her hand, her own name and signature splashed across the bottom of the page. Even with the proof in front of her, it was inconceivable.

  “It’s not like you own the whole town, hon. It’s just a strip mall.”

  Just a strip mall. But right now, it was the most beautiful strip mall she’d ever seen. She scanned the length of it, as she had countless times in the weeks since putting down the earnest money. Right to left, she counted off the storefronts.

  On one end, anchoring the mall, a craft store. Next to that was a do-it-yourself ceramics studio, then some kind of packaging distributor. In the middle was a restaurant. It used to be a pizza place. When Madi was small, she would order cheese pizza, no sauce, and eat it as fast as she could so she could pretend to play on the race car video games before Cyndi and Mike finished eating.

  Honestly, if the pizza place were still open, Cyndi wouldn’t have bought the mall, but a few years ago it was bought out by a sushi bar. Recently, new management had torn out the conveyor belt and converted the restaurant space to a sandwich shop, now boldly labeled as Hometown Hero in green, red, and white.

  Next door to the restaurant was an accounting firm, Spencer Ridley, CPA. That place was new.

  And on the far left, the other anchor space stood vacant. The tape around the brown paper in the windows had lost its sticky in places. The paper hung as if a breath of wind would blow it to the ground. Cyndi made a mental note to tear it all down today and start cleaning the space for a new client.

  She’d have to put a For Rent sign in the window. Beyond that, she had no idea of how to find a tenant. Where should she advertise? What kind of business should she target? Her already dog-eared book on landlording would be getting more use for sure.

  She’d start at the craft place and work her way down to the vacant space. If she timed it right, she could hit the sandwich place for lunch. Cyndi looked in the side pocket of her purse to make sure her new business cards were there.

  She’d printed them off last night.

  Cynthia Finch, Proprietor

  She’d never had a business card before. It made her feel so official. One more look in the car’s side mirror to make sure hair and makeup were in place and she was ready. She wanted to make a great first impression.

  She just hoped she wouldn’t puke.

  Things started off easy, since the craft store owner wasn’t in. She left her card, promising to return later in the week. The ceramics studio proprietor, a friendly bohemian woman who was happy to meet her and know how to get in touch in case she needed anything, talked longer than Cyndi cared to listen about all kinds of things that had gone wrong in other ceramics shops. Cyndi made a mental note to make sure there was enough insurance to cover damages if the kiln malfunctioned.

  She paused in front of the financial advisor’s door, memorizing his name before she walked inside.

  Spencer Ridley.

  It was late morning, and the sun had actually dared come out for a glimpse at January. It wouldn’t like what it saw and would hide its face again for the next fe
w months. But the few minutes of bright daylight gave Cyndi a flicker of hope.

  She pulled the door open and walked in.

  The small reception area only had four seats. The woman at the desk looked up at her. “Good afternoon. May I help you?”

  “I’m Cyndi Finch. I’m your new landlord, um, proprietor, I mean. I mean, I own this building.” She held out a business card, stiff armed. Everything about her screamed novice. “Could I speak with Spencer Ridley?”

  The receptionist took the card. “I’m Mr. Ridley’s wife, Allie. I’m sorry, but he is with a client right now. If you want to make an appointment, I can fit you in as soon as possible. I’m sure you understand.” Allie set the card by her phone.

  Something in the woman’s attitude threw her off balance, like she was mad at her even though they’d never met before.

  “No, I mean, yes, of course,” Cyndi stammered. “I’m just trying to meet everyone. I didn’t realize . . . I’ll call ahead next time.” She hated that this woman had such a withering effect on her. Just by being poised, she’d had the power to wilt Cyndi’s confidence.

  Cyndi skipped the shipping business and went straight to the Hometown Hero Sandwich Shop. Maybe she was just anxious because of low blood sugar. She’d feel better after she got some food in her. Maybe some tea, too. She wouldn’t tell the server who she was until the end of the meal. She didn’t want to get yelled at again for being the new owner.

  A greeter welcomed her at the door and invited her to pick her seat. She bypassed the booths for a spot along the bar that had a view of the room.

  It took more effort than she expected to heft herself onto a high stool. While she waited for her salad, she watched the other customers, curious what kind of people stopped at her mall.

  Next to her, an elderly gentleman in a business suit read a book, propped up on the salt and pepper shakers and held open by a giant black clip. A couple of soccer moms chatted away at a booth. A steady stream of professionals came for takeout.