The Lost Queen of Crocker County: A Novel Read online

  Were. Were real. Were bright.

  My eyes well up, and I turn toward the peaceful peas on the wall so nobody will see.

  Clara wants to take my order, wants to get as far away from me as possible, whichever comes first. “What can I start you off with?”

  I sniffle my almost-tears away like they’re summer allergies, and before I can order a sensible low-carb garden salad, some long-ago craving unearths itself, and I suddenly feel the urge to feed it.

  “I’ll take a steak,” I say, and after hearing my mother’s reminder about manners in my head, add, “please.”

  “Super! Do you want the charred tofu, the seitan steak, or the sautéed mushroom steak?” Clara says as she points to a menu photo of a colossal mushroom the size of California held hostage between two gluten-free buns.

  “A real steak.” And then I whisper, “Made from an animal,” like we’re involved in some sort of carnivorous espionage. “And some mashed potatoes, with, like, a stick of butter,” I add, my grief-induced state temporarily forcing me to be someone I used to be.

  The look of horror on Clara’s face says she can’t decide what’s worse, bovine homicide or a week’s worth of carbs in one dollop of potatoes, the latest item to be vilified in the land of no-fun food.

  When Clara returns fifteen minutes later with the best she could do—sweet potato fries and a veggie burger between two sad pieces of lettuce—I am struck by a new realization: perhaps my surly attitude isn’t so much because I’m a total bitch, but that I’ve been chronically deprived of carbohydrates for years and have subsequently depleted my brain of serotonin and all things happy.

  A skittish and covert Clara places the bill on the table and starts to turn away. “Wait. Here,” I say, calling her back. Along with the bill, I give her a hundred-dollar tip, my apology for being a pain in the ass. When she softens, stops to give me a smile, I feel an undeniable longing for some sort of humanity, like this scene needs a more meaningful, cinematic resolution. So I ask her the only question that really matters.

  I wait until our eyes lock and then with a smile ask, “Hey, what’s your favorite movie?”

  Clara readjusts a half-full glass of water perched on two dirty plates. She grins, confused. “What?”

  “Your favorite movie, what is it?” I repeat, now noticing her name tag that reads: Clara D.

  She stops, painfully in thought, but then loses her focus and glances out the window. A convertible on the street outside hums by, blaring Randy Newman’s “I Love LA.” Clara ponders for a few more seconds, and I prepare for the moment I’ve been waiting for, when a movie unites two random people scurrying through this thing called life.

  “I don’t watch movies,” she says and darts away.

  Now I am left alone to talk about movies all I want. All day. To nobody.

  So there it is. A moment of clarity with Clara D.

  I look down at the small bag sticking out of my purse, holding the DVD I’ve just bought Felicia for her birthday. I had planned on dropping it at the office in the morning for my perfect plan. No party. No people. No problem.

  Hey, Happy Birthday, Felicia. Sorry I chose not to spend time with you on your special day. Here’s a movie instead!

  Must revise. Right now.

  “Thank you, Clara D.,” I say to myself and dial the number of my first of three accomplices.

  “Sean,” I say. “It’s Jane Willow. You owe me a favor.”

  • • •

  The next day I wake up, pack for my short trip home, and swallow away the lump in my throat that forms every time I look for texts from my parents.

  But there is one thing I need to do, want to do, before I leave.

  When I show up on the tree-lined street in Burbank, the whole affair looks less like a birthday party and more like a neighborhood barbecue. Seven pink balloons are tethered to the mailbox out front, and a small Happy Birthday sign sticks out of the tiny lawn. Felicia is written in with a black Sharpie.

  Neighbors mill about, mingling amongst the aroma of meat on the grill and Maria’s beautiful flower garden lining the sidewalk leading up to the small, modest home. Before I even have a chance to ring the doorbell, Felicia bounds out the front door and hugs me around the waist.

  “I knew you’d come!” she says. “I’m really sorry about your mommy and daddy,” she adds, taking my hand like a child does, followed by a heartfelt moment of solidarity. “I hate airplanes.”

  Maria is close behind and greets me like one greets her boss who has come to her daughter’s birthday party when she should be planning a funeral.

  “Jane…” She stops in front of me, trying to conceal her shock, partly that I showed up at all, but mostly that I showed up after yesterday’s news. “How are you… I can’t believe you…”

  “You only turn seven once, right?” I say, handing her Felicia’s gift—Born Free on Blu-ray and a Blu-ray player in case they didn’t have one. I urge them to open it later, and tell Felicia to go have fun. We all walk to the backyard together, and sometime between my first and second trip to the adult beverage station (a must at any birthday party if you want return guests the following year) it happens.

  It begins with the sweet part, the procession of caterers in baking smocks carrying tray after tray of cupcakes, each adorned with Felicia written in fancy-chocolate-cursive goodness. They walk past the small card table strewn with a few mismatched paper plates and napkins and unfold a large industrial table. They attract some attention from the partygoers as they begin to stack the cupcakes on a four-foot-tall wire frame in the shape of a giant number seven. Store-bought cupcakes will probably not taste as good as Maria’s homemade sheet cake, but it is quite a sight—a giant mountain of Felicias, larger than life, ready to take on the world with love and luck on her side.

  Before Maria can make her way over to the caterers to ask who sent them, if there’s been some mistake, the real show begins. Two trucks, both with the LA Zoo sign and logo on the side, pull into the side driveway that leads to the backyard. Sean’s nephew, the animal caretaker and outreach program director who brings his animals to the late-night talk shows, steps out of the truck. He and three other handlers wave to the partygoers, now brimming with excitement, and completely ignore me as instructed. One handler carries a giant blue-and-gold macaw on his forearm, while another mingles with the guests, showing off a baby orangutan who is clinging to her like a baby clings to its mother.

  Then comes the best part, the climactic scene when Felicia, holding her own mother’s hand, sees the cinematic moment of the day: Sean’s nephew holding the newest addition to the LA Zoo family of cats—a baby lion cub.

  “Mama, it’s Elsa!” Felicia belts out, but then softens, careful not to scare the baby animal.

  By now the crowd is overflowing with oohs and aahs, and I can’t take my eyes off Felicia, who is beaming with wonder. “Do you guys know Elsa?” she says to the crowd. “She’s from Born Free. That’s my favorite movie!”

  Every good woman knows her favorite movie. “Atta girl,” I whisper to no one.

  I almost don’t notice a slow-moving cloud as it blocks the sun for a moment, because the scene here is so euphoric. I take one last close-up shot of Felicia, petting her Elsa, and look for my exit.

  As I sneak out amid the bustling excitement, I hear Maria pleading with one of the animal handlers. “No, seriously, who set this up?” I can hear a slight fear in her question, a concern about the cost, so I call Sean’s nephew over to the side of the house, out of view.

  “Remember what I said, right? She won this, courtesy of the LA Zoo Outreach Program… God knows my donation should keep it up and running for quite some time.”

  He smiles. “Whatever you say, Ms. Willow—I hear you’re a real ball breaker.”

  I shrug. “Hey, don’t let anyone get mauled today, all right? I don’t wanna see this end up o
n Dateline.”

  I drive away from Burbank toward the unknown, my long trip home a long shot in a finished scene, and as the wind blows through my hair, I feel the weight of being free.

  Chapter Four

  It’s been three days, eight hours, four minutes, and twelve seconds since I lost my whole family at the age of thirty-six.

  A plane would’ve gotten me to Iowa too fast, left me with two days to spend in True City before my parents’ funeral, so I take the long way home and drive. Any time one drives across the full length of Nebraska, it’s considered the long way home, regardless of where home is, but my mode of transport and gift from my father—a fully restored 1964 Aston Martin DB5 painted in the quintessential Goldfinger Silver Birch, color code ICI 2829—makes me feel like the road is endless, no destination. The engine’s purr soothes, numbs, anesthetizes.

  This car, this sweet, sweet car, is the stuff of boyhood fantasies. Every time, and I mean every time I drive it, I am reminded of this. The envious looks, the long stares—most of them assuming that a woman couldn’t possibly appreciate the magnificence of such a rare automotive gem, but they underestimate my own childhood fantasies fueled by images of Bond’s DB5 racing down dark alleys, owning the rolling countryside. What the envious onlookers don’t know is that after Bond marathons with Dad, I would imagine Q debriefing me about my very own modified Aston Martin, complete with revolving number plate, left- and right-mounted machine guns, and my personal favorite—the ejector seat. In seventh-grade math, while Mr. McCallister wrote algebraic equations on the board, I was somewhere else, racing through a tree-lined road, five car lengths ahead of the bad guys, moving fast toward a clandestine getaway with my finger on the smokescreen button—imagining the day when Dad’s masterpiece would be complete.

  And now, twenty years later, even though it doesn’t have air-conditioning or power steering, I am still driving the dream. I actually prefer the amount of muscle needed to control this car, how you feel everything, the slight pull to the left, the oppressive heat when life gets sticky. I love that unlike other legendary cars—the Lamborghini, the Corvette, the Porsche—that say board shorts and flip-flops, the Aston Martin says immaculate tailored suit. Driving an Aston Martin is like spending stolen moments with an unattainable lover, and unlike most of the actors I meet, it does not disappoint in the flesh. When you first see that sleek shape, the elongated front and shorter back, it gives the illusion of hope, that you have more ahead of you than what you’ve left behind. Yes, that profile makes you think you can do anything. And when the all-aluminum-triple-carb-fed 4.0-liter straight-six roars for a second, then settles into a polite idle, you know you are ready to chase the horizon.

  Right now, I’m not chasing anything. I’m inching my way through Nebraska—the state the never ends. I grew up surrounded by corn and have subconsciously looked for fields my whole life, but the cornfields outside of North Platte, Nebraska, blanket the land like mere frauds—weaker, shorter than Iowa corn. Knee-high by the Fourth of July. That’s the saying, but this corn is barely waist high, and it is late August. Every field I pass, from Kearney to Grand Island, unsettles me, perhaps a precursor of what awaits me. What words would my father choose to describe my current state?

  Orphaned.

  Solo.

  That is to say, alone.

  Close to where Nebraska ends and Iowa begins, the landscape comes alive. Flat land gives birth to peaceful almost-hills and happy, cartoon-like trees jut out of nowhere like little warnings of what’s to come. It’s the calm before the storm. A deceiving easiness. It’s Cary Grant thinking he’s going for a stroll in the cornfield, only to be attacked by a malevolent crop duster. It’s Jack Dawson serenely drawing Rose right before the iceberg hits. It’s Quint, Brody, and Hooper throwin’ back whiskey while their fate circles below.

  I focus on the immediate road, not what lies ahead. But despite my attempts to keep my focus shallow, my eyes remain wide open with the ugly truth: my former self, Before Jane, left me a long time ago; the current me, After Jane, abandoned my own parents, the very parents who taught me to take care of those I love.

  My chest tightens. I switch focus so I can breathe again.

  Depth of field. An important tool in a director’s bag of camera tricks designed to manipulate a viewer’s emotions. Citizen Kane’s deep-focus shots flashed in my mind and across Interstate 80 as I fight hard to avoid what comes into focus next.

  Welcome to Iowa: A Place to Grow.

  Jesus. Even the signs here are preachy.

  With blurred cornfields deep in the background, the highway sign, signature green with white reflective lettering, comes into sharp focus, letting me know exactly where I have landed.

  The full-blown rolling hills announce themselves within seconds of crossing the state line, as if to give a tentative hello to the stranger I am. I hear Mother sing how the hills are alive with the sound of music. The hills are one more thing I have forgotten. So green. Impossibly green. Like someone has taken the black-and-white childhood I remember and colorized it, angering the purists who believe the past should be left untouched.

  It is jarring to see a place that is so dead to me teem with such life. I touch the metal bangle I always wear on my left hand, this time letting my fingers go straight to the inside inscription. At first, I try to ignore the pronounced emptiness that has taken residence in my core, but then I let myself feel it: all ache, no mercy.

  I need to regroup, and what better place to get my bearings than an I-80 truck stop? I pull into the Sapp Brothers truck stop, a beacon in the Midwest known for the enormous water tower they’ve rejiggered into a giant, vintage pot of coffee. Inside there will be no trace of Los Angeles. No juice bar, no wheatgrass shots, no chai lattes, just pure midwestern fare: Funyuns, Hostess cherry pies, Slurpees.

  A handful of people who are fueling up their semis, pickup trucks, and sensible sedans stare at me as I walk past them. Their eyes widen when they see my Aston Martin, the shiny, out-of-place foreigner devoid of dust or humility. I see their eyebrows lift as they take me in. My blond hair in loose pigtails, my definitely-not-from-here outfit: frayed, cutoff jean shorts, black go-go boots, and a faux-fur shrug draped over a fitted T-shirt featuring the original Jaws movie poster circa 1977.

  As I approach the convenience store entrance, a local trucker quickens his lumbering pace to open the door for me.

  “Thank you.” I flash a brief smile and walk in.

  The trucker smiles back, gives me a nod upward, the signature midwestern farmer’s nod. “Sure, kitten.”

  I’ve been in my home state for under three minutes and have already been addressed as a helpless baby animal. Something deep inside me stirs, then wakes up, forces my shoulders back. I stop, turn around, and step in front of him. “Kitten? Really?” I wait a beat, prepare to just walk away, but when the words surface, I’m unable to stop them. “I prefer pussy,” I say, way too loud, and as the words hang in the thick Iowa air, I realize that although I meant to emasculate this guy, I’ve somehow declared that I’m a lesbian. Loudly. Before I can clarify, a man in a leather jacket walks past, giving my emphatic lesbianism an enthusiastic thumbs-up, while a mother glares and puts her hands over her little boy’s ears.

  The trucker evolves from startled to pissy. I can’t decide if he’s angry because he thinks I might play for the other team or because I’m blocking the way to his next dose of donuts. His too-small tank top, which reads I wish my girlfriend was as dirty as my truck, stretches over his sizable beer belly, then tucks into his jeans. “Your mother know you talk like that?”

  “Does your girlfriend know you call other women ‘kitten’?” But now something else in me comes loose. My shoulders fall, my voice softens. “And yes, my mother knows I talk like this, but it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore. She’s dead.”

  Recently dead.

  Freshly dead.

  That is
to say, not able to be my moral compass anymore.

  Before I can stop myself, honesty leaks out of me until I’m standing in a puddle of truth. “I can’t believe she’s gone.”

  The truck driver gently lifts up his hands, like he’s going to try to fix what he’s broken. “Aw, hell, sweet”—but he revises—“ma’am. I’m real sorry.”

  I smile, sniff away his apology.

  The two of us—a couple of sorry midwesterners—walk into the gas station convenience store together and revert to the midwestern default conversation: weather.

  After a pregnant pause, he says, “Looks like it’s gonna rain.”

  “Yep,” I say.

  “We sure need it,” the trucker says, and it all comes back to me. Midwesterners love to speak as if they are the land itself, like the land needs a spokesperson. My memory starts to come into soft focus somewhere between the Little Debbie snack cakes and the carousel display of dueling Iowa Hawkeye and Iowa State Cyclones key chains, and just when the trucker and I find common, Iowa ground, we part ways.

  I make my way past the beverage coolers, and a woman hovers next to me, swaying her body in order to rock the small baby nestled in the Baby Bjorn strapped to her chest. Although the baby is quiet, the woman makes no attempt to hide her own whimpering as she stares, wide-eyed, at a small gas station television set hanging from the corner ceiling. She shakes her head, mouthing Superman’s “No, no, no, no, no!” as he sees his beloved Lois Lane, lifeless among the fallen boulders.