The Calhoun home sat quietly on my left, between the Peterman’s and the Rickman’s places. I paused on the sidewalk, my gaze roaming over the Subaru station wagon parked in the drive. Suitcases filled the seats and back. Were they moving? I’d not heard about them putting the house up for sale. No one did anything in this town without everyone knowing about it ten minutes later. Half the population had police scanners and the other half had the internet so any kind of news spread like a damn wildfire. Which was why I’d come out so early. I’d known back then that there’d be no way to keep something like being gay under wraps.
Standing on the sidewalk like a dope, I heard my name being called. I glanced from the car to the front porch and there stood Linda Calhoun. She was a short pudgy woman with silver in her once all blonde hair. An engaging woman with zero tolerance for bullshit, she’d been running the paper forever, at least as far back as I could recall.
“Mayor.” She smiled as I made my way down her walk to her porch. “Would you like to come in? I just made a pot of coffee.”
“Thanks. Yes, that would be wonderful.” Her home was still as it had been when I’d been here to help celebrate their fortieth wedding anniversary last June. Nothing was packed up or in any way appeared as if they were moving. Had they split up? I found that hard to believe knowing them both as I did but they say you never really know what happens inside someone’s house when the door is closed. “It was such a nice day I thought I’d take the long way home.”
“And eyeball my car while you passed?” she asked, waving a hand at the kitchen table. I may have blushed. “It’s fine. I’m surprised it took you this long to make your way over. I imagine Gideon Pierce taking over shocked you a bit.”
“You could say that,” I replied then chuckled, although there was nothing at all funny about Gideon, the asshole. We made our way to the round table sitting in the middle of a small kitchen. I waited for my coffee and then sat down after Linda did, sniffing the French vanilla creamer aroma wafting up from the mug. “I never thought I’d see Gideon again.”
“No, me either. He’s grown up well. Has his mother’s sad eyes though even all these years later. You don’t use sugar, do you?” she asked as she went to pass along the delicate china sugar bowl. I shook my head. “I didn’t think so. Well, I suppose I owe you an explanation.”
“You don’t owe me anything. I’m here as a friend and the kid who used to clean your gutters and mow the grass when Lyle was on the road.”
“Which was and is all the damn time. I’ll be glad when he retires next year,” she said with a sigh while stirring her coffee. I glanced around quickly. The walls and cabinets were rich honey oak and the appliances on the older side. Still the room, and the house, had personality. Linda loved pigs and that was reflected in the curtain toppers, dishtowels, placemats, and the pink piggy salt and pepper shakers. “He’s going on part-time though now that I’m leaving. His mother needs more care than he can give working full-time.”
“So you’re leaving him?”
Her pale blue eyes rounded. “No, I mean, not like that. I am leaving though. Heading out to Ohio to spend some time with our youngest Jenny. You remember her?”
“Of course. She’s married to a lawyer out in San Bernardino, right? Four kids who are all under ten.”
“You and she were such nice friends. At one time I thought there might be more between you and her but…”
“But I like to kiss boys,” I responded with a playful wink. That made her smile. “Is everything okay with Jenny?”
“Her husband has just been diagnosed with stage four colon cancer. He’s only forty-five. We’re just…well, we’re all just devastated. And we’re not ready to banter the news all over town. Lyle is staying here and will let folks know after I’ve left. I just can’t deal with all the sad faces and sympathy wishes from kind people when he’s not even dead yet, and that’s what will happen. So, I’m going out to be with her and watch the kids while they undergo therapy