Solemnly Swear Read online

  They always said Call me.

  Well, usually.

  Sometimes.

  He glanced at the clock. One-thirty. In the afternoon? The light streaming in the window was his answer. At least Lor—whatever had stuck around. Of course they hadn’t gotten to his house until nearly five in the a.m. part of the day. He’d met her at a bar where she waitressed. When she got off work at two they grabbed something to eat, then went back to his house to grab each other.

  Ken sat up, swinging his legs to the side of the bed. He moved his head carefully, testing to see if a hangover was in the cards.

  Free from that burden, he found his terry robe thrown over the chair by the window, the robe he’d bought on a whim at a golf resort in Arizona ten years ago. As he tied the belt around his thickening waist he noticed there was a red stain across the front of it.

  Then he remembered. Wine. But not from last night. Wine from a little tête-â-tête he’d had last week. Another pickup in a bar. Another woman.

  He really should wash it.

  One of these days.

  He traipsed downstairs in search of coffee. And oatmeal would be good. Oatmeal was supposed to regulate his cholesterol. It was kind of late for breakfast, but Ken had long ago given up trying to adhere to regular hours. And who really cared? As long as he got to the Marlborough Country Club in time to give his private golf lessons his hours and diet were his business.

  Ken turned the coffeepot on and put a bowl of instant oatmeal in the microwave. While he waited he perused the mail. Two days’ worth. At least.

  Junk, junk, bill, coupon, bill, advertising.

  What was this? A letter from the district court. His mind scanned any infraction they might be writing to him about. Parking tickets? That one DUI?

  No. Those had been taken care of eons ago.

  He opened the letter. Jury duty? He read the letter with interest—and glee.

  Women would be impressed by jury duty, especially if he got assigned to some scandalous trial. This might be fun.

  ***

  Deidre Kelly sat in the principal’s office with her twelve-year-old daughter beside her.

  Crying beside her.

  “This is not acceptable,” Deidre told the principal. “Nelly should not have to endure the abuse of a bully.” She turned to Nelly’s PE teacher, who stood near the door. “Where were you during all this?”

  “I have thirty students to watch, not just Nelly,” Ms. Hollings said.

  “Are you telling me this has never happened before, to another child?”

  “I’m afraid we can’t say,” the principal said. “A student’s records are private and—”

  “There was nothing private about Damon knocking Nelly to the ground and putting his foot on her arm.”

  She nearly caught Ms. Hollings in a shrug. “He’s being disciplined.”

  The principal closed a file on her desk. “I assure you, Mrs. Kelly, we do not condone this sort of behavior at our school.”

  “But you also apparently do little to stop it. Damon has also been harassing Nelly after school.”

  “Other girls too,” Nelly said.

  “I’m afraid we have no control over the children once school is over and they are away from school property,” the principal said.

  “It appears you don’t have control over them ever.” She stood and nodded to Nelly to stand also. “Boys who harass girls turn into men who assault women. I’m sure you can find a hundred statistics to bear that out.”

  “A correlation might be made, but Damon—”

  Deidre led Nelly to the door. “Damon will not harass my daughter again, nor any other girl in this school, or the school board will hear about it.”

  “We don’t appreciate threats,” Ms. Hollings said.

  “And I don’t appreciate apathy. You have a problem in your school. You see a need, you see children who need help—then do something about it. Good day, ladies.”

  Once in the car, Nelly said, “Thanks, Mom.”

  “Anytime, sweetie. Anytime. Anyplace.”

  ***

  It was not something any citizen—patriotic or otherwise—looked forward to getting. A jury duty letter.

  After reading it once, Deidre read it again. Not now. She couldn’t do this. She’d been so stressed the past few months that she’d turned into one of those nervous Nellies who jumped at sounds and focused on worst-case scenarios.

  Speaking of Nellies, she had her own Nelly to worry about. Beyond the problems with bullies at school, Nelly had a schedule that rivaled that of the president of a country. Being a Carpool Mom and Mother Protector was as unglamorous as it sounded and often made Deidre feel as though she had no purpose other than negotiating the drop-off lane or meeting with an assortment of powers that be, suggesting they do their jobs.

  Her husband, Sig, offered little help with the logistics of Nelly’s schedule. He was a pediatric orthopedic surgeon and often traveled the world performing free surgeries with his Kelly Pediatric Foundation. The foundation’s motto was “Bringing help to the helpless.” An able goal, though helping Deidre with the occasional piano lesson or teacher conference would have been appreciated. The world already sat heavily on Deidre’s shoulders like the yoke of a milkmaid carrying sloshing pails. Her feet were in constant danger of getting wet, her shoulders were sore, and her breaking point was imminent.

  Added to the intricate scheduling were the responsibilities she incurred as the wife of a pediatric surgeon. In order to help finance the foundation, she was required to attend countless banquets and fund-raising events. Deidre usually enjoyed playing the pretty socialite, smiling and saying all the right things to the right people to get the right results. She hadn’t climbed her way out of near poverty to sit in the shadows. Yet sometimes being “on” all the time was a pain and a drain.

  Though certainly not the same degree of pain and drain as what she’d endured in her life before Sig. Deidre’s first husband, Don, had died five years earlier after a long battle with cancer. In the aftermath of his death—since there’d been no insurance—she’d been forced to sell their small home and move in with Don’s mother, Karla. Karla had lived in the Polland family home, a crumbling fixer-upper that sported a refrigerator whose freezer only worked part-time, many lights that wouldn’t work at all but couldn’t be fixed for fear that the electrician would say the entire house needed rewiring, and a furnace that clanked loudly as it spit out not-enough heat.

  The only perk to the house had been the presence of Karla. The typical mother-in-law jokes never applied to her. Karla was the nurturing mother Deidre never had. The three generations of Polland females had huddled together in the old house, sharing their grief, making do, striving to get from this day to the next.

  Until Deidre met Dr. Sigmund T. Kelly.

  After their whirlwind courtship and union, Deidre, little Nelly, and even Karla had moved into Sig’s 7,500-square-foot mansion that sported an enormous stainless steel refrigerator-freezer, lights that wouldn’t dare not work, and a furnace that softly purred as it made their life cozy warm.

  Yes indeed, the life she was living held little pain and was very nearly perfect. She felt guilty for complaining and needed to get a grip and quit her belly-aching over the small stuff. Life was good.

  Back before Sig, Deidre—known as Dee-Dee back then— had been working as a med tech at Mountain Valley Hospital in Branson, Missouri. She’d come into contact with Dr. Kelly off and on and had been instantly attracted to him. More surprisingly, he’d been attracted to her. She was pretty enough, with long blonde hair and a body with just enough curves to be interesting. Physically, they were on an equal par. As for the rest of any Sig-Deidre comparison? She was a nobody, a peon pricking fingers and taking blood, while he was an internationally known doctor, famous for his philanthropy. Dee-Dee hadn’t even known what philanthropy meant.

  When Dr. Kelly first asked her out, she’d kept her past private, as well as her current housing situation. Sig
didn’t need to know about her rough beginnings, her sorrows and insecurities, or her tough living conditions. Not until she’d charmed him into not caring.

  Which she’d done with great skill. They had that in common—two charmers in search of an appreciative audience.

  Not that there was anything wrong with that.

  If only Sig didn’t use his charm to attract other females. Last winter Deidre had overheard some women gossiping in the restroom at an awards banquet about her husband and a woman named Audrey. She’d confronted Sig, but with great expertise he’d made her feel ridiculous.

  Her memory of that night quickly sped past what had happened next. If only she could take back that night, that accusation, that...everything.

  That everything that had changed everything.

  Yet nothing had changed. Although Sig reassured her there was nothing to worry about regarding anyone named Audrey (or any other female), Deidre didn’t believe it. She knew what a catch her husband was—after all, she’d caught him—and so she remained on full alert, ready to pounce on any hint that something in their life was amiss. She was not going to lose all she had gained.

  But not-losing what she had took a lot of time and work.

  Jury duty? No way. “Anything for me?”

  Upon hearing her mother-in-law’s voice, Deidre was yanked from the past and placed firmly in the present. She handed the rest of the mail to Karla. Actually Karla might be her lifesaver in this current jury dilemma.

  Deidre waved the court’s letter between them. “I got called to jury duty.”

  Karla saluted. “Congratulations, O mighty citizen!”

  “Don’t tell me it’s an honor, because I know it’s random. There is no honor involved.”

  “There is honor in doing your duty.” Karla leafed through a Chico’s catalog. She stopped at the page with the coupon and ripped it out.

  Deidre’s first reaction was Hey, that’s mine! but she silently reminded herself that since marrying Sig she could afford full price.

  Karla couldn’t.

  Old habits and frugalities died hard. When Deidre and Don were married, she had never considered shopping at Chico’s. Wal-Mart and clearance sales offering at least 70 percent off were the recipients of what little money she had to spend on clothes. Same with Karla. After all, she was Don’s mother, cut from the same blue-collar cloth. Karla had never even heard of Chico’s until she’d come to live with Deidre and Sig.

  Some people thought it was an odd arrangement, but Deidre didn’t care. She loved Karla and Karla loved her and Nelly. So when the maintenance of the Polland family home had become too much for Karla, Deidre had offered her a home.

  She’d asked Sig, of course. And Sig, being the kind of guy who helped the helpless, had agreed.

  And honestly, what did he care? He wasn’t around that much anyway.

  Karla was a gem. She was only sixty-two, had more energy than Deidre could cook up on a good day, and possessed a wit and pizzazz that appealed to Nelly.

  Deidre often remembered the time when Nelly was down with strep throat, and Karla donned a tiara and an old poufy petticoat and pirouetted into Nelly’s room, making her laugh. Actually, it was the red sweatpants and tennies under the petticoat that had made the ensemble truly memorable.

  Through all the turmoil of the past few months, Karla had been a lifeline to Deidre, an oasis of sanity and common sense and strength and humor.

  Karla interrupted her thoughts. “I’ll take care of Nelly while you’re on the jury.”

  Once again Karla had seen a need and filled it.

  “That would be wonderful,” Deidre said.

  “Hey, maybe you’ll get assigned a murder trial. Something lurid and juicy.”

  “Karla!”

  She shrugged. “Who wants to listen to testimony about a robbery or tax evasion or some corporate mishmash? If you’ve got to sit there day after day, it might as well be interesting. Plus, you’d know you were doing something important, getting a murderer off the streets, making the world safe for mankind.”

  “It sounds like you’ve already convicted them. What happened to ‘innocent until proven guilty’?”

  Karla flipped Chico’s shut and moved the Coldwater Creek catalog front and center. “That’s good too. Saving an innocent person from a lifetime in jail. Heady stuff, my dear.”

  Deidre looked back to the letter. “I may not be chosen. Then all of this talk will be for nothing.”

  “Oh, you’ll be chosen. Just be your sweet self—and wear your tan suit. You look authoritative in that.”

  “I don’t think they want authoritative jurors.”

  “Maybe the pink polka dot then. To look impressionable.”

  “Impressionable? Polka dots make me look impressionable?”

  “Pink ones do.” Suddenly, Karla pegged the page with her finger. “This. Ooh! I want this.”

  Deidre looked over her shoulder at the catalog page. “Which?”

  After a moment’s hesitation, Karla removed her finger and said, “The whole page. Yes, that’s it. I want the whole page. Goodness, I love this catalog!”

  “You help me get through this jury time and I’ll buy you that whole page.”

  Karla’s eyes sparkled. “You got a deal.”

  ***

  If Bobby Mann had to say, “Welcome to Burger Madness. May I help you?” one more time, he would combust into some nice ground-up something-or-other they could make into thin-as-a-dime patties. Get me an extra-large fries and drink with that, and make it snappy.

  Yes, he was bitter. But also resigned. What twenty-eight-year-old man with a wife and two kids worked at a burger joint? If he were a manager, or even an assistant manager, that would have been one thing. But to just hand out burgers at a drive-through was pitiful.

  As he turned onto Magnolia Lane, the street where he lived, he checked his watch. He had two hours before his second job started—working concessions at the Higgins Family Variety Extravaganza show. Considering the way the smell of fries and popcorn made his stomach roil... he used to love fries and popcorn.

  He used to love a lot of things. Like life.

  He pulled into the driveway and parked behind his wife’s ’85 jade green Grand Prix that needed new shocks and a new paint job that would hide the trunk, which was pieced from a blue Grand Prix, and the front right bumper, which was tan. “My patchwork car” Becky called it, with no malice in her voice whatsoever.

  Becky didn’t do malice. Nor bitterness. Becky was a saint.

  She has to be to put up with me.

  Bobby opened the screen door but noticed the real door was open. Probably to let the air flow through. It was a hot September day but air-conditioning was expensive. Again, Becky never complained.

  He was just about to call out, “I’m home” when he saw her asleep on the sofa, a stuffed bear held to her pregnant belly. The pregnancy was sapping her strength and they still had two months to go. Actually, a bigger cause of her sapped strength was in the other room.

  Bobby tiptoed up the stairs into the kids’ bedroom. Four-year-old Tanner lay asleep on his back, limbs sprawled. Two-year-old Teresa was curled into a ball, sucking her thumb.

  Nap time at the Mann residence.

  He should join them. His shift at the theater didn’t get over until midnight.

  Yet he couldn’t waste time sleeping.

  Bobby detoured into the master bedroom and removed the green Burger Madness polo shirt, replacing it with a red Mozart T-shirt he’d bought at the symphony concert he’d taken Becky to a few years previous.

  He moved through the house without making a sound and went out the kitchen door. Within a few steps he was in the one-stall garage that was his shop.

  Once inside, once the lights were switched on, the stiffness in Bobby’s body fell away. He breathed deeply and let the sweet aroma of wood shavings fuel his soul. He knew other people would think he was crazy for being so energized by a bunch of wood and tools, but that didn’t cha
nge his reaction every time he came into his shop. His reaction was reliable, one of the few things he could count on in this unpredictable life. Besides Becky. He could always count on Becky.

  He carried the thoughts of her to the sanding table. On it was the top of an inlaid coffee table. While the bulk of the table was red oak, Bobby had painstakingly cut tiny triangles and squares of walnut and birch veneer, creating a decorative border two inches from the table’s edge. It was a piece of art—if he did say so himself.

  Which he didn’t.

  Because it was also busywork, a stupid dream, a fantasy.

  These were not new thoughts and with a flick of his head, he shoved them aside. He retrieved the sanding block and started on the table top with long sweeping motions. He’d used the electric sander on the main part of the table, but with the veneer ... he had to use finesse. He stopped sanding and felt the edges of the inlay. He closed his eyes to rely completely on touch. It needed just a little off the right-hand edge.

  He leaned over his work, gingerly rubbing the offending edge. He stopped and felt again. Yes. Yes.

  Bobby heard the door to his work space open. Becky came in, offering her usual smile. “You should have woke me up.”

  “You looked too cute. Maybe I should get you your own teddy bear so you wouldn’t have to borrow Teresa’s.”

  She ran her fingernails up and back on his shoulder before kissing it. She held a stack of mail. “There’s a letter for you.”

  “Let me guess. A bill?”

  “Those too, but this one looks official.” She held it out to him.

  He checked the return address. District court? “I hope I’m not being arrested for anything.”

  “I’d visit you.”

  “Only if you bring your oatmeal raisin cookies.”

  “Open it,” she said. She read over his shoulder. “Jury duty?”

  Bobby shook his head. “I don’t have time for this.” He pointed to the table he was making. “I don’t have time for this.” He pointed at her. “I don’t have time for you, for them. ”

  “Shh. It’ll be all right. It’s an honor, Bobby.”