Page 12 of Cascade

I drive to the office just outside of town and turn down the music on my truck when I see whose car is in the lot. Opal’s. Her lady parts bumper sticker made an impression, so to speak. I glance up at the sign on the door: Oak Valley Midwifery.

I drag a hand through the stubble on my chin, unsettled. We didn’t use any sort of protection the other night, come to think of it. I’m feeling like an asshole for not being proactive about that. Hell, what’s the point of keeping a rubber in my wallet if I’m just going to forget to use it. Not that she gave me much of a chance.

I make my way inside, looking for Dotty, feeling a bit unsettled. I see her at the reception area, cracking her gum and leaning against the wall. “Oh! Archer. Thankssomuch for coming. Truly.”

She drags me down the hall to the business manager’s office and shows me some of the paperwork she was organizing. “Dotty,” I tell her. “You’re notbeing audited.This is a nonprofit and auditors are coming for youraudit.”

“Right,” she says, shaking the paper. “It says past due!”

I realize this really is just another situation where people have no idea how taxes work, how spending works, all of it. I pat her hand. “Dotty, all nonprofits bring in auditors every year to check the numbers. You get a lot of money from grants, right?”

“Oh!” She perks up. “Opal has a huge grant from the HNI? INH? Something like that. For her home study.”

I file this nugget away with a smile. Opal works here. And she must be hot stuff to land funding from what I assume is the National Institutes of Health. I nod at Dotty. “So what happens is the person who gives the grant wants to make sure you’re spending it like you said you would. That’s all an audit is.”

I take some time and show her the email from the auditing company. I start to wonder what sort of accounting staff they’ve got here at the clinic to put Dotty in charge with such obvious knowledge gaps, but she explains that half her team has been out with the flu. “We can’t have sick people around the pregnant ladies and I’m way over my head here.” She clutches both my hands in hers. “Thank you soooooo much for helping me out, Archie.”

She starts to lean a little closer, and I clear my throat. “Well, look, Dotty. They’re coming in right on schedule on Monday. You just have to give them access to the computer. I mean, it’s better if you have stuff prepared for them but—”

Someone runs into the hallway, talking loudly on a cell phone.

“Yes, this is she. Yes, I am his next of kin. Please don’t let him leave. I’m coming right now.”

“Opal?”

She whips her head around to me, her eyes wide, startled. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Dotty had some questions about the audit. Can I help with…whatever has you upset?”

She shakes her head and resumes rushing toward the doorway. “Dotty,” she yells over her shoulder. “I’m having a family emergency. Cancel my 3pm for me?”

Dotty cracks her gum and rolls her eyes. “Opal, they already were in. Remember?” She’s already outside. “Whoosh,” Dotty says. “She seems a mess.”

She really does. I set the files back down on the table. “Hey, Dotty, it’s great to catch up, but I’m actually going to go see if Opal needs anything.” Dotty’s eyes fall and her brows shoot up. “Like you said, she seemed upset. She’s friends with my family…”

I jog out of the clinic and find Opal fumbling with her purse. “Shit,” she yells, as she drops a tangle of keychains, each with a plastic picture of a baby on it.

“Hey, Precious,” I say, gently touching her arm. She stills. “Let me drive you where you need to go, ok? I won’t ask any questions.”

She drops her keys again while she considers and I hear her sigh. “All right,” she says, and I flash her my best grin.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Opal

ARCHER DRIVES ME to the health clinic about twenty minutes away, in the outskirts of Philadelphia where I grew up. “Ms. Whittaker, thank you for coming so quickly.” The doctor seems frustrated, which is understandable given the bellowing I hear from the exam room.

“What seems to be the problem with him?”

I manage to forget that Archer is standing with me in the clinic lobby while the doctor explains that he suspects my father might have developed lung cancer. I hear Archer gasp and he reaches out to squeeze my shoulder. That’s when I remember such news would often be upsetting for a regular person. I should care that my dad has cancer, right?

I sigh. “Are you basing this off his high alkaline phosphatase from his bloodwork?”

The doctor’s eyes widen. “Well, yes…are you a physician?”

I hear my father bellowing that this “hogwash” is keeping him from important business at his club. I shoulder past the doctor and into the exam room, where my father is half dressed and irate. “Dad,” I say, “you need to be up front with your doctor about your alcohol consumption.”

He waves a hand at me. “That again. You and your opinions.”

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