Page 8 of July Skies
As soon as Karen was finished shaking hands thanking everyone in the parade for their hard work, she approached the Hibiscus Films crew and asked them to follow her around that part of town. She also left on her mayoral sash, since she figured it was a good day to go out and connect with tourists and townspeople alike.
Naturally, Dahlia had questions about it.
“Is that normal?” Her chuckles set Karen on edge. “I like it. Makes you look like Ms. Paradise Valley.”
“Don’t bill me that way on camera,” Karen warned her. “We actually have a Miss Paradise Valley contest every year. She should be around here somewhere…”
Their first stop was the library, where the quilt show was in full swing. Right away the mayor recognized Cindy Smith, a devout volunteer at one of the local churches and the kind of nosy busy-body who wanted nothing more than to regale the camera crew with how she stitched for Jesus. (Mostly for the young minister. She really,reallystitched for him. By the way, had the mayor heard anything about how he felt about the “anonymous” cookies he received for his birthday?)
The camera crew politely interviewed her for a few minutes before realizing she was notthedemographic they searched. That’s why Karen was keen to reintroduce them to Joan Sheffield, who sat on a stool by the start of the display. She nursed a large canteen of water and wore a baggy blouse that looked much too hot for that warm summer day.I’m cranky because I’m wearing a light jacket and doing all of this running around.Yet the way Joan refused to get off the stool, and theglowto her skin made Karen stop and take another look long before Dahlia shook the crafter’s hand and asked about the display.
Has her hair always been that silky? And fluffy? It was rather mousey a few months ago.Like most of Paradise Valley, Karen knew about the unfortunate story of Joan and her partner Lorri attempting to start a family. She hadn’t heard about any recent tries, however. Were they keeping it mum until it was safe to announce how pregnant Joan was again? Karen hated her compulsion to stare at another woman’s stomach, but damnit, Joan was wearingsuch a baggy blouse!Karen couldn’t see anything!
“…My contribution to the community quilt this year was about family in Paradise Valley.” Joan may not look as mousey as she was a few months ago, but her voice was much the same. The guy operating the boom mic had to ask her to repeat that after he made a few adjustments. Joan stared into the camera as if she were the proverbial deer hitting the headlights of a moving vehicle. “I decided to write… I mean quilt about… um…”
“Try to forget the camera is even there, dear,” Dahlia softly said. “We can edit out any of your mess-ups later. Anyone who sees you on film will only see an articulate young lady of this lovely town.”
Karen wanted to roll her eyes, but apparently Dahlia’s words gave Joan a little pick-me-up of courage. She squared her shoulders and continued, “When I first visited this town several years ago, I was heartened to see the families making their lives here. Back where I’m from, I never saw something like two women raising their kids out in the open. I always wanted something like that for myself, but didn’t think it was possible, you know?” Joan sheepishly looked away, the baggy sleeve of her blouse touching her lips. “I, uh… really wanted to find a woman to settle down with and have a family.”
That was a lovely ending to a brief interview. Honestly, Karen thought Dahlia would cut it there. What better way to frame this community project than by including the struggle so many lesbian families had outside of Paradise Valley? No, it wasn’t perfect here, either, but Karen was proud to say that families could move here without fear of reprisal. They could find the small town life they craved without so many of the closed-minded insistences they faced in other communities. Even neighboring Roundabout had become a sort of bedroom community with slightly less expensive housing. The old guard who didn’t like “all the funny types” moving into their neck of the county either moved away or died off wallowing in their bigotry. Save from one incidence in the seventies, there had never been a sizable threat to the women and men living in this part of Oregon.
Wasn’t that something to take pride in, let alone advertise in a documentary?
Apparently not.
“Tell me more about having a family in this town,” Dahlia said. “How many kids do families tend to have around here, do you know? What about the backgrounds of the women? How many used to be married to men, let alone have kids from prior marriages?”
“Uh…” Joan looked to Karen, who was as agog as the craftswoman that such a question was asked. “I… I really don’t know. You have to understand, how many kids women have is totally up to them and… science, I guess. A lot of the couples here either adopt or use IVF.”
“So you don’t know of any who have kids from previous marriages?”
The cameraman briefly pointed his device toward the director. “Uh…” he muttered.
Karen stepped in. “I’d be happy to go over our census and demographics with you later, Dahlia,” she said in her politician’s voice. “Let’s leave poor Joan alone for a while now, hm? Look at the poor dear. She’s such an introvert. This is already a big deal for her.”
Dahlia furrowed her brows. “All right,” she finally said. “Sorry about that, Ms. Joan. Now, if you could please sign this model release for us…”
Joan shakily took a pen, read over the terms with glossy eyes, and left her signature on a certain line. By the time she returned her pen, the glint in her eyes implied she’d be happy if Karen took her new friends far away from here for a little while.
Absolutely.There were plenty of other townsfolk to bother with invasive questions they had no way to know how to answer. Not even Karen could answer some of those questions!How many women here have kids from previous relationships? To men?She qualified for that…
As she was reminded when her daughter texted her, asking if she could go hang out with a friend in Roundabout.“What did I say about staying in the city limits?” “You didn’t say which city limits.”
Dahlia wanted to talk about kids from previous relationships? Well! She’d have a field day talking to grown kids like Christina and Xander, two people who knew a thing or two about being dragged to Paradise Valley to start a new life.
On second thought, Dahlia better not ask the Rath kids. They were in thewrongstage of life to answer such questions without a heap of sarcasm!
Chapter 6
DAHLIA
Wayne kept looking at her as if she had lost half her face. Dahlia, meanwhile, continued to ignore him as they sat at the big farm table in Waterlily House and went over their footage from the weekend.
She had a bright yellow legal pad beneath her elbow. There was supposed to be loopy cursive writing outlining her narrative for the documentary. Usually, by the end of their first week in a town, she knew exactly what direction to head and how to take advantage of what they had in terms of people and locations. Paradise Valley’s stock footage potential was great, of course, but the townsfolk had thus far proven incapable of talking about anything but how much they loved the place. The few qualms they had were about how far it was to certain specialists, a decent airport, and the rising costs of food and gas… but those were complaints in most small towns around America.
“Isn’t that the angle we should go for?” Wayne asked, dubious. “Showing that this town is like any other? People complaining about gas prices and the quality of the school?”
Dahlia scoffed. “Nobody isthishappy where they live. Not this many people, anyway.” Every time she tried to dig a little deeper, everyone looked at her as if she had dripped some brains out of her ear. Even the straightest of the heterosexuals they interviewed only had nice things to say about the town. If Dahlia thought she was unearthing a treasure trove of bigots and their ensuring culture war with the local lesbians, she was sorely mistaken.Sorely!
