was, if people had to sit through eight hours of traffic laws and driving techniques, at least make it entertaining. Dennis might never have a future on stage, but his presentation of the top ten ways to avoid a traffic ticket had people rolling in the aisles. The girls were a pair of greyhounds Gloria adopted from a rescue organization. Their names were Sand and Sable, tall elegant dogs that looked almost comical walking alongside short, round Gloria.
“That’s okay. I have a place to live.”
“Where? Don’t tell me you moved in with that musician. I told you he’s no good for you.”
“That musician” was an angst-ridden aspiring country star Lucy had dated for a few weeks. He only knew three chords on the guitar and he sang with a twang that would peel paint, but he looked spectacular in a pair of starched jeans and a cowboy hat, so Lucy had no doubt he’d go far. Gloria had hated him on sight.
Gloria hated all the men Lucy dated. She claimed to be able to read in the tarot cards that these men weren’t good enough for her friend. Maybe she was right, since no man had been good for her yet. “No, I moved back home. Just until I get back on my feet again.”
She was sure Gloria would have lots to say on this subject, none of it good, but her friend surprised her. “That’s a good idea,” she said. “It’s healthy to get back to your roots sometimes. Home is a good place to heal.”
“Gloria, I’m not sick.”
“Maybe not physically, but spiritually—Listen, I have a new book to lend you. It’s called Karmic Healing and the woman who wrote it…”
Lucy sort of tuned out the rest of what Gloria had to say. So sue her. Gloria had a new theory about life every week. She was into crystals, fortune telling, feng shui, aura reading and ancient Native American rituals. Only last week, she’d told Lucy ten different ways to realign her chakras.
As for Lucy, if a theory didn’t involve shopping or chocolate, she wasn’t interested. “I have to go, Gloria. I, uh, I think someone’s at the door.”
“Wait, wait. I have to tell you the reason I called. My friend Jean has a booth at the downtown art fair and I told her I’d stop by. Wanna come?”
“Sure. I’m into art.” Anything was better than washing her father’s shorts. “And afterwards maybe we could swing by the mall….”
Gloria laughed. “Okay. Pick me up in half an hour.”
4
Making simple matters complex or complex matters simple are both bad gardening techniques.
LUCY LEFT MILLIE with a breakfast of canned tuna and a fresh bowl of water. She made a mental note to buy dog food and something more substantial than dry cereal for herself while she was out today. After she’d backed the car out of the garage, she glanced back and the dog was watching her out the window like an abandoned child. I don’t need this kind of guilt, she thought.
Gloria and Dennis shared a duplex off Gessner. It was one of those areas of the city that used to be run-down but was now trendy. Slick new apartments sat side by side with sagging bungalows. Gloria claimed this gave the neighborhood character. Personally, Lucy thought it meant paying high taxes and still having to dodge the crack-house traffic on weekends.
But Gloria and Dennis had fixed up their place and it looked real nice, if you didn’t mind purple burglar bars on the downstairs windows and a red front door. When Lucy pressed the door bell, she set off frantic barking, accompanied by the scrabble of toenails on the hardwood floors. Gloria opened the door and Sand and Sable launched themselves at Lucy with all the enthusiasm of body surfers in a mosh pit. She fended off doggy kisses and lashes from doggy tails. “Yes, I’m thrilled to see y’all too,” she said as Gloria dragged them by the collars back into the house.
Dennis appeared in the hallway, a container of instant ramen noodles in his hand. “Hey, Lucy. What are you chicks up to?” Like many men in their late twenties and early thirties, Dennis had his hair cut very short in an attempt to disguise the fact that he was going bald. Unfortunately, he also had rather large ears, one of which sported a gold loop. When he wore a white T-shirt, as he did now, he bore a startling resemblance to Mr. Clean.
“I told you, we’re going over to see Jean’s display at the art festival.” Gloria made a face at Lucy. “He never listens.”
“I listen.” He stabbed at the noodles. “I just don’t agree that what Jean does is art.” He pointed the forkful of quivering noodles at her. “She makes collages out of garbage.”
“It’s found art,” Gloria corrected.
“Garbage.”
Lucy hated it when her friends fought. She never knew what to say and besides, the argument was usually over something really uninteresting. It wasn’t as if she could actually get involved in the conversation. “How did it go at the Laugh Stop last night?” she asked Dennis.
“Lame crowd.” He spoke around a mouthful of ramen. “They wouldn’t know funny if it bit ‘em in the ass.” He dropped the fork into the ramen container and set it on the hall table. “Gotta go. Got a class this afternoon.” He aimed a kiss in the direction of Gloria’s cheek. “Catch you chicks later.”
When he was gone, Lucy helped Gloria put the girls in the backyard. “How was your first night back at home?” Gloria asked.
“Okay, I guess.” She waited while Gloria locked the various deadbolts on her front door. “My dad went out on a date.”
“A date?” She grinned. “I think that’s sweet.”
Lucy led the way to her car. “Gloria! It’s only been a year.”
“But your mom was sick for a year before that. I mean, he must have been lonely. Besides, your dad’s kinda cute. If I didn’t have Dennis—”
Lucy clapped her hands over her ears. “You did not say that. I do not want to hear my best friend lusting after my dad.”
She opened the car and they both slid in. “Speaking of lust, is there a new man in your life?” Gloria asked as she fastened her seat belt.
“No. Why would you think that?”
“Your aura has a nice warm red tone today. Signifying sexual arousal.”
Lucy rolled her eyes. The things Gloria believed. “I do not have a new man in my life.” She pulled the car into traffic and headed downtown.
“Auras don’t lie. You haven’t met anyone new? Even casually?”
“No. Well, not unless you count the gardener I hired to try to salvage my mom’s rose garden.”
“Oh? Is this a male gardener?”
She thought of Greg Polhemus’s well-defined muscles and broad shoulders. “Uh, yeah.”
“Then he counts.” Gloria angled toward Lucy and assumed her therapist’s tone of voice. “Tell me about him.”
She shrugged. “What’s to tell? His dad always took care of my mom’s garden. I got his number out of her garden planner. But then the old man’s son showed up instead.”
“What happened to the old man?”
“He died. About the same time as my mom.”
“See, there’s something you have in common.”
“Gloria, I am not lusting after this guy. He’s a gardener and that’s it.”
“Is he good-looking?”
She squirmed and tightened her grip on the steering wheel. “I suppose. If you like the clean-cut, straight-arrow type.”
“And, of course, you don’t.”
“Come on, Glor. Have I ever gone in for