Just what I need. Callie has fallen asleep in my back seat, and I have no idea where she wanted to go next.
This is ridiculous. Even indulging in this fantasy of hers—that she can hire me all day to trot her all over town to buy gifts for people who may or may not even exist—is insane. I have to end it right now.
I go around the block and head back to her house. I’m the one who needs to sleep. And so much for the rent money. Not only am I not going to get the day’s pay, I won’t even make what I usually do because I’ve been off the meter for half the morning.
Life always turns out this way for me. Some people are given lemons and they make lemonade— and frankly, I detest those people—and some, like me, are given acorns, and unless you’re a squirrel or a Naked and Afraid contestant, they are pretty much useless.
I reach Callie’s house and pull into the driveway. I look into the back seat. She’s still sleeping, her head back and her mouth hanging open. She’s going to get a neck cramp.
Sighing, I turn off the meter. “Miss Callie?”
No response. I try again. Still nothing. She doesn’t even flinch.
Her face looks pale, and it occurs to me that she might be . . . No, she wouldn’t dare die in my back seat! I jump out, open the back door, and lean in. I shake her. “Miss Callie?”
She stirs then, and I blow out a sigh of relief. “Miss Callie? Wake up. We’re here.”
Her eyes come open, and she looks around, confused. Then she smiles up at me.
“We’re at your house. I’ll get your wheelchair.” I get her chair, and when I’m back at her door, she’s digging through her purse. I don’t know if she’s thinking about paying me, but I highly doubt it. But while she’s in there, I might as well try.
“Ma’am, that fare is twenty-two dollars. Eleven for taking you to the mall, and another eleven to come back.” I should add on the time in between spent walking around Macy’s, but it would be too complicated to explain to her.
“Oh yes,” she says, pulling out an oversize wallet. She opens the coin purse and digs through, pulling out a few quarters.
“No, ma’am. It’s twenty-two dollars. I doubt you have all that in change.”
She looks embarrassed and opens the billfold part. She pulls out two twenties and hands them to me. “I don’t have change.”
“I’ll get it,” I tell her.
She grabs my hand. “It’s all right, sweet boy. You keep it. Buy something nice.”
Like shelter? I want to say. “Thank you, ma’am.”
I help her out. She leans on me as I maneuver her into the wheelchair. I wheel her up to her door. “Your key?”
“Oh yes.” She plunges into her nightmare of a purse again, and I cringe at the sound of useless items rattling against each other. “I’m afraid I can’t find it,” she says finally. “It’s not in here.”
Dread twists in my gut again. “May I look?”
She looks a little suspicious, but I don’t care. I pull her purse open as wide as I can get it and look past the wallet and checkbook, the hairbrush and lipsticks.
There are no keys. “Are you kidding me?” I mutter. “Seriously? You came away without your keys?” I open the screen door and try the doorknob, but it’s locked. I locked it myself. Why didn’t I check to make sure she had her key?
“Miss Callie, are you sure you don’t have keys in a pocket somewhere? Maybe you dropped them into your shopping bag?” I grab the bag hanging on the handle of the chair and look into it. Nope.
I’m ready to kick something, but I don’t want to frighten her into a heart attack. What am I going to do now?
She’s distracted by the weeds in her garden now, as if she’s already forgotten that she lost her key.
“Miss Callie, do you have your granddaughter’s phone number anywhere?”
“What? Oh yes. Somewhere.”
“How do you get in touch with her when you need her?”
“In touch with who?”
“Your granddaughter. What’s her name again? Sydney?”
“Yes, Sydney.”
“I need a phone number.”
The distressed look on Callie’s face makes me regret my harsh tone. She can’t help this. It isn’t her fault. It’s LuAnn’s. She should have sent Lamar instead of putting me through this again. I’m going to get ulcers.
This isn’t accomplishing anything. She doesn’t know where her keys are, we’re locked out, and Sydney is a world away since I don’t know her last name and have no way of finding her.
I turn Callie’s chair around and push her back toward the cab.
“Where are we going?” she asks.
“I would love to know that myself.” I help her back into the cab and roughly collapse the chair again. “Somebody is going to have to pay for this,” I mutter. “This is my work. I don’t do it for my health. I do it to put a roof over my head.”
She doesn’t seem to hear me. I put the chair back in the trunk. Acorns. Once again, I’m stuck with acorns instead of lemons. Congratulations to all those who get lemons. You could make lemonade out of that, and lemon icebox pie, and lemon bars, and lemon chicken. You could season with it and add it to other dishes. You could use the juice on fish and steak.
But acorns . . .
I back out of the driveway and start my meter running again.