Page 1 of July Skies
Chapter 1
KAREN
“Achoo!”
Every member of the city council leaped in their seats. Tom Deacon almost lost the reading glasses off his face. Sissy Clarence slapped her hand over her heart. The only person who didn’t express extreme startlement was Wanda Roy, the park commissioner. She continued to munch on her granola bar and write down the figures from the Power Point shining behind Mayor Karen Rath.
“Excuse me.” Karen dove for the box of tissues on the end of the table. “Allergies are ripe right now.”
She didn’t know why she was suddenly so afflicted. For most of the spring, she watched her fellow townsfolk fall beneath the haze of sneezing, coughing, and itchy throats, but she remained relatively unperturbed.Pop a pill a day and be on my way.She attended every outdoor event without incident and had the energy to throw her daughter a seventeenth birthday party down at the river, where half the girls from her class died from the pollen.
It was the wedding, wasn’t it? Two days ago, Karen officiated the wedding of her good friend Dr. Brandelyn Meyer and local B&B owner Sunny Croker. The ceremony was held at the Waterlily House outside of town, a place known for its beautiful floral gardens. Didn’t help that local florist Meadow went all out with the orchids the brides loved so much.
Those flowers must have finally triggered Karen’s allergies. Since the day before, she had struggled to breathe. The left nostril was Niagara Falls, and the right was already crusty from excessive blowing and wiping. The rings around her eyes could only be described asraccoonish.When Karen wasn’t knocking back more Zyrtec, she was rolling in her bed and praying that no grass seed had made it into her sheets.
Too bad she had to be in the city hall first thing Monday morning. There was so much going on that week. Fourth of July, for one. The weekend-long festivities started that Thursday with a parade and pancake breakfast at the American Legion Hall. The firehouse sponsored the pancakes, but Karen was expected to make an appearance to eat strawberry pancakes and serve scrambled eggs to the families paying admittance. Then her ass was at the front of the parade line. Her afternoon would be spent hobnobbing around town, from the quilt show at the library, to the flower and vegetable blue-ribbon contests at the elementary school.
That was before she acknowledged the entourage she invited to tag along.
Wasn’t that the whole point of this first-thing-in-the-morning meeting? There was plenty of time to go over her schedule for Thursday and what everyone else on the city council would be up to once the festivities were underway. First, they needed to come to a consensus about Paradise Valley’s new guests, due to arrive that day.
“Hibiscus Films have graciously forwarded us their proposed filming itinerary.” Karen sniffed up a glob of snot as she passed around the copies her assistant made earlier that morning. “Dahlia Granger is our primary contact. She has assured me that they won’t go filming anywhere with restricted access without our consent.”
“Is she still complaining that I haven’t given it to her?” Wanda scoffed at the itinerary in front of her. “She was blowing up my phone last week for the permit to film in the off-access road at Wolf’s Hill. Told her she had towaituntil I got the all clear from the forest service, but you’d think they were filming a movie for Hollywood instead of whatever it is they’re doing.”
“A documentary. About Paradise Valley.” Karen could still hardly believed it. She had been minding her own business that past May when a random call from someone named “Dahlia” at Hibiscus Films came through the line. Apparently, Ms. Granger had heard all about Paradise Valley after it was featured in the April national news. A celebrity had started dating a local, after all, and the whole country wanted to know about this supposed town full of “lesbians,” as they were always called. Karen had been polite when she gently corrected Ms. Granger that they were not, in fact, a town full of lesbians. There were many bisexual women and gay men as well. They proudly represented the full LGBTIQA+ spectrum. Just because the place was founded as a lesbian commune decades ago didn’t mean…
Right. Dahlia hadn’t cared about that. She cared about filming a mini documentary about the history of Paradise Valley and the people who lived there. What this accomplished didn’t matter as much as raking in the profits from the boosted tourism. Paradise Valley was a vacation hotspot year-round, especially when it came to lesbian and bi women from around the country. Those who wanted a slice of small town Americana and some outdoorsy fun often gravitated toward Paradise Valley for the perceived “safe space.” Businesses were not likely to turn them away, nor did they fear canoodling with their partners down at the bar or in the second-run movie theater that played during the summer. A popular Texan hiking group often booked rooms in August to make a vacation out of it for their members. July was stacked with events, from Fourth of July to Paradise Pride at the end of the month. The annual Paradise Days festival ended the season over Labor Day weekend. Sure, there was family-friendly Halloween and the Winter Solstice/Christmas spectacle, but nothing else compared to July.
If you were mayor, that meant extra work, though. For Karen, that was both a boon and a curse. She liked being busy. She cared about the town, and like a self-employed entrepreneur who feared slowing down meant losing money, Karen feared that taking days off meant parts of her town lacked in what it desperately needed. It wasn’t only about her. It was about the small business owners affording their rents and staying open. It was about the farmers’ market attracting enough patrons. The school summer lunch program helped the kids whose parents desperately needed the aid. Potholes needed filling. Sidewalks cracked. Trees overhung on Main Street. Ordinances must be passed. Corporations – both utility and retail – knocked on her door to gain admittance to the sleepy mountain town. Taking a break, let alone at this time of year, was verboten.
It also meant she had little time for herself and her family. Her two kids were grown enough to take care of themselves, but what was the point of her son coming home from college if she wasn’t around to fawn over him and cook his favorite meals? Her daughter was such a lovely young woman now. She was about to become a senior at Clark High School. She needed her mother’s guidance more than ever right now. Such a bright, pretty girl could end up making some bad choices if her worldly mother didn’t intervene. God knew her ex-husband wasn’t helping much around there.
Right. Fourth of July. Hibiscus Films.The film crew was coming in that day and settling in at Waterlily House. They had a meeting here at city hall on Tuesday. After that, Karen would be in full Fourth of July mode.I almost forgot the dog contest I have to judge on Friday. God! How could I forget…Probably because her friend Brandelyn wasn’t in town that year to enter her Pomeranian like she usually did – and never shut the hell up about. Brandy was off on her honeymoon that week. Thank God.
“As far as I know, there are no complaints,” Karen asserted. “They’ll be by the office tomorrow to say hello and to conduct their introductory interviews. So, we better be all on our best behavior! I have no idea if they’ll be filming.”
Tom shuddered. His tall, wiry frame only made his reading glasses and salt and pepper hair stand out more. In another life, he was the kind of man Karen was attracted to, not that she ever fancied having another man in her life.My son is plenty now.He reminded her so much of his father, it was almost uncanny.Well, there are reasons I dated his father. I must like some things about him…Never mind the only reason Karen married her ex was because their son cooked in the oven.
“If it’s all the same to you,” Tom said, “I’d rather not be filmed. I think I’d have to sign a release, anyway.”
“Yes, you have the right to not be filmed.” Karen blew her nose again. Everyone politely looked away as a glob of snot made its way into the trash and Karen grabbed a wet wipe from her purse. “We had agreed to at least do the written interviews. They’ll use the information to conduct more research so they can depict an accurate picture of our town. I think that’s fair.”
Tom looked at her as if she were nuts.We get it, Tom, you’re shy.The man had enough troubles when people showed up to the city council meetings. While Karen could understand him not wanting to show up on camera, she didn’t see what the big deal was regarding a simple interview. The man was in charge of city finances. He could buck up.
“This whole thing is going to be trouble,” Sissy said with a shake of her head and a removal of her wire-frame glasses. “You ask me, outsiders coming into town, wanting to sniff around, ask our poor folks a bunch of questions… they’ve got some kind of agenda. Maybe they ain’t conservative shills looking to portray us as Godless American heathens, but they’re up to something.”
“Dahlia has assured us that their intentions are to only portray us as we are. You go in front of camera and start bitching about your ex-wife, Sissy, you can bet they’re gonna use it to portrayyoua certain way.” Karen continued to sniff.
“What about you? Gonna moan about your ex-husband while you’re showing them around the library?”
“At least yours pays child support,” Karen muttered.
“Ladies,” Wanda interrupted, “let’s get back on track, huh? We’ve got plenty to do without going at each other’s throats. Again.” She nodded to Karen. “As you were saying about the plans for filming?”
Karen didn’t know how she got through the meeting. Between her brain fog and the stress of everything there was to do, she was liable to fall over at her desk and take a hearty nap.Sissy would absolutely love that, I bet.Sissy could go suck her toes for all Karen cared.
She instead smacked into her office chair, put her head in her hands, and sighed. The allergy medicationfinallykicked in, or that could have been the excellent air filter pumping away in the corner of her office.That’s right. Suck up every allergen. I don’t have time for them right now.Karen barely had time for the message flashing on her phone. The only reason she picked it up was because her assistant informed her it was from her son.
