Page 3 of July Skies
KAREN
Although Fourth of July was right around the corner, Karen cleared her calendar to welcome the small crew of Hibiscus Films into her town.
They came with their cameras, boom mics, and other such paraphernalia. Sissy was agog in wonder as she beheld the three men in beards, manbuns, and faded T-shirts, each one uncoiling cords and fussing with buttons on their cameras. They assured everyone that they were not filming anything yet. That would come when their boss, Dahlia, began her interviews.
Karen had only talked to Dahlia over the phone and her LinkedIn profile. This was her first time seeing the documentarian face to face, and she had to say… the faded picture on her internet profile did not do her any justice.
Dahlia was an assured woman of about forty, the lines on her face and the few stretch marks on the sides of her torso appearing every time she reached for the boom mic or bent over to push cords out of the way. Her dark curly hair was pulled back into a no-nonsense ponytail. The bendable capris accompanied shoes with hardly any socks. Her form-fitting T-shirt advertised her film studio before anything else. A utility watch graced one wrist, and a charm of the Tree of Life wrapped around her neck. Prayer beads bedecked her chest. She wore no rings. Especially no wedding rings.
Goodness gracious. Why in the world do I…Karen knew why she checked for wedding rings. This was Paradise Valley, where talking to a woman – as a woman, no less – could be taken the wrong way no matter what one did or said. Some wives could be as jealous as husbands from these small towns. While Karen didn’t consider herself the looker of the year, she wasn’tthatbad to behold. She kept her look professional. Few people saw her out of a pantsuit or a sensible skirt and blouse. That was what the people expected when they saw a former businessman and big city councilwoman running a show like Paradise Valley, but Dahlia already knew about that. She had inquired about Karen’s background no fewer than five times leading up to today.She only wants to get the story straight. A fantastic journalist.Karen couldn’t help but extend her hand and prepare her stump-smile when Dahlia finally turned around in the atrium of Paradise Valley’s humble city hall.
“Welcome to our town!” Karen offered the firmest handshake around. Or, at least, Dahlia thought as much, from the way she shook out her hand after they first touched. “I’m Karen Rath. Mayor. Great to finally meet you, Ms. Granger.”
“Please. Dahlia.” She snapped her fingers to get one of the men’s attention. The right one looked up with alacrity. Karen didn’t understand the next hand signal, but the man leaped into action by adjusting the boom mic again. “Sorry. We’re going for full efficiency so we can get you back on schedule, Mayor.”
“Appreciated.” Karen looked around the atrium. Sunlight spilled through the skylights. It would be another beautiful, seventy-five degree day in Paradise. With any luck, that Fourth of July would be the first one without fog! “Please don’t worry too much about it. I’ve made plenty of room to talk to you this morning and show you around the town. Were you… planning on taking this with you on our walk of Main Street today?”
Dahlia, still distracted by her crew, waved the mayor off as if she were an afterthought. “No, no. It will be you, me, and Tom here for the tour. We have iPhones that can get some quick filming done if necessary. No, the others will stay here with the equipment to get set-up shots of the city hall and the grounds outside, as decided over the phone. I’ve also left them interview questions for anyone on your staff who is willing to sign a release and waiver.”
Hm. Karen had hoped to sit on any interviews among the council and her staff. If for no other reason than to gauge the direction this documentary might go.
“Will we still be doing our interview this morning? I’m afraid I’ll be very busy with Fourth of July preparations after lunch.”
“Of course. Why don’t you show us around, and we’ll do the interview when we come back?”
Up until this moment, Karen had worriedshe’dbe the one coming off as too distant and aloof. No. That award went to Dahlia Granger, who spent more time staring at her equipment and the peak of the atrium than listening to anything the mayor said. Karen knew Hollywood types could be like this, having met the whole contingent of LA people that came with Fleur Rosé’s wind last April, but… well, Dahlia wasn’t supposed to be Hollywood. She was from a more inland location and focused on indie and documentary works. Her award-winning documentary about that Native American reservation in Washington had assuaged Karen’s worries that the wrong types might be profiling Paradise Valley for nefarious gain.Everything seems to be okay with them. Suppose we shall see.What was the worst that could happen? It was almost 2020. People wouldn’t be filming a town founded on lesbian principles and trying to make them look bad…
Right?
Because that had happened long before Karen’s tenure. Back in the ‘80s, one of her predecessors who was there for the official founding of the town came up against a film crew who “demanded” to be let in to film. Instead, they came up against a legion of lesbians who not so nicely told them to get the hell out, if they knew what was good for them.They thought they were here to make a salacious film about us. Kept asking us to kiss and feel each other up, as if that’s what why we exist!Karen certainly hoped times had changed. Let alone with a woman at the film’s helm.
“Mayor,” Tom hissed from the entrance to the men’s restroom. He motioned for Karen to come over, not that she felt the least bit comfortable about sauntering to the men’s restroom entrance. Yet she knew that look on poor Tom’s visage. The man suffered anxiety attacks when overwhelmed by the presence of strangers. The only reason he survived the public city council meetings was because he knew most of the people who frequented them.
Surrounded by a film crew that didn’t know how to slow the hell down for two seconds? Karen was this close to telling Tom to go home.
“What is it?” she whispered, head bent toward his. When she was in her sensible heels, Tom was a good one inch shorter than her. “If it’s about the interview, you absolutely do not have to agree to…”
“It’s not that, Mayor. I thought you should know something I overheard a couple of those guys saying in here.”
She braved glancing over his shoulder. “They’re not still in there, are they?”
“Oh, no! I only don’t want to get out of here yet. Some… private time, yeah?”
Sighing, Karen asked, “What is it?”
“That guy over there, the one with the thing on his head…” Manbun? Did he mean amanbun? Jesus, Tom, get with the times.Granted, the only reason Karen knew what a manbun was had to do with her own son’s fashion choices when he first came back from college. Karen had kept her mouth shut about what her adult son did with his body, but when he candidly asked what she thought of the hairband he picked out, she said,“It definitely dresses it up a bit.”That was the day she discovered how passive-aggressive she had become since moving to Oregon several years ago. “Anyway, I overheard him on the phone saying that they still didn’t have the permit to film at Pride. Do you think that’s something I need to get on? Or Wanda?”
Really? This is what Tom was so concerned about? Karen pivoted on her beige heels and beheld Dahlia standing a few feet away, patiently waiting for her to get out of the men’s room. At least she wasn’t filming. Yet.
“I’ll worry about the Pride permit,” Karen said. “For God’s sake, Tom, get to your office and answer your emails. There will be bigger stuff to worry about later.”
Dahlia awaited Karen in the middle of the front hall. “I’ve got ninety minutes to spare for the tour. Shall we get going?”
Karen had almost forgotten about it already!
Luckily, the tour mostly consisted of what happened on Main Street, which was only a mile long if Karen felt generous. Most of the buildings were constructed in the late seventies and early eighties, back when the first generation of townsfolk got serious about chartering a “real” town and opening their collective doors to anyone who might like to live in their “little piece of Paradise.” Karen gave her guest this spiel as they strolled from the city hall to the library, where the original communes’ rules and priorities were on full display near the entrance. (The city charter hung up in city hall. It had seemed appropriate at the time.)
Dahlia lingered before the handwritten “Lesbian Manifesto.” An elderly man and his tiny grandson emerged from behind a stack of new arrivals, hands holding and bag of books hanging at their sides. They paid no mind to the manifesto or to Dahlia, but Mr. Johnson offered Karen a hearty good morning before leading his grandson to a truck in the parking lot.
