Fiction Story Published in Pomona Valley Review

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I am so pleased to announce I have gotten my short story titled Furnace Creek published in Pomona Valley Review. This means a lot to me for two reasons. First, this story takes place in the desert basin east of the Sierra Mountains in California, a place that I fell in love with when I took several backpacking trips to those mountains.

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Second, the Pomona Valley Review is affiliated with California Polytechnic State University in Pomona and I received my undergraduate degree from the university many, many years ago. My story follows.

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Furnace Creek

 Cathy Beaudoin

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“Allie., you’re here!” A wave crashed on the shore and a crack of thunder followed. “I thought I’d never see you again!”

 

Camera equipment in her hands, Allie looked up and greeted her longtime friend with a warm smile. “Hi Nick, I told you I’d be back.”

 

Another wave, anoth­­er loud boom. White foam bubbled up on the shore, then disappeared with the undertow. “Yeah, but I figured, with everything that was going on…”  He sighed. “How’s your grandma?”

 

“Like all of us. Alive and kicking.” The wind blew Allie’s shoulder-length, chestnut-brown hair across her face and she tried to wipe the strands away with the back of her hand. “She’s a tough one.”

 

“I always said your strength came from her.”

 

Allie snorted. It sure as hell didn’t come from her mother.

 

Tall, blond, tanned, and super fit, Nick leaned on the chest-high tripod Allie had just set up. “Who you here shooting for?” he asked.

 

“Surfer Magazine. How about you?”

 

 “No one, just adding to my portfolio.” He brushed away a stray hair from the corner of Allie’s mouth and tucked it behind her ear. Although she never liked it when he fussed over her, the gesture reminded her how easy it was to be with him. She felt the familiar pull, the latent chemistry. Though it’d been three months since they’d last seen each other, it felt like yesterday.   

 

“Are you staying?” he asked.

 

“No, I have to drive back to Furnace Creek after the finals.”

 

“That’s crazy, a ten-hour drive after shooting all day, on those hulking mountain roads?”

 

A small, hard woman, she was nonplused. “Aw, thanks Nick. But I can handle the drive, been doing it for years.”

 

“I can’t help it Allie. I still care about you.”

 

“I know. But I need to be back before the sun comes up.”

 

Allie gently touched Nick’s arm and softened her voice. “And right now, as much as I’d like to catch up, I need to finish setting up for the competition.”

 

“Yeah, no problem. I should finish getting my gear together, too.”             Another wave crashed onshore and sprayed them both with cool, salty water.

 

Allie went to work. She studied the horizon and saw a solid west swell. The breeze pushed the peaks of the waves, which came at regular intervals, a quick five count within the set. But the timing of the sets was irregular, and the conditions were going to be a challenge.

 

 Staked out as she was on a patch of warm, silky sand with her media credential dangling from her bare neck, meant no one was about to take the spot in front of her. Between the credential, and her reputation as one of the top sports photographers, only the unaware stepped between her camera and the surfers in the water. Allie screwed on a telephoto lens, careful to protect the open cavity. After attaching the camera to the tripod, Allie peered through the lens and saw a set of head-high waves hit the sandbar thirty yards from shore. She scanned the swells, looking for lineup markers. Watching a couple of guys paddling out, she counted their strokes, judging the distance covered with each pull. Like the surfers about to compete, her work required intense, technical concentration.

 

Allie should have been feeling the pins and needles of excitement. But she wasn’t. Instead, her mind was back in her hometown, with her grandma. Stricken with dementia years ago, her grandma’s peace was coming any time now. Allie spent the past couple years caring for the once vibrant woman and was conflicted about leaving her. Except for the two years Allie was away at art school in Los Angeles, she lived her entire life in Furnace Creek, either in her grandma’s small, tidy trailer, where a spiced pumpkin candle usually burned,  or later, just up the street in a more roomy trailer of her own. For years, the smell of pan-fried onions and boiled potatoes meant her grandma was feeding the neighborhood. Now, the neighbors were feeding her.

 

The dusty, desert town wasn’t the kind of place that nurtured kids, much less produce one of the most sought-after photographers when it came to big wave surfing. The only water within a hundred miles was stored in the town’s most prized possession, a fifty-thousand-gallon, bleach-white water tank. A nearby mine once had value, but it was shuttered over twenty years ago. Her grandma managed on a small pension left from her husband’s days working in the mine. But the pension barely covered food and utilities. Unless Allie went to Los Angeles to shoot corporate ads, covering the surfing competition was one of her highest paying gigs. So, when offered the opportunity to work, Allie took a chance that her grandma would make it one more day.         

 

The smell of coconut oil brought Allie’s attention back to the competition. She took in the scene. Crewcuts, board shorts, ponytails, and bikinis, it was surreal. With the allotted practice time about to expire, one of the competitors bobbed on top of a swell, then made a run for the next wave. The surfer successfully dropped in and after a couple of big swooping turns, stood tall and pointed to the logo on his shirt. Allie clicked her tongue in disappointment. She worried this wasn’t going to be a day about the purity of curls and breaks but sponsors and those seeking adoration. Remaining hopeful, she looked for Nick but couldn’t find him in the crowd.

 

A high-pitched whistle blew, and the announcer called out the names of the first two competitors. A couple of spectators hooted and hollered. A surfer came flying down a big blue-black wall of water. The wave curled, the surfer disappeared, and after the spectators gasped, popped out of the shoulder-high spray. She focused. Snap. Click. Allie was pretty sure she captured the gleam in the surfer’s eye as the water engulfed him. Her broad smile matched his.  The next competitor plunged straight down the face of a wave and a board soon flew high in the air.  Snap. Click. This time she hoped she captured the empty board as it danced alone on top of the water. Each surfer caught a couple more waves, the camera shutter in a constant state of opening and closing. A whistle blew, and two more names were called.

 

The lulls between rounds left plenty of time to regroup, and daydream. Whenever Allie worked a big competition, she couldn’t help but reminisce about her upbringing. As far back as she could remember, the few jobs around Furnace Creek were at the post office, the general store, or as a handyman. With no ability to hustle for money, the only way Allie got her first camera was when Old Man Carlson snuck a Pentax into her duffle bag, right before she left for school. She later found out he drove ninety miles to a pawn shop to make the purchase and, because he didn’t have enough cash, gave up one of his most prized possessions, his harmonica. Though grateful, she told her grandma she wished the present came from her daddy.

 

“Be glad your papa ain’t around,” her grandma said. “He ruined your ma’s life. He didn’t need to ruin yours too.”

 

After all these years, Allie still wished she had a picture of her biological father. She wanted to look in his eyes, to see what kind of man could let her ma smoke meth until her brain turned to mush. Unfit to parent, Allie figured her ma left town because it was better to be absent than be a lousy role model for her kid. Luckily, Old Man Carlson kept an eye on Allie. To those who didn’t take the time to know him, the old man was nothing mor than a washed-up desert rat, wearing the same second-hand plaid shirt and dirty jeans for months at a time. But looks were deceiving, and Allie came to understand he was simply the kind of guy who didn’t need anything to be happy.  

 

*****

 

 Allie scanned the crowd again. She couldn’t see Nick and wondered if he left. That’d be just like her, to drive him away. When they first met, life was simple. They’d work a competition and then spend a few days together, either at his place or hers. But she wasn’t ready to settle down. Then, as her grandma’s condition deteriorated, Allie saw less and less of Nick. Though not thrilled, he respected her dedication to her grandmother and told her he was a patient man.

 

Allie refocused on the western horizon. The best ride of the day came in the second semi-final heat. Ripping a wave, two times over his head, the rider, knees bent into a deep squat, reappeared from a barrel forty yards down the line. He pivoted, then ripped a cutback. Snap. Another severe cutback. Click. The wave lost its’ power and the surfer faded off its back. Snap. Allie pumped her fist. It turned out he was the winner of the competition, and she knew she had enough for a cover photo and a twelve-frame sequence.  With twenty-five hundred bucks for a day’s work in mind, she hustled to pack and get on the road. As she was lugging her equipment back to her van, Nick came up from behind and deftly grabbed the tripod and blankets.

 

“Are you sure you can’t stay overnight?”

 

Allie hesitated. “She’s not well and I want to be there.”

 

“Is there anything I can do?”

 

She sighed. This was why she loved Nick. “No. This is just part of life.”

 

“Okay, but when it’s over…”

 

“Don’t. Not now.” He hugged her anyway.

 

She welcomed the embrace. After a couple of seconds, she released him and stepped back. “I’m sorry Nick, I have to go.”

 

“I know. But soon, right?”

 

She reached up and cupped his cheeks with her palms. “Soon. I promise.”

 

*****

          

After five hundred miles of driving through the pitch-black night, as the sun started to rise, Allie turned off the highway. Her destination was still another half hour away. With its tiny grid of six two-mile-long gravel roads, the town was painted a permanent blend of tans and taupe. It didn’t help that Furnace Creek sat in the basin of one of the hottest plains in the West, where the relentless sun sucked the life out of everything. Allie’s grandma ended up here when her grandpa was promised plenty of work and free land. The work was sporadic and the land barely livable. But her grandma told her a thousand times, “Life is what you make of it. I refused to be miserable about it.”

 

 Allie’s grandpa died when she was five years old, from lung disease. Her grandma often lamented about how she made a mistake counting on him to take care of her until she died. When Allie started to waffle about going to Los Angeles for school, her grandma was firm, “Don’t repeat my mistake, or your mother’s.”         

 

 By the time she was a teenager, Allie spent more time exploring the surrounding hills than she did in school. Though she barely went to class, the teachers passed her anyway. She read every book the clerk at the post office could get for her through the library loan system. Biology, grammar, history, math, it didn’t matter. She read them all and got her GED when she was sixteen.

 

No father around, Old Man Carlson showed her how to change the oil in a car, fix the pipes under the sink and patch the holes in the trailer roof. But it was the lessons about people that impacted her most. She never forgot the day he chastised her for her attitude towards her grandma, the incident forever etched in her memory.

 

“Why do you care so much about my grandma?” she once asked when they were clearing his property.  “She’s a dolt.”

 

The old man went stone cold. “A dolt? What the hell is a dolt?”

 

“Dolt. You know.  A stupid person.”

 

Old Man Carlson made the meanest face ever. “Let me tell you something about your Grandma. She is no dolt.”  He shook his head in disappointment. “You just don’t know enough about her. It’s time you learned your own history.”

 

“History! I know my history. Ask me anything,” she boasted.

 

“No, I mean your history. Back in the 1930’s, when your grandparents were teenagers, they escaped from Poland after the Russians invaded the country.” He paused. “They both witnessed unspeakable acts of violence on their neighbors. That’s when your great-grandpa, who knew how to get people out of the country, decided to send your grandma away. Your grandparents were a part of a small group that got themselves to Yugoslavia, then to northern Italy, then to France. Your great-grandpa gave the group enough money to get passage to the United States. From there, everyone was on their own and your grandparents stuck together When your grandpa heard about work in the mines, they headed west.”

 

Allie remembered how she flushed with embarrassment. “I…I…had no idea.”

 

“They never wanted you to know. So, Allie, don’t ever call your grandma a dolt again.”

 

She hung her head, then cried.

 

The old man dropped his rake and stepped close enough for Allie to smell his acrid breath. Unbothered, she slipped her arm around him. Not willing to let her off so easily, he looked her straight in the eye and scolded, “We have hard lessons to learn. People are never what you see.”

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“I know. I know you have a good heart.”

 

After that, Allie looked into the eyes of everyone, trying to find clues about who they might really be. As a photographer, she was known for her ability to capture a full range of emotions. For surfers, it was about a person’s relation between the body, his board, and the water. With her zoom lens, she could focus in on the joy of someone working on the wall of a wave, the pain of a fall, or the intimacy of laying on top of a board. If she was patient, she’d usually capture what others missed.    

 

 When Allie wasn’t working, she liked to take pictures of her neighbors, explaining she wanted to capture the history of the town. Over the years, she photographed one hundred and seventy residents. Unlike when she took pictures of surfers, working with her neighbors required more intense interaction. With a knack for putting people at ease, the portraits revealed a group of rural townsfolk who, despite their imperfections, never appeared uncomfortable. When she was with them, they forgot about the brown spots, moles and other cancerous nodules that marked them like tattoos. Sometimes she came across a gaunt face or one puffy with alcohol. But for the most part, these were not unhappy people. With the smallest aperture settings, she’d capture the deepest, sharpest pictures of faith and perseverance possible.

 

The most recent photo she took was of Lily Soto, whose Japanese-American parents were housed in one of the desert encampments during World War II. Though hesitant about getting her picture taken, Lily welcomed Allie into her own cramped trailer.

 

A small, petite woman, she resisted the thought of her image on paper. “I look too shabby,” she pleaded.

 

Allie promised Lily she would destroy the portrait if Lily did not approve of the final product. After some coaxing, Lily acquiesced. But first she excused herself and disappeared behind her bedroom door. When she re-emerged, she’d pinned a dragon broach to her blouse just below her left clavicle. Self-conscious, she explained, “It was my mother’s.”

 

Lily relaxed, sat on her faded print couch and clasped her hands on her lap. Allie watched as her eyes grew sad. “What’s the matter?”

 

Lily shifted in her seat and repositioned her cuff to hide a tiny butterfly tattoo on her left wrist. “I’ve never had my picture taken before.”

 

Allie took extra care as she set up her equipment. Lily’s eyes brightened, then came to a sparkle. Snap. Click. When Lily saw the final portrait, she asked if she could have a copy to keep for herself. Allie mounted the picture in a special frame and gave it to Lily on her birthday. The same delicate fingers that lay clasped on her lap in the picture grabbed the frame with firm strength.

 

“Thank you,” Lily said as she fingered the spot where the broach was.

 

*****

           

Allie liked it when Old Man Carlson talked about her grandpa.

 

“Your grandpa and I worked in the mines together. It was hell. The mines smelled like some kind of toxic gas and it’s a miracle I’m still alive. Most of the men working in those mines died before the age of fifty, including your Grandpa.”

 

Though anxious about what he said, that was the day she decided to find out more about her ma. She went all in.  “Why’d my ma leave?”

 

“That’s something different. Your grandma was hard on your ma. Wanted her to make something of herself. Wanted her to make it on her own.” 

 

Allie rolled her eyes.

 

“Yup,” he confirmed, “You know your grandmother. Your ma rebelled something fierce. One day some bastard came into the general store and asked your ma if she wanted to go for a ride with him, she left. When she came back two months later, she was hooked on the meth, and it wasn’t the first time.”

 

Allie remembered what her ma was like when she did drugs, all sweaty and lolling her tongue when she spoke. Allie was even more unnerved when she saw a dope pipe hanging out of her ma’s back pocket. She remembered how her ma snapped, “What are you looking at?” when she caught Allie gawking at the needle marks on her ankles.

 

Old Man Carlson didn’t hold back. “Your grandmother got sick of the dope cycle and kicked her out of the house, and no one has seen her since.”

 

 *****

           

Over time, too many medications took away the grandma Allie knew. Medical costs increased. Sometimes, when Allie needed money, she’d sell one or two of the photos of the locals to Henry, a gallery owner in Los Angeles. Allie met Henry when she snagged a coveted internship at his gallery. She was surprised she could sell a single portrait for a couple thousand dollars, and Henry was always clamoring for her pictures.  

 

Waiting for a check from her latest sale, Allie first heard about the problems with the town’s water tank when she was at the post office.

 

“Sprung a leak,” was all anyone knew. “Old Man Carlson is up there looking at it now.” By the time he determined the extent of the problem, at least half the town was milling around, waiting to hear his assessment.

 

“Not good,” he warned. “We can weld the leaks, but we’d need to drain the tank first. Gonna cost a bundle of cash. Probably a hundred thousand by the time it’s fixed.”

 

There was a collective gasp. The townspeople didn’t have access to those kinds of funds.

 

“We could try to get some emergency money from the state. But that’ll take time and they’ll just tell us to get someone to deliver water by the truckload in the meantime.”

 

There was a lot of mumbling but no resolution. “Let me sleep on it. Maybe there’s something I didn’t think about.”

 

Allie knew this was Old Man Carlson’s way of providing hope to a situation he thought was hopeless. That night, Allie went to her trailer and pulled out all the photos she’d taken of the townspeople. If she put them in the gallery and a third of them sold, that might generate enough money for the tank repairs. She went to talk to Old Man Carlson about her plan. It took her a couple more days to work out the details. Then she gathered everyone at the post office and asked if they were okay with having their portraits sold.

 

“Good of a solution as any,” a woman shouted.

 

“To hell with that,” a man fired back. “How about giving us the money so we can do what we want with it?”

 

“Shut up, Baker,” Old Man Carlson scowled. “We’re trying to solve a problem here. You got a better idea?”

 

After a few seconds of silence, Old Man Carlson concluded, “I didn’t think so.”

 

One of Allie’s friends from town piped up. “You sure about this, Allie? I’m guessing you could use the money from those portraits.”

 

“The portraits are everyone’s, not mine.”  She looked at the group for approval and Old Man Carlson nodded, rubbing his hand against his chin as he smiled at her.

 

The next morning, she packaged the first fifty prints and sent them to the gallery. Instead of showing all the portraits at once, Henry suggested multiple showings. The first date was for a two-week stint beginning in about a month. Henry insisted she be in Los Angeles for the initial kick-off. Because her grandma was still hanging on to life, Allie balked at the request. But she also understood her obligation to make sure the pictures sold. The night before she left, Allie went into her grandma’s room and sat with her. When she took her hand, she knew things weren’t right. Her grandma lacked warmth and her breath was deathly shallow.

 

“I can’t go,” she cried when Old Man Carlson came over to say goodnight to her grandmother.

 

“Allie, she’d want you to go. This town meant everything to her. She lived here with no regrets. She’d be proud of what you’re doing.”

 

“I can’t. Besides it’s everyone’s images that are fixing the problem. They’re the ones who should be at the gallery.”

 

“We all have to do things we don’t want to. And I’ll be here, right by her side.”

 

Allie leaned over and stroked her grandma’s forehead with her fingers. She pictured her grandma in her prime. A sharp, svelte woman, she used to wear her ash-brown hair in a ponytail, small hoop earrings, and a generous amount of light pink lip gloss. Allie started to hum one of her grandma’s favorite songs, and when it was over, leaned in close and whispered, “I love you.”

 

Allie stepped out of the trailer and into the pitch-black night. There was nothing else to do. It was her time now. She called Nick and asked him to meet her in Los Angeles for the opening night showing. He agreed and the two met at the gallery the next afternoon.

 

When she saw him walking towards her, she stepped forward and met him halfway.  “Thanks for coming, Nick.”

 

 “Anything to help, you know that.” He squeezed her hand, and she didn’t let go.

 

For the next five hours Allie and Nick smiled, chatted, and worked the crowd of patrons eager to buy her photos. It was Ben Norlander’s picture that fetched the most money that night. He looked oddly regal, dressed in a brown jacket frayed at the cuffs and pants cinched with a rodeo rope. His long gray hair dropped in a tangle down his back. With stubby whiskers white with age, he sat upright, rum bottle snug against his belly. When an offer was made on the photo, Allie felt a shiver and dropped her eyes to the floor. When she looked up, Henry was walking towards her.

 

 “People love your work, Allie. It looks like we sold seventeen of the portraits. You should net around forty thousand dollars and I’m sure we can do even better next time.”

 

Allie thanked him and spied Nick across the room. He made his way toward her and asked, “You ready to go?”

 

Yes.”

 

Together, they made the long drive back to Furnace Creek. When they pulled up to her grandma’s trailer, Old Man Carlson step outside. He came over and hugged her and they cried for a long time before the old man finally said, “I’m sorry you weren’t here.”

 

Allie kicked at the dirt and bit her lip.

 

“You did good, Allie. She knows what you did.” Old man Carlson drew in a deep breath. “These people…you gave them life.”

 

Allie wiped her nose on her sleeve and looked at Nick. “Will you stay?”

 

“Of course.” He draped his arm across her shoulder and squeezed hard.

 

“You go get some rest,” Old Man Carlson suggested.

 

“Yeah,” she sighed. “It’s been a long haul.” She raised herself on her toes and gave the old man a peck on his cheek. Then she slipped her arm around Nick’s waist and they walked towards her trailer.

 

“We’ll need to figure out where we’re going to live,” Allie half asked, half stated.

 

“I was hoping so.”

 

After a pause, Allie asked, “Nick, can we do an errand next week.”

 

“Sure. What is it?”

 

“To go to all the pawn shops within a hundred miles. I want to find a harmonica.”

 

After a sniffle, she added, “For Old Man Carlson.”