Chapter 14 #2
“Why does the radio station play the same song on repeat all day long?” I asked, forgetting my patience. “I mean, from six to six anyway. Which isn’t all day long, by the way.”
“Patience, Jordan!” Auguste demanded in a comedic voice.
“Sorry,” I said. “Again.”
Auguste watched me for a moment. I made a “zipping” motion over my lips, then pretended to put a key in my pocket.
“Okay.” He looked away, then glanced at me again before continuing. “So, AMOR is over there. The radio station.”
He pointed at the second building on the left, green and squat, but pleasant looking.
“Amos runs the radio station,” Auguste said. “He’s a really nice guy. But, well, I mean, he does play just one song a day for twelve hours. No one really knows why, I guess. We all suspect that it’s his form of art, but we’re not sure.”
“Um, okay?”
Auguste shrugged with a smile, then nudged me and pointed down the street. My eyes darted over to check out what he was pointing at in the street.
“That’s Earl Dean.” He was pointing at the man with the pickaxe who was already awake and tearing up another spot in the street. “Liberty Lane is his project, I guess. He’s making a rainbow in the street. He said that he hopes one day to have the entire street full of different colored bricks.”
“I see that.” I nodded as I pointed at the police officer stationed on the side of the street, leaning against one of the buildings. “But why? And why does the cop just let him?”
Auguste shrugged.
“What’s he hurting, you know?”
“That’s not an answer.” I laughed. “He’s tearing up city property.”
“But replacing it with something prettier,” Auguste said. “So, he’s not tearing up city property—he’s improving it. At his own expense and labor.”
“That is a really weird way to look at it.”
“What’s wrong with weird?” Auguste mumbled.
“Nothing,” I answered quickly. I didn’t want to upset him like I had Jack with my ‘weird’ comments. “I’m just surprised that the city is okay with it.”
“Well,” Auguste started slowly, “it’ll be really nice when he’s done.”
“How long has he been working on it?” I asked.
“Couple of years?” Auguste shrugged. “He can only do it on days that it’s nice and dry, and some days he has to rest his arms and shoulders. It’s hard work.”
I just nodded. Auguste nudged me again and pointed at the tram at the other end of the track.
“That’s Jasper,” he said. “He’s the tram conductor. He runs the tram up and down the street hourly.”
“But why?” I groaned, though I wasn’t unamused. “That doesn’t make any sense at all.”
“Why?” Auguste turned to me.
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. Seriously.” He nudged me again with a smile.
I laughed.
“I mean,” I began, “it’s quicker to walk down the street on foot. You can get to the other end in seconds. The tram is slow. Also, it really doesn’t take you anywhere, does it? Just up and down a street. And not all the time, either. On the hour. That just—it doesn’t make sense.”
Auguste stared at me for a long moment, then smiled.
“You’re not a very whimsical person, are you?” he asked.
“What does that mean?”
He grinned. “Come on.”
Auguste was dashing down the street before I could respond, so the only thing I could do was chase after him.
We raced along Liberty Lane until we were almost to the creek, then hooked a right.
The back of the post office building, tall, teal, and quaint, came into view.
Auguste slammed on the brakes again, but I was ready for it.
“The post office,” he said simply.
“Sofia Salazar is the postmaster,” I added. “Yeah. We met.”
“Did she tell you about the letters to Shirlene?”
“It might have been discussed.”
“Well,” Auguste said, “everyone goes crazy trying to figure out that mystery. Some people say that it’s some guy who just has a wrong address.
Or even some woman, I suppose. Other people say that Sofia is writing the letters herself.
I mean, she doesn’t have any envelopes or postmarks to show where they came from, right? ”
“Right?”
“Other people say it’s someone in town, writing letters to get over a lost love—or an unrequited love,” he said. “Like, maybe there’s not even a ‘Shirlene’ at all, you know? Maybe it’s a pseudonym for someone else entirely.”
“That’s weird, too,” I said, then realized what I’d said. “I mean, how odd.”
Auguste looked over at me and shook his head with a grin.
“We all hope that one day we’ll find out who Shirlene is and why she’s so important to get so many letters,” he said.
“Okay.”
Auguste didn’t run away from the post office so much as power walk towards Starbuck’s, and I fell in behind him.
When the old pirate ship came into view, I could see that Levi Lee was outside the front door, doing his brand of performance art.
He was standing on one leg, a silver platter balanced on his head and two platters held aloft by his hands.
A look of stern concentration was on his face.
“That’s Starbuck’s,” Auguste said, stopping a few yards away. “Coffee shop. Starbuck is a nice guy. Always dresses as a pirate. Hence the pirate theme, I guess? But is this a chicken or the egg scenario? Who knows?”
“Like,” I asked, “does he dress like a pirate because his coffee shop is in a pirate ship, or did he get a pirate ship as a coffee shop because he likes eye patches?”
Auguste chuckled. “Exactly. No one knows. But he’s a nice guy. Just eccentric.”
“Okay.”
“That’s Levi Lee.” Auguste pointed.
“I’ve talked to him a few times.” I nodded along. “Nice guy.”
“The nicest,” Auguste agreed. “He’s still trying to figure himself out. He’s been doing his performance art for at least six months and he switches it up every few days. I guess he just hasn’t figured out what he’s trying to say yet.”
“What?”
“Life is art.” Auguste gestured grandly. “Our actions speak volumes about how we perceive the world.”
“Uh…”
“So, why not make our actions art?” Auguste finished.
“I mean…what?”
Auguste laughed but offered no further explanation. He pointed down the street towards the mosque-like building.
“That’s The Pueblo,” he said. “It’s an artists’ studio and performance space. Church is held there on Sundays.”
“Ah.” I nodded. “I wondered where everyone…did church stuff.”
“Yeah.” He nodded. “Lilly is the groundskeeper for The Pueblo and also teaches the art classes. She’s super nice, too. I’ll have to introduce you sometime. All of the classes are free. If you ever want to take one, I mean.”
“I’m not really an artist.” I shrugged.
“Well,” Auguste said as he turned to me, “what are you?”
I shrugged. Grinned goofily.
Auguste leaned in with a smile and tapped a finger against his temple.
“Life is art.”
“You’re weird,” I said. “I mean, it’s cool, though.”
Auguste laughed loudly, then he was nudging me again.
“See the houses at the end of the street?” He pointed towards the other end of the road where four identical buildings sat perpendicular to the street we were on.
“Uh, yeah?”
“Second one from the right is Blooms,” he said. “Have you met Agnes Broussard yet?”
“Who?”
“She’s the lady with the broken leg in the wheelchair?”
“Oh.” I frowned. “No. I haven’t seen her.”
Auguste slipped his phone out of his pocket just far enough to glance at the time, then he started glancing around, as though he was expecting someone.
“She should be heading into work at Blooms,” he said, his head turning back and forth, looking around for someone. “Ah! There she is!”
Auguste pointed down the street towards the corner of The Pueblo.
My eyes followed the direction of his finger, and seconds later, a woman in a wheelchair appeared on the street.
Beehive hair, way too much makeup, a kitty cat sweater, leggings, a cast from her hip down to the middle of her shin, and tennis shoes.
She was…something to look upon. The oddest thing about her wasn’t her makeup, hair, or choice of clothing.
The fact that she was using a crutch to push herself in her wheelchair—almost like an oar in a paddleboat—as her bad leg stuck out perilously in front of her, was the oddest thing.
We both watched for a minute as Agnes Broussard swung the crutch to the right side of the wheelchair, dug it into the road, and pushed off.
Then the left side. Right side. Left side. She kept rowing her way towards Blooms.
“What happened to her leg?” I asked.
“Well,” Auguste turned to me to murmur, as though Agnes would hear us all the way at the other end of the street, “she was making dinner one night. Pimento cheese sandwiches? She got distracted by her cats and a sandwich fell off the counter. When she turned around, she stepped on the sandwich, slipped, and went ass end up. Broke her leg in two places.”
“She…slipped…on a…pimento cheese sandwich…and broke her leg?” I didn’t believe anything Auguste was telling me.
“Yeah.” Auguste sighed and turned to look at Agnes with pity as she rowed her wheelchair up to the front of Blooms. “Her doctor had been telling her to eat right for ages but she just wouldn’t listen.”
“Okay, okay.” I laughed as I held up my hands. “I don’t believe any of that. You’re just pulling my leg or something, man.”
“Hand to God.” Auguste put a hand over his heart and the other he held aloft. “She stepped on a pimento cheese sandwich and…weeeeeeeeeeeeee.”
I laughed loudly.
“Okay, fine.” I relented. “If you say so.”
Auguste grinned and then he was pointing at a building across the street.
“Red-striped roofs?” he asked.
“Yeah?”
“One on the right is Samuel’s Soda Spray,” he said. “Samuel’s a nice guy. Obsessed with all things bottles, bottle tops, road signs, Rorschach ink blots, and—”
“Wait.” I stopped him. “What?”
“You’ll see.” Auguste waved me off. “We’ll go get a soda sometime. He makes really good floats and milkshakes, too.”
“All right?”
Auguste turned so he was looking towards the creek, so I followed his lead, turning so that the bridge that led into town came into view.
“Lovelorn Bridge Pass,” he announced.
“Okay?”