Barbara Allan - Antiques Maul

Antiques Roadkill

Antiques Maul

Antiques Flee Market

By Barbara Collins:

To Many Tomcats
(short story collection)

By Barbara and Max Allan Collins:

Regeneration

Bombshell

MurderHis and Hers
(short story collection)

T he snow had begun falling in the late afternoonbig, wet flakes that stuck to the rooftops of houses like dollops of marshmallow cream, and coated bare branches with hardened white chocolate, and covered the ground in fluffy cotton candy. (Ive been off sugar for a while and its just killing me.)

I was sitting in the living room on a needlepoint Queen Anne armchair, gazing out the front picture window at the wintry wonderland, waiting for Mother to come downstairs. Sushi, my brown and white shih tzu, lounged on my lap, facing the window, toobut she couldnt see anything because the diabetes had taken away her vision.

Soosh, however, seemed content, and any impartial observer who hadnt caught sight of the doggies milky-white orbs would swear she was taking it all in. I imagine she could still picture what was going on outside, her ears perking every now and again at the muffled rumble of a snow plow, or the scrape, scrape, scraping of a metal shovel along the sidewalk. (Mr. Fusselman, who lived across the street in a brick Dutch Colonial, had been coming out of his house every half hour to keep the pesky snow off his front walk; I, no foolat least where shoveling was concernedwasnt about to tackle ours until the very last flake had fallen.)

I sighed and gazed at the Christmas tree that was in its usual spot next to the fireplace. The fake tree, with fake white tipping (which made Sushi sneeze), had been up since early November, as Mother jumps the gun on everything. (Christmas cards go out in October.) She still decorated the tree with things I had made since the first grade, and many were falling apart, like the clay Baby Jesus that had lost its legs (makes walking on water way tougher). But mostly, hanging from the branches by green velvet ribbons, were small antique items, like red plastic cookie cutters, Victorian silver spoons, floral china teacups, and colorful Bakelite jewelry. One year, however, when I was in middle school, Mother went overboard with her antiques decorating and jammed an old sled in the middle of the tree, and it fell over knocking our one-eyed parrot off its perch.

For those just joining in (where have you been?), Ill lay in some backstoryall others (unless in need of a refresher course) may feel free to skip ahead to the paragraph beginning, I stood, giving my butt cheeks a break, etc.

My name is Brandy Borne. Im a blue-eyed, bottle-blond, thirty-one year-old, Prozac-prescribed recent divorce who has moved back to her small, Midwestern Mississippi River hometown of Serenity to live with my widowed mother, who is bipolar. Mother, a spry seventy-fourshe claims shes seventy and from here on probably always willspends her time hunting for antiques, acting in community theater, and reading mysteries with her Red-Hatted League gal-pals. Roger, my ex (early forties), has custody of Jake (age eleven), and they live in a beautiful home in an upscale suburb of Chicago, an idyllic existence that I forfeited due to doing something really stupid at my ten-year class reunion two years ago (involving an old boyfriend, alcohol, a condom, and poor judgment).

I have one sibling, an older sister named Peggy Sue, who lives with her family in a tonier part of town; but Sis and I have an uneasy relationship, due to the span of our ages (nineteen years) and difference in politics, temperaments, and lifestylesnot to mention clothing styles (hers, high fashion; mine, low prices). Therefore, a truce is the best we can hope for. Peggy Sue, by the way, is still ragging me for not getting a good settlement out of my busted marriage, but everything Roger and I hadwhich was substantialhad been earned by his brain and sweat, and I just couldnt ask for what wasnt mine. I do have some scruples, even if they didnt extend to ten-year class reunions.

I stood, giving my butt cheeks a break from the uncomfortable antique chair, and replaced Sushi on the hard cushionshe jumped down, not liking it, eitherand then I wandered into the library/music room to check on my latest painting.

Was I, perhaps, an artist? Someone who toiled in oil on canvas, waiting for her genius to be discovered? Hardly. Unless you count covering the bottom soles of an inexpensive pair of black high heels in red lacquer to make them look like expensive Christian Louboutins. (I dont know why I bothered; Id always know they were as cheap inside as me.)

I picked up a shoe to see if it was dry, and left a fingerprint in the still-gooey paint. (Sigh.)

Mother, who also had a painting project in progress on the plastic-protected library table, was having more success. She had taken the little dead bonsai tree I had given her during her last bout with depression (I didnt give it to her deadshe forgot to water it) and had resurrected the tiny tree (or entombed it?) by covering the brown branches with green spray paint. Brilliant!

I returned to the living room to see what was keeping Mother. We had preshow tickets this evening to the winter flea market event, and should have left a half hour ago for the county fairgrounds.

Mother and I maintained a booth at an antiques mall downtown and desperately needed to restock it with new merchandise for the holiday season. We also desperately needed to make a buck or two, since she was on a fixed income, and I wasnt working. (Okay, I did receive alimony that many scruples I havent.)

I crossed to the banister and gazed upstairs, where a good deal of banging and thumping had been going on.

What are you doing up there? I hollered.

Mothers muffled voice came back. Be down in a minute, dearkeep your little drawers on!

In Mothers eyes I was perpetually five. I guess if she could be perpetually seventy, I could be perpetually a kindergartner.

So I stood and waited, because there is no other choice with a diva, and in another minute Vivian Borne herself descended, wearing her favorite emerald-green velour slacks and top. Coming straight down would have lacked drama, however, and Mother halted on the landing and, with hands on hips, cast me an accusatory glare through thick-lensed glasses that magnified her eyes to owlish dimensions.

Where, she demanded regally, is my raccoon coat?

The hairs on the back of my neck began to tingle. I narrowed my eyes. When in doubt, answer a question with a question: Why?

Why? Because I want to wear it, thats why! What have you done with it?

This was not as unreasonable a question as you might suspect. I had been known to take certain measures with that particular garment.

Displaying the confidence and grace of a child with a chocolate-smeared face being asked about the whereabouts of a missing cake, I said, II, uh, I put it in the atticin the trunk.

What? Why?

To store it, I said lamely.

Mother sighed disagreeably. Dear, you know I like to keep that coat in my closet where I can get to it. Its my favorite! She turned on her heels and marched back up the stairs.

I shivered.

You would, too, if youd spent your formative years in that house with that woman. Nothing could strike more terror in little Brandys heart than the sight of her mother in that raccoon coat.

I dont know when Mother had bought itprobably in the 1940s (judging by the severe shoulder pads) when she was in college and Father was off being a war correspondent in Germany. Id always pictured Mother wearing the raccoon coat while riding around in an open jalopy with ten other kids, waving a school banner and shouting Boola-boola into a megaphone, like in an old Andy Hardy movie. (Not that there are any new Andy Hardy movies out there.)