Best Foot Forward Read online

  She smiled. “I have a storybook that you might like to look at.” She walked to the register and came back with The Elves and the Shoemaker. Webster plopped down on the floor, put the squirrels in his lap, and opened the book. He pointed to a word. “Shoe.”

  “That’s right,” Mrs. Gladstone said. “Shoe.”

  Webster scrunched up his face, pointed to more words. “Bed. Old. Night.”

  Mrs. Gladstone smiled. “Who taught you to read those words?”

  “Tanner.”

  “Shut up!” the girl shouted.

  Webster looked down.

  “Who’s Tanner?” Mrs. Gladstone asked him.

  “Just a friend!” the girl insisted.

  Webster shook his head. His dark, intense eyes seemed familiar.

  “Was Tanner here at the store with you?” I asked.

  “Yes.” Webster turned the page as the girl groaned. He pointed to a word. “Go.”

  Murray faced the girl. “Who was the boy who stole the shoes? We’re going to find out sooner or later.”

  The girl started crying. “He’s our brother.” Her cell phone began to ring.

  “If that’s Tanner,” Mrs. Gladstone said, “tell him to come back with the shoes.”

  The girl answered, crying softly. “. . . Well, you get back here, that’s what. ’Cause we’re here and they won’t let us go. . . . I can’t help it—Webster told ’em. You’d better bring it all back!”

  Chapter 3

  Tanner stormed through the door holding four shoe boxes, his square jaw clenched tight.

  “Is that everything?” Murray demanded.

  “Yeah,” he snarled.

  I dialed Mrs. Gladstone’s extension. She’d gone upstairs to her office with Webster and the girl. “He’s here,” I told her.

  Mrs. Gladstone, Webster, and the girl came down looking like they’d become pals. Tanner glared at his sister. “Thanks for nothing, Yaley.”

  “What do you want me to do, Tanner, sit here and rot while you’re—”

  Mrs. Gladstone slammed her hand on the register counter. “That’s enough!”

  That shut them up for a minute. Tanner stood there like a caged animal. He stared at me and I stared back, even though he scared me. I walked to the register extra tall and I had height to pull from—I’m five-eleven.

  The front door opened and an older woman walked in.

  Yaley started crying when she saw her.

  Webster said, “Hi, Grandma.”

  “Hi, sugar. You okay?”

  Webster nodded as Mrs. Gladstone stepped forward. “You must be Mattie. I’m very glad you could come.”

  The grandmother looked straight at Mrs. Gladstone. “I want to thank you for calling me.” She took Tanner by the elbow. Tanner muttered something. “Tanner Cobb, speak up directly and look this woman in the eye when you address her.”

  His whole body went stiff; he looked at Mrs. Gladstone with those electric eyes. “I’m sorry for what I did.”

  Mrs. Gladstone considered that. “Tanner, I have a feeling you’ve done this before.”

  “Once or twice . . . you know . . .”

  “I wish I could be everywhere,” Mattie interrupted, “but I can’t. Still, these children are under my roof and they’re my responsibility. I take that very seriously.”

  “It’s a hard world out there for young people,” Mrs. Gladstone offered.

  “Amen, but these two are making it harder than it needs to be.” She glared at Tanner and Yaley as Webster ran back to play with the tree.

  Tanner forced a smile. “I could help out at the store to make up for what I did.”

  “I’ll think about that, young man.” Mrs. Gladstone had a strange look on her face. “Mattie, I’ll call you and we can discuss this. For now, I’m not pressing charges.”

  Tanner and Yaley looked relieved.

  I tried to get Mrs. Gladstone’s eye—We don’t need a thief in the store.

  Webster walked up to me and held out two leaves he’d written on. One read TANNER, the other YALEY. He took me by the hand and we walked to the children’s tree. He dragged the footstool over, stood on it, fastened the leaves on a higher branch, and stepped down, satisfied.

  I hadn’t quite envisioned the names of shoplifters on the tree. I said, “Boy, we’ve got a lot of names up there.”

  “We’ve got forty-three names.”

  “We do?”

  Webster began to count the names out loud to show me. I bent down. “Who taught you to count like that, Webster?”

  He looked across the room and smiled. “Tanner.”

  It was 6:00 P.M. I drove Mrs. Gladstone’s old Cadillac through the Chicago traffic. The heat of the day hadn’t lifted yet—typical for August in Chicago.

  Deep snoring rose from the backseat; Mrs. Gladstone’s head bobbed up and down in fitful sleep. We’d spent six weeks on the road together driving from Chicago down to Texas. We got to know each other pretty well. I know her favorite food (chili with hot peppers); I know her greatest strength (not losing control); I’ve seen the full panorama of her personality (stern, sterner, and run for your life). She’s always taken a tough stand on shoplifters until now.

  The goal of the trip was to get to Dallas for Gladstone Shoes’ annual stockholders meeting so that Mrs. Gladstone could retire as president of the company and hand the reins of leadership over to her son. All told, she had a thirty-minute retirement before she got appointed Director of Quality Control for the newly merged shoe empire. Gladstone’s was bought by the Shoe Warehouse Corporation. Right now, everyone was trying to get used to all the changes.

  Mrs. Gladstone rustled in the backseat. I could hear her straighten up, which wasn’t easy with her bad hip.

  I glanced in the rearview mirror. “Are you okay back there?”

  “I’m fine, I’m fine.”

  A meteor could fall splat into Lake Michigan, causing rampaging floods, and she’d still say she was fine.

  “Do you want me to call the doctor’s office tomorrow and schedule your surgery?”

  “I do not.” Hip replacement surgery wasn’t high on her to-do list, even though earlier this summer she had to be in a wheelchair because of the pain. She was an ace at changing the subject, too.

  “Yaley and I had quite a talk,” she offered. “That girl is smart and has too much on her shoulders for a fourteen-year-old.”

  I could relate, but I didn’t go around ripping people off.

  “She told me her father is in prison and her mother is a drug addict.”

  Okay, so maybe she outweighed me on the bad parent scale.

  “Can you imagine having a parent in jail, Jenna?”

  Yes, actually. “It’s tough, I’m sure,” I said, and turned left onto North Avenue. “Do you know what her father’s in jail for?”

  “I didn’t ask. She said her brother stole the shoes for their grandmother’s birthday.”

  I looked at her determined old face in the rearview mirror. “Do you believe her?”

  “Yes, for the most part I do.” She looked out the window. “Let me tell you something about me, Jenna. The longer I’m alive, the more I’m interested in how people learn from their mistakes, not in the fact that they make them.”

  But we don’t know if they’ve learned from their mistakes, do we?

  I stopped in front of Mrs. Gladstone’s three-story brown-stone and walked her to the steps, where Maria, her house-keeper, took over. They headed slowly up the stairs. I pressed the button that lifted the garage door and backed my red car onto the street. I always parked it here, then drove Mrs. Gladstone to work and back in her car. I steered the Cadillac into the garage.

  I sat there in this car that had changed my life. For the first time ever, I hoped my English teacher would ask us to write an essay on What I Did on My Summer Vacation. I’d let the words and the memories spill out about Mrs. Gladstone’s all-out grit, and how hanging out with old people really has its moments. It pays well, too. I’d write a
bout meeting Harry Bender and how knowing him for just a week changed my life. Changing lives was Harry’s specialty. He could have changed so many more, too, if he hadn’t gotten killed.

  I walked onto the street, pushed the garage door button; the door creaked down. I’ll tell you what the world needs—a button to push to turn back the time.

  I climbed into my red car and took the long way home.

  Chapter 4

  How to Get Flat Abs, a Firm Butt, and Be Lean All Over.

  That was on the cover of the magazine my little sister, Faith, was reading.

  I gazed at my stomach that had never been flat; considered my behind that I never had to look at, so whether it was firm wasn’t a consuming issue for me. I’d lost thirteen pounds this summer, but lean was a long way off.

  “Hi.” I put my briefcase down heavily. “How are you doing?”

  “Look, Jenna, I need your help.”

  Faith stood before me in a white skirt with knee-high boots and a hot pink tank top. Faith had one goal—to be a world-famous model. She shoved a paper at me. “I’ve got to practice for my modeling class, so you shout these directions to me, and I’m supposed to change expressions.”

  Faith changed expressions a hundred times a day; I didn’t see why she needed prompts. She started walking across the room in long strides, one hand on her hip, not blinking. I looked at the sheet and called out, “Casual and free.”

  She stomped her foot. “That’s what I’m doing now!”

  “Okay, sorry! Be challenging. . . .”

  Faith shook her head, her cheekbones got higher, her eyes looked straight ahead. She took harder steps. Not bad.

  “Happy and demure . . .”

  A little smile played across her face; her eyes brightened; her steps got smaller; she swung her purse as she walked.

  “Exciting,” I said.

  “I’m not good at this one.”

  “Well, try.”

  She half bit her lip, raised her eyebrows in anticipation.

  “More excitement,” I shouted. “Make me thrilled!”

  She stopped in her tracks. “You are so bossy, Jenna!”

  “You asked me to help!”

  “Not like that!”

  She flounced out. Models know how to make a big exit.

  I went to the kitchen; put water on to boil.

  I looked at the wall calendar: TODAY IS AUGUST 21.

  I stared at the date; it hadn’t registered until now.

  I looked up to see Faith standing there by the kitchen door. She shook out her hair. “Happy birthday, Daddy.”

  “I forgot,” I said.

  We always make a big deal out of birthdays in our family, but it’s hard to celebrate someone when you never know quite where they are. Last year I got a cake and Faith and I sang “Happy Birthday” to an empty chair. It was so depressing—a colossal waste of devil’s food and fudge frosting.

  She plopped down on a stool. “What do you think he’s doing? You think he’s drunk by now?” she asked like a little kid.

  I checked my watch—8:00 P.M. “Probably.”

  My pasta boiled over. I poured the linguini into a colander, felt the hot steam rise against my face, added peppers, garlic, grated fresh cheese over it, let that melt just a moment, divided it into two bowls, and pushed one toward her.

  I took a wooden spoon and bonged a pan hanging from the pot rack overhead. “Happy birthday, Dad, wherever you are.”

  Faith lit the tea candles in the blue glass bowl.

  “I hate Dad,” she said softly, eating her pasta.

  I knew she loved him, too. We’d talked about this a lot—you can hate what someone does, but still love the person.

  It’s not the easiest concept to embrace. It’s right up there with not making excuses for bad behavior. I spent a lot of years making excuses for Dad.

  Faith twisted a tendril of her hair. “What would you say if Dad walked in here right now?”

  I ate some pasta. “I’d ask him how he got the key.”

  She elbowed me. “Seriously.”

  “I don’t know, Faith. The last time I saw him, it didn’t go too well.”

  She twisted that curl tighter. “At least you saw him.”

  Faith was throwing little pieces of paper into the tea light flames and watching them burn up.

  “Look, Faith, do you want to come to an Al-Anon meeting with me? They can really help to—”

  “Mom says I don’t need to go.”

  “What do you say?”

  She shrugged.

  The glow of the candles flickered through the leaded blue glass, casting an upward light on the wall calendar.

  TODAY IS AUGUST 21.

  Do you know where your father is?

  I sat at the computer, looked at the screen.

  Dear Dad,

  I lost someone I loved this summer and that’s why I’m writing to you—I don’t want to lose you, too. His name was Harry. I didn’t know him very long. He was a salesman like you. I worked with him when I went to Texas. He became my friend for a few weeks and then he got killed by a drunk driver. He used to have trouble with drinking himself, but he quit and was helping other people do the same. He said we don’t know how much longer we’ll have on this earth, so we’d better let people know we love them now.

  I never let him know I loved him, Dad. But I want you to know that I love you. I know that your drinking has brought you and me a lot of pain and misunderstanding. I know that you see it differently than I do, but I love you and that is real. I want you to know that despite what happened, I carry you with me in my heart.

  I hope that if you read this letter you won’t ever doubt that.

  Happy Birthday.

  Jenna

  Mom came in late from her date, looking happy. With her new boyfriend and her crazy schedule at the hospital, we didn’t get to see each other much. “Hi, stranger. How are you?”

  “Fine,” I said, turning off the computer.

  She sat on the couch, kicked off her shoes, and looked at me hopefully. I give the best foot rub of anyone in the family. Mom starts off strong, but she gives up after only a minute. I rubbed the soft section of the balls of her feet in a circular motion, so as not to do further injury. I rubbed and massaged the arches, touching on all the pressure points.

  You can’t quit too soon when you’re dealing with feet. You’ve got to stay the course. I kicked off my shoes because my blister was hurting.

  I’m a real ace at handling pain, emotional and otherwise.

  Chapter 5

  I was driving Mrs. Gladstone to work and she was on the phone already, fighting back the enemies of excellence who just want to cut corners here and there and think nobody will notice. “Well, the real problem,” she was saying, “is that everyone has a different definition of quality. We have to get one definition and work toward that.” She hung up and sighed. She’s been sighing a lot since we got back from Texas.

  She’s been shouting a lot, too. As Director of Quality Control for the Shoe Warehouse Corporation, Mrs. Gladstone gets paid to find problems and shout about them until they’re fixed. Finding problems around here isn’t hard since Gladstone’s merged with the Shoe Warehouse this summer. The early bonding phase hasn’t been pretty.

  To begin with, there was the big debate about how to answer the phone. Do we say, “Hello, Gladstone Shoes,” or, “Hello, Gladstone Shoes/Shoe Warehouse,” or just, “Hello, we’re confused.” Then there was the fear factor—will everyone keep their jobs? Followed by the financial factor—will salaries go up, down, or stay the same? And then there was the fudge factor—how truthful were the recent reports on how well our shoes were selling?

  Mrs. Gladstone was particularly interested in that. She rustled in the backseat. “Yes, Riley. . . . I want all the numbers you have for returns per store by brand. I want all the numbers from the factories as well. We can’t find out how to make things better until we see where we are. . . . No, I need it much sooner than
that. . . . Next week.”

  Mrs. Gladstone was on fire to make things better, but not everyone appreciates the heat. Ken Woldman, the Chief Executive Officer of the Shoe Warehouse Corporation, keeps telling her to slow down, change takes time, that he’s fine with cutting a few corners here and there. Then there’s Elden Gladstone, her ungrateful son, who keeps telling her how the business has changed and people care more about price than quality. Murray calls Elden “General Manager in Charge of Always Doing the Wrong Thing.” He’s very good at his job, too, at least how Murray defines it. Whenever Mrs. Gladstone has a phone call with Elden, she swallows an extra dose of pain medication because the sheer frustration of having a son like that starts her bad hip to throbbing.

  I drove down Wells Street. I hated to admit this, but my shoes were hurting. I’ve sold shoes for over a year and I pride myself on knowing how to get a proper fit. These were a new pair, too—Gladstone’s best-selling brand that bears our exclusive label:

  GLADSTONE SHOES

  Made exclusively in the USA

  We make them in our factory in Bangor, Maine. Mrs. Gladstone told me there wasn’t a better shoe factory anywhere. “From the factory workers to the designers,” she said, “every step underscores quality.” People don’t realize that over 160 steps go into making a good pair of shoes. Why these hurt was a mystery. I had the right amount of room in the toe, the cut wasn’t close to my ankles. I wondered if I’d changed so much this summer that my feet changed shape to keep up with the rest of me.

  When we got to the store, Murray was in a snit about the memo that had come from Ken Woldman:

  One of the Shoe Warehouse’s most beloved symbols, our bell, will be sent to all Gladstone stores. Please ring the bell with pride every time a customer buys two pairs of shoes or more. This is our way of letting our customers know we appreciate them.

  “I don’t ring bells,” Murray said. “It’s in my contract.” Mrs. Gladstone looked at the memo and sighed. “Let’s wait till the bell arrives and then decide.”