Free A Real Basket Case by Beth Groundwater

scrutiny. “We’ll figure out Judy’s finances later.”
    “I need to see Roger.” Dave placed a business card in her hand. “Once you’ve got the documents, meet me at this address. It’s right around the corner.”
    Dave led her out of the courthouse. With a curt wave, he sent her on her errands, then strode toward the jail.
    ___
    With the documents and cashier’s check in a folder on the car seat next to her, Claire drove back downtown. She passed Acacia Park, its stately elm and oak trees bare, and its benches empty except for a couple of homeless men with greasy mismatched clothing sitting slumped on separate benches. Claire figured they’d probably been booted out of the city shelter, as they were every morning, to spend the day looking for work. These two must have chosen to nap in the sunshine before manning a local street corner with an open palm and a hand-lettered cardboard sign proclaiming something like “Veteran, Please Help.” Instead of giving them handouts, Claire chose to donate money to the shelter, which offered job and substance abuse counseling to clients who wanted it.
    She drove by a group of teenagers, probably between classes at Palmer High School, situated next to the park. They were passing something among them, most likely a joint. One boy with hair moussed into long black spikes glanced sharply at her as she drove by. The boy needn’t have worried. Claire had more important things to do than turn them in.
    As she turned down Nevada Avenue, she remembered quite different summer scenes at the park. City workers lunching out of brown bags or take-out containers while listening to jazz or classical concerts in the band shell. White-haired men competing on the shuffleboard courts. The aromas of roasting chilis and kettle corn from the weekly farmers’ market. Children screeching and leaping with delight in the capricious waterspouts of Uncle Wilbur’s fountain under the plaster eyes of the whimsical tuba player. Oh, to be young and worry-free.
    Just before twelve-thirty, Claire parked her car in the lot facing a brown brick two-story office building near the courthouse. She entered through the glass doorway and glanced around the lobby, empty except for a statue of a blindfolded woman holding a set of scales. The stately quiet of the place enveloped her like an ominous cloud. She shuddered.
    After taking the stairs to the second floor, she found the bondsman’s office and entered.
    A bored-looking receptionist sat filing her nails behind a small black lacquer desk. She didn’t bother to glance up when Claire entered.
    On the other side of the room, Dave sat on the edge of a leather loveseat. When he saw her, he stood and dropped the magazine he’d been reading onto the glass-topped coffee table. “Got everything?”
    Claire held up the folder in her hands.
    He ushered her into the back office, where a gray-suited man with slicked-down black hair sat behind a huge walnut desk scattered with papers. Smoke curled from a cigar that lay in an overflowing ashtray. The man held out his fat, tobacco-stained hand for the manila envelope Claire clutched to her chest.
    “Wait,” Claire said, her nose wrinkling from the cigar fumes. “This is all moving too fast for me.”
    The bondsman frowned and crooked an eyebrow at Dave.
    Dave grabbed her arm and glared at her. “We haven’t got all day. You don’t want Roger to spend another night in jail, do you?”
    From Dave’s angry expression, Claire realized he blamed her for Roger’s situation. “No, I don’t.” She handed over the documents.
    A whirlwind twenty minutes later, Claire had relinquished the cashier’s check for the bondsman’s fee and signed over the equity in their house and the contents of their investment account as collateral for the bond. Nervous sweat trailed down her spine, because she didn’t fully understand all the papers she signed. She had to trust that Dave was looking out for Roger’s interests.
    Dave took