Chapter Five ~ An Emergency Bob-White Meeting

Friday, October 30

Jim and Brian had arrived for their planned weekend at home the day before Halloween, and brought Honey down to Sleepyside with them. The six Bob-Whites entered the Blue Dragon. Mei greeted them as they entered and showed them to a large table in one corner.

Trixie was apprehensive. She hadn’t been in the restaurant since the day she’d run into Lee in the Wegmans parking lot and the other girl had called her nosy. “What if Lee sees us and says something?” she asked Honey, picking at a hangnail as she fretted.

“Trixie, she won’t say anything as long as you just act like a normal customer,” her best friend assured her. “As a hostess and server at the restaurant, she has to treat all customers with courtesy. Just try to keep everything you say to her limited to your order. Maybe the weather, or if she’s wearing a cute outfit or hairstyle. Nothing about the job or her coworkers.”

“I’m sure you’re right.” Trixie sighed. “If I can just do that.”

Now they were seated, Trixie happy to be next to Jim, with Brian, Dan, Honey and Mart spaced around the table. They ordered a pot of tea and studied the menus. When Mei returned to take their orders, Trixie tried to study her without being noticed. If only Di could have been here with us, she thought. With her people sensitivity, I’m sure she could get some information out of Mei!

It didn’t take long for all of them to give their orders, and Mei collected the menus again and walked away to turn them in to the kitchen. There’s something different about her today, Trixie thought. I’m sure she’s been crying. Her eyes are puffy and a little splotchy. I wonder what that’s about. But she restrained herself and didn’t ask in front of the group.

She turned to Jim. “Tell us about your student teaching,” she said. “Especially if you have any funny stories.”

“Well... this wasn’t too funny while it was happening, but I can look back and laugh now. And it hasn’t happened again.” Jim cleared his throat. “The assistant principal came to observe my classroom, and she happened to come during the last hour before dismissal—always the wildest class of the day. She walked in at exactly the wrong moment—my class looked like chaos. Two kids were lying on the floor—and these were eighth graders! Three others were shooting spitballs from cannibalized Bic pens. Somehow things had just gone off the rails. Thankfully, after about a minute, everyone noticed our visitor. The kids who were up took their seats, I confiscated the spitball pens and redirected them to their social studies books. They started discussing the lesson, taking notes, and behaved more like they normally do. I just hope the first impression didn't last too long.”

“Oh my goodness!” Honey exclaimed. “I would have died right there!”

“No, you wouldn’t.” Jim shook his head. “We learn classroom management techniques and I use them on a daily basis. If you’d had all those classes, you’d know what to do. But it never fails that when you want to make a good impression, something crazy happens.”

“Isn’t that the truth!” Mart nodded in agreement. “Brian, are you ready for the MCAT?”

“I don’t know if I’m ready, but I’m studying specifically for the test for an hour every night and joined a study group. We meet once a week and quiz each other from one of the study guides.”

“Ugh, that sounds so stressful.” Trixie shuddered. “Do you have any crazy stories? I’ve heard that you can’t go to the bathroom by yourself and you can’t use any kind of notes.”

“That’s right,” Brian agreed. “You can take a regular pocket calculator, but just a plain one, no graphing calculator and definitely no Palm Pilot or anything like it that has the PDR loaded on it, or anatomy texts, details about diseases and diagnostic testing, all that kind of stuff. No food or drink, not even chewing gum.” He shook his head. “One of the guys in our study group is taking it for the second time. He told us he secretly chewed a small piece of gum last year, but he was really careful not to move his lips in case the proctors were watching the surveillance camera footage. Can you imagine trying to concentrate on some complicated passage and you hear some rando smacking chewing gum next to you?”

“I don’t have any funny stories,” Trixie said with a regretful sniff. “But I do have an interesting professor who’s called the Batman. He did a postgraduate study project on bats in New Mexico and he brings it up every now and then. Let me tell you, I’ve learned more about bats than I ever thought there was to learn. But I have to admit, they’re not as scary as they used to be.”

It was Honey’s turn to shudder. “I can’t help thinking they’d fly around my head and get caught in my hair.” She touched her smooth shoulder-length bob of shiny light brown hair.

“They don’t really do that,” Trixie reassured her. “It’s just an old wives tale.”

They hadn’t noticed the time passing while they talked and laughed over their college experiences, and were surprised to see Mei approaching their table with a loaded serving cart. She distributed their meals, correctly serving each one the meal they’d ordered, and placed a fresh pot of tea on the table as well.

“Do you need anything else right now?” she asked. A chorus of “No, thank you” was her answer and she bowed and walked away with the cart. Trixie noticed Lee Song at a table halfway across the restaurant, taking the order of an elderly couple. There was something odd about her appearance as well, she thought. But Lee didn’t approach their table and apparently it wasn’t part of her station. Trixie could hardly bear to stay in her seat, but she reined herself in and concentrated on her meal.

The boys ate all of their food, but Trixie and Honey both asked for take-home containers. As they waited, Honey said, “Trix, let’s go freshen up while we wait for our boxes.”

Trixie readily agreed, and the two girls started for the restroom, down a corridor behind the seating area and adjacent to the kitchen. For the first time, Trixie wondered if the reason for four stalls was related to a trafficking situation—or if she had totally built a mountain out of a molehill. The Blue Dragon didn’t seem large enough to need four stalls. “Nice to have no waiting,” Honey whispered. They took the last two stalls. Just as Trixie was ready to flush, she heard the outer door open, and then heard a choked-off sob.

She debated with herself what the best course of action would be. She didn’t want to embarrass someone who was crying. But what if the person needed help? What if she could help them? She made up her mind, flushed the toilet and exited the stall to wash her hands. Honey came out of her stall at the same time, and they shared concerned looks.

The crying girl was Mei. Lee Song had an arm around her and was murmuring words that seemed intended for comfort. But tears streamed down her cheeks as well, and her voice seemed to break. They were speaking a foreign language, which Trixie assumed was Chinese.

Trixie and Honey washed their hands, sharing looks of concern again. Would they make things worse by trying to intervene? Or could they help the two upset girls?

Honey ended up going first. She touched Lee Song’s shoulder. “What’s wrong, Lee? Is there something we can do to help?”

Lee shook her head, her lips compressed.

Trixie joined the trio. “Maybe we can help, Lee. Please let us try. You guys do such a wonderful job and we’re so glad to have the Blue Dragon in Sleepyside. The food is so good.”

Mei raised her head. “No one can help. I’m taking dual credit classes in biology and calculus at school, and found out I can get twelve college credits if I take two more dual credit classes next semester. But now, I can’t go to college. I have to go to a different job because I’ll be eighteen in a month. I can graduate in June but then will have to leave and go to another town.”

“But why?” Trixie couldn’t stop the words that sprang from her lips. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why would you have to move to another town when you’re with family now?”

Lee opened her mouth to reply, but the restroom’s door swung open to a middle-aged Asian woman. Honey and Trixie, startled, sprang back. The woman closed the door, blocking it with her body, and began to berate the two waitresses. At least Trixie was sure she was berating them, based on her facial expression and accusatory gestures. Lee and Mei nodded and spoke with short answers in low voices. The woman scowled and left with a swish of the door.

“What was she saying?” Trixie asked. “It seemed like she was upset.”

“Nothing important.” Lee’s face showed no expression. “We are working, and there are still customers. We need to get back on the floor. That’s why she was upset.”

Mei nodded. “That was it. I’ll wash my face and be right out, Lee.” She walked over to the sink and turned on the cold water, splashing it on her face and blotting it with a paper towel.

“Go now. We can’t talk to you.” Mei wasn’t tearing up any longer, but like Lee, she had schooled her face into an expressionless mask. “Everything will work out.”

Trixie and Honey complied. There wasn’t really anything else they could do.

Back at the Bob-Whites’ table, the two girls discovered their brothers had already scraped their dinners into the to-go boxes.

“What took you so long?” Mart asked tactlessly.

“Never you mind, brother dearest.” Trixie tossed her curls and picked up her box. “But we need to have a Bob-White meeting. What we’ll talk about really needs to be kept under your hats.”

“A clandestine Bob-White meeting?” Mart’s eyebrows shot up. “Diana’s not here. How will she feel that we had a meeting without her?”

“Not clandestine, Mr. ‘I swallowed a dictionary’.” She took a deep breath. “But I can’t talk about it here. Come on, let’s go.”

“Hold your horses, Shamus.” Jim grinned at Trixie. “We’ll at least need to stop and pay our bill.”

“Oh, Jim! Of course I didn’t mean to not pay.” The two girls took their take-home containers, and everyone pulled out money for tips, leaving it on the table.

The same middle-aged woman who had come into the restroom operated the cash register. She showed no sign that she recognized Honey or Trixie. Trixie found that suspicious as well as the whole situation with Mei.

The Bob-Whites piled into Brian’s and Jim’s cars and soon were cruising down Glen Road. “This will have to be a short meeting,” Brian warned as they disembarked from the two cars at the Bob-White clubhouse—once a gatehouse serving the Manor House where Honey’s family lived. Unused for several years before the Wheelers arrived, it had fallen into disrepair, and had been restored and fixed up by the Bob-Whites, even to the extent of a new hardwood floor, won by Dan in an ice-skating competition shortly after he’d come to Sleepyside.

“Don’t worry, it will.” Trixie asserted confidently. “We just need some extra opinions and feedback.”

“Plus, I think we learned some new information tonight,” Honey reminded her gently.

“Shall we call the meeting to order?” Mart was a stickler for Robert’s Rules of Order, although Honey held the official position of secretary.

“I call the meeting to order.” As co-President, Jim took the lead. “Any old business?”

“Not right now.” Dan thought for a moment. “But didn’t we agree to contribute twenty-five dollars from the treasury to UNICEF?”

“We did. I remember discussing it before we left for school in September.” Serious Brian always remembered details.

“The question is, do we have enough money in the treasury to make that donation now?” Jim asked. “Treasurer’s report, Mart?”

“Let me see.” Mart withdrew a notebook from a drawer in the table around which they were gathered. “Yes. Currently the treasury is solvent to the tune of thirty-seven dollars and fifty cents.”

“Good!” Honey clapped. “We might need to do a fundraiser of some kind, or agree on some donations from our allowances or chores if we’re going to adopt a family for Christmas, though.”

“Let’s get to new business,” Trixie urged. “We can talk about that stuff later. Even at Thanksgiving. If people want to contribute money from chores, I don’t think we need to make a motion about that.” She stood up and began to pace the width of the meeting room. “Now this is really important. Remember I sent you all information about a presentation on human trafficking that was put on at the community college two weeks ago Friday?”

Everyone nodded, and the out-of-towners murmured a low “yes.” “Well, Mart, Dan, Honey and I went, and it was really good. We ate with the presenter afterward, because she and her husband were spending the weekend in Sleepyside before visiting a friend in the city. They’re from Miami and were very nice. Gina, the presenter, is on a task force in Miami to investigate possible cases of trafficking. And it’s not just prostitution. People can be trafficked for labor—restaurant, factory, domestic, construction, or farm work are common. And it doesn’t just happen in big cities. We learned about a case in a small town in Kentucky where workers had been trafficked for almost ten years before police could collect enough evidence to charge the traffickers.” She stopped to catch her breath.

“I can see why this is important, Trix.” Brian ran his fingers through his wavy black hair. “But are you trying to say someone is being trafficked in Sleepyside?”

“We don’t know for sure. But the Blue Dragon has had several new waitresses in the past couple of months. More than you’d think they could use, when the place is so small. And one of them told Honey and me tonight that she’s not being allowed to go to college next year because she’s going to have to move to another town and start a new job as soon as she graduates, because she’ll be eighteen. This girl is really smart, she’s taking two dual credit classes now and she’s planning to do two more next semester. She wants to go to college so badly, she was crying in the restroom. That’s why Honey and I were gone for so long.”

“But wait a minute.” Jim frowned in thought. “Trafficking of children under eighteen can be reported by anyone. I’ve had some presentations on that in my program, too. But for anyone eighteen or over, they must consent before someone else can make a report. They can report for themselves, of course.”

“Don’t you see, though? This girl—Mei—will be eighteen next month. She’s in school now, so I guess she’s being allowed to finish school. The outfit in Kentucky moved women around every few months, that was one reason why it took so long to prove trafficking was happening. I’m afraid Mei will be moved into a sex worker role when she finishes school and is eighteen.”

“Trix, that’s still a little thin as far as evidence goes.” Dan had been quietly listening until now. “If you can get Mei, or Lee Song, to tell you more, I’d be all in favor of getting more involved. But what about those lip balms Gina was giving out that have the national trafficking hotline printed on the label? You still have some, don’t you?”

“Yes, but I didn’t think to bring them with me to the restaurant today. I haven’t been able to come up with a good opportunity to try to talk to Lee Song again, since she called me nosy for asking questions.” She frowned. “I’ve been saving them in hopes of getting her or Mei to open up more.” Trixie sighed and sat back down. “I think I scared Lee by asking too many questions. Gina said that victims often have been isolated by their traffickers, and they’re told that there’s no one who will help them; they have nowhere to go and no transportation of their own. So, often they’re afraid to make a report or ask for help. It seems like we might have an opening now, since Mei told us about the future plans. But I need to be smart about approaching her, or Lee Song, and giving them information. If it doesn’t apply and I’ve been jumping to a conclusion… well, it’s happened before. But I don’t want to miss a chance to help someone who really needs it.”

The conversation continued for a few more minutes, but no one had better suggestions for Trixie. Everyone agreed, though, that she should try to pass out the lip balms.

The weekend was packed with planned activities since all of the Bob-Whites except Diana were home. Mart and Dan had established a lawn mowing business over the summer, and were offering their regular customers a chance to have leaves raked or mulched over since nearly all deciduous trees had given up their leaves for the year. The money earned for this extra service would go into the Christmas adopted family fund. Trixie, Honey, Jim and Brian were happy to pitch in and help with this job and they all spent Saturday afternoon clearing the leaf litter from ten customers’ yards. By the end of the day Dan proudly counted out the money for his yards to Mart, the treasurer; it amounted to one hundred dollars. Mart had earned the same amount.

“Guys, this is awesome!” Trixie couldn’t restrain herself from jumping for joy.

“Just think, if the rest of us hadn’t been here today, you might have only been able to get half of this work done, or at least not as much as we got done together, I mean, by dividing up in teams. Oh, you know what I mean!” Honey blew a strand of hair away from her face.

“It was definitely a good afternoon’s work, and blew away some of the cobwebs in my brain.” Brian rubbed his hands on his jeans to brush away some leaf crumbs.

“Let’s get the mowers and rakes loaded onto the trailer, guys. The sooner we get our equipment home, the sooner we can get some sustenance. And I for one, am ready for some sustenance.” Mart suited his actions to his words, hopping onto the riding mower and driving it up onto the trailer hitched to the faithful old Bob-White station wagon. Dan followed suit with the push mower and Brian carried a leaf blower. The girls carried an assortment of rakes as well as a bucket with their gardening gloves and a broom.

That night Jim built a bonfire in the Wheelers’ new fire pit at the end of their terrace, and all the Bob-Whites as well as Bobby and the Lynch twins roasted marshmallows. Brian excused himself early, though, citing his need to put in some study time.

“I’m glad we talked about Lee Song and Mei at our meeting, Trixie,” Honey said as the older teens sat in a group on lounge chairs, watching the younger kids roast the last of the marshmallows. “It’s just awful to think something so horrible could be happening in this picture-postcard small town. I hope it’s not, but what we saw in the restroom with those two girls makes me lean toward thinking you’re onto something. You have good instincts, Trix.”

“I think trying to speak to at least one of them away from the restaurant would be a good idea,” Dan offered. “Not to really try to get details, because that could scare them off. But to let them know there are processes and organizations that can help them, give them a place to live and food to eat if they are being isolated and kept in their current places by a trafficker. Giving them the lip balms is one way for them to have access to the available help, even if they don’t want to call on it now.”

“But even if you can’t get any more information from Lee Song or Mei, the next step should be to report your suspicions to the police.” Jim’s voice was low, but very firm. “You don’t know if they may already be watching the restaurant. They may have been building a case for several months, or even longer. And right now, both of those girls are apparently still under eighteen. So you could make a report without their consent.”

Trixie sighed. “Oh, Jim! I know you’re right. Even Gina—the task force officer for trafficking who came to speak to us at school—said the same thing. I just hate to go to Chief Molinson or even Spider Webster without a little more evidence. I don’t want them laughing at me. After all, I’d like to try to get a job with the police department next summer, even if it’s only dispatching.”

“Well, Sis, I’m afraid there’s probably all sorts of criminal, or quasi-criminal activity going on around us that we never notice because we aren’t attuned to the behavior.” Mart shook his head. “I agree with Honey. It’s shocking to think about human trafficking happening here in Sleepyside. But I’m guessing that since Lee Song opened up to you about Mei’s situation, that she’s not completely unaffected by whatever Mei has going on.”

“Gleeps! It’s almost ten o’clock.” Trixie jumped up. “Bobby! Terry and Larry, Barbie and Margie! Time to go home.”

Jim walked over to the fire and carefully extinguished it with a bucket of water, while the five younger kids groaned in disappointment.

Honey joined them. “We’re glad you kids could come, and we’ll do this again. But I probably won’t be home again until Thanksgiving, so it might be spring before we can really have another campfire like this and roast marshmallows.” She hugged Diana’s eight-year-old twin sisters and ten-year-old twin brothers before leaning over to hug Bobby.

“Thanks for having us, Jim and Honey,” the young boy said. Trixie might complain of Bobby’s spoiled ways as the baby of the family, but she had to admit his manners had grown a lot better now that he was in the fifth grade.

“We’ll walk back to the farm and I’ll drive you kids home,” Mart said. “Thanks again, Jim and Honey, for having us all and for the fire.”

Trixie hugged Honey and then Jim, exchanging only a quick kiss with him since Mart was right there.

“I’m heading out, too. Morning will come too early,” Dan said, stretching to cover a yawn.

Trixie wished she could come up with a way to meet Lee Song outside of the restaurant. What a wild coincidence that she’d seen her in the Wegmans parking lot that day! Maybe she could pass Lee Song a note at the restaurant and ask for a meeting...

She fell asleep still trying to come up with a plan.