Maxine responded with a negligible shrug.
Vivienne turned to Lilian. “Care to join us?”
Lilian shook her head and slid her hands in her pockets. “I’d love to, but sadly, no chair. I figured I’d sit in the bleachers with the other hard-core baseball fans.”
“The hard-core fans are actually the ones out here.” The wide sweep of First John’s arm encompassed the grass-covered sea of people setting up seats and food and blankets, preparing for the long haul. “We know better than to think we’d make it through a game on those things.” He pointed to the nearly empty bleachers farther down.
“Well, that’s good to know. Note to self. Go comfortable, or go home.” Lilian beamed at them before peering in Maxine and Celeste’s direction.
Maxine turned away from Lilian and her apparent mental note-taking and traded out her glasses for her larger, prescription shades. The better to hide your face, my dear. She grimaced. She pressed the button to unfold her chair and hoped her newfound “friend” would mosey on over to the risers.
“I have an extra chair in my car, if you’d like to sit with us.” Teddy aimed a thumb toward the parking lot.
“I can go, Theodore. Stay here with your lady love,” Roy volunteered.
“It’s no trouble. Absence makes the heart grow fonder.” Teddy winked at Maxine.
“You’re sure?” Lilian seemed to test the temperature of the welcoming waters as her eyes bobbed from one face to another.
Teddy settled the matter. “I’ll be right back.” He jogged away.
“I’ll join you!” Maxine leaped to her feet. As she trotted after him, she heard her mother’s voice.
“Lilian, do you want somethin’ to tide you over until we bring out the real food?”
Once Maxine reached Teddy’s side, she tugged on his fingers, panting, “Why rush? Let’s give Mother, First John, and Lilian a chance to get to know each other. Uncle Roy can keep the conversation going, no problem, and they’ve got food. Worse comes to worst, Lilian can use my empty seat. This is supposed to be a date, remember?”
“A double date—with your sister and your uncle tagging along, and now Lilian?” Despite his apparent skepticism, Teddy slowed to a walk.
Maxine squeezed his fingers. “I’ll settle for my missing-in-action fiancé.”
“Does that mean you’re willing to share your last bite of pizza or your water bottle?” Teddy smiled and threw an arm around her shoulders.
She leaned into him. “Don’t think I’ve missed you that much. But close.”
He gently pinched her side. “Thanks for understanding about my dad. I’ve got to take you to New Orleans someday. You’d love it.”
“Honeymoon potential?”
“Hmmm. Maybe not that much. But close.”
She returned the pinch, then waited as he popped the trunk and retrieved the chair. They locked hands again as they strolled back toward the family’s spot.
“In all seriousness, New Orleans is probably not your cup of tea, especially not for our honeymoon.”
“Why not?” Maxine let go of his fingers as a group of teenage boys ambled between them.
“The partying, the nightlife. You’re not familiar with that type of lifestyle.”
You wanna bet? Maxine kept her face blank as she stuffed her hands into her pockets. “You think I’ll faint if I smell alcohol? I’m not . . .” She closed her mouth.
Teddy wrapped his hand around her elbow to bring her closer to him. “Whoa, there. I feel like I offended you somehow.”
She fought the urge to yank her arm away. “No, no. It’s not like that. But you don’t need to shield me like I’m . . .” Again, she reached into the barrel to extract the noun or adjective that reflected who she was. She wanted to wave it high in the air and shout, “This is me! This is who I am!” but she came up empty. All she could think about was what she wasn’t: innocent.
Out of something to say, she managed a smile. “Thanks for being my Creole knight in shining armor. I guess this woman should learn to be more gracious and recognize chivalry when it presents itself.”
“It’s not chivalry. Just love.” Teddy kissed her forehead.
Maxine closed her eyes. Before, she would’ve leaned into that kiss, but her heart was an anchor that kept her head in place, unmovable. She couldn’t let him see her inner tug-of-war, something that was getting harder and harder to hide. Her feet dragged as he led her back to the group.
It was the bottom of the first. The Raptors had struck out, and Lilian had already hired Manna to cater Grace Chapel’s women’s retreat. By the middle of the fourth, Vivienne had given Lilian her secret to a perfect potato salad, and by the top of the seventh, First John was referring to the pastor as Willy. Roy had even made tentative plans for a golf foursome with the pastor, his brother-in-law, and Teddy, once he and the pastor had been formally introduced.
“Maxine, can you cook like your mama and grandmama?” Lilian twisted around in her seat toward Maxine, who was seated with Celeste and Teddy behind the main group. She lowered her sunglasses.
“Mmmm . . .” Maxine coughed when she couldn’t seem to clear her throat. “Not exactly, but I know my way around the kitchen.”
“You’d better, because I hate to cook,” Teddy laughed. “I love to eat, but the only things my refrigerator holds are water bottles and French vanilla creamer. And my favorite take-out menus, which I stick to the front.”
Celeste pointed at him. “Then you wouldn’t have enjoyed your date with Grandma and Granddaddy. I heard they kept Maxine in the kitchen all day.”
Teddy looked at Maxine. “I thought we were rescheduling that?”
“We are. We did. I stopped by to visit, and they still had all the ingredients out, so . . .” Then Maxine spied Celeste lifting the lid of the cooler. “More water? That’s your fourth bottle. The portable bathrooms ain’t pretty, let me tell you.”
“I’m thirsty. And drinking water is better for you than the deviled eggs you’re eating. And that’s your fourth, you know. Don’t you have a wedding dress to squeeze into?”
“Technically, it’s her second. Remember you cut the egg in half,” Teddy explained.
Maxine glared at her fiancé. “Are you both counting my calories? And hey, you, don’t disrespect your elders. My gown will fit just fine.” Maxine gently nudged Celeste with the tip of her sneaker and popped the rest of the egg into her mouth.
“Ouch!” Celeste lightly kicked her back, her laughter attesting to the phantom nature of the pain. “Disrespect who? You’re not my mother.”
Maxine’s heart flip-flopped—as it always did when Celeste teased her like that—and she peeked in Lilian’s direction.
And was pinned to her seat by the woman’s stare.
Maxine swallowed and managed to show her a few teeth.
Roy leaned forward, edging closer to Lilian. “I love watching them go at it.”
Lilian’s eyes flitted from one to the other.
“Then you’ll be happy with us.” Celeste snatched off Maxine’s hat and ruffled her curls. She giggled as Maxine stretched to reach for it, nearly causing her seat to collapse.
“You’ll have to excuse my girls.” Vivienne looked askance at them over her shoulder. “Celeste, give your sister her hat. Maxine, act like you’re the one gettin’ married in a matter of months. Goodness, I can’t tell who’s the teenager.”
“Told you gettin’ hitched was no fun,” Roy teased his niece.
Vivienne tsked and turned her attention back to the slow-moving game. “Lilian, is that your granddaughter who caught the ball at third?”
“No. She’s in the outfield, with the braids.” She pointed in that general direction before half turning toward Maxine.
Vivienne squeezed Lilian’s knee. “Do you want something else to eat? I think John left one or two chicken wings.”
“I’m stuffed. Who brings two types of salad to a baseball game?”
“People who don’t want to be here!”
First John patted his stomach. “I love my sons, but I tell you, if it wasn’t for the food . . .”
Vivienne gathered containers. “Anytime is a great time to eat good food, Lilian. Don’t let anybody tell you different. Maxine, hand me that bag.”
Maxine poked Celeste. “Get up, lazybones. We need to pack up. The game is almost over.”
Celeste closed her eyes and leaned her head back over the seat. “I’m too tired . . . and I feel sick.”
At once, Maxine and Vivienne were at her side. Maxine squatted by Celeste’s chair, and her mother tilted up her chin and rested the back of her hand against the girl’s forehead. Teddy and Roy hovered nearby, and First John took a knee on Celeste’s other side while the women fussed over her. Lilian didn’t move.
“Gotcha,” Celeste drawled, mischief dancing in her one open eye.
It took a second before they all froze. Then First John squeezed his daughter’s toes and returned to his seat. Vivienne tugged on Celeste’s hair, a smile squeaking through her pursed lips as she resumed her clean-up duties.
“What in the world, Celeste! Do you think it’s funny to make us all worry like that? Well, it’s not. It’s irresponsible, disrespectful, unkind, and immature.”
“Shh. It’s okay, Max.” Teddy tried to drape an arm around her shoulders.
She shrugged off his embrace. “No, Theodore, it’s most certainly not okay, and Celeste should know better. Shouldn’t you, Celeste?”
“Sorry.” Celeste looked down at her toes.
“What? What did you say?” Maxine refused to accept the lame apology for the trick that had her own heart racing. She was just now catching up to it.
Celeste met Maxine’s eyes. “I said I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that, made y’all worry. I didn’t realize you’d have heart palpitations.” She smiled a little.
Maxine tried to hold on to her outrage, but it was too slippery. Her shoulders relaxed. “I forgive you. But don’t ever do that again.” She pulled Celeste up from her seat and whispered, “I knew you were stewing over that thing with Mother, but if this was your way of getting back at her, don’t do it again. Now get to work.” She hugged her quickly but tightly. When she pushed Celeste in the direction of the cooler, she found Lilian eyeing her. Again.
“I don’t think I shared about Celeste.” Maxine took a deep breath. “She collapsed a couple of months ago during her music lesson, and she’s been undergoing some testing. We’re all concerned, and just now . . .”
“She scared y’all.” Lilian stood there quietly while everyone around them scurried about.
Suddenly Vivienne pointed to the field. “Home run! It’s over! Let’s go console the boys and get out of here.” She, First John, and Teddy cheered and trudged along with the other onlookers toward home plate and the tumbling pile of blue. Roy pulled the recalcitrant Celeste from her seat and fell into step with them. Lilian and Maxine lagged behind.
“Yes, she scared us. She just hasn’t been herself. Not eating or sleeping well. Losing weight. Heart racing. And the doctors said we should monitor and note everything. So when I realized Celeste was pretending just now, scared turned to mad fast. She was playing with us, but it’s no laughing matter. I know she’s young . . .” Maxine searched for the right words, as she had for familiar faces in the crowd hours ago.
Just what does acceptable truth look like?
“You wanted to make sure she was all right. And you wanted her to learn a valuable lesson.” Lilian reached out and clasped Maxine’s trembling fingers. “Like any loving mother would. Right, Maxine?”
Chapter Nineteen
“IS IT OKAY IF I ASK YOU ABOUT CELESTE?” Lilian proffered Maxine a cup of chai tea, part of the bribe that had coaxed Maxine from the car and was meant to draw her out of the hole she’d crawled into after the twins’ baseball game the week before.
Maxine was loath to wade through these waters, though Celeste was the bait on the hook. But she had to face the light of day. If all the messages peppering Maxine’s voice mail were any indication, Lilian had overheard her part of the conversation with JD. She relaxed her grip on the fringed pillow and reached for the tea.
“I know you’ve spent more than a decade trying to hide the truth, and it seems you’ve been pretty good at it. But I don’t care if you wear a snorkel and a Ronald McDonald wig; that’s your daughter. No doubt about it. And I know a man named JD is her father. How did that happen?” Lilian took a deep breath and shifted to a different spot in her seat. “Well, you know what I mean.”
Maxine tucked her bare feet beneath her on the Atwaters’ overstuffed upholstered sofa. She looked away from Lilian to the window framing the world she wished she could escape to. Her voice was low and deep when she finally spoke.
“JD was like this island for me. You know, somewhere I could sail away to. My escape. I was so glad Mother came back when I was eleven, but was it for good? What if something happened to her, like with my dad? I mean, she left me once. And from what I could see, Mother had everything she needed in First John, especially once they had Zander. She didn’t need me, not really.
“When I was with JD, I didn’t have to think about all of that—Mother, my dad, my fears. I didn’t have to listen to my own voice or comfort myself, because I felt at home with him when we met that day. Immediately.”
Reverend Atwater’s absence gave Maxine wiggle room to let down her burdens, not that she felt safe, exactly. But she had spent the past decade and a half running from her memories, and it was good to slow down long enough to let the past nip at her heels. Those memories swallowed her altogether as she sipped tea in the Atwaters’ bungalow.
“Mother got all worked up the moment she met him. She just knew he was trouble, no matter what First John tried to tell her. JD drove me home that afternoon, and when I climbed out of Blue, she had a fit.” Maxine waved off an oatmeal lace cookie.
“Blue?”
“His vintage truck, painted the color of the Carolina Tar Heels. Mother couldn’t stand the university, the truck, or him.”
“Why, do you think?” Lilian set down the plate and settled into her chair with her cup. She peered at Maxine through the wisps of steam.
“A mother knows.” And that’s all I’ll say about that. Maxine intuited Lilian’s question wasn’t referring to Vivienne’s fidelity to the old gold and black, the team colors of Wake Forest University, First John’s alma mater. She held her peace as she stared at the red lily painted on the side of her host’s cup and lifted the lids of different boxes in her brain, discovering and discarding words and memories as she searched for the right ones to explain. “After that day, we were together all the time. And I don’t mean . . . It wasn’t all . . .”
“Maxine, don’t.”
“Don’t what? Don’t try to pretend JD and I spent our time reading poetry in the library? Don’t paint a picture of us sitting in Sunday school, working on our memory verses?” Maxine studied the leaves in the bottom of her teacup as if they would shed a clear answer. “No, I’m not going to lie to you, Lilian. I felt like me with him, whether we were talking or driving around town or laughing or merely breathing in the same room—and that’s what we did, a lot. JD helped me find direction, but most of all, he quieted the noise and gave me room to breathe.”
“How so?” Lilian’s voice was hushed, as if she were watching a skittish fawn test the air at the edge of the woods. Soundlessly she slid off her slippers and drew up her feet in the plush chair across from Maxine.
But Maxine smelled danger. She squeezed her lips together to stifle the words and the feelings that bubbled up, threatening to overflow and free themselves. Instead, she drank in the scene around her.
The den was as cozy and eclectic as Lilian’s personality. Matching scarlet armchairs flanked the chintz-covered sofa. Emerald, goldenrod, and scarlet throw pillows dotted the furniture. Family photographs in various sizes and exposures dotted the cream-colored walls, along with an oil painting of the Eiffel Tower, a large aer
ial photograph of Wheaton’s campus, and a sepia rendition of Chicago’s Magnificent Mile.
Potted plants, real and artificial; a miniature replica of the Cape Hatteras lighthouse; and collections of rocks, shells, and clocks adorned the mahogany end tables and bookshelves. And throughout the room, spots of red peeked out—a bowl of ceramic apples on a bookshelf, a picture of a male cardinal on a leafless branch, a heart-shaped throw pillow, a bowl of dried rose petals. The muted glow of two heavy, cut-glass table lamps and an antique brass floor lamp held at bay the early evening shadows.
“I felt that way about Willy. I still do. I can be my old ugly self with him.” Lilian’s voice was as low as the lamplight beside her.
Maxine found nothing ugly about the pastor’s wife in her slim-fitting chinos, oversize cream silk blouse, and multicolored head wrap, and she was sure Reverend Atwater would agree with her. But it’s the heart that counts, not the outside, she heard a voice say.
“What is it?” Lilian swung her legs to the floor. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“No. But I think I just heard one. I’ve been talking to myself a lot lately, dreaming crazy things, hearing voices. I just scare myself sometimes. I think it’s the stress of the wedding.”
“Maybe it’s God trying to get your attention.” Lilian sounded like she didn’t mean maybe.
“Well, He certainly has it.” The pillows enveloped Maxine as she leaned back.
Lilian said nothing.
“Mother always taught me to be a ‘good girl,’ to be this ‘unwrapped gift’ for my future husband.” Maxine’s eyes lit on Lilian’s face for a moment before flitting off to a land far, far away. “JD and I were more than a couple of frisky teenagers, you know. He not only listened, he responded—and boy, I had a lot to say.” Maxine laughed at herself, at the young woman who wanted to believe her thoughts and feelings could keep the world spinning in place. Or stop it, if only for a few hours.
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