by K. A. Ware
“Not quite in the middle, I live just out of town. It’s close enough to get my Hurricane fix whenever I’d like, but I can still drive back home for Sunday supper with Mama.”
“So you come back often?” I asked, feeling ashamed that I’d avoided coming home.
“Not all of us were in a rush to run away,” he said softly, looking at me over his shoulder. He was trying to be gentle, but his words still stung.
I averted my eyes and toed at the dusty gravel. “Some of us just gotta get away to find ourselves.”
“Must be a family trait,” he grumbled.
My head jerked up. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I didn’t mean any offense, Sav. Just that your sister seemed to have the same idea. I haven’t seen her in nearly a decade. I guess she found herself a new life and liked that version better.”
I opened my mouth to defend my sister, but closed it when I couldn’t think of anything to say. He sounded almost sad, but that didn’t make any sense. Zep and Addie hated each other. I’d think he’d be happy to see her gone.
“Well, she’s here now,” I hedged, knowing full well my sister was going to be seven shades of pissed that I’d let that cat out of the bag.
His eyes flashed as he stood up, the new tire in place. “For the funeral?”
“Yeah,” I sighed, still not able to wrap my head around the fact that my grandfather was gone.
“I’m sorry for your loss, Savvy. Your Pappy was a…good man.”
I barked out a laugh. “He was a grumpy asshole to everyone that wasn’t blood, but yeah, I guess he was a pretty good guy.”
“That’s the truth,” he smiled. “Well, you’re all set to make your grand return home.”
I hopped out of the van and gave Zep a tight squeeze. “Thanks for coming to my rescue. You’re an all right guy, Z.”
“It was my pleasure, Sav. I’ll see you at the funeral.”
“Uh, yeah, see you then,” I stumbled, watching as he retrieved his tools and headed back to his truck.
He’s going to Pappy’s funeral? Oh, boy.
Addie would blow a gasket. Maybe if she didn’t know beforehand, her manners would force her to be polite and my poor Pappy’s wake wouldn’t turn into Godzilla vs. King Kong.
Yeah, that’ll totally work. I hope.
Three
A Date with The Colonel
Adelaide
Terrebonne Parish, LA
There was a chill in the air, so I’d replaced the god awful crocheted shawl Savannah wore the minute it slipped off her shoulders. I’d restrained myself from asking what underpass hobo she’d lifted it from as I covered her. She shivered and tilted her chin, flashing me one of her trademarked half-smiles. I would’ve smiled back if we both weren’t holding white roses and standing by Pappy’s pine casket. It hardly seemed like the time for sisterly bonding.
There hadn’t been time for much of anything since my return to Terrebonne. After hugs, tears, and a few suspicious glances at my bare ring finger, my time back home had been a whirlwind of well-wishers bearing inedible casseroles, flower deliveries, and a trip to Walmart with Savannah to buy a shitty black dress I’d never wear again.
Everyone tried to pull information out of me as to why Roland hadn’t come with me. Babs, yet again, rolled her eyes to the ceiling, asking God to make her a great-grandmother before senility had her burping the dogs and giving the kids a flea bath. I didn’t have the heart to tell her to put a bib on the Chihuahua and go for it.
Children weren’t in the cards for me. Roland had made that perfectly clear years ago. He’d even threatened me with a vasectomy. I laughed as I shook my head at my own stupidity. If I’d known then what I knew now, I’d have given him one myself.
“You always used to say, ‘A man should always fish hard. He can rest when he dies.’ Rest in peace, Pappy. You’ve earned it. I love you.” Savannah placed her white rose on the top of Pappy’s casket, trailing her fingers along the edge. I watched a tear rolled down her cheek, and my stomach flipped. Savvy wasn’t a crier. She was always the strong one between the two of us, and it unsettled me to see her so emotional.
Brushing a piece of her long dark hair out of her tear-stained face, I placed my own rose crossways on top of hers and kissed my fingers, placing them on the casket. “We’ll take care of Babs, Pappy. Don’t worry.” As Savannah bit her lip to hold back more tears, my arm went around her waist on its own accord…just like when we were kids. I was the older sister by five years, not that it mattered much. Savvy was the aggressive one. She always held her own and never needed typical big sister protection. If anything, it was the other way around. However, when my little sister found herself upset, only I could calm her down and center her.
That was the weird thing about me and Sav. We were as different as vanilla and chocolate, but as crucial as yin and yang. Somewhere along the way, I’d forgotten that.
Savannah leaned her cheek against my shoulder and wrapped her free arm around my own waist as we stumbled across the cemetery toward my blue BMW that was parked on the outskirts of Floral Glades Cemetery. Savvy had her face tucked against my shoulder, covertly wiping her snotty nose against the sleeve of my polyester dress when I saw him.
I. Saw. Him.
I saw him and my blood boiled a heated level of hellfire I hadn’t felt in years. Not when Courtney Carrington revealed my hidden bloodline to the entire country club to win president of the Caddo Parish Ladies Auxiliary Club…not when Roland forgot my birthday three years in a row then scheduled a ski trip to Colorado on my thirtieth birthday, and not even four days ago when he unceremoniously kicked me out of my own house and told me he’d been cheating on me for god knew how long. No, this level of hate, went beyond Roland Bordeaux and the Jezebel of Shreveport.
It went straight to the devil blue eyes of Zephirin “Zep” LeBlanc.
Jerking Savannah’s snotty nose away from my armpit, I clenched my teeth to keep them from chattering…not from the cold, but from pure anger. “What the hell is he doing here?”
Following my glare, she shrugged as if my world hadn’t spun on its axis. “I ran into him on the way to Terrebonne. He said he was going to come to Pappy’s funeral. Didn’t I tell you?”
I blinked at her as if the action would transport some sense into her. “No, you didn’t tell me, Sav! But it sure as hell would’ve been a nice conversation starter when you got here.” I threw my hands up in air, gesturing wildly and mimicking her voice. “Hi, Ads. Nice to see you, Ads. Your ass looks good in those jeans, Ads. The douchebag who plagued your entire high school existence is coming to Pappy’s funeral, Ads.”
“Oops.”
“Oops?” I stared at her with an open mouth. “This is not an oops, Savvy.”
Rolling her eyes, she shrugged and wiped her nose on the edge of her shawl. “Okay. Fuck?”
“This is just like you, Savannah. Don’t you remember what a dick he was to me? He lived to ridicule and torture me.”
“Don’t you think you’re being just a little dramatic?”
“Adelaide Dubois.” The graveled voice six feet in front of me stopped me dead in my tracks. My pulse roared in my ears and sweat beaded across my upper lip. Slowly, I lifted my head and collided with a nightmare from my past in faded black jeans and a black button up shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbow. “What hole did you crawl out of? I’m assuming there’ll be a parade later in your honor? Maybe a ticker tape for the plantation princess’s homecoming?”
My jaw ticked, holding in my rage. “Bordeaux.”
“Come again?” he asked, furrowing dark brows that covered clear and hateful blue eyes.
“Bordeaux. My name is Adelaide Bordeaux.”
Moving quickly, he grabbed my ringless left hand and smirked. “Rings at the cleaners, Mrs. Bordeaux?”
“Very funny. Don’t you have a boat to be scrubbing somewhere?” Leaning in, I made a big production of inhaling his scent and wrinkled my nose in disgust. “You
smell like low tide. Couldn’t you shower first out of respect?”
Actually, he smelled like sea salt and spice. All man. It was intoxicating…something I wasn’t used to and found mildly unsettling. But I sure as hell wouldn’t tell him that. I hated myself a little as I scanned his ring finger for a gold band.
There wasn’t one.
“What’s wrong, Addie? Never smelled a real, honest, hard working man before? Are you too used to those metro-pseudo mannequins up in Shreveport?” A slow, smug grin pulled the corners of his mouth outward until they disappeared into deep dimples.
Ugh. What was wrong with me? They weren’t cute dimples. They were annoying, and he was annoying, and his whole existence reminded me why I left Terrebonne in the first damn place.
Then it hit me. “How’d you know I lived in Shreveport?” Shooting an accusing glare in Savannah’s direction, I rephrased the question, carefully controlling my tone. “Savannah, how’d he know I lived in Shreveport?”
“Lucky guess?” She grinned, raising an eyebrow.
All three of us stood in awkward silence as I shot death glares at my sister while Savannah bounced amused eyes back and forth between me and Zep. I didn’t care enough to look at what Zep LeBlanc did. He could go to hell for all I cared.
“Well, I better get going. I’m going to be late,” he announced as if zoning in on my thoughts.
Good. Your bungalow in hell is probably ready for check-in, asshole.
“Probably,” I retorted, still staring holes into Savannah. Breaking out of my stupor, I shook my head and attempted to find what composure I’d lost. Placing a hand on Savannah’s shoulder, I steered her toward my car again. “Come on, Sav, we have to go too.” Mustering all my courage, I finally looked Zep LeBlanc in his devil eyes. “Family business, you understand.”
Instead of walking away like any normal, decent person, the cause of so many tearful and sleepless teenage nights grinned that damn Cheshire, eat-shit grin and scanned a slow perusal down my Walmart dress. “Of course. And you’re all about the family, aren’t you, Snow White?”
Snow White.
That damn nickname. I hadn’t heard it since the day I graduated and swore I’d never hear it again.
Damn Zep LeBlanc.
“Screw you.”
Savannah elbowed me and whispered, “Fuck you, Ads. Screw you is an eighth-grade insult.”
I elbowed her back, a little harder than necessary. “Screw you too, Sav.” As we walked with a brisk pace toward my BMW, I fought with the key fob, pressing the unlock button at least four times before the damn thing clicked.
“He really gets to you, doesn’t he?” Savannah mused, fastening her seatbelt and flipping the overhead vanity mirror down to fluff her messy hair.
“No,” I grumbled, throwing the car into reverse. “He pisses me off. There’s a huge difference.”
“Whatever you say, sis.” A smug smile played on her lips, and an internal war waged within me on whether to keep driving or pull over and smack it off.
Not because I was mad at her.
But because she was right.
An hour later, the entire Dubois family sat in a semi-circle in the museum-styled office of my grandfather’s business attorney for the will reading. The place was as tacky as the man who inhabited it. Mounted deer heads on the walls stared at me with sad, disapproving eyes that seemed to watch every move I made.
I didn’t care what the will said. I just wanted it over with so we could put this behind us. As my grandparent’s only child, we all assumed that my father would inherit the fishing business my grandfather had built from the ground up. It wasn’t as if we were a rich family, so I didn’t understand why the lawyer kept tugging at his collar like he was at an open confessional.
“So, I say, I say, Charlie came to me about three months ago and revised this here will I hold in my hands.” Bartholomew Carlisle, Esq. held a stack of papers and waved them to the entire room as if he held the Declaration of Independence. He tightened his black string bolo tie, and dabbed at his sweaty forehead with a handkerchief he’d pulled from the pocket of his white suit. “I say, I realize this may be a little unusual,” he stammered, adjusting his black rimmed glasses and stroking his white goatee, “but I abide by the law, and Charlie Dubois followed the law, ya hear?”
Lowering my voice, I leaned close to Savannah’s chair. “Why does he look like Colonel Sanders?” I whispered.
Savannah stared at him and cocked her chin. “I don’t know. Why does he sound like Foghorn Leghorn?”
Making the mistake of meeting bewildered stares, Sav and I held it together for a second before losing our composure and dissolving into barely contained snorts.
“My English is better than this assoff,” Babs spat in disgust, joining party.
“Asshole, Babs.” Savannah laughed, holding her stomach. “Asshole or jerkoff…pick one.”
“Girls!” My mother reprimanded us from three seats down as if we were children again. Instead of calming us down, it had the reverse effect, escalating our snorts into full out howls.
The past few days had me in such an uproar. With Pappy’s death, Roland kicking me out, the stress of hiding everything from my family, and now the return of the nightmare from my past, it was nice to finally laugh and unwind. Even if it was at the most morbid place to do it.
I’d just sat back in my chair and zoned into the amusing rhetoric of Colonel Leghorn when my world shifted, tilted, spun 180 degrees, and free fell into the depths of hell.
“Sorry I’m late y’all. I had to give a friend a ride home, and traffic was horrible.”
My throat burned. “What the fuck?”
“There you go!” Savannah beamed, slapping me on the back. “Welcome to big girl talk!”
Beside me, laughter rumbled in Babs’ chest, and Daddy tapped her leg in annoyance.
No. No. No. No. No.
All eyes turned toward the open door and there he stood. All six-foot four inches of tousled black hair, and a full beard that clearly said he didn’t give a shit what anyone thought about his appearance. He smirked at me like he’d just won the damn lottery, and I glared at him like a rabid dog foaming at the mouth.
“Friend,” I snorted under my breath. “Yeah. I’ll bet. Friend with double d’s and lips that can suck the chrome off a—”
“Adelaide!” My mother twisted in her seat, her face horrified and arm ready to reach across four people to slap me.
“Sorry, Mama.” So much for decorum.
“What’s gotten into you?”
It was a valid question. What had gotten into me?
I’d left Sugarbirch a broken, but still refined and classy woman. Three days in Terrebonne Parish and the bayou had seeped into my skin like a leech, sucking out the culture and infusing me with Swamp Shit Syndrome.
It was the inability to hold back what was truly on your mind, regardless of how crude or tasteless. The struggle was real.
I leaned over to Mama as he took a seat at the end of the semi-circle. “What’s he doing here?” I whispered, clenching my fists.
Mama tapped her index finger against her lips, indicating my voice level may not have been as quiet as I thought. “Zep’s grandpa bought half of Dubois Fishery about two years ago, Addie. When Henry became a partner, they changed the name to DuBlanc Fishery and split the work and profits fifty-fifty.” She shot me an accusing look. “If you’d come home in the last five years, you’d have known that.”
Ouch.
“Okay, fine, but why is he here. Why isn’t Mr. LeBlanc representing his share?”
Mama patted her lips again. “Henry had a stroke last year, poor man. Lost use of the entire right side of his body, so Zep took over the LeBlanc side of the business.” She nodded to him and smiled. “He’s now the Blanc in DuBlanc.”
I don’t know what possessed me to glance over at him. Maybe I thought he’d be looking at Colonel Sanders. Maybe I thought he’d be texting whatever slut he dropped off before arriving
late to Pappy’s will reading. I didn’t expect to see his smug face staring right at me, the same taunting and pretentious dimples piercing a face that’d haunted me for years after I left Terrebonne Parish.
Zephirin LeBlanc ruined my high school years. Even with his ridicule and merciless taunting, I’d still managed to graduate as homecoming queen and head cheerleader, padding my college resume just as I’d planned, so I could get the hell out of this one-horse town for good. But Zep made sure I didn’t leave without one final reminder of why I’d never come back, cranking the shit factor up to about an eleven. It was the day I decided I was better than this place and would never get kicked around again.
So much for that.
As I stared, he grinned then puckered his lips and shot me a kiss across the room. Revolted, I lifted my right hand and flipped him off.
“So, I say, I say, I’m just going to read the will and if y’all will hold all y’alls questions until the end, I’d surely appreciate it.” Foghorn adjusted his glasses and squinted at the paper in his hand. “I, Charles William Dubois, a resident of Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana, hereby make this will and revoke all prior wills and Codicils.”
I concentrated on the scuff on my patent leather Mary Janes as Zep’s eyes burned into the side of my face. Colonel Sanders rattled on while my cheeks heated. Why the hell wouldn’t he look away? I was a married woman and he was a manwhore. It wasn’t proper or appropriate. Feeling exposed, I jerked at the hem of my knee-length, simple black dress, trying to cover as much skin as I could.
“I give my private residence at 74 Rosehill Lane to my wife, Ekaterina Kasekov Dubois as well as all the funds in the bank accounts labeled….”
The staring. Why the hell wouldn’t he stop staring? Did I have something on my face? Oh, my God. Did I have a bat in the cave? Of all the things…Jesus, did I have a booger on my face? I rubbed the side of my nose raw trying to feel for random snot.
“In the matter of my half of the business and financial holdings of DuBlanc Fishery, I bequeath all rights and ownership to…”