“You should have invited Brody.” Jac looks at Savannah, expectant of an answer as to why she did not.
“I thought about it. Until Mama said Jack accepted her invite.”
“Who cares if it makes him uncomfortable.” Jac throws her head in Jack’s direction. “He paraded his new thing in your face. Turnabout’s fair play.”
“It wasn’t his comfort level I was worried about,” Savannah says, clarifying her concern for Brody. “Besides, whatever Brody and I are or will be, I have no desire to rub it in Jack’s face. I’m not playing games. Really, it’s none of his business.”
“Ooh! Do I sense a bit of defense? A little ownership?” Jac stops swinging, her intent eyes focusing on Savannah, her easiest read. “You like this guy,” she declares, identifying with the sense of protection her baby sister exhibits for gym boy.
“Maybe.” Savannah refuses to look at Jac, robbing her of the satisfaction of the blatant truth on her warm expression. Comforted yet conflicted by the fact that Jac is always right. Just once she might revel in proving her mistaken.
“Good,” Jac affirms. “I’m glad you finally let your conscience recuperate. And I like Brody for you. Although, I’d just as soon keep an eye on him, too. With all those bloodsucking cougars he seems to have affiliated himself with.”
“I know. I’m not completely naive, sister mine,” Savannah spars, a kindred affection.
“Wonder why he didn’t bring his girlfriend?” Jac continues to eye Jack and his partner in crime, Payton.
Savannah shrugs. “I told Mama if she was inviting him, she better invite Daisy. Don’t want her thinking about some kind of reconciliation.”
“Mama? Or the girlfriend?” Jac’s spidey senses kicking in.
“Oh great,” Savannah mutters. “I didn’t even think about that. He should have brought her.” She rolls her eyes with the thought of what Daisy may think knowing he is here among the ex’s family without her.
“He knows exactly what he’s doing,” Jac bites. “Ruffling your feathers by being here. And ruffling hers by excluding her. All the while playing the loyal card in front of Mama.”
“Aunt Savannah! Aunt Savannah!” Luka and Zoey chant her name, attempting to outrun one another, headed toward the tire swings. “We need your phone. For the lyrics to the jack-o’-lantern song,” Luka explains.
“We’re going to Doodle it,” Zoey adds proudly, her hand pushing in front of Luka’s, waiting ever-impatiently for the device. Savannah eagerly offers up the electronic rectangle, glad to be of assistance.
“It’s Google,” Luka proficiently corrects Zoey, shoving her pint-sized hand out of the way and snatching the phone.
“Now don’t fight over it,” Savannah schools them. “Luka, you show Zoey how to do it.”
“Yes Ma’am,” Luka reluctantly concedes, her brow furrowing. The two girls run away, Zoey trailing after Luka much like a hound dog on a hunt.
“Don’t break it!” Savannah yells after them.
Jac laughs. “You know that thing is going to come back malfunctioning, smeared in dirt and cider.”
“I wouldn’t expect anything less.” Savannah shakes her head, smiling at the two petite figures disappearing from their sight.
“It’s amazing, really. How different their lives will be. All the technology nowadays,” Jac reflects. “We didn’t even know what cell phones were growing up. Let alone Google.”
“I know,” Savannah agrees. “Remember when Daddy used to take us down to the arcade? Pac-Man and Asteroids,” she reminisces their limited, gargantuan electronic options.
Jac nods her head, a smile forming. “Every Sunday. Video games and football. Not a care in the world.” She scuffs her feet in the grass below her tire swing. “Why do you think he did it?” she asks, her vulnerable tone a rarity, fittingly reserved for the presence of her youngest sister.
“I’ve been asking myself the same question, Jac,” Savannah says of their father’s infidelity. “Maybe he needed a little excitement. Mama’s not necessarily one to throw caution to the wind. Live in the moment, you know.”
“Yeah,” Jac exhausts. “Maybe validation. She’s not exactly the easiest person in the world to please, either.” Both women are silent momentarily, feeling guilty for their candid thoughts. Knowing Buffy Bondurant represents everything a wife and mother should be, on paper anyway. A domestic goddess, a kind and caring person, it would appear as though she did everything right.
“Maybe in making sure everything was right, she sacrificed the natural progression of things. The pleasant surprises. The spontaneity of the moment. All the little things.” Savannah shrugs. “Daddy was excitable. Charismatic. Curious. Maybe being right all the time caused too much pressure, strained the relationship.” Shaking her head she continues, “Doesn’t excuse it. I’m just saying. I don’t know, Jac.”
“Sounds like what that one over there is going through.” Jac nods her head in Vangie’s direction. Vangie cleans up after Payton, scooping his plate out from under him before he’s even finished. ‘Would you just sit down, Vangie? Relax and enjoy yourself. That plate can wait,’ she reads Payton’s lips.
“How is it that there are some people in the world dying for that kind of affection and care, while others feel smothered by it and ultimately pull away?” Savannah asks.
“Is it care or control?” Jac meets Savannah’s question with one of her own, considering Buffy and Vangie’s meticulous discipline.
“Hmm? Guess I never thought of it that way.”
“It’s human nature, baby sister. To grab on to what you’ve got with a chokehold. Doesn’t work, though. Everyone needs their space. A little time…to respect and appreciate what they have.”
“Yeah,” Savannah exhausts, contemplating all of the times Jack made a competition out of her work and her affection for him. ‘You work too much. You never have time for me. You’re going to do really good, I know it. And I’ll just get left behind.’ All of those sentiments, each and every one wedging them further apart with resentment, now seemingly a self-fulfilling prophecy.
“I invited Noah,” Jac divulges.
Savannah pauses, tilting her head, her ears perking much like a canine. “To Mama’s party? Here?”
“Yeah. I think it will do them both good. To meet. They gotta clear the air, Savannah. Noah’s not going away. Maybe it will help Mama to process things…the truth…once and for all.”
“Oh boy.” Savannah picks up the pace of her swinging as nerve-inducing endorphins stir inside her body.
“You’re not going to run off on me, are you?” Jac smirks at Savannah, owning up to her bold move.
“Wouldn’t think of it, Sis.” Savannah chuckles apprehensively. “I’ll be right there beside you. Hell, I think it’s a grand idea. I just don’t think Mama’s going to share in our genius,” she quips sarcastically. “So you’ve been talking with him, too?”
“Of course. After I got over the initial shock. It’s not his fault. What Daddy and his mother did.”
“It’s kind of neat, huh? Having a brother. Not that it’s any better than having sisters,” Savannah quickly adds. “Just different. I try to imagine how our lives would have been otherwise, with him in it.”
“And his, too,” Jac empathizes. “I feel bad for him. Going his entire life without knowing us. Without knowing Daddy. I get the sense it kind of made him restless, you know. Never feeling like he really belonged.” Jac remains still in her tire swing. “Mama and Vangie better not make him feel like an outcast.”
“Maybe they just need some time.” Savannah thinks of how different she and Jac are from Vangie and their mother when it comes to accepting truth and the changes it requires.
“Well, I’d say time is slipping away from them. If he shows up.” Jac shrugs. “Maybe he won’t.”
“Surely they can’t be any more intimidating than a tour of duty,” Savannah references Noah’s status as a Marine. Both of them give in to a nervous chuckle as they watch Buffy, m
uch like a demure drill sergeant, effectively lining up usually unruly neighborhood children for a hayride.
Luka runs toward them, returning Savannah’s phone. Her fearless confidant Zoey having aborted the mission for a much better assignment, sitting shotgun beside the hayride chauffeur. Her proud and horn-tooting arm waves victoriously in the air at her position, the navigator of the team of massive and fastidiously groomed Clydesdales who will be pulling the hay-filled and children-riddled wagon. Luka stops running as she nears them, her cute little face drawn and full of concern.
“What? What’s the matter, Luka?” Savannah jumps out of her tire, kneeling at her visibly disturbed side.
“Is ‘slut’ a bad word?” Luka blurts out.
“Well, it’s not exactly a nice word, honey,” Savannah says, her arm around Luka’s waist, wondering which foul-mouthed young one brought that very adult word to the party. “Where did you hear that?”
“I didn’t hear it. I read it. On your phone,” Luka answers, disappointed.
“My phone?” Savannah grabs it out of her hand, appalled. She shoves the rectangle into her back pocket, scolding herself for letting them run off with the unmonitored cesspool of information. “You know we don’t talk like that, right?” Luka nods her head with gusto, her bright eyes wide as they can be. “I’m sorry you saw that on my phone. We’ll just have to be more careful about what we Google. Deal?”
“Deal!” Luka finally finds her smile, meeting Savannah’s pinky finger with her own.
“Luka,” Buffy calls, the Clydesdales getting impatient, their hooves nearly the size of dinner plates pawing at the road.
“I’m coming. Don’t leave without me!” Luka runs toward the wagon, securing her most favorite activity of the autumn festival. Buffy happily greets her, hoisting her up and onto the wagon.
“Giddyup! Gee! Haw!” Zoey chants her navigational cues to the team of Clydesdales. Simply beside herself, she beams at the chauffeur, the driver rather, proudly displaying the lingo he taught her. Her customary comical delivery causes a round of laughter throughout the backyard as the grand horseflesh marches away, the first official hayride of the year. Fall has begun.
“Someone needs to get that kid her own show.” Jac chuckles.
Savannah waits until they are well down the street before retrieving her phone from her back pocket. Slut? The unbecoming term haunts her. “What site were they on?” Her hands busily investigating.
“Welcome to the World Wide Web,” Jac mutters. “Good for informing your kids long before they need to be informed.”
“What the…” Savannah’s words trail off as she reads, not from the infamous web but from her own text box.
“What?” Jac hops off of her tire, coming to Savannah’s side, nosing over her shoulder and reading from the screen.
You’re a slut! I hate you. Jack hates you. Everybody hates you!!! You better quit talking to him like you’re something special. You’re not. Get your own
The startling text barrage begins, a hundred and sixty characters at a time.
godamn life and stay the fuck out of ours! You wanted to spread your legs. Go do it! And leave my boyfriend the fuck alone. You’re nothing but a white trash
“What the hell is this?” Jac’s dander is most definitely battered, not simply stirred at this point. “Is this that douchebag’s girlfriend,” she points to Jack, “talking to you like this?” Her hands visibly shaking, the adrenaline bashing her system at the thought that someone would attack her sister in such a vile and cowardice manner as a texting spree.
Completely flabbergasted and quite numb, Savannah attempts to remain calm, assured there has to be some sort of explanation. “She spelled godamn wrong,” Savannah notes, the journalist coming out in her. “It has two d’s…goddamn. If you’re going to sputter swear words at someone via text, shouldn’t you at least spell them correctly?”
“Is her intelligence even a question?” Jac lashes out. “Nobody but an idgit would do this,” Jac uses her most favorite term, classifying an individual who is something of a cross between an idiot and a dimwit.
“Maybe she just needed to get it off her chest.” Savannah maintains, attempting to shield the defamatory words from affecting her as she scrolls down to the next text.
whore. You think you’re all that. Your column writing lame ass self. I have an education, too. You’re nothing special. Miss Independent? You’re a pathetic
excuse for a woman. You used Jack. Walked all over him to get ahead. He loves me more than he ever loved you. We have the best sex. He loves having sex
with me!!! You better stay the fuck away from him. You think I give a fuck? I don’t. I know people. You better be careful little princess…
Savannah sucks in a deep breath, the insulting and threatening words chewing on her heartstrings, she fends them off. “Hmm. Well, guess I know what she thinks of me.” She chuckles to bury the pain, not only of what a stranger thinks of her, but what Jack must have told Daisy for her to think so. “Should I tell her, ‘I can only please one person per day. Today is not her day. And tomorrow doesn’t look good either,’” Savannah preps the phone in her hand, not quite sure of how she should respond, never having encountered such before.
“You block that bitch’s number from your phone. That’s what you do,” Jac orders, her face beet-red, her body amped and transforming to her derby girl persona, Jac-You-Up.
“Jac,” Savannah soothes, her voice soft and low. Her efforts to no avail, Jac is gone much like Bruce Banner, her alter ego rearing its reckoning-loving head.
Jac makes a beeline for Jack Brigant, who conveniently has his face ducked in the apple bobbing bucket. A menacing smirk forms on her lips, likening the unsuspecting Jack to her sister, who certainly was not prepared for the plethora of noxious sentiments his idgit girlfriend unleashed.
“Jac!” Savannah yells, following after her.
Jac mashes her hand down against the back of Jack’s head, fully submerging it under water. Holding it down momentarily as the water sloshes and gurgles about with his resistance. Yanking his head up and out of the basin by his hair, Jac seethes, “You want an apple, you sorry ass son of a bitch?” She grabs up an apple, shoving it into his open mouth gasping for air. The red fruit bruising against his teeth ultimately falls to the ground.
Jack looks at her as if she has gone mad, completely unaware of what has triggered such a reaction. “What the hell has gotten into you?” Jack rebukes, wiping at his mouth with the sleeve of his shirt, growing embarrassed at the alarmed eyes of party-goers peering in awe at the ruckus.
Jac clutches floating apples from the basin, pelting them one by one at Jack. He unsuccessfully attempts to dodge the balls most suitable for pie filling as he quickly backs away from her. Savannah and Vangie come to Jac’s side, trying to calm her. Payton attends to Jack, pulling him away to a safe distance, the two men ducking and dodging.
“Stop it!” Vangie pleads, dumping the basin and the rest of the apples onto the ground, shutting down Jac’s mode of ammunition. “Sorry folks. Please don’t let us disturb you,” Vangie apologizes to her mother’s shocked guests. “Thank God the kids and Mama are on a hayride. What is the matter with you?” she mutters out the side of her mouth to Jac.
Jac points her finger accusingly at Jack, taking off after him. “He is what’s the matter with me. Him and his idgit.”
Payton jumps in front of Jack. “Now…there’s no need to get physical. We’re all adults here. Surely we can talk this out,” he plays to Jac’s senses.
“Payton, move,” Jac challenges headed in their direction, dropping her shoulder as if she is in the derby rink.
“Ah shit,” Payton stammers, having seen her perform this maneuver before at one of her bouts. “Sorry Brigant,” he apologizes before stepping out of the way.
Jac levels a defenseless Jack, planting her shoulder into his middle and charging forward with all of her might, dumping him to the ground. “Ugh!” he expels as his back an
d ribs take the brunt of his weight.
“You’re not welcome here anymore. You got that?” Jac stands over him, her fists clenched and aching for release.
“Jac. That’s enough.” Savannah stands beside her, taking hold of her hand, nearly on the verge of tears, knowing this whole debacle is her fault.
“Maybe you should go, Jack,” Vangie joins them, mediating.
“Keep her off of me and I will,” he defends, brushing himself off and standing up. He looks at Savannah, his eyes angered and hurt. “This is what it’s come down to, huh?”
“You don’t get to be the victim anymore,” Savannah warns through gritting teeth, her finger pointing in his direction.
Vangie shoos them further from the backyard, out into the street. Returning to the guests, she attempts to reestablish a fun, enjoyable atmosphere. Payton assists her.
In the street, Jac, Savannah and Jack stand in front of his red Challenger. Savannah stands between them, her arms outstretched, for Jack’s protection.
“Would somebody please tell me what the hell is going on?” Jack asks, holding his arm against his aching ribcage.
“We’re going to your place, that’s what the hell is going on,” Jac says. “That’s where your nasty-mouthed little wench is, right? Seeing how the two of you have moved in together.”
“Whoa,” Jack defends, “wench? There’s no need for name calling.”
“Tell her that.” Savannah lobs her phone at him, the texts displaying one by one.
“Aw no,” Jack mumbles, shaking his head scrolling through Daisy’s messages. “Ah God. Savannah, I’m sorry.”
“Huh!” Jac releases a disbelieving scoff.
“I’ve been here. You think I knew she was texting this?” Jack challenges.
“It doesn’t matter. None of this matters,” Savannah says.
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