A Billion Reasons Why

by Kristin Billerbeck

  “Are you saying I’m not really invited?”

  “I’m only saying that I wouldn’t read too much into it . . . the idea that it came from Mrs. DeForges. She’s learned to do things a certain way. Properly. Inviting you to Luc’s party is the proper thing to do.”

  “It did come from her, though!” She waved the invitation’s vellum envelope in front of her mam. “Look, it has her seal on it and everything!”

  “Katie, people—not just Mrs. DeForges, but most people— do things formally here. Mrs. DeForges is doing what all the other mothers are doing when their sons graduate from college.”

  “I’m graduating from college too, Mam. It’s not like Loyola University is any less prestigious. I’m the first one in our family to graduate! Maybe we should invite Luc’s family to my party. No one cooks better than you, Mam. We could use Grammy’s china, and we’d have nothing to be ashamed of.”

  Mam brushed the bangs from Katie’s forehead as if she was still a child. “We don’t have anything to be ashamed of, sweetheart. If anyone looks down on another, it’s their own lack of breeding.”

  “She doesn’t, Mam. Paddy told me Mrs. DeForges would come around. He told me, Mam!” She paused. “No, don’t make that face at me. He was right. He knew people.”

  “Your father, God rest his soul, your father only saw the best in people. I know Mrs. DeForges does a lot of good in this community, but that doesn’t mean that she wants her son to marry you. You’re both so young, and there’s an entire world out there. I’m sure Mrs. DeForges has nothing against you personally—she just wants the best for her son.”

  “I am what’s best for him.”

  “Then there will be time.” Mam patted her cheek. “You have your daddy’s ability to see the best in people, and that’s a gift, Katie. But it can also be a curse if you don’t protect yourself from the wrong sorts.”

  “How can you not see the good in her, Mam? She’s invited me.”

  Katie clutched the invitation to her heart. It changed the game. Until that moment she’d been nothing more than a waif to Mrs. DeForges; an unclaimed friend of Ryan and Luc that she paid no mind. Nothing more than a ministry for her Junior League Friends, an Eliza Doolittle from the Channel.

  Until she saw Luc and Katie under the magnolia tree. Mrs. DeForges’ reaction sent birds flying off in several directions, but Katie forced that thought away. Paddy would want her to seek reconciliation. To see the best in others. And this seemed like the perfect opportunity to show how forgiving she could be—because Luc’s love was worth the trouble.

  “Katie, you’re too young to be serious about any boy, much less Luc DeForges. There are two kinds of men, Katie. There are men who make you feel like Luc DeForges makes you feel with their skills and their charm, and then there are the men you marry . . .”

  “Luc is the man I’m going to marry! He loves me, Mam! I know he does. I’ll prove it to you. You just wait until after this party. You’ll see.”

  Luc’s graduation party wasn’t the end, it was only the beginning, where they would announce their love publicly for the first time.

  “Luc is the one and only man I’ll ever love. Mrs. DeForges sees that now, and so will you.”

  Mam gave her a dismissive smile, which made her more determined than ever to prove her wrong.

  “Gosh, what an idiot I was,” Katie said aloud. She lifted a bouquet of red roses and sniffed them. Mam was right, of course. When had her momma ever been wrong when it came to the character of another person?

  Katie searched the store for some reminder of her dad, some homage that paid tribute to the man who created Luc’s spark for taking healthy eating global, while maintaining the idea of eating locally. Failing to find anything, her walk slowed and an employee managed to catch her.

  The middle-aged woman, who did nothing to hide the Southern frizz in her hair and wore the same khaki apron as the kid out front, spoke to her. “Are you all right, miss? You having trouble finding something?”

  “My dad owned this store,” she said softly. “Before, when it was a real grocery and all. He just had fruit and vegetables and staples. You know, dairy, eggs, bread—oh, and peanut butter and jelly, because he always said inevitably some momma would forget about her child’s lunch for school the following day.”

  “Bless yo heart, dahlin’. You come sit down right here.” The woman patted a rattan chair she’d pulled next to the flowers. “Why are you dressed like that, sweetie? You been to a funeral or something?”

  Katie looked down at her getup and shook her head. A red chiffon dress, tennis shoes, and an oversized T-shirt. The woman, whose name tag identified her as Pat, probably thought she was nuts. She knew her father would have treated a disoriented ragamuffin the same way had one wandered into his store, and it was as though his spirit was alive in the business.

  “You’ve got a good heart, Pat. My dad would have appreciated that.”

  “Sit here for a minute, hon. I’m going to get you some water.” Pat came back with a paper cup.

  Katie drained the cold liquid and crumpled the cup in her hand. “It’s nice here. Luc’s done a good job.”

  “You know Mr. DeForges?”

  “Well, I did.” She shrugged. “Once.”

  “You must have never grieved his loss.”

  “Wh-what?”

  “Your father. You must never have grieved his passing. You can’t bypass that kind of grief. It only waits for you at the other side of whatever you’ve avoided it with. I’ve seen it time and time again.” Pat’s frizzled, weather-beaten look belied her warmth.

  Katie wondered at how caring people could be. Had she avoided this kind of community since leaving home? If she was honest, even church didn’t feel as warm as this solitary chair in Luc’s store.

  “Katie!”

  She turned to see Luc rushing toward her, holding her handbag. “We’ve been worried sick.”

  “I just left the club.”

  He showed her his watch. “It’s nearly eight o’clock. You left the club hours ago.”

  Katie searched for an acceptable excuse, but there was nothing more than she’d become consumed, spellbound by Luc’s consideration of every detail. He’d created a world unto itself, one that made a customer forget the mundane task of marketing.

  “Hello, Mr. DeForges.” Pat held out her hand to her boss.

  “Luc, this is Pat. She got me hydrated and stopped me from wandering your store aimlessly. It’s incredible, Luc. I’m afraid I got rather lost in all the details.”

  “Actually, she wandered for quite a while before I finally got her a chair. I think she was avoiding me.”

  Luc put a hand on Pat’s shoulder. “Thank you. Thanks for seeing to her.” He knelt in front of Katie. “You ready to go?”

  “I’m ready.”

  Luc stood and took her hand. “Come here. I want to show you something first.”

  She followed as Luc walked resolutely through the aisles and dodged carts until they passed the cash registers and came to a community bulletin board. It was next to the espresso café and over the condiment table, which was filled to the edges with Southern sauces and utensils for the myriad take-out items.

  “Nice,” she said. “It’s making me hungry.”

  He seemed to want more from her. “No, look.” He pointed to the wall.

  A picture of Paddy stared back at her.

  “My father!”

  His smiling eyes and toothy grin met her, and she reached out for his sun-ravaged face. Underneath the photo, in gold, were etched the words IN MEMORIAM IAN “PADDY” MCKENNA, FATHER OF FRESH EATING IN NEW ORLEANS 1954 – 2001.

  She fingered the letters. Then Luc braced her elbows as she leaned into him, her back against his chest.

  Katie beamed with pride. Maybe she’d been too hard on Luc. It wasn’t his fault she’d made a fool of herself. Maybe she’d convinced herself by then that she was as good at reading people as her mother. Whatever it may have been, she needed to
let it go. Luc had moved on; it was time for her to do the same.

  “Luc.” She turned her head so that her ear rested on his heart. His breathing sounded shallow. “I’m sorry. I blamed you because it was easier. I lost my way because I loved you and I wanted you to love me back.” She felt lighter with the admission.

  “Sh, sh. I did love you back. Do love you back.”

  She peered up under his strong jaw. From her angle, and in the store’s light, Luc was all shadows and mystery, but his heart felt familiar. Like home.

  “Men are different from women,” she said. “It was my duty to stop—”

  He kissed the crown of her head. “We need to go, Katie. Your mam’s worried, I’m sure.”

  She twisted in his arms, and he surrounded her at the back of her waist. He made her feel so safe. How did he do that?

  Chapter 14

  IN THE COOL, COOL, COOL OF THE EVENING

  It was said by all who knew Irene McKenna Slater that she had a sophisticated understanding of proper society and how decorum operated. Irene knew her place in the world. While Papa told Katie that she could reach for the sky and pluck any star to her liking, Mam had a more practical theory on the futility of chasing rainbows. “People belong where they belong,” Mam would say. “You can pluck an Irish Channel girl and put her somewhere else, but someone will remember her as the girl from the Irish Channel. There’s nothing to be ashamed of in being who you are. If God created a person to sell vegetables, he should sell the best vegetables there are and do whatever he can to satisfy his customers.”

  Even as the Irish Channel’s neighborhood grew in prestige, due mostly to its higher elevation and proximity to Uptown, Mam clung to the roots of the old neighborhood and what it meant to be a part of her Celtic heritage. Though most of the neighborhood was African American by the time Katie grew up, Mam never saw a bit of difference in a person’s skin color. If they were in the Irish Channel, they were Irish to Mam.

  So it just made no sense to Katie that Mam had moved to the Garden District. But seeing the gated Victorian, with its Celtic cross and statuary in the front garden, she supposed the Channel wasn’t far behind.

  “Mam’s house looks a bit like a cemetery, wouldn’t you say?”

  Luc chuckled. “It’s a nice house.” He pulled to the curb in his brother’s Prius. Apparently, Ryan and Olivia had been given matching cars for a wedding present.

  Katie gasped. Her mother’s covered gallery porch teemed with people under the light, but through them all she could make out Dexter’s image.

  “What? What’s wrong?”

  “Dexter’s here.”

  “How do you know? The gallery’s bursting at the seams with people.”

  Katie didn’t answer.

  Dexter stood against the front window, as though he thought he couldn’t be seen, but he actually made himself more obvious in his misty movements. His tall frame hardly lent itself to disappearing. Reaching for the car door handle, still with Luc at her side, she wondered how she’d explain their day together to Dex.

  “What are they all doing here, anyway?”

  “You know my mam. Every night’s a party.” She scrambled out of the car and ran up the steps. “Dexter!” she called over the hum of chatter. She ricocheted from guest to guest. Some she recognized; others were just random faces in all colors and sizes. So many chairs cluttered the shared townhouse gallery that the porch looked like a Mardi Gras float. The sky was just darkening, and she knew she’d created a stir being gone for so long.

  “Where have you been?” Mam scolded. “We very nearly called the police! If it hadn’t been for Luc saying he knew where you’d gone . . .”

  “I’m sorry,” she muttered. “The time got away from me. Have you met Dexter?”

  “Yes, I’ve met him. I’m afraid he’s not used to all of the noise in our house. We’ll have to work him up to it.”

  “Dex is an only child,” she said to her mother.

  “So are you!” Mam answered.

  “Your only child is a far different cry, Mam.” Katie laughed but grew serious at the sight of Dex standing pressed against the wooden window frame.

  He seemed agitated, but what right did he have to be angry? She hadn’t asked him to come, and he certainly couldn’t expect Mam to quiet things for him. At least not without warning.

  She swallowed her guilt, remembering what it had felt like to be in Luc’s arms again. What did that say about her? She knew what it said. It said she was as dumb as a box of rocks and not worthy of a man like Dexter, that’s what it said.

  “Hey, Dex, can I have a hug?”

  He loosed himself from the wall and hugged her, then checked his watch. “I hadn’t planned to be here this late.”

  “It’s only eight thirty,” she said.

  “I brought work with me.”

  Eileen came up and wrapped an arm around her. “Dexter, Katie has a habit of disappearing, don’t you know. Remember that time in high school when we snuck out for Mardi Gras? I thought your dad was going to kill us!”

  “You snuck out in high school?” Dexter asked as if she’d committed murder one. Her beau was not a man to understand misbehavior, not for any reason—but in New Orleans during Mardi Gras, it was practically cultural.

  Eileen went on, oblivious to Dexter’s shock. “When I saw the grill of his old Chevy truck coming around that corner, I knew we were toast. I couldn’t think up a story that fast. Not one you’d go along with, anyway.”

  “We cleaned toilets at the store for two weeks after that,” Katie said to Dexter, hoping he saw justice as served.

  He pulled her into the doorway and spoke into her ear. “I’m here to ask your mother’s hand, I mean, ask for your hand in marriage. I thought you’d want to start wearing your ring right away, and what kind of fiancé would I be if I didn’t come down and ask properly?”

  “That was sweet,” she said truthfully.

  “I wanted to meet your family first too.”

  “What do you think?”

  “They’re very . . . very friendly.”

  Eileen, eavesdropping from the porch, laughed at his composure. “What’s the matter, Dex? It’s like you’ve got sand in your oysters. You’re in New Orleans, loosen up!”

  He stared at his watch again. “I’m sorry, Katie. I wasn’t expecting all this ruckus. It threw me off my game. Then you drive up with Luc. Did you spend the entire day with him?” His jaw clenched. “When you weren’t here, I got worried I’d made an error in judgment. I called Pastor earlier.”

  “You called Pastor?”

  Dex paced the entryway. His expensive shoes clicked on Mam’s hardwood floors as guests separated like the Red Sea. Dex turned back around and took her by the arm into the foyer. “I just got nervous. I’d expected to surprise you, and instead you surprised me. And what are you wearing, anyway?”

  “You got nervous? About what? That your girlfriend was missing? Or that your schedule, which you didn’t make me aware of, was rearranged?” She drew in a deep breath. If she was honest, it was her own guilt that forced her to snap at Dexter. He had every right to expect her to be at her mam’s, not with Luc off on one of her jaunts. And it was sweet of him to go out of his comfort zone and surprise her.

  “Katie, you’re making a scene. I was worried about you.” He gazed around him, as if he noticed the crowd for the first time.

  She looked outside onto the gallery. If she’d made any sort of scene, no one but Dexter seemed to notice. “I’m sorry, Dexter. It’s been a long day. Lot of emotion since yesterday. I need to tell you about something.”

  “I wanted to surprise you, Katie,” he said warmly. “I’m doing my best to romance you. I’m clumsy at this sort of thing, but it doesn’t mean I love you any less.”

  “Of course not. I know that, Dex.”

  “Your mom’s having some kind of party. I think I should come back tomorrow when the house is quieter, so we can talk.”

  She nodded. She felt her h
eart thump in her throat, upset that they hadn’t really solved anything. When Dexter didn’t get his way, he generally threw a quiet, irritated tantrum or began negotiations to convince her of his side. His voice was always so measured, his demeanor so stoic—she’d never noticed until now, when they had an audience. She was Irish. When her family threw a tantrum, you good and well knew it.

  He stepped into the hallway and withdrew a single black suitcase. “I need to get some sleep. Irene,” he said to Mam, “may I borrow the phone to call a cab?”

  “A cab? Where’re you going? Don’t we have the beer you like or something?”

  “No,” Dex said. “I’m tired. I wanted to head to the hotel.”

  “Hotel?” Mam squealed. “Listen, I’ve slept twenty in a shotgun row house. No guest of mine is staying in a hotel.”

  Dexter raised his suitcase. “I’ve got a load of work to do tonight. I want to have an important conversation with you in the morning.” He slapped his suitcase. “Want to be in top form.”

  Mam grabbed at his suitcase, which Dexter wouldn’t relinquish. The two of them stood there, locked in a battle of wills.

  “Dexter, you may as well let go,” Katie said. “My mother’s not going to let you go to a hotel.”

  “I have a reservation,” Dex said.

  And Mam let go of the suitcase, just like that. Katie had never seen a guest win that particular battle with her mam, and she knew what it meant. Mam wanted him to go. The air rushed from her lungs. At home, Dexter fit so perfectly into her life. How could a change of locale make them so vastly different?

  Her mother reached for the phone. “I’ll call you a cab, Dexter.”

  “Very good.” He glanced at his watch again. “Heavens, it’s hot here.” He tugged at his collar.

  “Get that tie off, for one thing.” Katie started to unfasten it, but he brushed her hands away.

  “What time will you be free tomorrow for me to express my wishes to your mother and stepfather?”

  “I don’t know.” She shrugged. “Mam, what’s the schedule for tomorrow?”