“Didn’t you tell me you liked Italian food?” he said over Grace Slick’s wails.
Italian came out “Eye-talian.” He was constantly mangling the English language. Why hadn’t it bothered her before?
“Yes,” Mrs. Tobias said, holding on to the dash as the truck trundled out of the parking lot.
“Good, because I’m going to take you to one of my favorite restaurants tonight.”
They ended up at Moretti’s House of Cannelloni, a chain restaurant that featured heavy, sauce-laded Italian dishes like spaghetti and lasagna. When Mrs. Tobias had said she favored Italian food, she meant the lighter cuisine of Tuscany, dishes seasoned with fresh herbs, lemons, and capers. But Rusty probably wasn’t aware of the distinction.
“Excuse me, I need to visit the little boy’s room,” Rusty said shortly after they’d been seated in the eatery.
After he left, Mrs. Tobias took stock of her surroundings. On a far wall there was a watercolor mural of a gondola drifting through Venice. “O Sole Mio” played in the background, and each red-checkered table blazed with candles stuck in Chianti bottles. Moretti’s certainly won’t get any points for originality, she thought as she unfolded a napkin on her lap.
“Anything striking your fancy?” Rusty asked as he returned to their table.
“I don’t know.” Mrs. Tobias put down the oversized menu. “Maybe Bruno’s Caesar Salad.”
“Is that all? I’m going to have Mama Moretti’s Pasta Sampler. I could eat a horse.”
Mrs. Tobias noticed a group of servers assembling around a nearby table. A kazoo sounded, and they launched into an Italian song, presumably “Happy Birthday.” Mrs. Tobias pitied the poor red-faced birthday woman who was slowly sinking in her seat, thinking, What an embarrassing display!
A waitress in a white apron set a small loaf of bread on the table and took their orders. When the food came, Mrs. Tobias’s Caesar salad was swimming in dressing, and there wasn’t an anchovy in sight. Rusty dove into his towering plate of Chef Boyardee-like pasta with gusto, splattering tomato sauce on his shirt.
“Tonight’s a very special night,” Rusty said, after he’d devoured about half his food. “Do you know why?”
Before Mrs. Tobias could answer, a phalanx of grinning servers headed in their direction. She glanced behind her in a panic, praying her table wasn’t their intended target. But there was no one seated behind her, and the staff people continued their determined march to her table. What did they want with her? It was at least six months before her birthday.
There were eight of them, and they closed in like lions around a Christian. A kazoo tooted, and their clear, young voices reverberated throughout the restaurant. Every patron’s head swung in her direction, and hundreds of eyes were fixed on her face.
Why are you rubber-necking, she wanted to say. Haven’t you ever seen people sing in a restaurant before? Get back to your overcooked manicotti!
After the torture ended, a baby-faced waiter set a covered silver platter in front of her. The birthday tiramisu, Mrs. Tobias presumed.
“What was that all about?” Mrs. Tobias said, trying to hide her mortification. “It’s not my birthday.”
“No,” Rusty said with a self-satisfied grin. “They were wishing us a happy anniversary. Did you know we’ve been dating now for a whole month?” He lifted his glass of Merlot. “It’s been the best month of my life.”
“I need to visit the powder room.” Mrs. Tobias tossed her napkin on the table.
“Aren’t you going to take a peek?” Rusty asked. He indicated the silver dish the waiter had left behind.
Mrs. Tobias sighed and lifted the lid. There was a small piece of paper underneath.
“Lo sposerete,” it read. Mrs. Tobias didn’t know Italian, so she assumed it meant “Happy anniversary.”
“How sweet,” she said, crumpling the paper and putting it in the pocket of her jeans. “Now if you’ll excuse me—”
“But—” Rusty stammered.
“I’ll be back right back,” she said.
But she wasn’t coming back; she knew that the minute she rose from the table. There was no denying it. She and Rusty didn’t belong together, and she couldn’t bear to tell him and see the hurt in his dark brown eyes. She rushed past the restrooms and headed for the front door. There was a doughnut shop next to the restaurant, and she could call a cab from there.
Mrs. Tobias wiped a tear from her cheek. As much as she hated to admit it, Cecilia was right. Rusty was a dear man, but she simply couldn’t handle the vast differences between them. Tonight’s events had made that glaringly clear. She and Rusty might as well live in different solar systems.
Twenty-Eight
Wal-Mart is not the only saving place.
~ Sign outside Rock of Ages Baptist Church
“Chicken wings, barbecued ribs, and some of them little crock-pot meatballs that Dooley favors,” Attalee recited from a handwritten list. “Sounds yummy, don’t it? Trouble is, ribs are kind of messy. Remind me to tell the caterer to put Wet Ones on all the tables.”
She glared at Mavis, who was at the checkout counter punching figures into an adding machine. “Are you listening to me? I’m talking about the food at my wedding reception. This is important.”
“I’m listening,” Mavis said.
“No, you ain’t,” Attalee said. “You’re still stewing.” She took a pencil from behind her ear and added more items to her list. “Fried mozzarella sticks and nachos. I almost forgot about them. And what’s your opinion on marinated shoe leather? Yea or nay?”
“Sounds delicious,” Mavis said.
“A-ha!” Attalee pointed her pencil at her. “You weren’t listening to me. Quit your moping. It wasn’t that bad.”
Mavis looked up from the adding machine. “A geyser burst from my bra. What could be worse?”
Attalee considered her question for a moment. “Janet Jackson at the Super Bowl. A geyser’s better than a bare nipple, don’cha think?”
“You’re not making me feel better,” Mavis said.
“Then come here, and let me tell you about my honeymoon,” Attalee said, motioning her over.
Mavis switched off the adding machine, walked to the break area, and dropped into a seat beside Attalee.
“Birdie just flew out of the banquet without saying a word,” Mavis said in a small, strained voice. “She didn’t even apologize to me.”
Attalee ignored Mavis’s comment and stuck the brochure under her nose. “Now it was a toss-up between Pigeon Forge and SOB. But since Dollywood don’t open until late April, Little Pedro won by a sombrero.”
“SOB?” Mavis glanced down at the glossy travel magazine. “South of the Border? That tacky tourist trap off 1-95? You’re not going there for your honeymoon?”
“You never ‘sausage’ a place,” Attalee said, affecting a Mexican accent. “And what do you mean tacky? Roadside America called it ‘one of the seven wonders of American kitsch.’”
“Kitsch means tacky,” Mavis said.
“Well, I don’t care. It says here they got three hundred and five acres of fun.” Attalee pointed to a page in the brochure. “We’ll be staying in the ‘heir-conditioned’ honeymoon suite. Free champagne and waterbeds.”
“What’s there to do?” Mavis asked.
“A whole mess of things. There’s an indoor golf course called the Golf of Mexico, an arcade, fourteen gift stores including an adult-only outlet store,” Attalee said, wagging her eyebrows in a suggestive manner. “Indoor swimming pool, fine dining in the Sombrero Room restaurant, and an elevator up to the two-hundred-foot sombrero tower. You walk around in the brim of the hat and gaze down at the Interstate and miles of loblolly pines.”
“I see,” Mavis said.
“As they say, there’s ‘sometheeng for every Juan,’” Attalee said. “So as long as me and Dooley
can tear ourselves from our king-size waterbed—”
“Time to go back to work.” Mavis stood.
“Wait!” Attalee said. “What’s new with Brew? If you speed things along, maybe we can have us a double wedding.”
“He called last night to see if anyone else had RSVP’d for the reunion. He also told me he was going to be pretty busy this week, finishing up his house. But he promised we’d see each other at the reunion Saturday night.”
“Birdie will have a fit when she sees you paired up with Brew.”
Mavis stuck out her lower lip. “He’s not taking me to the reunion. Brew thought it was best if we went stag since we were the ones who put it all together. But I’m sure I’ll get a dance or two.”
“And Birdie?”
Mavis sighed. “Brew says Birdie keeps throwing herself at him. He’ll probably dance with her out of politeness.”
Attalee grunted. “No one at the reunion will even know he’s your beau.”
“I know he’s my fellow,” Mavis said, retying the apron of her uniform. “And that’s what’s important. And when this reunion is over, Brew and I will have the time to be a real couple.”
Twenty-Nine
Work is the curse of the drinking classes.
~ Slogan on Dwayne Polk’s t-shirt
Elizabeth and Dorrie sat on the back stoop of Uncle Ray’s saltbox house, watching a warm breeze stir the damp clothes on an old-fashioned metal umbrella-shaped clothesline. Dorrie wore a pair of cork sandals and a dark cotton shift, while Elizabeth sweated in her long-sleeved black turtleneck, wool skirt, and tights. Dry Branch was over a hundred miles south of Cayboo Creek, and Elizabeth had forgotten how much warmer the weather could be. Spring hadn’t officially begun, but the temperature was seventy-five degrees. The two cousins had been eager to escape the hordes of people who’d gathered in the tiny house after Ray’s memorial service.
“Remember how we buried a time capsule in the backyard near the tire swing?” Dorrie asked.
“I do remember,” Elizabeth said. Her eyes swept the overgrown grass. “You think it’s still out there?”
“Nope,” Dorrie said. “We buried a Ferris Bueller video, and I got bored about a week afterwards and dug it up.”
Elizabeth laughed. “What else did we have in there? I don’t remember.”
“Let’s see,” Dorrie said, cocking her head in thought. “A Rainbow Bright doll, bald as a billiard ball; a Cyndi Lauper poster; a pack of those trashy trading cards we used to collect. What were they called?”
“Garbage Pail Kids.” Elizabeth giggled into her hand. “I had all of them, and they were so disgusting. Meemaw always threatened to throw them away, so I’d hide them underneath my mattress.”
“Those were the days.” Her cousin tilted her head toward the sky. The day had started out overcast, with a backdrop of gray clouds. Now golden veins of sunlight seeped through the haze.
“I had big dreams back then.” Dorrie poked a twig into the dirt, her face obscured by a sheet of dark hair. “First, I wanted to be a roadie for Duran Duran. Do you remember that?”
“Yes,” Elizabeth said. “And I wanted to be a soap-opera star on General Hospital.”
Dorrie jabbed Elizabeth’s arm with her stick. “Because you were all gooey over Jack Wagner.”
“I admit it, but you had a thing for Corbin Bernsen on LA Law.”
“Guilty. I was hot for Corbin, but I wanted to be the Susan Dey character.”
“That’s one dream that came true.”
Dorrie didn’t respond. Instead she dusted the dirt off her hands and stared up at a string of crows on a telephone line. The silence between the cousins stretched for such a long time that Elizabeth feared she’d introduced a taboo subject.
“I was this close to making partner at the law firm,” Dorrie finally said, pinching her index finger and thumb together.
“And?” Elizabeth gently probed.
“And I felt like an imposter.” She whipped her head up and looked at Elizabeth with pained eyes. “Who did I think I was, wearing pinstripes and designer pumps? Sometimes I prepared contracts that involved millions of dollars. It scared me. I was terrified that eventually I was going to be found out.”
“Found out how?”
Dorrie tossed her twig in the dried-out yard. “That I was just plain, old Dorrie Polk from Dry Branch.” She slipped her hands between her knees and exhaled deeply. “Long story short, I came back here one weekend and hooked up with Skip. We had a long-distance relationship for a couple of months, and then I found out I was pregnant. I married Skip, had my kid, and a year later got knocked up again. Finally, I was doing what everyone here expected me to do in the first place. My family never did cozy up to me as a corporate lawyer.”
She flipped her long hair over her shoulder. “I heard you had a high-powered marketing career a while back. Did you find it as hard to escape your small-town upbringing as I did?”
“I wasn’t a marketing executive long enough to feel like an imposter,” Elizabeth said in a drowsy voice. Her eyes were closed and the sun warmed the thin skin of her eyelids, making everything look rosy. “But it probably would have happened to me eventually.”
“I left Atlanta ‘cause I felt like I didn’t belong.” Dorrie rubbed a hand over her swelled belly. “And even though I love Skip and my son, I still feel out of synch in Dry Branch. I just wonder, is there ever going to be a place for me in this world?”
Elizabeth was about to respond when the screen door squeaked open and Skip, who was holding Toby, stuck his head out the door.
“Hon, where’s Toby’s diaper bag? He’s walking around sopping wet.”
Dorrie lifted herself up from the cement stoop with her elbows. “Luckily, I don’t have the time to think too deeply about all this,” she said to Elizabeth with a half-smile. “Real life is constantly interfering.”
The door thwacked shut behind her as Dorrie joined her husband inside the house. Elizabeth continued to bask in the sunlight.
She, too, wondered if she’d ever find her place in this world, one where she would feel comfortable in her own skin. Chiffon had discovered her niche as a photographer. Mavis was happiest when she was running the Bottom Dollar Emporium, and Birdie loved being publisher of the Cayboo Creek Crier. Where was Elizabeth’s place? Would she ever stop feeling so at odds with her lot in life?
The next morning Dwayne, Elizabeth, and Taffy headed for Myrtle Beach with Ray’s ashes stored in a cardboard box in the trunk of the Trans Am. Georgia stayed behind in Dry Branch.
“Myrtle Beach just brings back too many memories of Ray,” she’d said through her tears. “I can’t face it just yet.” The Polks promised her they’d take pictures of the moment when Dwayne tossed the ashes into the waves of the ocean.
Taffy couldn’t wait to get to the beach. At the memorial service, she kept whistling the song “Myrtle Beach Days” under her breath until Dwayne elbowed her in the side, at which point she quickly switched to “Taps.”
Elizabeth had called Timothy a couple of times in the last two days since Ray’s death, but he’d seemed distracted and had kept their conversation brief. Elizabeth missed him, and her arms ached to hold her daughter. Thankfully, Dwayne was planning to scatter his brother’s ashes at sunrise, per Ray’s request, and then they could all head back to Cayboo Creek.
Taffy fidgeted in her seat as they passed the numerous billboards along Highway 501 advertising Myrtle Beach attractions.
“Dolly Parton’s Dixie Stampede, Carolina Opry, Ripley’s Haunted Adventure,” Taffy recited as she passed each sign.
Dwayne, who’d been somber for the last few days, perked up a bit. “Crazy Horse exotic dancers, Gentleman’s Oasis, and A to I Cup Lingerie Shop.” He let out a phlegmy laugh. “I want to see an I cup for myself. Must be one of the seven wonders of the world.”
“Wa
tch the road, Dwayne,” Taffy snapped. “You’re weaving.”
After traveling a few more miles, they entered Myrtle Beach proper with its mishmash of Wings t-shirt shops, themed miniature golf courses, and Calabash Seafood Buffets.
“My blood pressure is dropping ten points just being here in this tropical paradise,” Taffy said with a contented sigh.
“I feel mine rising,” Elizabeth said, after they’d passed miles of highway lined with all-you-can-eat buffets, pancake restaurants, and tourists shops. “Where’s the palm trees and the sand?”
“I think we’ll have to turn off the main drag to see the shore.” Taffy nibbled on an arm of her sunglasses. “There’s a seagull, Dwayne. Follow that bird.”
Unfortunately the seagull, instead of flapping its way to the beach, perched on the roof of a Dunkin’ Donuts. Elizabeth spotted a sign across the street that said “Public beach. One mile.”
“Turn here,” she said, pointing to the sign.
They drove along Ocean Boulevard, which was bordered with hundreds of hotels in saltwater-taffy colors of pink, green, and yellow.
“I’ll choose the hotels from now on,” Taffy said, surveying the offerings as they cruised down the road.
She picked a white high rise called Buccaneer By the Sea, mainly because she saw a Jaguar parked in the registration area.
Dwayne read the sign on the marquee.
“Welcome shaggers.” He reached over the car console to squeeze Taffy’s knee. “I guess that means us, sugar.”
“Hmmph.” Taffy slapped at his hand. “We ain’t in England. If we shag here, it’s going to be to ‘Sixty-Minute Man’ on the dance floor. I wouldn’t mind going out on the town tonight.”
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