This particular morning, the town is buzzing with excitement about Beanie Bradsher winning the lotto from the Super Kwik market downtown.
“Shoot, I bought two quick picks the same day. I knew I shoulda bought ten a’ them things,” Randy Kerner shook his head sadly and sipped his tepid coffee.
“I heard it was the Powerball she won,” Clyde Owensby said.
“How much she get?” Mac McConnell asked.
“I heard it was over a hun’erd thousand,” Eustace Falwell said as he approached the table, swiping his hat from his head as he slid into the nearest empty chair.
“Lord, Useless, where’d you hear that. Wadn’t but twenty thousand,” Clyde said.
“She got more’n that,” Randy said. “LouWanda Crump is hittin’ her up for a contribution to the Historical Society.”
“Hope she don’t get the big head with all that money,” Mac said. “We count on Beanie’s sewing skills down at the Rotary. She made thirty blankets for our last orphanage project.”
“I didn’t know she belonged to the Rotary.” Eustace said, his eyes lighting up with interest.
“She don’t, Useless. She just volunteers for us, so don’t get any big ideas.” Mac rolled his eyes and looked around for the waitress.
Sissy Reid approached waving a coffee pot in salute. Four hands answered, raising cups to be filled.
“Y’all still talkin’ about Miss Beanie?” Sissy asked, deftly filling each mug without spilling a drop. “Useless, you eatin’ this mornin’?”
“Yes, Ma’am,” Eustace grinned. “I’ll have a short stack with sausage.”
“Gotcha,” she replied. “Anyone else need anything?”
Five hands waved her away in unison.
“Y’all keep it down to a dull roar, ya hear?” Sissy admonished. “I’m sure Miss Beanie doesn’t want her business broadcast down the road and back.”
Sissy hustled to the kitchen shaking her head as she heard the old boys debating the size of Beanie Bradsher’s winnings even as she walked away. They didn’t hear a word she said or, if they did, they ignored her as usual.
At 6:30, Suvi Jones parked his Chevy truck in front of the café, grabbed a couple of quarters from the cup holder and made a run for it. The rain started about the time he woke up – 6:00 a.m. sharp, as always. It was only a few steps from his truck to shelter, but he needed to grab a newspaper from the machine by the front door and his size outclassed the roof’s slight overhang. By the time he made it inside, his back was drenched.
“Mornin’ Suve! I gotcha over there,” Sissy pointed at a cup of coffee and small metal pitcher of milk parked at a booth in the corner.
Suvi grinned and raised his newspaper in a kind of wave. Sissy decided where he sat every morning. If it weren’t already taken, he’d be at his usual spot, close enough to the coffee pot to refill his own cup if it got too hectic for Sissy to keep up. His table was taken by a trucker this morning.
“Whatcha havin’?” Sissy asked from across the room.
“Scrambled with bacon,” Suvi replied, fanning out the sports page as he angled his huge frame onto the red vinyl bench seat. She knew everything else he wanted. No need to tell her he liked his bacon cooked well done, or his toast dry or the side of pancakes he ate every day no matter what style of eggs he chose. He rarely missed a breakfast at the café, even though it was technically his competition. The Big Pig opened each day at 11:00 a.m., though, and the only eggs he cooked were boiled for the chef salad.
Within minutes Sissy reappeared, plates stacked across her arm and a coffee pot in her right hand. He didn’t know how she did it, but he wished many a time he could get her to come to work for him. She was fast, pleasant, efficient and reliable, but he did not dare offer her a job. Edwina, a distant cousin and long-time friend, would never forgive him.
“Did you hear the news?” Sissy asked.
Suvi raised the sports page over his head, leaving room for her to situate his food and warm his coffee.
“Which news?”
“About Beanie winnin’ the lotto the other night,” Sissy said. “Some folks is sayin’ she won over a million dollars, but you know how it is around here. You buy a pork roast for Sunday dinner and folks’ll have you ownin’ a pig farm before the day’s done.”
“You got that right,” Suvi laughed. “And, yeah, I heard.”
“Miz LouWanda was sayin’ she was gonna see if she could get Beanie to make a donation to the Historical Society. You know they’re trying to fix up the old drugstore downtown.”
“Mmm-hmm—donated to that one myself. Good cause.” Suvi was already back to reading the paper, but he could talk and scan the stats at the same time and Sissy was undaunted.
“If I were Beanie, I know exactly what I’d do with that money,” Sissy said wistfully.
“What’s that?” Suvi asked, peering over the top of the paper.
“If I won the lotto, I’d buy me a big ol’ house in the mountains,” Sissy said.
“Really? And leave Mayhew Junction?”
“Well, maybe I’d come back every now and again, just to parade my fancy car down Main Street. Reckon she’ll finally get her own car?”
“Wouldja look at that?” Suvi said, squinting at the small print of his newspaper. “Looks like we may be headed for a back-to-back.”
There was also no need to tell Sissy who “we” were, or to shoo her away from the table. In Mayhew Junction, there was only one team, and not just because Suvi played there, either.
“I’ll check on ya in a minute,” Sissy said and headed for the round table, where several of the men, unaccustomed to seeing the bottom of their coffee cups, were staring forlornly in her direction.
“Oh, stop poutin’, ya big babies,” Sissy fussed. “I’m comin’. God forbid you should have to get up and pour your own.”
3
Sweet Lee Atwater
“Tater, get back here this minute!”
Sweet Atwater’s youngest son was half-way down the block, still on the sidewalk, but peering hopefully over the curb for any sign of stray candy that might be lingering after the Founder’s Day parade on Saturday. His light brown hair, buzzed close to his head once a month whether it needed it or not, glowed yellow gold in the morning sun.
“Tater! Dad-gummit, boy, don’t make me come after you!”
Sweet held three-year-old Daisy in one arm as she wrestled with the keys to the front door of Sweet Lee’s Dress Emporium in downtown Mayhew Junction. The three-story brick building was a bit on the dilapidated side, but what little work Sweet could get Bubba John to do on it was sufficient for now. She bought the whole building with the idea of having her husband remodel it in his spare time. The only problem she’d found was the gaping chasm between their definitions of spare. This morning was a perfect example. Normally he was on hand to help her get their children fed and dressed so she could drive them into town to catch the bus from her shop. There was a school bus stop about three-quarters of a mile from their house, but theirs was the first stop on the morning route. Catching the bus in town allowed everyone forty-five more minutes of sleep. Lately though, Bubba John was up and out of the house before Sweet rolled out of bed. Her day never started out well trying to herd five kids on her own.
“B-Kay! Come gitcher sister. I gotta go get that boy again.”
“Aw, Mama! I’m puttin’ on my makeup. The bus will be here any second.”
B-Kay complained loudly, but slid from the front seat of their old minivan.
“Here!” Sweet said dumping Daisy into her arms. “Thanks, Baby. I’ll be right back.”
B-Kay sighed and used a make-up smudged baby wipe to scrub the dried snot from Daisy’s cheek.
“Tater! I’m tellin’ you what, Son, I am gonna tear you up.” Sweet’s voice carried easily down the two blocks Tater traveled. “B-Kay! Wake your brother up. I hear the bus comin’.”
B-Kay plopped Daisy down on the front seat of the car and slid the back door open.
“Mama says time to get up, Tee.” B-Kay said, poking her twin brother with her foot when he didn’t respond.
“T-Ray! Get up. GET UP! The bus is comin’ around the corner! For cryin’ out loud, Mama, I only got one eye done and this lump of horse poop won’t even wake up!”
B-Kay leaned across Daisy and pushed hard on the center of the steering wheel. The car sounded like a cow in distress as B-Kay pumped the horn over and over. Finally, T-Ray rolled out of the side door, groggily pulling his backpack with him.
“All right, already. Jeez, B! What’s up your ass this morning?”
T-Ray wiped at his mouth where drool puddled in one corner. The two eldest Atwater children were twins by birth, but that’s where the similarities ended. More than one person pointed out the fairly obvious fact that B-Kay took after her mama, and T-Ray was a bit more laid back like his father.
“T-Ray, watch your mouth, Son.” Sweet said, dragging her youngest son to a halt at the car door before stooping to tie his shoe.
“Well, tell B-Kay to lay off then,” T-Ray muttered, more to himself than his mother.
“I told her to wake you up. She’s already doin’ what I told her to do. Tate, zip up your zipper. T-Ray, get Tater’s backpack outta the car and tell Bitty to get hers, too. Where is that child? Bitty! Oh, my Lord. Has anyone seen Bitty?”
No one moved or uttered a word, but stood looking at each other with open-mouthed stupor. Everyone except B-Kay, who scooped Daisy up, sat back down in the front seat and proceeded to apply makeup over the head of the docile toddler.
“Where in the world is that child?” Sweet stuck her head into the minivan, lifting a half dozen coats in the rear seat hoping her quiet second grader was asleep beneath them.
“Did anyone see Bitty get into the car this morning? Sweet wounded Jesus, did I leave her again?”
“She was here a few minutes ago. I saw her myself,” B-Kay said, dusting her cheeks with powdered blush for the third time that morning.
Just then the bus rounded the corner, its brakes protesting as it squealed to a stop in front of them. T-Ray grabbed Tater by the arm and headed toward the waiting bus.
“I got this one, Mama. You’re on your own with the girls.” T-Ray said, trudging up the bus steps.
B-Kay thrust the baby back into her mother’s arms and grabbed her purse. “Maybe Bitty’s inside. I heard her say something about having to pee.”
“Tell that driver to wait, then,” Sweet said.
“She ain’t waitin’, Mama. You know she ain’t.” B-Kay said.
“Then walk slow,” Sweet said as she poked her head into the store and hollered for Bitty.
“What are you yellin’ about, Mama?”
Elizabeth Atwater climbed slowly from beneath the back seat, brushing crumbs and dirt from her t-shirt and jeans. The generous spray of freckles across her nose and cheeks were the exact same color of her ginger hair which hung in side braids to just below her shoulders.
“What in the world? What were you doing under there? Never mind – don’t answer that. Get on that bus right now, young lady! B-Kay! Gitcher sister!” Sweet hollered at her oldest daughter’s retreating backside.
“Come on, Bitty,” B-Kay called over her shoulder, and Bitty dutifully followed her onto the bus.
“Oh, my Lord, those kids’ll be the death of me.” Sweet moaned.
Normally her next stop would be the daycare, but Daisy hadn’t fully recovered from a stomach virus, so she decided to keep her out another day, which may not have been the best move, considering how the day was shaping up.
“I gotta go potty,” Daisy said, looking up at her frazzled mother.
“Hang on, baby,” Sweet said and sighed. “I gotta close this car up.”
Sweet looked at the van and shook her head in disgust. Clothing and shoes and bags of half-eaten potato chips spilled from the doors as if the car had vomited. She couldn’t decide whether to lock up the car, or leave it open and pray someone would walk by and steal something out of it. As she stood mulling it over, she felt a warmth spread across her hip and down her leg.
“Daaaayseeeee!” Sweet screeched.
“I go pee-pee.”
“Good thing I own a clothing store, Missy, or you’d be in big trouble right now.”
“I gotta go poop,” Daisy replied.
“Well, you better hold it ‘til we get inside, little girl, ‘cause you will not be watching Dora for a week if you poop on me.”
Sweet yanked the side door to the right and it ground to a stop just shy of fully closed. Sweet shrugged and turned toward the store giving the door a sideways kick that locked it into place.
Beanie Bradsher
When I was a little girl, my daddy used to take me to the Golden Oldies Matinee over in Taylor County. We never had a movie theatre here, long as I can remember. Anyways, we had a date, every Saturday morning, come hell or high water, and the water rises a lot in this county.
Sometimes we’d see The Lone Ranger, or cartoons or what-not, but my favorite was Roy Rogers. He was so handsome and gallant, a lot like my daddy. I loved that Palomino horse Trigger, and the dog Bullet, but the best part was his beautiful wife Dale Evans. I always wanted to be just like her, that gleaming white smile and pretty outfits. Best of all, she had Roy.
I don’t remember when we stopped going to the movies together. I think it happened kinda gradual-like. Daddy started travelin’ some and didn’t always come home of a weekend. Mama got snappish and she never wanted to take me no ways. I got into high school and took a sewing class in home economics and I learned that I could be anything I wanted to be, including Dale Evans, if I just dressed right. Now all my dresses look like Dale’s and my boots and hat always match. I started sellin’ Avon so I could get just the right shade of lipstick to go with my outfits.
Daddy stopped coming home at all and never bought me the pony he promised, so I did the next best thing and bought a bicycle. I ain’t never drove a car in my life and don’t plan on learnin’. Never once in all them Saturdays did I ever see Roy Rogers drive a car, and what’s good for him is good for me. I’m still waitin’ on somebody like Roy to come along. Maybe somebody who rides a Palomino, or has a dog. It don’t have to be named Bullet. I just want somebody who plans on stayin’.
4
The Château
Beanie was silent almost the entire ride home from Walmart. Will was used to this. Whenever Beanie got tired, she would reserve her energy by not speaking. When his wife was alive, silence meant Marie was unhappy – usually with him, though that was rare. Their marriage was full of conversations and outings and gatherings. It was a good life and they made big plans. The Château was the biggest plan of all; now he was here and she was not.
“Whatcha thinkin’ about?”
The question took Will by surprise. He thought Beanie was asleep.
“Oh, nothing much,” Will said. “The usual.”
“You don’t talk about her much,” Beanie said. “May help, you know.”
“I know, but…” Will sighed then. Beanie thought it felt like a full minute before he took a breath back in.
“I just miss her, that’s all.”
“Must be hard, livin’ here all by yourself. This town ain’t easy. You’re an outsider for life less’n you’re born here. And even still, you know how they say, ‘Just ‘cause a cat has kittens in the oven, it don’t make ‘em muffins.’”
Will smiled. “Oh, I don’t mind the town at all. People were kind to us when Marie got sick. We’d only been here a few months before she started her chemo.”
“How in the world did y’all wind up in Mayhew Junction, for cryin’ out loud?”
“Oh, surely I’ve told you this.” Will sounded tired.
“Not that I recollect,” Beanie said.
“Well,” said Will. “We found Mayhew Junction by accident, really. It was a paddling trip cut short by Hurricane Frances.”
“Oooo, I remember that one. Lotta wind and rain.”
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“Yeah, and not much else, but enough to make us think twice about being on the river.”
“What were y’all doing on the river if Marie was sick?”
“Well, she wasn’t sick then. We’d joined an adventurers’ club in Minnesota. It was an annual trip for the club. Supposed to go from White Springs to Fanning Springs in one week.”
“Long trip,” Beanie said. “I don’t know if I could do that.”
“I know. I wasn’t sure we could either. We’d already traveled a lot. We owned a travel agency, you know.”
Beanie nodded. “I ‘member that part.”
“Natalie was finished with college and starting her own career. Marie wanted some excitement – something different, she said.
“To tell the truth, I was kind of tired. I’d have been happy staying home, but Marie was always our social planner - parties with friends, trips to the theatre, season tickets to all the Vikings games.”
“Man,” Beanie said, staring wistfully out of the window. “I can’t even dream of anything like that. I wouldn’t know what to imagine.”
“I’ve seen a lot, that’s for sure. But, it was the river. We just fell in love with it. We weren’t terribly outdoorsy, other than piddling in our garden. We joined the adventurer’s club on a whim. Gosh, if you told me Marie and I would be sleeping in tents, in campsites with no running water or flushing toilets, I’d say no way. But there we were, kayaking down the Suwannee River in October. Amazing. And I remember thinking that I had never seen Marie looking so happy and alive as she did out on that water.”
Will cleared his throat twice, then sat silently watching the road.
“I’m sorry I never met her.” Beanie said.
“I’m sorry, too. You’d have liked her, I think. Always talking, always planning and admiring things. She adored The Château. That’s why we bought it.”
What Matters in Mayhew (The Beanie Bradsher Series Book 1) Page 2