by Cathy Holton
Fine. If he wasn't here, she'd use the next best thing. She'd do whatever she had to do, given the circumstances. Meditation sure as hell wasn't working. She stuffed the cell phone back under the sofa cushions and went upstairs to find her vibrator. She had named it Milton, which probably wasn't a healthy thing, she knew, but over the years, during two trial separations from Trevor, she had grown quite fond of the little machine. She rummaged around in the bathroom drawers for a while before finally locating it behind a stack of towels in the linen closet. Since she and Trevor had reconciled and moved to New Orleans, she hadn't had much need for Milton. It lay in its little box, patient and gleaming and ready for love.
Eadie lay down in her big empty bed and thought about Richard Arcenaux. She thought about his dark eyes and his full lower lip. She closed her eyes and imagined his arms around her. She imagined kissing his mouth. Ea-die. Do you want a po' boy?
Too bad meditation wasn't this easy.
She had just switched Milton on when she heard a sound deep within the house. The ghosts were back. She kept her eyes closed and imagined Richard climbing the stairs, two at a time, young and strong and eager. She heard a soft sliding sound but she refused to open her eyes, afraid she might see something otherworldly shimmering in the doorway.
“Eadie. What in the hell are you doing?”
Trevor stood in the doorway, looking tall and blond and handsome. His hair had grown shaggy around his ears and there was several days' growth of beard on his face. That's what the Vikings looked like stepping off the long boats, Eadie thought, shivering and pressing her knees together. She turned the vibrator off and sat up on her elbows.
“What does it look like I'm doing?” she said. “I'm pleasuring myself with Milton.”
“I thought I told you to get rid of that damn thing,” he said.
“You can't honestly tell me you're jealous of a mechanical object,” she said, but he was already striding across the room and before she could react, he had taken Milton and unceremoniously tossed it out one of the opened French doors. They heard a distant clattering sound as Milton landed on the bricked patio.
Eadie recovered quickly after that. She flung a pillow at his head, followed by a picture frame, an alarm clock, and a magazine. Each time he ducked and advanced closer to the bed, grinning.
“I've been trying to reach you for six hours,” he said. “Why don't you answer your cell phone? Or the house phone, for that matter?”
She looked around, trying to figure out what else she could throw. “I thought you were calling to tell me you weren't coming home.”
“Well, actually, sweetheart, I was calling to see if you wanted to go out to dinner tonight. But I can see you have other plans for this evening.”
“You flatter yourself.”
He grinned. “I don't think so,” he said.
“I've been alone for four days, peckerhead,” she said. “Shut up in this big old house while you were off doing God knows what.”
“Is a Georgia Homecoming Queen allowed to call her husband a peckerhead? Because I'm thinking, no. I'm thinking that might be grounds for impeachment or crown recall or whatever it is they do to bad homecoming queens.” He pulled his shirt over his head and stepped out of his shoes.
“And I don't much like what you did to Milton,” Eadie said. She leaned over on her stomach to reach for another picture frame, but Trevor, taking advantage of a lull in the action, grabbed her by the feet and pulled her toward him.
“Did you miss me?” he said.
She flipped over on her back and aimed another kick at his head but he caught her feet easily and held them with one hand while he deftly pulled her yoga pants over her hips with the other. Eadie, who was ticklish, giggled.
“I'm going to take that as a yes,” he said. He stood up and unbuckled his belt. Eadie, released, scrambled up against the headboard. “Don't think it's going to be that easy,” she said, trying to sound bored. She wasn't fooling anyone. Looking at her husband, she could see why women threw themselves at him at cocktail parties.
“It's a good thing I got home when I did,” he said, shaking his head like a doctor diagnosing a serious condition. “It looks like I got here just in time.”
“Just in time for what?” she said, and aimed another kick at his head.
“Just in time for this.” He grinned and grabbed her ankles and pulled her toward him. He said, “You know I can do things Milton can't.”
Of course he was right. After awhile there was no denying the truth of this statement. Eadie didn't even try.
————
FOUR DAYS BEFORE HER WEDDING, NITA ARRIVED HOME TO FIND Jimmy Lee and Whitney in the yard playing ball with Otis, the black Labrador. Jimmy Lee was holding the ball over his head and Whitney was leaning against his chest, trying to take it from him. Otis bounced around their feet, barking. Nita was amazed at how much Whitney had grown. She was tall for twelve. Almost as tall as Jimmy Lee. A few more inches and she wouldn't have any trouble taking the ball away from him.
He saw Nita and waved, flinging the ball toward the lake. Otis dutifully went after it. Whitney glanced over her shoulder and, seeing her mother, frowned and punched Jimmy Lee in the shoulder with her fist. Nita tried not to read too much into the disappointment she saw on her daughter's face. Her relationship with Whitney had grown prickly over the past year, but surely that was normal. Nita and her own mother had never had an adversarial relationship, but Nita had read enough books on child-rearing to know that sullen teenage girls were as common as ticks on a hound dog.
Whitney thumped Jimmy Lee on the head, and he began tickling her. It was an old game of theirs. Nita climbed slowly out of the car. She had left them in charge of stringing the wires the Japanese lanterns would hang from, but she could only see one lone wire running from the porch soffit to a distant pine tree. “I thought I told y'all to get those strung up,” she said, pointing.
“We're taking a break,” Whitney screeched, in between her giggles.
“Don't sass your mother,” Jimmy Lee said. He let go of her and walked toward Nita, smiling. A slight breeze ruffled his dark hair. He wore faded blue jeans and a T-shirt that read Motes Construction across the front. Whitney thumped him between his broad shoulder blades, trying to draw his attention, but he ignored her. He picked Nita up in his arms and spun her around.
“Are you ready to take the plunge, Miss James?” He never used her married name. It was as if he wanted to forget that part of her life had ever happened. He didn't mind that she had children, he just didn't like thinking about her being married to another man.
“I guess I am, Mr. Motes,” she said, kissing him lightly, thinking she must be one of the luckiest brides alive to have a husband as young and handsome as he was.
“Motes,” Whitney screeched. “What kind of a stupid name is that?”
He set Nita on her feet and kissed her hungrily. Whitney shot her a murderous look and stalked past them toward the house. He was still kissing Nita when the door slammed, hard, behind them.
He looked up then. “What's wrong with her?” he said.
She put her hands on both sides of his face and gave him a little shake. “She's gotten too big for tickling.”
“Does anyone ever get too big for tickling?” he said, pinching her side.
“Stop that,” she said. He'd cut his hair and it lay neatly against the nape of his neck. He'd always worn it long before, shoulder length, like a pirate or a Creek warrior, and she'd liked that, but this was nice, too. “Did Lavonne call?”
“She did. She said they'd deliver the tables and chairs on Friday morning.”
“I sure hope it doesn't rain.”
“The Weather Channel says Saturday will be clear and sunny.”
Nita looked beyond him to the yard littered with wire and tools and dog toys. A rusty patio table with four chairs and a sagging umbrella sat under a chinaberry tree. “Just remember it was your idea to have a wedding. It was your idea to have it in th
e backyard.”
“Hey.” He put his finger under her chin and lifted it gently. “It's gonna be okay. You have to have a little faith, is all.”
She smiled but her throat felt tight. “I'm sorry,” she said. “It's just prenuptial jitters.”
“Everything will be fine. You'll see.” He dropped his head to nuzzle her neck but Nita protested. She put her hand on his chest and stared at him until he stopped grinning.
“I'm happy,” she said. “I'm happy and I don't want to jinx it. I don't want anything to change.”
He shook his head slowly. “It's not gonna change, baby, it's only gonna get better.”
She put her hand up to his cheek. “Promise?” she said softly.
He grinned lazily, tightening his arms around her. “I promise, Mrs. Motes,” he said, leaning to bite her earlobe.
LAVONNE FINISHED THE 941 REPORTS AND WENT OUT FRONT TO relieve Little Moses so he could take a cigarette break. The lunch crowd had thinned considerably, rain was bad for tourism, and the new girl, Maureen, had no trouble handling the few customers that remained. Lavonne took out her checklist and went down the column carefully. She had ordered the chicken and the beef for Nita's wedding barbecue, and the tables and chairs were set to be delivered on Friday. Nita was expecting around seventy-five guests and she had insisted on a simple menu and red-checked tablecloths because she had had the fancy wedding before, and look how well that turned out. Everything was on schedule and Lavonne was glad because Eadie was arriving tomorrow and she seemed to be in a hard-drinking kind of mood. God only knew how much work she'd get done once Eadie got here.
The bell on the front door rang and Lavonne looked up. “Hello,” she said. “Can I help you?”
He pushed the hood of his rain jacket back and wiped his brow, smiling apologetically. “Sorry,” he said. “I don't mean to drip water all over your freshly waxed floor.”
She shrugged. “That's what mops are for.” He had been in before, his face looked familiar.
“It always takes me a minute to decide,” he said, leaning over the counter. “Everything looks so good.”
“Well, everything is good,” Lavonne said. “I can vouch for that.”
He grinned. He was about forty-five, Lavonne was guessing; not tall, but the kind of man who kept himself in good shape. He wore no wedding ring. “Let me have a dozen of the dinner rolls,” he said. “And a loaf of the sourdough bread, sliced.”
Little Moses stuck his head out of the swinging door and said, “I'll get it.” She wiped down the counter while Little Moses went in the back to slice a sourdough loaf.
The man watched her work, still smiling. He had laugh lines at the corners of his eyes. Lavonne liked that. A man with laugh lines in his face couldn't be all bad. “Lavonne,” he said, reading her name tag. “That doesn't sound Jewish.”
“I'm not Jewish,” she said. “But my partner is.”
He stuck his hand across the counter. “Joe Solomon,” he said.
Lavonne shook hands with him. “Lavonne Zibolsky.”
“You don't sound like a native.”
“Neither do you.”
He laughed and dropped his hand. “I'm from New York originally. Upstate. I got transferred down here about six months ago.”
“I'm from Cleveland. Originally. But I've been here almost twenty years.”
“Wow. You must like it.”
“I'm getting used to it. I've learned to mash a button and carry someone to the store, if you know what I mean.”
“Very impressive.” He crossed his arms over his chest and looked at her as if he were trying to read something in her face. “Let me guess,” he said. “You followed a husband down here and you both liked it so much you refused a transfer to Minneapolis or Chicago or Buffalo or someplace else where it snows twelve feet a year.”
“I followed him,” Lavonne said. “He left. I stayed.”
Little Moses came out with the sliced sourdough loaf and Lavonne pointed Joe toward the register. He followed her, pulling his wallet out of his back pocket.
“I don't know how you do it,” he said, as she rang him up.
“Do what?”
“Stay so slim. If I worked here I'd weigh three hundred pounds.”
Lavonne was dismayed to find herself blushing. She stuffed the loaf of bread and the rolls quickly into a bag. “I hope your family enjoys the bread,” she said, handing it to him.
“My family?” He grinned, taking the bag from her and shoving it down the front of his rain jacket. “It's just me,” he said.
Lavonne smiled and went back to wiping down the counter.
At the door, he turned around and looked at her. “Same time next week?” he said.
“I'll be here,” she said.
He grinned and went out, the door closing softly on his heels.
VIRGINIA HAD BEEN TRYING FOR WEEKS TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO wrangle an invitation to Nita's wedding, so it was a special bit of luck when she ran into Nita at the grocery store the Wednesday before the ceremony. She had not seen Nita in months, and Virginia almost didn't recognize her. She looked so young and fresh, not like she had looked when she was married to Charles. Then she had looked pale and worn. Virginia supposed Nita's new look probably had something to do with the young handyman she was marrying. In Virginia's day, of course, such a thing would have been scandalous, but it was a sign of the times, she supposed, that everything seemed to be changing. Even here in the Bible Belt, a woman could run off and leave her husband of sixteen years just because she wasn't happy. She could take up with a man thirteen years her junior and no one thought anything of it.
“Yoo-hoo, Nita!” Virginia said, smiling and waving her hand. She pushed her cart in front of Nita's, effectively blocking any escape.
Nita, startled, put down a grapefruit and smiled bravely at her ex-mother-in-law. “Virginia,” she said calmly. “How are you?”
Virginia smiled, showing a line of tiny white teeth. “Oh, I'm fine,” she said. Nita's eyes slid past her to the grapefruits. “And how are the children? I had hoped to see them at my wedding. Charles said something about them being … indisposed.”
Nita looked uncomfortable. This barb had found its mark surely and swiftly, as Virginia had known it would. “Yes. About that,” Nita said, glancing at Virginia and then again at the grapefruits. Color crept into her cheeks and along the line of her brow. “They had planned on coming to your wedding, of course, but then something came up. …” Her voice trailed off helplessly. Nita had always been a bad liar and it appeared her skills at deception had not improved over the past year. Virginia wondered how in the world she had managed to pull off whatever trickery she had used to crush Charles into submission. Any fool could read Nita's intention in her face. But then again, Virginia thought unpleasantly, I didn't see an ambush coming, either. She stood watching her ex-daughter-in-law flounder around beneath her sharp steely gaze like a moth pinned to a mounting board.
Nita cleared her throat and tried again. “I've been meaning to bring them by. They've gotten so big you'd hardly recognize them. And Logan's driving now. He just got his license.” She picked up a grapefruit. “I assumed Charles would bring them by to see you on one of his custody weekends, and I've been so busy planning …” She stopped. Color flooded her face. “I'm back in school, you know. My days are pretty crazy.”
“But of course, you've been so busy planning the wedding and all,” Virginia murmured. “Didn't I hear that you were getting remarried?” This barb also found its mark.
Nita put one hand on her forehead and rubbed the worry lines that appeared there suddenly. “You know, I've been meaning to call you about that,” she began hesitantly.
“Don't these look good?” Virginia said, picking up a grapefruit.
“I've gotten so busy planning the wedding and being back in school and all.”
“Two for a dollar,” Virginia said, sniffing the grapefruit. “Doesn't that seem a little expensive?”
“But I had
you on my list to call.”
“When I was a child, you could buy a whole bag of grapefruits for a dollar.”
“I thought since you hadn't seen the children in a while …”
“Oranges, too,” Virginia said.
“I thought you might like to attend the wedding,” Nita said flatly.
“Oh, I'd just love to.” Virginia put the grapefruit down and smiled her most charming smile.
Later that night, at dinner, she told Redmon about the invitation to Nita's wedding.
“Aw, honey, you're not planning on going to that are you?” Redmon said. He sat with his elbows on the table, a knife in one hand and a fork in the other, hunkered down over his plate like a hyena guarding a freshly killed wildebeest.
“Of course I'm going,” Virginia snapped, trying not to watch him eat. “Why wouldn't I go?” She was curious to see the life Nita had made for herself after giving up a half-million-dollar house in the suburbs and a country club membership all in the name of love. Running into her in the grocery store had been a personal coup. Virginia was glad to know she still had the power to manipulate her ex-daughter-in-law into doing things she didn't want to do. Now if she could only figure out some way to manipulate her husband.
Redmon was proving more difficult to train than Virginia had originally anticipated. She had expected, after a few days, to have him well in hand, and here it was nearly a week later and he still insisted on slurping his soup and telling off-color jokes at the dinner table. He still persisted, for some unknown reason, in calling her “Queenie” and slapping her on the rear end whenever she was within striking distance.
“But Queenie,” Redmon said, opening his mouth to reveal a mass of half-chewed pot roast. “I thought after what them girls done to your boy, Charles, you wouldn't want to go to that wedding.”
Virginia leaned forward. “What did they do to him?” she asked grimly.
Redmon grinned and smacked his oily lips. “Now, baby doll, you know I can't tell you that. You know what happens in Montana, stays in Montana.”