The Secret Lives of the Kudzu Debutantes

by Cathy Holton

  They both looked at her with blank expressions on their faces. The clock on the wall ticked like a metronome. “Jennie K,” she said, impatiently. “Virginia Kelly. It fits.”

  Lavonne looked at Eadie. Eadie sat down at the table and poured them all a drink.

  “But how do we prove this?” Eadie said reasonably. “Most of those places didn't even keep birth certificates, much less birth mother records.”

  Lavonne sat down. “Eadie's right,” she said. “A shadowy photograph and a first name aren't proof.”

  Nita sat down and crossed her arms on the table. “She's the only Jennie that was admitted the entire year of 1951.”

  “That still doesn't prove anything,” Lavonne said.

  Nita shrugged. “We're not going to have proof,” she said. “Not legal proof, anyway. Not anything that would hold up in a court of law. But we don't need legal proof to bargain with Virginia. Don't you see? Just the fact that we know her secret, just the fact that we can spread the rumor is enough.”

  “Well, hell, then let's just make something up,” Eadie said. “If all we're trying to do is threaten Virginia with a scandalous rumor campaign, we could just make it up.” She grinned and touched her glass to Lavonne's.

  “I've thought of that,” Nita said seriously. “But I don't think it'll be necessary. To lie, I mean. I think we'll find all the proof we need in Chattanooga.” Eadie and Lavonne stopped grinning.

  Lavonne said, “How do you figure that?”

  Nita pulled out another piece of paper and pushed it toward them. “They didn't keep birth mother records or birth certificates, but they kept employment records. This is a list of all the employees at the Brainerd Home for Unwed Mothers in 1951. I've been down the list and I've contacted everyone I could. Some are dead, and some I couldn't reach, but this lady here”—she pointed with her finger. “This Lorena Potter, she was a nurse at the home in 1951 and she remembers Jennie K well. And she still lives in Chattanooga. All I have to do is show her the photo of Charles and Virginia and ask her if it's the same woman she knew back in 1951.”

  Eadie frowned. “But there are laws about protecting confidentiality,” she said.

  “There are laws for legal adoptions,” Lavonne agreed. “But illegal adoptions are something else.”

  “I told her I was a journalist,” Nita said. “I told her I was writing a book on sex in the 1950s and the shameful way they treated wayward girls. I told her I'd keep her name confidential, that I'd use her as an unnamed source.”

  Lavonne and Eadie stared at Nita in astonishment.

  “Damn, girl,” Eadie said, finally. “Look how you turned out.”

  “We're so proud,” Lavonne said.

  “Desperate times call for desperate measures,” Nita said, gathering her papers. “Y'all want some supper? I can make some meatloaf sandwiches.”

  Eadie shook her head in admiration. “So you're going up to Chattanooga tomorrow to interview this woman?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay,” Eadie said. “I'm going, too. I wouldn't miss this for the world.” She looked at Lavonne.

  “I can't,” Lavonne said. “I've got payroll.”

  “Oh come on, Lavonne, it's a road trip. How long's it been since we had a girls' road trip?”

  “Believe it or not, Eadie, some of us have to work.”

  “But not you. You've got employees. You've got a partner who can do payroll.”

  Lavonne tapped her fingers against the table like she was playing a keyboard, and thought about it. “Okay,” she said finally. She lifted her glass and sipped her Cosmopolitan. “It's not every day a girl gets to act like a hero in a detective novel. It's not every day a girl gets to learn a lesson as big as this one.”

  Eadie said, “Oh yeah? What's the lesson?”

  “Don't fuck with Nita.”

  “Y'all are crazy,” Nita said. “Pour me another drink.”

  THE NEXT DAY THEY GOT AN EARLY START, LEAVING SOUTH GEOR gia around eight-thirty. The day was cool and sunny. Hawks wheeled lazily in the blue sky, gliding above the trees and empty fields. On the CD player, Mary Chapin Carpenter sang about love gone bad.

  “I love this song,” Nita said, tapping her fingers against the steering wheel. She had been telling them about how she and Jimmy Lee had started dating again.

  Lavonne said, “That's great.”

  Eadie said, “Dating? Is that a euphemism for that other word you don't like to use, Nita?”

  Nita smiled but watched the road. “We've been dating since he got back from Kentucky and moved in with his cousin Montel. We never really had a chance to date before. I moved in with him right after the divorce.”

  Lavonne said, “His cousin's name is Montel?”

  Eadie said, “Yeah, we know all that. But what's all this shit about dating?” She was sitting in the back and had her feet propped up on the seat.

  “You know. Going out to dinner, to movies, bowling, stuff like that. Courting the way we would have done in high school. It's called Recommitting to Virginity. I read about it in a book. You and your partner recommit to being virgins and then you rebuild your relationship based on communication instead of sex. It's a growing trend.”

  “If you're going to read self-help books,” Lavonne said, “you might want to try some Carl Jung.”

  “That's the stupidest thing I ever heard,” Eadie said. “Recommitting to Virginity. Hell, if it were that easy I'd recommit to being twenty-two again. I'd recommit to having my nipples point skyward and my thighs be hard as rebar. Who writes this shit?”

  Nita watched her warily in the rearview mirror. “Dr. Lucy Cloud.”

  Eadie snorted. “Dr. Lucy Cloud,” she said. “That sounds like a made-up name to me. I bet she's not even a real doctor. I bet she sent away for one of those Ph.D.s you can get over the Internet.”

  “So you and Jimmy Lee have been celibate since he got back from Kentucky?” Lavonne asked. Now that her own sex life was so prolific, she found it hard to imagine anyone going without. Now that she was dating Joe Solomon, it was easy to forget that she had spent eight years as chaste as a cloistered nun. Only instead of committing to Jesus, she had been committed to Peach Paradise and Rocky Road ice cream.

  “Well,” Nita said, appearing to consider this, “technically we're celibate.”

  “You mean technically as in Bill Clinton's use of the word? As in technically I did not have sexual relations with that woman.”

  Nita giggled. “Something like that,” she said.

  “So what happened?”

  Nita glanced at Lavonne and then back at the road. She giggled again. “Vodka,” she said.

  In the backseat, Eadie was still fuming about Dr. Lucy Cloud and her self-help book. “Recommitting to Virginity, my ass. That's just another way of trying to make women feel guilty about enjoying their sex lives. I thought we got rid of all that shit with the women's movement.”

  “Do y'all want to stop at the Cracker Barrel for lunch?” Nita said.

  Eadie stared her down in the rearview mirror. “Quit changing the sub ject and get back to telling us what happened between you and Jimmy Lee last night.”

  Nita craned her neck, trying to see around a semi truck. “Y'all watch the signs and tell me when we get close to a Cracker Barrel.”

  Eadie said, “You heard me.”

  Lavonne kicked her shoes off and stuck her feet up on the dash. “So does this mean Jimmy Lee is moving back in?”

  “No. I told him he can't move back in until after I get my kids back. As long as Charles thinks me and Jimmy Lee are separated, he'll help me with Virginia.”

  Lavonne stared at Nita. She shook her head slowly. “Let me see if I have this right,” she said finally. “What you're saying is, you're shamelessly using your ex-husband to help you get back at your ex-mother-in-law. You're willing to use any trick necessary, no matter how dirty and underhanded, to get your child back?”

  Nita slid her eyes over to Lavonne and then back to the road.
“That's correct,” she said.

  A pickup truck swung around to pass them. The driver honked and waved.

  “All I've got to say,” Eadie said, “is keep up the good work.”

  “Okay,” Lavonne said, “now you're scaring me.”

  Nita shrugged. She glanced at the truck driver and then back at the road. “Sometimes I scare myself,” she said.

  AFTER LUNCH, LAVONNE DROVE FOR A WHILE AND NITA CLIMBED into the backseat to take a nap. By three o'clock they had entered the foothills of the Appalachians. The afternoon sun was a deep yellow and rode just above the dark tree line to the west. Purple mountains rose in the distance, cloaked in fog. Eadie played with the radio, trying to find a station, but finally gave up and pushed in Mary Chapin Carpenter.

  “Aren't you meeting Trevor this weekend?” Lavonne asked.

  “In Chicago. We've got a suite booked at the Ritz Carlton.”

  “Do you guys come up for air or is it pretty much a three-day romp?”

  “It's pretty much a three-day romp.” Eadie didn't tell her how the last time, in L.A., they'd gotten into a huge fight. Trevor had yelled, “I can't live like this anymore!” and Eadie had gotten up and left in the middle of the night. She didn't tell how they hadn't spoken to each other for six days.

  In the backseat, Nita snored softly. They topped a rise and came down into a long flat valley rimmed with mountains. Mary Chapin sang about passionate kisses.

  “Just think,” Eadie said, grinning. “You and Joe will have the house all to yourselves. You can play Hide the Lizard to your heart's content.”

  Lavonne focused her attention on a point on the distant horizon and tried not to blush. “Very funny,” she said.

  Eadie picked up a magazine and began to flip through it. “I really like him. Joe, I mean.”

  “Thanks. I like him, too.”

  Eadie fanned the magazine and dropped it in her lap. She yawned and then pulled the courtesy mirror down to check her reflection. “Is it serious?” she said to Lavonne, rubbing her finger over her front teeth to take off a lipstick stain. “You and Joe, I mean?”

  Lavonne glanced at her blind spot and pulled into the passing lane. “We're not getting married anytime soon, if that's what you're asking.” They passed an old barn with a “See Rock City” sign painted on the roof. A black- and-white cow stood in a pasture, watching the cars like a suicide waiting to jump. Lavonne wasn't even sure why she'd mentioned marriage, but now that she had, she felt a little embarrassed. Getting married to someone just because you were having sex with him wasn't always the answer. And it had taken her only twenty-one years of marriage to Leonard to learn this little tip. “How about you and Trevor? Is he still being patient?”

  Eadie closed the courtesy mirror. She pulled one foot up under her with her knee stuck out at a right angle. She thought, For all I know, my marriage might be over. She said, “What choice does he have?”

  “But don't you miss him? Don't you miss the physical closeness of seeing him every day?”

  “You mean the sex? Don't I miss the sex?” Eadie glanced at her and grinned. “That's what the Love Monkey's for.”

  Nita's eyes fluttered open. She sat up, wiping the drool off her chin. “What's a Love Monkey?” she said.

  Eadie tossed the magazine into the backseat. “Nothing a Recommitted Virgin needs to know about,” she said.

  LORENA POTTER LIVED IN EAST RIDGE, TENNESSEE, A BLUE collar suburb just north of the Georgia state line. Nita called her to let her know they were on their way and to make sure they had the right directions to her house.

  “I'm bringing two of my colleagues with me,” Nita said.

  “I'll get the coffee going,” Lorena said.

  She was a small spry woman in her late seventies. She greeted them at the front door of her tiny ranch house and led them back to the den, where she served them coffee and cookies on a silver tray. The house was like a sauna, but Lorena wore a sweater and rubbed her hands together to warm them. “Are y'all cold?” she asked.

  “No,” they answered simultaneously.

  At the sliding glass door, Lorena's enraged terrier, Benjie, barked like a rusty weathervane spinning in the wind. “Don't mind him,” Lorena said fondly. “He's really sweet. His bark is worse than his bite, if you know what I mean.” On the other side of the glass, Benjie lifted his top lip and showed his teeth.

  “Where's a good place to eat in Chattanooga?” Eadie asked, wondering if there was some other way Benjie might get into the house, wondering if there was a doggie door hidden somewhere in the kitchen Lorena might have forgotten to latch.

  “Oh, any of those new restaurants down by the aquarium are good,” Lorena said, stirring cream into her coffee. “They're expensive, but they're good. Chattanooga's come a long way since I was girl. It used to be just a railroad crossroads but now there's shopping malls and restaurants and the new aquarium and all those parks down by the river.”

  Nita was taking a folder out of her briefcase while Lorena talked. “It's grown a lot since the 1950s then?” she said.

  “Oh, honey, yes. You wouldn't hardly recognize it now. It was just a sleepy little place back then.”

  Benjie scratched frantically at the glass door. Nita took a tape recorder, a notebook, and a pen out of her briefcase. “As you know, Mrs. Potter, I'm writing an article on unwed girls who got pregnant in the 1950s and had to give their babies up for adoption. We've agreed that anything you tell me today is confidential and you won't be named as a source in the article.”

  “That is correct,” Lorena said formally, like she was being sworn in with her hand on the Bible.

  They talked a while about the Brainerd Home for Unwed Mothers, how Lorena had started there as a young woman just out of nursing school and worked for a number of years until the place closed down in the early 1960s. “It was the birth control pill that did it,” Lorena said, shaking her head. “Girls didn't get pregnant after that. At least not as many as used to.”

  Nita took out the photograph of Virginia and Charles as a baby and handed it to Lorena. “Mrs. Potter do you recognize this woman?”

  On the other side of the glass, Benjie made a sound like a chipmunk trapped under a box. The elderly woman squinted her eyes and peered at the photograph. “I don't know,” she said. “Maybe.” She handed the photo back to Nita. “It was a long time ago. I probably nursed over a thousand girls in my time that came through the home for unwed mothers.”

  Lavonne glanced at Eadie. Lorena said, “Do y'all want some more coffee?”

  “No, thank you, we're fine.” Nita took out the photograph she had downloaded off the Internet and handed it to Lorena. “Mrs. Potter do you recognize this girl?” she asked.

  “Which one?” Lorena took the photograph and stared down at the table of solemn girls. Nita pointed with her finger and Lorena brightened and said, “Oh, yes, Jennie.”

  “Jennie?” Nita said, trying to keep the excitement out of her voice. She glanced at Eadie who raised an eyebrow and shrugged. Lavonne carefully studied Lorena's face.

  “I'd never forget Jennie,” Lorena said, rising. “She was a pistol.” She left the room and came back in a few minutes carrying an old scrapbook. “She was what we used to call a ‘white gloves girl,’” she said, sitting back down beside Nita on the sofa. “You know, the kind that seemed like she came from a good family. She kept to herself but she had real nice manners and talked like she might have come from some money. We didn't get many like Jennie, most of our girls were cotton mill hands or daughters of cotton mill hands, but every so often one would show up at the door.” She laughed. “I guess even rich girls get tempted.”

  Lavonne leaned forward. “Where was Jennie from, Mrs. Potter?”

  “Somewhere down in south Georgia. I know that because the family that took Jennie's baby was from down there, too. Of course, Jennie didn't know that. We never told any of the girls who got their babies back then. We just let them hold them once and then they were taken away an
d given to their new families.”

  No one said anything. Eadie leaned forward and picked up the photo of Virginia and Charles and the photo of the young women gathered around the table. “Mrs. Potter, do you think this might be Jennie?” Her movements seemed to set the dog off again.

  “Benjie, hush,” Lorena said. She compared the two photos and shook her head. “There is a resemblance,” she said doubtfully.

  “What family?” Lavonne said, and they all turned and looked at her. “What family from south Georgia took Jennie's baby?”

  Lorena gave the photos back to Eadie and opened her scrapbook. “We didn't keep the mothers' full names but I kept the names of the people who took the babies. Unofficially, of course.” She took out a piece of fragile typing paper and ran her finger down a long list of names. “Grantham,” she said, finally. “Vienna, Georgia.”

  Nita leaned over her shoulder and stared at the opened scrapbook. She picked up a photograph and said, “Is this Jennie?”

  Benjie was throwing himself at the glass now, his little claws clicking like castanets. “Yes,” Lorena said. “I took that right after she got to the home. She was such a pretty little thing and had the nicest clothes. Always dressed like a movie star even up to the time right before she delivered.”

  Nita stared at the photograph. Her chin trembled. Slowly she passed it to Lavonne.

  Lavonne said, “Oh my God.”

  Eadie said, “Oh shit.”

  Nita said, “Do you mind if I keep this photograph, Mrs. Potter?”

  ON THE RIDE INTO CHATTANOOGA, NITA CALLED HER MOTHER Lavonne was driving and Eadie was sitting in the front passenger seat, beating her hands on the dashboard and singing along to Mary Chapin Carpenter.

  “Hey, Mama, it's me.” Nita was shaking so badly she could hardly talk.

  “Nita? Where are you?”

  “I'm up in Chattanooga with Lavonne and Eadie.”

  “What in the hell are you doing up there?”