“That’s fair. I’ll take you home now. But since it’s just us in the truck right now and not another person in sight, can I please kiss you once, for old time’s sake?”
“No, Ray. I really need some space. And I don’t know if can forgive you, but for what it’s worth—I am sorry I didn’t help you when you needed me. I’m not sayin’ what you did after that was okay—not one bit. But I am sorry.”
And now I’m crying like a moron. Most men hate it when women cry. They don’t know what to do. But that’s one thing about Ray—no one comforts a weeping woman like Raymond Rizzo.
He leans in and wipes my tears with both of his thick thumbs and kisses my forehead. As hard as it is to believe, I am the one who reaches out to kiss his lips.
Through the tears and confusion I can still taste my Ray, the one who was there when the girls were born, who married me when I got pregnant at nineteen, who helped me when Meemaw was sick and Mama was a lunatic. He’s always been there for me, until he wasn’t.
I pull away as the kiss turns from comforting to something more. I can’t believe after my sexual drought, I am pushing away two men I’m wildly attracted to in a span of twenty-four hours, but I must be strong. Ray is probably still lying about something, and Tucker could be…well, he’s probably done with me now.
“Ray, I didn’t mean to do that. Please take me home. I need to think.”
“I’m sorry, Molly. I swear I didn’t reach out to trick you into kissing me. I just hate to see you so sad and know that I caused all this pain. What a mess we have on our hands.”
He squeezes my hand and puts the truck in gear.
“I’m taking you home now and I promise I will not try anything again. Although, for the record, you did kiss me.”
He laughs and turns up the radio.
The ride home is silent, and I watch the beautiful snow as we drive the familiar roads. Me and Ray.
Now all I can think of is Tucker.
No matter what, I am so screwed.
CHAPTER SEVEN
When Ray drops me off, a bunch of the residents, including my daughters, are outside playing in the snow. Shawn is building a snowman and trying to interest Ashley in his creation, but the only person who seems to want to help him is Magnolia. I was going to intervene, but with that many people around nothing was going to happen. And I don’t think I have to worry about Shawn.
Besides, Beth Washington is out there, and while she’s a nurse and full of compassion for the sick, she would put Shawn in the hospital if she thought he had any impure intentions towards a minor.
We look out for each other here at Pentagon Place.
I scan the crowd and Tucker is nowhere to be found. His brother, Dawson and his girlfriend, Emma are right in the thick of it, and even Arielle and Marcos, my young neighbors on the other side of my apartment wall, are out there. Miraculously, they aren’t playing loud metal music.
They are in charge of planning the Mardi Gras party—that should be interesting.
I don’t even want to think about parties because they now mean that Ray and Tucker will be in the same room. With all our friends and my girls. I only have a few weeks to figure out my game plan before my messy business will be on full display.
I let myself in and shrug off all my winter garb again, like I did at Angie’s. More than anything I feel like taking a nap, but I decide to take to my bed with Meemaw’s letters again. I need a diversion from my own love life, and hers is intriguing.
There are more letters from the mysterious Albert, but I had never finished the one I was reading when I got that text from Tucker that has thrown a monkey wrench in my peaceful existence.
Albert was quite the jokester, but he was also obviously smitten with my grandmother. And there’s definitely a big secret there.
The rest of the letters I skim through contain the same type of pleading with her to write back and asking for her forgiveness. Looking at the dates on the letters, it looks like she was away quite a while.
I drop them all on the bed and lean back against my nest of fluffy pillows.
I wish I knew where to find this Albert guy. He signed the letters with his full name (how formal and old-fashioned if they were intimately involved) and if he still lives in Applebarrow, I bet someone knows him.
The problem is that I don’t know too many old people who I would want to discuss this with. Even though Meemaw is long gone, I don’t want to disrespect her memory by broadcasting her business all over town.
And of course if I do that, Mama will make my life even more difficult than it is already.
I get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach when I realize I will have to tell Mama that Ray is back.
Crap! She will give me all kinds of hell for not taking him back immediately with open arms. And then my brothers know about my budding relationship with Tucker.
Tucker. He wasn’t outside playing in the snow, which isn’t unusual for him. But I know he’s probably still upset about what happened last night, and I need to find him and apologize.
I carefully place the letters in piles on my night table—I haven’t read them all and don’t want to get confused—and walk over to the window in my bedroom, draw the curtains open and peer outside.
It’s getting dark out and it’s even harder to see who is out there. It’s freezing cold and I should call the girls in, but it’s Saturday and they’re having fun.
Now I see Ray’s bulky form out there. All the old neighbors know Ray, and I’m sure they are all wondering if we are getting ready to play happy family again.
And I’m sure he’s charming the new neighbors before I get a chance to tell my side of the story. Not that it matters. It’s none of their business.
Except in Applebarrow, everyone makes everything their business.
I continue to survey the white covered courtyard when I see him.
A lone figure in a silhouette. Off to the side. Away from the crowd. Smoking. I can see the lit cigarette’s orange flame from up here.
I guess it’s hard to stick with quitting smoking when your new love interest’s husband rolls into town.
And she pretends you’re just the plumber to ease her guilty—
Crap, what was that noise? It sounds like someone is on the stairs and having a hard time walking.
Oh, I hope Mama isn’t here, but what would she be doing out in a snowstorm. Unless she got word that Ray was here. I’m afraid to turn around and I’m almost wishing for it to be a burglar.
A familiar voice assaults my ears and now I know I’m cracking up.
“Lordie, that’s a long staircase. I didn’t think I’d get winded like I did when I was alive…oh Molly Mae, I’m sorry…I keep forgettin’ what they told me to do. Rule number one—don’t kill your loved ones with fright before you get to help them. Let me just catch my breath and then I’d like to know why my personal business is spread all over your bed, missy.”
I blink several times and back up closer to the window. I glance out and see that the fall would either kill me or injure me worse than this…whatever this is…I don’t think burglars masquerading as dead grandmothers is a thing, and now I’m backed into a corner.
The ghost-like thing that looks like Meemaw says, “Sugar, sit down over here on the bed and let’s have a catch up. I’m sorry about the shock but Haunting School was so boring, and once I learned that I could still eat fried chicken in the afterlife, I kind of lost interest in my studies…Molly, oh dear you’re lookin’ a little…where are you going?”
I make a break for it and run into my bathroom and slam the door. Maybe if I close my eyes and count to ten…a hundred…a million…my brain will reset, and I’ll stop imagining things. I wasn’t even day drinking with Angie. Am I that stressed out that I’ve taken to hallucinating?
I grab the sink with both hands and lean forward, doing more deep breathing.
I know…I’m dreaming. Of course! I didn’t sleep at all last night and I fell asleep while reading M
eemaw’s letters.
I should just concentrate on dreaming of something more pleasant. Normal.
I sit on the toilet and close my eyes (because they’re already closed—I’m obviously sleeping!) and think about Tucker’s lips…
“Young lady, I did not come here to wait for you to come out of the bathroom…and don’t have any naughty thoughts while I’m here because I just remembered I can see the thoughts of the person I’ve chosen to haunt. Molly Mae, oh dear now…”
***
I hear the girls downstairs in the morning and I panic—they’re never up before me. How did I oversleep? I open my eyes and try to adjust to the daylight, except it’s still dark outside. It all comes back to me. Ray. Tucker. The snowstorm. The letters. Falling asleep and dreaming that Meemaw came to visit me.
I rub my sleepy eyes and roll over to see it’s past supper time. Not morning at all.
I wonder if Ray decided to feed the girls. He knows I’m exhausted and if he did that, it is awfully nice. But I don’t want to think nice thoughts about Ray.
I get a spooky feeling when I recall that Meemaw’s ghost said she can read my thoughts.
Haha, I guess I have a guilty conscience for reading her letters. I should just let it go. The past isn’t important, and my present is enough of a mess to deal with.
Luckily, I don’t hear Ray’s voice downstairs. I need to think more before I have to face him again.
I get up and walk unsteadily towards the bathroom to splash some cold water on my face. I’m never going to catch up on my sleep now that I’ve napped at the worst possible time, and now I smell fried chicken and I’m starving.
Ray probably got some takeout from our favorite county cooking place in town and the girls are eating. I hope he got enough for me. It’s hard to hate him when I think of how it felt when he wiped my tears…
“AAAHHH!!!” I yell and then clamp my hand over my mouth as I grab the bathroom door and sink to the floor.
You know you’re a mom when you remember your daughters are downstairs and you don’t want them to be alarmed by your screams, especially when you see a vision of an old lady sitting on your toilet eating a chicken leg.
“Good gravy, girl, you need to calm down. I can’t bite. Well, I can bite this chicken, but I can’t offer you any because it’s not real. Well it’s sort of real but anyway…please stop lookin’ like you’re gonna keel over. I know this is a shock, but I promise you it’s really me and you’re not goin’ bonkers. Now we have a lot to talk about, and it’s only a matter of time before those girls come lookin’ for you to make them supper. That no good louse Ray Rizzo did not feed them.”
I take deep breaths and manage to squeak out, “Meemaw, is it really you? I mean, Mama says she feels your presence sometimes, but I think she’d have a heart attack if she actually saw you.”
“I can’t appear to your mama. You’re right—I don’t think she could tolerate it, and besides she doesn’t need my help, and you surely do. Now come over here and sit on the edge of the bathtub, where I can see you better.”
The questions in my head are falling all over themselves, but I do as I’m told and slowly creep over to the tub. I hold on tight because if I let this Meemaw vision scare me anymore I’ll fall in and knock myself out. I don’t want my daughters to find their mama dead in the tub.
Instead, I have found my dead grandmother on my toilet.
“Wait, will the girls see you if they come up here?”
“No darlin’, I can only appear to one person and I chose you.”
“Why now? You’ve been gone for five years. Did you see when Ray left?”
I decide to play along with this because it’s either a wise all-knowing ghost who can solve all my problems, or I’m still dreaming and maybe this will get super weird and she’ll turn into a chicken leg, and I can go back to my much more fun dream about Tucker.
“Oh, I am real, Molly Mae. And while I love that Swanson boy to pieces, I would prefer you hold off on the naughty thoughts while I’m here. It’s a little disturbin’. Now about that Ray. Yes, I knew he ran off, but I was resisting this whole haunting thing. An old friend of mine was doin’ it with her granddaughter and she wound up in Haunting Jail, and then I found out I could also eat rhubarb pie, and then of course I was gettin’ reacquainted with your Peepaw, if you know what I mean.”
She raises her white eyebrows and I am sickened all over again by the suggestion of grandparent ghost sex.
The good news is that I’m now sure this is a dream because my grandmother wouldn’t be acting—
“Oh, you young people are all the same—always thinkin’ you invented intimate relations. How do you think you and your mama got here, silly girl? Now listen—Ray is a liar and a no-good snake in the grass, and I just had to get my big butt down here when I saw you cozyin’ up to him in his truck.”
“You saw that? What else did you see?”
“Yes, I also saw you with Tucker. I broke out the caramel popcorn and sweet tea for that one, but when I saw it was going past G-rated, I switched it off. I can’t believe you ran that cute as a button Swanson boy off. I can’t let you mess this up.”
“So why do you think Ray is lying?”
I can’t believe I am asking a ghost these questions, but I’ll wake up soon and maybe I’ll have that drink Angie was suggesting.
I need a dreamless sleep before I process all of this and most importantly, find Tucker and set things right. I think that’s the point of this long and bizarre dream.
“Well, if he’s talkin’ he’s lyin’, but I can’t say exactly. I can’t tell you things you don’t know, it’s some stupid rule. If you ask me, it’s horse dookie because all I can do is warn you, but I figure it’s better than nothin’ and maybe you’ll take my advice, seein’ as I’m so old and wise.”
And dead. Don’t forget dead.
“I don’t understand any of this, obviously. But if you can haunt me, why can’t you tell me about Ray?”
Meemaw wipes her greasy ghost hands on her skirt and says, “I don’t know, sugar. I’m still learnin’ but I know if I break any rules, I’ll end up in Haunting Jail, and there is nothin’ to eat up in there.”
“So, you’ll starve?”
She laughs and slaps her still meaty thighs. “No darlin’, they just serve healthy foods, and I don’t need to eat. I finally get to do it just for fun, without everybody harpin’ on me about my fat and my cholesterol. Speakin’ of which, your mama needs to grab a salad now and then, but one problem at a time. Oh dear, I think my great grandbabies are on the steps lookin’ for you. I’ll have to go now, but I’ll be back.”
She waves a finger at me and I notice it’s not fully formed. I think the girls are just coming to wake me from my nap, and this is all just a product of stress, sexual tension and—
“Mom why are sitting on the bathtub staring at the toilet?”
***
“Okay, girls make sure Dad brings you back in time for supper and homework.”
Ray is taking Magnolia and Zinnia out for the day. He’s says they’re going shopping. I was about to warn him that he can’t buy their affection, but since he hasn’t bought them anything in well over a year, I’ll let him do it.
“We know, Mom. Don’t worry. You still look tired. You should rest up for your work week.”
Zinnia is the oldest twelve-year-old on the planet, but a quick glance into my hall mirror confirms her wisdom. My eye bags look like they could hold all the loot the girls are likely to come home with.
Magnolia waves and is already at Ray’s side—chatting away. Even though I’m not sure about Ray’s intentions with me, I am fairly certain they are pure when it comes to our daughters.
And he rang the doorbell and walked off to give us some space and didn’t barrel his way into my apartment, as I suspected he would after our closeness in the truck the other night.
I wave to Ray, more for the girls’ sake than because I’m feeling fondly, and I close the door
. I sigh and head for the kitchen. I’m starving and I need my strength today. I am not going to let a free day go to waste.
As I open up my fridge to survey the contents, or lack thereof, I think of how the mother in this house needs to start doing regular grocery shopping and stop fantasizing about men and ghosts.
I still don’t believe Meemaw really visited me. It’s just my wild imagination. I’m getting ready to slice a tomato for a BLT when the darn doorbell scares me half to death.
Thank goodness I dropped the knife away from my fingers. I need my hands to deliver tuna melts at the diner and draw pretty outfits on dolls.
It’s probably just Magnolia forgetting something, including her key. It’s a good thing her sister is the responsible one, although she could have used Zinnia’s key—oh, I hope they’re not arguing already, but it wouldn’t hurt Ray to get a taste of what I’ve been dealing with alone.
I put my lunch fixings aside and yell out, “I’m coming.” I stop just short of the door.
Do ghosts ring doorbells?
I look at myself in the mirror again. Now that’s just loony talk. Obviously if there was such a thing as ghosts, they would waltz right in like Meemaw did last night. I mean, in my dream.
Dear Lord, my hair looks as crazy as my thoughts. Maybe I’ll see if I can get a trim and a blow dry today.
The doorbell rings again, and now I doubt it’s my daughter, because she would be pounding by now and sassing me up a storm.
I open the door, hoping it’s just a girl scout or somebody with a petition to save the whales or something.
As soon as I crack the door, Tucker is inside, and the door is slammed behind him.
I’m too shocked to move, so he is standing right on top of me—like literally there isn’t room for the Holy Ghost between us, as Mama would say.
I clear my throat and thank the good Lord I at least brushed my teeth this morning.
I could take a step back but I’m waiting for my guest to speak.
Screw it, I can’t wait.
“Tucker, I’m so sorry about the other night. I was just so shocked, and I said the first thing—”
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