Sumter Point

by K. G. MacGregor

  Chapter 20

  Audie popped a mint into her mouth as she scanned the hallway for Beth. She didn’t feel hung over today—she had drunk only three beers last night after Dennis left—but she wasn’t taking any chances on having Beth pick up a whiff of anything.

  Last night was supposed to have been a relaxing evening with a friend, a chance for her to catch up with Dennis on what she had missed with the Gallery crowd since her love life had taken off.

  Instead, the whole evening had turned into a train wreck. She was probably going to have to go crawling back to Dennis to make up for that pity party crack.

  And if things with Dennis weren’t bad enough, something was going on with Beth. According to her Grammaw, Beth had already come by to perform her midday check of vitals and dispense medications.

  She usually waited until Audie got there to do that so they could see each other and have a chance to talk while her Grammaw ate lunch. That probably meant Beth was pissed about something, like her getting stoned last night. Audie hoped she hadn’t phased out on the phone and said something stupid she couldn’t remember.

  Whatever it was, they needed to talk to straighten things out.

  Beth hadn’t been around her before when she was high, so she felt she needed to explain how it wasn’t all that big a deal… she hadn’t been driving… yada yada yada. She would try harder to keep that part of her life separate from their relationship if Beth had a problem with it. It didn’t have to come between them.

  Audie wandered back into her grandmother’s room aimlessly and slumped into the recliner.

  “Did you two have a fight?” Violet asked.

  “No, we’re okay, Grammaw.” Even if they had been fighting, Audie wouldn’t want her Grammaw to know about it. “I was with Dennis last night and she called me. We couldn’t talk very long, so I don’t know what’s bugging her. You sure you don’t want more of your lunch?”

  Before her grandmother could answer, Audie heard Beth’s voice in the hall and sprang from the chair to intercept her as she went past. “Beth?”

  “Audie… hello.”

  “Hello?” Audie closed the distance between them and lowered her voice. “Is everything okay?”

  “I’m really busy right now.” Beth tried to push past her, but Audie blocked her path.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Beth glanced nervously toward the nurses’ station, where most of the staff seemed to be gathered. “I didn’t like you getting stoned last night,” she whispered, “but I don’t want to talk about that sort of thing here.”

  “What didn’t you like? Did I do something?”

  “I told you I’m uncomfortable with that.”

  “No, you didn’t. You said you didn’t understand the appeal. That’s different.”

  “It’s not something grown-ups do, Audie.” Again, Beth tried in vain to escape the conversation. “I need to go to work.”

  Audie stepped back, unable to stem the flow of anger that seemed to boil up out of nowhere. It was one thing for Beth not to like her getting high with her friends, but to imply she wasn’t grown up was outrageous. “You know, Dennis was right. You really are more like a mother than a girlfriend.” She spun toward her grandmother’s room, resisting the urge to bang the door as she went through. “I have to go, Grammaw,” she said, her voice shaking.

  “I’ll be back to help you with dinner.”

  “Audie?”

  “I can’t stay any longer. I love you.”

  She turned away from the nurses’ station to exit the side door of the building. This time, she tried her best to slam it, but the hydraulic closer caught the heavy door and allowed it to gently latch.

  Beth pulled the laundry door closed behind her and flung her pen across the room in frustration. When she decided last night to be forceful in making her views known, being called a mother wasn’t exactly what she had in mind. Her so-called serious resolve had come off as patronizing and bossy. No wonder Audie had said what she did.

  And now the truth was out. Audie—or at least Audie’s friends—had reservations about the difference in their ages. Audie was young and carefree, maybe even reckless sometimes. Beth was older and responsible. And prudish, she admitted, running both hands through her hair. If they were going to bridge the gap, they needed to find common ground somewhere in the middle.

  Otherwise, their relationship had nowhere to go.

  She checked her watch. Audie would be at work for the next four or five hours, then back at the nursing home to feed Miss Violet her dinner. That was too long to let things seethe. At the very least, she should call and try to smooth things over for now.

  Maybe Audie would be willing to talk it all out tonight.

  Beth exited the laundry room and almost collided with Wanda.

  “There you are. Miss Violet was looking for you.”

  Beth steeled herself and made her way back down the hall. “My ears were burning, Miss Violet. I thought I’d better come see what that was about.”

  The old woman waved her over to the bed without even a greeting. “Tell me what’s wrong with you and Audie.”

  Beth knew it was useless to pretend things were fine, but this particular subject was one they needed to keep private, especially from Miss Violet. Especially from everyone, actually. “We just need to talk some things out, Miss Violet. It’s hard to do that here with everybody around.”

  “Audie can be stubborn. I told you that the first day I moved in here.”

  “I think it was my fault this time, not Audie’s.” Beth went through the mindless motions of clearing the lunch tray and filling the water pitcher. “We’re just not communicating very well.”

  “You still love each other, don’t you?”

  The anxious tone of her question was unmistakable. Violet wanted them together and happy.

  “I love her very much, Miss Violet. Everything will work out. I promise.” She hoped.

  Audie wished she could rewind the last two hours. Why had she popped off about Beth being like a mother? That was Dennis talking, not her.

  She had never experienced this kind of inner turmoil. Ever since she left the nursing home, she had made herself sick imagining what her life would be like if this fight ended their relationship.

  It wasn’t as if she could just go back to being the person she was a few weeks ago. It would tear her heart out to walk away… or worse, to have Beth walk away.

  The clock on the wall seemed to be stuck. She couldn’t even try to talk to Beth again for another hour and a half when she left the nursing home. This wasn’t the sort of thing they should be talking about in public, and Beth had tried to make her see that. Instead, she had pushed it to a breaking point and both of them had lost their tempers.

  At least Dennis wasn’t pissed anymore. He said he owed her a free pass after being such a shit recently, but that she had better not push her luck. She called him a dickhead, signifying things between them were back to normal.

  Oscar opened the door from the hallway and entered the technician’s room, setting off a round of excited barking from the twelve dogs who called the shelter their temporary home. “I’ve got a job for you on Monday, Audie.”

  “Monday? That’s my day off.” She slid a water bowl into a crate that housed a yappy terrier mix.

  “What if I gave you Saturday and Sunday instead… from now on?”

  Audie shot him a sidelong glance to convey her suspicions.

  “What’s the catch?”

  “No catch. But I hired that friend of Dennis’s and two other techs this morning, so we can start scheduling you for a few of those outreach events.”

  She didn’t really want this now, not when her whole life might be on the verge of being turned upside down again. On the other hand, it was a chance to step up and show Beth she could be responsible. “Okay, but I thought it wasn’t going to start until December.”

  “That was the plan, but they want to do this on Monday.”

  “What
do I have to do?”

  “Talk to third graders at Sumter Creek Elementary School. Tell them what we do here and how they can help.”

  “I’ve never talked to third graders before.” Automatically, she thought of Dennis.

  “Sure you have. You do it all the time when they come in here to pick out a dog or cat. Just do the same thing, but with thirty of them.”

  Her cell phone began to ring inside her backpack, but she ignored it. It was probably Dennis again. “What do I have to wear?”

  Oscar looked at her and grinned. “Well, I guess there is a catch. Isn’t that your cell phone?”

  “It’s nobody. So what’s the dress code?”

  “Do you have some pants besides blue jeans?”

  Audie thought at once of her leather hip-huggers, but she was sure Oscar meant something else.

  “I can probably get your bump in pay to start next week,” he went on. “You can plan a few events to do here and there while you bring the new techs up to speed.”

  “Does this mean I don’t get to sleep late anymore?”

  “Eight to five, but we can fudge it a little so you can get out to the nursing home in time for dinner.”

  Audie sighed. First the house. Now the job. Next would be giving up all her bad habits. “Can I have this Saturday off? I have to go buy some pants.”

  “Sure. You ought to look at your vacation schedule too. You need to use those hours before the end of the year or you’ll lose them.” With that, he disappeared back into the hallway.

  A chirping sound announced a voicemail, and she dug her phone from her backpack. Now that she and Dennis were pals again, he probably wanted to go out to the Gallery. These last few weeks, her penchant for partying seemed to be causing more problems than it was worth, what with the police pulling her over, the fights with Dennis, and now with Beth. It was time to take a step back. She would start with telling Dennis no, even if it meant getting grief.

  She dialed her voicemail and pressed the phone to her ear. She was startled to hear not Dennis but Beth.

  “Audie… I don’t know about you, but I’m not feeling so good right now. Obviously, we both need to find a better way to express ourselves when we disagree about something. I was a jerk and I apologize. So… maybe we could talk all this out at my place when you get off work.”

  Audie heard her draw a deep breath and exhale. “In the meantime, I’d appreciate it if you would just call me at home and leave a message telling me you still love me. Then I’d quit having such a bad day.”

  Audie smiled as her whole body relaxed. Everything was going to be okay, not because they had magically worked out their differences—they hadn’t—but because they still loved each other. She dialed Beth’s home number as instructed and waited for the machine to pick up.

  “I got your message… and thanks to you, I just quit having a bad day too. I love you, and I’ll see you about five thirty.”

  “There’s Audie, BD,” Beth said, stretching across the sink to pet the cat in the windowsill. The yellow SUV was pulling into the space next to her Mazda. She and Audie had so much to talk about, not just the drugs issue, but the way they both had handled things today at the nursing home. They had to learn to talk to each other rationally and respectfully… like grown-ups, she thought dismally.

  Why had she said that about what grown-ups do? She was just begging for Audie’s mother remark, and it had stung her like a wet whip. She walked to the front door to wait, and when she heard footsteps, she opened it and held her arms wide. “Don’t say anything yet. Just hold me for a little while.”

  Audie enveloped her in a bear hug. “I’m sorry.”

  “Shhh… I love you.”

  They stood in the entry in a quiet embrace for several minutes.

  Then Audie dipped her head and began a series of soft kisses that finally found Beth’s lips. Beth couldn’t remember a kiss so tender, and it gave her confidence they would weather this storm together.

  Finally they broke, resting their foreheads together as each let out a soft sigh.

  “What do you say we skip the talking and just make out instead?” Audie asked, nuzzling Beth’s ear.

  “Tempting, isn’t it?”

  “I really am sorry, Beth. I don’t know why I said that about you acting like a mother.”

  “Because that’s pretty much what I was doing. There’s plenty of blame to go around.”

  “But I don’t think of you that way.”

  “And I don’t think of you as a kid.” They exchanged sheepish looks as she took Audie’s hand and led her to the couch. “I need to tell you about something… something I haven’t told many people.”

  “Okay.”

  “Remember that day we were out at Sumter Point when we smelled the marijuana?”

  Audie nodded, sinking against the back of the couch to hear the tale. Beth joined her, tucking a knee underneath as she turned sideways.

  “I wanted to get out of there so bad. I just can’t be around that kind of thing. It’s not worth the risk to me.”

  “What risk are you talking about?”

  “Back when Kelly was sixteen, one of her friends in Nashville got caught smoking pot behind the mall. The police got her to name the people she knew who used drugs and they showed up at our apartment with a search warrant. They found a bag of pot in Kelly’s room and arrested both of us.”

  “You got arrested?” Audie suddenly sat up straight, her mouth agape.

  “Hazel went to bat for me and helped me get my charges dropped. But since I was Kelly’s guardian, I was responsible for everything she did. She got probation and community service, and I got monitored by family services until she turned eighteen.”

  “I had no idea.”

  “Believe me, we kept it as quiet as possible. That’s why I can’t be around it. They wouldn’t be lenient if it happened again. And I’d probably lose my job.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me any of this?”

  “We didn’t know each other that well back then. I never even told Shelby.”

  “So you’re afraid if I get caught, it’ll make you look bad.”

  “That’s part of it. The other part is what if I was with you when it happened?” She studied Audie’s pensive look, afraid she might go on the defensive. “I know you’d never mean for it to—”

  “I’m always careful. We don’t even have it in the car anymore, just at home with the doors locked.”

  “Is it that important to you?”

  Audie shrugged, not making eye contact as she struggled with her answer. “I wouldn’t want you to break up with me because of it.”

  “And I don’t want to be making rules for how you should live. You have to be the one to decide. I promise you we won’t break up over this, but try to imagine what would happen to us if you did get caught. I’d be mad as hell and you’d feel so guilty it would probably tear us up anyway.”

  Audie wiped her sweaty palms on her jeans, a sure sign she was uncomfortable with the conversation.

  “Look, Audie… like I said, I won’t make rules for you. And I won’t force you to make them for yourself. Just please be careful.”

  “I am careful.”

  “Okay. That’s all I ask.”

  “So are we done?”

  Beth chuckled, breaking the tension for them both. She had a hunch she could extract a promise from Audie if she put more pressure on her, and the temptation to do that was great. But she didn’t want Audie to give up smoking pot only because she was asking. It had to be something she did for herself.

  “We can be done with that. But I want to ask you about something else.”

  Audie frowned and looked at her suspiciously. “What else have I done?”

  “Nothing. But I want to know if it bothers you to have your friends saying I might be too old for you?”

  “No! No way. You’re not too old.”

  Beth was glad to hear the vehemence of Audie’s denial. “That’s good, since we can’t do a
thing about it.”

  “Do you ever think I’m too young?”

  She almost answered with similar forcefulness, but caught herself.

  They needed to be honest with each other. “I never think you’re too young for me. But sometimes I worry that I might be too… I don’t know, too boring.”

  “Why? Because you don’t go out every night?”

  “Because I hardly go out at all.”

  “That’s not a big deal. I don’t have to go either.”

  “Audie, that’s not fair. You like it. I don’t want you to stay home every night because of me. You should go whenever you want to.”

  “I do like it, but what I want is to be with you, whether it’s here or at the Gallery. Of course, if you would come out with me once in a while that would be the best of both worlds.”

  “Are you sure you want me there with all your friends?” The last thing Beth wanted was for Audie’s pals to sit watching them in judgment.

  “What kind of ridiculous question is that? My friends like you.”

  “Even Dennis?”

  “Don’t worry about Dennis. Talk about somebody who needs to grow up!”

  “But he’s your best friend.”

  “He won’t be if he tries to come between you and me. It’s as simple as that.”

  “I don’t want that to happen, Audie.”

  “Me neither. But it’s up to Dennis, not you. He’ll come around once he realizes you’re not going anywhere.”

  Beth scooted over on the couch to straddle Audie’s lap. “You’re right about that. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Now are we finished?”

  “I guess so, unless you have a deep, dark secret or two you want to share.”

  “You already know my secrets… except that I didn’t tell you about Dennis and me getting stopped a few weeks ago by the cops and me having to eat a joint so they wouldn’t find it.”

  “Audie!”

  “I know. It scared the shit out of both of us.”

  Beth listened in disbelief as Audie related the details of her traffic stop. “It scares me just to hear about it. I can’t believe you ate a joint.”