by Marsha Moyer
I showered quickly—not hard, seeing as there was no hot water left in the tank—unsnarled my hair with a comb and toweled it dry, and grabbed a dress out of the closet in the back bedroom, long and loose and covered with an all-over pattern of little blue flowers. It wasn't as polished as the way I usually dressed, but it made me feel more like the old Lucy again, the one who used to go to work feeling upbeat and hopeful instead of muddleheaded and rundown. Plus, it did a decent job of covering most of the visible damage from the night before. I slipped on my shoes, picked up my purse and my keys, and headed for the door. With any luck, I'd only be an hour late and might not have that much explaining to do.
Denny corralled me on the front porch.
"Lucy! Hold up a minute. I need to talk to you." She was wearing frayed jeans and a tank top, no bra, and with her wild hair and her bare feet with the toenails painted a bright orangey-red, she looked as ripe and ready as one of Aunt Dove's Early Girl tomatoes. Just looking at her, I felt the old, hopeful Lucy starting to fade, started feeling like somebody's worn-out stepmama again.
"What's up?" I said.
"I've been thinking, and I was wondering if you and me could do Girlfriend Night tonight. Remember? Like we used to?"
Of course I remembered. The summer she turned sixteen, the year she'd finally started getting periods and breasts, she'd come up to spend a month with Ash and me and Jude in the new house in Nashville. When Ash was on the road, Denny and I would tuck Jude in his crib upstairs, and with the baby monitor on, we'd retreat to the huge oak-and-marble kitchen, where we popped popcorn and painted our nails outrageous colors and gave each other avocado-and-oatmeal facials, the big-screen TV tuned to an old movie or CMT. Those nights had been some of Denny's and my best times together, but it made me a little sad to think about them now, to recall how sure of ourselves we'd been, how thrilled and awestruck to have wound up in what we thought was permanent Disneyland.
"That sounds like fun," I said. "But what about Will and your daddy?"
"Oh, I was thinking they could go out together, just the two of them. Get to know each other better. Do whatever it is that guys do to, you know—bond."
My ears started to ring as I stared at my stepdaughter, her face as goofy as a month-old puppy's. Didn't she know what men did to "bond"? They drank and picked up women, or, in the case of guys like Ash and Will, sat back and let the women come to them. There might be a little greasy food thrown in, a little televised sports, but the two constants were always there: alcohol and females. Anyway, couldn't she see that her daddy had it in for Will? Did she really think anything good could come from this?
"Have you talked to Will about this?" I asked.
"Not yet. But he'll do anything I say." Denny grinned and held up a crooked little finger. "I've got him wrapped so tight, he can't even holler for help."
In spite of myself, I laughed. It reminded me of a song Ash had played for me once, a long time back.
"Tell you what," I said. "If you can talk them into it, I'm game. Call me later and fill me in, okay? I'll run by Wal-Mart after work and get whatever we need."
"Great," she said happily, then bounded down the steps two at a time into the yard and flung her arms around my neck. "Oh, I'm just so glad we came!"
I hugged her hard, pressing my face into her hair, which smelled like a just-mown meadow. She was as tall as I was, and headed for just as much trouble, and I felt a kinship with her, greater than before, even back when she was sixteen and sitting at my kitchen counter with blue toenails and goop smeared all over her face. We were grown women who had each done something big and irrefutable, and we were going to need each other now more than ever.
There seemed to be an unusually large number of Thursday-morning patrons at Faye's when I finally made it in, a few minutes past ten. In addition to Peggy, I counted her friends Alene and Mary Dale, Mrs. Florence Binder, Everett the UPS guy, and an old man I recognized but didn't know personally, one of the feed-cap gossips from the cafe. Everybody stopped talking as I bent to tuck my purse under the counter. Everett, lounging against the counter with a Styrofoam cup of coffee, gave me a big smile and a wink. The old man turned and started browsing through the greeting cards.
"What was she thinking?" somebody, I think Mrs. Binder, whispered. As I was trying to think of a few words in my own defense, Audrey stepped out of the cooler, her arms full of red long-stemmed roses, looking like a beauty contestant from another planet. She wore baggy canvas pants and one of her sawed-off T-shirts with a couple of inches of skin showing in the gap between, and her hair, which the day before had been as black as pitch, was now a shade I'd always thought was exclusive to blonds with too much exposure to sun and chlorine.
I gasped. "Was that an accident?" I asked. "Or did you do it on purpose?"
"Well, the color on the box said 'Champagne and Moonlight,' " she said, "but I think this is a little more…"
"Green," I said. "Your hair is green."
Audrey handed the roses to Peggy, who started to arrange them on a sheet of tissue.
"Joe hates it," Audrey said dolefully. "He said I look like a slut. He said it like that was a bad thing."
"I could call my sister-in-law Connie for you," I offered. "She went to beauty school. It's been awhile, but I bet she'd know how to fix it."
"You think?"
"Sure. I'll ask her if she can stop by later and take a look."
"Tell her I'll pay her," Audrey said fervidly. "Have babies for her, whatever it takes."
"She's got four of those already," I said. "My guess is she'd rather have the cash."
"What's that on your neck?"
Instinctively I raised my fingers, conscious of seven pairs of eyes on me.
"Other side."
I switched hands, but I still couldn't feel anything.
"Probably a mosquito bite," I said, feeling myself burn from my collarbone to my ears. "We had supper last night at Curly's at the lake. You know how bad they get this time of year down by the water."
"Wow," Audrey said. "Those must've been some pretty big teeth, for a mosquito."
By law I wasn't allowed to smack her, so I had to settle for a sneaky little pinch to the skin above her waistband.
"Hey, guess what, y'all?" I said, since the whole room was listening now, making no bones about it. "Denny's here. She got married."
"Oh my Lord," Peggy said, a hand flying to her chest. "Not to that King boy, I hope! I mean, I like to think I'm as open-minded as the next one, but…"
She glanced at Everett, who gazed politely but purposefully back. If he hadn't known it before, Everett knew now that "that King boy," like himself, was African-American. I hated to admit that what Peggy d said was the truth; in Cade County, she was about as open-minded as the next one, which meant, You can cook in my restaurant, mow my lawn, deliver my packages, even drink coffee with my customers, but I'd just as soon you didn't intermingle with my daughter, thank you very much.
"Erasmus is in New York," I reminded her. "Studying at Juil-liard. No, this is somebody else. The bass player in her band. His name's Will Culpepper."
They all stared at me, wanting to ask the obvious question they couldn't very well ask with Everett standing there, which was, What color is he?
"He's from Mississippi," I went on, which of course didn't tell a thing. "His daddy used to own some kind of factory or something. He's—well, he's real good-looking. In fact, he looks so much like Ash, it's spooky."
The ladies all smiled with relief and nodded at each other. I kept to myself what I wanted to say, which was that I would've been a thousand times happier if Denny had married Erasmus King instead of Will Culpepper. I always thought Erasmus and Denny had found each other too early in life, when both of them were too young and naive, their feelings for each other too unwieldy to get hold of. Not that I was fooling myself, that any kind of permanent relationship between them would have been smooth sailing. It wasn't just in deep northeast Texas that folks looked askance on mix
ed marriages, not even in the so-called enlightened twenty-first century. Still, some part of me wanted to believe true love could rise above all that, love and their shared gift for music. But Erasmus had gone to New York and Denny had gone to Nashville; their lives had been growing in separate directions a long time before Denny met Will Culpepper.
"So, y'all went to Curly's to celebrate?" Alene asked. "You and Denny and this, this Culpepper fella?"
"And Ash," I said. "You know—meet the parents and all."
"Great chicken-fried steak at Curly's," the card-browsing old man piped up.
"And then what happened?" This from Mrs. Florence Binder, who had such a look of Christian blamelessness plastered on her face that it was hard to believe she had some ulterior motive for asking.
"Nothing special. We ate supper. Drank a little champagne. Denny got up and sang a song on the karaoke thing. Then we went home."
"So did Ash get all chewed up like you did?" Audrey asked, without a drop of compunction. "By those mosquitoes, I mean."
"You know," I said, "I'd love to stand around here all day chewing the fat, but I've got a payroll to get out. So, if y'all will excuse me, I'll be in the back."
"Don't forget to call your sister-in-law!" Audrey sang out as I made my way to the office and collapsed in front of the desk in the swivel chair.
I switched on the computer and sat staring at the screen as it glowed to life and ran through its litany of startup commands, but all I could see was Ash's body moving together with mine, as supple as a pair of sea creatures in the silvery light.
I picked up the phone and called Connie and asked her to drop by and see if she could do anything about poor Audrey's hair. Then I called directory assistance and got the number for St. Jude's Catholic Church in Jefferson.
chapter eleven
"Oh, honey, no, no, no." Connie circled Audrey like a snake, like if she came too close Audrey might coil and pounce. "Hair like yours, you need a double process!
You got to lift the base color before you go laying down the blond."
Everett had left to finish his rounds, and Peggy, Alene, Mary Dale, and Mrs. Binder had gone up the street to drink coffee at the cafe, along, I guessed, with the feed-cap man, no doubt all of them speculating on my mosquito bite and how it factored into the latest poll. I didn't know who'd bought the roses.
"Can you fix it?"
"Well, I'm not saying I can make it look like champagne and moonlight." Connie reached out and fingered a crispy strand. "But I'm pretty sure I can do better than this."
"Hey, I've got an idea," I said. "Denny and me are having Girlfriend Night at the house tonight. Facials, pedicures, all that stuff. Why don't y'all come out and do Audrey's hair there? Say, seven o'clock? We'll make it a party."
"Great! I'll run by Sally Beauty Supply and pick up what we need." Connie was already on her way out the door, waving as she climbed into her maroon minivan.
Audrey let out her breath in a rush and slumped against the counter.
"I don't know how to thank you," she told me.
I brought a bunch of gerbera daisies out of the cooler and took a vase off the shelf. "Look, everybody makes mistakes. Why not try to fix the ones you can, is my philosophy." It wasn't, actually—my own life was proof enough of that—but I thought it sounded like something you'd say to a seventeen-year-old with chartreuse hair.
"So does that mean you and Ash are back together?" I looked up from the flowers. "Well, dang, Lucy," Audrey said. "Everybody knows a hickey when they see one."
"And everybody in town will hear about it now, too, thanks to you."
"You didn't answer my question."
"Listen, I know this is a tough concept for you, but some things are a person's own private business."
"Not around here, they're not."
"What can I say? I'm trying to buck the trend. Do you think you can run these over to Betty Ponds in the loan department at First National?" I pushed the vase across the counter. "It'll serve you right, having to strut that hair on Main Street. Maybe you'll think twice next time about minding your own business."
For the first time that morning, the shop was mine alone, sunny and quiet. After a quick peek at Everett's delivery—some boxes of fancy ribbon Peggy had ordered from a company in California—I took the phone out from under the counter and dialed the number of the Catholic church in Jefferson.
After three rings, a woman answered: "St. Jude's." Her voice was sandpapery, like a smoker's.
"I'd like to speak to Father Laughlin, please."
"Not here right now. Want me to take a message?"
"Actually, I'd— Well, I'd really like to see him. In person."
"You a parishioner?"
"A—? Oh. No, ma'am. I'm not." I was raised Baptist, I imagined myself saying, but I'm not sure what I believe anymore. "Can I see him anyway? Maybe make an appointment?"
"Well, Father's not real big on keeping a calendar, like regular folks. If I was you, I'd plan on just dropping by. He'll be in this afternoon, between three and five. That's assuming nobody up and dies in the meantime."
I called Dove, who wasn't home, then Geneva, leaving a message on her cell phone about Girlfriend Night, then Bailey to ask if he'd mind watching the kids. I checked the pad on the counter, but the red roses—which, it turned out, had been purchased by Everett—and the bouquet for Betty Ponds seemed to be our only orders for the day. The cooler was fairly neat already, it being Thursday, when the week's stock was low, so I went to work straightening the greeting cards. The old man in the cap had made a mess of them, pulling them out and then sticking them back willy-nilly, the birthday cards mixed in with the baby announcements, anniversary with sympathy.
The front door opened, and I peeked around the card display as Peggy walked in, fortunately alone.
"Hey," I said. "How's everything over at the cafe?"
"Oh, about like usual," she said. "Buzzing like a swarm of mosquitoes."
We looked at each other and started to laugh.
"That Audrey," I said. "I swear I could skin her alive sometimes. So, did anybody win any money?"
"Dudley Ward. Forty-some-odd dollars" and change."
"Well, I'm glad to know some good came out of this for somebody."
Peggy went around behind the counter and picked up the empty coffee carafe. "You don't sound very happy for a woman who got chewed on last night by a big old mosquito."
"I have a favor to ask." She set down the coffeepot again. "I know I was late coming in this morning, but I need to take some time off this afternoon, too," I said. "I guess you could call it mosquito control."
"It's about Ash, you mean."
"I don't know if it's possible to fix what's broke, Peggy. But he asked me to do this. I want to try."
"Then go," she said. "I'll cover for you. It's not like I haven't done it before." She smiled, and I smiled back, remembering how in the old days she'd made it possible for Ash and me to court, how she'd even been in cahoots with him sometimes, running interference, setting up rendezvous.
"Listen, Denny and I are having Girlfriend Night tonight at the house," I said. "Connie's coming out to fix Audrey's hair, and I've called Dove and Geneva. You come, too. Cut loose for once and wreck your diet."
"I'll bring my spicy Velveeta dip," Peggy said happily. "Lord, I don't think I've tasted the stuff in five years."
"Just so long as you don't wind up back in County General."
"Nah. All that plastic they stuck in me, I'll be around till I'm ninety."
"I need to leave around three."
She waved her hand toward me like a fairy dispersing pixie dust. "I think I still remember how to keep this place going on my own."
I left work at three and headed across town, then swung south on Highway 59. The afternoon was mild, sunshine drifting m and out amid fast-moving clouds, patterns or shadow and light nickering across the highway.
Twenty miles south of Mooney, I turned off the four-lane and drove slowly th
rough the wide, shady streets of Jefferson. I never could figure out why what looked just plain shabby in Mooney was stately and historic in Jefferson, the aging structures well preserved and tended to, the shopfronts bright and inviting. Every other building, it seemed, was a bed-and-breakfast, and tourists strolled the brick main street, stopping in for pie at the Hamburger Store or Dr Pepper in a bottle at the five-and-dime, buying crafts and antiques, lining up for the riverboat cruise down the Big Cypress Bayou. A ghost was said to haunt the old Excelsior House hotel on Austin Street, but nobody I knew had ever seen it.
I followed the directions given to me by the lady on the phone and, after one or two wrong turns, found St. Jude's, a redbrick building with a white peaked roof set back from the street on a tidy rectangle of lawn, a set of steep concrete steps leading up to the big double doors of the sanctuary.
A sign directed me around the side of the building to the office, and I opened a door and climbed half a flight of stairs till I came to a landing. At the top was a closed door with a cross-stitched sampler mounted at eye level that read, Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unaware. I knocked twice, but no one answered, so I tried the knob. It was locked.
I stood on the landing feeling a mix of emotions: irritation that I'd driven all this way for nothing, relief that I wouldn't have to confess my sins to a total stranger. A small window overlooked a courtyard garden, and down below I could see a man in a T-shirt and running shorts and heavy canvas gloves tending a crop of rosebushes. I didn't suppose a gardener would know where the priest was, but it couldn't hurt to ask. That way, I could tell Ash in all honesty that I'd done what he wanted, even if I did have to go home empty-handed. Was it my fault this Father Laughlin was too arrogant or too lary to keep a calendar, like ordinary people?