Maggie Sweet

by Judith Minthorn Stacy

  Even though we were too busy to take more than one breath at a time, I grinned the whole day.

  At noon, we quit taking walk-ins. But even so, it was seven o’clock before I powdered the neck of my last customer.

  We were all cleaning up our sections and talking about the day when Modine, Doris, and Jessie Rae Moore came into the shop.

  “We’re fixing to close, ladies,” Shirley said, sweeping hair into a pile.

  “Oh, we’re not here to get our hair done.” Modine said.

  “It’s just…we’ve heard some news that can’t wait,” Doris said.

  “We came right down—wanted you to be the first to know,” Modine said.

  We all stopped what we were doing and looked at them.

  Doris took a deep breath. “I went down to Nims Hardware this morning and the store was closed—”

  “That should have told us something…Nims never closes…It’s Bucky’s motto—Nims Never Closes,” Modine interrupted.

  “Well, it did seem kind of odd, but I shoved it to the back of my mind, you know, like you do when you’re busy. Then tonight I was calling around town to find out where I need to drop Mama off for her bus tour of Charlotte in the morning—”

  “Lord, Doris, cut to the chase. My feet are killing me,” Shirley said.

  “Well, that’s when I heard it,” Doris said. “Bucky Nims has gone and left Dreama!”

  “What?” Shirley shouted.

  “Not Bucky Nims. Why he’d never…” Dixie, Lurleen, and I said in unison.

  “Bullshit and applesauce,” Mrs. Mabes said.

  “It’s true,” Modine said.

  Shirley sat down hard in her chair. “Now, you all, repeat that and say it real slow, but don’t tell me something like that if it ain’t true. My nerves just can’t take it.”

  “It’s true all right,” Doris said. “Like I said, I was calling around for Mama and got it straight from Harvel Pollard at the Trailways Bus Depot. Harvel said Bucky just packed his things and left a note saying ‘I told you I was leaving. Now I’m gone.’ Then he took the first bus out of town.”

  “It happened yesterday, right after that pasty-faced girl of theirs graduated,” Modine added.

  “He musta had it planned for years. To leave out so quick,” Shirley said.

  “Lord, Lord. I didn’t know he had it in him,” Dixie said, her voice filled with wonder.

  “Still waters run deep,” Lurleen said.

  “It’s the quiet ones that bear watching,” Jessie Rae said, biting her lip.

  “Well, I hope he went farther than a Trailways bus could take him. His life won’t be worth a plug nickel when Dreama and that girl of hers catch up with him,” Mrs. Mabes said.

  “Maybe they won’t catch him, Mama,” Shirley said.

  “Oh, they’ll catch him all right. They won’t rest ’til they catch him,” Mrs. Mabes nodded wisely.

  “Lord, Mama, can’t we enjoy this for one minute?” Shirley asked.

  “All I’m saying is, I know what I know. They’ll catch him all right and when they do his life won’t be worth spit,” Mrs. Mabes went on.

  Shirley rolled her eyes. “Go on, Doris. Mama’s just being a killjoy.”

  “They say Dreama’s taking it right hard—she’s took to her bed. Why the shock alone like to have killed her. I drove by her house and all the shades were drawn,” Doris said.

  “Ashamed to show her face,” Modine said.

  “Bullshit and applesauce. That woman don’t have no shame,” Mrs. Mabes said.

  “What Bucky did was the bravest thing I ever heard of and I surely hope he gets away,” Jessie Rae said. Then her eyes darted everywhere. “Oh, my, that sounded so ugly. I only meant—”

  “It’s all right, Jessie Rae. We know what you meant,” everyone said.

  “Anyway, we figured after Shirley chasing Dreama out of her shop and Dreama fixing to ruin all y’alls’ lives…well, we figured you all deserved to be the first to know,” Doris said.

  “Shirley, I want you to know, I think you chasing Dreama off and all, well, I think that’s the bravest thing I ever heard of,” Jessie Rae said. “And Maggie Sweet, I think you wearing that precision cut and working at the Curl & Swirl, when everyone knows how Steven feels about it…well, I think it’s the bravest thing I ever…”

  “Thanks Jessie Rae,” I said.

  Everyone stared at Jessie Rae. It was the most we’d ever heard her say.

  Her eyes darted everywhere, but she went on. “Sometimes I get so timid and tongue-tied I wonder why you all even bother with me. But, Maggie Sweet, I’ve been thinking about some things. I’m nearly forty years old and I’ve never done anything the least bit brave…so I figured I’d start with one of those precision cuts and a little of that number 104 hair color. And I’d like you to set me up an appointment…you know, if it isn’t too much trouble.”

  I looked at Shirley. I wasn’t sure if I was an official Curl & Swirl employee.

  Shirley winked and handed me the appointment book.

  A second later she disappeared into the back room and returned with a dusty, green bottle.

  “It’s old, it’s cheap and it’s room temperature. But it is champagne,” she said.

  When she opened the bottle, the cork hit the ceiling so hard it stuck. Everyone shrieked.

  After she’d divided the champagne into eight Styrofoam cups, she raised her cup and said, “We need to celebrate. Bucky Nims lives. The Curl & Swirl lives. And Maggie Sweet and Jessie Rae are fixing to start a new life. I swanee, some days the universe is just slap full of surprises.”

  It was late when I left the Curl and Swirl. All in the world I wanted to do was get home, take a long soak in a hot tub, and crawl into bed.

  But when I pulled into the driveway, Steven’s car was there.

  For a second I panicked—unbuttoned my smock to hide it under the car seat. Then I thought about Jessie Rae calling me brave. No one had called me brave in years. I thought back to the little girl who’d wanted her nickname to be Scout. What had happened to her? What had happened to Daddy’s “Rebel,” his “feisty little brown-haired girl”?

  I took a deep breath and got out of the car.

  When I opened the door, Steven called from the kitchen, “I was just about to call the State Highway Patrol. The girls decided to stay with Mother, but I had work to do.” He rounded the corner into the front room, spotted my smock, and stood stock-still. “Dammit, Maggie! You’ve been working at the Curl & Swirl, haven’t you?

  “Yes. I—”

  “The breakfast dishes are still on the table. You must have gone down there the minute we left this morning. No wonder you wouldn’t go with us. You’d planned this all along. Well, I won’t have it. I’ve told you over and over again that no wife of mine is ever going to work.”

  I didn’t think. I just blurted out, “I can’t do this anymore, Steven. I won’t. You’re not my daddy. I don’t need your permission.”

  Then I walked out the door and drove to the center of town and checked myself into the Yadkin Motel on Main Street, next door to the Zippy Mart—fifteen dollars a night, no questions asked.

  I felt reckless and happy, strong enough to handle anything.

  I was barely settled in my room when the telephone rang. “Maggie Sweet, have you lost your only mind?”

  “Steven! How in the world did you find me?

  “You’re staying in a motel on Main Street, next door to the Zippy Mart. Everyone in town knows where you are. I’ve already had two calls. I’ll give you five minutes to get home.”

  “I won’t be home. I’ve gone and left you, Steven.”

  He gasped at the other end. For a few seconds the phone seemed to go dead. I was just about to hang up when he sputtered, “You can’t do that. You’ve got children. You’ve got responsibilities.”

  “I’ll take care of my responsibilities. But I’m not coming home.”

  “I’m warning you, Maggie! Five minutes!”

 
; I didn’t bother to argue. Hanging up was the easiest thing in the world to do.

  Ten minutes later he was pounding on my door.

  I opened the door as far as the chain lock allowed. “What do you want?”

  “I want to know what’s come over you. I want to know why you’re determined to humiliate me?”

  “I’m not out to humiliate you.”

  “Dammit, Maggie…”

  “We haven’t been happy for years. I want a divorce.”

  He brushed his hand across his forhead like he was completely worn out. “I never thought you’d do this to us.”

  My eyes welled. I fumbled with the chain lock, opened the door. “I never thought I would either, Steven. It’s just…no one should have to live with someone who doesn’t love them—someone they don’t love.”

  “You’re being ridiculous. What’s worse is you’re making me look ridiculous. If you don’t care about me and the children, what about your mother and Mama Dean? Any minute now their phone will start ringing too. I never thought you’d do this to them.”

  I took a deep breath. I’d rather take a beating than have Mother or Mama Dean come to the Yadkin. Then it hit me: Steven was threatening me with Mother and Mama Dean to keep me in line. To make me do what he wanted. “If it’ll make you feel better, I’ll call Mother and Mama Dean myself,” I bluffed.

  He looked at me like my hair was on fire. Then he grabbed my arm and started hauling me across the parking lot toward his car.

  Now I’m not the type to make a scene in public and Steven knows it. But with my free hand I snatched his good Cross pen and pencil set from his shirt pocket and stomped on them. It was the only thing I could think to do.

  Steven just stood there with his mouth gaping open, staring at his pen and pencil set sticking out of the blacktop.

  Then the traffic light in front of the motel turned red and several cars stopped. Everyone was craning their necks watching us scuffle.

  “Steven! Those people in the cars are watching us. They think you’re trying to kidnap me or something,” I hissed.

  Well, Steven was so mortified he let go of my arm and aimed a sickly smile in the direction of the cars to show he was harmless. Then he picked up the pieces of his pen and pencil set, got in his car, and drove off.

  I ran back to my room completely worn out.

  For a while, I sat on the patched chenille bedspread, aggravated enough to scream. A person couldn’t even leave her own husband without everyone in this town getting in on it.

  Staying at the Yadkin was not going to work. I’d only left home for a half hour, and Steven had already been down here, all because certain people couldn’t mind their own business.

  In an hour half the town would be parading through the parking lot, knocking on my door, offering advice, taking sides between Steven and me.

  I thought about Mother and Mama Dean. Steven was right. They’d be down here any minute. And Dreama Nims. Why, she’d get off her deathbed to witness my disgrace.

  I picked up my purse, left a message on Mary Price’s message machine, and drove to the only place in this world I could go.

  Chapter 23

  I hadn’t been on I-40 fifteen minutes when I knew I’d made the biggest mistake of my life. It had all happened so fast. One minute I’d been standing on the side of a hill and the next minute I was rolling down the hill, going too fast to know where or when I’d stop. I’d left my family. What if Jerry never came back? What if I’d left my family only to live on the streets like a bag lady? I wasn’t sure if I had a job; I didn’t have a place to live. I’d disgraced everyone—ruined my life.

  Now I was speeding down the interstate to Daddy’s and didn’t even know what I’d say when I got there. When I passed the Chapel Hill city limits sign, I decided to tell Daddy and Willa Mae that I’d just stopped by for a visit. Later I’d break it to them that I’d left Steven.

  But by the time I got to Daddy’s, I was in such a state that I threw myself into his arms and wailed, “Oh, Daddy, I’ve gone and left home.”

  And Daddy said, “Now, sugar. It’ll be all right. Everything’s gonna be all right,” just as calm as if me showing up in the middle of the night, dressed in a pink Curl & Swirl smock was the most normal thing in the world.

  Later when I settled down, Willa Mae loaned me a nightgown and I crawled into bed in my old room.

  I was almost asleep when I overheard Daddy talking on the phone.

  “Well, Steven, I just thought I’d let you know she’s safe. Now there’s no sense carrying on so. You knew how it was when you married her. It’s in her blood. Why, her Mama Dean Pruitt run her granddaddy off and her mama run me off, too. I guess it’s a pure wonder Maggie stuck around as long as she did, bless her heart. The thing is, Steven, she just couldn’t help herself.”

  I sat up straight in the bed. No wonder Daddy wasn’t surprised to see me. He’d been expecting me for nineteen years.

  I sat there in the dark, listening to Daddy explain women to Steven—especially Pruitt women. Women were treacherous. That’s just how they were. It went along with the xx female chromosomes and couldn’t be helped any more than flat feet or color blindness. ’Course me having Pruitt blood in my veins made me doubly treacherous. Why, according to Daddy, Steven ought to thank his lucky stars that I wasn’t all Pruitt. If I’d been pure raging Pruitt and not watered down with Daddy’s forgiving, reasonable Sweet blood, Steven wouldn’t be sleeping safely in his bed tonight. A pure Pruitt woman would have run him off.

  Before he hung up, Daddy said, “’Course I won’t be listening to nothing bad about my girl, nor have you bothering her, either one. If she said divorce, well, that’s it. It’s been good talking to you too, Steven. Uh-huh. Good-bye.”

  It was the oddest thing, lying in bed in the guest room, hearing Daddy explain me that way. I probably should have felt insulted but that was exactly why I’d come here. Steven would never follow me here. Daddy’s odd, stubborn logic had always confused and infuriated him.

  But mostly I’d come here because no matter what happened, I knew that Daddy loved me warts and all.

  Sunday morning after breakfast I walked down to the creek behind Daddy’s property. The sky was a cloudless blue, the color of prewashed jeans. I sat on a rock and stared into the creek, thinking back to that long-ago summer when I came here to smoke on the sly and brood about Jerry.

  Nothing had changed. Here I was twenty years later, doing the same thing—smoking on the sly and brooding about Jerry. Was I in some kind of time warp? Or was it one of those universal things Shirley talked about—coming full circle?

  I reached in my pocket and pulled out a cigarette and a piece of paper fluttered to the ground.

  Jerry’s poem. I took a deep breath, unfolded the paper and read it, lingering over the words “he finds his soul /where he left it / with the girl at Belews Pond. Always remember. I loved you then. I love you now. I’ll ALWAYS love you.”

  I sat there awhile and let the tears fall. Then I wiped them with the backs of my hands, took a deep breath, and headed back toward the house.

  As I walked over the rise, I saw Jerry’s pickup in the driveway.

  He was at the table drinking Daddy’s thick, strong coffee. I’d never been so glad to see anyone in my life. Then he was whirling me around, lifting me off my feet and shouting, “We did it! We did it! I can’t believe we did it!”

  “Lord, Jerry! I can’t believe you’re here,” I said, holding on tight.

  “I got home last night and didn’t know how to reach you. So I went down to the Palomino. Mary Price said she’d call you and call me back. She didn’t call till three A.M.—the minute she got home. She’d heard your phone message that you’d left Steven. Lord, honey, it was all I could do not to drive here then and there. I just didn’t know how your dad would take it.”

  “He come here half an hour ago to ask for your hand. I was just asking him about his prospects,” Daddy said.

  “His prospects?
Lord, Daddy!” I said.

  “Now, Maggie, this is between us menfolk,” Daddy said.

  “It is not. It’s between Jerry and me.”

  “Well, now, there you go, Jerry. I told you she was feisty.”

  “I can see that, sir.” Jerry grinned at me.

  “It’s plain to see how you all feel about one another. But it’s a daddy’s job to talk about prospects,” Daddy said, giving Jerry a friendly man-to-man nudge.

  In nineteen years I’d never seen him nudge Steven.

  “Well, Mr. Sweet, it’s like this—” Jerry started.

  “—Call me Jack. Smilin’ Jack. Every time you say Mr. Sweet I look around expectin’ to see my daddy,” Daddy said.

  “All right, Jack. To tell you the truth, I just got my clock cleaned pretty good in my divorce—”

  “So money was the name of her game,” I said.

  Willa Mae poured fresh coffee and set huge slabs of peach pie in front of everyone.

  “Money was always the name of her game. But I’ve still got the farmhouse and the truck…that and my Navy pension. Uh, thanks, Mrs. Sweet,” Jerry said.

  “Maggie’ll have to work then? Daddy asked.

  “I want to work. I’ve already got a job,” I said.

  “You did? When?” Jerry asked.

  “Yesterday. I started working at the Curl & Swirl.”

  “It’s all falling into place,” Jerry said, squeezing my hand.

  “Well, it takes two a’working just to make it these days. Why, Willa Mae and me worked at that old hosiery mill for years and…you say you own a farmhouse?” Daddy said, looking up from his pie.

  “Yes, sir…uh, Jack. It’s an old farmhouse—only a couple of acres of land. But it’s got the prettiest pond behind it…and lots of outbuildings. I plan to start a carpentry business,” Jerry said.

  “He’s good, too, Daddy. Wait’ll you see the farmhouse. He’s built cupboards, countertops, a new porch—”

  “Is the pond stocked?” Daddy asked, ignoring me.

  “There’s bream and bass and catfish…I don’t know what all. You’re welcome to try your luck anytime,” Jerry said.

  We all dug into our pie. Daddy and Willa Mae, Jerry and me. It all seemed so natural, I could already picture Daddy loading his pickup with fishing poles and flies, spending weekends with us at the farmhouse.