“What now?”
I swallowed before I spoke. Now that there were no more secrets coming between us, I could say what I should have said the last night we were together.
“I love you, Carl.”
“Does that mean yes?” Carl said.
I was too overcome to speak, so I nodded.
Yes to him. Yes to love. Yes to the baby, and yes to getting married. The feeling was too big to be contained in my body; it was fighting to get out.
And that’s when it happened. I felt something wet and unfamiliar pearling up in my eyes. Could it be? Yes, it was! Tears. I barely recognized them, it’d been so long. They were the first ones I’d cried since I’d read my mother’s diary. Looked as if I hadn’t forgotten how to weep after all. Carl wrapped his arms around me and held me to his chest as I leaked almost fifteen years’ worth of waterworks all over his white dress shirt.
Carl followed me home from work, and even that brief period of separation made me ache for him. He must have felt the same way. As soon as he parked and got out of his car, he grabbed me around the waist, gently bent me backwards, and kissed me deeply. It reminded me of the photo of the sailor kissing the girl in Times Square on VJ Day.
The sky was so big and endlessly blue, I thought about the Dixie Chicks song “Wide Open Spaces.” We sprinted up my walk, a current of anticipation flying between us like sparks from a car battery. I stopped short when I saw an envelope shoved in my door. I almost ignored it, but my curiosity won me over. I grabbed it.
“Can’t you look at that later?” His hand caressed the small of my back, raising goose eggs all over my body. I could scarcely wait to consummate our engagement.
“It’ll only take a sec.”
“Okay,” he said, nibbling on my ear.
I’d never torn open an envelope so quickly; inside was a card on my aunt’s letterhead.
If you marry him before the baby’s born, it isn’t bastardy. Something to consider.
Aunt Cornelia
P.S. I hope to endorse this on your wedding day.
P.S.S. I’m proud of you, and I know your mama would be too.
Folded inside was a check made out for five million dollars. I nearly cried again when I thought about how many Harriet Hall students were going to benefit from the money. As for the distribution of the funds, I knew exactly what I was going to do: I’d reserve a portion for a down payment on a modest three-bedroom house and a college fund for the baby, but the bulk would go to the school. I was almost certain Carl would agree with me. With our two salaries combined, our family would have enough for the essentials and a little leftover for occasional niceties, like a honeymoon, maybe in one of the romantic little inns in Charleston.
After all, hadn’t a steady stream of unearned money kept me from growing up? My life had only become meaningful when I had to make my own way.
“What’s that all about?” Carl said, pointing at the note.
I smiled mysteriously. “I’ll tell you later. Let’s just say this: We shouldn’t waste too much time planning our wedding.”
About the Author
Karin Gillespie is national bestselling author of five novels and a humor columnist for Augusta Magazine. Her nonfiction writing had been in the New York Times, The Writer and Romantic Times. She maintains a website and blog at Karingillespie.net. Sign up for her newsletter on her website, follow her on Twitter or connect with her on Facebook.
Don’t Miss Karin Gillespie’s Bottom Dollar Series
BET YOUR BOTTOM DOLLAR
Karin Gillespie
The Bottom Dollar Series (#1)
Welcome to the Bottom Dollar Emporium in Cayboo Creek, South Carolina, where everything from coconut mallow cookies to Clabber Girl Baking Powder costs a dollar but the coffee and gossip are free. For the Bottom Dollar gals, work time is sisterhood time.
When news gets out that a corporate dollar store is coming to town, the women are thrown into a tizzy, hoping to save their beloved store as well their friendships. Meanwhile the manager is canoodling with the town’s wealthiest bachelor and their romance unearths some startling family secrets.
The first in a series, Bet Your Bottom Dollar serves up a heaping portion of small town Southern life and introduces readers to a cast of eccentric characters. Pull up a wicker chair, set out a tall glass of Cheer Wine, and immerse yourself in the adventures of a group of women whom the Atlanta Journal Constitution calls, “… the kind of steel magnolias who would make Scarlett O’Hara envious.”
Read all about it and/or grab the book from Amazon
CLICK FOR BET YOUR BOTTOM DOLLAR
A DOLLAR SHORT
Karin Gillespie
A Bottom Dollar Novel (#2)
It isn’t every day a movie star steals your husband. When that day comes for Chiffon Butrell of Cayboo Creek South Carolina, she looks to the Bottom Dollar Girls to help her out of one fine mess.
Husband Lonnie has run out to Hollywood and holes up with famous star Janie-Lynn Lauren. He’s left behind Chiffon, her three children and a very tiny bank account. Chiffon breaks her ankle and has to rely on her estranged sister Chenille to lend a hand.
When the tabloid media gets wind of her husband’s torrid romance, sleepy Cayboo Creek lands on the star map. Under the glare of camera lights, the two sisters must put aside longtime grievances to forge a newfound relationship. Meanwhile the rest of the gang is cooking up a questionable scheme to raise money for the senior center.
The Bottom Dollar Girls are back and in fine form in this hilarious sequel to Bet Your Bottom Dollar.
Read all about it and/or grab the book from Amazon
CLICK FOR A DOLLAR SHORT
DOLLAR DAZE
Karin Gillespie
A Bottom Dollar Novel (#3)
Cupid is running rampant in Cayboo Creek, South Carolina, and all the Bottom Dollar Girls have been struck dizzy with his arrows. When high school heartthrob Brewster Clark returns to town, both Birdie and Mavis are angling for his affections, threatening their long-term friendship.
Ever-so-proper Gracie Tobias meets Rusty the dreamy doctor of her dreams but soon discovers he’s actually a blue-collar duct doctor. Will their wildly different social positions drive a wedge between them? Meanwhile Elizabeth is trying to put the sizzle back to her marriage. Not even octogenarian Attalee is immune to love’s siren call. She gets engaged to beau Dooley and plans a wild bachelorette party and steamy honeymoon.
Traveling love’s rocky road keeps the Bottom Dollar Girls asking, “Is it ever too late for moons and Junes?” Through much laughter and a few tears the girls discover that the answer is a resounding no.
Read all about it and/or grab the book from Amazon
CLICK FOR DOLLAR DAZE
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And finally, before you go...
Here are a few other books
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THE BREAKUP DOCTOR
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Call Brook Ogden a matchmaker-in-reverse. Let others bring people together; Brook, licensed mental health counselor, picks up the pieces after things come apart. When her own therapy practice collapses, she maintains perfect control: landing on her feet with a weekly advice-to-the-lovelorn column and a successful consulting service as the Breakup Doctor: on call to help you shape up after you breakup.
Then her relationship suddenly crumbles and Brook finds hers
elf engaging in almost every bad-breakup behavior she preaches against. And worse, she starts a rebound relationship with the most inappropriate of men: a dangerously sexy bartender with anger-management issues—who also happens to be a former patient.
As her increasingly out-of-control behavior lands her at rock-bottom, Brook realizes you can’t always handle a messy breakup neatly—and that sometimes you can’t pull yourself together until you let yourself fall apart.
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As she slowly pieces together the mystery of how her dreams and aspirations could have disintegrated so completely in five short years, she finds herself utterly failing to manage this life she can’t imagine choosing. When Sarah meets the man of her dreams, she realizes she’s got to make a choice: Does she follow her bliss and “do-over” her life? Or does the Sarah she’s forgotten hold the answers to how she got here… and how she can stay?
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DOUBLE WHAMMY
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Davis Way thinks she’s hit the jackpot when she lands a job as the fifth wheel on an elite security team at the fabulous Bellissimo Resort and Casino in Biloxi, Mississippi. But once there, she runs straight into her ex-ex husband, a rigged slot machine, her evil twin, and a trail of dead bodies. Davis learns the truth and it does not set her free—in fact, it lands her in the pokey.
Buried under a mistaken identity, unable to seek help from her family, her hot streak runs cold until her landlord Bradley Cole steps in. Make that her landlord, lawyer, and love interest. With his help, Davis must win this high stakes game before her luck runs out.
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Girl Meets Class Page 25