One More Time

by Deborah Cooke

  Annette fidgeted. “Something.”

  “No. You show me exactly what.”

  Annette turned to face her, squaring her shoulders and standing up straight for once. “You’re only worried about appearances, about what everyone else thinks—” she began, clearly gearing up for a teenage tirade.

  But Beverly had survived four teenagers, more or less, and wasn’t that easily ruffled. “You’re right. I want people to think that my family had respect for my husband, and that means that you will dress appropriately or you will not go.”

  Annette’s face lit and Beverly realized her mistake a bit late. “Bonus!”

  “No bonus.” Beverly smiled a slow cold smile, one that made Annette shiver just as children before her had shivered. “Because if you do not extend the courtesy of attending your grandfather’s funeral, I will find a way to make you regret it. You can count on that.”

  Annette reached for Champagne’s collar. “You won’t take the dogs away.”

  “They have a trust fund,” Beverly said, only realizing the import of that now. “It might be my obligation to house them in the style to which they’ve become accustomed, which would be, of course, in a condo downtown that is reasonably inaccessible without a car.” She shrugged, though she was touched by Annette’s horror at this prospect. “Which might mean that I had to get rid of the Jag, maybe for a Corolla or something more practical.”

  “I thought you were going to teach me to drive in the Jag!” Annette wailed.

  Beverly arched a brow, letting the child do the math all by herself.

  “You’re not supposed to play dirty like this,” Annette muttered. “Adults are supposed to take the high road and set an example.”

  “I decided a long time ago that I couldn’t be an example, so I might as well be a horrible warning instead,” Beverly said, quoting a quip she’d once heard somewhere.

  Annette almost laughed. “You don’t mean that.”

  “I’m serious about the funeral. You need to go and you need to look like the pretty young woman that you are.” She held out the suit on its hanger, the plastic bag from the store bunched around the hook of the hanger. “You could at least try it on. You might be surprised. It is of excellent quality, because I don’t believe in wasting my money on garbage.”

  The fact that it had been expensive kindled the girl’s interest, which Beverly thought a good sign. “Do I have to get a paper route or something lame to pay you back for it?”

  “No. It’s a gift, even if it’s one you don’t want. Look at it this way: I’d rather not be buying you a suit to wear to your grandfather’s funeral.”

  Annette looked surprised. “But if I have to go and I have to wear something appropriate and I don’t have anything that’s right, then you mean you wish he wasn’t dead.”

  Beverly held her granddaughter’s gaze. “That’s right.”

  “But he wasn’t…I mean, he wasn’t nice.”

  “Are you always nice?” Beverly shook her head, not waiting for an answer. “I’m not, but I hope that doesn’t mean that there’s a long line of people wishing me dead. If so, I don’t intend to oblige them anytime soon.”

  Annette took the hanger with some reluctance, and didn’t move further. Beverly crossed the kitchen, shed her coat, and looked in the fridge. Great. There was cranberry juice. Hip hip hurray.

  It would have to do.

  She poured herself a glass, aware that Annette was watching her. She turned slowly and looked the girl up and down, ignoring her stricken expression. “You could have had the worst over with by now. It’s not an enormous concession that I’m asking of you.”

  Annette passed the hanger from one hand to the other, looked away, then impaled Beverly with a glance. “Are you really sad that he’s dead?”

  “Yes.” She smiled slightly at Annette’s shock. “I knew him for a long time and, though we weren’t always nice to each other, it was comforting in a way just to know that he was there.”

  She might have stopped there but the child was watching her so intently that she felt obliged to continue.

  “I believed, even after we separated, that if I really needed anything, that Robert would have helped me. I’m not sure whether that was true, but it doesn’t matter. The idea that there was someone I could rely upon was one that reassured me. And now he’s not here anymore, which means there’s no one to call. My parents and siblings are all dead already, and I think it’s a bit tacky to keep counting on your kids to help you out.” Beverly laughed a little, without humor. “Especially when you need as much help as I tend to.”

  “Maybe you shouldn’t live alone.”

  “I have the girls now.”

  “I mean, without other people. Because then there’d always be someone around.”

  “I can’t imagine that anyone would put up with me.”

  “We’re doing it.”

  “Yes, I suppose you are. But then, I’ve asked your mother for more than enough and probably should move soon.” She frowned at the dogs, thinking of that trust fund and what it could buy. “I suppose the girls’ money would enable me to move out and not rely on anyone.”

  “But you need someone you can call. You just said that.”

  “I guess I’ll have to get over that.”

  “You could call me,” Annette said with heat and Beverly glanced up in surprise. “I mean, you’ve never asked me for anything except for a chance, and I said okay to that, so maybe I’d say okay to other things.” She shrugged and flushed, uncomfortable with Beverly’s silence. “I mean, it can’t hurt to ask, right?”

  Beverly put down the glass, touched beyond expectation. “No,” she said quietly. “It never hurts to ask. The worst thing anyone can do is to say no, after all.”

  “I don’t think I would,” Annette said, then shrugged. Her tone changed, revealing that the moment between them had passed. “Unless you, like, asked me something totally gross, then I’d have to say no, you know?”

  “That’s only reasonable,” Beverly agreed. She gestured to the suit. “Does trying that on qualify as totally gross?”

  Annette smiled, looking so soft and pretty that Beverly’s heart nearly stopped. “No. Not really. I’ll go try it on now.” She ran for the stairs, which meant that the girls became convinced that they were missing something. They galloped after her, Champagne barking as they vaulted up the stairs. Annette giggled, then her door slammed, though Beverly could hear the tap of toenails on the hardwood floor overhead.

  She sincerely hoped they were the dogs’ toenails.

  The child was trying so hard to eat properly, but Beverly knew that a radical change is the hardest one to stick to. That was why she’d been hunting cookies. It was far wiser, in Beverly’s experience, to take a middle course over a radical change.

  She thought a reward was in order.

  Her own kids had always adored pizza and could have eaten it three times a day, instead of the three times a year or less that she’d permitted them to have it. She’d treat Leslie and Annette to pizza tonight: undoubtedly Leslie would be relieved to not need to cook again. Beverly glanced through the yellow pages, dismissing the national chains without undue consideration, her fingertip landing firmly on the number for a local pizza place with a nice Italian name.

  Macetti’s. Perfect.

  Beverly had no sooner hung up the phone from placing her order than it rang again. Mercifully, Leslie was just coming in the front door because the call was for her.

  And it was a man.

  “Leslie! There’s a Graham Mulvaney on the phone for you.”

  Leslie’s pleasure was clear as she hastened down the hall, dropping coat and bags en route. “Wonderful!” she said, looking younger and more vibrant than Beverly could ever remember her looking.

  It wasn’t just the pink.

  Surely, Leslie couldn’t be in love with another man already?

  The thought depressed Beverly more than she might have expected. The girls had leaped back do
wn the stairs at the sound of the front door opening and were lobbying to go out into the backyard. It was no doubt a result of the excitement of everyone coming home, but this time, Beverly went out into the snowy yard with them.

  Although she was aching to hear what Leslie said, the tone of Leslie’s voice told Beverly more than enough.

  Why had Matt felt obliged to leave? It wasn’t her business and Beverly knew it but for a heartfelt moment, she wished she’d had the chance to change his mind.

  * * *

  Annette was thinking that the suit wasn’t as bad as she’d feared. She heard her mom come home, let the girls out of the bedroom to thunder down the stairs, but stayed in her room to consider her reflection.

  She liked the black. It was a deep rich black, and the fabric was something with a texture that made the black look even darker. It felt good beneath her fingertips, pretty deluxe.

  She liked the skirt, too. It had a kind of flirty little hem with a flounce on the bottom that bounced a bit when she walked. It had some kind of stretchy stuff in the waist and didn’t have one of those waistbands that made her feel like she was being cut in half, like an assistant in a magician’s show. The skirt made her feel like a girl, like being a girl wasn’t all bad.

  The jacket was short, stopping at her waist, and had a zipper up the front. It was kind of funky, but restrained, too. Maybe she could even wear it with jeans. There was a package of pantyhose in the bottom of the bag, black ones like adults wore and Annette felt a thrill of excitement that she’d been admitted to that class.

  She had a pair of black shoes that weren’t hugely exciting, but she put them on anyway. They looked better than they did with her other skirt, which was long and straight and denim. She would have liked to have had a pair of sling backs with long pointed toes, but it was probably too late to lobby for that.

  Annette pivoted in front of the mirror and reluctantly conceded that the witch knew how to shop. The suit fit pretty well, and looked a lot better on her than it had on the hanger. She admired herself for a good chunk of time, imagining that the bra she had picked would feel good under this, picturing her legs looking sleek in those black stockings. She checked the pantyhose package and was intimidated by the promise that the stockings within were ultra-sheer and had cost twelve dollars.

  Maybe she’d wait for help on those.

  Could she press her luck for lipstick? Maybe not for a funeral.

  The T-shirt, though, wasn’t coming together with the suit. She needed a blouse, but a rummage through her jammed closet revealed that she had nothing even remotely cool enough for this suit. She zipped up the jacket and thought it would look as if she didn’t have anything on underneath if in fact, she didn’t.

  Then she remembered the scarf.

  She had just pulled out the fabulous gold and orange box when the doorbell rang.

  Incredibly, no one answered it, because it rang again, ringing longer and louder than it had before.

  At the third insistent ring, Annette wondered whether anyone else was still home. She chucked the silk across the bed, where it spilled like a splendid patch of sunlight. The doorbell rang again. She kicked off her shoes and ran down the stairs, flinging open the front door just as the bell started to ring again.

  “What?” she demanded.

  Anything else she might have said became a choking sound, because Scott Sexton himself—the amazing hunk Scott Sexton!—was standing on their porch with a pizza box.

  “I thought there was nobody home,” he said, flushing a little. “Sorry.”

  “Well, I don’t know where everybody is.”

  “Well, somebody ordered a pizza.”

  Annette glanced over her shoulder, mostly to keep herself from staring at Scott, and saw her mother chatting on the phone in the kitchen, oblivious to what was happening at the door.

  As if. This was probably a set-up.

  “So, how much is it?” Annette asked, feeling that the suit gave her a measure of dignity that she might not have had otherwise.

  “It’s paid already, on a credit card. I just have to drop it off.” Scott passed Annette the hot pizza box, but didn’t turn immediately to leave. “Don’t you go to my school?”

  “Doesn’t everybody around here go to that school?” Annette asked, not wanting to show how thrilled she was that he had some clue who she was. Instead, she sounded like a jerk, which she only realized too late.

  Scott flushed. “Well, yeah, pretty much.” He shoved one hand in his pocket, the insulated pizza bag hanging from the other. “I don’t even know your name.”

  “It’s Annette. And you are?”

  “Scott. Scott Sexton.”

  “Oh,” Annette said as if she didn’t know that already. “Hi.” She would have turned away if he’d left, but he didn’t go anywhere, just stood and looked at her.

  “Are you going out or something?” he asked, gesturing to her suit.

  “No. Well, sort of. I have to go to my grandfather’s funeral tomorrow. My grandmother bought this for me to wear and I’m supposed to check that it fits.”

  “Looks nice.”

  “Oh, thanks.” Annette tried her best to be cool, but she felt herself blushing all the same. She couldn’t look straight at him, but he didn’t leave. The pizza was warm, exuding the scent of bacon and cheese, but Annette wasn’t anxious to get inside and have a piece.

  Weird.

  “Sorry about your grandfather.”

  “Thanks.” Annette shrugged. “I didn’t know him very well.”

  “But it’s still sad, ’cause everyone else is sad. Your grandma must be sad, for example. Mine was when my grandfather died.”

  “Yeah.” Annette met his gaze and deliberately chose a different word to refer to the witch. “My grandma is sad.” She didn’t choke on the word and lightning didn’t strike her dead.

  Maybe Beverly was going to be her grandma, after all.

  “You watch that?” Scott asked.

  For a minute Annette didn’t realize what he meant and then she saw that he was gesturing to her T-shirt. “Yeah, but I like the original series better.” She took a deep breath, knowing that she was taking a big chance by stating her preference. “I mean, Starbuck is a man.”

  Scott grinned. “Absolutely!”

  Annette felt her mouth fall open. They agreed on something, and not just anything, but something totally critical.

  “And he was so cool,” Scott continued. “Turning his character into a woman was like, just not right. And lame. I mean, not like I think girls can’t do anything they want, but it just changed everything.”

  “Yeah, exactly.”

  “I’d like to see those old ones again, but they almost never come up on TV.”

  “I have them on DVD,” Annette said, without meaning to do so.

  “No way! That is so cool.” Scott looked at her with new admiration, then sobered. “I mean, that’s great that you can watch them and maybe compare the two. I know I’ve forgotten a lot about what made the original series so neat.”

  “You could buy the DVD.” Annette nearly smacked herself for making such a dumb suggestion when she could have made a much better one.

  Scott shook his head. “No, I’m trying to save for a car. You know how much they cost? No DVD’s for me anytime soon.”

  Annette took a deep breath and fought to sound casual. She wasn’t sure it worked. “Maybe you could come watch the ones I have some time.”

  Scott didn’t seem to care whether she was casual or not, and he certainly didn’t trouble to hide his enthusiasm. “Yeah, maybe. That’d be cool, Annette.” He held her gaze for a long delicious moment, while Annette savored the fact that he’d actually said her name.

  Her heart was leaping all over the place and her mouth was dry and her palms were damp—though maybe that was the grease from the pizza seeping through the box. Either way, she couldn’t she stand here all night and gape at him.

  Could she?

  “Pizza’s getting col
d,” she said, with an apologetic shrug.

  “Oh no!” Scott jumped in sudden recollection. “I’ve got three pizzas in the truck to deliver!” He looked at his watch, visibly panicked, and ran for the Macetti’s truck idling at the curb. “I gotta go! I’ll see you around, Annette.”

  “Yeah,” Annette said, smiling to herself as she turned back into the house. “Yeah, I guess maybe you will.”

  Scott Sexton had recognized her.

  Scott Sexton knew her name.

  Scott Sexton wanted to watch her DVD of Battlestar Galactica.

  Which meant that Scott Sexton probably watched all of the Star Trek series, too. Maybe he didn’t have those on DVD, either.

  Annette almost hugged the pizza in her delight, but remembered her new suit in the nick of time.

  * * *

  Leslie hung up the phone, excited beyond belief. Annette bounced into the kitchen in a gorgeous black suit, which made Leslie gape at the transformation in her daughter. It was more than the beauty of the suit: Annette was radiant.

  And she was carrying a Macetti’s pizza box. The math added up quite neatly then and Leslie chose not to pry into the delicate matters of the teenage heart.

  “See what Grandma bought me?” Annette asked, and twirled for her mother.

  Grandma even.

  It’s beautiful, but you’d better change before dinner.”

  Beverly came in from the backyard with two snowy dogs who headed straight for the pizza box on the counter. They both sniffed so emphatically that Leslie thought the box would move, drawn by the power of their inhalation.

  “Poodles do not eat pizza,” Beverly said sternly, sending them to their corner with a single gesture. They collapsed there, chins on paws, eyes wide open and gazes fixed on the pizza box. Beverly set the table with brusque gestures, her impatience so clear that Leslie felt obliged to ask.

  “Have a bad day?”

  “No. I had an excellent day, thank you very much.” Beverly put the plates down on the table with force, then turned to confront Leslie. “All right. It’s not my business and I admit it, but I still want to know. Who is Graham Mulvaney and what exactly is going on between you? My son may have one foot out the door but he’s not gone yet.”