When Doris June heard her mother ask for this kind of a dress, Doris June didn’t believe her mother actually meant it even though her mother had later sent her a picture from a catalogue showing this kind of a dress.
As it turned out, her mother had not only meant for her to buy those kinds of dresses, her mother was also intent on sharing the wealth. Her mother insisted Doris June wear one of the new dresses meant for her instead of the plain gray one Doris June had bought for herself.
The only explanation in Doris June’s mind was that her mother was regressing so far back that she was thinking like a thirteen-year-old girl. Unusual behavior like that was definitely up there on the list of symptoms for senior confusion.
Doris June thought she was fortunate she did not have to wear a lamp shade on her head to please her mother. As it was, the pink dress was a little large on Doris June, but it did, at least, look like something a person would wear. Of course, her work shoes had looked foolish next to all the pink froth of the dress, so Doris June had agreed to break in the new slip-ons she had gotten for her mother as well.
If her mother hadn’t looked so happy to see her in the pink dress, Doris June would have thought the whole dress thing was just a way for her mother to get someone to wear her new shoes so they wouldn’t hurt her own feet when she wore them later.
Doris June looked across the table at her mother. She did look happy.
“More liver?” Doris June picked up the platter closest to her and turned to offer it to Curt.
Doris June decided that the one good thing about wearing shoes that were too tight and a dress that was too short was that it didn’t give her a lot of time to worry about how fickle some men could be. Something was wrong with Curt tonight and she didn’t know what it was, unless he objected to the dress she was wearing. If she had a minute, she could assure him she thought the dress was ridiculous on someone her age, too. Although now that he was glaring at her as if she’d done something wrong, she probably wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of agreeing with him.
“Thank you,” Curt said as he slid another piece of meat onto his plate.
Doris June watched him, speechless. He was wearing a tie; he hated ties. He was eating liver and onions; he hated liver and he wasn’t overly fond of onions. How could someone have changed so much? The way he’d been looking at her all night, she would have thought he had everything reversed in his mind and thought she should be the one to say she was sorry to him. He seemed to have forgotten who had left whom standing at the sheriff’s office.
“Linda had the liver in the freezer over at the café,” Mrs. Hargrove said in the same bright voice she had used all evening. “She’s thinking about adding liver and onions to the menu if there’s enough demand for it.”
“I’ll have to tell her she has my vote,” Charley said. “It’s good to change the menu once in a while.”
“Her sister, Lucy, says they’re selling more kinds of pie, too,” Ben added.
Since this was the only bit of conversation Ben had offered for the evening that wasn’t required as part of the food-passing process, Doris June thought she should say something to encourage him. Young people could be so shy.
“I bet they serve great pies there,” Doris June said with a full-wattage smile for the boy.
Ben looked at her like he appreciated her support and nodded. “Lucy says Linda lets her keep the pie money. Well, on the days when she’s working there, at least.”
Doris June was pleased to see that Ben was talking.
Apparently Mrs. Hargrove was pleased, too. “I thought I’d seen Lucy working in there.”
“Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday after school and some weekends,” Ben said with a nod. “She’s saving money to buy a new guitar.”
Doris June looked over at Curt to see if he was noticing how his son was opening up.
“Lucy must be about your age,” Mrs. Hargrove said.
Ben nodded. “Almost.”
“Didn’t you say once that you played guitar, too?” Mrs. Hargrove asked.
Ben nodded.
“Well,” Mrs. Hargrove said. “I vote that we go over and get pie after we finish up here. My treat.”
“Really?” Ben said.
“Really?” Doris June echoed. She knew her mother had brownies thawing on the kitchen counter.
Mrs. Hargrove nodded. “I always like to encourage young people, and a guitar is a good thing to have. I like to see a young girl who knows what she wants at Lucy’s age.”
Doris June looked down at the last little piece of liver on her plate. She hoped no one else was thinking what she was—that her mother hadn’t been so supportive of her own daughter when she knew what she wanted when she was a couple of years older than Lucy. Of course, there was a difference between a guitar and a husband. Still, the thoughts came and Doris June didn’t stop them. She’d missed out on so much. If her mother hadn’t interfered, she and Curt would be sitting at this table now and Ben, well, he would be their son.
Not that, Doris June assured herself, she was still pining away for Curt and the life they could have had. Her dream of him had died years ago.
“I can stay and do dishes while you go for pie,” Doris June offered. She didn’t feel much like walking around Dry Creek with the man who was her dead dream glaring at her the way he had been all evening.
“Nonsense,” Mrs. Hargrove said as she set her napkin down on the table. “We could all use the walk over to the café.”
Doris June didn’t want to argue with her mother even though one hundred steps would do nothing for anyone’s exercise routine, especially not if they sat down at the end of the short walk and had a piece of pie.
Mrs. Hargrove didn’t understand how Doris June and Curt had ever gotten together as teenagers. Earlier, they had been looking at each other as though they’d never even thought about kissing each other. Mrs. Hargrove and Charley were leading the way over to the café. The day was just sliding into night and so, while there were deep shadows, it was easy enough to find firm footing on the sidewalk leading down to the front gate of Mrs. Hargrove’s lawn. From there, they walked on the gravel-sided road toward the café.
“Do you think it’s working?” Charley leaned over and asked Mrs. Hargrove softly.
“Ben looks like he’s got more romance on his mind than our two kids do,” Mrs. Hargrove said in disgust.
Mrs. Hargrove didn’t need to turn around to know that Curt and Doris June were walking behind them with a good yard between them and frowns on both of their faces. It was quiet as a tomb so she knew they weren’t talking.
“Maybe they need someone to give them the idea,” Charley said as he reached over and took Mrs. Hargrove’s hand in his.
“Why—?” Mrs. Hargrove stopped walking to look over at Charley in astonishment.
Charley winked.
“Oh, yeah.” Mrs. Hargrove swallowed and then smiled weakly. She didn’t remove her hand from his, however. Maybe Charley was right, she thought. Maybe their children did need a nudge. She wished she could turn around and see it Curt and Doris June were taking the hint, but she didn’t want to be obvious. Children were so sensitive about their parents prying into their romantic lives and Mrs. Hargrove had always been careful not to do that. Well, except for the time she had stopped their elopement, of course.
Mrs. Hargrove sighed at the thought. When she made a mistake, it was always a big one. Not that she could have let them get married. But she could have at least let them write letters to each other. What was the harm in a few letters?
Charley looked over at Mrs. Hargrove and stepped closer so he could put his arm around her.
Doris June hissed.
Curt drew back his breath. He was on the verge of saying something to her. Just one word that would start the tumble of his confession. But she hissed. How could he talk when she wasn’t paying attention to him? Instead, she was staring straight ahead.
“Did you see that?” Doris June demanded in a low voi
ce as she moved over close enough to him so they could have a private conversation.
Curt hadn’t noticed earlier tonight that tiny wisps of hair were escaping Doris June’s tightly controlled hair style. But when she stood next to him, he could see the strands of hair lying against her cheek. The strands showed up when Doris June walked under the one streetlight Dry Creek had. It was distracting enough that he hadn’t even tried to figure out what she was talking about.
“Huh?” Curt said. He wondered if she’d be mad if he smoothed those strands back. He’d forgotten how much he used to love the feel of her hair.
“Them,” Doris June jerked her head toward something in front of them. “Our parents. Did you see them holding hands?”
“I wasn’t watching them, you see I was thinking—” Curt began.
“How could you not see them?” Doris June squeaked. “Your dad had his arm around my mother’s shoulder.”
Curt decided to try again. “Sometimes when old friends start to feel romantic, things are confusing—”
“You think they’re romantic? Our parents?”
Curt could see Doris June was completely missing the point he was trying to make.
“No.” Curt figured the only way to get her attention back was to answer her questions. “No, I don’t think anyone around here is romantic. But—”
“Of course,” Doris June said in a rush. “I should have seen it before now. My mother isn’t senile, she’s in love. That explains why she wanted me to buy this for her.” Doris June held out the skirt of her dress as if there was something wrong with it. “This is probably her idea of a date dress. Why my mother needs a dress like this I don’t know. I don’t even want to know.”
“That dress is your mother’s?” Curt smiled in relief. The longer he had looked at that pink frilly dress tonight the more convinced he had been that Doris June must have a regular boyfriend back in Anchorage. A woman wouldn’t buy a dress like that unless she had occasion to wear it and wear it often in places that were usually date kind of places.
“You have a problem with the dress?” Doris June asked stiffly.
“Absolutely not, it’s a pretty dress,” Curt said mildly. He wasn’t about to tell her that he’d been worried she had a boyfriend. “But I don’t think you have anything to worry about. Things aren’t always what you think. Your mom and my dad have known each other for years. They’re good friends—that doesn’t mean they’re romantically inclined.”
“So your father has been acting normal lately?”
Curt stopped a moment to think. Now that he knew Doris June didn’t own the pink dress, he was enjoying how the breeze blew the sleeves around in the faint light that was coming from that new light Linda had installed on the café porch. He wouldn’t mind standing out here and talking for a bit.
“Well, has he been acting normal?” Doris June asked again.
“He might have been a preoccupied, I suppose. If one wanted to be technical about it.”
Doris June nodded. “My mother, too.”
“Maybe they had an argument and were worried about how to fix it between themselves,” Curt said, and it could be possible. “I know when friends disagree it can be painful for both people.”
“They don’t look like they’ve been fighting.”
“Well, but if they had, I’m sure they’d both be sorry and want to say they were sorry. I know I’m sorry about what happened with us.”
Curt had to admit his apology lacked any kind of flourish, but it was sincere.
Doris looked up at him as if he was nuts. “What do we have to do with anything? Look at them.”
Doris June pointed ahead of them and Curt decided he had no option except to look. Their parents were standing in the doorway to the café. Light was streaming out around them and they were standing sideways in the door. Their heads were close together and they were talking.
“They’re just old friends. That’s all,” Curt said. He couldn’t believe his father and Mrs. Hargrove would change the rules of their friendship after all these years. Besides, he had other things he wanted to talk to Doris June about now that they were alone.
“Your father better not just be stringing my mother along,” Doris June whispered up at him fiercely. “That kind of thing runs in your family.”
“It does not,” Curt protested. “If you’re talking about you and me, you know I wasn’t stringing you along. I asked you to marry me.”
Doris June snorted, but she did look up at him. “For ten seconds. Then you were off marrying someone else. You never said anything about your proposal expiring. It didn’t have the shelf life of a piece of cheese.”
“Now, that’s not fair. It didn’t expire. You wouldn’t even talk to me. I didn’t know where you were. I couldn’t even get an address to write to you.”
Curt knew his apology wasn’t going well. He probably should have reminded Doris June of the good times they’d had as kids before he talked about their separation, but he was running out of chances.
“Don’t worry about it,” Doris June said. “It happened a long time ago.”
Curt looked down at Doris June’s face. The smile she had on looked too much like the kind of smile a person reserved for a difficult customer who came into a store complaining about some milk that had gone bad. It was impersonal and polite. In fact, she wasn’t even focusing on him. She was looking at his chin.
“It wasn’t that long ago,” Curt said. He wished she would look at him. “And I think we still have issues to work out.”
Now what had he done wrong? Doris June had stopped even looking at his chin. Instead, she’d turned around and was looking straight ahead at the café. Curt followed the line of her gaze and saw she was still looking at their parents. Curt frowned. His father seemed to be wiping a tear off Mrs. Hargrove’s cheek. He didn’t know whether he was more astonished that Mrs. Hargrove had shed a tear or that his father was tenderly wiping it away.
“See?” Doris June whispered as she looked up at him.
“I’m sure there’s some explanation,” Curt said.
“Like what?” Doris June demanded.
Curt squirmed. Now she decided to look him in the eye. “Maybe your mother got a spot of sauce on her cheek from dinner.”
“There was no sauce at dinner.”
“Well, then, maybe it’s the lipstick she was wearing,” he said.
“She doesn’t wear lipstick on her cheekbone,” Doris June answered as she started walking toward the doorway of the café. “And what do you know about lipstick anyway?”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Curt asked, but Doris June was already walking away from him. The doorway to the café was empty. The two older people and Ben had all gone inside. Only he and Doris June were outside and he was wasting his chance to talk with her privately. At the moment, he didn’t care if Mrs. Hargrove was crying and his father was turning soft.
“Wait,” Curt called as he saw Doris June reach the steps of the café.
She didn’t wait, of course, and he had little choice except to follow her inside. He did notice, though, that the light inside the café flashed pink through the material of her dress as she walked through the door. She looked like a sunrise. A sunrise that was moving awfully fast, of course, but a sunrise nonetheless. That was his June bug, all right.
Chapter Six
The inside of the café was dimly lit. It had a floor with black-and-white tiles alternating across it and big street windows with white eyelet café curtains covering their bottom halves. Red-checked cotton cloths covered all of the tables. Two couples sat in the front of the café. Linda, the owner, gestured Mrs. Hargrove and Charley to a table at the back.
“We’ll need room for five,” Charley said as he looked behind him. Ben was inside the café, but Curt and Doris June were still halfway outside. Charley hoped that was a good sign and that they were at least talking to each other by now. This matchmaking stuff was wearing him down and he wasn’t sure how much more of i
t he could do, especially because Edith, well, Mrs. Hargrove, seemed so discouraged by it all.
Charley didn’t know why, in the midst of all their matchmaking plans, he’d started thinking of Mrs. Hargrove as Edith, but he had. Of course, he hadn’t said her first name aloud to anyone yet and he wasn’t planning to do so. She’d been Mrs. Hargrove to him for too many years to start changing the rules now. Besides, he wasn’t sure she’d answer to Edith. Everyone called her Mrs. Hargrove.
Names were a funny thing, Charley thought to himself as he watched Lucy bring an extra chair over to the table where he and Mrs. Hargrove were headed.
“Anyone ever call you by your full name?” he asked the young woman.
“Lucille? Not in years. Why?”
“I just wondered.” He also wondered if he should tip Lucy for bringing the chair and decided he would. He wanted to make a contribution to her guitar-buying funds. He wasn’t so old that he couldn’t appreciate good music.
Besides, even in the dim light of the café, Charley could see that Ben’s face was bright pink. Charley figured Ben must have a crush on Lucy and it wouldn’t hurt his grandson’s cause to give her some money for her effort with the chair. As far as he knew, this was the first girl his grandson had shown any interest in.
“Here.” Charley held out the dollar bill he’d pulled out of his suit jacket.
Lucy just looked at the bill. She had her blond hair pulled up in some kind of a fancy ponytail and had tiny red disks dangling from her ears. Ben needed a friend who wore red like that, Charley decided. She would bring him out of his shyness.
“It’s a tip for bringing the chair,” Charley said as he stepped a little closer to her with the money.
“But you haven’t even been served anything yet,” Lucy protested. “No one needs to tip when we move a chair around. That’s just doing business.”
Charley figured if it was a good sign that the young woman was so opinionated. The Nelson men always liked strong women who spoke their minds.
A Match Made in Dry Creek Page 6