But my choices would determine where this new revelation would take me.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Vanni, if you’re riding with me you better hurry up.” I wet my hand to press back the golden brown lock that was protruding from an otherwise pristine ponytail. It was Sunday and I could drive myself, but it was about the only time Thomas and I even got to talk anymore. I peered in the mirror one more time and made sure my white suit jacket laid neatly across the matching white skirt, and appreciated the way the delicate black pinstripes elongated my five-foot-six frame.
This suit accomplished in an instant what Pilates could only do in four years. My rather pitiful legs stuck out, but the strappy white sandals (with a heel rather high for my taste) made them look a little better. Usually by this time in May I had a golden tan. But after my smoky run-in with Tan Beautiful last week, and now the revelation that I looked old and tired, well, I would have to rethink the whole tanning ritual. I could only wish for the olive complexion of Ms. Austin.
Thomas was waiting at the bottom of the stairs, and Duke waited by his side . We walked out the front door to his Jeep.“What do you think Duke does on Sundays when we are all gone?” I asked.
Thomas opened my door and shut it behind me. He crawled in the other side.“Oh, after his last two nights, he’ll probably sleep.”
“I’ve always pictured him sitting at the table, drinking coffee, reading the paper, then going for a dip in the pool and blow-drying himself off in Mom’s bathroom.”
“You are weird.”
“Weird, but it’s still possible. He’s that smart, don’t you think?”
“No dog is that smart.”
“But Duke isn’t stupid, is he?”
“No, he’s one of the smartest dogs I know . Why? Are you trying to get him on a stupid-pet-tricks show?”
“No, I just think he does amazing things when we’re not looking.”
“Make sure you get prayer for that this morning.”
Thomas’s Jeep jerked as he took off from the stop sign and headed toward Tybee Island and our interdenominational church.
Thomas got his Jeep—which he has named Leroy, no one knows why—for high-school graduation. Mother had visions of a four-door LTD, but Dad would have nothing to do with it. She was stirring up enough trouble over Thomas’s choosing of The Citadel. Believing Charleston to be the illegitimate child of the South, she warned him she wouldn’t even visit.
Don’t let her fool you. He’s going into his senior year and she’s already made over the bookstore, brought in a new line of Citadel dishware, and was even asked to represent The Citadel in trying to dissuade the first female applicant from attending.
Vicky herself went to the girl’s hometown, took her to lunch, bought her a dress, and did her best to get the young woman to go to a school that would make her appreciate “being a lady.”
“They are forming men there, honey. Surely you don’t want to spend your life with people thinking you’re a she-boy.”To this day I am not quite certain what a she-boy is,was, or will be. But Vicky was sure that would work.
Two weeks later Shannon became the first woman in the corps . Vicky was mortified and still to this day calls it an “all-male” academy.
In her quarterly column in The Citadel’s Pass In Review, entitled “The Making of an All-American Man,” Vicky wrote,“If those girls want to be treated like men then I’ll just call them men.”And so she does.
Anytime she passes a girl on campus, she simply smiles and says, “Well, hello, young man.” Hasn’t phased them a bit . Downright near sent Mother to the halls of Washington. Fortunately for Washington, she’s afraid to fly.
The church was already bustling. It had grown so much over the past year that Pastor Brice decided we needed to go to three services. As I watched the people enter, I was amazed by how many young people there were. Dad greeted us at the door and handed us a bulletin . The usual big hat and red lipstick and happy greeting from the other side of the door was conspicuously absent.
“Savannah, you look beautiful,” Dad said, kissing me on the cheek. “Your mother wouldn’t have wanted to miss this.” That creeped me out. It was as if we were talking about someone who had passed through the eternal gates of glory.
I gave him a raised right eyebrow, and Thomas and I entered the sanctuary.“Where did all these college students come from?”I asked.
“A lot are from the Savannah College of Art and Design. Pastor Brice said the other day that he gave his heart to Jesus over twenty years ago, and he wasn’t going anywhere. So, if the music was too loud or the service needed to be a little different to reach his kids and their friends, he was okay with that.”
“That’s a rather different perspective,” I mused.“What’s Granny Daniels think?”
“I heard she attends their Sunday-night youth services and keeps up with the best of them.”
I laughed, certain he had accurate information. “I wouldn’t doubt it. Seems weird today, huh?”
Thomas sat down beside me on a pew in the middle of the left-hand side.“What, with Mom not at the door?”
“No, with her not telling us to take our seats and sit quietly or spitting in her hand to wet your cowlicks down.”We both laughed.
The music began, and the very essence of it seemed to lift me. It started with an up-tempo song about faith . The multiracial choir swayed from one side to the other. By the time they were through, the volume had been brought down to a powerful yet reverent conclusion. Our associate pastor,Tom Jackson,was speaking this morning. The former Washington Redskin, with whom my father liked to chat football, rose to take the platform . His forty-year-old physique oozed professional athlete. And his African American heritage gave him beautiful skin and a magnetic smile.
He towered behind the Plexiglas podium, where he sat his Bible down and took in the thousand pairs of eyes staring back . He moved to the right of the podium and leaned against it. And I looked forward to some inspiring moments away from Vicky and the events of the last two days.
I was not to have them. For the next forty-five minutes, Pastor Jackson delivered a message entitled “Declaration of Dependence,” offering insight and reflection on the events transpiring in our city. No one could get away from it . Yet no one else’s mother was keeping quite the vigil mine was. I wouldn’t be getting away from Vicky until this madness was over.
Thomas started the Jeep. “What are you doing for lunch?”
The question brought revelation. There would be no Sunday roast today. No country-style steak. No rice. No gravy. No homemade biscuits. No nothing. Just take-out.
“I’m going to go find a housekeeper that cooks.”
“Dad got a big dinner from Lady & Sons last night and put it in the refrigerator so we could have it today . We’re taking it to the square and having lunch with Mom.” He noticed my disgust.“Just think of it as a Sunday dinner on the grounds.”
“When have you ever been to a Sunday dinner on the grounds?”
“We used to when we would go to Granny’s country church.”
“They had ants.”
“Are you ever positive?”
“Yes, smarty butt, I’m positive you will have a wonderful time. Don’t worry about me. I’ll get something.”
As he pulled up in front of the house, he turned to look back at me.“You really need to get over this pride issue you have. If you are proud of anything, it should be over our mother standing up for something she believes in, no matter how she may look to others.” He didn’t wait for a reply. He just left me there sitting in the Jeep staring at his backside.
Thomas had been mean in the past . We didn’t even like each other much until I left for college. I think we even had a few knock-down, drag-outs that ended with the words “moron!” and “Well, what do you know? You were an accident anyway.” Both of which hurt my feelings and left me screaming for my father.
But Thomas had never said anything that stung like those words just did. “P
ride? I’m not the one with the pride issue . The one with the pride issue is the silly woman sitting in the middle of a square, holding the city hostage. That’s who has a pride issue. You’re telling me what to do? I’ll do what I want to do. I’m a grown woman who’s about to have her own apartment . You’re a little bald Citadel boy. Haven’t even finished school yet. Need to teach you some manners.”
Two fanny-pack-toting tourists on the street watched me quizzically as I ascended the stairs to the front door.
The Sunday newspaper was lying atop the breakfast-room table, where Dad had obviously read it with a morning cup of coffee. Or possibly where Duke had left it. I needed to see if Joshua’s dog could do that. By it rested a note and a take-out dinner. Enjoy your lunch . We’d like to see you today.
The cover of the paper only caused the anger of last night to return. There I was, betrayed by my own employer. My backside was on the front of the paper, with the beaming face of my mother peering over my shoulder. It would resonate with the world that I agreed with her. I would never wear that outfit again and would do whatever I could to prevent the world from knowing it was me.
Then I noticed the caption underneath. “Victoria Phillips, head of the chamber of commerce, embraces daughter, Savannah Phillips, in front of Ten Commandments Monument.”
My cell phone rang. I sent her to voice mail once again. Does US Air fly to Tanzania?
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
I wasn’t hungry for anything but vengeance. I had two plans of attack. And they were vicious, but well deserved. One: Get a housekeeper. Two: Get a housekeeper that cooks. To sort through strategies, I had always walked. So I walked straight up West Jones Street instead of going near the courthouse . That was nowhere on my agenda today. Con me with food or not, I wasn’t biting.
Mr. Fisher was outside his house, trimming the ivy that had overtaken the iron-gate entrance to his spectacular garden. Mr. Fisher’s house, a beautiful aged, burnt brick with rich tones and streaks of black, had a side-porch entrance more common to Charleston, South Carolina, architecture. The black shutters and ebony-stained wood door that led to the porch, complemented by a brass lion’s-head door-knocker, had all been maintained with extreme care.
Charleston homes were originally taxed based on how many windows they had in the front of their house. So the Southerners got frugal as well as savvy and built all of their homes with side-porches, which served as the main entrance. By building the houses sideways, the “fronts” had as few windows as any other part of the house.
But Vicky’s issues are deeply rooted in her competitive spirit with the other “Sister of the South.” Stepsister, if you ask her . The fact that any house in Savannah resembled a Charleston residence is a fact Vicky fought tooth and nail, and well, I do mean literally tooth and nail.
It happened one beautiful fall day a couple of years after our arrival here from Atlanta, and only months after I decided to picket in front of our house because there was no McDonald’s near our home. About the time Mr. Fisher and his wife were having their furniture unloaded, Mother pranced herself up the street and threw herself on top of their baby grand piano as the movers were trying to carry it into the house.
“What in the tar hill are you doing, young lady?” Mr. Fisher screamed. The young lady part almost caused mother to completely forget why she was there. But the jolt of the piano brought her back to reality.
“I’m saving you!” she replied with great animation.
“You’re violating my piano! Now get yourself down!”
The mover provided extra incentive. “You might want to do what he says, lady, because we’re about to have to turn this baby on her side, and then you won’t be on the top any longer.”
“Well, wait just a minute!” she said, still atop her perch.“You don’t want to buy this house.”
“I already bought it, lady!”
“Well, you don’t want to move in.”
“And why wouldn’t I want to do that? Are you going to tell me it’s haunted or something?”
“Lord have mercy, no. I don’t like ghosts, and I pray them out of town any chance I get. Even walked a street or two getting them out of here.”
“Lady, you’re crazy. Now get off of my piano!”
About that time, the dainty Mrs. Fisher walked out with her pretty bobbed gray hair, and pants that looked like jeans but weren’t.
“Oh my Lord, what is she doing on our piano?”
“She’s preparing to get off!” her husband assured her.
“Lady, I’m warning you,” the mover said, straining beneath the added one hundred and ten pounds of peculiar. “We are tipping this puppy on three. One, two, three.” And with that, three grown men turned the top of the antique baby grand piano on its side, and one Victoria Phillips on her bum . They didn’t stop to check on her or survey the damage; they just continued straight in the house.
Mr. Fisher just stared at my mother, but Mrs. Fisher ran over to help her up.“Young lady, what is all this about?”
Mother tried to salvage as much grace as she possibly could after being dumped off a piano.“You live in Savannah . Why in the world would you want to buy a home that looks like Charleston?”
Mrs. Fisher let out a chuckle. “Is that what this nonsense is about? What is your name anyway?”
For one minute, or so the story goes, Mother hesitated. After all, to say that she was the head of the chamber of commerce might make for rather embarrassing dinner conversation. But then again, that revelation wasn’t enough to forgo her great pride in her position. “I am Mrs . Victoria Phillips, head of the Savannah Chamber of Commerce.”
Mr. Fisher let out a humph.“You have got to be kidding me. Is this how you welcome everyone to the city? If it is, tourism will be destroyed in six months.”With that he and Mrs. Fisher left her there with a bruised ego and a bruised bum.
Vicky walked back to our house. Rumor has it there were a couple more similar episodes involving dressers and a dining room table, but the episodes ceased after the washing-machine incident made it on the front page.
Mr. Fisher’s voice threw my recollection. “Savannah Phillips, how do you like my garden? Not bad for a Charleston house, huh?” A pretty good memory for his seventy-five years.
I peeked inside the gate and admired how beautifully landscaped and sculpted it was. “Oh, it’s beautiful . You’ve been working hard, haven’t you?”
“Oh yeah . Takes up most of my time. But with me still working, it gets away from me and I have to attack it whenever I have free time . Where you off to? Trying to get away from the picture in the paper?” He smiled knowingly.
I picked invisible lint off my khaki capris and made my way up to my white T-shirt. “Just taking a walk before I eat lunch.”
“Lunch?” he asked, putting down his trimmers.“Why on earth are you not eating at—oh, that’s right, your mother’s down at the courthouse. Is she lying on the monument or just sitting beside it?”
That made us both roar with laughter. “She’s actually gone to sitting these days,” I finally managed.
He took out his hanky and wiped the sweat from his gray bushy eyebrows. His blue eyes were crystal clear and shimmered of a stolen youth, but also of a life still flourishing inside.“Why don’t you come eat with me and the Mrs.? She has enough food for us to eat off all week . We’re having fish.”
“No, that’s okay really. I appreciate it. But I’ve got to do some work this afternoon for my next column, so I’m just going to grab a quick bite at home.”
“You sure?” He picked up his clippers.
I patted him on his damp white T-shirt. “Yes, sir, I’m sure.
Thanks anyway.”
“Will do.”
“Uh, Mr. Fisher?”
“Yes?”
“Does Mrs. Fisher ever rent out her cooking services?”
He laughed.“You’re asking for trouble,Miss Savannah.”
“You think?”
“I’ve gone a round with
your mama. I know.”
“Well, tell Mrs. Fisher I said hello.”
“You tell your family the same.” Fortunately for Victoria, Mr. Fisher was able to let go . Too bad the letter to the editor he wrote about her welcoming party took them four years for the letting go to begin.
I would eat on the stoop. If I sat in the garden, sequestered by ivy, I couldn’t really see what was happening on the streets.So, I went out to the stoop and sat on the steps . This is virtually the only way I am like my mother. I do like to see what is going on around me.
Come to think of it, Dad does too. He likes to plant himself at the table by the window in the hopes that some weary straggler will need to bare his soul. He’ll act all casual, sitting there petting Duke. Someone will walk in for a quick hello or cup of coffee, but before you know it Jake’s helping with marital problems (which he denies having), adolescent terrors (of which he declares he’s had many), or financial difficulties (which he overcame). By the time they leave smiling, Dad’s sitting back at the window, smiling too.
About two bites into my first piece of catfish, my park-bench friend arrived. I heard her before I saw her. She was humming that same melody she had departed with yesterday. She wore the same dress as yesterday too, carried the same bag, and didn’t look much different than she had twenty-four (or forty-eight!) hours earlier. This week anyway, she and Vicky had a thing or two in common. “Well, well, young lady . Where’s your book?”
I laughed, finding it hard to believe she remembered me. “Inside.” I motioned to my house.“I didn’t bring it for this journey.”
But she didn’t really care about my book. She didn’t care about the house either. Didn’t care about Victoria’s lovely iron balconies, or stately wooden, black-painted doors. Couldn’t have given a rat’s rear end for the pristine ivy growing over our own brick wall that surrounded our fortress. No, her eyes were on my plate. She was like Duke eying a tenderloin. I wanted her to pull out her apple and get to eating her own food. She walked up a few steps and planted herself next to me, still fixated on my food.“Ooh, you got a nice Sunday dinner there, don’t ya?”
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