Sleigh Belles

by Beth Albright

  “Sure, I mean...I guess.” Dallas took a tissue from her coat pocket and wiped the tears from her cheeks. “I still have no idea why in the world you are doin’ this.”

  “I’m doing it ’cause it’s time. That’s all. It was overdue.” Blake reached over and squeezed Dallas’s cold hand and smiled a confident smile. “Now, go have some fun. I’ll see you later.” And Blake walked away.

  * * *

  Dallas stood alone on the dark street corner. What the hell had just happened? She felt her head swimming as she tried to process everything. Something was stirring inside her that she hadn’t felt in a very long time. Even though she had messed up her report, even though everything seemed to be hitting her at once, and her job—heck, her happiness—was on the line, something inside her felt really good. It was a feeling she hadn’t felt since childhood. It was a sense of hope, and she held on to it as tightly as she could.

  Dallas walked slowly back to the news van, and Daniel hugged her as soon as she stepped up into the back.

  “You were fine, ya know?” he said softly. “Besides, nobody really heard anything, those freakin’ bagpipers were so loud,” he added, laughing. She knew it was obvious that she’d been crying, and he was trying to lighten the mood. He knew she put so much pressure on herself, and the bubble had burst tonight. At least in her eyes.

  Dallas sat in the passenger seat and buckled up. “Let’s just head back, okay? I need to go home.” She had to reconcile to herself that tonight’s performance didn’t do anything to help her shot at the anchor seat. And she had to try to wrap her mind around the idea of Blake and...friendship? Even the thought of that was too crazy to process.

  “You sure you don’t wanna go back to the station?”

  “No, I really need to get off this ankle.” She gave him a small smile. She was tired. And she really didn’t want to face anyone at WTAL. She just wanted to get home to Wilhelmina, where she felt safe. Where everything still made sense.

  * * *

  Daniel let Dallas out in front of her house, and she made her way up to the front porch. It was dark. She had forgotten to leave the light on, and her few Christmas lights weren’t on any sort of automatic timer. The neighbor’s Times Square lights were glaring, as usual, so she used them to find her way up the stairs of her front porch and fumbled to put her key in the front door. Out of the shadows of the porch, a figure approached her.

  “Dallas?” The person reached for her arm, and Dallas nearly jumped out of her skin.

  “I’m sorry to show up like this,” the woman said softly. “I didn’t mean to scare you, but I really needed to see you. And since you wouldn’t return my calls, I had to come here.”

  “Mother!” Dallas had to take this in a minute. She hadn’t seen her mother in so many years and, looking at her now, she realized she would have hardly recognized her on the street. “You shouldn’t have come here,” she said as she opened her front door and flicked on the porch light, all of the Christmas lights coming on at the same time.

  “Please, let me come in. It’s freezing out here.”

  “Fine,” Dallas said after a slight pause. “But you can’t stay long. I have an early meeting tomorrow and I just got back from work.” She allowed her mother inside. LouAnn looked frail. She was certainly not aging well. She was already a small woman, but she had withered over the years. Her dry gray hair was unruly, sticking out from under her knitted winter hat.

  Dallas took her coat and hat, hanging them on a hook by the door before leading her mother into the living room. They sat awkwardly at opposite ends of the couch, both of them silent for a few moments.

  Eventually, LouAnn spoke. “Dallas, I want you to know I think it’s time we all get together this year, you know, for Christmas.”

  “Really? You think it’s time? Why not last year? Why not twenty years ago, Mother?”

  “Look, I know you’re still angry...”

  “Angry? Is that all you think I am? Let me clue you in. I’m infuriated. I’m appalled. I want nothing to do with you. Ever! You left me. You chose Houston over me—something no proper mother would ever even consider. I’m not just angry, Mother. I’m alone! And it’s because of you and your inability to take responsibilities. I was your daughter and you abandoned me. I’m not sure why you think you can turn up on my doorstep after twenty years of silence and think we’re gonna have a nice little chat. It’s laughable, really. Now, thank you very much for this little surprise visit, but I want you to go.”

  “Would it have been better if I had chosen you? Is that what you wanted?”

  “Oh, mother, you are such a piece of work. What kind of mother chooses? No, you shouldn’t have chosen either of us. You were the parent. It was your job to hold the family together, not tear us apart...don’t you think?”

  “I was wrong, Dallas. Please, just...”

  “You have to leave now. I have nothing else to say to you.”

  “Your brother wants to see you, too. We need you to forgive us.” LouAnn was breaking down.

  “Me? Forgive y’all? Really? I was a child! I was fourteen years old and I begged for forgiveness—from both of you. I wrote letters and wondered where my family was, what I’d done that was so bad my family would throw me away. You treated me like garbage. Just threw me out like trash. And when I asked to come home, or for you to come to my graduations or any other events in my life, both of you flat-out ignored me and never even wrote me back,” Dallas was shaking with years of pent-up rage and sadness, tears spilling down her cheeks.

  “I’m sorry. I was so wrong,” LouAnn pleaded, sobbing.

  “I lost my home, my friends and, most of all, my family. And what have you done since then to make things better? Did you answer my letters? Ever even call to check on me? Ever try to say you were so sorry that you threw me away and missed every single life event for the last twenty years? Or even apologize properly to show that you really wanted me back in your life? Nothing. Nothing at all. You just show up out of the blue and you think...what? That it will be as though all these years hadn’t passed? As if you’d been here all along? No, Mother. There’s too much water under the bridge. Please, just go, okay?” Dallas stood and went to the door, holding out her mother’s things in one hand and opening the door with the other.

  LouAnn cried quietly as she zipped up her coat and turned to the door.

  “Please, Dallas. Just think about it.”

  Dallas didn’t answer her. LouAnn walked out slowly, her head down, and Dallas locked the door behind her. She went to her bedroom and closed the door. Falling across her bed, she suddenly felt as if she was fourteen all over again. All the deep buried pain engulfed her and she cried herself to sleep.

  11

  “Hey, Blake, am I bothering you? It’s Dallas.”

  Dallas still wasn’t sure how she’d mustered up the courage to pick up the phone and call Blake, but she’d decided it was time to try her hand at trusting someone. She still questioned the entire conversation she’d had with Blake the night before, but she was going to try accepting Blake’s offer of reconciliation. It was an experiment in hope—and Dallas felt she sure could use some of that right about now. Still, it was weird that the person she’d picked for this test was Blake, her oldest enemy. But she had known her longer than anyone else in her present life, and to Dallas, something felt right about it.

  “Dallas! Hey. No, not at all. Feeling better?”

  It was a huge relief to hear Blake was still friendly. Dallas braced herself and carried on. “Um, yeah, a bit better. I wanted to call to thank you for...that talk we had last night. And also, I was wondering something.”

  “Sure, what can I do for ya?” Blake asked.

  “Well, I remember you spent a lot of time in the theater when we were growing up and, I don’t know if you heard, but I’m directing the Christmas p
lay right now and I could use some advice.” There. Whew. She took a deep breath. She’d done it. Taken the first step. She was actually reaching out to someone, and it felt...okay. I can do this, she thought.

  Blake responded without hesitation. “Sure, I’d love to help out. I was on the stage so much, I think Kitty would have loved if I had just become an actor instead of a lawyer. But they’re basically the same thing,” she laughed.

  “Kitty would have loved whatever you did,” Dallas said, recalling all the unconditional love showered on Blake by her mother. “Well, great! So...um...do you think you can meet me for lunch today? I just need a little direction.” Dallas laughed at herself. “Yeah, a little direction for the director.”

  “Sure. I’m wide-open for lunch. Where ya wanna go?”

  “I love Fifteenth Street Diner.”

  “Oh, me, too. Okay. See you there in, like, an hour?”

  “Sounds great. See you then.” Dallas hung up and leaned back in her chair. Wow. Blake might turn into a friend, she thought. What planet am I on?

  * * *

  During a Tuscaloosa winter, you never know what you’re gonna get. The crisp, cold December air had turned milder, with temperatures in the mid fifties and bright sunshine. The surprises in the weather seemed to reflect Dallas’s life right now: something new at every turn.

  “Hey, Blake,” Dallas said as she slid into the crimson vinyl booth at the fifties-style diner.

  “Hey, Dallas. I’ve already ordered our drinks. I remember how you loved your sweet tea as a girl, so I just assumed...”

  “Yeah...still the same. Thanks.” Dallas liked that Blake had remembered such a small detail. Already she felt at ease. Was she being a fool? She and the one person who had been her nemesis as long as she could remember were sitting down together for lunch. She studied Blake’s face and mannerisms carefully as she talked, looking for signs that this might not be real. That she was somehow being tricked or mocked. But she never picked up anything but genuine happiness. Sonny had certainly brought out the best in Blake. Maybe being in love was everything the fairy tales said.

  Blake looked exactly how you’d expect a Southern beauty pageant winner to look—long dark hair that fell loosely around her ample breasts, gorgeous light blue-green eyes, flawlessly tanned skin. But she wasn’t as tall as Dallas. Dallas was about five foot eight in bare feet. Blake stood only about five foot four and now that she was pregnant, she was almost always in flats. Dallas towered over her in her usual five-inch heels.

  “So,” Dallas began, but it wasn’t easy after all these years. “I, uh, wanted to say thanks again for last night. I mean that was really nice of you and all.”

  “Hey, no biggie. I mean, I’m fixin’ to be a mother pretty soon, and all that anger just isn’t good for anybody, ya know? Especially a new baby. I mean all that crap in the past is just stupid. We were teenagers and now we’re adults. There’s no reason we should carry on like rivals anymore.”

  Blake was surprisingly down-to-earth. Where the hell had that huge ego of hers gone to? It wasn’t the apocalypse, but it sure felt as if the world was totally off its axis.

  “It’s a surprise to hear you say this, I have to say, Blake.”

  “I know,” Blake said a little sadly. “We’ve held on to these grudges for a lot of years. But, seriously, I’m just tired. Keeping up all that attitude is just exhausting, really. I want to apologize for all the awful things I did when we were young. I was terrible back then, I see that now. I really want to clear the air.”

  “Well, I appreciate that so much. But I wanted to say that I’m sorry, too. For back when we were teenagers, sure. But...” Dallas hesitated, unsure of how exactly to explain. “I guess I’m most sorry for what I’ve done as an adult. I mean, all that sneaking around with the camera trying to catch some news about you and Sonny sneaking around—I was completely out of line to try to use that against you. And then, my God...what happened with Harry that day...”

  Dallas felt her cheeks blazing as she remembered that awful afternoon with Blake’s now-ex-husband. He had been in the middle of his run for senate, and Dallas had hoped to benefit from his connections. She had basically thrown herself at him that particular day in his backyard—and Blake had walked in right at the worst moment. Dallas was ashamed to even think about it.

  “Oh, Blake, I’m just totally embarrassed about all that. I hope you can understand how sorry I am. Most of the time, I’m just thinking about work and how to make sure I can keep my job or...well, sometimes I don’t make the best decisions about how to do that.”

  “Hey, you know what?” Blake said, and Dallas was surprised to realize she was smiling. “You actually did me a favor. Truth is, you weren’t the only one I caught him with. Anyway, it’s all said and done now. I want to be married to the kind of man who wouldn’t cheat—even when tempted with a woman like you! You’re the ultimate fantasy girl, and poor Harry just couldn’t live up to the test. Besides, he’s not my husband anymore.”

  “I haven’t even begun to forgive myself over that, so I’m just...I can’t believe that you would. We’ve been against each other so long that it just doesn’t feel real to be sittin’ here with you and actually havin’ a nice talk.”

  “It’s real for me. I kinda always felt in the back of my head that maybe I’m the one who started this twenty-year tug-of-war, anyway.”

  “What do ya mean?”

  “You know, way back when Vivi and I sabotaged your dress with itching powder.”

  “Oh, I think I remember that.” Dallas smiled, raising her eyebrows at Blake.

  “I’m really sorry about that awful trick and, well, I just need to bring this baby into the world when I don’t have any anger or hate. And Sonny completes me in a way I never knew possible so that...all this stuff just seems ridiculous now.” She smiled wistfully, resting her hand on her five-month baby bump.

  “He always did love you, Blake. Since you guys started dating back in high school. I guess everybody knew that but you.”

  Blake smiled wistfully. “Now, tell me all about this Christmas play. Sounds like a hoot,” Blake said, smiling.

  The waitress came back with their drinks and took their orders. Dallas ordered the chunky vegetable beef soup and a side of fried green tomatoes.

  “Oh, I love their fried green tomatoes! Best in town. I’ll just have the same,” Blake said, smiling at the waitress.

  Blake was so confident and she had a beautiful pregnant glow. Dallas thought the pregnancy hormones might be holding the real Blake hostage. Like the happy drunk, she was the happy pregnant lady.

  “Yes, the play,” Dallas said. “Well, I’m pinch-hitting this one. The director got the flu bug, and they called my news director and asked if I would step in, since we always try to do a lot of community service this time of year. Mike said yes before he actually asked me.”

  “That’s awful. Did you even wanna do it?”

  “Me? Direct a play with kids? Come on, Blake. Not that much has changed,” she replied with a smirk. “So, no. Not really. But Mike said it was part of station policy to do charitable work this month, and I guess I was next on the list.”

  “So, what did you need my help with?”

  “Well, the show is in less than two weeks, and some of these kids have no idea what their lines are yet. They’re either reading straight from the book or else they need me to say their lines from the wings.”

  “Oh, my. That’s no way to put on a show. But luckily, you’ve come to the right place,” Blake answered. ”I directed little kids as a college project eons ago. You have to gain their trust first. Let them know you’re on their side and that you’re there for them. Then all they wanna do is please you, so they try very hard.”

  Dallas realized she had been going about this all wrong. “Threatening them with kicking them out of the show mig
ht be a little too harsh then, huh?”

  Blake burst out laughing. “Ya think?”

  “I guess I’ll try this new approach today. They’re having so much trouble. At first I was so irritated by the whole thing, especially since I hadn’t even signed up for it. But then...” Dallas had felt such a whirlwind of emotions after being confronted by her mother. She had suddenly remembered what it was like to be the powerless child at the mercy of the adults around you—and how awful it was to be cast off by them. The memories had helped her realize how the kids from the play must feel around her when she hollered at them or flat-out ignored them. But she wasn’t sure she was ready to share all that with Blake. This friendship thing was still very new and very fragile. “Well, anyway...something made me realize that maybe I was the one being difficult, not them. They seem scared,” Dallas explained.

  “Well, they probably are, a little. They loved Mrs. Fairbanks. She had been their director for a month before she got sick. Plus, she’s been the director of that theater forever. And they probably don’t watch the news, so they have no idea who you are.”

  Ouch. That hurt Dallas’s ego for a second. But she realized Blake was probably right.

  “You do have a point.”

  The waitress returned to set the plate of fried green tomatoes between them and refill Dallas’s sweet tea. They sat and chatted for over an hour, laughing and apologizing and making up for lost time. It didn’t seem real, and yet, at the same time, it felt so genuine and honest. It was good to clear the air. It was good to be real for a change. To not have that firewall so thick and impenetrable. It was a new feeling for Dallas, but one she really wanted to get used to. She was even looking forward to rehearsal that night.

  “Thanks so much for all the advice, Blake,” she said, sipping the last of her tea.

  “Hey, no problem, anytime. I like to be needed. It’s my business, you know?” Blake got out her wallet to pay.