by Wendy Wax
“Right,” said Miranda. “Everyone in favor say—”
“Is this eggplant?” Angela pointed to the band of color on her shirt.
Miranda’s mother cupped a hand to one side of her mouth and hissed, “She’s not going to take her shirt off again, is she? I heard she pulled it right off at the last meeting.”
“No, of course not, Mother,” Miranda said wearily. “All those in favor of—”
“That’s what happens when you don’t attend,” Gran observed. “You miss all the good stuff.”
Miranda turned to Angela Johnson. “You’re not planning to remove any of your clothing tonight, are you?”
Angela shook her head.
“Good.” Miranda turned to her mother. “Satisfied?”
“Yes, dear, I just—”
“Okay. All in favor of—”
“What are we voting on again?”
“Purple. The napkins are going to be purple. And I think we should do the tablecloths in the ecru with black as an accent,” Miranda said.
“Oh.” Angela perked up. “You never told me I could use more than one color.”
Miranda sighed again and glanced at the clock above the stove as her mother said, “I’d like to present an idea for consideration.”
Miranda bit back a groan.
“If we’re going with royalty, let’s have Miranda wear her rhododendron crown and bring back the velvet robes for the king and queen. The committee chair and her husband always used to be crowned queen and king.”
“Oh, no, Mother,” Miranda got out. “Let’s not . . .”
But after a night of interminable dawdling, the committee suddenly snapped to life. United in their love of the royalty idea, the group, who up until now hadn’t reached a single decision, made a slew of them. And every one of those decisions was going to leave Miranda sitting on a throne, her old rhododendron crown on her head. Without a king by her side.
“Look, I really don’t think—” she began.
“Oh, Miranda,” Vivien crowed. “It’s so perfect. And we can use your Rhododendron girls as a kind of queen’s court. They can invite escorts and do a processional in their evening gowns. It’ll be fabulous!”
“No! I mean, let’s not—”
“I’ll get the thrones out of storage,” the decoration chair offered. “And you know what else we could do?” She jumped up, excited. “We could turn the hall into a palace garden. The winter’s been so horrible it’ll be the perfect antidote. We’ll fill it with flowers so that it feels like spring!”
“But the forecasts are all calling for it to stay cold through April.” Miranda tried to remain calm, but her committee was gathering speed like a runaway train. “Flowers would cost a fortune, and it just doesn’t—”
“Oooh, oooh, I know.” Angela raised a hand and jumped up and down. Her new breasts didn’t even bobble. “We can use tissue-paper flowers—a garden full of them. It’s so retro it’ll be cool.”
Miranda tried to apply the brakes, but her committee had jumped the track. “You know why those things went out of fashion, don’t you?”
But everyone was buzzing with excitement.
“Because they’re so much work!”
“I can just see it now,” Angela exulted. “Tissue-paper flowers in every color of the rainbow. Annuals and perennials. Why, we can make flower beds full!”
“That would take younger hands and shorter nails,” Miranda countered, hiding her own still nimble and short-nailed hands behind her.
There was a brief respite from enthusiasm and then, “I know,” the newly decisive Angela exclaimed. “We can get your girls to make them!”
Like Andy Rooney and Judy Garland screaming “Let’s put on a play!” the committee zipped through the details, once again painting Miranda into a corner she couldn’t find a way out of.
“And maybe they could make extra to sell at school!”
“That money could go to the children’s hospital, too!”
“The school could give the girls credit for community service!”
“Oh, I can just see the garden now!”
“Do you think we should put AstroTurf down?”
Miranda blinked, and it was all decided. She was going to have to wear her Miss Rhododendron crown and a velvet robe and sit on a throne in a garden of tissue-paper flowers made by her students, without a king by her side.
Talk about your defining moments.
Later, over cake and coffee, Miranda pulled her mother aside. “I wish you hadn’t pushed this whole royal court thing. I’m not even sure Tom will be back in time for the ball.”
“Not back? Why, he’ll have to be.” Her smile was grim. “I’m sure Tom wouldn’t want to see you so publicly humiliated.”
Miranda considered explaining to her mother just how little her son-in-law cared about potential humiliation. Or what he probably would be wearing under his king’s robes if he had, in fact, been planning to show up. Instead she helped herself to another cup of coffee and rejoined the ladies seated around Angela’s kitchen table, all of whom stopped talking as soon as they noticed her approach. Miranda’s stomach dropped.
Angela looked away as Miranda set her coffee cup down, and every one of Miranda’s self-preservation instincts shouted “run,” “duck,” “hide.” But she’d learned enough from dealing with Helen St. James and the staff at Ballantyne to know it was better to confront this unpleasantness head on. “Did I interrupt something?” she asked.
Angela flushed with embarrassment. She was having trouble meeting Miranda’s eye. “We were just wondering when Tom was going to be back from his business trip.”
The attention of every woman in the room was now focused on them.
Her grandmother left her place near the counter and stepped over to stand behind Miranda, a move that spoke volumes in the too-silent room. Her mother stayed put.
Miranda felt as if she and Gran were starring in Truro’s version of the shoot-out at the OK Corral. She sincerely hoped they were going to be the Earps.
“He’s in China, visiting the smaller villages to find new suppliers. Textiles are very big in the more remote areas right now.”
“He’s been gone for a long time.”
“Are you, I mean, when are you expecting him back?” Sheila Taylor’s face belied her concerned tone.
“When he’s done,” Miranda said.
“It’s been two months,” Karen added. “How in the world are you managing without him for so long? The nights have been so . . . cold.”
“Kind of like this room at the moment,” Gran commented dryly.
“I have an electric blanket,” Miranda replied.
There were titters, but everyone had pretty much given up the pretense that they were doing anything other than listening.
“Actually,” Miranda continued. “I’m planning to meet Tom in San Francisco in a couple of weeks.” She was very careful to maintain eye contact with her committee members. “We decided he wouldn’t come home until all his business was complete, but, you’re right, it’s been much too long.”
She smiled as she added, “Why, he’s been gone so long I’ll have to take a picture along so I can recognize him.”
chapter 15
M iranda called Friday’s Rhododendron Prep session to order, determined to put the best possible spin on her upcoming humiliation. “I am happy to report that you have all been asked to participate in the Ladies’ Guild Ball in April.”
There were murmurs of surprise and pleasure.
“You’re going to serve as ‘attendants’ to the queen; that would be moi.” She pointed a finger to her chest and inclined her head in regal fashion. “Which will require wearing evening gowns and doing the same sort of walk you’d do on a pageant runway. On the arm of your escorts.”
The girls simmered with excitement, or at least most of them did. Andie Summers slumped down in her seat and folded her arms across her chest.
“We’ll be getting out our high heels in jus
t a moment to practice, but first I want to tell you about something else you can be a part of.”
She explained the whole paper-flower business as succinctly as she could and then pulled her own heels out of her bag.
Mary Louise’s hand shot up. “How many flowers are we each supposed to make?”
“Well . . .” Miranda hadn’t really thought that one out. “We need a ton of them to create the feeling of a palace garden, so the more the better.”
Thinking the subject covered, Miranda held one shoe aloft but had barely opened her mouth to speak when Mary Louise raised her hand again. “I’ll make fifty,” she said.
“Me, too,” said one of Mary Louise’s friends.
Across the room, Andie sat up straighter, her face suddenly intent.
“That’s great, girls, but it’s quite time-consuming, and—”
“Seventy-five,” Andie Summers said.
“I’m sorry?” Miranda lowered the shoe.
“I said I’ll make seventy-five.” Andie’s chin jutted out just like her father’s.
Mary Louise’s head whipped around. “Eighty!” the girl said, turning back to face Miranda. “I can make eighty flowers!”
“Eighty-five.” Andie’s voice rang out strong and clear.
ML’s hand shot up. “Ninety.”
“Ninety-five.”
Once again a group of females was taking the bit in their teeth and racing toward a finish line Miranda had never intended. “This is not an auction,” she said. “Or a competition.”
“I don’t know how someone who can’t even get her makeup right is going to be able to make that many delicate tissue-paper flowers.” Mary Louise sniffed. “I’ll make one hundred, since it’s for such a good cause and all.” She tossed her hair. “Plus the ones she doesn’t finish.”
“Ha,” Andie sneered back. “I’ll have my hundred and then some. Just because I’m new to this whole stupid face-painting thing doesn’t mean I can’t fold up some dumb tissue paper.”
“All right, then.” Miranda turned from the two combatants. “Thank you both so much for your generous contributions.” She cleared her throat. “Anyone else?”
The other girls volunteered for smaller, more reasonable amounts, which Miranda made note of. She was very glad she wouldn’t be around when Andie and Mary Louise discovered just how much work they’d goaded each other into.
“I know the ladies of the guild will be very appreciative. Now then,” she continued, raising a strappy black dress sandal aloft. “Shall we begin?”
Andie felt like a skyscraper in the pointy-toed heels she’d found at the Second Time Around Boutique. She was used to towering over everybody, but doing it with her center of gravity thrown so far off kilter was a whole other thing. She’d survived her solo walk and turn, but now they were lined up in a big circle like circus elephants following each other, and they were supposed to be doing it with the short, fluid, on-the-balls-of-their-feet steps Miranda Smith had promised would show their legs and bodies off to best advantage.
Andie held her breath and attempted the subtle sway Mrs. Smith had demonstrated, but the only thing swaying was her as she teetered along behind the other girls like a rogue elephant tied to the back of the herd.
“Eyes forward, chin up. Don’t look down. Glide, ladies, glide.”
Andie closed her eyes in frustration and quickly realized her mistake as the toe of one shoe dragged on the floor and made her wobble wildly. Her eyes flew open, and her arms shot forward grasping for something steady to cling to, which in this case turned out to be Earlene Johnson.
“Hey!” Earlene tripped, then righted herself before turning to glare up at Andie.
“Sorry, but . . .”
“Don’t give up, girls,” Mrs. Smith said. “Remember, we’re walking and gliding. We are positively floating on air.”
Drawing in a deep breath, Andie squared her shoulders, then took one small step, then another, all the while fighting the urge to look down and check what her feet were up to.
“Yes, that’s it. Lift your feet, but don’t march. Very good, ML. That’s it, Susan. Much better, Andie. Glide, girls, glide.”
Andie gritted her teeth. The shoes pinched her toes, yet somehow managed to slide up and down on her heel, and she felt taller than she’d ever felt in her life, and that was saying a lot.
The second time around she teetered and clutched a little less, but she still couldn’t find anything resembling her normal sense of balance. Keeping her chin raised and her eyes forward meant she was looking over the tops of the other girls’ heads. She had her eye on the clock on the far wall when the girl in front of her stopped.
“Ooof.” Unprepared and unsure how to downshift in the heels, Andie slammed into Earlene, who banged into Susan, who crashed into Mary Louise.
They went down like dominoes, each knocking into the other, so that the next person hurtled forward with a shriek or a gasp. Andie watched it all as she teetered in place, her long arms windmilling as she frantically tried to regain her balance. In her effort to get out of the way she stepped back and felt one foot catch under the metal leg of a desk. With no one to grab onto she, too, started to go down.
Blake raced to the high school with his siren blaring. It took him only five minutes to get there, but he spent those minutes with the image of a bruised and bloody Andie stuck in his head.
His heart slowed a little when he reached the classroom and confirmed the lack of blood at the scene. Then he spotted Andie, her long jean-clad legs splayed out in front of her, her back propped up against a desk, with Miranda crouched beside her. And he was torn between anger and relief.
Andie’s right hand had a plastic bag full of ice on it and lay limply in her lap. A passel of girls stood in a semicircle around her, and every one of them had on a pair of high-heeled shoes.
The girls skittered out of his way as he hunkered down next to Andie. “Where does it hurt?” he asked, more gruffly than he meant to.
She sniffled, and he could see in her eyes how much she hated that. “Everywhere. But it’s kind of numb now, and I—” She looked up at him and swallowed. “I can’t move my fingers.”
“I called Donald Greenwell, the head of orthopedics at All Children’s,” Miranda said. “We need to take her up there right away for X rays. He thought it sounded like a possible wrist fracture.”
He looked into Miranda’s face. Now that the fear for Andie was fading he felt his anger build. Mad as he was, his daughter’s hurt and embarrassment called out to him. He wanted to scoop her up in his arms and cradle her against his chest as he had when she was a child; or read her the riot act and ground her for life. He settled for fashioning a quick splint out of his nightstick and a stray scarf while Miranda dismissed the other girls.
“Dad, I’m sorry I—”
Blake helped Andie stand. “Let’s just get you taken care of. Then I plan to give you some serious shit for blackening the Summers name this way. High heels!” He shook his head and snorted in disgust. “I knew you should have gotten a pair with training wheels.”
Miranda grabbed her and Andie’s coats from the rack. “We can take her in my car if you’d like. It shouldn’t take more than twenty-five minutes to get to the hospital.”
“That won’t be necessary. I’ve got the cruiser here and I can make it in fifteen.” He walked Andie toward the door.
“You can drive if you want to, but I’m coming.” Miranda was already pulling on her coat and draping Andie’s over the girl’s shoulders.
Apparently considering the conversation over, Miranda helped Andie into the front seat, positioning the injured hand so that it wouldn’t get jostled. Then she slid into the backseat and waited for Blake to give up and take his place behind the wheel.
They made the trip in one of the thickest silences Miranda had ever experienced. Blake kept his eyes on the road and his mouth set in a grim line as they sped toward the hospital. Midway, Andie laid her head on his shoulder and Miranda noticed
how careful he was not to make any sudden movements. Occasionally he looked down at his daughter, and the look of pure love he shot her pierced Miranda to the core.
Together they walked Andie into All Children’s, where Dr. Greenwell was waiting. He ushered them through a series of X rays, which revealed a buckle fracture of the right wrist and broken middle and index fingers on the same hand, and then took Andie away to be casted.
Once Andie and the doctor disappeared around the corner, Blake fixed Miranda with an accusing look. “She got hurt prancing around in high heels.”
“No one was prancing,” Miranda said. “We were practicing.”
“Practicing, prancing, what’s the difference?” he said. “I told you before, this whole—” She watched him search for a word that would sum up his feelings “pageant thing . . . is not for Andie. You take a girl who belongs in high-tops and stick her in high heels and something’s bound to happen.”
“It was an accident,” she pointed out calmly, which seemed to piss him off even more. “She was just starting to find her balance when she had to stop suddenly. It wasn’t as if—”
“She had any need to be tromping around in shoes high enough to give her a nosebleed.”
Now Miranda was the one gritting her teeth.
They stood toe to toe, their faces only inches from each other, and only pulled apart when Andie came toward them. Her cast was neon orange and reached from her fingertips to the middle of her forearm. Her face was almost as dark as her father’s.
“The doctor said this won’t come off until after the state championship.” A lone tear squeezed out of her eye.
“Yeah,” Blake observed, as he slung an arm around his daughter’s shoulders. “You’re definitely going to be sitting this one out.”
His tone softened and he gave Andie a wink. “But I wouldn’t be surprised if you make the record books anyway. You’re bound to be the first forward in the entire Southeastern Conference to get injured falling off a pair of high heels.”
Miranda followed them out to the car, trying to understand what she’d just witnessed. How could a man be so irritating and so endearing at the same time?