Show Me the Way

by Ashley Farley

  Pete returns with their drinks, and Presley takes a sip of club soda. “How long have you been trying?”

  “A year, give or take a month or two. I admit things have been stressful with Dean starting a new job in the college’s admissions office and me getting my business up and running. We probably should wait a little longer. I’m just impatient. I’m not getting any younger, and I’d like to have more than one child.”

  Me too, Presley thinks. A vision of Everett holding a newborn baby comes to mind. Carla’s baby. Will Presley ever find the right guy to settle down with? “How old are you, Katherine?”

  “Thirty-five next month. And you?”

  “I turned thirty in June,” Presley says.

  Pete brings their food, and they load up their plates with helpings from each of the appetizers.

  Presley’s eyes roll back in her head as she savors a bite of quesadilla. “This is so good.”

  Katherine dips a buffalo wing in blue cheese dressing and gnaws it to the bone. “This will give me heartburn for sure.”

  Presley points a nacho at Katherine. “You know, Katherine, sometimes you have to wait a couple of months to see the doctor of your choice. Why not schedule an appointment with the fertility specialist for January? You can decide later if you want to keep it.”

  Katherine sits straight up in her chair. “I never thought of that. That’s exactly what I’ll do. Dean will surely be on board with seeing a specialist by January.”

  Presley stuffs the nacho in her mouth. “Who knows? Maybe you’ll get pregnant before then.”

  “Maybe,” Katherine says, but she doesn’t sound very hopeful. “Start talking. I want to hear your sad tale. Does it have anything to do with your insignificant other?”

  While they finish gorging themselves, Presley tells Katherine about both Everett and Lucy. By the time she’s finished talking, she feels nauseous from eating too much and depleted from unburdening herself of her problems.

  Katherine gives her hand a squeeze. “Oh, honey. You’re handling the stress so well. I’d never have guessed you were going through so much. What’re you gonna do?”

  “About Everett? There’s not much I can do. Our relationship is over. He made that clear when he left town without telling me. Even if I wanted to get in touch with him, I can’t call him, since he doesn’t have a cell phone. As for Lucy, I figure I’ll let that situation play itself out. I’ll know when to make my move.” Presley places her hands on the bar, fingers splayed. “In the meantime, I’m going to stay busy.”

  “I’m sure you have plenty to occupy your time, but I would love some help decorating the inn for the holidays.”

  Presley comes out of her chair a little. “I would absolutely love that. A fun project is just what I need.”

  Katherine smiles. “Honestly, that’s a load off my mind. I’m not sure what Stella was thinking when she put me in charge. I’m great at poinsettias and greeneries, trees and wreaths. But I’m over my head when it comes to ornaments and trimmings.”

  “Come on, Katherine. I don’t believe that.”

  “It’s true.” Katherine wipes her mouth and tosses her napkin on her plate. “I’ve been talking to the people at a Christmas tree farm about an hour away. They’ll give us a discount if we buy more than one tree. I’m going to check out their offerings this weekend. Would you like to come with me?”

  Presley grins. “Yes! Count me in! What’re you thinking in terms of how many trees you want to put up in the inn?”

  “We need a Rockefeller Plaza-worthy tree for the center of the lounge with a combination of live and fake trees in other key rooms. I’m wondering if we can get away with having a white, musically themed tree in Billy’s Bar?”

  “Themed trees are the bomb,” Presley says. “We could have a nature tree in the library and one with sports-related ornaments in the game room.”

  “And a tree that glimmers and shimmers in the solarium. We can brainstorm on the way to the tree farm this weekend.”

  When Katherine covers her mouth to stifle a yawn, Presley signals Pete for the check and they plunk down their credit cards. “I’m so glad I ran into you tonight, Katherine. Having the holidays to focus on will keep our minds off our problems.”

  Presley feels pounds lighter as she traipses back across the street in her rain boots. She doesn’t realize she’s humming Everett’s tune until she’s unlocking her apartment door. She hasn’t been able to get the song out of her head since she first heard him sing it. She doesn’t know the title. It’s not the one about his mama but the one about a man who’s lost his way. She sits down at her desktop computer and googles Rhett Baldwin. What she learns transports her back fifteen months.

  She’s just arrived home from being out at dinner with friends. Loud music greets her at the back door. Wanting to avoid a scene with her mother, she tiptoes down the hall toward the stairs. But her mother hears her.

  “Presley!” Renee calls out. “Is that you? Come here a minute.”

  She can tell from her slurred speech that her mother’s been drinking. Sure enough, when she enters the study, her mother is sprawled on the sofa, stemless glass in hand with a red wine stain down the front of her white blouse.

  “What is it, Mother?”

  “Listen! This young man sounds like Johnny Cash. He wrote this song himself. It went viral on its own. I’m gonna sign him and make him a star.”

  Presley had ignored her at the time. Renee’s alcoholism was at its worst, a month before a bout with pancreatitis marked the beginning of her downward spiral toward death.

  She has no trouble finding a video of the song on YouTube. The man singing into the microphone and strumming his guitar like a professional is Rhett Baldwin, aka Everett. She replays the video over and over, listening carefully to the lyrics. In the song, this man, who Presley assumes is Rhett, turns to his mama for help when his excessive drinking and fighting gets out of control.

  The first night they met, Everett told Presley he doesn’t like the person he is when he drinks. He posted “Show Me the Way” to YouTube eighteen months ago. Presumably, he’s been sober for at least that long. But that means nothing. Renee quit drinking too many times to count. The ease in which Presley downed those two glasses of wine at lunch today serve as a reminder of how fast one can fall off the wagon. She spent her young adulthood taking care of one alcoholic. She has no interest of traveling down that path again. Presley let her infatuation with Everett overpower her common sense. As much as she’s missing Everett right now, she knows their breakup is for the best.

  25

  Everett

  Because of heavy traffic around the Charlotte area, the drive to Atlanta takes Everett longer than expected. His mom is asleep when he arrives at the hospital at nearly eleven o’clock on Monday night. The sight of her face, bruised and swollen beyond recognition, is like a knife in his heart. Her broken left arm is in a cast past her elbow, and a rectangular gauze bandage that presumably covers a laceration is taped to the side of her neck. Tubes provide oxygen and deliver fluids to her lifeless body. Her lips are slightly parted, and he can see the gaping hole in her upper jaw where her left canine tooth is missing. That bastard. How could any man do this to any woman, particularly one as sweet and honest as his mother? She took care of his mean ass for thirty-four years. And this is the thanks she gets?

  Everett lowers himself to the recliner beside her bed, but he’s too wired from his trip to sleep. He watches his mom sleep instead, vowing to let nothing bad happen to her ever again. He finally drifts off around two, and when he wakes, his mom is staring at him with roadmap eyes through slit eyelids.

  Everett sees how much it pains her when she tries to smile through cracked lips. In a weak and raspy voice, she says, “If you’re trying to outdo me with the black eye, you’ve lost the contest.”

  “No doubt about that.” Everett doesn’t explain his black eye, and his mom doesn’t hound him with questions. She knows he’ll tell her the truth when he’s
ready. He doesn’t hold back his tears. “I’ll never forgive myself for leaving you here with him.”

  She reaches for his hand with her unbroken arm. “Hush now, sweet boy. You have your own life to live. The last thing I want is to be a burden to you.”

  “You’ve never been a burden. It’s you and me against the world. Remember, our words for when times are rough?”

  She nods. “You and me against the world. Did you sort through your problems?”

  He shakes his head. “Things are more complicated than ever.”

  “Since we’re both in a bad place how about we support one another while we figure out our lives?”

  “I’d like that very much. I definitely need my mama right now.”

  “And I need my son.” She squeezes his hand before letting go.

  Doctor Mullins enters the room wearing a white jacket over blue scrubs as though he’s been in the operating room. He’s a distinguished-looking rich dude with hair graying around the temples. The doctor gives Everett’s eye a hard stare, but doesn’t say a word about it.

  “How’re you feeling today, Mary?” the doctor asks in a gentle voice that makes Everett soften toward him.

  “A little better.” His mom looks at her doctor with pleading eyes. “Can I go home today, Doctor? My son is here to take care of me now.”

  “Hmm.” He listens to her chest with his stethoscope. “I’m pleased with your progress, but I’d feel better if we give it one more day.”

  Mary presses, “Tomorrow morning, then?”

  The doctor smiles at her. “As long as you don’t have any setbacks between now and then.” He spends several minutes typing on his iPad before leaving the room.

  For the rest of the morning and into the afternoon, Mary’s room is a constant beehive of activity. Around three o’clock, his mom says, “Go home, Rhett. You need a shower. When’s the last time you ate anything?”

  Food is the last thing on his mind. How can he think of eating with his mom in so much pain? But he hasn’t showered since Sunday morning, and he can barely stand the smell of himself. “Maybe I will.” Everett gets up from the chair and stands beside the bed. “I want to stock up on groceries and get the house ready for your homecoming, anyway.”

  Mary grabs a fistful of blanket. “I have no idea what condition you’ll find the house in. I remember little about that night. But don’t worry about cleaning anything up. We can do all that later. Just get some rest. You look like you could use it.”

  Everett kisses her forehead. He’s not going to argue with her. “I’ll check in with you later, Mom. Maybe I’ll come back later. I can bring you your favorite salad from Panera Bread.”

  She cups his cheek. “Please, baby, don’t go to the trouble. All the medications I’m taking have zapped my appetite. Just be here in the morning to take me home.”

  He pats her thigh beneath the blanket. “Don’t worry. I’ll be here first thing.”

  They only live five miles from the hospital, but Everett drives it slowly, dreading what he’ll find at home. A rancid smell assaults his nose when he pushes open the front door. They took his father away, right? Everett takes tentative steps through the small entryway to the living room where the furniture is overturned, lampshades are askew, and picture frames are smashed on the floor. The beige rug sports a large rust-colored stain that he assumes is his mother’s blood. He sniffs his way to the kitchen and stops short in the doorway. The trash can is knocked over with trash strewn across the floor. Everett identifies an empty package of raw chicken breasts as the source of the godawful smell. Grabbing the broom from the pantry, he sweeps up the trash, bags it, and takes it outside to the supercan.

  After unloading his truck, he removes his cell phone from under his mattress and plugs it into the charger. He cleans the kitchen and straightens the living room, rearranging the furniture to hide the blood stain. Stripping off his clothes, he leaves them in a heap on the bathroom floor and takes a long hot shower. He’s dressing in sweatpants and a long-sleeved T-shirt when the doorbell rings. Stuffing his feet into his bedroom slippers, he hurries down the hall to the door.

  A kid of about twenty—wearing jeans, a red jacket, and a backward baseball cap—thrusts a brass urn at him. “Delivery from Pearly Gates Funeral Home.”

  Everett stares down at the urn, afraid to touch it. The kid is holding his father’s remains. He’s tempted to pay the guy his last hundred bucks to dispose of the ashes at the city dump, but he needs the money to buy groceries.

  “Thank you,” Everett says finally, taking the urn from him.

  “Here.” The kid removes an envelope from his back pocket and gives it to Everett.

  Everett watches him walk down the sidewalk. Tripping on an uneven paver, he stumbles forward several feet, but he doesn’t fall. He jogs the rest of the way to the funeral home van and speeds off.

  Closing the door, Everett takes the urn to the living room and places it on the mantel. Stepping back, he stares at the vessel that houses his father’s remains. He feels no sadness or remorse, only reassurance that his father can no longer hurt them.

  Everett tears open the envelope and reads the invoice. They owe Pearly Gates Funeral Home five thousand dollars for burning his father’s body, something Everett would gladly have done for free.

  He takes the invoice to his room and hides it in his backpack. He has no clue where he will get five thousand dollars, but he doesn’t want his mom to know about it, when she’s already so stressed out about the hospital bills.

  He unplugs his fully charged phone and spends a few minutes installing updates. Since August twenty-nine, the night he split town, he’s received over two thousand unread text messages and over a hundred missed calls from friends. He deletes them all.

  Checking his email, he discovers a message from Wade Newman with a contract and bank deposit request form attached. He’s stunned. Wade never mentioned an advance, but a windfall is just what he needs right now.

  He goes down the hall to the spare bedroom Mary uses as her sewing room. Seated at her dinosaur desktop computer, he signs into his account and prints out the contract and bank forms. His eyes pop out of his head at the dollar amount printed in the advance section of the contract. Fifty thousand dollars. If he’s careful, he can pay his mom’s bills and make this money last a good long time. When a wave of relief rushes over him, he gets up and does a little victory dance around the sewing room. His problems are far from over, but his life just got a heck of a lot easier.

  26

  Presley

  Promptly at seven o’clock on Wednesday night, with a bouquet of Katherine’s garden-grown flowers in hand, Presley rings the doorbell at 237 Hillside Drive. She neglected to exchange contact information with Emma or Rita at the party, and since she has no way of confirming their plans, she hopes they haven’t forgotten about dinner.

  Emma, her hair still wet from the shower, swings the door open. “Come in!” The teenager wraps her fingers around Presley’s wrist and jerks her inside. “I hope you like lasagna. I wanted to make something super special for you, but I’ve been studying for a physics test tomorrow.”

  “I love lasagna,” Presley says. “But I don’t want to keep you from studying. I can come back another time if tonight doesn’t work for you.”

  “Don’t be silly. I have to eat dinner, and you’re already here. Besides, everything’s almost ready.” She gestures for Presley to follow her. “Come on back. Mom and Abby are in the kitchen.”

  Presley has imagined this house a thousand times. She expected 1950s Happy Days. While the layout is traditional—central hallway with living room on the left and dining room on the right, the decor follows current-day trends of neutral palettes with pops of color. They round a corner into an updated kitchen with stainless steel appliances and stone countertops, white with gray veining. Rita stands at the island tossing a salad while Abigail sets four places at a farm table in the adjoining family room.

  When she sees Presley, Rita put
s down her salad tongs and gives her a hug.

  “I love your home,” Presley says.

  Rita smiles. “Thank you. The girls and I took over the house after my parents moved into a retirement home last year. They lived here nearly sixty years. The place needed a face-lift. We hired a contractor to remodel the kitchen and baths, but the girls and I did most of the painting and wallpapering throughout the rest of the house.”

  Abigail finishes setting the table and comes to stand beside her mother, smiling shyly at Presley.

  Rita places an arm around her younger daughter’s waist, pulling her close. “Emma is the one with style. She was in charge. Abigail and I took orders from her.” Rita gives Abigail a squeeze. “Didn’t we, sweetheart?” Warmth spreads throughout Presley’s body at the abundant love in this kitchen.

  Emma cracks the oven door and peeks inside. “The lasagna’s ready. I hope you don’t mind if we eat,” she says to Presley. “I really need to get back to studying.”

  “Anything’s fine with me,” Presley says. “What can I do to help?”

  Rita removes a vase from a cabinet. “You can put those lovely flowers in this.”

  Presley takes the vase from her. “Katherine, the groundskeeper at the farm, cut these especially for you.”

  “That’s very thoughtful of you both,” Rita says. “Thank you.”

  Rita and the girls put the finishing touches on dinner while Presley arranges the flowers in the vase. “Where are you girls thinking about going to college?”

  “Cornell is on the top of my list,” Emma says. “As I’m sure you know, they have one of the best hospitality management degrees in the country. Chad and I want to go to the same school, but I’m not sure he can get in with his grades.”