The Christmas Quilts

by Olivia Gaines

  “Maybe I should call Cody to make sure he can stay for dinner and let him know that you are here,” Bisa said.

  “No. I want to see his reaction first hand. No warnings, please,” Aneta said. “Tonight will be fun.”

  For Bisa, the evening was going to be about as fun as a poison ivy on her face in the summertime on a tropical island full of humidity.

  IT SEEMED LOGICAL TO Cody to start with his own quilt. While the class worked to finish the children’s quilt project. Cody set about working on quilting the first of his Nana’s projects. Learning how to get in a groove on the machine with his own quilt worked best in case he screwed everything up with uneven stitches and bunched up fabric. Bisa kept watch over Cody as he loaded up the machine with the 90 inch wide sheeting he’d purchased in Paducah for backing. He moved with ease, loading in the batting, then the quilt top he had carefully ironed, pressing open the seams for easy quilting.

  “Have you decided on which stitch pattern you are going to use?” Bisa asked him.

  “I am just going to meander my way through, trying out flowers, vines, and a few other things,” he said softly, adding the cone of color matched thread to the holder.

  “Let me know if you need my help,” he told him.

  “I think I got it.”

  “Cody, do you have any plans this evening, after class I mean?”

  He looked at her as she scratched at her neck. He blinked several times, wondering if the scratching meant she had an itch like the one he experienced in Kentucky or if she was simply uncomfortable.

  “I can stay for dinner if that is what you want to know. Cassidy is picking up Nana tonight,” he said smiling.

  “Good. I want you to stay for dinner,” she said, scratching again.

  Chapter Sixteen – Batting

  Aneta Washington was certifiable. Bisa wasn’t sure if there were levels to crazy, but either way her mother had a full hand in spades. From the crazy purple shoes on her feet to the orange, life-size kitten hair clamp on her head. It was too soon for Cody to meet her mother. She kicked herself for not sleeping with him in Kentucky. At least if she had, he would have been hooked on her good-good and would overlook the crazy which he might fear was hereditary. Men loved having sex with crazy women. However, he wouldn’t stay around for genetic crazy if he didn’t know how good her loving was.

  This is the dumbest conversation you have ever had with yourself, Bisa.

  “Baby,” Ms. Clara said. “That man has learned to quilt in a month. I saw you two on C-Span and him working your booth and making sales like he was part of the dream. Child, he even smiled, stopped people from touching the quilts and I saw him cutting fabric at one point. I think the cuts were crooked, but I’m not one to make snap judgements on people. I say that man is a keeper.”

  “You are right, Ms. Clara,” Bisa said.

  “Don’t overthink it and wait too long. You wait too long and that idiot that you were seeing may convince you otherwise,” Clara added.

  “He’s not an idiot by any means, Ms. Clara. He has a plan for his life and I have one for mine. They just don’t coincide,” Bisa corrected the old lady.

  “Oh, horse poo. He just doesn’t have room in his life for what you are trying to do because it will take away from your time fawning over him.”

  “Maybe you’re right.”

  “I know I’m right. I have three ex-husbands which proves I’m right,” she said.

  “Goodnight, Ms. Clara,” she said, walking the old woman to the door.

  “You two be safe,” Clara said, winking at Cody who watched her expressionless.

  His forehead now crinkled, Bisa was scratching again, and Ms. Clara was outside of the window making kissy faces at him. He stared at Ms. Clara uncertain what the old lady was doing. When she stuck out her tongue, making lewd circles with it, he shuddered.

  “Bisa, what is going on?”

  “Nothing,” she lied. “I’m starving. Cody, can you please shut it down and come on upstairs.”

  “Okay, be right there. But just so you know, if dinner is going to be a salad, I don’t want it. I can leave right now and get something else,” he said.

  “It’s not salad,” she told him. Her mother was cooking, so it was going to be worse. Way worse. She set the alarm on the downstairs shop and climbed the steps to face the music led by a deranged maestro. Cody came up a few seconds later.

  Aneta had filled the upstairs living space with lighted candles, the smell of deep fried foods, and down home, dirty southern blues music. Bisa held onto the door jamb for support as the childhood nightmares all came back to life. This was the reason they spent the holidays on an island. Her mother’s idea of festive bordered on a replay of a ceremony which resembled the removal of virginal eyes by cult members in hooded robes. The sheer number of lighted candles was enough to set the smoke alarm off, so Bisa began to blow them out. Cody arrived after she’d only successfully extinguished three.

  “Whoa!” she heard him say as he reached the landing.

  “It is a lot of candles,” she said, blowing out another.

  “How...so many...how...lit...downstairs,” he said, pointing at the stairwell. Aneta came around the corner in a flourish in a red broomstick skirt, a yellow lacy blouse cut entirely too low, and that orange kitten stuck in the back of her head. “Whoa twice.”

  “You must be Cody,” Aneta said, grabbing both of his hands.

  “And you, my fine lady, have got to be Bisa’s mother,” he said, squeezing her hands.

  “Listen to you, dripping with Southern charm and refinement,” Aneta noted in his mannerisms and speech.

  “I declare,” he said to drive home her very thought as he started the sentence. “Your daughter’s fruit did not roll far from the family tree. It is an honor to meet you.”

  “Mmmm...hmmm. You might be able to charm the panties off my daughter with those honey dripping lips, but I will see for myself the kind of man you are,” Aneta said, pulling her hand away.

  “I guarantee you, Mrs. Washington, I have not charmed anything off of your daughter, least of all her panties,” Cody said, elongating the her to sound like hurh.

  “You sound like Foghorn Leghorn,” Aneta said. “I bet your family owned slaves!”

  “As the world we live becomes smaller and connected by information, it would not be surprising to learn in the Motherland, your family might have owned them as well,” he said.

  Aneta smiled at him.

  Cody smiled back.

  “Well, ain’t you something?”

  “I sure am, Ma’am,” he said with a wider smile. “Something smells delicious. Is it you I am to thank for this evening’s meal?”

  “Yes, I made fried lamb,” she said turning to head into the kitchen, leaving Cody to stand there with his mouth open.

  “Bisa, I didn’t know you could fry lamb and your mother has a kitten stuck on her head,” he said softly, leaning towards her.

  “My mother would fry popcorn if she could and the kitty isn’t real,” she said. “At least I hope it wasn’t at some point.”

  Cody’s arm slid around Bisa’s shoulder as his lips came to her temple. He squeezed her body to his for good measure as they walked into her dining room to be greeted by a colorfully set table with more burning candles.

  Mocking Foghorn LegHorn he spoke in a hushed toned, “Boy, I say boy, I am not sure if we are going to eat dinner or if your Mama is about to perform a séance.”

  “After that meal, I may have to perform an exorcism and make you a cup of my tea,” Bisa said.

  He arched a well-trimmed eyebrow, looking at her when he asked, “The poop making tea?”

  “Yes, you are going to either want to poop out everything you eat or throw it up,” she said.

  She was right. The food was the kind of greasy that floated in pools grease and tasted like butter, deep fried in grease. Aneta fried the corn. She country fried the lamb in a thick floured coating. She also fried the cabbage.


  And the cornbread.

  And the mini fried sweet potato pies.

  It tasted like she fried everything all in the same oil.

  “I see why you eat so healthy,” Cody said.

  “I don’t understand why she isn’t dead. Her arteries should have given up twelve years ago and staged a walk out of her chest in symbolic protest,” Bisa said, frowning.

  “Did I hear you say die? I think I may have forgotten to tell you why I was here. I came to dye,” Aneta said grinning.

  Cody leaned forward. “Are you ill, Ma’am?”

  “No fabric, you sweet talking Republican. I came to dye some fabric tomorrow for a dress. I have a hot date this weekend with a man I met on Tinder,” she said. “I can’t get the right color of orange to match Dionysus, so I am going to have to make it.”

  He mouthed word Dionysus to Bisa, who pointed to the back of her head, replying, to Cody, “she is talking about the kitten.”

  “Huh?” He said aloud.

  “The kitten on the back of her head is named Dionysus,” Bisa said in a whisper.

  “Huh?” he said again, his face contorted as if he misunderstood why a grown woman would have a dead kitten, which she fondly named, on the back of her head.

  “Don’t ask me to explain my Mother. I barely am fluent in speaking Aneta Washington and I have known her all of my life. You can’t learn the language in one night!” Bisa said.

  He winked at Bisa, touching her thigh under the table, “Does that mean I will have time to learn it in years to come?”

  “I don’t know which shocks me more. You eating this horrible meal or you still being interested in me after meeting her!”

  “She is who she is and you are the opposite. I can’t hold you accountable for what she says or does,” Cody said.

  “Aren’t you afraid that her crazy may be hereditary and will impact generations to come?”

  “You have yet to meet the rest of my family, so no. I am game if you are,” he said.

  Bisa stared into those compassionate blue eyes and wanted to cry. This was also a point in the relationship she never got to with men out of fear another soul would believe she was as far to left of the spectrum of sanity as her mother. God bless the woman. She enjoyed every moment of her life.

  “Bisa, can I ask you something?” Cody whispered when her mother went into the kitchen to get ice cream to go with the fried pies.

  “Sure.”

  “Did you father die a happy man?”

  “He died of a heart attack from forty years of eating this crap,” she said.

  “But was he happy in his life with your mother?”

  “He was, Cody. My Daddy loved my mother with everything in him,” she said.

  “Then there you go. What appears to be aberrant behavior by some is the perfect match for an opposite soul seeking light. She was his light,” he said, pausing to touch her hand. “You have become mine.”

  “Cody, that was so beautifully put,” she said.

  “I’m glad you think so because next I am going to ask you for a very large cup of your special making tea to get this meal out of my system,” he said with a frown.

  Bisa began to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all, which in turn made Cody laugh. She wanted to know what he found so humorous.

  “Imagining my mother and your mother in a room together,” he said.

  “Oh dear Jesus!” Bisa said, making Cody double over in laughter.

  The dessert and coffee portion of the meal progressed without a hitch as Aneta pelted Cody with questions on everything from his income down to the car he drove. She wanted to know about his family, his desire for children, and race relations in America as he saw it. He answered each question as honestly as he could.

  “Okay. You have my permission,” Aneta said.

  “My dear lady, I thank you, but I am uncertain what you are granting me permission to do,” he said arching one eyebrow.

  “Marry my daughter, of course. My brother Reginald will give her away and we are Baptist, in case you wanted to know,” she told him.

  “As are we,” he said.

  “Good. For a second there I was afraid you would want her to convert to Catholicism,” Aneta said. “Whew. I have the itis and need to rest my kitty and feet.”

  “Thank you for the meal. It was indeed a refreshing pleasure to spend the evening in your delightful company,” Cody said. “Bisa, can I help with the dishes?”

  “He does dishes, too? Child, you better take that man in your room and put it on him real good to keep him in pocket,” Aneta said, rising, groaning and grabbing her cup of coffee.

  “Thanks for the encouragement to fornicate Mom,” Bisa called back.

  Aneta waved her hand as if dismissing her daughter’s words. Bisa rubbed her fingers across her stinging eyes, trying to hold back the tears threatening to come out in an unsophisticated hurling of snot and salty water. All she wanted was a normal life.

  “Bisa, I noticed you put up the schedule in the shop for classes next month,” Cody said, collecting the dishes. He stopped, almost fascinated by the slow moving puddle of grease under the two remaining deep fried lamb chops.

  “Yes, I did.”

  “Saturday has no classes. Are you free to accompany me to the ballet that evening?”

  “The ballet?” she asked, looking up with tears welling in her eyes.

  “You know. Waif thin, nearly anorexic women in tutus dancing on their toes in wooden shoes,” he said. “The reception afterwards is really nice with high end catered food. I always get a ‘to go’ box since those women aren’t going to eat it anyway.”

  “Ahh...sure,” she said, looking at him with drier eyes.

  “Cool. We have a date. I will pick you up here. I am wearing my black suit and red tie, so if you could maybe wear a black dress with a red shawl or scarf to compliment it, that would be great,” he told her as he carried the dishes to sink. “Cool, you have a dishwasher!”

  Bisa never stood up from the table as her eyes went back and forth from her mother, sprawled out on the couch with her skirt hiked up, the kitten sitting on the coffee table looking at her as if it were crying for help, and Cody, whistling in the kitchen. Antoine would have never made it past the candles. Yet here Cody was doing dishes after possibly the worst meal he’d ever eaten. And he ate it. He actually ate my mother’s cooking.

  She was right. He was a keeper. Have I found my husband? No. I have found my husband.

  Chapter Seventeen – Quilting

  All of the pieces were in place and Bisa was feeling itchy. Nearly six months had passed since she and Antoine had kicked it, as he liked to label their encounters, and right now she was itching so bad she could scratch the crap out of Cody Richardson. In anticipation of inviting him up after the ballet, she changed the linens on her bed and turned down the covers. The black floor length dress she wore didn’t work well with the hot red undies she wanted to wear, forcing her to change into a black lacy set of undergarments. A red pashmina shawl was draped over her shoulders when she opened the door to her upstairs living space to let him in.

  “You look amazing,” he said, kissing her cheek. “I love your hair pulled off your face like that. I can see the whole you.”

  “Thanks,” she said, patting the bun. “I started to clip on the red bulldog my Mom gave me as a hair pin, but I figured it was too much.”

  “Ya think?” he said, laughing. “Let’s get moving. The curtain rises at 8.”

  Cody was not driving his SUV but a sleek, expensive black sedan with shiny chrome wheels.

  “This is nice,” she said.

  “It’s my Sunday car,” he said with a grin, closing her car door. She watched him walk around the front of the vehicle in the black suit which appeared tailored for his body. The red tie held black flecks in it and a red rose was attached to his lapel. He slid into the driver’s seat, turning on the vehicle and putting the car into gear. The scent of the catnip cologne filled her nostrils as her body
responded to the smell.

  “You look very handsome in that suit, Cody,” she said, touching his hand.

  “We do make a striking pair,” he said, winking at her.

  Soft music filled the car as he drove to the University of South Carolina at Aiken’s Etheredge Center, parking in a reserved spot. Other couples marched into the building in twos as if Noah was filling the last seats for artistic procreation. To her surprise, there was a box in the upper row where Cody lead Bisa to be seated. She spotted his parents first.

  “Good evening,” she said, leaning forward to air kiss Rona’s cheek. Bisa exchanged a hug with his father, turning to see six pairs of eyes boring into her. Cody performed the introductions, starting to his left.

  “My Uncle Dirk and his wife Charlotte,” Cody said. Bisa only nodded at the woman with close-set eyes whose gaze seemingly obviously disapproved of her being here with Cody.

  “My Aunt Amanda and her husband Dr. Caden Driscol,” he said. Amanda was warmer, offering Bisa a hug.

  “My Aunt Druscilla and her husband Strom,” he said.

  “Like the Senator,” Bisa said.

  “My late cousin,” he added with pompousness. He reminded Bisa of the house elf in Harry Potter. She nodded to him as the chords of the orchestra started and everyone took their seats.

  As a child, Aneta had taken Bisa to New York to see the Bolshoi Ballet when the company toured America. To her it seemed tragic for young women to starve themselves and deform their feet in order to dance on their toes in unison. Nevertheless, it was a beautiful performance which she thoroughly enjoyed as much as she did this performance, by the Aiken Civic Ballet. The dancers were good and after the performance, they were able to take photos with the principal dancers, a bonus for Ballet Masters donating $10,000 or more as the Richardson’s did.

  “Hello Quilting B,” a soft voice spoke.