Mulberry Moon

by Catherine Anderson

  Ben curled an arm around her. “Because it might jostle your tibia. And also because you can’t bend your brace. To get in the right position, I’d have you twisted like a pretzel.” When he saw disappointment in her expression, he added, “We don’t have to wait much longer. Besides, it gives us both something to look forward to.”

  After they’d both gotten satisfaction, Ben felt like a fallen log when he collapsed beside Sissy. Hands down, it had been the best sex he’d ever had. That blew his mind. They hadn’t actually had sex in the traditional way. Yet with Sissy, it had still been extraordinary for him.

  “Guess what,” he said as he drew her into his arms, allowing her to roll toward him this time because her right leg could remain elevated. “I’ve developed a passion for Snickers bars.”

  She giggled. “Is that what we’re now calling this activity?”

  “Why not? It can be our code word.”

  * * *

  The next day set a pattern for those that followed. Ben asked Joe Paisley to help him order supplies. While he waited for the deliveries, he called his family and some friends to tell them he was doing a practice run and would love it if they would come for dinner that evening, on the house. Once off the phone, he put a pot of chili on the stove, thinking he could use it over the next couple of days for Coney Island hot dogs. Then he tried his hand at making Sissy’s chocolate cake and blueberry muffins. Shortly after he had the muffins on a cooling rack, a teenage boy arrived with fresh pastries from the Jake ’n’ Bake. Ben felt as if he was officially open for business.

  For dinner, he decided that his two offerings would be pot roast and hamburgers. He couldn’t see how he could possibly screw up pot roast, and fries and onion rings were a snap.

  Around lunchtime, people started coming in, which would have been great except they were not individuals Ben invited and it wasn’t dinnertime yet. “We heard you reopened!” a man called out. “How is Sissy doing? And how are your nerves holding up? It can’t be easy taking over for her.”

  Ben turned to see that the speaker was Charlie Bogart, owner of the sporting goods store. A large-boned but slender man, he wore a baseball cap bearing his business logo over his sandy-brown hair. His gray-blue eyes danced with amusement.

  “I’m not actually open for business yet,” Ben explained.

  “You aren’t? I got the word from a bag boy over at Flagg’s Market.” Charlie’s mustache twitched. “Are you forgetting what town this is? One person tells another person and—”

  Ben cut him off. “I know how fast word travels. But somebody got the story wrong. Today I’m just practicing. I’m not ready to reopen.”

  Charlie swung up on a barstool. “Hmm.” He glanced over his shoulder at the tables, which were filling up fast. “Well, start practicing. People are here to show support for Sissy. We want her to know we’re behind her. Word is she’ll be out of commission for a long time.”

  Ben forced a smile. “Well, I know she’ll appreciate that. But I don’t have anything cooked.”

  “Short order is fine. I’ll have a grilled cheese.”

  Ben hurried into the kitchen to turn on the grill. Then he sent out a group text to all his family members. “Help! The restaurant is packed!”

  Just then a deliveryman propped open the street door and began wheeling in boxes of produce. He’d barely finished unloading when the meat supplier showed up. Before Ben knew it, he was running through a maze of unpacked containers to make hamburgers, fries, onion rings, grilled tuna and cheese sandwiches, and his muffins were nearly gone. How in the hell had Sissy managed all this alone?

  Jeb was the first family member to show up. He loved to cook, but he knew little about commercial equipment. His wife, Amanda, accompanied him and set up a playpen for their son in one corner of the dining room to keep him from running all over the place. Once a school cafeteria assistant, Amanda not only helped cook but also waited on and bused tables. Barney and Taffeta texted back to say they’d be along as soon as they both got off work. When Jeremiah and Kate arrived, Kate blew a kiss at Ben and went directly upstairs to watch after Sissy.

  “I am so screwed,” Ben whispered to Jeb in the kitchen. “The one thing I never learned to do is operate the damned cash register! And if I call Sissy to ask her how, she’ll try to come downstairs on crutches.”

  Jeb burst out laughing. Then, to Ben’s horror, Jeremiah stuck his head through the pass-through window and yelled, “Anybody out there know how to run a cash register?”

  “Dad, keep your voice down to a dull roar, will you?” Ben said. “Do you want Sissy to hear you?”

  Before Jeremiah could respond, Ma Thomas hollered back, “I do!” The next thing Ben knew, the older woman was at his elbow. “I also know my way around a commercial kitchen. I was once a cook at the Dewdrop Inn.”

  He didn’t have time to hug her before she brushed past him and began to unpack all the boxes and crates stacked in the kitchen. Sooner than he dared hope, he actually had room to walk. He felt even more grateful when Ma unearthed some frozen packages of soup bases and soon had corn chowder bubbling on the stove beside the pot of chili.

  “Salad. You need salad,” she said. “Where’s an apron?”

  Ben knew that Ma had her own shop to operate. Yet here she was, helping Sissy. The next time her orders got mixed up, he’d be there to make sure she didn’t have to go across the street and exchange sex toys for perfume.

  * * *

  Over the next hours, Ben came to understand how wonderful small towns could be. Many customers jumped in to help. Others ordered simple things like sandwiches or the soups of the day because they knew he couldn’t serve them anything else. Ma Thomas taught him how to run the cash register and make change. Even Christopher Doyle proved his loyalty to Sissy by eating pot roast on his meat loaf night, and when Barney’s little boy began to cry, Christopher held the child on his knee, wiped away the snot from his quivering mouth, and fed him Lynda VeArd’s French fries.

  Ben didn’t know how he survived the fallout from everyone’s love for Sissy. He did know he’d done a piss-poor job of filling in for her. But the customers hadn’t seemed to mind. In fact, Ben had the feeling that eating at the Cauldron with him in charge had almost topped bingo night as entertainment.

  After the café closed, all his family members who could stayed to help Ben clean up and do breakfast prep. Jeremiah, busy laying strips of bacon out on racks, asked, “How the hell did she do all this by herself?”

  Until today, Ben believed he’d understood how hard Sissy worked, but now he had a whole new perspective. “I don’t know. I was wondering the same thing when I was tripping over boxes and trying to get the cash register open at the same time. She’s amazing. A lot of it is preparing ahead. And she sticks to a meal plan for each day. But all in all, I think she sleeps very little and works a lot.”

  When the breakfast prep had been done and the kitchen was spotless, Ben bade his siblings and in-laws farewell, locked up behind them, and led the way upstairs so Jeremiah could collect his wife. They walked in to find Sissy and Kate playing canasta, Kate using the coffee table as her playing surface and Sissy using her blanket-draped abdomen.

  “Don’t interrupt us,” Kate warned. “For the first time all night, I’m whipping her ass.”

  Kate Sterling never talked that way. Ben remembered Barney having to remind their mother once that the Virgin Mary had ridden into Bethlehem on an ass, trying to prove to her that ass was not a cussword.

  Jeremiah arched an eyebrow. Kate shot her husband a merry grin. “This is a girls’ night. On a girls’ night I wear my girl hat.”

  “Oh.” Jeremiah shrugged and turned to Ben. “You got anything to drink? We may as well have a boys’ night.”

  * * *

  The next morning, long before his cell phone alarm went off, Ben got a call that jerked him from a sound sleep. Startled and disorie
nted, he forgot he was sleeping on Sissy’s sofa, grabbed for the device, and rolled over onto empty air. He hit the floor on his stomach, the phone still clutched in one hand.

  “Hello, this is Ben,” he croaked.

  “Hey, bro. It’s Barney. I’m heading your way. I can help in the kitchen until nine. I figure Dad will be awake by then, nursing his hangover with strong coffee and prancing like a rope horse in the box, wanting me to drive him to the café to get his truck. At ten, I go on duty.”

  Ben groaned and peered at his phone. “Damn it, Barney. It’s only four thirty.”

  “Yep. While you were partying with Dad, I was in bed asleep. When he called for a ride home at eleven, I wanted to break your neck. Paybacks are hell. Why’d you let him drink that much whiskey?”

  Ben rubbed his forehead. “It seemed like a fine idea at the time.”

  “Well, when you play you have to pay. I’ll be there in thirty.”

  “Sissy’s roosters haven’t even gargled out a crow yet.”

  “I know. My roosters aren’t awake yet, either. But you need to get ready, man. Breakfast is at seven.”

  Ben hung up and fished clothes from the pile of clean garments his mother had collected from his place. Soon he was standing under a hot shower. He hadn’t tipped the Jack Daniel’s jug as much as his dad had, but he hadn’t gotten enough sleep to recover from the nonstop work he’d done yesterday.

  After dressing, Ben mixed Patches a bowl of his mush and then administered a dose of medication to Sissy before giving her fresh ice water and her phone, which had charged in the kitchen all night.

  “Call if you need me,” he told her.

  She fixed a bleary gaze on him. “Most men wouldn’t do this, you know.”

  Ben shrugged. “I guess I’m not most men. Go back to sleep.”

  * * *

  When Barney arrived, Ben was getting ready for the breakfast rush. He had a bucket of diced potatoes in water that would be drained before use. He’d gotten out packages of bread to make a variety of toast. Barney donned a sterile overcoat, found rubber gloves, and went to work as well.

  “Thanks for calling,” Ben said as they bypassed each other. “Sissy has this down to a fine art. I don’t.”

  “Yep, and I have a feeling that half the town will show up for breakfast.”

  Four and a half hours later, as he fell into a chair with a pounding headache and a kitchen full of dirty dishes, not to mention a cash register full of money, Ben decided his brother was a prophet of no small ability.

  * * *

  Over the next few days, Ben got the hang of cooking. During slow periods at her store, Marilyn came over to help. If she saw customers going into her place, she ducked out to go wait on them. After the third day she put a sign on her door directing customers to come fetch her. Sissy’s hens also started to lay, and the customers enjoyed farm-fresh eggs, even though the first ones were small. Ben compensated by serving three eggs instead of two. He still had plenty to spare. He silently saluted Sissy, though. She’d been smart to get all those chickens.

  After that first week, Sissy had to be taken to St. Matthew’s to get an actual cast put on her leg. Kate volunteered to be Sissy’s chauffeur and arrived at the Cauldron with three pairs of oversize sweatpants with drawstring waistbands.

  “She can’t go out in a nightgown,” Kate explained. “Where are some scissors?”

  Ben found a pair and watched as his mother whacked off the right leg of each garment. “Her brace won’t fit into them, even though they’re stretchy,” Kate said. “I cut them to hit just above the brace. Now she’ll have bottoms to wear.”

  Ben reluctantly stayed at the café. Sissy’s business was thriving. That was important to her. He worried the entire afternoon. His mother called him twice, once to let him know that Sissy’s X-rays showed the bone was still in alignment and again to say that Sissy was in a treatment room, getting a cast put on her leg. Ben chopped vegetables, putting more force behind the blade than necessary because he wanted to be with Sissy. Would it be painful? Was she scared? It just seemed wrong that he wasn’t there.

  That night, when the dinner mess had been dealt with and the next day’s breakfast was under control, he could finally go upstairs to see Sissy. He found her alone. She sat on the sofa with her leg elevated on the coffee table.

  “Where’s Mom?” he asked.

  “I sent her home.” Sissy smiled up at him. “The doctor says I can start cutting back on the pain medication. I won’t be needing round-the-clock attendance now.”

  Ben studied her. “You’re pale. That means you’re hurting.”

  “A little. The good news is that it should hurt a little less each day.”

  Ben sat beside her. “That’s a whopper of a cast.” It was sky blue and reached to midthigh. “Is it heavy?”

  “Not too bad. They use different stuff to make casts now. It’s just as sturdy but not as weighty. I’ll wear this one for a while. Then, if I’m lucky, get a walking cast.”

  Somewhere along the way, Ben had developed an ability to read Sissy better than he’d ever been able to read anyone. “You’re upset about something. Give me the straight scoop.”

  She took a deep breath. “I can’t have sex for another week.”

  Relief flooded him. She wasn’t suffering any complications. “That’s it? No other bad news, like you may limp for the rest of your life or you’ve contracted hydrophobia from Snickers?”

  She giggled and slanted him a glance. “He wants another X-ray before he gives me the go-ahead.”

  Ben curled an arm around her shoulders and moved closer to draw her against his side. “Hey, it could be worse. He might have said a month. And, hello, I think those Snickers bars that we’ve been enjoying are phenomenal.”

  She looked up at him. “You’re not upset?”

  Ben considered the question. “Am I disappointed that it can’t happen sooner? Yes. But I’ve learned something since I met you.”

  “What?”

  “There are some things worth waiting for, and you’re one of them.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  By the middle of the second week after Sissy’s fall, Ben could tell with only a glance when she was in pain and choosing to tough it out. He wanted to insist that she take a dose of medication, but he remembered how dearly she treasured her independence and realized he had to respect that. If she chose to be clearheaded rather than comfortable, that was her decision to make.

  Ben didn’t rest well on Sissy’s sofa. If his head was settled on a cushion, his feet were dangling over the other end. If his feet were comfortable, his head and shoulders weren’t, and his neck developed a crick. As for turning over, it required caution or he would end up on the floor. He still didn’t trust himself to sleep with Sissy. He tossed and turned a lot, and he was afraid of hurting her.

  One night when he’d been shifting around more than usual to get comfortable, he heard Sissy call him. When he went to see what she needed, she invited him to sleep beside her. “My leg is protected now. I don’t think you’ll injure me by turning over or thumping me with your knee.”

  Saint Ben flew out the window so fast that Ben didn’t feel his exit. He and Sissy had been intimate, so it felt completely right to strip down to his boxers, slip between the covers, and hold her in his arms. She’d changed sides of the bed, even at night, so she was able to turn toward him and welcome him into her arms.

  “You don’t have to wear boxers,” she told him as he settled cautiously on the mattress.

  Ben kept them on anyway. “Think of them as behavioral modification tools.”

  She giggled.

  The moonlight cast her upturned face into a silver-limned silhouette. He couldn’t resist tracing the bridge of her nose. He liked the way it turned up slightly at the tip. “Have I told you today how much I love you?”

  “L
ots of times while you worked your butt off in my café. And when you forget to tell me, I remind myself of how worried you were when I got the cast put on. Your mom is a narc. She said you texted her twelve times while I was having it done.”

  “Of course I was worried. I even got mashed potatoes all over my phone.”

  “I just wish the doctor had said I can have actual sex. I’m twenty-six years old, I’ve found a man I love and trust, and I’m eager to experience the real deal.”

  Ben shifted closer to hold her against him. “It’ll happen soon. Just be patient.”

  “Waiting sucks.”

  “So does a phone call from Barney at four thirty. He’s coming again to help me out.” Ben wanted to be buried deep inside of her as much as she wanted him to be there. She ran her hand over his chest and explored his belly. He nearly groaned. “Stop that,” he warned with a smile in his voice. “I’ll lie awake all night wanting you and end up back on the sofa in order to get some rest.”

  She drew back her hand. “Don’t leave. I like having you beside me.”

  Ben lay awake long after Sissy fell asleep. He yearned to make actual love to her. But when he remembered how aloof she’d been in the beginning, he couldn’t help but think how lucky he was to have even this amount of intimacy with her.

  That thought remained with him as he followed her into dreamland.

  * * *

  When Sissy returned to Crystal Falls for her next X-ray, Ben closed up the restaurant for thirty minutes to walk to Flagg’s Market on East Main and buy two bottles of mulberry wine. He planned to celebrate with Sissy that night and then seduce her. Tonight, he kept thinking. Tonight I can finally make love to her.

  When Kate brought Sissy home from the appointment, he instantly knew by the glum expression on Sissy’s face that she’d gotten bad news. He thought the worst and left Blackie and Ma Thomas waiting for their food while he helped Sissy upstairs, got her situated on the sofa, and then asked what the doctor had said. Sissy glanced at Kate, who was hanging her winter coat in the bedroom closet.