by Beth Duke
No one, Aunt Jean assured her, would ever know about the baby. She had a lawyer friend in St. Pete who had arranged an adoption. Violet’s monthly visits to Dr. Southerland and the hospital stay would be covered. And because she’d been hysterical at the thought of handing her baby to a stranger, she was promised she didn’t even have to see her child’s new parents. Everything was arranged, planned, set into motion, going forward, and rushing to rip Violet apart.
The baby was due in one month. Violet ran her hands across her stomach and cried salt back into the Gulf of Mexico.
fifteen
RONNI
I had come to believe Rick was right about everything. He seemed to know exactly what any given situation required, have an answer to every problem, and never waver when he’d made a decision. It was one of the things I adored about him.
Our days at the lake were set in a pattern: I’d blink my eyes about seven each morning and find Rick staring at me, smiling me awake. He’d cook breakfast—usually waffles or scrambled eggs—and bring it to me in bed with a cup of strong coffee. We’d eat while discussing Violet’s latest chapter. Then he’d kiss the tip of my nose, take the dishes, and disappear.
I spent the next four hours with the door closed, clutching the laptop and writing while Rick roamed the woods and water with Kitty. I’d written more in six days at the lake house than all the months before. The lack of distractions was nice, but I knew the book was flowing freely because I discussed ideas with Rick. Violet, I’d decided, did not expressly prohibit general discussion with my boyfriend. It wasn’t like I was talking to Kait or Donna about it; surely this was okay.
Sometimes I clutched the laptop and didn’t write. I deleted sentences and added them back. My word count had expanded to eighteen thousand, and I’d told most of what I knew about Violet’s youth from my written notes and her teenage diary. I found myself trying to remember our more casual conversations, hoping for revelations.
And about sixty thousand more words.
On one of those days I got exasperated and joined Rick on the dock, where he’d been fishing for an hour. He heard me walking up and patted the space next to him, mouthing “shh” and pointing to the water.
After a few minutes he announced, “I’m giving up. Not accomplishing anything here. I think we’re having hot dogs for supper.”
“I’m not, either. I deleted everything I wrote this morning. There was this long scene about Violet at a dance with Johnny, where she’d gotten jealous of another girl. She went on and on about it in her diary. I decided it was boring and took it back out. I’ve been going back and looking for new Johnny and Sam stories I might’ve missed.” I thought for a minute. “Johnny was a great guy, and Violet’s first love, but Sam is more my type. He was funny and smart and had some amazing lady-pleasing skills.”
Rick laughed. “How do I compete with that?”
“Very well, sir.” I ran my fingernails up and down his back. “I’d choose you. Anyway, he was deeply in love with her. Violet found out he’d been collecting photos of her for a long time…”
“That’s creepy,” Rick interrupted.
“Stop thinking like a cop.” I punched his arm. “He was the yearbook photographer. He took lots of candids of Violet she never knew about plus the usual yearbook stuff. He kept copies at home.”
“More romantic and less creepy, I guess. If you say so. Let me ask you something,” Rick said. “Why do you think Violet wanted you to write her story?”
“I don’t know.” I looked across the lake at a little boat putting along. “I think she saw her life as fascinating. She was the center of attention in any room. She felt loved and adored by men. She lost her daughter and survived that pain, then I came into her life and she doted on me in her place. So many things came full circle for her at Fairfield Springs. You have to admit it was remarkable.”
“Can you think of any other reasons?” He raised his eyebrows.
“She wanted me to prove to myself I could accomplish it. I told her more than once I didn’t know how I’d even begin.”
“Is that everything?”
“Well, she wanted the world to know what she’d been through. She’d had to keep a lot of secrets. And Violet was the type of person who craved attention...”
“...even after she was gone,” Rick finished.
“And the book will immortalize her. Hmmm. I never thought about that. You’re right. Violet would have loved the idea of living on as a character for millions of people.”
“And why do you think she set this one year time limit for you?”
“Believe me, I’ve wondered. Mr. Sobel didn’t have an answer for me. I think it has to do with Violet’s own writing experience. She worked on stories but never finished them. She told me one time it was because no one pushed her. So she left me a carrot and stick to make sure I’d follow through.”
“A very effective one.” Rick smiled. “I hope to be the center of attention in your rooms again someday.” He began packing up his gear. “I think I’ll run into town and buy some fish. That’s extremely damaging to my ego, but necessary.” He kissed my forehead. “And I have an assignment for you.”
“That’s great. As long as it’s not writing.”
“It’s not. First of all, Google how to make hollandaise sauce and print it out for me. I’m pretty sure I know what to buy. Leave the recipe on the kitchen counter and then go back to your laptop and type out the first conversation with Violet that comes into your mind, no matter what or when it was. Something you didn’t write down, something she didn’t intend for your book.”
“I could stay here and catch some fish instead.”
“Not a chance. And if you did, I’d be all hurt. Go on now. I’ll see you in an hour or two.”
I printed Rick’s recipe and delivered it to the kitchen, wondering for the hundredth time why anyone ever found avocado green suitable for appliances. Then I plopped onto the bed beside Halle, closed my eyes and fell asleep. When I woke up, it was fresh in my mind:
I found Violet sitting in Fairfield’s library one day. I’d finished an overnight shift and was exhausted, but something about the way she was hunched over a book drew me in.
“Hey, are you okay?”
She slapped the book shut and placed her hand over its cover, barely concealing the flowing Fabio hair on its hero. “Hi, Ronni. Yes, I’m fine.” She saw me grinning at the book. “Oh, all right, I’m reading a stupid clichéd romance novel.”
“Look, if you want to read As the Bosom Heaves it’s fine with me.” I reached over and turned the cover toward me. “Hmm. This one looks very romance-y and heave-y and throbby.”
“It’s a stupid book, but I began thinking about the men in my life and wondering how they measured up.”
I laughed.
“Oh, stop it. Not like that and not really, anyway. I’ve never read a bodice ripper and I was curious.”
“Are you going to finish it?”
“I haven’t even started. I’m skimming it for declarations of undying love and pondering the whole thing. Sometimes I think romantic love is only real half of the time. The rest is a chemical reaction.”
“Well, that’s depressing. How do I know if I just have magnificent pheromones?”
“That’s the question, isn’t it? I’m starting to wonder how any of us know. Maybe you should call my book The Magnificent Pheromones of Violet.”
“Not catchy. I don’t like Everybody Smelled Her, either.”
Violet collapsed into laughter. “I do love you, Ronni.”
“I love you, too. Any particular reason this is on your mind?”
She sat back and crossed her arms. “Today is the anniversary of my wedding to the only man in my life who didn’t love me. I used to wonder why that happened.” She brushed at her skirt. “It’s a long story I’ll tell you someday. Right now you look exhausted and I’m not in the mood to talk about it.”
“Okay. I’ll see you tomorrow. I’ve been on for ten
hours and I need some sleep.”
“Get some rest, honey.” She opened the book and began searching for her place as I walked away.
I closed the laptop and heard Rick come in a few minutes later. He poked his head into the room. “Thanks for the recipe. Did you think of anything?”
“Yes, I did, and it’s made me curious about her marriage. She never did say much of anything about Tolly, and I still haven’t read the journals in the bottom of the box, which should be about those years.”
“Why not?”
“ Because I have to break this into small pieces, Rick. If I read it all, I’ll get overwhelmed. I was trying to finish The Early Years with Johnny and Sam before piecing together her marriage.”
He’d nodded and said, “You’re the writer. You know what you’re doing.” I heaved an exasperated sigh at him. “But,” he added, “You can always come back to the earlier stuff. Might be a good idea.”
“Okay. But for now I’m helping you cook and we’re using lots of wine.”
He laughed. “Way ahead of you. There’s a glass on the counter.”
I should’ve been writing the next morning, but I found myself daydreaming about ways to spend the inheritance money. Every one of those fantasies included Rick, whether I willed it or not. I saw us together in exotic places; kissing in front of the Eiffel Tower, walking through the streets of Vienna at Christmas time, gazing at the chandeliers sparkling overhead. Neither of us had jobs anymore, of course.
Then I remembered that I was twenty-six, and while Violet had promised a huge amount of money for the book’s completion it wasn’t nearly enough to contemplate complete freedom. There were increments as I aged, but I didn’t know how much and when. It occurred to me I’d failed to ask Mr. Sobel a lot of important questions about the will.
Mr. Sobel.
Did he know about his cousin Sam’s relationship with Violet? Since I’d read her diary and reconstructed her day with Sam in Atlanta, I knew how she’d chosen her attorney years later. I was almost positive, though, that she’d never told Melvin Sobel about her relationship with his cousin—or that she’d visited him at his home when he was a baby.
Did no one in his family ever mention Violet? Considering her exit, it was possible. Mr. Sobel certainly hadn’t known Violet was pregnant at the time.
I shook my head to stop wandering through cobwebs and took Rick’s advice. I dug out a beautiful purple journal with Violet engraved in gold script on the front cover. Today I would allow myself to read it. I pulled Halle onto my lap and turned to the first page, practically purring along in anticipation.
Part Two
sixteen
VIOLET
Birmingham, Alabama 1960
Violet consulted her Cartier watch and patted the pearls at her neck nervously. The Junior League’s placement committee would be meeting here in thirty minutes. She ran through a mental checklist: crackers, cheese ball, crab dip, mixed nuts, fruit salad, chicken salad, potato salad, deviled eggs, yeast rolls, centerpiece, napkins, plates, forks, crystal, sweet tea, wine, Cokes and Tabs...dessert. Oh lord—had Beatrice remembered the lemon icebox pies? She raced to the kitchen, heels clicking a frantic tattoo on the polished wood floor. Yes, thank goodness, the pies were on the top shelf.
Now, if Tolly would just stay at the club until nine or so. He hated these “home invasions,” preferring to write an enormous check to The Country Club of Birmingham or a restaurant when it was Violet’s turn to host.
Tolliver Burnette “Tolly” Thompson was known to almost everyone in his insular world as Dr. Thompson. He allowed the use of his nickname by his wife, in-laws, sister, and three or four colleagues. Not only was Tolly a well-respected surgeon; he was married to a beauty twenty years his junior. He had a handicap of seven on the golf course, a mansion in Mountain Brook, and a bourbon addiction that beckoned with gentle, cradling arms every afternoon. If he had to stay at St. Vincent’s to monitor a patient, there was a monogrammed leather flask in his pocket. By mutual agreement, emergency surgeries were assigned to partners on call after twelve o’clock each day—no exceptions. Doctors Lacefield and Healy took up the slack because it was worth it to have Tolly’s name on the practice.
At fifty, his hands were still steady. Tolly believed his afternoons and evenings in the company of Jack Daniels were one reason his mornings in surgery were such a success. A man needed and deserved a sip or two to relax as the day wore on. Surgery was a demanding and high-pressure discipline.
As Violet prepared for her meeting, he marched the corridors at St. Vincent’s like he was in a parade, waving at nurses and nodding benevolently at visitors. His post-op patients were in various stages of recovery and monitored by staff he trusted well. Tolly decided to have a drink or two with a smoke on the hospital’s roof.
Stewart Mattison began to show signs of internal bleeding as Tolly lit his first Kool. Mr. Mattison had surrendered his gallbladder in a simple procedure. He wasn’t being watched too closely. No one noticed, not even the two nurses trading gossip over coffee at the station down the hall. No one saw Stewart try to blink his eyes open and tell his wife something was wrong. No one saw Stewart Mattison dying until he was dead.
By the time Tolly wandered down to the third floor for his final round of the day, Marie Mattison was sobbing outside her husband’s room. A nurse stood in the doorway, shaking her head solemnly at him.
Tolly dug fingernails deep into his palm inside his lab coat pocket. He assumed the concerned face with detached demeanor he’d perfected over the years, and hoped the spearmint gum he was chewing would do its job.
Violet checked her lipstick in the powder room and smoothed her ruby red shift. She’d placed the record player’s needle at the beginning of Mozart’s piano sonatas twice already. She closed her eyes and inhaled the music, just as she had as a little girl in her parents’ living room. The doorbell blasted her out of her reverie. Genevieve had arrived to help her set up, though there was nothing left to do.
Genevieve Carroll was a Mississippi beauty queen married to Birmingham’s premier jeweler. She wore a simple black shirtwaist accented, Violet thought, by everything DeBeers had dug up in the past six months. Violet watched Genny smooth her auburn hair over and over, flashing the five carat anniversary gift on her right hand.
Tolly didn’t believe in buying jewelry. Violet glanced at her modest wedding ring set, summoned her inner gracious hostess and said, “Oh, Genny, is that ring new? It’s so beautiful!”
Genny held her right arm straight and waggled her fingers. “Edward is great with the diamonds. If I could get him to add European vacations to his repertoire, he’d be damn near perfect.” She surveyed the dining room table. “Looks like we’re all set. Let’s have a glass of something.”
“Isn’t it kind of early to start?” Violet eyed the wine chilling in a silver bucket.
“Not if you live with three children under the age of five, Violet. I’d have a chardonnay IV if I could figure out how to drag it around.” She handed Violet a full wineglass and clinked hers to it. “Here’s to the placement committee. May they select chairmen naive enough to be flattered and smart enough to accomplish great things next year. You look gorgeous, by the way. Red is great on you.”
Tolly sat in the bar at his club, watching people come and go as he nursed his fourth bourbon. He spotted Pete Hughes, a cardiologist and sometime golf buddy. Pete inclined his head slightly at Tolly and followed his wife into the dining room.
Had word spread through the hospital already? Tolly raised his glass to signal for a fresh drink, cursing the Birmingham Junior League. He was going to make Violet resign from The Do Good While Dressed Expensively Club. The thought made him smile for the first time today.
Bourbon relaxed Tolly temporarily, but soon it would cause him to pick at the thread that would unravel his life.
Violet had agreed to host placement interviews this year because she loved opening her home to big groups and it was an easy meeting for the
hostess. All she had to do was keep refreshments set up as the women came and went, occasionally helping someone find her placement advisor. She viewed her expansive living room from a fainting couch that had belonged to Tolly’s grandmother. Antiques galore, none of them connected to her.
The house, she thought, was a monument to ostentation. She knew the neighbors resented the way it towered over their roofs. She also knew they called it “Tolly’s Folly.” Twelve thousand square feet of Tudor splendor, but her husband insisted they couldn’t afford to take a vacation. She sipped her wine and waved at Genevieve as she ushered a young woman toward the library. One hundred and sixty women would walk through her house tonight to carefully plan their upcoming year of Junior League commitments. Family obligations would be discussed. Pregnancies, ailing parents, demanding husbands...and for a few, work schedules...would be factored.
She closed her eyes. Our lives, she considered, were so frighteningly unplanned. Everything came before or after certain moments; huge rocks that sent rivers of expectation and hope spilling into new directions, never to return.
April 3, 1948 divided her life forever. A nurse handed Violet a tiny bundle of sleeping baby girl to kiss goodbye. What she remembered best were her eyelashes, so long and delicate on those creamy cheeks. The little fists clenched under the hospital blanket. The way her head smelled.
She’d named her Alicia, even though they’d told her not to give her a name. When they carried her away, Violet knew that all the joy and light in her had passed into her daughter. She was a dark, empty shell.
She tried to get up and follow. She needed to tell them it was a mistake. She screamed at a nurse, who gave Violet medicine to make her sleep.
