The sound of a squeaky screen door could be heard on the other end.
“Yes, that’s right,” Martha said, her voice now unnaturally loud. “We’re not interested in any surveys so early in the morning, even if we will be home all day today.”
I think she was trying to tell me to come visit and didn’t want whoever it was behind her to know. “Okay, thanks,” I said, hanging up.
Charlotte looked over at me, then took a sip of her coffee. “Certainly early for a caller. Was that your Leo?”
“Um, no, not Leo,” I said. “That was a lady we were going to be getting flowers from for the wedding. I forgot I was supposed to get our wedding planner out there. I’m hoping he likes her enough to use her flowers in future weddings. They’re having a hard time financially. To be honest though, I’m not sure if Mr. Andre will approve of her.”
“What was wrong with the lady’s flowers?”
“Her husband, Lenny, has had problems with half the people in town. Nobody seems to like him. Regardless of whether Mr. Andre uses them for future weddings, I’ve already put the deposit down for the flowers. We are using them for ours no matter what.”
“Ooh,” she said, putting her hands together under her chin, “I just love planning a wedding. I know I just got here, but if there’s anything I can do to help, I wouldn’t mind.”
I had agonized over inviting her to our wedding. I had never considered having her be a part of the preparation. I wasn’t quite sure how I felt about it.
The back door squeaked behind us.
“Betsy? Whose car is that with California plates parked in your driveway?” In walked my father, who abruptly stopped in the arch of the doorway.
“Uh,” I turned to Zach. “Hey buddy, you’d better go get dressed for school.”
“Really? Grandpa’s here. I want to say good morning to him.”
“Then say it.” I hurried him out of his chair.
“Good morning, Grandpa,” Zach said, sloshing his bowl into the sink and then running down the hall.
“Good morning, Grandson.” As he stepped closer, he stared at Charlotte, who sat up straighter and adjusted her collar. “Charlotte?” was all my father could get out.
She leaned her head against her hand, rubbing her temple. Running into my father was probably a little more than she bargained for in her first hour in Pecan Bayou. She had driven all night and she looked tired. My dad, though, couldn’t have known that.
“I sure as hell didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”
I walked over to my dad and took him by the elbow.
“Come on, Dad, why don’t you sit down?” Dad smiled and put his hand over mine.
“No need to bring out the smellin’ salts, darlin’, but I do have to admit it sure is a kick in the head.”
“You haven’t changed much,” Charlotte said.
“I had no idea I had all this gray hair and these wrinkles when you left me. No wonder.”
“And your sense of humor is still the same, too,” Charlotte countered.
“Oh, I don’t know. I got me some better jokes these days.”
Charlotte bristled and let out an exhausted sigh. “What are you doing here, anyway?”
“I could ask the same of you,” said my father. “I’m here because this is my daughter’s house and I often visit her on my way into the station.”
Charlotte took a sip of her coffee, seeming to be quietly content with his answer. After a pause, my dad continued. “And you?”
“I’m here because my daughter invited me.” She fished into her tan crocheted bag and came out with a tattered invitation.
“You invited her? I didn’t think she was even on the guest list.”
“Uh, Dad. I was going to talk to you about that.”
“Just when exactly?” He turned to Charlotte. “Did you bring along your husband? Nothing like a good fight at a wedding. Oh and by the way, aren’t you a little more than a month too early?”
Charlotte started to say something, but then stopped herself. I could see she was working on controlling what came out of her mouth next. “My husband died five years ago. I am a widow and my coming here was … a little impulsive.”
“She drove here straight from California,” I said. “She started thinking she was going to the store and just kept driving.”
“I’ll be damned,” Judd said. “Hope you remembered to put the cat out.”
“Charlotte,” I said. “You have to admit, you haven’t been a part of my life for most of my life. I didn’t even think you would respond to my invitation.”
“I suppose you didn’t, and for that I can’t blame you,” she said. I haven’t exactly been available.”
My dad sneered at me. “So everyone down at the sperm bank should be on all kinds of invitation lists by your thinkin’, Betsy.”
“It was a little more than a sperm donation, if I remember right,” said Charlotte.
“It’s good you have your memories, because that’s all it will ever be.” Judd turned toward me, his face hardened. “Enjoy your time with your mother. I’ll be keepin’ my distance ‘til she hits the town line.”
“Dad,” I pleaded as he walked back out the door. In all of our years together, he had never turned his back on me.
“Oh, Judd. Nice seeing you, too,” my mother said to the door my father closed on us. Charlotte rose from the table, searched my cabinet, brought down a container of creamer and grabbed a spoon out of the drawer. “After a little nap, I’ll be ready to go with you and look at the flowers.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“I thought you were an artist,” I said to my mother a couple of hours later as we drove out to the Stokes Flower Farm and Floral Shop.
“Oh, yes. I was for a while, but then, I don’t know. My stuff wasn’t selling, and other things started interesting me.”
“Like what?”
She bit her bottom lip as she seemed to call up a list in her memory. “Um, I did makeup for a movie.”
“That’s exciting. Did you do the makeup of anybody I know?”
“Not unless you have a passing acquaintance with the zombie legion.”
I laughed. My mom was funny.
“So how long were you a makeup artist?”
“Oh, I just did that for that one movie. After that, I did several different things. I was a bartender, and I arranged flowers, and I was a banquet coordinator at an L.A. hotel … just a lot of stuff. I guess you could say I like variety in my life.”
“Was your husband okay with that?” I said.
“Yes and no. He always liked it when I brought home a paycheck, but he wished I would stick to one thing,” she said. “I found out he was more like your father than I had guessed. He plodded through day after day. No excitement.”
I found it curious that she had stayed with him and not my father.
“Did you have any more children? Do I have a sibling out there somewhere?”
“No. After leaving you, I never felt like I was cut out to be a mother. Some people just aren’t meant to have children, I guess.”
She guessed? She was so detached it almost felt like we were talking about somebody else.
“So, you never wanted to come back here?” I continued.
“Oh, sometimes. The only family I had left here was an aunt, and she died over a year ago. There just wasn’t much for me to come back to.”
I felt my shoulders slump at her admission.
“Oh, Betsy. Of course there was you, but I just felt like I had made such a mess of things. You understand that, don’t you?”
I was trying, but it was a lot to ask of the person you wronged to take your side.
We drove up the dirt road that led to the Stokes place. A mangy-looking dog ran through a broken fence rail.
“Oh my, maybe your Mr. Andre was right,” Charlotte said as she peered out the window. “This place does look pretty bad.”
“I know it looks terrible,” I said, “but they have a greenhouse
where they grow some beautiful flowers. Martha has made some beautiful arrangements that I’ve seen at some of the ladies clubs I’ve spoken at. She has a real gift for creating things that showcase what we have in the area.”
“If you say so,” she said.
I desperately needed to call Leo and tell him about my mother showing up. He was another person I had hid my invitation blunder from. I did get a quick text out to Maggie to meet us out here. I felt a full-on panic attack hitting me when I started guessing how she would react.
Once we’d ascended the ancient steps, we knocked on a screen door. Lenny Stokes himself came to the other side. He peered out, scratching his scrawny body clad only in a thin white T-shirt and saggy blue jeans.
“Yes?” was his form of a cordial greeting to his prospective customers.
“Mr. Stokes, I’m Betsy Livingston. We wanted to come out and see the flowers for our wedding. Remember we spoke earlier on the phone, and I mailed you our deposit?”
His eyes squinted at me as he assessed whether or not he thought I was telling the truth. I recognized a flowered jar of the church batch of calamine lotion from the Christmas bazaar in his hand. He was rubbing the lotion into an angry rash on his arm. Mr. Andre came out from behind him. He pulled his arms close to his body to avoid Lenny, and then briefly looked down on him and shook his head. He turned to me.
“Betsy, dear. Glad you could make it,” he said. “I’ve been here for almost fifteen minutes. Mr. Stokes and I have been discussing your flowers. Can I speak to you alone for just a minute?”
“Yes,” I said.
Mr. Stokes started to head inside, but Charlotte stopped him. “Would you mind if I looked at the flowers in your greenhouse?”
“They’re over there,” was his gruff response. My mother went down the porch ahead of us and into one of the two domed greenhouses. Mr. Stokes followed her, set the jar of lotion down on the porch railing and continued scratching his rash along the way. Mr. Andre pulled me off the porch and we walked around the corner of the house.
“After talking with Farmer Sam here, I’ve decided his quality is not up to my standards. His roses are limp. The petals and leaves are not firm, and the bloom diameter is much too small.”
Like I cared that much about flowers. Still, I didn’t want to let Martha down if I could help it. “Well, it’s early in the year,” I said. “The flowers have some growing to do before the wedding.”
“And you want to gamble on this yeehaw?”
I thought about Martha and the desperate way she had approached me in the supermarket.
“I was hoping to,” I said weakly.
“Well, put your trust in me,” Andre said. “I am the professional, after all. This isn’t my first Rodeo Drive.”
Aunt Maggie pulled up in her car, and seeing me and Mr. Andre around the corner, she got out of the car and headed toward us.
“Sorry, I’m late, Betsy,” she said. “I hope you don’t mind, I needed to bring Danny along. He didn’t feel like going to his workshop today.”
Danny trudged up behind Maggie. “Hi Betsy,” he said. He looked over at Mr. Andre and stepped up to shake his hand. “Hi.” He shook Mr. Andre’s hand a little too hard. “I like your shiny shirt.”
“No problem, Aunt Maggie,” I said. “Mr. Andre and I were just discussing Mr. Stokes. He doesn’t want to use him.”
Martha Stokes came running around the corner, wiping her hands on a dishtowel. She had an apron on top of a floral blouse. “Oh, dear. Lenny just told me you were here. I hope he was polite. I’m so sorry. My husband has a way of making people angry. I do hope you’ll come look at our flowers.” She gestured toward the greenhouses.
Mr. Andre snapped together his clipboard and started down the steps. “While I can already see that you are a much nicer person than your husband, ma’am, I’m afraid we’ll have to pass on this one. I have a long-standing relationship with Baskets of Bluebonnets, and we’ll be going there. Let’s go, Betsy.”
“Uh, wait I need to get …” I started to round the corner of the house and ran into Charlotte coming from the other direction.
Maggie clasped her throat. “Charlotte!”
Upon seeing Maggie, Charlotte stood frozen to the ground.
Danny, not remembering the decades-old feud, ran to Charlotte and grabbed her in a bear hug. “Aunt Charlotte!” he said, burying his head in her shoulder.
Stiffening at the hug, Charlotte regained her senses and acknowledged my aunt with a perfunctory nod. “Maggie.”
Maggie stepped up and planted her hands on her hips. “Why are you here, Charlotte? The broom factory close down?”
Charlotte responded quickly, surprising me. “I guess your last order was too big.”
“Ladies!” Andre cut in. “We are not here to settle old scores.”
After seeing the tension between the mother I always wanted and the woman who was like a mother to me, I began wondering if the Elvis Chapel in Vegas might be available in the next twenty-four hours.
“Really, Betsy,” Martha said. “You have to come see what we are working on here. You at least promised that.”
“Betsy, do you truly want to order flowers from … Stokes here?” Mr. Andre demanded.
“I don’t know,” I squeaked out. “Mrs. Stokes asked me to come out, and well, she sounded like they really needed the business.” I saw Lenny Stokes bristle.
“We don’t need nothin’, and my wife needs to keep her meddling to her own affairs,” he said. “Watch out for them good Christian women, they’ll get you every time.”
Martha stared at the floor. Her husband hadn’t known she was out begging for business. From the exhausted look of the house and farm, she had to be desperate.
The crowd turned to me as I uttered something unintelligible. Mr. Andre chortled, and Lenny Stokes stepped up.
“What you laughing at, boy? I’ve heard about you and your prissy weddings. I’m not so hard up I’ve got to do my business with the likes of you. Now get the hell off my place.”
Mr. Andre, in shock, stepped back from the porch. He raised his hand in the air and stuttered, “In all of my experience I have never met anyone so … awful.” He turned to me, the satin in his shirt sagging slightly. “It’s up to you to make this decision, Betsy, but I advise highly against it!”
Aunt Maggie stepped closer to me and took hold of my hand. “Whatever you decide will be fine, darlin’.”
Charlotte grabbed my other hand and nodded.
“Mr. Andre,” I began, “you’ve given me good advice so far, so I’m going to trust your judgment on this one.”
Martha crossed her arms and shook her head. Lenny went back in the house with a slam of the screen door.
“Good luck trying to get in over there is all I have to say,” Martha said, following him.
Mr. Andre crossed his arms and then waved off Lenny Stokes. “Then it’s a big fat ‘no’ to Mr. Stokes,” he said. “Betsy, are there any other local tradesman I need to be aware of? Any other Neanderthals you have hired for your most important day?”
I shifted from one foot to the other.
“Think, girl – food, flowers, pictures, venue, entertainment? That’s a wedding.”
Realizing I was totally being talked down to, yet feeling like Mr. Andre knew best, I answered his condescending tone. “The photographer. You’d better check him out.”
“Did you look at my list of approved photographers?”
“Yes, but Zach really liked this guy and wanted me to use him.”
“What ‘guy’ is this, and who, pray tell, is Zach?”
“Zach is my grandson,” Charlotte piped in before Maggie could claim her nephew.
“I see,” said Andre, “And how much experience has he had with our photographer?”
“He’s had his picture taken at least twice a year for the last five years,” I said.
“Really? Why does your son need a portrait done twice a year?”
“Well,” Aunt Maggie
said, “there’s baseball, and then there’s soccer.
Danny cut in, scratching his head in thought, “And then there was that one year when he did the pee wee football …”
******
After leaving the Stokes Farm, I took Mr. Andre directly to the photographer I had chosen. As we walked into his tiny storefront photography studio, I was reminded of the little photo booth at SuperWally.
Bernard Price came out of the back room wearing his trademark Hawaiian shirt. His glasses, dwarfing his eyes, were a little larger than what was currently in style. Bernard’s hair had thinned in most places on the top of his head, except for the very center where he had a small fountain of foliage. With his roundness in the middle, he reminded me of an old-fashioned Kewpie doll.
“Hello there, Betsy,” he said. “Are you here to set up your big day?”
Mr. Andre and Aunt Maggie entered the store behind Charlotte.
“And who is this lovely lady?” Bernard asked, eying my mother.
“Um, this is … this is Charlotte.”
My mother stepped in front of me. She reached out to Bernard. “How do you do,” she said, placing her hand in his chubby fingers.
“Charmed,” Bernard said.
Mr. Andre stepped up and extended his hand as well, causing Bernard to drop my mother’s hand abruptly.
“Good morning,” Andre said. “I don’t suppose you can you show us your wedding book?”
“Wedding book?” said Bernard.
“Yes, your portfolio of wedding images for other occasions you’ve worked on.”
Bernard nodded in understanding. “Well, that could be a problem, seeing as I don’t really have anything in a notebook for you. I mostly get calls to take kids’ pictures, you know. I’m a regular over at Buzz Aldrin Elementary. I can show you some of those.”
Mr. Andre sighed in disgust. “Do you even know how to take wedding pictures?”
Buzzkill (Pecan Bayou Series) Page 5
