“You want me, Peewee, or are you practicing for the parish hog calling contest?” She gave him an exasperated look and hefted a wicker basket filled with damp clothes onto her hip. “Don’t just stand there, give me a hand before it starts to rain.”
Storm clouds were closing in fast.
Peewee went out to his wife, who was jerking sheets off the line and dropping them into the basket. Under the eager eyes of the Methodists, she gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, grimacing at the pungent odor of tar and stale sweat rising from his body. Her nose twitched as her lips brushed his blond stubble. “I thought you were working in the office today.”
“No such luck,” he answered as he pulled the clothespins off the sheets still on the line. “Norbert called in sick again. We was patching that stretch over by Raceland, so guess who had to go out there?” He dragged the last of the sheets down and waved to the ladies heading home before the storm.
Sissy knew that so much of the unpleasantness in a marriage is a direct result of the husband feeling underappreciated. Rule Number Fifty-five. What she could never understand was how a smart woman let that happen, especially since it was so easy to remedy. “You poor thing. You don’t mean you were working all day on the road in this heat?”
Peewee nodded.
“Come on, you need a beer.” Sympathy and understanding oozed out of her words. Peewee didn’t exactly smile, but he did look grateful and he took the towering laundry basket from her.
She followed him into the house. His sandy-blond hair was cropped so short, she could see his pink scalp showing through and the place where his glasses made dark marks on the back of his ears. His otherwise trim figure was beginning to spread out softly in the middle and roll over the top of his slacks.
Peewee put the laundry on the kitchen table, and as he caught sight of her full on, his blue eyes narrowed. “What the hell have you been up to?”
“I can’t imagine what you mean.” She picked up a pack of cigarettes and slapped her pockets in vain for a match.
Then she noticed an ice cube on the linoleum. She curled her bare toes over it.
“Look at yourself, woman.”
Sissy looked down and saw creosote stains down the front of her sundress. It was not the afternoon attire recommended in the Southern Belle’s Handbook.
“What’s been going on around here?”
Rule Number Twenty-three popped into Sissy’s mind. When a train heads straight at you, a smart girl derails it. She looked her husband in the eye and said, “Peewee, I have spent the day chasing after a bunch of kids, cleaning up your mess, and taking care of this big old house. Who do you expect me to look like, Dinah Shore?”
It didn’t work. Peewee pulled the chair out from under the kitchen table and held up the tool belt. “What’s this doing here?”
“How should I know?” She kicked what was left of the ice cube under the sink and picked up the laundry basket. Finding no matches under it, she slammed it back down and started opening drawers. God, she needed a smoke.
“Says it belongs to Parker Davidson.”
Sissy froze mid-drawer and then, with as much nonchalance as she could muster, said, “Oh, yeah. Parker’s back.” She heard the rumble of distant thunder.
“What was he doing here?”
Sissy didn’t hesitate. “He came over to make indecent advances. In his spare time, he fixed the telephone line.” She grabbed the box of kitchen matches from the stove and shook them, but she came up empty.
“What are you talking about?”
“He’s working for the phone company.”
“Come on.” He sounded shocked.
“True.” Sissy didn’t understand it either.
Peewee was silent for a moment, taking it in. Then a smile spread across his face. “The great Parker Davidson, Gentry’s biggest football star and war hero, is stringing phone lines? The Jew boy that was gonna bring back fame and glory?”
“Peewee! Stop it! You know I can’t stand it when you talk like that.”
“Damn!” Peewee said, ignoring her reproach. He couldn’t remember when he’d felt so good. And then a nagging thought curled around his brain. “What was he doing on our front porch?”
Sissy wanted to explode, but forced a teasing smile. Rule Number Eighteen, Fools and husbands fall for flattery. “Oh, Peewee, I just love it when you’re jealous.”
“I’m not jealous, I just want to know what’s going on.”
“I saw him working in the hot sun and offered him a Coke. Is that okay?”
He didn’t say anything. He pressed his lips together and after some thought nodded as if the whole issue wasn’t worth much consideration.
“Good. Now stop being so silly. I married you, not him. Remember?” She ruffled his blond crew cut, knocking his two-toned glasses askew, and kissed the air near his cheek. Desperate for a match, she sashayed into the pantry, a cigarette dangling from her lips.
And then she dropped her cigarette.
Parker Davidson was crouched on top of a shelf, partially hidden from the little window, displacing paper bags, a carton of matches, and four jars of Sissy’s pickled watermelon rinds, which he was holding in both hands. The shelf was made of good, strong cypress, but it was bowed under Parker’s considerable weight. He shrugged and grinned.
Sissy was furious. He thinks this is some kind of a damned adventure. She backed out of the pantry, closing the door behind her.
Stretching her mouth into an imitation of a smile, she said to her husband, “Why don’t you go on over to the telephone company and drop off the belt?”
“Why should I?” He wiped off his two-toned glasses, which Sissy had smudged.
“Well, Parker just started working there. He could get into a lot of trouble.”
“No skin off mine,” Peewee said, taking a beer from the icebox and crossing to the pantry door.
Sissy heard the first drops of rain hit the roof and saw the sky flash white.
A small face peered through the kitchen window.
Sissy put her arms around her husband. “I’m sorry I blew up at you, sugar, but you know how I hate it when you ask me all those questions. I mean, I already have a daddy. I never expected to marry one.” She kissed him and then made a face. His skin was greasy. “Why don’t you run a nice bath and I’ll come in and wash your back.” She did her best to make it sound suggestive and it worked because Peewee said:
“For God’s sake, woman, we haven’t even had supper yet.” He took a swig of beer and pushed her aside. His hand was on the pantry door. Sissy blocked his way. Her heart was pounding. She had to think of something. She took the beer out of his hand and sipped it. Then she handed it back. “I wasn’t making an indecent suggestion. I just thought you’d feel better after a nice, cool bath.”
Peewee wavered, and then turned the doorknob. “Just as soon as I get me some of your pickled watermelon rinds.”
“Why, sugar, I got a plate of them, nice and cold in the fridge. Tell you what, you just go and lie down in that tub and I’ll bring them to you on a tray with another beer. What do you say?” She was proud of how casual she sounded.
Peewee let go of the pantry door. “You mean it?” There was surprise in his voice. She knew he felt she should wait on him more, the way women were supposed to wait on their men, but with three kids and a big house she could never work up the energy.
“Course I do. You deserve a little attention after spending the day in this hot sun.”
That did it. “Sounds good to me.” He turned toward the door, slapping her on the butt as he passed, when Billy Joe rushed into the kitchen, breathing hard. “You all gotta come…”
“Billy Joe, you’re sopping wet!” Sissy said,
Sounding just like his own father, Peewee took his son by the arm and said, “Young man, you know better than to stand there dripping all over your mother’s linoleum. Now, march!”
He pushed the boy toward the bathroom, but Billy Joe stood his ground. “Marilee
fell into the gravel pit.”
Sissy saw the lightning splinter down the middle of the sky.
“I told you kids to stay away from there, didn’t I, didn’t I!” Sissy cried, clutching her son. Hysteria tightened around her voice. Sissy’s brother Norman, the big brother she’d spent her childhood trailing after, the reason she was nicknamed Sissy—he couldn’t pronounce Cecile—dove into the gravel pit the day he came home from college. And drowned.
She was surrounded by the thunder.
RAIN SHEETED OVER the windshield when Peewee skidded to a stop in the mud. Layers of clouds shrouded the late afternoon sun. Before Sissy and Billy Joe could get their doors open, Peewee jumped out of the pickup and ran to the edge of the water.
He knew his little girl could hardly swim. He’d never found the time in all her six years to teach her. He’d left that to Sissy, and that wasn’t good enough, not nearly good enough.
Rain obscured his sight behind his two-tone plastic glasses. He took them off and wiped them on his shirt when a flash of lightning lit up the man-made lake and Peewee saw Chip, his oldest son, with his shirt off, staring into the far side of the pit. Then Peewee spotted a lump of pink caught up in a bunch of branches. Was that Marilee wrapped around a fallen tree?
He yelled. Chip looked up through the pelting rain, pointed into the pit, and yelled back, but Peewee couldn’t hear him. Peewee bent down to untie his boots. He handed his glasses to Sissy, who’d run up behind him.
“Wait a minute,” she said. “We’ve got to find out where she went…” But the rest of her words were smothered by the roar of thunder that seemed to shake the pond. Billy Joe was screaming something, too. He grasped his father’s arm, but Peewee pushed them both aside and plunged into the deep water of the pit.
“Peewee, don’t!” Sissy screamed.
But he didn’t hear. He tried to strike a bargain with God. Don’t take Marilee, not yet. Please. Let us have her a little longer and I’ll…
Lightning zippered across the sky. The pit lit up. Peewee froze in the water. But no electricity charged through his body. He wordlessly thanked God for saving him this time and began to count the seconds before he heard the thunder. One and… He splashed wildly toward the mound of pink. Two and… His arms and legs were working like pistons. Please just let her hold on. Just let her hold on until I get there. Three and …He lifted his head up and yelled in Chip’s direction, but he got no response. Four and… Peewee was swimming as fast as he could, but not nearly fast enough. His legs were getting heavy in his waterlogged slacks, which were riding up on him. Five and …Thunder shook the pit. God, he wished he were out of here. He tried to think about John Wayne. What would the Duke do? He wouldn’t let a little lightning stop him. Finally Peewee reached the floating tree. Branches tore his arms as he fought through their tangle, but he hardly felt them. He snatched up the pink mound. And came away with Marilee’s shirt.
His little girl wasn’t in it. He put his face into the murky water and opened his eyes, hoping he wouldn’t see her floating naked in the dark. The darkness went on forever. He’d heard the pit went down a hundred feet in some places. He’d never be able to dive that far. Lightning flashed through the water and then the thunder. Oh God. Anyplace but here.
SISSY RAN BAREFOOTED through the dunes of gravel piled up next to the pit. The thunder crashed around her. She wrapped Chip in her arms. “When did you lose sight of her?”
But Chip wiggled away. “First you gotta promise, I get that chemistry set at Rubinstein’s, the big one, and oh, yeah, Billy Joe wants a red Schwinn.”
“What?” Sissy couldn’t make out what he was saying. She pushed him away from her and looked into his face. He was grinning. Billy Joe, his tears totally gone, was shaking his head. Lightning crackled above them. Sissy screamed through the thunder. “Where is she?”
Chip didn’t budge. “First you gotta promise.”
“The only thing I’m going to promise, young man, is to let you live…maybe. Now, where’s my baby?”
“She’s not in the water, Mama.”
“Shut up!” Chip hit his brother on the shoulder. “You’ll ruin everything.” Billy Joe swung around, ready to give as good as he got.
And then as the lightning flashed, Sissy saw Parker against the darkened sky, lashed by the wind and rain, standing on top of a tall gravel dune. In front of him was a small girl in a big T-shirt. She waved at her mother.
Sissy ran down to the edge of the pit. The boys ran with her. “Oh my God, Peewee, get out of there!” She screamed, but her husband didn’t hear her. He had disappeared beneath the surface. The rain beat on the water, hiding all traces of him.
Sissy looked up and saw Marilee alone on the hilltop. She called for her to come down, but her voice was drowned out by the thunder.
“I’ll get him.” Billy Joe took off toward the edge of the pit.
Sissy ran after Billy Joe and pulled him back. “You don’t have the sense God gave crawfish. You know you can’t swim in an electric storm.” She waved at Peewee when he came up for air, but he ignored her and dove again.
She turned back to Chip. “Get Marilee.” Chip didn’t budge, so Sissy started up after her daughter, sinking into the gravel with every step. The boys trailed behind her. “Your daddy’s gonna whip the pants off you when he finds out.”
“No he won’t,” Chip said with smug assurance as he came up next to her. “ ’Cause you’re not gonna tell him nothing.” Sissy glanced at her firstborn and began to shiver, but it wasn’t from the rain and the wind. She turned back and kept on climbing, barefoot in the slippery gravel. She recognized that tight smile, the squint of those pale blue eyes.
“We was trying to rescue you, Mama,” Billy Joe said on her other side. The twelve-year-old put on the tragic face he had worn in the kitchen and then broke into a self-conscious grin. “We just wanted to give Mr. Parker time to get away.”
But he didn’t get a chance to finish. Chip ran around her and punched him. “Shut up, I’ll handle this.” Then he said to his mother, “We saved you. Now you owe us. Deal?”
Sissy didn’t want to believe what she was hearing. Chip pursued her up the hill. “A chemistry set would be very educational. Okay? Okay?” When he wanted something, he wanted it bad.
Sissy picked up her daughter and ran with her, sliding through the gravel. The little girl giggled. “Did Chip tell you what I want? A movie star doll with her own suitcase. Did he?” It was all a big game to her.
Lightning sizzled through the sky immediately above them. Thunder shook the water. Sissy began throwing gravel. When Peewee came up, she pointed to Marilee, who waved to her daddy and then ran up the embankment to her big brother.
“Is she gonna do it?” the little girl asked, panting.
“Course she is,” said Chip. And then, “She better.”
Sissy bent over to pull Peewee out of the pit. And as the folds of her skirt fell away, Chip spotted a creosote handprint. A mean smile spread across his face. “Don’t worry. She’ll do it.”
Chapter 2
Inside the biggest, hairiest man, a little boy is asking,
“What do I do now?”
Rule Number Fifty-two
THE SOUTHERN BELLE'S HANDBOOK
PARKER DAVIDSON DROVE slowly down the muddy service road that surrounded the gravel pit. Piles of rock cast phantom shadows through the rain. Every few seconds when the windshield wipers cleared away the sheets of water, he could see the landscape of mud and pebbles and it looked like a landscape on the moon.
He knew he hadn’t heard that note of terror in the boy’s voice. Not the terror he’d heard during the war, when boys, not much older than Billy Joe, looked into the grimace of death. But he had to be sure.
He rolled down his side window. The cold rain beat on his face, but he had to see. He drove almost all the way around the pit, before in a flash of lightning he spotted the little girl hiding, pressed like an angel into a hill of gravel in somebody’s big white T-shirt.
Kids.
He got out of the car and spoke to her softly as the rain lashed them. But she was skittish of him, which was only right, he figured. She started to run up the gravel dune. He followed her to be sure she wouldn’t veer off, run somewhere else. As soon as he was certain Sissy had seen her daughter, he disappeared. He thought about sticking around, but decided he’d gotten her into enough trouble.
The truck lurched in the gravel and mud. Then it caught and leaped ahead. He was surrounded by thunder.
He rolled up the window so the rain no longer pounded on his face, turned down the feeder road, and headed back to town away from the dreary landscape of the strip mine. Raindrops beat a tattoo on the roof of the cab.
“Jew boy,” echoed through the raindrops.
Parker tried to shake it off as he turned onto the blacktop lined with tall loblolly pines. He’d run into that sort of thing a couple of times in grammar school when one of the country boys called him “nothing but a dirty Jew.” And a minister’s daughter explained politely how he was going to hell because he’d gone to her daddy’s Bible school and knew about Jesus and still didn’t believe. But he’d hardly ever run into it since then. He wasn’t so naive as to think anti-Semitism was dead. The war made that clear. But people who didn’t like Jews tended to stay away from him. Or at least they didn’t insult him to his face. Peewee’s offhand remark had thrown him. Is that the way they all talked behind his back? he wondered as he drove down the leafy residential street, slowing for the stop sign in front of the Methodist church. He looked at Sissy’s house across the street, where he used to take her after movies. They used to kiss good night on that same front porch.
When he’d first heard Sissy was going to marry Peewee, Parker had kicked a hole through his bedroom wall right into the living room. It had taken three tall glasses of Scotch and water to calm his father down enough to inspect the damage. Finally he walked into Parker’s room and said, “You’re just going to have to face it, son. Girls like Sissy will date Jewish boys, but when they get married, they generally find themselves a nice gentile.”
The Scandalous Summer of Sissy LeBlanc Page 3
