“Is there anything I can do?” Garnell asked.
“Nothing.” She parted the curtains to look out into the yard. A reporter, chewing on a slice of cheese pizza, spotted her and waved. “I need to walk Walter, but I don’t want to face all those people. We’re practically prisoners in our own home.”
“That’s a crying shame. Those folks should have better manners,” Garnell said. “Tell you what, why don’t you let me come over there? I’ll chase off those nosy reporters.”
“I don’t want to put you to any trouble,” Chenille said. On the surface, Garnell seemed a gentle sort, but she was familiar with the behavior of riled Southern men. Buckshot and battle cries of “yee-haw” were the usual modus operandi.
“No trouble at all. Just let old Garnell take care of this for you.”
Minutes later, Garnell rumbled up the drive in a red twin-cab pickup truck the width and girth of a steamroller. The grille gleamed with what looked like sharp silver teeth, and Garnell revved his engine, spewing a blue-gray cloud of exhaust. Any minute, Chenille expected to see the barrel of a shotgun poke out the driver’s-side window.
Instead, Garnell cut the engine and hopped out. He wore blue jeans and a tight T-shirt that emphasized long, ropy arm muscles. Nodding curtly at the reporters, he swaggered to the side of the vehicle to open the door of the back cab.
Here it comes. Chenille squeezed her eyes shut, imagining anything from a battalion of pit bulls to a cache of firearms. Peeking out from the narrowed slits of her eyelids, she saw Garnell tugging on the leash of a small animal. It was PU.
It took a moment for the little skunk to make his impact, but as soon as his tail twitched, the effect was immediate. Pizza slices and notebooks were tossed aside as their owners scattered like seeds in a windstorm.
Garnell grinned as he watched the vans and cars spit gravel, trying to depart. Once the area was cleared of vehicles, he and PU ambled up the drive. Chenille met him at the door.
“That was clever,” Chenille said. “It’s no wonder you were in Miss Beezle’s honors class.”
“All in a day’s work. Good thing those city people didn’t know PU is descented,” he said. In the last lingering light of day, his eyes looked bottle-fly blue.
“I’m grateful, and I know Chiffon will be, too.”
Garnell sniffed the air. “Is that pork I smell?” Pork came out as “poke.”
“Heavens, no. Pork’s much too fatty. I’m making lentil cutlets. I have an extra cutlet if—”
“Don’t mind if I do.” He slipped his cap off his head and entered the house.
She settled him in the living room with a magazine so she could finish dinner. Not a minute later, he peered over her shoulder as she put a head of broccoli on to boil.
“That would be even tastier if you added chicken bouillon to the water,” he remarked.
“I try to limit my consumption of animal products,” Chenille said quickly. He made her nervous, standing so close to her. “Aren’t you comfortable in the other room?”
“I didn’t want you to get lonesome in here.” He slapped a rolled-up copy of TV Guide on the speckled counter. “This was on the coffee table. Maybe we have something else in common besides Miss Beezle.”
“Like what?” Chenille asked.
“Every episode of Law and Order is highlighted. Who’s the fan? You or Chiffon?”
“Me,” she said casually. “I watch it now and then.”
He hooted. “You’re lying, girl. Nobody watches it now and then. Admit it. You’re a full-blown addict. You haven’t missed a listing in this guide.”
She turned to face him, her spatula playfully aloft.
“You’re awfully pretty in this light,” he said softly.
Embarrassed, she whirled back to attend the cutlets sizzling in the skillet. He wasn’t nearly as poetic as Drake, but his compliment had caused an odd flowering feeling in her chest.
At dinner, Garnell told a string of knock-knock jokes that had Emily and Dewitt in stitches. Chenille found herself smiling at a couple as well. Just as the children got up from the table to play in their rooms, Chiffon slogged into the kitchen, a waffle-like imprint on her cheek from her blanket. When she saw Garnell at the table, she straightened her shoulders and her face lit up like a Wurlitzer.
“Garnell Walker! What are you doing here? Come here and hug my neck.”
Chiffon was happiest whenever there was a trace of testosterone in the room. Seeing her sister glow in Garnell’s presence gave Chenille an idea.
“We should go out some evening,” she said. “To a nightclub. Why not that place on Mule Pen Road? What’s it called?”
“The Tuff Luck Tavern?” Garnell said.
“Yes. That would be fun,” Chenille said.
Chiffon rattled the ice in her tea glass. “The old Tuff Luck. I haven’t been inside that dive in a coon’s age.” She sighed. “I’ve gotten too old and creaky for clubbing.”
“Nonsense,” Chenille insisted. “I’ve heard they have a dance floor. We could drink Jell-O shots, dance the boot-scooting boogie, and have a jolly time.”
Garnell squinted at her. “You do Jell-O shots?”
“No,” Chenille said. “But I could give it a go.”
Chiffon snickered. “Somehow I don’t think you’d much like the Tuff Luck.”
Before Chenille could protest, the phone rang, and Chiffon picked up when she heard Mavis’s voice.
“You’re kidding?” she said after listening for a moment. “I guess I should watch, but I need moral support. Why don’t you and Attalee come over?”
She hung up the phone. “Mavis said Janie-Lynn Lauren is a guest on Hollywood Hijinks tonight. It’s on in twenty minutes.”
“Do you really think you’re up to it?” Chenille asked.
“Yeah.” She nodded. “I want to know what’s going on.”
Garnell slung an arm over Chiffon’s shoulder. “I caught wind of some gossip at the barber’s today, and it all sounds like a load of hoo-ha. Don’t know how they can make up them kind of stories.”
A strand of hair had made its way into Chiffon’s mouth, and she was gnawing away at it. “Me, either,” she said.
Twenty-Two
Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder.
~ Sign outside of the Tuff Luck Tavern
Attalee rattled a box of Junior Mints in front of Mavis’s nose. “Want some?”
Mavis shook her head and adjusted the sofa cushion behind her neck.
“How about some Wonka Runts or Hot Tamales? Anyone?” Attalee asked, looking around Chiffon’s living room for any takers.
“It’s no wonder you don’t have any teeth,” Mavis said.
The women were assembled on the dilapidated couch, and Garnell had commandeered the La-Z-Boy. The only light in the room was the blue flicker of a TV commercial peddling tampons.
“Pearl girl, she’s a pearl girl,” Attalee warbled along with the jingle.
“Are those Tamales regular or extra hot?” Garnell asked.
“Shhh!” Mavis said. “The show’s coming on.”
The theme music for Hollywood Hijinks swelled from the television, and the kittenish visage of Godiva Jones, the host, filled the screen.
“Good evening,” said Godiva, wearing a sequined red evening gown with a plunging neckline. “Tonight we take you far from the glamorous and moneyed hills of Hollywood to what could literally be called Hillbilly Country.” Banjos twanged in the background, and a wide shot of Cayboo Creek appeared on the screen.
“Cayboo Creek, South Carolina, is a sleepy backwater town with no particular distinction, until today,” Godiva continued.
“Who they calling backwater?” Attalee said. Her dentures whistled as she bit into a Milk Dud.
�
�Cayboo Creek is the home of Chiffon Butrell, the wronged yet madcap wife of Lonnie Butrell, Janie-Lynn Lauren’s latest squeeze.”
The screen showed taped footage of Chiffon spraying reporters with the Super Soaker; it switched to a shot of Janie-Lynn and Lonnie frolicking on a private beach in Malibu.
“But maybe it’s Lonnie Butrell who’s been the wronged one all along. According to Janie-Lynn Lauren, Chiffon Butrell won’t earn any Girl Scout badges for loyalty.”
The camera zoomed in on Janie-Lynn, dressed in a long ivory dress, looking like a vestal virgin. She sat on the edge of a white leather sofa, her legs crossed primly at the ankles.
“Lonnie told me he can’t be sure he’s the father of any of Chiffon’s children,” said Janie-Lynn, her fawnlike brown eyes taking on a serious cast. “He’s supported them out of the goodness of his heart. I’m trying to help him recover his pride.”
“Why doesn’t Lonnie speak for himself?” an unseen reporter asked gently.
“Because he’s liver-lillied!” Attalee heckled.
“Hush,” warned Mavis.
Janie-Lynn bit her lip in a dramatic gesture. “He finds it too painful. It’s hard for a man as sensitive and strong as Lonnie to have the whole world know his wife is a cheat.”
The camera showed footage of reporters firing questions at a zombie-like Chiffon with Chenille by her side.
“Chiffon Butrell was unusually subdued when confronted with questions about her supposed infidelities,” said Donovan Tate, Hollywood Hijinks’s on-location reporter, as he stood on the edge of Chiffon’s lawn. “She refused to confirm or deny the allegations. But her sister, Chenille Grace, vehemently defended Chiffon against the rumors.”
“Thank you, Donovan,” Godiva said. “Let’s go to Darcy Day, who interviewed some citizens of Chiffon’s hometown.”
“I’m at a restaurant called the Wagon Wheel in Cayboo Creek, talking with a former employer of Chiffon’s, a Mr. Wilbur Peet,” said Darcy, a bouncy-looking blonde in a short pink skirt. She thrust the microphone in Wilbur’s face. “What can you tell us about Chiffon?”
“She was an inferior employee,” said Wilbur, his skinny face screwed up with self-importance. “She wouldn’t suggestive-sell our Flowering Onion, which, by the way, is made from farm-fresh Vidalia onions, lightly breaded and fried to a golden—”
“Was she overly friendly with her male customers?” Darcy interrupted.
“Yes, ma’am,” Wilbur said. “She called them sugar pie, honey lips, and other inappropriate names. She flirted constantly.”
“We talked to another resident of Cayboo Creek, who asked not to be identified,” Darcy continued. “Her face and voice have been digitally altered.”
There was a shot of a blurred face, belonging to a woman in a navel-skimming sweater and skintight blue jeans. “Chiffon Butrell is the biggest tramp this town has ever seen,” said the woman.
“Jonelle!” shouted everyone on the couch.
“I’d recognize those snug blue jeans from twenty paces,” Chiffon said bitterly.
“She thinks she’s so hot, just because she won a beauty pageant or two,” continued the blurry-faced Jonelle. “But does anyone really care who won Miss Catfish Stomp fifteen years ago?”
“She does!” Chiffon said, pointing at the TV. “Jonelle competed with me in that pageant and didn’t even place. Someone needs to tell her that playing the kazoo isn’t a talent.”
The camera panned back to a pensive-looking Godiva. “This just in,” she said. “Apparently a group of reporters gathered outside the Butrell residence were scared away by a man with a skunk on a leash. Were you on the scene for that incident, Donovan?”
Donovan was framed in a small box on the right-hand side of the screen. He guffawed, showing rows of capped teeth. “No, Godiva, I missed it. But I heard it caused quite a stink.”
Godiva smiled. “Well, Donovan, I guess you’re not in Kansas anymore. Next up on Hollywood Hijinks: Who is that new lady on George Clooney’s arm?”
Chenille clicked off the television. “Enough of that bunk.”
Mavis scowled. “How can a TV show get away with such outrageous lies? Chiffon, you probably have a case against these people. I know a crackerjack lawyer in Augusta. Want me to call him for you?”
“No,” Chiffon said abruptly. “I want to put all of this behind me.”
“Mavis is right, Chiffon,” Garnell insisted. “You shouldn’t let them get away with those lies.”
Chiffon snapped her fingers. “You know what? I’ve changed my mind.”
“You want to sue?” Mavis said.
“No, but I do want to go out drinking and dancing, just like you suggested, Chenille. I could use a night out.”
“Tonight?” Chenille asked. “Where would we get a sitter at this hour?”
“If it’s a sitter you need, I’d be glad to oblige,” Mavis said. “A night out will do you good.”
Forty-five minutes later, Chenille crawled out of the backseat of her sister’s Firebird and tentatively put the toe of her borrowed cowboy boot on the pavement.
“I don’t know about this. I look...strange,” she said.
Chiffon yanked the rearview mirror toward her face and dabbed at her eye shadow. “You look fine,” she said.
“Fine and dandy,” Garnell said, taking her by the elbow and helping her out of the car.
As she stood, Chenille tried to pull down the short flared skirt that Chiffon had loaned her. “I was more comfortable in the clothes I was wearing.”
Attalee wriggled out from the front seat in a pair of electric-blue Lycra pants. “You can’t wear Hush Puppies and a cardigan sweater to a place called the Tuff Luck Tavern,” she said.
Attalee twirled in front of them. Her pants sagged noticeably in the rear. “How do I look?” she asked.
Like a refugee from an ‘80s roller-boogie film, Chenille thought, suppressing a giggle. Then, fearing her unkind thought registered on her face, she said, “Those are darling trousers.”
“You look mighty sharp, Ms. Gaines,” Garnell added.
Chiffon stood by the door of her car and eyed Attalee. “Those pants bring back so many memories. My girlfriends and I drove into Augusta every Saturday night to a disco called Studio Five. I must have danced to a hundred ABBA songs in those pants. ‘Course now I’d bust the zipper just trying to squeeze into them.”
She pointed at the lemon-sherbet moon, wedged between two branches of a crepe myrtle. “It’s our night to howl. Yee-haw!” Chiffon emoted, in homage to the fall moon.
“Whooop! Whoooop!” Attalee chimed.
“Meow!” Chenille said, trying to get in the spirit of things.
“Darn it, if you aren’t the cutest thing,” Garnell whispered in her ear.
“Will they have a mechanical bull?” Chenille asked, bashfully pulling away from him.
“They got rid of that years ago,” Garnell said. “It was an insurance worry.”
“That’s too bad,” Chenille said, hoping for an ersatz Urban Cowboy experience.
The Tuff Luck Tavern, a low-slung cinder-block structure, looked seedier close up than from the street. The entrance was lit up with a Pabst Blue Ribbon sign, and die dawgs was spray-painted on the side of the building. Chenille’s nose wrinkled at the smell of sour beer in the parking lot.
As they reached the entrance, Chiffon flung open the door, and the air buzzed with the song “Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under?”
“Y’all step right up,” she said, ushering them in. She wore a black-and-white-spotted cowboy hat atop her froth of honey-blond hair and a skintight pair of Wranglers that—thanks to a heavy-duty girdle—didn’t betray her taste for sweets.
An awning of cigarette smoke hung in the entrance, and as Chenille stepped inside the hazy gloom, a
dart whistled past her ear.
“Dang, Harlan, you’ve got the worst aim I’ve ever seen,” Garnell said, retrieving the dart and handing it to a grizzled man in overalls.
Their group walked through the gloom and took seats at an empty table. Above hung a framed picture of a revolver with the slogan in Dixie we don’t call 911.
Garnell pulled out a padded wooden chair for Chenille. Just as she was about to sit, someone screamed, “Stop!” A middle-aged woman wearing a leather miniskirt stumbled toward them.
Chenille glanced back at the seat, looking for gum or something else equally unsavory. “What’s wrong?”
“That’s Earl Widener’s memorial chair. Can’t you read?” she slurred. She pointed a long press-on nail at the plaque affixed to the back of the chair.
“Memorial chair?” Chenille said.
“He choked on a maraschino cherry right here,” the woman said, patting the cushion. Her eyes glowed red underneath the light of a neon Gamecock sign. “He was trying to tie the stem into a knot with his tongue.” Suddenly she flung her narrow frame upon the back of the chair. “God, I miss him!”
Garnell gently helped her up. “Come on, Claire. It’s all right. She didn’t mean to sit in Earl’s chair. It’s usually by the video poker machine.”
“I thought he could use a change of scenery,” Claire said through sooty black tears.
Garnell guided the weeping woman back to her bar stool. He whispered something to the bartender and then returned to Chenille’s side. He snatched a chair from another table and gestured for her to sit.
“You know a lot of people here,” Chenille said, squinting at the row of patrons who were bellied up to the bar.
“I come here now and again. Mostly for the darts and sometimes for the company.”
And for the whiskey. Chenille knew how much small-town Southern men loved their sauce.
A red-haired waitress, wearing a pair of overtaxed Daisy Dukes and a T-shirt with a rebel flag, plodded to their table. “What’ll it be?” she said, flipping open her order pad.
A Dollar Short (The Bottom Dollar Series Book 2) Page 16
