The Sugar Queen

by Sarah Addison Allen

  This was obviously worthy of her undivided attention, so Della Lee finally looked up. “How did she know?”

  “I told her.” Josey still couldn’t believe it. Adam was more secret than chocolate, yet she had told Chloe. What was the matter with her?

  Della Lee rolled her eyes. “I can’t believe you blamed me.”

  “Well, it never would have happened if it weren’t for you.”

  “You’re welcome.” Della Lee indicated the box. “What do you have there? Oh my God, you didn’t go to my house again, did you?”

  “No. Chloe loaned me some books.” Josey took the sandwich bag off the box and put it in front of Della Lee. “Here. It’s a cold fried egg sandwich.”

  “No, thanks. I’m not hungry. You have it,” Della Lee said, and Josey didn’t need to be told twice. After today, pride seemed stupid. “What kind of books did she loan you?”

  “Romance novels,” Josey said as she took the sandwich out of the bag.

  Della Lee held her arms out on both sides, as if to take up as much space as possible in the closet. “Don’t you dare put them in here.”

  Josey took a bite of the sandwich and looked at Della Lee curiously. “But that’s where the rest of my books are.”

  “Don’t you get it yet? You find out your mailman knows you love him and what do you do? You bring back romance novels to read in your closet.”

  “Well, obviously I can’t read them in my closet. You’re there.”

  Della Lee made a frustrated sound. “Adam knows how you feel about him. Why don’t you do something about it? Ask him out. Something.”

  “You sound like Chloe. He doesn’t want to be asked out. He found out I was interested in him, and he backed off. Way off. He’s wondering what he’s done to encourage me, how he could have prevented it from happening. I’m not going to make either of us feel more uncomfortable than we already do. Soon this will all blow over and we’ll get back to the way things were.”

  “When are you ever going to get fed up enough to do something about this life of yours?”

  Josey snapped her fingers in an aha! moment. “I know, I’ll start with kicking you out.”

  There was a knock at the door, which made Josey jump. She hurriedly wrapped her sandwich and wiped her mouth. “Scoot over,” Josey whispered, trying to push the box into the closet.

  “No way. You are not putting that in here.”

  “Della Lee…”

  Another knock.

  “Just a minute,” Josey called, turning to push the box under her bed, then stuffing the rest of the egg sandwich into the bag. She threw it under the bed too. She quickly closed the closet door on Della Lee, then stood and said, “Come in.”

  The door opened. It was Helena. She was wearing a long robe and her hair was in paper rollers, covered with the silk scarf Josey had given her for her birthday in the summer. She stood in the doorway and looked around Josey’s bedroom leerily. “Oldsey,” she said, bringing a small peanut butter jar out of her deep robe pocket, “I bring this.”

  Josey walked over to Helena in the doorway. “Peanut butter?”

  Helena unscrewed the lid and showed her. “Dirt.”

  “Oh,” Josey said, nodding though she had no idea what Helena was talking about. “Right. Dirt.”

  “Look. Look what I do.” Josey watched as Helena sprinkled dirt in a thin line on the floor at the threshold. Then she handed the jar to Josey. “You do at that door.” She pointed to the closet across the room.

  “You want me to sprinkle dirt at my closet door?”

  “Yes. Dirt from my home. My sister send.” Helena indicated the jar. “It keep bad thing away. No more downstairs.”

  “Oh, I see.” Helena knew something was going on, and she knew it had something to do with Josey’s closet. Great.

  Josey went to the closet and sprinkled dirt at the door to make Helena feel better. Every so often Josey would find that Helena had sewn small crosses into the hems of Josey’s dresses for luck, and she always knocked on door casings three times before entering a room that had been empty for more than a couple of hours, to chase ghosts away. Helena didn’t speak often of where she came from, but she held fast to beliefs that were obviously deeply rooted.

  She brought the jar back to Helena, who was nodding now. “There. Oldsey sleep. No bad thing.”

  “Thank you, Helena.”

  “Oldsey a good girl,” Helena said, and walked away.

  Josey closed the door, then went directly to her bed.

  “You live in a crazy house,” Della Lee called from the closet.

  “You can always leave,” Josey said, going to her knees and crawling under the bed to get her sandwich bag.

  “And miss all this fun? I don’t think so.”

  6

  Sour Patch

  Saturday afternoon Margaret changed her shoes three times, her purse twice, and snapped at Josey for no other reason than because she was standing there, waiting patiently to take Margaret to tea.

  Margaret hated having tea with Livia Lynley-White. She second-guessed everything she wore and actually practiced answers to possible questions Livia might ask. Margaret knew she should be past the point of feeling intimidated by this woman. Livia was ninety-one years old now. No one that old should still have so much power.

  But she did have power. She was the only person in town, besides Marco, who knew about Margaret’s affair. It had happened over forty years ago, but Livia would not let it go. Every month, like a queen, Livia commanded Margaret to join her for tea, and every month Margaret had no choice but to go. They met in a private, sectioned-off area of the tearoom in what used to be Livia’s old family home, the oldest home in Bald Slope. Thirty years ago, at Marco’s encouraging, Livia had donated the house to the preservation society and it was turned into a museum with a tearoom. Livia thought Marco could do no wrong. She’d even consulted him on the perfect place to build her new home on the mountain. She lived there now with her nurse, her maid and a cowed granddaughter. Though it had been three decades since she’d actually lived in the historic home, Livia still thought it her right to come and go as she pleased, entertaining and sometimes offending tour groups and walking into the kitchen and criticizing the pastry chef like she was still the mistress.

  Josey finally drove Margaret to the Lynley-White Historical Home, though Margaret still wasn’t happy with her choice of shoes. But it would be even worse if she was late, so she made do. Once there, Josey walked with Margaret into the private room. Margaret always insisted on this. She wanted Livia to see that her daughter was attentive. But also, since her hip replacement, Margaret wasn’t very steady on her feet without her cane, and she wanted Josey there to lean on to keep from stumbling. She never walked with her cane around Livia. She didn’t want to give her that satisfaction. Livia had never needed a cane. She was as tall and bony and straight as a calcified tree.

  Livia was already seated in the tiny room. She checked her watch pointedly, though Margaret knew she was on time. When they reached the table, Livia said, “Josey, wait outside with Amelia.”

  “Yes, Mrs. Lynley-White,” Josey said, then left.

  “Margaret, what are you waiting for? Sit down.”

  “Yes, Livia.” Margaret pulled out the chair and sat, with considerable effort going into doing it gracefully and not wincing.

  “Your daughter looks different,” Livia said, her long knobby fingers toying with the pearls at her neck. “What’s different?”

  Margaret put her napkin in her lap. “I don’t think anything is different.”

  “She was never a pretty child, was she?”

  “No, Livia.”

  “We’re ready!” Livia yelled, and Margaret closed her eyes briefly. The curator, always the curator, slid back the partition that separated the small space from the rest of the tearoom and rolled in the cart with the tea service. All the other employees refused to do it. “It’s still such a surprise, you being a beauty. It’s hard to believe she’
s your child. In fact, knowing your ways, I would’ve even doubted she was Marco’s child if she didn’t have his eyes,” Livia continued as the curator poured the tea into fine china cups. “But my Amelia isn’t pretty, either. They need to stay that way, to stay at home and take care of us. The uglier the girl, the more helpful she is, that’s been my experience. Pretty girls aren’t very trustworthy.”

  “Josey is going to stay at home,” Margaret said as the curator set small bowls of sugar cubes and lemon wedges on the table, then a three-tiered server laden with cucumber finger sandwiches, flaky raspberry jam puffs and thin slices of rum and-butter cake. She made haste and left without a word. Lucky woman.

  “Hmm, you hope.” Livia stirred two sugars into her tea. “So tell me about your month. I heard you went to the ladies’ club meeting.”

  “Yes. It was very nice.”

  “And that you had a manicure and pedicure the day before you went.”

  Margaret smiled and nodded, annoyed that Livia asked questions she already knew the answers to. She was just testing Margaret. Livia had an endless network of acquaintances who kept tabs on things for her. Margaret was always aware that, every public place she went, there was someone who would, inadvertently or not, be Livia’s telescope into her life. “That’s my routine.”

  “Rawley Pelham still takes Annabelle Drake to the ladies’ club meeting in his cab, doesn’t he?”

  “I believe he does, yes,” Margaret said.

  “He might be sweet on her, I heard.”

  Margaret reached for the sugar tongs. “Oh?”

  “Interested, Margaret?” Livia said slyly.

  Margaret wondered at the power of her own heart. All these years of doing what she was supposed to, of sacrificing happiness for her place here in Bald Slope, and it still hurt. Her damn old heart still hurt for him. Three sugars later, Margaret managed to say, “No, Livia.”

  “It was a long time ago. Surely you don’t still have feelings for him. I’m disappointed in you. I’ve tried very hard over the years to give you guidance, direction.”

  “And I’m very appreciative.”

  “Bald Slope is a different place from your Asheville. We have different rules here. Rules that can’t be forgotten. I’d always hoped you would take up where I leave off, making sure things are done right here, when I die.”

  Margaret took a sip of tea instead of commenting on the improbability of Livia ever dying.

  “Everyone said you knew the rules. Pretty little Margaret from Asheville. She doesn’t do anything wrong. Oh, how everyone used to envy you. But I knew you weren’t good enough for Marco. It’s a shame he’s not around to see how much I’ve helped you.”

  “A shame,” Margaret said tightly.

  Livia had been in love with Marco. Margaret knew it from the moment she met her. And Livia had watched and watched for some misstep, anything that would dishonor Margaret, make her not worthy of the great Marco Cirrini. And Livia found it, all right. She had to have known about all of Marco’s affairs, but that was acceptable in Livia’s eyes. Perhaps she’d even hoped that one day he would have an affair with her.

  But for Margaret to have a little happiness?

  That would never do.

  Out in the main tearoom, Josey sat with Livia’s granddaughter Amelia at a table near the windows. They were served tea, but Amelia just stared out into the side yard, watching the leaves whip around.

  Amelia was a short, earnest woman who bit her fingernails and wore her blond hair in a bowl cut. She’d been bred for this. When Amelia was born, Livia took one look at her with her red splotchy face, her crusty cradle cap and her calm, almost morose disposition, and said, “This one will take care of me.” So Amelia’s mother, eager to keep her trust fund, had told Amelia all her life what she was going to do. Right after high school graduation, Amelia had moved in with Livia and had been her personal servant ever since.

  Josey produced a bag of caramels and chocolates from her purse, knowing from years of these teas that, when allowed a dessert, Amelia always chose the chocolate caramel torte. “Here, Amelia, I brought you this,” she said. She always brought Amelia candy, even though it was like trying to make friends with a stuffed doll.

  Amelia’s eyes slid toward the partition separating them from Livia and Margaret. “I really shouldn’t.”

  “I know.”

  Amelia took the bag miserably. “You’re a bad influence on me. Ma’am-mother always says, ‘Don’t eat so much! You’ll end up like Josey Cirrini.’”

  Josey smiled ruefully. “Yes, I’m a warning to all children.”

  “She doesn’t like your mother. I don’t know why she invites her to tea.”

  “And I don’t know why my mother accepts. I guess ours is not to reason why. Do you want to walk around outside?”

  “No, Ma’am-mother might need me.” Amelia opened the bag Josey had given her and pulled out a chocolate. She stared out the window vacantly as she put the chocolate in her mouth.

  “Did you ever have plans of your own, Amelia?” Josey suddenly asked. Amelia was in her early forties, and sometimes Josey would look at her and wonder if this was what was going to become of her. It wasn’t a cheery thought. “Or do you still? I mean to do something more, something else?”

  “It’s my job to take care of Ma’am-mother. My father passed away last year, so my mother will probably move in with Ma’am-mother soon, and I’ll take care of her too.”

  Josey hesitated before asking, “Have you ever thought of leaving?”

  “Ma’am-mother doesn’t like to travel.”

  “No, I mean just you.”

  Amelia looked aghast. “Alone?”

  That answered that question. “Have you ever been in love?”

  Amelia blushed. “No.”

  “Do you like to read?”

  “Not much.”

  “Ever want to go on vacation? See the ocean?”

  Amelia pushed the bag across the table, giving it back to Josey. “You’re a bad influence on me.”

  “Then I really hope a rough, disreputable woman never shows up in your closet,” Josey said. “I don’t think you’d be able to handle it.”

  “There’s something wrong with you, Josey,” Amelia said. “I’m going to go sit over there.”

  After tea, when they all walked outside, the wind hit them with surprising force. It was getting colder. Crickets were taking up residence in fireplaces. Woolly worms had more black on them than brown. And every persimmon sold at the market turned out to have seeds in the shape of a spoon. Everyone knew what that meant. Natives of Bald Slope were hardwired to recognize the signs that snow was coming. Josey hoped it would be a big snow, even though that seemed too much to ask of November. The big snows came in late winter, even early spring, in western North Carolina.

  Livia and Margaret said their goodbyes, their dark coats flapping around them like blackbirds. Livia turned and walked to her car, and Amelia trailed behind her like a stray thought.

  Josey and Margaret watched them go, similar expressions on their faces.

  Margaret sighed. “Well, that’s over.”

  “Yes,” Josey said.

  “Until next month.”

  “Is it just me, or do you imagine it’s always going to be a more pleasant experience than it actually ends up being?”

  Margaret shook her head. “I stopped believing that a long time ago. Hope is for fools, Josey. Let’s go home.”

  While Josey and Margaret were suffering through tea, Chloe was across town going over apartment rental listings in the newspaper. Jake was doing it again this weekend, not contacting her. He was just waiting. Waiting for her to come to her senses. Where else would she go? he was probably saying to himself, not with arrogance, because Jake wasn’t arrogant. But he saw some things as simply inevitable. That every Monday night he had to have dinner at his parents’ house. That people would always like him. That he and Chloe would always be together. Did he think about that while he was sleeping
with the other woman? Was he thinking, This doesn’t matter. This doesn’t count. Chloe will always be with me?

  She angrily circled another listing in the paper. She didn’t have to depend on Jake for her social life, for the roof over her head, for her sense of security. She was going to take steps to forget all about him. Soon she would forget about his voice, how good it felt to have him around, how amazing his body was, the things he could do to her in bed. And she would stop imagining him making the other woman feel the same way.

  She set her pen down on the newspaper. Julian had been in the back of her mind all week, lingering, not pushing. He said he was at Jiggery’s most weekends. She could go there tonight and maybe talk to him some more about their shared misery. He understood what it was like to be hurt by someone you love. It was a step, and that’s what her life was all about now. Taking steps, random steps, in any direction that took her away from the center of the hurt.

  She spent a lot of time with her hair and makeup again. She even used her shimmery eyeshadow. She wore her heeled boots and her short wool plaid skirt and her favorite soft cabled sweater. When she looked at herself in the mirror, she liked what she saw. What she looked like couldn’t be the reason he slept with someone else, could it?

  She guessed that depended on what the other woman looked like.

  When she got to Jiggery’s, she spotted Julian right away. He was more handsome than Jake. Or rather, more beautiful. Jake was good-looking in a prosperous kind of way. You could tell he came from money. You could tell he’d worn crisp school uniforms with crests on the blazers. You could tell he knew how to play polo and golf and squash, though, in fact, he didn’t anymore. He didn’t want his parents’ lifestyle. They’d had high hopes for him when he went to law school, but they were sorely disappointed when he went to work at the DA’s office. Now, even they could see that he was so good at what he did that he was going to go far.

  Julian’s confidence was different, mercurial. He could be whatever you wanted him to be. He was seated at the bar, surrounded by women, women who existed only at night, thin sheets of steel, all sharp edges and shine, undulating and unsteady. He was something different to each of them, and that made them swoon and think the other women were no competition at all, because each thought she had the true Julian.