Talk of the Town

by Lisa Wingate

  Every so often, as the lunchtime filming was going on, Amanda-Lee glanced out the window, like she was wondering about the horse trailer, or Carter, or both. When the filming was done, we got up and let the crew sit down, and Amanda-Lee disappeared out the door before I could give her a plate. After serving everybody and cutting the pies, I started fixing a little food to take to the barn for Carter and Amanda. I didn’t get in too big a hurry, mostly for selfish reasons. It made me feel good, having all those young folks around my table, going on about how good the food was. One of the camera boys said he used to work for the Good Morning America show and if I’d like to tell the rest of the world how to make a real apple pie, he could probably get me on TV.

  I was so flattered, I turned red in the face. “Well, I might do that. I just might,” I said, and tried to imagine me, plain old Imagene Doll, riding an airplane all by myself, all the way to New York to cook on TV. Betty Prine and the ladies of the Daily Literary Society would sure drop their dentures over that, and wouldn’t Jack get a kick out of it?

  I wrote down my phone number and handed it to that boy. “You just have someone call me when you’re ready,” I said, and he tucked the number in his pants pocket, like he’d really do it. He thanked me again for the lunch, then he and the good–looking baby-faced kid they all called Butch got up, got their things together, and asked me for directions to the fairgrounds, because they were planning to go on ahead of everyone else. I pointed out that it was still two and a half hours until the rodeo, but that didn’t seem to bother them. They wanted to look over the arena while it was empty, they said.

  “Y’all can’t wait a little while?” Amber asked, and a glance passed between her and Butch. I’d intercepted that look a couple of times at the table. There was something going on between them, some private conversation underway. I wondered what was behind that, seeing as Amber was here with Justin Shay, who even in spite of his bad reputation, did have pretty good table manners. He complimented my pies twice and said he’d eaten in the best restaurants all over the world and didn’t know when he’d ever tasted anything finer. He winked at me and asked what he’d have to do to talk me into moving to Hollywood and cooking for him. I wagged a finger and told him I was too old for all that, but he could come into the Daily Café anytime, because I was the one who baked the pies there.

  He said he just might, and then he watched another private look pass between Amber and Butch and his grin turned upside down real quick. When Butch came over to tell Amber good-bye and to knock ’em dead at the fair, Justin leaned back, crossed his legs, and looped an arm over the back of Amber’s chair. “She’ll be awesome. She’s always awesome.” He flashed another smile at Amber before he turned back to Butch. “You get enough to eat there, Bubba … I’m sorry … Butch. It’s Butch, right?” Patting his flat, tight stomach, he looked down his nose at Butch, stopping at the point where Butch’s tummy drooped over his pants just a little bit.

  Everyone at the table froze up, and I decided right then and there I didn’t like Justin Shay. It was bad enough that he’d taken a shine to Amber, who was too young and innocent for a rich dandy like him, but it was another thing to be hateful to poor Butch in front of everybody. Butch was a nice young fella. He probably had a real good mama somewhere who’d raised him right and taught him to show proper manners, especially in someone else’s house. In all the news articles about Justin Shay, I’d never seen one single mention of his mama. With all the rigmarole he was into all the time, his family probably didn’t claim him anymore.

  Like usual, Amber couldn’t stand to see anyone get their feelings hurt. She stood up, gave Butch a big hug around the neck, and said, “Thanks, Butch. I guess if it wasn’t for you, we’d still be stuck out at the old Barlinger place.”

  Butch turned red as a beet, then went out the door looking like a barnyard rooster puffed up to crow at the sunrise.

  I fixed plates of food for Carter and Amanda-Lee, then headed out the back door. When I got closer to the barn, I could hear laughing inside. I didn’t mean to spy exactly, but I did tiptoe around the end of the barn aisle. Amanda had the lug wrench and she was holding it away from Carter, who was squatted down by the trailer, trying to get the tire back on.

  “All right, this is war,” she said, giving him a flirty smile. “I’ll have you know that I do understand what a lug wrench is for. My father wouldn’t let me get my driver’s license until I’d learned to change a tire. I’m not the helpless urban girl you think I am.”

  Standing up, Carter rested an elbow on the truck, looking like he was enjoying the conversation. “I don’t think I said that, exactly. I just said you probably didn’t want to get your nice clothes dirty.” He waved a hand toward her cute blue sweater and black slacks. Standing there in the barn, she looked as out of place as a flower in a hogpen. Carter seemed to appreciate that fact.

  “I might,” she said and moved the lug wrench like she was thinking about getting down there and showing him how it was done.

  “Now how would that look, a bigtime TV producer like yourself down here changing tires?” Pushing off the truck, Carter circled around and trapped her against the fender.

  “You’d be surprised what producers do,” she said.

  “I’ll bet I would,” he agreed, his voice low and soft. The two of them looked into each other’s eyes for a minute, slowly swaying closer together before he slipped a hand into her hair and kissed her. She let the lug wrench go, and neither one of them noticed when it hit the dirt and clattered against the tire.

  A heat rose in my cheeks and I backed out of the barn aisle, figuring neither one of them probably had much appetite for food at the moment. Whenever they got finished in the barn, they could have a plate at the house. In the meantime, I had a little reconnoitering to do about the situation with Amber and Justin Shay. That match had no business happening, and I was about to see that it didn’t.

  When I got back to the house, the kitchen was empty, Justin Shay was sprawled out on my sofa with a pillow over his face, and the film crew was busy on the porch, setting up lights and those overhanging microphones on long poles. They had Amber’s brothers and Verl out there in the rocking chairs, and they were telling them not to be nervous, just act natural and talk about Amber—how she was as a child, funny things they remembered about her, how she’d always liked to sing, and that sort of thing. Brother Harve and O.C. were waiting just inside the screen door, so I guessed maybe they were next in line to get on camera.

  Amber came out of the laundry room with a stack of dish towels. “Sorry, Mrs. Doll. I couldn’t find any in the kitchen.” She kept her voice real quiet, so as not to wake up Justin, or bother the filming, or both.

  That was just like Amber to be cleaning up the kitchen when she was supposed to be the star of the show. “Sweetie, you give me those rags. You shouldn’t be doing dishes.” I reached to get the towels from her. “You go rest or watch the camera crew or whatever else you need to do.”

  She shook her head and kept the dishrags. “Oh, that’s all right, Mrs. Doll. I need something to help me pass the time.” She stole a glance toward the screen door. “It’s weird sitting around, listening to everybody talking about me.”

  “I guess that would be strange.” I slipped an arm around her shoulders and watched with her as the camera crew moved Verl to a seat near the edge of the porch. The sun sparkled against his silver hair. Verl really did have a good head of hair, when it was washed and combed.

  Amber seemed to be thinking the same thing. “I guess you helped get Granddad cleaned up. He looks real nice.”

  Suddenly all the effort seemed worth it. “Goodness, it was no trouble at all.”

  Amber ducked her chin like she knew that wasn’t true. “Thanks for doing that. He doesn’t cooperate so good sometimes.”

  “Oh, he’s no match for me, sugar. Don’t you worry.”

  She sighed as the bright lights lit up the porch and the helpers with the big foil sheets and the microphone p
oles moved into place. “I didn’t want people to make him look bad, to make fun of him on TV. People can be real mean that way sometimes.”

  She turned to me, and there was a little tear drawing a line down the side of her cheek. I wiped it away, then cradled her face in my hand and looked into her pretty blue eyes. “Don’t you worry about that, sugar. You just keep your own sweet spirit and do right yourself.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  On my sofa, Justin Shay snorted in his sleep.

  “How about we go do the dishes together?” I suggested, figuring that, being as everyone was occupied, this might be a good time to talk to Amber about a few things.

  When we got to the kitchen, Amber started right in on the dishes at the sink. I took the towel to dry and waited a few minutes before I said too much. Over the years, I’d only spent a little time with the Anderson kids during vacation Bible school or around town or when Amber was working at the café. It wasn’t like I was her gran or an auntie or someone she was used to getting advice from, but since getting involved with American Megastar and keeping Amber’s brothers overnight, I felt closer to the family.

  Still, I didn’t want her to think I was another hanger-on trying to stick my nose in her business. She always was kind of a shy kid, and every time anyone ever asked her if she and her family were doing all right, she just smiled and said everything was fine, just fine. She’d tell about a big holiday dinner they’d cooked, or how she and her brothers and her grandpa’d played a baseball game out in the back yard, and it was so much fun. I always knew those were stories she made up so no one would feel sad for her, and maybe to hide how bad things were at home. I never had any real idea what it was like for those kids until I saw Andy carrying his granddad up my steps. I should have known how things were, because I knew—everyone knew—about Verl, but it’s easy to mind your own business when someone else’s business looks like too much trouble.

  Even though Amber and I worked side-by-side at the café a lot of days, I never even knew she was trying for American Megastar until I saw her on the audition show. She didn’t tell a soul she’d tried out except Buddy Ray, who, I found out later, drove her to Dallas for the audition.

  I laughed, thinking about the look on Buddy Ray’s face the other night when he locked his keys in his car. Poor thing. He never could seem to do anything right, bless his heart. And now, from the looks of it, he was losing his girlfriend to a slick city fella with a smooth white smile. I never would’ve thought Amber’d carry on with another boy behind Buddy Ray’s back. “You know, Buddy Ray darned near arrested your producer her first night in town,” I said, and watched to see how Amber’d react to me bringing up Buddy Ray.

  Amber looked heavenward, like she wasn’t surprised, just embarrassed for Buddy Ray’s sake. “Oh no. Did Forrest find out?”

  “I’m not sure how much Forrest knew about it, exactly. It did go out over the radio, because that’s how I heard. By the time I got there, Buddy Ray had jumped to some pretty wrong conclusions, but in his defense, nobody told him the Daily Hotel was open for business again. It all worked out okay anyhow.”

  Amber leaned over the bean pot in the sink and gave it a good scrubbing. “Was Ms. Florentino mad?”

  “I don’t think so,” I said, walking to the cabinet to put away a pie plate. “She didn’t laugh outright, but I think she saw the humor in it.”

  Holding the bean pot under the rinse water, Amber got the bubbles off and handed it over. “She’s been real nice to me, helping me get my mark in rehearsals and get extra time with the voice coaches and stuff. They think I don’t know it, but a bunch of them at the studio have a bet going about when I’ll get kicked off the show. Ms. Florentino didn’t ever bet in it, though.”

  “I wouldn’t think she would,” I agreed. “That’s a terrible thing for those people to be doing.”

  Amber shrugged. “I don’t pay it any mind.” She went on with washing pots, then, in a minute, turned the conversation back to where we’d started. “I hope Buddy Ray didn’t get in trouble with Forrest. He was already in hot water for calling me in California on his work phone. He didn’t do it when he was on duty—just when he’d stopped for coffee or something to eat, but Forrest was mad. I told Buddy Ray he shouldn’t get himself in trouble just to call me.”

  Since the door was open, I went on and stepped through it. “How are you and Buddy Ray doing? I guess it’s hard, you being out in Hollywood and all.”

  Finished with the last pot, Amber drained the sink, grabbed an S.O.S. pad from the soap basket, and started scrubbing the greasy mess left behind by the water. “Oh, Buddy Ray and me broke up a long time ago. We just didn’t say anything because—” pausing, she glanced over her shoulder and checked the doorway for listeners before she whispered—“he’s sweet on Cassidy Martin, but if her daddy knew that, he’d have a fit, her still being in high school and supposed to go away to Baylor in the fall and all.” I gasped in surprise, and Amber added, “Please don’t say anything to anybody. I don’t know how it’ll all end up, but Cassidy’s eighteen, so it’s really not anybody’s business but theirs.”

  I couldn’t help but think about Jack and me, and how my parents weren’t happy about me quitting college to marry a boy who had almost two years left in the navy. I wasn’t in much of a position to pooh-pooh young love, but on the other hand, I wondered if Amber was also saying that, her being nineteen herself, it wasn’t anybody’s business but hers if she wanted to get involved with Justin Shay. “Well, sure enough, if she’s of legal years, it is her choice,” I allowed. “But naturally, her daddy would be concerned about the age difference. Buddy Ray’s twenty-five. He’s been to school in Dallas and lived in Waco, had a job and such. He’s … worldly, and she’s just a girl only beginning to see things.”

  Amber’s eyes blinked wide when I called Buddy Ray worldly. It was a stretch, but of course, I wasn’t really talking about Buddy Ray. I was talking about that smooth-talking lump in there on my sofa.

  “Sometimes you meet somebody and you just know,” Amber said. Letting the dish towel rest on the side of the sink, she gazed out the window with the wistful look of a girl in love.

  Oh dear. Now what? “Well, sometimes, a young girl can get her head turned by a fella—you know the type that’s got a nice smile, a big name around town, a pretty way of talking? You know that kind of man? Sometimes a girl can get her head turned and think she’s in love, and the fact is that fella’s no more right for her than … well … Don Juan. Some men just like to see if they can turn a girl’s head. They like to …” Gracious, being the mother of four boys, I wasn’t very good at this particular conversation. I’d never thought through anything like this before. “… unwrap a pretty girl like a shiny new toy at Christmas, but then pretty soon that toy ain’t new anymore, and he’s on to other things, and the girl is left behind in a bad way. You know there’s fellas that do that kind of thing.”

  Amber didn’t answer at first. She was concentrating on something out in the yard. “Oh, he’s not like that,” she answered kind of absent-like, and my heart sunk to my shoes. Poor girl really did have herself fooled. There she was, defending Justin Shay’s character. “He’s not like people think he is.”

  “My daddy used to say a man doesn’t get his reputation by accident.”

  “There’s a lot of stuff about Justin people don’t know, either.” Amber’s shoulders got stiff and defensive, and I could tell I was pushing too far. “There’s a lot of stuff about him people don’t see.”

  I probably should have kept my mouth shut, but I couldn’t. “There’s a lot people do see, too, hon. Once you show your hind end in public, it’s hard to get folks to see anything but. That’s a bad old pun, but it’s true. Justin Shay’s had an awful lot of blessings fall in his hands, and he hasn’t done much with it except buy big houses, wreck fancy cars, get himself arrested for drugs and drinking, cheat on his women, make kids he’s not raising, and get himself into the newspapers. He may have been nice
to you so far, but his past ain’t much of a recommendation.”

  Amber folded the dish towel without looking at it, then set it on the edge of the sink. “I hate those newspapers. They never tell stuff the way it really happened. They make it look like I don’t have half a brain.”

  I smoothed a hand over her hair. It felt like yellow silk under my fingers. Even though I loved my boys, I’d always wanted a little girl with long blond curls. “There’s usually a lot of gossip about people who are famous. Folks want to know all about someone who’s pretty and talented and on TV, and what they don’t know, they make up sometimes. It’s not right, but that’s the way it is. I reckon it makes regular people feel better about their own lives when they know somebody famous makes mistakes, too.”

  Turning on the water, Amber cupped her hands under the stream and washed the last of the crumbs down the sink. Then she stood there with the water running over her fingers. “I almost didn’t come for the concert today. I maybe wouldn’t have, if it wasn’t for Justin coming.”

  I kept stroking her hair, letting it slide between my fingers and over my palm. She leaned into my hand, like somewhere deep inside her there was a little girl who remembered a mother’s touch. “Why in the world would you miss your big homecoming show after you worked so hard to get into the Final Five?”

  She stared into the sink for a long time, watching the water run over her small, pale hands. “I don’t know if I want to be famous. Justin says you get used to the things reporters say and to having people stop and take your picture on the sidewalk and cameras following you around. He says you learn what things not to say, but I don’t know. Sometimes I think it’d be easier not to try—to just come home and live a regular life, you know?” Resting her elbows on the sink, she kept turning her hands over and over in the water, like she was trying to wash something off.