Queen Bee Goes Home Again

by Haywood Smith

  Been there, done that. I nodded. “Same with my son David. He has a wonderful corporate job in Charlotte, and a great wife and the cutest little boy and girl you ever laid eyes on, but ever since he told me his dad was living in the Caribbean with his stripper, on money he stole from me and the IRS, David’s dropped down to calling only once a week.”

  Connor nodded, compassion in his expression. “What his father did, and is still doing, is a heavy burden for David to bear. Maybe he hasn’t dealt with it enough yet to get past it.”

  “Exactly what I thought,” I said, “but that doesn’t make it any easier. I miss the sound of his voice and knowing what my grandchildren are up to.”

  Connor sighed. “Ditto. But I call anyway.”

  “I tried that, but they see it’s me and don’t answer.” Changing to the new number on my drop phone had helped at first, but once they’d memorized it, they just screened me out again.

  Connor shook his head. “Sounds like they’re as independent as my girls.”

  Affirmed, I confided, “Do you know the special ring tone they’ve assigned to my number? On both their phones? The funeral march, for goodness’ sake.”

  Connor laughed. “Are you gloomy when you talk to them?”

  “Of course not. I just ask what’s up and how the kids are. I’ve never dumped my problems on my son.” I had Tricia for that.

  “Kids today,” Connor said, then promptly repeated the question he’d asked me before. “Is it okay with you for me to court you?”

  As stubborn as Julia, just a lot more polite.

  As much as I wanted to say yes, I repeated, “I told you, seeing me could really cause a problem with your congregation.”

  Connor laughed, too. “I didn’t ask you to marry me. Just to let me court you, strictly on the up-and-up, so we could find out if we’re truly matched by God.”

  I resisted the powerful urge to grab him. Instead, I told the truth. “Connor, I can’t do it. I can’t get within ten feet of you without wanting to jump your bones.”

  He grinned, clearly complimented. “I have enough self-control for both of us.”

  I waggled a finger toward his face. “Oh, really? Then what was that kiss?” A shard of desire ran up through my body at the thought of it. “You can’t just go dropping bombs like that on me.”

  He smiled like Dick Van Dyke. That was who he looked like, only Connor’s nose was more classic. (Read: smaller.)

  “We have a saying in the Baptist church,” he said brightly. “Sometimes it’s easier to ask forgiveness than to get permission.” He waggled his brows. “Can you forgive me for kissing you that way?”

  Flustered, I blurted out, “Well, of course.” I straightened my clothes. “But please don’t do it again without letting me know what’s coming.”

  God was laughing. I could hear it echo in my soul.

  No fair!

  “Okay.” He sobered. “If it will make you feel better, we can limit our dates to public places.”

  I must not let this get a foothold. “Connor, in addition to being the one woman in Mimosa Branch you don’t want to be seen with”—well, except for the midget on Sheetrockers’ stilts—“I have no intention of remarrying. My mother needs me, and so does my father.”

  “How convenient that I live right next door,” he countered, smug.

  “For how long?” I challenged. “Once the church sees us keeping company, they’ll probably fire you.”

  He sobered for a quiet rebuke. “My congregation is made up of people like you and me. No better, no worse. Please don’t write them off so easily. They just need guidance to shift their focus from other people’s shortcomings to God’s grace and forgiveness in Christ.”

  The compassion in his voice was real, which only made him more attractive.

  I stood corrected. “Sorry. You’re right.”

  There was that glint of little-boy mischief again, but his voice was dead serious when he told me, “I need this job, need to make it work. I need to prove to myself that God hasn’t withdrawn His hand from my ministry. But as long as I don’t break any of God’s rules, who I date is my personal business. The Lord laid this church on my heart, so I mean to do what I can to help them, but I’m human, and it’s better to marry than to burn.”

  All the more reason not to date me.

  This was a true holy man. I could feel it. Far too holy for an impulsive, irreverent person like me.

  I shivered at the mere thought of trying to be a minister’s wife, covering my face with my hands. “This can never work.”

  Connor stood, then drew me to my feet. Facing the tracks, he put his arm around my shoulders. “Why don’t we leave that to the Lord and take it one day at a time?”

  Uh-oh. AA-speak. Was he a recovering alcoholic?

  Oh, mind, shut up!

  I needed to go to some convent somewhere to mortify the flesh. But I wasn’t Catholic.

  You are sixty years old, my inner Puritan chided. Get a grip on yourself and run as far and as fast as you can from this man!

  My inner hedonist retorted, Oooo, that kiss. Remember that kiss? You don’t have to be married to kiss like that. What could it hurt to try a few dates?

  I let out a long sigh of surrender. I couldn’t send Connor Allen packing.

  But I could put on the brakes. “Okay, then. We can try dating. But not till Christmas, so you’ll have some time to get to know your congregation first. If you’re serious about this, you’ll do as I ask.”

  Connor considered, his expression a bit wounded at first, then resolute. “Okay. I can wait. But may I have the honor of celebrating New Year’s Eve with you at my church?”

  Oh, yes. Yes, yes, yes.

  But my Puritan commandeered my voice to say, “We’ll see. If all goes well, ask me again on Christmas, but not before then.”

  His smile flattened and his brows drew together. “And what will you do till then?”

  “Study algebra and try to CLEP as many classes as possible.”

  Connor stared into the night. “Nothing like math to distract a person.”

  I sincerely hoped so. “It’s okay if you want to go out with other people till then,” I lied. “Probably a good idea, really.” True.

  He said okay, but his head wagged no. “May I still come visit once in a while,” he asked, “when your mother’s there to chaperone?”

  Oh, please. “I don’t know,” I blurted out. “It’ll only make things harder.”

  “But if I avoid y’all completely,” he reasoned, “people might think I’m shunning you.”

  Rats! He had a point.

  “Okay,” I conceded, “but not too often. I’m trying to do the right thing, here.”

  His expression softened. “I know, and I deeply admire you for it.”

  He’s only interested because you’re the one available woman in town who hasn’t chased him! my Puritan scolded. It’s that guy thing, all over again. They want what they can’t have till they find out you really won’t have casual sex with them, then they drop you. And tell everybody you’re a slut, like Grant did.

  A giant vise clamped down on my heart as I peered at Connor. “I think you’d better leave now.”

  Connor Allen took my hand and gave it a squeeze, sending a fine web of electricity up my arm. Then he let go. “As you wish. Please thank Miss Mamie again for the meal. It was the best I’ve ever eaten.”

  Tears of frustration and sadness welled behind my eyes. “I will.”

  But not tonight. Tonight, I would head straight for my bed for a good cry.

  I hate being noble. Hate, hate, hate it.

  Twenty

  After twenty minutes of crying, off and on, I finally came up for air in my bed and called Tricia. I hadn’t told her about my crush on Connor because I was too ashamed, but that paled now that he’d made his intentions known. I had to talk it through. Safely.

  “Hey,” I said when she answered.

  “Uh-oh. You’ve been crying.” She knew me so
well. “What happened?”

  “It’s awful.” I fought back fresh tears. “I have a horrible crush on the gorgeous man next door!”

  Alarm sent her voice up high. “That divorced Baptist minister?” Tricia and I had celebrated long-distance about the sale and commission, but I hadn’t told her about my crush, so this dropped like an atom bomb between us.

  “Yes. And he has a crush on me, too. Asked if he could court me,” I wailed. “And now, I’m so horny I can’t see straight. So is he. This is a disaster.”

  “Whoa. This sure happened fast.”

  “Yep. That’s one reason I don’t trust it.”

  I could almost hear her shaking her head in consternation as she offered, “I’ve been praying God would send you a good Christian man,” she said, “but this is overkill.” Having grown up in Mimosa Branch, she could appreciate fully what would happen if I dated the new divorced Baptist minister. “Poor baby, poor baby, poor baby, poor baby.”

  The maximum for non-life-threatening situations.

  Too weary even to cry anymore, I let out a long sigh. “Absolutely.”

  After a pregnant pause, she asked, “What are you going to do about it?”

  “I told him to date other people till Christmas.”

  “You what?” Tricia exclaimed.

  How could I explain without breaking his confidence? “He’s at a real turning point in his career and his spiritual life.” Part of me wanted to tell her everything, but the better part of me kept Connor’s confidences. “This job is very important to him,” I told her. “I can’t come between him and his congregation.”

  “Have you asked God for guidance about this?”

  I shook my head no as if she could see me. “I told God this was a dirty trick, so now He’s not speaking to me.”

  “Poor baby, poor baby.”

  “So I looked for direction in the scriptures. I’m so glad Jonah and that one whiny Psalm are in there.”

  “Hah,” Tricia chided with a single word. “You’d probably do better if you stuck to the rest of the Psalms and made a gratitude list.”

  “I keep going back to the part about how a man who divorces his wife for any other reason than marital infidelity, then remarries, causes his second wife to commit adultery.”

  “You’re reading that all wrong,” Tricia, the Presbyterian, corrected. “That only applies if the people remarrying broke their original marriage vows. Why did he get divorced?”

  “His wife left him for a rich man who paid more attention to her. And he admits it was his fault. He spent so much time with his church that he neglected her.”

  Uh-oh. I’d said too much. “Erase that. I shouldn’t have told you.”

  “So the vows were broken by your spouses. You’re both free, in God’s eyes.”

  “I wish I could be sure of that.” Something awful occurred to me. “What if this is a test?” It got worse. “For both of us?”

  “I have no idea what to tell you.”

  That was one of the best things about our friendship. When we didn’t know an answer, we said so.

  Wrung out, I flopped back against my pillows. “Which puts me right back where I started.”

  “Poor baby, poor baby, poor baby, poor baby.”

  A huge yawn ambushed me. “Thanks, sweetie. ’Night.” I hung up and sank into exhausted sleep, but my dreams were invaded by highly inappropriate fantasies about me and my minister.

  I apologized to God in the dreams, but it didn’t help.

  I got up at three for my regular bathroom trip, feeling like my soul needed a good scrubbing, but still without a clue as to what to do.

  As they say in my 12-step enabler’s group, “When you don’t have an answer, don’t just do something, stand there.”

  So I went back to bed and dreamed of Connor Allen, over and over. And over.

  Twenty-one

  The next morning Miss Mamie woke me with a fresh cup of coffee in one hand and my copy of the Gainesville Times in the other.

  I sat up abruptly, despite my sore muscles. How the heck had she gotten into my apartment without my hearing her?

  How had she gotten in, period? I’d had the locks rekeyed a week before I moved back and not given her one, on purpose. I loved my mother, but I had to have at least some space to call my own.

  At that moment, though, I was way too groggy for a confrontation. “Well, hey, Miss Mamie.” I sat up and took the steaming mug, tasting a sip. Just right: half strength with two Splendas. “To what do I owe this?” I stopped short of saying intrusion.

  “Well, sweetie, I figured after a kiss like that one last night, you might be dreaming of somebody special, but it’s already ten-thirty. Time to get up and go for it.”

  That kiss? What the … I bowed up like a Chihuahua taking on a Great Dane. “You weren’t supposed to see that! Y’all were in the kitchen!”

  “We were,” Miss Mamie said, all wide-eyed innocence. “Till we came out to make sure you were okay.”

  Ah, yes, the immortal mother-justification. “Okay, my fanny,” I snapped. “Y’all were spying on me.”

  I’d scarcely gotten there, yet the walls already had eyes.

  Help.

  “I just wanted to make sure you didn’t blow this one last chance.” Miss Mamie patted my hand. “This man is a true catch. Don’t let him get away. It’s terrible to be alone when you’re old.”

  Ah, the guilt card. If I didn’t go along with her, I was guaranteeing a long and lonely demise. She’d pulled that one out so many times, it had totally lost its power.

  “I’m not alone,” I said, “I have you and Tommy and Tricia.”

  “I mean a husband,” she insisted. “Even though your daddy’s out of his mind, I know he’s still here. That makes it easier for me to soldier on.”

  The martyr card. She’d also played that one too many times to be taken seriously. I wasn’t buying it, so I counterattacked with a concerned, “Would you ever want to remarry if Daddy died?”

  My mother waved the mere thought of that away with her perfectly manicured, buffed nails. “Good gracious, Lin, there’s no comparison. I’m ninety years old! And I’ll love your daddy till I die.”

  How, after all their fighting, escaped me.

  “You’re only sixty,” Miss Mamie said. “The new forty. And you’ve never had a devoted husband. But you deserve one, and maybe God, not that real estate contract, put Connor Allen right next door just for you.”

  “Miss Mamie, I do not need another husband, good, bad, or indifferent,” I said with decreasing conviction. “I’m going to college.”

  My mother clucked under her breath, then got sarcastic. “What? You want a football player?”

  “Ocee doesn’t even have a team, and you know it,” I grumbled.

  She rose from the edge of my bed. “You’re no girl,” she said frankly. “And Connor Allen seems perfect. Don’t waste this chance, Lins-a-pin. Remember the story about the boats and the helicopter.” She headed for the door.

  A devout man on his roof in a flood turns down two offers of rescue by boat, and the emergency helicopter, saying he’s trusting God to keep him safe. When he wakes up in heaven, he says to God, “What happened? I was trusting You to save me!”

  God shakes his head. “I sent two boats and a helicopter. What does it take?”

  But I wasn’t trapped on the roof in a flood.

  Or was I?

  I dared not tell Miss Mamie that Connor had asked to court me. “We’ve both agreed not to see each other till after Christmas, so he can concentrate on his church, and I can concentrate on testing out of some of my required classes.”

  Miss Mamie turned and rolled her eyes, then headed for the door, muttering, “Right in her lap, and she pushes him away.”

  “Please lock the door on your way out,” I hollered after her. “And leave your key inside.”

  Not that she would.

  Help, help, help.

  I got up and went to nuke some precooked
bacon, then put on a face because Connor Allen might see me on my way to or from the house.

  Passing the bathroom mirror, I saw my fuzzy crop of curls and stopped to tame them into a reasonable shape with my fingers. Better.

  Definitely needed some makeup.

  Makeup, in the summer, just to go clean with the Mame.

  I mean, really.

  Seriously, renewed self-awareness at my age was a curse, not a blessing. Just when I’d made peace with my smile lines and sagging self.

  I looked into the mirror again and the worst happened.

  I saw myself as I really was, zeroing in on the once-proud bustline that hovered at my elbows.

  Before The Kiss, I wouldn’t have cared. But thanks to dadgummed Connor Allen, darn it, I decided I needed to jack up the girls with a bra under my cleaning T-shirt, just in case he saw me.

  Shoot! Shoot, shoot, shoot.

  A man in my life—even one on hold—meant brassieres.

  My ideal bra quotient had dropped to three hours, max, yet there I was, going to clean for the rest of the day—in the heat—in a very expensive torture band.

  Connor had better see me; that was all I could say.

  Twenty-two

  By noon the Mame and I started on the last room of the ninety-five-degree third floor—halleluiah, amen. Working together, we’d developed a system that started with my climbing the ten-foot stepladder to clean the overhead fans and lights and replace burned-out bulbs, then both of us sponge-mopped the high ceilings with Pine-Sol. Then I went back up the ladder to wipe down the crown molding. Then we used sponge mops and Pine-Sol on the walls, changing the rinse water often because of the dust of a decade. Next we vacuumed, moving everything, then cleaned the glass and mirrors with Windex, then sprayed the backs of the furniture with Citrisafe and polished the rest, then put everything back in place. Next, we put hypoallergenic encasements on the mattress and pillows, then changed the bed. And last, but not least, we WetJet-mopped ourselves out and closed the door, leaving the ceiling fan on to dry everything out.

  When we were finished with the third floor—halleluiah—I dragged myself and the cleaning gear to the back stairs and collapsed on the top step, too hot and tired to get up.