At the Corner of Love and Heartache

by Curtiss Ann Matlock

  “Well, about Stuart being here, for one thing. I had to hear about that from Julia J.T., who also told me that Tate’s mother has come up from Texas.” Her aunt’s voice betrayed hurt.

  “We’ve all been busy,” Marilee said, then thought to ask, “Who’s Julia J.T.?”

  “Our postmistress and self-appointed society reporter, Julia Jenkins-Tinsley. I get so tired of saying that entire name. Why doesn’t she pick one or the other and stick with it? Julia says Frank Goode told her Stuart has paid for a month out at the Good-night.”

  “He has?” So there was a strong possibility that he truly would be back. The knowledge, curiously, did not lighten her mood.

  “You didn’t know?”

  “He hasn’t said. We haven’t had time to talk, either.” The peppermint tea burned her tongue.

  “Well, that’s what Julia says, and Julia is usually accurate. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

  Marilee hung up and wondered if she ought to go ask Julia just where Stuart had gone that afternoon, and when he would return.

  Vella Blaine had seen her niece only a scant few brief times in the past month, as they had both been very involved with their own business. Vella’s business had constituted what she thought of as getting a life. This endeavor had begun last summer, when she had thrown her husband Perry out of the house. Since their reuniting had not proved fulfilling, she had worked to accept the marriage as it was and gone on to make a life she could possibly stand to live, while remaining as Perry’s wife. She could not bear to throw him out again. That was too much upheaval for both of them, having been married for forty-six years. The guilt was too much for her to bear, because she recognized her fault in causing Perry to become dependent on her in the ways of everyday living. He had no idea what to do on his own, couldn’t even keep his clothes clean. And she did love him. That remained, despite being bored to death by him.

  Yet living with him and having so little in common, most especially no sexual relations at all, was killing her. She sought expression for the more lively side of her nature in the venue of classes in gardening and landscape design, researching healthy cooking, and encouraging herself into the new woman she longed to be.

  That was why, when Marilee saw her, her eyes widened. “You got your hair cut.”

  “Oh, yes. Like it?” Vella touched the back of her smoky-colored hair. Always short, it was now very, very short and enhanced with hair gel in the modern manner. And today she wore painter’s jeans and a large cotton sweater. Being a big-boned woman, she had rarely ever worn pants. She always felt too prominent in them. But she decided it was okay to be prominent, and she liked the loose jeans.

  Her niece was gazing at her, taking it all in. “Yes. It looks wonderful on you…but I’m glad you didn’t dye it,” she said of the hair. In fact, Marilee thought she might not be able to stand it if her aunt showed up with bright black or orange hair.

  “Oh, no…I don’t have time for that stuff. Here are the bridal magazines. Belinda snatched them from the magazine deliveryman.” She liked to point out whenever her daughter did something thoughtful for someone, as usually Belinda did not stir herself on anyone’s account but her own. “He regularly only leaves two different ones at the store, but she got you all he carried on his truck—five in all. There ought to be some good ideas in them.”

  As she spoke, Vella sat herself down. She observed her niece and saw the tea bag in the saucer. “Are you drinking herb tea?” Her observation turned sharper; things were deep if Marilee was past chocolate.

  “Yes,” Marilee answered in a tired voice.

  “What’s wrong?” Vella knew her niece well; she had been more of a mother to Marilee than her own mother. Heaven knew her sister-in-law had tried, but, as a mother, Norma Cooper had always been a square peg trying to fit into a round hole. She had never grown up herself. Some people simply were not cut out for parenthood, and it was too bad those people could not figure that out before they had children.

  “Oh, nothing.”

  Vella sat there.

  Marilee’s gaze came up and met Vella’s. “Stuart comin’ back seems to have dredged up some annoying old feelings.”

  “That’s usually the way of it.”

  “Well, it’s silly. I got past this years ago. I was a little surprised when he showed up. Here I had not had a word from him in almost two years, and he shows up. Now, of all times.”

  “A bit rude to be so startling,” Vella put in. “What if you hadn’t been at home? What if it had been your wedding day, or you were off on your honeymoon?”

  “I don’t imagine that would have bothered him. And I wish I had been gone. Then I would not have to go through this now.” Anger vibrated in her voice, and she lowered her eyes. “You know, I am wantin’ him to have regrets for what he gave up…wanting him to want me now that I don’t want him and he can’t have me, and I’m feeling the hurt of him leaving me all over again, and worryin’ that he needs somethin’ from me…and I don’t have it to give. It is just plain nuts,” Marilee added emphatically.

  “But it is human.” Vella had grown to the age where she was generally surprised when human beings did make sense. “Feelings are feelings, sugar. They are not good or bad or rational, they just are. And they are indicators of things going on within us that need to be dealt with.”

  Marilee sighed. “I know.”

  Vella didn’t think her niece did know. People were all the time saying they knew, when they really didn’t.

  “It is wearing. I do not have time for this.” Marilee raked her hand through her hair with agitation.

  Vella observed her, then asked, “Where’s Tate today?” and glanced at the door, as if he might appear any minute. In fact, Tate Holloway had been in this house most times whenever Vella had stopped by in the past months. He had pursued Marilee with an uncommon single-mindedness possessed by few men when it came to a woman.

  “He was working when he called this mornin’. We both were. I don’t know about this afternoon.” She turned her eyes to the clock. “I suppose he and Franny will call about supper. I have no idea what to have for supper.”

  “Franny—that’s his mother, right? I guess she came up to get a look at you. Julia says she is from Texas and is very artsy.”

  “She is…and quite pretty, and very nice.”

  Vella noted the warmth in her niece’s voice and experienced a prick of pique, which she found highly annoying. She was a grown woman, and certainly too adult to be touched by such a shallow thing as jealousy of another woman.

  She said, “I’ll have to meet her. I heard she had coffee with Winston the other mornin’.” Ah, there was the needle poking again, just with the telling. But Vella’s relationship with Winston was over…over before it had become anything, because it never could.

  “Oh, really?”

  Vella changed the subject. “What about Stuart?”

  Marilee played with the earring in her lobe in an absent manner. “He hasn’t changed all that much. He’s thinner. Older. But it’s sort of like time has not touched him.”

  “Hmm…that sounds like Stuart.” Vella had never thought there was much inside Stuart that time could touch. “How’d it go between him and Tate?”

  Marilee shrugged. “Tate was cordial. You know Tate.”

  “No one can be as cordial as Tate when he makes up his mind to be. Sometimes it’s annoying. He makes everyone else look petty.” And it made Tate appear untouchable at times, she thought. “Nothing like a good foolish blowup to make a person be real and alive.”

  Marilee didn’t appear to be listening. They each fell silent for some moments.

  Then Vella asked about how arrangements were going for the wedding. She noted that Marilee looked almost surprised at the question.

  “Well…we have an appointment with Pastor Smith on—” her gaze went to the calendar hanging by the telephone “—oh, tomorrow afternoon. I’d forgotten. Do you suppose you could baby-sit? Maybe Franny could stay with th
e kids.”

  Her niece was definitely distracted about the matter, Vella thought.

  “I have an appointment,” Vella said, feeling vaguely guilty, but not guilty enough to call off her appointment—the tall, thick-shouldered image of a man filled her mind—about which she did not intend to elaborate, but Marilee didn’t ask, anyway.

  “What about the invitations?” she asked. “I’ll be glad to help you address them.”

  “I haven’t gotten them yet.”

  Vella did not think this adequate. “Have you made a list of those you want to invite?”

  “Well…there isn’t a long list. You and Uncle Perry. The kids, of course. Everyone at the paper. Charlotte’s going to stand up with me, and Parker is Tate’s best man. Mama and Carl are going to be out of town—”

  “They are?” Vella cut in.

  Marilee nodded. “They’re goin’ on a Caribbean cruise. It’s all set.”

  Vella didn’t think she should criticize Marilee’s mother to her face, and, in fact, she didn’t think Norma would add all that much but demands if she did attend the wedding.

  “Oh. And where are you and Tate plannin’ on goin’ for your honeymoon?”

  “I don’t know. We haven’t decided.”

  There was simply too much undecided to suit Vella. She wondered if she should point out that Marilee was not giving this wedding anywhere near sufficient attention. It was going to be an important milestone in her life—entering a second marriage, the second chance of a lifetime, and she wasn’t likely to get another at her age, not to mention that half the town would be coming to the ceremony, formally invited or not. Tate had been going around inviting people at the same time he had been showing off the engagement announcement. This was Tate’s manner. And so many people loved Tate and Marilee and would want to celebrate with them. Marilee could not see this. Marilee rarely saw how beloved she was by many people, who remembered her from childhood, and who had read her writings in the newspaper each week for years and thought of her as their very own Marilee.

  The next instant Vella realized she herself had not been giving sufficient attention to the moment, when Marilee’s expression crumbled like a clay figurine shot with a BB gun, and she dropped her head to her arms on the table and sobbed.

  Vella quickly pushed the swinging door closed, not wanting to awaken Willie Lee and Corrine, who had fallen asleep with her book on her chest. She filled a glass of water for Marilee, then on second thought she drank it herself and ran another for her niece.

  Her niece cried for quite an amazing amount of time. When she seemed to be drying up, Vella said, “Here, sugar, have a glass of water and a tissue, and tell me what this is all about.”

  Marilee blew her nose fully. “Oh, my mascara is probably all over my face.” She got up and looked in the mirror and moaned.

  “Marilee,” Vella said firmly, “quit worryin’ about your looks and tell me what is going on with you. You are about to be married to a wonderful man and start a wonderful new life, and here you haven’t made one arrangement and you’re cryin’ your head off.”

  Her niece sighed and sat down heavily, dropping her hands between her legs. “I don’t know where to begin with this wedding. Stuart and I were married by a justice of the peace. I have never been involved with a wedding.”

  “That is easily solved. I will help you. Most of it we can contract out.” Vella’s time at landscaping classes had her using terms like contract out. “What else is the matter?”

  Then Marilee shook her head. “I’m so angry at Stuart. I hate feeling so angry. It was all so long ago. It’s just stupid, and Tate and I…” She shook her head. “Oh, I don’t know what’s wrong. Just nerves, I guess.”

  Vella regarded her with an expectant eye. “Nerves, you guess?”

  Her niece shook her head and bit her bottom lip, looking teary again.

  It came out from her then, haltingly and in great confusion, something about how Tate didn’t seem interested in making love, or they didn’t have time, but as far as Vella could gather, Marilee was very interested. Or maybe not. Vella got so annoyed at the confusion of messages she was getting that she said, “Which is it? You want sex, or you don’t?”

  Her tone was rather sharp, and she instantly regretted it. She herself knew very well what confusion a person could get into over the many facets of a relationship with a man.

  Marilee looked startled. “Oh, I do.” Her gaze wandered again. “I want Tate badly, but…well, we are busy, and Tate doesn’t seem all that interested. Well, if he were, wouldn’t he insist on us finding time? Of course the children…and then, well, Stuart has shown up.”

  There were too many wells in there to suit Vella. “You are having jitters, Marilee. And questions. It is to be expected in your situation.”

  “Yes, I am afraid, and I should have learned something from the past.”

  Vella saw they were at last getting to the heart of the matter.

  “What if I’m makin’ another mistake?” her niece wanted to know. “What if I’m not a person who can be married? I am quite good as a mother, but I just seem to mess up with tryin’ to be a wife…a lover to a man. Why, I can’t even attract my own ex-husband to stay and have a conversation with me.”

  “Stuart is not attracted to anything other than his own desires. Did Tate seem dissatisfied with you, when you have made love?”

  Marilee reddened. “Well, no. But that was months ago. And it isn’t the same as being married to a person. He just seems, well, far too accommodating without sex.”

  Vella, who noted the well, had her own experiences with and without sex; either could be trying and confusing.

  She laid her hand atop that of her niece. “Sugar, you need to talk this all over with Tate. You are afraid because of old fears. Get them out where you can look at them, and they won’t seem nearly so daunting.”

  Marilee’s gaze slipped sideways.

  Vella shifted in her chair, getting a firmer seat. This matter required conviction of attitude. “I have learned that one thing paramount in this life is to accept your feelings and speak them honestly aloud. Feelings are given to us by God. There’s no need for shame over a one of them, not a one. Don’t let them pile up inside, but deal with them as they come. Take them to God and confess them to Him, and you’ll feel better immediately. Then deal with them with this man with whom you intend to spend the rest of your life. Start out straight and honest with exactly who you are.

  “This is important, Marilee. Don’t form the habit of hiding yourself from Tate, because you think what you feel is wrong, or because you don’t want to hurt him. It isn’t that you don’t want to hurt him so much as you are afraid of yourself.”

  Marilee’s eyes came up then, sparking. Vella was encouraged.

  “Talk to Tate,” she said again.

  Marilee breathed deeply. “Yes, I will.”

  “Ohhh!”

  Marilee had been rather listlessly going through the bridal magazines with her aunt, who was making a schedule of what they would need to accomplish, and when, for the wedding, when her eyes lit on a dress that caused that certain leap inside of her that happens when a woman recognizes the perfect outfit.

  It was a wedding dress with a wide sweep of a neckline, cutting across the shoulders, much in the manner of the sweater she wore at that minute. Marilee adored tops that showed her shoulders, which she thought were one of her better features. The sleeves of the dress were long and slim, and the dress skimmed the body, then fell in a soft swirl just above the ankles.

  “Now that’s a dress for a woman.” Aunt Vella’s eyes shone with approval. “It is perfect for you.”

  “But not in white.” Marilee had certain convictions about her wedding. “How do you think it would look in…” Eyes glued on the image, she tried various colors. “Dusty blue?”

  “Hmmm…” Aunt Vella looked at Marilee, then looked at the photograph on the page. “Apricot. Deep, warm apricot.”

  “Oh, yes.”
Certainty and pleasure washed over her.

  “And we’ll take this picture down the street to Margaret Wyatt and get her to make it up. Doesn’t look too hard.”

  “I didn’t know she made gowns.”

  “Uh-huh…Margaret made the costumes for the senior play this year, and the gowns for each of Ramona Stidham’s daughters’ weddings. She is excellent. Then we will be able to tell Fred Grace that we want all apricot roses. He’ll handle that.”

  Marilee studied the dress on the glossy page, picturing her hair done up and herself wearing the dress, in apricot. Her heartbeat picked up a delighted tempo as it does in any woman who sees herself happily beautiful in a dress, all saucy and swirling around her ankles that swept up from strappy heels, smiling and gracious, and indeed capable of any endeavor required of her.

  At that particular moment there came a rapping at the back door, and it opened, with Tate poking his head inside. “Hello…is my bride-to-be home?” He came inside, followed by Franny.

  Marilee, still affected by seeing herself in the beautiful dress, went instantly to Tate, totally oblivious to Franny, and wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him. She had meant it to be a simple kiss, but he held her fast and went all out.

  “Well, don’t mind us,” said Franny, who went forward to Vella to hold out her hand and introduce herself.

  Marilee, coming back to earth, pushed away from Tate, wondering what in the world had gotten into her.

  There was no time to recover or smooth over, because just then the kitchen door swung inward, with Corrine following and announcing in a breathless manner, “There’s a big truck comin’ in the driveway!”