At the Corner of Love and Heartache

by Curtiss Ann Matlock

  “Small-town America isn’t vanishing,” stated Mayor Upchurch, who dropped by one evening and sat on the front porch with everyone. “It’s just changing. Life moves on here, same as anywhere, except maybe a little slower.”

  As soon as the words came out of his mouth, the mayor had the idea of a brand-new slogan for the town, that it was time to leave behind their current slogan of Flag Town of America—people were letting their flags get ragged and not replacing them—and become the Small Town on the Move.

  The debate about town then became: small town on the move to where? Everyone had different ideas. Tate did an editorial on the subject and invited people to drop by the offices to give their opinions, which he would then publish in the paper.

  Charlotte, who hated this practice of open invitation to all and sundry, put up a sign in front of her desk that read: For All Opinions, See The Editor. Beneath it was an arrow pointing to Tate’s office. She told Tate not to even think of asking her to get anyone coffee.

  “I wouldn’t think of it, Miss Charlotte,” he said.

  There was something else that went on in the town that Marilee, after hearing of the third occurrence, realized was a result of the situation with Stuart.

  The first occurrence was Fayrene Gardner down at the Main Street Café telling Marilee that she had telephoned her mother, from whom she had been estranged for fifteen years.

  Fayrene said, “I did not want to drop dead, like my Dave did last year, and meet St. Peter and have to explain to him why I was not speakin’ to my mother.” She added, “It was bad enough that Dave and I didn’t get back together when we had the chance. We kept puttin’ it off. It doesn’t pay to put off.”

  The next, and quite amazing, thing to happen was Leo Pahdocony, Sr. booking a trip to Cancún for his and Reggie’s upcoming twentieth anniversary. When Reggie found out that her husband had not only come up with the idea but had himself done the entire work of making the arrangements and all she had to do was pack her bags, she had gone white as a sheet and sunk into her chair. Charlotte, always alert, had made her put her head between her legs.

  While Reggie was down there, she whispered to Charlotte, “He must have a lover…or maybe some horrible disease.”

  Charlotte said with all practicality, “So what if it’s both? Take the chance for this celebration while you have it, Reg.”

  The third happening Marilee heard about was the return of her neighbor’s wife. Julia Jenkins-Tinsley told the tale when Marilee went into the post office to pick up a parcel for Franny.

  “Oh, hey, Marilee.” Julia was hanging up the phone. “I was just talkin’ to your cousin Belinda. I was tellin’ her about your neighbor Leon Purvis and his wife gettin’ back together. Did you know that Stella’s come home?”

  Julia leaned on the counter and told all about how Leon Purvis had located his wife on her trucking route and begged her to come home to try their marriage again. Stella Purvis admitted that part of it had been Leon suffering a backache, but that on the telephone he had cried and said he didn’t want to die with regret about their marriage. Stella had gotten home within six hours and said she was tired of the open road anyway.

  “Stella was in here this mornin’ fillin’ out change of address forms and told me all about it herself,” said Julia. “She started cryin’, even.”

  Marilee had found the parcel slip in her purse and handed it across the counter. Julia picked it up but didn’t quit talking.

  “I asked her if Leon had told her about your Stuart, and she said no, so I told her about how you’ve taken in your sick ex-husband, right into your home. I tell you, hon, I am so touched, and so are a lot of other people. It is sure makin’ people do some thinking. I’ll bet that whole thing is why Leon called Stella. Did you hear about Fayrene and her mother?”

  “That Fayrene called her mother over in Childress?”

  “Yep. Her mother’s comin’ over here at the end of the month. She didn’t even come last year when Fayrene had that setback about her ex-husband, but she is comin’ now.

  “I think you are a saint for takin’ in your ex, but there’s some around that can’t imagine how you could have brought him into your house after all this time and how he treated you and Willie Lee. And there’s a few sayin’ it all has to do with Stuart being a big-time journalist and leaving you and Willie Lee a lot of money.” She cast Marilee a curious glance.

  “Would you get Franny’s parcel? I need to go get the children from school.”

  “Oh, yes. It’s right here.” Julia stepped aside, looking over some shelves, then reached in and pulled out a large padded envelope that she passed across the counter. “Well, you are a rare woman, Marilee. Tate and Stuart are lucky men.” She gestured at the parcel. “It’s from Frederick’s of Hollywood. How old is Tate’s mother?”

  “Old enough to shop where she wants,” said Marilee. “Thanks, Julia.”

  She turned and went out into the muggy air of a spring day and started down the sidewalk. She got out of sight of the post office window before checking the package for verification that it really was from Frederick’s of Hollywood.

  It was. Well. So many things were not what they appeared.

  Take her own life, for instance. For her part, Marilee knew there was a lot of talk around town about the situation with her and Tate and Stuart, and there of course was a lot of rehashing as to how she had been engaged the previous fall to Parker.

  My goodness, how could she end up looking like a vamp, when she had hardly had any love life for her entire existence?

  She herself did not quite understand her own actions concerning Stuart. She was neither a saint nor a sinner, and the idea that some people would consider her in either light made her uncomfortable.

  She knew she had simply done what she must. It was tied up in her desire to give Willie Lee every chance to know his father, and his father a chance at knowing his son. And yet, it was more than that. She knew that to not do what she could to help Stuart, who truly was all alone, somehow denied herself, who and what she was. She believed, rightly or wrongly, that she would want someone to help her if the situation were reversed. Certainly, truth be told, she was benefiting from Stuart’s presence as much as was everyone else, and it had not cost her anything out of her life but a little time and a house that would have been going empty anyway.

  It was, too, as if something needed finishing, and this was the way to do it.

  Still, Marilee had a little difficulty with how smoothly everything was going. She had expected more problems concerning Stuart, and she felt uneasy about the wedding preparations seemingly going on without a hitch. In her experience, when life ran this smoothly, something dire was about to happen. Fully aware that this was a negative attitude, she tried to shake it but did not quite succeed.

  The truth that came floating up in her mind at that moment was her concern over the possibility that Stuart might drop dead right on the eve of the wedding.

  There, she had admitted it. So much for her supposed altruism.

  She had, in fact, been observing her ex-husband closely, trying to gauge his waning energy. It didn’t seem to be particularly waning. Yes, he took an hour or two’s nap in the evening, but this could be attributed to his walking all over town each day. He had even gotten a bit of a tan. He’d always been skinny, so his current gauntness was not any particular indication of a lack of health. Tate reported that he and Stuart—her ex-husband, she seemed to have to remind her intended—sat up nights talking about the ever-expanding photo article on Valentine and small-town America in general. Stuart had contacted two national magazines, and both were interested in his photographs and the concept.

  Marilee hoped very much that he would live at least until after the wedding and honeymoon. She really hoped they did not get a nasty surprise and find him dead on the eve of the wedding…or maybe during the wedding.

  God knew she was doing the best she could. She would trust God to handle everything and know all would work o
ut for the best, no matter what happened, and she would take it as it came. Yes, she would.

  Whatever else was there to do?

  Franny showed Marilee and Corrine what she had ordered from Frederick’s of Hollywood—a bright floral kimono robe and a padded girdle. Inspecting the girdle quite thoroughly, Corrine said, “Granny Franny, why does it have these little pillowy things?” The pillowy things were the padding on the derriere.

  “Because I have a bony behind, and I wanted to see if this would make sitting on the church pews more comfortable.”

  When Marilee pointed out that the church pews were padded, Franny promptly replied, “Not enough.”

  Then she brought forward one more thing she had purchased from Frederick’s—a shimmering white stretch satin and lace strapless teddy, a gift for Marilee.

  When Marilee eyed it uncertainly, Franny said, “It is just the thing for underneath your wedding dress. It is for you alone, no one else will see, and wearing it will make you feel one-hundred-percent woman. Remember that, Corrine,” she told the young girl. “God made you a woman, and that is something to respect and honor.”

  The way Franny put it, it would be sacrilegious not to wear the sexy thing.

  Marilee donned the teddy. It was amazingly comfortable. And it did make her feel very much of a woman. “I didn’t know I could look like this,” she said, beholding herself and her breasts, which had become voluptuous, in the mirror on the chifforobe.

  “Honey, those catalog models don’t have all their endowments naturally, you know,” said Franny quite practically. “They simply know how to make the best of what they have by squeezin’ it all around.”

  Marilee slipped into her wedding dress. It felt wonderful on her skin. Seeing her reflection in the mirror, she drew in a breath.

  “You look beautiful, Aunt Marilee.”

  Corrine’s tone reflected the awe Marilee felt. She touched her bare skin above the scooped neckline, then smoothed the soft, flowing skirt that fell to just above her ankles.

  “You will do my son and your mother proud,” said Franny.

  “I would like to move my desk to your house.” She handed Tate his morning coffee. “To the alcove in your living room. It’s so perfect. It’s so much bigger than my living room. And I just love the area, with the windows. I was thinking that maybe we could move your small desk from the dining room and have ours side by side.”

  “In the living room…well, okay. What do we do about the stuff that’s already there?”

  “I called Albert’s Antiques out on the highway. They’ll buy them, if you are agreeable.”

  His eyebrows went up. “Oh.” The eyebrows went down. “Fine. Then your desk is the first thing we’ll move.” He leaned over and kissed her, as he always did when seeking to please.

  “I’d like to do it today.”

  “You would? Today?”

  She nodded. “We could ask Parker to help, to bring his old pickup truck.”

  “Are we in a hurry?”

  She felt a little silly and had to get courage to speak honestly. “Not a hurry, but I want it done. It just seems that moving my desk over to your house will make certain that the wedding will happen on schedule. Like putting a firm nail into the plan.” She felt more confident; it all made sense to her. “Like believing and acting on the belief.”

  “Okay, darlin’,” he said instantly. “You got it.”

  Early that afternoon, Parker came with his old pickup truck, and he and Tate hauled over the desk, while Marilee, Stuart, Franny and the children came along the path with the computer, lamp, pictures and whatnots. Marilee had chairs and tables moved from the alcove and directed the placing of her desk, then the moving of Tate’s desk from where it was stuck in the dining-room corner. It was a small desk, but he said he liked it.

  “Didn’t I give you this?” asked Stuart, picking up a blue china vase and regarding it closely.

  “Yes…and I love it.” She took it and placed it correctly.

  “I gave her this,” Parker piped up, waving a letter opener.

  “I gave her the living-room nook,” said Tate quite happily.

  The antique chairs and crooked walnut table now sitting in the middle of the living room were carried out the front door and loaded into Parker’s truck, which sat at the foot of the steps.

  Marilee stood on the front porch of the big old house and watched the truck drive away, in the front seat all four of the important men in her life: Tate, Parker, Stuart, and Willie Lee, who had said, “I am one of the gu-uys,” and climbed in on top of Stuart’s lap.

  Franny came up beside her. “There go the men who have contributed to the woman you are. You are blessed.”

  “Yes,” Marilee said, her vision blurring as a surge of gratitude flooded her heart. “Yes, I am.”

  All the hurts from her past were fading away, she realized. Life flowing on like a river, always. Pain and joy mingling. Now was a time of healing. Now was a time of forgiveness. Now was a time for letting go of the past and moving on with her new life.

  She wondered why, although she felt herself moving on, she also felt a foot dragging.

  Twenty-Six

  Unexpected surprises…

  Papa Tate was given a surprise bachelor party, and Aunt Marilee was given a surprise wedding shower, and each knew about the other’s party but not about their own.

  In fact, Aunt Marilee had told everyone that she didn’t want a party, but Aunt Vella said, “That’s not acceptable on her part. She’ll have to bear up,” and Granny Franny and Charlotte agreed; the three of them got both parties going, putting Parker and Mr. James in charge of Papa Tate’s party, but pretty much telling them everything to do.

  There was one thing Corrine noticed that Mr. James did all on his own, or at least started all on his own, and that was to fix up a poster of pictures of Aunt Marilee from when she was a kid on through the time of their marriage to display for Papa Tate. Aunt Vella jumped in to help him, and searched through albums belonging to Aunt Marilee in order to get some of the pictures; even though he was a photographer, he didn’t have but a couple of pictures of Marilee. Corrine had seen him take one out of his wallet and put on the poster board, right in the middle.

  Granny Franny liked the idea, so she gave Mr. James pictures of Papa Tate and had him make up a second poster board. It was decided that the poster of Papa Tate would go to Aunt Marilee’s party, and the poster of Aunt Marilee would go to Papa Tate’s party.

  Corrine and Willie Lee were included on all the secret plans and admonished half a dozen times not to tell. Corrine knew neither she nor Willie Lee would tell, but she wasn’t so certain about all the grown-ups, especially Aunt Vella’s daughter, Belinda. She heard Aunt Vella tell Granny Franny that she wasn’t inviting Julia Jenkins-Tinsley until Friday evening, to minimize the possibility of Julia letting everything slip.

  It was decided to have Aunt Marilee’s party down at Aunt Vella’s house, where she had a big front porch and her flagstone patio was now finished, even if the landscaper had fallen off on a quality job—Aunt Vella’s description—and the party could flow inside and out, if the weather was really nice.

  Papa Tate’s party would be at his own house, where he would least expect it. Aunt Vella said that men didn’t care about a house being partially torn up for renovation.

  After church, Papa Tate and Aunt Marilee took each other to the IGA. Each one thought they were keeping the other busy. As a further diversion, Granny Franny gave them a list of groceries she herself wanted, saying that she and Winston were giving the rose club a little party on Tuesday.

  Willie Lee, when Granny Franny tried to take him down to Aunt Vella’s, insisted on staying at Papa Tate’s house for the bachelor party. “Me and Munro are gu-uys,” he said, standing firm, with arms crossed, Munro right beside him.

  Corrine regarded her cousin with concern. She felt caught between taking up for him against the adults and leaving him at a place that she found questionable. She ha
d seen Parker bring in a case of beer, and this did not set well with her. She did not know what went on at bachelor parties, but she had caught snatches of comments that led her to suspect them. Ricky Dale had told her that his older brother had described to him a bachelor party, and that such a party entailed a lot of drinking, nude women and pornographic movies. This sounded like what had gone on at a house down the street from Corrine in Fort Worth, which had been filled with unsavory characters and to which the police had often been called. Corrine, who could not imagine Papa Tate drunk or with a nude woman, had told Ricky Dale that she figured Papa Tate’s party would be the NASCAR race that he liked to watch on Sundays, and talking about sports and what those nuts up in Washington were doing. Privately, though, she was not completely certain of this assessment.

  Then Mr. James said, “Of course Willie Lee stays with us. I’ll watch out for him.”

  As far as Corrine had seen, Mr. James had never watched out for Willie Lee, but there he stood, with his hand on Willie Lee’s shoulder. She eyed him and recalled him placing the picture of Aunt Marilee from his wallet so very carefully in the middle of the poster.

  Granny Franny agreed to letting Willie Lee stay. Corrine slowly followed the older woman out to the little MG, with the top down, and slipped into the passenger seat, where Granny Franny set the cake from Sweetie Cakes bakery—a big sheet of double chocolate, with white icing—into her lap, and they headed off to Aunt Vella’s house up the hill.

  The guys did not have cake, but submarine sandwiches and pickles and chips and jalapeño dip, and stuff like that that went with beer and Coke and root beer and ice tea. And farting, Ricky Dale said.

  This was the first ladies’ party Corrine, who had only school experience with parties, anyway, had ever been to. She slipped into being invisible and passed around the crystal dishes of mints and refreshed cups of punch, while taking in all the expressions and actions and comments made by the ladies. She was amazed by how Reggie Pahdocony jumped up in front of all the ladies and pretended to sing into a spoon, sounding just like Reba McEntire. Tammy Crawford liked to say, “I don’t think so,” in a smart way, and she wasn’t careful where she put her sweaty tea glass. She set it right on Aunt Vella’s polished mahogancy end table, but Corrine wiped the water up quickly. The general consensus was great surprise that Zona Porter came. The small grey woman sat quietly in a corner with a smile on her face. Miss Charlene—Papa Tate always called her Miss Charlene—was unusually vivacious. Corrine heard her grama Norma use this word. Miss Charlene hugged just everyone; she smelled of fresh perfume that Corrine liked.