“Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle.” Attalee worked her jaw. “Only thing is lately I’ve been taking my lucky agate to bingo since my game’s been off, but at least I ain’t waving it around like I was some kind of witch doctor.”
I leaned against the checkout counter and smiled at them both. “Look, I got something to tell you before any customers come in. It’s really big news.”
Mavis lowered herself into her chair with her coffee cup. Attalee’s eyes narrowed.
I took a deep breath. “I don’t know how to say this except to just spit it out. Timothy and I are now man and wife! We eloped last night.” I stuck out my hand to show off my diamond ring.
“Eloped? My goodness, Elizabeth,” Mavis said.
“You went off and got hitched and didn’t even invite us, your nearest and your dearest?” Attalee asked. She grabbed my hand to get a closer look at the stone. “You could give someone a shiner with that rock.”
“Timothy came over to my house last night at midnight and proposed,” I said. My skin tingled as I recalled the scene. “Then he insisted we drive to Edgefield to get married right away. He’d brought over this beautiful ring that’s been in his family for years. It was a whirlwind. I’m still trying to get used to the idea of being Elizabeth Hollingsworth.”
“Oh, Elizabeth, I’m just in shock,” Mavis said, fanning herself with a newspaper flier. “Our little Elizabeth, a Hollingsworth, of all things.”
“Are y’all going to live here in Cayboo Creek?” Attalee asked.
“Yes. Timothy loves it here,” I said. “He’s going to move his things out of his condominium in Augusta and move in with me until we can find us a larger place.”
“This is truly wonderful news,” Mavis said. “You and Timothy are like biscuits and gravy; you belong together.”
“Mrs. Tobias ought to be tickled about your news,” Attalee said. “She’s always been so sweet on you.”
“I hope so. She’s the one that got us together in the first place, but I don’t imagine she expected we’d get married. She can be awful hard to read sometimes.”
Meemaw, on the other hand, wasn’t a bit hard to read. I stopped by after work to visit her and she started slamming cupboards in the kitchen when I told her the news.
“Timothy and I are going to have another ceremony so we can share the moment with all our friends and family. Maybe we could have it here,” I said, knowing how Meemaw loved entertaining folks.
“Don’t know how we could,” Meemaw snapped. She banged a lid shut on the pot of stew simmering on the stove. “I don’t have linen napkins and table runners and silverware with the coat of arms pressed into the handles.”
“You’re going to like Timothy so much, Meemaw.” I followed her as she stomped out to the porch. “I know we should have waited and had a real ceremony with you there. It was just one of those crazy spur-of-the-moment things. Please forgive me.”
She whirled around to face me. “What is it about this family and shotgun weddings? My daughter got married in the dusty office of a Justice of the Peace, but at least she invited me and your granddaddy. My granddaughter runs off to a gambling house to get married, not once thinking to pick up the phone so that her meemaw, who has raised her since she was tiny—” Her face turned red as a firecracker. “Oh, just go on with you. I’m too mad to talk now.”
“I’m sorry, Meemaw. You’re right. I should have made sure you were there.”
“Scat!” She waved the spatula at me. I started slinking back to my car. “And you can tell that Mr. Hollingsworth of yours that he has already gotten off on the wrong foot with me,” she hollered.
I continued to my car, knowing that once Meemaw stewed for a while, she’d come around.
“Have you told your no-good daddy this news?” Meemaw shouted after me.
Nineteen
Instant Redneck: Just Add Beer
~ Message on Dwayne Polk’s T-shirt
I drove out to Taffy and Daddy’s house after leaving Meemaw’s. Just before I knocked at the door, I slipped my ring into my jeans pocket, out of habit mostly. There was a time in the Polk family when any jewelry would eventually end up behind the counter of a pawn shop.
Daddy and Taffy were enjoying their cocktail hour. Old Milwaukee for him and wine coolers for her. After I told them my news, Daddy’s mouth twitched and Taffy went completely silent. She squinted at me, as if I were a road map that she was trying to read in poor light. “When’s the baby due?”
“I’m going to be a granddaddy,” my daddy said.
Taffy glared at him.
“There isn’t going to be a baby,” I said. “Because I’m not—”
Taffy held up her index finger. “Betty D. We weren’t born yesterday. Were we, Dwayne?”
“Not the last time I looked,” Daddy said with a husky laugh.
Taffy jumped up and circled my chair, clicking her nails on the kitchen table as she passed.
“You sign anything? Any kind of paper before you said your wedding vows?” She was behind me, close to my ear, and I could smell the fermented fruit scent on her breath.
“No, just the wedding license. And I’m not preg—”
She planted herself in front of me, so close that I could see the pink veins in the whites of her eyes.
“Then I suggest you get pregnant, quick like a rabbit, if you want to stay married. Once his kin gets wind of this, they’ll wipe you out like a bathtub ring. But if you have a belly heavy with a grandchild, that’s something else entirely,” said Taffy. She was wearing a purple pantsuit that made her look like an eggplant.
My daddy squeezed his beer can and tossed it in the trash.
“Shoot, Taffy, I don’t want to hear this talk about women’s bellies.”
“Go on in and watch your TV show,” she said. “Your boy Lanier is in the den watching the Game Show Channel all day. See if he’s still kicking.”
As my daddy left the room, Taffy said under her breath, “Don’t know why I married a man with children. First Lanier lounging around my house like a big smelly dog and now—”
I slid off my chair. “Well, I’m going home. I just wanted to tell you and Daddy about the marriage.”
“Wait a minute, Betty D. Stay put for a minute,” she said.
I stopped, feeling like a bug skewered by a straight pin.
A smile was toying at her lips. “To tell you the truth Betty D., I didn’t think you had it in you. You’ve surprised me, girl.”
“Taffy, it isn’t what you think—”
“Shoot, Betty D., I mean... Elizabeth. We’re both women here and since it’s a man’s world out there, we women gotta use what we got.” She looked me up and down. “You got the stuff, Elizabeth, but I swear to the Lord, I never would have guessed that you knew how to use it. I underestimated you.”
She looked at me with a creepy kind of admiration, the way a kid from the Little League stares at Chipper Jones. The gold chains on the breast pockets of her pantsuit jingled as she spoke. “I want to have y’all over for some supper sometime. We gotta meet this rich fellow of yours. You staying with him at his house?”
“No, he’s staying with me for the time being.”
She snorted. “Well, he isn’t going to be lasting long in your hole-in-the-wall once he gets tired of hot- and cold-running fleas. You’re gonna have to get rid of Estée Lauder.” She hefted her wine cooler to her mouth and took a noisy swallow.
“Maybelline,” I said, correcting her. “And why should I get rid of my dog? Timothy’s crazy about her.”
Actually, I was fibbing. Fact is, Maybelline was probably low on Timothy’s list right now. There had been a fierce struggle over his sock this morning, a piddle stain on his side of the bed last night, and when we made love, Maybelline had stared at us from the corner
of the room, eyes like spangles in the semi-darkness, a dark, panting, peeping Tom.
“The only kind of dogs rich folks have are the kind with pedicures, and your mutt doesn’t got that,” said Taffy.
“Pedicures?”
Taffy waggled her fingers impatiently. “Those fancy papers that says who the daddy is. You don’t have any for her.”
Or for myself, I thought. What would Timothy think of me if he knew his wife might not have a pedicure?
After I left my daddy’s house, I stopped at the grand opening of the Winn-Dixie to pick up the makings for the first supper I would prepare as Mrs. Timothy Hollingsworth.
Outside the grocery store the Pepsi-Cola folks arranged a display of their cans to spell out “Welcome Shoppers.” Freckles the Clown was inside making balloon animals and the high-school band booster club was out front selling boiled peanuts in rolled-up paper bags. Miss Cayboo Creek and her court were stationed throughout the store doling out free samples.
By the time I’d steered my buggy into the produce section, I’d sampled a Vienna sausage, a sweet-and-sour meatball, and a new kind of banana snack chip which I’d spat out in a napkin. In my opinion, there are certain places bananas don’t belong.
I parked my buggy in front of the iceberg lettuce hoping to catch the thunder-and-lightning display I’d read about in the paper. Other folks had the same idea. Carts were lined up from the bins of corn-on-the-cob all the way down to the green peppers. Arnold Thorton, the produce manager, tried to break up a traffic jam near a Wishbone crouton display.
“The show’s not for another ten minutes. Please keep your carts moving,” he said in the overly bossy tones of newfound power.
I decided that if I was going to have supper on the table for Timothy, I’d better move along. I glanced at the recipe card Attalee had given me for “dump casserole.” It didn’t sound very appetizing, but she’d promised it was real simple. All you had to do was take a can of shoe-peg corn, a can of string beans, a can of cream-of-mushroom soup, and a jar of pimentos and dump them into a casserole dish. Shake some fried onions on top and you had a meal.
I was tooling my buggy down the canned-vegetable aisle when I heard someone calling my name. I turned around and saw Boomer and Meemaw standing behind me.
“Hey there, Toots. It’s been a ‘coon’s age. Come and hug your Uncle Boomer’s neck,” Boomer said.
I parked my buggy and flung my arms around Boomer, who of course being Meemaw’s beau wasn’t any kin to me, but I didn’t mind calling him uncle if it made him happy.
I went to hug Meemaw. Boomer, who was wearing a parrot-print shirt, said, “Watch out for that one. She’s a real sourpuss today.”
Meemaw felt about as cuddly as an ironing board in my arms. “I know,” I said to Boomer, dropping my embrace. “We spoke only a couple of hours ago. So are you checking out the competition, Boomer?”
“What competition?” Boomer asked. “They don’t even carry goat. What kind of meat department is that?”
“Not much of one,” I remarked. “You’ll still get all my business.”
Boomer glanced at my purchases. “What’s with all these cans? Are you trying to stock a bomb shelter?”
“I’m just picking up some odds and ends.” I paused and looked at Meemaw. “I’m making my first supper for Timothy tonight.”
“He won’t be hanging around for long if you’re serving him this kind of rubbish.” Boomer put a big, soft hand on my shoulder. “Elizabeth, let me tell you a secret. Men marry women so they can stop eating out of cans. Do you think a fine young whelp like myself would have anything to do with your grizzled old granny if she didn’t make the best chicken pot pie I’ve ever locked a lip on?”
“Hope you got a good memory because you aren’t going to taste that pie for a while,” Meemaw snapped.
Boomer scratched his bald head.
“She’s also a great French kisser, but the only sugar I’ve gotten lately has been in my coffee.”
“You better start checking it for hemlock.”
Meemaw looked into my cart. “I hate to say it, Elizabeth, but Boomer’s right. Opening a few cans isn’t any kind of supper for newlyweds.”
I twisted the ring on my finger. “But I don’t know how to make much of anything else.”
“You hardly need to know how to cook these days, what with all the convenience foods. Get you one of those roasted chickens in the deli. That will make a fine supper,” Meemaw said.
“Maybe I’ll do just that.” I began replacing the cans on the shelf.
“And Elizabeth...” Meemaw’s fingers ran up and down the buttons of her sweater. She seemed at a loss about what to do with her hands, seeing how she couldn’t smoke in the grocery store.
“Yes, Meemaw.”
“There isn’t a thing to cooking.” She blinked behind her glasses. “I could teach you a dish or two.”
“I’d like that.” I knew that Meemaw’s offer was her way of forgiving me.
“It’s settled, then. Come by this weekend, if you can tear yourself away from that husband of yours.” Meemaw elbowed Boomer. “We need to get back.”
Twenty
Bacteria is the only culture some people have.
~ Marcie Castlewood’s favorite put-down
I was inhaling the homey scent of roasted chicken when I heard Timothy’s key in the door, and I ran to greet him with a kiss. Unfortunately, it was one of those long, drawn-out smooches that gave Maybelline just enough time to hop up on the supper table and drag the chicken down to the floor. She was shaking it, like she wasn’t sure if it was dead or not, when I walked into the kitchen.
I started boo-hooing right then and there, which isn’t like me at all. It was as if my wedding ring gave me license to be silly and weepy, like Jane Fonda in Barefoot in the Park.
Timothy was the model husband. He wrestled the bird from Maybelline—after a National Geographic-worthy struggle— cleaned up the grease, murmured phrases like “there, there,” and patted me gently on the back. Then he told me he wanted to take me out to a very fancy restaurant for supper so he could show off his brand-new, beautiful wife.
We drove to a restaurant in downtown Augusta called the Summit Club, a private dining room that’s on the very top floor of the old First Atlanta Bank Building.
Full-length windows revealed the city lights, twinkling like a county fair. There was a man in the corner playing a big, black shiny piano. I’d only been in one restaurant with live entertainment before. Bobby’s Barbecue on Highway One had a piano player who wore string ties and played “Turkey in the Straw.” The fellow playing at the Summit Club wore a tuxedo, and it was my guess he wouldn’t be playing any songs you could clap along to.
The dining room was hushed. A man in a dark suit spotted us in the doorway.
“Mr. Hollingsworth, how good to see you this evening. Will you be dining in your private room tonight?”
“No, Preston. My wife and I want to enjoy the view of the city.”
I felt woozy at Timothy’s use of the word “wife.” It was still hard to believe we were married.
The Preston fellow pulled out my chair and then handed us both menus that looked like big books with tassels dangling from them. While we were opening the menus, a waiter wearing white gloves appeared at our table and filled our glasses from a silver pitcher beading with water droplets.
“Evening, Mr. Hollingsworth,” said the elderly black man. His voice rumbled deep from his chest. “Will you need a minute to look over the menu, sir?”
“Yes, thank you, Gerald.”
The waiter left and I leaned over the table and said, “How do you know these people?”
Timothy sighed. “This is where most of the board meetings are held during the day. Although we meet around the corridor in the Hollingswo
rth Room.”
“You have a room in here all to yourself?” I asked.
“Yes. My father was a founding member of the Summit Club, so he had a private dining room dedicated to him. I’ve known Gerald, our waiter, since I was a kid.” He lowered his voice. “I’d like a more casual atmosphere for business, but it’s the way my father always conducted his affairs. People expect it from me as well.”
“Well, it’s very nice here,” I said. My eyes took in the gleaming cutlery, the butter pressed into rosettes, and the sparkling city lights. “I feel like I’m in a movie.”
“That’s why I brought you here. I thought you’d enjoy the view.”
I folded my menu. “It’s fantastic. I could sit here for hours. Just look at all those lights down there. It looks like everyone is scurrying around to prepare for a celebration. Just imagine if you were from another planet. Wouldn’t you feel welcomed by all those lights? Wouldn’t you want to hurry up and land your spaceship just so you could be a part of it all?”
He took my hand across the table and gave it a squeeze. “You’re always helping me see how beautiful this world is.”
Gerald appeared at my side and poured more water into my glass even though I’d only taken a couple of sips.
“Mr. Hollingsworth, have you decided?”
I stuck my nose in the menu. Fact was, there was a lot of strange-sounding food on it: potato and sorrel soup, pear and Gouda salad with pine nuts, mussels in white sauce with saffron. I was hoping Timothy would suggest something.
As if reading my mind, Timothy asked, “Do you like prime rib?”
“Lord, do I.”
Bet Your Bottom Dollar (The Bottom Dollar Series Book 1) Page 12
