“What happened to that jerky y’all used to sell?”
Her hair-chewing speed increased. “I moved them to the back. Trevor says eating animal products is like eating our own brothers and sisters. I promised him I’d only sell them if somebody really, really, really wanted them.”
I thought about it for a moment. Between Maddie, Teensy, and Carlos, I barely got any pizza earlier. My stomach growled. I pictured the sorry state of my fridge at home: A jar of salsa which I was certain had grown mold; an apple so old its skin was wrinkled; and a stale chocolate bunny leftover from Easter with both ears eaten off.
A horn honked behind me. I looked in the rearview, saw a blowsy woman with big hair impatiently waving me on.
“Ohmigod, that’s Dab Holt!” Linda-Ann rolled her eyes. “Must be out of booze for those parties she throws down at the lake. I’m not going to look, but tell me: Does she have one of those young guys she’s always running around with?”
I peeked in the mirror again; gave the woman a friendly wave. “Nope she’s alone.”
“Not for long, I guarantee you.”
My stomach grumbled. “Why don’t you run and grab me a handful of that jerky? I’ll take three of the spicy sweet ones, two with cracked pepper; and one with garlic.”
“Do you really, really …”
“Yes,” I interrupted. “I really, really, REALLY want them.”
The aroma of biscuits and sausage gravy enveloped me like a high-calorie blanket as I opened the door at Gladys’ Diner. I spotted Mama at our favorite breakfast table, the one next to the calendar from Gotcha Bait & Tackle. C’ndee was at the table, too, sitting in Mama’s usual seat. I would have liked to have seen the tug-of-war for that spot, from which Mama could normally see—and be seen by—everyone in the diner.
“Yoo-hoo, Mace! Over here, honey!”
I gave her a wave, mainly to stop her from flapping her arms and shouting loud enough to raise the dead in the cemetery next to the Baptist church off State Road 70.
Mama’s dreaded wedding book lay open between C’ndee and her on the table. The huge tome contained everything from the seating chart for the VFW reception, to the ice-cream colored fabric swatches for our bridesmaid gowns. If we were going to discuss the ruffles yet again on those Gone with the Wind parasols, I knew I’d better get some coffee. Taking a seat, I signaled to Charlene, the waitress, to pour me a cup.
Coffee pot in hand, she leaned over The Book and stared at a picture Mama had clipped from a magazine of a dashing young man modeling Sal’s white wedding suit. “Isn’t it exciting, Mace?” Charlene’s eyes shone. “Not many gals get to be the bridesmaids at their own mama’s marriage.”
With good reason, I thought.
“Mace isn’t like most gals, Charlene. She doesn’t like weddings,” Mama explained. “I guess they remind her of the fact that she’s thirty-two and not even close to getting hitched. She has a boyfriend, in a fashion. But you know what I always say: No man’s gonna buy the cow when he can get the milk for free.”
My cousin Henry picked just that moment to join us. “Mooooove over, would you, Mace? I’d like to sit down. And would you pass that creamer over this way? The one with the free milk?”
“Very funny, Henry.” I punched him in the arm. “You’re a laugh riot, as usual.”
He didn’t hit back because his attention was now riveted on C’ndee. She was bursting from the V-neck of her tight, off-the-shoulder, red paisley top. Matching hair combs, glittering with rhinestones, swept her mass of black curls off her face into waves that cascaded onto her bare shoulders.
“I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure,” Henry said, fairly licking his chops.
“How’s your wife, Audra, Henry? And those fine young children?” I smiled sweetly.
C’ndee extended a hand across the table as my cousin took a chair. Her scarlet nails gleamed under the wagon-wheel lamp that hung from the ceiling.
After introductions were made and everyone got straight how everybody else was related, Charlene returned to the table. She dropped off a plate of hot biscuits beside Mama, and took our orders. Then Mama and C’ndee got down to business.
“I don’t know, C’ndee. I still think we should just go in there with scissors and trim this last row of ruffles off. See how that would accentuate the graceful curve of the parasol?”
She turned The Book so C’ndee could see the parasol, held by a smiling Southern belle in crinolines. Dress and umbrella matched, a sickening shade of lime-sherbet green. God help me, that one was my costume.
“So, Henry,” I stole a biscuit off the plate Mama hadn’t offered to share, “what do you hear about Ronnie Hodges?”
My cousin’s the best-known attorney in Himmarshee. This isn’t saying much, since we can count the number of attorneys in town on one hand. But he does have a pretty good pipeline to the police department and courthouse. If there had been any kind of development in the investigation into Ronnie’s death, Henry would know. His face turned grave.
“It’s a mystery to me how someone could do that. That was one awful murder,” he said. “Poor Ronnie.”
The scene from the VFW kitchen flickered into my mind. Putting the biscuit down, I glanced at C’ndee and Mama. They’d gotten quiet, too.
C’ndee rose and pushed back her chair. I noticed her hand shaking as she reached for a gigantic silver purse on the chair next to her. “I’m going to visit the little girl’s room.”
Mama and I traded a look as she walked away. Henry was concentrating on the view of her behind in tight white slacks, like two baby possums tussling in a pillowcase.
“Even if you weren’t married, cousin, that’s too much woman for you,” I said.
“A man can dream, can’t he?” He turned to Mama. “Aunt Rosalee, I thought you told me you couldn’t stand That Woman. How come she’s helping you with the wedding?”
Mama sighed. “I really didn’t have much choice, Henry. First off, she’s kin to Sal through his late wife. That’s a family tie I have to honor. Plus, no matter how I feel about her, Sal is fond of C’ndee.”
“What man wouldn’t be?” Henry said.
“Careful, cousin. You’re drooling on the biscuits.”
“And second,” Mama raised two fingers, “Ronnie’s murder left me in a bad spot.”
“Not as bad as the spot it left Ronnie in,” I said.
“Hush, Mace! I know how that sounds to say it. But it’s the truth. I have a hundred and fifty hungry guests coming to the VFW on Saturday, and no one to feed them. C’ndee’s helping me get all that organized, pulling together the food suppliers and serving people Ronnie used for catering. She seems to know all about this kind of thing. She says her family was in the restaurant business back in New Jersey.”
Mama clamped her lips shut. C’ndee was returning. I noticed a customer at another table was getting up to leave just as she approached. She blew by the woman, nearly knocking her down, instead of stepping aside to let her into the narrow aisle. Mama winced at C’ndee’s civility breach.
“Yankees!” she tsked-tsked in my ear.
“My Gawd!” C’ndee exhaled as she sat down. “The floral scent was so thick in that bathroom I nearly choked to death. What is it with you people down here with perfumed rooms and potpourri? I even smelled a big bowl of it on the counter at the gas station the other day. What are you trying to cover up? Don’t Southerners bathe regularly? Is it a lack of running water?”
Her voice carried like the horn of a semitruck on the New Jersey Turnpike. Several diners turned to stare. The woman she’d nearly trampled looked especially offended.
Mama’s smile was like ice. “C’ndee, honey.” Syrup dripped off the word “honey.” “Didn’t your mama ever teach you that if you don’t have something nice to say, you shouldn’t say anything at all?”
“No, Rosalee. Honey.” Something that wasn’t sweet oozed off the word. “We always spoke our minds and worried about the consequences later. Being truthful was mo
re important than faking nice in my family.”
They glared at each other over The Book. I hoped the heat didn’t singe the pages. Or, if it did, it burned up the one with the picture of that lime-colored gown and stupid parasol.
“Now, what’s this I heard about family, Aunt C’ndee?”
A good-looking guy with an Ivy League voice stood beside the table, smiling down at us. His teeth were as white as his polo sport shirt, worn with the collar casually turned up. He looked like he was ready to head to his private club for an afternoon of squash.
C’ndee’s dark mood brightened in an instant. “Anthony!” she called, rising to embrace him in a smothering, two-armed hug.
“This is my nephew, everyone. Tony Ciancio.” She rotated him by degrees so he could face each of us. I was heartened to see he looked embarrassed at being spun like a game show prize.
“It’s nice to meet you, ma’am.” Greeting Mama first, he demonstrated that he, at least, had good manners. “I’ve heard that wedding of yours is going to rival a Broadway show. I don’t doubt it, because you’re as pretty as any leading lady.”
Mama rewarded him with a flutter of her eyelashes.
“And you must be Mace.” He turned to me, green eyes lively in a chiseled, sailboat-tan face. “I’m looking forward to visiting Himmarshee Park. I hear you have a great nature path. People say that the wading birds and those huge cypress trees are something to see.”
He had me at “nature path.”
Tony stuck out a hand to Henry, who stood up as the two men shook. I could see my cousin’s sharp eyes assessing this outsider from the North. With his corny jokes, his football-star-gone-beefy paunch, and his rumpled suits, Henry liked to play the country bumpkin. But he’d graduated top of his class from the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Henry Bauer, Esquire, is no dummy.
Tony met Henry’s gaze head-on; confident, yet not aggressive. “I’m looking forward to seeing the Brahmans play at Himmarshee High,” he said. “I understand they have a pretty good chance at a state title this year.”
A delighted grin spread across my cousin’s face. He pumped Tony’s hand, and then clapped him on the back. “Their chances are excellent, my friend. Excellent!”
Charlene came back just then with our food. She looked around for a place to put down her big tray, crowded with heavy plates. Tony jumped to clear away water glasses and coffee cups from an adjoining table.
“Let me give you some room.” He flashed a blindingly white smile. Charlene, in full swoon, nearly lost her tray.
It was hard to believe C’ndee and Anthony Ciancio ever sat at the same family table. He must have gotten her share when they were passing around charm and courtesy.
Food safely delivered, Charlene’s eyes drank in Tony’s long, lean build. Apparently, she was one thirsty waitress. “Are you that male model in Rosalee’s wedding book? The one in the white suit?”
He shot his aunt a puzzled look. She patted his cheek twice, doubly affectionate, I guess.
“Tony’s not a model. But he’s gorgeous enough, even after driving south all night,” C’ndee said. “He’s here on business, actually. We’re looking at some opportunities to expand in the area.”
Mama and I each raised an eyebrow. In the month since she’d steamrolled into our lives, this was the first we’d heard about C’ndee starting a business in Florida. I’m sure Mama was calculating how geographically distant that definition of “in the area” might be.
“Is that right?” Henry clapped Tony’s back again. “What are y’all planning to do?” Tony hesitated for just a moment, seeming to weigh how much to say. “We want to do a full-service, event-planning business.”
All of us looked at him blankly.
“Like bringing in demolition derby and monster-truck events?” Charlene asked.
C’ndee looked horrified.
“More like special-occasion events,” Tony said. “We’d do everything from décor to food.”
Henry and I looked at each other over the rims of our coffee cups. He zeroed in like the attorney he was: “Is a wedding the kind of special occasion you’ll handle?”
Tony nodded.
“Looks like you arrived in the nick of time, then,” I said, my tone as neutral as a judge.
Betty Taylor was busy at Hair Today, Dyed Tomorrow, combing out a permanent for the wife of the president of the local branch of First Florida Bank. She grinned above a head full of unnaturally dark curls as Mama and I came in, bells jangling on the beauty parlor’s door.
“Mornin’ ladies.” She punctuated her greeting with a hurricane-force blast of hair spray. Coughing, First Florida’s First Lady squeezed her eyes shut.
“I see you’re working, Betty. How ’bout I come back for our consult some other time?”
“Oh, no you don’t, Mace. I think you’d rather go to the dentist than come to my shop. Sit down over there, next to that hairdryer.” She pointed her purple comb to a far corner. “I’ve got to finish here and then I have one quick cut to do. We can talk about your hair then.”
Mama reached up on tiptoes to grab a handful of my hair. “I’m thinking something with lots of curls, Betty.”
“Ow, that hurts!”
“But it has to look nice with the girls’ bonnets.” She let go of my hair, her hand making a hat-shaped arc above my head.
Bonnets? Lord deliver me.
“Aren’t the parasols enough, Mama?”
“In for an inch, in for a mile, Mace. You can’t be half a Southern belle.”
Mama had been promoting fancy hairdos for the wedding. Of course I’d been resisting. Betty was supposed to persuade me to go along today by showing me sample styles in some kind of beauty book.
“Don’t worry, Mace,” Betty said. “I’m a professional. You’ll look gorgeous.”
I glanced at the bank president’s wife, who looked like a poodle in earrings.
Muttering darkly, I grabbed a People magazine and took a seat to wait. Mama bustled around the shop, straightening up and lighting her aromatherapy candles.
“Hey, y’all!” A voice came from the supply closet in the back.
“Hey, D’Vora,” Mama and I chorused.
Betty’s twenty-something beautician trainee, D’Vora had made a big boo-boo last summer involving peroxide, an overly long cell phone call, and Mama’s platinum dye job. But all Mama’s hair grew back; and she’d forgiven D’Vora for the mishap.
Now, I looked up from an article on Angelina Jolie’s brood to see D’Vora emerging from the closet, juggling several bottles of shampoo and conditioner. I wondered which ones were responsible for the smells at Hair Today: green apples, tropical fruits, and citrus, all overlaid with the ammonia-like odor of permanent solution. Add in Mama’s aromatherapy candles and the lingering cloud of hair spray, and the shop was an allergist’s nightmare.
As D’Vora began restocking shelves, I saw she was wearing her customary, jazzed-up uniform: painted-on purple pants and too-small smock, zipper revealing her cleavage. Appliquéd flowers and lilac-colored butterflies along the neckline further accentuated her chest.
Like C’ndee, D’Vora was a fan of the “If you’ve got it, flaunt it” school of fashion. They shared that, along with the fanciful use of apostrophes in their self-created first names.
“I saw y’all through the window at Gladys’ this morning,” D’Vora said to Mama, who’d stepped in to help her shelve the hair products.
“You should have joined us, honey.”
“She was running late, as usual.” Betty shot D’Vora a sharp look as she rang up the bank president’s wife.
“Sorry, Betty,” D’Vora recited by rote. “Anyways, who was that gorgeous guy at your table?”
Mama supplied the details on Anthony Ciancio as I leafed through People. What is it about Hollywood that makes celebrities go crazy? The star of a kids’ show arrested for porn. A pop singer out in public with no undies. A famous actor caught in a racist rant. I tuned in to the beauty shop
chat again.
“I should have known that guy was related to C’ndee,” D’Vora was saying. “She’s so glamorous!”
“That’s a nice word for it,” Mama said dryly. “But I have to admit, I do like that nephew. Maybe he can be a backup beau for Mace, once she screws things up completely with Carlos.”
“Hello? I’m sitting right here!” I said from behind my People.
Mama clapped a hand over her mouth. My presence in the shop was so unnatural, I’m sure she’d forgotten I was there.
Ignoring her editorial comments on my love life, I said, “I’ll give you the fact Tony is charming …”
“And gorgeous,” D’Vora chimed in from near the shelves.
“Right,” I agreed. “But doesn’t it seem a little strange he and his aunt have those plans for a new catering business? I mean, Ronnie Hodges isn’t even in the ground yet.”
Betty was already snipping at the wet hair of her next appointment, a woman I didn’t recognize. Scissors flying, she added her two cents’ worth. “Everybody can agree it was horrible what happened to Ronnie, girls. But you have to strike while the iron is hot. That’s the business world.”
None of us had anything to add to that. The break in the conversation gave me time to think, not for the first time, that I was happy I worked mostly in the animal world.
Expertly navigating the lull, Mama steered the talk to her favorite topic, my marital prospects. “Betty, you’ve got to do something extra special with Mace’s hair for Saturday. Weddings are fertile fields for romance. Maybe Carlos will pop the question once he sees Sally and me tying the knot.”
All of a sudden, I was fed up. The dresses. The hair. Mama’s constant meddling. Not to mention the assumption that Carlos was the one dragging his feet. I slammed my People onto the purple chair beside me.
“Let’s put aside for the moment that seeing you get married for the FIFTH time might have just the opposite effect on Carlos, Mama. And on me. Have you given a bit of thought to the fact I might want to be certain things are right between us before I run off to the altar? I mean, I don’t want a long string of ruined marriages, like some women I could mention.”
Mama Gets Hitched Page 6
