by Donna Ball
After all, Easter only came once a year.
“Whose turn is it this year?” Lindsay asked as she got out of the car. “Methodist or Baptist?”
Each year the respective pastors of the competing churches took turns delivering the holiday sermons—one at Easter, and the other at Christmas. “Methodist, I think,” replied Bridget. She adjusted the hem of her pink bouclé skirt and straightened the short matching jacket before reaching back inside the car. “Ida Mae, hand me the cinnamon rolls and I’ll take them over to the table.”
She hurried off across the lawn to the tables that were set up under green funeral home canopies. And Lori, dressed in a 1960s chiffon and velvet gored skirt and a smart little brocade peplum jacket (for which she had no doubt paid a fortune in California), offered Ida Mae her hand to help her out of the car. Ida Mae brushed it away. “Wow, this is fantastic,” Lori said, gazing around. “Is this the church you went to when you were a little girl, Ida Mae?”
Ida Mae scowled at her. “What am I, two hundred years old? Use your brain, child.”
Noah looked miserable in a starched white shirt, clean jeans, shined loafers—with socks—and a dark blue tie. “It’s cold,” he said, hunching his shoulders. “Whoever heard of going to church in the middle of the night, anyhow?”
Cici said mildly, “I told you to wear your blazer.”
“That’s a sissy coat.”
“It’s a gentleman’s coat,” corrected Lindsay.
“Are we going to stay for the Easter egg hunt?” Lori wanted to know, and Noah rolled his eyes.
“That’s for little kids,” he said.
“Well, they’re fun to watch. Sometimes it’s nice to remember when you were a little kid.”
“I got a ham in the oven,” Ida Mae warned.
Lindsay, watching Noah’s face, said, “Come on, let’s find our seats.”
The sun tipped the mountaintop with gold and streaked the sky with cerulean and pink while the choir sang hallelujahs. The good Reverend Mitchell delivered a sermon of warmth and hope while the good Reverend Holland sat on his right, beaming beneficently. Ghost tendrils of mist drifted across the lawn, interlaced with the aroma of coffee as the Ladies Aid Society got busy under the tents. And as the final benediction was declared and the swells of the final hymn faded in echoes across the valley, the gentle rose light of morning burst over the ruins of the old church and the gaily dressed crowd spread across the baby green grass, bonnets nodding like daffodils in the breeze.
Bridget sighed happily as the service ended. “Easter is my favorite holiday of the year.”
Cici grinned and slipped her arm through Bridget’s. “Every holiday is your favorite.”
They made their way toward the canopies and the coffee, high heels catching a little in the soft grass. They waved to Mag gie, who was Farley’s sister-in-law and the real estate agent who had sold them their house. They called a greeting to their banker and to their plumber, and to Jonesie and his wife. One of the obvious advantages of attending both the Methodist and the Baptist churches was that they knew almost everyone in town.
“Remember when we used to get all dressed up in our little white gloves and patent leather shoes and hats with ribbons and have our pictures taken downtown in our Easter outfits?”
Cici nodded at the memory. “Remember that horrid plastic Easter basket grass that used to get all over the house? I’d still be vacuuming it up at Christmas.”
“Remember those little yellow marshmallow chickens?”
Lindsay broke in. “Remember when we didn’t used to say ‘remember’ all the time?”
Noah said, jerking at his tie, “I’m gonna wait in the car.”
Lindsay watched him go, her expression sobering, but she didn’t try to stop him. “Did you ever stop to wonder,” she said after a moment, “how different your lives might have been—or your children’s lives—without Easter baskets and birthday cakes and crazy old Aunt Ruth at Thanksgiving dinner and all the things that come with growing up in a family?”
Bridget slipped her arm from Cici’s and draped it around Lindsay’s shoulders, giving her a brief understanding hug. “Like a new outfit for the first day of school.”
“And someone to make you write thank-you notes,” added Cici. “My mother used to make me crazy, insisting I do that, but now I realize it wasn’t so much the note that was important as the feeling of connection that came with writing it. It made me remember the people who loved me.”
“Exactly,” agreed Lindsay quietly. “And who would we be today, any of us, if we had never known the people who loved us?”
Cici glanced over her shoulder to catch sight of Noah, head down and hands in pockets, headed toward the car. Then she caught the flash of color and light that was Lori, dancing in and out of the crowd, laughing and chatting with people she barely knew, her skirt billowing as she sank down to help a child with his Easter basket. She looked back to Lindsay.
“Maybe,” she said quietly, “we’d have problems trusting people because we’d never known anything but betrayal.”
“And maybe we’d prefer to live in a shack in the woods than in a room with a private bath, because we’d be too afraid to get attached to anything permanent,” added Bridget with understanding softening the sorrow in her voice. “Oh, bless his heart.”
“And we’d be very, very careful not to make ourselves vulnerable to anyone or anything,” said Lindsay, “because we would know how much it hurts to lose something once you start caring about it.”
“We can’t do anything about his past, honey,” Cici reminded her. “All we can do is try to make up for it as best we can now.”
Lindsay said simply, “I only hope it’s enough.”
Priscilla (“but call me Prissy, everyone does”) Holland was a diminutive, silver-haired woman with a soft, girlish voice that perfectly suited her frame. She was dwarfed by her husband, a broad, genial man with thinning white hair and a florid face. Though he was a man of few words, his voice boomed when he spoke.
“Oh, I just admire you girls so much,” Prissy was saying. “What you’ve done with this old house, will you just look at that staircase? And don’t you just love the big old windows, but however do you manage to keep them clean? I’ve always wanted to see the inside of the place, but old Mr. Blackwell wasn’t very sociable, was he, Stewart?”
“You have a beautiful home, ladies,” Reverend Holland responded. “And you’re very gracious to have us. Something smells mighty good from that kitchen, too.”
But Prissy went on in her soft, happy, breathless way, “And I just can’t believe Ida Mae is still here and cooking for you! Isn’t that just the most wonderful thing? Christmas just wouldn’t be the same without one of her fruitcakes. They always make me think of my grandma. There’s something so old-fashioned about a fruitcake at Christmas, isn’t there? When I was a little girl I can remember mounds of flour and spices and all that chopped fruit spread out over the big wood kitchen table . . .”
Cici exchanged a look with Bridget over the small woman’s head. “Wouldn’t you like to see the upstairs? Lindsay, why don’t you show the Hollands around while Bridget and I see what we can do to help Ida Mae in the kitchen?”
After a time the sound of Prissy Holland’s voice became like sweet background music to which no one really listened but everyone enjoyed. By the time they led their guests to the dining room, the ladies had learned when to interrupt and when to let the music flow into conversational lapses.
The Easter table was spectacular. The wine stain had been removed from the white damask tablecloth through some miracle of baking soda and lemon juice. A three-tiered silver candelabra bearing a dozen snow-white candles sent sparks of light dancing across every glass, plate, spoon, and mirror in the room, and a mild breeze billowed the lace curtains at the open window. The ham, beautifully browned and glistening with honey glaze, rested on a bed of fresh parsley and red spiced apple rings, and was surrounded—in homage to a tradition only I
da Mae understood and would not deign to explain—by bright yellow deviled eggs sprinkled with paprika. Bowls of garden-fresh peas and carrots, roasted new potatoes, and fluffy sweet potato casserole flanked the ham platter, accompanied by buttered corn from the freezer, a pineapple-cheese casserole that was Ida Mae’s specialty, and a basket of fragrant homemade rolls. The table was set with Cici’s Haviland china and Bridget’s Baccarat crystal and starched white linen napkins. At each place setting was a bright yellow daffodil in a silver bud vase, courtesy of Lindsay’s collection.
After all, having the preacher to dinner was not something that happened every day.
Noah appeared at the table on time, still dressed in his white shirt and looking unhappy about it, but Lori was nowhere to be found. “It’s not like her to be late for a meal.” Cici cast an apologetic look at Lindsay, who had spent the entire trip home from sunrise services threatening dire consequences if both of them weren’t on their best behavior. “Maybe I’d better—”
“Oh, my, have you ever in your life seen anything so lovely?” intoned Prissy. “Why it’s just like a fairy tale. Everything’s so gorgeous, and all those flowers! You ladies certainly do have a flair, and will you just look at all that food—”
“Did you all invite somebody else to Easter dinner?” Ida Mae, her church dress covered by a frilly print apron, shouldered her way through the swinging door with a gravy boat in her hand. Her tone held a note of outrage at the mere thought they might have invited guests without telling her. “Because a truck just pulled up.”
“A truck?” Cici started toward the window. “I can’t imagine—”
Prissy went on, “My mama used to make a Coca-Cola ham every Easter. Have ya’ll ever heard of that? It’s the sugar in Coca-Cola—”
“Dear Lord in heaven.” The voice of her husband boomed off the walls and rattled the china. Prissy stopped speaking. Then, following the big man’s lead, they all bowed their heads as he intoned, “We thank Thee for the bounty of this table and for the good hands that prepared it . . .”
Seats were found, and napkins were unfolded. Prissy was saying, “I just can’t tell you what a treat this is, to be in your lovely home and sitting down to such a lovely meal. Now, Noah, don’t you agree? You are such a lucky young man, aren’t you? And you look so handsome today, doesn’t he Stewart? Will you have a roll?”
Bridget was gently nudging Noah to straighten his posture when Lori burst through the swinging doors, flushed and a little breathless, juggling a long, flat box in her arms.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know you’d already gone into dinner,” she said. “Hi, Reverend Holland, Mrs. Holland. I don’t mean to interrupt. That was Jonesie who just left. I asked him to, well, to drop something off.”
Lindsay’s smile was a little stiff. “Couldn’t it wait, Lori?”
Cici eyed the box with some trepidation. “What, exactly, did you ask Jonesie to drop off ?”
Lori beamed. “Your Easter surprise!”
As a corner of the box shifted in her arms, Lori dipped quickly to right it, unsettling the lid in the process. When an alarming scratching and chittering issued forth, Cici half rose from her chair.
“Lori, what on earth—”
But even as she spoke the box slipped further, tilting toward the floor. Then the lid slid off and a veritable ocean of tiny yellow cheeping balls of fluff spilled out.
“Chickens!” gasped Bridget.
Like a miniature yellow tide, baby chicks swarmed over the dining room floor, chirping and bobbing and darting this way and that. Prissy squealed as tiny claws scrambled over her feet. “Whoa! Call the Colonel!” Noah exclaimed, jumping to his feet. Ida Mae came through the swinging doors just then with a pitcher of iced tea, and a stream of chicks escaped into the kitchen before Cici could cry, “Ida Mae, the door!”
As Ida Mae disappeared behind the swinging doors and returned seconds later with a broom, Lori got down on her knees and tried to scoop the chicks back into the box, but they hopped out again as soon as she replaced them. Bridget tried to shoo them into the box with napkins while Ida Mae used the broom to block them from scurrying under the buffet, and Noah, enjoying himself, stuffed baby chicks into his pockets. The Reverend Holland, with his hands planted firmly on either side of his plate as though for security, clucked his tongue and murmured, “My, my,” while his wife, with her heels drawn up securely on the chair rung and her eyes big, said nothing at all. “For heaven’s sake, Lori, how many are there?” Cici exclaimed.
“A hundred and forty-four.” Lori stretched across the floor to scoop up an armful of cheeping fluff. She looked a little desperate. All three women stared at her, momentarily abandoning the reconnaissance effort. “A hundred and forty-four chickens?”
“You’re gonna need a bigger box,” Ida Mae said, flatly.
She thrust the broom into Cici’s hand and disappeared into the pantry.
Half an hour later, having tracked down baby chicks under the stove, behind the china cabinet, in the cabinets, and under the table, all were present and accounted for and safely contained inside a deep cardboard box from which they could not escape. Cici and Bridget helped Lori carry the box into the kitchen while Ida Mae stayed behind to pluck feathers from the dining room rug and Lindsay, pretending a savoir faire she could not possibly feel, tried to get Easter dinner back on track.
Cici collapsed into a ladder-back chair, and for the longest moment seemed incapable of doing anything but staring at her daughter. “A hundred and forty-four?” she said, again.
“There are two more boxes on the porch.”
“But . . . Lori!” Now it was Bridget’s turn to stare as she searched for words. “A hundred and forty-four! Chickens!”
“They were twelve dozen for a hundred dollars,” Lori said defensively. “We would have paid a lot more if we’d just bought a dozen.”
“We?” repeated Cici. “We?”
“But . . .” Bridget gestured helplessly. “I don’t understand. What . . . why . . . chickens?”
Lori spread her hands in a sincere gesture of apology. “I really didn’t mean to ruin Easter dinner, honestly, and I never would have brought them inside if I’d realized everyone was at the table, but Jonesie stopped by early—he had to go to his mother-in-law’s for dinner—and . . .”
“Lori,” Cici said. “The point.”
She took a breath, the spark of irrepressible excitement creeping back into her eyes, and declared, “The way to success in business is to reinvest your profit. Donald Trump or someone said that. So we’re taking our profit from the sheep and investing it in chickens. Our new business!”
There was absolute silence.
Ida Mae came through the swinging doors with a dustpan scattered with yellow chicken fluff. A scattering of laughter and Prissy’s melodic chatter filtered in from the dining room, signaling that all was not lost on that end, but neither Cici nor Bridget turned her head. “Ya’ll gonna eat?” Ida Mae demanded. “Food’s getting cold.”
They ignored her. “Where are they going to live?” Bridget asked. “What are you going to feed them? Don’t baby chicks have to have special food?”
Ida Mae shook the dustpan out in the trash can. “You’re gonna need an incubator, least till they get bigger.”
Lori looked at her in surprise. “An incubator? Jonesie didn’t say anything about that.”
“Everybody knows that,” Ida Mae returned with a touch of exasperation. “Reckon you could rig one up with a woodbox and some lightbulbs, though.”
“Lori, don’t you realize these chickens aren’t going to stay this size forever?” Cici demanded. “Do you have any idea how much room a hundred and forty-four chickens need?”
“We’ll build them a coop,” Lori assured her.
“A coop? For a hundred and forty-four chickens, we’re going to need a commercial chicken house!”
“Not to mention the work,” added Bridget. “I don’t know how to tell you this, but chickens make a mess!”
“Exactly,” returned Lori, pleased. “And do you know how much chicken manure costs?”
“No,” admitted Bridget, “but I do know how it smells.”
“It’s a high-nitrogen fertilizer,” Lori explained, “great for the garden. And we get it for free! But that’s not even the best part.”
“I’m so glad,” murmured Cici.
“Cage-free eggs!” Lori declared. “They’re over three dollars a dozen in the grocery! All we have to do is hook up with a distributor—”
“Who’ll take half the profit.”
“Which still leaves us with $1.50 a dozen, and if each chicken gives a dozen eggs a day—”
“Ain’t no chicken alive gonna give you a dozen eggs a day,” Ida Mae pointed out sourly. “It takes fourteen hours of sunlight a day for a laying hen if you want to get just one egg. It also takes a rooster. You got any roosters in there?”
For the first time, Lori looked nonplussed. She turned to the box. “Well . . . I don’t know. But I’m sure . . .”
“Lori, didn’t you do any research at all before you spent a hundred dollars on chickens?” Cici could not quite keep the incredulity out of her voice.
Lori’s chin went up in a gesture that was remarkably reminiscent of her mother. “Of course I did! For one thing, these aren’t just ordinary chickens. They’re Rhode Island Reds—show chickens! They’ve won all kinds of awards. And show chickens, I’ll have you know, can go for up to a thousand dollars a piece.”
Bridget’s eyebrows arched. “Where did you hear that? From Jonesie?”
“No,” Lori admitted, looking uncomfortable. “Noah.”
Ida Mae sniffed. “Rhode Island Reds are common as dirt. Fine chicken, but if I ever met a man who’d pay a thousand dollars for one I’d sell him my worn-out stockings next.”
