Текст книги "Spring Fever"

Автор книги: Mary Kay Andrews

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Текущая страница: 27 (всего у книги 29 страниц)

52

The kitchen table was set with placemats and blue and white checked napkins and blue glass water goblets. A perky bouquet of daisies in a red bowl sat in the center of the table, and tall white taper candles burned from blue glass candleholders.

Mason stood at the stove, long-handled fork poised over a cast-iron skillet full of frying chicken, while Annajane sat at a high stool at the counter, preparing the salad.

Sophie came clomping into the kitchen and her eyes widened. She was wearing a pink ballet tutu over her purple pajamas and pink cowboy boots. “Are we having a party?” She climbed up on the stool beside Annajane’s and plunked down a picture book, some paper, and a box of crayons.

“Yep,” Mason said. “It’s a Friday-night party. And you’re invited.”

“Who else?” Sophie asked, noticing that the table was set for three.

“Just us,” Mason said. “It’s a very exclusive gathering. We used to have Friday-night parties a lot when I was your age, Soph. It was the only time my daddy ever cooked. And he only knew how to cook one thing, so we always had fried chicken.”

“I don’t like fried chicken,” Sophie said, her eyes sparkling behind the thick glasses. “I love it!”

“Me, too,” Annajane said. “How about we start the party with a cocktail?”

“For me?” Sophie looked puzzled.

“It’s a kiddie cocktail,” Annajane explained. She took a plastic highball tumbler from the cupboard. She poured in a couple inches of Quixie, added a splash of ginger ale, then topped it with a maraschino cherry before presenting it to the child. “Ta-da!”

“Mmm,” Sophie took a delicate sip. “Am I allowed to have Quixie?”

“In very small amounts,” Mason said. “For very special occasions. Like tonight.”

Annajane reached over and picked up the well-loved picture book. By her own estimation she had read The Runaway Bunny to Sophie at least a couple hundred times. The edges of the board book were dog-eared, and the cover bore a couple of purple crayon doodles, but nothing had ever diminished Sophie’s love for her favorite book.

Sophie picked up her crayons now and began to draw on the sheaf of printer paper she’d borrowed from Mason’s office.

“Whatcha drawing?” Annajane asked, looking over.

“I’m ill-luss-stra-ting,” Sophie said proudly, drawing out the word. “Miss Ramona lets us make new illustrations for books in school. This is my homework. I’m illustrating The Runaway Bunny.”

The child’s pink glasses slipped down her nose as she bent over her picture, painstakingly drawing a very small bunny. She glanced over at Annajane. “In school, Miss Ramona reads the stories to us while we draw.”

“Then allow me,” Annajane said, putting her paring knife down, pushing away the salad bowl and the wooden cutting board, and picking up the book.

“Once there was a little bunny who wanted to run away,” Annajane read. “So he said to his mother, ‘I am running away.’”

Mason flipped the pieces of chicken over in the pan and covered it loosely with the lid. He stepped behind Annajane and, looking over her shoulder, read, “‘If you run away,’ said his mother, ‘I will run after you. For you are my little bunny.’”

Sophie poked out the tip of her tongue as she concentrated on drawing the rabbit’s ears. “I would never run away from my mama, if I was the little bunny,” she commented, filling in the middle of the rabbit’s orange ears with a brown crayon.

“Even if it was just a game, like hide-and-seek, like we play sometimes?” Mason asked.

“No,” Sophie said solemnly. “If I had a mama, I would never, ever run away.”

Annajane glanced over at Mason, who looked stricken. “Sophie,” he said gently. “Remember, you do actually have a mama. I told you that, remember?”

Sophie continued coloring, using a gray crayon to draw a lumpy version of the rabbit’s body. “My real mama’s name is Kristy. She lives in Florida now, and she loved me a lot, but she couldn’t take care of me, so she asked my daddy to take care of me.” Her voice was singsongy, but matter-of-fact.

“You’re killin’ me here,” Mason muttered. “You know, Sophie, when you came here to live with me, I decided I would be your daddy and your mama for a while. Then I asked Letha if she would come and help take care of you while I’m working. And your aunt Pokey helped out, too, and also Annajane. So you’re a lucky girl, because you have lots of people to love and help take care of you, instead of just one mama.”

Sophie looked up at him thoughtfully. “The runaway bunny only needed one mama. The kids in school all have one mama. Except Lucy. She has two mamas. And Clayton and Denning and Petey all have one mama—Aunt Pokey. That’s all I need, too.”

Annajane and Mason exchanged worried looks, but Sophie, who knew the book by heart, was already onto her next illustration, drawing a fish, swimming in a stream. “Read some more, please,” she told Annajane.

So Annajane read, “‘If you become a fish in a trout stream,’ said his mother, ‘I will become a fisherman and I will fish for you.’”

Sophie gave the fish a green body and a yellow tail and a red dorsal fin. She drew wavy blue lines to represent the blue trout stream, and beside the stream she drew a stick figure with long brown hair, wearing a dress and red high heels, holding a fishing pole.

“Who is that?” Mason asked, tapping the figure in the picture.

“That’s the mama,” Sophie said, rolling her eyes at her father’s ignorance. “Duh.”

“But she doesn’t look like a bunny fisherman,” Mason said.

“This mama is a real lady. Like Annajane,” Sophie said. “See, she has brown hair like Annajane.”

“And red shoes,” Annajane added. “I have a pair of red shoes that look like that.”

Mason wrapped his arms around Sophie. “We were thinking, Annajane and me, that when we get married, Annajane will be my wife. And she’ll be your mama. Your only mama. What do you think of that idea, Soph?”

“We’re not gonna marry Celia, right?” Sophie asked, adding a pink bow to her fisherwoman’s hair.

“Nope. Celia and I decided that wouldn’t be a good idea, because I love Annajane best,” Mason said.

“Letha said Celia is gone for good this time,” Sophie said.

“That’s probably true,” Mason conceded.

“We should marry Annajane,” Sophie said, without hesitation.

Mason left one arm around Sophie, and put the other around Annajane’s shoulder. “I think so, too. Definitely.”

“See?” Sophie said, as if that settled it. She put the fish drawing aside and started on another one. “Keep reading, please.”

Annajane read the next few pages, and Sophie’s crayon flew over her paper. At one point, she looked up at Annajane. “What’s a crocus? And why do they have a hidden garden?”

“I guess they have a hidden garden because the little bunny and the mother bunny are playing hide-and-go-seek,” Annajane said, leafing ahead in the book. “And a crocus is a little flower that comes up from the ground in very early spring,” Annajane said. “We can look online and find a picture of one, if you want.”

“No, that’s okay,” Sophie said, reaching for another sheet of paper and drawing a daisy. “Keep going.”

So Annajane read on, about the baby bunny morphing into a rock, then a bird, and a sailboat, and even a trapeze artist.

Mason hovered over his stove, adjusting the heat under the skillet and putting a pot of peeled potatoes on to boil. He poured a glass of wine for himself and one for Annajane, who nodded her thanks and kept reading aloud.

Near the end of the book, Sophie put her crayon down and sighed dramatically. “I hate this part,” she announced.

“Why?” Annajane asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.

Did Sophie resent the fact that she didn’t have a real mother like the bunny in the book? Or had she been dwelling on the fact that her own mother had, in a way, run away from her? Maybe they should think about having Sophie see a child psychologist. Especially since at some point, before Sophie got too much older, they would need to explain the complicated story behind her real father as well as her real mother.

“Yeah, Soph,” Mason said, placing his hands protectively on the little girl’s shoulders. “Do you hate this part of the story because you’re sad about the runaway bunny and his mama?”

“No,” Sophie said, frowning down at her picture. “I hate this part because I can’t draw a tightrope walker, like the one in the book.” She looked up at Mason. “You draw it.”

“Hmm.” Mason picked up a crayon and sketched a brown rope, and then added an extremely detailed sketch of a little girl with eyeglasses and blond curls, wearing a pink tutu with a pink pocketbook slung over her arm and one dainty foot placed on the rope, the other poised above it. “How’s that?”

“It’s me!” Sophie breathed. “You drew me!”

“Not bad,” Annajane said, regarding Mason with new respect. “I didn’t know you could draw that well.”

“I am a man of many talents,” Mason said, bowing first to Sophie and then to Annnajane.

“Draw the next one,” Sophie ordered. “The one with the bunny turning into a little boy and running inside the house.”

Mason glanced over at the stove. “Can’t,” he said. “My dinner is just about ready. I’ve got to get my potatoes mashed. Are you two almost finished reading your book?”

“Almost,” Sophie said, glancing over at the book. “Read the end, Annajane. That’s my favorite part.”

Annajane liked the ending, too. “‘If you become a little boy and run into a house … I will become a mother and catch you in my arms and hug you.’”

She stood and folded Sophie into her arms. Sophie wriggled contentedly and picked up her cue like a seasoned pro, reading in an uncannily baby-bunny-sounding voice.

“‘Shucks,’ said the bunny. ‘I might just as well stay where I am and be your little bunny.’”

“Come on, you two,” Mason called, dumping his mashed potatoes into a serving bowl. “My dinner is getting cold. Annajane, you need to finish making that salad.”

“In a minute,” Annajane said. She knew the last two lines of the book by heart. As did Sophie.

“‘And so he did,’” Sophie said.

Annajane reached into the salad bowl and snagged one of the vegetables she’d been cutting up.

“‘“Have a carrot,” said the mother bunny.’”

Sophie took the proffered carrot and munched happily. “The end,” she announced.

*   *   *

Annajane’s cell phone rang just as she was wiping the skillet clean with a paper towel. Sophie had gone to bed, and they’d been discussing whether or not to watch a movie. She looked down at the caller ID. “It’s your mother,” she told Mason. “I didn’t even know she knew I had a cell phone.”

“This can’t be good,” he said. “Don’t answer.”

“I can’t not answer when Sallie calls me,” Annajane said. She punched the Connect button.

“Hi, Sallie,” she said brightly. “This is a surprise.”

“I’m sure it is,” Sallie drawled. “Annajane dear, I was wondering if you could come over to Cherry Hill tomorrow morning for a little chat.”

Annajane put her hand over the phone and lip-synched to Mason, “She wants to see me.”

Mason shook his head vigorously. “Tell her no. Tell her hell no.”

“Well, um, let me think what my morning is like,” Annajane said, stalling for time, fishing for an excuse.

“I won’t take up much of your time,” Sallie said. “Just a quick little visit.”

Put like that, she couldn’t very well decline, Annajane thought.

“What time?” she asked.

“Ten would be perfect,” Sallie said.

“Perfect,” Annajane said gloomily.

53

They discussed the visit to Cherry Hill until midnight, right up until the moment Annajane reluctantly got in her car to drive “home” to the Pinecone Lodge.

“You do not have to go over there tomorrow,” Mason said, his lips lingering at her collarbone. “She can’t just call you up and issue a command performance.”

“I’m going,” Annajane murmured, her arms wrapped around his waist.

“She’s still mightily pissed about me breaking up with Celia,” Mason said. “Even after I told her about the fake pregnancy.”

“And she’s just as mightily pissed at me for marrying you years ago—and agreeing to marry you again,” Annajane said.

“Which is why you should politely decline,” Mason said.

“Nope,” Annajane kissed him one last time. “I’m not running away from your mother anymore. I’m here to stay, and she can just like it or lump it.”

*   *   *

In the bright light of Saturday morning, Annajane began to doubt the wisdom of a visit to the lioness in her own den. But it was too late to back out now. She played various scenarios over and over again in her head, planning a strong, assertive, take-no-crap offensive against Sallie Bayless.

She dressed carefully for the occasion, but not in the clothes she might formerly have worn for an audience with her mother-in-law. This time, she wore what she’d wear any other Saturday morning around town: a pair of red cotton capris, a red and white striped oxford-cloth shirt, an off-white cable-knit sweater, and a pair of navy-blue skimmers.

After she rang the doorbell at Cherry Hill, she repeated her mantra under her breath, as she’d done countless times on the drive over. “She is not the boss of me.”

Annajane heard footsteps approaching from the other side of the heavy carved door. It swung open, and Sallie offered her a chilly smile. “Right on time. How nice.”

Sallie was dressed in what passed for casual wear for her: black slacks, a peach silk blouse, and a black cashmere sweater that was looped across her shoulders. “It’s such a beautiful morning; I thought we’d sit out in the sunroom.”

Annajane followed her down the wide, marble-tiled central hall and out through a set of tall french doors onto the sunporch. She hadn’t been out here since the divorce, but she doubted that anything had changed in five years. The room stretched the length of the back of the old house, with large, arched windows that gave a stunning view of the back garden and pool area. The floors were made of muted pink and gray brick pavers that had come out of the old smokehouse on the property, and the ceiling was high, with thick cypress beams. Fringy potted palms and ferns filled the corners of the room, which was furnished with comfortably battered white-painted wicker with flowered cushions. A ceiling fan whirred lazily overhead.

Sallie seated herself on a high-backed wicker armchair and gestured for Annajane to sit on a matching armchair opposite hers. A silver tray on the wicker coffee table held a pitcher of iced tea.

“Tea?” Sallie asked, pouring a glass. “Or I could open a bottle of Quixie. Glenn always thought it was so cute how much you enjoyed the stuff.”

“Nothing for me, thanks,” Annajane said. “I do still love the taste of Quixie, but I try to limit myself to one a day, and I had one for breakfast already.”

“Oh,” Sallie said, looking faintly nauseated at the idea. “How sweet.”

Annajane looked uneasily at her surroundings, wondering how long it would take for Sallie to get down to brass tacks.

“The garden looks beautiful,” she said, looking out at the sweep of emerald lawn and the blooming flowerbeds. The turquoise of the swimming pool dazzled in the sunshine. It was a storybook setting, Annajane thought, as she had so many other times in the past.

Sallie waved away the compliment. “This is not our best spring. My tulips were anemic-looking, and, I swear, Nate’s gotten so old and blind I believe he mistook most of my perennials for weeds and dug them up back in the fall. But that’s not what I wanted to discuss with you today.”

Annajane steeled herself. “What did you want to discuss?”

“Family,” Sallie said, without hesitation. “I want to talk about my family. You know I love my children, unconditionally.”

“Of course,” Annajane murmured. Although she might have argued about the unconditional part. She’d seen how stingy Sallie could be with her affection if one of her children—especially Pokey—didn’t measure up to her impossible standards.

“I never thought you were the right kind of girl for Mason,” Sallie said flatly.

Wow, Annajane thought. Way to get the niceties out of the way.

“You’ve made that pretty clear over the years,” Annajane said.

“Glenn felt differently about you,” Sallie said. “He admired your ‘spunk,’ whatever that is.”

“Glenn was lovely to me,” Annajane said.

“And I … wasn’t.” Sallie reached under the cushion of her chair and brought out a pack of cigarettes and lit one. “Someday, if you ever have children of your own, Annajane, you’ll understand what it’s like, as a mother, to stand by and watch your child make a decision that you’re positive they will regret. And maybe you’ll understand why I treated you as I did.”

Annajane felt her face go hot. “When I have children, and they grow up, I hope I’ll trust their decision-making skills. Mason wasn’t a child when we fell in love and got married, Sallie. He was an adult, and he was fully capable of deciding the qualities he wanted in a wife.”

“Maybe,” Sallie said, conceding nothing. She inhaled and then exhaled a long plume of smoke through her nostrils, waving ineffectively at it. She got up and opened the glass door that led to the patio and pool area. A cool wind swept the room, sending the pale green fern fronds swaying. “Better,” she said to herself.

She gave Annajane an assessing look. “You know, you’re much more attractive than your mother ever was. Your features are softer; you wear your hair in a much more flattering style; and of course Ruth, bless her heart, never did know how to dress.”

For real? Annajane thought. She expects me to sit here and listen to her insult my mother?

“I disagree,” Annajane said. “Mama was much prettier than me at her age. She had a way better figure, and if she didn’t have the nicest clothes, well, that’s because her parents never had a lot of money.” She smiled. “It’s funny you should mention my mother. Do you know, just this week I came across an old Quixie recipe booklet that had a photo of her at a cookout. In the photo, they had her posed with a bottle of Quixie, and Glenn was standing there, too, with his arm around her. They looked like a real couple. Funny, I’d never seen that photo before.”

Sallie exhaled another stream of smoke, and her eyes narrowed. “Your mother never told you she dated Glenn?”

“No. She didn’t even want to admit it when I called her that night to ask about it.”

“I’m not surprised,” Sallie said. “It’s nothing to be proud of, stealing a friend’s man.”

That made Annajane laugh out loud. “Mama had a different perspective. She told me she went out with Glenn only a few times that summer, after he’d already broken up with you, but before my father got back from the army.”

“That is not how it happened,” Sallie said sharply. “Glenn and I were engaged to be engaged, and everybody knew it. But your mother had a huge crush on him. And why not? He was the best-looking boy in school, from the best family. He and I had some silly fight that spring, and I broke up with him. To get back at me, to make me jealous, he asked your mother to the prom. The biggest dance of the year, and I’d already bought my dress. Of course, Ruth knew all that, but she went with him anyway.”

“And you never forgave her, or me, by extension,” Annajane said. “She never forgave you, either, although she refuses to talk about her reasons.”

“I wouldn’t know either,” Sallie said airily. “Ruth was always full of spite. Your mother is not a happy person, Annajane.”

“Mama was in her early twenties when my father died. Driving a Quixie truck,” Annajane said, her tone mild, pleasant even. “She was widowed with a young toddler. She had to go back to night school to get a nursing degree so she could support us, and she worked days to pay for the tuition. She hasn’t exactly had an easy life.”

“Oh, yes,” Sallie said, rolling her eyes. “Here we go again, poor, poor Ruth Hudgens. The twice-widowed martyr with a chip on her shoulder the size of a two-by-four.”

“Knock it off, Sallie,” Annajane warned. “I’m used to your criticism, but I don’t have to sit here and listen to you ridiculing my mother.”

Sallie shrugged, unrepentant. “The point is, I knew what kind of girl your mother was, and I figured you’d be the same sort. I didn’t want that for Mason. And besides, you two came from two very different worlds.”

Annajane stood up. “Is there a point to all of this? Because if not, I can think of a more pleasant way to spend a Saturday morning.”

“I’m almost finished,” Sallie said. “Sit down, please.”

Annajane glanced at her wristwatch. “Five minutes. That’s how much more of my time you’ve got.”

Mason was right again. She shouldn’t have come. Despite all her best intentions, Sallie was getting to her yet again, needling, criticizing, and, yes, pushing her around. Annajane felt all the years of long-simmering resentment coming to a boil.

Sallie took a deep drag on her cigarette and flicked the ashes into the nearest potted palm. “All I wanted to do … all I wanted to say, is this: if you’re going to become a part of this family … again, I want you to stop trying to tear us apart. That’s it. In a nutshell.”

“I’m tearing your family apart?”

“You think I don’t know what you’ve been up to?” Sallie asked. “Pokey is furious with me over this mess with Celia, which she somehow thinks is my fault. Mason won’t return my phone calls. He actually has Voncile running interference for him. And just last night, Davis came over here and announced that he was selling his share of the business to Pokey and possibly moving away.” Sallie blinked rapidly, fighting back tears. Her voice cracked. “This is all your doing.”

Annajane was speechless. For nearly a minute.

“You are unbelievable,” she said, when she could finally gather her thoughts. “Me? Wreck your family? Let me clue you to the real world, Sallie, since you refuse to face it for yourself. Your daughter is furious with you because you let her know you don’t consider her children to be ‘real’ Baylesses. Also, you treat her like shit, always criticizing her clothes, or her weight, or her housekeeping, always letting her know she isn’t quite good enough.”

“I never!” Sallie said. “Pokey knows I love her. And if I’ve given her constructive criticism, she knows it’s because I want her to be the best she can be.”

“I don’t know what’s going on with Davis,” Annajane admitted. “It’s news to me that Pokey and Pete are going to buy him out. But it’s good news. He hasn’t been happy at Quixie in years, and it’s time for him to move on to something else if he doesn’t believe in the company anymore. Besides, if he leaves Passcoe and quits trying to prove what a hotshot he is, maybe he’ll finally grow up and become half the decent, compassionate, loyal man his father was and his brother is.”

“You have no right,” Sallie said, stubbing out her cigarette in the palm. “I want you to leave this house right now.”

“You asked me over here, and I listened to your bullshit, so now it’s my turn,” Annajane said. “Do you want to know why Mason won’t return your calls? Why he avoids coming over here like the plague? It’s because he’s tired of having you tell him how to live his life. You helped destroy our marriage, years ago, and then you came damned close to pushing him into marrying a pathological liar. Earlier this week, you as much as accused him of lying when he finally told you the truth about Sophie. A truth you already knew.”

“How dare you!” Sallie jumped up from her chair and stormed into the house. Annajane found her in the kitchen, unsteadily trying to open a bottle of wine.

“It’s not even noon yet,” Annajane observed, taking the corkscrew from her and applying it to the bottle herself. “But go ahead and have a snort. You’re gonna need it by the time I’ve had my say.” She took a goblet from the cupboard and poured the glass nearly to the brim.

Sallie gulped the wine, spilling some down the front of her blouse, a rare sight. “He had no right to tell those lies, to talk about his father that way,” she said.

“He’s telling the truth and you know it,” Annajane said. “Mason loved his dad, more than you’ll ever know. He loves you, too, which I don’t think you fully appreciate. That’s why he went down to Florida and brought Sophie back here after Glenn died. It’s why he adopted her, rather than let her be raised by strangers, and why he let everybody believe he’d cheated on me. He did it out of respect for you and Glenn, because he couldn’t stand the idea of a scandal. I don’t think he had any idea he’d fall in love with Sophie as quickly or as deeply as he did.”

Sallie took another gulp of wine. “This is unforgivable.”

“You knew all about the cheating, didn’t you?” Annajane asked. “You knew all about the other women, but it was convenient to look the other way, wasn’t it, Sallie?”

“I didn’t know anything,” Sallie said, unconvincingly.

“But you guessed.”

*   *   *

Sallie stared down into her wineglass. “The first time he cheated, I told myself it was just a slip. The children were so young; Pokey was still in diapers. He went to a ballgame in Chapel Hill for the weekend, and I stayed home with the children. When he came home, I just knew. The phone would ring at night, and if I picked up, she’d hang up.”

She gave Annajane a tremulous smile and fingered the pearls around her neck. “He bought me these, afterwards. And the phone calls stopped, and I told myself all was well. Until the next time. It was years later. He’d gone up to Virginia to visit Mason, when he was in boarding school up there. I think he was actually sleeping with one of the teachers. That went on for three or four years.”

“Why didn’t you have it out with him?” Annajane asked. “Threaten to leave him if he didn’t stop fooling around?”

“I didn’t want to leave him,” Sallie said. “I was in love with him. You knew Glenn. He was a good person. A wonderful father to our children. And so generous. He never denied me anything.”

“Except your self-respect.”

Sallie raised an eyebrow. “A highly overrated commodity, Annajane dear. We had a good marriage for a long time. It worked for us.”

“Until things changed,” Annajane said. “Like that last Christmas. The night of the company party.”

“It was outrageous behavior!” she said, her nostrils flaring. “Even for him. I waited up all night, wondering whether he and Mason were even alive. He came stumbling into our bedroom way after midnight, still drunk. And Glenn rarely got drunk. He stripped down to his underpants and fell into bed. I slept in the guest bedroom. In the morning, I found his clothes on the bathroom floor, where he’d left them. His clothes reeked of her perfume. That was a first. Before, he’d always been very careful to hide his … affairs. And then I went to unpack his overnight bag, to put the rest of his clothes in the laundry. I was emptying his pants pockets before I put them in the wash. He always left loose change and his pocketknife in his pockets, and I’ve ruined more than one load of laundry that way. But this time I found all that and a little bottle of blue pills I’d never seen before.”

“His heart medication?” Annajane asked.

“Sildenafil citrate. Ever hear of it? I hadn’t. I had to look it up on the Internet.” Sallie put the glass carefully down on the counter, then picked up a sponge to wipe down any traces of the spilled wine. “He’d gotten himself a prescription of Viagra so he could perform like the young stud he thought he was. He didn’t care if he couldn’t get it up for his wife,” she said bitterly. “But his girlfriends were a different story.”

Sallie opened the cupboard under the sink and brought out a bottle of spray cleaner. She sprayed the already-immaculate formica countertop, then wiped it briskly, using nearly half a roll of paper towels, while Annajane stood, transfixed, waiting to hear the rest of the story.

“You think I’m a bitch,” she told Annajane. “A mean, withered-up, spiteful old bitch.”

Annajane shrugged. “Mean and spiteful, yes. But not so withered up.”

That made Sallie laugh. “I spend a lot of money to look this good. I had a face-lift last year, did you know?”

“I wondered,” Annajane admitted. “You had it done down in Florida?”

“Yes. There’s a surgeon down there who does amazing work. I’m thinking of having a tummy tuck next. In fact, I’ve put in a contract on a little bungalow down in Palm Beach, and that’s where I’ll be wintering next year. I’m going to sell the Wrightsville Beach cottage. I never cared for it there anyway. It’s much nicer in Highlands, and most of my friends have places there. A much more interesting social scene.”

“Sounds like you won’t be spending much time in Passcoe,” Annajane said. “How long has this been in the works?”

“I’ve been thinking about it for a long time. And now, since I don’t have any ties to Quixie, well, there’s really no reason to stay around here. This house is beyond depressing. I’m only sixty-six, did you know that, Annajane? Glenn left me very well-fixed, so I intend to go out and live my life for myself now. Maybe even date. Who knows? I might even decide to remarry.”

“Go for it,” Annajane said. “But you were telling me about Glenn. About the day he died.”

“I put the Viagra bottle on the bathroom counter, right beside his shaving kit, and then I waited for him to wake up and find it,” Sallie said. “He came downstairs, still in his bathrobe. Glenn never left the bedroom unless he was fully dressed. It was a pet peeve of his.”

“I remember, Pokey always had to get dressed before she came downstairs, even on Saturday mornings,” Annajane said.

“I should have known he wasn’t feeling well,” Sallie said. “But I was so angry!”

“Did you confront him about the Viagra? About the woman he’d been with?”

“Eva. Her name was Eva,” Sallie said. “He said it was just a … mild flirtation. We had a fight. I told him I wouldn’t stand for being humiliated anymore. I asked him if he wanted a divorce, and he said no, of course not. He apologized, and I left shortly after that, to go to the country club for my bridge date. And when I got home,” she said, biting her lip. “He was on the floor, unconscious.” She opened a cookie jar on the counter and brought out yet another pack of cigarettes and a lighter. She lit a cigarette with trembling hands and blinked back tears.

“That’s a nice story,” Annajane said. “Too bad it’s not true.”

“You’re calling me a liar?” Sallie asked, her face deadpan.