Elaine Hussey - The Oleander Sisters

And poor Jim. She couldn’t endure thinking about him right now. If an intimate family dinner could render him speechless and wrecked, what would a public outing do?

When the dining room was clear of everybody except the two of them, she turned to Larry.

“I’m sorry, darling.”

“Let’s just eat dessert and get out of here,” he said. “I knew it would turn out this way.”

“Beulah and Sweet Mama didn’t mean any harm. Really. They’re just getting on in years and set in their ways.”

“Thank God I don’t have to contend with my family.”

Why not? Emily didn’t dare ask, not after Larry’s humiliation at the hands of her family.

“I’ll make it up to you later, Larry. I promise.”

She led him onto the front porch where Sweet Mama smiled up from her rocking chair, Andy looked like an angel and Sis served up Amen cobbler on china plates. The moon hung low over the water, casting silvery patches on the porch floor. It was the kind of clear summer night that made you think there was nothing bad in this world that couldn’t be fixed.

* * *

Late that night, Sis sat on the front porch in the dark alone, heavy with the feeling that something awful was happening to someone she loved. It couldn’t be Jim. He’d been in his room ever since he left the table tonight without dessert. But Sis doubted he was sleeping, and even if he were, his slumber was unlikely to be peaceful.

And it couldn’t be Sweet Mama or Beulah. She’d checked before she came onto the porch. If they were bothered about goading Larry because he’d shirked his military duty, you couldn’t tell by the way they rested on their backs with their snores rattling the windowpanes. Had their bluntness been deliberate or was it old age? Didn’t they know if you prodded a coiled snake it would strike back?

Sis jumped up from the swing, her sister suddenly so strongly on her mind she wanted to race inside and call her. Sis walked to a patch of moonlight on the porch and peered at her watch. It was after midnight, far too late to call Emily and say, Are you okay? Did Larry punish you for what happened at dinner? Sis had no doubt he would. A man who would reduce his fiancée to tears over a dinner invitation would use any excuse to exert his power over her.

Or would he do worse?

Sis paced the porch until she was so tired she thought she’d fall over. Easing through the front door, she tiptoed upstairs, got into pajamas and fell into bed. But her sleep was restless, broken by nightmares and the helpless feeling of being chased and unable to run.

When the morning light pinked her windowpanes, she sat up in bed with a headache so fierce she didn’t know how she’d begin her daily routine, much less get through it with a shred of compassion. Just this once she wished she could wake up in bed with a good man who would say, Honey, you rest. I’ll take care of everything.

She eased out of bed, tiptoed to the bathroom, then downed two aspirins and waited. When the jackhammers in her head subsided, she went back into her bedroom and picked up the phone. Emily answered on the first ring.

“Em, you sound funny. Are you all right?”

“Just a little tired is all, Sis. Too much excitement.”

“I’m sorry about the way dinner turned out. Was Larry mad?”

“He was a little upset, that’s all. What man wouldn’t be? But after I talked to him, he was fine.”

“You’re sure?”

“Oh, for Pete’s sake, Sis. Let it alone. Andy’s downstairs dragging out more boxes and I’ve got to get to the café to put together an order list. I’m going to need more supplies for the wedding petit fours.”

Sis hung up, still hoping there wouldn’t be a wedding. But she had the sinking feeling that she was riding on a train that had already left the station. It didn’t matter how hard she yelled, Stop! Let’s all get off. They were going to end up listening to Emily pledge Till death do us part to a man they all considered a coward.

The aroma of coffee and bacon coming from the kitchen told Sis she’d better get moving. She dressed quickly, then went to Jim’s room and knocked.

“Come in.” He was sitting at his window wearing the white dress shirt she didn’t know if he’d slept in or worn during an all-night vigil with the moon or put on again this morning.

An unbearable tenderness came over Sis, and she sank into the only other chair in the room, the one at his desk where the encyclopedia was open at C for compass. Or was it compassion? Did the encyclopedia tell you that compassion was not something you searched for, but a feeling you carried in your heart whether you knew it or not, one so powerful it could render you speechless?

Sis studied the slump of her brother’s shoulders, the blond hair grown too long and straggling down the back of his neck, the hollow in his cheek as he tilted his head toward the view beyond the window.

“I thought you might want to go down to breakfast with me.”

“Yeah, Sis. The family dinner went so well.”

The flash of sarcasm gave Sis hope that the Jim of old was somewhere inside those baggy clothes.

“Did you see the look on his face when Beulah talked about 4F-ers?” she said.

“It would have been funny if Em weren’t fixing to marry him.”

“Well, she is, and there’s not a thing either of us can do about it except carry on.”

“You carry on, Sis.” He turned his back to her and stared out the window.

Sis sat there awhile, undecided, and then she went downstairs to brace herself with a cup of coffee. A day that had started off so badly was bound to get worse.

The scene in the kitchen stopped her cold. Sweet Mama was sitting at the kitchen table with her hat on. It wasn’t a garden hat, which might have made sense if she’d been working outside and just forgot to take it off. It was a wide-brimmed white Panama with a virtual flower garden on the brim, red and pink peonies the size of saucers with a big blue feather spouting out from the bouquet.

Beulah looked up from the coffeepot and lowered a look at Sis that said Don’t you say a word.

Sis hurried to the cabinet and turned her back to hide her dismay. She took her time selecting a mug from the array that had collected over the years. She selected one with Alabama the Beautiful from a long-ago trip to Natural Bridge. Then she stood there just holding on, wishing the grandmother wearing the flower garden hat was still the same strong woman who had loaded Beulah and her grandchildren into the car for a three-hundred-mile trip in spite of the fact that she’d had to fight for Beulah every step of the way.

When Sis had regained composure, she went to the pot and poured her coffee.

“We having a garden party in here.” Beulah smiled at her. “Where’s your hat?”

Sis grabbed her garden hat off the peg by the back door and sat down to have breakfast. Carrying on.

Still, wearing a hat at a battered old table for a nonexistent garden party would be mild compared to the facade she’d have to wear once she got to the café. How she would ever get through the petit fours and the cheese balls, not to mention the wedding madness that had overtaken the regulars, Sis didn’t know.

Sometimes she wished she could hole up in her room like her brother while Beulah trekked up the stairs with sweet tea and sympathy.

Six

EMILY DIDN’T KNOW WHAT was wrong with Sis. Ever since their talk about having her wedding in the garden, she’d been snappish and forgetful. It had gotten worse since that awful dinner with Larry, and that was more than a week ago.

Yesterday Sis forgot to order coffee with chicory, and she still hadn’t brought those polka-dot sunglasses she’d promised Andy last week.

Still, nothing could mar Emily’s happiness. The cheese balls for her reception were in the refrigerator, the petit fours decorated with pink icing were rapidly piling up in the chest freezer in the pantry and she was going to do one last campout with her son before the wedding.