Contemporary Women's Fiction: Agnes Hopper Shakes Up Sweetbriar (Humorous Women's Fiction)

P
RAISE FOR
A
GNES
H
OPPER
S
HAKES
U
P
S
WEETBRIAR

Carol Heilman has successfully combined her smooth Southern style with gentle fiction to create a cozy, neighborly read full of memorable characters with whom readers will fall in love.

~ Leanna Sain
Award-winning author of
Gate to Nowhere
,
Return to Nowhere, Magnolia Blossoms
, and
Wish

Written with a Southern flair,
Agnes Hopper Shakes Up Sweetbriar
is a captivating story about eccentric and irresistible characters who weave their lives together. Set in a small-town retirement home this book is filled with laughter, suspense, and wisdom. You will find yourself curled up with this page-turner, unable to put it down!

~ Judy Dearing
Author of
Chrissy’s Moments

Carol Heilman’s book makes you feel. I chuckled, I frowned, I was indignant, and I laughed out loud. I learned Southern colloquialisms and fell in love with some pretty outrageous characters. This is a story you cannot put down till it’s over.

~ Karin Wooten
Author of
Don’t Tap Dance in the Shower

When circumstances cause Agnes Marie Hopper to move into the local retirement home, Sweetbriar Manor, she ends up an unwitting sleuth, uncovering deception, embezzlement, abuse, and intrigue. Her independent and protective nature leads to confrontation and a moment of truth, even within her own heart. How Agnes becomes a heroine to the residents and to her special friend Smiley is a story that resonates with humor, intelligence, and a graceful flow of “southern speak,” the vocabulary and language of the South.

~ Ann Greenleaf Wirtz
Author of
The Henderson County Curb Market:
A Blue Ridge Heritage Since 1924,
Sorrow Answered, Chicken Soup for the Soul
,
and numerous articles and stories for
the
Times-News
and
The Pulse
.

AGNES HOPPER SHAKES UP SWEETBRIAR BY CAROL HEILMAN
Published by Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas
2333 Barton Oaks Dr., Raleigh, NC, 27614

ISBN 978-1941103265
Copyright © 2015 by Carol Heilman
Interior design by Karthick Srinivasan
Cover illustration by Dark Hues
Cover design by Third Stage Productions

Available in print from your local bookstore, online, or from the publisher at:
www.lighthousepublishingofthecarolinas.com

For more information on this book and the author visit:
http://www.carolheilman.com

All rights reserved. Non-commercial interests may reproduce portions of this book without the express written permission of Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas, provided the text does not exceed 500 words. When reproducing text from this book, include the following credit line: “
Agnes Hopper Shakes Up Sweetbriar
by Carol Heilman published by Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas. Used by permission.”

Commercial interests: No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by the United States of America copyright law.

Scripture quotations from The Authorized (King James) Version. Rights in the Authorized Version in the United Kingdom are vested in the Crown. Reproduced by permission of the Crown’s patentee, Cambridge University Press.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and incidents are all products of the author’s imagination or are used for fictional purposes. Any mentioned brand names, places, and trade marks remain the property of their respective owners, bear no association with the author or the publisher, and are used for fictional purposes only.

Brought to you by the creative team at
LighthousePublishingoftheCarolinas.com
:
Eddie Jones, Rowena Kuo, Andrea Merrell, and Brian Cross.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Heilman, Carol
Agnes Hopper Shakes Up Sweetbriar/Carol Heilman 1st ed.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my sister,
Bonnie Rae (1941-1980).

I
would first like to thank Edith and Charles Guthrie (Bo and Spiz), my mother and daddy. Mother loved me “warts and all” while Daddy thought I could do no wrong. They inspired me with their stories, their sense of humor, and their love of life.

A special thank you to my husband who thinks everything I write is wonderful. It is not, of course, but I love him for believing in me. Thank you, Sarah and David, our children who cheer me onward.

I am thankful for writer friends who have walked beside me through the peaks and valleys of a writer’s life. Trish Thayne first believed in my stories many years ago. A writers’ group in Columbia, SC (Betsy Thorne, Carol Williams, Carole Rothstein, Sandra Johnson, and Carrie McCray, now deceased, but who graciously became my mentor) encouraged me to keep writing. The members of my W.O.W. (Weavers Of Words) group in NC (Ann Wirtz, Leanna Sain, Karin Wooten, and Judy Dearing) continue to inspire me and nudge me to reach higher than I ever thought possible. All of these women have encouraged and loved me unconditionally. When I grow up, I want to be like them.

My heartfelt appreciation goes to Betsy Thorne for her gracious contribution of the poem,
A Dry Spell
.

Thank you, Eddie Jones, for listening and taking a chance on a new writer. And thank you, Ann Wirtz, for bending his ear and promoting my work instead of your own.

And thanks to Andrea Merrell, an exceptional editor and patient instructor.

The good Lord has blessed me beyond measure.

A
fter the fire and smoke cleared, leaving my house in a pile of ashes, I reluctantly moved in with my daughter, Betty Jo—along with my pet pig, Miss Margaret. I was grateful to have a place to lay my head but soon found myself testy with my daughter, treating her like the child she is, even though she’s pushing fifty. “Are you going out?” I’d say. “What time will you be home? Take a wrap. Air’s got a nip to it.”

Betty Jo, when she spoke to me at all, used her normal, snippy tone. “I’m roasting in this house. Did you turn the heat up? Again?” And then she might add for good measure, “Stay out of the kitchen, Mother.”

Three months later we came to an understanding, and though it was a gradual, unspoken thing, it was a fact. Neither of us could tolerate living with the other. I needed my own place and she needed … well, to be rid of me, and there was no use trying to beat around any bush.

So, on a sultry August morning a week after my seventy-first birthday, Betty Jo loaded my few belongings into her shiny, black Buick and carried me to Sweetbriar Manor, Sweetbriar’s
senior-care alternative
that, according to the brochure, offered
a rewarding, enriching lifestyle
.

“If you ask me, there’s nothing
sweet
about it,” I grumbled under my breath. But of course she didn’t ask me. Only dropped me off, wished me well, and sped away. Well, maybe I’m stretching the truth a little, but that’s how it felt.

Ten minutes into my stay at this place I knew two things. No, three. One,
senior-care alternative
was code for, “We don’t care what you do in your tiny room as long as you don’t ring the bell and bother the help.” Two, Sweetbriar Manor would own all my assets in six months if I stayed. And three … oh, fiddle, I can’t remember the third thing, but if you’ll hang around for the rest of the story, I’m sure it will come to me.

On the day my daughter was to dump me off, her shrill voice came screeching down the hall. “Are you ready yet, Mother? We don’t want to be late. I have other things to do, you know. We need to get moving.”

“Don’t get your panties in a wad; I’m coming. Can’t see why we’re in such an all-fired hurry anyway. If you’d take me to look at some of the apartments I’ve called about, or even that little house down the—”

“We’ve been through this a dozen times, Mother. You don’t need to be living alone. It’s not safe.”

Not safe my foot
, I wanted to shout back. But I’d show her. I wasn’t about to be left in a place with a bunch of crotchety old people like I didn’t have a lick of sense or shred of dignity. Soon as I got out of Betty Jo’s reach, I’d find me a place to live. Nobody—especially my middle-aged
child
—was going to tell me what to do.

“And just so you know,” I added, “I’m taking Miss Margaret with me even if I have to pack her inside a hat box and sneak her in.”

“No pets, Mother. That’s their policy.”

“Stupid policy, if you ask me. Pigs keep their mouths cleaner than any dog—or human for that matter.”

Betty Jo’s answer to my ranting was to head to the car and lay on the horn.

Of all the nerve.

I decided to take my time and let her stew a little, so I stood in front of the bathroom mirror, adjusted my hearing aid, and straightened my hat—a wide-brimmed straw and Charlie’s favorite. I asked him what he thought about me moving to such a place. Now, I know he passed to the other side two years and three months ago, but I still ask his advice.

Before I turned away, clear as anything, he said, “Pumpkin” (he never called me Agnes, always Pumpkin), “it might not be so bad. I predict you’re going to make a passel of new friends.”

I shook my head so hard my hat flew off. One of these days, like the good Baptist I am, I would have to give up this game, this pretense of talking with my Charlie. But not today. Not when my daughter’s taking me to a retirement home, of all places. With a deep breath, I squared my shoulders, determined to have the last word.

“I’m not staying, Charlie. Mark my words. I’m getting my own place by the end of the week. And I’m
not
going to make any friends. Don’t need ’em. Don’t want ’em. I was doing perfectly fine by myself. Will be again. Anybody can have an accident. All this fuss about where to live
is unsettling. Just plain unsettling.”

But now I was talking to myself. Charlie had tuned me out—just like he used to do at times when he was alive.

Riding the two miles from Betty Jo’s brick ranch, familiar sights held new significance. I read the wooden signs, nearly rotted and poking out of the weeds along the roadside.
Free … A Trip … To Mars … For … One Hundred … Jars … Burma Shave.
Sweet reminders from a bygone era. It’s a wonder nobody had picked up these old signs and used them for firewood. Maybe they were left there just for me.