Never Sit Down in a Hoopskirt and Other Things I Learned in Southern Belle Hell (4 page)

She didn't say a word. She dropped the knife and quietly navigated Scooter-boy down the hall and into the elevator, where she sequestered herself. I had no idea what to do. She refused to come out no matter what I said. Cosmo wasn't home; in fact, he wasn't even in town. By then, his business was taking him more and more to Greece and London, so he was no help. And when she started crying, a deep, mournful keening, I really didn't know what to do. I went back to the kitchen and sliced the bread and attempted to coax her out with it, but all she did was take the elevator to the second floor to get away from me.

I called Grandmother.

“Cecilia! Open this door!” Grandmother had been in the middle of semifinals for the Bienville Ladies' Bridge Tournament, but she was at our house within twenty minutes of answering her cell.

“No!” called Cecilia, her voice muffled by the two sets of elevator doors.

“Cecilia Jane Fontaine Ventouras! You may be an adult, but the Lord God says honor your mother, and as your mother, I say open this door right now!”

The door creaked open to reveal Cecilia's face was swollen and shiny with tears. There's nothing worse, when you're a kid, than seeing your parents cry. It makes you feel like the world's coming to an end. “Oh, Mommy!” I cried, pushing my way into the elevator and maneuvering myself into her lap so that I could hug her hard. As if my tight squeeze could make her tears, and this cruel disease, go away.

Over my head I heard Cecilia say, “I can't do this, Mother! I can't live this way.”

Grandmother wrapped her arms around Cecilia and me and rocked us both as if we were little babies. “Darling, what's happening to you I would not wish on my worst enemy. But the Lord, he never gives us more than we can handle. You have to keep your spirits up. You have to live each day He gives you to the best of your ability.”

“But this disease is eating away my abilities!” Cecilia cried. “I can't even cut bread anymore! Soon I'll be a lump of—”

“Hush, you hush now. I'm calling Henry, and it's all going to be fine, you hear me?” said Grandmother, and three days later, Henry and his wife, Charisse, moved into the guest quarters above our garage so that he could take care of the house and carpool me wherever I needed to go. Charisse handled the cooking and took care of Cecilia, which, as her disease ravaged the motor neurons connecting her brain to her muscles, meant things like pureeing her food into mush so that she could swallow it, putting her on the toilet, bathing, and dressing her. Cecilia never cried again, though. At least not that I ever saw or heard.

Even when people stopped coming to see us. Her friends. They didn't know how to talk to her because she couldn't talk anymore. My friends. They didn't know what to say to me. My father. He… frankly, I don't know what he thought. He just stopped coming. Everyone stopped coming.

Except Luke Churchville. But even he, in the end, was taken away from me.

Fifth grade: How packed the church was. How loudly we sang “Shall We Gather at the River?” How kind Reverend Burbank sounded, even if I wasn't listening to a word he said. Cosmo, finally returned, his face carved ice, squeezing my hand so hard I thought it would break. Me, Cosmo, Grandmother pouring what remained of our beloved Cecilia into the Gulf of Mexico. Gray ashes meeting deep blue sea. The current sweeping them off into the Gulf Stream, knowing that it flowed in the direction of the Bahamas, then North Carolina, before curving up toward Europe and the north Atlantic.
That's nice,
I thought.
Mom always said she loved London.

Alone on the viewing deck of the Petroleum Club, I wondered if maybe Grandmother was right. That maybe Cecilia could guide me. Maybe she could hear me. Maybe she could help me. I glanced south, toward the gulf, vaguely in the direction of the place where we had poured her ashes in the water all those years ago. “Okay, Cecilia,” I said out loud. “Can you hear me?” No answer. I forged ahead. “Let's just pretend this is going to work. Tell me, why do you want me to be on the Magnolia Court? What in the world am I supposed to do on it? What in the world am I going to do with these girls? Besides give Ashley a hard time, which will be fun, don't get me wrong. But this whole thing is sooooo not me, Cecilia, can't you tell? How in the world am I going to survive it? Cecilia? Cecilia? Mom?”

I studied the horizon. Stars twinkled, but not a one fell from the sky in symbolic response. Ships and boats plied the waters, but none used Morse code to signal an answer. The wind whistled, but I caught no secret messages.

I sighed. Bienville was a town full of ghosts.

And I was the most haunted ghost of all. “SOS, Cecilia,” I said as I turned away from the night sky. “SOS.”

And so I settled into the slow lane called May in Bienville. Because I had gotten kicked out of Stanton Hall so late in my junior year, Grandmother determined there was no need to enroll me in any one of Bienville's fine educational establishments, public or private. The result was daily lessons throughout the month of May at home with Mr. Charles Dumas, tutor to Bienville's upper crust. Mr. Dumas was tolerable, even if he was periodically besieged by sinus flare-ups that made him snort like a horse. God bless him, he had a tendency to drone on about the Hundred Years' War, even when discussing Algebra II. How he was able to find a connection between the Fibonacci sequence and the Battle of Calais is beyond me. At least the medieval tapestries of Joan of Arc were pretty.

In general, I had nothing much to do, and no one much to do it with. I finished Mr. Dumas's assignments like a good little girl. I fired up my Netflix queue with constant requests for
Veronica Mars
and
Alias
. And I ran. Oh, how I ran. I know, it's an odd thing for a smoker. Maybe it's because I feel like I need to make up for the fact that I am destroying my little pink lungs with every puff. Also, I have a truckload of nervous energy. I'm not one of those people who is constantly on the move, but every once in a while a wave of anxiety crashes over me and I feel like I have to move or I will die. And since we wouldn't want that, I run.

Grandmother's house was in one of the oldest neighborhoods in Bienville, Magnolia Oaks, and as such, it was a stone's throw from downtown. Every day after the mid-afternoon rain shower, I stepped out the front door, turned right, and took off at a slow jog through the residential streets canopied with oaks and lined with grand old homes on giant plots of land. That time of day, the humidity is insane, so I often felt like I was breathing water vapor. But I kind of liked that I would get so sweaty so fast. At Commerce Street, I picked up speed, racing cars heading into the business district. At Government Boulevard, I turned right, ran past town hall, the city courthouse, and the chamber of commerce (where I sometimes waved at Mr. Walter). I'd hit the port and run along the docks, dodging forklifts and weaving my way through shipping containers. Then I'd loop back home, throw myself in the shower, and call it a day.

But I never, ever, ever turned left. Coming out of Grandmother's, I most consciously avoided turning left. In fact, since returning to Bienville, I had studiously avoided even glancing left out of the very far corner of my eye at the house that was two doors and three oak trees down from me.

At 511 Magnolia Street.

Home of the Churchvilles.

Last known residence of one Luke Churchville, my childhood best friend.

It's not my fault things ended the way they did. It's not his fault, either. All that blame, in my humble opinion, resides with Cosmo. Luke and I didn't do anything wrong. It was a huge misunderstanding, really. But when you've been so close for so long, and then suddenly it all explodes, there are a lot of loose ends and unknowns.

So I felt nervous. So nervous that I wasn't sure what I wanted. To see Luke or not to see Luke, that was the question. Hmmm. Better to keep that boy tightly sealed in his little box, all bricked up in the wall of tragic fame. If I didn't see him, I didn't have to deal, right? So I never turned left.

But, of course, the day came when curiosity got the best of me. Maybe it was my new Magnolia Maid status (not!) that gave me the gumption to mosey in the direction of 511 Magnolia. Or maybe it was the extra-strength espresso I had just gulped down.

Whatever it was, a few days after the pageant I decided to turn left. I chanted Bienville's motto (“Fill our city with sweet perfume, plant a magnolia and watch it bloom!”) and inched my way over to the spacious home I had practically lived in during that terrible time after my mother's death. I wondered if the tire swing was still hanging from the giant oak in the backyard. If Mrs. Churchville still maintained a greenhouse for her orchids. Was it still strictly off-limits to kids, something that Luke and I learned the hard way? What about the clubhouse we built together? Was that still there? We must have been about eight the year we pooled our allowance money together to buy plywood out at Lowe's and slap up a structure that came out as decrepit and treacherous as an ancient fishing shack. We didn't care, though. It was our second home until the Churchville family dog, Daisy, claimed it and infested the place with fleas so bad that Mrs. Churchville swore she'd make Luke and me take a flea bath if we ever crawled in there again.

“You looking for Mr. Luke, Miss Jane?” I jumped at the sound of Henry's voice. He had come outside to trim the azaleas back.

“Oh, hi, Henry.” I acted as nonchalant as I could. “Yeah, I haven't seen the Churchvilles at all since I got back.”

“That's 'cause they built themselves a big house out by the new golf club. Moved a coupla years ago.”

Aha. Luke wasn't there. He wasn't residing in the house two doors and three oak trees away from me. I didn't have to worry about running into him at any old moment. Hearing that, every single cell in my body breathed a sigh of relief. Honestly, until that moment, I didn't realize just how tense I had been.

“Oh, that's nice. Who lives there now?”

“Dr. Paxton and his wife. They got three girls. Little things.” As if to punctuate his statement, the front door of the house formerly known as Luke's swung open, and three feisty little sisters bounded out to a family-sized SUV shrieking over who got to put in the DVD.

“Good to know,” I said, and took off running. Yes, it was very good to know that Luke Churchville wasn't living in the middle of my street anymore. I didn't have to run into him. And as long as I stayed away from the new golf club, the Churchville family church and, oh, just about every social event in this fishbowl of a town, I could keep it that way.

“Now, Jane, I want you to be sweet.” At breakfast a few days later, Grandmother was giving me advice on how to conduct myself at the very first meeting of the Official Magnolia Maid Court.

Ugh. Be sweet?
Be sweet?
Boy, is that straight out of the Southern belle handbook. It also happens to be Grandmother's catchphrase, something she says to her little dog, Chienette, when she's baring her teeth on the verge of chomping up the mailman. It's something that she's been saying to me since I was a little girl. “Be sweet, Jane, and share your Barbie playhouse.” “Be a sweet girl and eat all your peas.” I'm convinced my first words were “be sweet.”

Truth is, there's nothing sweet about me. I hate being sweet. It's Southern belle code for “Don't make waves.” “Don't ruffle feathers.” “Keep your opinion to yourself because it might upset somebody else.” A good Southern girl practices the three
D
s, according to Grandmother. Decorum. Dignity. Denial. Bite your lip, nod your head. Accept the circumstances, for you cannot change them. Deny that they are even bothering you. Basically, it means let everyone walk all over you, then go complain about them behind their backs.

Besides, the last time I was “sweet,” all it did was land me in a heap of trouble with Cosmo and get me banished from Bienville.

“Do you hear me, Jane? Promise me you won't do anything improper.”

“I can't promise that, Grandmama, you know me.”

“I do know you,” Grandmother continued. “And I know that now that you're back, I don't want to lose you again. So will you please promise me you won't do anything unseemly and get yourself taken away from me again?”

As established, the last thing in the world I want to be is sweet. Especially with the Magnolia Maids. But it was Grandmother asking. “Okay. I'll try.” And I meant it. I really did. I really thought,
I'll try to be sweet. To everyone.
If only Ashley weren't such a bitch. If only Mizz Upton weren't such a pain in the butt. If only… oh, a million and one if-onlys, so little time.

When Henry dropped me off at Mizz Upton's house (an appropriately dark and sinister brick Tudor over in the Dauphin District), I found Zara lingering out front. Opportunity number one to be sweet. “Hey, Zara! How in the world did a good Sidwell Friends girl end up in a place like this?”

Zara swiveled around and cracked a smile. “Sidwell? How did you know?”

“You moved here from DC, you're a girl of a certain class and stature. Sidwell. That's the school for you. Me, I went to Foxcroft.”

“Out in Virginia? That's a great school.”

“So I've heard. I wasn't there long enough to find out.”

“You transferred?”

“Nah. Got kicked out.”

Zara looked at me like I had just told her I was an alien or something. She clearly had no idea how to process this information. “Oh. I'm sorry.”

“Don't be. If I hadn't gotten kicked out, I would never have ended up back in Bienville, all Magnolia-fied up, and that would have been a real tragedy, wouldn't it?”

Zara caught the twinkle in my eye and grinned again.

“So seriously, what's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?”

Zara's grin turned polite and pasty. “Oh, you know, my parents thought it would be a great way for me to meet new people. Get to know the town.”

“Couldn't you have taken a tour?” I rooted around in my bag for a cough drop to quench the intense desire for a cigarette that standing in front of Mizz Upton's house had given me.

“Would have been a lot easier.” She laughed. “Oh no. We've been busted.” Zara pointed at the bay window of Mizz Upton's living room, where Brandi Lyn was waving at us with great zest. She disappeared from our view and appeared moments later throwing open the front door and pulling us inside.

“Hey, y'all! Guess what we're talking about?”

“I just couldn't tell you.”

“Dandies! Who is yours going to be?”

I frowned. “Dandy? As in ‘Yankee Doodle'? ‘Stuck a feather in his cap—'”

“‘And called it macaroni'?” Zara finished my sentence. We raised our fists in a jab, which brought us both to giggles.

Brandi Lyn joined in the giggling fun. “No, sillies!”

Zara and I climbed the steps as an icy voice called out from the living room. “She's talking about escorts.” I recognized that voice. Ashley. She and Mallory were perched like princesses in a couple of wing chairs by the fireplace. They clearly had arrived early enough to assess the layout of the room and establish themselves in the power positions. “Magnolia Maids need age-appropriate male escorts for certain occasions, like charity events and Mardi Gras balls.” Ashley tsked in Mallory's direction. “See? Didn't I tell you?”

Mallory shook her head in deep, agreeing concern. “They don't know anything.”

Zara and I flopped down next to Brandi Lyn on a couch so big and puffy that it sucked you in to the point that you'd have to struggle to get out of it. These were the opposite of power seats. I smiled ever so
sweetly
in Ashley's direction. “Well, I guess we'll just have to learn, then, won't we?”

Brandi Lyn turned to me again. “So who is yours going to be?”

“I don't know. I just moved back here.”

“And you, Zara?”

Zara shrugged. “I just moved here, too.”

Ashley arched an eyebrow at Mallory. Mallory arched one back. “Total disaster,” Ashley said.

Brandi Lyn smiled. “Oh, I'm sure it will be fine. Zara and Jane are so lovely. They'll find cute boys soon enough. Anyway, JoeJoe's gonna die when I ask him to be my dandy.”

“Is that the guy who leapt off the balcony for you at the civic center?” I asked.

“Isn't that the most romantic thing in the world?” Brandi Lyn cooed. “He just adores the whole Civil War thing.” She turned to Ashley. “Do you think he can wear his Confederate uniform to events?”

Ashley rolled her eyes. “No, Brandi Lyn. It's either morning suits or casual wear, depending on the occasion.”

“And you, Ashley?” Engaging others in conversation, that's sweet.
Look how sweet I'm being,
I thought. “Who is your dandy?”

Ashley straightened up proudly. “My boyfriend, James Hardison the third.”

“Ooh. A third. How exciting!” Did I deserve an award or what?

“Our fathers are partners in Hardison and LaFleur.”

“What a match made in heaven.”

“Isn't it? And I feel so sorry for y'all,” said Ashley. “Not having a steady boyfriend you can depend on to be your dandy. Or even knowing any of our Bienville boys.”

“Thanks, Ashley,” I replied. “I'm sure we'll figure it out. Hey, Mallory, who's your dreamboat?”

Mallory blushed. “I haven't decided yet.”

Ashley got a conniving look on her face. “Mallory has more of a free-form attitude toward boyfriends.”

Mallory blushed even more. “Ashley! That makes me sound like a…
slut
.”

“If the shoe fits.”

“Y'all don't listen to her! I can't help it. I like boys. I just have a hard time making a decision.”

“You mean you haven't met a boy you didn't like yet.”

“That's okay, Mallory,” I said. “What's wrong with being a slut?” Okay, I was trying to be sweet…. That one just didn't come out right. Thank God Mizz Upton and Walter Murray Hill chose that moment to come in from the kitchen.

“All right, y'all!” Mizz Upton called, a big smile on her face, her omnipresent blown-out bob bobbing every time she nodded. She motioned a maid—not the Magnolia kind—to set a heavily loaded tray onto the coffee table. “We have sweet tea, cream cheese and olive sandwiches, and lemon squares! Help yourselves. But not too much! You don't want to be bloated for your first dress measurements.”

Walter Murray Hill chuckled. “Oh, I'm sure we won't have any bloating. This is the best-looking group of girls in town.”

Mizz Upton dismissed the non-Magnolia maid and glanced around the room, finding something amiss. “Caroline! We're starting, Caroline!”

Moments later, Caroline trudged down the stairs from the second floor, book in hand. “Excuse me, Mother, but do I really need to attend? I already know all this stuff from the other years.”

“Well, you need to bond with your sister Maids, don't you, honey?”

“I'm the alternate, Mother. I'm not that important.”

Mizz Upton looked like her patience was being sorely tested. “Something might come up where you will be called upon to serve the Court and if that ever happens you need to be prepared to serve well, sweetie. So do sit down. Please.” The last few words probably would sound polite on paper, but trust me, said out loud, they were nails hammered into a coffin.

I felt so bad for her, I said, “Yeah, come join us. Have a lemon square.”

Caroline beelined to a seat across from the couch and did indeed grab a lemon square, until her mother slapped her hand away from them. “What did I tell you?” Caroline snatched back her hand, completely embarrassed. Yikes. That was awkward.

Walter Murray Hill cleared his throat. “Now, girls.” He shook his head. “No, I can't call you girls anymore. From here on out, you'll be known as Maids.”

Oh boy.

“On behalf of the Bienville Chamber of Commerce, I welcome you to the sixtieth Magnolia Court. This is going to be our most exciting year yet, right, Martha Ellen?”

Mizz Upton, fake smile cemented in place, bobbed and nodded. “It already is, Walter! In my fifteen years as the Official Etiquette Mistress and Head Advisor of the Magnolia Maids, I have never seen such a, well,
diverse
Court.”

Ashley raised her hand. “I saw in the paper that people have been calling the selection of the Court the shock of the century.”

I rolled my eyes. “Obviously they don't read up on international affairs much.” Uh-oh. Couldn't help that one. Just slipped out.

Mr. Walter held up a hand. “Now you girls don't worry about those letters to the editor, okay. We at the Magnolia Maid Organization will make every effort to protect and support y'all at every single event. And I'm sure the lawsuits from the Lennoxes and the DeVilles will be going away any day now.”

“Lawsuits? Seriously?” I gasped.

Ashley jumped in. “Yes, Jane, people do take this seriously. Maybe not you, but other people.”

Walter Murray Hill cleared his throat. “That's right. We do take this seriously, and we are not going to let a few contradictory voices interfere with official Magnolia Maid business. You ladies are going to have the time of your life representing our fair city to folks around the country!” He launched into a sales pitch that would have made a game-show host proud, with Mizz Upton backing him up with delicious little details. We'd be marching in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. That thrilled Brandi Lyn to no end because she'd always wanted to go to New York City. There would be a presidential inauguration next January, which cheered Zara up since she could see her friends in DC again. Ashley got excited about the Memphis in May festivities because she had family there. And we all agreed that our trip to Los Angeles for the Rose Bowl would be the perfect opportunity to scope out the yummy likes of Channing Tatum and Shia LaBeouf.

Mizz Upton bobbed her head again. “But our very first event, coming up in six short weeks, is right here at home. Your debut…”

“… at the Annual Magnolia Festival at Boysenthorp Gardens!” As Walter Murray Hill completed her sentence with a bang, Ashley and Mallory worked themselves into a frenzy of delight.

“OMG, OMG, OMG!”

“Can you believe it? The best days of our lives are finally here!”

Mizz Upton held out a hand. “Now, Maids, there's good reason to be excited, but we have a whole lot of work to do. First, there is…”

Walter Murray Hill cut her off. “Before you get down to business, Martha Ellen, I have to tell you, a special request came in the other day. I mean, you could have knocked me over with a feather.” He paused dramatically, really working the “game-show host on the verge of announcing the big prize” angle. “Get your passports out, Maids! You're going to Spain!”

Every ounce of air in the room disappeared as we all gasped in unison. The Ashley/Mallory excitement buzz spread all over the room. Even I sat up. Spain? Sangria and bulls and cute Latin boys Spain? Not bad. It was Mallory, though, who got the first response out. “Abroad? No Magnolia Maid's ever gone abroad before!”

Mizz Upton's blonde bob nearly bobbed off her head in excitement. “Why, Walter Murray Hill, you rascal, you didn't breathe a word about this!”

“Just found out myself, Martha Ellen, isn't it something? We have been invited by our sister city, Ronda, to attend the annual bullfighting festival! I got a call direct from the mayor himself.”

Mallory threw her arms around Ashley. “Oh my God, we're going abroad. We haven't even had out debut yet, and we're already making so much history!”

Brandi Lyn's hand crept up. “Um, Mr. Hill. I don't have a passport.”

“Oh, I don't, either,” replied Mallory.

“Me neither,” said Ashley.

Caroline shook her head, too.

“I do,” Zara said. “My family travels a lot.”

“I've practically had one since I was born,” I added.

Zara and I exchanged glances. None of these girls had passports? This is
exactly
what I meant about Bienville looking at the world from afar.

Brandi Lyn sighed. “Is this a problem that we all don't have them yet?”

Walter beamed. “No, it makes you one hundred percent Bienville born and bred, which is exactly why you're Bienville's best! We'll get it all taken care of later in the year. Well, you ladies have a lot to talk about, so I'm gonna let Martha Ellen get going with you. Before I leave, though, I just want you Maids to know I am here for you. Just give me a ring if you need anything, if you have any old question. I mean anything. Walter Murray Hill is here for you, okay.”