Sweet Carolina Morning (26 page)

“All of you are smart, competent women, and you did so well on that cruise,” Linny said in a soothing tone. “You went to all of those islands, and had different languages to deal with, and you flew in and out of some of the busiest airports. That's pretty impressive.” Linny didn't think she needed to mention that none of them had ever even flown before.

Her mother considered this, a little smile playing at her lips. But after a moment, doubts must have crept back because she threw up her hands and shook her head wearily. “I don't know, sugar. I don't think I'm up for this.”

“What could make you feel more comfortable about taking this trip, Mama?” Linny's mind was in high-gear, sifting through options. Was there a Triple A deal for RVs or campers? Could the three women pool their money and hire a driver or . . .

Her mother didn't miss a beat. “I'd feel better if you came with us on the first week of the trip.” Dottie's gaze was steady. “You can help us learn the ropes.”

Linny opened her mouth and closed it again. Her big mouth. But she watched her mother patting Curtis and saw the thin gold band she still wore despite her husband's betrayal. Linny understood every one of her mother's fears and was so proud of her for all her courage. But she'd been married less than a week. She breathed out a sigh. “I can't Mama. Jack and I are just getting settled in and Neal's coming to stay with us for a while.”

“I shouldn't have even asked,” Her mother nodded, but her lower lip trembled and she looked as though she might cry. “I'm afraid I need to cancel on the girls, then.”

B
ack home, Linny walked in and saw Jack and Neal sprawled out on opposite ends of the huge L-shaped sofa in the living room engrossed in their binge TV favorite,
Wicked Tuna: Outer Banks Edition
. Neal's big tennis shoes and socks were in the middle of the floor. Sharing the couch with the Avery men were three of their six dogs, including Roy, the Lab-mix rescue that Linny had brought into the marriage. Wedged in between Jack and the arm of the chair, Roy looked at Linny coolly and didn't even bother to get up. He was so smitten with Jack that Linny was old news. She looked at the traitor reproachfully, but gave his silky black head a quick scratch. “Hey, men,” she called. Still nursing some irrational resentment toward Jack for the abbreviated honeymoon, she didn't go to him for her usual kiss, and stood there with her purse still on her shoulder, feeling like a guest.

“Hey, Lin.” Jack sat up, muted the TV and gave her a smile. He shot a glance at Neal. “Son, Linny said hello.”

Neal glanced at her as coolly as Roy had. “Hello.”

Though she was tired of trying to be so mature all day, Linny still decided to ignore the boy's standoffish behavior and leaned over to kiss the top of his head. “Hey, buddy. We missed you.”

“Me too,” he mumbled. Neal scratched the ears of Wilbur and Orville, their Border Collie mixes, who were snoring on his knee, and turned his gaze back to the television as the wind-buffeted crew members baited hooks.

Linny perched on the ottoman, took her purse off her shoulder and looked at Jack. “Mama's getting cold feet, and is talking about calling off the whole trip.”

“Whoa. That would be a shame,” Jack said, raising his brows.

Linny gave herself a mental shake, trying to dispel the guilt she felt for her mother's adventure possibly falling apart. “What's new around here?”

“Oh, not too much,” Jack said, but had a hang-dog look about him.

“Nothing except our trip.” Neal pushed the glasses up his nose, his eyes still on the television screen. “Chaz was going to take me out to Tucson for a few days on a camping and astronomy trip, but he might cancel. Mama asked Dad if he could take me and he said yes. Tucson is called the Astronomy Capital of the World. Did you know that?”

“I did not.” Linny gazed at Jack and crossed her arms. Without even bothering to run it by her, he'd agreed to pinch hit for Chaz and take off with Neal just because Vera crooked a finger. And Linny hadn't even let herself seriously consider riding along with Mama and her friends for a few days.

Jack gazed at her, his eyes lit with worry.

Neal pulled his eyes away from the screen and looked at her. “We are going to see the Mt. Lemmon SkyCenter and the Whipple Observatory. It has the eighth largest reflecting telescope in the world and the research on Black Holes is done there.”

“Sounds like you all have the whole thing planned out nicely,” Linny said evenly.

Lulled into a false sense of security by her calm demeanor, Jack looked proudly at his little astronomer. “We thought it'd be cool to camp in those high mountains and see the stars under the open sky, right buddy?”

“Right.” Neal's eyes slid back to the screen as a woman fisherman in a fighting chair almost got jerked overboard as she struggled to reel in a big fish.

Abruptly, Linny stood and walked into the kitchen, her shoulders hunched and her pulse racing.

Jack trailed along behind her. “I'm sorry, Lin. I should have talked this over with you beforehand.”

“I wish you had.” She leaned against the kitchen counter, crossed her arms and eyed him. “It seems like Vera can still say jump and you say how high.”

“It's not like that,” Jack said, his eyes flashing. “When I got to the house, she was still crying, and Neal was upset.” He shook his head, looking grim. “I just wanted to get his bag packed and get him in the truck. Then Vera announced Chaz has gone to stay with a buddy. Said he needs some time. Neal started to cry and talking about this astronomy trip the two of them had planned.” Looking weary, Jack scrubbed his face with his hands. “So I told him I'd take him. It's only four days.”

Linny softened, but was still bugged by his tendency to rescue Vera and clean up her and Chaz's messes. “You wanted to keep Neal from being disappointed. I get that. But maybe we should talk things over before we commit to time away from each other.” Over and over, guest bloggers to the Bodacious Bonus Moms' blog wrote about how the first year of marriage in a blended family was always the hardest, even for someone who'd been married as many times as Linny had. Negotiations and compromise, she reminded herself. She cocked her head, and gave him a crooked smile. “We're a team, right?”

“We are. Sorry, Lin,” he said ruefully, and touched her arm.

“When are you going?” she asked, making herself uncross her arms.

“With your okay, week after next,” he said. “Chaz already lined up tickets to the Observatories and made reservations at the campground.”

Linny's thoughts began to clicking away. “Mama and her friends are leaving a day or two before that on their trip. What if I go with them for a week? I can get Mama all calmed down for the road.”

“That works,” Jack said, nodding and looking relieved. He leaned over and gave her a short but smoldering kiss.

Linny smiled at him. Though he'd misstepped, he was just trying to do damage control for his son, and she shouldn't blame him for that. “Who is up for pizza? I'm calling in supper.”

“We were talking about how starved we were just before you came home,” Jack said. “Let me see what strange topping Neal wants to try this time. The number for Frankie's is on the refrigerator.” He stepped into the other room.

Linny switched on the light in the kitchen and smiled when she saw that Jack had stuck the picture from their white water rafting trip on the fridge door under the
Buy Pizza and Get Gas at Frankie's Fuel and Go!
magnet. She grimaced. The best pizza in Willow Hill that just happened to be located in a gas station needed to change their motto. Neal had probably stuck that magnet up there. Typical twelve-year-old boy humor. Linny was learning how to be a good sport about that and a lot of other things—rooms strewn with dirty laundry, dishes under the bed, and bags of chips that disappeared as soon as she brought them home from the store. She slipped the photo out from under the magnet, moved to the light of the kitchen window, looked at it again. Even though the trip had been cut short, what a perfect four days they'd had. But that river trip was like her new marriage. Every time she began to relax and glide along thinking they were finally in calm waters, they'd go around the bend and hit the rapids.

Linny pushed her shoulders back. Nothing the two of them couldn't manage. She stuck the picture, and that magnet, back into a central spot on the fridge, reminding herself to add an action shot of the three of them doing something fun together. Better yet, she'd put up a shot of Jack and Neal doing something manly like rock climbing or caving, maybe a pic from their upcoming Tucson trip. The pictures served as a reminder to them they were a new little family. Linny was determined to make sure Neal knew he was loved and that nobody was leaving him out or going anywhere—like Chaz might.

After supper, Neal and Linny had dessert together while Jack went into the other room to work on the computer. Linny dipped into her bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream and looked at Neal gravely. “I never understood Butter Pecan.”

“Me neither. It's a mystery,” Neal said, his expression as serious as if they were discussing evolution. “Coffee is a strange flavor, too.” He took a too large spoonful of his chocolate ice cream and worked his way through it.

Instinctively, Linny knew light conversation and large bowls of ice cream were good for Neal now. The young man needed some normalcy after all the craziness he'd witnessed. She patted her mouth with a napkin, realizing they'd exhausted the topic of ice cream flavors. And then it came to her. Even though she was bored silly by the sport, Linny knew he was a Caniac—a rabid fan of the North Carolina Hurricanes ice hockey team. She tilted her head. “Tell me how the Hurricanes look this year.”

Neal's eyes lit up and in the know-it-all voice he'd recently begun using with her and Jack, told her.

* * *

The following Monday afternoon, Linny finished her assigned task of setting out napkins and utensils, and sat sipping ice water at her mother's kitchen table. She glanced through the travel brochures and information about various models of RVs that were fanned out on the table in front of her while she waited for the peach-cobbler-eating and final-trip-planning meeting to begin. Linny eyed Dottie. She'd sprung back fast. Once Linny had agreed to join the women for the start of the trip, her mother's symptoms had disappeared and she was back to the newer and happier Dottie—bright-eyed, bustling and organizing everybody.

Linny glanced at the others. These were the women she was going to spend almost a week with in very close quarters. She'd known her mother's friends from the time she was a girl, but examining them more closely now, she wondered how much she
really
knew about them. What kind of traveling companions would they be? She narrowed her eyes. And why did their hair-dos all look so normal? Dottie's ashy blonde gray hair, Ruby's auburn curls and Dessie's salt and pepper pixie were all missing the unfortunate pink tint that their beloved hairdresser, Joseph, gave to all his clients. “Y'alls' hair looks so pretty. Is Joseph doing something different?”

“He's gone,” her mother's said mournfully and heaved a heavy sigh.

“Oh, I'm so sorry,” Linny put a hand to her chest, and even though she hardly knew the hairdresser, felt bereft remembering what it was like to have a man up and die on you. “He was too young to pass.”

Dottie cocked her head and peered at her. “He moved to Wilmington to be closer to his Mama. She's ninety-eight.” She gave a satisfied little nod. “She still drives to the Harris Teeter every Tuesday.”

Linny just shook her head.

Dessie gave Linny a quick eye roll. Looking sporty and patriotic in a red and white striped blouse, navy blue slacks, and bright white sneakers, Dessie poured a generous dollop of cream in her decaf and peppered Linny with questions about her and Jack's mountain trip.
What was the cabin like? Were there a lot of motorcycles on the Blue Ridge Parkway? Did you eat any mountain trout? Is that little homemade candy store still there?

As Linny answered, she tried to think of exactly what she knew about Dessie. When she was young, she'd been married briefly. She divorced, and married Del—a photographer who was the love of her life—and had a son, daughter-in-law and grandson in California. Del passed a few years ago from cancer. On the cruise, Dessie had met a man named Perry, a divorced scrap metal dealer from South Carolina who wore a fedora with a feather.

Ruby wore a gauzy coral dress as she took tin foil off the dish of the peach cobbler she'd made and chattered to Dottie about wishing she had grandkids. Linny knew she had a son and daughter-in-law in Colorado and a daughter in Oregon, and reminded herself to find out their name and ages and ask about them. Linny noticed her jeweled sandals and the apricot of the polish on her toes. Ruby kept herself up. Did she have a man in her life? If not, did she want one? Linny remembered that Ruby's husband, Pete, had died of a heart attack a long time ago.

Linny examined her mother more closely. Dottie had fresh honeyed highlights in her hair and wore a canary yellow linen blouse over black leggings. Linny tried not to stare. Yup, her mama was wearing very cool-looking leggings. She was looking youthful and pretty—or
sassy
as her personal shopper friend at Belk's would say. She'd ditched the white Velour clunker sandals and was back to wearing cute shoes. She was chirping to Ruby about her new man friend.
So Mack and I are going to try Chet's Barbecue tomorrow night, and they have a bourbon pecan pie . . .

All the women looked pretty, and they'd put effort into their appearances. Maybe Linny needed to step up her own game. She glanced down at her khaki shorts. They were flecked with small spots of the yellow paint she'd applied to her kitchen walls. She wore her favorite sage green scoop necked t-shirt that was now shrunken but still wearable. Neither Avery man understood that you couldn't throw everything in the dryer on the cotton setting and just waltz off. While she thought no one was looking, she pulled at the hem of the shirt with both hands, willing it to stretch.

“What are you doing, Linny?” her mother asked. Three sets of eyes turned to look at her.

“The men keep shrinking my clothes in the dryer,” she muttered and Dessie and Ruby chuckled.

Her mother just pursed her lips and shuttled the bowls of cobbler to the table. Linny paused to stare at her bowl. Her mother had served her a fourth the size serving of the cobbler and ice cream as she had the others. Even though she was no skinny-minnie herself, Dottie was always vigilant about Linny's weight. She might be five or ten pounds over fighting weight, but Linny was still fairly trim. With a pointed look at her mother, Linny rose from the table and filled her bowl to the brim with cobbler and topped it with a giant scoop of ice cream. She wasn't hungry and didn't even intend to eat it, but still. Her mother raised a brow but said nothing.

Around the kitchen table, Dottie had laid out four legal pads and four freshly-sharpened pencils. The women slid into chairs.

Linny felt the familiar surge of excitement and possibilities that she used to feel every late summer when school started again.
Crack.
She jumped as her mother smacked the kitchen table with a meat tenderizing hammer.