The Worst Romance Novel Ever Written (58 page)

Milly blinked.

Johnny stared at her knees.
She’s going to bruise for sure. I bet they’ll be really splotchy. She’ll have to wear pants for a couple days. Or dark hose.

“
I think we’re done here,” Milly said. “Have a nice day, Mr. Holiday.”

Johnny stood and nodded. “You have a nice day, too, Milly.”
Hope your knees feel better.

What now?
Johnny thought on his way back to AB Auto Repair and Towing.
How am I going to come up with all that money? If I put away five bucks a week … okay, ten a week …
Johnny sighed.
It will take me sixty years to raise that much money! I’ll be ninety and won’t be able to eat pizza let alone make it or walk it up to someone’s door.

Johnny realized then that he needed partners, people with spare money, maybe men like … Armstrong and Byron.
Armstrong can probably eat him some pizza, might even be nice to have him on the register now and then. He couldn’t be a delivery man. He might not fit through the average house door. He could, however, carry fifty pizzas at a time. Byron could man the phones and play some funky music …

Byron waved him over when he came into the garage, Johnny’s Big Mac and fries still fresh on his breath. “Any luck?”

“
Yep,” Johnny said, “but it’s all bad.”

Byron patted him on the back. “It’ll turn.”

“
It can only turn,” Johnny said.

“
Ready to get dirty?” Byron asked.

Johnny nodded.
My luck is turning already.

43

After tossing and turning for two weeks about “the question of Paul” and his effect on her daughter, Gloria decided to give Paul a tryout.

“
You are taking Angel shopping tomorrow,” she ordered.

Angel returned with a dozen archaeological books, a fancy reading light, and a half-drunk large Arabian Mocha Sanini from Starbucks.

“
You gave coffee to a five-year-old?” she scolded.

“
She likes it,” Paul said.

Angel did a great deal of interpretive dance in her room that night.

Angel also spent a great deal of time in the bathroom the next morning.

“
You are taking us to church tomorrow,” Gloria ordered him.

“
I do not go to church,” Paul said. “I do not believe in that superstition.”

“
Superstition?” Gloria cried. “Archaeologists have found proof of everything that’s happened in the Bible.”

“
Not reputable archaeologists,” Paul said.

Gloria knew the easiest way to win the argument. “Angel likes church, Paul, and it will give you another free morning to see her.”

Paul went.

Gloria felt proud to be seen with her new man, who wasn’t really her man, and no one at Faith Ministries had doubts about the man who brought her to church. Paul’s suits fit, he looked sharp, he was more than handsome, he was well-spoken and had that sexy accent, and most of all, he was there. He sat between her and Angel. The space in the back of the sanctuary where Johnny used to stand had already been filled by another man. Gloria absolutely enjoyed being seen with Paul, the sight of a gorgeous man sitting next to her creating twitters of jealousy and delicious rumors among the ladies in the church, some of whom were already rumoring the two of them into marriage. And after only four consecutive Sundays, Paul had actually approached Pastor Payton after the service. Their conversation was brief, but Gloria was certain Paul was on his way to salvation.

“
Where’s our driver?” Marion had asked.

“
He’s talking to Pastor Payton,” Gloria had whispered. “Isn’t it wonderful?”

“
What’s so wonderful about it?” Marion had said. “It’s starting to rain, and he has the keys.”

“
Mama, I think Paul is talking to Pastor about getting saved,” Gloria had said.

Marion had shaken her head. “Then why didn’t he go up at the end of the service?”

“
He didn’t want to call attention to himself,” Gloria had said.
And if Paul gets saved,
Gloria had decided,
I may do more than just sit beside him.

“
Well, can you hurry him along?” Marion had asked.

“
All right, Mama.” Gloria had walked up the stairs just as Paul was coming down. “What were you and Pastor talking about, Paul?”

“
I asked if it were possible to turn down the volume on those speakers,” Paul had said. “It’s much too loud.”

On the fifth consecutive Sunday, Gloria had peeked at Paul during prayers and saw that his eyes were open, his expression beyond bored, his face grimmer than grim. Like a good single, Christian mother, however, she continued to pray for him, prayed that he would see the light, prayed that he would feel the Spirit, prayed that he would keep his freaking eyes closed during the prayer.

After two months of church, Gloria had felt sure enough of Paul to invite him home for Sunday dinner.

“
I do not wish to impose,” Paul had said. “You know I have a delicate stomach.”

“
But Angel’s going to cook,” Gloria had said.

“
I will be happy to eat my Angel’s cooking,” Paul had said.

Though Angel had only stirred the beans, helped mash the potatoes, and drizzled glaze on the ham, Paul had pronounced Angel’s cooking “exquisite.”

Angel had, dutifully, rolled her eyes. She hadn’t yet warmed up to the man, but she was tolerating him about as well as she tolerated Johnny.
This,
Gloria thought, was a good sign,
a welcome change, a monumental shift of affections from the Pizza Man to the exquisite archaeologist.

All this, of course, was enough to make Marion Minnick want to puke, and she let her concerns be known right vociferously.

“
What do you think you’re doing?” Marion asked while she and Gloria did the dishes while Paul and Angel went for a walk.

“
What do you mean?” Gloria asked.

“
You know what I mean,” Marion said. “You’re throwing yourself at Paul, and he isn’t exactly catching you. He’s only around you to get more time with Angel.”

Gloria sighed. “Oh, I don’t know. Once Paul gets saved, he’ll straighten up and do right by both of us.”

“
When hell freezes over,” Marion said.

“
Well, what other options do I have, Mama?” Gloria asked.

“
There’s still Johnny,” Marion said.

They would have a similar argument for the next four Sundays, and Marion would end of them with: “There’s still Johnny.”

And Gloria never had a comeback.

There was also still Quick-E-Mart, and Gloria found herself working longer hours and double-shifts because Gladys did indeed quit soon after Johnny had intimidated her. Gloria received a promotion to store manager, but she had to work crappy shifts and train a new assistant manager with the IQ of a newt larva. The higher salary was nice, of course, but her manager-in-training, Pamela Jean Sweetwater, was an ignorant, mindless, mentally challenged brunette bombshell who had difficulty scanning customer purchases because of her “new nails, aren’t they so adorable?”

Gloria found little adorable about Pamela Jean, wishing secretly that she could bury “Gammy Pammy” alive.
I’d give anything to see her trying to claw her way out of a coffin, breaking all her “adowable wittle nay-ohs.”

Of course, these evil, non-Christian, but fully justifiable thoughts reminded her of Johnny, who was still out there somewhere, and his hopefully still unpublished romance.

One night, Gloria looked under the orange counter and saw only a half-full bag of Dum-Dums.
That was a brand new bag,
Gloria thought.
Who’s been eating my Dum-Dums?

She turned to her favorite dum-dum. “Pamela Jean, have you been eating my lollipops?”

“
No,” Pamela Jean said.

Gloria had held up the bag. “These are mine, and I didn’t open them.”

Pamela Jean shrugged and threw up her endearing and adorable nails. “But those aren’t lollipops, silly. They’re Dum-Dums.”

Gloria wished Pamela Jean’s hair would catch on fire so she could see her “cutie wootie nail-ooties” melt into her scalp when Pammy tried to scratch out the flames. Gloria found herself writing down these evil plans on napkins and had amassed quite a stack for when Johnny would come marching home.

Johnny didn’t come marching home, of course, and Gloria had almost stopped jerking her head to the door whenever the bell would ring.

On the third Saturday in May a little after midnight, Gloria was preparing to leave Pamela Jean on her own for the first time. She had gone over the “after hours” checklist six times. She had even walked “PJ With a Brain of Hay” through each and every step twice. Although she didn’t want to, she had given “Clammy Pammy” her home number and her cell number to call “only in an emergency.”

Pamela Jean had bobbed her head several times before asking, “Whose numbers are those?”

As Gloria was gathering her purse and the deposit bag, a skinny black man wearing a clear plastic grocery bag on his head burst into Quick-E-Mart and slid up to the counter.

Pamela Jean fainted.

Several of her adorable nails broke her fall.

Gloria was secretly pleased.

“
This is a stick-up!” the man yelled, or at least seemed to yell. He had forgotten to put a hole in the bag, which was fast steaming up, and the bag’s straps were tightly tied around his ears.

Gloria stepped around Pamela Jean and several nail chips and tried not to laugh.
If I stall him long enough,
she thought,
he’ll asphyxiate himself.

The man lifted his jacket to show he had a gun in his pocket. “Gimme the money!” he again seemed to yell.

Gloria again tried not to laugh.
It’s only his finger, and that jacket has far too many holes in it to hide it.

The would-be robber lifted the bottom of the plastic bag from his chin and took a large gulp of air. “Didn’t you hear me?”

No,
Gloria thought.
I really didn’t.

“
Just gimme the money!” he yelled.

Gloria blinked. “There are cameras everywhere, sir.” She leaned forward. “And you’re wearing a clear plastic bag,” she whispered.

The man’s eyes squeezed shut. “C’mon, sister. I didn’t come here to be criticized.”

Gloria squinted. “Why are you robbing a Quick-E-Mart anyway? We don’t have much money.”

The man opened his sweaty eyelids. “I was too tired to walk to Kroger,” the man said, “now gimme the money.”

Gloria looked down at Pamela Jean, a line of drool cascading down her cheek to the floor.
She’s cleaning that up, not me.
“Look, you don’t really want to do this.”

“
I’m doin’ it, now—”

“
I know, I know,” Gloria interrupted, “give me the money.”

“
That’s right.”

Gloria pointed at his jacket pocket. “Your finger’s showing.”
I hope it isn’t loaded.

The man looked down and sighed. He put both of his hands on the counter. “C’mon, sister. It’s cold out. I need a place to stay. I could hurt you.”

Gloria shook her head slowly. “No, you couldn’t. If it was Pamela Jean, you might have had a chance.”

The man looked over the counter at Pamela Jean. “She okay?”

She’s actually doing a better job down there than she does up here.
“She’ll be all right.”

“
She fell out kinda quick, didn’t she?” The man scratched his head through the plastic bag. “I knew I shoulda waited till you left.”

Gloria nodded. “You don’t want to stay at the jail tonight, do you?”

“
At least it’s a place,” the man said. He removed the plastic bag, several drops of sweat hitting the counter.