Big Cherry Holler (33 page)

“Spec, now you listen here. I ain’t sharin’ you with no goddamn whore. You got to choose. You choose me or her. Now that’s that. I didn’t give up my goddamn life since the age of goddamn fifteen to get to this point and be by my goddamn self. If you wanted out, you should’ve gotten out when I could still get me out there and find me another man. Who is gonna want me at sixty-four? You might as well set me on farr right here, right now in this room, and watch me burn. Now that’s the goddamn truth.”

The barrage keeps me in the hallway. Soon I hear the sound of soft sneakers on linoleum.

“Hi, Leola.”

“Hey, A-vuh.”

Leola has a yellow bouffant hairdo and big Oscar de la Renta glasses. Her face is small, so the glasses cover most of it. She has an unlit cigarette dangling from her mouth. She is tiny, and you can see the remnants of a great figure from her youth. She was always busty, but now she’s low-busty. She wears tight pink stirrup pants that pick up the pink letters on her oversize sweatshirt, which reads
MYRTLE BEACH MAMA
.

“Are you okay?”

“I need a smoke. Nice balloons.” Leola walks up the hallway.

Spec is lying in the bed attached to tubes of all kinds. He’s wearing his sunglasses, which I think is weird.

“Hey, Spec. I heard it went great.”

Spec holds up five fingers.

“I heard. Quintuple. Well, might as well unclog all the pipes while the doctor’s in there.”

Spec nods. “Doc Turner split my breastbone in two with an ax. He’s a fine surgeon. The scar is vurry thin, but it’s right long.” Then he whispers, “Is she gone?”

“Leola?”

He nods.

“She went for a smoke.”

“I got caught,” he says quietly, rolling his head back into the groove of the pillow.

“What do you mean?”

“Just what I said. Twyla was over here last night. She come to see me.”

“Oh no.”

“And I got caught.”

For years, Spec has led a double life, seeing Twyla Johnson, his off-and-on girlfriend, while married to Leola, the mother of his five children. Twyla works at the Farmers and Miners Bank down in Pennington. She’s a petite brunette with a gorgeous smile and lots of time on her hands (bank hours are ten to three). She’s probably sixty now, still a young thing to old Spec.

“I’m sure Leola thinks she saw more than she saw. Didn’t she?”

“No, she pert near saw it all.”

“Well, what did she see?”

Spec won’t say.

I press him. “Did Twyla kiss you or something?”

“No.”

“Was she holding your hand?”

“Not my hand.”

“Oh no.”

“Yeah, she was, well, you know what she was doing. It’s been a vurry vurry stressful time for me. Vurry much so. And Twyla come all this way, and frankly, she wanted to make me feel good.”

“Oh, Spec.”

“I know. It’s like your worst nightmare. It’s like your mother catchin’ ye, for Godsakes. It could turn you off entirely. You know what I’m sayin’.”

“Yes, I do.”

“I mean. Is it so wrong? Is comfort so wrong? I mean, let’s say I was about to die in here, which I was, they practically spelled it out, I mean, I was a goner. Every damn avenue to my heart was clogged,
Ave. It was dirt nap,
Good Night, Irene
, and kiss-your-ass-good-bye time. And if I had my pick of ways to spend my last moments, it sure weren’t gonna be with my sorry kids and my hateful wife gaping at me like a carp in a fish tank. I wanted my Twyla.” Spec sounds pitiful.

“Well, what’s gonna happen now?” I sit down on the bed. The movement jostles the cloudy tubes connecting in and out of him like overpasses on Appalachia Strait.

“That remains to be seen. Leola’s not left the room since. Poor Twyla burst into tears and run out of here. I ain’t seen her since. She ain’t called, neither.”

“She’s probably afraid.”

“It’s just a mess.”

“Yes, it is.”

“What ought I do?”

“What do you want to do?”

“I want out of this hospital. And then I want to be happy.”

“Who makes you happy?”

“The truth?”

“Yes. The truth.”

“Twyla.”

“Well, then you have to choose Twyla.”

“But what about Leola?”

“Leola can get another man.”

“You think?”

“Yes.”

“But she done took care of me when I was sick.”

“Give her combat pay.”

“That’s true. I can’t believe you’re sayin’ this. You bein’ a Cathlick and all. Y’all ain’t never supposed to go for divorce.”

“Well, Spec, we’ve known each other a long long time. And I think I know you pretty good.” I don’t want to say what I’m thinking, but something tells me I should. “Spec, I think you deserve more than a hand job on a gurney. I think you should be happy all the time.”

Spec is a little stunned at my blunt assessment. He appreciates it, though, and twists the food IV needle stuck in his hand like a sewing needle in a pin cushion. “Well put. Well put.” Spec looks away, but I can’t tell what he’s looking at through the sunglasses. “Thank you for that,” he says, and looks toward the window.

“Spec, I read something once that helped me a lot.”

“What was that?”

“Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between true love and lust.”

“Yes ma’am, it surely is.”

“Do you want to know how you tell the difference?”

“I think it would shed some light,” Spec says from behind his sunglasses.

“True love energizes you; lust exhausts you.”

“And women will ruin you.”

“That wasn’t in the book, Spec.”

“It ought to be.”

P
earl Grimes and Dr. Taye Bakagese are to be married tonight on the stage of the Trail of the Lonesome Pine Outdoor Drama Theatre. Pearl chose the Friday night after Thanksgiving because she knew most folks had the day off and could party into the wee hours. I am rushing around, ironing Jack’s shirt, hunting for Etta’s tights, and trying not to nick my freshly painted toenails on anything.

“Theodore?”

“What?” he says from inside the bathroom.

“Do you see Etta’s tights in there?”

Theodore hands me Etta’s tights through a crack in the door. He drove up to spend Thanksgiving with us. I convinced him that he shouldn’t miss Pearl’s wedding. The entire cast of the outdoor drama is invited, and they all wanted to see him.

Etta grabs her tights. I finish Jack’s shirt and pull the curlers out of my hair. Jack comes in from the kitchen.

“Your hair looks nice.”

“Thank you.”

We decide to go in Theodore’s car, since it’s a four-door. When we get to the theater, it looks like a sold-out show. Pearl Grimes has cast a wide net in her life already: she went to college, then she opened a second pharmacy in Norton, with a third scheduled to open in Pound. She’s amazing. As we join the folks filtering in, Otto sits by the door asking each person for tickets. Of course, everyone laughs at his joke.

“Can you believe my little grandbaby is gettin’ murried?”

“Isn’t life something?” I give him a hug.

“I mean, she’s my new grandbaby, little Pearl, since my son murried her mother. But I can claim her, can’t I?”

“Of course you can.”

As we gather onstage, the ceremony is simple and elegant. It’s a mix of Indian and Bluegrass, two cultures that have some things in common, like love of nature and family. Leah, radiant in a long red velvet dress, takes her place with Worley, who is wearing a new suit. Albert Grimes, hair slicked down, wearing gray slacks, a navy blazer, and a tie, fidgets nervously in the row behind Leah. (I think the insurance claim that the fire at the theater was caused by faulty wiring has taken the heat off of Albert.)

Taye looks at Pearl with so much love, it makes the hardest among us tear up. Nellie Goodloe runs out for more tissue (or maybe she’s jittery because the crowd is too big and she didn’t order enough mints).

Pearl’s simple white gown is exquisite. It has a scoop neck and long sleeves, the kind that trumpet out. The tiny seed pearls on the bodice catch the light. She wears the shawl I brought her from Italy over her shoulders. Her hair, soft in the cool air, curls down to her shoulders like a loose ribbon. She has placed tiny sprigs of baby’s breath throughout. As Taye puts the ring on Pearl’s hand, Otto nudges me.

“That there is my Destry’s ring.”

I put my arm around Otto. He has tears in his eyes as he thinks of
the love of his life, the beautiful Melungeon girl who died in childbirth bringing Worley into the world. Pearl holds her hand and looks down at the ring and adjusts it with her other hand. The judge pronounces Taye Bakagese and Pearl Grimes man and wife, and the applause echoes up and into the mountains behind us.

I feel Fleeta’s breath on the back of my neck. “Them babies of theirs is gonna be real brown,” she whispers.

“And beautiful,” I whisper back.

“Yup,” she says. I turn and look at Fleeta. Could she be softening up after all these years?

The tent, lit by tiny blue lights, showcases a feast of Southwest Virginia and Indian cuisine. Who knew that buttery sautéed kale tasted so good with grilled lamb kabobs?

“Hey, Ava!” Sweet Sue Tinsley says as she pats me on the back. In Big Stone Gap, we have open-church weddings (in this case, open-theater); they are announced in the paper and everyone is welcome. Sweet Sue Tinsley evidently kept her subscription to
The Post
, so she stays in the loop and on our party circuit. I take a good look at Jack Mac’s old girlfriend. She is aging just as I thought she would: very well. She’s cut her hair very short. Little spikes of white-yellow hair stick out all over her head. She wears a strapless white dress with a red patent-leather belt.

“How’s Kingsport?”

“The boys love it. Mike is working at the paper plant.”

“Great.”

“How are you?”

“Busy. But fine.”

“I’m a grandmother, you know.”

“I didn’t know!” I look at Sweet Sue. It seems impossible that she could be a grandmother.

“Yeah, my oldest, Chris, fell in love with his high school sweetheart. And she got pregnant. Little Michael is three months old.”

“Congratulations. You’re the foxiest grandma I’ve ever seen,” I tell her, and I mean it.

“Thank you, honey. I appreciate that. I do. You’re lookin’ good yourself!”

Sweet Sue excuses herself and runs off to say hello to lots of folks she hasn’t seen in a long while. I knock back an egg roll. I may look all right, but it’s depressing to think that I am actually old enough to be a grandmother.

“I’ll give you a hundred bucks if you dance with me right now,” Theodore says in my ear.

“I’m eating.”

“Starve.” He grabs me for a slow dance by the Jerome Street Ramblers.

“What is your problem?”

“Sarah Dunleavy has a jones for me like you wouldn’t believe.”

“She’s harmless.”

“She’s forty.”

“You’re forty-four.”

“Yeah, but I’m not trying to score a husband and a baby in the next six months. She’s on a mission.”

Then, as though we have glided into an old memory, Jack cuts in.

“I’d like to dance with my wife,” Jack says, and smiles.

“I’d like you to dance with Sarah Dunleavy,” Theodore tells him.

“No way!” I step into my husband’s arms and out of Theodore’s. Theodore heads for the dessert table as Jack sways with me under the glittery canopy (the same one used every year at the Powell Valley High School prom).

“What was that all about?”

“Nothing.”

“Why’d you cut in?”

“I don’t know. Sometimes you’ve got to dance with your wife.”

“Don’t you want to dance with Sarah Dunleavy?”

“She’s too skinny.”

“But she’s quiet, and she choral-reads Shakespeare.”

“I like noise, and I hate Shakespeare.”

“Uh, Jack?”

“Yes, darlin’?”

“Honey, is that your—” As we sway on the dance floor, I carefully move Jack’s hand from my butt to my waist.

“It better be my hand,” he says.

Pearl and Taye kiss by the band; Spec presses his fork into Nellie Goodloe’s cherry jubilee; Leola has a smoke with Fleeta (I’m sure Leola is catching her up on all the News); Iva Lou and Lyle stand over the steam tables surveying the choices; and Theodore takes the last seat at the table with Rick and Rita Harmon and their kids, so he doesn’t have to sit at Sarah Dunleavy’s, where there are two open seats on purpose. Etta waves to me from the corner of the tent, where the kids eat sugared mints and tell silly jokes. I wave to her; she smiles.

As the clock hits midnight, Pearl and her new husband take to the dance floor for one final go-round. The remaining guests, and there’s just a few of us, leave the floor to the bride and groom. Otto rigged up a couple of portable heaters under the tent, so it’s warm inside. The stage of the Outdoor Drama, fully lit and bathed in pink light, is empty now.

“Your shoes,” my husband says to me as he hands me the strappy sandals that stayed on my feet for about ten minutes into the reception. “Why do you wear shoes that hurt?”

“Because they’re pretty.”

Jack shakes his head and motions for Etta to join us. Theodore waits by the flap of the tent.

“Wasn’t it beautiful?” I ask Theodore as I look back at Pearl and Taye on the dance floor, shimmering beneath the canopy.

“It was fine. It would have been better if I didn’t have to play Hide the Band Director with Sarah Dunleavy.”

Etta climbs into the front seat with Theodore; Jack and I settle into the backseat.

“Mama, is Daddy drunk?”

“No honey, he’s just very very happy for Pearl and Dr. B.”

Theodore looks at me in the rearview mirror and smiles.

As we circle around the cul-de-sac and back onto Shawnee Avenue, we stop at the turnoff to Beamontown Road at the light. The black gates of Glencoe Cemetery glisten in the middle distance where the road meets the river. For a moment, I think to ask Theodore to make the turn. But I think better of it and let it go.

“Cracker’s Neck?” Theodore asks.

“Yeah.”

Jack puts his head on my lap as Etta tells Theodore about a small drama at the wedding between her friend Tara and some cute older boy named Chad. Soon the lights of Big Stone Gap blur behind us, and we’re speeding in the dark toward home.