Small Town Girl (22 page)

There were, of course, many kind words in the fan mail, yet the negative ones left a longer-lasting aftertaste. It was just after Tess had been chewed out for the double negatives that Mary woke up complaining, "Why didn't you wake me? I missed the beginning of
60 Minutes
. I never miss
60 Minutes
."

"Well, you didn't tell me, Momma. How was I supposed to know?"

Perhaps Tess would have been more patient with her if it hadn't happened at that particular moment.

When Mary was settled on the sofa in front of the TV, she added, "And suppertime was at six, too. What are you making for supper?"

"Chicken breasts and rice."

"No potatoes?"

"No. Rice, I told you."

"But I always fix potatoes with chicken."

"This chicken is different. I marinated it and I'm going to broil it."

"It gets dry that way."

"Not if you don't overcook it."

"Broiling always makes it dry. I like mine fried."

"Mother, you don't fry marinated chicken, you broil it or grill it."

"Well, I don't have a grill, and besides, I never liked the flavor of charcoal anyway."

Tess sighed. Domesticity being her short suit, she was doing her best here.

"Do you want me to go to the store and buy you a piece of chicken so I can fry it?"

"The store's not open on Sunday night."

"Well, I could thaw one in the microwave then."

"Heavens, no. I wouldn't put you through all that trouble."

"But you just said—"

"No, I guess I'll have to eat mine however you're fixing yours."

But when Mary sat down to supper, distaste was written all over her face.

During the meal Tess attempted to broach the subject of Judy's jealousy and how it hurt her, but Mary said, "Don't be silly. Judy's not jealous. She was in the kitchen washing up the dishes while all the rest of us were having fun."

So that's how it went at mealtime, always disagreements about what Tess chose to put on the table, always differing opinions when they tried to talk. The yellowed plastic doily reappeared in the middle of the table and stayed. Tess couldn't believe her mother had retrieved it from the garbage, but there it was, looking as warped and discolored as ever.

Tess loved her mother, truly she did, but she was beginning to realize that as Mary aged she was becoming argumentative and persnickety about lots of things. She wanted to have her way. Maybe her hip was hurting, maybe she missed her privacy, maybe Tess wasn't the best cook in the world, but damn it, she was trying.

Starting on Monday they established a routine. Every day Tess helped her mother with physical therapy. Every day she watered the garden and fetched and carried, and did laundry and housecleaning and errands, none of which she enjoyed, and with much of which Mary found fault. Every day Kelly Mendoza sent an express packet that required Tess's attention, be it signatures, decisions, phone calls or simply reading. It became difficult to find a time when Tess could compose on the piano because during the mornings she was busy, and during the afternoons Mary watched soap operas on TV, and in the evenings there was prime time, followed by bedtime during which Tess hesitated to use the piano for fear of keeping Mary awake.

On Tuesday Jack Greaves called and said, "The new song is a winner and so is the other voice. Is it that high school girl's?"

"Yes. Her name is Casey Kronek. I thought you'd like her."

"So what's on your mind, Tess?"

"I'll let you know."

On Tuesday night choir practice started at seven-thirty. An hour beforehand, Tess bathed, washed her hair, spritzed Jean-Louis Scherrer eau de toilette on her neck and behind her knees, dressed in a denim skirt and white shirt, and hooked a pair of silver discs in her ears. Tricia had been commandeered into staying with her grandmother and arrived when Tess was putting the finishing touches on her makeup. She came and lounged against the bathroom door-way. "Wow, Aunt Tess," she said, "you look sensational."

"Thanks."

"Smell good, too."

"Some new perfume I just found last month."

Tricia watched as Tess finished outlining her lips with lip liner and began filling them in with a lipstick brush.

"Going to a lot of trouble just for choir practice, aren't you?"

Tess checked the results in the mirror. Her makeup was perfect, her lip line crisp. "It's about maintaining an image. People expect you to look a certain way when they see you out in public."

It wasn't about that at all. It was about impressing Kenny Kronek, though Tess wasn't exactly admitting that to herself yet.

She walked out of the house with fifteen minutes to spare and was halfway to the alley when the man himself came out of his own house heading in the same direction. They caught sight of each other and felt a connection that kept their footsteps brisk and their gazes locked as they continued toward their cars, which were both sitting out.

"Hiya," she said jauntily, reaching her Z.

"Hiya," he answered, reaching his Plymouth.

She felt spunky and a little flirtatious and decided to test out her wiles on him. "I'm goin' to choir practice, where you goin'?"

He caught her mood and squinted at the clear violet sky. "Full moon. Thought I'd go out and bite a couple necks."

"You all alone?"

"Yes, ma'am," he drawled, opening his car door.

"Where's Casey?"

"Gone already. She picks up Brenda and Amy on the way." Those were the girls Tess had met after church on Sunday.

"Shame to take two cars when we're both going the same way. Wanna ride with me?"

He slammed his car door and crossed the alley. "You bet."

"You won't bite my neck, will you?"

"Might have to, to steal your car."

"Get in."

Inside the Z, they both buckled up and settled low in the leather seats, like riders in a bobsled. She started the engine and shifted into reverse.

"Boy, this
is
nice, and this time I mean it."

"Meaning you didn't the last time?"

"We both had attitudes that day, didn't we? The car's incredible, Tess."

"Thanks."

As the car rolled up the alley he ran his window down and cocked his head toward the throaty sound of the engine.

"Listen to that. Like a lion purring. Real leather, too," he noted, rubbing the edge of the seat.

"Absolutely."

"What'll she do?"

"I don't know. I've never opened 'er up." She tossed him a glance. "I wouldn't take you for a speeder."

"I'm not really, but sometimes a person gets the urge. 'Specially when there's a full moon." He sent her an arch glance. "Damn moon can make you do all kinds of things you shouldn't."

He seemed like a totally different man tonight, as if he, too, had been anticipating this get-together. It was easier than ever to spar with him.

"Hey, Kenny, know what?"

"What?"

"There's no full moon."

"There isn't?"

"There's no moon at all. It's not up yet. And if I'm not mistaken, when it shows it'll be about one half."

"Is that a fact? Must be something else that got into me then."

She gave him a second, longer glance. He was watching her from the corner of his eye, as if half-interested, relaxed in his seat. Everything about his pose was flirtatious and teasing. His clothing was a surprise. He was wearing pressed khaki trousers and a short-sleeved shirt in a bunch of wild summer colors featuring a ludicrous design of sunglasses and fish and seaweed. Very trendy and not at all the kind of thing she'd expect him to break out in. He was freshly shaved and smelled good, too. She'd noticed it as soon as he'd gotten in, and with the window rolled down the woodsy smell went grapevining all over.

"Pretty wild shirt," she told him, returning her eyes to the road.

"Damn right," he said smugly.

She gave the steering wheel a jerk, just to throw him off balance. He flew to the right, bounced off the door and grinned.

"Showoff," he said.

"But then I always was, wasn't I?"

He eyed her openly, not trying to hide it. "So what happened to the huge earrings tonight?"

"These were more reverent."

"Big improvement," he said.

"Thanks a lot," she said sarcastically.

"Hey, you know what? I read that about you, that you have a very cutting sense of humor."

"Oh, so you read about me, huh?"

"Sometimes."

"That surprises me."

"Why wouldn't I? An old schoolmate. Hometown girl. Mary's daughter."

"The bane of your youth."

"That, too."

They arrived at First Methodist, a red-brick structure with a white bell tower and traditional ogive windows. She parked at the curb and they climbed the front steps together. Twilight was coming to a close as he opened the heavy wooden door for her and she stepped into the wine-hued dimness of the vestibule. Steps curved up to the choir loft from Tess's right. She climbed them without waiting for Kenny and stopped to look down at the nave, while in the dim recesses below he switched on lights that came on over her head. The sound of the switches echoed through the sanctified silence, followed by his footsteps on the wooden stairs. The church smelled exactly the way she remembered, of old wood and candle smoke and memories. It brought peace and a sense of suspended idleness; empty as it was tonight.

Kenny arrived and stopped beside her, looking down at the pews and altar, the familiar lines of the roof, windows and side pillars. Even the burgundy carpet down the center aisle seemed timeless.

"Churches never change," she said.

"No."

"We used to sit right down there." She pointed. "I remember coming to Sunday services when Daddy was still alive."

"I remember your dad. He used to call me sonny. 'Well, let me see if I've got any mail for you today, sonny,' he'd say, when I was way too young to get any. Then he'd hand me the letters for my mother and warn me not to drop any on my way into the house. Once when he came along the sidewalk with his great big leather mailbag I was sitting there trying to get my chain back on my bike, and he stopped and put down his mailbag and fixed it for me. Do you think mailmen still do that today?"

She smiled up at him. "I doubt it."

"Another time he was back by the burning barrel in the alley, breaking up a cardboard box, the kind that's from big bottles, like liquor bottles, you know? And he gave me the cardboard divider from the middle of it so I could play post office with it. I set it up on the front step to be the post office boxes, and I pretended my baseball cards were the mail I stuffed into them."

It was a nice moment, standing there remembering, their voices murmuring back to them in the quiet while the shadows grew darker in the space below. Whatever Kenny had been like as a boy, being with him now felt vastly nostalgic.

"Did you always go to this church?" she asked.

"Yes."

"I don't remember you here. I remember you in a lot of other places but not here."

"We used to sit down there." He, too, pointed.

A door opened downstairs—an intrusion as it clacked and echoed—followed by other footsteps ascending the stairs. A boy appeared, tall, gangly, with freckles and a red crew cut.

"Here's Josh," said Kenny. "Josh, come and meet Tess McPhail."

Josh Winkworth was a high school senior who played the organ and reacted with a blush when introduced to Tess. He had a long bony palm that was slightly damp when he shook her hand, and she could tell he was totally flustered to be meeting her.

Josh escaped to unlock the key cover on the organ and Kenny moved to the top tier of the choir loft, straightening the black metal music stands. "I don't know who's going to play the organ for us next year when Josh isn't here anymore. 'Course, by then I hope either Mrs. Atherton is back directing, or somebody else besides me." Tess moved along a lower tier, helping him with the stands. Voices sounded below and other choir members began arriving.

Casey and her friends made their appearance and Tess had the extreme pleasure of being able to tell her, "I talked to my producer, Jack Greaves, and he likes the song and wants to include it on the album."

"Are you serious?"

"Absolutely. You're going to be a published songwriter, one who gets royalties."

The squeals of excitement might have been the slightest bit out of line in the church, but giving Casey the thrill of her life gave Tess one of her own. Casey hugged her and thanked her while Brenda and Amy exclaimed, "Oh, Casey, wow! On a real album!"

Thirty-three people showed up for choir practice and Kenny performed a simple introduction.

"I know you all recognize Tess McPhail and know who she is, so make her feel comfortable by not asking her for her autograph tonight, okay?"

A ripple of laughter relaxed everyone and they got to work. Kenny warmed them up with the old warhorse of hymns, "Holy, Holy, Holy," and from the moment he raised his arms he became a different man. He became, in all respects, a leader, one who directed with animation and expressiveness. His choir liked him, and he them. They were not professionals. They were people who enjoyed singing, and it showed in how they responded to him.

For Tess, being directed by Kenny was not the trial she'd imagined when first asked. It was wholly pleasant, and blending her voice with the other thirty-three took her back to the Sundays of childhood when she did it regularly. She'd been placed with the sopranos, curved around on Kenny's right, while Casey stood with the altos on his left, and sometimes when they were singing, their glances caught and Tess had the feeling that destiny had brought her home for much more than caring for Mary. It had brought her here for Casey. And for Kenny, too? Heavens, what in the world was she thinking? It was exactly one week ago tonight that she had come back home and he'd walked into Momma's carrying that bag of salt. One week wasn't long enough to be having such fatalistic thoughts. But she'd admit that every time she was with him she saw a new facet of his personality, and what she saw she liked, more and more.