Sweet Carolina Morning (16 page)

Linny nodded. “I know what you mean about boys not talking. Neal can be like that.”

Ceecee rolled her eyes and shook her head. “You just muddle through those years.”

Pausing as she dried the knives, Ceecee peered at the windowsill at the plastic angel statue Linny's mother had given her last year, while Linny was in her dead-husband, no-money, and no-job phase. Ceecee read aloud the prayer on the base. “
God's guardian angels watch over you, night and day
. That is so beautiful,” she said softly and looked at Linny. “I heard you lost two husbands, honey, and I'm just so sorry.”

Linny carefully rewashed the glass she'd just washed, both unnerved and touched by Ceecee's empathy. “Thank you,” she said briskly and drained the dishpan. “Sometime I'd love to hear more of your reminiscences of when Jack was a boy.”

“There's nothing I'd love to talk about more. He was a darling boy, and we probably spoiled him because he was our only child,” Ceecee said, sounding wistful. “Rush and I always dreamed about having a houseful of kids, but after Jack, I . . . had . . . several miscarriages,” she said, a wobble in her voice. “Jack was our miracle baby, part of God's plan for us.”

Linny gazed at her and said softly, “I'm sorry for your losses, Ceecee.”

But Ceecee smiled brightly, hung the dish towel on the side of the sink, and neatened it. “That chicken salad was tasty. Not too much mayonnaise. Don't you hate when they put too much mayonnaise in it?”

Linny nodded slowly, again nonplussed by the glimpses she kept catching of a woman she found she liked. She picked up the wilted-looking pink pumps that were now stained clay orange and shook her head regretfully. “I'm sorry about your shoes. Let me put them in a plastic bag, and maybe you can work some magic on them at home. You can keep the clogs.”

Ceecee waved a hand. “Don't you worry your head about those pumps and I'll get these . . . zippy little shoes back to you.”

The door to the trailer opened and the men strode back in, bringing with them a blast of cool air. A pink-cheeked Jack called out, “All done. It was just a loose connection.”

“Maybe got jiggled by some of these potholes. We've grown a bumper crop of them this year,” Rush said importantly.

“Thank you so much,” Linny said.

Jack glanced at the clock and grimaced. “I need to get to the office.” Brushing Linny's cheek with a kiss, he gave his parents quick hugs and was gone.

Linny walked her future-in-laws to their car, Ceecee linked her hand in Linny's arm and shuffled along beside her in the too-big clogs. Stumbling on a small root, she held on tighter to Linny and said in a confidential tone, “I do have two left feet. Really. I try so hard to be graceful, but I'm not.”

Again, Linny found herself liking Ceecee.

After opening the door for his wife, Rush beamed at Linny and gave her a bracing side-arm hug. “Have a good week, sweetheart.” He stepped into the car and turned on the ignition.

Ceecee let down the window. “This has been such a nice visit and I'm just so glad we got everything settled.” She clasped her hands together and twinkled at Linny.

Linny paused, finding herself smiling, and looked at her questioningly. “Remind me what exactly we settled?”

Ceecee gave a silvery laugh and wagged a finger, as if Linny had just said something so clever. “Why the engagement party, sugar. We'll have a small cocktail party at the club to celebrate. It'll be simple but elegant, and you all can invite family and your closest friends.”

Linny blinked and found herself grinning. She waved as they drove off and walked back to the trailer. She'd pass the ball to Jack on this one.

Back inside, Linny sent a text to Jack:
Enjoyed lunch. Your mama's a catbird, but she's growing on me. FYI: Ceecee still thinks we're having a cocktail party at the club. See you at 5:30.

* * *

After a quick run to the grocery store for much-needed supplies, Linny folded the cloth bags and stowed them, congratulating herself for remembering to bring them into the store instead of leaving them in the car. As Linny put yogurt and milk in the fridge, she found she was humming a Taylor Swift song she'd just heard on the radio and realized she was excited about tonight's outing. She and the two men were going clothes shopping for Neal. At Jack's insistence, Neal was doing his own laundry these days, and though he claimed he used cold water and low dryer settings, his pants had shrunk to high water length and his tight clothes made him look like a member of a boy band. Linny shook her head and smiled as she slid the jar of marinara sauce and cans of beans onto a shelf. Chores like clothes shopping that other parents would find mundane seemed exotic to her. She'd never really done it for a boy. She gave a little shiver. Looking appraisingly at lengths of sleeves and pants legs seemed so domestic and homey, and well . . . official. It was a real stepmother moment.

The phone rang and she picked it up, happy when she saw Jack's name on the display. “Hey, there.”

“Hey, you,” Jack said in his warm, gravelly voice that made her feel like the only woman in the world. But his tone changed to one of weary exasperation. “Guess what we're doing tonight?”

Linny slumped against the counter and closed her eyes. “Not going shopping?”

“I'm sorry, honey. I really am.” Jack blew out an exasperated sigh. “Neal just told me that he has an earth science project due tomorrow and he hasn't even started it. It counts as a third of his grade,” he explained. “We're building a tsunami.”

“Oh, Jack.” Linny thought about it, and her feeling of sinking disappointment was replaced by a hot flare of anger. “Why does this keep happening? How does a smart guy like Neal keep forgetting big school assignments?”

“I don't know, honey. When we meet up with the counselor, we'll get an explanation.” He sounded determined. “But until then, I can't let him mess up his studies. He's worked too hard to get on the honor roll to blow it all up because he's having trouble adjusting to . . . whatever he's having trouble adjusting to.”

“I understand,” she said, mouthing the words of a good fiancée but feeling a creeping resentment as she wondered if this was how it was always going to be. Their plans getting shoved aside, Neal's needs always coming first. She felt like saying,
What about me? What about us?
They were supposed to be in the heady early days of their engagement and already she was tired of being a good sport. But Carol Brady was so patient and understanding when the kids got up to hijinks; she could be, too. Linny tried to convey her flexibility. “It's okay, Jack. Really. Now you two get working on your tsunami.”

Jack sounded relieved. “Thanks, Lin. Things will settle down. I promise they will. I'll call you later.”

Linny ended the call and pinched her lip, wondering if Carol Brady was a big drinker. Equanimity and understanding just drained her. Pulling an emergency bag of Flamin' Hot Cheetos from the hiding place in the pantry, Linny was about to push the corkscrew into a nice bottle of Chardonnay when the phone rang again. She brightened as she picked up, just knowing Jack was calling again to apologize. “It's okay. It really is okay,” she said in her well-modulated, perfect TV stepmom voice.

“Good,” Mary Catherine said briskly. “I was worrying, but now I'll stop.”

Linny giggled. “I thought you were Jack.”

“Well, I'm not,” Mary Catherine said mildly. “Do you want to go shoot sporting clays in an hour? I still have a bunch of those adventure coupons left and I feel like shooting something.”

“Why do you feel like shooting something?” Linny asked, hedging while she rummaged around in her head for a good excuse not to go.

Her friend snorted. “Immature son antics. Makes me crazy.”

Why hadn't she called Mary Catherine in the first place? Was she trying not to let on how hard this family mess could be? Her friend would give non-sugarcoated advice, and she wouldn't think Linny was being a crybaby. She'd been though those wars, too, including Dare's recent drunk-driving-on-a-bike incident. “I want to hear all about the crazy, and I'm in on the clay shooting,” Linny announced.

“Good. Pick you up in twenty minutes.”

Saying good-bye to the air, Linny grinned. Though they'd been friends since grade school, Linny still caught herself offering hellos and good-byes to a woman who saw pleasantries as time wasters. In the bedroom she gazed in her closet and cocked her head, baffled. Roy wandered in, sat down beside her, and also studied the open closet. Linny rested her hand on his silky head and remembered a
Garden & Gun
magazine she'd flipped through at her dentist's office last week. In the photo of a shooting party, a stunning woman wore a jaunty, houndstooth newsboy cap and a crimson cutaway coat that was vintage Chanel. Linny scratched behind Roy's ears and his eyes closed in bliss. “Fresh out of vintage Chanel, buddy,” she explained.

After a few more moments of examining and discarding potential outfits, Linny gazed at Roy. “Who am I trying to impress, buddy? No one.” He gave her a look that conveyed his utter agreement and began to lick his nether regions. She'd just wear her usual Saturday kick-around clothes. Pulling a soft L.L.Bean fleece over her head, she traded her sneakers for a pair of sturdy boots and grinned, realizing the bonus of the adventure. Besides getting in a gabfest with Mary Catherine, she'd get to casually tell Jack that she'd gone clay shooting instead of moping because he'd canceled their plans. Linny grinned at her meanness.

O
n the drive out to Tucker Farms Sporting Clays Course, Linny and Mary Catherine didn't have much time to talk. The Waze lady sent them down a gravel road that dead-ended, and then she wound them through the parking lot of the No Credit? No Problem! Mobile Home Dealership. When Linny realized they'd whizzed past the same tumble down tobacco barn for the third time, she finally pulled the old Rand McNally out of her friend's glove compartment. Squinting at the map, Linny called out directions and Mary Catherine followed them, her hands draped casually on the wheel as she whistled tunelessly under her breath.

For all their hurrying, they were fifteen minutes early for the mandatory new shooters orientation session. After signing in and paying, the two women bought drinks and sat on a picnic table that overlooked miles and miles of rolling fields.

Linny took a cool swallow of water and turned to Mary Catherine. “So what's Dare done to make you so mad?”

Crossing her long, khaki-clad legs, Mary Catherine grimaced. “My son, the future business major, just put thirty-two-hundred dollars on our credit card for a spring break trip to Fort Lauderdale. The three guys he stayed with agreed to divide the hotel bill and expenses, but when it came time to pay up, all of them suddenly had money troubles: canceled credit cards, wallets stolen, that sort of thing.”

Linny shook her head, knowing where this was going. “So Dare put it on your card?”

“Correct,” Mary Catherine said crisply. “And he swears the boys will pay up as soon as they get back to Chapel Hill, but the three are nicknamed—and I am not making this up—Captain Bomb, Romeo, and Cheesepants.” She raised her eyes to heaven. “These aren't the names of responsible, debt-honoring young men.”

Linny tried not to laugh. “I'm sorry, girl. How's Mike taking it?”

“He's chopping firewood. Lots of firewood,” Mary Catherine said wryly.

“Oh, dear.” Linny thought about how tricky Neal could be and tilted her head. “What's the hardest thing about raising kids?”

Mary Catherine looked off into the distance, quiet for a moment. “They need different things from you at each stage of their growing up. My job now is to make sure my son and my husband don't kill each other, and to keep a tight rein on Dare. He needs to focus on school and finding a career.” She peeled at the label on her water bottle. “He also doesn't believe bad stuff could happen to him. His life could go off a cliff if he trusts the wrong person, gets a girl pregnant, drives drunk . . .” She shuddered. “Those thoughts keep me up at night.”

Linny saw the set of her friend's jaw and noticed anew the streaks of gray in her sleek bob. “I never really got how worrisome being a parent was until now.”

“Welcome to the club,” Mary Catherine said.

“I was naïve,” Linny admitted and cast a sideways glance at her friend. “I never understood how much you worried about Dare. When you talk about problems with him, you make the stories funny.”

Mary Catherine looked chagrined. “I learned that cover-up early on. I could make my family getting evicted from yet another trailer park sound like an Indiana Jones–type adventure.”

Linny nodded, feeling like a bad friend for not understanding the gravity of her friend's worries. From now on she'd dig deeper and listen harder when Mary Catherine talked about family problems. Linny gave her friend a level look. “I should have said this before: You two have done an amazing job with Dare. He's a sweetheart and has a good head on his shoulders.” She cracked a smile. “Well, most of the time.”

“Thanks,” Mary Catherine said. “This credit card deal will all come out in the wash.” She sent Linny a mischievous smile. “But still, I feel like shooting something. How are you doing, Miss Here Comes the Bride?”

“I'm in over my head with this family stuff,” she admitted, fiddling with the zipper of her fleece. “Jack canceled two get-togethers with me in less than a week so he could help Neal study.”

Mary Catherine cocked her head. “I thought Neal was a whiz kid, though.”

Linny pressed her lips together. “He has been up until now. We're trying to figure out why he's struggling. Last week Jack and I went to a parent teacher conference along with Vera and her new husband.” Linny glowered as she thought about it. “I had to play nice with the woman who'd told Neal I'm trailer trash and that I'm marrying Jack for his money.”

“Classy,” her friend said dryly.

Linny grew clearer on what was bugging her. “One day I feel like part of the family team and the next day I'm an outsider. Neal likes me and then he doesn't. Sometimes I feel like I'm intruding on Jack and Neal. How included should I try to be? And am I supposed to try to be a parent, too, or just Jack's wife?” She threw up her hands. “I'm trying hard to figure all this out because I really, really want this marriage to work, but I feel like I'm getting Cs and Ds on everything.”

“Nobody gets As at this,” Mary Catherine said firmly. “An old client of mine was a sweet lady and a psychologist who worked with the kids of divorce. When she remarried, her daughter ran away. The new stepfather was a great guy, and the ex was a mean alcoholic.” She gave Linny a level look. “Just buckle your seat belt, sister. This is going to be bumpy for a while, no matter how hard you try to be the perfect stepmother and soon-to-be new wife.”

Linny nodded glumly, recognizing the truth. She took a small sip of water, feeling calmer after having aired what was bugging her. She cocked her head at Mary Catherine. “One more thing: This early on, shouldn't we still be gazing at each other over candlelight?”

“And running slow motion through a field toward each other?” Mary Catherine asked, a smile playing at the corner of her lips. “Kids change everything. You got dropped into an already existing deal and have a lot to figure out with no rule book.”

“How do the parents and stepparents you see in your practice manage it?” Linny asked.

“A lot of them see me because they aren't managing it,” Mary Catherine reminded her but then was quiet for a moment. “The ones that do okay with blending families make it up as they go along.”

“I don't want to make it up as I go along,” Linny said stubbornly but started to smile, realizing she sounded like a thirteen-year-old. “I need a clearer job description. Goals and expectations. Roles and responsibilities.”

“Ah, my corporate girl.” Mary Catherine patted her arm comfortingly. “You're going to get through this. It's just going to take time.”

Linny gave a halfhearted nod.

“Gather round, folks.” A burly, farm-fed-looking man wearing an orange vest and a long-billed cap waved them over. He held a cracked-open shotgun in one hand and a tablet in the other. Mary Catherine and Linny joined the small group forming around him. “I'm Butch, your instructor for the new shooters orientation session.” He glanced at his tablet. “I'm just waiting on two more folks. Let's give them one more minute.”

Thinking about shooting a real live, loaded gun, Linny felt her stomach start to do backflips, and her hands grew clammy. People watching to try to relax, she slipped on her shades and glanced at the other novices. They looked like the normal mix of old South and new: a few serious-looking IT/engineering types seeming ready to take notes standing beside a couple in matching Wrangler's and Dale Earnhardt Jr. T-shirts. She nudged Mary Catherine and tilted her head at the couple next to them: a young man wearing blue suede shoes and a Jake Gyllenhaal/Gavin Rossdale–inspired male bun peeking out from underneath his red beret. His girlfriend wore black leather jeans, sparkly eyeliner, and high-heeled wedge tennis shoes in a camouflage print. Mary Catherine's eyes twinkled and she nodded.

Linny winced inwardly as she pictured the novices winging each other and studied the instructor, silently praying he was as competent as he seemed.

Butch looked around the group. “Welcome to Tucker Farms. Glad y'all came out on this fine afternoon to do some shooting. Before I send you on your way, I'll give you an overview of how we work things on the course and a brief talk on safety.”

“Brief? Don't we need more than brief?” Linny whispered to Mary Catherine, but she just shushed her.

Butch handed out orange foam ear plugs and safety glasses. “Ear protection and eye protection are a must, so wear these any time you're in the shooting box. Safety is your main concern today, so let's review gun handling.” He eased the cracked open gun from his shoulder and pointed it at the ground. “Today you'll be shooting .22 gauge shotguns. Always think of your gun as loaded. Never point it at anyone and always keep the gun action open when you're not using it so others know you're not going to accidentally shoot them.” He smiled and shook his head as though he was recalling a particularly amusing participant shooting incident.

Linny's eyes widened, raised a tentative hand, and asked in a thin voice, “Does that happen very often? People shooting other people?”

Other participants in the group glanced at one another and laughed uneasily.

“It's never happened here in the ten years I've owned and operated this course,” Butch said with a reassuring smile. “My team and I take gun safety seriously.”

Linny began to breathe more normally as Butch discussed safety, firing, and loading the shells. He patted the stock of the shotgun. “The guns can give you quite a kick, so if you lean forward and crease your shoulder around the butt of the gun when you shoot, you'll get less recoil, which means less bruising on your shoulders tomorrow.” He started to chuckle again but saw Linny's wide eyes and resumed his serious look.

“You'll take golf carts to each of the twelve shooting stations we've got set up. You've got fifty shells each to shoot.” He held up what looked like a big-pronged plug to a kitchen stove. “This here's a trap control. You plug it in at each station, and when your buddy calls
pull
, you mash this control button and the machine lets loose a clay.” Butch's voice grew more animated as he went on, making sweeping gestures with his hands as he described the arc of the clays. “The targets get thrown from different angles and distances and move at different speeds. They'll be thrown low like ducks winging off the water, high like a covey of quail flying up through the trees, and close to the ground like rabbits hopping along.”

Linny gasped quietly and whispered to Mary Catherine, “I don't want to think about shooting bunnies.”

Butch caught her expression and he paused in his spiel, his face softening. “Now there's no harm in thinking of this whole sport a different way.” He pushed back the brim of his hat and scratched his head. “I had a bunch of lady professors from the University at Chapel Hill come out last week for team building, and they weren't hitting much of anything. Finally, one told me they were a mite squeamish about the whole animal shooting deal, some of them being vegetarians and all.” Butch winced, probably contemplating life without T-bone steaks. “So they put their heads together and came up with a whole list of things they'd rather shoot and started shooting real good. Regular Annie Oakleys, they were. I got so tickled, I asked them what they imagined shooting at, and I wrote it down and saved it.” He reached in the pocket of his brown canvas shirt, pulled out a piece of paper, and read it in his deep baritone voice:

“Ex-husbands who try to weasel out of paying child support, people who mistreat animals, lazy students who think they're entitled to As and Bs, do-nothing deans and department heads who need to go ahead and retire.”

As the group laughed, Linny breathed a sigh of relief and Mary Catherine patted her arm.

Butch slipped the list back in his pocket and gave a reassuring smile. “So you do this however you want to. The main thing is that you enjoy yourselves. Let's have you start at different stations so you don't get all backed up at the same place, waiting for the others to take their shots.” Directing the group to the row of golf carts behind him, he called out, “Go ahead and get situated in your carts. I'll get you your guns.” He strode off, calling over his shoulder, “Me and my men will be riding around checking on you. Wave us down if you have any questions.”

In the driver's seat, Mary Catherine took a swig from her bottle of water and grinned over at Linny. “When I was a kid my friends and I would shoot BB guns at Pabst Blue Ribbon cans set up on a board.”

“You were probably a dead eye,” Linny said knowingly. “You're good at every sport you try.”

“Maybe.” Mary Catherine shrugged. “But I can't cook, and my interpersonal skills aren't that great.”

“True.” Linny nodded, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth.

“Hey, there, little ladies,” Butch called as he strode over, and had Mary Catherine and then Linny examine the gun. When she first held the cool heft of it, Linny's hands shook, and she tried to stay calm by thinking about the beautiful Dale Evans from the Roy Rogers re-runs she used to watch when she was a kid. That cowgirl could shoot a gun.

Butch showed them how to slip the gun into a metal slot in front of the golf cart seat.

“It's like a little umbrella stand, isn't it?” Linny asked, realizing how fatuous she sounded as the words left her mouth.

“It is.” Butch nodded solemnly, his eyes twinkling. “You're all set to go.”

As they tooled away, Butch waved at them.

“That man is seriously cute in a John Wayne kind of way,” Mary Catherine said as they jounced down the tree-lined dirt trail. “No ring on his hand and his neck hair was unkempt. You know my theory: A scruffy neck on a man is a sure sign he's got no woman in his life or his marriage is in trouble.”