The Future Homemakers of America (34 page)

I said, ‘How about a dishwasher?’

‘Got one of those, too.’

Marc, being a slightly older man, came fully equipped.

I said, ‘Well, you're hard to treat. How about some money for your honeymoon?’

‘Now you're talking!’ she said. ‘We're going to South Africa. Seeing rhino, hippo, all the big cats. You sleep in a tent and they take you out in a four-wheel drive and show you everything. And please don't say, “Well, Crystal, if that's what you really want.”’

I said, ‘Sounds like you've found a soulmate.’

‘I have, Mom,’ she said. ‘And you'll love him too.’

Marc's folks were dead. All he had was a brother, might be coming down from Ottawa for the wedding.

Crystal said, ‘Marc's clean. He doesn't have any weird kin or any dark secrets.’

I said, ‘You by any chance planning to wear pants for this wedding?’

‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘I'll probably pick something out from L. L. Bean. We'll probably get his ‘n’ hers waders too.’

I said, ‘Is Martine gonna be there?’

‘Of course,’ she said.

I said, ‘Is she pretty?’

‘Mom!’ she said. ‘There's nobody in the world as beautiful as you.’

I was so choked, I couldn't answer her.

I always had wondered about Martine, though. I never had seen any pictures, and when your ex takes another wife, you can't help but be curious. The way Crystal told it, Martine's boy Eugene wasn't no oil-painting. I didn't really care. I'd looked after myself. I'd probably get a few facials the month before I went up there. And I'd definitely give Betty's Lipo-Zipp a try. You get to a certain time of life, don't matter what you eat, your hips spread up and your bosom creeps down and everything just settles round your middle. I was thinking to get a plain sheath dress, not too fitted, and a matching jacket.

I was thinking, whatever I wore I'd probably look like royalty alongside of a worm-farmer's wife.

When I heard Vern's voice, I naturally thought he was calling about the wedding.

‘That you, Peg?’ he said. Then he started. It came at me like a flash flood. ‘You've got some nerve, getting me involved with that Moon kid and not levelling with me. You ask a person a favour, you owe them the full story. That way they know what they're letting theirs elves in for.’

I said, ‘Vern, I don't know what the hell you're talking about.’

He said, ‘Kirk Moon is what I'm talking about. Causing bad feeling between decent folk. You know how many years Bob Pick's been a friend of mine?’

Bottom line was, Kirk was finished at Glens Falls Reel-and-Lure. I said, ‘He have his hand in the till?

‘No,’ he said. ‘Worse than that. He was fired for lewd and diabolical behaviour, and don't even ask me to tell you. You must have known what he was like.’

He was yelling, just like the bad old days. ‘I had my doubts all along,’ he said, ‘and I should have listened to them. Doing favours. Well, not any more. From now on, I don't ask no favours and I don't do none.’

I said, ‘What kind of behaviour did you say?’

‘I'm not going into it,’ he said. ‘You must have known what he's like. You've seen him.’

I said, ‘Vern, I haven't seen him since he was a boy. He's a married man now, got a kid of his own.’

‘Then ask Lois,’ he said. ‘Get her to explain why a twenty-five-year-old couldn't find himself a job. Has he been in reformatory? He done time?’

I said, ‘Do you think I'd have asked you to help him if I knew he was trouble? All I knew was what Lois told me. Sounded like he'd had a bad run of luck. Then there was a baby on the way.’

‘Bad run of luck!’ he said. He was still yelling. ‘That's real con-talk. Never got an even break neither, I'll bet. Never got straightened out, more like. Never saw enough of Herb's belt. And that's another blow. Was a time I'd have trusted Herb Moon with my life. Now I find out he's spawned a reprobate, behaves like he was never showed right from wrong. You can tell Herb and Lois from me they got some neck dumping a piece of work like that on innocent strangers.’ And he slammed down the phone.

I felt sick. I got the shakes. I phoned Lois.

‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘thought I'd be hearing from you.’ She made me feel bad before I even started, like I was the one making trouble.

‘Look,’ she said, ‘it just didn't work out, okay? Sometimes things don't. I don't see why folks have to make such a big deal out of it.’

I said, ‘What'd he do, Lo? Vern's in a real fit.’

‘I swear,’ she said, ‘these woodchucks oughta get out more, see a little of the world. They spent five minutes in New York they wouldn't get scandalised so easy.’

I asked her again, what he had done.

‘All he needs,’ she said, ‘is for people to show a little patience and understanding. And now he's really down. Marisa's gone home. Her folks won't let him see Cory. I told them they should just butt out. He's pacing around the house. He's even driving Herb nuts.’

I screamed at her. I said, ‘Lois, just tell me what he did!’ Matter of fact, I said the F-word. First time I ever used it, and I pray it's the last. Made her change her attitude, though.

‘Oh Peg,’ she said, all soothing and sweet, ‘you know Kirk's always had some weird ways. He just made some suggestion to one of the old boys in the store. You know? Like a joke?’

I said, ‘He didn't get fired for a joke.’

‘Well,’ she said. ‘He might have done it a few times. He might have given them a flash of his privates or something.’

I said, ‘Might have? Did he or didn't he?’

‘So they say,’ she said. ‘But who would you believe? Young married man, got a good-looking wife, or some old hayseed, only action he ever sees is Rosy Palm and her five sisters?’

I said, ‘You telling me he didn't do anything? Or he might have done something? What
are
you telling me? Anybody brought charges?’

She said, ‘Will you quit the interrogation? I'm sorry if Vern gave out to you, but it's finished now. Me and Herb are dealing with it. Herb'll give Vern a call, smooth things over.’

I said, ‘Kirk ever done a thing like that before?’

‘Crying out loud, Peg,’ she said, drop it, will you? What's it to you anyway?’

I said, ‘I'll tell you what it is to me. I'm all ready to fly up to Maine, stand beside Vern Dewey and watch our daughter get married, and as of 9 p.m. this evening Vern isn't even speaking to me.’

‘Know what I think?’ she said. ‘You're such a tight-ass, Peggy. No wonder Vern left you. Why don't you just loosen up? And quit picking on my boy.’

I didn't say another word to her. Just put down the telephone. I never expected to speak to her again, not as long as I lived.

I didn't sleep. First thing, I called Crystal.

I said, ‘Honey, I don't think I can come to your wedding.’

‘Mom,’ she said, ‘you've been on my case since ever since Trent Weaver. You don't show up, we'll come down there and get you.’

I told her about Kirk and everything, but she already knew.

‘You'd think he'd have been more careful,’ she said, ‘leaving a little thing like that lying around in a bait store.’ Crystal always could make me feel better.

Half an hour later Vern phoned. All he said was, ‘Idiot! See you next week.’

89

I flew up to Boston, then on to Bangor, and Crystal drove me into town in her old pick-up. I never saw a bride so laid-back in all my days. She hadn't even had her nails done.

‘No point,’ she said ‘First, Marc'd never recognise me if I did. Second, I have a lynx skin in tanning liquor I need to take a look at before I'm through.’

We picked up Marc from his office, so we could all go get something to eat. One thing. He was nothing like her first husband. Matter of fact, you could have gotten two Trent Weavers out of Marc and still had flesh left to spare.

‘Y'all finished, then?’ she said, as he was climbing into the car. ‘Can we go off and get married and go to Africa and everything?’

‘Don't pressure me now, Crystal,’ he said. ‘We've got a big story breaking in there. I shouldn't even be out to dinner.’

He turned to me, gave me a big smile. ‘Outbreak of black-headed fireworm in Massachusetts,’ he said. ‘We're holding the front page.’

Marc was forty-one, same age as Grice, as a matter of fact, and he'd never been married neither. He said Crystal was the first woman he ever met was happier on a mountain trail than she was in a shopping mall.

I liked him, and it was plain to see Crystal was head over heels. The only thing I wished was, she would remember to moisturise at night. A girl spends so much time outdoors she has to think of her skin. It's something, to see your baby turn thirty.

They put me up at the Harbor House Inn. I had a great big canopy bed all to myself and breakfast brought to my room. Blueberry pancakes, hazelnut coffee. I just sent down for a lemon tea. When a person's going out on the ocean they can't be too careful, is what I think.

Ten a.m. the Dewey wagon-train rolled into the car park. I stood inside and watched them pile out. It was the first time I had seen Vern in twenty years. I thought he looked old, and maybe he thought the same about me. He was kinda bashful, though, having me and Martine around. First thing I said to him was, ‘I'm real sorry about Kirk.’

‘Let's say no more about it,’ he said. ‘Me and Bob Pick are back on tracks. Main thing is, we make sure Crystal has a great day.’

Martine was a bundle of energy, for a larger woman. She had dyed hair, burgundy red, and a Terylene pants-suit in sky-blue. Took me right by the arm and told me not to worry about a thing. Way I looked at it, it was my daughter's wedding day and it was entirely up to me what I worried about.

Her boy Eugene had a beer gut, and a wispy moustache. I don't believe I heard him speak all day. And his little wife, Filomena, was real homely too, always had her hand over her mouth when she smiled, which she did most of the time, and when I seen her teeth I understood why. Speaking of teeth, Mom Dewey had in new plates, top and bottom. And Crystal was right. She hadn't aged frail. She had gone hard and leathery.

‘Well,’ she said to me, ‘at least she's marrying a white man. She hadn't a been marrying a white man I wouldn't have closed up my store for the day.’

I never saw my girl look so beautiful. She only had a chainstore dress, cream with a chocolate trim, and an ivory wool wrap, but I guess she was wearing her happiness too. Marc was waiting on us down at the quayside, had his shirt buttoned to the neck but no tie. I guess that was the trend. In Texas we don't pay much heed to what the East Coast is doing.

It was a real sail-boat they had hired, a schooner called
Bonaparte
with canvas sails and everything. It even had a lounge downstairs with a soapstone fireplace.

Mom Dewey said, ‘Where's the preacher?’

We headed up the coast and I surprised myself. I liked the feel of that old boat dipping through the water. She was so well built, and the colour of the maples, just starting to turn, was so pretty, I didn't even bother thinking about shipwrecks or getting sick or anything.

Mom Dewey said, ‘Where's the Justice?’

They stopped the boat by a little granite island and Marc and Crystal made their vows and exchanged rings. Me and Vern both had to wipe a tear, and Mom Dewey heaved her breakfast into the bay and her bottom plate too, which accounts for her face looking kinda caved in in the pictures. There were seals in the water and, as soon as they had finished getting married, the bride and groom were over to the rail checking them out through their field-glasses.

Marc said they were harp seals. Crystal said they were young greys.

‘Uh-oh,’ he said. ‘Our first fight.’

It was the darlingest wedding I ever was at, and I've been to a few.

The boat people had everything ready. Lobsters for baking and all the fixings. They had a pit on the island, lined with firebricks, used it all the time. They'd had it lit since daybreak. Soon as we landed they spread seaweed over the hot bricks and lobsters on top and corn in the husk, pulled a tarp over the top to keep the steam in and served cold beer and Polish sausage while the dinner cooked.

I found myself next to Martine and kinda lost for small talk.

I said, ‘Business going okay?’ It was the best I could do.

‘Going great,’ she said. ‘Only one outfit bigger'n us now and they're out of state. I do the redworms. Vern and Eugene do the nightcrawlers. Course, I was laid for a while. I expect you heard. I had a cancer in my bosom.’

I said, ‘Good friend of mine got cancer of the cervix.’

She sucked in her breath. ‘They take it all away? They took all mine away.’

I said, ‘They took her womb, took her ovaries. I don't know what else they took,’

‘Best thing,’ she said. ‘She won't be needing it any more. Best they take it all away, give you a clean slate. That's what I got and I never felt better. Did I, Vern?’

He had wandered over to us, after he'd checked those folks knew how to cook lobster. ‘Never felt better, never looked better,’ he said, and he slipped his arm around her. There was no need for him to do a thing like that, right in front of me.

‘Well, Peg,’ he said. ‘So we finally got her off our hands.’

I said, ‘Marc's nice.’

‘Yeah,’ he said, a bit lukewarm. ‘Course, he's white-collar. He's a great one for reading and all that. Can't say I've ever seen him roll up his sleeves. Still, we got Eugene for that. And Crystal's not shy of getting her hands dirty. Takes after her old man, there.’

I said, ‘You remember when we were at Drampton? You remember those coney-skin gloves she got? Wouldn't be parted for them, didn't matter how hot she was? I reckon that was the start of this taxidermy thing.’

He said, ‘Could be you're right. And that cat we had at Wichita. She was always trying to train him up. Always was good around animals.’

Martine didn't like us reminiscing. ‘Vern,’ she said. Cut right across me. ‘Vern, you think your mom's okay?’

Mom Dewey was just fine. She was sitting on a foldaway chair telling Filomena how corn in the husk was schwartze food. Filomena was nodding and smiling.

Crystal said, ‘Did you have insurance on those dentures, Gramma?’