DASHED DREAMS (24 page)

“Yes, my mother taught me when I was a young girl. I don’t have much time for it now. I’ve always wanted to learn the chevron pattern. My attempts from reading a pattern have always ended up with uneven lines and rounded v’s, instead of sharp points.”

“I know that pattern. Here, I’d be happy to show, if you’d like.” Natalie put down her yarn work.

“Oh no, Natalie, don’t stop. You can show me later.”

Natalie nodded and resumed her crocheting. Jillian picked up one of the medical journals she had brought to read, opened it, and thumbed through the pages.

“I really don’t know. We haven’t really haven’t talked much about our plans. Robert said that you and Mike have been married 54 years.”

“Yes, we have. That’s a long time, but in many ways it seems like only a few years. We have a good marriage. We’ve raised great kids, and kept our farm…”

“You have everything to be proud of.”

“Thank you. When we’re in town tonight, please help me remember that we need a couple of things from the market that I forgot this morning.”

“Yerington, Nevada’s also a farming community that grows onions, garlic, hay, and alfalfa. The population is about 4,000 people, including the out-of-city residents, of about 1,300. We have two casinos, one large market, three gas stations, and one main street, with diagonal parking.”

“Maybe after you’re married, Mike and I could come out and visit. The kids are always saying we need a vacation.”

“You know you both have an open invitation to visit anytime.”

“Thank you. That means much to me. Dear, I think you’re good for Robert. He needs some stability.”

Jillian’s thought was: Is that all I’m good for?…just stability?

After they arrived at Homewood’s Country Café, almost instantly there were a couple of older ladies stood at the table asking for autographs. Robert was gracious as always. Mike and Natalie were silently greeting various patrons seated around. Only the brave approached the table, mostly friends of Mike and Nat’s wanting to meet their famous son.

After dinner the four diners decided to walk a couple doors down for ice cream. Moo’s Frozen Delights was an old-fashioned ice cream parlor, complete with red-and-white striped chairs and tablecloths. When seated, a chipper teen-aged girl dressed in a red and white striped apron came to take their order.

“
You
want ice cream?” She questioned as if people of his caliber didn’t eat ice cream.

“Yes, I think we’d like to order something.”

“I’ll be right back. Please don’t go anywhere.” She hurriedly left their table, went behind the counter, picked up the telephone receiver, dialed and started talking.

Still being polite but slowly losing his temper, RJ said, “I’d like to meet your mother. But could we please have our coffee and sundaes?”

“Oh, yeah, sure.”

They were almost finished with their ice cream, when through the door came, Lola Mae Jenkins, the waitress’s mother, moving at a fast pace, like a woman on a mission.

“My, my, my, look at this!” Mike said to the group.

“That’s Lola. She sings in our church choir,” Natalie gasped.

Lola was dressed in probably the shortest skirt Natalie had ever seen. Her top was a skimpy tube-top, tight and both articles of clothing were bright purple. At the Montgomery table, she laid down a stack of CD’s.

“I’m Lola Mae and I can’t believe it! Robert John Montgomery right here in the ice cream parlor! Mrs. Montgomery, I knew he was your son, but I never realized that he ate ice cream,” Lola Mae said excitedly all in one breath. She pulled at her top.

“Sign all these, ‘To Lola, Love, Robert John Montgomery.’ I’m your biggest fan and have more of these at home!” All the while she was talking, she was inching closer and closer to the entertainer’s arm. Finally, her hip was resting against his right arm.

Natalie looked embarrassed about the woman’s actions towards her son.

“Don’t worry about it, Mother. He can handle her,” Mike whispered to his wife.

“How nice to meet you, Lola. I’d be happy to sign a couple of these for you. However, I don’t think I can sign all of them. We were just getting ready to leave.” RJ said politely.

“Phooey! You can’t leave. I want to get to know you,” pressing her hip to his arm.

RJ quickly signed three of the CD’s. “Okay, there you go. It was nice meeting you. We’ve got to go.” The foursome stood to leave.

“No! Now I need a picture. Carol-Ann get right over here and take our picture.” She arranged the picture, wanting only herself and RJ in the photograph. He took Jillian’s hand and pulled her closer to his side.

“I don’t want your sister in the picture! Just us!”

She took RJ’s hand, placed his arm around her shoulders, and posed. Her daughter took a picture, then another, with Lola kissing him on the cheek.

Losing his temper, RJ tried to control his actions.

“Listen, please let us leave now! I’m just a regular guy who wants to spend some time with my family. I don’t bother you when you’re trying to have a quiet time with your family, do I?”

“Okay, okay. You don’t have to get sore about it! Thank you.”

As the group turned towards the door, she pressed something into RJ’s palm. He quickly put his hand into his pocket. As the group walked back to their car, Natalie commented on Lola’s clothing, about how tight everything was.

“Yeah, I thought
‘the girls’
were going to make an appearance,” RJ chuckled.

His father said, “Robert, that’s not the language to use in front of our ladies.”

His son said nothing. The foursome hurried down the street, in case there were more Lola Maes around.

Later, when Mike and RJ were sitting on the front porch, his father said, “Son, is that a common occurrence…what happened in the ice cream store?”

“Pretty much so. I’ve had too many women throwing themselves at me, offering themselves to me in almost every way you can imagine, like having panties and nude pictures mailed to me, very descriptive love letters, and those are only the healthy ones.” The two men chuckled.

“Dad, that’s why I love Jillie. I picked her because she’s not like the rest. I’ve had too many Lola Maes in my life,” RJ said taking a swallow of the dark liquid.

“You’re drinking too much, son. I’ve seen nothing good come from a bottle.”

“Boy, I have. Jack Daniels, Jim Beam, Crown Royale, to mention a few.”

“I know you’re being a smart-ass, but you know your mother and I are worried about you. You drink way too much, and no one who’s been drinking as long as you have will be able to stop on their own.”

Upstairs, when emptying his pockets, Robert came across the folded piece of paper that Lola Mae had pressed into his hand. He crumpled it, threw it in the trash, because he knew it was like all the other invitations he’d received in the past. He dressed in sleep shorts and a tee shirt.

While in the bathroom he noticed that Jillie’s bedroom light was still on. He lightly tapped on the partly opened door. “Jillie, are you still awake?”

“Yes, come on in.”

He opened the door. She was sitting on the bed with a couple of old opened scrapbooks. Behind the bed roller shades were drawn halfway down two large windows. Blue moonlight cast its rays on the bed. The night air-cooled the room. She was wearing one of his
Charm Tour
tee shirts and a pair of blue boxer shorts, and her hair was still damp from her shower. Her legs were crossed and her feet bare. His heart leapt. She’d never been so beautiful. He walked over to the edge of the bed. She moved one of the scrapbooks and patted the bed.

She slid one over, it was opened to reveal that Natalie Montgomery had everything with her son’s name: photos, and everything that’d been written about his career and had scrapped it all. Whether positive or negative, it was all in the books organized date-wise. The book was opened to an article done by
Country People
magazine a few years back.

“Are you reading all this crap? You know it’s all fiction and what isn’t is totally out of context.”

“Hey, don’t knock my reading material. I’m learning a lot.” She smiled at him, a quirky playful smile, and one that he’d never seen. “I want to know everything that’s been written about my fiancé. Good or bad makes no difference to me, it’s all about you.”

“Oh, darlin’, I love you! Let’s move these books and I’ll show you how much.”

She shook her head no, “You’re welcome to join me here but just to peruse these memory books and talk...nothing else. RJ, you know how I feel about waiting.”

He didn’t wait for her to invite him a second time. He slid the books away and jumped onto the bed. She pulled back one of the books and started thumbing through the pages. Jillian stopped at a glossy color picture of him. “What was on the paper that the woman gave you tonight?”

“I don’t know, I didn’t open it. I threw it away. It’s probably an invitation to have sex with her or some such thing like that.”

“I thought so. I noticed you didn’t let her know that I’m not your sister.”

“I don’t think she was interested in you.”

Jillian just stared at him, she thinking: Your mother thinks I’m stable for you. “Once we’re married, is some of your popularity going to wane?”

“Yeah, reading all this boring junk makes a person sleepy.” He moved the quilt and sheet back, slipped his legs in and snuggled down.

“These are interesting. You’re planning on sleeping in MY bed tonight?”

“Yes,
sleeping.
Good night. How ‘bout a kiss?”

“Goodnight.” She leaned over and kissed him. His breath smelled of liquor.

Jillian read until about 2:30 a.m. RJ was sleeping soundly when she got up to put the books on the desk. She debated whether or not to go into his room to sleep. She was tired so simply crawled back into her bed. She turned out the light, closed her eyes against the moonlight, and listened to RJ snore.

RJ reached the bathroom to silence the alarm. He pulled Jillian’s door closed, then came face-to-face with his mother who was also coming in to hush the alarm. She looked over at his unslept bed.