I should have been more insistent with Trip. I would call him again in the morning. I would call him and tell him that he simply must do something immediately.
I decided to call Amelia. She might tell me something that could prove to be helpful to push Trip into action before it was too late. I got her voice mail. In a clever moment, I didn’t leave a message because I knew she wouldn’t call me back if I did. If she saw a missed call, she would be more likely to become curious or worried and actually call me back right away. See that? I was still onto the ways of our youth-obsessed culture. In less time than it took me to turn off the lights in the back of the house, the phone was ringing again.
“Aunt Caroline? Is everything okay?”
It was Amelia. Ah, I loved it when I was right. It didn’t happen nearly often enough.
“Yes, of course! I just wanted to thank you again for the fabulous balloons! Made me feel like a kid! Can you believe that crazy dream I had?”
“Spooky, if you ask me. I mean, seriously!”
“Well, it just goes to show you that this is a crazy world.”
“Yeah, and that Grandmother Lavinia is still hanging around.”
“And thank goodness she is! Anyway, sweetheart, thanks for coming and bringing my boy home. I loved seeing y’all. I always do.”
“Aunt Caroline, I should look so good when I’m as old as you! Seriously!”
Mentally, I gave her a good slap right across the face.
“Thanks, hon. So, Amelia?”
“Hmm?”
In my mind’s eye I could see her multitasking, probably looking something up on the Internet or playing on that infernal Facebook, which I had to admit was very handy when researching the lives of old boyfriends, finding out who was single again and so forth.
“Was everything okay driving your mom home? And was it okay when you got there? Where were your sisters?” Did that sound too nosy? Probably.
There was a distinct pause. I could hear the opening and closing of a door and assumed she was going somewhere more private. Her roommates were probably home.
“Oh, Aunt Caroline. What are we going to do about Mom? I mean, I can’t be there all the time and Belle and Linnie are practically useless. I made them swear not to let Chloe in the car with her if they thought she was, well, you know. But I can’t depend on them. They’re completely unreliable, as we all know. Sometimes I feel like the only grown-up in my whole family.”
Her remark wasn’t too far off from the truth.
“Well, I had a talk with your father today and we all agree it’s time to take steps again. My problem is the same as yours. I’m worried, very worried in fact, about the safety of all of your sisters. What happened yesterday was inexcusable. It really was.”
“What can I do? I mean, I have a year left of school! I’m up to my ears in papers and all kinds of crap!”
I hated the word
crap
. It was so common. I cleared my throat, a signal of my displeasure, and I could hear her sigh. When I was her age we never used that kind of language in front of adults.
“Well, maybe you can talk to your sisters about Rusty.”
“And do what? Help them hire an
F
-ing hit man?”
F
-ing was worse. But then she had learned to express herself at the knee of a dairy cow.
“No. Please! Don’t be ridiculous. But here’s the
situation
. If your mother goes to Promises again or the Betty, somebody’s gonna have to care for Chloe, you know? Bath, supper, homework, bedtime.”
“We hired a housekeeper last time.”
“And last time your two younger sisters got arrested for engaging in lewd acts in public, which nearly killed your father.”
“He got them out of it . . .” Her voice trailed off in weariness.
“Yes, but we don’t want a repeat of that performance, do we? They were caught without panties! Do you remember that?”
“God. They are such little idiots.”
“No, they’re really quite clever, and well, they just have their priorities out of whack and they make some very bad choices.”
She groaned loudly. “Oh! Why is this happening to me? I am the good girl! I never did anything! Why can’t I have a normal life? God! I hate them!”
In the next instant, I could hear Amelia’s voice start to crack and I didn’t want to be responsible for making her cry. This was no time for tears. I had not called her to upset her. The poor girl!
“Well, Amelia? Honey? Listen to me right now. This isn’t your fault. You know that.”
“I know. But I don’t need this!”
“Who does? I think you’d rest a lot easier—we all would in fact—if someone who really cared about the welfare of children was around if and when your mother agrees to take a break from, well, polite society for a stretch of time.”
“Polite society?” Amelia was mounting her high horse and was about to unleash the part of her social conscience that dealt with class struggle.
“What would
you
call it?”
“I don’t know. But calling it taking a break from polite society? It makes you sound like such a . . . well, you sound like a little bit of a snob, Aunt Caroline. I’m sorry.”
I knew that she thought I was a snob. Her whole family thought I was a snob. So what? Well, maybe I was. But not all the time. Really.
“If not coming right out and announcing that
rehab
is imminent for a family member for the
fifth
time makes me a snob, then so be it. I’ll be a snob.”
Honestly, my niece would go a lot further in this world if she softened her language and could remember not to correct her elders. But at that moment I guessed that in some way she was trying to defend her mother, the low-rent drunk who nearly killed her sister. And I was fully aware that alcoholism was a progressive disease and that Frances Mae was firmly in its clutches and being eaten alive by it. It was all deeply upsetting, and when I was upset I did indeed have the capacity to get bitchy. Unapologetically so. I’m way far from perfect.
“Sorry,” she said. “Oh Lord! Let me think about this. You’re right. We would all be totally insane to leave Linnie and Belle in charge of the house and Chloe.”
“My point exactly.”
“So what are we going to do? Wait and see what Dad says? I guess.”
“I’m just saying that if your sisters would consider the fact that maybe Rusty isn’t the Antichrist, maybe there could be a possibility for an easy and workable solution. Do you see what I mean?”
“Yeah, sure I do.” She sighed deeply. “Look, I think Rusty is okay. In fact, I think if I had met her under different circumstances, I’d probably really like her. But I don’t care what any of us say, you know how Mom feels. Mom says she’s a home wrecker and that’s pretty much about it.”
“Well, she might be, from Frances Mae’s point of view, but she’s got time on her hands and it’s not like you can commute from Columbia. And I have a business to run.”
“Right. What about Millie? Couldn’t she come and stay with them?”
“Millie? Humph. She’s got a job, and besides, there would be a bigger revolt than if Rusty was there! Millie has no patience for nonsense. Zero tolerance. Anyway, Trip has to work this out. I’m just an aunt. He’s y’all’s parent. And here we are planning your mother’s absence when I don’t even know if Trip has talked to her about it.”
“Well, there’s really no option but rehab, is there, Aunt Caroline?”
“None that I know of, honey. I wish there was a pill.”
“Well, actually, there is one. It’s called Antabuse, I think. All I know is if you take the pill and drink booze, you puke your guts out and you could die.”
Puke
was such a repulsive word and
guts
was better used in conversation between men regarding the eviscerating of deer and fish and animals they caught in the woods. Antabuse was it?
“Good Lord!
That’s
pretty powerful.”
“Yeah. It is. In fact, you can’t give it to somebody with heart trouble or any kind of vascular weakness because they really could drop dead.”
“Is this what they teach you in college these days?”
“No. I found it on the Internet. It’s been around since the 1950s, believe it or not. I was trying to find a solution for Mom. You know. She’s my mother, right? I worry about her morning, noon, and night.”
“I’m sure you do, honey. I’m sure you do. But, sweetheart?” The poor child. She needed to study, not to fear for her sister’s life. “Listen, I don’t want you to worry anymore. Let us old fogies do the worrying for a while, okay? Why don’t you see if you can soften your sisters’ hearts and I’ll keep you in the loop on everything. Is that a deal?”
“Sure. I’ll try. But they’re pretty convinced of the party line, you know.”
“Yes, I know that. Listen, Amelia, on another topic?”
“Sure, what?”
“Do you think Eric is seeing someone?”
There was silence.
“Are you there, Amelia?”
“Yes, I, um, don’t know. Maybe you should ask him?”
“Oh! I didn’t mean to pry, I mean . . . of course, you’re right!”
We said good night and I felt like I had failed miserably in trying to console her. But I had let her know that she wasn’t alone. Poor girl. Not even twenty-one years old and she was like Atlas trying to hold up the globe on her back. And to make matters worse, I asked her to betray some sort of confidence by prying into Eric’s business. Of course I was prying! He was my son! I was his mother! So, if she didn’t want to tell me, she must know something. I’d find out.
I put my wineglass in the sink and decided to forgo the grapes for a while—at least until Frances Mae went away.
I went to the front of the house to turn out the rest of the lights and saw familiar headlights at the end of our avenue of oaks. I blinked the porch lights to signal that it was not too late to approach. Was it Trip? No, it was a patrol car driven by my friend Matthew. Matthew was coming by to check on me. That cheered me on the spot. I watched as he pulled up our long road. I ran my hand through my hair to smooth it. And I bit my lips to give them some color, hoping I didn’t look like a hag. He got out of his car and turned to look at me standing there in the doorway. Good grief, he was so appealing. Was it the uniform?
“Can I help you, Officer?” I said, teasing him in my best slow Scarlett drawl.
“Yes, ma’am, I reckon you can.” He said this with a smile but his eyes were telling me another story.
“Would you like to come in?” I leaned against the doorjamb and he stood very close to me, leaned down, and smelled the side of my neck, giving me chills.
“Yes, ma’am, I reckon I would.”
“Do you want to pull your car around back for the sake of the neighbors?” It appeared I was to have company at least for a few hours.
“If you think I should, then I will. But there’s nobody out here tonight. I checked. A couple of opossums and some bears.”
“Bears?” He was kidding, of course, but I pretended to be alarmed. “Oh my!”
“Yes, big black bears. Hungry ones. I just wanted to make sure you were safe.”
It should be noted here that I had not slept with Matthew in decades. Okay, it was last week but there was no sleeping. I was unsure of how to proceed. No, I wasn’t. I mean, was it all right to just sleep with him without some sort of goal on the relationship beyond the obvious? Of course it was. We were consenting adults, after all. So much for moral dilemmas. Problem solved.
“Are you hungry, Officer?”
“Yeah. Do you have something you might offer a starving servant of the people?”
I thought of offering him a roll in bed with honey, but instead I said, “That depends on what you’re starving for. Why don’t we go inside and see what we can find?”
Our words were corny and silly but intellectual debate on the true meaning of life was not on the agenda. I led him through the hall and up the stairs to my room. Now, may I just mention that the kindest thing ever invented by mankind is the dimmer switch? I slipped into the bathroom to change into something ooh-la-la, and there was my tub, filled with hot water while camellias and gardenias floated on the surface. I stopped for a moment and then I realized. Miss Lavinia approved.
I
T WAS BARELY EIGHT-THIRTY IN
the morning but Millie and I had already been talking for almost an hour. I woke up with the birds and could not get the image of Chloe’s bleeding head out of my mind. I was still worried sick and called Millie as soon as I saw the lights on at her house. So over a pot of coffee, Millie and I cooked up a plan that we hoped might convince Frances Mae to go to rehab, sign new separation papers, and give the children to Trip for an unspecified period of time.
“Get your brother on the phone and tell him to get himself over here,” she said. “I’m making biscuits.”