The Red Hat Society's Queens of Woodlawn Avenue (4 page)

“We have your goals, then.” Jane ripped the list off the score pad and pushed it across the table toward me.

“But—” I looked at all the notes written there. I hadn’t agreed to all of that, had I? Evidently my assent wasn’t necessary,
though. From the determined looks on the faces of the other Queens of Woodlawn Avenue, I wasn’t going to get away with hiding
in my house anymore. These ladies clearly weren’t the type to let me continue my Krispy Kreme Pity Parties in solitude.

I knew I wasn’t ready for all they were proposing, but it felt good to have their support. That feeling had been missing from
my life since before Jim walked out the door and drove away in his BMW Roadster. How had it happened, over the years, that
the one person I most enjoyed spending time with became the person I saw the least? But Jim had his practice, his patients,
his hospital responsibilities and the occasional teaching stint at Van-derbilt Medical School. I’d lost myself in the children,
the church, PTA, Scouts, and sports. Like continental drift, our estrangement had been immeasurable to the eye, but slowly,
over time, the gaps between us had grown steadily wider. “I’m not sure what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything,” Linda squeezed my shoulder. “You’re one of us now.”

And that’s the moment, with Linda’s simple words of acceptance and the concurring nods of Grace and Jane, when I truly felt
I’d become an official member of the Queens of Woodlawn Avenue.

CHAPTER THREE

I
awoke the next morning with yet another carbohydrate-induced hangover, but also with the knowledge that my life had very
nearly been hijacked by three would-be fairy godmothers in red hats. Sure, last night, all four of us had some fantasy that
I could somehow be gotten back on track. But in the light of that April Sunday morning, as I nursed a cup of Sanka on the
cracked concrete patio and tried to pretend it was a nonfat latte from Starbucks, I knew otherwise. Building my own business,
chairing a prestigious charity event, even reclaiming the tattered garden where I sat—all were far beyond my limited resources.

The phone rang inside the house, and I reluctantly stood up and went inside to answer it. The old princess phone I’d dug out
of Courtney’s things didn’t have a Caller ID screen, I had to answer, though, because it might be one of the kids.

“Hello?”

“Ellie? It’s Jim.”

My stomach sank. “Good morning.” I forced myself to sound cordial, if not particularly warm. I hadn’t seen him since the last
mediation session several weeks before. How unfair that the rich timbre of his voice still resonated in my heart as it had
done from the first time I met him.

There was a long moment of silence as I walked back outside and waited for him to say something. Finally, around the tightness
in my throat, I said, “Did you need something?”

“Um, well…”

It had been a long time since I’d heard Jim utter such tentative syllables. In fact, the last time he sounded so awkward was
right before he proposed. The memory of that moonlit night, his hands holding mine as he looked into my eyes, was too painful
to be revived, so I wrapped the phone cord tightly around my finger, hoping the pain would keep me from drowning in the past.

“What is it? Is it one of the kids?” His terseness scared me.

“No, no. Nothing like that.”

I could hear Our Lady of the Hooters singing Britney Spears in the background. The fact that she had the same musical tastes
as my twenty-year-old daughter might have made me feel culturally superior, but it also made me feel old.

“What’s the matter, Jim?” As my fear receded, impatience took its place.

“Nothing’s wrong. I just thought I should be the first to…That you should hear it from…”

When had my socially adept, well-educated husband lost the ability to formulate a complete sentence? Clearly the Hooters hottie
had taken a toll on his IQ.

“Hear what?”

“I just thought you should know that, well, Tiffany and I are getting married.”

Well, of course they were. I couldn’t suppress the bark of laughter that erupted from my throat. But the dark humor was a
cover for a deeper, lethal pain. I looked down at the cracked linoleum beneath my feet, wondering how I managed to remain
upright. Could the black hole that had just opened up in my midsection spread to the floor below me? And here I thought I’d
already found the bottom of my emotional pit.

“Congratulations, Jim. I always knew you had it in you. You’ve finally made a total ass of yourself.”

“C’mon, Ellie,” he said in that tone of hurt/annoyance that had crept into our marriage over time. “You don’t have to be that
way. You’re going to have to accept what’s happened.”

When pigs fly,
I thought, but it was a sentiment I kept to myself. “Pardon me if it takes me a bit longer to forget about the last twenty-five
years, but one of us had a significant head start.”

“If you’re going to be that way, I’m hanging up.”

“Since I didn’t ask you to call in the first place, that will really be no hardship for me.” I reached over and opened a cabinet
to pull out a glass.

“Was there anything else?” I really made an effort
to sound detached. In an attempt to make things seem normal, I reached into the refrigerator for a pitcher of iced tea.

“Just a small thing.”

Right. I poured the tea into the glass. The last “small thing” Jim had dumped on me was the news that he was taking me off
his health insurance plan. At the moment, if I were to be hit by a car, I’d have to be left on the side of the road like a
stray dog.

“How small?”

“It’s about my alimony check. With all the wedding expenses, it’s going to be a few weeks late.”

“A few weeks?” I hated it when I shrieked. After the last time we went to divorce mediation, I’d sworn not to anymore. But
I couldn’t help it. It was gut instinct, born of terror.

“Jeez, Ellie, why don’t you do that a little louder so the whole neighborhood can hear you?”

I swallowed, took a sip of tea, and tried to remember that somewhere underneath this walking midlife crisis was the man I’d
loved, and who had loved me, for most of my adult life.

“When can you send it?” The only bright spot about tying up most of my available cash in this new house was that I had a month’s
grace period before I had to make the first payment. Jim, though, didn’t need to know that.

“We’re getting married in June. I’ll get it to you after that. I promise.”

“June?” It was April. “And what am I supposed to live on for the next three months?”

I could hear him bristle through the phone line. You
would have thought by that point he’d have learned to avoid the word “promise” within my hearing.

“If it’s more than two weeks late, I’ll take legal action.” If only my heart could be iced down like the glass of tea in my
hand.

“Ellie, don’t say that. We both know you haven’t got the money.”

“Then I’ll pawn something. Or I’ll borrow it. I don’t think you want your partners to know you’re a deadbeat.”

If I had to end up garnishing his paycheck, everyone in his medical practice would know, because the bookkeeper was the biggest
gossip since Rona Barrett and she was on my side—her husband had dumped her for a pole dancer. Amazing how shared suffering
created those bonds.

“Okay, okay. It’ll be there on time.” He paused for a moment. “I was hoping you’d be at least a little happy for me.”

“Then you’re a bigger idiot than I thought.”

The weird thing about everything that had happened since the day of Jim’s big announcement was that he still wanted my approval.
At first it had infuriated me. Then it galled me. Now I was starting to see it for the pathetic need to shirk responsibility
that it was, the emotional equivalent of his beloved Harley-Davidson. I wondered, not for the first time, how other couples
managed to navigate their midlife crises and still be married. Clearly there was some secret formula to which Jim and I hadn’t
been privy.

“Good-bye, Jim.” There was no point in prolonging the agony. Or the anger. He mumbled a good-bye of his
own, and I hung up the phone. The agony receded, but the anger remained. Suddenly, I craved a Twinkie with every last fiber
of my being.

No. I pounded my hand on the kitchen counter, hoping the physical pain would replace the emotional scourging. I had to stop.
I wanted to stop. With a sob, I sank down, my back scraping the cabinet handles on the way down, until I rested on the scarred
linoleum.

I couldn’t stop the thoughts swirling through my head. I couldn’t stop wondering what I’d done wrong. What I should have done
differently. How I could possibly have prevented myself from growing older.

That thought hurt the most.

Because no matter what, turning fifty was the one thing I couldn’t have changed.

L
inda St. John was a woman of her word. She showed up at ten o’clock on Monday morning, looking chic and polished in a linen
sheath dress and strappy sandals. I couldn’t remember when I’d last had the energy to iron linen or the well-maintained feet
to carry off such dressy sandals. Linda’s pedicure glowed brightly enough to signal the space station. I wiggled my own pathetic
toes in my plastic Target thongs. How could I even think of doing what Linda wanted me to do? But after Jim’s phone call the
day before, after I’d dried my tears and scraped myself off the floor, I had acknowledged to myself that I was tempted by
her offer of help. My inner Amazon, the long-buried warrior woman who was raging mad, well,
she had apparently begun to stir down there in the tomb where I’d incarcerated her.

“Come on.” Linda stood just inside the front door. “We’re going shopping.”

“I still don’t understand how one outfit’s going to save my social standing.”

Linda smiled. “You’ll see.”

“I may need a minute to get ready.” Since Jim’s phone call, I’d come to at least one conclusion. I didn’t want to continue
to sit home consuming vats of Rotel-and-Velveeta cheese dip and speculating just how gaudy Tiffany’s wedding invitations were
likely to be. If Linda could help me keep my spot on the planning committee for the Cannon Ball, maybe I should give it a
try. I couldn’t humiliate myself any more than Jim had already done. Well, okay, I could, but at least it would be at my own
hands and I would be the instrument of my own downfall, not simply an unwilling victim of another woman’s DD-cup bra.

“Give me a few minutes to change, and I’ll be ready,” I said to Linda. She nodded, and I headed back to my tiny bedroom and
my even more minuscule closet.

I’d always heard that Linda St. John knew two things: how to manipulate people and how to dress them. I wanted to take advantage
of her talents, but I also didn’t want to be evicted from my squalid little house when it came time to pay the mortgage, assuming
the arrival date of Jim’s alimony check wouldn’t do that for me. I would rather have a roof over my head than silk shantung
from the new spring line on my back.

So, of course, half an hour later, Linda led me into
Elliott’s, the most glamorous store in town, like she owned the place. I slunk in behind her like I planned to shoplift a
few items while no one was looking. Furtive is as furtive does. Well, at least I could look around, and then maybe we could
go find a comparable designer knockoff at TJ Maxx.

An elegant saleswoman named Carol introduced herself, and she and Linda hugged like long-lost college roommates. During my
marriage, I’d tended to be more Chico’s than chic for a number of reasons. One, I liked to hide my lack of a bustline behind
draping tops and jackets. And, two, because I’d spent most of my clothing allowance on our home, making it beautiful and comfortable
so Jim and the kids couldn’t wait to come home at the end of the day.

“A suit, I think.” Linda gave me the once-over with a practiced eye. “But not too business-y. Very ’ladies-who-lunch.’”

Carol nodded and looked me up and down. Then she took my hand and led me to the front of the store so she could study my complexion
in the harsh daylight streaming through the plate glass windows. She turned me this way, then that. I wished I’d kept that
last appointment at Illusions to touch up the blonde highlights in my otherwise ordinary brown hair. Salon visits, too, were
now a thing of the past.

“Blue,” she finally pronounced. “This way.”

She spun on her stiletto heel and headed toward the back of the store. “Follow me,” she ordered over her shoulder, and I did
just that, too intimidated not to.

At Elliott’s, the price tag amount increased with each
square foot you progressed into the store. At my best guess, we were already twelve feet beyond my budget. Oh, who was I
kidding. We’d passed my budget out in the parking lot.

Carol went all the way to the back, and I saw where she was headed long before we got there. The suit—a stunning confection
of robin’s egg blue—hung like a crucifix above the holy altar of fashion. Any woman who wasn’t legally blind would have fallen
to her knees and worshipped that suit. And there was no way the price tag had less than four numbers to the left of the decimal
point.