“Not going to see Mary-Margaret,” Pap replies.
Not sure I could be more shocked, and my eyebrows shoot straight up to provide testament to it. I thought Pap was sweet on Mary-Margaret, but I’m clearly wrong. “Who are you going to see then?” I demand.
“A gentleman never kisses and tells,” he says slyly.
“Maybe not.” I feel compelled to point out, “But you know how the gossip mill operates. I could have the information by the time Muriel started making her morning biscuits, if she was, in fact, able to make biscuits.”
Pap harrumphs and mutters something about me being impertinent but then leans in and waves me closer. I bend toward him, grateful the jukebox is silent, so I can hear.
He looks left, then right, seems to think this is a private conversation, and then confides, “I’m meeting Sissy Givens for a glass of wine.”
And yup… he’s managed to shock me more. More so that he’s going to drink wine rather than beer, but Sissy is also quite the surprise.
First and foremost, she’s a town treasure. She runs the vintage shop called Lady Marmalade’s and dresses like an Amazonian queen. She’s younger than Pap by at least fifteen years and has a good six inches on him without heels, and the woman loves her heels. They couldn’t be any more different, and that has nothing to do with the fact that she’s Black and Pap’s white. It’s that she’s striking, with ebony skin, silvery hair and ethereal blue-green eyes, and Pap is, well… just a normal guy bordering on wannabe curmudgeon.
“I’d close your mouth, son.” Pap cackles. “Something might fly into it.”
I shake my head, laughing as Pap ambles through the bar. His exit is always the same—shaking hands with some patrons, clapping others’ backs. He leaves with a wave over his shoulder, and everyone yells good night to the man who owns their favorite watering hole.
Bartending is an okay gig and it won’t be my forever. But for now, the main reason I’m here is because I love working for that old coot.
CHAPTER 2
Penny
TheWelcome to Whynotsign still leans a little to the left, which is the exact opposite of most politics in the rural South. I roll down the rental-car window, and warm, sticky air rushes in. I catch a whiff of honeysuckle, nostalgia for the magnolia and wisteria that aren’t quite ready to perfume the air.
Within ten seconds, my hair gives up its city-girl smoothness and puffs out like I’ve been electrocuted.
Wilmington Street looks exactly the same. The courthouse dominates the square—three stories of red brick and white columns. Judge Bowen, who is a distant relative of mine, is probably on his bench right now, smacking his gavel to tame unruly lawyers. The courthouse remains the tallest thing in town, unless you count the water tower that proclaimsWhynot—Home of the World’s Best Biscuits, but that’s technically just about fifty yards outside of city limits.
Across the northeast corner sits Aunty Q’s, Mary-Margaret Quinn’s antiques shop, windows crammed with everything from porcelain teapots to rusted farm signs. Mary-Margaret has sworn she’s set to retire every year since I left for college, and every year the open sign still hangs on the door.
A block down, Sweet Cakes Bakery glows behind its pink-trimmed windows. There’s a fuchsia-and-yellow neon cupcake shining in the front window—if there’s one business I intend to frequent during my visit, it’s that. Not only do I adore the sweets offered for sale, but the owner, Larkin Mancinkus—now Locke—is my very best friend in the world.
I ease around the square, slowing by the Mainer House, a beautiful Victorian with white clapboard siding and black shutters. Hanging ferns span the large porch and the rocking chairs are the best seats from which to view the entire town. It’s been a part of Whynot longer than electricity. Catherine Mainer and her husband, Gerry Mancinkus, used to host spring galas there—she the gracious farmer’s daughter, he the brash Yankee Marine. Now their grandson Lowe and his wife Mely live inside those same walls, and Muriel has shared with me on more than one occasion that the town is expecting the patter of little feet soon.
Doesn’t matter what Mely or Lowe want, Whynot demands the next generation be brought forth.
Central Café appears next, its windows dark, and mychest squeezes. The place raised me almost as much as Muriel did. I grew up in that diner, earned money in summers to help with college and probably owe my love of all desserts to the sweet potato pie served there.
The thought of it not surviving Muriel’s broken hip is more than I can bear, and that’s why I’m back in town.
Then I see him, and I have to resist the urge to crank the air-conditioning because that man can make a woman flush.
Sam Rochelle.
He’s walking down Wilmington toward Chesty’s, tall and broad-shouldered, his blond hair catching sunlight. His sunglasses hide what I remember to be impossibly blue eyes, and the dimple in his cheek flashes when someone calls out to him. He laughs—low, easy, familiar—and then disappears through Chesty’s door.
Still gorgeous and apparently still working at the same bar where he started after dropping out of college five years ago. I’d assumed bartending was a temporary thing for him… a way to fill time until he figured himself out. Sam’s a smart guy and I didn’t see bartending in his long-term future, but maybe I was wrong. After moving away, my finger isn’t on the Whynot pulse the way it used to be.
Muriel’s bungalow sits under a canopy of dogwoods whose leaves are fully unfurled, the flowers just starting to open. It’s one of my favorite trees and I know it has alot of religious symbolism, but I love it simply because it represents spring in the South.
My aunt lives on a quiet street where everybody’s mail gets read twice—once by the recipient and once by the neighbor across the hedge. Muriel’s 1976 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham sits in the driveway, taking up almost the entire concrete pad. The damn thing’s nearly twenty feet long with velour seats and chrome spit-shined to a sparkle. It was a gift thirty years ago from her late husband, Earl.
I note two cars parked along the curb and I peg the one with theHonk if you love Jesusbumper sticker as belonging to a sweet church lady. That proclamation graces many a bumper around here and always makes me smile with fondness.
The other has no identifying features, but I presume it’s a home health aide. Muriel got discharged from the rehab hospital just yesterday and I know she has to continue therapy.
