Drop Dead Divas, page 2
“Why should I be ashamed?” Bitty wondered as she scrubbed dumpling bits from the pug’s left ear. “She started it. Only an idiot would come up to a woman whose husband she used to boink at the Motel 6 during recess and ask to be friends.”
“She was already out of high school,” I reminded as I lifted my tea glass. Just before I took a sip, I noticed half a dumpling floating atop the ice. I set it back down. “Besides, I know your mother taught you to be nice to half-wits. Truevines have always had good manners.”
“My mother was a Jordan.”
My lips twitched. Bitty looked up about that time and laughed.
“See, Trinket? You would have done the same thing.”
Probably. But not in public. I had no intention of encouraging her though, so just said, “If you’re through bathing Chitling, I’m ready to leave.”
“Her name is Lady O-ya Moon Chen Ling,” Bitty said haughtily, “and I wish you would remember that.”
“I’ll remember her name if you’ll stop making a habit of insulting Philip’s former flings in public. My dry-cleaning bill could get steep.”
“Sugar, just think how steep it could get if he was still alive. You know how much he loved spreading himself around.”
By this time we stood outside on the concrete walk in front of Budgie’s café. The cute sign in the window may say French Market Café, but it would always be known to the regulars as Budgie’s, despite who really owned it now. The new owners had had the foresight to keep the former owner Budgie on as the manager, so not much had really changed over the years, except the décor and a few menu additions.
Bitty caught me by the arm when I started to step off the curb to get into her car. “You’ve got corn muffin on your rear end, Trinket. Oh. And it looks like dumplings, too. Those pants are washable, aren’t they?”
“No. They’re unwashable linen. That’s okay. I didn’t want to wear them more than once anyway.”
“Well, I have the dry cleaners on retainer, so we’ll just put them in with my stuff. Come on home with me.”
“Bitty, you have everyone on retainer. Lawyers. Caterers. Florists. Gardeners. I think I’m the only one you don’t pay to hang around. And no, I’ll just go home. I have no intention of staying at your house waiting on my clothes to come back from the cleaners. That hasn’t worked so well in the past.”
“You have a long memory for the wrong things,” Bitty said. She pressed the button on her remote, and the car lights flashed, a beep sounded, and the motor started. As soon as cold weather arrived, she’d probably trade in this convertible for a more practical car. If it was still in one piece. Bitty had purchased a stick shift before she learned to drive one. The Miata struggled bravely to outlast her.
After backing out into traffic and hitting no one, we bucked forward on the slope of the street and made a left to go around the square. My parents’ house, Cherryhill, lies about three miles outside the city limits of Holly Springs, Mississippi. It can seem much farther when riding with Bitty, depending upon her mood and the weather.
Fortunately the weather was fine, and even Bitty’s mood was good. I guess it had cheered her up to insult Naomi Spencer. Elvis played on the car stereo system, a really nice one Bitty had paid extra for, and with the top down, the sun shining, and the wind in our hair, we lurched through the town square at a reasonable speed, the engine only dying twice. Once out on Highway 311, she lowered her foot on the accelerator. I tried not to think about immovable barriers hidden beneath the thick kudzu vines draping trees and telephone poles we passed at seventy miles an hour. And I did my best to ignore the pug sitting in my lap. She pees at inopportune times, and I’ve found it’s usually much drier if I don’t upset her. Getting my lunch out of the seat of my nice linen pants was going to be a major feat. I certainly didn’t want to extract Chitling urine as well.
“So,” Bitty shouted over Elvis and the rushing wind, “have you had that thing you won’t let me talk about yet?”
Bitty, I’m sorry to say, discovered that in all my years of marriage, I had never experienced the . . . uh . . . pinnacle of female ecstasy. It’s my fault she knows. In a weak moment I’d confessed that my eyes had never rolled back in my head. Not once. She was horrified at the discovery. Since she tends to dwell on the oddest things, and took it upon herself to ensure that I have that special moment before I die—not as that may sound, but by choosing the right man for me—I had quickly decided she was not to mention it to me again. Ever. Bitty nags.
“None of your business,” I shouted back.
Bitty glanced at me then made a face. “You forgot to put Chen Ling’s sunglasses on, Trinket.”
“Why would I wear her sunglasses?”
She motioned impatience, and with a sigh, I took out the pair of doggy sunglasses with the strap to hold them on and slid them onto the pug’s head to cover her eyes. Chen Ling bit me in gratitude. It didn’t really hurt. She only has one front tooth on top. And an underbite like a Louisiana alligator. She constantly drools. That’s why she wears bibs. Bitty has them special-made with embroidered scenes of China, pagodas, dragons, and so on. If not for nice settlements from three former husbands, and alimony checks from her last—and dead—husband, she wouldn’t be able to afford canine couture. Fortunately for Bitty, she has rarely been lacking in male attention or alimony.
“What are Aunt Anna and Uncle Eddie doing today?” Bitty asked when the car jolted to a stop in the half-circle driveway at Cherryhill.
I unbuckled my seatbelt and unglued the pug from my chest. She has her own seatbelt, but since I take up all the space in the bucket seat, she has to share mine.
“Probably booking a camel trip along the Nile. I’m sure I saw some brochures with pyramids lying on the kitchen table earlier. It’s my job to warn them about sand storms and crocodiles, not to mention bad-tempered camels.”
“Good luck with that.”
Bitty understood. My parents are enjoying their second adolescence. While I’m glad for them, they can be remarkably stubborn at times. And single-minded. It must be a Truevine trait. After all, Bitty is as stubborn as they come, and her father was Daddy’s brother. There is a lot that can be blamed on genetics, I’ve decided.
Bitty firmly buckled Chen Ling into her own special seatbelt complete with a seat that holds her up high enough to look out the passenger window—a sight bound to have startled more than a few unsuspecting pedestrians—then she tooled off down the driveway with a careless wave of one hand. I went into the house to look for my parents.
Mama stood at the kitchen counter dishing up Brownie’s food. I don’t know why she bothers cooking special dog meals for him. I believe one of his ancestors had to be a goat. Any dog that can eat metal and expensive jewelry qualifies as a member of the ovine family, in my opinion. I still haven’t found one of my emerald earrings he ingested, although I spent a disgustingly long time wearing a plastic glove and looking through piles of dog poop.
“How was your lunch, sugar?” Mama asked over her shoulder. “What’d Budgie have as the special today?”
“Chicken and dumplings.”
Mama laughed. That particular dish has been a joke around our house ever since it caused so much trouble a few months back. Trust Bitty to be able to give a household favorite a bad reputation.
“Hey, punkin,” my daddy said behind me, and gave me a squeeze around my shoulders. “What have you got all over the back of you?”
I answered dutifully, “Chicken and dumplings.”
At that, Mama turned around to look at me. While my father, Edward Wellford Truevine, is six foot four in his socks, my mother is just a little over five feet tall. Once she might have been taller, like five-one. Now she’s petite, has nicely coifed silver hair, fair skin that has rarely if ever seen a blemish, and insists on coordinating her clothes with Daddy’s. Oh, and with Brownie’s. That’s only in the winter, though. In the summer he gets to go naked. The dog, not my dad.
Before my mother could ask, I explained. “Naomi Spencer came up to our table to ask Bitty to be friends since Philip is dead and shouldn’t mind. It did not go well.”
My father guffawed. “She’s either crazy or stupid.”
“Yes,” I agreed.
Mama, of course, had to hear the entire story. She sat transfixed while I related the experience, a hand over her mouth to hide her laughter. Bad manners should not be rewarded or encouraged, she has always felt. When I finished, both my parents expressed their relief that Bitty seems to be recovering nicely from the shock of a few months ago.
“At least she’s not grieving anymore,” Mama said.
I stared at her. “For Philip? Why would she grieve for him? He cheated on her with any bimbo who’d go out with him. He embarrassed her. He gave her nothing but trouble. She’s glad to be rid of him.”
“Yes, all of that is true. But he hurt her deeply with his affairs, and in public, too. That’s not something a woman can easily forgive. Yet she stayed married to him even after he took that girl to Mexico and all the pictures of them drunk in the Acapulco hotel pool made the evening news and papers. She must have felt something for him.”
I hadn’t thought of that. Why hadn’t I guessed that real emotion lay beneath all her callous comments about Philip Hollandale? Sometimes I can be so self-centered. I thought about all the gossip, and how I’d listened to what Bitty said instead of how she felt. I should really learn to look beneath the surface, I told myself, and resolved that from now on, I would do my best to recognize what Bitty really meant instead of what she said.
It would not be easy.
CHAPTER 2
“Philip was pond scum,” said Bitty, regarding her freshly manicured fingernails with a critical eye. “Do you like this color? It seems too red to me, but DJ says I’m the type who can wear bold colors. Did I tell you I have a new manicurist?”
I tried again to plumb the depths of emotion that must be tightly trapped in her scarred psyche. “But he had his good points, too, I’m sure. There must be times when you really miss him.”
Bitty turned to look at me. We sat in her euphemistically named parlor with our shoes off and bare feet up on plush ottomans. Refreshing glasses of sweet tea helped cool some of the heat of midday.
“Eureka May Truevine, have you been drinking? Or smoking something funny? You’ve done nothing but pester me about that man since you got here. The funeral’s come and gone, and now we don’t have to pretend there was anything nice about him.”
Since Bitty had used my full name, it hardly seemed worth another try. Maybe my mother had misread Bitty. It was possible. Not likely, but possible. Obviously, I would have to be more subtle in my effort to allow Bitty to properly purge her grief.
Subtlety is not my strong suit. Silence stretched until I said, “Well, if ever you want to talk about him, I’m here for you.”
“I’d rather eat rocks than talk about Philip. Wait. You aren’t thinking of going back to Perry, are you? Is that what this is about?”
Since any discussion of my ex-husband usually summons an instant migraine, I became rather cross. “No. I just had the brainless idea your late husband’s violent death may have scarred you somehow. My mistake.”
“Good god, Trinket. The only thing that got scarred was my expensive rug. By the time I got it back from the police, it was ruined for me. Every time I looked at it, all I could see was Philip rolled up in it like a taco. I donated it to charity, though, so it wasn’t a complete waste.”
A sharp tap in the region of my sinus cavity suggested that Chen Ling had missed her regular appointment with Bitty’s front lawn. It could certainly clear sinuses in a hurry. Since there was no sign of anything unpleasant behind or under the dog sitting next to Bitty, however, I figured it was just Chitling’s usual digestive windiness. I put my hand over my nose and seized the moment to change topics.
“What on earth do you feed that dog?” I asked despite knowing the answer. “Gunpowder and pinto beans?”
“Now, Trinket, you know she’s on a strict diet these days. I’m still using Rayna’s recipe for dog food.”
“You mean Sharita is using Rayna’s recipe. You don’t cook.”
Bitty looked at me over the rim of her tea glass. “You’re awfully cranky today. I’d ask if it was that time of the month, but you should be past that by now. Maybe you should think about taking Kit Coltrane for a test drive. If you know what I mean.”
I knew what she meant. “While your interest in my sex life—”
“You don’t have a sex life,” Bitty rudely interrupted.
“—is gratifying,” I continued as if she hadn’t spoken, “we have an agreement.”
“I didn’t say one word about you not ever having a hallelujah moment. You’re just being sensitive.”
“I tend to get that way when people start prying into my personal business.”
“It’s fortunate I don’t do the same then, because you’re always prying into my personal business.”
There wasn’t a whole lot I could say to refute that. She’s right. I have a lamentable tendency to pry into Bitty’s personal business at times. There’s no good reason for it, since she lives such a charmed life nothing ever really touches her, it seems. Apparently, despite Mama’s opinion to the contrary, not even the murder of her ex-husband affected her for long.
“Forgive me,” I said, more to end the conversational sidebar than because I was sorry. Bitty, of course, knew what I was doing.
“That won’t work every time, you know. I’ll let you get by with it now, but you owe me.”
I said something rude and she smiled. “Sharita made up a batch of Mama’s pimento cheese. Want some?”
Bitty’s late mother Sarah made unarguably the best pimento cheese in the entire world, and she’d entrusted her only daughter with the recipe. Eating one of Aunt Sarah’s pimento cheese sandwiches is like taking a bite of heaven. Rich, creamy, cheesy, with just the right amount of pimento—I began to drool just thinking about it.
Sharita Stone owns a catering service and also cooks for a few private citizens who were lucky enough to get on her list of clients. Her family owns a diner that makes delicious muffins and other baked goods, and their jams and jellies are superb. Sharita’s brother is a Holly Springs policeman, and happened to be the one who arrested Bitty when she was thought to have murdered her ex-husband. All a terrible mistake, of course, and Bitty never held a grudge against Sharita or Marcus Stone for it. She’s very open-minded. That’s one of Bitty’s best virtues, that she holds very few grudges, which makes her hostility toward Naomi Spencer that much more intriguing.
Of course, if my ex had flaunted his mistress right under my nose like the senator did to Bitty, my hostility would have been immediate and flammable. Perry would have been looking for what was left of his . . . well, badly bruised private parts, while I was on the way to my divorce attorney’s office. This would have occurred in private, of course, since I really do have a dread of public scenes.
But that’s me.
Bitty often utilizes the Southern-belle trick of being a perfect lady in public, yet still manages to convey just what she really thinks of the person or their actions. I’ve never quite figured out how she does it without looking like a complete bitch. If I ever do figure it out, I intend to practice the art until I’ve got it mastered. There must be some kind of code words belles use. I’m usually so enthralled with their absolute mastery of the art that I don’t take notes, and consequently, can never recall exactly what was said or in what tone. It’s usually not so much the words as it is the tone of voice, the smile, the tilt of the head and batting of the eyelashes that convey exactly what is really meant, despite even the most innocuous comments. As I said, it’s an art form.
As Bitty and I converged on her gleaming kitchen like piranhas in a feeding frenzy, her phone rang. I stuck to my mission and took a bowl of pimento cheese out of the refrigerator while she answered the phone. Chen Ling—abandoned on the floor—looked up at me with a decidedly greedy gleam in her little bug-eyes. I smiled at her, rather relishing the fact that I have opposable thumbs and she—despite her charms—does not. It gave me a rare feeling of superiority, which is usually short-lived.
“Rayna!” Bitty exclaimed in what can only be described as a deliciously shocked tone. “Are you certain?”
Whatever Rayna Blue, a founding member of the Dixie Divas, said on the other end of the line must have been affirmative, because Bitty immediately laughed, then said in a solemn, pious voice, “Well, bless her heart.”
My attention was now immediately riveted on the informative phone call instead of pimento cheese. I moved closer to Bitty. “What? Bless whose heart?”
“Naomi Spencer’s,” Bitty said over her shoulder, and then went back to listening to Rayna.
Naomi Spencer? The young woman Bitty had so recently showered with venom and chicken and dumplings? Oh, this had to be good. I could hardly wait for her to get off the phone and tell me what was going on.
By the time Bitty finally hung up the phone and turned to look at me, I had managed to smear pimento cheese on slices of bread, the countertop, and the back of my hand. She sucked in a deep breath and smiled. It was a feline, satisfied smile.
“Naomi Spencer has been arrested.”
In my shock, I nearly spread pimento cheese up my arm. “No! For what?”
Bitty leaned against the counter and propped her chin in her palm. “Murder.”
She rolled the R and drew the word out like a character in a bad TV show.
I rolled my eyes. “Who did she murder?”
“Oh, that’s the best part. Her fiancé. Race Champion.”
“Dear god—that’s really his name?”
“No, I think it’s Rupert or Roger, or something like that. They only call him Race because he races stock cars. Can you believe it? She probably killed him for giving her an engagement ring he got out of a box of Cracker Jacks.”
“I don’t think Cracker Jacks has prizes anymore,” I said, and it was Bitty’s turn to roll her eyes. I ignored her. “How did Rayna find out about it?”
