Buzzkill (Pecan Bayou Series) (14 page)

Orley Ortiz was
just pulling into the driveway as Rocky pulled his pickup to the curb in front
of the Olin house.

As I got out of
the passenger side of the truck, Orley called out, “Betsy, I think you’re a
little early. Dispatch didn’t say this one was dead yet.”

“Nice seeing you
too, Orley,” I called back.

Nancy Olin came
running out of the house, her hands shaking. “Thank goodness you’re here!
Prissy’s in the living room. She’s swelling up like a tick.”

We followed
Orley in as if we were part of the paramedic team. Mrs. Olin was too upset to
notice two extra people in her first responder party. Upon entering the
two-story Victorian home, we made our way through a foyer crowded with pictures
of Prissy placed tastefully on the walls.

“She had a
little rash. Pre-wedding jitters, you know,” said Mrs. Olin. “She’s marrying
Theodore Obermeyer, the mayor’s son. I mean, you can’t do much better in this
town. Still, she’s nervous, and it was starting to play out in her complexion.”

“Yes, ma’am,”
Orley said as he pulled an epinephrine pen out of his bag. We walked in on a
grotesquely swollen Prissy weeping on the couch.

“Miss Olin? Are
you having any difficulty breathing?”

“No, I’m
breaving, but you have thu make dis betta. I have vedding announcethment
picthures thomorrow.”

“Yes, ma’am.
I’ll do my best.” Orley turned to Prissy’s mother. “Has she come in contact
with something that she’s allergic to recently?”

“No, nothing
that I know of.”

Prissy started
motioning wildly to a small cold cream jar on the coffee table.

“Did you put
this cold cream on today?”

“No!” Her scream
was muffled by the swelling of her lips.

“You didn’t put
this cold cream on?”

“Yeth!”

“I think she’s
delirious,” Rocky said.

Mrs. Olin took
the cold cream from Orley. “Prissy, did you put some of this on your rash?”

“Yeth! Yeth!”

“Has she had a
reaction to cold cream before?” Orley asked.

“No!” Prissy
said.

“No, she
hasn’t.” Mrs. Olin unscrewed the cap of the small white jar. “But this isn’t
cold cream. This is the batch of calamine lotion I made with the ladies group
at church. We brought our own jars and chose not to put tacky flower stickers
all over them.”

Prissy was now
jumping up and down, overwhelmed with joy that she was being understood. I
decided to slowly back out of the room, bumping into Rocky, who was doing the
same thing.

“You made your
own calamine lotion? I didn’t even know a person could do that,” said Orley.
“Where’d you get the recipe?”

“Well, I think
someone got it out of the paper. That helpful hints advice column or
something.” Mrs. Olin stopped mid-thought and turned in my direction. It was as
if a bright, hot spotlight hit me cowering in the corner, trying to make a run
for the exit.

“Betsy? Did they
get this from one of your Happy Hinter columns?” Orley asked.

“Maybe,” I answered.

“What do you
mean, maybe?”

“Orley, I wasn’t
there when the ladies made up this batch. They could have put in all kinds of
stuff that wasn’t in the original recipe.”

“Like what?”

“Like a rose
scent or something.”

Orley took the
open jar and sniffed at it. “No rose scent. Mrs. Olin, I’ll need you to get me
the exact list of the ingredients for us to take along to the hospital. It
could be that Prissy here had some sort of bad reaction.”

“Okay.” Mrs.
Olin pulled her cashmere sweater close around her and left the room.

“You did vis,”
Prissy said, pointing her swollen finger at me.

“I certainly
hope not,” I answered. “We’ll get you to the hospital.”

“You jus wannabe
da only bribe.”

“No, that’s not
true,” I said. “There’s room for two Pecan Bayou brides on Valentine’s Day.”

“You did vis!”
she screamed as Orley stabbed the epinephrine pen into her leg.

Mrs. Olin came
back in with her purse on her arm. “Prissy, calm yourself. We’ll get this all
straightened out.” She reached out her hand to her daughter and looked at me.
“Do us all a favor and stay away from the hospital. I think you’ve done enough
damage here, Betsy.”

That evening, as
I turned out Zach’s light and closed his door softly so as not to wake him, my
cell jangled where I had left it on the coffee table.

“Hey, Bets.” It
was Leo. “So I was online working out where we are going to be staying in
Vermont, but I couldn’t stop thinking about whether we should put a contract on
that house I showed you. It’s still on the market, and we could go through the
closing process and be in it a month after we’re married. It would really
shorten how long we stay in the apartment,” he said.

“How much time
do you think we have?” I asked.

“About a week,
but calling the realtor now would be even better.”

“We also need to
figure out what to do about the boys while we’re on the honeymoon.” I said,
changing the subject away from the real estate contract.

“Could they stay
with Aunt Maggie or down in Galveston with my mom?”

“What about
school? Zach doesn’t need to miss all that school.”

“Okay, Betsy,
here’s the problem. We can’t make this decision because we have been putting
off making the other decision.”

I dreaded the
direction our conversation was going. We had to choose whose town we were going
to live in, and we had to do it now.

“Leo, you have
to understand … moving to Dallas is a really hard thing for me,” I said. “My
family is here. I’ve lived here all my life.”

“It’s not like
you’re moving across the ocean.”

“Do you know how
many times a week I call and get together with my family?”

Leo didn’t
answer me.

“Betsy, you know
I love you, but I don’t think it’s out of the question for me to want to live
in the same city as my wife.”

I pulled the
afghan from the couch over my legs. A chill was descending in the room.

“You’re right. I
know you are.”

“Betsy, we’ve
discussed this,” he said. “My job is here, and you can write your column
anywhere. Dallas is the logical decision for us right now.”

“I know,” I
said, a single tear escaping and making a lonely journey down my cheek.

Leo was right,
but what I was giving up was immeasurable. I wouldn’t have my father stopping
by for coffee and then telling me the latest story of the goofy residents of
Pecan Bayou. I wouldn’t have Danny and his beautiful smile and ever-present hug
any time I wanted it. Mostly I wouldn’t have Aunt Maggie, dear sweet Aunt
Maggie, who was the mother my heart recognized.

“Betsy?”

“Sorry,” I said.
“I just realized I need to do something to help me with this.”

“What’s that?”

“Talk to Aunt Maggie.”

There was a
pause on the other end. “Don’t worry about the honeymoon. I’ll take care of it,
okay? You just worry about getting everything arranged for the wedding. That’s
plenty. Talk to Maggie. Love you, Betsy.”

“Love you, too.”

And I really
did, but why did I feel so unhappy?

The next morning
I waved to Zach as he settled in a seat on the bus headed to Buzz Aldrin
Elementary. Next year he would be in middle school with Tyler, and that scared
me. The thought of him being in middle school in Dallas took me up another
notch. The schools there were gigantic. Would he get lost in all those kids?

Right now the
concept of living in Dallas was exciting to him, but next year when he would
start to miss his grandpa and Danny, it would be different. I headed back to
the house as my dad pulled up in his squad car. He jumped out holding a copy of
the morning paper.

“Betsy. Have you
read this thing yet?”

Mine was still
rolled up in its plastic sleeve on the kitchen table.

“No, I haven’t,”
I said. “Why don’t you come in and you can tell me all about it.”

I poured him a
cup of black coffee and set it down on the table as he spread the paper flat.
The headline read: “Battle of the Brides: Attack with Killer Calamine Cream.”

“Oh my God,” I sputtered.

“You look
surprised. According to the article, you were the one who started it.”

“What?” I
scanned the newsprint, and indeed I was named as one of the battling brides.
Rocky had snapped a picture of Prissy Olin’s swollen face as she raised what looked
like one grotesquely shaped middle finger at him.

“That old
rascal,” I said. “I’m surprised he would even touch this, seeing as it reflects
so badly on the paper.”

“We know there
was something extra in the calamine Martha made, but the rest of the town
doesn’t,” said my dad. “There wouldn’t be anything else in it, would there?”

“No, yes, maybe.
I don’t know,” I said. “I didn’t think so. I’ve used it on Zach, and he didn’t
swell up like Prissy. I certainly never told Rocky he could use this story in the
paper.”

“Yeah, well that
never stopped him before,” Dad said. “Rocky is like The Enquirer at an alien
sighting in the Elvis Lives Here Trailer Park. He can’t help himself.”

“I can’t believe
it.”

“The problem we
have now is all the people in this town who will believe it. The loonies will
start coming out of the woodwork.”

“Don’t forget,
Dad. This paper is online.”

Judd shook his
head. “Damn computer age.”

******

“Mrs.
Livingston?” I had finally decided to answer my cell phone after my house phone
had been ringing nonstop since the newspaper article came out three hours
earlier.

I sighed. How
could they get my cell? I only gave that out to people I actually had
face-to-face conversations with. “Yes?”

“This is Yancey
Fischer, Mrs. Livingston. We have ourselves a real problem here, missy.”

“What’s that? If
this is about the article in the paper …”

“No, ma’am, we
don’t take much stock in the paper at our house. Rocky Whitson’s an idiot,”
said Yancey. “No, we just had a visit from Prissy Olin and her mother. Seems
that Morton might have booked them for a reception out here, a week before I
booked you.”

“A reception?
Out there? Well, that’s really not my problem that you can’t keep your
appointment calendar straight,” I snapped. “Prissy Olin has already used the
church we we’re also using. I think we should at least be able to use that
field you call a chateau.”

“Now there’s no
need to get ugly about this, Mrs. Livingston. Everyone has a right to make a
livin’, you know.”

“Fine, so how do
you fix this mistake?”

“Well, Morton
and I discussed that very fact. We would be willing to give you folks 10
percent off your fee if you reschedule for another weekend.”

I was
underwhelmed by his offer.

“Seriously? You
want me to change the date of my wedding? Do you know how difficult that is?”

I slammed my
hand down on the counter.

“There is no
need to get angry and go all crazy on us. My missus told me you wouldn’t be
happy about this.”

“Fine,” I said.
“I’ll be out to pick up my deposit.”

“About the
deposit …”

“It will be returned
in full, or maybe the Pecan Bayou Police would like to know about it,” I
threatened.

“I was saying,
about the deposit, that we will be glad to refund it in full,” Yancey Fischer
hung up. I uttered a frustrated scream and pushed “end call” on my phone. Was
there anything else that could go wrong?!

The phone rang
in my hand, making me jump. If this was Yancey Fischer, I was ready to let him
have it with both barrels.

“What!” I said
sharply.

“Betsy?” Aunt
Maggie inquired as though she’d just found me sitting by the side of the road.

“Oh, Aunt
Maggie. I’m sorry,” I said. “I thought you were Yancey Fischer. He just called
and told me we couldn’t have our reception at Chateau Fischer.”

“Why not?”

“Because our
favorite bride, Prissy Olin, had booked a week before we did, and the Fischer
brothers lost track of it until now. Just how does that happen when they told
us we were the first wedding they would have out there?”

“I’ll tell you
how,” Maggie said. “Nancy Olin and a collection of dead presidents. That’s how.”

“You really
think so? I can’t believe they would do that. They were so well organized. Why
would they be booking the reception just now?”

“Maybe they had
something fall through in their plans and they’re scrambling too?”

“Getting married
seemed like such a simple idea,” I said. “A bride, a groom, a sunny honeymoon.
I have headaches, dead florists, snippy guys with two-bit fields they call
chateaus, and my own mother couldn’t even stick around to see it through.”

“Don’t be saying
things like that, baby girl. You’ll curse yourself,” my aunt said. “We’ll
figure something out, I promise you. Maybe we can get the old VFW hall.”

“Wonderful, then
later we can all play horseshoes.”

“Don’t worry,
I’ll start making some calls.”

So now I had
another deposit to pick up. I punched in Mr. Andre’s number to tell him about
our latest crisis.

“What do you
mean they made a mistake?” he demanded. “That’s crazy. They told us we were
their first customers.”

“I know they
did. It seems they accidentally had another first customer that they
conveniently forgot about. Aunt Maggie thinks Prissy’s mother slipped them some
cash to cancel us and put their own reception on the calendar.”