Love in a Small Town (21 page)

She grabbed her purse and marched to the door. No matter if Tommy Lee still didn’t pay her any attention, she wanted to look good. She wanted men to look at her, and she wanted Tommy Lee to see that. She sure hoped he went to Rodeo Rio’s that night.

As she opened the door, thundered rolled and rattled the window glass, as if offering warning. Molly looked upward a moment and then slammed the door hard and started purposefully down the sidewalk.

Chapter 13

Going Out Tonight

Molly could ignore the summer storm. Although it made a lot of noise and wind—and Molly listened to the radio for a tornado warning—it cooled everything down, and in all likelihood it would pass over and be gone by the time she and Rennie went out. It was not as easy to ignore Kaye, however, who also made a lot of noise but wasn’t as likely to pass over and be gone, and who just seemed to make everything hotter, too.

Kaye telephoned to say she wanted to hold a Collier girls meeting that evening at their mother’s house; she wasn’t forthcoming as to what she wanted to discuss. “I’ll tell you when you get there.”

“Rennie and I have plans,” Molly said.

“What kind of plans?” Kaye asked.

“We’re goin’ out.”

The line hummed for a long minute, Kaye waiting in a loud silence. Molly let it sit.

Finally Kaye said, “Well, I know this is short notice, but I didn’t think I had to make appointments with my sisters. Surely givin’ me ten minutes won’t hurt anything.”

It wouldn’t, of course, and the whole time Molly bathed, dressed, and applied makeup in the spotty mirror above the bathroom sink, she kept telling herself that, and that she loved Kaye. She kept trying to hold a rein on herself. She had the frightening feeling that she was about to fly off any moment and be wild and crazy. She felt certain she was about to do something she would regret.

“Whatever you do can’t be more regretful than your life at the moment,” she told her image in the mirror.

She leaned close and applied a bit more blush and a bit more lipstick. Then she studied her eyes. The low light of the bathroom was kind to her face.
What will Tommy Lee think? Will he even pay attention?

Well, if he didn’t pay attention, someone else surely would, she thought, tossing her makeup back into its case. She strode into the bedroom, took up the bottle of Chanel she had purchased that afternoon at Blaine's—paying full price just to see how it felt—took out the stopper, and dabbed it between her breasts and behind her ears, then drew a line slowly down the hollow of her throat.

Through the kitchen window she watched each of her sisters—Kaye, then Lillybeth, then Season—drive up, park in a line behind their mother’s Lincoln, and go in the back door. Rennie was late.

Molly kept waiting for Rennie and thinking that maybe she wouldn’t go over after all, but she simply couldn’t hurt her sisters’ feelings—Lillybeth and Season would feel if they had to be there, so did Molly. And she was having trouble just waiting around for Rennie.

They were all gathered around the big mahogany family table in the dining room, and Kaye was serving sweet rolls on the good Noritake and French roast coffee, pouring it herself. Right away Molly guessed that Kaye wanted a big favor from them all.

When Molly came through the swinging door, they all turned to look at her, all four pairs of eyebrows arching at varying degrees.

“Oh, my,” Season said, eyeing Molly with a bright grin. “You look very nice. Where are you goin’?”

“Rennie and I are goin’ over to Rodeo Rio’s.”

Kaye’s eyebrows went up further. Mama gave a little smile and commented that she liked Molly’s shoes. Lillybeth said her dress looked at lot better on Molly than it had on herself. “I just don’t have enough boobs to make that dress hang right.”

Season leaned close as Molly sat down. “You’re gonna show Tommy Lee a thing or two.”

The comment made Molly feel a little silly, but she didn’t have to reply or even to think about it, because Kaye said in a raised voice, “Well, Rennie’s gonna be late, as usual, so we might as well get started.”

Kaye didn’t like the attention turned from herself and her plans. She straightened herself up and looked at everyone.

“With the cancellation of Molly’s anniversary party, we still have the question of what to do with the VFW hall.” She paused. “Well, I’ve come up with a way to not waste any of our money or our plans. I would like to hold a big Country Interior Design event instead.”

“Event” was the term Rennie had applied to Kaye’s sales party, and Kaye had readily taken up the term. Kaye had a conniption when anyone used the word “sales.” She preferred the term “opportunity-to-own.” She had been practicing smaller events—three in the past week and a half alone—and she had proven exceptionally fitted for bestowing Country Interior Designs upon the world. Mama was the one to say that Kaye had found the perfect outlet for her theatrical proclivity, and Kaye was so pleased with herself that she agreed.

“I want to hold a Country Interior Design event like no one has ever held before,” Kaye said, “and I’d like y’all to help me set it up and to hostess.” She spoke as if bestowing a great honor upon them.

Molly and Lillybeth and Season looked at each other and then at Mama, who was beaming at Kaye.

“We’ll be invitin’ all the women who would have come to the anniversary party anyway,” Kaye said, “so it won’t be like we canceled on them.”

Molly thought,
God forbid anyone be inconvenienced.

Lillybeth, moving so quickly that she startled Molly, set both feet on the floor and leaned forward. “If we do this”—she gestured to Molly and Season—“then are we each off the hook for havin’ to host one of your parties at our homes?”

“Well, if that’s the way you look at it,” Kaye said, bristling.

Molly stared at the table and thought of the brick VFW hall while Kaye went on to say that they could even use the white tablecloths and that each of them could proceed with the refreshment tray they had been assigned for the anniversary party. The silver streamers they had bought could be exchanged at McMahon’s Dry Goods for red ones, to go with the red bouquets she planned to have on each table. Oh, Kaye had plans, and all on what was to have been Molly’s twenty-fifth anniversary, which no one seemed to notice at all.

Molly took her sunglasses out of her purse and put them on. Season looked at her with a start.

Ten minutes later Rennie drove up, but she went into the cottage instead of coming over to Mama’s. Molly, glad for an excuse to escape, went over to get her. When she stepped into the kitchen, she saw Rennie at the sink, popping something into her mouth. Aspirin, from a bottle on the drain board. Rennie’s hair was a mess, her skirt was split on the side seam, and there was a rip in her black stockings.

Molly slipped off her sunglasses and took a second look. “What happened to you?”

Rennie was also wearing sunglasses, so Molly couldn’t see her eyes.

“It’s nothin’. I just stumbled on the steps of my apartment.”

Rennie snapped the cap on the aspirin bottle, and the snap was to Molly an exclamation point for a bald-faced lie.

“You have two steps to your front door.”

Rennie said nothing to that. Molly put a hand to her hip and stared at her. After long seconds of silence, Rennie, in aggravation, ripped off her sunglasses, and Molly found herself staring a freshly bruised right eye.

“Are you happy now?” Rennie’s mascara-smudged eyes glittered with tears and stubbornness. “I ran into my own stupidity with men; that’s what happened.”

Then she turned and fled into the bathroom and slammed the door.

* * * *

Molly went to the bathroom door and heard Rennie crying on the other side. She turned and went back and sat on the edge of the couch for several minutes, looked out the window toward her mother’s house and then down at the rug.

Whenever Rennie was upset, she would run and lock herself in the bathroom. Once, when she was nine, she had locked herself in and the lock jammed, and Mama had to take the knob off the door to get it open and Rennie set free. When Rennie had had her miscarriage, she might have died in the bathroom if she hadn’t unlocked the door before she passed out.

Molly wondered why everyone had to keep pulling and tugging her into their lives.

She rose and went to the bathroom door and rattled it. “Rennie, open the door.”

Rennie made no sound now.

“Rennie, I’ll kiss it and make it better.”

Rennie said nothing. Rennie could be more stubborn than a herd of mules.

Just then the telephone rang, somewhere in the living room. Molly’s first inclination was to ignore it, but then she got worried that it was Kaye, and surely if ignored Kaye would come storming over. Molly had to follow the cord to find the phone sitting on the far side of the sofa.

It was Kaye, and Molly told her, “Not now, Kaye, Rennie has diarrhea,” and hung up.

Turning, she saw light pouring into the hall from the bathroom. She went to the open door. Rennie was at the mirror with Molly’s makeup spread out around the edge of the sink.

“That was Kaye, wasn’t it?” Rennie said, sponging makeup over the bruise beneath her eye. “What did you tell her?” She paused but kept her gaze on the mirror.

“That you had diarrhea.”

It was the old standby excuse, one they had used since childhood; the subject was rarely questioned and never open for discussion.

“Well, I want to get out of here before any of them come over,” Rennie said, once more dabbing makeup high on her cheekbone. She turned and faced Molly. “I think it’s better now."

Molly looked from the bruise to Rennie’s muddy-green eyes.

“You need ice.”

She went to the kitchen, wrapped three ice cubes in a cloth, and broke them with a hammer. She did not need this, she thought as she whacked the ice a good one.
It’s my turn.

“Come sit in the kitchen and hold this on it for about twenty minutes.” She smacked the ice packet into Rennie’s hand. “I’ll make us some coffee.”

Molly turned her back and returned to the kitchen and put the kettle on to boil.
Why couldn’t she be allowed to focus on her own crisis?

They sat at the table, beneath the single light above. Rennie set aside the ice pack while she lit a cigarette. Molly saw that Rennie’s hand shook. Molly felt shaky herself, felt the panic rising up in her chest. She shoved up the window and opened the door to have a draft to suck out the cigarette smoke. Ace appeared, and she let him outside.

“It’s quit raining,” she said, inhaling the fresh earth scent and thinking of how Tommy Lee always liked to go out on the porch and watch it rain.

Behind her, Rennie got up and rifled through the cabinets, looking for food. When Molly told her the Oreos were all gone, that all she had were generic crackers, Rennie about bit her head off. Rennie got the crackers and peanut butter and began to eat the peanut butter right out of the jar, scooping it out with a cracker. She would use both hands to scoop, then hold the ice to her bruise while she chewed.

It was hard for Molly to believe that someone had beat on Rennie. There had always been something about Rennie that made people step lightly around her. She could have a dagger look and an even sharper tongue. Who would dare to raise a hand to her?

Molly realized that in her mind beatings by men were something that happened to other women, women who were weak and foolish, certainly not to a Collier girl, who was of a good family and education. She had to laugh at herself. Undoubtedly every spectrum of weakness and foolishness could be found within the Collier family.

But not violence. The Colliers were against physical violence. Her own mother had never raised a hand to her girls; Mama did not believe in spanking. Molly thought her mother far too permissive—a very avant-garde liberal—and had been determined to be more firm with her own children. Once, when Savannah had been four, Molly had hauled off and spanked her for some infraction—back-talking. Oh, Savannah had had such a smart mouth. Molly had smacked her thigh. But Savannah’s thigh had been bare, and suddenly Molly had seen the white imprint of her own hand. It had raised a welt, and Molly had faced that she had hit her child. No matter the reason, nor the term, she had hit her child, and she found it unacceptable. After that she had never again spanked any of her children. Sitting Savannah on her bed for fifteen minutes had worked much better anyway. To have to sit still and be ignored was for Savannah almost too horrible to be endured.

Tommy Lee had honored Molly’s feelings in this matter, despite his belief that sometimes a boy needed the threat of violence to keep him in hand. They’d disagreed over this, although once Molly had let Tommy Lee have his way with Colter, when Colter had taken the car, without benefit of driver’s license or permission, and driven all the way to Oklahoma City and was not inclined at all to remorse. She’d given thanks that Colter had backed down; she didn’t believe Tommy Lee would ever have forgiven himself had he come to blows with his son.

Molly spooned the instant coffee into two cups. She really was going to have to buy a coffeemaker. Instant coffee simply did not provide in crisis.

“Who is this guy?” she asked.

Rennie breathed deeply and shifted her gaze to the peanut butter jar. “A guy that was in one of my night classes this past spring. He got out of the army last year and started back to school.”

“Well . . . what’s his name, and why does he want to use you for a punching bag? Did you give him a bad grade?”

Rennie shook her head, a sad grin playing on her pale lips. She looked so pale, Molly thought. So pale and fragile. So unlike Rennie.

“His name is Eddie Pendarvis, and we dated for a few weeks. When I tried to break it off, he didn’t want to. He’s been pesterin’ me.”

Molly poured the hot water into the cups. She was so unnerved by what Rennie told her that she splashed the steaming water onto the table and had to reach for a cloth.

Rennie pushed away the crackers and peanut butter and reached for her cigarette. “He caught me as I was leavin’ the apartment. He has a really bad temper and just sort of goes berserk.”