Raney

This is the story of the first two years, two months, and two days of a modern Southern marriage.

The bride, Raney Bell, of Bethel, N.C., and the groom, Charles C. Shepherd, of Atlanta, Ga., met through their common interest in
Music.
("Charles
don't
look like a banjo picker, but he sounds good.")

Another interest that Raney and Charles share is
Religion.
Raney is a Free Will Baptist. ("If Jesus made wine on the spot, it had to be grape juice because it didn't have time to ferment.") Charles is an Episcopalian. ("Raney, Jesus Christ was a radical. If the people at Free Will Baptist met Jesus, they'd laugh at him-or lynch him.")

The young
couple also share
a strong interest in
Sex.
Raney's views are traditional. ("I had told Charles way back, of course, that I wanted my marriage consumed
after
I was married ... so Charles figures the minute we get married he can start acting like a African Brahma bull.") Charles's are a little more liberal. ("Raney, honey. It's OK. Try it. Try it!")

But there are other topics on which they differ. For example:

Race Relations:
("I figured if Charles thought skin color didn't make a difference, then he must be blind.")

The Extended Family:
("Charles, the entire foundation of my entire family is built on visiting. The family that visits together stays together.")

Nomenclature:
("Raney, they are feet.
Feet,
not footsies. What are you going to call its breasts?"

"I'm going to call them the same thing my mother called them, ninnie pies.")

Can this marriage be saved? Stay tuned, for, as one of the Bethel matrons said to the Bride-to-Be, "Honey, you're at the start of a long, wonderful journey."

RANEY

A novel
   

Clyde Edgerton
  

ALGONQUIN BOOKS OF CHAPEL HILL

P.O. Box 2225 Chapel Hill, NC 27515-2225

a
division of WORKMAN PUBLISHING COMPANY, INC.

708 Broadway New York, NY 10003

Copyright
1985 by Clyde Edgerton All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical articles and reviews, this book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher.

"Give Me the Roses While I Live"
—
A. P. Carter Copyright
©
1980 by Peer International Corporation Used by Permission. All Rights Reserved.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING

IN PUBLICATION DATA

Edgerton, Clyde, 1944
  
Raney.

I. Title.
   
PS3555.D47R3

1985
   
813'.54
   
84-24590

ISBN 0-912697-17-2

NINTH PRINTING

I am grateful to my mother and father, Truma and Ernest Edgerton, and to others in my family, especially Oma Crutchfield, Lila Spain, and W. C. Martin, for giving me those wonderful gifts, family stories, over and over, for as long as I can remember.

To Susan
Blood Kin
 

PART
ONE

LISTRE, NORTH CAROLINA

APRIL 18, 1975

FROM THE
Hansen County Pilot:

BETHEL
—
Mr. and Mrs. Thurman A. Bell announce the engagement of their daughter, Raney, to Charles C. Shepherd of Atlanta, Georgia. Mr. Bell owns the Hope Road General Store and the family attends Bethel Baptist Church. Raney graduated from Chester F. Knowles High School where she was in the school band and various other activities. She attended Listre Community College.

Charles Shepherd, the son of Dr. and Mrs. William Shepherd of Atlanta, is the assistant librarian at Listre Community College. Dr. Shepherd is a college professor, while Mrs. Shepherd is a public school teacher.

A June 7th wedding is planned at Bethel Baptist Church. A reception will follow in the education building.

The couple plans to honeymoon at Myrtle Beach and live in Listre at 209 Catawba Drive.

I

We get married in two days: Charles and me.

Charles's parents are staying at the Ramada
—
wouldn't stay with any of us
—
and today
me
, Mama, Aunt Naomi, and Aunt Flossie ate lunch with Charles's mother, Mrs. Shepherd. And found out that she's, of all things, a vegetarian.

We ate at the K and W. Mrs. Shepherd wanted to eat at some place we could sit down and order
—
like a restaurant
—
but Aunt Naomi strongly suggested the K and W. She said the K and W would be more reasonable and the line wouldn't be long on a Thursday. So we ate at the K and W.

I got meatloaf, Mama got meatloaf (they have unusually good meatloaf
—
not bready at all), Aunt Naomi got turkey, Aunt Flossie got roast beef, and Mrs. Shepherd,
Mrs
. Shepherd didn't get any meat at all. She got the vegetable plate.

When we got seated Mama says, "I order the vegetable plate every once in a while myself."

"Oh, did you get the vegetable plate?" says Aunt Naomi to Mrs. Shepherd.

"Sure did," says Mrs. Shepherd. "I've stopped eating meat."

We all looked at her.

"I got involved in a group in Atlanta which was putting together programs on simple living and after a few programs I became convinced that being a vegetarian
—
me
, that is
—
made sense."

Somehow I thought people were
born
as vegetarians. I never thought about somebody just
changing over.

"What kind of group was that?" asks Mama.

"Several Episcopal women. I'm originally Methodist, but
—
"

"Naomi!" says this woman walking by holding her tray. "Good gracious, is this all your family?" Her husband went ahead and sat down about three tables over
—
picked a chair with arms.

"It sure is," says Aunt Naomi. "Let me introduce you. Opal Register, this is my sister-in-law, Doris Bell." (That's Mama.) "You know Doris, don't you?"

"Oh, yes. I think we met in here one time. Right over there."

"And this is her daughter, Raney, who's getting married Saturday."

"Mercy me," says Mrs. Register. She had on big glasses with a chain, little brown curls on the top of her head, and too much lipstick. "You're at the start of a wonderful journey, honey," she says. "It was thirty-seven years for me and Carl the twenty-first of last month. I hope your journey is as happy and fulfilling as ours."

"And this is Mrs. Millie Shepherd, the groom's
—
groom-to-be's
—
mother. She's up from Atlanta, Georgia."

"Atlanta!" says Mrs. Register.

"And this is Flossie Purvis, Doris's sister. And ya'll, this is Opal and Carl Register," said Aunt Naomi, pointing toward Mr. Register who had started eating over at his table. He smiled, with food in his mouth. You couldn't see any though.

"Atlanta!" said Mrs. Register again. "You don't know C. C. Lawrence, do you?"

"No, I don't think I do," said Mrs. Shepherd.

"C. C. works at one of the big banks in Atlanta. He got a law degree and a business degree
—
one right after the other. His mama and daddy didn't think he'd ever finish
—
and them working at Liggett and Myers. He went
—
"

"Opal," Mr. Register calls out. "Sit down and eat."

"Well, nice to have met you," said Mrs. Register. "Good luck on that wonderful journey, honey," she says to me.

When Mrs. Register was out of hearing distance, Mama says, "Mr. Register just had a prostrate operation and I don't think he's recovered."

"Prostate," says Aunt Flossie.

"Is it?" says Mama. "Prostate? Oh. You know, I've always liked him better than her. She always makes so much out of every little thing."

The conversation went from the Registers to prostrate operations back around to eating meat.

"You know," says Aunt Naomi, "once in a while I've gone without meat, but I got so weak I thought I'd pass out."

"Well, that
happens
a bit at first," Mrs. Shepherd says. "But after a few days that usually goes away. It's a matter of what you get used to, I think. The body adjusts."

"I'd be afraid I couldn't get enough proteins," says Mama.

"Oh, no," says Mrs. Shepherd. "There are many protein substitutes for meat. Beans
—
soybeans, for example
—
are excellent."

"My next door neighbor, Lillie Cox, brought me some hamburger with soybean in it," said Aunt Naomi, "when I had the flu last winter, and it tasted like cardboard. She's always trying out the latest thing."

"I couldn't do without my meat," says Mama. She was fishing through her tossed salad for cucumber
—
and putting it on her plate. "I'd be absolutely lost without sausage for breakfast. Cole's sausage. The mild, not the hot. Do they have Cole's in Atlanta?"

"I don't think so. I really don't know."

"Do you get the patties or the links?" Aunt Naomi asks Mama.

"The patties
—
Thurman don't like the links; they roll off his plate."

We all laughed. Even Mrs. Shepherd, so Mama stretched it out. "Every time we go to Kiwanis for the pancake supper he'll lose one or two links. Because of the way he eats his pancakes
—
pushes them all around in the syrup. Last time one rolled up under the edge of Sam Lockamy's plate, and for a minute there we couldn't find it. Then Sam swore it was his."

"I guess you have less cholesterol if you don't eat meat," says Aunt Naomi.

"There are health advantages," said Mrs. Shepherd. "And also our women's group has been concentrating on how eating less meat can help curtail hunger in the third world."

"On another
planet?"
says Aunt Naomi.

"Oh, no. Developing nations," says Mrs. Shepherd. She finished chewing and swallowed. "Developing nations."

"What I don't understand," says Aunt Naomi, "is that if they don't eat their own cows, like in India, then why should we send them ours? They wouldn't eat ours, would they? Or maybe they
would e
at
American meat."

"We wouldn't send meat to India, of course; we'd send grain and other staple goods. The fewer cows we eat the less grain we'll need to feed cows, so there will be a greater grain surplus."

Aunt Naomi blew her nose on this Kleenex she had been fumbling with. She had a cold. She can get more nose blows on one Kleenex than anybody I ever saw. She always ends up with this tiny corner which she slowly spreads out, then blows her nose into.

We'd finished eating so I said, "Aunt Naomi, you get more nose blows out of one Kleenex than anybody I've ever seen in my life."

"I probably won't be able to sing Sunday," she said. She sings in the church choir. "This cold just drags on and on and on."

"Ain't it nice the way Raney and Charles play music together," says Mama to Mrs. Shepherd. I was relieved to get off the meat subject.

"Yes, it is," says Mrs. Shepherd.

"I think it's wonderful," says Aunt Naomi.

"They sound real good together," says Aunt Flossie.

Music is what brought me and Charles together. He plays banjo and collects old songs from the mountains. When I sang for the faculty at the college Christmas dinner he was there
—
he's the assistant librarian
—
and he came up afterward and complimented my singing. He was real nice about it. And has been ever since. Charles is the kind of person who is real natural around people
—
and is smart as he can be.

Then I met him again when I went to the library to check out a record. They have a good collection, thanks to Charles. One thing led to another and the first thing you know we're playing music together. We've had three or four performances. Kiwanis and such. Charles calls them gigs.

"Charles sent me a tape," says Mrs. Shepherd. "You two sound really good together. You have a beautiful voice, Raney."

I thanked her.

Charles is learning to sing too. We harmonize on two or three songs. He's improving gradually. He plays good banjo. He
don't
look
like a banjo picker, but he sounds good.

"I don't know what I'm going to do without Raney singing around the house, and helping out with Norris and Mary Faye," says Mama, looking at me.

"Mama, I'm twenty-four years old," I said.

There's a big gap between me and my little brother, Norris, and sister, Mary Faye. Norris is eight and Mary Faye is eleven. Mary Faye picks on Norris all the time, but sometimes he deserves it.

"How many children do you have, Mrs. Shepherd?" says Aunt Flossie.

"One," says Aunt Naomi.

"Please call me Millie," says Mrs. Shepherd. "All of you," she says, and smiles. "You too, Raney, if you're comfortable with that. I have only one," she says. "Charles is the only one."