The Ladies' Room (8 page)

The jewelry box had taught me not to throw anything away
unexamined, so I carried the envelope to my bedroom. I removed my wet gown, put on the fresh one, and crawled into
the middle of the bed. The envelope was dated the previous
March, and the postmark said it had come from Hollis, Oklahoma. The return address label had Harriet Stemmons on it,
but the handwriting was big and masculine.

I turned the envelope upside down, and letters tumbled out in
front of me. Aunt Gert's precise, small writing on the outside of
the letters addressed them to either Harriet O'Brien or Harriet
Stemmons. A single sheet of paper among them explained that
Harriet had prized their friendship and had kept a few of the
letters she had received through the years. But Harriet had
passed on the month before, and the sender was now returning
those letters to Gertrude. He hoped she'd enjoy remembering all
the good times they'd had when they were the two new teachers
in the Milburn school system and the letters they'd shared since
then. The letter was signed Thomas O'Brien, Harriet's son.

I shuffled them into order by date and opened the one dated
December 10, 1944. In it, Aunt Gert wrote about riding a horse
nine miles each day so she wouldn't have to use her gas ration
stamps. She mentioned her sister, who would have been my
grandmother, and then told Harriet how much she missed her
beau, Miles, who was fighting in the war.

It was hard to think that Aunt Gert had ever been that young
or happy, but there it was on the page. One letter turned into
two, three, and four until I'd read all of them.

Gert didn't go into much detail, but there was a splotch that
looked like a teardrop on the letter she wrote saying that Miles
had died in the war and that she'd never marry.

Letter number twelve was dated May of 1957, and she was
almost giddy. She was in love, and she was going to be married. He worked at the local Chevrolet dealership and was ten
years younger than she. She hoped that in the near future she
and Lonnie Martin would make a road trip to western Oklahoma to visit Harriet and Rick.

Number thirteen, written in December of 1957, was a very
different letter. Gert's tone had changed drastically. She apologized to Harriet for not writing since the wedding but confessed that the marriage had been a very big mistake.

The fourteenth letter was the one that caused my eyes to
pop wide open. It was dated June of 1958, a year after she'd
married Lonnie. It started out:

Dear Harriet,

I made a mistake. If I could figure out a way to kill my
husband, I'd do it in a heartbeat, but I'm stuck with him
until he dies. He married me because he thought I had
money, and he's cheating on me, and the crazy thing is,
most of the women he goes after are my friends. Daisy
Black and I were friends from the time we were just little
girls, and now she's sleeping with my husband. He even
gave her a fancy piece of jewelry just like one he gave
me. I saw her wearing it at church and knew immediately what was going on. When I confronted him, he
laughed in my face and said that when I gave him access
to all my money instead of a monthly allowance, he'd
stop giving his mistress the same jewelry he gave me.
Until then I could expect to see lots of jewelry just like
mine in Tishomingo. If I divorce him, he'll get at least
half my property. What am I to do? If I toss him out,
everyone will think I was just a silly old woman who played into the hands of a con artist. If I don't, I'll be
miserable.

I wish I'd never married him.

I took a deep breath. It's a wonder the man lived another
thirty years. No wonder she'd grown bitter. I yawned twice and
turned off the light. A full moon filtered in through the lace
curtains, and I thought about Lonnie's spirit being locked up in
the room across the hall. If I heard chains rattling in Uncle
Lonnie's old room, I was hightailing it out of that house and
buying dynamite the next morning.

I had just shut my eyes when I heard a sound like a freight
train headed right toward my pillow.

How on earth the train had jumped the tracks in Ravia and
made it five miles to Tishomingo was a mystery, but clearly it
was on Broadway Street and coming on strong.

I sat up so fast, it made me dizzy, and I tried to jump out of
bed, but my legs were tangled up in the sheets. My life flashed
before my eyes as I got ready for the impact.

If I died, Drew would automatically get everything Aunt
Gert had left me. I'd rather suffer the wrath of Lucifer than
Aunt Gert in those circumstances. I hit the floor in a run and
made it to the door when I realized it wasn't a train but Gert's
alarm clock, which I'd set the night before so I wouldn't be
late to church.

The cursed thing had two bells on the top and no volume
button. It took me several minutes to find the off button on
the back, and the silence did nothing to stop the ringing in my
ears. I grabbed the clock and slung it against the far wall, but
it kept ticking. I kicked it like a soccer ball against another
wall, and it still kept ticking.

I picked it up and marched downstairs, out the back door,
and to the garage. The cursed thing was not going to live to ring
another day. The noise it made when it hit the concrete floor
was pitiful but still not enough to kill it. Until that moment, I
hadn't known that inanimate objects could be immortal.

I searched for something to use to destroy it. I uncovered
ant poison in a bag with the top rolled down and secured with two clothespins. Would alarm clocks be susceptible to ant
poison? Probably not. I pushed around a dozen cans of paint
with labels dating them back at least fifty years. It would take
an act of God to get any of the lids off, so lead poisoning was
out too. There had to be a hammer somewhere. Finally I spied
a rusty metal toolbox pushed up under an old chrome kitchen
table. I bloodied a knuckle trying to open it, but finally a good,
solid cussing popped the lid, and there was a hammer, right on
top. I picked up the clock, set it on Uncle Lonnie's worktable,
and smashed it with the first swing.

It felt so good that I hauled off and hit it again, then once
more as I envisioned Drew's face between the bells. He was
still smiling, so I gave him a couple more licks for good measure.

"That clock do something to make you mad?" Billy Lee
asked from the doorway.

I was wearing one of Aunt Gert's cotton summer nightgowns
in Pepto-Bismol pink. My hair kinked all over my head. My
bare feet were dirty from trekking out across the dusty yard,
and rising blood pressure was no doubt turning my face red
and blotchy. But I did not care. For the first time in my entire
life I was liberated.

I pointed at him. "Yes. Scared the devil out of me. It won't
do that again."

"You don't give second chances?" He grinned.

"Not anymore."

He stepped aside and, I guess, returned to the peace of his
own home when I marched past him and into the house. I wasn't
living one more second doing what society expected. That had
gotten Aunt Gert a life of misery until Lonnie died, and by then
she was so set in her ways, she couldn't change. I had just destroyed the first thing to upset my brand-new life. I was brave
enough now to take Drew on.

I put a Band-Aid on my knuckle and ate leftover ribs for
breakfast-cold, right out of the refrigerator, licking the sticky
sauce off my fingers instead of using a napkin or even a paper
towel. The phone rang as I started up the stairs to get ready for
church. I picked it up on the third ring.

"Hello"

"Trudy, are you still there? You will go home right now.
Mother is mortified. Dad is ready to commit you. You've
proven your point. You've embarrassed me. I'll be home tomorrow, and you'd best be there," Drew said.

"You can kiss my naturally born southern hind end, Drew
Williams." I hung up. That felt even better than murdering the
alarm clock had.

The phone rang again, but I gave it a threatening look and
reminded it that the hammer was still out in the toolbox. It
stopped on the fourth ring. Guess I made a believer out of it.

I held up the two new dresses hanging in the closet and decided on the red one. I liked the yellow with the Hawaiianprint jacket, but I would want to wear the hat with it, and today
I wasn't covering up my hair. Not one resident of Johnston
County, Oklahoma, was going to say I wore a hat out of shame
for a bad decision.

I slipped the red dress over my head. It was as comfortable
as one of Gert's nightgowns. The jacket didn't bind me up, and
the shoes felt pretty darn close to house slippers.

Billy Lee was sitting on the porch when I opened the door. He
wore bibbed overalls and a short-sleeved chambray shirt. Both
were crisply ironed, and his shoes were polished.

"You going to church?" he asked.

"Yes, I am"

"Which one?"

"Same one I always go to. The one on Main Street. You?"

"I go to the same one me and Gert always went to. The one
on Broadway Street. Thought if you were going to our church,
we might ride together."

It looked like the property came complete with Billy Lee
Tucker in all phases-work, eating, church. "Maybe another
time. You want to come with me today?"

He shook his head so hard that if he'd been wearing
glasses, they would have been flung to a far corner of the yard.
"No, thank you. But it's an open invitation if you ever want to
go with me"

"Thanks. I just might do that someday."

He followed me out to the Impala and opened the door.
"You look lovely. Is that a new dress?"

"Yes, it is, and thank you," I said.

"Red is a good color for you. It goes well with your hair."

I had a panic attack in the church parking lot. I wasn't even
sure I could get into heaven if I didn't uphold the standards
set by my mother. What would happen to the rich and shameless if I didn't wear black Versace and control-top hose to
church on Sunday mornings?

Eyebrows almost hit the ceiling, and there was a steady
drone of whispers, but no one brought out a rope with a noose
on the end when I walked inside. Betsy wore the same black
suit she'd worn to Aunt Gert's funeral, and her bleached hair
had been cut. Marty wore a black sheath-style dress with a
lacy jacket, and her red hair was swept up with a clip. If they
had their hearts set on a new Thunderbird, they'd best call in a
plastic surgeon. A new hairdo wouldn't be enough to do the
trick. I slid into my normal place, leaving room for Drew out
of habit.

Betsy leaned over and whispered into my ear. "What in
God's name are you wearing?"

"A new bra, panties, no hose, a dress with matching jacket,
and shoes," I whispered back.

Marty leaned past her and gave me a dirty look. She should
be careful with those mean glares. A dead alarm clock could
testify that I was never taking any guff again, and the hammer
was in the toolbox, ready and waiting.

The Sunday school director made a few announcements.
The choir director led us in a hymn, and the preacher took the
pulpit. He preached on about forgiveness. He was one funeral
late and two cousins short. I'd forgive my cousins if they
apologized from the depths of their evil souls. I would forgive
Drew when he was lying in a casket with his hands draped
over his cheating heart.

"Drew is going to kill you, coming to church looking like
that," Marty said the minute the benediction was delivered.

"Crucify, is more like it," Betsy said.

"Which one of you wants Aunt Gert's house when he does?"

Marty shivered.

Betsy's eyes bugged out.

"Then you'd better protect me, because I swear to God, I'll
leave it to one of you. You'll be sure to take care of it for me,
won't you?" I reached the door and shook the preacher's hand.
He blinked fast a dozen times before he called me by name.
I'm sure he was in shock, but I don't reckon it was fatal, since
he didn't drop graveyard-dead.

I was glad for air-conditioning when I got into my car and
drove west through town toward the Western Inn's restaurant.
I cruised past the funeral home, the H&R Block, the flower
shop, drugstore, E-Z Mart, a bank, clothing stores, and all the
makings of a small town with a four-block business area and
two red lights.

I knew most of the people in the restaurant, and a few
mumbled a cautious hello. They didn't want to get too close to
the crazy woman, since scientists hadn't yet proved whether
crazy, like stupid, is inherited or contagious.

The waitress brought a glass of water to my booth and asked
if I wanted to see a menu or if I would be having the buffet. I
chose the buffet, so she told me to help myself. Mabelle Strong
slipped in behind me as I was loading my plate with fried
chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, and hot rolls
and eyeing the fried okra on the other side.
--- -- - - - -- - - - - -

Mabelle had wispy blue gray hair that barely covered her
scalp. Her lipstick had run into the wrinkles around her mouth,
and a bed of crow's-feet cradled her bright blue eyes.

"Trudy
Williams,
you
need
to
go
home
and
stop
this
nonsense. You look like a cheap floozy. Have you lost your mind,
girl? Gert would be ashamed of you," she said, without lowering
her voice a bit.

"How are you doing, Mabelle? I suspect that Gert would be
standing on a tabletop clapping for me this morning. That is
a lovely brooch you're wearing. I believe my Uncle Lonnie
bought that for you back before he died. Now, what were you
saying about my state of mind?"

She turned sixteen shades of red, one of which matched her lipstick perfectly. It looked as if she was going to succumb to
acute cardiac arrest, but she managed to suck in enough air to
keep her heart pumping. It would have been terrible if she'd
dropped right there, because it would've slowed down the
line, and the fried okra was on the other side of the buffet.