The Sweetgum Ladies Knit for Love (17 page)

She was so lost in her reading that she barely registered the
whoosh
of the library’s front door opening to admit a patron. She looked up to see Hazel Emerson marching toward her. Eugenie forced a smile.

“Good morning, Hazel.” Whatever Hazel wanted, it had nothing to do with broadening her mind. Sharpening her claws, more like. Eugenie had spent the past six weeks bending over backward to please Hazel and her ilk. Standing beside Paul in the receiving line after church. Visiting shut-ins. Even volunteering to serve on the board of the Mothers Day Out program. The requests for her participation, though, rather than slacking off, had actually picked up. The more she did, the more people found for her to do.

“Eugenie. I was hoping I’d find you here,” Hazel said. She wore a fur jacket that was too heavy for the mild November day.

Eugenie swallowed the urge to make a sarcastic reply. Instead, she spread her hands to indicate her surroundings. “My natural habitat. What can I do for you, Hazel? Did you need to use the reference section?” She couldn’t resist the last remark.

“Oh, goodness no. I wanted to talk to you about the women’s auxiliary again. We still haven’t seen you at a meeting.”

“I know.” Eugenie steeled herself to be patient for Paul’s sake. She had to remember why she was volunteering for all these church activities. “But as I said before, I really can’t get away during the day.”

Hazel pursed her lips. “As the pastor’s wife, you’re expected to take a leadership role in the auxiliary.”

Eugenie knew there was no point in arguing, but she wasn’t going to agree to Hazel’s request either.

“I’m afraid that’s not possible,” Eugenie said.

Hazel pursed her lips more firmly. “I would reconsider if I were you.”

Eugenie shook her head. “I’m sorry Hazel.” She didn’t offer any further explanation, just let silence fall, which was easy to do in a library. Paul had warned her that she was like a popular college freshman during sorority rush. “Everyone will want you to get involved with their pet project,” he had said. “As far as I’m concerned, you can pick and choose. The church is paying me, not you.”

Which was kind of him, Eugenie thought, but also not completely realistic. The tradition of the highly involved pastor’s wife was too deeply ingrained in southern culture to discount quite so easily. But she hadn’t expected to find herself in over her head so quickly.

Hazel crossed her arms over her chest, her pocketbook dangling from one elbow. “I would think you’d want to support your new husband as much as possible.” She cast a dismissive glance around the library. “I hardly think your little job here is worth the sacrifice of your husband’s ministry.”

Eugenie felt her cheeks redden. “Paul understands the importance of my work.”

The other woman’s eyes flashed. “So you won’t even consider coming to the meeting?”

“I don’t really have a choice, Hazel. It’s no reflection on what is, I’m sure, a very fine group of Christian women.” She resisted the urge to cross her fingers behind the height of the checkout counter.

“The steering committee won’t be happy about this.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Please do give them my regrets.” Eugenie picked up a stack of books from the counter in front of her. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to catalog these new arrivals.” As a dismissal it wasn’t very subtle, but it was the only thing she could think of.

Hazel glanced at her watch. “I need to be going anyway. I have an appointment at the beauty salon.”

“Have a lovely day,” Eugenie said in her friendliest voice, but inwardly she seethed. What right did someone like Hazel Emerson think she had to come in and start telling Eugenie how to manage her life? Was this just a glimpse of her future as a minister’s wife? The thought depressed her.

“Good-bye, Eugenie,” Hazel snapped before stomping out the door.

After shed gone, Eugenie did catalog the new books, but she also started to worry. People like Hazel could make life miserable for Paul if Eugenie didn’t do as they expected. She’d been forced to humor and placate the city council for the last thirty years in order to achieve her goals for the library. The pressure on Paul, as a minister, to keep people happy must be even greater than what she had experienced. How to strike the right balance though? That was the question—one she spent the rest of the day pondering.

Camille sat on the stool behind the counter at the dress shop. Through the large plate-glass windows, she watched shoppers
passing up and down the street. Most of them she recognized, although there were a few unfamiliar faces—lake people or folks from around the county who came into Sweetgum to shop. Of the people she knew, very few stopped in to see her.

Although she was only twenty-four, Camille had been running her mother’s shop since she was nineteen. She was savvy enough about the business to know that slow sales in early November did not bode well for the holiday season. She doodled on the pad of paper next to the register, trying to come up with an idea for a spectacular advertising campaign in the local newspaper that would turn the sales slump around. She’d pit her management skills against anyone, but marketing was not her strength.

Underneath the pad of paper was the course catalog for Middle Tennessee State that had arrived in the mail that morning. She should call and tell them to take her off the mailing list; she was only tormenting herself. She’d thought that once her mother was gone, she would finally be free to leave Sweetgum and pursue the future she’d always dreamed of. That dream had been the one thing that kept her head above water during the upheavals of the last five years, but her plan had depended on finding someone to buy the dress shop, and given its current financial state, who would throw their money away like that?

Camille slid the pad to the side and flipped open the catalog. If she could go to college, what kind of classes would she take first? She enjoyed fashion and looked forward to her modest
buying trips to Atlanta twice a year. But maybe she’d rather try something new—computers or engineering or fine arts. Anything, really if it got her out of Sweetgum.

After a long, silent morning, the bell above the door rang.

She looked up, thankful for the first customer of the day, and saw Dante. He wore a shirt and tie and looked far more enticing than he had a right to. She felt a strange fluttering in the region of her heart and tightly curled the fingers of one hand in protest. She was determined not to let him get to her.

“Afternoon, Dante.” She came around the counter and stopped beside one of the clothing stands. She put a hand on a rack in a nonchalant pose, but really it was to steady herself.

“I thought I’d drop in and renew my invitation. I’ll make reservations at the Watermark.”

She shook her head. “I can’t.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Dante—”

“C’mon, Camille.” He stepped closer, and she gripped the rack more firmly. He was like a magnet, always drawing her closer even as she fought against it. “We’d have a great time,” he said, tempting her. “And you need to get out of Sweetgum, at least for a little while.”

Truer words had rarely been spoken, she thought glumly. But was an evening’s liberation worth the risk of his company?

Her hesitation encouraged him. “We could drive up early in the afternoon. See a movie first. I’ll even take you to a chick flick.”

She smiled in spite of herself. “My choice?”

His face tightened in a pained expression. “Yeah. Your choice.”

She was sorely tempted. “I don’t know.”

He looked so delighted at her hesitation that she would have thought she’d already agreed. “I’ll take that for a yes.”

“Dante, you can’t just—”

“Camille, I learned a long time ago that with you no means no. But hesitation means you can be persuaded.” He smiled and her willpower softened in proportion to its charm.

“When did you learn I was so persuadable?”

His expression grew serious. “When you almost agreed to go to the prom with me.”

“When did I do that?” But the moment she asked the question, the memory came tumbling back.

He’d cornered her coming out of the girls’ bathroom a week before the senior prom and asked her, probably for the tenth time, to be his date. She’d wanted to agree so badly, and she’d had such a horrible day. At that moment, she’d have liked nothing more than to grab him, tell him to put his arms around her, and bury her head against his broad shoulder. He seemed to promise security and comfort. But then Natalie and Cody had walked by and called out some teasing remark about how Dante was finally going to get lucky, and she’d withdrawn, packing her emotions back into their deep freeze, and turned his invitation down flat.

She looked at him now, a little older, definitely a man and not a boy, and she had the same urge to cling to him for strength and support.

“I’m not asking for anything big, Camille. Just an evening of your company”

“Okay” What? Had she lost her mind?

“Okay?” His smile was as wide as his chest. He pounded one hand with the other. “All right. I’ll pick you up at one o’clock on Saturday.”

“Not this Saturday, Dante.”

“Then the next one.”

She shook her head. “I can’t.”

“Then the one after.”

Camille nodded, the adrenaline rushing through her veins at odds with her outward calm. “The one after,” she agreed.

He turned and hustled for the door.

“Dante? Where are you going?” Camille felt a knot form in her stomach. She didn’t want him to leave.

He looked back, laughter in his eyes. “I’m getting out of here before you can change your mind.”

And then he was gone, and Camille was laughing too. It felt good, though she was out of practice. Maybe it was okay to hope. To trust Dante just a little and take a risk. Even if she did feel as if she’d agreed to jump out of a plane without a parachute.

Maybe things might work out for her after all. Even if she was still stuck in Sweetgum.

Maria and Daphne clambered down the stairs from their rooms above the five-and-dime, as eager and excited as schoolgirls. They rarely left their mother home alone, especially since their move. Stephanie hardly ever spent an evening under their own roof, which meant the two older sisters had very little social life.

Tonight, though, was a rare exception. Stephanie had caught a cold and was at home for once, being pampered by their mother. The irony of Althea doting on the daughter who ignored her was not lost on Maria, but rather than hold on to resentment, she chose to relish the unexpected night of freedom.

She and Daphne planned to eat dinner at Tallulah’s Café and then catch a romantic comedy at the movie theater. The sisters laughed as they made their way down the street to the café, clutching their well-worn coats around them against the sharp November wind.

“Well, if it isn’t the Munden girls.” Tallulah greeted them with a bright smile and a glint in her eye. “You all look as lovely as ever.”

Maria laughed. “Tallulah, no wonder this place is always packed, the way you sweet-talk everyone.”

The older woman winked at her. “Whatever works.”