A Forever Thing (6 page)

“She’s talking about Chris Miller. He has a missing tooth”
Theron was so close to Fancy’s elbow that she could feel the warmth
of his body.

She froze.

“Know him?” he asked.

“Did at one time, but that was long ago,” she said.

“Oh?” Theron raised an eyebrow. “Well, I guess I shouldn’t be
surprised.” He waved a hand in the air. “Birds of a feather.”

“Leopards don’t change their spots,” Fancy said. “Is that what
you’re saying?”

“But, Miss Fancy, this is a fish, not a leopard.” Rachel giggled.

“Seniority just lost,” Fancy said.

Theron cocked his head to one side. “What?”

“You can leave. I’m staying. I love this class.”

“I don’t think so,” he said.

“Afraid that I’ll teach them to make amaretto cocktails?”

“I’m not sure I should leave small children in your hands,” he
said.

She glared at him. “Why not? I might even teach them some reality instead of fantasy. Jonah wouldn’t have had a little table with
a candle in the middle while he was in the belly of that whale or
fish or the Loch Ness monster. He’d have been struggling among
seaweed and gunk, trying to hold his head up enough to keep breathing. He wouldn’t have put his finger on his chin and figured
out he’d angered God by not doing what he was supposed to do.
He’d have been begging for a second chance.”

Theron gritted his teeth. “You don’t tell six-year-olds a gory tale
like that. I’m not about to leave this class in your hands.”

“Then we’ll both stay, and I’ll give them a little reality to keep
them from getting a spiritual sugar high from all your Santa Claus
stories,” she said.

“You are evil,” he growled.

“Takes one to know one,” she shot right back.

“Are you fighting?” Rachel asked.

“No, we’re having a big-people discussion,” Theron assured her.

“That’s what my mommy and daddy say when they’re fighting,”
Rachel said.

“If you fight, Rev’end Paul won’t let you play together,” another
little boy said in a slow Texas drawl. “‘Member when me and
Jimmy had that fight? Rev’end Paul told us that if we weren’t good,
we couldn’t come into this room together. We’d have to sit with our
mommies in the big people’s room, and there ain’t no coloring in
there.”

“Then we won’t fight,” Fancy said. “I wouldn’t want to go where
there was no coloring.”

“Come over here and look at next week’s lesson plan,” Theron
said, taking her by the arm and leading her to a far corner of the
room.

“Why do I think this has nothing to do with Moses and the Ten
Commandments?” she whispered.

“This is my classroom. I’ve had it three years, ever since I
moved here from Shamrock, and you are not going to run me out
of it,” he declared.

She looked up at him. “You don’t share and play nice with others, do you?”

It was strange for Theron to look down at a woman. Most of the
women he’d been involved with had been anywhere from one to
six inches taller than him.

“How long are you staying in Albany? I figured you’d be gone
when we didn’t hire you,” he said.

“I’m not sure, but I’ll be here every Sunday until I leave. Consider it your punishment for judging me”

“I’m not judgmental,” he said.

“Yes, you are, and if you argue with me, you’ll have to go sit
with the mommies and daddies, and you won’t get to color,” she
taunted.

“I really don’t like you,” he said.

“Well, darlin’, I love you,” she teased.

The tinkling sound of music floated from the intercom system,
and the children put all their crayons into the basket, picked up
their coloring sheets, and lined up at the door. When Theron nodded, Rachel opened it, and they were gone in a flurry of speed
down the hall toward the sanctuary, where they’d show their parents their work.

“Good day, Miss Sawyer,” Theron said stiffly.

“I’ll see you next week,” she said right back at him, wishing she
could restart the whole morning. If she could, she never would
have gotten out of bed, would have read a good, thick romance
book all morning, and had a candy bar for breakfast.

She headed for the sanctuary, where she planned to sit in the
back row, avoiding the second pew on the right, where Hattie had
laid claim to a seat long before Fancy was even born. But when
she headed down the aisle, Tandy Stephens reached up and
grabbed her hand from a pew in the middle of the church.

“Sit with us old women and make us happy,” she said.

“Miss Tandy?” Fancy eyed the woman. She hadn’t changed all
that much in fifteen years, but still, there was a possibility she’d
gotten the wrong name among the whole row of elderly women sitting together.

Tandy patted the corner of the pew. “That’s right, darlin’. Sit
right here. We’ve got a proposition we want to put before you.”

Fancy slid into the seat. “In church?”

“It’s not a godly thing or a spiritual one, but we aren’t going to
ask you to sell your soul to the devil either. We’re not out to save
your soul from hell or pray you through the Pearly Gates. We just
want a place to fix our hair again. I saw Hattie last week in the nursing home. She says it’s just for a few weeks and then she’ll be
back, but we don’t want to wait that long.”

“I’m a teacher, not a beautician,” Fancy said.

“And we know that, but back when you were just a kid, you
used to wash our hair and get us ready for Hattie, remember? We
miss the beauty shop. It was our hangout. The old men go to the
Dairy Queen for coffee. We went to the shop. Open it back up
for us “

“I don’t have a license,” Fancy argued.

“Don’t need one. We’ll put a quart jar on the table and give donations. You wash and roll. We can show you what to do past that.
Monday at ten. Wednesday at one. Friday at three. Work for you?”
Tandy asked.

“Please turn to page one-twelve, and we’ll sing together,” the
music director said from the podium.

“Well?” Tandy asked.

“Why not? I’ll see you at ten in the morning,” Fancy said.

Tandy looked down the row at her cronies and nodded. They
sang with smiles on their faces that morning.

Sophie and Kate arrived promptly at two o’clock that afternoon
and went straight to the kitchen. Fancy had Oreos arranged on a
plate and set a pitcher of sweet tea in the middle of the table.

Kate hugged Fancy before she sat down. “I can’t believe that
school didn’t give you the job after they did everything but promise it to you on a silver platter. I’m sorry, honey.”

“Me too,” Sophie said.

Fancy giggled.

“Was not being hired somehow funny?” Sophie asked.

“No, but this morning was,” she said, and she told the story of
being shoved into Theron’s Sunday school room and the bickering
that had followed.

“Ooh, sounds ominous,” Kate said.

“That black cat was definitely an omen. It’s brought me nothing
but bad luck from the time it darted out in front of me. My car still
smells like almonds. I have to face that abominable man every Sunday or let him win. And now I have to fix hair three days a
week for donations.”

“Fix hair? I thought you hated doing that when you were a kid.
If I remember right, it was what put the idea of teaching into your
head. You said you’d never grow up to cut and curl other women’s
hair,” Sophie said.

`And you said if you ever got away from mesquite trees and
Texas dust, you’d never come back to Baird to see your aunt again,”
Fancy pointed out.

“And I said I’d never be a waitress at the Amigos if I ever got
away from Breckenridge,” Kate joined right in. “Maybe we’ve all
three got lessons to learn.”

Fancy joined them at the table and poured herself a tall glass of
iced tea. “Never thought of it like that. I’ve been up to my ears in
a pity pool ever since I left church.”

“You only get fifteen minutes to whine, remember?” Kate said.

“And then you get on with your life. Momma always said that,
and I’m learning why,” Fancy said. “Okay, my minutes are over, so
tell me what’s going on with you two.”

“I got three shifts this week at the police station but made more
in tips at the Amigos than I did from the police department,” Kate
said. That afternoon she wore baggy sweatpants that had been
raggedly cut off just above her knees and a faded gray T-shirt.

“Aunt Maud’s been feeling poorly,” Sophie said. “I took her to
the doctor in Abilene on Wednesday. He wanted to put her in the
hospital for tests. She told him she didn’t have time for a vacation.
She’s got hay to be baled and a cattle sale to plan. Said she’d think
about it in the fall. Which reminds me, the sale is next week, and
afterward we have this big party. Band. Dancing. A thank-you to
all the rich cattlemen in this area as well as half of Texas, Oklahoma, and even one from Australia for buying cattle. Y’all are
both coming,” Sophie said. She slipped off her cowboy boots and
propped her feet on the extra kitchen chair. Her jeans were faded
and her chambray work shirt tied up at her waist.

“Lots of food?” Kate asked.

Sophie nodded.

“I’ll be there.”

“Dessert?” Fancy asked.

Sophie nodded again.

“Tell me the time and place.”

“Next Friday night at seven o’clock. The sale is Thursday night
and Friday morning. I’ll expect you both at six. It’s western. Boots,
jeans, and lots of glitter.”

Fancy moaned. “I don’t have boots or glitter.”

“Then go buy ‘em. You’ve got all week,” Sophie said. “Hey,
let’s go shopping in Abilene on Wednesday.”

“Can’t. I now fix hair on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.”

“Then Tuesday. I’ve got to be at the sale on Thursday.”

“I’m going too. I might not have enough glitter to impress that
Aussie, and I do love that accent,” Kate said.

“That’s settled, then. Now, what else happened this week? Anything wonderful or terrible?” Sophie asked.

“I saw Chris Miller,” Fancy said.

“And?” Sophie asked.

“And Momma was right. I called her and told her so”

“Is he still handsome?” Kate asked.

“He looks sixty, and I don’t know how many times he’s been
married. First there was Becky, then Debbie, and the wife now is
Tina. She seems nice enough, but she has to look at a tattoo on his
arm of Debbie’s name. Can you imagine snuggling up with him and
seeing another woman’s name? And he hit on me. He’s got a pregnant wife, a six-year-old son, and he thought I’d call him just because he told me to”

“Be thankful for what we were saved from,” Kate said.

“Not me. I didn’t get saved like you two,” Sophie said.

“Check the clock. She’s got fifteen minutes to whine, and then
she has to shut up” Fancy laughed.

The cookies were gone and the tea pitcher nearly empty at five
when they had to go home. Kate wanted to a sneak in a nap before a
graveyard shift at the police station. Sophie had to take Aunt Maud
to Sunday-night services at her church. Fancy had to visit Hattie.

They paraded out of the house together. Sophie drove away in
her red truck. Kate took off to the east in her white one, and Fancy
got into her little Camaro and headed south toward the nursing home. She gave thanks for her friends as she drove. At least they’d
made her laugh, and she needed something positive to sustain her
when she walked into the nursing home.

Hattie looked up when Fancy rapped on her door. Her expression changed from indifference to disgust immediately. “Why are
you still here? I told you to go home.”

Fancy drew up a chair beside her grandmother’s bed. “Granny,
why do you talk like that? I’m your only grandchild. Why do
you hate me?” She asked questions that had been worrying her
for most of her life but that she had been too afraid to put into
words.

Hattie glared at her for several minutes. “I’m eighty-seven years
old.”

“That doesn’t give you the right to be hateful,” Fancy said.

Hattie’s stare softened a little but not much. “I’ve got every right
to be any way I want to be “

“And what gives you that right?”

“You want to know? You really want to know?” she asked,
leaning forward, her eyes glistening with fury. “I hate your mother.
She ruined my life, twice, and I can be hateful if I want to be”

She was a wizened little woman with thick gray hair she wore
short and combed back in waves, a style of the fifties. Her brown
eyes held absolutely no warmth, her face was a bed of wrinkles,
and her hands were dry from more than fifty years of hot water,
hair dye, and permanents.

“Why would you hate Momma? She’s been nothing but good to
you. She just wants you to love her like a daughter. A mother
should love her child.” Fancy figured if she was in trouble for a
penny, she might as well be in real trouble for a dollar.

Hattie shot her a look that told her where she thought Fancy
oughtta go, then clamped her mouth shut. After a few seconds
she sighed. “Might as well get it over with, I suppose. Hid it all
these years, but like the Good Book says, evil will surface.”

“Momma is not evil,” Fancy protested.

“Yes, she is, and so are you. Draw that chair up closer, because
I’m only going to tell this once, Fancy Lynn. I hated that name
when you were born and don’t like it any better today. She should have given you a real name, not a play one, but then, she was only
sixteen.”

Fancy waited. “Why was that such a horrible thing?”

“Be quiet. I’m going to talk, and you’re going to listen. If you
say one word, I’ll stop talking. If I stop for a breath, you wait. Is
that understood?”

Fancy nodded.

“I was seventeen when I married your grandpa. He was twentysix, and folks thought we weren’t a good match. But I loved him,
and he loved me. At first I expected to have kids, but when I didn’t,
I was relieved. We settled down together, and we were happy, just
the two of us, and I was glad there wasn’t no kids. When I was
forty, I decided I wanted to fix hair. I’d done it on the side for a few
years, giving my friends home permanents and cutting their hair.
Orville had some money saved up, and he let me get the schooling
and license to put in a shop.”