The Secret to Hummingbird Cake (9 page)

The Farm was only fifteen minutes out of Bon Dieu Falls, but when I was here, it felt like a different and all-inclusive world. I liked being here. I liked lazing in the big wicker
swing on the massive porch that wrapped around the house. I liked listening to the hired hands tell Jack about their day. I liked helping Mamie in the kitchen, although I am pretty sure Mamie didn't like it too much. I was pretty useless in a kitchen situation. She'd asked me to peel potatoes for her and I did. After I gave her the bowl, she said, “Humph”—or something like it—and, “Now peel your peelings.” But she did let me lick the spoons every now and then if she was baking.

Mamie had been with the Whitfields since they'd moved in and even lived on the Farm in a little house Poppa Jack had built for her. She'd known Mrs. Diane when they were both still in Tennessee, and from what I could gather, she'd run away from an abusive relationship. Nobody ever talked about that too much, not even Jack. I don't think he knew much more than I did, anyway. All I knew was she wasn't interested in a man and she loved this family like it was her own. Jack thought she hung the moon and the stars.

I loved it here, but I missed Laine and Ella Rae. I talked and texted with them every day, and I had repeatedly asked Laine to come out to the Farm for supper, but she was always too busy. She lived for that job. I guessed all teachers must. You would have to for the things you had to put up with. I knew I wouldn't last fifteen minutes. The first time one of those kids popped off at me, I'd have gone to jail. But Laine always defended them, saying you never knew what things were like inside their homes, or they were just trying to find their way, or they were sometimes really good kids that got dealt a bad hand. Laine's mother, Jeannette Landry, had just
retired from the teaching profession recently, and I knew she'd been the same kind of educator Laine was. That apple sure hadn't fallen far from the tree.

I was lounging in the wicker swing when Ella Rae called. “Somebody's going to die tonight,” she said. “I'm either going to smother that woman with a pillow or slit my own wrists.”

I couldn't help laughing. “What's your mother done now?” I said.

“What hasn't she done? She's after me all the time. Last night, out of sheer self-defense, I washed down one of those p.m. sleep aids with a shot of whiskey. I woke up this morning being sprayed in the face with a plant mister.”

“And you're supposed to stay with her for six weeks?”

“Yeah, but I don't see how that's happening.” Ella Rae paused. “I don't know, Carrigan. I suspect I'm not cut out to be a nurse.”

I laughed so hard my sides ached. Ella Rae had many good qualities and I loved her down in my soul, but a nurse she was not. In fact, I think I'd prefer the angel of death to Ella Rae.

I missed my friends. But I really did love being here. It was peaceful and serene, two things that weren't usually high on my priority list, but I was learning to embrace them both. Something about this place drew me closer to Jack, though, and I had to be really careful about that. This was, after all, where it had all started. Right here at the Whitfields' Crawfish Boil when I was sixteen years old.

The memory came back to me on a wave of passion and sadness.

I knew who he was, of course. Everybody did. But I'd never actually talked to him. He was twenty-six years old, ancient by my standards. He was good-looking and charming and, trust me, he didn't disappoint. But I was ready and running on all eight cylinders that night. When I saw him walking in our direction, I told Ella Rae and Laine, “Let me handle this,” and they did. Mainly because they had drool running down their chins.

He leaned up against the tree we were sitting under. “I believe I have stumbled upon two of the best softball players in the state and the newly elected president of the Louisiana Beta Club. Congratulations on the State Championship, ladies, and on your election, Miss Landry.”

Laine and Ella Rae wiggled around like praised puppies and honestly, I was pretty shell-shocked myself. This man was exceptionally handsome up close and in person. Those blue eyes alone were enough to make a girl stupid. Thankfully, I recovered quickly enough to say, “Why, Mr. Whitfield, you sure have done your homework.”

“You can call me Jack, darlin'.”

“Oh, it's sweet of you to offer,” I said, “but my daddy taught me to respect my elders.”

He chuckled and crossed his arms. “A blonde, a brunette, and a redhead to boot? How lucky can a country boy get?” All that and dimples too. I thought Ella Rae and Laine were going to melt into a puddle. I wasn't feeling too stable either, and
my heart was pounding. But I wasn't going to fall at his feet like everybody else seemed to. Even if I had to jump in a cow trough to cool myself off.

“A country boy?” I asked, “You've been off to college in Baton Rouge and traveled all over the place. You still consider yourself a country boy?”

“Oh, I consider myself many things, darlin'.” He winked. “Sorta like a Jack-of-all-trades.”

Ella Rae and Laine giggled like they were ten years old at their big sister's slumber party.

“Do you have any idea how cheesy that was?” I said.

“Was it now?”

I could see Lexi Carter standing on the balcony of the house watching this little scene with a scowl on her face. I turned to Jack and gestured with my eyes. “While we all appreciate this oh-so-original banter, I don't think your girlfriend is loving it.”

“Hmm . . .,” he said. But he didn't bother turning around. Instead, he leaned toward me until his face was inches from mine. If he'd gotten any closer, he would've been able to hear my heart pounding. “Tell me something, Miss Carrigan Suzanne French. Are you always this sweet?”

I sucked in my breath, willing my voice to stay even. How did he know my entire name? And besides that . . . when he used it, I wanted to wiggle like a puppy. But I found my self-control and swung for the fence. “Don't that just beat all?” I said. “I was sweet yesterday and you missed it.”

He pulled away from me and smiled. “Just my luck,” he said. “You girls staying around awhile?”

“Probably not,” I said.

“Where you headed later?” he asked.

I smiled the smile I reserved for my daddy when I really wanted something before I answered. “You know, I think we're headed over to the National Federation of None of Your Business. By the way, we're children. You could get arrested for this.”

He laughed in earnest, then leaned in close to me again and smiled just enough that I saw those dimples up close. “Ms. French,” he said, “I am acutely aware of just how dangerous it is for me to be around you.”

There went my heart again. “We sure appreciate your hospitality,” I said. “But I'm afraid we need to run now. Good night, Mr. Whitfield.”

Mercifully, the zombie girls followed me as I walked away. It was
killing
me not to turn around to see if he was still looking, but I knew it would ruin our exit. However, I could hear his quiet laughter behind us, and that pleased me, indeed.

Before I had this conversation with Jack, I hadn't really cared if he paid much attention to me or not. I had other stuff going on—sports to play and general fun to be had. At sixteen, I was living for college and an escape from the suffocating confines of Bon Dieu Falls, Louisiana. I wasn't interested in a relationship. I had always assumed I would fall in love with some baseball player at LSU and we would produce little athletes and live happily ever after.

Still, I could understand why women were so captivated by Jack, especially after the encounter at the Crawfish Boil. A girl
would have to be dead not to appreciate that. Something about him made me deliciously uneasy. The attraction made no sense whatsoever, but that's what made the feeling so intense.

And it wasn't just women who were fascinated by him. Men appreciated him too. He was extremely attractive, extremely wealthy, and oblivious to either of those facts. He was just as at home at a softball game in Bon Dieu Falls as he was at the Governor's Mansion in Baton Rouge. If the hands on the Farm were fixing fence, he wasn't in the truck watching. He and Poppa Jack were fixing fence with them. He could drink beer with the good ole boys on Saturday night, then move mountains in the State Legislature come Monday morning. He was perfect.

Only nobody is perfect.

So I became obsessed with finding the chink in his armor. And I started looking for it. For months I paid closer attention when he was around. I had to be as inconspicuous as I could, though, lest he was watching me watch him. It was exhausting, but bear in mind, I was seventeen and on a mission. You can accomplish quite a bit when you are young and determined. Then one night, near the end of summer, I thought I had discovered the flaw that would keep him from perfection. What I had actually done, though, was seal my fate with the man.

There was a boat landing on Red River where everybody from age sixteen to thirty congregated if there was nothing else going on in town. (After age thirty, we talked about you if you were still loitering at the landing, and you were immediately filed under “Creepy” if you showed up.) We were
all on friendly terms with the cops, and they would usually turn a blind eye if we were hanging around in parking lots talking and listening to music and drinking a little beer. But sometimes, if there was a new cop in town, we fled to the boat landing for fear he'd try to flex his muscles. Besides, we weren't troublemakers, just kids and young adults having a get-together. Bon Dieu Falls wasn't exactly a mecca in the entertainment department. We had to make our own fun instead of buying it. The landing was right on the parish line, and the war had waged for years about which police department had the responsibility of patrolling it. So nobody did. It was a perfect gathering place.

There were probably forty or fifty people there that night, and there was a pretty good party going on. We never got too rowdy, just built a bonfire, listened to music, and generally escaped our parents. The beer flowed freely, but another thing about small towns is you know who will turn idiot when the tap is turned on. And you know how far they will go.

For instance, we all knew that Junior Morris was going to strip at some point that night. He was about one hundred pounds overweight, as strong as a bull, and virtually unstoppable when he began whooping and unbuckling his overalls. And when he started the striptease, he'd be about ten minutes away from passing out. His buddies would throw a blanket over him, load him in the back of his pickup, and drive him home. That's about as out of hand as it ever got. And nobody was impressed with Junior's striptease, but that never stopped him from performing it.

On this particular night, I knew everybody, except for a couple of guys who'd driven up on Harley Davidsons. We all eyed them, but they were talking to Eddie Rivers and Johnny Mac, two boys we went to school with, so they seemed harmless, and the party continued. The night was young and Junior still had his clothes on. I was relaxing in the front seat of Tommy's truck with Laine, listening to an Eagles CD.

Sometime around nine, I saw Jack and Lexi Carter drive up in his pickup. Lots of people came down here regularly, but I'd only seen Jack here once, looking for a young guy who worked for him. I sat up immediately to get a better view.

I watched Lexi get out, making an unpleasant face and wiping at a speck of dirt on shorts that looked like white panties. Good Lord. Was I jealous? At the time, I knew very little about Lexi Carter, just that she had gone to high school at Grayson, our parish rival, she was a hygienist for some dentist in Alexandria, and she dated Jack Whitfield III.

She and Jack started talking to a group of people near where they'd parked. I hopped out of the truck and leaned up against Hunter Tillman's tailgate and observed from afar. Lexi kept her hand on Jack's arm even when she was talking to somebody else, which I found childish and stupid. Jack didn't seem to notice it much at first, but when he did, he pulled away from her, which I found pleasant and encouraging.

“What are you staring at?” Ella Rae said.

“Nothing.” I looked away from Jack and Lexi.

“Bull,” Laine said from inside the truck. “She's staring at Jack Whitfield.”

“I am not!” I said. “I'm just bored, that's all.”

Laine continued flipping through radio stations. “Whatever.”

“Y'all wanna go climb the fire tower?” Tommy said.

Laine groaned. “Please, not again.”

“That's only fun the first fifty times,” I said.

“Y'all wanna get drunk and climb the fire tower?” Ella Rae said.

“You're already drunk,” Laine said, “and besides, Carri doesn't want to leave here 'cause she's enjoying the view too much.”

I made a face. “I'm not the one that peed my pants the last time he talked to us.”