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“You actually tell people that story?”
I nodded. “But when I tell it, Walter is six-foot-three and a trained cage fighter.”
Andrea chuckled.
I grinned slyly. “Dick has been looking for you.”
She grumbled. “He doesn’t know the meaning of the word ‘restraining order,’ does he?”
“Technically, that’s two words.” I giggled. “Dick and Andrea sitting in a tree, B-I-T-I-N-G—ow!” I whined as she punched my shoulder. “You’re just mad because secretly, underneath that sophisticated exterior, you’re hot for Dickie.”
“I am not hot for Dickie,” Andrea spat.
“Me and my bruised shoulder say thou dost protest too much,” I said dryly.
“He’s practically stalking me. He just won’t let it go. He’s just being … he’s being a jackass with a flaky jackass crust and a delicious jackass filling.”
“So he’s jackass pie?” I asked, making my “ew” face.
“There’s no reason to be crass,” Andrea mewed primly.
“You know, you’re starting to talk like me. I find this more than a little troubling. Maybe we should spend less time together.”>By the time he called, “Jane!” in a warning tone, I had already grabbed Mama from a gaggle of tutting church ladies and dragged her into an alcove. “Lyme disease, Mama? Really?”
“What?” Mama asked, the picture of innocence.
“You told the uncles I have Lyme disease!”
“I told them you’d had some health issues,” she spluttered. “They just assumed it was Lyme disease.”
“No one assumes you have Lyme disease,” I whispered. “How do you just assume Lyme disease? I know this hasn’t been easy for you, Mama. I know you’re embarrassed that I’m different. I know it took you months to work up the nerve to be around me without being afraid or ashamed.”
“I’m not ashamed of you,” Mama insisted. “It’s just that everyone makes these assumptions about me and your daddy. I know it’s not true, but it’s so difficult knowing that people are looking at me and judging and whispering.”
“But it’s not even like this makes me the most scandalous member of the family. I’m bothered by the fact that Junie manages to pick up singles without using her hands while she performs at the Booby Hatch. But do I say anything? No.”
It was at that moment that I realized that we were standing next to a podium. A podium with a mic on it. A mic that was on.
Crap.
We turned to find most of the bereaved watching us, horrified. And my cousin Junie didn’t look thrilled with me, either.
5
Hostility toward human males marrying into were clans is to be expected and taken seriously. Potential sons-in-law may want to carry wolfsbane or silver items in their pockets. Weres find both substances to be extremely irritating.
—Mating Rituals and Love Customs of the Were
Despite Bob’s being laid to rest on a cloudy day, I elected not to go to his burial. I thought it might build strange expectations for Mama. Aunt Jettie, who relished her role as my go-to daytime spy, reported that Bob’s burial was much more entertaining than his visitation.
Grandma Ruthie had gone from grieving widow to seeing herself as some sort of postmodern, postmenopausal Juliet. She wore an even bigger veiled hat to the cemetery and a black crepe dress with a full, flowing skirt and trailing sleeves. I’m thinking she bought it from the Gone with the Wind Widows Collection. She wailed and screeched her way through the eulogy, screamed, “Why, Lord? Why?” through the final blessing, and tried to snatch Bob’s service flag away from his son when it was presented by the honor guard. Also, she demanded front-row center seats for her and her male companion, Wilbur.
That’s right. My grandma brought a date to her fiancé’s burial. She’s all class, that lady. Apparently, she’d met Wilbur at Whitlow’s as he was heading into an old Army buddy’s visitation. Sparks flew, time stood still, and Grandma Ruthie snagged another victim. On the upside, I think Wilbur’s presence may have been the only thing that kept her from flinging herself into the grave on top of the casket.
But somehow, my outing cousin Junie as a day-shift dancer at the Booby Hatch made me an embarrassment to the family. At the burial, Grandma had declared that she wouldn’t speak to me until I’d apologized to Junie. I would think this odd considering that Junie was a cousin on my dad’s side of the family and Ruthie was my maternal grandmother. But Grandma Ruthie liked ninety-nine percent of the general population better than me, so why not cousins on the other side of the family?
During my shift that night, Aunt Jettie came into the shop to give me all of the details of the cemetery theatrics. She was in the middle of reenacting this declaration when a little woman in a double-knit pant suit came into the shop to claim a phone order. Aunt Jettie made herself scarce.
On the phone, Esther Barnes’s voice had sounded deep and accented. In person, she was squat, with dyed jet-black hair, deep wrinkles at the edges of her eyes, and a smoky topaz cocktail ring the size of a door knocker. Her voice was reedy and thin as she asked whether I had the “Barnes order” ready yet. I pulled her reserved copies of Mind over Matter: Maintaining Your Psychic Ability and The Search for the Inner Id from under the counter and rang them up.
