Whistlin' Dixie in a Nor'easter Page 3

  Alice was bobbing up and down in her seat like a dang Mexican jumping bean. “I can’t stand it anymore, Leelee. What’s this all about? Mary Jule and I were on our cell phones the whole way from home to the club trying to figure it out.”

  “You’re the one dying to figure it out, Alice, I’m not having a cow to know like you are,” Mary Jule said. Her blond bobbed hairdo had a little flip in the back.

  “Calm down, everyone. I hate to disappoint.” I leaned in closer to them. “But I have no gossip. Y’all might as well prepare yourselves. This news is about me.”

  Now all three of them were wide-eyed.

  I searched for a good way to break it to them, but nothing would come out.

  “Yeeeess . . . ,” Alice said, and swept her hand as if to say, out with it.

  After another long pause I finally let the words flow. “Baker . . . wants to move . . . to Vermont!” I watched all three of them gasp at the same time. “To buy an inn.”

  “AAAAHHHHH!” Alice squealed loudly, causing the next table of women to look over at us. “Vermont! Where in the hell is that, anyway?” In one motion, she tossed her long, freshly weaved blond hair behind her shoulder and slid a Virginia Slims regular out of its pack.

  “That’s just what I asked him,” I said. Then I relayed the whole story, beginning with Baker’s unusually good mood, the peach daiquiris, the North American Inns magazine ad, and finally the breakfast in bed bit.

  Virginia was silent, but her furrowed brow let me know she was giving the situation serious thought.

  “Just tell him you’re not goin’.” This was Alice’s simple answer to my complex dilemma. “Why didn’t you tell him to go on without you? He’s the one who’s so unhappy, not you.”

  “You know I could never let him do that.” I threw my head back and sighed.

  “Why not? If Richard ever came home with a lamebrain idea like that I’d tell him to have fun, call us every week, and be sure to set up a direct deposit account for his paycheck at First Tennessee Bank. And that”—she paused for effect and flipped her French-manicured hand in the air—“would be the end of that.”

  “I’ve got it!” Virginia said, like she had solved the problem. “I’ll go home and tell John, who can mention it to his father, and once he does that, I’m sure his father will be happy to call Mr. Satterfield.” (John’s father and Baker’s father had been tailgating near one another at Neyland Stadium in Knoxville for years.) “We’ll just nip this crazy idea in the bud before he has the chance to take it one bit further.” She tore open a melba toast and smeared it with butter.

  “No, Virgy. Thanks, but . . . I couldn’t let you do that. I’d feel like I was betraying Baker.”

  “Betraying Baker? You would not. But have it your way; it was just a suggestion.” The light blue V-neck tee she was wearing looked so pretty next to her brunette hair. Virginia’s always hated her figure because of a few extra pounds, but we all think she’s beautiful.

  “This is just wrong. I’m surprised at Baker,” Mary Jule said. “He has never, to my knowledge anyway, ever let on to Al that he’s unhappy. And Al tells me everything.”

  “You’re in a mess,” Alice blurted out before I could respond to Mary Jule. “All I can say is thank God it’s not me. I wouldn’t move up north for all the tea in China.”

  “Why not?” I asked, now strangely taking Baker’s side. “Maybe you would if you could see how beautiful it is. Baker showed me the pictures last night, and I have to admit it’s perfectly gorgeous up there.”

  “So is Jamaica, but you’d never move there, would you?” Virginia wanted to know.

  “No, I mean probably not,” I said.

  “Then why on earth would you consider moving to Vermont?” Alice looked over at the other two for backup. Virginia raised her eyebrows and Mary Jule shrugged her shoulders.

  I paused a moment before answering her, honestly giving her question serious thought. “I guess to make Ba—”

  “Baker happy,” Virginia interrupted, finishing the sentence for me. “Believe me, you do that enough. Don’t you see that? Think back to your wedding. You didn’t want to get married in the Catholic church. You wanted to get married at Grace St. Luke’s. But you did it anyway, because Baker wanted you to.” She threw her arms up in the air and sat back in her chair. I could tell she was getting riled up at Baker. It had happened many times over the years.

  “That was actually Mr. and Mrs. Satterfield who insisted on that,” I told her. “You know how Catholics are about marriage. I don’t think Baker really cared all that much.”

  “But you still did what he wanted. How about your honeymoon? Would you call a trip to Montreal to see some car race a honeymoon? Not to mention the long layover in New York with just enough time to make it to a Yankees game. I still don’t know why you didn’t tell him to drop you off at Saks.” Virginia ripped open another melba toast and glanced around for the waiter.

  “It was my honeymoon. I didn’t want to be away from him. And for y’all’s information Montreal is a very romantic city. There’s a whole lot more going on there than just that car race. We stayed at a fabulous hotel, went to great restaurants. Baker even shopped with me some. I had a good time,” I said, studying each of their faces for any sign of support.

  Obviously they were in unanimous agreement with Virginia.

  “All right. I get the message. Y’all think I’m crazy. But try to put yourselves in my place for a minute.” I took a long sip of the Coke my friends had already ordered for me.

  Mary Jule jumped to my rescue. “I don’t know, Leelee, it’s a tough call, but if Al really wanted to move as much as it sounds like Baker does, I think I’d have to go. I’d support him.” She glanced at the other two before folding her arms in front of her.

  “Really?” I was thrilled to finally have a backer.

  “Yeah, I think I would.” Her head nodded up and down nervously.

  “Now you’ve both lost your minds,” Alice said, disgusted with the two of us. She turned to Mary Jule. “You mean to tell me if Al came home from work one night and announced that he wanted you and the children to up and move to Vermont you’d go—just like that? No problem?”

  “Well, I’d think about it first, just like Leelee’s doing.”

  “Come on, Mary Jule, you would not,” Alice told her.

  Mary Jule looked back at me with a look that seemed to apologize in advance for what she was about to say. “He probably would never ask me to do it, so it’s not something I’d have to worry about.” Once she saw the disappointment on my face she tried to recover. “But I suppose I’d go if he asked me.”

  Alice chimed in again. “That’s just it, you know he’d never do it, so it’s easy for you to say you’d go.”

  “Well . . . that’s true. Leelee, I guess it is hard for me to put myself in your shoes. Alice is right. Al would never leave Memphis, nor the Memphis Country Club, if his life depended on it.”

  All at once I felt like they had driven me out to a secluded pasture and left me to find my way back alone. “I know it’s hard for y’all to imagine ever moving away. Believe me, it’s blowing my mind, too. But y’all know how I am. It’s hard for me to say no to anybody—especially Baker.”

  “All I can say is I tried to get you to marry Michael Barkley in college,” Virginia said, and turned to the group. “But Fiery was waiting on someone who never gave her the time of day.” (Virginia nicknamed me Fiery way back in seventh grade. It was the red in my hair.)

  “Virginia Murphey, Baker did so give me the time of day . . . once we got home from Ole Miss.”

  “I’m not trying to be mean. It’s just that I feel like Baker always gets everything on his terms. Baker knows you’ll move to Vermont. You’ve spent a lifetime catering to his every whim.”

  “And now . . . he’s making me mad,” Alice interrupted Virginia and hit the table with her palm. “It’s not his money he’s spending.”

  Mary Jule winced. Alice’s the only o
ne who could get away with a statement like that.

  “My problem is,” I said, ignoring Alice’s comment, “I don’t know how I’ll ever tell him no.”

  “Here, I’ll help you.” Virginia was all too happy to oblige. “Open your mouth and press your tongue to the roof of your mouth and say nnnnooooo.”

  “Nnnooo,” I repeated. “Very funny.”

  “I’m serious. Now go home and practice it on Baker,” Virginia said.

  “Just don’t tell him we told you to,” added a worried Mary Jule.

  “As if he won’t figure it out,” said Virginia. “Whenever she says no to him for anything, he knows right where she’s getting her fuel. Can we order now?”

  Alice raised her arm and motioned for the waiter’s attention.

  When we were leaving the club after lunch, Virginia lagged behind and pulled me into the bathroom. “We were hard on you, weren’t we?”

  I nodded.

  “You know we’ll all support you in whatever decision you make. But I do wish you’d at least try and tell him no. I’d miss you so much. I can’t imagine what it would be like without you here.”

  “Me neither.” We stood there for a long time hugging each other.

  I placed my hand on the doorknob and turned back around to face my dearest friend. “Do me a favor?”

  She nodded.

  “Say a prayer for me?”

  Virginia stood a moment, comforting me with her eyes. “You’re gonna need it, friend. You’re really gonna need it,” she said, and we both turned around to leave.

  Chapter Three

  “Wha’d you tell him?” Virginia was on the other end of the line, dying to get the scoop, when I answered the phone at exactly 8:05 the next morning. She knew Baker was always gone by eight o’clock. “I can’t wait another second. What happened last night?”

  There was no point in prolonging the inevitable. “I told him I’d go up to the inn. For a visit.”

  “You what!”

  “It’s just a visit. I never said I’d move.”

  “What happened to ‘no’? Couldn’t get it out?”

  “Couldn’t get it out.”

  “Fiery, you’re as good as gone. Dear God, I can’t picture you as a Yankee.”

  “You can stop trying to picture it, Virginia, because I’ll never be one,” I told her.

  “You will be if you move up to the North with them.” I heard her hold out the phone and fall into hysterics. “I was just thinking about you,” she said, barely able to catch her breath, “coming home for your first visit and talking like Fran Whatever-her-name-is on that obnoxious babysitting show.”

  “The Nanny? Yeah, right.”

  “That’s it, The Nanny. I can just hear you now, ‘Hieee you guyeeez.’ ” Her nasal intonations sounded right on.

  “Real funny. Oh, hold on a minute, would you? My phone is beeping.” When I clicked over to catch the incoming call, it was Baker. He must have called me the second he put down his briefcase.

  “Hey,” he whispered. “Is it there yet?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Okay, just checking. Call me right when it comes.”

  “I told you I would, now relax.” I said good-bye and clicked back over to Virginia. “He’s about to jump out of his skin.”

  “About what?”

  “This buyer’s prospectus that’s coming from Vermont. Some real estate agent is supposedly FedExing information on the property to us this morning. Baker’s coming home for lunch to look at it so he wants me to call him as soon as it arrives.”

  “He wasted no time, did he?”

  “Not really.”

  “Gotta go fix breakfast. Bye, Fran,” Virginia teased, and hung up.

  On time, Baker’s Eddie Bauer Explorer zipped up the driveway. I watched him through the kitchen window as he sprung out of his car and hurried inside.

  “Leelee,” he called, the minute the door swung open.

  “It’s in the living room,” I said, reading his mind. The FedEx man had rung my doorbell at exactly 9:00 A.M., with a bulging envelope addressed to MR. AND MRS. BAKER SATTERFIELD.

  Baker dove into the living room, and didn’t resurface for a half hour. Every few minutes, though, I could hear little gushes of delight spewing from his lagoon of euphoria. “Wow, would you look at this place—it’s even got a slate roof!” And, “Fifteen minutes from two ski resorts—NO WAY!” When he finally did decide to pop back up for air, I heard him calling, “Leelee, come here. Tell me what you think about it.”

  I took my time drying my hands on a dishcloth and then moseyed off to join him. “It’s attractive,” I said, walking up next to the chair where he was sitting, hovering over the inn brochures.

  “Is that all?” he said, looking up now. “All you can say is ‘it’s attractive’? This house looks like it belongs on the cover of Country Living! It even has a slate roof. There’s an antique barn, and twenty acres of land. And look, here’s the most incredible part. Did you see this?” He was swiftly pointing his finger up and down on the picture. “This aerial view of the property shows a river running right through the middle of town, within walking distance of the inn!”

  All of a sudden, Baker sprung up from his seat, raised his right arm, and started casting with his imaginary fly rod.

  “Baker,” I said, trying to make eye contact with him between casts, “I’m trying to be excited about this, really I am. But this whole thing has taken me completely by surprise. It’s happening too fast. I mean, we have a beautiful home right here, don’t you think?”

  He didn’t answer me.

  “Baker, Baker,” I cried, “are you listening to me?”

  Finally he stopped fishing and sat back down in the chair. “You know I think this house is beautiful. You’ve done an incredible job with it. But you could make any old house look like this one. Wouldn’t you love to do it again?”

  “I don’t know. It takes forever for the fabrics to come in and then longer for the curtains to be made. The painters never show up when they say they will. I’ve just now started enjoying this house.”

  “I know you love it, honey, but you could love any house. You never know until you try. Let’s just take a trip up to Vermont and take it all in.” He threw his line in again off the right side of the chair.

  “I already told you I would.”

  “I know, I’m just trying to get you to be excited, that’s all.”

  “What would make me excited is that pair of diamond earrings you’ve been promising me.” I pulled my hair back into a ponytail. “See? Wouldn’t my ears look much nicer with shiny diamond studs?” I batted my eyes and posed.

  He squinted his eyes and studied my ears. “I just might be able to arrange something.” Then he arched his back over the left arm of the chair, pretending he was fighting the world-record lunker, and never gave up until he reeled the sucker in.

  Baker went back to work after lunch, pouting a little because I wasn’t doing cheerleading jumps around the house over the prospect of us buying an inn, with a slate roof, in a foreign corner of America.

  Virginia and her three stopped by around 3:00 P.M. It was a scorching, Memphis-in-July day, so we each grabbed a few little Cokes, the green-bottled kind, from my fridge and headed out to the porch. All five children barreled out behind us in hopes of being the first one to ride on Sarah’s Little Tikes train.

  Virginia and I sat down on the swing together, and tilted our heads back so we could feel the wind on our faces from the high speed of the ceiling fan. I shut my eyes while she leafed through Ed Baldwin’s précis of the ideal life in Vermont.

  “It is pretty. I have to admit that,” she said, when she was finished reading. She closed the packet and slipped it between the cushion and the arm of the swing. “He’s really going ahead with this, huh?”

  I exhaled an exasperated sigh. “I guess so.” The loose hair around my face swirled around from the draft of the fan.

  “What’s gotten into him?” Vi
rginia reached around and pulled her thick, shoulder-length dark hair into a ponytail, twisted it around, and tried to get it to stay in a bun.

  “Beats me. He’s talked about moving and doing something different. But I’ve never taken him seriously. He’s never gone this far. Can you believe he’d even want to get that far away from UT football?”

  “I’ve been thinking about it and yes, I can believe it. His whole identity is UT football. Now that that’s over—and he’s no longer a star—he’s dying to get out of town. He knows he can’t ride that wave forever.”

  I paused before answering. “I see what you’re saying, but to move all that way—just to feel good about himself?” Bless Baker’s heart. He was so proud of his football prowess.

  The ringing of the telephone interrupted us and I reached down to grab my cordless, which was on the floor underneath me. A stranger’s voice was on the other end of the line.

  “Leelee?”

  “Yes.”

  “Ed Baldwin calling from Vermont.”

  How does he already know my name? “Oh, hi, how are you?” I looked over at Virginia, pointed to the phone, and then over to the prospectus beside her.

  “Fieeene,” he said, sooo Yankeeish. “Just fieeene. I wanted to make sure you had gotten the material I sent you and Baker on the Vermont Haus Inn.”

  “Mmmhmm,” I answered. “Yes, we did.” I glanced over at Virginia and rolled my eyes.

  “Good. Well then, when will you be arriving in Vermont to tour the property? I’ll make your arrangements on this end.”

  He caught me totally off guard. “I haven’t really thought that far ahead, Mr. Baldwin. We only received it a few hours ago.”

  “Actually, the weekend of August fourth would work well for me. Do you guys have any prior commitments for that weekend?”