Spare Change (Wyattsville #1)(27)

“I thought you were gone.”

“Gone? I’m not even half-finished.” She reached into the basket and hauled out an orange. “Eat this,” she said, pushing the fruit into Olivia’s hand. Without another word Clara marched herself into the kitchen and set about making a chicken casserole. “It’s a good thing I got here when I did,” she sighed, “otherwise you never know…”

“Nonsense; feeling down about Charlie’s death is the only thing wrong with me.”

“Oh really? Do you think a person’s skin is supposed to be grey? You think eyes are supposed to be red as a beefsteak?”

Olivia had to admit she’d been unaware such was the case; she then settled in alongside of Clara and lent a hand to the peeling of onions. By the time the casserole was ready to take from the oven, she’d gone through the full tale of Charlie’s death, including the part about the unlucky opal.

“You poor thing,” Clara sighed sympathetically; then she dished up two plates of chicken, and set them on the table. She slid into the chair opposite Olivia and leaned forward, waiting to hear the rest of the story.

“There I was,” Olivia said when she got to the part about the convertible breaking down, “stranded by the side of the road, miles from civilization, no way to get home…”

“You did the right thing, honey. Getting yourself a good serviceable car is exactly what Charlie would have wanted you to do!”

Strangely enough, sitting there and talking openly as she was, Olivia started to feel a bit lighter—not quite as floaty as she’d felt from Canasta’s okra soup, but close. “Is there some sort of secret ingredient in this casserole?” she asked.

“Heavy cream,” Clara answered and shoveled a forkful into her mouth.

When Clara left what she now considered Olivia’s apartment, she went directly to Maggie Cooper’s and told Maggie they’d been all wrong about Olivia. “Why, the woman is devastated!” she said. “We owe it to poor Charlie to take care of his wife!”

Next Clara rapped on Henry Myerson’s door and gave him the same message. She then stopped off at Barbara Jean Conklin’s, Fred Magenheimer’s, Tillie Rae’s, and Susan Latimer’s, setting everyone straight as to what they should and shouldn’t do about the widow Olivia Doyle.

Before noon of the next day, Olivia had received eight condolence calls, six casseroles, three fruit baskets, and a spray of red gladiolas so large the delivery man had to turn sideways to squeeze through the apartment door. She’d also been invited to a Fuller Brush party, a gin-rummy luncheon and Friday night Bingo. When Olivia suggested she was not yet up to socializing, Gertrude Plumber turned a deaf ear and rambled on about how the group desperately needed someone to co-host the monthly pot luck dinner. “We can’t possibly ask Louise to do it again,” she told Olivia, “…so, you’ve simply got to say yes.”

Although nothing could replace the sweetness of Charlie’s kisses, the sudden onslaught of friends and neighbors helped to brighten Olivia’s days. Her skin gradually regained its color and the redness left her eyes. Every once in a while, mostly when she was with Clara who soon became her closest friend, Olivia would feel a strange tugging at the corners of her mouth and before there was time to wonder what was happening, she’d find her face crinkled into a smile.





Ethan Allen Doyle





People think a kid’s got no brains, but I was smarter than Mama; leastwise I knew not to go sassing when Daddy was on the warpath. Mama, she didn’t care. She’d sass anyway—go shit in your hat, she’d tell him, even when she knew it meant a punch in the face. Seems she would’ve learned, but no sir, not Mama!


Daddy never even thought twice about punching people—but then he was mean enough to shoot the eye out of a bird for singing the wrong song. I ain’t one bit like my Daddy. He used to say I got Mama’s foul mouth and sneaky ways, but Mama said what I got was her love of living. I liked when she said that.

Me and Mama both knew Daddy would throw a shit-fit about us going to New York; but seeing as how she could unruffle his feathers anytime she’d a mind to, I figured she’d smooth things over when we got back home. I sure as hell never figured the fighting to get bad as it did.

Daddy should’ve just let Mama have her fling, then she’d of been done with it and we’d of come home—‘course I was wishing we’d see a real live Yankee game before we did. Now, that Yankee game’s gone to hell, along with everything else.





Truth and Consequence

It was one thing to hate your daddy so much that you sometimes wished him dead, but quite another to see his head split open like a rotted pumpkin. Ethan Allen huddled beneath the wisteria, afraid to move, trying with all his might to twist his brain around to believing that any minute Susanna and Benjamin would get up and stumble to the bedroom together. There had been plenty of fights before and nobody ever ended up dead—but then Scooter Cobb, a mountain of a man with fists the size of ham hocks, had never before gotten involved. Much as Ethan wanted to go see about his mama, he couldn’t force himself to leave his hiding place. When he tried to stand his knees buckled under; when he tried to crawl his arms stayed locked in place, and if he even thought about crying out for help his heart took to jumping around as if it would explode. There was no telling what would happen if Scooter came back.