Queen Bee (Lowcountry Tales #12)(13)

“You’ll be reporting to Andrea Blatt. She’s been here forever,” Barbara Hagerty from Human Resources said. “I hope you like decorating cakes. We sell a lot of birthday cakes.”

“Who doesn’t like decorating cakes?” I said, knowing I’d never decorated a cake with anything other than canned frosting and press-on candies that you had to peel off a piece of cardboard that was so stiff that it cracked the decorations. I was so excited, you’d have thought they just made me a network anchor on the six o’clock national news. And I was excited to take a shot at something creative.

“Great! Can you come in tomorrow?” she said.

“Sure! Why not?” I said. “And Barbara?”

“Yes?”

“Thanks,” I said.

“Let’s see if you’re still grateful in six weeks!” She laughed and stood, indicating the interview was over.

“I’m going to go and buy supper now,” I said and left her office to forage.

In the produce aisle I was filling a bag with apples and I put them in the wrong cart. Then I walked that cart the whole way up the aisle. Just as I was about to add lemons, I realized it wasn’t my cart. I looked up into the face of an old classmate from high school.

“Ted?”

“Holly?”

“Yeah! Wow.” Ted’s appearance was vastly improved over the years. No acne, for one. “What are you doing here?”

“Manhandling the cantaloupes and rescuing my cart. You?”

No wedding ring.

“Buying groceries?”

“Okay, well, nice to see you,” he said and handed me my bag of apples.

“Yeah, you too.”

Wow, he got cute, I thought.

Thinly cut pork chops were on special, so I grabbed a family-sized pack of a dozen, a double box of Stove Top stuffing, a huge jar of applesauce, and a bag of frozen spinach and drove back to the island singing along with the radio. I had a job! And I was about to enjoy a perfect meal. I’d fry up some bacon and use that grease to sauté my pork chops. And I’d bought myself wine in a bottle. I was celebrating. A job! I’d been liberated!

When I pulled into the driveway, Archie and his boys were getting out of his car with enormous backpacks that looked like they would topple the boys over from the weight of them.

“Hey, Mith Holly!” Tyler called out.

“Hey, Tyler!” I called back. “How was your day?”

He gave me a thumbs-up. I started unloading my trunk to bring the groceries inside.

“Do you need help?” Hunter yelled at the top of his little lungs.

“Oh, no, I’m fine! But thank you, sweetheart.” He was so darling.

“How’s your momma?” Archie said, coming over to the low hedge of pittosporum that edged his property. “I thought you might be bringing her home today.”

“No, not yet,” I said, and somehow my voice sounded strange to me.

“I’m sorry. Have you had bad news?”

“No—well, yes. For the moment, she’s all right. But long term? It’s unclear.”

I relayed the story to him as I knew it. There was no point in sugarcoating the news. In one way, I felt absolutely terrible about my mother’s possible illness, and in another way, the news of it and the retelling of it was strangely freeing. Naturally, there was a part of me, that young Catholic girl, that knew I should be ashamed of my black soul that delighted in any part of it. But I wasn’t ashamed one bit. I felt like this might be cosmic retribution for her thinking it was all right to steal my independence while she indulged herself in every way imaginable.

“Well, I’m terribly sorry to hear the news. Please tell your mother I asked about her and that we’ll be thinking about her. And you know, Holly, if there’s anything I can do, or my boys, please tell us. You’ve been so great to us since, well, Carin, well, you know.”

He still couldn’t even bring himself to say what had happened and it had been months and months. He really loved her.

“I know. It was so terrible. But I think we’re meant to help each other when life gets too difficult, don’t you?”

“If we’re able to, yes. It’s one of the beautiful things about humanity. We actually can lift each other up. Ease someone’s burden. And it’s just, well, it’s just nice to help others. There’s a special joy to be found in service. You know, being useful. Like your hives.”

“Yes. Yes, there is something very special about helping each other. Ask my bees. Your boys know that, too, which is sort of amazing, given their ages and all that.”

“Thank you. I think they’ve learned a lot about empathy from you, too, and I’m very grateful. They’re good boys.”

“They are wonderful boys,” I said. “Well, now I have to go and call my sister and drop this lovely bomb on her.”

“That won’t be easy,” he said.

I could see him then questioning whether I had the diplomatic finesse to deliver this kind of news in the right way. I looked at him as if to say, If you knew all the bullshit I’ve had to endure every day of my life, you’d never have a moment’s doubt about my capacity to deal with bad news.

“I’ll be all right,” I said. “And Momma’s not even symptomatic of anything yet. But tumors are not a good thing.”