The Perfect Dress(59)

Jody took the stairs two at a time. “I brought snow cones.”

Paula reached out a hand as soon as Jody was in the room. “Bless your heart. I wanted one but the line was so long that I didn’t stop on the way home. Where have you been?”

“You first,” Jody said. “What’d you do? Shop for the baby?”

“I saw a movie today that made me feel much better about everything. Clinton is a first-class bastard. I feel sorry for his wife, but he’s her husband, not mine.” She dipped into the snow cone with the plastic spoon that came with it. “I’m glad you’re here. Mitzi wouldn’t tell me a blessed thing until you arrived.”

“I didn’t want to tell it twice. Graham asked me for a date next Sunday. We’re taking his pontoon boat out on the lake, and y’all are invited,” she said before she took the first bite of her snow cone.

“I believe you’re old enough to go on a date without chaperones,” Paula said.

“The girls are going and so is Alice. You might as well come with us,” she said.

“It’s not a real date until it’s just the two of you, but I’d love to go out on the lake, so I’m in. Now your turn, Jody?” Paula said.

Jody curled up in the recliner across the room from the sofa where the other two sat. She needed a few minutes to talk without tears or cussing, so she turned to Mitzi. “I’ll tell you in a minute, but I want to hear more about you and Graham. I know it was hot out there building the arch. How did it turn out?”

“It was a sweaty job but I’m pleased with it. He’s storing it out on his screened porch until we need to load it, and he made it so that afterwards it can be dismantled and stored flat,” she said.

“Did he kiss you and make you all hot and sweaty on the inside?” Jody asked.

“Yes, he did,” Mitzi answered.

“Well, I’ll be danged.” Paula clapped her hands. “I told you it was a real date. Do you believe me now?”

“Maybe,” Mitzi said. “But what do I do now? If we started dating and decided we didn’t like each other, then would that ruin my friendship with the girls? And they like me as a friend, but what about as their dad’s girlfriend? It’s all so complicated. And then there’s the thing with Rita.” She told them about Rita showing up at the dealership.

“You sure you even want to deal with that?” Jody asked. “It could sure get sticky if she starts attending graduations and birthdays and all that.”

“Are you blind-trusting him?” Paula asked.

Mitzi could understand both questions. Jody was probably giving thanks again that she wasn’t pregnant and having to deal with those events with Lyle. Paula had gone into a relationship trusting Clinton, and look where it had got her.

“I’m going to take it slow. What could possibly happen on this next date with all y’all around us anyway?” Mitzi asked.

“Okay, then we want to know how the kiss made you feel,” Jody demanded.

“If I were in the second grade, I’d say it was like Prince Charming kissed a princess and I was that girl. But as a grown-up, the fact that he walked me home and held my hand the whole way meant as much as the kiss,” Mitzi answered.

“From the looks of your mouth, it’s like we’re back in elementary school.” Paula took a bite from her snow cone.

“With all our lips turning cherry red, it does, doesn’t it?” Jody finished off her snow cone and set the cup aside. “Now it’s my turn. Lyle was serious about selling the property. Quincy Roberts was out there today looking at it.”

Mitzi leaned forward on the sofa. “We need details.”

“He’s tall, maybe around six feet. Not as tall as Graham or as big. Broad shoulders and he was wearing starched jeans and boots, and an expensive cowboy hat. I only got a glimpse of his truck, but it was one of those four-door numbers and real shiny white. Is that enough details?”

“No, keep going,” Mitzi said.

“He had brown eyes and a face that was all angles. I’d guess him to be in his late thirties, maybe even early forties,” Jody said. “That’s all I know. We exchanged a few words. He reminded me of a cowboy from a television commercial about expensive whiskey.”

“With a name like that, we’d remember him if he went to school with us,” Mitzi said. “I wonder what he wants with that piece of property.”

“He said he wants to run some cattle out there or raise hogs,” Jody said. “I think that’s kind of poetic after the way Lyle has treated me. It sounds kind of crazy, don’t it? Smelly hogs runnin’ on that land kind of brings me closer to feelin’ peace about this whole thing.”

Mitzi laughed out loud. “That’s too funny.”

Paula giggled with her. “You should’ve told us you wanted to go back out there again. We would’ve gone with you.”

“I needed to go alone.” In one way Jody was glad that she had gone alone, but in another she wished that her friends had been with her so they could render an opinion of Quincy. “I should have at least had part of the money from the sale. Don’t seem fair that I worked and made more than Lyle did most years, and yet, he gets everything but a leaky trailer and a couple of worn-out lawn chairs.”