The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires(26)

Everyone settled into her living room with their glasses of wine, and water, and iced tea, blotting the backs of their necks with Kleenex, fanning their faces, slowly reviving in the air conditioning, and Patricia thought this would be the perfect time to say something.

“Are you all right?” Grace asked. “You look like you’re about to jump out of your skin.”

“I just remembered the cheese tray,” Patricia said, and went to the kitchen.

Mrs. Greene stood by the sink washing Miss Mary’s supper dishes.

“I’m going to give Miss Mary a bath before bed,” she said. “Just to cool her down some.”

“Of course,” Patricia said, taking her cheese tray out of the fridge and stripping the Saran Wrap from it. She balled it up and then stopped, wondering if she could use it again. She decided she could and left it beside the sink.

She took the cheese tray back into the living room and had just set it down on the wooden crate they used as a coffee table when the doorbell rang.

“Oh,” Patricia said in the tone of someone who’d forgotten to buy half-and-half. “I forgot to mention that James Harris wanted to stop by and join us tonight. I hope no one minds.”

“Who?” Grace asked, sitting bolt upright, neck stiff.

“He’s here?” Kitty asked, flailing to sit up straighter.

“Great,” Maryellen moaned. “Another man with his opinions.”

Slick looked around wildly at everyone, trying to figure out how she should feel as Patricia scurried from the room.

“I’m so glad you could come,” she said to James Harris, opening the front door.

He wore a plaid shirt tucked into blue jeans, white tennis shoes, and a braided leather belt. She wished he hadn’t worn tennis shoes. It would bother Grace.

“Thank you so much for the invitation,” he said, then stepped over her threshold and stopped. He made his voice so low she barely heard it over the screaming insects behind him in the yard. “I have over half in the bank. A little each week. Thank you.”

It was more than she could bear to hear him talk about their shared secret with people right in the next room. Her arms prickled with goose bumps and her head felt light. She hadn’t even deposited the two thousand three hundred and fifty dollars he’d given her into her and Carter’s bank account. She knew she should have but instead it sat in her closet, tucked inside a pair of white gloves. She liked having it in her hands too much to let it go.

“Don’t let the air conditioning out,” she said.

She led James Harris into the living room and when she saw everyone’s faces she realized she really should have made those phone calls and prepared them.

“Everyone, this is James Harris,” Patricia said, putting on a smile. “I hope y’all don’t mind if our new neighbor sits in tonight.”

The room got quiet.

“Thank you all so much for letting me join you,” James Harris said.

Grace coughed softly into a Kleenex.

“Well,” Kitty said. “Having a man around will certainly liven things up. Welcome, tall dark stranger.”

James Harris sat down on the sofa beside Maryellen, across from Kitty and Grace, and everyone pulled their legs together, tucked their skirts beneath their thighs, and straightened their spines. Kitty reached for the cheese tray, then pulled her hand back and held it in her lap. James Harris cleared his throat.

“Did you read this month’s book, James?” Slick asked. She showed him the cover of her copy of The Bridges of Madison County. “We read Helter Skelter last month, and we’re reading Ann Rule’s The Stranger Beside Me next month, so this felt like a nice break.”

“You ladies read a strange assortment of books,” James Harris said.

“We’re a strange assortment of broads,” Kitty replied. “Patricia says you’ve decided to live here even after what your aunt did to her.”

Patricia brushed her hair over her left ear and opened her mouth to say something nice.

“Great-aunt,” James Harris said before Patricia could speak.

“That’s cutting it a bit fine,” Maryellen said.

“I’m surprised you don’t mind the notoriety,” Kitty said.

“I’ve been looking a long time for a community like this,” James said with a smile. “Not a neighborhood, but a real community, away from all the chaos and change in the world, where people still have old-fashioned values, and kids can play outside all day until they’re called in for supper. And just when I’d given up on ever finding someplace like that, I came to take care of my great-aunt and found what I’d been looking for all along. I’m a very lucky man.”

“Did you already join a church?” Slick asked.

“And there’s no Mrs. Harris joining you?” Kitty asked over her.

“No,” James Harris said, addressing Kitty. “No children. No family, besides my great-aunt.”

“That’s peculiar,” Maryellen said.

“What church do you belong to?” Slick asked again.

“Who do you read?” Kitty asked.

“Camus, Ayn Rand, Herman Hesse,” James Harris said. “I’m a student of philosophy.” He smiled at Slick. “I’m afraid I don’t belong to any organized religion.”