The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires(73)
“You wouldn’t believe the schedule they have me on this fall,” Carter was telling him. “Six talks before January. You’ll have to keep an eye on the old homestead.”
“You know you love it,” James Harris said, and they both laughed.
Patricia’s steps faltered and she cursed herself for not wanting to see James Harris, who had done so much for all of them, and she forced herself to walk toward him with a big smile. James Harris was Leland’s business advisor these days. He called himself a consultant. He made up for not being able to go outside during the day by working through the night. He pored over the plans for Gracious Cay, he wooed outside investors at catered dinners he hosted at his home, and sometimes when Patricia walked down Middle Street early in the morning she could still smell cigar smoke lingering in the street outside his house. He worked the phones, he encouraged people to get outside their comfort zones, he convinced Leland to grow a ponytail. He carried them into the future.
“We’re going to have to get you married so you can know what it’s like to be tied down,” Carter said to James Harris.
“I still haven’t met someone worth giving up my freedom for,” James said.
He and Carter were almost like brothers these days. He was the one who’d convinced Carter to go into private practice. He was the one who’d talked Carter into getting on the lecture circuit, where he extolled the virtues of Prozac and Ritalin to doctors on paid vacations in Hilton Head, and Myrtle Beach, and Atlanta, courtesy of Eli Lilly and Novartis. He was the one responsible for all the money piling up in their bank account that would let them send Korey to college, and remodel the kitchen, and pay off the BMW. And yes, sometimes the phone rang after Carter came back from one of his trips and a young woman would ask for Dr. Campbell, or sometimes they’d call him Carter, but Patricia always gave them his office number, and when she asked who they were Carter always said, “Damn secretaries,” or “That effing girl at the travel agency,” and it made him so angry that Patricia finally stopped asking, and just kept giving out his office number when they called, and she tried not to think about it because she knew how easily ideas could get into her head and grow into twisted shapes.
“Patricia!” James Harris beamed. “You look wonderful!”
“Hello, James,” she said as he pulled her into a hug.
She still wasn’t used to all this hugging, so she held still and let him squeeze her.
“This one was just telling me I’m going to be having supper with y’all all fall,” James Harris said. “To keep an eye on you while he’s out of town.”
“We’re looking forward to it,” Patricia said.
“Did you understand any of this month’s book?” Kitty asked. “All that military language left my head whirling.”
“Whirlybird!” Horse cheered, loudly, raising his beer.
And the men started to talk about the war on drugs, and the inner cities, and metal detectors in schools, and James Harris said something about crack babies, and for a moment Patricia saw him, chin dripping black blood, something inhuman retracting back into his mouth, and then she hustled that image away and saw him the way she saw him so often—waving as he walked through the neighborhood in the evenings, at book club, at their table when Carter invited him over for supper. It had been dark in the back of his van. It had been so long ago. She wasn’t even exactly sure of what she’d seen. It had probably been nothing. He had done so much for them.
It was better not to think about it.
CHAPTER 25
“So what did he say?” Carter asked.
He stopped slapping undershirts and dress socks into his suitcase on the end of their bed.
“Major said Blue has Saturday school for the next two months,” Patricia said. “And he has to do twelve hours of volunteering at an animal shelter before the end of the year.”
“That’s almost an hour a week between now and then,” Carter said. “On top of Saturday school. Who’s going to take him to all that?”
His suitcase slipped off the end of the bed and clattered to the floor. Cursing, Carter started to bend down, but Patricia got there first, squatting awkwardly, knees popping. He was always frantic before he left on one of his trips, and she needed him calm if he was going to help with Blue. She picked up the suitcase and put it back on the bed.
“Slick and I are going to carpool the boys,” Patricia said, refolding his spilled undershirts.
Carter shook his head.
“I don’t want Blue around that Paley boy,” he said. “To be honest, I don’t want you around Slick. She’s a loudmouth.”
“That’s just not practical,” Patricia said. “Neither of us has time to drive them back and forth separately every Saturday.”
“You’re both housewives,” he said. “What else do you do all day?”
She felt her veins tighten, but didn’t say anything. She could find the time if it was that important to him. She felt her veins relax. What bothered her more were his comments about Slick.
She pressed the last refolded undershirt on top of the pile in Carter’s suitcase.
“We need to talk to Blue,” she said.
Carter let out a soul-deep sigh.
“Let’s get this over with,” he said.