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“Here,” Thomas said, handing her the cocktail shaker. “Just take the whole thing with you.”
* * *
The bad thing about staying in a genuine retro ’50s motel room, A
Instead, she reached into the box of old Quixie recipe booklets she’d rescued from one of the boxes that had been headed for the Dumpster. She decided to look for anything approaching a muffin recipe that Thomas could use.
The booklets had apparently been produced in-house and given away at grocery store displays or as mail-in premiums. She was leafing through a booklet called “Quixie Entertaining Tips” when she came to a page featuring recipes for “Summer Quix-E-Que.” Among the dishes was a Quixie-marinated barbecued chicken, the baked beans recipe A
On the page facing the recipes was a full-page black-and-white photo of teenagers enjoying a summer cookout. As she was marveling at the teenager’s clean-cut outfits, she realized, with a start, that the perky brunette who was holding an upraised bottle of Quixie in her hand was none other than a teenaged Ruth Hudgens.
“Oh my gosh, Mama,” she said softly. Her mother’s dreamy-eyed smile was directed at a trim lad dressed in a madras short-sleeved shirt and sharply pressed khakis. He looked enough like Mason to take her breath away, but as she looked closer, she realized she was staring at a teenage Gle
A
“Mama and Gle
“Hey, Mama,” she said softly. After a few minutes of chatting about her job prospects and some sharp questions about why she didn’t come to her senses and make up with Shane again, she finally managed to get to the point.
“Listen, Mama,” she said, staring down at the recipe booklet spread out on her bed, “I was going through some old Quixie ads, and I found one with a photo of a barbecue layout that you were in. Do you remember that?”
“That old thing?” her mother chuckled. “Good Lord, honey, I haven’t thought of that in years.”
“You were wearing a little cotton shift dress and had your hair in a flip; you looked so cute, a little bit like Jackie Ke
“People did used to tell me that,” Ruth admitted. “I bet I wasn’t but eighteen when they took that picture. I made that dress myself. It was my favorite.”
“It’d be right in style today,” A
“What?” Ruth sounded startled. “A
“You’re looking at him like he hung the moon,” A
She heard Ruth sigh. “We went out a few times that summer, yes. I wouldn’t call it a thing.”
“Was this before or after Gle
“Now, why are you digging up all this ancient history? You are good and done with that family, I hope.”
“Humor me, Mama, please?”
“I can’t remember back that far,” Ruth groused. “I think that was the summer after our senior year. Gle
A
“It was years and years ago,” Ruth said. “Way before you were born. What difference does it make?”
“I thought you hated all the Baylesses,” A
“I never said I hated them,” Ruth corrected. “I just said I didn’t care for the family. Especially the mother.”
“All these years, I’ve wondered why Sallie didn’t like me; this explains everything.”
“Sallie Bayless didn’t like you because she thought she was better than you and me and everybody else in this town,” Ruth said.
“But she hated you, probably because she had some idea that you stole Gle
“Stole him! I did no such thing. Gle
“But I bet he only went ru
“That woman is bad news,” Ruth said flatly. “How we were ever friends is beyond me.”
“You were friends?”
“Best friends. In grade school,” Ruth said. “Like you and Pokey always were. Although I will say that Pokey is nothing like her mother, thank the Lord.”
“And then what happened to break up the friendship?” A
“Boys!” Ruth said. “Sallie Woodrow was boy crazy. She didn’t have any time for girlfriends once she discovered boys.”
“Wow,” A
“If that’s all you wanted to know, I’ll say good night,” Ruth said. “It’s too late for an old lady like me to be up this time of night. But honey?”
“Yes, Mama?”
“Send me a copy of that picture, would you?”
After talking to her mother, A
The room did have an old hi-fi, though. A
What the hell, she decided. She had to study the console switches and knobs for a few minutes to figure it out, but then she put the record onto the turntable, turned up the volume, and dropped the needle on the record.
Lush strings and background singers filled the room. A
“You ask how much I love you,” Joh
“That’s it,” A
The twelfth of never, she reflected, sipping her drink, could have been the theme song for her relationship with Mason, with never the operative phrase. They’d been so close this last time to finding their way back to each other. But close, her mother had always warned, only counted in horseshoes and hand grenades.