That was another annoying thing about Buster. He was a stickler for the rules. It was probably why Ron had hired him.
Alan finished tapping out the cigarette and stuck it between his teeth while he searched for his lighter. Thing was wedged deep into his pocket and it took a bit of concentration to keep the coffee from spilling as he began to dig it out.
“Don’t worry about it. It’s Friday, remember?”
Buster seemed dissatisfied with his answer, and when Alan glanced over he noticed that Buster had ironed his shirt this morning. No doubt he’d made sure that Ron had noticed. Probably went into the office with a notepad and pen, too, so that he could write down everything Ron said while simultaneously complimenting Ron on his wisdom.
And what about the guy’s name? That was another thing. What kind of a parent named their kid Buster?
The delivery van lurched onto the shoulder again as Alan finally freed his lighter.
“Hey, where the hell did you get the name Buster, anyway?” he asked.
“It’s a family name. On my mom’s side.” Buster frowned. “How many deliveries today?”
All week long, Buster had been asking that question, and Alan had yet to figure out why the specific number was so important. They delivered nabs and nuts and chips and trail mix and beef jerky to gas stations and convenience stores, but the key was not to speed through the route, or Ron would just add more stops. Alan learned that last year and he wasn’t about to make that mistake again. His territory already covered all of Pamlico County, which meant driving endlessly along the most boring roads in the history of mankind. Even so, this was far and away the best job he’d ever had. Way better than construction or landscaping or washing cars or anything else he’d done since he graduated from high school. Here, there was fresh air blowing through the window, music as loud as he wanted, and no boss constantly breathing down his neck. The pay wasn’t half bad, either.
Alan cupped his hands, steering with his elbows while he lit his cigarette. He blew the smoke through the open window. “Enough. We’ll be lucky if we finish.”
Buster turned toward the passenger window, speaking under his breath. “Then maybe we shouldn’t take such long lunches.”
The kid was seriously irritating. And that’s what he was—a kid, even if, technically, Buster was older than him. Still, the last thing he wanted was for Buster to report back to Ron that he was slacking off.
“It’s not about the lunches,” Alan said, trying to sound serious. “It’s about customer service. You can’t just run in and run out. You have to talk to people. Our job is about making sure our customers are happy. That’s why I always make sure that I do things by the book.”
“Like smoking? You know you’re not supposed to smoke in the van.”
“Every man’s got a vice.”
“And blasting the radio?”
Uh-oh. The kid had obviously been compiling a list, and Alan had to think fast.
“I just did that for you. Kind of a celebration, you know? It’s the end of your first week and you’ve done a great job. And when we finish up today, I’ll make sure Ron knows that.”
Mentioning Ron like that was enough to make Buster quiet down for a few minutes, which didn’t seem like much, but after a week in the car with the guy, any silence was a good thing. The day couldn’t end soon enough, and next week he’d have the van to himself again. Thank God.
And tonight? That was all about getting the weekend started right, which meant doing his best to forget all about Buster. Tonight he’d end up at the Tidewater, a hole-in-the-wall just outside town that was almost the only place nearby that offered any kind of nightlife. He’d drink some beer, play some pool, and if he was lucky, that cute bartender might even be there. She wore tight jeans that hugged her in all the right places, and she leaned forward in her skimpy top whenever she handed him a beer, which made it taste that much better. Same thing Saturday night and Sunday night, too, for that matter, assuming his mom had plans with her longtime boyfriend, Leo, and didn’t drop by his double-wide like she had last night.
Why she didn’t just marry Leo was beyond him; maybe then she’d have better things to do than check on her grown son. What he didn’t want this weekend was for his mom to expect him to keep her company, because that just wasn’t going to happen. Who cared if he was a little worse for the wear on Monday? By then, Buster would be in his own delivery truck, and if that didn’t call for a little celebrating, nothing did.
Marilyn Bonner worried about Alan.
Not all the time, of course, and she did her best to keep her worries in check. He was an adult, after all, and she knew he was old enough to make his own decisions. But she was his mother, and Alan’s primary problem as she saw it was that he always opted for the easy path, which led to nowhere, instead of the more challenging path that had a chance of turning out better. It bothered her that he lived his life more like a teenager than someone who was twenty-seven years old. Last night, when she’d dropped by his double-wide, he’d been playing a video game, and his first reaction had been to ask whether she wanted to give it a try. As she stood there in the doorway, she’d found herself wondering how she could have raised a son who didn’t seem to know her in the slightest.
Still, she knew it could be worse. A lot worse. The bottom line was that Alan had turned out okay. He was kind and had a job and never got into trouble, and that was pretty good, in this day and age. Say what you want, but she read the papers and heard the scuttlebutt around town. She knew that a lot of his friends, young men she’d known since they were boys, even some from the better families, had descended into drug use or drank too much or even ended up in prison. It made sense, considering where they lived. Too many people glorified small-town America, making it seem like a Norman Rockwell painting, but the reality was something else entirely. With the exception of doctors and lawyers or people who owned their own businesses, there were no high-paying jobs in Oriental, or in any other small town for that matter. And while it was in many ways an ideal place to raise young children, there was little for young adults to aspire to. There weren’t, nor would there ever be, middle management positions in small towns, nor was there much to do on the weekends, or even new people to meet. Why Alan still wanted to live here was beyond her, but as long as he was happy and paid his own way in the world, she was willing to make things a bit easier for him, even if that meant she’d had to buy a double-wide a stone’s throw from the farmhouse to get him started off in life.
No, she didn’t have any illusions about the kind of town Oriental was. In that way, she wasn’t like the other blue bloods in town, but then losing a husband as a young mother of two tended to adjust your perspective. Being a Bennett and having attended UNC didn’t stop the bankers from trying to foreclose on the orchard. Nor did her family name or connections help her support her struggling family. Even her fancy economics degree from UNC didn’t buy her a pass.
In the end, everything came down to money. It came down to what a person actually did, as opposed to who they thought they were, which was why she couldn’t stomach the Oriental status quo anymore. These days, she’d hire a hardworking immigrant over a UNC or Duke society belle who believed that the world owed her a good living. The very notion probably struck people like Evelyn Collier or Eugenia Wilcox as blasphemous, but she’d long since come to view Evelyn and Eugenia and their ilk as dinosaurs, clinging to a world that no longer existed. At a recent town meeting, she’d even said as much. In the past it would have caused a commotion, but Marilyn’s was one of the few businesses in town that was actually expanding, and there was nothing much anyone could say—including Evelyn Collier and Eugenia Wilcox.
In the years since David had died, she’d come to treasure her hard-won independence. She’d learned to trust her instincts, and she had to admit that she liked being in control of her own life, without anyone’s expectations getting in the way. She supposed that was why she’d rejected Leo’s repeated marriage proposals. An accountant in Morehead City, he was smart, well-to-do, and she enjoyed spending time with him. Most important, he respected her, and the kids had always adored him. Emily and Alan couldn’t understand why she kept saying no.
But Leo knew she’d always say no, and that was okay with him, because the truth was they were both comfortable with the way things were. They’d probably see a movie tomorrow night, and on Sunday she’d attend church and then visit the cemetery to pay her respects to David, as she’d done every weekend for nearly a quarter century. She’d meet Leo later for dinner. In her own way, she loved him. It might not be the kind of love that others understood, but that didn’t matter. What she and Leo had was good enough for both of them.
Halfway across town, Amanda was drinking coffee at the kitchen table and doing her best to ignore her mother’s pointed silence. The night before, after Amanda had come in, her mom had been waiting in the parlor, and even before Amanda had the chance to sit down, the questions had begun.
Where have you been? Why are you so late? Why didn’t you call?
I did call, Amanda reminded her, but instead of being drawn into the incriminating conversation her mom obviously wanted, Amanda mumbled that she had a headache and that what she really needed to do was lie down in her room. If her mother’s demeanor this morning was any indication, she was obviously displeased by that. Aside from a quick good morning as she’d entered the kitchen, her mom had said nothing. Instead, she went straight to the toaster, and after punctuating her silence with a sigh, she popped some bread in. As it was browning, her mom sighed again, a little louder this time.
I get it, Amanda wanted to say. You’re upset. Are you done now? Instead, she sipped her coffee, resolving that no matter how many buttons her mom pressed, she wouldn’t be drawn into an argument.
Amanda heard the toast pop up. Her mother opened the drawer and pulled out a knife before closing it with a rattle. She began to butter her toast.
“Are you feeling any better?” her mom finally asked without turning around.
“Yes, thank you.”
“Are you ready to tell me what’s going on? Or where you were?”
“I told you, I had a late start.” Amanda tried her best to keep her voice even.
“I tried to call you, but I kept getting your voice mail.”
“My battery died.” That lie had come to her last night, on her way over. Her mom was nothing if not predictable.
Her mother picked up her plate. “Is that why you never called Frank?”
“I talked to him yesterday, about an hour after he got home from work.” She picked up the morning paper, scanning the headlines with studied nonchalance.
“Well, he also called here.”
“And?”
“He was surprised you hadn’t arrived yet,” Amanda’s mother sniffed. “He said that as far as he knew, you left around two.”
“I had to run some errands before I left,” she said. The lies came way too easily, she thought, but then she’d had a lot of practice.
“He sounded upset.”
No, he sounded like he was drinking, Amanda thought, and I doubt if he’ll even remember. She got up from the table and refilled her cup of coffee. “I’ll call him later.”
Her mother took a seat. “I was invited to play bridge last night.”
So that’s what this was about, Amanda thought. Or at least part of it, anyway. Her mom was addicted to the game and had been playing with the same group of women for almost thirty years. “You should have gone.”
“I couldn’t, because I knew you were coming and I thought we’d have dinner together.” Her mother sat down stiffly. “Eugenia Wilcox had to fill in for me.”
Eugenia Wilcox lived just down the street, in another historic mansion that was as gorgeous as Evelyn’s. Though they supposedly were friends—her mom and Eugenia had known each other all their lives—there’d always been an unspoken rivalry between the two of them, encompassing who had the better house and the better garden and everything in between, including which of them made the better red velvet cake.
“I’m sorry, Mom,” Amanda said, sitting back down again. “I should have called you earlier.”
“Eugenia doesn’t know the first thing about bidding and it ruined the entire game. Martha Ann already called and complained to me about it. But anyway, I told her that you were in town and one thing led to another and she invited us over for dinner tonight.”
Amanda frowned and put down her coffee cup. “You didn’t say yes, did you?”
“Of course I did.”
An image of Dawson flashed in her mind. “I don’t know if I’m going to have time,” she improvised. “There might be a wake tonight.”
“There might be a wake? What does that mean? Either there’s a wake or there isn’t one.”
“I mean that I’m not sure if there is one. When the lawyer called, he didn’t give me any specifics about the funeral.”
“That’s kind of strange, isn’t it? That he wouldn’t tell you anything?”
Maybe, Amanda thought. But no stranger than Tuck arranging for Dawson and me to have dinner at his house last night. “I’m sure he’s just doing what Tuck wanted.”
At the mention of Tuck’s name, her mom fingered the pearl necklace she was wearing. Amanda had never known her to leave the bedroom without makeup and jewelry, and this morning was no exception. Evelyn Collier had always embodied the spirit of the Old South and would no doubt continue to until the day she died.
“I still don’t understand why you had to come back for this. It’s not as if you really knew the man.”