Page 8 of Evil Bones
Eight p.m. Dinner with Katy and Ruthie.
“Got it. That may delay me a bit.”
“No prob.”
“How’s it going with Ruthie?”
“We can talk about it.”
With that cryptic comment, she disconnected.
So much for my leisurely evening solo.
Racing inside, I dumped Birdie on the sofa, flew up to my bedroom, and yanked on fresh jeans and a tee. After a quick redo of my very questionable ponytail, I fired off a text to Ryan, then hustled back down to the first floor.
The cat watched with dubious eyes as I checked his kibble and refilled his water fountain. Or maybe he was still sleepy.
Grabbing my purse and keys, I hurried out to my car.
We Charlotteans insist on labeling every square inch of our burg. Dillworth. South End. NoDa. Opinions are split concerning the city center. Some call it Uptown, others prefer Downtown. Battles have been fought over this matter. Mannerly battles, of course.
My neighborhood is called Myers Park. Think surgically manicured gardens and lawns; sidewalks buckled by tree roots older than the Valley of the Kings; churches on every corner—Baptist, Presbyterian, Methodist, Catholic. Except for the steeples, each pious complex looks like a small college campus.
Myers Park’s charm comes with a price. Her southern gentility is fiercely guarded against any resident who might consider going rogue. Paint your shutters orange? No way. Cut down that willow oak? Not a chance. The fine ladies of the MP homeowners’ association could give Stalin pointers on authoritarian rule.
As predicted by the largely traditional architecture, the populace is mainly white and Christian—the golf at the club, martinis at five,church on Sunday crowd. During elections, most yard signs feature Republican candidates.
Why do I choose to live in such a conservative enclave? Typically, the quiet on my block is disrupted only by lawn mowers, leaf blowers, and the occasional barking dog.Tsk-tskand call me boring. What can I say? I like the serenity.
Katy lives roughly ten minutes away in Elizabeth, Charlotte’s only neighborhood named for a woman, though a regal one. After a quick stop at the local grocery to buy its finest baguette, I was mounting the steps to Katy’s front porch a few minutes later.
My thumb had barely hit the buzzer when my daughter opened the door. Her honey-blond hair wasn’t exactly chaotic. It was cut far too short to rise to that level of disarray. But it was seriously tousled. I was unsure if the look was a fashion statement or the result of agitation.
The tension in Katy’s face suggested the latter.
“Hey,” I said.
“Hey,” she said
Not a shared warning. That’s how we Southerners greet.
Katy stepped back and held the door wide. I entered, followed her down a narrow hall to a shockingly large kitchen, and laid the baguette on the table, which was set for two.
That surprised me. Tonight’s dinner was arranged so that I could spend time with my sister Harry’s granddaughter, Molly-Ruth Howard. Perhaps I should unravel that little bit of the family tree.
My younger sister, Harriet Brennan Howard Daewood Crone, has been married and divorced three times. Or is it four? In all honesty, I don’t bother keeping track since the score sheet could change at any moment.
Harry, who lives in Texas, has a grown son named Christopher “Kit” Howard, the result of her second, and very lucrative, marriage to Howard Howard. Kit, a veterinary researcher living on an island near Beaufort, South Carolina, has two daughters born fifteen years apart. Go, Kit.
Victoria “Tory” Brennan is the older of the half sisters. Kit first learned of Tory’s existence when the kid was fourteen years old. The Brennan-Brennan surname match is a weird coincidence. Tory’s mother, sadly deceased, was from a clan of Massachusetts Brennans.
Unlike Tory, Kit’s younger daughter is the fruit of a long and relatively stable marriage. Molly-Ruth, called Ruthie since birth, was now seventeen and, according to Harry and Kit, pissed off with everything in life. And letting the world know about her unhappiness.
When the grandmother-father-daughter dynamic became intolerable, Katy took pity and invited Ruthie to spend the end of her summer in Charlotte. Ruthie gladly accepted and had been in town for two weeks. I thought the visit was going well.
“Where’s Ruthie?” I asked.
“Gone.”
