Page 6 of A Week To Wed
“Why wouldn’t you have this for dinner? Breakfast is the best meal of the day.”
Can’t argue with that.
She sees me poking at the green stuff and answers my question before I can ask it. “That’s collard greens. Always have something green on your plate; that’s my rule.”
I take a bite. It’s strange, a little bitter, but not bad. There’s enough butter in it to satisfy my taste buds, and I quickly wolf down all of it.
“Who taught you how to cook like this? Your parents?”
Maisy laughs. “Oh, heck no. Daddy spends most of his days in boardrooms. Mama’s always either planning charity galas, shopping for new statement dresses for said events, or attending them. They have a cook. No, my meemaw taught me everything she knows. She grew up on a ranch in west Texas.”
My ears perk up at this. “That so?”
Maisy nods and shoots me a bright smile. “Yep! They had six hundred head of cattle.”
“You ever work the ranch?”
She shakes her head. “I spent most of my summers helping Meemaw in the kitchen, tending the garden, feeding the goats and chickens. Sometimes I got to brush the horses down. That was always my favorite part.”
“Well, that’s something,” I say.
She nods. “I s’pose it’s not nothing. Daddy married the daughter of an insurance man, moved to Dallas, and went to work for him, and he never looked back at ranch life.”
“Your meemaw coming to the wedding? I’d love to meet her.”
Maisy’s smile dims slightly. “She died a few years ago, unfortunately. Outlived Papaw by about twenty years. I don’t know how she managed without him, but she was a great woman. She would have loved to see this place.”
There’s no mistaking the glimmer of a tear in her eye. I must have a strange look on my face because she apologizes. “Guess I’m still not over it.”
“Don’t apologize,” I say, my memory casting back to my own grandmother. She was the only one who believed in me, who knew I could work the ranch after I came back with my hat in my hand, asking for a job. She was the one who convinced my Dad to give me another chance after the…incident.
I wonder what my grandmother would have thought about Dad’s cockamamie stipulation in the will. She’s probably rolling in her grave right now. Ah, but she’d take one look at Maisy and give her a big hug, then hand her a bowl of chicken and dumplings.
I ask, “Does anyone ever really get over it when a loving grandma dies? I don’t know. I’m real sorry, Maisy.”
“Thank you,” she whispers, her expression soft as if that’s the kindest thing anyone ever said to her.
Desperate to change the subject and curious about how she plans to fill two hundred seats at our wedding, I ask, “What about your parents? Siblings? Cousins? I take it they’re all coming.”
“I’m waiting to invite my parents. My married sisters probably won’t come; I heard they all had quite a fit that I walked away after they’d spent so much money on bridesmaids’ dresses. Dresses that they never would’ve had to purchase had they not insisted on me having bridesmaids in the first place, by the way. I’m not ready to talk to any of them yet; I guess that makes me a chicken. I will, though. Just not yet.”
I choose not to mention that the wedding is less than a week away now, so now seems like a good time to invite her people.
“You must have a large extended family,” I say.
Blandly, she nods her head. “About twenty or thirty, if we invite kids. I guess we should talk about whether kids are invited. What do you think?”
Ignoring this question, I press on. Things just are not adding up here. “I’m sorry. Why are you ordering two hundred chairs?”
Maisy lifts one shoulder and says, “For whoever wants to come. That’s where you come in. I need a guest list from you, Lincoln. Names and email addresses of all your friends and family. Anyone in Darling Creek you might want to invite.”
“I don’t have any friends. None except Harley and Ray, who’ve worked here since they were teenagers.”
She blinks at me.
“What about your neighbors, then? On the way here, we passed a big metal sign for some huge place called Wilkins Ranch? And then that small place, called something-something organics….”
“Zeke Wilkins is busy with a new wife and a baby. And the other one is a scrubby little patch that used to be the Turners’ place for about a hundred years, now called Whitlock Organics. That’s my nephew, Jonas Whitlock, but we haven’t spoken since he and my Dad had words when he decided to move on from Hall Ranch. He’s a decent kid, but he sunk his life savings into a dump with dreams of getting into hydroponics and all grass-fed beef. Knee deep in renovations and contractor woes. Let’s not obligate him to buy us wedding gifts.”
