'Annie Sue—'
Anger was tightening his jaws, but she couldn't let it alone.
'I just don't see why's it such a big deal that I don't have a license. Don't I work for you, too?'
Normally I don't get between my brothers and their children, but I thought Annie Sue was being reasonable.
Each company has to have at least one licensed electrician on staff, and the others are empowered to work under that. Sometimes though, the person who holds the license never does a lick of field work. In fact there's a company at the other end of the county that occasionally swaps work with Herman. Their holder of record is the owner's wife. He can put electricity anywhere you want it, but he couldn't pass the written examination. She could. And did.
'So are y'all furnishing any of the materials?' I asked, hoping to find some ground for compromise.
'They're buying the fixtures and outlets, but we had some extra coils of wire left over from another job,' Herman grunted. 'I told Lu I'd just donate it. Along with my services,' he added heavily.
'But don't you see, Dad?' Annie Sue broke in. She sat with her heels resting on the edge of her chair, her hands clasped around suntanned legs drawn up in front. 'It's supposed to be only women that's building the house. To make a statement.'
'And just what kind of statement, daughter? That women don't need men for anything?'
'Oh, now, hon,' said Nadine as I stirred uncomfortably in my chair. 'She didn't mean that.'
'Yes, ma'am, she did. Just look at her.'
Annie Sue had showered since work and was dressed in a cool blue sundress because she had a date later. White sandals on her feet, pale pink polish on her nails, her shining chestnut hair clipped up off her neck. A stranger might have seen only a sturdy young woman who hadn't yet lost all her baby fat, sitting in respectful silence; but there was nothing respectful about the set of her lips or those hot blue eyes.
I waded in with flags flying. 'And just what's wrong with women proving they can be self-sufficient?'
His big hand tightened around his glass of half-melted ice. 'Now don't you start on me, Deb'rah.'
The exact tone of defensive exasperation, even his choice of words, made me smile. 'You sound just like Daddy when he gets cranky.'
The anger went out of Herman's jaw. He loves our father. So does Annie Sue. She put fresh ice cubes in Herman's glass and filled it up again with tea.
'Look,' I said. 'What I'm hearing is that you're afraid it'll endanger your license if Annie Sue screws up the wiring, right?'
'No, it's because I don't want another Mary Dupree on my conscience.' As soon as he'd blurted it out, I could tell he wished he'd kept that thought to himself.
'Why, Herman Knott!' exclaimed Nadine, clearly surprised. 'You still worrying about that after all these years when you know good and well that wasn't your fault?'
'Who's Mary Dupree?' Annie Sue and I asked.
'Tink Dupree that owns the Coffee Pot's mother.'
The Coffee Pot is next door to Herman and Nadine's office. It's only open for breakfast and lunch, but half the town walks in and out between six and two. Herman stops off there for a cup of coffee every morning and I think Nadine takes her midmorning break there. It's a family business—Tink and his wife, Retha, and their daughter, Ava—but I didn't remember seeing his mother.
'Happened about ten years ago. During that time you lived off,' said Herman. (All my brothers walk gingerly around that patch of wild oats I'd sown back then.) 'Tink and Retha were working at the Coffee Pot, but they didn't own it then.'
'Didn't have two nickels to rub together,' Nadine said, stirring more sugar into her tea.
'His daddy used to work on the base at Fort Bragg and one night they were driving back down to Fayetteville and got in a bad wreck. It was raining and he run off the road and got killed. His mama got banged up so bad she had to come up to stay with Tink and Retha while her leg healed, Tink being their only child and all.'
Annie Sue was waiting impatiently to hear what Tink Dupree's mother had to do with wiring the WomenAid house, but Mo-Cat rearranged his bulk on my lap so I could stroke his other side for a while.
'Won't enough room in that old house to cuss a cat without getting hair in your mouth,' said Herman, 'so they give Ava's room to Miss Mary and they made a little attic room for Ava. It was around Thanksgiving, so that worked out okay as far as it being warm enough up there. Heat rises. She'd've burned up if it'd been summer. But they figured either Miss Mary'd be back in her own house by then or that they'd just build 'em on another room if they needed to. Ava won't happy about having to move, of course, and she pitched a fit to have her hair dryer and her stereo and all the other stuff girls think they've got to have.'
Annie Sue rolled her eyes again. I knew what Ava Dupree looked like now, and now I remembered hearin how she got that way; but Herman was so deep into his tale that, like the Ancient Mariner, he was constrained to finish.
'Tink got me to come in and show him how to add another circuit for the attic. That fuse box of his was so old and rusty, I told him right off I didn't feel good about adding anything else to it. But he kept on and on at me, swore it had to be done or Ava wouldn't give him no peace, promised they'd be careful about overloads, and then said he was going to do it whether I helped him or not. The long and short of it was that I told him how it could be done and I give him a good price on the stuff to do it with, but I said not to come blaming me if his house burned down —never for a minute thinking it would.'
'And he didn't,' Nadine said loyally, —cause it wasn't your fault.'
'So you say and so says Tink.' Herman set his empty glass back on the tray. 'But every time I look at the scars on Ava's face and arms—every time I think of Miss Mary dead in that fire— Well, I know and Tink knows, too, who bears half the blame.'
