I Still Dream About You

sorry, I don’t know.”

In truth, there were a lot of things Maggie wished she hadn’t known. Maggie was stunned at what people you just met would tell you about their personal lives. She had never discussed Richard with a living soul, much less a stranger. Maybe she was a prude, but to her, there had always been something so lovely, so civilized about not knowing the graphic details. She really preferred people to be a little more vague, but now, especially in real estate, you couldn’t afford to be vague or the least bit sensitive about anything. Today, in order to even stay in the game, you had to be tough, and in Babs’s case, ruthless. Maggie had tried her best to be tough, but she simply couldn’t do it.

Just another reason she should have married Charles when he’d asked her, but she had been determined to go to New York and become rich and famous and make her state proud. The only problem: she hadn’t thought about how she would become rich and famous. She couldn’t sing, act, or dance, and with her obvious lack of musical talent, all she could really do was look good in clothes. But as she found out, in New York, at only five foot seven and a half, she was not tall enough to be a professional runway model. And after a year, the only modeling job she had been able to get was in the mezzanine tearoom at Neiman Marcus’s department store in Dallas. The other career she might have pursued was that of an airline stewardess, but back then, ex-Miss Alabamas did not become stewardesses; they married well and had 2.5 children.

Maggie could have married well. Most of the kids she had gone to high school with were from the old iron, coal, and steel families, and even though her parents were quite poor, there had been quite a few wealthy “over the mountain” boys who had tried to date her, but the only one she had liked was Charles.

When she had turned him down, he had been a complete gentleman and had not acted very upset, but she heard later that he had been to the point of almost drinking himself to death after she left for New York City. Why hadn’t he fought for her? Why hadn’t he insisted that she stay home? Why hadn’t he come after her? There was that moment in time, before she left New York City for Dallas, when, if he had come, she would have gladly headed for home. If he had, she would never have met Richard. Lord… why had Charles been so noble? Why had he been such a gentleman? Both their lives could have turned out so differently. But she guessed he couldn’t help being what he was any more than she could help being who she was: so incredibly stupid.

After she’d moved home from Dallas, she’d lived in fear and dread of running into Charles again, but thankfully, she hadn’t. Most people had been kind and not mentioned him at all. Only once had a girl she hardly knew, who had married a mutual friend of theirs, asked, “Do you ever hear from Charles Hodges?”

“No, I’m afraid I don’t.”

“Oh, we don’t either. All we know is that he married some Swiss banker’s daughter and moved there for good, I hear.”

She hoped Charles was happy. He deserved to be happy, just like she deserved to be as unhappy as she was. She had, after all, brought it all on herself.

So Rare

1965

THERE WERE A LOT OF PRETTY GIRLS IN BIRMINGHAM, BUT MAGGIE Fortenberry was one of those rare pretty girls who grew more beautiful the longer you looked at her, and Charles Hodges III, who could stare at her for hours, tried to figure out what set her apart from the others. He finally came to the conclusion that it was her eyes. There was an expression deep down in her brown eyes, something so sweet, so shy and vulnerable; it made him want to protect her from the whole world.

He had come from quite a social background and was able to converse with everyone, young and old, but around Maggie, he often found himself at a loss for words and, to his embarrassment, kept repeating, “God… you’re pretty.” But she was. Charles was an amateur photographer, and he had taken photograph after photograph of Maggie and found that no matter what angle he shot, it was impossible to get a bad picture of her. She didn’t have a bad side as far as he could see. But he was in love.

He must have been. That summer, he had driven Maggie and her harp from one event to the other, had gone to all the Miss Alabama affairs, and had stood in the back as people fluttered all around her. He didn’t mind; he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. And after a private talk with her father to get his blessing, he had spent hours selecting just the right ring for her. An entire evening was planned: dinner, dancing, and, later, the proposal.

Maggie didn’t know it, but his parents had already made a down payment on a house for them. After she said yes, he was planning to drive her up the mountain the next day and surprise her. His parents would be waiting inside with champagne to celebrate. But she had said no.

She had decided to go to New York first. He had been so torn about what to do. He didn’t want to stand in her way, but he also knew that if she went, she was sure to become famous, and he would never see her again.

The day she left for New York, he stood with her parents and smiled and waved, but as the train pulled out of the station, he knew he was losing her. He couldn’t blame her; she couldn’t help being who she was. But he didn’t think he would ever get over her. No wonder he stayed drunk for the next five years.

The Purple Flash

Monday, October 27, 2008, Midnight

LONG AFTER MAGGIE HAD TURNED OFF HER LIGHT, ETHEL CLIPP WAS Still sitting up in bed in her purple flannel nightgown with the cats on it, rolling up her thin purple hair in bobby pins, busy clicking from local news to CNN and Fox TV and back. At this point, Ethel didn’t care who won the presidential election. She didn’t like either candidate. Still, she wanted to know what was going on, so she could have something to complain about in the morning. Of course, Brenda was all hoo-ha for Barack Obama, and Maggie never discussed politics, so she didn’t know who Maggie was voting for. She herself hadn’t liked anybody since Harry Truman. In fact, she hadn’t liked much of anything since 1948 and was quick to tell you about it. Ethel could be a little blunt at times. She was quite a bit older than she cared to admit (eighty-eight last May), was deaf in one ear, and had terrible arthritis in both knees, but regardless of her age, she never missed a day of work at Red Mountain Realty. She liked work. It kept her heart going. She supposed some people looked forward to retiring and traveling, but not her. There was a time when people traveled for pleasure, but as far as Ethel was concerned, there was nothing pleasurable about it anymore.

She used to like to take the train, but since the government took that over, what was once gracious dining with white linen tablecloths and fine silver was now just a snack bar full of people in flip-flops eating bad microwaved sandwiches, drinking beer and Diet Snapple. And forget flying. Standing in those long lines, being prodded and poked to a fare-thee-well, treated like a criminal. Hell, she didn’t want to take her shoes off in front of strangers and stick them in some dirty plastic tub. Years ago, when you took a plane, you were served a fully cooked hot meal: roast beef and gravy or lobster with a nice wine and a dessert. Now it was just water and a bag of peanuts. And even if your plane was on time, there were no more redcaps to help you with your luggage anymore. At the end of her last flight, when she’d tried to grab her bag, she had been dragged halfway around the carousel, and if that man hadn’t caught her, there was no telling where she would have ended up. And then it hadn’t even been her suitcase. They had lost hers. How a bag clearly marked Birmingham, Alabama, could wind up in Butte, Montana, on an entirely different airline was beyond her. And God knows you couldn’t drive anywhere with all of the big eighteen-wheeler trucks running up your behind, blowing their horns, and scaring you half to death. And even if you did make it to where you were going without having been