another piece of toast, when I saw Shelby Youngblood coming down the stairs to the apartment. He walked around the far side of the garage and I heard a car start. They must have decided that was the most discreet place to park. He backed out, used the concrete turnaround apron, and left (I presumed) for work. His car crunched as it hit the gravel; sooner or later we would have to have the rest of the driveway paved. I thought about Angel Youngblood in her peach and green apartment, and I remembered what Amina had blurted out before the wedding. Amina’s concern had stuck to me like a cockleburr, irritating and hard to dislodge.
I found myself wondering what Angel would do with herself all day. It wasn’t really any of my business; but I am curious about the people around me. They’re what I use to keep myself entertained.
I put the breakfast dishes in the dishwasher, wiped the counters, and went upstairs to get dressed. After wearing all my new “honeymoon” clothes, it was nice to get back into my oldest blue jeans and my mystery bookstore Tshirt. I did put on some makeup, so as not to give Martin too complete a shock when he came home today. I had picked out my red-framed glasses to wear and was brushing my hair and planning my day when I heard a double rap on the kitchen door.
Angel was wearing one of those spandex exercise outfits that practically outline your arteries and veins. This bra-and-shorts combination was in a striking black and pink flame design. She had a warmup jacket on over the bra. Her legs were long columns of muscle ending in heavy pink socks and black running shoes.
“Welcome back,” she said briefly.
“Come in.”
“Just for a minute.”
“Thanks for arranging all the furniture.”
She shrugged and managed a smile. It suddenly dawned on me that Angel was shy.
“I just dropped by before my run to tell you that later, when you’re ready, I can come help you move the living- room stuff into the position you want. We just kind of put it to where it looked like a real room, but I figured you would want to rearrange when you got home.” Angel had to look down and down at me, but she didn’t seem either to mind or to feel it gave her an edge.
“Angel, what are you exactly?”
“Huh?”
“Are you my employee? Martin’s employee, like Shelby? If so, what’s your job description? I feel like I’m missing something.”
I hoped I wasn’t being rude, but it made me feel uneasy, her doing me all these favors, since she wasn’t a personal friend. If she was getting paid for it, that was another matter.
That proved to be the case.
“Martin pays Shelby and me,” she answered after looking at me consideringly for a moment. “Of course, Shelby gets a paycheck from the plant, but we get some money besides. For helping you all out here. Because this house is a little far from town, out of earshot… and Martin’s gone a lot, Shelby tells me.”
“Sit down, please.” We faced each other over the table. “What does helping me out include?”
“Ah… well. Working in the yard, this is a lot of yard to keep trimmed and mowed and planted. And if you need heavy things done in the house. And to house-sit when you go somewhere and Martin’s gone, too… like that.”
We regarded each other intently. This was very interesting. What on earth had this woman’s life been like?
“Thanks, Angel,” I said finally, and she shifted a little in her chair. “Have a good run.” She rose without haste, nodded, and drifted to the kitchen door, which opened onto the backyard.
“I’ll be thinking about the living room while you run, and maybe later after you shower and everything, you could come over.”
“Sure,” she said, sounding relieved. “Should be about an hour, maybe a little longer.”
“Fine.” And I closed the door behind her, leaned against it, and wondered what she hadn’t told me.
At the end of a morning spent moving heavy objects, I knew a little more about Angel. She and Shelby had been married for seven years. They had worked together on their previous job. What that job was, was vague. I am southern enough to have trouble asking direct questions; I’d used up my quota for the day that morning in the kitchen. And Angel, whether deliberately or not, did not respond to anything but flat-out bald-faced directness. I still had no clear fix on her character.
Martin had a lunch meeting that day, and Mother was taking some clients out, so I sat down at the kitchen table and worked out a meal plan for the week, which was one of the things I’d heard good housewives did, and shopped at the grocery accordingly. I’d cooked for Martin before, of course, and he’d grilled meat for us many times, but this would be the first meal I’d cooked for him as his wife in our new home, and I thought it should be fancy, but not so fancy that he got inflated ideas about what our daily cuisine would be: and also not so difficult that I ruined it. We’d gotten at least five cookbooks as wedding presents, and I mildly looked forward to our eating our way through them.
I sat in our little family room and watched the news, reading through our backlog of magazines during the ads. Then I wrote some more thank-you’s, managing to acknowledge over half the gifts that had arrived in our absence. When I walked to the end of the drive to put the notes in the mailbox, I noticed for the first time that the Youngbloods had put up their own mailbox. That made sense, since we had the same address; it was a problem I hadn’t thought of before, and here it was already solved. I ambled back up the drive, looking idly through the load of bills and occupant notices and free samples I’d found in the box. As we’d decided in our premarital counseling, I would be responsible for paying the month-to-month bills from our joint account, into which Martin and I each deposited a predetermined amount from our separate incomes. So I pulled out our brand-new joint checkbook, paid the bills, and signed the checks “Aurora Teagarden.”
Okay, okay. I’d kept my name, that absurd and ridiculous name that had been my bane my whole life. When it got right down to it, I just couldn’t become anyone else. Martin had had a hard time about that, but I had a gut feeling I was right. When I feel like that, I am fairly immovable. And I can’t tell you how much better it made me feel. I had my own money, I had my own friends and family, I had my own name. I was one lucky woman, I told myself as I sliced strawberries.
Martin opened the front door and yelled gleefully, “Hi, honey! I’m home!”
I started laughing.
I was actually able to turn from the sink and say, “Hello, dear. How did your day go?” just like a sitcom mom.
I was one lucky, uneasy woman.
Chapter Eight
THE NEXT MORNING, on a whim, I went to Peachtree Leisure Apartments, a sort of independent old folks’ home, as Neecy Dawson had so cheerfully pointed out. I’d been there before to visit various people, but not in a long time. There’d been a few changes. Before, there’d been a directory in the large lobby, and you could just walk in and take the elevator to the floor you needed. Now, there was a very large black man with a narrow mustache seated at a desk, and the directory was gone. There was a television camera pointed from one corner that embraced almost the whole lobby area.
“They was getting robbed,” the man explained when I asked about the change. “People was coming in here, reading a name and apartment number, and just wandering through the building till they found who they wanted. They’d sell them magazines the old people didn’t need, if they thought the old person was senile enough, or they’d just rob them if the old folks were feeble. So now I am here. And at night, from five until eleven, there’s another man. Now, who did you come to see?”
Somewhat shaken at this picture he painted of wolves roaming the halls in Peachtree Leisure Apartments, I told him I’d come to see Mrs. Melba Totino.
“She expecting you, Miss?”
“Mrs. No, Ms.” What was I going to call myself? He was eyeing me warily. “No, Mrs. Totino isn’t expecting me. I just came to thank her for the wedding present.”
