They were doing all right now. Sally had graduated from college to be a teacher at the same time CJ had. Rachel was in her last year. As soon as Rachel graduated, she’d get a good job as a nurse and be able to pave her own life.
“I heard from the bank again today.” CJ asked her what he had wanted. “Other than for me to go out with him, he wanted to know if we wanted to refinance this house. I have no idea why we’d want to refinance a house that we own. I told him no again and no to the dating thing too. I’m not ready for that.”
“Not that I think you should date Daniel Benson, but you really should be dating again.” Pfeiffer just looked at her. “Okay, we both should be dating, but it’s been almost ten years. Aren’t you ready to get your body waxed up for some sex-starved man?”
“He would have to be sex-starved to want to sleep with me.” CJ told her sister they didn’t usually do much sleeping when they were sex-starved. “Very funny. When are you going to date again? I think it’s been longer than I have since you went out on a— Oh, CJ, I’m so sorry.”
“It’s all right.” She looked away so her sister wouldn’t see the hurt. “It’s been a while, I know that. But he hurt me, and I’m afraid. It took me four years to learn it wasn’t my fault, even though he blamed me and to say that he hurt me. I think it was money well spent.”
They didn’t speak for a few minutes, and she was all right with that. She and her sister could go days without really talking about anything serious, and it never really bothered either of them. Sometimes the quiet was better than emptying out one’s brains, as her grannie said.
“I was just thinking of Grannie myself.” Pfeiffer was like that. She could latch onto whatever a person was thinking without a second thought. “When was the last time you saw her? I’ve not been in about a week. She doesn’t like me as much as she does you anyway.”
“She loves you. And the girls. I went to see her just this morning on my way back from my run. Grannie still asks me why I run if there isn’t anyone chasing me. But we had a nice talk. And she and I had breakfast together.” Pfeiffer asked her if that was her second or third breakfast this morning. “I do believe it was only my second this time. Anyway, she was telling me about this blanket I should make. I don’t know where she comes up with this idea that I can quilt, but she always has a rough draft of a pattern when she thinks of one.”
“You look so much like Mom. Maybe that’s it. Mom loved to quilt. She wasn’t as good as Grannie, but we stay warm all winter with her quilting. Well, most of us do. Do you have any more than a sheet on your bed in the winter months?” CJ told her she had one quilt on her bed. “Small wonder. I remember Dad being like you are, overheated all the time. However, I don’t think I ever saw him walking around in the snow without shoes on. It’s a miracle you have any feeling in your feet at all.”
“I have lots of feelings in my feet, thank you very much.” They both laughed, and CJ asked her why she’d brought up Grannie. “I was just thinking about how she would always have some saying about something you were doing. Like emptying your brains out.”
“Yes, she did at that. I remember thinking she was nuts when I was a kid. She’d say something like that and then just walk away like I was supposed to be able to decipher whatever the heck she was talking about. My least favorite one was, ‘Bachelor’s wives and maid’s children are well taught.’ That is a contradiction all the way around.”
“Of course it is. I know the meaning. Do you want me to explain it to you?” Pfeiffer looked at her oddly, and CJ smiled. “I promise you I know what it means. It means that a childless man and a childless woman have no knowledge about maintaining a good idea about things they don’t have. You see? They have these opinions about child-rearing that are wrong because they have nothing to base it on.”
“Okay, that does make it sound right. What other tidbits of information do you have about her sayings? Let me think of one.”
While her sister thought about what Grannie used to say, CJ read over the email that had just entered her box. It was from her boss. As her emails were coded, she put in the password to open it up.
“Something wrong?”
“I’m not sure. I have this email about the last job I did. He’s saying he didn’t get it. However, not only does it have the work order number on it that I assigned, but the attachment is attached to the reply he sent.” Pfeiffer asked her if that made better sense in her head. “Yes. What I mean is, I attached the job to an email that he just replied to me on. On it is the attached job. It’s been opened too. The email and the attachment.”
“How do you know he opened them?” She said her email told her that. “You can fix it, so you know if someone opens your email? I’d like to have that on mine. I have people telling me all the time they didn’t get
