Finger Lickin' Dead (2 page)

There was a groan from Cherry that wasn’t even all that muted. Evelyn had mentioned that little fact to them quite a few times, thought Lulu. “I think it’s wonderful,” said Lulu. “To think he likes our red beans and rice so much!”

Cherry said innocently enough, but in a tone that Lulu knew meant trouble, “And how does Adam stand on Elvis? Is he as big a fan of the King as we all are?” She blinked her big green eyes.

Adam made a face. “I don’t see how on earth y’all spend so much time at Graceland every week.”

“It’s the highlight of our week,” said plump Peggy Sue with surprise. “The very pinnacle of it! We just love the staff—they’re practically family to us. And every time I go out there, I discover something interesting and different that I hadn’t seen before.”

“And they
depend
on us at Graceland,” said Jeanne earnestly. “The fans that come through are sometimes so thrilled to be there that it’s easy for them to forget themselves and start climbing over the velvet ropes to try to visit with the King for a spell. We help keep them straight.”

The trays of barbeque ribs and sides of beans and spicy cornbread arrived at the table. Adam took a big mouthful of ribs, which he ate noisily. “Delicious!” he proclaimed, smacking his lips. Cherry was long past hiding anything and looked disgusted with his table manners.

“Darling,” he said, reaching out and squeezing Evelyn’s hand. “I’ve got a wonderful idea. Let’s go out tonight and really have a night on the town. We’ll have a Beale Street night. Work our way down the street, eating soul food, listening to music, and drinking beer. We can even watch the street flippers backflip down Beale. What do you think?” There was a little whiny tinge to his voice that grated on Lulu’s nerves.

“You have the best ideas!” said Evelyn. She beamed at him. “Want to shoot for eight o’clock?”

Cherry cleared her throat and deliberately ignored Adam. “Tonight’s Bunko night. Remember? It’s over at Bertha’s house. And I believe you promised to bring your famous Crock-Pot spinach dip. With the artichokes in it.” Cherry turned to Lulu. “Have you ever had it? It’s to die for. All that cheese just bubbling off your cracker—it’s a meal all by itself.”

“Bunko!” Evelyn slapped her palm on the table with enough force to make nervous Jeanne jump. “I
knew
I was forgetting something. Shoot!”

Adam’s mouth curled downward. “Can’t you just give the cards a pass tonight? We’d already made plans.”

“It’s dice. Not cards. And it’s been a plan for months,” said Cherry through gritted teeth.

“Sugar, I just can’t give it a pass tonight,” said Evelyn. “Last month I didn’t make it because I had that nasty cold that knocked me out. I wouldn’t have been able to go without toting a supersized box of tissue with me and my own wastebasket. Then, the month before
that
I couldn’t go because it was my mama’s birthday and Mama wanted me to come by and do what we always do for her birthday.”

“What do you always do for your mama’s birthday?” asked Peggy Sue in a curious voice.

“We go to the cafeteria. It’s all Mama wants to do. She does love her fried okra, dinner rolls, and meat loaf. We walk through the cafeteria line with our trays and Mama practically claps her hands in excitement over all the choices.”

“Ahh,” nodded Flo. Evelyn’s mama was in her nineties. Ladies in their nineties were allowed any number of eccentricities. “The food in there is awfully salty, though, isn’t it?”

“It’s salty to me, but not to Mama. She brings her own bottle of soy sauce in her pocketbook and pours it all over the rice. Says she likes international flavors. And you know, the salt hasn’t killed her yet, has it? She’s ninety-five years old, playing bridge every day, going to that ‘sit-er-cize’ class at the retirement home twice a week. . . . She’s got to be doing something right. Between the Jack Daniels, soy sauce, and peppermints,
something
is working out for her.”

Adam’s restlessness had progressed to the point where he looked to be about to jump out of his skin. “Fine. Just fine. I guess you can find time to squeeze me in later in the week? I know your schedule in your appointment book is really tight with all your activities.”

Cherry rolled her eyes at Lulu. Lulu had to admit that he did sound pitiful. But luckily she saw someone coming into the Aunt Pat’s dining room that they could visit with a while and shift the focus off Adam.

Adam apparently caught Cherry’s eye roll because he shifted his displeasure to her. He looked at her thoughtfully, taking in her bright, tight clothing and clunky bracelets. His gaze rested on Cherry’s Elvis helmet. He said, “You do realize you’re wearing your motorcycle helmet, don’t you?”

Cherry bristled. No one but a newcomer would even notice that Cherry had
on
a helmet, thought Lulu. It had Elvis on the side and Cherry wore it almost everywhere. She claimed that life was too dangerous to face without a helmet.

“Of course I know that. I happen to ascribe to the belief that I’ll live a much longer life this way. With this helmet, Elvis is acting as my guardian angel. If I’m in a car accident? I’ll have my helmet protecting me. Get thrown off my riding mower? Luckily, I’ll be wearing a helmet. Tornado pops up? I’m protected from debris.”

Adam snorted. “And what dangers are you facing here in the bosom of your friends in the middle of a barbeque restaurant?”

“Bad company,” said Cherry. “Only my helmet doesn’t help too much with that.”

“Oh, look, y’all—here comes Tudy,” said Lulu, interjecting before the situation got too heated. Adam didn’t know what Cherry could be like when she got all fired up. “Let’s try to cheer her up—she’s had such a rough couple of months.”

All the ladies’ faces immediately registered an appropriate level of sympathy and concern. Adam’s brows raised curiously as a brightly dressed, well-preserved middle-aged woman with lots of large pieces of jewelry approached.

“Come sit with us, Tudy,” urged Evelyn. “How are things going for you?”

“Awful!” said Tudy, although she still had a broad grin on her face. “Hi, girls!” she said brightly and hugged as many of the Graces as she could reach. “Could I get a barbeque plate with cornbread?” she asked the hovering waitress.

Lulu said, “Tudy, Ben fried up some okra today, too, in case you want any of that.”

Tudy said, “You
bet
I want some fried okra!” The waitress added it to the order and hurried away. “I don’t know what Ben puts in that breading, but that okra is the best I’ve ever put in my mouth. I wish he’d add it to the main menu instead of just having it as a special sometimes.”

Tudy pulled up a chair to the end of the booth. “Where was I?” she asked. “Oh, I remember. Awful! It’s been terrible, ladies . . . and gentleman,” she said, with a nod at Adam. “You know that restaurant was my
life
for so many years. And Oliver’s, too. I’ve been at Aunt Pat’s every day this week because I’ve got to be in
somebody’s
restaurant. Besides, this place has been part of my life for so long that it feels like home to me. My mama used to come here,” Tudy said to Adam. “And you look around and you feel like you’re a special guest . . . all the pictures and college pennants and baseballs and memorabilia on the wall where you can hardly even see the bricks!”

Evelyn explained to Adam. “Tudy’s husband owned a restaurant for years.”

“A wonderful restaurant. And it always did really well,” said Lulu stoutly. “We’d eat there anytime we weren’t over at Aunt Pat’s. Good food that stuck to your ribs.”

“Rib-stickiness being a good trait for a meal,” murmured Adam in a voice that
could
be translated as sarcasm.

Tudy beamed at Lulu. “Aren’t you the sweetest!” Then she said to Adam, “Then Oliver had this nasty review in the paper. That restaurant reviewer who has the following like a rock star? Eppie Currian. She’s on the Twitter. She’s on the Facebook. She’s everywhere! And people take her advice like it’s gospel. They’re just that taken in by her.”

Adam leaned a little closer to Tudy. “So what happened after that review?”

“You wouldn’t
think
that one bad review would close down a restaurant. That’s
crazy
, right? After you’ve got a group of regulars built up and a nice reputation and been around for years and years? But that’s just how devout those followers of this Eppie Currian woman are. They’re gaga over her.” Tudy looked bemused.

“Who is she again?” asked Adam.

The whole table frowned at him like they thought he was soft in the head. “He doesn’t subscribe to the newspaper. He’s just too busy to sit down for long enough to read it. Isn’t that right, Adam?” said Evelyn protectively.

“Her name is Eppie Currian. Isn’t that just the most revolting name? The paper was making a cutesy thing out of ‘epicurean’ for her pen name. She’s incognito so she can visit the restaurants and be anonymous and then print hateful things. Anyway, it doesn’t matter who she is. What matters is that she ruined us. And if it happened to us, it could happen to anybody.” She gave Lulu a tired look.

“What’s Oliver doing now?” asked Jeanne in a quiet voice.

“Driving me half out of my skull with annoyance is what Oliver’s doing,” said Tudy with a snort. “He’s messing up my daily routine big-time. This morning? I came downstairs at my normal getting-up time and Oliver was on
my
laptop. Mine! And I always check my e-mails the very first thing in the morning because the girls like to e-mail me late at night after I’ve turned in.” Tudy and Oliver had grown daughters who lived somewhere along the East Coast, as far as Lulu could remember.

Cherry winced. “That’s hard. I like to check my e-mails first thing, too.”

“And then? He finally hands me the laptop back. I get on it, and I
do
have a nice long e-mail from our older daughter, Janet. But do I get to read it? No. Because Oliver has picked up the morning newspaper and starts reading the stories to me. Reading them to me! Directly from the paper as if I don’t know how to read for myself.” Her face flushed from just the thought of it.

Lulu’s daughter in law, Sara, had joined the group and listened in for a few minutes. She made a face. “It sounds like he has Retired Husband Syndrome,” said Sara.

“Get out!” said Cherry. “There’s no such thing.”

“No, there is! And RHS has become a problem for millions of women worldwide,” said Sara, bobbing her red head emphatically. “There was this article I read about it. Here these women are. . . . They’ve been queen of the castle for thirty or forty years. They’ve run their houses like generals—cleaning, cooking, running errands, making decisions. Then their husbands come home and they’re bored and they start meddling in the household affairs. Why not try
this
brand of peanut butter? Did their wives know that they could make their own cleaner instead of buying it? Although I don’t really see myself having that problem with Ben when he retires.”

“You don’t?” said Lulu. “I’d think he’d be itching to do something to keep busy if he didn’t have the restaurant. He’s always got to be moving around, doing something.”

“He’d be off in the woods all day . . . subduing nature,” said Sara. “I probably wouldn’t see hide nor hair of him.”

Evelyn looked adoringly at Adam, who looked coolly back at her. “Adam is so outgoing that I wouldn’t see anything of him, either. He’d be dining out with friends or playing tennis or going to see a play or concert.”

“I wish I could say the same about Oliver,” said Tudy in a sad voice. “He doesn’t golf, he doesn’t hunt. He doesn’t play bridge. He needs another job. Quick. Before he drives me crazy!”

Peggy Sue said, “When my husband retired, it was the shortest retirement in the world—it ended up being for only five days. The next thing he knew, he had a job at the meat counter at the Piggly Wiggly.” She archly raised her eyebrows. “He criticized my dusting abilities. ‘Missed a spot!’ ”

The Graces groaned and nodded.

Lulu said, “Can’t Oliver find another restaurant job? Even if it’s not
his
restaurant, it’s still what he knows.”

Tudy tapped her manicured nails on the table. “It’s not as easy as you’d think. College students are competing for those positions now. And he’s got his pride, too. He’s been running a restaurant for so long that he doesn’t want to do those little piddly jobs anymore. He needs to get rid of that pride, though—otherwise it’s going to be all he has left.”

“You know,” said Lulu in a low voice, as if diners might hear her and run out the door, “we had one of those reviews in the morning paper today. From that Eppie Currian.”

Tudy sat back in the booth in alarm. “A bad one?”

“Awful.”

“In that snarky, looking-down-her-nose tone?”

“As snarky as you can imagine,” said Lulu.

“So how,” asked Jeanne in a hushed voice, “is Ben doing? After reading that review and all? I know how proud Ben is of his cooking abilities and everybody
knows
he’s the finest barbeque cook in all of Memphis. That review was pretty rough. I wasn’t going to mention it, but since you brought it up . . .” The Graces all murmured a concerned echo.

“I suppose he’s doing all right,” said Lulu with a sigh as she thought about her son. “He’s back there cooking, after all. Thank the Lord. It’s just not the same when Ben’s not wielding the spatula.”

Sara said, “Ben was just
devastated
this morning when he read that review. I won’t be surprised if he ends up going home sick. He was that ill over it. He puts everything he has into his cooking and having somebody make fun of it was so hurtful to him. He’s in desperate need of a hunting or fishing trip. It makes him so mad when he’s put everything he’s got into cooking and someone writes something so ugly about it.”

“That reviewer is such a . . . such a smarty pants,” fumed Jeanne. Lulu was fairly certain that a more derogatory name had been on the tip of Jeanne’s tongue, but she was too much of a lady to use it. “What got me most of all is that she said Aunt Pat’s ‘wasn’t Memphis enough.’”