Livvie's Song (26 page)

“This isn’t her handwriting, so, no, it couldn’t have been. The truth is, I don’t have a clue who did.”

Will eyed the note she clutched in her hand. “May I have a look?”

She handed it over, and Coot edged closer to get a glimpse of it, too. “That don’t look like a lady’s handwritin’,” he asserted.

One of Will’s thick eyebrows rose a fraction, and he passed the note back to her with nary a glance in her direction. “Humph. Guess you got yourself a secret admirer.” In his tone, she detected the tiniest hint of something unusual. Surely, he wouldn’t have been so bold as to buy her a dress and then feign ignorance! True, he’d kissed her, but, in the weeks since, he’d managed to keep it out of their conversations and had shown no interest in repeating the act. The few times that he’d walked her upstairs at the end of the workday, he hadn’t lingered to chat; he’d simply tipped his chin at her and said a friendly good night. As for the dances on Saturday nights, he had not extended another invitation to her—not that she would have accepted, but the gesture would have been considerate. She knew he attended regularly, for she often overheard his harmonica serenades, followed by thundering rounds of applause and rousing whoops of appreciation from the audience. He’d certainly become popular on account of his bounteous talents, not to mention his good-humored personality. More than once, she’d recalled the way Marva Maxwell Dulane had hung on his every word, not to mention his arm! Had he taken a special interest in her? And, if he had, did he even know of her sordid past—the rumors of it, at least?

“You wouldn’t happen to know who sent her that fine dress, now, would you, Will?” Coot asked with a devilish grin.

Prickles of heat crept up Livvie’s neck and scuttled straight across her cheeks. To hide her embarrassment, she lowered her gaze to the dress and found that the hem stopped at the knee, an inch or so shorter than the drab, gray dress she now wore.

“Me?” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Will shift his weight. “Sorry, I can’t take the credit. Maybe one of her girlfriends bought it for her.”

Girlfriends?
Livvie nearly laughed. The few female friends she had were married and had mostly fallen by the wayside since Frank’s death, either from not knowing how to act around her or from having less in common with her. All of them treated her kindly, no question there, but, one by one, they’d simply drifted away. Not that she blamed any of them. She was a hardworking widow with young children, and she couldn’t think of another woman who could relate to her situation. There were other widows in town, of course, but none as young as she. No matter; she’d come to accept her circumstances and was beginning to learn and grow from them. If anything, she’d developed an entirely new understanding of the grieving process. And, thanks to the sermons she’d been hearing every Sunday, the Bible reading she’d been doing to sate her recent thirst for the Word of God, and even Will’s Christian testimony, her bitterness and anger toward God had dissipated significantly.

“No, none of them knows I’ve been admiring this dress for some time.”

“Well, it must have been somebody who knows you awfully well,” Will said in a tone that she could have sworn held agitation. “Coot has a point. That looks like a man’s handwriting.”

Feeling irritated herself, she crumpled the note and stuffed it inside her apron pocket, then went about folding the dress and laying it back in its box. “Well, I can’t express my gratitude until I figure out who sent it.”

“How you plannin’ to do that?” Coot asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe I’ll walk over to J. C. Penney and see if they can tell me who purchased it.”

Coot frowned. “It’s clear somebody admires you and wanted to give you a gift, an anonymous one. Why spoil the guy’s fun?”

She paused. He did have a point. Even the Bible talked about giving gifts in secret, lest the benefactor receive recognition and think too highly of himself. When she looked at Will to see if he would add to Coot’s advice, all she saw was a slight shrug of the shoulders. The oaf! She ought to invite herself along on his little fishing excursion just to spite him. She could wade in the river, make a racket, and scare off all the fish.

***

For a host of reasons he couldn’t sort out, the dress and its mystery sender put Will in a sour mood. He’d seen that poorly penned note and known without a doubt that it hadn’t come from any woman. Besides, it’d had a few smudge marks on it, and he’d detected the faintest odor of nicotine. That some man assumed she’d finished mourning her husband and thought she might be ready to start dating again pulled at his innards. She wasn’t ready. She’d proved that to him some weeks ago, when he’d planted that kiss on her soft lips and, in return, heard her husband’s name whispered in his ear. He was half tempted to post a sign in the window that read, “Olivia Beckman is still mourning her late husband and is not available for dating. Please cease with the anonymous gifts!”

It was plain absurd to be jealous. He didn’t have any claim on her just because he’d kissed her, which had been a dumb move on his part, anyway. She could do as she pleased, for Pete’s sake! Still, he knew that if and when she wore that dress, the question of who had sent it would nag him to no end.

At two thirty, alone in the restaurant after cleaning up from breakfast and lunch, he starting preparing for supper. When everything was ready, he headed to the back door to retrieve the tackle box and fishing pole Livvie had lent him some weeks ago. “It was Frank’s, but he would want someone to use it,” she’d said. He’d planned to invite the boys along, but Sally had taken them to her house after they’d spent the morning at the public library. Livvie usually minded them in the afternoon hours when the restaurant was closed, but today was an exception. Sally sure had developed a love for those boys, and it appeared that the feelings were mutual.

Will pushed open the screen door, then pulled the other door shut to close up the place. And that’s when he noticed a second fishing pole, propped next to his against the building. He glanced around and discovered Livvie, leaning against the tree in the alley, dressed in a low-waisted, sleeveless yellow dress that looked like it’d seen better days. On her feet were toeless shoes, and a wide-brimmed, khaki-colored hat completed the outfit. Her hair hung in a long ponytail across one shoulder. If he’d ever seen a more fetching sight, he couldn’t recall when, and his gut did a complete somersault. “Livvie!”
Lord, have mercy on my thumping heart.
“What are you doing out here?”

“Waiting for you.” She unhurriedly stepped away from the tree and sauntered in his direction. Her skirt flared in the warm breeze, revealing those shapely calves behind her slender shins.

“Oh?”

“You said you were going fishing, and I thought I’d join you.”

“I heard you tell Coot you don’t fish.”

“I don’t.”

He scratched his head and felt a grin tickle the corners of his mouth. “All right, then. Come on.” He picked up both fishing poles and handed one to her, then hefted the tackle box and metal pail. “Hope my worms didn’t shrivel up in this heat.”

“Worms? Don’t you use those shiny wooden lures? There are a bunch of them in that tackle box. Frank always—”

“I’m sure he did, but I prefer live bait. That’s why I went looking for night crawlers at four this morning.”

“What?”

“You heard me.” He set off at a fast pace, and she matched it, her breath coming in huffs.

“You do that often? Get up to hunt for night crawlers?”

“If I plan to fish that day, sure. You and the boys can come look with me sometime, if you like.”

“At four o’clock? No, thank you. Do we have to walk so fast?”

“Yep.”

When they reached the river, he spotted a few fishermen upstream wearing waders. Afternoon was not the best time for fishing, particularly when the water moved at a good clip, but, with a little “divine luck,” as he liked to call it, he might catch a few bluegills and maybe even a bass. He wouldn’t mind a catfish, either. Some folks weren’t wild about the flavor, but, in his opinion, fried up with the right batter, catfish made a tasty bedtime snack, even if he’d have to air out the odor from his small apartment.

He was still trying to get used to the fact that Livvie had decided to tag along with him. Surprisingly, she had talked a blue streak the entire way to the river. Granted, it hadn’t been a long walk, but he began to wonder if she’d chattered the entire time on purpose. If she had, and if she kept it up, he’d be hard put to catch anything, and that didn’t bode well for his hankering for some good, fried fish.

“I think the Family Feasts have been a great success so far. I saw Sandy Flood at the bank yesterday, and she told me she’d never tasted such excellent meat loaf as you made last Thursday. Oh, and when I ran into the Stingers at the market the other day, Paul said Joyce would never have to cook another Tuesday or Thursday night, as far as he was concerned. Isn’t that wonderful? The money keeps pouring in, and I’m sure we’ll exceed our budget by a fair piece this month.”

“That’s great, Livvie. Exactly what we were aiming for. Now, what you do is, take the excess and apply it to your mortgage and other outstanding loans.”

“Oh, I will, I will. At this rate, I’ll have those bills paid lightning quick.”

He moseyed over to his favorite fishing spot, where he’d managed to catch a few bluegills and some small bass on other occasions. Propping his pole against a stump, he crouched down to open the tackle box and take out the canning jar he’d filled with moist soil and several fat night crawlers.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Livvie rest her pole next to his, kick off her summer shoes, throw her hat down beside them, and wander down to the water’s edge. He had a hard time concentrating on that dumb jar of worms once she put her back to him and dipped her toes into the water, then quickly jumped back with a shriek.

“The river’s freezing! I thought it’d be warmer.” Slowly, she dipped her foot in again and proceeded to inch her way further into the water, picking up her skirt as she eased along.

Grinning, he started threading the sticky worm onto the hook at the end of the line, still distracted by the beguiling sight just a few yards away. “Watch where you step, Liv. The rocks can get pretty slippery.”

No sooner had the words left his mouth than down she went with a splat, landing on her backside.

He threw down the fishhook, leaped to his feet, and ran to her, crouching at her side and helping her to a sitting position. “You all right?” he asked, putting an arm around her shoulder for support. “Did you hurt yourself? Man, you went down hard.”

He expected her to shed a tear or wince, at least, from humiliation, if not from pain. Instead, she started to giggle, and her dimples appeared like two deep canyons. “Oh, gracious, look at me!” There she sat, sprawled in the water, her legs spread in a
V
and her skirt floating up around her knees, as her bare feet wiggled in the water. Her ponytail was entirely drenched and hung down her back like a long, drippy dishcloth. She continued to giggle, and the sound, which had begun as a gentle ripple, soon crescendoed into a loud, infectious wave. Soon, she was holding her stomach, as if to keep it from bursting wide open.

At first, he didn’t know what to make of her—he’d never seen her engaged in such riotous laughter—and his mouth twitched at the corners, wanting to smile. He shook his head in disbelief and couldn’t decide whether to laugh himself or settle her down. Either she’d knocked something loose in her noggin and gone a bit zany in the head, or she truly found humor in her predicament. “Are you…all right?” he asked once more.

“You goof.” She pushed him smack in the center of the chest with both hands and knocked him off balance, so that he fell backward onto the riverbank. Next, she proceeded to scoop up two handfuls of water and splash his face and shirtfront.

“Hey! W-what’d you do that for?” he sputtered.

More giggles tumbled uncontrollably out of her, and he broke into a smile, which soon turned to full-out laughter. Righting himself, he leaned forward and dipped his hand into the water, giving her a dose of her own medicine as he splashed her face. She gasped, eyes and mouth as round as marbles, and then returned the act.

Soon, they were both splashing each other like a pair of giddy ducklings, until he managed to snag her by both hands and hold her firmly, despite her squirming. “Enough, you rascal,” he laughed. Cold water dripped off the tips of his nose and chin, and his soggy hair hung in front of his face, partially blocking his vision. He dared not let go of her hands to brush it away, though, lest she start up her shenanigans again.

“All right, now, young lady. Answer me honestly. Can you stand up?”

“Of course I can, silly. The only thing I hurt was my pride.”

“It doesn’t seem to be suffering all that much,” he said with a grin. “Come on, then. Up with you.” He tugged gently on her arms and brought her to her feet. She, of course, was soaked from the top of her head to her bare toes, and he tried to resist feasting his eyes on the places where her dress clung to her body. Dropping his hands to his sides, he gazed down at her face, amazed she still wore a smile.

“I haven’t laughed that hard since…since…I don’t know when!” she confessed, clutching her chest.

A chuckle rumbled out of him. “I think it’s safe to say we’d better hang up this whole fishing idea, don’t you?”

“What do you mean? I’m off to a good start, don’t you think?”

He couldn’t stop his mouth from gaping and his eyebrows from arching. “Sure, if you call falling on your fanny a good start.” He swept the wet hair out of his eyes.

“Well, you have to admit, it was funny.”

The urge to touch her wet cheek nearly overtook him. “I do. And I’m glad you gave me permission to laugh.”

“Did I do that?”

“Well, maybe not in so many words, but when you started splashing me, I figured that gave me the right. By the way, I don’t think I deserved that kind of treatment. I’m about as wet as you now.”

“You were taking the whole thing too seriously, Mr. Taylor.”