Revenge of the Kudzu Debutantes (8 page)

“They’ll think I was too cheap to hire decent caterers!” he shouted at Lavonne. He stopped and took a deep breath. Moisture clung to his upper lip. “All I asked was that you handle one simple little party,” he said, lifting his arm to wipe his face. “This isn’t brain surgery, it’s a party. When my mother said—”

“Yes, let’s talk about your mother,” Lavonne said.

“You leave my mother out of this! My mother loves me! My mother wouldn’t sabotage this party when she knows how much it means to me! My mother . . .”

The doorbell rang and Nita jumped and dropped a glass on the floor. A terrible revelation came gradually over Charles. His nose quivered. One eye drooped at the corner.

Lavonne said, “Once the margaritas start flowing no one’s going to notice who we got to cater.”

Nita swung around and went to answer the door. Crows settled like vultures on the ridge of the Zibolskys’ garage.

Charles said, “Margaritas?”

F
ORTY-FIVE MINUTES LATER,
Virginia Broadwell arrived to find the party in full swing. Loud music blared from the patio speakers, some kind of grating monotonous music that Virginia didn’t recognize, although some of the guests seemed to know it well. A small group clustered around the pool throwing their hands in the air and moving their hips in a shocking manner. In the yard, Mavis Creal, the firm’s bookkeeper, danced the macarena. Standing on the porch and looking down at the vulgar chaos below her, a slight smile of satisfaction appeared on Virginia’s face.

Charles stood on the deck clutching the railing and looking morosely down at his guests who seemed to be multiplying like rabbits. A pale harvest moon rose slowly over the trees. “Love Shack” blared from the speakers. His mother never served anything other than wine and cocktails and the event always ended promptly at nine. But it was already seven-thirty and this party showed no sign of winding down anytime soon. The classical music Virginia provided encouraged the guests to be sedate and moderate in their drinking. The B-52’s did not have the same effect. At the edge of the lawn, two of the girls from word processing stood on chairs and danced like go-go dancers in a wire cage. Dillon Foster took his shirt off and swung it around his head like a man swatting bees. Under the influence of the music and the little silver machine that cranked out its endless stream of lime green poison, things were getting quickly out of hand.
Lord let it rain,
Charles prayed.
And if you can’t let it rain, then at least let the margarita machine break down.

Virginia moved up beside her son at the railing, sipping her wine, and thinking how sweet revenge could be, how it gave shape and meaning to a life that might be otherwise drab and uneventful. Charles had made his bed, so to speak, and now he must wallow in it. She prayed he was conscious of his wallowing. She hoped, by now, he had realized that the firm party did not run itself, that it was a meticulously orchestrated event that must be carefully planned or run the risk of deteriorating into the train wreck they saw going on around them now. Virginia sipped her wine and tried not to gloat openly.

Looking down at a group of associates and their wives who sat at one of the tables whooping and hollering like cheerleaders at a pep rally, it occurred to Charles that perhaps they would drink past the point of remembering, perhaps they would fall victim to some sort of mass amnesia, perhaps there would be earthquakes, pestilence, flood, nuclear annihilation. Anything was possible. Hope, a rare and fragile thing, flared in his breast for the first time that evening.

Below them on the lawn Little Moses passed carrying a tray of blintzes over his head.

“Oh my,” Virginia said, her little hand fluttering against her chest like a deformed bird. “Are those the
caterers
?”

Hope flickered, and died. Doug Clark and the Hot Nuts opened up with “Baby Let Me Bang Your Box” and a crowd of younger guests whistled and stamped their feet and began to shag around the pool, followed soon enough by the older set who wanted to get in on the fun. On the far side of the pool, Grey Spradlin picked up his wife, threw out his back, and went down like a rhino felled by a tranquilizer dart. Mavis Creal bumped and ground her way across the yard like an overweight stripper. Charles sighed and pushed himself off the railing. He knew he’d have to stop them or they’d be gatoring before the evening was over, flopping around on their backs like morons until one of them got hurt, and then he’d be facing a lawsuit in addition to public humiliation.

“Excuse me, mother, I have to put a stop to this,” he said, lifting his hands, and it wasn’t clear whether he meant the dancing or the party itself. It occurred to him as he pushed his way through the crowd toward the stairs that maybe the Zibolsky woman was right, maybe his guests would take their cue from him. If he acted like nothing was wrong, if he acted as if the music, the margarita machine, and the caterers were intentional and not some kind of monstrous mistake, perhaps his guests would follow suit.

His mother’s loud voice followed him doggedly across the crowded deck. “Oh dear, hide the silver,” she said, watching Weasel slice through the crowd carrying a tray of drinks. “That one looks like a Puerto Rican.”

L
AVONNE HURRIED TOWARD
the cluster of dancers who were shagging dangerously close to the edge of the pool. She had heard of parties where someone drowned and the body wasn’t discovered until morning, and it occurred to her that this was quickly turning into one of those parties. Looking around her, she had to admit Eadie’s idea to use a disk jockey and a frozen margarita machine had been brilliant. This party was definitely changing from a function into a throw-down, and it was too bad Eadie couldn’t be here to see it for herself.

Still, from a containment standpoint, the margarita machine might not have been such a good idea. Lavonne hurried toward the shaggers, feeling like a lone fireman trying to put out multiple fires. So far this evening she had talked Braxton McCracken out of riding his electric scooter into the pool, had convinced Mavis Creal to dance the macarena
without
throwing her skirt over her head, and had tactfully tried to convince Leonard’s secretary she might want to go easy on the tequila for a while. In the process Lavonne had managed to drink a good number of frozen margaritas herself, trying to shake the feeling of calamity that clung to her like a bad odor, saturating her hair, her clothing, the pores of her skin, all to no avail. An hour into this party, she was still sober and she still had the disturbing feeling that, despite her best efforts, this evening was going to end badly.

It took her about two minutes to realize there was nothing she could do to prevent one of the shaggers from drowning him- or herself if they felt so inclined. She gave up the minute Charles Broadwell showed up, trying in his jovial pompous way to convince everyone to settle down. Just knowing she was on the same side of the fence as that asshole made Lavonne feel like a hypocrite, and she left the pool patio in disgust.

Crossing the yard, she waved at Mona Shapiro who gave her a motherly grin and a thumbs-up sign. Lavonne was glad for Mona’s sake that the crowd seemed to be genuinely enjoying the food. The Burning Bush boys kept bringing it out and the guests kept wolfing it down, jostling one another over platters of barbecued beef brisket, roast chicken with matzo farfel dressing, artichokes, and squash fritters. The barbecued beef brisket was especially good. Lavonne had already been back for two helpings. The secret was Grandma Ada’s Kosher Barbecue Sauce. Lavonne was pretty sure Mona could bottle the stuff and make a fortune.

She spotted Leonard fluttering among the guests like an obese hummingbird, stopping to clap one on the shoulder, leaning to kiss one on the cheek, his loud voice rising above the hum of the crowd. Mona Shapiro crossed the yard carrying a tray of vegetable latkes. Leonard, seeing her, tried to duck behind a camellia bush, but Mona didn’t notice him, and after a moment he slunk from behind the bush and stood watching her disappear into the buffet tent. Leonard acted like a man with something to hide and Lavonne reminded herself to ask him about the Redmon/Shapiro deal later. She reminded herself that there was much she and Leonard needed to discuss, and it wasn’t just Mona Shapiro and Leonard’s redneck client Redmon.

Leonard had his arm around his secretary and his head bent close, trying to hear her above the noise. Lavonne had not spoken to him since the party began and she wasn’t sure how he was handling the Burning Bush boys and the music and the margarita machine, but she was sure he had to be handling it better than Charles Broadwell. She waved at her husband, but he didn’t seem to notice her.

She had read somewhere that marriage was a series of stages. If this were so, she and Leonard were entering their Golden Phase, that long, sedate, financially secure period between grown children and death. Maybe they could travel. Maybe they could take up skydiving. Maybe they could sell the big house and move to the south of France.

Moths as big as dragonflies fluttered around the Japanese lanterns, and far off in the distance, old Buddy, the Redmons’ sad cocker spaniel, howled mournfully at the moon. Lavonne tried not to see Buddy’s sad howling as an omen. She drank her margarita and told herself that in only two more hours, one if she was lucky, it would all be over.

Then she could put this party behind her and move on with the rest of her life as if it had never even happened.

S
TANDING NEAR A
camellia bush, Leonard ignored his wife as gracefully as he could given the fact his secretary had just made an extremely improper suggestion in his ear. At least he
thought
it was an improper suggestion. Christy was from Soddy-Daisy, Tennessee, and even after eighteen years in the South, Leonard still had trouble understanding her.
Creesty,
as she called herself, followed the suggestion with a flicker of her tongue in his ear, leaving no doubt as to her intent. The suggestion, not to mention the swelling tightness in his groin, made it extremely difficult for Leonard to respond casually to his wife’s wave.

“I’ll be right back,” Christy said, handing him her drink. “Hold my beer, sweet cheeks.”

Leonard couldn’t remember the last time a woman had stuck her tongue in his ear. In his whole life no woman had ever called him “sweet cheeks.” Across the yard he could see his wife grinning and waving and wearing a dress two sizes too small. No doubt she was congratulating herself on pulling the wool over good old Leonard’s eyes. Hiring a Jewish caterer no one had ever heard of and her criminal assistants—he knew a parolee when he saw one, and that boy Johnny had parolee written all over him—making a fool of Leonard in front of his clients and law partners. And worse than that, bringing the Shapiro woman here, where she might see him and spill the beans about him and Redmon and their bid to buy her out. Leonard had to keep all that quiet. No one in town trusted Redmon anymore, so Leonard went in as his front man, lowballed the seller, closed the property, and then turned around and sold it at an agreed-upon profit to Redmon. The arrangement wasn’t illegal; it was just unethical. It wasn’t something Leonard wanted getting around town. Small Southern towns were hotbeds of gossip and innuendo; even a hint of scandal could ruin a person socially and economically, and Leonard knew this, even if his wife didn’t.

Lavonne was the only woman he had ever seriously dated. He’d given her two children, a huge house, and a life of leisure, and all she’d ever given him was ingratitude and resentment. But all that was about to change. Now he had women like Christy sticking their tongues in his ear. He had women who knew how to appreciate the things he could give them, throwing themselves at him. All he had to do was be patient. All he had to do was set up his dominoes and watch them fall. Lavonne was smart about money and she’d know where to look, if he wasn’t careful. He’d already met with Dillon Foster, the associate who handled the firm’s divorce clients, and they’d come up with a game plan.

“You have to be like a commando behind enemy lines,” Dillon said, leaning back in his chair and putting his feet up on the desk. “She can’t know a thing is wrong until you serve her with the papers. If she gets wind of what’s up, she’ll freeze your assets before you have time to move anything. Does she have any idea what you’re planning?”

“She doesn’t have a clue,” Leonard said.

“Good,” Dillon said. “Keep it that way.”

A
ROUND EIGHT O’CLOCK,
Trevor Boone showed up wearing blue jeans and a white shirt rolled at the sleeves, looking tanned and fit and happy. Lavonne, who had spent the last five minutes trying to talk King Stanton out of doing a swan dive off the cabana roof into the pool, was disappointed to see that Trevor had brought his secretary with him. She decided to let King kill himself after all and started across the lawn toward Nita, who was sitting alone at a table looking up at the moon. Trevor saw Lavonne and gave her a big charming grin, but Lavonne just nodded and went on. She was glad Eadie wasn’t here. It was one thing to hear about your husband leaving you for another woman, but something else to witness the humiliation firsthand in front of the entire town. Still, watching Trevor move among the guests, Lavonne could see why Eadie was still crazy about him. She could see why every woman in the place had perked up when he arrived.

“Here,” she said to Nita, setting two glasses down on the table. “I brought you a margarita.”

Nita, who had been looking up at the moon and wondering if Jimmy Lee was sitting somewhere looking up at it, too, colored slightly and said, “Thanks.”

“As soon as this party’s over we’re going to have a talk, Nita, you and me, about what’s going on in your life.” Lavonne sat down. “I’m worried about you. You haven’t seemed yourself lately.”

Nita didn’t want to get into this conversation so she changed the subject. “I’m glad Eadie’s not here,” she said, looking at Trevor and Tonya as they moved slowly among the buffet tables. It didn’t seem right to her that a man who had stood up in front of an altar and made a promise to God to be faithful, could so easily break his marriage vows. She thought how wrong it was that a cheating husband could show up at a party with his girlfriend on his arm and no one thought much about it, but if a wife did the same thing she risked public condemnation and social exile.