A Year on Ladybug Farm - Donna Ball [49]
Cici looked at Bridget and Bridget looked at Lindsay. They all looked back at Maggie.
Maggie glanced at Lee, who just shrugged and wedged a huge piece of Texas toast onto the plate he was preparing. She lowered her voice and leaned toward them confidentially. “You know. He drinks. Sometimes for weeks at a time. Most of the year, he’s just as fine a fellow as you could meet, but if you happen to be in the middle of a job when he goes off on a bender, Lord help you. No, no, you don’t want Will, do they, sweetie?” She poured herself a glass of lemonade, looking thoughtful. “Why don’t you girls put in your own circuit box?” she suggested. “Nothing to it, really, just make sure you turn off the main breaker for the house before you get started.”
“Easy as pie,” Lee assured them, mounding coleslaw onto the plate. “Ya’ll want sweet or sour?”
Lindsay said, “Sweet for me,” and Lee ladled red sauce over the shredded pork on her plate.
Cici said, “Don’t you have to have a licensed electrician do something like that to pass code?”
Maggie gave a dismissing wave of her hand. “What code? Around here, we figure it’s your property and you can do what you want with it. Farley can take care of your electric work,” she added, growing thoughtful again, “but you’re really going to need a heating-and-air contractor, not to mention a new septic tank. What you need to do,” she advised, “is go to church.”
Lindsay accepted a heaping plate of hot barbecue pork. “Church?”
Maggie nodded. “The Baptists have the carpenters, the Methodists have the plumbers. Baptists have a good heat-and-air man, Methodists have the best stonemason. And for your grading and septic work, it’s Methodist all the way.”
“But I’m Presbyterian,” Lindsay said.
“And I’m Lutheran,” said Bridget, looking concerned.
“Unitarian,” Cici admitted with an apologetic shrug.
Maggie gave them a sympathetic smile as she produced the last overflowing plate. “Well, now,” she assured them gently, “I’m sure you’ll do just fine.” She held out her hand. “That’ll be fifteen dollars.”
So, on Sunday, Bridget and Lindsay went to the Methodist church and Cici went to the Baptist church. They wore their most conservative suits—Bridget’s navy blue with a white blouse and ruffled collar; Lindsay’s a camel color with a short jacket and pleated skirt; and Cici in smoke gray and a black blouse. Their hair was pulled back, their jewelry modest, and their expressions determined. They looked like members of a law firm setting off for a power lunch.
Lindsay volunteered to stuff envelopes for the March of Dimes in the spring, and Bridget agreed to serve on the Food Committee for the Mission Society’s annual banquet in the fall. They were introduced to two contractors, a high school guidance counselor, the librarian, and Deke Sanders, who owned Sanders Grading, Hauling, and Septic Repair.
Cici sang “Amazing Grace,” listened to a sermon on the evils of moral complacency and video gaming, and was heartily embraced by Maggie—as well as by several other people she didn’t know—who swept her off to the Fellowship Hall to drink Kool-Aid and munch lemon cookies. There she wrote a check to the Building Fund, and was introduced to the pastor and his wife, several councilmen, the church pianist, and Sam Renfro, of Sam’s Heating and Air.
“You know,” decided Lindsay as they kicked off their high heels and peeled out of their hoisery at home, “it’s not such a bad thing to go to church every now and then. In case of emergency, you know.”
Cici said, “You don’t call having no air-conditioning and a backed-up septic system an emergency?”
“I know what she means,” Bridget said. “You know, in case you get sick or something.” The last time they had been together in a church, had been for Jim’s funeral.
Cici took off her jacket and tugged her blouse out of her skirt as she started upstairs. “I suppose,” she agreed, a little reluctantly, “at our age you have to think about things like that. Besides, it’s a good way to get to know the new community.”
“One thing,” Lindsay cautioned, following