Folly Beach - Dorothea Benton Frank [104]
She went on for at least fifteen minutes about her horrible lot in life and I listened like the dutiful mother should. Which is to say, I offered no unwelcome solutions.
“So what are you thinking about? I mean, is there something else you’d like to be doing?”
“I don’t know! I don’t know! I mean, the money’s good but I’m so tired when I get home! I don’t feel like getting up and going to auditions, if I even had them to go to that is. My agent hasn’t done shit for me.”
“Language!”
“Whatever. Anyway, maybe I should get another agent.”
Okay, it’s not like I never used the word myself but never in front of my children and I still believed that children were supposed to curse among themselves, not in front of adults. And here was another stellar example of Sara taking license. We are not and will never be peers.
“Well, honey, you’re the only one who can answer that question.” I could see then that since Addison’s death, Sara may have been brooding all along. It wasn’t easy to be so far away from home, especially when she lost a parent. Maybe a visit to the Lowcountry would do her some good. “Listen, how’s this? When Aunt Daisy gets out of the hospital and comes home, why don’t we find you a cheap ticket to come here for a few days? I think it would do her a world of good to see you. And Ella, too.”
“Awesome! Yeah, I’d love that. Let me see when I can get some time off.”
“Yeah. Just remember, there’s no urgency, Sara. Honestly, there isn’t. If, heaven forbid, her condition changes I’ll get you here right away.”
“Okay. Mom?”
“Yep?”
“This John is a nice man?”
“Let me tell you how nice . . .”
By the time I finished telling her about how he picked up Aunt Daisy from the bathtub, called 911, and then sat up all night at the hospital with Ella and me, her tune was in a different pitch altogether.
“Wow,” she said. “Mom, he sounds like amazing.”
“Look, there’s no reason for anyone to get excited about John Risley. He is my friend and if that status changes, I’ll let you know that, too.” No, I won’t.
“Yeah, I guess when you’re your age, you have to take what you can get.”
Now, what kind of an assessment was that?
“Um, I’m not so sure what that meant . . .”
“Wait! I meant, you know, you don’t have, you know, sex and stuff.”
“Sara Cooper! Go wash your mouth out with soap!” She should only know, I thought.
She laughed and said, “Yeah, I’ll get right on that! See ya, Mom! Love ya!”
And the Contentious One was gone. For the moment. I had not told her about my budding career as a playwright or Piccolo Spoleto or that John had suggested Sara to possibly play Dorothy Heyward. So far all I had were notebooks filled with notes and a lot of Xerox copies of Dorothy’s and DuBose’s letters. And I had not droned on about the Charleston Renaissance as I was now inclined to do whenever I got my hands on the mike. But I had raised her spirits and introduced the idea of me having a friend of the opposite sex in a way that I thought seemed reasonable and acceptable to her. No sex, huh? Is that what twenty-five-year-olds thought? That their parents didn’t get it on like jungle animals? That they had cornered the market on that pastime? My children would drop dead if they knew. Drop dead on the floor.
I was still laughing to myself about that when I picked up Ella to go back to the hospital. She put a big tote bag on the floor in the backseat and got in the front with me.
“Did you manage to get a nap?” I asked her as she was buckling her seat belt.
“Well, I closed my eyes but I didn’t sleep. I made a pie and brought it with me.”
“What kind?”
“Pecan. It’s so good. I think I’m gonna be taking the nurses a pie whenever I can so they’ll keep an extra eye on you-know-who.”
“Not a bad idea,” I said. “Did you eat?”
“I had a banana and a glass of milk. Whenever I’m worrying about something I lose my appetite.”
“Not me. I can always eat. Oh, I spoke to Russ and they’ll be meeting us there at some point. And Patti is flying in tonight. She lands at six thirty so I’ll be going out to pick her up and then I’ll bring