“Now turn at that mailbox that says 104,” Big Ben directed.
Lily did as she was told, but had no idea why she was pulling into a strange house’s driveway.
She didn’t begin to catch on until her hapless husband said, “Now Daddy, what have you gone and done?” At that moment, Lily saw the realty company sign in the yard with the banner across it announcing, SOLD.
“I know it’s nothing fancy” Big Ben said, “but it’s a good house — built solid — and it’ll do ya till you can build the house you really want.”
“But, Daddy,” Ben said, “we were just going to rent an apartment.”
“Now, Benny Jack,” Big Ben said, “you know there ain’t an apartment in Faulkner County that’s worth living in. And besides, you remember that broken-down old trailer you and your mother and me had to live in back when I was first starting the company?”
“No, I don’t remember it. We moved out of that trailer when I was two years old.”
“Well, it don’t matter whether you remember it or not. It was no place to raise a child. And soon as the money from the company started rolling in, I swore that no son of mine would ever have to live without a decent roof over his head.” He produced a house key from his jeans pocket. “So whaddaya say, kids? You wanna take a look at her?”
The house had a garage large enough to hold both Ben’s Lexus and Lily’s new monstrosity of a sedan. Architecturally, the dwelling resembled a brick shoe box. Everything about the house bespoke a normal, heterosexual respectability. Lily hated it.
Inside, the walls were white and the carpeting beige. Each room was square, pristine, and sterile.
The only thing Lily liked about it was that there were three bedrooms: one for Mimi, one for Ben, and one for her. “So what kind of monthly payments are we gonna be making on this place?” she asked.
Big Ben looked puzzled. “Payments?”
“Yeah,” Lily said. “I mean, you made the down payment, right, but then Ben and I will pay —”
Big Ben hooted. “You and Ben won’t have to pay a dime! I bought this house outright — with cash money!”
Lily leaned against a white wall to steady herself. She couldn’t imagine having the kind of money where you could just buy a house, any house, on the spot and pay for it all in cash. These people really were loaded.
“I know it don’t look like much right now, since there ain’t a stick of furniture in it,” Big Ben said.
“But picking out furniture’s a woman’s job.” He checked his watch — a Rolex, Lily noticed. “Lily, if you’d drive us on into town, you’ll have plenty of time to pick you out some stuff over at American Home Furnishings before we meet ole Buzz for lunch at the Bucket.”
Lily, still leaning against the blank wall, smiled wanly. All her needs were supposedly being taken care of, and yet she had never felt so empty.
CHAPTER 7
Lily and Ben had just finished a grueling forty-minute shopping spree at American Home Furnishings, during which Lily kept protesting that Big Ben was spending too much money on them, and Ben the younger kept complaining that all the furniture in the store was too tacky to go in any house of his. “It’s bad enough,” he said, “that I have to live in a ranch-style house. Now I have to furnish it with crap that’s just a cut above cardboard!”
“Oh, for godssake.” Lily sighed. Her furniture preference was for antiques and junk-store finds, but if somebody was gracious enough to buy her a houseful of furniture, she wasn’t going to be rude enough to complain about the store’s limited selection. “Okay,” she announced, “we’ll take that sea-foam green sofa and armchair and the coffee table that goes with it. We’ll also have that round table and chairs over there for the dining room, the oak bedroom suite, the Jenny Lind nursery set, and the maple bedroom suite for the spare room.”
The oversolicitous furniture salesman grinned at Ben. “There’s something to be said for a lady who knows what she wants.”
Every item on the Dinner Bucket’s lunch buffet was represented on Buzz Dobson’s tie. The fact that he seemed to have trouble conveying a forkful of food to his mouth didn’t exactly fill Lily with confidence in his legal abilities. Could a man really have mastered the art of Socratic dialogue if he had never learned how to feed himself?
“So,” Lily asked, “where did you go to law school, Mr. Dobson?”
“Oh, call me Buzz,” he said, trailing his too-short tie through his mashed potatoes as he reached for his iced tea glass.
“Buzz,” Lily corrected herself. While trying not to stare at his gravy-soaked tie, she found herself focusing on Buzz’s toupee, a dark brown, vaguely hairlike mass that was perched on his head like a jaunty hat.
“Ahh, I went to law school at your old stomping ground... down in Atlanta.”
“Emory?” Lily asked, picking at her overcooked macaroni and cheese.
“Naw I went to the Bushrod Washington School of Law...it’s off of Peachtree.”
“Oh, yes, I know it.” Under the table, Lily used her index finger to trace the letters l-o-s-e-r on Ben’s thigh. Spelling out words in this way was a method of communication Dez had invented in order to sit through dull plays and lectures.
Ben traced back on Lily’s thigh: It’s okay.
Lily wasn’t sure she believed him. The Bushrod Washington School of Law was housed in a dilapidated, graffiti-sprayed office building. It was widely known as the Last Resort School of Law, an institution whose only entrance requirements were a pulse and a checkbook.
“Yup,” Buzz said, discarding a thoroughly gnawed chicken bone, “took me six years, but I finally graduated.”
Lily was trying to calculate how quickly she could gather Mimi and her belongings and return to Atlanta when Big Ben said, “Yup, me and Buzz go way back. Ole Buzz was the best running back, Faulkner County High School’s ever seen.”
Buzz grinned, clearly enjoying the compliment. “You tell that to my poor ole, broke-down knees.” He pushed his plate away. Lily expected him to wipe his mouth with his tie, but he didn’t. “So,” he said, clasping his hands on the table. “I hear you young people are in a spot of trouble. Why don’t you tell me a little about it?”
Ben launched into the story he’d concocted, devoting equal detail to the truths, half-truths, and outright lies. When he finished, Buzz turned to Lily. “You got a copy of Charlotte’s will on you, honey?”
Lily winced at the unsolicited endearment, but retrieved a photocopy of the will from her bag.
Buzz scanned the document, sucking his teeth. “Well,” he said finally, “it’s all here in black and white, ain’t it?” He slipped the document back into its envelope. “Well, first I’m gonna tell you kids what I always tell people. If you got a problem, the best way to settle it is out of court.”
Particularly with a lawyer like you, Lily thought, but she kept her lips clamped shut.
“My advice,” Buzz continued, “is invite Charlotte’s momma and daddy up to Versailles. Have ’em to supper at your new house, or even better, invite ’em over to the big McGilly place that oughta impress the hell out of ’em. Grill ’em some steaks, let ’em see that Mimi’s being taken care of and that y’all are just regular folks like anybody else. My hope is that when they see their granddaughter in a normal, family atmosphere, they’ll give up on this foolishness and let you alone.”
Lily looked Buzz in the eye. “And if they don’t?”
“If they don’t, then guess we’ll see ‘em in court.” Buzz glanced over at Big Ben, then looked back at Lily. “Let me put it to you this way, honey. When Big Ben and me played on the same team back in high school, we never lost a game.”
“I know what you’re thinking, Lily,” Big Ben said, as they got into Lily’s new ship of a car.
“Really?” She didn’t mean to sound snippy, but she still did.
“Uh-huh,” Big Ben said, “you’re thinking you and Benny Jack woulda fared better if you’d stayed in Atlanta and hired you some hot-shot lawyer.”
“Well,” Lily admitted, “when I look at Buzz Dobson, hot shot isn’t exactly a phrase that pops to mind.”
Big Ben laughed. “Well, I reckon not. The ole boy can’t even hit his mouth with his fork about half the time. But I’ll tell you this, Lily. He’s a fine feller, and he means well.”
Lily pulled out of the parking space and aimed her new tank in the direction of the Confederate Sock Mill. “I’ll try to bear that in mind when I lose custody of my daughter.”
To her surprise, Big Ben laughed. “She just don’t get it, does she, Benny Jack?”