IN THE COOL, COOL, COOL OF THE EVENING
It was said by all who knew Irene McKenna Slater that she had a sophisticated understanding of proper society and how decorum operated. Irene knew her place in the world. While Papa told Katie that she could reach for the sky and pluck any star to her liking, Mam had a more practical theory on the futility of chasing rainbows. “People belong where they belong,” Mam would say. “You can pluck an Irish Channel girl and put her somewhere else, but someone will remember her as the girl from the Irish Channel. There’s nothing to be ashamed of in being who you are. If God created a person to sell vegetables, he should sell the best vegetables there are and do whatever he can to satisfy his customers.”
Even as the Irish Channel’s neighborhood grew in prestige, due mostly to its higher elevation and proximity to Uptown, Mam clung to the roots of the old neighborhood and what it meant to be a part of her Celtic heritage. Though most of the neighborhood was African American by the time Katie grew up, Mam never saw a bit of difference in a person’s skin color. If they were in the Irish Channel, they were Irish to Mam.
So it just made no sense to Katie that Mam had moved to the Garden District. But seeing the gated Victorian, with its Celtic cross and statuary in the front garden, she supposed the Channel wasn’t far behind.
“Mam’s house looks a bit like a cemetery, wouldn’t you say?”
Luc chuckled. “It’s a nice house.” He pulled to the curb in his brother’s Prius. Apparently, Ryan and Olivia had been given matching cars for a wedding present.
Katie gasped. Her mother’s covered gallery porch teemed with people under the light, but through them all she could make out Dexter’s image.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“Dexter’s here.”
“How do you know? The gallery’s bursting at the seams with people.”
Katie didn’t answer.
Dexter stood against the front window, as though he thought he couldn’t be seen, but he actually made himself more obvious in his misty movements. His tall frame hardly lent itself to disappearing. Reaching for the car door handle, still with Luc at her side, she wondered how she’d explain their day together to Dex.
“What are they all doing here, anyway?”
“You know my mam. Every night’s a party.” She scrambled out of the car and ran up the steps. “Dexter!” she called over the hum of chatter. She ricocheted from guest to guest. Some she recognized; others were just random faces in all colors and sizes. So many chairs cluttered the shared townhouse gallery that the porch looked like a Mardi Gras float. The sky was just darkening, and she knew she’d created a stir being gone for so long.
“Where have you been?” Mam scolded. “We very nearly called the police! If it hadn’t been for Luc saying he knew where you’d gone . . .”
“I’m sorry,” she muttered. “The time got away from me. Have you met Dexter?”
“Yes, I’ve met him. I’m afraid he’s not used to all of the noise in our house. We’ll have to work him up to it.”
“Dex is an only child,” she said to her mother.
“So are you!” Mam answered.
“Your only child is a far different cry, Mam.” Katie laughed but grew serious at the sight of Dex standing pressed against the wooden window frame.
He seemed agitated, but what right did he have to be angry? She hadn’t asked him to come, and he certainly couldn’t expect Mam to quiet things for him. At least not without warning.
She swallowed her guilt, remembering what it had felt like to be in Luc’s arms again. What did that say about her? She knew what it said. It said she was as dumb as a box of rocks and not worthy of a man like Dexter, that’s what it said.
“Hey, Dex, can I have a hug?”
He loosed himself from the wall and hugged her, then checked his watch. “I hadn’t planned to be here this late.”
“It’s only eight thirty,” she said.
“I brought work with me.”
Eileen came up and wrapped an arm around her. “Dexter, Katie has a habit of disappearing, don’t you know. Remember that time in high school when we snuck out for Mardi Gras? I thought your dad was going to kill us!”
“You snuck out in high school?” Dexter asked as if she’d committed murder one. Her beau was not a man to understand misbehavior, not for any reason—but in New Orleans during Mardi Gras, it was practically cultural.
Eileen went on, oblivious to Dexter’s shock. “When I saw the grill of his old Chevy truck coming around that corner, I knew we were toast. I couldn’t think up a story that fast. Not one you’d go along with, anyway.”
“We cleaned toilets at the store for two weeks after that,” Katie said to Dexter, hoping he saw justice as served.
He pulled her into the doorway and spoke into her ear. “I’m here to ask your mother’s hand, I mean, ask for your hand in marriage. I thought you’d want to start wearing your ring right away, and what kind of fiancé would I be if I didn’t come down and ask properly?”
“That was sweet,” she said truthfully.
“I wanted to meet your family first too.”
“What do you think?”
“They’re very . . . very friendly.”
Eileen, eavesdropping from the porch, laughed at his composure. “What’s the matter, Dex? It’s like you’ve got sand in your oysters. You’re in New Orleans, loosen up!”
He stared at his watch again. “I’m sorry, Katie. I wasn’t expecting all this ruckus. It threw me off my game. Then you drive up with Luc. Did you spend the entire day with him?” His jaw clenched. “When you weren’t here, I got worried I’d made an error in judgment. I called Pastor earlier.”
“You called Pastor?”
Dex paced the entryway. His expensive shoes clicked on Mam’s hardwood floors as guests separated like the Red Sea. Dex turned back around and took her by the arm into the foyer. “I just got nervous. I’d expected to surprise you, and instead you surprised me. And what are you wearing, anyway?”
“You got nervous? About what? That your girlfriend was missing? Or that your schedule, which you didn’t make me aware of, was rearranged?” She drew in a deep breath. If she was honest, it was her own guilt that forced her to snap at Dexter. He had every right to expect her to be at her mam’s, not with Luc off on one of her jaunts. And it was sweet of him to go out of his comfort zone and surprise her.
“Katie, you’re making a scene. I was worried about you.” He gazed around him, as if he noticed the crowd for the first time.
She looked outside onto the gallery. If she’d made any sort of scene, no one but Dexter seemed to notice. “I’m sorry, Dexter. It’s been a long day. Lot of emotion since yesterday. I need to tell you about something.”
“I wanted to surprise you, Katie,” he said warmly. “I’m doing my best to romance you. I’m clumsy at this sort of thing, but it doesn’t mean I love you any less.”
“Of course not. I know that, Dex.”
“Your mom’s having some kind of party. I think I should come back tomorrow when the house is quieter, so we can talk.”
She nodded. She felt her heart thump in her throat, upset that they hadn’t really solved anything. When Dexter didn’t get his way, he generally threw a quiet, irritated tantrum or began negotiations to convince her of his side. His voice was always so measured, his demeanor so stoic—she’d never noticed until now, when they had an audience. She was Irish. When her family threw a tantrum, you good and well knew it.
He stepped into the hallway and withdrew a single black suitcase. “I need to get some sleep. Irene,” he said to Mam, “may I borrow the phone to call a cab?”
“A cab? Where’re you going? Don’t we have the beer you like or something?”
“No,” Dex said. “I’m tired. I wanted to head to the hotel.”
“Hotel?” Mam squealed. “Listen, I’ve slept twenty in a shotgun row house. No guest of mine is staying in a hotel.”
Dexter raised his suitcase. “I’ve got a load of work to do tonight. I want to have an important conversation with you in the morning.” He slapped his suitcase. “Want to be in top form.”
Mam grabbed at his suitcase, which Dexter wouldn’t relinquish. The two of them stood there, locked in a battle of wills.
“Dexter, you may as well let go,” Katie said. “My mother’s not going to let you go to a hotel.”
“I have a reservation,” Dex said.
And Mam let go of the suitcase, just like that. Katie had never seen a guest win that particular battle with her mam, and she knew what it meant. Mam wanted him to go. The air rushed from her lungs. At home, Dexter fit so perfectly into her life. How could a change of locale make them so vastly different?
Her mother reached for the phone. “I’ll call you a cab, Dexter.”
“Very good.” He glanced at his watch again. “Heavens, it’s hot here.” He tugged at his collar.
“Get that tie off, for one thing.” Katie started to unfasten it, but he brushed her hands away.
“What time will you be free tomorrow for me to express my wishes to your mother and stepfather?”
“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “Mam, what’s the schedule for tomorrow?”
“How would I know? It’s still today. We’ll figure out tomorrow when it happens. Rusty’s going out shrimping tonight. He should be back home by about ten in the morning.”
“Dexter wants a time.”
“So give him one,” Mam said. “We’ll work it out.”
“Why don’t you come at eleven, Dex? I’ll make brunch.”
“On a weekday?”
“Yes,” she answered firmly. “Dexter, I need to talk to you about something. Maybe we’re rushing things a bit—”
Dexter pecked her on the cheek. “We’ll talk tomorrow.” He jogged to the street as the cab pulled up. The trunk opened, Dexter tossed his bag inside, and soon only red taillights marked his having been there at all.
Katie blinked slowly and wondered how to explain his strange behavior. At the same time, she wondered if maybe his social skills were skewed by the Bay Area’s lack of connection skills. Perhaps she’d become immune, and he ceased to stand out there. What if she’d made a terrible mistake? Correction, what if she’d made another terrible mistake?
Mam grabbed her by the wrist, passed the settee in the living room, and walked up the stairs. She stared back with a look that said to follow her. Katie did.
When they reached the top of the stairs, Mam opened a door, led her into her grayish-green bedroom with the old cast-iron bed, and crossed her arms. Like a metronome, when Mam stopped walking, the silence clamored for attention.
“What was that?”
“I don’t know, Mam. I’ve never seen him like that.”
The questions came like bullets. “Why are you getting married to that man? Why are you home now? Why is Luc DeForges here in my house again? Why is your best friend on my gallery? What is going on? You come home for a visit and bring the entire state with you?”
Katie shrugged.
“I want an answer!”
“Sorry, I thought it was a rhetorical question. The house is full of people I’ve never met.”
“I invited them. It’s my house! Katie, that man is afraid of his own shadow. If someone breaks into your house, who’s going to beat him off with a stick? You?”
“Well, I could.”
“I know you could, but, Katie . . . I don’t understand it. All these years you waited. I thought you were waiting for Luc, but then you announce you’re marrying some stranger. I want to like him, sweetheart. But why now?”
“I’m getting married because it’s time and I want to have a family.”
“No, that’s why men get married. Women get married because they’re in love.”
“I love Dexter but in a good, safe way. A healthy way, not where I’ll lose my mind and make a complete fool of myself in front of everyone we know.”
“Katie, listen. I may be old, but I have not lost all my faculties. Tell me what you love about that man, besides the fact that he isn’t Luc DeForges. I will give him points for that much, but, Katie, tell me what I’m not seeing.”
“You don’t like him, then?” Katie wrung her hands. “What did he do?” She couldn’t imagine what had Mam so agitated.
“Tell me what you love about him.” Her mother sat on the bed and crossed her legs underneath her.
It brought her comfort to watch Mam do that. It was the pose she used to take every night before she read a bedtime story and prayed over her.
“Mam, he’s very bright. He went to MIT, and he’s—”
“He can be as bright as the North Star, but if he can’t put two words of greeting together, he’s no match for you. You’re a social creature, Katie.”
“Not nearly as social as I used to be.” Her shoulders fell. “I can’t defend him. I can’t defend myself. Mam, I kissed Luc today.” Without pausing she went back to describing Dex. “He’ll be a good dad. He’s very intellectual. He’s punctual. He’s had the same job since he got out of his PhD program, and that’s not easy to do in the consumer electronics field. Technology changes daily. He picks up on the new stuff and leads the way. He writes iPhone Apps for a hobby, and he’s made quite a lot doing that.”
“What does he do with the extra money?”
“I don’t know. It’s not my business.”
“Why isn’t it your business? Your father didn’t make a dime that I didn’t know where it went. I didn’t ask, but he told me because he said if anything happened, I’d need to know. And I did, so your father was right. Ignorance is not honoring a man, Katie. Does he try to keep it from you?”
“We just don’t talk about money. It’s not really an issue. We’re not married yet.”
“What’s the last gift he gave you?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?” Mam slid off the bed and went over to a wooden box on the antique dresser. She opened it, and “Some Enchanted Evening” began to play. Her mother dug both hands into the box and lifted out strings of glittering baubles.
Katie studied them closer and saw familiar things: strings of pearls, saltwater and fresh, a garnet pendant, her mother’s birthstone, and lots of gold chains and ear bobs, as Mam called them.
“That’s not fair. Dad’s grandfather was a jeweler.”
“Dexter is not . . . he’s not kind, Katie.”
Mam’s words had merit, and it surprised Katie that she couldn’t dispute them. Dexter did all the right things. He said all the right things, opened car doors for her, helped her on with her coat—but Mam was right, his actions weren’t marked by a benevolent spirit.
“He brought me his extra suitcase to borrow,” she said.
“Aha!” Mam said. “You saw the suitcase he had with him. Did he give you the good suitcase? Or take it for himself?”
Katie slid her hand down the long bedpost.
“That’s what I thought. You know, Katie, you can plan so that nothing goes wrong in life. But something will, and it won’t be what you expected to go wrong. So make sure you’re with someone who will help you bail the water out of the boat, not someone who will blame you for the hole.”
“Mam, what’s going on down there?” She watched Olivia come up the walkway with Ryan on her arm. Ryan held a potted bromeliad that looked like a giant red pineapple, and two lawn chairs hung from his elbow. Several band members she recognized from the rehearsal also trotted up the walkway with cookies and various local treats in hand. It was then that she noted all the seating on the front porch and their sheer mass registered. Folding chairs, lawn chairs, deck chairs.
“Oh, they’re here! I have to get down there. Katie, get some clothes on and come outside. Luc has a surprise for you!”
Katie turned off the light, so she couldn’t be seen from outside, and tossed off her dress and pulled on a pair of jeans. She selected a lightweight cotton T with sleeves to fight off the mosquitoes. Then she went to the window and saw a large truck pull up into the street and two workmen get out and put orange cones around the truck’s perimeter. They brought out white folding chairs and set them in rows on the front lawn. On every third chair they placed a can of Off. Next they rolled a giant red popcorn machine off the truck and donned white hats and aprons. Neighbors started coming down the stairs and filling the seats.
“They’re here already,” Mam shouted from the porch. “Katie, hurry up, child!”
Katie landed on the front gallery. “I’m here.”
“Eileen, run in and get some sodas,” her mother said.
“I took care of all the drinks. Sit down and enjoy yourself, Irene,” Luc said. The workmen rolled off a wheeled refrigerator, the kind an ice cream man would push, and then hung electronic bug zappers on a nearby tree. Within a span of five minutes, the entire front lawn had been transformed into an outdoor movie theater. Judging by the wave of neighbors holding various snacks, Katie figured there must have been some kind of invitation.
Luc thrust a flyer into her hand.
YOU’RE INVITED TO A
CLASSIC MOVIE NIGHT
WHERE: MCKENNA-SLATER GARDEN
WHEN: APPROXIMATELY 9 P.M.
ST. CHARLES AVENUE
BRING FOOD TO SHARE.
Within minutes the projector was set up, and the truck served as the movie screen. Katie marveled at how quickly Luc’s money could make something happen. “You did all this?”
“I thought it would get us all in the mood for the wedding theme. Get it? In the mood?” He laughed.
People streamed in and filled the empty white chairs in the garden one by one. Luc patted the seat beside him.
“Dexter left before he got to see this,” she said.
“I know. Bummer, huh?”
“I want to go down where the popcorn is.” She skipped down the steps.
The film started to spin.
“Don’t you love that old sound of the movie rolling? I’ll go get us some sweet tea.”
“It’s Casablanca.” She glanced at Luc. “Is this symbolic? Ilsa must choose between Rick, the dangerous love of her life, or Victor Laszlo, her husband and leader of the Resistance Movement. The past or the future. Desire or sacrifice. Casablanca or freedom. Love or honor.”
“Love. Always love,” Luc answered. “This isn’t the French Resistance, and Dexter Hastings is no Victor Laszlo. Sometimes love and honor are the same thing. Forgiveness, the ultimate sacrifice.”
He brought a chair beside her and sat down. As soon as the speaking parts began, Luc recited Rick’s lines. “Who are you really, and what were you before?” He pulled his fedora down on his forehead.
As the Germans marched into Paris, Katie forced her eyes to the screen. “Maybe I’m not so noble.”
Luc took her hand in his. “Maybe you are, but you’re defining honor incorrectly.”
She ventured a gaze into Luc’s eyes. If it were only that easy. Love was more than a feeling, and wasn’t it more honorable to honor her vow? Or was it more honorable to listen to her mam and abandon herself to the unknown? Luc may not have been the marrying kind, but did that make it honorable to vow herself to another man who didn’t understand what Ilsa gave up? And never would?