Amid the chaos, no one noticed a small, redheaded woman standing hesitatingly at the door. Her large eyes were wide with shock.
“Hello?” Harper called out.
It was not the entrance she’d hoped for.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Dinner that evening was as long as a month of Sundays. Not that the meal wasn’t delicious—Lucille had put her back into preparing a spicy gumbo, crisp hush puppies, and Carson’s favorite banana pudding for dessert. It was the tension at the table that Carson couldn’t stomach.
It should have been a happy homecoming. A time of laughter and catching up. Instead, Carson could feel a headache blossoming from holding in the dozens of pithy comments pressing against her tight lips.
To be fair, the evening started off badly. Dinner was late and everyone was still on tenterhooks after Nate’s hissy fit. Dora had prepared a special plate for him and brought it on a tray to his room for him to eat while he watched his favorite programs on television. Then Harper caused brows to rise when she refused the white rice. And they couldn’t help but stare when she began daintily picking out the pork sausage from her gumbo with her fork. Lucille harrumphed loudly but everyone held their tongue politely.
Except Dora.
“Are you a vegetarian now?” she asked in a censorial tone.
“No,” Harper replied blithely. “I just don’t prefer red meat.”
“Pork is a white meat,” Dora said, correcting her.
Harper looked squarely at her sister and smiled. “Then, meat,” she clarified.
When the hush puppies were passed, Harper refused those as well.
“You don’t like hush puppies anymore, either?” Dora asked, clearly annoyed. “There’s no meat in those.”
Carson gave Dora the look, the one that told her to stop badgering Harper about her food, but Dora ignored her. Carson remembered Harper being quiet and subdued as a child. That, and her petite size, earned her the nickname “the little mouse.” Dora could never boss Carson around the way she did Harper. In fact, sticking up for Harper was one old habit that Carson could settle back into quite seamlessly.
“It’s not that I don’t like them,” Harper replied pointedly. “I don’t eat fried foods. Or anything white, for that matter.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dora asked, pressing her. “You don’t eat anything white?”
“White flour, white rice, white noodles, etc.” Harper shrugged. “It’s not as healthy as brown.”
“Oh for pity’s sake. Lucille slaved over this dinner, you know,” Dora said, fuming. “The least you could do is try it.”
“Dora, she’s not your child. She can decide for herself what to eat,” Carson said.
Harper’s pale cheeks turned pink. She turned to Lucille and smiled sweetly. “In that case, I’ll definitely try one of these magnificent hush puppies, Lucille.” She pinched a single hush puppy and laid it on her plate. Then she reached for the collard greens and began serving herself a big helping. “These smell heavenly. You make the best collards anywhere, Lucille.”
Lucille puffed up, her pride assuaged. “I’ll make some whole-wheat waffles in the morning,” she offered. Then under her breath she added, “I’ll fatten you up some, don’t you worry. You’re so skinny I can’t find your shadow.”
“I, for one, am going to eat every bite,” Dora said, picking up her fork.
“I’ll bet,” Carson muttered, then caught a warning glance from Mamaw.
“The amount of food one eats doesn’t imply the appreciation of the food,” Mamaw said, picking up her fork. “Harper never was a big eater, if I recall. Dora, you’ve always had a healthy appetite.”
Dora flushed and stared at her plate, heaped with food.
The dinner conversation took a turn for the worse when Dora began to complain about how the island had changed, how much she missed its sleepier days, and how the Northerners—especially Manhattanites—were destroying the South all over again, this time using dollars and loose morals as bullets.
Divorce or no divorce, Carson thought Dora needed to be taken down a peg. To Harper’s credit, however, she seemed to have her own method. Harper ignored Dora’s comments, focusing instead on cutting her shrimp and okra into ever-smaller pieces, which was driving Dora to bristle more than any comeback could.
As soon as the dessert of banana pudding was finished, Mamaw rose and announced that she was tired and going to retire. Then she suggested that the girls do the dishes, seeing as how Lucille had worked all day preparing the meal.
Dora immediately left to check on Nate, with a promise to return. Harper and Carson went into the kitchen and faced, flummoxed, a mountain of dirty dishes, pots, and pans.
“Welcome home!” Carson called out, grabbing a towel from the counter.
Harper grinned wide and walked across the room to take an apron from the wall hook. “I don’t think I remember how to wear one of these things,” she said with a laugh as she slipped the loop over her head. The apron was pale green with ruffles along the shoulder straps and hem. Her hands fumbled with the strings behind her back. “I haven’t worn one since I was maybe ten. In fact, I think this is the same apron.”
Carson laughed and stepped behind her. She tied the apron strings tight. Her sister had always been little, and it didn’t look like she’d grown much since she was ten. “I think you’ve actually got an eighteen-inch waist.”
“Me and Scarlett O’Hara,” she quipped, walking to the sink.
Carson rolled up her sleeves and turned on the radio. Country music blared out.
“I see Lucille still loves her country tunes,” Carson said. “Do you remember how the radio was always blasting out her music?”
“That or baseball games. I don’t think I’ve listened to country music much at all since I was last here.”
“Me neither,” Carson said. She gave Harper a quick glance. “I’d forgotten how much I loved it.”
“Me too!”
As they washed and dried the mountain of dishes, they shuffled their feet and sang out refrains about love lost and found, regrets and hopes, red dogs, and sexy black dresses. The time flew by as they began sharing bits of their own stories with the lyrics. Gradually, the ice that had formed over dinner began to thaw.