“No.”
“Oh, yes,” said Mrs. Bell. “One time, when I was out of town, she had four of my camellia bushes dug up and replanted where she thought they would look better.”
“Did they?”
“Yes, but the point is she didn’t ask.”
“Ah.”
Ida called out, “Is that Mrs. Bell over there?”
“Yes, it is. Hello, Ida.”
“Hello, dear…I just want you to know that your camellias are holding up very nicely. I had a little talk with your husband’s new wife…your friend, what’s her name? She was not watering properly, but I straightened her out.”
“Onzelle Deasen?”
“Yes. Anyhow, your husband is holding up very nicely as well, although, I must say, everyone was just a teeny-tiny bit surprised when Lloyd remarried so soon after you died, but alas…you know men. I’m just glad my Herbert went first. I would hate to be in your shoes, having another woman move into my house so soon. Weren’t you surprised? Mrs. Bell?”
“I didn’t know he had remarried, Ida.”
“Oh, well…good to catch up with you, dear.”
After a few moments, Ida’s husband, Herbert, who had come up earlier that year, said, “Ida, don’t you ever think before you speak? Now you’ve upset Mrs. Bell.”
“Well, I don’t know why she would be upset. It’s not like he married a stranger or anything.”
It was true. The woman Mr. Bell had married had not been a stranger. However, when he passed away a few years later and arrived at Still Meadows, he received a very chilly reception from the first Mrs. Bell. He didn’t think he would ever see her again, much less have her find out about his second marriage. Oops. And he had bought the plot on the other side of him for Onzelle. This spelled big trouble. When she died, he was going to be stuck in between both wives for eternity. Lord, help him.
—
LATER THAT NIGHT, Ida said to her husband, “Herbert, you know I’m glad to be with you again, dear, but I am quite worried.”
“Ah, about Norma?”
“No. My column. Now that I’m gone, how will people find out the news?”
She needn’t have worried. Cooter Calvert’s daughter, Cathy, who now ran The Elmwood Springs News, had taken over the column, writing under the byline “Chatty Cathy.”
1972
As an only child, it had been hard for Norma to lose both parents. First her father, and now, only a year later, her mother had suddenly succumbed to a rare case of leukemia. She missed her mother very much, even though she had driven her crazy when she was alive.
Now she was just tired. She had been left with the daunting task of having to sell her parents’ old house and clear out all four of her mother’s storage bins. It had taken forever. Why anyone would want nineteen sets of dishes and seventy-six bird figurines was beyond her.
After her uncle Will Shimfissle passed away, Norma more or less insisted that Aunt Elner sell the farm and move into town. Ida had hidden the family Bible, so nobody really knew how old Elner was, but she was far too old to be living alone. Norma wanted her to move closer to her, so she could keep an eye on her. Aunt Elner finally agreed. “All right, honey, if it will make you feel better.”
Elner sold the farm to a friend, but she kept some of her old furniture, one old orange cat, and a few of her favorite chickens. And Norma so wished she hadn’t. Nobody in town kept chickens anymore, and she was afraid there might be complaints.
Norma had wanted Elner to buy one of the brick townhomes on the new side of town, closer to the new mall. But Elner bought the Warrens’ old house in the older part of town, with a fig tree in the side yard. She said, “I couldn’t be happy if I didn’t have a front porch to sit on and a nice backyard for my chickens.”
As it turned out, her neighbors were not bothered by the chickens at all. In fact, they got a kick out of hearing Elner sing to them. This morning, she had treated them to a rousing rendition of “When You and I Were Young, Maggie,” and everyone enjoyed it. Despite their recent move to town, her chickens just kept on laying eggs in remarkable numbers. And thanks to Elner, not one of her neighbors ever had to buy eggs (or fig preserves) again.
It meant a longer ride to Elner’s house for Norma, but one of the nice things about Elner moving to the older part of town was that she already knew her neighbors. Merle and Verbena Wheeler, who owned the Blue Ribbon Dry Cleaners, now lived directly across the street from her. And to the right of her was Ruby Robinson, a retired registered nurse, and her husband, John. Tot Whooten and her ninety-two-year-old mother lived on the other side. And they were all quite social. Their houses backed up to a large open cornfield, and when the weather was warm, they would bring their plastic chairs and sit in Elner’s yard and watch the sunset together and drink iced tea, or a beer, if you wanted.
They didn’t need a NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH sign. Between the fact that Verbena was nosy and that they all kept an eye out for one another, a burglar wouldn’t stand a chance in hell on that street. Consequently, Elner never locked her doors, a fact that made Norma somewhat concerned. But Elner said, “Honey, a burglar would be doing me a favor; I have too much stuff as it is.” It was true. Her house was a mess, and, of course, she never kept it as clean as Norma would have liked.
One day, shortly after Elner moved in, Norma noticed a large Maxwell House coffee can full of dirt sitting in the middle of Elner’s kitchen table. “Aunt Elner, what is this? Did a plant die?”
Aunt Elner laughed. “No, those are my worms. I brought them with me. They’re my pets, but they don’t know it…and they’re the cutest things. Every once in a while, one will stick its little head up and wiggle it all around. Oh, they just tickle me to death.”
“You have pet worms?”
“Yes, and they’re so easy to keep…give them some bread crumbs and throw in a few coffee grounds once in a while, and they are happy. Oh, honey, speaking of that…guess what I have for you? I found it just this morning in my yard.”
“It’s not a snail or a worm, is it?”
“No, it’s a four-leaf clover. I said to Merle, I said, ‘I’m giving that to Norma.’ I have it in the icebox.”
Norma sat at the table, staring at the can. “Aunt Elner, do those worms ever crawl out?”
“A few times, but I just pick them up and put them back.”
“Aren’t you worried about germs?”
“Oh, no. The table’s clean.”
Driving home, all Norma could do was thank God her mother hadn’t lived to see it. If Ida knew that her sister had a can of worms sitting out on her kitchen table, she would have been mortified. Norma had been only mildly horrified. But then, Norma was a clean freak. If you were visiting Norma and lit a cigarette, she emptied your ashtray before you finished it. She tried her best not to. She tried not to look; but she couldn’t help it. One day, she asked her daughter, “Linda, do you think I have obsessive-compulsive disorder?”