Fiction Friday: Good Fences

I wrote this short story during my undergraduate years at Florida International University.  It won the FIU Literary Award for Fiction.  Enjoy!

The Norfolk County Fair’s cooking, canning, and crafting pre-contest mixer was well into its second hour when Bonnie Mae Delacroix made her entrance. The first person she recognized was her own daughter, Tara, making her way through the crowd of women towards her.

            “You are not going to believe what Laura Jean’s been up to already,” Tara said to her mother, taking Bonnie Mae’s hand and leading her towards the main stage.

            “Tara, the reason I’m late is because I didn’t want to ride over here with that woman. I’d like to get a drink and something to eat before I have to see her.” Bonnie Mae tried to protest, but her daughter kept pulling her through the crowd.

            “I don’t want you to talk to her, I just want you to see what she’s gone and done.” Tara stopped and pointed up at the stage. “Just look up there and see.”

            Bonnie Mae looked up at the stage. There in the middle of the grandstand was a small table with a lemon meringue pie sitting right in the center. A perfect circle of countless years’ worth of blue ribbons ringed the pie. There was no question in Bonnie Mae’s mind that the pie belonged to Laura Jean Delacroix – the woman who had taken her place as wife to Douglas John Delacroix III over two decades ago. No one else had ever won so many blue ribbons.

            “Well, doesn’t that just take the cake?” Bonnie Mae raised her brow line and shook her head in disgusted disbelief.

            “At least the pie,” Tara Delacroix said, jabbing her aging mother in the side, waiting to see if Bonnie Mae had gotten the joke.

            Bonnie Mae spied Laura Jean’s perfectly coifed red hair coming towards them through the spectrum of ash blonds and grays. Bonnie Mae knew she wouldn’t have long at the mixer till Laura Jean caught wind of her presence. Bonnie Mae was just like honey to Laura Jean’s buzzing personality. Bonnie Mae could hardly ever find a moment’s peace. It was almost all she could take, having to live next door to Laura Jean and share the things they fatefully had to share. Bonnie Mae knew she shouldn’t be surprised at the spectacle of the pie and Laura Jean’s ribbons lording over the whole congregation of fellow competitors. Still, something about its presence, glowing in that tiny pinpoint of light, made Bonnie Mae start to shake with anger.

            “There you are, Dear, I thought you were going to ride over with me. I knocked at your door, but you never answered,” Laura Jean said.

            Bonnie Mae clasped her hands together to hide the trembling. “I must have been in the shower. I hope I didn’t cause you any fuss.”

            “No, not really. I was a bit late getting here to set up. But, I can’t really blame you.” Laura Jean placed her hand delicately on Bonnie Mae’s shoulder. “Don’t worry, I won’t let it ruin this night for me.”

            Laura Jean’s comment dug its stinger deep into Bonnie Mae’s countenance. It was just like Laura Jean to kill with kindness. Bonnie Mae just nodded and smiled in response, which was her normal reaction to Laura Jean’s antics, but deep down inside, she was boiling over. All she wanted to do was leave the mixer and go home and have a good stiff drink. It wasn’t as if she herself was entering any of the competitions. Bonnie Mae merely showed up as a social obligation. She had been too timid and unwilling to face the conflict that would surely arise if Bonnie Mae were ever to enter against Laura Jean.

            “Nice pie, Laura Jean,” Tara said, pointing up at the stage, taking the conversation in a new direction.

            “Thank you, honey. Wasn’t it just so sweet of the committee to allow me to showcase one of my pies during the mixer? I suggested it to them yesterday. I thought it was fitting since it is my twenty-fifth year entering the contest. And with Douglas passing recently, well, I felt this would just cheer me right up.” Laura Jean leaned in close to Tara’s ear. “And give all those bitties out there a look at what they’re up against.”

            “Well, you are not the queen of the pie world, Laura Jean. Maybe someone will come along this year and knock that crown off your head.”  

            Tara and Laura Jean looked at her, puzzled as much as Bonnie Mae was puzzled at herself. She had never lashed out at Laura Jean before; she had wanted to and fantasized about it daily, but it had only ever been a carefree wile of hers.

            Laura Jean decided to take the comment in stride. This was a rare gesture on her behalf. “Well, we know that person won’t be you.” Laura Jean gave a shrill laugh, patted Bonnie Mae on the back, and resumed making the rounds, leaving Bonnie Mae and Tara in her wake.

            Laura Jean’s comment struck a deep chord in Bonnie Mae. She had always wanted to enter the pie contest. But the last twenty-five years had molded Bonnie Mae into a submissive being – all in the name of peace and harmony, but now the children were grown and her ex-husband had been dead nearly a whole month. There was very little reason for keeping the halcyon Bonnie Mae had been so resolute in maintaining. Looking up at that lemon meringue pie one last time before leaving the mixer, Bonnie Mae started thinking that maybe it was about time she took charge of the situation and put Laura Jean in her place once and for all.                                                                                                                                      

~

            “Well,” Laura Jean said rather loudly and slightly slurred. “I call this meeting of G.R.I.T.S. to order.” She raised her third tumbler of Jack and water up high. It was the day after the mixer and the day before the competition in the pie category would begin. The women of Mockingbird Lane were gathered around Laura Jean’s card table on the sun porch for their weekly social.

            “What did she say?” Mildred Durst, the town matriarch, said as she leaned over to her spinster daughter, Sally.

            “The meeting,” Sally yelled. “It’s startin’, Mama,”

            “Then where the hell is my drink?” The ancient lady replied in just as loud a tone.

            “Good Lord! It’s right there in your hand, Mildred,” Bonnie Mae Delacroix hollered at her from across the round table the five women were seated at.

            The four women put down their cards and gazed at her with surprise.

            “Mother! I’ve never heard you raise your voice so!” Tara Delacroix was wide-eyed, amused at her mother’s comments.

            “Is something wrong, Sugar?” Laura Jean tapped Bonnie Mae on the shoulder with a dramatic look of worry on her face.

            “I’m fine, Laura Jean.” Bonnie Mae put forth a smile.

            “Would you like us to wait for you so you can go and put some lipstick on?” Laura Jean shuffled her cards back and forth, waiting for an answer.

            “Whatever do you mean?” Bonnie Mae was confused by the question.

            “Well, it looks like you forgot to put some on,” Laura Jean said. “I didn’t know if you wanted to be out in public like that or if it was a mistake.”

            “I’m ok,” Bonnie Mae said, embarrassed. “Let’s continue.”

            Laura Jean resumed her attention on her cards. Bonnie Mae watched Laura Jean’s bright red hair bounce back and forth as she swayed her head to Santo & Johnny on the radio. She had no poker face, and Bonnie Mae could see that she was holding a great hand by the way Laura Jean licked her lips. In all the years they had lived side-by-side, Bonnie Mae had come to know all of Laura Jean’s faces.

            Sex-pot red, that’s what Laura Jean tells everyone her hair color’s called, but that Jenna at the salon has a big mouth. You vain old bag, I know your nasty secret.

            Bonnie Mae was becoming quite comfortable with the dark and sinful thoughts she had been having lately about Laura Jean. Ever since Douglas John Delacroix had died, Bonnie Mae had started to dream wicked dreams that she would set fire to Laura Jean’s house and watch it burn down to the ground from the safety of her own home. The only hint of remorse in her was that the lovely old magnolia that grew between their two properties would be lost.

            When Douglas had married Laura Jean only three short years after their own marriage had dissolved, Bonnie Mae had been fine about the whole deal. When Douglas and Laura Jean bought the house next door to Bonnie Mae, because it would be good for the children to have both parents close by, she just smiled and said nothing that would hinder their plans. But that had been decades ago, and the years had been endless, and since Douglas’s death, the fair mixer Bonnie Mae was beginning to regret ever being so complacent.

            “So, Tara, how’s things over in Vidalia?” Sally asked, breaking the momentary pause in banter. She looked up from her cards through her silver bangs at Tara and smiled at the young woman.

            Bonnie Mae’s daughter eased back into her wicker chair and smiled at Sally. “Well, I’ve met someone.” She twisted a strand of her yellow curly hair around her finger in a casual manner while trying to concentrate on her hand.

            “Really?” Laura Jean’s curiosity was sparked by the new news of her step-daughter’s love life. “Who is he? What’s his name? When do we get to meet him?”

            The other women at the table looked at Laura Jean peculiarly, even old Mildred. Bonnie Mae patted Tara’s hand, and the mother and daughter shared a brief knowing glance at each other before Tara answered her stepmother’s question.

            “Why, Laura Jean!” Tara said in an exasperated tone, her green eyes sparkling with mischief. “Now you know that I’m a lesbian, what silly questions to ask!”

            “Even I knew that.” Mildred let out a short laugh and slapped Laura Jean on the shoulder. “And I’m a cranky old bat!”

            “Well, Sugar, I am always hoping that you’ll grow out of that nonsense.” Laura Jean picked her teeth with one of her long pink fingernails. “The Lord didn’t design us to be doin’ those kinds of things with other women. It just ain’t right. I tell you, and you’re such a pretty girl, you could have a fine husband.”

            Tara rolled her eyes at her mother while Laura Jean prattled on. Bonnie Mae smiled slightly at her daughter and squeezed her hand in support, but inside Bonnie Mae was finding her patience with Laura Jean growing quite thin.

            “You lecturing about it over and over again ain’t going to change her,” Bonnie Mae said. “So just end your milk-box sermon and let the girl have some peace!”

            Laura Jean glared at Bonnie Mae and then cast a sweet smile over to Tara. “I just want you to be happy, Sugar.” Laura Jean slowly laid her cards down on the table. “Full house. I guess I win again as always.”

            Bonnie Mae coughed lightly as she put her cards down on the table. “Royal Flush. I guess you don’t win this time.”

            “Well, everyone gets lucky now and then,” Laura Jean said.

            “We had those lesbians around when I was young,” Mildred spoke up while grabbing a handful of sugar-glazed pecans from a crystal bowl. “I even knew some by name. None of them ever tried to put the moves on me. Kinda disappointed me cause I was a pretty thing back then.”

            “Mama!” Sally moved the crystal bowl away from her mother as an act of silent scolding for chewing while talking. “The things you say sometimes.”

            “It’s true, Sally girl. Not that I wanted to do those man/woman things with them, just wanted to know that I was attractive. Everyone wants to know they are wanted, that they are special. Nothing wrong with that.” Mildred retrieved the bowl with a violent tug.

            “Can you believe the pie contest is tomorrow?” Laura Jean said in a loud and clear tone that seemed to rise up into the whitewashed rafters of the country house. She beamed lovingly at yet another lemon meringue pie that she had baked, which now sat in the middle of the table. She touched the pumpkin colored earthenware pie dish with the tips of her manicured fingers. “I don’t know where I’ll put another blue ribbon.” Laura Jean swept back her hand to direct attention to the beadboard wall, which housed all her years’ worth of first-place ribbons in the pie category. She must have stayed up late the night before restoring her ribbons to their rightful places.

            Bonnie Mae’s hands began to shake once again at the mention of the bake-off. For twenty-five years, Laura Jean and berated her baking and cooking attempts with sweet, but vile comments. Just enough belittling so that Bonnie Mae never considered contributing to a holiday meal or to one of the G.R.I.T.S. meetings ever.

            “What will you enter this year, dear?” Mildred asked. Apparently, the mint julep had helped her hear more clearly. She poked Sally in the side and thrust her pewter cup into her daughter’s hands for a refill.

            “Douglas always loved my lemon meringue pie the best.” She brushed aside a small tear from the corner of her eye. “So to honor him, it will be my sole entry this year.”

            “I think he would like that,” Sally said as she fixed a new cocktail for her mother and another Jack for Laura Jean. “It will be good for you too.”

            Laura Jean danced around the table, handing out plates to each of the ladies. Bonnie Mae trembled with hostility as she watched the pride waft off Laura Jean and fill the room, suffocating Bonnie Mae.

            “I have entered my pie this year,” Bonnie Mae said flatly

            Laura Jean whipped around to face Bonnie Mae, dropping an antique Royal Dalton Tea Rose china plate as she did so. It shattered on the rough pine floor, causing them all to flinch.

            “What the hell was that?” Mildred asked.

            “Laura Jean dropped a plate, Mama,” Sally said.

            “Is she drunk?” Mildred yelled.

            “No, mama, at least I don’t think she is.” Sally looked up at the still and silent Laura Jean.

            “What did you say, Bonnie Mae?” Laura Jean asked.

            “I’m entering my lemon meringue pie this year.” Bonnie Mae smiled up at her.

            “That’s fabulous, Mom!” Tara said, delighted. “I’ve always loved your pies; it’s a shame you don’t make them so much anymore.”

            “But you’ve never entered before.” Laura Jean glared at Tara. Her green eyes flickered in the late afternoon light.

            “I never knew you could bake, Bonnie Mae?” Sally’s gaze went back and forth between the two women.

            “I thought she was smart enough to leave the baking to me.” Laura Jean laughed. “I’ve tasted your cookin’, Hon, and believe me, it best remain out of the public eye.”

            “Everything has to be about you. All the holidays have to be about you and your cookin’ at your house.” Bonnie Mae smoothed out her tweed skirt. “Did it ever occur to you that I might want to have a holiday at my house with my family? Maybe your opinion of my bakin’ and my cookin’ is not the opinion of the rest of Georgia, and that I just might want to enter my pie at the fair?”

            “Well,” Laura Jean said, crossing her arms in front of her. “I am appalled at your behavior, Bonnie Mae. I have been nothing but a warm and wonderful friend to you and a co-parent all of these years. And I allowed you to be a member of G.R.I.T.S. It’s a special honor to be a member you know.”

            “Bullshit, Laura Jean. Your mama started this idiotic club so she’d have an excuse to drink on Sundays after church.” Bonnie Mae couldn’t believe she had just spoken a curse word out loud.

            “We have chapters throughout Georgia.” Laura Jean’s tone was as firm as her stance.

            “Yeah, chapters. Is that what you call your sister and that crazy aunt of yours over in Columbus?” Bonnie Mae laughed out loud at the thought of the so-called “other chapter” of “Girls Raised In The South.”

            “Well, if it’s been so terrible being a part of this club and being a part of this family, then you should have gotten remarried long ago and left us alone,” Laura Jean said.

            Her comment stung Bonnie Mae. She had wanted to remarry, but with the divorce and having to live so close to Douglas and his new wife, as she would always think of Laura Jean, was a wound that never seemed to have healed enough to let her get on with her life.

            “I guess with Doug dead, I can see things a bit clearer now.” Bonnie Mae sighed deeply and relished how sweet it was to get this all off her chest. “Now I see how stifled I have been living next to you all of these years. I can’t believe I haven’t gone crazy yet because you have to be the most obnoxious woman on the face of this earth!”

            “Bonnie Mae!” Sally said in a chirping voice. “I think you have gone crazy, Dear. Why would you say such things?”

            “No, Sally.” Laura Jean raised up her hand to quell her friend. “Let her speak her mind. It seems Bonnie Mae has wanted to do this for quite some time now.”

            “I’ve wanted to do this since that day you moved next door and cursed my life, and my pie is already entered into the contest.” Bonnie Mae let a satisfied smirk spread across her lips.

            “Well, I pretend to, you know. You don’t think living next to Doug’s first wife and the woman who could give him children was any picnic. You’re always so polite and kind and proper, and the kids love you and put you up on a damn pedestal all the time while I bust my ass to make them like me for twenty-some years now.”  The veins in Laura Jean’s neck were purple, throbbing webs. “I did this all so the family wouldn’t suffer and Douglas could be near his children and be happy.”

            Laura Jean stepped away from the broken bits of china that remained on the floor. “God knows how I wished I could have given him children of our own, but it was not in the Lord’s plan for me to have my own.” She looked over at Tara. “But I treated yours as my own.”

            “The children are grown up now, and Doug is dead. There is no reason that either of us should have to pretend to like each other any longer.” Bonnie Mae ignored the guilty tone Laura Jean had assumed and gave it to her matter-of-factly.

            “This is the best meeting we’ve ever had!” Mildred laughed and slapped her daughter on the leg. “Get me another drink, Sally. In fact, I think we all need a refresher.”

            “Do you really want to humiliate yourself by losing to me in the pie competition?” Laura Jean shook her head in mock sympathy. “Maybe you should try an easier division for your first year. Lemon meringue is not just a pie; it’s an art, and to make a winner, you must be an artist.”

            “I hate to break the news to you, but Doug loved my lemon meringue pie. In fact, last Christmas he told me that mine was far superior to yours.”

            Look at that face! Makes you wish Doug had actually said my pie was better. Amazing how much satisfaction comes from one tiny lie.

            “You liar!” Laura Jean clenched the back of her chair. Her knuckles were turning white from the force she exerted. “Douglas would never have said such a thing. He was a wonderful and honest man, and he loved my pie and told me so every time I made it.”

            “Doug was a bastard. You just saw what you wanted to see. If he were a decent man, he wouldn’t have cheated on you with me over the years.”

            Laura Jean’s jaw dropped open and hung slack as her eyes glazed over with shock. For the first time in all of the two ladies’ strange relationship, Laura Jean was speechless.

            Bonnie Mae didn’t know where that came from. It wasn’t true, not one bit of it. But the look on Laura Jean’s face gave her the satisfaction she had been looking for.

            “Mother? You and daddy? Really?” Tara said, shocked by the news, like the rest of the ladies.

            “Yes, once a year since we separated, on our wedding anniversary.” Bonnie Mae spoke quickly as Laura Jean’s face grew redder with each word. “I couldn’t stand your father, but he was good in bed, I will give him that much.” Bonnie Mae had never lied so blatantly in her life.

            “I knew this was going to get better,” Mildred said.

            “Shut up, Mama.” Sally glared at her mother. She turned back to the two ladies. “Please, let’s not go any further. Both of you need to calm down before you say anything more to each other.”

            “Oh, she’s already passed the line of no return.” Laura Jean’s face had turned a fierce red at Bonnie Mae’s last remark.

            They stood in silent battle on opposite sides of the round table, with Sally, Tara, and Mildred in the middle of the war. Bonnie Mae stifled a laugh as she watched Laura Jean’s rage swell.

            “Douglas was a kind and faithful church-going man. He loved my pie, he loved me, and I don’t believe any of your filthy lies.” Laura Jean’s frame began to quiver.

            “Believe what you want,” Bonnie Mae said without emotion.

            “You’re a joke.” Laura Jean’s voice was full of hate. “You’re a joke and you’re pathetic and the whole town thinks you’re a joke cause you never could get a new man after Douglas dumped your sorry ass.”

            “No, you’re the joke, cause everyone in town knows your dirty little secret.” Bonnie Mae moved slowly towards Laura Jean.

            She was surprised that Laura Jean did not move away from her as she crept closer.

            “I’ve got no secrets.” She put her hands on her hips and stood up to Bonnie Mae, who was now inches from her face.

            “Only this one,” Bonnie Mae said as she tore the red wig off Laura Jean’s head. “Did you really think we didn’t know?”

            “Bitch!” Laura Jean screamed. Her hands raced to her head, touching the fine wispy patches of grey that mottled her head.

            “Oh, Dear Lord.” Sally covered her mouth with her hands. “I never knew. It looked so real.”

            “Ha!” Mildred laughed out loud, but was interrupted by a loud hiccup that caused her to spill the remains of her beverage.

            Laura Jean backed up away from Bonnie Mae, tears streaming. She stepped on the broken plate fragments, cutting her bare feet, causing blood to seep into the blond floorboards, but she made no sounds of pain.

            “Get the hell out of my house!” Laura Jean screamed.

            Mildred watched amused as Bonnie Mae stormed out the back door and across the lawn with Tara in tow. “I know one thing, it’s going to be one hell of a pie contest.”

~

            A warm breeze blew through tent three at the Norfolk County Fair, sending strawberry, blueberry, apple, banana, and, of course, lemon aromas into tent four. They did not complain, because in tent four the cows were being shown and the breeze was greatly welcomed.

            Bonnie Mae stood opposite Laura Jean. The news of their brawl had traveled fast, and great pains had been taken to assure that the ladies were placed as far apart as possible during the contest. Bonnie Mae was a bit aggravated that Laura Jean had kept herself close to the judge of the contest. Bonnie Mae could see her batting her big fake eyelashes at the handsome man and giggling like a very old schoolgirl.

            You’re sixty two you hussy! Bonnie Mae wondered if Laura Jean was actually dumb enough to think the young man could be interested in her.

            The crowd held its breath as Laura Jean sauntered by Bonnie Mae’s cooking cubicle. Laura Jean stopped and turned to Bonnie Mae. “I just wanted to say good luck, Sugar.” Laura Jean smiled a wicked smile.

            Bonnie Mae smiled back at her, but not out of good sportsmanship.

            “Well, good luck to you, too,” Bonnie Mae said.

            They both headed for the line of competitors that were already assembled on stage. Thirteen pies were displayed on a long ebony table in front of the scaffold. Bonnie Mae took her place in line and took a deep breath. She turned her attention to the row of pies below her, trying not to look over at Laura Jean. The judges would soon begin their inspection and tasting. A great excitement rose inside Bonnie Mae. This was a new start at life for her, free of Laura Jean, free of the pushover she had been. She dreamed of the blue ribbon that would be the first of many on her beadboard wall in her kitchen.

            She looked down lovingly at her lemon meringue pie. But something was not quite right. She leaned over the edge of the stage to get a better look. Bonnie Mae gasped in horror as she realized the problem. There, lying across the middle of her fluffy peaks of meringue, was a long hair.

            Sex Pot Red. That whore!

            The synthetic hair was in grand contrast to the white and golden brown landscape of her pie top.

            It was then that Bonnie Mae realized what a crafty and clever character Laura Jean was. If she were to go and remove the hair, the judge would see her; she’d be ruined. If she left it alone, she was still ruined.

            Bonnie Mae smiled at her thoughts. She had no choice but to smile, for there was nothing else she could do. She turned and caught sight of Laura Jean, who was glancing triumphantly in her direction. Bonnie Mae gave a small wave and a knowing smile to her eternal foe, and Laura Jean returned the wave and smile. Bonnie Mae resumed her tall and proud stance on stage.

            Oh well, it makes you feel not so bad for putting cayenne in her lemon curd.

            She resisted the temptation to laugh as the judge raised his forkful of Laura Jean’s pie to his lips. At least she was first, and that made it better. Bonnie Mae gazed out into the crowd, where Tara stood watching in delight. Bonnie Mae knew the cayenne bottle was tucked safely away inside Tara’s purse. The two of them exchanged winks before Bonnie Mae resumed her watch on the fate of Laura Jean’s pie.

            There was always next year for a blue ribbon, Bonnie Mae thought as she watched the horror on Laura Jean’s face as the judge forcefully spat out her pie and asked for a glass of water.