out several photos of her and Lyle through the years. She was tempted to tuck them in the cabinets, stick them on the bathroom mirror, and maybe even slip them under the pillows on the bed. But she couldn’t do it.
“God, why didn’t I see this? I knew something was wrong, but I never thought he was cheating on me,” she groaned. “I had my head stuck in the sand so far that my scrawny butt was sticking up in the air.”
“Enough of that. That hussy might be younger, but she needs to remember that he was cheating on you the whole time. Once a two-timin’ sumbitch, always one, so she just might lose him the same way she got him someday,” Paula said as she and Mitzi maneuvered the mattress down the hallway.
Jody’s chin quivered. “Y’all pinch me and wake me up. This is all a nightmare like the one I was having this morning, isn’t it?”
Paula set her end of the mattress down and asked, “What nightmare?”
Jody told her about the tornado and then clamped a hand over her mouth. “Evidently somewhere in my subconscious, I must’ve felt that a storm was brewing.”
“Of course you did. It was a sign that there was a mental storm brewing in your life, but you are strong. We’re here for you just like we’ve always been. We’ve stuck together through everything since before we started school. We’ll get you through this,” Paula said.
“You got a gris-gris you can put on this place when we’re done?” Jody asked.
“Honey, karma will bite Lyle on the butt better than any spell I could cast on this old trailer,” Paula said. “Think about it. He’s used to having you make his meals from food you grow. He never has to lift a finger to help with anything around here other than a little garden work. She’s young, and from that Christmas picture, she’s a handful, and she’s pregnant. He’s going to pay dearly.” Paula picked up the mattress again.
Jody understood that they were trying to make her feel better, but it wasn’t working. Her stomach was in knots, her hands were clammy, and tears streamed down her face.
They came back inside and began to carry out black plastic bags of her clothing. She didn’t want any of her clothes—her hippie days were over. She’d been the other half of a couple who stood for something, and now she was nothing but a woman who’d thrown away years of her life. This all had to be a terrible nightmare. She and Lyle would laugh about it when she woke up. He’d tell her that she was the only one he’d ever loved, and everything would go back to normal. She shook that idea from her head. This was the cold hard truth—reality in a two-minute phone call.
“The bastard didn’t even have the nerve to tell me to my face.” Anger washed over her as she rolled up on her feet, got a box of matches, and stormed outside. She emptied several bags of clothing into a pile in the firepit that she and Lyle had built last year and lit them up. As she stood there watching the outfits burn, Mitzi came outside and slung an arm around her shoulders.
“Do you want the chest of drawers in the guest room? You’ll need something to put the rest of your clothes in. The closet in the living room is pretty small,” she said.
“Mama might forgive me and let me—”
“No!” Mitzi shook her head. “She’d make you miserable if you moved in with her, and besides, we’d be worried sick about you.”
Paula tossed another bag of clothing into the truck. “You don’t want to live with her. You know what I’m enduring with my mother, even though I’ve moved out.”
“Yes, I’ll take the chest.” Jody nodded. “I’ll go through my things later and throw away a lot of those clothes because I’m not going to be that woman anymore. And I want to go to Greenville this evening for fried chicken.”
“You got it,” Mitzi said. “And we’ll have bacon for breakfast in the morning.”
Chapter Five
I didn’t sleep very well. Maybe it was eating fried chicken after all these years of not having meat, or the fact that I couldn’t turn off my mind. One minute I wanted to take one of Lyle’s guns out to that ranch and shoot him dead, and the next I blamed myself for the whole thing. If I’d been prettier or younger or