The Scandalous Summer of Sissy LeBlanc (37 page)

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within the realm of possibility, almost. The thought of finally going all

the way with Parker was exciting. She moved in closer and felt he was

excited, too. But he was too honorable to leave Doreen stranded.

Okay, she’d get him to make a late date with her. Tonight. Two

A.M. She’d climb out the window and meet him at the corner. And

maybe when he kissed her and touched her skin, it wouldn’t be so

bad. Maybe the image of the weasel wouldn’t slip in between them,

but she suspected Peewee had embedded it in her brain for all time.

She wondered if Parker thought nice girls aren’t supposed to like it.

Maybe all the boys did. Maybe they were right and she wasn’t a

nice girl. She looked up at him. He smiled and pressed her gently to

him, his lips on her hair.

It wouldn’t be fair. With his grades and his football record, he

was sure to get the appointment to the Naval Academy he had

worked so hard for. He had a big future ahead of him. Her daddy

said so. Everyone said so. Would he still have a future with a wife

and child dragging him down?

“Can I come over tomorrow? We need to talk.” His voice rum-

bled through her and Sissy felt a throb down there. She stroked the

hair on the back of his neck. Tomorrow would be as good as

tonight. They could park somewhere in the woods. Even go to

Manchac and rent a boat, do it in the swamps. He kissed the top of

her head and Sissy was caught up in the romance of gliding through

those misty waters in a pirogue with Parker.

But if the boys talked, and she knew how boys talked, neither

one would want to marry her! And even if Parker did want to, the

Naval Academy wouldn’t take him if he was married. She won-

dered if any college would. In the movies, football players went on

dates with sorority girls. Did they let married men play football?

Did they give scholarships to fathers? The child she was carrying

wouldn’t even look like him.

The music stopped. “What do you say?”

Sissy hesitated, but just for a moment. “I can’t. I’m going steady

with Peewee.”

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* * *

daughter could drop out of high school to marry the spawn of

Bourrée LeBlanc!” yelled Belle Cantrell as she stormed through the

door. It was a week before Christmas. Bowers of mistletoe and

holly decked the living room. A large pine tree stood in the corner.

The creche Belle’s husband had carved for Cady stood watch over

the family from the mantelpiece.

“I’m almost seventeen,” said Sissy, but she was glad her grand-

mother was making such a fuss.

“I suppose that makes it all right for you to give up your educa-

tion to wash that boy’s socks! Dammit, Sissy, I’ve put every dime I

could scrape up into your college fund.”

“She’s pregnant, Belle,” said Hugh.

“Of course she’s pregnant, why else would a woman with any

sense get married?”

“Mama,” objected Cady, propped up on the couch, looking gray.

The cancer they’d all feared had come back. The doctors were talk-

ing about another operation, but nobody was optimistic this time.

Sissy, sitting on the floor at Cady’s feet, covered her mother’s lap

with a shawl.

“I know you did it for love,” Belle said to her own daughter. “But

I said a woman with sense. Now, Sissy’s got sense, but she’s still a

girl. What are you going to do if that boy decides to up and leave

you? You won’t even have a high school education.” Belle lowered

herself into a wing chair. In her late fifties, she was still a handsome

woman, with auburn hair swept up on her head and fastened with

an art deco comb. She wore a broad-shouldered rust-colored jacket

with a pinched waist over a straight skirt. She had a red camellia

pinned to her shoulder in an effort to look festive, but it was obvi-

ous Belle didn’t feel festive.

“What about you?” Sissy asked. “You eloped with Grandpa

when you were just sixteen.”

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Belle paused. Sissy remembered stories about how wild her

grandmother had been to marry her big, taciturn dairy farmer. “I’ve

had to live with that decision for forty years. Don’t do it, baby, life’s

too long.”

“What do you all want me to do?” Sissy asked.

“You’re not some country girl who has to get married just because

she got caught,” Hugh said, trying to warm himself in front of

the fire.

“How pregnant are you?” Belle wanted to know.

“About two months, I guess. My last period was ten weeks ago.”

“Good! We’ll get you an abortion and afterward, we’ll get you fit-

ted for a diaphragm,” said Belle firmly, her tone brooking no objec-

tions. “Then you can screw like a rabbit, if that’s what you want.”

“Mother!” Cady protested. “Now you just stop it.”

But Belle was flying. “She’s not a breeding machine, who has to

drop a baby just because she’s able to conceive one.” She turned to

Sissy. “I found someone who’ll do it.” Sissy’s green eyes lit up, her

heart was pounding with relief. Was it still possible? But Belle

didn’t look happy. “There’s a woman out by Big Creek who’s sup-

posed to be reliable.”

“No!” Sissy screamed.

“Now, hush, Sissy, her name is Sarah Miller. She’s been doing it

for years, apparently.”

“Tibor told me about her. The police let her operate as a kind of

safety valve. Does mostly colored . . .” Hugh’s voice trailed off. He

shook his head as if to get rid of his thoughts.

“What about those hospitals you told me about, Grandma? With

doctors?”

Hugh, Belle, and Cady looked from one to another, embarrassed.

“I told you I’d heard about them, honey. I didn’t say I actually

knew of any around here.”

“I checked,” said her father. “There’s a doctor in New Orleans

who used to do them, but he’s under indictment.”

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Sissy screamed, “Shit!” No one told her not to swear. She

reached for her mother. “Please, Mama, don’t make me.” And for

the first time since she’d found out, Sissy let herself go and cried. All

the fear and grief and anger she’d held back came out in terrible,

soul-wrenching sobs. “Don’t let them kill me.”

Cady stoked her daughter’s hair and squared her frail shoulders.

“Nobody’s going to make you do anything,” she said, glaring at her

husband and mother. “Nobody, you hear? I’m not risking my

daughter’s life on some backwoods abortionist.”

Belle suddenly looked much older than her years. “I’ll talk to

your cousin Loreen over in Little Rock. Maybe you can stay there

until the baby’s born.”

Sissy sat up. “That mealymouthed hypocrite! She’d spend the

whole time lecturing me about being a fallen woman. I’d rather die!”

“Look at it this way,” Hugh said. “When it’s over, you can get on

with your life. You can finish high school and go to college. You’ll

just be a year behind.”

“Just a year?” Sissy said sarcastically. “What do you know about

it? I’m sick every morning. I’m swelling up like some kind of horri-

ble watermelon. Even my legs are all pumped up. You can’t make

me go through nine months of . . . of . . . manufacturing this baby

and then tell me to give it away! By then, don’t you understand, it’ll

be
my
baby!”

“It won’t seem so bad after it’s over,” said Belle without convic-

tion.

“Oh, come on, Grandma, even suffragettes don’t give their babies

away.”

Hugh was fed up. “Stop being so dramatic, Sissy. Girls do it all the

time.”

“No grown woman would.”

“A grown woman can take care of a baby,” he shot back.

“So can I! Peewee’ll get a job. I’ll be an inspiration to him.” In

the face of what she felt was her father’s insensitivity, Sissy was dig-

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ging in. Even Peewee seemed better than throwing a helpless baby

out into the world and never knowing what happened to it.

There was more. A lot more. Hugh talked about the importance

of an education, about having a family when she was ready for one.

Sissy didn’t see what difference it made when she had a family. It

would all come out the same anyway. Especially since she wasn’t

looking for love. She’d be stuck in a house somewhere with a bunch

of kids. At least Peewee adored her.

And then she thought about Bourrée. Carrying his baby to term

would make him nuts. They’d live at Sissy’s until Peewee graduated.

But they’d still have dinner at the LeBlancs’ every week. And every

week Bourrée would see her getting bigger and bigger and there’d

be nothing he could do about it. Revenge was so much more satis-

fying than love.

Finally, she stormed out of the house, announcing she was going

to get married and they had two choices: give her a wedding or

watch her elope.

“What does she know about taking care of babies?” Hugh raged.

“What did any of us know?” asked Cady.

“Belle, you talk to her. She listens to you.”

But Belle was watching her own daughter. Her face had become a

mask of pain. “Cady?”

Cady reached for her mother. Belle moved to the couch, took her

daughter in her arms, and rocked her.

When the spasm passed Hugh said, “Dammit, I won’t let her ruin

her life. If she doesn’t want to go to Loreen’s, I’ll find one of those

homes for unwed mothers. I heard about one in Baton Rouge, I’ll

check it out myself. I’ll make her go.”

Cady closed her eyes. “I hate to think that my only grandchild is

going to be given away to strangers. God knows what they’ll do to

it.” A second spasm racked her body. When it passed, she said, “It

would be nice to have a baby in the house, wouldn’t it, Mama.”

“It would,” Belle agreed.

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“Are you all crazy! She’s ruining her life and that boy’s and all

you can talk about are babies!”

“She’s set on having it,” Cady said, reaching for her husband,

who was pacing the room now. “Remember how sweet you were to

me when I was pregnant? I don’t want Sissy to go through it alone

in some home in Baton Rouge.”

“You think you can hang on until the baby gets here?” Belle

asked. Cady’s face clouded over. “You’d want to hold it in your

arms.”

“I’m gonna try, Mama. I’m gonna try.” And that’s when Hugh

knew he was beaten.

Sissy and Peewee were married in a simple but tasteful ceremony

the second weekend in January. The bride wore white. Newton

Carruthers was Peewee’s best man.

The same afternoon Gentry won the state football championship.

A representative from Annapolis was on the fifty-yard line. College

scouts came from as far away as Notre Dame. Parker broke the

state record for passing and running. And he broke the national

record for most points made by a single player. As the sportswriters

were to say the next day, when Davidson gets his hands on the ball

the other team might as well leave the field. But after the game,

when the sportswriters and the scouts converged on the locker

room, Parker wasn’t there.

The Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor the month before. And

at six o’clock, while the minister was asking Peewee to take this

woman, Parker joined the Marines.

P A R T I I I

1956

The

River

of

Desire

Fourteen years of foreplay are enough for any girl.

Rule Number Forty-five

The Southern Belle’s Handbook

C h a p t e r 1 7

Parker opened the front door of the Guest House and walked

across the steamy French Quarter street. He’d been there since ten

o’clock that morning, driving the staff crazy. He’d changed rooms

three times. When he was finally satisfied, he sent the bellboy out to

buy some flowers. “Anything but roses.” Roses would have been

too obvious. He wanted it to look as if he’d gone to no special trou-

ble. He wanted everything perfect.

He spotted Sissy as soon as he opened the door to the restaurant.

The maître d’ came oiling up to him, but Parker waved him off. He

wanted to see her fresh.

She was sitting next to a cream-colored wall with dark wainscot-

ing. Yellowing Mardi Gras photos hung overhead. She was wearing

a white straw hat and a green dress that hugged her every curve.

Her cigarette made smoke signals in the air.

He sat down across from her and felt the pressure of her knees.

He could smell her, even though the kitchen was sending out the

aromas of fresh bread, sautéed garlic, and chicory coffee. She

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leaned toward him. She was wearing perfume, but under that was

the deep scent of something much more exciting.

He picked up a menu. “Did you order?”

“No.”

“Have you figured out what you want?”