Church of the Graveyard Saints by C. Joseph Greaves

Author:C. Joseph Greaves
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Torrey House Press
Published: 2019-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

18

She stood on the corner and waited for her grandfather’s pickup. When at last it rolled into view, a wisp of oily smoke trailing behind it, she waved her arms and watched in horror as it veered into the adjoining traffic lane, setting brakes screeching and car horns angrily blaring.

“Damn tourists,” he said to Addie as she climbed into the passenger seat.

“You need to be more careful.”

“Me? I been drivin this road since before it was paved.”

“And before it was striped, apparently.”

It was less than a mile to the Denny’s on Highway 160 that had played host to her grandparents’ weekly date nights since the old M & M Truck Stop closed back in 2001. As they swung into the parking lot Addie asked whether this particular Denny’s, chrome-clad in the retro style of a 1950s diner, harkened back somehow to Jess and Vivian’s courtship days.

“Nah,” he said, setting the brake. “Your grandmother was just partial to the bacon chicken sandwich is all.”

The hostess greeted Jess by name and led them through the half-empty dining room to a booth by the window where a passing waitress set a white china mug at Jess’s elbow and filled it with steaming coffee.

“For you, hon?”

“Iced tea, please.”

The waitress hesitated, as if searching for the right words, and then patted Jess on the arm before trundling back to the kitchen.

“That’s Dotty,” he said. “When your grandma and me didn’t show up last week, she called the house to make sure everything was all right.”

While Addie scanned the oversized menu, Jess gazed out the window to the EconoLodge across the highway where, in a tableau pixilated by the flash of passing cars, a couple stood arguing in the parking lot. A suitcase rested on the blacktop between them with its handle extended as the woman leaned forward, poking the man’s chest with a finger.

“Some things never do change,” Jess said, shaking his head.

Addie watched what he was watching. “Did you and Grandma ever used to fight?”

“Oh, my. Like cats and coons, till I learned a valuable lesson.”

“What lesson was that?”

“That gettin your way ain’t nearly half as important as gettin along.”

Addie enjoyed this shared confidence. She tried to recall her grandparents as a couple, the way they’d behaved in each other’s company. Vivian, of course, was a woman of strong opinions readily voiced, and yet there was an unspoken deference she seemed to pay only where Jess was concerned. Addie thought of Waylon and how as a young dog full of bark and bluster he would trot ahead of Feather on a trail ride, a study in self-confidence. Until, that is, he noticed horse and rider had turned, at which point he’d dash to resume his position, always following from the lead.

Was her grandma Vivian’s canine fealty to her husband always reciprocated? Addie could not recall a single instance of Jess talking over her grandmother or chiding her in public or disparaging something she’d said. Then again, two trucks traveling in the same direction rarely collide, and if ever they do, the impact is generally minimal.

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