The Owl and Moon Cafe by Jo-Ann Mapson

Author:Jo-Ann Mapson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2006-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

“Mama?” Allegra said into the telephone at Al’s “beach house,” a four-thousand-square-foot palace that she told him was as far from a beach house as Camp David was a Y camp. “I’m not coming home tonight. I just wanted to let—”

“You’re not coming home?” Gammy said. “Alice, are you going back in the hospital?”

“No, Mama. I’m fine. I’m spending the night with Al.”

“Have you lost your mind?”

Allegra sighed, while Al kissed the back of her neck. “Mama, Al asked me to marry him tonight. I said yes. I’m staying at his place. I called so you wouldn’t worry when I didn’t come home. Mama? Are you still there?”

Bess gave a heavy sigh. “Alice, the minute you turned fifteen you were as wild as duckweed. You nagged me for hiphugger bell-bottom pants and money to hear rock bands. You sneaked cigarettes whenever you got a chance. I let you go to one concert in San Francisco and boom, suddenly you’re on the road like that Jeff Kerouac. I probably should have called the cops, reported you a runaway, but how could I when it was my own fault for not chaining you to your bed? I did the only other thing I could, which was turn it over to our Lord. Then you come home, pregnant with Mariah. I bit my tongue and helped you raise her. She turned out to be such a good girl, but she didn’t escape the Moon family curse.”

“Mariah’s a grown woman, Mama. When are you going to stop judging us on getting pregnant outside of marriage?”

“Be that as it may, now you’re calling to tell me you’re spending the night just because the man said he wants to marry you. I’m sorry. I don’t care if you’re fifteen or fifty, Alice, marriage is a holy sacrament. The fun stuff comes after you get the ring. Now you call a taxi and come on home.”

Allegra could hear Lindsay squealing in the background. Did she say engaged? Is it to Doc? “Mama, be serious. I’ve just been through chemo. We are not having sex. Even if we were, it’s not like I’m going to get pregnant. If my ovaries had any eggs left I’m sure they got fried.”

“Alice, your words are arrows in my heart. How are you going to explain this at the pearly gates? Good gravy, Lindsay, will you hold on a second?”

Next, Allegra heard some muffled conversation, while Al nibbled her ear. Oh, it felt good to be with someone who wasn’t afraid you were going to give him cancer. Whenever she felt well enough to run the café register, people set the money on the counter and it hurt her to think they saw her as infectious.

Don’t listen to Gammy, Lindsay was saying. A person should take a chance to be happy no matter what.

“You hear that?” Gammy said.

“Hear what?”

“Me holding the phone to my creaky knees attached to my legs with the varicose veins that could burst any minute. I’m kneeling down for your immortal soul, Alice.

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