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  “Oh, at The Twinkle on Commerce Street. I dropped in one evening for a quiet little dinner. Lanny was having a good day, and that sweet brother of mine told me I needed to take a break away from him. So I did. The minute I walked in the door, that very nice lady down there gave me a flyer along with the menu.”

  Maura Beth was beaming. And then she took the time to explain her shared history with Periwinkle Lattimore.

  “She sounds like most of the people living in Cherico,” Sarah Key said. “Lanny really likes it here. He works as a mechanic at Greater Cherico Ford, and he swears by how friendly everyone is. He’s not a reader, though. I’m the booklover in the family. I read everything I can get my hands on, so when I found out about the book club, I didn’t have to think twice about coming. Except I did ask Lanny about it, and he told me not to worry about him, and to go and have a good time.”

  “Well, once again we’re really glad to have you with us,” Maura Beth told her, glancing at the clock behind the front desk. “And it’s nearly time to get the meat of our meeting under way. I hope you enjoy it.”

  Maura Beth moved to the podium and was just about to open the proceedings when two latecomers walked through the front door. Periwinkle, she had been expecting, even though she had also been wondering why her best friend hadn’t shown up earlier for the buffet and all the socializing. The woman knew how to cook food with the best of them, but she also liked to enjoy it, particularly when other people gave her a break from the kitchen and had to prepare it themselves. No dainty, picky, “Oh, I couldn’t eat another bite,” girlie girl, she! The big surprise, however, was the tall, rugged man in jeans and boots trailing her with what looked like a copy of Forrest Gump in his hands. Now that had to be a last-minute development of some kind, since Periwinkle had not mentioned bringing anyone with her to the meeting.

  “Sorry we’re bringing up the rear like this,” Periwinkle announced, as the two of them found a couple of seats on the back row and quietly settled in. “Harlan and I got a little sidetracked.”

  Maura Beth caught Periwinkle’s gaze and playfully arched her eyebrows. There would be plenty of time after the review to extract the latest from her on what was going on with her “ex.”

  Then she put that out of her mind but soon found herself replacing it with another, more personal and painfully emotional speculation. Why couldn’t it have been Jeremy who had walked through that door at the last minute, giving her hope that their relationship was not over and done with? More to the point, why hadn’t she just sent that e-mail she had spent the better part of an afternoon composing and offered him an olive branch of her own?

  “Welcome to The Cherry Cola Book Club, and our first review and potluck of the year,” Maura Beth announced from her position behind the podium a few minutes later. “I know we’ve all enjoyed this delicious food that some of the members were kind enough to contribute. By the way, if you’d like to bring something for our next gathering, our very own Becca Broccoli Brachle is the person you want to talk to. Stand up so that everybody will know who you are, Becca. I’m sure she’ll be happy to get together with you later and explain the ‘double-broccoli thing’ if you’re one of the few who doesn’t know who she is or what on earth I’m talking about.”

  There was muted laughter and a sprinkling of applause as Becca popped up briefly, nodding her head and waving.

  “But now it’s time to get down to club business,” Maura Beth continued. “As you all know, we will be reviewing and commenting on Winston Groom’s Forrest Gump. First, let me call your attention to the movie posters we’ve placed around the room.” She began gesturing broadly. “On one side we have Tom Hanks as Forrest Gump sitting on that iconic bench by the bus stop, just waiting for someone to come along and listen to his stories. On the other side we have Tom Hanks accepting the Oscar he won for his outstanding portrayal.” She turned and pointed to the circulation desk. “And there at the checkout counter we have a capture of that celebrated actress Sally Field as the devoted Mrs. Gump.”

  Connie McShay quickly raised her hand, jangling her multicolored, beaded bracelet to get everyone’s attention. “And just for the record, folks, those posters didn’t cost the library a cent. That was an issue last time out with certain local politicians who shall remain nameless but who are well-known to one and all.” Then she glanced around the room. “And unless they’re hiding in the closet, none of them is present tonight.”

  “Thank you, Connie,” Maura Beth said, winking at her friend smartly. “So back to our review tonight. We like to say here in the club that outside-the-box angles make for a livelier and more personal discussion, and we hope we’ll achieve that once again.” She glanced down to consult her notes. “A couple of our esteemed members have already proposed questions, so I thought we would go ahead and tackle those first.”

  She pointed toward Justin Brachle and Douglas McShay, who were sitting next to each other on the front row. “These two fellas here proposed that we discuss the football aspects of the Forrest Gump plot since the character played the game for Bear Bryant. From that starting point, I believe they intended to apply the old adage that football is indeed a religion here in our Deep South.”

  “Who can deny that?” Becca said, shrugging her shoulders with a resigned expression on her face. “Our husbands are living proof. Certain wives, for that matter. Okay, I’ll confess—I’m probably an example of football worship myself to a certain extent. But we women are nowhere near as bad as the men down here. They might find the time to go to church maybe once a year around Christmas if we nag them enough. On the other hand, you better believe they don’t miss a college or pro game during the regular season, the bowl season, the playoffs, and, of course, they wouldn’t dare miss the Super Bowl. That would be a betrayal of their gender.”

  Justin raised his fist. “Super Bowl rules! Right, Doug?”

  “Right!” But Douglas kept his hands in his lap as Connie gave him a skeptical stare.

  “Maybe I should just come up there to the podium and remove all doubt about this,” Becca said, gesturing toward Maura Beth. “I have this little tale to tell. And it’s all true, I swear.”

  Maura Beth smiled back. “By all means. Enlighten us.”

  Becca took the podium and in no time was in the midst of her story. “Well, to cut to the chase, I’ve kept in touch with some of my Chi O sisters since I graduated from Alabama.” She paused, took a deep breath, and let out a modest, “Roll, Tide!” There was a mixed reaction to her subdued cheer from the crowd, many of whom were fans of the two SEC schools in Mississippi, but Becca brushed off their lack of enthusiasm and continued.

  “Sorry. I couldn’t help it. As I said, it’s not like I haven’t taken part in this pigskin worship, too. I like to think that I’ve been more reasonable about it, of course. Anyway, back to the contact with my sorority sisters. You know the type of thing I’m getting at—you exchange Christmas cards with the newsletters that fall out when you open them up, birth announcements with pictures and so forth. Well, as it turns out, three of the girls I’ve kept up with somehow all managed to marry LSU grads, and the six of them do practically everything together. Now, what are the odds of that, I ask you? Sounds like some sort of lame reality show, doesn’t it? But in the world of football, it’s what’s called a mixed marriage, and it’s every bit as difficult to manage as one that involves race or religion, believe me. Sometimes it can get even worse. Perfect example was the 2011 season. It was for all the marbles for the ’Bama and LSU fans. LSU beat ’Bama during the regular season in Tuscaloosa, but my Tide beat the Tigers the second time when it counted down in the Superdome for the National Championship.”

  That raised the level of buzzing throughout the crowd, but Becca just stood there smiling and looking innocent until it tailed off. “So now I’ve set up the story for you. The payoff is that those three LSU husbands were so hot and bothered that their beloved Tigers had lost the game—hey, they were even blanked, 21-0—that they all withhe
ld the other kind of hot and bothered in the boudoir that night back in their hotel rooms in the French Quarter. All my ’Bama girlfriends wanted was a little mattress magic, but the boys weren’t having any and said, ‘No, ma’am, not tonight!’ Can you believe men would give up . . . you-know-what like that?”

  Most of the men in the crowd sprang to life over the comments, almost as if someone had lit a match and given them each a hot foot. And Douglas seemed to be speaking for all of them when he said, “It’s not as crazy as it sounds, but it’s easier to believe the other way around. Women are pretty good at that withholding business themselves. Hey, we’ve all been there.”

  Connie balled up her fist and punched her husband on the arm. “Douglas, I can’t believe you said that in front of all these people!” Then she inched closer to him and whispered out of the side of her mouth. “Everyone will get the wrong impression about us.”

  He was massaging his bicep, and the scowl on his face indicated she had hit him a bit harder than was necessary. “We’re all grown-ups here, aren’t we? It’s not the first time adults have discussed the subject of withholding sex.”

  “And it won’t be the last,” Becca added, giving her Stout Fella a stern look as she headed back to her seat. But he did not respond, staring straight ahead at the podium as if he had not even heard her.

  Maura Beth knew she must try to dissipate the tension in the room quickly, so she consulted her notes once again and cleared her throat with authority. “Be that as it may, we were supposed to be talking about football as a religion and the plight of football widows. And somewhere along the way, we were supposed to be relating it all to the plot of Forrest Gump. Please, let’s try not to forget that and return to those topics, why don’t we?”

  “I’ll bite,” Periwinkle said, getting to her feet and moving to the front to face the crowd as Maura Beth stepped aside. “There’s a lot to cover on the subject of the football widow.” She began moving back and forth slowly and deliberately, giving a passable imitation of a lawyer addressing a jury in a courtroom trial. “Now, let’s examine some of the evidence we wives—or ex-wives in my case—know to be factual. First, everything is often indeed on hold when it comes to men getting their football fix. And I do mean everything—with no exceptions. I have a good friend over in Corinth—and I’m not about to reveal her identity—whose husband waited until halftime of the big game to get his first glimpse of their fourth child in the hospital. Just happened during this past football season, matter a’ fact. He figured it was all no big deal by the time they’d had three, and he managed his time pretty doggone well as he raced the clock, his wife told me. He worked in a kiss on the forehead to her and a peck on the cheek to their latest bouncing baby boy with some sweet talk thrown in and still got back to the flat-screen TV in the waiting room before the third quarter started. Last time I heard from her, she said she was seriously thinking of nicknaming this last child Halftime.”

  The laughter that followed eased the tension somewhat, but it took the gathering by surprise when a voice from the back row posed the question, “May I add something to your insights there, counselor?”

  Most everyone turned in their seats to see the man who had come in with Periwinkle out of his chair with a twinkle in his eye.

  “Now that was very clever,” Periwinkle put in. “So why don’t you get on up here and finish what you started? Ladies and gentlemen, this is my ex-husband, Harlan Lattimore.”

  He was soon standing beside her, scanning the crowd with that rugged smile of his. “Well, the gist of it is, I’m here to say before all a’ you good witnesses that I was as guilty as the next fella when it came to ignoring his wife during football season. If I’d paid more attention to my wife in general, football or no football, I believe Peri and me’d still be married. But, fellas, let’s be honest here. Some of us really are fanatics about the game. I’ve got my share of customers who spend most of Saturday afternoon at the bar guzzling beer, peeling shrimp, and watching the games with their wives nowhere in sight. It’s become the most important thing in their lives, I do believe. Now, I read this Forrest Gump book here because Peri was so high on your book club. Seemed like it was something we might do together.”

  He reached over and rubbed her arm gently a couple of times, looking her straight in the eye. “So that’s what I’m doing. As I told Peri here on the way over, I’m not much of a reader, but I liked this book. I thought this Forrest Gump was a fine fella with a great sense a’ humor who tried hard, whatever he undertook; and I just wanted to say to you right here tonight, Peri, that if I’d tried as hard as Forrest Gump did in his relationship with that pretty Jenny Curran, I know for dang certain we’d still be married to each other.”

  A few of the women in attendance let out an “Aww!” for starters; then there was light applause that briefly grew louder before finally dying out. Maura Beth, however, was astonished to see that Periwinkle was actually blushing, something she had never witnessed in the six years of their friendship.

  “And furthermore to that,” Harlan continued, “I think this Winston Groom fella who wrote this was smart as a fox to connect Forrest Gump with Bear Bryant the way he did. Why, you can’t go wrong in the Deep South if you talk about legends like that. A whole lotta people will take a peek, even ones who aren’t Alabama fans.”

  “Yes, I believe the idea was to have the fictional character present for many watershed moments of the twentieth century, and it obviously worked quite well,” Maura Beth said.

  “That’s what I liked most about the novel,” Nora Duddney put in next. “All the iconic figures during the time I was growing up are there—JFK, Lyndon Johnson, the first astronauts. Even though Forrest Gump was a fictional character, that made him seem all the more authentic, giving him a place in the march of history like that. There were times that I forgot he really didn’t participate in all those events. There’s brilliance in that concept.”

  “Good insight,” Maura Beth said, smiling generously at her new friend and confidante.

  “I kinda thought of Forrest Gump as Everyman, myself,” said Justin Brachle. “You know, not the two-word version but the one-word spelled with a capital E.”

  “Excellent point, Justin,” Maura Beth added with a grin, “and I think Forrest Gump would have explained it exactly the way you just did. And I mean that in a complimentary way, of course.”

  Justin beamed, puffing out his big chest. “Stout Fella thanks you. And I agree that Forrest Gump seemed real, since he ended up playing football for The Bear. It made me want to be him because I was just a small potatoes quarterback at Millsaps. Our big rival was Sewanee—the Methodists versus the Episcopalians, ya know.”

  Miss Voncille’s hand shot up. “This has all been very interesting, I’m sure, but haven’t we talked about this football angle enough? We get it. Some people love their football, and others take the game too seriously. Then that leads to marital problems and yada, yada, yada. If you’ll permit me to say so, there are lots more important things to fight over than football. So I respectfully propose that we move on to discussing the Vietnam angle of the plot that I submitted to Maura Beth. I’m sure I’m not the only one here tonight who’s interested in discussing that.”

  “I’m just one person,” Mamie Crumpton said, thrusting out her bosom as usual. “I don’t mind the football topic, but I think we’ve had more than enough of this sex talk. Let’s return it to the bedroom where it belongs.”

  Ever the diplomat, Maura Beth scanned the gathering and said, “Well, what do you say, people? Show of hands to move on?”

  Everyone appeared to have had their fill of the men versus women topic, as there were far more hands up than down. Periwinkle and Harlan resumed their seats. Maura Beth consulted her notes once again and then motioned to Miss Voncille. “Please come up and get this part of the discussion started, then.”

  Miss Voncille rose from her seat on the front row, her face solemn and her pace to the podium deliberate. There was an init
ial grand exhalation; then she began reading from a prepared speech, looking up now and then to make eye contact. “My years as a schoolteacher serve me well tonight. If I know nothing, it’s how to organize my thoughts in a cogent manner. So I will begin by saying that our country hasn’t been the same since the Vietnam War. We had some politicians—and you know who they are—who wanted to have it both ways: trying to please those who wanted to win the war, while placating those who wanted us to withdraw from it unconditionally. The media began to take sides, of course, and I’m inclined to think that that’s when objective journalism began to die in this county. The press stepped away from merely reporting and started advocating. When the war was finally over and done with, some came home—but many didn’t. The phrase life and limb comes to mind. Some gave their lives, as Bubba Blue did, dying in Forrest Gump’s arms. Others gave their limbs, as Lieutenant Dan Taylor did, Forrest Gump’s commanding officer. They weren’t real people, but they represented real people. Too many to count, unfortunately.”

  Miss Voncille paused to take another breath for courage. “Meanwhile, back in the real world we all live in, I found myself affected by another phrase—missing in action. My connection to the war—Sergeant Frank Gibbons of Corinth, Mississippi—never came home. As many of you know, his status remains MIA. I never got the kind of closure that Forrest Gump did as he neatly concluded every episode of his fascinating life journey. That was entertaining fiction, but the MIA issue is a heartbreaking one for those of us who live on. It’s always in the back of our minds, dogging us no matter how many years have passed. If only we could close that chapter of our lives as easily as we could finish and close up a copy of Forrest Gump. And that’s what I wanted to say here to all of you tonight. I needed to try and once again exorcise my demons, and I thank you for listening.”

  The gathering was stunned, to say the least. No one said anything—not even Locke Linwood—and there was no applause as Miss Voncille headed toward her seat.