Meet Me at the Starlight

Chapter 15

TUESDAY

MARCH 1937

“You serve a mean pot roast, Tuesday.” Doc shoved his plate forward and patted his belly. “I’d ask for your buttery potatoes with gravy as my last meal.”

“Don’t flatter her, Doc.” Leroy lit a cigarette and shot her a wink. The knife scar down the side of his cheek was new. Longer and deeper than the one Doc bore. More evidence of his dangerous games. “Tooz already knows she’s worth a million smackeroos.”

How would he know when he was never around? After being shot, Leroy hadn’t changed. He came and went just like before, only now appearing with a knife wound.

At night, he nuzzled her with kisses, wearing down her resistance until she gave into him and pretended things were as they used to be. Afterward, he’d fall asleep with a lit cigarette dangling from his full lips.

Sleep never came easy for Tuesday on those nights when she still buzzed with his love. She’d take his cigarette downstairs, stand by the window facing the Starlight, and finish the last few puffs.

The neon light atop the roof anchored her when it felt as if life was out of her control.

“Pie for dessert?” Tuesday gathered the dishes with a glance at Doc and Lee, then called to the boys, who’d been excused to the living room. “LJ, Dup? Blueberry with a dollop of ice cream?”

“Pie? I want pie.” Dup ran in, leaned on his dad’s chair, and almost set his chin on Lee’s head. But he wasn’t quite brave enough. Lee could be a bit ... testy. Yet so affectionate, tussling with the boys in the yard, tossing the football. At the moment, Dup didn’t know which side of his pa sat at the table.

At sixteen, Dup was cute and charming, yet still awkwardly finding his way in his world. It didn’t help he had to swim in his older brother’s wake. At eighteen, LJ was a full-grown man, a chip off the Leroy block. Square-jawed, handsome, and star of every sport the school offered. Tuesday suspected his achievements were to spite his dad. See, I didn’t need you.

But Tuesday knew different. He needed Lee’s approval very much. She saw the letters he tucked into Leroy’s bag on his way to bed or out the door for school. To her knowledge, Leroy never responded.

That being said, she was still Ma around this place. “Dup, you and LJ clear the table and wash the dishes,” she said. “You can have dessert while listening to the Lone Ranger.”

“You do it, LJ. I did it last night.” Dupree casually reached for the last dinner roll, but Lee shot out of his chair and grabbed him by the collar. “Don’t you mouth off to your ma. Ever.”

Dup’s eyes filled with tears and his cheeks burned red as he cut a glance at Doc.

“Hey, boy, you look at me when I’m talking to you.” Lee was harsh because he wanted their respect. He’d forgotten it was earned.

“They’re your sons, not one of the boys on your crew,” she’d told him.

Tuesday gently touched Leroy’s shoulder as she passed toward the pie safe. “It’s all right. The boys and I sort of have a tradition. I tell them to do something, and they whine and complain, but they always mind. Isn’t that right, boys?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Dupree stepped back as Leroy released him. LJ stood with his arms folded, a defiant air about him.

“Got to be tough with boys, Doc. You had daughters, but with boys . . .” Leroy pounded his fist against his palm. “You got to make men out of them.”

“I agree. Boys are different, but, Lee, sons need love and tenderness as much as girls, if not more. I’ve seen—”

Leroy laughed. “You’re soft in your old age, Doc.”

Leroy, please. Pie should sweeten him up, though. Always did. And she’d try to get ahead of things tonight, put on her lacy nightgown and see if she couldn’t gentle him down, say some things that need saying. He took truth easier after lovemaking.

“Can I make the coffee, Tuesday?” Doc said. He’d become a regular at her table and knew how many scoops to put in the percolator.

After nursing Leroy’s gunshot wound, Doc came around every other week or so. The other day, he showed the boys how to plow up a little garden in the sandy soil and told them which crops to plant. He instructed them how to properly stack firewood and fix a leak on the roof. All the things their daddy should’ve taught them.

In turn, they took Doc to the beach and taught him to fish in the surf. He provided the Knight household with a calming, stabilizing presence. He helped with dinner and homework and read to all of them from the Psalms and Proverbs before bed.

“Pardon me.” Doc maneuvered behind her, his hand grazing her hip. He took the cups from the shelf and returned to the table, leaving his fragrance to cloud Tuesday’s thoughts.

“I could join you in Montgomery,” he said to Leroy. “If you need.”

“Might be a good idea, Doc. There’s bound to be some . . .” He shot a look at Tuesday.

“Don’t stop on my account,” she said. “You’ve been shot and sliced. I don’t think you’re a traveling salesman, Leroy.”

“How’s the rink, Tooz?” Leroy pulled her down to his lap when she set his pie in front of him. “I stopped by the bank. That new teller, Cletus, told me you’re in the black. Good to know you’re not squandering money at the beauty parlor and the dress shop.”

“Do I look like I’ve been to the beauty parlor? And I’ve had this dress since before we were married.” It still fit, thank God, even if the waist was a bit tight.

At the sink, the boys tossed suds at each other but managed to get the dishes washed, dried, and put away. “I’ll do the pots,” she said as she handed them each a large slice of pie and scoop of ice cream in white china bowls. These dishes were the only thing her grandmother left behind. “Hurry, or you’ll miss your program.”

“You should get them a new radio, Lee,” Doc said. “That old thing takes twenty minutes to warm up.”

Leroy shrugged and dug into his pie, thanked Doc for the coffee when he filled his cup, then made his way into the living room to listen to the Lone Ranger.

“Need any help with the pots?” Doc said.

“You best go in with the boys.” For the hundredth time today, Tuesday noticed the small crack running down the side of the sink window. She flipped on the light as the last of the western sunset glowed above the horizon. “I don’t want Leroy getting ideas something’s up between us. He’s not always rational.”

“What ideas might those be?” Doc leaned against the counter with a damp dish towel slung over his shoulder.

“Well, nothing, of course, but like I said, Lee’s not always rational.”

“You know why I come around, Tooz?” Doc spoke low and gazed at his polished shoes.

The warm kitchen suddenly felt cold. “Why, you—you come around to help out. Which, you know, the boys and I really—”

“If you don’t know, I’ll leave it.” He snapped the towel in the air and draped it over the rack by the door to dry. “I know I’m old enough to be your father, but I thought it was time to be honest.”

“Sometimes honesty means we say nothing at all.” She tipped her head toward the living room. “You best get in there, hear what the Lone Ranger is up to.”

He squeezed her arm as he passed, and when she was alone in the kitchen, a deep sob broke her composure. Oh, Doc. Leaving the pot and pan in the now-tepid dishwater with fading suds, she made her way to the back stoop.

The North Florida air was fragrant with the hope of spring. The golden light along the horizon blended with the neon colors of the Starlight. Burt manned the rink tonight, and by the notes on the breeze, he’d raised the panels to release the music of a newly reborn Dirk.

She’d suspected Doc loved her. She’d seen it in his eyes a few times. But since he said nothing, nor made a move her direction, she’d let herself rely on him as a friend. Tonight’s exchange changed things. Gazing at the Starlight, his words in her ears, she resented him slightly for telling her.

Every part of her was intertwined with the Starlight—her childhood, her teen years, meeting Leroy, raising the boys. If she left Lee, which had occurred to her on occasion, for the love of a good man, she’d lose everything that defined Tuesday Knight.

She jumped when the screen door creaked behind her. Leroy stepped down to the driveway and kicked at the thin gravel. “Doc’s got a lot of nerve.” He struck a match against the bottom of his shoe and lit his cigarette. “Telling me to buy the boys a new radio.”

“Why don’t you? You built the one we have now before we were married.”

“It still works.” He blew out a long stream of smoke toward the barn, which by now was really nothing more than an oversized shed that leaned too far left. “Don’t want the boys to get spoiled.”

Tuesday scoffed. “How you reckon? They wear hand-me-down clothes, live in a house that was once a fishing shack, and their mother cooks on a wood-burning stove.” Lee gave her a hard look, which she returned. She’d not kowtow to him, and every word she spoke was true. “You talk big about making a better life for us, but you don’t seem to mind the ribbed lines have worn off your sons’ corduroys and the rubber’s peeled away from their sneakers.”

“You should tell me these things.”

“When would that be?” Tuesday shifted from Doc’s confession to Leroy’s dereliction of duty. “When you breeze in town for a day? When you’re laid up in bed with a wound? You scared the beans out of LJ when you were shot. Did you know that? Never mind that slice down your cheek.”

“Boys need to learn life is hard.”

“Lee, we’re very aware life is hard and unfair. But some people add fuel to the fire. A lot of men go through life without getting shot or cut.” She sank to sit on the porch steps. “Why did you get shot? Who cut you? Why, if you’re working so hard, do I live in this shack with a stove from the last century, wearing dresses I bought before we were married?”

“You don’t think I want to do better by you and the boys? What do you think I’m doing out there?”

“I have no earthly idea, Lee. That’s the point. Did a lawman shoot you?”

He crushed his cigarette on the sun-bleached concrete walk. “Maybe.”

“Have mercy, Lee. Will you stop this life? I won’t have some lawman or mobster knocking down my door looking for you. This town talks. We know what men like Capone or the Trafficante gang do to folks they don’t like.”

A note hit the air. More music from the Starlight. Tuesday moved past Leroy to listen. Dirk was playing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” She wished she was skating.

Lee wrapped his arms around her. “I’ll get the boys a new radio.”

“I’d rather you find a job around here and treat them with kindness.”

“I don’t mean to be harsh, Tooz.” He kissed her neck. “I’ll do better. I promise. But for now...” He kissed her lips. “I love you. You know I do.”

“Then come home for good, Lee. Please. That’s all I ask.”