Rosa was a remarkable-looking woman. Remarkable in that she wasn’t what most people would call beautiful, but she oozed a raw femaleness that I was certain made most women uncomfortable and sent men walking into walls. And when she smiled, well, that was magic.
Rosa earned her living as a bookkeeper for Wilma Jo’s Beauty World, which stood just a half block from Aunt Lu’s jewelry store. Aunt Tootie said Wilma Jo’s was touted as the place to go for bouffant hairdos and dye jobs. Aunt Lu claimed it provided the best entertainment in town.
“See what I mean,” Aunt Lu said as two women appeared from beneath the sun-bleached, pink-and-white-striped awning. One had a blond beehive teased up as high and frothy as carnival cotton candy, and the other walked out with her auburn hair done up in a perfectly round bubble. It was lacquered so heavily that not a single hair moved when a gust of wind blew. As I watched the women come and go, there was no doubt in my mind that Wilma Jo’s produced the greatest cavalcade of big hair this side of Savannah.
“So, how did this street picnic begin?” I asked, taking a bite of my sandwich.
Rosa laughed. “Well, years ago I was married to a man named Frank. He bounced from one job to another, usually with months of unemployment in between that were spent on the golf course. After nineteen years of supporting him and my son, I woke up one Friday morning, sat up in bed, and screamed, ‘Enough!’ ” And I kept screaming as I went on a rampage through the house, throwing my son’s dirty clothes in the trash and emptying the refrigerator of my husband’s beer bottles.”
Rosa leaned back and laughed. “My son ran out the door to join the army. Frank ran out with his golf clubs in tow, and I ran out behind them and rented a one-bedroom apartment that had a pink-tiled bathroom and shag carpeting. That same day I bought myself a purple velvet sofa.”
Aunt Lu chuckled and said, “The purchase of the sofa was how the Friday street picnics began. Rosa wanted to celebrate every pay-check she had all to herself.”
Rosa nodded. “Friday is a purple-velvet-sofa day for some poor woman who’s finally reclaimed her life. A purple velvet sofa is a gal’s symbol of freedom.”
“Lu, it was your idea to set up a lunch table outside the store, wasn’t it?” Aunt Tootie asked.
Aunt Lu took a swig of her Vernor’s ginger ale and nodded. “That way I could enjoy our celebration of financial independence, but not miss a sale if someone wandered into the store.”
“How long have you been friends?” I asked.
“Since we were nine,” Rosa said, popping a potato chip into her mouth and crunching loudly. “See that?” She pointed to the small window of Aunt Lu’s store. “To the rest of the world it’s just another jewelry store, but to me that’s where I can always find my best girlfriend. When we were kids, I’d knock on that window every morning, and Lucille would grab her books off the jewelry case and come out the door so we could walk to school together.”
Aunt Lu swallowed a bite of her sandwich and said, “I bet you’ll make lots of friends in Savannah. There’s nothing better than having a good girlfriend.”
“So, CeeCee,” Rosa said, “what do you think you want to do with yourself when you grow up?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe I’ll be a librarian or a writer.”
“Well, if you end up writing, make sure you write about me and Lucille. We’re interesting as hell, aren’t we, Lu?” she said, knocking her elbow into my aunt’s arm.
I flushed with delight at being in the company of a woman who used cuss words so freely.
Aunt Lu gave Rosa a wry smile. “You’re the one who’s interesting. I just hang around for the laughs and the stories.”
“What stories?” I asked. “I love to hear stories.”
“These two have more crazy stories between them than the National Enquirer,” Aunt Tootie said. “Rosa, tell CeeCee about the day you fried your hair.”
Rosa took a cigarette, and held it, unlit, like a movie star. “Well, I’d been divorced for a little over a year when a salesman dropped by the shop to show Wilma Jo a new line of depilatories.” She looked at me and wrinkled her nose. “It’s gooey stuff that rips hair off your upper lip. If anyone ever tries to use it on you, run like hell.
“Anyway, that man had the most beautiful blue eyes I’d ever seen. His name was Stan Cole. About ten minutes after he’d packed up his bag and left, the phone rang. When I answered, a man’s voice said, ‘I’m calling to speak to the raven-haired beauty at the front desk.’ I all but melted. It was Stan. He asked to take me to dinner the following evening. Well, of course I said yes. I was so excited. I felt like a teenager again.”
Aunt Lu shook her head. “You acted like one too.”
“I did, didn’t I?” Rosa chuckled. “Well, I got this nutty idea that I wanted to perm my hair before I went out on my date, but it was prom weekend and all the beauticians at Wilma’s were booked. That night I stopped at the drugstore and bought a home permanent. On Saturday morning I wrapped my hair on the perm rods and drizzled on the solution. While my hair was cooking, I decided to have an apple. When I took a bite, the crown on my front tooth came off. My dentist’s office was closed, so I called Lucille in a panic. A few minutes later she showed up at my apartment with a tube of jeweler’s glue.”
Aunt Lu swallowed a bite of her sandwich and said, “Once I got the glue inside the crown, I pressed it into place and held it there for a few minutes. But some of the glue had seeped out from under the crown, and when I tried to let go, my finger was cemented to Rosa’s tooth. I tried to slice the glue away with a paring knife and ended up cutting my finger. That’s when Rosa remembered her perm and started screaming.”
“I dragged Lucille to the kitchen sink so we could rinse off the perm solution, and when we removed the rods, half my hair came out right along with them.”
“When Rosa saw her hair in the sink, she threw a fit. And my finger was still stuck to her tooth! I couldn’t stop the bleeding. So I suggested we hurry down the street to Floyd Webber ’s, but Rosa refused.”
Rosa laughed so hard she snorted. “Of course I refused, Lu. Floyd’s a butcher.”
“He trimmed meat better than anyone I’d ever seen, so I thought he’d do a fine job of trimming my finger from your tooth,” Aunt Lu said with a defensive sniff. “Anyway, once Rosa calmed down, we knew we’d better get to the hospital. So we climbed into Rosa’s car. What a sight we were—I was practically sitting on her lap with my finger stuck in her mouth. I couldn’t stop laughing, and Rosa was in tears. When we got to the hospital, a doctor sliced my finger free from her tooth and wrapped it in a bandage.”
Rosa shook her head. “I’ve never been more mortified in my life.”
Aunt Lu laughed. “Oh, sure you have, Rosa, lots of times.”
I gulped down a bite of my sandwich and asked, “What did you do about your hair? Did you get it fixed up for your date?”
“No. My hair looked like I’d doused it in gasoline and lit a match. There was no way I could go out with Stan, but I didn’t know how to reach him to cancel our date. And I sure didn’t want to sit in the dark all night with the lights turned off pretending I wasn’t home.”
“So Rosa wrote him a note that said she’d had an emergency and taped it to her door. Then she packed an overnight bag and came home with me,” Aunt Lu said.
Rosa sighed. “And that was the end of Stan. I was so upset that when I went back home on Sunday, I spent the entire day in bed. I was a sniveling basket case of wrecked humanity. That night, Lu came over with a pizza, and we sat on my sofa and talked. I was feeling sorry for myself, fussing about my ruined hair and missing my date with Stan. Well, Lucille looked me right in the eyes and said, ‘What’s wrong with you, Rosa? Did you forget why you bought this sofa? Are you that anxious to go out and find your next ex-husband? ’”
Rosa, Aunt Tootie, and Aunt Lu burst into laughter. It took me a moment to get the joke; then I laughed too.
“And she was right,” Rosa said, leaning back and ta
king another pretend drag from her cigarette. “I realized I was happy with the way things were, so why mess it up by bringing a man into my life? I’ve got my job, my apartment, my purple velvet sofa, and the best friend in the world,” she said, grinning at Aunt Lu.
Just then a sharp ding sounded, and a little red flag popped up inside the window of the parking meter.
“Time’s up. Back to work,” Rosa said, folding her napkin.
“Wait. Don’t go anywhere.” I ran to the car and grabbed my new camera. “I want a picture of you two.”
Rosa pressed her cheek against the side of Aunt Lu’s face, and I took their picture. As I watched it develop, I wondered if I’d ever be so lucky to have a girlfriend I’d grow old with, a girlfriend who knew my secrets, my fears, my hopes—and loved me anyway. A purple-velvet-sofa kind of girlfriend.
Two weeks later I was passing through the kitchen when the phone rang. Aunt Tootie was out in the garden, so I answered. I heard nothing but sobs echoing over the phone line. Finally I realized who it was.
“She’s gone,” Rosa cried. “My best girlfriend is gone!” With gulps and tears punctuating her words, she told me that Aunt Lu had died only a couple of hours ago.
I was so shocked, I slid down the wall and landed on the floor.
As Aunt Lu would have wanted, Rosa was with her when she left this earth. And as only God himself could have ordained, Aunt Lu died while sitting at that old card table as she and Rosa enjoyed what was to be the last of their Friday street picnics.
Rosa blew her nose and said, “I can’t believe it. Just a few hours ago we were having lunch, and I nearly fainted when Lucille told me she’d paid her dues in life and had finally earned her freedom. She told me she’d decided to retire and was closing the store at the end of the summer.” Rosa whimpered and blew her nose again. “Lucille laughed and asked if I’d help her find a purple velvet sofa to celebrate her retirement. So we made plans to go shopping on Saturday.”
By this time I was crying myself. I climbed up from the floor and wiped my eyes on a paper towel. But my tears flowed again when Rosa told me how Aunt Lu’s eyes had twinkled when she’d laughed and said, “Can you imagine it—me with a purple velvet sofa?”
According to Rosa, Aunt Lu was still laughing when she stiffened and pitched forward, dropping dead of a massive brain aneurism, right there at the card table. Rosa wept uncontrollably when she told me that the moment Aunt Lu died, the parking meter whirred and the little red time-expired flag popped up into the window and sounded its customary ding.
“I’ll never get over it,” Rosa sobbed. “Never.”
Before going to bed that night, I pulled the photograph I’d taken of Aunt Lu and Rosa from my bureau drawer. I sat on the edge of the bed and studied their faces, how the sparkle of their friendship lit up their eyes. Anyone who saw the picture would never doubt they had loved each other.
The next afternoon, Aunt Tootie and I packed our suitcases and headed to Brunswick to make funeral arrangements. We drove in silence for a long time, and then I looked at her and said, “It doesn’t seem real. We just saw her.”
“That’s the way it is sometimes when people leave us—one minute they’re here and the next minute they’re gone.”
I nodded and stared at the hem of my dress, thinking about Momma and wishing I hadn’t brought up the subject.
Picking out a casket was a somber experience that left me thinking cremation was a good idea. As Aunt Tootie spoke with the funeral director, I stared at the room full of caskets on display—their lids gaping open like hungry mouths, waiting to swallow up the newly departed. I decided I’d much rather exit this world in a crackle of flames and a swirl of smoke through my ribs than be cooped up for all eternity in a dark box surrounded by puffy white satin.
After we left the funeral home, Aunt Tootie drove to a cement-block building that sat on the edge of town. The sign above the door read: JOE BODACCI AND SON CONSTRUCTION—NO JOB TOO BIG OR TOO SMALL. Her eyes swam in a pool of tears when she parked the car. “Wait here for me, honey,” she said, pulling a handkerchief from her handbag and blowing her nose. “I won’t be long.”
Though I wondered why she’d driven to a construction company after picking out a casket, I thought it was best not to ask about it.
The day after Aunt Lu was laid to rest, Aunt Tootie and I went to Rosa’s apartment for lunch before we headed home to Savannah. Rosa had adopted Aunt Lu’s old cat, Napoleon, and when she greeted us at the door he was curled up in her arms. “Look at him. He’s in mourning, just like I am.”
The three of us sat at a pink Formica table by the kitchen window and had lunch, the whole time Rosa crying and laughing while she told stories about Aunt Lu. Aunt Tootie and I laughed and cried right along with her while Napoleon sat on the windowsill and gazed out through the screen with sad green eyes.
While Rosa was telling us another story, there came a knock on the door. “Who could that be?” she said, lifting her napkin from her lap and blotting her eyes. She got up from the table and walked to the living room.
Aunt Tootie pressed her finger to her lips and said, “Shhh,” then stood and motioned for me to join her at the kitchen doorway. Rosa unlocked the dead bolt and was speechless when she opened the door. In walked Mr. Bodacci and his son, and in their hands they carried the front window from Aunt Lu’s store, its peeling gold letters spelling out the name BRUNSWICK FINE JEWELERS. The window had been professionally framed and backed with a mirror, making the letters stand out as if they were floating on a sheet of ice.
The single largest tear I’d ever seen rolled down Rosa’s cheek as she reached out and lightly ran her fingers over the frail gold letters. Aunt Tootie, Rosa, and I stood holding hands as we watched Mr. Bodacci and his son carefully hang the framed window on the wall—directly above Rosa’s purple velvet sofa.
For several days following Aunt Lu’s funeral, friends of Aunt Tootie’s would stop by the house. I’d feel the atmosphere lift when they arrived, only to sense it fall when they left. At dusk, Aunt Tootie would go out to the garden and sit on the bench beneath the live oak—her shoulders hunched forward and her hands clasped at her knees. She wore her sadness on the outside, like a heavy winter coat. Though I knew I should go out there and be with her, I couldn’t. Something inside me had slammed shut when Momma died, and whatever it was, I needed to keep it that way. I felt selfish and small as I watched my aunt from the kitchen window. She had given me so much, so freely, yet I was unable to do something as simple as sit at her side.
Then one morning, as I headed out the front door to take some pictures, I heard a clackety-clack. From around the side of the house came Aunt Tootie with her rusty gardening wagon in tow. A gust of wind snatched her straw hat from her head and sent it sailing. I put down my camera, raced down the front steps, and chased it to the far end of the lawn.
When I returned the hat to my aunt, we stood facing each other. Then she looked into the sky. “Lucille always loved a strong breeze. She said it was nature’s way of blowing away our sorrows.”
Just then another gust of wind whipped around us. Aunt Tootie smiled. I smiled too. “Would you like some help today?” I asked.
“Oh, sugar, that would be lovely.”
I reached down, took hold of the wagon’s handle, and together we headed for the garden.
Eleven
It was a warm Thursday evening. Aunt Tootie and I had just finished dinner, and she settled into a chair in the den to work on her cross-stitching and watch a rerun of The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show. I wasn’t in the mood for TV, so I wandered to the back porch and began reading one of the books I’d borrowed from Miz Goodpepper.
I loved this time of night, how everything softened and lost the hard edges of day, and how, if the wind moved just right, the live oaks would murmur tender green words across the shadowy lawn. Sitting with a book in the warm circle of light from the table lamp had become my favorite way to end the day.
While read
ing The Call of the Wild, I came across something that looked like a piece of old money pressed between the pages. It was faded and dry and had a picture of a sailing ship etched in the center. Above the ship was the word Confederate. I walked into the house to show Aunt Tootie, but she was sound asleep in her chair. I turned off the TV and quietly went back to the porch.
The white blooms of Miz Goodpepper’s rosebushes glowed in the moonlight like tiny lanterns. Just beyond the trellis I noticed something flutter. I stood on my tiptoes and saw Miz Goodpepper move across her patio. Wanting to return the money I’d found, I hopped off the porch, cut through the opening in the hedge, and entered her backyard. I called her name softly as I approached.
She looked up with surprise. “Cecelia?”
“Yes, ma’am. It’s me. I was reading one of the books I borrowed from you, and I found this inside.” I offered her the money. “There’s a date on it—1861. It’s even older than the book.”
In her hands she held a rubber pancake flipper and a Mason jar. She set them on the ground and took the bill from my outstretched hand. “This was my granddaddy’s,” she said, smoothing the bill between her slender fingers. “He was fond of old paper money—had the habit of using it as bookmarks. He’s been gone for nearly thirty years, and I still find all sorts of bills tucked inside his books.”
She thanked me for returning the money and slid it into the pocket of her emerald green caftan. “Oh, look—there’s a big one,” she said, grabbing the pancake flipper and jar. She scurried to the brick walk, bent down, and scooped something up. “This one will do lots of damage.” She tapped the pancake flipper on the edge of the jar and something the size of a sausage link fell to the bottom. “This is an all-time record. I’ve collected at least a dozen of these fellows tonight.”