The All- Girl
FILLING STATION’S
Last Reunion
A NOVEL
FANNIE FLAGG
d RANDOM HOUSE • NEW YORK
A MOST UNUSUAL WEEK
Point Clear, Alabama
Monday, June 6, 2005
76º and Sunny
Mrs. Earle Poole, Jr., better known to friends and family as
Sookie, was driving home from the Birds- R- Us store out on Highway
98 with one ten- pound bag of sunflower seeds and one ten- pound bag
of wild bird seed and not her usual weekly purchase for the past fifteen
years of one twenty- pound bag of the Pretty Boy Wild Bird Seed and
Sunflower Mix. As she had explained to Mr. Nadleshaft, she was worried that the smaller birds were still not getting enough to eat. Every
morning lately, the minute she filled her feeders, the larger, more aggressive blue jays would swoop in and scare the little birds all away.
She noticed that the blue jays always ate the sunflower seeds first,
and so tomorrow, she was going to try putting just plain sunflower
seeds in her backyard feeders, and while the blue jays were busy eating
them, she would run around the house as fast as she could and put the
wild bird seed in the feeders in the front yard. That way, her poor
finches and titmice might be able to get a little something, at least.
As she drove over the Mobile Bay Bridge, she looked out at the big
white puffy clouds and saw a long row of pelicans flying low over the
4 Fannie Flagg
water. The bay was sparkling in the bright sun and already dotted with
red, white, and blue sailboats headed out for the day. A few people
fishing alongside the bridge waved as she passed by, and she smiled
and waved back. She was almost to the other side when she suddenly
began to experience some sort of a vague and unusual sense of wellbeing. And with good reason.
Against all odds, she had just survived the last wedding of their
three daughters, Dee Dee, Ce Ce, and Le Le. Their only unmarried
child now was their twenty- five- year- old son, Carter, who lived in
Atlanta. And some other poor (God help her), beleaguered mother of
the bride would be in charge of planning that happy occasion. All she
and Earle would have to do for Carter’s wedding was show up and
smile. And today, other than one short stop at the bank and picking
up a couple of pork chops for dinner, she didn’t have another single
thing she had to do. She was almost giddy with relief.
Of course, Sookie absolutely worshipped and adored her girls, but
having to plan three large weddings in fewer than two years had been
a grueling, never- ending, twenty- four- hours- a- day job, with all the
bridal showers, picking out patterns, shopping, fittings, writing invitations, meeting with caterers, figuring out seating arrangements, ordering flowers, etc. And between dealing with out- of- town guests and
new in- laws, figuring out where to put everyone, plus last- minute
bridal hysteria, at this point, she was simply weddinged out.
And no wonder. If you counted Dee Dee’s last one, technically
there had really been four large weddings, which meant shopping and
being fitted for four different mother- of- the- bride dresses (you can’t
wear the same one twice) in less than two years.
Dee Dee had married, then promptly divorced. And after they
had spent weeks returning all the wedding gifts, she had turned around
and remarried the exact same husband. Her second wedding hadn’t
been quite as expensive as the first, but every bit as stressful.
When she and Earle had married in 1968, it had been just a typical church affair: white wedding gown, bridesmaids in matching pastel dresses and shoes, ring bearer, best man, reception, over and out.
But now everybody had to have some kind of a theme.
Dee Dee had insisted on having an authentic Old South Gone
with the Windwedding, complete with a Scarlett O’Hara dress, large
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 5
hoop skirt and all, and at the last minute, she had to be driven to the
church standing up in the back of a small moving van.
Le Le and her groom wanted an entirely red and white wedding,
including the invitations, food, drinks, and all the decorations, in
honor of the University of Alabama football team.
And Ce Ce, Le Le’s twin sister, the last girl to marry, had carried
her ten- pound Persian cat, Peek- a- Boo, down the aisle instead of a
wedding bouquet, and the groom’s German shepherd, dressed in a
tux, had served as best man. And if that wasn’t bad enough, someone’s
turtle was the ring bearer. The entire thing had just been excruciating.
You can’t hurry a turtle.
Looking back on it now, Sookie realized she really should have put
her foot down when Ce Ce and James invited all their friends to bring
their pets to the reception, but she had made a sacred vow to never
bully her children. Nevertheless, having to replace an entire banquet
room’s wall- to- wall carpeting at the Grand Hotel was going to cost
them a fortune. Oh, well. Too late now. Hopefully, all that was behind
her, and evidently not a minute too soon.
Two days ago, when Ce Ce left for her honeymoon, Sookie had
broken down and sobbed uncontrollably. She didn’t know if she was
experiencing empty- nest syndrome or just plain exhaustion. She knew
she must be tired. At the reception, she had introduced a man to his
own wife. Twice.
The truth was, as sad as she was to see Ce Ce and James drive off,
she had been secretly looking forward to going home, taking off all
her clothes, and crawling into bed for about five years, but even that
had been put on hold. At the last minute, James’s parents, his sister,
and her husband had decided to stay over an extra night, so she had to
quickly try and whip up a little “going away” brunch for them.
Granted, it wasn’t much: Earle’s coconut margaritas, an assortment of crackers, cream cheese and pepper jelly, shrimp and grits, crab
cakes with coleslaw, and tomato aspic on the side. But still, it had
taken some effort.
***
6 Fannie Flagg
When Sookie drove into the little town of Point Clear and passed
the Page and Palette bookstore, it occurred to her that maybe tomorrow, she would stop in and pick up a good book. She hadn’t had time
to read anything other than her daily horoscope, the Kappa newsletter, and an occasional Birds and Bloomsmagazine. We could be at war
for all she knew. But now, she was actually going to be able to read an
entire book again.
She suddenly felt like doing the twist right there in the front seat,
which only reminded her how long it had been since she and Earle
had learned a new dance step. She had probably even forgotten how
to do the hokey pokey.
All she really had left to deal with was her eighty- eight- year- old
mother, the formidable Mrs. Lenore Simmons Krackenberry, who absolutely refused to move to the perfectly lovely assisted-living facility
right across town. And it would be so much easier on everybody if she
would. The maintenance on her mother’s yard alone was extremely
expensive, not to mention the yearly insurance. Since the hurricane,
the insurance on everybody’s house on the Mobile Bay had gone skyhigh. But Lenore was adamant about never leaving her home and had
announced with a dramatic gesture, “Until they carry me out feetfirst.”
Sookie couldn’t imagine her mother leaving anywhere feetfirst. As
long as she and her brother, Buck, could remember, Lenore, a large
imposing woman who wore lots of scatter pins and long, flowing
scarves, and had her silver hair teased and sprayed into a perfect
winged- back flip, had always rushed into a room headfirst. Buck said
she looked like something that should be on the hood of a car, and
they had secretly referred to her as “Winged Victory” ever since. And
Winged Victory never just left a room; she whisked out with a flourish, leaving a cloud of expensive perfume in her wake. Never a quiet
woman in any sense of the word, much like a show horse in the Rose
Parade, she could be heard coming a mile away, due to the loud jingling of the numerous bracelets, bangles, and beads she always wore.
And she was usually speaking long before she came in sight. Lenore
had a loud booming voice and had studied “Expression” while attending Judson College for women, and to the family’s everlasting regret,
the teacher had encouraged her.
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 7
Now, due to certain recent events, including her setting her own
kitchen on fire, they had been forced to hire a twenty- four- hour livein nurse for Lenore. Earle was a successful dentist with a nice practice,
but they were by no means rich, and certainly not now, with all the
money they had spent sending the children to college, the weddings,
Lenore’s mortgage, and now the nurse. Poor Earle might not be able
to retire until he was ninety, but the nurse was a definite necessity.
Lenore, who was not only loud but also extremely opinionated
and voiced her opinion to everyone within earshot, had suddenly
started calling total strangers long- distance. Last year, she had called
the pope in Rome, and that call alone had cost them more than three
hundred dollars. When confronted with the bill, Lenore had been
incensed and said that she shouldn’t have to pay a dime because she
had been on hold the entire time. Try telling that to the phone company. And there was no reasoning with her. When Sookie asked why
she had called the pope, considering that she was a sixth- generation
dyed- in- the- wool Methodist, Lenore had thought for a moment and
said, “Oh . . . just to chat.”
“To chat?”
“Yes, and you mustn’t be so closed- minded, Sookie. One can certainly be on speaking terms with Catholics. You don’t want to marry
one, but a friendly chat can’t hurt.”
And there had been other incidents. At a chamber of commerce
meeting, Lenore had called the mayor a pointy- headed little carpetbagger and a horse thief and was sued for defamation of character.
Sookie had been worried to death, but Lenore remained unfazed.
“They have to prove what I said was not true, and no jury in their
right mind would dare convict me!” In the end, the judge had thrown
the case out, but still, it had been very embarrassing. All last year,
Sookie had to try to avoid running into the mayor and his wife, and
in such a small town, it had been almost impossible. They were just
everywhere.
Since the lawsuit, they had been through three different nurses.
Two quit, and one left in the middle of the night, along with one of
Lenore’s dinner rings and a frozen turkey. But now, after months of
searching, Sookie felt she had finally found the perfect nurse, a darling
older Filipino lady named Angel, who was so patient and so sweet,
8 Fannie Flagg
even though Lenore continued to call her Conchita, because she said
she looked exactly like the Mexican woman who had worked for her
in Texas in the forties, when Sookie’s father had been stationed there.
The good news was, now that Lenore had Angel, Sookie was finally going to be able to attend the Kappa reunion in Dallas, and her
old college roommate, Dena Nordstrom, had promised to meet her
there. They talked on the phone regularly, but she hadn’t seen Dena in
a long time, and she couldn’t wait.
As Sookie sat at the intersection waiting for the red light to change,
she pulled down the visor and looked at herself in the mirror. Good
God, that was a mistake. She guessed that after fifty, nobody looked
good in the bright sun, but even so, she really had neglected herself.
She hadn’t seen her eye doctor in over three years, and she clearly
needed a new prescription.
Last month at church, she had embarrassed herself half to death.
The correct quote was, “I am a vessel for God’s love,” but she had read
out loud in front of the entire congregation, “I am a weasel for God’s
love.” Earle had said that no one had noticed, but of course, they had.
Sookie glanced at herself in the mirror again. Oh, Lord, no wonder she looked so terrible. She had run out the door this morning
without a stitch of makeup. Now she was going to have to drive all the
way home and throw some on. She always tried to look somewhat
presentable. Thankfully, she wasn’t as vain as her mother, or she would
never have left home at all. Outward appearances meant everything to
Lenore. She was particularly proud of what she called “the Simmons
foot” and her small, slightly turned- up nose. Sookie had gotten her
father’s longer nose, and wouldn’t you know it, Buck got the cute one.
Oh, well. At least she got the Simmons foot.
Just as the light changed, Netta Verp, Sookie’s next- door neighbor,
whizzed by in her huge 1989 Ford Fairlane, probably on her way out
to Costco, and tooted her horn. Sookie tooted back. Sookie loved
Netta. She was a good old soul. She and Netta were both Leos.
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 9
Netta’s house was in between their house and Lenore’s. Poor thing.
She had been stuck in the middle, with all the Poole children and
animals on one side and Lenore on the other, calling her night and
day, but she never complained. She said, “Hell, I’m a widow. What
else am I going to do for fun?”
Sookie supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised that Ce Ce’s
wedding theme had been “Pets Are People, Too.” At one point, there
had been eleven animals living in the Poole house, including an alligator that had crawled out of the bay and up the back- porch stairs, three
cats, and four dogs, one being Earle’s beloved Great Dane, Tiny, who
was the size of a small horse.
All the dogs, cats, and hamsters— and the one blind raccoon—
were fine, but she had drawn the line with the alligator and insisted
that it stay in the basement. She loved animals, too, but when you’re
scared to get up at night and go to the bathroom, it’s time to put your
foot down, and hopefully not on top of something that could bite it
off.
The hard part of having animals, for her, was losing them. Two
years before, Mr. Henry, their eighteen- year- old cat, had died, and she
still couldn’t see an orange cat without going to pieces. After Mr.
Henry died she told Earle no more pets. She just couldn’t take the
heartbreak.
Sookie drove straight on through town, waved at Doris, the tomato lady on the corner, then headed down the hill, toward her house
on the bay.
The old historic scenic route was lined on both sides with large
oak trees planted before the Civil War. On the right side, facing the
water, were miles of old wooden bay houses built mostly by people
from Mobile as summer homes. Sookie guessed that if she had a penny
for every time she had driven on this road over the years, she would be
a millionaire by now.
She had been eight the first time her father had brought the family
10 Fannie Flagg
down from Selma to spend the summer. They had arrived in Point
Clear on a warm, balmy evening, and the air had been filled with the
scent of honeysuckle and wisteria.
She could still remember coming down the hill and seeing the
lights of Mobile, sparkling and twinkling across the water, just like a
jeweled necklace. It was as if they had just entered into a fairyland.
The Spanish moss hanging from the trees had looked bright silver in
the moonlight and made dancing shadows all along the road. And the
shrimp boats out in the bay, with their little blinking green lights, had
looked just like Christmas to Sookie. For her, there had always been
something magical about Point Clear, and there still was.
About a mile past the Grand Hotel, Sookie turned in and drove up
her long crushed- oyster- shell driveway and pulled into the carport.
Netta’s house was almost identical to theirs, but Netta’s yard was much
prettier. As soon as she could get rested enough, one of the first things
Sookie was going to do was prune. Her azalea bushes were a disgrace,
and her limelight hydrangeas had just gone completely wild.
Their house, like most of the others along the scenic route, was a
large white wooden home with dark green shutters. Most of the bay
houses had been built long before air- conditioning and had a wide
center hall that ran all the way to a large screened- in porch in back
overlooking the bay. And like their neighbors, they had a long gray
wooden pier with a small seating area with a tin roof on the end.
When the kids had been much younger, she and Earle used to go sit
there almost every evening to watch the sunset and listen to the church
bells that rang up and down the bay. They hadn’t done that in years.
She was so looking forward to being alone with Earle again.
Sookie took the two bags of seeds out of the car and put them in
the little greenhouse Earle had built for her, where she kept her bird
supplies. A few minutes later, after she went inside, Sookie suddenly
noticed how quiet the house was. Almost eerily quiet. As she stood
there, all she could hear was the ticking of the kitchen clock and the
cry of the seagulls out on the bay. It was so strange not to hear a door
slamming or someone running up and down the stairs. How pleasant
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 11
to have peace and quiet, and not hear loud music blaring from someone’s room. So pleasant, in fact, she thought maybe she would fix
herself a cup of tea and sit and relax a few minutes before she headed
out again.
Just as she was reaching for a tea bag, the kitchen phone rang.
Now that the house was empty, it sounded like a fire alarm going off.
She picked it up and looked at the caller ID number. It was a longdistance call, but not from an area code she recognized, so she just let
it ring. She was too tired to talk to anyone if she didn’t have to. In the
past few days she’d had to smile and talk to so many people that her
face still hurt.
Sookie stuck a cup of water in the microwave, grabbed her tea bag,
and went out on the screened- in porch to enjoy it. She sat down in her
big white wicker chair. The bay was as smooth as glass, not a ripple in
sight.
She noticed that her gardenia bushes were still in bloom and
thought she might cut off a few and float them in a dish in the living
room. They always made the house smell so sweet. She took a deep
breath of fresh air and was about to have her first sip of tea when the
phone started ringing again. Oh, Lord, it was obviously somebody
calling the wrong number or a solicitor trying to sell her something,
and if she didn’t answer they would probably drive her crazy all day.
She got up and went back to the kitchen and picked up. It was her
mother.
“Sookie, I need you to come over here right now.”
“Mother, is something wrong?”
“I have something extremely important to discuss with you.”
“Oh, Mother, can’t it wait? I just got home.”
“No, it cannot!”
“Oh, well . . . all right. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
Sookie frowned as she hung up. That particular tone in her mother’s voice always made her a little anxious. Had Lenore found out she
had spoken to the woman at Westminster Village about assisted living? She had just been inquiring about the price, and it had only been
one short call. But if someone had told Lenore she would be furious.
A few minutes later, Sookie walked over, and the nurse, who was
12 Fannie Flagg
in the front yard cutting fresh flowers, looked up and said, “Oh, good
morning, Mrs. Poole,” then added with a sympathetic little smile,
“God bless you.”
“Thank you, Angel,” said Sookie.
Oh, Lord . . . it must be worse than she thought. As Sookie walked
into the house, she called out, “Mother?”
“I’m here.”
“Where’s ‘here’?”
“In the dining room, Sookie.”
Sookie went in and saw her mother seated at the large Georgian
dining room table with the twelve Queen Anne chairs. On the table,
placed in front of her, was the large leather box with the maroon velvet
inside that held her set of the Francis I silverware. Next to the box was
the large Simmons family Bible.
“What’s going on, Mother?”
“Sit down.”
Sookie sat down and waited for whatever was coming. Lenore
looked at her and said, “Sookie, I called you here today because I am
not entirely convinced that you fully appreciate what you will be receiving upon my demise. As my only daughter, you will be inheriting
the entire set of the Simmons family silver . . . and before I can die in
peace, I want you to swear on this Bible that you will never, under any
circumstances, break up the set.”
Sookie was so relieved it wasn’t about the call to Westminster Village, and said, “Oh, Mother . . . I do appreciate it . . . but really, why
don’t you leave it all to Bunny? She and Buck entertain much more
than I do.”
“What?” Lenore gasped and clutched at her pearls. “Bunny? Leave
it to Bunny? Oh, Sookie,” she said with wounded eyes. “Do you have
any idea what was sacrificed to keep it in the family?” Sookie sighed.
She had heard the story a thousand times before, but Lenore loved to
tell it over and over, with large dramatic gestures included. “Grandmother Simmons said that at one point during the war, all that stood
between them and the entire family going hungry was your greatgrandmother’s silver. And do you know what she did?”
“No, Mother, what?”
“She chose to go hungry, that’s what! Why, she said there were
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 13
days when all they had to eat was a pitiful little handful of pecans. And
they had to bury the silver in a different spot every night to keep the
Yankee soldiers from finding it, but she saved the silver! And now you
say, ‘Oh, just give it to Bunny’? Who’s not even a Simmons— and not
even from Alabama? Why don’t you just cut my heart out and throw
it out in the yard?”
“Oh, God. All right. . . . I’m sorry, Mother. It’s just . . . well, if you
want me to have it, then thank you.”
Sookie certainly hadn’t meant to hurt her mother’s feelings about
the silverware, but she really had no use for it. She didn’t know anybody who used a pickle fork or a grapefruit spoon anymore, and you
can’t put real silver in the dishwasher. You have to wash each piece by
hand. And she certainly didn’t want to have to polish silver all day. The
Francis I pattern had twenty- eight pieces of carved fruit on the knife
handle alone, not to mention the tea service, the coffee service, and
the two sets of formal candlesticks.
Sookie realized she probably should care more about the silver.
After all, it had come all the way from England and had been in the
family for generations. But she just wasn’t as formal as her mother.
Winged Victory would die of epilepsy if she knew her daughter sometimes used paper plates and plastic knives and forks and just hated
polishing silverware.
Lenore dearly loved to polish silver and, once a month, would sit
at the dining room table wearing white cotton gloves with all of it
spread out before her. “Nothing relaxes me more than cleaning my
silver.”
Oh, well. Too late now. The die was cast. Sookie was stuck with it.
She swore on the Bible that not only would she never break up the set,
but that she personally would polish it regularly. “Don’t ever let tarnish get a head start on you,” Lenore said.
What could she do? Being Lenore’s daughter meant she had come
into the world with preordained duties. First, to proudly carry on the
Simmons family line that, according to Lenore, could be traced all the
way back to fifteenth- century England. Second, to protect the family
silver.
It was such a beautiful warm day, and after Sookie left her mother’s house, she took her shoes off and walked back home along the bay.
14 Fannie Flagg
As she strolled along, she suddenly wondered how many times she and
the children had walked back and forth to Lenore’s house over the
years. It seemed like only yesterday when all day long, the kids were
running back and forth to her house and theirs.
Time was so strange. When the children were younger, she used to
marvel at the tiny little footsteps they left in the sand, but those days
were gone forever. They were all grown up now . . . and, bless their
hearts, not a one of them had the Simmons foot, and three had the
Poole ears. But that was another story.
A few minutes later, after she had thrown on a little makeup, Sookie
drove back to town and was sitting in line at the drive- in bank waiting
to make a deposit to cover yet another one of Lenore’s unexpected
expenses. About ten years ago, Lenore had suddenly started bouncing
checks all over town and hadn’t seemed the least bit concerned. “I hate
fiddling with figures,” she said. So now all Lenore’s mail was delivered
to Sookie to handle, including all her bills. Lenore’s letters alone were
almost a full- time job. She was always firing off editorials to the newspaper. The last one, suggesting that we do away with the vote for
people under fifty- five, had brought in more than one hundred letters
that Sookie had to answer. Lenore never looked at her own mail. “Just
tell me if something is important,” she said. The woman ordered almost everything she saw on television, and Sookie always had to send
it back. Why would anybody over eighty want a ThighMaster?
Lenore was her mother, and she loved her, but Lord,she was a
lot of trouble. When Earle had first bought the dental practice and
they had moved down to Point Clear for good, Lenore insisted that
before she would move with the family from Selma, Sookie’s GreatGrandfather Simmons must be moved from the Selma Cemetery and
transferred down to the Soldier’s Rest Cemetery in Point Clear. “I
would just die if I didn’t have Grandfather Simmons to decorate. He
was a general, Sookie!” And, naturally, Sookie was the one who ended
up having to deal with all the endless red tape of trying to arrange it.
After weeks of hassling back and forth with the cemetery people, having to sign paper after paper, she finally just begged them to please dig
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 15
up anything— dog, cat, or horse— and send it on. At that point, she
was so tired, she didn’t care.
The car in front of Sookie moved one space closer to the teller, and
she moved up with it. She looked at herself in the mirror again. She
looked a little better with her makeup on, but, of course, she had forgotten to put on her earrings. Honestly, between the weddings and
dealing with her mother, it really was a miracle she was still sane at all.
She had always had a delicate nervous system and a tendency to
faint under pressure. And it was very stressful never knowing what her
mother was going to do next. Lenore had shown up at Ce Ce’s wedding wearing a large yellow hat with two live lovebirds in a cage sitting
on top. God only knows where she got that.
Thank heavens, all Sookie’s kids had been good kids, because
when they were growing up, she had let them do pretty much what
they pleased. She had wanted them to have a carefree childhood. Hers
certainly hadn’t been, with Lenore pushing her into everything. She
had always been basically shy. She never wanted to be a Magnolia Trail
Maiden or a cheerleader or to join all those organizations. But she had
had no choice. Lenore ruled with an iron hand. “You owe it to the
Simmons name to be a leader in society, Sookie!” she said.
Well . . . that certainly hadn’t worked out. She knew she was a
disappointment to her mother, but what could she do? She didn’t
know why, but in school, as hard as she tried, she had never been able
to get more than a C average while Buck had made all A’s. And those
ballet lessons Lenore had pushed her into had been a complete disaster.
Sookie was finally at the drive- through window and handed the
bank teller her deposit and suddenly noticed that she had developed a
strange tic in her right eye, probably some leftover stress from the
wedding. Thankfully, Earle had finally just picked the turtle up and
handed it to James or they would probably all still be sitting there. The
girl in the window pushed the drawer back out with her receipt and
said over the speakerphone, “Thank you, Mrs. Poole, have a nice day.”
“Oh, thank you, Susie. You, too.”
“Tell your mother I said hello.”
“I will.”
After she left the bank, Sookie ran into the market and picked up
16 Fannie Flagg
a few pork chops and, as an afterthought, a can of sliced pineapple.
Earle said he had a big surprise for her tonight, so she thought she
might spice up the chops a bit.
Sookie was standing in the “less than six items” checkout line when
she heard someone call out her name. It was Janice, a pretty blond girl
and one of Ce Ce’s bridesmaids, who rushed over from the produce
department, still holding a head of lettuce, and hugged her. “Oh, Mrs.
Poole, I’m so happy to see you! How are you? You must be exhausted
from all the excitement . . . but I just had to tell you, that was one of
the nicest weddings I have ever been in. And such fun, too! Ce Ce and
Peek- a- Boo looked so cute coming up the aisle— and it’s always so
wonderful to see your precious mother. I swear she never changes.
She’s still the prettiest thing . . . and funny. I wish you could have been
at our table— she had us all just screaming with laughter. And that hat
with those birds! How does she come up with these things?”
“I have no idea,” said Sookie.
“What a character, and she was so sweet to bring her little Mexican nurse with her.”
As Sookie moved one person closer to the checkout girl, Janice
moved with her. “Oh, and listen, Mrs. Poole, I was going to drop you
a note and apologize for Tinker Bell’s terrible behavior at the reception. I don’t know what got into him. He usually just loves cats to
death.”
Sookie said, “Oh, don’t worry about it, honey. . . . After all, dogs
will be dogs.”
Janice thought about it for a second and said, “Yes, I guess you’re
right. They just can’t help themselves, can they?” Then she made a sad
face. “How are you holding up? You must be so blue with Carter and
all the girls gone— but thank heavens, you still have your mother to
keep you company . . . and I’ll bet she just keeps you entertained
twenty- four hours a day doesn’t she?”
“Oh, yes, she certainly does,” said Sookie.
Finally, it was Sookie’s turn at the cash register, and Janice said,
“Well, I’d better run. ’Bye, Mrs. Poole, so nice to see you. Be sure and
tell your mother I said hey.”
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 17
“I sure will, honey.”
When she came out of the market, she saw that the Elks Club ladies had set up a bake sale, so she walked over to see what they had.
Dot Yeager, sitting behind the table, said, “Don’t they all look good?”
“Oh, they do.”
“Your mother looked so pretty at church yesterday in that bright
blue dress with her silver hair. I wish I could wear that shade of blue,
but it just fades me out to nothing. I had my colors done, and I’m a
fall, but Lenore is definitely a spring, isn’t she?”
“Yes, I believe she is.”
Sookie was standing there, trying to decide between the lemon
icebox and the pecan pie, when her friend Marvaleen walked up. “Oh,
hi, Marvaleen. What do you think would go better with pork chops?
The pecan or the lemon icebox?”
“If it were me, I’d go for the key lime, but then, I’m a fool for key
lime.” Sookie bought the key lime.
Sookie was glad she had run into Marvaleen. She seemed so much
calmer now. Marvaleen had recently gone through a divorce and, for
a time, had been quite intense. She had been seeing a life coach over
in Mobile named Edna Yorba Zorbra, and all she wanted to do when
you saw her was tell you in great detail what Edna Yorba Zorbra had
just said.
A few months ago, Sookie had been at the store and in a hurry,
and she had tried to hide, but Marvaleen had spotted her and cornered her in the frozen food department. “Sookie, do you journal?”
“What?”
“Do you journal? Write things down?”
“Oh, like lists. Yes, I have to. I went to the store four times before
I remembered to buy Parmesan cheese.”
“No, Sookie, I mean seriously journal. Write down your innermost thoughts. Edna Yorba Zorbra says it’s essential to maintain a
healthy psyche. I can’t tell you what a difference it’s made in my life. I
would never have divorced Ralph if I hadn’t started journaling. I didn’t
realize how much I hated him until I saw it written down in black and
white. Oh, you must journal, Sookie. I didn’t know who I really was
until I started journaling.”
Well . . . that was fine for Marvaleen, she guessed, but she couldn’t
18 Fannie Flagg
imagine anything she would rather not do than write about her innermost feelings. And besides, she already knew exactly who she was
and, unfortunately, so did everyone else within a five- hundred- mile
radius.
Driving home, Sookie passed by the cemetery, and sure enough,
there was Lenore’s car parked at the entrance. Every Monday, she put
fresh flowers on her Grandfather Simmons’s grave and inspected the
grounds and made sure to call anyone whose relative’s blooms were
fading and lecture them about honoring the dead. Most people had
moved on and were more interested in the recent dead. But not
Lenore. The woman was obsessed with her ancestors.
Lenore’s own mother had died in childbirth, and she had been
raised by her grandmother. That probably explained a lot about Lenore
and her propensity to live not just in the past, but in the distant past.
Sookie’s Great- Grandmother Simmons had been born during the
Civil War, and her memories of that time were still raw and somewhat
bitter. From early childhood, the message given to Lenore almost daily
at her grandmother’s knee was that in order to survive in this world,
she was to remain strong and proud. The South had been bloodied
and defeated, yes, but never bowed. They had lost everything but their
pride and their good name.
At seventeen, Lenore was sent to Judson College and became president of her sorority, Kappa Kappa Gamma, and valedictorian of her
class. It was at Judson where Lenore had met Sookie’s father, Alton
Carter Krackenberry. He had been a cadet attending the Marion Military Institute nearby. And from the first moment he met her in the
receiving line, he had been blinded by love for life.
During World War II, Sookie’s father had commanded an entire
unit of men in Brownsville, Texas. But at home, Lenore always ruled
the roost. He spoiled her terribly and did pretty much whatever Lenore wanted him to do. No matter how many insane things she did,
he would just look at her and exclaim to his children, “Look at her—
isn’t she just wonderful?” To the day he died, he said that Lenore had
been the most beautiful girl at the Senior Military Ball, a fact that
Lenore had agreed with most wholeheartedly. And often.
***
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 19
After Sookie got home and put the groceries away, she went into
the sunroom with the paper and sat down to read when Peek- a- Boo
jumped up in her lap. Oh, dear. She was perfectly happy to keep her
until Ce Ce came back from her honeymoon, but she didn’t want to
get attached to her, so she picked her up and put her down on the
floor. But the cat jumped right back up again. Sookie sighed and said,
“Oh, Peek- a- Boo. Honey . . . don’t make me like you. Go on now,”
and she put her back down again. But she jumped right back up. The
poor thing was obviously starved for affection, and so against her better judgment, Sookie started to pet her. After a minute, Peek- a- Boo
was purring and kneading Sookie’s legs, looking up at her, happy and
content. “Oh, well, bless your heart. . . . You miss your mother, don’t
you? But she’ll be back, don’t you worry. Do you want me to get you
some more bites? Is that what you want, precious? Do you want to
play with your little toy?”
Oh, Lord. She had only had the cat forty- eight hours, and she was
already talking baby talk to it. But what could she do? She couldn’t
just ignore the poor thing . . . and she was so cute.
When Earle came home from work, Peek- a- Boo was happily chasing her mouse on a string that Sookie was pulling all through the
house. Earle said, “Hi, sweetie. What did you do today?”
Sookie had been waiting for years to say this: “Nothing. Absolutely nothing.”
That night in bed, Earle was fast asleep, and so was Peek- a- Boo,
who was now cuddled up next to her, but as usual, Sookie was still
wide awake. Earle’s big surprise was that he was going to take her on a
second honeymoon and she was so happy about it. She wanted to
spend as much time with Earle as she possibly could, while she still
could. With her future being as uncertain as it was, Sookie really didn’t
know how much time she had left.
It was the curse of the Simmonses. When they reached a certain
age, some of them (her Aunt Lily and Uncle Baby) had to be sent to
Pleasant Hill Sanitarium. As the doctor said, “When a fifty- eightyear- old man goes downtown dressed up in a Dale Evans cowgirl outfit, complete with a skirt with fringe, it’s time,” and after Aunt Lily’s
20 Fannie Flagg
unfortunate incident with the paperboy, it was obvious she needed to
be committed. But with Lenore, it was hard to tell. When Sookie had
called Dr. Childress in Selma about her mother’s latest exploits and
asked what he thought, he sighed and said, “Sookie, honey, I’ve known
your mother all my life, and the problem with Lenore has always been
trying to figure out what behavior is just ‘delightfully eccentric’ and
what’s ‘as batty as hell.’ I know it’s not an official diagnosis, but every
Simmons I ever knew had a loose screw somewhere.”
Dr. Childress had been the family doctor for years, and Sookie
wished he had told her this before, not after, she had had four children. Who knows what wacko genes she may have passed on? Being
second- generation, the children could be safe, but she was a genetic
time bomb waiting to go off any minute. She lived in fear and dread
of one day embarrassing her husband and children, and at one of the
weddings, having someone point at her and say, “That lady in the
corner talking to herself and batting at imaginary flies is the mother of
the bride.”
When she tried to tell Earle how worried she was about the Simmons curse, he had always dismissed it. “Oh, Sookie, don’t be silly.
You’re not going to lose your mind. You’re as sane as I am.” She hoped
he was right. But a few weeks ago, she had gone for a dress fitting in
Mobile and had left the dress at home. Hopefully, now that she was
almost sixty, it was just a normal senior moment and not the beginning of something worse. She didn’t know, but she had written her
family a letter and put it in the safety-deposit box at the bank, just in
case.
She also wished Carter would get married sooner rather than later.
He had always been popular. A couple of his old girlfriends still called
her, wanting to know about him, so she was hopeful. The other day,
he had said, “Mom, I want to get married . . . it’s just that I haven’t
found anybody, yet, and it’s getting pretty discouraging.”
“Oh, I know, darling, but I promise one day, you’ll meet the exact
right one, and when you do, you will know it.”
“How?”
“You just will, that’s all.”
Sookie knew it was a stupid answer, but it had happened to her,
sort of. She’d known Earle Poole, Jr., since grammar school. She just
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 21
hadn’t known he was the right one until years later. Granted, her life
had not always been a bowl of cherries— but then, whose had? Even if
her life were to end tomorrow, she still had so much to be grateful for.
First and foremost, for Earle.
And her children had mostly been a joy. The twins, Ce Ce and Le
Le, had never given her a minute’s trouble. They had always been
happy, probably because they had each other. From the moment they
could talk, they just chattered away together. They were like their own
separate little unit, and she was amazed at how well they got along.
She had read that some twins hated to dress alike, but not hers. They
loved it and had to have matching underwear and pajamas. They even
spoke in stereo. One would start a sentence, and the other would finish it.
Raising Carter had been easy. He was just like her brother, Buck.
Send him outside with a ball to play with, and he was fine. Dee Dee
was the one she worried about the most. She had never been a particularly happy young girl, and her teenage years had been especially
painful. She had always been a little on the chunky side, and unlike
the twins and Carter, who had inherited Lenore’s perfect complexion,
she’d had terrible acne all through high school. Each new pimple
brought on a new set of histrionics. Almost every afternoon, Dee Dee
would come home from school, run to her room, and fling herself
across her bed in tears, because some boy hadn’t spoken to her or she
hadn’t been invited to some party or something equally as devastating.
Sookie had spent hours sitting with her, holding her hand, while she
cried and sobbed about how terrible her life was. “Oh, Mother,” she
would sob. “You just don’t know how it feels to be me. Everybody’s
always telling me how cute and darling the twins are. All my life,
people have fallen all over them and just ignored me.” Then, inevitably, she would wail, “Oh, Mother . . . why did you have to have twins?
Why couldn’t you have just onelike a normal person!”
Sookie tried to explain. “I’m sorry, honey. It wasn’t anything I
planned. It just happened. It was a surprise to me, too. They are the
first twins on either side of the family. It was just a fluke.”
“Well, I hope you’re happy! You’ve ruined my entire life. I will always be some ugly fat lump with bad skin that nobody wants.” And
so it went, on and on. She tried to give Dee Dee special attention and
22 Fannie Flagg
be patient with her, because, unfortunately, what she said was true.
Whenever the girls went anywhere, especially when they were younger,
people made a huge fuss over the twins and left poor Dee Dee standing there, having to listen to them ooh and aah about how absolutely
adorable they were. It broke Sookie’s heart to see her suffer so. And she
did know how it felt. Growing up with Lenore, she had always felt like
a little brown wren, hopping along behind a huge colorful peacock.
TUESDAY
June 7, 2005
The next morning, Sookie woke up early, prepared to try to
solve her bird problem. Earle had just walked out the door when the
phone in the kitchen started ringing, and she wondered who in the
world was calling her so early. It couldn’t be Lenore; she was on her
way to water therapy at the senior center. Oh, dear God, please don’t
let it be Dee Dee saying she was moving back home. She knew she was
having marital problems again and today’s horoscope had warned her
to “Expect the unexpected.” Sookie looked at the phone with trepidation and read the number on the readout. It wasn’t Dee Dee. It was
that same area code as yesterday, probably the same phone solicitor, so
she didn’t pick up. She didn’t have time to talk to anybody now. She
had to concentrate on her bird- feeding plan. It was going to be tricky.
She’d seen how those blue jays could go through all their food in just
a matter of minutes, so she was going to have to move very fast.
Sookie quickly rinsed off the breakfast dishes and stuck them in
the dishwasher, but whoever was calling wouldn’t hang up, and it was
distracting. They used to have an answering machine, but Lenore
thought it was an open mike for her to speak into on any subject at
any time and had left fifteen- and twenty- minute messages on it,
sometimes in the middle of the night, so they had to get rid of it.
24 Fannie Flagg
As she finished up in the kitchen, she debated whether to put the
sunflower seeds for the blue jays in the front yard or the back. If she
put the sunflower seeds in the front, someone driving by might see her
and want to stop and talk, and she didn’t have a second to spare. So
she decided she would start at the back and run to the front. Her success depended on how long it would take the blue jays to finish the
sunflower seeds before they discovered the bird seed in front and how
fast she could run from one yard to the other.
But what shoes should she wear? She looked down and realized
she shouldn’t try and run in her flip- flops; it was too dangerous. She
went to her closet and found nothing suitable— practically every shoe
she owned had a little heel.
She went down the hall to the twins’ bedroom closet and started
rummaging through a box of their old shoes. She found a pair of
worn- out pink sneakers with pom- poms. Unfortunately, they were
two sizes too large, but they’d be better than trying to run in flip- flops
and breaking an ankle.
She put them on and laced them up as tightly as she could and
went out to her greenhouse and filled her two large ceramic polkadotted bird seed containers, one with sunflower seeds and the other
with the wild bird seed. She went out and placed the container with
the wild bird seed on the side of the house, ready to be picked up as
she ran by, headed to the front yard. She then went back to the greenhouse, picked up the container with the sunflower seeds, took a deep
breath, and ran to the backyard, filling up the feeders as fast as she
could.
After Sookie finished filling the feeders in the backyard, she
dropped the container on the ground and ran to the side of the house
and picked up the other polka- dotted seed container and was running
toward the front yard when she stepped in a gopher hole and lost her
left shoe. She couldn’t stop so she just went on without it.
And of course, the very same moment she hit the front yard, the
new Methodist minister and his wife were driving by the house and
saw Sookie, wearing one pink shoe with tassels, hopping around on
one foot, throwing seeds from a large polka- dotted container at her
feeders. They slowed down and, as a matter of courtesy, were going to
stop and say hello, but thankfully for Sookie, decided against it and
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 25
quickly drove on. They were from Scotland and didn’t know if running around wearing one pink shoe with tassels while carrying a large
polka- dotted container and throwing seeds was some kind of Southern bird- feeding ritual or not, but they were afraid to ask.
Sookie’s neighbor Netta Verp was sitting out on her side porch in
her robe, having her morning coffee, when she suddenly saw Sookie
flying around the yard like a bat out of hell, with her polka- dotted
bird seed container, slinging seeds every which way, and she wondered
what in the world she was doing. Netta had never seen anyone in such
a hurry to feed their birds in her life.
After Sookie had filled all the front yard feeders, she ran back into
the house and stood looking out the living room window, waiting to
see if her smaller birds would come to feed. She waited, but none
came. Where were they? There was not a bird to be seen anywhere.
She then ran down the hall and looked out the kitchen window and
saw the blue jays happily gobbling up all the sunflower seeds in back,
while as usual, all of her smaller birds flittered around in the bushes
below. Oh, no. Those little birds didn’t know what was waiting for
them in the front yard. Oh, Lord. She hadn’t planned on this. Now
she didn’t know what to do. She ran out on the back porch and started
waving her arms and yelling at the top of her lungs, “Go to the front,
little birds— go around to the front! Hurry up, little birds!” But how
do you communicate with birds? It was so frustrating. Now not only
were her little birds not getting anything to eat; all those sunflower
seeds seemed to have attracted every blue jay in the entire area, and
more were flying in by the minute.
Netta observed her neighbor out on her back porch, jumping up
and down and waving her arms around like a crazy person, and she
didn’t know what to think. It was certainly peculiar behavior. She just
hoped poor Sookie hadn’t flipped overnight, but with the Simmons
family you never knew.
After a moment, Sookie ran back to the living room window to
see if, by chance, any little birds were there, but now a whole new gang
of big blue jays were in the front yard, eating all the bird seed. It was
so frustrating. The only other thing she could think of to do was to get
Carter’s old baseball bat and run out and try to scare the blue jays off.
But she didn’t want to get reported to the humane society for cruelty
26 Fannie Flagg
to animals, especially since she was on the board. Oh, God, the phone
was still ringing off the hook. Whoever it was must have her on some
computer redial. Between the blue jays and the phone, she was getting
a headache, so she went in and picked it up.
“Hello!”
The person on the other end seemed surprised that someone had
finally answered and said, “Oh, hello! Ahh . . . to whom am I speaking, please?”
“Well, whom were you trying to reach?” asked Sookie, as she saw
three more blue jays swoop in.
“I’m trying to locate a Mrs. Earle Poole, Jr.”
“Yes, this is she.” As soon as she said it, she knew she had made a
mistake. She should have pretended she was the maid and said Mrs.
Poole wasn’t home. She was stuck now. As she stood watching more
and more blue jays show up at the little birds’ feeder, she suddenly
remembered that old BB gun of Carter’s in the closet and wondered if
she could fire off just a few warning shots from the porch without
being seen.
The man on the phone was asking another question. “Are you the
former Sarah Jane Krackenberry?”
“Yes, I was . . . am.” Sookie realized that the idea that she would
even think about shooting a gun at a helpless bird was not her normal
way of thinking, but those blue jays made her so mad— the way they
pushed the smaller ones around.
“Was your mother’s maiden name Simmons, middle name Marion, first name Lenore?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Did your family live in Brownsville, Texas, from the years 1942
to 1945?”
“Yes, uh- huh.”
“Is the current mailing address for Mrs. Lenore Simmons Krackenberry 526 Bay Street, Point Clear, Alabama?”
“Yes, all her mail and bills are sent to me.” Sookie was still thinking whether or not she should get Carter’s old BB gun and try and
scare the blue jays away, but decided not to. If she were to accidentally
hit one, she would never be able to forgive herself.
“Is your zip code 36564?”
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 27
Peek- a- Boo walked over and rubbed up against her leg. Then it
suddenly occurred to her: Maybe Peek- a- Boo would like a big fat blue
jay for breakfast. She could let her out. But on the other hand, if Peeka- Boo ran away and anything happened to her, Ce Ce would have a
fit.
“Ma’am? Are you still there?”
“Oh, I’m sorry, what was it?”
“Is your current zip code 36564?”
“Uh, yes. That’s correct. You have to forgive me. I’m a little distracted. I’m having a little bird problem at the moment.” Sookie sat
down, held the phone against her ear, and retied her pink sneaker. She
felt a dull pain start up in her right ankle. Oh, no. She knew as soon
as she had stepped in that gopher hole, she had twisted something.
She just hoped it wasn’t sprained. She needed to put ice on it right
away, before it could swell up, and she also had to get the man off the
phone, but in a nice way. “Sir, I’m so sorry, but I think I’ve sprained
my ankle, so I’m going to have to hang up now.”
“I see . . . uh . . . Mrs. Poole, one more thing before you go. Will
you be home tomorrow between ten a.m.and twelve p.m.?”
“Pardon me?”
“Will you be at this address tomorrow?”
“Yes, I guess so. I might go to the travel agency later. Why?”
“We are sending a letter to Mrs. Lenore Simmons Krackenberry—
and we need to know if you will be home to sign for it.”
It suddenly occurred to Sookie that this was certainly a weird call.
Why did this man want to know where she would be tomorrow and
at what time? She began to get a little suspicious and wondered if he
might be some sex pervert or a burglar. So she quickly said, “Yes, I will
be home, and so will my husband, the police chief. May I ask where
you are calling from?”
“I’m calling from Texas, ma’am.”
“Texas? Where in Texas?”
“I’m in the Austin area.”
“Austin, Texas?”
“Yes, ma’am. And Mrs. Poole, the letter should arrive at your address tomorrow, sometime between ten and twelve.”
Now Sookie really was baffled. Why would anybody in Texas be
28 Fannie Flagg
sending Lenore a letter? “Is this from the Gem Shopping Network?
Are they in Texas? Has she ordered more scatter pins? I hope not. She
has over a hundred now.”
“No, ma’am.”
“Is it from Barbara Bush? My mother thinks they have a lot in
common, and she’s always writing the poor woman, asking her to
come down for a visit. I said, ‘Mother, Barbara Bush is far too busy to
come all the way down here, just to go to lunch with you.’ ”
“No, ma’am, it’s not from Mrs. Bush.”
“Oh . . . well, is it a telephone bill? Has she called somebody and
reversed the charges again? If so, I apologize in advance. We have a
wonderful nurse watching her, but she must have turned her back for
five minutes. Anyway, I’m so sorry, and tell whoever she’s called that
we will be happy to pay for it.”
There was a pause, and then the man said, “Mrs. Poole, we have a
registered letter we are sending out overnight, and I just need to confirm that someone will be home tomorrow who is authorized to sign
for it.”
Sookie’s heart stopped. A registeredletter! Oh, no. That always
meant something legal. Sookie winced as she asked the dreaded question. “Sir, when you use the term, ‘we,’ are you by chance a law firm?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Poole, but I’m not at liberty to discuss it over the
phone.”
Oh, God, it must be something serious, if the man can’t even discuss it over the phone. “Listen . . . I’m so sorry. What is your name?”
“Harold, ma’am.”
“Listen, Harold, is it about some editorial she’s written? She
watches the news and gets herself all riled up, and she’s always spouting off about something. But believe me, if my mother has made any
threats against the government or said anything stupid, I can assure
you that she’s a perfectly harmless old lady. Well, harmless as far as not
being armed or anything. She’s just not quite right, if you know what
I mean. It’s a family trait. You just have to know the Simmonses. They
are all a little off. She has a brother and sister that are really off. You
have no idea how much trouble the woman has caused. She’s almost
eighty- nine years old, and she won’t go to assisted living, and she re-
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 29
fuses to let us put in a walk- in tub for her, and I worry to death about
her falling and breaking a hip.” She sighed. “I’m sorry to be so upset.
It’s just that my poor husband and I have just gone through four weddings, and my little birds won’t go around to the front yard. I’m just
being overrun by blue jays, and another lawsuit is just not what I need
right now. My nerves are all a jangle as it is. Can’t you tell me what it’s
about?”
“I’m sorry, ma’am. I’m not authorized to give out any information
over the phone.”
“Oh, please, Harold, don’t drag this out. You don’t know me, but
I really could go off the deep end at any moment. It’s the Simmons
family curse. It hit Uncle Baby overnight. One day, president of a
bank, and the next, off weaving baskets over at Pleasant Hill. And
Aunt Lily was perfectly fine and then for no reason, she shot at the
paperboy. Thank God, she didn’t hit him or she could be sitting in jail
right now, instead of where she is.”
“As I said, Mrs. Poole, you will be receiving the letter in the morning.”
“Oh, Harold, can’t you just open it up and read it to me now? I
don’t need to know all the details, just how much she’s being sued for.
We just went through our entire retirement account for a down payment for a house for our daughter Le Le and her husband. He’s perfectly nice, but he plays the zither for a living.”
“Oh . . .”
“Yes . . . that’s what we said. But she loves him, so what can you
do? Anyhow, we are mortgaged up to the hilt. Can’t you at least tell
me how much my mother is being sued for, so I can be prepared? I
won’t tell anyone. I promise.”
“I’m so sorry, ma’am, but I don’t have the authority to do that. I
was instructed to locate the current mailing address and send it on,
that’s all. This is not even my department. I’m just filling in.”
“Oh, I see. Well, couldn’t you just take one quick little peek and
tell me if it’s over a hundred thousand dollars?”
Then she heard his muffled voice, obviously whispering behind
his hand, “Mrs. Poole, the wife and I just married off our daughter, so
I know what you’ve been through. Don’t worry, she’s not getting sued.”
30 Fannie Flagg
“No? Oh, thank God! Oh, bless you, Harold. I don’t know why,
but with Mother, I always assume it’s going to be bad news, but then
again, it could be good news, right?”
Harold didn’t say anything, so Sookie’s mood suddenly brightened. “Hey, wait a minute. Did she win a contest or something? Are
you from Publishers Clearing House? Should I have her over here at
the house in the morning, dressed and made-up or anything? I need
to know, because she’ll want to have her hair done. Will there be photographs? Or news people?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Oh . . . well . . . can you give me just a little hint of what to expect?”
There was a long silence on the other end, then Harold said, “Mrs.
Poole, all I can say is . . . you are not who you think you are,” and then
he abruptly hung up.
Sookie sat there with his last words ringing in her ear, and now
there was someone banging away on her back door. As Sookie stood
up, her ankle throbbed even worse than before, but she hobbled down
the hall and opened the door, and there stood Netta in her robe, who
looked at her strangely. “Honey, are you all right? I saw you running
around the yard like you were in some kind of distress. I tried to call
you, but your line was busy. You left one of your shoes out in the
yard.” Sookie took the shoe and said, “Oh, thank you, Netta.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, Netta. I was just trying something new with feeding the
birds, and this man just called about some registered letter for Lenore
and I think I’ve sprained my ankle. Come on in.”
“No, I can’t, I’m still in my robe. I better get back home, but call
me if you need me.”
A few seconds after Netta left, Sookie went and looked out in the
front yard to check on her birds and, to her dismay, saw that her entire
yard was now a veritable sea of blue. It looked like she was running a
blue jay reserve. She’d been so distracted by the phone call that she
didn’t know if the little birds had gotten anything to eat at all. Oh,
drat. She would just have to try again tomorrow.
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 31
She hobbled back into the kitchen and put some ice cubes in a
hand towel and wrapped it around her ankle. As she sat there with
Peek- a- Boo in her lap, she thought more about the phone call and
what the man had said. “You are not who you think you are.” Then it
suddenly dawned on her. That man had probably been calling from
the Jehovah’s Witnesses or some other religious group. They were always leaving pamphlets at her door asking, “Do you know who you
are?” or “Do you know who your father is?” Oh, Lord. Now she felt
like a fool. What a complete idiot she had been, telling him all that
personal stuff about the family.
But on the other hand, knowing her mother, he could be calling
from ancestor.com or some other genealogy- tracing company. She’d
also seen ads for them that said, “Who are you?” or “Who do you
think you are?”
The more she thought about it, she thought that it must be Lenore
trying to trace the Simmons family line again. “I just know we’re related to the royal family in some way. I just feel it in my bones,” she
said. For as long as Sookie could remember, she had been tracing and
retracing, but so far, no connection. Now even Dee Dee was obsessed
with it and had the Simmons family crest hanging over the mantel in
her condo.
As the morning wore on, Sookie tried to relax and just forget about
the call, but she was still feeling a little uneasy. It was the word “registered” that bothered her. She hated to call Earle at work but she dialed
the number anyway, and his receptionist answered. “Dr. Poole’s office,
may I help you?”
“Hi, Sherry, it’s me. Could you get him to pick up? I need to ask
him a quick question.”
“Sure, hold on. I’ll buzz him. How’s your mother?”
“Fine, thank you.”
“Well, good. Hold on.”
A few seconds later, Earle picked up. “Hi, are you okay?”
“I’m fine. I just need to ask you something.”
“Honey, I’m right in the middle of a root canal.”
“Okay, I’ll make it fast. A man from Texas just called and said he
32 Fannie Flagg
was sending Lenore a registered letter tomorrow. Should I be worried?
He said he wasn’t a lawyer.”
“Well, then, no.”
“What do you think it’s about?”
“Oh, I don’t know. It’s probably just some come- on, trying to sell
something or get her to join something.”
“Then I shouldn’t worry?”
“No, just forget about it.”
“But it’s registered.”
“Well, honey. Just don’t sign for it.”
“Isn’t that against the law?”
“No. Just tell Pete you don’t want it. That’s all. Sweetie pie, I’ve
really got to go. I’ll see you at home, okay?”
“Earle, maybe . . . I just won’t go to the door.”
“Fine.”
“But won’t he leave a note and try and redeliver it?”
“Honey, do whatever you want. Don’t go to the door or just sign
for it and throw it away. It’s probably just junk. Okay?”
“Then I shouldn’t worry?”
“No.”
“And I don’t have to accept it.”
“No. Forget about it. I gotta go. Love you.”
Sookie hung up and smiled. Earle always knew how to make her
feel better. Even her ankle felt better.
FILLING STATION’S
Last Reunion
A NOVEL
FANNIE FLAGG
d RANDOM HOUSE • NEW YORK
A MOST UNUSUAL WEEK
Point Clear, Alabama
Monday, June 6, 2005
76º and Sunny
Mrs. Earle Poole, Jr., better known to friends and family as
Sookie, was driving home from the Birds- R- Us store out on Highway
98 with one ten- pound bag of sunflower seeds and one ten- pound bag
of wild bird seed and not her usual weekly purchase for the past fifteen
years of one twenty- pound bag of the Pretty Boy Wild Bird Seed and
Sunflower Mix. As she had explained to Mr. Nadleshaft, she was worried that the smaller birds were still not getting enough to eat. Every
morning lately, the minute she filled her feeders, the larger, more aggressive blue jays would swoop in and scare the little birds all away.
She noticed that the blue jays always ate the sunflower seeds first,
and so tomorrow, she was going to try putting just plain sunflower
seeds in her backyard feeders, and while the blue jays were busy eating
them, she would run around the house as fast as she could and put the
wild bird seed in the feeders in the front yard. That way, her poor
finches and titmice might be able to get a little something, at least.
As she drove over the Mobile Bay Bridge, she looked out at the big
white puffy clouds and saw a long row of pelicans flying low over the
4 Fannie Flagg
water. The bay was sparkling in the bright sun and already dotted with
red, white, and blue sailboats headed out for the day. A few people
fishing alongside the bridge waved as she passed by, and she smiled
and waved back. She was almost to the other side when she suddenly
began to experience some sort of a vague and unusual sense of wellbeing. And with good reason.
Against all odds, she had just survived the last wedding of their
three daughters, Dee Dee, Ce Ce, and Le Le. Their only unmarried
child now was their twenty- five- year- old son, Carter, who lived in
Atlanta. And some other poor (God help her), beleaguered mother of
the bride would be in charge of planning that happy occasion. All she
and Earle would have to do for Carter’s wedding was show up and
smile. And today, other than one short stop at the bank and picking
up a couple of pork chops for dinner, she didn’t have another single
thing she had to do. She was almost giddy with relief.
Of course, Sookie absolutely worshipped and adored her girls, but
having to plan three large weddings in fewer than two years had been
a grueling, never- ending, twenty- four- hours- a- day job, with all the
bridal showers, picking out patterns, shopping, fittings, writing invitations, meeting with caterers, figuring out seating arrangements, ordering flowers, etc. And between dealing with out- of- town guests and
new in- laws, figuring out where to put everyone, plus last- minute
bridal hysteria, at this point, she was simply weddinged out.
And no wonder. If you counted Dee Dee’s last one, technically
there had really been four large weddings, which meant shopping and
being fitted for four different mother- of- the- bride dresses (you can’t
wear the same one twice) in less than two years.
Dee Dee had married, then promptly divorced. And after they
had spent weeks returning all the wedding gifts, she had turned around
and remarried the exact same husband. Her second wedding hadn’t
been quite as expensive as the first, but every bit as stressful.
When she and Earle had married in 1968, it had been just a typical church affair: white wedding gown, bridesmaids in matching pastel dresses and shoes, ring bearer, best man, reception, over and out.
But now everybody had to have some kind of a theme.
Dee Dee had insisted on having an authentic Old South Gone
with the Windwedding, complete with a Scarlett O’Hara dress, large
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 5
hoop skirt and all, and at the last minute, she had to be driven to the
church standing up in the back of a small moving van.
Le Le and her groom wanted an entirely red and white wedding,
including the invitations, food, drinks, and all the decorations, in
honor of the University of Alabama football team.
And Ce Ce, Le Le’s twin sister, the last girl to marry, had carried
her ten- pound Persian cat, Peek- a- Boo, down the aisle instead of a
wedding bouquet, and the groom’s German shepherd, dressed in a
tux, had served as best man. And if that wasn’t bad enough, someone’s
turtle was the ring bearer. The entire thing had just been excruciating.
You can’t hurry a turtle.
Looking back on it now, Sookie realized she really should have put
her foot down when Ce Ce and James invited all their friends to bring
their pets to the reception, but she had made a sacred vow to never
bully her children. Nevertheless, having to replace an entire banquet
room’s wall- to- wall carpeting at the Grand Hotel was going to cost
them a fortune. Oh, well. Too late now. Hopefully, all that was behind
her, and evidently not a minute too soon.
Two days ago, when Ce Ce left for her honeymoon, Sookie had
broken down and sobbed uncontrollably. She didn’t know if she was
experiencing empty- nest syndrome or just plain exhaustion. She knew
she must be tired. At the reception, she had introduced a man to his
own wife. Twice.
The truth was, as sad as she was to see Ce Ce and James drive off,
she had been secretly looking forward to going home, taking off all
her clothes, and crawling into bed for about five years, but even that
had been put on hold. At the last minute, James’s parents, his sister,
and her husband had decided to stay over an extra night, so she had to
quickly try and whip up a little “going away” brunch for them.
Granted, it wasn’t much: Earle’s coconut margaritas, an assortment of crackers, cream cheese and pepper jelly, shrimp and grits, crab
cakes with coleslaw, and tomato aspic on the side. But still, it had
taken some effort.
***
6 Fannie Flagg
When Sookie drove into the little town of Point Clear and passed
the Page and Palette bookstore, it occurred to her that maybe tomorrow, she would stop in and pick up a good book. She hadn’t had time
to read anything other than her daily horoscope, the Kappa newsletter, and an occasional Birds and Bloomsmagazine. We could be at war
for all she knew. But now, she was actually going to be able to read an
entire book again.
She suddenly felt like doing the twist right there in the front seat,
which only reminded her how long it had been since she and Earle
had learned a new dance step. She had probably even forgotten how
to do the hokey pokey.
All she really had left to deal with was her eighty- eight- year- old
mother, the formidable Mrs. Lenore Simmons Krackenberry, who absolutely refused to move to the perfectly lovely assisted-living facility
right across town. And it would be so much easier on everybody if she
would. The maintenance on her mother’s yard alone was extremely
expensive, not to mention the yearly insurance. Since the hurricane,
the insurance on everybody’s house on the Mobile Bay had gone skyhigh. But Lenore was adamant about never leaving her home and had
announced with a dramatic gesture, “Until they carry me out feetfirst.”
Sookie couldn’t imagine her mother leaving anywhere feetfirst. As
long as she and her brother, Buck, could remember, Lenore, a large
imposing woman who wore lots of scatter pins and long, flowing
scarves, and had her silver hair teased and sprayed into a perfect
winged- back flip, had always rushed into a room headfirst. Buck said
she looked like something that should be on the hood of a car, and
they had secretly referred to her as “Winged Victory” ever since. And
Winged Victory never just left a room; she whisked out with a flourish, leaving a cloud of expensive perfume in her wake. Never a quiet
woman in any sense of the word, much like a show horse in the Rose
Parade, she could be heard coming a mile away, due to the loud jingling of the numerous bracelets, bangles, and beads she always wore.
And she was usually speaking long before she came in sight. Lenore
had a loud booming voice and had studied “Expression” while attending Judson College for women, and to the family’s everlasting regret,
the teacher had encouraged her.
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 7
Now, due to certain recent events, including her setting her own
kitchen on fire, they had been forced to hire a twenty- four- hour livein nurse for Lenore. Earle was a successful dentist with a nice practice,
but they were by no means rich, and certainly not now, with all the
money they had spent sending the children to college, the weddings,
Lenore’s mortgage, and now the nurse. Poor Earle might not be able
to retire until he was ninety, but the nurse was a definite necessity.
Lenore, who was not only loud but also extremely opinionated
and voiced her opinion to everyone within earshot, had suddenly
started calling total strangers long- distance. Last year, she had called
the pope in Rome, and that call alone had cost them more than three
hundred dollars. When confronted with the bill, Lenore had been
incensed and said that she shouldn’t have to pay a dime because she
had been on hold the entire time. Try telling that to the phone company. And there was no reasoning with her. When Sookie asked why
she had called the pope, considering that she was a sixth- generation
dyed- in- the- wool Methodist, Lenore had thought for a moment and
said, “Oh . . . just to chat.”
“To chat?”
“Yes, and you mustn’t be so closed- minded, Sookie. One can certainly be on speaking terms with Catholics. You don’t want to marry
one, but a friendly chat can’t hurt.”
And there had been other incidents. At a chamber of commerce
meeting, Lenore had called the mayor a pointy- headed little carpetbagger and a horse thief and was sued for defamation of character.
Sookie had been worried to death, but Lenore remained unfazed.
“They have to prove what I said was not true, and no jury in their
right mind would dare convict me!” In the end, the judge had thrown
the case out, but still, it had been very embarrassing. All last year,
Sookie had to try to avoid running into the mayor and his wife, and
in such a small town, it had been almost impossible. They were just
everywhere.
Since the lawsuit, they had been through three different nurses.
Two quit, and one left in the middle of the night, along with one of
Lenore’s dinner rings and a frozen turkey. But now, after months of
searching, Sookie felt she had finally found the perfect nurse, a darling
older Filipino lady named Angel, who was so patient and so sweet,
8 Fannie Flagg
even though Lenore continued to call her Conchita, because she said
she looked exactly like the Mexican woman who had worked for her
in Texas in the forties, when Sookie’s father had been stationed there.
The good news was, now that Lenore had Angel, Sookie was finally going to be able to attend the Kappa reunion in Dallas, and her
old college roommate, Dena Nordstrom, had promised to meet her
there. They talked on the phone regularly, but she hadn’t seen Dena in
a long time, and she couldn’t wait.
As Sookie sat at the intersection waiting for the red light to change,
she pulled down the visor and looked at herself in the mirror. Good
God, that was a mistake. She guessed that after fifty, nobody looked
good in the bright sun, but even so, she really had neglected herself.
She hadn’t seen her eye doctor in over three years, and she clearly
needed a new prescription.
Last month at church, she had embarrassed herself half to death.
The correct quote was, “I am a vessel for God’s love,” but she had read
out loud in front of the entire congregation, “I am a weasel for God’s
love.” Earle had said that no one had noticed, but of course, they had.
Sookie glanced at herself in the mirror again. Oh, Lord, no wonder she looked so terrible. She had run out the door this morning
without a stitch of makeup. Now she was going to have to drive all the
way home and throw some on. She always tried to look somewhat
presentable. Thankfully, she wasn’t as vain as her mother, or she would
never have left home at all. Outward appearances meant everything to
Lenore. She was particularly proud of what she called “the Simmons
foot” and her small, slightly turned- up nose. Sookie had gotten her
father’s longer nose, and wouldn’t you know it, Buck got the cute one.
Oh, well. At least she got the Simmons foot.
Just as the light changed, Netta Verp, Sookie’s next- door neighbor,
whizzed by in her huge 1989 Ford Fairlane, probably on her way out
to Costco, and tooted her horn. Sookie tooted back. Sookie loved
Netta. She was a good old soul. She and Netta were both Leos.
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 9
Netta’s house was in between their house and Lenore’s. Poor thing.
She had been stuck in the middle, with all the Poole children and
animals on one side and Lenore on the other, calling her night and
day, but she never complained. She said, “Hell, I’m a widow. What
else am I going to do for fun?”
Sookie supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised that Ce Ce’s
wedding theme had been “Pets Are People, Too.” At one point, there
had been eleven animals living in the Poole house, including an alligator that had crawled out of the bay and up the back- porch stairs, three
cats, and four dogs, one being Earle’s beloved Great Dane, Tiny, who
was the size of a small horse.
All the dogs, cats, and hamsters— and the one blind raccoon—
were fine, but she had drawn the line with the alligator and insisted
that it stay in the basement. She loved animals, too, but when you’re
scared to get up at night and go to the bathroom, it’s time to put your
foot down, and hopefully not on top of something that could bite it
off.
The hard part of having animals, for her, was losing them. Two
years before, Mr. Henry, their eighteen- year- old cat, had died, and she
still couldn’t see an orange cat without going to pieces. After Mr.
Henry died she told Earle no more pets. She just couldn’t take the
heartbreak.
Sookie drove straight on through town, waved at Doris, the tomato lady on the corner, then headed down the hill, toward her house
on the bay.
The old historic scenic route was lined on both sides with large
oak trees planted before the Civil War. On the right side, facing the
water, were miles of old wooden bay houses built mostly by people
from Mobile as summer homes. Sookie guessed that if she had a penny
for every time she had driven on this road over the years, she would be
a millionaire by now.
She had been eight the first time her father had brought the family
10 Fannie Flagg
down from Selma to spend the summer. They had arrived in Point
Clear on a warm, balmy evening, and the air had been filled with the
scent of honeysuckle and wisteria.
She could still remember coming down the hill and seeing the
lights of Mobile, sparkling and twinkling across the water, just like a
jeweled necklace. It was as if they had just entered into a fairyland.
The Spanish moss hanging from the trees had looked bright silver in
the moonlight and made dancing shadows all along the road. And the
shrimp boats out in the bay, with their little blinking green lights, had
looked just like Christmas to Sookie. For her, there had always been
something magical about Point Clear, and there still was.
About a mile past the Grand Hotel, Sookie turned in and drove up
her long crushed- oyster- shell driveway and pulled into the carport.
Netta’s house was almost identical to theirs, but Netta’s yard was much
prettier. As soon as she could get rested enough, one of the first things
Sookie was going to do was prune. Her azalea bushes were a disgrace,
and her limelight hydrangeas had just gone completely wild.
Their house, like most of the others along the scenic route, was a
large white wooden home with dark green shutters. Most of the bay
houses had been built long before air- conditioning and had a wide
center hall that ran all the way to a large screened- in porch in back
overlooking the bay. And like their neighbors, they had a long gray
wooden pier with a small seating area with a tin roof on the end.
When the kids had been much younger, she and Earle used to go sit
there almost every evening to watch the sunset and listen to the church
bells that rang up and down the bay. They hadn’t done that in years.
She was so looking forward to being alone with Earle again.
Sookie took the two bags of seeds out of the car and put them in
the little greenhouse Earle had built for her, where she kept her bird
supplies. A few minutes later, after she went inside, Sookie suddenly
noticed how quiet the house was. Almost eerily quiet. As she stood
there, all she could hear was the ticking of the kitchen clock and the
cry of the seagulls out on the bay. It was so strange not to hear a door
slamming or someone running up and down the stairs. How pleasant
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 11
to have peace and quiet, and not hear loud music blaring from someone’s room. So pleasant, in fact, she thought maybe she would fix
herself a cup of tea and sit and relax a few minutes before she headed
out again.
Just as she was reaching for a tea bag, the kitchen phone rang.
Now that the house was empty, it sounded like a fire alarm going off.
She picked it up and looked at the caller ID number. It was a longdistance call, but not from an area code she recognized, so she just let
it ring. She was too tired to talk to anyone if she didn’t have to. In the
past few days she’d had to smile and talk to so many people that her
face still hurt.
Sookie stuck a cup of water in the microwave, grabbed her tea bag,
and went out on the screened- in porch to enjoy it. She sat down in her
big white wicker chair. The bay was as smooth as glass, not a ripple in
sight.
She noticed that her gardenia bushes were still in bloom and
thought she might cut off a few and float them in a dish in the living
room. They always made the house smell so sweet. She took a deep
breath of fresh air and was about to have her first sip of tea when the
phone started ringing again. Oh, Lord, it was obviously somebody
calling the wrong number or a solicitor trying to sell her something,
and if she didn’t answer they would probably drive her crazy all day.
She got up and went back to the kitchen and picked up. It was her
mother.
“Sookie, I need you to come over here right now.”
“Mother, is something wrong?”
“I have something extremely important to discuss with you.”
“Oh, Mother, can’t it wait? I just got home.”
“No, it cannot!”
“Oh, well . . . all right. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
Sookie frowned as she hung up. That particular tone in her mother’s voice always made her a little anxious. Had Lenore found out she
had spoken to the woman at Westminster Village about assisted living? She had just been inquiring about the price, and it had only been
one short call. But if someone had told Lenore she would be furious.
A few minutes later, Sookie walked over, and the nurse, who was
12 Fannie Flagg
in the front yard cutting fresh flowers, looked up and said, “Oh, good
morning, Mrs. Poole,” then added with a sympathetic little smile,
“God bless you.”
“Thank you, Angel,” said Sookie.
Oh, Lord . . . it must be worse than she thought. As Sookie walked
into the house, she called out, “Mother?”
“I’m here.”
“Where’s ‘here’?”
“In the dining room, Sookie.”
Sookie went in and saw her mother seated at the large Georgian
dining room table with the twelve Queen Anne chairs. On the table,
placed in front of her, was the large leather box with the maroon velvet
inside that held her set of the Francis I silverware. Next to the box was
the large Simmons family Bible.
“What’s going on, Mother?”
“Sit down.”
Sookie sat down and waited for whatever was coming. Lenore
looked at her and said, “Sookie, I called you here today because I am
not entirely convinced that you fully appreciate what you will be receiving upon my demise. As my only daughter, you will be inheriting
the entire set of the Simmons family silver . . . and before I can die in
peace, I want you to swear on this Bible that you will never, under any
circumstances, break up the set.”
Sookie was so relieved it wasn’t about the call to Westminster Village, and said, “Oh, Mother . . . I do appreciate it . . . but really, why
don’t you leave it all to Bunny? She and Buck entertain much more
than I do.”
“What?” Lenore gasped and clutched at her pearls. “Bunny? Leave
it to Bunny? Oh, Sookie,” she said with wounded eyes. “Do you have
any idea what was sacrificed to keep it in the family?” Sookie sighed.
She had heard the story a thousand times before, but Lenore loved to
tell it over and over, with large dramatic gestures included. “Grandmother Simmons said that at one point during the war, all that stood
between them and the entire family going hungry was your greatgrandmother’s silver. And do you know what she did?”
“No, Mother, what?”
“She chose to go hungry, that’s what! Why, she said there were
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 13
days when all they had to eat was a pitiful little handful of pecans. And
they had to bury the silver in a different spot every night to keep the
Yankee soldiers from finding it, but she saved the silver! And now you
say, ‘Oh, just give it to Bunny’? Who’s not even a Simmons— and not
even from Alabama? Why don’t you just cut my heart out and throw
it out in the yard?”
“Oh, God. All right. . . . I’m sorry, Mother. It’s just . . . well, if you
want me to have it, then thank you.”
Sookie certainly hadn’t meant to hurt her mother’s feelings about
the silverware, but she really had no use for it. She didn’t know anybody who used a pickle fork or a grapefruit spoon anymore, and you
can’t put real silver in the dishwasher. You have to wash each piece by
hand. And she certainly didn’t want to have to polish silver all day. The
Francis I pattern had twenty- eight pieces of carved fruit on the knife
handle alone, not to mention the tea service, the coffee service, and
the two sets of formal candlesticks.
Sookie realized she probably should care more about the silver.
After all, it had come all the way from England and had been in the
family for generations. But she just wasn’t as formal as her mother.
Winged Victory would die of epilepsy if she knew her daughter sometimes used paper plates and plastic knives and forks and just hated
polishing silverware.
Lenore dearly loved to polish silver and, once a month, would sit
at the dining room table wearing white cotton gloves with all of it
spread out before her. “Nothing relaxes me more than cleaning my
silver.”
Oh, well. Too late now. The die was cast. Sookie was stuck with it.
She swore on the Bible that not only would she never break up the set,
but that she personally would polish it regularly. “Don’t ever let tarnish get a head start on you,” Lenore said.
What could she do? Being Lenore’s daughter meant she had come
into the world with preordained duties. First, to proudly carry on the
Simmons family line that, according to Lenore, could be traced all the
way back to fifteenth- century England. Second, to protect the family
silver.
It was such a beautiful warm day, and after Sookie left her mother’s house, she took her shoes off and walked back home along the bay.
14 Fannie Flagg
As she strolled along, she suddenly wondered how many times she and
the children had walked back and forth to Lenore’s house over the
years. It seemed like only yesterday when all day long, the kids were
running back and forth to her house and theirs.
Time was so strange. When the children were younger, she used to
marvel at the tiny little footsteps they left in the sand, but those days
were gone forever. They were all grown up now . . . and, bless their
hearts, not a one of them had the Simmons foot, and three had the
Poole ears. But that was another story.
A few minutes later, after she had thrown on a little makeup, Sookie
drove back to town and was sitting in line at the drive- in bank waiting
to make a deposit to cover yet another one of Lenore’s unexpected
expenses. About ten years ago, Lenore had suddenly started bouncing
checks all over town and hadn’t seemed the least bit concerned. “I hate
fiddling with figures,” she said. So now all Lenore’s mail was delivered
to Sookie to handle, including all her bills. Lenore’s letters alone were
almost a full- time job. She was always firing off editorials to the newspaper. The last one, suggesting that we do away with the vote for
people under fifty- five, had brought in more than one hundred letters
that Sookie had to answer. Lenore never looked at her own mail. “Just
tell me if something is important,” she said. The woman ordered almost everything she saw on television, and Sookie always had to send
it back. Why would anybody over eighty want a ThighMaster?
Lenore was her mother, and she loved her, but Lord,she was a
lot of trouble. When Earle had first bought the dental practice and
they had moved down to Point Clear for good, Lenore insisted that
before she would move with the family from Selma, Sookie’s GreatGrandfather Simmons must be moved from the Selma Cemetery and
transferred down to the Soldier’s Rest Cemetery in Point Clear. “I
would just die if I didn’t have Grandfather Simmons to decorate. He
was a general, Sookie!” And, naturally, Sookie was the one who ended
up having to deal with all the endless red tape of trying to arrange it.
After weeks of hassling back and forth with the cemetery people, having to sign paper after paper, she finally just begged them to please dig
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 15
up anything— dog, cat, or horse— and send it on. At that point, she
was so tired, she didn’t care.
The car in front of Sookie moved one space closer to the teller, and
she moved up with it. She looked at herself in the mirror again. She
looked a little better with her makeup on, but, of course, she had forgotten to put on her earrings. Honestly, between the weddings and
dealing with her mother, it really was a miracle she was still sane at all.
She had always had a delicate nervous system and a tendency to
faint under pressure. And it was very stressful never knowing what her
mother was going to do next. Lenore had shown up at Ce Ce’s wedding wearing a large yellow hat with two live lovebirds in a cage sitting
on top. God only knows where she got that.
Thank heavens, all Sookie’s kids had been good kids, because
when they were growing up, she had let them do pretty much what
they pleased. She had wanted them to have a carefree childhood. Hers
certainly hadn’t been, with Lenore pushing her into everything. She
had always been basically shy. She never wanted to be a Magnolia Trail
Maiden or a cheerleader or to join all those organizations. But she had
had no choice. Lenore ruled with an iron hand. “You owe it to the
Simmons name to be a leader in society, Sookie!” she said.
Well . . . that certainly hadn’t worked out. She knew she was a
disappointment to her mother, but what could she do? She didn’t
know why, but in school, as hard as she tried, she had never been able
to get more than a C average while Buck had made all A’s. And those
ballet lessons Lenore had pushed her into had been a complete disaster.
Sookie was finally at the drive- through window and handed the
bank teller her deposit and suddenly noticed that she had developed a
strange tic in her right eye, probably some leftover stress from the
wedding. Thankfully, Earle had finally just picked the turtle up and
handed it to James or they would probably all still be sitting there. The
girl in the window pushed the drawer back out with her receipt and
said over the speakerphone, “Thank you, Mrs. Poole, have a nice day.”
“Oh, thank you, Susie. You, too.”
“Tell your mother I said hello.”
“I will.”
After she left the bank, Sookie ran into the market and picked up
16 Fannie Flagg
a few pork chops and, as an afterthought, a can of sliced pineapple.
Earle said he had a big surprise for her tonight, so she thought she
might spice up the chops a bit.
Sookie was standing in the “less than six items” checkout line when
she heard someone call out her name. It was Janice, a pretty blond girl
and one of Ce Ce’s bridesmaids, who rushed over from the produce
department, still holding a head of lettuce, and hugged her. “Oh, Mrs.
Poole, I’m so happy to see you! How are you? You must be exhausted
from all the excitement . . . but I just had to tell you, that was one of
the nicest weddings I have ever been in. And such fun, too! Ce Ce and
Peek- a- Boo looked so cute coming up the aisle— and it’s always so
wonderful to see your precious mother. I swear she never changes.
She’s still the prettiest thing . . . and funny. I wish you could have been
at our table— she had us all just screaming with laughter. And that hat
with those birds! How does she come up with these things?”
“I have no idea,” said Sookie.
“What a character, and she was so sweet to bring her little Mexican nurse with her.”
As Sookie moved one person closer to the checkout girl, Janice
moved with her. “Oh, and listen, Mrs. Poole, I was going to drop you
a note and apologize for Tinker Bell’s terrible behavior at the reception. I don’t know what got into him. He usually just loves cats to
death.”
Sookie said, “Oh, don’t worry about it, honey. . . . After all, dogs
will be dogs.”
Janice thought about it for a second and said, “Yes, I guess you’re
right. They just can’t help themselves, can they?” Then she made a sad
face. “How are you holding up? You must be so blue with Carter and
all the girls gone— but thank heavens, you still have your mother to
keep you company . . . and I’ll bet she just keeps you entertained
twenty- four hours a day doesn’t she?”
“Oh, yes, she certainly does,” said Sookie.
Finally, it was Sookie’s turn at the cash register, and Janice said,
“Well, I’d better run. ’Bye, Mrs. Poole, so nice to see you. Be sure and
tell your mother I said hey.”
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 17
“I sure will, honey.”
When she came out of the market, she saw that the Elks Club ladies had set up a bake sale, so she walked over to see what they had.
Dot Yeager, sitting behind the table, said, “Don’t they all look good?”
“Oh, they do.”
“Your mother looked so pretty at church yesterday in that bright
blue dress with her silver hair. I wish I could wear that shade of blue,
but it just fades me out to nothing. I had my colors done, and I’m a
fall, but Lenore is definitely a spring, isn’t she?”
“Yes, I believe she is.”
Sookie was standing there, trying to decide between the lemon
icebox and the pecan pie, when her friend Marvaleen walked up. “Oh,
hi, Marvaleen. What do you think would go better with pork chops?
The pecan or the lemon icebox?”
“If it were me, I’d go for the key lime, but then, I’m a fool for key
lime.” Sookie bought the key lime.
Sookie was glad she had run into Marvaleen. She seemed so much
calmer now. Marvaleen had recently gone through a divorce and, for
a time, had been quite intense. She had been seeing a life coach over
in Mobile named Edna Yorba Zorbra, and all she wanted to do when
you saw her was tell you in great detail what Edna Yorba Zorbra had
just said.
A few months ago, Sookie had been at the store and in a hurry,
and she had tried to hide, but Marvaleen had spotted her and cornered her in the frozen food department. “Sookie, do you journal?”
“What?”
“Do you journal? Write things down?”
“Oh, like lists. Yes, I have to. I went to the store four times before
I remembered to buy Parmesan cheese.”
“No, Sookie, I mean seriously journal. Write down your innermost thoughts. Edna Yorba Zorbra says it’s essential to maintain a
healthy psyche. I can’t tell you what a difference it’s made in my life. I
would never have divorced Ralph if I hadn’t started journaling. I didn’t
realize how much I hated him until I saw it written down in black and
white. Oh, you must journal, Sookie. I didn’t know who I really was
until I started journaling.”
Well . . . that was fine for Marvaleen, she guessed, but she couldn’t
18 Fannie Flagg
imagine anything she would rather not do than write about her innermost feelings. And besides, she already knew exactly who she was
and, unfortunately, so did everyone else within a five- hundred- mile
radius.
Driving home, Sookie passed by the cemetery, and sure enough,
there was Lenore’s car parked at the entrance. Every Monday, she put
fresh flowers on her Grandfather Simmons’s grave and inspected the
grounds and made sure to call anyone whose relative’s blooms were
fading and lecture them about honoring the dead. Most people had
moved on and were more interested in the recent dead. But not
Lenore. The woman was obsessed with her ancestors.
Lenore’s own mother had died in childbirth, and she had been
raised by her grandmother. That probably explained a lot about Lenore
and her propensity to live not just in the past, but in the distant past.
Sookie’s Great- Grandmother Simmons had been born during the
Civil War, and her memories of that time were still raw and somewhat
bitter. From early childhood, the message given to Lenore almost daily
at her grandmother’s knee was that in order to survive in this world,
she was to remain strong and proud. The South had been bloodied
and defeated, yes, but never bowed. They had lost everything but their
pride and their good name.
At seventeen, Lenore was sent to Judson College and became president of her sorority, Kappa Kappa Gamma, and valedictorian of her
class. It was at Judson where Lenore had met Sookie’s father, Alton
Carter Krackenberry. He had been a cadet attending the Marion Military Institute nearby. And from the first moment he met her in the
receiving line, he had been blinded by love for life.
During World War II, Sookie’s father had commanded an entire
unit of men in Brownsville, Texas. But at home, Lenore always ruled
the roost. He spoiled her terribly and did pretty much whatever Lenore wanted him to do. No matter how many insane things she did,
he would just look at her and exclaim to his children, “Look at her—
isn’t she just wonderful?” To the day he died, he said that Lenore had
been the most beautiful girl at the Senior Military Ball, a fact that
Lenore had agreed with most wholeheartedly. And often.
***
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 19
After Sookie got home and put the groceries away, she went into
the sunroom with the paper and sat down to read when Peek- a- Boo
jumped up in her lap. Oh, dear. She was perfectly happy to keep her
until Ce Ce came back from her honeymoon, but she didn’t want to
get attached to her, so she picked her up and put her down on the
floor. But the cat jumped right back up again. Sookie sighed and said,
“Oh, Peek- a- Boo. Honey . . . don’t make me like you. Go on now,”
and she put her back down again. But she jumped right back up. The
poor thing was obviously starved for affection, and so against her better judgment, Sookie started to pet her. After a minute, Peek- a- Boo
was purring and kneading Sookie’s legs, looking up at her, happy and
content. “Oh, well, bless your heart. . . . You miss your mother, don’t
you? But she’ll be back, don’t you worry. Do you want me to get you
some more bites? Is that what you want, precious? Do you want to
play with your little toy?”
Oh, Lord. She had only had the cat forty- eight hours, and she was
already talking baby talk to it. But what could she do? She couldn’t
just ignore the poor thing . . . and she was so cute.
When Earle came home from work, Peek- a- Boo was happily chasing her mouse on a string that Sookie was pulling all through the
house. Earle said, “Hi, sweetie. What did you do today?”
Sookie had been waiting for years to say this: “Nothing. Absolutely nothing.”
That night in bed, Earle was fast asleep, and so was Peek- a- Boo,
who was now cuddled up next to her, but as usual, Sookie was still
wide awake. Earle’s big surprise was that he was going to take her on a
second honeymoon and she was so happy about it. She wanted to
spend as much time with Earle as she possibly could, while she still
could. With her future being as uncertain as it was, Sookie really didn’t
know how much time she had left.
It was the curse of the Simmonses. When they reached a certain
age, some of them (her Aunt Lily and Uncle Baby) had to be sent to
Pleasant Hill Sanitarium. As the doctor said, “When a fifty- eightyear- old man goes downtown dressed up in a Dale Evans cowgirl outfit, complete with a skirt with fringe, it’s time,” and after Aunt Lily’s
20 Fannie Flagg
unfortunate incident with the paperboy, it was obvious she needed to
be committed. But with Lenore, it was hard to tell. When Sookie had
called Dr. Childress in Selma about her mother’s latest exploits and
asked what he thought, he sighed and said, “Sookie, honey, I’ve known
your mother all my life, and the problem with Lenore has always been
trying to figure out what behavior is just ‘delightfully eccentric’ and
what’s ‘as batty as hell.’ I know it’s not an official diagnosis, but every
Simmons I ever knew had a loose screw somewhere.”
Dr. Childress had been the family doctor for years, and Sookie
wished he had told her this before, not after, she had had four children. Who knows what wacko genes she may have passed on? Being
second- generation, the children could be safe, but she was a genetic
time bomb waiting to go off any minute. She lived in fear and dread
of one day embarrassing her husband and children, and at one of the
weddings, having someone point at her and say, “That lady in the
corner talking to herself and batting at imaginary flies is the mother of
the bride.”
When she tried to tell Earle how worried she was about the Simmons curse, he had always dismissed it. “Oh, Sookie, don’t be silly.
You’re not going to lose your mind. You’re as sane as I am.” She hoped
he was right. But a few weeks ago, she had gone for a dress fitting in
Mobile and had left the dress at home. Hopefully, now that she was
almost sixty, it was just a normal senior moment and not the beginning of something worse. She didn’t know, but she had written her
family a letter and put it in the safety-deposit box at the bank, just in
case.
She also wished Carter would get married sooner rather than later.
He had always been popular. A couple of his old girlfriends still called
her, wanting to know about him, so she was hopeful. The other day,
he had said, “Mom, I want to get married . . . it’s just that I haven’t
found anybody, yet, and it’s getting pretty discouraging.”
“Oh, I know, darling, but I promise one day, you’ll meet the exact
right one, and when you do, you will know it.”
“How?”
“You just will, that’s all.”
Sookie knew it was a stupid answer, but it had happened to her,
sort of. She’d known Earle Poole, Jr., since grammar school. She just
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 21
hadn’t known he was the right one until years later. Granted, her life
had not always been a bowl of cherries— but then, whose had? Even if
her life were to end tomorrow, she still had so much to be grateful for.
First and foremost, for Earle.
And her children had mostly been a joy. The twins, Ce Ce and Le
Le, had never given her a minute’s trouble. They had always been
happy, probably because they had each other. From the moment they
could talk, they just chattered away together. They were like their own
separate little unit, and she was amazed at how well they got along.
She had read that some twins hated to dress alike, but not hers. They
loved it and had to have matching underwear and pajamas. They even
spoke in stereo. One would start a sentence, and the other would finish it.
Raising Carter had been easy. He was just like her brother, Buck.
Send him outside with a ball to play with, and he was fine. Dee Dee
was the one she worried about the most. She had never been a particularly happy young girl, and her teenage years had been especially
painful. She had always been a little on the chunky side, and unlike
the twins and Carter, who had inherited Lenore’s perfect complexion,
she’d had terrible acne all through high school. Each new pimple
brought on a new set of histrionics. Almost every afternoon, Dee Dee
would come home from school, run to her room, and fling herself
across her bed in tears, because some boy hadn’t spoken to her or she
hadn’t been invited to some party or something equally as devastating.
Sookie had spent hours sitting with her, holding her hand, while she
cried and sobbed about how terrible her life was. “Oh, Mother,” she
would sob. “You just don’t know how it feels to be me. Everybody’s
always telling me how cute and darling the twins are. All my life,
people have fallen all over them and just ignored me.” Then, inevitably, she would wail, “Oh, Mother . . . why did you have to have twins?
Why couldn’t you have just onelike a normal person!”
Sookie tried to explain. “I’m sorry, honey. It wasn’t anything I
planned. It just happened. It was a surprise to me, too. They are the
first twins on either side of the family. It was just a fluke.”
“Well, I hope you’re happy! You’ve ruined my entire life. I will always be some ugly fat lump with bad skin that nobody wants.” And
so it went, on and on. She tried to give Dee Dee special attention and
22 Fannie Flagg
be patient with her, because, unfortunately, what she said was true.
Whenever the girls went anywhere, especially when they were younger,
people made a huge fuss over the twins and left poor Dee Dee standing there, having to listen to them ooh and aah about how absolutely
adorable they were. It broke Sookie’s heart to see her suffer so. And she
did know how it felt. Growing up with Lenore, she had always felt like
a little brown wren, hopping along behind a huge colorful peacock.
TUESDAY
June 7, 2005
The next morning, Sookie woke up early, prepared to try to
solve her bird problem. Earle had just walked out the door when the
phone in the kitchen started ringing, and she wondered who in the
world was calling her so early. It couldn’t be Lenore; she was on her
way to water therapy at the senior center. Oh, dear God, please don’t
let it be Dee Dee saying she was moving back home. She knew she was
having marital problems again and today’s horoscope had warned her
to “Expect the unexpected.” Sookie looked at the phone with trepidation and read the number on the readout. It wasn’t Dee Dee. It was
that same area code as yesterday, probably the same phone solicitor, so
she didn’t pick up. She didn’t have time to talk to anybody now. She
had to concentrate on her bird- feeding plan. It was going to be tricky.
She’d seen how those blue jays could go through all their food in just
a matter of minutes, so she was going to have to move very fast.
Sookie quickly rinsed off the breakfast dishes and stuck them in
the dishwasher, but whoever was calling wouldn’t hang up, and it was
distracting. They used to have an answering machine, but Lenore
thought it was an open mike for her to speak into on any subject at
any time and had left fifteen- and twenty- minute messages on it,
sometimes in the middle of the night, so they had to get rid of it.
24 Fannie Flagg
As she finished up in the kitchen, she debated whether to put the
sunflower seeds for the blue jays in the front yard or the back. If she
put the sunflower seeds in the front, someone driving by might see her
and want to stop and talk, and she didn’t have a second to spare. So
she decided she would start at the back and run to the front. Her success depended on how long it would take the blue jays to finish the
sunflower seeds before they discovered the bird seed in front and how
fast she could run from one yard to the other.
But what shoes should she wear? She looked down and realized
she shouldn’t try and run in her flip- flops; it was too dangerous. She
went to her closet and found nothing suitable— practically every shoe
she owned had a little heel.
She went down the hall to the twins’ bedroom closet and started
rummaging through a box of their old shoes. She found a pair of
worn- out pink sneakers with pom- poms. Unfortunately, they were
two sizes too large, but they’d be better than trying to run in flip- flops
and breaking an ankle.
She put them on and laced them up as tightly as she could and
went out to her greenhouse and filled her two large ceramic polkadotted bird seed containers, one with sunflower seeds and the other
with the wild bird seed. She went out and placed the container with
the wild bird seed on the side of the house, ready to be picked up as
she ran by, headed to the front yard. She then went back to the greenhouse, picked up the container with the sunflower seeds, took a deep
breath, and ran to the backyard, filling up the feeders as fast as she
could.
After Sookie finished filling the feeders in the backyard, she
dropped the container on the ground and ran to the side of the house
and picked up the other polka- dotted seed container and was running
toward the front yard when she stepped in a gopher hole and lost her
left shoe. She couldn’t stop so she just went on without it.
And of course, the very same moment she hit the front yard, the
new Methodist minister and his wife were driving by the house and
saw Sookie, wearing one pink shoe with tassels, hopping around on
one foot, throwing seeds from a large polka- dotted container at her
feeders. They slowed down and, as a matter of courtesy, were going to
stop and say hello, but thankfully for Sookie, decided against it and
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 25
quickly drove on. They were from Scotland and didn’t know if running around wearing one pink shoe with tassels while carrying a large
polka- dotted container and throwing seeds was some kind of Southern bird- feeding ritual or not, but they were afraid to ask.
Sookie’s neighbor Netta Verp was sitting out on her side porch in
her robe, having her morning coffee, when she suddenly saw Sookie
flying around the yard like a bat out of hell, with her polka- dotted
bird seed container, slinging seeds every which way, and she wondered
what in the world she was doing. Netta had never seen anyone in such
a hurry to feed their birds in her life.
After Sookie had filled all the front yard feeders, she ran back into
the house and stood looking out the living room window, waiting to
see if her smaller birds would come to feed. She waited, but none
came. Where were they? There was not a bird to be seen anywhere.
She then ran down the hall and looked out the kitchen window and
saw the blue jays happily gobbling up all the sunflower seeds in back,
while as usual, all of her smaller birds flittered around in the bushes
below. Oh, no. Those little birds didn’t know what was waiting for
them in the front yard. Oh, Lord. She hadn’t planned on this. Now
she didn’t know what to do. She ran out on the back porch and started
waving her arms and yelling at the top of her lungs, “Go to the front,
little birds— go around to the front! Hurry up, little birds!” But how
do you communicate with birds? It was so frustrating. Now not only
were her little birds not getting anything to eat; all those sunflower
seeds seemed to have attracted every blue jay in the entire area, and
more were flying in by the minute.
Netta observed her neighbor out on her back porch, jumping up
and down and waving her arms around like a crazy person, and she
didn’t know what to think. It was certainly peculiar behavior. She just
hoped poor Sookie hadn’t flipped overnight, but with the Simmons
family you never knew.
After a moment, Sookie ran back to the living room window to
see if, by chance, any little birds were there, but now a whole new gang
of big blue jays were in the front yard, eating all the bird seed. It was
so frustrating. The only other thing she could think of to do was to get
Carter’s old baseball bat and run out and try to scare the blue jays off.
But she didn’t want to get reported to the humane society for cruelty
26 Fannie Flagg
to animals, especially since she was on the board. Oh, God, the phone
was still ringing off the hook. Whoever it was must have her on some
computer redial. Between the blue jays and the phone, she was getting
a headache, so she went in and picked it up.
“Hello!”
The person on the other end seemed surprised that someone had
finally answered and said, “Oh, hello! Ahh . . . to whom am I speaking, please?”
“Well, whom were you trying to reach?” asked Sookie, as she saw
three more blue jays swoop in.
“I’m trying to locate a Mrs. Earle Poole, Jr.”
“Yes, this is she.” As soon as she said it, she knew she had made a
mistake. She should have pretended she was the maid and said Mrs.
Poole wasn’t home. She was stuck now. As she stood watching more
and more blue jays show up at the little birds’ feeder, she suddenly
remembered that old BB gun of Carter’s in the closet and wondered if
she could fire off just a few warning shots from the porch without
being seen.
The man on the phone was asking another question. “Are you the
former Sarah Jane Krackenberry?”
“Yes, I was . . . am.” Sookie realized that the idea that she would
even think about shooting a gun at a helpless bird was not her normal
way of thinking, but those blue jays made her so mad— the way they
pushed the smaller ones around.
“Was your mother’s maiden name Simmons, middle name Marion, first name Lenore?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Did your family live in Brownsville, Texas, from the years 1942
to 1945?”
“Yes, uh- huh.”
“Is the current mailing address for Mrs. Lenore Simmons Krackenberry 526 Bay Street, Point Clear, Alabama?”
“Yes, all her mail and bills are sent to me.” Sookie was still thinking whether or not she should get Carter’s old BB gun and try and
scare the blue jays away, but decided not to. If she were to accidentally
hit one, she would never be able to forgive herself.
“Is your zip code 36564?”
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 27
Peek- a- Boo walked over and rubbed up against her leg. Then it
suddenly occurred to her: Maybe Peek- a- Boo would like a big fat blue
jay for breakfast. She could let her out. But on the other hand, if Peeka- Boo ran away and anything happened to her, Ce Ce would have a
fit.
“Ma’am? Are you still there?”
“Oh, I’m sorry, what was it?”
“Is your current zip code 36564?”
“Uh, yes. That’s correct. You have to forgive me. I’m a little distracted. I’m having a little bird problem at the moment.” Sookie sat
down, held the phone against her ear, and retied her pink sneaker. She
felt a dull pain start up in her right ankle. Oh, no. She knew as soon
as she had stepped in that gopher hole, she had twisted something.
She just hoped it wasn’t sprained. She needed to put ice on it right
away, before it could swell up, and she also had to get the man off the
phone, but in a nice way. “Sir, I’m so sorry, but I think I’ve sprained
my ankle, so I’m going to have to hang up now.”
“I see . . . uh . . . Mrs. Poole, one more thing before you go. Will
you be home tomorrow between ten a.m.and twelve p.m.?”
“Pardon me?”
“Will you be at this address tomorrow?”
“Yes, I guess so. I might go to the travel agency later. Why?”
“We are sending a letter to Mrs. Lenore Simmons Krackenberry—
and we need to know if you will be home to sign for it.”
It suddenly occurred to Sookie that this was certainly a weird call.
Why did this man want to know where she would be tomorrow and
at what time? She began to get a little suspicious and wondered if he
might be some sex pervert or a burglar. So she quickly said, “Yes, I will
be home, and so will my husband, the police chief. May I ask where
you are calling from?”
“I’m calling from Texas, ma’am.”
“Texas? Where in Texas?”
“I’m in the Austin area.”
“Austin, Texas?”
“Yes, ma’am. And Mrs. Poole, the letter should arrive at your address tomorrow, sometime between ten and twelve.”
Now Sookie really was baffled. Why would anybody in Texas be
28 Fannie Flagg
sending Lenore a letter? “Is this from the Gem Shopping Network?
Are they in Texas? Has she ordered more scatter pins? I hope not. She
has over a hundred now.”
“No, ma’am.”
“Is it from Barbara Bush? My mother thinks they have a lot in
common, and she’s always writing the poor woman, asking her to
come down for a visit. I said, ‘Mother, Barbara Bush is far too busy to
come all the way down here, just to go to lunch with you.’ ”
“No, ma’am, it’s not from Mrs. Bush.”
“Oh . . . well, is it a telephone bill? Has she called somebody and
reversed the charges again? If so, I apologize in advance. We have a
wonderful nurse watching her, but she must have turned her back for
five minutes. Anyway, I’m so sorry, and tell whoever she’s called that
we will be happy to pay for it.”
There was a pause, and then the man said, “Mrs. Poole, we have a
registered letter we are sending out overnight, and I just need to confirm that someone will be home tomorrow who is authorized to sign
for it.”
Sookie’s heart stopped. A registeredletter! Oh, no. That always
meant something legal. Sookie winced as she asked the dreaded question. “Sir, when you use the term, ‘we,’ are you by chance a law firm?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Poole, but I’m not at liberty to discuss it over the
phone.”
Oh, God, it must be something serious, if the man can’t even discuss it over the phone. “Listen . . . I’m so sorry. What is your name?”
“Harold, ma’am.”
“Listen, Harold, is it about some editorial she’s written? She
watches the news and gets herself all riled up, and she’s always spouting off about something. But believe me, if my mother has made any
threats against the government or said anything stupid, I can assure
you that she’s a perfectly harmless old lady. Well, harmless as far as not
being armed or anything. She’s just not quite right, if you know what
I mean. It’s a family trait. You just have to know the Simmonses. They
are all a little off. She has a brother and sister that are really off. You
have no idea how much trouble the woman has caused. She’s almost
eighty- nine years old, and she won’t go to assisted living, and she re-
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 29
fuses to let us put in a walk- in tub for her, and I worry to death about
her falling and breaking a hip.” She sighed. “I’m sorry to be so upset.
It’s just that my poor husband and I have just gone through four weddings, and my little birds won’t go around to the front yard. I’m just
being overrun by blue jays, and another lawsuit is just not what I need
right now. My nerves are all a jangle as it is. Can’t you tell me what it’s
about?”
“I’m sorry, ma’am. I’m not authorized to give out any information
over the phone.”
“Oh, please, Harold, don’t drag this out. You don’t know me, but
I really could go off the deep end at any moment. It’s the Simmons
family curse. It hit Uncle Baby overnight. One day, president of a
bank, and the next, off weaving baskets over at Pleasant Hill. And
Aunt Lily was perfectly fine and then for no reason, she shot at the
paperboy. Thank God, she didn’t hit him or she could be sitting in jail
right now, instead of where she is.”
“As I said, Mrs. Poole, you will be receiving the letter in the morning.”
“Oh, Harold, can’t you just open it up and read it to me now? I
don’t need to know all the details, just how much she’s being sued for.
We just went through our entire retirement account for a down payment for a house for our daughter Le Le and her husband. He’s perfectly nice, but he plays the zither for a living.”
“Oh . . .”
“Yes . . . that’s what we said. But she loves him, so what can you
do? Anyhow, we are mortgaged up to the hilt. Can’t you at least tell
me how much my mother is being sued for, so I can be prepared? I
won’t tell anyone. I promise.”
“I’m so sorry, ma’am, but I don’t have the authority to do that. I
was instructed to locate the current mailing address and send it on,
that’s all. This is not even my department. I’m just filling in.”
“Oh, I see. Well, couldn’t you just take one quick little peek and
tell me if it’s over a hundred thousand dollars?”
Then she heard his muffled voice, obviously whispering behind
his hand, “Mrs. Poole, the wife and I just married off our daughter, so
I know what you’ve been through. Don’t worry, she’s not getting sued.”
30 Fannie Flagg
“No? Oh, thank God! Oh, bless you, Harold. I don’t know why,
but with Mother, I always assume it’s going to be bad news, but then
again, it could be good news, right?”
Harold didn’t say anything, so Sookie’s mood suddenly brightened. “Hey, wait a minute. Did she win a contest or something? Are
you from Publishers Clearing House? Should I have her over here at
the house in the morning, dressed and made-up or anything? I need
to know, because she’ll want to have her hair done. Will there be photographs? Or news people?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Oh . . . well . . . can you give me just a little hint of what to expect?”
There was a long silence on the other end, then Harold said, “Mrs.
Poole, all I can say is . . . you are not who you think you are,” and then
he abruptly hung up.
Sookie sat there with his last words ringing in her ear, and now
there was someone banging away on her back door. As Sookie stood
up, her ankle throbbed even worse than before, but she hobbled down
the hall and opened the door, and there stood Netta in her robe, who
looked at her strangely. “Honey, are you all right? I saw you running
around the yard like you were in some kind of distress. I tried to call
you, but your line was busy. You left one of your shoes out in the
yard.” Sookie took the shoe and said, “Oh, thank you, Netta.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, Netta. I was just trying something new with feeding the
birds, and this man just called about some registered letter for Lenore
and I think I’ve sprained my ankle. Come on in.”
“No, I can’t, I’m still in my robe. I better get back home, but call
me if you need me.”
A few seconds after Netta left, Sookie went and looked out in the
front yard to check on her birds and, to her dismay, saw that her entire
yard was now a veritable sea of blue. It looked like she was running a
blue jay reserve. She’d been so distracted by the phone call that she
didn’t know if the little birds had gotten anything to eat at all. Oh,
drat. She would just have to try again tomorrow.
The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion 31
She hobbled back into the kitchen and put some ice cubes in a
hand towel and wrapped it around her ankle. As she sat there with
Peek- a- Boo in her lap, she thought more about the phone call and
what the man had said. “You are not who you think you are.” Then it
suddenly dawned on her. That man had probably been calling from
the Jehovah’s Witnesses or some other religious group. They were always leaving pamphlets at her door asking, “Do you know who you
are?” or “Do you know who your father is?” Oh, Lord. Now she felt
like a fool. What a complete idiot she had been, telling him all that
personal stuff about the family.
But on the other hand, knowing her mother, he could be calling
from ancestor.com or some other genealogy- tracing company. She’d
also seen ads for them that said, “Who are you?” or “Who do you
think you are?”
The more she thought about it, she thought that it must be Lenore
trying to trace the Simmons family line again. “I just know we’re related to the royal family in some way. I just feel it in my bones,” she
said. For as long as Sookie could remember, she had been tracing and
retracing, but so far, no connection. Now even Dee Dee was obsessed
with it and had the Simmons family crest hanging over the mantel in
her condo.
As the morning wore on, Sookie tried to relax and just forget about
the call, but she was still feeling a little uneasy. It was the word “registered” that bothered her. She hated to call Earle at work but she dialed
the number anyway, and his receptionist answered. “Dr. Poole’s office,
may I help you?”
“Hi, Sherry, it’s me. Could you get him to pick up? I need to ask
him a quick question.”
“Sure, hold on. I’ll buzz him. How’s your mother?”
“Fine, thank you.”
“Well, good. Hold on.”
A few seconds later, Earle picked up. “Hi, are you okay?”
“I’m fine. I just need to ask you something.”
“Honey, I’m right in the middle of a root canal.”
“Okay, I’ll make it fast. A man from Texas just called and said he
32 Fannie Flagg
was sending Lenore a registered letter tomorrow. Should I be worried?
He said he wasn’t a lawyer.”
“Well, then, no.”
“What do you think it’s about?”
“Oh, I don’t know. It’s probably just some come- on, trying to sell
something or get her to join something.”
“Then I shouldn’t worry?”
“No, just forget about it.”
“But it’s registered.”
“Well, honey. Just don’t sign for it.”
“Isn’t that against the law?”
“No. Just tell Pete you don’t want it. That’s all. Sweetie pie, I’ve
really got to go. I’ll see you at home, okay?”
“Earle, maybe . . . I just won’t go to the door.”
“Fine.”
“But won’t he leave a note and try and redeliver it?”
“Honey, do whatever you want. Don’t go to the door or just sign
for it and throw it away. It’s probably just junk. Okay?”
“Then I shouldn’t worry?”
“No.”
“And I don’t have to accept it.”
“No. Forget about it. I gotta go. Love you.”
Sookie hung up and smiled. Earle always knew how to make her
feel better. Even her ankle felt better.
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