we got back within spitting distance of the stadium, Marcus retraced our steps to get back to work and I swiped on some Christmas Nutmeg to undo the sweat and add some kind of glamour. Sneaky like the stadium pigeons, I rounded the corner out front to get closer to the box office, closer to the pennants, closer to June.
“Derby?”
A small voice came from the steps. It belonged to Betsy, and there she was, right under the marquee. Before, I would have thought she was sitting alone because she’d bossed everyone right out of the picture, but now she was a snapshot of lonely.
“Betsy, hi,” I said, gentle like you would be if you saw a broken-winged bird. “What are you doing here?”
She sighed a dramatic Woe is me kind of sigh, but I believed her. “Lollie and I were supposed to be planning the Rally booth. We’re the best at painting nails, you know.”
“I know,” I said.
“Aunt Candy said she’d take us to the drugstore to stock up, and I said it didn’t even matter to me what the colors were, as long as they were beautiful and not tested on animals.”
“Right. Vegetarian.”
“And then Aunt Candy laughed at me but Lollie didn’t say anything and so they went without me because I wouldn’t come out of the bathroom and I really hope they got the best pinks.” Betsy unraveled right before my eyes.
I didn’t really know what to say, mostly because I’d seen the other half of this ruckus in the lobby at the Heritage Inn. Plus, Triple and Garland and I had never had a conversation about nail polish, so I didn’t have any Been there, done that wisdom for her.
“I wouldn’t come out because I cut my hair,” Betsy said, and she really had.
She shook out a sloppy ponytail to show me what was left over. Her bathroom floor must have looked like the bullpen with all its grass clippings strewn about in clumps and piles—that’s how much she’d hacked off.
“Oh.” It was all I could find.
Miss Houston’s organ was warming up behind us, providing a soundtrack for this moment that was equal parts horror and sympathy.
“Well, don’t you both look like somebody trampled through your rosebuds?” That was June, and Betsy and I looked up at her in sync. “I can fix this. Come on.” June probably meant Betsy’s unfortunate haircut, but the way she said it made me think that she could have fixed the impatiens and the Christmas wreath and the peeling paint too. But the storm that had trampled through her rosebuds was too much, too strong, too gray.
And so, believe it or not, we went to her house, the three of us.
June ushered us in with all the tenderness and care she would use for picking up shattered glass. There I was again, inside the front hall with an invitation this time, a moving picture by the wall of stills. And then I caught a whiff of something sweet, a fresh smell, one that traveled farther than the mustiness that clung to the walls.
“Strawberries.” June answered the question I hadn’t even asked yet.
“Smells delicious,” Betsy said, and I agreed.
While June went ahead of us, we stayed back. It was hot, so maybe it was the sight of the girl that made my skin go goosebumps.
The pictures on the wall showed a family of three at birthdays and barbecues and celebrating the first day of school. June and Franklin were so young once, and even though they got older as the wall got longer, they were always looking at the girl. All three of them were dancing, dancing all the way down the hall. The scenes spoke of that girl’s shyness and her spunk. In just a few steps she grew up from a little thing to a girl my age, riding a lawn mower. And then there she was, nearly grown, in right field at the James Edward Allen Gibbs Stadium, wearing jean shorts, saddle shoes, and a grounds‑crew cap.
“Wow,” I said, and this time it was Betsy who agreed.
I didn’t hear June slip behind us until she clanked some ice against the sides of a glass. Maybe it was to get our attention, or maybe she was as startled as I was by that photograph.
“Franklin took that one. That’s why she’s laughing so hard. He was too, which is why it’s a little blurry. Stole her daddy’s heart more often than she stole his riding lawn mower.” June handed us each a glass of lemonade, and used the cool napkin left over to dampen her sweaty forehead.
“Who is she?” I barely heard myself ask.
“That’s our girl, our one and only.” I heard a smile in June’s voice, even though the sparkle in her eye was turning a bit watery. “That’s Phoebe Susan.”
Of course June had to go and have a daughter with the most beautiful name I had ever heard. I’d thought the name June was glamorous, but Phoebe Susan was exquisite.
“She’s pretty.” Betsy nudged me a little, reminding me to snap out of it or say something, and that’s when I realized who she was.
Sugar Sue.