The All-Girl Filling Station's Last Reunion Read Online Free Page A

know who I really was until I started journaling.”
    Well … that was fine for Marvaleen, she guessed, but she couldn’timagine 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.

    A FTER S OOKIE 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.”
    T HAT 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