Rebel Without a Cake by Jacklyn Brady Page A

weren’t for the worry shadowing her eyes, I would have said Bernice looked twenty years younger.
    Maybe it was a good thing Miss Frankie was with us. Seeing how happy Bernice was to visit home, even under difficult circumstances, she might understand why I wanted to go home for Christmas. She might even agree to ask Pearl Lee for help with the holiday festivities instead of me.
    â€œI must confess, Bernice, I had you pegged as coming from an entirely different background,” I said as I made the turn onto a red dirt road.
    Bernice sighed softly. “I married when I was just a girl. Sixteen years old. It wasn’t so unusual back then. I took one look at my husband and fell hard. He’d been off fighting in Vietnam, and when he came back, he just swept me off my feet. I thought we’d settle down here and live the kind of life we were both used to, but going off to the other side of the world had changed him. We left the swamp and he never looked back.” She smiled at me and a twinkle danced in her eye, momentarily replacing the worry. “I may’ve peeked back over my shoulder a time or two, but I loved that man hard enough to put the past behind me.”
    Miss Frankie stirred in the backseat, but she didn’t say a word. It didn’t matter. I knew what she was thinking. In the beginning, I’d loved Philippe as much as I knew how to love anyone, but I’d never felt comfortable around his wealthy relatives. After spilling red wine on Miss Frankie’s white sofa and carpet on my first visit, I’d avoided coming back with him when he visited New Orleans. Maybe I hadn’t loved him enough. Maybe I’d been too selfish to make sacrifices. Maybe if he’d understood my emotional baggage better, I would have found my way through it.
    We’d never know, and I didn’t want to start dwelling on past mistakes, so I concentrated on Bernice instead. “So your husband grew up around here, too?”
    Bernice nodded. “David’s people live about thirty miles east. Close enough that we used to run into each other from time to time. You know how it is.”
    Not really, but I pretended I did. “If he’d been off serving in the military, he must have been a little older than you.”
    â€œSeven years,” Bernice said. “These days you’d worry about a man that age setting his sights on a girl as young as I was, and you’d probably be right to. But like I said, it was a different world when I came up. It was no big deal for a girl to leave school and get married. A boy either, for that matter. People around here didn’t worry much about education in those days.”
    From the looks of the ramshackle houses we were passing, I guessed that not much had changed. We rounded a few more turns in the road and Bernice pointed to the roof of a large house visible behind a grove of leafy green trees. “That’s it. That’s Aunt Margaret’s place there. Slow down now. The driveway’s coming up just after this bump in the road.”
    The undergrowth was so thick I would have missed the turnoff if she hadn’t warned me. I turned onto a wide dirt driveway that led to a clearing and a large and surprisingly modern home. A broad porch stretched along two sides of the house and at least a dozen trucks and cars were scattered in the clearing, but I couldn’t see anyone moving around. Either the search party was still out looking for Eskil, or they were back and dinner was already being served.
    There was no room left in the clearing, so I parked on the edge of the driveway next to a deep ditch filled with weeds and a few inches of brackish water. We took a few minutes to get out of the car and stretch, and then Bernice led us to the front door.
    She gave a courtesy knock and let herself in. Miss Frankie and I followed. Just as the screen door banged shut behind me, I saw a broad woman wearing a plaid shirt and jeans squeal