Chapter Thirteen

Sunday Evening
Meraux Residence
Rainelle Parish, Louisiana

“…have you had complete and total leave of your senses? Do you not have the brains God gave a gnat? It’s simply beyond my realm of comprehension how you could have allowed such a thing to happen!”
The matriarch of the blended Meraux/Devereaux clan boomed, as she stormed back and forth across the polished floor of her living room, each step a resounding clack of despair.
Kathleen cut a rather somber figure, pacing to and fro, still draped in her severe, black, ‘Sunday-Best’ dress. So riled up was she, she’d neglected to remove her hat and gloves before launching into her tirade.
Instead, she had been angrily stomping a groove from one end of the room to the other, airing her grievances somewhere near the top of her lungs and had been for about the past hour.
Only an hour before, a sleek blue Cadillac coupe had pulled up to the walk in front of the house, stopping just long enough for three, grinning, laughing and all-around happy girls to disband, the two elder girls, kissing at the men still inside the car.
With waves and words of warm affection, the car had pulled off and arm in arm, the three girls had merrily made their way up, and through the front door of the house.
Where the happiness and exuberance within them had died a swift and sudden death, upon entering the home to be faced with a scowling, reddening and trembling Kathleen.
Just short of going out into the backyard to uproot a tree to beat them to death, Kathleen had begun yelling, and hadn’t yet stopped.
Demanding to know what they thought they were doing, by staying the night in New Orleans? Did they know what time it was? Did they know that they had missed Mass for the first time since the Spanish Flu Epidemic of 1918?
Everyone was asking about them! Wondering where they were!
“Where’s your girls Kathleen? My goodness they haven’t become ill have they?”
And how she had to stand and tell a bold-faced lie in God’s House, because she couldn’t tell them that her girls were alone, in New Orleans, at a hotel, with two men, unchaperoned!
Did they know how people would talk about them if they knew they had done such a thing? Did they know the kind of embarrassment it would have brought upon all of them? Have they forgotten who they are? Who they’re descended from? Have they forgotten all the teachings she’d slaved to raise them up with?
And this was all shouted before the girls, woebegone, shaky-legged and sweaty-palmed had even been able to collapse into the couch, with a young, frightened Vinnie hiding her face in her sister’s arm.
It was then, Kathleen Meraux got a very good look at her daughter and niece, seeing the makeovers that had made them so proud, so happy, so joyous.
And berated them for it.
What on Earth had they done to themselves? Were those permanents in their hair? Make up on their faces? Where are your eyebrows Lorraine? Those are lines on your forehead! Where are your freckles, Child? Colored in fingernails? What have I told you about girls who put on all that lipstick and rouge and try to be something they are not? Good girls don’t do those things to themselves!!!
Knowing better than to backtalk and have the teeth slapped out their faces, the elder girls had sat, staring down at the ringing hands in their laps, saddened.
Michael and Marlon had thought them the most stunning women in the South.
Somewhere amidst the screeching and caterwauling of a mother losing her grip on her offspring, Dr. Meraux, had appeared, disturbed from his post-Mass nap by his spouse’s ear-grating voice.
And now, as he sat in his arm chair, frowning, not across at the girls, but up at his wife, she began to launch a verbal attack on him.
Because apparently. Kathleen Meraux had been the last to know about this overnight stay.
“Almanzo Meraux, how on Earth could you have consented to let our girls stay the night, alone, in New Orleans, with only a pair of men! Men they aren’t married to!”
Yet. Men we aren’t married to yet, Vylette screamed in her mind.
Hands gripping onto the padded arms of the chair, the country doctor tried to control his temper, but it showed clearly on his face. His bronzy complexion becoming a deep, raging plum as his eyes widened behind the lenses of his glasses.
“And just what do you propose I should have done Kathleen?” He questioned salty, veins starting to bulge from his thick throat.
“We have no mode of transportation ourselves, other than the two legs attached us! It wasn’t as if Vylette and Vinnie and Lorraine were by themselves in the streets! They were with--protected by--Michael and Marlon! Kathleen--”
His wife turned her back to him, fuming, and the doctor unfolded his towering body from his favorite chair.
“What did you want me to do? I certainly was not going to borrow someone’s rickety truck, and have them all bouncing around in the dark in the middle of the night on those old country roads. Hit a pothole and one of them fly out to be killed! I spoke to Michael Jackson yesterday evening on the phone! The radiator on his brother’s car played out--it was repaired this morning, right away. And there’s the girls!”
He pointed to the three cowering figures on the couch.
“There’s our girls, safe and sound, not a hair out of place!”
“Safe and sound, indeed!” Kathleen taunted, turning her stout body around to face her husband and squinted up into his face, large bosom heaving.
“I know you’re wearing spectacles, but you can’t possibly be blind to the way they look, Almanzo!” She exclaimed, hands in the air.
“Especially Vylette and Lorraine. With their hair all waved and all that paint on their face and their nails colored! Changing what God blessed them with! Leave them overnight, one night, and they come back and I can barely recognize them!”
The two cousins sank deeper into the seat.
The transformation, which had left them in such a wonderful, peaceable state, was now bringing them all the trouble in the world.
Vylette wanted to shrivel up and disappear and the way Lorraine’s eyes were emerald with rage, it was only a matter of time before her jaw loosened and she said something to leave her slapped.
“…you seem to have no problems with it at all--”
“You’re damn right I have no problems with it at all!” Dr. Meraux snapped, catching his wife off guard. “Not one iota, Kathleen. Times are changing! These are the nineteen-thirties! And Vylette and Lorraine aren’t little girls anymore! They’re young women! Young women with young men in love with them. Steady boyfriends. And  young women, for the most part , it seems, make use of cosmetics and permanents and nail varnish, nowadays. Lord knows I’ve seen enough advertisements in the papers and magazines for them! And since when does lipstick and waved hair change who the girls are on the inside?”
“Oh Almanzo--” Kathleen started and Dr. Meraux slammed his fist into his open palm.
“Don’t you ‘Oh Almanzo’ me, woman!” A long finger wagged at her and light bounced from his plain gold wedding band.
“Now you’ve raised these girls up right. They are eighteen years old; they need to spread their wings and have life. The world is so much bigger than the Parish, and it can be given to them! I’ve told you and told you, the Jacksons are from a style of life where looks and leisure are a mainstay. So they stayed the night at a hotel? They stayed at the Landmark; the premiere hotel in New Orleans. Not some tenement shack! A place where presidents and royalty have stayed when in town--”
“Don’t tell me you’re letting their money turn your head too!” Kathleen stammered losing color.
“And what is so wrong with their money, Kathleen? Michael and Marlon work. They earn their living legitimately. They aren’t bootleggers or number runners or drug pushers or gangsters! They own theatres.  And I see nothing wrong with how they treat our girls. Go out of their way to treat them like princesses!”
Vylette’s heart swelled. Her father was so fond of Michael and Marlon!
“They even make an effort for Vinnie! Why, right now, there’s clothes from halfway around the world on their way here for the girls! Michael told me of it, in case parcels began to arrive and were brought here for them!”
“Clothes--”
“Yes clothes Kathleen!” The man bellowed and Vinnie covered her ears, Vylette wrapping her arms around her.
“Michael told me, he’s not even sure of what all was bought. That one afternoon he and his brother merely gave the girls catalogues and said ‘Get what you want.’ Now, I know we’re better off than some, but I’ve never been able to provide for our girls like that!”
A true look of piercing sadness came to her father’s face and Vylette softened, knowing her father had always tried his best for them.
That naturally waved head tossed and Dr. Meraux sniffed.
“Even when times were good, before the Crash, I was never able to just jump up and say get whatever you want. And I asked Michael, ‘Why? WHY are you doing this for the girls?’ And…and…”
Dr. Meraux stepped so closely to Mrs. Meraux their bodies were practically touching.
“And Michael just kind of laughed and said to me, ‘Because we love them Dr. Meraux. We love them and want them to want for nothing, Sir!’”
Vylette was smiling and next to her, Lorraine was too.
“But it’s--”
“Don’t you dare fix your mouth to say its extras!” It was the doctor’s turn to boom. “In times like these, girls like ours need extras. They’re good, well-behaved, polite, God-fearing girls. They cook and clean and are always where we need them. I couldn’t ask for better children. And if they can get something they like and have it, let them have it! I have nothing more to say about it!”
Holding her face in her hands, Kathleen’s true fears were finally brought to light.
“I…I only hope our girls haven’t been compromised! Being alone like that…they‘d be ruined!”
Vylette and Lorraine stiffened. Oh, they had been, the latter, much more fully than the former.
And besides they had each only been with one man…the only man they needed.
“I’m quite sure they haven’t!”
Tongues were bitten and pulses raced.
“Besides, we know where to find Father Lachey when the time comes, and I will administer the blood tests myself for marriage. I don’t doubt that soon enough, I’ll be giving the girls away.” A defiant, fond look came into the older man’s face.
“I believe in the Jacksons and their intentions to our girls. Don’t let the idea that they are wealthy stand in the way. Most mothers would be happy to have her daughter with a wealthy man--You seem to hate it Kathleen!”
“I just don’t want the girls to become materialistic and worldly. Forget their upbringings--” Kathleen sputtered, drained and shaking her head.
(Well, Vylette wouldn’t. Lorraine was another story entirely, when coupled with arrogant Marlon.)
“They won’t.” Hands grasped thick shoulders and the doctor shook his wife gently.
“Oh…” Kathleen sighed miserably and her next words lit a fury in her daughter.
“What will I do when people see them? God, we all have to host the Ladies Christian League on Wednesday…”
Vylette hid her trembling hands and beneath her carefully applied makeup, she was going blue with rage.
How she looked! How she looked! How she looked! That was all her mother could seem to cry about. Her outward appearance.
Vylette liked how she looked!
And what was so very wrong? She was wearing the best clothing money could buy, at the moment, a dotted silk frock that had cost nearly fifty dollars--she knew it, as Michael had neglected to remove the tag.
When most dresses were less than a single dollar!
That was more than some families had seen in the last decade!
She wore a diamond tennis bracelet constantly, and the baubles she’d worn in the Tropics Room were stored away in a safe in the basement of Jackson Manor.
Her hair had been permed and styled with, again, the best treatment on the market, she was made up with exclusive cosmetics and her nails sparkled with the top of the line polish guaranteed to cling for two whole weeks!
Michael had gone to extreme lengths to give her the utmost and her mother saw nothing but wrong in it.
But as she sat staring at her mother, still quibbling at her father, her small, pointed chin lifted.
Vylette was swiftly growing to like, and revel in this new manner of living, way of grooming and be looked after. And as more mention of the League came up, red, painted lips parted and a sardonic, maddened grin came to her beautiful face, creasing its features.
Lorraine gazed at her strangely, a bit scared of that Godless glaze to her cousin’s eye.
If her mother was so very scared of this style of life the Jacksons lived, starting to permeate into her simpler, country mode of living, Vylette was just going to have to do something for her floundering mother.
Something along the lines of grabbing Kathleen and throwing her head-first into the deep end of a new, chic mode of life.
And she was already having ideas on how to achieve that goal.

The Following Morning
Jackson Manor

“Thomas and Sons Construction, Laveaux Waterworks, Mason’s Masons and Crystal Clear Glasswork…”
Leaning against the low, polished banister of the veranda, just outside the formal living room, Vylette stood, reading the names emblazoned in brightly colored paint on the sides of the half dozen utility trucks parked haphazardly all over the tree-lined avenue leading up to the Jackson home.
Absently running her fingers along the warm wood, she commented, a bit self-consciously,
“I…I completely forgot that you were starting work on the pool and solarium today…”
“It’s quite alright, My Darling. I always have time for you. And even when I don‘t, I‘ll make the time.”
Michael’s voice, soft and sweet assured from behind her.
“Besides, all of the work is taking place in rear of the house, and Marlon is supervising it. Except for the occasional clang of a hammer, we’ll be undisturbed.”
Turning around, Vylette paused and smiled at Michael, her heart quivering in her bosom as her eyes washed over the figure and form belonging to her. Her belonging to him.
A million thoughts raced
How she had come to be blessed with a man like Michael, so caring and loving and willing to drop everything for her…she’d never get through thanking God for him.
That beautiful, lithe, slim man, standing only a few feet away, a frosty crystal pitcher in his strong hands, pouring lemonade for the two of them into tumblers.
This tall, elegant being in the black pleated slacks and red shirt, with checkered suspenders, having a seat on the wicker divan and petting at the upturned head of Baron, as he rested at his Master’s feet.
He would help her…
“Now…” A large brown hand patted the vacant spot on the cushion. “I’d be so much happier with you closer to me, instead of over in Siberia there…” White teeth shone in jest and Vylette was eased.
Slipping over, she rested against him, and took the glass offered her.
His shirt was a silk blend, soft to the touch, and his cologne was faint. Michael hadn’t been expecting her that day, and even with the property crawling with workmen like vermin, he was the effortless gentleman.
“You said you wanted to talk to me…” Michael reached into the pitcher and plucked out one of the lemon wedges floating inside.
He put it to his mouth, sucking on it a moment, lips puckering and popping as he withdrew the tangy treat.
Holding her glass in her lap, Vylette remained quiet and stared into the yellow liquid.
“You’re up to something…” Michael stated matter-of-factly. “I can see it in those eyes of yours--what is it?”
“Well--” Vylette ran her finger around the rim of her glass, producing a dull note.
She wasn’t quite sure exactly how to phrase her request and the last thing she needed was for Michael Jackson to laugh at her.
Nervously, she shifted and crossed her legs.
“Hmm?” Those plucked brows went up in interest and his hand rested on her thigh.
“You see…” Vylette stammered and looked from him. “…I…I…I…um…” She sucked in her bottom lip.
The same hand took her chin and brought her face back around to his.
“Tell me, Vylette.” Michael urged, his voice dropping an octave and she practically spit it out into his face.
“I’d like to borrow Adelaide!”
“Borrow Adelaide?” Michael repeated and his eyes danced in that amused way. “Whatever for?”
Pulling from him, Vylette rose and wandered a few feet away.
Arms wrapping herself as she miraculously felt a chill, on such a humid day, the young woman stared off down the path leading back to the road.
Back to the real world that laid beyond those secure, serene gates.
Back to the Parish that didn’t quite understand the Jacksons and their way of life. Only about a mile separated them but the Jacksons were strangers in a strange land.
Hammers clanged in the distance, and Marlon Jackson’s bawdy laughter was carried on the warm breeze.
Michael’s hands, grasped and kneaded at Vylette’s slumped shoulders as he held her from behind.
He said nothing, and yet he encouraged Vylette just the same. Just by being there.
“Vylette…” Slowly, she was spun to face him and couldn’t avoid those eyes, so full of affection and concern.
“…what do you want Adelaide for?”
Lips, moist and lemony, pressed Vylette’s.
“Tell me…”
And she spoke.
“Ever since we’ve come home from New Orleans, Mama’s been an absolute terror!” She declared and Michael’s face went plain.
“What?”
“She…she doesn’t like any of what’s happened. She doesn’t like that we stayed over in the City, and she…she hates what Latoya’s done to us. She hates the perms and the makeup and manicures--”
“I think you look perfectly lovely, Violette Blanche, like a page out a fashion magazine…” Michael commented, and Vylette shook her head.
“Mama sacked out all of us about it--even Papa, for letting us stay and letting us do all of it. She thinks we’re changing--”
“You are changing. That‘s part of growing up, Sweetness.”
“But Mama thinks its for the worse. That we’ll be spoiled pampered brats and forget who we are and where we come from. Become some kind of affected ninnies or something! Mama doesn’t like money, she doesn’t like wealth. You’ve seen Mama, how…how religious she is.”
“Yes…”
“She thinks money is the root of all evil. Thinks that unless a person is working, hard work, every day they’ll do wrong. Idle hands are the Devil’s workshop…”
Vylette sighed and her head lowered.
“Wednesday evening, Mama’s hosting the Ladies’ Christian League. Same sob story, trying to raise funds for the soup kitchen. And…and….” Vylette’s head shook.
Those hands held her cheeks and that handsome face bobbed closely to her.
“And you want to show your mother that how Marlon and I live isn’t so bad.” He said knowingly and Vylette nodded.
“You’re so…so social, Michael. So cosmopolitan. You really know how to host and entertain and everything. And, I’m really sick of Mama looking down on you all the time!” She blurted and Michael let go of her as a hint of evil came to her eye.
“That’s why I want Adelaide… I don’t really like the League and if she could make some refreshments…”
Michael raised a hand.
“Consider it done, Precious. You shouldn’t have to do anything you don’t want to. Of course, I’ll pay Adelaide overtime, but for this cause, it’s worth it.”
“You honestly don’t mind?” Vylette was throwing herself against him squeezing for dear life. She wanted to kick up her heels and do cartwheels up and down the lane.
“Why would I? Sooner or later, your mother will have to get used to the idea of my being able to provide for you and take care of affairs. I’m not some bum…”
He paused and his eyes bugged causing Vylette to laugh, knowing just whom he meant.
Arm slung around her middle, Michael lead her back to the couch and the two snuggled together, a weight lifting off of Vylette.
“That’s settled…what kind of food would you liked served for this meeting? I’m asking now, so I can send for the ingredients in the morning.”
Covertly, he picked at a pin in her hair.
“Uh…” Vylette had been so busy trying to work up the gall to ask him for the use of the housekeeper, she’d never thought past that point and had no natural idea of what to feed those old hens.
“What do you suggest?”
Sucking on another lemon wedge, Michael waved it at her.
“You should serve what we served for my brother Jermaine’s birthday last December. That party was a lulu and people complimented us on the food for weeks afterwards. About how many people will be at the meeting on Wednesday?”
“Around twenty-five. Mama’s shaking out all the women she can get her hands on now--is that too many?” Vylette winced, hoping she wasn’t imposing too much upon Michael Jackson and his generosity.
“That’s all?” Michael cackled and clapped his hands. “Twenty-five people is nothing! Why, for Jermaine’s party over two hundred people were wandering around his place! Less than thirty will be a cakewalk!”
Vylette found it hard to fathom a party consisting of that many people in one place, outside of a wedding, but again, Vylette remembered how easily the Jacksons seemed to get on with people, and friends seemed to come abundantly.
Vylette started to drink more lemonade.
“And what should Marlon and I wear to the meeting?”
A stream shot from Vylette’s mouth.
“What…you…you should wear?” She choked putting her glass down and coughing.
“Yes…I’d like to see my future wife acting as a hostess.” Michael patted her back.
“But…but, there’s never been a man at a Ladies’ Christian League meeting before. Papa won’t even be home; he’ll be down at the church playing Poker for candy with Father Lachey!”
This was going too far, even for Vylette. Never in the entire history of the Ladies’ Christian League, dating all the way back to  when her own grandmother, Evangeline De La Croix had presided over it before her death when Vylette was ten years old.
“Well, there is a first time, for everything.” Michael’s brows wiggled and he grinned mischievously like a little boy. “You wanted to shake things up, I can’t think of anything that could shake a pack of matrons up than to look and see two cocks among the hens.”
In spite of herself, Vylette smiled, and clutched his hand.
Yes, she wanted to push the envelope, tear it to shreds even, and give her mother an unsettling treatment, as she had received the last two days.
Chug-chug-chug-chug…
“Now, what is this?” Michael squinted, as making its way up the drive was a large, dark brown truck.
Chug-chug-chug-chug…
Coming to a halt and idling, the driver’s side door popped open and a man, wearing a brown uniform and cap embroidered with “Delivery” in gold lettering, disbanded, a clipboard in his hands.
“Excuse me, Mister…” He tilted his hat and squinted at the papers attached to the board.
“Is this here the Jackson house?”
“Yes, I’m Michael Jackson, how can I help you?” Michael stood.
“You see that there truck, Sir?” The man pointed at his vehicle.
“How can I miss it?” Michael snorted.
The man stared at him a moment, then continued,
“Well, there’s nine more just like it making their way to this hole in the wall, alright. I don’t know what the devil you’ve ordered, Sir, but you’re about to have packages and parcels coming out your ears!”
“Sweet Fancy Moses!” Michael exclaimed as in a row, more large trucks began rumbling up the road.
He performed a perfect pirouette, and rushed Vylette.
“Baby!” He was pulling her to her feet. “Do you know what this means?”
“YES!” Vylette shrieked hands to her face.
The clothes! The clothes were arriving. The clothes for her and for Lorraine and perhaps even the toys for little Vinnie.
All the beautiful, wonderful things were starting to arrive.
“Hot damn!” Michael ran to the corner of the porch and shouted down it.
“MARLON! Come here! Hurry! Come here! Get the molasses out yo’ asses!”
“What in the hell you hooting and hollering for?” Marlon Jackson, mopping at his brow with a handkerchief was heard before he was seen.
“Hey Vylette--”
“Hi!”
Grabbing his sibling by the arm, Michael directed him over to the delivery man.
“See this fella in the brown? Well, there’s nine more just like him driving up to start delivering things for the girls. Sign for them. Me and Vylette are gonna run down and get Lorraine and Vinnie! They have to see this!”
“Nine--goddamn, did you say nine?” Marlon was left gasping as more men in brown jumped from trucks, each holding a clipboard, all clamoring for his signature.
“Shamone, Baby!!!” Michael, was pulling Vylette towards his car so hard, she was flying behind him.
Slamming the door on her, Michael clung to it and was all mouth.
“Baby, not only are you and your cousin going to host the League meeting people will talk about for generations to come, but by golly, you’re gonna be outfitted head to toe in the best to do it, too!”
Laughing uproariously, as he hopped in and fired up the engine, Vylette Meraux had never felt so alive in her life.

Two Days Later
Meraux Residence
Rainelle Paris, Louisiana

It was barely five in the morning, with day still looking very much like night, as darkness shrouded and covered everything within the field of vision around that picturesque, white cottage.
A quintet of people should have still been slumbering peacefully, only to be awakened once the heat and light of the sun decided to pour through the cracked windows.
Instead, near the rear of the house, a lone body was stirring.
From the bed, nearest the window, Vylette moved stealthily.
Had she slept? Had she known slumber that night? She couldn’t quite recall.
All she remembered were her nerves. Her aching nerves, ragged and raw, with the situation at hand.
How she was going to, with the help of the Jacksons and their housekeeper, Adelaide, get the home ready to host guests in a manner never before seen in Rainelle Parish.
But right then, her only thoughts were of getting her mother out of the house.
She didn’t worry about her father; Dr. Meraux knew all the details of his daughter’s doings and had no qualms about it.
(But then, he seemed to approve of everything associated with the Jacksons anyway. Perhaps it came from the knowledge that in the not-too-distant future, he may call Michael “Son” and appreciated his ability to provide for and care for his daughter. )
Her mother, on the other hand, had yet to relent.
Indeed, she seemed to have gotten worse in the past forty-eight hours, with the arrival of so many “extras”.
Kathleen had been mortified to see dresses, blouses, skirts, shoes and accessories, by the dozens, being carried in by squealing, happy girls and silently proud men. Enough to fill a store, being packed within the walls of her home.
And toys, so many toys for Vinnie, she’d cried, being held in Michael’s lap for fifteen solid minutes, at the wealth of playthings.
Baby dolls with eyes that opened and closed--two of them cried “Mama!”-- stuffed animals, a grand dollhouse, with miniature furniture and a vinyl family with a dog, a tea set of real china, boxed board games and jigsaw puzzles …even a shiny red bicycle with a woven basket on the front. Everything a child could desire.
Dr. Meraux had been pleased that his girls had and were joyous.
Kathleen cried they were spoiled and had even threatened to give away some of the items, as she deemed it “too much”.
Of course, her spouse roared like the docile lion he was and the objects remained.
Standing in the warm room, for once, Vylette felt luxuriously cool.
Where she usually wore a clinging, too-small, non-breathing cotton gown, her body now bore satin, pajamas.
Light blue, sleeveless and trimmed in pink lace.
In the moonlight, she could see her sister and cousin, in striped satin renditions of her own pajamas.
Lorraine was even smiling in her sleep, underneath her framed portrait of Jean Harlow.
And Vinnie hugged a pale brown, stuffed monkey in a death grip, tightly to her chest. Her oldest toy, Mr. Bear rested on the pillow beside her.
A pair of slippers, trimmed in marabou, appeared on her feet, and Vylette slowly stole out of the room.
It wasn’t until she was out in the hallway, she could smell the pungent aroma of brewed chicory.
Vylette’s breaths slowed. Someone was up.
She prayed desperately, it was her father, readying to walk to work.
It would be so much easier…
She wasn’t so fortunate.
Through the open door to the kitchen, she saw her mother, still wrapped in her floral bathrobe, hair flowing, at the counter, pouring herself a cup.
“G-good morning, Mama…” Vylette stammered and her mother’s eyes, stormy and judgmental came up, as her eldest entered the room.
“Good morning, Vylette.” Her mother’s voice was curt and crisp, a clear indicator she was still unhappy. “I was just about to come get you…”
Automatically, though she wasn’t hungry, Vylette went through the motions to prepare oatmeal.
“Oh?”
“Yes…I’m going to go to the Church this morning to speak with Sister Roberta…”
Vylette’s heart lifted, he mother was going to leave.
“…to get a clear estimate on just how much money is needed to reopen the soup kitchen…”
Hazel flecked eyes swept her child.
“Is that new?”
“Yes…yes, Ma’am…” Pot boiling, Vylette began to stir in the oats.
“Such a deviant waste of money. Those Jacksons, instead of carelessly tossing away funds, should be doing something to help the community--not gilding the lily.” Kathleen sighed and blood surged into Vylette’s face.
Teeth clenched, and Vylette’s smooth hands shook.
“Michael Jackson is not in love with the community, Mama. He’s in love with me…”
“Vylette Evangeline Meraux!” Her mother gasped, as she was on the receiving end of backtalk.
Vylette never spoke back to her mother. Lorraine often did it in quiet tones, but Vylette certainly never had.
Nor had she ever done it where her voice was plain to the ear!!!
“…and he’s looking out for me, first. Please do not fault him, especially in front of me…”
“Vylette!” Hazel eyes wide, Kathleen was horrified.
“You won’t let anyone speak badly about Papa, the man you love, and I won’t stand to have it done to the man I love!”
“Why I never!” Kathleen clutched at her throat, large bosom heaving.
“I love Michael, Mama. Nothing can change that…”
“I won’t hear this--”
“You still want me with Steven, don’t you? I’m not going to marry Steven, I never was! I hate Steven!”
There was something truthful in that statement. Though Vylette and Lorraine openly associated with the Jacksons, Kathleen had remained quite tight and friendly with both Beatrice Wilkes and Mary Povah.
The mothers of the boys tossed away carelessly.
And as driven as Mary Povah was, and as gullible as Beatrice Wilkes was, it was anyone’s guess what was being said or how one or the other was goading on Kathleen in an attempt to bust up the forthcoming unions and try to mesh the three top-tier Parish families back together.
And it just wasn’t so. Vylette was fiercely wild about Michael and Lorraine was loony as a road lizard about Marlon.
God himself couldn’t pry them apart!
“I’m going to the Church! I’m going to ask Father Lachey to speak to you! The…the Devil’s in you girl! I don’t know how that man’s bewitched you, but I don’t like it! Jesus Christ!”  Fleeing on thick ankles, Kathleen Meraux exited the room, leaving her daughter, gripping the walls and breathing heavily. Taxed out from delivering a home truth…
Tap! Tap! Tap!
Timidly, someone was knocking on the backdoor.
Through the panes of glass and screen door, Vylette could make out Michael’s smiling face.
Michael. Her sweet, kind, loving, attentive Michael.
Michael who never raised a hand except to pinch at her.
Near collapse and so thankful to see him, she rushed to the door, opening it.
“Good morning, Lover!” Michael giggled sheepishly, extending the two grease stained boxed in his hands.
“I brought some donuts--”
“Vylette?”
“OOF!”
Frightened her mother had returned to pick up the argument where it had been left off, Michael Jackson was shoved backwards and out of sight, as Vylette whirled around to face her father, dressed for work and holding his white coat.
“What in God’s name did you say to your mother? She’s talking like you’re possessed by Satan! Saying something about throwing Holy Water on you!”
“We sparred about Michael--”
“Oh, I thought it was something serious.” The doctor shook his head. “Well, I’m off to work. See you around lunchtime, Dear.”
“Good-bye!” Vylette called, and spun to open the door.
In the light, Michael sat on the ground, holding the boxes.
“I…I saved the donuts, Baby…” He whimpered with a weak smile.

A Few Hours Later

With the departure of a haunted Kathleen Meraux, in search of Father Lachey to perform an emergency exorcism, the interior of the Meraux compound was slowly transforming in preparation for the Ladies’ Christian League meeting that night.
Since six a.m., the pudgy, talented hands of sweet Adelaide had been hard at work, preparing a palate moistening assortment of finger sandwiches and large, gooey pecan coffee cake.
The living room of the home was quite beautiful, with two long tables having been set up and draped with antique lace, and dark green heavy crepe runners.
In the center of one of the tables, a large, crystal punchbowl set on top of a sterling silver platform, surrounded by matching etched tumblers.
On the other, platters and plates waited to be used, made of fine china, rimmed in gold leaf with burgundy enamel and painted roses in the center.
Michael had joked it was the “most feminine pattern I could find at home!”
“It’s all so pretty…I just can’t stop staring at it…I can’t believe its real…” Vylette cooed in awe, standing over the settings continuing to admire all that had been brought, simply because she’d asked for it.
“I know, you’ve been standing there about forty-five minutes, can you even feel you legs?” Michael called, from where he stood at the open front door, watching Vinnie riding her bicycle in circles.
“Yes…” Vylette chortled, poking her hands into the pockets of her floral skirt. “I love everything, thank you--”
“Wait till you get a load of the cutlery Marlon and Lorraine are going to bring back.” Michael flicked ashes from his cigarette and closed the screen door.
That poor man, he still wore dirt smudges on his plaid trousers from being thrown that morning.
“Is it very pretty?” Vylette wondered dreamily as he came over, joining her at the table.
Pretty…she could have pretty things just for the sake of having them!
And how her mother would stew at the opulence!
She was so happy and spiteful at the very same time.
“Yes! Gold with burgundy enamel handles… I told you, anything you need, you‘ll have.” He winked and hugged her.
Jokingly, Vylette plucked at his wrist.
“I want the Eiffel Tower!”
That curly head flew back as Michael crowed.
“Don’t you think the Parisians would miss it thought, Violette Blanche?”
“Perhaps…” Vylette snickered and ran her fingertips across one of the long platters.
“You really don’t think its too much?” Vylette inquired, and he patted her hand. “I mean, it IS a fund-raising meeting.”
“Don’t worry…” A peck was given. “…I’ve helped raise money for charity before, and I’ve always heard that its best to look as if you don’t need a handout, when asking.”
A handout? Had Michael Jackson ever needed a handout?
But if anyone knew the ins and outs of getting what was needed to benefit others, it was him.
Why wasn’t Kathleen around to hear that?
“What do you plan to wear, Vy?”
At the inquiry, Vylette looked down at her skirt and rather plain sleeveless blouse.
“This--”
“No.” Every glossed tendril on his head bounced. “You will dress the part. Wait here…”
Michael turned abruptly and started for the door.
Dress the part. He was such a consummate showman.
Vylette watched him go, curiously.
He called to Vinnie, who obediently rolled her bike to the front porch and jogged in as he proceeded to his car, parked on the road.
“Michael said he was getting something.” Her little face was bright and shiny.
“You enjoyed riding your bike?” Vylette asked absently, watching as Michael bent and dug around in the glove compartment.
“Yes! I love it. It’s the best, prettiest bike in the whole wide world. I wish I could ride it to show Hildegard!” Vinnie sighed, but her mother thought she’d fall and get scraped up riding out to her friend’s home.
(And she frowned on the flaunting of the new bicycle anyway.)
Michael returned, and it seemed he was empty-handed.
“Ran out of matches…” He stated, holding a hand to each.
“Now, we’re going to look through the closets and get dresses for each of you to wear. Hostesses, no matter how small--” He pinched Vinnie’s cheek, “--should look it. Come on…”
A hostess. Vylette was a hostess, and with Michael’s guidance, she would be dressed as one.
What would it be like? To one day be the Lady of Jackson Manor and hostess to tea parties and dinner parties and having the likes of Sir Reginald and Lady Tabitha Cavendish in for the afternoon?
Be invited in and out of swanky places and waste afternoons at the country club.
The Meraux girls were lead back to their bedroom and both sat on the edge of Lorraine’s bed, closest the closet.
It was practically bursting with garments.
“You don’t need a gown, as this is rather informal, but you have to be dressy…” Michael explained, opening the door.
The garments were arranged with Lorraine‘s articles to the left, Vinnie‘s smaller pieces in the middle and Vylette‘s to the far right.
(Though, Lorraine and Vylette could interchangeably wear each other‘s clothing, as their figures only differed by a manner of inches in height and in the bust, a fact which doubled the wardrobes of each.)
Hangers clicked and clacked as Michael examined tiny dresses for Vinnie.
So many little dresses of silk and organza and organdy, and chiffon. In so many becoming colors and patterns.
“This would be nice for Vinnie…it‘s sweet, just like her!” He held up a cute dress of grey and gingham, its white, squared collar, embroidered with small blue flowers.
Her eyes, even at ten years old, were important enough to be accentuated.
“Yes, Sir!” Vinnie snatched the dress and was holding it against her body, admiring her reflection in the long mirror beside the closet..
“You’ll need shoes and socks and a ribbon--”
“That’s in Mama’s closet!” Vinnie was running away. “Wait till Hildegard sees me!”
“She wants Hildegard to see everything.” Vylette chuckled, watching her sister go.
“She should be seen. Little girls should enjoy dresses and be happy.” Michael nodded.
More hangers shifted and clothing swayed as Michael probed further into the closet.
“I’d like you in something purple, its so becoming to your eyes…” Michael cooed, looking at the longer dresses designated for Vylette..
“You’d dress me in purple all the time…” Vylette teased, standing up as he lifted a lilac shift, rimmed in lace, and replaced it.
“Of course, Lover. Your eyes are one of your best features.” Michael grinned back at Vylette and she warmed feeling special.
“Then again, everything to you is a strongpoint.”
Steven had never complimented her like that.
“Nah…”  A dotted dress was rejected.
“Too frilly…” A blouse, frothing all over with gauzy ruffles was also replaced.
“Hmmm, you need something stronger, deeper…but not too adorned. The main attraction is that face…” Michael was speaking to himself, Vylette his lackey.
He wouldn’t steer her wrongly, he wanted what was best for her.
“This!” Another dress appeared in his hands.
And Vylette’s breath caught in her throat.
It was simplistic and beautiful, the sort of dress used to enhance a girl’s beauty, not detract from it.
Made of deep purple chiffon, it was trimmed with a warm, rose-beige piping around the sleeves, self-tying belt and neckline.
It was short sleeved, with an asymmetrical collar, all rimmed in more of that beige.
The waist was belted and on the shoulder, a plume of off-white rosettes contrasted.
“I…I like that dress…” Vylette was whispering. “I…I have matching shoes…”
Her mind was across the hall in her mothers closet, focused on the purple and beige cap-toed pumps, setting in a box, waiting to be worn.
She was going to wear that? That gorgeous dress? She owned it? It was hers?
She didn’t’ even remember selecting it for purchase! She wanted to faint.
“It’s perfect…with flesh-toned stockings…since you‘re home you don‘t need a hat or gloves.” Michael laid the frock across the bed, with one hand, and dug in his pocket with the other.
“I love it, Michael. Thank you.” Vylette was so tongue-tied, she could scarcely speak.
“Hold this for me, please.”
A big fist was held out and something cold and hard was dropped into Vylette’s outstretched palm.
“Ok--oh my God!” She gasped loudly and almost threw the object.
“Oh…oh, Mike!”
In her hand, was a ring!
“My God…!” Holding onto it gingerly, she brought it closely to her face, eyes widening.
“Oh no…oh, Michael…!”
Set in platinum, on the top was a strange, huge opaque cabochon stone, reflecting with shades of blue and violet and soft pink in a sea of milky white.
On either side of the gallery of the ring, twin V’s twinkled with tiny diamonds.
“Michael--” Vylette was breathless and hands gripped her shoulders to keep life from slipping away.
Was this…did this mean…?
“It’s not an engagement ring…” He spoke slowly. “Not just yet. Your ring is still being made. I just grew tired of seeing your hands naked, and wanted to see how a ring would look. Here…”
He took the ring, admiring it himself.
Her hand was taken and squeezed affectionately.
It was slipped onto the quivering ring finger of her right hand.
“ How pretty it looks…A wedding band goes on the left hand. This is going on your right hand, just for your enjoyment. And I know every time you look at it, you’ll think of me. It won’t come off, will it?”
Playfully, Michael touched at the diamond tennis bracelet on Vylette’s wrist.
“No…never…” Vylette vowed.
“It will eventually…” Michael’s cheek pressed her own. “Because I will get you more things to wear, and we’ll keep them in the safe at home.”
At home. His home…their home.
More things! He said more things.
“You’re spoiling me, Michael…” Vylette was doing her best to hold onto her sanity as her hand moved, reflecting.
“This is my favorite gem…its called a moonstone.” Michael spoke as Vylette cried.
“I love how it shows so many colors. Kind of changing, how your eyes do, depending on what you wear…”
“I love you, why do you do this to me?” Vylette wept, mascara stinging her eyes.
“Because I can and want to--”
He was perfect.
“Hey! I need some help here!” Marlon’s voice, panicked, called suddenly. “Somebody, help!”
Wrenched from her daydream, and dizzy, Vylette was scampering after her lover.
Worried, the house emptied into the living room, where Lorraine’s limp body was being stretched on the couch by a harried Marlon Jackson.
Lorraine was out cold, slightly clammy, her breathing shallow.
“Lorraine! Is she alright?” Vinnie, eyes bugged, white Mary Janes in hand, questioned as they all clamored around. “Should I run get Papa?”
“I’ll get some water!” Adelaide was waddling away.
“Lorraine! Lorraine! Baby! Come on, Cherry, wake up!” Marlon urged, patting at her freckled face.
“What’s happened!” Vylette, antsy repeated the question to no avail.
“I see what happened!” Michael declared sharply, reaching and taking hold of Lorraine’s right hand.
A platinum ring, featuring a sizeable octagonal diamond and flanked by baguette sapphires, sparkled.
“Zowie, is that real?” Vinnie cried and was moved back.
“She thinks its an engagement ring! I didn’t get to tell her…”Marlon sputtered, hand still slapping at her cheek.
“This ain’t the damn ring! Christ!”
“I told you not to get anything with a diamond as the main stone!” Michael had his hands in his hair.
“She’s gonna murder you, when she comes to!”
“No…I’ll just explain, hers is still being made. The real one!” Marlon declared and Vinnie went into shock.
“You’re gonna marry Lorraine?” Vinnie yelled, shoes falling to the floor,  and Marlon’s hands wrapped her head,
“Shhh! Shhh! Shhh! Shut up, Kid!” Marlon hissed, as Vinnie struggled against him to free herself.
“I’m in the stew already! But yeah, I will! I am! Just wait! Just wait a while--not yet!”
He held out one of his hands, gripping Vinnie by the front of her blouse and she ceased wiggling.
“You see this? You tell a soul before I get to ask your cousin properly, I’ll spank you till your butt turns red like a baboon’s ass, you understand me, Lavinia?”
They didn’t want anyone to breathe a note about engagements until they had the bands to show for it.
“Yes, Sir! I’m deaf, dumb and blind!” Vinnie rushed to her sister as Adelaide waddled back with a glass of water.
With hands as large as his, Marlon Jackson could have slapped Vinnie’s soul clear out her body!
“Don’t scare the child!” Michael growled defensively.
“Aw shut up! She’ll be my cousin soon enough, anyways!”
“Goddamn!”
“Daddy?”
Life was returning to Lorraine with the shell-shocked cry.
“Sugar!” Marlon dropped to his knees as she threw her arms around him.
“We’re going to be married! Finally!” Lorraine gushed excitedly.
“Vylette, Vinnie look at this sparkler! It‘s diamonds and sapphires! Isn‘t it just the bee‘s knees? Did I faint? I feel lightheaded! Am I drunk?”
Her hand was held out and she wagged the bauble at them.
“Oh Daddy, you’ve made me so happy! And no one has a ring like this! So pretty, so expensive! I‘m going to be married--it‘s a dream come true! I want a backless, white satin gown…”
Lorraine was hugging her body against Marlon who was flabbergasted and looked seconds away from upchucking.
“Vylette will be my Maid of Honor and Vinnie will be my Flower Girl, of course. Uncle Almanzo will give me away…oh, Jesus! I want your sisters to be bridesmaids! Oh and pink! I want pink everything, Daddy! Or…or green, for my eyes…and you…you in a white suit, Daddy, a tuxedo Marlon! With tails!”
“Uh…” Marlon stammered and Michael swooped, picking up Vinnie in his arms as mumbling, Marlon started to tell his mistakenly betrothed otherwise.
“Mercy!” Michael cried, clutching Vinnie to his bosom, and pushed Vylette. “Run! Run! For the love of God, RUN!”
“It ain’t an engagement ring, Lori…”
“What did you say to me, Marlon David Jackson?” Lorraine cried, sitting bolt upright and pulling from him, her eyes widening and darkening to a violent emerald green and Marlon mumbled incoherently a moment at her.
Adelaide was rushing away, towards the kitchen, footfalls pounding, and the last thing Vylette heard as she leapt from the front porch after Michael, taking cover, was her cousin shrieking,
“WHAT THE GODFORSAKEN HELL DO YOU MEAN ITS NOT AN ENGAGEMENT RING?!?!?!?!!!”
Followed by a flurry of words with no business coming from a young lady’s mouth, and the sound of glass breaking.
As they reached the car, with Michael tossing Vinnie in between them, he cackled,
“Maybe from now on, that fat-headed rascal will heed the advice I give him! Hee-hee!”

Sometime Later

“…and Marlon is the Dearest Darling…”
Lorraine was speaking lightly and placidly, as she dug through a drawer on the chest across from the beds, and came up with a pair of stockings that mimicked her skin tone.
Walking back over to her bed and sitting, she began to pull them on and fix them into place with white lace garters, that matched her barely there lace teddy.
“…he explained to me that he does intend to marry me! Me, Mrs. Marlon Jackson!” Lorraine tittered merrily and stood, whirling to the closet. “He’s having a ring custom made for me…diamonds in platinum he said. Big too--’Lori, you’re gonna go blind if you stare at it!’ He said that!”
“And it only took you beaming him over the head with a broomstick to get it out!” Vylette laughed, thinking of how poor Marlon had cowered in the backyard as Lorraine had whacked him several times before Vylette and Michael managed to pull her off and Marlon could flee.
Marlon had to really love her to get a pummeling like that and not even curl his fist at her.
Vylette couldn’t imagine hanging Michael out to dry like that. But Lorraine had always been as fiery as her hair and too quick-tempered for a woman.
“Aw, he’s not too sore about it!” Lorraine pouted. “Why you can barely see the lump I left on his head, since Uncle Almanzo put ice on it. Hand me my dress, will you, Vy?”
Vylette, tying her belt securely around her waist,
Reaching, she pulled out her cousin’s dress, made of contrasting green voile.
On top, with a wrap around bodice and belt it was a lighter, bluish green, while the skirt, in the same family was several shades darker.
“Thank you…” the zipper was loosened and Lorraine stepped into it, with Vylette helping to zip it back up.
“What do you think it will be like, Vy?” Lorraine wondered, as they took turns preening before the mirror.
“What?” She watched as Lorraine stepped into patent green pumps.
“Being married to Michael and Marlon!” Trembling hands, freckles powdered away gripped Vylette’s.
“Never having to leave them. Being with them all night long. Seeing them in the morning!”
Green eyes danced wildly with sexual undertones.
“Marlon’s asked me to think of someplace for a Honeymoon! He said anywhere I like! Vylette, anywhere! Honey, I want to go to Paris and shop at Chanel, see Versailles and the Eiffel Tower. I even want  to do boring things like see a museum!”
It was then, briefly, a thought occurred to Vylette.
For the first times in their lives since they’d been born, they’d be separate.
They would marry and already their honeymoons would be separate. Lorraine in France and her in Austria…
And where would they live?
Michael was adamant about staying in the ancestral home, but Marlon was sure to move away, and take Lorraine with him. Would they go to New Orleans? Or further?
Chicago? St. Louis? New York? Abroad?
Marlon was as cultured as Michael. Fluent in several languages--French, German, Italian, Mexican Spanish and Spaniard Spanish, making life anywhere easy and attainable. Hell, he could curse in Mandarin!
It had come from being everywhere.
Suddenly, quickly, Vylette was clutching Lorraine to her.
Pressing her enflamed cheek to her cousin’s cool one.
“Vylette, please!” Lorraine struggled with her, alarmed. “You’re going to wrinkle our dresses, Darling! What’s wrong? You look so queer!”
Vylette stared at the pretty, painted face with the laughing, amused, devilish green-grey eyes and proud mouth and dimpled chin.
“I…I love you Lorraine…” Vylette declared, bottom lip quaking. “You’re my cousin, but I love you like a sister, just like Vinnie. You’re my best friend. You always will be. I…I want us to stay that way, even after we’re married.”
“Why of course we will!” Lorraine laughed and brushed at her own tears.
“Marlon and I plan to have a place in New Orleans. I know I’d like to get away from Louisiana, but not forever. He knows why…”
Lorraine’s head lowered.
“My Mama and Papa are here. He knows it important to me to be near them. His mother is Albany now and his father is traveling…Mrs. Jackson likes to be in one place…Mr. Jackson doesn’t. But I want to be married and have my babies on Louisiana soil. And them come up with their cousins--and visiting Auntie Vy and Uncle Mike--Oh!”
Lorraine was mashing her cousin.
“I’m so happy! I love you! I love everything, Jesus Christ!”
“Are y’all alright?” A voice interrupted and the two turned, as Vinnie, looking skeptical, entered the room.
“We’re just happy, Honey--” Lorraine half-laughed half cried.
“Mama’s in the living room. She….she ain’t happy.” Vinnie replied woodenly, eyes huge and all the joy left the room.
Kathleen! They’d forgotten about her!
Both girls inhaled sharply.
“Damn it!” Lorraine whimpered and emboldening, Vylette took her hand.
“Come along. You too Vinnie! Its best we get it over with now!”
Head up and defiant, Vylette was leading the pack dragging her relatives with her. She heard her mother’s distaste booming.
“…so this is what happens when I leave the house! I left explicit instructions to those wenches to make sugar cookies and lemonade! I return and it looks like a cocktail hour at the Cotton Club!”
“It’s fruit punch Kathleen. With fruit juice in it. No liquor--we’re under Prohibition!” Came the long-suffering reply from the doctor.
Entering the living room, Vylette saw her father, looking quite annoyed from where he sat in his armchair, fist to his cheek, watching his wife. Pain were in his steely eyes.
Set up around the room were two dozen chairs of ebony and cream brocade, that had been rented specially for the meeting.
Kathleen stood before the tables, head wagging, her hat bobbing.
“Look at all of this--china, crystal, all this food! Just flaunting money! These chairs like the King of England was coming! Why--”
Vylette drooped the clammy hands in hers.
“Mama!”
“Vy…no, have you gone mad…!” Lorraine whispered, trying to grab at her. “Don’t walk to your own murder!”
There was a fire in her, as she approached her mother, hazel eyes turning to her.
“This is all your doing, Vylette!” Her mother hissed angrily, long stubby finger in her face.. “After all I’ve said. After how I’ve raised you! You go and show out, with the League members minutes away--”
“Yes, Mama, the League!” Vylette spoke over her.
“Vinnie, remember your sister fondly, because she’s about to be killed!” Lorraine was hugging the child.
“The League. The twenty-five ladies and their daughters you invited to our home for a meeting. The organization Lorraine and I were railroaded into membership of. The organization that has done nothing for over a month since the kitchen fell apart, but argue. Will we have a bake sale? Won’t we? Will we have a concert? Won’t we? Its the same thing! It’s monotonous!”
Kathleen’s jaw swung and she sputtered, praying in Latin at the impertinence.
“You ran off and left me and Lorraine and Vinnie saddled with the task to feed the people. Well I did. I went to Michael and asked his assistance. He was nearly overjoyed to help me.”
“Did you even prepare--?” Kathleen was speaking through her teeth.
“NO Ma‘am! Adelaide prepared the food, Mama. I selected a menu, ran it by Lorraine and Vinnie taste-tested everything--”
“I got to lick the spoon for the cake!” Vinnie boasted before slapping her hands over her mouth at her indiscretion.
If Kathleen Meraux sucked her lips in any harder, they’d have been swallowed.
“We’ve got plenty refreshments for every one…” Vylette busied herself, smoothing the tablecloth. “There’s Fruit Punch, Cucumber and Herbed Cream Cheese on White Toast, Sliced Strawberries and Sweetened Cream Cheese on White, Chicken Salad and Crab Salad, both with Crackers, and a Pecan Cake… plenty.”
“A flagrant display if I ever saw one!” Kathleen grabbed Vylette by the arm and spun her to her.
“Kathleen!” Dr. Meraux called in warning, a hand up.
“It’s just sandwiches, Mama.” Vylette yanked her arm away. “Bread with a filling to it, cut into triangles.”
“Look at you, all painted up like a Teenaged Jezebel, with all that waved mess in your hair!” Kathleen declared hoarsely, wheezing. Didn’t she forget she had a permanent too?
“And those clothes…and, and…”
“And this is what women in 1931, wear Mama.” Vylette added, putting her head back and staring down her nose at her mother.
“Almanzo! My heart! My heart!” Kathleen wheeze gripping at her massive chest. “My mother died of a heart attack! Help me!”
“You mother died after eating raw pork, Kathleen…took with food poisoning, wasn‘t a thing I could do but comfort her.” The doctor calmly was lighting his pipe.
“Who the hell ever heard of Pork Tartare anyway?”
Smoke billowed and Kathleen bristled like an angry cat.
“And quit twitting that girl about everything. I think the house looks nice and I want some of that cake. Carrying on for nothing, Kathleen. I think Vylette, Lorraine and Vinnie are nice little hostesses. Why they look beautiful, all three of them.”
Losing the battle as an army of one, as her husband was even a part of the opposing side, Kathleen tossed her head in woe, eyes narrowing at him.
“You only encourage this behavior!” Kathleen griped, storming out of the room, with Lorraine and Vinnie leaping out of her way.
“Beats the heck out of discouraging them!”
“--oh shut up you old coot! I’m going to change before the Ladies get here! God give me strength!”
The door to the bedroom slammed, rocking pictures on the walls.
“Thank you, Papa!” Vylette, arms opened, flew into her father’s lap, hugging him and pecking at his cheek.
“You’re welcome… I’m proud of you for standing up for yourself and your decisions. That’s what a lady--a real lady--does.” He pointed out, poking the tip of her nose.
A lady.
Vylette Meraux was a lady.
And her father was proud of her.
Vylette looked from him, over to Lorraine and Vinnie, both smiling back at her.
Tap! Tap! Tap!
“There’s your company…” Dr. Meraux helped his daughter up and hugged her. “I’m going to slip out the back and down to the church. You enjoy yourself.”
He looked back at the other two.
“All of you.”
As he departed speedily, Vylette straightened her shoulders and glanced at Lorraine for confirmation.
Tap! Tap! Tap!
It was time to show the world what they were becoming.
The ladies they were.
As the polite knocking went on a third time, Vylette reached the front door and opened it.
Standing on the porch were their first guests, Hannah and little Hildegard Povah. (There was a  flock of more Povah girls, but as Hannah was the only girl old enough to be considered for the League, her membership was mandatory, and Hildegard was there for Vinnie.)
Pale, plain-faced Hannah smiled sweetly at Vylette, looking so much like her brother Ulrich. So tall and gangly, without a curve to her name and her hair parted severely in the middle, and held with a ribbon.
Those pale, watery blue eyes swept up and down Vylette a moment.
“Oh, pardon me Ma’am…” Hannah chuckled in a low, heavy voice. “I must have the wrong home. I was looking for the Meraux residence.”
Vylette stared at Hannah, and then down into the inquisitive face of Hildegard.
They didn’t know her.
They didn’t recognize her! Did she really look that different.
“This IS the Meraux residence, Hannah.” Vylette stated and two sets of those cornflower eyes squinted.
“Vylette?” Hannah gasped and her eyes swelled.
“Leapin’ Lizards, you look amazing! Oh my Goodness!”
“Please come in…” Vylette held the door and the Povah girls  shuffled in.
“Vylette, you look so beautiful! Oh your makeup! Your Mama let you wear it! That dress…” Hannah was babbling as Lorraine and Vinnie came over.
“Oh my Word! Look at you! Those dresses are divine! You look like movie stars! All of you!”
“Wow!” Was all Hildegard could manage as she took in her best friend.
“Vylette, can I show Hildegard my toys, please?” Vinnie questioned and Vylette nodded.
“…did you see my bicycle? Michael bought it for me…”
The two girls ran off.
“Vylette…Lorraine…” Hannah was stammering, eyes going around the room and taking in all the treasures.
“My goodness, when did all of this happen? All of this is sensational--is that a real diamond?”
Lorraine was purposefully flaunting her ring and Hannah snatched her hand for a closer look.
“Yes, Marlon gave it to me. Isn’t it just too, too?” Lorraine tittered, eyes showing that high-and-mighty glint to them.
“Oh, and your bracelet! I don’t have any jewelry…” Hannah remarked enviously and reaching over she was admiring Vylette’s gems.
“What kind of stone is this?” Hannah questioned, gazing at the kaleidoscope of colors shimmering from Vylette’s ring.
“A moonstone. It’s Michael’s favorite.” Vylette looked down on it fondly.
“Are…are y’all engaged? Are y’all married? I heard y’all stayed over the weekend in New Orleans.”
“No, we were stranded when the motor on Marlon’s car went out. We were visiting his sister--”
“Latoya Jackson…of the New York Jacksons…” Lorraine bragged, ushering Hannah to the table and pouring her a glass of punch. “She came all the way from Manhattan, special for us. She gave us makeovers. The complete works. Latoya owns theatres like Marlon and Michael, but she gives makeovers as a hobby, can you imagine…” Lorraine was happy doing what she loved best, making herself seem important, as more knocks fell onto the door.
This time it was a quartet of the inbred Pringle cousins.
And again, it was feeding time at the zoo, as Vylette and her cousin were complimented on their new appearances and were questioned on their garments and hairdos and makeup.
Had conversations over the appetizers and inquired about the china and who made what--all seeming impressed that Adelaide had cooked.
That the Merauxs had access to hired help.
It happened over, and over, each time there was a knock, and more young ladies, and later, the matrons began to appear.
It had been the matrons Vylette had feared the most.
The old-fashioned women who held onto her mother’s sentiment. Who thought girls should have remained barefaced with plain hairstyles and plainer clothing.
But, incredibly, it seemed the consensus among the general population was that Vylette and Lorraine turned out as a pair of alluring, enchanting women and Vinnie was a charming little girl, looking so adorable.
The highest praise came from that sweet, round-cheeked Mrs. Wilkes, who took Vylette aside and confided she looked like a radiant ray of sunshine.
It still puzzled Vylette how such kind and loving woman as Beatrice Wilkes was, could have birthed a bear like Steven.
If it weren’t for her son, and his misogynistic ways she would have liked that jolly, jiggly woman for a mother-in-law.
But no, she was going to eventually count Katherine Jackson for that title…soon enough.

An Hour Later

“…I spoke with Sister Roberta just this afternoon, Ladies, in regards to exactly how much funds were required to reopen the Soup Kitchen and restore it to being operational it had been before…” Kathleen, outfitted in her tan, second-best dress was booming like a politician on the campaign trail.
She was slowly pacing back and forth, before the crowd.
Around the room, about twenty-five women sat, seeming to listen to Kathleen Meraux as she gave her speech, with poor Hannah writing shorthand in a notepad to keep track of the minutes.
But Vylette, tending to the refreshment table, was keenly aware that not all eyes were on her mother.
Every so often, eyes--cornflower blue, and colorless grey, and flecked green and warm, somber brown--would drift over to her at the table.
Or to Lorraine, who sat near the door.
Or to Vinnie who sat on the couch whispering back and forth with Hildegard.
Examining the Meraux girls. Seeing how they had turned out since becoming entangled with the Jacksons.
Since they had abruptly dropped the Wilkes and Povah boys.
How well the sons of Katherine Dauphine were taking care of the girls of the Parish’s first family.
How fine they looked in their brand-new dresses and diamonds and moonstones. With their faces painted in and hair pinned up in place.
How upset and desolate that pinched Mary Povah looked, each time her eyes fell on Lorraine, and she felt the loss of her daughter-in-law all over again.
(Not that Mary actually liked Lorraine particularly to begin with. It was no secret that Mary had always considered Lorraine to be something of a ‘fast’ girl. It had long been believed that Mary had simply tolerated Ulrich’s ‘relationship’ with her, because of Lorraine’s appearance, and though Colored, how she looked so much like a White woman. Though Mary bore a yellow complexion from her mixed heritage--everyone in the Parish bore a mixed heritage to some degree, no matter their complexion--all of her children had taken after their father, a rather fair man. And if Lorraine, a natural green-eyed redhead and Ulrich a sallow, blue-eyed, brown haired boy had a child, it more than likely would look White, just as its parents did. And Mary, seemed to be as backwards as Steven Wilkes thinking the lightness or whiteness of a person’s skin color made them better than other darker ones. Mary should have been Steven’s mother, not that angelic Beatrice.)
“…estimates to keep the kitchen open for one month, just as it had been before, stands at about forty dollars…”
Kathleen stated and threw the entire room into turmoil, chaos and filling it with the squawking of feminine voices.
“Forty dollars!”
“Why that’s as high as a cat’s back!”
“Why, we’ve got to feed our own families first, Mrs. Meraux!”
“My husband barely makes enough for us as it is!”
“There’s a Depression on, Mrs. Meraux!”
“Times are hard!”
“I feel as badly as the rest of y’all about the folks in the Bottoms, but my young’un’s need their nourishment first!”
Boredom wearing at her as the same scene was unfolding for the umpteenth time, Vylette picked up one of the toasted cucumber sandwiches and went to her mouth with it.
And above the din, a voice reached Vylette’s seashell ears.
“Well, it seems to me, with the way you and yours have appeared to hit the jackpot overnight, why aren’t you donating the funds of which we are in such desperate need?”
Near the center of the room, Mary Povah, that flat-chested rabble-rouser, had risen.
The sandwich landed back to the platter.
A hush fell on the room and eyes grew.
“Why that old cow, I could just kill her!” Lorraine barely managed to go unheard as she rushed to Vylette’s side, going bright pink beneath all her powder.
“Marlon and Michael haven’t given us any cash money; only bought things for us! That…that…that bitch, Vylette!”
Lorraine was crushing her cousin’s hand, her own perky bosom quivering and delicate nostrils flaring as she shot daggers across the room.
“Have…have some punch, Dear…” Vylette was nervously trying to hand her relative a tumbler, in an effort to calm her. Because if Lorraine got worked into a tizzy again, she’d be laying a broomstick across Mary’s lopsided head.
But, at the front of the room, Kathleen Meraux held her own.
“Mary Povah, do you mean to insinuate that I am holding back funds from the League?” Kathleen demanded and the room fell dead silent.
“Well…ha!” Mary tossed her scraggly head. “A person would have to be blind, not to notice all the wealth of riches you seem to be slopping over with! All that food there and the fancy jewelry and fine dresses your girls are wearing now. I saw the trucks hauling that in the other day while I was in town. Ten trucks roared past delivering things! Ten! Who needs ten trucks worth of anything? I bet the price of either of those diamond bracelets would supply the kitchen far into the next decade!”
“Oh!” Whispers were immediate, and instinctively, both Vylette and Lorraine grabbed their bracelets.
They couldn’t possibly expect them to…
Why those bracelets meant everything them…
So much…
And before she could stop her, Lorraine’s mouth flew open.
“I…I can’t! I won’t! I refuse to! You’re not taking my bracelet from me!”
Mary Povah turned stone, snowy white.
“Lorraine!” Kathleen cried, but Lorraine was in rare form.
“This bracelet was a gift! It’s a token of affection! Given to me by the man who loves me--”
“Not my son!” Mary interjected and Lorraine cackled,
“You got that right, Sister! Marlon Jackson gave this to me, and I’m not giving it away. I don’t care if you’re the one starving to death, Mrs. Po-vah!”
Mary’s eyes bugged and popped and her thin lips curled in a sneer as she pointed a gnarled finger at Lorraine.
“Heresy! Insolence! Greed!”
Gasps shook the rafters and those big, beady eyes focused on Lorraine.
“Just because you’re jealous of me for having nice things and a man who can give them to me, is no reason to try to pull it out from under me. You’re not my Mama, Mrs. Povah! My Mama died on April 30, 1918! If you want my bracelet, you’ll have to pry it from my cold, dead, blue body! Because I am not giving it away!”
“Oh! Oooooh!” Mary growled and her sleeves were being rolled up.
Kathleen, losing control of her very house, didn’t know whom to address. Her lifelong friend, or her niece.
Vylette began bracing for a brawl to break out.
Lorraine had wanted for years to tell Mary Povah just what she thought of her--with little clenched fists of fury.
“No one is giving anything away.”
At the sound of a deeper, testosterone-ridden voice, heads and bodies flew around.
Mouths opened, wind exhaled and someone belched.
Standing just inside the living room, were Marlon and Michael Jackson.
There was a long moment of silence, where eyes, one set dark, smoky brown, the other a fierce, bright amber, swept the room, taking in the faces of all those in attendance.
And all those in attendance took in the faces of the Jacksons.
Michael in his exquisite black suit over a white shirt and black tie, in a Windsor knot. The jacket was open under which he wore what appeared to be a nubby leather vest, closed with gold buttons. At his waist a golden watch chain was draped and several enameled, brightly-colored crowns hung. On his chest a larger, gold, sunburst crest pin was attached.
Slightly behind him, Marlon was a bit more relaxed in a light brown, closed, jacket with grey trousers over a white shirt and striped tie.
Just above his right eyebrow, Marlon wore a small bandage, where Lorraine had molly-whopped him good.
Fedoras were off in hands in respect of the women.
“Michael…” Kathleen was putting her hands out at him. “This is the Ladies Christian League meeting! The Ladies!”
“We can see that…” Marlon smiled and boldly took a seat in the rear of the gathering.
“Men--at a League meeting!” Mary was unwilling to back down at any cost.
“Yes Ma’am, I am a man.” Michael nodded and Vylette had to hide her smile.
“And just why are you here?” Mary demanded and Kathleen was growing flustered.
“Why…hmmm….” Michael hummed, hands in his pockets and casually made his way over to her.
“Why…well, it could be because my girlfriend and my brother’s girlfriend are the hostesses, along with the lovely Mrs. Meraux, Mrs. Povah.”
Mary Povah seemed shaken that Michael knew who she was by name.
“Or…it could be that after investing halfway with my brother for this event tonight, I’d like to see how it turned out…”
Whispers shook the room at the confirmation that all had been paid for by the Jacksons.
A hand came up and Michael stroked at his chin.
“Or…it could be that as far as I know, I’ve always been considered a guest in this house, with as much right to be here as you, Ma’am.”
“You’re incorrigible!” Mary groaned and started to turn from him.
“And you’re a sore loser, Mrs. Povah.” Michael stately flatly and she turned green. “You hate us because Lorraine favors my brother over your son. And that’s sad, because I’ve seen Ulrich, he’s a nice guy. I like him. He’s never been mean-spirited to me. And he’s been gracious in this entire situation. You can’t force a girl to be with someone she doesn’t want. That’s barbaric.”
“Kathleen, you’re going to allow him to speak to me in such a fashion?” Mary Povah grimaced and Michael put up a hand.
“My intent is not to be flippant, nor is it to disrespect anyone. I was raised better than that--”
“Oh, ho, one of the Mighty Dauphines!” Mary shook her head and Vylette was worried as there was a look of murder in Michael’s eyes at the mention of his mother’s family.
Somehow, Lorraine had gotten into the seat beside Marlon Jackson and was patting after him as he was clearly fuming.
Vylette didn’t think Marlon would slap a woman…
“Yes Ma’am, one of the Dauphines. And one of the things my mother and father taught me was about charity and how it’s a Godly thing to help others who don’t have, when you do have--”
“We want none of your charity!” Mary announced and several women muttered otherwise.
That was cutting off their foot right there!!!
“Mary, you’re out your head!”
“Think of the poor children!”
“They need food, Mary!”
“Don’t be cruel!”
Mary was undaunted and continued to try to stick barbs at Michael.
“You walking in here with your fancy suits and throwing around all these extras and is that a leather vest, Boy?”
“It’s African ostrich, Mrs. Povah…” Michael’s eyes narrowed. “And I am a twenty-five-year-old man. Not a boy.”
Michael smoothed his vest.
“But I’m not here tonight to hold a conversation with you.”
With that, he slipped around Mary, leaving her glaring at air.
Michael was approaching Kathleen.
“Mrs. Meraux…several times, your daughter, Vylette has made mention of the soup kitchen failing due to lack of funds, is that correct?”
“Yes…yes, Michael…” Kathleen’s hazel eyes widened.
“As I came in, I heard you say it would take about forty dollars a month to feed those people, correct?”
“Yes.”
“So, that’s close to…oh, five hundred dollars in a year, give or take?” Michael stated and Vylette had to grip onto the edge of the table.
“Yes, it is--”Kathleen stared at him questioningly.
Out of his jacket pocket, Michael produced a slip of folded paper, and handed it to Vylette’s mother.
“What’s that?”
“What’s he given her?”
“Kathleen?”
Some shushed others, as Kathleen unfolded the paper.
And her eyes grew to epic proportions.
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph!” Kathleen gasped and made the sign of the cross on herself.
“A thousand dollars! Michael and Marlon Jackson have each donated a thousand dollars to the soup kitchen!”
“A thousand dollars, each?”
“Two thousand dollars?”
“What did you say, Mrs. Meraux!”
“Good Lord, we can run the kitchen for four whole YEARS!”
“God is good!”
“The kitchen is saved!”
“Amen!”
“Hallelujah, Praise God!”
“Quickly! Someone go fetch Father Lachey and the Sisters! Hurry!”
Mary Povah was shakily having a row of seats, as women and girls leapt to their feet rushing to shake hands with and kiss at the cheeks of the two Jackson men.
It didn’t help Mary that her daughters, Hildegard and Hannah were amidst the throng.
Tears of joy were in Vylette’s eyes as she stumbled to Michael and hugged him around his waist.
Marlon was holding Vinnie up as Lorraine held onto his arm, her bosom poked out by a mile. Even Hildegard was hugging Marlon at his waist.
“Michael, this is the kindest, sweetest, most thoughtful thing I’ve ever seen anyone do!” Vylette gushed merrily into his ear as his lips pressed her cheek.
“I wanted to do it. When you told me about the starving children in the Bottoms, I made up my mind to do this…” Michael grinned.
“Oh I love you to bits and pieces…” Vylette started and stopped when she noticed a piece of folded paper being held out to her.
“Read it…” Michael instructed and obediently, Vylette opened it, revealing a note in his chicken scratch. 

“Oh…oh Michael…”Vylette stammered a hard flush taking her cheeks. Thick lashes fluttering, she focused her eyes up on him, and slipped her hand into his.
She was starting to feel like a brand-new, born-over person!
Leaning upwards she spoke into his ear as people continued to clamor around them rejoicing.
“I don’t want to walk. You have that big car. You want me, you come and get me.”
Teeth showed whitely and Michael’s thin brows bounced.
“That can be arranged Violette Blanche…that can be arranged…”