She stood there in the kitchen door and looked for a place on the counter to put down her armload of groceries. “Mama, what on Earth are you a doin’?”
“What does it look like, Vista Kay? I’m bakin’ some apple pies.”
“Are ya feedin’ an army?” She asked as she finally found a place to plop the pokes.
“Law no, but the boys is comin’ over ta watch “Primeval” with me, so I thought we’d have some pie an’ ice cream.”
“That’s real sweet Mama, but ‘xactly how many boys is comin’ over?”
“Just Brod, Ronnie and Jeff.” She rubbed White Lily on her wooden rolling pin and went to precisely flattening the dough. “I tol’ them boys they needed to be out a cattin’ aroun’, but they insist on one night a week with their Maw Maw.” She put the rolling pin aside and smiled at her daughter. “Who’da thought I’d be the pop’lar gal all the boys wants spend Saturday night with?”
Vista opened the pantry and started putting cans of soup away. “Are ya gonna be finished in time fer me ta start dinner?”
“Oh, honey, I already gots a chicken casserole in the ice box ready for the oven. That little Melanie and Brady was a sittin’ around eatin’ one Maggie made on m’story this week an’ I got a hankerin’. I tried ta find Maggie on Twitter ta tell her ta add a brick a cream cheese, but I cain’t find her.”
“You’ve really gotten into ta this Twitter thang, ain’t cha?” Vista opened the fridge and put some veggies from her bags in the crisper.
“Oh, I jus’ love it. Gives an ol’ lady sumpin ta do.” Maw Maw picked up her pie crust and gently laid it in one of the pie pans she’d bought when she was Vista’s age.
Suddenly the kitchen was filled with music. Vista looked up from her grocery bags. “Is that cello music?”
Maw Maw held up her finger. “Torchwood Theme…hold that thought, honey pot.” She pulled her I-Phone out of her apron pocket. She expertly pressed a few buttons and smiled. “Ronnie’s gonna bring Modene. Did you get some Sun Drop?”
“Yes…”
“Good.” Maw Maw smiled and typed a message and hit send. “Cain’t understand why Ronnie and Modene love that Sun Drop. Tastes like dirty water a lemon peed in ta me.” She dropped her phone back in her pocket, washed her hands and went back to work on her pies.
Vista balled up the grocery bags and stuffed them into the recycle holder her Aunt Faye made out of an old umbrella cover and some safety pins. She walked past the oven to preheat it for the casserole. “Have you already got pies in the oven?”
“Uh huh.” Maw Maw sprinkled more White Lily on the counter and plopped another mound of dough on it. “Got four a coolin' in the mud room, four in the oven and getting ready ta fill the last four.”
“Twelve pies?” Vista put her hands on her hips. “Just how many tape worms do the boys have?”
Maw Maw giggled. “Vista Kay they ain’t all fer me an’ the boys. I’m sendin’ ten of em as gifts to m’friends.”
“What friends?” Vista opened the door to the mudroom and sure enough, there were four golden brown apple pies on the baker’s rack.
“Well, James Scott had a birthday las’week. Now he ain’t got no Twitter account so I couldn’t wish ‘im happy birthday, but that Nicole girl, what’s her name agin? Sumpin Zucker, anyway she Tweeted a picture of a birthday cake someone sent ‘im so I thought…”
The woman held up her hands. “Stop right there, Mama! Are we a talkin’ about that soap opera agin?”
“No.” Her mother looked up from her last pie crust and rubbed the flour off her nose.
“Ain’t James Scott that actor?”
“Yess’m. He plays E.J.”
“Then we are talkin’ about your story.”
“No, we’re talkin’ about James Scott. The actor who plays Elvis, Jr. on m’story. They’s a difference a tween real and not real, Vista honey.”
“No kiddin’.”
“Anyway…” Maw Maw went back to her pie. “I thought I’d send him one a m’apple pies as a late birthday gift. Then a course that little Ali Sweeney hurt her knee. She’s still a waitin’ on the MRI, so I thought I’d send her one. Then I thought well, I’ll just make enough for whoever’s a workin' the day they come.”
“So you’re gonna send twelve apple pies to Salem?”
Maw Maw shook her head. "Jus' ten of 'em. The other two's fer tanight. We gots ta have some sugar wif our monsters."
“Mama, Salem don’t exist!”
“Yes it does!” Maw Maw whipped around and stabbed her flour covered rolling pin at her daughter. “It’s a set at the studio. I’m a havin’ m’pies UPSed to the set with a little thank ye note, and I sorry I fergot yer birthday card fer Mr. Scott.”
“Mama, I’m beginning ta worry about you.”
“P’shaw honey. I know them people don’t read most a m’Tweets, but it makes me happy. An’ if someone from Ca-nay-de-a kin have a choc’late cake sent to E.J. fer his birthday, then UPS can fer dern sure cart ten pies to ‘em.”
“Fine, Mama.” Her head turned when the chicken timer started squawking. “Does’at mean yer pies are comin’ out of the oven?”
“Yup an’ leave the oven on. I jus needs ta put the finishin’ touches on this’n and the last batch’ll go right in. Do ya wanna sign Jimmy Scott’s birthday card?”
Vista smiled as she stuck her hands in the oven mitts shaped like cows and opened the door. “No thanks, Mama.”
“It’s real funny. On the front it’s got Lazarus a tellin’ somebody ‘I was dead! I tell ya, I was dead!” an’ on the inside it says ‘My excuse fer missin’ birthday isn’t as good’. Ain’t that darlin’?”
“Real cute, Mama.” She carried one of the pies into the mud room.
“I thought ‘bout scratchin’ Lazarus’ name out an’ writin in Stefano, but I thought that a might sac-religious.”
Maw Maw carefully laid the top crust on her pie and began to pinch the edges. The Torchwood theme played again. She reached in her pocket and looked at the screen. “Hey, Luller, what’cha doin’?”
“I need your hep’ somethin’ awful, Ruby.” She heard her day. “Am I a botherin ya?”
“I’m jus’ finishin’ up makin’ some pies for E.J.’s birthday.”
“Is it his birthday?”
“Las’ week.” She shifted the phone to her other ear and wiped her hands on her apron. “You want I should put yer name on the card, too?”
“Would you? That’d be so sweet.”
“Sure, honey, now what can I do fer ya?”
“I’m a tryin’ ta make yer Monkey Bread fer m’ gran’babies. I got ever thing, but I forgot how ta put it ta-gether.”
“No prob, Luller. I’ll walk ya through it. Now what have ya got?”
“Well, I got two cans a buttermilk biscuits…”
“Have ya preheated yer oven to what the directions says?”
“Ya huh and a melted a whole stick a butter.”
“Did ya mix tagether a cup a sugar an a tablespoon a cinnamon?”
“In the bowl, now what?”
“Hold yer horses, Luller. Ya gots yer bunt pan all greased?”
“A course I got m’bunt pan greased, ya think I jus’ come from a two fer one sale on stupid?”
Maw Maw laughed. “No, honey, but if ya ain’t got that bunt pan greased real well yer Monkey bread’s a gonna stick ‘n’ burn.”
“Taken care of.”
“Okay, Luller, the rest is simple. Jest cut them biscuits each in half then half agin, roll em into balls an roll ‘em in that sugar mixture.”
“That’s it?”
“Uh huh. Drop 'em in the bunt pan onest ya gots ‘em rolled. When ya got one can a biscuits dropped in, pour half that butter over ‘em, then sprinkle half yer remainin’ sugar mix then repeat.”
“See I knowed it was easy. I was jest sure it was harder’n that.”
“Now, if’n ya want afore ya do the other can a biscuits you kin sprinkle a handful a nuts er choclate chips er raisins, what ever blows yer skirt up. Just do it again when ya git that other can a biscuits done.”
“Then I bake it fer whatever the directions on the can calls for plus fifteen right?”
“Plus ten, but if the top ain’t brown leave it a while longer. An don’t ferget when ya take it outta the oven, flip it right outta the pan. Don’ let it cool er you’ll never get that mess out!"
“Got’cha. Hey, you watched the story yet?”
“Course, once yestady and once on Hulu this morning. I been bawlin’ my eyes out all day.”
“It’s jus sa sad.” Luller moaned. “I cain’t believe they’s pokin’ both a little Johnny’s eyes out.”
“Law, you don’t think they’d make that little boy blind do ya?” Maw Maw fretted.
“They gots ta do something to redeem E.J. and Sami.”
“Well, Sami ain’t got nothin’ to be forgiven fer as far as I’m concerned.”
“But she shot E.J. in the head, Ruby!”
“Law, the way that man has treated her, the only thang she did wrong was put a bullet in the wrong head!”
Luller giggled. “I swan, Ruby Acres, you is a mess. Now do ya thank Dr. Dan and that Chloe’ll get back tagether?”
“I gots to admit, I do feel sorry fer Chloe, but she’s just one split end away from Crazyville, an’ poor ol’ Doctor Dan. With all the yer the daddy yer not the daddy biz'ness Carly and Chloe has put him threwed, if I was him I’d join Vivian a daydreamin’ about skinny dippin with Brady.”
“The womens in Salem just don’t know how ta treat a man, do they?”
“Luller honey, I gots to crimp m’pies now. Me ‘n’ the boys er a watchin’ “Primeval” tonight if ya wants ta come over.”
“No honey, but I'm sa glad God give us poor folk BBCAmerica."
"Ain't it the truth." Maw Maw agreed.
"But lets me know when season three a “Being Human” starts, the good one." She remembered, then added, "I loves me some Russell Tovey.”
“Luller, ya know he’s one a them gay boys.” Maw Maw reminded her.
“I know, but it don’t matter whar ya git yer appetite as long as ya eats at home.”
Maw Maw laughed. “Law, ain’t it the truth, Luller. Hope the gran babies like the Monkey Bread.”
She hit end on her phone and slipped it back in her pocket. She picked up a bread knife and made five perfect slits in the top crust of her last pie, then inspected her work.
Vista breezed in from the mudroom. “Mama, one a these days yer gonna hafta teach me yer secret to crimpin’ a pie crust. They is always the purdiest I ever seed.”
“Honey, it’s a secret handed down from each generation a women in are fam’ly. When I pass on, I left a letter fer both you ‘n’ yer sister ‘xactly how ta do it.”
“But Mama…”
“Honey, ya waited all this time, another thirty forty years ain’t gonna hurt’cha none.”
“Fine. Get them pies in the oven. Brod’ll be home from work soon; an I wanna have dinner on the table. He likes aspar’gus with chicken. Has we gots any in the freezer?”
“Should be. You run out ta the Spring house an’ check an’ I’ll crimp these last pies an’ gets ‘em ta bakin’.”
“Ya won’t let me stay ‘n watch?”
“No honey. I wants ta be buried in m' Save Mark Hapka tee shirt, so my secret is all a gots ta pass on to ya when I die, other wise I cain’t leave ya nothin’ but m’bills.”
“Okay, Mama.” Vista grabbed her jacket and kissed her mother on the check. “It’s cold out thar. I keep a wonderin’ when Johnson County, Tennessee slid all the way to Montana.”
“Still gots four more pebbles in m’jar. Winter aint’ ova yet.” Maw Maw nodded to the Mason jar on the windowsill.
“Well, if I don’ come back in five minutes come lookin’ fer m’body at Spring thaw.” Vista pushed out the kitchen door into the snowy winter chill.
Maw Maw nonchalantly looked out the window to make sure she saw her daughter had passed. As soon as she was sure she wouldn’t return suddenly, the old woman pulled closer the last pie to be finished. “Ain’t even lettin’ m’daughter has a chance a winning the blue ribbon at the county fair ‘stead a me…”
She looked out the window one more time. Satisfied Vista wouldn’t return, she pulled out her false teeth and used them to perfectly crimp the crusts of her pies.
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