Free No Daughter of the South by Cynthia Webb Page A

pouring Crown and Coke over ice into highball glasses and putting them on a tray. I made myself a sandwich and got a beer out of the refrigerator, and took them both to the breakfast table. I like a drink or so now and then; occasionally I like a whole lot of them. But I haven’t overindulged on what you’d call a regular basis in a long time. No, I’d done that mistake up the way I like my mistakes: good and outrageous, and then put it behind me. Which is all to say that I no longer relied on alcohol as a part of my daily routine. But there’s something about being home that makes me keep reaching for the booze.
    I ate, and tried to figure out what my next move should be. One thing I knew for sure was that I was starting to drift. My so-called quest was starting to seem silly, even to me.
    I chewed my food, not tasting it, thinking hard. I had scratched Johnny Berry off my list, that was certain. I might as well try visiting Mr. Miller. He had lived in Port Mullet since way back, knew everybody who was anybody. He was on every important committee, his support was essential in every local election.
    Susan Miller had been my best friend from kindergarten to high school graduation. My parents had been happy about that, always hoping that one day her sweet normality would rub off on me. She was as wholesome and practical and law-abiding a girl as a family could wish. I personally had believed that she was the one who would profit from our association. I had hoped it would loosen her up. And for a while there it seemed to. She had been my companion on a couple of adventures that I remembered fondly. But in the end she had gotten in trouble and married Tom, one of the most insubstantial and boring of the football, sock-hop, and steady job types. What had really amazed me was not what happened to her. Getting knocked up could happen to anyone, I figured, and, once it did, a girl’s options were limited. No, what took me by surprise was that she had seemed really happy that it had happened. She had been glad that she was getting married, she had actually looked forward to being a mommy.
    Her father, Forrest Miller, was a tall, thin man. Faintly aristocratic-looking. I thought he was the only man in Port Mullet with any sense of style. He dressed elegantly. Around the house, he would wear a cashmere cardigan sweater over a beautiful shirt, instead of a t-shirt and a cap. You would never catch him in a recliner, wearing his undershirt and drinking from a can of beer. He would sit in his study and listen to music. I never knew any other person in Port Mullet, male or female, to sit absolutely still and listen to music. Outside of church, of course, where you didn’t have any choice. Mr. Miller had been demanding of his wife and daughter. Even then I saw that his insistence on standards in dress, behavior, and demeanor were a burden to Mrs. Miller, and to Susan. But he wanted life to be something beautiful, something more than the shoddy, tacky affair everyone else was content with. And I thought that a man who played such music would understand passion, and longing, and desire. All the things I had struggled with while my classmates had been tortured over which class would win the spirit trophy.
    How Susan felt about the way I worshiped her father was something I was never clear about. I didn’t want her to think I was friends with her just because of her father and her house. Still, I’m sure she couldn’t help noticing how much I envied what she had. The ballet lessons, the piano lessons, the charm school. Susan was more popular at school than I was. But I was the only friend she invited home regularly. I had never thought to wonder about the reasons for that.
    My own father was pretty important around town, too, in a different way. He was the football coach at Port Mullet High School. If you don’t know how important it was to the citizens of Port Mullet to have a winning football team every year, then you still don’t