Read Hope Springs - 05 - Wedding Cake for Free Online Page B

“This one mine?” she asked, pointing to the third glass of tea.
    Louise nodded. “Good afternoon, Bea,” she said. “Did you have a fight at the bank?” she asked.
    “Some fight,” Beatrice replied. “I told them to take my money out of their investment portfolio and give me a CD and a savings account. I’m tired of getting their loss statements every month.” She smiled as she glanced over at Jessie and Louise. “But enough of that, hello friends,” she said. “Did Jessie tell you about our wedding plans?”
    Louise looked surprised.
    “We hadn’t gotten to that,” Jessie responded. “There’s been some other wedding news to talk about first.” She glanced over to Louise, waiting for her to catch Beatrice up on the latest.
    “Well, that certainly piques my interest. What wedding news?” Louise asked.
    “Jessie and James are renewing their vows in May and we’re calling Charlotte to come back and perform the ceremony. It’s going to be in Jessie’s backyard. We’re going to have a nice reception with little finger foods, nothing over the top, but a little more dignified than chicken wings and potato chips, and a beautiful cake, of course. Casey Hampton is the photographer and his brother-in-law is making a video, which I guess now is really a DVD or some such as that. Sharon Newbright is handling the floral needs and Caroline Bender is going to sing a solo.”
    “Good heavens, Bea.” Jessie turned to look at her friend. “When on earth did you make all of those arrangements?” She shook her head in disbelief. “We only agreed to this thing a couple of days ago.”
    Beatrice drank a sip of her tea and pointed to the sugar packets. Louise slid the plastic holder over, and Beatrice pulled out three packets and poured them in her tea. “Why didn’t you order sweet tea?” she asked.
    Before either Jessie or Louise could answer that the tea was already sweetened, the waitress arrived with their lunches. She placed them in front of each of the women, calling out the order. When she got to Beatrice, she set the plate down on the table with the remark, “Diet plate,” and rolled her eyes. Beatrice smiled and looked at her order. “No French fries?” she asked the server, who simply turned her head and walked away.
    “What is with the attitude?” she asked her friends, who had already started to enjoy their food.
    “It’s supposed to be a diet plate,” Louise replied. “And you turned it into the Hearty Man’s Special.”
    Beatrice shrugged and reached for the salt and pepper. She seasoned her food and took her first bite.
    “Well, Jessie, that is fabulous news about you and James. That will be a lovely event. And Charlotte is coming back for it?” Louise asked.
    “I haven’t called her yet,” Beatrice explained.
    The other two women looked at her in disbelief.
    “You’ve arranged for a florist and a soloist and a photographer and you haven’t called Charlotte to make sure she can make that date?” Jessie asked.
    “And the videographer,” Beatrice added. “And no, I tried Charlotte a couple of times yesterday and didn’t reach her.” She wiped her mouth and took a sip of tea. “Maria says her boyfriend was married before and didn’t tell her.
No se puede confiar en los hombres.”
She shook her head. “Men are so untrustworthy,” she translated. “So, I don’t know what we are going to do about the police officer.”
    “What police officer?” Louise asked. She hadn’t heard any of the recent news about their young friend. “And I didn’t know you spoke Spanish.”
    “Sí,”
Beatrice responded with a grin.
    “Oh, Charlotte is dating a young man in the Gallup Police Department and Beatrice is all upset because she wanted her to fall in love with a North Carolina boy. She even set her up with the funeral director’s nephew.”
    “You set Charlotte up with Rollin Fair?” Louise asked. “Rolypoly Rollin?”
    “He has not been called that since he was a teenager,