Down Home and Deadly

One summer I went to camp with ‘Debbie’ in raised white letters on bright blue tape stuck on everything I owned.”
    Raised voices in the dining room interrupted our soft laughter.
    “Do they know yet?” Debbie whispered.
    I shrugged. “It sounds like maybe they do now.”
    With trepidation, I walked over to the door and peeked out. Marco was gone , and Carly stood facing Harvey and Alice, who had their backs to me.
    Carly saw me and motioned me to her. “Jenna, come tell them that you think the new name is great.”
    I looked over my shoulder at Debbie who shooed me out. “I’ll just be in here hanging wallpaper and minding my own business.”
    “Chicken,” I muttered. I walked over to the tense trio. “You have to admit that ‘ Down Home Diner ’ has a ring to it.”
    “What does ‘ Down Home ’ mean , anyway?” Alice asked, her nose crinkling like a skunk had suddenly crawled up under the diner and died.
    “You know what ‘ Down Home ’ means,” Harvey insisted. “Country and common.” He waved his hand to the porch. “That’s why that table’s out there, obviously. Checkers and dominoes are ‘ Down Home . ’ ”
    She narrowed her eyes at her husband. “Whose side are you on?”
    “You know I’m on your side. I always have been. I was just answering your question.”
    Alice took a couple of steps backward , and Harvey pulled a chair out for her to sit on.
    Seated, she looked up at Carly, her eyes swimming with tears. “We should have put in the contract that you couldn’t do that.” She grabbed a paper napkin from the table in front of her and wiped her nose. She motioned toward the small delicately lettered sign Carly had just finished and placed on the pie counter. “It’s crazy enough to be giving police officers in uniform a free piece of pie. But I’d never have thought of anyone changing the name of the diner.”
    Harvey ran his finger around the collar of his checked shirt. “Actually, remember when Mom and Pop first turned the diner over to us? You wanted to rename it Alice ’s Restaurant. But Mom had a fit.”
    For a second, Alice ’s face opened as if she were remembering a younger her—full of plans and hopes. But then she pinched her lips together and shrugged. “And rightly so. I was a silly kid who didn’t know what was what.”
    I glanced at Carly , wondering how she’d handle the inference. But her S outhern graciousness won out.
    “I’m sorry I hurt your feelings, Alice ,” she said softly. “But this is a fresh start for me. And the Down Home Diner is what I need.”
    My sister, the quintessential steel magnolia.
    Alice slumped. “Oh, it’s okay. You bought it. You should be able to call it whatever you want. I’m just an old fool.”
    Harvey sat down beside her and patted her hand. “This is a fresh start for us, too, Allie. Heaven knows we need one. And I think it’ll be easier for us to let go of the Down Home Diner than the Lake View Diner.”
    She nodded. “You might be right.”
    In unspoken agreement, we left them to their own conversation and walked out onto the front porch.
    Carly sat down at the small table that had started all of this and motioned me to sit across from her. She mussed her dark curls with her hand in a mannerism I recognized meant she had something on her mind.
    “What’s up?” I asked.
    She picked up a red checker and tapped it against the table absently. “Nothing really. Not yet , anyway.”
    “What does that mean? Is it about the diner? Or Elliott? ” Ever since I’d gotten engaged a few weeks ago, I’d been wondering about Carly and Elliott. Apparently that old adage about those in love wanting everyone to be in love was true.
    “You know Elliott and I are getting pretty serious.”
    I propped my elbows on the table and leaned toward her. “Yes?”
    She turned the checker up on its edge and rolled it from one hand to another across the wooden surface.
    “Carly! What’s going on?” Patience wasn’t my strong point. And she knew it.
    “I’m thinking about trying to find Travis,” she said in a rush.
    “Why?” I blurted out. Her ex-husband, Travis, had divorced her when she was pregnant with the twins and Zac was six. He’d run off with an emaciated model and eventually skipped the country to Mexico . We assumed he left the country to keep from paying child support. I’d loved my brother-in-law once, back before he betrayed our whole family and broke my sister’s heart. But going searching