“Well, not quite.” I walked over to the window and looked out through the trees and across the street to where a small brown-haired girl was standing on the porch of a small blue house. “Who’s that, Momma? Who’s that girl?”

Momma came and stood by my side. She put her hand on my shoulder. “That’s Irise Lane, honey. She’s just your age. She’s dying to meet you. Shall I call her over? Shall I invite her over?”

“No, wait until tomorrow. I’m really tired, Momma. I had to drive a long time to get here. Who’s in our old house in Franklin? Did someone buy it?”

“Daddy sold it to Val’s cousin Donald. Val said to tell you goodbye. He said you could keep on writing columns and send them to him in the mail if you wanted to.” I was still watching the girl on the porch of the blue house. A heavy boy in a loose white shirt and a pair of shorts came walking up the sidewalk and took her arm and the pair of them went into the house.

“Who’s that with her?”

“That’s Charles William Waters. He’s very artistic. He’s studying architecture at Georgia Tech. He’s Doctor Freer’s nephew. We really need to go see Doctor Freer tomorrow and do something about this weight. I don’t want you to be fat. You’ve never been fat.”

“You shouldn’t have sent me to that goddamn school without getting me some Kappa recs. It’s been terrible. It’s the worst thing that ever happened to me in my life.” My voice was rising. Daddy’s cousin James’s wife, Lelia, backed out into the hall. “I had to join that goddamn new Chi O chapter you and Aunt Lucille cooked up for me. It’s the worst thing that ever happened to me in my life. You didn’t even tell me about Dudley being kicked out of school for cheating. You let me go up there with that hanging over my head and you didn’t even tell me.” I turned on her then, so full of rage and incomprehension and despair, so glad to find a target for my wrath.

“Oh, darling, please don’t start anything. There are people in the house. Don’t come down here and make everyone’s life a hell. There’s a wonderful country club in town. Tomorrow we’ll go out and you can see the pool. So you can keep up with your swimming.”