“No,” Jody said. “I need food and maybe a good cold beer to settle me down. I just had a run-in with Quincy, and what should have been the end to the Jody-and-Lyle story wasn’t.” She told Paula the details of what had happened. “What is it about men? Just because they can settle something with three words, they can’t understand that womenfolk need to figure out things.”

“They’re from Mars, remember?” Paula told her in a flat tone.

“I think they’re from further out than that.” Jody filled her plate and took it to the table.

Fanny Lou opened the back door and stuck her head inside. “Where’s Mitzi?”

“Upstairs.” Paula pointed.

Fanny Lou set a covered dish on the table. “That’s seven-layer dip. I took it to my Sunday school committee meeting this evening. We had too much food, so it was barely touched.” She pulled up a chair and shook out half the bag of chips into a bowl. “I’m glad we’re here by ourselves. I’m worried about Mitzi.”

“Graham?” Paula asked.

Fanny Lou got three spoons from the drawer. “It’s better if you dip to the bottom and put it on the chip. And yes, about Graham. She’s so damned happy that I’m afraid when they have an argument—well, you know her. Things are black or white in her world. There is no gray.”

“It’s either rainbows and unicorn farts, or nothing,” Jody said. “She came from a pretty nice family, so she doesn’t know how to argue and then make up.”

“Exactly,” Fanny Lou said. “I guess she’s about to learn if this gets any more serious, because reality is being able to run the obstacle course that life throws at you and make it to the end without killing the person you’re in the relationship with.”

“I remember the first fight me and Lyle had after we moved in together. It was all over this old tomcat that came up to the back door. Lyle hated cats, but I couldn’t bear to see it hungry, so I fed it without telling him. Of course it kept showing up and meowing every night. He threatened to shoot it, and I said I’d shoot him if he did. It took us a week to reach a compromise. I could feed the cat, but it couldn’t come inside the house,” Jody grumbled.

“And the makeup sex?” Fanny Lou winked.

“I’d like to say it was horrible but it wasn’t. We were good together in the bedroom and I still get a stomachache when I think of him with the other woman,” Jody fumed.