It was late Saturday afternoon. Edna’s house phone started ringing. She checked the caller ID and read the display indicating that Cassandra Nix was calling. Cassandra was a lifelong friend of Edna’s and the mayor of Conway Corners. Actually, “friend” may not be the right word. They had known each other since they were girls, but sometimes it seemed to Cassandra that Edna often just used her, but it had been going on for years. When they were teenagers, Edna had given her the job of going out with Edna’s potential boyfriends to try them out and report back to her and it seemed that she had been serving Edna’s interests in one way or another since.
Edna let the phone ring a few more times. She always did when Cassandra called, thinking it a subtle way to remind the mayor who was the dominant in the relationship.
She picked up the phone, saying “What’s up, Cass?” letting the mayor know that she had known whom she had kept waiting.
Cassandra had just returned from a visit to
Jacob Scullworth was the city manager.
“We’ve kept him up on the things that the city government has a role in,” Edna answered. “Gordon went down himself to get the permit for the park. But this is a business and civic thing, not a government thing. The court even said that local government is a non-entity in this thing. And somewhere in your stack of paperwork and electronics there you should have both hard and electronic copies of an invitation to the barbecue here Monday night. You and that significant other of yours are certainly welcome to come over and get whatever the latest dirt is then.”
“You know that I don’t have a significant other. Byron is just somebody I see and you know I see him a lot, but he’s our fire chief and the mayor cannot be seeing him or be seen seeing him.”
Edna was certain that the real reason that Cassandra did not show Byron off as her main man was because he was black and the idea of a black fire chief was still somewhat controversial. Cassandra had not been involved when the choice was to break tradition and hire an out-of-town person to be the city’s first full-time, paid fire chief five years earlier. That move still offended many of the all white, mostly volunteer department. Cassandra also wondered how Edna learned so much about so many people’s personal business.
“Well, you can do what you want with him,” she told the mayor. “I do expect to see you here. You’ll want to get the inside stuff.”
“I’m still checking up on what I can manage” the mayor answered. “I’ll be back to you.” She hung up before Edna could hang up on her.
Edna sat back and smiled. She knew that Cassandra would be at the barbecue on Monday and at the picnic on Thursday, and probably would take her clothes off then despite her present protests.
