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since I was a young’un growin’ up in Alabama. But gwine is my favorite.
    Now tell me, was he worth it?”
    I nodded. “He was. He’s got a good head on him, if you know what I mean.”
    Rhoda gave me a look of envy. “He sounds like my kind of man,”
    she squealed. “Are you, uh, gwine to see him again?”
    I shrugged and giggled for a few seconds. “I don’t know what I’m gwine to do,” I replied. “It depends on a few things.”
    “Annette, if you don’t want to talk about this, just say so.”
    I shuddered and let out a loud sigh. “Rhoda, he made me feel like a teenager again. He made me feel like a beauty queen. He . . .
    he was like dope. And I couldn’t get enough. . . .” I turned to Rhoda, with a concerned look on my face. “This scares the hell out of me,” I admitted. “How have you managed to do your thing with Bully for all these years and not lose your mind?”
    “Let me put it this way. Had I not started my affair with Bully, I would have lost my mind a long time ago.” Rhoda started the motor again and eased out into the street, looking straight ahead. “And by the way, we won the tournament tonight.”
    “Excuse me?”
    “Girl, you joined my bowlin’ team so you could have a cloak to cover this thing you started with Louis. Now if you don’t get your shit together, you will never be able to pull this off. I am your alibi for tonight, and any other night or day that you want to hook up with your baby boy.”
    I cringed. The reference she’d made to Louis was true but disturbing. It was a painful reminder that there was a very wide gap between our ages. “Don’t call him that,” I pleaded. “That makes me feel like one of those aging celebrities known for fooling around with youngsters.”
    “Well, he is a little on the youthful side, Cher,” Rhoda teased.
    “I can see that, so you don’t have to remind me,” I snarled. “His GOD AIN’ T BLIND
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    age was the one thing that made me hold off this long. I had to tell him to stop saying ‘Yes, ma’am’ to me, because it made me feel my age.” I gave Rhoda a guarded look. From the blank expression on her face, I got the feeling that she didn’t know what to say next. I decided to steer the conversation in a less painful direction. “Now, going back to that countrified thing, he says ‘nome’ for no, ma’am. ”
    “Nome? Now you are goin’ real far up into the backwoods, Andy Griffith–Beverly Hillbillies country with that one,” Rhoda howled.
    “He dozed off for a few minutes and snored so loud, the manager called from the office and said that the people in the rooms on both sides of us had called to complain.” We both laughed, cackling like hens.
    “That’s hysterical, but let’s get back to his age. He’s at least as young as twenty-five, if he’s a day.”
    “He’s thirty,” I said, nodding. “Had you and I not aborted my first child, he or she would be thirty. The truth is, I’m old enough . . .
    I . . . I’m old enough to be Louis’s mother.”
    “Uh-huh. That’s a fact. But if it doesn’t bother him, it shouldn’t bother you. And I meant what I just said. If you don’t want to talk about him, I understand.”
    “No, maybe we should talk about him. If I had known I was going to live this long, I would have prepared myself better for, uh, certain things. Like losing my appeal to my husband. I was beginning to think that the fun part of my life was over. But I’m not ready for a rocking chair,” I declared.
    “If you think that forty-six is old, the fun part of your life is over.
    I’m a few months older than you, and I sure as hell don’t think my fun is over. My kids are grown, my house is paid for, I’ve got my husband and my lover under control, and I look damn good for a woman my age. Girl, these are the best years of our lives. You’d better enjoy them while you still can. Life is shorter than you think.
    Do you want to stop off at that rib place and pick up a plate for Pee