The Hot Flash Club Strikes Again Read Free

restaurants. We don’t believe in supporting the gluttonous American consumer economy.”
    Polly had cleared her throat and asked, meekly, in that case, could she invite Amy and her family to her house for a birthday celebration for David?
    Yes, Amy had said, that would be nice. As long as Polly understood they would eat only organic foods and no sugar.
    Polly had looked at her son, who had been born with a sweet tooth as fierce as her own. David had smiled back serenely.
    “I know!” Polly had offered without a hint of desperation. “Could I treat you two to a weekend on the Maine coast?”
    Amy had wrinkled her forehead in gentle alarm, as if Polly had proposed sending them to a nudist colony. “Why would we want to go to Maine when we have so much beauty around us?”
    David had always loved the ocean, finding physical and spiritual energy in its blue tumbling and surge. But now David sat so quietly, Polly privately wondered whether Amy had cut out his tongue.
    “Okay, David,” she asked in lighthearted tones, “what
would
you like for a birthday present?”
    “We need a new tractor for the farm,” David told her, quickly adding, “I don’t mean you should pay for the entire thing, but perhaps you could give us whatever money you were thinking of spending on my birthday and we could add it to our savings toward the tractor?”
    A tractor? Her son had a degree in economics and he wanted a tractor? He hadn’t even played with tractors as a child. Was he brainwashed? Polly wondered. Had he joined a cult?
    Whatever had happened, he seemed happy, so she thought of Claudia and kept her mouth shut.
    ——————————
    David and Amy were married on a sunny July day on the Anderson farm. David wore clean but grass-stained chinos and a peasant shirt embroidered by Amy. Amy wore a see-through natural-hemp garment, through which her breasts and belly showed in all their pregnant glory. Tucker’s mother, David’s step-grandmother Claudia, was invited, and Polly, squeezing between the Scylla of Claudia’s bitter formality and the Charybdis of Amy’s organic purity, offered to drive Claudia out to the farm. Claudia accepted and wore a suit and high heels, even though Polly had cautioned her that the wedding would be outside. David and Amy walked hand in hand to stand in front of the minister—a sight that brought tears to Polly’s eyes—they looked so beautiful, so innocent, like Adam and Eve at the beginning of the world! Beside her, Claudia stiffened. The moment the ceremony was over, Claudia turned toward Polly.
    “You didn’t tell me the girl was pregnant. Nor that she’s an exhibitionist.”
    Several people standing near them cast startled looks at Claudia.
    “Oh, Claudia,” Polly began soothingly.
    “I’ll wait for you in the car,” Claudia said, and stalked away.
    Let her wait, Polly thought rebelliously. She followed the party to the reception table set out in the barnyard, toasted the newlyweds with a glass of mouth-puckering homemade Anderson raspberry wine, kissed the bride and groom, and hugged Katrina and Buck Anderson. Standing alone, she surveyed the crowd, realizing only now how few of David’s old chums were present. Had they not been invited? Her opinion about the wedding had not been requested, so she’d not offered, but now she felt even more strongly that her son had been indoctrinated into a strange sect.
    She smiled at everyone, then, claiming that Claudia, who was in her eighties after all, didn’t feel well, took her leave, feeling, as she walked away from the crowd, like an outcast.
    She drove Claudia back to her home in the charming, Waspy suburb of Dover, listening in resignation as Claudia criticized the wedding and each of its participants. Polly was too tired and depressed to argue.
    Finally they reached Claudia’s enormous old house on Madison Street.
    “Thank you for coming,” Polly said to Claudia. “I know David was glad you were there.”
    “I doubt that