Read Online The Secrets of Peaches by Jodi Lynn Anderson - Free Book Online Page A

hadn’t bothered telling her mom that. It would just stress her out, and maybe she didn’t need stress. Her mom hated the orchard. It was too unruly.
    â€œBut she could do anything. Go anywhere,” Murphy said, then cracked her gum again.
    Leeda looked at her mom, hoping she wouldn’t take Murphy’sbait. But Lucretia was on to another topic—the hotel the Cawley-Smiths owned.
    â€œYou know, Miller, I haven’t seen your wife in our spa in quite a while. Tell her to come in for her next treatment on us.” She looked at Murphy, whose crazy brown hair leapt out of her cheap wool hat like snakes in a trick can of nuts. Then she winked at Judge Abbott as if they were in on some private joke. “Murphy, you should come in for a cut before your interviews start.”
    Murphy squinted at Lucretia with exaggerated concern. “Do they do waxing? It looks like your mustache is growing back.” Lucretia’s face went icy, and she looked at Leeda. Leeda gave Murphy a look to lay off. Then her mom turned around and took another sip of her hot cider.
    A few minutes later, the crowd did the wave. When it got to them, Murphy reached over Leeda, took Lucretia’s hand, and lifted it. Leeda shot her a look, but she shrugged innocently. The next time the wave came around, Murphy did the same thing. Lucretia actually went along happily. The next wave, when Lucretia started waggling her arms in the air on her own, Leeda began to get uneasy.
    â€œYou spiked her cider, didn’t you?” Leeda muttered.
    Murphy just nodded and kept her eyes on the game.
    As the game crept into the third quarter, Leeda had to admit that her mom became a lot more fun. Murphy had convinced Lucretia that every time the ball went into the end zone, she should yell, “Poot!” Lucretia complied happily. She waggled her long, thin arms in the air and wiggled her hips, yelling, “Poot!” and then looked around like the class clown, hoping she’d gotten a rise out of someone.
    â€œLucretia,” Murphy said, like she was talking to a patient at a mental hospital. “At the end of the game, everybody’s gonna rush the field. Are you in?”
    â€œMurphy, she’s not a puppet,” Leeda hissed, trying not to laugh.
    â€œShe’s having fun.”
    â€œI’m having fun,” Lucretia purred, pulling Leeda’s arm out from under the coat again and holding it softly, friend-like. Leeda didn’t hold back, didn’t move her arm an inch. She let it rest there.
    â€œThat’s because Murphy spiked your cider, Mom,” she finally said.
    â€œOh, I know.” Lucretia opened her eyes for emphasis, then laughed, leaning in and across Leeda’s lap to look at Murphy. “Do I look like I was born yeeserday?”
    â€œOh God, she’s slurring,” Leeda said.
    â€œI’m not an alien .” Lucretia held up one finger toward the sky to indicate outer space. “I’m not all boring.” Her perfect chignon had gone slightly akimbo. A few tendrils snaked around her ears.
    â€œI thought you were,” Murphy said. “But you’re pretty funny.”
    Leeda, half amused, half nervous, tried to make more room between her mom and Murphy. Lucretia kept turning around to tell the people behind them that her daughter was the Pecan Queen and wasn’t she pretty. She said Leeda was going to Columbia next fall and a whole bunch of things she’d just made up, like that Leeda had been Little Miss Kings County and that she had been approached to be a model.
    At the end of the game, Lucretia linked her arm through Leeda’s as they walked to the car. To her left, Leeda heard a squeal and turned to see Murphy being swept up over Rex’s shoulder.
    â€œI’m taking this peanut with me,” he said to Leeda casually, his arm hooked gently around Murphy’s thighs, her upper half disappearing over his shoulder. “That okay? You