“The Fet ain’t where it’s at without Crawfish Crozat,” Artie said, adding a few beat box sounds for effect.
“Hah, look who’s a rapper.” Cal slapped his partner on the back. “We gotta give you a rapper name now.”
“His name is Artie so . . . how about R2DCool?” Maggie offered, happy to do anything, however inane, that would keep the cops on the Crozats’ good side. Cal and Artie both loudly approved the new moniker, and the atmosphere became close to pleasant.
“We gotta work a double shift tonight, Mrs. C.,” Artie told Ninette, “so if you could save us a couple’a bowls, that’d be great.”
“We’ll save you your own pot of it,” Tug assured the officers, who then headed back to the main house to complete their investigation. The Crozats got to work chopping, sautéing, and boiling. Gran’ wandered in, fresh from a nap, and Tug filled her in on what had happened. Gran’ turned to Maggie.
“You know what you have to do, Magnolia Marie.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Maggie slunk into the parlor, sat down at the rococo desk, and opened an elegant gray box. Inside lay note cards, 100 percent cotton and embossed with a monogram of her initials. The Brooklyn hipster in her bowed to the Southern manners ingrained since birth—which, she thought, may have been when Gran’ first gifted her with genteel personalized stationery. Civilization may have been two decades into a new millennium, but among Southern Louisiana gentry, a behavioral cow patty like the one she had just dropped still required a written note of apology. “All I’m missing is a quill pen,” Maggie muttered, annoyed that she felt obliged to follow social protocol. But she did, so she hunted around the desk, dug up a pen that sported the logo from Gout’s Beef Palace, and started writing a note to Bo Durand.
It began as a simple apology for her angry eruption. But for some reason Maggie couldn’t explain, she kept writing. She admitted that it wouldn’t be fair to blame her blow-up on the fallout from the Clabbers’ deaths. Her frustration had been building since her return to Pelican six months ago. She filled the inside of the card as she tried to explain how alien she often felt in her own hometown—only matched by how alien she’d sometimes felt in New York City, where her friends would respond with patronizing amusement whenever the Southerner in her slipped out.
Maggie turned the card over and continued on the back. She wrote about the heartbreak that still haunted her. She had given her longtime love, Chris, space to decide whether he was ready for marriage. He was—but not to her. After six years with Maggie, Chris met and married another woman within six months, and the couple now shared the home and business that he and Maggie had created together.
She then wrote about her fear that she would never achieve her dream of creating exceptional, evocative art—and if she didn’t do that, what was her future? Who would she be? She shared her worry that the strain of a murder investigation would cause her mother’s cancer to return. And finally, she revealed her deepest shame: there was a part of her that dreaded the possible loss of Ninette beyond the grief it would bring. Maggie knew that if her mother died, she would step into Ninette’s place as Crozat’s chatelaine, trading her own dreams for her parents’ because she loved them so dearly.
She signed her name in the only tiny blank space left on the card and then placed it in an envelope and addressed it to Bo. She thought for a moment and put the card next to a pile of books on the desk, knowing in her heart that it was something that you write but never send. Then she checked her phone. It was time to get ready for Fet Let. She’d reread the card later that night for her own catharsis and then tear it up and write the simple note to Bo that she intended to write in the first place.
*
The streets around Pelican’s town green were closed to traffic for the evening, so the Crozats parked behind Fais Dough Dough and shuttled tables and supplies to their spot next to Lia’s in front of her shops. The Butlers and the Georgia boys pitched in to help. All of Crozat’s guests were excited to be part of the town’s festival. It was a welcome distraction from the deaths of Crozat’s elderly duo. “I’m really starting to feel at home in Pelican,” Emily told Maggie as the two transported a large table to the Crozats’ site. “Who knows, Shane and I may never leave.”
Maggie smiled. “That would be nice. I could use some new friends. Most of the ones I went to high school with are married and going on their second or even third kid, so they don’t have much time to get together. Or much interest, to be honest.”
“Ugh.” Emily made a face. “Can you imagine being around thirty and already having three kids? It seems so old-timey.”
“I know. But there’s a part of me that envies them. I wish I could want that. I mean, I know I want it someday, but I wish I wanted it now. I feel like it would make my life so much simpler.”
“That’s funny, thinking having kids would make your life simpler,” Emily said. “My parents always said that their lives were so much easier before I came along.” Emily tried to make this sound like a joke but couldn’t hide the hurt underneath.
Maggie felt for her. “What a crappy thing for parents to say. I’m sorry.” She hugged Emily, who brightened.
“I’m going to look for Shane. If you need us, text me.”
“Will do.”
Emily went to find her husband, and Maggie focused on setting up her family’s table. She waved to Lia and Kyle, who were bringing out baked goods and candies from Bon Bon and Fais Dough Dough for Lia’s Fet Let booth. Kyle waved back and Lia blew her a kiss. Maggie was happy to see Lia’s playful side reemerge after a long period of mourning.
An hour later, Fet Let was in full swing. Bunting in green, gold, and purple decorated the lacy iron balconies of Pelican’s historic town center. A Cajun band followed a Zydeco group on the bandstand, and revelers two-stepped to the classic tunes. But traffic at the Crozat stand was surprisingly light. The band took a break and the dancers dispersed. Yet for the first time in the history of Ninette’s Crawfish Crozat, no long line of hungry patrons formed. A few out-of-towners browsed but didn’t buy. It was as if some kind of subliminal message had gone out to all Fet attendees. Maggie had heard actor and comedian friends in New York talk about “flop sweat,” the panic they felt when an audience wasn’t responding to their material. She was beginning to know how it felt. She smiled and tried making eye contact with some festivalgoers, friends and neighbors she’d known for years, but they looked away. She was horrified to realize that they were actively avoiding her.
The one person she had no interest in seeing, Rufus Durand, finished planting a sloppy kiss on girlfriend Vanessa and then wandered over to the Crozat table. His belly strained the buttons of the shirt he wore to the Fet every year, a purple polyester button-down with a pattern of yellow cocktail shakers.
“Hey there, Crozats.”
Ninette and Tug greeted Rufus politely, but Maggie chose to pass on the pleasantries. “Any updates for us, Ru? Did you get anything useful off the poison box, like prints or something?”
“I wish I had some news, but I’m afraid I don’t. These complex investigations take time, sorry to say.”
Maggie wanted to yell at Rufus that she knew he was dragging his feet because the sooner the case was solved, the sooner the Crozats’ lives could get back to normal, and that’s the last thing he wanted. He was having way too much fun watching the family twist in the humid Louisiana wind. Instead, she dished out a bowl of crawfish and offered it to Ru with a smile. “Here you go. On the house.”
“That’s real generous,” Rufus said, “but I’ll pass. I know y’all are up to code and real thorough about everything. But still . . . we did find a box of poison in your kitchen today.”