CHAPTER 1: Do Not Disturb Cecilia Moffett

Unlike the others, Cecilia Moffett kept to herself. She didn’t enjoy the chatter and the games prevalent in town and made it clear with the “Do Not Disturb” sign that hung in a prominent place on her front door where the average citizen would hang a welcome wreath. Children didn’t come to Cecilia’s door at Halloween, even if the light was on. Cecilia wouldn’t come to the door anyway. She didn’t even leave her house when the town had the Perilous Disaster drill that included the entire town. It was such a huge event that it ultimately turned into a holiday and a parade.

The residents of Magnolia Junction have always loved a celebration, as witnessed by many a casual visitor. That’s exactly how Jeremiah Sothesby had made his home there. He was traveling through, on his way back to Boston, when he ran out of gas just this side of the county line. Desperate to find gas, he headed off in the direction of what smelled like barbeque pork. He found the gas, the Disaster Drill Festival, the best barbeque ribs he had ever eaten and a wife all in one adventure. But that’s another story.

Cecilia had the most beautiful flower garden in town. Actually, her whole yard was a flower garden. It had started off small, but Cecilia tended to be obsessive by nature, and the patch of ground that she had originally laid out for her flowers soon spread to include both the front and the back yard. Maude and Mary Grace were constantly complaining about the way the roses spilled onto the sidewalk and made it impossible to pass by without having to detour into the street. On one such occasion, Mary Grace almost got run over by Jimmy Franklin. Jimmy was on his bicycle throwing newspapers and trying to get them directly on Mr. Crawley’s front porch. He made the mistake of taking one last look backward and just about nailed Mary Grace. Maude screamed and it scared Mary Grace so badly that she fainted. (She had done that several times since she and Maude had returned from the treatment center in Valhollow.)

Maude and Mary Grace had never been quite the same since they had lost their husbands in the mill accident. Maude took to drinking, which wasn’t hard for her, since she was the talk of the town at every party. She hovered over the punch bowl and always seemed to be much happier at the end of the party than at the beginning. She danced better, too. When Frank passed away, she tabled (so to speak) the punch bowl, and went right for the Jack Daniels. No one was really surprised, but everyone was quite disturbed. She had taught half the town in Sunday School for the past 40 years and was a most unlikely drunk. But when Mary Grace lost her precious Arnold, she and Maude became the best of drinking buddies and soon decided that the best way to keep the secret was to live together in Maude’s two-story Victorian. There was plenty of room, and Maude had a cellar perfect for keeping the medicine, as it came to be referred.

Maude and Mary Grace took frequent walks. Some said they did it to practice walking straight in case they ever had to take a sobriety test. People had reported hearing Maude tell Mary Grace, “Walk straight, Gracie! You’re going to get yourself in trouble”. And that’s all it took in a small town like Magnolia Junction to make a good story. As a matter of fact, the Jimmy Franklin incident got written up in the Junction Independent as a hit-and-run, simply because it scared Jimmy Franklin so bad when Miss Mary Grace fainted that Jimmy had dropped his bike on the spot and ran for Doc Porter. On the other hand, the Magnolia Daily News had hailed Jimmy as a hero for having the presence of mind to go for the doctor. So the Daily News and the Independent were once again locked in controversy. You could always be sure of getting both sides of any story if you subscribed to both papers, because whatever one reported, it was sure to be quite the opposite in the other.

If the truth be known, the unsocial Cecelia had poked her head around the corner of the house that day of the hit-and-run (or Jimmy Franklin saves the day, whichever is your persuasion). Doc said he saw her when the crowd that had gathered all bent down in unison. Doc proceeded to give Mary Grace mouth-to-mouth and then pulled back with a sort of a wince, indicating that the fumes coming from Miss Gracie’s mouth might be combustible. When the crowd bent down, Doc came up and just happened to catch Cecilia’s eye. She disappeared in a flash.

The story goes that Cecilia and Doc Porter had had a fling in the olden days. It was common knowledge in the gossip circles, but you never saw the two together and Doc Porter had remained the town’s most eligible gentleman and totally unwilling to impart any information. But stories in Magnolia Junction are as plentiful as the kudzu and conjecture could fill the tabloids or the big screen with some amazing drama. Nevertheless, whatever conjecture had entertained the Daughters of the Revolution or the consortium of self proclaimed local dirty dozen that convened at Rudy’s Hardware on the weekends, the truth could not be known by the lips of either Cecilia or the good doctor. First of all, no one had heard a word from Cecelia in years, and it was a given that whatever you told Doc Porter was as safe as Fort Knox, especially if told in confidence. Whatever had happened between the two was the best kept secret in town, and believe me, if the Daughters of the American Revolution had had any inkling of the truth, it would have been front page news in the Independent or the Daily News, and both sides of the revelation would have been represented in stark contrast. Doc Porter didn’t hob-knob with the dirty dozen at Rudy’s because he knew that nothing good came from the talk there and he also knew that he was often the topic of conversation. Being the most eligible bachelor, handsome and the heir to the Porter fortune, he was the target of much jealousy and verbal venom. No one could quite explain why he would stay in such a small town with the potential that surrounded him. But stay he did, and had cured the ails of the vast majority of the town’s residents. The only exception was Freeman Gottschalk who had every ailment known to man, and some unknown that he had conjured up himself. He claimed to have the only case of gastroembolicomatitus. Even Bernita Coleman, the town librarian who had investigated the alleged disease, said that it didn’t exist. But you couldn’t convince Freeman of that.

Cecilia Moffett, even at her age, was lovely. Not to be confused with beautiful, Cecilia had always had a glow about her. People who knew her later on in life had contributed it to the amount of time she spent in the garden. But Cecilia had glowed since early childhood. The first time she sang a solo at the First Baptist Church of Magnolia junction at age 8, the light in the baptismal reflecting off the holy waters had made an ethereal connection with the brass offering plates on the communion table and had projected a halo around Cecilia’s golden haired head. It was like a little angel stood before them. The combination of the halo and the cherubic sound that had come from her lips made the whole congregation weep. It was one of those times in church when you're expecting the usual spiritual sedative, only to find that the gates of a well bastioned soul have gotten penetrated by surprise. Even Reverend Haygood commented on it when he got up to deliver the sermon. It was as if the whole sanctuary had become a victim of a holy spell. From that day forward, Cecilia had been referred to as “ that angel, Cecilia”. Cecil and Bertha Ann, Cecilia's parents, referred to the incident repeatedly and Cecilia finally requested that she be referred to by her Christian name, not her acquired title. As Cecilia got older, she became more and more embarrassed by it. She had never taken herself seriously, but the more the name came to be sanctified by her parents, the more uncomfortable she became with it. Of course, the kids in school were envious of her vocal talent and got fed up with her sainthood and made it unbearable for her. It had made socializing with the children her age almost impossible. It wasn't long before Cecilia was spending hour after hour alone in her room. In spite of it all, Cecilia loved to sing and sje was called upon often to display her talent. The fact that she glowed was unmistakable. Sun or no sun, reflection or not reflection, there was an undeniable glow about her. She couldn't help it.

Yes, Cecilia glowed. In high school, she tried to cover it up with the pressed powder that she had found in her mothers dresser. She had mistaken the glow for shine and had hoped that the powder make take the edge off. But that was not to be. You can’t put a lid on a candle without snuffing it out, and powder was no match for Cecilia’s spirit and the sunshine that accompanied her. Her best efforts could not disguise the glow.

Maybe that was what had first attracted the young Doctor Porter to her. He had everything any young man could want: wealth, looks, talent, charm. He could have had any girl in town, or out of town for that matter. When the high school football team traveled out of town, it was Carson Elliott Porter, III who wowed the girls. It didn’t take long for his fame to spread. He was a talented quarterback every touchdown pass got written up in the Daily News, compliments of Carson Elliott Porter, Senior. He not only owned the newspaper, but every politician south of the Mason-Dixon. He had garnered his fortune from the oil fields of Texas at a time when others were losing theirs. With money came power and with power and money, you can buy your way in or out of any situation. So Porter Senior could do or say just about anything he wanted to. Thus the Daily News, became his soapbox and pulpit, depending on his mood. It didn’t take long for Carson’s picture and embossed report of his successes to be displayed on the front page of newspapers throughout the region. It was a necessary evil for Carson, and he knew that complaining about it would only bring about an editorial featuring his humility and an even more prominent candid shot in the next issue. It was a no win situation.