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hasn’t realized that his head sticks out of one side and his tail out of the other.
    As soon as Big Boy finished his business, he tugged his leash, dragging me to the sidewalk, and led me around the block a few times. St. Mary is a small town. I feel safe even after midnight, and who would bother me with Big Boy by my side? I don’t know how I ever got along without Big Boy. I’ve been married—and divorced—once each and I grew up in a house with Daddy, five brothers, and whatever assorted friends were visiting, but I’ve never felt so welcomed and loved when I arrived home as I do since Big Boy became part of my life.
    My sister-in-law Molly, who breeds dogs, keeps insisting I have him neutered. He’s been to the vet for shots. He was also poisoned once, and he’s had his ears cropped, so it’s not that I’m too cheap to pay for it, but I haven’t had him fixed yet. Molly keeps telling me if I don’t have it done, I’m risking Big Boy getting loose when I walk him if the circumstances prompt him to chase a female dog for a little loving. That’s her word—loving—not mine. I call a spade a flippin’ shovel, and she’s not talking about loving; she’s talking about dog boinking.
    No point in thinking about that tonight. I just wanted to finish the walk. When we were back inside, I poured Kibbles’n Bits into Big Boy’s food bowl and checked out my pantry to see if I had anything to give him as a treat besides MoonPies. Someday, I’m going to start buying groceries on a regular basis and get all kinds of special dog bones, but I never get around to food shopping. Not that my social life has been what’s kept me busy since Dr. Donald dropped out of my life.
    Jane is a much better cook than I am, and when we shared her apartment while mine was being remodeled, I never had to even consider food. She always had something good cooked, and if I didn’t get home at meal time, I could microwave a plate. Nights when I knew Jane and Frankie were eating out, I’d stop by Gastric Gullah and pick up food to go. Maum’s fall would put a stop to that. She and Rizzie were the only cooks at the restaurant, and I knew Rizzie would close the business until Maum was in better condition.
    Big Boy gobbled down some of the Kibbles’n Bits in his bowl while I stood staring into my empty refrigerator. Oh, well, I didn’t feel like going back out and trying to find something else to eat. I’d had a delicious gourmet dinner, but I still wanted something. What I really desired wouldn’t be in the fridge anyway, but I thought food might take my mind off the warmth.
    Finding nothing else to eat, I took the box of MoonPies into the bedroom and put them on the bedside table. I stripped and dropped my clothes on the floor by the bathtub. Big Boy lay down on the floor beside my bed and eyed the unopened box of MoonPies. After a brisk scrub with peach-scented body wash and shampoo, I wrapped myself in a towel and went to the kitchen for a banana MoonPie for Big Boy. He gobbled it down while I put on an old flannel nightgown. The weather outside wasn’t cold, but that gown is as comforting to me as MoonPies are. I slipped into bed and rummaged through the drawer of the nightstand until I found a book I’d been planning to read.
    I went to the University of South Carolina in Columbia, which is where I married and taught kindergarten before I realized both of those were mistakes. Don’t get me wrong. I loved the little children, but by the time I’d been through the divorce, I was tired of dealing with almost every aspect of my life, including five-year-olds who wouldn’t be quiet or lie down to take their naps. I came home to St. Mary and lived with Daddy for a while. I had taken voc ed in high school and earned my state cosmetology license.
    In South Carolina, people who cosmetize (Funeraleze for putting on makeup and doing hair and nails of dead people) must have either a funeral director’s license or a cosmetology license.