The All-Girl Filling Station's Last Reunion by Fannie Flagg Read Free Book Online Page A

I open this letter?”
    “What letter?”
    “The registered letter.”
    “Oh. I thought you weren’t going to sign for it.”
    “Well … I tried not to … but anyhow … I wanted you to be here.”
    He smiled at her. “Okay, sweetie. Let me fix a drink, and I’ll be right there.”
    Sookie sat down on the sofa in the sunroom and waited until he came back in and sat down across from her. “Okay, open her up, and let’s see what we got.”
    Sookie took a deep breath and opened it and read the cover letter.
    Attention: Mrs. Lenore Simmons Krackenberry
    c/o Mrs. Earle Poole, Jr.
    526 Bay Street
    Point Clear, AL 36564
    Our office has received the following, and as requested, we are forwarding to your present address.
    H. Wilson
    The envelope attached was postmarked Matamoros, Mexico, and handwritten in an almost uneven and childlike scrawl. Sookie read the letter inside, which was in the same handwriting.
    May 20, 2005
    Dear Mrs. Krackenberry,
    Hello. I am the daughter of Conchita Alvarez, who worked for you in Brownsville, Texas, during the war. I am sorry to say my mother passed away last spring at the age of eighty-five. When we were going through her things, we found these papers she was keeping for you. They look important. They look like you might need them. I do not know where you live. I am mailing them back to where they came from so they can send them to you. My mother liked you very much. She said you were so pretty.
    Sincerely,
    Mrs. Veronica Gonzales
    “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” said Sookie.
    “What?”
    “A lady in Texas that used to work for mother died and her daughter found some of Lenore’s old papers and is sending them back. Well, that’s very sweet of her.”
    “What kind of papers?”
    “I don’t know, yet. Let me see.” Sookie picked up another piece of paper.
    The next thing Sookie knew, she was lying on the floor, and Earle was standing over her, fanning her with a newspaper.
    “It’s okay, honey, you just fainted. Just relax and breathe. Don’t talk.”
    Lying on the floor beside her was what she had just read.
    October 8, 1952
    Dear Mrs. Krackenberry,
    Due to the military’s recent lifting of certain restrictions in the Children’s Medical Privacy Act, and in reply to your request of January 6, 1949, we are now at liberty to release photocopies of your daughter’s original birth certificate, including all birthmother medical records in our possession, up to the date of her adoption from the Texas Children’s Home. We hope this information will assist you and your daughter’s health care professionals in determining her risk of any hereditary conditions. Please contact this office if you have any further questions.
    Sincerely,
    Cathy Quijano
    Director of Public Health Services
    Please find enclosed the following:
    Birth certificate
    Medical records
    Adoption papers
    A few minutes later, Earle had helped Sookie to the couch, and she was lying there with a cold rag on her head, trying to comprehend what she had just read. All she remembered were the words “her adoption.”
    Earle came back with a brown paper bag for her to breathe into, and a glass of brandy. “Here, honey, drink a little of this.” He looked very concerned and kept patting her hand.
    “Did you read it?” she asked.
    He nodded. “Yes, honey, I read it. What a hell of a thing to spring on somebody.”
    “But what does it mean?”
    He picked up the letter and read it again. “Well, sweetie … I’m afraid it means just what it says. Evidently, you were adopted from the … here are the papers … the Texas Children’s Home … on July 31, 1945.”
    “But Earle, that can’t be true. It has to be a mistake.”
    Earle looked at the papers again and shook his head. “No, honey … I don’t think so. It looks pretty official, and they have all the right information.”
    “But it has to be a mistake. I can’t be adopted. I’ve got the Simmons foot and Daddy’s