Wise-cracking Wiley Cantrell is loud and roaringly outrageous -- and he needs to be to keep his deeply religious neighbors and family in the Deep South at bay. A failed writer on food stamps, Wiley works a minimum wage job and barely manages to keep himself and his deaf son, Noah, more than a stone’s throw away from Dumpster-diving. Noah was a meth baby and has the birth defects to prove it. He sees how lonely his father is and tries to help him find a boyfriend while Wiley struggles to help Noah have a relationship with his incarcerated mother, who believes the best way to feed a child is with a slingshot. No wonder Noah becomes Wiley’s biggest supporter when Boston nurse Jackson Ledbetter walks past Wiley’s cash register and sets his sugar tree on fire. Jackson falls like a wet mule wearing concrete boots for Wiley’s sense of humor. And while Wiley represents much of the best of the South, Jackson is hiding a secret that could threaten this new family in the making. When North meets South, the cultural misunderstandings are many, but so are the laughs, and the tears, but, as they say down in Dixie, it’s all good.

Shaking the Sugar Tree

Please call me,he said, biting at his lip.


He turned quickly, grabbed his bags, and walked away.


I watched him for a long moment. He was such a sweet-looking guy, handsome in that Latino way, but he walked as though the weight of the world was on his shoulders and he didn’t have a friend in the world.


There are many Hispanics in Tupelo. All throughout the South, actually. No doubt a great many are illegal, a fact that enrages many of my neighbors. That Juan gave me a card indicating his willingness to work cheaply suggested he was one.


What would it be like to be an illegal immigrant who was not only deaf but gay? Talk about three strikes against you.


He didn’t give me that ants-in-the-pants feeling that Jackson Ledbetter did, though I was certainly willing to give him an opportunity to shake the sugar tree and see what might fall out. 10: Kayla Gets Out


Chapter 13