What Every Girl Should Know

by J. Albert Mann

  “She’s dreaming about Walter Kearney,” Thomas said. “Don’t try to hide it, Maggie.”

  I swung my books at him. “Like the Devil loves holy water, I am.”

  “Walter Kearney is in love with you, and women love having men in love with them.”

  I almost shouted that I wasn’t a woman. Then I almost shouted that Walter Kearney was far from a man. Instead I just shrieked, sounding a bit like a red fox caught in one of Joseph’s traps.

  “Leave her be, Thomas,” Nan soothed.

  And Thomas did because Nan asked. Why did he never listen to me?

  We walked along, everyone returning to their own thoughts. It was just Nan, John, Thomas, and I. Joseph had stayed home to patch the roof. With father still gone, and snow on the way, somebody had to climb up and stop the leaking. It would be nice to sleep without the wind knocking things off our dresser or the rain pattering into buckets. But now because of my brother, my thoughts were stuck on Walter Kearney.

  I admit it was easy to see Walter Kearney favored me, since he was the only boy in class who didn’t show the sign of the cross every time he came within ten feet of me. I didn’t love him, but the truth was, I didn’t mind having him love me. It was better than him hating me like everyone else did . . . like Emma did.

  It stung every morning when I walked in and she turned away from me. Our friendship had seemed as real as the braid swinging down my back, as real as the boots pinching my toes.

  As we approached school, I reminded myself not to look at her when I walked in. But as soon as I walked in, I looked. And like scratching off a scab that hasn’t quite healed, fresh blood gushed from my wound as she quickly turned her face toward Clara, laughing at something funny Clara said. Of course, we both knew she was obviously pretending because Clara Martin had never uttered anything funny in all her life.

  I slid slowly into my seat next to Nan, telling myself to do anything but look over at Walter Kearney. This, too, I failed at, and when I glanced over at him, I caught him smiling at me. My eyes darted over to Thomas, who was smirking gloriously. I glared at my brother and then opened my Latin. I hated Latin.

  I attempted to get lost in conjugating the past tense imperfect of give. Dabam, dabas, dabat? I didn’t get lost, and instead found myself looking back over at Walter. He was still staring at me.

  Where was Miss Hayes? Had this boy nothing to work on?

  I attended to my verbs. But not really. What I really did was scratch about like a mouse at my desk until lunch when Miss Hayes released us into a beautiful fall afternoon, a great day to be anywhere but sitting in a bunch of weeds under a sugar maple outside the schoolhouse eating stale cornbread and cold salted potatoes.

  John and Thomas didn’t ever stick around for lunch. We had no idea where they went. I guess we’d never been that interested. Although I was glad they were gone when I saw Walter staring at me from the steps of the schoolhouse.

  I sighed.

  “Emma getting you down?” Nan asked.

  “Emma? No. Never. I don’t care a bit about her,” I lied.

  She looked around and spotted Walter. “Oh.”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s to be expected,” she said. “You’re of age, Maggie. Of course boys will court.”

  “Court?” I barked. “What are you talking about? Court! He’s just mooning at me. That is it.”

  “Mooning. Courting. Same thing.”

  “I want nothing to do with him.”

  “Then why have you been staring at him all day?”

  I jumped from the grass. “Nan!” I hollered. “I have not been.”

  Her shoulders slumped. “You have.”

  “Only because of Thomas. He’s made Walter like a sore tooth, and I can’t keep my tongue from finding him over and over again.”

  “He’s just admiring you.”

  “I don’t want anyone admiring me,” I grumbled, plopping back down next to her in the grass.

  But this was an even bigger lie than the one I told about Emma. I wanted everyone to admire me . . . my father, my mother, Mary, Emma. Even Walter Kearney.

  “Oh my goodness, he’s coming over.”

  Nan was right. He was walking straight for the woodpile.

  “Do something, Nan!”

  She laughed into her hands.

  “Not that!”

  She laughed harder.

  “Nan, get a hold over yourself,” I whispered.

  This had the opposite effect on her. Thank the holy heavens Thomas was not witnessing this.

  Walter stopped in front of us.

  Nan choked.

  “She all right?”

  “She’s deathly ill,” I informed him.

  Nan choked harder.

  “I’m sorry for that,” he said.

  “Kearney’s in love with Satan’s witch!” screamed one of the McGills.

  “Satan doesn’t have witches, he has followers or minions,” I shouted back, rolling my eyes. “Get your hellfire terminology correct.”

  I heard Clara Martin gasp, and looked pointedly at Nan.

  “May I return to my profession of love?” Walter Kearney asked.

  “Please, d—”

  Before I could finish saying “don’t,” he did.

  “Margaret Higgins. I love you. Despite your unfortunate choice in fathers. I think you are beautiful and will make me very happy.”

  “My choice? Your happiness?” I sputtered. Did he say beautiful?

  He smiled. As if I’d understood him completely. Which was true, I actually had. And even though he did call me beautiful, I was choosing to be unhappy.

  I stood, so that I might look directly into his eyes. It didn’t exactly work because I was taller than he was.

  He took a step back. I’d thrown him off with my change in position.

  “Walter,” I began.

  Nan cleared her throat. It was a warning. Be kind. To the boy who liked me because I would make him happy. To the boy who just insulted my father.

  I was kind.

  “Thank you for your profession of love. You are bricky and bold, Walter Kearney, two qualities I admire. However, I must inform you that I do not love you in return, and therefore do not believe you would be able to make me happy. I sure hope this doesn’t ruin your day. And that you’re able to love again very soon.”

  “You’re turning me down?” he asked. His face crumbling.

  “I don’t love you. I’m sorry.”

  And I was, sorry. Really sorry, as I watched his chest heave, his feet shift in the grass, and his eyes glisten over.

  “Well . . . I d-don’t love you either,” he stammered. “I was dared to say it. You’re an ugly witch.” He crossed himself and then spit on my boot and stormed off.

  “Horrible boy!” I shouted at him, dragging my boot in the grass trying to get his sticky gob of phlegm off me. I could hear Clara and Emma laughing over by the schoolhouse steps.

  “She’s so dramatic,” Emma lamented. My old compliment, thrown back at me. I felt the red fox’s sad shriek rise in my throat.

  “That didn’t go so well,” Nan said.

  I shook my head in agreement. “Thank God Thomas didn’t see it.”

  “Oh, I saw it,” said Thomas as he and John came from behind us. “Funniest thing I ever saw.”

  “Don’t,” Nan told him.

  Thomas held out his hand. It had two peppermints in it. “One for each of Satan’s minions.”

  “I guess you’re not marrying Walter Kearney, Maggie.” John grinned. “Maybe he’ll ask Nan next.”

  “Marry?” I grunted. “Nan and I are never marrying anyone. I’m going to be a doctor, and Nan is going to be a writer.”

  As soon as the words left my mouth, I wished I hadn’t said them. Nan and I might say it all the time. But we only said it when it was the two of us. We didn’t say it out in the general world. Not that Thomas and John were the world, but at the moment—in this moment—they felt like they were. And maybe they w
ere, really. The world kept growing larger, and in comparison, I grew smaller.

  Miss Hayes rang her bell.

  “All girls get married, Maggie,” John said, swinging the hair from his eyes. It was as if he was saying we all die, which we do, but first I wanted to live. It wasn’t that falling in love sounded fatal, it was what followed. I wasn’t ready to be someone’s rib yet—I’d barely used my own.

  Miss Hayes rang her bell harder.

  “Or teach.” He shrugged, glancing over at Miss Hayes.

  We walked toward the schoolhouse. Nan and I lagged a few steps behind, like we didn’t want to be too close to them right now. Which, we didn’t. I wanted to apologize to Nan, but I wasn’t sure for what. I took a closer look at Miss Hayes as I passed her on my way inside. Could I be her? I glanced around the classroom. It was better than death, I guess.

  Once we returned to our studies, there were snickers and snorts making their way round the room behind Miss Hayes’s back. I knew I was at the center of them. I didn’t dare look over at Walter now. Strangely, this made my heart even heavier. Walter was a dirty dog, but still, I liked it better when he was a dirty dog who loved me. And thought I was beautiful.

  Miss Hayes had us open our history books. We were reading about the beginnings of the Roman Empire. It felt as if I’d read this a hundred times. Miss Hayes, sensing my disinterest, called on me to stand and answer questions.

  “What was the informal alliance called between Octavian, Mark-Antony, and Lepidus?” she asked.

  “The Second Triumvirate.”

  “Who was the second emperor of the Roman Empire?”

  “Tiberius.”

  I could see she was pleased.

  “What was the imperial title granted to Augustus?”

  “Princeps.”

  The class seethed with anger at all my correct answers. I could feel them, like snakes hissing and slithering over one another, hoping I would fall into their pit. But I wouldn’t. Because I knew the answers. Anyone could know them. You just needed to read the material. I absently rubbed the protuberances behind my ear.

  “How long did Augustus reign?” asked Miss Hayes.

  “Forty years.”

  “What were his last words?”

  I loved Augustus’s dying words, and I couldn’t help giving them a dramatic air. “Have I played the part well? If so, applaud while I exit.”

  Miss Hayes applauded.

  “You may sit now, Margaret.” She beamed. “Thank you.”

  I sat, pleased with myself. Not caring one single red-eyed bean that they all hated me . . . they all hated us. Glad even that Walter Kearney no longer loved me.

  Nan reached out and squeezed my arm. I knew she agreed with everything I was feeling right now. Not all women got married or become teachers. Because she would be a writer and I would be a doctor. And we would both leave this town in triumph, taking Mary with us. And maybe Ethel, if she pulled herself together.

  We opened up our geography books. Miss Hayes made her way through the desks toward me. I could see she couldn’t wait to whisper in my ear how wonderful I was. And I couldn’t wait to hear it.

  “Margaret Higgins.” She smiled. “You show so much promise.”

  There was a whoosh of air as my triumph rushed from the room. I wanted to reach out and grab Nan for support, but Emma was watching. Walter was watching. Everyone was watching.

  “Want to mushroom hunt on the way home?” I asked my sister, wearing the most fake smile my lips had ever made.

  Snow Angel

  Nan and I began hunting mushrooms every afternoon following school. We didn’t speak—we just searched. And when we discovered the most wonderful patch of blewits a mile south of our cabin, we actually hugged each other under the oak trees. We might not be able to find our way in the classroom, in Corning, or in life, but we could find fungi. When we arrived home with our third full bucket in a week, my mother actually laughed aloud.

  Mary used the mushrooms to make gravy. She rendered down pork fat, onions, and any other manner of things we had in the house. Thomas couldn’t stop complaining about the never-ending stench of mushroom gravy, which added considerably to the pleasure of the whole experience. I admit it smelled worse than an outhouse baking in a late August afternoon, but the gravy tasted delicious. And any odor that annoyed my brother was an odor I’d deal with.

  My father arrived home one afternoon while Nan and I were out hunting. Later that evening when we returned with a bucket brimming with hen-of-the-woods, all he said in way of greeting was, “Mushrooms.”

  But my mother whisked the bucket out of my hands with a smile. “They’ll be delicious tomorrow morning with eggs.” Somehow, she knew how important these mushrooms were to us.

  During our third week of mushroom gathering, a white flake floated past my face as I leaned over a dead tree trunk covered in oyster mushrooms. A few yards away, I heard Nan exclaim sadly. She’d seen it too. There were three solid inches of snow on the ground by the time we reached our yard with what would most likely be our last batch of mushrooms for quite a while.

  Later that night, when Mrs. O’Donnell blew into the house in a swirl of snow hunched over her newest screeching baby, all I wanted to do was run out into the woods and burrow deeply into the earth and nestle in next to the mushrooms. Instead, I stayed planted in my usual spot next to Ethel, in front of a sink piled high with dirty dinner dishes.

  “He threw him out!” Mrs. O’Donnell shouted over the baby’s cries. “He threw him out!”

  My father was the first to respond. He put down his poetry, got out of the chair he’d been sitting in since he returned from Elmira jobless last week, and closed the front door.

  Mrs. O’Donnell’s eyes were wild in her red and dirty face. She wasn’t speaking or behaving sensibly as she paced and tossed her head, shivering from the cold. “He threw him out!” she repeated.

  My mother rushed toward her, but Mrs. O’Donnell backed away, clutching her baby.

  “Eleanor,” my mother said soothingly. “Eleanor, come sit.” She pulled out a chair and reached politely for Mrs. O’Donnell’s arm. But Mrs. O’Donnell wouldn’t sit.

  “Let her carry on if she likes,” Father said, returning to his chair and his book. “It’s a free country.”

  Mother ignored him, but I felt her allowing his words to hang in the air, along with her silent response. It is a free country, and the people of Corning have freely chosen not to commission their angels from the Devil. My father hadn’t worked since Bob came to town.

  Mrs. O’Donnell didn’t seem to notice my mother or my father. Neither did her screaming infant. But the commotion brought every single one of my brothers and sisters scrambling into the room. Anything louder than a houseful of Higginses was a wonder in itself, and we behaved like nocturnal animals, watching silently from every dark corner of the house.

  Speaking in a hushed tone, Mother tried to reach through Mrs. O’Donnell’s frenzy and pull her out. But the baby kept screeching and Mrs. O’Donnell kept repeating herself over and over. “He threw him out. He threw him out.” And before we knew it, our own little Richard and Henry were joining in, creating a chorus of screaming babies. I thought back to that day in Emma’s room with her dolls. Use your imagination, she’d said. Of course, now Emma refused to say anything to me. I wished eighteen babies on Emma Dyer.

  The trio of howlers quickly wore down my father’s patience. He stepped in front of my mother and confronted poor Mrs. O’Donnell.

  “What is it, woman? What’s happened?”

  Stunned into silence, Mrs. O’Donnell sniffed in, swallowing a face full of tears. But though he might have silenced Mrs. O’Donnell, my father had no effect on the squawking babies. That job belonged to Mary and Nan, who soothed Richard and Henry using the tried and true method of a bit of honey on their thumbs. This left only Mrs. O’Donnell’s howling infant, its cries seeping into every crowded corner of our house.

  One after another after another, they
rolled in, shrill and high, like a string of misery held together by moments of silence so slight, there was no recovery.

  Toss whined and pawed at the door. My father opened it and the dog fled, barking into the night. When he shut the door, the barking was instantly muffled . . . and we understood. Mr. O’Donnell threw his child out. Into the night. Into the snow.

  My mother reached for the baby again, and this time Mrs. O’Donnell let it go, as if she might be done with it for good. Mother laid it on the marble-topped table and peeled the wet shawl away.

  Not a Higgins moved, or breathed, or gasped. We just stared. The baby was red. Raw. Covered in pustules. His cheeks and chest screeched louder than his mouth ever could. Eczema.

  “Oh, you poor little angel,” my mother cooed, and I wondered if she was thinking of her own little angel, buried out with the others under the snow.

  You didn’t need much medical knowledge to know there was absolutely nothing to be done for this baby but to keep his skin dry until the rash subsided—which could be weeks. I grabbed the softest piece of mending in the basket and brought it to my mother. She squeezed my hand as she took the clean linen pillowcase from me, my fingers vibrating from her warm touch. She then gently wrapped the sad screeching creature and rocked him in her arms, and for a moment, it felt as though it was me she was rocking so warm and close.

  Father grabbed his coat and headed to the door. “Margaret?” he called. “Let’s have us a walk.”

  For the first time in my life I didn’t leap for my coat and make for the door. I didn’t follow him. Something held me in place. And it wasn’t my mother’s touch. It was anger. I was angry. For the loss of Emma’s friendship, for the tiny little sister I’d never know, for snapping at this baby and his mother. I was even angry at him for not appreciating our mushrooms.

  “Suit yourself,” he said, grabbing his whiskey and slamming the door behind him.

  The baby screamed. Poor Mrs. O’Donnell slumped into a chair. Mary put on the kettle. My mother rocked the infant. The rest of us returned to our chores. All of us enduring the torment, which we now knew was nothing like that being suffered by the baby in my mother’s arms.