Tallahassee Higgins

by Mary Downing Hahn

  "I'm not surprised. It wasn't very nice of me to take Johnny away from her, but I couldn't help it if he liked me better." Liz didn't sound very sorry, and a little smile twitched the corners of her mouth. "So she's still living in Hyattsdale. And married to boring Bud. I bet she has a zillion kids, too."

  "Six," I said. "Jane, the oldest one, is in my grade, and she's my best friend."

  We talked for a while about school and how I was doing, but every time I asked Liz about herself, she shifted things around to me again.

  "How about me and you?" I asked finally, unable to bear the uncertainty. "What are we going to do?"

  "When do Thelma and Dan get home?" Liz looked up and down the street as if she expected to see them coming.

  "Aunt Thelma should be here any minute, but Uncle Dan doesn't get home till five or five-thirty. They'll sure be surprised to see you."

  Liz stood up. "Look, Talley, I don't want to see either one of them. I just stopped in to make sure you were okay, that's all."

  "What do you mean?" I stared at her, bracing myself for bad news. "Aren't you taking me with you?"

  "Not right now, honey." She backed away as I tried to reach for her. "I'm on my way to New York with a friend. He knows some people in the theater, and he thinks they'd be interested in me."

  "But why can't I come?"

  "You're better off here, at least till I get settled. You understand, don't you?" Her voice took on a pleading note. "New York's no place for a kid. You wouldn't have fun there, Talley."

  I held myself very, very still. It wouldn't do any good to grab her, to cling to her. She'd only get mad. "Do you mean you're dumping me here? The same way you dump everybody?"

  "What do you mean?" Liz stared at me.

  "Johnny, Roger, Bob." I glared at her. "You even dumped our cat, Bilbo! And now you're doing it to me, your own daughter!"

  "Don't talk to me like that, Tallahassee! I took care of you for twelve years, and don't think that was easy! A time comes when a person has to think about herself. I'm twenty-nine years old, and if I don't get into acting soon, it'll be too late."

  "But you just said you wanted me to be all yours. You know, Peter Pan and Tinkerbell. What about that?"

  "Oh, honey." Liz flung her arms around me and hugged me tight. "You like it here, don't you? Dan and Thelma take good care of you, you have friends, you even have a grandmother." She tried to laugh, but her eyes were worried. "Let's face it, I'm not exactly the world's best mother."

  "You're the only one I have."

  "Listen, I have to get out of here before Thelma comes home. You want to meet Max? Come on." She started walking down the sidewalk, almost running.

  "No!" I yelled, "I don't want to meet Max! I just want you to stay here!"

  She took a step toward me, hesitated, threw her arms up in the air and sighed. "I come all the way here just to see you and this is how you act! I can't believe it!"

  Before she could say anything else, a little sports car pulled up to the curb behind her. The top was down, and the guy driving it had long hair even though he was getting bald on top. "Are you ready, babe?"

  Liz smiled at him, then turned back to me. "Come on, Talley, give me a kiss good-bye and say hi to Max." She stretched an arm toward me, beckoning, pleading.

  I walked slowly toward her and let her introduce me to Max.

  "This is Tallahassee," Liz said. "Isn't she the prettiest little girl you ever saw?"

  "She looks more like your kid sister than your daughter," Max said as Liz hugged me.

  I scowled at Max. "She's twenty-nine years old," I said. "And she's my mother."

  "Kids, I love them." Max laughed. "You're a real trip," he said to me.

  "Now you be good, Talley," Liz said. "This time I promise I'll write more."

  I clung to her for a minute, breathing in the smell of tobacco and perfume. Then she pulled away and got into the car with Max. She waved and blew me a kiss, Max gunned the motor, and the little car sped away with Liz's hair streaming out behind it. I watched it turn the corner and almost collide with Aunt Thelma's car.

  "Was that Liz?" she asked before she was even out of her old Ford.

  I nodded. "She couldn't stay long," I whispered. "She's on her way to New York."

  "You mean she left? She didn't even wait to see me?"

  I shook my head and stared at a line of ants marching across the sidewalk. The lump in my throat was back, making it hard to talk.

  "I can't believe it!" Aunt Thelma stared down the street in the direction the car had gone, as if she expected to see it coming back.

  I didn't say anything, but a big tear splashed all the way down to the sidewalk like a drop of rain.

  "But what about you? Did she say anything about sending for you?"

  "Maybe in the fall," I whispered, "when she gets settled."

  Aunt Thelma sniffed. "Well, we've heard that before, haven't we?"

  Then she did something that really surprised me. She reached out and pulled me toward her, pressing my face against her bosom. "Oh, Talley, you must be so disappointed," she said as she patted my back. "I'm sorry."

  I cried then, I couldn't help it. "She doesn't want me anymore," I told my aunt. "I'll never see her again. Never, never, never."

  Giving me a huge hug, Aunt Thelma said, "Of course you'll see her again, Tallahassee. Don't be silly."

  "No," I said. "She's gone forever this time, I know she is."

  Aunt Thelma took my arm and led me into the house. "It might be a while, Tallahassee, but you mark my words. Liz will be back again."

  Sitting me down at the kitchen table, she fixed us each a glass of iced tea. "Now you calm down, Tallahassee, and stop crying," she said firmly. "Tears aren't going to bring Liz back, you know that."

  I sipped the cold tea, but it was hard to stop crying. After waiting all this time, I had just spent fifteen minutes with my mother. Not even half an hour. She could have at least stayed long enough to see Uncle Dan, to have supper with us. Jane could have come over and met her. Mrs. Russell, too. But no, she had to run off to New York with a creepy guy wearing an earring.

  "Did Liz say what she's going to do in New York?" Aunt Thelma asked.

  "That weird guy driving the car knows people in the theater," I mumbled. "She still thinks she's going to be an actress, but do you know what I think?"

  Aunt Thelma looked up from her iced tea, waiting for me to go on.

  "I think she's going to be a waitress all her life and she should have stayed in Florida. What will she do in a place like New York? She'll never meet anybody like Roger in a city."

  Aunt Thelma patted my hand. "Well, Talley, I'll tell you something. I'm glad you're staying here. Believe it or not, I'd miss you if you went up to New York, and I'd worry about you all the time. The things that happen in cities—they're no place for kids."

  "You mean you don't feel stuck with me?" This was surprising news. I knew Aunt Thelma and I were getting along better, but I never dreamed she'd miss me if I left.

  She shook her head. "Not a bit." Then she stood up and went to the refrigerator. "Help me get dinner started now," she said. "Dan will be home soon, and I haven't done a thing."

  As I pared the potatoes, Fritzi sniffed the floor at my feet, hoping something might come his way, and Aunt Thelma tuned in her favorite radio station. While she fried the chicken, she sang "I Left My Heart in San Francisco" with Tony Bennett, hitting a few false notes now and then as well as muffing the words more than once. From Jane's backyard I heard Matthew, Mark, and Luke playing some weird death-ray game they'd invented. I knew Mrs. DeFlores would soon shout at them to come in for dinner.

  Maybe after we ate, I would go over and tell Jane about Liz's visit. She'd be furious at first, but then she'd dream up some wild explanation for my mother's behavior, and I'd feel better. At least for a while. But no matter what Jane said, I knew Liz and I would never live the way we used to. Too many things had happened. I had ties I hadn't had before. Mrs. Russell,
my aunt and uncle, Jane. And so did Liz.

  When Aunt Thelma wasn't looking, I handed Fritzi a little piece of the French bread I was preparing for dinner. "Here, greedy," I whispered as he snapped it up. "Me and you might as well be friends. It looks like I'm going to be here for a long time."