Almost Alice

by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor

  Pamela was quiet on the way back to the bus stop. She looked drained. Relieved, maybe, but sad. Everything about this was sad. But just before the bus came, she leaned against me, hugging my arm, and said, “Thank you, Alice. I’m glad I talked with Mom. I’m glad you made me do it.”

  “I didn’t make you. Encouraged you, maybe,” I told her. “But I’m glad you gave her the chance to act like a mother.”

  We got on board and took a seat near the back. “It’s good that it’s almost summer,” Pamela said. “I won’t have to answer a lot of questions at school if I’ve got morning sickness. Maybe I’ll go live at Mom’s after I start to show. For a while, anyway. First, I guess, I have to decide if I’m going to keep the baby.”

  “And you have time to think about it, Pamela,” I said, and glanced over at her. “You won’t do anything impulsive, will you?”

  “Like a clothes hanger, you mean?”

  “Like anything that isn’t safe.”

  “I won’t,” she promised.

  I could have gotten a transfer to another bus that would have taken me to Georgia Avenue, but I was tense and needed to walk off some anxiety. So I said good-bye to Pamela and got off at a corner where I had seven blocks yet to go. After a while, I thought, you have to stop telling yourself that it can’t be happening and realize that it can. That it is. And that somebody you’ve known since sixth grade, someone you love, is an expectant mom and has to deal with it.

  I was a block from home when I realized it was almost seven, and I still hadn’t called Sylvia. I could hardly believe it was so late! I should have used Pam’s cell.

  When I got in the house, I called, “I’m home! Sorry I’m late.”

  I could smell Sylvia’s homemade spaghetti sauce. Dad’s special garlic bread.

  “We put some dinner aside for you, Alice. Help yourself,” Sylvia called from the family room.

  I was glad I could eat alone and would do it later, because I wasn’t hungry. I went upstairs and dropped my bag on the rug, realizing that I’d left not only my sweater at school, but my books, my homework, my assignments.… Suddenly I felt exhausted. I lay down on my bed and closed my eyes, one arm across my forehead.

  I’d probably been there about ten minutes when there was a light tap on the door.

  “Al?” Dad said. “Can I come in?”

  “Sure,” I said, but didn’t get up.

  He stood looking at me a minute, then pulled a chair over. I could barely see his face from where I was laying, but I still felt too tired to get up.

  “Anything wrong?” he asked.

  “I’m okay,” I said, begging the question.

  “When Sylvia got home, she checked the voice messages,” Dad said. “There was an automated call from the attendance office saying that you skipped sixth period.”

  Damn! I thought. Why did they have to be so darn efficient? Skip a class, it’s transmitted immediately to the school office, and the phone call gets made.

  “What was that all about?” Dad asked.

  “Something really important came up,” I said. “There was something I had to do, that’s all.”

  Silence. I hate silence almost more than anything. More than quarreling.

  “I’m worried about you,” Dad said finally. “Is there anything you want to tell me?”

  “No. Why are you worried?”

  “Because … I was emptying the wastebaskets before dinner—for the trash pickup tomorrow—and I found this.”

  I looked over and saw that he was holding something in one hand, and I sat up. There was the wrapper from the pregnancy test kit.

  “It’s not mine,” I said quickly, which sounded totally ridiculous, because it had been in my wastebasket.

  “Al,” Dad said. “All these years I’ve tried to keep an open relationship with you and Les. And I know that at seventeen you tell me only a small percentage of what goes on in your life, and that’s only natural. I don’t have to know everything. But when it’s something serious, I hope you’ll tell me.”

  “I will,” I said. “But I wasn’t the one who took that test, Dad. I can’t tell you more than that. Not yet. But I’m sorry that it got you worried about me. Really.”

  Dad was so relieved that I could see the crease lines disappearing on his forehead, the little smile crinkles at the corners of his eyes growing deeper.

  “Okay, honey. I won’t ask. Except … where were you this afternoon? Can you at least tell me that?”

  I smiled a little. “We weren’t doing anything illegal or dangerous. Just having a talk with somebody’s mom.”

  He didn’t say anything. Just sat there smiling at me. Finally he said, “Did I ever tell you I think you’re great?”

  I smiled a little too. “I don’t remember those exact words.”

  “I never said you were fantastic?”

  “Nope. Not that, either.”

  He was grinning now. “Trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind …?”

  “Keep talking,” I said.

  “Come on down and I’ll heat up that garlic bread for you,” he told me, and I followed him downstairs.

  18

  Finale

  I hadn’t asked Patrick for the details of prom night, because that kind of thing bores him. He isn’t much for stuff like clothes and flowers and photos and such. But it was his senior prom, his invitation, so I would go along with whatever he had planned. Or hadn’t planned. All he’d told me was that he’d pick me up at six and to bring a change of clothes for the after-prom party at school. But I’d go with Patrick if he wore a Hawaiian shirt and rode up to our house on a bicycle.

  Because Marilyn had loaned me a dress and Dad and Sylvia didn’t need to help me buy a new one, Sylvia said she’d pay for my hair appointment—I wanted it piled high on top of my head, with curls in back. Then Dad said he’d pay for a manicure, which was their way of telling me they were glad that Patrick was back in the picture and that I wasn’t going out with guys like Tony.

  “Hey,” I told them, “you’d think I was getting married or something.”

  But I really did want to look different for Patrick’s prom. Blend in with the seniors. I wanted to look older, mysterious. Seductive, even. I hate fake nails, though—hate what they do to your natural ones—and only a professional manicurist could make my old nails look glamorous.

  Liz came over to give me a pedicure. The guys she’d dated this semester were all juniors, so she hadn’t been invited to the prom. But she knew I’d be wearing my new beige strappy sandals and wanted to make sure that my toes were gorgeous.

  “Patrick doesn’t notice toes,” I said, but willingly rested one foot in her lap.

  “How do you know?” She massaged lotion into my heels. “He could have a secret fetish and go nuts over women’s shoes. But frankly, I think he’s more of a butt man.”

  My eyes opened wide. “A what?”

  “Hey. Men are divided into three groups, you know: breasts, legs, and butts. And I’ve seen Patrick’s eyes following you out of a room, so I think he’s a butt guy.”

  I laughed. “Those are all brain-dead guys, Liz. Isn’t there a category for guys who take in the whole girl?”

  “I’m still looking,” she said.

  I loved the Burnished Copper color the manicurist had used on my nails, so I’d bought a bottle of it, and now Liz was using it on my toenails.

  “Remember when Pamela painted—,” she said, and then stopped. I think we were both remembering the time in eighth grade when Pamela had inked J-U-I-C-Y on each foot—one letter on each toenail—and the gym teacher gave her polish remover and made her take it off.

  I figured that Liz didn’t want to ruin my evening by bringing up Pamela, so that’s why she didn’t finish the sentence. But I don’t think either of us could stop thinking about her, not really.

  “Sorry,” Liz said. “I didn’t mean to remind you of that.”

  “She’s on our minds no matter what,” I said.

&nbs
p; Liz sighed and carefully brushed Dry Kwik over the polish of each toenail. “And it will never be like we planned, will it? I mean, we’ll never go to the same college or drive to California like we wanted. Everything changes in the blink of an eye.”

  “That’s life, I guess,” I told her. “Or, as David would say, that’s what makes life so ‘terrifyingly wonderful.’”

  We did my makeup last. I’d bought a bronze blush with glitter in it, and after I did my foundation and powder, Liz did my brows, my mascara, and my eyeliner, then topped it off with the bronze blush on my cheekbones.

  We’d told Sylvia we’d invite her up for a final inspection, but I didn’t want to put on my heels till I had to; I’d be on my feet all evening as it was. Forty minutes before Patrick was to pick me up, my cell phone rang.

  Liz and I looked at each other.

  “If Patrick tells you he can’t make it, tell him you’ll never speak to him again, ever!” Liz said. “Remember how he got mono the night of the eighth-grade semi-formal?”

  “As though it was his fault!” I said, reaching for the phone. But it wasn’t Patrick’s number. “It’s Pamela,” I told Liz.

  We both stared at the phone. I was afraid to answer. What if Pamela was crying? What if she was threatening to do something awful? What if she really, desperately needed to see me again? What if …?

  “Should I answer for you? Tell her you’re just about ready to leave? That you’ve left?” Liz asked.

  I shook my head and picked up my cell.

  Pamela was breathless. Again. I couldn’t tell if she’d been crying or not. “Listen, Alice, I know you’re getting ready for prom, and I didn’t want to upset you and I’ll only take a minute and you don’t have to come over, but … I don’t think I’m pregnant anymore.”

  “What?” I cried, and Liz looked stricken.

  “About an hour ago I felt like I had to go, and I went to the toilet and passed these really big clumps of blood. I was cramping and there was blood in the toilet, and I think … I think everything came out.”

  I didn’t know what to say.

  “Could you … could you tell … by looking?” I asked finally.

  “Just big clumps of blood.”

  “But … are you okay?”

  Liz was trying to read my face, and I made a sweeping motion between my legs. She understood and sat with her lips apart, waiting.

  “I called Mom,” Pamela said, “and she called her gynecologist, and he said if I wasn’t cramping anymore and the bleeding had stopped, it was probably a complete miscarriage.”

  “Oh, Pamela!” I said. “I’m … I’m …”

  “Glad,” she answered for me.

  “You didn’t …?”

  “No. No coat hangers or Ex-Lax or jumping or anything. Mom said that somehow I lucked out, but I couldn’t count on that ever happening again. The doctor wants to see me tomorrow, and we’ve got an appointment at the clinic. If I start bleeding or cramping again, Mom will take me to the emergency room.”

  I was doubtful. “You’re not just making up this story so I’ll have a good time tonight and won’t worry about you?”

  “Honest. I called Tim before I called you, and you know what he said? He said that the last couple of weeks have been the worst of his life. I told him, me too. But listen, have a great time, okay?”

  “Are you alone now?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Meredith’s out somewhere, and Dad’s watching a baseball game. He doesn’t have a clue. Mom’s coming over later to get me. I’m going to spend the night with her.”

  Liz was motioning to herself, then pointing in the direction of Pamela’s house. “Do you want Liz to come over? She just gave me a pedicure,” I said.

  “Oh no, Alice! She’s there to help on your big night!”

  “Hey. She’s volunteering.” I handed the phone to Liz.

  “Pamela,” she said, “I’m through here. And I’ll be right over.” She handed the phone back to me.

  “Alice?” said Pamela. And now her voice sounded choked. “You’re the best, you know it?”

  “And you’re the bravest,” I told her.

  I ended the call, and Liz said, “She had a miscarriage, right?”

  “Yeah, and we’re celebrating. It’s weird, isn’t it? If she was married and wanting a baby, we’d all be in tears. Her mom said to consider herself lucky but not to count on it happening again.”

  “Oh, man! It’ll be nice having the old Pamela back, won’t it?” Liz said, gathering up her bag.

  “You can’t go through something like this and not be changed a little,” I said. “And maybe that’s a good thing.”

  Patrick didn’t come in a limo, and he didn’t come in his dad’s car. He and fifteen other couples came in an old school bus they had hired for the evening, with a big banner stretched along one side reading PROM OR BUST. All the windows were dropped down, and as soon as I opened our front door, we could hear all the laughing and chatter coming from inside it.

  “Wow!” I said, partly for the bus, partly for Patrick, who was dressed in a white tuxedo, white vest, and white tie, a handsome contrast to his face, still lightly tanned from his week of landscaping work during spring break. “Patrick, you look terrific!”

  “And you’re gorgeous,” he said, kissing me lightly on the lips when he handed me a wrist corsage of white baby roses, tied with an aqua ribbon. He must have called Sylvia at some point about my dress.

  I put a boutonniere in his lapel, and we posed for pictures for Dad and Sylvia in front of the stone fireplace in our family room. They even got a picture of us on the porch, with the bus in the background.

  Then we were climbing aboard with my afterprom bag under a seat, and Patrick introduced me to some of the other seniors. I didn’t really know any of them. I’m sure I’d seen them around school, but it’s hard to recognize people who are all dressed up in glitter and tulle and fancy tuxedos with bow ties.

  The ones Patrick knew best were a Latino couple, Mario and Ana, and his Asian friend, Ron Yen, and his date, Melinda. One of the many things you can say for Patrick is that he’s international, and he speaks four languages. But if I ever thought that Patrick was all work and no play, that he didn’t know how to have fun, prom proved me wrong.

  The bus took us to Clyde’s, where we sat at long tables, guys across from their dates, and we feasted on crab cakes and steak and chocolate mousse. Ron and Mario kept us laughing, telling how they had asked their dates to prom. Mario said he printed the question on a big sheet of poster board and planted it in Ana’s front yard. Great idea, he said, except that her dad came out and told him to stay off the lawn, he’d just planted grass seed, and to bring the sign inside.

  “So here I am, walking in their living room, holding this huge sign on a stick, and I knocked a picture off the wall,” said Mario.

  Then Ron said he’d been thinking for weeks of a creative way to ask Melinda to go with him, and finally he invited her out to dinner and persuaded the waiter to bring her a piece of cake with Prom? written in frosting. But either the waiter couldn’t spell or the o looked like an a, because it came to the table reading Pram?

  And Melinda said, “I looked at it and said, ‘Pram? A baby carriage? What is this, a proposal or a proposition?’” We shrieked with laughter.

  No one asked if Patrick had invited me in some creative way; he had simply phoned and asked. But I’ll bet none of the other girls had been asked five months in advance, on New Year’s Day. Patrick and I just smiled at each other across the table.

  • • •

  We got to the prom at the Holiday Inn about nine and took our bags in with us so we could change in the restrooms later. The ballroom ceiling was dark, studded with pinpoints of light, as though we were dancing outside under the stars. Potted plants along the sides of the room gave the feel of an island veranda, and as we passed a mirrored wall, I caught a glimpse of my face and my hair—Marilyn’s dress with its satin-trimmed layers—and I looked good. No, I l
ooked great. My dress was different from all the other dresses—very elegant and sophisticated and chic.

  I didn’t feel especially chic or sophisticated or elegant—just good. Just me. Like I was almost comfortable with who I was right then. I liked Patrick’s friends. I liked the way he made friends—the way he could be different and still be funny, be smart, be Patrick.

  “Hey, babe,” he said, putting his hands on my waist and moving me out onto the dance floor.

  “Hey, guy,” I said, and put my head against his chest as we slow-danced along the edge of the ballroom.

  I was having a wonderful time, and yet not a single one of my close friends—other than Patrick—was here. I could be part of the senior crowd and no one looked at me as though I didn’t belong. I caught a glimpse of Don and Christy having their picture taken, and we danced by Scott and his date. I just smiled in his direction as Patrick turned me around and we moved on across the floor.

  At some point in the evening, when I went out on a balcony with Patrick, I almost told him that Pamela had miscarried. Then I caught myself, realizing it was Pamela’s secret—or story—to tell, not mine. Another one of those things you just “hold in your heart,” as they say, and learn to keep to yourself.

  So I just stood on the balcony with Patrick, my arms around his neck, the breeze in my hair.

  “You surprise me, Patrick,” I said after we’d kissed. “You look so good tonight. I mean, I figured you as a black tuxedo man, if you wore a tux at all.”

  “Symbol of my purity.” He grinned.

  When the couple who had been occupying the one bench went inside, Patrick and I took it over. He had his arm around me and pulled me closer.

  “Having a good time?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I said. “I like watching you enjoy yourself. You usually seem so … so busy. Like you’re running your life on a railroad timetable or something.”

  “That’s not a compliment, right?”

  “Just an observation. I like to see you having fun. Sometimes you seem so driven. Do you ever feel that way? Driven?”

  He appeared to be thinking it over. “Just the way I’m wired, I guess. Only child syndrome, I suppose.”