Secret City

by Julia Watts

  “Not peculiar,” I said. “Just different.”

  “It’s habit I got into Saturday nights after we moved here,” Mrs. West said, splitting a biscuit and dousing it with gravy. “We go to the show on Saturday nights, so we’re kindly in a hurry. One night, I didn’t have time to cook up a full supper so I cooked breakfast instead. Everybody liked it, so I just kept right on doing it.”

  “I like it, too,” I said. I especially liked the bacon, which was a rare treat these days. “And the catheads is real good.”

  After Virgie and I helped Mrs. West clear the table, we all walked to Townsite to the show. Virgie wanted to sit in the front row, and I was the only one who’d sit there with her. I believe she would’ve sat touching the screen if she could have. Watching Virgie watch the show was almost more interesting than the show itself. Through the newsreel, the Daffy Duck cartoon, the Western serial, and the main feature, she sat with her eyes open wide, almost as if she was willing herself not to blink. She leaned forward in her seat, getting even closer to the screen, and her mouth gaped the way that would’ve made my mother ask if she was “catching flies.” Virgie wasn’t sitting next to me, not really. She was in the world on the screen.

  I poked her in the arm once to see if she would notice me. She brushed me away absently, as if a fly had landed on her.

  Later, when we sat barefoot and Indian-style on her bed, Virgie hugged a pillow to her chest and said, “So, who’s your favorite leading man?”

  “You know,” I said, “I’ve never really thought about.” I racked my brain until an interesting face popped up. “But I do like Humphrey Bogart real good. He’s smart. And tough.”

  Virgie crinkled her nose and stuck out her tongue. “Tough like an old piece of shoe leather. He ain’t a bit good-looking. What about Tyrone Power?”

  “He is real handsome, but I don’t guess I find handsome to be that interesting. For some reason, I always notice women in movies more. I guess I like to pick out who I want to be like.”

  “I do that, too, sometimes,” Virgie said, resting her chin on her pillow. “So what actresses do you like?”

  “Well, I love Barbara Stanwyck because she’s such a good actress. She’s a different person in every single movie she’s in, you know? But my all-time favorite had got to be Bette Davis.”

  “Are you kidding?” Virgie’s eyes were wide with shock. “Barbara Stanwyck’s as scrawny as a goat, and Bette Davis looks like one of them pop-eyed little dogs people bring back from Mexico. I can’t believe you’d rather look at them than Rita Hayworth.”

  “I didn’t say nothing about their looks. I was thinking about being like them—smart and confident and nobody’s fool, you know? There ain’t much point in picking out what movie star I want to look like. I look how I look, and it sure ain’t like Rita Hayworth.”

  “No, you don’t,” Virgie said. “But I’ve got red hair like she does. Too bad I’ve got all these freckles, though. Rita wouldn’t be wearing them strapless gowns if she had freckly shoulders like mine.”

  Virgie didn’t shut up about movie stars until I fell asleep. Of course, I’m just assuming she shut up then. For all I know, she could’ve chattered on all night with me sleeping beside her. As it was, though, I didn’t hear a thing till she was shaking my shoulder and saying, “You’d better get dressed for church.”

  “Oh, are we going to church?” I asked, confused for a minute to be waking up in a strange place.

  There’s one main church in Oak Ridge. Mother and Daddy have taken us there a few times, but we didn’t really feel much at home there. It’s called the United Church Chapel on the Hill, and they have services for all kinds of religions, Baptist or Methodist or Catholic. I’ve heard tell the Jews even have services there on Saturdays.

  “We ain’t going to the big church,” Virgie said. “Daddy says the people there ain’t right with the Lord. They’ll let anybody have church there, even the Catholics, and they ain’t even real Christians on accounta them worshipping the Pope, so we don’t go to the church. The church comes to us.”

  I thought about telling her I was pretty sure she was wrong about Catholics worshipping the Pope, but I was so confused by what she’d said about the church coming to us that I didn’t really know what to say.

  I soon found out what she meant. No sooner than we’d had time to dress and have a glass of milk and a cold biscuit apiece, people started knocking on the door: young men in overalls, young women with babies on their hips, a couple of older fellows in guard uniforms. A skinny-necked, buck-toothed boy who was probably just a couple of years older than Virgie and me came in carrying a guitar. Soon there were a dozen people besides the Wests and me crammed into the living room.

  Mr. West stood up, holding a fat Bible in his hand. “Now brothers and sisters,” he said, “we ain’t supposed to shout on accounta the other people living in this building. We ain’t supposed to wake up the sinners that likes to sleep late of a Sunday. But I tell you what—I feel like shouting this morning!”

  “Amen!” the buck-toothed boy with the guitar called.

  Mr. West was pacing back and forth, holding his Bible high. “I feel like shouting because I’ve got the Lord in my heart this morning!”

  Amens.

  “I feel like shouting because I am happy in the Lord!”

  More amens.

  “I feel like shouting because I am sanctified!”

  “Preach it, brother!” one of the guards said.

  “Now I’ve got to tell you,” Mr. West said, his eyes scanning over his listeners. “They’s people in this town that thinks they’re safe in the arms of Jesus. But they ain’t! They think they can go to a fancy white church on a hill once a week and do what they want to do the rest of the week, and the Lord won’t mind. But the Lord has His eyes open every day of the week, and He sees all and knows all.”

  Somebody said, “That’s right.”

  “He sees all and knows all,” Mr. West said, “and He knows the ways of the world is wicked.” He shook his head and repeated, “Wicked. I went to the picture show last night, brothers and sisters. And do you know what I seen?”

  “What did you see, Brother?” Buck Tooth asked.

  “I seen sin and degradation! I seen women in low-cut dresses drinking liquor and smoking cigarettes and running around with men that wasn’t their husbands…”

  Virgie nudged me and whispered, “Daddy goes to the show Saturday night so he’ll have something to preach about Sunday morning.”

  “Why does he let you go?” I whispered back.

  “He says if I see what sin looks like up on the screen, I’ll know what it looks like in person and run the other direction,” she whispered back; then she grinned.

  I wondered how Mr. West would feel if he knew about the shoebox of movie star photos that Virgie opened far more often than she opened her Bible. Or if he knew that Virgie had talked to me in worshipful tones about Tyrone Power and Rita Hayworth, but never about Jesus. At the movies, Virgie had sat in a trance, her eyes fixed on the screen. During her daddy’s sermon, though, she was as fidgety as she was at school. Mr. West might think the movies are teaching his daughter how not to be, but here’s what I think: The movies are Virgie’s religion. She might get more interested in Jesus if Tyrone Power was to play him.

  November 24, 1944

  The Knoxville News-Sentinel today was full of pictures of dirty, tired-eyed U.S. servicemen squatting in trenches and bombed-out buildings eating chunks of Thanksgiving turkey out of tin plates. The caption described each soldier as “enjoying his Thanksgiving dinner.” I couldn’t help wondering, if I was eating my dinner crouched alone in rubble and in danger of being shot at, would I really be enjoying it? And would I feel thankful? I guess our boys should be thankful they have the freedom they’re trying to get for people in other countries, but I don’t know if I’d be able to feel too grateful if I was thousands of miles from my family on a big holiday. I must be too selfish to be a soldier.

&
nbsp; Or maybe, like so many people in this country, I’m just ready for this war to be won and over with. FDR has called for the time between now and Christmas to be a national period of thanksgiving and prayer in hopes of victory overseas. I guess the Republicans are thankful they got to celebrate Thanksgiving at the regular time instead of the earlier date FDR had set for it the past few years. Franksgiving, the Republicans called it.

  My family’s taking the prayer and thanksgiving seriously. Daddy said a blessing at dinner, though it wasn’t as long as Mr. West’s (The biscuits were still warm when he finished). And after dinner, Mama brought out the family Bible and read the verse about turning swords into plowshares. She says she’s going to read us a Bible verse a day until the war’s over.

  I have to say looking at the pictures of those soldiers made me thankful. Sure, I was thankful not to be them—not to be scared and dirty and in danger—but I was also thankful to them for giving up their safety and comfort to help people they didn’t even know. I’m thankful for the soldiers, and I’m thankful to FDR, too, and in the spirit of thankfulness, I’m going to close this entry with a list of some other people and things I’m thankful for.

  My family: I’m the odd duck in the group, but I know they love me even if they don’t always understand me.

  Iris: not just for giving me a job, but for being my friend and treating me like I have a brain even though she’s older and smarter and more educated and sophisticated than me.

  Baby Sharon: for all those gummy grins she flashes at me. Her smiles are special because she doesn’t dole them out to just anybody.

  Miss Connor: for choosing me for the essay contest and looking me in the eye and saying “when you go to college.”

  Virgie: even though she can’t shut up for two seconds.

  The Oak Ridge Public Library: because it’s the best thing that ever happened to me.

  This town: Because sometimes everything’s so new and wonderful I feel like Dorothy in the Land of Oz, but I’m not like Dorothy because I got to bring my family here and so except to visit Granny and Papaw, I don’t want to go back home at all.

  November 27, 1944

  Iris offered me some work this weekend—not because she and Warren were going out but because they were staying home and entertaining. “I need that extra pair of hands,” she said as we sat in her living room, “to help with the house and the dinner and Baby Sharon and”—she shook her head, all in a tizzy—“You wouldn’t happen to have an extra-extra pair of hands hidden somewhere, would you?”

  “How many people you got coming?” I asked.

  “Eva and her husband and Hannah and her husband.”

  “Just four besides you and Warren. Shoot, that’s nothing. My mama cooks for that many people every night of her life.”

  “Yes, but your mother can probably cook, unlike some people.”

  “You’ll do fine. Just cook up a big pot of something that stretches a long way—soup beans or squirrel and dumplings or something.”

  Iris laughed. “I’d just about do it to see the look on Eva Lynch’s prim little face when she hears that squirrel and dumplings are on the menu.”

  Saturday afternoon I went over to Iris’s and saw that all the ashtrays had been emptied, all the books had been shelved, and all the newspapers and magazines had been put away. Baby Sharon was crawling around on the clean, swept floor, and a spicy smell was coming from the kitchen which was surprisingly good to be Iris’s cooking.

  Iris came out of the kitchen wearing her frilly pink apron over her skirt and sweater. The apron was splashed with orange stains. “Looks like somebody else’s house, doesn’t it?”

  “It looks nice,” I said. “I don’t know if you need this extra pair of hands after all.”

  “I do so need them,” Iris said, taking my hands and squeezing them. “Do you really think that fussy girl here is going to settle down and go to sleep with all these people in the house? I’ll need your hands to tend to her while I tend to the company. Right now, though, I’m going to sit down and smoke a cigarette. I’m a nervous wreck.” Iris flopped down on the couch, and I flopped beside her.

  “What are you nervous for? Mrs. Lynch and Mrs. McGill come over here all the time with your house looking like it usually does.”

  “Yes,” Iris said, lighting up and taking a puff. “But they don’t come with their husbands. Warren works under Eva’s husband at the lab, so this is one of those occasions where the wife has to make the home nice to welcome the husband’s boss. I don’t play these kinds of games very well, I’m afraid.”

  “You’ll do fine,” I said. “Anybody in his right mind would be impressed by you.”

  “Thanks, Ruby. That’s the real reason I asked you here, you know. You always make me feel better. I knew I could get through tonight if I could look over and see your face.”

  Iris was leaned against the back of the couch, and she turned her head and smiled at me. The smoke around her face made a sort of veil, and her blue eyes shone behind it, blurred and dreamy. I felt like there was something I needed to say to her, but I didn’t know what it was.

  “Oh, I took your cooking advice,” she said, sitting up straighter. “Not about the squirrel and dumplings, but about cooking a one-pot meal. I found a recipe for chili in the cookbook Warren’s mother gave me for a wedding present. Subtle, eh? But the recipe makes what little meat I could buy go a long way, and it was so imprecise it seemed nearly impossible to ruin.”

  “It smells good,” I said. But then Iris hit herself in the forehead. “What’s the matter?”

  “Crackers! I forgot crackers. We hardly have any, and the ones we have are so stale only Sharon will eat them. You can’t have chili without crackers.”

  “Sure you can. Chili’s just a fancy pot of beans, ain’t it? You can make cornbread instead.”

  Iris raised an eyebrow. “I can make cornbread?”

  “Okay, I can make cornbread. And I’ll teach you how to make it while I do it.” I stood up, reached out my hand to help Iris from the couch, then stooped down to pick up Baby Sharon to take her to the kitchen with us.

  “See, I told you I needed that extra pair of hands,” Iris said.

  * * *

  The cornbread was a big hit. I had my doubts at first because everybody was dressed so fancy they didn’t look like the cornbread-eating type at all. Mrs. Lynch and Mrs. McGill both had on black dresses with pearl necklaces. Dr. Lynch—that’s what Iris called him—was a salt-and-pepper-haired gentleman in a fancy suit and tie who put me in mind of Clifton Webb a little bit. It wasn’t that he looked so much like Clifton Webb; I guess it was more that he had a prissy manner and a mustache. Mr. McGill was younger and stouter and had black slicked-over hair like men in magazine advertisements. When Iris called him Dr. McGill at first, he was quick to say, “Nope, just Mr. McGill. All I’ve got is a lowly B.S. degree—and we know what ‘B.S.’ stands for!”

  “That’s all I’ve got, too,” Iris said, laughing politely.

  “Same here,” Mrs. McGill said.

  “So I guess I’ve got a degree that qualifies me to sit around and talk to the wives,” Mr. McGill said. “Seriously, though, everybody call me Tom.”

  Dr. Lynch didn’t tell anybody to call him by his first name.

  “Who’d like a cold beer?” Warren said. His almost too-cheerful tone made it obvious that he was as nervous as Iris.

  I figured if these folks were going to get liquored up, I should probably get the baby out of the room. I said, “Say good night, Baby Sharon,” and let all the ladies cootchie-coo at her before I took her to her room.

  From then on I stayed in Sharon’s room, but I managed to eavesdrop on a lot of the conversation. The women chattered about their children, and the men talked about sports. Everybody talked about the new Oak Ridge Symphony and how wonderful it was to bring some culture to this isolated part of the country. This led them to talk about the cities they came from and what they missed about them: the theatres, the ballet,
the restaurants.

  Once everybody settled down to eat, I heard Mrs. Lynch say, “Well, Iris, you’re always saying you can’t cook, but this chili is delicious.”

  “And the bread is wonderful,” Mrs. McGill said. “It’s crispy on the outside, but inside it has the texture of cake. I’ve never had anything like it.”

  “I can’t take credit for the cornbread, I’m afraid,” Iris said. “Ruby made it.”

  “Oh, your little babysitter?” Mrs. Lynch said. “Well, that makes sense. Cornbread is native to the people of the Appalachians.”

  The way she said “the people of the Appalachians” made us sound like some tribe you’d see in a Tarzan movie.

  It got harder to follow the conversation after they finished eating. The women stayed in the dining room, and the men moved to the living room, so I only caught dibs and dabs of the overlapping conversations without being able to tell which person was saying what. From the dining room: “Yes, not too bad, just a little queasy in the morning…ginger ale and soda crackers are my salvation.” From the living room: “Now that we’re away from the ladies, how about another round of beers, Warren…more of a football man myself…about what you’d expect from the Japs…”

  I tried to listen to the men more than the women in hopes that one of them might say something about the work they did all day. But nobody did. The only secret I found out from eavesdropping was that Mrs. McGill is expecting a baby.

  After a while, the women and the men begged Warren to play something on the violin. I figured he was happy to oblige since small talk wasn’t exactly a specialty of his. Baby Sharon had been sitting up in her crib wide-eyed, eavesdropping like me, I reckon, but as soon as she heard her daddy’s violin, her eyelids got all droopy. She lay down on her belly, stuck her diaper-padded behind up in the air, and went right to sleep.

  Before Warren had even finished his song, Iris pushed the door open. She was carrying a tray with a bowl of chili, a hunk of cornbread, and a glass of milk. “Oh, good. She’s out,” she said, glancing at Sharon. “You can eat in peace.” Iris looked around. “I guess I’ll just set your tray on the floor. Putting it on the changing table doesn’t seem very appetizing.”