by Julia Watts
“Thanks.”
“Well, I can’t let you starve, can I? Listen, I think the evening’s starting to wind down”—she mouthed but didn’t say the words “thank God”—“I’ll drive you home after everybody leaves.” She gave me a little wink, like we were both in on the same joke, and left, softly shutting the door behind her.
Once all the goodnights were said, Iris opened the door of the nursery. “I’ll take you home now if you’re ready. Warren doesn’t like to drive at night.”
After we were in her car, Iris said, “Well, the best thing I can say about that is that it’s over.”
“It seemed to go fine.”
“You think so?” Iris pulled out of the driveway and into the road.
“Yeah, I do.” I watched the way the headlights brightened the dark street. I had never ridden in a car at night before, and something about barreling down the road in the darkness was kind of thrilling.
“I think it did, too,” Iris said. “I’m just exhausted from the smiling and the chit chat and all the things I had to do to make the right impression—clean all the ashtrays, hide my copy of Forever Amber…”
“You’re reading that book?”
Iris looked away from the road long enough to grin at me. “I am indeed. And I’m entertained, though I can’t say it’s up to my exacting literary standards.”
Forever Amber is far and away the most scandalous book in anybody’s remembrance. Preachers denounced it from pulpits all the time, so I wondered if Virgie’s daddy had read it to know what sin looked like on the page. “Is the book as”—I struggled for a way to ask my embarrassing question—“dirty as people say it is?”
“You bet it is,” Iris said, laughing. “Dirty enough to turn Eva Lynch’s hair snow white.”
I laughed at the image.
“Maybe sometime when you’re babysitting, you might find my copy of Forever Amber lying around. I won’t send it home with you, though. Your mother would be scandalized.”
“My mother would have my hide,” I said. “Mostly she don’t pay attention to what I read, but everybody knows about that book.” We had left Snob Hill and were coming to the muddy, low-lying land where us common folks live. “Oh, turn here,” I said.
When we came up on the camp—all those ugly little boxes planted close together in the mud—I suddenly wished I’d walked home.
“Is this your neighborhood?” she asked. If she thought it was ugly or pitiful, she had the good manners not to say so, and for that I was grateful.
“Yes,” I said.
She stopped the car and turned around in the seat to look at me. “Ruby, it really helped to have you at the house tonight and not just because you’re an extra pair of hands. I’m never any good at these kinds of gatherings where I have to wonder how I seem all the time. I don’t want to think about how I seem. I just want to be what I am, you know?”
I nodded.
“That’s what I like about spending time with you, Ruby. You accept me the way I am.”
I didn’t even think before I said, “I like the way you are.”
Iris smiled. “I like the way you are, too.”
She leaned over and gave me a quick, light kiss on the cheek. Nobody besides family members had ever done that to me before, and it made me feel all funny and fluttery. I blurted out goodnight, then ran inside, grabbed my diary, and tried to use my pencil to catch all the words that started tumbling out of me.
December 4, 1944
It feels like I haven’t written in here in a month of Sundays. But really, you can’t blame me. It’s the end of the semester, and I had to write a ten-page paper for English literature (I wrote about Samuel Pepys, naturally), plus I had to study for tests in biology and history and algebra. I never had to work so hard in school in Kentucky, but then I never learned this much there either.
Today was our last day of school before Christmas vacation, and nobody felt much like working. We had drawn names in homeroom, so we gave our presents to the people whose names we got. It seemed like just about everybody got a box of stationery or chocolate-covered cherries. I ended up with cherries, which was the same thing I’d bought for the person whose name I’d drawn. I was happy, though, because I had really struggled with not letting my sisters eat the cherries I’d bought and not eating them myself. But this box was mine free and clear. There are twelve cherries in the box, so each person in my family can have two.
In English lit we wrote Christmas cards to soldiers and ate sugar cookies Miss Connor brought from home. “It’s hard to believe,” Miss Connor said, “that when I see you in class next time, it will be a whole new year.”
“I wish it was a whole year before we had to go back to school,” Virgie whispered to me.
“Not me,” I said. “I’d miss it.”
“Yeah, but you’re weird,” Virgie whispered back.
On the way out of the classroom, I set a candy cane on Miss Connor’s desk. “Merry Christmas, Miss Connor,” I said.
She smiled her little gap-toothed smile. “Merry Christmas to you, too, Ruby. And remember to spend plenty of time during your vacation working on your ‘What America Means to Me’ essay. It needs to be ready as soon as you come back to school so I can submit it to the contest.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said. But I thought, boy, it’s a good thing Samuel Pepys wasn’t in school because if he had been, he never would’ve had time to write in his diary!
December 16, 1944
Iris is beside herself, and I’m pretty upset, too. Glenn Miller’s plane went down yesterday—well, I say it went down, but nobody knows for sure what happened to it. Iris said it’s hard to imagine living in a world without any more of Glenn Miller’s music. I tried to cheer her up. “He might be all right,” I said. “The reports ain’t saying he’s dead. They’re saying he’s disappeared.”
But he’s dead. People don’t just disappear, here one second and gone the next. Glenn Miller is—or was—a musician, not a magician. And as much as I’d like to think he landed safely on a sunny island and is drinking coconut juice on the beach with Amelia Earhart, what I really believe is that he, like so many less famous men, ended up sacrificing his life for his country in this long, hard war.
The reason I sat down to write today was to see if I could come up with an idea for the essay contest. At first I told myself I wouldn’t write in my diary at all for a while—that I’d turn all my thoughts to my essay instead.
Well, that idea was a miserable failure. I haven’t written a word of the dadblamed thing.
So now I’m thinking if I’m writing in my diary, at least I’m writing something. And something’s better than nothing, right? Also, maybe while I write in my journal, I can jot down some ideas for my essay:
What America Means to Me
Shoot, what does America mean to me? And why should it matter to anybody what America means to some ignorant, sixteen-year-old hillbilly girl?
But maybe that’s one of the important things about America—that somebody would even ask a nobody like me what America means to her. In America, it matters what you think. You can bet that Hitler’s not asking his people what Germany means to them. He’s telling them what it means to him, and if it doesn’t mean the same thing to them, they get shipped off to prison.
Here at least a person has the right to complain and to vote and to complain some more if the fellow they voted for doesn’t win. Our country doesn’t have to be made up of one big “we” where everybody thinks and acts the same way. But we can come together as a “we” when we need to, like with the war effort. I keep thinking of that picture of Rosie the Riveter showing her arm muscle and saying, “We Can Do It!” The American people have come together as a “we” to be strong and make sacrifices. The soldiers have made the biggest sacrifices, but everybody on the homefront has pitched in, too, with smaller sacrifices that make a big difference. All the Rosies picking up the slack in the factories, all the women who have set aside their vanity and gone without
new outfits or stockings, all the people who have done without the foods they like because of rationing or planted Victory Gardens or collected scrap metal or bought war bonds.
Oak Ridge may be one of the greatest examples of people coming together to make sacrifices for freedom. Here we have people of all kinds, from physicists to factory workers, from chemists to construction workers, from generals to janitors—all far from home, many away from loved ones and living in less than comfortable conditions—all working together, each contributing in his own individual way to the war effort. It’s that spirit of daring and cooperation and hard work and sacrifice that built America in the first place, and it’s the same spirit that will win us the war.
* * *
I just read back over what I wrote, and I guess I must be much better at writing than I am at thinking. When I told myself I wasn’t going to write for a while because I needed to think up ideas for my essay, I didn’t think up a dang thing. But when I sat down with my pencil a few minutes ago, it just started racing across the paper. I didn’t feel like I was thinking while I did it. But when I read back through it, there were my thoughts, right there in front of me. So now that I’ve seen what I think, maybe I’ll try to write the real essay.
December 27, 1944
On Christmas Eve morning, everybody woke up happy. Mama had already packed us each a change of clothes in the big cardboard suitcase she’d bought for the trip. Daddy had bought a roll of bologna, a loaf of white bread, and six bottles of orange pop for our lunch on the bus. Baby Pearl was dancing around the room while we were trying to get ready to go and singing, “Home! Home! Home! We’re going home!”
“Well, we’ve got to go home for Christmas,” Daddy said, “so Santy Claus’ll know where to find you. If we stayed here, he wouldn’t know how to pick out your little house from all the others that look just like it.”
“That’s right,” Mama said, laughing. “Now sit down with your sisters, Baby Pearl, and eat your breakfast. It’s gonna be a long ride today.”
“And I ain’t gonna be willing to break out the baloney sandwiches till it’s at least noon,” Daddy added.
Mama was right about the bus ride being long. It wasn’t bad, though, because the bus was full of happy people—construction workers, factory workers, janitors, and their families, all of them mountain people, all of them going home for Christmas. After a while we got to singing Christmas carols, which made the time pass faster, at least for those of us doing the singing. The bus driver never joined in, and I wondered if he wished we’d hush.
The driver needed to concentrate, I reckon, because at every little town—Lake City, Caryville, Lafollette, he had to stop and let people off. Sometimes he’d stop where there wasn’t even a town. He’d just let somebody off, and they’d start wandering down a holler.
When some of the kids started saying they had to go to the bathroom, the driver pulled off at a wooded place by the side of the road. The women and children took off to one edge of the woods, and then men went to the other. It was a pain to get my coat and skirt pulled up and my drawers pulled down, and I was so cold with my behind out in the open that my pee felt as hot as coffee. “This is just one more area where boys are luckier than girls,” I said to Opal, who was squatting beside me.
“Yeah, and they can write their name in the snow,” she said, giggling.
Garnet was standing beside us. “I’m not going,” she said. “I’ll wait till we get home.”
“It’s just an outhouse we’ve got at home,” Mama said. She was helping Baby Pearl with her clothes so she wouldn’t pee on them. “I don’t know why you’re acting like you’re the Queen of Sheba all of a sudden.”
“At least in an outhouse, there’s a place to sit,” Garnet said. “You don’t have to squat down in the dirt like a dog.”
On our next bathroom break, two hours later, Garnet wasn’t so proud. She dropped her drawers and squatted with the rest of us.
After the bus dropped a few passengers off in Jellico, we crossed the Kentucky state line, and everybody left on the bus cheered. “Ain’t you glad we got rid of all them Tennessee hillbillies?” Daddy said. “Now we’re all aboard the Briar Hopper Express!”
The bus dropped us in downtown Morgan, and Papaw was waiting for us, standing propped up against his farm truck, working on a big chaw of tobacco. His weathered face looked freshly shaved, and his silver hair was slicked back with Brylcreem. He had probably decided that since he was coming to town, he might as well pay a visit to the barber shop. As always, he wasn’t wearing an overcoat. Papaw dressed the same whether it was December or August: in layers consisting of a pair of overalls, a plaid flannel shirt, and long johns. He said the combination of clothing was perfect for keeping out the hot air and the cold air both. “There’s my girls!” he hollered, stretching out his arms. “Come give your papaw some sugar!”
We all ran to Papaw, but Garnet got there first. She’s always been Papaw’s girl. I hung back and let my sisters get their kisses first, then Papaw looked at me. “Well, look what a fine young heifer you’ve turned into!” he said, around his chaw of tobacco.
“Why, Papaw, if I didn’t know you thought cows was pretty, I’d be insulted,” I said.
Papaw laughed. “You’ve still got a mouth on you, I see. You ain’t got too big to hug your papaw’s neck, have you?”
“Of course not,” I said. I wrapped my arms around Papaw and breathed in his special old-man scent: tobacco, coffee, and dried apples.
Mama and Daddy got in the cab of the truck with Papaw, and we girls climbed in the back, which was full of straw. It was cold, but Granny had sent us a quilt to cover up with.
When we walked into Granny and Papaw’s little house, I breathed in two other happy smells: the cedar Christmas tree and Granny’s chicken and dumplings simmering on the stove. At the moment, though, I was more excited about the chicken and dumplings than the tree. It was past our usual suppertime, and the baloney sandwich I ate on the bus had worn off hours before.
Granny came bustling out of the kitchen, flour all over her apron and dress. “Well, look at you’uns,” she said.
Baby Pearl ran for her and wrapped her little arms around Granny’s thick middle.
“There’s my baby,” Granny said. “You know what me and your papaw did today? I kilt a rooster to make you some chicken and dumplings, and your papaw chopped you down a Christmas tree.”
After Granny hugged us and fussed over us, we sat down and ate her good chicken and dumplings till I was sure I couldn’t eat another bite. But then she brought out an apple stack cake, which is my favorite thing in the world, so I had to eat a big piece of it, too.
After we ate, Papaw and Daddy said they were going to look at the barn, which probably meant they were going to take a nip or two of moonshine. Garnet and Opal and Baby Pearl got busy stringing popcorn and making paper chains to hang on the Christmas tree, and I helped Mama and Granny with the dishes.
“So,” Granny said, handing me a plate to dry, “I reckon every young feller in Tennessee is after you now, Ruby.”
“Not hardly,” I said, laughing.
“Well, as nice as you’re filling out, they soon will be,” Granny said. “You know, I was your age when I married your papaw.” She handed me another dish. “It’s your job to give me a great-grandson before I die.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” I said, but I only said it because I love Granny and didn’t want to disappoint her by saying that I don’t want to be a mother till after I’ve gotten an education, and I don’t want to be a wife ever.
After the tree was decorated and Granny had made us sticky-sweet popcorn balls out of the popcorn that didn’t get strung, it was time for Mama, Daddy, my sisters and me to go back to our little house so Granny and Papaw could rest. It was strange to be in our two rooms again, and even though Granny had dusted and swept there regularly, there was still something stale about the air. Everything looked so bare and untouched, it was almost like being in the h
ouse of someone who’d died. But when we girls settled down on our pallets on the floor and Mama and Daddy snuggled down in their bed, Mama said, “Lord, it’s good to be home,” and Baby Pearl said, “Amen.”
It seemed like everybody but me was asleep within seconds. But I lay there a long time, listening to the quiet.
Christmas morning at Granny and Papaw’s, my sisters and I found each of our stockings stuffed with peanuts and an orange and a candy cane. There were unwrapped Santa Claus presents under the tree of the younger girls: a baby doll for Baby Pearl and a cute stuffed puppy dog for Garnet which I knew she’d want to keep on her bed. There were wrapped presents for Opal and me: pretty fake fur winter hats with matching muffs. And Granny had knitted a cream-colored sweater for each of us girls and one for Mama, too. We ate biscuits and gravy and sausage, and eggs fresh from the henhouse. After breakfast, Daddy and Papaw went off to shoot their shotguns—a Christmas tradition that’s never made much sense to me. And Mama and my sisters settled around the fireplace, listening to Granny talk about what people they knew who had had babies or gotten sick or lost a family member in the war.
I put on my coat and new hat and muff and went for a walk. Even though we’d been there for such a short time, I was still gripped by my old restlessness. There was nothing to read, nowhere to go. But everybody else seemed so happy. I wondered, not for the first time, what was wrong with me.
About five o’clock, after a late dinner of ham and sweet potatoes, Daddy said, “Well, Papaw, I reckon you’d better drive us on into town soon. The bus is picking us up at six o’clock.”
“Mercy,” Granny said, “it seems like you’uns just got here.”
Baby Pearl let out a high-pitched wail the likes of which we hadn’t heard since she was a toddler. “No!” she screamed. “No! You said we was going home!”
