Nora

by Constance C. Greene

  Both babies roused themselves as if on signal, raised their little heads, and started bawling.

  “Mention food and those kids go crazy,” the man said proudly.

  “Are they twins?” I asked the man.

  “Not that I know of,” the man said.

  A man wearing a hairy cowboy hat and hairy sideburns and high-heeled cowboy boots slid into the space left when the man and woman went off with the babies.

  “Would that go with my draperies or would it clash?” He meant our mother’s portrait. “I have absolutely no eye for color.” The man turned to me. “My furniture is upholstered in a beige fabric, sort of nubby, and my draperies are red and green and beige. What do you think?”

  “It’s not for sale,” Patsy said.

  The man’s eyes snapped open and looked as if they might explode. “What do you mean, not for sale? I never heard of such a thing! They got me all the way out here and then tell me it’s not for sale? That’s practically fraudulent. I have never been so insulted in my entire life.”

  Patsy and I watched him stomp off on the high-heeled cowboy boots.

  “My horse, my horse, my kingdom for a horse,” I said.

  “Those heels take a lot of practice,” Patsy said. “That dude’ll be lucky to make it down the steps. You know,” Patsy said, smiling, “I think I like these wine and cheese affairs. There are more weirdos at them than you usually see at parties. I think I’ll have a glass of wine. How about you?”

  “You better not,” I said. “Daddy will scalp you if he finds out you’re drinking wine.”

  “There she is.” A pretty woman smiled at Mother in her red shawl. “That’s Buffy, all right. Dee told me she was here. It’s a glorious likeness. We were friends when we were children.”

  That’s what they called our mother, “Buffy.” Her real name was Elizabeth.

  “She’s our mother,” Patsy said.

  “Of course. Of course. How absolutely perfect that I should run into you.” The woman put out her hands and each of us took one.

  “My name is Jane Morris. Your mother was like a sister to me when we were children. We lived on the same street, went to the same school. Then my family moved to the West Coast and we lost touch. Is your father here? I’d like to tell him how sorry I was when I heard your mother had died. Dee wrote me, but I was out of the country and didn’t get the letter for ages.”

  “I think he’s over there,” Patsy said, standing on tiptoes, scanning the crowd. “Nora, go see if you can find Daddy, tell him a friend of Mother’s is here.”

  “You go,” I said. “I’ll stay here and keep her company. You’re much better at finding people than I am.”

  I talked to Jane Morris while Patsy went for Daddy. She told me she had her own public relations firm in Chicago and was in New York on business. Dee had sent her an invitation, never thinking she’d come out from the city for this party.

  “I had to come,” Jane Morris said. “Something made me come.” She told me all sorts of things about our mother I’d never heard before. About how they used to play baseball in the schoolyard every day after lunch. “Your mother was a terrific second baseman,” she said. “And you should’ve seen her when we started to go to boy-girl parties. That was in fifth grade, I think, maybe sixth. We played Spin the Bottle. Oh, how she spun that bottle.” Jane Morris rolled her eyes. “It was a sight to see! No boy in the place was safe. She’d just grab hold of whoever the bottle pointed to and kiss him until she was ready to let go. She was very strong. The boys didn’t have a chance. I used to watch in awe and admiration. I was kind of a goofy kid, young for my age. But your mother was a ringleader. And when we went to dancing school, all done up in our velvet dresses and white gloves, Buffy’d dash across the floor and nab the boy she wanted to dance with.”

  Oh, I could just see her, racing to be the first to reach a certain boy. Her long legs flashing as she skidded across the dance floor. How I wish I’d been there. She’d have that determined look on her face that I remembered, too. And she’d have on her black velvet dress and her Mary Jane shoes and little white socks. We have a picture of her in that outfit. She told Patsy and me that when she was eleven or twelve all girls wore little white socks and didn’t get to wear silk stockings until they went to college. She said panty hose hadn’t been invented when she was a girl. Patsy and I didn’t believe her. Mother had a tendency to exaggerate to make a story better.

  Someone laughed close by and I thought, She’s here! But when I turned to look, I saw a blond woman waving her hands and tossing her hair out of her eyes in a girlish way, although she was no girl. And her laugh wasn’t the least like Mother’s.

  When I was in second grade, I had a friend named Stephanie. She and her sister Lu had an imaginary friend named Calvin. They took Calvin everywhere, on picnics and to climb trees and into the woods to hunt wildflowers. I thought it was kind of strange they both had the same imaginary friend, but I didn’t say anything. They even set a place for Calvin at their family’s dinner table. Stephanie and Lu had three brothers and two sisters, so when Calvin (who was a picky eater anyway) sat down at the table, nobody even noticed he was there.

  Could I be imagining my mother’s ghost?

  Fourteen

  Next morning Patsy floated in with my breakfast on a tray. I hate breakfast in bed. Patsy thinks it’s classy.

  “It’s Martha Stewart here!” she cried.

  Martha Stewart’s this perfect person who writes books telling how to throw a wedding reception for three hundred and fifty guests and do all the work yourself. She came to our local bookstore to autograph her books, and there was a line that reached all around the block.

  “First you bone a hundred turkeys,” she starts off. Then she rushes on to the cake. “Separate twelve dozen eggs, making sure no whites get into the yolks.” Or vice versa. I’m never sure which shouldn’t get into which.

  “Sit up, Norrie! Don’t forget breakfast’s the most important meal of the day!” Patsy cried.

  I snuggled deeper into my pillow and made noises.

  “Sit up, I said! I went to all this trouble just for you. We have here eggs Benedict with hollandaise sauce, freshly squeezed orange juice, pits and all, and cinnamon nut coffee cake,” Patsy read off a menu.

  I sat up. Sometimes it’s easier to give in than to fight her. Besides, it all sounded very delicious.

  Patsy slapped the tray down on my stomach. “Enjoy! Bon appétit!”

  “You are a fraud,” I said sourly. The string of the tea bag dangled limply over the side of the cup and the toast sat in the toast rack getting colder by the minute. A sad little dab of marmalade completed the scene.

  Patsy and I bought that toast rack at a flea market. “It’s very British,” the flea market lady told us. “They always put toast in one of those gizmos.”

  “How come?” I said. “It’ll only get cold faster.”

  “They like cold toast,” the lady said. “You can have it for a buck. I’m losing money on the deal, but I have to wind up here and get to Florida.”

  “All we’ve got is fifty cents,” Patsy said.

  “It’s yours.” The lady handed over the toast rack and we were stuck with it.…

  “Okay.” Patsy plunked down on the foot of my bed. I could tell she wanted to be friends and forget Chuck.

  Daddy knocked and stuck his head in.

  “Just wanted to make sure we’re on for tonight,” he said. “I’m about to call Wynne Ames and set a time. Seven all right for you? Wear something pretty. Dresses, please. This is an event. I want you both to look smashing.”

  The Tooth is “in fashion”—a fashion consultant or something unreal like that. I can take fashion or leave it alone.

  “That Mrs. Morris is very nice, Daddy,” Patsy said. “She told Nora lots of interesting things about Mother when she was little. Maybe you should ask her for a date.”

  “Sure,” Daddy said, “fine.” And he disappeared.

  “I don’t thi
nk Mrs. Morris’s divorced,” Patsy said. “She didn’t look divorced.”

  “Give it up,” I told her. “And get off my bed. If I’m going to eat this mess, I want peace and quiet, not some great lump bouncing on the mattress.”

  That was a mistake. Patsy started bouncing up and down vigorously, and the tea slopped over the cold toast and hit the marmalade.

  “I don’t have a dress,” Patsy said. “I’m wearing my fake leather mini and my denim shirt. If The Tooth doesn’t like it, tough.”

  “You wear that and you might have to stay home,” I said. “Daddy’d have a fit, never mind The Tooth.”

  “Yeah.” Patsy grinned her evil grin. “I might have to stay home and brood all night about you guys having a good time in Darien.” I listened to her cackling like the wicked witch of the West all the way downstairs.

  You know how sometimes you think something’s going to be absolutely awful? Like a school dance in the gym. Or a party someone asks you to and you don’t know a soul except the person who asked you, but you go anyway because you talk yourself into going? Mostly, when you expect the worst, things turn out to be not as bad as expected. Well, our dinner with Daddy and The Tooth turned out to be so much worse than I thought it would be it wasn’t even funny. By the end of the evening I wanted to slide under the table and disappear.

  In the first place, Chuck Whipple was at the dinner theater with his family. Sitting three tables away from us. I had just sat down when I saw Chuck. He saw me and waved a little.

  Patsy had cleaned up her act and looked pretty nice in her navy blue dress, which is way too tight across her bust. I looked sort of cute in my red-and-white striped dress, which resembles a beach umbrella. It is also pretty long, halfway to my ankles, which was just as well because I could feel the big rip in my panty hose getting bigger and bigger as I ate my soup. Every time I breathed, that rip expanded, up and down my leg. Probably by the time I got up the whole leg would be dragging on the floor as it followed me like a puppy all the way to the ladies’ room.

  “Such a pretty frock,” The Tooth purred, checking me out. She does that, sort of purrs when she’s being insincere, which is most of the time. She takes inventory of you with her eyes, checks out every wrinkle, every spot of mustard, sees every safety pin holding your underwear together. She herself, as we already knew, bought Victoria’s Secret stuff up the wazoo.

  “She looks at me as if she thinks I have hairy armpits,” Patsy had said after her first experience with The Tooth’s X-ray vision.

  “But you do have hairy armpits,” I had reminded her. Patsy doesn’t shave under her arms or eat red meat. If there’s a connection there, it escapes me.

  Now, to set matters straight, I said, “It’s not a frock, it’s a dress.”

  The Tooth looked at me oddly, then said to my father, “Perhaps we should have some champagne, Sam.” She laid her hand on Daddy’s arm. “In celebration of this momentous event, being with your family tonight. I’m thrilled to be a part of it.”

  Daddy called the waiter over and ordered champagne. “Two glasses, please,” he said. That meant none for us. I have never had champagne. Patsy sneaked some last year at our cousin’s wedding. It made her tipsy, as well as sick as a dog. Patsy says she may never drink champagne again.

  The waiter brought two champagne glasses and two plain glasses for Patsy and me.

  “Are we having Shirley Temples?” Patsy asked, wide-eyed. I kicked her under the table. We were at the awkward age when we were too old for Shirley Temples and too young for champagne.

  We drank Perrier with a twist of lemon.

  I managed to sit so I could keep Chuck Whipple under scrutiny. He kept looking over at us. Too bad there was no dancing here. Maybe he’d ask me to dance.

  The Tooth kept putting her hand on Daddy’s arm. Oh ho, I thought. It’s the old territorial imperative routine. A dog pees on a tree, the next dog who comes along pees on the same tree, only higher up. That’s territorial imperative. So I put my hand on Daddy’s arm, a little higher than where The Tooth’s hand rested, sending her a message she could not fail to understand.

  Speaking of peeing, during the lull between dessert and the beginning of the play, I excused myself to go to the ladies’ room. Never miss an opportunity to pee, as the Duke of Wellington once said. Patsy was gabbing to Daddy about something so I went without her.

  When I came out of the ladies’, I bumped smack into Chuck Whipple. He acted surprised to see me, even though we’d been tossing goo-goo eyes at each other all evening.

  “Come on over and meet my parents,” Chuck said.

  “Sure, that’d be fine,” I said. I followed him to the table. Chuck’s father stood up and shook my hand. His brother did, too. The girlfriend hardly acknowledged my presence. Chuck’s stepmother was friendly and nice.

  Without warning, Chuck’s stepmother got up and said, “Nora, come along with me, dear,” and she sort of pushed me in front of her, all the way to the ladies’ room.

  “But I was just there,” I said. “I don’t …”

  Chuck’s stepmother reached behind me and tugged at my dress. I backed off. “What’s the matter?” I said.

  “Your dress got tucked up inside your panty hose,” she said. “I just pulled it down. Now everything’s fine. I got you in quick before anyone saw. There now. Turn so I can make sure it’s right.”

  Face aflame, I did as she said. My dress had been hiked up high, tucked inside the waistband of my panty hose, showing my bare behind, not to mention my panty hose full of holes, hanging out there for the world to see.

  “I’m sure no one saw, Nora,” Chuck’s stepmother said. “Rest easy.”

  I could die. The rest of the evening was ruined. I tried to act as if I was enjoying the play, but I was in the pits. He had seen my rear end hanging out, my panty hose that looked like Swiss cheese. He must’ve had a good laugh. Oh, I could just die, go right through the floor and not come back up for fifty years.

  I never wanted to see Chuck Whipple ever again. Never, ever again.

  Fifteen

  When we first got home I dry-heaved into the toilet bowl for a while. Patsy kept asking me what was wrong. I couldn’t talk to her, couldn’t tell her what had happened. I couldn’t speak of the unspeakable.

  I couldn’t sleep. I kept seeing myself walking across the restaurant with my bare behind hanging out. No wonder they smiled as I passed by. No wonder they all laughed and pointed at me. Chuck Whipple must’ve been sorry he asked me over to his table to meet his parents. They must’ve thought I was some total weirdo, some cretin who didn’t know enough to pull her skirt down. Nerd. Oaf. There weren’t enough words to describe me. I was a loser.

  At last, after tossing and turning like a whirligig, I went down to get something to eat.

  It was dark downstairs, but I didn’t need any light. I went to the refrigerator and got an orange, which I took into the living room to eat. I brought along a paper napkin to catch the drips. Still in the dark, I sat on the couch and ate the orange. It tasted good. I like the dark. I like sitting by myself and thinking about things. Life. Mother. Death. Bare skin hanging out of holey panty hose. I kept seeing Chuck Whipple with his mouth open, laughing at me. Making fun of me. If Mother were here she’d know what to say to make me feel better.

  It took me a few seconds to realize I wasn’t alone.

  The sound of a man clearing his throat made me jump.

  “Daddy? It’s me, Nora.”

  He didn’t answer, but I could hear him breathing.

  “What’s wrong, Daddy?”

  “I thought the evening went well,” he said.

  Not for me, I thought.

  “I’m sorry you don’t like Wynne. She thinks both you and Patsy are charmers.” His voice was only a little blurred, a little angry.

  “I think you could’ve pretended you liked her,” he said.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, unable to say more.

  My father raised his voice and in his
formal way, he said, “Your mother would understand. She’d know right now I’m just going through the motions, connecting the dots, so to speak. If she were here, she’d give me her blessing.” He paused. “Of course, if she were here, it wouldn’t be necessary, would it?”

  His voice sounded very tired.

  The down cushions on the couch sighed as they always did when someone sat on them. Across from me I could see the vague outline of my father sitting in his usual big chair.

  I tried to turn, to see who was there, but my head wouldn’t move. I thought I might be hallucinating. I put out my hand and felt my fingers held, a warm touch. A touch so warm, so loving, so familiar I was not afraid. Then I felt cold run up my arm. It was a terrible cold, unlike any cold I had ever known before.

  I must’ve made a noise. My father said, “What’s wrong, darling?”

  I wasn’t sure if he was talking to me or to her.

  It didn’t matter. She was there, in the room. I knew she was. We sat in silence, the three of us. I wished I had a sweater. The cold was like a prèsence. I scarcely dared swallow for fear of disturbing the quiet.

  She will give us a sign and soon. Very soon, I thought.

  Gradually the cold receded. So gradually it took me a while to realize it was gone. She had gone, too. I longed to turn on the light, to see if there was any trace of her, to see my father’s face. I wondered if he knew.

  “Well.” My father’s voice sounded thin and very far away. “I’m going to turn in. Good night, darling.” I listened to him climb the stairs slowly, heard him go into his room and close the door.

  I got up stiffly, feeling old before my time. Still in the dark, I went to Patsy’s room and laid my hand against her face.

  Patsy sat up.

  “Your hand’s freezing,” she said crossly.

  I opened my mouth to say, Mother came back. She was here.

  Instead, I said, “What’s the other reason Daddy wants to marry her?”

  “It’s the middle of the night, Nora. You must be on drugs,” Patsy said.