The Divorce Express

by Paula Danziger

  Now we have an arrangement. When I stay overnight, Duane doesn’t. What they do when I’m not there I don’t want to know about.

  Maybe I’m a prude, but I don’t like to think about my parents having sex with anyone but each other. Even that is more than I want to think about.

  I pull on the lavender unicorn-shirt, jeans, cowboy boots, leg warmers. It sure is beginning to get cold here. I put a feather barrette in my hair.

  All I need now is the ride to Rosie’s.

  My father calls out, “Phoebe, ready yet? I want to get to the sales early.”

  Garage sales. He’s been doing a lot of them lately. Since he gave up work, he worries a lot about money and is trying to be careful, so that his savings last until he gets accepted into an art gallery. We used to have lots of money. I think my mother still does. My father, though, worries more and more about it lately. So do I.

  “Ready, honey?” He picks up the car keys. “You look great.”

  I put on my sweat-shirt jacket.

  “It’s getting cold.” He sighs. “You’ve grown a lot. We’ll have to buy you a new coat.”

  “I’ll get one when I see Mom,” I say, and then, not wanting him to feel bad about the money, I add, “Or I can hold out till the January sales.”

  He shakes his head. “Don’t be silly. We’re not that poor.”

  “You pay for all the day-to-day stuff,” I say, kissing him. “She can pay for the coat. After all, if I were living with her, she’d be paying more. In lots of families people pay child support to the parent who’s got the kid most of the time. So don’t worry.”

  As we get into the car he says, “If people had told me a few years ago that we’d be having this discussion, I’d have said they were nuts.”

  We drive in silence for a while.

  If only I can think of a way to get him out of this mood.

  “Guess what, Dad,” I say. “When I went to Rosie’s after school yesterday, she made us grilled cheese sandwiches.”

  “That’s nice.” He uses the voice that parents have when they really aren’t interested.

  I continue anyway. “She said that she didn’t want to dirty the grill, so she took two slices of bread, some cheese, made a sandwich, and wrapped it in aluminum foil.”

  “That’s nice,” he repeats.

  I start to giggle. “Then she took out an iron and ironed it.”

  He laughs and glances my way. “You’re kidding.”

  “No, it’s true and it works.”

  He says, “I guess that’s one way to handle a pressing problem.”

  I groan and say, “We’ll just have to remember that technique when things get all wrinkled up.”

  It makes me feel good when I can get him out of a bad mood.

  CHAPTER 12

  Rosie’s house is on Meade Mountain Road. Actually it’s a carriage house, part of a much bigger property. The landlord lives in the big house and rents out what was once the place where servants lived.

  It’s not big, just cozy and right for two people, a cat, and a dog. Mindy and Rosie furnished most of the house with things from yard, house, garage, and estate sales. In New York City the stuff would probably be called antiques. Here it’s called stuff.

  I walk into the house, through the front porch. Mindy’s got her typewriter and paper on the table. It’s a mess, what she calls “creative disorder.”

  Rosie’s at the kitchen sink, doing dishes. “Be with you in a minute.”

  I stoop down to pet Salamander, the dog.

  He licks my face.

  If only my father weren’t allergic to animals.

  Salamander’s rolling over, wanting to be scratched.

  As I scratch his stomach I feel something patting at my face.

  It’s Fig Newton, the cat. He’s after my feather barrette.

  I don’t know what to do. If I move fast, he may decide to pounce. If I don’t move, he may decide to pounce. What if he claws my hair or face?

  “Rosie,” I say, softly.

  Rosie turns to me, sizes up the situation, and puts down the plate she is drying.

  As she approaches, Fig Newton continues to bat the feather around.

  His paw is getting closer and closer to my face.

  Rosie comes up behind him, scoops him up, and puts him outside.

  “Thanks.” I take a deep breath. “For a minute I thought I was a dead duck.”

  “That’ll teach you to wear feathers with Fig Newton around. He probably thought you were a bird.”

  “That would have been fowl,” I say.

  “That pun is definitely a down.” Rosie throws a dish towel at me. “DUCK.”

  Mindy walks in. “Rosie, I’ve got to get to work . . . . Oh, hi, Phoebe. Listen, would you kids be careful and not touch my stuff on the table? I’m in the middle of a chapter and don’t have time to clean up.”

  “We can eat lunch on the porch,” Rosie says.

  “Or go on a picnic,” I suggest.

  “A great idea.” Mindy grabs her coat. “I’d rather do that than have to wait on people . . . but duty calls. See you tonight.”

  As she rushes out of the house Rosie says, “Sometimes I think I’m the grown-up in this house. Look at the mess she left.”

  My mother would have a fit if I did something like that, left everything lying around. It’s a good thing she’s not Mindy’s mother, although I don’t think she could be, since they’re about the same age.

  Rosie says, “The picnic sounds like fun. The meeting’s not until two o’clock. Why don’t we pack up some food and go walking by the stream?”

  We make up some sandwiches and start the walk into town.

  It’s a beautiful Indian summer day. The trees are still colorful. The air is so clean, not at all like city air.

  We walk down Meade Mountain Road, onto Rock City Road.

  There are no sidewalks, so we’ve got to be careful of the passing cars.

  Neither of us says much as we walk. Friends can be quiet together.

  At Andy Lee Field there’s a baseball game going on.

  Past the cemetery. Someday I want to go in there and look at all the old tombstones, but it makes me a little nervous to think about dying.

  Finally we end up right in the center of town.

  Stopping to get a drink of water from the fountain at the Village Green, I look at all of the people who are shopping, hanging out, eating ice-cream cones.

  “Let’s go into Tinker Street Toys,” I say, “and play.”

  We walk over to the store and go inside.

  There’s a table set up in the middle of the store with all sorts of windup toys.

  Rosie and I have a race with two pairs of walking feet.

  Her feet win.

  My feet get all tangled up with a walking coffepot that some little kid was playing with.

  I decide to buy a bottle of bubble liquid.

  As we leave the store I start to blow bubbles.

  It looks great, all of the bubbles streaming down Tinker Street as if they are in a parade.

  People are smiling at them.

  Rosie and I walk over to Millstream Road and start walking on the edge of the stream.

  Finally we stop and sit down on a dry rock. It’s so still that I can hear the wind and the water moving.

  After a few minutes Rosie breaks the silence. “My father called this morning and told my mother that the child support check was going to be late again this month. Mindy was really angry.”

  “What did she say?” I pick up a pebble and throw it in the stream.

  “Most of what she said was profanity. She was really steamed up. He’s such a creep sometimes. He just bought a whole bunch of electronic equipment. I don’t see why he couldn’t send the money. Sometimes I think he does it just to get her mad. You’re so lucky that your parents don’t do stuff like that.”

  I remember that when everything got split up, there was fighting. Maybe it’s good there is no child support money to worr
y about. I’d feel responsible, even though I’d know it wasn’t my fault.

  Rosie opens her lunch. “It makes me feel cruddy, like he doesn’t care about me. He spends all the money on his wife’s two kids . . . . Sometimes he doesn’t send the money, but he’ll buy me a big present. Then it makes me feel disloyal to Mindy because I don’t want to tell her about it.”

  “Do you need some money? My father’s going to give me my allowance tomorrow. It’s not much, but I’ll share it.”

  “Thanks, pal.” She reaches over and pats me on the head and then pulls at my feather barrette. “No. We’re doing okay. Mindy’s getting lots of tourist tips and I’m baby-sitting, so it’s okay. It’s not the money as much as it is the hurt. I don’t know why my own father should act that way.”

  I tell her about how I feel, knowing that my mother’s spending the weekend with Duane the Drip. How he always talks down to me as if I’m three years old and how he always acts as if he’s so wonderful because he’s so rich. I also let her know how uncomfortable I feel about their sleeping together.

  “I know,” Rosie says. “A couple of years ago this guy Ben moved in with us. That took a lot of getting used to.”

  “What happened?” I start eating my lunch.

  “It just didn’t work out. I was sorry when he left. I got used to the three of us being a family, and then he was gone. While he lived in Woodstock, I still saw him but then he moved away. He’s in Florida now. I just got a letter from him. He’s married and they just had a kid.”

  “Did he and Mindy fight a lot?” I think of my parents during their bad time.

  “No. He wanted to marry Mindy. She wanted to leave things the way they were. So he left.”

  “Why didn’t Mindy marry him? Doesn’t she want to get married again?” I put a grape in my mouth.

  “She’s not sure . . . said it would have to be someone really special, that the first marriage was such a disaster that she was afraid of her own judgment. My father felt that way too. He waited a long time to get remarried.” Rosie shakes her head.

  “Do you ever want to get married?” I bite into my sandwich.

  Rosie shrugs. “Who knows? I’m having enough trouble finding a boyfriend.”

  I look at two people who are walking in the middle of the stream with their pants legs rolled up. They are carrying their shoes and holding hands.

  “You shouldn’t have any trouble finding someone. Look at all the guys who are your friends.”

  She says, “Yeah, but none of them want to start dating yet. Why do girls have to grow up faster than boys? The guys who date want to go further than I do. Oh, well . . . I guess I’ll just have to wait. Until someone comes along, I’ll just baby-sit a lot so that it isn’t a total loss.”

  We look at the water. There are lots of leaves in it, going downstream.

  Rosie says, “So what about you?”

  “I don’t know. I kind of like Dave, a lot. I like him much more than I liked Andy.” I blush. It’s not easy to talk about something that I’m not sure is going to work out.

  “He’s nice, isn’t he.” Rosie pulls out an apple and bites down on it. “I think he likes you too.”

  I think for a minute. “I guess I want him to like me and be my boyfriend. But that’s just for now. I don’t know about later. If I’ll ever get married or anything . . . Marriage just doesn’t seem to work out for anybody.”

  “I know some that work,” Rosie says. “Dave’s parents are still together, and I think they’re happy.”

  “But a lot don’t. I guess I’ll just have to wait and see.”

  “Why don’t we go to the same college and be roommates and then when we graduate, we can get an apartment in New York and have careers?” Rosie says. “And if we ever do get married and have kids, we can be bridesmaids for each other and aunts to the kids.”

  “If I could choose a sister, it would be you.” I close my lunch bag. “Somehow I never thought you’d be so traditional about weddings and stuff.”

  She picks up my bubble stuff and starts to play with it. “Maybe because Mindy is so untraditional. Don’t kids have to do stuff to rebel against their parents? Maybe the only way I can go against her is to be real straight.”

  I laugh. “You can get all dressed up each day in three-piece suits and be real conservative.”

  She shakes her head. “I don’t think that’s going to happen, but I’ve never really been part of a whole happy family or even an unhappy family. My parents split up when I was a baby. I’d like to have a good family.”

  “I promise to be your bridesmaid and baby-sit for your kids if that does happen.”

  “Okay, now let’s figure out what our apartment’s going to look like,” she says.

  We sit by the stream and make plans for what our lives are going to be like when we’re on our own. Rosie’s much more sure of what it’s going to be like. She’s obviously thought about it a lot. I haven’t. I think much more about the present. She thinks more about the future.

  The only future I’m really thinking about right now is whether or not I’m going to see Dave at the meeting.

  CHAPTER 13

  The first meeting of KRAPS is about to take place.

  KRAPS stands for Kilmerites Rebel Against Poor Sustenance. Personally I think the group name is a little obnoxious, but I was outvoted.

  Rosie and I ring the doorbell. Sarah Bennett answers it. “Everyone’s in the living room. Go in. I’ll be there in a minute.”

  Rosie leads the way because she’s been here before and I haven’t.

  The house is absolutely beautiful, all natural wood and all the furniture in earth colors. It’s large, with high ceilings.

  Everyone’s sitting by the fireplace. Some are on chairs; a lot are on cushions.

  Dave’s not here yet. There are about twenty kids already present and there should be about thirty, so maybe he’ll arrive soon.

  Sarah brings out dip and vegetables. There is already some great-looking food on the table—apple slices with melted cheese, granola cookies, carob candies.

  Garbage Gut downs a couple of carob candies.

  Jennifer Farley says, “Milt, how come you’re here? You like the school food.”

  He doesn’t answer until she asks him the same question, calling him Garbage Gut.

  I can’t believe it. He seems to prefer that awful nickname because he stops eating long enough to answer. “My father, the dentist, said that I should come here. Anyway, I like parties.”

  His father, the dentist . . . . I think about Rosie’s comment about kids having to rebel. It’s a good thing that Garbage Gut’s father isn’t a policeman.

  The kids are all sitting around talking.

  Wendy Aaronson pulls out a cigarette and lights up.

  Sarah walks up to her. “Listen, if you want to smoke, you’re going to have to do it outside. We don’t let anyone smoke in the house. The smell . . . plus we care too much about people to be part of their harming themselves.”

  Wendy says “Okay” and goes out the side door.

  “That was done nicely,” I say.

  Sarah nods. “My parents used to smoke, and then my uncle died of lung cancer.”

  More kids arrive. Some are from Woodstock. Others are from other towns. That’s good because sometimes only the Woodstock kids get involved in causes, like leftover hippies from the sixties. Also, it’s hard for all the kids to get together because there’s no public transportation.

  Abby Streetman. Harry Marcus. The school couple. They go everywhere with their arms around each other. Most of the time his hand is in her back jeans pocket. Sometimes I wonder if it has to be surgically removed every time they go to class or home.

  Pete Redding. The school clown. He does the best imitation of teachers and the Principal.

  Holly Marham. Willow Smith. Meredith Cooper. The three of them are always together unless two of them decide to gang up on the third. That usually lasts for only a few days and then they are all back to
gether until the next fight.

  Still no Dave.

  Oh, well, I’ve got to remember that the real reason for being here is to work on the committee.

  The work begins.

  Everyone starts talking about the steps already taken . . . letters sent to the Principal and the school board . . . trying to talk to the Principal and nutritionist. Nothing has worked.

  I take a piece of broccoli and stick it in the dip.

  It’s interesting to watch everyone. Even though there’s some joking, everyone’s serious about the subject, except for Garbage Gut, who keeps saying things like “I love hot dogs . . . . What’s wrong with processed cheese? . . . So what if potato chips have a little grease?”

  “Any suggestions besides the things that Phoebe told us they did at her old school?” Rosie picks up a notebook and pen.

  “Why don’t we have a commando raid on the kitchen, take it over, and make our own meals?” Sarah practices a ballet step as she talks.

  “Illegal,” Rosie says. “We want to stay within the law.”

  “I thought of a new one.” I raise my hand, forgetting that we’re not in school. “I guess by now that most of you know I have this weird habit of rearranging letters in words so that they mean other things.”

  “Those are called anagrams,” Steve Gleason says, pushing his glasses back.

  “An A-plus for the Poindexter.” Pete waves a piece of cauliflower.

  Rosie shakes her head. “Yeah, you rearranged my name, and I ended up with I SORE. What a friend.”

  Abby stops making out with Harry long enough to call out, “See what our two names are when they are put together.”

  “Your two names together are going to spell out BABY if you aren’t careful.” Garbage Gut cradles his arms as if he’s got an infant in them.

  Harry makes an obscene gesture to Garbage Gut.

  Then he and Abby go back to making out.

  “Continue.” Rosie nods to me, trying to get back to the subject.

  “Well, I tried it with CAFETERIA and ended up with several things.” Taking out my list, I read from it. “Here are some . . . I TEAR FACE . . . EAT FAR ICE . . . AFTER I, ACE.”