Babyface

by Norma Fox Mazer

  “I guess so,” Toni said. She pushed back from the table, put space between Martine and herself.

  “They sleep in twin beds, right? That’s when they got them. They stuck their marriage together. It was coming apart, and they patched it up, glued it together. Moving was part of it. New home. Like putting a new cover on a book. But what if it’s the same old book inside?”

  “But they weren’t fighting anymore.”

  “True. But you know how they managed that? They didn’t talk to each other all that much. New marriage, new home, new baby. No talk … I didn’t want to move. I liked where we lived. I had my friends, my school, I grew up there. They didn’t ask me, though, just went ahead and did it. They turned my life inside out to solve their problems. They didn’t think about me. All they thought about was themselves—and you.”

  All they thought about was themselves. Wasn’t that a perfect description of Julie’s parents? Toni shifted in her seat. “Where did you live before?”

  “Sunnyfield Avenue in the city.” Martine stirred her tea. “On the west side. It was such a great street. Lots of nice little houses and trees. We lived on the side of a hill.”

  Toni tried to imagine that other house, that other life, her sister as a teenager, a girl like her. A girl sitting in her room, listening to her parents fighting.

  “You know what’s so weird right now?” Martine said. “Just talking about it is making me feel awful all over again, like the whole thing is happening again in big living color.” She looked down, biting her lip. Her eyes filled.

  “Martine …” Toni’s hand went out, covered her sister’s hand.

  They stayed that way for a minute, then Martine withdrew her hand. “I’m okay.” She wiped her eyes with her napkin. “Thanks. You want to ask me anything?”

  “There’s one thing I don’t understand.”

  Martine nodded, as if she knew what Toni was going to say and approved. Martine, who had never approved of anything about Toni before! But something had changed between them. In that moment when they sat with their hands laced together, something had shifted, some connection had been made that hadn’t been there before.

  Toni fiddled with the salt shaker. “If Mom and Dad hated each other, why did she get pregnant?”

  “I didn’t say they hated each other, Toni. I never said that. I said they quarreled, they fought, they yelled.”

  Quarreled. Fought. Yelled. Another definition of the Jensens, the immature ones who didn’t think about their kids, who didn’t know anything about getting along. But now it was her parents, too.

  “Besides,” Martine said, “people can fight and still go to bed. That’s not so unusual.”

  Toni nodded as if she’d always known that. “But it was worse than fighting. You said he slap—slug—” She felt that racing of her heart and couldn’t get the words out. And thought: Julie’s father never hit her mother, which meant that her father was rungs below Mr. Jensen on the moral ladder. This hit her like a shock of cold water. “Do you hate Dad, Martine?” she blurted.

  Her sister’s shoulders tensed. “Maybe.” Then she shook her head quickly. “No, I don’t, not anymore. I’ve never felt the same toward him again, though. Sometimes I forget all about it … and then I remember. And it horrifies me. It makes me feel sick and disgusted. I can’t stand the thought of one person hitting another. I can’t stand the thought of a man using his strength to bully a woman. When I think of Mom hitting the floor—”

  Toni’s eyes blurred, the room seemed to rock around her. She had a vision of her mother on the floor, of herself bending over her mother, then turning to scream and spit at her father.

  CHAPTER

  EIGHTEEN

  “Fourteen dollars,” the cabdriver said, turning off the meter and stopping in front of the house.

  Toni pawed through her pocketbook. “Fourteen?” All she had was a ten-dollar bill and a handful of change. The driver put her arm over the back of the cracked vinyl seat and turned to watch her. Flustered, Toni said, “I don’t have enough money.”

  “I knew this was going to happen,” the cabbie said gloomily. She had straight blond hair, a pockmarked face. “I had a feeling in my gut all the way out here.”

  “I can give you my name. I can get the money tomorrow. I’ll pay you, I promise.”

  “Isn’t there anybody home you can get money from now?”

  Toni shook her head. Her parents wouldn’t be home until later this evening, around nine o’clock.

  The cabbie pushed some buttons, and the radio crackled with static and incomprehensible words. “Fifty-two. I’ve got a stiff on Oak Street,” the driver said into the speaker. “Roger. Over.”

  Toni felt stupid and slightly frightened. What was going to happen now? Was this a crime? Would they call the police? Slow down, she told herself. You can go across the street and borrow from Mrs. Abish, or down the block to Mrs. Frankowitz.

  “Bleeegh somebody bleeegh bleeegh … in the bleegh?” the radio voice growled.

  “Negative. What do I do?”

  More growling, sounding even more menacing. Meanwhile, with a surge of relief, Toni remembered that her mother always kept emergency money in the desk in the living room. She tapped the driver on the shoulder. “Wait, wait, I can get it. I just remembered—” She opened the door. “I’ll only be a minute. I’ll be right back.”

  “I ain’t moving,” the driver said.

  Toni ran up the walk to the house. Their lawn was dry and yellow. She glanced over at the Jensens’. Everything was quiet, the whole street was quiet, eerily quiet, and empty. She unlocked the front door. The cabbie was leaning out the window on her arm, watching. Toni waved reassuringly and went in.

  The house was dim, the shades drawn. “Hello …?” she breathed into the emptiness. Nothing moved. Nothing responded. What had she expected?

  The desk drawer was stuck and didn’t want to open. “Open!” Toni ordered, and gave it a sharp tug. The drawer flew open. Inside was an envelope with three twenties.

  When she paid the cabbie, Toni remembered to give her a tip. And the cabbie remembered to give Toni a smile. “I knew you were going to come through,” she said.

  “I have an honest face,” Toni joked.

  “Yeah, I can tell these things,” the cabbie said seriously. She pushed in the clutch. “I know things about people.”

  “Do you?” Toni held on to the window for a moment. Did this woman know things other people didn’t? Was she wise? Toni leaned toward her. There was so much she needed to know. Tell me about my parents.… Tell me how they could have done the things Martine said and yet be the people I think they are.… Tell me how I can keep on loving them.…

  That morning, in the cab Martine had flagged outside her building, they had both been quiet, barely talked on the way to the bus terminal. Martine, in a sleeveless dress, fragrant with perfume and lip gloss, had alternately looked out the window and tapped her fingers restlessly on her pocketbook. “I’m going to be late to work,” she said once.

  “Sorry,” Toni said.

  “No, it’s all right.”

  At the bus station, part of Toni had wanted to stand aside from Martine, to show her independence. And part of her had wanted to throw her arms around her sister. Martine had settled it by kissing Toni, her version of a kiss, her cool cheek against Toni’s, her lips kissing air.

  In the house again, Toni stood in the front hall and listened. No horns, no sirens, no buzz-moan-whine of the city. It was so quiet! Negative noise. The quiet had a hum of its own.

  She went through the house, opening windows. The two beds in her parents’ room were stripped, quilts folded at the bottom. Toni remembered now all the nights her parents hadn’t even slept in the same room, her father going to the couch in the family room. “I was restless last night,” he would say in the morning, meeting her in the hall. “Poor Daddy,” she’d say, and lean against him for a moment. That was all. She had never thought about it. Had she thought about anything?<
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  She got linens from the hall closet, snapped out the sheets, and began to spread them over the beds; but a wave of revulsion, a sour heaviness in her stomach, stopped her. She left the sheets piled at the foot of the beds.

  Everything in the house seemed strange until she went into her own room. She touched the bed, the desk, the dressing table. Her Bobby McFerrin poster was peeling off the wall, and she taped it on again. She picked up a book she’d been reading when she left, then rearranged the stuffed animals on the shelf. Paws had slept on her bed. She saw hairs and the indent of his body.

  In the kitchen, she discovered that the clock over the stove was dead. It had been making gaspy noises for weeks. She got up on the step stool and took the clock off the wall. It left a pale, round space. The hands had stopped at eight-ten. Did that mean anything? She held the clock for a moment. They’d had it for years. When she was little, she thought it was alive, that its cheerful face watched her approvingly when she ate.

  Paws still hadn’t shown up. She stood at the back door and called him. The leaves on the plum tree rattled gently. What if something had happened to Paws? She dialed Mrs. Abish’s number, but there was no answer. She called Julie’s number next. Suppose, despite the closed, blank look of the house, Julie was actually home. Suppose she answered the phone: “Toni! Surprise! I’m home, and I’ve been waiting for you!”

  She let the phone ring a dozen times, then hung up. Her hand was barely off the receiver when it rang. She picked it up, and Julie’s name rushed out of her mouth. “Julie!”

  “Toni?” her sister said. “Did you just get in? How was your trip home?”

  “It was okay, but I didn’t have enough money for the cab.”

  “You should have told me you were short,” Martine said. “What did you do?”

  “I took care of it.”

  “Are Mom and Dad home yet?”

  “Not till nine o’clock.”

  “Oh, right.” A pause. Then: “Toni? There’s something I want to tell you. A couple of things.”

  Toni held the phone away from her ear. Was Martine going to come up with another unpleasant story about their parents?

  “I’ve been thinking, all the stuff we talked about … I hope you remember that it’s all history. You know what I mean? It happened a long time ago. Try to remember that. Will you keep that in mind?”

  “If it’s ancient history, Martine, why does it still hurt you so much?”

  “Oh, I’m all over it,” her sister said.

  Are you? Toni thought.

  “And the other thing—I don’t know if I said this or not, but I don’t want you to forget that I’m your sister.”

  “I’m not likely to.”

  “No, listen. This isn’t clowning around.”

  No kidding. When did Martine ever clown around?

  “What I’m trying to say is, if you need me for anything, I’m here. I’m always here. I’m your sister and I’m always here for you.”

  “Well,” Toni said after a moment. “Thank you, Martine.”

  Late that afternoon, her mother called. “Brace yourself, sweetheart, we’re not coming home tonight. In fact, we’re not coming home until Monday night.”

  Toni’s palms went damp. “Are you fighting?” Her voice was rough, blurry.

  Her mother misunderstood. “Friday? No, not Friday. Monday we’ll be home.”

  “Monday?”

  “What’d you say, sweetie? I can’t hear you too well. Is the connection all right on your side? Can you hear me?”

  “The connection is fine,” Toni said, speaking more directly into the receiver. The connection is fine. The words echoed in her head. No. The connection was not fine. The connection was frayed, suspect.

  “I’m sorry to do this to you, sweetie, but there’s a special program on affirmative thinking, and we were strongly advised to stay for it.”

  “Okay.”

  “I would have called you sooner, but it only came up at the last minute. We just found out about it this morning, too late to call you at Martine’s. Now, what I’ve been thinking is that you could stay with Mrs. Abish across the street.”

  “Mom, I don’t have to do that.”

  “That way my mind will be at rest,” Toni’s mother went on. “I’ll call her as soon as I hang up with you and make the arrangements.”

  “Mom.” Toni raised her voice. “Mom, listen. I want to stay here. I want to stay in my own house.”

  There was a short silence. Then her mother said, “Do you think you can handle it?”

  “Mom. Yes!”

  “There’s no food—”

  “I’ll go to the store.”

  “Do you have any money?”

  “There’s the emergency money in your desk. I’ll use that.”

  “That drawer sometimes gets stuck. You have to—”

  “Jiggle it around to get it open,” Toni finished. “I know, Mom. I did it.”

  Her mother laughed a little uncertainly. “Well, you do seem to have everything figured out. You’ll go to school tomorrow, so you’ll only really be alone over the weekend. Four days—Friday, Saturday, Sunday—”

  “Mom,” Toni interrupted, “I know the days of the week.”

  “I’ll call every night,” her mother said.

  “You don’t have to do that. I’ll be all right.”

  Her father got on the phone. “We don’t have to do this program, Babyface. It’s optional.”

  “Mom said the program is important, so I think you should stay.” Her voice rose. “And please don’t call me Babyface.”

  He didn’t seem to have heard her. “Brave of you to stay alone,” he said. “I’m proud of you.”

  What was so brave about a fourteen-year-old girl staying in her own house for a few days? Why was everything she did such a huge deal to him? To both of them? Why were they stupefied every time she did something the least bit independent? Martine hadn’t acted that way. In fact, the opposite—she had expected Toni to do everything for herself.

  Later she put a frozen pizza in the oven, and while it was heating, she stood in the doorway, calling Paws. He appeared around the side of the garage and picked his way across the yard toward her, mewing and talking the whole distance. “Paws!” She scooped him up and kissed his little face. Here was somebody who didn’t worry about her, who accepted her as she was, as she had been, and as she would be. He flattened himself against her body and began a slow, heavy hum of happiness.

  CHAPTER

  NINETEEN

  “You weren’t in school yesterday … or the day before,” Mrs. Evelyn said, looking at Toni over the tops of her half glasses.

  “I know,” Toni said. She leaned on the counter in the office. She had just finished explaining the whole situation to Mrs. Evelyn.

  “Nobody answered your phone at home,” Mrs. Evelyn went on.

  “Nobody was there. My parents are in Ohio,” she said again.

  “And you were—?”

  “In New York City.” Behind her, Toni heard the office door open.

  “New York City?” Said as if Toni had mentioned the moon.

  “Yes. Could you tell me what my room assignment is please, Mrs. Evelyn? And give me my schedule?”

  “Just one minute, young lady. I’ll get to everything. And what do you want?” Mrs. Evelyn said, looking past Toni.

  Toni turned. L.R. Faberman was standing just behind her. Same L.R., dark glasses and all. Maybe a little bit taller, but maybe she was a bit taller, too. She hoped so. She was just about looking him in the eye.

  “I forgot my locker key,” L.R. said. Had his voice been that deep when she had talked to him at the drugstore? He was wearing flowered shorts and what seemed to be the same black T-shirt he’d worn all last year.

  “You forgot something else, too,” Mrs. Evelyn said.

  L.R. pushed his dark glasses up on his nose. “No. Just my locker key.”

  “You forgot your pants,” she said.

  He looked d
own at his bare legs. So did Toni. Nice.

  “And you forgot your written excuse,” Mrs. Evelyn said to Toni.

  “I can’t bring it until my parents come home. Tuesday I’ll bring it in.” Toni wondered if she should tell Mrs. Evelyn again about her father’s heart attack and the Hertha Center.

  “And who’s home with you now? Are you alone?”

  “I … no. I have someone with me.” Toni didn’t say it was a cat. She glanced at L.R., then at the clock. “The bell’s going to ring, Mrs. Evelyn. I hope I’m not late for my first class.”

  “Me, too,” L.R. said.

  Mrs. Evelyn opened a drawer. Slowly. She pulled out a folder. Slowly. Nothing could rush her. If there had been an earthquake, if the building had been shaking, if the room had been on fire, she would have moved in the same deliberate way. She went to her desk and began typing. Slowly. L.R. and Toni looked at each other. He put his finger to his temple like a gun.

  Mrs. Evelyn came back and gave L.R. a key on a leather thong. “Use that and return it immediately. Are you going to forget your locker key again?”

  “I hope not,” he said.

  “What kind of an answer is that?”

  “Honest.”

  Toni hid a little smile as Mrs. Evelyn put down her locker key and a pass card. “Do I have to tell you about locker keys?” she said. “The rules?” Toni shook her head. Mrs. Evelyn took a sheet of paper from the folder. “This is your schedule.”

  “Is this all I need, then?”

  “All you need?” Mrs. Evelyn said. “Your wits would help. It would help all you kids. But God forbid you should bring them to school. Why are you still here?” she said to L.R. “Go!”

  In the hall, L.R. went one way, Toni the other. She wondered if he remembered that they’d talked in the drugstore.

  All day people kept asking, “Where were you? Where’s Julie? How are you going to survive without her?”

  “I swear I’ve never seen you without Julie,” Kelly Lutz said in gym. Her hair was pink again.