A Room of My Own

by Ann Tatlock

  But Aunt Sally had married Jim Dubbin anyway. They had eloped one night when Aunt Sally was only seventeen years old. Not even Mother, who was older by three years, was married yet. According to Aunt Sally, Grandmother Foster had cried straight through for a week and had even worn mourning clothes for a year, but the way Aunt Sally liked to embellish a story, I was never sure whether that last part was true or not.

  She told me all this with a look of victorious joy on her face, as though she had outwitted her parents at their own game.

  "They said I'd never be happy, but they were wrong," she boasted. "Jim and I have been together all these years, and I can't imagine any two people being happier than we are. Oh, I know I don't have all the fancy things my own mama and papa had--a big house, fancy dishes, pretty clothes. But"--she waved a hand gleefully--"who needs all that finery? Jim's always worked hard and we've never lacked for anything. We have three fine sons, and I wouldn't chose to live any other way."

  My grandfather Foster had been a rather wealthy businessman and what Aunt Sally called "a big man about town." She described both her father and mother as educated and sophisticated and "always strutting about town like a couple of peacocks with their feathers all puffed out." Maybe my grandparents impressed a lot of people, but I had a feeling that one person who wasn't terribly impressed was their own daughter Sally. "The quality of a person's character isn't measured by his bank account," Aunt Sally was known to say.

  And yet one of the first things I learned in life was that a wing down at Mercy Hospital had been named after my grandfather because he had donated the largest amount of money toward the hospital's expansion fund. More than once Mother had taken us children down to that wing of the hospital to show us a bronze plaque on the wall bearing Grandfather's name and the year the wing was completed, 1924. Evidently Mother, unlike Aunt Sally, was rather proud of her father's accomplishments.

  My grandparents were both still living, but sometime before the Depression they had moved back to Grandmother's native Georgia to escape the long harsh winters of the upper Midwest. It was never talked about, but I suspect they lost some or all of their fortune in the crash, as it was about that time that the flow of extravagant gifts from Georgia to Minnesota stopped.

  When Aunt Sally first related to me the story of her nuptials, I couldn't understand my grandparents' stubborn objection to Uncle Jim. So what if he was a working man? Papa worked. He worked long hours every day. All my friends' fathers worked. For that matter, Grandfather Foster himself worked! It appeared to me that all men worked unless they were bums. Wasn't everyone who worked a part of the working class? And if a man worked and wasn't a bum, wasn't he respectable? Just what was it that made Uncle Jim different?

  I still didn't understand fully the reason my grandparents rejected Uncle Jim, but when I learned that the Dubbins would be moving in with us, I thought perhaps Grandfather and Grandmother Foster had been proven right at last. There must be something wrong with Jim Dubbin. He couldn't provide for his family. And because of him, the Dubbins and the Eides were all going to be miserable, especially me.

  I went to my room, and feeling intensely sorry for myself and quite sure that I of all the people in the world had been the most ill treated by the Depression, I started to pull my clothes out of the closet and threw them across the bed. "I'll run away," I muttered as the tears came again and I sniffed angrily. "I'll run away and live with Charlotte--they have plenty of room there. Probably no one around here will even notice, since there's going to be such a crowd in this house." But even as I declared my resolve to run away, I knew, of course, it was a futile plan. Mother would only find me and drag me home by the ear, and three more poems by the unfathomable Campion would be drilled into my reluctant brain.

  For the next couple of days I divided up my garments, taking some up to the attic to be stored in boxes, moving the rest into the closet in Molly and Claudia's room. I gathered up my toiletry items, my knickknacks, my books, my secret stash of "True Story" magazines and carried everything into the room on the north side of the house. Claudia and Molly sat on the double bed, each of them clutching a doll with a porcelain face and porcelain hands and real human hair. The dolls had been given the rather dubious names of Gardenia and Petunia. (Aunt Sally, who loved flowers, had named them.) They had been a gift to me and to Claudia from the Grandparents Foster a few years back, just before Molly was born. I gave mine to Molly when she became old enough to appreciate it and I too old to play with it any longer. Now four pairs of eyes--those of my sisters and the glassy eyes of the dolls--stared up at me in puzzlement.

  "Whatcha doing, Ginny?" Molly asked.

  "Moving in. You know that--Mama told you."

  "You mean," Claudia asked, "you're going to live in here with us?"

  "I'm afraid so."

  "And sleep in here with us, too?" Molly asked.

  "Yes, that too."

  A gleeful cheer arose from my sisters, and the porcelain hands of the dolls began to clap at the bidding of their owners.

  "Well," I said, "I'm glad somebody's happy about it."

  "It'll be fun, Ginny," Claudia said. "We can tell stories every night."

  "And you can sleep on this side of the bed," Molly added, "so I don't have to be afraid of the ghost anymore."

  "What ghost?"

  "The ghost Simon said stands by our bed and watches us when we're asleep," Claudia explained.

  Molly added, "Mama says there's no such thing as ghosts, but Simon said--"

  "Simon's just telling you a story," I said. "But if it'll make you feel any better, I'll sleep on that side of the bed. I just hope the two of you won't push me out of it. I don't care to wake up in the morning and find myself on the floor."

  "Ginny," Molly asked, "why are you moving in here? Don't you like your own room anymore?"

  I sighed. "Yes, I like my old room, and I wish it was still my room. But I have to move in here because Uncle Jim's a--" I wanted to say that Uncle Jim was a bum, but I couldn't quite get the word out. As angry as I was with him, the word just didn't fit the man I knew.

  "Uncle Jim's what?" Claudia asked.

  "Is he dead?" Molly asked, horrified.

  I laughed at my younger sister's quivering lower lip, set in motion by the slightest fear or provocation. I pinched her lip playfully, kissed her forehead, and assured her that Uncle Jim wasn't dead. "You know what happened. Mama already explained everything to you. Uncle Jim lost his job, so he and Aunt Sally and Rufus and Luke all have to move in with us."

  "Where did he lose it?" Molly inquired.

  "What do you mean, where did he lose it?"

  "Whenever I lose Toonya"--she held Petunia up for me to see--"Mama tries to make me remember where I might have lost her. Maybe we can help Uncle Jim find his job."

  "Well, it's not that he lost it, not that way, it's just that--oh, never mind. You two are just too young to understand. You have to be grown up, like me. Now, listen, instead of just sitting there like a couple of bumps on a log, how about giving me a hand?"

  The last items I brought over from my old room were My Two Charlies. I stuck them into the frame of the dresser mirror in my new room, high enough so that neither Claudia nor Molly could reach them. "Sorry, fellows," I apologized as I fitted them between the wood and the glass. "I know you don't like these new surroundings any more than I do, but there's nothing I can do about it. Like Mama says, I suppose we're just going to have to grin and bear it."

  I still carry in my mind a picture of the Dubbins walking up the street toward our house on the day they moved in. They had never owned a car. Papa intended to pick them up, but he was called out to see an ailing patient just at the agreed-upon hour. Mother didn't drive, though she somehow got word to her sister that Papa would meet them with the Buick as soon as he could. But the Dubbins didn't wait. Rather than spending another few hours in the rented house they could no longer afford, the Dubbin family walked across town with their few possessions crammed into a half-do
zen beat-up old suitcases. Whatever happened to all their furniture and household goods, I never knew. Perhaps they had tried to sell some of it, or perhaps they had given some away. Yet again, maybe they had simply left it all in the house and walked away from it. I don't know.

  I spied them coming up the sidewalk when they were more than a block away--a forlorn group of refugees, victims of an economic debacle as shattering to human life as any war. Even from a distance I could see that the four of them tried to walk with dignity. In spite of the heat, they were dressed in their finest clothes--Uncle Jim and the boys in slacks and white shirts, suspenders and bow ties; Aunt Sally in a yellow dress with an artificial lace collar, a pair of buffed pumps strapped across her tiny feet. Both the boys wore caps, but Uncle Jim wore a fedora, and Aunt Sally had on the white straw hat with the cloth flowers on the brim that she'd worn to church every Easter for the past several years. Had it not been for the suitcases and the fact that it was a Friday afternoon, they might well have passed for a respectable family on their way to Sunday morning services. And yet, as it was, their attempt at dignity actually made their small parade appear all the more pathetic. It was obvious they were a family on the move--on the move because they had lost what they had, on the move from the place they had once called home to a place they would never really call home. Because they, like so many others, were a defeated army. They had tried to stand up against calamity, but the enemy had been too big, just too overwhelming for them.

  I called to Mother and she joined me on the porch.

  "Oh!" she exclaimed at the spectacle of her own flesh and blood tramping like displaced Okies up the sidewalk. "Now, why didn't they wait for William to pick them up, I wonder?"

  I had no answer and knew she didn't expect one.

  She waved a hand and called out, "Gracious, Sally, why did you hike all the way over here in those high-heeled shoes of yours?" She hurried down the porch steps, took one of the suitcases from Sally, and put an arm around her shoulder. "That's a good way to wear out the soles before their time, and heaven knows we have to make things last as long as we can. Well, come in, come in, everyone. You must be roasting, walking all that way in this heat. I've got some cold lemonade in the icebox. Virginia, get out some glasses, will you, and pour some lemonade. Well, wait a minute, before you do that--here, take this suitcase and show your aunt Sally and uncle Jim to their room. Rufus and Luke, you follow me."

  None of the Dubbins had uttered a word so far. The weary and solemn-faced troupe climbed the porch steps and filed silently into the house while I held open the screen door for them. Aunt Sally did attempt to smile at me as she passed by, but the slight upturning of her lips was overshadowed by the dull sheen of sadness in her eyes. Uncle Jim, his own eyes averted, took off his fedora and offered me a taut nod. The cousins looked cross and out of sorts, and I was rather surprised when Luke stuck out his tongue at me. A year younger than I, Luke had always been more or less cordial toward me, though obviously disinterested in my feminine world. Now he poked his pale tongue at me as though his family's misfortune were all my fault. I frowned and fought the temptation to return the gesture.

  I was the last to enter the house, dragging one of Aunt Sally's suitcases with me, and by the time I got into the hallway, Mother was already ascending the stairs, throwing words over her shoulder as she went.

  "Now, boys, we're going to put you in with Simon. I trust you'll be comfortable there. We want you all to make yourselves right at home here, of course. Anything you need, you just let us know. Ginny, are you coming? Let's get these folks settled in so we can start enjoying that lemonade."

  "Yes, Mama," I replied. I looked up shyly at my aunt and uncle, who were waiting for me to lead the way. "You'll be in my room," I said. Then, though of course they had seen the room before, I added, "I hope you'll like it."

  I started up the stairs when I heard Aunt Sally behind me begin to say something.

  "Ginny, I'm--"

  I clutched the banister with my free hand and looked back over my shoulder. "Yes, Aunt Sally?"

  My aunt's face was red from the heat and moist with perspiration. The hair that poked out from under her hat was matted to her skin. For a moment I thought she was going to say she was simply too tired to climb the stairs. I reached out to take her other suitcase, but she smiled bravely and waved a hand.

  "I'm fine, Ginny," she said. "I was just going to say that I'm sure your room will be lovely."

  "Oh," I muttered. I turned and we walked the remainder of the distance to my room--their room--in silence.

  When we had put the suitcases down beside the bed, Aunt Sally asked, "But where will you be?"

  "In with Claudia and Molly. I've already moved all my stuff over there."

  "Ah, I see. Well, it's very kind of you, Ginny, to give us your room."

  "Oh," I muttered feebly. "I don't mind. I mean, I'm glad to let you have it." I wondered whether they could tell I was lying.

  Aunt Sally went to the dresser and removed her hat. Unlike Mother, who insisted on wearing her hair in the unvarying severe bun, Aunt Sally wore hers in a fashionable short cut. Now it lay matted to her head, but she gave it a cursory brush-through with her fingers and patted it back into place. I often wondered at the difference between my mother and my aunt. Where Mother was dark complected, Aunt Sally was fair. Where Mother was tall and large boned, Aunt Sally was short and diminutive. She might have appeared frail had it not been for her natural exuberance and unbounded energy. And unlike Mother, Aunt Sally didn't consider it a sin to add a little color to her cheeks and lips, or to wear fashionable dresses of bright material. Personality-wise, where Mother was quick to reprove and correct, Aunt Sally was quick to laugh. She was the carefree one, the one always ready with a song or a story or a shriek of unbridled glee.

  Except for now. As she turned from the mirror toward Uncle Jim, the look of sorrow on her face was completely foreign, so completely out of character that even her features seemed twisted and changed.

  Uncle Jim dropped his eyes from Aunt Sally, tossed his fedora onto the bed, and sat down on the edge of the mattress. His red face became redder still, and I could see his pulse thumping in his temple as he clenched his hands together. When he spoke for the first time since arriving, it was through clenched teeth.

  "It's a crying shame, Ginny," he said, "just a crying shame to kick a little girl out of her room like this." It was defeat more than sorrow that settled over Uncle Jim's face, the same defeated look of the men standing in the breadline, the look of men who had lost everything and had been reduced to seeking a handout.

  "Oh no, Uncle Jim!" I cried. I lifted my hand to my chest. My heart ached so with pity I thought it might burst. "I don't mind at all! Really, I don't. It'll be awfully fun to have you and Aunt Sally and the cousins here, really it will. And you'll get another job soon, I'm sure of it, Uncle Jim, I'm--"

  I stopped when Uncle Jim went into a fit of coughing that drowned out my words. Aunt Sally stepped over to her husband and, sitting down beside him, patted his back. Uncle Jim had been coughing half his life. Papa said it was because of the grain dust down at the mill. He said it was destroying Uncle Jim's lungs. "One good thing about Jim's losing his job," Papa had said, "maybe he can find a job that won't kill him in the end."

  I wanted to run to Uncle Jim and throw my arms around his neck and tell him everything would work out for the best somehow. I wanted to tell him that he could stay here in my room for as long as he wanted, years and years if need be, and I wouldn't mind at all--no, not one bit. I wanted to comfort him and Aunt Sally and peel away all the sadness so that the jolly people they were inside--the happy people I'd always known--could come out again.

  But the picture of the two of them sitting on the edge of the bed that stifling afternoon was enough to drain away my own hope, and I quietly slipped out of the room, leaving them alone while I went to the kitchen to set the table with large glasses of cold and bittersweet lemonade.

  Chapter Si
x

  That same week Mother let Emma May go. Now that Aunt Sally would be around to help, Mother figured she could do without a hired girl. I suppose, too, she thought the money she spent on Emma May should more rightly go toward the upkeep of the family that had increased overnight by four.

  Emma May had been with us for three years, and we all hated to lose her--especially Molly, whose lower lip worked overtime on Emma May's last day. Emma May herself took the news calmly, though not without a few tears. She was a shy and retiring girl who never said much, but when she did speak she always tried to be positive, and the comments she made when Mother apologetically dismissed her were in keeping with her optimism. She had been secretly hoping, she said, to marry her sweetheart and set up a home of her own by year's end. Now that she had lost her position, perhaps her young man would view this as a suitable time to pop the question--Depression or no. After all, he was earning a small but steady income as a clerk for the railroad, and Emma May had always heard that two could live as cheaply as one. So with a brave smile and a promise to stay in touch, she left us.

  Her absence was the reason Mother and I both stood kneading separate mounds of bread dough on the kitchen counter the morning after the Dubbins moved in. It was a task that Emma May had perfected--nothing tasted better than a slice of her bread straight from the oven with a big slab of butter melting on it--but now the chore had been handed down to me. Mother was showing me how to knead the dough properly by pressing it down and away from me with the heels of my hands, then turning it a quarter circle and repeating the process until the texture of the dough was smooth and elastic. She encouraged me by saying it would strengthen my fingers and make me better able to play the piano. Mother was a woman of indefatigable hope.