At our house, Jimmy gently scooped Will out of the car and carried him up the walk and porch steps to our house. Daddy’s car was parked in the driveway, but the living room was quiet. There was light coming from under his bedroom door, but no sound.
Jimmy followed me up to Will’s room and carefully placed him on the bed. I pulled his covers over him. He moaned a little when I started to pull the Marvel Puffs box top and atlas from his hands. Jimmy whispered, “Let him keep it,” which made me smile, and forgive him for being dismissive of Will’s rules. On our way back downstairs, we made the third step creak, and I heard Daddy cry out in his bedroom. Another nightmare, I guessed.
So we stepped out on the front porch. Jimmy kissed me and then whispered in my ear, “My girl.” He grinned, then pulled a cigarette from his jacket pocket, lighting it as he ran down the porch steps to his car. Then he hopped in and drove off.
I stood there, still dizzy from the kiss and the evening and the champagne, not wanting to go back inside and be alone, but then a faint whiff of smoke from the direction of Miss Bettina’s house drew my attention. I could just make out, in the light that spilled out from the living room window onto the porch, a slim figure sitting on the porch swing. Then there was an orange flare, the tip of a cigarette. Daddy? But no. I’d just heard him inside his bedroom—the reason I hadn’t asked Jimmy to stay in the house with me. For a second, a tingly feeling came over me as I briefly imagined what might have happened if he’d been able to stay…. I shook my head. Did I want those things to happen? Or was it the champagne?
I walked across our lawn—the grass was too overgrown and itched my ankles—and across hers, shivering. September was more than halfway over. By October, the chill of night would creep into the day. I pulled my cardigan around me, went up the steps.
I sat down in a rocker across from Miss Bettina, who held up her cigarette. “I used to smoke all the time. Now, just on meeting nights. Everyone smokes at them.”
How is Daddy? What happened? What did he say? Is he really going to stop drinking, for good? The questions swirled in my mind, but I bit them back. I didn’t want to care.
“Want some iced tea?” Miss Bettina asked.
“No thanks. I’m fine.”
“Are you?”
My fingers immediately went to Jimmy’s ring on the delicate chain around my neck. I knew Miss Bettina wasn’t really asking about my thirst. “I am fine.” Defensiveness crept into my voice. “Jimmy asked me to go to homecoming. And to meet his parents. And to go steady with him. I said yes, to all three.”
Miss Bettina didn’t say anything.
“Jimmy is good to me, to Will,” I said. For God’s sake, he’d even carried Will up to the house moments before. She’d just seen that!
“Oh,” Miss Bettina said, exhaling the word along with her smoke. She ground her cigarette out on the porch.
“Why don’t you like him?” I asked.
“I do, honey. I think he’s a very nice young man.”
“He thinks you don’t like him.”
She sighed. “I don’t want him to hurt you.”
Girl on chaise longue, stretching out in a suggestive pose—turning, twisting however the artist tells her to…. I pushed the image from my mind. I thought, I’m more likely to hurt him.
“Just…be careful. I knew another young woman, once, who thought her life would be better because of a young man,” she went on. I thought she must be talking about herself. Or was she? I remembered how little I knew about her life.
And then I thought…Mama. Maybe she was talking about Mama.
I fingered the fabric of my skirt, the perfect seam that I’d been so proud of after taking it off the sewing machine in the basement. I didn’t have any childhood memories of the dress I’d made it from, or of any of Mama’s other garments tucked away in old suitcases in the basement. I wondered if she’d been beautiful, laughing, carefree, charming when she wore that dress.
Suddenly, I was desperate to ask Miss Bettina what she remembered about Mama. The words finally blurted out. “Miss Bettina, do you mean Mama? She thought life would be better with Daddy?”
Miss Bettina sighed. “I’m sorry, sweetie—I shouldn’t have said that. Jimmy’s a nice boy, but I just want you to remember who you are.”
Funny. I wanted to forget who I was.
“Please, Miss Bettina, what do you remember about my mama? I mean, from before she got sick?” I stared out into the darkness of Elmwood Street, waiting for an answer.
After a long while, though, all she did was sigh. “Just be careful, sweetie,” she said, and went back inside her house.
The next Monday, halfway through art class during the last period of the day, my eyes pricked with tears of boredom. I couldn’t stand shading yet another sphere while the classroom clock ticked, Mr. Cahill read a book, and half the class snoozed or passed notes.
Suddenly, I ripped the page from my sketchbook, wadded up the paper, tossed it to the floor. The rustle made the other kids stir, turn, stare at me. Lisa Kablinski glared at me the hardest—word had gotten around quickly about me wearing Jimmy’s ring. Jimmy turned in his seat a few rows up and winked at me. I smiled, thinking, Take that, Lisa.
I flipped to another page in my sketchbook and started sketching a jacket and pants ensemble, a variation on the outfit Audrey Hepburn wore in Roman Holiday.
“Is there a problem, Miss Lane?”
I looked up. Mr. Cahill was standing by my desk, staring down at me.
“Um, no,” I said.
“Having trouble with the sphere?”
Of course he knew I wasn’t.
An awful flush crept up my face when I realized that he was staring at Jimmy’s ring on the slim chain around my neck. My fingers automatically, protectively went to the ring. Jimmy’s girl. Mr. Cahill clearly didn’t approve, just like Miss Bettina didn’t.
He stared at me, waiting for my answer. My neck suddenly stiffened, like it had at our last session, when I’d stretched out in some impossible pose on his chaise longue. I thought about the massage and kisses Jimmy had given me on our picnic, when I’d complained about a stiff neck, not saying how I’d gotten it. My face burned even more deeply.
“She’s just upset that she’s in a class with a red,” Hank said.
The class gasped. I knew I should have been thankful that Hank was diverting Mr. Cahill’s attention, but suddenly I was scared as Mr. Cahill closed his book with a purposeful snap and turned his gaze to Hank.
“I beg your pardon, Mr. Coleman?”
Mr. Cahill’s tone would have made most kids mumble a quiet “Nothing, sir,” but not Hank. He said, “My old man read your editorial. Said you’re one of them reds. That true?”
The class went silent and still, a sudden tension holding everyone breathlessly in place.
Mr. Cahill said, “This is art class, Hank. I will gladly answer questions pertaining to art.”
There was something so self-satisfied in Mr. Cahill’s tone, like he knew that no one was going to ask anything about art.
“I have an art question, Mr. Cahill.”
“And what question is that, Miss Lane?”
“Why don’t we ever draw anything except spheres and cones and cubes, Mr. Cahill?”
For too long a moment, Mr. Cahill and I stared at each other. He reached down, his hand brushing mine, as he flipped several pages—sketches of clothes and designs—and finally stopped at a random sketch of a nude girl on a chaise longue, reaching for a bowl of persimmons. He did a double-take, and looked at me with unvarnished surprise. My face flamed.
Suddenly, the drill siren went off. We all knew what to do—duck and cover.
Mr. Cahill walked past scrambling kids, hands in his pockets, like he was ambling down the sidewalk on Main Street. I caught Jimmy’s confused, questioning gaze and Hank’s knowing smirk as they moved to get under their desks. I grabbed my sketchbook first, and then curled up under my desk.
I didn’t actually remember maki
ng that sketch.
In the event it survived an actual atomic attack and revealed me for the scandalous girl that I was, I pulled the awful sketch from my notebook and wadded it into a tight little ball. As soon as this was over, I’d get rid of it.
After the siren stopped, we all got up from under our desks. Mr. Cahill had left the room. I didn’t see Jimmy or Hank, either. I put my books in my bag, clutched my wadded-up sketch, and headed out of the classroom. Out in the hallway, Jimmy came toward me, looking anxious. Hank stood near him, still studying me.
I smiled at Jimmy and veered suddenly into the girls’ bathroom. No one was there. I dropped the sketch into the special bin for menstrual pads. For a second, I stood in the bathroom, shaking. Pull it together, Donna.
I went to the bathroom sink, and stared at myself in the mirror. I smoothed stray hairs back into my ponytail. The door swung open. Babs came in.
“Are you OK?” she said. “You were acting weird in art class. And you just ran away from Jimmy.”
I pretended to inspect a spot on my left eyebrow. “The siren went off. You know how that makes everyone jumpy. And I came in here because, you know, I needed to.”
Babs looked over my shoulder at me in the mirror. Our eyes met in the reflection. “Uh-huh. You’ve been jumpy all day,” she said. “I bought you a little time—told Hank and Jimmy you weren’t feeling well.” She grinned. “They took off like two terrified little boys. Said we should meet them at Cosmic Burger.”
Thank you, Babs.
“Of course, you probably want to study in the library after school again,” she said. She rolled her eyes. I was supposed to go by Mr. Cahill’s after school for another modeling session, but suddenly, I knew I couldn’t face him. Not after he’d seen that sketch.
I shrugged. “I think I’ll skip studying today.” A surge of disappointment shot through me.
“Good for you!” Babs sounded pleased. “You study harder than anyone. But I still want to know what’s wrong with you. You should be over the moon! Jimmy is the greatest thing that could happen to you. And you don’t have to work for that old shrew anymore.”
I laughed. Babs knew how I felt about Grandma.
And I knew she was right. I was now officially Jimmy’s girl, and I knew I should be over the moon. Spending time with Jimmy almost every night. Tending to Will and Daddy. Studying. Doing alterations for Miss Bettina. Posing for Mr. Cahill—and making sure not to get caught. Instead, I was exhausted. So exhausted I’d apparently sketched myself naked at Mr. Cahill’s while I was half-asleep.
Babs leaned toward me. “I think I know what’s wrong with you,” she whispered.
My eyes went to the trash bin. Even Babs—Babs, who loved her racy novels and who had gone all the way with Hank (it wasn’t nearly as thrilling as she’d hoped, she said)—would not think kindly of me if she saw that sketch.
“Come on, you can tell me,” she said.
“I’m just a little distracted thinking about pulling together Will’s birthday party,” I lied. “It’s this coming Saturday.” Will would spend the night at Tony’s on Friday, and then they’d both return to our house for Will’s party the next day.
Babs rolled her eyes. “Oh, come on. I don’t believe for a moment that you’re really tense about Will’s birthday party.” She waggled her eyebrows. “I know what’s really bothering you.”
I felt suddenly ill. Did she know I’d spent the past week modeling and cleaning after school for Mr. Cahill? “What’s that?”
She laughed. “Meeting Mr. and Mrs. Denton this Friday night, of course!”
I nodded, relieved to let Babs believe this. “I—I’ve been working on something to wear.” I’d spent most of the previous night in the basement remaking Mama’s yellow dress, tense that every creak in the house meant that Daddy was coming down and would find me.
Babs reached in her purse and pulled out a bottle. Her mom’s Dexamyl. My eyes widened. She pressed the bottle into my hand.
“It’s the Dexamyl my mom takes.” She rolled her eyes. “She has plenty of bottles—she’ll never miss this one. Or the one I took for myself.” She giggled. “Anyway, they’ll help you be more confident, more awake.”
At that moment, Lisa Kablinski came out of the stall at the far end of the bathroom. I wondered how much she’d overheard. Everything, from the look on her face.
But Babs gave her a hard, daring look and said, “You didn’t hear anything, right?”
“R-right,” Lisa said.
“Don’t be silly, Babs,” I said, “regular aspirin will take care of my cramps.” I breezed toward the door, held my hand over the waste bin as if I was throwing away the pills.
But I hung on to them.
I made it through a very busy week without taking the pills, although I thought of them often, tucked at the bottom of my intimates drawer by the Blue Waltz Sachet and my stash of money.
I missed seeing Mr. Cahill, hated myself for that, hated the hurt, questioning look in his eyes, hated myself for looking away. And always, the image of the Dexamyl bottle floated across my mind’s eye accompanied by the thought that taking the pills would make things so much better.
I resisted. Instead, I worked on the yellow dress, planned Will’s party, and tried to escape into the comfort of being Jimmy’s girl, preening just a bit too much around other girls, clinging a little too tightly to Jimmy’s arm.
On Wednesday night that week, Grandma came to our house, three days before Will’s party. Daddy was out at a midweek AA meeting; Will was upstairs in his room. I was sitting on the couch in the living room, carefully reading, for the third time, the Chocolate Cake II recipe in the one cookbook in our house, the Boston Cooking-School Cook Book. The book had been inscribed to Mama—“with many happy wishes on your wedding day”—from Mrs. Mary Lou Johnston, the wife of the then-president of Groverton Pulp & Paper. The book’s brown cover and eight-hundred-plus pages looked as new and untouched as they would have when Mama opened the gift.
Hearing a knock, I put the cookbook down on the side table and went to the front door. Grandma stood there, overdressed in a black wool coat and matching hat. Other than at church, where we exchanged only public pleasantries, I hadn’t seen her since the night Jimmy had come to Dot’s Corner Café and swept me into his life. She looked too small, smaller than I remembered her seeming at her café, at least.
“I heard you’re having a party for Will’s birthday on Saturday,” Grandma said. There was a little tremble in her voice. I couldn’t help but smile. “I thought you could use some help. I could make the cake—”
“Oh, thank you, but I have that under control,” I said. Her thin eyebrows went up. I’d been studying the Chocolate Cake II recipe more painstakingly than I studied for a chemistry or algebra test. I’d made the cake at least twenty times in my mind, and each time, it had come out perfectly. I pulled myself up a little taller and stared down at Grandma. “I’m baking a scratch cake. I have a recipe from Mama’s cookbook.”
Grandma’s eyebrows heightened almost to the gray fringe over her forehead and I could just feel her thinking, Your mama never cooked a decent meal in her life…but in the next second, her face fell. She was disappointed that I was denying her the chance to do the one thing she did really well—baking—for Will’s birthday.
“Very well,” she said. Her voice carried no taunting, only sadness. “I came by with something else,” she added. I kept my arm up, barring her from entering our home. Leave us be, I thought. Just leave us be.
Her hands shook as she unclasped her purse and pulled out an envelope. She held it out to me. “Go ahead, take it. Look inside.”
I took the envelope but said, “Will can open this Saturday, with his other gifts.”
Grandma shook her head, her too-big hat wobbling on her head. “It’s for you. Open it.” Some of the spitfire was back in her voice, and I hesitated, but then I unsealed the envelope.
I gasped. Inside was a twenty-dollar bill. A fortune.
&n
bsp; I looked back up at Grandma, confused. Her smile was tight with grim pleasure that she’d made me lose my composure. “I also heard,” she said, “that you’re going to the homecoming dance with Jimmy Denton. I thought you could use some help for a dress and shoes and such. A real dress.” Her gaze took in the remade outfit I wore that evening—a teal-and-pink-checked skirt and a white blouse to which I’d added matching trim around the collar and cuffs—and suddenly I felt as exposed as if I were wearing nothing.
She knew. She’d probably known all along that I’d been remaking Mama’s clothes. Grandma never missed or forgot a detail. Especially not where her hatred of my mama was concerned.
My hand fell from the doorpost, and I hugged my arms around me, suddenly shivering on the warm, humid evening. But Grandma didn’t take the opportunity to rush past me inside to see Will, or even wait to see if I’d thank her. She just turned on her heel and walked down the porch steps with that slightly-to-the-left hitch in her gait.
I shut the door and ran upstairs to my room. I pulled Grandma’s twenty from the envelope and stashed it in my own envelope, with all the money I’d already set aside for the following summer, when I’d go to New York and somehow become a costume stitcher, by the Dexamyl tablets from Babs (that I couldn’t quite bring myself to throw away) and the Blue Waltz Sachet from Jimmy. Of late, my only income had been a few alterations for Miss Bettina’s customers. I hadn’t been working for Mr. Cahill or getting tips at Dot’s Corner Café, but the twenty dollars more than made up for even weeks of lost work.
I made up my mind right then, as I wadded up Grandma’s envelope and threw it in the wastebasket, that I would go through with my plan. Well, not a plan, really; until that moment it had been a vague, uneasy idea that I tried to push away. But Grandma’s comment, her “gift” to me, made that idea come to life with startling, sudden clarity and determination: I would remake the last big dress left in Mama’s old suitcases for my homecoming dress.
My One Square Inch of Alaska (9781101602850) Page 9
