“Good morning, girls,” she said. “Won’t you come in?”
They stepped into the cool foyer. It took a few minutes to get used to the darkness after the sunlight.
Lisa said, “Hello, I’m Lisa Loutzenhiser.”
“Loutzenhiser! What an unusual name.”
“It’s Italian,” Georgie said as she lifted the lid of an urn on the hall table.
“And this is Georgia Collins,” Lisa said.
Leave it to Lisa to remember her manners. Georgie peered into the urn.
“I see you’ve met Madge.” The woman waved her hand toward the urn. “She was a resident here. After she passed on, we decided to put her ashes in the entryway. Madge always loved it when company came to the door.”
Georgie dropped the lid so fast it clanked. She immediately recovered from the shock and said, “Far out!”
“Follow me,” the lady ordered.
Lisa started to follow, but Georgie pulled on the back of her shirt. She grabbed a used ashtray off the hall table and held it up for Lisa to see.
“Who do you suppose this was? Madge’s husband?”
It was funny. How could Lisa not laugh? Instead she said, “Why don’t you knock it off? Let’s just be normal, all right?”
Georgie let go of Lisa’s shirt as if it were on fire. “What’s with you?”
“I just don’t want to act stupid or goofy while we’re here, that’s all. What’s wrong with that?”
There was plenty wrong with that. And plenty wrong with Lisa, too. Georgie sailed past her into the reception room.
“Georgie?” Lisa said.
Georgie ignored her.
“Now, what can I do for you girls?” the lady said.
“Um, we’re from Glendale Middle School,” Lisa said.
“And?”
“We came to visit Mrs. Albertson.”
A side door creaked open and a large woman came in. Her caramel-colored skin contrasted with the white uniform she wore. “Aggy?” she said. “What are you doin’?”
The woman in the 1940s dress said in a childlike voice, “I was just playing, Camille. I was pretending to be the lady of the manor.”
“You know playin’ is one thing. But you answer that door, you’re supposed to be yourself,” the woman named Camille said. Aggy hung her head.
“So, you’re the girls from the school?” Camille said. Lisa nodded.
“Aggy, you run on and tell Sophia she’s got company.”
Aggy smiled so widely that her eyes turned into slits. “Okay!” She wobbled out of the room on her high heels.
“I’m Camille. I’m one of the nurse’s aides here,” she said. “I can’t tell you how tickled Sophia’s gonna be to have company.” She said the word company as if it had no a—comp’ny. Her soft Southern accent reminded Georgie of her dad, and, despite herself, she felt her insides warm a little.
“Your school sent us a sign-in paper. Let me get it.” Camille rummaged through a drawer at the front desk. “Here we go. A letter came with it that said you were supposed to visit for two hours every week for six weeks.”
Lisa picked up the pen and filled out her line. She handed the pen to Georgie.
Georgie shook her head in disbelief.
“Come on, Georgie,” Lisa said. “I’m sure all the students have to do this.”
Georgie practically ripped the pen from Lisa’s hand. “I don’t like this. It’s like they’re spying on us or something.” She quickly signed and left Lisa to fill in the date and time for her.
Camille said, “Good, good. Now, come on. I’ll take you to meet Sophia. You’re just gonna love her. We all do.”
Lisa went through the door, but Georgie didn’t move. Camille stopped and put her hands on her hips. “Come on, child. I ain’t got all day and wouldn’t want to waste it here if I did.” She stood in the doorway.
Georgie thought of leaving, but something about Camille’s don’t-argue-with-me attitude made Georgie slowly shuffle past her.
In the parlor Georgie saw an old gentleman carrying a box of checkers into a room. He walked with a cane. She saw two old women watching television. One of them was knitting.
“This is a nice place, Camille,” Lisa said. “You have so many homey touches, like the braided rugs on the floor and the doilies.”
“We try to make it as much like home as we can.”
Georgie couldn’t help herself. “And don’t forget that nice homey antiseptic smell.” She snorted. “If you ask me, keeping a dead person’s ashes doesn’t sound too much like home.”
Camille stopped and stared down at Georgie. “And what are you talkin’ about?”
“That Aggy. She said Madge used to live here and now her ashes are in the urn by the front door.”
“I think Aggy’s been watching that soap opera Dark Shadows again. Most of what she says comes from television.” Camille’s expression didn’t change. “We’ve never had a Madge, dead or alive. And you’d think a person who looks as smart as you would recognize salt when she sees it.”
“Salt?”
“For when the walk gets icy in the winter. We can’t be havin’ our residents fallin’ on ice. Half of them can’t walk good as it is.”
Camille stopped at room 17 and said, “You girls go on to the sitting room at the end of the hall. I’ll bring Sophia down directly.”
Georgie flopped into a chair in the sitting room.
“It’s not a bad place, don’t you think?” Lisa asked.
Before Georgie could answer, Camille wheeled Sophia into the room.
“I’ll leave you all here for a little visit,” Camille said. “We’ll have treats after you get acquainted.”
Sophia sat in her wheelchair, a colorful afghan over her knees. She was thin, with wavy silver hair. Her face had a natural look of worry, as if the lines on it were etched that way permanently, even when she smiled at the girls.
“Hello, I’m Sophia Albertson. I’m sorry, but I don’t know who you are.”
“I’m Lisa!” She was quick to answer. “Lisa Loutzenhiser, Mrs. Albertson, and this is Georgie Collins.”
Georgie ignored them and pretended to study a picture.
“Loutzenhiser, that’s—”
“Polish,” Georgie interrupted. “It means two-headed freak.”
Lisa’s face went white.
“Really? I was about to say that it’s an old German name. One I haven’t heard in quite some time.” She looked confused. “It’s Polish, you say?”
Lisa said, “Georgie’s just kidding around.”
“I see.” Sophia brightened a little. “Well, I’m pleased to meet you both. Now I need you to do two favors for me. Please call me Sophia. Mrs. Albertson was my mother-in-law. The other favor is, could you please tell me why you’re visiting me today? My memory isn’t as sharp as it used to be.”
Georgie said, “We’re here because if we don’t do something nice for the community, we flunk. So it’s either visit you or get an F.”
Sophia’s face looked shocked for a second and then sort of closed up, the way leaves protect a flower.
“It’s not like that, Sophia!” Lisa said. “It’s true that our school has a program to help the community, but we had choices. Lots of them! We thought you sounded like such a nice lady that we wanted to visit you.”
Georgie had to give Lisa credit for lying well when she had to, but it was too late. Sophia said, “I see. Well, now you’ve done your duty. You can tell your teacher you did your job. I don’t know how you got my name, but I’m certainly in no need of visitors.”
Sophia unlatched the brake on her wheelchair and said, “Good day.”
As she watched Sophia wheel toward the door, Georgie thought, Good riddance. If Sophia didn’t want them to visit, Mr. Gordon couldn’t make them.
Suddenly Aggy burst into the room. Her faded gray hair hung about her face and she had changed into a caftan that billowed around her bare feet. She looked like an old hippie.
�
�It’s brunch!” Aggy called.
“Aggy, the girls were just leaving,” Sophia said.
“Not now. We get to eat and I set the table!”
She grabbed the wheelchair handle and took off at a dead run. Sophia squeezed the armrests so tight her knuckles turned white. Aggy called out, “Faster than a speeding bullet. More powerful than a locomotive. Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound…”
She skidded the wheelchair around a corner and they were out of sight.
Georgie headed for the front door.
Lisa said, “The dining room is this way.”
“I know,” Georgie said. “Which is why I’m going the other way. She said she doesn’t want us to visit so I’m leaving. This is our ticket out.”
“Okay, fine. We won’t come back, but we’re here now and it would be rude to just leave. Please, Georgie.”
“I don’t want to have brunch, okay? Even the word is stupid. It’s something square people do. You stay, Lisa. You’ll fit right in.”
Georgie was losing her cool fast. She’d been holding her breath, breathing only when she had to because she thought the place stank. It didn’t matter that the people seemed clean and able to get themselves to the restroom. Georgie still thought of dirty diapers and drool. Now they expected her to eat.
Georgie thought of how Sophia had sat so regally in that wheelchair, almost as if it were a throne. Didn’t she know how pathetic she looked? Aggy might actually be fun, in a creepy sort of way. But Georgie couldn’t like any of it after Lisa had bitten her head off.
I just don’t want to act stupid or goofy, she’d said. Let’s just be normal, all right? “Let’s just be boring. Let’s just be fake,” she might as well have said.
Georgie definitely wanted to leave, but the feeling that her body wasn’t big enough to hold all her anger came over her. It had been happening more and more lately. Suddenly she didn’t want to go—not because she wanted to stay, but because she wanted them to feel as lousy as she did.
She walked toward the dining room. “I’ll stay, but just remember, you asked for this.”
Georgie sat, putting her feet up on an empty chair as she watched Aggy pour tea into mismatched teacups. It was as if she were having a kids’ tea party with her mom’s castoffs. Sophia smiled her thanks when Aggy passed a paper napkin to her. The napkin Aggy put in front of Georgie said “Happy Birthday.” Georgie watched Lisa lay her heart-shaped napkin with “Be Mine” in pink letters on her lap, cross her ankles, and say, “Yes, please,” when Sophia asked if she wanted sugar.
Lisa wasn’t the person Georgie had thought she was. Today she was so perfect, so prissy. She probably walked around with a book on her head and took classes on which fork to use and stupid etiquette junk like that. She’d been whiny ever since Mr. Gordon had called them in. And now she was simpering over a dumb piece of crumb cake. Georgie decided she didn’t like Lisa at all.
“There!” Aggy said after everyone had been served. She sat in the tall chair, her back not quite touching it. She drank her tea with her pinkie stuck out. She smiled at Georgie, and little fans of wrinkles appeared at the corners of her eyes.
Georgie wanted to barf. The air was stuffy. She was sure she would smell the place for days after she left. Aggy was crazy as a loon and Lisa behaved as if she were having tea with the Queen of England instead of the Mad Hatter.
Georgie looked around the room. Lisa would pay for making her feel so angry. She saw the old man with the cane hobble into the room. She could trip him, she thought. Lisa would hate her, but they’d kick Georgie out of there and she wouldn’t have to go back.
But Georgie couldn’t make herself hurt an old man.
Just then, Georgie noticed Aggy leaning to the side. Suddenly there was a loud pplllllllllooofff!
“What was that?” Georgie asked.
Sophia finished sipping her tea and put the cup back on its saucer. “Well, Georgie, I do believe Aggy sat on a duck.”
Aggy beamed as if she’d blessed them all with a gift and sang out the Alka-Seltzer jingle: “Plop, plop, fizz, fizz, oh, what a relief it is!”
Georgie quickly looked at Lisa, who lifted her head up, startled. Her lips parted and splashes of pink sprang up on her cheeks, as if she’d never before heard a fart outside a bathroom.
Georgie cackled. She laughed so hard that she slid out of her seat onto the floor.
She held her side, gasping for breath, and looked up at Lisa. Lisa stared at her for a minute and then laughed. Soon Sophia joined in, and they were lost in a fit of giggles.
When she finally stopped laughing, Georgie was flat on the floor, her anger gone. She wiped tears of laughter from her face and said, “Soph, you’ve gotta let us come back.”
Sophia looked down at her hands folded neatly in her lap. “I guess it would be all right. But only if you both want to.”
“You really want to, Georgie?” Lisa sounded surprised.
Georgie got up, grabbed a piece of crumb cake, and said, “I wouldn’t miss it.”
9
Georgie ran into the restroom before lunch on Monday and saw Lisa at the sink.
“Look at this mess!” Lisa said.
Georgie squinted at Lisa’s hair. It had a streak of green running down the side.
“You look like Lily on The Munsters. Except hers is white,” Georgie said, washing her hands.
Lisa moaned and rubbed soap onto her hair.
“What happened anyway?”
“Kathy Newman’s in my health class and I heard her telling her new best friend, Angel Cameron, how cute she thought Craig Evans was. I know she was just doing it because I told her last year that I liked him.” Lisa turned to the mirror. “We were making posters and I have this stupid habit of tucking my hair behind my ears when I’m nervous. The next thing I knew, I pulled my hair back and I had green paint on my hand!”
“It could be worse,” Georgie said. “You look good in green.”
Lisa flipped water at Georgie for an answer.
Georgie laughed. She’d been so put out with Lisa at the Sunset Home, but by the time they left, she’d decided that Lisa wasn’t so bad. She had been looking for her when she came into the restroom.
“You got much homework?” Georgie asked.
“No,” Lisa answered. “Not yet anyway. How about you?”
“Nah. Let’s do something tonight.”
“Tonight?” Lisa asked. “A school night?”
“I can’t stand it at my house! My mom has two cribs in the living room for babysitting. Two! I feel like the rooms shrink when I’m there.” Georgie yanked a paper towel and dried her hands. “I’d rather go to your house. Better yet, let’s go to the Sunset Home. Sophia’s a square but Aggy’s groovy. I want to see what else she does. It’s like a free freak show, y’know?”
Lisa flinched visibly. “Aggy is pretty weird, but maybe she can’t help it. I mean, she is old.”
“So?” Georgie said.
“I just don’t think we should make fun of her,” Lisa said. “Besides, Sophia isn’t expecting us until Saturday.”
Lisa wiped her hands on a paper towel and then wrapped it around the handle of the bathroom door when she opened it.
Georgie didn’t move. “What are you doing?”
Lisa looked down at the paper towel. “I’m opening the door. A lot of people don’t wash their hands after using the restroom, so I always do this to keep from getting their bacteria.”
Georgie threw back her head and laughed.
Lisa’s face went straight to red. “Why is that funny?”
“Never mind. You’re just different,” Georgie said as she walked through the doorway. “If we’re not going to the Sunset asylum, I guess that leaves your house. I can be there around seven o’clock.”
* * *
Georgie scraped the food off a plate, grabbed the dishrag, and began scrubbing before the sink filled with water.
Mom added their dirty silverware to the suds. “I know you’re a
nxious to visit Lisa, but you don’t have to be in that big a rush.”
“I told her I’d be there at seven. I don’t want to miss the news.”
“Georgie, not tonight.”
“But—”
“No buts.” Mom dried her hands. “I said I’d take you to Lisa’s, even though this is a school night, because I want you to have fun. You can pay me back by not watching the news.”
Georgie threw her dishrag into the sink, spraying bubbles onto the counter. “Fine! I’ll call Lisa and tell her I’m not coming.”
“You’ll do no such thing. I swear, Georgie, if you don’t stop this obsession of watching that war play out on television, I’ll sell it. And wipe that scowl off your face, young lady.”
Georgie knew Mom wouldn’t really sell the television, but she felt as if she’d explode if she didn’t get out of the house soon. So without another word she fished the dishrag out of the water and attacked a pan.
* * *
Mom slowed the station wagon in front of Lisa’s house. Georgie opened the door before it had completely stopped.
“Georgia Francine! Don’t ever do that again! You could have fallen out.”
“Okay. Sorry.” She looked at Mom. Georgie used to want to be little again and to curl up on Mom’s soft lap. But more and more, she felt that she would suffocate if she didn’t get away from her.
“Lisa’s a new friend and I like her. I’m just anxious to see her, that’s all.”
Mom glanced at Lisa’s house. “I think I’ll come in and meet her mother.”
“No!” Georgie almost shouted. “I mean, geez, Mom, talk about embarrassing! You act like I’m a little kid.”
“Okay, okay. I can take a hint when I’m clubbed with it.” Mom leaned over and hugged Georgie. Georgie didn’t shrink away, but she didn’t hug back, either.
“Have fun. I’ll be here at nine o’clock.”
“Right.” Georgie threw open the door, slammed it, then immediately felt guilty for not being nicer. She looked at her mother. “See ya at nine.” Then she bounded up the steps just as Lisa opened the door.
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