by Pamela Morsi
She shook her head. “No, I guess not.
“Did you have any trouble with Jet?”
“That kid? She’s a little sugar,” he said. “She practically tucked me in.”
Amber smiled.
“Well, I guess I’d better be going,” Brent said.
“I was hoping you’d take me out for a drink,” Amber said.
He glanced down at his watch. “Sure,” he said. “Where would you like to go?”
“The strip, I guess,” she answered, referring to the two miles of rowdy bars and hip dance clubs along North St. Mary’s frequented by college kids and the younger set.
Brent screwed up his face in distaste.
“Couldn’t we go someplace a little more mellow,” he suggested. “All those drunks and dopers are just too much for me on a Wednesday night.”
Amber thought for a moment. “Okay,” she said. “It doesn’t have to be too noisy. It might be nice to just relax and chill.”
“And maybe we can get some pie!” he said.
“Pie?”
He put a finger to his lips and gave her a secretive look. “I’m taking you to my favorite late night hangout,” he said. “And they serve pie.”
They got into the Tahoe and he drove them to Earl Abel’s, a San Antonio landmark on Broadway and Hildebrand, that was not much changed since its heyday in the 1960s. It had the same decor, the same menu and for the most part, the same waitresses. Twenty-four hours a day they served drinks and burgers and chicken fried steak and pie.
Amber ordered vodka tonic.
Brent ordered coconut cream.
“This is a kind of celebration for me,” Amber said.
“Yeah?”
“Tonight I finally told my mother what I’m going to do,” she said. “I’ve been putting it off for weeks and tonight I just told her.”
“What did you tell her?”
“That I’m moving in with my friend, Gwen,” she answered. “We’re getting an apartment together and we’re not taking our kids.”
Brent’s fork stopped in midair. He looked over at her, puzzled.
“What do you mean ‘we’re not taking our kids’?”
“We’re going to go out on our own,” Amber said. “She has a boy. I have Jet. We’re going to leave them with our moms.”
He continued to look at her.
“What?” she asked finally.
“That’s what I’d like to know,” he said. “Just hours ago you were complaining about how you get sick of everyone interfering between the two of you.”
“So?”
“So now you’re response to that is to throw up your hands and say, ‘Jet is yours, I’m out of here.’”
“That’s not what I’m doing,” Amber said.
“Then explain to me, please,” he said.
She hesitated. “It’s nothing you would understand.”
“Why don’t you think so?” he asked.
“Because…you’ve never had to make hard choices,” she said.
His fork hit the pie plate with such force it could have broken it.
“That’s bullshit,” he declared adamantly. “Yeah, it’s true, both my parents are living. I haven’t brought any children into the world. I don’t even have to support myself. But, come down from the cross, Amber. You are warm and safe and your little girl is healthy and happy and never goes hungry. There are a lot of people out there who would trade places with you in a skinny minute.”
“Yeah, I know, there are starving children in Africa,” she responded sarcastically.
“Yes, there are,” he said. “And there are starving children in San Antonio as well.”
“I’m sorry about those people,” Amber said. “But you don’t understand. I’m fighting for my life here. If I don’t get out on my own, now, I probably never will.”
“Why would you even think that?”
“Because it’s true,” Amber said. “You don’t understand, because you’ve got a future.”
His brow furrowed. “We’ve all got a future,” he said.
Amber shook her head. “No, we all don’t,” she said. “I don’t. I’ve got what I’ve got right now. Tomorrow looks a lot like it. And the next day looks the same. Nothing is going to change for me. I’m going to work at a job that pays next to nothing. I’m going to live hand-to-mouth, never getting ahead, until I start getting behind. Then it’s all downhill from there. You have the hope, no more than that, you have the expectation that life is going to get better for you. I don’t have that.”
“If you don’t have that,” he said, “then get it.”
“I can’t,” Amber said. “I missed my chance.”
“Your chance at what?”
“At what you’ve got,” she said. “You and all my used-to-be-friends from Clark High. You’re all going to college, figuring out what you want to do in life, dreaming dreams and making plans. I’m selling underwear.”
Brent looked at her intently. “That’s what this is all about—college?” he asked. “Do you think you can’t have a great life or good future because you didn’t go to college?”
She didn’t answer.
He rolled his eyes. “I wish you could meet some of the losers that I know at college,” he said. “Believe me, these flake-o-dudes have nothing on you.”
“They have a chance,” Amber insisted. “Sure, maybe they’ll piss it away, but they’ve got it.”
He couldn’t argue that.
“So somehow deserting Jet is going to be a substitute for college,” he said.
“I’m not deserting Jet,” Amber said. “She is going to live with my mom and Wilma. You make it sound like I’m leaving her in a locked car in a parking lot. Jet will be better off if I leave her at home.”
The phrase “at home” momentarily caught Amber up short. Jet’s home would never be with her.
“Your mother has a ton of problems and the way the doctor told it tonight, Wilma won’t be around that long,” Brent said. “Do you think they deserve to have that kind of responsibility dumped on them?”
“I deserve to have a life,” Amber told him, very annoyed. “I deserve to have a young life, a fun life. As for my mother, she’ll finally get to raise Jet however she likes. And she’s one of those women who thrive on responsibility. I’m not and I don’t want to be.”
“Wow, this all sounds really lucky for you,” Brent said, facetiously. “You just walk in and out of the kid’s life and other people clean up the mess.”
Amber didn’t like the sound of it, but she had no idea how to dispute his words.
“What is this going off on your own suppose to get you?” he asked.
“It’ll be easier to get ahead if I don’t have Jet,” Amber told him.
“Get ahead of what?” he asked. “Are you going to try to go back to school?”
“I told you, I missed my chance.”
“College isn’t just one chance,” he said.
Amber rolled her eyes and ground the words out between clenched teeth. “Where would I get the money to go?” she asked him. “It costs thousands of dollars a semester.”
“There’s financial aid,” Brent said. “And you don’t have to go to an expensive state university, there’s community college and you can go part-time.”
“Community college? Oh, yeah, like that counts,” she said. “It’s just high school on steroids. None of the kids from our group at Clark ever considered community college.”
“We’re not at Clark anymore,” Brent said, his jaw firm. “At community college they have real teachers who give real classes where you learn real things. If you think it’s too easy, then dig deeper. The profs will be glad to let you.”
“It would take years for me to get a degree going part-time,” Amber said. “I’d be thirty at least!”
“I hate to be the one to point this out,” Brent said. “But you’re probably going to get to be thirty anyway. You’re the one who thinks that college is so important.”
&nbs
p; He made it sound possible. Amber wanted it to be possible.
“It’s such a long shot,” she said. “Maybe I couldn’t hang in there. I mean, maybe I could do it, but what if I couldn’t? As you said, Mom has her own problems and Wilma’s not well. We’re about to get thrown out on the street. I might start school, but it would be really hard to keep it up. If we move into another place, there will be rent to pay. And if Wilma couldn’t keep Jet, then I’d have to pay for child care. But if I leave Jet and move in with Gwen, at least I’ll have my own place. Maybe after a while, get a car.”
It sounded insufficient even to her own ears.
“Is that what you’re going to tell Jet when she gets to be our age?” Brent asked. “I gave up being your mother so I could get an apartment and a car.”
“Go to hell!” Amber said, scooting out of the booth and leaving in a dramatic huff. It was an excellent exit line, but as she walked home, she couldn’t quite get past the truth that had provoked it.
Ellen hadn’t slept well, so she’d gotten out of bed early and headed downtown with the excuse that she had to get a head start on the job. She and Amber had decided that Amber would keep Jet this morning and then bring her down to the tax office when she went to work at three.
The fact that she packed a thermos of Earl Grey and some shortbread cookies might have called into question her destination had anyone been awake to take notice. Fortunately, nobody was.
Ellen drove the Chrysler down Broadway, through the business district and on to King William.
Give me a light heart, she asked sincerely. It was a much needed prayer. Things were weighing very heavy. Wilma. Amber. Jet. It was all just too much.
She was eager to see Mrs. Stanhope. The woman would be sitting in her lovely garden this morning, thinking happy thoughts about a life that once had been. Ellen was sure of that. And she wanted to be there with her. She wanted to talk about Paul. Remember old times. Just be content to live in the more pleasant past.
She parked at the curb near the garden gate and gathered up her basket of goodies.
Mrs. Stanhope was seated at her usual location. As always her attention seemed to be focused on the eastern sky. The slate stone path was damp and slippery from predawn-timed water sprinklers.
From the back porch she could hear Irma, as usual, talking on the phone. Ellen offered a polite wave in her direction. He response was equally tepid.
“Good morning, Mrs. Stanhope,” she said as she approached the little garden nook.
The woman looked up. Her expression was momentarily reticent. Then as she recognized her visitor, her eyes lit up.
“Ellen,” she said. “It’s Ellen, isn’t it.”
“Yes, ma’am, good morning.”
“Good morning to you,” the woman responded. “Please sit down. I can’t offer you any tea—”
“I brought some to offer you,” Ellen said.
“Oh, my.”
“I remembered that the maids don’t arrive until eight and I thought we could share some tea before I have to go to work.”
“What a lovely idea,” Mrs. Stanhope said. “Should I invite Irma?”
That was the last thing that Ellen wanted.
She smiled brightly at the older woman. “Perhaps we shouldn’t bother her,” she said. “Irma seems to be very busy already.”
Mrs. Stanhope sighed. “Yes, she is very busy. She works much too hard, but she enjoys it so much.”
“I’m sure she does.”
“I worked in my husband’s store for a short time,” Mrs. Stanhope said. “Of course, Papa put a stop to that. ‘Young women of good family do not engage in commerce,’ he said. And whatever Papa said, well we had to go along with it.”
Ellen could almost see the joy of the morning fading with that thought. Ellen didn’t want to see it go.
“You must tell me about the parties you used to give at this house,” she said. “You must have given some very lovely parties.”
Mrs. Stanhope immediately brightened. “Oh, yes, indeed,” she said. “I was a very eager young hostess and Lyman was extremely proud of me.”
Ellen pulled the table between them and set up their little breakfast tea as Mrs. Stanhope reminisced lovingly upon the gala occasions she’d orchestrated and witnessed decades earlier. Ellen thoroughly enjoyed the sentimental journey among the local ladies of leisure, in their dresses by Chanel or Dior, their pillbox hats with netted veiling and their ever-present and pristine white gloves.
She told a delightful story of one season’s pinnacle social event that was attended by the former governor’s daughter, Miss Ima Hogg. During the planning of the event, one wickedly spiteful young matron kept referring to the renowned Miss Hogg as Madam Pig. It was all very humorous until during the evening after being presented to the lady, the silly matron had slipped up and called her that to her face.
Ellen laughed.
Mrs. Stanhope tutted reprovingly. “Miss Hogg very generously ignored it, but it was a dark day for San Antonio society,” she said, before her stern visage turned to a smile and she giggled as well.
“Enough about me and my fond memories,” Mrs. Stanhope said. “Tell me, how is your lovely family.”
Momentarily, Ellen was at a loss for words. The last thing she wanted to do was delve into it all: Wilma’s smoking herself to death. Amber’s moving out, and herself suddenly conscripted into parenthood of a little girl not yet four. It was foolish in the extreme to burden Mrs. Stanhope with her problems. For all her eagerness to listen, she had her own issues that obviously had never been resolved.
“Everyone is doing well enough,” Ellen answered. “My mother’s health is not the best. There are things that come up day to day, but we are fine.” It sounded like the truth, even to her own ears. “My granddaughter turns four this week.”
“Oh my goodness, four years old,” Mrs. Stanhope said. “She must be charming.”
“We think so.”
“So what has happened with your house?” the woman asked. “I recall that you were in the middle of some unpleasant family conflict and that your mother’s house might be taken away.”
Ellen hadn’t remembered telling her that. It was surprising to her that she’d done so. Even more surprising that Mrs. Stanhope had remembered it.
“Nothing is settled yet,” Ellen told her.
Mrs. Stanhope nodded. “Well, please don’t give it another thought,” the woman said. “I told Irma about it and she said they would never be able to do it. This is Texas and we have laws to protect people from being pushed out into the street.”
“Yes, thank you, Mrs. Stanhope,” Ellen said. “I’m sure everything will be fine.” Ellen changed the subject. She could not bear to discuss the prospect of her emphysemic mother attempting to recover her health in a homeless shelter. “Everything will be fine,” she repeated. “How could it not be on such a lovely day. I can’t remember when this springlike weather has lingered so long into summer.”
They finished their tea and cookies.
Ellen talked about her fifteenth anniversary. She and Paul went to Round Top for the symphony and stayed in a charming little inn.
Mrs. Stanhope drifted in and out of the present. When she announced that Lyman was putting stockings on sale for half price and that she should stop by the store and pick up a pair, Ellen knew she should be leaving.
“He says all the ladies want seamless now,” Mrs. Stanhope explained. “But for half price, I doubt many ladies of my acquaintance would complain about a nice, well-sewn seam along the back of the calf.”
“I really have to go,” Ellen said, gathering up her impromptu picnic. “Thank you, Mrs. Stanhope, for a lovely morning.”
Leaving, Ellen felt Irma’s eyes upon her. She acknowledged her presence with a nod. It wasn’t particularly pleasant having the woman watching her as if she were about to steal the silverware, but Ellen dutifully gave the niece credit for attempting to protect a very sweet and charming lady who must be very vulnerable
to conniving strangers.
Ellen put the picnic things into her car and headed toward the office. She was actually a few minutes late. Not a particularly great idea after leaving early yesterday and planning to have her granddaughter in the office in the afternoon.
No one appeared to notice as she came in. Max was already in his office and Yolanda was on the phone. She held the receiver against her chest and whispered a quick, “How’s your mother?”
Ellen answered, “Better.” And Yolanda went back to her conversation.
It was not possible, however, to ignore Max. Ellen needed his cooperation.
Ellen poured herself a cup of coffee and went to face the lion in his den.
“Max? May I have a word with you?”
“Sure, sure,” he said, looking up from a pile of papers he’d been perusing. He had on his reading glasses, half frames on the bridge of his nose. They gave him a more scholarly air than his normal cowboy appearance.
“My mother is in the hospital,” she said.
He nodded. “Yolanda told me when I got back yesterday,” he said.
“She has bronchitis, complicated by emphysema,” Ellen said. “She’s doing better than she was yesterday, but she’s going to be in the hospital for a couple of days.”
“We all have these family emergencies,” he said. “You can be as flexible with your work schedule as you need to be.”
Ellen was surprised that he didn’t show more interest in Wilma. She had been certain that Max was the man her mother had been seeing at the Empire Bar. But perhaps she was wrong. He certainly didn’t behave as if he knew Wilma at all.
“My mother normally keeps our granddaughter,” Ellen told him. “Jet is not quite four. Her mother, Amber, works evenings at the mall. I told her to bring Jet here when she goes to work.”
The man’s eyebrows went up at that.
“I think Jet is well behaved enough not to be too much of a distraction,” Ellen said. “If not, then, I’ll take her and my work home with me.”
“Well, whatever you have to do,” Max said. “It’s a pretty confined space for a small child.”
“Yes, well, it’s only until my mother is better,” Ellen said. “Assuming that she does get better. The doctor is very clear that if she doesn’t quit smoking, it’s going to kill her and very soon.”
