“No. Nothing like that. We just stand outside in the yard and talk. I mean this has been really tough for me. This week. You know? And I can’t be calling you all the time, and she’s right there, practically next door.”
Amanda sucked in air that turned into a small gasp. She got out of bed and walked to the window. The street was empty. Street lights glowed a soft yellow-white light. “Suppose,” she offered, “that Foxy invited you to move in here until your dad comes home. Would that be okay with family services? I mean we’re not related, but Foxy is an adult and we do go to school together.”
Nick was silent and Amanda thought she’d overstepped some line. She was already feeling stupid and young and like an idiot when Nick said, softly, “You would do that?”
“Sure. We have a pull-out couch in the den, and there’s an extra bathroom next to the living room. I mean Foxy wouldn’t mind. I don’t think. I can ask her anyway. If you want me to.” She waited to hear Nick’s response, but he didn’t say a thing and then, very softly, she heard him sob. It was just a sharp intake but she knew that sound. She’d sobbed silently when she didn’t want anyone to know, and she recognized how that sounded and felt. She didn’t let Nick know. She waited. Tomorrow she’d talk to Foxy. But she already knew it would be all right. She knew, for the first time since she started to grow up, that Foxy did want what was best for her and that she did care what happened. She may have had a strange way of showing it. She may have been thoughtless and self-involved and narcissistic. She may have had different values from her daughter, and she may not have made all the right choices in her life. But she loved her daughter, in her way, in her time. And Amanda could depend on that. She knew that now.
Chapter Forty-Nine
On her way home from school Amanda stopped at the window of Chouette to look at the display again. It had changed a little. Now there was a black wool pencil skirt and black leggings stretched below the red angora scarf and hat. And a black-and-red-striped boat neck top with long sleeves that had been pulled out to look as if they were almost dancing. Amanda stood in front of the window just staring inside. And then a small woman with curly brown hair motioned for her to come inside. She smiled invitingly and nodded when Amanda looked surprised. Amanda shrugged a little and pushed the door open. She was carrying her backpack over one shoulder.
“Bonjour,” said the petite French woman. “Welcome to Chouette.” She pronounced it shweht and it sounded so nice to Amanda, who was wondering how you said it and what it meant. “You were looking for something particular?”
Amanda thought how Knot would like to hear this woman talk. Maybe she’d tell him to walk in one day. “I, um, I was just looking at the hat in the window.”
“Oh yes. A very pretty hat. For a pretty girl. No?” The woman stepped up into the window display and took the hat off the mannequin’s head. “You like to try it?”
“I don’t know,” Amanda hesitated, thinking it would look stupid on her.
“I tell you what,” said the little woman with the heavy French accent. “You are so pretty a girl. This hat and the scarf would be perfect for you with your coloring. But I think the hair is too dark. Not altogether right for this look. You go down the street to Pierre’s.” She went to the window and pointed toward Du Pont Circle. “See over there?”
Amanda nodded.
“You go see Pierre and ask him to give you a little bob. A soft bob. And then you come back and try the hat. You will see. It is perfect for you with a bob.”
“Pierre?” Amanda asked.
“C’est ça. Exactly. Pierre. He will know what to do for you. He is wonderful. And then you come back to me and we will make you look just the way you are dreaming of. A pretty girl. You want that, no?”
“I guess,” Amanda said and slowly made her way back outside. She was a bit confused now, not sure what she wanted or who she was anymore. She caught sight of her reflection in the store window and saw the discrepancy between the red angora slouch hat and her own green striped black hair. She had beautiful flawless skin and wide brown eyes. Her cheeks were high and flat and her chin was well defined above a slender neck. She marched toward Pierre’s salon determined to make a clean break with her past. In the back of her mind she heard Nick’s voice saying “how beautiful Mimi is, how beautiful Mimi is, how beautiful Mimi is” like the refrain from a song. She couldn’t get it to stop. She marched more determined than ever in the direction of Pierre, convinced this was the only way to get that noise out of her head.
“First we have to get rid of all the black,” said Pierre. He leaned over her shoulder and looked at her reflection in the mirror. She was seated in a swivel chair with a stainless steel foot rest and covered in a green plastic cloth snapped around the neck. “And the green, too.” He frowned at her face in the mirror. Amanda could almost hear Foxy’s voice all that past year harping at her and now, here she was ready to do just what she had sworn she would never do.
“I’m ready,” she told Pierre.
“Good.” He rubbed his hands together. “First to the washing sink, and then we’ll see if we need to add back your natural color.”
It all seemed to go fast. Before Amanda had a chance to see herself in a mirror, Pierre was clipping at her hair with enthusiasm and chattering like a wren. He blow dried it and styled it a little bit and whirled her around in the chair so she could see the result.
“Oh!” she almost shouted. “It’s just like in those makeover shows on TV. I love it. I just love it.” She jumped up and gave Pierre a hug, then turned to stare at herself. She fluffed her light brown hair and watched it fall effortlessly back into place.
“No girl is prettier than you,” Pierre said and pulled off the plastic cape from around her neck. “And now, please, buy the new clothes to match the hair. And no more black around the eyes. Such pretty eyes. Need just a little touch of pale color. No heavy lines anymore. OK?”
She pumped his hand, nodded in agreement, and couldn’t help but look at herself in every mirror as she walked to the desk to pay. On the way back to the store, she glanced at store windows and had trouble meshing what she saw with what she still felt inside. But that was changing and, before she went back to the store, she ran to her house to get the red boots. She wanted the whole outfit to look just perfect.
When she re-entered the store, the French woman fussed over her and showed her how to wear the clothes. Amanda bought them all. The pencil skirt and leggings, the striped boat neck top, hat, scarf. The woman even sold her a pair of gold earrings – well, not real gold, but gold plated – stars that hung from a little chain at each ear lobe.
Amanda left wearing her new outfit. She carried her old clothes in a shopping bag and wondered what she was going to do with her other old clothes and whether this transition would be permanent or simply a whim of the moment. Although she never stopped at Second Chances on her way home from school, today was different.
She saw Foxy and Knot through the window, and she pushed open the door. The little bell tinkled, and Knot was the first one to look up and spot her. At first he didn’t know who she was. He walked toward her, thinking it was a customer coming in just before closing, which sometimes happened. People stopped in after work. Maybe they’d seen something when they were in a hurry that morning, and they’d made a mental note to look more closely later. Or maybe they just wanted to unwind after a day at work, and wandering among antiques was soothing for them. Whatever their reasons, Knot found that late in the day on weekdays and after lunch on weekends were the best times to sell. So he barreled forward toward Amanda until he reached a velvet chair and petit point footstool someone’s grandmother had stitched long ago and stopped short, his mouth a gaping O.
“Oh my God,” he said. His hands shot out in front of him as if he was waiting for a toy poodle to leap into his arms. “Look at you.”
Amanda grinned and dropped her backpack and the shopping bag on the floor. She pulled off the red hat, patted her hair and ruffled it a little.
She was still getting used to the way it felt. It was so fluffy. “It’s me,” she said and grinned.
Foxy walked slowly to the front of the store. She was cautious, amazed. “Amanda? Manda Bear?”
Chapter Fifty
“I know kids today start having sex very young, but you’ll have some rules in place during your boyfriend’s stay here.” Foxy dropped two folded sheets on the pullout couch in the den. She’d already freshened the towels in the bathroom and plumped a pillow. All of a sudden she was Harriet Homemaker.
“Foxy,” Amanda used her old familiar tone of forbearance with her mother. “Nick is not my boyfriend. And we are not having sex.”
“Well, you can’t help your urges. God knows I couldn’t help mine. Now I suppose you know how to protect yourself. I didn’t, but then my mother never talked to me about sex. When I got pregnant, she just said, ‘See, the good Lord doesn’t want you going off to some college and learning a lot of stuff no lady ever needed to learn to get by.’” She bustled around the small room. It was obvious she was looking forward to seeing Amanda and Nick together. “Poor boy. It’s just awful what he must be going through. What about his mother? Did you tell me? Are they divorced?”
“I don’t know if they’re divorced or not. And no, I didn’t tell you about her before. And no, it’s none of your business where she is. And please, please, Foxy, don’t call Nick my boyfriend. It would embarrass him, and it would mortify me.” She watched Foxy until there was nothing left for her to fuss over and she stood in the middle of the room, then Amanda asked, “Did Grandma really say that?”
“Of course she did. Do you think I could make something like that up? Why do you think I became a beauty queen? It was expected of me. In our circle, it’s what you did.”
All at once Amanda saw her mother in a new way, and she realized that opening the antique store was actually a very brave move for Foxy. She put her arms around her mother and gave her a long hug. “Oh, baby girl,” said Foxy. “We’re going to be all right. Really we are.”
“Foxy,” Amanda whispered to her mother, “I want to ask you something.”
“Yes?” Her mother leaned back and looked at Amanda’s face. She cupped her cheek in her hand and said, “You look so wonderful. I never would have guessed what was under that green hair. Ask me anything.”
“Do you think there are such things as vampires?”
Foxy stepped back, caught off balance. Then she laughed. “Oh, please. I guess the sex talk is over, huh? Honey, people think all kinds of things exist. UFOs, vampires, ghosts, past lives. It’s all nonsense, but people want to believe in such things. They need to. I guess because their everyday lives are so humdrum. Or something. Maybe it’s because there’s so much we don’t know. I mean they keep on discovering galaxies and planets. The universe just goes on and on with no end. Who knows what’s out there? It may be something scarier than anything we could dream up, and who wants to face that? I suppose anything is possible, but vampires? It’s Hollywood stuff, that’s all.”
Foxy didn’t ask why Amanda wanted to know. And Amanda didn’t say any more about it. Instead she asked, “Foxy, how can you tell when it’s okay to trust a guy?”
Foxy took a deep breath and sat down on the pullout couch next to the pile of sheets. She ran her hand over the top, smoothing out the few wrinkles over and over.
“Well,” she said, “it’s like this.” She stopped, unsure how much to say on this subject. Then she sat up straighter, squared her shoulders, and said, “I met a man when I was in Florida.”
“You did?” For some reason this amazed Amanda. She thought of her mother as done. Completely done with men. But the fact was, Foxy was still a young woman and Amanda had to adjust the way she saw her.
“Yes. The very first day. It was all very surprising. I wasn’t looking, you know. And he was so handsome and charming and interested in me. It was really wonderful, and I felt like I’d come alive again after . . . well you know after . . .”
“After Pigskin Pete?”
Foxy nodded, a sad little nod. “Precisely. I spent ten years of my life with that man, and I never really knew him.”
“Maybe he changed during that time,” said Amanda. “Maybe he was a nice guy in the beginning and then he changed.”
“Then that would mean that I did something wrong. Or didn’t do something I should have. Or just wasn’t a good wife.”
“No it doesn’t. You were a good wife to him.”
“Well, anyway, I met this man on the beach and everything was going along great and then he turned out to be a fake. A total fake. And I really fell for him, so I can’t tell you how to know when you can trust a man. I don’t seem to be able to get the hang of that myself. Maybe the trick is not to go for the good-looking ones. Maybe they just have it too easy. Although I don’t think that was the case with Florida. He just wanted to be taken care of. Financially, that is. And I didn’t have what it takes. Not that I would want a man who wants to be supported. At least I don’t think I would. It’ll never be a possibility for me, so I’ll never know.” She stood up and fluffed Amanda’s hair. “But you don’t have to worry about all that. I’m sure your Nick has nothing to hide yet. He’s too young.”
Later, in her room alone, Amanda opened her laptop and wrote:
Amanda’s Life in Hell – Post Thanksgiving
It seems Foxy’s had another love trauma. I wish she would meet a really nice guy. Someone who would see beyond the pretty face. Oh, who am I kidding? That’s not going to happen unless she gets old and ugly. I don’t think Foxy will ever get old and ugly, though. I wonder what it will be like to have Nick here for a week. I think it might be strange. But where else could he go? He doesn’t seem to have any other family. I guess he could have stayed with one of the guys from his team. But those runners are kind of loners. Like Nick. I think maybe he’s embarrassed to tell any of them what’s going on. I’m sure he hasn’t told them about the women down the street. Just imagine that. Whoa. That would be weird. I hope Foxy doesn’t totally mortify me in front of Nick. I don’t know what I’d do.
I wonder what Nick will say when he sees the new me!
Chapter Fifty-One
Nick arrived with one duffle bag slung over his shoulder, his backpack, and his iPad in a slim case. He looked worn out. Amanda led him to the den and he dropped his stuff on the floor. She showed him the bathroom and asked if he was hungry, which, of course, he was. She told him to get settled and went to make him a sandwich. In a few minutes he followed her and sat at the counter.
“Do you want some help? I’m pretty good in the kitchen. I can make microwave pizza and coffee.”
“Gee, if I’m ever stuck in the wilderness, I hope you’ll be there too so I won’t starve.” Amanda laughed and then remembered why Nick was there. “How’s your father?”
“It’s pretty awful. He’s hooked up to a bunch of tubes and a respirator. On top of everything else, he has an enlarged heart now. I have to go back to the hospital in a while. He likes it when I read to him. And we play cards. I tell him what’s in his hand, and he makes signs to tell me what cards to play for him. We’ve been playing poker and gin. I let him win a lot. He wasn’t always like this. I remember when we did things together. He went downhill after my mother left, but it wasn’t until last year that he got really sick. I think it started out with him being depressed. He’s never gotten rid of her stuff. It’s like he half expects her to come back.”
Amanda chopped up some canned tuna and spread two pieces of bread with mayonnaise, then mixed some in the tuna. “Do you like anything in your tuna salad?” she asked him, and when he shook his head she continued mixing. “Maybe he’s been mourning her all this time. I once had a puppy and it got hit by a truck, and I kept his bed in my room for two years.”
“Yeah, well, if he has, it’s not doing him any good. She’s not going to show up. She’s just gone and that’s that.”
Amanda thought Nick must have deeper feelings about it than
that, but she didn’t say anything more. “Foxy is planning a big dinner on Saturday. But early. She wants you to feel welcome. Of course she’s not cooking. Knot is. And she plans to invite Mr. Standlish, since you’ve already met him. Knot might bring the Congressman, too. But I’m not sure about that.”
“They told me if my dad is off the respirator by Friday, they’ll watch him for two days and then move him to the nursing home Monday. I’ll have to miss school again that day, but after that he should be getting better. They’ll be doing rehab with him and stuff. So yeah, I can be here by Saturday afternoon. That would be fun. Where’s your mom anyway? I wanted to thank her for letting me stay here.”
“She’s out shopping. Her real profession.” Amanda placed the sandwich and a glass of apple juice on the counter in front of Nick. “She wants to take me out tomorrow and buy me a whole new wardrobe.”
Nick took a big bite of the sandwich and then another. He wolfed it all down and drank the glass of apple juice so fast Amanda almost missed it. She made a second sandwich and poured another glass of juice. He took this one slower, and when he finished, he wiped his mouth and then grinned at her. “That was great. Thanks. I’m pretty sick of microwaved food. And I like your hair and everything. You look really beautiful.” He grinned again. Amanda blushed. She didn’t think he’d even noticed. She turned away so he couldn’t see her face, but she felt his hand on her neck. He ran his fingers through her bobbed hair. “You hair’s so soft. I never realized it before. I mean you looked good before, but now you seem so, well, so pretty. It’s really nice.” He kissed her neck and she turned around, and before she could protest he kissed her mouth and she felt as if she was falling softly into a pillow. When he stopped, she pulled back and blinked.
“We can’t.”
“Why not? Don’t you trust me yet?”
“We can’t because I promised Foxy.”
“Promised her what?” He reached out and stroked her face with his fingertips.
Foxy's Tale Page 19
