Achingly Alice

by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor

  We turned, and he gallantly handed us the nozzle and closed the door.

  6

  VALENTINE

  WOMANHOOD WAS GETTING TOO COMPLICATED for me. It must be so much easier for guys, I thought. Girls are just plain messy.

  I told that to Dad as we were mashing potatoes for dinner. Every so often we have what he calls real food. We don’t just mix up powdered potatoes, we actually boil them and mash them with milk and butter.

  “Not any messier than boys,” Dad said. “Boys ejaculate, you know. We always figured you couldn’t get much messier than that.”

  “But I’ll bet it’s a lot easier for boys to be examined than it is for girls. Lester said to tell Elizabeth just to close her eyes and think of England, but it didn’t help. We didn’t know what he meant.”

  Dad laughed. “It’s been said that back in Victorian times, that was the advice brides-to-be got from their mothers on their wedding nights.”

  “I don’t get it,” I said.

  “Well, back then women weren’t supposed to get any pleasure from sex. They were told it was something they just had to endure, so brides were instructed to put their minds on something pleasant—England, for example—while the act was going on.”

  That was about the stupidest thing I’d ever heard. We go our whole lives wondering what sex is all about, and when it finally happens we’re supposed to think of England?

  Dad yelled for Lester to come to dinner, and when he sat down at the table, he said, “Have the screaming meemies gone home?”

  “You weren’t supposed to come in the bathroom, Lester,” I told him.

  “I didn’t. I knocked.”

  “Well, you sure picked a bad time.”

  “Sorry, but it’s the only bathroom in the house.” He helped himself to the roast chicken.

  “We were just looking at the stuff Elizabeth got from the drugstore,” I explained, and then, just as Lester lifted a fork to his mouth, I added, “She has to douche.” Oh, I love bugging Lester!

  His eyes rolled upward. “Do you mind, Al?”

  I just kept at it. “And she has to use ointment because she has a slight infection.” I remembered a commercial I’d seen on TV. “A yeast infection,” I added knowingly.

  “You’re excused, Al. You can leave the table anytime,” Lester said.

  I took some mashed potatoes and green beans, and went right on as though I were talking only to Dad: “The doctor said there are at least three things that can cause wetness down there.”

  “Dad?” Lester said pleadingly.

  “Oh, I think I can stomach this all right, Les. It’s instructional, after all,” Dad told him.

  “Hormones,” I said, “infections, and masturbation.”

  Lester dropped his fork.

  “Problems, Lester?” I asked pleasantly.

  He reared back in his chair. “She just does that, Dad. Comes out with stuff that no civilized person would talk about in public,” Lester complained. “We’re raising a social ignoramus here.”

  “This isn’t public, and I’m just curious,” I said. “Do men ever itch down there?”

  “You’ve heard of jock itch,” Dad told me.

  “And do they … ?”

  “Yes. Now can we have an ordinary conversation, do you think?”

  Lester shoveled down his food as though he wanted to finish dinner before I opened my mouth again. But I was quiet for a while. I was thinking about Pamela, actually.

  “I’m worried about Pamela,” I said finally. “She’s really having a hard time of it since her mom walked out.”

  “You’ve been a good friend to her for a couple of years now, honey. Just keep on being a good friend,” Dad said.

  “It’s so sad, though. She’s sad, her dad’s unhappy, and her mom’s dating this NordicTrack instructor. If someone could just get through to Mrs. Jones about how ridiculous she’s acting …”

  “Well, don’t let that someone be you,” Dad told me. “The last thing in the world you should do is get involved in her parents’ love life. It’s up to them to work it out. Just be there for Pamela when she needs you.”

  I wished he hadn’t said anything about the love life of adults. It had been more than a week since I’d told Miss Summers that lie, and I wished now it had all been a bad dream. Valentine’s Day, though, was right around the corner, and somehow I felt that if I could only get Miss Summers past that without her getting engaged to Mr. Sorringer, we were beyond the danger point.

  There would be a Valentine’s dance at school, only it wouldn’t be formal or anything. Most of the kids just come in groups, and everybody goes home together—not like the eighth-grade semi-formal that was held each May. That would be my first school dance in a long dress. The bad part about the Valentine’s dance was that some of our school band members had formed a combo to play for us. Patrick would be the drummer in the combo, of course.

  Justin Collier made a point of asking Elizabeth if she’d be there, and Patrick asked me, but a lot of good that did me.

  “That’s not fair, Alice!” Pamela said sympathetically. “Patrick will be playing most of the evening. What are you supposed to do?”

  “Just hang out with you and Elizabeth, I guess,” I told her. Not only was Patrick playing in the combo, but he would be leaving the dance early to catch a late flight to Vermont. He and his folks were flying up there for a three-day ski trip. I wouldn’t even see him after the dance.

  “You know what? We need a life,” Pamela said. “I’m sick of boys and I’m sick of Mom. Of school. My hair is awful, and my face is breaking out.”

  “Yeah, tell me about it,” I said.

  Pamela and I called each other a lot. The fact was she could have had a dozen boyfriends, but she’d broken up with Mark Stedmeister to date Brian, and then she broke up with Brian to go back to Mark, and she even went out a few times with my old boyfriend back in Takoma Park, Donald Sheavers. But what Pamela needed was nothing a boyfriend could give her. So she’d talk and I’d listen, and lots of nights she called me just to connect with somebody. We’d sit and do our homework together over the phone until Dad came by and made me hang up. I think it was the night we were on the phone together watching TV that Lester freaked out, though.

  “You’re not saying a word!” he yelled.

  “We talk during the commercials,” I told him.

  He grabbed the phone out of my hand. “Lester to Pamela; Lester to Pamela,” he said. “This phone is out of order until further notice. All messages for Alice may be delivered on foot or by mail. I repeat: This is not a working phone.” And he hung up.

  “You’re horrible!” I told him. But at least we’d already worked out what we were going to wear to the Valentine’s dance. Since the seventh-grade girls were talking about wearing red-and-white polka dots or pink-and-white lace, we eighth-grade girls would come in black, a bunch of us decided—sophisticated black, with bright red lipstick and nails. Show them how it’s done!

  On February fourteenth, I opened my locker at school to find this huge one-pound chocolate Hershey’s Kiss wrapped in silver foil waiting for me. LOVE FROM PATRICK, it said on the tag. It made me feel warm and

  happy inside. I wished I could divide that feeling and share it with Pamela.

  She and Elizabeth both came over to my house that evening, and Pamela had this white, white face powder that we all put on, so that our eyes, lined with mascara, really stood out. So did our lips.

  “Yikes!” said Lester when he put on his jacket to drive us to the school. “What are they? The three witches from Macbeth?”

  “We’re gorgeous, Lester, and you know it,” I said.

  When we went out to the car, we saw that Lester had already picked up Marilyn for their Valentine date, so the three of us squeezed in back.

  “My, don’t you look elegant!” Marilyn said, turning around.

  “See, Lester?” I told him. And then, to Marilyn, “Where will you guys be going?”

  “Oh, the
re’s a club over in Bethesda we like—good music, good food. We’re going to meet some friends,” she said.

  When we got to the school and were walking up the sidewalk, Pamela said, “I can’t understand why Lester and Marilyn would be spending Valentine’s Day with friends! I mean, the whole point is to be alone with your sweetheart! The point is to make love!”

  “That’s all you think about, Pamela! Sex, sex, sex! Just doing it, like animals!” Elizabeth snapped.

  Even I was surprised.

  “Well, aren’t we touchy all of a sudden!” said Pamela. “What do you have against bodies, Elizabeth, other than the fact that you hate pelvics?”

  “It’s just that you’re so one-sided! When you get married, sex is only one small part of it, you know,” Elizabeth said.

  “Well, darn!” Pamela joked. “What’s the rest?”

  “Babies, diapers, cooking, cleaning, shopping, babies …”

  “You already said babies,” Pamela told her. “Anyway, I’m never getting married.” And even though she was still joking, she sounded as though she meant it.

  All at once I grabbed Pamela’s arm with one hand, Elizabeth’s with the other, because there, going in the door ahead of us, were Mr. Sorringer and Miss Summers. Together!

  “Relax,” said Pamela. “Maybe he just gave her a ride, that’s all.”

  “But she could have brought Dad!” I insisted. “Maybe she figures that she’s still on the job at this dance. You know, chaperone and everything. She probably doesn’t consider it a real date,” Elizabeth suggested.

  That was possible.

  The combo was already playing when we got inside, and we put our coats on the coat tables and went into the gym. The word had spread about wearing black, because almost all the eighth-grade girls were in it. We really stood out among the ruffles and hearts of the seventh-grade girls and felt very grown-up. I had on a black sweater and leggings, Pamela was wearing a long black rayon dress with thin, pointy-toed boots, and Elizabeth had on black pants and a black lacy top.

  “You girls look so sophisticated!” Miss Summers said, greeting us at the door to the gym.

  “Happy Valentine’s Day,” I said, trying to smile.

  “Thank you, Alice. Have a good time,” she said.

  I absolutely refused to say, “You, too.” I did not want her to have a good time. I wanted her to have a perfectly miserable time—to look at Jim Sorringer’s craggy face and wish she had brought Dad instead.

  “Gentle Ben,” she had called him once. How could she not love my father more than any other man in the world?

  I moved through the crowd toward the combo there onstage so I could wave to Patrick, but before I could get there, I heard a voice behind me.

  “Hi, Alice.”

  I turned and saw Sam. He is slightly on the chubby side, but he has nice eyes, a nice smile. And I like him.

  “Dance?” he said, nodding toward the patch of floor where the couples were doing a fast number.

  I’m not sure what I thought I would be doing all evening while Patrick was playing, and since you couldn’t tell who was dancing with whom, anyway, I said, “Sure,” and followed him over. We shook our bodies and moved our feet. Patrick caught a glimpse of me, smiled, and added a couple extra beats on the drum to say hello.

  I milled around with Pamela and Elizabeth after that, walking through the halls with the other girls, gathering in the restroom to talk, taking our Pepsis out on the steps and watching some of the guys horse around. Patrick spent as much time with me as he could. Whenever the combo took a break and they put on a CD, Patrick came over and danced with me. So I was having a pretty good time.

  But later in the evening, I was standing at the edge of the dance floor when Sam asked me to dance again, and I did. This time, though, when the fast number was over, the combo went immediately to a slow one, and the lights dimmed. Without even asking me, Sam put one hand on my waist and held my other hand, and we started to slow dance. I guess when you tell a guy you’ll dance with him one number, he just assumes you’re good for two.

  I don’t even know how to slow dance—only a waltz with my dad—but Sam is a good dancer. He placed his hand firmly on my back so that I could tell which way we were going to go.

  It seemed strange to be holding another guy’s hand after going with Patrick for so long, my left hand on Sam’s shoulder. I expected him to feel pudgy, but there was more muscle than fat. His face is round, maybe that’s why he looks chubby. Actually, he was looking pretty good right then.

  We were dancing out of Patrick’s line of vision, and I was glad, because I really didn’t know how to handle this. To break away from Sam right then would have seemed awfully rude. If I didn’t like him, I shouldn’t have agreed to dance with him the first time. On the other hand, I wondered what Patrick would think. How was I supposed to get to know other boys, though, if I was always worried about what he’d think?

  Sam didn’t try to press against me or anything. The point was … well, I liked dancing with him. I liked his quietness. He reminded me a little of my father. It was all so confusing.

  And then it was as though my world came to a stop right in front of my eyes, because Sam had slowly turned me around to dance in another direction when I saw—not ten feet away—Mr. Sorringer dancing with Miss Summers. They were dancing the same way we were, except that Mr. Sorringer’s cheek was against Miss Summers’s, and though her eyes weren’t closed in ecstasy or anything, she was smiling.

  7

  PERSUASION

  DAD WENT TO BED SHORTLY AFTER I GOT home—Elizabeth’s dad picked us up—and didn’t even ask if Miss Summers was there, so I didn’t tell him. He’d been working on income taxes, and when Dad’s doing taxes, he has a one-track mind.

  I couldn’t sleep, though. I was still wide awake at two o’clock when I heard the front door close, and Lester’s footsteps on the stairs. I got up, pulled on my robe, and stuck my head in his room.

  “Lester … ?” I whispered.

  He jumped. “Ye gods, Al! Don’t hiss at me. You sound like a snake.”

  “Could I talk for just a minute?” I went on in and closed the door. Lester was taking off his shoes, so I sat down beside him on the bed.

  “I saw something horrible tonight,” I began.

  He glanced at me quickly. “Accident, right?”

  “Worse.”

  He waited.

  “Mr. Sorringer and Miss Summers were dancing cheek to cheek at the Valentine’s dance.”

  I could see Lester’s shoulders slump with relief, but I could tell by his face that it wasn’t the best news he’d ever heard, either.

  “It just isn’t right, Lester! The way she was with Dad at Christmas—how can she go do something like that!”

  “Is that all they did?” he asked, trying to sound matter-of-fact.

  “Probably not,” I sniffled. “Probably at this very moment, while Dad’s sleeping peacefully in his room, Mr. Sorringer is over at Miss Summers’s house helping her take off her black lace slip with the slit up one side.”

  “Whoa! You even know what kind of underwear she owns? What do you do? Snoop?”

  “I saw her buying it once.”

  “Well, neither of us knows what’s happening between her and Mr. Sorringer, Al, so it makes no sense to guess. But just because a man and a woman dance cheek to cheek doesn’t mean they’ve got something going.”

  “It doesn’t?”

  “No. I can remember when high school teachers came to dances with their wives and sometimes they exchanged partners and danced cheek to cheek. But it doesn’t necessarily mean they were trading bed partners.”

  Did you ever notice how one word can suddenly add another crack to your nice, peaceful view of the world?

  “Necessarily?” I squeaked, and stared at my brother. “Lester, are you telling me that those high school teachers probably didn’t, but could have been, trading wives?”

  “Well, it’s been done.”

 
“You mean …” I gasped. “I’ll trade you a blonde for a brunette, or a fat for a skinny, as though they were baseball cards or something?” I was horrified.

  “Al, I didn’t say it happened.”

  “And when the wives who got traded went to the other wives’ houses, they put on the first wives’ nightgowns and …”

  “Will you shut up?”

  I just couldn’t take any more. I got dramatically to my feet. “If this is your world, Lester, I don’t want it,” I said, and marched toward the door. But I stubbed my toe on the foot of his bed and collapsed against the wall, holding my toe and sobbing.

  Lester put his hands on my shoulders and guided me over to his desk chair to recover.

  “Some people automatically kiss friends when they meet, Al; some just naturally hug; and some feel very comfortable dancing cheek to cheek with anyone they happen to be with. In most cases, it does not mean, ‘Let’s jump into bed and make mad love.’ Okay?”

  I swallowed. “But it could?”

  “Anything is possible in this world, but that doesn’t make it probable.”

  I would have to have a philosophy major for a brother. But at least it helped me get to sleep.

  It was the Monday after the Valentine’s dance that I got the news. I was sitting in history when Pamela walked breathlessly into the room, handed the teacher her pass, and said she had to speak to me in the hall about an emergency.

  The teacher looked at her skeptically, but said I could leave the room briefly.

  I quickly got out of my seat and followed Pamela into the hall. She led me away from the open door, then grabbed my arms. “Guess what? Karen’s dad owns that jewelry store on Georgia Avenue, and one of the clerks told her that Mr. Sorringer came back after Valentine’s Day to return a diamond.”

  My mouth dropped and my eyes opened wide. “What?” I grabbed her by the shoulders and we both jumped up and down.

  “It worked! It worked!” I cried gleefully.

  “What worked?” asked Pamela.

  I stopped jumping. “Just … just having her at our house for Christmas and everything,” I said.

  The teacher came to the door.