Back Home

by Michelle Magorian

  ‘Aw, come on Peg,’ insisted Mitch.

  ‘I’d rather stay, if you don’t mind. I suddenly feel terribly tired.’

  Ivy touched Mitch’s arm. He turned and smiled. Gee, thought Rusty, they really love one another. You could see it in their eyes.

  ‘O.K., honey,’ he whispered. ‘I guess everyone’s gotta celebrate in their own way.’

  He gave a nod to Peggy. ‘So long,’ he said.

  She waved, and watched the jeep hoot and rumble its way towards the dirt road.

  Staring out at the night sky, Peggy listened to the faint chimes of the church bells still ringing. So it was all over, she thought. Now her husband could be sent home. She had lived for this moment. Now that it had come, she felt absolutely nothing.

  12

  Rusty folded her blue sweater and placed it neatly in her suitcase. She slid her sandals in alongside. Her best skirt and cardigan were lying over the chair with a pair of washed white bobby socks. Beatie had even managed to find some Meltonian so that she had been able to whiten up the toes and heels of her saddle shoes. She wanted to look the tops for her grandmother. The following day she would be meeting her for the first time in five years.

  She knelt by the bed and spread out all the letters that had suddenly avalanched on to the house in the past two weeks.

  There was only one letter from Skeet – he had never been the greatest letter-writer – three from Janey, two from Grandma Fitz and Gramps, and a bumper one from Aunt Hannah and Uncle Bruno with all little bits written in by Kathryn and Alice and Jinkie.

  She rested her head against the bed. It was September. Soon it would be Labor Day. Everyone would be leaving their summer cottages and heading back home. People would be selling pumpkins and squashes and apples and goat-milk candy on the roadside. The ice-cream parlours would start closing and the shutters would go up for the winter. She closed her eyes. For an instant she could see schoolbooks in the Omsks’ hall and hear the sound of kids playing ball in the driveway, and someone yelling because the door of the hall cupboard had burst open and a whole stream of baseball bats, tennis racquets, roller skates and boots had come tumbling out on to the floor.

  She wondered who had taken over her newspaper delivery. She just hoped that Mr Harpstein had kept the signs that she had painted for him. She’d made the stencil designs herself.

  Soon Skeet and Janey would be playing Chinese chequers and pick-up-sticks down in the romper room, and lots of other games like Five Hundred, Tripoli and Monopoly, and there’d be Sunday-night suppers for the gang. And the house would be full of students again. Kids would be dropping in from school and Jinkie would be forever baking brownies. No, she wouldn’t. She’d be busy taking care of the baby, and looking foward to Ted coming home.

  ‘I bet they’ll have a swell homecoming for him,’ she whispered.

  She remembered Jinkie and Ted’s little flat. She liked paying visits there. Jinkie would make beautiful huge light New England-style biscuits.

  She glanced at the Fitzes’ letters. They had been spending time at their summer cottage on Lake Champlain. She loved it there, no matter what time of the year it was. Sometimes, even in the winter, she and Skeet would go and stay with them and camp out in the cottage, and they’d go ice-boating and skating on the frozen lake.

  Oh, she missed them. And Janey.

  Poor Janey. Her mother had dragged her off to some place and got her to record her voice on a disc so that she could hear how screechy and monotonous it was. Sometimes her mother was the end. Janey had worked for a whole week on her voice, softening it and making it go up and down as she spoke. Skeet had met her down at the drugstore, and, when she had started talking in her new way, he had just cracked up and fallen off the stool. He said she sounded like a drunk on a roller-coaster.

  She heard her mother calling to her from downstairs.

  ‘Yeah?’ she yelled back.

  ‘We’ll be leaving in ten minutes.’

  ‘O.K.!’

  For their last afternoon, her mother thought it would be nice if they could go out for a drive in the Bomb. Rusty was just folding the Fitzes’ letters when she caught sight of a postscript at the bottom of one of them. It was in Gramps’ handwriting.

  ‘Remember the Fitz motto,’ it ran.’ “Believe in yourself, believe in others, and work like hell.”‘

  She laughed, grabbed her Beanie, and ran downstairs.

  Charlie was standing in the hallway, his freckled face so scrubbed that it had a shine to it. He scowled briefly at her. Rusty was not looking forward to spending an afternoon with him. He’d been so darned grouchy lately. It had been a week since Susan and her mother had left for Southampton; they had moved there so that they would be ready to leave for America as soon as all their papers were in order. Charlie seemed to blame Rusty for their going.

  He stuffed his hands into the pockets of his grey frayed shorts and walked slowly out to the porch. She looked at his thick, curly red hair, his old white shirt sticking out between his braces, and his little bare legs, and wanted to hug him. She knew how much his heart was breaking.

  Her mother was standing outside in an old sweater and slacks, smiling brightly. Too brightly, thought Rusty.

  ‘Hop in the front, you two,’ she said.

  Beatie was sitting on the sill of the dining-room window.

  ‘Aren’t you coming?’ asked Rusty.

  ‘And have all my innards thrown around in that thing?’ she retorted. ‘The real reason,’ she whispered quickly, ‘is that I’m preparing an extra-special tea. I want it to be a surprise for Charlie. So keep mum, won’t you?’

  Charlie refused to sit in the front with Rusty. Instead, he insisted on having the back seat all to himself.

  “Rusty gripped the side of her seat as the car jerked violently into life.

  ‘Atta girl!’ her mother whispered to the throbbing engine. She pushed the large gear lever across and down with a grinding creak. The car leapt forward and then relaxed into a humming rumble.

  ‘For gosh sakes,’ commented Rusty, ‘aren’t you afraid it’ll explode?’

  ‘That’s why she’s called the Bomb,’ explained her mother. ‘But don’t worry. She won’t explode.’

  Once they had backed down the dirt track and were out on the road, Rusty sat back.

  ‘I’ve never seen earth such a sort of pinky-brown colour,’ Rusty remarked.

  ‘They call it red,’ said her mother. ‘In some parts of Devon, even the bricks of the houses look pink!’

  She had hardly finished speaking when a large tractor came whirring round the corner. Her mother wheeled the window down and leaned out. ‘Hello, George!’

  ‘Can’t back, I’m afraid, Peggy,’ he yelled in a broad Devonshire accent. Ts got a trailer fixed at the back.’

  ‘Hang on,’ she said. ‘I’ll reverse.’

  Rusty was amazed to see her mother pat the dashboard affectionately.

  ‘Come on, old girl,’ she whispered, ‘don’t go letting the side down.’

  Within minutes the car was groaning backwards. Charlie stood up to watch.

  ‘Look out the side-window, Charlie, will you?’ said Peggy. ‘Tell me how far I am from the hedge.’

  Rusty leaned out of the window. Charlie gazed briefly at her, stuck out his tongue, and turned away.

  Little monster, she thought.

  Deftly her mother manoeuvred the ancient bit of metal and rubber back along the lanes and squeezed it into a tiny gap in the hedge. The tractor rumbled by. The trailer was a large wooden box on wheels.

  ‘That’s a trailer?’ gasped Rusty. ‘Our trailers are six times the size of that, and you can live in them.’

  Her mother frowned.

  ‘Yes, well,’ she began. ‘The Americans tend to use our words to mean different things.’ And with that she backed the Bomb out of the gap and on to the road.

  They stopped at a stretch of deserted beach.

  Charlie threw open the door and ran down to the sea, his sa
ndals discarded on the running-board.

  Rusty shivered. She couldn’t understand how her mother and brother could bear not having a coat on.

  Beth didn’t think it was cold at all, either. ‘It’s only September,’ she had said that morning. ‘It gets far colder than this. I thought you’d be used to it. Don’t they have snow in Connecticut?”

  ‘Sure they do,’ Rusty had replied. ‘But we have this thing called central heating. Ever heard of it?’

  Rusty and Beth had said their goodbyes just before lunch. She would miss Beth, too.

  Rusty wandered up to where her brother was playing in the sand. His legs were a little blue from the wind that was blowing in from the sea, and his nose had started to run, but that didn’t seem to bother him.

  ‘Need any help?’ she said.

  ‘No, thank you,’ he replied icily.

  Her mother drew Rusty away, and they strolled in the direction of the sea.

  Charlie looked on, furious, and threw a handful of cold sand back into the pit he had begun digging.

  ‘I know,’ said Rusty, when they were out of earshot. ‘Be patient.’

  ‘He’s missing Susan.’

  ‘I know that,’ said Rusty angrily. ‘And I’m missing Aunt Hannah, and Uncle Bruno and my American brother and sisters, and Grandma Fitz and Gramps, and Janey, and my school-friends.’

  Peggy turned away and stared into the distance. ‘Aren’t you pleased to be back?’ she said shakily.

  Rusty was shocked at how pale her mother had become. She hadn’t meant to hurt her.

  ‘Of course I am,’ she lied.

  They had a small picnic, which consisted of jam sandwiches, and tea from a thermos flask. The tea tasted as lousy as usual, but Rusty was so cold that she just poured it down her throat.

  Later, while Charlie and her mother built a sand-castle, Rusty sat on the running-board and felt sick. Somehow things were going to get better, she told herself fiercely. Come hell or high water, she was going to make it so.

  When they clambered back into the car, Rusty noticed that it was spluttering more than usual.

  ‘Now come on,’ murmured her mother. ‘It’s a long way home.’

  It sure as hell is, thought Rusty soberly.

  ‘What’s the matter, Mummy?’ said Charlie. ‘Have the sparks gone wrong?”

  ‘I hope not.’

  She turned the engine off, climbed out of the car and rolled up her sleeves.

  Charlie gave a dramatic sigh and threw himself wearily back on the seat.

  Rusty hopped out. Her mother unfolded the bonnet of the car sideways and peered inside.

  ‘Can I help?’ said Rusty.

  Her mother, who was staring at a tangle of cables, looked up briefly.

  ‘I don’t know yet.’

  Rusty stood beside her as her mother stood on tiptoe and leaned over the large wing of the car.

  ‘Would you get me a spanner from the boot?’ she said over her shoulder.

  ‘Sure thing,’ said Rusty.

  She made for the door, and then she stopped.

  ‘Oh dear,’ she murmured. ‘What’s a spanner?’

  She didn’t want to ask her mother. Whatever a spanner was, it was in the boot. First thing to do was to locate the boot.

  She knelt on the front seat and looked into the back, where Charlie was sitting with a picture book. And then she saw them: two large rubber boots standing upright on the floor. All she needed to do now was to find out which one her mother needed.

  She leaned over and thrust her hand into one.

  Charlie looked up sharply. ‘What are you doing?’ he said grumpily.

  ‘I’m looking for a spanner.’

  Charlie watched her, puzzled. Rusty pushed her hand deeper into the boot.

  ‘Why are you looking in there?’ he said.

  ‘Because’ – and she was dying to add ‘dummy’, but she didn’t – ‘Mother says it’s in the boot.’

  At that, Charlie took one look at her and began to laugh hysterically.

  ‘O.K.,’ said Rusty, ‘what’s so funny?’

  ‘In the boot!’ he spluttered.

  ‘Charlie,’ she said, irritated, ‘did you hide it?’

  He shook his head and laughed even louder.

  Her mother, hearing the shrieks, took her head out from under the bonnet. ‘What’s going on?’ she said. She smiled at Charlie. It was the happiest she had seen him all week.

  He pointed wildly at the floor. ‘She’s looking in the Wellingtons!’ he yelled. ‘She’s looking for a spanner in the Wellington boots!’

  Rusty was baffled.

  ‘Oh,’ said her mother, smiling, and she squeezed Rusty’s shoulder. ‘I’m sorry, it’s what you call the trunk. We call it the boot.’

  ‘I see,’ said Rusty.

  ‘And a spanner is what you call a wrench. That much I learned from...’ She paused. ‘From the G.I.s. And this,’ she added, pointing to the bonnet of the car, ‘is what we call a bonnet, not a hood.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Rusty said, feeling like a fool.

  Her mother strode briskly around to the back of the car, fixed it so that it stayed open, and rummaged around inside. Within minutes she was back by the engine, one leg up on the wing of the car. Seconds later, she was lying full length across it.

  Charlie by now was outside, peering through the long vertical bars of the radiator, attempting to see the upside-down head of his mother inside.

  ‘Hurrah,’ she yelled suddenly. ‘I’ve got a spark!’

  She pulled her head out and sat gleefully on the wing.

  ‘Is that good?’ said Rusty.

  ‘Marvellous. It means that I don’t have to check lots of other things, like the coil or the distributor or the H/T leads or the condenser or the…’ She stopped. ‘It means that it shouldn’t take too long to mend.’

  She rolled full length on top of the wing again and disappeared inside, mumbling something about the mixture.

  ‘Aha!’ she yelled.

  ‘What is it?’ said Rusty.

  Her mother raised her head. ‘There’s water in the juice.’

  ‘Juice?’

  ‘Pool.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Petrol. Very cheap, awful petrol,’ she said. ‘And they have the nerve to ration it, too.’ She paused. ‘Petrol is what you call gasoline.’

  ‘Yeah, I sorta guessed that. So does that mean we’re stuck here?’

  ‘No. It just means that I have to clean it out. There’s probably some dirt in there, too. You see, there’s a small pipe that comes from the tank at the back of the car and leads up to the engine. The petrol is sucked up by the lift pump down here,’ she said, pointing down into the engine.

  Rusty peered in, but there was so much to look at that she didn’t know which was which. Before she could ask, her mother had begun talking again.

  ‘Then when it’s sucked up, it goes into this filter,’ she said, indicating a small glass bowl, ‘which has this under it. Then the petrol goes into the carb. The carburettor, I mean. Now, the only snag is…’

  To Rusty’s amazement, Peggy began to wave her arms about excitedly.

  ‘... if any water or dirt gets through to the jets.’ She stopped. ‘Jets are these tiny fine nozzles that spray. They’re thinner than a needle.’ Rusty nodded. ‘If these jets get blocked up, that means that no petrol will get sucked into these cylinders,’ she said, indicating several of them over her shoulder, ‘just lots of air. And, much as I wish we could drive on air, we can’t. If there’s no petrol coming through, the car won’t fire.’

  Just as she was about to do her slow dive into the interior of the car, she glanced at Rusty. ‘Do you still want to help?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘I’m going to unscrew things, and when I’m sure they’re clean, I’ll put them back together again,’ said her mother. ‘The important thing is to unscrew the filter bowl, swill out the element, and then…’

  Rusty sat on the running-board
to wait for her mother’s instructions. She had no idea what she was talking about. While her mother rambled on about how she was going to pump petrol up by priming with some lever under the lift pump, Rusty watched out of the corner of her eye as Charlie came slowly nearer and sat nonchalantly on the running-board.

  ‘Virginia!’ called her mother.

  She sprang to her feet.

  ‘Now,’ Peggy said, ‘if you’ll just turn the engine over on the self-starter, I’ll cover the air intake with my hand. That way the suction in the engine will unstick any bits out of the jets, and,’ she added, crossing her fingers, ‘it may start.’

  ‘I have to turn the engine over?’ said Rusty.

  ‘Yes, that’s right, on the self-starter. You turn the key, and when the light goes on, you press the button beside it.’

  ‘O.K.!’ And she threw open the door and slid in behind the wheel.

  After much key turning and instructions of’ Now push’ and ‘Stop!’ from her mother, the engine suddenly rumbled into life.

  ‘It’s firing!’ yelled Peggy.

  ‘It’s firing,’ repeated Charlie. ‘Bang! Bang!’

  Rusty laughed, and this time when she looked at Charlie, he didn’t scowl at her.

  On the journey home, Rusty began to sing. She persuaded her mother to help her make up verses about fixing the car engine to ‘Ee aye the addio’. They took turns. Her mother began first.

  ‘ There’s water in the juice, there’s water in the juice,

  Ee aye the addio, there’s water in the juice.’

  And Rusty sang,

  ‘ There’s dirt inside the gas, there’s dirt inside the gas,

  Ee aye the addio, there’s dirt inside the gas.’

  ‘It’s in the filter bowl,’

  added her mother,

  ‘It’s in the filter bowl,

  Ee aye the addio, ifs in the filter bowl.’

  Then Rusty made up the next two.

  ‘The jets are all fouled up, the jets are all fouled up,

  Ee aye the addio, the jets are all fouled up.

  Unscrew the whole darned thing, unscrew the whole darned thing,

  Ee aye the addio, unscrew the whole darned thing.’

  ‘And then we’ll swill ‘em out,’