Betty stepped closer to the edge of the porch. “No, thanks, I’m waiting for Abe.” She leaned at the waist and waved to Marv without looking at Eleanor. She’d never confronted her about the message from Abe or about flirting with him.
“He can meet us there,” Marv said.
Eleanor turned her head toward the passenger window.
“You go.” Betty would have said “have fun” but she had trouble being too nice around Eleanor.
“Everyone will be there.”
“Then you don’t need me.” She hadn’t meant to be snide; Marv was trying to include her. Isn’t that what she’d always wanted? “Maybe next time.”
Marv pulled his arm inside the car, gripped the wheel with his left hand, shifted, then rested his right arm atop the back of the seat.
Eleanor slid next to him and looked out the driver’s side window. “Don’t wait too long,” she said. “It sends the wrong message.” She tipped back her head onto Marv’s shoulder and they drove away.
Eleanor knew what to say to rile up Betty’s insides. What if Abe stood her up? Maybe he’d changed his mind and didn’t love her after all. Boys were the fickle ones, not girls.
Betty exhaled a long breath. No. Love like theirs lasted forever. He’d have an explanation. It was only a few minutes, yet it weighed heavy on her, like the first days of a cold or flu.
Just then two headlights cut through the deepening darkness.
Betty turned to the street and folded her arms across her bosom. Then she dropped her hands to her sides, mitigating her cleavage. This was not the time.
She swore if it wasn’t Abe, well, she’d march right into the house and write another letter to her roommate. They’d have grand adventures at Barnard. Who wanted a boyfriend anyway?
She did.
A horn beep-beeped and the car slowed to a stop. Betty’s pulse thumped against her chest and her throat burned as she swallowed back fury. Underneath, her heart swirled with relief.
Betty slid into the passenger seat and clicked the door closed. She smoothed the sides of the navy-blue fabric along her thighs, as if primping, when really she was wiping off her clammy palms. She folded her dry hands atop her lap. She did not slide over next to Abe or lean in for a kiss. While the silent treatment wasn’t really her style, she didn’t know what to say. The only words ping-ponging around her brain were unkind and crass. Had she no patience or tolerance? He was only ten minutes late.
Nannie’s voice echoed in her head. “Always be on time. Punctuality is a sign of respect.”
But that was an old-fashioned sensibility, and this was a modern relationship. Surely he had a reason for being late, so she didn’t know why it bothered her so.
Marv drumming the car door. Eleanor laughing. Why did anyone have to know Abe was late and see her standing on the porch checking her watch?
Anger wove through her thoughts, trickled along her veins. She wished it wasn’t so, but appearances mattered. How was she to convince Nannie and Zaide Abe was the right guy for her if this behavior continued?
Betty’s jaw hurt from clenched teeth. She shuddered with fear. Did this mean she and Abe were over? Was love compatible with anger and disappointment? She’d always been careful not to rile up her grandparents. They loved her, but she wouldn’t take any chances.
“I’m sorry I’m late.” Abe held the steering wheel at the twelve o’clock position. “Do you want to know why I was late?”
Betty’s pulse quickened. She creased the fabric of her pant leg between her fingers. It was fidget or cry. She looked at Abe. “I was so embarrassed when Marv and Eleanor came by and invited me to go with them to the arcade. I was just standing here, waiting for you, not knowing if you were even going to show up. I had to cover for you. I’m not a very good liar, you know. I’m sure your friend Eleanor got a real charge out of that.”
“I would never stand you up. I was on the telephone with my mother.”
His mother. He had been on the telephone with his mother. That was something that never happened to Betty, not even on her birthday.
After an hour at the arcade and a double scoop of fudge ripple to share, Betty locked fingers with Abe as they stepped from the street to the sand. In his other hand, Abe swung a Big Beam lantern like a lunch pail, the same way Zaide had when he and Betty had walked to the Black River before dawn, fishing rods over their shoulders, tackle boxes stocked with supplies. She hadn’t fished with Zaide in years, but that tackle box held some of her fondest memories. Abe pointed the Big Beam toward the lake, past the resort, and it shined a glowing path as if reaching toward the unknown, where it all went dark again. The farther they walked, the farther the light would reach.
“I know you didn’t ask, but I told my mother about you,” Abe said. “She asked me if you were pretty, but I told her no.”
Betty stopped. “Pardon me?”
Abe threw back his head and laughed deep and loud. He looked at Betty and placed one hand on her cheek. He set the Big Beam on the sand and placed his other hand on her face as well. “I told her you were the most beautiful girl in the world. Inside and out.” He kissed her forehead, grabbed her hand, scooped up the lantern as if his arm were a digger, and started walking again. They headed toward their dunes.
Betty welcomed walking in silence, piecing together parts of Abe’s story. Long-distance telephone calls cost a lot of money. Abe’s mother didn’t just telephone to say hello when stamps cost a nickel. “You know, you can tell me anything,” Betty said.
Abe didn’t turn around. He walked faster, holding the beam out at shoulder height as if the answer was out there. “She wanted to tell me about my father.”
“What’s happening with your father?”
Abe dropped his arm to his side and the light brightened only a small circle ahead of their shoes. The muscles in his forearm tightened as he squeezed the lantern’s handle. “He’s gone again.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means he took money from the store and he’ll be back when it runs out.”
“Where does he go? What does he do?”
“Who knows?”
Betty cringed. “It must be awful to worry about your mother like that. Is there anything else you want to tell me?”
“Just that I’m not my father.”
The way Betty was not her mother. She wondered if Abe looked like his father, the way she favored Tillie. Was it as disconcerting for Abe as for her? Betty would have preferred not to look like the mother who gave her away even though she could not imagine doing anything similar.
“I know you’re not like that,” she said.
They continued down the beach, hand in hand.
As if reading her mind—which she was sure he could—Abe looked at Betty like he was reminding himself she was there. He stared into her eyes and didn’t blink. Then he pulled her into a kiss. And time stopped.
When they arrived at the bottom of the dunes, Betty released her grip on Abe’s hand and removed her shoes and socks. She folded one sock into the other as if Nannie were watching. Then Betty stashed them inside one of her loafers and set the pair in a patch of tall grass. Feet in the sand was better than sand in the shoes, Nannie would say.
Without talking, they followed the flashlight’s beam up the hill, treading and sinking into sand, stepping over the thickets of grass and through bushes of thistle. If someone ever cleared this, the view from the top would be vast and spectacular, like the ones of exotic locations she’d seen in Vogue and Seventeen. Her heart pounded at the thought of privacy. If she didn’t love Abe and trust him, she would have mistaken the thumping and shaking for fear.
When they’d almost reached the top, Betty saw a neatly folded cardigan atop a patch of beach grass. Abe shined the light on it. Aquamarine with pearl buttons. She’d seen it before, but it was a popular color this season according to Seventeen. It could be anyone’s.
Then Betty heard an indecipherable sound. A deep voice. Guttural. An animal? It sou
nded more like a grunt or a pant than a feral cat’s howl or a lost dog’s whimper. With one more step, Abe fell to his belly as if hiding in a foxhole and shined the light up at the shed. Betty lowered herself next to him and saw two pairs of feet—human feet. Knees, pale skin, a bare behind? She closed her eyes and covered her ears with her hands.
“Oh my God!” Betty whispered. “They’re . . .”
“Having sex.” Abe kissed her cheek and pressed his lips to her hand.
Betty dropped that one hand away but kept her eyes closed. She was horrified. They were doing it outside? On the ground? “Are they gone?”
Abe chuckled. “They scooted as soon as they saw the light. I guess that’s one way to forget about what’s going on at home.”
Betty opened one eye, then the other, and rolled onto her back. “How dare they!” They’d ruined her night and her favorite place.
“Who do you think that was?” Abe asked.
“Marv and Eleanor.”
“What makes you think that?”
Who else could it be? Although an aquamarine cardigan seemed a little conservative for Eleanor. And hadn’t she been wearing pink earlier?
She stared through the leaves and broken branches. The stars twinkled brightly and seemed just out of reach. Sometimes she felt that way about Abe. “It has to be them,” Betty said. “Marv has grown up coming to Stern’s. Not many people know about this place. Who else could it be?”
“It could be anyone,” Abe said.
“Not here. It had to be Marv. Didn’t you see who it was?”
Abe laughed, but it wasn’t a mean laugh. “I tried not to!”
Betty burned with embarrassment, yet at the same time she knew Abe’s humor wasn’t at her expense. Her heart was safe. “They don’t even love each other. Not really,” Betty said.
Hand in hand, they skittered and slid back down the dune in the dark.
“I’d like to go home now,” she said. “I think that was enough excitement for one night.” That really wasn’t what she meant but Abe didn’t argue. Nor did he let go of her hand.
If she slept with Abe, would everyone be whispering about her the way she had just whispered about Marv and Eleanor? If they’d been making out, would someone have seen them? Would she become just another girl who’d succumbed to summer romance, or was it different because she and Abe were in love, planning a future?
Abe squeezed her hand. “Let’s pretend tonight never happened.”
After Betty’s earlier tryst with anger, they had talked, laughed, kissed, and shared ice cream. She’d learned about his father. They’d grown closer, linked by disappointment. She wasn’t sure she could forget such a lovely evening, even if she tried.
The next day, instead of eating lunch with her grandparents, Betty stood in the foyer of their house, licked one of the three-cent stamps she’d found in Zaide’s desk drawer, and affixed it to the corner of the envelope addressed to Patricia in New Jersey.
The correspondence filled both sides of Betty’s engraved and monogrammed cream-colored, linen stationery. Beneath the black engraved, swirling “BCS,” Betty’s A+ penmanship filled the page. She exaggerated her preparations for Barnard—the book she was reading, the clothes she was packing, the anticipation she was feeling. Truth was, Betty hadn’t been thinking at all about leaving South Haven—because that meant leaving Abe.
Betty looked out the window, then pushed open the door. “I thought you’d never get here.”
“Not everyone can come and go like you can,” Georgia said. “These are real jobs for us.”
Betty huffed and flared her nostrils. Georgia could be such a spoilsport.
“Let her be; can’t you see she’s excited?” Doris turned to Betty. “We’re here now. How can we help?”
Betty tossed the envelope onto the Parsons table and led her friends upstairs where three skirts and three blouses, in various shades, patterns, and combinations of red, white, and blue, lay on Betty’s bed. Betty, Georgia, and Doris stood across from the patriotic fashion display.
“Are you okay?” Georgia asked.
“Why do you ask?” Betty said.
“You haven’t mentioned your date so I thought maybe it didn’t go well.”
“It was peachy.” Betty planned to keep the incident on the dunes to herself. She never wanted to think of it again.
“Peachy? That’s all? That’s not like you,” Doris said.
“Well.” Betty tapped her toes on the floor. “I’m just focusing on these outfits now, I guess.” That her friends would believe.
“They’re all pretty,” Doris said. “I hate to say this, but does it matter? You’ll look fabulous no matter what you wear.”
“Independence Day is not a holiday about fashion, you know that, right?” Georgia said in a meek voice that sounded more like an apology than a fact. “It’s about independence.”
Exactly. “Everything is about fashion. Or have you forgotten?”
Georgia laughed and slouched into the pillows. “Pardon me.” She pointed. “That one and that one.”
Betty bounced and clapped, then grabbed the navy skirt with gold buttons and the white-and-navy-striped sailor blouse with gold buttons. She showed Georgia and Doris the small red anchor embroidered on the breast pocket.
“Well, then you’re set. Red, white, and blue,” Doris said.
Betty held the blouse under her neck and the skirt at her waist as she twirled. “What about my hair?”
“Since when do you care about your hair on the Fourth of July?” Georgia said. “We’re going to serve a thousand hot dogs and hamburgers on the lawn, play games with the kids, and then watch the fireworks on the beach. Like every other year.”
Doris pushed on Georgia’s arm. “Don’t be silly. This isn’t like every other year.”
“Oh, because of him.” Georgia smiled and rolled her eyes.
Betty set about returning all the clothes to her closet. “It’s not just about Abe,” she said. “If I’m going to finally compete in Miss South Haven, I should take extra care of how I look no matter what day it is. Don’t you think?”
Doris ruffled her hair. “You’re dazzling. I’m doomed to be cute for the rest of my life. That’s if I’m lucky.”
“You’re both perfect,” Betty said. “Any fellow would be lucky to have you. I only asked because, well, don’t tell anyone, but Abe and I are going to sneak off and watch the fireworks alone.”
Georgia rolled her eyes.
“Don’t be a wet rag,” Doris said. “It’s romantic. I hope I have at least one great romance in my life; otherwise, what’s the point?”
“What’s the point? The point is to do something whether or not you have a man in your life,” Georgia said.
Doris turned to Betty and twirled her index finger by her temple.
“I like the idea of a love affair, don’t get me wrong. I just think there’s more to life,” Georgia said.
“I said romance, not affair; there’s a difference.”
Georgia smirked, but in a playful way. “How would you know?”
Doris huffed.
Betty laughed, stepped back to her closet, and rifled through the clothes. “Try this.” She thrust a white cotton eyelet sundress toward Doris. “I think it will fit you. You can wear your blue Keds and red lipstick, maybe a flag pin on the lapel. I’m sure I have one, or Nannie does.”
“You’re a doll. I’ll try it on.”
“You don’t have anything in that closet that will fit me,” Georgia said.
“You don’t need anything, and any boy who doesn’t think you’re a knockout with those legs needs new glasses.”
A flush of pink rose on Georgia’s cheeks.
“You’re blushing. You never blush.” Betty placed her hands on her hips. “Tell!”
Georgia raised her eyebrows, then she walked to the closet. She leafed through the clothes like they were pages of a book she didn’t want to read. “There is nothing to tell.”
“Oh my
God! You like someone. Who is he?” Betty scoured her memory. “One of the fellas taking tennis lessons? Someone on staff? Jerry? Sol? Bob? Herman?”
Georgia turned around, her cheeks as purple as Nannie’s beet borscht, her eyes wide and shiny. “It is not one of those boys.”
Doris skipped into the room. “How do I look?”
“You look terrific,” Georgia said.
Betty tugged on Doris’s waistline. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before.” She held Doris’s shoulders and pivoted her toward the dresser and away from Georgia. “Borrow my red patent belt. It’ll pull you in and add a little extra flair.”
“You’re the best,” Doris said, then she glanced at her watch. “Can I pick this up later? I have to get back. I’m taking kids to the beach after lunch and I want to stop in the kitchen and grab a sandwich. You coming, Georgia?”
Just as Georgia said yes, the telephone rang. The girls ran downstairs.
“Georgia, this isn’t over! You don’t get to have a secret crush.”
Georgia tipped her head back and laughed like Betty had told the funniest joke.
The telephone rang again and Betty answered. “Hello?”
“Come see me in the office, bubbeleh. I’ll be here for another half hour.”
“Zaide, what’s wrong?”
“There’s a little hitch in your plan.”
Betty hung up the telephone, her mouth dry, and her head starting to ache. What plan? If only Betty knew to which plan Zaide was referring, she could prepare. Did she forget to do something she’d promised? Should she plan a defense for her relationship with Abe? Did someone else see Marv and Eleanor and notice Betty scampering away? Or maybe he needed help plunging toilets.
For once, that was what Betty hoped.
Minutes later, Betty leaned on the wall outside Zaide’s office, her thoughts atwitter, her arms and fingers prickling with cold even though the ceiling fans whirled a warm and comfortable breeze around the lobby. She knocked on the door, opened it, and stepped inside.
The afternoon sun sneaked through the closed venetian blinds. Her grandparents didn’t want anyone looking and seeing their powwow. Zaide shuffled a stack of pink invoices and set them off to the side. Nannie nodded and shut the file cabinet drawer. What was Nannie doing in the office? She should be supervising the kitchen or shmying around the cardroom, chatting up the ladies. Betty had walked into the middle of a conversation. This couldn’t be good.
The Last Bathing Beauty Page 17