She wants to know everything about San Diego, her father, the man she barely remembers. I tell her about his job at the marina, our cottage on the beach, Wiley, Keith's Coffee Shop, the stores along Mission Boulevard, Electric Avenue with the black lights and posters, how warm the afternoon sun felt even in winter. I tell her how I got here, the gambling, the debts he couldn't pay.
“We'll go back there together,” she says, stretching out on the carpet and resting her chin on her fist. “We'll wake up early and collect shells along the beach like they do in movies. Do you think my dad will like me?”
“Yes,” I say. “He loves you already.”
I tell her about her pictures and letters held together with a rubber band in his sock drawer. I invent stories of Cammy as a little girl, how sweet she was when she sat in his lap, the cute way she learned to say cookie.
“He remembers all that?” she asks, slowly running a strip of hair over her tongue. “My dad told you all those stories?”
“Sure. He talked about you constantly. He used to tell me stories about you every night before I went to sleep.”
“Really? Every night?” Cammy says, opening her glassy blue eyes wide. She twists the wet strand around her finger. “Tell some to me.”
“Well, he said you were Papa Roy's little angel. That Papa Roy loved you so much it made everyone jealous. Even me.”
“That's true. I was Papa Roy's whole life. Next to Lenore. What else?”
“He said you liked to play pony on his back, and when he tucked you in at night, he sang you the same song he sang to me.”
I'm running out of ideas for stories, mixing my memories with the details I've dreamed these last six months.
“What was that?” she asks. “I don't remember.”
“'Anchors Aweigh.' From his days in the Navy.”
“Oh, yes,” she says, laughing. “I remember him singing that to me.”
I wonder if my dad really did that with Cammy, or if she's fallen under the spell of my story. “Do you remember the way he'd rub his whiskers against your cheek after kissing you good-night? And how his fingers always smelled like engine grease?”
“Yes,” she says, touching her hand to her face. “Faina, this is so weird. I mean, it's all coming back to me.”
“What about me?” I ask, dipping my chip into the creamy pool of sour cream.
“What about you?”
“Did you guys ever talk about me?”
“I don't remember,” Cammy says slowly, as if she's struggling to come up with the next sentence. “I thought about you, for sure. Who you were, what you were doing with my dad, that sort of thing. But while Papa Roy was alive, it was a dead subject. You know he hated my dad, and it upset my mom too much to mention your name.”
My dad and my mom, Cammy insists, as if we're not really part of the same family. My mom needs time alone with me, my mom feels better when I give her a bath, I'll pour my mom a drink.
“Never? You never talked about me?”
“Not that I remember,” Cammy says, lighting a fresh cigarette. “I want to live in San Diego so badly. I want my dad to know me.”
“What about Lenore?” I ask. “Who would take care of her?”
“Who cares?” Cammy says. “I've done enough already.”
Now that Cammy's home, we have food in the house. “I'm not living on TV dinners. I've had enough of that shit.” She teaches me how to make Shake-and-Bake chicken, melt Velveeta cheese for vegetable sauce. “My mom liked to eat dinner when Papa Roy did the cooking.” We make mashed potatoes from powder and milk, whipping the mix with the fork until it's thick. Some mornings, Cammy fries fluffy scrambled eggs with raw onions, serves them to Lenore in bed with a strong Bloody Mary. She scribbles the grocery list for me, her handwriting crooked and loopy. Tomato juise, ry bread, baloney. “Lenore wants me to stay out of Kenny's, in case the FBI is tracking me.”
“Very funny,” Lenore says, slapping playfully at Cammy's leg. “I just want to keep my family private. Is that so strange?”
“I don't mind going,” I say, tucking the list into my pocket. In a few days Jimmy will be back, and I want it to be me, not Cammy, who stands at the cash register paying for groceries. Me, not Cammy, who watches Jimmy load the paper bag. I want to keep my family private, too. I want to keep Cammy from Jimmy.
All of our meals we eat in Lenore's bed, the sofa cushions propped behind our backs, our plates on our laps, our faces turned toward the TV. We sit like this for hours, through the Sonny and Cher Show, All in the Family.
“Honey, I'm just not hungry,” Lenore says, when Cammy inspects her plate.
“Oh, for Christ's sake, Mother. Eat. Think about what happened last time.”
Last time, Cammy says, and Lenore swallows another hill of cold potatoes.
“I'm taking Faina down to see Daley's eighth floor,” Cammy announces. She's put on make-up: fleshy base, black raccoon eyeliner, a shiny coat of white lipstick. “It's New Year's Eve. The last day. I wouldn't want her to miss it.”
“No,” Lenore says. “You girls stay home here with me. It's ten below zero.”
“What's Daley's eighth floor?”
“Oh, it's this cool display the department store creates every Christmas. You know, little mechanical dolls and elaborate decorations. Like window displays, only better. You walk through a dark room, and it tells a story. Every year it's a different thing. Rapunzel. Cinderella. All the kids go. Papa Roy always took me down to see it.”
“Please,” I say to Lenore, dropping to my knees and clasping my hands together. “Please let me go with Cammy.”
“We'll only be gone a few hours,” Cammy says. “Don't be a pain in the ass. You can't keep this kid locked in here like a prisoner.”
“She isn't a prisoner,” Lenore says, taking my hand. “We're happy. Please, Cammy. You've only been home a week. I'm not ready to let go of you.”
“Mother, cut the dramatics. I'm taking her to see a Christmas display.”
“Be careful,” Lenore says, still holding on to me. “You girls are all that I've got.”
“Go get your coat,” Cammy says to me. “We're going to have a blast.”
Outside we huddle together on the bus bench, and wait for the green 6B to screech to a halt in front of our building. “It's twenty cents,” Cammy says, slipping two thin dimes into my mitten. “Just drop it into the slot.”
On the bus, we zig-zag down the aisle to the farthest back seat, spotted with pink globs of gum and graffiti. “It's quiet today,” Cammy says. “Holiday. But it'll start to fill up closer to downtown.”
“I've always wanted to get on one of these buses. To go somewhere. But Lenore never let me.”
“My mother's scared of her own shadow. I've walked the worst streets in this city, and look at me, I'm here.”
We pass Loring Park, the Avalon Theater and Sex Shop, Raymond's Shoe Store with metal grates across the windows. Off Dakota are old brick buildings, boarded windows, drunks passed out on icy front steps. Wet newspaper, beer bottles, and McDonald's wrappers litter the icy sidewalks and streets. “I used to live near here,” Cammy says. “In a basement place off Portland. With my boyfriend, Tony. We'll go there someday. When the weather's better.”
“Okay,” I say, though I hope we never do. “Will we be home before dark?”
“Don't worry,” Cammy says. “We're here to have a good time.”
Inside Daley's, we ride the shiny escalator past the fancy jewelry department, fur coats, cosmetics and perfumes. I love the department store's waxy marble floors, the prism chandeliers, the bustle of customers. On the eighth floor, we step off the escalator and into a huge blue ice castle decorated with styrofoam candy canes and Christmas lights. “Isn't it cool?” Cammy says, taking my hand and leading me into a silvery room with snow sprinkled along the floor. “It's ‘The Christmas Carol,’” Cammy whispers as if we're in church. “I love that story.”
We linger in front of each display of mechanical figures—
the women in long, elegant velvet dresses, the men in their formal wool coats, Christmas carolers in black top hats, the frightening ghost of Christmas past. Cammy rests her arm on my shoulder, pulls me close while she reads the story printed next to each scene. “That's just what Papa Roy used to do for me.” When she stumbles on some of the words, I don't correct her; I let her keep reading though I'd rather read it myself.
“Don't you wish the world was really like this?” she whispers. We're standing in front of the Cratchit's dinner scene, the fat turkey and Tiny Tim's blessing. “God bless us, every one,” she says.”Yeah, really. I used to dream of a Christmas like that when I was a kid.”
At the other end of the display, there's a gingerbread house with a miniature door meant for small children. “Just duck,” she warns, pushing me through the tiny opening. Inside, a stout woman dressed as Mrs. Claus polishes the glass counter.
“This is for children,” she frowns at Cammy. “Besides, Santa's gone for the year.”
“We just want a gingerbread cookie.” Cammy jingles the coins in her jacket pocket.
“Ten and under,” Mrs. Claus barks. “Read the sign outside.” She studies Cammy, the black eyeliner, her tangled blonde hair.
“It's for my little sister,” Cammy says. “Look at her, she's only nine years old.”
“Nine?” Mrs. Claus says suspiciously. She hands each of us a soft brown boy with pastel icing. “It's the end of the season. They'll just wind up in the trash. But don't let me see you back here next year. This isn't set up for girls like you.”
“Don't worry,” Cammy says. She lifts a Santa coloring book from a wire rack. “These free?” She shoves me back out the wonderland door without waiting for an answer.
“For you,” she says, handing the coloring book to me. “Merry Christmas. And hold off on that cookie, I still have another surprise.”
Off the twelfth-floor elevator, Cammy grabs my sleeve, and pulls me after her. “Here,” she says, stopping abruptly. “It's the Elm Tree Room. It's Papa Roy's tradition. I haven't come back since he died.”
I glance into the elegant restaurant, the red luster of candlelight on the polished woodwork, the white tablecloths. “Here? What do you want to do here?”
“Eat. What do you think?”
It's late afternoon, but a few customers are still eating. Women in fancy dresses or matching polyester pantsuits, men in business suits and ties.
“We can't eat here. We don't have any money.”
“So what?” Cammy says, pulling me inside with her. “Come on.”
“Yes?” The hostess glares at Cammy's damp moccasins and faded tight jeans.
“We're here for lunch,” Cammy says.
Pressing the menus to her chest, the hostess looks from Cammy to me, then back to Cammy. “You want to eat?”
“No,” Cammy says. “We're here to take a bath.” Cammy flashes two fingers in front of the hostess's blank face. “Table for two. Do you read me?”
The hostess shrinks under Cammy's fiery gaze.
“Come on, Cammy. Let's eat our gingerbread cookies on the bus ride home.”
She snatches the menus out of the hostess's hand, storms into the restaurant, drops her purse on a vacant table. “Bring me an ashtray.” I've never seen someone so solid, so dead set on getting their way.
“Cammy, we can't stay.” I just want to get out of here, away from the staring eyes of the other customers.
“It's my tradition. Don't let them push you around.”
The waitress slams our silverware down on the table. Cammy orders club sandwiches, a black coffee for her, a kiddie cocktail for me. “Club sandwiches. That's what Papa Roy and I ate every Christmas. Of course he had a Manhattan with his. Papa Roy loved his cocktails. Runs in the family. We'd come down to see the displays, Christmas shop, then stop here for a nice long lunch. Of course, Papa Roy got perfect service. He was so powerful, no one ever screwed with him.”
“Where was Lenore?”
“Same place she's been as long as I can remember. At home in bed. Same place she is today.”
“Was she always like this?”
“Not when I was little. But after a while she just crashed.”
“How did she get so sick?”
“Sick? She's sick all right, but not like she wants you to think.”
“What do you mean?”
“Stick around, you'll find out for yourself.”
Cammy clinks her coffee cup against my kiddie cocktail. “Cheers,” she says. The fruity ginger ale dribbles down my chin. She dunks her fingers into my drink and lifts out the soft red cherry. “I love these,” she smiles, plopping it onto her tongue. She lifts the yellow umbrella out of my glass. “Look, it opens and closes,” she says. “Another souvenir. You'll never forget this day.”
“Cammy, how are we going to pay for this?” I ask softly so the other customers can't hear.
“Who cares?” she laughs. “We're here to have a good time.”
“Come on, Cammy. Really.”
“You worry too much. Ta da!” Like a magic trick, she pulls a fifty-dollar bill from her shirt sleeve and waves it in front of me. “You got to learn to trust Cammy. It's Cammy who knows the right tricks.”
“Where'd you get that?” I don't want to eat a sandwich that was paid for with stolen money.
“That's my little secret.”
“Cammy.”
“You take all the fun out of things. This is our celebration lunch. My little sister is back; let me be happy.”
I take another bite of my dry sandwich, the toast rough against the roof of my mouth, the bacon hard and brittle. When we're finished eating, we light our cigarettes from the candle wick, careful not to touch the hot wax.
“I've been living a hard life,” Cammy says, licking the mayonnaise off her fingers. “But I was born for finer things.”
“Cammy, where'd you get that money? Did you steal it from Lenore?”
“So what if I did?” she hisses. “She owes me a hell of a lot more than this.”
We smoke through two more cups of coffee, Cammy wrapping her hands around the china cup and breathing in the steam. The restaurant is nearly empty except for the workers setting out fresh white tablecloths. “We're getting ready for dinner,” our waitress says, handing our bill to Cammy. “Please pay.”
“Bring me the change.” Cammy gives her the fifty-dollar bill. “She can forget the tip.”
“Let's go. Lenore's going to be worried.”
“Lenore worries most about Lenore. Besides, I have one last surprise. I want to buy you a present.”
“A present?”
“Yeah. That's the deal with the money. My mom gave it to me, so we could buy ourselves something for Christmas. She's given me money since I was about ten. Can't be bothered shopping. She said we should pick up something we need.”
I think about the things I've needed so long: a new pair of jeans, a regulation navy-blue school sweater to keep me warm this winter, new boots.
“That money was for us? Why didn't you tell me?” My sandwich turns in my stomach. “We shouldn't have spent it on lunch.”
“Why? It was my treat. Besides, we got some left over. And you don't always need money to get what you want.”
“I do. I need boots.”
“Boots,” she says, wrapping her arm around me. “Come on, then. Let's get my little sister some boots.”
In Daley's bargain basement, I find the ones I want; they're soft crinkled vinyl, rust colored with a fat layer of fleece. When I slide my feet into them, I'm warm for the first time this winter. “Cool. Do they fit?” Cammy asks, slipping on a pair of high red platforms. “Christmas clearance—it's the best time to buy.”
I stand in front of the slanted floor mirror. The heels are thick wedge chunks, not high enough to make me wobble, and there's plenty of space around the calves to tuck in my jeans.
“Jesus, girl, you're so skinny,” Cammy says.
The boots are two sizes too big f
or me, a woman's six, but I don't tell Cammy; I don't want to end up with a pair of red rubber pull-ons like the kindergartners wear. “I love them. Do we have the money?”
“Not if we're both buying. But that doesn't stop me.” Cammy struts down the aisle, spins once, and comes back to me. “Too tight,” she says, kicking them off.
“Does that mean I get mine?”
I can't wait until Jimmy comes back and sees me in my new boots. Two more days. When we meet on the fire escape, I'll look like a girl my age. I'll look like Emmy Atwood.
“Too bad we can't lift them,” she whispers in my ear, her breath hot and airy. “The clerk's watching. Maybe if we come back next week.”
“No,” I plead. “I want to buy them now.” I lift my foot like a horse so she can read the price sticker.
“Okay,” she says, slapping my ankle. “They're yours. Just tell my mom they took the whole fifty.” She stands behind me and kisses the top of my head. “Happy New Year, little sister. I told you it'd be a great day.”
With Cammy, my secrets are safe. “You can tell me anything,” she says, winding my new white cashmere scarf around my neck. It's a Christmas gift from Cammy, a surprise sister present. She sets the matching beret on my head, tilts it to one side until it touches my eyebrow. “There,” she says. “That's what sisters are for.”
We stand in front of the antique mirror, Cammy's chin resting on the top of my head, her golden hair framing my face. “You should try bleach. I bet Jimmy would like you blonde.” Jimmy, my eighth-grader from Cathedral, Jimmy the boy who stops by on his way home from shoveling.
“I don't know. I think he likes me the way I am.” I remember Christmas Eve, the hairdo Lenore made me wear. Why do you always try to look older?
“Don't be stupid,” Cammy says, buttoning my coat.
Tonight Jimmy works his first shift back at Kenny's, and I'm impatient to see him, alone on the fire escape, away from Lenore and Cammy.
Where No Gods Came Page 10