But she didn’t want to think about that. She and Sam did have a strict agreement that he would never sleep with any of the women she knew, so even if he did sleep around it wouldn’t seem real to her. She’d only heard of his infidelities by innuendo. One “friend” or another mentioned vague things from time to time. But she’d never discussed it with Sam.
And why should she? she thought. She wasn’t 100-percent sure, and, anyhow, he loved her. That much she knew. He had nurtured her acting craft, encouraging her for almost three years. And still was. If it had hurt her when he insisted she’d get character work in L.A., it had also buoyed her. She’d never be an ingenue, but he still believed in her.
Still, what was that in Bethanie’s gaze?
I’ve got to stop this, Mary Jane said to herself firmly, letting Sam’s voice bring her back to the business at hand. Anyway, if anything was up in that department, her pal Molly Closter would let her know.
“We have four scenes in front of the curtain put together so far for the revue, and six backstage scenes,” Sam began telling the now attentive group. “We still need a few more variety-act skits to round out the show. I have an idea myself, but I would like to hear some of yours.”
Before anyone could answer, the door from the stairs crashed open and Neil Morelli came bounding in. “I got it! I got it!” he screamed.
The group rose as one and ran to him, everyone hugging and talking at the same time. Neil Morelli, Mary Jane’s best friend, obviously had gotten the TV pilot he had read for last month! Another one of us has made it, thought Mary Jane as she ran to him along with the others. Neil might be a little crazy, but he had a good heart. He was one of the cleverest comedians she had ever known. And she had known many—a few in the biblical sense.
The congratulations bubbled on. Taking her turn, Mary Jane threw her arms around Neil’s skinny neck and said. “Oh, Jughead, I couldn’t be happier if it happened to me. You deserve it.”
Neil managed to scoop her up and gave her a little twirl. “Thanks for all the rehearsal time you gave me,” he said. “How ’bout a French kiss?” He planted a loud wet smack on each of her cheeks. The crowd laughed; he bowed, then turned back to her. “You’re next, you know.”
Mary Jane smiled wanly at this. In all her years of trying to get jobs as an actress in New York, every time someone else made it, he or she always said the same thing to her: “You’re next.” But she never was. She thought that Jack and Jill had been her shot, but the phone wasn’t ringing off the hook.
Sam, the only one who hadn’t crossed the floor to Neil, did so now. “Good luck,” he said, extending his hand. Neil took it—reluctantly, it seemed to Mary Jane. They weren’t great friends, but had always tolerated one another, if only for her sake. Sam smiled at Neil, his eyes cold. “We’re all very happy for you, Neil. Now, if no one objects, let’s get back to work. I have an idea for a short skit for the show. A magic routine.”
Everyone groaned. Magic! Mary Jane thought. Well, I guess it could be worse. It could be a mime act.
“Hey, this is a democracy. I’ll let you all judge. Then I’ll decide.” Everyone laughed. “Mary Jane, Beth, Neil. Front and center. I’m going to walk you through it.”
Sam outlined the blocking of the skit to each of them. Neil was the magician; Beth and Mary Jane were to play the obligatory assistants. Neil, always ready to take center stage, gave up his moment of glory and, stripping out of his coat, did the walk-through, not knowing where it was going. As Sam directed, Neil placed Mary Jane in the imaginary box and said “Ta-da.” Mary Jane did the classic one-arm-in-the-air, one-on-the-hip gesture of the magician’s assistant. She got a laugh. Sam grinned at her. At the cue, Neil threw a sheet over the box. Then, ad-libbing, Neil went into an abracadabra spiel, playing to the crowd. Selling it. Meanwhile, Sam grabbed Mary Jane’s hand, pulling her from behind the sheet. Without urging, Bethanie quickly took her place.
Then, with a big flourish, Neil pulled off the fabric. Bethanie perfectly aped Mary Jane’s ta-da movements. The members of the troupe sat in silence for a moment, then erupted into laughter. At the sidelines, Mary Jane stood still. She wasn’t certain what had happened. But fear flickered somewhere around her stomach. What was the joke? Then someone said it out loud. “I get it. ‘Before’ and ‘After.’”
Mary Jane stood as if rooted to the spot, stunned by the realization. Her cheeks reddened with humiliation; tears stung her eyes. She was afraid to look at Sam, or anyone. How could he? she thought. Why? Why? Sure, she was a trouper about her looks. The part of Jill was that of an unattractive woman. Everyone knew it. She herself made self-deprecating jokes. But this was different. He knew how she really felt. Was that cheap joke worth her pain? Sam couldn’t be so insensitive as to think that this wouldn’t hurt.
She forced herself to scan the throng. They’re my friends, she thought, my family. And they’re laughing at me.
But not everyone was laughing. Molly Closter was looking at her with pity. And now so was Bethanie, who blushed and turned away. Mary Jane also felt a hot flush of shame. Pity felt worse than ridicule.
Then Neil Morelli held up his hands and called out Sam’s name. The group’s reaction calmed. Sam looked over at him as the group followed suit.
“I don’t get it, Sam,” Neil said. “I mean, what’s so funny?”
Sam opened his mouth, but before he could explain, Neil interrupted. Mary Jane could see he wasn’t having any of it. And he was starting a roll. Oh, no, Neil, she thought. Let it go. Don’t be a hero for me. Just let me sit down, creep away.
“A transformation? Short, dark Mary Jane turns into tall, blonde Bethanie? Jeez, it’s politically incorrect, but, even worse, I don’t think it’s very funny. I mean, it’s been done. Wait a minute, Sam. I got a better idea. Let’s change the scene just slightly, so it’s not such a cliché. I think we can get a better laugh. A role switch. A woman magician, Sam. And you go in the box. She says ‘Ta-da,’ you disappear, and, in your place, Rick here pops out.”
Mary Jane, like all the others, looked over at one of the newer troupe members. Rick, the kid with a full head of golden curls and a body sculpted to perfection. Mary Jane saw Rick dip his head down a bit, then shrug. Some of the group laughed, and Molly Closter and another woman clapped.
Sam looked coldly at Neil, then smiled. Despite her shame, Mary Jane could see Sam was raging behind his pasted-on smile. Everyone watched Neil as he walked casually across the room and took his coat from the back of a chair. “Come on, Mary Jane,” he said, as he began to put it on.
Mutely, she shook her head. That would make this all worse. She’d been waiting for Sam to come back from L.A. for two long weeks. She had so much to discuss with him tonight. And she wanted him to hold her, to be with her. Where would she go if she left Sam and her family? If she took this too hard, if she let them see her shame, she could never come back. Now Neil was pushing her into a corner. She backed away and shook her head again.
“Well, all right, then,” Neil sighed. “But I’m out of here for good.” As he reached the door to the stairs, he turned and spoke only to her.
“I meant it, Mary Jane. You are by far the most talented actress I’ve ever met. You are next,” he said, and closed the door behind him.
4
In the search for an obscurity capital of the world, Lamson, Texas, would be a major contender. Grim and seemingly endless, Interstate 10 stretches from El Paso to San Antonio and has got to be one of the most depressing, dismal drives in the whole United States. Each dot on the map is an excuse for a town more dusty, faded, and dead than the one before. I, Laura Richie, know that, because I had to stop at so many of them, doing this research. But Lamson doesn’t even rate a dot on the map. And in Lamson, the most obscure homes were in the trailer park beside the highway.
Sharleen Smith jumped off the dented yellow school bus and began to walk quickly along the dusty highway. She kicked small stones ahead of her with the toes of her Keds, puffing the dry dir
t in low clouds around her feet. She turned off the main road and away from the other students, down the littered side street, toward the haphazard collection of decrepit trailers at the end, pulling at the red ribbon holding her pony tail as she went. She shook out her long, white-blond hair, running her fingers through the loosened mass.
The groan she usually felt in the back of her throat, the groan she usually let out as she neared the tin box of a trailer she shared with her brother and father, was replaced today by a low hum of pleasure. Today nothing could bother her. Not even Sueanne Skaggs, who’d come to school on Monday in a new T-shirt. It had Sharleen’s picture on it and a line below it that said, “Just say no.” Sueanne had given one to all the boys on the football team. But Boyd, the captain and Sueanne’s ex-steady, he didn’t wear his. And none of the team would dare to if he didn’t.
Sharleen couldn’t quite figure out why Sueanne and all the girls hated her. Of course, she was poor, and she knew she was ignorant. Maybe even stupid. But she was really pretty. At least she thought that she must be. Momma had always told her she was. But then Momma had left a long time ago.
If she was still pretty, the girls didn’t seem to like her for it. Maybe it was her clothes. She tried to dress like the others, but she and Dean didn’t have much, and that was a fact. Still, her red sweatshirt was clean, and her hair ribbon was pressed, and her jeans didn’t have no more holes in ’em than the other girls’. But it seemed like they bought their jeans with holes, while hers came naturally. That made all the difference, she reckoned. Sharleen winced for a moment. Even with the thought of Boyd glowin’ in the back of her mind, it didn’t feel good, knowing the other girls hated her. But the boys sure didn’t.
Sharleen skirted the trailer next door, ready for the snarling dog on a chain, remembering, too, when the pit bull used to run loose. Six years the dog had known her, but it still reacted with fury when she approached. Only her brother, Dean, could quiet the beast down. Well, Dean could make any animal love him. “Shut up, Wally,” she told the snarling dog, feeling sorry for the creature. She knew what it felt like to be trapped and beaten. Poor Wally; its owner, a nasty biker, had never dignified the animal with a name. Only she and Dean called the dog Wally.
“Oh, shoot.” Her father’s aged pickup truck stuck out from behind the end of the lot. The angle at which it was parked and the door left open told her that he was not only home but also drunk. She sighed. Nothing ever changed in Lamson, Texas. She paused for a moment, right there in the dusty road, and took out the Bible her momma had left her. She opened it blindly, then let her eye fall on the page. It was in Psalms, the prettiest part of the Old Testament. It was Psalm 21, and she read it through. All right, she told herself, then went to the door of the trailer and opened it quietly, not wanting to wake him if he was passed out. “Please, oh, Lord, let him sleep,” she prayed. She didn’t want tonight to be ruined.
His smell hit her as she stepped inside, a rank mixture of body odor and beer. She could make sure he had fresh-washed clothes, but she couldn’t make him change them often or take a shower. Luckily, though, there wasn’t a sound in the trailer. She realized he must be in a stupor, because she also smelled the overlay of cheap bourbon he drank only when he was into a real bad bender.
She turned on the light in the cramped living room where she slept. She sighed with relief to see that her father had made it to his own room in the back and bypassed the convertible sofa bed.
Sharleen welcomed this time alone. Dean worked over at the feed-and-grain store after school let out. Tugging off her sneakers without untying them, she stepped out of the worn jeans and pulled the bright sweatshirt over her head in a single motion. Taking a towel from one of the hooks she used as a closet, she tiptoed toward the bathroom for her few luxurious moments of privacy. But before going in, she pressed her ear against the thin door of the room her father slept in, to confirm what she knew. Yep. His snores rattled like a snake in a bucket.
She closed the equally flimsy door to the tiny bathroom, and once again bemoaned the broken lock. Sharleen had no privacy. Though Dean was supposed to share the bedroom with their father, he most often wound up sleeping on the sofa with Sharleen. Not that she minded. She would feel safer now if Dean were home, knowing that he would keep an eye on her father while she showered. Still, Dean in his own quiet way demanded a lot of attention. Perhaps it was better like this. She reached into the cramped bathroom and turned on the water, hoping that there was some. Lamson Trailer Park’s well occasionally went dry, or the pump broke. When she felt the first sting of the stream, she adjusted the temperature, pulled the cheap plastic curtain on the shower stall aside, and stepped in.
She let the water fall on her head and down her sleek hair to her shoulders. Her hair turned darker as the water ran down it to her breasts. Her nipples hardened as the water touched them. She turned slowly with her eyes closed. The water played at the small of her back, her buttocks, down her long, tapered legs to her feet. She felt good. Well, I might not be smart or rich or anyone important, but thank the Lord I’m pretty. Bein’ pretty made Boyd like her. She was just like Momma, who had been pretty. Men liked Momma. All men except her daddy.
Sharleen could still picture Momma. She didn’t have a photo of her or nothin’, but she remembered her real well. Thinkin’ of those times made her sad. She could still remember hiding with Dean in the red dust under the trailer, listening to her daddy and her momma above, hearing Momma being beaten. It had been a familiar sound, an awful sight, terrifying, but in a way even more terrible to think about. Sharleen still remembered the last time. Momma had come back from the laundry where she worked, still in her pink uniform, her hair batted up under the hairnet, tiny tendrils twisted at her temples, limp from the heat. Old tennis sneakers were on her feet, small holes at each pinky toe, worn by the three-mile walk each way between the laundry and the trailer. Down by her side she carried a plastic bag, holding the white shoes she polished each morning. She looked real tired, but when Dean showed her the tiny pup he’d found that day, she’d smiled.
Until Daddy had come home.
Sharleen and Dean had so often hidden from their dad, breathing into each other’s ears, blocking out the sounds of the screams. The gentle hum of their breaths had always calmed her. She hummed now. She closed her eyes, letting the water run over her. It was almost as comforting as Dean’s hand, the comforting rhythm he used as he stroked the back of her head, their bodies pushed tightly against each other. That day, the day of the puppy, had been real bad. She thought of how they rocked in rhythm with their breaths. The memory of the warmth of his body against hers, the fear that was a knot in her throat, now made her moan softly. His hand always went to her secret place and held it as she moved against him. The rocking caused them both to utter long slow moans. The sounds from the rest of the trailer, the fighting and the screams, would seem far away.
They spent that night in the dirt under the trailer, while the screaming continued, followed by silence. Somehow, the silence was worse, and they trembled until they finally slept.
Sharleen remembered their last morning together. Momma had come to find them. “Sharleen, Dean. Are you there, kids?” Her voice was a whisper. Sharleen knew without being told that they were not to wake their father.
“We’re here, Momma. Dean, come on, let’s get up.”
Dean had rolled over and crawled out from under the trailer. Sharleen followed, brushing the dust off her as she started up the steps. Momma stopped just inside the door, and Sharleen saw her in the light. One side of her face was swollen and red. Her right eye was black and blue and puffy. The other was swollen shut. Dean froze, and Sharleen tapped his shoulder gently. Nothing else she could do.
“Go wash up, Dean, but be quiet,” she said. “Don’t wake him.”
When Dean went into the bathroom, Sharleen went to Momma and put a hand up to her face. Her mother winced and drew back. Sharleen had never seen her hurt so bad.
“Momma, it�
��s bad,” she said gently, as if breaking news to her mother. “You’re hurt real bad this time, Momma.”
“I know, honey. It feels real bad this time.”
“We gotta go to the hospital. Momma.”
“No, honey. We’ll just ask Jesus to take care of me and the puppy.” Momma took out a shoe box, the puppy lying twisted inside it. Sharleen didn’t have to ask. Momma knelt, and so did Sharleen, who first got her mother the little Bible. Then Dean joined them. Sharleen even now remembered how he looked at the box and how his eyes got big, so very big.
“Is it sleepin’?” he asked.
“No, Dean. She’s in heaven now, with Jesus. She’s Jesus’ puppy now.” Dean knelt beside them, and their mother whispered some words.
After breakfast, only Frosted Flakes and water ’cause there was no milk, Momma walked Sharleen and Dean to the school bus. Sharleen saw that her mother had put on her one good dress. It was bright blue with a white collar.
And she was carrying a cardboard suitcase. Sharleen knew then that her life was about to change, but couldn’t imagine it getting worse. As Dean moped alone up ahead, their momma spoke real serious to Sharleen. It made Sharleen feel like a grown-up.
“Sharleen, honey, Momma’s got to go away for a while. I can’t take you two with me, but I’ll come back for both of you as soon as I get a job and a place for us to live. You know you wasn’t my natural-born daughter, but I love you like my own. Dean is my blood, but I got to leave him, too. He’s only your half-brother, but I want you to love him like a true sister. I’ve only been your stepmomma, but I love you like flesh.” She handed Sharleen the little Bible. “Keep this now, till I come back. No, honey, don’t cry. You got to be strong. Jesus is going to watch over you. I promise you that. You talk to the Lord, and he’ll take care of you while I’m gone.” She paused, wincing at the pain in her face. “I want you to promise to take care of Dean. He ain’t as smart as you.”
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