Hollywood and Maine

by Allison Whittenberg

  I spun around. “Raymond?” I made a beeline for Tracy John. “Is Raymond going with you?”

  “Well, he couldn’t invite him and then not invite him,” Leo said.

  “Yeah, that would be rude,” Tracy John said.

  “I hope he gets bitten by a bear!” I told them.

  Ma drew back in horror. “What a horrible thing to say!”

  “I mean it. As the old folks say, I solid mean it,” I said, and stormed back into the house.

  After she came back in, Ma tsk-tsked me. She told me I was being pigheaded and that I should get over myself and make up with that “well-mannered young man.” I rolled my eyes. She was a fine one to come chiming in at this late date like she was some kind of expert in male-female dynamics! Sure, she had been happily married for eighteen years and everything, but she didn’t have to go on and on like she was sitting atop a high mountain.

  She handed me the duster. She told me to go down the banister but to be sure to stop if I felt woozy.

  “I slept the day away yesterday, Ma. I’m not going to drop,” I reassured her.

  “Well, go ahead then, make yourself useful, Charmaine.”

  After I completed that task, Ma and I cleaned the windows in silence. I next vacuumed the carpets, which totally erased the quiet, as she swept the front stoop. We finished all those tasks by noon. Instead of sitting down, Ma snapped her apron in the air. She said it never hurt to get a head start on tomorrow’s cooking, it being Sunday and all. As she began battering okra (like anyone had a fondness for that vegetable, breaded or otherwise), I took the opportunity to slip out.

  I went to the living room and turned on the TV. Usually on Saturday, there were wall-to-wall sports shows on the major network channels and creature double features on UHF. Somehow, on channel forty-eight, I happened onto a movie called Algiers, starring Hedy Lamarr. I remembered her from the Hollywood book. She was hailed as the “most fabulous brunette ever” and was called a term that I hadn’t seen before: “a Jewess.” Originally from Austria, she slipped out of Europe just before the Nazis came to power. With that dramatic background, I expected to see real acting from her. What she delivered instead was presence. Her expression was still and singular, yet this repose transmitted volumes.

  The plot of Algiers was allegorical. Hedy’s character was a social climber who married well, in the financial sense only. From their first scene together, it was clear that she had no love for her new husband, who was twice her age and size. Soon she met a romantic jewel thief, played by Charles Boyer, who, the Hollywood book claimed, was fluent in French, Spanish, German, and Italian, but from listening to him, he was severely limited in English. Most actors like him were bumped from talkies, but actually his heavy accent aided his delivery of the immortal line: “Come with me to the casbah.”

  Even though I didn’t know what a casbah was, I was hooked. I was so wrapped in the story that it didn’t dawn on me till the flick’s end that though they were in North Africa, all the natives were kept to the background.

  Besides any sense of political consciousness, my principles also went out the window. I really hoped that the affair between this kept woman and a crook would work out. It was all romance, romance, romance. It convinced you that you were really having an experience, while in reality you were just sitting there watching a box. That’s Hollywood.

  Around nine that night, they came in smelling of the great outdoors. Uncle E carried Tracy John straight up to bed.

  “One day in the country plumb tired him out,” Daddy explained as he carried a container into the kitchen.

  Though I didn’t like fish (they are so weird—they look oily, but they feel dry), I followed him in for a peek.

  They certainly had a wide array: butterfish, porgies, flukes, and a few crappies.

  “This one looks good,” I said, pointing.

  “That’s Raymond’s catch,” Leo told me.

  I frowned. I should have known. I made a mental note to myself not to eat any of his crappies.

  How was it possible to dislike and like someone with the same intensity? Not long before, I’d believed we would always be together. What could go wrong? We seemed to have so very much in common. In truth, we were in two different places. Better that I learned that now rather than later. Just think if we ever got married. I’d have to cook two different meals for dinner each night. One normal. One without meat. And we’d have two different locales to be on Sunday. He’d have Latin Mass, and I would have Reverend Clee.

  My brother told me, “Raymond really likes you, Maine.”

  I sensed that I was being set up. “What’s the punch line, Leo?”

  He shrugged and said, “There is none.”

  twenty-nine

  “He lost his canoe, his house, his son,” Mr. Mand said.

  “And his dignity,” Raymond added.

  “It seems like the author is trying to show us that money is the root of all evil,” Mr. Mand said.

  Raymond nodded. “It turned him into a gangster.”

  That’s how English class went on Monday morning, just the two of them dialoguing. Two yes-men agreeing with each other, paying homage to the vision of a classless society. I watched the clock’s second hand move so slowly, I couldn’t take forty more minutes of this. I had to jump in.

  “Maybe the author’s trying to say that the lack of money’s the root, not the money itself,” I replied to Raymond without looking at him. “I mean, at least he made an attempt. Besides belting his wife, everything Kino did was to make a better life for his family. He wanted his son to have an education. He wanted to marry his wife formally in the church, and that takes money.”

  “He forgot about his loved ones,” Raymond said. “All he cared about was the pesos he was going to get. After the pearl went to his head, he went bananas. He lost his simpleness.”

  “Since when is simpleness the same as goodness?” I asked. I held up the book. “That’s where Steinbeck goes off the deep end. Just because Kino wants things doesn’t make him a bad person.”

  Raymond’s eyes remained forward, not looking at me. “He’s not so much a bad person as a blind person.”

  “Everyone has a blind spot, Raymond.”

  Behind me, I felt the class pulse alive.

  “You can say that again.” Raymond’s voice went up a decibel. “Some people don’t know how to leave well enough alone.”

  “Maybe that’s why you took up with my two best friends,” I blurted out.

  “What page are they on?” I heard someone behind me ask.

  I continued my attack. I faced Raymond and offered incontestable evidence. “I saw you. I saw you! You were on my street. You don’t have to go past Dardon Avenue to get to Redwood Avenue. You wanted me to catch you.”

  Intrigued, Mr. Mand looked over the top of his glasses at us.

  The class went “Ohhhhhhhh.”

  “I’m not going out with Cissy or Millicent,” Raymond said.

  “You expect me to believe that?” I asked.

  “You can believe whatever you want, Maine. I’m telling you the truth.” He shook his head gravely and pointed at me. “You threw away your pearl.”

  Now the class was absolutely still. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a smile hovering on Dinah’s lips. Demetrius looked equally amused.

  “You call yourself a pearl? Of all the arrogance! Of all the gall!” I continued my outburst, in spite of my better judgment. I was positively on fire.

  “This book is better than I thought,” someone from the back row said.

  “I’m not the pearl, Maine,” Raymond said. “Our feelings for one another, that’s the pearl.”

  For a second or two, I felt like Neil Armstrong, you know, the first man on the moon. It was such a revelation knowing that Raymond felt that deeply.

  “Oh,” I said after a long lapse of time.

  Mr. Mand’s mouth, usually a hard line, was now open and animated. He was truly caught up in this junior high soap opera. Sudde
nly I was not just the smart girl. I was a fool, a romantic fool, but a fool nonetheless. I was not sure I wanted my English teacher to see me in this light. What if I needed a recommendation for something?

  Mr. Mand said, “I thank you, Raymond and Charmaine, for your input. It’s important to feel what you read. To get inside the words and make them relevant to your life.”

  He went on that way for another few moments; then he read the concluding pages of The Pearl. At last the ordeal was over.

  The buzzer sounded and we were free to go our separate ways.

  Hot with embarrassment, I prayed for the floor to swallow me up as I made my way from Mr. Mand’s classroom, not daring to look back. When you’re five-foot-eight in the ninth grade, you have no choice but to walk tall. No amount of slouching was going to make me invisible, so I threw my shoulders back.

  From third period the day wore on. You know what they say: Time heals and flies. But it did neither that day. I don’t know how celebrities stood it, with all their business thrown out on Front Street.

  In the lunch line, I felt hands on my shoulders. “We heard,” they said. It was Cissy and Millicent. We sat at our usual spot, and they commiserated with me.

  There’s some saying that the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.

  I disagree with that statement.

  Outside, the sun was shining and the birds were singing, but inside, I’d managed to wreck everything again.

  I deposited my books in my locker at the end of the day to lighten my load. No Monday homework, just a light reading assignment for history.

  “Maine,” someone said. My heart leapt because there was no mistaking his voice. At the sight of his tiny, cramped shoulders and broad smiling face, I thought I might melt.

  “I was wondering if you might like to go for a soda or something.”

  All the phrases I had prepared for this moment dissolved at once, like a bubble of foam.

  “Tracy John has a game …,” I began.

  “Oh,” he said, crestfallen.

  “I don’t mean it like that. You’re more than welcome to join me.” I rushed to say, “I—I mean, I’d like you to. Raymond, I’m so sorry. I don’t know how I could have made you feel like I didn’t care about you, because nothing, nothing could be farther from the truth.”

  “No, Maine, I’m sorry. I did overreact to things and blow them all out of proportion.”

  I held out my arms and said a really cliché line: “Oh, Raymond, let’s never quarrel again.”

  We embraced.

  Off to the side, Cissy and Millicent both gave us the thumbs-up.

  thirty

  America has only come up with three originals: jazz music, comic books, and baseball. Though many more pastimes have woven their way into our country’s lore, baseball is king.

  Raymond and I held hands as we made our way to the bleachers.

  Tracy John rushed up to us. “I didn’t know you’d be here, Raymond.”

  I was in shock. “So now you know his name.”

  Raymond tugged on his cap. “Tracy John can call me whatever he wants.”

  Happy to have that door open, my cousin looked at me with eyes that sparkled at the prospect of mischief.

  Raymond and Tracy John did a two-minute handshake like long-lost soul brothers.

  “Is Spider-Man your boyfriend again?” Tracy John asked me.

  My “I hope so” ran into Raymond’s “Of course I am.”

  “Good, cuz Maine’s not so bad,” he told Raymond.

  “Thank you, Tracy John.”

  “You have to get used to her.”

  My grin turned tight. “Thank you, Tracy John,” I repeated.

  “Because,” he continued, “she thinks she knows everything.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I mean she can be bossy.”

  Was there no stopping him? “Thank you, Tracy—”

  “—But she’s getting better.” He finished his point with his eyes wide. As my reflection filled his irises, I couldn’t help but cave and give his terminally adorable face a big kiss.

  After Tracy John returned to the field, Raymond asked me, “Hey, can I have one of those?”

  I removed my glasses and closed my eyes. I certainly didn’t need twenty-twenty vision for this. Our lips met, and it felt like the first time: majestic and timeless, warm and surprising.

  “Hey, you never told me, Maine, how did that modeling contest work out?”

  I chuckled a little. “Not so well. It wasn’t what I expected. Thanks for entering me, though.”

  He shook his head mournfully. “Their loss.”

  I realized that as far as the four fs of life were concerned, I was right back where I’d started. No fame. No fortune. All I had were family and friends. And deep down, I guess I always knew that was the better part of the bargain.

  The umpire raised the flag while we sang the national anthem. Then it was time to play ball. The sun ebbed bright through the trees. They said, “Batter up!” but I had to wait till late in the third inning for my cousin to take to the plate.

  The pitcher, who was a third grader and could do curves, released the ball. It wound closer and closer to home plate, where Tracy John stood ready and able. His expression turned serious.

  The chances swelled.

  I moved to the edge of my seat, and Raymond squeezed my hand.

  The moment before Tracy John’s swing seemed so long, but I thought that very moment was perfect.

  I wished it could have lasted forever.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  A Philadelphia native and a Virgo, Allison Whittenberg studied dance for years before switching her focus to writing. She has an MA in English from the University of Wisconsin and enjoys traveling to places like the Caribbean and Russia. Her first novel about Charmaine and Tracy John, Sweet Thang, is available from Yearling Books. She is also the author of Life Is Fine, a novel for teenagers available from Delacorte Press.