Just Plain Al: The Al Series, Book Five

by Constance C. Greene

  “The time has come to rid myself of my worldly goods,” Al concluded, looking even more soulful.

  “All your worldly goods?” I said.

  Behind her glasses Al’s eyes were huge and filled with life’s mystery.

  “All,” she said, bowing her head.

  “Can I have your lavender sweater, then?” I asked.

  Al’s eyes lost their soulful look.

  “You are positively disgusting!” she snapped. “You make me ill. I shall give my lavender sweater to the poor and the needy. Along with everything else.”

  “How about your red shoes?” I had her. I knew I had her. She would never, never give up those red shoes. It would be like giving up her life.

  Al thought a long minute. “Well,” she conceded, “I might keep them. If only to remind myself of my former excesses. Besides,” she said, “if you want to know, those shoes are very uncomfortable. No poor person would want them. I plan to hang them over my bed to remind me of my foolish youth.”

  “Well,” I said, “it’s going to be a big change, that’s for sure.”

  “You have only one year left to be a child, my child.” Al placed a hand gently on my shoulder. “Make the most of it.” Then she started rooting around in her mess of clothing like a pig looking for truffles. “Scram,” she said. “I have work to do.”

  I went to the door, opened it, took a step out into the hall. Then I hollered, “Your mother’s going to have a cow!” slammed the door, and ran.

  chapter 8

  “I tell you what we could do.” My mother threaded the needle with one eye closed, the only way she could do it, she said.

  “Maybe they’ll let you return my dress,” I said, long-faced. “And give you back the five bucks.”

  She got it threaded on the third try. “I hate to sew,” she murmured.

  “Who would ever know?” I hate it when she starts to say something, then goes off on a tangent like that. “What could we do?”

  “We could throw a birthday party for Al.”

  “Where?” I didn’t tell her about Al renouncing her worldly goods … I figured it would pass.

  “Why, right here, of course. We could put the leaf in the table and polish the silver and have a cake with candles. Fourteen with one to grow on,” my mother said, smiling at me.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe Al wouldn’t like a party right down the hall from where she lives.”

  “We could make it a surprise party,” my mother said. Like most people, she hears what she wants to hear and throws the rest away.

  “I don’t think she’d be up for a surprise party. I think she’d flip if we all jumped out at her.”

  “We wouldn’t jump out at her. We’d hide behind the door or someplace, and come out very casually. We could have balloons and party hats and …”

  “Yeah, and little baskets filled with M and Ms,” I added. “And we could play pin the tail on the donkey.”

  My mother gave me a long, hard stare.

  “I hope you’re not going into a difficult phase,” she told me. “I understand some girls get rather impossible when they hit their teens. Somehow, I never thought it would happen to my little girl.”

  If there’s one thing that sends me into a fit, it’s being called my little girl, which my mother is fully aware of.

  “Maybe I better sound Al out about this party,” I suggested.

  “That won’t be necessary.” My mother bit off a thread. “I’ll simply call up and ask Al and her mother to come to dinner Saturday night.”

  “If you call Al on the telephone,” I said, “she’ll think somebody died. You’ve never called her in your entire life. She’ll pass out.”

  Just then the hand of fate pressed our doorbell.

  Two, then one, then two, the ring came.

  “Ta dah!” Al breezed in under full sail, the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa María all in one.

  “Guess what? I just got a birthday card from my father. It was signed by Louise and all the boys. Can you beat it? It’s a couple of days early, but my father said he wanted to be sure it arrived in time. There was a note from Louise. She said they hadn’t been in touch because of having so many visitors. Her mother”—Al ticked off the visitors on her fingers—“and her brother and his wife, and some people she’d known when she lived in St. Louis. She said she hadn’t had a minute to write. Also, Sam just got home from the hospital.” Sam is Al’s favorite stepbrother. Sam is beguiling, Al says. She’s sappy about Sam.

  “He had his appendix out,” Al said. “Can you imagine a little guy like Sam being in the hospital? I bet he hated it. I thought people didn’t even have their appendix out, anymore. I thought they left it in because it might come in handy someday.”

  “That’s your tonsils, dumbo,” I said. “If your appendix wants out, let it out. Polly had appendicitis and she said it hurt.”

  “The birthday card says, ‘Present follows,’ in my father’s writing. What do you suppose they sent me? Maybe a pair of sweat pants to go with my sweat shirt. Then I’d have a total outfit.” Al liked the idea, I could see.

  “Yeah, pants with AL(exandra) the Great written all across your rear end,” I said. “So they’d know who you are, coming and going.”

  Al’s face was wreathed in smiles as she waited for me to finish talking so she could go on with what was on her mind. I know Al. Now that she’d heard from her father and Louise and the boys, she was on the glory road.

  “Who needs a birthday party, anyway? Who cares? The Rainbow Room’s not so much, anyway. Who cares?” She was a new woman.

  “I do,” my mother said. “A birthday party is in the cards for you, Al. I feel it in my bones.”

  “You do?” Al looked from me to my mother and back to me. She knew something was up.

  “You’re invited to a birthday party here, Saturday night,” my mother told Al. “Just tell us whom you’d like to invite, and we’ll invite them.”

  “Well.” Al was flabbergasted, knocked out of her socks. I’d never seen her like this before and found it a real treat. She didn’t know what to say.

  “That’s very nice of you,” she settled on at last. “But won’t it be a lot of trouble?”

  “Everyone will pitch in,” my mother said, in a soothing tone.

  They will? My father could push the vacuum and Teddy could get down on his knees and attack the ring in the bathtub, a first for that little creep. My mother and I would prepare the food. Neato.

  “Tell your mother I’ll call her tonight,” my mother told Al, “and let her know the plans. Better still, have her call me when she gets in, if she’s not too tired.”

  Al and I zapped into my room for privacy.

  “We were going to have it be a surprise,” I said, “but I figured you’d freak out if we jumped out at you.”

  “I would have died,” Al said. “I’m not up for surprises. What will I wear? I have nothing to wear!”

  That’s just what you get for giving away your worldly goods, I thought, but did not say.

  “Just wear any old thing. Your denim skirt would be great with that nice blouse you have,” I told her. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “Yes, it does. If your mother’s throwing me a party, I owe her the courtesy of dressing up,” Al said solemnly.

  “You know what?”

  “No, what?”

  “For a minute there, I thought your mother had snuck in. I thought it was your mother saying what you just said. You sounded just like her.”

  “Yikes!” Al clutched her head. “What a terrible thing to say!”

  chapter 9

  “Hello, Daddy.” My mother was on the horn, talking to her father. They talk a couple of times a week. My grandfather lives alone. My mother worries about him being lonely. My father says how can he be lonely with all those luscious ladies inviting him for potluck?

  “You’d think he was rich,” my father teases my mother. “Maybe he better let those gals know he’s not. I wish you
r father would let me in on his secret.” My grandfather has the reputation of being a ladies’ man.

  My grandmother died when I was five months old. My mother says I was a great comfort to her after her mother died. She’d hold me and walk around the apartment with me in her arms, and it made her feel better, she says. Less sad.

  “A baby is a lovely thing,” my mother told me, “especially when someone you love very much dies. A baby is a new soul, a fresh new soul to take the place of the person who’s died.” I like that idea.

  When she tells what a comfort I was to her when I was five months old, Teddy gets very jealous. He wants to know why she couldn’t have held him to make her feel better. The fact that he wasn’t born yet doesn’t seem to occur to him. I hope Teddy gets smarter as he gets older, the way you’re supposed to, but I wouldn’t put any money on it.

  “We’re having a birthday party for Al on Saturday,” I heard her say. “You remember Al, don’t you? Yes, that’s the one. Well, she’s going to be fourteen so we thought … yes, why, that would be wonderful. I’m sure the girls would love it. It starts at seven. Grand. Goodbye, darling.” My mother calls her father Daddy and darling. I like to hear her call him things like that. I think when I’m middle-aged and my father is old, I’ll do the same.

  “Amazing!” my mother said when she’d hung up. “Absolutely amazing. Grandfather wants to come to Al’s party.”

  “He’s not bringing Mrs. Oakley, is he?” I asked. Mrs. Oakley came to our apartment the day Teddy sang the dirty song. The same day Al and I hid in the broom closet while Teddy performed, we were so embarrassed. My mother told me later that Mrs. Oakley kept time to the music with her dainty foot and never turned a hair at Teddy’s lyrics.

  “You’ve got to give the old girl credit,” my father said. He likes Mrs. Oakley. My mother can take her or leave her.

  “He’s coming alone,” my mother said. “I would never have thought of asking him, but he’s fond of Al.”

  “Al thinks Grandfather’s an ace,” I said.

  My mother laughed. “And so he is,” she agreed.

  “So that makes you and Dad, me and Al, Al’s mother, Polly, and Grandfather,” I counted on my fingers. “Seven in all.”

  “Don’t forget Teddy,” my mother tossed out, leaving the room on the pretext of work to be done. She was escaping from me, I’m sure of it.

  No, sir. I put my foot down on Teddy. In more ways than one. Teddy would have to be eliminated. For the evening. Nothing permanent. Ha, ha.

  We haven’t discussed the menu yet. If my mother says tuna or meat loaf, the party’s off. Polly said she’d bake a cake. Al’s mother called and was almost crying, she was so delighted about us giving Al a party.

  “You have no idea what your family means to us,” Al’s mother told mine. “You’ve made us feel right at home here and more of a family together, Al and me. I can never thank you enough. This will be a memorable occasion.”

  Not if we have tuna-fish surprise it won’t be.

  But I underestimated my mother. She decided to spring for a standing rib roast. And it wasn’t even on special! My father’s eyes misted over as he heard the news.

  “When was the last time we had a rib roast?” he said wistfully. “Wasn’t it the day you told me you were having a baby? And that,” he pointed to me, “was the baby, and she’s about to be thirteen. I’m pretty sure that was the last time we had a rib roast.”

  My mother looked at him in a way that, if Al had looked that way, it would’ve been a super duper piercer.

  “And I think asparagus would be nice.” My mother plowed onward.

  On my mother’s family’s coat of arms is engraved, “Never buy fresh fruit or vegetables out of season.” This was going to be a bang-up bash, all right.

  Just as we were discussing what flavor ice cream might be best, the bell rang. Two, then one, then two. It was the guest of honor, two days early.

  I opened the door a crack. “Go away,” I said. “You’ve got the wrong night.”

  “Ta dah!” Al stood there in her red shoes, her AL(exandra) the Great T-shirt, and a billowy skirt that reached her ankles. She was smiling. “I think I’ve got it,” she said softly. “I really think I’ve got it this time.”

  “Got what?” I whispered, afraid of breaking the spell.

  Al looked over her left shoulder, then over her right. When she saw the coast was clear, she whispered, “Zandi.”

  Was this the secret password?

  “How do you spell it?” I asked.

  “With a capital Z,” she said, “and an i at the end. How does that grab you?”

  “Well,” I opened the door all the way, “it’s different. I’ll say that. The trouble is, with an unusual name like Zandi, nobody will know how to spell it. You’ll get it spelled all kinds of ways. It’s sort of far out, you might say.”

  “That’s what I like about it.” Al couldn’t stop smiling. “This morning, when I woke up, a little voice said, right smack in my ear, it said, ‘Your name is Zandi.’ Just like that.” Al looked closely at me to see if I bought that one. I kept my face inscrutable, which ain’t easy.

  “So then I hopped out of bed,” Al continued, “and looked in the mirror, and, sure enough, I looked like a Zandi.

  “And you know something?” Al scrunched up her face. “It’s perfect. I feel it in my bones, and my bones never lie.”

  “You’ll be the first in your crowd with that name,” I told her. “That’s for sure.”

  I swung the door back and forth, wanting to tell Al about the rib roast and the asparagus and figuring this wasn’t the right time.

  “You want me to start calling you that now?” I said. “Before your birthday, I mean?”

  “That’s OK,” Al said. “You can wait until the big day. I have to keep saying it to myself to make it seem real, though.”

  And I watched as she walked down the hall and let herself into her apartment, repeating, “Zandi, Zandi,” over and over, until she got the hang of it.

  chapter 10

  “My mother’s bringing the horses doovries,” Al announced.

  “The what?” I said.

  “You know, the stuff you eat with drinks before you get down to the serious eating,” Al explained. “She does this thing with pineapple and cream cheese and curry powder.”

  I looked at her.

  “The first time she made it,” Al continued, “I pulled a boo-boo. I pretended I liked it. My mother’s no ace in the kitchen, as you know, and she needs reinforcement when it comes to her culinary efforts.” Al gave me a piercer. “From here on in, kid, take Mother Al’s advice. Tell it like it is. If it’s gross, say it’s gross. Even if it hurts. In the long run, the truth will out. It cuts down on the pineapple and curry-powder jazz.”

  She proceeded to pace, wearing a path on the already worn rug. “So do me a favor, OK? Pretend you like it. Even if it makes you want to barf. So she doesn’t get hurt feelings.”

  “Sure, Mother Al. Whatever you say. But I thought your name was Mother Zandi.” I couldn’t help giggling. I could see Al dressed in a purple turban, bending over her crystal ball. In a deep, dark voice I said, “Beware the ides of September, Mother Zandi. Watch out for a tall, bald man, smoking a fat black cigar and carrying a teddy bear on his back.”

  Al took it up.

  “I, Mother Zandi,” she began in an even deeper and darker voice, “advise on all matters in life. There is no problem Mother Zandi cannot solve. I can tell you the color of your aura and warn of good and bad cycles you must pass through before you come out on the other side without harm.”

  “What? Color of my aura?”

  Al nodded, looking wise, if weary. “The atmosphere that emanates from any and all bodies,” she said.

  I looked down at myself, at my body. Nothing.

  “I don’t think I have an aura,” I told her.

  She raised her eyes to the ceiling. “All mortals have an aura. Perhaps yours is concealed beneath your skin a
nd will show itself only when you reach puberty. Upon the receipt of certain fees, I, Mother Zandi, will reveal to you the color of your aura when the right moment arrives.” Al pulled down her bangs as far as they’d go and glared at me. “When Mother Zandi speaks, the world trembles,” she intoned.

  “It’s a good thing you changed your name,” I said. “Mother Zandi sounds classy, like the real thing, and Mother Al sounds like a new health-food line. Mother Al’s Tofu would be good. Or how about Mother Al’s Bulgar?”

  “I’m glad your grandfather’s coming to the party.” Al spun off on another tack. “I think it’s really cool of him to want to come. You didn’t threaten him with anything to make him come, did you?”

  “Of course not,” I said. “He likes you. My mother didn’t even think to invite him. He invited himself.”

  “That’s really nice. I mean, a man of his age probably doesn’t get asked to too many birthday parties. Probably most of his friends have retired to Florida or have died off,” Al said.

  “Hey, he isn’t that old. He’s only sixty-six,” I said.

  “A mere boy. What do you think we ought to plan for after dinner? Do you think we should play games or just talk?” Al pondered what to do after dinner, something I hadn’t thought of. “Maybe we could have a stimulating conversation,” she said, frowning. “An exchange of ideas, discussing the latest books, the latest plays we’ve seen. How about that?”

  “The latest book I read was Misty of Chincoteague,” I said. “And my grandfather took me to see Cats. We could zero in on Cats. Is that what you meant?”

  “You are such a turkey.” Al sighed. “We have here a classic case of youth and age. And ne’er the twain shall meet. How about if we played bridge?”

  “I don’t know how,” I said. “Do you?”

  “My mother tried to teach me and I freaked. You have to remember all the cards that have been played, and keep track of the cards in other peoples’ hands. It’s a real drag, if you ask me,” Al said. “How about vingt et un?”

  “Or better yet,” said I, “crazy eights.”