by Julia Watts
His expression softened. “School is important to you?”
“Yessir. I want to go to college after I finish high school.”
“Well, in that case”—he opened up his black bag and took out a notepad and pen—“what’s your name, dear?”
“Ruby Pickett, sir.”
He scrawled something down on a piece of paper and handed it to me. “Take good care of your mother, Miss Pickett,” she said, “and send for me if you need me.”
“Thank you.” I looked down at the note he had given me. I hoped my teachers could read his handwriting because I sure couldn’t.
February 5, 1945
Well here it is Monday, and Mama’s not out of bed yet. The doctor came back today and says she has bronchitis on top of everything else. He gave her some medicine and told her to stay in bed for three more days.
Mama’s got company in the bed now, though. Opal and Garnet and Baby Pearl all have the flu, too, and they’ve piled in with her. The doctor said to especially keep an eye on Baby Pearl, since the flu hits the very young and very old the hardest.
Daddy and I are the only healthy ones in the house. He’s been sleeping on the living room floor in front of the stove, and I’ve been lying in bed, half-asleep and half-awake, listening to Mama’s cough through the thin bedroom wall. Daddy and I are just waiting to get sick, too.
The past couple of mornings, Daddy’s gotten up, poked his head in the door of my room, and said, “I feel fine. How about you?”
“Fine, too,” I’ve said.
Daddy says the two of us must have the strongest constitutions in the family.
I’ve needed my strong constitution for the past week. All of Mama’s work has become my work: cooking meals, washing dishes and clothes, keeping the house clean—all that, plus looking after four sick people who are always needing drinks or medicine or something to blow their noses on.
I’m glad that I’m healthy and can take care of them, but I’ll be much gladder when they’re healthy and can take care of themselves. In the past week, all the normal things I love about my life have disappeared. I’ve not been to school. Iris and I have had to do without each other. Even if I didn’t have to take care of Mama and my sisters, I wouldn’t keep Baby Sharon in case I’m carrying flu germs. And I’ve had no time to spend with Virgie, to just act silly and be girls together. I’ve not even had time to go to the library to return Cold Comfort Farm and get something else to read.
I’ve not said one word of complaint, though, because people have to take care of each other and do the best they can. Here on these pages is the only place I’ve let myself complain a little.
I’ll tell you one thing I know for sure now, though. A life of cooking for and cleaning up after other people is not for me. Like Iris said, it’s boring and repetitive and lonely. I don’t know where my adult life will take me, or else I might just let the dust on the furniture get so thick I can take my finger to it and write, “From dust we are born, and to dust we shall return.”
This evening, Daddy and I sat down to some tomato soup that had come from a can. We’ve been relying on canned soup a lot lately because it’s something sick people can eat, and fixing it takes a minimum of cooking effort. Daddy took a slurp of soup, a bite of cracker, and a sip of milk, then said, “Ruby, I’m right proud of the way you’ve took charge of the house with your mama sick. I’ve had my doubts at times, but now I’m thinking that when you’re a little older, you’ll make a good little wife and mama yourself.”
“Thanks, Daddy.” I wasn’t about to tell him I still had no plans to become anybody’s wife. No use starting an argument with somebody who’s just paid you a compliment.
February 14, 1945
Thank the Lord and the doctor, everybody’s healthy again. I didn’t get back to school till Friday, and since then I’ve been buried in books and papers, trying to catch up on my work, which is why my journal hasn’t been getting much attention.
But today something happened that I just have to write down because it’s the kind of thing that never happens to me. Or, I guess, it’s the kind of thing that’s never happened to me before, but now it’s happened to me once. See? I can’t even write about it without getting all flustered.
Here’s what happened.
We were changing classes, and I went to my locker like I always do. When I opened it up, though, this red, heart-shaped piece of paper fell out onto the floor. I picked it up fast, slipped it into my history book, and scurried off to the girls’ bathroom so I could look at it in private.
Behind the closed bathroom door, I opened up my history book and took out the paper heart. White lace had been glued neatly along its edges, and in the middle, in letters that looked like they’d been cut out of a newspaper or magazine, it said,
Happy Valentine’s Day
To Ruby
A real jewel
From your secret admirer
My first thought was that if my name hadn’t been on it, I would’ve thought somebody had put it in the wrong locker by mistake. My second thought was what if this was some kind of cruel joke meant to hurt my feelings? Maybe some of the rich girls who ignored me had made me a fake Valentine so they could watch my reaction and laugh at me. But then again, why would girls who didn’t seem to know I existed go out of their way to be so mean to me?
My mind kept turning through reason after reason. It wasn’t till the final bell rang that I let myself consider the most obvious reason—that somewhere in the halls of Oak Ridge High School, there might be a boy who actually liked me. This thought made walking through the crowded hallways nearly impossible because I had to look at the face of each boy I passed and think, is it him? Could it be that short, pimply-faced freshman whose family just moved to town? It surely couldn’t be that movie-star handsome Kleen Teen whose dad was a high-ranking general. Or could it be Cal, the black-haired boy who always said hey to me and whose daddy worked on the same construction crew as mine did?
The strange thing is, I do want to know who my secret admirer is, and at the same time, I don’t. Because if he did reveal himself to me, it would mean I would have to do something—reject him or go out on a date with him, and both of those options scare me so bad I want to throw up. I never thought I’d be in a situation like this because I never thought I was the kind of girl a boy would like. A flat-chested, freckle-faced country girl with mouse-brown hair and her nose stuck in a book all the time. Whose type is that?
Here’s something else about me, too. If Opal or Garnet or Virgie had gotten a card like mine, they’d tell every other female in creation about it. They’d be giggling and blushing and jumping up and down at the thought that some boy liked them. And maybe that’s the way it should be, too, but it seems silly to get all excited when you don’t even know who you’re getting excited about. Maybe the boy who likes me stinks or has cooties.
I know that Opal and Garnet and Virgie would never understand why I’m not acting the way they would in the same situation. And so I haven’t told them about the card. I haven’t told anybody. I folded up my heart and tucked it inside my journal where only I can see it.
February 20, 1945
“Bee!” Baby Sharon squealed as soon as Iris let me into the living room. “Bee!”
“Oh,” Iris said, looking at Sharon and then at me. “A mystery has just been solved. These weeks you’ve been gone, Sharon’s been saying ‘Bee? Bee?’ all the time and looking around all over the place, even under the coffee table and behind the couch. Apparently, you’re Bee, and she’s been trying to figure out where you’ve gone.”
Sometimes with babies, all you can say is “awww” and then pick them up and cuddle them, which is what I did with Sharon right then. “I’m sorry it took me so long to come back,” I said. “Once everybody was finally healthy, I was so behind in my schoolwork…”
“Bee!” Baby Sharon squealed triumphantly and petted my cheek with her chubby hand.
“You should be pleased,” Iris said. “Y
ou’re her second word after ‘Mama.’”
“I am pleased,” I said, taking Sharon’s little hand and kissing it.
“Well, Sharon wasn’t the only one who missed you,” Iris said.
She looked better than the last time I saw her. She had dressed without being told to, and her hair was clean and combed. But there was still sadness in her eyes.“I missed you, too,” I said. “A lot.” I took Iris’s hand and squeezed it.
“And you can see what a state the house has fallen into,” she said, gesturing around her. “I don’t know if it’s because having you help with Sharon a few hours a week gives me more time to tidy up…or if it’s because knowing you’re coming over in the afternoon gives me a reason to tidy up.”
The living room did look especially lived in. The usually-full ashtrays were now overflowing, spilling ashes and butts over the top of the coffee table. The unswept, unmopped floor was cluttered with magazines and newspapers and Baby Sharon’s toys. Half-empty coffee cups sat abandoned on every flat surface in the room. “You know,” I said, “this is what I want my house to look like when I grow up. Women like my mama waste too much time trying to keep everything spotless.”
“Well, it’s fine to be a slob if you’re a single girl,” Iris said, “but heaven help you if you’re married. Apparently in most women’s minds there’s some kind of correlation between the cleanliness of their homes and their love for their husbands.” She suddenly winced. “Damn, I forgot! It’s my turn to have ‘the girls’ over for coffee in the morning. If they see the house looking like this, they’ll tar and feather me!”
“I’ll help you clean it up.”
“Ruby, you’re not my maid. I don’t pay you to clean.”
“But I want to help you.”
It was true. As tired as I was of cooking and cleaning for my family, at that moment there was nothing I wanted to do more than help Iris empty her ashtrays and clean her floor. It was strange. But I’m a strange girl, I reckon.
“Okay, you’ve convinced me, but only because I’m desperate.” Iris walked over to the record player. “If we’re going to clean, though, we have to have music, and that means we have to play Baby Sharon’s favorite song, ‘Rum and Coca-Cola.’ I suppose some teetotalers would object to my playing my child a song with booze in the title, but it’s not like I’m putting rum in her baby bottle. Do you like it?”
“Rum in a baby bottle?”
Iris laughed. “No, the song, silly.”
“I ain’t heard it.”
Iris rolled her eyes. “Ruby, ‘Rum and Coca-Cola’ is the number-one song in the country. You’re a teenager—you’re supposed to keep up with these things.” She dropped the needle on the record, and the Andrews Sisters’ happy harmony filled the room. Even though we were cleaning, it sounded like we were having a party. Baby Sharon laughed and clapped to the music—the three of us must’ve listened to the song a dozen times, and by the last few times, we were singing along with it: Iris on-key, me off-key, and Sharon in baby babble.
With the Andrews Sisters urging us along, we had emptied the ashtrays and dusted the furniture and swept and mopped the floor within an hour. Maybe because of too much rum and Coca-Cola, Baby Sharon passed out for a nap, and Iris and I collapsed on the couch.
“It’s good to have you back,” Iris said, “and not just because you helped me clean.”
“It’s good to be back,” I said, “and not just because you pay me for helping you.”
All of a sudden, a picture of the red paper heart flashed into my mind. I knew I could talk to Iris. She wouldn’t tell anybody, and she wouldn’t make anything silly out of it. “Iris…can I talk to you about something?”
“Sure,” she said, folding up her legs on the couch like she was settling in to listen.
Even though I wanted to talk about it, I couldn’t make any words come out for a couple of minutes. Finally, I took a deep breath and said, “The other day—well, it was Valentine’s Day, really…”
“Mm-hm?” Iris prompted when I trailed off.
“Somebody left a card in my locker, and I don’t know who it was.” I was talking like I was in a race to see who could finish a sentence the fastest.
“What did it say?”
“It said, ‘Happy Valentine’s Day to Ruby, a real jewel, from your secret admirer.’”
“That’s sweet. Do you have any idea who might have sent it?”
“Nope. There ain’t a boy at school who’ll even give me the time of day.”
“And the handwriting on the card isn’t familiar?”
“There isn’t any handwriting. The letters looked like they’d been cut out of a magazine or something.”
“Very sneaky.” Iris smiled.
“Yeah. You’re the only person I’ve told about it. Have you ever had a secret admirer?”
Iris looked down, then gave a shy smile. “I’ve never had one, but I’ve been one. When I was Warren’s student, I used to leave notes and poems in his faculty mailbox. I even scented them with my perfume. I was a bit melodramatic in those days.”
“Is that how he found out it was you—because your notes smelled like your perfume?”
Iris lit a cigarette. “No. I guess he’d never been close enough to me to smell me. He figured it out by comparing the handwriting in my notes with the handwriting on my mid-term exam.”
“So you weren’t as sneaky as my secret admirer.”
“I’m afraid not.” She let out a puff of smoke. “Of course, I did kind of want to get caught.”
“I’ve been a nervous wreck ever since I got the card,” I said. “What do you think I ought to do?”
Iris ashed her cigarette. “You don’t really have to do anything. Just enjoy the fact that you have a secret admirer. He’ll let you know who he is when he’s ready.”
I wasn’t sure how to ask my next question without sounding like a terrible person. “And when he does, what if he’s…he’s…”
“Not up to your standards?”
I nodded. Iris could always find a nice but accurate way of putting things.
“Well, then, you let him down gently. Even if he’s not to your liking, he’s still paid you a lovely compliment.”
“So I just wait and see, then?”
“Yep.” She stubbed out her cigarette. “And enjoy it. You should always enjoy it when someone—no matter who they are—thinks you’re special. And Ruby, whoever it is who thinks you’re special”—she reached out and patted my arm—“is absolutely right.”
I knew my face was red as a Valentine.
February 22, 1945
Virgie’s been acting real strange around me lately. She’s been almost quiet—or as close to quiet as Virgie can get—and has seemed kind of far away somehow. Yesterday when the final bell rang, I said, “Are you going over to the Red Cross to roll bandages?”
“I’m going,” she said. “You can come if you want to.”
Virgie and Aaron and I walked to the Red Cross in silence. For Aaron, silence is the norm, but for Virgie, it’s downright spooky. Once we got to the door of the Red Cross, Aaron left us like he always did. When Virgie and I were sitting with a stack of bandages in front of us, I said, “Are you mad at me or something?”
Virgie started folding a bandage in a fury. “No, I’m not mad. I just keep waiting for you to talk to me, and you don’t say nothing.”
“I talk to you all the time. What do you mean?”
“I mean, to talk to me about something that happened to you last week. On Valentine’s Day. You know what I’m talking about.”
I knew, but I didn’t know how she knew. “How do you know about the card? You didn’t give it to me, did you, as some kind of joke?”
Virgie threw down her bandage. “I can’t believe somebody could have so much book sense and not a lick of common sense! Can you honestly tell me you don’t know who gave you that card?”
“Of course I have no idea who gave it to me. Why—what do you know about it?”
Neither of us was folding bandages now. “Stop torturing me and tell me.”
Virgie looked around. The room was empty. “It was Aaron.”
“Aaron?” I wouldn’t have been any more surprised if she had told me it was Douglas MacArthur.
“You seem like you’ve got eyes and ears,” she said, going back to her folding. “Ain’t you seen the way he looks at you? Ain’t you heard the way he talks to you?”
“But he doesn’t look at me! He looks down at the ground. And he doesn’t talk to me unless I talk to him first, and when he does, he just mumbles under his breath.”
“That’s because he likes you,” Virgie said, finally giving me a smile.
“But ain’t he like that with everybody?”
“Well, yeah, but with you, it’s worse.” She scooted her chair closer to me and spoke in a whisper. “See, he didn’t know how to tell you how he felt, so I gave him the idea of giving you a Valentine and signing it from a secret admirer. I even helped him make it since boys ain’t no good at that kind of thing. We cut the letters out of one of my movie magazines. Of course, I thought you’d have enough sense to know who it was from as soon as you seen it.” She shook her head.
“Well, I’m sorry I’m not too bright.”
“That’s all right,” Virgie said. “It sure is hard trying to get people together when one’s too shy to talk and the other’s got her nose stuck too deep in a book to know she’s in the world.”
Poor Virgie. Here she was, acting as director in a movie of her own making, and she couldn’t get either Aaron or me to play our roles the way we were supposed to. I still didn’t—still don’t—know how to act. Until Virgie spilled the beans, I had never thought about Aaron at all, except in passing. “Are you gonna tell Aaron I know?”