How High the Moon
Page 30
“Teaspoon,” Ma said, with a not-mad scolding voice. “I told you I didn’t want to go because I want to wait and see the real thing.”
Teddy pulled out a chair for me, like I was some kind of princess or something. Then Ma held up her glass and told the rest of us to do the same. They gave me three hip, hip, hoorays.
While we waited for Charlie to have seconds, Teddy disappeared into his room and came back with the bag I’d seen him with the day before. “What do you have there, Teddy?” I asked, grabbing the top of the bag and giving it a tug so I could see what was inside. “Clothes?”
“Just a little something so we all look respectable on your big night,” Teddy said.
He pulled out a fine new shirt for Charlie. A dark blue one that fit around his tubby middle, but wasn’t long like a dress. He’d bought a pair of light brown trousers, too, but we didn’t get to see those right then because Mrs. Fry was busy hemming them—which meant that Charlie might be wearing light brown pedal pushers to the gala. Charlie sure was proud when Ma held the shirt up against him and said that he looked as handsome as Humphrey Bogart in navy.
“What did you get me?” I asked, clapping my hands.
“Well,” Teddy said. “You have your outfit, so, well, here…” Teddy pulled out a pair of white anklets trimmed with blue lace.
“Holy cow, Teddy. How’d you know about lacy anklets?”
“Well, I had a little help picking them out,” Teddy said, and I turned to Ma and smiled.
I thought that was it, but no. Teddy took out a little black box with FILLERS FINE JEWELRY stamped in gold letters on the lid, and handed it to me.
I was still staring at the box when Ma squealed, “Hurry, open it up so we can see!”
I pulled off the lid, and inside there was a short silver chain curled up on a bed of cotton. Ma plucked it from the box. “Oh, it’s a charm bracelet,” she said. “They’re all the rage, Teaspoon.” She held it up to show me the little silver star dangling from it.
“A star for my little star,” Teddy said. “Look on the back.”
I flipped the star around while Ma held it, and there it was—September 3, 1955—the date of my debut! “Every big event you have, we’ll get you another charm to mark the special day,” Teddy said, while I laughed and blinked tears and Ma told me to keep my arm still so she could clasp it to my wrist.
I flipped my wrist this way and that, watching the little star flip and glow. Then I wrapped my arm around Teddy’s neck, holding my arm out so I could still see my bracelet, and gave him a one-armed squeeze.
Teddy even had something in that bag for Ma to wear to the gala. A nice pair of clip-on earrings that she liked so much she gave him a kiss. I glanced at Charlie when she did this, and I could tell that he was thinking the same thing as me. Only somebody in love would buy fancy clip-on earrings. And only someone in love would kiss them for doing it, too. I decided, right then and there, that maybe that big spat they had the other night was just that. Nothing but a spat. After all, Teddy and me had those all the time, but we still loved each other. I probably didn’t even have to decide now!
After that kiss, Teddy disappeared into his bedroom and came back with a man’s dark blue suit hanging in a plastic bag. “And this is so I can go to your gala in style, too.” he said. “I was due for a new one after fifteen years, don’t you think?”
“Wow, Teddy!” I said. “What did you do, rob Mrs. Bloom’s safe?” Everybody laughed. Well, except Charlie, who apparently didn’t know I was kidding.
When our little party was over, Charlie headed home with a piece of cake for Mrs. Fry and an extra for him for later. Ma headed to The Dusty Rose, but not before telling Teddy thank you all over again, and Teddy looking her right in the face with frosting-soft eyes and saying, “Thank you,” though I don’t know why since Ma didn’t get him anything.
“Teddy, can you help me get my bracelet off now?” I asked. “I want it saved pristine for the gala.” It took Teddy a while to undo the little clasp, but when he did, I put the bracelet back in its box and put the box on my dresser right next to Ma’s movie poster.
Both Taxi Stand Ladies were on the corner when I pulled up on my scooter, and they laughed like crazy when I asked them to be our makeup ladies. “You can’t be serious, Teaspoon,” The Kenosha Kid said.
“Course I am. Brenda said that stage makeup has to be thick and bright so we won’t look like ghosts on the stage. There isn’t a lady in town who knows how to put on makeup like that, except you two. I swear, even on the sunniest days, I can be down a whole block and see your makeup like I was standing right beside you.”
“Did you… um… tell Mrs. Bloom that you were asking us?” The Kenosha Kid asked.
“No. She didn’t ask.”
They exchanged giggles. “Is Miller’s kid a Little Sister?” Walking Doll asked.
“No. Even though she’s afflicted enough to be. But she’s coming to the show with her family. She said it was only to see Les Paul and Mary Ford, but I think she wishes she were a little sister.”
“We’ll do it,” Walking Doll said, and The Kenosha Kid gave her one of those suspicioned looks.
When I got home, Teddy had the house all spiffy-clean and he was in the bathroom washing out a few things. I poured myself a glass of water, clear up to the rim because I was that thirsty, and a plop of it landed on the toe of my shoe. Thinking that water might ruin the shine, I wiped it off with the dishrag and sighed, because under that wet there wasn’t nothing but black scuffs. “Hey Teddy? You know how to get black marks off patent leather?”
“No, Teaspoon. Maybe your ma does. You can ask her in the morning.”
Didn’t that just figure. Give Teddy a cow-bloody pair of pants and he knew how to get them clean enough to wear to church. But give him a pair of scuffed patent leathers, and he was worthless. I set down my butter knife and went to my room to dig through the empty coffee can I kept my old school crayons in.
I suppose I should have figured that a white crayon couldn’t get out black scuffs, considering that the white crayon itself was full of them, but I had to try something. It didn’t work. So I went back into the kitchen to get an S.O.S pad from under the sink. I figured if it could clean brown sausage crud out from a pan, then for sure it could get a few black marks off patent leather.
I scrubbed until my shoes were bubbled with blue soap, but when I wiped them with the corner of yesterday’s dirty shirt, I found that it hadn’t taken off the scuffs at all. It sure had taken off the shine, though.
Near tears, I went into Teddy’s room where Ma’s stuff was strung all over, messy as my room, and started digging around, hoping I’d find something in a tube or a can that would take scuffs off shoes as easy as Jergens took scales off elbows.
I didn’t find any cleaner, but I did find a bottle of silver nail polish in Ma’s little makeup case. Perfect!
The nail polish didn’t hide the black scuffs, but it did give them a nice glow after I dabbed it on thick enough. I paired them up on the little table by my window where the sun was shining so I could see what they’d look like under stage lights. So maybe my shoes would have a few little dents and dings on the toes, but it wasn’t like anybody even five rows back, much less in the nosebleed seats, would see that. What they’d see would be my shoes sparkling silver like a moon.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
When gala eve came, I was spinning like a top, and made Charlie play “Sisters” so many times that he got grumpy. “You said it was the last time, three times ago,” he whined.
“So what!” I screamed. “Do it one more time. Do it, Charlie!”
Teddy came into the living room then and thanked Charlie for his patience, and told him to go home and get a good night’s rest. Then Teddy took me aside and sat me down on the couch—even if I wanted to sit on the Starlight seats instead—and he said we were just going to sit quietly for a while.
“You’re just overexcited, Teaspoon,” he said. “It happens.”
“You won’t forget,” Teddy said. “You know that song and those steps like the back of your hand. Why, I think you could even do them in your sleep.” He rubbed the top of my arm with his thumb. “Just breathe, like a slow song,” Teddy said. And I started humming one, just to remind myself how slow a slow song is.
“Teddy?” I said, when my legs finally stopped jumping and hung still over the seat of the couch.
“Yes?”
“The day after tomorrow, do I still have to say if I’m staying here or going with Ma, even if you two are done being mad?”
I could feel Teddy get stiff. “Don’t think of that now. Just think of how everything is going to go just fine tomorrow night. One thing at a time, Teaspoon.”
“But Teddy…”
“Shhhhhhh,” he said.
I must have fallen asleep on the couch, and he must have carried me into my room, because when I woke up, I’d been sleeping in my clothes. I got out of bed and went to my dresser, tipping the clock toward the window so the streetlight could help me see the time. It was three o’clock. Too early to wake up, yet I wasn’t tired anymore.
I went to the window and pressed my cheek to the glass so I could see if Ma’s car was in front of our house. I could see a brown fender, so I knew she was home. At the Jacksons’ house, every window was black, and I wondered if Johnny would come home by the time I turned sixteen in case I still wanted him to be my boyfriend. Then I looked straight ahead, at the Frys’ bay window. I got the daylights scared out of me because there he was, Charlie Fry, looking like a ghost as a passing car’s lights lit his face.
It wasn’t like Charlie to be up in the middle of the night, so as soon as I got my breath back, I pointed toward our front yards, even though I knew it was a long shot that Charlie would figure out that that meant “meet me there.” Then I ditched out of my room on bare feet.
Poochie’s head was flopped out of his doghouse, and it lifted when I closed our door, even if I barely shut it. His eyes glowed like the devil’s as he watched me go down the back steps. “Don’t you even dare,” I whispered, hoping Teddy was right when he said that dogs can hear lots better than people. Maybe they could, because Poochie put his head back down as I zipped between our houses.
I went right to the bay window, the ground so cold I had to keep my feet dancing, and I looked up for Charlie.
“I’m right here,” Charlie said. He was standing in the grass, wearing pajamas that looked Mrs.-Fry-old, rolled at the ankles.
“Geez, Charlie. You’re going to give me a heart attack yet.”
“Well, you pointed for me to come out,” he reminded me.
“You’re sharpening up, Charlie.”
Charlie’s front steps were colder than the ground. “Grandma G said you get piles if you sit on cold cement,” he said.
“What’s piles?”
“That’s what I was asking you,” Charlie said.
I told him I didn’t know, and that I had other things on my mind.
“Charlie,” I said. “My ma isn’t staying in Mill Town.”
“I already know that,” Charlie said.
I cocked my head to look at him. “You do?”
“Yeah. I heard Grandma G and Miss Tuckle talking about it.”
“They talked about it in front of you?”
“No. I was in the bathtub. Miss Tuckle must have asked where I was, because Grandma G said, ‘Oh, he won’t hear us. You can’t hear a thing from in there.’
“And Grandma G said, ‘Can you believe it, April? That she’d make that poor child decide?’ She said Teddy was livered, and that she didn’t know what he’d do if you got caught up in all the promises your ma was making. Then Grandma G said that Teddy’s scared she’ll take you, then drop you off God knows where when she gets tired of dragging a kid along.”
“She wouldn’t do that!” I said.
Charlie shrugged. “She dropped you off here, didn’t she?”
Something dropped in my stomach when Charlie said that. Something as big and hard as a scooter.
We sat there, me not saying anything. Just shivering. Then Charlie said, “Miss Tuckle told Grandma G not to worry, though, because she was going to help Teddy see that that didn’t happen. Then they just talked about your leaned porch and stuff, so I started washing so I could get out of the tub. I was already wrinkled.”
Charlie and I sat awhile longer, quietly, me staring at nothing, just thinking.
“Charlie?”
“Yeah?”
If your ma wasn’t dead, and your dad wasn’t in the clink, and you had to choose which one to live with because you could only live with one, who would you choose?”
“You,” he said, stopping me right in my tracks.
I blinked because my eyes were watering, then I said, “You’re a good friend, Charlie Fry,” and I gave him a hug.
Charlie went back inside because he was yawning big enough to swallow his head, but I wasn’t ready, even if I was shivering. I looked over at the Jacksons’ house, which was dark and quiet for a change, and I thought of Johnny leaving, and Ma, when she left, and the folks back in Peoria… I thought of how most people leave, even when you love them and want them to stay. And as I headed back to my house, I thought about how if I went with Ma, I was going to be leaving Teddy thinking the same thing.
I went inside through the back door, standing still in the kitchen. I looked over at the metal table next to the pantry where Teddy and my last Scrabble board sat. We’d started that game so many days ago I couldn’t remember whose turn it would be next. I flipped my letters around and plucked three U’s off my windowsill thing and exchanged them for letters worth something. Then I took gluck off the board and spelled something else, my fingers wide awake, even if the rest of me felt like it was sleeping.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
I slept so late that even Ma was awake, having a cigarette and coffee at the kitchen table, squinting because the sun was spilling bright over the tablecloth. Teddy was leaning over her shoulder saying something, but he stopped talking when I came into the room. I glanced up at the clock, scared for a minute that I was late.
“You have plenty of time. It’s not even noon yet,” Teddy said, giving me one of those let’s-stay-calm smiles.
“But I’m going early. At three o’clock—Brenda said I could. Even if I’m not working today, I know she’ll need my help. The doors open at six for the refreshments, then the show starts at seven.”
“Just sit down and relax, Teaspoon,” Teddy said, even though he wasn’t sitting. Ma was, but she went from sitting to standing, puffing smoke rings that blew apart before they hardly left her lips, and chewing on her fingernails like she had a gala coming up.
Teddy made me eat some eggs and toast, even if I didn’t want any. Then Ma made me a bubble bath and told me to soak in it. I could hear her in the kitchen while I soaked. I suppose it was like what I heard Mrs. Jackson say before one of our Christmas programs when Jolene had to read part of the Nativity story—having your kid on stage was harder on the moms than the kids.
Ma did my hair so that my curls were tight and pretty, not bunched and frazzled, and she put my white barrettes in so folks could see my eyes. She helped me pick out my nicest dress, too, even though I told her it didn’t matter because I had my dress for the show, because she said I had to look nice when I got there, too.
“What did you do to your shoes?” she asked me while clasping my charm bracelet, right before I headed out the door.
“Fixed them up so the scuffs wouldn’t show so much,” I said.
Ma was about to say something—probably compliment me for making them so stage-sparkly—but Teddy jumped in and said I’d better hurry along.
I was on the porch when the door opened and Ma called, “Wait!” I stopped and she opened the screen. She
didn’t say anything, and she didn’t step all the way outside. She just stared at me, her lips doing that quivering thing lips do when you’re trying not to cry. “What is it, Ma?” I asked.
Teddy came up behind her, and Ma shook her head. “I just wanted to take another look at you before you headed off for your big debut. That’s all.”
“Okay, but I don’t want to be late, so could you look quick?” I spun in a circle, even if I was wearing an old dress, so she could see all of me.
Ma was smiling and crying when I got done with my spin. “Do you know how proud I am of you?” she asked. “Teddy’s done a fine job raising you these past years. You’re…” She stopped and took a deep breath.
“Respectable?” I asked hopefully, when Ma couldn’t seem to find the words she was looking for.
Ma laughed, tears glossing her eyelashes. “Yes,” she said.
I grinned. “Good. Because I’ve been working hard on that one,” I said, then I jumped down the steps and grabbed my scooter.
The Starlight was beehive-busy when I got there. Helpers and people I’d never seen before were running from one side of the theater to the other, and everybody was shouting to each other. I spotted Mrs. Bloom. She was standing back by the concession stands with two men in white jackets, yelling at the delivery guy who was carrying two big pots of flowers into the theater. “No, no. All flowers are to be left in the foyer!”
I figured wherever Mrs. Bloom was bellyaching, Brenda couldn’t be far off, so I headed toward her. When Mrs. Bloom saw me, she called me to her. “Hurry,” she snapped, even though I was whizzing up the aisle fast enough to win a race at the end-of-the-school-year picnic. “Show these gentlemen to the conference room,” she said, nodding to the guys in white jackets when I got closer. “Bring down as many tables as you’ll need,” she told them.