by Tamara Bundy
“Well . . . sure. Sure he shouldn’t be just traipsin’ about other people’s private property. Hearing or not, he better learn not to trespass. I got a right to this property, you know.”
I had no idea what I’d said to change her attitude.
All I knew was that I was ready to hightail it out of that yard—and hopefully out of Rainbow, too—for good.
chapter 4
When I got Eddie back to Grandma’s yard, I talked him into going into the shed and getting that bike and box for me. He came out of the shed pushing the bike with the box resting on the seat, all the while grinning like it was the best bike in the world. He didn’t seem to notice the rusted handlebars, the once-white wicker basket that was half on, half off, and the loose chain.
“You teach me,” he signed, and pointed to the bike.
“No,” I signed back, since I didn’t know the first thing about teaching someone to ride a bike. “Daddy will teach you later.”
Eddie shook his head, shaking loose a cobweb stuck in his hair. “Daddy gone. Daddy all the time gone.”
I couldn’t argue with that. This time, Daddy’d been gone six months. Time before that, it was three months. But each time, he came back. I knew he’d come back this time, too. Still, I couldn’t explain all that to Eddie, so I just said, “We need to clean the bike up first and see if it can be fixed before anybody rides it.” Eddie nodded like usual.
I picked up the little faded gold box from the bicycle seat. I could tell it was my mama’s handwriting that once wrote her name and Daddy’s inside the heart. It made my heart feel bad, wondering if Mama might still think she and Daddy belonged inside the same heart.
I sat down beside the shed, just looking at that dang box for the longest time like I expected it to talk to me or something. I couldn’t bring myself to open it. Eddie sat down next to me. “What’s in it?” he signed.
I shrugged in a sign everyone understood.
Eddie reached for the box and opened it. Inside there were envelopes—stacks and stacks of old, yellowed envelopes—all with my mama’s name written in my daddy’s handwriting.
A jumble of feelings raced inside me, trying to be felt at the same time.
I felt sneaky—like I shouldn’t look at my mama’s letters from my daddy, knowing they weren’t written for my eyes.
I felt happy to find something from my daddy when I was missing him so much.
I felt sad that yellowed old letters were all I had to make me happy about my daddy.
Eddie just peeked under the envelopes and shrugged in disappointment. He dropped the box and went back to seeing about fixing the bike.
“Help me fix,” he signed.
I tucked the box back inside the shed, planning to return when Eddie wasn’t around.
When we went inside Grandma’s house to get some rags to clean the bike, the house smelled better, for sure, but I could tell Mama wasn’t feeling any better about it. And other than the crazy, messed-up house, Grandma still seemed okay to me. I kept holding on to the hope that we’d be able to go back to Columbus, where I wouldn’t have to hold yellowed letters to think of Daddy and he could teach Eddie to ride a bike and teach me everything else he hadn’t taught me yet.
Sure, we gave the landlord notice and had a yard sale selling every single item that represented home to us. But I kept thinking we would head back north just as soon as Mama came to the rational conclusion that Grandma was fine.
. . . . . .
After cleaning that bike and finally fitting that chain back where it belonged, I tried to teach Eddie how to ride. Of course, as soon as Eddie realized he wasn’t going to learn to ride it in a few minutes, he was bored with trying and went right back to his plate that he needed no lessons to drive.
While he drove his plate up and down the sidewalk in front of Grandma’s house, I rode the old bike up and down the bumpy road, bouncing up and down, each time going a little farther than the last.
On my longest spin up the street, I went around the corner and all the way to Grandma’s church—the only church in Rainbow. Up in Ohio we had all kinds of churches around us. We had a Catholic church, a Baptist church and even a Methodist church. But there’s only one church in this little town.
I wasn’t really looking for a kid my age to play with as I rode around, since it didn’t matter to me at all—what with us not staying for long. But if I was looking, I would’ve seen only one kid out at all, and I couldn’t tell if it was a boy kid or a girl kid. I could tell the hair was short and messy—making me think it was a boy—but there was something kinda girlish to make me wonder.
By the time I got back from that spin up the street, I realized I must’ve been gone for longer than I thought, ’cause in front of Grandma’s house there were two kids—definitely boys, stopped on their own bikes. I could tell one of them was yelling at Eddie, who, of course, wasn’t hearing any of it.
As I got close I heard the boy shout, “I asked you what ya was doin’ with that plate! Y’all stupid or something? Answer me!”
When I heard those words, I pedaled my bike so fast the old brakes couldn’t stop me soon enough. My bike ran smack into the bike of the boy not yelling, and I knocked both of us down. The yeller thought this was hysterical and burst out laughing. “Guess they’re all stupid!” he said.
The boy I ran into was smaller than the one yelling. He got up, brushing himself off as I stood up, too. He reached out to my bike, and I yelled, “Don’t touch it!” And then I turned to the yeller and yelled right back. “And you—don’t say that about my brother. He’s deaf but he’s a lot smarter than you!”
By this time, Eddie was aware of something going on and he was standing next to us waving like he was happy to meet new friends. I signed to him, “Go up to the porch. These guys are not nice.”
I picked up the old bike and began to walk away, but not before hearing the tall kid say, “Man, it’s a family of freaks. Just what the neighborhood needs.”
The other one said something, too, but I tuned them both out. My eyes stung with anger and the tears I was holding in. I stomped to the porch and dropped the bike so fast the just-fixed chain fell back off.
Eddie followed me and I saw in his eyes that he was waiting for me to explain. But I was so mad, I couldn’t sign to him. I just shook my head and sat down on the porch swing.
But I’ve never been able to hide my feelings from Eddie. It’s like because he can’t hear, he can see things better.
“Why you mad?” he signed.
“I am mad,” I answered with my hands, “because Rainbow is stupid! Moving is stupid! And everyone is stupid!”
As if the day wasn’t bad enough, the sign for stupid is a fist up against your forehead, and when I signed it three times, being so stinkin’ mad, I actually smacked myself in the head too hard. And it hurt.
My brother thought that was the funniest thing in the world and started doing his own exaggerated stupid sign, pretending to fall over when he hit his head. “Stupid . . . stupid . . . stupid!”
I had to smile.
Eddie’s movement made the swing sway back and forth, and I began to relax a bit. I took a deep breath and recognized the smell of Mama’s chicken and dumplings coming from the house. I was just about to suggest to Eddie that we go inside to see if supper was ready when I heard the crunch of footsteps coming from the backyard.
It was Grandma walking toward the sidewalk in front of the house. She was in her nightgown.
Something told me she wasn’t heading to a slumber party, and I just knew more bad news was about to pour down on us and Rainbow.
chapter 5
“Grandma!” I hollered to get her attention since she looked kind of lost in spite of the fact she was only twenty steps from her house. “Grandma, what are you doing?”
“Hey, Joanie! Are you back?”
Since she cal
led me my mama’s name, I figured the sun, which was pretty bright, must be in her eyes. “It’s me, Grandma. Alice. And Eddie’s here. Why are you in your nightgown . . . and where are you going?”
Eddie of course saw Grandma, too, and I’m guessing he thought she was playing some sort of dress-up game, what with being outside in her nightgown and all. Still in a laughing mood from before, he started cracking up again.
But I could hear Grandma wasn’t laughing.
Not at all.
“Oh, dear,” she mumbled as I walked closer to her. By then, she was looking at the ground like she’d dropped something real important. “Oh, dear . . .” Her voice sounded all shaky and I feared she was about to burst into tears or something, so I ran inside to get Mama.
Mama helped Grandma back inside and took her to her room. She told Eddie and me to go ahead and eat, but even though my stomach was rumbling just a few minutes earlier, I kind of lost my appetite.
I popped a dumpling in my mouth and chewed it about fifty times, but it still felt like I was swallowing a biscuit whole.
That’s when I heard the phone ring—but it wasn’t the usual slow ringing like a phone from my house—it was more of a fast “ring-ring” sound like the phone tried to ring as usual, but instead just stuttered.
Since Grandma’s only phone was in the living room and I knew she and Mama were busy—and ’cause I was hoping that phone call might be from someone like Daddy—I ran to the phone and picked it up.
But before I could say anything I heard a conversation already going on.
That’s when I remembered Grandma had what’s called a party line, which sounds like it should be fun, but it’s not really. It’s just a phone line shared with her neighbors. Of course, as small as Rainbow is, I guess it’s a wonder they don’t all have to share just one phone for the whole town.
I listened to two ladies gossiping about the grocery store owner’s daughter, Maddie, who was out late the weekend before with the son of the guy who works at the post office.
“Her daddy was madder than a wet hen when she come strollin’ home way past when she oughta. Woo-wee! She might not see the light of day for a while. And who could blame her daddy? After her ma left the family in such disgrace. Well, you know the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree . . .”
I had no idea who these ladies were talking about or even who these ladies were until I heard in the background the same growling monster noise I heard from the back fence all day and realized Miss Millie must be one of the ladies on the phone. She wasn’t the one gossiping, but she was the one listening to the gossip when she wasn’t saying, “Hush up! Hush up!” The barking, growling monster actually did hush up as Miss Millie offered up her own gossip. “Poor Clarence is almost completely blind now . . . can’t see anything except—”
“Alice Ann!”
Mama’s voice shocked me something fierce and made me drop the phone. I could hear the ladies on the phone saying something as I tried to put the receiver back. But somehow the phone suddenly seemed coated in butter and it took me three tries to hang up that dang phone, with it slipping all over the place.
Eddie didn’t miss the little show I was putting on with the falling phone. He started laughing so hard, he spat out a dumpling. I thought if I tried to act sillier and make Eddie laugh, Mama would forget about me listening in on that conversation.
’Course Mama doesn’t forget anything.
Ever.
“Young lady, were you eavesdropping on the party line?” It was definitely a question, but she didn’t wait for an answer. “I can’t believe it! Have I not taught you any better than that?”
Mama says stuff like that sometimes. Makes me feel lower than gunk on the bottom of a shoe.
“Sorry, Mama. I was bored . . . and the phone rang and . . . I really didn’t hear anything. Just some gossip about the grocer’s daughter and somebody’s son.” As soon as those words fell out of my mouth, I knew I was digging myself into a hole.
“Gossip? Now you’re repeating gossip! You know we don’t do that! Have you no morals?”
“No, Mama, it was only Miss Millie and some lady.”
Mama’s gasp made me realize that last bit of information wasn’t helping my case. I needed to stop digging before I buried myself.
“So you knew who it was and you still continued to listen? Young lady, you need to march right over there and apologize to our neighbor Miss Millie.”
“But Mama, I really didn’t hear anything bad about her! She was just talking about a guy named Clarence who can’t see anymore.”
Mama stopped talking, which is usually worse for me than when she keeps talking. She took a deep breath. She looked older now than she had when we got to Rainbow just that morning.
Mama’s a pretty lady. Real pretty. People always say so. She’s got shiny, wavy brown hair that she usually wears pulled back in a ponytail. She only wears makeup on a special occasion, but everybody thinks Mama’s pretty anyhow. ’Course most people always say how pretty my mama is right before they point out I don’t look anything like her.
I look like my daddy.
Not that Daddy’s not nice-looking, too . . . last I saw him . . . blond hair and freckles, like me . . . but it’s not the same. Now that I’m getting older I wish I looked more like my mama.
Mama exhaled and then announced, “Tomorrow, you will march over to Miss Millie’s house and apologize for listening in on her private conversation. Then you will ask her if she needs help with anything.” She turned to look at me like she wanted to make sure I was feeling the impact of her words.
I was.
“Maybe she needs something . . . or the gentleman who is going blind needs something. But you will say you are sorry, and offer to help. Do you understand?”
I swallowed the last bit of dumpling as I mumbled, “Yes, ma’am.”
It’s a wonder that food went down at all, what with my stomach doing flips just thinking about that growling dog I feared would swallow me faster than any old dumpling tomorrow morning.
chapter 6
I woke up the next day hoping maybe Mama had forgotten about me eavesdropping on the phone and having a lesson to learn, but I might as well have hoped to sprout wings and fly back to Ohio, ’cause I knew better. Mama doesn’t forget anything.
Right after I put the last breakfast glass in the dish drainer, Mama looked at me with one of those looks whose sole purpose is to remind me that she’s the mama, and she said, “Might’s well go take care of that little business now.”
Grandma, who once again looked as right as rain, dressed in her nice clothes, wondered what was going on.
“Why is she going to Millie’s?” she asked. “Be careful. I don’t trust her.”
“Mother! Why would you say that?” Mama whispered. “’Cause that’s wrong if it’s just because she’s—”
“No. No,” Grandma interrupted. “And maybe I am wrong, because Lord knows I get mixed up sometimes, but I swear sometimes I look out at my yard and I see her near my garden. What’s she doing in my yard? Must be up to no good.”
“Mother, I’m sure you’re just . . . confused,” Mama said. “I mean, she’s lived behind you for years and she’s always nice when I see her.” She turned back to me. “Alice, get going.”
And so with no reprieve, I walked slow . . . very, very slow . . . through Grandma’s backyard, kind of like I was being sent to the principal’s office at a school where the principal ate kids who were bad.
With each step toward that fence, I wished I was back in Ohio. Back home right now, I’d be getting ready for swimming lessons with my best friend, Linda.
We’d spend the day at the pool and hold hands and run and jump into the water. Then we’d see who could hold their breath the longest. Or sometimes we’d try to talk underwater to see if we could figure out what the other said.
And even if I had to keep an eye on Eddie, it’d be okay since Eddie loved the sidewalks of the pool more than the pool itself. He could spend an entire afternoon driving his plate around the pool and the side shuffleboard courts, and nobody would bother him.
But I wasn’t back home in Ohio and no wishing or walking slow could change that.
I peeked inside the still-open shed and saw the faded gold box sitting right where I left it. As much as I wanted to see what the letters said, I knew Mama would be mad enough to see I wasn’t hopping the fence to talk to Miss Millie. If she noticed I was instead reading her letters, she’d really start to worry more about my morals. I pushed the box deeper into the shed to hide it just in case Mama came out there. Then, as slow as I could, I walked on.
Lifting up the tree branch that covered the fence separating Grandma’s yard and Miss Millie’s, I looked around.
On one side of the yard, I could see Miss Millie’s garden and what was probably going to grow to be green beans and maybe some cucumbers. On the other side, there was a huge tree with an old picnic table underneath.
I was happy to not see any sign of the loud, ferocious dog I’d been hearing.
But just to be sure I wouldn’t be hopping the fence only to have my leg bit off, I whistled. One of the best things my daddy taught me was how to put my two pinkies in my mouth, curl up my tongue just right and let out a loud whistle. I was pretty dang proud of that whistle, too. People could hear it a block away.
Or just a house away, if they were a ferocious dog.
Right as soon as I whistled, I heard that horrible growling and barking coming from Miss Millie’s house.
Now, I wasn’t afraid of all dogs. Just big snarling dogs, like the one back in Ohio that used to scare me every day on my walk to school. Twice my size, he’d bark and growl and yank at his chain like he was threatening to get me. Every day I feared he’d pull that chain clear out of the ground and make good on that threat.