by Cat Bauer
Back on the platform, Johnny and Reed step up to the mike. Johnny says, “I'd like to introduce a good friend and a fantastic singer, Prudence Clarke.” The crowd applauds. In the other room, the bowling pins crash.
The phone rings and it is Carla. “Guess what, Harley?”
I am in my pajamas. “Why are you calling so late, Carla?” I keep my voice low. I'm sure Peppy is listening in the family room.
“Troy asked me to go to the movies.”
“Great.” I am not thrilled with this bit of news. Now Carla's going to have a boyfriend and I'm not.
“You don't sound too happy for me.”
“I'm ecstatic. I'm just tired.”
“Oh, Harley, don't be upset about Johnny. He's just using you to get back at Prudence. He's not worth it.”
Using me? Could she be right? She means well, I know, but I'm not in the mood for any advice. “Look, Carla, I've gotta go.”
I am sketching a caricature of Johnny with a dagger in his heart. I am contemplating whether I should add some dripping blood when Miss Posey comes over to me. “What's up, Harley?”
I sigh. “Nothing.”
“Hey, are you in a bad mood, or what?” Miss Posey is all decked out in a tiny skirt and jacket. I wonder if she has a class with her favorite senior boy later in the day.
“I'm sorry. This guy I like is being a jerk.”
“What a drag. Listen, I was talking with Bud Roman, the director of the play. He's ready to see you.”
“Really? When?” With all this Johnny distraction, I'd almost forgotten about the drama club play. Well, I am not going to let some stupid guy interfere with what's important.
“They're rehearsing after school in the auditorium. Stop by and tell him I sent you.”
“Okay.”
Miss Posey picks up my Johnny caricature and examines it. “You know, Harley, maybe you should add a little blood….”
I wait for Carla by the gym. She doesn't show. This is the third time she's left me hanging. All I hear about is Troy, Troy, Troy. I am getting really fed up. At least she could inform me that she's going home with Mr. Wonderful instead of me.
I walk over to the auditorium. I haul open the enormous doors and enter through the back. It is dark, except for the lights on the stage. There are a few people up there, all older than me, huddled in a pack, discussing motivation and emotion. Their voices echo. Actors. They are gods on Mount Olympus.
Usually the only time I'm in the auditorium is for homeroom, when they take attendance. It looks different now, like a Greek temple. I get this urge to genuflect, but I restrain myself. I'm not sure what I should do, so I tiptoe up the aisle and sit in the front row. The wooden seat squeaks when I flip it down.
Onstage, an older man with a goatee stops talking and looks at me. He is wearing a shirt and tie, but he's got sneakers on his feet. His eyes are black and wild and he has a booming voice. “Can I help you?”
“I … I'm Harley Columba. Miss Posey sent me over to paint a portrait?” I am stammering; I'm a little nervous.
“Oh, hi. Yeah. I'm Bud Roman. I'm the director.” He turns to the people onstage. “Take a break, all.”
Bud Roman jumps off the stage. He talks like he is spitting out thunderbolts. “What I need is a life-size portrait. Of a princess. See, this girl shows up claiming she's Anastasia—but we don't know whether to believe her, because, well, you know, she's supposed to be dead—so I want this full-size portrait of a princess, but I want her features to be fuzzy so she doesn't look like anybody—maybe even leave the face blank. Have fun with it.” He tosses me a small booklet. “Here's a copy of the play—come back in a week or so and show me what you've got. What was your name again?”
I am exhausted just listening to him. “Harley … Harley Columba.”
“Harley. Like the motorcycle, eh?”
“No, Harley, like a person.”
Bud Roman grins. “Okay, Harley like a person. See you next week. I like to keep the rehearsals closed until the actors get on their feet.”
Bud Roman jumps back onto the stage and claps his hands. “People!” He is Zeus, and the other gods obey. “Okay, people. Let's get to work.”
I pick up the play, a small blue booklet full of mysteries and promises. I walk out of the auditorium and back onto the earth.
Peppy and Roger are still at work, and I am stuck watching Bean and Lily because my parents are too cheap to hire a babysitter. Of course they don't pay me. I'm supposed to do it because they said so. Peppy even wants me to get the supper ready, but this I refuse to do. I have homework and I hate to cook. I say, if you can't afford to have three kids, then don't have them. But you shouldn't turn your oldest daughter into a mother before her time.
Bean goes wandering. I don't care, as long as he's home before my mother. It is Lily who is the pain. I don't really think I should have to plan different ways to amuse a five-year-old child. Most of the time, I just toss her in front of the television. She does a great Céline Dion impersonation, throwing out her arms and pounding her heart.
I settle into Roger's Barcalounger and push the footrest up. Ah. I am Goldilocks and he is Papa Bear. I can just hear Roger when he gets home: Someone's been sitting in my chair!
I open my copy of Anastasia and turn to the first page. I'm just planning to skim it, but I end up reading the whole thing. I love it. It's about a girl who claims she is a long-lost princess who was supposed to have been murdered during the Russian Revolution. Nobody believes her and she's got to prove it. They think she wants to claim the royal fortune, but she just wants to find her family.
I have all sorts of ideas. I am hopping out of the chair to get my sketchbook when I remember to check the mail.
I walk to the front porch and open the door. Getting the mail is one of my favorite things, like getting little gifts on your doorstep every day. It is one good benefit of babysitting; otherwise Peppy and Roger have first grab at it. Today there is an envelope addressed to Harley Marie Columba from New York City.
My birth certificate has arrived.
I toss the rest of the mail on the dining room table and head into the family room, where Lily is singing at the top of her lungs, falling on her knees, and pounding her chest with her fist. I sink into my father's Barcalounger. I stare at the envelope, then rip it open. Inside is an official-looking piece of paper with a raised seal from the Department of Health, City of New York.
I force my eyes to the page. “Borough: Manhattan. Sex: Female. Mother: Patricia Ann Harley, homemaker. Father: Roger Joseph Columba, proprietor, service station …”
So. This confirms it. Those two creatures really are my parents. At least I was really born in New York City and not Lenape Boring Lakes.
I read the words over and over. Something bothers me. I touch the bumps of the raised City of New York seal. They match the goose bumps on my arms.
I have a new memory, one I've never had before…. I am Lily's age, almost five years old. My mother is enrolling me in kindergarten. I sit in front of a lady with black hair. I am drawing the lady with my crayons. The lady asks for my birth certificate. My mother is saying, I'm sorry, I've misplaced it, how stupid of me, and the lady is telling her it's impossible for your daughter to go to school. I am worried because all my friends are going to school and now I will be the only one home in the neighborhood. I start to cry and my mother tells me to be a big girl, not a baby and I say I am not a baby, I am a big girl and I want to go to school. Before we leave I give the lady the drawing as a present so she will let me go to school.
Johnny waits by my locker like nothing has happened. “Thanks for coming the other night.”
“Yeah.” I open my locker and stick my head in so he can't see my red face. “It was fun.”
“We're playing at a coffeehouse next Tuesday if you wanna go.”
I grab my French book off the top shelf. Who does this guy think he is? Maybe he is just trying to drum up an audience for his band. I turn around and look him in
the eye. “You know, Johnny, you ask me to come hear you play and then you ignore me all night. What's that about?”
“What?” He looks off down the hallway at nothing. “I didn't ignore you. I was busy playing.”
“You know what I mean.”
Johnny puts his arm around me and kisses me, even though we're not supposed to show signs of affection in the hallway. “Don't be upset, Harley.”
Upset? I am fuming. I want to push him away and tell him to drop dead, but he kisses me again and looks at me with those brown puppy-dog eyes. I hear myself say, “It's just … I just would have liked to have spent more time with you.” I swear, I am so lame.
“Next time.” Johnny brushes hair off my cheek. “I promise.”
We are in Carla's kitchen doing beauty parlor. Ronnie helps us. She's a beautician with her own hair salon. We have steam rollers, makeup, manicures, pedicures, facials—the works. Ronnie is wrapping rollers around my hair. She's got these long fake fingernails decorated with stripes and tiny rhinestones and I am afraid she's going to impale me. Bruce Springsteen is blasting and she dances as she twists my hair. She's a real Jersey girl.
Carla talks about her date with Troy. “Then we go see that vampire movie.” She is painting her nails blood-red.
“You were late getting home,” says her mother.
“Did he kiss you?” You can ask questions like that in front of Ronnie.
“He kissed me like a gentleman. His lips were soft. He's a great kisser.”
“Where was this? In the car?”
“No,” says Ronnie. “On the front porch, for fifteen minutes. I was watching.”
“Mom!”
“Me and all the neighbors. It was better than what was on TV.” Ronnie is cracking up.
Carla scowls, but we know she is proud of her front-porch kiss. We are all laughing, but underneath I am so jealous: of her date, of her kiss, of her mother, of her life—everything.
“So, Ronnie … do you ever hear from Sean Shanahan?” I ask.
Ronnie drops her comb. “What did you say?”
Carla is shocked. “HARLEY!”
Ronnie picks up the comb and starts rolling my hair again, but now I can feel her hands shaking. “What makes you ask, Harley?”
“Me and Carla found my mother's yearbook and he wrote her a note.”
“Oh?” Ronnie sounds very interested. “What did it say?”
“Harley, just drop it, will you?” Carla knifes me with her eyes. I don't care. I want to know.
“It said something about the wild times they had together.”
Ronnie sprays my hair with a puff of water. I can see her face in the mirror. She looks upset. “I think you should ask your mother about that, Harley.” Her voice cracks. “I haven't seen Carla's father in fourteen years.”
The last place on earth I want to be is at my father's gas station, but that is where I am. If anybody I know drives by, I will die. My mother has taken Lily and Bean to the dentist and dropped me here because she wants to use me later as a slave at the supermarket.
I hide out in the waiting room, which consists of one metal chair and an ashtray. Out in the garage, my father is fixing a flat tire, whistling “Home on the Range” off-key. He's driving me nuts.
I sketch a series of princesses with blank faces. Hmmm … Maybe I should do two portraits—after Anastasia is accepted by her grandmother, a new portrait could appear onstage with her features filled in. Yes. I know I'm onto something. I can't wait to show Bud Roman. I am absolutely in love with this project.
My father pokes his head in. “You okay?” The creases in his forehead are lined with grease. He looks tired. “You want to help me out? Wash windshields or something?”
Oh, right. I can just see me lurching around in public with a paper towel and a spray bottle. “Uh, I don't think so.”
He stands there like he doesn't know what to do with me. He reaches into his pocket and offers me a handful of oily coins. “Here. Get yourself a Coke or something. I've got to finish a tune-up.”
I don't really want a Coke, but I think he's trying to be nice. I take the coins. “Thanks, Dad.” He heads back into the garage, his cowboy boots clomping against the cement floor. When I was little, I used to love to put the coins in the machine and watch the soda appear in the slot. This is what he remembers, and I wonder if he realizes that I am now a grown woman.
I slip out the front of the gas station and go over to the soda machine, one eye on the pumps. The only person there is a gray minivan–mother, filling 'er up. As I drop the quarters into the slot and listen to them clank, it hits me: Roger did not own this service station when I was born. He was a foreman at the chemical plant that polluted all the lakes back when Grandpa Harley was the vice president of the company. He did not buy the gas station until I was five years old. I am sure of this. I am positive. That birth certificate is a lie.
Me and Carla walk down the hall to homeroom, where they take attendance and say the Pledge of Allegiance. The auditorium in the daylight no longer looks Olympian; now it looks all drab and brown. Lenape High is so small, the entire school fits in the auditorium, freshmen through seniors. A lot of people don't say the Pledge of Allegiance; they just stand up and slouch. Roger told me you used to have to say it, but then the Supreme Court changed the rules. I stopped saying it in sixth grade because it was no longer fashionable.
Johnny is never in homeroom because he reads the morning announcements over the PA system. Boring Lenape stuff like if there's a spaghetti dinner at the firehouse or who received the Daughters of the American Revolution award.
Carla is just sunbeams and rainbows and all she talks about is Troy, Troy, Troy.
“One more month till the Spring Ball,” says Carla.
“Guess who asked me to go.”
“Oh, well, let's see,” I say. “Vic?”
“Actually, he did ask me, too, but I said no.” Carla is making me sick with these gloats. “It's Troy.”
“What a surprise.” I would like to be happy for her, but I am too envious. Carla is getting out of hand. She is rubbing it in deep.
“Do you think Johnny is going to ask you?”
“Come on, Carla. How the hell should I know?”
“Testy, testy.”
“I really don't want to talk about it.” I am sorry to be so mean, but half the school already has a date for the Spring Ball and I am the cheese, standing alone.
“My mom is buying me a new dress and everything.” Carla gets in another dig. I think she is punishing me for asking her mother about Sean Shanahan.
“Shut up.” There are tears in my eyes. I blink and turn my head away. My emotions just ooze all over the place, I swear. It's so embarrassing.
“There's still time, Harley.” Carla's voice turns kind. She knows when she's gone too far. “There's still time for Johnny to ask you.”
At that moment Johnny's voice booms over the PA system: “AND REMEMBER, KIDS, THERE'S STILL TIME TO BUY YOUR TICKETS FOR THE SPRING BALL! DON'T MISS OUT ON A SPECTACULAR EVENING OF FUN AND ROMANCE! ASK THAT SPECIAL SOMEONE TODAY!”
Oh, please, God, let him ask me, I pray. I will clean my room and wash and dry the dishes and get straight A's and be a sweet darling angel if he just asks me to the Spring Ball.
I am in Bud Roman's office, underneath the stage. I had no idea that these rooms were down here. It's a secret world where the actors rush through an underground passage to change costumes between scenes and put on makeup. There is a girls' dressing room, a boys' dressing room, a storage room for scenery and costumes, and Bud Roman's tiny office.
Yellow legal pads are scattered everywhere. Broadway show posters cover the walls. Stuffing spills out of the arms of the sofa that Bud Roman sits on. He is flipping through my sketches. I am holding my breath.
“Well, Motorcycle Mama, I like where you're heading. First act, blank face; second act, fuzzy face; third act, complete face. Problem is getting the supplies.” Bud Roman is chewing on a pencil lik
e he's smoking a cigarette. “You wanna use oil and canvas, but it's so expensive, you'll eat up the entire budget for the play.”
I realize that I have no idea how much the supplies cost because Granny always got them for me. I don't want him to think I'm totally out of it. “Maybe I can use acrylic and poster board or something?” I suggest.
“Yeah, but even that's pricey when we're talking life-size….” He shakes his head. “If these idiot politi cians had their way, there wouldn't be art classes or theater, just target practice.” He tosses my sketches onto my lap. “Don't get me started.”
I must look concerned, because he jumps up and claps his hands like he's ready to get down to business. “Don't worry, Motorcycle Mama. I'll talk to Emma—uh, Miss Posey. We'll figure something out.”
* * *
Johnny is not waiting for me at my locker and Carla is not waiting for me at the gym. Fine. I don't care. I don't care about anybody or anything except the drama club play.
I walk down the steps to the Pond Hole. I am going nowhere in particular, maybe uptown. That cute blond guy is standing there, smoking. I smile at him and keep walking.
“Hey, slow down,” he calls to me. I stop. “Come over here, beautiful.” Beautiful! No one has ever said that to me before. I shuffle over to him. He really does have these incredible gray eyes. “What's your name?”
“Harley,” I say. “Harley Columba. What's yours?”
“Evan Lennon.”
My jaw drops farther than Tattletale Betty Jo Clemings', I'm sure. “Lennon? That's so wild. I was born at a John Lennon concert. Well, not at his concert, but a memorial concert for him.”
“Yeah?” Evan grins. “What are you, named after the motorcycle?”
I giggle. “No, my grandmother.” Then I'm serious. “But she just died.”
Evan inhales his cigarette. “That's sad.” He offers me a smoke. “Want one?”
My first public cigarette. I am not sure, but I say, “Sure.” My hands shake a little as I hold it to my mouth. Evan lights it for me. I take a tiny puff and pray I don't cough. “Are you new?” I ask.