Alice in Charge

by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor

  “Well, it was a relief, mostly,” Leslie said. “I never worried she’d kick me out or anything. I guess I wasn’t sure how she’d handle the news. She just stared at me for a minute; then she laughed and said, ‘You are not! Don’t be ridiculous.’ It took me an hour or more to convince her. She just sat there shaking her head. Sometimes I think that she still doesn’t believe it and that if I could ever just meet the right guy …”

  “That’s the way it was with my parents,” said Lori. “It wasn’t till I reached way back and told them how I’d felt when I was five and six that they began to understand. How I’d always hated dresses, loved my truck collection, cried when I got a Barbie doll instead of a G.I. Joe. They began to see that this wasn’t just a temporary phase because some guy rejected me or something. Our parents can’t seem to imagine us ever rejecting guys.”

  We smiled at the thought—Lori, tall and brunette; Leslie, a natural blonde, shorter, sturdy … both of them pretty.

  Liz picked up her egg salad sandwich. “What I can imagine,” she said, “is feeling entirely out of step with everyone else—feeling that what I wanted was natural to me but seemed unnatural to other people. And what they wanted for me seemed disgusting.”

  “And the more they try to ‘fix it,’ the more unnatural it feels,” said Leslie.

  “Daniel told me that homosexuals in his country would be killed for it,” I said.

  “Well, people in this country have been killed for it too,” said Gwen.

  That afternoon, as the buses were pulling up at the main entrance, I saw a small crowd gathering inside.

  “What’s going on?” I asked a girl who was walking away, shaking her head.

  “Go look,” she said.

  I did. The large paper rainbow we had constructed was still hanging overhead, but there was a little pile of rainbow armbands on the floor beneath it, bent and crumpled, like trash. And on top of the little heap, a hand-lettered sign in Magic Marker: FAG DROPPINGS.

  The administration had debated how they should handle this, Miss Ames told the newspaper staff. There were pros and cons about giving these incidents any publicity—treating them as anything more than scribbles on a restroom wall. One of the GSA guys had cleaned up the pile of armbands quickly before too many kids had even seen it. We’d heard no rumors, picked up no gossip, and Miss Ames said that the next step might be to send out our roving reporters on an investigative mission, armed with the right question. Perhaps that would give us some clues.

  But choosing the right question itself caused a debate among the staff. We first proposed What do you fear most about your safety here at school? but decided that was too suggestive. The question Is there anyone or any group here at school that makes you feel intimidated? sounded as though we were pointing the finger at someone. We finally decided on What, if anything, makes you fear for your safety here at school?

  The B-team reporters promised to go to work on it and would turn in some replies by the following Monday.

  With the teachers’ in-service training day coming up, and therefore our three-day weekend, I called Les that night and left a message on his cell phone.

  “Remember, Les? This is the weekend you promised! UNC on Friday, William and Mary on Saturday, George Mason on Sunday. And you can be home in time to watch the Redskins play at four. I already checked their schedule. How early do you want to come on Friday? Call me.”

  Then I sat down at my computer, went to Yahoo for directions, and printed out a map of the whole trip—drive south to Chapel Hill, northeast to Williamsburg, then back up to Fairfax before heading home. The map planner gave me the routes, the travel times, and local attractions. I checked my notes. I was pretty sure I had a dorm room assignment for Friday night—I was supposed to call someone at Welch Hall; I was waiting for a callback about Saturday. I’d received a brochure from George Mason, a packet from Maryland, another from Chapel Hill….

  The phone rang Wednesday night. “This weekend?” Les bellowed.

  “Yes!” I said. “Lester, I already told you! You promised!”

  A huge sigh followed by silence.

  “It’s my only three-day weekend this fall! I’ve got to see some colleges before I apply, and you have to admit you owe me one, because—”

  “Okay, okay, let me think, will you? It’s … what? Three hundred miles to Chapel Hill?”

  “Two hundred ninety-three.”

  “Al, have you got everything planned?”

  “Yes. I told you! I’ve got the maps and the mileage and—”

  “Where am I staying?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re staying overnight on campus, right? Where am I staying? Have you checked out motels?”

  Omigod! Lester! “Right. Um … I’ve got the numbers right here. I’ll have it all down for you in black and white.”

  “When’s your first appointment on Friday?”

  “Two o’clock,” I said.

  “We need to allow five hours, minimum. Six, if we stop to eat.”

  “I’ll call you about the details,” I said. “Dad said he’ll pay all expenses.”

  “Okay. I’ll fill my tank.”

  “Thanks, Les!” I said cheerfully. “We’ll have a ball!”

  “Right,” said Les.

  A few minutes after I’d talked with Lester, Patrick called.

  “How are things?” he asked.

  “Crazy,” I told him. “We’re seeing three schools this weekend. Lester’s driving me to UNC, William and Mary, and George Mason.”

  “All in one weekend?” he asked.

  I sucked in my breath and let it out again as I plopped down on the edge of my bed. “Yes, Patrick. Three schools in three days. Is that so unusual?”

  This time I could hear the amusement in his voice. “What are you going to do? Sample the food in the dining hall, check out the student union, and move on?”

  “I’m going to get a feel for each place. I think I can at least rule some of them out after I’ve been there. This doesn’t mean I can’t visit one again if I really like it.”

  “How did you rope Les into this?” he wanted to know.

  “Brownie points,” I said. “He owes me big-time for a lot of things.”

  “Wow! You’re keeping score. So what else is happening?”

  “Well …” I smoothed out my bedspread with one hand. “I guess I’m going to the Snow Ball.”

  “Oh!” Now I really had his attention. “Who’s the lucky guy?”

  “Daniel Bul Dau.”

  “Who? Do I know him?”

  “No. He’s from Sudan.”

  “So … what’s he like?”

  “Tall, dark, and handsome,” I teased. “Even taller than you are.”

  “Should I be jealous?”

  “Wouldn’t hurt,” I said. “Actually, he’s very nice. Polite.”

  “You invited him?”

  “No. He invited me. And I didn’t know what to say, Patrick. Gwen got on my case because I wondered if he was up to it, but he doesn’t really know much about our culture. I think he’s a little overconfident because we taught him a few steps at the Homecoming Dance.”

  “Well, someone will clue him in,” said Patrick. “Lucky Daniel.”

  “What have you been doing?” I asked.

  “Catching up on Bollywood movies,” he said. “I’ve missed most of them, but we’re having an Indian film festival, so I walk over to Ida Noyes when I can.”

  I took a chance. “By yourself?”

  “And whoever else wants to go. You met John and Adam and Fran, I think.”

  “Yes …”

  “They go sometimes. I even sat beside one of my professors last week. He was there with his girlfriend.”

  “You’re getting up in the world, Patrick,” I joked.

  “Yeah, before you know it, I’ll have a graduate assistantship, teaching nerds like me.” We laughed, but he didn’t exactly answer what I wanted to know.

  We talked fo
r another twenty minutes, and then I said, “You’re coming home for Thanksgiving, aren’t you?”

  “Well, actually …”

  I couldn’t breathe.

  “My folks want to have Thanksgiving at my uncle’s house in Wisconsin.”

  “Oh, Patrick! I haven’t seen you since—”

  “I know. Mark’s funeral. I’m disappointed too.”

  “They were just in Wisconsin! I mean—” I stopped. What right did I have to decide where Mr. and Mrs. Long should spend the holiday?

  “But I’ll definitely be home for Christmas,” Patrick said.

  “That’s a long way off.”

  “Two months, is all.”

  “Ten weeks.”

  “You miss me?”

  “More than you can imagine. I thought of you all during the homecoming parade….”

  By the time we’d finished talking it was nine thirty and I went back to the website I’d bookmarked to confirm that I was signed up for the Friday tour at two. Then I found the website for William and Mary and clicked on TOURS to sign up for Saturday. Two p.m. filled, it read. Next available tour: three weeks.

  By Thursday it seemed as though every teacher had assigned a little more homework, just to fill up our three-day weekend. One teacher did say that those who were planning to visit colleges over the weekend would have three extra days to get their assignments in.

  I hadn’t even thought about what I’d be taking with me to visit schools. Hadn’t checked to see if I had any clean pajamas. Hadn’t made motel reservations yet for Les. For a girl who might be leaving home in less than a year, I was pitifully unprepared. Somehow I’d thought that signing up for a tour was no big deal. Colleges were always happy to show students around, right? How could William and Mary be filled? I called George Mason directly and asked about tours, but they didn’t have a tour that Sunday.

  The lonesome, homesick, panicky feeling returned as I pulled a duffel bag out from under my bed and opened it, trying to organize my thoughts: jeans, top, T-shirts, sweater, sneakers, tampons, makeup kit….

  Next I looked up hotel chains in the Yellow Pages, called some toll-free numbers and asked if they had any locations near the UNC campus. The closest I could find was a motel called Sleepy Inn, and I made a reservation for Les for Friday night. Then I did the same thing for Williamsburg and got a Ramada.

  Les called around seven. “You find a place for me in Chapel Hill?”

  “Yep, and my tour’s at two,” I said.

  “I think we should leave at eight, then. Make it seven thirty if you want to stop and eat somewhere.”

  “I’ll bring sandwiches,” I said.

  He must have sensed the tension in my voice. “And, Al,” he said, “hang loose.”

  Dad and Sylvia were falsely impressed with my arrangements. Dad was absolutely gleeful, I think, that he didn’t have to drive. “Any expenses within reason,” he said, handing me his credit card.

  “Hope all goes well!” said Sylvia.

  My hair was filthy, so I set my alarm for six thirty, and hoped to be asleep by eleven. But I realized I still hadn’t received a callback about my request for a place to sleep at William and Mary. I tried the number I’d called before, but no one answered. Then I called the number I had for Welch Hall, to confirm my room at Chapel Hill, and got voice mail. I left a message that I was arriving Friday and would drop off my bag there.

  By the time I did get to bed, I was wakeful and didn’t drift off till after midnight. I dreamed I was in a room that kept getting smaller, and I couldn’t tell if the walls were moving closer together or the ceiling was coming down or what. When the alarm went off, I sprang out of bed as though it were on fire, glad to be out of the dream, I guess.

  Later, when I opened the fridge, I found a lunch Sylvia had already packed for us, but this just proved how dependent I’d become, always having someone there to look out for me, remind me, encourage me, pick up the tab. I thought about Patrick at the University of Chicago, getting right to work, fitting in, doing assignments, learning his way around….

  I was sitting on the steps when Les pulled up a couple minutes past eight, and I could tell he saw this as a mission of mercy, not a pleasure trip.

  “Good morning!” I chirped as I got in, dropping my bag in back.

  “Morning,” he said. He reached for his Starbucks cup and took a long drink.

  We were two blocks away when I realized I’d left my folder with all the necessary addresses and brochures in it, and we had to go back. While I was in the house, I remembered I’d also left the lunch Sylvia had prepared, so I got that, too.

  “Better now than later,” I said as I climbed back in the car, and at last we were headed for the beltway.

  I took out my map and directions and began to read aloud: “Take ramp onto I-495 West toward Beltway/Northern Virginia. Go 6.7 miles. Continue on I-495 South for 17.5 miles.”

  “What’s the exit we’re looking for?” asked Les.

  “Uh, 57A/Richmond,” I told him.

  He took out one CD and put in another, lifted the Starbucks cup again, then rested his arm on the open window.

  It was a beautiful October morning, and it was sort of exciting going somewhere with Lester, our bags in the backseat. I rolled down my window too and pretended we were in a convertible. A beautiful girl on her way to college. I smiled at a couple of guys who passed us in a truck, and they waved.

  Les gave me a look. “Watch it,” he said, and grinned.

  There’s not a lot to see from a beltway except cars, and even less after the exit. But I-95 South was worst of all, and we had to go 118 miles on it.

  We stopped for a bathroom break, but Les wanted to eat as he drove to make sure I made my two o’clock campus tour.

  “You’re not going with me, are you?” I asked.

  “No. I’m going to drop you off and pick you up in the morning. You have the address of my hotel?”

  “Yes. It’s called Sleepy Inn. And I’ll give you Dad’s credit card too. Boy, this is the life, isn’t it, Les?” My hair was blowing around my face, and the warm breeze rustled the map in my hands.

  “Pretty sweet,” he said.

  I’d noticed Les had brought some books and papers along with him and would probably be working on his thesis while I was visiting schools. I thought about how many years he’d been in school and how he was finally almost finished. I tried to imagine Christmas and a college graduation both in the same month.

  “Sometimes I wish I could just press a button and be through school and starting my real life,” I told him.

  “This is your real life, Al,” he said. “Don’t start living in the future. That’s like gulping down a piece of fudge cake and then asking yourself, ‘Where’d it go?’ You’re missing the moment.”

  “Ah! The philosopher is back,” I said. “I know how to enjoy a moment, Les. I’m enjoying this, aren’t I?”

  “You’d better.”

  “Frankly,” I told him, “I don’t think about the future enough. Sometimes I can’t even see what’s coming right at me, and I get blindsided.”

  “Yeah? Anything in particular?”

  “Our student from Sudan asked me to the Snow Ball, and it caught me off guard. I said yes.”

  “And?”

  “I don’t know what to expect.”

  “Well, neither does he. Obviously, though, he feels comfortable with you.”

  I sighed and rolled up my window halfway because my hair kept blowing in my mouth when I tried to talk.

  Les glanced over at me. “How does Patrick feel about you going with someone else?”

  “I hope he’s a little bit jealous, but he says he’s comfortable with it. Too comfortable, maybe.”

  “Well …” Les drove for a while without speaking. Then he said, “He’s hundreds of miles away, Al. He’s there, you’re here, life goes on. But nobody’s written the last chapter.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Just that what happens today or n
ext week or next year isn’t necessarily the way things are always going to be. As soon as you settle into a routine, life throws you a curveball. Sometimes you hit it, sometimes you don’t.”

  “It sure threw a curveball when Mark died.”

  “Yeah. It sure did.” He was quiet for a moment. “Getting back to Patrick, though …”

  “He wants me to live it up my senior year, even though he’s not here to share it with me.”

  “Smart boy.”

  “Which means that he plans to live it up his first year of college even though I’m not there to share it with him.”

  “Ditto.”

  “Which means that’s why he doesn’t mind that I’m going to the Snow Ball with somebody else, because that means that the equal opportunity rule is alive and well in Chicago.” I turned to Lester. “You’re not even thinking of marriage yet, are you?”

  “Not really. Are you?”

  “Of course not. But I’m curious: How many women do you think you will have dated before you find the right one? I mean, honestly, Les, not to get personal or anything, but how many girls have you been out with in your whole life up until now?”

  “To the nearest hundred?”

  “Seriously! There was Claire last year, Tracy, Lauren, Eva, Joy, Crystal, Marilyn … Any others?”

  “Lord, yes. Gloria, Mickey, Maxie, Amy, Lisa, Josephine, Caroline …”

  “Omigod, Les, did that say Exit 51/Durham/Atlanta? That’s the one we were supposed to take!”

  “Al, you’re supposed to be navigating!”

  “Turn around! Turn around!” I cried.

  “Are you insane? This is a freeway. We have to go to the next exit.”

  Les was cussing, I was hyperventilating, and then we saw we hadn’t missed it after all:

  EXIT 51/DURHAM/ATLANTA, NEXT RIGHT.

  Saved. Now all I had to do was pretend I knew what I was doing when we got to Chapel Hill.

  7

  CALL GIRL

  Lester stopped in the driveway of an official-looking building. It was already past two, but I told Les I’d catch up with the tour.

  “This where it starts?” he asked.

  I was digging through my folder of papers and couldn’t find where I’d written the starting place for the Chapel Hill tour. “I think so,” I said. And then, when Les frowned, I leaned forward and took a quick look at the name of the building.