It was the first I’d smiled since Mama left.
Bert Barnett walked with Ray and me to school. Both of those boys walked stiff in their fresh-starched shirts that I knew would be nice and loose by the end of that day. Ray had even used a little of Daddy’s pomade to sweep the hair off his forehead. It sure made him look grown. And handsome, but I wasn’t about to tell him that.
“Know what I found?” Bert asked as we made our way down Main Street. “A baby raccoon out in the woods.”
“You shouldn’t be going out there by yourself,” Ray told him.
“I was careful,” Bert said. “Wanna hear about the baby raccoon?”
He went on and on about how small it was and how it had liked the piece of bread he fed it. He’d brought it home all cradled in his arms and tried to convince his mother to let him keep it.
“She made me take it back, though.” He sighed and let his shoulders slump. “She was worried it would scratch me.”
“I heard of a fella that caught a baby raccoon down in Ohio someplace,” Ray said, working at rolling up his shirtsleeves. “He raised that coon from birth. Once it got full-grown, that critter got mean. One day he got some kind of wild hair in him and bit off the man’s thumbs.”
“Both of them?” Bert asked, stopping right in the middle of the walk-way.
“Yes, sir,” Ray answered. “Come on. We’ll be late.”
Bert looked like he might faint, thinking on such a thing as that. I had half a mind to tell him that most of Ray’s stories were just tall tales and to pay him no mind. But, then again, I thought Bert should be more careful about the critters he came upon in the woods.
“So you touched it?” I asked.
“Of course I did,” Bert said. “I let it crawl all over me. It liked it.”
“I read somewhere that if a mama raccoon smells human on its baby she’ll leave it,” I said.
“Well, I don’t think that’s true.” Bert went on and on about raccoons and I didn’t hear a single word of it.
The rest of the way to school I was trying not to think of that baby raccoon left all by itself in the woods.
One thing I’d learned was that mothers weren’t always good at sticking around.
We got to the schoolyard just as the sound of a clanking handbell rang through the clusters of kids. They made their way into a line by the school steps and Ray and I did the same. The schoolteacher, Miss De Weese, stood at the door, calling for our attention. She warned us all against running through the hall and instructed that we should keep our hands to ourselves.
“Everyone should take a seat in the classroom,” she said, her voice nice and clear. “Younger children in the front, older in the back.”
We filed in and the teacher smiled at me as I walked past her. It relieved at least a tiny bit of my nerves.
Bert had to sit in a row in front of Ray and me with the younger and smaller children. Ray and I sat together just as I’d hoped we would and I thought he was plenty anxious about the starting of that day. He hadn’t been in a classroom since he was six years old. He’d turned twelve over the summer. But he’d worked hard. Mama had, too. I did have faith their lessons would help.
If nothing else, he’d learned to read just enough to show that he was smart. And he could write a whole bunch of words. Mama had tried to start in on fixing his grammar, but found that was a battle he’d hold firm against.
Even if they’d missed their last few lessons, he was still ready for school, I just knew it.
All the chitchatting in the room came to a stop when Miss De Weese stood at the front of the desks, a clipboard in her hand with, I imagined, a list of all our names. She said when she called our names we were to answer with the word “present” loud enough that she could hear it, but not so loud that it was a yell.
That room was overfull of kids and roll call seemed to take half of eternity to get through. Knowing my name would be all the way to the end of the list, I got to daydreaming about what I’d like to do just as soon as school let out for the afternoon. I thought of making fresh-baked cookies with Opal and reading under the tree and watching Ray whittle on the horse he was making for me. I’d gotten myself so distracted I didn’t hear Miss De Weese when she called my name. Ray had to elbow me in the ribs so I’d pay attention.
“Pearl Spence?” Miss De Weese called.
“Sorry, ma’am,” I said after clearing my throat. “Present.”
More than a couple kids laughed quietly at me.
So embarrassed, I blinked at my desk, working at not crying. What made it worse was that when the teacher called out Hazel Wheeler’s name, the girl announced she was present without so much as a hint of a stutter.
When I turned to see where she was sitting, straight as a rod, Hazel scowled right at me from just one row behind. I wondered if that wasn’t her very best smile on account she was such a sour and mean human being.
I didn’t doubt that at all.
We went about our lessons all morning long, not taking a break from working out arithmetic or from searching maps in geography. We wrote our hands sore when practicing our penmanship and read quietly at our desks until Miss De Weese told us to stop.
It took Ray a long time to finish his work, longer than everybody else in the class, as a matter of fact. And I was sure he didn’t get all his answers right. He didn’t seem to care, though. He was doing what he could and I thought he was proud of himself.
Besides, other than Big Boy Bob, he was one of the larger boys in the room. It would have been a fool that poked fun at him.
We were real close to the noontime dinner bell and I was looking forward to running wild outside after sitting still and quiet for so long. I’d even managed not to daydream so much as one time since the teacher called the roll. I checked the clock on the wall, seeing we didn’t have more than thirty minutes left in the morning, and I started getting antsy.
Just then a girl shuffled her way into the classroom. Even from where I sat I could tell she was the kind who would have benefited from a long, hot-water bath with a strong bar of soap and a scrub brush. A couple kids behind me snickered at her as she stood there, waiting for Miss De Weese to tell her to come in.
“Did anyone think to bring clothespins?” Hazel asked. “My fingers are going to get tired of holding my nose.”
I flashed with anger at Hazel for saying such a thing and turned to glare at her. Too bad she didn’t notice. She was too busy seeing who else was laughing at her little joke besides just her.
I remembered Meemaw telling me that in times of temptation the good Lord would always provide a way of escape. I got to praying that God would give me some way to flee the temptation of flattening Hazel Wheeler’s nose.
In Jesus’s holy name, amen.
Turning to face the front of the room I saw that the late-coming girl hadn’t moved so much as an inch. Dirt smudges soiled her overalls and the shirt she wore under them was yellowed and stained. I figured those were all the clothes she had to wear and wondered if they’d been handed down from an older brother. Wherever she’d gotten those clothes, they were bad. So bad they made all the rest of us in our feed-sack dresses look dressed to the nines. Her hair hung in greasy threads against her neck and her cheeks, and in her eyes. It wouldn’t have surprised me to find out that her shoes had holes in the soles and that they were more than a couple sizes too small. The way she walked made me think they hurt her something awful.
Making her way past all the taken desks she bounced her lunch pail against her leg. It made a hollow sound, that tin pail, and I wished she’d stop letting it hit her thigh. All the kids in the class were watching her, hearing her. It made me sad, knowing they were thinking less of her than themselves.
If I could’ve made a bet, it would’ve been on her family being on Abe Campbell’s list of folks taking assistance. Just thinking of him made my stomach sour.
The only empty seat was on the left-hand side of me and that was where the girl was headed.
“Don’t get too close to her,” a boy near me whispered loud enough for the class to hear. “Delores gots cooties.”
When she stopped and slipped into her seat I half turned toward her. I didn’t see any bugs crawling around in her hair, but I did understand how there could’ve been some. The girl was filthy as could be and sure smelled the part.
“Delores Fitzpatrick?” Miss De Weese asked, still sitting at her desk. “Is that your name?”
The girl nodded but didn’t look up at the teacher.
“I’m glad you made it today.”
The girl bent down and slid her pail under her seat.
“Did Uncle Frankie Roosevelt pack that lunch for you?” a boy asked, reaching out his foot and nudging the pail with his toe.
“Excuse me,” Miss De Weese said to the boy. “Did you say something you’d like to share with the class?”
“No, ma’am,” he mumbled.
“Then kindly keep your mouth shut until I ring the lunch bell.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I knew he was making fun of that Delores girl for being poor. He was teasing her for needing the relief. I clenched my fists so hard my fingernails dug into my palms.
As mean as some kids in Red River got about Beanie or anybody that was different from them, not a one of them—not a single one—had ever made fun of somebody for being poor. We’d all been poor. Ray was one of the worst off, even. And we’d never said so much as a single word about it to him. We just plain knew not to.
When the lunch bell did ring I was glad. But I waited in my seat until everybody else cleared out and it was just me and the teacher and Delores Fitzpatrick in the room. Last thing I wanted was to get in a knock-down, drag-out fight on the very first day of school. I thought I’d let all the other kids, especially that Hazel Wheeler, get a head start on going home.
Delores took her pail and pulled out what little lunch she did have inside. Just a slice of bread folded in half that I’d have guessed had only a dot or two of ketchup inside it and an old, wrinkled-up apple that looked like it had seen better days more than five years before. I tried not to stare so I wouldn’t embarrass her.
“Miss Spence?” Miss De Weese said from her desk where she’d begun unpacking her own meal. “Are you staying or going home?”
“Going home, ma’am,” I answered, sliding out of my seat. “I’m sorry.”
“You don’t need to be sorry.”
That Miss De Weese certainly was a kind lady. I was glad.
Just as I stepped outside the classroom door, I heard the teacher say something to Delores. I stopped and listened.
“Would you believe I packed two cookies today?” she asked. “Would you like one, Delores? It’s oatmeal raisin.”
Hearing shuffling steps I peeked in to see the girl grab the cookie and rush back to her seat before taking even one nibble. She hadn’t said thank you, but I didn’t think that mattered so much to Miss De Weese.
I turned and left, stepping outside, glad to find Daddy and Ray waiting for me in the schoolyard.
“You having a good day?” Daddy asked once I made my way to him.
“I guess so,” I answered, not wanting him to worry about me too much. He had plenty on his mind as it was.
“That’s fine,” he said. “How about we get a bite to eat at Shirley’s today? She’s got meatloaf sandwiches.”
Ray and I both told him that sounded real good.
My brand-new shoes made a clipping sound on the pavement as we made our way to the diner. The shoes I’d worn before never had made anything but a clunking. I thought of those shoes, stowed away in the bottom of my closet.
“Daddy,” I said. “Do you think it’s all right if I give my old shoes to Delores?”
“Who’s Delores, darlin’?” he asked.
“A girl in my class.” I took a look at him out of the corner of my eye. Then I made a point of whispering, “I think she’s poor.”
“Well, I don’t mind.” He nodded at me. “You best ask your—” Mama. He was about to tell me I best ask Mama.
Not one of us said anything to each other until we got to the diner.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Hazel Wheeler busied herself with talking behind her hand into some girl’s ear. Both sets of eyes followed me all the way from the gate of the schoolyard to an old tree not three feet from the steps. It was only the second day of school and already I felt a fight coming on.
“Don’t you pay her no mind,” Ray told me. “She’s just tryin’ to get your goat.”
“Well, she’s already got it,” I muttered. “I hate everything about her.”
“You don’t hardly know her.” Ray stayed standing and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Don’t borrow trouble, Pearl.”
That’d been something Meemaw had said when she was still alive. Somehow it hadn’t irked me near as much when she’d said it.
“I’m telling you what, if that girl says one sideways thing to me …”
“You’ll turn around and walk away from her,” he told me. “She ain’t worth gettin’ in trouble over.”
“Maybe she is,” I said under my breath.
Ray sat on the stump beside me and leaned forward so his elbows rested on his thighs.
“Pearl, that girl will never be half as good as you,” he said. “You know that?”
I didn’t know that but I kept it to myself. Good girls didn’t drive off both their mamas before they’d reached the age of twelve.
“Don’t let her get to you. That’d just be givin’ her what she wants.”
I wanted to ask Ray when it was he’d started talking just like Daddy, but Miss De Weese came out the school door, ringing her bell as the kids hustled to get in line. I hung back so I was right behind Hazel and the girl she’d been whispering with.
The part of me that was full of evil wanted to yank on her perfectly bouncy sausage curl until it straightened right out.
Then I remembered what Meemaw’d told me time and again when somebody treated me mean back in Red River. She’d dry my eyes with the hem of her apron and pat my cheek with her crooked-fingered hand.
“You gotta find a way to bless ’em, honey,” she’d said. “When somebody treats you bad, you gotta think of somethin’ good to do to ‘em. They might hit you again and again, but you gotta come back with blessin’s every time.”
Some days I wished I could stop remembering things Meemaw’d told me. Seemed easier just to smack Hazel across the face and be done with it.
Walking behind her and watching her silky and shiny ginger-colored hair sway back and forth across her shoulders, I couldn’t think of one thing to do to bless Hazel. She already had everything she needed and I sure didn’t want to tell her she was pretty.
Pretty is as pretty does, I thought.
Right before we walked in the school she peered at me over her shoulder, giving me a look that told me she thought I was worse than worthless.
“Good morning, Hazel,” I said in the very sweetest voice I could make. “I do hope you have a nice day.”
Her eyes grew wide before she narrowed them at me.
My kindness took her by surprise. It felt better than punching her in the mouth would’ve. Besides, kindness wasn’t near as hard on my knuckles.
I held my shoulders back and felt a smile creep up on my face.
Miss De Weese held me after class to wash the chalkboards and clap the erasers. The fine powder that puffed in the air in front of my face reminded me of Red River. It was fine and silky just like the Oklahoma dust. It also made me cough something awful when I breathed it in too deep.
I deserved the punishment and I knew it. Still, I’d felt justified in tripping a boy in class after I heard the nasty word he’d called my mama.
When the teacher had asked me why I’d done it, I just looked her in the eye and told her I didn’t know for sure. That wasn’t the whole truth but the last thing I needed was for her to know our family business, even if the whole r
est of the town seemed to know more about it than I did.
Ray had waited for me on the stump, gnawing away at his fingernails that could’ve used a good clipping. His hair was growing out dangerously close to his collar and it seemed his pants had shrunk a good inch in the legs.
Mama never would’ve let those things go. And she wouldn’t have tolerated the grime that’d taken up housekeeping in his ears, either. I thought I’d have to see what Opal could do to help him.
“Ready?” Ray asked once he saw me walking down the school steps. “Wanna cut through the woods?”
“Nah,” I told him. “I’m too tired.”
He kicked at a pebble that was loose on the pavement. I could tell just by the way he half shuffled his feet that he was disappointed.
“You go on if you wanna,” I told him. “You don’t need me holding your hand.”
“You sure?” he asked.
“Sure I am.” I shook my head. “I know the way home without you.”
He didn’t wait for me to tell him twice. He took off running toward the woods fast as he could. I imagined him one day with a big old woolly beard that grew all the way down to the middle of his chest and hair so long it curled up around his ears and at the nape of his neck. He’d have a cabin all his own where he’d live in the woods, trees growing all the way around so he wouldn’t even need a fence.
Ray wouldn’t be a hermit. He wasn’t that kind. But he would like to keep to himself sometimes. He’d always let me come and sit to visit just so long as I brought him food enough to last a month.
And if I’d ask real nice he might even let me live out there with him.
I dreamed of all we’d have out in our cozy cabin in the woods until I got to the front porch. Opening the door, I saw that Opal was there waiting for me.
“May I please have something to eat?” I asked.
She nodded and walked to the kitchen without saying so much as a word. It seemed odd to me that she hadn’t asked how school was or why I was so late getting home. She hadn’t even asked what I’d like to eat.
That was when I realized something about the house felt wrong. A little bit emptier.
A Trail of Crumbs Page 27