“Yeah,” Al said, “but then I keep thinking of Mr. Richards.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Remember how he told us his wife took their baby daughter back home, and when he tried to send them money, his wife sent it back. He never saw his grandchildren. Why?”
Al gave me a real piercer. I knew better than to interrupt.
“I’ll tell you why. His daughter wouldn’t forgive him, either, for walking out on her. I think people who never forgive are crumby. It’s a terrible thing to never forgive something, even if it hurt you a lot. Don’t you think so?” Al said.
“Yes,” I said. The only thing I ever had to really forgive was when Teddy flushed my silver ring down the toilet by mistake. I still haven’t forgiven him, but he doesn’t know it.
“So I’m going to try to forgive my father,” Al said, getting up. “The older I get, the more I know that not only is almost nothing perfect, but almost nobody, no person, is either.”
“Sometimes I think that thee and me are the only perfect ones,” I said, “and once in a while I worry about thee.”
“Have a weird day,” Al said, and went home.
20
People expect grandfathers to be sort of dried up and crotchety. My grandfather is very handsome. He is my mother’s father. My grandmother, his wife, died before I was born. He always stands up when a lady comes into the room. Even one my age.
“Remember that cleft chin? If you want to see one,” I told Al after gym, “come over about six. My grandfather’s coming. You said to let you know.”
I didn’t tell her about the standing up. I knew that would get her. I like to watch Al’s face when she’s surprised. She has a very expressive face.
My grandfather has a lot of dates, for a man his age. This time he brought Mrs. Oakley, who has been to our house before. She is very dainty and scented and wears a hat and gloves and pale clothes. I have never seen anyone like her. My father calls her a “grande dame,” Only he pronounces it in French, which makes it sound considerably different.
Mrs. Oakley sits with her ankles crossed. She handles a teacup so it seems part of her. She’s nice to me, but she’s one of those ladies who gives the men her full attention. She turns the old eyes on my father or my grandfather when they talk to her like she has never seen or met anyone so fascinating. Her hands look as if she never did a day’s work in her life. My mother says she probably hasn’t. My mother isn’t all that hot on Mrs. Oakley. My father thinks she’s a great old girl. My grandfather seems to be amused by her. Teddy acts like some kind of a retard when Mrs. Oakley’s around. More than usual, I mean.
I noticed my mother had on a new skirt and a new blouse. My father had come home from work and put on a clean shirt. Mrs. Oakley has that effect on people. My mother gave my father the hairy eyeball and made a couple of remarks about not seeing any clean shirts for her.
“I asked Al to come over,” I told my mother. “She has never seen a cleft chin.”
When Al came, I introduced her to Mrs. Oakley and to my grandfather.
“Grandfather,” I said, “this is my friend Al.”
He stood up. I saw Al get a little pink in the face.
“What’s Al short for?” he asked her, shaking her hand.
“Alexandra,” she said.
“When you’re older, you’ll probably be glad of Alexandra,” he said. “You know me, Al.”
We looked at each other, confused.
“I know you, Al,” I said.
“You two are old enough to read Ring Lardner,” my grandfather said. “He wrote a book of pieces about some very interesting characters. He called it You Know Me, Al. Give it a whirl. You might like it.”
Al and I went into the kitchen. My mother had asked me if I’d turn on the broiler and watch the little toast things so they wouldn’t burn.
“He’s super,” Al said. She stationed herself at the window in the kitchen door that maids looked through when people had maids. I knew without looking at her that she was shooting a few of her special piercers at the folks out there.
“Who’s she?” Al asked.
I knew who she meant. “She’s just a lady who’s a friend of my grandfather’s,” I said. “He brings a lot of different ladies when he comes.”
“She looks as if she might break if you dropped her,” Al said in a sour voice.
“Get me the silver plate, will you?” I asked Al. She knows the plate I mean. My mother keeps it in a special wrapper so it won’t tarnish.
Al tore herself away from the peephole and got the plate. She watched me as I opened the oven door.
“I read something very interesting in the paper the other day,” she said. “Did you know it’s a proven fact that people can enjoy sex well into their seventies and eighties?”
I almost dropped the toast things.
“It’s true,” Al said. “I was amazed. Isn’t that bizarre? A bunch of doctors made a scientific study, and those were their conclusions.”
Al stationed herself at the peephole again.
“Does your grandfather like her?” she said.
“He likes the opposite sex,” I said.
“I’m going to read that book he suggested,” Al said.
“I know you, Al,” I said.
“No, it’s You Know Me Al,” she corrected.
Sometimes she could be awfully literal. “In my case, it’s ‘I know you, Al,’” I said. “Hold the door for me, will you?”
“What a fine young man you’ve turned into, Teddy,” Mrs. Oakley was saying. “I’d never would have known you, you’ve grown so big and strong.”
As I say, keep a foot in the middle of Teddy’s back and beat him regularly and he stays in line. Give him a word of encouragement and he takes off. Teddy was revving his engines for takeoff.
“I’ve got a song I can sing for you,” he said.
Al and I froze.
I passed the hors d’oeuvres so fast they skidded and almost hit the dirt.
“That would be lovely,” Mrs. Oakley said in her dainty voice. “Both my brothers sang. In the church choir. They had lovely voices. There’s nothing sweeter in the world than a young boy singing. I can still see them in their choir robes, their faces so young, so innocent. Lovely.”
Mrs. Oakley took a toast round.
Al and I escaped to the kitchen.
Al opened the door to the broom closet and went in. “Call me when it’s over,” she said.
“You really want me to sing?” I heard Teddy ask. I looked through the peephole. My mother had a little puzzled smile on her face. She hadn’t known Teddy sang. My father and grandfather looked noncommittal. Mrs. Oakley smiled. She was prepared to enjoy herself and give Teddy a big hand when he finished.
I turned on the water, both taps, as hard as I could. Even above the noise I could hear Teddy begin.
“My bonnie lies over the ocean,” he sang. “My bonnie lies over the sea.”
I couldn’t stand it another minute. I opened the door to the broom closet. Al had her hands over her mouth. Her face was beet red. It was a very small broom closet.
“Move over,” I said.
Turn the page to continue reading from the Al series
chapter one.
“I’m not getting any younger,” Al said.
“Who is?” I asked.
“I’ve got miles to go before I sleep, and I seem to be standing still.” I noticed that underneath her new tweed jacket she was wearing her old brown vest, a sure sign she’s in the pits.
“How come you’re wearing that”—I pointed to the vest—“when today is practically boiling?”
“False summer,” Al said, looking critically at the sky as if she could see a weather report there. “We always have a false summer just before school closes. Pay no attention. We’ll have a relapse, I guarantee.”
Suddenly she hissed through her teeth, “Listen, I’m pushing fourteen, and once you’re fourteen, it seems something should’ve happened to you. Someth
ing memorable.”
“What’d you expect?”
Al lifted her shoulders until they almost touched her ears. “I don’t know. I might find out I was a missing heiress. Or maybe the illegitimate daughter of a French count. Or I might be discovered by a TV tycoon.” She dropped her books to the sidewalk.
“There I am, sitting, enjoying a sausage-and-pepper pizza, minding my own business.” She bent her knees to show she was sitting at a counter, enjoying her pizza. “And along comes this TV tycoon in a three-piece suit, with his hair all styled and everything, and he takes one look at me and says, ‘Pardon me, miss, but if I may say so, you’re precisely the type we’ve been combing the city for.’
“Then he decides to star me in his new sitcom, which turns out to be a romance with a lot of laughs, an unbeatable combination, and it also turns out to be the hit of the century.
“Well”—Al smiled ruefully at herself—“maybe not of the century but of the half century. But it’s big, really big. I am able to buy a mansion for my mother and also a Mercedes-Benz, on account of this sitcom runs in prime time and takes the Nielsen ratings by storm. I’m on the cover of Time and even Newsweek…”
A little old lady walking with a cane came up behind us. “You’re blocking the sidewalk,” she said. “Please step aside.”
“I’m a TV star,” Al told her, “in the process of being discovered,” and she stepped aside.
The little old lady drew back as if she smelled something bad. “In this world,” she said, “you meet all kinds. Life is not what it used to be.” She tottered off down the street, shaking her head, muttering to herself.
“I made her day,” Al said. “She thinks I’m on drugs.” She bent and picked up her books and went on talking.
“And people would stop me on the street and say, ‘Aren’t you Laura in Squat Down in Squalor?’ or whatever. I think that’d be cool. That and all the residuals.”
Here we go again.
“What are the residuals?” I said. Al frequently uses words I don’t understand. One nice thing about her, though. She never says, “What! You never heard of residuals!” or anything like that. She doesn’t treat me as if I were a total idiot because I don’t know the meaning of a word, and I know plenty of people who do that.
“Money, baby.” Al did a little tap dance. “That’s all. The folding green stuff. Every time they show your sitcom on reruns in the summer, especially if it’s in prime time, they have to fork over big bucks. Which are otherwise known as residuals. Which will make you rich. You savvy?”
I savvied.
“You could always write a book that they’d turn into a major motion picture for six figures,” I said. “That’s a good way to get rich quick.”
“I’d settle for one they’d make into a minor motion picture for five figures,” she told me. “I’m up for an ice cream cone. How about you?”
“I’m broke,” I said. Sometimes, when I say, “I’m broke,” I feel like a record that’s gotten stuck.
“Then we’ll share.” There was an ice cream cart at the corner. “One mocha chip cone, please,” she told the man. “First this year. How’s business?”
“Stinks,” he said. “You want small, medium, or large?”
“I want large but this is all I have,” Al said, holding out her money. “I guess I’ll have to settle for small, huh?”
“You must be psychic, lady,” he said.
Al looked at me. “L-A-D-Y,” she mouthed.
“Have a weird day,” she told him when he handed her the cone.
“I already did,” he answered.
“If that guy ever broke down and smiled,” she said as we walked away, “he’d probably bust a gut.”
We stood waiting for the bus. The branches of the trees lining the street stretched spidery little tentacles rimmed with leaves toward the sun. They were trying hard. Maybe they’d make it.
“Did you ever think about living in the country?” I asked Al. “Instead of here, I mean?”
“I have,” Al said casually. “Once, when my mother and I were trying to decide whether we should move East, we rented a little house outside of L.A. We had an orange tree in our backyard.”
“An orange tree? In your own backyard?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “Why didn’t you ever tell me that? That’s absolutely fabulous. Did you pick oranges off it?”
Al shrugged. “Sure. They were sour, though. We also had a walnut tree.”
“With real walnuts growing on it?” How did she take things like this so calmly?
“It wasn’t so much,” Al said. “I’d rather live here. It’s much more exciting. Have a lick.”
“You first. It’s your cone,” I said. I couldn’t get over having an orange tree plus a walnut tree in your backyard. I’d never lived anyplace that was different. Up to now I’d had a fairly boring existence.
First she took a lick, then me. It was delicious. The sun really was hot. We had to work fast.
With her tongue, Al pushed the ice cream down so nothing stuck up. It was all inside.
“It lasts longer that way,” she said.
“I think Vi’s getting bored with Ole Henry,” Al told me. Vi is her mother. Her real name’s Virginia. Ole Henry has been taking Vi out for quite a while. He’s in Sportswear. Al’s mother is in Better Dresses.
“How come?” I said.
“Well, last night he stopped by right after we’d finished dinner. His timing was a little off, which, as you know”—she gave me her owl’s eye—“doesn’t happen very often. And my mother gave him a frankfurter and some sauerkraut, and I happen to know for a fact there was plenty of roast beef left over. You should’ve seen Ole Henry’s bird-dog nose sniffing. He said, ‘I thought I smelled roast beef,’ and Vi looked straight at him and smiled and said, ‘Must be the neighbor’s.’ So that ought to tell you something. I think the romance is over.”
“Ole Henry is too old for your mother,” I said. “She looks very young for her age.”
“I’ll tell her you said that. She already likes you, but that will definitely cement your friendship,” Al said. She leaned past me. “Where’s that dumb bus?” she said.
“She likes me?” I was pleased. “I didn’t know that.” Al’s mother usually calls me “dear.” When I first knew her, I thought it was because she didn’t remember my name. But I guess she calls me “dear” because she likes me. That was nice of her.
“You’re putting me on,” I said. “Does she really like me?”
“She says you’re a good solid kid who has her head on straight.”
“That doesn’t sound like your mother,” I said.
“Actually”—Al looked over the top of her glasses at me—“she said she thought you were a very nice child with lovely manners. And you know my mother has a manners fetish.”
“No kidding? She really said that? Remind me to tell my mother.”
“She also said she liked having you drop in on her. She enjoys you, she said. But I told her she should see you when the moon is full.” Al dipped her tongue down into the cone, then handed it to me for a dip.
“And when the tide is high. I mentioned the way your fangs start growing and horns sprout out of your head and you bay at the moon when you take a minute off from stirring the foul-smelling brew in your cauldron. You know what she said?”
I shook my head.
“She said she admired you very much.”
I could feel myself blush. It’s one thing to like someone. It’s another thing entirely to admire someone.
“I don’t believe you,” I said. “Better polish off that cone. Don’t forget what happened last time.”
Al crossed her eyes. “Have I ever lied to you?” she said.
“No,” I said, “but there’s always a first time.”
“Here comes our bus,” Al said and shoved the cone into her mouth, chewing like mad.
chapter two.
The last time Al took an ice cream cone onto the bus, a man sitti
ng in back of us gave her a hard time about eating on public transportation. He said it was against the law. So Al had flipped the cone back into her mouth the way a kid in our class did. Only in her case, she almost barfed all over her coat and it happened to be a brand-new coat that her mother had bought on sale. I can still remember how she looked, her eyes all bugged out and her face red.
But she made it. Good thing. I told her her mother would have killed her if she’d barfed on that coat.
“If my mother ever paid full price for anything,” Al once told me, on account of her mother bought everything on sale, “I think she’d jump off the George Washington Bridge.”
Sometimes Al exaggerates. Not always.
Al and I live in the same apartment building. She and her mother moved down the hall from us more than six months ago. We’ve been best friends ever since. I have a feeling we’ll be friends all our lives, until we’re old and rickety and have grandchildren. My mother has two friends she’s known ever since she was younger than we are now. Al is a year older than me, but we’re in the same grade, due to the fact that she moved a lot when she was little so she lost a grade somewhere along the line. I hope we stay friends forever.
The bus driver let us off and we started to walk.
We had almost reached our block when Al suddenly leaned over and spit something into her hand. It was the remains of the mocha chip cone.
“You didn’t try that trick again!” I cried. “You’re nuts.”
Al looked at me sadly. “Someday I’ll pull it off,” she said. “Just for the record, that stunt isn’t as easy as it looks. Life is full of things that aren’t as easy as they look.”
“Mr. Richards!” I shouted.
Al stumped glumly along. “That gives you another point,” she said.
Every time we spot a Mr. Richards quote, we get a point. Mr. Richards was the assistant super in our building when Al moved in. When he showed us how he polished the kitchen floor, he told us it wasn’t as easy as it looked. He was right. When we tried to do it, we couldn’t. Al and I and Mr. Richards were friends. Then he died. Things haven’t been quite the same since.
I Know You, Al: The Al Series, Book Two Page 7