by Bev Marshall
“But he didn’t bring you back.”
“No, he was going to, but ...” I could hardly bear to say his name to Jehu. “Wallace wouldn’t let me go back out. He was against me going just about anywhere. I even had to lie about going to the pool, told him I was at the library on those afternoons.”
Jehu stood up. “Well, you could have called me and told me what happened. I thought you just liked him better and were giving me the brush-off.”
I jumped up beside him. I couldn’t let it end like this.“I know, but I was scared you wouldn’t understand, wouldn’t believe me, and I’ve never called a boy before. Not ever.”
He rubbed the side of his face with his palm. I held my breath.“Lyn calls me all the time. My mother doesn’t like it though. I guess you and she think alike.”
His mother! I didn’t want to be like his mother although I had no idea what she was like, having only just met her that one night when she drove us to and from the dance. “But do you believe me? I wanted to come back to the game. I really did.” And I remembered that I had told Roland we should go back. I pressed my lips together. But I hadn’t insisted, had changed my mind when Roland leaned against me rubbing his hands down my thighs. I held my breath. Just then some kid began playing “Chopsticks” on the old upright piano against the back wall. “Bom bom bom.” I wanted to yell “Stop it!”
Jehu twisted his initial ring and I sucked in air. Lyn wasn’t wearing that ring around her neck anymore. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed it before now. Jehu’s voice rose over the irritating plunking sounds flying out from the piano. “Sure, I believe you, Layla Jay. It’s just that back then, I didn’t know what all you were going through with your stepdad, how it was so awful for you.” I turned my head to the side to hear him better as his tone softened.“I’m sorry now that I didn’t know. Dad doesn’t talk about his cases, but it’s not hard to figure out some of it.”
Well, he figured out that you’re not a virgin, Layla Jay, I said to myself. Or at least he’s guessing you aren’t. I crossed my arms over my breasts.“Thanks for saying that.You’re right. I just couldn’t talk about it. It’s still, you know, hard to talk about.”
When he moved closer and looked at me like I imagined he would look at the winner of the Miss America pageant, I understood what Mama had felt like on the night she went to Skinnys.We were celebrities!
“Time to go, Jehu.” I looked over his shoulder and saw Mrs. Albright bearing down on us. Her high heels clicked on the floor as she made short hurried steps across the room in her slim navy skirt.
Jehu turned around. “Okay, in a minute,” he said.
The kid had finally stopped playing and Mrs. Albright’s voice was way too loud. “Now,” she said, without looking at me. She stood so close to Jehu he must have felt her breath on his reddening neck.
“I’ll call you,” he said before he turned and followed her across the floor.
As I watched them go over to where Mr. Albright stood talking to Mr. Greer, I realized she hadn’t bothered to say so much as hello to me.
Chapter 22
WHEN I GOT HOME FROM CHURCH, I FOUND MAMA IN HER nightgown, with red-rimmed eyes, sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee. “Hangover?” I said.
“The worst.Where’ve you been?”
I tossed my bulletin on the table. “Church. Pisgah with June and her folks. Mr.Albright was there.” I smiled.“And Jehu. He’s going to call me. Broke up with Lyn again.”
“Jesus! He can’t make up his mind who he wants.You ought to get a guy that will stick.” Mama tapped a fresh pack of Lucky Strikes on the table, pulled off the cellophane strip, and fished one out.
I waited until she lit up. “He’s going to stick this time.” Waving smoke out of my face, I said,“At least I think so. Gotta get changed.” Before I made it out of the kitchen, I heard a car outside. “Company.”
Mama stood up and looked out the window. “Shit! It’s Mervin. It can’t be twelve-thirty already.” She pushed me toward the door. “Tell him I’ll be ready in a minute.”
“Where you going?” I hollered after her as she headed down the hall.
“Dixie Springs. Dave Turner’s having a barbecue at his cabin.” Mervin was banging on the door. “Answer it, will you?”
Mervin was wearing baggy plaid Bermuda shorts and a big grin. “Hey, Layla Jay. Frieda ready?”
I moved aside and let him in. “Nope. She’ll be awhile, most likely. You want some coffee?”
“No thanks.” He followed me into the dark den and sat on the couch while I opened the blinds.“You been to church, I take it,” he said eyeing my pink skirt and white blouse as I walked back to the chair beside the couch.
“Yeah.”
“Your mama tells me you’re real smart. Did good in school.”
“Not really. I did okay.” I couldn’t help feeling mad that Mama was taking up with the man who had been the reason she had gone to that party at Dixie Springs Lake. He shouldn’t have let her drive, no matter what she said, and now he was taking her back to the same place. People would hear about it and say she shouldn’t be enjoying herself when she was about to face judgment for taking a life.
We could hear Mama banging drawers, running the water in the bathroom sink. I crossed my legs, swung my foot back and forth. I wished she’d hurry so I could go to my room, and then I wondered why I felt I had to be polite when I didn’t give a shit what Mervin thought. I stood up. “I have to change. I’ll see you,” I said.
Mervin reached up and curled his long fingers around my wrist. “Wait a second, will you? I want to ask you something.”
I jerked away, but remained standing, looked up at the ceiling.“What?”
“How do you feel about ...”
“Fine. Bye.” I turned to head for my room.
Mervin’s hand stretched out, but he didn’t touch me. “Please? Give me a minute. Please?”
I hated being rude, couldn’t keep it up, so I sat down on the chair beside the couch and tried not to look surly. “Go ahead then. What do you want to know?” I wasn’t going to tell him jack about what had happened with Wallace if that was what he was after. It was none of his business.
“I want to know how you feel about me and your mama dating again. I hold myself responsible for her accident, figure you blame me, too, and I understand if you do. But I’d like a chance to make it up. I’d like to keep seeing Frieda. I’ve been sweet on her for a long time, and when all this mess is over with the hearing, I’d like us all to take a little trip somewhere, kind of like a family vacation. I can take some time off, got a good inventory right now.” Mervin owned Written in Stone, which was a wonderland of cement figures, tables, benches, and fountains that he sold for grave monuments and yard ornaments. Mama had changed her mind and decided to overlook the white powder in his ears. Now she was calling him an artist. She acted like his praying angels stuck in the ground measured up to Michelangelo’s David. “So Layla Jay, what do you say to that? Think you could accept me as a friend of yours?”
A vacation? Like a family? It was such a remote possibility he might as well have said we were invited to the White House to eat Sunday dinner with Lady Bird.“I knew you liked Mama” was all I could think to say.
His eyes were honest to God shining like a kid’s lit up by candles on a birthday cake. “And I’m pretty sure now that your mama likes me, Layla Jay, but the question is can you like me?”
I smoothed my skirt. I had liked him the night of Mama’s party when he was drunk and told funny stories and jokes, but that seemed like twenty years ago instead of a few months. I opened my mouth to say something smart, then closed it. I was tired of lying, worn out with plotting and figuring out people and trying to make things the way I wanted. Here lately, nothing ever turned out the way I wanted, so what did it matter whether I wanted to be his little pretend daughter for a few days or no
t? “I don’t know, Mervin. I just don’t know. Right now I’m doing good to know what day it is.”
Mervin shot me a look with such tenderness that for a moment I understood why Mama liked him. Had my daddy looked at Mama as Mervin was looking now? I was beginning to understand why she might fall for him. He smiled. “Layla Jay, I understand. That’s fine. Fine if you don’t know, but I hope you’ll think about it sometime. I want to make it up to Frieda and you. If you’ll just consider giving me a second chance, that’s good.That’s all I’m asking for.”
“Almost ready,” Mama called, sounding younger than me, and now I remembered that they were headed right back to the scene that had caused Mama to get drunk.
I lowered my voice, hoping Mama couldn’t hear us.“If that’s all true, then why are you taking Mama back up to Dixie Springs? You know she’ll get drunk again.”
He frowned.“I know it. But she’s not driving. I am.” He put his hand over his heart.“And Layla Jay, I don’t drink anymore. After the accident, I gave it up, drank a Coke at Skinnys last night. I’ll take good care of her.”
“Okay, but I still wish she weren’t going up there. I don’t think going to places like that, anywhere where there’s lots of drinking, is a good idea right now with all that’s going on.”
Mervin leaned over and squeezed my arm, put his mouth close to my ear. “I don’t either, but you know your mama. If she’s set on doing something, no one can put the brakes on her. Dave invited her last night at Skinnys, and she’s hell-bent to go. Better that I take her.”
I liked him for saying that. He was right about Mama. She could be stubborn as Papaw’s mule, and time and again, he’d said to Grandma, “You can’t fight Frieda; might as well join her.” Of course, Grandma hadn’t joined her in anything even once. I smiled. “I’m glad you’re driving. Mama hates to drive Wallace’s car anyway. It took her a long time to get back behind a steering wheel, and she said she sure wished her maiden voyage didn’t have to be in the piece of shit Galaxie Wallace bought when she threw him out back in January.”
Mervin grinned. “I bought a Caddy. It’s real old, but she doesn’t mind riding in it one bit.”
When Mama finally came out of her room dressed in a low-cut green blouse tucked into white short shorts I saw that she’d lost all of her weight, and as she twirled around the den, she looked like a woman made to ride around in a Cadillac.
WHEN THE PHONE RANG around two that afternoon, I raced to it, waited a moment to calm down, and lifted the receiver, certain it would be Jehu on the line. “Hellllo,” I said.
“Hey, Layla Jay.” It was June.“I’m going to the matinee at the Palace. From Russia with Love is showing. It’s gonna be fab.You want us to pick you up?”
I wanted to see the movie, but I didn’t want to spend the afternoon with June.“I can’t,” I said. I wasn’t going to tell her about Jehu, so I said, “Mama asked me to stay home. She’s expecting an important call. About the case.”
“Oh, well, if the movie is as good as they say, maybe I could go see it again with you.” June’s disappointment ran through the wires and spiraled into my body. I squeezed my eyes shut. Telling another lie so quickly after going to church and hurting June’s feelings again made me feel like a piece of lint.
“Okay, we’ll do that and thanks anyway,” I said before I hung up.
An hour later when the phone on the hall table rang again, I ran for it shouting, “Let it be him.”
And it was! “Layla Jay? It’s Jehu.” His voice was so low I could barely hear him.
“Hi” was all I could think to say.
“Uh, I need to tell you something.” He was practically whispering.
“I can’t hear you,” I said.
“I don’t want my mother to know I’m calling. She’s in the kitchen,” he said.
Uh oh, uh oh, uh oh, I thought. She hadn’t spoken to me at church. I’d suspected this. “Why not?” But I knew.
“She thinks with Dad taking your mother’s case and all, it’s not a good idea for people to think we’re anything but casual friends. Casual was the word she used.”
“Oh.”
“And Dad said she’s right. He said, if the charges don’t get dismissed, you might have to testify, that I shouldn’t be dating you until this is all cleared up.”
“I see.” I was trying hard not to cry, but I knew my voice was wavering. I pressed my lips together as hard as I could and took a deep breath.
“It’s them. Not me. But I can’t, you know.They’re my parents.”
“Yeah, I guess.” Why couldn’t I say something smart, something to make him change his mind? Why did I have to be punished for Wallace’s sins and Mama’s mess? I hated them both. It wasn’t fair.
“But I wanted to tell you, didn’t want you to think that I didn’t mean it when I said I’d call. So you know now. It’s not because I don’t like you.”
I counted the stripes of white, green, yellow, and blue on the wallpaper. Fourteen stripes from the phone to the doorway.The yellow was halved where it was cut to fit.There wasn’t anything to say and I wasn’t going to think anything about anything. Empty. I’m empty.
“Layla Jay? You still there?” His voice was louder now. Jehu’s mother must have walked out of earshot.
“Yeah. I’m here. It’s not because you don’t like me,” I repeated.
“Right. Well, now you know. So, I guess ...”
“Yeah, you can hang up,” I said, picturing him rubbing suntan lotion on Lyn’s back at the pool. He’d never stroke any part of me now.“Good-bye.” I never knew if he said good-bye back. I hung up and then swiped the phone off the table. It clattered with a ring onto the floor, a dial tone humming as I stepped over it and ran outside.
I wanted to go to June’s house, lie on their couch, eat something fresh out of their fridge, smell June’s mother’s perfumes lined up on her dresser. But today was Sunday. I couldn’t risk it. Mr. McCormick would probably be home, maybe mowing the yard, or watching baseball on TV. Mrs. McCormick would be in the kitchen in her white apron with the cherry appliqués, stirring a pot of spaghetti maybe, slicing French bread without a speck of mold on it. Or maybe she was sitting in the blue velvet chair wearing her reading glasses with the gold chain around her neck. She would be reading the Sunday paper, smiling at the huge sandwich Blondie had fixed for Dagwood in the comic strip. She wouldn’t want a daughter with big boobs that men ogled, a fourteen-year-old who had had sex, who had witnessed a murder, and who was going to be gossiped about for the rest of her life.
I lay on the grass, wishing now that I had gone through with the suicide. Closing my eyes, I imagined sinking down into the warm earth. I crossed my hands over my chest. I heard the mourners as they looked down into my grave. “Poor Layla Jay. She was so beautiful and smart. Such a shame. She’d barely lived any of her life.” But Mama would be there, looking sad and beautiful in a red dress surrounded by men who wanted to comfort her. She’d get all the attention even if I was the one in the casket. I sat up. She was the reason for all of my suffering. If not for Mama, I’d be dating Jehu. I’d be popular. I’d be a virgin. I’d be everything Grandma believed I was. Everything was Mama’s fault. Her marrying Wallace was the worst fault of them all. And she hadn’t even loved him. I remembered her saying that all he was was a ticket out of Grandma’s house. Maybe I could forgive her if she’d loved him. But she hadn’t. She’d loved my daddy; he was the only one. And if she hadn’t had the fight with him, he wouldn’t have forgotten his helmet that day and maybe he’d still be alive. I didn’t care if she went to prison. I hated her. I didn’t see how I could live with her for another minute. But where would I go? I looked up into the canopy of leaves overhead. I wasn’t ready to go to heaven, but I could go back to the last place that was closest to it. I’d call Papaw and ask him if I could live with him again.
Before I got to the kitchen door
, it opened and Papaw stuck his head in. “Phone was off the hook. Been trying to call you,” he said.
His coming just when I needed him was a sign. This was going to work out perfectly. Grandma had sent him to me. He was surely a gift from her or God. I ran to him.“Where’ve you been all weekend? Mama tried to call you from Friday night through today.”
Miss Louise had followed him into the kitchen. “Well, that’s what we came over to tell you,” Papaw said, winking at Miss Louise. She blushed, and an alarm bell went off in my head.
Papaw threw his arm around my shoulder and hugged me close to his side. “We’ve been to Biloxi, left on Friday morning, just got back.”
He went to the beach! He’d never liked the beach. I’d begged him to take me plenty of times and he’d always said, “Sand’s for Arabs and crabs. Nothing grows in it.We got good dirt right here, we don’t need to go sit on grit.”
Papaw let go of me and went over to Miss Louise. He lifted her left hand where a gold band ringed her fourth finger. “Say hello to your brand-new stepgrandma, Layla Jay.We got hitched on the beach.”
Chapter 23
PAPAW AND MISS LOUISE (I WASN’T GOING TO CALL HER “grandma”) had another surprise. Papaw’s wedding gift to Miss Louise was a 1963 canary yellow Corvette, which they were planning on driving across the country to the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, and Disneyland.“Of course, we won’t leave until after your mother’s case is decided,” Miss Louise said.
“Yeah, we’re delaying the honeymoon until we know what’s what with her. And you.” I was an afterthought.
I must have looked how I was feeling because Miss Louise pulled away from Papaw’s grip and walked over to me. Putting her hands on my shoulders, she looked into my heart. “Honey, I know how much you loved your grandmother, and I want you to understand that I’m not trying to take her place. No one can do that.” She looked over at Papaw for help, but he was fishing in his shirt pocket for a cigar. “You and I have been friends for a while now, and I’m hoping that we can build on that. Maybe in time you could come to love me a little?”