by Julia Watts
When Bo takes his eyes off the road to look at me, I’m surprised how sad he looks. “Well,” he sighs, “even if Wendy don’t like you that way, you and her are still gettin’ awful close, and before long you’re gonna be wantin’ to get rid of your third wheel.”
We’re parked in front of my house, and Bo looks close to tears. “But Bo, me and Wendy need a third wheel. You know why?”
“Why?”
“Because you and me and Wendy—we’re a tricycle.”
Bo smiles a little. “But what if you decide you’re happier bein’ a bicycle?”
“Now, Bo, you know just as well as I do that you can’t just take a wheel off a tricycle and call it a bicycle; the danged thing’d fall right over. Look, no matter what happens with Wendy and me, I’m not gonna leave you by the wayside.”
“You’d better not, H.F., ‘cause if you do, you’ll be leavin’ me with nobody but a bunch of rednecks who’ll beat the livin’ daylights out of me.”
I grab Bo’s hand and hold it. It’s long-fingered, fine-boned—a musician’s hand. “Don’t worry,” I grin. “I don’t never forget my friends. How could I? I’ve only got two of ‘em.”
Bo sniffs a little. I’ve seen him do this at the movies before, when he’s trying not to cry. “Well, speakin’ of gettin’ the livin’ daylights beat out of me, I’d better get on home before Daddy decides to take his belt off. And sugar, you’d better go on in that house and ask your memaw about stayin’ all night at Wendy’s.”
Memaw’s frying salmon patties, and you can smell them all over the house. If I cracked a window, every cat in the neighborhood would be in our yard. I hear the oil sputtering in her cast iron skillet.
Memaw likes to sing hymns while she cooks. Right now, it’s “Bringing in the Sheaves.” The woman is a walking hymnal—if a song has anything to do with God or Jesus, chances are, she knows it. Right now, hearing her plain, clear voice singing about bringing in the sheaves, and smelling the fishy smell, I think about that Bible story with the loaves and the fishes—about how Jesus made a little bit of food turn into enough for a whole bunch of people.
I don’t have faith the size of a mustard seed or even the size of one of those critters you have to look in a microscope to see. But right now I like thinking about that Bible story. I may not have much in my life, but I’ve got Bo and Wendy’s friendship. I’ve got Wendy wanting me to stay all night on Friday, and I’ve got Memaw cooking in the kitchen. That might not be a lot, but right now that little bit seems like enough.
Like always, I wish I had my momma too, but even without her, I feel pretty happy.
“Hey, Memaw,” I say as I walk into the kitchen. She’s lifting the patties out of the pan and setting them on a paper towel to soak up the grease.
“Well, Faith, you sure are pussyfootin’ around this evenin’. I didn’t even hear you come in.”
“I’m just sneaky, I guess.” I start getting out the glasses and silverware without even being asked. I don’t think Memaw’s gonna say no when I ask her if I can stay over at Wendy’s, but I want to get on her good side just in case.
“Oh, you’re about as sneaky as a freight train,” she says, dishing up a plate of salmon, macaroni and cheese, and cream-style corn. “You’ve never been able to hide anything from me to save your life. It’s just like that little china cat with the broke ear.”
I shovel in a mouthful of macaroni. The one-eared china cat still sits on one of the umpteen dozen knickknack shelves in the living room. Memaw’s told the story about it a thousand times—sometimes to me, sometimes to other old people to illustrate my good character: “I reckon you was about three years old, and you just fell in love with this little china cat your uncle Bobby brung me as a souvenir from one place or the other. I said you could look at the kitty, but not to touch it because if it got broke, you could cut yourself on it. I wasn’t worried about the cat bein’ valuable, you understand; I was worried about you. Children are what’s valuable on this earth. I like havin’ all my pretty things around me, but they ain’t worth a plugged nickel when you compare ‘em to people.” Memaw likes this story. I can tell because she’s so wrapped up in it she’s forgotten to stop talking every once in a while to eat.
“Of course,” she says, “one day I got busy doin’ somethin’—I think it was about the time I was makin’ them crocheted covers for the Kleenex boxes—and I left you in the livin’ room lookin’ at Mister Rogers. Well, sir, I reckon that little china cat just started callin’ out to you to come play with it. The next thing I knowed, you come toddlin’ into the kitchen with tears the size of dimes rollin’ down your face. You had the little china cat in one hand and its ear in the other. You just looked up at me with them big blue eyes and said, “Memaw, I bwoked it.’ Well, of course, I had to hug your neck on accounta you bein’ so honest. Most kids—your mother included—woulda hid that little cat and hoped I’d never notice it was missin’. But not you—there ain’t a sneaky bone in your body.” She finally cuts off a piece of salmon patty and eats it.
I know Memaw will say yes when I ask her about staying all night with Wendy. Whether she’s got a right to or not, she trusts me. “Memaw,” I say, “Wendy Cook asked me to stay all night at her house Friday. Is that all right?”
“Cook... Cook...” She chews thoughtfully. “Now, who’s her people?”
“She’s from up in Pennsylvania. Her daddy teaches over at the college. I think her mom’s got some kind of job at the college too.”
“Teachers, huh? I reckon that’s all right, then. But I’ll get awful lonesome rattlin’ around in this old house all by myself.”
I swallow hard. “I don’t have to go if you don’t want me to.”
“Oh, of course I want you to go, Faith. Some of the best times I ever had growin’ up was when I’d stay all night with one of my little girlfriends. Everybody else in the house’d be asleep, but we’d just lay awake in bed together and talk and giggle about the craziest things.”
In bed together? I’ve already been a nervous wreck about what to say to Wendy’s family, but I hadn’t given any thought to the sleeping arrangements. Thinking about crawling into the same bed with Wendy is like thinking about skydiving out of an airplane: exciting and terrifying at the same time. I try to imagine laying beside her, seeing her flaming hair spread out on a pillow, and all of a sudden, I feel like I’m gonna pass out.
“Faith, are you all right, honey?”
I nod feebly and push away my plate. For the first time in my life, I don’t go back for more of Memaw’s macaroni and cheese.
Chapter Five
I’ve been a nervous wreck all day. In world history, Mr. Clayton called on me, and I jumped like a bullet flew past my head. Everybody laughed, except Mr. Clayton.
That’s something I’ve been trying to comfort myself thinking—that real adults don’t tend to laugh at you the way other kids do. That’s not to say grown-ups don’t look at you like you’re some three-headed alien that just landed on this planet, but for the most part they don’t bust out laughing.
I hope Wendy’s parents don’t laugh at me and don’t look at me like I’m something out of a science fiction movie. To tell the truth, I want them to love me. I want them to think I’m witty and charming and sophisticated, even though I’m not any of those, especially sophisticated. Good Lord, except for that one time Bobby drove Memaw and me to Lexington to the eye doctor and after that we ate at Frisch’s, the only restaurants I’ve ever been in are Hardee’s and the Dixie Diner. I guess girls that get raised by little old ladies don’t get out much.
As soon as Wendy gets out of band practice, Bo’s gonna drive me to her house. I’m pacing back and forth in the hall so hard I’m probably wearing a path in the floor. Isn’t it weird how you can spend all this time wishing for something, and then when it looks like you’re actually gonna get it, all you can think about is whether you need to go pee or throw up?
When the band room door swings open, Wendy and Bo are the firs
t ones out. “Hey, H.F.,” Wendy says, smiling. “Where’s your overnight bag?”
“I’ve got all my stuff in here.” I point to my schoolbag. It says something for how often Memaw gets out that there’s not a single piece of luggage in the house. When I asked her about it, she said, “There used to be an old Samsonite suit satchel, but your mother took it when she left, and I reckon I just never got around to buyin’ another un.”
It was Bo’s idea for me to put my things in my schoolbag, which is a lot less humiliating than carrying them in a paper sack like I’d thought about doing. The stuff fits in with my books fine, since all I packed was a shirt to sleep in, a toothbrush, a clean T-shirt, and a change of drawers.
Bo’s been great about getting me ready to stay at Wendy’s. He even went to the library and got me a copy of Emily Post’s book on manners, so I could study it. No matter how many forks the Cooks have at their supper table, I’m ready for them.
I’m so quiet in the car, listening to the butterflies flap around in my stomach, that Bo leans over and whispers, “Relax, H.F. Lord, you’d think I was drivin’ you to the women’s penitentiary.”
I make myself take a deep breath and feel so much better that I realize I must’ve been forgetting to breathe. I wonder if you could die that way. I can see the doctors leaning over my corpse saying, “Well, it looks like this girl got herself in such a tizzy she done forgot to breathe.”
I come back down to earth when the car stops and I hear Wendy say, “Thanks, Bo. I wish you could stay with us too.”
“Well,” Bo says, “I wouldn’t want your daddy comin’ after me with a shotgun.”
Wendy laughs. “You wouldn’t have to worry about that. Dad isn’t the shotgun type. He’d be more likely to back you into a corner and drill you on grammar.”
“Lord, that’d be even worse,” Bo says.
We just sit there a few seconds until Bo says, “H.F., was you plannin’ on gettin’ out of the car any time soon?”
“Oh.. sorry.” I’d forgotten I was sitting in the front seat of a two-door car. I have to get out of the front before Wendy can get out of the back. God, how can I make Wendy’s parents think I’m witty and charming when I can’t even remember to do things like breathe and get out of a car?
“Bye, girls. Remember to have fun, H.F.” Bo drives away, leaving us standing in front of Wendy’s well-kept brick house. Memaw always thinks of brick homes as the big sign that a person’s making good in the world. She says my papaw always wanted to make enough money to buy them a brick home, but it wasn’t the Lord’s will. “I reckon,” she always says, “some of us was just meant to have our riches up in heaven.” I always wonder if she thinks that when she passes through the pearly gates, St. Peter’s gonna give her a gold key that opens the door to her own three-bedroom brick ranch-style house, filled up with enough craft projects to last her an eternity.
“Come on in, H.F.” Wendy’s voice makes me remember that I’m not standing outside Memaw’s house in heaven, but Wendy’s neighborhood is the closest thing Morgan has to a subdivision.
In the living room there’s nothing but books, books, books. The walls are lined with shelves that look like they could fall over from the weight of the books that are wedged and stacked in them. More books are stacked up on the floor next to the bookshelves, like they’re waiting in line in case any shelf space opens up. There’s some furniture in the room—a green couch and chair—but mostly it looks like the reason the Cooks need a roof over their heads is so their books won’t get wet.
“You got more books in here than the Morgan Public Library,” I say.
“Not that that’s saying much,” Wendy says back, reminding me how tiny my world is. The only library I’ve spent much time in is the one at school. The only time I go to Morgan Public—which always seems big to me—is when Billy Graham has a new book out and I go get it for Memaw.
“I thought I heard somebody. Hi, you two.” When I turn to face the voice, I see that Wendy’s hair color doesn’t come from her mother, but her taste in clothes does. Mrs. Cook’s shoulder-length hair is as mouse-brown as mine, except for a few gray streaks, but she’s wearing a light-purple, flowered skirt that I’m pretty sure I’ve seen Wendy wear before. The gray in Mrs. Cook’s hair and the lines on her face make her look older than most mothers of girls our age.
“Mom, this is H.F. H.F., this is Mom.”
I can see a little bit of Wendy in Mrs. Cook’s smile. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Cook, ma’am.”
“Oh, you can drop that formal stuff,” Wendy’s mom laughs. “It makes me sound old enough to be a Confederate widow. Just call me Carolyn.” She sips from a glass I’ve just noticed for the first time.
“Carolyn,” I say, but I’m having a hard time acting normal, because I know the golden liquid in Wendy’s mom’s glass is not Coca-Cola. Memaw says drinking alcohol is willful sinning, and while I don’t know if anything you do is sinful as long as you’re just doing it to yourself, I can’t get used to seeing somebody drinking out in the open, without acting ashamed or worried about what somebody might think.
“Can I get you girls something to drink?” Carolyn says, and I say “No, thank you” too quick, even though I don’t honestly think she’s offering liquor to a couple of 16-year-olds.
“Well, then, I guess I’ll go out and water the flowers,” she says. “Make yourself at home, H.F. Help yourself to a snack if you get hungry. We won’t start dinner until the powers that be at Randall College see fit to unshackle Wendy’s dad from his desk in the English department.” Barefoot, Carolyn walks out the front door, with her watering can in one hand and her drink in the other.
Wendy and I stand in the living room and look at each other for a second, then we both smile at the same time. “So...uh,” Wendy says, “I guess I could give you the grand tour, if you’d like.”
“Sure.”
I follow her out of the living room and into the dining room, which makes me review all of Emily’s silverware rules in my mind. The kitchen even has bookshelves full of books called things like An Introduction to Indian Cooking and The French Chef. I wonder if the French book has recipes for frogs and snails, but I decide not to ask. And I wouldn’t even know what would be in an Indian cookbook, except maybe recipes for corn and buffalo.
There’s a piano in the den and a stereo and lots of shelves of CDs. But the funny thing is, there’s no TV...not in the living room, not in the den, nowhere I can see. “Y’all don’t have a TV?” My brain’s been full of questions since I walked into the house, but this is the first one that’s made it out of my mouth.
“Nope,” Wendy smiles. “We’re one of those weird families that likes to sit around and talk.”
“Huh.” I’ve never thought about people not having a TV not because they were too poor to buy one, but because they just plain didn’t want one.
I follow Wendy down the hall, past the bathroom, past another room full of books that she calls “the study,” which I think is a weird thing to call a room. She leads me into the next door on the right and says, “My room.”
When I first walk through the beaded curtain, I feel like I’m gonna pass out. I’m so surrounded by Wendy—by her, by her things, by a feeling I can only call “Wendyness”—that I’m afraid my knees are about to buckle.
The walls are painted peach—the same peachy color that shines through her skin. The bed is piled with big pillows covered with all kinds of crazy patterns, and a white net canopy hangs over the whole thing. A rainbow-colored poster on the wall says LOVE in big squiggly letters, like it’s a sign advertising how I feel.
Wendy flops down on the bed and props herself up on a purple pillow. She pats the pillow beside her. “Come on,” she says, “make yourself comfortable.”
“Uh...I think I’ll just stand for a minute.” I walk over to her bookshelf and try to act like I’m interested in what’s on it, but the titles swim in front of my eyes, like all those red-and-white Campbell’s Soup cans in
the grocery store.
I’m getting dizzy staring at the books, so I walk over to her dresser. But looking at that stuff’s even worse...thinking about the hairbrush sliding through her thick halo of hair, the talcum powder she dusts all over her body with that fuzzy pink powder puff. When I look up to escape all her personal things, I face myself in the mirror and see how hard I’m blushing.
It seems like I’ve had three birthdays since anybody said anything, so I nod toward the purple, green, and gold beads that are hanging down over the mirror and say, “Nice beads.”
“I got those last year at Mardi Gras.”
“Cool,” I say, trying not to give away too much of my ignorance. All I know about Mardi Gras is that it’s one more reason Memaw thinks the Catholics are gonna burn in hell.
“H.F., are you sure you don’t want to sit down?”
I sit on the straight-backed wooden chair in front of Wendy’s desk. It’s not that comfortable, but there’s no way I’m gonna get on the bed with her now, especially not with her momma roaming around the house all liquored up. “I like your room,” I say finally. “Everything in it looks just like you.”
Wendy smiles. “Well, maybe you can show me your room sometime.”
“There ain’t much to it. Not like this. I’ve just got me a little single bed and a chest of drawers shoved up against the wall in the little room where Memaw keeps her sewin’ machine. When my mother had me, Memaw turned half of her sewin’ room into a nursery with a little crib and changin’ table. It seems like Memaw would’ve moved me into Momma’s old room after she left, but instead she just kept me in my little corner of the sewin’ room, and when I outgrew my crib, she sold it off and moved in the bed I sleep in now and replaced the changin’ table with the chest of drawers. She kept my mom’s room just the same. Maybe she thought if she left it just the way it was, she would come back to it someday. Or maybe she was afraid that if I moved into Momma’s old room, I’d take a notion to leave too.” Great, I think. First I couldn’t think of nothing to say. Now you can’t shut me up.