by Diana Estill
Other than David, no boy would have dared risk asking me for a date. I imagine it was more acceptable to join the canine patrol. If romance was to become a part of my high school experience, I knew I’d have to search for it outside of White Rock High.
Kenny lived in Lolaville, a town named after a popular hot spot that had stood in its midst for a half-century: Lola’s Fruits & Vegetables. This small settlement of farmers, quarrymen, misfits, and social renegades was twelve miles southeast of White Rock and, thankfully, in a different county and school district. Kenny wouldn’t have known of my reputation as White Rock High’s sophomore class joke. In fact, if it hadn’t been for a band party at the County Line Skateland situated halfway between our two rural communities, I’m sure we never would have met.
I’ll always believe Kenny’s lack of insider knowledge accounted for his willingness to notice my pathetic existence. As for David, I don’t know how to explain his attraction to me other than to say he might have had a thing for Cocker Spaniels. Long after I’d kicked sand into the flames of his first romance, he’d refused to forget about me. “If anything ever happens to him,” he’d say about Kenny, “I want to be the first to know.” He’d made me promise, and I’d agreed, though neither of us imagined the significance.
TWO
Every morning after Kenny left for work, I wondered what I’d do with myself for the next nine hours. I kept my ears trained for noises of any kind, hints of welcomed punctuations in my otherwise silent existence. If the germs Kenny brought home from the trash trucks didn’t kill me first, I feared I’d die of boredom.
The familiar sound of tires crunching gravel told me someone, probably Momma since nobody else ever visited, had parked a car in our driveway. Occasionally, she’d drop by to tell me something noteworthy—like Ricky took third-place on his science fair project or Daddy found a lucky double-yolk egg that morning—some important incident or gossip that couldn’t wait to be shared.
Momma let herself inside before I could open the screen door. “Hey,” she said stepping out of an early autumn mist, “know what Sunday is?”
“Of course I know.” I rolled my eyes. “It’s Daddy’s birthday.”
“Ya’ll be there ‘bout noon?” she asked, marching straight through to my kitchen like she paid my rent. The idea of me being the lady of the house hadn’t had time enough to fully sink in.
Kenny and I would have sooner suffered a beating than to have eaten Momma’s cooking, but I nodded to spite myself.
“Brought this for you.” Momma pointed to a small football-shaped object she’d set on my dinette table. I studied Momma’s deposit, though I couldn’t say I was bowled over by curiosity. Whatever it was, if she’d made it, it was sure to be a disappointment.
Momma followed me back to the bedroom where I’d been cleaning and sat on one corner of my bed. “How’s your neighbors? You seen ‘em yet?”
“You mean the Hendersons?” I jabbed a thumb to my right, motioning toward the bedroom’s east partition, the dividing wall of the duplex Kenny and I shared with the elderly couple. “Can’t help seeing ‘em and hearing ‘em. Two old codgers fight like a couple of game roosters. Cussin’ each other out all the time.” I made a fake smile. “Reg’lar love birds. But what can you expect for sixty-dollars a month? Lolaville ain’t exactly filled with perfect housing or perfect people.”
Momma cocked her head. “Don’t hear nothing but a dump truck going by right now.”
“That’s ‘cause Ol’ Man Henderson done disappeared this morning, like he does most mornings.” I opened the Venetian blinds and peered between the dusty slats, calculating the time. “Hard to have a cock fight when you only got one rooster.”
I turned and mimicked Granny Henderson. “I’m gonna outlive him! He kil’t his first wife, but I’m damned sure gonna outlive him. You just wait and see.” Granny’s eyes had shimmered like tourmaline when she’d said this. And for weeks afterward I’d listened, one ear to the wall, checking for any hint of strangling or suffocating noises, before I’d learned that Granny had a broad definition of murder.
Momma gasped. “He killed his first wife?”
“Died during childbirth.” I chuckled. “But Granny says, ‘Same thing.’”
Momma took in her surroundings as if seeing them for the first time. “Your daddy says this...” She swirled her hand in a semi-circle. “…is a shotgun house.”
I kicked a pair of Kenny’s dirty briefs underneath the bed before Momma could see them. “Mm hmm. He told me that, too. Said you can fire a shotgun at the front door and pellets will fly right out the back.” I squinted and thought about that. The doors between our living room, bedroom, and kitchen aligned squarely with the front and back entryways. I could see Daddy’s point, though I hoped no one ever tested his theory. I remembered the day I’d asked Granny Henderson what she knew about shotgun houses. She’d studied the porch ceiling and said, “I knowed they’s built simple on ’count o’ they’s built to house slaves.” And I’d thought, Figures.
Momma shifted and leaned forward, placing her hands on her knees. “I wish you hadn’t moved so far, Renee Ann. Out here, pregnant, and no telephone.”
We lived ten miles from my folks so Kenny could be close to his mother, Neta Sue. He hated the thought of her being alone now that he’d married, given that his daddy had run off when Kenny was a toddler. Before Momma could work up a case of nerves, I said, “Oh, don’t worry. It’ll be all right. The Hendersons have a phone...said we can use it anytime. Granny’s always home because she’s crippled and can’t drive. The old man takes the car off somewhere every morning and leaves her here.”
Momma stood up as though something had bitten her behind. “I better get going.” She scurried toward the front room. “Daddy’ll be real happy to see you Sunday.” I followed her as she eased open the torn screen door and made her way onto the porch.
“Wait. Before you go,” I said, “could you please buy Daddy a couple of bookmarks from the bookstore?” I handed Momma the three dollars I’d found earlier that morning when I emptied Kenny’s uniform pockets. “I don’t have a way to get there.”
Daddy loved bookmarks, especially ones with scripture on them. It wasn’t much of a birthday gift, but it was all I could afford. Actually, it was more than I could afford.
“Sure.” Momma stuffed the bills in her purse. “Hey, don’t forget to try some of that cake I put on your table.” She scooted into her station wagon and cranked the engine. “I didn’t have any baking chocolate, so I used instant cocoa.” She dismissed the substitution with a wave. “Aww, it’s all the same, anyway.”
From the veranda I watched until Momma’s car faded out of sight before I wandered back inside. There sat the plastic-wrapped brick loaf, looking deceptively promising, like those Halloween candies wrapped in shiny papers printed with names that no one has ever heard of, the kind that taste like cow manure. Not to say that I’d ever officially conducted a taste test.
I poked a forefinger at the chocolate icing that had solidified into a coal-colored enamel. Yep. She’d used that same recipe again, the one that called for equal parts of water, granulated sugar, and baking chocolate, the one she never got quite right. With a sigh, I tossed the cake into the wastebasket before Kenny had the chance to take a nibble and make fun.
That night, right after I’d cleared the supper dishes, I told Kenny about Momma's invitation. “What do you mean we’re going to your momma and daddy’s for dinner Sunday?” he groused. “I’m gonna watch the Cowboys play. Right here.” He smacked one hand against the beige vinyl sectional he’d found behind Weir’s Funeral Home. “From my own sofa.”
I stared at his knuckles, traced the worn out cushion seams, and wondered if the couch pillows had ever held a corpse. Kenny hated it when I tried to guess the original upholstery color, which might have been ivory, tan, or even taupe. No way to be sure, the grime had been there too long. Still, Kenny had said I should appreciate the sofa because it, like most of the fur
nishings in our house, was one of his employee benefits.
“Come on, Kenny,” I whined. “We can be home in time to see the game. It’s Daddy’s birthday. What do you want me to tell Momma? That you won’t let me come?”
“Oh, yeah, you’d like to tell your mommy and daddy what a rotten guy I am, wouldn’t you?” He said that as though it might be a lie. But I’d never admit it, even if it were the gospel truth, because if I did I’d have to acknowledge the fuzzy image growing sharper every day—a vision of me living in squalor with a man who worshipped his television and hated his life. No. I knew my place, when to speak, when to shut up, and when to pretend I was the happiest girl since Shirley Temple sang that song about a ship named after a sucker.
Perhaps if I were more lovable, a decent wife, or at least a better-looking one, Kenny would kiss me on the cheek and say, “Anything you want, Sugar Pie. What time they want us to be there?” He’d ask me what he should wear and if I needed money to buy a gift. Maybe he’d even offer to sign Daddy’s birthday card.
“Change the channel,” Kenny said, as though I’d failed my duty to read his mind, notice he was bored with Dolly Parton talking about towels and laundry detergent, and switch the set to The Untouchables.
“Ken-ny?”
“Put it on channel eleven,” he commanded.
I spun the dial fast, overshot my goal, and wound up at Channel 13.
“Whoa! You passed it, damn it.” His look warned I’d better hurry and get it right.
The channel safely adjusted, I relaxed and began again. “Kenny, I swear we’ll be home before the game even starts. Can’t we please go to Momma and Daddy’s Sunday?”
He grunted something almost inaudible.
“Huh?”
“I guess,” he bellowed. “Now will you leave me the hell alone so I can hear my show?”
~
On Sunday, Momma outdid herself. She’d set out her white lace tablecloth and wedding china and cooked an almost adequate-sized pot roast and three-vegetable assortment for Daddy’s birthday dinner. She’d even wrapped my gift using leftover paper that I recognized. I had to give her credit where it was due. Momma was one resourceful woman.
Daddy didn’t wait to finish his dinner before opening his gifts. “Why, thank you, sweetie,” he said, tearing the pink rose-petal gift wrap from his bookmarks. “You know I always like this kind.” He stared at the uppermost marker and read aloud, “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? Psalm 27:1.”
Gazing into my lap, I said, “You’re welcome, Daddy.” And then I gave my brother Ricky the evil eye, daring him to smart off. He giggled and choked on an ice sliver.
“Sa-a-ay,” said Kenny, turning to Momma. “Can I have some of that...that there...uh, meat?”
“You mean this pot roast?” Momma smiled like Edith Bunker. She passed Kenny a Blue Willow china bowl full of charred chunks of beef.
“Yeah, pot roast.” Kenny tapped a fist against one of my knees.
I shoved away his hand.
“Wasn’t Caroline Sontag’s solo right pretty today?” Daddy asked.
Momma nodded as she circulated a dish of fried okra. “Lovely voice.”
I knew Momma would agree. If you wanted to know her views about anything, all you had to do was ask Daddy. No point in forming her own opinions when his were just as good, if not better.
“Real sweet girl, that Caroline,” Daddy said. “And a downright natural beauty, at that.”
Caroline was Brother Sontag’s fifteen-year-old daughter. Because of her, I’d come to suspect that virtuous men produced ravishing children. However, if this were true then I was living proof my daddy had been either a hypocrite or tragically overlooked. God had blessed Caroline with her father’s olive complexion, her mother’s crimson lips, and the kind of blue-black hair typical among Native Americans. She'd once told me that her grandmother had been a full-blooded Cherokee Indian. If I’d ever been sure of anything, it was that Caroline Sontag would never need Cover Girl cosmetics the way I’d come to rely on them.
Every time Daddy mentioned Caroline’s name, I felt a pain that penetrated flesh, tore through tendons and ligaments, and burrowed deep into my bones. I was neither pretty nor musically gifted, so I didn’t measure up. That was what I heard him saying. And I thought if he’d wanted a naturally beautiful daughter like Caroline, maybe he should have married Caroline’s mother instead of a third-generation Irish immigrant. In my face, underneath my skin, I could feel a burn seeping.
Momma glanced at me, her head still bobbing as if attached to a coil, then zeroed in further. “Did you do something different to yourself?” She gave me a suspicious look. Two weeks earlier, I’d plucked my eyebrows out of pure boredom. She’d just now noticed.
“Change your makeup or something?” she asked, critically scanning my face for clues.
Kenny bent his head to take a better look at me. “I don’t see nothing different.”
“Oh!” Momma gasped. “That’s it! Ohmigosh, you shaved your eyebrows off.”
Momma wouldn’t have known the difference between shaving and tweezing. She’d never plucked anything other than a few corn-silk hairs now and again, and she’d probably last shaved her legs during Eisenhower’s administration. Her hair hung wild, like mine, only gray, and her weatherworn complexion revealed her skin care regimen, which included no facial creams or lotions of any variety. “That stuff doesn’t really make wrinkles go away,” she liked to say. Maybe so, but her choice of cleansers didn’t help matters. When she was out of Ivory, she washed her face with Daddy’s Lava.
“I didn’t shave them, Momma. I tweezed away the extras,” I said.
“Extras?” She knitted her own unibrow. “What extras?”
“The part that made me look like Groucho Marx.”
Ricky asked, “Which one was Groucho?” but Momma paid him no attention.
“Well, honey, there’s a new teen model out named Brooke… Brooke something.” She searched for help. “Wha— What’s her name, Jess?”
Daddy shrugged and continued sawing at his blackened beef.
“Anyway, she has eyebrows just like yours. Or like yours used to be. And she’s not worried about hers.”
“Fine. She can keep them, then.” Before anyone had the chance to say any more about my facial features, I announced, “We’ve got to leave at two-thirty ‘cause Kenny wants to watch the ball game from home.”
Daddy set down his stainless steel fork, giving Momma the cue. She grabbed her plate and raked it into Ricky’s, gathering scraps for the chickens.
“Well, I’m right proud to have ya’ll here anytime you can make it,” Daddy said with a tone I’d seldom heard. Any other time, Daddy would’ve spouted off his usual remarks, said sports were nothing but senseless wastes of human energy, suggested only brainless people knock their heads together intentionally.
I helped Momma clear the dishes and then said my goodbyes. Later, on my way to the car, I noticed Kenny standing behind the vehicle with the trunk open. Ricky flanked him, his eyes wide and hands clutching a brown paper bag. I thought how grown up Ricky looked, unlike his old portrait Momma kept on her dresser. His blond hair was beginning to darken, and he’d soon be as tall as I. Those Sunday trousers of his had climbed up and over his ankles, which caused me to grin. In some ways, I felt sorry for him. That Surfer Cross, which Daddy insisted was a swastika sign, hidden underneath his button-down shirt might have escaped Momma and Daddy’s attention but it hadn’t sneaked past mine. Poor kid. I knew what it was like to live with those two and try to stay in step with popular trends. I remembered how, when I was in eighth grade, Momma and Daddy had refused to let me play basketball on account of religious reasons. I’d been heartbroken the day Daddy said, “God never intended for girls to wear shorts in public.”
Kenny shut the trunk lid, and I wondered why he’d opened it. “Wha’choo two looking at in there?” I asked.
Kenny shook his head as though I’d said something ridiculous. “Just some junk I found at work the other day.” He smirked.
Nothing worth investigating, I decided. Probably an antique soda bottle or some seventy-eight records. I recalled Ricky’s paper sack. Maybe illegal fireworks.
A vague nausea, one I’d later identify as morning sickness but right then attributed to Momma’s pot roast, suddenly made me swoon. I held on to the Fury’s side panel and leaned through the lowered passenger-side window to release the door. Someday, I vowed, I’d own an automobile with handles that worked from the outside, one with dual-controlled electric windows, too. And I’d raise and lower mine whenever I wanted.
Frozen in thought, I rode home like a statue. Mentally, I dwelled on family, both the one I’d come from and the one I’d soon have. My hair whipped against my face, stinging my cheeks and slicing at my eyes. But I never complained. I simply sat there with my gaze fixed firmly on the American flag waving from the Plymouth’s antenna.
THREE
Some rural folks think of neighbors as security. However, Kenny and I never suffered that delusion. From the beginning, the Hendersons proved that living next door to them only increased our risks.
Over the sounds of a blaring televised football game, something blasted like a sonic boom. I heard Granny Henderson yell, “Fhar! Fhar!” She hobbled out onto the front porch, her arms waving above her like helicopter blades. Her right leg, which normally dragged behind her left, moved with newfound strength. Partially crippled since birth, she lurched about in ways I wouldn’t have thought possible as she announced that the other half of our duplex—her side—had ignited.
Mr. Henderson emerged with a grunt, the tips of his snowy hair broiled brown as toast, beard singed, his dungarees dusted with what looked like chalk dust. “Damned old woman. You just got to go runnin’ off before you know what’s what.”