Blue Skies

by Anne Bustard

  “Come in.”

  “Would you like some assistance, Glory Bea?” she asks, holding an empty cardboard box.

  “I don’t think so, thanks.”

  “Holler if you change your mind.”

  “Grams,” I say, sitting up. “Isn’t there something we can do to stop this? I’m his daughter. You’re his mother.”

  Grams smiles gently. “It’s your mama’s journey too.”

  She sets down the box next to my desk that spills over with valentines makings for my classmates and family. “They’re volunteering to chaperone with us at the Valentine’s Day Dance next week,” she says quietly, and tiptoes out.

  So Grams and Grandpa’s conversation was about Randall Horton wanting Mama’s help with the dance. Fine. Go. Go to the dance, Mama. It won’t matter. Daddy’s coming two days later.

  The wind outside is gusty. The tops of the trees sway like someone is standing on the ground, shaking their trunks. A bare branch snaps on the pecan outside my window—it is V-shaped and snagged by a lower branch.

  I glance at my closet door. I will start cleaning when that branch falls.

  A big gust of wind rattles my windows, and I move to the sill. The thin branch sails away.

  “There she blows,” hollers Grandpa from below.

  Grandpa and Randall Horton have moved their cleanup campaign to the front yard.

  Just like that, a bonus New Year’s resolution effort flies into my head and I zip downstairs and out the door.

  Randall Horton is picking up branches near the street, while Grandpa is closer to the house.

  I reach for a twig near Randall Horton and snap it in two. “I heard about you and Mama and the dance.”

  “Glad to help,” he says, straightening up. “I’ll miss the start but will come as soon as I finish up at the pharmacy.”

  “Well, seeing as you’re new to Gladiola and all, I thought you should know there’s an important tradition all the grown-up men follow.”

  I spot a weed in the grass next to my shoes and yank it out.

  “I’m all ears.”

  “Everyone comes in costume. I’m told one time Grandpa came as a pirate, but his all-time best was when he showed up as an armadillo.”

  Grandpa could have. Would have. If given the chance.

  “Wish I could have been there to see that, Glory Bea. I’m definitely going to have to think about this. Thanks for giving me the inside scoop.”

  “You’re welcome,” I say, and throw the weed onto the pile of debris. “Oh, I almost forgot. It’s always a surprise.”

  Randall Horton gives me a thumbs-up.

  That ought to keep him busy. The less time with Mama the better.

  “By the way, I need to learn how to play chess ASAP. Can you teach me?”

  I can’t believe I’m asking. But as Grams says: “Desperate times call for desperate measures.”

  “I’d be honored, Glory Bea. We can start after I finish here.”

  “Thank you, thank you,” I say, and zoom back inside.

  Grams is on the phone so I slow as I climb the stairs.

  “I love your plans,” she says. “A scavenger hunt that ends atop the water tower is a fitting introduction to your town. I’ll let you know if she’s afraid of heights.”

  She ends the call and begins another. “Connie, I’ve got a quick question for you.”

  Someone is about to have a big adventure.

  Upstairs, I begin grabbing clothes off the hangers and toss them onto my bed. I pick my shoes off the closet floor and add them to the pile. I move back and forth until my bed is a mound of dresses, skirts, blouses, and shoes to be excavated. I reach deep into the dark for the last few things, and my big toe slams into something hard. I hop back on one foot and crumble to the floor, rocking back and forth to ease the pain.

  My jack-in-the-box. It was a birthday gift from Daddy. I pick it up and hold it tight. I think about how I would sit on Daddy’s lap, buried in his arms, and wind it up. Every time the clown popped up, I’d scream, half-scared, half-excited. Daddy was always there with a hug and a laugh.

  “Don’t be afraid, sweet pea,” he’d say, and I’d wind it up again.

  * * *

  An hour later, there’s a knock on my door. “Randall can give you a quick lesson before dinner,” Grandpa says.

  I join him in the study downstairs.

  “Pretend like I’ve never played before,” I tell Randall Horton. Because it’s true.

  “Each piece has a different role and moves in a different way,” he says, and he shows me what they can do.

  We clear the board and I practice moving the white pieces.

  “Most times, the game is won by checkmate.”

  There’s a monumental amount to learn, and my head is already full. “Thanks for the lesson,” I say. “I need to go and help with dinner.”

  “You’re a quick learner, Glory Bea. Let me know when you’re ready for round two. Your daddy would be proud of you, you know.”

  “Thanks.” I don’t correct him, but he should have used the present tense. Is proud.

  The Most Important French Words and Phrases (According to Moi)

  Je t’aime (Zhuh tem) I love you

  Oh là là (O la la) Oh boy!

  Je suis si heureux de vous revoir! (Zhuh swee see ehruh da vu rev wah) I am so happy to see you again!

  Tu me manques tellement (Too meh manck telemon) I miss you so much

  Bon retour de la France (Bohn reh tour da la France) Welcome home/back from France

  Did You Know?

  Gladiola Gazette

  February 9, 1948

  Are your hearts all aflutter, Gladies?

  Tickets for the annual Valentine’s Day Dance at Gladiola Primary and Intermediate are almost sold out. Proceeds will benefit the school library. Don’t delay! Something unforgettable always transpires.

  Remember who won the “Name That Love Song” contest last year?*

  Daisy Smithers’s answer to Grant Jordan’s proposal in 1940?*

  The champions of our longest-ever jitterbug marathon in 1944?*

  What, oh what, will ensue this year?

  No interest in cutting a rug? There’s still a place on the dance floor for you. To chaperone, call Mrs. Jerald Andersen, #27, today.

  Finally, as a public service, devoted readers, I’d like to remind you (in French, the language of love) of the most perfect and popular gift ideas for your amour: bouquet des fleurs (bouquet of flowers), des bonbons (candy), du parfum (perfume), des bijoux (jewelry).

  So now you know, dear Gladies, now you know,

  Penny Pfluger

  *Conner McGrath (age 10, visiting from Houston), grandson of Mr. and Mrs. Steven McGrath; Daisy declined (she and Grant were 7 years old); Coach Allen and Miss Betty X. Johnson (both over 21).

  thirty-eight

  ON THE EVE of Valentine’s Day, I sit at my desk adding an extra helping of silver glitter to a paper heart that says Be Mine when Mama calls me for supper. Other valentines that I’ve spent the last two afternoons decorating cover my floor and dresser and desk. Valentines that I signed in red pencil with my name and title—Glory Bea Bennett, Matchmaker Extraordinaire.

  I am in serious need of success.

  Sometimes you have to take decisive action. I slide down the banister, land on my feet, and run to the phone.

  “Miss Connie, please connect me to number twenty-nine.”

  “You mean your next-door neighbors, oui?”

  “Oui.”

  “Mademoiselle Bennett, can’t you just walk over there instead of tying up the line?”

  I don’t answer.

  Ring. Ring.

  “Truman here.”

  “Mr. Truman, may I please speak to Ben?”

  “Glory Bea, is that you? Why don’t you just come over?”

  I twist the phone cord around my free hand.

  “Ben. Telephone.”

  “Hello.”

  “Would you like to take Ru
by Jane Pfluger to the Valentine’s Day Dance?”

  “No.”

  “Are you sure? She’s really nice and I think she likes you.”

  “No.”

  “Is that a yes no, a maybe no, or a no no?”

  “Double no.”

  “Okay, bye.”

  That didn’t go so well.

  “Uh, Glory Bea,” says Ben.

  “Yes.”

  “You can tell Ruby Jane to save a dance for me.”

  “I will.”

  I put the receiver to my heart and hold it tight.

  “Allô?” says Miss Connie. “Allô? Glory Bea. Either hang up or ask me to make another call.”

  Ruby Jane answers on the first ring.

  “Ben requested that you save a dance for him tomorrow night.”

  I pull the receiver away from my ear and cover it with my palm as fast as I can.

  When my friend takes a breath from screaming, I jump back in. “You won’t be going to the dance with him like you’d hoped. No double date.”

  “This is a start, right?” says Ruby Jane.

  “Right.”

  “Good, because I made a valentine for him that I’ll slip into his locker before school. I signed it ‘From Your Secret Admirer.’ What do you think?” she asks me.

  “Why not?”

  “Exactly,” says Ruby Jane.

  thirty-nine

  RUBY JANE got one more valentine than everyone else in our class today. Only, not from Ben. Our classmate Toby Mickelson sent it via his mama from his hospital bed, where he is in traction for a broken leg. “I guess it’s because I dropped by after my first-aid class on Saturday and played checkers,” Ruby Jane says.

  “I guess,” I answer.

  * * *

  The Valentine’s Day Dance begins at six thirty. Ruby Jane and I are ready at four. I wear my pink poodle skirt, white blouse, and pink sweater. She wears her red party dress. Her hair is pulled off her face with two white barrettes. Soft curls fall to her shoulders. Her perm has relaxed. This is the look we were after two weeks ago.

  Ruby Jane’s coat lies across the back of my desk chair. She reaches into the pocket, pulls something out, and slips it behind her back. “Guess.”

  “Right,” I say.

  Ruby Jane brings her hands in front of her and opens up her right hand.

  “Lipstick? You get to wear lipstick?”

  “Not just me. Us. It’s called First Dance.”

  “It’s perfect,” we both say at the same time.

  “Just don’t tell my mama,” I say.

  “Never,” says Ruby Jane, and puts a line of blushing pink on the top of my hand between my thumb and forefinger to check the color. “It was made for you,” she says.

  “Look at this wall,” I say, pointing to the one behind my dresser. “Imagine a photo of you and Ben.”

  Ruby Jane’s eyes crinkle. “If that happens—”

  “No, when that happens,” I interrupt.

  Ruby Jane twirls. “It would be the best thing ever.”

  Almost.

  Since we want to be wrinkle free, we stand beside the kitchen counter and eat Grams’s deluxe homemade burgers. For extra insurance, we cover up with aprons so we won’t drip mustard and ketchup onto our clothes.

  “Grams,” I ask, “may I put in a request for meat loaf, mashed potatoes, green beans, and pecan pie for supper on the sixteenth?” It’s Daddy’s favorite.

  “You surely may,” she says.

  “Très bien, merci!” I say, and kiss her on each cheek.

  After supper, Grandpa volunteers for kitchen duty, and Grams hightails it to my school to help set up. Ruby Jane and I move to the parlor and stand by the blue wing chairs while I quiz her on current events.

  When Grandpa walks in with his gold watch in his hand and announces it is six fifteen, we put on our coats. There is a most enormous bouquet of red carnations on the front table. Grandpa must have used up all his savings. I lean in to take in the smells. That’s when I see the card with print like an architect’s.

  I shake off the name. Randall Horton can send all the flowers he wants. My daddy is coming back the day after tomorrow, and Randall Horton will be known as a friend of the family.

  * * *

  Red and white streamers and balloons hang from the ceiling of the school cafeteria turned dance hall, along with paper hearts. Chairs ring the room. Folks cluster in groups holding punch cups or are on the dance floor.

  The band onstage wears top hats. Our school principal plays fiddle, and Mr. McGrath the guitar. They start “I’m Looking Over a Four-Leaf Clover.”

  I clutch my bracelet. Ruby Jane holds her arms tight across her body and twists in time to the music. Her curls move from side to side just so.

  “I am so nervous, I can hardly stand it,” she says.

  Delilah and Harry Ackerman swing and sway to the music. Minus her baton.

  “Look, there’s Ben, on the far side of the floor with Claire,” I say.

  Ruby Jane springs in place.

  Ben whirls Claire around. They make their way over to us when the song ends.

  “Fruit punch, everyone?” Ben asks.

  “In a minute,” says Claire. “I’m going to the powder room.”

  “YES, PLEASE,” says Ruby Jane, and looks him in the eye.

  She sounds good. Confident, even. The shouting? It doesn’t matter. It’s already noisy in here.

  “There’s someone I need to catch,” I say. “See you later.” Ruby Jane is ready. She can do this.

  The band strikes up “Till the End of Time.” And I start to back away. Ben holds out his hand to Ruby Jane and leads her onto the dance floor. Fruit punch can wait.

  Ruby Jane and her curls bounce to the center of the room.

  My favorite dance partners bound over when the song ends, and Ben asks me to dance next.

  “Me?”

  “You.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  He takes my right hand. It isn’t hot in the cafeteria, but I feel warm.

  Two steps into the dance, the band stops midsong.

  Whispers fill the room and folks stand still. Randall Horton escorts Mama through the parting crowd.

  Romeo? He’s dressed as Romeo? With tights? A tunic? A sword?

  He looks perfectly ridiculous.

  “Now I’ve seen everything,” says Ben.

  Someone claps. Another joins in. Suddenly the whole room, except me, cheers.

  This is not the plan.

  Randall Horton bows to Mama. The band starts up. And they dance.

  I flee to the bathroom.

  The door swings open. Miss Connie and Ruby Jane’s mama enter.

  I slip into a stall before they can see me.

  “C’est l’amour,” says Miss Connie. “Now, that is love. Randall Horton is a certified romantic.”

  “So creative,” says Mrs. Pfluger. “I couldn’t imagine why he needed Homer’s plastic sword. Of course I said he could borrow it, especially since Randall harbored Homer and Ruby Jane in the pharmacy during the hailstorm last week.”

  That man ruins everything.

  * * *

  “May I have your attention, please,” says Mr. McGrath from the bandstand, and he waits for a hush to come over the room. “It is time to announce this year’s Valentine royal couple.”

  Mr. James from the Gladiola Gazette has his camera ready.

  I spot Delilah between Harry and her daddy.

  “Will Miss Shelley Darrow and Mr. Howard Leavitt please come to the stage.”

  Delilah bites on her lower lip. She looks like someone stole her favorite baton.

  Harry and her daddy talk to her from each side, and whatever they say helps her smile.

  “There you are,” says Mama as I skirt around the tables that ring the dance floor. “Have you said hello to Randall yet tonight?”

  I wiggle my fingers in his direction.

  “As you can see,” says Mama, “Randall’s starting a new traditio
n.”

  “It might catch on,” he says with a wink to me.

  He didn’t tell her?

  “Really?” I ask.

  “Why not?” says Mama, linking her elbow in mine. “Now come on—it’s photo time.”

  “Thanks,” I mouth to Randall Horton as we head to the corner of the room.

  Without missing a step, he does a quick bow from his waist.

  Mama and Randall Horton are scheduled to take pictures for the next hour. Grandpa has painted the backdrop—a big red heart. He and Grams were the first duo on duty.

  “As the designated photographer for a few more minutes,” Grandpa says as we walk up, “I insist on a picture of you three.”

  Mama, Randall Horton, and I pose. I don’t want to smile. However, Randall Horton just did me a favor and Grams is by Grandpa making funny faces.

  * * *

  Back home, Grams, Grandpa, Mama, and I place valentines under each other’s pillows and say good night.

  In my room, I sit at my desk and open their cards. Grandpa’s is funny, and Mama’s and Grams’s are mushy.

  I have one more valentine to sign—the best one of all. I reach for my pen and write, I love you, Daddy. Your Glory Bea.

  I stand the card on the top of my dresser beside his photo and blow him a kiss. Sparkles of glitter sprinkle around him. A few stick to his picture. One settles over his heart.

  “See you the day after tomorrow.”

  forty

  TODAY IS the day.

  A kaleidoscope-of-monarchs-in-my-stomach kind of day.

  I ensure that my WELCOME HOME DADDY! poster is still under my bed. I’ll retrieve it later and tape it to the railing upstairs.

  I look out my bedroom window toward the train station and squint real good. I can make out the American flag waving on top of the building against the clear sky, all the way at the end of Main. Mr. McGrath was wrong about the weather.

  “Blue-sky day, Daddy,” I say, turning from the window to his picture. “Our favorite kind.”

  “Ready, sugar?” calls Mama.

  My hair ribbon has vanished, but it is time to go.