Rabble Starkey

  I waited while Veronica chose, because I didn't want to go into the dressing room all alone. I didn't know if the lady would go in with us or what, and it made me sort of embarrassed.

  Finally Veronica picked out a blue dress, an old-timey style with little pearl buttons up to the neck, where there was a tiny ruffle.

  And after that we didn't even need to look anymore, or to spend time thinking or deciding. We tried them on, together in a little dressing room with mirrors all around, while the woman waited outside. Then when we said we was ready, she came in and smoothed the material over our shoulders and did the button that I missed in the middle of my back.

  "Well, I don't know which one of you looks more beautiful," she said. "Won't your daddy be pleased? You go right on out there and show him."

  When we did, Mr. Bigelow got a smile on his face that widened and widened. Veronica posed and turned around like a model, but I felt too shy. I just stood there in the green dress, hoping my posture was good.

  He looked at the tags that hung down from our sleeves, and I got nervous because I hadn't remembered to look at the price and make sure that I didn't pick an expensive one. But I guess not, because he nodded to the lady and told her that the dresses would be just fine.

  "Unless you want to try on some others?" he said to us.

  But we both shook our heads. Once you put on the perfect dress you don't want to try on something else and get your thinking all confused. There's no need.

  She put them in separate boxes so's we could each carry our own, going home.

  Back at the house, we modeled them again, for Sweet-Ho and Gunther, and this time we changed out of our sneakers and put on our good shoes, and this time I didn't feel so foolish about my posture and all, so I was able to walk and twirl like Veronica did.

  Gunther, setting there on Sweet-Ho's lap in his pj's, all ready for bed, clapped his hands like we was a show or something. He commenced to sing in a Ker-mit the Frog voice, "'It's not easy being green...'"

  We all laughed. It was easy being green, at least in that beautiful green-meadow dress.

  I saw the dictionary there on Mr. Bigelow's desk, and I picked it up and leafed through to the H pages.

  "'Hoyden,'" I read out loud. "That's what the part of the store was called," I explained to Sweet-Ho. "The part where we got the dresses.

  "'Hoyden. Bold girl,'" I read. I liked that. Standing there in the green flowered dress, feeling beautiful, I suddenly took a mind to do a thing that only a truly bold girl would do.

  I went over to Mr. Bigelow and put my arms around him and gave him a big hug.

  14

  We was all, girls and boys, supposed to meet at the party. Sweet-Ho drove me and Veronica. It isn't far to Diane's house, just down past the grocery store and over a couple of streets. But Sweet-Ho could tell we felt embarrassed, walking in our new dresses and carrying our present, the big bottle of cologne all wrapped up, with two different birthday cards.

  It feels okay just to be walking along in jeans, maybe carrying schoolbooks. But walking all dressed up, and with our hair washed and curled and all—well, what if someone from school saw us, maybe someone who wasn't invited, and if they made fun?

  Sweet-Ho pretended like she had to go to the store right then, and said since she was going anyway, in the car, why didn't she give us a ride to Diane's house? So we pretended like we really thought she needed groceries and said sure, we might as well keep her company in the car, even though we all of us knew that Diane's house was three blocks out of her way.

  Parker Condon's dad was just dropping him off, too, when we got there. I glanced over at him, playing like I was just looking over to admire the Briggses' mailbox, which was one of them mailboxes with pheasants painted on it. Somehow Parker had managed to slick down them spikes of hair that usually stick up in the back like insect feelers. And he was carrying his present in a brown paper bag; I could sympathize with that, because it must be even more embarrassing for a boy to carry a fancy, wrapped-up present.

  Veronica said hi to Parker, but I pretended like I didn't notice him, like I was all interested in that pheasanty mailbox.

  Then Norman Cox rode up on his bike, and lord, he was all gussied up, too. That very morning we was with him at Millie Bellows's house, and he was same as always, wearing a grubby shirt and foul sneakers while he pruned the bushes in her yard. Now, at two o'clock, he had on clean clothes and regular shoes, like he was going to church or something. He looked as if he had even had a bath. His hair had a part in it.

  He leaned his bike against the side of the Briggses' garage and we all of us went up to ring the doorbell.

  Most of the other people was already there, and it was strange inside. Everybody was just sitting there all dressed up, in the Briggses' family room: all the boys on one side, and all the girls on the other, and presents piled up on the Ping-Pong table, and all of us not looking over that way, pretending the presents wasn't there. Nobody was talking much. It was like we was all strangers in a Greyhound station or something.

  Mrs. Briggs kept coming in and passing stuff like Cokes and popcorn around. She commented nicely on all our dresses, and said polite stuff like "How's your family?" We all cringed when she asked Corrine Foster whether her mother had had her baby yet, and Corrine said no, not yet, and blushed.

  Finally Mrs. Briggs said, "Why don't you open all these lovely gifts, Diane?" so's we had to stop pretending the pile of presents wasn't there.

  You could tell that mothers had bought the boys' gifts. Well, maybe not Norman, because he had brought just what we had suggested, some art supplies in a paper bag from the hardware store, not even wrapped up, but Diane was some pleased. She said she didn't have any markers that good. We all tried out the markers, writing our names in different colors on the paper bag. Parker wrote his name in lime green, right under my purple.

  But the other boys had all brought presents wrapped in decorated paper, with bows made out of curly ribbon. One was a book, and one was a hair-brush-and-comb set, and one was some stationery that had a cartoon of a guy with a saxophone and said "Just a note" under it.

  Diane squirted all of the girls with the cologne me and Veronica brought, and then she tried to squirt the boys, but they all acted real macho and shoved her away. After that everybody started talking a little more.

  Next Mrs. Briggs put the movie into the VCR and set out a big bowl of popcorn, and we all sat down again, still boys on one side and girls on the other. Everybody had already seen The Karate Kid —Norman said he seen it twice—so we knew what was going to happen, and that made it better. We all yelled and cheered and stuff. When it ended, we all did karate moves, yelling "Hhhaaaaa" the way they do. And foolish old Parker Condon took the scarf that somebody gave Diane as a present, tied it around his waist like a black belt, and came at me with his hand made into a weapon aimed at my middle, so's I fell into a fit of giggling.

  When we started sitting down again, everybody was rearranged, so now boys was sitting next to girls all of a sudden, as if by accident. Some of us—me for one—had birthday wrapping ribbons tied around our foreheads like sweatbands for karate.

  Mrs. Briggs had come in during the movie and put a big paper tablecloth on the Ping-Pong table, and set up folding chairs around. Now she put Cokes at each place, and paper plates, and finally she brought in two big, loaded pizzas and told us it was time to eat. When we went to the table, we all just sat down girl-boy-girl-boy as if it was natural.

  I noticed that Parker, sitting next to me, smelled like sweat. But I couldn't fault him none for that because of the karate moves that required a lot of jumping around. I just hoped I didn't smell like sweat. But I figured that the cologne would cover it up if I did.

  Nobody liked anchovies, not a single person, except Diane. So we piled all the anchovies on a paper plate and sent them up to Diane at the end of the table, for an extra birthday present. Then we got the idea to pile all the mushrooms on another plate, and all the pepperonis on ano
ther, and all the green peppers, and like that. We fooled around a lot with them pizzas and didn't really eat much, to tell the truth. But it was fun.

  "You know what Jeff did once when he was little?" Peter Hardesty said. "He went out in the woods and picked a whole bunch of mushrooms and brought them home for his mother. But half of what he picked was poison! Good thing his mother knew to throw them all away!"

  Jeff Murphy, sitting up at the end of the table beside Diane—he was the boy she invited—got all embarrassed. "I was only five when I did that," he explained. "Anyway, Peter, I know something you did once. You guys wanta hear what Peter did?"

  We all called out, "Yeah!" So Jeff told about when all the guys was at Boy Scout camp together a couple of years ago, and when one of the counselors was in the outhouse Peter nailed the door shut on him, so he couldn't get out and had to yell for help, and Peter got into trouble. When Jeff was telling it, Peter kept pretending to hate it, but you could tell he was some proud for having thought of a trick like that.

  When we quit laughing, Diane swallowed the last anchovy and announced, "I got an idea for a game! We'll go around the table, and everybody gets a turn. And you have to tell some secret you know about somebody else at the table, okay?"

  "You go first, Diane!" Veronica said.

  Diane started in laughing. "Okay. I'll tell on Corrine!"

  "No fair!" Corrine Foster yelled.

  "You'll get your turn, Corrine," Diane said. "Anyway, this isn't so bad. One time Corrine and I were at the mall, just fooling around, and we were in that store that sells jeans and T-shirts, you know the one?"

  We all nodded. "Jeaneology, it's called," Veronica said. "Is that the one you mean?"

  "Oh, don't tell about that!" Corrine giggled, and covered her face with her hands.

  "Yeah, that's the one," Diane went on. "And when we started to go out, this alarm sounded, real loud."

  "What'd it sound like?" someone asked.

  Diane did a sound like a real loud buzzer.

  "What'd you do?"

  "Well, I was already outside," Diane went on, "but Corrine was standing there in the door, scared to move, and this alarm kept going. And a clerk came over to her, all stern, and took her by the arm."

  "Then what?"

  "He took her back in the store, so I followed behind, and when they got her to the counter where the cash register is, we could all see that there was a belt caught on her sweater. It was just hanging there, she didn't even know it was there. But the tag was still attached, of course, so it made the shoplifting alarm go off."

  "Did they call the police?"

  Corrine looked up, finally, and took her hands away from her face. "I've never been so embarrassed," she said. "Everybody was looking."

  "Well, they believed her," Diane said, "because of the way the belt was caught. If she'd wanted to steal it, she wouldn't hang it there on her sweater right where you could see it. So they let her go."

  "Lucky," someone said.

  Now Corrine was laughing, now that the story was all told.

  "And also," Diane added, "Corrine was crying."

  Corrine stopped laughing. "That's not fair, Diane! You didn't have to tell that!"

  Diane shrugged. "Well," she said, "it's true." She looked around. "You already did one, Jeff. So it's your turn, Veronica."

  I got all nervous because I knew the one Veronica would tell on was me. And Veronica knew all my secrets, every one. I looked at her, and she was grinning. "Let me think," she said. "I guess I'll tell one on Rabble."

  Everyone yelled and pointed at me. I looked down at the plate of pepperonis in front of me. I waited, all nervous.

  "Once upon a time," Veronica began, all dramatic-like, and everyone groaned. She started again. "Once upon a time, when Rabble was about nine years old, she found this old dried-up hornet's nest in the garage at the end of the summer. And she thought it was pretty; you know how nature-loving Rabble is?"

  Everybody said "Yeah," and I relaxed, because I knew what Veronica was going to tell, and it wasn't so bad. I felt a whole lot of gratitude to her, considering all the things she could've told on me.

  "So she brought it inside for her mother," Veronica went on, "and put it right in the middle of their kitchen table, like for a centerpiece?"

  "I bet hornets came out, didn't they?" Parker asked.

  "Yeah," Veronica said. "All these mad hornets came out and Rabble got stung right on her butt!"

  Everybody shrieked with laughter. Except me, of course. She didn't need to tell that part. I got stung on my elbow, too, and she didn't even mention that.

  Well, lord, we went round the table and everybody had a story on somebody else who was there. Some of them was just stupid, like Susan MacReady telling about the time when Diane thought she had chicken pox even though she'd had it already, but it turned out to be poison ivy.

  And some was cruel. Norman Cox did a cruel one, telling that Parker Condon had cheated on his history report, copying most of it out of the encyclopedia, so that Mrs. Hindler spoke to him private and made him do it over. Parker got all tensed up while Norman was telling it. He laughed, pretending like he was tough and didn't care. But we all knew how Parker's parents commanded him to get all A's so's he could go to the same college where his brother was, and how Parker was nervous all the time about it. So it was cruel to tell on him for cheating that wasn't even completely his fault.

  After Norman told, Parker yelled out, "Hhhaaaa" and did a fake karate chop across the table at him so's we was all able to start laughing and pretend to forget the cruelness. But I didn't forget. And I thought about a way to get even.

  That's why, when it was finally my turn—I was last—I said, "I have one to tell on Norman Cox."

  Everybody expected me to say "on Veronica" because Veronica and me has been best friends for so long. So they looked surprised. And Norman sure looked surprised, too.

  "On Halloween," I started, trying to make a story out of it the way everybody else had, "me and Veronica took Veronica's little brother out trick-or-treating. He was dressed up like a ballerina, with toe shoes and all."

  Everybody started laughing. "Gunther?" somebody yelled. "You dressed old Gunther up like a ballerina?"

  In the midst of all the laughing and shouting, I saw Veronica's face staring at me. She knew. She knew I was going to tell that Norman hit Millie Bellows in the face with a stone.

  I could see she was going to hate me for doing it.

  I continued on talking, and I could hear my voice describing how Gunther twirled around, and how he had a magic wand and all. But I was having a whole lot of thoughts at the same time. I was thinking about how Veronica had begun to like Norman Cox. And how her liking him had begun to make Norman act different. He was helping at Millie Bellows's house now, and being faithful to it, showing up every time, even though he complained.

  I was thinking, too, about what Norman could have told, when it was his turn. He could have told about the day he seen Veronica's mother go crazy and try to baptize Gunther in the creek. But he didn't.

  I heard myself say, "and while we was hauling old Gunther around in his ballerina costume, we saw Norman Cox and he didn't even know it. And he was wearing his mama's choir robe. Big man Norman Cox was all dressed up like a Presbyterian lady!"

  Everybody laughed, and that was it. I didn't say no more. While I watched, Veronica laughed, too, and started in to tease Norman, sitting next to her. Norman put his hands into a praying position and sang, "Rock of Ages, cleeffft for me—" in a high, girly voice.

  "AMEN!" we all sang. Then Mrs. Briggs brought in the birthday cake, and pretty soon the party was over.

  15

  Thanksgiving came, and so did Veronica's grandparents, all the way from Tennessee. I had met them before, of course, on other visits, but this was the first time we all sat at the same table together, with us girls wearing our new dresses. Her grandmother told stories about when Mr. Bigelow was a little boy Gunther's size. They called him "F
lip" then, short for Philip.

  Sweet-Ho had cooked a turkey, and me and Veronica had helped to mash up sweet potatoes and put marshmallows on top. Gunther agreed to taste the sweet potatoes, and he did, too; but I noticed that he only ate one bite and then went back to his Chef Boyardee.

  Millie Bellows came to our house for Thanksgiving dinner and even commented nicely on everything as if she was taking real pains not to be a grouch on account of it being a holiday and all. She even told about how we was helping her about the house. And she told about Thanksgivings when she was a girl and her brother Howard was still alive, how they used to have little mints at the table, set in paper baskets with Thanksgiving decorations painted on.

  Millie Bellows had four helpings of stuffing with gravy on top, and me and Veronica had to hold our napkins to our mouths to keep our laughing down, when she took the fourth.

  Grandma Bigelow sang a hymn for us, with the words "Sweet Hosanna" in it, and she taught us so we all sang it with her. Sweet-Ho said she remembered it from when she was a girl but she hadn't heard it since.

  We held hands around the table when we said grace.

  After dinner, Grandpa Bigelow lit up his pipe, and Millie Bellows fluttered her hands a bit in the air to indicate that the smoke was in her eyes and probably causing her to get cancer, but he didn't notice. Then Millie's head nodded while we was sitting there at the table after dessert, and she fell sound asleep and even snored some.

  Veronica told her grandparents about how their names was on her family tree at school, in the form of apples.

  "I hope I'm a Mcintosh apple," Grandma Bigelow said. "It's my favorite kind. Mcintosh makes the best pies."

  We all laughed because Grandma Bigelow was somewhat round and pink-colored, like a Mcintosh apple; and when we laughed Millie Bellows snorted a bit in her sleep and her eyelids fluttered, but she didn't wake up.

  "When Mrs. Hindler gives the family trees back," Veronica said to her grandma, "I'll send you mine in the mail, so you can see your apple."