“Just the same, Alice, I think it would make for a happier birthday for your father if she didn’t come.”
After she hung up, I started worrying whether Dad would enjoy the party more if Janice wasn’t coming. How could I not invite his assistant manager, though? And was it even possible to dis-invite someone after they’d already been asked?
I imagined calling Janice Sherman and suggesting she may not want to come because we didn’t have enough chairs. I imagined her telling Dad the next day that she resigned.
Patrick always seems to know what to do in social situations, so I called him and asked if there was some way we could dis-invite Janice Sherman without hurting her feelings. He said they had an etiquette book and he’d look it up and call me back.
Five minutes later, he called. “Here’s what it says,” he told me.
In the unfortunate circumstance of having invited guests who would now be unwelcome in your home, or who you discovered belatedly would add to the discomfiture of the others, there is no acceptable way to inform them that they are no longer expected to attend. One would only hope that they would themselves realize the true nature of your feelings, and decline the invitation. In the event they do not, you may wish to cancel the entire event and reschedule it for another day, omitting this time, of course, the names of the now undesirable persons who were invited previously.
“Cancel the whole party and plan it for another day?” I croaked, knowing that if I even made it through the rest of this week, I should get a medal. “Forget it, Patrick. Whatever’s going to happen will happen, and there’s not a thing we can do about it.”
If I had to sum up seventh grade in seven words, they’d be: “There’s nothing you can do about it.” It’s opening your eyes every morning and knowing that a whole day’s just waiting to happen and you’re going to be caught up in it, ready or not. I could plan all I wanted, but I was stuck with whatever name the boys in the cafeteria called me; I could clean the house, but it only stayed as clean as Dad and Lester allowed it to be; I could play up to Miss Summers till my eyes rolled out of my head, and it wouldn’t make any difference as to whether she married Dad or not; ditto with Les and Marilyn or Crystal.
There were problems everywhere I looked, all waiting for the Woman of the House, who wasn’t even thirteen yet.
16
RESEARCHING N.C.
FRIDAY BEGAN JUST LIKE ANY OTHER day. I stumbled out of bed when Dad knocked on the door of my room, groped around in the closet and grabbed whatever I touched first, then tried to find something to go with it.
I waved my hand in front of Lester’s face at the breakfast table to see if he was functioning, beat him to the comics, shared a grapefruit with Dad, and changed my earrings twice before leaving to catch the bus.
I sat with Elizabeth and heard her say, for the hundredth time, that she was going to be a nun because she couldn’t stand the thought of getting pregnant, but that if she did get married, she’d never have children, and if she did have children, it would be only one, just to see what it was like. Being pregnant, I mean, not the kid.
Miss Summers looked beautiful in a cream-colored skirt and sweater with gold earrings and necklace, and I wondered how Dad could keep from proposing on the spot.
“She’s your dad’s girlfriend, huh?” Denise said, before the bell rang. I guess it was getting around in spite of everything.
“Well, they go out together, that’s all,” I said. I didn’t want it to seem like a big thing. “How old do you think she is, Denise?”
Denise studied Miss Summers. “Thirty-five, maybe? No, more like forty.”
“That’s what I figured. Forty-two, I’ll bet.”
“How old is your dad?”
“Fifty tomorrow.”
“Fifty! He’s old enough to be your grandfather!”
I wondered if that was true. Well, technically, I guess. If Dad had married at sixteen and had a son the same year, and the son married at sixteen and I was born that year, Dad would now be my grandfather. Of course, if he’d had me instead of a son at sixteen, that would make me thirty-six years old right now, close to Miss Summers’s age. I wondered if I’d ever look like her when I was thirty-six.
“Alice?” Miss Summers was saying, and I realized that the whole class had grown quiet. “Do you want to start?”
“Huh?” I said. “Oh … yeah! Sure!” And I opened my book to read a poem by Robert Frost.
It happened right after lunch. Pamela, Elizabeth, and I were going to go outside and sit on the steps in the sun. We took our trays over to the tray-return window, and started for the door. We had just passed the boys at the last table when Brian Brewster said, “Hey, Wyoming! Hey, North Carolina and Illinois!”
Pamela flashed them a little smile and Elizabeth stared straight ahead, and I took a couple quick steps to keep up with them, the way I always do, when all of a sudden it clicked: North Carolina.
I looked around. There weren’t any other girls nearby. Had I heard right? I glanced over my shoulder.
“Hey, North Carolina!” another boy said, looking right at me. “You, in green! How ya’ doin’?”
It was me! I was the only one in green. I was noticed! Initiated! I was named!
“They named you!” Pamela said after we got out in the hall. “At last!”
“North Carolina!” said Elizabeth, sounding cautiously cheerful.
I tried to think of everything I knew about North Carolina. I didn’t know anything. I didn’t even know the capital. Was it flat? Was it hilly? Was it big? Was it depressed?
“Quick!” I said to Elizabeth. “Tell me everything you know about North Carolina.”
She stopped to get a drink from the fountain and looked thoughtful. “They grow tobacco,” she said tentatively.
“What else?” I pleaded, turning to Pamela. “Think! What do you know about North Carolina?”
“The Outer Banks,” she said. “I think there’s a string of islands or something off the coast. I’m not sure.”
We sat down on the steps just outside the front door.
“Hi, N.C.,” a guy said to me, coming out. He smiled when he said it.
Was that a smile, or was that a grin? A leer? N.C. That was me now. The way he said it made it sound like “Nancy.” Where was it exactly on the map? I couldn’t think. Why hadn’t I paid more attention to that puzzle map Uncle Milt had sent me one year for Christmas? What was it famous for besides tobacco? Did I have tobacco breath, and I don’t even smoke? Were my teeth yellow?
“I can’t stand it any longer,” I told Pamela and Elizabeth. “I’ve got to go research North Carolina. See you later.”
I hurried back in to the library. Patrick was going down the hall with his drumsticks from band practice. I grabbed his arm.
“Patrick, what’s in North Carolina? Tell me everything you know!” I begged.
“Cape Hatteras,” he said.
“What’s that?”
“Someplace where there are a lot of shipwrecks,” he said.
My heart was beginning to sink. “What else?”
He thought. “Dismal Swamp.”
“Patrick!”
“Hey, don’t yell at me! I didn’t put it there. What’s the matter with you, anyway?”
“The boys named me North Carolina. That’s my name, now. Is that all I am, a Dismal Swamp? A place for shipwrecks?” I could feel tears in my eyes again. You sure do get a lot of tears in seventh grade.
“Don’t be dumb,” he said, and went on down the hall.
I walked on. Well, someone had sat down with a map and figured out that there was something about North Carolina that was me. I had to find out what.
I got to the library and tore over to the reference books. We have two sets of encyclopedias in our library, and both of the N books were taken. I mean, is Life out to get me, or what?
There was a topographical globe on the other side of the library, and I went over to check out the elevation of North Carolina, but the
continent wasn’t divided into states, so you couldn’t tell where North Carolina was. My stomach hurt. My palms were sweaty.
Anyone who thinks junior high is easy doesn’t remember junior high. Anyone who thinks this is the best time of our lives hasn’t had much of a life.
Across the room, I saw a guy put down one of the N encyclopedias, and I dashed over and took it to a chair in one corner. I didn’t want anyone to see me reading it. Didn’t want anyone to know what I was looking up, or what I found after I did.
I opened the World Book encyclopedia to North Carolina and looked up the section called “Land Regions.” It talked about low level marshland, moss-hung trees, the Dismal Swamp, and grassy prairies. And then my eye caught the word mountain. It actually said mountain! My heart raced.
The Blue Ridge region is named for the Blue Ridge Mountains, North Carolina’s chief range.
Joy in the morning!
Several mountain ranges make up the northern and western part of the Blue Ridge region. They include the Iron, Stone, Unaka, Bald, Great Smoky, and Black mountains.
I swallowed. I was bald, stone, and smoky? It was all I could do to read on. And then my eye fell on this sentence:
The Blue Ridge region rises from the Piedmont Plateau to heights of more than one mile above sea level. Mount Mitchell rises 6,684 feet and is the highest peak east of the Mississippi River.
I wanted to scream! I wanted to dance! Mount Mitchell was the highest peak east of the Mississippi River, and Mount Mitchell was me?
I couldn’t believe it! I got up and didn’t even think to put the encyclopedia back. I stood straight, head up, chest out, my Mount Mitchells protruding proudly out in front, and for just a moment that afternoon, when I first stepped out of the shower in the gym, I didn’t wrap the towel around me.
As soon as Dad and Lester were seated at the table that night, I said, “I’m North Carolina.”
“Congratulations,” said Lester. “What were you yesterday? Napoleon?”
“It’s what the guys named me, Lester! That’s the state they chose. And Mount Mitchell is the highest peak east of the Mississippi River!”
“I’m glad you’re taking an interest in geography,” said Dad.
17
BEING MISS SUMMERS
WHEN I WENT TO MY JOB AT THE MELODY Inn the next day, Loretta said to me, “Lie low, Alice. Janice is in one of her moods.”
I took the Windex and began cleaning the glass of the revolving display case. “What is it this time?” I asked.
“I think she broke up with the oboe instructor. She asked if I wanted to ride with her to your dad’s party tonight, since she would be going alone.”
Uh-oh, I thought, and realized for the first time that of the twelve people now who would be there, only three were males, Patrick included.
When I went over to the sheet music department later to see if Janice had any filing for me to do, she was going over receipts. She had on a blouse with a bow tie that made her look like a neatly tied-up package, with all the loose ends, along with her feelings, tucked in. She always wore her glasses on a chain around her neck, so she could pop them on and off when necessary, and you sometimes had the thought that if anybody gave that chain a tug, she would fly into a million pieces.
“Hi,” I said. “Any filing for me today?”
“There’s some violin music over by the window, Alice. You could start on that. Look on the invoice because there’s been a change in price. The stickers are there on my desk.”
I set right to work.
“I hope,” she said after a minute, “it’s not too late to tell you that Woody will not be coming with me tonight.”
“Oh, no, it’s okay,” I said.
There was more silence while I started in on the price stickers. But when I stood up to file the music, she added, “Of course I can’t tell your father that Woody isn’t coming, since he doesn’t even know about the party, but after I get there tonight, it might be a good idea if your father knew that … uh … well, Woody and I aren’t going out together anymore.”
In other words, she was available.
“He’ll probably figure that out for himself,” I said cheerfully, but she didn’t answer.
At twelve, I winked at Loretta, then went over to Dad, who was helping a family select a child’s trumpet, and kissed him on the cheek.
“Come home right after the store closes tonight, Dad,” I reminded him. “I’m baking you a cake, remember.”
“Is that a threat?” Dad joked. “Okay, sweetheart. I’ll be there.”
I went outside and down to the corner where I promised I’d meet Miss Summers, and only waited a minute or two before her car pulled up and I got in.
It had a wonderful smell, and I realized it wasn’t the upholstery, it was her. Jasmine or something.
“Hi,” I said.
“Hello, Alice. How’s it going? Still a secret, do you think?” The car glided out into traffic the same way Miss Summers glides in and out of the classroom at school. She was wearing slacks, with a loose shirt as a top, the cuffs rolled up to her elbows. There were little pleats down the front of the shirt, and she had on loafers.
“I think so. As far as he knows, Lester and I are just having a little birthday supper for him ourselves.”
“Good.”
When we pulled into the supermarket parking lot, I realized that this was the first time we had ever gone out in public together—just Miss Summers and me. And suddenly I wanted everyone to see us. I wanted to find everyone I knew in the supermarket—wanted them all to see the woman who was probably … well, likely to … well, maybe would marry my dad.
There wasn’t anybody in the supermarket I knew, unfortunately. But I kept imagining that people were staring at us anyway, wondering: Who is that beautiful woman with her attractive daughter?
“What shall we start with first?” she asked. “Are you having a salad, Alice?”
I nodded, so we picked out some lettuce, and Miss Summers added fresh spinach leaves. She told me that if I put in some thinly sliced purple onions and white mushrooms they would be beautiful against the dark green of the spinach.
It was the first time I heard anyone talk about a salad as beautiful. But of course, what other kind of salad would Miss Summers make?
Next we chose the baking potatoes, then went to the meat counter for steaks. Miss Summers found some on sale.
Then it was the stuff for the pineapple upside-down cake (I had the recipe in my pocket) and a few jars of olives, some napkins, and ginger ale.…
Miss Summers said she’d contribute some Brie, which I had never heard of before, but it was some kind of cheese that looked like it was melting on the inside. Dad had given me money for groceries that morning, and Miss Summers paid for the steaks and the cheese. Then we were off to her place.
We talked about cake on the way—what our favorites are: She likes poppy seed and I like chocolate fudge. In the car, I rested one arm on the window just as she did. I put out one foot in front of the other, as she did on the gas pedal. She tipped her head back a little when she laughed, and so did I. I know that anyone who saw us together thought we were mother and daughter, even though her hair is brown and mine is reddish blond.
Miss Summers’s house wasn’t exactly the way I had imagined it. I guess I thought there would be filmy curtains at all the windows and flowers in every room, but it was more like a pin cushion. I mean, the rooms were filled with an assortment of stuff—a jumble of photographs along one wall, books everywhere, baskets of knitting yarn with glorious colors spilling out onto the floor, magazines, a jacket on one chair, blouse on another. A pair of shoes lay just inside the door, and she kicked them aside when we went in. I could see off into her bedroom, and the bed wasn’t even made. She’d fit into our household perfectly, I was thinking.
“Let’s put the groceries in the refrigerator to keep them cold while we make the cake,” she said, and pulled out the flour and sugar canisters while I read
Mom’s recipe aloud. I showed her where Mom had written Ben’s favorite on one side.
As we were mixing the batter, she said, “What do you remember of your mother, Alice?”
“Not very much,” I told her. “I remember some things, but then I’m never sure if it was her or Aunt Sally who did them. A lot of the time I get them mixed up.”
“That’s natural. You were only five, weren’t you?”
I nodded.
She showed me how to add the leftover pineapple juice in place of water in the recipe, and a bit of almond flavoring. We had fun arranging the pineapple slices and pecans and maraschino cherries at the bottom of the pan, along with the butter and sugar mixture, and then we poured the batter on top.
“Your dad is very fond of you, you know.” Miss Summers smiled as she ran the rubber scraper around the pan. “This will please him very much.”
And before I could stop myself, I said, “He’s very fond of you, too.”
I thought she’d just smile or laugh or something, but instead she grew serious, and that was the only time all day I got a sort of sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.
“I like your dad very much, Alice,” she said. But she still didn’t say love, she didn’t even say “fond of.” And the way she got serious made me decide not to ask her any more, because I was afraid I might not like the answer.
But maybe that’s the way grown-up people fall in love. Middle-aged people, I mean. They start out going to a Messiah concert and then they become friends. They get to liking each other more and more, and it slowly turns to love, like leaves changing color on a tree. And finally they decide they want to spend their whole lives with that one particular person. Maybe Dad and Miss Summers were still changing colors.
“I like your house,” I told her.
“So do I.” Now she was smiling again. “It’s just a little thing, really, but big enough for me, and comfortable. All my favorite things are in it; I love coming home at night.”