When we stand there frozen, she yells, Don’t just stand there like ignoramuses. Yall heard me, go get your damn school things!
I race to my room where I have my brown-and-gold dress with the drifting leaves laid on the chair. I scoop it up, along with my slip, panties, socks, and cordovan tassel loafers. These loafers are my all-time favorite shoes, hand-me-downs from my teenage cousin and broken-in just right. When I wear them, I feel like a cheerleader who writes poetry, like I have a guaranteed good future.
Lulu says, Sidda, can I bring my turtle?
I say, Shut up, Lulu!
Then I grab my book sack, take my little sister by the hand, and fly down the hall to the kitchen door. As I run, I can see the couch, the TV set, and the piano from the corner of my eye. All our familiar things look foreign to me, and for just a second I can’t remember where I am or what I have done in my life before right now.
Mama is already in the car with nothing but her nightgown, crutches, and purse. She’s smoking and leaning on the horn, cussing at Daddy, who is nowhere in sight. I’m so frenzied, I drop my book sack, and all my papers fly everywhere. Crayons roll under the car.
One of my loafers falls on the concrete and I reach down to get it, but Mama yells, Sidda, get in the goddamn car!
Then she backs the car out of the long driveway and speeds down the gravel road—away from the house. We are all keyed up. We are quivering with fear and excitement at leaving the house so late on a school night.
We quiz her, Where’re we going, Mama? Where’re we going?
We’re going to Buggy’s, she explains and I breathe with relief to hear she has some kind of plan. Maybe this isn’t so bad after all, I think. Maybe she’s got this all mapped out. Maybe I’m being delivered into the life I was meant for. I love spending the night at my grandmother’s old house near City Park. You get to stay up late there and walk to school. It’s like a little vacation, if you don’t mind her dog and kneeling to pray all the time.
But halfway down the road lined with old pecan trees that leads away from our house, Mama slams on the brakes and turns the car around.
I’m not losing every single thing I deserve because that bastard claims I run out on him! she yells. We’re going back! That sonovabitch is not going to get rid of me this goddamn easy!
She squeals the car back under the carport. I walk toward the end of the driveway to catch my breath. But Mama yells at me and I walk back into the house that is all quiet except for the sound of the air conditioner that Mama leaves running till Halloween. I don’t let myself look at the furniture like I did on the way out. I go in the bathroom and run cold water on a washrag and put it on my forehead, like you’re supposed to do when you’re upset. Then I sit in my bed with my flashlight and try to straighten out my school things, which have gotten all messed up in the big getaway.
I don’t sleep that night and I keep having a hard time getting my breath. I wish I had a fan blowing straight on me so I could get some air into my body.
The next day at school, my head hurts and the back of my eyes burn. It’s Friday, the day for my last piano lesson before my recital. Sister Philomena asks me to rehearse every move—the way I’m supposed to lift my hands to the keyboard before beginning the performance, the exact way I should gracefully rest them in my lap after the piece is over, my perfectly rehearsed curtsy. I try to picture smiling faces applauding for me, but all I can think of is how jumbled up all my school papers are, and how there are some important things missing from the night before that I can’t seem to find.
When I play for Sister Philomena, I don’t miss any notes, but my timing is way off.
She says, Siddalee, be sure to give yourself some quiet practice time this weekend. And on Sunday, go to Holy Communion. Offer the recital up to the Baby Jesus and everything will be fine. He will give His angels charge concerning you to guard you in all your ways.
But there’s no chance to practice on Saturday. The day is devoted to converting our schoolroom into Mama’s new bedroom. Daddy is nowhere in sight. Mama and Chaney rip down the blackboards from the walls. They haul out our desks, our toy boxes, and the tall shelves with the set of World Books. In their place, Mama moves in a Hollywood bed she gets delivered from Holden’s Fine Furniture, along with a matching nightstand and a new portable TV set. Before, no one was even allowed to smoke in that room because it was just for children. It was all ours. But now it is Mama’s new bedroom, and she has her silver and crystal ashtray with “Ya-Yas, 1960” engraved on the side right there on her new night table.
On the day of the recital, I’m real tired but still sure of myself. I really know “The Elf and the Fairy.” Those notes won’t abandon me in my powder blue dressy dress and patent leather shoes, with my hair rolled into a French twist, Mama’s favorite style. I fast my three hours before Communion. But at Mass, the Sacred Host sticks to the roof of my mouth and makes me nauseated. I feel like spitting up on the floor, but a mortal sin like that could easily take away my power of speech and make me grow a harelip to boot.
That Sunday afternoon the Divine Compassion auditorium is filled with mothers and fathers and aunts and grandmothers and the smell of floral arrangements and floor varnish.
Mama hugs me tightly and whispers, I adore you!
I join the music students in the front row. I perch on my folding chair with my feet crossed at the ankles and off to one side like we’re supposed to do. I watch the other students, one by one, rise from their seats, climb the steps to the high stage, and plunk out their recital pieces. Each one of them looks so afraid. I almost pity them. They’re so insecure, so ill-composed. I feel utterly calm; I do not even feel like a child.
When it’s my turn, I sit down at the piano. My hands are steady, my hair is clean, my heart is true. But the moment I hit the first note, somebody else’s hands—wild, shaking, and ignorant—take over. At first I’m only kind of curious and dizzy. It takes me eight entire measures to realize that I am the one producing the crazy frantic noise. I am confused, because part of me can actually hear myself playing the music impeccably. But the other part of me knows that the only thing left of “The Elf and the Fairy” is the phrasing. The rest is ugly, unrelated notes that crash through the thick air in that gymnasium. Inside myself, I can hear all the beauty, but my body can’t respond. And I don’t even consider just giving up. I keep on playing because I have to. And because I truly believe that I will finally discover the right notes and lead the audience into my elf and fairy world, where peaceful out-of-state light glimmers and cleanses and redeems.
I cannot stop myself. I attack the keyboard for the exact length of time it would’ve taken me to perform the piece like it’s written. But not once do I manage to hit a note that sounds anything like the music I have spent months rehearsing.
When I finish, I am sweating all over. I stand up from the piano in a trance and curtsy like I’ve practiced a hundred times in front of the mirror. I look out into the audience. Even the other children are silent and wide-eyed. All the mothers are wiping tears from their eyes. I hate them all. Afterward they walk by me and stare at me. Later that afternoon, some of the mothers call Mama to see how I am “taking it.”
The next day at school nobody makes fun of me. In fact, they are nicer than usual, which feels worse. I don’t want anything to do with them. That afternoon, instead of going to my music lesson, I sneak out behind the parish hall where nobody can see me. I take one of Mama’s cigarette lighters out of my uniform pocket and I light the sheet music of “The Elf and the Fairy” on fire. I just flip open that little lighter and hold the flame under the notes. I think about setting all the grass back there on fire as well, but that would cause more trouble than I feel up to. I just burn up all those elf and fairy chords and stomp on the runaway sparks.
Just as I’m finishing up, I hear somebody over by the walkway calling out my name. It’s Sister Philomena. She sounds like she is scared that I’m lost. I remember how clean and neat her music room is,
how when she plays the piano it makes me feel like everything is in the right place for at least a while. I think about running to her and burying my head in her rustling black habit. For some reason I think that if I do that, she will reach down and touch my face with her long cool fingers that know how to move across a keyboard with total control.
I don’t run to her, though. I hide behind the concrete steps until she stops calling out my name and finally goes away.
All I think then is, Don’t you dare call out my name ever again. You don’t even know who I am.
The Princess of Gimmee
Lulu, 1967
I am—bar none—your best shoplifter in the town of Thornton, Louisiana. I would go so far as to say in all of Garnet Parish. Maybe even in the entire great state of Louisiana. But to be perfectly truthful, I haven’t spent enough time in New Orleans, our biggest city, to say that is definitely true. But I bet if you gave me one good weekend down there on Canal Street, I could ace out anybody in that city when it comes to five-finger discounts. I’m not bragging, I’m telling it like it is. I have learned to reach out and take what I want for my own self. I don’t have to listen to Mama anymore saying: Gimmee Gimmee Gimmee every time I ask her for something. Gimmee Gimmee Gimmee, she says, that’s all you are, Tallulah Abbott Walker, is Gimmee.
Mama named me for Tallulah Bankhead. My Daddy told her, No you will not name a daughter of mine for a woman who claims she is “pure as the driven slush.” But Mama told him she was the one who had thrown up and carried me for nine solid months and she would name me after whoever she damn well pleased.
I will tell you this: Saint Siddalee the Goody-Goody does not have one iota of trouble using all the stuff I steal for her. Every time I fork over something, she says: Lulu, you are sinning your butt off. But you should just see her whipping out that mascara-wand like there’s no tomorrow. I’ve run all over town kyping things for her, putting my reputation on the line. For the past year it has been me and me alone keeping her in Bonne Bell White-White which she loves-loves-loves to put under her eyebrows. I’ve brought her Yardley eyeliner, eyeshadow, and oatmeal soap that costs a fortune. And I’ve also brought her the Yardley Slicker Lip Gloss, which Mama says is not half as good as plain old Vaseline. Mama also says that oatmeal soap is not half as good as plain old Camay with the quarter-ounce of cold cream. Sidda claims Mama says all this just so she won’t have to spend money on my big sister’s beauty.
When Sidda read in Seventeen that Yardley was the only makeup to use, I had to make the jump up from stealing at Woolworth’s to your more expensive stores. Now see, I had it down at Woolworth’s. I know those bins and shelves inside and out. I know just how to browse, looking like an innocent child who wouldn’t steal a No. 2 pencil, even if you gave her the chance. I am not dumb. I always buy me something—like a magazine—and sit at the lunch counter and drink a Coke and act very natural. I pay for my Coke and then I just wander around, looking. You have to always buy something. That throws them off the track. I buy some little what-not and then I stuff my gifts in my pockets or my purse. (Rule Numero Uno: You never set foot in a store with a big purse. It’s the first thing they look for! You got to have you a classy little purse that nobody would ever think you’d use to stash stolen goods in.)
I walk right up to the cash register and say, Good afternoon, ma’am, how you doing? Then they say back, Fine, how you? And I say—just like Mama—Marvelous, couldn’t be better. Then I pay for my what-not with my allowance, counting out the nickels and quarters. And they just smile at me and give me a piece of Super-Bubble because I’m so cute. My insides might be shaking like Mama’s hands in the morning, but on the outside I am cool as a cucumber! Once I get out of the store, I run around the corner to the covered bus stop where all the colored maids wait. Then I take out all my free stolen goodies and examine them and I feel like a million dollars! I love it! I get so excited I can hardly stand it. One time I was so happy that I asked somebody’s maid if she wanted a compact I’d just stolen. I said, Go ahead, take it. It’s a gift. But she said, No thank you, I already got me one.
I never plan what I’m going to take. I just go browsing and see what catches my eye. Sometimes it will be something real stupid, like a tiny tube of Prell shampoo. But my favorite things are lingerie and makeup. I can take what I want for free because I am so good! The fuddy-duddy salesladies just look at me and smile and I steal them blind right from under their noses!
At Woolworth’s I get all my Maybelline eyelash curlers and Sable Brown and Sky-Blue eyeshadow and Max Factor Brownish Black mascara-wands that I give to Sidda. And I get my lipsticks and any color fingernail polish a person could want.
I’ve brought Mama home five different shades of red nail polish. I am the one responsible for introducing her to Aladdin’s Fire when she had been using only Rich Girl Red on her toenails for years and years. When I gave it to her she said, Oh Lulu-Cakes, you shouldn’t have gone and spent all your allowance on me!
So I said, Well Mama, maybe you could think about raising my allowance a little.
And do you know, that is exactly what she did! Right there on the spot. Which of course meant she raised Sidda’s, Little Shep’s, and Baylor’s too. Even-Steven is what Mama says. I take care of myself. I take care of all of them, in my way.
I went right out after that and stole Mama a Ronson cigarette lighter that flips up with a sharp little click. She just adores that lighter. Every time she uses it, she says to the Ya-Yas, Yall know Lulu gave this to me?
And Caro and Necie and sometimes Teensy say, Oh, isn’t that the sweetest?
And I stand there and smile and suck in their cigarette smoke, which I crave. I have my own stash of cigarettes that me and my best friend Amy smoke anytime we feel like it. We do it at her house because her mother is never home. She is having an affair with a world-history professor at LSU-Thornton. We saw them kissing in the parking lot behind St. Cecilia’s Hospital one time when we were riding our bikes. Amy’s mother was sitting there in her station wagon wearing her Ladies Auxiliary volunteer uniform, kissing on that professor like all get-out! Amy said you could tell they were tongue-kissing because of the way their heads moved. Your head moves different when you tongue-kiss because of the suction. I haven’t tongue-kissed yet, but Amy has. She says it’s not all it’s cracked up to be, that sometimes it can make you gag. But I think it must have something going for it, since the Penguins say it’s a mortal sin.
So. I had been making-do at Woolworth’s. Then Sidda discovers from Seventeen that the darling things I’ve been bringing her are cheap cosmetics that only trailer-trash would wear. She says: Don’t bother bringing me any more of that tacky junk. I would rather look homely than cheap. From here on out, it’s Yardley for me, or nothing at all.
Mind you, she read this from a Seventeen that I stole for her. The big fat Back-to-School issue that almost got me nabbed, but that I managed to get away with due to the baggy shorts I was wearing that day. (And to the fact that I am just plain superior at what I do.) Like I said, it was that Seventeen that caused me to widen my horizons.
I had to make the jump all the way up to Wayland’s department store! Their cosmetics counter is on the first floor near the glass doors off the street. The second you walk in there, you get a whiff of the newest perfume. And there is Rosalyn, the cosmetics lady, in her white smock just waiting to pounce on some rich lady and rub makeup all over her face and squeal: It’s you! Oh, it is so you!
Mama uses Daddy’s charge account at Wayland’s, so I have been known there since the day I was born. Which is very dangerous in one way and very helpful in another. It means I don’t look too suspicious just taking my time, but if I ever did get caught, Mama would probably belt-whip the skin off me.
I wait until Rosalyn is busy contouring some old fatbutt’s cheeks, and then I steal only one or two Yardley things at a time. Well, maybe three or four. I cup them in my hand—don’t even spend the time to put them in my pocket—just put them in my han
d and walk out of the store. The first time I did it I almost wet my pants! Stealing from Wayland’s! Wayland’s, where every time Mama walks in with the Ya-Yas she says Hello dahling to all the salesladies, like she is the queen and they are her servants. Wayland’s, where Mama blows cigarette smoke right into the shoe salesman’s face, and asks him, Honey, would you mind running upstairs and getting me a cold Coke because my throat is just parched?
Yeah, I was nervous the first few times—but after that, it got to be a good kind of nervous. Finally I got so good that I actually stepped over to the Wayland’s jewelry counter and picked myself up a pair of Monet earrings in the shape of seashells! I love them! They are so rich-looking! They go with the diamond dinner-ring I won playing Bingo with Buggy at Our Lady of Divine Compassion on Las Vegas Night. My grandmother was so jealous she could have spit, but she just bit on her old chapped-up lips. Tough. I’m the one that won that ring. Won it fair and square and nobody can say a thing about it. They didn’t have any rules saying that a child could not win a diamond dinner-ring. But after my big win, they put an age limit on the more expensive prizes. That is just like the Catholics, is what my Daddy said.
I wear that ring all the time, everywhere. I don’t even take it off to bathe. Mama would snatch it up and sell it for the money and swear it got sucked in the vacuum cleaner. I am not dumb. My diamond dinner-ring is worth something. It might come in handy if I ever decide I need to make a quick getaway out of this place.
I steal for myself and for the people who deserve gifts in my book. You take my best friend Amy. She would love to steal, but she is just not brave enough. We stand in front of her mirror and practice being models. Sometimes I let her wear some of the stuff I’ve stolen in exchange for letting me hide it over at her house. Her mother never goes in her room—only their maid, who isn’t like Willetta at all, but more like plain hired help. My very very favorite thing that I have stolen so far is an aqua chiffon nightgown with spaghetti straps. It is so beautiful, and so European! I put it on in the dressing room at Wayland’s, then I tucked it into my jeans, pulled my LSU sweatshirt on over it, and just walked out of the store! Right out onto Cypress Street! Can you imagine?! I am the best! Me and Amy take turns trying it on and practicing runway modeling and turns. That nightgown cost $20 and I got it for free!