Incredibly Alice

  “Sure, I’ll come,” I said.

  “Bring food,” said Les.

  As soon as I ended the call, I punched in Kay’s number and asked if she would be needing any rescuing Friday night.

  “I need it twenty-four/seven,” Kay said. “If I don’t have something planned every night of the week, my parents invite me over. I asked them the other day if they didn’t agree this was a hopeless cause, and Mom just said that as long as James was in the States, it was our obligation to entertain him. And then I really made my dad angry, because I said, ‘But is it necessary to involve me?’ And he said, ‘Since you are determined to do the least possible to help, yes, it is necessary for you to come along.’ It’s so miserable. James and I hardly even talk to each other. I don’t think he can stand me.”

  “How would you like an excuse not to go to their place this Friday?” I said. “Could you get some girlfriends together and come with me to Lester’s apartment? He’s got to stay home that evening and needs cheering up.”

  “Great! I’ll do it!” Kay said. “I’ll say my boss’s son is giving a party. They don’t like to interfere in my work.”

  Asking Kay Yen to bring some of her friends to Lester’s apartment Friday night was one of my more inspired ideas. The two other girls were about Kay’s age—early twenties—fairly attractive, one Asian, one Caucasian, friendly and full of life.

  “I’ve got food, but I figured friends were welcome too,” I said, brushing past him with a grocery bag in my arms.

  “Hi, Les,” Kay said. “Nice to see you again. This is Lee and Judith.”

  “Well, come in! Come in!” Les said, holding the door open wide, obviously taken by surprise. I wondered if he even remembered he’d invited me.

  “We were going to get together for dinner, and Alice said you were home alone, so we thought, ‘Why not have dinner there?’” Kay explained, following me to the kitchen.

  “Yeah, dirty up your kitchen instead of ours,” I joked.

  “Be my guests!” said Les, still puzzled but looking pleased. “I’ll even put on shoes for the occasion.” He went into his bedroom while we set out some stuff. Nothing fancy. Kay had bought a cheesecake from the supermarket, and I brought a jar of spaghetti sauce and pasta. The others purchased green beans almondine and garlic bread. A feast.

  We put on water to boil for the spaghetti, and Les emerged from his bedroom. He had put on a clean shirt over his tee and combed his hair a little.

  “Too bad Paul isn’t here. He’d love this,” he said.

  “So we’ll do it again,” said Kay.

  “You have a roommate?” Judith asked.

  “Yeah, two of them, both out for the evening. I’m on duty,” Les said. As we set the table, he told them about the arrangement with Mr. Watts, and they laughed during dinner at his account of how Andy got in on the deal. Lee found a soft-rock station, Les opened some beer, and as the evening progressed, it seemed as though we’d all known each other for a long time.

  Judith entertained us with stories of her and Kay’s canoeing adventures on the Potomac, especially the time they managed to collide with a kayaker, who threatened to sue.

  “Can you believe it?” Judith said, imitating the man in the kayak, waving his paddle in the air and demanding to see their IDs.

  We were still laughing when we heard the door click. I hoped it was Paul, that he could join the party. But a moment later Andy appeared in the kitchen doorway, her red-framed glasses fogging up slightly as she surveyed us there at the table.

  “Hi,” she said, and I was about to introduce her to the others when she turned and walked back down the hall to her room. We heard voices, and even though Andy’s is low, we could tell that the other voice was male. And then she shut her door.

  “She tutors,” Les said in explanation.

  A TV set came on in Andy’s room, and the volume was turned down. A man’s laughter. The women exchanged smiles.

  “What subjects?” Kay asked.

  “English, history … ,” Les said, and then, catching their drift, “physiology, maybe? Hey, she’s allowed to have friends, you know.” We laughed and talked of other things.

  13

  SOUND OF THE WHISTLE

  After work the next day, Kay and I went to visit Marilyn. Actually, we volunteered to go over and make a big pot of chicken and corn soup, and Jack said the kitchen was ours to do with as we liked. I brought along Sylvia’s recipe for blueberry muffins and all the ingredients I’d need.

  But first we wanted to see the baby.

  Marilyn was sitting on the couch in an old pair of baggy jeans and a sweater, folding laundry, the baby snoozing in the narrow dip between her knees. All I could see when I came in was a wisp of fine golden hair over a pink scalp and two tiny fists clenched tightly.

  “Oh, Marilyn!” I said, pushing some towels out of the way and sitting carefully down beside her.

  Marilyn beamed as she studied her baby. “Isn’t she the sweetest thing you ever saw?” she whispered, gently edging her fingers under the baby’s back and neck, lifting her from her lap and handing her over to me.

  The small body was so light! How could a baby weigh so little? The pink lips barely opened as the head tipped back a bit. But when I cradled her in my arms, she gave a soft sigh and the yellow flannel shirt she was wearing rose and fell again ever so slightly as she breathed.

  Jack and Kay were hovering over the back of the sofa behind us. He chuckled as a tiny bubble of spit formed at the baby’s mouth.

  “She’s adorable!” said Kay. “Oh, I want one of those!”

  “Get a husband first,” said Marilyn. “A good one, like Jack. They don’t come any better.”

  I watched the baby’s mouth twitch, the lips forming an O, almost a smacking motion, and she stirred slightly.

  “She’ll be getting hungry pretty soon,” Marilyn told us. “Every three hours, she lets us know she’s alive.”

  I stroked the side of Summer’s face with one finger, marveling at the fine hair of her eyebrows, the dark lashes, the chrysanthemum-colored lips. “Grow up like your mama,” I told her.

  “Next?” said Kay, coming around the sofa to sit beside me, and I gently placed the little sleeping beauty in her lap.

  Jack went off to run errands, and while Marilyn nursed her baby, Kay and I took over the kitchen. We’d brought a fruit salad that Sylvia had made, and Kay set to work on the chicken soup, her grandmother’s recipe from China.

  The Robertses’ house was small, but it had a large old-fashioned kitchen. It was a welcoming place, with a rocking chair in one corner on a braided rug, where the cat was sitting now. There were plants at every window and a big round table in the middle of the floor.

  We soon had the windows steamed up, and as Kay followed the soup instructions, I concentrated on greasing the muffin tins and paid extra attention to the lines on Sylvia’s recipe card that she had underlined in red: Stir only until moistened. Batter will be lumpy. DO NOT OVERMIX.

  Once we had the soup simmering and the muffins in the oven, we allowed ourselves to talk to each other, and Marilyn, hearing the chatter, came out to the kitchen to make us some tea.

  “Summer’s sleeping,” she said. “Now we can visit.”

  I couldn’t keep my eyes off Marilyn. She was still a little thick at the waist, but even so … !

  “You can go through having a baby, and two weeks later you’re walking around like this?” I marveled.

  “What do you mean, two weeks later?” Marilyn said. “I was walking around the very next day.”

  “Amazing!” I told her. “I figured you’d be all sore and bent over and—”

  “Alice, it’s a normal bodily function, having a baby,” she said. “I take a nap each day. But the more I move around, the stronger I feel.” She looked about the kitchen and inhaled. “Mmmm. Everything smells so good. You guys are the best!”

  We sat at the round table, drinking our tea, letting the steam moisten our faces, waiting for th
e muffins to finish baking so we could taste them.

  “So how are things going with your parents?” Marilyn asked Kay.

  “Nobody’s budged,” said Kay. “They invite James over for dinner twice a week and expect me to be there at least once. James sits there with a stoic look on his face, and more than once I’ve caught him checking his watch. I think his consulting job is over in April, so this can’t last forever. I escaped last night’s dinner at least, thanks to Alice—rounded up some girlfriends and took dinner to Les.”

  “Lucky Les,” said Marilyn. “What’s the latest with that new roommate of his?”

  We told her how Andy’s “student” turned out to be a boyfriend.

  “And they didn’t come out of her room all evening,” Kay said.

  Marilyn laughed. “Well, at least she has friends.”

  “Anyway,” Kay continued, “Andy’s on duty next Friday night, so Judith and I are going to take Les and Paul to a club. We promised them a canoe trip when the weather gets warmer.”

  “Les always lucks out, doesn’t he?” Marilyn said.

  “Not always,” I said, but didn’t say more. Jack was the lucky one here.

  The rehearsal schedule for March was unrelenting. No holidays, no time off. Some were late rehearsals, which meant we worked through the dinner hour, ate alone when we got home.

  On Friday there was an assembly right before lunch.

  “Now what?” said Gwen, as she and I filed in with a couple of friends from physics. I knew what it was about but had to pretend I didn’t.

  “I think it’s supposed to advertise all the spring activities,” one of the girls said.

  “Just so it’s not another lecture on drunk driving or STDs,” someone else said.

  Principal Beck came to the microphone first and gave a two-minute history of all the awards and honors our school had won in the past, then talked about what a bang-up year this one was turning out to be.

  When he mentioned the orchestra concert in May, three violinists in their white shirts and black bow ties emerged from behind the curtain and, playing a schmaltzy tune, crossed the stage and exited the other side. When he mentioned the coming band concert at the end of this month, a trumpet player, oboe player, bassoon player, and drummer came marching across the stage from the other direction, playing a polka.

  The basketball team dribbled a ball across the stage when Mr. Beck gave a shout-out to the high school finals that weekend. The girls’ soccer team followed, then the cheerleaders, and finally the madrigals, singing a short piece to promote the choir concert in April.

  Gwen, a seat away, leaned forward and gave me a puzzled expression, like, Where’s any mention of the play?—and I just shrugged and gave her a woeful look.

  Then, as Mr. Beck walked off the stage, Brad Broderick entered, dressed in an old-fashioned three-piece suit, obviously padded around the middle. His dark sideburns had been grayed, he wore his round-rimmed spectacles halfway down his nose, and there were lines drawn on his forehead and around his mouth.

  Without a word, Brad stood in the center of the stage. He pulled a stopwatch out of his vest pocket and held it out in front of him. Then, lifting a whistle to his mouth with his other hand, he blew a loud blast and pressed the button on the stopwatch.

  Instantly, I leaped to my feet and yelled, “Coming!” and the girls in my row shrank back, staring at me wide-eyed. But all over the auditorium, the scattered Gilbreth children were climbing over legs in their rows, all heading for the stage, all yelling, “Coming, Dad!” and “Wait for me!” and “Just a minute!” as our classmates began to get the picture and broke into laughter.

  Using the side steps of the stage, up we went, dropping our books in a heap and quickly forming a row in front of the footlights, from oldest to youngest, as our father clicked the stopwatch once more.

  “Fourteen seconds!” Brad boomed, looking us over in disgust.

  “That’s pretty good!” said Jay cheerfully, playing the part of Frank Jr.

  Brad glared at him.

  Tim, as Fred, said, “Only eight seconds off the record.”

  “Where’s your mother?” Brad asked.

  “Upstairs with the babies,” I told him.

  Turning toward the audience, Brad said gruffly, “I had so many children because I thought anything your mother and I teamed up on was certain to be a success. Now I’m not so sure.” He wheeled about abruptly. “Let me see your fingernails.”

  And as Brad moved down the line, all of us wincing, drawing our hands back or quickly buffing our nails against our clothes, the school principal returned to the microphone and said, “And you won’t want to miss this year’s spring production, Cheaper by the Dozen, to see what happens when two efficiency experts raise a family of twelve children and there’s an uprising brewing over—you guessed it—romance … freedom … silk stockings and other unmentionables! Bring your family! Bring your friends! April eighth and ninth, fifteenth and sixteenth.” And then all of us onstage shouted together, “Cheaper by the Dozen!”

  And the assembly was over.

  It was so much fun. Liz and Gwen and Jill and Karen were waiting for me out in the hall, and we all collapsed in laughter. Even Liz hadn’t known it was coming, not being in that particular scene.

  “You almost gave me a heart attack!” said Gwen. “I thought you were having a fit or something.”

  “It wasn’t till we saw the other actors jumping up that we realized it was staged,” said Karen.

  “Yeah, Alice will do anything for attention,” said Jill, but she said it jokingly, and for maybe the first time, I sensed that perhaps she was relieved she hadn’t gotten the part of Anne after all.

  “Even scared the wits out of me,” Ryan McGowan said as we were leaving the physics lab last period. It was hard for me not to call him “Larry.” “Pamela was in our row, and when she jumped up, I thought she was choking or something.”

  I laughed. “Mr. Ellis wanted us to keep it secret from everyone, even the rest of the cast. Have you done theater before?”

  “Back in Illinois,” he said. “My dad was transferred here last year. I had bit parts in community theater. How about you?”

  “My first time, unless you count my sixth-grade production.”

  He smiled a little. “What part did you play?”

  “A bramble bush with branches thick,” I said, and he chuckled.

  “Well, I’ll bet you were a darned good bramble bush.”

  “Not really,” I told him. “I tripped up the star of the show, who happened to be Pamela, by the way, and she was furious. I was so jealous of her.”

  “The tragedies of life,” Ryan said. “I’m thinking of majoring in theater. I’ve been getting some coaching.”

  “Really?”

  “I’ll see how it goes at college. Either theater or a fine arts degree. Publishing, maybe. You?”

  “I want to be a school counselor.”

  He glanced down at me. “Yeah?”

  “Yes.” And when he didn’t respond, I added, “I’ve been accepted at Maryland. I’m waiting to see if two other schools come through, William & Mary in particular.”

  “I’ve applied to Columbia and the University of Iowa. Also, a little college in Minnesota where my mom went, just to make her happy,” Ryan said. “But I want to do my grad work at the University of Iowa, if I make it that far. It’s the best writing program there is, if I go into that.”

  We reached the corner and I had to turn. “See you at practice,” I said.

  “I’m heading for the doughnut sale,” he told me. “Can I get you something?”

  “Yeah. One glazed. Thanks,” I said.

  Seemed strange, somehow, that I was sounding more and more like my life was on track and that it was other people’s lives that were question marks. As Dad was fond of saying, though, “Life is what happens when you’re planning something else.” In fact, every new person you meet introduces a question mark. And Ryan was no exception.


  14

  NEWS

  March Madness was going on, and I hardly got to watch any of the games. By the time rehearsals were over, I still had homework to do and didn’t have much evening left, even for watching TV.

  On Sunday, though, with Maryland poised for a slot in the Elite Eight if they beat Virginia Tech, I called Les to see if he and Paul were going to watch it and ask if I could come over to join them. It’s always more fun to watch a college game with a Maryland student or, in Lester’s case, two former grad students, him and Paul.

  “Sure,” he said. “Couple buddies are coming over, and Kay’s dropping by. Join the crowd!”

  Hmmm, I thought. Was it just possible that Les and Kay were hitting it off? Was there remotely, conceivably, incredibly a chance that under the guise of rescuing each other from Andy and James, respectively, an attraction between them was blossoming under our very noses?

  I had some errands to run first, and when I finally got to Lester’s apartment, the place was rocking. The game had started, Maryland had the ball, and there were guys I didn’t know on every available chair and couch cushion. Paul was lifting a couple beers out of a cooler and passing them around. Kay said that Judith would be coming too, but right now she was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the couch, between Lester’s knees. I tried not to smile. I had managed to hook up Dad and Sylvia, hadn’t I? Was I a matchmaker or what?

  When I went to the door later to let Judith in, I noticed that Andy’s door was shut. I took Judith’s chips to the kitchen to get a bowl, and when Paul came out for more ice, I asked, “Nobody invited Andy to join in?”

  “We did! We did! But she’s doing a tutoring session,” he told me.

  I shrugged.

  It was during the third quarter, when I was taking some bottles to the trash, that I saw one guy leaving Andy’s room and another coming in from outside. They passed without speaking. Andy was waiting in her doorway in a knit top and silky leisure pants, purple dangly earrings at her ears.