Chapter 18
JANUARY 1982
*
"Mom, do I really have to go back to school?" Eric whined, slurping a droplet of milk that trembled on his bottom lip back into his cereal- clogged mouth. I munched extra noisily on my Cheerios while widening my eyes at him, but he was clearly ignoring my hushing techniques. I made to kick him lightly under the table, then remembered his cast and withdrew my foot. I wasn't particularly worried that his incessant pleading to stay home would bug Maggie; it was MY nerves he was grating on this morning. No matter how much I loved the boy, being cooped up in the apartment with him so long had begun to take its toll.
Maggie made a pained face and huffed like she was sympathizing for him, but her reply was an emphatic "Yes." Instantly, she returned to nibbling on a bit of pulp from the juicy orange that was her breakfast.
I lowered my head and snickered, absentmindedly shoveling another spoonful of cereal into my mouth. Eric didn't find it quite as amusing.
"Fine. Laugh at the poor cripple," he said dramatically. "I bet Phillip's mom wouldn't make him go to school if he got hit by a car and his leg broke."
"If that happens, I hope Phillip's mom has him put down so we don't have to hear about how wonderful he is anymore," I muttered, using my spoon to swirl the discolored milk in my bowl. A cluster of soggy Cheerios bobbed in its wake, no more appetizing than the pair of banana slices that were floating nearby like two yellow fish eyes staring up at me. Bloated dead fish eyes swimming in the scummy remains of milk-and-oat mush.
It occurred to me just then how deeply I hated breakfast.
"Shut up." Eric pulled my bowl towards him as I pushed it away, and I watched with disgust as he drank down what was left in it. He smacked his lips and burped before adding, "At least he's not dumb like your friends."
"You don't even know my friends," I pointed out.
"Do too."
"Do not."
"They're retards," Eric said.
"So are you," I replied, irritatingly calm.
A full-scale war was about to erupt, I could see it in my brother's eyes, but Maggie had been quietly observing our little spat and finally chose to intervene. "Cool it," she advised, gathering up shards of orange peel and emptying it into the trash. While her back was turned, Eric mouthed "dummy" at me and I retaliated by mouthing "retard." We shot each other dirty looks until Maggie was facing us again.
"Time for school," she said brightly, dealing out the sacked lunches she'd prepared earlier this morning. Apparently the visit to Grandma Corrie Jo's house had been a good influence on my mother. Her maternal instincts seemed to have kicked into high gear. She was a regular Donna Reed these days. It was... strange.
"I'm walking." I took the lunch, though I had no intentions of eating it. Bartering in the cafeteria was one of my best school subjects. Whether it was mooching meals off the neighbors or finagling one of my classmates into handing over a Hostess cupcake, I'd always had a knack for obtaining food. At least I'd never go hungry in my lifetime, I thought.
"But I'm driving-"
"I know, but I'd rather walk."
Eric glanced from Maggie to me, and back again. "Well, there's no sense in you driving just me, Mom," he said with a tone that suggested great benevolence on his part. "I'll stay home and save you the trouble of going out in all that pesky snow and ice and wind..."
"You're going to school, Eric." The crispness in Maggie's voice warned that Eric was pushing his luck, and my brother very reluctantly resigned himself to the fact that his winter vacation had officially ended. Without another word he pushed back from the table, hoisted himself onto his crutches, and went to retrieve his coat and gloves, looking as pathetic as possible. If he hadn't acted so rotten lately, I might have felt sorry for him. Whereas Grandma's house had a positive effect on Maggie, it seemed to have given Eric the notion he could be a holy terror. And since it was "that time of the month" for me, all I'd had for the past couple days was major take-no- bullcrap PMS. I hadn't even listened to Scott's song the entire weekend, because I couldn't get through it without bawling uncontrollably or wanting to pulverize the freaking stereo with a hammer.
I got up from the table and rinsed my bowl out in the sink, aware that Maggie was watching my every move. Avoiding meeting her eye, I started to brush past her on my way to the coat closet, but she blocked my path and placed a gentle hand on my shoulder. "Sure you don't want a ride to school, sweetie? That old wind's pretty harsh."
"I said I'd walk, and I'll walk," I snapped, shrugging her hand away. "The wind's no different now than it was before when I DIDN'T have a ride."
An angry reaction would not have succeeded in making me regret what I'd just said, but the ashamed, chastised expression that stole over Maggie's face did. She lowered her arm and fidgeted uncomfortably, distancing herself from me a bit. "O-okay... I'll see you later, then. Be-..." She halted, pressing her lips together before they could form the next word: good. She cleared her throat. "Have a good day."
Remorseful, I latched onto her before she could go anywhere, pulling her into a rather fierce and hasty sort of hug. "I'm sorry," I murmured into her shoulder, relieved when she didn't hesitate to put her arms around me. "I just feel like I need to be alone for a while, that's all."
"I understand." Maggie smiled lovingly at me when we parted, and I believe she really did understand. Maybe too much.
So my return to Hopkins Junior High began as a solitary one. Indeed, the wind was ferocious and it took all of three minutes for my face, fingers, and toes to go completely numb, but I marched on without lament. The cold jolted me to life, actually, and my head felt a lot clearer than it had since before my vacation had started. With no specific worries to cloud my brain at the moment, I was free to ponder whatever I saw fit. I decided not to think about Scott. Or my father and would-be family. Or pretty much anything that had happened in the past two and a half weeks. Like I did with most unpleasant memories, I wanted to push Christmas 1981 to the back of my mind and let it fade into nothing more than a bad dream. So I did.
While I took turns breathing through my nostrils and sniffing back drippy snot, I got to thinking about underwear. Bras, mostly. They weren't all they were cracked up to be. My grandmother, the packrat that she was, had an attic full of trunks that contained just about every piece of clothing she and her daughters had ever worn, including a couple of training bras that had undoubtedly been Maggie's. (The size tags had M's penciled onto them, probably to avoid laundry mix-ups with Aunt Shelia.) I'd discovered this while Eric and I had been trying to entertain ourselves during what Granddad Wilbur called "adult playtime" - otherwise known as boring chatter and card games.
Figuring it wouldn't be missed, I'd pocketed the smallest, whitest bra and planned to try it out when I got home. I guess I'd been expecting some miraculous change the instant I put it on... maybe a little swelling in the chest area, maybe a few more heads turning. Something. But all it really did was itch and remind me of a cumbersome harness. And yet, I'd worn the damn thing again today. Go figure.
I'd just begun to wonder if any of my friends would notice a difference in me, when I glanced up to see Howie - my only real guy friend - waiting for me at our usual meeting spot, bouncing his lacrosse stick carelessly against one knee. He was keeping warm by jiggling his body and standing in a patch of sunlight, his unruly white-blond curls shining almost as blindingly as the January snow. His ears were a tad large, a flaw that made him the brunt of many of his own jokes, and presently he looked like someone had ripped a giant pink Valentine's heart in two and pasted a half to either side of his head. It made me smile.
"It's about time you showed up," he greeted as I approached. Without missing a beat, he fell into step beside me and we trudged the sidewalk as if we'd already been walking together for the past few blocks. "I was about to freeze my heinie off back there," he said, motioning over his shoulder with the lacrosse stick like it was an extra-long arm. "The least you could do is say" - He made his voice high and squealy - "'Hi, Howie. How was Christmas?'"
I cocked an eyebrow. "Heinie??"
Howie rolled his smoky-gray eyes and swung the lacrosse stick, whacking me on the bottom with it before I even realized what he was doing. "Y'know, rump, fanny, posterior, glu-te-us max-i-mus," he spouted impressively, then hit me with the stick again. "The bee-hind."
"Ass?" I offered, fixing him with a meaningful stare.
He pretended to be taken aback. "Oh, that hurt almost."
We had frequent verbal spars such as this, all of them harmless fun, some of which became a competition of who could whip out impressive words the fastest. It was because of our advanced vocabularies that Howie and I were friends, as a matter of fact. We'd both been placed in an English class for accelerated learners. It's doubtful we would have ever spoken to each other if the teacher hadn't broken the ice by making us partners for a project on literary greats. I'd wanted to use Sylvia Plath; Howie'd been adamant we use J.D. Salinger. After about a week of hating each others' guts, we'd discovered we shared an affinity for Edgar Allan Poe. We'd aced the project and been friends ever since.
"Is it really necessary to carry that club around in the middle of winter - when, by the way, there aren't any tournaments - and use it to assault innocent young women?" I eyed Howie's lacrosse stick with disdain, well aware that it would drive him crazy for me to do so. He was in love with that thing, took it everywhere he went. One of these days he was going to marry it.
"Women? I see no women here." There was a devilish glint in Howie's eyes as he jabbed at me with the netted end of his stick. "Just a whiny little girl who got her keister up on the wrong side of the bed this-"
The rest of his sentence ended in astonished sputtering, for I had scooped a handful of snow off someone's mailbox and tossed it directly into Howie's wind-chapped, rosy-red face. Pausing only long enough to give him a smug smile, I swatted him on the butt with my gloved hand, then strode ahead with a saucy gait. "You forgot 'derriere', smarty pants," I called over my shoulder.
I knew he would pay me back, but I faked surprise and screamed anyway when he used the net on his lacrosse stick to launch a chunk of snow at me. We took turns pelting each other for the remainder of our trek and arrived at school flushed and extremely wound up. My hair was damp and straggly, my coat was two different colors (wet purple and dry purple), and I was shivering so badly my chin quaked like I was some kind of haywire ventriloquist's dummy, but I felt really happy and satisfied. It occurred to me that I hadn't played in the snow for a long, long time. I'd forgotten how much fun it could be. Maybe I would remind Eric and my mom when I got home, because I don't think they remembered, either.
*
THE END
-----
Author's Note, 7-25-03: Many thanks to the readers and reviewers-- your comments are greatly appreciated. I hope y'all enjoyed reading the story as much as I enjoyed writing it. :) At the moment I've got ideas for a couple more fanfics "in the wings," and my plan is to get the next started within a couple weeks (unless I procrastinate...) Stay tuned.
JANUARY 1982
*
"Mom, do I really have to go back to school?" Eric whined, slurping a droplet of milk that trembled on his bottom lip back into his cereal- clogged mouth. I munched extra noisily on my Cheerios while widening my eyes at him, but he was clearly ignoring my hushing techniques. I made to kick him lightly under the table, then remembered his cast and withdrew my foot. I wasn't particularly worried that his incessant pleading to stay home would bug Maggie; it was MY nerves he was grating on this morning. No matter how much I loved the boy, being cooped up in the apartment with him so long had begun to take its toll.
Maggie made a pained face and huffed like she was sympathizing for him, but her reply was an emphatic "Yes." Instantly, she returned to nibbling on a bit of pulp from the juicy orange that was her breakfast.
I lowered my head and snickered, absentmindedly shoveling another spoonful of cereal into my mouth. Eric didn't find it quite as amusing.
"Fine. Laugh at the poor cripple," he said dramatically. "I bet Phillip's mom wouldn't make him go to school if he got hit by a car and his leg broke."
"If that happens, I hope Phillip's mom has him put down so we don't have to hear about how wonderful he is anymore," I muttered, using my spoon to swirl the discolored milk in my bowl. A cluster of soggy Cheerios bobbed in its wake, no more appetizing than the pair of banana slices that were floating nearby like two yellow fish eyes staring up at me. Bloated dead fish eyes swimming in the scummy remains of milk-and-oat mush.
It occurred to me just then how deeply I hated breakfast.
"Shut up." Eric pulled my bowl towards him as I pushed it away, and I watched with disgust as he drank down what was left in it. He smacked his lips and burped before adding, "At least he's not dumb like your friends."
"You don't even know my friends," I pointed out.
"Do too."
"Do not."
"They're retards," Eric said.
"So are you," I replied, irritatingly calm.
A full-scale war was about to erupt, I could see it in my brother's eyes, but Maggie had been quietly observing our little spat and finally chose to intervene. "Cool it," she advised, gathering up shards of orange peel and emptying it into the trash. While her back was turned, Eric mouthed "dummy" at me and I retaliated by mouthing "retard." We shot each other dirty looks until Maggie was facing us again.
"Time for school," she said brightly, dealing out the sacked lunches she'd prepared earlier this morning. Apparently the visit to Grandma Corrie Jo's house had been a good influence on my mother. Her maternal instincts seemed to have kicked into high gear. She was a regular Donna Reed these days. It was... strange.
"I'm walking." I took the lunch, though I had no intentions of eating it. Bartering in the cafeteria was one of my best school subjects. Whether it was mooching meals off the neighbors or finagling one of my classmates into handing over a Hostess cupcake, I'd always had a knack for obtaining food. At least I'd never go hungry in my lifetime, I thought.
"But I'm driving-"
"I know, but I'd rather walk."
Eric glanced from Maggie to me, and back again. "Well, there's no sense in you driving just me, Mom," he said with a tone that suggested great benevolence on his part. "I'll stay home and save you the trouble of going out in all that pesky snow and ice and wind..."
"You're going to school, Eric." The crispness in Maggie's voice warned that Eric was pushing his luck, and my brother very reluctantly resigned himself to the fact that his winter vacation had officially ended. Without another word he pushed back from the table, hoisted himself onto his crutches, and went to retrieve his coat and gloves, looking as pathetic as possible. If he hadn't acted so rotten lately, I might have felt sorry for him. Whereas Grandma's house had a positive effect on Maggie, it seemed to have given Eric the notion he could be a holy terror. And since it was "that time of the month" for me, all I'd had for the past couple days was major take-no- bullcrap PMS. I hadn't even listened to Scott's song the entire weekend, because I couldn't get through it without bawling uncontrollably or wanting to pulverize the freaking stereo with a hammer.
I got up from the table and rinsed my bowl out in the sink, aware that Maggie was watching my every move. Avoiding meeting her eye, I started to brush past her on my way to the coat closet, but she blocked my path and placed a gentle hand on my shoulder. "Sure you don't want a ride to school, sweetie? That old wind's pretty harsh."
"I said I'd walk, and I'll walk," I snapped, shrugging her hand away. "The wind's no different now than it was before when I DIDN'T have a ride."
An angry reaction would not have succeeded in making me regret what I'd just said, but the ashamed, chastised expression that stole over Maggie's face did. She lowered her arm and fidgeted uncomfortably, distancing herself from me a bit. "O-okay... I'll see you later, then. Be-..." She halted, pressing her lips together before they could form the next word: good. She cleared her throat. "Have a good day."
Remorseful, I latched onto her before she could go anywhere, pulling her into a rather fierce and hasty sort of hug. "I'm sorry," I murmured into her shoulder, relieved when she didn't hesitate to put her arms around me. "I just feel like I need to be alone for a while, that's all."
"I understand." Maggie smiled lovingly at me when we parted, and I believe she really did understand. Maybe too much.
So my return to Hopkins Junior High began as a solitary one. Indeed, the wind was ferocious and it took all of three minutes for my face, fingers, and toes to go completely numb, but I marched on without lament. The cold jolted me to life, actually, and my head felt a lot clearer than it had since before my vacation had started. With no specific worries to cloud my brain at the moment, I was free to ponder whatever I saw fit. I decided not to think about Scott. Or my father and would-be family. Or pretty much anything that had happened in the past two and a half weeks. Like I did with most unpleasant memories, I wanted to push Christmas 1981 to the back of my mind and let it fade into nothing more than a bad dream. So I did.
While I took turns breathing through my nostrils and sniffing back drippy snot, I got to thinking about underwear. Bras, mostly. They weren't all they were cracked up to be. My grandmother, the packrat that she was, had an attic full of trunks that contained just about every piece of clothing she and her daughters had ever worn, including a couple of training bras that had undoubtedly been Maggie's. (The size tags had M's penciled onto them, probably to avoid laundry mix-ups with Aunt Shelia.) I'd discovered this while Eric and I had been trying to entertain ourselves during what Granddad Wilbur called "adult playtime" - otherwise known as boring chatter and card games.
Figuring it wouldn't be missed, I'd pocketed the smallest, whitest bra and planned to try it out when I got home. I guess I'd been expecting some miraculous change the instant I put it on... maybe a little swelling in the chest area, maybe a few more heads turning. Something. But all it really did was itch and remind me of a cumbersome harness. And yet, I'd worn the damn thing again today. Go figure.
I'd just begun to wonder if any of my friends would notice a difference in me, when I glanced up to see Howie - my only real guy friend - waiting for me at our usual meeting spot, bouncing his lacrosse stick carelessly against one knee. He was keeping warm by jiggling his body and standing in a patch of sunlight, his unruly white-blond curls shining almost as blindingly as the January snow. His ears were a tad large, a flaw that made him the brunt of many of his own jokes, and presently he looked like someone had ripped a giant pink Valentine's heart in two and pasted a half to either side of his head. It made me smile.
"It's about time you showed up," he greeted as I approached. Without missing a beat, he fell into step beside me and we trudged the sidewalk as if we'd already been walking together for the past few blocks. "I was about to freeze my heinie off back there," he said, motioning over his shoulder with the lacrosse stick like it was an extra-long arm. "The least you could do is say" - He made his voice high and squealy - "'Hi, Howie. How was Christmas?'"
I cocked an eyebrow. "Heinie??"
Howie rolled his smoky-gray eyes and swung the lacrosse stick, whacking me on the bottom with it before I even realized what he was doing. "Y'know, rump, fanny, posterior, glu-te-us max-i-mus," he spouted impressively, then hit me with the stick again. "The bee-hind."
"Ass?" I offered, fixing him with a meaningful stare.
He pretended to be taken aback. "Oh, that hurt almost."
We had frequent verbal spars such as this, all of them harmless fun, some of which became a competition of who could whip out impressive words the fastest. It was because of our advanced vocabularies that Howie and I were friends, as a matter of fact. We'd both been placed in an English class for accelerated learners. It's doubtful we would have ever spoken to each other if the teacher hadn't broken the ice by making us partners for a project on literary greats. I'd wanted to use Sylvia Plath; Howie'd been adamant we use J.D. Salinger. After about a week of hating each others' guts, we'd discovered we shared an affinity for Edgar Allan Poe. We'd aced the project and been friends ever since.
"Is it really necessary to carry that club around in the middle of winter - when, by the way, there aren't any tournaments - and use it to assault innocent young women?" I eyed Howie's lacrosse stick with disdain, well aware that it would drive him crazy for me to do so. He was in love with that thing, took it everywhere he went. One of these days he was going to marry it.
"Women? I see no women here." There was a devilish glint in Howie's eyes as he jabbed at me with the netted end of his stick. "Just a whiny little girl who got her keister up on the wrong side of the bed this-"
The rest of his sentence ended in astonished sputtering, for I had scooped a handful of snow off someone's mailbox and tossed it directly into Howie's wind-chapped, rosy-red face. Pausing only long enough to give him a smug smile, I swatted him on the butt with my gloved hand, then strode ahead with a saucy gait. "You forgot 'derriere', smarty pants," I called over my shoulder.
I knew he would pay me back, but I faked surprise and screamed anyway when he used the net on his lacrosse stick to launch a chunk of snow at me. We took turns pelting each other for the remainder of our trek and arrived at school flushed and extremely wound up. My hair was damp and straggly, my coat was two different colors (wet purple and dry purple), and I was shivering so badly my chin quaked like I was some kind of haywire ventriloquist's dummy, but I felt really happy and satisfied. It occurred to me that I hadn't played in the snow for a long, long time. I'd forgotten how much fun it could be. Maybe I would remind Eric and my mom when I got home, because I don't think they remembered, either.
*
THE END
-----
Author's Note, 7-25-03: Many thanks to the readers and reviewers-- your comments are greatly appreciated. I hope y'all enjoyed reading the story as much as I enjoyed writing it. :) At the moment I've got ideas for a couple more fanfics "in the wings," and my plan is to get the next started within a couple weeks (unless I procrastinate...) Stay tuned.
