Billie Standish Was Here (22 page)

I found Miss Lydia sipping iced tea in the kitchen and poured myself a glass. She slid a fat manila envelope across the table after I sat down.

I slipped the sheaf of papers out and read “Last Will and Testament” across the top of the first page. Tried to say, “Oh no, Miss Lydia—” but she cut me off.

“Oh, now, I don't plan to go anywhere anytime soon, so don't get your undies in a bunch.”

It didn't work. I couldn't laugh and my hands were shaking.

She said, “Read. Read first and talk later.”

So I read. There was a lot that might have been written in Portuguese for what I understood. It must make lawyers feel smarter to pretend they have their own language. But the gist of the thing was that everything went to me. The house, the land, the money, the car. Everything.

A maintenance allowance for the house would be mine no matter when she died. The rest would be held in a trust, if need be, until I turned eighteen.

My teeth were chattering when I finished. I looked up and told her, “It's not fair.”

“For me to do what I want with my own money?” she asked.

“I don't deserve this,” I started.

She was calm as can be. “Who does deserve it, then?”

She had me there. I fumbled the pages back into their envelope.

“Billie Marie.” The way she pronounced it I knew she had rehearsed a speech. “I wanted you to know what was in it. This is a copy—the original is with Ernest Troutman in Milton. When I'm gone you can do whatever you want. I don't care if you give away every penny after your college has been paid for.”

“But I'm not—” I began.

“Oh yes, you are,” she finished. She was nodding. Agreeing with herself. “If I'm still alive, I'll kick your behind all the way there if I have to.”

I had to smile at that image.

“. . . and if I'm gone, well . . .” She went blank for a second. Then a wicked grin spread across her face. “I'll haunt you till you go, that's what I'll do.”

College. She was going to send me to college. No matter what Daddy said. No matter what he thought, I was going to college. A pulse throbbed at my temple. Then I had another thought.

“What about Harlan?” I asked.

She answered with a shrug that said, “What
about
Harlan?”

I said, “I mean, shouldn't he—shouldn't you—” then caught myself. I had no business telling her what to do with her money. But maybe I did. No, I couldn't. My thoughts were fragments.

Miss Lydia was nodding. She had thought about this. “Harlan's parents likely expect him to go to school and would have the money to pay for it, too. Or if they don't—well, honey, scholarships are still a whole lot easier to come by for boys than girls. It's not fair, but—”

“But what if, what if—” The least possibility of going off and leaving Harlan down on the farm felt like a betrayal.

“If all else fails,” she went on, “then either you or I can do what needs to be done when the time comes.” She nodded at the envelope between us. “There's enough there for two college educations. More than enough.”

A shudder shook my backbone. It was starting to sound like blood money.

“Honey.” Miss Lydia reached and patted my hand. “Like I said, I have no plans to go anywhere. But the fact is, someday I will go. And I wanted to let you know about this now because you need to start planning for that.
And
for college. I had a notion your peckerhead daddy's words were still stuck in your head and your face is telling me I was right.”

I was pretty sure the idea of college would grow on me. But life without her? Plan to give up life as I knew it now? I was still in a daze when I got home.

It was hours before it registered that she had called Daddy a peckerhead.

I
  t might have all been written on my forehead, self-conscious as I felt. Harlan asked once what was wrong. I told him I couldn't talk about it and he was so understanding I wanted to brain him. It seemed like the least he could do was hound me with questions until I broke down and told him without it being my fault.

My studying took on an urgency. Harlan and I had pushed so far beyond our class it was a laugh but now it wasn't nearly far enough for me. I went from book to book at such a frantic pace I wasn't learning anything. That made me panic even more.

Then one day during study hour Harlan told me to lighten up and that was all it took for me to come unglued. I started screaming with all the logic of a newborn baby, then collapsed in a heap and commenced to cry like one. He somehow got me up and on his lap. Sat there rocking while I soaked his shirt.

He petted my hair and said, “Shhh,” in my ear. I
couldn't remember anyone but Miss Lydia ever giving me such comfort and that made me cry all the more.

But nobody can cry forever, even if they want to. After a while I became aware I was on Harlan's lap. My arms were around his neck. His were around my waist. I lifted my head from his shoulder, our cheeks brushed, and then we were kissing. I'm pretty sure I started it.

I felt that first kiss in every cell of my body. And then some.

If I'd ever thought about it I would have predicted any speck of romance at all would start our friendship down the road to ruin. But when it happened it was like Harlan and I had both been holding our breath without realizing it. Now we could let go and breathe. It felt that natural.

I asked him to leave his truck at school that day and walk with me to Miss Lydia's. On the way I told him about her will.

He wasn't a bit surprised. “Well, good God, Billie Marie,” is what he said. “You're all the family she's got. What would you expect?”

And I loved that thought so very much it began to feel all right.

I found my way onto Harlan's lap again during study hour the next day and after a little nuzzling said, “Should we tell them?”

He frowned. “Tell who, what?”

“Our parents? Miss Lydia? About us?”

He gave me a little kiss on the neck that made my pulse flutter and said, “Billie Marie, if Miss Lydia didn't know before we did I'll eat my hat. And just what would you tell your parents?”

“Um . . . that we're boyfriend and girlfriend now?” Those words sounded so stupid out loud I cringed.

He said, “And . . . how is that different than before?”

“Well, completely,” I told him.

“For me too,” he smiled, “but how would you describe what's different to them?”

I shrugged.

“You want to tell them . . . we've started . . . making out? Scare them into watching us? Maybe even trying to keep us apart? Teenage hormones and all that?”

I jumped up like his lap had caught fire. “No.” I smoothed my skirt and sat down in my own chair. The heat spread to my cheeks and my eyes started to sting. I hadn't thought about kissing Harlan as leading anywhere.

But maybe he had. He would, wouldn't he? That's how boys were. Teenage hormones and all that.

“What? What happened? What's the matter?” Harlan's eyes were huge. I shook my head. I couldn't say anything.

Never mind that I knew Harlan so completely we were practically extensions of the same person. Suddenly he was a stranger, that
Y
chromosome of his jumping out
like a roadblock between us. My breathing turned ragged and I wanted to bolt.

He leaned forward, took both my hands in his and started rubbing his thumbs over my knuckles. I tried to pull away. I didn't want to be touched, not even by him. Ever again. I got my hands free and crossed them under my arms in a self-hug.

Harlan studied me a good while before saying, “Billie Marie, I don't know what you're afraid of, but I would hope you know I'd sooner throw myself into the river than hurt you. Ever. You have to trust me on that.”

I turned away because he was looking me in the eye. How could I explain that “trust” had turned out to be the biggest word I knew? The one with the sharpest edges, for sure. I didn't answer him.

He was hurt. Of course. He was quiet the rest of the day and drove off after school without saying good-bye. I felt it as a physical ache in my chest. There's a reason they came up with the image of a little guy shooting arrows as a symbol for falling in love.

I knew I couldn't bring myself near what I'd have to tell Harlan to make him understand. I spent a long while in my room that night searching the mirror for answers, but that girl didn't have any either. That was okay. I didn't trust her either.

The next day Harlan and I had not said so much as
hello by time for study hour. I walked onto the stage with a huge volume from the encyclopedia, figuring I could hide behind it for an hour even if my stomachache wouldn't let me concentrate. Then I heard his voice behind me say, “Stop right there. And don't turn around.”

I froze. I was a rabbit and he'd whistled.

He cleared his throat and told my back, “I'm not sure what happened here yesterday, but I know when I said you had to trust me you looked like I'd knocked the wind out of you with a baseball bat. So I'm just going to ask if you can at least give me benefit of the doubt. Have a little faith. That's all.”

Trust. Faith. I couldn't speak above a whisper. “What's the difference?”

“Well, let's see,” he said. “I know for a fact you have faith in God, Billie Marie, but that doesn't mean you would step out in front of a train because you trust him to save you, does it?”

Not a solitary smart aleck thought came into my head. That's how rootless I felt.

“You be just as careful as you need to be, Billie Marie. But you know me. Remember that.”

My ears burned and my mind's eye showed me Harlan at age eleven scowling while he asked me to play baseball. Then I turned and saw the face he'd grown into
at sixteen. It looked worried but resolute. I was the only other person in the world.

I walked over, wrapped my arms around his neck and laid my head in the hollow of his shoulder. He took a deep breath and rested his hands at the small of my back. It wasn't a hug, but more like dancing without moving our feet.

Come to find out, time doesn't make exceptions when good things fall from the sky any more than it does when a tragedy smacks you upside the head. So after that little bump our lives just kept going on. Miss Lydia tried to hide her smile whenever she saw us touch hands or look at each other so moony we forgot what we were saying.

Harlan had been right—there really was no reason to tell anyone anything. We'd gone to a movie together once in a while ever since he got his license. It seemed silly to announce that we held hands during the show, and now we kissed good night when Harlan dropped me off. For everything to be so completely different, it was strange how very little had changed.

For so long my heart had felt like it was closed into a fist around the secrets Miss Lydia and I shared. Now it opened up to make room for all it needed to hold. That was the biggest difference to me.

A few days after Miss Lydia bought the Caddie, Mama
noticed that the grout between the tiles in our bathroom looked dingy and she decided I should clean it. Thoroughly and painstakingly. With an old toothbrush, baking soda, and peroxide. I almost busted out laughing when she told me—it was like something out of a reform school movie on the late, late show.

Each night for a week she came in to call me for dinner and blew on about what a good job I was doing and what a wonderful difference it was going to make. She was using the same chore both to punish me and to try flattering her way into my good graces. A few years earlier it would have driven me nuts.

I decided to borrow a page from Miss Lydia's book instead.

The first day there was no more grout to clean I went home earlier than usual and baked a carrot cake. I didn't much care for the stuff, but of course I knew it was Mama's favorite. I even made the cream cheese frosting that always puckered my lips. We had some used birthday candles in the silverware drawer—I have no idea why she had saved them. I put one on the cake and lit it when I heard the car in the driveway.

Mama walked in with a sack from Smith Hardware and eyed that cake like its candle was a lit fuse. “What's this?” she said.

I hadn't planned it out in detail, so I said the first thing
that came into my head: “Happy birthday!”

She looked peeved. “My birthday's in September, Billie. Surely you know that.”

“Well, then, SURPRISE!” I yelled. I gave her my best beauty pageant smile.

Mama's jaw dropped and I waited. She started chuckling. I exhaled and laughed along with her.

Finally she wiped at her eyes and said, “Well, should I make a wish?”

I said, “Sure!” and she closed her eyes for a couple of seconds before she whooshed out the candle. Then she looked up at me with an expression I'd never seen.