Cheating Lessons: A Novel (14 page)

“As an Asian.”

“You’re not Asian,” Bernadette exclaimed. “You learned to talk from
Sesame Street
like everybody else.”

“I know, but I
look
Korean.”

Did Nadine look Korean? To Bernadette she just looked like . . . Nadine. “You know what Kipling says: ‘Oh, East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet.’ You’d be the East,” she added.

“Thanks. Wasn’t Kipling the one who called Gunga Din a squidgy-nosed idol? I don’t care what he says. Vince thinks being Korean is something special.”

“Uh-huh. Does Vince speak Italian?”

“Just a few swear words.”

“
That’s
special.”

“I don’t expect you to understand.”

Her superior tone goaded Bernadette past endurance. “You want to know what I understand? That you’re so busy researching your damned heritage at McDonald’s that you’re not reading your list. We’re all worried sick.”

“Who’s ‘we’?”

Uh-oh. “Lori said something.”

“Lori Besh is worried about
me
?”

“Yeah. And David. He’s worried.”

“David.” Nadine’s voice dripped skepticism.

“Yes. And—and Mrs. K. is concerned. She never sees you in the media center anymore, she says.
Nobody
ever sees you anymore.”

“Oh, Bet.” Nadine’s sigh was so adultly condescending that Bernadette considered stuffing the portable phone down the garbage disposal. “Tell them I’m reading my share and then some. And then tell them they should think about getting a life. I gotta go.” She hung up.

Bernadette stared unseeingly out the window over the sink. Nadine hadn’t asked why she’d called. Not that Bernadette had planned to worry her by telling about Malory being turned down by Pinehurst. But Nadine hadn’t even given her a chance to be tempted. She had just assumed Bernadette wanted to hear her go on and on about Vince Cirillo, when in fact it all made Bernadette slightly ill.

Asian movies! Nadine Elaine Walczak was about as Asian as a Baby Ruth bar.

Her parents came in from shopping before she could finish brooding in peace. Martha set down her bag of groceries with a loud thump, looked at the phone in Bernadette’s hand and the expression on Bernadette’s face, and said, “I told you this would happen.”

“Don’t start. I’m warning you.” Bernadette stood stiffly while her father came over and massaged her shoulders.

Martha said no one was starting anything but these things always happened when your best friend fell in love, and the wonder was that it hadn’t happened sooner and so on, and so on, until Bernadette escaped upstairs.

It was easy for her mother to talk. She had a husband who for some reason thought her wonderful. A block full of neighbors, the people at work, clients and their families who needed her . . .

Bernadette had only Nadine. Who’d never said a word about roses.

That night Bernadette came downstairs only when she was sure her mother had already gone to bed. At the kitchen table her father pored over papers from his job. She settled in a corner of the couch with
The Grapes of Wrath.
They read in companionable silence.

By 11:30 the Joads had another flat tire and she couldn’t keep her eyes open. “I’m going to bed.”

“Come here just a minute, would you?” Joe Terrell patted the chair next to him. “Pumpkin,” he began awkwardly.

“Hmmm?”

“I just wanted to say—don’t let your mother upset you. You know. That business about Nadine and her boyfriend.”

The phone call came stinging back. Bernadette’s mouth turned bitter. “It’s hard not to get upset, when I ask her to leave me alone and instead she gives me a lecture. Like it’s
my
fault.”

Her father took her hand in his. The lamp hanging over the table made his gray hair—how had it gotten so gray? Bernadette wondered—gleam silver. “That’s just her way. Your mother thinks talking things over is therapeutic—even if she’s the only one talking. I was glad you didn’t make a big scene about it.” He cleared his throat. “She’s going through the change, you know.”

Bernadette thought he’d caught Martha rifling through the box of quarters on his dresser.

“Mood swings, hot flashes,” he continued. “I read a thing in
Reader’s Digest
on it. That’s why she’s so cranky these days.”

Oh, that change. “I can’t tell the difference.”

He chuckled softly. “You’re your mother’s child, all right.”

Bernadette grabbed his hand and pressed it to her cheek. “No, I’m not. I’m yours.”

“You’ve got the best of both of us in you.” He hugged her. “I never worry about my pumpkin.”

“Oh, Daddy.” She hugged him back, then turned the letter he’d been reading toward her. Paper-clipped to it was a page from a store catalog. “Who’s sending you pictures of luggage?”

He snorted. “Some guy in Redford claims this set of brand-new suitcases, among other things, was in his basement when it flooded—wants us to give him the full replacement value.”

“Does he have the receipt?”

“What do you think? He doesn’t even have the suitcases. Says they smelled too bad, so he threw them out. And he forgot to take photos.”

“So what do you do?”

“I tell him very politely that the evidence won’t let us give him the amount he’s asking—you never call customers liars—and I pay him the fair market value on used suitcases. That’s all his policy covers. He’ll get more than he deserves, we’ll be slightly cheated, and it’ll be business as usual.” He patted a pile of paper beside the letter. “I got six more claims here, and what do you want to bet five of them overstate their loss. If there
was
a loss.”

“Wow. Does everyone cheat?”

“Oh, no. One time a client sent
us
a check—she found her diamond ring in the bathtub drain, so she was returning the insurance money. Now that was a day. The branch manager bought me lunch on that one.” He grinned, remembering. “But mostly it’s lies. Penny-ante stuff. My customers could never be politicians, they don’t steal big enough.” He massaged his neck tiredly.

“Do you like this job, Dad? Because it sounds awful to me.”

His smile was so full of love and pride, it made her throat ache. “I’ll tell you what I like. I like watching my daughter practicing up to be a
Jeopardy!
champion so she can win her parents a vacation to Europe.” He ruffled her hair. “Did I tell you Grandma wants me to tape the Classics Bowl for her? She’s going to show it to her euchre club. You’ll be the talk of Manistee.” He looked at the kitchen clock. “What are you doing up so late? You can’t win anything if you’re tired. Go to bed.”

Bernadette climbed the stairs through sudden tears that stung her eyes. That insurance job sounded like something even the Joads would turn down. And her father was so sweet. It wasn’t fair. While her mother—well, Bernadette was fast coming to believe there was no accounting for taste. Look at Nadine.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

If there were no girls like them in the world,

there would be no poetry.

—Willa Cather,
My Antonia

T
he next day was Monday. At lunch, Bernadette and Nadine ate with Lori and pretended that everything was normal between them. At least Bernadette pretended. Maybe Nadine really thought things
were
fine, which just went to show how little attention she was paying these days.

Out the window they saw Mr. Malory get into his car and drive away. He wore sunglasses.

“He’s gorgeous,” Nadine said dreamily.

Bernadette stiffened. “You’ve got a boyfriend, remember?” she said coldly. “You want to be careful or you’ll get your fantasies mixed up.”

“Who says they’re fantasies?” Nadine smiled mysteriously while Bernadette tried in vain to think of a scathing reply. “It’s like I just got a brand-new VW bug. Suddenly I see VW Bugs everywhere, and I have to compare them to mine. What do you think, Lori? Does that make sense?”

“I don’t think you should talk about Mr. Malory like that.”

Bernadette and Nadine looked at each other, surprised. Lori frowned at them. “You make him sound like some—some centerfold. If he hadn’t done all that research, we wouldn’t have a prayer against Pinehurst. It’s just not very—respectful.”

“I’m
very
respectful—especially when he wears that gray shirt with the button open. C’mon, Lori, I’m only kidding.” Nadine coaxed, but Lori wouldn’t smile.

She’d called him “drop-dead sexy” not three weeks ago. From force of habit Bernadette found herself exchanging glances with Nadine, who didn’t even know about the cell phone calls. What was happening here?

After practice that afternoon, Nadine couldn’t give Bernadette a ride home. Errands to run, favors for her mother, etc. The usual. She said this fast, gathering up her books, with little sidelong glances that dared Bernadette to object.

Bernadette would eat worms first. After Nadine’s showing off at lunch, she’d be damned if she gave the Korean Kid another chance to tell her to get a life. “Don’t put yourself out,” she said. Lori glanced from her to Nadine. “I’ll call my mother.”

“I go right down Grand River, Bernadette,” Lori volunteered. “I’ll give you a lift.”

“Thanks, that’d be great.” Bernadette ignored Nadine’s wink and “how about that” face. Maybe Nadine wanted to pretend they shared some secret about Lori, but secrets were precisely what they did not share. Not lately.

Lori had parked on the far side of the track. The summery weather from the week before was still in evidence, and the March day had soared into a temperature range Michigan did not normally feel until June.

Bernadette ambled across the football field. With each breath of balmy air her worries about best friends, contests, and faculty members with perplexing secrets baked away in the physical joy of hot sun on her face.

Track season had not officially started, but a few members of the boy’s team were wrestling hurdles into place over by the far goalpost. More boys raked the long jump pit. Lori stopped to watch three girls practice the shot put.

These were seniors, serious-faced and solid as tree trunks in their dark green Wickham sweats. They went through an identical series of moves: warm-up stretches, a practice rotation, then the actual throw. Numbered markers in the field made it easy to gauge the distances.

What Bernadette knew about track and field she could put in her eye and not even blink, but even to her this crew didn’t look much of a threat. That last toss barely cleared twenty-five yards. It appeared to have given its thrower a cramp, because she fell to the ground swearing and clutching her side.

Lori went over and said something. The seniors exchanged looks. One of them snorted. Lori dropped her backpack and slipped off her pompon jacket. Her silver hoop earrings glinted in the light.

Sly grins passed between the shot-putters. Bernadette sat down on the track. This ought to be good.

Lori’s short pleated skirt and cap-sleeved sweater suggested Miss America being photographed at a construction site. Her hair flamed red-gold in the sun. Muscles Bernadette herself did not own flexed in Lori’s upper arms as without self-consciousness she did some elbow-behind-the-head stretches. Right, left, arms behind the back. The sweater grew taut. Over by the long jump pit all motion ceased.

The seniors’ grins turned thoughtful.

Lori took her stance and faced the back of the scuffed dirt circle. She tucked the shot snugly under her chin. She leaned backward on one bent leg, took two little hops in a turn, then exploded skyward like a released metal coil. Her shoulders twisted as she thrust the shot forward and grunted the “ooof” of a sumo wrestler.

The sequence imprinted itself on Bernadette’s brain: Lori frozen in time, her muscled arm stretched out before her, a vision of power and grace whose beauty caught at the throat.

The shot thudded down past the thirty-five-yard mark.

The seniors were as shocked as if it had landed on them.

“Thanks, guys.” Lori picked up her things and strolled back to Bernadette.

“That was awesome.” Bernadette scrambled upright and trotted behind her. “You smoked them. You blew them away! You are in the wrong sport, Lori Besh.”