In Trouble (3 page)

Well, not exactly normal.

20

5.

I pulled on jeans, put on the blouse I’d meant to iron but never got to, and grabbed a sweater and jacket. It was in the mid-forties, the radio said. I took a cup from Mom’s morning coffeepot, scribbled a note about going for a walk, and closed the apartment door as quietly as I could.

Elaine’s been in the city now for two days. With Neil.

We’d had a bad fight on the phone when I said she should forget about him.

“You just don’t understand. You don’t know anything about love,” she’d snapped.

“Love with a capital
L
?”

When I said that, Elaine swore she could see the sarcasm washing over my face, and she slammed the phone down. Now we were talking again, and again about Neil.

But she just doesn’t get it. “Look before you leap,” that 21

corny phrase, should be look and double look before you trust.

I waited at the Automat and scanned the crowd as dozens of people came through the revolving doors. It was Sunday, and most people weren’t eating a quick lunch before going back to the office. They looked cheerful in that don’t-show-you’re-excited Manhattan way.

At last Elaine came through the doors. She looked at me for a second, then rushed over and gave me a hug. And I remembered how much I’d missed her.

If you didn’t know, you might think we were sisters or maybe cousins. Both not too tall, not too short. Average, although Elaine’s gained weight since I last saw her.

Both of us have average brown hair, average length just below the ears. Nothing different, except mine’s curly and Elaine’s is straight. Elaine always said she envied my curls, and I wished more than anything for her straight hair, which I knew would be perfect in a close-up when the moon shines a spotlight on you.

“Only in the movies,” Elaine says, and for both of us that means
From Here to Eternity
with Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr making love on the beach in the moonlight.

We hugged a second time, and suddenly I felt shy but glad we were at the Automat. We’ve loved this place since we were kids. It’s familiar. It’s our place. You go up to the cashier lady who sits in a closed booth in the center near the door. You hand her a dollar bill, and 22

she hurls coins into the marble troughs in front of her.

These ladies never speak a word, even when you ask a question. It’s as if they have a union contract that says all they have to do is toss coins grabbed from a bottomless sack of money, nothing else. Their fingers seem to know nickels from dimes from quarters. They never count out your change, just fling the coins into the gullies in front of them. And it’s always right. That was the first job I ever wanted.

No waiters or waitresses to bother you in the Automat. Just put your change in the slots and turn the knob. A little window opens and there sits your food.

It’s easy.

“Hey, you gained weight,” I said. She blushed, and I felt stupid. This is the first thing you say to a friend you haven’t seen in a couple of months?

I found a table and motioned her over. “What are you going to do about Neil?”

Elaine sipped her tea. She wouldn’t look at me.

“You have to think about it,” I insisted.

She seemed distracted.

“Hey, Elaine.”

She’d been silently crying.

I stared at her. “You did it!” I practically choked on the words.

In a flash I understood this weekend wasn’t the first time for Elaine. “Every time you saw him?” I held my breath. She nodded. “That’s months!” 23

Elaine wasn’t loose. That’s the word everybody uses for girls who did it. Elaine, my best friend for years. I couldn’t stop looking at her. She looked only at her cup.

Why would she do this? How could she? Oh my god.

I bit my tongue.

Headache stab like jagged lightning.

Run!

“For months?” I said again. She looked shaken.

Elaine had moved out of the city by the time they showed us the sperm-egg film. Did they teach any of that in parochial school? I mean even if you’re a nun, you’d know about that, wouldn’t you?

“Was he careful? Elaine, you’ve got to be careful. If you got . . .” It was unthinkable.

Elaine stared at me.

“You have to figure out a way to be safe.” Elaine’s cup rattled loudly in the saucer. Tea spilled on the table. She sat unmoving as it flowed in a stream towards her. I grabbed a batch of napkins and leaned over.

“Jeez, Elaine, get a grip on yourself.” She looked at me the way you’d eye a stranger. And I sat back and shut up.

“Neil said you could count the days to make sure it was safe.” She looked down at her hands. “But I’m not sure I did it right.”

“Do they teach you biology in your school? Like men and women, and—”

“—sin.” Her voice was almost a whisper.

24

My heart began to pound. “Sin?” I said. “What about the science things that happen when you . . . when you do it. Like sperm and egg, that stuff. Did they tell you about that?”

Elaine turned such a flaming red I thought she’d have burn marks for life. It seemed like an hour later she said,

“Not really. But Sister Mary Joseph had us write down questions about dating and sin. A lot of us wanted to know if making out was a sin.”

Sin
was clearly the big word.

“But making out isn’t going all the way,” I said.

A little necking, that’s all. Second base.

Run!

“Sister thought it was. Fornication is a mortal sin, and every day they tell us we shouldn’t be ‘an occasion of sin.’”

“An
occasion
?” I said, completely puzzled.

“Girls shouldn’t tempt boys into committing a sin.” I needed a piece of chocolate cake. When I got back to the table, Elaine had destroyed her napkin. It sat in a pile of twisted little balls.

“If you love someone, how can it be so terrible?” She was almost pleading.

I’m no help. The only thing I know about the Catholic Church is that there are beautiful windows and people light a lot of candles. But I tried. “It’s okay if you plan to get married, right?”

“That’s what I think,” she said, looking up. “It’s only out-of-wedlock temporarily.”

25

“How temporary?”

“Next year we’ll be married.”

Oh god, she really thinks that’s going to happen. I started to tear
my
napkin. “Listen,” I said, “I don’t know how they do it, but boys can get those
things
. Neil must know. He’s in college.”

Elaine shook her head. “He said it would spoil everything.”

I didn’t know who was more embarrassed. “Why?” I said, concentrating on my napkin. “I mean how? . . . I mean . . .” but I didn’t know what I meant.

She bit her lip and sighed. “He says it keeps us apart.”

Now I really didn’t know what she was talking about, but I wasn’t going to ask. Georgina would have understood. Maybe it did help to have a big brother, although when I pictured Stevie as older, the thought of asking him about this was revolting.

“Look, I know you’re probably right, but I have to go home,” she said, slipping her arm into her jacket.

I reached across the table and patted her hand. That’s what adults do, pat your hand when you’re upset. But it felt right, and Elaine gave a wan smile.

“Did I ever tell you that my Uncle Maury once worked at the Automat?” That got her attention. “Yup, he was a pie man. Bet you never thought about how all those dishes get behind the little windows.”

Elaine glanced at the nearby bank of food windows.

26

I leaned forward with my revelation. “Lots of workers stand behind them, and as soon as one is empty they rush to refill it.”

Elaine smiled.

“But leave it to my Uncle Maury. He flunked pie window!”

Elaine actually laughed. “Why?”

“Put blueberry in where apple was supposed to be.”

“And they fired him for that?”

“No, but when he mixed up cherry and mince, that was the end.”

“Oooh, not mince!” Elaine laughed again.

“Come on,” I said, as I pulled on my sweater. “Let’s go.” She stood up as if she were fifty years old with knees creaking and back bent. “Hey, listen,” I said, “it’ll be okay.” Outside, clouds drifted across the face of the sun.

Dark and light, light and dark. We headed for the subway.

It’s an accident of birth that I’m not Catholic. But if you’re not Catholic, is
it
still a sin?

We waited at the Long Island Rail Road station for Elaine’s train home. I don’t remember when we’d had so many cups of tea.

“There’s no bathroom on your train, is there?” I asked.

“No, but you know me, I’m a camel.”

We stood there not looking at each other. “You’re a junior in high school,” I said in a low voice. “You live with your parents. It doesn’t make sense to get married right away. You always said you weren’t going to be like your 27

mom, all day at home raising a kid—you were going to go to college, be something—we were going to go together.”

“Yeah, well things change,” Elaine said softly. “They change.”

Then she turned and walked to the candy stand. I followed her.

“Boarding Track 19,” the loudspeaker blared. We rushed back. A quick hug and Elaine was gone. I watched dozens of people go down the staircase to the track. Backs of all kinds, broad-shouldered, narrow, hunched over, skinny, plump, wearing expensive jackets, baggy sweaters.

Two teenage boys and a man with a briefcase were the last to go down before the gate closed. I couldn’t see Elaine anymore.

“Final call Track 19. Woodside, Forest Hills, Kew Gardens.” The voice recited the names with singsong emphasis, WOODside, FOREST Hills, KEW Gardens.” Country names, not my world, not the city. And like Elaine, far away. “LOCUST Manor, ROSEdale, VALLEY

Stream . . .” The voice droned on.

“Things change,” Elaine had said. And how. Only yesterday we were trading movie star pictures, loving Gregory Peck and Ava Gardner and Jimmy Stewart. I turned away from the gate.

I made my way past the coffee shop and newsstand and headed for the subway turnstile. Do dreams change, or is growing up giving them up?

I hate change.

28

6.

Nobody was home when I got back. I opened the door to my room and jumped back, startled. Dad was standing next to my bureau. Strange. He never wandered in and out of our rooms. At least he didn’t used to.

He waved his hand back and forth as if in explanation.

“It’s about opening and closing doors with nobody watching,” he said. “Who’d have known that would be so satisfying?”

“Everybody out?” I asked. A dumb question, since it was clear Dad and I were alone. In the old days, the days before Dad went away, he would have made a joke about my powers of observation. Today he seemed not to hear.

“Want a cup of tea?” he asked.

I started to say I’d had a lifetime’s worth of tea today, but caught myself in time.

“Sure.”

29

His shoulders sagged as he walked into the kitchen.

He’s definitely shorter. I sat in the living room at the end of the couch farthest from the kitchen. It’s crazy to feel nervous about talking to your own father. He came in carrying the tray with a plate of Grandma’s rugaluch.

“I ate all the apricot, but the raspberry are almost as good,” he said.

This is my dad. He looks mostly like himself, but something’s different in his eyes. What has he seen?

First time ever in my whole life I ate rugaluch without pleasure.

Dad wiped away a flake of crust from the corner of his mouth. “I wrote you a letter—at least fifteen drafts.”

“Cutting-room floor,” I said. Dad and I used to talk about movies a lot. Before.

He nodded. “I want to tell you I know it’s been hard.” He put the plate down and stared at his hands. When I was little I used to count the freckles on the back of his hands. Took me a while to learn how to say “fifteen.” His hands looked paler now. I looked away. I can’t stand remembering what used to be.

“I know how much you’ve helped Mom with everything around the house and with Stevie.” I shrugged, but he went on. “I do know. I know it’s been tough.” His voice broke.

“It was fine,” I said. “Really. Everybody chipped in, and Stevie didn’t need too much pushing. Really, I mean it. It was okay.”

30

I didn’t say that Mom wasn’t around much. In the apartment she’d close her door and work, or go off to the library and work, or visit some publisher’s office and work.

And even with all that work we still had to be extra careful about money.

“It was okay” I said again. “Besides, you know with Grandma it’s always FHB with company.” I wanted to sound cheerful, but Dad shook his head ever so slightly.

He probably guessed it was Family Hold Back every night.

But I plowed on. “And Uncle Maury gave us his Christmas crate of oranges.”

“Jamie, Jamie,” he said with a sigh. “Christmas comes once a year.” He riffled his hair. “I know you thought I could have avoided prison if I gave the Committee names—”

“Listen, Dad, I . . . I think you’re the bravest person I know. It would have been easy to tell them what they wanted to hear. I didn’t understand at first, but I . . .”

—it was hard to say— “. . . I was wrong.” Dad ran his fingers through his hair. He started to speak, but I kept on talking. “Anyway, it had to have been tougher for you than us, right?”

“Left.”

That’s my dad. “You know, I used to hate it when you made us say, ‘Is that correct?’ But now, now it feels like you’re really home.” He smiled. “But really,” I said, “what was it . . . I mean . . . the other prisoners . . . fights? . . . you know, like in the movies? . . . beatings and stuff . . . ?” 31

I forced myself to keep looking at him.