Me and Fat Glenda (9 page)

One of the people I found this out from was Roddy Fenton. I saw Roddy around school, of course, but he usually kept at a distance, especially if Glenda was around. Then, two weeks after Mrs. Waite's visit, Glenda was absent for a couple of days.

“Hi,” Roddy said, catching up with me as I was walking home from school on the second day of Glenda's absence. “Where's Fat?”

Before I could answer he leaned over and took a couple of heavy schoolbooks out of my arms. It felt lots better with just my notebook and a skinny math book left to carry.

I was annoyed with him for calling her “Fat,” though, so instead of saying thanks, I said, “If you mean Glenda, she's sick. With a virus or something.”

Roddy just loped along beside me looking straight ahead. “Oh,
too
bad.”

“I don't think you really mean it.”

He stopped short and stood in the middle of the sidewalk looking at me.

“Listen, if you two want to be friends, what do I care? In fact, you want to know the truth? I think you two make a real freaky pair. So go ahead and be friends for life.” He started walking again, shaking his head as though he was agreeing with himself.

It was my turn to stop now. “Okay, give me back my books. You don't have to bother
acting
like a gentleman, carrying lunch trays and books around for me, because I don't think you
are
one.”

Roddy pulled back. “Hold on a minute. Don't get sore. What'd I say that was so terrible?”

“Plenty. And the way you said it, too. So Glenda and I are freaks, huh? What's that supposed to mean?”

“It means what it says. She's a freak. That's what. Fat as a house. Crazy, too. That kid's not normal. You just got to admit she's freaky.”

“And me, too, I suppose?”

For the first time Roddy seemed uncomfortable. His face turned kind of pink.

“Well,” I said, “I'm still waiting. What's freaky about me?”

“You?” he said blankly. “Uh . . . nothing. You look okay to me.” He stopped and stood there rubbing his ear, then started walking again. “But, I'll tell you something. That family of yours. Wow! Some kids and I passed your
house the other day and this dame was out in the yard boiling something in a big pot. Looked like a witch. And there was this whole pile of junk sticking up in the middle of the yard, only it was all connected like it was supposed to
be
something.”

The things Roddy was saying made me feel terrible. I kept walking along looking at the cracks in the sidewalk.

“Listen,” he said, putting a hand on my arm. “It's not your fault. Lots of people have nuts in their families.”

His trying to be kind about it made me angrier than anything else. “They're not nuts,” I said hotly. “They're my parents and I love them. Now give me back my books and leave me alone!”

But Roddy just stood there holding onto my books as though I'd put him in a trance.

I glared at him. “Is that why somebody left a dead cat on our doorstep? Because they'd decided we were a bunch of nuts before we even moved in?” He still didn't say anything.

“And then you threw that dumb note into Glenda's house.”

Roddy half smiled. “Oh, so you read it?”

“
I
did. But Glenda didn't see it and I didn't show it to her. Incidentally, you ought to be grateful to Glenda. She never told her mother about your throwing that paper airplane into the living room.”

“So what?”

“Well, a lot of stuff got broken because of it and Glenda got into a lot of trouble. It's costing her fifteen dollars in allowance money. But she took the blame. She told her mother it was all her fault because she didn't want to squeal on you.”

“Big deal!” Roddy said bitterly. “She's a number one squealer from way back—and don't let anybody tell you different.”

“Then why didn't she tell on you?”

“Oh,” Roddy shrugged. “How should I know? Probably because you're a new friend and she wants to impress you with how noble she is.”

“Then why would she have put that cat on my doorstep? You know what I'm beginning to think? I'm beginning to think
you
put it there, Roddy Fenton, to try to get Glenda into trouble.”

Roddy whirled around in front of me. “Oh yeah? Prove it!”

That was the whole trouble; I couldn't prove anything. Even though I wanted to trust Glenda, I couldn't get the thought out of my mind that she had had something to do with Mary Lou's chicken-foot sandwich. And whoever had planted the chicken-foot sandwich might very well be the same person who had left the dead cat. So I was still wondering about Glenda—and I remembered that Mary Lou, too, had called her a squealer.

Roddy and I had started walking again, and we were
getting close to the corner of Dangerfield Road.

“You can give me back my books now,” I said. “You might get scared by witches if you walked down my block.”

Roddy handed me the books. “Listen, I'm sorry I made you mad or if I hurt your feelings or anything. But, number one, you want to watch out for Fat. She's not what you think she is. And, about your folks and that yard full of junk, I might as well tell you it's no joke. There's a petition going around. Somebody came over to our house with it last night, and my Pop signed it.”

“A petition? What sort of petition?”

“Well, it's got something to do with your folks running a junk-collecting business. It says they gotta haul all that stuff out of the yard and get rid of that garbage truck.”

I didn't want to believe him but his face was dead serious.

“That's not true, Roddy. They can't make us do that. We're not running a . . .”

“Sure they can. They can make you do anything around here once they get after you. They can run you out of the neighborhood; they can put you in jail. Anything. Take it from me,” he said, moving in closer. “I ought to know.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“Look. Don't ask questions. I'm just telling you what
I know.” He began to walk backwards slowly, down the street and away from me. “No joke.”

It turned out that Roddy Fenton was telling the truth. On Sunday, Mr. Creasey showed up at our house, driving an old beat-up black Ford. Instead of his green eyeshade he was wearing a straw hat, even though it was already October and getting a little chilly. Mom and I were both in the house. We could see Pop and Mr. Creasey talking in the yard. Most of the time they just strolled around as they chatted, and Pop seemed to be showing his junk sculpture to Mr. Creasey. Once, Mr. Creasey even went up a few rungs on Drew's ladder to get a better look at the construction under progress. This stovepipe one was going to be a monster, about fourteen feet high, Drew said.

After about half an hour, Mr. Creasey left and Pop came inside.

“Did he come for the rent?” Inez asked matter-of-factly.

“No,” Drew said. “I dropped that off a few days ago.”

“He came on account of the petition, didn't he?” I blurted.

Inez and Drew both looked at me in surprise.

“Oh, so you knew about that,” Pop said.

“I heard about it the other day. A kid from school told me.”

“Why didn't you tell us?” Drew asked.

“I thought he was making it up,” I said sheepishly. “At least, I hoped he was.”

Drew outlined the petition for Inez while she listened to him wide-eyed.

“Of all the nonsense I ever heard,” Mom exclaimed. “Did you explain about your sculpture, Drew?”

“Of course. You saw us out there. Creasey was as nice as could be about it. He was quite interested in ‘Stovepipes,' too. Took a long look at it.”

“So that's all settled then,” Inez said.

“Well, I guess so. Creasey's on the town council. He says as long as we're not running a business enterprise, the other members can't register any official beef against us. Said he was delighted to learn it was just a hobby after all and that he was impressed with the ‘vigor and originality' of my work.”

“He's a dear fellow,” Inez said absently. She was busy setting up her loom for a new weaving project.

“What about the garbage truck?” I asked. Even though I knew how calm Inez and Drew could be about things that got other people terribly upset, it was amazing to me that they didn't seem more uneasy and hurt about the petition. After all, it was a serious thing.

“What
about
the garbage truck?” Drew wanted to know.

“Can you go on keeping that in front of the house?”

“Well, actually Creasey said he couldn't see any technical objection to it as long as it isn't being used for commercial purposes.”

“But it is awfully ugly,” I said.

“It's also serviceable, Sara love, and it cost a song,” Mom commented. “I've gotten to love that old load.”

“Well everybody else around here just hates it!” I said. “Did you know that? Even you've got to admit it's pretty terrible-looking.”

“Oh rubbish,” Inez said impatiently.

Drew was staring out the window at the truck, which was parked as usual in front of the house. “I could rip down a section of fence and pull it into the yard under those trees,” he said.

“Why should you?” Inez wanted to know.

“Oh, maybe just for Creasey's sake. He's being nice about things. And people
are
talking about it, I.”

“Well of all the nerve . . .” Inez began.

“Nobody would say anything about
anything
we did if you just didn't make it so noticeable,” I broke in.

“Noticeable? What's that supposed to mean?” Inez wanted to know.

“Oh Inez,” I said imploringly, “can't you see that we're different from everybody else around here? I know we were like this in California, too. But there we weren't the only ones in the whole town. Here we really
are
different. People in Havenhurst are sort of old-fashioned and . . .
well, straight. The same families have been living here for years. They don't have a lot of new people from all over the country moving in and out all the time and changing things around the way they do in California. Havenhurst is more like . . . well, like Crestview, Ohio. Like when I lived with Aunt Minna.”

“Ah, I might have known it,” Inez said exasperatedly. “Crestview and Aunt Minna.”

“Hold on a minute, I,” Drew said to Mom. He'd been intently watching us both. “Did you ever notice that you're about as antagonistic to Crestview and Aunt Minna as Havenhurst is to us? More, probably.”

“Oh that's nonsense,” Inez retorted.

“Pop's right” I said. “You are against them, and that's why they watch us and act so picky, though really the garbage truck and the junk in the yard
do
look awful. This is a pretty-looking street. Or it was until we moved in.”

Inez just glared at me.

“Did you know,” I went on, “that they ran Madame Cecilia out of the neighborhood, not just because she was running a business but because she took in an Indian and some gypsies to live with her? And did you know that the reason they wanted to get this house condemned and torn down was because they were afraid that . . . well, afraid that the only people who would move into a dump like this would be. . .”

Inez lifted her arm. “I know. Don't tell me. Do you
think I can't spot racially prejudiced people from a million miles away? What are you trying to say Sara, that we must conform to Havenhurst and not be ourselves anymore? Haven't we taught you anything? Haven't you any convictions at all? Don't you even know what you believe in anymore?”

“Of course I do,” I said angrily. “But I just don't think people around here are as ready for changes as they are in some other places. Glenda understands because I explain things to her all the time. But most people around here only judge us from the way we dress, or the way we take care of the house and the yard, or something like that.”

It was awfully quiet in the room. Mom just sat there at her loom with her hands in her lap.

After a while Drew got up and went to the window again. “She's right, I,” he said to Mom, without turning around. ‘I'll pull that truck in the yard. Easy enough. Make a gate out of the section of fence I take down. Maybe build a shed for the junk materials, too. Won't do them any good sitting out there with winter coming on.”

I went over to the window and stood by Pop while he pointed out where he'd put the shed. “See, there along the side. Straighten the whole place up. Make it look more like a sculpture garden than a junkyard.”

“Okay,” I heard Mom say very quietly and slowly, from what seemed like very far behind us. “Okay, move the truck off the street and have a shed. But some things
stay as they are. My black ceiling does, for one.”

Inez' tone was brave but her voice sounded small. Like a little girl.