Music in the Night (14 page)

"Yes?"
He opened it and stood there, his hands on his hips.
Daddy always seemed to feel out of place in my room. My things were too dainty, too sparkling for him to touch. Even though he gave money to Mommy and approved of the gifts, the stuffed animals, the dolls, and ceramics, he looked uncomfortable around them. When I was just a little girl, not much older than May, Daddy rarely came into my room. He always said his goodnight from the doorway. Once or twice he came to my bedside when I had a fever and when I had the measles.
"Laura, where did you go today?" he demanded. "You mean after school?" I replied.
"You know what I mean, Laura," he said, his voice dripping with disappointment. I never lied to Daddy face-to-face and I wasn't about to now.
"I went to see Aunt Belinda," I admitted.
"Who took you there, Cary or Robert Royce?" "Daddy--"
"Who took you there, Laura?"
"I took her," Cary confessed from his attic doorway. Daddy spun around and glared up at him.
"You know I told you distinctly never to go there, Cary." I never knew Daddy had strictly forbidden him. It made me feel worse for asking him to do it.
"He didn't go in, Daddy. I went in to see her myself. Cary waited in the truck and he didn't want to take me. I made him."
"You can't make a young man Cary's age do anything he doesn't want to do," Daddy said.
"She didn't make me," Cary said.
"You turn those truck keys over to me, Cary. I don't want you using it until I say again, hear?"
"Okay," Cary said. "Here." He tossed them down and Daddy caught them in his right hand, which only turned up the fury in his eyes another notch. Then he looked at me.
"I thought we were clear on this matter, Laura. I thought you understood I didn't want you going up there, that it disturbed your grandmother."
"But why, Daddy? I don't understand how it disturbs anyone for me to go see a lonely old lady."
"It's family business," he said.
"So? I'm part of the family. Why can't I visit her?" "Belinda is the black sheep of the family. It's a matter of reputation, family honor," he said.
"Why is she the black sheep?"
"I don't have to go into details, Laura. She was not a good girl, a decent girl. She gave Grandma Olivia's father and mother a lot of grief and that behavior continued tong after they were gone, only then it fell on Grandma Olivia's shoulders. She's done right by her and that's that. It's embarrassing to me to have to learn my children disobeyed me. It says in the Bible, honor thy father and thy mother, Laura. It's a sin not to. Remember that," he warned.
"But--"
"There are no buts. I absolutely forbid you to go up there again, understand? Do you?" Daddy demanded.
The tears that came to my eyes blurred my vision. Daddy looked out of focus, but his anger was so great, his face so red, I couldn't look away.
"Yes, Daddy."
"I hope this is the end of it and I never get another phone call from your grandmother about it. She's very upset."
I shook my head.
"It also says 'For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you .'"
"Don't quote Scripture to me, Laura. I know Scripture and I know you should obey your father," Daddy said, his face so crimson now I thought his blood pressure must be sky-high.
"Okay, Daddy."
"Let it be," he said.
I nodded and looked down. I heard Cary slam his attic door shut. It sounded like a gunshot in the house. Daddy turned and descended the stairs, each of his steps sounding like a judge's gavel, pronouncing harder and harder sentences on all of us.
It was difficult to get back to my studying. It took all the concentration I could muster, but I was finally able to run through a few chapters and go over some quizzes before I got too tired to focus any longer. After I crawled into bed and put out the lights, I heard Cary come down the ladder. I got up quickly and went to the doorway. He was just turning to go to his room.
"Cary . ."
"What?" he snapped.
"I'm sorry about what happened with Daddy."
"I
told you it would. I don't know why you had to go up there, why it was so important right now," he said. "Girl stuff," he added and started toward his room.
"Cary!" I called, but he continued walking away from me. He closed the door hard.
I never felt more like crawling under my blanket and disappearing.
I apologized again to Cary in the morning when we walked to school.
"Forget about it, Laura," he said. "You know Dad. He'll calm down and it will be all right again."
"I just don't understand it, Cary. If you met Aunt Belinda once, you would see what a sweet little old lady she is. She can't be a threat to anyone and I'm sure she doesn't even remember half the things she was accused of doing."
"It's not our business," Cary said.
"But why isn't it, Cary? We're members of this family. Why can't we ask questions and express our opinions, too? We're old enough now," I insisted.
"It's the way it is," he replied. Then he stopped walking and spun on me. "Somehow all this is because of you and Robert, isn't it? It has to do with your great love affair, right?"
I blushed before I could utter a reply.
"You don't have to answer. I know the answer," he said, walking ahead. We had just dropped off May when he quickened his steps and kept in front of me the rest of the way to school. As soon as Cary saw Robert waiting at my locker, he glared at me and then hurried away to join his own friends.
"Something wrong?" Robert asked
immediately. He looked after Cary, who was plowing through other students, knocking shoulders, and clearing a path.
"I'll tell you about it later," I said and organized my books and notebooks for another day of school.
Cary remained distant, barely looking at me in classes or in the hallways. He sat with his friends in the cafeteria and I sat with Robert. It was then that I told him about Cary and me getting into trouble for visiting my forbidden aunt.
"How weird," Robert said. "No one will tell you exactly why she's off limits?"
"No one thinks we're old enough yet," I muttered.
"I've got relatives I haven't seen, but it's only because they're wrapped up in their own lives. My mother calls them the funeral family." He laughed at my look of puzzlement.
"Funeral family?"
"We see them only at the funerals of other family members. She says as far as she knows, these people have only black clothing."
He laughed and I smiled.
"That's better," he said. "That's more like my Laura. Do you want to go to the movies this weekend? I can splurge. My father paid me back wages. I can take you to dinner, too. I can even afford the Captain's Table!"
"I'll see," I said and then quickly added, "what my father says. I want to go."
"Good," Robert said, slipping his hand under the table to take hold of mine. He squeezed it gently. "Good."
I wanted to wait until a little more time passed before I asked Daddy's permission to go to dinner and a movie with Robert. Fortunately, over the next few days, Daddy's mood improved because he was enjoying a good lobster catch and there was talk that the prices for the cranberries would go up in time for our harvest this year. One night after dinner and after I helped Mommy clean up, I stopped in the living room and asked him if it would be all right for Robert to take me to a movie.
"And dinner first," I added.
"Dinner?" Daddy's eyebrows rose. "The tourist season hasn't even started yet really, and he's got money to waste?" I smiled.
"He doesn't think it's a waste to take me to dinner, Daddy," I said.
Daddy shook his head.
"When I was your age, going to a restaurant was something I did only with my parents."
"It's different now, Daddy."
"Aye, that it is, and not all for the better."
"It's just a date, Daddy. I'm old enough to go on dates," I said softly, giving him my best smile.
"Ask your mother about it," he said finally. This was the same as him saying it was all right. Of course, I knew Mommy would approve.
I told Robert the next day at school, which made him very happy. We were both back to our old selves, holding hands, laughing, enjoying our time together. I felt a whole new energy, and I was eager now to face my exams and end the year on a high note.
When Cary, Robert, and I left the building at the end of the day, however, we were surprised to see Grandma Olivia's Rolls-Royce in front of the school and Raymond waiting beside it. He waved as soon as he spotted us.
"What's going on?" I wondered aloud.
"Your grandmother would like to see you, Miss Laura," Raymond said.
"See me?"
"She asked me to bring you up to the house right after school."
I looked at Cary, whose gaze dropped to his feet. "I'll see about May," he said and started off. "Something wrong?" Robert asked me.
"I don't know. I'll call you tonight," I promised and got into the luxurious automobile. I hadn't ridden in it all that much and never before alone. I felt selfconscious about driving off in a chauffeured Rolls with other students looking after me.
When we arrived, I went right inside and found Grandma Olivia alone in the living room, seated in her favorite chair, her thin-framed glasses on her pearl chain resting against her bosom. She had been reading the society pages in the Boston newspaper and set it aside.
"Hello, Grandma. You wanted to see me?"
"You can sit over there, Laura," she said, nodding at the sofa across from her. I sat and waited as she pulled her shoulders up.
"Is this about my visiting Aunt Belinda?" I asked quickly.
"No, not directly," she said, pursing her lips for a long moment. "You and I, you'll recall, had what I thought was a very important conversation. I was hoping you had listened to what I said and would behave accordingly. That you would be a source of family pride and accomplishment and continue to be a good daughter, a good granddaughter. But you have chosen, it seems, to fly in the face of all my words of wisdom and be defiant."
"It's about Robert," I said, nodding. "I told you, Grandma, that he is a very nice young man and I--"
"Nice young men don't invite impressionable young women to their homes when their parents are away and seduce them," she spat.
For a moment I could swear my heart actually stopped. I know I felt faint.
"What?"
"Don't deny it. I can see it's true in your face and denying it only makes it worse."
"Who--I don't understand." Did she have spies everywhere? Was every living soul in this town on her payroll?
"There's nothing to understand. What you've done and what you seem bent on continuing to do is disgraceful. I want it put to an end tonight. I will not say a word of this to your father and your mother if you obey, but if you don't--"
I shook my head and stood.
"Sit down, I'm not finished with this
conversation, Laura."
"I won't listen. I don't want to hear another word, Grandma. You don't understand and you have no right to run my life like this."
"Of course I do," she replied, as if I had spoken the silliest words. "I'm responsible for the health and welfare of this family."
"Why?"
"Why?" She laughed. "Why? I'll tell you why," she said, fixing her eyes on me and narrowing them into slits, "because the men in it are not capable of it. They've never been capable of it, and the other women haven't the stamina or the backbone.
"Now, back to what I was saying. You are apparently seeing so much of this boy and being so openly intimate with him, you have people talking. Some of my closest friends have come to me and--"
"You have people spying on me, Grandma? Am I being followed?"
"Of course not, but they have eyes. They have ears and they know how important the family reputation is to me," she said.
"They're just gossips who have nothing else to do with their lives," I cried. "I'm no princess, Grandma, and you're not a queen. We're not royalty because we can trace our family lineage back to the first settlers here. We're just like everyone else. We put our shoes on one at a time," I said, the tears streaming so freely down my cheeks, they dripped off my chin.
"Have you no self-respect?" she hissed. "Don't you care at all about what you do to my family name?"
"Your family name?"
"Our family name. I explained how important that is, how reputation--"
I straightened my shoulders to match hers.
"I'm not doing anything I'm ashamed of, Grandma Olivia. I have a personal life and I'm old enough to make my own decisions about it."
"That's idiotic talk. Age has nothing to do with it. There are people twice your age who are twice as foolish and some of them are in this family," she said.
"How do you know you're always right about everything, Grandma?"
"It's my unfortunate destiny to be right about everything," she said calmly, resting her hands on the arms of the chair, "because with that comes the awesome responsibility of looking after the family."
"You don't have to look after me," I said.
"Apparently, I do, even more than I first thought. I'm warning you, Laura. Don't defy me. I'll go to your father tonight and reveal what you have already done. Just think what such a revelation will do to your parents."
I shook my head, unable to speak.
"Now, quietly end the relationship, do well in your schoolwork, and continue to be a helpful, loving daughter. In time you will see my wisdom. After your next year, 1'11 see that you are admitted to the best of the Ivy League schools and you'll be admitted to the most prestigious sorority there. You'll meet a young man who is deserving of your name and your life will be wonderful."
"As wonderful as yours has been, Grandma?" I threw back at her. She stiffened. "With a sister locked away in a rest home and deserted by her family, and with a son who's been disowned. No, thank you," I said.
"Laura! Stop being impudent! You will do as I say or I will carry out my threat," she snapped back at me.
I felt myself wilt. Mommy and Daddy would be devastated to hear about my evening with Robert. All their trust in me would be gone.
"Now go home. Raymond's waiting for you outside. Study for your tests and put an end to this stupidity immediately. I will not have another member of my family be defiant and go astray. I didn't take action early enough with my sister and my younger son, but I am determined to do so with you," she vowed.
It was as if she spoke from the heavens. Her words rained down on me and landed like a heavy weight upon my shoulders.
There was no more to say to her. I turned and walked away, moving like someone in a trance. I didn't even remember the ride home. When I got into the house, I ran up the stairs and into my room before anyone could see me or ask any questions. I threw myself on my bed and started to cry. I cried until my chest ached and then I turned and sat up and wiped my tear-streaked face.