The Beresfords (23 page)

My uncle waited, his solemn eyes fixed on me. He wanted me to want something, so he could have the pleasure of granting it, and I didn’t want to displease him.

“Actually, Uncle Paul,”—I dug my nails into my palms—somehow this was worse than asking for a car—“what I was really thinking about lately—and you can say no if you want—but I thought it might be fun to do something…different…with my hair. Like some of the other girls have. You know.”

He didn’t. Both Rachel and Julie used rollers and curling irons while living at home and got perms the moment they left.

I took a deep breath, bracing myself for long explanations. “What I mean is that, if you don’t mind, for my birthday…I’d really like to get one of those permanents.”

Annette tugged one of my new spiral curls and watched it
sproing
back into place.

“Do you like it? I do,” I said, trying to sound confident. “It makes me look older.”

“You’re right. It makes you look seventeen instead of thirteen.”

“Good. Because no one wants a thirteen-year-old handling their money.”

She shook her head, smiling, as I slid my
Next Teller, Please
sign to the side of my window.

I’d been working at the savings and loan eighteen months now, nearly full-time in the summer and on breaks, and Saturdays and afternoons during the school year. Having excelled at so few things I tried, I was thrilled to realize I was a fast and accurate teller. At first Monica put me in the Express Lane where I only had to smile and make the minimum of polite talk while I gave out cash or validated checks, but as my tenure lengthened, more was required of me. I had to process more complicated transactions or fill in at the New Accounts desk or help people get into their safe deposit boxes. Despite my dread of speaking, I found so many of the customers were regulars that making conversation was not as painful as I imagined. Old Mrs. Dodd always wanted to brag about her son. Mr. Hughes didn’t want to talk at all, thank you very much. Ms. James relished the opportunity to vent her pet peeves. I discovered a knack for listening to the long-winded and making them feel heard. When retired Mr. Franco limped in the first time and all the
Next Teller
signs swung out like magic, he occupied my window for a solid half-hour. Without a line behind him, I could think of no reason to shoo him away, and with fresh meat for an audience he saw no reason to go. A friendship was born.

“Who’s the new girl?” he hollered this morning when he caught sight of me. “I’m gonna close my account if you went and fired Frannie, Monica. Bad enough that you folks don’t have any ATMs.”

Monica glanced up from her computer monitor. “
Frannie’s
still here, Mr. Franco. Third window down.”

“That’s not Frannie,” he teased, stumping over to drop his bag of rolled pennies and nickels at my station. “That’s some pretty
new girl you hired.”

“Don’t,” I managed, hunching down to hide my flaming face. “How are you today, Mr. Franco?”

“My wife looked a lot like you do now when I first met her, God rest her,” he continued to holler. “Otherwise I would never have married her because she talked too much. Yap
yap
yap
. I’ve told you about my wife, haven’t I? I didn’t get a word in for the first ten years.”

“You’ve mentioned her. Did you want to deposit these, Mr. Franco, or exchange them for bills?”

“Deposit. Yes, sir. Pretty as a picture with all that curly blonde hair. I called it her lion’s mane, you know. You have a boyfriend, Frannie?”

The other tellers were hiding their faces and snickering by this point. I shook my head and blurted in desperation, “How is your dog doing? Is the abscess getting any better?”

Mission accomplished. Embarrassing references to my appearance were forgotten and I counted the coins in peace while Mr. Franco ran down his pet’s very familiar health history. At my break, however, I locked myself in the bathroom and crept to the mirror. It had become a new habit of mine. Not from vanity so much as amazement—was this person really me? After being so gawky for so long, all knees and elbows and feet since I was nine, I had at last grown into myself. My arms and legs were rounded, my cheeks fuller. If the same could hardly be said for my chest and backside, as least they were no longer sheer vertical drops. Just the other day I locked my bedroom door and unearthed the strapless corseted gown from Jonathan’s wedding. Maybe if it had fit me then as it did now he might have noticed me. Or not. It went back in the closet. Even my white-blonde hair was darker now, giving me eyebrows and eyelashes that didn’t disappear if you were further than a foot away from me. And with my new hair—Mr. Franco hardly represented a teenager’s dream demographic, but to be called pretty for the first time was never offensive. I was grateful for it. When you have spent years being Freakishly Unattractive, even praise from an old Mr. Franco
droppeth
as the gentle rain from heaven.

I emerged to find Monica at the break room table, swirling non-dairy creamer into her coffee. “There she is,” she smiled. “What big weekend plans does the birthday girl have?”

“A dinner with my family.”

“B-o-r-
i
-n-g!”

“No, I’m excited.” I sat in the chair my manager pulled out for me. “My cousin Julie is coming and Jonathan and his wife and Tom and his girlfriend.”

“Don’t you have four cousins?”

“Oh, well—yes, but Rachel and her husband can’t make it.”

“He’s the baseball player, right?”

“Uh-huh. For the Mets now. They’re not coming because Rachel is pregnant and her doctor doesn’t think she should travel.” At least, that’s what Rachel told Aunt Marie. The Perkins’ had booked their tickets until Uncle Paul let drop that Caroline’s brother Eric was going
to be in town and, of course, they had to invite him. A couple days later, Rachel called back to say she really ought to stay off airplanes and the doctor was even threatening to put her on bed rest.

“Well, even without the baseball player, sounds like a rip-roaring time,” Monica grinned at me. “And I have something for your birthday, too.”

“Another shift?”

“A suggestion.”

I wondered if she was going to tell me it was time to learn how to open and close Individual Retirement Accounts, or that I had to take over the weekly comment report.

“You’re a junior this year, right?”

I nodded. Yes, an eighteen-year-old junior. Ugh.

“Have you thought about what you’ll do after you graduate? Are you going to college?”

“I—don’t know yet. School isn’t really my thing.”

“Wasn’t mine either,” said Monica. “I never went to college.”

“You didn’t? But you’re a manager.”

“Yeah. Nowadays the newer branch managers have college degrees, and I’ll never be a district manager, but I don’t really want to be. I like running my little kingdom here. All of which is to say, Frannie, I think you may want to consider the management trainee program after you graduate. I think you’d be great. You could sign up for some classes at
Ohlone
, too, if the district manager insists, but you could get going without waiting for any degree.”

I don’t think I breathed for a solid minute. This was even better than old Mr. Franco saying I was pretty! To have a direction in life, one that would give me independence and make me a legitimate member of society, not just the charity case the Beresfords took on, who hung like an albatross about their necks till the end of her days.

“Oh, Monica—thank you for thinking of me! I think I would like that. Really, really like it. I would work so hard!” I clapped my hands together so I wouldn’t hug her, and she laughed at me.

“Glad to hear it. It’s a ways away, so let’s keep it to ourselves for now, but I might mention it to the district manager the next time I see her. Now get out there—I think this break has been plenty long and I bet Annette will let you have it.”

Annette could say whatever she liked. I was eighteen and I had a spiral perm and a future. Nothing could wreck that for me.

“
Egads
, Frannie,” said Tom when I came home. He and his girlfriend Marcy were in the kitchen, digging into Paola’s relish tray. “What were you thinking? You look like Olivia Newton-John after she said good-bye to Sandra Dee.” Gripping his leather jacket he yelled, “
I got chills! They’re multiplying—
”

“
Aww
, don’t be a jerk,” chided Marcy, punching him in the shoulder. “Look—she went all red. Ignore him and, here, take this. Happy birthday.” She held out a bottle of wine with a bow on it.

“I’m only eighteen.”

Marcy snatched it back and turned on Tom. “I told you it was a stupid gift!”

“And I told you it was for my parents.” He ruffled my hair. “Happy birthday, kid. My present is my presence.”

“Thanks, Tom. Did Uncle Paul and Aunt Marie go to get Julie at the airport?”

“Nah. They’re out somewhere. But Paola said Julie isn’t coming after all. Apparently Rachel freaked out last-minute about this pregnancy of hers and made Julie go down to New York instead. I swear, you’d think she was having the Messiah.”

“Hey!” protested Marcy. “No blasphemy!”

“You Catholics. How is that blasphemy? I’m making fun of Rachel, not the Baby Jesus.” Another round of her smacking him and him pinching her followed.

“Too bad about Julie,” I said, before they could get too carried away. “I was looking forward to seeing her. I hope Rachel’s okay.”

“She’ll be fine,” said Tom dismissively. “She better be, or Aunt Terror will go out there and pay her a long visit.” He pulled open the fridge to inspect the beverage offerings, although, judging from his breath, this wouldn’t be his first refreshment of the day. “I can’t believe this. I tell Mom and Dad I’m coming over and there’s not even any beer. It’s not just me—Eric Grant isn’t gonna want iced tea either.
Gimme
that.” He reached for the bottle of wine.

“I thought it was for your parents,” Marcy said.

But Tom was already digging in the drawer for the corkscrew.

No Rachel and Greg and no Julie, then. Just my aunts and uncle, Tom and his girlfriend bickering and wrestling, Jonathan and Caroline cooing at each other, and dumb Eric Grant. Some birthday.

I hugged my knees to my chest as I sat on my bed. At least there was the
tres
leches
cake because Paola wouldn’t let me down.
Be grateful
.
You’re the one who didn’t want a party. And you’re still eighteen
whole years old
and Monica still thinks you could be a
m
anagement
t
rainee, remember?

There was a soft knock. “Frannie?”

It was Jonathan.

I sprung up to let him in, heart racing in surprise. I couldn’t think of the last time he’d come to my room—before he left for college all those years ago?

“I didn’t hear your car pull up,” I accused him breathlessly, as I tore around clearing surfaces and slinging clothes into my open closet.

“No. I—uh—walked the last few blocks.”

Since he and Caroline lived a good twenty miles off in Mountain View, I could only stare at him.

Jonathan held out his hands, palms upward. “I’m empty-handed for your birthday. Your gift is in the car.”

“Don’t worry about that.” I gestured at the vacant window seat, but he began to pace instead. From the foot of the bed to the desk; from the desk to the messy closet; from the closet back to the bed. On his third round trip I sank into the window seat myself. “Are you okay, Jonathan?”

“Yes. No. It’s okay.” With an effort he abandoned his nervous movements and leaned against my desk, his eye falling on my open Bible. “First Timothy?”

I nodded. “Aunt Terri gave me a study guide to the Epistles.”

He grinned. “Only Aunt Terri would think a guide to the Epistles was the perfect gift for a girl’s eighteenth birthday.”

It beat a bottle of wine, in my humble opinion.

“But maybe it
was
the perfect gift,” Jonathan went on, “because here you are using it.
Only you, Frannie.” Rising, he came toward me. I thought for a wild second he might hug me or take my hand—no, no—more likely he would just sit by me. I scooted over on the cushioned bench to make room for him, but it wasn’t me after all who drew him to the window. He was checking for Caroline. I looked, too, at the empty street below.

“First Timothy,” said Jonathan again. His voice was meditative as he began to quote, “‘Let no one despise your youth, but set the believers an example in speech and conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.’”

I nodded before I realized he didn’t see me, and then I murmured, “Yes.” I knew the passage. After a moment I took it up again. “
‘Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophetic utterance…Take heed to yourself and to your teaching; hold to that, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers.’” My cheeks flushed, but I added, “You know, Jonathan—when I was younger, I always thought of you when I read those verses.”