My One Square Inch of Alaska (9781101602850) (10 page)

For a moment, our kitchen went silent. There was only the sound of the clock ticktocking over the stove, the tines of Will’s fork on his plate as he poked at his peas, and the thin rustling of the newspaper in Daddy’s trembling hands. His hands got like that if the time between drinks went on too long.

“Says here he’s an art teacher at the senior high—art, of all things!” He glared up at me. “You have this red trash at school?”

I could have lied. Daddy had no idea what classes I was in. I wasn’t even entirely sure that he knew I was in my senior year.

But suddenly, as boring as I found Mr.-Cahill-the-high-school-teacher, I felt angry for Mr.-Cahill-the-artist. I said, “Yes, Dad. I have Mr. Cahill for art.” That was true. “He’s a good teacher.” Not true.

Will stared at me, his eyes wide, holding his breath. I
glanced at the clock. Jimmy would be at our house in about ten minutes.

Daddy shoved the newspaper at me. “Does he teach this trash in school?”

I took the paper, scanned the editorial that had so offended him, and quickly realized that Daddy would not be the only Groverton citizen to be outraged. The true betrayers of our country, Mr. Cahill wrote, were not communists, but those who, like Senator McCarthy, persecuted artists and musicians and writers. A truly free society, he stated, would not fear any kind of artistic endeavor, no matter how startling or odious or beautiful the ideas.

I looked up at Daddy. “No. Mr. Cahill does not discuss these ideas in class.” My heart thudding, I said, “But in social studies class, we learned that Senator McCarthy supported the Taft-Hartley Act.” That act, passed in 1947, made it more difficult for labor to strike after the surge of the labor movement in 1946. The year Mama died. The year Strange Freddie lost his hand, after Daddy had promised to support safety features at the mill. “So I guess that you also don’t agree with McCarthy on everything. I mean, Strange Freddie told Jimmy that you’d agreed with him about safety features at the mill. Back in 1946. But I guess you didn’t get a chance to speak up, like you promised him.”

I swallowed hard, knowing that I was taking this risk only because Jimmy would soon be over. And I also knew that I was being cruel, striking back at Daddy for his weaknesses in this way. The color drained from his face. Suddenly, he looked so much older than his fifty years. Quietly, he said, “I’ve made that up to Mr. McDonnell the best way I know how.”

Tears of instant regret pricked my eyes as I heard Daddy say Strange Freddie’s proper name, just as Jimmy had. I opened my mouth, about to apologize, but there was a banging at the back door.
Jimmy,
I thought—hoped—even though he always came to the front door.

But when I opened the door, it was Miss Bettina standing there. “I brought your favorite pickled green beans, Porter. One for now and one for your fallout shelter.” Right after Mama died in 1946, Daddy had built that fallout shelter in a rare burst of energy, saying he wasn’t going to let anything happen to his children.

“We’d better put both jars in the shelter.” He slapped the newspaper. “With commies like this art teacher, we’ll be under attack soon.”

“Now, Porter, I don’t think anyone is going to seek out and attack Groverton because of the opinions of one art teacher.”

Daddy shook his head, stood up, stalked off from the table.

Will pushed his plate back. “Done!” he said. He’d eaten the island of noodles and smashed up the pea and tuna islands. He grabbed his comic and ran from the table.

“Will, you get back here!” I hollered. I looked at Miss Bettina. “Maybe you could get him to eat more later. Thanks again for watching him for me.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t watch Will tonight. You know I’d normally love to. But I’m going to the meeting with Porter—your Dad—tonight. It’s at my church,” Miss Bettina said. She drove all the way into Dayton to attend the Unitarian church (which Grandma said didn’t count as a real church, but Miss Bettina’s kindness always seemed real to me). I was
relieved; maybe they could take Will to whatever the meeting was. But then Miss Bettina added, “An AA meeting. Alcoholics Anonymous.”

“Well, how wonderful,” I said. “But I don’t see why you have to take him. If he’s not drinking, he should be OK to drive himself—not that being drunk has ever stopped him from driving before.”

Miss Bettina gasped. I looked away, wishing I could snatch back the hateful words. I hated how I sounded—stiff and mean, just like Grandma—but I couldn’t suddenly feel all happy for Daddy.
Well, gee,
I wanted to say,
what made him finally figure out he needed to stop drinking? All the jobs he couldn’t keep, the nights he didn’t come home, the money he spent, the depressed funks that made him neglect me and Will? What has changed?

Jimmy.

I knew Daddy hadn’t quit on his own because of Jimmy. But Jimmy’s presence in my life definitely had an influence on how people treated us. Made Grandma less bitter. Made people treat Daddy a little more kindly at Ace Hardware.

Miss Bettina gently put a hand on mine, but I didn’t look at her. “I have to go,” Miss Bettina said softly. “I’m Porter’s sponsor. And I never miss a meeting myself, if I can help it.”

This made me look up and study her for a long moment as her meaning sank in.

I suddenly realized that as available as she was for us, most Saturday nights she wasn’t.

Because she was at AA meetings. Because, she was telling me, she was an alcoholic.

Alcoholic.
No one used that term back then, just like no one said
cancer
. Especially when cancer involved private
body parts. The disease was half-whispered, if named at all. Like the breast cancer that had taken my mama.

Suddenly I remembered, like a photo of the moment sliding before my eyes, Miss Bettina sitting with me on her front porch, telling me how Mama had gone away to get treatment for breast cancer down at a special clinic in Florida. Later, Miss Bettina—not our daddy—had been the one to tell me and Will that our mama had died from that breast cancer and been buried in Florida.

Alcoholic.
I could attach the term to Daddy, to his angry rants alternating with his sullen sorrow. But to Miss Bettina? Sweet, quiet, soft-spoken Miss Bettina, who watched Will for me, who brought us canned goods whenever she had extras, who quietly sold dresses in her shop, who sometimes slipped me an extra quarter or two when she paid me for doing alterations?

But what did I know of Miss Bettina? Only that she’d been my mama’s best friend. That she’d lived next door to us for as long as I could remember. I realized, though, that I had no idea how she, a single woman, had money for her dress shop, for a house. Why she’d never married.

I studied her tired, sad face. She wasn’t trying to trick me. She was telling the truth.

The doorbell rang. I heard Will’s steps galloping down the stairs, the front door being flung open, and then there was Will, rushing into the kitchen. “Oh, Donna,” he said, his voice singsong. Despite his promise from the week before, he made fun of me all the time about Jimmy. “Your boyfriend’s here!”

Jimmy came into the kitchen right behind Will. He laughed, scooped Will up, rubbing his knuckles across
Will’s head. “Yes, I am,” he declared. Jimmy and Will had become fast friends, like Will was his little brother, too.

Then Jimmy stopped, still holding Will in midair, and stared at Miss Bettina and me. “What’s the matter?”

“I’m afraid I can’t—” Miss Bettina said, as I said, “She can’t watch Will—”

We both stopped. “I need to find someone to watch Will,” I said.

“I can watch myself!” Will hollered, still writhing in Jimmy’s arms. “Put me down!”

“Maybe Will could see if he can go over to Tony’s house—” I started.

Suddenly, Will was making retching sounds. Jimmy quickly put him down. I could tell from Will’s ashen face that he was about to throw up. I hurried him up to the bathroom, held his head while he puked noodles into the toilet. Then I cleaned him up, felt his forehead. No fever.

“I’m sorry,” Will said, while I tucked him into bed. Even if he didn’t have a fever, I wanted him to rest. “I’ve messed things up.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said. But I swallowed over a lump in my throat. “You’ll be fine. You just need to eat better than noodles and Marvel Puffs cereal!”

“But I’m only three box tops away!” he said. “And the deadline for sending the box tops in is September thirtieth! Just eleven days from now!”

“Hush,” I said, and went downstairs.

Miss Bettina and Jimmy were talking quietly when I went into the kitchen. They stopped when I walked in, looking a little guilty. What was that about?

“He’s fine,” I said. “No fever or other symptoms. I think
he just got an upset stomach from running around all day and then not eating well at dinner.”

“I shouldn’t have roughhoused with him.” Jimmy looked sad. “I’m sorry. I was really looking forward to surprising you.”

“Well, if all Will has is an upset stomach from a rough day, why not take him with you?” Miss Bettina said. We both stared at her. She rolled her eyes. “Oh, I know. It’s not so romantic, taking a ten-year-old with you on a date, but isn’t that better than missing it altogether?”

“Ewww…I’m going on a date with you two?” Will was standing in the kitchen doorway.

“Will, what are you doing? You should stay in bed—”

“I was thirsty,” he protested. The little brat. If he was thirsty, he could have gotten water from the bathroom upstairs. He was spying! He looked at Jimmy. “You aren’t going to make out with my sister at the picture show, are you? Then I might really throw up. All over you.”

I was horrified. “Will!”

But Jimmy laughed. “I was planning on taking her on a picnic. By the Tangy River. Think you can handle that?”

Will lit up. “The Tangy River? I know the perfect fishing spot! And if it’s a picnic, well, just this once I could bend the rules and we could take Marvel Puffs. For a treat.”

I was about to say
No, no, no
to the whole thing, but Jimmy said, “That sounds like a great idea.”

W
e went to the Tangy, high on a bluff upriver. Through the trees, we could just make out the smoke from the stacks of Groverton Pulp & Paper, but none of the sulfur smell reached us. The bluff smelled woodsy and earthy. Jimmy had to have driven up and down River Road often to have spotted the place. It was new to me and I’d lived in Groverton my whole life—but then, I’d never had Jimmy’s freedom.

He wouldn’t let me do a thing to set up the picnic, but he let Will, which made Will strut with importance. I sat in the car, watching Jimmy and Will spread out a classy blue-and-white-striped picnic cloth—no faded, sad ducks and lambs, like the tablecloth on Mama’s old car in the garage. Then Jimmy got a picnic basket out of the trunk, and I followed him back to the cloth, where Will was sprawled. I knew I should feel glad that Will seemed better after getting sick at dinner, but I wanted Jimmy to myself.

When Jimmy came to the car, I leaned in close to him and whispered, “I don’t think he’s going to give us much privacy.”

He smiled. “It will be fine. Trust me.”

When we got to the picnic cloth, Will sat up. Jimmy sat down next to him, while I sat down across from them. “Think you’re feeling better enough to eat?” Jimmy opened the basket. “I brought grapes, olives, pâté—that’s a liver spread—and good, crusty bread.”

All exotic food, I thought. Except the grapes.
Persimmons…now that was exotic fruit
…. I tried to shake the thought from my head. I would not think of Mr. Cahill on this date.

But I was curious. I knew Jimmy hadn’t gotten the food from the A&P. Or from a tree in his backyard. “Where did you get all of this?” I asked, at the same time Will wrinkled up his nose as Jimmy spread a slice of bread with the pâté, which looked a lot like deviled ham to me.

“That stuff stinks!” Will said.

“Will!” But it did. And the olives—which were black, instead of green—smelled briny. Still, Jimmy must have spent a fortune on the food.

Jimmy laughed. “I went to a grocery in Cincinnati.”

Will took a crust of bread with pâté and bit into it. He immediately looked like he wanted to spit it out. And like he might be sick again.

I felt a little sorry for him. “You don’t have to eat, if you don’t want to.”

He started to look into the basket, but Jimmy snapped it shut. What was he hiding in there that he didn’t want Will to see? “I think I’ll have some grapes. And Marvel Puffs.” Will looked at each of us. “You two want some Marvel Puffs, right?”

He was getting desperate. As he kept reminding me, the deadline for the postmark for mailing in his ten box tops was September 30, just four days after his eleventh birthday.

“Of course,” Jimmy said. He opened the basket just enough to slide a hand in and pull out a floral-patterned china plate. Then he poured a big heap of the Marvel Puffs onto the plate.

Will grinned. “Wow! I bet we finish this box tonight. And then just two box tops more, and I can send off for my deed.” He looked perplexed, suddenly. “I wonder where in Alaska the square inches are? It doesn’t say on the box. But it would say on the deed, right?”

“Of course,” Jimmy said again. He got out another plate and filled it with olives, grapes, the little container of pâté. He put the bread on the picnic cloth. I realized that he had only brought two plates. “And then you can look it up on a map.”

Will looked annoyed. “I don’t have a map of Alaska. There isn’t even one at the library! I checked when I did my diorama last year—we had to do this diorama of Ohio, but I chose Alaska because it’s more interesting and I know it’s not a state, not yet, but it will be, even though my stupid teacher says it never will be—”

“Will!” I gave him a warning look.

He shot back a defiant glare. “She
was
stupid. She said it would never be a state—”

“That does seem kind of stupid,” Jimmy said casually. “Especially since it’s already in my atlas, right there with the U.S. and Canada.”

Will’s eyes widened. “Really?”

Jimmy nodded. “The atlas is in my glove compartment, if you want to look at it.”