Starring Sally J. Freedman as Herself (24 page)

“Do you think it’s a wise idea, Arnold?” Mom asked. “After all … remember
The Hindenburg
 …”

“This is 1948, Lou … besides, the Goodyear Blimp runs on helium, not hydrogen.”

“Some difference!” Mom said.

“There is.”

“Not to me.”

“That’s because you don’t understand the scientific facts, Mom …” Douglas said. “I’ll explain them to you. You see, the …”

Mom held up her hand. “You know I have no head for science,” she said.

“Is it expensive?” Sally asked her father.

“About ten dollars a person …”

“Then I guess I’ll invite Barbara,” Sally said, thinking out loud, “because Andrea’s father can afford to take her … and Shelby’s grandmother probably wouldn’t let her go anyway …”

“And I wouldn’t blame her one bit,” Mom said.

“How about you, Fanny,” Daddy asked, “… going to give it a try?”

“Ha ha,” Ma Fanny said, “such a comedian! I like my feet on the ground.”

“How about you, Lou?” Daddy asked.

“No, thank you!”

“Come on, Mom,” Douglas said. “Live it up for once.”

“Remember, you enjoyed Cuba,” Daddy reminded her.

“I was very lucky,” Mom said. “My first plane trip was a good one … let’s just leave it at that …”

“I’d really like you to come with us,” Daddy said.

Sally looked from one to the other.

“I am
not
setting foot in that blimp,” Mom said, “and I wish you’d have discussed the whole idea with me before you went ahead and told the children … after all, they’re mine, too … don’t I have anything to say about what happens to them?” She pushed her chair away from the table and ran for the bathroom.

Daddy cleared his throat.

Ma Fanny carried the pudding bowl back into the kitchen.

“Well …” Douglas said, “I think I’ll give Darlene a call and tell her the good news.”

Sally just sat there, watching, waiting and wondering.

“Would you like to take a little walk?” Daddy asked her.

“I have to call Barbara first …”

“You can call when we get back … Douglas is on the phone now.”

“Okay,” Sally said.

They went outside. It was just turning dark. The air was warm and sweet smelling.

“Your mother worries a lot,” Daddy said, as they passed the goldfish pool.

Sally nodded.

“She can’t help it … she loves us all so much … but I don’t want you to grow up worrying that way.” He took her hand in his.

“Miss Swetnick is moving in there,” Sally said, pointing to the next building. “Did I tell you I helped her and Hank paint their bathroom?”

“That’s nice,” Daddy said, but Sally could tell he had something more serious on his mind. And it made her uncomfortable.

“Some people worry away their whole lives …” He looked down at her. “Do you know what I mean?”

“I think so.”

“Your mother, for instance, spends too much time worrying about what
might
happen.”

“Why does she do that?”

“I don’t know … that’s just the way she is.”

“Don’t you ever worry?” Sally asked.

“Sure … everybody worries sometimes … it’s just that some people worry so much about tomorrow
they have no time to enjoy today. Do you understand?”

“I think so.”

“You don’t worry, do you?” Daddy asked.

“Well … only if it’s very important …”

“At your age you should be free of worries.”

“There are some things I
have
to worry about.”

“I know,” he said, squeezing her fingers, “spelling tests and boyfriends …”

She squeezed back without saying anything. How could she tell him that
he
was the one she worried about most?

“I’m going to tell you a secret, Sally … I think you’re ready to hear it … both of my brothers were exactly my age when they died …”

“They were?” Sally tried to sound surprised.

“Yes … your Uncle Eddie and your Uncle Abe … and I used to worry that the same thing would happen to me … that I would die when I was forty-two … and I didn’t want to … I didn’t want to leave you and Douglas and Mom …”

Sally tried to keep her breathing quiet, while inside she felt ready to explode.

“But now I realize how foolish it was for me to worry about that … because it was just a coincidence … it has nothing to do with me. It’s taught me something, though … I’ve learned what’s really important … to experience everything that
life has to offer … to be near the ones I love …” He looked down at her. “Don’t cry, Sally … don’t, honey … I didn’t mean to make you cry … stop now … stop, Sally …” He held her to him.

But Sally couldn’t stop. It felt so good to let it all out. “I don’t want you to die,” she said, hugging her father.

“Everybody has to die, Sal …”

“Promise me you won’t.”

“I can’t promise that … we live and we die … it’s a fact we have to accept …”

“But you won’t die until I’m old, will you?”

“I hope not … but I’m not going to worry about it and I don’t want you to either.”

When they went back upstairs, Douglas was sitting at the kitchen table, listening to
Inner Sanctum
. Ma Fanny was sitting in the stuffed chair in the livingroom, working on a red sweater, and Mom was stretched out on the Murphy bed, holding a magazine upside down. The only sound in the apartment, besides the radio, was the click-clack of Ma Fanny’s knitting needles.

Sally couldn’t get to sleep. Couldn’t stop thinking that one day
she
would be dead, too. What would it feel like? It could be nice. It could be that she’d turn into an angel and fly around and watch what
was going on down on earth. Suppose she knew she was going to die in one month, like in that radio program she’d heard last week. What would she do? See a lot of movies, for one thing. And eat whipped cream at every meal and have a party every week, with boys, and never do anything she didn’t feel like doing. And she’d get a kitten. Maybe two or three of them. And she’d get all the cut-out books she wanted and if Mrs. Daniels said,
Cut-out books at her age? Why, when my Bubbles was her age she
 … And this time Sally wouldn’t let her finish. She’d say,
I know all about your Bubbles … she did it with a goy and got a baby … so ha ha on you
.

And then she’d fly up to heaven and be a beautiful angel with long blonde hair. Or maybe she’d keep her own hair because who says angels can’t have brown hair? But if it turned out that there were no angels and when you died there was nothing … because you were just plain dead … dead and cold … lying in the ground … 
oh!
She moaned at the idea of that. There had to be angels. There just had to be!

T
WENTY MINUTES OVER SCENIC MIAMI IN THE GOODYEAR BLIMP
the sign said. They sat in a small compartment on the underside of the blimp: Sally and Barbara, Douglas and Darlene, Daddy and two
strangers, who also had tickets for the 2 p.m. ride. Sally was scared and excited at the same time. So was Barbara. “This could be it,” she said. “We could crash during take-off … or burn up, like
The Hindenburg
 …” She and Sally held hands. “Do you believe in life after death?” Barbara asked.

“Yes … do you?”

“Today I do.”

“I believe in angels,” Sally said.

“Me too … Jewish angels,” Barbara said. “Not the Christian kind who go around blowing bugles.”

“Right,” Sally said. “Jewish angels …” It had never occurred to her that angels had to be one religion or the other.

Suddenly they lifted up … up, up, into the sky. They were floating. And down below them was scenic Miami and the Atlantic Ocean. It was fun looking down. Scary but fun. Everything seemed so small.

Darlene and Douglas talked on and on about helium and how it works and that it was too bad the U.S. government wasn’t smart enough to build lots of blimps. And that some day the two of them would build their own and possibly start a magazine called
Blimp News
.

Daddy looked across the compartment at Sally and smiled. She smiled back and let go of Barbara’s hand. Her own was all sweaty.

When they were down again, when the ride was over, Barbara leaned close to Sally and whispered, “I don’t believe in angels after all. When you’re dead, you’re dead, and that’s it.”

Sally was home with Ma Fanny. Douglas and Mom and Daddy had gone to Lincoln Road to buy a suit for Douglas because Darlene had invited him to her house for dinner and Mom said
The Swells
dress up when they eat.

Sally had the phone to her ear. Ma Fanny knew she listened in to other people’s conversations but she never told on her.

“Papa … Papa is that you?” A woman’s voice asked.

“It’s me,” Mr. Zavodsky answered.

“Oh, I’m so glad you got a phone … I worry about you …”

“Don’t worry … I couldn’t be better.”

“Papa, I wish you’d come to live with us … Murray wants you and so do the boys. We’d fix up the attic room so you’d have privacy …”

“I like it here, Rita … who needs the cold?”

“Are you still having pains?”

“Not a one.”

“That’s wonderful! And you’re going to the doctor?”

“When I feel like it.”

“But Papa, you’re supposed to go every two weeks …”

“You shouldn’t worry, Rita … I’m fine … I’m enjoying …”

“That’s good. You take care of yourself … promise?”

“I promise … I promise …”

“I’ll call you again in a few weeks.”

“Did Hitler have any kids?” Sally asked that night.

“Not that I know of,” Mom said. “And what’s this sudden fascination with Hitler?”

“I’m just trying to get the facts straight,” Sally said. “Was he married?”

“He had a girlfriend,” Mom said.

“Was her name Rita?”

“No … Eva.”

“Oh, Eva.”

So … the phone conversation had been in code again, Sally thought. He didn’t have a daughter. And Rita was probably Eva. And they were making plans. And Murray and the boys were probably his old cronies, like Simon. Too bad the police weren’t smart enough to crack Mr. Zavodsky’s code.

Douglas was angry. He’d worn his new suit to Darlene’s house for dinner and Darlene’s father had
worn a golf shirt and Darlene’s brothers had worn bathing suits and Darlene’s mother had worn a bathrobe—a pretty fancy one, but still a bathrobe—and Darlene had worn dungarees and sneakers. “Only the maid was dressed up,” Douglas told them.

“How was I to know
The Swells
have no manners?” Mom asked.

“They have manners,” Douglas said. “They say
please
and
thank you
and all of that and they were really nice to me. Her father even offered me a tee shirt.”

“Next time you’ll know better,” Daddy said. “But your mother was right to want you to make a good impression … not just on them, but on everyone.”

“Yeah … sure …” Douglas answered.

Sally and Barbara were hot from playing statues in Sally’s side yard. They lay down under the trees to rest. Across the yard, Ma Fanny and some of her friends were talking and knitting.

“Miss Swetnick’s getting married tomorrow,” Sally said.

“I know.”

“I wish we could go to the wedding … she probably wanted to invite the whole class but there wasn’t enough room.”

“Probably …” Barbara said. She rolled a coconut toward Sally. “We could go to the temple and stand outside … you don’t have to be invited for that …”

“And see her dressed as a bride?” Sally sat up.

“Sure.”

“Let’s do it!” Sally rolled the coconut back to Barbara.

“Okay … and I know something else we could do at the same time.”

“What?”

“Kiss Peter,” Barbara said.

“
You
want to kiss Peter?”

“No …” Barbara said, “I mean you … 
you
could kiss him.”

“Who says I want to?”

“Don’t you?”

“Well … I wouldn’t mind … but not in front of a lot of people.”

“We’ll get him away from the people.”

“How?”

“Oh … we’ll say you have a surprise for him or something.”

“And you’ll do all the talking?” Sally asked.

“Sure … all you’ll have to say is
congratulations
 … and then kiss him … it’ll be easy … everybody kisses at weddings.”

“I don’t know …”

“If you don’t want to …” Barbara began.

“It’s not that …”

“… or if you’re
chicken
 …”

“I’m
not
chicken!”

“Then it’s all set,” Barbara said, standing up. She brushed off her hands. “I’ll meet you at the corner at noon … and Sally …”

“What?”

“Don’t wear your hair in braids … let it hang loose for a change.”

Sally and Barbara stood outside Temple Beth-El, waiting. Each of them had a bag of rice. It was very hot and Sally wore her new off-the-shoulder midriff. She had a hibiscus tucked behind one ear and her hair hung loose, below her shoulders. She checked herself in the mirror and was surprised that she looked so much like Lila. When Miss Swetnick and Hank came out of the temple everyone cheered and threw rice. Miss Swetnick looked beautiful but she wasn’t wearing her glasses and Sally could tell that she was having some trouble without them by the way she squinted at the crowd. She laughed as she tossed her bouquet. Sally hoped to catch it but Miss Swetnick aimed it at her bridesmaids. Then she and Hank got into a shiny car and drove away.