The Divorce Express (12 page)

I hope none of us has to get up to go to the bathroom.

There are still people standing, but not as many. And later they’re going to switch places with people who are now sitting. One of the good things about sitting with four people in a two-seat place is that we won’t have to get up.

Someone starts singing a Christmas carol. Lots of people join in.

Then Rosie begins a Chanukah song. People join in again.

The bus skids a little.

I hope that Stevie’s stomach is okay.

The driver’s going very slowly.

One of the high school seniors starts singing “Trees,” the regular version. I guess that some of the adults went to Kilmer or just know the song because there are a lot of people singing.

Then Rosie and I start to sing “Cafeteria.” The other Kilmer kids join in.

People on the bus laugh and applaud. They start passing out food that they’ve brought along for the holidays. I contribute the granola cookies my father gave me. We get some great cookies, fruit cake, and pumpkin pie.

The pumpkin pie’s so good that I get the recipe for my father. He’s going to love it.

The bus creeps along.

On the side of the road I can see cars pulled over.

Gina’s fallen asleep. She’s got her head on Rosie, her middle on me, and her feet on Stevie and she’s sucking her thumb.

The closer we get to New Jersey, the less snow.

It’s always worse upstate, at least at first.

Finally we reach the Lincoln Tunnel, go through it, and pull into the Port Authority building.

Stevie hasn’t thrown up, something else to be thankful for.

“We’re here because we’re here because we’re here because we’re here,” everyone sings.

We’ve been on the bus for four and a half hours, two hours late.

People get off the bus stiffly, like they’ve been in a rolling sardine can.

We’re in the middle of the bus, so it takes awhile for us to get out.

“Free at last,” Rosie says as we step off the bus. “I can’t believe I’ve still got a subway to catch.”

I hear someone call my name. “Phoebe.”

It’s my mother. She’s got this worried-changing-to-glad look on her face.

She hugs me. “Where’s Rosie?”

“Here,” Rosie says, raising her hand.

People who go to school raise hands instinctively. I’ve noticed that.

My mother hugs her even though they’ve never met before. I guess she’s been really nervous. It’s the first time since the very beginning that she’s met me at the bus.

She stands up, catches her breath, and says, “Rosie, you are to spend the night with us.”

“Yay,” Rosie and I both say at the same time.

My mother continues. “Your father has to work late, and your stepmother couldn’t leave her children to wait for you. It’s too late and dangerous for you to get downtown by yourself. Your parents and
I’ve decided that staying with us is best. Your father will pick you up tomorrow morning.”

Rosie and I look at each other and smile. It’s all arranged. Somehow they’ve all been talking.

As we gather up our suitcases my mother says, “You two know all the kids who ride the bus alone. Are any of them not being met by their parents? It’s not safe for them to be here alone. Let’s make sure they’re all right.”

That’s like my mother. Sometimes she can think only of herself. Other times she can really come through.

She checks it out, in a very logical way. That’s like my mother too—superorganized and take-charge personality. Once she sees that everyone’s accounted for, she says, “Time to go. Anyone hungry?”

“Starved,” Rosie and I both say at the same time. I’ve noticed that happens a lot with friends. You get to the point when you start to say things together or sometimes not even have to say some things out loud.

“Okay.” My mother pulls back her hair. “We’ll get some food as soon as we call your father and Rosie’s parents. When the snow started to come down so
hard and the weather reports predicted problems, we made these plans.”

“I’ll call Daddy,” I say.

“And I’ll call my parents,” Rosie says.

My mother walks to the phone booth with us. “Rosie, call your father first.” When Rosie finishes talking, my mother says, “You don’t have to call your mother’s house. She and Jim said that no matter how late it is, to call Phoebe’s father’s house. That’s where they’ll both be.”

No matter how late it is, they’ll both be there—at the same place.

I look at Rosie.

She looks at me.

My mother looks at both of us.

Finally my mother picks up the phone, dials Woodstock, and tells them we’re safe.

Rosie and I each talk to our parents.

Neither of us asks what they’re doing together, no matter how late it is.

I want to talk to Rosie about what’s going on . . . and I bet she wants to talk to me about it.

It’s not a good idea in front of my mother.

I can’t wait until Rosie and I are alone.

W
e’re finally going to get a chance to talk.

It was so hard sitting through dinner with my mother when all I wanted to do was talk to Rosie about Mindy and my father.

Somehow it didn’t seem like a wise move to bring up the subject in front of my mother.

Now we’re alone. Or at least we will be as soon as Rosie gets out of the bathroom.

I look around my room. It’s pink and frilly and
kind of preppy-looking. Everything’s in place and doesn’t show much personality.

My room in Woodstock is different. During the time I’ve lived there, the room has changed from when it was just a summer place. There are pictures all over the walls, candles, stained-glass pieces on the window. It feels like it’s mine.

This room in the City doesn’t feel like the me I’ve become.

I think about my father and Rosie’s mother. Is it possible? What’s the story? Are they going out? Was Mindy the person he called to say I was home safely from my date? Is my father the person that Rosie thinks is making her mother so happy or were they just worried about us and decided to worry together?

Why didn’t they tell us? I thought my father and I had a deal to discuss important things like this.

Rosie returns, toothbrush in hand.

“Do you think our parents are going out with each other?” I ask her.

She flops down on the lower part of my trundle bed. “I was thinking about that while I flossed my teeth. I think they are. Something strange is definitely going on. Usually when Mindy starts going
out with someone, she tells me. This time she’s said nothing.”

“My father hasn’t either.” I bite my fingernail.

“Are you upset?” Rosie asks. “I think it’s great. I like your father. We would really be sisters if they were together.”

“That part’s great,” I agree.“And I like Mindy a lot. It’s just hard to think of him involved with anyone.”

“We could ask them,” she says, fluffing up her pillow. “Anyway you’re going out with Dave now and in a couple of years you’ll be going away to college. Your father’s going to have to make his own life. That’s the kind of stuff that Mindy and I talk about.”

“Do you think I could be jealous?” That sounds right as I say it.

“Maybe,” Rosie says. “Fathers and daughters. I know I have trouble with my stepmother. Maybe that’s part of it.”

It’s definitely something to think about.

Rosie puts the blanket around her body and yawns. “Let’s get some sleep.”

“You can go to sleep soon,” I promise. “But first let’s talk a little more. They probably are spending the night together. Can you imagine our parents—”

“Doing it?” Rosie finishes my thought. “I don’t want to think about it right now.”

I touch the satin part of my blanket just like I did when I was little. “Do you think they’re serious?”

“You keep asking for answers to things that we’re not even sure are questions. Maybe, if it is, they’ll decide to live together. If they do, we won’t have to keep trading the unicorn shirt back and forth. It’ll stay in the same house.” Rosie lies down.

I decide to let her go to sleep. “I’ll keep quiet now.”

“Thanks, pal.” She pulls the cover over her head. “I do have one question . . . . Your father doesn’t really believe much in religion, does he?”

“Not the organized kind,” I answer.

“My grandparents will really love that,” she says from under the pillow.

After I turn out the light, I stare at the ceiling. There is still a fluorescent universe pasted up there. Before the divorce my father helped me put up all the little pieces. When the light goes out, all the planets, stars, moons, and sun shine.

I think about the world—the one on the ceiling . . . the one in New York . . . and the one in Woodstock.
I’ve always kind of thought of myself as the sun—the one that all of the others revolved around.

It’s not true, I guess. It feels like someone’s ripped the sun out of place but everything is going along anyway.

I sure hope that I’m still part of everything. If my father is going out with Mindy, that means that he’ll want to spend more time with her and do more things together. I won’t have him to myself.

Maybe it won’t be bad, but it sure will be different.

How can Rosie take the whole thing so calmly?

I wish I could.

R
osie’s gone.

Her father just picked her up.

He seemed okay. It’s hard to tell the first time I meet someone. I just kept remembering how he acts to Mindy.

Mindy. My father.

I have to deal with my mother at the moment. That’s enough to think about.

I go into the kitchen.

My mother’s sitting at the table, drinking another cup of coffee.

Pouring a glass of milk, I join her.

She asks me whether Dad and Mindy are going out, kind of casually, but in a way that I know she’s really interested.

I shrug. Even if I knew, I wouldn’t say anything. I’ve learned not to get in the middle.

Then she says, “Phoebe, remember how upset I was when Duane and I broke up?”

Remember? How can I forget? That’s all she’s talked about lately.

Continuing, she says, “One of the problems was that we never could spend much time together when you visited. I didn’t want you to get upset because he wanted to stay here, and I know it made you uncomfortable. But now Duane and I have talked it out and I want you to get to know him better . . . to like each other. He’s very important to me and I want to continue the relationship. He wants to be with me and I want to be with him.”

The phone rings.

It’s for her . . . . Duane.

While she’s talking to him, I make my getaway.

Going into my room, I want to tear everything apart.

How can she say that I’ve got to do something that I can’t?

I pick up a stuffed animal and throw it across the room.

It hits the wall.

I pick it up and hug it to me. “I’m sorry.”

I’m not sure if I’m sorrier for my stuffed animal or for me.

When my mother gets off the phone, I call Dave.

Something in my life has to stay the same.

I hope that he still cares.

I call him.

He still does care, a lot, he says.

I’m really glad that I don’t have to depend on my parents for everything.

M
y opinion of Duane hasn’t changed.

I have to sit at a Thanksgiving dinner at a restaurant, watching the two of them and pretending to listen.

I can’t believe that she’s picked him, that he’s so important to her.

He is though. I can tell. My mother acts like Sunshine Anderson when she’s around Duane. Sunshine is this kid in my homeroom who is really good at lots
of things, sports and schoolwork. But when she’s around her boyfriend, Ray, she acts like she can’t do anything. That’s what my mother’s doing. I know that she can do lots of stuff by herself, but when she’s with Duane, she lets him make all the decisions. And he treats her like a precious china doll.

Maybe it’s the difference in their ages. She’s thirty-six. He’s forty-eight, almost half a century old.

I just don’t understand it.

The waiter brings dessert: pumpkin pie.

Duane starts talking to me about his children. “For a while Duane junior wanted to be a musician, but now he’s found himself and he’s in business with me.”

“If he’d stayed a musician, would you have said that he’d found himself or would he have been lost?” I ask, taking my fork and stabbing it into my pumpkin pie.

The pie’s lousy, not half as good as the piece I had on the bus. I’m beginning to think that everything about Woodstock is better.

My mother flashes me a warning look.

I’ve gotten to him. I can tell.

He frowns and says, “No. The arts are all right if
you can make big money, but most people can’t. Let Duane junior’s music be a hobby. People have responsibilities to meet.”

I think about the wonderful painting my father’s doing. Doesn’t he have a responsibility to pursue that talent? He thinks so. So do I. I stab my pie again, pretending that it’s Duane senior.

He continues. “My daughter, Beatrice, is very happy. She’s married to an orthopedic surgeon and has a beautiful daughter, with another baby on the way.”

Two thoughts enter my brain at the same time. Duane’s a grandfather. My mother is going out with a grandfather who wants to stay overnight with her. I didn’t even think that grandfathers had sex anymore. I also think how much I want to tell him that my father goes to a chiropractor, that he’s nervous about the traditional medical profession.

Looking at my mother, I can see how tense she is getting, so I decide not to say anything.

Sometimes I think that I spend more time protecting my mother’s feelings than she does protecting mine.

Duane turns to her and says, “Honey. Don’t forget.
Sometime this weekend, I want you to go for your fitting.”

My mother nods, smiles, and then explains to me. “Duane’s already picked out my Christmas present. It’s a mink coat.”

She just bought herself a sable coat. How many creatures have to die for my mother? That does it.

I say, “My father and I think that killing animals for fashion is barbaric and unnecessary.”