The Second Summer of the Sisterhood (12 page)

Lena took a piece of corn from the bag and gingerly pulled back the husk. You never knew when you were going to find a fat beige worm or a nasty black hole full of scurrying creatures. This one looked perfect, though. She liked the silk because it reminded her of Bridget’s hair. The way it used to be, anyway.

“So, Lena, how is your boyfriend?” Tibby’s mom asked. She wiggled her eyebrows as if to indicate that this was dishy, and wasn’t she just one of the girls for knowing about it.

Lena tried not to wince openly. She wasn’t comfortable with the term
boyfriend
even when she did have one, and she hated everybody knowing her private business.

“We broke up,” she said lightly. “You know, the whole long-distance thing.”

“That’s too bad,” Alice said.

“Yes,” Lena agreed. She couldn’t help feeling that the mothers were a little eager on the boyfriend issue, as if life would really start once the boyfriends were under way. Lena resented that. She waited in silence for a while for that subject to die off before she introduced a new one.

“Um . . . Alice?” As soon as the girls had learned to talk, Tibby’s mom had insisted they call her by her name.

“Yes?”

Lena had first had this idea a few days before. Originally she’d dismissed it as being too diabolical. The truth was, it was pretty unlike her. But now that she was presented with the perfect opportunity, she didn’t really see how she could do harm with it.

She took a deep breath. She wanted to make sure her voice came out casual and innocent. “Did my mom ever talk to you about Eugene?” she asked.

Alice paused over her potatoes. In the sunlit room, Lena could see Alice’s freckles—all-over freckles like Tibby’s but very faint. “Eugene?” Her eyes got a slightly glazed, nostalgic look. “Sure. That was the Greek boy your mom was so crazy about, right?”

Lena sucked in her breath. She had scored information more quickly than she’d expected. “Right,” she said, feeling dishonest about pretending to be the one with the information.

Alice still had a distant look on her face. “He broke her heart, didn’t he?”

Lena faced the corn. Blood rushed to her head, turning her cheeks pink. She hadn’t been expecting to hear that. “Yeah, I guess he did.”

Alice put her knife down and gazed up at the ceiling. She seemed to be enjoying her stroll down memory lane. “God, I remember when he came to visit when you were just a baby.” She looked at Lena. “I’m sure she told you about that.”

Lena bit the inside of her cheek. “Um . . . she might have.” She was starting to feel uncomfortable. She had found more treasure than she was prepared to carry home. Treasure in such large amounts stopped feeling precious.

Lena couldn’t help staring at Alice. She had the sense that Alice wasn’t being careful enough, that she didn’t care enough about other people’s secrets.

“Well, I’m sure she’ll tell you about it sometime,” Alice said quietly. She seemed to consider that she had said more than was wise. She turned back to her potatoes. “Anyway, why do you ask about him?”

That was a good question. Lena tried to think of a good answer very quickly.

Luckily Katherine stumbled through the sliding doors, crying and slipping and trying to explain something about Nicky and her bucket. She trailed water and dirt and bits of grass all over the clean kitchen floor. Lena felt grateful to both Nicky and Katherine, because Tibby’s mom instantly shooed the baby out of the kitchen and began cleaning the floor, sending all thoughts of Eugene the heartbreaker back to distant memory.

Bridget woke up in a sweat. It was hot, that was the reason, but it was also her dreams. By day, she studied and touched her mother’s things, and by night, she dreamed about them. The dreams gave her as fragmented a vision of Marly as the boxes in the attic did. There were a thousand dramatic episodes, but very little sense of the person linking them together.

Bridget had gotten to like taking slow showers in the past year, but here, on the third floor of the Royal Street Arms, in this bathroom that she shared with two grizzled day laborers, she made them very quick. She consoled herself with the thought that the brownish water going down the drain was from her hair dye, but still, she had the unpleasant feeling she was getting dirtier in the shower rather than cleaner.

Greta had breakfast waiting for her. Juice and whole-wheat toast with butter and jam, just the way she liked it. She had mentioned that in passing a few days before, and Greta had had it all set up the next day.

Bridget ate and drank fast. She didn’t feel like chatting with Greta. She wanted to get back to her mother.

Upstairs, Bridget came across an admittance form for Shepherd’s Hill in one of the boxes. It was dated the year after Marly graduated from high school. At first Bridget assumed it was a summer school or a cheerleading camp or something, but it wasn’t. Bridget realized, with her heart clunking around noisily, that it was a mental institution. From the paperwork, Bridget could see Marly had been there for a little under three months. She’d been prescribed a drug called lithium. One doctor reported that Marly had talked about suicide. Bridget watched the clean black type bend and bow as her eyes filled.

She laid the papers down and sat in the window, watching the mail truck make its way down the street. She didn’t think she could keep going today.

She’d been so excited and dazzled by the images of young Marly, belle of the town, she’d almost let herself forget how the story really ended.

She was relieved when Greta called her down for lunch. Bridget had mentioned the day before about how she hadn’t been eating vegetables lately, and she felt touched when she saw the carefully peeled carrots on her plate.

“Thank you, Greta,” Bridget said.

“Aw, don’t mention it, honey.”

Since the first week, Greta had stopped calling her Gilda and started calling her honey.

They ate their sandwiches quietly, but after they finished, Greta didn’t get up from the table. She seemed more in the mood for Bridget’s company today than for her sweat.

“I had two kids, did you know that? You probably figured it out from all the stuff upstairs.”

Bridget nodded. This was another thing that she both wanted and dreaded.

“My daughter died six and a half years ago.”

Bridget nodded, looking down at her hands. “I’m so sorry to hear that.”

Greta nodded too, slowly and with her whole body. “She was a beautiful girl. Her name was Marlene, but everybody called her Marly.”

Bridget couldn’t make herself look up yet.

“She was famous in Limestone County when she was your age. People said if she’d run for Miss Alabama she would have won.”

“Really?” The absurdity of this comment somehow gave Bridget an opportunity to pull herself together.

“Sure.” Greta smiled. “But she was too busy going out with boys. She wouldn’t learn the baton twirling or whatever it was those pageant girls had to do.”

Bridget smiled too.

“She was homecoming queen as a junior
and
a senior. I can tell you that never happened before or since.”

Bridget nodded, trying to look impressed enough to suit Greta’s pride.

“You want some more iced tea?” Greta asked.

“No, I’m fine. Thank you.” Bridget stood up. “I should get back to work.”

Greta waved her hand. “It’s hot as blazes up there. Why don’t you sit here for a while longer?”

“Okay,” Bridget said.

Greta poured them both more iced tea. Even though Bridget had said she didn’t want it, it turned out she really did.

“Honey?”

“Yeah?”

“Your folks know where you are?”

Bridget’s face felt warm. “Yes.” It was true. Her one folk, anyway.

“You know you can use my phone if you ever need to.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

“They’re traveling, you say?”

Bridget nodded, staring into her iced tea. She didn’t want Greta her to ask more questions. Sure, lying was easy, but Bridget wasn’t enjoying it anymore. She wished her lies would just evaporate when she was done with them.

Bridget cleared her throat. “Did Marly go to college around here?” she asked.

Greta seemed to like talking about her daughter. “She went to Tuscaloosa. That’s where her father went too.”

“Did she enjoy it there?”

“Well . . .” Greta thought about this. Bridget knew she’d be honest about it, even before she opened her mouth. “She had some troubles there.”

Bridget sipped her iced tea.

“Marly was real moody. High as a kite one week, and couldn’t get out of bed the next.”

Bridget nodded again and put her feet flat on the kitchen floor. It was hard for her to hear this. It sounded too familiar.

“She fell down hard in her first year of college—I’m not exactly sure of all the details. A doctor diagnosed her with a mental disease and put her in a hospital for a few months. I think it helped her, though she hated it at the time.”

Bridget knew this was the Shepherd’s Hill part.

“The next year at school, she fell in love with her history professor—a young man from Europe. It was crazy behavior for a girl of nineteen, but I’ll be darned if she didn’t marry him.”

Bee was surprised. She had known her father had taught in Alabama, and that her parents’ paths had first crossed then, but she had had no idea it was like that.

“It was sad, really, because Franz—that was her husband—he lost his job because of it.”

Bridget nodded. That explained why her father had gone from a university job to teaching at a private high school.

“He got a job in Washington, D.C., so that’s where they went.”

“Oh.”

Greta studied her thoughtfully. “You look tired, honey. Why don’t you have a nice shower in the guest bathroom and lie down and take a little nap?”

Bridget stood up, feeling so grateful she wanted to kiss Greta on the head. Because a nap and a shower were exactly, exactly what she most needed.

Bee,

I wish I could call you. I hate not being able to e-mail or call you fifty times a day. I’m not patient enough for letters. But I’ll keep writing anyway, because I have to be with you somehow.

I loved hearing about your grandma and about Billy. You mighta mentioned, though, that your grandma still doesn’t know who you are. (Heard it from Tibby, btw.) When are you going to tell her? How is it going to help if she doesn’t know?

Can’t bear to bore you now with tales of my bad behavior toward my mom, or my fizzling love life. Maybe later.

Call me this week. Otherwise, no more brownies, ya hear?

Love,
Carma

N
ow Lena was the one trying to get time with her mother instead of the other way around. For days she had eagerly awaited a call to sit in the car while her mother returned videos or whatever. By now she’d realized that her mother was avoiding her.

What could it be? she wondered. What did Eugene mean to her? Why did she need to be so secretive about him?

She continued her streak of diabolical behavior when she finished her shift at work that evening and called her mom for a ride. The truth was, she really didn’t have a car, and it really was raining. And there really was a fairly attractive blouse—beige, of course—that she thought her mom might want to see.

Once they were in the car together on the way home, Lena pounced.

“Hey, Mom?”

“Yes?”

“I know you’re uncomfortable about it for some reason, but could you please tell me who Eugene is? It’s just me. I won’t, like, put it on
Sixty Minutes
or anything. I won’t say anything to anybody—not even Dad—if you don’t want me to.”

Her mother’s lips pressed together. This was not a good beginning.

“Lena.” She sounded like she was trying to be patient but it wasn’t easy.

“Yes,” Lena said timidly.

“I don’t want to talk about it. I think I’ve made that pretty clear.”

“But
whyyyyy
?” Lena knew she could only sound that whiny with her mother. She very purposely did not summon Kostos or his new girlfriend into the car with her at that moment.

“Because I don’t want to. It’s my business, and I don’t feel like sharing it. Understand?”

“Yes,” Lena said, quietly defeated. What else could she say?

“I don’t want you to bring it up with me again.”

“Okay.”

Rain began to splash against the windshield. Lightning cracked the sky. This had the makings of a great summer lightning storm. Lena loved those.

“What about the next time I don’t want to share something in my life with you?” Lena asked. She couldn’t help adding that. She couldn’t come away totally empty-handed.

Ari sighed. “It depends what it is. But just so we keep things straight, I’m the mother, you’re the daughter.”

“I know that,” Lena mumbled.

“It’s not always fair.”

It’s never fair,
Lena felt like saying, but for once she managed to keep her mouth closed.

Her mother pulled into their driveway. She turned off the engine, but she didn’t make a move to get out.