Just as Long as We're Together (4 page)

"The usual?" I asked.

"Yes . . . I saw it," he said, gulping for air. "I saw the bomb. . . it was silver. . . shaped like a football. . . rolling around in the sky. When it got to our house it started to fall . . . straight down . . . and then there was a flash of light

and I heard the explosion. . ."

"It's all right," I told him. "It was just a bad dream."

"It's coming," Bruce said, "the bomb is coming. . .

"But it's not coming tonight," I told him, stroking his hair. His hair was soft and damp around the edges.

"How do you know?"

"I just know. So there's no point in worrying about it now."

"It could be the end of the world," Bruce said, shuddering.

"Look," I told him, "if it happens, it happens." I don't like to think about the end of the world or the bomb so I don't. I'm good at putting bad things out of my mind. That's why I'm an optimist.

I lay down on Bruce's bed and held him until he fell back asleep. The good thing about his nightmares is that he never has more than one a night. It's as if he just needs to be reassured that the end of the world isn't coming yet.

I guess I fell asleep holding Bruce because soon my mother was gently shaking me and whispering, "Come on, Steph. . . let's go back to bed."

She walked me down the hail to my room. "He had a nightmare," I said, groggily.

Mom tucked me into bed and kissed both my cheeks.

The next morning, when I came into the kitchen, Bruce was sitting at the table, writing a letter.

I poured myself a glass of orange juice. "Who are you writing to today?" I asked.

"The President," Bruce said.

"Oh, the President." I set out a bowl for my cereal.

"You should write, too," Bruce said. "If everybody writes to the President he'll have to listen. Here . . ." Bruce shoved a piece of notebook paper at me.

"Not while I'm eating," I said. I finished my cereal, rinsed the bowl, then brought the box of doughnuts to the table. Mom is a doughnut addict but since we moved she's buying only the plain or the whole wheat kind. No artificial flavors or colors, no preservatives. Mom will eat only one a day now, at the most two, because she's trying to lose weight. I miss glazed doughnuts. I miss chocolate and jelly filled too.

"Mom is going to kill you," Bruce said.

"For what?"

"Polishing off three doughnuts."

Three? I counted the ones left in the box. He was right. Sometimes when I'm eating I forget to keep track.

I washed my doughnuts down with another glass of juice and then I started my letter.

Dear Mr. President,

I really think you should do more to make

sure we never have a nuclear war. War is stupid, as you know. My brother, who is ten, has

nightmares about it. Probably other kids do, too. I have mainly good dreams. My friend, Rachel, says I am an optimist. Even so, I don't want to die and neither do any of my friends. Why can't you arrange more meetings with other countries and try harder to get along. Make some treaties. Make them for one hundred years so we don't have to worry for a long time. You could also get rid of all the nuclear weapons in the world and then maybe Bruce, my brother, could get a decent night's sleep.

Yours truly,

Stephanie B. Hirsch

I like using my middle initial for formal occasions. The B stands for Behrens. That's my mother's maiden name.

I shoved my letter across the table, at Bruce. He read it. "This is about dreams," he said.

"No, it's not," I told him. "It's about nuclear war."

"But there's a lot in it about dreams."

"So . . . what's wrong with that? If you didn't have bad dreams about nuclear war we wouldn't be writing to the President, would we?"

"I don't know," Bruce said. "And you didn't make paragraphs, either."

"I didn't make paragraphs on purpose," I said. That wasn't true but I wasn't going to admit it

to Bruce. "I think it's an outstanding letter,"~ I said. "I think the part about the hundred year treaties is really brilliant."

"In a hundred years we'll be dead," Bruce said, sounding gloomy.

"So will everybody."

"No. . . people who aren't born yet won't be."

"That doesn't count," I said. "Everybody we know will be dead in a hundred years."

"I don't like to think about being dead," Bruce said.

"Who does?" I passed him the doughnut box. "Here," I said, "have one. . . it'll make you feel better."

"I don't like these doughnuts," he said, "especially in the morning."

8.

Saturdays.

Ever since Dad went to L.A. Mom takes Bruce and me to the office with her on Saturdays. She's got a travel agency in town. Going Places is the name of it. Aunt Denise says Mom is a real go-getter. She says she hopes I take after her. I don't know if I do or not. Mom had puppy fat like me when she was a girl. And we both have brown hair and blue eyes if that means anything.

I reminded Mom this was the Saturday Rachel and I were going to shop with Alison, to help her fix up her room. "Rachel says it's very depressing the way it is. It's all gray."

"Gray is a sophisticated color," Mom said.

"But it's so blab . . . it doesn't suit Alison," I told her. "Alison is a very cheerful person."

     
"She sounds like a good match for you," Mom

said.

"I think she is. I think we're really going to get along."

"What about Rachel?" Mom asked.

"She wants to be Alison's friend, too. She wants to help her get adjusted here. We're meeting in front of the bank at one o'clock. Is that okay?"

"I think we can arrange to give you the afternoon off," Mom said. "But try and get as much as you can done this morning."

"You know I'm a hard worker," I said.

My job is filing. Craig taught me how to do it. He's one of Mom's part-time assistants. He wears a gold earring in one ear and has a scraggly moustache that he's always touching to make sure it's still there. He wants to write travel guides to places like Africa and India when he's out of college. So far he's only been as far away as Maine.

There's no big deal to filing as long as you know the alphabet. The only thing I have to remember is that we file front to back here, which means I have to put the latest papers at the end of the folder, not at the beginning.

While I was filing, who should come into Going Places but Jeremy Dragon, that good-looking boy from the bus. Only Rachel and Alison know my secret name for him. I named him that because

of his chartreuse jacket with the dragon on the back. He wears it every day. He was with two of his friends. I recognized them from the bus, too.

"Can I help you?" Craig asked them. "We need some brochures," Jeremy Dragon said, "for a school project."

"Help yourself," Craig said.

"How many can we take?" one of Jeremy's friends asked.

I came running up front then. "How about five apiece?" I said.

Jeremy and his two friends looked at me. So did Craig.

"Aren't you supposed to be filing?" Craig asked. "In a minute," I told him and hoped that he

would go do something else. When he still didn't get the hint I said, "I'll take care of this, Craig." I've heard Mom say that to him lots of times.

Finally Craig got the message and said, "Oh . . ." and he excused himself to go back to the desk where he'd been working.

"You should try the Ivory Coast," I said to Jeremy, handing him a brochure. "And Thailand

• . . that's a good one." I handed him that brochure, too. "I also recommend Alaska . . and then there's Brazil." Each time I handed Jeremy Dragon a brochure our fingers touched and I got a tingly feeling up my arm.

"We're doing a project on marketing and advertising," Jeremy said, "not on travel."

"Oh," I said, as his friends helped themselves to more than five brochures apiece. Then I quickly added, "If you ever do want to plan a trip this is the best travel agency in town. My mother owns it so I should know."

"We'll keep that in mind," Jeremy said. He kind of waved as he went out the door.

"My name is Stephanie," I called after him. But he didn't hear me.

I couldn't wait to tell Rachel and Alison about my morning.

9.

Gena Farrell.

Here's what we bought for Alison's room: two lamp shades, one comforter, a set of flowered sheets, four throw pillows, three posters and one box of push pins.

We shopped all over town, walking from store to store, until my feet ached. Rachel said it was important to see everything available before making a decision. She took notes on what we saw, and where. I hoped we'd run into Jeremy Dragon again but we didn't. Eventually we wound up where we started, at Bed and Bath. I couldn't believe how Alison just bought whatever she wanted. Even though the sheets and the throw pillows were on sale, they were still very expen

sive. Alison charged everything on her mother's American Express card.

"You mean she just gave you her credit card . . ." I asked, "just like that?"

"She trusts me," Alison said.

"I know, but still . . ." I said. "Did she tell you how much you could spend?"

"We talked about what I needed," Alison said. "At least you got some of it on sale," Rachel said. "My mother buys everything on sale. And you got very good things. It pays to buy the best because it lasts longer."

I don't necessarily agree with that. Take my flowered sweatshirt. If I had bought the expensive kind I'd be stuck with it as long as it fit. But I bought the rip-off sweatshirt which only cost half as much so when it fell apart in the wash after a couple of months I didn't mind.

"Let's meet tomorrow morning at my house," Alison said, "around eleven. And you guys can help me fix up my room.. . okay?"

"Sure," I said.

"I'm going to visit my grandmother in the morning," Rachel said, "but I should be back around noon."

Rachel's grandmother had a stroke last spring. Once, I went with her family to the nursing home, but I got really upset because Rachel's grandmother couldn't walk or talk. Rachel says

her grandmother understands everything they say and someday she may even be able to speak again. I don't know. I hope that never happens to Gran Lola or Papa Jack. It would be too sad.

On Sunday morning I got to Alison's house right on the dot of eleven. I rang the bell and a woman opened the door. She was wearing jeans and that red and white T-shirt Alison had been wearing on the day that we met. She looked very familiar.

"Hello," she said, "I'm Alison's mother. Are you Stephanie?"

"Yes."

"Alison's in her room. You can go on up. . ." I started up the stairs. Then Alison's mother called, "Thanks for helping Alison find such beautiful things yesterday."

I stopped and turned at the landing, looking down at her. I know who she looks like, I thought. She looks like Gena Farrell, the TV star.

I went to Alison's room. She was unrolling her

posters and laying them out on the floor. "Hi,"

I said. Maizie was on the bed. She barked at me.

"Hello, Maizie." As soon as I spoke she turned

her back. I guess she wasn't interested in having

a conversation.

"Your mother looks a lot like Gena Farrell," I told Alison.

"I know," Alison said.

"I guess everybody tells her that." "Yes. Especially since she is Gena Farrell." "Your mother is Gena Farrell, the TV star?" "She's an actress," Alison said, "not a TV star."

She held a poster of Bruce Springsteen against the wall. "What do you think?"

"I can't believe this!" I said. "Your mother is Gena Farrell and you never said anything?"

"What should I have said?" Alison asked, holding up a second poster. This one showed a gorilla lying on a sofa. "Do you like it here or do you think I should hang it over my desk?"

"Over your desk," I said. "I just can't believe that you didn't tell us!"

"Would it have made a difference?" Alison put the posters on her bed.

"No," I said, "but . . ."

"But what?" Now she looked directly at me, waiting for me to say something.

"Nothing..

"Get down, Maizie!" Alison shooed her off the bed.

Maizie growled.

"She can't stand it when people gush over my mother," Alison said. "She'll try to bite anyone who does. You wouldn't believe how many times she's tried to bite reporters."

"Really?"

"Yes," Alison said, taking the comforter out of its plastic bag. "Give me a hand getting this on the bed."

The comforter had tiny rosebuds all over it. And the lamp shades, which had been my idea, were made of the same fabric. Rachel said the lamp shades were unnecessary and too expensive, but Alison bought them anyway. At the time I thought it was to please me, since everything else had been Rachel's idea. But now that I knew Alison's mother was Gena Farrell I wasn't so sure. I mean, Gena Farrell is famous! She must be very rich.

I helped Alison hang her posters. I wished I had thought of push pins when I was hanging mine. They don't take the paint off the wall and they make such tiny holes that no one would ever notice them.

When we'd finished Alison said, "Do you know how to play Spit?"

"Spit as in saliva?" I asked.

Alison laughed. "Spit as in the card game."

"There's a card game called Spit?"

"Yes." Alison opened her desk drawer and took out a deck of cards. She shuffled, divided them into two piles, then explained the rules of the game.

By the time Rachel got there Alison and I were in the middle of a really fast hand and couldn't

stop laughing. "We're playing Spit," I told Rachel.

"What?" Rachel said.

"It's a card game."

"You want me to teach you?" Alison asked Rachel.

"No . . ." Rachel said. "I came over to help with your room but I see it's all done."

Alison collected the cards and wrapped a rubber band around them.

"Doesn't it look great?" I asked Rachel. "Actually, it does," Rachel said. "It looks just like a flower garden. Maybe I should be an interior designer."

"Did you recognize Alison's mother?" I asked Rachel.