Read Ice Online

Authors: V. C. Andrews

Tags: #Horror

Ice (9 page)

BOOK: Ice
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"In Balwin's case it's deplorable. He has nice clothes to wear and he takes good care of his wardrobe, but you can't turn a pig into a swan merely by dressing it in pretty feathers."
"Balwin is not a pig," I blurted.
He stared at me and then closed his eyes for a moment as if he had to seize control of his raging emotions.
"No," he said opening his eyes again, "He's not a pig in spirit even though someone looking at him might think he overindulges, as do pigs."
"What do you want from me?" I demanded, growing tired of listening to Balwin's father tearing him down.
"I want you to get him to lose weight." he said.
"What?"
"You heard me. I want you to get him to shape up, to improve his self-image. I know you can motivate him now because of what's happened. That shows some commitment to something other than his music.
"Of course, I don't expect you to do this without receiving some compensation so I am prepared to make this offer... I'll give you ten dollars for every pound you get him to shed from now until the end of the school year," he stated.
I simply stared at him.
"Twenty pounds gets you a quick two hundred dollars. I'm sure you could use it," he said, glancing around the living room. "No," he said after another moment of my silence and my famous penetrating stare, "I should improve this offer. Tell you what. I'll increase the dollars per pound with every five pounds so that pounds one to five, you'll get fifty dollars, but pounds six to ten, you'll get double that, a hundred dollars, and then pounds ten to fifteen, we'll make triple and quadruple the amount for fifteen to twenty. Anything more than twenty, give you fifty dollars a pound. How's that sound?'
"Stupid," I said. "Insulting. Depressing, disgusting and insensitive," I concluded. 'Balwin will lose weight when he wants to lose it and not because I tell him to lose it."
Mr. Noble smiled.
"Please. Miss Goodman. We both know that a boy who has a crush on a girl. as Balwin has on you, will do almost anything the girl asks him to do. All I'm asking is you... lead him on a bit. I don't have to tell you how to get a boy to do your bidding, I'm sure. Only this time, you can earn some good money for it.
"I might even be inclined to throw in a bonus if you succeed in making a difference in a few months. It will be a nice graduation present and what harm will you have don't? Nothing. But you will have helped Balwin immensely. Wouldn't you like to do something good for someone and make money doing that as well?"
"I don't need to be paid to do something good for someone," I said.
I heard Mama's distinct groan and looked toward her bedroom, expecting her to make an appearance and be shocked at the sight of Mr. Noble. It grew silent again, however. so I turned back to him.
"My mother's not well, Mr, Noble. I'm sorry, but you should leave."
"Fine,' he said. standing. "Think over my offer and get back to me. You can continue to come to the house to practice your music, of course, and benefit that way. too."
He walked to the front door, opened it, and stood there a moment.
"Don't be so quick to condemn a father for trying to help his son," he added and then slipped out gracefully, closing the door softly behind him.
I stood there for a moment staring after him. Then I heard Mama behind me. I turned and saw her shaking her head.
"I raised a fool," she said. "I heard all that. You just went and threw out hundreds of easy dollars."
"I couldn't take money from Baiwin's father for something like that. Mama. I'd feel like a traitor or something," I said and started for the kitchen.
"Why? Who you betraying? Some fat boy? Believe me. Ice, you don't get a chance to take advantage of men much in this world. It's usually the other way around. Think of that Shawn Carter. Didn't he try to take advantage of us? Of you? It just comes natural to men, so why shouldn't you benefit from an opportunity, huh?"
I started to shake my head.
"If you don't want the money, take it and give it to me, for godsakes."
"I can't. Mama," I said. She smirked and nodded.
"Right, you can't. And what have you been doing over that boy's house anyway, huh? C'mon, tell me all of it"
"We've been practicing music for my audition," I revealed.
"Thought so. Your father know about this?"
"Yes," I admitted.
She pulled herself up.
"Well, that figures. too. Secrets. You and him keep secrets."
"No, Mama," I cried. "'He didn't find out until last night when I came home. I would have told you, too, but you didn't come home until very late..."
"Sure, blame it on that. He blames everything on me, too," she said.
She took a deep breath, turned and went back to her bedroom. I wanted to follow her and explain more. but I thought she would only close her ears as tightly as she closed her eyes. Later. I tried to get her to eat something and she finally relented and had some toast and jam.
"You take that money," she told me when I brought it into her. "Don't be the fool I've been. Take whatever you can while you can. It doesn't last long. Before you know it, they're looking at younger women and you might as well be invisible," she complained.
I went to my room to finish my homework. Just before ten. Balwin called.
"I guess you heard what happened," he began.
"I'm sorry. Balwin. I never wanted to get you into any trouble," I told him.
"It's not your fault. Jeez. Ice, you can't blame yourself for what those idiots do. I shouldn't have let him yet to me," he said. "but I wouldn't let him say those things about you."
"I know." I said. I wandered if he had any idea his father had been to my house. "Was your father very angry?" I asked,
"Not as any as I expected he would be. He didn't even ask about the cause of the fight and he hasn't said a bad word about you. Ice. I don't mind the days off. I'll work on my music. I'll finish your song, too," he vowed.
"Balwin' ..."
"You'll come over after dinner tomorrow night, won't you? Please? I'll feel like a total idiot if you don't," he explained. "Like it's all been for nothing, a waste."
I smiled to myself.
"Are you sure. Baiwin? It won't stop at school, you know."
"I know, I don't care. Matter of fact," he said, his voice deepening, "I think I'm going to start to enjoy it. They're just jealous, that's all.
"Here, the prettiest girl in the school and the most talented, too, is friends with me, coming to my house," he bragged. "I guess they just don't
understand the power of music as well as we do. right. Ice?"
He waited,
"Right?"
"Right, Balwin," I said.
"Okay. Same time. okay?"
"All right. Balwin," I said.
"I can't think of anyone I would rather get in trouble over than you. Ice," he said. Then he quickly said. "Good night," and hung up.
It was just like before when
I
felt he had stolen a kiss. It brought a deeper smile to my face.
Music is powerful. I thought. It can make you feel so much better about yourself and your life, it can help you visualize your dreams, it can give you hope and strength. Just like Daddy. Balwin and I would wrap our music about ourselves snugly and shut out the nasty world.
Let them curse and laugh, ridicule until they're blue in the face.
All we'll hear is the rhythm and the blues or the melody of Birdland. I'll sing louder, better and longer.
And I'll drown them all out.

7 Sweet Harmony

I decided not to say anything to Balwin about his father visiting me. Of course. Balwin was confused as to why his father was so cooperative about my coming over to practice music, giving him the car to pick me up, never questioning what we were doing and never complaining about the noise. It filled him with suspicions, and he often wondered aloud about it when I was there. I thought it would just break his heart even to think that I might be seeing him only because his father was paving me.

"It's almost as if he's happy I got into a fight at school," Balwin said. "My mother was far more upset than he was about it. In fact, she was the one to suggest I should stop seeing you."

"Maybe you should." I quickly said.
"No, no, it's all become nothing," he promised. He was back in school and back at the piano for

our chorus rehearsals. An unexpected and happy result of the fight and of all the trouble we both had with other students was Balwin's loss of shyness. He was no longer reluctant about talking to me and sitting with me at lunch. It was as if the fight had been some sort of initiation he had to endure in order to be accepted. Almost immediately afterward, fewer and fewer boys teased him, and those who did, didn't do it with any enthusiasm.

"They're making things up about us behind our backs anyway," Balwin rationalized after I had made a remark about it. He gazed around the cafeteria, still searching for wry smiles and sly glances.

"We never needed their permission to talk to each other. Ballwin," I told him.
"Right. Who even cares about them?" he asked with his new bravado.
Despite my fury toward his father and the insulting proposal he had made to me.. I had to admit to myself that what he had predicted was coming true anyway. Balwin began to take better care of himself He loosened up, wore less formal clothing, actually had his hair styled and began to do more vigorous exercise and lose weight. I started to wonder if Balwin didn't suspect something because he began to report his losses to me on a regular basis, almost as if he believed I had some sort of personal stake in his physical improvement. After two and a half weeks, he was down ten pounds and it became very apparent in his face. His cheeks lost their plumpness and I thought he looked a lot more handsome.
Exercise made him proud of his budding muscularity. One afternoon, he just had to roll up his sleeves to show me his emerging biceps.
"My father's happy because I'm finally making use of the expensive weight lifting equipment he bought me three years ago."
I felt funny encouraging him. I couldn't help experiencing the guilt, even though I had specifically and vehemently turned down his father's offer. Nevertheless. Balwin was so excited and proud about his process. I had to compliment him.
He no longer avoided physical education classes and he began to make friends with boys who previously had no use for him. Now they were inviting him to participate in their pickup basketball games and then, nearly a month after the fight he had had with Joey Adamson, I saw the two of them talking and joking with each other between classes as if they had been lifelong friends.
Even Thelma Williams began to eat her own words because some of her girlfriends were making positive remarks about Balwin's new look.
Reluctantly, she approached me after our physical education class and said. "Looks like you're having a good influence on your man."
She spoke the words as though they each left the taste of rotten eggs in her mouth.
"Whatever he does, he does because he wants to do it. Not because of me," I said. "'And he's not my man. He's his own man," I snapped.
Everyone's eyebrows went up. Even I was changing, talking more these days, and they all took note of it.
Thelma smirked looked at the others and shook her head.
"Sure," she said. "'Just shut him off and you'll see whose man he is and whose he isn't."
They all laughed and walked on, leaving me pondering what they all believed. Balwin and I had hardly exchanged a friendly kiss. What made them assume otherwise? Was it simply our spending so much time with each other?
"It's the music." I told Arlene Martin and Betty Lipkowski one afternoon when they asked me why I spent so much time with Balwin as compared to some of the better-looking, more outgoing boys who had shown interest in me.
"Music?" Arlene asked.
"Balwin feels it like I do. When we're doing a song together, we're connected. We touch each other more deeply. In here." I said with my hand over my breast. "and here," I added pointing to my temple.
They sat there staring at me for a moment. Then Betty shook her head and smiled.
"You make it sound like sex," she said with an air of jealousy. "Maybe it's better than sex," I said.
The two looked at each other and then gazed at me as if I was truly insane. Soon, there was something else about me and Balwin, something else to fill the pot of gossip and to be stirred and spread. Betty and Arlene were telling people we were in some kind of weird, kinky
-
relationship related to music. It kept us on the idle-chatter theater marquee, kept us moving through spotlights and made us aware of every word we said to each other, every touch or smile. It was as if we both felt we were under glass, in the camera's eye, being recorded. Ironically, it made Balwin even more self-conscious about his appearance and he looked more handsome.
When I sang in chorus now. I could feel everyone's eyes and ears on me, watching how I gazed at Balwin behind the piano, all of them looking for some special light, some special sin that would reveal the magic we shared. I suppose I sang even better. I know
I
sang louder. but Mr. Glenn 1.xras very pleased.
"This will be the best concert ever," he predicted.
Two nights before the concert. Balwin picked me up for another special rehearsal at his house. He had completed his song about me and wanted me to hear all of that as well as complete our preparations for my second audition number. His father, pleased with Balwin's physical changes, was talking about buying him his own car.
"He told me if I was going to have girlfriends and dates and such, there would be a greater need for my own transportation. I didn't even bring it up!" he cried, ecstatic over his father's new face.
Whenever his father greeted me now, he always wore a very pleased smile. Balwin said it was having an effect on their whole family. When his father was happy, his mother was happy.
"I can't believe the changes that have come over my home these past few weeks," he told me as we drove to his house. "My father and I actually talk to each other these days. I don't know how to explain it. but I'm sure it has a lot to do with you," he added.
"Me? Why?" I asked quickly. He shrugged.
"I said I don't know how to explain it. All
I
know. Ice, is ever since you and I started working together, the world turned into rainbow colors from the gray and black it used to be. You're just going to have to accept the compliment," he insisted.
I turned from him, feeling my heart skip beats. These were nice things to hear said about me, but somehow they made me very anxious. It was as if my heart knew more than my brain and with every beat was warning me that rainbows don't come until after the storm.
We had yet to have the real storm.

BOOK: Ice
9.17Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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