Love Me Tender (14 page)

Chapter 25

WHEN I woke up early the next morning, my ear didn't feel like I'd hung a backpack from it. It was swollen, but not as bad as the day before. It was tender, but it didn't throb. My head didn't pound. I didn't have to walk tilted to one side.

All in all, I suspected I'd live.

I looked into the other bedrooms. Kerrie was sleeping, Mel was sleeping. But I could hear the grandmother moving around downstairs.

I knew I'd be putting a coat of paint on that window, so I dressed in a fairly new T-shirt that I didn't treasure. It couldn't impress the grandmother less than the Jimi Hendrix shirt.

She glanced at me as I went into the kitchen, then looked back at her measuring cup. “I thought I'd make some hotcakes and we can just leave them in a warm oven. Let everybody eat as they get up and about.”

“Sounds good to me,” I said, following the smell of coffee. “What should I do to help?”

“You can explain to me how it is that your momma doesn't mind that you drink coffee but she had a conniption fit over that green soda.”

“Mel has a twelve-year rule. Once I was twelve, I could drink coffee, smoke cigarettes if I wanted to kill myself, and drive.” I remembered to add, “In the driveway.”

The grandmother didn't look like this rested easy with her.

“Mel knew I wouldn't smoke, I hate the smell. So basically, she was saying I could drink coffee if I wanted to have something most kids couldn't have. Everything else, I have to wait till I'm twenty-four.”

“What everything else was she worried about?”

“Boys.”

The grandmother got a kick out of that. I was just thinking we were getting off to a good start, for six o'clock in the morning, when somebody knocked on the back door. I figured it was Aunt Clare making a sneak attack, and I opened the door with an oh-it's-you-again expression on my face.

It was Mr. Singer. Different colors today.

“Hello, Vertie,” he said to the grandmother as he passed her a bucket about half filled with blueberries. She wasn't decorated with tissue paper this morning. She'd done her seven minutes before I got up.

He went on, saying, “I started picking and I just couldn't stop. I'd love a piece of that coffee cake you make.”

The grandmother made all the grateful noises, but she looked a little perturbed. “I'd ask you in,” she told him, “but I have to make the most of an opportunity to weasel all the family secrets out of this child. You understand.”

Mr. Singer grinned and in a stage whisper said, “Bribery is helpful in these situations. Bribery and flattery.”

“You may have something there,” the grandmother said.

I felt pretty good as we shut the door. I had the grandmother to myself. I tried to strike just the right note. “You going to do some more banging on that burner?”

“No. There's just those clinging bits left on it. We'll do the hotcakes on that burner. The metal will soften up again. I'll push some strips of aluminum foil under it to catch any drips. But the window is more important to me right now. Do you think you could put a first coat on it this morning?”

“No problem.”

We stuck to safe subjects while I ate, like my friend Debs and a roller-skating party. When the grandmother asked about Kerrie's ballet classes, I described her as a girl of quickly changing interests. An explorer.

The grandmother set the second plate of hotcakes into the warmed-up oven. She turned the oven off, though, and put the frying pan into the sink.

“Aren't you going to sit down to eat?” I asked.

She said, “I ate toast and a poached egg while I was making coffee. I don't have much of a sit-down habit. Are you ready to work?”

The grandmother opened the paint can while I made fast work of the dishes. “The brush may seem a little small for the job,” the grandmother said as I climbed up on the counter. She made a show of barely dipping the brush and then scraping it against the edge of the can.

“A big brush would slap too much paint on at one time,” she said. “Do around the glass first, while you have paint only on the tip of the brush. Then do the edges close to the wall.”

I said, “I'll be careful.”

“Throw this over your shoulder,” she said, passing me a small damp cloth. It was thin as a hankie. “You have to wipe the paint off the window glass before it dries.”

I said, “Where'd you learn so much about this?”

“Your grandfather was a housepainter,” she said.

“A housepainter instead of a doctor.”

“It suited him. Gave him lots of time to think. And now and then, if his day was hard, if the sun was hot or it rained unexpectedly, he came home and said he didn't lose any patients.”

I painted about three inches along the edge before I got a dab of paint on the glass. Right away I used the little rag to wipe it off. “Don't get nervous,” the grandmother said. “That happens to everybody. That's why I gave you the cloth.”

When I needed more paint, she dipped and scraped and gave me the brush. She stood below me and supervised, but she didn't need to. I had made up my mind. I would paint this perfect window and all would be forgiven.

As I handed her the brush again, I asked, “Are you very religious or something?”

She glanced at me, then put more paint on the brush. “Why do you ask?”

“Well, Mel's never said one way or the other.” I painted another three inches without screwing up. “About you, I mean. But she's not. We're not.”

“Are you asking if this is a family trait?”

“No.”

“So what are you working up to?”

“I noticed you don't really look at me. I wonder if it's a religious issue. If I'm ‘an offense to thine eyes’ or something.”

“Not at all,” she said as I dipped the brush myself. Still not meeting my eyes, but giving an approving nod as I scraped the brush, she added, “You're a very pretty girl, I think. And even if you end up with a cauliflower ear, you'll pass muster.”

I didn't want her to think I was fishing for compliments, so I dove right in. “I can't help that Mel and Daddy didn't get married right away, you know.”

“I know that.”

As I stood up, paint dripped off my perfectly scraped brush. But she was ready with a damp sponge and wiped it up.

“This is the twenty-first century,” I said. “We don't brand red
A's
on people's foreheads anymore, and illegitimate children aren't suspected to be the spawn of the devil.”

“Quite a history buff, are you?” she asked me.

“Kerrie is the history buff. But I read.”

“So did my sister.”

“I didn't know you had a sister,” I said, and blopped paint on the glass. Blopped and wiped. “I mean, I know I'm in her room, but I hadn't heard of her until yesterday.”

“She died when she was just about your age,” the grandmother said. “Pneumonia. You look so much like her, I was afraid of staring.”

I dipped and scraped. “You miss her a lot?”

“I didn't realize how much until I saw your face,” she said. “I'll show you some pictures later, if you like.”

“I don't mind if you stare.”

She wrapped her hand around my ankle in a way that was strangely comforting. “You're not illegitimate. Your mother is married to your father.”

“Not until after I was born.” Not until only a few days before Kerrie was born.

“That's just a technicality,” she said.

We were both quiet for a minute. My painting arm had stopped of its own accord. I asked her, “Does this paint make your eyes burn? It sure does make my eyes burn.”

She patted me on the foot.

“Can I call you Grandma?”

She gave me one of her sharp looks. “You call your mother Mel, you want to call me Grandma?”

“How about Granny? Or Grammie, that would be really cu—”

“Grandma will be fine,” she said in a dry tone.

My painting arm had gone back to work. I could have called her Grandma right off to get the ball rolling, but I didn't want to do that. I wanted to wait for the right moment. It was like waiting for Christmas.

“I'm going to put some paint in a jar for you,” the grandmother said. “So you don't have to keep bending over to the can all the time.”

“Thanks.”

“It'll cut down on the dripping.”

Hmmm. Message decoded: “Don't drip paint all over the place.”

Mel came downstairs about twenty minutes later.

“The paint smell woke me,” she said. “I see you dressed for dirty work.”

“These are my clothes,” I said. Crabby is what Mel gets when her stomach is about to turn over.

“I'm going to put on some water for tea,” she said.

“Don't turn on the gas,” the grandmother said in an alarmed voice. “You should never start a fire where there are paint fumes in the air.”

“It won't explode in here, Momma,” Mel said in a falsely understanding voice.

“I'm not worried about a fire,” the grandmother said testily. “But it makes a terrible odor, and I can't believe it's healthy to breathe that odor in.”

Mel got a Coke from the fridge, sighing pretty much the same deep sigh she hated for me to sigh when she was giving orders.

“That isn't the right breakfast for a woman in your condition,” the grandmother said.

“I agree,” Mel said. “But I'm going to go sit outside and drink it.”

“There's hotcakes in the oven,” the grandmother said.

“In a while,” Mel said. “I don't know that I could hold it down just this minute.” She, lucky woman, went out the door as Aunt Clare came in.

“Well, good morning to you too,” Aunt Clare muttered to herself.

“Mel never quite got over the morning sickness thing,” I said. “The doctor says it's about a nerve getting pressed on.”

“I'll make up a plate for her,” the grandmother said, pulling a cookie sheet out of the oven. “Hotcakes ought to go down easy when she's ready. Clare, come stand next to Elvira. And don't turn on the gas, either one of you.”

“How are you feeling, darlin'?” Aunt Clare said.

It took a moment to realize she meant me. “It's not so bad. Thank you, Aunt Clare, for the CD player. Thanks for thinking of me.”

“You're welcome. I thought a charm bracelet might be nicer, but Kerrie was sure the CD player was a better bet.”

The grandmother went out the back door, carrying plates—hotcakes stacked on the top plate—syrup, forks, and napkins, like a professional.

“I'm not going to fall off here, you don't have to worry.”

“I'm not worried. Momma's worried.” Aunt Clare reached for a hotcake, rolled it up like a cigar, and started to eat. “Where's Kerrie?”

“Still sleeping.”

“You and I haven't exactly hit it off,” she said. “Why is that?”

I stopped painting and looked down at her. “You're a little hard on Mel, that's why.”

“That's between sisters,” Aunt Clare said. “I'm asking about you and me.”

“Sisters have to be able to count on each other,” I said.

“I agree,” Aunt Clare said. “So while you may not like everything you see and hear when I'm around, maybe you could remind yourself I need my sister now. I think Momma needs her too.”

“I'll keep that in mind.” I shoved the window open so I could paint around the bottom without bending over to it.

“You know, I think I'll go sit in the garden too,” Aunt Clare said. “If that paint smell makes you dizzy in the least, get down from there and come outside with us.”

She went out the back door, and the kitchen was quiet again.

I heard Mel say, “I used to dream about raising my children in this house, Momma. Of course, that was before I had any, but still, I'd hate to see you sell it.”

Mel was sitting beneath the window, the grandmother beside her.

“You know, it's not too late to bring your family back here.”

“Tony and I used to talk about moving to Memphis, Momma.”

“And now?”

“Now we talk about other things.”

“Yoo-hoo, don't say anything you wouldn't want me to hear,” Aunt Clare called, coming around the corner of the house.

The chairs were shifted a little, and when Aunt Clare sat down, they all agreed it was going to be a hot day. For about a minute nobody said anything.

Then the grandmother said, “I didn't expect to tell the both of you together, but I'm glad it's worked out Mel's here. Mr. Singer has asked me to marry him. I've said yes.”

Both Mel and Aunt Clare whooped and made happy noises; it took a minute for me to sort out their voices.

Mel said, “When did this happen?”

“Last week.”

Aunt Clare said, “And you haven't said a word till now?”

“I didn't want you to think I'd marry because you're worried about me, Clare,” the grandmother said. “I hope you girls don't believe I'm too old to remarry either.”

“No, of course not,” Aunt Clare said.

Mel added, “I'm not sure there is such a thing as being too old for love.”

The grandmother said, “I know I said some harsh things when you left home so long ago, Melisande. Especially when you got pregnant.”

“I know you didn't mean them, Momma.”

“Of course I meant them. But I might have been wrong then. Certainly I'd be wrong now. Times have changed. Maybe they had already changed.”

“Thank you, Momma.”

“On a practical note, Mr. Singer's house is smaller than this one and, in some ways, more convenient,” the grandmother said. “Better suited to old people.”