A Soft Place to Land (22 page)

“I’m just used to things a little sweeter,” said Julia, and put down her spoon.

That night in bed, side-by-side on Ruthie’s full-size mattress, Julia’s curls splayed on the white pillowcase like the corona of an eclipse, Julia grilled Ruthie about Robert.

“How many books has he published?” she asked.

“Um, four I think.”

“Has he ever written a novel?”

“I don’t think so. He writes books for businesspeople, mostly. But he did write one book about the history of gefilte fish, which is this stuff that only Jewish people like.”

“What’s it called?” asked Julia.

“The Carp in the Bathtub
,” said Ruthie.

“He really loves you,” said Julia. “He looks at you the way Dad used to. Like he’s just so thrilled that you are his daughter.”

This talk made Ruthie uncomfortable. For one thing, she loved Robert, but he was not her father. And she didn’t like Julia bringing up the old charge that Phil loved Ruthie more than Julia because Ruthie was his biological daughter.

“Mimi is always telling him he’s got something stuck between his teeth, or dust on his glasses, or a stain on his shirt.”

“Yeah, she’s kind of a bitch to him,” said Julia.

Ruthie felt suddenly defensive of Mimi. She didn’t want Julia to turn her aunt into a Peggy. “He usually does have something stuck between his teeth or a stain on his shirt.”

“He’s allowed to be a slob,” said Julia. “He’s a famous writer. If I ever become a famous novelist I’m going to gain a hundred pounds and sit around all day in my pajamas, eating chocolates while I type away.”

“Gross,” said Ruthie. “Anyway, I don’t think Robert is really famous. It’s not like people stop and ask for his autograph.”

“Do you think he might look at some of my stories?”

Ruthie was pretty sure that Robert would, but she suddenly had a tight feeling in her throat. She didn’t want Robert looking at Julia’s stories, didn’t want her uncle to decide that Julia was the talented one, and not Ruthie. She didn’t want Robert’s attention to shift from her to her sister.

In Atlanta everyone—Naomi and Phil, the teachers at Coventry—knew that Julia was brilliant. And she had proved it sophomore year when she scored 1480 on her PSATs. That she was a bad student was simply because she was lazy, didn’t do the homework, didn’t turn in papers.

Ruthie had been a solid student, a hard worker who made decent enough grades but did not bowl anyone over, did not have English teachers tell her (as they did Julia) that when it came to her writing, the best thing they could do was step back and not get in her way.

“He’s pretty busy,” Ruthie said. And then she felt guilty. “But you can ask.”

“Hmm.”

“Hey, guess what?” asked Ruthie, wanting to change the subject, to make Julia laugh and not brood.

“What?”

“I am a C. I am a C-h. I am a C-h-r-i-s-t-i-a-n. ’Cuz I’ve got C-h-r-i-s-t in my h-e-a-r-t and I will l-i-v-e-e-t-e-r-n-a-l-l-y!”

Julia started whacking at Ruthie with the pillow. “Shut up; shut up; shut up! You’re reminding me of Virden!”

It was a song Ruthie had learned the summer after fifth grade, when she signed up with Alex for what she thought was a regular spend-the-night camp but turned out to be run by fundamentalists. Unless you read your Bible every day, writing down the verses you read on a little chart above your bed, you did not get dessert. And every morning a fourteen-year-old boy wearing white gloves came into the cabin to do room inspection and everyone had to stand at attention by their beds and salute him when he walked by. And he could inspect any item in the room. Once he even looked through a girl’s box of tampons.

“Maybe I’ll sing that to Peggy when I get home,” said Julia. “Tell her I found Jesus in San Francisco.”

“Good idea,” said Ruthie. And then, because she felt so bad that Julia had to live with her awful stepmother, Ruthie asked her sister if she would like for her to scratch her back.

Julia rolled onto her stomach and lifted her T-shirt so that it bunched around her shoulders. “Not too hard,” she instructed.

This, if nothing else, made things feel normal. Ever since Ruthie could remember she had been scratching Julia’s back, following her sister’s instructions as to exactly how she liked it done.

The next morning Ruthie woke to a series of pokes in her side.

“Rise and shine,” said Julia, who was already dressed in a purple tie-dyed T-shirt and used Levi’s.

Ruthie put a pillow over her head and moaned. Since turning fourteen she had lost her ability to be chipper in the mornings.

“What time is it?” she asked, her voice muffled from the pillow.

“Time to get up!” said Julia. “Time to explore San Francisco!”

Julia walked to Ruthie’s CD player and pressed play. Loud music filled the air, music that Julia had clearly chosen just for this moment. Seventies stuff, corny but fun, declaiming the band’s urge to celebrate life.

“Oh my god,” said Ruthie, sitting up as her sister started dancing to the music, raising her arms above her head, moving her hips back and forth, shaking out her auburn curls.

But then Julia was walking toward the bed, was bending down and pulling Ruthie up by the arms, was forcing Ruthie to dance with her.

“Don’t you want to celebrate?” asked Julia, gently mocking the song’s lyrics.

Ruthie felt like an idiot, and she wondered if they were waking Robert, who tended to sleep late in the mornings, but then something sparked inside her and she threw up her hands, started shaking her hips, too.

She was having fun.

After a breakfast of Pop-Tarts and chocolate milk (both purchased especially for Julia) the girls went back into Ruthie’s room so she could get dressed and Julia could put on her makeup. While they readied themselves, Julia played “Sugar Magnolia” from the Dead’s greatest hits album.

“Let’s go to Haight-Ashbury,” Julia said.

“It’s just like Little Five Points,” Ruthie said. “It’s not that exciting.”

“Dude, I live in Virden, Virginia. Where the most exciting thing that happens is Biscuit World’s two-for-one special on Wednesday mornings.”

Julia was sitting by the little dressing table Mimi had set up for Ruthie, complete with a three-way mirror and a silver tray to keep her cosmetics on. With one eye open, the other closed, Julia dusted her left lid with gold shadow, and then her right. This was new. In Atlanta Julia had hardly ever worn makeup.

“Biscuits are exciting,” Ruthie said.

“Want me to do your makeup?” asked Julia.

Ruthie had already applied a little brown liner to her eyelids and Clinique blush—from a free sample Mimi had received—to her cheeks.

“I’ll take a little eye shadow,” she said.

She walked over to Julia, stood facing her, and closed her eyes. Felt the soft brush tickle her lids.

“Now you’re Tinkerbell,” said Julia.

Ruthie opened her eyes, looked in the mirror. The gold shadow was barely noticeable, just a thin sheen on top of the ordinary.

“Beautiful,” she said.

It was easier just to pretend that she loved it.

As they walked toward the Haight, Ruthie eyed Julia surreptitiously. Ruthie knew she was being shallow, but Julia’s purple tie-dye made her cringe. Teenagers didn’t wear tie-dye in San Francisco anymore. They wore J.Crew, or they dressed Goth, or they went grunge, like Dara, who was forever wearing granddad cardigans and black Doc Martens. Or they donned vintage T-shirts, the cornier the caption the better.

The only person Ruthie knew in San Francisco who wore tie-dye was Abby Beringer’s dad, an independently wealthy man who “missed his little girl so much” when she was away at school that he signed up as a substitute teacher at Hall’s. An older dad with curly hair and a silver beard, he looked a lot like Jerry Garcia. Indeed, he was in a Dead cover band comprised of men in their fifties called More Than Just a Touch of Gray.

Though Mr. Beringer was nice, the Hall’s girls rolled their eyes over what a hippie he was. Abby especially, who complained that her dad’s Grateful Dead tie-dyes, which he wore with khakis on days he substitute-taught, broke the dress code.

Julia didn’t look as goofy as Mr. Beringer, of course. She was young, slender, and pretty with her cloud of crazy auburn
curls. Still, Ruthie thought Julia looked like she was trying way too hard.

Ruthie knew that to Julia, Haight Street represented freedom, a place where bohemia was on display both in the stores and out on the street. Where people could wear what they wanted, say what they wanted, smoke what they wanted.

To Ruthie, Haight Street was crowded, junky, touristy, and gross. In particular she did not like the groups of kids who congregated on the sidewalks in front of the shops, white kids mostly, with facial piercings and dreadlocks, dirty clothes, and mangy dogs surrounding them.

“Hey, man,” one of them would say in a plaintive tone. “Can you give me some money so I can go get fucked up?”

And then, when he was ignored, “At least I was honest.”

And collectively the group would snicker and laugh, as if they alone were in on the joke that the world was playing on humanity.

Despite Ruthie’s dislike of Haight Street culture, there were a few stores, scattered between the head shops, in which she enjoyed browsing. There was a bath and body shop that sold yummy soaps and Japanese robes made of the softest cotton Ruthie had ever felt. There was an independent bookstore that had hosted Robert’s last reading. There was a women’s clothing store where Mimi once took Ruthie shopping, though the clothes were a little expensive for someone who was still continuing to grow. And there was a Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream parlor, which Ruthie and Julia were fast approaching.

“Want to get ice cream?” Ruthie asked.

Ever since they had turned onto Haight, Julia had fixed a dreamy expression on her face, as if she expected soon to be greeted by a tribe of kids dressed for Woodstock, handing out flowers.

“Get some if you want, but I’m too fat,” said Julia. She lifted her T-shirt and slapped at her flesh, revealing a flat stomach.

Julia was not fat. Julia was so skinny Ruthie imagined her
slipping right out of her jeans. If anyone was fat it was Ruthie, who had developed a little roll around her waist from eating all of Robert’s good food.

“Is there any shop you are looking for in particular?” asked Ruthie.

Julia looked at her, snorted. “What are you, the cruise director?”

“Just asking,” said Ruthie. She eyed a black and tan dog that lay beside its owner, who was slumped up against the side of a natural food store. The dog was not wearing a leash and looked mean. Ruthie stepped to her left, to put a little more distance between herself and it.

“Oh, Ruthie. You are so lucky to live here. I wish you could see where I live, what passes for excitement in the big V. That you live where you can walk to Haight-Ashbury, it’s so fucking cool.”

“People just call it the Haight. Not Haight-Ashbury.”

Ruthie thought Julia would act pissed at being corrected, but all she said was, “That’s good to know.”

“There’s a really cute store near here called Ambiance,” said Ruthie. “It’s got really cool clothes and fun jewelry and shoes and everything.”

“Okay,” said Julia. “Fine. Lead me to the consumption.”

They were near, only half a block away. Ruthie recognized the cheerful black-and-white-striped awning of the store.

“Every time I’ve worn something from here on free dress day at school, I get complimented.”

“That’s really cute,” said Julia, as if she were thirty years older than Ruthie.

Ruthie pushed open the door to Ambiance and a little bell tinkled above them. A woman behind the counter with dyed black hair cropped to her chin greeted them enthusiastically. All of the saleswomen at Ambiance were enthusiastic.

The store consisted of one long room with a loft upstairs. Every bit of it was packed with clothes. There were racks down the middle of the room, each packed so tightly it was hard to
squeeze a hanger back in once you pulled a dress out. There were racks against the side of the store, also stuffed with hanging clothes. And in every corner, against every wall, there were baskets filled with scarves or tights or tank tops or slippers. There were several glass-front cases that formed the counter where the register was kept, packed with inexpensive jewelry, earrings, necklaces, rings, headbands. And even though it was only 11:00
A.M.
, the store was already filling with shoppers.

“How do you find anything here?” asked Julia. “It’s like Loehmann’s or something.”

“It is
so
not like Loehmann’s,” said Ruthie. “Just start pulling stuff out. And don’t be afraid to try on a ton of things. Mimi always says there’s no hurt in trying.”

Ruthie walked to the front rack and started looking through it. Something bright pink caught her eye. She grabbed its hanger and pulled it out, revealing a long-sleeve shirt made of fine cotton with a scoop neck and a little white heart printed on the front.

“Isn’t this cute?” Ruthie asked, waving the hanger in Julia’s direction.

Julia was standing in front of one of the side racks, a shirt in her hand. She was staring at the price tag and did not answer Ruthie.

“Earth to Julia. Isn’t this cute?”

Julia glanced at the shirt Ruthie was holding up and nodded. “Very,” she said. “Listen, is there a place nearby where I can get a cup of coffee?”

“You don’t want to shop?”

“Dude, this just isn’t my scene. Why don’t you try on stuff and I’ll get a coffee and we can meet in say thirty minutes?”

“There’s a place down the street, not two blocks away,” said Ruthie, putting the hanger with the pink shirt back in the rack. “I’ll go with you.”

“No, try that on. It’s adorable. I’m just a little claustrophobic in here. I’m used to the spacious wonder of Belk’s at our local
mall. But no worries. I’ll get coffee; you try on clothes. All will be well with the universe.”

“Um, okay,” said Ruthie.

Julia waved good-bye and was out the door.

And suddenly it was as if she’d never been there at all, as if the sight of Julia in San Francisco had just been a fantasy. For a second Ruthie felt panicked, imagining Julia disappearing down Haight Street and never coming back. But then Ruthie shook her head and focused on where she was, on what was really happening. She was in a clothing store and Julia was getting coffee down the street. It was no big deal. She would meet up with her sister in half an hour.