She thought about all this as she and Gladys walked to the bus stop. She wished that Ms. Jeffery was driving them home. Once at the bus stop, Mel sat down on one end of the bench. Gladys, on the other hand, was grumbling. She removed her hat and undid her coat – all the while complaining about the sun being too bright, the day being too hot, and her shoes being too tight.
It was all going by Mel until Gladys blurted out in exasperation, “For crying out loud, a library card!”
Yes
, Mel thought,
a library card
. She began making a mental list of all the books she’d seen over the last week that she wanted to check out.
—
“Wake up!” Gladys said. “The bus is here.”
Mel wanted to say that she wasn’t asleep, that she was thinking, but she didn’t. Gladys, once again, took hold of her arm. The whole exercise was a combination of being leaned on and hoisted up into the bus.
“She rides for free,” Gladys said, jerking her head toward the fare schedule.
The sign clearly read “Children nine and under free.” Gladys then poured the contents of a rumpled envelope into the coin slot and continued down the narrow aisle. The driver gave her a doubting nod, and Mel felt her face flush.
“Here,” Gladys said, pointing to the seat next to the back exit. “Sit down.” Everything about the way Gladys spoke told Mel that Gladys was angry.
Mel was grateful to have the window seat. The view would keep her from thinking about the grumbling in her empty stomach. If today was the first day, then there were twenty-nine more days, but if the judge counted the two days Cecily had already been in jail, then today was twenty-seven, tomorrow would be twenty-six, and maybe with good behavior …
Mel knew that staying at Gladys’s wasn’t going to be anything to look forward to. Nothing Gladys said or did
made Mel think that she was welcome or that this could be her home – even if it was just for a month. Gladys was cold, and Mel wondered about Gladys’s anger toward Cecily, about how it was connected to Tux dying and the jewelry box and everything else that had happened, and if there were any answers stored in all the little boxes that lined the walls and encircled the room of the apartment. And if now, with Mel there, Gladys had reason to set that anger loose.
Mel’s family wasn’t like the families she read about in books, the stories that had fueled the thoughts she’d carried up the stairs that first day she and Cecily arrived back in Riverview. That day, there had been hopes of baked cookies, warm hugs, and kind words. But those dreams had tumbled down the stairs, and Mel had no intention of picking them up again – ever.
Gladys showed no sign of making dinner when they arrived back at the tiny apartment. Rather, she sat down in the kitchen, and turned on the TV. Mel sat on the sagging couch and looked at the deadbolts on the door, the tinfoil on all the windows, the stacks of dusty, yellowing newspapers tightly tied with string that were piled next to a box of flattened Red Label milk cans and neatly folded orange pekoe tea boxes.
She slipped her hand into her pocket, brought out the two twenty-dollar bills, and then promptly put them back. When she walked into the kitchen, Gladys seemed oblivious to her presence. With the tinfoil on the windows, blocking the afternoon sun that might have shone in Gladys’s apartment, and with only the small fluorescent light flickering on the stove, the tiny apartment was in perpetual dusk.
Mel looked at the white metal enamel cupboard that was strangely positioned in front of a door that led off the kitchen, as though the room didn’t exist.
What is with that room?
she thought.
With a deep breath, Mel garnered the courage to be heard over the TV, and, almost shouting, she asked, “Is it okay if I go for a walk?”
“Where?” Gladys barked back.
“Just down the street.”
“There isn’t anything but trouble for you to get into on this street,” Gladys said.
“I was just –”
“You can pick me up two cans of milk at Frohberger’s. But I tell you, girl, if you try pulling one of your mother’s stunts, I’ll let them toss you in that cell with her and throw away the keys.”
Ignoring this, Mel asked, “Is it Red Label milk that you want?”
“Yes, and I know exactly how much it is, so don’t try pulling any fast ones on me.” Gladys set three dollars on the table and turned back to the TV.
Going to Frohberger’s would give Mel the opportunity to change one of the twenties into coins and bills so that she had bus money. It would also satisfy her growing curiosity about Mr. Frohberger, her grandfather, and the store.
The Frohberger’s sign hung out from the long, narrow building on the corner of Maple and Thirty-Seventh. A bright red wrought-iron bike rack sat empty under an enormous oak tree shading curved concrete steps. Inside, the long, wide planks of wood floor were smooth and inviting. There was a barrel of damp sawdust next to the door. An old man was sprinkling scoops full of the sawdust onto the floor and then sweeping it up. Single lightbulbs in metal shades hung from the high ceiling, illuminating the extra-wide aisle that separated one row of shelves from the other. As Mel took in the sights of the store, the old man finished sweeping and then shuffled to a place behind the counter next to an elaborate cash register. The store was what Mel imagined a store would have looked like a hundred years ago. The smell was sweet, and, as Mel breathed in the cool air, the corners of her mouth lifted, and she smiled. She wondered if the old guy was Mr. Frohberger.
The floorboards gave long creaks as Mel made her way past the sparsely stocked shelves. There were two or three of most things. She’d already passed the cans of Red Label, but she kept walking. She made a mental list of the products she liked: cereal (four kinds), macaroni and cheese, chocolate chip cookies, gingersnaps, ketchup, mustard, relish, canned ravioli, chicken noodle soup, pork and beans, salsa, corn chips, barbecue chips, instant rice.
At the end of the aisle there was a small cooler with four jugs of milk, three packages of cheese slices, and two cartons of eggs. Next to it was a freezer. It was difficult to see exactly what was hidden under all the white ice that grew around the edges.
At the back of the store hung floor-length black velvet curtains. They were the kind of curtains used in theaters. Mel wanted to peek behind them, but she didn’t. What Cecily had told her about Tux’s Saturday Magic Matinees must have been true. She let her fingers run down a fold of velvet, but not for long. Mel felt the shopkeeper’s eyes on her back, and it was an uncomfortable feeling she was all too familiar with.
She made an about-turn, picked up the cans of Red Label on her way to the front, and set them next to the newspapers on the counter. Mel noticed the collection of four-leaf clovers pressed under the thick glass. There were
seven of them – Cecily’s lucky number. There wasn’t much behind the counter: chocolate bars, small packets of pain relievers, lottery tickets, gum, ballpoint pens, a few plastic tubs of penny candies, and assorted bags of chips. An old cardboard display, hanging slightly lopsided on the wall, held a few last pairs of cheap sunglasses.
“Will that be everything?” the storekeeper asked.
“I was wondering if I could also get some change?”
“Oh, sure. What do you need – dimes or nickels?” the storekeeper asked as he pushed a large key on the ornate cash register.
The register clunked, a gear was released somewhere within the enormous contraption, and it produced a clear and precise
ka ching!
as the cash drawer opened. Mel had never seen or heard anything like it.
“Well, actually, this –” Mel put the three dollars on the counter, “is for the canned milk. I need to bring that change back to my grandmother. I was …”
“Your grandmother?” the storekeeper interrupted. “Who would that be?”
“Gladys Tulley.”
“Gladys. So you’re her granddaughter?”
“Yes,” Mel said, and in that moment she decided to find another place to get change for the bus.
As the storekeeper counted the change back, he set
each coin on the counter. “Two-fifty, seventy-five, and three.”
An unusual look moved across the storekeeper’s face. He looked down, and then his head turned slightly to the side. “You’re Melody?”
“Yes, I am.”
“Cecily’s daughter?”
“Yes.”
“Well, how about that. It’s been a long time. I don’t suppose you remember me. My name’s Ed Frohberger. I knew you when you were knee-high to a grasshopper.”
Mel laughed at the thought of being that small.
“I was a good friend of your grandfather. Thirty years Tux and I were friends.” As he spoke, Mr. Frohberger pulled a half-filled plastic container off the shelf and used the little tongs to fish out a multi-colored gummy. “Here you go, Miss Melody. Welcome back to the neighborhood.”
“Thank you,” Mel said, but what she really wanted to do was ask him to tell her more.
“My pleasure,” Mr. Frohberger answered. “It’ll be great for Gladys to have someone around to run errands for her. Give her my regards.”
“I will,” Mel garbled out as she tried to chew the almost-rock-hard candy.
Once outside, Mel looked up at the stately trees and worn-down houses. She couldn’t help but wonder what it
might be like to be one of these trees, or even to be Mr. Frohberger, or even Gladys.
What does it feel like to be in the same place today as you were yesterday, as you will be tomorrow?
Cecily liked change. Lots of it. Mel, on the other hand, did not.
As Mel sauntered down the street to the market, she kicked little bits of chipped concrete from the lifting and tilting sidewalk. When she got there, she picked out a bag of chips, and – although it didn’t feel right using what she was sure was the lawyer’s money – she did it anyway and got the change she needed: three five-dollar bills and the rest in quarters. She’d break the five-dollar bills one at a time as she needed them.
“My neighborhood,” Mel whispered. “This was my neighborhood.”
She liked the sound of those words strung together, and she felt happy all the way back to Gladys’s – until she tried the door to the apartment. It was locked.
“You can’t be leaving the door unlocked when you go!” Gladys snarled as she opened the door. “I’m giving you a key, and I expect you to hang on to it. It’s for the top lock. If you lose it, you’ll have to pay to have the lock changed.” Gladys took the too-short string she’d threaded through the hole at the top of the key and stretched it over Mel’s head. Then, using one hand to take the cans
of Red Label evaporated milk from Mel, she held out her other palm. “Change,” she said.
Mel lifted the key up, dropped it between her shirt and her skin, and then handed Gladys the coins.
“You can put your stuff on that bottom shelf, but don’t be getting into any of those boxes.” Gladys motioned to the vacant end of the bookshelf that sat across from the couch. “I’ll be leaving for work at six-thirty first thing tomorrow morning,” Gladys added, and then strode into the kitchen.
Scenes, like those in a film, sometimes played out in Mel’s mind. In this scene, Gladys was telling Mel once again not to touch any of her things. Words ran along the bottom of the screen, like captions.
There is a way they treat you when they don’t trust you, or don’t want to trust you. It’s in the way they speak, the words they use, the way they hold their body and look at you. Sometimes they look at you for so long it feels like forever, like they have already caught you doing what they think you are going to do, or have already done. Other times, they look past you or through you as though you are invisible
.
Mel’s eyes returned to Gladys, who was futzing in the kitchen, and then to her backpack, and then to the shelf.
Late that night, with the crocheted blanket wrapped tightly around her, Mel peeled back a corner of the tinfoil from the window beside the couch, and looked out at the stars. Air – cool, clean, and fresh – blew through a thin crack in the paned glass window. If there was a window where Cecily was, Mel was sure Cecily would be looking up at the night sky and thinking about her, too. Mel brought a handful of her spiraled ringlets close to her face. Her hair still smelled of the menthol cigarette smoke Cecily blew over her head at the courthouse.
She thought about the list Cecily would be making. It would be a list of all the things they would do when this was over – when things got better. Cecily was going to come by and get her, and together they were going to find a place of their own. They’d make a list of places they’d like to live, a list of all the details of the perfect home, and a list of things they’d need.
“You have my heart, girl,” Cecily would tell her.
“You’re my grounding force. You’re my gift from God Almighty Himself.” Then Cecily would start singing: “I need you, like the flower needs the rain, you know I need you” – or some other silly love song. Cecily’s voice always made Mel smile when she was sad. It made her feel warm when she was cold, and it made her feel safe when she was scared. And when Cecily was finished singing, she’d say, “Girl, let’s write a list.” The list would include all the places they were going to tour when they got enough money together to cut their first record, a list of festivals they’d sing at, and a list of songs they were going to sing – in the order they were going to sing them. Mel always went along with it, but what she didn’t tell Cecily was that – secretly – she hoped they’d find one beautiful place, and they’d stay there. They’d have a garden, flowers, and, maybe, if Cecily could afford it, Mel could get a kitten.
Cecily talked about being onstage, in front of thousands of people, and about jamming with other musicians backstage as though it was destined to happen. It would be Cecily’s moment of fame. When Cecily talked about her dream, Mel always felt guilty, wondering if she had been the reason Cecily hadn’t been able to pursue her dream. Cecily had only once told her about the moment everything changed. Cecily had been drinking and let the words slip out. She said that everything had been going
great, that she was on her way, playing lots of festivals, that there had been talk of a record. But then Cecily had started partying a lot, and the next thing she knew, she was pregnant.