Leo the Lioness (7 page)

“Speak for yourself.” Nina smiled smugly. “A boy in a car whistled at me yesterday and stopped and asked me if I wanted a ride and he must've been at least twenty.”

“That's it,” I said. “Start taking rides from strangers in cars and you'll wind up sexually molested in a shallow grave.”

“I didn't take the ride, finkhead. I just said he asked me.”

“What'd you do, run into the bushes screaming?”

“Why don't you stop cutting everybody up into little pieces?” Jen said.

“I can't stand phonies.” I got up and walked away. I would go to the wedding but that didn't mean I'd enjoy it.

Count was coming toward me across the grass and he had something in his mouth. He'd probably been raiding garbage cans for miles around. He has a bad reputation for raiding. He looked sheepish.

If a dog can look sheepish, can a sheep look doggish? Hey. Pretty good. I laughed. I enjoy my own jokes. If Jen had still been the good egg she used to be, I would have told her this one. It was her type. But now she was nothing but a colossal bore, what with her “boys, boys, boys” routine. And if it wasn't boys, it was “clothes, clothes, clothes.” I don't see how we could ever have been best friends.

Count had a gigantic bone. It was so big it looked as if it had belonged to a dinosaur. He rolled his eyes around. I think he was afraid to put it down. Some other dog might take it away from him.

“You're a clod,” I told him. He smiled at me. I swear he did. His mouth sort of stretched out on either side of the bone and he smiled. But he still didn't let go.

“You can't trust humans,” I told him. “That's one thing about you. I can trust you to always be my friend. You're not going to get boy-crazy, like some people I could mention.”

I sat down on our back steps and watched him and after a while Count let the bone drop and then he lay down and put one big paw on top of it and gnawed away.

John came out to empty our garbage. He is still young enough to consider this a big deal. He considers it a treat. He'll learn.

“Hey, John, I've got a good one for you,” I said. He didn't have his hat on for once and his face was pale from being under the brim all summer. His arms and legs were very tan, though. He was two-toned.

“If a dog can look sheepish, can a sheep look doggish?”

I waited. Sometimes John is a little slow to get things. I think it is because I expect too much of him. He is only seven, after all, and maybe my humor is too sophisticated for him.

But then his face broke into wrinkles and he laughed the funny high laugh he has. I'm not absolutely sure he got it anyway, but he wouldn't let on. He has too much pride.

“I made it up,” I said.

John nodded. “I thought so,” he said.

“You're my favorite brother, kid,” I told him.

He smiled. He is missing two front teeth. On him it is very becoming. We went inside and I lined the pail for him. He does not do such a hot job of lining garbage pails.

20.

Today is my birthday. I am fourteen years old. I got a card from Carla in the mail, which I thought very nice of her, considering her wedding is two days away.

My mother and father gave me a typewriter. That is what I wanted more than anything. My handwriting is execrable and this will help immeasurably. I am going to train myself in the touch system. I have already memorized the top row of keys and day by day I will memorize more until I have the whole keyboard in my head. Then I will tie a blindfold over my eyes and see how well I do. It should be an interesting experiment.

Nina gave me a pair of earrings which are very nice. They are silver owls. I like them a lot. There is just one drawback. They are made for pierced ears. My ears are not pierced.

Hers are.

I have made it a rule never to let a cross word pass my lips on my natal day. I will stick to this rule.

Jen gave me a belt with a lion's head for a buckle, which I love. I also think it was nice of her, considering I have not called her “Niffy” once all summer.

My grandmother gave me a check for twenty-five dollars and a copy of
The Deerslayer
by James Fenimore Cooper. She said that I remind her of herself at my age. She was a romanticist too, she said, and James Fenimore Cooper was her favorite author.

I do not consider myself a romanticist but that is neither here nor there.

I have begun
The Deerslayer
. It is one of
The Leatherstocking Tales
, telling of life in early America. The leading character is a man named Natty Bumppo, who is noted for his honesty, probity, and integrity. I have not got very far along but already I feel rapport with him. He has also been pursued by quite a lot of girls, but he has never succumbed to the sins of the flesh.

John gave me a lanyard.

My mother asked me if I wanted a party. I said no. I do not know who I would ask. I certainly would not ask boys, and most of my friends, except for Jen, are still away somewhere. That is the worst of having a birthday on August fifteenth.

I told her I would like to have just a small family party and maybe go to the movies afterward. If we could find a movie for family consumption, John could come along.

My horoscope for today is: “Just possible that from a distance or through professional channels your big break to travel or express talents comes again as in April.”

Well.

In April I went on a trip to Washington, D.C., with my class and also in April I was in my class play. It was
Cheaper by the Dozen
, and I was one of the kids. I did not have a prominent role, only two lines, but still.

People who laugh at horoscopes should take another look.

21.

I woke up early this morning. It is Carla's wedding day. I had a dream last night. Carla was trapped in a well and was calling for help and I couldn't reach her. Then she was dressed up in a bride's dress and veil and walking down the aisle and when she got to the end there wasn't anyone waiting. At no time was there any sign of Dave.

Fortunately the sun is shining. It has been raining for almost a week and Mrs. McAllister must have been having a fit because they planned on having the reception outdoors and their living room isn't all that big.

We sent Carla and Dave some dessert plates. Each one has a different flower in the center. They are very pretty. I picked them out.

I put some lemon juice on my freckles last night. I read somewhere that this would bleach them out. In the strong light of day it is obvious that this is a canard. I am going to wear a yellow dress I got for the dance after our graduation from eighth grade. It does not do much for me. Nothing does. I only wore it that once. The dance was one of those blasts where the girls stand around, the boys stand around, and only the clods who are going steady do any dancing. I do not know why I bothered going.

By next summer the yellow dress will be too small for me so I might as well wear it to the wedding.

No one will be looking at me anyway.

Nina is in another catatonic state because she has a big zit on her chin. She woke up this morning and there it was. She ate a fried Swiss-cheese sandwich and drank a bottle of soda for lunch yesterday because our mother wasn't home and she could have anything she wanted. That's why she got the zit. She is trying to cover it up with layers of cosmetics but it is still there. Serves her right.

John said he would not go to the wedding if he couldn't wear his hat. My mother is trying to find a tactful way to solve this problem. I say, give the hat to Count and he will eat it. I have never known him to turn anything down. Put a little A-1 Sauce on it and he'll never know the difference.

My father had made plans to play golf when my mother reminded him about the wedding. He stomped around for a while, muttering about how if it wasn't Carla, he'd go ahead with the golf. He has always liked Carla.

I am going to wear dark glasses. That way nobody can see my eyes and if you can't see a person's eyes, you can't possibly know what they are thinking. I do not want anyone to know what I am thinking.

22.

Nina popped her zit, my mother managed to hide John's hat where he can't find it, my father made another golf date for tomorrow, and my mother went to the hairdresser and came back looking very soignée indeed.

I am a dream in my yellow dress. It makes me look sort of jaundiced, like Mary in
The Secret Garden
. Or maybe it's a little leftover lemon juice on my patrician features.

At any event, we finally all got into our car and drove to the church. I wanted to sit in back but my mother whispered to the usher and he put us up front. The usher who ushed us was one of Dave's roommates at college. He was pretty nice-looking, if you go for the tall, athletic, broad-shouldered type. I myself prefer the intellectual ones. The ones with glasses and stooped shoulders which got that way because of the weight of the many books they have supported over the years.

Nina, of course, was practically swooning as the usher offered her his arm. I felt like giving her a good goose right then and there but figured that might be out of order.

I sat next to John. It was his first wedding too.

“Where's Carla?” he kept asking.

The music began. Heads began to turn and all the old ladies sighed and the feathers on their hats agitated and there was the maid of honor, who was a sex symbol if I ever saw one. She was practically popping out of her dress. Her name is Nancy Tyler. She was a friend of Carla's from high school. She was a nice girl and sometimes came over to our house while Carla was sitting with us.

“Hi, Nancy!” John called.

I put my hand over his mouth. “Hush,” I told him. “You're not supposed to yell in church.”

“Who's yelling?” he yelled.

Everyone looked at us. My mother moved away and pretended she was a total stranger.

Then came the bridesmaids, two of them. They were also sex symbols. They were nice-looking girls. I knew Carla would be next. I didn't turn my head. She had on a white dress and a white organdy kerchief tied under her chin. She was beautiful. She didn't look to the left or to the right.

Her father is considerably older than most fathers. He has white hair and carries himself very erect. I wondered what he was thinking about. I wondered if he wanted to punch Dave in the nose. Carla is his only child and he is very fond of her.

Dave stepped forth on schedule and he didn't forget the ring or anything. He and Carla didn't kiss after the ceremony. They came down the aisle and I will say this for Dave, he looked capable of taking care of her, if that's worth anything. He also looked very happy. Carla smiled at everybody. I don't think she saw any of us. John, for once, was struck dumb. He put his thumb in his mouth and looked like an idiot. Nina made eyes at the handsome usher, who was escorting Nancy Tyler down the aisle. Who did Nina think she was, competing against Nancy?

We all sort of milled around outside and then the bridal party got into cars and went off to the reception. Maybe I could sneak away and they'd never miss me. But then Mrs. McAllister, who was waiting for her husband, came up to me and hugged me. Mrs. McAllister also has white hair. They had Carla when they were pretty old.

“Tibb, darling, how nice to see you. And John and Nina.” She smiled. “How good of you to come.”

Carla used to take us over to her house some days and her mother would give us cookies and stuff she'd baked. If Mrs. McAllister wasn't whipping up dresses and skirts for Carla, she was baking. That was the kind of woman she was.

She acted as if this was just an ordinary wedding. She was doing what my mother would call “carrying it off beautifully.”

“Carla looked lovely,” my mother told her. “Perfectly lovely.”

“Thank you. She did, didn't she?”

“Aren't you lucky? Such a glorious day!”

“What a lovely ceremony.”

I guess people probably always say the same things at weddings.

Then Mrs. McAllister got into a car and everyone drove off to the reception.

We had to go through the receiving line, my mother said. We were supposed to say hello to everybody whether we knew them or not. I thought that was pretty dumb but it was one of the rules. Weddings are loaded with rules.

I shook hands with the bridesmaids and Nancy and then Dave.

“Congratulations,” I said. I finally said it to the right person.

I thought he might be going to kiss me and I wasn't going to stand for that, so I stuck my hand out with a stiff arm and shook hands.

He looked different without his pith helmet.

“I'm glad you came, Tibb,” he said.

“I hope you'll be very happy,” I told Carla. I had my dark glasses on so she couldn't see what I was thinking.

“I already am,” she said, smiling. “I really am. Hello, John.”

She bent down and John shook hands with her.

“How do you do?” he said.

“That's Carla, you spaz,” I whispered. I explained to Carla that I didn't think John knew her in those clothes.

He looked at her again. Then he took his hand away and planted a big kiss on her cheek.

“Hi,” he said.

I think I saw tears in her eyes but there was such a bunch of people bearing down on us from the rear I couldn't be sure.

Like Jen had said, there were pots of champagne. I rather like it. I had one glass. Nina had at least two. There was a big wedding cake. We each got a piece of it to take home and put under our pillows. You are supposed to dream of the man you will marry if you sleep on the cake.

What a lot of baloney.

Finally Carla changed into her going-away costume and got ready to throw the bouquet. Nancy Tyler and the bridesmaids were standing directly below her, and there was a plethora of young men around who presumably would get ideas about weddings of their own.

Carla tossed her bouquet and there was a lot of jumping. I must've jumped higher than anyone else, because I caught it. As I said, I have grown almost three inches in the past year and I also am a forward on the basketball team. However, it was unpremeditated, I assure you.