Little Altars Everywhere (13 page)

Verna breaks away to help the man and Maxine says, Well, Miss Priss, I certainly hope your brother enjoys the new hat you bought for him. If it doesn’t fit perfect, you bring it on back and we’ll get him the right size, okay?

Yes ma’am, I tell her. Thank you again.

Then she puts the hat in a box for me. She whispers: You take care of yourself now, you hear? And watch those sticky fingers. Not everybody in the world is me and Maxine, you know what I mean?

Yes ma’am, I do. I know what you mean.

And I walk out the door. Outside the light is all hot and white, like when you step out of the Paramount after a good movie in the middle of the day and you
get all blinded. I feel dizzy again and it takes me a long time to find the bus stop. When I finally do, I go and get me a window seat and crack open the window and let the air blow on me.

I give the hat to my Daddy that night when he gets home. Here, Daddy, I tell him, I got a present for you.

But when he tries it on, it just perches up there on his head like a stupid little Shriner fez or something.

Walker men have got big heads, Lulu, he says. Don’t you know that by now? We come from a long line of big heads. Maybe you oughta just give this thing to Little Shep. It’s more likely to fit him.

So I give it to my brother and he likes it good enough. But it was a gift for my Daddy, not for my brother. And that makes me real tired.

Later in my room, I write a letter to Maxine and Verna at The Cowboy Store. I disguise my handwriting and leave off my return address. I write:

At night in my bed when everyone else is asleep, I lay there and feel sad.
I can’t go back and exchange that hat for the right size. I can’t go see Verna and Maxine again. I’ve used them up and now I can’t have them any more. Maybe it’s true what Mama says: All I am is Gimmee Gimmee Gimmee, and after a while people get sick of me.

Well, Mama ought to know. She is the
Queen
of Gimmee. Where do you think I learned every single thing I know?

Siddalee, 1965

I
t’s Saturday morning and we are all riding over to the Hotsy-Totsy Room with Mama and Caro. We have to get Mama’s high-heel from under the
porte cochere
where she forgot it the night before.

Little Shep, Lulu, Baylor, and I are packed into the back seat of the T-Bird like sardines, and Mama and Caro have the air conditioner cranked up full-blast. Caro spent the night with us at Pecan Grove, even though Mama originally started out the night with Daddy, who ended up not coming home at all. When Mama and Caro woke the whole house up coming in, I took one of Mama’s Nytols that I had stashed in my nightstand and went back to sleep. But Lulu must have stayed up all night. When I got up, she looked all dazed and she had another picked-at red spot on her head.

I said, Jesus, Lulu, have you been at it again? I don’t see how anybody can actually eat their own hair.

She said, Siddy, I
try
not to. Really.

I know, I said, and rubbed a dab of Vaseline on the spot. Now don’t pick at it anymore today, you hear me?

In the front seat of the car, Caro and Mama are wearing sunglasses, even though it’s overcast outside. I put on my sunglasses too. We just pull up in front of the Hotsy-Totsy Room, and without the car hardly coming to a stop, Caro opens the door and scoops up Mama’s ice blue sling-back pump, and we drive off.

The Hotsy-Totsy Room is the only cocktail dance lounge of its kind in Thornton and it is very popular because of the Ya-Yas and their friends. It’s a stucco building with sparkles built into it. Seashells are set in the concrete driveway, and at night, twinkly lights shine in the bushes. Every time Mama and Daddy walk in there, the band stops whatever they’re doing and plays “Moon River,” Mama and Daddy’s favorite song.

After we pick up the high-heel, Mama pulls out onto the service road and says, Sidda, reach into that ice chest and get Caro and me those cold rags, will you?

I hand them the rags and they each put one on their forehead.

What’s wrong with yall’s heads, Mama? Little Shep asks.

We don’t know, Mama says.

We both caught one of those little bugs that’s going around, Caro explains. And they both give a little laugh.

Mama turns to Caro and says, I don’t know about you, girl, but I’m sick as a dog.

Make that two dogs, Caro mumbles. Drive a little smoother, will you?

Well, I’ve got those damn little floaties in front of my eyes, Mama says. They don’t make for the best driving I’ve ever done in my life.

Well, says Caro, we have got to stay on the move. I cannot bear the thought of seeing either one of those men we married until I feel a little more up to snuff.

Plus, Mama says, pressing her finger to her right temple, I don’t want the party to end. It’s hell this morning, but it was heaven last night. I haven’t danced like that since high school.

You finally had some decent dance partners again, Vivi—that’s why.

Mama says, Little pitchers have big ears.

I stare out the window and act like I’m not listening to every word that comes out of their mouths.

Hell, Caro says, you know damn well Shep has never been a dancer. The man might be able to grow cotton, but he’s a slew-footed clod on the dance floor.

Mama giggles and says, He tries.

That’s about the extent of it, Caro says, he
tries
.

Well, it didn’t slow me down any, Mama brags.

That’s
an understatement, Caro laughs. We were magnificent! We danced with every man in the place at least twice.

Yeah, Mama says, until we wore them out or teed off
their wives and had to start dancing with each other. Hell, Chick’s the only male who can keep up with us. I knew I should’ve married him instead of letting Teensy have him.

He was too short for you in high school, Vivi, and he’s too short for you now, Caro says.

Well, he still could grow, Mama says and laughs.

Anyway, it was glorious, Caro says. Just like the old days. And of course, those diet pills didn’t hurt.

Not one bit, Mama says. Then she turns around and looks at the four of us. How yall doing, spooks? Yall hungry?

Yes ma’am, we all say.

Hold on then, Mama says, We’ll get something in your pitiful stomachs before you know it.

We didn’t eat any breakfast or anything. Mama didn’t even try to fix my hair like she does every morning. My hair is almost down to my waist, and if it isn’t done in a certain way it just drives Mama to the insane asylum. She says with all my hair I could easily look like poor white trash or a Pentecostal if I’m not careful. This morning, though, she completely forgets about my hair, and I’m glad, because the way she usually whips it around feels like she really is trying to jerk me baldheaded. She always says, That’s the price you have to pay for beauty, Siddalee.

The thing is, Caro says, Shep gets so burned up when the Ya-Yas get together. It makes me want to kill
him, the way he talked to you last night. Saying: “You have never known how to act in public, Vivi.” Caro says this in a voice like Daddy’s.

Well, Mama says, Shep was raised different than we were.

That’s no excuse for him to drive off and spend the night at the goddamn duck camp, Caro says. If Chick hadn’t driven us home, then I don’t know what we would’ve done. It’s not like Thornton is New York City when it comes to taxicabs at four
A.M
.

Then she just snorts like she does not have the energy to go any further.

Don’t you have a pillow anywhere in this car? she asks Mama. Mama lets Caro boss her around and criticize her like nobody else ever can.

Caro holds her wet rag in front of the air-conditioner vent, then lays it over her whole face and leans back against the door.

Mama drives real slow and careful—until she comes to an intersection and then she speeds across real fast, stepping on the gas like she’s afraid someone will slam into her. Then she slows down again and crawls the car along the street until she comes to the next intersection. We stop and fill up the car at Roland’s Texaco and then Mama drives us in fits and starts over to Ship-Shape Donuts.

She leaves the car running, hands me ten dollars, and says, Go get whatever yall want. Get us two huge coffees, black.

They stay in the car and we run in and get a dozen
donuts and some cinnamon rolls and Lulu gets four of her rum balls. She hordes those rum balls and eats them on the sly. We all get Cokes too, even though Daddy says that having a cold drink before twelve noon is “a whore’s breakfast.”

Back in the car, those donuts are so soft and squashy and sweet, all warm out of the oven, and we sit in the back seat of the T-Bird and just eat and eat. Ooh, all that sugar and those Cokes on crushed ice just go down so good.

Mama looks in the rear-view mirror and says, Lulu, put that donut back in the bag right this instant.

Lulu says, Oh Mama, why?

Mama says, Just do what I say. Trust me, you will live to regret that donut if you eat it. I am only trying to save you from growing up to be a lard-ass like the women on your daddy’s side of the family.

Do you think a cigarette will kill me? she asks Caro.

I would not touch a ciggie with a ten-foot pole, Caro says. Not until I swallow a hair of the dog that bit me.

Mama sighs, Thank God I have the Ya-Yas to tell me what to do.

Where in the hell are we going next? Caro asks.

Mama says, Who cares? Let’s bomb over to Chick and Teensy’s and see if they’re up yet. I hope they feel just as bad as we do.

Fine, Caro says, just fine. And she settles back with the cold air blowing on her.

Mama pulls the car out onto the almost empty street. Where is everybody? It feels like we’re in a sort of Twilight Zone town.

Little Shep pulls out his Etch-a-Sketch and Lulu says, Let me play!

Little Shep says, Shut up, Porky.

She starts to cry and I say, Yall cut that out. Mama doesn’t feel good.

Lulu sits there sucking on a strand of her hair and I give her a look like: You remember what I told you, Baldy.

I pull
Nancy Drew and the Mystery of Lilac Inn
out of my purse and try to forget where I am. The car is so crowded there isn’t even enough room for us to hardly sit, let alone stash any of our stuff. So we have to squinch in together and it is horrible being that crammed in. Mama and Daddy had a big fight over Mama getting the T-Bird because it’s only built to seat four. But Mama says if she’s going to haul us all over the place, she’s going to do it in the car of her choice. When the six of us have to go somewhere together as a whole family, Daddy just follows behind in his truck.

After four or five blocks, Mama says, I simply
cannot
drive another inch. Caro, you have
got
to take over, the floaties are killing me.

Caro groans, You think I’ve got it any better? When are these kids going to start being good for something? Let one of them drive.

We should be so lucky, Mama says, and starts to
slide toward the passenger seat. They climb over each other, because neither one of them is about to step outside into the heat. Caro gets in the driver’s seat and Mama props her foot up on the dash and complains: If we didn’t have kids we could have cars with tinted windows. We’re martyrs, that’s what we are: martyrs to the cause.

Caro laughs. She says, Blaine is probably still sound asleep and I bet the boys are tearing my house to shreds. Let them. I’m sick of that rat-trap anyway.

And they both laugh and turn on the radio to some Easy Listening. The Ya-Yas love Easy Listening whenever they catch one of their bugs.

At Teensy and Chick’s we pull into the driveway and pile out of the car. Mama raps on the kitchen door like shave-and-a-haircut, two bits! She says, They damn well better have a pitcher of Bloody Marys ready.

Ruffin, who is my age, answers the door. He still has on his cowboy pajamas.

Mama says, Hi, Ruff, where’re your Mama and Daddy?

Ruffin crosses his arms and says, They’re still asleep. Yall better not wake them up or they’ll kill you.

Caro says, Good boy! Then she and Mama push past him into the kitchen. We trail in behind them.

I say, Hi, Ruffin.

He says, Yall better get out of here, I mean it. Yall better not make any noise.

All over the kitchen counters there are those tiny ce
real boxes you can eat right out of and you can smell burnt toast in the air.

Ruffin says, Really, Vivi, if you wake them up they’re gonna be really mad. They don’t feel good.

Well honey, Mama says,
we don’t either
, and we want some company. Now take all the kids and yall go play in traffic.

Ruffin stands there looking stupid and hurt.

Mama gives him a hug and says, Ruff dahling, I’m just
kidding!
Now yall go watch some TV.

Ruffin mumbles, Our antenna is broken.

Mama ignores him, and says to Caro, Plan 27-B (which is their code for: move on, no matter what). The two of them head back to Teensy and Chick’s bedroom. The door is shut and you can hear their big window air conditioner blasting away inside.

Ruffin gives one last warning: I mean it, they’re not going to like this.

But Mama and Caro burst into Chick and Teensy’s room and just jump in the bed with them, and yell: Get up! Yall think yall can sleep all day while we’re awake suffering?! Get up!

We stand at the door and watch. Teensy’s nightclub dress is on the chair next to the bed, and she has on this poofy peignoir. Teensy props herself up in bed and stares at Mama and Caro like they are Ubangis. It looks like there are pieces of red thread stuck to her eyeballs.

You damn fools! she says. Get out of here. Yall think
because I’m the only Ya-Ya with a fun husband you can come in here and wake me up like this?

Chick just rolls over without opening his eyes. He kind of waves his hand like he’s swatting flies. Chick is real little and wiry and cute, kind of like a horse jockey. He is sort of an honorary male Ya-Ya. When his hand reaches out, you can see his silk pajama sleeve. I never realized grown men actually slept in pajamas except in movies. Daddy always sleeps in his boxer shorts.

Come on Teensy! Mama says. Come on Chick! Don’t yall want to get up and play? We drove all the way over here just to commiserate.

The hell yall did, Teensy growls, and turns her pillow over to the cool side. Yall came over here because you’re scared to death to face Blaine and Shep. I can’t
believe
some of the stunts yall pulled last night. Yall were out of control, even for Ya-Yas.

We didn’t do anything you wouldn’t have done if you hadn’t married Chick, Mama says.

Teensy says, Yall are terrible, now get out of here. Go find somebody else to torture.

Mama and Caro just keep lying on the bed like they think she is kidding.

I’m serious, Teensy yells. Yall go on. Chick and I are going to sleep till three, then get up and have eggs Benedict. Hit the road.

Party-poopers! Caro says.

What a bunch of spooks, Mama says. Then Mama and Caro both climb out of the bed and start to lead us
out to the car, but not without checking the liquor cabinets first.

Where is your mama’s vodka? Caro asks Ruffin.

I don’t know, Ruffin says, she hides it.

Oh well, Mama says, and gives Ruffin a kiss on the forehead. Then she opens the kitchen door and we all walk out again into the hot gray day and climb into the hot stuffy car.

Mama and Caro look at each other and Caro says, Those SOBs. I was
counting
on them for a Bloody.

Mama says, Well, we can have one of the beers out of the cooler.

I will die before I drink any of that alligator piss, Caro says. I need a real drink.

Mama looks at Caro and says,
Abra!

Caro winks at her and says,
Cadabra!

Then Caro guns the car in the direction of Davis Street, which means the Abracadabra Liquor store.

Usually we go to the Abracadabra at night when Mama and Daddy run out of something or need to stock up. They go inside and leave us in the back of Daddy’s pickup. It’s always dark all around us, with the only light coming from the blazing fluorescent lights inside the store and the sign that hangs out front.