Little Divas (2 page)

Daddy reminded her that he’d quit the band and wouldn’t be touring anymore. He said he’d reserve Saturday nights for gigs and suggested that on those nights I could stay with Uncle Lance and he’d join us at church every Sunday and take me home afterward. How was that?

I opened my eyes, held my breath, and waited.
Please let her say yes. Please, please, please. Puh-leeeeease!

But Mom laughed at that, too. Uncle Lance had been trying to get Daddy to go to church for years. Was she really supposed to believe that now, all of a sudden, he was going to go
every
Sunday?

Daddy took a long, deep breath and looked Mom in the eye. The room was quiet, without so much as a sigh from any of us as we waited for his answer.

“Yes,” Daddy finally replied.

Mom was silent, and still. She didn’t so much as blink.

Daddy took a deep breath and spoke a little softer when he said that all he would focus on from then on was being a father. Sure, he was going to start refurbishing the house he’d just bought, and yes, he would have to spend time running the computer repair company he was starting up, but that was it. Maybe their marriage hadn’t worked out, Daddy said, but didn’t he at least deserve a second chance to be a good father?

Amazingly, Mom was convinced. And boy, was I glad.

And so for the last two months, Mom has been in Africa teaching Ghanaian children to speak English, and Daddy rescued me from having to live with my aunt Beanie for a year. Now I don’t have to share a room with my know-it-all,
GOOD-GOODY,
oh-so-perfect cousin Tosha. You have to pronounce her name “Toe-shuh,” not “Tah-shuh,” otherwise she gets upset. Even though she is only a year older than Rikki and me, she doesn’t act like it. Tosha goes to a stuck-up, all-girls private school, and thinks she’s
so
mature because of it. In June she left to go to some fancy foreign-language camp, so I haven’t seen much of her this summer. Not that I care, though. I say good riddance.

So now I only have to put up with Aunt Beanie while Daddy’s at work during the week. She watches my every breath and listens out for my every tiptoe, but at least Daddy is home by five o’clock, so it could be worse. And, just like Daddy suggested to Mom that day, on Saturday nights I stay over at Rikki’s.

This particular Saturday night Aunt Honey and Uncle Lance were upstairs watching some movie on the USA network, far out of listening distance, and Mary was sitting beside me on the couch. She had just finished applying her lip gloss and was taking a moment to blot. Rikki was eyeing me from the swivel chair she was twisting and turning in, sending urgent glances like she was getting ready to burst open if she had to wait any longer.

“Okay, girls.” Mary
finally
sounded as if she were about to leave. “If everything goes as planned tonight, I’ll take you down to the Court after church tomorrow. Okay?”

But Rikki looked unimpressed. “What else you got?”

Mary was a little shocked. “What is this, a negotiation?” She laughed.

“Well.” Rikki shrugged. “You’re the one who wants to go drool all over Archie.”

Mary sighed. “Okay…” She thought for a moment before snapping her compact closed. “I’ve got it! How about on my next payday, I’ll also take the two of you to the mall? How’s that?”

Rikki cut her eyes over at me.

I shrugged. “Sounds cool to me,” I said, quite pleased with the results of Rikki’s bargaining.

“Fine,” Rikki agreed. “That’ll work.”

“But,” Mary said, “that’s
only
if you keep me covered until I get back.
Comprende?”
Mary had been teaching us the Spanish she was learning from a girl at the Dairy Queen where she worked. Did we understand, she wanted to know?

“Sí,” we
agreed.

“And be sure to make at least
some
noise down here, okay? As long as Mom and Dad can hear some Mississippi Mass Choir or something gospel coming from the stereo, they won’t bother to check up.”

“I know, I know,” Rikki groaned.

“Cassidy?”

“Gotcha,” I said. Now even
I
was starting to feel eager for Mary to leave. Hadn’t we been through this routine a dozen times since she’d started seeing Archie?

Usually Rikki and I pass the evenings by sitting on the floor, our backs up against the couch, looking through Mary’s high school yearbook. With pencils, so we can go back and erase things, we like to draw hearts around the faces of guys we think are cute. Tonight, though, I had something else on my mind. The sooner Mary left, the quicker I would get to hear this secret.

Mary sprayed a little peach body mist on the back of her neck. “Just please, don’t you
dare
go to sleep until I’m back in the house,” she said.

“We know….”

“When I get back”—Mary recapped the plan once more—“I’ll go around to the back of the house first. If their bedroom light is off, then I’ll know they’re asleep. If not, I’ll wait in the bushes. You know the signals. One knock on the window means I’m in the bushes waiting—”

Rikki spoke up. “And then we wait for the next signal.”

“Right,” Mary said. “But two knocks—”

“We know, we know, we know,” Rikki interrupted again. “Open the window and let your stupid butt in.”

Mary hummed as she blotted her lips once more. “Yeah, I love you, too, little sister,” she quipped. “Listen. I just don’t wanna forget anything, okay? Tonight is important, and it has to be perfect. So let’s see… What else?”

“You still haven’t told us where you’re going,” Rikki pointed out.

“That’s because I don’t know. Just somewhere special where we can be alone.” She sprayed another dose of that body spray.

“You big goofball,” Rikki snapped. “What if he takes you somewhere and chops you up? How are we supposed to know where to find the pieces?”

Mary laughed. “Please. Archie is a complete gentleman. He would never.” Whoa. A third shower of body spray? Tonight must
really
be special.

Suddenly I felt worried about Mary. I wanted to tell her to be careful. But I didn’t. I couldn’t. Mary looked so excited, especially with the way she kept fixing her hair and slathering more lotion on her arms, so I forced myself to look happy instead. “Have fun,” I suggested. I hardly ever say the things that I
really
mean.

Mary winked and gave me a gentle smile. “I will, kiddo. Be sure and wait up for me, okay?”

I watched Mary’s brown sandals as she climbed on top of the television, pushed open the window, and crawled out into the dark woods. She’d done this so many times before, but for some reason, just like everything else in my life lately, tonight felt different.

two

Rikki locked the
window behind Mary and turned to face me. It seemed too quiet in the room. My throat felt dry, but there was no way I was going upstairs to get something to drink. What if Aunt Honey told me to tell Mary to come up? What would I say? A Carter girl would never tell the truth if it meant getting another one of us into trouble. But I’m nowhere near as good at lying as my cousins are, so I’d just as soon stay thirsty.

“Man, have I got something to
tellll
you.” Rikki clasped her hands together. “Are you ready?”

Naturally my cousin had to make a big deal out of making her announcement. She bit down on her bottom lip and took too long to think of the same big, huge, gigantic secret that just a little while ago she’d been dying to tell. Then she pressed her finger to her temple and sat there with a look on her face like she was trying real hard to remember. I hate it when she does that.

“Oh yeah, oh yeah,” Rikki finally began. “First of all, do you realize that I had to stay completely still for ten whole minutes for this information?”

I knew that she was exaggerating, but I acted as if I was impressed. “Really?”

“Yes! Mama would kill me if she knew that I was in the hallway eavesdropping.”

“Okay,” I said. “And so the big secret is…?”

“Mama and some lady were in the kitchen having coffee and talking, right? I don’t know who the woman was—couldn’t see—but I’m pretty sure that she was from church.”

“Okay…”

“First the lady asked Mama if she was ready for school to start back up. Mama said ‘yes,’ but then she said ‘and no.’”

“‘And no’?”

“That’s what she said. She said yes because maybe then me and Mary will stop complaining all the time about not having anything to do.”

“And?”

“But then she said ‘and no.’”

“Why?” My cousin can be so frustrating sometimes.

“Well, that’s when she said that she doesn’t know how she’s gonna deal with telling
me
about
you
going to private school.”

I felt my heart ripple. “Huh?” I said. “Going
where?”

“Yup. Mama says Uncle Ray is sending you to Clara Ellis.”

This time my heart crashed against my ribs.
“What
are you talking about?”

She spoke slowly. “Mama says that Uncle Ray—”

“I heard you,” I interrupted. “But, yeah, right.”

“Like I would joke about something this serious, Cassidy. Come on.”

“Like I said, yeah,
right.”

Rikki sighed. “Sounded to me like it was true.”

I dismissed such nonsense. “Yeah, well, I think that I would know about it if my father was going to do something
that
crazy. Don’t you?”

Rikki thought for a moment. “But remember how they were with the divorce?”

She was right! Rikki was the one who told me that my parents were separating. Several days before they sat me down in the living room with hot chocolate and graham crackers, telling me in somber voices that there was something that we needed to discuss, I already knew what was coming, thanks to Rikki.

So now what? Was I supposed to wait three days, and then it would be a glass of lemonade and a Popsicle on the porch and Daddy saying, “Cassidy, I’ve got a major disaster to warn you about”?

This couldn’t be happening! Clara Ellis? No!

Rikki said, “Uncle Ray is probably scared to tell you, Cassidy. I bet he thinks you’re not gonna wanna go, that you’re gonna be mad at him. Just like they didn’t know how to tell you about the divorce.”

“Uh,
hello,”
I shouted, not caring if Aunt Honey and Uncle Lance or anyone else in Forrest Hills heard. “Of course I don’t want to go to any stupid private school! Uniforms. All girls.
Tosha!
No way.”

Rikki said, “Everybody acts like that school is so great. Like wearing stiff white shirts and plaid skirts every day is a good thing.
Loafers.
Those stupid ugly shoes. Yuck. And having to ride the cheese for five hours every morning?
Humph.

“I wish my mama
would
tell me that I have to go there. My mama knows better. I’d just hold my breath until I die, right there in front of her. That’s why she wouldn’t even try that with me.”

Barely hearing her, I demanded, “Rikki! Are you absolutely sure that’s what you heard? Positively?”

She mimicked her mother’s grown-up voice. “‘I just don’t know how Rikki’s gonna handle it, being away from Cassidy. Sometimes I wonder if those two can even breathe without each other.’” Rikki sighed. “Yup. That’s what I heard.”

Well, I wasn’t going to Clara Ellis, that was for sure. I was going to King Junior High with Rikki, and I was going to wake up every morning, sit on a kitchen bar stool, and eat my Frosted Flakes while I watched MTV and waited for Daddy to get dressed. Then he was going to drop me off at King. There would be no yellow bus riding, no standing outside waiting on “the cheese” like everyone at school calls it. I wasn’t going to wear a uniform to school every day.

Then I remembered what Rikki and Mary are always complaining about, how as long as you’re a kid, your parents get to decide everything for you. What if Daddy really did make me go to Clara Ellis? How could he do this to me?

He had allowed me to wallpaper my new bedroom walls with all the posters I wanted, plus he lets me wear my hair down. I get to buy any lotions and smell-goods that I want from the mall, and all summer I haven’t had to have a bedtime. He buys me all the clothes I want, plus CDs, plus anything else. All that, but now he won’t let me go to a normal junior high school?

Then again, maybe all I had to do was just tell him no.
Daddy, I’m sorry, but I’m not going to that stupid school. I’m not wearing a uniform. Thank you very much, it was a thoughtful idea, but no.

I could just make sure to let him know how much I appreciate the thought, that it was really quite nice of him to want to spend thousands of dollars on my education, but I would be just fine going to King. Then I would assure him that I would keep my grades up and stay on the honor role and everything. I just needed to stay calm and talk to Daddy rationally.

After a few moments of both of us just sitting there thinking, Rikki broke the silence. “Please, Cassidy, just don’t forget that you’re not supposed to know. ’K?”

What? Wait a minute. I was not allowed to talk about something this devastating, something that had the potential to ruin my life? How in the world not?