FROM HER BED THAT night, Karen said, in a sleepy voice, “Tomorrow I’ll start with the new selling proposition. I’ll make new signs and everything. I’m going to put another one on the bathroom mirror with soap too. ‘Smoke gets into more than just your eyes,’ ” she repeated to herself.
“Okay,” I said.
“Teddy?”
“What?”
“Are you going to get your hair cut?”
“I don’t know. I’ll see.”
“How come you changed your mind? At Daddy’s you sounded really excited about it.”
“Well, I just don’t know. I haven’t decided yet.”
“When I’m older,” Karen said, “I think I’m going to dye my hair the same color as Shelley’s.”
“It would look stupid.”
“No, it wouldn’t. Why would it look stupid? I bet you wish you had hair like Shelley’s yourself. Why would it look stupid?”
“Because ... because you’re too young to dye your hair.”
“When I’m older, I said. Maybe even after I’m married.” Then she propped herself up on one elbow and looked around. Our room is pretty crowded, and sometimes we fight about someone’s stuff being on the “wrong” side.
“When I marry a millionaire,” Karen said, “I’m going to have my own room. I’m going to have blue wallpaper and a gorgeous canopy over my bed.”
“Oh, boy,” I said. “First of all, when you get married, you don’t have your own room. Second of all, by the time you grow up you might not even want blue wallpaper.”
“Blue is my favorite color,” Karen said. “It’s always been my favorite color. And my husband can decorate his room any way he wants to.” She lay back on the bed again, her arms folded behind her head.
“I’m going to turn off the light,” I said.
“Don’t. Not yet.”
“Why not? It’s late and I want to sleep. I can’t sleep with the dumb light on.” I wasn’t really that sleepy, but I didn’t want to talk any more. I thought the darkness would keep Karen quiet.
“But I still want to talk,” she said.
“You can talk in the dark.” I leaned out of bed and pushed the switch and the room was suddenly black.
Out of the darkness came Karen’s voice again. “Teddy?”
“What?”
“Are you sleeping yet?”
“How can I be sleeping? I’m hardly even under the covers.”
“Teddy?”
“Huh?” I just wished she’d be quiet. I wanted to think. There were so many things crowding into my head at once: Daddy and Shelley, the letters in the closet, the telephone call from Steve, the angle haircut, Mother’s smoking, school, Maya, Marc Singer and his bedroom eyes ...
“Some of my friends have it already,” Karen said.
“Have what?”
“You know,” she whispered.
“You mean their periods?”
“Uh-huh.”
My heart softened a little. She was really just a little kid. “You’ll get it,” I said. “Don’t worry about it.”
“When you got it, were you glad?”
I thought about it. It was a year ago, and I was the next to the last of my friends to get her period. I had read all those little booklets a million times, and I knew everything. I mean the whole explanation about how and why you menstruate. I had a new pair of sanitary panties in my underwear drawer and Mother had told me where the napkins were, in case I needed them when she wasn’t home. I was absolutely ready.
Still, when I came home from school that day, it all seemed very mysterious and wonderful. I kept thinking, I’ve got it, I’ve got it, as if I were the first girl in our crowd instead of the next-to-last. When I came out of the bathroom after putting everything on, I ran to the big mirror in Mother’s bedroom. I turned slowly, looking at myself. Everything looked the same, everything looked fine. I leaned close, staring at my face. Didn’t I look different somehow? A little older? Maybe Mother would notice when she came home from the bank. I wasn’t going to say anything, just stand around looking casual and see what she’d say.
I remember that I sat in the living room and opened a book. It was my French book from school. Life as usual with Madame Bonnard and Madame Bruin. Bonjour. Bonsoir. Mais oui. Mais non.
Karen was visiting her friend Cynthia on the second floor. She had gone there straight from school. I kept looking at the clock. Mother would be home soon. I sat up straight every time I heard footsteps or a door slam out in the hallway. I would be very casual when she came in, sitting there and reading my French book. Bonjour, Mama. Bonjour, ma fille.
Then there were footsteps coming closer and closer to our apartment. It was Mother! I could hear the rattle of her keys and she was singing to herself.
I jumped up so quickly my French book fell on the floor. Mother hadn’t even taken her key out of the door when I ran down the hallway and threw my arms around her. “I’ve got it, Ma! I’ve got it!”
“For heaven’s sake, Teddy,” she said. “What’s going on? Let me get inside, honey, will you?”
But I kept tugging and pulling at her until she understood what I was saying. Then she put her pocketbook on the table and gave me a tight hug. “Hey!” she said. “That’s wonderful! You’re a woman now. My little girl. Welcome to the club.”
“So? Were you?” Karen was saying.
“Was I what?”
“What I was saying, Teddy. Were you glad?”
“Yes,” I said. “Listen, do you know it’s very late?”
“I know,” she said, “but I’m wide awake.”
“Well, just try to be still anyway, and let me sleep.”
She was, for a while, and then I could hear the funny, whispery voice she uses when she talks to herself—Karen’s night voice. She was going over everything, the whole day at Daddy’s apartment, the ride home in the car, all of her dreams and plans for the future. Buzz buzz buzz.
On my side of the room, I could just make out the outlines of the furniture in the darkness, the funny lump of Karen’s clothes where she’d left them in a pile on the chair. Buzz buzz.
I tried to imagine how I would look with an angle haircut. Marc Singer would be walking down the school hallway toward me. “Say, is that you, Teddy? I didn’t recognize you! You really look great! I never realized ...”
“Teddy?” It was Karen’s real voice cutting through my dream. I didn’t answer. I just lay still and breathed in and out as loud as I could.
“Teddy?”
Then one of us fell asleep.