20

We drowsed away the rest of yesterday. I read Keats’ “Nightingale” which is sleepy too. But today Aunt Laura has volunteered to take me sightseeing. I can’t wait!

“It’s a sight what you’ll see with Laura, that’s for sure,” Opie says over breakfast. “But you might like to look at this first.”

He hands me a letter from the stack of mail Omie brought in. It’s from Mama.

“And here’s yours.” He slides another one across the table to Omie.

I’ve never had a letter from Mama before. Miss Amanda Perritt: her handwriting, plain as day. Opie has already slit the envelope with his pen knife; I fish out the single sheet.

Sunday, December 21
Goose Rock

Dear Amanda,

Merry Christmas to my first daughter! I hope you are en joying your holiday and remembering your manners.

Your father put the tree up today—a handsome fir—so the house smells like the woods and he felt right at home.

Willie is trying very hard to roll over. Anna and Helen coax him, not knowing the work when he begins to crawl. You remember keeping up with Helen.

With school out this week, David and Ben have gone to help at the mill and the house is awfully quiet.

Kiss Omie and Opie for me and come home soon. We miss you.

Love,
Mama
Mrs. James D. Perritt

When I finish the letter, it’s a shock to be in Memphis. I feel like I’ve stood in the door at home.

Opie is drawing a map to the streetcar stop.

“Put in Johnson School,” Omie reminds him.

He does. Neatly. They debate about how much money I need. Finally, mid-morning, they let me set off.

I try to look like I’ve waited for streetcars all my life.

“Where are you visiting from, honey?” says a lady in a cranberry coat.

“Kentucky.”

“Daniel Boone’s country.

“Yes, ma am.

She probably thinks we wear coonskin caps and eat deer meat.

“Don’t worry about getting lost. The conductor will help you. We’re all friendly down here.”

“Thank you.” I dread more help.

But when the streetcar comes we get separated, so I don’t have to worry. I get off at Second and make my transfer for Catalpa with no problem.

I could pick out Aunt Lauras door even if I didn’t know the number. All the other houses have lace panels behind the side glass. Aunt Lauras curtains are two shades of purple.

When she lets me in, I see there are curtains in the other doorways, too, tied or pushed to one side—yellow, orange, white.

“Your house doesn’t look like this,” Aunt Laura laughs.

“Not exactly.”

“You probably have furniture. Tables, chairs. If you do that, you have to decide which room is which.”

“Don’t you?”

“Sometimes this is the living room,” she says, as we walk into the room off the hall. It has bare floors, a rag rug, and one big straw chair.

“And we eat here sometimes.” She gestures to the next room, with a wooden card table in the center and big pink and gold pillows piled under the window. “We can sit on the floor, we can sit at the table. Or we can switch the two rooms around.” She makes it sound like great fun.

“But I do know where the bedroom is. Come back with me while I finish my face.”

I follow her down a narrow hall and through a doorway hung with beads. Really. They rattle as I walk through. She laughs.

“Mother says I’m a genius at furnishing doorways.”

Curtains are shut in the bedroom, so it’s dim despite the bright day. Aunt Laura waves toward a cloud of clothes heaped on the unmade bed.

“I’ve been going through things this morning, clearing out for the new year, and I wonder if there’s anything there you could use.”

I look at her. There’s a difference between having your clothes on and being dressed. She’s dressed: black chemise, red shoes, red beads, and fingernails red as fire. And her cast-off clothes will be for getting dressed, too. In Goose Rock you put your clothes on.

She sits down at her dressing table.

“Oh, Amanda, I forgot to take your coat. Just hang it on the bedpost.”

I do, and she gets to work, licking an eyebrow pencil, leaning intently toward herself. I sort out the delicate dresses, feeling like a chowhouse dish beside china. These aren’t for me—a yellow crepe scoop-necked shimmy, a lavender square-cut shift.

“At least try the red one.”

I untangle it and find buttons smaller than baby teeth, a straight skirt, a flounce to let you walk. Can you see me headed up the dirt road to school in this?

But she’s saying to try it on—

“No, you ninny, you have to take your clothes off first!”

I feel more naked standing here in my slip than bathing in the kitchen at home. I try to hurry, but the dress sticks at my shoulders, my hipbones. Finally I get it on, pull it straight.

Aunt Laura watches from the mirror.

“Not bad,” she says. “Come let me see.”

She tilts her head and studies me. Her red mouth curls.

“I used to look just like you.”

“You did not.” That pops out before I can stop it.

“I did too. I was tall and skinny, what they call a carpenter’s dream.”

“Pardon?”

“Flat as a board. And I slumped to apologize for taking up space.”

“Your face never looked like mine.”

“No, yours is stronger. And your eyes are like amber. The dress isn’t right but the color is. Amanda—”

I hate being inspected by someone so pretty. “What?”

“Did you ever have a doll?”

“I had Beverly.”

“And clothes for her.”

“All that Mama had time to make.”

“No matter what you put on her she looked the same, right?”

I nod. I didn’t come over here to talk about dolls.

“But people aren’t like that. They change. The doll is all on the outside.”

I wait for her to get to the point.

“So the outside has to be perfect. But what people have on the inside changes how they look. Of course, hairstyle helps and makeup—”

“What you’re saying is I’m not pretty but I’m nice.”

She laughs.

“You’re stubborn, I’ll say that. Like Mother and me and Rena.”

“Is that bad?”

“I’d say it’s good, the world being what it is. But that’s another story. I’m ready. You get your clothes on and let’s see what we can see.”