Mom told Carl Ray to sit at the end of the table, opposite Dad. That’s a “special” seat that we all take turns sitting in. I don’t know why it is special; it just is.
For being a skinny person, he sure eats a lot. He had four pieces of chicken, three helpings of mashed potatoes, about a ton of green beans, three glasses of milk, and two helpings of cake. Mom kept looking at the chicken, as if she could make more pieces appear by staring hard enough. And when Dennis went to take his second piece, she gave him a dirty look, and said, “Wait a bit; we have com-pa-ny.”
After dinner, we all sat around watching TV. Carl Ray sat in my dad’s favorite chair, the one none of us is ever allowed to sit in when Dad is in the room. During the whole night, Carl Ray never said one single word, even though sometimes Mom or Dad would say something to him. He just nods or shakes his head; sometimes he grunts a little.
When everybody started going to bed, Mom said, “Now let Carl Ray get in the bathroom first,” so we all waited around while he went into his room and shut his door. We waited and waited and waited. Finally, Dougie went over and peeked under the door and whispered that the light was out! Doesn’t Carl Ray even wash up or brush his teeth before he goes to bed?
It’s one o’clock and Maggie isn’t home. I bet Dad is still waiting in the living room. I sure wouldn’t want to be her tonight.
Carl Ray is going to drive me cra-zeeee. And so is Maggie. Lord.
First, Maggie. She got home at two A.M. I know, because she came into the room crying and throwing her shoes around and she turned the light on, and needless to say, I wasn’t sleeping through that. When I asked her what was wrong, she said, “Ohhh! Everything.”
I said, “Like what?”
“Everything. Kenny. Dad. Ohhhh. I’m so mad.”
She was mad? “Why are you mad?”
She glared at me. “Because I told Kenny we had to call and he kept saying, ‘Yeah, yeah,’ and because Dad never lets me have any fun, and because now he says I’m grounded for at least two weeks and next Saturday is only the biggest party I’ll ever be invited to, and because Dad told Kenny not to show his face around here until he could be a gentleman, and because Kenny probably will never speak to me again.”
Then she threw herself down on her bed and started pounding her pillow and sobbing. I hate it when she does that. It looks like a movie. I told her Carl Ray had arrived.
“So what?” she said.
“Don’t you want to hear about him?”
“No!” She was pounding the pillow again. This morning she stayed in bed until noon, and then she was in the bathroom for about two hours, and when she came downstairs finally, her eyes were all puffy and she wasn’t talking to anybody.
Whenever Dad came into the room, she would go storming out. Finally, Dad told her if she didn’t quit her “theatrics,” he was going to ground her for a month, for starters. That made her shape up a little. She’s still pretty mopey, and every time the phone rings she jumps for it, but at least she’s talking to people a little bit.
For instance, she’s the only one who seems to be able to talk to Carl Ray and get some words out of him. I heard her asking him some questions and he actually answered her with words. It went something like this:
“So I hear you’re going to look for a job? Is that right, Carl Ray?”
“Yup.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Where are you going to look?”
Long pause by Carl Ray. Then, “Don’t rightly know.”
“What sort of work are you interested in?”
Long pause by Carl Ray. “Don’t rightly know.”
“What are you good at?” That’s Maggie all right. She just keeps picking away and picking away like a vulture or something.
I was glad that I didn’t have to try to make conversation with him. It’s painful. Besides, I was already mad at him for spoiling my day. I was supposed to go over to Beth Ann’s at eleven and we were going to go and hang around the pool, but Mom said I had to wait until Carl Ray got up so I could make up his bed and stuff. I said, “What? Why do I have to make up his bed?”
“Because you’re responsible for the upstairs and you know you can’t leave until it’s clean.”
“But why can’t he make up his own bed, like everyone else?”
We have this hugely complicated chore system at our house. Every year we have a big meeting where we’re supposed to swap jobs. It begins all nice and civilized, but ends in a shouting match: “Dennis always gets the easy jobs!”—“I do not!”—“I’ll trade you vacuuming for dusting!”—“No way!”—“That’s not fair!” You get the picture?
We’re all supposed to make our own beds, but my main chore is to vacuum and dust the upstairs. I had to clean the bathrooms last year (eck!), but Dennis has that wonderful job now.
Back to Carl Ray. I said, again, “Why can’t Carl Ray at least make up his own bed, like everyone else?”
“Because Carl Ray is our guest, Mary Lou.”
That drove me crazy. Whenever I’m going to spend the night at someone’s house, my mom tells me that I must be very considerate and always make my bed up neatly as soon as I get up. When I reminded her of this, she said, “Well, his mother might not have told him that. If he’s still here in two weeks, he’ll make his own bed.”
“But if I don’t go now, Beth Ann might not wait—”
“Now don’t you argue with me. If you’re going to argue, then you can stay home all day.”
Boy, are people touchy lately. So I waited and waited. I even tried making noise upstairs, like turning on my radio.
Mom said, “Turn that off! You might wake Carl Ray.” (Exactly.)
I waited a little longer and decided to go ahead and do the vacuuming in the other bedrooms and the hallway, so all I would have left to do would be Carl Ray’s room.
Mom came flying up the stairs after me and flipped off the switch and said, “I told you to keep quiet up here!”
“But—”
“Mary Lou Finney!” When Mom says “Mary Lou Finney,” she means business.
I kept calling Beth Ann, about every fifteen minutes, telling her Carl Ray still was not up and I couldn’t leave until I did maid service for him. Finally, at twelve thirty, Beth Ann said, “It doesn’t sound like you’re ever going to get out of there. I’m going for a ride with my parents.”
Boy, was I mad. When ole Carl Ray finally did stroll out of his room about one o’clock, I nearly pushed him over when I passed him. Sure enough, he didn’t make his bed, so I did, and I picked up all his stupid gum wrappers that he left all over the floor and I vacuumed his stupid room. I was done by one fifteen, but then I had nowhere to go.
All Carl Ray did the whole entire day was sit in front of the television set chewing gum and watching whatever happened to come on. I don’t think he even got up to change the channel. A real live wire, this Carl Ray.
What a boring day, with everyone just wandering in and out of rooms: Maggie avoiding Dad, Dad avoiding Maggie, me avoiding Carl Ray, all of us avoiding Mom, who was doing the laundry and if you get in her way, she makes you fold clothes or iron.
I was so bored, I even went with Dennis and Doug over to the field behind Mrs. Furtz’s house.
There’s a big old tree there that sits in a little dip in the ground and its branches hang real low, so if you crawl into the dip and under the branches, it’s like a fort inside. Anyway, we went in and cleaned out some leaves and junk, and we moved the rocks that cover a hole we dug last year. It was funny to see what we put inside: a box of matches, a newspaper, a red ball, two packs of chewing gum, a treasure map we had drawn (the treasure consists of fifty cents, which we buried in another hole about a hundred yards away), and a deck of cards. Real exciting.