Well, she didn't but I couldn't sleep anyway because I was afraid Daddy might break down the door and come in and kill us or something. I just didn't know what to do, and then I decided I would talk to him and tell him how he was making me and Mother feel.
I didn't get a chance until Saturday when she went shopping.
Daddy got up late and came downstairs acting grouchy. I made him some coffee and he said it was good coffee and drank three cups.
He also ate a sticky bun. I ate one also and sat at the kitchen table with him.
"Daddy," I said, "I don't think you should drink so much alcohol."
"I don't drink so much, baby," he said. "just enough to make me feel good."
"I am not a baby," I told him. "I'll be nine next year, and maybe alcohol makes you feel good, but it doesn't make Mother feel good or me either. And you slapped her. You shouldn't have done that."
He sighed. "I know I shouldn't, baby, and I'm going to apologize to her. Everything will be all right."
"Well, I don't see why you don't like her cooking. mother is a very good cook, everyone says so." you think I don't He looked at me.
"What makes like her cooking?"
"Well, a lot of times you don't come home for dinner, and you smell of perfume, so I guess you had dinner with some other woman because you like her cooking better." I smell of His face got all twisty. "Who told you perfume? Your mother?"
I didn't want to get her in trouble. "No," I said, mells "I smelled it myself. I know what perfume s like."
"Listen, baby," he said, "sometimes you get too bossy.
Maybe I do things that you and your mot er don't like but that doesn't mean I don't love you. When you grow up, you'll discover that at times you do things that seem wrong to other people, but you just don't change because of other people's opinions. Either because you can't or because you don't want to. It's your own life. Do you understand what I'm saying?
"Well, I don't understand why you drink so much alcohol when it makes Mother and me so unhappy, and you say you love us and all." a golf He stood up. "I've got to go, baby, I'm late for date. Tell your mother not to expect me for dinner."
Then I knew he was just going to keep on doing like he was and nothing was going to be different. So I decided I better run away with Chet Barrow.
Chet didn't have much money and neither did I, but I thought that maybe if I left home my parents would be worried and Daddy would be so sorry for the way he had treated us that he really would change. Then even if the police found me and brought me back, Mother and Daddy would be so glad that everything would be better.
It was like a book I read that my uncle wrote. It was called The Adventures of Tommy Termite. It was about this boy termite who runs away because he thinks his parents don't love him and sometimes they are mean to him. A lot of things happen to him, some good and some bad, but finally he decides to go home and he finds his folks were worried sick about him, and now they love him and treat him nice.
I went looking for Chet, and he was in their garage. He was sitting on an old wooden box and looking at a folding map of the entire country.
I sat down on the box next to him.
"What are you doing, Chet?" I asked him.
"I've been thinking, " he said. "Look at how big the country is. See here-this dot? That's our town. just look at all the places I've never been-the whole rest of the map."
"Are you looking for a place you want to go when you run away?"
"Not so loud," he said. "My dad went to the lab, but Mom's still in the house. Your father's in there, too.
"He is? He told me he had a golf date."
"Maybe he does. I heard him say he just stopped by to bum a cigarette.
Hey, look here-this is the Intracoastal Waterway.
You know where that is, don't you? "
"Of course. It's near Federal Highway."
"That's right. And it goes all the way up the coast. You get on a boat down here and you can go all the way up to Maine.
Isn't that neat?"
"Uh-huh. Is that what you're going to do?"
I'm just planning things."
"I haven't decided yet.
"Did you do what you promised?"
"What did I promise?"
"That you'd think about letting me go with you."
"Yeah, I been thinking about it. But I don't know… It could be dangerous.
You might get hurt
"I don't care. I want to go."
Well, I'll keep planning about it. That don't mean I'm leaving tomorrow."
"Doesn't. I don't care how long it takes to decide. I talked to my father this morning, and nothing is going to change in my house so I might as well go."
"Your mother will cry-"
"She cries now, Chet, and I'm still there."
He tried to fold up his map but he made a mess of it so I took it from him and folded it up right. We sat there awhile without talking. Chet scratched his ankle. ,You know," he said, "grown-ups are supposed to be so smart.
I don't think they're so smart, do you?"
"Sometimes they can be dumb," I said. "Like this morning my father told me he couldn't stop drinking alcohol. You know that film we had at school about taking dope? It was like that, like he was addicted and couldn't stop."
Maybe he is. Addicted, I mean."
"He could stop if he wanted to- Like I used to eat candy bars all the time. I got so fat. Remember that?
"Yeah, I remember."
"Well, I decided I'd just quit and I did. Once I make up my mind to do something, I do it."
"But that's you. People are different."
"Well, I don't see why my father can't just decide to quit, and then he would."
"I don't know," Chet said. "Ernie Hamilton wants to stop picking at his zits and he's still doing it."
"Because he's a stupid boy."
"You really think so?"
"Yes. I do."
"Do you think I'm stupid, Tania?"
"Of course not. I think you're very smart. You get all good marks, don't you?"
"Well, maybe not all, but a lot of them. You're smart, too."
"Thank you," I said.
He turned to face me. Suddenly he leaned forward and kissed me right on the mouth. It was the first time a boy had ever kissed me. I pulled back.
"You shouldn't have done that," I told him.
"Sure I should," he said. "Did you like it?"
"Yes," I said. reg went in to work on Saturday-he does that a lot-and Chester was outside when Herman Todd stopped by to ask if I could spare a cigarette.
He looked sharp in a plaid sport jacket and lime green slacks. He said he had a golf date but he didn't seem to be in any hurry.
I was in the kitchen making a meat loaf we were going to have for dinner that night. And I was watching a travelogue about Baluchistan on the little portable TV I keep on the counter. But I turned it off when Herman came in and gave him a cigarette.
"You look very snazzy this morning," I told him.
"And you don't look like Mother Hubbard yourself," he said, grinning.
"Now those are really short shorts.
"I like to be comfortable around the house," I said.
"There's no point in dressing up to make a meat loaf or run a vacuum."
"It's a wonder Greg can get any work done if you dress like that," he said. "Is he around?"
"No, he went to the lab."
"All work and no play," he said. "Doesn't he ever relax?
"Not very often."
"Too bad. He doesn't know what he's missing. How about you, Mabel?
What do you do for kicks?"
"Watch Baluchistan on television."
"That sounds tame. Don't you ever get an urge to take a walk on the wild side?"
I was working at the sink and didn't look at him. "Such as?"