“June, I am not in the mood to argue with you.”
“Then just say we can take them.”
I heard Linwood’s sigh all the way down the hall.
Once back in my room, I explained the situation to Roberta. I dressed her in the black lace and red skirt and replaced her in her favorite spot. She would comfort the others for me. Then I packed Pole, the photo album, and the costume box in the suitcase. Miraculously, they all fit. There was no doubt in my mind that June would win; the truth was that nobody cared enough, whatever the issue, to wear her down. When you gave in to her, her will of steel cables, you had this sweet sense of saving your own soul, because you knew you would never be damned by stubbornness, as she was.
I lay down in the saggy center of my bed, perhaps for the last time. I thought about Disneyland, about how it took away all the sinister parts of the stories. In the book Peter Pan, the ending made me kind of nauseated. Wendy was this huge, embarrassed woman, trying to hide her size and age, and Peter turned out to be pathetic, unable to appreciate Wendy’s desire to lead a normal life. I only read the ending once, and after that I always skipped it. Likewise, in the book Alice in Wonderland, the caterpillar is not a nice guy. He’s cruel and sinister, and he has no sympathy for Alice. In the Disney version, he is charmingly suave, a worm version of David Niven. In fact, the books were much more like the games we used to play, four or five years ago, when we were all smaller. Deane was okay then, she hadn’t started smoking yet. We used to create our own magic kingdoms. Our game of Pretend was more complicated and vivid than my illustrations of “Bluecrest” or “Green Snake.” In the best game of all, we rode our tricycles in a ritualized formation at the far, looped end of the driveway. One person steered, one person pedaled, and the third person guided the voyage. The Guide stood on the back of the tricycle and described the world we were passing through. Things took shape before my eyes as I explained them to my sisters:
This is the land of Lavender and Roses. We are dressed in apple-green satin gowns and our hair is braided with diamonds and pearls. Our hair is six feet long and it floats in back of us. Now, something is coming toward us, bigger and bigger. They are bigger than horses, bigger than dinosaurs. They are huge black dogs, with eyes bigger than Ferris wheels!
“‘The Tinder Box’!” June would cry, always quick to spot when I strayed into something I had read.
If June was Guide, we heard:
We are riding into the Land of Babies. Pink and white iced animal cookies are raining down. The rivers are Hawaiian Punch and the lakes are Nestle’s chocolate milk. Everyone has a swimming pool filled with M&M’s.
The swimming pools filled with M&M’s was her signature piece, while I got carried away with clothes and hair. After all, we were little, and we were ordinary.
And, then, nobody could guide like Deane:
We are magicians! Our heads are ravens, our wings are purple, studded with nails. When we fly overhead, sleeping women feel the breath of frost on their cheeks. Children dream of the seven tongues of fire. We fear only the Master Wizard. Now he is on us. His arms are giant radishes with revolving razor blades. Each blade can cut a piece of paper into two thinner pieces of paper. We feel the heat on our cheeks. Without the magic formula, we will be torn to ribbons!
“Say it! Say it!” June and I would shriek.
“What’s it worth to you?” she’d ask.
We’d be slaves, we’d do her chores, whatever. With Deane, I swear you really saw what she saw. You didn’t want to, not all the way, but you did. And it wasn’t like the floating visions of princesses I conjured, soap bubbles you could still see the world through—what Deane spun out was solid, it was there; if only I dared, my hand would feel the keen pain of the razor.
We were grateful that she saved us from the demons she had created.
Funny. I remembered her apparitions with a sense of deep loss. Hardly conscious of what I was doing, I opened my suitcase back up, lifted out the cigar box, and removed the red leather book.
I closed my eyes and opened the book at random.
There was a pen-and-ink drawing, very detailed, of me and Tommy out in Deane’s room.
For a minute, I thought I was going to be sick.
“Fatso,” June yelled. “Stan’s home! Bring your suitcase out pronto!”
Chapter Three
My eyes were stuck together with grainy sleep, but I knew I wasn’t in my own bed: the sheets were smooth and stiff-ironed, not made of the same cloth as real sheets. And then, too, I could hear the heavy, even breathing emanating from June in the next bed.
A thrill shot up from my stomach to my heart.
Disneyland!
That motel smelclass="underline" air-conditioning, tiny soaps wrapped in paper, matchbooks and clean ashtrays, ice buckets, desks that were used only for storage: embossed stationery, postcards of patrons enjoying the pool or the dining room, plastic bags for wet swimsuits, shoeshine kits, and the Bible, always the Bible, patiently waiting with its unturned pages.
Quietly, I climbed out of bed and walked across the carpet, feeling guilty for being barefoot since Linwood insisted on shoes for motel carpets, breeding grounds for unidentified diseases, and slid open the desk drawer. There, cuddled in the raw wood corner, was a spanking new Bible.
I let the Bible fall open. Eyes closed, I stabbed a random passage.
What exactly were “bowels” anyway? The Bible was always bringing them up.
Potsherd? Now what? This was too confusing. I scanned farther down the page.
I felt all creepy. This didn’t sound like the Bible at all, what with the wax and the bones.
I needed something soothing, something spiritual.
Wax and bones. My arms goose-pimpled. As if it were floating before my eyes, I saw the pen-and-ink drawing of Deane’s room.
I slapped the Bible shut and slipped back into bed.
What did it all mean? Did I want to understand, or did I want it to go away?
I had to pee. If I could get past all this queasiness, would the world make sense again?
If I wanted it to go away, why had I brought the book with me? It beckoned from my suitcase.
June pulled her head out from under the covers. She rubbed her eyes and reached for her glasses. “Disneyland!” she said.
“Pet, here’s your coupon book.” Stan handed it over, his mouth set in hard lines, contrasting with the smiles of the other amusement seekers. We were all standing inside the gates, right in front of Main Street. Bright flowers and topiary hedges reinforced the atmosphere of fun, fun, fun.
Even though it was October and Wednesday, the place was jam-packed with tourists, especially Japanese, the children with their neat patent leather hair and white anklets making me feel untidy in my brown pedal pushers and green sweater set. I’d wanted to wear my sailor dress, but Linwood convinced me I’d get it dirty. She was dressed in blue silk capris and spanking white tennis shoes. She never got dirty. June was doing her bit with the gray coat, buttoned up to the chin, and it wasn’t even cold. She looked like a nanny.