Hattie Ever After (16 page)

“You’re right.” He reached out and clinked cups with me. “I suppose you want congratulations.”

“Well, that’d be nice, of course, but what’s more important to me is that we’re square.” I leaned against his desk. “Why am I getting the silent treatment?”

“I’ve been busy.” He cut his eyes down to the typewriter keys.

“So that’s all?”

He shrugged. “All I want to talk about for now.”

“I didn’t know where you were …,” I started.

“I’m glad you got to the airfield,” he said. “I’m not mad that you didn’t wait for me.”

“Then what are you mad about?”

He typed a few more words. I waited.

“Who was the flyboy?” He stopped and looked at me.

“Flyboy?” I thought for a second. “Oh, you mean Charlie. He’s a friend from high school, in Iowa.”

“Friend?” Ned raised an eyebrow.

“Yes.” My answer came out sharper than I intended. Charlie was certainly a friend. And whatever else there was to it was none of Ned’s beeswax. Especially since I barely knew myself.

“Okay then.” He nodded. “Okay.” Then he grinned. “That’s great. Now I really do have to get back to work.”

I gathered my things and headed to the Cortez for a short nap before my supper date with Charlie.

Raymond had two messages for me when I arrived at the hotel. The first was one Ruby had sent over. Pearl had taken another turn—“By the time you read this, I’ll be on my way to Santa Clara,” she’d written. This time, Pearl needed a specialist. “I know I haven’t paid you back yet for the other loan, but if there is any way you can help, financially, I would be so grateful.” I thought of my Pond’s Cold Cream jar and how it had acquired a nice little jingle. At this rate, what with helping Ruby out, I might never make a trip to Seattle. I was instantly ashamed of my selfishness. The important thing was Pearl’s health. I went upstairs to change into my yellow dress and then gathered what I needed to wire Ruby the money. I would do it after supper.

The second message was from Mrs. Holm wondering if I had Ruby’s mother’s telephone number. She had a question for Ruby about a recent transaction. I rang right back and told her I only had a mailing address. Long-distance calls were out of my budget. “Oh, of course,” Mrs. Holm said. “I’m so sorry to have bothered you.”

Charlie met me in the lobby, armed with copies of the paper he’d collected from all the pilots at the airfield. “For your scrapbook,” he said.

“For Dora Dean’s scrapbook,” I corrected. But I was still pleased at the thought. And pleased to have someone like Charlie to share my good news.

He set his cap on the front desk in the lobby. “Mr. Hubbard gets all the credit for his fancy flights, but I know I’m part of the reason he’s up in the air,” he said. “ ‘Not for glory, but for the job well done,’ ” he added dramatically, quoting our old teacher, Miss Simpson.

I whacked him with one of the newspapers.

“Ow!” He rubbed his head. “Maybe I should reconsider that offer of supper.”

“It’d take more than a clop with the
Chronicle
to harm that hard head of yours.” I shuffled the papers he’d given me into a manageable bundle. “Let me run these upstairs. I’m famished.”

Charlie plopped his cap back on his head. “I’ll wait right here.”

I hurried up to my room and dropped off the papers. A quick glance in the mirror afforded a pleasant surprise: the girl there looked like she was on her way somewhere.
Somewhere besides a cleaning woman’s job. She looked like she had another good story or two in her. I smiled at the thought. A story or two and maybe even a real job at the paper. I let myself enjoy that notion for a minute, then locked up and rode the elevator down to meet Charlie.

Supper flew by in a barrage of Charlie stories. As tired as I was, I kept him talking. I was like a squirrel, storing up his voice for the coming winter. When the last of our sandwiches were devoured—minced olive for me, a club for him—I stifled a yawn.

“I guess I’m boring you,” he teased.

“Never.” Another yawned threatened. “But I didn’t get a nap in today.” I made a motion as if dusting a shelf. “One of the many necessities of working the night shift if I change my schedule.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” He stood, then came around to pull out my chair. “I didn’t even think about that.”

“I’ll live,” I assured him. “I’ll catch up on my beauty sleep tomorrow.”

He offered me his arm and I took it, and we stepped out onto the sidewalk. “Let’s head this way,” I said. “I have an errand.”

Charlie stopped and made a fearful face. “Not at a hat shop?” he asked. “Or some such?”

“Rest easy.” I rolled my eyes at him. “I wouldn’t make you suffer through something like that.” Nor would
I
want to suffer through shopping of any kind with Charlie moping behind me.

“I’m going to mail a copy of your article back home, to Mother and Dad,” Charlie said. “They’ll be so proud of you.”

“Well, don’t make too big a fuss,” I said. “It might be a fluke.”

He guided me around a grandmother pushing a pram. “I think that Miss Marjorie D’Lacorte needs to take care that Miss Hattie Brooks doesn’t pass her right on by.”

I shook my head. “She has no reason to fret.” I shivered a bit. The evening breeze carried a touch of fall’s cool air in it. My jacket might get me through autumn, but after that, I’d need something warmer. And the cheapest winter coat at Praeger’s would be well out of my price range after I wired Ruby the money for Pearl’s specialist. I crossed my fingers for some more research assignments. “Even if I got a job at the paper, it’d be on the fashion desk or society news. I wouldn’t be a
real
reporter.”

“Wasn’t it Lincoln who said ‘Whatever you are, be a good one’?” Charlie patted my hand. “You’d hit a home run no matter which job you were given.”

“Spoken like a true friend,” I said lightly. A hank of his dark hair had fallen over his forehead. I brushed it back. “You need a haircut,” I teased.

He caught my hand. “What I really need is to know if what you want is here in San Francisco.”

I pulled away. It seemed Charlie and I had just figured out how to be easy with one another again, and now this. “Let’s not talk about this now. Here.”

“I want to.” He stopped under the Owl Drug awning. “I’m tired of not talking about it.”

Something in his voice made me stop, too. “I’m not ready—”

“I know. I know.” He exhaled deeply. “That I can live
with. But what I can’t live with is wondering if you’ll ever be ready. For me, that is.”

It was a fair question. What was the answer?

He didn’t wait for me to say anything. “You know I’d be the last person to keep you from doing what you want.”

“I do know that.”

He reached out and took my hands in his. “What about the papers in Seattle?” he asked. “Couldn’t you try to get a job at one of those?”

Another fair question. “Yes. And no.” I stepped closer to him. Bad mistake. His eyes had too much power at this range. Not letting go of his warm, strong hands, I rocked back on my heels, away from those eyes. “I could try, certainly. But it’d be like planting a whole new field, from scratch.” I paused, thinking about what to say next. “Here, it’s like I’ve already picked the rocks and done the plowing. Now all I have to do is buy the seed.”

He edged closer. A matronly woman clucked her tongue at us. “Really,” she said, the word dripping with disapproval. We walked a few more feet, then turned down a street with fewer passersby.

“What about Chase and the little girls? Fern and Lottie?” he asked. “They all miss you like crazy.”

I slowed my pace for a moment. “I miss them, too.” That was the truth. Little Lottie wouldn’t even know me by the time I got to see her. “It’s not that I don’t love them or want to be with them.…”

He stopped to face me, placing his hands on my coat sleeves. “It’s me that you don’t want to be with.” His voice was soft. Sad. Maybe even resigned.

“Everything’s all jumbled in my head.” I blinked back tears. “It’s like I’ve got all these quilt pieces—Perilee and the kids, Seattle, the newspaper. And I can hardly leave Ruby now, not with Pearl so sick and all.”

“Am I even
one
of the quilt pieces?”

I swiped at my eyes. A life without Charlie? It was impossible to imagine. “Yes. You are certainly an important piece of my life.”

“Well, that’s a comfort,” he said with a head shake. “Look, I saw that guy with Miss D’Lacorte. He’s a reporter, too, right? Is that my competition?”

“Ned?” Ned was barely speaking to me. “No. No.” How could I explain things to Charlie when I wasn’t even sure myself? “Looking back, I’d have to agree with Aunt Ivy that I was a fool to think I could prove up on Uncle Chester’s homestead. I’d never farmed and didn’t have one idea about what that big prairie could be like.”

“Don’t be too hard on yourself,” Charlie said. “Lots of men went bust out there, too.”

“That’s just it.” His words helped jell my thoughts. “I
was
hard on myself. At first. For failing.” We started walking again. “Did you know that Thomas Edison made thousands of mistakes before he got the lightbulb right?”

“Thomas Edison?” Charlie wrinkled his brow.

“Yes, and even that Ty Cobb strikes out, sometimes, too, doesn’t he?”

He shook his head. “This sounds like one of those try, try, and try again lectures Miss Simpson used to give.”

“Not exactly.” Why was it I could hear the explanation so clearly in my mind but the words were coming out all
knotted up like tangled thread? “It’s sort of about not giving up. But more, it’s about giving yourself—giving
myself
the chance to see what I’m really made of.” I thought back to the emptiness I’d first felt after leaving Vida. That feeling that something was unfinished. That
I
was unfinished. “It probably makes no sense to you, but I don’t think I’ll be able to know what I can really do with my life unless I stick it out.”

He didn’t say anything for about a half a block. “And your only shot is here?”

His question pricked like a darning needle. “It is for now.”

We slowly crossed the street, as if each of us were carrying a steamer trunk on our backs. Or in our hearts. “Oh, here’s Western Union.” I unclasped my pocketbook and brought out my wallet.

“You need to wire money?” He reached out to open the office door for me.

“To Ruby. Pearl needs a specialist.”

“But you told me you already gave her some money.” He stood so that he blocked my entry. “Doesn’t seem right, her asking again.”

“Charlie!” I tapped him to make him step aside. “A little girl needs my help.” I hadn’t been able to help Mattie. There was no way I’d let Pearl down.

“Okay. Okay.” He brushed that rebellious hank of hair off his forehead. “I better be getting back. We’re leaving in the morning.”

“Back to Seattle?” My heart felt as if it’d been put in an icebox. “So soon?”

He turned up his hands. “Seems like there’s not much reason to stick around.”

“Charlie—”

“You know I wish the best for you. But I may have to start thinking about what’s best for me. I’m sure you can understand that.”

I wanted to say, “But what does that mean, the best for you?” I wanted to say, “I’ll look for a job in Seattle.” I wanted to say, “Don’t leave now.” But all of that stayed locked up inside. Instead I said, “It was so very good to see you, Charlie. Thank you for the meals and for—for everything. Good-bye.” I held out my hand to shake.

He clasped it, stepping close. I thought he was going to kiss me again, right there in front of Western Union! Would I be able to say good-bye if he did? Seconds passed.

There was no kiss. He released my hand, strode down the steps to the sidewalk, and, with that cap of his, was soon folded into the crowd of other workingmen in their matching caps and I could not see which way he went.

“Are you going inside?” a woman on the steps behind me asked.

“Oh, yes. Pardon me.” I stepped into the lobby, my shoes making a lonely scuffing sound as I walked to the nearest operator window.

Shaken to the Core