Little Women and Me (16 page)

“I like my larkspur best of all the flowers,” Beth said, “but I am happiest to grow chickweed for the birds and catnip for my cats.”

People
grew
catnip?

“I’m thinking of redoing my bower this year.” Amy stood with hands on hips. “What do you think of more morning glories and honeysuckles?”

As I observed them excitedly planning their gardens for the year, I realized something was wrong. Where was my little plot of earth to till?

Quickly I did the math in my head, counting off the subdivisions of the squared-off plot. I was able to do it quickly since it doesn’t take long to count to four.

“Hey!” I shouted to the others. “What about me?”

“What about you?” Jo said, not even bothering to look up from her digging.

“Where’s my little plot of earth to till?”

“Silly Emily!” Beth laughed.

“You’ve never liked gardening,” Amy said.

“You don’t like getting your hands dirty,” Meg said.

According to them, I didn’t like this, I didn’t like that. So who was I supposed to be here, some kind of negative no-personality idiot?

I threw my spade down in disgust and trudged back to the house.

Every Saturday evening at seven p.m., like clockwork, the other four disappeared. Happy to have a rare hour or so alone where I could work on my writing, I’d never asked where they were going and they never said. But the night of the gardening incident, curiosity got the better of me and I followed them at a safe distance, keeping silent so they wouldn’t know I was there as they chattered amongst themselves.

Eventually, I followed them up to the garret. I again remained silent, observing as they each picked up badges off the table. The badges had “P.C.” printed on them, and they wore those badges around their heads like paper crowns. With great solemnity, Meg took a seat behind the table, while the others sat in chairs across from her.

“P.C.”? What could that mean? Not “politically correct,” but it was the only thing I could think of at the time.

“I hereby call this meeting of the Pickwick Club to order,” Meg announced.

The Pickwick Club?

“Mr. Snodgrass.” Meg turned to Jo. “Do you have this week’s edition of
The Pickwick Portfolio
?”

“Yes, Mr. Pickwick,” Jo said.

“Please present it,” Meg directed.

“Well, sir,” Jo said, “your own entry about a masked marriage is quite good, and the piece about the squash by Mr. Tupman”—she nodded at Beth—“was also quite good, if a little on the simple side.” Jo turned to Amy with a glare. “Unfortunately, this week
all Mr. Winkle had to offer was
yet another
apology for laughing during club and for failing
yet again
to deliver a suitable piece for publication.”

In spite of Jo’s stern look, Amy giggled.

Pickwick? Snodgrass? Tupman? Winkle?

What
were
they doing?

The strange things people did for entertainment before You-Tube was available. And yet, they looked like they were having fun.

“What
are
you all doing?” I burst out.

The four others gave little jumps in their chairs as they turned to look at me. Apparently, I was better at acting invisible than I’d ever thought.

“Why, you know,” Meg, the first to recover, said.

“We’ve been doing it for a year,” Jo said.

Well
—I mentally gritted my teeth—
I haven’t been here a year, thank you very much!

“Jo got the idea from reading Dickens,” Amy said. “She liked
The Pickwick Papers
so much she thought we should put out our own paper.”

“So we each assume different characters from the book,” Beth said, “even though some of us haven’t read it yet and probably never will.”

“Well,” I said grudgingly, “it looks like fun. Why wasn’t I ever invited?”

“What do you mean you weren’t invited?” Jo snorted at me. “You said you hated Dickens. You’ve never wanted to come before.”

“Well, I do now.” I pulled over a chair from against the wall. “Perhaps I could sit in just this once …”

I tried to stay silent, I really did, but soon I realized that in spite of Meg being the symbolic head of the group as Samuel Pickwick, the real force behind
The Pickwick Portfolio
was Jo, who in addition to writing most of the pieces was also the editor.

“Here, let me see that.” Sick of being left out of things all the time, I snapped my fingers at the paper, which I began to read for myself.

“Yes,” I muttered, “Beth’s ‘History of a Squash’ does have something sweetly simple about it.”

“In here,” Jo said, sitting up straighter in her chair, “we address Beth as Mr. Tupman.”

“Fine, fine.” I read some more. “Oh,
come on
, Jo!”

“That’s Mr. Snodgrass to you,” she said.

“Fine. Mr. Snodgrass. But
come on
. Did you really write an ode to a dead cat?”

“Well, the cat did die.” Jo sniffed haughtily. “It’s good to have poetry in a paper, and odes do have to be about something.”

“And what about these advertisements in the back? ‘Hannah is to give a cooking lesson’? By all means, alert TMZ!”

“What?” Amy said, puzzled, but the others ignored her.

“Well, Hannah
is
going to give a cooking lesson.” Jo reddened. “Or, at least, she’s going to make us dinner.”

“And these hints and the weekly report? Meg using less soap on her hands would keep her from being late for breakfast? And while you accurately grade yourself as
bad
, Meg as
good
, and Beth as
very good
, you only give poor Amy
middling
?”

“
Middling
?” Amy echoed. “Not again, Jo! I swear you only do that because you’re still mad at me for burning your book that time!”

“The
middling
person is to be called Mr. Winkle,” Jo said
heatedly. Then she turned on Amy. “And don’t forget to call me Mr. Snodgrass!”

Freak.

“I don’t care what any of you call yourselves,” I said, tossing
The Pickwick Portfolio
aside, disgusted. “This paper of yours is rubbish.”

“I suppose you think
you
can do better?” Jo said.

“Yes,” I said coolly. “I believe I can.”

“Fine.” Jo crossed her arms. “Prove it.”

I got up from my chair and went to stand beside Meg. “Do you mind?” I looked down at her, gesturing at her seat.

With reluctance, she relinquished the seat of power, assuming the less important one I’d vacated.

I sat down behind the table and surveyed the four journalists.

“And take those silly badges off your heads!” I directed.

Looking sheepish, they complied.

“Now then, I should like to call to order this meeting of”—and here inspiration struck me—“the Twist Club!”

“The Twist Club?” Jo echoed.

“Yes,” I said. “And our new paper will be called
The Twist Times
.”

“But I don’t understand,” Jo said. “Why would we call our club and our paper that?”

“For
Oliver Twist
, of course. You seem to have this obsession with Dickens, so I just figured—”

“It made sense with
The Pickwick Papers
,” Jo said. “But what does
Oliver Twist
have to do with newspapers or any papers at all?”

Huh. She had me there.

“It’s the only Dickens I know,” I admitted, not adding that
I’d only ever seen the movie musical version. “Now then,” I barreled on, ignoring Jo’s snort, “what I really think we need to do is liven up this dreadful rag you’ve been producing. We need punchier headlines, and more timely stories—”

“And we’ll also need new names,” Beth cut in, although I must point out, she cut in as timidly as possible.

“New names?” I echoed.

“Well, yes,” Beth said. “It doesn’t make sense for me to be Mr. Tupman if I’m writing for
The Twist Times
now.”

“Anyway,” Amy said, “I was growing tired of being Mr. Winkle.”

Jo glared at her.

“Okay,” I said. “What new names would you like to have?”

“You pick, Emily,” Beth said. “I don’t know anything about
Oliver Twist
.”

“How about the Artful Dodger?” I suggested.

Beth smiled at this. “Oh, I like the sound of that very much:
Mr
. Artful Dodger.”

“What about me?” Amy asked eagerly.

I studied her. “Fagin, I think. You know—the nose.”

She didn’t look quite as pleased as Beth.

“And me?” Meg asked.

“Nancy would suit you,” I said. “She dies horribly; but before that, she’s terribly and tragically romantic.”

“Mr. Nancy,” Meg said, pleased.

“And what about me?” Jo asked.

“How about Bull’s-eye?” I suggested.

“The
dog
?” Jo was aghast. “I have read the book, you know.”

“Fine then,” I said, “you can be Bill Sikes.”

“But he—”

“And I’ll be Oliver Twist, of course. I guess now that we all have our names, the next thing to do would be to start writing.”

“But what should we write?” Beth asked. “I always do better if there’s a specific assignment.”

“Er, write what you know!” I said, remembering a phrase Mr. Ochocinco used to use. “But punchier! More timely! More lively!” I shooed them with my hands. “Get to it now!”

Jo regarded me. “And what will you be doing while we’re doing all the work?”

“Why, I’ll be editing your work as you hand it in,” I said, “just like you used to do.”

“This ought to be good,” Jo said.

The following Saturday night, the first edition of
The Twist Times
was presented, which I read aloud to the others.

THE TWIST TIMES

A HAPPY DEATH
by Nancy
It is a tragedy that Nancy died
But a triumph that she loved Bill,
Even while he was killing her.

OF CATS AND DOLLS
by the Artful Dodger
Cats and dolls have more in
common than people think. For
you can love them all even when
they have no limbs, or even a head,
and they make messes on the furniture.
Oh, and pianos are very nice too.
And squash.

THE TRAGEDY OF HER NOSE
by Fagin
She would have had such a good life,
but her nose got in the way of everything.
Whenever she tried to drink something,
her nose banged against the lip of the cup.
When she slept at night, her nose was so
large that the snores from it kept waking
her. People her own age shunned her.
Small children ran screaming from her
path. So she died.

ON WRITING
by Bill Sikes
When one first makes the decision
to be a writer, she must.

ADVERTISEMENTS
Hannah will once again be
offering a cooking lesson—

“Wait a second!” Jo interrupted me. “What’s going on here?”

“Oh, sorry,” I said. “It’s just that with all the confusion—you know, the friendly takeover at the newspaper and all—there
simply wasn’t any time to seek out new advertisers, but I promise that next week—”

“I’m not talking about
Hannah
!” Jo was clearly exasperated.

“What else could be wrong?” I asked.

“I’m talking about my piece!” Jo said. “All you read was, ‘When one first makes the decision to be a writer, she must,’ and then you stopped reading without finishing the rest.”

“But I did finish,” I said, holding up the newspaper so she could see her piece with its two lines.

“What happened to the rest?” she demanded. “The piece I gave you was ten pages long!”