Little Women and Me (30 page)

“I hope I didn’t offend you,” Laurie said.

What?

“Oh. No. No. I wasn’t offended.”

But did I want to do it again? Did
he
want to do it again? I wasn’t sure. Because as much as I had thought I
wanted
to kiss Laurie, something had been missing in that kiss, and not just on his part, but on mine as well.

I did think the idea was nice, the idea of kissing someone who probably hadn’t already kissed a million other girls before just for the sake of kissing them.

I was standing there wondering if he’d try to kiss me again—perhaps we could both try to put more feeling into it
this time?—when there was an insistent pounding at the door, and Jo shouted:

“
Will
you let me in? Oh, very well. I guess I’ll shove it under the door.”

In the next instant a sheet of paper came flying through the narrow gap between door and floor.

Laurie left me to go to the paper. He picked it up, turned it over, read. Then his face lit up and he unlocked the door, throwing it open wide.

“I can’t believe you accomplished this, Jo!” he said. “You really are the most amazing girl! But how did you ever get him to apologize? And in writing!”

Jo launched herself into a long-winded tale of her discussion with Mr. Laurence. I barely caught a word, still too busy thinking about that kiss.

When Jo finally paused long enough to take a breath, I turned to Laurie.

“So,” I said, “when do we leave for Washington?”

“Washington?” he echoed.

Odd. They both seemed so far away from me now.

“Yes, Washington,” I said. “You know, our trip? Our adventure?”

Laurie looked entirely puzzled by this.

“I’m sorry, Emily,” he finally spoke, “but now that Grandfather’s apologized, in writing, no less—how
did
you do it, Jo?—there’s really no point in my running away, is there?”

That night Jo found some paper covered with Meg’s handwriting. She’d written
Mrs. John Brooke
over and over again.

Jo grew extremely angsty over this, worried that the future was being hastened. I didn’t even bother trying to comfort her. She’d already loused up enough things for me for one day. And besides, I wondered, when would the future finally “hasten” for me?

Twenty-Two

Christmas won’t be Christmas without any presents
.

Those were the words that had greeted me in this world, and a full year had passed since I first heard them spoken.

It was Christmas again, only this time there were presents: a soft wrapper for Beth to keep her warm, books by authors no one would care about in another century and a half for Jo, an engraved religious picture for Amy, a silk dress from the Laurences for Meg. Marmee received a brooch made of her and her children’s hair: gray, golden, chestnut, brown. As gross as I found the peculiar item, I looked at it closely, having no recollection of being asked to contribute any hair to it. Where was the auburn? But then I glimpsed a single strand. Just one single strand? Oh, well. It wasn’t like I wanted to be strongly represented in such a disgusting way. But then I saw something interesting. All the other colors were looped over like the different-colored strands of embroidery floss
that comes with a kit. But mine was the strand knotting them together. Mine was the only one touching all the others—coolio!

And wait a second. Where was my present? Hadn’t anyone bought me anything?

“Here, Emily,” Beth said from her position on the sofa in front of the fire. “I made you this.”

I went over to her, took the tiny hand-sewn garment from her fingers. It took me a moment to figure out what it might be.

“A new dress for Joanna?” I guessed.

“Yes,” she said, pleased. “Since you and she have become such great friends, I thought you might like something of your own to dress her in.”

I held it to my chest and smiled down at Beth. “I’ll treasure it always,” I said, and I meant it.

And then the others surprised me by having presents for me too!

Meg gave me a pair of white gloves. “For parties,” she said. “Soon you’ll be going to them too.”

Amy gave me a drawing she’d done of herself in which she’d made her nose look seriously smaller.

Jo gave me a large straw hat with a massive brim. “You’ll appreciate it come summer. And you know, you do look ridiculous in bonnets.”

Even Laurie had something for me, a copy of a book he’d seen me admiring in his library.

“I can’t believe you all got me things!” I said, still shocked. “Of course we all got you things,” Jo said. Then she snorted. “What do you think you are, old mutton?”

Jo and Laurie had been excited all day. Ever since the plan for Laurie and me to run away to Washington had fallen through, he and Jo were tight again.

Right before we were ready to sit down for our big meal—and this year it
was
a big meal, with a turkey and everything—Laurie, having disappeared briefly, poked his head into the parlor. He said he had a big surprise for us. Then he stood out of the way to let two men enter.

One I recognized immediately: it was Mr. Brooke. Leaning on his arm was a tall man all muffled up in scarves. There wasn’t much of him that could be seen above the muffling. But when the others ran to him, I instantly knew who he was.

This man was my father.

He raised his head from where it’d been nestled in Marmee’s neck, looked at me over her shoulder, a quizzical expression on his face. But before either of us could speak, Beth entered the room, drawn by all the excited noise. She’d barely regained half her strength since her bout with scarlet fever but you’d have never guessed it now as she flew at him and the others parted to allow her flight. And then she was in his arms, happy as I’d never seen her, and then the two huddled in one big chair together, chattering away as if no time had passed, as if no one had nearly died.

Christmas dinner that day was a happy one. Mr. Laurence and Laurie joined us, and so did Mr. Brooke. This last addition didn’t please Jo, who leaned over to whisper in my ear at one point.

“Did you see how Mr. Brooke kissed Meg when they first arrived? He hurriedly explained that it was some sort of accident, but I am absolutely positive it was not. And did you see how she blushed?”

I hadn’t seen any of that. I’d missed it because my eyes had been fixed on this new addition to the household, wondering if this man who was supposed to be my father recognized the one daughter who hadn’t huddled around him, if he even knew who I was.

The Laurences and Mr. Brooke were sensitive enough to leave soon after the meal was done, allowing our family its first night alone together.

As we sat before the cheery fire, and the man who was supposed to be my father and Beth huddled in the big chair once again, Amy urged him to comment on the changes in us girls since he’d last seen us.

He commented first on Meg’s hands, saying how they weren’t so soft as they used to be but that he liked their rougher state. It proved she understood the need to work hard to make our world go round.

His widest grin was for Jo. He said he’d left behind someone who had more in common with a boy but that now he had before him a young lady, one who would even give away her hair to benefit others.

Beth, he said, was not as shy as she’d once been, but that if possible she seemed even smaller than he remembered her. His face briefly saddened when he spoke that last part, but then his expression lightened again as he turned his attention to Amy.

He said that she seemed to finally be taking the importance of molding her own character seriously and he further observed that she had grown less selfish.

HA! I hadn’t seen any less-selfish behavior in Amy!

“What about Emily?” Amy asked. I shot a glance at her
just in time to see a mischievous look briefly pass across her face.

“Emily?” the man who was supposed to be my father said.

“Yes, Emily,” Amy said with a chin jut in my direction. “You have not commented on how she has changed since last you saw us.”

The man studied me for a long moment.

What would he say?
I wondered nervously.

“Emily,” he finally said, addressing me directly. “Well, what is there to say really? You are the same as you have always been.”

What a bizarre thing to say! All the others had changed, in ways he considered great and significant, while I hadn’t? How odd. And how insulting too on another level. It was almost as bad as Marmee’s
Wherever you go, dearest Emily, there you are
inscription in that book she’d given me.

I didn’t know what to make of it, or him.

A year here. A whole year. I was finally beginning to accept the fact that no matter what I did, I’d never leave.

Twenty-Three

It was the day after Christmas and we were all in the back parlor again. Now that Papa had returned from the war, not dead, and Beth had survived scarlet fever (also not dead), it was time for the family to turn its collective mind to other matters, to matters involving love rather than death:

Meg and Mr. Brooke.

Meg had a dopey, distracted look on her face, while Marmee and Papa studied her with curiosity, Beth looked at her lovingly, and Amy looked at her romantically. As for Jo, she did her usual practical Jo thing: she shook her head angrily at the umbrella in the corner of the room, the umbrella Mr. Brooke had accidentally left behind the night before.