Raising Hope (9 page)
“We’ll work our way down the hall,” she said. “The two guest rooms won’t need much, so start in there. The last room on the other end of the hall is Sara Lynn’s.”
Ma was right: It wasn’t anything to clean rooms that nobody used. We zipped right along, Ma a little bit behind me because the bathrooms took longer to do. When I came to Sara Lynn’s room, I growled under my breath. “Bitch,” I muttered as I opened the door.
I walked in and looked around. It was all different shades of white. Now, I had gone along in my life thinking white is white, but leave it to Sara Lynn to show me I was mistaken. The walls were cream, the bedspread was white, and the lampshade was somewhere in between. The bed was white-painted iron, and the curtains matched the lampshade. The only nonwhite item in that room was the bureau, which was a dark wood. There was an oval mirror hung up over the bureau with a wire hidden by a large white ribbon. The one picture on the wall was a blown-up black-and-white photograph of Sara Lynn’s profile, her hair blowing back from her face. In case she forgets what she looks like, I sneered. In case she can’t remember how goddamn beautiful she is.
I got to work with the dusting, asking myself just who in the world would slap a picture of herself on her bedroom wall. I’d scare the bejesus out of myself if I woke up to a picture of myself, I can tell you that. Of course, Sara Lynn was so in love with herself that it probably started her day just right to open her eyes and see her mug on the wall.
When it was time to dust the bureau, I picked up the little music box that sat in the middle of it and dusted that. Then I ran my cloth over the top of the bureau and gently replaced the music box. I began to move my cloth down the sides of the bureau and, I couldn’t help myself, I got the biggest itch to find out what was inside those drawers. I glanced at the door real quick and slid the top drawer open. Just underpants and bras and socks. I fished around to see if she had anything hidden underneath those things but found nothing. I closed it and opened the next drawer—it held piles of shirts folded neatly on top of one another. I felt at the back of that drawer, too. Nothing. As I slid open the bottom drawer, I jumped a mile as I heard a voice say, “What do you think you’re doing?”
Sara Lynn stood at her bedroom door, breathing hard and bending over a bit, her hand pressed to her stomach. Her long blond hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and she was wearing blue running shorts, a white T-shirt, and sneakers. Her eyebrows were raised practically up to her hairline, and her mouth was set in a hard line.
“I asked you what you were doing,” she said again, and she wasn’t the least uncomfortable watching me ferret through her bureau drawers. That’s what I’d always hated about her, the way she didn’t ever look afraid or upset or caught off guard.
“I’m helping my mother clean your house,” I offered, trying to sound like putting my hands into her bureau drawers was all part of the job.
“Does your mother look through my private things, too? Or just you?” Sara Lynn put her hands on her hips and tilted her head. She didn’t even sound mad, just curious.
“I was just cleaning,” I said breezily. Lie and deny, as Bobby always said. Just lie and deny.
“Oh, really? You need to open my bureau drawers and look inside them when you’re cleaning? Maybe I should ask your mother if that’s the way she recommends cleaning my bedroom. I’ll just go ask her right now.” Sara Lynn made a move to turn around and walk out of the bedroom.
“No!” I cried. Shit. The jig was up. “Listen, I’m sorry, Sara Lynn. I won’t do it again.”
“So you admit that you were going through my things when you shouldn’t have been?”
“Well, I didn’t mean to,” I protested. “I didn’t come in here and say, ‘Hmm, I’m going to spy on Sara Lynn’s things.’”
“But you did it, didn’t you?” she insisted.
“Yeah, I guess,” I finally said. Then I added quickly, “But I won’t do it again!”
“And I should believe you because . . .” She stood there looking at me coldly, drumming her fingers on the doorway’s woodwork.
“Because I’m telling you I won’t,” I cried. I was getting mighty tired of her little lawyer act. “God, Sara Lynn, you’re so prissy sometimes.”
Sara Lynn smiled smugly and turned away, her blond ponytail flying behind her.
“Wait!” My heart pounded in my throat. Here I was finally doing something that pleased Ma, and Sara Lynn was going to ruin it all. “Don’t tell my mother, okay? I’m sorry I looked through your stuff; I’m sorry I called you prissy. I’m asking you, please, as a favor, not to tell my mother. I promise I won’t do it again. Okay?” I hated that my voice quavered on the last word.
Sara Lynn wrinkled her nose and tilted her head as if she were surprised. She said, “I wasn’t going to tell your mother.”
I felt like an idiot, standing there looking at her with pleading eyes, and then she added, “But I will next time if I catch you doing anything you’re not supposed to be doing.”
I dug my nails into my arms to stop myself from opening my mouth. When I heard Sara Lynn’s sneakered feet tap lightly down the stairs, I took a deep breath of relief and sat on the rug. My hands were trembling, and I just sat there trying to look anywhere but at the damn picture of Sara Lynn.
As my relief faded away, I wanted to tear up that picture. “How about this?” I’d yell at her as she found me smashing the picture frame and ripping apart the photo. “Is this cleaning your house the way you like it?”
I hated her. I’d hated her ever since I could remember. Little Miss Perfect with her clothes from Boston and her long blond hair that never tangled and all her school awards. Had her own car, too—a brand-new convertible she got just for turning sixteen. It wasn’t fair. And it sure didn’t help that Ma thought she was so great, either.
“Why can’t you be friends with Sara Lynn Hoffman?” Ma would carp. “She’d be a good influence on you.”
“I hate Sara Lynn, Ma,” I’d reply. “She’s a priss ass.”
Sara Lynn played the piano so beautifully. Sara Lynn didn’t talk back to her mother. Sara Lynn got all A’s on her last report card. Sara Lynn was going to horseback-riding camp. Ick! It’s all I ever heard, how Mrs. Hoffman’s daughter was so smart and nice and talented.
“What’re you doing sitting here parked on your rear end?” Ma said. I looked up and saw her standing at the doorway. Ma looked at me skeptically, as if I were showing my true colors after all.
I scrambled up and said, “I’d be done already if Sara Lynn hadn’t been in here bothering me.”
Ma smiled this goofy smile. “Oh, did Sara Lynn come up to say hello? That was nice of her.”
I wanted to scream, but I just shrugged and said, “Yeah, because she’s a nice girl. I should be half as nice.”
Disappointment clouded Ma’s eyes, and my back stiffened as I turned away and got back to work. Once a screwup, always a screwup. I knew that was exactly what she was thinking. Well, I was damned if I cared. Ma could march right downstairs and kiss Sara Lynn Hoffman’s ass, because hell would freeze over before I’d do it.
I’m pulling into Jack’s driveway, and I sit in the car for a sec and close my eyes. Ma was a tough old bird, that’s for sure. But I don’t want to think about her right now—hurts too damn much. Besides, it’s hotter than hell in my stinking car, so I turn off the ignition and slide out of the driver’s seat. On my way up the back walk, I fumble in my purse for the key. I sigh as I unlock the door because the cool of the house feels so good to my tired self. I pour a glass of cold water at the kitchen sink and drink it in a gulp, and then I walk to the bedroom, where Jack is lying on his back, looking up at the ceiling.
“Hi, angel,” he says, smiling at me. “I heard your car driving up.”
I snort. “Who didn’t hear it? It needs a new muffler, I’m sure. Though why I keep throwing money at it is a mystery to me.”
I kick off my shoes and sit on the bed, and Jack rolls toward me and starts rubbing my back. “Why don’t you let me buy you a new car?” he asks.
“Why do you think?” I reply, lying down next to him. “What am I supposed to tell people—that I just happened to have enough dough socked away to buy myself something that big? Besides, I don’t want to be beholden to you.”
“Beholden to me?” Jack stops rubbing my back. “Ruth, I love you. You need a new car, and I can afford to give you one. It’s as simple as that.”
“Keep rubbing,” I say, pointing to my back. “It felt good.”
“Aren’t you afraid you’ll be beholden to me if you let me rub your back?”
I laugh. “No, because I’ve rubbed you enough, that’s for sure.”
He laughs with me and pulls me in to him. “Yeah, you have.” He starts touching my nonexistent breasts, and I take his hands away.
“Can we not do this today?” I ask. “I’m so tired.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. It’s my old age,” I tell him. “I’m just not as young as I used to be.”
“Jesus,” he says, “if you’re getting old, what does that make me?”
I laugh and snuggle into him. “Just wake me when it’s time to get up, okay?”
“Why don’t you sleep in today? Take the day off.”
“Who’s going to run your damn diner?” I say sleepily.
“I can handle it, angel. You sleep today.”
It sounds so tempting that I almost say yes, but I jerk myself out of the sleep I’m heading toward and say, “No! I want to work today. Promise you’ll wake me up.”
“Okay, darling,” he says, rubbing the back of my neck gently. “Just rest for now.”
It takes me about a minute to close my eyes and drift back into the world of sleep, where, God willing, I won’t dream about anything this time. My mind’ll be blank as a freshly scrubbed white countertop, and nothing will hurt me, just for a little while.
N
ow, you remember how we went over the difference between a forehand and a backhand, right?”
“Umm-hmm.” I look out the car window, trying to tune out Sara Lynn’s annoying voice. I’m on my way to my first tennis lesson, and I’m a little nervous, because what if I totally stink? What if I make a fool out of myself in front of everybody? It’d be just so typical. A picture floats into my mind of me tripping over a tennis ball and falling into the net with everyone looking at me in horror. Ugh! I shudder and chew at my pinky nail.
“Stop that biting,” Sara Lynn says automatically. And without hardly taking a breath, she quizzes, “What’s the scoring system in tennis? Do you remember?” She doesn’t even give me a chance before she prompts, “Love, fifteen . . .”
“Thirty, forty, game,” I recite, still looking out the window at the houses and trees whizzing by.
“What about ad in and ad out points?” she asks.
I shrug. I’m losing interest in this conversation real quick.
“If the game’s at deuce, that means you’re tied forty-forty. Then, if—”
“Sara Lynn!” I interrupt, whipping my head around to glare at her. “Can’t I just have the fun of taking a lesson?”
I could swear her eyes get soft and hurt-looking before they turn all hard and glittery. “What’s that supposed to mean?” she asks.
“It means that you don’t have to cram everything into my head. The whole point of taking a lesson is to learn stuff you don’t know! God!”
“Don’t say ‘God,’” she says, braking for a red light. “And besides”—she sniffs, tapping her pink-painted fingernails on the leather steering wheel—“it never hurts to be prepared.”
I slump down in my seat and duck my head so my hair covers my face. “Well, it’s not helping right now, so why don’t you just be quiet?” I mutter.
“What?” she asks, accelerating the car and emphasizing the “t” part of the word. “What did you say?”
“Sorry,” I mumble, still not looking at her.
“Watch yourself, Hope. I mean it,” she warns.
Oooh, I’m shaking in my sneakers.
That’s what goes through my mind, but I don’t say it. I just sigh and think how much I hate Sara Lynn sometimes. I hate her; I hate her; I hate her. I really do.
When we get to the club, she acts like we’re all lovey-dovey, like that little scene in the car never happened. “Oh, I’m so proud of you!” she coos, putting her arm around me and squeezing my shoulders as we walk toward the courts. “Just look at you in your little tennis outfit!”
I wrinkle my nose. It was her idea to buy me a new tennis dress, but I wouldn’t let her get me the one she wanted to buy me. The one she liked had pink rickrack trim on the skirt, for crying out loud. Can you imagine? “Oh, it’s so darling,” she kept saying, holding up that darn dress.
“No way, Sara Lynn,” I told her, clutching the plain dress I’d picked out. “It’s this dress or forget it—I’ll just wear shorts.”
“All right,” she said, sighing. But even when we were at the cash register, she kept asking, “Are you sure you don’t want to try on the other dress? It would look so cute on you.”
Just thinking about it makes my blood boil, and I shrug off her arm like I’m shaking off an annoying bug. She gets the picture, because she just pats my back real quick and then stops touching me.
When we arrive at the tennis courts, she takes an elastic out of her purse. “Here,” she says, grabbing my hair and starting to tie it up in a ponytail.
“Ow!” I say, jerking my head away from her. “I don’t want it up.”
“Of course you do,” she hisses, pulling at my hair again. “It’ll get in your face otherwise.”
“I don’t care!” I almost stamp my foot; that’s how mad I feel. Why does she have to embarrass me all the time?
“Hi, ladies!” Oh, no. It’s Sam, the tennis pro, jogging up to us. He gives me a wave, then puts his hand out to Sara Lynn and says, “Hi, I’m Sam Johnson. We met last week, on Hope’s birthday.”
“How nice to see you again,” Sara Lynn replies. “Hope is just sooo excited to start lessons!” Oh, I could throw up. She’s acting like a Hostess cupcake—all fake, sugary sweet.
She puts her hand up to her forehead to block out the sun and says, “I’ve just been telling Hope she should put her hair back. Don’t you think so, too? I wouldn’t want her to trip and fall because her hair’s in her eyes.”
Get a life, Sara Lynn! Get a life so you can get out of mine!
I know I can’t say it to her, but I’m sending her my thoughts, and they aren’t pretty.