The Mighty Miss Malone (17 page)

After I practiced on some of my foolscap, I only messed up one sheet of the pretty paper when I wrote the new letter. I kept in mind what Mrs. Needham said about good writing being short and to the point.

Mrs. Carsdale was far too verbose.

I was kind of upset that I was making this woman look good by improving her writing.

I got my thesaurus and dictionary and after about a hour I came up with:

“Jimmie?”

He came upstairs into my room.

I read the letter.

He gave me a thumbs-up sign and said, “Put it back in the filing cabinet, Deza, and let’s get ready to say goodbye to Gary.”

Jimmie’s words brought all the sadness back out in me. It was true, I was going to have to leave my home, just when it seemed my luck was turning. I’d have to say goodbye to Mrs. Needham, and worst of all, I’d have to say goodbye to Clarice.

But the chance of finding Father and bringing him back home was worth even this.

If I ever found that Dewey decimal system for superstitious sayings and looked up “Bad news comes in threes,” I would’ve seen that for the Malones, it meant three times every hour.

At supper Jimmie asked what kind of truck we were going to use to move.

Mother said, “Children, give me your hands.”

A not-so-good sign.

“Jimmie, Deza, there isn’t going to be a moving truck, we won’t need one.”

My heart flew! “Oh, Mother! I knew it! We aren’t moving!”

“Yes, Deza, we are. We just won’t need a truck to do it.

Most of this furniture …” She looked around. “Who am I kidding?
None
of this furniture is ours.”

“
What
?” I wouldn’t have been more surprised if Mother had told me that after twelve years of being on the end of my leg, my left foot belonged to someone else!

“No, dear, we rent this place furnished. Pretty much all of this belongs to the landlord.”

I was shocked and mortifried! The first thing that came to my mind was the wardrobe. That
had
to be ours, we’d been writing on it for years and Mother and Father wouldn’t tolerate us writing on someone else’s furniture.

“Mother, what about the wardrobe?”

“What about it, Deza?”

“We wrote all over it. It’s always been part of our family history.”

Well, it had been part of the Malone history for a while. Ever since I was two and Jimmie was almost five, on each of our birthdays, we would stand next to the opened wardrobe door. We’d stretch our necks as long as they’d go without letting our feet come off the ground.

Then Mother and Father would put a ruler on top of our heads and take a pencil and make a mark to show how tall we were. That way we could keep track of how much we’d grown.

All that stopped around the time Jimmie turned twelve. I was nine when, after measuring me, Father put the ruler on Jimmie’s head.

It was right at the same mark it had been last time.

Father looked at Mother, then made a mark that was half a inch taller than Jimmie really was.

I almost said, “Hey! That’s not fair!” But Mother shot me a look and I kept quiet.

Jimmie was so happy that he had grown even that much. But after while, when my dress had to be let out, Jimmie was wearing the same clothes month after month. We stopped going to the wardrobe on our birthdays.

“Yes, Deza, we wrote on it because we thought, a million years ago, that we were going to buy the furniture from the landlord, but just like with so many other things, life got in the way.”

Which is just a unpoetic way of saying, “gang aft a-gley.”

Mother was so sad that I said, “I guess that means we’ve got a lot less to worry about, right?”

She smiled. “When aren’t you right, my Mighty Miss Malone?”

“It’s only because I’ve got the blood of the Malones in my veins!”

“You also have the blood of my family, the Sutphens, in there too. Let’s not forget that.”

We looked around at what we’d need to pack. There wasn’t going to be much.

Mother said, “OK, Deza, Mr. Rhymes is going to give us a ride as far as Detroit. I’ve got three dollars for gas for him, then another two dollars for bus fare to Flint.

“Jimmie, we’ll be leaving in three days, you’ve got to say goodbye to your friends. I’d much prefer you write, rather than visit in person, those who are currently in jail.”

Mother could still make jokes.

She told me, “Sweetheart, you have permission to walk
over to Mrs. Needham’s and Clarice’s to say goodbye. Jimmie, walk with your sister, please. Give them my love, Deza.”

This was going to be terrible.

I was relieved when no one answered Mrs. Needham’s door. She was counting on me so much that I knew it would break her heart that I was leaving. But I stayed strong.

It wasn’t until we were walking to Clarice’s that I could feel tears swelling up in my eyes.

How can you say goodbye to the best friend you’ve ever had?

I reached over and took Jimmie’s hand. I knew he wouldn’t try to pull away.

“Come on, sis, don’t cry. We gotta get this over with. It’s just like when you pulled that tape off of my eyebrow. Do it quick, that way it don’t hurt as much.”

Jimmie knocked and Mrs. Johnson answered.

“Why, Jimmie, Deza, come on in. Child, what’s wrong with you?” She pinched my cheek.

Jimmie said, “Bad news, Mrs. Johnson. We gotta move to Michigan and Deza’s come to say goodbye to Clarice.”

“Oh, dear.”

She wiped at my tears and said, “I’m so sorry, Deza, did you forget? Clarice and Mr. Johnson and the big boys found some work with Uncle Boo in Nashville. They left an hour ago.”

I’d forgotten all about Clarice telling me this.

“I’m not expecting ’em back till next Thursday. Can you come then?”

Jimmie told her, “No, ma’am, we’re leaving on Wednesday.”

Secretly this wasn’t such bad news. I knew if I saw how Clarice would take me leaving, it would scar and bruise my soul in a way that wouldn’t heal for centuries.

Jimmie said, “Do you want to write her a note or something, Deza?”

I tried to talk but only sobs came out. I nodded my head.

Mrs. Johnson said, “Hold on one minute, darling, I’ll get you a pencil and some paper.”

Jimmie hugged me hard.

She came back. “I swear, these children must eat pencils. All I could find was these crayons, Deza.” She handed me a old Prince Albert cigar box full of broken, speckled crayons. She also gave me a piece of blue-lined paper.

Mrs. Johnson pulled out a chair at the gigantic table where her family ate. I sat down, took the stub of a black crayon and wrote,
My dearest sister Clarice …
My hands started shaking too much and my eyes started getting too cloudy to write.

For me to write a letter telling Clarice a proper goodbye would take years. This letter had to be the best memory Clarice would have. I needed it to be so special that she’d keep it folded up in her pocketbook for centuries and would show it to her great-great-great-grandchildren and tell them, “
Once upon a time … in a city named Gary, Indiana … there lived two great and loving friends
.”

My head plopped down on the table.

Jimmie put his arms around my shoulders. He took the crayon out of my hand. “You want me to write it for you, sis?”

I looked up and shook my head.

Jimmie said, “Well, someone’s gotta write something. What should I say?”

I just blubbered.

He looked over at Mrs. Johnson. I could see where my dear Clarice got her kind and loving nature, her mother was close to blubbering too.

Jimmie said, “OK, sis, how ’bout if I just draw something for Clarice?”

Oh, no! Not one of Jimmie’s drawings! Could Fate be any crueler? Not only was I losing my best friend, but Jimmie wanted one of his horrid drawings to be the last thing Clarice heard from me.

I had to pull myself together and stop Jimmie from drawing anything, but the heaviness in my heart had swole up into my head too, and it plopped back down into my arms.

Jimmie tugged at the piece of paper I was crying on. “Raise up some, sis, just give me a minute.” He started drawing.

“There.”

He gave the paper to Mrs. Johnson. She looked like she wanted to say something kind about it but couldn’t find the words.

I was going to have to translate. I wiped my eyes and blinked at the piece of paper.

It was another very bad drawing.

Under where I had written,
My dearest sister Clarice …
Jimmie had used the black crayon to draw two frowning girls standing with their arms spread all the way out to their sides.
There was a capitol “D” over the left-hand one. That was supposed to be me. There was a capitol “C” over the girl on the right-hand side.

My left arm and Clarice’s right were as long as giraffe necks and reached to the center of the page. Each of us held one side of a red, dripping blob.

Both of us had huge, fat drops of water squirting out of our eyes and spraying all over the page. Right in the middle of both my and Clarice’s stomachs there were two big, red, colored-in circles.