6
Marcy went at my luggage like a starving resistance fighter behind enemy lines who had just had an airdrop of needed supplies. She moaned and groaned about not being my size every time she took out something and held it up to see how it might look on her. It reminded me of how Haylee would put on something Mother had bought us both and tell me why it looked better on her than it did on me, even though we had identical bodies and there was nothing different about our dresses, blouses, or skirts. According to Haylee, the color would do more for her complexion, her eyes, and her hair because hers was subtly different. If Mother had heard her say it, she would have punished her severely, which would mean I would suffer, too. The logic was that if there was the seed of something wrong in one of us, it would be in the other. Punishment wasn’t just retribution to Mother; it was preventive, protective.
While we were unpacking, Claudia entered, practically tiptoeing to her side of our room. I realized quickly that she had a way of moving about surreptitiously, making hardly a sound, and keeping her eyes from meeting anyone else’s. She wasn’t simply shy; she wanted to be unnoticed, to completely disappear, which was not something easy to do in this place, I thought.
There was a window across from each bed, and each of us had a bedside light, a side table, and a small pink area rug beside the bed. The flooring was similar to the wood floors in the study hall. There were dark brown paneled walls and, to the right of the door, a bulletin board on which we could tack any reminders or schedules. Already pinned to it were the dormitory rules in big black letters.
“Need any help?” Marcy asked Claudia, peering around her at her suitcase.
“No,” she said quickly. “Thank you,” she added after a long moment, like someone who had just remembered she should say that.
“So where you from?” Marcy asked her.
“Allentown.”
“First time in a private school?”
She looked like she wasn’t going to answer as she took out clothes and began to hang up blouses and skirts.
Marcy shrugged, and we continued with mine.
“No, it’s my third,” Claudia finally said. It was as if sounds entered her ears and then took their time reaching her brain.
“Third? Did you say third?” Marcy asked.
“In three years,” Claudia added. Then she smiled, but it wasn’t so much a smile as a smirk that said, So shut up about it.
“Say,” Marcy said, turning to me as well. “Now that I think of it, how come your mothers didn’t come along to see you guys enrolled and moved into the dorm?”
“My mother’s recuperating from a long illness,” I said.
Claudia thought a moment, obviously deciding whether to answer Marcy.
“My mother’s home with my younger sister, Jillian. She’s six now. Our little princess,” she added. “Jillian didn’t want to take the ride, and when she whines, it’s like a thousand church bells ringing. I usually put my hands over my ears, but my mother says I should stop doing that because I might give Jillian a complex. So my mother stayed home with her to keep the peace. That’s the slogan that hangs above our heads in my house: ‘Keep the Peace.’ ”
Neither Marcy nor I spoke. Marcy turned to me and widened her eyes. We finished getting my things into the drawers built into the closet. We could hear Terri marching up and down the hallway and calling for all newlyweds to join their parents in the lobby to go to Mrs. Mitchell’s orientation meeting. She paused in our doorway.
“Watch out for Marcy,” she said, staring at her like a schoolteacher reprimanding a first-grader. “She tends to borrow everything she can and then conveniently forgets to return it. That’s why she helps newlyweds unpack.”
“It’s not doing me any good,” Marcy whined. “Nothing Kaylee has fits.”
“You can borrow anything I have,” Claudia said. “And forget to return it.”
Marcy and I looked at each other and then started to laugh.
But Claudia didn’t. She looked like she meant it. We all started out.
“Her bark is worse than her bite,” Marcy called after us as Claudia and I joined our fathers, who were standing together in the lobby.
“How’s it going?” my father asked, looking at both of us for an answer.
“Good,” I said. Claudia didn’t respond, and her father didn’t wait to see if she would.
As we walked across campus to Matthews Hall, where the administrative offices were, our fathers remained ahead of us, talking. I imagined they had a lot to share, both apparently having daughters who needed some special tender loving care. My father, of course, would mention nothing about Haylee or what I had survived. I wondered what reason for my being here he did tell Claudia’s father. He would probably give him the reason most were here. Their parents had little faith in public schools and could afford to send their kids to one of these places, so why not try it?
I glanced at Claudia, who walked with her arms folded tightly across her chest, her head high and her neck stiff. Three private schools, I thought. She’d been through these orientations twice. No wonder she looked only vaguely interested.
“So why have you gone to so many private schools?” I asked her.
She shrugged. “My father says it’s like trying on shoes. Even though a pair might be your size, they might still squeeze here and there or simply be wrong for your feet.” After a moment, she added, “However, if Littlefield doesn’t work for me, they’ll ship me to a nunnery.”
“Seriously?”
“Who knows?” she said. “My mother thinks I’m an unhealthy influence on my little sister. If she could, she’d keep Jillian in a plastic bubble or keep me in the attic.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
“I’ve stopped feeling sorry for myself,” she replied. When she spoke, she quickly glanced at me and then shifted her eyes to look down before she finished a sentence.
Everyone had family problems, I thought. Some were only skin deep and could be shrugged off, but some were so deep that they’d affect who you were forever. Here I was arriving with so much emotional baggage that I thought there was little chance I would succeed at anything, especially making new friends, and the first person I had to get along with seemed to be a walking tragedy.
Since I had arrived, I hadn’t thought much about Haylee, and, more important, I wasn’t thinking about how she would react to things. I had begun to feel optimistic. Now I couldn’t help wondering what Claudia would think if she knew my story. Would she avoid complaining about her own life? She did have that “top this” attitude, as if she were the poster child for parental neglect, and as funny as it might sound, I was betting she didn’t want anyone else to draw more pity than she could. Maybe she didn’t feel sorry for herself any longer, but she sure seemed eager to get others to feel sorry for her, whereas I wanted to avoid it like the plague.
“Do you have any brothers or sisters?” Claudia asked, as if she could hear me thinking. It was like a bell I was waiting to hear ring. Marcy had yet to ask, but I knew she would as soon as she could.
“No,” I said. It wasn’t an instantaneous decision for me to deny Haylee’s existence. I had been thinking about the question constantly during the ride to Littlefield and concluded that for now, being an only child was the best answer. Besides, right now, as far as my father was concerned, and apparently even Mother, I was the same as an only child.
“You’re lucky,” she said. “Is your mother seriously ill?”
“She’ll be all right,” I replied, rather than making up something. There was obviously no way to tell the truth.
We walked silently for a while. I saw that my father was having a good conversation with Claudia’s father.
“What’s your father do?” I asked her.
“He’s a private business manager.”
“My father runs a very successful software company,” I said, then decided not to sound too perfect. Misery, after all, loves company. “My parents are divorced.”
“Are they?” She paused and looked thoughtful. “I wish mine were.”
“What? Why?”
“Children of divorced parents get more attention, because each parent wants to show the other that their child or children love them more. My mother had been trying to get pregnant again for years, so when my sister, Jilly, came, they treated her like she was a gift from the angels. I became the back-burner child. Everything I wanted was put on the back burner until Jilly’s needs and desires were met. My mother hates when I call her Jilly instead of Jillian. That’s why I do it.”
She walked faster.
“I’m sorry,” I said, catching up, “but being the child of divorced parents is not better than being a child in a happy family, believe me.”
“I wouldn’t know,” she said. “I haven’t had either type.” She sounded like someone who had been deprived of food.
Our fathers waited for us to catch up when we reached the entrance to Matthews Hall. They were of one serious face full of worry. Suddenly, the beautiful sunny day looked overcast to me, and there weren’t more than a few puffy, cotton-candy clouds moving lazily across the sky. Depression was insidious, crawling over the grounds toward me, smiling and reminding me that I was always only a short memory away from its firm, tight grip. My father started to reach for my hand, but he stopped when he glanced at Claudia’s father, who was already turning to enter. Maybe he thought I didn’t want to seem like a little girl next to my new roommate, when in truth, that was really what I felt like.
A lean woman in a gray skirt suit and high-necked blouse was there to greet us. She wore her dull gray hair severely drawn back and pinned with a black hair clip. She easily looked like she was in her sixties, but I bet myself she was probably no more than forty, someone who thought the older she looked, the more respect she’d command. Later I would learn that she was Mrs. Mitchell’s personal assistant, Pamela Cross. Marcy would tell me, “She’s the cross Mrs. Mitchell bears.”
“Right this way, please,” she firmly directed us and the others entering the hall. She held her arm out as though she were preventing us from going anywhere else in the building. We entered a conference room on the right. Inside, a female student in a midlength black skirt and a frilly white blouse handed out pamphlets to both parents and students. She barely smiled and wore a tag that read, “Student Government President, Kim Bailey.” Some of the information on the pamphlet was also in the brochures my father had brought for Mother to see, but there were two pages of rules that applied to both classroom behavior and dormitory behavior. The list for the latter looked longer than what was pinned on our room’s bulletin board. Everyone stopped talking in anticipation. Some looked like they were even holding their breath. I imagined a drumroll.
Everyone turned when Mrs. Mitchell entered. She was about five foot nine and quite pretty, with small facial features and dazzlingly bright blue eyes. She had her light brown hair styled in a classic bob. Her smile was warm and friendly, and I couldn’t imagine why my father had heard and why Marcy and the others thought of her as an Iron Lady, a Mrs. Thatcher. Her makeup was subdued but tasteful, complementing her natural beauty. She wore a dark green skirt suit in the same style as the one Pamela Cross wore, with a white blouse and a string of small pearls matching her pearl earrings.
“Welcome, everyone,” Mrs. Mitchell said, stepping behind the podium. She held out her arms. “Welcome to Littlefield. I’m so glad we have been able to provide you with a beautiful fall day for your first impression of our campus. We’re very proud of it. It’s truly our home away from home, something I have high hopes your children will come to believe as well.”
Her voice was crisp; her words, although spoken sharply, made her sound refined and proper, and they seemed genuine.
“Please, take seats if you haven’t. I promise I won’t keep you long. I know how eager your children are to become part of Littlefield.”
Her posture firmed, and the warm smile evaporated. The dazzle in her eyes quickly changed to a steely, sharp, and intense focus on us all.
“What I want to do is assure you that you have placed your child in a responsible, efficient school where every child is treated like an individual. Everyone reaches his or her goals in a different way, but we’ll provide the foundation for your child to exhibit his or her predilections freely and successfully. To our way of thinking, there is no such thing as a normal child or an average child. Perhaps it’s been well hidden until now, but we’ll know and nourish what makes your child special.
“To do all this, we ask a few things of everyone. We are not here to reform anyone,” she continued. Now I could hear the firmness in her voice, but it wasn’t simply gritty and unwavering. There was a clear suggestion of intolerance. “Littlefield is not a solution for children who have been in constant trouble in their public schools. We have little time for disciplinary problems. And we know you parents aren’t spending all this money to have your child waste time or effort or be responsible for wasting someone else’s. That is a belief set in concrete here.
“The pamphlet you’ve been given has the latest update to our rules. We are aware of the growing problems educators and parents are having out there,” she said, nodding at the window as if those problems and troubles were peering in at us. “I can guarantee you that you left them behind you when you passed through our gates. We believe we have a contract with you and your children. We’ll provide the best education possible, and in return, we ask your child to provide the best behavior possible, characterized by cooperation, obedience, and respect for others as well as him- or herself.”
She smiled, but her smile was ice-cold now, more like a mask.
“No DSD,” she said. “Drinking, smoking, drugs. A single violation of that rule is a breach of our contract. Children, your parents signed a document that establishes they will lose all the money they’ve invested in Littlefield. There are no exceptions, no special circumstances. Violators who plead will plead to deaf ears.
“Read the rules, obey the rules, and enjoy your school life and education,” she said. “Parents, you all have my direct phone line should you need anything. We have our own medical facilities. Mrs. Cohen, our school nurse, comes to us from service in the U.S. Army.”
Mrs. Cohen stepped forward. She was in a nurse’s uniform and looked to be in her late thirties, even though there were strands of gray in her dark brown hair.
Mrs. Mitchell continued. “You will soon meet our guidance counselor, Mr. Hedrick. We are proud of all our staff. Every teacher at Littlefield has a master’s degree.
“For now, let’s get everyone settled in comfortably. Tomorrow, after all, is a school day.”
It was so quiet when she paused that I could hear heavy breathing behind me. Mrs. Mitchell nodded and started out. Someone’s mother stopped her to ask a question, but the rest of us began to leave. My father was at my side, Claudia and her father ahead of us, looking like they were fleeing a fire.
“I set up an account for you,” my father said as we walked. “The business department handles it. You can withdraw cash when you need it for things.”
“Thank you, Daddy.”
“So what do you think?” he asked. I knew he was eager to hear me say encouraging things.
“So far, so good. My roommate is a bit much, but I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
He nodded. “You might end up doing some psychotherapy yourself. Her father told me a little about her. This is her third private school in three years.”
“She told us.”
“She’s also a bit of an anorexic,” my father said.
“Maybe more than a bit. So she’s in therapy, too, huh?”
“Be careful you don’t start trading stories,” he joked, but my slipping and saying something I didn’t want anyone here to know was something I feared. He saw the fear in my face. “Look, Kaylee, when it comes to your roommate, just be a listener. Maybe that’s all she really needs.”
I stopped walking abruptly.
“What?”
“Did you tell Claudia’s father about Haylee?”
“Not a word. He didn’t ask about any other children.”
“Good. I don’t care to mention her, either, and I won’t. I’m an only child now.”
“Very wise,” he said. “You’re a lot stronger than you think, Kaylee. I’m sure you’ll be a great help to some of the other girls besides your roommate.”
I looked down and shook my head. “How did this happen? In hours, it all turned around so that I’m the normal one here.”
“You always were,” he said, and hugged me. “You were always the normal one, Kaylee.”
He kissed me, and we walked back to Eleanor Cook Hall holding hands as if we never walked together without doing so. We paused at the parking lot.
“So I guess I’ll just take off,” he said. “Girls don’t want fathers hanging around. I feel confident you’re in a good place with good people, and I’ll impress that fact on your mother.”
“Okay, Daddy.” My voice sounded so young, so helpless. I hated it.
“Hey, hey, you’re going to be fine, honey, fine.”
I nodded.
“I’ll call you, or you call me whenever you feel like it, no matter what time of day or night,” he said. “I’ll stop by to see your mother as soon as I get back and give her a report. She’ll come around. You’ll see.” He hugged and kissed me again.
I stood there and watched him go to his car, get in, back up, and start out. He paused and opened his window.
“You’re never alone, Kaylee, never,” he said, and then he drove off. I stood there until he was gone.
Finally, out of his sight, I started to cry.
Then I saw Claudia with her father at his car. He was lecturing her forcefully about something, perhaps telling her this was her last chance. The whole time, she had her head down. When he stopped, she kept her head down. He gave her a quick, mechanical hug during which she remained stiff, her arms extended downward, her hands like claws, and then he got into his car and drove off without waving to her or anything.
She turned and saw me. She looked surprised to see me waiting for her when she stepped forward.
“How does it compare?” I asked her.
“What?”
“Littlefield, our orientation with the principal, any of it, to your other private schools.”
She shrugged. “I don’t think I ever noticed,” she said, and walked faster, like someone who didn’t care to walk together.
I kept up with her, and we entered the dorm. Mrs. Rosewell was waiting for us.
“Right this way, girls,” she said, and led us to her office. She had a small desk, but she had us sit on the settee and then pulled a chair up to face us.
“I want you both to feel comfortable here at Cook Hall, but I want you to treat the building with respect and at least as well as you would treat your own home. It is, after all, your home away from home,” she added, smiling.
She reached over to her desk and picked up copies of the rules that were posted on our bulletin board.
“Let us begin to read them together,” she said, handing us each a copy. She read the rules as I imagined Moses read the Ten Commandments to his people. She emphasized no alcohol, drugs, or cigarettes dramatically but seemed self-conscious when she read the rule forbidding any boys in our rooms.
“Okay,” she said. “We’ve done what we’re supposed to. I have no doubt you two will be ideal residents. If either of you has any problems, no matter what, you should know my door is always open. I wish you both luck.” She stood.
We thanked her and went to our room. The moment we arrived, Marcy popped out of hers and threw herself onto my bed.
“First impressions of Mrs. Thatcher,” she declared, and pointed to me.
“That’s loading the question,” I replied. “If you call her that, you’ll influence our opinions.”
“What?” She widened her smile. “Are you going to be a lawyer?”
“Maybe,” I said. “I’m right, right, Claudia?” I asked as she continued to organize her things.
She paused and looked at us. “Sorry,” she said. “I wasn’t listening.”
“Not listening?” Marcy sat up. “There’s not a lot of conversation going on in here, so you have to pay attention. We might say very important things.”
Claudia simply stared at her. Her dark eyes weren’t registering anger. In fact, they were almost void of any emotion and more like glass marbles.
“Whatever,” Marcy said. She looked at me. “So what about you? Do you have any brothers or sisters, spoiled or otherwise?”
“No.”
“Neither?”
“It’s not unusual,” I said, smiling to keep her from having any suspicions.
“I’ll say. I’m a child of divorced parents.”
“You, too?” I said. “Divorced?”
“You mean yours are?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Wow. We’re almost the majority here at Cook Hall. There are eight others. My parents divorced when I was only five. I grew up thinking that marriages were supposed to last only five or six years and people traded in wives and husbands like they do cars. I thought there could be too much mileage on a marriage, too.”
I looked at Claudia, who suddenly seemed very interested in what we were saying.
“No wonder you’re so happy,” she told Marcy. “Your divorced parents probably spoil you.”
“Probably,” Marcy sang. “Viva la Divorce!” she cried, and even Claudia had to smile. Finally.
I finished my unpacking and glanced at the pamphlet.
“The cafeteria is in Asper Hall?”
“We call it Regurgitation Central,” Marcy joked.
“Do we have to wear anything special to dinner?”
She tapped the rules on our bulletin board. “No shorts, no bare midriffs, no bare feet, and this vague reference to no inappropriate blouses, shirts, or otherwise. Otherwise anything else. Terri Facilities and I will escort you two. You can get rid of us after today, if you like,” Marcy added, more for Claudia’s benefit than mine. She looked at me.
“Well, we certainly don’t want to be a burden,” I said, sounding as if I meant it. Almost as soon as the words left my lips, I thought I sounded more like Haylee, dripping with sarcasm. I quickly smiled.
“No worries. We’re both trained professional busybodies,” Marcy said.
“I think I’ll take a shower and change,” I said.
“Good idea. There are a few boys you’ll want to impress,” Marcy said, looking at both of us.
Claudia raised her eyebrows at being included.
“I mean, we’re not really here just for an academic education, are we?” Marcy added. She did a little pirouette and headed out.
“I like her, don’t you?” I asked Claudia.
“Sure,” Claudia said dryly. “I like everybody.”
She began to draw school supplies and her computer out of her bag and get her desk organized.
Later for that, I thought, and chose something to wear to dinner.
“Off to the shower,” I said. Claudia glanced at me and then back at her computer.
“You need a password for the Wi-Fi,” she said. “No one told it to us.”
“I’m sure they will. See you soon,” I said.
There was no one else in the showers when I entered. As the water cascaded over me, I imagined it was washing away all traces of my nightmare abduction. Perhaps my father’s hopes for me could be realized. I could make new friends and create a world with only me in it, no Haylee to refer to, no Haylee to consider. There were only my feelings now, my dreams. The warm water felt wonderful. This is a magic shower, I thought. It erases your past.
When I returned to our room, Claudia was still in front of her computer. She had gotten the password and had put it on my desk for me. She looked like she was in a heavy instant-message exchange with someone. I didn’t want to seem nosy, so I didn’t look over her shoulder. Instead, I concentrated on what I would wear. There was a sense of freedom about it. I didn’t have to consider what Mother would think or if Haylee liked my choice. Better yet, I didn’t have to conform to what she wanted. I put on a turquoise blouse and a dark blue skirt.
“I thought you were wearing a wig!” Marcy exclaimed as I was brushing my short hair to give it some sense of style. There were obviously no locks on our doors. Right now, I looked like Joan of Arc or someone. There were women who had their hair cut as short as mine deliberately, of course, but I had always been so proud of mine, of ours.
“I’m sorry I got talked into that,” I said. “My father felt sorry for me and bought me the wigs.”
Claudia was now giving me her full attention. “My father forbids me to cut my hair,” she said.
“What’s he going to do if you do, disown you?” Marcy asked.
Claudia shrugged. “Too late for that. He did that years ago,” she said.
Marcy widened her eyes and then laughed because she didn’t know what to say. Neither did I. She turned to me.
“You have one of those faces that can’t be damaged by a bad hairstyle,” Marcy said. “I’ll poke you in the ribs if one of the boys I’m after looks at you with too much interest.”
“What?”
“Kidding,” she sang, and smiled at Claudia. “You didn’t change for dinner?”
“I had other things to do,” Claudia said. “It’s not the Ritz, is it?”
“The what? Oh.” Marcy laughed. “No, it’s definitely not the Ritz. It’s not even McDonald’s, but it’s all we have,” she said dramatically. “Cherish it, darling,” she added. “Mrs. Rosewell calls everyone darling. Or dearie. I hate dearie, don’t you?”
“Call me anything,” I said, recalling one of my father’s pet expressions. “Just don’t call me late for dinner.”
“That’s good!” Marcy cried. “C’mon. Let’s march in together like the Three Musketeers!”
“I’m really not hungry,” Claudia said.
“Hey, wait until you see the food before you say that,” Marcy replied, and shocked her by scooping her under one arm and then holding her other arm out for me.
It was going to be difficult to be depressed in Marcy’s company, I thought, and for both Claudia and me, she was just what the doctor ordered.
The question was how long before she would flee our company.