[13]

Fall fever, 1980

Colin Atwell was in Becca’s reading, math, social studies, and art classes. He was still weird, but he liked art. Becca liked art. Her teacher, Mrs. Fairaday, said Becca’s self-portrait was “the most compelling” she’d seen in her sixteen years as a middle school art teacher. In Becca’s painting, red flames shot from her eyes, and the top of her head opened like a lid. Mrs. Fairaday even suggested Becca attend an artist’s summer camp, to which Becca’s mother said no. The first image that sprang to Mary’s mind was from the sixties: flower children high on god knows what, smeared with psychedelic body paints. No, Becca would not attend an artist’s summer camp. Becca knew that there was no point arguing with her mother, who was irrational and paranoid.

Despite no artist’s camp, the summer passed quickly. Becca had a knapsack for her charcoals and sketchpad and spent most days drawing the beauty she saw everywhere in Chapel Hill. It seemed better to sketch and shade without instruction, which stifled the imagination.

Today, Colin Atwell was joining her. In the sunshine, her hair streaked gold, Becca waited for Colin on the green lawn of Polk Place. The sun was high in the October sky. She gnawed a pencil, the yellow flaking away. He was late. She knew he might not show at all. That’s partly why she waited—to see if he would. She sat Indian-style and wrote his name, Colin Atwell, in her sketchbook. She was a sixth-grader now.

Colin flicked her in the back of the neck before dropping onto the lawn. Forever flicking her in the back of the neck and knocking the back of her knee with his knee so that she wobbled on the bleachers during chorus, he called her “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.” He shot rubber bands at her when Mrs. Creighton, the chorus teacher, wasn’t looking, and he pretended to dislike Becca because he thought that was how boys got girls to like them. Basically, like many little boys, he was clueless.

She grabbed the back of her neck. “That hurt!”

“No it didn’t.” Grabbing Becca’s sketchbook and rolling onto his back, he stretched one hand toward Becca.

“Don’t do it.”

“What?” With two fingers, he poked her in the waist.

“I’m not ticklish. I told you.”

He mimicked, “I’m not ticklish. I told you,” and rolled onto his stomach. “Are you going to the homecoming dance?”

“Maybe.” Sometimes she went to Richmond with her dad when he had meetings with Atkins and Thames. Hardly teaching anymore, he said he was successful now. Becca couldn’t tell a difference.

“Keep still,” Colin said. “I’ll draw you.” He wanted to make her look the way she looked to him—bright, explosive, inviting, alluring—but he couldn’t, so out of frustration he drew a snot-nosed monster.

Becca posed, squinting in the sunlight at the magnolias that blurred. The sun blazed in the viburnum and japonica, and she’d forgotten her sunglasses. This morning she’d applied two layers of pink lip gloss and her mom’s blue eye shadow. She had this feeling that Colin was going to make a move and kiss her. He might ask, “Will you go with me?” and she might say yes because even though he was no Kevin Richfield, he genuinely liked her drawings and paintings. He said the right things, knowing what she meant, what she thought, what she felt when she made art; saying things like “The texture here is perfect,” “You used the right shade of yellow. It makes it soft,” “This is wonderful. It’s my favorite painting because it’s like you pieced yourself inside it.” She probably would “go with him.” She’d kiss him too—if he tried. They’d hold hands and walk the main hall at school. A boy who knew and loved art, even if he was weird—and Colin was weird—was good enough for her.

He passed back her sketchbook. “You like it?”

“No!”

“What’s the matter, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm?”

“You’re not funny.” She got up, clutching the sketchbook to her chest.

“I was just kidding.”

“You drew an ugly monster! Is that what you think I am?”

“Of course not.”

“What was I thinking, meeting you here? You’re an idiot.”

“Wait.”

“Don’t bother me.” With the pencil back between her teeth, she stepped blindly into the midday sun, hoping he’d follow, feeling suddenly mad at her father, but unsure why. Colin called again, “I was just kidding,” but he didn’t chase after her. Instead, he sat defeated, feeling stupid. Try as he might, he could never tell Becca how he felt. Why couldn’t he say “I like you”? His best friend, Julian, said that if you tell a girl you like her, she won’t like you back. And what if she never liked him back? He couldn’t keep wobbling her knee for the rest of the year. Colin thought he was running out of options.

As she walked home, Becca felt feverish, unhappy, angry, frustrated, and desperate, all at the same time. Her hands in fists, she tromped. In the distance, she saw Kevin Richfield outside Pepper’s Pizza with three eighth-grade girls. Becca was burning up. She hated those stupid eighth-grade girls. She never should’ve considered settling for Colin Atwell.

I’ll skip Richmond this weekend. I’ll go to the dance. Maybe Kevin will be there. She was burning up, ravenous for something; an emptiness gnawed her gut.

Mary was dusting the coffee table. “How was your day?

“Fine.” Becca took four Chips Ahoy cookies to her bedroom. She fed one to Whiskers. Her sheets gritty with crumbs, she fell into a deep sleep. She slept all afternoon and through the night.

Later in the week, she approached her father about their trip to Richmond. She didn’t want to disappoint him, but she wanted to attend the dance. Rather than being disappointed, her father said, “I didn’t think you were coming with me this weekend. No harm. I’ve got meetings back to back.”

“All right.” It would’ve been nice if he’d told her sooner.

Sadly, it rained the night of the dance. Downstairs, Becca searched for her hair clips on the sideboard, feeling insignificant in comparison to Mother Nature. She often compared herself to the weather. The back door swung open and she saw Grandma Edna, drenched, her white hair loose and matted to her face. She didn’t see Bo. Before Becca could speak, the door slammed shut. The electricity went out for a second. Whiskers barked. She felt her own forehead. Again she was on fire. She pushed open the back door. “Grandma Edna, are you there? Where are you?” There was the warm rain and a gentle wind. She pulled the door shut and went upstairs to her mother’s bedroom. “I don’t think I should go to the dance.”

“Why? Is it because you don’t have a date? Big deal! It’s a middle school dance. You’ll have fun.”

“That’s not it, Mom.” She hesitated. “When I was downstairs, the door blew open and I saw Grandma Edna. It was just before the electricity flickered. Maybe she’s trying to tell me something.”

Her mother said, “I hate when you do this. She was my mother, not yours. If anyone is going to see her, it would be me, and I don’t see her. There’s no such things as ghosts.” She quaffed her drink. “Fix me another one,” she said, handing Becca her glass. “Scotch, and two ice cubes.”

Becca took the sticky glass.

“You’re going to the dance, and you’re going to have fun.”

As Becca turned away, Mary grabbed her sleeve. “Just one ice cube.” Becca’s mother was unrecognizable: ruddy face, bulbous nose, gray skin under vacant, bloodshot eyes.

When Becca returned with the drink, her mother took a sip and said, “Sit down. I have something I want you to wear.”

“Mom, I think I have a fever.”

“Nonsense.” Mary felt Becca’s forehead with the back of her hand. “You’re anxious. Now sit down.”

Becca sat on the edge of the bed. Mary opened her large oak jewelry box, necklaces hanging in shimmering rows. Becca spotted emeralds, rubies, and diamonds. A long time ago, her father had spoiled her mother with jewels. Mary had once told Becca, “I felt like Elizabeth Taylor. I always had some new rock for everyone to admire.”

“Here we go,” Mary said. “This is going to go perfect with your dress.” She pulled out the purple butterfly brooch. “This was my mother’s, and before that, it was her mother’s, and now it’s mine. I want you to wear it tonight for your first formal dance. One day it will belong to you.”

Becca knew the story, but she listened raptly, loving stories, loving history, loving the connections between people that can be sustained through the smallest trinket. “I love you, Mom.”

Mary pinned the brooch on Becca’s dress. “It looks beautiful.” They admired it in the vanity, hearing the honk of Belinda Drinkwater’s Pinto. Mary said, “You’d think she could ring the fucking bell.”

“It’s raining.”

“It’s only decent.”

Becca left with her curly hair loose, frizzing in the humidity.

• • •

Belinda Drinkwater said, “Meet me here out front in this exact spot at nine-thirty sharp.”

“I think we get it, Mom,” Carrie said. Belinda waited for a hug, but this was middle school; she got a “See you later, Mom.”

Carrie wore a snug blouse, a white mini skirt, and red and white striped tights. She looked, Becca thought, like a candy cane. Her blond hair was pulled tight in a clip. Becca wished she had worn a mini skirt, but she didn’t own any.

Carrie had boobs—really big boobs, noticeably big in the red shirt she’d somehow stretched across her chest; and Carrie was taller than most of the boys, so their eyes were at her chest when she talked to them. Sometimes Carrie wore colored bras and light-colored tops, so Becca could see the pink or blue straps through Carrie’s shirt. Sometimes Becca wanted to tell Carrie that she was starting to look like a slut, that people were talking about her, that boys were saying things about her (things Becca wished they’d say about her: exclamations like “Holy shit! Did you see her?”).

Kevin Richfield approached the two girls, who swayed back and forth to the music, each with her cup of bland punch. Staring at Carrie’s chest, he said, “Do you want to dance?”

Carrie gave Becca that look: Is it okay? Let’s be serious. It has to be okay. It’s Kevin Richfield—eighth-grader. Eyebrows raised. Hopefulness. I might talk about you the whole time. Becca reached for Carrie’s cup of punch. “Have fun.”

They danced to “Rock with You” while Becca leaned against the folded bleachers holding two cups of punch. Carrie’s chest was pressed into Kevin’s. It made Becca sick.

Looking at Kevin and Carrie, looking beyond them—at the lonely boys snapping their fingers, counting right foot, left foot, and the stupid girls applying lip gloss and checking their hair—Becca spotted Colin Atwell. He spotted her too. He turned with his back to her, yanking at the belt of his pants like he might moon her. He high-fived one of his friends. He’s a jerk.

The rain picked up. Inside the gym, it sounded like a bag of marbles being dumped on the roof. Then it stopped. Boom! A loud clap of thunder, and Becca ducked, spilling the two cups of punch she’d held. Her stomach ached. She huddled there, red punch spreading across the gym floor. It wasn’t supposed to thunderstorm. Just rain. She’d checked the forecast.

Mrs. Lewis, the school librarian, who very much looked the part of school librarian, with her hair in a bun, spectacles, and high-necked ruffled blouse, said, “What are you doing?” Looking at the spilled punch, she added, “This is why we shouldn’t have these inane dances.” The thunder boomed, and Becca heard a dog howling.

“Did you hear that?”

“It’s raining, dear. The punch!” Mrs. Lewis pointed to the floor.

“Sorry,” Becca said.

“Sorry is right!” Mrs. Lewis called out to one of the custodians.

Becca felt flushed. She shouldn’t have come to the dance.

Becca headed for the door. On her way, Colin Atwell bobbed the back of her leg, tipping her backwards, catching her just in time. He was smiling. “You made it? Do you want to … you know?”

“I don’t want to ‘you know’ anything with you. I’m leaving.”

“Do you want to dance, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm?”

“Are you deaf?”

Becca made her way toward the gym doors, thinking, Everything’s going to be okay, but feeling the opposite. She pushed the door’s silver bar, and the force of her palms along with the fierce wind propelled the door to slam back against the brick. The frustration and anger that had been bubbling in her gut spread up into her esophagus. It wasn’t just Carrie and Kevin. It was her mom too. She felt sick. It wasn’t okay. Nothing was okay. Fuck lightning. Fuck Carrie. Fuck Kevin, and fuck God! Fuck everybody. She hated the stupid corduroy dress that clung to her stupid white tights. She made a fool of herself cowering on the gym floor. She was a flat-chested, stupid, punch-spilling idiot.

Becca ran into the rain that blew in sheets from the south. She heard the same dog howling in the distance. She had to go home. Maybe that howling dog was Bo trying to warn her that something was wrong. With the rain pelting her freckled cheeks, she looked up at the strange sky, a pale lavender in some spots, like it was far away, like the distant mountains at Grandma Edna’s, like there was breathing room—dark and menacing in other spots, like a low ceiling pressing down on her. Please don’t let me get hit by lightning. Please, God. I didn’t mean fuck you. I didn’t mean it, really. I didn’t mean fuck Carrie or anybody else. I’m sorry. Something’s wrong with me. Despite her parents’ atheism, Becca believed in Grandma Edna’s god. Grandma Edna was smart.

Colin Atwell followed Becca through the gym doors, across the parking lot.

He wasn’t thinking about the storm. Becca was the only girl with whom he’d hoped to dance. She was the only girl he had ever liked in his entire twelve-year-old life. He recognized something in her that he’d never perceived in any other girl. He didn’t want to flick her neck or wobble her knee. He wanted to hold her hand and touch her breasts. He wanted to kiss her on the mouth, but he didn’t know how to do those things. He chased after her, yelling, “Wait up!” He’d say I like you. Even if it meant she wouldn’t like him. Even if she wouldn’t stand beside him in chorus, he would tell her how he felt. He would say I like you.

As Becca ran through Morgan’s Woods for the shortcut to her house, Colin followed. The wet leaves soggy underfoot, the trees canopying the two of them from the storm, she couldn’t believe she was actually out in the middle of a thunderstorm. She couldn’t believe she was rushing home, and she didn’t know what was compelling her to do so. Was it Carrie with Kevin? Was it the fire in her gut? Was it the sky pressing down, making it difficult to breathe? Was it the vision of Grandma Edna, dripping wet, just outside the den? Was it Whiskers cowering alone under her bed? She didn’t know, but she ran.

The brightly colored leaves of autumn were muted blood red in the darkness, a few clinging to Becca’s tights. Slugs squished between the treads of her brown leather Mary Janes. Colin kept calling “Wait up,” and halfway through the woods as she approached Forest Theatre, the place where the yearly ballet recital was held, the purple butterfly brooch came unhinged, falling from her dress into wet maple leaves, an insignificant speck of amethyst. Becca kept running. A quarter of the way across the wide lawn of McCorkle Place, she saw lightning strike the dome of the Old Well. White everywhere. Becca, beaded and dripping with rain, her knotted curls crowned with pine needles and twigs, vibrated from fall fever. She was dark and muted like the autumn leaves. She was speechless.

Colin took her hand. “Holy shit,” he said. “Did you see that?”

She pulled her hand away.

“What’s the matter? Why are you running?” Colin’s father had warned him that girls, women—it makes no difference—are crazy. Colin’s own mother was a runaway. Colin thought Becca especially crazy. Maybe that’s why he liked her.

“I have to go,” she said.

The house’s back door was unlocked, the rooms dark. Colin tried to wipe his mud-caked Buster Browns on the straw welcome mat, but gave up, following Becca inside through the den, past the library, and into the kitchen, where Becca’s mother was slumped on the floor, her back against a bottom cabinet, her head limp, her hair wild, a mountain of photographs between her bare legs. The cuffs of her robe, the tips of her red hair wet and putrid with bourbon. The empty bottle of Jim Beam touching her big toe. Red toenail polish. Freckled, milky legs. White robe. In her mother’s right hand, the black-and-white photograph of Mary Wickle and Rowan Burke on a St. Patrick’s Day parade float. She hadn’t been lying. She was wearing a top hat and Rowan was kissing her. The girl in the photograph looked at the camera with confidence, so much confidence, that Mary hardly resembled her.

Had Becca’s mother been conscious, she would’ve told her daughter, Our picture almost made the newspaper. She would’ve added, You look positively terrible. You’re soaking wet. She would’ve then returned to the matter at hand: Just look at how young I am in this picture. Instead, Mary was unconscious, mute, with Becca imagining what her mother might say.

Colin backed away, knocking his head into the telephone. The receiver clacked to the floor. Becca looked to the window, at the unrelenting rain, at the puddle of water at her feet, at her white tights, at her own knees dropping to the linoleum. She could hear Whiskers upstairs, whining. Her world was slowing down. “Mom,” she said. “Mom?” She wiped at the sticky crust around her mother’s mouth, pulling her mother’s robe tighter and cinching the waist. She lifted her mother’s head, propping it upright against the cabinet. Earlier tonight, when she’d felt anxious about the dance, she’d wanted to be a little girl again. She’d wanted to nuzzle against her mother, to hear her mother say I’m proud of you or something encouraging. Now, Becca indulged in that missed opportunity, resting her head on her mother’s lap, holding tight to her waist, pretending she was an innocent girl and her mother was proud and doting. Becca shut her eyes and waited for whatever will be, will be; the future’s not ours to see. Que sera, sera. There was nothing else to do.

Becca was eleven when she found her mother slumped against the kitchen cabinet, when she lost her mother’s favorite brooch racing through the woods, when Colin Atwell waited with her for the ambulance to arrive. When Colin said, “I’m sorry. I need to call my dad. I don’t want him to worry.” When the paramedics roused Mary from her stupor and insisted on taking her to the hospital. When the ambulance drove away and Colin left with his father, and Bob and his cheating whore wife stood in the drizzle, gawking at the red ambulance lights. When one of the paramedics suggested Becca wait with the neighbors across the street, and Becca waited in her bedroom instead for her dad to come home. She got out her sketchbook, composing a poem:

Beside the poem Becca drew an imposing man with a thick head of black hair. She sketched an Austin Healey on his right and a strawberry on his left, then, staring at the sheet of paper, eventually scribbled over his face. Crying, she realized that no matter how hard she tried, it is nearly impossible to hate one’s father.

She didn’t know when he’d be home. She stared at the raindrops beading on the windowpane, pressing her cheek against Whiskers’s cool, wet nose.

She was eleven the next day and for the rest of that year, when Mary promised to pull herself together, that things would get better; when Becca chucked her drawer full of useless watches and fed chocolate chip cookies to the mourning doves in the backyard. When Becca felt that she’d lost something more than her love of cookies, something more important, something irretrievable, but she didn’t know exactly what it was. When her mother said, “I’m really sorry. I’m so embarrassed. I’m going to be a better mom, a better wife, a better everything.”

When Mary asked Becca, “Where’s the butterfly brooch?”

“I’ve got it. I’ll get it.”

When Colin Atwell found the brooch beneath a pile of leaves and remembered Becca wearing it at the dance.

He tried in vain to return the brooch to her. She wouldn’t speak to him, let alone look at him. It wasn’t him. It was her. He was part of an event she wanted to forget.

Every few years, he found the brooch like new, remembering the downpour, the Old Well struck by lightning, and crazy, beautiful Becca Burke running for home.