Blueberry Hill: a Sister's Story(4)

“How much money?”

“Depends on how many kids we get.” I start doing the math in my head. “We could charge five dollars for the whole week. That way it’d be so cheap all the moms will want their kids to come. I’ll bet we could get at least twenty kids. That’s one hundred dollars.”

“I get half?”

“Of course not,” I say, knowing I’ve got the upper hand for once. “It’s my idea, and besides, I’ll have all the business responsibility.” A look of doubt starts creeping across her face so I quickly add, “But you’ll get two dollars for every kid we watch. That’s forty dollars a week.”

Now she’s interested. “Forty dollars? No working in the afternoon?”

“Yeah, providing we get twenty kids.”

~

That July we started our babysitting business with more than forty kids, and I was raking in a whopping two hundred bucks a week. I saved most of my windfall. Of course I did; that’s the kind of person I am. Part of that money went into a college fund, and the rest was set aside to buy new clothes for school.

Donna treated her friends to ice cream sodas, movies, and even a day at Palisades Amusement Park. Come September, she didn’t have a dime left.

What can I say, we were different people.

Sometimes I wish I had been a little more like Donna. She did what she wanted to without caring about who liked it and who didn’t. Not me. I worried about everything, including the possibility of becoming a social reject because I was still walking home with Fatty Patty.





A Time of Rebellion




I was fifteen when I discovered the next best thing to being Donna was having her for a sister. Granted, we were an unseemly pair, her in blue jeans and leather jacket, me in head-to-toe pink. Standing next to Donna, my narrow shoulders and small stature ran a poor second to her tall athletic build. With almost two years difference in our ages, I had the advantage of being older; she had the advantage of being bigger. This resulted in a long-standing argument as to who was the “big sister.”

I can’t begin to count the number of times I wished to be Donna. From time to time I would dress in her clothes and sashay across the room, looking to the mirror for validation. There was none. I could no more pretend to be my sister than she could pretend to be me. In time, I came to accept that I was what I was: a little girl with a fragile self-image. I was the wisher, the dreamer. Donna was the doer. I doubt she ever wished to be me. Perhaps in those last months she did, but it’s not likely.

~

I am not a person who resorts to fisticuffs. Never. Under no circumstances. Not only do I lack the physical prowess to win such a battle, but a lifetime of hearing Mama say “A lady never fights. It’s undignified and unacceptable” has taken root in my head.

In the heat of anger I let go of words: a snide comment or verbal put-down perhaps. But that’s the extent of it. More often than not, I simply turn and walk away. Mama’s countless admonitions about what she termed brawling did not have the same effect on Donna. She had no such inhibitions. I came to appreciate that the day I saw Sally Walther standing outside the drugstore.

~

It started because of Tommy Ballinger, a boy whose locker is two down from mine. Boys like Tommy rarely ask girls like me on dates, so when he does I get all giggly and jump at the chance.

Stupid move. I know Tommy has a thing with Sally, but when I glance over her picture is no longer stuck to his locker door.

“What’s up with Sally?” I ask.

“She’s history,” Tommy tells me, and I believe it because it’s what I want to believe.

On Friday night we go to the movies and out for sodas. Half the town sees us together at the Sweet Shoppe. I’m practically floating on a cloud and starting to picture myself wearing his varsity jacket.

This lasts for less than a day, because the next morning Sally spots me through the glass window of the drugstore and slams her fist against the palm of her other hand to illustrate what she has in mind.

Sally Walther is not a person willing to listen to words. I panic and telephone home. I plan on asking Mama to come and get me, but Donna answers.

“Mama’s not home.”

“Oh, crap.” I sigh and explain my predicament. “I’ll wait here. When Mama gets home tell her—” I hear a click.

“Donna?”

Nothing. It’s obvious she’s hung up the phone, so I call back. This time there is no answer.

I stay in the phone booth where I am safe. From here I can keep an eye on Sally and her two cronies. I watch her make a few more threatening gestures, and I try to come up with another plan.

Three times I try calling home; still no answer. As I dial again, four kids on bicycles round the corner. It’s Donna and her friends.

I’m expecting the worst, but when Donna comes to a stop and drops her bike on the sidewalk Sally makes no move.

Donna sashays over, pokes a finger toward Sally’s chest, and starts saying something. I can’t hear the words, but the sight of it gives me courage. I venture out of the phone booth and head for the door. As I step outside Sally starts to walk away. She turns, gives me a disgusted look, then keeps walking.

“What’d you say to her?” I ask.

Donna shrugs. “I said she oughta leave you alone.”