The Mutual Admiration Society(18)

Damnation!

I switch off the water faucet and call out, “Bir—Robin Jean?”

When she doesn’t answer, Here I am, Tessie! the way she’s supposed to if I lose sight of her, I wipe my soapy hands off on my shorts and run through the dining room to check for her in the living room. She’s not on the green shag carpet in front of the Motorola television set, and she wouldn’t go into the basement by herself, so I dash back through the kitchen and head up the stairs two at a time. “Honey?”

After I poke my head into the bathroom and our bedroom and come up empty, that only leaves the last place that I was dreading looking for Birdie in the first place. I really don’t want to find my sister in what was once the most special spot in the house. It used to smell like Daddy’s Old Spice, and there were always matchbooks and a pack of his Lucky Strike cigarettes on his bed stand, and a deck of cards sitting on top of the bureau, and just being in there filled me to the brim with love. But ever since we lost him, when I even think of going in there, a missing sadness comes crashing down on me, the same way it’s doing right this minute. I have to plaster myself against the hallway wall to keep myself from getting knocked to my knees. But what choice do I have? I made a solemn vow to step into Daddy’s shoes and I’m not going to let him down. Not again. I promised to take tender loving care of Birdie and that’s what I’m going to do. Come Hell or high water.

So I take a deep breath and try to push away the missing sadness the best I can, take shaky baby steps down the hall, and through the bedroom door. Because I’m feeling roughed-up when I plop down next to my sister on the edge of the bed Daddy used to snore in, I take an extra tight hold of her little hand. To steady myself, of course, but also to keep her glued to me. If Birdie starts to act up and do something really weird and loony, Louise, who is sprucing herself up at her vanity table, could change her mind and decide that “somebody more qualified” needs to keep watch over my sister today instead of me. I can’t risk that. The Finley sisters got what I’m almost positive is a kidnapping murder to investigate that could earn us great running-away bucks. That means getting stuck on Gert Klement’s front porch all day so she can keep her evil eye on Birdie and me while Louise is at her new job is completely out of the question.

I know that our mother has got to report to work by 8:15 a.m., but what I don’t know is how long she’ll be taking money for gas or tire-changing or whatever else a cashier at a filling station does, besides hopefully steal some of the big bills out of the till so we don’t lose our house. Will she be up at the Clark for the same eight hours that she spent at the hat shop called Turner’s Toppers that she quit after two weeks? It’s not like I’m going to miss her or nothin’, I just need to know when she’ll be back, so Birdie and me don’t get caught with our hands in the cookie jar.

I fake-yawn and ask Louise very ho-hum, “When will you be home for supper?”

“I won’t be,” she says as she brushes one more coat of polish on the last of her nails. Usually she chooses something eye-catching, but I guess clear polish must be better for cashiers than Revlon’s Matador Cape. “Mister Gallagher and I are going out to Mama Mia’s to celebrate my first day on the job.”

Hmmm. It’s good news that she’s going to be gone all day and into the night, because it gives my sister and me lots of time to do our snooping. And usually I’d also be 100% glad that we wouldn’t be saying Grace tonight over one of her revolting “gourmet” meals, but I am not happy one iota about her going out to eat with what’s-his-name at Mama Mia’s Ristorante. The last time the Finley family ate there together, we had such a swell time. We were celebrating ten years of Louise and Daddy’s being married. She was still called Mom then, and her and him slurped spaghetti like Lady and the Tramp, and on the drive home, I laughed so hard at Daddy’s jokes that I got the hiccups and Birdie stuck her head out of the woody car window and lapped the fast air the way she loves to, and Louise sang “That’s Amore” and didn’t even mind that her hair got mussed when her husband pulled her closer.

I haven’t figured out yet how to stop memories of the good old days from squeezing my heart so hard, so the missing sadness jumps out of the shadows and bushwhacks my heart again. It travels up my throat and wants to come out of my eyes, but I’m trying with every ounce of strength I got not to break our mother’s #2 Commandment—“Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about”—because blubbering could tick her off enough to sentence us to Gert’s porch for the whole day, too.

So I swallow, snort back the sad, and ask her, “If you’re goin’ out, what are Robin and me supposed to eat for supper?”

“TV dinners.”

At that news, Daddy’s “little dreamboat”—another nickname he called my sister, whose brain doesn’t have an anchor, so she tends to drift off to parts unknown—shouts, “Ship . . . ship . . . hurray!” because she really adores the gummy brownie that comes in Swanson’s fried chicken dinner and she is not at all good at remembering famous sayings.

“Theresa.” Louise snaps her gold compact shut and drops it into her red pocketbook. “Missus Klement has agreed to check in on you two until I get home tonight, and if she has to call me at work to report that you and your sister left the house for any reason other than to take the garbage out or go to confession—” The ah-OO-ga horn that belongs to her new boyfriend’s Chevy blares below the bedroom window. “Do not climb over the cemetery fence or peek in people’s windows or . . . or get yourselves into any other fixes, or I’ll . . .” It must be a wave in the mirror or my eyes playing tricks on me or something, because her reflection looks sad when she says, “I’ll have to take away your Three Musketeers bars for an entire month, Robin.”