Beautiful Little Fools(45)

“You little bitch,” she spat at me. Her words were so jarring, so unexpected, they felt like a slap.

Had Mrs. Pearce told her, told everyone what she thought she saw between me and Mary Margaret? I couldn’t believe she would, no matter what she might have suspected. It wasn’t the sort of thing a proper southern lady would ever speak of, and, if nothing else, Mrs. Pearce really fashioned herself a proper southern lady.

I stood and wrapped myself in my robe. “I don’t appreciate you barging into my room this way,” I huffed angrily, trying to hide my confusion wrapped in fear, with an outward sort of aggression. It was the same aggression I always channeled into the golf ball.

Jerralyn stared at me, unfazed. “We all thought you were so great at golf,” she said. “But you’ve been cheating all this time, haven’t you?” She crossed her arms in front of her chest, and I caught the headline on the newspaper she was holding: “Lady Golfer Thrown Out of Peachtree Tournament After Moving the Ball.”

Did Jerralyn think that headline was referring to me? But that was impossible and blatantly untrue, and she was utterly mistaken. “I’ve never cheated at golf in my life,” I said. “How dare you accuse me of such a thing.”

She shoved the newspaper into my trembling hands. I skimmed the article beneath the headline and saw the words Jordan Baker. I suddenly felt cold all over, too light to stand, too heavy to sit back down. I grabbed the bureau for support. This article was about me. It said I, Jordan Baker, had moved the ball, and that was how I’d come in first place yesterday. “But… but… this isn’t true,” I stammered, clutching the side of the bureau for support and for breath, neither of which it gave me. “This… didn’t happen. I never moved a ball.”

“Oh Jordan.” Jerralyn sighed and shook her head a little, like now instead of being angry, she felt sorry for me. “Mrs. Pearce told us how she saw you do it. Mrs. Pearce saw everything.”





Catherine 1921

NEW YORK




JAY GATSBY.

His name sat on the tip of my tongue, cool and a little tart, like the illicit taste of gin with lime. And yet I didn’t utter it. I just left it there, tasting it for a moment, feeling the bold, intoxicating texture of it. Instead I just looked at Myrtle and shook my head.

“Really?” she repeated. “No man in your life at all?” She rested her chin in her palms and sighed.

I’d taken a taxicab out to Queens for dinner tonight. I hadn’t spoken to Myrtle in over two weeks, and she hadn’t made it into the city for months. I was worried about her. For one thing, I knew my sister thrived on social interaction and the buzz and hum of the city, and for another, I never forgot those bruises on her neck. Every time she kept her distance from me, I wondered and worried about what it was she was hiding. Why it was exactly she didn’t want to see me.

I’d called her earlier this morning to let her know I was coming today for a visit and I hadn’t given her a chance to tell me not to. A few hours later, I’d entered her small home above George’s garage and found it immaculately clean. Myrtle herself was in a pretty floral dress and had done up her hair. But there was something in her eyes, something a little flat or a little lost. It made me feel I was right to be worried after all. Right to have come out here practically unannounced.

“I’ve told you a thousand times, Myrtle,” I said now, in response to her question about having a man in my life. “I’m never getting married.” We’d eaten a quiet dinner, just the two of us, ham and potatoes. Both had been a little dry, but I’d choked them down and complimented them all the same. Now we sipped coffee and worked our way through a small lemon cake, which was also a little dry for my taste. “I don’t need a man,” I reiterated, working my fork through the cake, watching it fold easily into crumbles.

Myrtle put a forkful of cake in her mouth and chewed carefully. “Yes, but wouldn’t it be nice to have one, Cath? You’re young and pretty. You could find a rich man who would buy you anything. Give you everything.” She sighed and finished off her piece of cake.

Looking around at her sparse, dimly lit kitchen, I knew my sister desired so much more than this life with George. I was living out some wayward fantasy in her eyes—young and living in the city. I just wished she understood that this fantasy, my life, didn’t have to be about a man. Why couldn’t supporting myself, earning my own money, and living my own life be what she wanted for me? What she wanted for herself, too? And that’s exactly why I didn’t let the name Jay Gatsby escape my lips. We’d been lovers now for months, but it was nothing more than that. It was never going to be anything more. I didn’t want a relationship and neither did he. And that was something Myrtle would never understand. If I were to mention his name now, she would hang on to any tidbit I offered her about him, even just that: Jay Gatsby. And she would fixate on it. I certainly didn’t want her doing that.

“Do you want more cake?” she asked me now. I shook my head, and she stood to cover the cake plate. The sleeve of her dress shifted a bit, and I caught a glimpse of purple encircling her wrist. The cake I’d just eaten rose in my throat, threatening to come back up, and I swallowed hard. I had been right to be worried, to come out here today.

“What’s that?” I asked, pointing to her wrist, trying to keep my voice steady. She ignored me or pretended she hadn’t heard. But clearly she had because she tugged her sleeve down a little before she finished covering the cake. “Myrtle,” I said her name loudly, and she startled a little, jumped.