The Secrets on Chicory Lane: A Novel(15)
All the houses on the block were more or less the same.
I had a habit of leaving the front door unlocked in the daytime so I could go in and out without a key. In those days, kids didn’t carry house keys like they do now. I don’t think I even owned one. Sometimes, my mother would admonish me. “We can’t have any Tom, Dick, or Harry walking in our house,” she’d say. The fact that our neighborhood was, allegedly, very safe didn’t make locking the door a huge priority for me. Mom kept saying she’d get a key made that I could use, but I guess she never did.
As a matter of fact, the kids in our neighborhood did have something of an unofficial open-door policy. If you were good friends with someone, and his or her door was unlocked, you could go inside. There were times when I’d come out of my bedroom, walk down the hall, enter the living room—and there was Eddie, sitting and waiting for me. Several days that June, during the weeks Eddie and I were fooling around, he just let himself in and turned on the television. It was fine, a regular occurrence at our house. We’d sit and watch a show together while my mother tended to baby Michael in the nursery, the bedroom next to mine. I wouldn’t have been allowed to have Eddie over if we were alone. Mom stayed in the bedrooms most of the time, and Eddie and I were often by ourselves in the living room. We had to put up with her periodically coming through on her way to the kitchen and back. We managed to sneak in a few kisses. Whenever Michael did his colicky child act, Mom would calm him down and retreat to her own room to lie down. As soon as she did, he’d cry again. So, I often got up to perform the duty. The crying annoyed Eddie. He always complained that we couldn’t hear the TV because of Michael.
“Let’s go to the bomb shelter,” he’d suggest.
One day, my mind was made up. I don’t know why or how I finally came to the decision to tell him I didn’t want to go to the bomb shelter anymore. It happened too long ago for me to totally recall what was going on in my head at the time. I had enjoyed the encounters in our secret place, but soon he seemed to want to do more taboo stuff than just kissing, and I felt uncomfortable. Eddie thought I didn’t like him anymore. That wasn’t true. I liked him tremendously; I just didn’t want to do what we had done that very first time in the bomb shelter. Maybe I was afraid of being caught. Perhaps I had feelings of guilt. I still enjoyed being with him, and I allowed him to kiss me, but the truth is I was freaked out by the shelter—it was creepy. I didn’t like the claustrophobic feeling I got when I spent more than a half hour in its basement. Claustrophobia is something I’ve experienced my whole life, I’m afraid; I have never liked confined spaces. An airplane trip is tolerable for several hours, but if it’s ten hours or more in the air, I get anxious and restless. I hate excursions to the Far East!
Nevertheless, during this period, Eddie and I continued to be very close. We told each other everything—all our secrets and wishes and dreams. Eddie wanted to be a great artist, one who drew comics. I thought I wanted to act on stage—and I did, a little—but mostly I wanted to write plays. I suppose I have already accomplished my childhood goals. Eddie eventually did do some work in comics in his twenties and thirties, but not much after that.
Eddie’s cat Jimmy died around this time. He was found one morning lying in Eddie’s front yard. I didn’t see it for myself, but I heard about it. Eddie was very upset. He displayed a vulnerability I hadn’t seen before, and claimed his father had killed Jimmy because he hated the cat and wanted to punish Eddie for something ridiculous. For days afterward, all Eddie would do was curse his father and repeat how much he hated him. I felt bad for Eddie, but I was sorrier for the cat. Jimmy, though a bit wild, had been a good pet. I was finally starting to agree with Eddie that Mr. Newcott was a terrible person.
For the rest of June, Eddie and I spent a lot of time in the park. I never went back to the bomb shelter with him; we also didn’t go into his house. He’d come over to mine, but he couldn’t stand hearing Michael cry and would leave soon after. At the end of June, my mother finally came to me and said, “You’re too young to be kissing boys.” I clearly remember those distinct words and how shocked I was to hear them. How did she know? She’d never seen us. It was the first time Mom had ever said anything about me spending so much time with Eddie. She had cautiously allowed us to “play together,” but she kept asking me if I knew any girls to call. What happened to Sally? I explained that Eddie was my best friend; he was like a brother to me.
“I’m not kissing boys,” I responded.
“Don’t lie to me, young lady, or you’ll be spending the summer grounded.”
I didn’t argue with her, but I kept seeing Eddie. There was really no way to stop us getting together in the park without keeping me at home, and that wasn’t going to happen. And besides, she really couldn’t complain about me—I did my share of helping around the house with the baby and all. I had my chores, and I always did them. I fed Michael and changed his diapers and played with him. Still, most of the time he just cried. I suppose Mom took him to the pediatrician to find out if there was anything else wrong, but it was just one of those things. Some babies have a hard time being colicky, and Michael would have to outgrow it. We did everything we could—holding him, burping him more often, rubbing his back and tummy, and taking him for car rides and walks in the stroller, but they were of no use. At least Michael liked his rattle. It was a blue-and-white barbell-shaped toy about six inches long. When Michael shook it, his eyes grew wide as if amazed that he could cause the thing to make such a noise. The rattle quickly became a first-response cure for attacks of colic. “Quick! Where’s his rattle? Oh, here it is, under the blanket.” Though it didn’t work all the time to alleviate his discomfort, the rattle became an additional appendage to his little hand.