changed,’ said Tully.
‘I don’t believe you,’ Julie said. ‘What do you call Washburn Day Care every Thursday?’
Tully looked at Jennifer with a what-am-I-to-do-with-her look. Jennifer shrugged.
‘Besides,’ continued Julie, ‘what are you going to do with Jen in California? You know she’ll leave you first chance she gets. She wants to get married. She wants to have children. Right, Jen?’
‘Right, Jule,’ said Jennifer, looking at Tully.
‘Jennifer wouldn’t leave me,’ Tully said, mock pouty. ‘Would you, Mandolini?’
‘First chance I get,’ said Jennifer, smiling.
‘I don’t know. It seems a shame to throw Robin away, Tull,’ said Julie. ‘You guys sure do spend a lot of time together.’
‘A lot?’ asked Tully. ‘What, out of a whole day? A whole week? A year? Out of a life?’ Tully laughed. ‘We sure spend a lot of purposeful time together. That red leather in his ’Vette beckons us and seems better than, say, talking.’
Jennifer and Julie giggled. Jennifer was drinking a glass of milk and dipping her index finger into the glass, drawing concentric circles on the table.
‘But think about all the advantages of moving in with him,’ Julie persisted. ‘He’s got plenty of money. He’ll sire cute offspring.’
‘And Tull, think about it,’ interjected Jennifer. ‘If you ask, I’m sure he’ll buy you that house on Texas Street. Dad found out for me who owns it. An old lady.’ Jennifer raised her eyebrows. ‘A very old lady.’
Tully looked from Julie to Jennifer. ‘What is it with you guys? Leave me alone, will you? Jen, what’s the matter? What about Stanford?’
Shaking her head, Jennifer patted Tully on the arm and continued decorating the table with milk rings.
‘Think about it Tully,’ Julie said. ‘You’ll be out of your house.’
‘Yes,’ said Tully. ‘And in somebody else’s.’
‘Oh, yes, but on Texas Street! Just think!’ said Jennifer.
‘Mandolini!’ Tully exclaimed.
Jennifer laughed mildly. ‘I’m only joking, Tully,’ she said. ‘Julie, Tully doesn’t think she loves Robin. And how can you reason with a heart? Right, Tully?’ Most of the milk from Jennifer’s glass was drying on the table.
‘Right, Jen,’ said Tully, looking away.
‘Tully, how do you know you don’t love him?’ asked Julie.
‘I don’t know,’ Tully said slowly. ‘How would I know if I loved him?’
‘You’d know,’ said Julie, glancing at Jennifer. ‘Right, Jen?’
‘Right, Jule,’ Jennifer replied slowly.
Together, Jennifer, Tully, and Julie accomplished nothing that afternoon. At six in the evening they agreed to give up and surprise each other when the yearbooks came out.
In the car, Jennifer sat in the passenger seat and let Tully drive the Camaro to the Grove.
‘You’re doing well, Makker,’ she said. ‘A few more years, and you may pass your test.’
‘Get out of here,’ said Tully. ‘My test is March seventeenth.’
Jennifer shook her head. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Maybe you should pray to St Patrick.’
March 1979
The days spun on. Their pattern was the same, small and uninspired, but each blade of grass brought with it the field of spring, each rainfall washed away the smell of winter. Each breeze carried off the last of winter air. The process was slow, of each tree’s and flower’s rebirth, of each day’s light getting longer by the minute and nightfall’s coming yet later and later. Had they all seen what was growing in the spring of all their lives, they would have paid more attention to those petty things that slip by so unnoticed, so unremembered. Time, however, is slow when nothing happens; and those cracks in the foundation seemed so unrelated, so trivial, that each incident was absorbed and forgotten, the way breakfast and sunset are forgotten – as part of the sameness that filled everyone’s days, especially theirs, especially the days of the young, when they gulped the air and lived to see the better world, the grown-up world, when they could not wait for the days to end so that they could get on with the rest of their lives.
February snowed into March. And in March, it rained.
The smell of spring came with the winds and the storms. There was a tornado alert every day, and rain every day, and sun every day, too. A typical Kansas March.
Tully was busy with Robin, with keeping him away from her mother, and busy keeping herself away from her mother. She received a small scare in the first week of March when she found a letter addressed to Hedda Makker in the mailbox one afternoon. What surprised Tully about the letter wasn’t that it was addressed to Hedda Makker, but that the address was handwritten. Hedda, besides bills, never received anything – certainly nothing handwritten. Upon closer examination, Tully noticed Hedda was misspelled. Heda Makker, it said. The Grove. Okay, thought Tully, and took it upon herself to commit a federal offense.
She was glad she did when she tore open the envelope. ‘Mrs Makker,’ the note said. ‘Your daughter is fooling around with my boyfriend. A lot. Every week. She stole him from me and now she’s lying to you every Wednesday and Sunday.’
The note was unsigned. Tully wasn’t so much stunned by the arrival of the note. She half expected some form of sabotage. What surprised her was the depth and accuracy of Gail’s knowledge. Not only did she know what days Tully met Robin, but she also knew to a useful extent the difficulties Tully had with her mother.
Tully tore up the letter, deciding to keep very quiet about it to everyone. She figured that Gail must have gotten all that information from the guileless, unsuspecting Julie, who was in the same English class. If Gail now thought her ploy had succeeded in getting Tully in deep shit, then she wouldn’t attempt any more war missions.
Julie was busy with the debating society, the history club, the current events club. ‘Talk is the one four-letter word you and Tom can enjoy together,’ Tully called it.
Jennifer continued to lose weight.
Monday, March 12, at Sunset Court, when Jennifer left the kitchen for a moment, Tully mentioned the weight loss to Lynn Mandolini. Lynn got a little defensive, saying her daughter never looked better.
‘Mrs Mandolini, yes, twenty pounds ago she never looked better. I’ll be surprised if she is a hundred and ten now.’
‘Oh, Tully!’ said Lynn, lighting up and taking a drink. ‘A hundred and ten! Really!’
‘Jen,’ said Tully when Jennifer returned. ‘How much do you weigh?’
Jennifer looked as if she’d been hit. ‘I – I don’t know. Why?’
‘Jennifer, you used to get on the scale twice a day. How much do you weigh now?’
‘Tully, don’t badger her!’ Lynn said loudly.
‘Mom, Mom. It’s okay. I weigh about a hundred and fifteen,’ answered Jennifer.
Lynn looked at Tully with an I-told-you-so look. Tully stared back defiantly.
‘Oh,