sat on the edge of my bed in the room I shared with my aunt Margie (pronounced with a hard “g”). I liked the crinkling sound my shiny blue dress made as I swung my feet back and forth. With each swing forward, I could see the tip of my black patent leather Mary Jane shoes. Still, I listened carefully to my aunt’s words. The catch in her voice told me the special day, a sunny September afternoon in 1957, might not be a fun day.
Margie brushed my hair so hard I would have cried if I wasn’t already used to it—every morning she pulled my hair into a perfect, tight ponytail with an ink-stained rubber band she’d saved from the rolled-up Boston Globe. This day, she added my straw hat with the strap that dug into my chin if I opened my mouth. Then she gave me my white cardigan sweater to hold in case it got chilly. I felt hot with my stiff blue dress and shoes and didn’t want to put on the sweater anytime soon, but Margie always knew what I might need in case of an emergency.
Margie led me to the living room sofa in our third-floor walk-up apartment on Boston’s Commonwealth Avenue. I lived with my mother and Margie, her sister, when I wasn’t staying at one of the boarding homes my mother sent me to from the time I was three months of age. Very few mothers worked in 1953, and daycare was scarce. The few women who did work usually had a relative or babysitter take care of their children in the home, but it was rare for a mother to send her child to a boarding home.
“Sit quietly now, Anne. Don’t mess up your dress, or the sisters will think you’re naughty,” Margie said.
I didn’t know what sisters she meant and I didn’t understand why they’d think I was naughty if my dress got a little wrinkled. But my mother was home, so I knew that I had better sit still. While I waited, I held my doll—I named her Ruthie—close to my side with her legs sticking straight out just like mine.
The yellow taxi pulled up to a four-story, light brick building in Watertown, just west of Boston. We climbed out of the cab and stood on the sidewalk while the driver went around to the back and struggled to pull a long box out of the trunk. My mother opened her black purse, counted some money carefully into the driver’s hand, and asked him to carry the box up to the building.
“That wasn’t part of the deal, lady,” he said, “and if you’re not going to give me a tip, why should I do you a favor?”
My mother’s face contorted into the look she got right before she slapped my face, so I hid behind Margie’s skirt and held Ruthie’s hand tight.
As the taxi pulled away, my mother said, “Well, we’ll just have to carry the damn thing.”
She and Margie each grabbed a handle on the box and lugged it across the sidewalk to the building’s entrance, their faces scrunched with the effort. They wore almost-identical black skirts and white blouses with pearl costume necklaces and earrings. The seams of their nylon stockings rose perfectly straight up the backs of their calves. Crimson lipstick provided their only spots of color. Both women had dark brown hair and deep brown eyes—the latter rare among the Irish. “Black Irish,” they might have been called, although they considered their pale, freckling skin proof of their Celtic roots. My blonde hair and blue eyes contrasted sharply with their coloring. Years later, my mother would tell me this came from my bastard of a father, making me regret my palette.
My mother pushed a button next to the front entrance. After a few minutes, a woman opened the tall, wooden door. She wore a long black dress that covered her feet and a funny black cloth wrapped around her head so it looked like she didn’t have any hair. I’d never seen anyone in such strange clothes.
“Hello,” said the lady, “I’m Sister Mary Joseph. Welcome to Rosary Academy. You must be delivering one of our new boarders.”
“Yes,” said my mother. “I’m Mrs. Mary McTiernan, and this is my sister Miss Margaret Smith.” She emphasized the “Mrs.” and the “Miss.”
“And who is this?” Sister Mary Joseph asked as she looked down at me, smiling.
“This is Anne Marie McTiernan,” my mother said.
“How old are you, Anne Marie?” the nun asked.
I looked down at my shoes.
“Anne, tell Sister Mary Joseph how old you are.” My mother pinched my shoulder.
I held up four fingers. It bothered me that I didn’t know how to show with my fingers that I was four and a half.
“Four years old? That will make you our youngest boarder.”
“Make sure you don’t spoil her,” my mother said.
“Hmm,” the nun said. “Well, then, you’d better follow me.”
Sister Mary Joseph led us down a dark hallway. My Mary Janes tapped the tiled floor. We climbed up four flights of wide staircases; my mother and aunt stopping at each step to lift the box between them. The smell of Lysol permeated the cold air. I shivered.
“This is the dormitory,” said Sister Mary Joseph. “We have only girls boarding at Rosary.”
We entered a long room. Thirty identical beds, covered with white chenille bedspreads, lined the room. Whitewashed walls contrasted sharply with the black linoleum floor and dark wood wainscoting. The room was silent. Sister Mary Joseph led us over to the first bed on the left. My mother pointed to a sign I couldn’t read taped to its foot.
“This is your new bed, Anne Marie,” she said. “This is where you’ll be sleeping from now on.”
I looked up at my mother and asked, “Where will you and Margie sleep?”
All three grown-ups laughed.
“Margie and I will sleep at home,” my mother said.
Panic shook me. I was being sent away again. For the past year, I’d lived in the apartment with my mother and aunt. Margie’s lingerie sales salary was so low that it was cheaper for her to work evenings and Saturdays, and take care of me on weekdays, than for my mother to pay for me to live at a boarding home. I loved being with Margie every day. She and I slept in the same room—so I wouldn’t disturb my mother’s sleep—and I knew that she’d comfort me if I called out for her at night. Now I felt sick to my stomach.
A brand-new doll sat on the pillow. It had perfectly curled brown hair, brown eyes, and a stiff pink dress. I hated it immediately. I hated the lady with the weird black clothes. I didn’t want to stay in this place. I wanted to go home with Margie to my own bed. I wanted to hear Margie breathing if I woke up scared in the middle of the night.
My mother opened the long box and showed me the contents. All my clothes and shoes were folded and stacked neatly, along with pink towels, white sheets, and a green blanket. My mother and aunt made the bed.
“There, honey,” my mother said, “now it’s all ready for you.” Then she put my clothes into the two drawers of a small metal cabinet that stood by the head of the bed.
“All your things are in here,” she added. “Your pajamas and underwear are in the top drawer, and your dresses and sweaters are in the bottom drawer. Your toothbrush, toothpaste, and hairbrush are here on the top of your cabinet. I’ll leave your jacket in the trunk.” She closed the lid of the trunk and slid it under the bed.
“My tummy hurts,” I said.
“You’ll be fine,” my mother snapped.
I looked at Margie. Her eyes were wet, so she looked around the room and at the nun, not at me.
“Has Anne had her dinner today?” Sister Mary Joseph asked.
“Yes, I cooked a big Sunday dinner. She ate a nice meal.”
“Good, then we’ll just give her some sandwiches in the dorm later. The cafeteria won’t be open until tomorrow.”
I wondered what a cafeteria was.
Sister