Читать книгу The Son Of Someone Famous - M.E. Kerr - Страница 9

Notes for a Novel by B.B.B.

Hairgo is a waxy substance you apply warm, let dry on your skin, and then rip off in exactly ten minutes. Seven minutes had passed that night when my mother entered my bedroom and said, “Always the clown, hmmm, Brenda Belle?”

What made her say that was the wax mustache I had made from Hairgo. It was colored pink and firmly attached to my upper lip.

I made a face and bowed low, letting her think I was just fooling around. I didn’t want her to know my mustache was a depilatory, for fear she’d go into one of her famous panics.

“You know, Brenda Belle,” she said, sitting down on the edge of my bed, “playing the clown isn’t a very feminine thing to do. A funny woman is rarely a lady. I’m telling you this for your own good.”

“You’re probably right,” I said, watching the second hand on my alarm clock. I had two minutes to go before it was time to remove the wax.

“I don’t want to criticize you,” my mother continued, “but it is a fact that very few female comediennes have happy lives.”

“I don’t particularly want to be a female comedienne,” I said.

“Men laugh at funny women,” my mother said, “but they rarely fall in love with them. A man likes a serious woman, a quiet woman.”

“I plan to be a quiet, serious woman,” I told her. “I promise.”

“You don’t seem to be headed in that direction, Brenda Belle. Even now you’re intent on being the funny girl.”

“I’m just practicing for a part in a school play,” I said.

“Brenda Belle, you’re not going to take a male role in a play, are you?”

“No,” I said. “I’ve decided against it.”

My fingers were playing with the wax mustache; I was seeing if it was possible to just pull it off in front of her, without her guessing its real purpose. The wax would not give an inch.

The ten minutes were up.

“You’re at an age now when you should begin to grow out of your tomboy stage,” my mother said.

“I intend to,” I said. “Excuse me, I have to go to the bathroom.”

“Just a moment, Brenda Belle,” she said.

“What is it?” I said impatiently.

“Please sit down, dear. I came to have a little . . . to discuss certain . . . to explain—” her voice drifted away without finishing.

I suddenly realized what she was up to. It was a rotten time for it. “I know the facts of life,” I blurted out, and I could tell by the look in her eyes that she was hurt because I wouldn’t sit down.

She stood up. “I guess you don’t have time for a talk with your mother.”

“Yes, I do,” I said. “I just want to go to the bathroom first.”

“I come in here for a serious talk with you, and you sit here wearing that mustache. Then you jump up and announce you know it all. I can see you’re not in a receptive frame of mind.”

“Just let me go to the bathroom first,” I said desperately.

“Never mind,” she answered, walking toward the door. “You’d rather be a clown and a know-it-all. I can see that.”

I think she was really relieved that she didn’t have to go through with it. She was hurt, too, but more relieved than hurt, because sex was number one on the list of the ten things she least liked discussing. My father was a close second.

I felt sorry for her, and sorry for myself, because there was nothing I could do then and there to make things better. I made a dive for the bathroom, and she went downstairs wearing that particular expression which I’d seen over and over that seemed to indicate I was her major cross to bear, if not the only one.

If you’ve ever ripped away a scab before it was completely healed, you know the feeling I had when I removed the wax mustache. The manufacturers of Hairgo weren’t kidding when they advised the user to remove the wax in exactly ten minutes. Along with the wax, I removed a good deal of the skin above my upper lip. There was no blood, but there was a bright red tender bruise in the exact shape of a mustache.

For about an hour I rubbed the wound with vaseline, but nothing did any good. I was sitting on my bed, thinking of suicide and New York City again, when the telephone rang. It rang twice before my mother called up the stairs, “Brenda Belle, get that, will you? Faith and I are watching a movie.”

That may have been true, but my mother was not all that engrossed in the movie, because I heard the little click meaning she was on the line shortly after I said hello.

“It’s Adam,” he said. “Remember me?”

“Yes,” I said, and I tried to think of something funny to add, but I couldn’t, not just because I was miserable, but also because I was practically dumbfounded to think he’d call me. I wondered if he wanted to make fun of me, and I was afraid, too, knowing my mother was listening and he might mention the depilatory.

“How are you?” he said.

“Fine,” I answered.

“You’re not mad or anything?”

“No.”

“You sound different.”

“It’s hard to talk.”

“Why?” he said.

“I’m in the midst of something.”

“Oh . . . I’m sorry.”

“That’s all right.”

“I was just going to ask you if you wanted to go to a movie or something Saturday night.”

“Saturday night?” I said, picturing the scab I’d have over my upper lip by then. “This Saturday night?”

“Yes, this Saturday night.”

“I can’t,” I said.

“Are you sure you’re not mad?”

“Of course I’m not.”

“You sound different.”

“I’m doing something,” I said.

“Okay,” he said.

“Okay?” I said.

“Good-bye, then,” he said.

“Good-bye.”

I pressed the receiver button down, then up, and heard the click from the downstairs phone.

Then I sneaked out into the hall and leaned over the bannister to hear the conversation below.

“Wait for the commercial,” my Aunt Faith said. “This scene has that marvelous Billie Kay Case in it; remember her, Millie?”

I could see my mother standing by the television set, waiting for the commercial, so she could turn down the sound and tell my aunt about my telephone conversation.

“Billie Kay Case is a very sad woman,” my mother said. “It depresses me to watch her.”

“She’s a scream, though. Look at her!”

“What did she think was going to happen when she married him?” my mother said. “She was at least twenty years older!”

“Just enjoy the movie, Millie, and forget her personal life.”

“It didn’t take long for him to dump her. Five fast years. I knew he would,” my mother said. My mother is something of an authority on the personal lives of all celebrities past and present. Once a week at the beauty parlor she thumbs through all the movie magazines and gossip sheets.

“Maybe Billie Kay dumped him,” my Aunt Faith said.

“Not on your life!” my mother said emphatically. “He ditched her. He’s going around with every young thing from Washington to Hollywood. He escorted a nineteen-year-old to a White House dinner, which in my opinion is a scandal!”

“Billie Kay must be in her late fifties now,” Aunt Faith said. “This movie was made in the fifties.”

“He used her,” my mother said, “and then he tossed her out when she began to show her age.”

“She is funny, though—look, look!”

Then the commercial came on, and my mother turned down the sound.

“Faith,” my mother said, “what boy in this town is named Adam? What boy Brenda Belle’s age is named Adam? I can’t think of one.”

“I can,” said my aunt. “It’s the new boy. Charlie Blessing’s grandson.”

“His grandson by which child?” my mother asked.

“I don’t know,” my aunt said. “Charlie had three sons and then poor Annabell. I just know he’s got one of his grandsons living with him.”

“That grandson called here for Brenda Belle,” my mother said. “He asked her out.”

“He asked Brenda Belle out?”

“He did.”

“Out on a date?”

“He did.”

“He did?”

“Yes. But wait until you hear this: Brenda Belle refused.”

“How odd,” my aunt said. “The whole thing. Odd.”

“Is he a nice boy?” my mother asked.

“I have no idea. I feel sorry for him, though, living down there with Charlie.”

“I’m worried about Brenda Belle,” my mother said.

“That isn’t news,” said my aunt.

“I think she’s too busy playing the clown.”

“Better that she’s doing something happy than something sad, Millie.”

“Clowns aren’t happy,” said my mother. “Boys don’t like clowns.”

“This Adam must, if he’s asking her for a date.”

“I wish I could question her about it,” my mother said, “but then she’d know I listened to her phone conversation.”

My aunt said, “Turn up the sound now, Millie. The picture’s going on.”

After my mother turned up the sound on the TV set, she headed for the stairs.

I ran back to my bedroom. I knew she was on her way up to try and see if she could get me to talk about Adam.

By the time she got to my room, I was ready for her. I’d tied a silk scarf across my mouth, covering my Hairgo wound.

“Reach for the sky, Pardner!” I said when she walked through the door. “This is a stickup.”