Authors: Jill McCorkle

Crash Diet (25 page)

BOOK: Crash Diet

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By the time graduation came around and I had spent two months as a
bona puella
with no dates at all, things died down a little. I spent most of my time with Bill, the two of us playing cards or talking while Granddaddy stared at
us. There were so many nights when I almost told Bill the whole story, but I couldn’t risk it. By then (despite her husband’s differing opinion) Mrs. Wilkins had gone out of her way to show me all kinds of financial aid forms just
in case you might be interested, a smart young woman such as yourself
. We never
said
anything about what I knew but, as they say, a picture paints a thousand words and we were doing it all with our eyes. Mr. Wilkins watched her every move like he was waiting for a mistake. But the worst part of it all was the way my parents couldn’t look me full in the face for a while.

Sometimes when I think about it all, I wish that I had never crept out that night while Bill was sleeping. Then I would’ve just gone on about my business, to the carnival and then out to the Royal Villa Inn, where I would’ve taken my clothes off. Donnie would’ve gone off to school and I would’ve stayed at home—not a virgin—and worked somewhere like Pick-a-Chick, ending my day with bunions and a polyester uniform that smelled of grease. I would have eventually gotten around to going to Tech; I would have had to take the long route. Would it have been worth it, that one thrilling moment? Sometimes I think maybe it would’ve because I loved Donnie Wilkins like I’d never loved anybody. Sometimes I still think about kissing him and imagine myself in black lingerie writhing on a bed like Madonna.

Instead, I was called into The Counselors’ office one day late in the spring to be told that I had a full scholarship to the state university. “It was very lucky that there was an open spot this late in the year; I’m sure you’ll do very, very well,” Mrs. Wilkins said and handed me a letter that spelled it all out.

I wanted to say “mmmmm, mmmmm, mmmmm,” as I looked over the letter but instead I said “thank you.” Mr. Wilkins was standing there in all his Tinkertoy glory, acting like he was the one who had gotten it for me.

“Thank
you
,” she said, and it was clear that she meant it. It was the first time she ever looked me square in the eye and smiled.

On graduation night, my scholarship and attendance to State were announced along with all the others (including Donnie’s acceptance to Yale), and when I walked across the stage to get my diploma from Mr. Sinclair it seemed he held my hand a little longer and a little tighter than he had everyone else’s. It was like a silent pact, this scholarship of mine. It was as binding as the one Donnie and I had made to each other even though we’d never seen it through. I looked up at the rows of seats in the auditorium until I found my parents and Bill, all three of them waving at me. I walked under those bright lights while Mr. Sinclair told the whole auditorium that I planned to go to State and become an architect. I figure I’ve got the rest of my life to fall
in love and take my clothes off for a man, but I don’t have so long to be my parents’ future. I mean, someday they’re going to be sitting there like Monterey Jack, staring at me with a blank empty look, and I want to know that I made at least one decision that was right.

Published by
Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill
Post Office Box 2225
Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27515-2225

a division of
Workman Publishing Company, Inc.
225 Varick Street
New York, New York 10014

This is a work of fiction. While, as in all fiction, the literary perceptions and insights are based on experience, all names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. No reference to any real person is intended or should be inferred.

The author wishes to extend a long overdue thanks to Ann Crowther, Mimi Fountain, Bettye Dew, Liz Darhansoff, Susan Cobb, and Linda Dunn for their invaluable assistance and friendship. And, as always, thanks to Louis Rubin, Rhoda and David Shapiro, Melba and John McCorkle, Dan and Claudia.

Some of the stories originally appeared, sometimes in slightly different versions, in the following periodicals, to whose editors grateful acknowledgment is made: “The First Union Blues” in
Southern Magazine
, “Crash Diet” in
Cosmopolitan
, “Waiting for Hard Times to End” and “Comparison Shopping” in
The Southern Review
, “Departures” in
Atlantic Monthly
, “Gold Mine” in
The Greensboro Review
, “Words Gone Bad” in
New Virginia Review
, “Man Watcher” in
The Crescent Review
, and “Carnival Lights” in
Seventeen
. Two stories also appeared in
New Stories from the South
.