Promise Me A Rainbow (4 page)

They had had a family meeting about selling the sculpture—several, in fact. He’d never kept the realities of money or the lack of it from his children, and he had given them the full details of their current budget problems. There was only one solution he could suggest, and it had been unanimously decided that the gnomes would be sold. All three of his children had voted yes, but somehow he had neglected to look into Fritz’s eyes.

Now she reluctantly followed him down the stairs. She said nothing, but she looked at him once in that way she had, which made him defensive and angry. At seven she was far too wise for her years. He doubted that Fritz would have been so world-weary if Lisa hadn’t died when she was so young and she hadn’t been cared for by people who were immersed in their own private grief and guilt. Lisa’s mother. His mother. He, himself.

Fritz had been barely two when Lisa was killed, and it was not to his credit that days—weeks—passed before he could force himself to deal with the fact that he even had this child. He left her to the care of others because, emotionally, he had died himself, and he had nothing left to give anyone. Della had been twelve and Charlie eleven, both old enough to understand what he managed to tell them about their mother’s death. But Fritz had been too young, too dependent, too much in need of him in the wake of Lisa’s dying. Sometimes he felt that even now Fritz was patiently waiting for him to come up with the fatherly concern and caring she’d been shortchanged.

Still, he thought that Fritz had come through it all with remarkable good sense. She was much more stable than the dramatically emotional Della; more logical than her intellectual but absentminded brother, Charlie. Joe didn’t worry about her. For all her quietness, she wasn’t a pushover. His being in the Mayfair stairwell at the worst possible moment was proof of that.

“That lady’s got problems of her own,” he said as they went out the French doors. “She’s upset.”

He pulled the hood on Fritz’s poncho up over her head. Fritz hadn’t asked for explanations, but he felt the need to give her one. He wasn’t above the parental standard, Because I said so, but generally he tried to respect a child’s need to know.

“Because Jonathan’s getting married?” she asked, hurrying to keep up. “And Ellen Jessup’s pregnant?”

Joe glanced at her as they walked to where he’d left the truck. The truck was parked at the end of the street, and the man, Jonathan, was just ahead of them, getting into a small white Mercedes-Benz.

“Is it?” Fritz asked again, and he tried not to smile. He hadn’t sorted out the scene they’d just witnessed to that degree, but he wasn’t surprised that Fritz had. Fritz didn’t miss much. He had always tried to be truthful with his children, but it occurred to him suddenly that Fritz was the only one of the three who seemed to expect it.

“That would be my guess, yes,” he said.

“Couldn’t we just leave her your business card? I’ve got one in my pocket.”

“No.”

Joe unlocked the door for Fritz to get in, giving her his hand as she climbed into the battered pickup truck, which Della was ashamed to be seen in, and which Charlie didn’t seem to notice at all. Fritz, on the other hand, wanted it painted candy-apple red. If he ever got the money, maybe he
would
paint the damn thing candy-apple red.

“Why?” Fritz said, looking into his eyes.

“Why what?”

“Why can’t I give her a business card?”

He didn’t answer her until he’d gotten in on the other side. “Because we can’t just hand her a card with ‘D’Amaro Brothers Construction’ on it and expect her to understand what it’s for. You’d have to give her some kind of explanation and, believe me, Fritz, that woman doesn’t want to hear any explanations now.”

Because she’s going to cry? Fritz almost said. She knew that grown-ups didn’t like children around when they cried. Joe didn’t. He didn’t cry much anymore, or at least it had been a long time since she’d caught him at it. She hated it when he cried, when he sat in the dark, smelling like beer, and held Lisa’s picture even if he couldn’t see it. She never knew what to do, only that somebody should do
something
. She only knew enough to stay away and pretend it wasn’t happening.

She leaned forward on the seat a bit to count the number of streets from the Mayfair to Second Street. She knew how to get from home to Market Street, and then from Market Street to Second Street, because Charlie had showed her when he took her with him to the library, and she was almost certain Joe wouldn’t go back to see the sad lady who had the gnomes again.

“Can we come back and see the lady tomorrow?” she asked as a test.

“Not tomorrow,” Joe said.

“Sometime soon?”

“Maybe.”

Maybe
. She pressed her lips together and looked out the window, still counting streets, satisfied now that she’d have to handle this matter herself.

Joe pulled the truck in front of the house, but he didn’t come in with her because Charlie’s light was on and because Joe was running late.

“Tell Della I won’t be home until ten or so,” Joe said. “Tell her she doesn’t have to worry about keeping dinner warm for me. And tell her I’ll be working on the interiors at the Allen job if she needs me for anything. Fritz, are you listening to me?”

“I’m listening,” she said, because that was the truth. “Bye, Joe.”

He frowned for a moment, then grinned. “Go on. You’ll get all wet.”

She gave him a wave as she ran up the walk, taking great pains not to splash in the puddles. Sometimes she liked to do that—stomp the water out of the puddles—but she didn’t do it today. Joe was watching, and he was a builder. He and Uncle Michael were losing a lot of money because of the rain, and she didn’t want him to think she enjoyed it.

She stood on the front porch at the door, pulling back the screen and waiting until Joe thought she was about to go inside and drove away. Then she waited a moment longer until his truck had gone around the corner. She stuck her hand into the pocket of her poncho. She had three dollars in nickels, dimes and quarters—milk money she’d saved from school—and a package of dry-roasted peanuts; plenty of money for the bus fare to the Mayfair and plenty to eat until she got back for dinner.

She let the screen door close slowly. Charlie was probably doing something at his computer. There wasn’t much of a chance that he’d hear her even if she came in the front door with a marching band, but she didn’t want to risk it. She smiled a rare smile at the thought of leading a whole big band in red marching suits right into the living room—and Charlie not even looking up.

She looked at her watch, an old white plastic digital one that Della didn’t wear anymore because the painted flowers on the band had nearly worn off. Fritz didn’t care about the flowers; she cared about the time—six o’clock. The bus came to the corner at six-fifteen, only she couldn’t wait at this corner. One of the neighbors might see her and ask what she was doing and did Della or Charlie or Joe know she was out here in the rain? They were sure to ask if they saw her, because she was a motherless child and whatever she did seemed to be everyone else’s business. It was her opinion that people naturally assumed that children with mothers had permission and children without mothers didn’t—and were up to something.

She jumped off the porch into the wet grass, causing a splash of cold rainwater she felt on the backs of her legs and inside her running shoes. But she didn’t linger. She ran as fast as she could around the house and through the backyard, taking all the shortcuts she knew between the neighbors’ garbage cans and compost heaps to get to the next block ahead of the bus.

The bus was coming when she rounded the corner, and she had no time to reflect upon the advisability of this venture. She had never gone anyplace without Della or Charlie or Joe knowing, but she didn’t hesitate. She got on and carefully dropped the correct change into the slot, smiling slightly at the driver, who clearly thought she was about to make his life miserable with a dollar bill. She sat in the back, knowing that the bus would stop at Market Street without her having to pull the cord. She would get on another bus then, one going in the direction of Mayfair. She was a little worried about knowing when to signal the driver to stop. She had to ride for six streets. She’d count five, and in the middle of the fifth she’d pull the cord. Simple. She hoped.

The second bus was crowded with people, and she had a hard time getting to a window so she could count. She remained standing, letting a girl with a big stomach that meant she was going to get a baby sit down in her place. The girl was chewing bubble gum, and she blew a bubble, then popped it loudly. Fritz wished she had bubble gum instead of peanuts. She was hungry, and peanuts were a lot of trouble. She couldn’t count streets and eat them at the same time. She would have to pay attention to every mouthful to keep them from falling between her fingers, and it would be hard to do that and count, too.

She squirmed to get down the aisle, trying to move around a fat boy carrying a big old-fashioned radio. He was very wide, as wide as the whole aisle almost, and he had on a red beret with buttons pinned all over it. She read the ones she could read: U-2 and Sting and ZZ Top. He was wearing earphones, and Fritz was close enough to feel the bass notes from the music in the pit of her stomach. He didn’t move when she pushed him in the back.

“Where you going, baby?” a black woman asked kindly, in spite of Fritz’s squirming to get past. The woman smelled nice, like when Fritz took a bath and Della let her open a new bar of soap.

“The Mayfair,” Fritz told her, and the woman smiled.

“You all mashed in there where you can’t see nothing, baby. You want me to pull the buzzer cord for you?”

“Yes, please,” Fritz said politely, wondering if she should offer to pay the woman for doing it.

But the woman didn’t seem to want any money. She pulled the buzzer cord when it was time and made the fat boy move so Fritz could get off.

“Thank you very much,” Fritz said, and the woman patted her head.

It was still raining, and Fritz stood at the corner for a moment before she crossed the street to the Mayfair. She took a deep breath. There was no sense in worrying now. She was here, and she wanted to see the woman who had bought the gnomes. She wanted to see Daisy and Eric, too, and she had to get back before someone missed her. She hadn’t really thought about that part of the plan—how to get home before she was missed—and she didn’t waste time with it now. She waited until a line of cars went by, then darted across the street. The Mayfair faced the side street rather than Second, and she walked along the sidewalk under the big trees to the front door. The rain sounded louder under the tree, and she decided that she liked the Mayfair’s front doors. They had a sort of little porch over it that was held up with chains, so people coming out wouldn’t get wet before they got their umbrellas up. And she liked the panes of glass in the doors. She could see inside easily, to where a lamp sat on a little table in the foyer. Someone had turned the lamp on, making the dark foyer look warm and dry. She had always liked looking into places from the outside and wondering what kind of people were in there, and if it smelled like chocolate-chip cookies baking, and if there were children with a mother.

She had some trouble with the doors because they had swollen from the rain, but she managed. If Charlie had been with her, he wouldn’t have opened the doors for her. He’d have made her do it herself, to build her character. She was glad that Charlie did that, worried about her character. It made her feel better about things, knowing that even if she didn’t have a mother, with Charlie’s help her character would be all right.

The first door by the stairs was open, and she glanced through the screen at the old woman inside. She could hear the television playing—the man on Channel 6 talking about all the rain. She expected the woman to call out to her as she passed, but she didn’t. Fritz climbed the stairs quickly, the soles of her shoes making little squeaking noises on the wooden steps.

Three flights was a long way up, and she was panting by the time she reached the right door. She waited for a moment to catch her breath before she knocked. Her first knock was weak and timid, and no one answered. She tried again, knocking louder this time, and again she waited.

Nothing happened.

She looked around her, wondering if she should knock again. Maybe Ms. Holben had gone somewhere. No. No, she didn’t think Ms. Holben had gone. Ms. Holben was going to cry, and, when grown-ups cried, they sat in a dark room at home to do it. She took another deep breath. The door across the hall cracked open, and Fritz could see half a face wearing eyeglasses.

“Knock louder, honey. She’s at home,” the face said, and the door closed.

Fritz knocked again, hard this time. She tried to do it the way they did it on the television—really hard—and her knuckles hurt. She could hear muffled noises on the other side, but it was a long time before the door opened.

“Yes?” the woman, Ms. Holben, said. She still had on the same clothes—a denim skirt and a white blouse and red shoes. Her voice was whispery soft, and the room was dark behind her.

Fritz pushed the hood off her head. She should have done that sooner. She shouldn’t be standing inside with a dumb hood on her head. Ms. Holben didn’t seem to notice, and Fritz searched her pocket for Joe’s card. That was something else she should have done. She should have found the card before she knocked at the door.

It was in her jeans pocket, and it took her a moment to locate it. She kept glancing at Ms. Holben, expecting her to say something, but she didn’t. She just waited, and Fritz liked her for that, for waiting and not asking a lot of questions, as if Fritz didn’t know where she was or what she was doing there. She handed Ms. Holben the card, wishing she’d put it in another pocket so it wouldn’t be so bent now.

Ms. Holben stepped out into the hall to read it, holding it under the light in the ceiling. Fritz was relieved to see that while her face was still sad, she wasn’t crying.

“D’Amaro Brothers Construction,” Ms. Holben said, her voice puzzled. Joe had been right. Ms. Holben didn’t understand, and Fritz had forgotten all about giving an explanation.