Melody Read online

  I fell to my knees in front of the stone and bowed my head to say a little prayer and then I plucked a blade of grass growing on the grave and put it inside Papa George's pocket watch. It would always be with me, I thought. I kept the watch open so some of "Beautiful Dreamer" would play. Daddy loved that song, too.

  Mommy and Archie were honking the Chevy's horn again.

  I closed the watch, stood up, and gazed at the mountains in the distance, drinking in the trees and the bushes. I wanted to press the memory of this place into my mind as firmly as I had pressed the blade of grass into the pocket watch.

  Then I kissed Daddy's gravestone, leaving some of my tears on top of it before I turned to walk away. I got back into the car without a word. Archie and Mommy both glanced at me and then he turned the car around and we started down the road that would lead us north, first to Richmond.

  Mommy squealed with delight as we passed through the town and beyond the sign that read, Now Entering Sewell, West Virginia.

  "I'm leaving!" she cried. "I'm really getting out of here. My prison sentence is over!"

  I gazed at her and squinted. What had she meant by that? I would have asked, but my chest ached so, I knew my voice would crack as soon as I tried to speak.

  Archie sped up. They turned on the radio and began to sing along with the music. Mammy swung around to look at me.

  "Oh, be happy, Melody. Please. Be happy, if not for yourself, then for me."

  "I'll try, Mommy," I said in a voice barely above a whisper.

  "Good."

  The scenery whipped by. I barely paid attention, but I saw enough familiar territory fall back to fill my heart with sadness. I gazed through the rear window, watching Sewell disappear behind a hill, and with it, the cemetery in which Daddy rested.

  Then I turned around and looked ahead. Trembling, I felt no less frightened and confused than a newborn baby pulled kicking and screaming into the future, terrified at the unknown.

  4

  The Girl

  out of the Country

  .

  I closed my eyes and lay back in the seat.

  Before Daddy was killed, he, Mommy, and I had gone to the beaches in Virginia a few times, but other than those trips, we hadn't traveled many places. I had never been north, and had only read about and seen pictures of cities like New York, Washington, D.C., and Boston. Mommy tried to get me excited about the trip by telling me we would see Washington and Boston on the way to the Cape. Someday, she said, we'll go to New York City. She said she had been there once herself, but she went with her elderly adoptive parents who weren't much fun. She could barely remember it.

  "But we'll have wonderful times going to museums and shows and eating in the famous restaurants. Right, Richard?"

  "Absolutely," Archie replied. "Your life is really just beginning, Melody."

  "See?" Mommy said.

  As we rode on, I listened to their conversation. Archie talked about the cities he had been to, comparing them, complaining about this one or that one, raving about the others. He claimed to know the best restaurants in New York and Chicago. He had been to Las Vegas many times and Los Angeles at least three times. He bragged about the people in the entertainment industry he had met and gotten to know at the various bars and restaurants where he had worked. He said he was sure he could call any of them on the phone and get them to consider Mommy. Mommy squealed and laughed with delight at all his promises. I couldn't believe she was so gullible, but then I remembered Daddy once telling me that if you want something to be true hard enough, you'll ignore all the proof that it's not so. Mostly, you won't ask questions that give you answers you don't want to hear.

  Mommy should be asking Archie Marlin if he was so friendly with all these important people, why didn't he have a better job himself? How did he end up in Sewell? I was tempted to lean forward and fire these questions at him myself, but I didn't want to anger Mommy so I tried to sleep instead.

  We stopped for gas, got some snacks and drove until we reached Richmond. Archie bragged about knowing a little Italian restaurant, the owners of which he claimed would surely remember him and give us special treatment. He promised Mommy he would take us someplace special every step of the way. However, when we turned down the street where the Italian restaurant was supposed to be, it wasn't there anymore.

  "That's the trouble with these little restaurants," he remarked. "They go in and out of business so quickly. Let's just stop at that roadside diner," he decided and pulled into the parking lot.

  I wasn't hungry, but Mommy insisted I eat something. While we waited for our food, I took a closer look at Archie Marlin, trying to understand what Mammy liked about him, especially after she had been married to a man as handsome and strong as Daddy.

  Besides having patches of freckles on his face, Archie had them on the backs of his hands as well. His pink skin was interrupted here and there by white blotches. It looked as if he had been splattered with permanently staining milk. I thought his wrists were not much wider than mine or Mommy's, and I laughed to myself at the thought of him lifting a pick axe or a shovel. No wonder the heaviest thing he ever hoisted was a glass of beer.

  Archie Marlin was full of nervous energy. He lacked Daddy's strong, quiet, calm manner. Archie's gaze was forever wandering. When he answered questions, he rarely looked at you. He looked down or up at the ceiling or fiddled with a spoon while he replied. While we waited for our food he described how he had once been a Blackjack dealer in a Las Vegas casino. He demonstrated how he would flip cards and hide aces in the palm of his hand. He'd been one of the best Blackjack dealers in the whole city, he said.

  "So why did you leave that job?" I blurted, finally filled to the brim with his stories.

  "I was underage," he said. "And," he added with a wink, "I was throwing my pay back into the casino looking for the big win all the time, just like the rest of the poor fools. But it was fun for a while."

  "It must have been exciting," Mommy said. "The lights, the glamour, all those rich people, the entertainers you must have met."

  "Yeah, sure," he said, as if he had been doing that all his life. "I've had some pretty good times in Vegas, but I have a pretty good time wherever I am."

  "Then why did you end up in Sewell?" I asked as sharply as I had intended. Mommy threw me a reprimanding look, but I kept my eyes fixed on Archie. He hinged his lips at the corners and smiled like a cat.

  "It looked like a nice little town at the time," he replied. "I thought I'd settle down, take it easy. I thought I was ready for the simple life, but I was wrong." He laughed, then Mommy laughed too. "Boy, was I wrong about that."

  "There's nothing wrong with a simple life," I snapped. They both stopped laughing. "What's wrong with having a decent job and friends you can count on and a nice house?"

  Archie shrugged. "Nothing, if you're seventyfive or eighty."

  "That's stupid," I said.

  Mommy scowled. "Melody. You apologize. Go on."

  "It's all right," Archie said. "She's confused. Remember what they say, you can take the girl out of the country, but you can't take the country out of the girl." He winked at me.

  "I don't care if the country stays in me," I muttered.

  "That's because you really haven't been anywhere yet. Just wait," he promised. "You'll come around to my way of thinking."

  Hardly, I thought. I'd rather be buried forever in a coal mine.

  Our food came. I ate sullenly while they jabbered on about the things they were going to see and do. Every time Archie mentioned a new place, Mommy squealed. He had been to Niagara Falls, of course, and he had traveled through Yellowstone and he had seen the Grand Canyon, had-ridden over the Golden Gate Bridge and had been to the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. He had even seen the Alamo, and claimed he had gone river rafting and skiing in Utah.

  "You must be a lot older than you look," I remarked in a casual tone.

  "What? Why?" He held his forkful of food at his mouth and waited for my reply, his
thin lips stretching into another plastic smile.

  "Because if we believe all the places you've been to, you're about a hundred."

  The smile finally left his face. "Well, I don't lie, missy," he said. "I can't help it if you've been shut up in a small town all your life." He realized how angry he sounded, glanced quickly at Mommy, and replaced his angry expression with a syrupy smile. "But, thankfully, that's all going to change. Right, Haille?"

  "Yes." She shot a fiery look at me. "It definitely is."

  I shut up after that. They wanted to have coffee and dessert, but I didn't. I asked to be excused and was permitted to wait in the car. Neither seemed unhappy about getting rid of me. Archie gave me the keys and I left the diner and flopped in the rear seat, fuming and frustrated. They took their time. It was nearly a half hour before they came out, arm in arm, giggling like children.

  "How's the country princess doing?" Archie asked as he started the engine.

  "Wonderful," I said.

  "Good, because we don't want any unhappy country princesses in our chariot, do we Queen HaiIle?"

  "No," she said. "It's against the law to be unhappy, isn't it?"

  "Exactly. I, King Archie--I mean, King Richard--do hereby declare all tears and sadness prohibited from our lives from this day forward. Anyone who complains about anything gets a demerit. Anyone who has two demerits becomes the gopher."

  "Gopher?" Mommy asked.

  "Yeah, you know: go for this, go for that."

  Mommy got hysterical with laughter and we were off. "Where were you born?" I asked Archie after a few minutes on the road.

  "Me? Detroit."

  "Don't you have any family?"

  "Not that I care to remember," he said.

  "Why not?"

  "Melody," Mommy chastised, "I taught you better than that. You know better than to pry into someone else's personal affairs," she said.

  "I wasn't prying. I was just making

  conversation, Mommy. You complained about my being too quiet before, didn't you?"

  "Yes, but you don't have to cross-examine Richard, do you?"

  "I just wondered if it wasn't the other way around," I said with a shrug.

  "What do you mean?" Archie asked.

  "I just wondered if it wasn't your relatives that would rather not remember you."

  "Melody!"

  Archie wagged his head. "She's a card. You're going to do just fine, Melody." In the rearview mirror, I saw his smile fade and his eyes suddenly turn glassy cold.

  "She's not usually like this," Mommy explained. "It's all the excitement, I'm sure."

  Archie said nothing. He turned on the radio. Darkness grew thicker and we drove into a shower that turned into a downpour. The windshield wipers couldn't keep up and they were apparently worn out anyway. The window became lined with streaks.

  "Looks like we won't make as much time and distance as I had hoped," Archie remarked. "Best thing would be to find a motel and pull in for the night."

  "Whatever you think, Richard," Mommy said. "You're the seasoned traveler. We're in your capable hands." It was enough to make me want to puke. I stared angrily out the front window into the darkness, interrupted now and then by oncoming car headlights. They made the drops of rain look like slivers of ice that sent shivers down my spine.

  About ten minutes later, Archie turned the car into the parking lot of a motel. Rain was falling in sheets by now, so hard we could barely see the motel's neon sign. Archie pulled his jacket over his head and ran through the raindrops to the office door.

  The moment he left the car, Mommy turned on me. "Melody, I wish you would treat Richard with respect. He is an adult, you know."

  "What did I do?"

  "You talked to him as if he was one of your schoolfriends, and I don't want you asking lots of personal questions. It's impolite. If he wants to tell us about himself, he will. Okay?"

  "I really don't care."

  "Well, start caring. We're going to be together for a long time. We have to get along. We should be grateful Richard is doing all the driving." She leaned toward me, her eyes full of pleading.

  "Oh, honey, try to be happy. Soon you're going to see wonderful new things. Think of that," she cajoled. "You should be happy that you're getting this opportunity. It's one I never had. I was forced to live with people I didn't like and endure terrible things."

  "Like what?" I asked, my interest piqued.

  "Someday I'll tell you," she replied, a distant look in her eyes, the look of someone lost in her memories. "When will you tell me?"

  "When you're old enough to understand."

  "I'm old enough, Mommy. I'm fifteen. You should take a good look at me once in a while. I'm not a child anymore."

  "I look at you plenty. You're still growing and at a sensitive stage. I remember how it was when I was your age. Trust me." She reached over the seat and put her hand on mine. "I want only what's best for you. You believe that, don't you, Melody?"

  "Yes, Mammy," I said, wanting so much to believe her.

  The door was pulled open and Archie hopped in, slamming it shut behind him. He brushed the rain off his face.

  "Man, what a storm! But we're in luck. This place was almost filled. They had one room left."

  "Good," Mommy said.

  One room? I thought. All of us in one little room? Archie drove ahead and parked in front of Room C.

  "Okay, we're going to have to move quickly. I'll get the door open first and then you girls decide what you need for overnight and we'll just bring that in, okay?"

  "A-ok," Mommy said.

  He jumped into the rain again.

  Mommy turned to me. "What do you need, Melody?"

  "Mommy, how can we all sleep in the same room?" I asked, mournfully.

  "I'm sure there's two beds, silly."

  "But . ."

  "Now start acting like the grown-up you want me to think you are. Concentrate. What do you need?"

  "The small suitcase," I replied petulantly.

  "All right. Why don't you run inside? Richard and I will bring in all the things we need. Go on, honey."

  I opened the door. It raged like a hurricane outside. With my hands over my head, I rushed toward Room C. Its door was wide open and I lunged through it.

  I looked around the room. It had dull brown walls, stained near the baseboard. There were two double beds with a dark brown night table between them, on which sat an old fashioned telephone. Behind me were a dresser and a standing lamp with a faded yellow shade. The closet, open, some hangers dangling, was next to the bathroom doorway.

  I went to the bathroom and tried to close the door, but it was out of alignment. There was no shower curtain around the tub and there was a long rust stain down its middle, from the back to the drain. Water dripped in the sink, above which was a cabinet with a cracked mirror.

  Mommy and Archie came charging in from the rain, laughing. Was everything going to be funny, even this horrible room?

  "The bathroom door won't close," I declared. They both stopped laughing and looked at me.

  Archie raised his right forefinger.

  "That's one," he said.

  "One what?" I asked.

  "Complaint. One more and you're our gopher for the whole trip."

  "Very funny," I said with my hands on my hips. "But what about the door?"

  His laugh wound down like a dying lawn mower as he approached to inspect it. "When you close it," he said after a moment, "just lift up on the handle."

  "Thank you."

  I took hold of the door handle and stepped back into the bathroom, closing the door as he had instructed. It still didn't close tightly, but it would have to do. I heard them both giggling again.

  When I stepped out, I saw Archie had a bottle of gin and he was pouring some into two glasses. "This oughta take the chill out," he said.

  They tapped glasses and swallowed.

  "I just noticed there's no television set in the room," Mommy said. "Did you bring something t
o read, Melody?"

  "No. We left home too quickly, remember? I had to leave my books behind anyway because there was no room in the suitcases," I complained. Archie leapt to his feet.

  "That's two! Two complaints! You're the gopher." Mommy laughed. They clinked glasses again.

  "We really need something to mix this with, don't you think, Haille?"

  "It would help," she said.

  Archie dug into his pocket and produced two dollars.

  "Why don't you run down to the motel office and get us a can of tonic water or some ginger ale." Archie thrust the money my way. "Stay under the overhang and you won't get wet."

  I looked at Mommy. She sat on the bed, a wide grin on her face. "Be a good sport, honey."

  I plucked the bills from Archie's hand and grabbed my coat on the way out the door, thinking I needed to get away from them for a while anyway. Their laughter followed as I slammed the door behind me.

  Looking around, I saw how dreary the motel was. The parking lot was torn up in many spots, and the neon sign had some letters burnt out. Closing my coat tightly around myself, I hurried under the overhang, noticing as I went that there apparently were other empty rooms.

  The office was small. Inside was a red imitation leather settee with slits and cracks in it, a worn cushioned chair, a coffee table, and the counter, behind which sat a short, bald man. He had long, bushy eyebrows and thick lips that looked as pale as day-old dead worms.

  When he smiled, I saw he was missing a lot of teeth. "How can I help you?" he asked.

  "I need a can of tonic, please."

  "The machine's broke, but I got some in the fridge back here," he said, indicating a room behind his office. "Just tonic water?"

  "Yes, please."

  "One minute."

  He brought it out and I paid him a dollar. I noticed the pay phone on the wall behind the settee.

  "Can I have change for the phone, please?"

  "Sure thing."

  He gave it to me and I went to the phone. He sat again and picked up his magazine, but his attention was fixed on me.

  I dialed Alice's phone number, put in the required change, and waited for her to answer. She did so on the second ring.

  "Alice, it's Melody."