Despite all that—there is their money. Without her parents’ money, Frieda and I would not be where we are today.
When we first opened Sisters’, my parents put up a small sum for us, more as a gesture than to make much difference financially, since their savings were meager. It was Frieda’s parents’ contribution that truly got us started. I remember the day we signed our loan paperwork, remember sitting in the bank next to Frieda, her father on the other side of her, the loan officer looming large over his desk in front of us. “So, Lou, you’re going to take a chance on these girls,” the bank man said. “You sure that’s a wise idea?” His mouth twitched playfully, but you could tell that he was only half joking; I was pretty sure that he didn’t think it was a wise idea at all.
Lou answered gruffly. “Wife agrees with you,” he told the man. “But let’s do this thing anyway.”
We pay our loan faithfully each month, although sometimes we’re late with the payment because of a simple lack of cash flow. We paid our parents back, Frieda’s and mine, as soon as we possibly could. After that, we never asked anyone for another dime. My parents didn’t have the money to spare, and Frieda’s—well, their money made her uncomfortable. She would have much preferred, if there’d been any way to do it, for us to get started all on our own. “Just this once,” I remember her hissing as we left the bank the day we got the loan, her father and the banker shaking hands behind us. “Just this once, Kitty. Never again.”
There was a time, a few years ago, when we were getting into a bit of hot water with the bookstore’s finances. It was shortly after the bus line left; we saw a sharp decline in business and mounting debt. I remember that I asked Frieda if she’d be willing to ask her parents for another loan, and she shook her head. “We’ll figure out something else,” she’d said firmly. “We’ll have to.”
Take it as coincidence or destiny, I don’t know—but soon after, my maternal grandfather died, leaving a thousand dollars to each of his grandchildren, including me. That money kept Sisters’ afloat, allowing us to catch up on the loan and pay Bradley the two months’ rent we owed him. We reorganized our stock, ran a few advertisements in the local papers, and also had a bit of random luck—a sandwich shop opened a few doors down from us, and a full-service restaurant on the next block. Those establishments brought in new customers, some of whom became regulars. Fortunately, we were able to stay in business.
My small inheritance also kept Frieda from having to ask her parents for money. She was grateful for this, I know. “Anything I can do to keep from being indebted to them,” she told me. “Anything is a help.” Across the countertop at Sisters’, she’d taken my hand and held it tightly, massaging my fingers between her own. “Thank you, Kitty,” she’d said.
Now, at my parents’ house, I bite thoughtfully into my apple. Then I ask Frieda, “Do you remember me eating a candy bar yesterday? Or perhaps the day before?”
She shakes her head. “What are you talking about?”
“A Hershey’s bar.” I hear the urgency in my voice—idiotic, illogical. “A Hershey’s Milk Chocolate bar. Did I eat one in front of you, sometime in the past day or two?”
Frieda smiles and takes another bite of apple. “I honestly cannot recall such an event.”
“What do you recall, then?” I query her. “What do you remember of the past couple of days?” I look around my mother’s familiar living room—the slumped but comfortable velvet chairs, the scratched but tidy Victorian side tables, the shabby rug. “Because I can hardly remember a thing.”
Frieda shrugs. “You came to my house and watched television with me all day yesterday. You remember that, don’t you?” She grins. “Please tell me you remember that the country is no longer threatened by direct nuclear attack.”
I nod. “I remember that. But nothing else. What did we do on Saturday, or Friday? Or the few days before that? I don’t remember anything since we ran into Kevin the other night.”
Frieda faces me. “You okay, sister?” she asks softly.
Again, I’m overwhelmingly tempted to tell her everything. All about the dreams, all about my mixed-up memories. But I cannot. I shrug. “Sure. I’m fine. Let’s talk about something else.”
Frieda glances around the room. “The place is in good shape.”
I groan. “I have hours of work ahead of me.”
She shakes her head. “No, it looks nice. They’ll be pleased.” She grins again. “You know they wouldn’t care, don’t you?”
I do know that. But there is something about pleasing your parents, even when you’re grown up, even when you’re almost middle-aged yourself. It never goes away, at least not for me.
Frieda nibbles the last of her apple. “Well, I’m off,” she says, standing. “I have shopping to do. Penney’s is having a sale. I want a new coat for winter.”
I nod. “I wish I could come. Have fun.”
She hugs me. “You, too, sister.”
After Frieda leaves, I’m frenzied in my work, and by midafternoon the place is spotless. I look around, a satisfied smile on my face. I’ve done a good job. They will be pleased.
I think about that rambling house on Springfield Street. I wonder how my other self keeps it clean, even with the faithful Alma to help out. And then I laugh a little.
It’s easy to keep an imaginary house clean, isn’t it?
Despite my intentions not to dwell on the dream life, I am drawn to Southern Hills again.
I tell myself it’s just something to do, a way to pass an evening that’s chilly but not yet wintry. I bike home from my parents’ place and, too weary for much more exercise, take the bus, getting off at Yale and walking south and then east.
Slowly I meander through the neighborhood streets. I imagine the people who live in each of the houses. I think about their lives, their families, their children. That house there, the red-brick one with the juniper bushes by the driveway, they must have teenagers. There’s a basketball hoop hung above the garage door and a pile of bicycles, all of them too big for young children, lying on the lawn by the front porch. The family in the house with the brown shutters—I think their car must be brand-new. It’s red with a white top, and it gleams with a just-off-the-showroom-floor sparkle. The man of the house stands next to the car, stroking its side panel affectionately, the way one might the cheek of a newborn.
These people have names, although I don’t know what they are. They have histories. They were probably raised in old-time neighborhoods like Myrtle Hill, where I grew up. They went to high school, perhaps to college. They met their husbands and wives; they had children. They decided this neighborhood of newly built houses would be a comfortable, homey, secure place in which to raise their families.