Her question should shock me. Instead, I rub my face, careful not to smear my lipstick. “Blanche, I ain’t having a bull session with you. What Roy and I do—that way—ain’t any of your beeswax.”
And it’s mostly ’cause we haven’t done nothin’ yet, it being wrong to do that before we’re married. But that doesn’t mean we’re lacking passion. Maybe I define passion as something more long term, a love like my parents’. Nearly a decade may’ve passed since Daddy died, but Ma loves him all the same.
She clucks before saying, “Well, if you’re insistent on marrying the fool, I suggest trying him out first.”
“Blanche,” I growl. It won’t help telling her I’ve had years of trying him out—in other ways. I know he likes more peanut butter than jelly. Blue instead of black. Dogs, not cats. We’ve spent nights at the picture house, afternoons by the lake. We’ve got history. And, thinking of our doodles, we’ve got ourselves a future. Ogling or not, we’ve got something stable. Love and stability. Ain’t those two things better than only having lust?
Blanche laughs at my growl. “One of these days you’ll quit being a priggish Mrs. Grundy.”
“Stop calling me that.”
“Stop acting like one,” she counters. “You’re such a wet blanket I’m surprised you don’t leave a trail of water behind you everywhere you go.”
“Really?” I say. “I ain’t that bad.”
She chuckles. “Okay, that was a bit of an exaggeration. But don’t go denying you ain’t tight-laced.”
Blanche slams on the car’s brakes, inches before the train tracks into Dallas.
I exhale, looking left, right. “There ain’t a train coming.”
“Glad to see your eyes are working.” Then she smiles, a devious Blanche-like grin, clearly no longer in a tizzy with me for withholding my news—probably ’cause she doesn’t consider anything related to marriage good news. “We got to get ourselves ready.”
Ready. For the speakeasy. Talking ’bout Roy distracted me from that. I lightly touch Blanche’s arm. “Hey, how ’bout we go to Victor’s, for real.”
“We will,” she says.
“I meant now.”
“Oh, I know what you meant, but it ain’t going to happen. This is important to me, Bonnelyn, and you said you’d help.”
“You didn’t give me much choice,” I say between my teeth—which are seconds away from chattering, and considering how hot it is, it ain’t from the weather.
Blanche lowers her sunglasses and looks at me over their frame. “What was that you just said?”
“Um,” I start, hiding a cringe from her glare, “there has to be another way for you to make some money. This just seems dangerous and reckless.”
“Reckless is my middle name.” She pulls something from the backseat. “Here, put these on.”
I take the bag she shoves at me and hesitantly peek inside. Clothing. It clicks. That’s why Blanche didn’t care what I was wearing. She brought a dress for me. Nothin’ new there; been wearing the clothes she’s outgrown for years, ’til her clothing became less modest. But this dress ain’t old. I shake my head in annoyance, pulling it out and letting its full length show. “Oh, no, no, no. This here’s ’bout six inches too short.”
“Gasp.” Blanche pulls her blouse over her head and shimmies off her skirt. A plunging red dress—that comes well above her knees—is all that’s left.
My jaw drops open.
“What ya think?” she asks, reaching into the bag, fastening a headband over her loose curls. “I wanna ooze sex appeal.”
“I can almost see your crotch!”
“I’m sitting. When I stand, the dress will be longer. Maybe.” She shrugs and drapes pearls ’round my neck, pokes something into my pinned-up hair. “If you won’t wear the dress, let’s gussy you up.”
I peek at Big Bertha’s rearview mirror and my mouth drops open again. “You’ve gone and put a feather on my head.”
Blanche takes one looksee at me and hoots with laughter. “I do suppose you look a bit like a peacock.” She tugs at my hair, removing the feather and letting a few strands fall onto my neck. “At least let down your hair. You got ’em all wrapped up like it’s the nineteen hundreds.”
I swat her hand. “Leave me be.”
She chuckles to herself and slides a cluster of bangles onto her wrist. “All ready.”
A few minutes of my nervous foot tapping later, Blanche stops Big Bertha outside a row of buildings. I’m no stranger to Elm Street in the heart of Dallas. It’s the way to school, where I run most of our errands, and Blanche and I have been to the picture house and soda shop here on many occasions, Blanche flirting and me blushing.
I scan the paved street. Nothin’ is out of the ordinary. No illicit bars, no unusual crowds of rowdy people. Many people are carrying on with their business, but no one seems to be doing anything illegal.
Blanche yanks the napkin from Buck from her brassiere and examines the buildings. Her brows scrunch. “Well, this here is a physician’s office.”
I release a sigh of relief. “Yup. Looks like the address is phony.”
Blanche pouts. “You think Buck lied to us?”
“Probably. He seems like the type.”
“Rhatz.” Blanche throws the napkin onto the dashboard.
The door to the physician’s office is flung open, catching both our attention. A man—no, a boy—saunters onto the sidewalk amidst a handful of people and peers up and down the block. I don’t like the looks of him, with his dark gray suit, bow tie and vest, and hair parted down the center. Too smooth.
I cringe, knowing who he is. And I was so close to getting myself out of this jam.
“Buck!” Blanche squeals. She practically lunges for the car door’s handle.
I instinctively reach for her arm. “You’re really going out there? Doing this?”
She’s baffled, like she’s solving an impossible mathematics problem in her head. “Ab-so-lute-ly. Now get your ass in gear.”
I can’t. Not when my imagination conjures police fabricating out of thin air and swarming the building. I lick my lips and shake my head. “Blanche, I’m sorry. I can’t. I ain’t going in with you.”
She sulks, staring at me. I expect her to drag me out of Big Bertha, but instead she twists in her seat, toward Buck. “Suit yourself.” The motion knocks my hand off her arm. “But I need this.”
“Blanche…”
I can’t help picturing her arms pinned behind her back, Blanche being forced into the back of a police car.
“Bonnelyn. Stop.”
I grab her shoulder despite her warning, and she pierces me with her determined green eyes.
Blanche is going to be Blanche. I know she ain’t going to listen to a word I say ’bout this being dangerous. Or how there’s got to be another way to earn money to make her daddy happy. I pull my hand back. “I’ll stay right here in Big Bertha. If I see any funny business, I’ll come get you.”
Even as I say it, I don’t know how—or even if—I could help her, but Blanche’s face warms, and telling the lie helps ease my guilt from staying behind.
“Thanks, Bonn. Now, how do I look?”