After Mr. Hopkins got done inspecting the damage, he hung a CONDEMNED sign on the basement stairs railing and then, according to my confidential informant Kitten Jablonski, he also reported that he smelled an “unusual” odor drifting around the basement, which was such great news. “The school needs to be closed down immediately as a safety precaution. It could be gas,” he told Sister Margaret Mary, who at that time was still present and accounted for. (I could’ve stepped in and told Mr. Hopkins that it definitely was gas he was smelling because he showed up on Beans and Wienies Wednesday to do his inspection, but no one except #5 on my SHIT LIST, brownnoser Jenny Radtke, would do something that repulsive.)
Louise, who’s admiring herself in the oleo knife, says, “Since you’re out of school until the repairs can be made, I expect the two of you to make yourselves useful. Dust and vacuum before I get home tonight, take out the garbage, and Theresa”—she gives me her evil eye—“go to confession today.” The reason she didn’t tell Birdie that she had to do the same is because she doesn’t have to go into the wooden box to tell her sins once a week to Father Ted like me and all the other kids in the parish do. My sister got declared an “innocent” by the church two years ago on account of the fact that she would kneel down in front of the black confessional curtain every Thursday and start clapping her hands and laughing her heinie off because she thought she was about to see a puppet show.
7:49 a.m. The Finley sisters have big-deal detecting to do today and the sooner our mother is out of our hair the better, which is why I’m trying to come up with a compliment that could get her moving faster toward the front door. She usually falls for anything having to do with how good looking she is, that’s how sweet she is on herself. But I don’t know, sometimes I think I’m being too hard on the gal, ya know? If my long red hair fell down my back in perfect waves instead of looking like it got caught up in the spokes of my Schwinn if I don’t stick it into a ponytail every morning, and if both of my ears laid close to my head and my right one didn’t stick out like a handle, and if my cheeks were the color of baby pink roses instead of being covered with so many freckles that I can’t fall asleep at my school desk without that nincompoop Chuckie Jaeger connecting them with a ballpoint pen, and maybe if my eyes were the color of shallow water instead of looking like the bottom of the deep-blue sea, one of my hobbies might be staring at myself as often as I could, too.
I lean back in my chair and tell Louise, “If you think you need to do more primping, don’t bother. I’m not kidding, you look even better than one of Mister Skank’s customers.”
I listen to the Braves baseball games on the radio with my friend and business advisor, Mr. Art Skank, every other Saturday at his funeral home on Burleigh St., so that was not “hearsay” evidence. The undertaker is so good at fiddling with his customers that they end up looking like masterpieces, which is how he got his neighborhood nickname, “The Leonardo da Vinci of Undertaking.”
FACT: Everyone around here tries to stay on Mr. Skank’s good side, because he is known to hold a grudge.
PROOF: You should’ve seen what he did to one of his high school sweethearts who dropped him for another fella. Believe me, Mrs. Mitzi Kircher did not look anything like a framed picture of The Last Supper at her funeral. Mrs. Mitzi Kircher looked more like a box full of cafeteria leftovers at her funeral. (Joke!)
When Louise doesn’t budge from the table, even though I just gave her that great Skank compliment, I move to my backup plan. I point to the clock above the sink and say, “Just like you’re always tellin’ Birdie and me how important it is to be on time, ya better hurry up if you don’t want to be late for your first day on the job. What’s-his-name is gonna pick you up at eight to take you to the station, right?”
Our mother slowly grinds out her L&M cigarette in her eggs and Spam scramble that she hasn’t barely touched because she is always watching her figure, waiting for it to do what, I don’t know exactly. “How many times do I have to tell you the name of the man I’m seeing, Theresa?”
What the heck comes over me?
I know that hope is something that should not be allowed to spring eternally when I’m in the vicinity of our mother, but for some unknown reason, I let myself believe sometimes that she misses Daddy as much as Birdie and me do. That’s why I think she’s about to make a joke to remember him by, the same way I do every chance I get. Like the kind ya hear up at Wisnewski’s butcher shop and Lonnigan’s Bar all the time. Daddy loved those “How many Polacks does it take to screw in a lightbulb?” jokes. (Three. One to hold the bulb, two to turn the ladder.)
“I don’t know, Louise,” I forget myself and say. “How many times do you have to tell me the name of the man you’re seeing?”