The Sisters Montclair Read online

  She tugged on the beer, her eyes fixed on the flickering screen. If she had done that to him, eaten it all without leaving him a piece, he would have pouted for days. There was a double standard in this house. There had been since the beginning.

  She stood up, too tired to think about it anymore, picked up her backpack, and headed for the stairs.

  “Where are you going?” Josh said.

  “To bed. I’m tired.”

  “You’re always tired.”

  “I wonder why.”

  “Hey, try working an eight hour day, five days a week if you want to know what tired feels like.”

  “Yeah, dude,” Macklin said. “Try dragging your ass out of bed every morning at seven-thirty.”

  She wanted to say, Yeah? Well, try staying up until three a.m. doing homework while some asshole plays video games all night and drinks with his friends. Try working twelve fucking hours and then coming home to a trashed apartment and no food on the table, knowing you’ve got another three hours of studying ahead of you. But it wouldn’t do any good to get into a pissing match with Josh, especially with Macklin around. She would never win.

  She was half-way up the stairs when Josh called to her, “I forgot to tell you, I need my car tomorrow.”

  She turned swiftly and came back to the bottom of the stairs. “How am I supposed to get to work?” she said.

  He shrugged. “Isn’t there a bus?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Sorry but I’m meeting some friends after work and you don’t get off until eight.”

  “If I don’t show up, I’ll get fired. Is that what you want?”

  “I don’t give a shit as long as you find something else.”

  Macklin chuckled. “Take that, bitch,” he said to the screen.

  Stella stood there, eyeing him stubbornly. “Can’t you meet your friends Friday night?”

  Josh’s eyes slid to her. He let them rest on her a moment before going back to the game. There was a warning in his expression. “No,” he said.

  Because she didn’t have the courage to stare at Josh, she stared at Macklin.

  “Hey, don’t look at me,” he said. “My car needs a new tranny. Jessica’s been taking me to work.”

  “Can she take me?”

  “I doubt it. But you can call her.”

  She went upstairs and lay down on the bed with the beer resting on her stomach. She couldn’t call Jessica; they weren’t really friends. She only seemed to tolerate Stella because Josh and Macklin were friends. And she didn’t know anyone else well enough to call them and ask them to drive her up Lookout Mountain at seven-thirty in the morning. She could call a cab but that would eat up a good portion of her earnings.

  She should have considered this before she took the job. The distance, the lack of transportation up the mountain. Josh had been good about letting her use his car on Wednesdays and Thursdays, catching a ride to work with a co-worker who lived a couple of blocks over. It wasn’t his fault she didn’t have any friends.

  She drank her beer, looking at the stains on the stippled ceiling. When she had finished, she leaned over and set the can on the floor, rummaging in her backpack for the small piece of paper Luke Morgan had given her.

  “I wondered why you hadn’t called me,” he said. They were driving slowly up Lookout Mountain, the morning sun casting a rosy glow over the distant ridges.

  “I’ve been busy,” she said.

  “I thought maybe it was because I’d asked too many personal questions the last time we met.”

  She turned her face to the glass, not saying anything. His car was a Jeep Cherokee, littered with bags of camera equipment and pieces of paper covered in lines of type. Scripts, she guessed.

  “That coffee smells good,” she said, embarrassed by the awkward silence between them.

  “Oh, damn, where are my manners?” He grinned and leaned forward and picked up a plastic cup and handed it to her.

  “You bought me coffee?” she said.

  “Is that okay?” He glanced at her and then back at the road. “There’s a cool little coffee house near where I live and I just picked up a couple of lattes to go. Nothing fancy, I’m afraid.”

  “No. It’s really good. Thanks.” She sipped her coffee, feeling guilty that she’d not called him for the class notes. Of course he’d wondered why she hadn’t after that first time. It was no wonder she had no friends, always keeping herself aloof, drawing away whenever she felt someone coming too close. And what had he done, really, that was so terrible? Nothing more than make a casual observation. A very astute, very troubling observation.

  “Look, about that day we had coffee,” she said.

  “No. Don’t explain. You don’t have to. Sometimes I overstep my bounds. It’s one of the qualities of being a documentary filmmaker - curiosity. What some people would call being a nosy asshole.”

  “I don’t think you’re a nosy asshole.”

  “Well, you don’t know me very well yet.”

  She liked the way he said yet. As if he was certain that they would become friends, as if there was no hesitation on his part. She glanced at him, noting the strong jaw line, the way his hair curled softly around his ears. His face, in profile, was interesting, but not handsome. It was his eyes that gave his face its attractiveness. His eyes and his voice, pitched low and soothing like a stage hypnotist.

  He swung his arm over the seat and picked up a faded messenger bag. “Here,” he said, “look in that top pouch. I’ve been making you copies of Thursday’s notes.”

  She didn’t know what to say. She was not unaccustomed to the kindness of strangers. But she had forgotten how it comes over you when you least expect it; gratitude and surprise at the goodness of people. She took the copies from him.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  “No worries.”

  She remembered Monica from the shelter in Birmingham. A young woman, a social worker not yet hardened to the troubles of others. She had taken Stella under her wing, had taken her in, given her a safe place to live and let her see how, with an education, she could make a good life for herself, independent of anyone else. It was Monica who had seen to it that Stella finished her GED, Monica who had taken her to sit for her SAT, Monica who had written reference letters and arranged for Stella to be accepted into a special program at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Monica was the only true friend she’d had since she left home at sixteen, which explained why Stella had stopped taking her calls or answering her emails. If she failed, if she didn’t make it, it would be easier if Monica didn’t know. Stella spent a lot of time preparing herself for failure.

  They had reached the top of the mountain and were driving slowly past columned mansions set back on wide sweeping lawns.

  “Wow,” Luke said. “Pretty high on the hog up here.”

  She laughed. “That’s a Southern expression,” she said.

  He glanced at her, grinning. “Oh, I know quite a few Southern expressions now. Mad as a bullfrog in a thumbtack factory. Crazy as a lizard with sunstroke. Stuffed like a Republican ballot box.”

  “It’s only when I meet people who grew up some place else that I realize how crazy we talk.”

  “I wouldn’t call it crazy. More like – descriptive. Creative, linguistically speaking.”

  “See, that’s not something a Southerner would say. ‘Linguistically speaking.’ People would think you were stuck up as a dog with two tails.”

  “I like plain-spoken people.”

  The lawns of the large houses they passed sparkled with morning dew. The tall trees lining the street were beginning to leaf out and in several of the yards daffodils and snow drops raised their sunny heads.

  “I can’t wait to get out of the South,” Stella said. “The minute I graduate, I’m out of here and I’m never coming back.”

  He glanced at her and she had the impression he was about to ask her something, but then thought better of it.

  “Take a right here
,” she said, “and follow Brow Road.”

  The houses became increasingly grand as they followed the curving road. From time to time a space would clear, with the foggy valley spread out below them and the ridges of the mountains rising in the distance.

  “Beautiful place,” he said. “This view is better than anything I’ve ever seen in L.A. It reminds me a little of the Hudson Valley.”

  “Yeah, well rich folks always take the high ground.” She hadn’t meant it to come out the way it had, bitter and envious.

  He glanced at her and again she had the impression that he was poised to ask her something, but thought better of it.

  He said, “Do you like your job? You said you were a caregiver, right?”

  “I like it all right. She’s a pretty cool old lady. I didn’t think I’d like her at first but she kind of grows on you. I don’t know why. She has a lot of stories that she tells over and over again. She forgets she’s already told me but that’s okay, because I like hearing her stories. I’m guessing it drives some caregivers crazy, but I like it. Also, she’s got this really dry sense of humor. I think she’s hilarious.”

  “Sounds like someone I might like to film.”

  “Oh, no. She’s very private. She’d never allow that.” She pointed ahead through the windshield. “Do you see that speed limit sign? Take the first left after the sign. Don’t pull up in the circular drive just let me out in front of the garage.”

  He did as she requested, leaving the car idling as she gathered her backpack and climbed out into the cool morning air.

  “Hey, thanks,” she said leaning over, the door resting on her hip. “I really appreciate this. And thanks for the notes, too.”

  “No problem,” he said. “How are you getting home?”

  “My boyfriend is picking me up,” she said, feeling her face heat up at the lie. She had already decided to take a cab.

  “You have a boyfriend?” His smile seemed to flatten at the corners.

  “Didn’t I mention that?”

  “I don’t think I asked.”

  “Oh. Well.” She laughed nervously. She put her hand on the door. “Thanks again.”

  “I’ll see you in class,” he said, not looking at her, and she closed the door.

  Alice was going out to lunch with Adeline, Ann, and Weesie and she was in a good mood. She rang the bell for exercise around nine-thirty and when Stella appeared in the doorway, Alice said, “Are you ready to walk?”

  “Let’s roll,” Stella said.

  As they passed the library, Alice stopped in the doorway, surveying the room. “Who’s been moving my books around?” she said.

  “I don’t know, Alice. Has someone moved your books?”

  “Of course they have! Look!” She pushed the walker ahead of her and Stella followed her into the library. Several piles of books were stacked on a low cabinet but the library looked much the way Stella remembered it always looking.

  “These were not here before,” Alice said indignantly, pointing at the stack of books. “Someone’s been moving things around.” Her hair, fine as a baby’s, stood up in wispy curls around her face. “Why do people do that? Why don’t they leave my things alone? I have everything the way I want it and someone comes in and decides my way is wrong.”

  “I’m sorry, Alice. I haven’t moved anything.”

  “I didn’t say you did. It was someone else.”

  Stella had no doubt that someone had moved things around. But it could have been done twenty years ago, and it could have been done at Alice’s instruction and she had simply forgotten.

  She said, “Do you want me to move everything back? Just tell me where you want this stack and I’ll put it back.”

  Alice sighed. She shook her head. “No, don’t do that,” she said in a tired, discouraged tone. She stared at one of the framed photographs on the shelves. “I have no idea who those people are,” she said.

  They went on and did their five circuits. By the time they got to number five, Alice had forgotten about the library. She stopped in front of the French doors in the dining room, and stood looking down at the valley.

  “Soon it’ll be time for the kudzu to grow,” she said.

  “Do you get kudzu on top of the mountain?”

  Alice chuckled. “Tell me where in the South we don’t get kudzu,” she said. “They say it grows up to two feet a day. Nothing kills it but frost.”

  “In East Rige, they’ve brought in goats to eat it.”

  Alice said, “Goats?”

  “The city paid some guy last summer to bring in a herd of goats and stake them to the side of the ridge cut. Only after awhile the goats started disappearing and no one knew why.”

  Alice’s eyes, in the slanting light, were a pale, milky blue. She snickered sofly at the idea of goats in East Ridge. “I remember when I was in the Garden Club,” she said. She rolled her eyes and said “Gah-den” Club like a Southern aristocrat and it occurred to Stella that Alice did not see herself as an aristocrat. “The President of the Garden Club at the time was a very snooty woman. Very high and mighty. She liked to talk about her great-great-grandfatha’s slaves. The woman was full of happy darkie stories.”

  “Now Alice,” Stella said.

  “Well, she was. Anyway, come to find out, it was her grandfather who first brought kudzu to Chattanooga. Can you believe someone actually thought kudzu would be a good idea? He went over to the Orient with a delegation of businessmen from Atlanta and they brought it back to use for soil erosion. Well, when it got out that Aurelia Hunt’s grandfather was responsible for bringing kudzu to the South there was quite a scandal. The rest of the Garden Club mutinied. They nearly revoked her membership.” Alice chuckled, shaking her head and rolling her eyes like a wicked child.

  Stella grinned. “And you enjoyed that, didn’t you?”

  “Immensely.”

  They stood in the dining room, grinning at each other. Behind Alice’s shoulder, Stella could see the portrait of the beautiful blonde woman. She had a slight smile on her lips as if she, too, was enjoying the Garden Club story.

  Stella raised her hand and pointed at the portrait. “Alice, who is that woman?”

  But Alice had already turned and started off across the wide dining room, and she obviously didn’t hear her.

  Alice’s friends arrived promptly at eleven o’clock to pick her up for lunch. Stella and Alice were waiting for them in the foyer, and Stella opened the front door and said, “Hello!” She and Alice walked out onto the bricked stoop. Ann, the sister-in-law who was driving, jumped out of the car and came around to help Alice with her walker. She was a small woman with a dowager’s hump and a brisk manner. Behind her, Adeline climbed stiffly out of the passenger’s seat and stood beside the car, holding the door.

  “Hello,” Stella said again, trying to be friendly. “Alice is really looking forward to this.”

  Ann looked at Stella with the same expression of cold dismissal that Adeline had displayed earlier. Stella shut up. She tried not to let it bother her. She decided that from now on, she would ignore both Adeline and Ann. From the backseat of the car, Weesie leaned over and waved.

  “Hello, I’m Weesie,” she said.

  “Hi, Weesie. I’m Stella.”

  She was unsure what she was supposed to do to get Alice to the car. She had seen a wheelchair in the guest bedroom but when she suggested using it, Alice had looked offended.

  “I don’t need a wheelchair!” she said. “I haven’t needed a wheelchair since I got back from Cantor ten, five, oh I don’t know how many, years ago.”

  Stella watched nervously as Alice navigated the steps with her walker. She put out her hand several times to steady her. “Are you sure you can do this? Do you need me to help you?”

  Alice’s face flushed a dull red. She was breathing heavily. “Young lady I’ve been walking by myself since long before you were born! No, I do not need your help.”

  The rebuke stung. Alice’s expression was cold, contemptuous.
Stella glanced at Adeline and saw a look of secret satisfaction pass swiftly across her face. Alice settled herself on the front seat, and pulled her legs in. Adeline closed the door and climbed into the backseat beside Weesie.

  “Fold that walker up and put it in the trunk,” Ann said to Stella, walking back around to the driver’s side. “We’ll be home in an hour and a half. Watch for us.”

  She got in and started the car, letting it idle while Stella folded the walker, placed it in the trunk, and closed the hood. As they drove off, everyone inside the car was laughing.

  Stella walked back inside, slamming the door behind her. Her throat prickled; she felt bruised. Ridiculous to let her feelings be hurt by a group of old rich bitches. Stella walked an endless loop through the house, berating herself. Where was that tough exterior shell she had worked so hard to build? People couldn’t hurt her because she wouldn’t let them. She gave up before they did. She turned away before she could see the disapproval in their faces. She moved on. It had seemed a good enough plan up until now, but somehow, without being aware she was doing it, she had let her guard down with Alice. She had felt something growing between them, maybe not friendship exactly, but something intimate, personal. She had misjudged their relationship entirely and now she felt raw, wounded in a way she had not let herself feel in some time.

  Inside the house she and Alice were one way with each other, but outside in the real world when Alice was with her own kind, it was something else completely. She saw that now. What she had mistaken for companionship and mutual respect was an illusion.

  She was a paid servant, nothing more. She would do well to remember that.

  She was in the fourth grade when Stella realized for the first time that she and her mother were poor. There was just the two of them in those days, traveling through Lower Alabama (L.A., her mother laughingly called it.) Her mother’s name was Candy. She was a Hamm from up around Maynardsville but she had not burdened Stella with this name, instead listing Stella’s father’s surname on the birth certificate. Earl Nightingale was a studio musician with Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show who came through Maynardsville on his way to Muscle Shoals to record an album. He would, no doubt, have been surprised to find that his night of tequila-hazed bliss with Candy had resulted in a daughter. Candy saw no reason to inform him, as he had no money, and everyone knew it was easier to squeeze blood out of a stone, than child support out of an itinerant musician.