Chapter 7F

Just before Easter, Martha Jane called and said that Mr. Buchanan's Easter present to her and her sister Evelyn would be to marry their mom soon after Easter and move all of them into his big East Memphis home. Martha Jane had mixed feelings about it.

"I'm glad for mother," she told me over the phone. "But I don't know if I can live in that house. He's nice. But he's still a redneck and I just can't seem to work past that fact."

"At least you won't have to spend the rest of your college career moving from place to place."

"True, but... one more move, actually."

"Oh no, not again!"

"Yes, but it's just a move *out* of where I am, and into that big house. Oh, well, at least this time I'm his future daughter, so he's hiring some movers."

I offered, "Being his daughter does have its advantages."

"Wanna come over and help me pack?"

"When?"

"I have two weekends when I can do it, the first and second Saturdays in April. Which one would you like?"

"Both," I said.

"Which one?"

"Both," I repeated.

Her voice on the other end of the line almost sounded as if she were winking at me. "Okay," she said. "This time we'll have longer to play. And I'll be able to use a car. Not Evelyn's, this time. My daddy-to-be is buying me one."

On a Saturday a few weeks later, Martha Jane showed up in a bright blue and white Chevrolet. But she didn't look happy behind the wheel.

I said after I got into the seat beside her and we were on our way to her place, "Wow, what a car!"

"It's not me!" she moaned. "This huge gas burner is NOT ME! Speedy, I'm scared. Really. I should love this, but I hate it. I feel like one of those East Memphis debutantes. I feel as if I'm selling out. And it takes me an hour to park it."

"Well... you can always give it back."

"But this is terrible! I feel so dishonest. I dread to think of how I'm going to be punished for this... this terrible sin! I've invested so much in claiming I was on my own and had my own ideas, and now I'm selling out."

I spent the afternoon with her and helped her pack books and clothes. She was cranky the whole time. I tried to joke around and make light of Mr. Buchanan and to convince her that at least her life would be settled for a while.

"I don't know what's going to happen to me," she said at one point. "I had finally got the feeling that I was in control of my life and I could honestly be myself. Now I have to spend every day in that house pretending that I agree with everybody, when I really and truly don't."

"I know," I said ruefully. "How well I know!"

"Hon, can I say something?" She was sitting on the floor with her legs under her and a pile of books in her lap.

"You can say anything you want, Miss Scarlett."

"Something's... wrong inside you, isn't it?"

"Wrong? What you mean, Red Ryder?"

"Because you're trying too hard to be cute. You never talk about what you think or feel anymore. You're being nice to me about anything and everything, to the exclusion of yourself."

I laughed. "You don't like me paying attention to you? I'm having a good time, just helping you today. Really. Honest."

"How are things with your mom and your stepdad? You never mention them. I don't have the slightest idea what's up with you and them."

I didn't know what to say. My own feelings about the way I'd been living and how powerless I felt were thoroughly confused. And I didn't want to spoil my time with Martha Jane by getting into it.

I mumbled something, a careless "Nothing much going on about that," and she was quiet behind me for a while. For sometime afterwards we didn't talk much except to say that another box was packed or to ask which box to pack next. At around six o'clock she decided we should stop for the day so she could make salads for dinner.

"You sure got quiet," she said after I had been eating wordlessly in front of her at the table for five minutes.

I shrugged. "Burned out from all this packing, I guess."

"I guess," she said. She sighed. "Me too."

I tried to change the subject. "So... you'll be living the life of a cool little East Memphis socialite from now on."

"Please. Don't talk about it while I eat."

I sat and chewed and tried to think of something else to say. But the only thing I could think about was that Martha Jane would not be in that college forever. She would be teaching one day, perhaps far away. I knew better than to bring up that subject. In fact, everything that I could think of as material for discussion somehow led to the fact that the one person in whom I could place any trust was surely going to be out of the picture sooner or later. And on that particular day I wanted very much to undress her and touch her, but I had grown fearful of even saying anything or making a move in that direction.

I blinked and looked up. She stared questioningly at me.

She asked, "Were you in a trance?"

"No," I said. She eyed me skeptically. I shrugged and confessed, "Yes."

"I asked you if you have any girlfriends at school."

The question sent a chill up my spine. "No," I said.

"Someone as active as you are, and you don't have some girl after you?"

I shook my head no.

"Why not, hon?"

I shrugged--a big, on-purpose, don't-give-a-damn shrug. "I'm not interested in anybody."

"I see..." She got up and poured some soda into her half empty glass. Wordlessly she returned to the table and sat.

After a moment she looked into her glass and said slowly, "I wonder... Speedy... oh, never mind."

I did not know what she was hinting at. I looked up to find her staring at me again. I had just taken a big bite of salad. Desperately reaching for something to talk about that had nothing to do with my thoughts or with anything else, I pointed at my face and said with a full mouth, "Nice salad. Good."

She gave me a sad little smirk. "Speedy, you're not talking to me. You're just throwing words across the table."

"I'm eating," I said, and tried to grin with lettuce sticking out one side of my lips.