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Behind Miss Pe
“Mrs. Simmons!” she said. “It’s been a month of Sundays!” Whereupon she gave Momma a big hug.
“Merry Christmas!” The jolly contralto of Miss Pe
Daddy was beaming over such a merry and sincere expression of fondness, and his eyes followed her as she embraced Mr. Thoms and then made a fuss over Buddy and Sam.
The boys had been smiling and dancing a little jig ever since she and Laurie came through the door.
“This is for you and the family!” said Laurie, hoisting her other hand, two fingers of which were looped through the neck handle of a half-gallon plastic jug of apple cider, non-fermented, one could be sure. There was a green-and-red plaid Christmas ribbon about the neck. “This is from Miss Pe
Momma took the jug in both hands. “Well, I’ll be switched,” she said. “You all surely did bring this to the right house. Buddy and Sam are sort of partial to apple cider themselves!”
She looked at them. Buddy put on a comic grin, and Sam copied him, and everybody laughed.
“What do you say, boys? ‘Thank you, Miss Pe
Charlotte stood where she was, next to Mrs. Thoms. She was fully aware of what a marvelous Christmas moment this should have been…the family assembled round the potbellied stove…dear friends arriving on a snowy night bearing gifts…cheeriness so rich and thick you could cut it like fruit-cake…Laurie looking absolutely glorious, a girl in the prime of youthful joy, generosity, and love for the folks around her…and Charlotte Simmons, on her first trip home from the field of triumph—she goes to Dupont—in a state of panic over what somebody right here in the room knows. She wanted to rush forward and hug her beloved mentor, who had plucked her out of obscurity in the Lost Province and sent her off to the great world arena “where things happen.” She wanted to shriek “Laurie!” in unrestrained, girlish camaraderie upon seeing her best friend from high school—the one constant when she took her stand against Cha
Charlotte could see Momma coming about. “Where’s Charlotte?” she said. “Charlotte! Look who’s here! Oh, there you are! I can’t see for looking!”
From the expression on Momma’s face you could tell that she was just waiting for her daughter to come forward, rush headlong, and put on the show of affection the moment demanded. And so was everybody else. Charlotte made the gravest smile one could imagine—and she knew it—and could do nothing about it—and moved forward, away from Mrs. Thoms, ever so slowly. She wanted to move faster…con brio…but she couldn’t command her legs to do it. She could feel her smile growing steadily more feeble by the moment.
In the few seconds it took her to reach Miss Pe
Miss Pe
Charlotte told her when she arrived and what a time they’d had driving up the mountain in the snowstorm. What on earth had the woman seen in her face? Then she turned to Laurie and tried hard to do better. “Laurie!”—and she held out her open arms.
“Why, it’s the Dupont girl!” said Laurie.
They hugged each other and even put their cheeks next to one another’s; but as hugs go, it felt like sheer protocol. Whatever it was about her expression—her ma
“Merry Christmas, Mr. Thoms! Mrs. Thoms!” Laurie had already turned to the Thomses. Her ebullience had immediately returned. Her cheeks were rosy. Her smile was sunshine itself. Youth! Joy! Hope! Rude animal health! Beauty! Laurie wasn’t really beautiful, but her radiance made up for any flaw. What did it matter, the faintly puffy quality of the end of her nose? She was the girl—the confident, warm-spirited, buoyant, loving young woman—any parents would love to see coming home from college. Charlotte didn’t envy her, however, because envy was irrelevant. Envy was a luxury of those who still had hopes for the future. No, Laurie merely made Charlotte pity herself all the more. She forced her to see in the most graphic way all the qualities Charlotte Simmons no longer possessed. She no longer had the strength to pretend, either. Anything anybody said, any look anybody gave her—for that matter, the mere presence of anybody in this room—bore down on her with an abominable weight and made her anxious to be somewhere else. The entire planet now orbited menacingly around her deep worries. All else was irrelevant.
Momma wasn’t the sort who was given to having people stand around talking and drinking refreshments—not even unfermented cider or lemonade or branch water—before sitting down to have supper. Charlotte decided she was just going to have to find the strength to get through it. There would be some pretty good talkers at the table, Momma, Miss Pe
She was stu
Murmurs, burbles of confirmation, and Laurie’s “Like totally!”
Charlotte experienced a pain that wasn’t physical but might as well have been. A great pressure squeezed her head from either side and bore down on the top of her skull. There was no worse fate than the sentence Daddy had just meted out. In the same instant it struck her just how countrified Daddy’s speech really was, Momma’s, too—and just how collegiate Laurie’s had become: Laurie’s with all the like totallys and cools and awesomes and ohmygod s.
Charlotte blurted out, “No, Daddy!” She knew she should demur in a calm, somewhat light way, but she was long past wily levity. She was in pain. “Nobody wants to hear me go on about—school!” School. She avoided the name Dupont at all cost; too painful. “Laurie—please!—you sit here. I want to hear about N.C. State!”
Friendly protests all around, as if her reluctance was mere modesty. So she found herself sitting at the table on one of the drugstore bentwood chairs Daddy had brought back to life. The inquisitors stared at her down both sides of the table. On one side were Mr. Thoms, sitting closest to her, Laurie, and Momma—or rather, that’s where Momma would be sitting—right now she was in the kitchen—and on the other side were Miss Pe