She took a drink from a glass of water on the floor. ‘Less me and you play a game--the name game. You can be It if you want to. Whichever you like. You can choose.’ He put his little fists up to his face and breathed in a quiet, even way because he was falling asleep. ‘Wait, George!’ she said. ‘This’ll be fun. I’m somebody beginning with an M. Guess who I am.’ George sighed and his voice was tired. ‘Are you Harpo Marx? ‘ ‘No, I’m not even in the movies.’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Sure you do. My name begins with the letter M and I live in Italy. You ought to guess this.’ George turned over on his side and curled up in a ball.
He did not answer. ‘My name begins with an M but sometimes I’m called a f name beginning with D. In Italy. You can guess.’ The room was quiet and dark and George was asleep. She pinched him and twisted his ear. He groaned but did not awake. She fitted in close to him and pressed her face against his hot little naked shoulder. He would sleep all through the night while she was figuring with decimals. Was Mister Singer awake in his room upstairs? Did the ceiling creak because he was walking quietly up and down, drinking a cold orange crush and studying the chess men laid out on the table? Had ever he felt a terrible afraidness like this one? No. He had never done anything wrong. He had never done wrong and his heart was quiet in the nighttime. Yet at the same time he would understand. If only she could tell him about this, then it would be better. She thought of how she would begin to tell him. Mister Singer--I know this girl not any older than I am--Mister Singer, I don’t know whether you understand a thing like this or not--Mister Singer. Mister Singer. She said his name over and over. She loved him better than anyone in the family, better even than George or her Dad. It was a different love. It was not like anything she had ever felt in her life before. In the mornings she and George would dress together and talk. Sometimes she wanted very much to be close to George. He had grown taller and was pale and peaked. His soft, reddish hair lay raggedly over the tops of his little ears. His sharp eyes were always squinted so that his face had a strained look. His permanent teeth were coming in, but they were blue and far apart like his baby teeth had . been. Often his jaw was crooked because he had a habit of feeling out the sore new teeth with his tongue. ‘Listen here, George,’ she said. ‘Do you love me? ‘ ‘Sure. I love you O.K.’ It was a hot, sunny morning during the last week of school. George was dressed and he lay on the floor doing his number work. His dirty little fingers squeezed the pencil tight and he kept breaking the lead point. When he was finished she held him by the shoulders and looked hard into his face. ‘I mean a lot. A whole lot.’
‘Lemme go. Sure I love you. Ain’t you my sister?’
‘I know. But suppose I wasn’t your sister. Would you love me then?’
George backed away. He had run out of shirts and wore a dirty pullover sweater. His wrists were thin and blue-veined. The sleeves of the sweater had stretched so that they hung loose and made his hands look very small.
‘If you wasn’t my sister then I might not know you. So I couldn’t love you.’
‘But if you did know me and I wasn’t your sister.’
‘But how do you know I would? You can’t prove it. ‘.Well, just take it for granted and pretend.’
‘I reckon I would like you all right. But I still say you can’t prove-- ‘ ‘Prove! You got that word on the brain. Prove and trick. Everything is either a trick or it’s got to be proved. I can’t stand you, George Kelly. I hate you.’
‘O.K. Then I don’t like you none either.’ He crawled down under the bed for something. ‘What you want under there? You better leave my things alone. If I ever caught you meddling in my private box I’d bust your head against the side of the wall. I would. I’d stomp on your brains.’ George came out from under the bed with his spelling book. His dirty little paw reached in a hole in the mattress where he hid his marbles. Nothing could faze that kid. He took his time about choosing three brown agates to take with him. ‘Aw, shucks, Mick,’ he answered her. George was too little and too tough. There wasn’t any sense in loving him. He knew even less about things than she did. School was out and she had passed every subject--some with A plus and some by the skin of her teeth. The days were long and hot. Finally she was able to work hard at music again. She began to write down pieces for the violin and piano. She wrote songs. Always music was in her mind. She listened to Mister Singer’s radio and wandered around the house thinking about the programs she had heard.
‘What ails Mick?’ Portia asked. ‘What kind of cat is it got her tongue? She walk around and don’t say a word. She not even greedy like she used to be. She getting to be a regular lady these days.’
It was as though in some way she was waiting--but what she waited for she did not know. The sun burned down glaring and white-hot in the streets. During the day she either worked hard at music or messed with kids. And waited. Sometimes she would look all around her quick and this panic would come in her. Then in late June there was a sudden happening so important that it changed everything.
That night they were all out on the porch. The twilight was blurred and soft. Supper was almost ready and the smell of cabbage floated to them from the open hall. All of them were together except Hazel, who had not come home from work, and Etta, who still lay sick in bed. Their Dad leaned back in a chair with his sock-feet on the banisters. Bill was on the steps with the kids. Their Mama sat on the swing fanning herself with the newspaper. Across the street a girl new in the neighborhood skated up and down the sidewalk on one roller skate. The lights on the block were just beginning to be turned on, and far away a man was calling someone.
Then Hazel come home. Her high heels clopped up the steps and she leaned back lazily on the banisters. In the half-dark her fat, soft hands were very white as she felt the back of her braided hair. ‘I sure do wish Etta was able to work,’ she said. ‘I found out about this job today.’
‘What kind of a job?’ asked their Dad. ‘Anything I could do, or just for girls?’
‘Just for a girl. A clerk down at Woolworth’s is going to get married next week.’
‘The ten-cent store--’ Mick said.
‘You interested?’
The question took her by surprise. She had just been thinking about a sack of wintergreen candy she had bought there the day before. She felt hot and tense. She rubbed her bangs up from her forehead and counted the first few stars.
Their Dad flipped his cigarette down to the sidewalk. .No,’ he said. ‘We don’t want Mick to take on too much responsibility at her age. Let her get her growth out. Her growth through with, anyway.’
‘I agree with you,’ Hazel said. ‘I really do think it would be a mistake for Mick to have to work regular. I don’t think it would be right.’
Bill put Ralph down from his lap and shuffled his feet on the steps. ‘Nobody ought to work until they’re around sixteen.
Mick should have two more years and finish at Vocational--if we can make it.’
‘Even if we have to give up the house and move down in mill town,’ their Mama said. ‘I rather keep Mick at home for a while.’
For a minute she had been scared they would try to corner her into taking the job. She would have said she would run away from home. But the way they took the attitude they did touched her. She felt excited. They were all talking about her--and in a kindly way. She was ashamed for the first scared feeling that had come to her. Of a sudden she loved all of the family and a tightness came in her throat.
‘About how much money is in it?’ she asked.