The Calamity Club by Kathryn Stockett - 7

I t must have been a dead scientist or a old Roman who decided each day has the same number of minutes. Whoever it was, let me tell you, it is not true. By ten in the morning, I would swear a couple years have passed while I been sitting in this office. Lord, I might have turned fourteen just waiting on lunch. By five o’clock, I would not be surprised to look down and see I had grown bosoms.

I try to plan tasks to fill the day, but there are always a couple hundred hours left to burn.

First thing I do when I sit down is rearrange my desk supplies. Somebody comes in here and messes with them, and I bet I know who it is too. Those other ladies will not hardly set foot in this smelly room. Just stroll on by like they do not see the mildew or that boarded-up window.

I center the Bible perfect exact on the desk and line up my three yellow pencils with the pink eraser beside it. Next are the View Day cards, which I make into a neat stack. I measure it all with the wooden ruler to get it just right. Last, I mark the desk leg for how many more days until I see Ava. It looks like something a criminal would do in jail. I got six months, eight days, and approximately fifteen minutes left here if Dorella doesn’t kill me first. She is next to go to the cannery in six weeks. Last night, she held my head up under the wash pump again so long, if Miss Mildred had not come out there and hollered, I might have been drowned.

This morning, I also see little pink eraser turds on the desk which I know I did not leave. I keep my area tidy. When Miss Garnett strolls in here, I am already in a mood.

Good morning, Meg. As usual, she is dressed in a outfit exactly the color of nothing. I bet that husband of hers would agree, she has no sense of style.

I come right out and tell her. I told you, Miss Garnett, if you are going to fool with my desk items, you could at least tidy up after—

They’re not your things, Meg, they’re for the bookkeeper. Which I still can’t find. When she asked some of the other ladies to help out in here in their free time, they all eyeballed each other with the Who Farted look. That is a look they get when they don’t want to do something but are too scared to say no to the Big Phony. I’ve got to find somebody to straighten out these books, the inspector is coming in a few weeks.

Well I know what to expect when he does.

The inspector is about the only person Miss Garnett kisses up to, since he decides our funding . That is a government word that means free money. Couple times a year he shows up and peruses the books to see where she spent all the cash. He walks around and says she needs to fix such-and-so. These are white girls, Mrs. Pittman. Then he looks us over and tells us to folla a finger, stick out our tongue. When we pass the mustard, he asks Miss Garnett if any girl has started to bleed yet. Only a couple girls have or else they showed up that way, but it always stops after they are here awhile. The ladies say it is odd. Then he moves on to asking about what he calls brain development .

You would think a man in a white coat would have the sense to ask us questions to decide are we smart or slow, but when it comes to our brains, all he cares is what the Big Phony tells him. She cannot wait to deliver the terrible news. As I suspected, quite a few are turning out well below average. This last time I saw her nod at that meanie Dorella. Well I about laughed, but then she looked at me . Said, And that one. Last month, we simply had no choice but to pull her out of school— She leaned in to whisper, probably, how I drew that dirty picture. Then she walked him up to the lounge to feed him a damn gelatin ring.

I suspect it’ll go the same way next time.

This morning, Miss Garnett fishes through the mailbag she has brought in here. Miss Garnett, let me handle that, I tell her. You go rock a baby or something. I figure it is worth a try.

Residents are not allowed to disport with mail, and you know that, Meg.

I bet she thinks if I got my hands on a girl’s letter, I would trade it for food. And I bet she is right. But what I am really after is a letter from Ava.

She ruffles through the bag and sticks some bills in the file cabinet to deal with later. You can always tell when they are starting to build up in there because she tsks, probably thinking she is too important to deal with that crap. Then she hands me the letters from prospective parents who want to come look at us. There are three, which is a lot.

When she is gone to lock the mailbag in the coat closet, I tear through the letters she gave me. But there is not a one hunting for a eleven-year-old with a gap in her teeth who likes hard candy and bacon, which was the plan for Ava to sneak a letter in to me.

That is all right, Ava probably doesn’t have that kind of time. Getting settled in at the cannery and all.

Besides counting coins, it is my job to write out cards to parents looking to adopt. Their letters come from all over the state or sometimes Tennessee or Louisiana. They are only allowed to look us over on what you call View Day, which is held four times a year. Miss Garnett does not care for people just showing up here on their own time. If the folks pick a girl they like, Miss Garnett takes them to the Ladies’ Lounge to have the Special Talk with the girl to make sure they are a good match. I have not got that far so I cannot account what is said. All I know is, then the girl is gone. Poof. Right before your very eyes.

Lately it is rare for a big girl to get adopted. Even if someone does look our way, Miss Garnett steers them clear, saying, The younger ones are more adaptable. Most are looking for a baby or toddler anyway they can start from scratch on. If they write that they want a big girl, it is usually to just do work, things like, Pickin sperience would be rite gud , or a helthy girl to help in the kichen. If I had won me that red pencil in Bible, I would mark up their spelling.

When I know there is not one from Ava, I go back and read them slow again. Lord knows I am desperate to see words strung together. The first two are dull and both want a baby, period. The third one is wrote in pencil on a card cut from a Victory Bobbed Hair Pins box. My mama used to use those. It says: We need us a older girl on acownt of I was choping cotton and it was hot out and the blade swung out my hand and sliced my wifes arm clean off so we had a proper funral for it but she can not lift a pot now so we need us a girl to cook.

A funeral for a arm, see now that is a letter. You got your people and your action and your weather to set the mood, plus some gore for added interest. I do them out a card.

INFANTS 1 TODDLERS 6

AGE SIX TO TWELVE 9 .

THE NEXT VIEW DAY WILL BE ON August 7th, 1933 , which is less than three weeks away. At the bottom is printed beforehand: Please bring proof of residence and show you have at least $25 in your name.

I address the cards and stick a stamp on and by nine o’clock I am clean out of tasks. For a while I just stare at that boarded-up window. There are five boards going left to right with thin lines of sunlight sneaking in under the second and fourth boards. I stare so long at those boards, even when I am not looking at those boards, I am looking at those boards. Finally I review my list of things to do when desperate: Find mean name that rhymes with Dorella. I cannot come up with one. I am tempted to check it off my list just for the thrill.

All I’m asking for is a decent view, some hard candies, and something to damn read. Is that too much to ask for in life?

Across the hall, that toddler named Ella Jane starts to scream. She has gotten what you call attached to Miss Frances, one of the lady volunteers. If Ella Jane makes it to age six here, Miss Frances will drop her like a hot potato and find a younger one to cuddle. Somebody ought to warn Ella to go on and expect it.

I could work on my special portraits of these ladies. I draw them in a criminal-type style with a sign around their neck and a name I come up with that suits their personality. So far I have drawed one for the Big Phony who is Miss Garnett, the Asskisser who is Miss Frances, and Miss Pripp who I call the Fatass because she got me jerked out of school for my art project. I keep the portraits hid way back in the desk drawer. When I leave this place, I plan to take them with me to keep my memory fresh for the day I run into one of them, oh I got your numbers, ladies.

Garnett, come quick, one of the babies has a fever , a volunteer calls up the hall. I look over and several are rushing to the baby room. I also see somebody left the coat closet door ajar.

They always keep the closet door shut and locked. From here, I can see something in there sitting on a shelf.

I get up and peer out my doorway. Look left and right. I can hear the ladies gathered in the nursery. Miss Frances is in the toddler room changing a diaper. The big girls are all up in the school. In seven steps, I am in the closet.

And lookathere. A Life magazine flies off the shelf like a bird in my hand. I slip it up my long dress and down in my underpants. At the top of the mailbag, I also see a letter, addressed to Resident: Dorella Pratt . I could trade this for cornbread for a damn week! I snatch it and smooth my dress down quick and slip on out of there. But all a sudden Little Ella Jane and another toddler run out into the hall screaming, and Miss Frances chases after them. She stops when she sees me.

Young lady, you know you’re not supposed to be in there! she says.

And then here comes the Fatass next, hands on her hips. You get out of there, missy! What do you think you’re doing—

What? What did she do? Miss Garnett says, walking up and oh she looks excited. Now it is the Big Phony, the Fatass, and the Asskisser out here with two toddlers running around loose in the hall.

My heart tries to whack its way out my chest. I will get damn twenty belt licks for this. I got the urge to touch my middle where the things are tucked, but I think about my mama’s lying lesson. So I say, I was just trying to collect those toddlers you got running around loose! and I give Miss Frances a stern look. Running around like a bunch of wild Indians.

Miss Frances runs to catch the little girls heading for the kitchen, but Miss Garnett stands there and gives me a hard, long look. I walk myself to the office, praying the goods don’t fall out my underpants.

After I ease down in my chair, I hold my breath and wait, my heart beating hard in my ears. I stare ahead, but nobody comes in after me. When everyone is gone from the hall, I stick the letter and magazine in the desk drawer and cover them up.

Soon as I am very sure the coast is clear, I ease out the Life .

Finally, finally , I got something to damn read, Lord, I am starving for it. On the front is a drawing of a woman in a short tawdry white getup examining a doll wearing a long dress and bonnet. On the side is wrote A Century of Progress . Which I do not find very interesting but when I open it, it is like a gold mine inside: There is Tarzan the ape man, the World’s Fair in Chicago, Sinbad the cartoon boy, something long and boring about the Democratic Party, though they do not seem to be having much fun at that party. And advertisements: Electrolux! Dial radio! A personal deodorant called Shun. Whoever named that ought to get fired. A man in a hospital bed smoking a Camel cigarette. His dark-headed nurse looks a little like my mama. I turn pages, gulping up the big words, bending to see the little ones.

If there is so much as a rat scratch in the wall, I stare straight ahead at the boarded-up window like one of those retard children. Just ole Nutmeg staring again, nothing to see in here.

You should see how the day flies. The world is right here in my lap . I lose myself a good two hours reading about a fat baseball player named Babe Ruth, the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City, something awful a lady has to watch out for called halitosis . I wish I could show that to Miss Garnett. By lunch, I have not even had time to talk to a pretend person or fall asleep drooling. I feel like I am living a actual life like a actual person again. They even got a thing you plug in the wall and it cools off the house. Someone must have invented that damn machine while I was in here sweating.

Six dollars gets you a airplane ticket to Memphis, twelve dollars gets you a mink stole. Toward the end I turn to a picture piece on CAL-I-FOR-NIA. How did they know about that? Cal-i-for-nia is where my mama wanted to go! Get out of this wrecked state, start fresh, we can do better than cotton and horseshit.

I study the woman in a bathing costume standing next to a swimming pool. There is a little girl holding her hand. I wonder if my mama went to Cal-i-for-nia without me. It has been a while since I have thought about that—

Meg. I go still in my skin. Look over and Miss Garnett is staring me down from the doorway. My throat gets a lump. She puts her hand out and I get up and give her the Life .

Come with me to the belt closet, she says.

The room has not changed since I was in here last. Chair, belt, holes to make it fly faster. I have dreams of this room along with another, though that one was colder and quieter. Behind the door I can hear Dorella and some other girls snickering. My palms on the wall, I stand there and take it like a man. But after seven or eight licks I got to cry, not just because it stings and cuts the back of my legs but like she is trying to get to something deeper. It is like she is trying to whip the hope out of me. I think about the pictures in the Life . Cal-i-for-nia. The blue of the pool, the lady holding the little girl’s hand. All the while she is whispering,

Dirty, filthy girl

After fifteen licks Miss Garnett sits down in the chair, panting. She only quits because her arm gets tired.

That night, I lay on my stomach to stay off the backs of my stinging knees. I will not be sleeping much tonight. When I hear the lock click, I get up off my cot and limp to Dorella’s bed down on the end.

You got a letter, Dorella , I say. The other girls sit up in their beds fast. There is just enough moon to see.

Dorella eyes it like it is water and she is dying of thirst. I know this letter is good as cash and cornbread, but I believe I have lost my appetite today.

You can have it for free if you’ll read it out loud, I tell her. She could wrestle me for it easy anyway, but she nods and takes it. I go lay back in my bed while she opens it slow and reads it out loud for the room to hear. It is from her mama, saying how sorry she is. Her other brothers and sisters are doing just fine. She promises to make it up to Dorella one day.