Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Vol. 46, No. 11, November 1982

Morning Song by Betty Ren Wright

Rose had a secret. And she wouldn’t tell it to anybody. Ever!

The song blew into her mind unexpectedly, like hot September wind, bringing with it the smell of the kindergarten room and the feel of her plastic nap-pack warmed by the sun. She closed her eyes and pretended she was lying on the nap-pack right now, and she sang the song in a very small voice, hoping no one else would hear:

The first day of school, Rose thought, they had learned that song the very first day. Where were the red-checked dress and white pinafore she had worn that morning? Home in the closet, probably; her mama hadn’t packed any of the clothes she liked best when she sent her to this place. Rose remembered fingering the smocking on the front of the dress when Miss Williams called her name and made her stand up. Later, Miss Williams had taken off the pinafore and hung it up so it wouldn’t get dirty when she played with her new friends.

All my new friends, she thought proudly, though of course they hadn’t been ready to be her friends at first. They giggled because she was the only one wearing a dress, and her heart sank since she knew there were no jeans in her closet at home, just a long row of pink and red and yellow and blue dresses. They snickered because she was afraid of the teeter-totter on the playground, afraid of the slide, even afraid to play in the sandbox because sometimes naughty children threw sand. Until that first day at school she had played only with her mama, rising and falling gently on the tiny backyard teeter-totter, swinging decorously on the red plastic swing, never far from her mama’s arms.

“Hey, she’s singing!” A voice broke harshly into her memories. “I wouldn’t believe it if I didn’t hear it.”

Rose clamped her lips over the third “good morning” and finished the song inside her head. She told herself she didn’t care what the people here said. The song filled her with a kind of joy, as if all the happy times at school were locked up in those few short lines. Gradually, because Miss Williams had insisted, her classmates had stopped teasing her about her dainty, always-perfect clothes. During story time she drifted with the magic of Miss Williams’ voice into a land where she had a father as well as a mama. She was a princess in that land, and she had fourteen brothers and sisters, and they played together all day every day. They wore what they wanted and they never worried about being sick and they all went to the summer camp where Miss Williams was a counselor, and they went swimming and climbed trees and never had to ask permission because they were all princes and princesses and could do as they pleased.

Once she told her Mama about that magic land, but it had been a mistake. She remembered a stinging slap that spun her across the room, then the comforting mother-arms around her soothing away the shock and pain.

“It’s only that I hate to see you drawing away from me,” her mama had said. “My darling, perfect little girl. Don’t ever stop being my sweet baby, will you?”

Rose had promised. She tried very hard to drop a curtain over the magic land and all the happiness there. It was enough to be in school — to stand in a corner of the playground watching the squealing shouting others and know she might someday be part of them and they a part of her. If she did think about the magic land, she was careful not to talk about it at home. She never mentioned Miss Williams either, after the first bad time when she said, “I really love Miss Williams,” and her mama’s face had turned pale and cold like the face of an angel in a painting. It was two days before her mother would talk to her again, and even though things were as they had been after that, Rose never forgot those terrible two days.

“I just don’t want outsiders coming between us, dear,” her mother had said, finally. “I love you so much. You and I don’t need anyone else.”

Rose thought about that now, until footsteps in the hallway told her the man was coming to see her again.

Good morning to you...

He was a nice man, and he came to see Rose at this place quite often. She never looked at him, just hugged her doll and said nothing, but she knew he was a nice man. The only trouble was that he was full of questions.

“You look different today, Rose. How do you feel?”

Don’t look up. Don’t talk. Nothing to say.

“I have a feeling you’re remembering today, Rose. Am I right? What are you remembering?”

She touched her doll’s painted-on fingernails and waited. He never stayed very long. When he was gone she would think about Miss Williams for a while and the day she had said there was someone who could help Rose stop being afraid.

“Are you thinking about school today, Rose? Are you remembering things that happened at school?”

Good morning to you! The song shrieked through her head. She looked up for just a second, startled, wondering if the man had heard it, too.

“That’s a good girl, Rose. You are feeling better today. Tell me what you’re thinking about.”

She dropped her head and began to rock her doll.

“She was singing this morning,” a voice said. “I heard her.”

The man sighed. He reached out and took Rose’s hand. “We’ll talk again tomorrow,” he said. “Maybe tomorrow you’ll tell me about school.”

When she was alone, she laid her doll gently on the bed and covered it with a towel. The doll had yellow hair like Miss Williams’, but there was no blood on her bright shining face. We’re all in our places, the song echoed in her head, and Miss Williams’ place had been at the bottom of the school stairs, lying there like a doll somebody had dropped. Rose saw herself standing beside poor Miss Williams, screaming and screaming till the janitor came and then the fourth-grade teacher who was working late. They called an ambulance and Miss Williams was carried away, and the fourth-grade teacher cried. For a while no one noticed Rose at all. When they did remember her, she had already forgotten most of what had happened. It was just there, a shadow behind a curtain, like the magic land her mama had told her not to talk about. And no one but the man here at the hospital asked her to talk about it. She had never told anyone in the whole world that just before the fall her mama had been standing at the top of the stairs with Miss Williams talking talking talking. Pushing. No one else knew. No one else saw. It was a secret forever.

“Here comes your mother, silly baby,” said a voice. It was a mean, jealous voice. No one else’s mother came every single day.

Rose stood up. She ran to the door and into her mother’s arms, as she always did. She bent down to sniff her mama’s elegant scent. Her mama held her a moment and then pushed her away.

“You’re going to ruin my dress, darling,” she said. “Now, tell me how you are feeling today.”

Rose hunched a little so she could look straight into her mama’s eyes. “We’re all in our places with bright shining faces,” she sang happily. She had never sung for her mama before.