Walk Two Moons

17 IN THE COURSE OF A LIFETIME

A few days after Phoebe and I had seen Mr. Birkway and Mrs. Cadaver whacking away at the rhododendron, I walked home with Phoebe after school. She was as crotchety and sullen as a three-legged mule, and I was not quite sure why. She had been asking me why I had not said anything to my father about Mrs. Cadaver and Mr. Birkway, and I told her that I was waiting for the right time.

“Your father was over there yesterday,” Phoebe said. “I saw him. He’d better watch out. What would you do if Mrs. Cadaver chopped up your father? Would you go live with your mother?”

It surprised me when she said that, reminding me that I had told Phoebe nothing about my mother. “Yes, I suppose I would go live with her.” That was impossible and I knew it, but for some reason I could not tell Phoebe that, so I lied.

Phoebe’s mother was sitting at the kitchen table when we walked in. In front of her was a pan of burned brownies. She blew her nose. “Oh sweetie,” she said, “you startled me. How was it?”

“How was what?” Phoebe said.

“Why, sweetie, school of course. How was it? How were your classes?”

“Okay.”

“Just okay?” Mrs. Winterbottom suddenly leaned over and kissed Phoebe’s cheek.

“I’m not a baby, you know,” Phoebe said, wiping off the kiss.

Mrs. Winterbottom stabbed the brownies with a knife. “Want one?” she asked.

“They’re burned,” Phoebe said. “Besides, I’m too fat.”

“Oh sweetie, you’re not fat,” Mrs. Winterbottom said.

“I am.”

“No, you’re not.”

“I am, I am, I am!” Phoebe shouted at her mother. “You don’t have to bake things for me. I’m too fat. And you don’t have to wait here for me to come home. I’m thirteen now.”

Phoebe marched upstairs. Mrs. Winterbottom offered me a brownie, so I sat down at the table. What I started doing was remembering the day before my mother left. I did not know it was to be her last day home. Several times that day, my mother asked me if I wanted to walk up in the fields with her. It was drizzling outside, and I was cleaning out my desk, and I just did not feel like going. “Maybe later,” I kept saying. When she asked me for about the tenth time, I said, “No! I don’t want to go. Why do you keep asking me?” I don’t know why I did that. I didn’t mean anything by it, but that was one of the last memories she had of me, and I wished I could take it back.

Phoebe’s sister, Prudence, stormed into the house, slamming the door behind her. “I blew it, I just know it!” she wailed.

“Oh sweetie,” her mother said.

“I did!” Prudence said. “I did, I did, I did.”

Mrs. Winterbottom half-heartedly chipped away at the burned brownies and asked Prudence if she would have another chance at cheerleading tryouts.

“Yes, tomorrow. But I know I’m going to blow it!”

Her mother said, “Maybe I’ll come along and watch.” I could tell that Mrs. Winterbottom was trying to rise above some awful sadness she was feeling, but Prudence couldn’t see that. Prudence had her own agenda, just as I had had my own agenda that day my mother wanted me to walk with her. I couldn’t see my own mother’s sadness.

“What?” Prudence said. “Come along and watch?”

“Yes, wouldn’t that be nice?”

“No!” Prudence said. “No, no, no. You can’t. It would be awful.”

I heard the front door open and shut and Phoebe came in the kitchen waving a white envelope. “Guess what was on the steps?” she said.

Mrs. Winterbottom took the envelope and turned it over and over before she slowly unsealed it and slipped out the message.

“Oh,” she said. “Who is doing this?” She held out the piece of paper: In the course of a lifetime, what does it matter?

Prudence said, “Well, I have more important things to worry about, I can assure you. I know I’m going to blow those cheerleading tryouts. I just know it.”

On and on she went, until Phoebe said, “Cripes, Prudence, in the course of a lifetime, what does it matter?”

At that moment, it was as if a switch went off in Mrs. Winterbottom’s brain. She put her hand to her mouth and stared out the window. She was invisible to Prudence and Phoebe, though. They did not notice.

Phoebe said, “Are these cheerleading tryouts such a big deal? Will you even remember them in five years?”

“Yes!” Prudence said. “Yes, I most certainly will.”

“How about ten years? Will you remember them in ten?”

“Yes!” Prudence said.

As I walked home, I thought about the message. In the course of a lifetime, what does it matter? I said it over and over. I wondered about the mysterious messenger, and I wondered about all the things in the course of a lifetime that would not matter. I did not think cheerleading tryouts would matter, but I was not so sure about yelling at your mother. I was certain, however, that if your mother left, it would be something that mattered in the whole long course of your lifetime.