Hippie Boy: A Girl's Story Page 4

  Life finally felt good.

  I CRIED FOR what seemed like hours before finally falling asleep on Patricia’s floor. But I was already awake when she opened her bedroom door.

  “Did you sleep okay?” she asked. Her voice was kind and she wore a concerned look.

  I was still stinging from the night before and my eyes were almost swollen shut from all the crying I had done, but I was determined not to let on.

  “Yeah, I slept fine,” I mumbled under my breath.

  She invited me into the kitchen for a glass of milk. I followed her into the room and sat down at her round kitchen table. She wore a pink bathrobe and her hair was tussled, but she still looked pretty. She pulled a plastic cup from a cupboard, filled it with milk, and set it down on a place mat in front of me.

  “So what do you sell with Dad?” I asked her, trying to make conversation as I sipped my milk. It was real milk, not the lumpy powdered milk we drank at home, and it tasted good.

  “Calculators,” she said. “Want to see one?”

  “Sure.”

  She hurried from the room and came back minutes later holding a black leather rectangle in her hand. She pulled out the calculator and laid it on the table.

  “You can go ahead and play with it if you’d like.”

  The calculator excited me. Dad never let me touch the calculators in his inventory. He said I might break one. I cradled it in my left hand, caressing it as I slid it out from its black leather case and ran my fingers over the smooth, cool buttons. I studied them carefully. There were the regular numbers and math signs, but there were also symbols I didn’t recognize.

  “Do you want it?”

  I looked up and saw Patricia watching me. She looked pleased. I stared at her in disbelief. This was an expensive calculator. I figured Dad could probably get seventy or eighty dollars for it. A debate kicked off in my mind. I knew I was supposed to say “no thank you,” but my fingers kept brushing over the buttons and I couldn’t keep my eyes off the smooth black leather case.

  “Yes,” I said quickly before I lost my nerve. “I would love it. Thank you.”

  She smiled and patted my head. I ran to the hallway and buried the calculator in my duffle bag before Dad woke up and saw it.

  My hurt from the night before started to fade. Getting a calculator was almost as good as spending a night at a motel. We stayed at Patricia’s house the entire morning. She made us eggs and bacon for breakfast and offered me a knowing smile each time she caught my eye. I was starting to like Patricia and could understand why she was Dad’s favorite salesperson.

  After breakfast, she and Dad had another meeting in the living room while I watched TV in Ben’s bedroom again. This time, I didn’t even mind.

  Dad and I left Patricia’s house around noon to start the long drive back to Walls. For the first hour, we drove in silence. My thoughts were on my new calculator, carefully tucked away in my duffle bag. I was dying to get it out and examine it more closely. I couldn’t wait to show Connie. She was going to die of jealousy.

  Dad started the conversation.

  “You know, I don’t think you ought to say anything to anyone about where we spent the night. Patricia’s my saleslady and she was nice enough to offer us a place to stay so we wouldn’t have to spend money on a motel, but I just don’t think you should say anything. In fact, if anyone asks you, just say that we went to a sales meeting, because that’s really all we did.”

  “Okay,” I assured him. “She was really nice.” My gut was still aching from the whole episode and I preferred to forget about it.

  Dad seemed relieved and smiled. I figured this was a good time to introduce the calculator.

  “You want to see what she gave me this morning?” I asked.

  I could feel myself glowing as I reached into my duffle bag and pulled out the calculator. My mood changed the minute I saw Dad’s face. It had turned beet red.

  “You shouldn’t have taken that from her!” he barked. “Do you know how expensive those are? That wasn’t right. What were you thinking?”

  Dad’s reaction startled me. I knew he wouldn’t be thrilled about me accepting such an expensive gift, but I didn’t expect him to get angry about it.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, feeling my own rage ignite inside me.

  “You can’t show that calculator to anybody. Do you understand me? That was just really stupid to take that from her.”

  “But you broke your promise about the motel!” I wanted to scream at him. “You lied to me!”

  My hands were trembling and I felt my lower lip quiver. I knew I was about to explode so I nodded my head in response and then quickly turned to stare out the window. I spent the next thirty minutes pretending to be engrossed in the road signs. I knew it was wrong to accept such an expensive gift, but it was the one good thing out of the entire trip.

  Dad broke the silence.

  “Well, I wish you hadn’t taken the calculator,” he said, his voice now patient and kind. “But since you did, you need to promise me that you won’t show it to anyone or say anything about where you got it. Do you understand?”

  “Sure, Dad,” I mumbled.

  I closed my eyes and pretended to be asleep for the rest of the drive. As soon as we got home, I hurried to my room with my duffle bag and shoved it under the bed. Nobody asked me about my trip so I didn’t have to say anything. The next morning, Dad left to meet up with his crew in Memphis.

  I wanted to keep my promise to him, but I was dying to play with my calculator and show Connie. When she and I were alone in our bedroom, I decided to let her in on my secret.

  “You want to see something?” I asked her. “You have to promise not to tell anybody though.”

  “What?” Connie asked.

  I walked over to our bedroom door and shut it tight. Then I knelt down on the floor and retrieved my duffle bag from its hiding place. I reached into the bag and pulled out the black leather case that held the calculator. Slowly, I slid the calculator into my hand. Connie’s eyes looked like they were going to pop out of her head.

  “Where did you get that?” she asked accusingly.

  “Dad’s saleslady gave it to me,” I answered. I could feel a grin spreading across my face. “We spent the night there and in the morning she surprised me with it.”

  Connie suddenly had this weird, shocked look on her face, and I knew I had screwed up big time.

  “You’ve got to swear you won’t tell anyone about this—either about the calculator or spending the night at Dad’s saleslady’s house,” I said quickly. “I promised Dad I would keep it a secret.”

  I was in my room, playing with my calculator, when Mom stormed in a few hours later. The look on her face scared me.

  “Ingrid, I want you to tell me right now what you and your dad did over the weekend!”

  “I didn’t steal it, Mom. I promise. Dad’s saleslady gave it to me.”

  Mom acted as though she didn’t hear me. She grabbed me by my arm.

  “Let me say it again,” she hissed. “I want you to tell me exactly what you and your dad did while you were gone!”

  I had never seen Mom so angry. She looked like she was going to hit me. I took a deep breath and started at the beginning. When I got to the part about spending the night at Patricia’s house so we could save money on a motel room, she dropped my arm and stormed out of my room, slamming the door behind her.

  Dad came home the next day, and he and Mom started screaming at each other. Then he left again and Mom announced we were moving back home.

  “Thanks for ruining my life,” I wanted to snarl at Connie when we were alone in our room. But I couldn’t prove she told Mom, and I felt so guilty I wanted to shut it all out of my mind.

  A few days later, we stuffed our duffle bags and trash bags full of clothes into the trunk of our Buick, piled into the car, and started our two thousand mile trek back to Utah. Despite our ruined weekend getaway, I would have done anything to stay near Dad and our new, nice h
ouse. I dreaded going back to our suffocating, miserable existence at home.

  I couldn’t shake the sick feeling in my stomach as I sat crammed in the back seat with my brother and sister. I knew it was my fault we were moving back to Utah, and I knew Dad knew it too. We hadn’t even talked since that weekend, and I was worried sick that he was mad at me. I didn’t know when I was going to see him again and I was convinced he’d never want to take me on a trip with him again.

  CHAPTER 3

  BACK IN UTAH, life quickly returned to the way it was before we left. Except that a dark cloud now hung over our house.

  Mom started locking herself in her room to pray for hours at a time and smiled even less than before. And Dad stayed away for nearly two months before he finally came to visit us. I was sure he was still mad at me for telling Mom about Patricia because when I met him at the door, he didn’t give me a hug or swing me around like he usually did when he arrived. He just walked into the house and headed straight for the living room couch.

  I followed behind him, pulled off his cowboy boots, and brought him a glass of water, same as I always did when he arrived.

  “How was your trip, Dad?” I asked nervously. “Did you have a good drive?”

  He didn’t answer. He just stared at the large living room window in front of us like he was in a daze.

  I plopped down beside him, waiting and hoping for him to snap out of his bad mood.

  The seconds of silence crawled like hours.

  “You know something? I’m tired,” he said finally. “I’m gonna go take a nap.”

  “Sounds like a great idea,” I agreed quickly. “I’ll bet you’ll feel a lot better when you get up.”

  I wrapped my arms around him for a hug, but he only half-hugged me back. He pulled himself off the couch without saying another word and headed for the bedroom. When he emerged a few hours later, he was dressed in a suit and tie and left with Mom for what I overheard her tell Connie was a church trial.

  When I woke up the next morning, Dad was gone.

  I felt a lump in my gut that only got bigger when Mom called us all into the living room for a family announcement.

  “Last night, your dad was excommunicated from the church,” she said quietly. Her voice was flat and dark circles hung below her bloodshot eyes. “This means he’s no longer a church member.”

  I could hear the hurt and shame in Mom’s voice and though she didn’t look at me, I was certain she was blaming me for the whole mess.

  We all knew Dad had to do something really sinful to get kicked out of the Mormon religion. I was sure it had something to do with Patricia because at church the week before, I overheard Mom telling one of the sisters that Dad had committed adultery. I knew adultery was against the Ten Commandments and that it tied back to Dad sleeping in Patricia’s bedroom.

  “So does this mean you and Dad are getting divorced?” Connie asked bluntly.

  My heart jumped when she said the words.

  Mom said nothing for a minute.

  “No,” she sighed, though her voice didn’t sound the least bit convincing. “Your dad and I are going to try to work things out.”

  Getting Dad kicked out of the church was bad enough, but causing a divorce was more than I could handle. I didn’t need Connie giving Mom any ideas. I didn’t understand why she even brought it up until later that day, when she explained to me that since Dad was no longer a church member, Mom’s temple marriage to him was no longer valid.

  “Just think about it,” she prodded, rolling her eyes like she always did when she was impatient or annoyed. “If they don’t have a temple marriage, they aren’t married for time and eternity, and can’t be together in the Celestial Kingdom. So what’s the point of them being married at all?”

  I hadn’t considered this and she had me worried. But after mulling it over, Connie said I should chill out.

  “Don’t sweat it,” she said, rolling her eyes again—but this time in an all-knowing sort of way. “They’re not going to get divorced because Mormons don’t get divorced. And Mom’s the best Mormon around.”

  It didn’t occur to either of us then that without Dad, Mom had no family.

  Mom had been an eighteen-year-old nursing student when she’d met Dad at church in Austria, where he was serving a two-year Mormon mission. By then she had already been living on her own for two years and had such a burning desire to move to the United States that she had already applied for a visa. Mom had no family to speak of—she had still not met her blood mother, and within months of meeting Dad, her father died of tuberculosis and her stepmother went crazy and was locked away in an insane asylum.

  Dad, then a nineteen-year-old farm boy from Utah who dreamed of doing something big with his life, said he knew he wanted to marry Mom the minute he saw her.

  “I tell you what, Ingrid. Your mom was real pretty back then,” he told me once when I asked him how they met. “I remember walking into church one Sunday and seeing her standing there all dressed up in her nursing uniform and hat. She was something else. She was so determined and smart, and she was so petite. I don’t think she weighed more than a hundred pounds.”

  They wrote letters to each other while Dad finished out his mission. Even before he returned to Utah, Dad sold his bike and begged relatives for the rest of the money to buy Mom’s airplane ticket to the United States. As soon as she graduated from nursing school, Dad flew Mom to Utah. Shortly after he completed his mission, the two of them married, and Dad’s family became Mom’s family. Without him, Mom was alone.

  I NOTICED PEOPLE staring at us the next Sunday at church. But no one said anything to me and nothing changed at home. When Dad called a few days later, he sounded happy again.

  “How’s my Hippie Boy doing?” he boomed with a laugh. I felt his voice smiling through the receiver and relief washed over me. Dad sounded like his old self. He didn’t seem upset anymore—either about being kicked out of the church or about Mississippi.

  “Hey, Dad! How’s it going? Where are you? When are you coming home?”

  Dad mistook my desperation for excitement and got a chuckle out my anxious inquiries.

  “You are something else, you know it?” he said, which was the same thing he always said when he called. “I’ll be home before you know it. And then you and I are going to have a great time, okay?”

  “Okay,” I managed, reluctant to hang up the phone. “But promise me you’ll hurry.”

  I clung to Dad’s voice like it was a life raft, hoping he could save me from my existence.

  It wasn’t just the non-stop church sessions and chores, or suffocating sadness that clogged the air around me. It was also the depressing, run-down state of our house.

  Mom insisted on keeping all of the walls in our house white because she said white represented good and helped keep Satan out. But they hadn’t been painted in years—making them a dirty grayish color—and the plaster was crumbling in some spots, leaving big, gaping holes right down to the wooden beams that held our house together. To cover up the holes in our flower-patterned living room carpet, Mom used mismatched kitchen rugs she’d purchased from the church thrift store. They made the floor look like a patch-work quilt and were the first thing anyone noticed when they came to our door. I hated it all, but I was especially bothered by our kitchen. Aside from the cubby space that housed our stove, sink, and fridge, the room was just a large rectangle with a peeling yellow linoleum floor. Most of the space was taken up by a banquet-style plastic table, with water-damaged black vinyl chairs that Dad had scavenged from a flood in Idaho.

  Jammed into one corner of the room was a giant aluminum trash can that stored our 50-gallon bag of powdered milk. On the other side of the table sat our washing machine, which also doubled as counter space and a cutting board. Sometimes food crumbs slipped into the cracks around the lid and got washed with our laundry. No one else I knew had a washing machine in their kitchen and I found it mortifying. But even worse than the washing machine was the lau
ndry hamper that sat next to it, only two feet from our table. The laundry smelled up the kitchen and flies were constantly swarming around the room. They got so bad during the warmer months that Mom hung a long, yellow fly strip from the light above the kitchen table to catch them. Every once in a while, a sticky dead fly dropped off the strip and landed in our food while we were trying to eat.

  When I asked Mom if we could move the fly strip somewhere else, she looked at me like I was crazy.

  “Flies are attracted to food,” she explained matter-of-factly. “So the best spot for the fly strip is over the table.”

  In the back of my mind I knew it was partly Dad’s fault that Mom was sad and that we didn’t have any money. But it was impossible for me not to associate her with chores, church, and being poor, and the only break we got from any of it was when Dad came home.

  As soon as he walked in the door, a different energy took over the house. Mom’s rules and home church sessions went away. So did her food, usually, because Dad didn’t like the Shipwreck Stew or other meals Mom managed to pull together on our small grocery budget. He often surprised us with a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken.

  “Look what I got,” he would say as he placed the steaming bucket of fried chicken on the center of the kitchen table. “Who wants to dig into this with me?”