My Girl Read online

  MY GIRL

  A novel by Patricia Hermes

  based on the motion picture

  written by Laurice Elehwany

  AN ARCHWAY PAPERBACK

  Published by POCKET BOOKS

  New York · London · Toronto

  Sydney · Tokyo · Singapore

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  AN ARCHWAY PAPERBACK Original

  An Archway Paperback published by

  POCKET BOOKS, a division of

  Simon & Schuster Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas,

  New York, NY 10020

  Copyright © 1991

  Columbia Pictures, Inc.

  Cover art copyright © 1991

  Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc.

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  ISBN: 0-671-75929-9

  First Archway Paperback printing December 1991

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  AN ARCHWAY PAPERBACK and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster Inc.

  Printed in the U.S.A.

  IL 6+

  For my Boys: Paul, Mark, Tim and Matthew

  And my Girl: Jennifer

  —P.H.

  CHAPTER I

  I was born jaundiced. Once I was in a bathroom at a truck stop and caught hemorrhoids. And I've learned to live with the chicken bone that's been stuck in my throat ever since Gramoo got sick—well, mostly I've learned. Although I was getting more worried about it lately, because I could feel it getting bigger.

  I've also learned to live with the dead people we always have in the basement and the living room. And that's true—there really are dead people here. They bring them to the basement, and then, when they're finished with them there, they dress them up and put them in the living room. Harry J. Sultenfuss, Parlor, it says on the brass plate outside our door. What it means is funeral parlor. That's my home.

  It's creepy being surrounded by dead people all the time—dead people and others who are crying over the dead ones. I wondered if Dad cried a lot when my mother died. I don't remember it of course, because she died when I was born. But I try not to think about that.

  So it's just me and my dad. Dad likes me okay enough, I guess, but he has problems talking about it. I guess lots of dads have trouble talking to their daughters. At least, that's what Gramoo says—what Gramoo used to say before she got weird and stopped talking.

  Anyway, with all that's happened and that I've had to learn to live with, I figured Dad would be upset about my latest affliction—this chicken bone stuck in my throat and the lump that was growing up around it. I had to tell him. This was serious.

  We were in the kitchen together, and Dad was at the counter by the window, making a sandwich. He was frowning down at it like it was some puzzle to figure out.

  "Dad," I said.

  He didn't answer.

  "Dad?" I said louder.

  He still didn't answer.

  "Hey, Dad!"

  "Hmmm?" he said, but he didn't look up from his sandwich.

  "I don't want to upset you," I said, "but you know this thing in my throat? I think it's getting bigger. I can't swallow well. I think it's cancer maybe. You think I'm dying?"

  "Hand me the mayonnaise out of the fridge, would you, Vada?" he said.

  He couldn't hear me, that's what it was. I wasn't making any sound. Maybe I was invisible, too? Add that to the cancer and the hemorrhoids.

  I got the mayonnaise and brought it to him.

  He said, "Thanks, Vada," but he didn't look up or anything.

  Maybe you get invisible from living around dead people?

  I sighed and went out on the porch. Thomas J was coming over in a little while. I could talk to him about it. I tell him practically everything. I even told him I was in love with Mr. Bixler, our fifth grade teacher this past year.

  I wished I could talk to Gramoo about it. Once I could have told her, but for the last few months she acts like everyone is invisible, not just me. It's like the only real people are the ones she sees inside her head, people she sings to—sometimes at the top of her lungs—but that no one else sees.

  I sat on the porch and looked at my watch. Thomas J was late.

  But just as I was convinced he wasn't coming, I saw him. He was heading for my house on his bike, and about a block behind him were some other kids on bikes, calling to him and yelling. From here I couldn't hear what they were saying, but I knew they were tormenting him. Thomas J is so easy to torment—what with him being allergic to everything and skinny and scared of so many things—that practically everyone in Mr. Bixler's class this year teased him, even me. But I'm not mean the way I do it. I like Thomas J. He's my best friend, has been ever since Gramoo and Thomas J's mother, Mrs. Sennett, met at the playground with me and Thomas J when we were two years old.

  Thomas J skidded to a stop in front of me. His glasses slid down his nose, and he punched at them with one finger. There was tape around them holding them together.

  "If you punch them any more," I said, "they're going to split in a million pieces."

  "Vada!" he said. He turned and looked nervously over his shoulder, down the block to where the others were, then turned back to me. "Is it true that you're showing them one? A body?''

  "Who?"

  "Howie and Billy?"

  "Uh-oh," I said. I'd forgotten. A week ago, on the last day of school, some of them were teasing me about being best friends with Thomas J, teasing and saying he was a big baby and all. So I told them they wouldn't be nearly as brave as him, that they wouldn't come in and see a corpse. And then when they said they would, I said they'd have to pay to see one.

  Of course, they didn't have to know that Thomas J had never seen one either, that he'd never even been in my house once in all the years we'd been friends.

  "Are you?" Thomas J said now.

  I nodded. "If they pay up."

  "But how come?" Thomas J said.

  "How come what?"

  "How come you're showing them?"

  I just shrugged. I wasn't going to tell him that they'd been making fun of him. So I just said, "Why not?"

  Howie and Billy came up then and dropped their bikes to the grass.

  "So? Gonna show us?" Howie asked.

  "Yeah, are you?" Billy said.

  "Got your money?" I said to them all. "Who's in?"

  They raised their hands, all but Thomas J.

  Howie and Billy dug in their pockets.

  Eventually Howie handed me fifty cents.

  Thomas J was backing up.

  "You coming or not, Thomas J?" Howie said.

  "Nah," I said, "he's seen plenty of them. He's tired of them, right, Thomas J?"

  "Can't," Thomas J said. "I hafta go home."

  "To play with your dolls?" Billy said.

  "Let him alone!" I said. "And where's your money? You didn't pay up."

  "How do we know you're going to show us any?" he said.

  "Talk about a baby!" I said. "You want it in writing so your mom can sign it?"

  He glared at me, but after a minute, he said, "All right, all right."

  He handed me a quarter.

  I kept my hand out.

  He sighed, then handed me another.

  "Finally!" I said. "Now follow me. And don't say a single word."

  I turned and saw Thomas J pedaling down the street alone. He'd be back later, after lunch, I knew.

  I went up the steps
to the porch, the two of them following. I was madly trying to come up with a plan, because I didn't think we had any dead bodies there right then—none except maybe a new one in the basement where Dad worked on them. And I sure wasn't going down there.

  But then suddenly I had an idea, a plan so good it almost made me laugh out loud.

  Very quietly we went into the house and I led them to a big room off the hall in the front of the house. We live in the back part of the house, but the rooms where the dead people are and the offices and all, those are in the front. I slid open a door and motioned them to come into the casket showroom. They didn't know it was just a showroom, though.

  They followed me in, and I closed the door behind us.

  There were lots of caskets in there, some open, some closed.

  On tiptoe, I went over to a closed casket, the two boys following.

  I put both my hands on the lid and stood there for a long time, just looking down at it, not saying a word.

  "What are we waiting for?" Howie whispered. His voice came out all quivery, sort of.

  "Giving you a chance to leave if you want," I answered.

  Nobody moved.

  "No one is chicken?" I said.

  "Not me!" Billy said. But I thought he sounded kind of quivery, too.

  Very solemnly then I turned to them. "You sure about this? You want to go through with this, both of you?"

  Nobody spoke for a minute. And then Billy said, "Go ahead!"

  "Okay, then," I said, "if you're sure."

  I turned back to the coffin then, put both hands on it, and said softly, "All right. Lean forward."

  They did.

  "Ready?" I said.

  They nodded.

  Quickly then I flipped open the top half of the casket.

  Nothing! There was nothing in there at all. They squealed and jumped back. Billy squealed the loudest.

  I felt like laughing out loud. But I didn't. Instead, I frowned, putting on my most serious look.

  "Uh-oh!" I said. I dropped the lid and put my hand to my mouth. "I was afraid of this."

  "Of what?" Billy said.

  "What?" Howie asked.

  "It's this problem we have," I said softly. "See, sometimes when we get these people, they're not completely dead. You know, like when you cut a chicken's head off and they still run around crazy?"

  "You're full of it," Billy said, but his voice was definitely shaky now.

  "It was an old lady," I whispered. "She was so old she just stopped breathing one day. But maybe she started up again. I bet she's roaming around this house right now. Come on. Let's see if we can find her. Follow me."

  I tiptoed to the door, then peeked out into the hall. No one was around.

  Very carefully I slid open the door, and all of us went out and I quietly closed it behind us.

  Then I led the way down the hall to our part of the house in the back.

  Being careful to be super quiet, and hoping and praying she was there, I opened the door to our kitchen-family room. I peeked in.

  There she was—Gramoo—just as I had hoped. She was sitting motionless in her rocker, bolt upright, absolutely still, her veined hands clutching the armrests. She was so still that for a minute even I could imagine that she was dead.

  I looked over my shoulder at Howie and Billy.

  They were staring at Gramoo, bugged-eyed, hardly breathing. Something in Billy's throat was bobbing up and down, and he was so white I was sure he'd faint.

  "That's her," I whispered. "I knew it."

  I turned back to Gramoo.

  She just kept sitting there, still, stiff as a dead person, the way she does most all the time now.

  But then as we watched, suddenly she began to rock.

  There was this stifled, choking cry behind me. And when I turned, they were running down the hall and out the front door.

  Laughing, I watched them go. I tucked my hands under my arms and flapped my elbows. "Bock, bock, bock!" I squawked.

  See if they made fun of Thomas J for being a chicken again!

  I went over to Gramoo then. I bet she'd love to know how she'd scared them. A couple months ago she'd have laughed a lot about this.

  "Hi, Gramoo!" I said. "You scared them good. Boy, did you."

  She didn't answer.

  "Gramoo?"

  I knelt in front of her, looking up into her face.

  She didn't see me. Or if she did, she didn't show it.

  I miss her so much. She's like my mom. For years I even thought she was my mom, until I grew up and knew more. So what had happened to her? How could she be here but not be here? If only she'd try. She used to hold me and pat me, and when I got scared or anything, she'd sing to me and rock me in her lap, right in this rocker.

  Suddenly I had a weird thought. I looked around, just to be sure no one was watching. Then, like a little kid, I climbed into her lap, curling myself into a little ball, just like I used to do when I was little.

  "Gramoo?" I whispered.

  She didn't notice me even then. Her face was as blank as a sleeping baby's.

  "Gramoo?" I whispered. "Can you see me? Do you know it's me sitting here?"

  She just rocked on.

  "Please?" I whispered, and I put a hand on her hair and stroked it softly. "Try," I said. "Come on, Gramoo. Try? You can talk if you try."

  CHAPTER II

  There was no answer from Gramoo, but Dad was calling me—loud.

  Uh-oh! He'd found out we'd been playing in the casket room.

  Slowly I got up off Gramoo's lap, then patted her hair once more. "Be right back," I whispered. "You stay there and I'll come back."

  "Vada?" Dad called again.

  "Coming!" I yelled back.

  "Vada!" Dad yelled. "Would you bring my cigarettes down?"

  Down. Down where he worked on dead people.

  But at least it wasn't to yell at me about what I'd been doing.

  I picked up the cigarettes from the counter. Then I went to the basement door. It was stuck, like always. I wiggled and pushed and finally opened it. Then I went slowly down the steps. But I stopped on the bottom step. I never step off the bottom step.

  Dad was standing at the counter, his back to me, working on a body that was hooked up to an embalming machine. I tried not to look, but even though it was gross, I peeked. I always had to peek when I came down here.

  Yuck.

  Uncle Phil was helping. Uncle Phil works part-time for Dad, helping with all the gross stuff, like embalming and picking up bodies from hospitals and morgues. The other part of the time he's a bartender. They were really engrossed in what they were doing, and neither of them had heard me come down.

  I didn't want to speak and scare them. I mean, they were working on a dead person.

  So I coughed—a small, delicate sound.

  "Phil," Dad said, "move him a few inches to your left, will you?"

  Uncle Phil moved the body, and Dad checked the machine.

  "Did I tell you he was my shop teacher?" Dad said

  "You took shop?" Uncle Phil said.

  "Yep. I made a tie rack."

  "No kidding!" Uncle Phil said. "I made a tie rack. And bookends, too."

  I coughed again.

  "Put them on the counter, Vada," Dad said, still not looking up.

  And come off the step? No way.

  I flipped them—a quick twist of the wrist and then—swish! Two points. Like a pro. I knew I'd make it as a basketball star someday. They landed right beside Dad on the counter.

  "Daddy?" I said. "Guess what? I beat Thomas J in Monopoly yesterday."

  For a minute Dad didn't say anything. And then he said, "Holds six ties. I still have it."

  "Uncle Phil!" I said.

  "Va-ta!" he answered.

  "I beat Thomas J in Monopoly yesterday."

  "Good for you, baby," Uncle Phil said.

  "Once you put the hotels on Boardwalk and Park Place, you're a shoo-in to win," I told him.

  "I like to
buy up the railroads," Uncle Phil answered.

  "We're trying to work here, Vada," Dad said.

  "Daddy," I said. "Thomas J's mother took us to see 101 Dalmatians. Cruella De Ville stole all the puppies. She was going to make a fur out of them."

  "Phil, check the carotid artery, will you?" Dad said.

  I sat down on the step, waiting. Maybe they'd be finished soon.

  I tapped my fingers on the steps. " 'Doo wah diddy, diddy dum, diddy doo,' " I sang quietly.

  Gramoo always says—said—I have a pretty voice.

  "Vada!" Dad said.

  "Dad?"

  "Vada, I'm embalming my high school teacher. Don't sing."

  I stood up. There was a clipboard against the wall by the steps and I picked it up and looked at it.

  "Layton, Charles," it said. "Age 60. Cancer of the larynx."

  Larynx! That was your throat, wasn't it?

  He was dead. And he had the same thing I did—a lump in his throat. Maybe it wasn't a chicken bone. Maybe it really was cancer!

  I started back upstairs. As soon as Thomas J got back here, we'd go see Dr. Welty.

  I was halfway up the stairs when the doorbell rang.

  Thomas J!

  But when I opened the door, it wasn't Thomas J at all. It was a lady—a very fancy-looking lady. Right away I realized that she wasn't what Gramoo would have called a "real lady," back when Gramoo was still talking. This lady had on tons of makeup, and her eyelids were smudged with so much dark stuff she looked like she'd been punched, and her earrings hung down to her shoulders practically.

  Her hair was frizzed out all over, and her dress was cut so Iow you could see practically all the way down the front of it.

  Wow!

  "Is Mr. Harry Sultenfuss in?" she asked.

  "That's my father."

  "Could I talk to him?"

  "Sure," I said. I opened the door wider, and she came in.

  "So," I said, once she was in the hall, "have you had the unfortunate experience of recently losing a loved one?"

  She blinked at me. "Excuse me?" she said.

  "Have you had the unfortunate—"

  "Could I see your dad for just a second?" she said.

  I went to the basement door and yelled down, "Dad! Somebody's here!"