Bluish (7 page)

They went up. “Granmom! Open up!”

“Don’t you have your key?” Dreenie asked her.

“Sure, I got my key,” Tuli said. “But Granmom don’t like the sound of a key in the lock. Makes her nervous.”

Gilla Bennett opened the door. She was in her robe and slippers. A thin, wiry woman, she looked tired.

“Hi, Granmom Gilla,” Dreenie said.

“Hello, Dreenie. You look nice!”

“I see you’re not dressed,” Tuli said to her granmom.

“No, don’t feel much like going out today,” she told Tuli. “I didn’t get off the job until way late. But I made you your favorite soup, baby.”

Dreenie sat down at the kitchen table. Everything was neat and clean, but bare. There was not much extra in Tuli’s house. The soup smelled good on the stove. Dreenie realized she was hungry.

Tuli filled bowls with potato and meat soup. Then she sprinkled grated cheese on top.

“This is really good!” Dreenie said. There was bread that Granmom had made; Dreenie had a big piece.

“Hits the spot!”Granmom said. Dreenie and Tuli both agreed it did.

Afterward, Granmom went to take a nap. And Dreenie and Tuli cleaned off the table, did the few dishes, and put them away.

“I guess we’re not going to afternoon services, then,” Dreenie said finally.

“We could go. But you’re not supposed to go without Granmom, and I don’t want to, anyway.”

“All dressed up and no place to go,” Dreenie said. She didn’t feel disappointed, exactly.

“Well, that’s just the way it is,” Tuli said. “I lead a sad life.” Sounding like an actress.

“No, you don’t, either,” Dreenie said.

“Yeah, I do. I got up and dressed, and Granmom was still asleep.” Gilla worked a night shift, helping to guard a large business.

Dreenie was silent. Finally, she said, “You got Granmom. You got me and my family.” Tuli stared at her, eyes blank. “And you look like a model.”

That made Tuli smile broadly. “Yeah? I do?”

“Yeah, you do!” Dreenie told her. And she meant it.

They played checkers for a while. And listened to the radio. Sitting on Tuli’s bed, they painted their nails. Tuli painted hers sunlight-yellow.

“I love Christmastime,” Dreenie said, “but I can’t wait for summer to come.”

She painted her nails a deep rose.

“We ought to make a resolution to do something different each week next summer,” Tuli said.

“Maybe by then, Bluish can go do stuff with us, and walk, too.”

“You’re always thinking about her,” Tuli whined. “What about me?”

Dreenie sighed. She let it go. But soon after, she said she had stuff to do.

She went home, relieved. Soon, she’d be seeing Willie and her mom and dad.

W
ELL, HOW COULD YOU
guess? I didn’t. Nobody did.

We get on the bus. And Bluish, she gets to go! She’s as excited as me, only we don’t show it.

“Tuli, stop jiggling!” we tell Tulifoolie and we all laugh. Then we all jiggle and the bus goes.

We had all the kids and Max and Ms. Baker. Guess what? Mrs. Winburn! She came with us. But she sat with Max, talked to him. She didn’t bother us. Bluish told her mom she wouldn’t speak to her if she watched us or anything. Whoop! We didn’t even notice her mom after a while. But how could anyone guess, huh?

Yay! We get down there. And there! Natural History Museum Central Park West at 79th. Really great with flags blowing in the cold. We get out—I want to count the steps with the rest of the kids. But how’s Bluish going to get up so many steps?

Her mom pointed to the sign. I saw it too. It says: WHEELCHAIR ACCESS. That means Bluish—and we get to go too. Missus says we can, me and Tuli and Bluish in the chair and her mom. Not that her mom’s not nice. She’s just kind of different than my family. But this is not about her.

We went to the side of the big steps and went under and through a big door. We went on in that way to an elevator. And up to the second floor. We meet the kids coming in and follow them.

“Where are we going?”

Man! It’s the Great Hall of the Dinosaurs, we call it. Has this great big skeleton and murals like two stories high on each end. Story of peoples from different times.

Ms. Baker spoke about them. All these visiting fa-real big people going to different parts of the museum and getting tickets, paying money. Ms. Baker took care of us. We all stood together. Max put us in bunches ’cause we all can’t go in at once. Too many of us.

“It’s not a great big place,” Max says.

“Well, where is it?”

“In the vivarium. It’s a closed habitat.”

We went into the Oceana Hall of Birds part, they call it. Where they put the vivarium.

They told us, “You have to get through the first doors quickly—don’t let anything escape! Go through the next doors and you are in!” Her mom said, OK, I could wheel Bluish. I did! We get through the doors and we didn’t let anything out.

Nobody minded that our ten bunch went first. Almost too many kids. Oh, it was hot.

“I want to stand.” Bluish, she stood. Tuli sat in Bluish’s chair. Paula pushed Tulifoolie. Funny! Bluish is just like anybody standing.

Always some of us have our caps on just like hers so nobody knows she’s been sick. Bluish and us walking around looking at everything. It took her breath some but she loved it there. I let her take my arm, she is so very not heavy. Her mom watches. But I don’t tell Bluish. It was so hot and wet in there it curled my hair!

They call it a made-up fragile forest in the middle of icy New York. Called it: Tropical Butterflies Alive in Winter, the official name. Not just any old butterflies too. But 500 great big ones and little ones from the tropics. 80 degrees in there! Whew! The humidity is way high too. Oh the butterflies, tropical plants, and rotting food—they like it!

One landed on Max’s sweater.

We held out our arms. Butterflies came soon. It was so fun! Colors were so many! Pretty! Be gentle! So bright.

A big one landed on my shoulder. Then on Bluish, right on her arm. It was humongous!

“Max, Max! Look on Bluish!”

Bluish’s eyes got great big. Her face lit up, man! She looked so happy.

“It’s all blue!” she said.

“It’s way big, too,” Tuli said. “Ho-ney don’t bring it near me. I’ll scream if you do.” But I watched Bluish. Her face filled. She was all happy. Butterfly giant.

Max says, reading: “It’s a Blue Morpho with a b-i-i-i-g wingspan. It’s a big butterfly!”

They told us not to brush the butterflies off us. Let them walk off or lead them onto a plant. Or we could hurt them.

“Butterflies are poisonous, toxic, most of them.” Max was reading it.

Bluish stares at the Blue Morpho as it finds a plant. Looking so far away now. But I read her. I didn’t look. Knew she was thinking, “Me, Bluish, toxic me.”

“That don’t mean nothing. You weren’t born that way.” I told it to the air.

The Morpho fluttered its wings open, then half-closed, like breathing out and in. Bluish wobbled. I got her chair for her. Her mom helped her and took Bluish out to the Great Hall.

I stayed in to watch all kinds—a Zebra Swallowtail that looked like the animal. Orange ones and one little red-rimmed one. I read a pamphlet about all the butterflies. I’m going to put it up in my room so I’ll know. Willie’s going to want one, so I took two. I like the Isabella Tiger butterfly. It’s so dainty. The Monarch looks small next to the big Blue Morpho.

There’s something scary about that Morpho. Like it bites, maybe. All so bright and deadly, maybe. Border all black.

Going through the vivarium, all of us, didn’t take more than an hour. You can’t stand the humidity longer than 15 minutes. I gave a last look to the tropics. Giant green plants and a giant Blue Morpho.

Well, it was sure something. From egg to caterpillar to pupa—when the caterpillar doesn’t eat or move. It rests and becomes an adult. The bitter/butter/fly!

We don’t have time for the nature shop outside the vivarium. Shoot. But whoop! I got an idea … guess what?

C
HRISTMAS WAS NICE FOR
Dreenie, but not the best thing she could think of. She never got what she really wanted. Willie got clothes, and things for her Game Boy. She got a really nice doll. Dreenie got a Barbie. She got the jeans she wanted. She got boots. They always got games from relatives.

It was all nice,
she thought.
I helped decorate our tree two days before Christmas. But you don’t always get what you want.

She and Tuli waited to go back to Bluish’s house before they all exchanged gifts. It was now two days after Christmas. Bluish had been out of town for the holiday.

They were at Bluish’s house, in her room. They’d returned from the African Market at a near uptown school. The market had been fun: bright, colorful decorations, music and games, food. Bluish and her dad went with Dreenie and her dad, and Tuli. Next, both of Bluish’s parents, Bluish, and Tuli would go over to Dreenie’s house.

Dreenie had gotten Tuli different bands and clips for her hair. They came in a painted box. And Tuli tried them on, deftly pulling her hair back, up, or to the side. She looked in the mirror and smiled at herself.

Bluish’s eyes nearly popped out of her head when she opened her present from Dreenie. “Oh! Oh! Wow!” she said. “Where did …?”

“Do you like it?”

“It’s so cool, Dreen!”

It was the Blue Morpho, painted and crafted from a kind of plastic that felt soft and smooth. Dreenie had found it in the nature shop when she and her mom and dad took Willie to see the butterflies. “It looks exactly like the real one. Exactly the same size! I love it!” Bluish said. “Thank you, thank you!”

But no one was more surprised than Dreenie when she opened up her holiday gift from Bluish. “How’d you know?” Dreenie asked.

“Well, you didn’t talk about anything else after the field trip,” Bluish said.

It was the Isabella Tiger model, the butterfly Dreenie had liked best.

“Wow,” Dreenie said. “Cool! I’m going to hang it in my room so it looks like it’s flying.” The Isabella Tiger wasn’t as large as the Blue Morpho. Something about it reminded Dreenie of a lady’s delicate fan.

“I’m going to hang mine, too,” Bluish said.

Tuli powdered her face, using the compact Bluish had given her for Christmas. “The powder smells good,” she said. “It’s just my color, too.”

Tuli had given Bluish and Dreenie each a CD of Christmas music. And now, Bluish’s CD was playing in the living room, where everyone in the house could hear it. They listened as Nat “King” Cole sang, “Merry Christmas, toooo you. …”

“My dad loves Christmas music,” Bluish said.

“So does my mom,” Dreenie said.

Tuli eyed them. “You don’t like the CDs as much as you like the butterfly presents,” she said.

“Oh, yes we do, too,” Dreenie said. Everything was a test with Tuli.

Bluish said, “When I look at the Morpho, I feel like I can go anywhere and do anything. But I can’t hear it! I can hear the Christmas music.”

“Yeah! That’s right!” Tuli said, but then she asked, “Is seeing better than hearing?”

“Tuli, stop,” Dreenie told her. “All our presents are just right, so quit it.”

“Anyway, you have the best coat of anybody,” Bluish said. “I got a duffel coat for my Hanukkah-Christmas.” She smiled. “I asked for it. My dad says I’m ‘earthy-crunchy,’ like my mom. He means I like outdoor stuff, winter and summer.”

Dreenie got good presents for Christmas, but not what she really wanted. She didn’t talk about it, but she said, “Nobody has a coat like yours, Tuli. Leather, with a real fake-fur collar? I mean, nobody but you!”

“I know it,” Tuli said, delighted. “Never thought they’d get me something like this.” She still had the coat on. It fit her perfectly, with the fur up close around her neck.

Tuli paraded up and down the room in her coat. She took the Blue Morpho out of its box and danced with it. Her bright hair sprang and tumbled around her face as she tossed her head.

Dreenie snatched the Morpho from her and pitched it over to Bluish on her bed. “It doesn’t belong to you,” she said to Tuli.

“I wasn’t going to hurt it,” Tuli said, flopping down in a chair.

Tuli’s the prettiest, Dreenie thought. “That coat makes you look like a movie star,” Dreenie told her.

“I wish I could look like that,” Bluish said. “I don’t look like much of nothing.”

“Hey, I think you look good,” Dreenie was quick to say to Bluish.

“I do, too,” Tuli said.

Bluish lay curled sideways on her bed, her head on two pillows. “I always have to lie down, still.”

“Yeah, but you walk more,” Tuli said.

“Then I get tired longer,” Bluish said. “I feel better. …” She laced the large Blue Morpho through her fingers. But she didn’t sound convinced. She sat up. “Listen, I hear my dad.” Her dad was calling them. They headed down the hall. Bluish held on to a wooden bar along the wall. Dreenie had never seen anything like it before.

Bluish’s mom stood by the door in a long, black duffel coat with a green plaid lining. She’d taken it out of the hall closet and put it on. She had Bluish’s coat over her arm. She was beautiful in a grown-up way.
Different from Tuli,
Dreenie thought.
I’d sure like to be looking gorgeous like her someday. She has on nice makeup, too.

Dreenie’s dad had stayed a while, talking. He had brought them from the market. Mr. Winburn was saying that if he drove them home, Dreenie’s dad wouldn’t have to drive them back. And he said that he could take Tuli home, too. So it was agreed. They would go to Dreenie’s house in two cars. Dreenie had felt jealous that Mr. Winburn offered Tuli a ride home. She didn’t know why, exactly.
Don’t be like that,
she told herself. She got to ride in Bluish’s car. “You get to ride home with them later,” she murmured to Tuli, “so let me ride with Bluish now.” Tuli didn’t mind riding with Dreenie’s dad, so long as she got to go, and be with everybody.

Not many people on West End Avenue, Dreenie noticed, as they drove. It was cold out, but not snowy. What people she saw were all bundled up, dressed up in holiday clothes, she guessed.
Christmas is for family; so is Hanukkah,
she was thinking.
I’m glad it’s gone, though.