When Madeline Was Young (2006) by Jane Hamilton

Author:Jane Hamilton [Hamilton, Jane]
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2010-12-19T00:41:59.421000+00:00

"It's a beautiful night," my mother said to Buddy. To me she said, "Why aren't you wearing your smock? You're covered in blood!"

Louise and Stephen were in the living room, taking another stab at Chopin. Cleveland and Malzena were out on the front porch, eating the candy they'd bought with money the church had given them for their educational experience. Louise had probably told Mikey to go home, or maybe he had needed no prompting, running off down the alley. Madeline was in her room bawling. The dress! Where was that dress? Had she taken it off, and would she hide it?

My mother listened up the back stairs. "What's wrong with her?"

I had never lied to Julia, or not much anyway, and I did not on that occasion begin. "She's mad at Buddy," I said. Poor Madeline, ripped from Jerry's arms, deprived of his manly attention.

"Now, why would anyone be mad at you?" my mother said to Buddy. "Great big girl--you'll have to excuse her. She'll be fine in a few minutes. Actually, she'll be right as rain by noon tomorrow, when Mikey gets back. She doesn't know what to do with herself when her sweetheart is away."

I was slow to come to it, but I suddenly realized that Buddy hadn't figured out who Mikey was; he thought the man on the sofa was a nobody, a generic neighborhood misfit. And why would he have known Mikey was the sweetheart when Madeline had degraded him so? "You, you big fat dodo!" Not to mention the fact that we were geared for Mikey's arrival home the next day, all of us unprepared to see him early. "The one you called the moron?" I murmured to Buddy. "That's him, the boyfriend."

I went down the basement as my cousin had directed, to be in the company of the baboon. I didn't know which shock to consider first. How could Madeline be so fickle? How could she lose her senses over Jerry when she loved Mikey? Happy Mikey, hurrying to see her! Joyful Mikey, caught in Jerry's snare. Because this was long ago, before teenagers knew so much--because this was years and years ago--I thought, How could . . . ? How could a woman put her mouth--there?

Overhead came the rushing sound, all those feet steaming to the kitchen, the sign that Mrs. Maciver was serving ice cream. It was no surprise to me that Buddy had done the job in Jerry's loft that should have been mine to do; how could it have been otherwise? I understood that I'd been watching Madeline for a few years without know-

ing what to look for, a gap Buddy would not have tolerated in himself. Of all the things to grieve for, though, of all the things that made it impossible to go upstairs for a sundae, was the humiliation Madeline had suffered in Mrs. Pindel's hideous dress--what she would have been crying about if she'd known better.

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