white gloves and wet umbrellas
by Pares
There were little rivers gushing toward the gutters in the street when dance class ended. Stella watched the Southside Catholic kids crowd together under ragged black bat umbrellas, shouldering toward the El. The kids she knew from church and school climbed into long cars lined up against the curb, like the limousines that celebrities got out of at movie premiers. Her mother's car wasn't among them, and so she had to wait under the dripping green awning.
She wasn't the only one standing there; there was a boy, too.
It wasn't Ray, though.
She'd danced with Peter Moffat today. That meant Ray would just stand on the corner by her school with his friends and take long drags of his gross shared cigarette and pretend to ignore her. Until next week, when she'd probably dance with him again.
This boy had a soft, chinless face, but a pretty mouth and sharp eyes. He was a year or two older and reeked rather powerfully of Old Spice, the sort of comfortable, creamy smell she associated with her Uncle Dennis, who was a teamster and seldom invited to dinner.
Something about the way he leaned against the scratchy red brick of the Goldwin Building prompted Stella to be polite.
"Hello."
"Hey." When he tipped his head to answer, she saw that he had green eyes. There was a brownish triangle on his cheek under his eye, like a bruise. He didn't smile, and Stella wondered why she'd spoken at all.
They stood there a while, under the awning, and Stella surreptitiously scouted for her mother's sleek gray Jaguar.
Surreptitiously. It was a good word. Her mother said it would be on the SATs in high school, and that if she wanted to get into a good college, she'd better start studying now.
Ray Kowalski slammed out the building's side door; by the time he'd said "shit" in a loud, careful way and shrugged his windbreaker over his head, his hair had been pounded down by rain. He turned to face her and then caught sight of the kid standing next to her, and crunched his face up, glaring at the boy, like he had anything to do with Stella. Like Ray had anything to do with her.
Ray was just a stupid boy she danced with. So what? That didn't make them anything.
Ray hawked a loogie on the rain-dark sidewalk and Stella rolled her eyes in disgust. Dropping his jacket back onto his shoulders, Ray spun on his heel to stomp toward the El.
When she couldn't see his back anymore through the heavy sheets of water, the boy next her said, "He your boyfriend or something?"
Stella had almost forgotten about the other boy; she shook her head, and heard herself say, "He smokes." As if that was the only thing keeping her from holding stupid Ray Kowalski's sticky hand. As if she would have let Ray kiss her again if only he hadn't tasted like an ashtray.
The boy nodded at her, like he thought that was a pretty good reason for not letting someone kiss you, and Stella figured she liked that.
"Are you waiting for someone?"
"My little sister's in there. You know Frannie Vecchio?"
Frannie Vecchio was a fluffy haired sixth grader, little and skinny as a stick but loud as anything. Everybody knew she had a crush on Peter Moffat; Stella had spent most of the afternoon pretending not to notice Frannie's resentful looks.
Stella nodded.
"I think she's talking to the teacher."
Ray let his head fall back against the wall. He had a fresh crew cut; Stella could see his skin past it. She thought about kiwis, but she bet his hair was softer.
"Figures. If there's a way to be late, Frannie's gonna find it. You got any sisters?"
Stella shook her head again. Her mother would have sighed at her, and said, 'Speak aloud, please. No one can hear you shake your head.'
"I got two."
Stella had never before considered having brothers or sisters.
"What's it like?"
"Okay, I guess. A little loud sometimes. I love them and everything, but I'd like them better if they weren't always touching my stuff."
Stella had never heard a boy say he loved anything; she'd only heard her mother and her mother's friends say they loved the new season's prints, or the salads at the Ritz-Carlton.
She wondered if she'd love her sisters, if she'd had any. She wasn't sure; her own mother seemed to hate Aunt Kitty like poison.
The side door opened again, and Frannie Vecchio appeared, in a yellow hooded slicker.
"Hello, Frannie."
Frannie eyed her suspiciously and after a moment, said, "Hi, Stella." She then transferred her attention immediately to her older brother.
"You don't gotta walk me home, you know. I'm not a baby."
"You're a baby as long as Ma says so. When she doesn't, you can walk the hell home by yourself and I don't gotta die of boredom waiting around for you."
Ray shook open the big tan umbrella he had with him and slung an arm around his sister's neck to keep her under it.
Together, they turned their backs to Stella, and walked into the rain as if she'd never existed, Frannie slapping Ray's chest, and promising, "I'm telling Ma you said 'hell'!"
"So what? You'd have to say it to her to tell her I said it, anyway."
Frannie sighed.
"Yeah." Before they'd walked too far, Frannie halted and said, "Can we wait up for Irene?"
"Nah. Her uncles will take her home."
Stella wasn't so sure the men who came to pick Irene Zuko up from dance class really were her uncles; for one thing, it was almost always a different guy, and how many uncles could one girl have?
Stella watched them as they rounded the corner, and she noticed she could still smell Old Spice in the space Frannie Vecchio's older brother had been standing.
Her mother had to honk twice before Stella came back to herself and ducked out from under the awning and into her mother's stuffy, idling car.END
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