Good Graces - Lesley Kagen [79]
AN AMERICAN IN PARIS
That’s the name of the movie we saw during old-timey week at the Uptown Theatre that Troo loved so much. My sister has turned herself into a living, breathing Eiffel Tower!
Dave, who has to do double duty as a judge, steps into the admiring circle. He takes his time, but when he’s done judging Troo, he says real loud—maybe even my sister can hear the pride in his voice—“I think all of us can agree hands down that we’ve never seen anything quite like . . .” He sweeps his hand toward her. “The blue ribbon for the under-twelves this year goes to . . . Miss Margaret . . . sometimes known as Troo . . . also called Leeze . . . O’Malley! Let’s hear it for her, gang!”
Troo starts hunh . . . hunh . . . hunhing and everyone’s clapping and Wendy Latour’s throwing Dinah Shore kisses and Artie shoots off his cap gun and Mary Lane is chimp-grinning and man, oh, man, excuse my French, but what a fucking genius my sister is!
Chapter Twenty-one
The heat usually dies down around this time of night, but I guess it’s making a day of it same as me and Troo and everybody else who’s spread out at the lagoon waiting for the sky to go a smidgeon darker so the fireworks can get shot off from the island in the middle.
My breathing is coming a little faster than it normally does, but I’m not feeling as jumpy as I usually do being this close to the murky water. It was right over there where Bobby set me down. My loved ones being close by helps. Troo is lying next to me and Ethel and Ray Buck are two blankets over. I’ve already said a prayer for Junie, my little cousin, who would also be cuddled up with us along with her mother and father if she wasn’t rotting away in the cemetery in her little white coffin. I bet Dave is thinking about his dead niece, too. All the blue today had to remind him of Junie since that was her favorite color. Can you see fireworks from heaven?
Mother and Dave are perched in folding chairs behind us, getting along better than the lovebirds in the pet aisle at the Five and Dime.
The ladies in the neighborhood were swarming all over Mother for most of the day. They wanted to get a close-up look at her engagement ring. Most of them told her congratulations, but I heard one lady grumble, “And not a moment too soon, if you ask me. I was afraid to let my husband leave the house without me. The woman’s a Jezebel.”
I don’t know where Uncle Paulie disappeared to but wherever he is, he’s busy. The Fourth party is the biggest day of the year for him. All the Popsicle sticks lying around on the grass are like manna raining down from heaven for my uncle. Granny isn’t here. Even though she likes fireworks, she never comes to the celebration anymore because she got sick of people telling her how she should win a prize for looking so much like George Washington. Nell, she’s not here either because she doesn’t even know what month it is. But her nincompoop of a husband showed up. I saw Eddie earlier over where they were selling beer. He was hanging out with Tommy “The Mangling Meatball” Molinari, who musta challenged him to a chugging contest because the both of them were blotto. I stuck around for a while to see if Greasy Al might show, but all that ended up happening was Eddie and Tommy weaved down to the Honey Creek and tinkled into it.
Father Mickey is visiting with his parishioners around the shadowy lagoon, stopping to ask about how things are going up at the Feelin’ Good factory or with their kids. When he comes by Dave and Mother they treat him like a king, can’t thank him enough for getting them the annulment. They also talk about the cat burglar. Everybody has been. The Montgomerys got hit yesterday and lost a boatload of money that Mr. Montgomery, who doesn’t believe in banks, kept in a coffee