I looked back at Great-aunt Frances. Her head was tilted to the side and she was breathing through her slightly open mouth now,
"C'mon," Alanis called again in a loud whisper.
"What are we going to do?" I asked when I joined her.
She turned to show me a bottle of whiskey and a pack of cigarettes stuck inside her waist.
"Let's have a private party," she said. "I promise. It will be better than the one you were just at. This one will be real!"
She laughed and disappeared down the stairway. I looked back toward the living room.
Great-aunt Frances was right. There was no one here to tell me what to do or when to do it. No rules hung above our heads. There were no tattletales in the corners, and even if there had been, who would they have reported to now? Certainly no one would have gone to Grandmother Emma or my father.
I was excited about this new freedom, but it was confusing, too. because I felt as if all the strings that had tied me to everyone I knew were now untied and I was floating with no idea where I would go.
Would I drift into the world in which Greataunt Frances lived? Would I have to pretend for the rest of my life to be happy? My mother's voice would continue to fade.
Even Ian's words were drifting away.
I had gone much further from who I had been than I ever dreamed I would.
Who would I become?
5
Turning the Tables
.
I followed Alanis to the basement living room, where she sat down on the old sofa, put the whiskey bottle and cigarettes on the table, then turned on a small portable radio. She found the station she wanted and smiled at me.
"Don't worry. She won't hear anything with that television going upstairs. She never does. C'mon. Sit down already." She laughed, pulling her legs up and folding them under her. You sure look silly in that dress. Why did you put it on?"
I went to the chair. It was as dusty dawn here as it had been upstairs. I thought, but Alanis didn't seem to mind or care.
"My great-aunt asked me to. She wanted us to pretend."
"Why would a grown woman ask you to do that? I told you she's bonkers. Aren't you afraid of living here with her?"
I shook my head. What was there to fear? So far, it looked only like fun.
"Couldn't your father keep you?"
"He said my grandmother was right. He wouldn't be able to look after me properly because he was in the wheelchair."
"Like your great-aunt can?"
"I don't know," I said. I could feel myself crumbling inside. She was right. There was so much I didn't understand. Tears were gathering to charge out of my eyes.
Alanis saw she was pushing me over an emotional cliff.
"Well, you'll have more fun here, so don't worry about it," she said, then she leaped off the sofa and started to dance to the music, "You dance?"
I shook my head.
'Don't worry. I'll teach you some great steps.' She stopped and reached for the pack of cigarettes on the table. "Neat, huh?" she said, looking around as she pounded a cigarette out of the pack. "It's just like having your own apartment. I discovered it by accident one day when I was bored. You ever smoke?"
"No. Ian says it's really bad for you."