"I remember I had a credit card, too. but I think Lester told me it expired."
"I think this will be enough." I said.
She stood up. She was still in her nightgown. It was faded and yellow, like the pages of an old book. I saw how dry her skin was around her elbows. She realized I was looking more closely at her.
"I didn't used to look this way," she said, touching her face. "I've just not been taking good care of myself. But I will now." she added quickly. "Now that you're here, we'll both take care of each other. okay?"
I nodded.
"Oh," she said, going to her closet. "Look at what I found in my closet."
She held up an embroidered schoolbag with a strap that went over your shoulder.
"My mother gave this to me when I went into the sixth grade, and now I'm giving it to you," she said.
I took it and saw the inside had a lining and the top had a zipper'
"Thank you."
"You're welcome, dear. Now, I'm going to take a bath and brush my hair and maybe even do my toenails," she said. "I haven't done my toenails in a long time. and I haven't put on nail polish since... since I can't remember."
I put the schoolbag over my shoulder and picked up the tray.
"Miss Puss is as good as a dishwasher." Greataunt Frances said.
Surely, she didn't think that was the proper way to clean the dishes. The way she had said it made me worry, however. I put it on the tray.
"Do you want me to buy you anything when I'm at the mall?" I asked.
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"Oh, you don't have enough money for me, too. You might not have enough for yourself. I'll keep looking for more," she said. "And next time he calls. I'm going to tell Emma's lawyer to send us some. We need petty cash now that I have a young girl living with me!" she declared. She grew serious. "I'm surprised Emma didn't think of it. She really must be sick. No one could think of everything necessary better than my sister. She could have been the first female American president,"
I stood there for a moment with the tray. She'd said the last sentence with respect and admiration.
"You do like my grandmother?"
"Of course, I don't like her. I love her. She's my sister. However," she said, lowering her voice and looking at the doorway, as if she was afraid someone might be listening, "she doesn't love me right now. But," she added, raising her voice and smiling. "now that you're here and she sees how wonderful things will be, she'll love me again."
"She's your sister. too. She should love you even if I wasn't here."
"I suppose."
"What made her stop loving you?"
She stared a moment and then she shook her head.
"What did I say?" she asked, waving her right forefinger at me. "What did we agree about? Never talk about anything unpleasant, remember? No sadness or unhappiness can come into this house. Only over the television set. Otherwise, what do we do? We go click our eyes closed and when we open them, whatever was unpleasant is gone, remember?"
I nodded. I wondered if she was saving this because she didn't want me to be sad or if she never wanted anything sad around her. She couldn't bury her head in the sand, but she could pretend to be some imaginary person and flee from tears as easily as opening and closing a door.
"Good," she said, smiling brightly again. "I'll be down after I get dressed. Don't worry if you have to leave before I come down, because I'm going to take much mare time brushing my hair. I'm going to start to do all the things I used to do when I cared about myself."
"Okay," I said and left her humming and rushing about behind me. Before I went down with the tray. I left the schoolbag on my little desk, next to the bag of Ian's letters. I thought I would come up to read them after washing and putting away all the dishes and silverware, but Alanis returned before I could.
"Well, how much did you get out of her?" she asked immediately. I held up the money. She took it from me and counted it. "That's it?"
"That's all she could find right away," I said. "Isn't it enough?"