I remember the cluttered, filthy home. The empty bottles of wine on the kitchen counter. The tiny, clean oasis that was Diane’s room. Another piece of the Diane puzzle has slid into place, even if the picture being revealed is hardly pretty.
Diane wipes at her eyes. ‘And do you know what?’ she says, her voice ratcheting up in volume and anger. ‘When I got back, my parents had emptied my room of my record player and my magazines and my records. My records! All the records I’d played all my life and when Johnny came over were gone. All of them! They said they were a bad influence.’ She starts to number them on her fingers, and her tears return. ‘The Cascades and the Chiffons and Little Stevie Wonder and Mary Wells and Dusty Springfield and Lesley Gore and everyone,’ she says, like they’re all old friends. ‘I know maybe it’s stupid. But the records really mattered. I sobbed and sobbed, and I begged Patty to tell me what had happened to them, but she avoided me like I was contagious.’ She takes a shaky breath. ‘She’s always been the good one, if you know what I mean.’
I nod, and I can’t help but think about Cheryl for a minute. Which one of us is the good one? Which one of us is bad? What did Diane do that was wrong but decide for herself who she was going to love?
‘Anyway,’ continues Diane, sniffling, ‘my parents sent me to my aunt’s house, only they didn’t realize it was Johnny’s neighborhood they were sending me to! They never even bothered to learn his name. They just threw him out of the house that day, and I never saw him again or talked to him again until I moved in with my aunt and started at Eastside. Before I left, I tried to talk to some of my old friends who I thought would care, but they didn’t want anything to do with me.’
A realization strikes me. ‘Wait, Diane, were some of those girls the ones who were giving you a hard time at Winkler’s on Saturday? I mean, before …’ I don’t finish my sentence. We both know what I mean.
Diane nods, frowning. ‘Yes, those were my friends. Or rather, my former friends. I’d told my best friend, Betty, about Johnny. She was one of those girls that night. I guess she couldn’t keep her mouth shut. I’m sure her vicious, awful mother helped spread the rumors, too.’ I remember what those tea sippers at Winkler’s said. How they couldn’t believe Diane had the guts to show her face in public again. All for loving a boy from my side of town. It makes me want to spit nails.
‘So why do you and Johnny act so strange around each other?’ I ask, confused. ‘I mean, shouldn’t you be happy to be together again? And at the same school?’
Diane looks away from me and presses her hand up against the listening booth wall, then leans her head against it, too, like this conversation has completely exhausted her. Maybe it has.
‘I know, you would think so, wouldn’t you? Only … I never got a chance to tell Johnny goodbye. And I think he believes I abandoned him. I just disappeared, and months ago, too. I think it’s why Connie doesn’t like me. And when Johnny and I have tried to talk since … well, everything feels off. Like that night at Winkler’s? Before you stood up for me at the concession stand? We got into a big fight about everything.’
Johnny skulking around the fence line at Winkler’s. A drunk Connie threatening to spill the beans about something until Johnny hauled her away. Now it all makes sense.
‘Couldn’t you explain it was your parents’ fault?’ I ask.
Diane nods. ‘I did. And he wants to be together again. Only … oh, Evie, I don’t have the words. It’s so complicated.’
I couldn’t venture a guess as to how complicated, or even begin to try. Suddenly Diane seems so old to me, older even than Cheryl, who’s married and everything.
Diane takes a deep breath. ‘Evie, I need to stop for a bit,’ she says. ‘I haven’t really talked about any of this with anyone. Not like this, anyway.’
I squeeze Diane’s hand. ‘I understand,’ I say. ‘Let’s just sit here for a little bit, all right?’
Diane offers me a soft smile of agreement, then reaches out and restarts the Irma Thomas record. The two of us barely make a sound as we wait for the song to begin, aching to hear the longing in her voice again.
After the record finishes, Diane takes it and slides it carefully back into its sleeve. In the past twenty minutes, it feels like we’ve lived through two lifetimes together. So much has changed – at least in the way I see Diane.
‘Could you buy it?’ I ask, suddenly aware of the silence. ‘I mean, I know you don’t have a record player anymore, but just to have it?’
‘It would hurt too much to have it and not be able to listen to it,’ she says. She sighs as she stands up. ‘Let’s just leave, all right?’
I stand up, too, and tentatively reach my hand out and place it on her back for a moment as we open the door. It’s strange how a conversation in a listening booth has changed how I see Diane. She’s not just some tea sipper I’m obligated to anymore. Is she my friend? Three days ago we didn’t know each other, and based on her appearance, I wouldn’t have given her the time of day. But now? My heart is breaking for her like it would for Juanita or Connie or Sunny.
After we exit the listening booth and then the Jive Hive altogether, we head toward the bus stop. I notice just how red and blotchy her face is from crying. I imagine her in that dark, messy kitchen with an aunt she barely knows and who doesn’t seem to care about her. A strange idea grips me. Before I have a moment to doubt it, I hear myself asking, ‘Diane, by the time we get back, school will be almost over. Do you want to come home with me? You could maybe have dinner with us?’
Diane turns to me, her eyes wide. ‘Oh,’ she says. ‘Are you … that would be swell, Evie. But I wouldn’t want to put you out … even if I have to say that I’m not really ready to go to my aunt’s house yet.’ I notice she doesn’t call it home.
‘No, it’s all right,’ I say. ‘It would be nice. But you’re going to have to meet my mother and my grandmother.’
‘What about your dad?’ Diane asks.
‘I don’t know him,’ I admit. ‘He took off when I was small.’
‘Oh. I’m sorry.’
‘It’s nothing,’ I say, even though some days it feels like everything. At least when it comes to how my mother views my future.
After a quiet bus ride home, we walk down Munger Street to my small green house, with the white shutters that have needed a paint job since I was in elementary school. When I lead Diane inside, where Grandma is in the kitchen preparing dinner as usual, I realize I’m so nervous my palms are suddenly slick with sweat.
‘Hello,’ my grandmother says, not looking up right away. When she does, she startles. I never bring people home.
‘Hello, I’m Diane,’ says Diane, stretching out her hand as smooth as you please, catching my grandmother by surprise. But Grandma is pleased, too, you can tell, and her eyes crinkle up at the sides as she carefully wipes her hands on her red gingham apron and extends the right one to Diane.
‘Hello, I’m Evelyn’s grandmother,’ she says, ‘Helen Davis.’