House of Blues

stuff that looks like shredded
AstroTurf, and plenty of jelly beans in the bottom. Then there were
chocolate bunnies and marshmallow chicks that tasted like cellophane,
and chocolate-cream eggs. The Easter eggs weren't there, because we'd
dyed them ourselves—so the bunny couldn't be expected to bring
them.
    We always got some little gift besides the candy. One
year I got the duck that became the bane of all our lives, but it
wasn't that year. That year I got a Mickey Mouse watch. Reed got what
Dad insisted was a "bunny lady," a purple and white stuffed
rabbit with short mouselike ears instead of long ones, red cheeks,
and feminine features, pouty mouth included. Evie got some sort of
jewelry-making kit, and frankly, I don't think she liked it much. She
was in a horrible mood that day, cranky and snappy.
    She even threw a tantrum before church.
    "I don't want to go!"
    "Quiet, Evie."
    "You can't make me."
    " I'm going to count to three . .
    That sort of thing. At the time, I didn't know what
it was about—no one paid any attention to Evie, except to tell her
to shut up—but now that I think back, she was in a tomboy stage.
    She was probably pissed that the bunny hadn't noticed
and brought her some boxing gloves or something.
    She must have hated her dress too. It was some kind
of light pink extravaganza; and Reed had white lace, I think, with a
pink sash, those tiny little black shoes with straps (are they the
ones called Mary lanes in books?), and white lace socks. I'll never
forget how she looked that day. I thought she was the cutest thing I
ever saw. She had a neatness to her, a compactness, even as a tiny
child, that I always admired. Evie on the other hand was all over the
place.
    I wonder what on earth I'm saying here. Perhaps I'm
talking about energy, whatever that is. Reed's was contained, I
think, just as it is now (too much so, I think). Evie's was full-out.
    A child like that is an inconvenient child; a child
who takes I up a lot of space; space I felt should have been mine, I
guess; space our parents would just as soon have had empty and
peaceful.
    Naturally, Mother and Dad won the fight, and Evie did
go to church. It's worth noting here that she always seemed to think
she'd win, and she never did. I never even tried, and I don't suppose
Reed did either because we saw you couldn't win. But that never
seemed to occur to Evie for a moment. What was wrong with her, I
wonder?
    Anyway, we did go to church, all five of us, and
afterward we were supposed to go have lunch with our
grandparents—Dad's parents, the ones who started the restaurant.
    They were old even then, and had long since retired
from running it. They lived in Covington, across the causeway, and
the ride over always seemed endless to us, or perhaps only to me, if
it's true that boys are noisier and more rambunctious. Anyone who's
ever had Evie for a sister would doubt it, but there is only one such
male and I did turn out to be a writer, a distinctly effeminate
calling in my father's opinion.
    We all knew the afternoon would hold no pleasures for
us children. First there would be a lunch of ham, probably, with a
million vegetables, followed, if we were lucky, by some passable
dessert. The whole procedure would be far too formal for my taste,
and none of the food appealing except the dessert. But with luck Ma
Mere would make a peach pie, I thought (though I know now it was far
too early for peaches).
    The worst was that we wouldn't be permitted to remove
our oppressive Sunday clothes until after lunch had been consumed
and—tedium of tedium!—photographs taken. Hair would be combed and
recombed. Then we'd have to stand still and squint endlessly into the
sun, holding our Easter baskets and possibly the treasures brought by
the seasonal rodent. With luck, Evie and I would be posed together
and I could untie her sash, or hit her upper arm or something. Both
girls had Easter bonnets that year. On the way to church I had jerked
Reed's off her head and threatened to throw it out the window. She
cried and Mama hit me, but I could probably attack Evie's with
impunity. It was a sort of wide-brimmed straw affair with a pink
velvet ribbon around it and a nosegay stuck in the ribbon. I might be
able to pull the flowers off, or perhaps sail the entire hat into the
neighbors' yard.
    We had to make a stop first, and I remember thinking
about that in the car—the little ways I could torture Evie. When I
look back on it, it amazes me that I wasn't