Spring Fire Page 2

  Mitch felt confident and proud. She sat at the bridge table with the Tri Eps flocking to her, and her eyes saw the wretched lanky girl in the corner near the window, alone, fumbling frantically with her purse, feigning an interest in its contents, ignored by the smooth busy figures in white. Another girl in a creamy yellow suit enjoyed the same attention Mitch received, the white formals reaching to light her cigarettes, bending to smile benignly, kneeling adoringly at her feet as she sat there in the stuffed chair and let the cool breeze from the porch ruffle her hair lightly. There was a fat girl in a red suit standing awkwardly with Mother Nesselbush in the doorway of the room, not speaking, looking fearfully at the assembly. A small, pug-nosed rushee with a flip feathered hat whispered fervently to two Tri Eps. Mitch saw them all, hearing the voices talking to her on all sides, answering and listening and watching until her eye rested on a girl standing near the piano. The girl was beautiful. Her white gown began just above her breasts and came in tight at her waist and full down to her ankles, where it ended and allowed spike-heeled silver shoes to glisten clean and clear. She was picking up records from a stack there on the top of the piano, reading the labels, and dividing them into two piles. When she felt Mitch's fixed look, she answered it and Mitch grinned, looking back quickly at Kitten, who was explaining how the Tri Epsilon house had been redecorated over the summer. For several minutes Mitch knew that the girl was staring at her now, and a warm flush rose to her face. There was something about the girl. She had never seen her before, but there was something familiar in that fast second when they had looked at one another.

  In a moment the phonograph was turned on, and throughout the room girls paired off and moved to the center of the floor. Kitten grabbed Mitch's hand. "Do you like to dance?" she asked, pulling her forward. Mitch nodded, and as they danced, Kitten held her off so that she could talk and watch Mitch's face.

  "How do you like Tri Epsilon?" she asked.

  "Fine," Mitch told her, and naively, "but of course, I haven't been to the other houses yet."

  Kitten said, "You will come back, won't you, Mitch? We all hope you'll save your most important dates for us. Try to save two and eight."

  "I didn't know there was a difference."

  "Yes." Kitten smiled and pressed Mitch's hand. "There certainly is. Will you try?"

  Mitch said she would. At the hotel she had heard the rushees talk ecstatically about the Tri Eps. They were rated tops nationally, and the Cranston chapter was the leading sorority on the college campus. A hot stir of pleasure enveloped Mitch. She had not known the fear her father had known for her when she had thought of rush week, but there was always the subconscious worry that she might be too uncut and plain for sorority sophisticates. During the summer the college catalogues and booklets had come through the mail, and she had flicked through the pages, seeing the pictures of debonair, glamorous young people her own age. But not like her. Mitch knew that then—and again when Kitten talked to her and Marsha walked with her, and Marybell Van Casey sat beside her and smoked long cigarettes and talked about tennis and swimming and things Mitch understood. Still different, all of them. Mitch was aware of that fact, but she no longer pondered the differences. They liked her anyway. They wanted her to join Tri Ep.

  Jane Bell danced with Mitch. Casey. Kitten again. Marsha. The lilting lyrics of "Temptation" filled the room. Suddenly Mitch felt a wave of uncanny turbulence, relieved then when she turned and saw the girl standing next to her. The beautiful girl who had stood at the piano. Marsha laughed and said, "Mitch, I don't think you've met Leda Taylor."

  Susan Mitchell was taller than Leda Taylor. Leda held her and led her along the waxed floor. Mitch was conscious of her own breathing, corning in gasps and causing her chest to heave uncomfortably against Leda's She smelled the faint pungent perfume that Leda wore, and her hand on Leda's bare shoulder was hot and rough. The words to the song sounded loud in her ears, and they embarrassed her, dancing to them close to this girl.

  "So you're Susan Mitchell," the girl said, and Mitch could not hear her own answer. She did not talk for those minutes when they were together before the music ended, and Leda Taylor did not talk again. When it was over, a note sounded on the piano, and Marsha Holmes hummed the note.

  "Form the loving circle," Marsha said. "Join hands."

  Leda grasped Mitch's hand tightly. As the Tri Eps hummed the melody, there was a slow swaying motion in the circle of girls, and when the words came, Mitch could feel Leda's eyes on her.

  "Love you, I love you,

  Come be a Tri Ep girl.

  Love you, I love you,

  Come be an Ep-si-lon pearl."

  Mitch looked down at Leda and then away toward the French doors and the drapes and the sun outside.

  Let me make my-message clear.

  Love you, I love you,

  Come be a Tri Ep girl.”

  "I suppose," Leda said when the song was finished, "that you'll come back."

  "Yes."

  "I'll see you then," Leda said. She said, "I'll see you then," and glided away while Mother Nessy ran forward to hug Mitch. "The taxis are waiting, dear," she told Mitch, "and we have to hurry you all away. Remember, Susan, Tri Epsilon is counting on you. We hope you're counting on Tri Epsilon."

  Past Kitten Clark and Marsha, Marybell and Jane, their "Come backs" echoing in her ears, Mitch felt the sun on her arms, heard the nervous honking of the cabs' horns, and remembered only the green color of Leda's eyes, and the four words, "I'll see you then."

  * * *

  That evening Marsha looked up from the stuffed peppers and the tossed salad in front of her. "I noticed you were Susan Mitchell's partner in the loving circle this morning," she said to Leda.

  "Wasn't my fault. I danced with her and it happened to be the last dance."

  "Well, what did you think of her?"

  Leda toyed with her crust of bread, spreading the butter thickly around the edges and on the sides. "We need the silverware," she answered.

  "But the girl has possibilities, too. I mean, she certainly isn't backward or shy."

  "I don't know anything about the girl. I had one dance with her."

  Kitten Clark sat opposite Marsha. She clinked her fork on her plate and said, "Well, believe me, if she were anyone but Edward Mitchell's daughter, she'd get a nice, fat, round blackball from yours truly. She's hickey! I mean, absolutely hickey!"

  "But she is Edward Mitchell's daughter," Marsha broke in, "and let's all of us remember that. The girl hasn't pledged yet, you know. Other houses will be after her too."

  Casey said, "She says she swims. We could use her on the intramural swimming team."

  "You'll find a way to use her," Leda said. "I'm not worried about that."

  After she said it, she bit hard into the bread and the layers of butter. Casey's eyes flashed and she spurted out angry words. "What are you talking about?" she demanded. "Since when have you cared a damn whether a girl got an even break in this sorority? You throw a blackball around at the drop of a hat, and all of a sudden you're so damned self-righteous. This is a new twist."

  Leda knew it. She pushed her plate away and stood up. "Must be the heat," she said. "I don't care a hoot about Mitchell. She can go back to Seedmore for all I care. Right now, lover boy is waiting."

  She ran to the side door, to the tall brown-haired boy with the pipe jutting from his jaw, and the sweater that said Sigma Delta, and she murmured, "Jakie," and moved close to him.

  "You finished fast," he said. "Wanna walk?"

  “Yes, Jake-O."

  "We can pick up some beer in Campus Town. Then wanna walk back out—to the stadium?"

  "You know I do."

  "You always do. That's why you're my baby. Because you always do."

  "Let's hurry, Jake."

  The long red car waited at the corner for the light to be green, and Mitch sat behind the wheel with Fredna Loughead in the front seat beside her. She had met Fredna at the hotel. Fredna was trying to convince her that
Delta Rho was a better house than Tri Ep.

  "They liked you too, Mitch," she said, "and I know they'll ask me. Why don't you join with me?"

  "I don't know. I can't make up my mind. All of them were so wonderful to me."

  "The Delta Rhos aren't snobs, either."

  The light went green and Mitch saw them. They were standing at the curb waiting. Leda Taylor looked up. There was a brief flicker of recognition, a half-smile. Mitch grinned broadly this time and waved, but Leda took the boy's arm and turned to talk with him. The car moved away and Mitch watched them as long as she could through her mirror.

  "Some buggy," Jake said. "Rushee?"

  "A potential Tri Ep. Father's a millionaire."

  "She gonna be your roommate?"

  "My roommate?"

  "Well, you gals have to room with a pledge. I just thought you might pick a pledge with a convertible."

  Leda laughed. She said, "Maybe that's an idea."

  * * *

  Back in the hotel room, Mitch finished unpacking some of her clothes. She hung them up and brushed them off, and when she was through, she slipped into her blue-striped pajamas and sat on the bed hugging her knees. She said, "Tri Epsilon," aloud, and then, "Delta Rho." She reached over to the night table, where the leather-bound books rested. On the cover of one, there was a picture of the huge house with the six white columns and the marble steps leading up to the door. The words underneath read: "Tri Epsilon is a friendly house."

  For a moment she stared at it dreamily, and then, turning the page, she saw the clear full-length picture of Leda Taylor in the black dress wearing the crested crown, smiling. Mitch's fingers moved delicately down the picture as though she were touching a live object, and they stopped there at the words printed in bold blue letters. They said: "Where every girl's a queen."

  Chapter Two

  Put your stuff in the top drawers," Leda told Mitch. "I don't mind bending down to get mine."

  Mitch was used to new roommates and new surroundings and the strange formalities attached to this form of orientation. For six years she had attended boarding schools, and each year it was smoother and less uncomfortable. The first year she had hovered behind a closet door, too shy to undress in front of the girl with whom she shared the room. She had bolted the bathroom doors, and picked odd hours to do her grooming. Even her underclothes had been a source of embarrassment, and she had brought them to her room wet from their washing in the dorm sink, and hung them surreptitiously along the radiator near her bed. In time she had developed an unabashed nonchalance toward these matters and they no longer concerned her. But now, in Leda's presence, the casualness fell away, and Mitch found the old inhibitions again. She found that it was hard to talk to Leda, too, because she wanted to so badly. She wanted to remember the glib, natural responses that came so readily with others, but she could not.

  "Tonight the pledges are supposed to go on blind dates," Leda said. "You know that?"

  "Yes."

  "Want to get out of it?"

  "How?"

  "By going out with a friend of Jake's. He's a fraternity brother. We'd double-date. It's O.K. with Kitten so long as you're with a fraternity man."

  Mitch said, "I'd like that, I guess."

  She knew what it would be like if Leda were along. She knew that she would forget how to act and what to say and that she would laugh too loud and too often. But she did not want to go on a date alone with a stranger, either.

  "Like men, Mitch?"

  "Sure, they're all right"

  "I mean, really like them?"

  Mitch's lips were tired from the painful grins she had been stretching them into all day. Leda laughed. "Never mind," she said. "You'll learn. I used to think you just had to lie there and that was it. Then I learned better."

  Mitch pulled nervously at the string of pearls around her neck. Her face flushed scarlet. Leda noticed. "You'll have to get used to me, Mitch. I believe in being frank."

  "I don't mind," Mitch answered. "I guess I'm kind of dumb."

  "We're all dumb at first. But don't get fooled by some of them that play dumb. My God, to listen to this bunch, you'd think they were all virgins. But take it from me, most of them have had it. You ever fool around?"

  "I—I don't know too many fellows."

  "Ever been kissed—hard?"

  "A few times, I guess." The pearls snapped then and rolled onto the floor. Mitch jumped down to chase them and Leda stopped one with her foot. "Couple of them under the desk," she said. "God! Never been kissed more than a few times. I started when I was six. Then I used to play doctor out in back of my house. God!"

  Mitch did not answer. Her hands felt huge as she groped for the tiny, round pearls, and bending down there before Leda, she felt like an immense malformed giant. She was remembering how many other times she had heard references to sex, behind locked bedroom doors in boarding school, interspersed with thick laughter and raised eyebrows, and hands held at the mouth in gestures of awe and excitement. But now…

  "You'll grow up in college," her father had said. "You'll be a real lady when you come home." She wondered vaguely what her mother had been like, and if she were a real lady, and how she would have told her about men and women and the things they did together. She thought of Billy Erickson—the day in the bushes when he had showed it to her. The snake, she had called it to herself. The snake that men have.

  "You'll have fun tonight," Leda said. "You'll like Bud Roberts. That's Jake's friend."

  Mitch put the pearls in a box and sat awkwardly on the bed beside Leda. "I hope he likes me. You see, I’m not too used to men. In the other schools, I didn't see many. You know—rules and all."

  "Forget it! Look, we're going to buy some beer and get out on the Creek Road and just take life easy. You'll like Bud. He's no movie star, but he gets around plenty. He's Sig Delt president. Say, what about your car? We could walk, but—"

  "Sure," Mitch said. "Might as well take it. Only I don't like to drive at night very well. Not in a strange city."

  "Can Jake drive? He's a peach on the roads. Careful as anything."

  Mitch hesitated. Then she agreed. Leda pulled her sweater up over her head and loosened her bra. "Scratch my back, will you, kid?" she said. "God, I'm tired." She flopped on the bed, face down.

  Timidly Mitch's hands reached over and rubbed her shoulders, and with her eyes fixed half shyly on Leda's body, she recalled doing this before — a hundred times — but never so fearfully as now with Leda.

  "Ummm. That's nice. Your hands are wonderful." For long minutes Leda let them run up and down her back. Susan Mitchell was an enigma. There was strength and force and power in her, queerly harnessed and checked, Leda thought. If it should be released, she would be stronger. Masterful. There had been a hint of this in her look that first day. It was the kind of look that an old acquaintance gives another, in a crowd where no one is aware that the two have known each other a long time. Leda balked at her own thoughts. This tall child was naive and uncomplicated, she scoffed inwardly, and there was no reason to be wary. Suddenly, on an impulse, Leda rolled over and lay with her breasts pushed up toward Mitch's hands. The girl jerked her hands away quickly and stood up.

  "F-f-feel better?" She forced the words out

  Leda stretched luxuriously. "Mitch, honey," she said, "look in the left closet and see if my yellow blouse is there. The one with the buttons down the back."

  Mitch turned toward the door to the closet and opened it, grateful for this sanctum. She stood there moving the hangers down the rack. I used to think you just had to lie there and that was it.

  "See it, honey?"

  "No," Mitch answered, not looking at the color of the clothes. "I don't see anything at all."

  * * *

  Bud Roberts was a straight, narrow boy with a long nose and a square jaw. A cigarette hung loosely from his mouth, and as they rode along in the back of Mitch's car, he held his hands firmly, cracking his knuckles in regular, even movements. Mitch sat bes
ide him, smoothing her skirt and glancing up at him now and then, searching frantically for something to say. The radio blared forth from the front seat, where Leda leaned against Jake.

  "I love to ride along like this," Mitch managed to say. "It's so cool and everything," she added.

  They turned down a dirt road and drove fast around the sharp corners and Mitch fell against Bud Roberts. "I'm sorry," she said, pulling away.

  He had not said anything beyond "Hi" since they started on their evening. He had simply said, "Hi," and then they had climbed into the car and he had not said another word. Mitch tried to pretend that the silence was natural and she hummed a bit from one of the songs the Tri Eps had sung at dinner. The radio was noisy and she could not hear her own humming, but it made her feel better. She thought of Leda and how beautiful she was, and she felt a warm glow in her stomach when she remembered the way Leda had turned on her back that afternoon, and how lovely she had been. At her feet, in the car, the beer bottles rattled and she remembered how she hated the taste of beer. A slow panic mounted inside her as she imagined the hours ahead with the beer and the boy who did not talk. The panic was edged with anger and resentment.

  When the car stopped and Jake called, "All out!" she was sick inside where a drummer beat fast against her breast, and dull loneliness gnawed there.

  Bud Roberts caught the blanket that Jake tossed at him.

  "We're going on up ahead," he said, and Leda called out, "See you later, Mitch."

  Mitch stood there while Bud spread the blanket a few feet from the car. He was whistling now, but there was no tune—just whistling with no order to the notes. Walking back to the car, he picked up the sack from the back seat and set it down by the blanket. Then he took a bottle opener from his shirt pocket and sat down.

  "Like beer?" he said.