If Daddy were here, I thought as I returned to bed, he’d be ranting about the waste of electricity in those buildings. Why was it necessary to keep the lights on so brightly in empty offices stories high? Was everyone afraid of burglars, even at those heights? How long would it take me to get used to this?
I decided I just had to get thicker curtains for my bedroom. These were too dodgy anyway and might fall apart after one wash. There were sure to be other expenses I had not anticipated. If I took too long learning how to be a waitress, I could run low on funds quickly, especially after having been robbed. This wasn’t going to be as easy peasy as I had convinced myself it would be. Another saying of my father’s flashed across my mind: “A fool spends no time at all convincing himself of something he knows in his heart to be untrue.”
Oh, put a sock in it, Emma Corey, I told myself. Just imagine your father’s look of self-satisfaction if you went running home after only a day in New York. You’d have to get rid of mirrors because of the disappointment that had sunk into your face. Every time he had a chance, your father would remind you of the money you had wasted, not to mention time, which was the same thing to him.
I won’t go home even for a short visit, I vowed, not until I’ve had some success that would quell his criticism.
Who knew? When I returned to New York after that, I might have his blessing. He could even begin to brag, although the few times I had seen my father admit to being wrong, he looked like he would choke. His face would redden, and my mother would have to say, “Breathe, Arthur, breathe.”
Still, the thought of all that happening someday filled me with encouragement.
However, when I finally fell asleep, I didn’t sleep well. There were so many unexpected sounds to wake me periodically. People in other apartments in the building apparently either worked at night or were serious insomniacs. Sometimes, the footsteps were so loud I sat up, thinking someone had broken into my apartment. I was really looking forward to a roommate, hopefully someone used to all this and therefore someone who could reassure me at night, as well as ease the burden of expenses.
Consequently, I almost overslept and leaped out of bed when I looked at the desk clock I had brought from England. It had been a gift from Mrs. Taylor on my fourteenth birthday. I could still hear her say, “Any daughter of Arthur Corey better know what time it is.” She had bought me one that matched the blue in Julia’s and my room. Right now its hands were clapping, and its face was screaming, Get up; get going. You wanted a new life. Start it!
Not knowing my way around New York, I knew I had to leave myself more time to get to the restaurant. I rushed about, gulping only a glass of juice for breakfast. I wasn’t satisfied with the way I looked when I had left, but as Daddy would chant, “Priorities, priorities, when it comes to precious minutes.” As I hurried down the stairs, I thought, Now the apartment building is so quiet? Maybe the other tenants were all vampires.
As soon as I saw a phone booth, I stopped to call home, because my phone wasn’t hooked up yet. I had left earlier as well to make the call, remembering we were five hours behind the U.K. Before I stepped in, I groaned with disappointment. Someone had vandalized the phone and cut the wire connecting the receiver.
I started to panic when I couldn’t find a public phone that worked. One after another either had its cord cut or smelled so much like a dirty bathroom that I couldn’t imagine going in and closing the door behind me. And with all the noise from traffic and jackhammers, I thought I would surely have to shut myself in the booth and maybe put my finger in my other ear. There finally was a relatively clean working one on the same block as the restaurant. After I stepped in, I realized that I would need quite a few quarters, and I didn’t have that many, so I tried a collect call first.
Because it was late June, Julia was off work and answered on the first ring, like someone sitting there beside it and waiting for it to chime. She accepted the charges. Of course, I had no intention of revealing what had happened to me my first night in New York if she asked how I was. I was determined to sound happy and excited.
“Hello,” she said in a deep whisper.
“It’s me, Julia, Emma.”
“I know it’s you, you silly goose. Are you calling from New York?”
“Yes, of course.”
She sighed so deeply that I thought it might blow out the phone like some light bulb.
“Daddy’s going to know you called when he looks at the phone bill, and I’m going to get into trouble for accepting it,” she whined.
It was hardly the response I was hoping to hear.
“I’m sorry, Julia, but I wanted you all to know I had arrived safely. I thought you’d be concerned. I’ve moved into my apartment, but I don’t have a phone hooked up yet, and—”
“Come home, Emma. You made your point. We’ll get Daddy to forgive you. Just come home. Please.”
For a moment, I was taken aback by the way she was pleading. It was quite unlike her, especially when it came to telling me to do something. But I quickly recovered.
“I have no intention of coming home. I just arrived, Julia. I haven’t even begun to try, nor have I begun my job yet. You’re the silly goose. Where’s Mummy?” I demanded.
“She’s lying down. She refused to eat breakfast, even though I brought it to her. Daddy isn’t talking to either of us. He still blames us for what you’ve done. He thinks we knew for weeks and didn’t tell him. He called your announcement at dinner the night before another example of a family Pearl Harbor. Mummy couldn’t eat and cried all through dinner. Thank you, Emma Corey.”
“Is she all right now?”
“No,” Julia said, punching the word over a few thousand miles. “How can she be all right now? Daddy’s still not talking to her. Aren’t you listening?”
Julia was never one to sugarcoat anything, and in that way, she was far more like our father than I was.
“He’s not right blaming her or you. I’ll send him a letter and tell him so.”
“He won’t read it, Emma. He really will burn it first as soon as he sees the postmark.”
“Then I’ll call him at the bank. He’ll have to speak to me.”
“I wouldn’t make a wager on it, Emma. He’s probably already told his secretary, that nosy parker Mrs. Weeks, not to transfer any calls from you to him. He’s not hiding his anger from people, either. If anyone asks him what you are doing or planning to do, he says, ‘I wouldn’t know.’ That’s what he said to Mrs. Taylor already. If he could, he’d take an eraser to your memory right now, and I’d be an only child.”
“I’ll call and give a different name.”
“Brilliant. He’ll still hang up on you the moment he hears your voice unless you were calling from this house, and even then I couldn’t be sure. Meanwhile, Mummy’s upset, and it’s making her sick. Just come back.”
“I can’t, Julia. At least, please tell her I’m safe. I have my apartment, and I’m starting work today, and soon I’ll have a phone with a telephone number, probably today. I left a note for the landlord to have that done. He’s very nice, by the way, sort of like Mr. McGregor. Remember? The shoe repairman?”