Read Online Something I've Been Meaning to Tell You by Alice Munro - Free Book Online Page B

wasn’t even old enough then to realize how out of the common it is, for a man to say something like that to a woman, or somebody he is treating like a woman. For a man to say a word like
beautiful
. I wasn’t old enough to realize or to say anything back, or in fact to do anything but wish he would go away. Not that I didn’t like him, but just that it upset me so, having him look at me, and me trying to think of something to say.
    He must have understood. He said good-bye, and thanked me, and went and started filling his pail from the pump. I stood behind the Venetian blinds in the dining room, watching him. When he had gone, I went into the bedroom and took the dress off and put it back in the same place. I dressed in my own clothes and took my hair down and washed my face, wiping it on Kleenex, which I threw in the wastebasket.

    The Peebles asked me what kind of man he was. Young, middle-aged, short, tall? I couldn’t say.
    â€œGood-looking?” Dr. Peebles teased me.
    I couldn’t think a thing but that he would be coming to get his water again, he would be talking to Dr. or Mrs. Peebles, making friends with them, and he would mention seeing me that first afternoon, dressed up. Why not mention it? He would think it was funny. And no idea of the trouble it would get me into.
    After supper the Peebles drove into town to go to a movie. She wanted to go somewhere with her hair fresh done. I sat in my bright kitchen wondering what to do, knowing I would never sleep. Mrs. Peebles might not fire me, when she found out, but it would give her a different feeling about me altogether. This was the first place I everworked but I already had picked up things about the way people feel when you are working for them. They like to think you aren’t curious. Not just that you aren’t dishonest, that isn’t enough. They like to feel you don’t notice things, that you don’t think or wonder about anything but what they liked to eat and how they like things ironed, and so on. I don’t mean they weren’t kind to me, because they were. They had me eat my meals with them (to tell the truth I expected to, I didn’t know there were families who don’t) and sometimes they took me along in the car. But all the same.
    I went up and checked on the children being asleep and then I went out. I had to do it. I crossed the road and went in the old fairgrounds gate. The plane looked unnatural sitting there, and shining with the moon. Off at the far side of the fairgrounds, where the bush was taking over, I saw his tent.
    He was sitting outside it smoking a cigarette. He saw me coming.
    â€œHello, were you looking for a plane ride? I don’t start taking people up till tomorrow.” Then he looked again and said, “Oh, it’s you. I didn’t know you without your long dress on.”
    My heart was knocking away, my tongue was dried up. I had to say something. But I couldn’t. My throat was closed and I was like a deaf-and-dumb.
    â€œDid you want a ride? Sit down. Have a cigarette.”
    I couldn’t even shake my head to say no, so he gave me one.
    â€œPut it in your mouth or I can’t light it. It’s a good thing I’m used to shy ladies.”
    I did. It wasn’t the first time I had smoked a cigarette, actually. My girl friend out home, Muriel Lower, used to steal them from her brother.
    â€œLook at your hand shaking. Did you just want to have a chat, or what?”
    In one burst I said, “I wisht you wouldn’t say anything about that dress.”
    â€œWhat dress? Oh, the long dress.”
    â€œIt’s Mrs. Peebles’.”
    â€œWhose?” Oh, the lady you work for? Is that it? She wasn’t home so you got dressed up in her dress, eh? You got dressed up and played queen. I don’t blame you. You’re not smoking that cigarette right. Don’t just puff. Draw it in. Did nobody ever show you how to inhale? Are you scared