Rescue - By Anita Shreve Page 0,51
blood.
“It was OK, not great,” Gina says, as Rowan fills two tall glasses with orange juice. “I was mostly at the back door, opening cartons. Least I got some sun.”
“I had this lady at the register went nuts on me,” Rowan announces, sitting at the table, glass in hand. “All of a sudden she starts screaming that I’m trying to cheat her. I haven’t even totaled her order yet, much less taken her money. And she’s screaming—I mean screaming— that I’m ripping her off.” Rowan downs the juice in one go, looks for a napkin. Webster tears off a piece of paper towel and hands it to her. “The assistant manager comes over, takes the tape out, and compares it to every item in her bags. Then the lady says she’s entitled to two boxes of strawberries for the price of one, and that I charged her for both—she’s pointing her finger at me now—and Mr. T explains that was last week’s offer. And before he gets a chance to tell her he’ll extend the offer, she throws her purse at him, and all this crap falls out. Coins, keys, dollar bills, used tissues, breath mints… a jar of makeup breaks and gets all over my sneakers and Mr. T’s shoes, and then the lady starts sobbing. Mr. T tries to put everything back into her purse except for the used tissues and the makeup. He gives her pocketbook back, bags her groceries, and wheels them out to her car for her, and of course she hasn’t paid for anything.”
Gina laughs. “I love the makeup.”
“You wouldn’t if it was all over your sneakers,” Rowan points out. “I had to clean that up and pick up the tissues and the millions of pieces of glass.”
“So,” Webster asks, “what are you two up to tonight?”
“Gina’s over because her computer broke again,” Rowan says, “and she needs to get some notes and a take-home quiz off mine.”
They both know this to be a white lie. Gina’s mother doesn’t have the money for a computer, and Gina is expected to use the one in the library, which always has a long line. At least two or three times a week, the girl comes to the house to use Rowan’s laptop. Gina had to complete all her applications on it, and some of those applications had four essays. Despite the hardship, Gina has excellent grades, which proves something, though Webster isn’t sure exactly what. He likes it that Rowan spends time with her.
“There’s homemade pea soup in the freezer,” he says.
Sometimes Webster worries about what Gina is getting to eat at home. The girl lives with her mother, Eileen, and a housebound grandmother. Eileen works part-time as a receptionist at Blake Ford because she can’t leave the grandmother alone all day. Eileen is probably pulling in twenty-five, thirty at best, Webster guesses. Gina will be able to go to Columbia only because she has a full ride.
On Saturdays, Webster doesn’t make dinner. Gina and Rowan are eating the first of two meals they’ll have that afternoon and evening, the other away from home and not a real meal—more like cows grazing. On Saturday nights, Webster consumes leftovers and watches TV until he can’t keep his eyes open. Rowan used to wake him up when she came in, but she’s stopped doing that.
“Well, I’ll let you be,” Webster says, eyeing Rowan, who returns his gaze and shrugs.
“You’ll do the windows today,” Webster announces on Sunday morning. “It’s going to rain tomorrow, so it has to be today.”
Rowan, sleep hanging off her face like a net, nods.
“Nana used to love the days when Gramps would wash the windows in the spring. ‘I’ve got new eyes,’ she’d say.”
Rowan, in her flannel pants and T-shirt, says she has to go to Liz Foster’s at four. “We’re finishing up a physics project.”
“Fine. Don’t be too late. I’m guessing you have a lot of homework.”
“A ton of reading.”
“What book?”
“Gravity’s Rainbow.”
“What’s that?” Webster asks.
“A really stupid seven-hundred-sixty-page book.”
Webster turns from the stove with a pan of fried eggs and bacon. “They’re asking you at the end of your senior year to read a seven-hundred-sixty-page book? Mrs. Washington assigned it?”
“She says it’s the best novel in the English language.”
“Your class make fun of her this year?” Webster asks as he slips the eggs and bacon onto Rowan’s plate.
“No. Maybe. A little.”
“You reap what you sow.”
Rowan shrugs.
“Bad luck for you,” Webster says. He puts a plate of toast between them.
“No kidding.”
“You and Gina have