Mummy especially was hoping he was right, and I’d be forced to come running home. They called it “tough love” here. However, as far as I knew, they had little information, if any, about me and how I was really doing. Nothing I would say would be believed if they could hear or read me say it, anyway, I thought.
You’re as good as an orphan, Emma Corey, I told myself. I could blame my father to help myself feel better about it, but in the end, there was no other conclusion, nothing that would make the realization land softly.
In February, there was another open audition. This one was for a musical that would start in the spring. It was to have a sizable chorus, so I thought that it could be a real possibility for me. Since it was so cold, I didn’t anticipate as many candidates would attend, but once again, by the time I had arrived, the line was out the door and nearly a city block up the sidewalk. Girls were getting one another hot drinks. Many were wearing hats with earmuffs. When anyone spoke, her breath looked like a little puff of smoke. The line of us resembled an old steam engine barely moving. I thought I might very well get frostbitten toes, but no one left the line because of the weather. By the time I got in, I thought my teeth were chattering too much for me to sing. Nevertheless, I gave it all I could.
I didn’t even make the chorus.
Shortly afterward, I finally did have a conversation with Mummy. She didn’t cry when she heard my voice, as I had anticipated she would. A part of me wanted her to cry. I wanted to be terribly missed, but I felt like I was talking with someone who had begun to get over the loss of a loved one. Time had diminished sadness. She seemed resolved to face the reality that I wasn’t going to come running back. True, with Clara’s contribution and my steady work, I was able to make ends meet, but I was able to do little more.
She didn’t mention my father; perhaps he had forbidden her to do so. She told me Julia had been dating another teacher at the school, a man seven years older, which was about how much older my father was than my mother. She didn’t ask me a single question about my effort to develop a singing career or what my life was like in New York. Instead, she ended the conversation by telling me she had to prepare tea, even though it wasn’t very late in the day there. Tea for us meant the evening meal. I was depressed about my conversation or lack of it with Mummy for days afterward but kept myself as busy as I could so as not to think about it.
And then, one night when I had dragged myself home after a particularly grueling ten straight hours on my feet, made more stressful by the failure of two of the other waiters to show up for work, I entered the apartment later than usual and was surprised to find Clara sitting up and waiting for me. Usually, she went to sleep at ten like clockwork, because she was up at six to prepare herself for work, have a good breakfast, and leave. She had told me she was closing in on being the top candidate for the private secretary position, and by doing extra work, coming in earlier than necessary, she thought she was becoming just that.
Until now, we had talked surprisingly little about our love lives or, more accurately, the absence of any. Thanks to Buck again, I had worked two gigs at two different clubs, but neither was interested in making me a regular. Twice I had gone to dinner with Buck, mostly because I felt indebted to him, but he realized that I didn’t have any romantic interest and stopped asking me out. He was still quite friendly and concerned enough about me to keep looking for other singing opportunities.
Jon hadn’t called me or returned to the restaurant since that last phone call. From time to time, I was tempted to call him but quickly snuffed out the spark. To some of the other waitresses and even Marge, I seemed to be an all-around failure when it came to men, not that a romance had become any sort of priority for me. I still believed that