drowsiness after a bump on the head can indicate that you’ve actually bruised the brain, and I think if it’s serious you can actually slip into a coma.”
“Well, I guess I don’t have one because I woke up same as usual this morning.”
“What did you do to this?”
Janet was pointing to the adhesive tape on one of Cathy’s fingers.
“Oh, that’s not related. I’m just trying to save a broken nail, that’s all.”
She thrust her hand out in front of her, turning it this way and that, examining the white taped finger, surreptitiously widening her eyes to the evaporating air.
Janet poked her nose into a brown paper grocery bag standing on the table. She pulled out a chunky blue box of tampons.
“Yea. More corks. Huge box! They on sale or something?”
“Well at the rate you use them I’m beginning to wonder if you’re smoking them or something.”
“Ew. Yuck, Mom.”
“Well. They sure don’t last long with you around.”
“Well, you’re just lucky I’m not like Lucy De Finca then.”
“Who?”
“Sandra De Finca’s little sister. You don’t know her. She’s in Grade 8. She has to use two at a time.”
“Two at a time? How can you do that?”
“Put the first one in really far and then hold onto the string so you don’t lose it and put a second one in. Sandra told me it’s the only way Lucy can use them without getting a leak.”
“Hm. I never thought of doing that. It sounds like a good idea. Sure beats using those manhole covers. Poor kid, flowing so heavily at her age.”
“Manhole covers?”
Cathy looked at Eva with even more wide-open eyes and started to giggle uncontrollably. Eva smiled.
“Well, what else would you call them? They make you waddle around with your legs two blocks apart, you can’t wear anything tight, they bunch up in the hot weather, it’s like sitting down on a stack of damp books, they’re hot, they smell awful, you can’t swim. Who the heck needs to live in the Dark Ages like that? You couldn’t pay me to use pads ever again. You girls are really lucky that tampons were invented so you never have to go through that.”
“And how.”
Janet lifted a package of fig cookies out of the grocery bag and tore open the cellophane.
“Here,” she said to Cathy, pushing the open end of the package towards her. “Have some. I’ll get some milk.”
“So, Cathy, besides beating up on yourself and nearly putting out an eye, what’s new?”
Eva was bent over a vegetable crisper in the fridge, her voice coming out from behind the opened door.
“Yeah,” said Janet. “I didn’t see you at all last weekend. What’s up?”
“Well, I’ve got a summer job.”
“Really? How neat. Where?”
“Well, my mother got it for me. It’s out at St. Alphonsis Church. You know, where Father Lauzon got transferred to?”
Eva had now closed the fridge and was rooting through the cutlery drawer looking for a knife to chop an onion.
“That’s way out in the east end, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“What’s the job?”
“I’m going to be a housekeeper.”
“What?”
“I know. Funny, eh? Me, a housekeeper. But the one that used to be out there died and they can’t find anybody to replace her, so I’m it for the summer.”
“You’re kidding. What do you have to do?” Janet asked.
“My mother said it’s nothing out of the ordinary. Just dishes and dusting and making beds and getting their meals.”
“Just! It sounds like a lot of work to me.”
Eva finished chopping, leaving a mound of onion bits on the breadboard, and turned her attention to breaking apart ground beef with a wooden spoon in a large bowl.
“How many priests?”
“Three.”
“You have to cook meals and pick up after three men? Boy, I don’t envy you that. How many days a week?”
“Monday to Friday. They have to fend for themselves on the weekends, I guess.”
“Well,” said Janet, pulling half a dozen cookies out of the package and putting them on a plate, “I hope they give you a vacation so you can come up to the cottage again this summer.”
“Oh, I’m sure you won’t be there that long, sweetie,” Eva said, brushing onion off the board into the bowl with the meat. “That’s a full-time job getting all those meals for three grown men and running a household. They’re gonna have to find a permanent replacement fairly soon, I would think. I know you’d like the money and everything, but you’re still just a young girl. You have the whole rest of your life to work. Besides which, keeping up with your own housework is boring enough without having to do someone else’s. I don’t know how Crystal comes here every week and puts up with us and this house. And she’s been a cleaning lady for years. She sure does a terrific job, though. I couldn’t survive without her. I’m sure you’ll do a great job for them.”
“As long as I don’t burn everything to a crisp on the first day.”
“Make sandwiches,” said Janet. “What can go wrong?”
“Actually, before you go home, sweetie, I’ll give you a copy of this recipe that I’m making. It’s for Scandinavian meatballs. It’s really easy. You just make these tiny meatballs here, like I’m doing, and then there’s a nice rich gravy that goes with them that’s also really easy to make. You serve everything over rice and you don’t need another thing to go with it. The priests will love it.”
“I’ve never made rice before.”
“Oh, that’s easy. You just boil water, add the rice, turn the heat down really low, and wait. That’s all there is, really, to making rice. It sort of makes itself. Even Whisky could do that if she had to, couldn’t you, sweetie.”
Just at that moment, with her stubby tail stump vibrating rapidly, the dog shot out from under the table to retrieve a scrap of onion that had fallen off the breadboard onto the floor.
Later,
