Free Something I've Been Meaning to Tell You by Alice Munro Page B

Chris to stay for supper, since he had already put up the sign that said: NO MORE RIDES TILL 7 P.M . Mrs. Peebles wanted it served in the yard, in spite of bugs. One thing strange to anybody from the country is this eating outside. I had made a potato salad earlier and she had made a jellied salad, that was one thing she could do, so it was just a matter of getting those out, and some sliced meat and cucumbers and fresh leaf lettuce. Loretta Bird hung around for some time saying, “Oh, well, I guess I better get home to those yappers,” and, “It’s so nice just sitting here, I sure hate to get up,” but nobody invited her, I was relieved to see, and finally she had to go.
    That night after rides were finished Alice Kelling and Chris went off somewhere in her car. I lay awake till they got back. When I saw the car lights sweep my ceiling I got up to look down on them through the slats of my blind. I don’t know what I thought I was going to see. Muriel Loweand I used to sleep on her front veranda and watch her sister and her sister’s boy friend saying good night. Afterwards we couldn’t get to sleep, for longing for somebody to kiss us and rub up against us and we would talk about suppose you were out in a boat with a boy and he wouldn’t bring you in to shore unless you did it, or what if somebody got you trapped in a barn, you would have to, wouldn’t you, it wouldn’t be your fault. Muriel said her two girl cousins used to try with a toilet paper roll that one of them was the boy. We wouldn’t do anything like that; just lay and wondered.
    All that happened was that Chris got out of the car on one side and she got out on the other and they walked off separately—him towards the fairgrounds and her towards the house. I got back in bed and imagined about me coming home with him, not like that.
    Next morning Alice Kelling got up late and I fixed a grapefruit for her the way I had learned and Mrs. Peebles sat down with her to visit and have another cup of coffee. Mrs. Peebles seemed pleased enough now, having company. Alice Kelling said she guessed she better get used to putting in a day just watching Chris take off and come down, and Mrs. Peebles said she didn’t know if she should suggest it because Alice Kelling was the one with the car, but the lake was only twenty-five miles away and what a good day for a picnic.
    Alice Kelling took her up on the idea and by eleven o’clock they were in the car, with Joey and Heather and a sandwich lunch I had made. The only thing was that Chris hadn’t come down, and she wanted to tell him where they were going.
    â€œEdie’ll go over and tell him,” Mrs. Peebles said. “There’s no problem.”
    Alice Kelling wrinkled her face and agreed.
    â€œBe sure and tell him we’ll be back by five!”
    I didn’t see that he would be concerned about knowing this right away, and I thought of him eating whatever heate over there, alone, cooking on his camp stove, so I got to work and mixed up a crumb cake and baked it, in between the other work I had to do; then, when it was a bit cooled, wrapped it in a tea towel. I didn’t do anything to myself but take off my apron and comb my hair. I would like to have put some make-up on, but I was too afraid it would remind him of the way he first saw me, and that would humiliate me all over again.
    He had come and put another sign on the gate: NO RIDES THIS P.M. APOLOGIES . I worried that he wasn’t feeling well. No sign of him outside and the tent flap was down. I knocked on the pole.
    â€œCome in,” he said, in a voice that would just as soon have said
Stay out
.
    I lifted the flap.
    â€œOh, it’s you. I’m sorry. I didn’t know it was you.”
    He had been just sitting on the side of the bed, smoking. Why not at least sit and smoke in the fresh air?
    â€œI brought a cake and hope you’re not sick,” I said.
    â€œWhy would