“Are you okay?” she called, tapping the glass with her knuckles.
No answer.
Only another low groan.
Her pulse kicked up, sharp and sudden. She considered running back to the room, grabbing Nora, telling the motel attendant, doing something, anything.
“Jush leave me alone. Shtopp hitting me.”
The man’s slurred voice inside the phone booth was thick with alcohol and confusion. He flopped an arm against the glass, smacking his palm to the door with a dull slap that had Leanne flinching.
“I just need to make a call,” she said, teeth clenched. “Think you can step out for a minute? I’ll be quick. Promise.”
He answered with a groan and a raised middle finger, his body folding deeper into the booth’s corner like he was trying to disappear into the floor.
Leanne sighed sharply through her nose. She turned on her heel and marched back to the motel lobby.
The clerk smiled. “Did you find it?”
“Is there another phone I can use? Inside? There was someone…indisposedoutside.”
The clerk wrinkled her brow. “Oh, dear me.” She bit her lip, glancing at the sign tacked on the wall that said PATRONS MUST USE PAY PHONE. “I’m not supposed to…”
“It’s fine. I’ll call my husband in the morning. But you ought to get someone to help the fellow out of the booth outside.”
“If you’re quick,” the clerk said, lifting her telephone up onto the raised part of the desk.
Leanne shook her head, too exhausted to try.
She returned to the room, her key clicking in the lock. Inside, the glow of the television filled the dark, and Nora was exactly where she’d left her—stretched out on the bed, face lit up in the soft flicker of the black-and-white screen. Only now instead of watchingEd Sullivan, she was watchingBewitched.
Leanne recognized it immediately. Nora was giggling as Samantha twitched her nose and made the dishes fly into the sink.
Leanne pulled her dress for the next day out of her suitcase and hung it from the doorframe, hoping gravity might handle the worst of the wrinkles. She peeled off her stockings, changed into pajamas, and scrubbed the day off her face and dried it with the motel towel, which smelled faintly of pine and mildew.
She crawled into bed just as Samantha Stephens wiggled her nose and made a pile of dirty dishes disappear with a twinkle and a chime.
If only, Leanne thought.
If she had magical powers, she might’ve managed less stress about spotless house and dinner on a loop and instead found a hobby she could enjoy. Gotten more books from the library and spent endless hours reading.
She turned slightly to look at Nora—her daughter still giggling, her hand fishing out the last sticky caramel-covered peanut from theCracker Jack box.
Please, Leanne thought,let her have more options than I did.
Yale was Ivy League. A degree from Yale meant job security. More choices for Nora.
Leanne hadn’t the opportunities afforded to Nora. Her education had been a secretarial course. Getting hired depended less on your skills and more on whether the man behind the desk thought you’d look good typing in heels.
Nora’s future would be completely different. Her daughter wanted to go into advertising like her father. A job that would allow her to use her creativity and receive a paycheck.
Leanne hoped her daughter would be happy.
Nora had always been creative—sketching in the margins of her notebooks, writing stories on the backs of napkins. Leanne had encouraged it when she could. But Dean? He thought it was a phase. That she needed something “practical.” A real plan.
She couldn’t blame Dean, not really.
He wanted Nora to be able to support herself—if it ever came to that. Not that either of them believed it would. Dean thought it was only a matter of time before Nora got married, just like Leanne had. College was a stepping stone, not a destination. Eventually, the degree would grow xanthic in its frame, collecting dust above the washer and dryer while Nora kept house and raised children.
