Crystal (Orphans 2)

She looked at Karl apprehensively. "Well, I .

"Of course you should, and of course there's a point to stopping, Dad. Why cause yourself unnecessary suffering?" Karl insisted.

"I'm not suffering. I'm enjoying. I don't know who's a worse nag, you or that woman you send around here. All she does is complain about the work I make for her. How much you paying her?"

"Ten dollars an hour," Karl said.

"Ten dollars! You know," he said, looking at me, "once that was enough to feed the family for a week."

"There have been many reasons for inflation since then," I said.

"That so? You an economic genius like Karl?" he asked me.

"No, sir. I just read a little."

"Oh, she reads a lot, Pa. She reads more than I do," Thelma said.

"Lily liked to read," he said, and thought a moment. Then he slapped his hand down hard on the arm of his chair. Thelma and I jumped in our seats.

"Well now, you bring this polite young lady around more often," he said, rising.

"We can stay a little longer, Pa," Thelma said.

"Well, I can't," he said. "I've got to meet Charlie, Richard, and Marty at Gordon's for our regular game of pinochle," he told her sternly.

Thelma looked to Karl.

"Well, we just came by to introduce you to Crystal and see how you were doing, Dad," Karl said, standing.

"I'm doing as good as I can with what I got," he said, looking toward me.

We all rose.

"Pleased to have met you," he said to me. He held out his hand, and I shook it. He had long, rough fingers with fingernails that were yellow and thick and two years past when they should have been trimmed.

On the way home, I thought about him and about what I'd always imagined my grandparents to be like. Never in any of my dreams did I imagine myself shaking hands with them. I thought they would be full of hugs and kisses, gloating over me and bragging about me just the way they did in movies and books. Maybe Thelma's mother and father would be more like that, I hoped.

And they were.

Thelma's mother was a small woman like her, actually smaller, birdlike and very thin with wrists that looked as if they might crack if she lifted a full cup of coffee, but she had a big smile and the loveliest blue- green eyes. She kept her hair its natural gray and styled neatly. Thelma's father was tall and lean but much warmer than Karl's father. They insisted I call them Grandpa and Grandma immediately, and Grandma hugged and kissed me as soon as we were all introduced.

"I'm so happy there'll be someone young in this house. Now it will be a real home. You make sure you spoil this child, Karl Morris," she warned, shaking her right forefinger in his face. "None of that thinking like an accountant when it comes to her. That's what parents are supposed to do, and if you don't, we will," she added with a mock threat.

Before they left that day, they even gave me twenty dollars. Grandma said, "Buy whatever Karl doesn't want you to have, whatever he thinks is a waste of money?' She laughed and kissed me again. I liked her a lot and looked forward to the next time I would see her.

Of all that had happened since I had come to live with Karl and Thelma, this was the best, I thought. My grandparents had finally made me feel part of a real family. Life with Karl and Thelma had started on such a formal and organized note, I had yet to think of them as parents. Karl was more like an adviser, and Thelma was so wrapped up in her books and programs that I felt more like a guest she had invited to share her fantasies.

I was looking forward to the start of school, making new friends, and being challenged by new subjects and teachers. Thelma took me to registration. Because of my record, I was put in an advanced class, and she bragged about it all throughout dinner that night. As always, however, she found a fictional character with whom to compare me.

"Brenda's daughter in Thunder in My Heart is just like you, Crystal. She's such a whiz kid, too. Maybe she'll be president someday."

"How can Brenda's daughter be president someday, Thelma?" Karl asked her. "She's in a book you've read, right?"

"Oh, but there's a sequel coming, Karl. There's always a sequel," she said, smiling.

"I see," he said, nodding and looking at me.

"Crystal's smarter, though," Thelma said. "You should hear some of the things she says, Karl. She can figure out what's going to happen on my soaps before it happens."