I wanted to add that I felt what it could be like to like a boy, maybe even love one, but I knew that would not make him happy. Most fathers felt ambivalent about giving up their daughters, but in Daddy’s case, that would be tragic, probably for both him and me.
“You are different now, Lorelei. You’re closer to being one of us, and I have the best daughters any father could hope to have,” he said softly. He kissed me on the cheek and then turned and smiled just before he left, closing the door softly and leaving me standing in the afterglow of his enormous love.
Maybe my instincts weren’t as sharp and developed as Ava’s were, but instinctively, I knew I would either grow because of that love…
Or drown in it.
5
Morning After
Had something really happened to change me? Was I different now, older, almost overnight?
I knew I felt different, even though it seemed silly. Surely, one night out with Ava wasn’t enough to make me feel more mature, and what had I actually done, anyway? Danced, flirted, enjoyed some repartee with college boys, stayed out later than any other time? But older was just how I felt. Could it be that when I went out with Ava, something magical did happen, that I not only looked older but had grown more sophisticated? After all, it was true that my body had matured quickly after what had seemed to be a body on hold forever, so why not my mind and personality?
“Surprising things will happen to you because of the way you are being brought up, the way we live,” Daddy once told me. “But I promise you, it will all be good, all wonderful.”
I believed him. As I observed other girls in school, I did believe that all of us Patios, all of Daddy’s daughters, were truly special in so many ways. It wasn’t only our physical beauty, either. We seemed to move in and out of another dimension and wore looks on our faces that had others believing we knew very interesting and mysterious things.
One of my fifth-grade teachers, Mr. Foggleman, told me one day that I looked like someone who knew the future. I had no idea what he meant. He tried to explain by telling me I never seemed surprised by anything. “It’s as if you always know something?
??s coming, expect it, Lorelei. Your father’s not a fortune-teller, is he?”
“He’s everything to me. Why not a fortune-teller, too?” I said, and Mr. Foggleman laughed. He thought I was joking, but I meant every word.
I thought about all that while I stood in front of my full-length mirror and studied myself. Today I was wearing an ordinary cotton short-sleeved red blouse and a dark red skirt. Except for a little lipstick, I wore no makeup, and I had pinned my hair back, more or less so I wouldn’t have to deal with it.
As I looked at myself, I concentrated on my eyes. There really was something new about them. The color hadn’t changed, but I could see a wiser, calmer look. The maturity appeared to radiate out of my eyes and through my face. I felt like a young girl realizing that once she had been cute and now she was on the threshold of real beauty. Dare I think it? Was I even prettier than Ava?
I always felt there was something cheap about Ava’s look. Her sexiness was more obvious. She was attractive in a more movie-star-glamorous sort of way. She had to wear enticing and revealing clothing. She had to do what she told me I had to do, be constantly aware of and employ her attributes, titillate with her nearly bare breasts and very tight skirts, whereas I was becoming a classic beauty, someone whose loveliness couldn’t be surpassed. In short, I didn’t think I had to try as hard as she did.
I expected I would be the more confident one and yet not the more arrogant one. In my heart of hearts, I hoped this was what Daddy saw in me, why, to me at least, his eyes always said, No matter what I tell the others, you will be Daddy’s best little girl.
Recently, I had gotten my driver’s license, and Daddy assigned one of our sedans to me. All I did was drive myself and Marla directly to school and drive us home after the last classes of the day. I was still forbidden to join any teams, go out for any stage productions, or become a member of any clubs. Without explaining exactly why it might be dangerous at the time, Daddy told me it was better for us not to have too high a profile. It was more advantageous for us to have less exposure.
“We come and go so quickly, Lorelei,” he did tell me as an initial reason. “It’s better if we’re easily forgotten.”
Of course, he meant only us daughters when he said “we.” I couldn’t imagine Daddy ever being easily forgotten. And yet I supposed that was part of his magic. He could swoop down on a new community, very quickly impress those he wanted to impress, and then slip away like a dream.
This particular morning, Ava surprised me by getting up before me and being at breakfast. She had no early classes to attend at UCLA and usually slept until hours after I rose. That didn’t bother me in the least. I was happy to miss her in the morning. Most mornings, she was angry at everything, even the sun for having the audacity to rise so early. Why couldn’t night be longer? she would petulantly ask.
“Ava will have to move to Norway,” Daddy would joke, “or perhaps the North Pole and room with Santa Claus.”
“Fine with me,” she would reply. “They are the luckier ones.”
At the time, I didn’t realize she was talking about families like ours who really did live in Scandinavia. She saw it as some sort of a reward.
“Once you spend a full winter there, you will change your mind,” Daddy told her. “I remember being stuck there for a few months during winter.”
Was there anywhere on this earth where Daddy hadn’t spent some time?
Contrary to her usual morning misery, Ava looked bright and cheery, babbling on with Marla about the fashions teenage girls wore these days. I was hoping to see Daddy at the table, but he had apparently left early on one of those secret missions Mrs. Fennel covered with the words “business trip.” Usually, Ava hated it when she was up and I said “Good morning,” but she said it before I could even think of it.
“I’m taking you and Marla to school today,” she told me immediately. “And I’ll pick you both up at the end of the day.”
“Why?”
She glanced at Mrs. Fennel, who was putting out my bowl of her warm cereal, but Mrs. Fennel didn’t look at her or speak. She barely glanced at me, but when she did, I saw she had a softer, more pleased expression. Her eyes confirmed that there was something very different about me, and whatever it was, it very definitely pleased her. Had Ava given her a report on our night out as well?