There was a buzzing in Rebecca’s head. Must’ve told Katy some things she had not meant to tell. How she was afraid of her father, sometimes. How she missed her brothers and wished they’d taken her with them.

Rebecca’s exact words had been reckless, extravagant. Like somebody in a comic strip she’d said Wished they’d taken me with them to Hell if that’s where they went.

Leora said, exhaling smoke through her nostrils, “That Herschel! He was a real character, I always favored Herschel. Is a real character, I mean. He’s alive, ain’t he?”

Rebecca was stunned by the question. For a moment she could not respond.

“I mean to ask, did you people hear from him? That you know?”

Rebecca mumbled no. Not that she knew.

“‘Course if your pa heard from Herschel, he might not tell you. Might not want word to get out. Account of, y’know, Herschel’s fugitive status.”

This was a term, both alarming and thrilling, Rebecca had never heard before: fugitive status.

Leora went on in her rambling way, to speak of Herschel. Katy said of her mother if you listened to her she’d tell you plenty, a lot of it maybe not intended. It was a revelation to Rebecca, Leora seemed to know Herschel so well. Even Bud Greb had known Herschel, before being sent away to prison. And Herschel had even played gin rummy and poker, right here at this table!

Rebecca was moved, to see how her brother was known to people in ways not-known to his family. It was a strange thing, you could live close to somebody and not know as much about him as others did. It made Rebecca miss him all the more, though his way of teasing had not been nice. Leora was saying, with girlish vehemence, “What Herschel did, hon, those bastards deserved. Taking the damn law in your own hands sometimes you got to do.”

Katy agreed. So did Conroy.

Rebecca wiped at her eyes. It made her want to cry, Leora saying such things about her brother.

Like shifting a mirror, just a little. You see an edge to something, an angle of vision you had not known. Such a surprise!

At school, nobody ever said a nice thing about Herschel. Only he was a fugitive from justice, wanted by the police and he’d be sent to Attica for sure where Ne-gro prisoners from Buffalo would cut him up good, himself. Get what he deserved.

The game continued. Slap-slap-slap of sticky cards. Leora offered Rebecca a sip of her ale and Rebecca declined at first then said O.K. and choked a little swallowing the strong liquid and the others laughed, but not meanly. Then Rebecca heard herself say, as if to surprise, “My pa’s some damn old drunk, I hate him.”

Rebecca expected Katy to burst into giggles as Katy always did when a girlfriend complained in harsh comic tones of her family. It was what you did! But here in the Grebs’ kitchen something was wrong, Leora stared hard at her holding an uplifted card and Rebecca knew to her shame that she’d misspoken.

Leora shifted her Chesterfield from one hand to the other, scattering ashes. Must’ve been the Black Horse ale that had provoked Rebecca to utter such words, making her want to choke and laugh at the same time.

“Your pa,” Leora said thoughtfully, “is a man hard to fathom. People say. I would not claim to fathom Joseph Schwart.”

Joseph! Leora didn’t even know Rebecca’s father’s name.

Rebecca shrank, in shame. The harsh monosyllable Schwart was stinging to hear. To know that others might utter it, might speak of her father in a way both impersonal and familiar, was shocking to her.

Yet Rebecca heard herself say, half in defiance, “You don’t have to ”fathom‘ him, I’m the one. And Ma.“

Carefully Leora said, not looking at Rebecca now, “What about your ma, Rebecca? She keeps to herself, eh?”

Rebecca laughed, a harsh mirthless sound.

Katy said, to Leora, in a whiny triumphant voice as if the two had been arguing, and this was the crushing point, “Momma, see? I told R’becca she can stay with us. If she needs to.”

Too slowly, Leora sucked on what remained of her cigarette.

“Well…”

Rebecca had been smiling. All this while, smiling. The hot sour liquid she’d swallowed was a gaseous bubble in her gut, she could feel it and worried she might vomit it back up. Her cheeks were burning as if they’d been slapped.

All this while, Conroy and Molly were fiddling with their cards, oblivious of this exchange. They had not the slightest awareness that Rebecca Schwart had betrayed her parents, nor that Katy had put it to Leora, with Rebecca as a witness, that Rebecca might come live with them, and Leora was hesitant, unwilling to agree. Not the slightest awareness! Conroy was a large-boned child with sniffles and a nasty habit of wiping his nose every few minutes on the back of his hand and the mean thought came to Rebecca If he was mine, I’d strangle him and the wish to tell this to Leora was so strong, Rebecca had to grip her cards tight.

Hearts, diamonds, clubs…Trying to make sense of what she’d been dealt.

Can a king of hearts save you? Ten of clubs? Queen-and-jack pair? Wished she had seven cards in the same suit, she’d lay them down on the table with a flourish. The Grebs would be goggle-eyed!

Wanting nothing more than to keep playing rummy forever with Katy’s family. Laughing, making wisecracks, sipping ale and when Leora invited her to stay for supper Rebecca would say with true regret Thanks but I can’t, I guess, they want me back home but instead there was Rebecca tossing down her cards suddenly, some of them falling onto the floor, Rebecca pushed her chair away from the table skidding and noisy, God damn if she was going to cry! Fuck the Grebs if they expected that.

“I hate you, too! You can all go to hell!”

Before anyone could say a word, Rebecca slammed out the screen door. Running, stumbling out to the road. Inside, the Grebs must have stared after her, astonished.

There came Katy’s voice, almost too faint to be heard, “Rebecca? Hey c’mon back, what’s wrong?”

Never. She would not.

In April, this was. The week after Gus left.

My pa’s some damn old drunk, I hate him.

She could not believe she had uttered those words. For all the Grebs to hear!

Of course they would tell everyone. Even Katy who liked Rebecca would tell everyone with ears.

At school, forever afterward Rebecca ignored Katy Greb. Would not look at Katy Greb. In the morning, her strategy was to wait until Katy and the others were out of sight walking along the road, before she followed behind them; or, she took one of her secret routes through fields and pine woods and, her favorite, along the railroad embankment that was elevated by five feet. So happy! She was a young horse galloping, her legs so springy and strong, she laughed aloud out of very happiness, she could run-run-run forever arriving reluctantly at school, nerved-up, sweaty, itching for a fight, bad as Herschel wanting somebody to look at her cross-eyed or mouth Gravedigger! or some bullshit like that, Christ she was too restless to calm down to fit into a desk! Herschel had said he’d have liked to break the damn desk, squeezing his knees under and lifting, exerting his muscles, and Rebecca felt the same way, exactly.

“Hey, R’becca-”

Go to hell. Leave me alone.

Hatred for Katy Greb and for Leora Greb and all of the Grebs and many others became a strange, potent consolation, like sucking something bitter.

Hardening her heart against dopey Katy Greb. Friendly good-natured not-too-bright girl who’d been Rebecca Schwart’s closest friend from third grade on, till Katy stared at Rebecca in hurt, in bewilderment, and finally in resentment and dislike. “Fuck you too, Schwart. Fuck you.”

A group of girls, Katy at the center. Smiling in scorn speaking of Rebecca Schwart.