Chapter Six Dottie
Chapter Six
Dottie
I had my last day at the office yesterday.
They’ve called three times to ask me how the mimeograph machine works, and I miss it already.
Not just the machine and the oddly comforting scent of the ink and the damp feel of the new copies.
I miss Big Red, my IBM Selectric typewriter, too, whizzing my fingers over the keyboard faster than any other girl in the office.
I even miss making the coffee on Monday morning when the account execs file in, except that the smell of freshly brewed coffee now makes me queasy.
I took one last run at Daddy yesterday morning. I went into his office by the sales floor and closed the door. He knew what I wanted before I even opened my mouth.
“Dottie. Please don’t.”
I sat down in the chair in front of his desk and tried to keep my voice steady. “But Daddy—”
He shook his head emphatically. “I should have made you quit the day you got married like we do with all the other girls.”
I smiled. “But you couldn’t because I’m indispensable.”
“You know the policy.” He brandished his gold pen at me. “We can’t have pregnant secretaries running around a car dealership. How would that look?”
“Please Daddy, just a little longer.” I felt like I was six years old again, begging to stay up past my bedtime.
“Absolutely not. Today is your last day, just like we planned. We’ll give you a nice send off.” His face softened. “Then you go home and take care of your new husband and my future grandson.”
I rested a hand on the not yet visible bump on my belly. “Or granddaughter.”
He shook his head and chuckled. “Nope. It’s a grandson. I feel it in my bones.”
I gazed through the window overlooking the showroom floor and spotted Dickie, my brand-new husband who supposedly requires so much care. His big hands caressed a powder-blue 1965 Chevy Impala. They remind me of sharks, those Impalas, the way the hood hangs over the grill.
Dickie spoke to a dazed-looking young couple, charming them with his wide grin and square jaw. Just like Paul Newman. That’s what all the girls in the office say. “You’re so lucky, Dottie. Your husband looks just like Paul Newman.”
The next part is implied. What’s a gorgeous guy like that doing with a girl like me? Because I’m plain. Unremarkable. And a little . . . different.
Mechanically inclined. Those are the worried words my mother used to whisper to her friends as I built towers with Tinkertoys instead of playing with dolls like a normal girl.
Daddy didn’t have a problem with it, though. In those terrible days after Mother died, he let me spend my time at the dealership with him, or out in the garage with Oscar and Herman and all the other mechanics, learning about spark plugs and carburetors.
Daddy indulged me, I suspect, because he knew I had a broken heart, just like he did. He let me stay out there doing oil changes until I turned fourteen. Then he put his foot down, and said I could only help out if I worked in the secretarial pool.
So I learned to type and run the mimeograph machine and take dictation. I loved working in the office with the other girls, typing up sales contracts and purchase orders after school and over the summer.
And that’s where I met Dickie, the day after I graduated from high school. He came into the break room to get a celebratory cup of coffee after selling a car.
He leaned against a file cabinet, tall and lanky with those bright blue eyes. “You must be the boss’s pretty daughter I’ve been hearing so much about.”
I blushed, stammered, and fell in love right there on the spot, standing next to the Bunn coffee machine.
And he does look like Paul Newman, which is why I should be over the moon right now. A handsome husband with a job working for my dad at the biggest car dealership in the mid-Atlantic. A couple months pregnant and carrying a healthy baby, according to Dr. Carlyle.
But . . . I thought we’d have more time before the baby. We went to Florida for our honeymoon, we came home, and now I’m expecting. I wanted to try that new pill that keeps you from getting pregnant. Not forever, of course, but just to delay things for a little while, just for a year or two.
I asked Dr. Carlyle about it before the wedding and he told me I had to bring Dickie to my next appointment, that I needed my fiancé’s permission before he’d write me a prescription.
And when I told Dickie, he looked at me like I was crazy.
“But honey, don’t you want to be a mother?”
“I do but . . . I just turned 19. And you’re only 23. Maybe we should wait . . . just a couple years. Maybe I don’t want to share you yet,” I added, pulling him closer.
He kissed me then and whispered in my ear and I forgot all about that pill until after the honeymoon and then it was too late.
There are . . . other things too . . . about Dickie. But maybe this is all just part of being married.
Like The List.
He says it’s designed to help me be a better wife, to make our house run more smoothly. He sits me down every Sunday night in the den and we go over it together.
For example, on Fridays I’m supposed to wax and polish the linoleum, dust the baseboards and clean every silver, copper, and brass item in the house as well as the insides of the windows.
On Mondays, I’m supposed to wash all the floor mats, in addition to laundering and ironing the sheets and all our clothes.
In the evening, I like to read. But instead I’m supposed to plan out my menu for the next day and make my grocery list so I’m never without the ingredients I need to make a proper three course meal for dinner each night. Not to mention all the baking I’m supposed to do.
I did all the cooking and some of the cleaning after Mother died, but we also had a housekeeper, so I guess I never realized how much work it takes to run a household.
I offered to give Dickie a list of things he can do as well.
For example, he could put his underwear and dirty socks in the hamper instead of leaving them in the middle of the floor, and he could fix that little hole in the corner of the garage, so mice don’t get into the fallout shelter underneath and eat up all our supplies.
But Dickie just laughed and told me I’m hilarious.
The list of household chores is for me, not him.
“Your dad gave us this beautiful home on this brand-new cul-de-sac. Don’t you want to keep it nice?”
And then I felt guilty. Of course I want to keep a nice house. Of course I want to create a clean, comfortable home for Dickie to return to after work each day.
I guess I just didn’t realize how much work is involved in being a new bride with a husband and a house to care for.
But maybe all married couples go through a period of adjustment. I just need to figure out how Dickie likes things, and then it will be easier.
Sometimes he gets so mad when things aren’t the way he expects them to be, and I never know what might set him off.
Like when I didn’t fold his undershirts the way he likes.
He ranted and raved for ten minutes. It reminded me of Danny’s final letter from Viet Nam, where he talked about how the jungle was filled with hidden traps, how he had to watch every step when he went out on patrol.
But the rest of the time Dickie is so charming. To me, and everyone else too. Daddy thinks he hangs the moon.
Anyway, the whole gang had a nice little party for me on the sales floor over the lunch hour yesterday, and that was the end of my career at the dealership, where I’ve spent summers and weekends for as long as I can remember.
I did a good job too. I’ve kept the books since I graduated from high school.
I handled payroll. I even sold a car, once.
I guess they’ll survive without me. But the mimeograph machine and my old Selectric might not make it. That new girl they hired to replace me doesn’t seem very bright.
But maybe being bright doesn’t matter as much as people think.
Danny was the smartest mechanic in the garage, and he died in Viet Nam because he couldn’t afford to go to college and got drafted instead.
And I’m a math whiz. Valedictorian of my class at good old SMA. And look where I ended up. Right here in the kitchen, just like my mother. Pregnant and making pot roast.
Pot roast is #9 on Dickie’s List of suggestions.