The Sky’s the Limit: My Journey with Maryellen

Going to the beach turns out to be more easily said than done. Tom has to be talked out of riding to the beach in his miniature fire engine. Mikey has to be talked into riding in his stroller. Beverly insists on adding her ballerina cape to her outfit. Scooter is falling asleep and has to be awakened, which makes him snort. I’m sort of chuckling because the kids and Scooter seem comical to me, but I can tell Maryellen is impatient. As she wheels her bike out of the carport, she mutters that we’d all be at the beach already if we didn’t have the slowpokes tagging along.

When we finally have everyone ready to go, I’m the one who hesitates. Don’t we need a grown-up? Maryellen says no. As long as we’re not swimming. This is odd. In Maryellen’s time, it seems people had strict rules about what you could wear to school, but a bunch of kids can just go to the beach by themselves. It does feel great to be independent. I’m perfectly safe, too, because lots of people in Maryellen’s neighborhood are out on the front lawns or working in their gardens or washing their cars. And everyone is friendly as we walk by.

As we pass an old woman, she asks which Larkin Maryellen is. She asks if Maryellen is Carolyn, and when Maryellen corrects her, she rolls her eyes. I bet she’s answered the same question a million times. I know how it feels. Every day of my life, people ask me if I’m Emma. I guess kids in big families are sometimes mistaken for one another, too, just like twins.

As we approach, I can see the ocean glinting in front of us. The street leads straight to it without a bend or curve. The street is tidy, with matching houses, each one with a palm tree in the front yard. Maryellen asks if her neighborhood looks boring to me. All the houses are the same. Maryellen says she tried to make their house stand out by painting the front door red. But even the streets are flat and dull in this neighborhood. I tell her I like it. For one thing, there can’t possibly be any skiing here!

In Cedar Top, the roads are very hilly with lots of sharp twists and turns. It makes me feel calm to walk on broad, level streets. The air is soft and smells like oranges. The sky is blue and endless, and the flowers are bright. Even the cars are colorful. Some are aqua, some pink, and some lemon yellow. I tell Maryellen it looks like paradise.

But paradise or not, Tom is done walking. He plops himself down on the curb and Scooter sits next to him. Maryellen tries to urge him forward, but he won’t budge. Sighing, Maryellen picks up Scooter and puts him in the basket of her bike. I tell Tom to pretend we’re in a parade. I lift him and put him on my shoulders. I tell Beverly to lead us. She’s the drum majorette. Beverly corrects me and says she’s the ballerina queen drum majorette. She takes the lead and does balletic leaps along the sidewalk, her cape fluttering gracefully in the breeze. Maryellen follows, wheeling her bike with Scooter in the basket. And I’m last, pushing Mikey in a stroller and carrying Tom on my shoulders. Maryellen says that I’m a genius with little kids.

I grin and blush. That’s a surprise. No one has ever called me a genius with kids before. Then again, I’ve never been around little kids, except for Daria, who comes with her mother, a secretary assistant, to help my grandmother organize her books and belongings since she moved into the house. Emma and I tried to ignore Daria, who wrecked Emma’s laptop the one time she came into our room. I wonder if I would be a genius with Daria if I tried.

Our parade reaches the beach in no time, and Tom wriggles to get down from my shoulders. He’s not too tired to run in the sand! Scooter is lifted out of the bike basket and he and Mikey waddle following Beverly and Tom. Maryellen and I walk toward the water. When we reached the edge, the waves lap our feet. I tell Maryellen that I’ve never seen the ocean in real life before. It’s really big. I’m overwhelmed by the crashes and roars of the waves, the glare of the sun bouncing off the water, and the enormous hugeness of it all. I’m glad that we’re not allowed to swim. Standing at the edge is enough for me. But I feel the tug of the water swirling around my legs, and the way the endless waves pull the sand I’m standing on.

I back up and stand safely away from the waves next to Scooter, watching Maryellen, Beverly, Tom, and Mikey race to the edge of the water and race away again as the waves chase them, laughing all the while. Maryellen tries to call me over, but I smile and shake my head. When Maryellen asks me what’s wrong, I say that I hate to admit it, but I’m scared of the ocean. It’s gigantic. Tom slips his hand into mine, and Mikey pats my leg. Maryellen says it’s not stupid at all. It’s smart to be scared of something as big as the ocean. I ask Maryellen if she’s scared of anything, and she says that when she was little, she had polio. It hurt terribly, and even now that she’s better, one of her legs is weaker, and sometimes she gets out of breath easily. I ask if she’s afraid that her polio will come back, and she nods. Maryellen says she’s also afraid that people will assume she’s weak because she had polio. She hates that.

Beverly pipes up and says there’s something else Maryellen is afraid of. Ellie is afraid of talking in front of people. At her birthday party, she wrote a whole show to raise money to fight polio, and everyone had songs and dances and tasks to do. But when it was Ellie’s turn to speak, she stood there like a statue.

Maryellen admits it’s true. She still gets shaky thinking about it; she never thought she’d be afraid of performing. And she’s always wanted to be on TV. But it turns out that standing in front of a live audience with all the faces staring at her made her freeze with stage fright. I ask what happened. Did Maryellen get unfrozen? Maryellen shakes her head. A terrible boy named Wayne did all the talking. It was very embarrassing.

When we get back to the Larkins’ house, Maryellen brings me inside and introduces me to her mother. Mrs. Larkin welcomes me, and the way she says it, and the warmth of her smile, makes me feel truly welcome. Mrs. Larkin is ironing the wrinkles out of a dress. She wears capri pants, a checked blouse, and a headscarf tied in a big bow like Lucy from I Love Lucy. Emma and I like to watch reruns that show. Maryellen asks if I can stay for dinner, and Mrs. Larkin takes the opportunity to correct her daughter’s grammar, “may” instead of “can”, before saying yes. When Maryellen asks if I may spend the night, since tomorrow is only a half-day before Thanksgiving vacation, Mrs. Larkin says yes to that, too. She smiles at me as she unplugs the iron and collapses the ironing board. She says I should call my family to be sure. She nods toward a wall phone that has a long cord hanging down like a tail. The cord connects the part you hold in your hand and talk into with the part on the wall.

Everyone leaves to go wash their hands and I’m left alone in the kitchen with Scooter. I stare at the telephone. What do I do? When Maryellen comes back, should I tell her that my family said I should come home? I can say goodbye and then click the watch and disappear forever. But, I don’t want to. I like it here. Besides, I’m not sure I’m ready to go back and face all those people who think I cheated. Maybe I should tell Maryellen that I have permission to stay for dinner and spend the night. I don’t need to explain that I gave myself permission. But either way, I’ll have to be a phony phoner and pretend that I called home.