The Glow of the Spotlight: My Journey with Rebecca

The next morning, Rebecca pulls a tweedy dress from a tall cabinet and hands it to me, then chooses the identical one for herself. I’d forgotten she owns two of everything. Next comes a long white pinafore with frilly edges at the armholes and hem, prettier than I imagined it would be. I tie the bow at the back the way Rebecca does hers, then tuck my nesting dolls into one of the deep patch pockets. They’re my ticket home, and I don’t want to go anywhere without them.

The stockings are itchy, held up with nothing but ribbon ties, and I already miss my tights. But the real trouble turns out to be the shoes. Each one has a long row of tiny buttons and narrow slits for buttonholes. I have no idea how to close them.

Rebecca shows me the trick: hook a shiny metal fastener through the hole, catch the button in its loop, and pull it through. My fingers fumble through all twelve buttons on each shoe before I finally get them done, slower than Rebecca but done all the same. It’s harder than tying a shoelace, and it’s only the first test of the day.

After a hurried breakfast of rolls and milk, Rebecca’s mother hands us our lunches, and we set off for school. Kids crowd the sidewalk in every direction, coats buttoned and scarves wound tight against the morning chill. Nobody has a bike. Nobody gets a ride, either. Everybody just walks, and it feels like a parade of children stretching down the block.

At school, Rebecca introduces me to her friend, Rose, as Millie, a girl from New Jersey staying with the Rubins for a while. Rose straightens the two braids hanging over her shoulders and studies me with a heavy accent, surprised that I already speak English. “Is lucky for you,” she says, and smiles. We don’t linger outside with Rose or the other girls jumping rope and tossing balls. Instead, Rebecca leads me to a huge wooden door, and together we pull it open to register.

Inside, an office with a high counter waits for us. Rebecca greets the secretary and asks for the proper forms, but the woman wants to know why my parents aren’t with me. I pretend to be too shy to answer. She calls the whole situation highly irregular but sends me off to Rebecca’s classroom anyway. Rebecca’s teacher, Miss Maloney, complains under her breath about squeezing in one more student. As students file in, at least forty of us are crammed into the single huge room.

We stow our lunches and wool scarves in a small open cubby set into a wall lined with wooden compartments. Boys sit at desks on one side of the room, girls on the other. Miss Maloney reluctantly shifts another student so I can sit near Rebecca. I find the chair and the desk are both bolted to the floor. I can only slide in and out of the seat and I can’t drag the chair any closer to the desk.

Before class begins, Miss Maloney walks the rows inspecting everyone’s outstretched hands. I catch on just in time and hold mine out, too. One girl gets ordered off to scrub her fingernails and hurries out looking mortified. Miss Maloney checks scalps next, and Rebecca murmurs that it’s a lice check, which makes my own head itch just from hearing the words.

Roll call brings a string of unfamiliar surnames, each one answered in a different accent, and I relax a little, realizing plenty of these students are still finding their footing, too. Then Miss Maloney reaches a boy named Sergei Rogenetsky and stumbles over his name. She declares that it isn’t American enough. “From now on, your name will be Sam Rogen,” she tells him. The boy starts to protest, but her stern look silences him, and he sinks back into his seat looking dazed. I wonder what his parents will say once they hear, and whether anyone bothered to ask him if he wanted a new name at all.

When Miss Maloney calls out the name Millie Santini, nobody answers, because I’ve completely forgotten that’s supposed to be me. Rebecca pokes my arm, and I snap back to attention. Miss Maloney curtly asks me if I speak English, and I stammer an apology, insisting that I do speak English. Miss Maloney taps her ruler against my desk and warns me to pay better attention from now on.

Once attendance is finished, Miss Maloney announces that she expects everyone to have mastered their times tables by now. My stomach sinks. I traveled all the way back to 1914 and I still can’t escape times tables.

A girl named Sarah Goldstein recites the twos flawlessly, and I silently envy her easy number. Even I know the twos. A few more students rattle off their tables without a hitch, until one boy stumbles on six times seven. Before he can recover, another boy blurts out the answer, and Miss Maloney rounds on him for speaking out of turn, warning the whole class not to answer for someone else.

My pulse climbs as the sevens go by, and then Miss Maloney reaches Rebecca’s desk and asks for the eights. Rebecca stands up straight and zips through them without missing a beat, as sharp as Megan back home. I shrink down in my seat, hoping to be skipped over, sure Miss Maloney wouldn’t hand a brand-new student the hardest table on her very first day.

Miss Maloney calls for the nines, and for one hopeful second I think I’m safe, until the girl sitting behind me gives me a nudge and I remember all over again that I’m Millie Santini. My knees feel weak as I stand. I start with nine times one, grateful for at least one easy answer, then make it through nine times two and nine times three without stumbling. Then at nine times four, my mind goes completely blank. Rebecca glances at me, sympathetic but silent, because if she says anything, we’ll both be in trouble.