They laughed as they walked arm in arm to Billy’s, the tavern on the corner, where they sat in a booth. Ruby’s skin was glowing from the facial. Without makeup she could pass for a high school student.
“What can I bring you lovely ladies?” Billy asked. Billy was bald, short and round, but he moved fast.
“Two hot toddies,” Dana said.
“With pleasure, though neither one of you beauties looks old enough to be legal.” He knew they were. Billy had known Ruby’s family since before she was born. Knew she’d turned twenty-two over the summer, just before her father’s surgery. Billy knew almost everything about her family, and he kept it to himself.
When they were served, Dana held up her glass. “Cheers. Here’s to a great year for both of us!”
Ruby clinked glasses with her. “I’ll second that.”
They talked for forty-five minutes over a second hot toddy, taking turns feeding nickels into the jukebox. When they tired of holiday songs they started on Broadway musicals, singing along with “Why Can’t You Behave?,” reminding them of their good times on the road and entertaining the few customers who were seated at the bar.
When it was time to leave, Billy called, “Have a good trip, Ruby.”
“Thanks, Billy. And don’t let my father have more than one, if anyone brings him in.”
“Don’t worry, sweetheart. And a Merry Christmas to you.”
“You, too, Billy.”
Miri
That night, Suzanne’s father dropped Miri and Suzanne at Natalie’s house. Mrs. Osner answered the door. Small and pretty, she wore a single strand of pearls whether she was in a skirt and sweater, like tonight, or a cocktail dress on her way to the country club. Miri liked to think of her as Corinne. She liked thinking of all the adults in her life by their first names. It made them seem more interesting, less like parents and more like regular people with stories of their own. Steve and Fern were dark-haired like Dr. Osner, but Natalie was dirty-blond, with short, soft curls like her mother, and the same gray-blue eyes.
Even though Natalie’s family was Jewish and attended Temple B’nai Israel on the High Holidays, same as Miri’s family, they had a big, beautiful tree in their living room, which they called a Hanukkah bush. It was decorated with handmade wooden animal ornaments. On Christmas Eve Natalie and Fern would hang up stockings by the fireplace and Fern would leave out milk and cookies for the Jewish Santa, who flew through the sky wearing a blue suit with silver Jewish stars. Instead of reindeer his cart was pulled by camels because he came from Israel, not the North Pole.
Dr. Osner didn’t approve of celebrating this way, but Mrs. Osner, who came from Birmingham, Alabama, had grown up with the custom and refused to give it up. Miri wished her family celebrated the Jewish Santa, too. She would have enjoyed decorating a tree and leaving milk and cookies for him even though she was way too old to believe.
“The young people are downstairs,” Corinne told Miri and Suzanne, as if they didn’t know.
Natalie wasn’t the only one in their crowd to have a finished basement, but if they put it to a vote Natalie’s would win by a mile. It wasn’t just the red leather banquettes, the knotty-pine walls, the red and black floor tiles, or even the oval bar with its flip-top counter and glasses in every size imaginable lined up neatly on mirrored shelves. Forget all that. What made Natalie’s basement take the prize was the jukebox.
“It’s not new,” Natalie always said, as if it would be a crime to have your own new jukebox, the kind with swirling colors and flashing lights. Natalie still got to change the records herself and nobody had to put in a coin to start it up. You just had to push the button. Dr. Osner brought home the jukebox with all the latest hits thanks to one of his patients who was in the music business. Some gangster, Natalie once confided to Miri.
When Natalie pushed the button and the jukebox came to life, the dancing began with something swingy, something they could Lindy to—Hey good lookin’, whatcha got cookin’? It left them laughing, breathing hard, ready for more.