The Smart One by Ellen Meister

bicep as if it would prove how hearty she was.
    I noticed that Clare looked grim. She’d been struggling with her weight her entire adult life, and often said how unfair it was that her sisters were naturally slim, practically assless. Joey seemed oblivious to Clare’s anguish, and I couldn’t help wondering if it was more passive-aggressive than genuinely clueless. Joey often managed to get in some digs with what passed for innocence.
    “Mrs. Bianco says hello,” I told her.
    “Helen? Hunh. She used to scream that I would get my comeuppance .”
    “You used to get high in her backyard,” I said. “What did you expect?”
    “Never. I got high with Maryanne Jackman next door and we would throw our burned-out roaches over the fence into her yard. It was hilarious.”
    I rolled my eyes. “Good times.”
    A crack of thunder interrupted our conversation and Clare looked out the window. Rain poured from the roof in sheets. “No way the gardener is coming today,” she said.
    “Figures,” I said, frustrated that I couldn’t get that out of the way.
    Joey asked what the big deal was about the gardener, and I explained about moving the industrial drum to the curb for garbage pickup.
    “I bet we could do it,” Joey said. “The three of us together.”
    “Too heavy,” I said.
    “And it’s pouring,” Clare added.
    Joey shrugged. “It’s only water.”
    “What about the lightning?” Clare said. “And the thunder?”
    “Storm’s moving away,” I said.
    “Remember Lydia?” Joey asked. “Remember how she used to say, ‘There’s no time like the presents’?”
    I smiled, remembering her gentle, if slightly ungrammatical, wisdom. “I think she was the only grown-up who listened to what we had to say.”
    Clare folded her arms. “Then let Lydia move the damn drum in the rain.”
    Joey flashed me her wicked grin, grabbed my hand, and headed for the back door. Her passion for fun was infectious, and giddiness tickled at me as I pulled Clare along the way.
    “Forget it!” Clare said, resisting. “I’m wearing new shoes.”
    I tugged harder at her hand. “You’re always wearing new shoes. C’mon. Marc will buy you another pair.”
    “At least let me find an umbrella.”
    And so it was that the three of us stood bent at the waist, under the umbrella Clare held, staring into the crawl space beneath the Waxmans’ house. I said that if we went under there and toppled the drum onto its side, we’d probably be able to roll it out. Clare refused to get on her knees, as she was wearing linen pants that she insisted cost more than two hundred dollars. Joey, of course, was game.
    So Clare held her umbrella and watched as Joey and I wentto work. We got on our hands and knees and crawled under the house, where it smelled musty and squirrelly and felt uncomfortably tight. It made me understand the foreboding feel of claustrophobia. Even though I knew it couldn’t happen, I felt like we’d run out of oxygen any minute. I wanted to get out of there fast .
    Toppling the thing wasn’t as easy as I thought. It was hard to get leverage when we were both on our knees. Joey and I put our hands against the top of the drum and shoved with all our might. I was just about to demand that Clare come in and help us when the drum finally went down with a thump and a slosh, letting us know the thing was filled with liquid. The lid held on tight.
    We rolled it out, and when we at last cleared the bottom of the house, I rose to take some air into my lungs and loosen the tightness in my chest.
    “Your turn,” I said to Clare. “I’ll hold the umbrella for a while.”
    Instead of getting on her knees, Clare bent over at the waist so she wouldn’t be dragging her pants through the grass. Good thing too, because in another five feet they would have to push the barrel through an oval of earth that had once been Mr. Waxman’s tomato garden, but which was now simply a huge, soupy mud puddle.
    Clare stopped when they got to