Her sheets were balled up and tangled as always. Through the open window came music mixed with curse words from the nightclub next door, words that a little child like me shouldn't know but learned anyway. I fumbled through the clothes scattered on the floor. I picked up a blouse lying in one corner, a home-sewn skirt in another, and got dressed.

"Going to Bess’s," I announced to nosy Mrs. Granderson, the landlady, who had poked her head out when she heard my shoes clicking down the stairway. "It's my birthday today."

"Young girls like you shouldn't be on their own," she warned. "Where is your sister anyway?"

"Not your business," I yelled. Then I rushed out the door.

Mary's face flashed in my mind as I ran through alleyways and cut across restaurant patios on my way to see her. I heard the tsks-tsks of customers, and taxi drivers shook their fists at me, their shrieking tires stopping just in time before running me over. Along the way I grabbed half-eaten shrimp and beignet crumbs out of trash cans. A half-full bottle of beer sat on the pavement and I guzzled it down.

I would arrive breathless at Bess’s house, which stood like a dark sentry covered in ivy and shadows. I slammed the heavy door behind me as I tiptoed into the foyer. Violin music wafted from a speaker high atop the staircase. Bess sat in the next room, her big brown arms outstretched, her lap as wide as the Mississippi.

"C'mere, baby," I heard her laugh.

And I dived onto that lap, buried my head into her big bosoms, her heart pulsating in my ear like a drum. Then I saw Mary, leaning on some man with dangling suspenders. I bounded off Bess, ran to Mary, and held her so tight that I feared her bones would crumble. Her perfume smelled of lilacs and her breath like cheap whiskey.

"Dance, sweet Ramona," Mary would giggle. "Do your special birthday dance."

I danced, twirling until my skirt lifted up like a kite. I twirled some more when I heard my sister's high-pitched laughter and the sound of Bess slapping her thighs.

"You is a good dancer," Bess hollered.

"Sweet, sweet little sister," Mary said, eyes shining, her long blond hair in ringlets like Shirley Temple.

I kept twirling, then stopped before I fell, beginning again once the dizziness eased. I pointed my one toe up in the air behind me balancing myself on the other, then down again until both feet touched, one arm curved above my head, the other circling my waist. I spun around like a ballerina inside a jewelry box. Once I stopped, Bess would put her thick hands together, and Mary would throw back her head in delight.

"We got us our own Ginger Rogers here," Mary said." You are the prettiest little dancer in all the world, Ramona."

By now Mary's man grew impatient. After all, he didn't want to see some little girl dancing around. He slapped Mary's behind, took her by the wrist, and led her toward the staircase. My insides trembled and I grabbed her. I pulled her aside and out of earshot.

"Let's leave, Mary," I pleaded. "We'll take Bess with us and go somewhere far, far away."

"Sweet little girl," she said. "It won't be too much longer. Just a little bit more money and we’ll be on our own."

"But you promised." Tears streaked down my cheeks. I wanted to get down on my knees and beg her, but I knew that getting down on your knees doesn't do any good. I knew because our mother left anyway. When I reached my teens, Bess didn't have the strength to hold me anymore. The chair where she used to cradle me was fastened together by duct tape and a prayer. I began to notice that Mary lost the sparkle in her eyes and her arms were pocked with needle marks. Sometimes she didn't know who I was and wouldn't come back to the little room we shared.

One night I visited Bess's place as usual, my 16th birthday. The foyer was silent. I climbed the stairs and saw Bess standing inside a sitting room. In the middle was Mary, slumped on a faded couch. Next to her were needles and traces of white powder. She picked up her head and smiled, her eyes dull and distant.

"Dance, Ramona," she whispered. "Sweet, sweet little sister."

I took off my sandals and began to twirl, going round and round like a dervish, tears splashing onto my cheeks. I saw Mary's face whirl by me. Memories of her finding me alone in our mother's house, the warmth of her arms holding my frightened body, flashed before me.

Finally I stopped and waited for the dizziness to go away. I kneeled in front of Mary and rested my head on her bony lap. I felt Bess kneeling behind me. Her large arms, big and brown, circled around my chest. I felt her familiar warmth as we wept.

"You is a good dancer," she whispered.

Lori M. Myers is an award-winning freelance writer living in Pennsylvania. Her articles, essays, and fiction have appeared in over 40 national and regional publications. She is a co-founder of the Central Pennsylvania Writer’s Consortium. One of her other joys is sharing her love of the written word with students in her writing workshops that she conducts throughout the region. She is presently attending Wilkes University for a masters degree in creative writing and working on a novel.