fascination with Daria Daniel. I was the only one who never called her Darie. I vowed that I wouldnât that first night we met, after we hurried away from the police and the paint bucket and the yellow stripe on our store window. We went to The Sweet Creek Diner, where she ordered a coffee and I ordered a Coke.
âNever call me Darie,â she said. âPromise? Iâm trying to outgrow that name.â
âI promise.â
What was I doing promising her anything ? My loyalties should have been with my big brother, not her. My eyes and my mouth werenât paying any attention to my thoughts.
âMy fatherâs real name is Lucio Danelli. I can understand why he changed Lucio to Dan, because kids called him Lucy, but why did he let my mother talk him into changing our name to Daniel?â
âDid she ever give you a reason?â I asked her.
âYes. She claims itâs best not to be too much of one thing. Donât be too Italian or too Jewish or too Irish.â Her eyes looked directly at me. âOr too Quaker,â she said.
Oh, great! I thought, just great. I said, âHow about too Catholic?â
âSame thing.â She shrugged. âMy motherâs nothing. Sheâs Protestant or something. Now she goes to St. Peterâs most Sundays because of the war.â
After the waitress brought our order, I looked across at Daria, wondering why I was afraid to ask the question I was about to ask, wondering what there was about her that made me want her to like me. She was about my age, I knew, but I always felt a lot younger around her, and I didnât have a reason for that either.
She was putting heaping teaspoons of sugar in her coffee, her brown hair touching her shoulders, the checkered cap cocked over one eye.
âDaria, why would you mark my fatherâs windows? Do you think my father had anything to do with Bud becoming a CO?â
âI donât know.â She looked up at me with these sea-green eyes of hers. She was blinking as though I made her nervous. That was a laugh. She said, âMy mother says your father was never really religious before he met your mother.â
âHeâs not really religious now.â
âI guess the most religious person in your family is Bud.â
âMy mother, and then Budâ¦. Then me.â
âAre you really?â
âIâm not passionately religious. Sometimes I envy people who are. But I believe in God. And I think I feelstrongly about whatâs right and whatâs wrong.â
âIâm not that religious,â she said, âbut since the war, I go to church every Sunday like my mother.â
âWho put you up to painting our window, Daria? Radio Dan?â
â Daddy? Oh, my gawd, you donât know Daddy!â
âJust what I hear over the radio. Youâre not supposed to clap your hands until the warâs over. You can only slap your sides.â
âI wouldnât think youâd listen.â
âI donât always listen.â
âDaddy doesnât like to make enemies, not even of slackers.â
âDonât call my brother a slacker! You donât know anything about him!â
âI know heâs letting my two brothers fight for this country, when he wonât.â
âWhat Bud is doing is for this country,â I said. âHeâs trying to stop sending guys like your brother off to war!â
âBut that wonât stop Hitler! How do you stop Hitler?â
âI donât know,â I said. Even kids at Friends admitted Hitler was a different kind of enemy.
âIt was my idea to mark the windows, Jubal! Itâs the least I can do, with both my brothers risking their lives. Let me ask you something, Jubal. Suppose there was a mad dog loose on our street, foaming at the mouth, his ruff up, his teeth bared as he went after people. Would Bud just walk away and leave it up to my brothers tomake the