In the Shape of a Man

by Paul Clayton

  “The gas gage says it’s empty,” said Terri, “but I put five dollars in it last night before I parked.”

  “Thanks,” said Tawny. “I’ll gas up when I come back.”

  “Okay. Don’t forget about the meeting tonight.”

  “I won’t.” Tawny had given up on trying to dampen Terri’s hope that Tawny would officially join the Buddhist organization. Tawny had agreed to go to the big introductory meeting tonight, but she didn’t think she was going to be joining.

  Terri gave Tawny a hug and went quickly out the door.

  Tawny wondered briefly what the meeting would be like. Terri had been trying to get her to go to one for the last four years. And now, out of a sense of gratitude to Terri for having taking her in, Tawny had finally agreed. Terri went to meetings every other night, it seemed. Tawny could never see herself getting that involved, but she would go just this one time to make her friend happy.

  Cool fog swirled around Tawny as she walked the street but she could see the pale image of the sun above through the moving river of milky whiteness and knew that it would burn off by two or three in the afternoon. Despite the chill, the air had that autumnal feel of short days and hibernation. Tawny found the little beat-up Ford Escort on Benicia Street and put the key in the door. She drove down Ocean Avenue toward the freeway, past the City College campus and the many students getting on and off the buses and trolleys, and her mood improved a little. She estimated that she could get most of what she needed out of the house and loaded into the car in less than an hour. As she took the South San Francisco exit off the freeway, she hoped that Rad would honor her request and not be there. No matter, she told herself. Even if he was there when she showed up, wanting some face-to-face reckoning, she would simply not speak to him.

  Tawny pulled up in front of the house and turned the engine off. She suddenly thought of the box of old vinyl records she had stored down in the garage what now seemed like a long time ago, after their record turntable had broken. At that time all the big music corporations had been shifting over to CDs. But there were still record turntables for sale and she wanted her records. A vague coldness went up her spine as she thought about going down there. She couldn’t recall if the box was on the snake’s side of the garage or not. Maybe she should just leave them.

  Tawny got out of the car. It had rained in South City the night before and the ground was still wet, the air fecund with musk and spores. Tawny’s nose flared involuntarily and began running. She could taste the air and earth of South San Francisco on her tongue although she had yet to open her mouth. She felt as if some tiny physical thing had invaded her body and was clawing at the sensitive mucus membrane of her throat. Then her mouth turned metallically bitter, sickening her. She put her head down and spat out a small amount of bile. Wiping her mouth with a Kleenex, she felt better. She decided that she probably should start having more for breakfast than just black coffee. Straightening up, she surveyed her surroundings. The truck was still up on blocks and the yard that had been a hard packed patch of earth, now sported a foot high, thick green growth of grasses, the same native grasses, Tawny was sure, as grew on San Bruno Mountain, which loomed at the top of the street.

  Tawny went into the house and was relieved to find it cold and empty. A sleeping bag lay half-open on the couch; Rad was not sleeping in their bed. A pizza box sat on the coffee table. He’d probably stayed up late last night watching a movie. She went into their bedroom and found it much as she had left it—the top two drawers, hers, still slightly open, the bed made, with, she’d be willing to bet a week’s tips, the same sheets and blanket that had been on it when she’d left. Shaking her head sadly, she threw the rest of her cosmetics and loose ends from the top drawer into a box. She then grabbed her hair dryer and went out to the car. As she put her things in the trunk, she noticed Mister Peepers coming up the hill in his van, the cute little brown-skinned boy sitting in his child booster-seat beside him. The boy smiled at her and she remembered her vinyl records in the garage. She decided to go in through the back door, rather than through the door in the kitchen. Walking beside the house, she marveled at the luxuriant proliferation of weeds and moss which now sprouted from every crevice underfoot. Swallowing, she put the key in the door and slowly opened it. She peered in, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dimness inside. After a few moments she could make out most of the garage and its contents. She scanned the enclosure side but didn’t see Ketsel. She reached in and turned on the light switch. The snake’s mottled length, most of it anyway, became visible at the far end of the enclosure coiled in and around Rad’s stack of old tires.

  Tawny went inside. She walked over to the washing machine and checked the bulge in the enclosure. It was bigger, and the chicken wire had now been pulled off two of the nails, instead of just one. She frowned. She would call Rad and remind him to take care of that. And why the hell hadn’t Gabriel come and taken back his goddamned snake? Tawny sighed. Guys were such procrastinators. She quickly looked around and located her box of records. As she knelt to it, she saw that the one on top was Kenny G, the album she had bought when she and Rad had first met. It seemed as if those mellifluous clarinet notes were always hovering in the air whenever they made love. Tears welled in her eyes and she was about to give full vent to the deep sadness that had now taken hold of her when she detected movement out of the side of her eye—the snake’s thick body was slowly pouring down the stack of tires, disappearing behind some of the storage boxes. Tawny slowly turned away from the records and ran to the door, turning to slam it closed with a loud bang.

  Tawny’s breathing was labored and her back pained her sharply as she slid into the front seat of the car. She heard somebody chanting nam myo-ho ren-gay kyo and realized it was herself. After a while her fear subsided and she decided to go back into the house. Leaning into the closet, she quickly yanked the rest of her clothes off the hangers and hurried out the front door, slamming it behind her. As she sat in the car and looked back at the house, her sadness seemed complete. It was like an achy flu now, painfully swelling every muscle in her body. As she stared at this house where she had known happiness and love, she realized that her pain was now coupled with an unshakable determination to move on and take her life to the next level, whatever that might be. The determination made her want to shout out, to thrust her fist into the air like the jocks did when they dunked a basket or scored a touchdown. She backed the car out of the driveway and drove off.

  Rad walked down the hill from the bus stop. He loathed the thought of spending another quiet evening in the house, but he was too tired to go out to the club and he wouldn’t see Jenny till the end of the week. He vaguely fantasized about finding Tawny in the house when he went inside—her laying across the bed, having fallen asleep as she waited for him, then the two of them making love. As he approached the door the fantasy faded. Inside, she had left little evidence of having been there, just an emptied closet and two hangers lying on the floor. Rad looked around, hoping to find something, a note or some indication of her wanting to communicate with him, but there was nothing. He picked up the mail in front of the door—some junk mailers and a letter with an official-looking, but unfamiliar, return address, neatly printed on the envelope. It was addressed to him. He opened it up, scanning the legal sounding words, stopping at, ‘your vehicle, evidently in non-working order, abandoned on the property in violation of your lease…Etc. etc., forty five days to rectify the situation.’

  “Shit,” said Rad aloud, “the guy down the block, I’ll bet.”

  Rad went to the refrigerator and took out a can of beer, popping the top and swallowing half the can, the effervescence burning his throat. He went into the living room and sat on the couch. Picking up the TV remote, he scanned the channels, finally settling on a wrestling match. Frowning at the obviously faked throws, kicks and slams, he watched out of boredom. A commercial came on and he reached over to hit the play button on the message machine. There was nothing. “Shit!” he mou
thed silently and sullenly, getting up to go back into the kitchen for another beer. He brought the beer and the bottle of vodka back to the couch and sat down again. He drank a shot and chased it with a swallow of beer. After a while he began to feel guilty, knowing his parents would never approve of him sitting around getting drunk. He thought of maybe going to his parents’. He wanted to reestablish a relationship with his dad but he didn’t know how to start. He thought about going over to his sister’s place, maybe showing little Jay some moves on the board. A quick glance at the curtains behind him ruled that out; the sun was already setting and it would be dark before he could get there. And he had probably had too much to drink already.

  Fuck it! He poured another shot. Just fuck it! “You could work on your board,” a voice seemed to whisper in his head, “and give it to little Jay.” He went down into the garage. The smell of something rotting got his attention and he realized it came from the green trash bag that he had forgotten to put out on the curb the week before. For a moment he considered putting it out in the yard. “Fuck it!” he said, grabbing his board instead. He went back upstairs and sat on the couch. He spun the wheels as he stared at the TV. The smooth sound of the wheels and their bearings soothed him and he lay back on the couch. Soon the chill of early evening penetrated his clothing and he pulled the board close to his chest to warm himself. He fell asleep.

  “Nam myo-ho ren-gay kyo, nam myo-ho ren-gay kyo.” The women in the hall, and there must have been a couple hundred of them, chanted the words in determined unison and the sound was like the throbbing of a great engine. Tawny looked around surreptitiously and was amazed at the variety of faces in the room. White, Hispanic, Asian, black. The only men in the room were the two who acted as ushers, stationed at the entrances. Tawny tried to concentrate on the chanting, thinking hard about what she wanted to get out of it, about what she wanted to overcome or accomplish, but her mind wandered. She imagined Rad seated next to her, smiling in wonder about all the chanting women, and she immediately grew angry with herself. She thought of what Terri had said about how she shouldn’t look to him for her happiness, how her happiness had to come from within. Next to Tawny, Terri held her beads in her hands as she stared sternly at the altar and chanted loudly. Every now and then she leaned over to try and help Tawny repeat the words with the group. Just when Tawny seemed to become one with it, the chanting concluded with the ringing of a heavy iron bell. A woman at the front stood and faced them. She took the microphone from its stand, sending a squawk of feedback through the hall.

  “Good evening ladies of Golden Lotus Chapter… and welcome to our annual young woman’s division meeting!”

  Exuberant cheering and clapping burst from the assembled women. Tawny could not help but be caught up in the enthusiasm of the other women. Next, a rather shy woman got to her feet to explain the Buddhist practice, “a tripod,” she said, “of chanting, studying the writings of the Japanese Buddha, Nichiren, and propagation, or telling others.” She was followed by three women giving testimonials to the religion’s power. Although Tawny was moved by the sincerity of the women who got up to testify, she was inclined to attribute their achievements and personal triumphs to wishful thinking, probably coupled with a little good luck. She still had no intention of joining up. But the women’s division leader, a black woman named Dorothy Stokes, changed her mind. Mrs. Stokes’ words effused strength and love, Tawny realized, for all the women in the room. Tawny had never experienced anything like it before. No relative or teacher, no nun from her days in catechism class, no one had ever awakened in her such feelings of hope and determination to change her life. “I challenge you,” Mrs. Stokes concluded, “chant nam myo-ho ren-gay kyo for ninety days and you will change your problems into benefit and joy.”

  Tawny decided to give it the requisite ninety-day try.

  Chapter 26

  As Tina Collins drove north on 101 she couldn’t get out of her mind the image of her manager’s fat pink face. “Tina,” Elizabeth had said, smiling as if Tina were an idiot, “don’t you see it? This is better. It says it all.” Elizabeth held the red-lined letter in front of her that she had dictated first thing in the morning, and that Tina had later edited and made grammatically correct. Elizabeth might be the new manager, but Tina knew the English language better than most native-born Americans.

  Tina had kept her tongue because she’d always liked this job, had loved it, in fact, back when David Wu had been the manager. But now this big fat stupid Anglo woman was making her life miserable. Every day Elizabeth closely scrutinized her work and always wanted changes, all of them clumsy and ungrammatical, and Tina had to comply!

  Tina fumed as she came up on a slowly-moving car full of old white folks that had just come off the exit from the airport. What did Allen call them, ‘silver-headed snails.’ Tourists, no doubt, they were all talking at once and looking around, instead of driving and doing the speed limit.

  “Sixty-five!” Tina said aloud as she leaned on the horn. She swerved left and went around their car, turning to glare angrily at them.

  Three miles up the highway Tina took her exit, pulling into the parking lot of Hillview Daycare Center. Across the street, the tall eucalyptus trees of the little grove on San Bruno Mountain moved gently in a freshening breeze.

  Tina went inside the office. Patty, one of the younger girls working there, was at the counter. She smiled and said, “I’ll get them for you, Mrs. Collins. Tina nodded and scanned the sign-out sheet on the counter for Reynaldo’s and Christine’s names. Christine came out from the playroom. She was a beautiful vision in her yellow playsuit. Tina’s heart lifted. “Hi Honey,” she said. “Did you have fun today?”

  “Yes, Mommy,” said Christine.

  Patty came out a moment later with Reynaldo. His face was filthy and he looked a mess. “Reynaldo and another boy were throwing sand,” said Patty with a kindly smile. “He had a timeout and he told me he wouldn’t do it again. Isn’t that right, Reynaldo?”

  “Yes, Miss Patty,” Reynaldo said.

  Tina frowned and leaned down to Reynaldo. “Never do that again, Reynaldo. Do you hear?”

  “Yes, Mommy.”

  Tina took Reynaldo by the sleeve. His hands were dirty. She led the children outside and unlocked the doors. “Get in the car,” she said to Reynaldo as she helped Christine into the child seat up front.

  Tina said nothing on the short drive from the daycare to their house. She glanced back at Reynaldo and he looked out the window guiltily.

  As Tina passed another slower moving car she thought again about how she had taken a leave of absence when she’d adopted Reynaldo. The adoption people had told her she needed time to bond with him. She glanced back at Reynaldo and thought again how unfair it all was. He had been more trouble than she’d ever imagined a kid could be. Much more… despite everything she’d given up for him!

  Tina drove quickly down Skyview and pulled into the driveway. Inside the house, she immediately had Reynaldo take his sweatshirt off. Holding it with her fingertips as if it were infected with plague, she told him to go to the bathroom and take off his clothes for a bath. She dumped his sweat shirt in the hamper and washed her hands in the sink. Then she turned on the TV for Christine and went into the bathroom. Reynaldo stood naked, his clothes in a pile on the tile floor. Tina frowned. His skin seemed to be growing more brown as he grew older. She wondered how much of it was skin color and how much the dirt he picked up at daycare.

  “You make so much work for me,” she said.

  “Sorry, Mommy.”

  “Get in the tub.”

  “Yes, Mommy.”

  Tina turned on the shower and soaked him thoroughly. She poured shampoo on his mop of black hair. As she massaged the gel into his hair she could feel the grit beneath her fingers. “Reynaldo! You got sand all in your hair!”

  “Sorry, Mommy,” he said, annoying her further.

  “Sorry? Is that all you can say? Sorry?”

  “Sorry, Mommy.”
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  “Shut up,” she said angrily, starting Reynaldo to sniffling.

  Tina finished scrubbing Reynaldo and rinsed the soap off him. As he began drying himself, She took his dirty clothes to the basement. She passed Christine watching the TV in the living room. Tina went into Reynaldo’s room to get fresh clothes from his bureau drawer. Her nose crinkled at a musty odor in the room. She pulled the underwear drawer open. Taking a pair of undershorts and a shirt, she noticed something silvery beneath the pile of undershirts. She picked it up—the shiny silver foil wrapper of a chocolate kiss. She rushed out to the bathroom. Reynaldo’s eyes grew large as he stood naked, the towel over his little shoulders.

  “Have you been taking candy from the dish in the living room?” she demanded.

  “No, Mommy.”

  “Liar!” Tina held the silver foil before his face.

  “Sorry, Mommy.”

  “Sorry mommy, sorry mommy!” Tina shouted. “You make me sick!” She put his clothes on the table. “Get dressed and go work on your definitions in your room.” She closed the door as she left.

  Tina took the fish out of the freezer to defrost for dinner and then she bathed Christine. She felt as if she never had a moment to herself and Christine anymore. If only they hadn’t adopted. They’d tried to have children and had had no luck. Out of desperation she’d gone along with Allen’s idea about adoption. And then, nine months after they’d brought Reynaldo home she got pregnant with Christine. If only they’d held off on the adoption. Tina found herself growing more angry as she thought about it.

  Tina got Christine dressed and went out into the living room. She looked at the clock. It was almost five and she still hadn’t vacuumed the living room rug. She got the vacuum out of the closet and plugged it in. She turned it on and the drone calmed her a little. She began running it back and forth, enjoying the way the brushes lifted the nap of the carpet, like brushed cotton or suede, leaving clean swaths behind in the gray of the rug. She worked quick and determinedly, increasing the clean expanse of smooth swaths. The vacuum clattered and spat something out. Tina looked closely—one of Reynaldo’s tiny toy men, a soldier. She angrily ran the vacuum over it several times until the machine broke it up and swallowed it. Reynaldo! Tina continued to roll the vacuum back and forth. She kept a clean house, an orderly house, and she didn’t need this brat always making work for her. She was a good, hard worker. She didn’t need Elizabeth scrutinizing everything she did with a magnifying glass. The woman’s house was probably a dump. Soon Tina was breathing heavily, sweat beading on her brow. She had most of the living room done. She left the vacuum running while she leaned her back into the back of the couch, sliding it over. She went back to the vacuum and stopped. A half dozen silvery chocolate kiss wrappers lay on the rug where the couch had hidden them. Reynaldo! That little imp! He was always making work for her, lying, stealing.