Jumpstart the World

by Catherine Ryan Hyde

  She glanced at me over her shoulder on her way out the door.

  “I’ll go back to school now,” I said.

  “You bet your ass you will.”

  Then she was gone.

  THIRTEEN

  Mascara, and Other Things That Run

  I wish I could say for a fact how much time passed by before the next really important thing happened. I’m thinking it was about ten or eleven days. Thing is, you don’t know another big thing is about to happen. So you don’t keep count. But it must’ve been around a week and a half.

  I was sitting out on the fire escape. Even though it was getting really cool in the evenings now. I guess it must seem like I never did much of anything else but just sit out on my fire escape. But it’s strangely addictive, watching the world move. I didn’t have a TV. I didn’t even really want one. And I liked the feeling of the seasons changing. I loved the feel of air that wasn’t hot.

  I looked down and saw a man walk out of the apartment house across the street. He was wearing an orange shirt and carrying a broom.

  At first, I didn’t think much about it at all. Other than maybe it was a little strange for somebody to sweep the street in front of his own apartment building. Unless he was the super or something.

  Then after a few minutes, I started wondering why he looked familiar. He reminded me of somebody. I just couldn’t for the life of me think who that might be.

  When it hit me, it felt like it hit me almost literally. Like a fastball you take right in the gut. My whole body felt freezing cold, but especially my stomach.

  I thought, No. It couldn’t be. They couldn’t have let him out. They were supposed to keep him locked up forever. For the rest of his life, so nobody could get hurt.

  I had this flash of memory. Sitting on the fire escape with Frank for one of the first times ever. He said when Harry was back on his meds, he was the nicest, quietest neighbor you could possibly want.

  I wondered what Frank would say about Harry now.

  I crawled back in through the window and got my camera, and my big, long close-up lens. Before I ran to Molly and Frank with this, I wanted to be absolutely sure.

  I crawled back out on the fire escape and watched him through the camera sight. It had one of those viewfinders that sights right through the lens.

  It was him all right. My body got all cold again. I wanted to run tell them right away. But first I snapped off a couple of shots. There was something weirdly precise about all of his movements. Like he might miss a piece of dust if he swept too fast. I wasn’t sure if I could get that on film. What it would look like with the action frozen. But I was in a period of discovery. Experimentation. I tried to get everything on film. Otherwise, how would I know?

  Thing is, I hadn’t been developing anything. Even the photos of Wilbur were still sitting in little film canisters, undeveloped. Like I’d been too tired and too busy and too much just barely coping with all this newness to follow through. Like I might not be strong enough to get the feedback on how I had done.

  When I’d taken a few more photos I might never develop, I ran next door. Knocked on the door.

  “Who is it?” I heard Molly call through the door.

  “It’s me. Elle. Molly, he’s back. Crazy Harry. He’s back.”

  The door opened. I looked at her face. Her eyes looked lost and far away. Hurt. Not really furious like I’d expected. And not really shocked.

  “Okay,” she said. “Thanks for telling me.”

  I just stood there. Waiting for something more, I guess. Something easier to recognize.

  “Why’d they let him out?” I asked.

  Like she would know.

  “I guess if he’s back on his meds, they probably judged him not a danger to himself. Or to others.”

  “Why didn’t they put him in jail? Somebody could have died because of him.” I heard myself speak as if I were standing outside myself. And I thought it sounded strange, the way I said “somebody.” Like I couldn’t bring myself to say who.

  “He doesn’t belong in jail, Elle. He has a mental illness.”

  “Well, he doesn’t belong on our street, either.”

  “Well, he has to be somewhere.”

  Then the doorway was empty. She didn’t close the door. Just stepped back from the doorway. Into her apartment. When she appeared again, she was wearing her big sun hat.

  I wondered if Frank was asleep.

  I followed her down the stairs and outside.

  She crossed the street, but I didn’t. I just watched. I still had my camera hanging from its strap around my neck. I couldn’t hear what they were saying to each other. But I could see their body language. The way they leaned in toward each other. Like they were sharing some sort of confidence. I snapped off a couple dozen photos with my close-up lens.

  When she came back across the street, I was wired and not sure what to say. I wanted to know what she’d said to him. But it didn’t feel like any of my business. It felt like a private place. Someplace where I had no right to trespass.

  But I think she must have seen the disbelief in my eyes.

  “It’s not like he ever meant Frank any harm,” she said.

  “So you forgive him.”

  “I know I wouldn’t have said this when it first happened. I would’ve probably taken the guy apart with my bare hands. But, in a way, there’s really nothing to forgive. It was just sort of a freak accident. I mean, all he did was make a sudden noise.”

  “So you forgive him.”

  “Yeah. I guess.”

  “Does Frank forgive him?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t asked him.”

  Then she went back inside.

  I looked up to see Crazy Harry, still across the street. Leaning on his broom. Watching her go.

  It was much later that evening. Dark. And the temperature was perfect. That perfect crisp autumn night.

  Or so I thought.

  I was sitting out on the fire escape. And I heard a little sound. A familiar sound, but I hadn’t heard it for a while. It was the sound of Frank’s window opening next door.

  I watched, almost in disbelief, as he very carefully climbed out onto his own part of the fire escape. He was using only his left hand, and being extra slow and cautious. I think he knew I was there, but he hadn’t actually looked at me yet.

  When he’d settled himself with his back up against the building, he said, “Hey.”

  Just kind of quiet. Still not looking at me.

  But it felt good, because it felt familiar.

  “Hey,” I said back.

  Then we just sat for a while. Maybe five minutes. Or maybe less, and maybe it just felt like five minutes. I had this deep feeling that felt suspiciously like being happy. It was an actual physical feeling, around in my gut. Like something priceless had been returned to me. Just as I was accepting that I’d never see it again.

  Then Frank said, “I have to tell you something.”

  The feeling left.

  “Okay. Tell me.”

  Silence.

  I looked away. Looked at the building across the street and one over. Through one of the windows I could see a couple fighting. Not hitting, just screaming at each other. Even though I couldn’t hear the screaming. I watched them because watching them kept my eyes turned away.

  “I hate to even tell you,” he said.

  “I caught that.”

  I could feel that sensation again. Like when I found Frank’s glasses lying in the street. In the blood. That sense that my feelings just closed up shop and went home. All quiet on the western front.

  “We have to move back to South Carolina. We can’t afford to stay here.”

  He waited for a minute. Maybe to see if I wanted to talk. I didn’t. I just watched that couple. The man kept walking away and the woman kept following after him. But they just kept going around in a circle.

  “We have lots of medical bills because, up to a hundred thousand dollars, my insurance only covers e
ighty percent. And I won’t be able to work for months because I won’t be using my right hand. So we don’t have next month’s rent. So we’ll be leaving at the end of the month.”

  In the silence that followed, I did the math. Not on the medical bills. On the time we had left. Eleven days.

  “What are you going to do for rent in South Carolina?”

  “Molly’s brother and sister-in-law have a little apartment over their garage. Sort of like a big guest room.”

  I didn’t say anything for a time. The couple pulled the shade and then turned off the lights. I wondered if that meant they were already planning to make up, which seemed just about unfathomable enough to make my head explode.

  “Do they accept you?”

  “Yes and no. They don’t really know me. They knew Franny.”

  “Did they accept Molly and Franny?”

  “Better than most of Molly’s relatives, I guess.”

  I really hate to admit that I winced a little at the image of Franny. Just the tiniest bit. Another of those feelings that you think should go away but it doesn’t entirely. I guess all feelings are like that. Information doesn’t affect them as much as you think it should.

  “Well, thanks for telling me.”

  I crawled back into my apartment, even though the night was perfect and I had planned to stay out there until I was too tired to keep my eyes open any longer.

  Toto had been sleeping on the couch, but he booked it when he saw me come back in.

  I stood in the middle of my own living room for a minute. Or more. Like I couldn’t remember what comes next. No, worse than that. Like I couldn’t possibly make up anything that could even potentially come next. No matter how hard I tried.

  Then I stuck my head out the window again.

  Frank was still there. Just sitting. Staring off into the dark.

  “Are you ever coming back?”

  “I hope so. But it’s probably going to take a couple of years.”

  I took my head back.

  I went to bed. But I wasn’t sleepy. And I didn’t go to sleep.

  Sometime after eleven—maybe even closer to midnight—I heard a knock at my door.

  I hadn’t been asleep.

  “Who is that at this hour?” I yelled, without even getting up.

  The voice came back a little muffled, but I managed to make out the words. “It’s me. Wilbur.”

  I got up. Threw on a robe over the thousand-year-old FRANKIE SAY RELAX T-shirt I’d stolen from my mother to use as a sleep shirt. Answered the door.

  I half expected him to look like he’d been beaten up or something. But if his stepfather had laid a hand on him, I couldn’t see where. I could tell he’d been crying, though. His mascara streaked all the way down onto his cheeks. Startlingly black.

  I looked down at his hands but they were empty.

  “No beer,” I said.

  “I’m trying to cut down.”

  I snorted one single blast of something like laughter.

  “You better come in,” I said.

  It was about two in the morning and I still couldn’t sleep.

  “Wilbur?” I said. Loud enough to sound like a whisper by the time it reached the living room. Or so I hoped.

  “Yeah?”

  “Are you asleep?”

  “Obviously not.”

  “Were you asleep? Did I wake you?”

  “No.”

  “Oh. Good.”

  Then I wasn’t sure what to say.

  “So … what?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. I’m not sure. I guess I just felt like talking.”

  No response. Then I looked up to see him standing in my bedroom doorway, wrapped in the blanket I’d given him. I wanted to see if he’d cleaned off all that mascara, but the only light came from behind him. The streetlight mostly shone through the living-room window. So I couldn’t see his face.

  I moved over a little and patted the bed beside me, and he came and lay down. Huddled tightly in the blanket. As if it were about twenty degrees in there.

  “How’s Frank?” he asked. Quietly.

  “Better.”

  “Good.”

  “He’s moving away.”

  “Oh. Bad.”

  “Yeah. Very bad.”

  “When did you find out?”

  “Just earlier tonight.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “I don’t think so. But I can’t really tell yet. I know that sounds retarded.”

  “No. It doesn’t. I never feel things until later.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. Really.”

  Silence. Silence. Silence. I wanted to say more about Frank leaving. So many more things. Only … what were they?

  “I keep wanting to tell him I’m sorry for the way I treated him. You know. After I found out.”

  “So why don’t you?”

  “Because I think he might not remember it. I know he doesn’t remember a lot from those last few days before the accident. He didn’t even remember that Toto was sick. So I’m thinking maybe he doesn’t even know what a jerk I was. Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that I’m trying to weasel out of it. It’s more that … Well, if he doesn’t know I did something to hurt him, then he isn’t hurt. Right? So if I tell him … Only, what if he does remember?”

  The mental twisting and turning was making my brain hurt, so I stopped to rest. For quite a few beats.

  Wilbur didn’t say anything.

  “What would you do? If it were you?”

  A pause while he thought that over.

  “I think I’d go with the living amends.”

  “The what?”

  “Living amends. That’s when you just don’t do the thing you’re sorry for anymore. You just do better. Some people think that’s better than words anyway.”

  “Both might be best.”

  “Yeah, but it’s like you said. If he doesn’t know, then he’s not hurt. You might be opening a can of worms.”

  I gave all that a minute to soak in. Find a place to sit down.

  Then I said, “I met Frank the very first day I moved in here. My mother was just throwing me out, and I’d never lived alone before. And I was scared to live alone. But I never really did live alone because he was there. Right from the start, he was there. So I was never really alone. But if some strangers move in next door …” The thought was so horrible that it stopped me in mid-sentence. I hadn’t tried on that image before. Strangers in Frank and Molly’s apartment.

  Wilbur spoke up before I could get back on track.

  “I know it’s not really much,” he said. “But you do have me. And Shane and The Bobs.”

  Did I have Shane and The Bobs? After the way I’d been treating them? But I figured Wilbur must know, so I said, “That’s true.”

  “Probably not much consolation.”

  “Some,” I said.

  Then we didn’t talk for a long time, and I wasn’t sure if we would ever start up again. I figured I might just lie awake all night looking at the outlines of him in the dark.

  Next thing I knew, I opened my eyes and it was light. My eyes felt grainy and sore, and my stomach was a little rocky. Almost like a hangover.

  Wilbur lay fast asleep beside me, still mummified in his blanket. The streaks of mascara still marking his face. Still betraying the fact that he really did feel. Whether delayed or not didn’t seem to matter much in the light of dawn.

  FOURTEEN

  Mocha Almond Fudge and Loss. The Perfect Companions.

  After Wilbur left, I spent most of that next day dancing.

  Sounds happier than it actually is.

  I have this thing about Janis Joplin. Her music, that is. Not Janis herself, who, of course, is long dead.

  I think I want to be her.

  Only not dead.

  Anyway. It’s the music. People might expect I’d be put off by the fact that it was all recorded a quarter of a century before I was born. They would be wrong.

&nbs
p; I have a bunch of it on an iPod. A different one than I have all my mixed music on. So after Wilbur left, I stuck the earbuds in and just got into it. And none of that “Me and Bobby McGee” crap, either. We don’t need no stinking slow ballads. Thirty-two really hard-rock tracks, and every other one was “Piece of My Heart.” I just can’t get enough of that one. Never really could.

  I still had one beer in the fridge, left over from the weird, upsetting party. I drank it all during the first play of “Piece of My Heart,” and then used the bottle as a microphone. It’s sort of like playing air guitar, only with singing. I didn’t actually sing. Just mouthed the words perfectly into the beer bottle and moved my body, and every time I opened my mouth, this perfect Janis Joplin shriek coincided.

  It’s very satisfying in a way I can’t really explain. Believe me, I’ve tried. It also makes me tired, which I appreciate when I’m feeling crappy.

  I think I’d been at this for somewhere between two and three hours when I saw my front door open. I pulled out the earbuds.

  In walked my mother.

  Before I could even open my mouth, she said, “Now, don’t say I should have called, because I’ve been calling you for hours.”

  “I had music on.”

  “But you can’t say I didn’t try.”

  “Why did you come over if I didn’t answer the phone? Didn’t you figure I was out?”

  “I took a chance,” she said. “I needed to talk to you. It’s important.”

  Only then did it hit me. Things were not okay with her.

  I honestly thought, at least from the look on her face, that she was having a worse day than I was. If such a thing was possible.

  She sat at my kitchen table with her forehead in one palm. I’d made her a cup of tea, and it sat on the table right under her face, and the steam swirled up like she was getting a facial, or trying to breathe steam to clear her sinuses. Actually, she did look like she’d been doing some crying.

  She still wasn’t telling me what this was all about.

  “What’s up, Mother?”

  She took a sip of the hot tea. Made a face. “Don’t you have any coffee?”

  “No. Sorry. I don’t drink coffee.”

  “But I got you that nice coffeemaker.”