"Do you have any brothers or sisters?" he asked.
"I had a younger sister, Beni. She was killed, murdered by gang members."
"Really?" He sounded shocked.
"I wouldn't want to make any of this up, believe me," I said. "I have an older brother who is in the army. He's in Germany now."
Randall just stared at me for a moment as if a mask had dropped off my face and he was looking at the real me.
"Do your parents still live there?" he finally asked.
"My father's in jail and my mother died recently," I said. "Depressed enough?" I muttered and got up and started away.
"Hey!" he called and caught up with me. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to put you in a bad mood."
"You didn't. I was born in a bad mood," I commented.
"I would never know it by talking to you. No, I mean it," he continued when I stopped to look at him skeptically. "When I first started to talk to you at the school, I just thought you were someone different," he added.
"Different? Yeah, Randall, I'm different," I said laughing coldly. "That's for sure. It didn't take you long to spot that."
"No, I didn't mean in a bad way. You're...I don't know ...not like any girl I ever met."
"I'm not surprised." Suddenly his white-bread world annoyed me. His whole life looked like a soft slide downhill and he had been born with a wonderful talent too. Who decided all this? Was there some judge who considered you when you were about to be born and with a wave of his hand, he sent you to this family or that, this world or that? What could I or Beni or Roy have done to be given this destiny as opposed to the one Randall had been given?
"You were brought up with a silver spoon in your mouth. You just said so yourself," I told him. "Private schools, rich parents, beautiful home...art galleries and theaters. Your family took you on expensive vacations. You were shocked to learn I hadn't even been to New York City!"
"No, I just..."
"You know why I seem different? I'm as good as an alien to you. You wanted to talk to me because you thought I was different?
"I'm different, all right. Boy, am I different. Yeah, I'm black and white, too, and ...lost," I moaned, hurrying away.
I didn't look back. I knew deep inside that it wasn't fair to take out my frustrations on him and jump on every word he said, but I wasn't in the mood to be fair. I dug my feet into the grass so hard, I could feel the earth move beneath my heels. I walked and walked, passing all sorts of tourists, couples holding hands, families, young men carrying backpacks, people from everywhere. A stream of foreign languages rushed by: Italian, French, Japanese, Russian...I really could be from outer space, I thought and finally, short of breath, flopped on a bench.
I sat there staring across the park at the street full of traffic: double-decker buses, sightseeing buses, English taxi cabs, foreign cars mixed with American cars, people everywhere waiting for the green man to appear at the crossing light. It felt like a carnival atmosphere, like the whole world was on holiday.
"Wow. I practically had to sprint to keep up with you," Randall said coming up behind me. "May I sit beside you?" he asked.
"It's a public bench," I replied.
You're so bad-tempered today, Rain, I heard a voice inside me say.
"I'm sorry if I insulted you in some way," Randall began. "Believe me, I didn't mean to."
"I'm just tired of thinking about myself as different," I said followed by a deep sigh. "For a while I'd like to be the same, boring and common."
"Different doesn't have to mean something bad. It could be good. Lots of people want to be different," he said softly, gingerly, like someone walking on thin ice. "My mother's always talking about being different. She hates being thought of as just another middle-class wife. I know because she's often saying that. I think that's why she wants to be an artist so much. While the wives of my father's friends are attending charity luncheons, afternoon cocktail parties and such, she's in her studio getting paint on her face."
"On her face?"
"She always comes out looking messy. My dad accuses her of tasting the paint before she uses it," he said.
I looked away to smile with tears still in my eyes. How wonderful it must be to have parents who love and cherish each other and create a warm, happy world for their children, I thought.
"You were right," he admitted gazing down, "I don't know too many black kids. But," he added, turning to me, "I really don't know that many white ones either. I don't have all that many friends back home. I guess it's because I've been attending these special schools, working with voice coaches, spending all my spare time on developing my voice because my parents want me to be a star."
"Don't you?"
"Not all the time," he said. He leaned back, the soft strands of his hair falling over his forehead. His eyes filled with a warm glow as he gazed into his own thoughts. "When we were watching those little boys back at Round Pond, I was thinking about all the fun I missed out on. I was given piano lessons, not many toys. My parents were afraid to let me participate in sports as if building my wind for something other than singing might damage my voice.
"They let me learn to skate, but being part of the hockey team was impossible because of the conflicts with my music practice.
"You know what, Rain," he said suddenly as if the realization had really just occurred, "I'm different, too. I was always different in the eyes of my fellow students. I guess I was freaky to most of them."
"I doubt that," I said. I really meant not to the girls, not someone with his good looks.
"Yeah, well, that's the way I felt now that I think about in"
"Are you going to sit there and tell me you didn't have a girlfriend or girlfriends?"
He laughed.
"I had a girlfriend named Nicolette Sabon. We were taking singing lessons from the same teacher, Mr. Wegman. He used to tap a ruler on the top of my head to keep me in rhythm. He had Nicolette and me singing duets, performing at the school's productions and going around the city singing for ladies' organizations and clubs. We were together a lot because of that, posed for pictures together, were seen everywhere together, and one day Nicolette told me I was her boyfriend and she was my girlfriend. I remember she made it sound as if I had no choice. Like it was ordained by a higher power."
"How old were you?" I asked.
"Twelve. She was eleven?'
"Twelve? Eleven? That was your only love affair?" He shrugged.
"I had a crush on a girl when I was fifteen, but I didn't smoke or drink beer and she thought I was some sort of dud, I guess, because all I asked her to do with rue was listen to music or go to a show. She said my good looks were wasted on me. She really made me feel different, speaking of feeling different. It got around the school that I was a huge bore, and I felt like crawling into a hole."
"She was an idiot?' I said, "and your good looks are not wasted on you. People will love to look at you as well as listen to you. Your good looks fit the quality of your voice, Randall. Don't ever regret that," I ordered.
His eyes widened.
"I can't tell if you like me or hate me," he said. I had to smile.
"I don't hate you. Of course, I don't hate you. Maybe I hate myself," I said growing serious again. "No, there's no maybes about it. I do."
"You shouldn't. I know I don't have the right to give advice to you. I know I can't even begin to understand the world you come from or what you've gone through before getting here, but I've seen many so-called talented girls arid-I'm telling you, you're the cream of the crop."
"Oh, is that right?"
"Yes, it is," he insisted.
I stared into those blue eyes, eyes as pure and as innocent as a summer's sky.
"I'm sorry," 1 said. "I didn't mean to jump on what you said back there. I had a very strange and difficult morning and I guess I'm feeling a little homesick, too."
"Funny, isn't it?" he said, nodding, "that no matter how hard or unpleasant we think our home lives are when we're there, we miss
it when we're far away."
"That's because we're among strangers in a strange place," I said.
He nodded and then brightened.
"Well, let's keep going and make it less strange. That's what we set out to do today, wasn't it?"
He dug into his pocket again and produced the tourist brochure.
"Buckingham Palace." He read to himself a moment and then looked at his watch and jumped up, grabbing my hand. "Come on." he cried, pulling me off the bench so hard I nearly fell forward on my face.
"Why? Where?"
I had to run along with him over the grass toward Knightsbridge Road.
"We need to catch a cab."
"Why?" I cried.
"If we don't hurry, we'll miss the changing of the guard!"
We shot onto the road and as luck would have it, there was a cab just coming.
"Buckingham Palace as quickly as you can," he told the driver as we got into the cab.
"All right, guy," the driver said, smiling.
Randall read as I caught my breath.
"Buckingham Palace is the sovereign's London home, named for the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, who erected it in the eighteenth century, selling it to George III in 1761.
"Just think," Randall said lowering the brochure, "it was built and sold before the United States even existed"
I don't know whether it was simply being with Randall and feeling his excitement or whether it was because I was in a new place, a whole new world, but suddenly all the darkness was washed away and the light of new discoveries filled me with a renewed desire to rise above my past and revive my ambition to find myself and my true identity. Even here, even so far away from everything and everyone I'd ever known.
Watching the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace and then touring the Royal Mews and the Queen's Gallery was interesting, but took a great deal longer than Randall had anticipated. Even so, we took another taxi to Trafalgar Square. It was jammed with people. I didn't know where to turn first. After we had walked by the fountains and then had taken in the scenic view along Whitehall to Big Ben and Parliament, Randall wanted us to retrace our steps and go into the National Gallery.
"I've been here twice with my mother," he said, "but you can never see it all. Come on."
I felt like I was in a race with time, trying to get everything in before some clock boomed and turned me back into poor Cinderella on her return to the hovel she lived in someplace in America. Randall was behaving as if he thought I would suddenly stop and say, "I don't want to see or do another thing with you." His object was to keep me moving, keep my eyes and ears full of sights and sounds and full of the history he was reading and showing me.
"The National Gallery hosts one of the world's best collections of Old Masters, but it is very strong on the French Impressionists as well," he explained. "Do you know a lot about painting?"
"No," I confessed.
"Then you should spend a lot of time here. You can educate yourself quickly. The range is from the thirteenth century through the nineteenth." He rattled off the names of the famous painters and scooted me about to show me as many examples of their works as possible. Finally, I had to stop and sit on a bench, pleading not only exhaustion in my body, but exhaustion in my mind.
"It's no good this way, Randall. Many small bites aren't as good as slow, big bites. I'm not absorbing it. We'll come back. I promise."
He laughed.
"Okay. Okay. Let's just go for a walk back again toward Big Ben and enjoy the beautiful fall day," he suggested. "I promise, I won't rush you. We'll take little steps."
We left the museum.
"When I'm walking around in my own country or in places I'm used to," I said as we crossed the square, "my eyes can fall asleep, even while they're open, but here or someplace as new as this, I can't see enough. It tires me out, Randall."
"Oh, I know. I just get a little too enthusiastic sometimes. Sorry," he said.
"I don't blame you. I suppose if our roles were switched and I had been here before and wanted to show it to someone who hadn't, I'd act the same way."
When we crossed a street, he took my hand and we didn't let go of each other for a long time as we walked up to Big Ben. Afterward, we crossed another street and just wandered down a smaller, narrower road until we saw a pub called the Hearty Sailor.
Randall checked his watch.
"Well, what do you know. It's time for tea," he said. "Would m'lady like a bit of shepherd's pie and a pint of stout?"
"Stout? You mean beer?"
"Well, you have to be eighteen to be served here," he said, "and I won't be for three months."
"I'm already eighteen," I said.
"Really? Great. Come on."
Above the door of the pub was a colorful metal sign with a robust-looking sailor holding a mug of beer. Randall caught the direction of my gaze.
"All British pubs have a painted sign on the outside because most people couldn't read until the beginning of this century, so when their mates said, 'Meet me at the Hearty Sailor,' they'd just look for the picture."
"How do you know so much about this city?" I asked him.
"I just spent my time reading about it when I knew I would be living here and going to school here," he replied.
"For me it all happened so fast, I barely had time to learn the difference between a pound and a dollar," I said.
"No harm done," he said opening the door. "You have me, the perfect guide and translator, and I come cheap."
I laughed at his happy smile and we entered the pub. It was somewhat darker inside than I anticipated, but somehow I felt a warm and cozy feeling the moment we entered. The people who were inside gazed at us with interest, but no resentment like people often did when I walked into a new place back home. They made me feel I had intruded on private property and that where I was did not welcome strangers.
"Here's a couple a real customers, Charlie," someone cried and everyone laughed, even the man behind the bar. A short, dark-haired woman with deep brown round eyes and a face like a marble cherub appeared with a plate of food in her hands. She placed it on the bar in front of an elderly man dressed in a suit and tie.
"Can I help you?" the bartender asked Randall. He looked up at the menu written in Gothic style on a board above the bar.
"Want to try the shepherd's pie?" he asked me.
"Sure," I said.
"We'll have two shepherd's pies and two shandies," he said and produced two ten-pound notes.
We heard people chuckling.
"Ya old enough for an ale, are ya?"
I handed him my student identification card. He glanced at it and nodded and looked at Randall. "Forgot mine," Randall said.
"He looks old enough to me, Charlie," cried a tall, thin man with an Adam's apple so prominent, I thought it would bust out and roll over the counter.
"Never you mind, Mush," the bartender said and everyone laughed again.
"I can only give 'er one," he said.
Randall nodded.
"Just a lemonade then," he said
He gave Randall his change and he and I sat at an empty table. I gazed around at all the signs on the walls, the old posters, farm implements, swords and helmets, everything looking like it belonged in some museum. The bartender put Randll's lemonade and my shandy on the counter and Randall fetched them.
Everyone returned to their conversations as if we weren't there.
"This is fun, huh?" Randall asked.
"Yes. Everyone seems... friendly."
"Most of the pubs are owned by one or the other of the major breweries. Ones that are privately owned are called freehouses. This one's a freehouse and they usually have a bigger selection of ale. Too bad I can't get served, too," he said in a lower voice. "Go on. Drink yours. The beer here is different from America. They serve it room temperature instead of cold."
"Really? Why?"
"It's supposed to taste better," he explained.
I sat back and studied him a
moment.
"Why are you smiling at me like that?" he asked.
"For someone who supposedly didn't get around much, who was locked away in music suites, you sure seem.. , sophisticated."
"I told you. It's all from reading. I've always been a big reader. I'd have a book with me whenever I went to my lessons because sometimes I had to wait for the teacher to finish. with someone else, and, when you don't socialize a lot, you get used to spending your free time with a book," he said, shrugging as if it was the most obvious thing.
He was quiet for a moment and then leaned forward.
"What about you? Do you spend your free time with books? Or do you have a boyfriend waiting for you back home?"
"No, no boyfriend."
"Did you have lots of boyfriends? You asked me so I can ask you," he followed quickly. It made me laugh.
"Not really, no," I said. "I was too busy helping Mama at home. She was so tired all the time."
"So we both have a lot of catching up to do," he said. "Oh, we do? I don't know, Randall Glenn. Sometimes, you sound more experienced than you claim you are."
"What?" He looked sincerely confused and turned so crimson, I thought he might burst. Maybe he wasn't coming on to me as strongly as I thought he was. It was difficult to believe a boy who looked like he did was so innocent after all.
I sipped my ale and shrugged.
When our shepherd's pies were ready, the darkhaired lady brought them to our table and asked us if we wanted anything else. They were so hot we had to wait for them to cool, but they were delicious.
Suddenly, at the other end of the pub, two men who looked about forty started to sing.
"Fill up the cider cup,
Have another round.
Of all the drinks in England,
No better can be found."
"I know that one, too," Randall declared, and as if his voice was something that had a life of its own and would emerge whenever it liked, he began to sing along. Being trained, he just normally projected and in moments, everyone in the pub was looking at us. I felt like crawling under the table.
But, to my surprise, no one resented his intrusion. More of the customers began to sing along and in moments, the whole place resounded with the tune. When it ended, they all applauded.
Hudson 02 Lightning Strikes Page 9
