He was forty pounds heavier and had lost most of his hair. The rest was a crew cut that made his face look even larger and squarer.
"Johnny! Hey, Johnny!"
He stopped and turned around. When he saw me he only stared.
"Do you remember me? Sam Bayer? I used to live here a long time ago?"
"No."
"I didn't think so. How are you, Johnny?"
"Okay."
"Whatcha been doing?"
"Not much."
Johnny Petangles lived with his mother and grandmother on Olive Street down by the railroad station. He was slow in the head, as they used to say, and worked odd jobs around town. What he really liked to do was watch television. Although I don't think he was an idiot savant, he had one great talent – he could repeat verbatim every television commercial he had ever seen. "And away goes trouble down the drain; Roto-Rooter!" "Take Sominex tonight and sleep . . . ." "Puff puff Cocoa Puffs." Club Soda Johnny's gospel came straight from the blue tube, and slow as he was, he still knew every chapter and verse. Summers we'd be sitting in the town park, bored stiff. Along came Johnny on one of his never-ending marches through town. "Hey, Johnny, do the Clark Bar ad. Do the Chunky. How does the Bufferin one go?" The ads didn't even have to have music or jingles for him to get them right. Even doctors in white coats pointing to charts demonstrating the effectiveness of Bufferin aspirin or Preparation H hemorrhoid cream went right into Johnny's soft head and stayed forever. But because he was demented, the sentences, although perfect, came out flat and totally deflated, sounding like a computer voice. "Char-lie says love my Good & Plen-ty!"
Being near him now was like bringing a bouquet of fresh flowers up to my nose. The smell of nostalgia was overpowering.
He looked to the left and right. Then in an exaggerated gesture, he pulled up his sleeve and looked at his wristwatch. I noticed the dial face was a picture of Arnold Schwarzenegger in The Terminator. "I have to go now. I have to get home to watch television."
I put out a hand and touched his arm. It was very warm. "Johnny, do you remember Pauline Ostrova? Do you remember her name?"
He narrowed his eyes, touched his chin and looked at the sky. He began to hum. For a moment I wondered if he had forgotten my question.
"No. I don't remember her."
"Okay. Well, it was nice seeing you again, Johnny."
"It was my great pleasure." Surprisingly, he put out his big hand and we shook. His face didn't change expression when he abruptly turned and strode off.
Watching him walk away, I remembered the old Club Soda Johnny, Frannie McCabe, Suzy Nicholls, Barbara Thilly . . . so many others. I remembered summer days in the town park, bored out of our skulls, happy to see crazy Johnny because he was a welcome five-minute diversion. We had so much time on our hands in those days. About all we had was time. Always waiting for something to happen without ever quite knowing what. Something about to happen, someone about to come and save our day, week . . . from just being.
Johnny stopped, spun around and looked at me impassively. "Pauline is dead. You're joking around with me. She was killed a long time ago."
"That's right, Johnny. A hell of a long time."
I drove past Sacred Heart Church, Stumpel Ford, Power's Stationery Store. It's interesting how some shops, no matter how many times they change owners, always stay the same. Most locations go from pizzeria to boutique to whatever every few years. The stationery store in Crane's View had a new owner but was still the place to buy a newspaper, rubber bands, candy. As a kid, my first allowance had been twenty-five cents. Enough to buy a Payday candy bar and a Sugar and Spike comic book there. I'd walk out not knowing what to do first – open the comic or the Payday. Usually I'd do both at once – read, eat, cross the street without looking and not realize until I got home that I'd finished everything.
At the traffic light in the center of town, Main Street forked. If you went straight, you took Broadway uphill toward the nicer sections. If you veered right, Main Street continued through the heart of beautiful downtown Crane's View, all six minutes of it. When I had brought Michelle on our pilgrimage to my roots, she'd said, "But what did you do for fun here? There's nothing."
Which was almost true. A pretty town an hour up the Hudson River from Manhattan, Crane's View had a Waspy name but was populated by mostly lower-middle-class Irish and Italian families. People there needed only a good hardware store, market, clothes store that sold chinos, Maidenform brassieres, housedresses, Converse sneakers. The most expensive thing on the menu at the best restaurant in town was surf and turf. There was a decent library but few used it. The Embassy movie theater too, but you went there to make out because it was dark and usually empty as a tomb. The bars were named Shamrock and Gino's. Michelle was right – it was a town where people worked hard during the day then went home at night, drank beer and watched the game on TV.
A few residents didn't fit the description. They were mostly white-collars who worked in Manhattan and commuted so they could own a decent house, a yard and some green around them. One rarely seen couple who lived way up on Pilot Hill drove a Rolls Royce, but they had no kids and whenever we encountered them they were like aliens from another planet.
At the other end of town was Beacon Hill, the only apartment complex. For some unknown reason, a good number of Jewish families lived there. I remember in sixth grade going to Karen Enoch's apartment when I was deeply in love with her. The first menorah I had ever seen was on their dining room table. I told Mrs. Enoch it was a beautiful candelabra that reminded me of the one Liberace had on his piano in his TV show. Later that day she tried to explain Hanukkah to me, but all I understood was it was Christmas times twelve.
I grew up in a small American town in the fifties. Part of the reason why I didn't have much to say about my childhood was simply because nothing much happened. No one grew their hair long, the only thing you protested was having pot roast again, drugs were only a whispered rumor, and any guy who behaved any differently from the norm was a fag. We played a lot of sports whether we were good or not. Most of my friends were named Joe, Anthony, John. Most of the girls we sweated and dreamed about were generally the kind who peaked physically at seventeen but then quickly started looking like their mothers once they got married far too early.
Driving through the center of town, I passed the police station and was tempted to go in and ask for Frannie McCabe, but that could wait. If things went the way I hoped, I'd be back soon and spending a great deal of time in Crane's View.
At the end of the small commercial district, Main Street curves steeply down and ends at the railroad station and river. As I took my foot off the gas and let the car roll down the hill, I remembered the many times I'd walked to the station from our house. All dressed up and full of expectation for a day in New York, I'd saved my allowance for weeks and had an agenda worked out to the minute. I'd be going to the Automobile Show at the Coliseum or a wrestling match at Madison Square Garden, sometimes to the Broadway Sports Palace to spend all my money on the arcade games. Lunch would be a hot dog and coconut champagne, or a stringy two-dollar steak at Tad's Steaks. New York wasn't frightening then. A twelve-year-old wise guy could walk around Times Square alone and the worst that would happen was a panhandler would come up and ask for a dime. I was never afraid to be there and thought of the city as a kind of flashy friend with a toothpick in his mouth.
I drove over the bridge that crossed the railroad tracks and took a sharp right toward the station. Some enterprising soul had built an expensive-looking steak house at the river's edge. I felt a spurt of dismay to think life had gone on here without me all these years. Who did they think they were, changing the landscape that had once been mine? Part of you thinks you own the terrain of your memories: A law should keep things looking just the way they were.
I parked the car in front of the station and got out. A moment later, the express train from Chicago blew down the track toward the city. As it passed in a violent whomp of air and a
thousand metal clicks, the world inside its cars was once again all romance and possibilities. The train we took from Crane's View to New York was always a local. It stopped twelve times in its easygoing ramble before pulling into Grand Central Station. Commuters took our train, old ladies going to the matinee of Hello, Dolly!, thirteen-year-olds in pants that were too short, purple V-necked sweaters and wearing enough Brylcreem in their hair to give the family car a lube job.
Sighing, I looked toward the water and saw a young couple playing Frisbee while a dog chased back and forth between them. It was having the time of its life. Every few throws they would let him catch one. He'd run around in a crazy triumphant dance before they wrestled it back and sent it flying again. It's interesting how many times in life you'll have a deeply sad moment only to be reminded an instant later that things are okay. I watched the couple. They sent out such strong waves of happiness that I felt them where I stood. The girl whirled around in a circle and threw the Frisbee as hard as she could. It came right at me and dropped a few feet away. I started toward it but the dog rushed over and I stopped. So did he. He stood inches away from the bright red disk, but looked up at me as if I was in charge.
"Go get it. It's okay."
He tilted his head in that classic "Huh?" look dogs have that makes me laugh every time. "It's okay. Get it."
He snatched it from the ground and tore off in the opposite direction. I started toward the water.
"Excuse me? Could you tell me what time it is?"
I don't know how long I had been standing there, looking at the river and remembering. It seemed the night was ripe for reveries. Whatever, I came out of the trance and looked first at the girl, then my watch. "It's a quarter past nine."
"Are you all right?" She had a sweet face, all concern.
I looked at her and tried to smile. I didn't know what to say.
"Did I ever tell you about the time I found the girl's body?"
The person I loved most looked at me and smiled the smile I would remember on my deathbed. Her long brown hair fell in a perfect part over her shoulders and her thin nightgown had little birds on it.
She shook her head. "That's one of the things I like about spending the night with you. In the morning you always tell me a story I never heard before."
She was sixteen years old going on thirty. I reached across the table and caressed her cheek. She took my hand and kissed it.
"It never ceases to amaze me you're my daughter."
Cassandra Bayer frowned. "Why? What do you mean?"
"I mean exactly that. How did your mother and I manage to hatch such a good kid? Your mom's lived a life that would make a nun blush. I've got more neuroses than Woody Allen. Yet here you are – solid, smart, funny . . . How'd it happen?"
"Maybe my genes skipped a generation." She picked up the bottle of spooky black nail polish and went back to work on her thumb.
"Can I paint my nails black after you?"
She rolled her eyes and groaned. "So what about this body you found?"
I got up and poured myself some more coffee. Without looking, she extended her cup to me. I filled it and looked at the top of her head. "I have a good idea: Why don't you shave your head and have DAD tattooed there? That would go with the nails and then I'd really know you loved me."
"I know a girl who got a tattoo down below."
"What? What'd she put there?"
"A lightning bolt."
I looked out the window, trying to absorb that one. "Cass, sometimes you tell me things that make me feel a hundred years old. I mean, I'm pretty hip for a guy my age, you've said so yourself. But if I went to bed with a woman and saw she had a tattoo there, I'd call the police."
"I don't think you'd want to go to bed with this girl, Dad. Her name is Spoon and the only thing she eats is lamb. It's some kind of new religion, like the Malda Vale."
"What do Spoon's parents say about that?"
She finished her thumb and screwed the cap back on the bottle. Her gestures were all so delicate and precise. "Are you going to tell me about the dead body or not?"
"Okay. When I was fifteen, a bunch of us went down to the river to swim."
"You swam in the Hudson River? Dad, that place is glowing with pollution!"
"Yeah, well, I'd rather swim in a dirty river than tattoo my genitals! Anyway, it wasn't so bad back then; just a little smelly. But we didn't really go to swim. All the cool girls went there in their bikinis. Someone would have gotten beer, everybody'd be smoking Marlboros, there'd be a portable radio . . . WABC with Cousin Brucie. It was nice. I always think of it as the day of 'A Hard Day's Night.' I'll tell you why in a minute. Joe O'Brien and I were the first there."
"Joe O'Brien – your best friend who you once knocked out in a fight?"
"That's the guy. Politics were rough back then. It was that kind of town. Everybody was tough or pretending to be. You could be best friends, but if the guy crossed you, Bam! you'd be in a fight in a minute."
Cass shook her head. "Nice place to grow up."
"It was a nice place to grow up. It was innocent. We believed in loyalty, most of the girls were virgins. The music we listened to was about going steady, not eating someone's cancer. We could come and go as we pleased without worrying about being murdered in a drive-by. Girls weren't raped and no one carried a gun. Well, almost no one."
"I bet Frannie McCabe did. Is this a Frannie story?"
"No, and he never forgave us for it. Frannie was the king of one-upmanship, but this turned out to be the biggest one-up in all our lives.
"Anyway, Joe O'Brien and I got there first. It was about ten o'clock in the morning. Hot day. Really hot day. There was this spot by the water where we always went. A couple of hundred yards away from the train station. We laid out our towels and stripped down to our swim-suits.
"We were all revved up for the party to start. There was a new girl in town, Geraldine Fortuso, who had the greatest body we'd ever seen. She also had a mustache, but nobody's perfect. All the guys were vying for her and we knew she was coming. Joe and I stood at the edge of the water looking at the boats and talking about the divine Fortuso's figure.
"A speedboat went by and sent waves rolling into shore. I don't know who saw it first. It's funny because it's such an important detail, but I honestly don't remember. Whoever did, said, 'What the fuck's that?' The waves had made this big, white, diaphanous thing out in the water about forty feet rise and fall like a gigantic jellyfish. Both of us stepped forward to get a better look but I went too far and slipped off the edge into the water.
"Joe said, 'You see that? Go out and see what it is. Maybe it's a parachute.'
Cass sat forward and said in the same doubting voice I had used that day, "Parachute?"
I shrugged. "It looked like one. Either a little parachute or the biggest damned jellyfish you ever saw. You know how fearless kids are until they learn life has big jaws. Without a thought that it might be something bad or dangerous, I waded right out and then started swimming for whatever it was."
"When did you see it was a body?"
"Not till I was only about five feet away. The water reflected the sunlight, and the color was a surprisingly light green so you couldn't make anything out till you were really close.
"She was floating on her stomach and wearing a man's shirt. It had been unbuttoned and that's why it looked so wide and filled out. I'm thinking back a long time now, but as I remember, first I realized it was a shirt, then that it was on something. That's what I thought – it was on some thing and not someone.
"I was calm, Cass. That's the amazing thing. If it happened today I'm sure I'd be a lot more scared or surprised. Maybe it's because when you're young, you still think things should happen to you. So since you're waiting for the adventures to begin, if you discover a dead body, it's just like a James Bond film. And that's only right because that's where you belong."
"James Bond is dorky."
"He wasn't then. He was the coolest dude on earth.<
br />
"So, now that I understand it's a shirt, and something's inside it, I let out a whoop that would have stopped a train. Joe started yelling from the shore but I barely heard him. I paddled over and just as I did, a big wave from a passing boat turned the body over. I saw her face. Even though she was just beneath the water, I saw every feature of her face clearly. Her eyes were open but there was something white and cloudlike floating across her mouth."
"God, Dad, weren't you scared at all?"
"No, that's the amazing thing. I was fascinated. Maybe it's just the different courage you have as a kid. I was only curious; I wanted to see everything. My parents thought I'd be traumatized by the experience, but it didn't touch me. It took a few seconds for it to sink in, and when it did, I called to Joe to get the police 'cause it was a body. He took off like a shot. I just paddled around wondering what to do next. I kept looking at her and thinking, she's dead. That girl is dead. But what I most vividly remember is how close to the surface she was; like if she'd only lifted her head a few inches she could have breathed again and been okay. Strange, huh? You know what the reality is, but part of your brain is still thinking crazy things.
"I took hold of her arm; she was in rigor mortis by then and very stiff. I started in toward shore, pulling her next to me. It took a few minutes of awkward struggling but I finally got her in. I stepped onto the little shelf of beach and then was able to use two hands to pull her out of the water.
"As I said, she was wearing a man's shirt and only a pair of very brief bikini underpants. I shouldn't tell you this, but it was really the first time I'd ever seen a woman like that. I could see everything. I couldn't believe it. The thing all us guys had been talking about and dreaming about for years was right there in front of me – an almost naked girl."
Cass groaned. "God, Dad, she was dead! You thought it was sexy?"
"I certainly did. She was beautiful and there wasn't much on her. I couldn't help staring."
"That is gross. I can't believe it. You were staring at a dead body!"
Kissing the Beehive Page 3
