When they entered, he immediately grabbed a pool cue and chalked it. “Remember how I taught you how to play?”
“Of course.” She took one too, then dusted chalk off her skirt. “Mom and Dad never knew.”
Kenneth used to bring his little sister to his friend’s house in high school, where he had a pool table in the basement. Since it was beside the garage, it always smelled of rubber tires and car exhaust down there, but she loved playing the game. It was the only rebellious thing she did, not telling her parents she was there. They most likely wouldn’t have approved of an eleven-year-old girl going to a high school boy’s house, even with her brother. They frowned on her socializing with any of his friends, whom her father called rednecks and, even worse, “older boys.” But Robin always felt safe with her brother, and she liked having this secret with him growing up.
He racked the balls. “Cutthroat?”
“Sure.” She smiled. “Dad told me about you and Sheila. I had no idea.”
He broke first. “I’ll take one to ten.” He winked at her. They used to improvise the three-player game. Since the object is to sink the other player’s balls and have at least one of yours still on the table, the person who had eleven through fifteen had a harder time winning. “It is what it is,” he said and took a shot.
When he missed, Robin took control of the table, with more balls to knock out than he. She slammed two of his balls into the side pockets, then took aim at the next shot, her face deep in concentration.
“You were always dangerous on the side pockets.” He shook his head, as she forced another into the left corner.
“Tell me,” she said. “Did you ever love her?” Another ball sank.
The question startled him. After so long, he probably didn’t expect a very deep conversation. Then again, they could seamlessly pick up where they left off as if no time had passed.
“I cared about her,” he replied. He was much more guarded around her than he used to be, although he could tell that something was weighing on her mind.
“That’s not what I asked.”
As she took another shot and another, Kenneth laughed in spite of himself. “I never should’ve taught you. I created a monster.”
Before taking his last ball off the table, she looked up at him with those intense blue eyes. “Did you love her?” She won the game without looking before taking the shot. “Cutthroat.” Then she placed her cue neatly back on the wall.
“Man, you are scary.” He hung up his cue and sat on the barstool. “No, I didn’t.”
She went around to the other side of the bar and fixed him a beer. He took it gladly. Much to his surprise, she joined him. She tipped each Corona upside-down, so the lime would float down perfectly in the yellow bubbles. He’d never seen her do this, so he watched in awe this stranger who used to be his sister.
“Dad said you always loved someone else,” she said, recalling their conversation years ago, how she’d warned him not to stay with someone he didn’t love. She wondered if he remembered.
Kenneth lowered his eyes, taking a sip of beer. “It’s ancient history.”
“Is it? Who was she?”
“After all this time, why do you give a shit?” The bitterness was finally surfacing.
“I do give a shit! I always have.”
“You got a funny way of showin’ it.” He took another gulp.
“You’re right, and I’m sorry. I know it can’t erase everything, but I really am, Ken.”
He said nothing.
“I’m making an effort here,” she said in her haughty tone. “What about Christian forgiveness?”
“I’m not the one preachin’ the Gospel everywhere.” He took a breath, calmed himself down, then looked her in the eye. “I can forgive, but I don’t forget.”
“Fine. I’m not going to argue with you over words. I really want to know who this love of your life is.”
“Why? What’s it to you?”
“You’re my brother.” She stared at her frosty bottle, unable to meet his eyes because it was all too real.
“This wouldn’t have anything to do with the love of your life? The one you had me call?” He had that all-knowing smirk that used to annoy her. “Oh, I know. And you never did a damn thing about it. Why should I?”
“It’s another man?”
He laughed, brushing off the ice still clinging to his beer. Then he leaned against the bar. “Her name’s Kathy, okay?”
Robin nodded, on the edge of her seat.
“She didn’t come from money,” he continued. “She lived in one of those housing projects on the other side of town. Her dad drank, her mom worked so many jobs she never saw her. So Kathy ran around with the druggies and…you know, the fast and loose crowd Dad warned us about.” He laughed bitterly to himself. But his gaze was distant, she could tell he was seeing Kathy in his mind again. “But you know…something about her. She had reddish, like auburn hair, and I didn’t even like redheads, so I told myself I didn’t wanna like her. But her face…when she laughed…” He cut his smile loose and a look of anger set in. He took a final swig and set the empty bottle on the bar.
“The thing is,” he said. “We’d get to talkin’ and it felt like she got me. If I said I was kinda depressed, she’d ask me why or about whatever happened that day…usually a fight with Dad. If I told Sheila that, she’d tell me to snap out of it and get extra cheerful and say some shit about where we should register for the wedding, something like, ‘Help me pick out wine flute glasses,’ or some shit. I didn’t care. But I knew…” His eyes narrowed to dark lines. “I knew that if I brought Kathy home…one look at her ripped jeans and denim jacket with the holes in it…they’d start askin’ what her parents did, where she lived… I was a fuckin’ coward and should never have married her! Like you and Tom.”
Robin’s jaw tightened. “You don’t know anything about my marriage.”
“I know everything about it, Robbie. Don’t make the mistake I did, okay? Not goin’ after what you really want, who you really want.”
She wondered if Kathy had been the reason he broke up with Sheila at Christmas all those years ago.
“Why don’t you find Kathy…when the divorce goes through?”
“She ran off to Texas with another guy, some asshole she said, ‘who wasn’t ashamed of her.’”
As he started to leave, he asked about Kendrick. “Where’s my girl? I figure she’s already in high school by now.”
When Kendrick was little, she and Kenneth had a special bond. She was even named for him. He was the fun uncle who gave her horseback rides on his back before she was big enough to ride a real horse. But Robin’s falling out with Kenneth, because of what he called her “extremist political views” and overall transformation the longer she was in public office, had kept Kendrick’s favorite uncle away.
“She’ll be sorry she missed you,” Robin said.
“I’m sorry too,” Kenneth said. “I didn’t even recognize her on TV.” He gave her a look that saddened her, as though he didn’t know her anymore. “It isn’t too late for you, even now,” he said.
Robin felt an inexplicable sense of loss as he turned and left. If she wanted to reestablish a relationship with her brother someday, she knew she’d have to make more of an effort—if he was still willing.
Chapter Fifty-Five
For me, courage was a funny thing. After all, how many people today would have been among those who sailed out to sea to prove the earth was round? And how many more would have stood at the shore, waving good-bye, uttering the words: “You’re all going to fall off the edge of the earth, you idiots”?
I knew I wouldn’t have gone on one of those ships, or the ones to the New World, even after it had been discovered. And that was exactly the point. That was also why I wasn’t going to do well in Film Production. I had to take it for both semesters, which culminated in a final film project. To make a truly good film, I had to take a risk, to put something honest up on the screen. But
I was too guarded, so my films looked like shapes trying to emerge through a kaleidoscope, but never fully formed. This, of course, drove Kyle Perkins crazy. “Why are there two girls running in the woods? What are they running from? What does it mean?”
In an age of music videos filled with images that didn’t seem to belong together, like the Eurythmics’ video of cows and cellos in the countryside, I told myself I was being avant-garde. “Why does it have to mean anything?” I asked.
“It always means something,” he said, not fooled by my evasiveness. He sensed that I had quite a lot to say, but something was duct-taping my mouth shut.
Night after night, I pored through footage I’d taken in the woods near campus, trying to make a more cohesive story out of it. I knew that Kyle wouldn’t accept anything less. I sat hunched over my film splicer with a tiny light on at my desk while Adrienne slept nearby.
“He’s too literal,” I complained to Carol as she lugged the tripod up the stairs of an old warehouse building.
“He knows you’ve got a story, but you’re too chickenshit to tell it.” She had a way of paring things down with the sharpness of a butcher knife. As we taped down cords and wires, Carol looked at me. “Doesn’t it drive you crazy, the stuff your dad says?”
“What do you mean?” I was on all fours, trying to work the sound equipment.
“Banning books? He wants to erase fuckin’ classics if they have sex in them! Everybody has sex. What the hell’s his problem?”
I sat up, resting on my knees. I hadn’t heard about this yet. “I don’t agree with that.”
“Then you’ve got to stop him.” She was a mad tornado.
“You can’t control what my dad says or does. You might as well try to pin mashed potatoes to the wall.”
She set up the lights, muttering, “Damn Republicans.”
“Will you quit saying that! Not everyone of a certain party all thinks alike.”
“The hell they don’t! Why do they always agree with every stupid idea he has?”
I stood up. “I agree with some things and not others. It’s possible for people to have ideas that overlap. I hate all this two-party stuff, like you have to claim to be one way or another.”
“So you’ll be some fuckin’ independent whose vote will never count and you’ll screw it all up for the Democrats.”
“Can we do this please?” I kept checking the time.
“Actors are flakes,” she said. “They’re gonna be late.”
I wiped my forehead and examined the lights once more. Since I wasn’t technically inclined, I was sure they were in the wrong place. But Carol, the authority on everything, insisted they were right. As for her arguing, I couldn’t focus on politics while I was trying to figure out how to come away with a decent grade in this class. The last thing I needed was a low grade in an elective to pull down my GPA. Then I’d never hear the end of it from my dad. So I ignored Carol’s vitriol about Republicans and tried to focus. Of course I didn’t agree with all of my dad’s policies, but I didn’t have the strength or energy to discuss it today.
When the two girls, who were both acting majors, finally arrived, I told them to kiss each other on the mouth. Everyone paused to collect themselves, including Carol. There weren’t many depictions of a kiss like that in student films or even in the ones shown in class, except in one of the Swedish films. Even then, it was labeled “subversive.”
So the girls slowly touched lips and caressed each other’s faces. I shot it as up-close as I could, to get the image in the face of the viewer, so anyone watching it couldn’t look away. Sure, it was literal. But it was raw. And real.
I was almost pleased with myself, then looked around to realize the actors hadn’t arrived yet. Such a scene might only happen if I knew there was no way my parents could ever see it.
So the daydream was over. And I was still a coward.
The scenes I actually shot in the warehouse turned out to be the extreme opposite of Oscar-winning material, with fuzzy, blurred shots because I could never set my F-stop correctly, and even with Carol’s help, some still had bad lighting. Worst of all, I settled for a story that wasn’t inside me. That was my fatal mistake. It was hard for me to admit that I wasn’t doing well in this class, especially since I’d made straight A’s in high school.
* * *
“I want you to drop that course!” Dad hollered over the phone.
“I can’t,” I said helplessly. “It’s too late in the year.”
“Whatever possessed you to take it?”
“I’m sorry, Daddy.”
That was the year I decided that film would not be the platform I was looking for, after all. A certain level of honesty was required of artists, to really put themselves out there no matter how embarrassing the truth might be. That was not a comfortable place for me. It felt too much like walking around naked in public.
* * *
Soon it was time for my political debate final. When I got to class and took my seat, I panicked because my partner, Chase, wasn’t there. Ms. Donovan arrived, and it was already past time for class to start. He was never late.
“Miss Sanders,” she called from the front of the room. “I believe you and Mr. Drescoll are debating today.”
“Uh, he isn’t here, so…” I hoped it would be canceled. Of course it should be. After all, you can’t have a debate with one person.
“Then you’ll have to do it.” Professor Donovan smiled. She had a booming voice that didn’t require a microphone, not to mention a constant desire to challenge students whenever possible. To most of the class, she was perfectly annoying.
I stood up slowly. “You want me to do…both sides?”
“That’s correct. Your topic is affirmative action and other antidiscrimination laws.”
I walked down the steps to the front. This was ridiculous. What teacher would allow something so stupid? There was no way…in my mind I fought with Ms. Donovan all the way to the chalkboard.
“You want me to…?”
“Begin. Just take both sides.” Ms. Donovan looked expectantly at me, like this wasn’t the silliest thing ever. Then she spoke to the entire class. “If any of your partners should be absent, be sure to know both sides of the argument.”
I could see whispering among the desks, probably everyone begging their partners not to be absent ever. I cleared my throat and stood behind one of the podiums that had been set up for the debates.
“Affirmative action is necessary to prevent discrimination in the workplace,” I began.
Before I could interrupt myself, Ms. Donovan chuckled. “I’m only kidding! Who else had antidiscrimination laws?”
There was a show of hands. Ms. Donovan pointed to Terri, the girl from the dormitory. “You had the opposing argument?” Ms. Donovan asked.
Terri nodded, and the professor motioned for her to come up front. I watched as some in the class snickered. Terri stood, wearing a plaid men’s shirt tucked into dusty jeans with a black belt. Her hair was cropped short, so short it was hard to tell exactly what color it was. It seemed brown. She walked with a swagger, her pudgy body swaying from side to side as she descended the steps with hiking boots clomping all the way down. Once she arrived at the opposite podium, she pushed up her black-rimmed glasses that had slid down her nose. I cringed inside; something about this girl bothered me for reasons I didn’t understand.
“Okay,” Ms. Donovan urged. “You take the second part.”
“Affirmative action is unnecessary,” Terri responded in a deep voice. “If we live in a country that’s already supposedly free, we shouldn’t have to have special laws protecting special groups of people.”
“But you’re ignoring the reality,” I argued. “We may call ourselves a free society, but the fact is, discrimination is real. It happens every day.” As I heard myself speak, my voice became stronger because I focused on persuading the audience. I stood taller, shoulders back, taking a more powerful posture.
“So where do you
draw the line?” Terri shot back. “You protect this group of people, then this group. How do you decide who is protected? Why can’t we leave it up to employers to choose the best person for the job?” A few in the audience clapped.
“Because,” I replied, “we can’t trust employers not to discriminate based on their own biases.”
No matter how many examples I gave, I couldn’t persuade better than Terri, who spun everything she said to suit her argument. Knowing that she was probably gay, I found it very ironic that she was arguing to not protect minorities. Of course, that side had been assigned to her. She may not have believed what she was saying, but she was very convincing. Very impressive.
After class, Ms. Donovan called me over to her desk. Knowing I’d lost the debate, and that was the only opportunity for a grade in this class, I felt defeated. I was already imagining what I’d say to Dad once he found out. I went to the teacher and stared down at my shoes.
“I’m giving you an A,” Ms. Donovan said.
“Why?” I asked. “I lost.”
“Doesn’t matter. You’re a natural. You need to work on your supporting arguments, but you have a real flair as a speaker. Don’t forget that.” She put her hand on my shoulder. It was a defining moment, trumped only by my sudden desire to be as good at the art of persuasion as Terri, the mysterious girl who convinced an entire class she was right. I really admired her for that. Not that I’d tell her that. Usually, whenever I saw Terri in the dorm lobby or around campus, I’d avoid her. And if I couldn’t, I’d simply look away, pretending to be distracted by something else. I wasn’t proud of that. But I was too much of a coward to ever say a simple hello.
All the way back to the dorm that day, the professor’s words echoed in my mind. The next time I would win the debate. A new resolve came over me. This was what I was meant to do. It was an odd realization. I’d spent so long trying not to follow in my father’s footsteps, only to find that I was most likely destined to do exactly that, and it was okay. With every step, I felt strangely powerful at the memory of myself at the podium. I was relieved that my Play-Doh legs didn’t buckle and that I didn’t vomit.
Hurricane Days Page 25
