Now that would have been one hell of a “rest of the story,” but Paul Harvey didn’t tell stories like that and your dad is dead now and so is Paul Harvey. And that’s the rest of the story.
The newscaster today isn’t telling about kids who play harmonica and fish in a lake. He is talking about climate change and global warming and how parts of the planet are disappearing due to rising seawaters and everything is melting and catastrophic floods and droughts and famine and new diseases are all heading our way and there is nothing we can do to stop it. But you don’t care. You just want to get to Canada before it melts and washes away. You want to see Glacier National Park. And then they are interviewing some scientist from the United Nations Weather Agency, and he says that the ozone hole over the Antarctic is one-and-a-half times bigger than it has ever been before. The ozone hole is bigger than the entire United States of America, and the radiation coming through it is giving people skin cancer, cataracts, environmental illness, and immunodeficiency, and causing animals to go blind.
All of this just washes over you in a numb sort of way because there is nothing you can do to impact it. What is there for you to do? You think about all the times you didn’t put your Coke cans in the recycle bin and you wonder if a little piece of that ozone hole has your name on it. And then the scientist says that if the hole keeps getting bigger—and there is every indication that it absolutely will keep getting bigger—no one knows for sure what the result will be. And even the Arctic is losing 12 percent of its ozone every year, and over southern Canada the ozone layer is depleting at a steady rate of 7 percent. And you say a silent prayer that Canada holds on. That it stays green and cold and safe.
And then the newscaster is saying how nuclear testing by the Koreans has caused a crack in the ocean floor and crude oil is gushing from it, thousands of gallons every second—every second—and nobody knows how to plug up the crack and thousands and thousands of gallons every second just gushing out and it could poison the whole ocean. The food chain will be devastated. People will starve.
You take your brochures out of your back pocket. They are really getting worn now. Hard to see in the dark, but there is some moonlight so you can see the pictures a little bit. You know them by heart anyway. Moonlight. You look out the window and there it is. Following you. Like it never stopped. And you look to your left and there is Frank driving, bathed in the pale green light of the dashboard instrument panel just like your father coming home from Gatlinburg all those years ago. And you feel good.
With your brochures in your lap and with Frank and the moon on either side of you, you fall asleep.
* * *
The sky is light when you wake up. The moon has deserted you. You are on a country road. No, not even a road. A path. A rutted, weeded path, and the car’s worn-out shock absorbers can’t keep up with the dips and bumps. This is what wakes you.
You look over at Frank. He’s smoking a cigarette. He looks tired.
The car lurches through three deep depressions in the earth, rounds a curve, and there is a clearing in the trees and thick underbrush. And there is a relic of a mobile home set up on cinderblocks in the clearing. Aluminum steps. Gas generator. Propane tank. Doublewide.
Frank cuts the engine and gets out. He walks up the three creaky steps and knocks on the door. You don’t think anybody is going to open it, but after a long time and a lot more knocking, you see movement at one of the windows. A corner of a sheet hanging in the window flutters. And then someone opens the door.
It is an old man. Not old-old, not elderly, but an adult. Not young like you and Frank. You are eighteen. Frank is probably in his late twenties. This guy is fifty, fifty-five. Fat. Fat fat fat. Jerry Springer fat. Doughy white. Blond hair, pale blue eyes. He’s dressed all in black. Like he took a black pup tent and draped it around himself. A muumuu, you realize. It’s called a muumuu. He looks like a slug. A snail peering out of its dark shell. A weak thing. But you can see enough of his eyes to know this man isn’t weak.
The man—Chandler, his name is Chandler—holds the mirror out to you, but you shake your head no. He shrugs and offers it to Frank. Frank takes it and uses the tube from a ballpoint pen to suck a line of coarse white coke, meth, crank, what is it? up his nose. Then Chandler takes his turn. Then they split the third line which was meant for you.
Chandler barks three times like one of those little Chihuahua dogs and then stretches his hands over his head. “My, my, my! That is sooo much better than coffee.”
He works a plump finger over the mirror, collecting every last bit of residue, then swabs his gums with the finger.
“I only started with this stuff because I wanted to drop a few pounds. Slim down a little bit. It’s not working.”
He claps his hand down on Frank’s knee—his real knee—and says, “So Frankie, I take it you two boys are in a spot of trouble.” Then Chandler winks at you and says, “My boys never visit me unless they’re in trouble.” Then the twinkle is gone from his eye and he says, “You haven’t gotten my Frankie in trouble have you?” And he is serious and you must answer him.
“No, Sir.”
“You don’t know what trouble is.”
He lights a cigarette. It’s a long skinny dark brown cigarette. Longer than any cigarette you’ve ever seen before. He takes his time and spews a little white cloud of smoke into the room, and then he giggles and once again Chandler is all winks and smiles. “‘Sir.’ I like that. Oh, Frankie, he is a taste-treat. A taste-treat!”
“Can we stay here a little while? A few days. Then we’ll move on.”
“What’s your rush? Thought you were on parole. Thought you jailbird types weren’t supposed to engage in extensive traveling.”
“We just need—”
“No pigs. No pigs around here. I smell bacon, I’ll turn you in myself. I have my children to protect. You know that.”
He turns and gives you a wink, reaches down and pulls a photo album out from under the couch and puts it in your lap, careful of his cigarette.
“Wanna see my children? Might be you see one you recognize.”
And you open the album. It’s the kind with a filmy sheet of clear plastic that covers each page and you peel it back to put the photograph under it. But the pages are lumpy and have air bubbles trapped under the plastic because the photographs are all Polaroid instant film prints—the old self-developing peel-apart kind, too thick for this kind of photo book.
Chandler reaches over and flips the binder over. “Here, start at the end and go backward. It’ll be like a little trip through time.”
And you know right away that these are not really Chandler’s children. For one thing, there are black kids and white kids and Hispanic kids and Asian kids. Nobody looks related. Almost all of them are boys, but you see one or two girls, too. And for the most part the kids look happy. They have been caught in moments of relaxation and even genuine joy. One or two have guarded expressions, as though they don’t quite trust the photographer one hundred percent, but they almost do. Almost. And one boy, a little blond kid with a spiky cowlick and maybe ten years old, that boy looks scared. And his eyes are glassy and red like he just got finished crying.
You keep flipping the pages and the way the kids are dressed subtly changes. Styles from years gone by. Longer hair cropped close on the sides. 90s styles. And you stop at a boy who’s about twelve years old. His big open grin reveals a substantial set of braces. Black hair flops across a fair forehead. The dark eyes are so open, so trusting. This boy feels safe. He feels loved.
And it is Frank. The boy is Frank.
You look up at Frank, seeking confirmation, but he looks away. He does not want you to look into his eyes. Not now.
“Yep, you found old Frankie. You’re sharp.” And the album is whisked out of your lap and secreted back under the couch.
And part of you understands that somewhere in this trailer—or maybe buried in the backyard, or maybe in a safe deposit box—is another photograph album. A counte
rpart to this one. And the kids in that album don’t look happy. Not at all. No, the kids in that album look more like the blond boy who just finished crying.
The bright sunlight coming in through rips in the tattered shades wakes you up. Frank had fixed you a pallet out of thrift-store blankets beside his bed, but at some point you climbed into the bed with him. You are curled around his body, protected in his warmth.
Lying in bed, you look around the room. Frank’s jeans and t-shirt are discarded on the floor, draped over his black boots—one standing upright, the other overturned. Right next to them is his artificial leg. You have seen people on TV with prosthetic legs. Soldiers back from Iraq who have skinny metal shins that connect to piston-like knee joints. You’ve seen athletes with legs made of curved spring steel. Titanium, probably. They look cool and futuristic.
Frank’s leg looks like something from the 1970s. It’s made out of hard, flesh-colored plastic. Except the plastic is not really the color of human skin. It is a dirty brown, yellowed in places. It looks old. Stained. There is a canvas sheath at the top where it cups just above where Frank’s knee would have been. Fasteners and straps dangle from it. The canvas is dark and soiled from sweat and skin oil.
And here you are in bed with Frank and he is asleep next to you and you very much want to reach down and touch that part of him that’s missing. Your hand begins to creep. Like a cat. Like a worm. Creeping ever lower. And in your heart you believe that if Frank wakes up and finds you touching him in that spot, there is every reason to believe that he will kill you. Your hand slides past his stomach. Past underwear that is stretched out with a morning erection. You are going to do this. Along his thigh, silky with hair. You are prepared to slide your hand lower still when you realize that there is no lower. His leg just stops. And you bring your hand back up and you are cupping it, the stub, in your palm. It is shockingly smooth. With a knotted fissure of what must be scar tissue. This is the most private part of Frank. You have touched it. You could be with Frank for the rest of your life. Spend every minute with him. Listen to every word he ever says. Hear his deathbed confessions. His morphine-fueled revelations. And you will never be as close to him as you are right now.
* * *
You walk out the back door of the trailer. The sun is hot. Chandler sits at a circular white aluminum table under the dappled shade of a ratty umbrella. A few hundred feet farther out, a mountain creek gurgles darkly.
“Nice nappy-nappy?”
You don’t say anything. You wish you hadn’t come out here, but it’s too late to turn around and go back inside. You wish Frank would wake up.
“Go for a swim. It’ll wake you up.”
Chandler is dressed in a flowing purple silky robe and nothing else. As you cross in front of him you see that his legs are apart, his genitals exposed. You get the feeling that it’s staged, that it’s supposed to look like he doesn’t realize that his pea shooter is hanging out in the wind. Only “hanging out” isn’t quite the right way to put it, because Chandler’s pecker is retracted up under the substantial hood of his hairy belly, nested and peeking out from coarse gingery hair like a rodent wondering if spring has arrived.
“I don’t have a swim suit.”
“You don’t need one. We’re casual ’round here.” He fans his robe as if to prove the point. You look away. “’Sides, don’t have running water here. If you ever want to bathe, the creek is your bathtub.”
“Is that what you do?”
“Oh sweetie, I never go near the water. I’ll melt. Just like the Wicked Witch of the West.”
You are happy to see Frank come out of the trailer. He’s wearing jeans and boots but no shirt. The black and blue tattoos crawl across his torso as well. An intricate scrollwork of pain.
“Frankie! Where did you find this child? Eighteen? I don’t know who you two think you’re fooling.”
Frank grunts and shakes his head.
“Well, I’m just saying. He’s very photogenic. A taste-treat! I have got the fever for the flavor. Indeed I do.”
“Not Billy.”
“No offense, but I was just being complimentary. I don’t do street trade, Frank. You know that.”
Frank nods.
“Line?”
Frank nods again. Chandler produces a compact and a razor blade.
“’Sides, ever since they hooked me up like Frankenstein and zapped my head with those lightning bolts, I can’t do nothin’ ’cept bump pussies and giggle. Shoot!”
You have walked away from them, to the stream. You hop out onto one of the smooth creek rocks that dot the surface, and hop from one stone to another, feeling the sun shining down on you.
You notice that the creek water is not clean. It runs brown and gives off a tangy chemical odor. You look down into a pool formed by a grouping of rocks. Beer cans. A doll head. Plastic wrappers. Bits of Styrofoam. And other trash floats in a frothy, polluted brown foam.
You look back and see Frank and Chandler at the table. Standing up now. And Chandler is pointing in the direction of Frank’s car.
The woods open up to a two-lane blacktop. Chandler drives and Frank rides shotgun. You sit in the backseat, like a child.
There are cow pastures and long stretches of farmland up here. Everything is green. And after a while you drive through a tiny mountain town that is set up to look like a little Bavarian village. All the stores have the word Alpine or Heidelberg or Black Forest in their name. Haus is popular too. Waffle Haus. Gas Haus. A candy store called Hansel & Gretel. Everything is red and beige. The roofs of all the buildings are done up in red shingles and swoop up into exaggerated points like Dr. Seuss drew them. There is a horse-drawn buggy going down the street. The horse is a Percheron. You even see a Coca-Cola machine that is made out of wood. Coke Haus. People on the streets wearing dirndls and lederhosen. And then before you know it, the little town is behind you. Helen, Georgia. Now leaving Helen.
Then it is trees and pastures again. Chandler turns down a side road that leads to another side road that leads to a tiny road with a sign that says PRIVATE DRIVE.
At the end of the private drive, the crowding trees disappear and the landscape opens up to a rolling expanse of lawn that is well tended, like a golf course dotted with islands of flowering foliage.
And in the middle of this green expanse is a house. Not a mansion, but a lavish home. Not quite an estate, but it’s the closest you’ve ever seen.
Chandler bypasses the house and pulls up to a garage shed. A brown-skinned boy zooms out the bay door on a riding mower. The garage sits right up next to the main house, connected by a breezeway. You can tell that it was meant to house cars, but it has been converted to hold landscaping equipment.
A dark-skinned man emerges from the interior and nods to Chandler. He and Frank get out of the car. The three of them retreat back inside the shadowy garage, but from where you’re sitting you can see Chandler rummaging through the airy folds of his muumuu until he extracts a manila envelope and hands it to the man. You know what is in that envelope. And as they all disappear deeper inside, you know that the dark-skinned man will have another envelope for Chandler and you know what will be in that one too.
* * *
Tonight you sleep on the couch in the trailer’s living room, a threadbare blanket that smells of stale farts wrapped around you. Frank must realize that you got in bed with him the other day. You don’t think he realizes that you touched that private part of him, otherwise you believe there would have been violence.
Earlier, you were watching Midnight Cowboy on Chandler’s VCR because he doesn’t have cable or satellite or Netflix or Blu-ray. But he does have a TV, a VCR, and an electric generator. You found a little three-shelf pressboard cabinet next to the TV. It held mostly books. Hop on Pop. I Can Read. The No-Cry Potty Training Solution. Stuff like that. But also a few Classics Illustrated. Moby Dick. To Build a Fire (which you have already read in the unabridged form). Treasure Island. On the bottom shelf were some VHS tapes. Other
than Midnight Cowboy, all the other tapes were kid shows like Barney and The Wiggles and The New Zoo Review. You almost put on The Parent Trap because it was the most grown-up tape you could find, but then you spotted this one at the back of the bottom shelf.
You started getting real sleepy right at the end, and it was like you couldn’t tell if the movie was real or not. If you were part of the movie. Like you were Jon Voight and Frank was Dustin Hoffman and you were leaving together on the bus. Escaping. But instead of going to Florida, you were going to Canada. And it looked like everything was going to work out all right except Dustin Hoffman pissed his pants and died right there on the bus and Jon Voight propped him up because he wanted Frank/Dustin/Ratso to be right there with him when he finally escaped the filthy city. You fell asleep and the VCR shut off and the steady glowing hiss of electronic snow fills the trailer. When you wake up you feel sad, like Frank really did die, and you have to remind yourself that you’re mixing up the movie with a dream and with reality. But that’s not what wakes you. What wakes you is the sound of Frank and Chandler coming in through the front door.
You pretend like you’re still asleep. They have a boy with them. White. Nine or ten. Chandler scoots the boy toward his bedroom. He has to use a key to open the door because Chandler’s bedroom door has a deadbolt lock on it. It is forbidden to you.
Once the boy is secreted inside, Chandler rummages inside his muumuu and comes out with one of the tiny glassine packets he always has. Through your squinted eyes, you can see that Chandler is not storing these drug packets in an inside pocket, rather they are tucked up under folds of body fat. Under his man boobs. He gives the speed to Frank and then disappears after the little boy.
Abnormal Man: A Novel Page 5
