Social Blunders

by Tim Sandlin

  ***

  I found Gus dribbling used coffee grounds into the garbage disposal. The moment she saw me, her index finger crossed her lips in the international sign for Shhh.

  “San Francisco by fourteen,” she said. “Bet on it.”

  “I don’t know any bookies.”

  “Your loss.”

  I opened the refrigerator for a Dr Pepper. Dr Pepper is my one remaining degenerative addiction. “Gus, I’ve read everything I can find on mystic, ju-ju bwana fortune-telling methods, and no legitimate psychic in the country reads the future in coffee grounds put down the garbage disposal.”

  She shut one thick eyelid and cocked her head over the drain. “My mama taught me, her mama taught her. The spirit ear goes way back to Africa.”

  “How many generations in your family owned garbage disposals?”

  Gus didn’t care to answer that one. “Going to be war,” she said.

  “Me and Wanda?”

  Her closed eye popped open. “United States of America.”

  “I have enough problems this week without a war.”

  Both eyes closed as Gus concentrated. “Against black people. The brothers and sisters going to fight men disguised as plants.”

  She obviously meant camouflage suits and I was supposed to go “Wow,” but I was too worn out to pretend amazement. So I sat at the kitchen table and drank my Dr Pepper.

  “You’re just like my friend Hank Elkrunner,” I said. “He thinks because he’s Blackfeet he has to say Great Spirit and bond with birds and stuff. You didn’t practice any of this voodoo jive till Roots was on TV.”

  Gus straightened and turned off the disposal. She glared down at me from on high, doing something with her eyes that increased the intimidation factor beyond the normal housekeeper-boss relationship.

  “Shannon tells me pretty soon you be listening to Elmore James yourself.”

  “You think I might really be black like you, Gus?”

  “Not like me. I been black all my life.”

  Throughout my junior high and high school years a rumor floated around GroVont that my father had been black. I don’t know how the rumor got started. It may have been because in 1963 I was the only person in northwest Wyoming who used the term Afro-American. Or maybe after Lydia took up with Hank Elkrunner townfolk decided cross-racial sex turned her on.

  I must admit, I didn’t deny the rumor. At times—around girls—I even hinted that it might be true. This was partly to pique curiosity, but more than mere seduction, I’d seen the photos in Lydia’s panty box and I liked the idea of Sam Callahan: outsider.

  I would be the wandering poet, scorned by black and white, shunned by all, except certain women of both races who are drawn to danger like a moth to flame.

  “You’re in trouble,” Gus said.

  “The disposal picked a football game, predicted a war, and said I’m in trouble? What brand of coffee are we drinking?”

  “The phone call say you’re in trouble. Man says get your ass over to Starmount Country Club. He says now.”

  “He say his name?”

  “Was a horse’s name—Scout.”

  “Skip.”

  “How do you know? I’m the one talked to him.”

  I hate being ordered around by men. Women, I can live with. A woman says Now, there’s generally a reason. Women deserve consideration bordering on servitude, but bossy men piss me off.

  “I hope my father is the black halfback,” I said. “These white guys are turning out dips.”

  “All white guys turn out dips.”

  “Except me.”

  She blew air out her nose. “You got no room to brag.”

  ***

  I fixed myself an avocado-and-cream-cheese sandwich because it was well after noon and Gus wouldn’t make lunch for anyone who wasn’t home at noon on the dot. She was strict with mealtimes—breakfast at eight-thirty, lunch at noon, and supper at six—and I was careless when it came to clocks, so I often had to fix my own meals while my cook stood in the kitchen and glared at me.

  Growing up in the Manor House, we had a succession of fifteen or so cooks who represented the vast spectrum of female domestic help. Young, old, and indeterminate, white, black, and mixed vintage, the only thing they had in common was not one got along with Caspar and Lydia. A few managed hatred. The only cook I recall as standing out from the group was a red-haired Irish girl who bathed me when the other grown-ups weren’t home.

  “Where’s Shannon?” I asked.

  Gus sat across from me, reading the New York Times. I consider anyone not from New York City who reads the New York Times ostentatious. Gus and I argue about it weekly.

  “Her and Eugene drove up the Blue Ridges to buy a pumpkin.”

  “Long way to go for vegetables.”

  “What difference it make to them. They’re young.”

  I can remember being young enough to drive 130 miles, one way, for an ice-cream cone. Maurey and I did that fairly regularly with Shannon back in high school.

  “What’d they want with a pumpkin?”

  She lowered her paper and gave me the you-idiot look. “Halloween. The one night white folks believe in magic.”

  “Do you believe in magic, Gus?”

  She went back to reading the paper. “Says here porpoises can open those little plastic bags in produce sections at the grocery market. If so, they’re smarter than me.”

  “I saw a boy in a space-man suit today. I wondered why he was dressed like that.”

  Gus turned the page. “The tramp called on the telephone.”

  “Is Wanda coming home?”

  “You fool.”

  “What’d she want, then?”

  “Money.”

  “She can’t have any. What did you tell her?”

  “I couldn’t lie. I told her you was comatose.”

  ***

  When a male says Now, my tendency is to slow down. I suppose I inherited the trait from Lydia. She’s the oldest person I ever met who still falls for the child psychology trick where you say “Don’t do such-and-so” when you really want her to do such-and-so. Lydia would jump off a cliff if a man in authority told her not to.

  First, I got together a six-pack of canned Dr Peppers, four clamps, and three clothes hangers. I poured the Dr Pepper on the lawn, straightened the hangers, and pulled the busted muffler out of my trunk. Hank Elkrunner taught me this trick. You cut the cans into pipe joints, rig up the muffler with the wire hangers, clamp it all down, and hit the road. Sometimes, I’m almost grateful to Caspar for banishing us to Wyoming. Rural competency comes in handy on Sunday afternoons when you can’t solve a problem by throwing cash at it.

  After more or less fixing the muffler situation, I drove to a flower shop and ordered flowers for all the women I liked but didn’t want to sleep with—six arrangements for the three women who run Callahan Magic Carts, and Gus, Shannon, and Lydia. I sent them rubrum lilies and hydrangea, tulips and gladiolus. Basically cleaned out the place of everything with big blossoms.

  I couldn’t decide on Maurey. A big part of why our next-of-kin-type relationship works so well is because we got the disgusting things over with early and now we can be open and above sexual tension. That’s what she thinks anyway.

  Me, I don’t know. Most of the time, I buy the buddies deal, and I would never hint at thoughts of lustful affection on my part, but every now and then, late at night, I remembered how sweet she had been and how emotional I felt when I touched her. Maurey was the first. And best. She was the one woman I’d slept with I still loved years later.

  When it came to the bottom line, in a nerve-racking moment of self-honesty, I didn’t send Maurey flowers. I hoped she wouldn’t catch the significance.

  ***

  Don’t you just hate kids who work in country club pro shops? Hate may
be too strong a word, but they’re such elitist slimeballs. American pro shops are nothing but a breeding ground for politicians.

  “Skip and Cameron around?”

  “Mr. Prescott and Mr. Saunders are on the driving range.” He arched an eyebrow and stared down his nose at me. “I doubt if the gentlemen wish to be disturbed.”

  “Doesn’t matter to me what the gentlemen wish.”

  “Are you a member?”

  “Are you kidding?”

  I watched for a few minutes from the relative safety of the putting green. The two represented more combative possibilities than Billy or Babe had. For one thing, I’d lost the advantage of surprise. Even the most urbane of men can be knocked off balance by “Hi, I’m the son you never heard of.” By breaking the news to their wives, I’d given Skip and Cameron time to work up a stance.

  The very tall man swinging an iron would be number 56, Cameron Saunders. He wore rubber cleats, madras slacks, a dark blue windbreaker, and a cap that read Duke. He also had a grayish-black beard. Hardly any of these country-club-cracker, good-ol’-boy types grow beards. Superiority begets a clean image.

  Skip Prescott had a sparrow hawk face. He wore steel cleats and tight tennis shorts over remarkably hairy legs. Rather than addressing the ball, he attacked it, blasting low bullets that shot off a hundred yards or so before slicing into a nearby duck pond. With every chop of his club, Skip grunted Ugh!

  I walked down to the Bull Run cart that held their golf bags. May as well start the relationships on an upbeat note.

  “Hi, Pops.”

  They stopped in mid-back swing to turn and stare at me. Cameron stooped and picked up his ball, then he walked over and stood next to Skip, whose face was blotchy red.

  Skip set the conversational tone. “I ought to wrap this club around your neck.”

  I spoke to Cameron. “Is he always like this?”

  Cameron calmly unbuttoned the golf glove on his right hand. A right-handed golf glove meant a left-handed golfer. His voice was soft, purrlike. “If he feels threatened.”

  “I’m not threatening anyone.”

  Skip was bouncing up and down on his toes. “We castrate blackmailers in these parts,” he said.

  “I’m not blackmailing anyone.”

  We observed a moment of silence. That’s what males do in a power struggle. They’ve been taught the strong, silent type wins, so they practice competitive silence. I put on Hank Elkrunner’s blank face that he says only Indians and people who have been in prison can do. Skip’s eyes popped and sizzled in a mad-as-hell mode, but Cameron’s were blue ice cubes. Was like facing down a pit bull and a rattlesnake.

  “Tell us what you want from us, then I shall bring my resources to bear and crush you,” Cameron said quietly.

  Skip couldn’t wait that long. “Let’s crush the punk now. Who cares what he wants.”

  This wasn’t what I expected at all. How could they be so angry? They created me; I never did squat to them.

  “What do you want?” Cameron repeated. He was the slick member of the team. The hit man. He looked like a politician. Skip was nothing but aggression and leg hair.

  “I only wanted to say hey to my daddies. Get a close-up look at you, give you a close-up look at me.”

  Cameron crossed his arms over his chest, cradling the iron under his left elbow. “My position is to deny all charges. I told Mimi you are a damned liar, and if you spread this libelous tale to the media or any of our peer group, I shall sue you for every dime you shall ever have.”

  I said, “I appreciate your position, but it’s horse manure.”

  Skip more or less snarled. “He’ll never have a dime. Look at how he’s dressed, like a rag picker. Katrina says he drives a piece of junk. This punk ain’t nothing.”

  I leaned one hand against the Bull Run and considered telling them what the Callahan Magic Cart decal on the right front panel stood for—I could have bought their silly sporting goods store and turned it into a 7-Eleven—but I decided that was none of their affair. These guys were totally blowing fatherhood.

  “All day long I’ve been driving around town meeting your peer group,” I said, “and Skip, you must be the most unpopular man in the South. None of your friends can stand you. Babe Carnisek is ready to break your neck on sight.”

  “Babe Carnisek is a loser.”

  “Your own wife called you a pinhead.”

  “Don’t you dare slander my wife.”

  I gave up on Skip and returned to Cameron. “This pinhead is your business partner?”

  Cameron seemed vaguely amused. “I cannot allow you to frighten my family.”

  “Look what you did to my family.”

  Skip produced a checkbook and a Bic. “Let’s talk your language, pal.”

  “I’m not your pal; I’m your son.”

  “How much to change your story?”

  “I hate to be disrespectful, but stick your money in your ear.” See how controlled I was, a lesser person would have said ass.

  “I have associates who could hurt you real bad,” Skip said.

  With each exchange, our voices grew louder. It had been a while since I’d dealt with a male long enough to argue. The feeling was like I’d separated from myself, as if I were watching TV and in the program at the same time.

  “What’s the matter with you?” I asked. “You do an awful thing to a little girl thirty-whatever years ago and now you have the scrotums to act like the injured parties.”

  That shut everyone up for a while. I think Skip was figuring out what scrotums meant in this context. Cameron put both hands in the pockets of his windbreaker. He seemed to be figuring repercussions. What I noticed was how pretty the day was—silver-blue sky setting off the sienna red of post oaks lining the fairways. That’s my pattern during heightened emotional states—I focus on irrelevant details.

  “Would you mind taking off your cap?” I asked Cameron.

  He considered refusal, then gave a what-the-hell shrug and took off his Duke cap.

  Just as I suspected. “You’re bald,” I said. “You’re left-handed and edging into fat.” I left out tall. “You probably aren’t the sperm father anyway.”

  I couldn’t believe the coldness of his eyes. The man could out-Indian Hank Elkrunner. I tried staring him down but lost and had to cover my loss with talk. “But just because you aren’t the genetic culprit doesn’t mean you aren’t morally responsible for what you boys did to Lydia.”

  Skip blew up. “What we did to Lydia. Your mother was a whore.”

  Time for the dramatic gesture. Lydia didn’t teach me much, but she was the queen of the dramatic gesture. I moved up within six inches of Skip’s face. “To hell with your associates, Mr. Prescott”—if you say Prescott right, spit sprays on the P—“either hurt me now or shut your ugly beak.”

  Skip’s blotches spread down his cheeks to his neck and he blinked like a strobe light. I expected him to belt me and us to roll around the driving range grass like grade school ruffians. But Katrina was right—he was a wimp. Thank God.

  I snatched the club from his hands, spun around, and walked back to the golf cart. “Here’s how we test our steering wheels,” I said, and I showed him a trick my sales manager, Ambrosia, taught me. I stuck the club handle through the wheel and wedged it under the instrument panel. Then I bent Skip’s golf club into a U.

  Skip’s eyes went wide at the sacrilege. Cameron smiled.

  Time for the tough-guy exit. I threw the ruined club in Skip’s direction. “Next time it’s your spine, Pops.”

  Pretty effective. I wish a woman had been there to watch.

  8

  Gilia Saunders was waiting at my car. She stood, blonde in the sunlight, holding a purse-like gym bag on her right arm, wearing a jean skirt and a short-sleeved shirt with no collar and an alligator over her left breast.
<
br />   “Men piss me off,” I said. “Anything they can’t control is a threat.”

  “You’ve been talking to Dad,” Gilia said.

  “Do you think I’m dressed like a rag picker? What the hell is a rag picker?”

  She studied me with that non-judgmental look on her face. She had the cheekbones and neck of an Indian. I was real aware that she was an inch or so taller than me, which put her around five eight, tall for a girl. She also had considerably better posture.

  “You are dressed casually,” she said.

  I had on a Wyoming Cowboys T-shirt and button-fly Wranglers. The T-shirt—jeans, too, for that matter—had seen better days. But I was raised to think men who care about what they wear are vain.

  She did this shrug thing with her shoulders that made the alligator jump out at me. “I don’t mind. I like a man with the confidence to look like a slob at the country club.”

  Mixed signals here. Was she implying she likes me or I’m a slob? Or both?

  “How was your swim?” I asked.

  “Two miles of backstroke. Then I came here for lunch, hoping I would run into you.”

  Holy shit, I was having a non-typical day. “How did you know I was here?”

  “Mom told me the men sent you a summons.”

  “And you were hoping to run into me?”

  She nodded, but didn’t explain why she was hoping to run into me. She leaned the bag on one hip and stood with her shoulders square to the Dodge. She seemed to expect me to talk, only I couldn’t know what to say until I knew why she was here.

  To move the conversation along, I said, “Gilia’s a flower.”

  “You got it.”

  She put a hand on the chrome trim on top of the Dart. Her fingers were long and large boned, like her hips and knees. Four fingernails were shiny perfect—Mary Kay showpieces—but the index finger fingernail was torn short and ragged.