She stood away from him, horrified. She moved toward the woods, then stopped. She wasn’t sure if she’d be able to walk home from there.
“Oh God,” Jo Jo said. “God Almighty, Little Jo.” He got up on his knees. “I didn’t mean anything. I was playing. I didn’t mean to scare you,” he said.
She felt ashamed to see him on his knees and to hear him talking like that. She wished she was home. She wished her mother was there, even if all she ever did was yell.
“I was just playing,” he said. “I wouldn’t hurt you for anything in the world. You know that, don’t you?”
She looked at him, trying to figure it out. She shrugged. “I guess so,” she said.
He stood and brushed off his pants.
Josie watched him fumble as he picked up their lunch things. Maybe her imagination was just running wild, like her mother always said it did. They were playing Bonnie and Clyde – and Bonnie and Clyde did things like that.
“We better get going,” he said. “We better go back.” He sounded embarrassed, and she felt bad for making such a big deal out of it.
She picked up her notebook and followed him into the woods. She wished he would say something, but he walked ahead, silent. She kept her eyes on his back as they walked. Every now and then he put his hand out and touched an overhanging branch as he passed it. The sunlight flashed across his shirt, like he was breaking up into little parts that would float away into the air.
They came out at the bridge. Halfway across, Uncle Jo Jo stopped. Josie watched him from a few feet away. He leaned over the railing, the way he did when he needed to rest, and looked at the creek.
After a time he turned to her. “I don’t believe this,” he said, and he pointed to the water. “Lily pads, for Christ’s sakes.”
He turned back to the creek and gazed up ahead, where the water curved around the shrubs that grew along the Oxbow road. “I wonder how they got here?”
Josie went closer and strained to see over the bridge. He moved down, giving her room, and nodded. “Take a look.”
At first she didn’t see anything. But then she noticed the clump of round leaves floating near the bank, where he pointed.
“It doesn’t make sense,” he said. “You don’t find lily pads in water like this. They shouldn’t be here.”
She’d seen pictures of them with big fat flowers, or sometimes with bullfrogs sitting on them. These didn’t have flowers, and the pads didn’t look big enough to hold a frog.
She looked at him, to see if he was making it up.
But he was already off the bridge and heading down the bank. “I’ll get you some,” he said.
He was all the way down by the water before she found her voice. “I can’t use them,” she said. “I need another tree leaf.”
“Just the same,” he answered. He bent over, disappearing into the weeds. She heard him splash through the water as he pulled at the leaves. “These bastards are tough,” he called to her.
Finally he straightened up and raised the plant to show her: a soggy green weed that had nothing to do with anything.
He stood smiling at her from the creek, holding the plant high in the air. The grass grew to his waist, and he looked small, like a boy, and far away.
“This is really something,” he called to her. “Isn’t this something?”
Josie felt funny inside, empty. It reminded her of the day her mother had moved all of Josie’s father’s things out of his office at home, and the room echoed and felt so strange. Now she wondered if Uncle Jo Jo would have to go live in a rented room, too, like her father. She wondered if Cousin Eddie would ever come back, and if she’d even be there when he did.
“It’s a weed,” she told Uncle Jo Jo. Her voice sounded odd to her, like it wasn’t even her own.
Jo Jo dropped his arm and looked at her. “You mean you don’t want it?” he asked.
She wished she never had to see any of them again. She shook her head. “No,” she told Jo Jo.
They headed for the car, and the gravel crunched under their feet. “Well, you couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful day,” Jo Jo sighed. He sounded pretty sad about it.
Just as they reached the car Jo Jo turned to her. “Everything’s okay,” he said. “Right, little pardner?” He moved his head, searching, like he was trying to find something in her eyes. And then he found what he was looking for and held on.
“Okay,” she said, and she got in the car.
But before he could start the engine she had left without him, going someplace she shouldn’t be.
DIFFICULT PASSAGE
We never spoke of the canal as anything very important. We never said, “It is because of the canal that we are here.” At most we would say, “The canal is high today.” Or, “The canal is low today.” “It’s covered with scum.” “It stinks in this weather.”
That summer when we wheeled Ole Papa to the bridge he let out a scream that stopped us cold. He was eighty-two and by that time both legs had been amputated. We had meant to wheel him over the bridge for a look at the new housing project when he cried out and we stopped. We looked up and down the still water. It was one of those hot days when the only sound is the whine of the cicadas up in the trees. The water was low and covered with scum, and I felt that I was just beginning to understand something, although I did not have a name for it.
Ole Papa’s father had moved here from a little town on the Adriatic because he had heard that a man could get rich in America working on the canal. He came, and he worked, but he didn’t get rich. Eventually his son, our Ole Papa, started working the water, too, loading the barges with onions and potatoes to send down to the cities. That was when Ole Papa was fifteen, the same year he met our grandmother.
The two of them, and then later their children, swam in that water in the summer and skated on it in the winter. They stood on the lift bridge as it was raised and lowered and watched the boats that came from New York and Albany loaded with spools of wire or bales of linen or furniture or tins of food or tobacco. And Ole Papa pulled his first son, the brother our father was named after, out of that water one March day when the ice was thin and it was already too late to save him.
You had to cross the canal to get to the cemetery. After they took you from Lou Grasso’s parlor and had the mass said for you at church, your last ride carried you over the canal. Ole Papa had followed many friends and family members on their last ride, and most recently it was his wife who had made the trip. So that day, when he cried out as we tried to wheel him across, we had the good sense to turn around and take him back home.
I loved Ole Papa fiercely, and claimed him as my own. I took delight in wheeling him around town, spoon-feeding him, because he couldn’t feed himself (nor could he”talk” in anything more than a grunt), adjusting his clothes, patting his bald head, and talking to him in the way I might have talked to a favorite doll or a younger sister. Ordinarily my parents thought of me as stubborn, wild, a little too imaginative for my own good, embarrassingly and hopelessly tomboyish. But they took solace in the fact that I was mature, responsible, and even somewhat maternal when it came to Ole Papa. They never had to ask me to watch him. I did it on my own because he was mine.
Father was always away working. When he wasn’t at the factory rebuilding transmissions for school buses, he was out on Uncle Paul’s farm, helping him top or weed or screen onions. Mother was often sick with her headaches, and couldn’t take care of Ole Papa. After her operation, the one she had when the baby wouldn’t come right, her headaches started. Sometimes they’d last a week. We’d all have to clear out of the house then, and she’d lie in bed with the shades down and a wet washcloth on her forehead until Father came home. Then he’d fry potatoes and eggs for our supper, and he’d open a can of pears for her because that was the only thing she could eat when she had her headaches, canned pears. If we had to ask her something she’d put her hand to her head and say, “Shh. Whisper to me,” and we would whisper.
It was later that same summer, in mid-August, that I took Ole Papa to the canal bridge a second time and wheeled him over the bridge, deaf to his protests. The circus had come to town. Teddy and I had been to church socials, and we had been to the county fair, but we had never been to a circus. I had saved a dollar and a quarter; Teddy had eighty-five cents. We couldn’t count on Father taking us, even though he had said, “Maybe,” because after work he had to help Uncle Paul. And two days before the circus came Mother’s headaches came too. But I knew I would steal, I would lie, I would do anything to get there.
We had seen the posters around town, and we had talked to some of our friends, imagining, and then elaborating on our imagination of what it would be like. Mostly, though, Teddy and I talked to each other of the wonders we would see, of the exotic animals, elephants and camels. In the dark of the night, in quiet voices, we talked of the freaks we’d seen in the advertisements, especially the man made of India rubber. He could twist his body into any number of unnatural positions, and make horrid, grotesque faces. Teddy thought it was because he was born with no bones, and we debated the idea for a while until we realized that most likely he would not be able to stand up if he had no bones. At any rate, there was something frighteningly wrong with the man. We had to see him.
The posters also promised the Amazing and Mysterious Zonzono, Master of Levitation and Other Dark Secrets That Will Astonish and Amaze You. I had recently been reading about magic and the powers of the mind, and Teddy and I had been practicing magic on each other. We’d read each other’s minds, concentrating with a passion that forced the other’s nose to itch, hypnotizing each other and convincing ourselves that our arms did grow heavy, we really couldn’t move them if we tried, and we were in a deep trance. And during those days, whenever I wheeled Ole Papa anywhere, in my heart of hearts I pretended I was one of the men who set up the circus and I was wheeling the legless wonder to the sideshow tent. Even then I was horrified at my thoughts, and didn’t speak a word of them to anyone, not even to Teddy.
On the day of the circus, Teddy looked at me, forlorn. He had his eighty-five cents tied up in an old sock that he had wrapped around his wrist. We were on the porch. Mother was lying in bed with the shades down, and Father was at work. Ole Papa sat on the porch with us, tilted to one side in his wheelchair, his head flopped over, snoring. “What are we going to do?” Teddy said. Earlier I had thought of just leaving Ole Papa while we took off. But if Mother got up, if Father came home, or, heaven forbid, if Aunt Ruby stopped by to see that everything was all right, we would be in for the belt. But I really didn’t want to leave Ole Papa because he needed watching. Sometimes he got thirsty or hungry or lonely or scared. And sometimes he got himself all slouched over in that chair and needed to be hoisted up and straightened around. “We’re taking him with us,” I told Teddy. Then I knelt down in front of Ole Papa, and put my hands on his hands, and shook him.
“Poppi, Poppi, you want to go to the circus?” He lifted his head and looked around. “Me and Teddy’s going to the circus,” I told him. Then he saw me and stared. “You want to go for a walk, Poppi? You want to go see some elephants and camels?”
He grunted out, “Huh.” It was the one word he used for both “yes” and “no.”
“I think he said no,” Teddy said.
“You dope,” I told him. “Take him to the bathroom and give him his pee can while I get my money.”
He looked at me.
“Go on,” I told him.
Teddy maneuvered Ole Papa through the doorway while I ran upstairs for my own sock full of money that I’d hidden in the heat register. When I passed Mother’s door she whispered my name, so I went in. She held the washcloth out to me. “Will you wet it,” she said. “Cold.” I ran the faucet a long time and came back with the wet washcloth. She folded it across her forehead.
“We’re taking Ole Papa for a walk,” I told her.
“Shhh,” she said. “Keep him out of the sun.”
“We will,” I whispered, and I tiptoed out.
Teddy was trying to get Ole Papa back through the door onto the porch. “Did he do anything?” I asked. I held the door for him.
“Some,” he said.
“I told Mama we’re going for a walk.” We wheeled down the ramp and out to the sidewalk. I jostled Ole Papa on the shoulder. “I bet you never saw a circus or a camel, did you, Poppi?” He made no answer, and I took over pushing the wheelchair.
Teddy and I talked about how much money it was all going to cost. It would be fifty cents to get in, that much we knew, but we didn’t know if they’d charge for seeing things once you were inside. All I really cared about was the sideshow, but to Teddy everything was a wonder, and he wanted to see it all. We decided we’d better hold on to our change until we found out how much everything cost. We weren’t going to miss the India Rubber Man, and I knew as well that no matter what I was going to see the Amazing and Mysterious Zonzono do his levitation act.
The circus was set up out in the vacant lot near the old canning factory, not quite a mile from our house. There was sidewalk for most of the way, at least until you got right to the factory. Then you had to walk in the road. The only hard part about getting there was going to be crossing the canal bridge with Ole Papa. As we got closer to the bridge, Teddy and I started talking faster and louder, and then I started firing questions at Ole Papa about the kinds of strange animals he’d seen in his time, and about India Rubber Men – had he ever seen one and did he know where they came from and what made them that way?
When we got to the bridge Ole Papa started grunting out, “Huh, huh,” and we knew that those “huh’s” meant “no.” We stopped. Somebody was walking across on the other side, and he watched us as he walked past. We waited until Ole Papa was quiet, but his hands gripped the armrests. I knew he was mad. But there wasn’t anything else to do. I nodded at Teddy, and we hightailed it over the bridge, pushing the wheelchair while Ole Papa let out a bloodcurdling scream. We didn’t stop once we reached the other side. I kept running down the sidewalk until we were almost to Coleman’s store and then I realized people were looking at us, so I slowed down. Ole Papa was making huffing noises and hitting the armrest. Teddy’s face was the color of chalk. “We’re gonna get in trouble,” he said, and I knew he was right. But we were across the bridge, and there was no turning back.
We strained to catch sight of the circus, but the canning factory blocked our view. Still, you could smell it, a smell that is unlike anything else in the world. When the sidewalk ended I wheeled Ole Papa into the road and we walked in silence, looking ahead. Then we passed the factory and there it was, looming before us like a vision: the one giant tent with three peaks, and a smaller tent, and trucks, and bales of hay, and people in costumes, small wooden stalls with clusters of people standing around, music, everything, all hitting you at once.
“We’re here, Poppi,” I told him. He sat gripping the armrest, his head held rigid, and I knew he was mad. Teddy stood with his mouth open, taking everything in. Then he started unwinding the sock wound around his wrist, and we headed for the entrance.
The man was saying, “Step right up, folks,” just like he was supposed to say. But he didn’t look like he was supposed to look. He was a kid, not much older than me, with stringy hair and a faded T-shirt. Teddy gave him fifty cents and got his ticket. I plunked my two quarters down and stared at him as he ripped a ticket off. Then I went through.
“Whoa there,” he called. “Hey you, girl.”
I turned around.
“What about the old man?” he said. “Fifty cents for the old man.”
I could feel my face go red. I went back and gave him two more quarters, and didn’t even think to make Teddy split it with me. Teddy just shook his head when I went back in. Then he shrugged.
What struck me about the people inside was how odd they all looked, not just the circus people, but everybody. They weren’t the sort of crowd you’d see in church on Sunday, or even what you’d see
at the train station or in the grocery store Friday nights. They were the circus crowd, and we were part of it.
We didn’t go in the main tent, even though that’s where most of the other people were headed. Instead we walked down to the concession stands and looked around. Besides the popcorn and candied-apple booths, there were all kinds of games, a dozen or so in a row, with a man or woman shouting at us to buy something, try something, win something, only a nickel or a dime. Teddy wanted to stop and smash plates so he could win a pirate bank, but I told him to wait a bit, till we’d checked the whole place out. Ole Papa sat wide-eyed. He didn’t grunt, and he didn’t pound the armrests. He just looked.
At the end of the row of stalls was the smaller tent. A rope hung across the entrance, and on it a sign saying Twenty-five Cents. You could hear noise inside, music, and words like amazing, incredible, and right before your eyes drifting out. We looked at the posters propped against the canvas. One showed a man with snakes wound around his neck and arms and stomach. Another had a fat lady in a flowered dress sitting in a tiny chair. On another a man wearing a cape was sawing a lady in two, and on another a tall man had his legs crossed twice, it seemed, and his arms twisted around his neck as if he were trying to put his right elbow in his left ear.
“It’s him,” I told Teddy.
“Is it him?” he said. We stared. “Crimast,” he said after a while. His own arm went up around his neck as he looked at the poster.
“Come on,” I told him.
“We going in now?”
“No, dope, not now. We have to wait for the next show.”
We wheeled back down into the big tent. The bleachers were half-full, and music was playing. A man with a long stick was taking a bow and next to him an enormous elephant bowed too. They walked out while people clapped, the elephant rocking from side to side and stepping slow like he was too old and tired to lift those heavy feet. Men rushed around, moving boxes and tightening wires. We parked Ole Papa in the front row. The seats were full down there, so we squatted in the dirt next to him.
A Place Of Light Page 3
