by Chris Lynch
“Not at all,” she blurts, practically lunging to stuff the words back into his mouth. “I have all I need to work with. Now it’s time for me to live with it for a spell.”
I get a chill thinking about my poor, decent-hearted mother living with it for even a while.
“Oh,” he says. “Okay, then. You’re the artist. So lemme just . . .” He reaches into the baggy pocket of his baggy shiny black pants and pulls out a folded hunk of currency, a thicket of bills that looks like a fat green cross section of a calzone.
“Oh, oh,” she says, holding both hands outstretched defensively, blocking her very sight of the dough as if the guy were waving his manliness around, which, of course, he is. “We’ll, ah . . . we’ll wait and see how it comes out before we talk about anything like that. We’ll let you know when it’s ready. Right, O?”
“We’ll be in touch,” I say, flat.
I see him to the door as Mom remains rooted to her place, and her art.
“Thanks for having me,” he hisses. “Fun to be inside your world. See how your type lives. Just like I imagined. What does your old man do again?”
“I want to see her,” I say, this coming from I don’t know where.
“You, want . . . ? Listen to me, sonny. You keep talking to me like that, and you’ll be happy enough to see tomorrow, you understand?”
I understand, of course. We have reached that unfortunate place where Ronny Blue and I understand each other quite clearly.
Not a place I’ve ever wanted to be.
I slam the door.
• • •
The horseflies are savaging me. Monstrous little things. They mostly leave you alone, until you go into the water and come back out. Salt water is like some combination of Worcestershire sauce and meat tenderizer to them, and it’s chow time once you settle onto the sand again.
So I don’t settle. I bodysurf, bodysurf some more. Come out, get punctured a few more times, go back and bodysurf some more. It is my kind of beach day, hot but overcast, sparsely populated, nice surf for the body.
It is the finest and purest of all water sports. I feel like I harness the force of the whole damn ocean when I flatten and fly the top of a wave all the way into the sand. If you glide rather than jump into it, if you catch the exact break point, if you just make yourself available, place yourself on top of the wave, then the wave accepts you, and there is no better feeling I have ever found, no closer you’ll ever get to being properly owned by the sea. And what higher state could there be than that?
Board surfing is okay. But there’s a board. A level of remove. Your belly can’t scrape along the sandy bottom with a board.
“Are you following me or something?” I say as I lie right there where the latest white horse has deposited me.
“What, the beach belongs to you now?” Malcolm says, walking in up to his ankles. “I know your dad’s a master of the universe these days, but—”
“My father is hardly a master of the universe. Where do you get this stuff?”
“Ear to the ground, my man. I’ve got my ear to the ground, and so nothing eludes me. You should try it.”
I turn my head and drop my ear flat to the sand. The remains of a wave come in and go up my nose.
“Goof,” he says, wading out into the water. I get up and join him.
He catches a wave right away, surfs it competently but jumps too hard into it and rides too low to go all the way in. I am childishly pleased at his mediocrity, and it is possible this is written on my face as he returns.
“Who cares,” he says. “It’s not like it’s tennis or anything.”
“You going to play at college?” I ask.
“I hope to. If you come along, I bet we could make it in doubles.”
“Hnn,” I say, September considerations chasing me right back into now. “Junie is gone on another holiday,” I say, and I can hear the sombre in my own voice.
“Yeah,” he says, sizing up another wave. “Don’t worry about it, though. She’ll be fine.”
He takes off, a little higher and lighter this time, and I follow his path all the way in. Then I follow him. I’m not surfing, though. I’m stomping.
“What do you mean by that?” I demand. “What do you know about it?”
He is wallowing in the shallows, about ten inches of water. He shushes around, eel-like, flips over onto his back to see me seeing him.
“Nothing. Junie is one tough chicklet, that’s all. She can handle anything.”
“What’s she handling, Mal?”
He grows quickly, visibly uneasy. Flips back over and starts lobster-walking away from me into the deeper water.
“Nothing. How would I know. Jesus, paranoid.”
I don’t know where this next thing comes from. It sure doesn’t come from my history or my nature or anywhere I recognize in myself.
I launch myself and dive right onto Malcolm’s back. When I am there, I get a grip on his neck, and I force his head all the way under the water. I feel his face thump into the sand, and I’ve got him in such an awkward position that it’s almost too easy to do this. I grind his face into the ocean floor as he flails back at me over his shoulders.
“Tell me what is happening,” I growl at him, insanely, since he cannot possibly meet my request. “Tell me, Ronny Blue ball boy, what is happening to Junie, or I’ll kill you, I swear.”
I have him under for six, eight, ten seconds, my knees now digging hard into his back, when I sense he is weakening. And I sense . . . myself.
I throw myself sideways off him and kneel there in the water as Malcolm surges up desperately and does an hour’s worth of deep breathing in ten seconds to regain the amount of his life I choked away.
“Are you demented?” he gasps, first kneeling, then on all fours. “You . . . have got something majorly wrong with you, O.”
I almost say I’m sorry. I come close. But not that close.
“Where is she?” I say calmishly.
“Kiss my ass.”
“I won’t. Might kick it, though.”
“Eat me.”
He stands up, wobbles a bit, then makes his way toward the beach.
“If anything bad happens to her,” I call at his back, still on my knees as the waves bump and nudge at me.
He stops to address me directly.
“Know what? Trifling with you is one thing. Junie could mess with you forever and never get burnt. But that chick’s had a lesson in humility coming to her for a long time, and I hope now she gets it.”
I jump up out of the water. He turns and bolts.
I stand there watching him run and letting the horseflies stab at me mercilessly.
• • •
“Are you serious?” I say to Mom.
“You know I treat art with the utmost seriousness and respect,” she says.
We are standing in front of the pair of portraits she has done, of Mr. and Mrs. Blue, and I do not believe I have ever been prouder of my gentle mental mother.
“You captured them both, so uncannily, spookily well.” I know she feels likewise because she has even framed them.
“Well,” she says theatrically, “that is what I do.”
“I thought you said, though, that you needed another sitting with Leona?”
“I didn’t need one. I just wanted one. She needed it. But when her rutting rhinoceros of a husband stole her date, I thought it best just to finish up. We’ll get together some other way.”
“Well, damn, you got her. She’s luminous.”
“Thank you, Son. That means a lot to me.”
We continue to consider the works before us, silently studying like real art gallery patrons. Then I start laughing, rumbling, cackling.
“He is going to be so furious.”
She allows herself a small giggle, then goes all professional once more.
“Thank you, Son. That means a lot to me.”
• • •
I phone Maxine, possibly to inform her that the portrait
s are ready.
“Is she there?” I ask.
“Yeah, O, she is.”
I hear loud voices in the background. In that household this does not have tremendous meaning.
“I’ll come over. To deliver the pictures.”
“Maybe not,” she says over increasing volume.
“I’ll be right there.”
“No—,” she says as I hang up.
“Mom,” I say, “can I deliver the portraits for you?”
“What, are you going to lug them over under each arm? Those are good, solid oak frames.”
“How delicate do you think I am, Mother?”
“Oh, I’m not worried about you. It’s my good work I’m trying to protect.”
“Guess you’d better lend me your car, then, huh?”
“Guess I’d better, then.”
• • •
I can hear them even before I turn off the car’s engine. I park at the curb right in front of the house, then quick-step up the walk.
I knock once, and Maxie throws open the door.
“I thought I told you . . . ,” she says, only half-angry. She walks into the house, and I follow.
Junie’s parents are shouting at each other across the breakfast bar in the kitchen, and I don’t care. I look around not-so-subtly until Maxie points me up the stairs. I still have the pictures under my arms as I take the stairs two at a time and knock on Junie’s door with my forehead.
“If you’re female, come in,” she says.
I lean one of the pictures on the floor against the doorframe and open the door.
As soon as I see her, my heart fills, my eyes fill.
She is sitting like a schoolkid on the side of her bed, back straight, hands folded in her lap as she stares at the floor. I see her in profile. Then slowly she turns to face me.
Her Creamsicle pillow of a top lip is clearly swollen. There is a bruise on her forearm that looks like she’s been hit with a baseball.
“Ah, Junie,” I say.
“Ah, O,” she says.
I put the pictures against the wall, close the door, and inch my way over to the bed. I kneel down on the floor and fold my hands over her folded hands.
“I boldly came in, even though I’m not a female.”
“Yeah,” she says, puffing out a pained little smile, “but you’re pretty close.”
I feign shock and hurt, because I am not man enough to manage the real thing.
“Hey, I nearly killed a guy over you, I’ll have you know.”
The statement is too far outside normal reality for her to consider. “Thanks,” she says.
The hollering continues downstairs. I hear Ronny shout, “You know how she’s making me look? Huh?”
“I may have to do it again,” I say, tipping my head in the direction of the racket and the racketeer.
“He’s concerned about the way he looks,” she says, shaking her head. “Is that the biggest joke you ever heard, or what?”
“It’s a pretty big joke,” I say. “I’ll laugh later, though.”
I am still kneeling at her feet, holding on to her, and desperately searching my brain and my experience for a clue as to what comes next. I’ve got nothing, so it’s down to guesswork.
“You got stuff you want to tell me?” I ask.
“I do not,” she says.
“You got stuff you do not want to tell me but should tell me anyway?”
“I do not.”
I nod and stare a little more, which I could do all night if she wouldn’t eventually kick me out.
“Well, this is progressing well,” I say. “How ’bout I get the ball rolling, then. Um, did you win the lottery, Sweet Junie Blue Lies?”
“No, I did not, Lyin’ O’Brien.”
“Well, then. It sure would be helpful if whoever did win it came forward and claimed, huh?”
“Yeah. S’pose it would.”
“Then they could take up the amazing offer and proceed to lead a charmed life, while the rest of us could calm down.”
That balloon just floats there, in the limited space between us.
“I say,” I say, “then they could take up—”
“Charmed,” she says, floaty, an incantation.
Ronny is clearly now bellowing up from the foot of the stairs. “There are rules. You don’t have to love the rules, but you do have to play by them. It’s about the principles.”
“Principles,” Junie repeats, with a bolted-on grin that looks chillingly like a doctor’s dummy skull. “If he gets any funnier, I might have to start applauding.”
I cannot help staring at her. I probably did that too much in the past, and that didn’t help my case too much. But I couldn’t help it then and I cannot help it now, even if the staring is more specific and concerned now.
I reach up and touch her face, cupping her chin in my hand and lightly brushing the swelled lip with my thumb.
“Is that him doing this? Ronny?”
She pushes my hand away. “Well, since there is no this, I guess the answer is no. Or yes, since there is no this, so both answers are equally true.”
“Or equally lies,” I say.
She stands up, leaving me genuflecting to her absence as she paces angrily. “Don’t talk about me like I’m some kind of victim, O, ’cause I’m not, okay?”
“Okay, okay, of course you’re not. It’s just—”
“Just nothing. Don’t even try, right?”
“You could use some help, though, surely.”
“Surely not.”
“Come on, Junie. You need help.”
“I do not need anything, thank you.”
“Yes, you do.” This may be the first time I have ever attempted to speak sternly to her. “You don’t want to admit it, but you need me. Jesus, your pigheadedness.”
She stops pacing and turns on me, and her body language alone is enough to discourage me from ever attempting the stern-speak again. She has both index fingers in front of her—in between us—pointing toward the ceiling as she bites off each word with ruthless precision. “I do not need you, sweetheart. That’s for damn sure. I have been fine and will be fine without you or anyone else. Hear me clearly on this, Oliver, and world: I am nobody’s bitch. Nobody’s.”
I feel the weight of her words, of her feelings, practically increasing the force of gravity itself. It’s probably a good thing that I am already on my knees, in supplicant pose.
“Sorry, June,” I say. “I know all that already.”
“You should,” she snaps.
“I do,” I say.
“Well, you should,” she says, reviving a familiar old debating style that got us nowhere on several occasions. But for the circumstances, I could really enjoy that right now.
For whatever reason Ronny is raging with increased vigor downstairs.
“Where does this wind up?” I ask her.
She shrugs. “He could have a stroke. Which would be nice.”
“Yeah, that would be nice.”
There is a knock on the door.
“Password?” Junie says.
“Ronny sucks the big one,” Maxine says solemnly.
“You may enter,” Junie says.
“This has been quite a while,” Max says, closing the door behind her. “You guys getting busy up here? Even with all that racket? I’d never be able to concentrate, myself.”
“How’s it going down there?” I ask as jovially as the situation will allow.
“I should ask you the same thing,” she says, noting that I have not managed to get up out of my kneeling pose. “You getting kinky, or are you doing that confession thing you people are so keen on?”
I stand to attention.
“Honestly, Maxie,” Junie says, gesturing toward the door, the stairs, and the jackass.
“I know, I know,” she says. “But first, sorry, I am required to ask you . . .” She drops into a robotic voice. “June Blue, have you won the lottery, by any chance?”
“No, ma’a
m,” Junie answers in the same voice.
“Righteo,” she says. “Now that that’s out of the way, I should tell you he’s into the tequila.”
“Aw, hell,” Junie says.
“Hell. Exactly,” Maxie says. “I estimate that we are now at approximately hell minus eighteen minutes.”
Junie sighs and walks around to the other side of her bed, looks like she is going to sit or lie down, then changes her mind, walks back to her sister, back to her bed.
This is a vision I never expected to see. It is a vision nobody should ever see; Junie Blue lost. She is right now unsure and unsettled, and it is so unnatural to her and just plain wrong that I am physically queasy just being present for it.
“That does it,” I say. “I’m going to go talk to him.”
Both of the women rush to get between me and the door, both protesting the unwisdom of that idea. They seem genuinely worried for me, though Maxine is simultaneously spluttering laughter at my folly.
“I think you should get out,” Max says to her sister.
“Well, that’s my plan, Maxie, and you know that. I’m moving just as soon as I—”
“I don’t mean that. I mean, like, now. Clear out so that his little mind will lack a focal point for his meanness. Nothing good can come from you being here tonight.”
“Excellent idea,” I say. “Superb idea, Maxie. We’ll go to my house. It’ll be great. My mom will—”
Junie is shaking her head.
“Junie,” I plead, “why not?”
“Yeah,” Maxine says, “why not? I’ve been there, and that place is wonderful. What’s not to like? Beats this dump every which way.”
Junie just continues to shake her head, and I don’t need to ask her again, because we both already know how she feels about it. She rarely ever came to my house. Said the place made her uneasy. The house did, the roses did, the neighborhood did, the smell did. My parents did, even though she said she liked them fine and my father was charmed to near baby talk by her, and my mother clearly sensed the situation and worked up a sweat trying to put her at ease. Junie went so far as to say one time that the house gave her the creeps.
“What if we go someplace else, then?” I say.
She eyes me suspiciously. She is hanging in there, but it is clear that events have been taking their toll, and she is looking weary. The sound of a glass shattering in the kitchen adds a little fillip of specialness.
