Roadside Bodhisattva

by Di Filippo, Paul

  “Yeah.” Sue sounded proud, and I knew I had hit on something that meant a lot to her.

  “Do you have any tattoos?” I said.

  Sue laughed. “Are you gonna ask to see them if I say yes?”

  I guessed I was blushing. “No, seriously, do you?”

  “No. My parents would never let me get one back home, and you gotta be eighteen in this state to get ink. But I’d like to have this one done.” She thumbed through the pages until she found her favorite. The design was roughly diamond-shaped, a maze of overlapping squares and rectangles. “Wouldn’t this look bitchin’ right above my butt?”

  “Um—I—yeah.”

  “How about you? You interested?”

  “I can’t say I ever really thought about getting one. Does it hurt?”

  “Some.”

  “Well, maybe a small one then.”

  “Wuss! The Kid’s a wuss!”

  “Whatever,” I said, and closed the notebook.

  That night in the trailer, I felt better enough about me and Sue to ask Sid how his latest brainstorm had gone down with Ann.

  “Not half bad. She thinks I found a business angle she never considered before. But I won’t know if it’s practical until I make a trip into Lumberton. So I probably shouldn’t waste your time yakking about it till then.”

  “Fine. Say, Sid, listen to this.” I told him about Sue and her flash book.

  Sid whooped. “Kid, you might’ve just hit on a way to break through little Miss Javor’s indifference here. Let me think about the best way to utilize this primo insight.”

  Two nights later I went looking for Sue like usual, so we could have supper together. But she was gone.

  With Sid.

  I tromped around the grounds of Deer Park, letting off steam by whacking trees and shrubs with a stick. Where had they gone? Why hadn’t they taken me? What were they doing? I started off down Route 1 on foot, got a few hundred yards, then turned around. How was I supposed to find them? The only two places I knew in town were Jayzee’s crib and Sonny’s house, and I doubted they were at either place.

  Eventually I wound up in the trailer, stretched out on my bunk still dressed. I swore I’d stay awake until Sid got in, then drag some answers out of him. But I had worked pretty hard that day, and around midnight I fell asleep.

  I never heard Sid come in, and by the time sunlight woke me up he wasn’t there, if he had ever come in at all.

  I went looking for him and Sue, and found them in the Diner, having breakfast while Sonny, Ann and Yasmine worked the early crowd. The stupid jukebox was playing already, lots of idiot horns and fancy drums and sensitive piano tinklings.

  I took a seat at the counter next to Sid. “So, have a good time last night?”

  “I’ll let the young lady answer that,” Sid said with a smile, like he had nothing to hide.

  Sue leaned around Sid to put a hand on my shoulder. “Kid, don’t be mad, but we couldn’t bring you. Sid had a helluva time convincing the guy that I was eighteen, and you just don’t look old enough to fake it.”

  I tried to keep my voice icy, when I really felt like yelling. “So you went to some club or bar then?”

  “What are you talking about? We went to a tattoo place! The Electric Needleworks! I got my ink done! And Sid convinced the guy to keep my flash book and study it. His name’s Bruno. He might buy some designs from me. And he even invited me to hang out there and maybe learn how to do what he does!”

  Ann came over, holding a coffee pot. “I gave her my permission, Kid. I’m sorry nobody thought to mention it to you.”

  Sid looked at me all eager and sincere. “Trust me, Kid, you woulda been bored outta your head. All Sue and Bruno could talk about was tats, tats, tats. It was nothing like the kinda deep conversations you and I have.”

  I didn’t say anything, because all I could think about was Sue’s naked butt under the needle and Sid watching every minute of the job.

  Later that afternoon, Sid and I were working alone together on the weather-stripping job, not talking. I was still pissed, but didn’t know how to bring up my anger. Everybody was acting so adult about the whole affair, like there were no controversial angles, that I felt like a baby for being upset about any part of it. But still, when you came right down to it, what Sid had done with Ann’s consent was to have a good time without me, to take my girlfriend, if she was my girlfriend, and enable her to do the one thing she most wanted to do, all without me being there to share the experience. And I was the one who had discovered Sue’s secret! Where was the justice in all that?

  I was getting so steamed up about everything, holding it all inside, that I wasn’t paying attention to what I was doing. And sure enough, I smashed my thumb with my hammer.

  “Jesus fucking Christ!”

  Sid came around the corner of the cottage to see what was wrong.

  “Oh, man, Kid, let’s get some ice on that.”

  By the time Sid returned from the rental office with some ice cubes in a cloth, I was so furious I couldn’t even talk. I just snatched the cold lumpy rag away from him and wouldn’t even look at him. Instead, I kept my eyes down on my hand.

  I was sitting on the stoop of the cottage, just like I had been the very first time I met Sue, what seemed like years ago. Sid squatted down beside me.

  “What’s bugging you, Kid? It’s not just whacking your thumb, that’s for sure.”

  I found my voice then. “Damn straight it’s not! It’s you, you and Sue! Why’d you have to cut me out of the picture last night? Didn’t I deserve to be there? How’m I gonna get Sue to really like me if I can’t show her I can get into whatever she’s into? You just made it harder for me, not easier, like you were supposed to. What kind of friend are you, Sid?”

  Sid had the decency to hang his head and look embarrassed. He reached up to rub one hairy, pockmarked cheek. This was the most nervous I had ever seen him, and somehow the sight calmed me down a little.

  “Aw, shit, Kid, I did fuck up that aspect of things, didn’t I? But you have to look at it from my perspective. I wasn’t thinking about your hormones, I was thinking about Sue’s future. The way you described Jayzee and his crowd, I knew Sue was on the road to something bad. Sure, a little pot-smoking never hurt anyone, but that kind of feudal scene with King Jayzee maybe ready to order the troops to rob a few houses or start dealing hard stuff is not the same as some simple backyard toking among friends. When you brought me the news about Sue’s interest in tats, I felt I had to act fast on it. I wanted to get her hooked on some healthy alternative to those dopers before she got in over her head with them. And I had a feeling that your presence would complicate things. Like Sue told you, this Bruno guy took a helluva lot of sweet-talking to accept Sue as eighteen. As it stands, he could lose his license if the authorities find out she’s not. Now, although you’re a handsome devil, Kid, in your own fashion, there was no way that Bruno was gonna believe you were not a minor. And even though you weren’t going in for some ink, just you being there would’ve queered things. So I had to make a split-second decision to exclude you. And of course I didn’t tell you last night, because I didn’t want to face this very same righteous wrath I’m getting now. Does any of this make sense to you?”

  I listened to Sid closely, watching his face for any sign of bullshit. But there was none, leastwise none I could see. His motivation seemed honest. For some reason I pictured Lita huffing gas and burning her brain cells out. I sure didn’t want that for Sue.

  “Handsome, huh? Why doesn’t Sue think so?”

  Sid grinned. “I get the feeling she does, pal. She’s just a little dizzy, like most chicks her age. She’s vacillating, doesn’t quite know what she wants. I get a hunch she’ll show you soon how she really feels. Just hang in there. Be patient, exert the old Kid A charm, and you can’t go wrong.”

  I stood up. “Okay.”

  “Friends?”

  “Friends.”

  “Shake then?”

  “Sure.�
��

  We shook hands and Sid turned around to go back to work. I put the slivers of the ice cubes down the collar of his shirt, and he chased me around Deer Park for the next ten minutes. He could run pretty fast for an old fart.

  The next morning, a Saturday, I came out from the back of the diner to bus tables, and I saw someone I never expected to see again.

  The fat suspicious geezer in the suv who had given me a ride, dropping me off just before the night I met Sid under the big tree.

  He was with a bunch of buddies, and they had fishing clothes on, vests with lots of pockets, goofy hats with hooks stuck in them. Suv guy and his pals were laughing and joking, but it was in a kinda superior way. I could tell from their faces and voices that they were all like, “Isn’t this place just too fucking lame and aren’t the local people just too stupid and aren’t we really cool for hanging out here, despite the lameness and stupidity?” I remembered then how irritated I had gotten when this jerk practically accused me of planning to break into his lousy weekend house, and how dumbass my parting jab at him had been. Maybe now I could make up for that.

  I went over to his table, carrying my plastic tub, not quite knowing what I was gonna say. When I got there alongside him, it took him a few seconds to register me. When he finally gave me his attention, he obviously didn’t recognize me.

  “Yes?”

  I said the first thing that came to mind. “Had any unexpected visitors at your little country palace lately, mister?”

  The reaction I got was like nothing I had expected. His eyes bugged out and his face turned patchy red and white like Sonny’s hash.

  “What do you know about that? Who are you? Were you in on the robbery? If you were, you’ve got a lot of nerve showing me your face. You’re in a lot of trouble now, you little bastard.”

  I kinda inched away a little until I felt a table pressing into my butt. “Wait just a minute, mister. I don’t know what you’re talking about—”

  He narrowed his eyes. “Now I recognize you! You’re that kid I picked up hitching last month. I thought you were up to no good. Well, you’re going to pay now.”

  Suv guy stood up, looking around like maybe there was some cop waiting right there in the Diner he could appeal to.

  “Mister, if you had a robbery at your place, I didn’t have anything to do with it—”

  “We’ll see about that!”

  “What’s the trouble here, sir?”

  Ann had never looked so good to me, like some kind of waitress angel. She stood close by me and confronted suv guy without batting an eyelash.

  “Who are you?” he said.

  “Ann Danielson, the owner of this place.”

  “This employee of yours is a criminal, Danielson. I’m certain of it. He was scoping out my house a month ago, just before it was broken into.”

  Ann turned to me. “Kid, is any of this true?”

  “No! All he did was give me like a ten-minute ride before chucking me out miles away from his lousy tightass castle. I never even saw his stupid house!”

  Ann looked back to suv guy. “Sir, this boy has been completely under my supervision since he came to work here. He lives on my property, and I know for a fact that he’s had no dealing with any criminals. I think you’ve made a mistake.”

  Ann’s calmness and certainty seemed to make suv guy reconsider a minute. But then he got huffy again.

  “I think we’ll let the police decide this matter. Right now, I’m leaving.”

  The guy’s buddies had sat through this argument in a kinda baffled way, but now they got ready to leave with their leader. But they hadn’t counted on Yasmine standing in their way.

  “Hey, pal, there’s the little matter of your check.”

  “We haven’t gotten our meals yet. We don’t owe you a thing.”

  “All your orders are up now, asshole, and you’re gonna pay for them even if you don’t eat them.”

  suv guy puffed out his chest. “I don’t think anyone here will be making me do that.”

  Nobody said anything for a few seconds, which is why the sound of something heavy smacking into flesh sounded so loud.

  Sid and Angie had come in from the back entrance and now stood in the door to the sink room. Angie held a big wrench and was whopping his palm with it. Sid didn’t have any weapon, but with his arms folded across his chest he looked meaner than a ripped-off crack whore.

  “Some problem here, Ann?”

  “Not yet, Sid.”

  I think suv guy took about a whole minute to get his jaw back in position. When he finally did, he whipped out his wallet, took out a twenty and tossed it on the table.

  “Where’s my tip, you stingy scumbag!”

  A ten-dollar bill followed the twenty, and then the suv guy and his posse were out the door.

  The other customers, all local people, were clapping, and I was getting hugged by Ann and Yasmine and Sid and Angie and Sonny, and I realized that my legs were shaking a little. When everyone moved apart enough to let me breathe, I sat right down.

  “Sorry. Sorry about that,” I said.

  “Don’t be, Kid,” Sid said. “You don’t ever apologize for facing down an arrogant, ignorant son of a bitch.”

  “I’ll—I’ll try to remember that. But it only works when you’ve got friends.”

  “Friends are good. But you’ve got to be able to stand alone sometimes too.”

  We got back to work then. But the whole mess still had a loose end or two.

  Officer Vakharia stopped by later that afternoon. He talked to Ann for a minute, out of my earshot, before he hustled me by myself into the back seat of his cruiser, without saying more than “Follow me.” Sitting there, I knew I was heading for jail. I could picture my folks coming for me, and an end to all my travels, which had barely gotten started.

  Vakharia looked at me in the rearview mirror above the dash for a while. His shades concealed any feelings. He didn’t start the cruiser. Finally he said, “You didn’t have anything to do with the robbery at the Wellington house, did you?”

  “No, sir.”

  I thought Vakharia was going to dispute me on that. But instead, amazingly, he broke into a big grin. “Well, shit, son, of course you didn’t. We have a pretty good lead on the gang that pulled that job. They’ve hit a whole string of summer homes for the past two years. And they don’t rely on little pissants like you for information.”

  I found out I could breathe again, I said, “But—but if you knew that, why’d you drag me in here?”

  “Why, just to say good job on making that Wellington fuck-head shit his pants. Those city yuppies annoy the hell out of me. Now, get outa my car and don’t do anything to bring me out here again.”

  I moved pretty fast then.

  And that evening, when Sue served me my canned ravioli, she watched me with a weird twisty grin for a few minutes before she said, “Now you had an adventure you didn’t invite me on, Kid. You see how it is? Sometimes these things just happen.”

  I was up extra early on Monday, because of going to bed extra early the night before. Sue had driven to Lumberton last night to hang with Bruno the tattooer, Sid and Angie had gone to Sonny’s house, Yasmine, who I never really saw outside of work, I knew was visiting her mother, after checking Mrs. O’Hara into the hospital for some kinda aids problem, and Ann had been fussing around in the rental office, everyone leaving me on my own. So I went back to trailer and sacked out on my bunk. I put in my earbuds, dialed up some Weezer, and picked up The Prophet. I turned to the chapter called “On Self-Knowledge” and read, “Your hearts know in silence the secrets of the days and nights. But your ears thirst for the sound of your heart’s knowledge. You would know in words that which you have always known in thought. You would touch with your fingers the naked body of your dreams.” Pretty soon I was fast asleep, even though it was still light outside. If I touched any naked bodies in my dreams, I didn’t remember them when I woke up.

  It was only five-thirty am, but no
Sid in the trailer. Birds were racketing outside like there was no tomorrow. I set out across the dewy lawn, skipping any shower time at Ann’s place.

  Usually the Diner was only about a quarter-full at that hour. But not today. Inside were a dozen guys who looked like brothers or cousins, brown-skinned, mustaches, straw hats, Wal-Mart jeans, plaid shirts or tees advertising foreign-sounding products I had never heard of before. Ann was serving their breakfasts, because Yasmine didn’t get in till six.

  I took a seat at the counter. I silently thanked Buddha that the juke was silent, if only for a little while. Apparently these new customers weren’t big jazz fans.

  “What’s up with these guys, Sonny?”

  “Tha—they’re the nuh—new ruh—renters here.”

  “How’s that?”

  “I duh—don’t know all tha—the details. Ask Sid.”

  “I’ll do that.

  Until Sid showed up, I concentrated on my food, a Spanish omelette, rich with lots of green peppers, onions, cheese and ham. I supposed I could have asked Ann for an explanation, but she was too busy to do more than smile in my direction. And besides, if these guys represented Sid’s big brainstorm of the other day, I figured he would have the full story.

  He came in just as I was spreading grape jelly over my last piece of toast.

  “If it isn’t Rip van Winkle! I thought I’d have to sleep rough outside, what with all those snores you were putting out.”

  “Just because you’re some kind of superhuman guy who doesn’t ever need to rest more than a couple of hours every night, doesn’t mean we’re all so lucky. I was beat. And besides, what else was I gonna do but sleep? Everyone split on me. And you can forget the snoring joke. I fell for the farting gag once before, but you won’t catch me twice.”

  “The mark of a wise man.” Sid swung onto a stool and Sonny set a cup of coffee down at his place. Just then a battered old school bus pulled up outside and beeped its horn. All the new guys hurried to gulp down their last bits of breakfast, then rushed outside. They piled onto the bus, and it pulled away.

  “What’s their story?”

  “You just met the new long-term lodgers at Deer Park. They’re migrant workers who come up here early in the growing season to work on the farms. Lettuce, potatoes, apple orchards. They do all the grunt work. Most of ’em live in pretty shabby conditions, in shacks and trailers provided by the farm owners. They’re trying to save up everything they earn to send back home. Even so, they end up spending a lot. The owners charge through the nose for everything. Anyhow, I found a dozen guys who were the worst off of them all. They were sleeping under bushes and cooking over open fires. Just no room at the inn for ’em. So I told them about the cottages here, quoted them a rate that seemed fair to them, which even included breakfast. Two to a cottage was all I’d allow, although they wanted to cram in more when they heard how reasonable the rent was. Got the farm owners to provide transportation on the cheap every morning and night. Now, Ann is guaranteed one-hundred-percent occupancy for about six months of every year. Her income’s gonna double or triple on those units. No more fly-by-night Peyton Place stuff that leaves half the cabins empty half the time. She’s set for at least six months of the year. In the winter, the lovebirds can take over again. Along with the extra dough the increased trade at the Diner is bringing in, Ann shouldn’t have any money worries anymore.”