“Guess you could say I’m figuring out my dreams. But,” I say slowly, “they may’ve recently been given another chance.” I pause, my gaze flicking to Clyde. “If I let ’em.”
Mr. Champagne Cocktail clinks his glass against mine again. “I’ll drink to that.”
Clyde walks up to the bar, but there’re no seats. He stands there awkwardly, behind Mr. Champagne Cocktail, hands in his pockets, and it may be the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.
I meet his nervousness with spunk, shouting over the room’s volume, “Doc’s two days in a row?”
“It’s more so that I want to see you two days in a row.”
Well damn. Mr. Champagne Cocktail chuckles as he turns and puts a hand on Clyde’s shoulder. “I think this seat will do you more good than me.”
“How sweet,” Blanche says, as Clyde taps his knuckles on the stool, not sitting. “You wanted to visit your future sister-in-law?”
It takes a second, but a smile cracks Clyde’s lips. “Actually, I wanted to see if Bonnie has a break coming up.”
Blanche takes a bottle from my hand, freeing me to go. I almost don’t let it go, not sure I’m ready to step out from behind the bar, to have nothin’ in between Clyde and me. Then he can touch me, prickling my skin with intrigue.
But I ain’t a believer in accidental happenings. After all those nights of sitting outside the Supper Club, I caught Roy cheating the one time I ventured inside. And now Clyde has walked into Doc’s at the exact moment I toasted to second chances.
“I’ll cover for you with Mary,” Blanche says to me, “if Clyde tells me what Buck’s real name is.”
He looks back and forth between Blanche and me, clearly confused, but also amused. “You must be skunked if you think I’ll double-cross Buck.” He points to the ceiling—I’m assuming at Buck’s apartment. “He’ll pull out that Colt on me. But I’ll give you a hint, which should cover Bonnie for a few minutes. Six letters.”
Blanche’s forehead creases. “You’ll be lucky if that gets you sixty seconds. You better hurry, Bonn.”
She pushes me toward the bar’s partition, and I duck under it, grabbing my coat as I go.
No words pass between us as Clyde and I go up the stairs, through the doctor’s office, stopping at the door. Clyde helps me into my jacket, his fingertips trailing over my neck and leaving behind a trail of goose bumps. I break the silence with a soft, “Thank you.”
It’s a cool autumn night, and, outside, the air feels good against my flushed cheeks. Up and down the block, the streetlights cast halos of light. Clyde extends his arm for me to loop mine through, and as we walk from one halo to the next, I jump from thought to thought, finally landing on, “The song you sang me was beautiful.”
“You mean our song?”
My cheeks flush. I hesitate. “About that…”
“I’m coming on strong, ain’t I?”
“Yeah,” I say, honestly.
Clyde laughs, a real deep-bellied laugh. “Blanche was right. I hate when that happens.”
A smile cracks my lips. “Me too.”
“Here’s the thing, Bonnie—I’ve been waiting awhile to meet you.” His free hand touches the arm I have looped through his. But then, as if he thinks better of it, he stuffs his hand in his pocket. “I came to the church the day you got married.”
I gasp and remember Blanche’s glance at the church doors in the middle of the ceremony.
“I couldn’t stop my feet from bringing me there, after seeing you at Doc’s the week before. But I couldn’t interfere with your happiness, if you truly were happy with that other fella. But when he left that first time—”
“When you helped Buck search my house.”
“Yeah. Well, I saw him—your husband—walking up the stairs to Buck’s place. It took all my strength not to stop him and give him a piece of my mind, and maybe even a black eye for ruining my chance to finally meet you. Then, after that fool left the second time, I was itching to see you. But Blanche said it wasn’t a good time, that you’d push away any man who came knocking.”
“She was right.”
He stops us, and his body leans forward, toward me. “What ’bout now?”
Glow from the streetlights light up his face—a face so vulnerable, so honest—and I push aside my fear that I could be hurt again. Doesn’t stick, though; those thoughts come back like a boomerang. I let out a breath and say, “Roy took a lot from me, and I’m just now getting my feet under me.”
“I don’t want to stand in your way, Bonnie. I want to stand by your side.”
Another smile cracks my lips.
“Was that too much?” he asks, turning his face away. But all it does is make his adorable dimple easier to see. He turns back. “Listen, I’m heading out of town for a few days. Reckon that should be enough time for you to get back on your feet, no?”
I laugh, not expecting I would, so freely, or that my shoulders would sag at the mention of Clyde leaving town. “Where are you going?” I ask, before I can think better of it.
“This copper, fella named Jacobs, has it out for me. He doesn’t have a warrant or anything, but he’s always bringing me in to see if he can trip me up, get me cuffed. When he sets his sights on me, it’s best if I get away for a bit.”
“Clyde.” I scrape my sole against the sidewalk. “Why’d you tell me that?”
“Bonnie.” He tries for a smile, though his voice is serious. “I ain’t ashamed of my past. It’s made me who I am; it’s brought me to this exact moment in my life, standing here with you.”
I look beyond his adoration—I have to, or else I’ll get swept away in a direction that may not be good for me—and I focus on what’s important, asking, “But what ’bout your future? Don’t you want more for yourself?”
“’Course I do.” My gaze drops to his hand, which is subtly clenching and unclenching at his side. “But the name Clyde Barrow ain’t carrying much prestige. I’ve been handcuffed ever since my first arrest. Makes it harder to go after what I want.”
“What is it you want?”
Clyde chuckles. “Believe that’s the fourth question you’ve asked me in a row.” He gently touches the underside of my chin when I open my mouth, and says, “I want to be alive and free. With you.”
“So I’ve heard,” I whisper. “But, Clyde, I need to be with somebody who—”
“Someone more straight and narrow?”
I nod, staring at him, waiting for his next words. I hadn’t realized, ’til this very moment, how badly I want a clean-shaven version of Clyde Barrow.
“All right,” he says. “Starting over. A job, my own car—”
“Not just taking what you want.”
“Yeah. It won’t be easy, and not nearly as fun.” He smirks. “But I can try for that. If it means you’ll be my gal.”
My smile starts slow, but soon stretches ’cross my face.
“Is that a yes?” Clyde asks.
“It’s a yes to supper, if you ask.”
“Bonnie.” His voice is like a feather teasing my skin. “Would you be a doll and have supper with me when I get back?”
“Why, Clyde, I thought you’d never ask.”
* * *
The next morning, Clyde’s hypnotic voice still streams through my head. Ever so softly, there’s a second voice, in my ma’s tone, telling me that daydreaming ’bout a boy who evades the police ain’t a good thing.
I skirt through the kitchen, avoiding my actual ma, and as I bike toward school, a sly smile spreads ’cross my face at how she doesn’t know I evaded the police the first time I laid eyes on Clyde Barrow.
The difference was—and my shoulders tense as I cross the tracks into Dallas—the police didn’t know me from Jane. But Clyde … they’ve got an eye out for him, always do.
I hear it before seeing it, the roar of too many people downtown, and I jerk to attention at the unusual crowd. The bike’s momentum carries me ’round the corner onto Elm Street. My brows scrunch. A blur of men i
n long dark coats and hats crowd the sidewalks, the streets. Shouting. Jostling for space.
Pedaling closer, I decipher their angry voices.
Wall Street.
Crash.
Their expressions are panicked, their fists are balled. I search the crowd for a familiar face, for my brother, for Mr. Champagne Cocktail, Blanche, or Buck. But I don’t see anyone I recognize.
In a mob this large, it doesn’t take long to pick up more tidbits of conversations and piece together why people are rioting in the streets. Yesterday, the market went into free fall, leading to the highest decline ever. Today, the market has just opened, yet the ticker is already falling behind, too many people selling their shares at once. One man proclaims, “Nothin’ those fancy New York City bankers can do to save the day this time.”
My mouth drops open, and I push my bike through the crowd, soon realizing it’s easier to leave it propped against a nearby shop. Banging and screaming pulls my attention to a new ruckus. I use a nearby man’s shoulder to prop myself higher, not caring I don’t know him. Men are pounding on the bank’s door. Inside, the bank tellers, their movements frantic, are trying to keep it closed.
Like part of a breaking wave, I stumble forward with those ’round me. The doors to the bank are thrown open, people rushing inside. I move with the men, nearly whisked off my feet, my heart beating erratically, ’til I’m at the door, then inside the lobby, having no other choice.
Outside, a gun is fired, followed by a string of gasps, profanities, screaming—some belonging to me. I grip the coats ’round me; otherwise, I know I’ll lose my footing and be trampled.
Through the bodies, I catch glimpses of hands grasping the bars of the teller windows, shaking them. Even behind their metal cages, the bankers take steps back, heads rocking from side to side, palms up.
I yank on the coat beside me. “What’s happening?” I scream to him.
A crashing sound.
I duck and use my arms to protect my head as shards of glass rain down. The room darkens. Steps away, another crash, another hanging light being smashed. The lobby grows even darker, louder.
“What’s happening?” I ask the man again. He looks over me before down at me. “It’s gone,” he says, and then his voice is directed at anyone, his panicked face jolting from side to side. “All of our money is gone. Bank used our money to invest. Lost it all.”
I tighten my grasp on the man’s sleeve. “What?”
31
That night, we still open Doc’s, patrons still come in, but it isn’t a typical night for us. It’s as if the lights are dimmed, the music softened, the electricity in the air tapered. Mr. Champagne Cocktail isn’t at his usual seat or pulling his normal antics on the dance floor. Not as many drinks are poured. Tips are lower.
I go home with less in my pocket—a lot less. In the morning, I go to class, but my thoughts are anywhere but here. They’re stuck on yesterday, on how the crowd swarmed the bank’s vault, banging their fists, doing nothin’ but bruising their skin. That vault was practically empty. That was when I learned our money, everybody’s, was spent “on margin.” Roy used that phrase before, but I didn’t know what it truly meant. I didn’t know two little words could mean so much, or that the bank was allowed to use my money for their own gains, losing it all when the market collapsed.
Still, I have to check, see it again firsthand, not understanding how my money could be gone when I wasn’t even playing the game. As I ride by the bank on the way home, my heart’s in my stomach. The windows are boarded up, the door chained shut.
The crash didn’t play favorites. It took the same amount from me that it took from Mr. Champagne Cocktail. He doesn’t come in that night, either. Or the next.
Now I’m sitting at my desk, for show, my hands folded in my lap, my pencil untouched on my notebook. My teacher drones on, her own enthusiasm lackluster.
At the end of the day, it’s time for the inevitable. The lower amount of money from Doc’s ain’t enough to get by on. But it was supposed to be. Doc’s was supposed to keep me in school, and now it can’t.
Frankly, that makes me mad. Madder still when I think I should be standing in front of this classroom by now, but ’cause of Roy, I’m a year behind, still sitting at this desk. And now I need to be out there, first in line, trying to find a second job. I can’t sit here any longer. Not with nothin’ in the bank. Not when jobs are going to be even harder to come by. I’ve no other choice but to sign away the last inklings of my dreams. For real this time. Permanently. With no hopes of coming back. I was kidding myself that my life would allow me to get my degree.
The door to the school’s office opens soundlessly. My footsteps, as I approach the desk, seem too quiet. Everything ’bout this moment feels like my time spent at Southwest Dallas High School will soon be forgotten: the talent shows, my victory in the spelling bee, the poem I wrote that my teacher tacked to the blackboard.
At one time, those were notches in my belt on my path to becoming somebody. But none of those matter anymore, not when my desire to be more than poor dangles broken, like those damn lights in the bank. It was hard losing Roy, but I hadn’t truly lost myself, ’til now.
I slide my disenrollment papers ’cross the desk, Bonnelyn Elizabeth Parker signed at the bottom, and the clerk accepts it. Just like that. She won’t question me; she probably saw this coming after I took that long break. She won’t frown at me; I’m over the legal dropout age. So few of my classmates graduate—now even less. I can’t be the only one who’ll trade in lessons for hours at some remedial job, if anyone is even hiring. I need to be up early, knocking on doors, before they are all gobbled up.
I thank her—for what, I don’t know—and leave the tiny room. I don’t want to think anymore ’bout what I just did. I don’t want to think ’bout Buster once again being out of a job, or the possibility of my ma losing hers if people go back to making their own clothes to save money. My feet simply move, carrying me out of the building, a chill running down my spine.
“Bonnie?”
That name: only spoken by one person. Despite the darkness of my mood, my heart flutters.
Clyde leans against a tree at the bottom of the school’s steps, arms and ankles crossed. He’d appear casual if it weren’t for the concern etched ’cross his face.
“Clyde,” I whisper, but in my mind, it’s as if I scream. Maybe it’s ’cause his presence speaks volumes. “You’re back already?”
“Never left. Spent the last couple of days trying to find myself that job.”
He never left. With each step down the stairs, I let that sink in.
“But then Blanche told me what you were up to.…”
“That girl’s got a big mouth,” I say.
He fidgets, uncrossing his arms, patting his palms against his thighs. “Should I not…”
“No.” I stop in front of him. Clyde Barrow is all nerves, and I’d be lying if I said butterflies aren’t taking flight in my stomach. We’re inches apart, but I want to move closer. It’d take only a slight roll onto my toes to be in perfect alignment. “I’m glad you’re here.”
He pushes off the tree, steps closer. “How you doing?”
“I’ve been robbed.” I drop my school bag to the ground. “That’s what it feels like.”
I could elaborate, ’bout how I’m not simply referring to my bank account, but Clyde is nodding.
“Never told you why I wanted to enlist, did I?” I raise a brow, and he says, “Wish I could say it was ’cause of duty, but I’d be lying. I spent too much time sitting ’round, wasting my day, or running away, trying to stay a step ahead of the law. But I wanted to make good, be somebody, and for the name Clyde Barrow to end in a handshake instead of a door in my face. So, when the navy turned me away, I felt like the floor fell out from under me. All my plans went to hell.”
I nod, biting my lip. He gets it, maybe better than anyone.
“Remember this feeling, Bonnie.” He takes a moment, swallows. “
I reckon decisions are only going to get harder from here on out.”
“That ain’t what I want to hear.”
Clyde intertwines his fingers with mine, looking down as if he’s asking if I’m okay with the gesture.
I squeeze his hand.
“I’ll make ya a deal,” he says. “You keep clawing your way to what ya want, and I’ll keep trying to do the same.”
“But what is it that you want? You didn’t quite answer that one the other day.”
He swings our arms between us. Back and forth. Slow. “A stretch of land to farm. Been trying to find some for my family. Land is hard to buy, even harder to keep nowadays, but…” He shrugs, trails off.
“No, tell me.”
“I want a simple life, away from the rules and the people telling me that I’m doing wrong.”
“Maybe if you stop doing wrong, you’ll stop hearing it.” My voice comes out teasing, needing to help ease the tension in both our shoulders.
He smiles, his chest rising with a soft laugh.
I return his smile—not something I thought would happen today. But then I sigh, thinkin’ of my Mason jar. Not what’s in it but what I etched on it. Clyde and I aren’t so different, both wanting more than the odds we were born with.
Clyde nudges my chin, brings my head up. “Hey, let’s see that smile again. When one door closes, another one opens, right?” He smiles slyly. “But, on the chance it don’t, you can always pry it open.”
My face is mock-serious, or at least that’s the look I’m going for. “It’s that mentality that landed you behind bars in the first place.”
Clyde chuckles. “You may be right, Bonnie.”
“I take it you didn’t have much luck finding a job?”
He rubs his nose. “Lots of those doors being slammed in my face.”
“What ’bout Doc’s? I know it ain’t your thing, but…”
“This crash hasn’t been kind to the doctor either. You know that.” Clyde touches his ear. “And he’s already done so much for me. I won’t ask any more from him. I’ll keep knocking on other doors, though. For you, Bonnie.”
Becoming Bonnie Page 26
