"I look forward to seeing him, too," Mommy said.
I watched her descend and then I went back to my room and changed. I was going to go downstairs and sit with everyone until they decided to leave for their hotel, but when I gazed out my window and saw the party decorations gone and all the tables and chairs folded and taken away, along with the dance floor and small stage, I felt sad again.
It had all come and gone so fast. I thought.
I pressed my face to the window and stared down at the lake. Suddenly, a silhouette took shape on the dock.
It was Harley.
He had come back, and he looked like he was sitting there and gazing up at my window.
In seconds practically. I grabbed the present he had given me and was down the stairs and out the door, hoping he wasn't just a wishful thought.
.
"Hey," I said walking toward him quickly.
"Hey."
He looked down at the water and then at me.
"Where did you go? I went to your house and Uncle Roy said you had run away," I said stepping up to the dock.
"I did. but I turned back as usual. One of these days, I won't." he swore.
"Aunt Glenda's very upset. I heard her crying when I went to the house."
He grunted.
"How do you know she was crying for me?"
"Well, you had run away, or at least that was what she believed."
"She probably still doesn't even know it," he said. He lowered himself back on the dock and put his hands behind his head to look up at the stars. "I guess everyone hates me now, too. huh? I nearly ruined your party."
"Wrong," I said. "But Amber feels bad. She thinks she was responsible because she screamed so much when Chase threw her in."
He laughed. Then he turned to me, just realizing.
"How come you're not off somewhere still celebrating with him?"
"We sort of parted company," I said.
"Parted company? You mean for good?"
"Yes," I said.
"Because of me?"
"No. I mean, that was part of it, but there was more reason to break up with him."
"Like what?"
"He's too..."
"Mushy?"
I laughed.
"Maybe," I said. "Some boys wear their selfconfidence like a nice suit of clothes. It makes them look better, but in Chase's case, it's like he's wearing a flag wrapped around himself, the flag of Chase Taylor, and he wants everyone to stand and pledge allegiance, especially girls."
Harley's smile deepened and widened. He continued to look up at the sky.
"How serious did you get with him?"
"What do you mean?"
"You know what I mean." he said.
"You're a nosy one," I teased.
"You told me about your other boyfriends." "yes, when I was twelve."
"Fourteen," he corrected.
"Whereas you never tell me anything about your girlfriends." I countered.
"There's nothing to tell. The longest I've gone with anyone is four hours, to a movie and after or whatever."
"Why is that. Harley? There's never, ever been anyone you liked enough to want to be with longer?"
He was silent and then he sat up and looked toward his house.
"I shouldn't have come back," he said. "I should have had the guts to keep going."
"You had to come back, at least for your mother. You're wrong about her. She needs you. too. Everyone would have been very, very upset."
"Right."
"They would!" He turned to me. "You too?"
"Of course. If I didn't see you out here. I would have been up all night, worrying about you." I confessed.
In the light of the stars. I saw his soft smile and his eyes twinkle. Then he looked toward the driveway.
"I have this dream lately, one I haven't told anyone, not that there's anyone to tell," he said.
"There's me."
"I know. That's why I'm telling you." "Okay."
I waited quietly, fighting impatience while he obviously worked at building his courage. It made me so curious and excited, it filled my stomach with jumping beans.
"I have this dream that I find my real father, and he's a great guy who's sorry he never knew me."
"Has your mother ever said anything more about him recently, Harley?"
"Very, very little more than what she has already told me. He was a construction worker, a carpenter who worked on the rebuilding of the city hall."
"She still hasn't told you his full name?"
"Whenever I ask, she says you don't want to know a man who deserted us. Once. I said maybe he didn't know you were pregnant, but she claims he knew for sure. Then she clams up and refuses to talk any more about him. I haven't even tried to ask her anything about him in a long time, maybe a year, but the dream keeps coming back.
"I keep thinking that maybe, maybe if I found out where he was, he would be interested in me and maybe help me and maybe I wouldn't be such a loser, at least not to him. I know I am to everyone else."
"You're not a loser to me, Harley." "I will be," he insisted.
"No, you won't. You're going to bear down and study for your finals and pass all your tests so you can graduate. Then you're going to try to be an architect, just like your art teacher told you."
"Sure," he said.
"I'll help you study."
"You will?"
"If you promise to try, really try. Will you?"
"I might," he said. "Just to prove Roy wrong," he added with a smile.
"Uncle Roy doesn't want you to be a failure. Harley. He's just afraid."
"Roy? Afraid? That's the only man alive whose shadow stays a few extra feet back."
I laughed.
"I don't fault him for that." Harley continued. "You want to know something else I haven't told you? I used to really idolize Roy, really look up to him. There was nothing I wanted more than being as strong and as feared as he is. I always thought it was better to have people afraid of you. That's why I worked beside him on construction. I thought I had to become as tough and as hard and I'd be all right.
"One time. I saw him lift a gown man with one arm and nearly choke him to death. He wagged him about like a rag doll before he put the guy down." "Why did he do that?"
"He heard the man call him a dirty name. I bet every time that 'cracker' used a dirty name like that, he recalled nearly being hung in boy's powerful hand and it choked him up," Harley said smiling. "He's got strength inside him that even he doesn't realize."
"Sometimes, you sound like you still idolize him. Harley."
"I don't want to idolize anyone. People let you down all the time. My motto is believe in no one but yourself," he declared.
"I won't let you down. Harley."
"You will, but you won't be able to help it. Summer. That's the only difference." he predicted.
For a long moment, neither of us spoke. Then I looked at the present in my hand.
"I saved opening this until I could do it with you," I said.
"Oh. It's nothing like the gifts you got from everyone else." he warned. "You shouldn't make a big deal of it."
"I don't care what it is. Harley. It's a big deal to me and don't tell me what to make important and unimportant in my life," I snapped.
He laughed.
"Okay. I'm sorry. And people accuse me of having a temper."
Carefully, I peeled away the gift wrapping paper. It was a thin flat box. I lifted the top. There wasn't much light, but the glow of the stars gave me enough to see a line drawing,
"What is this?"
I studied it, tilting it so I could see every detail. In moments I realized it was a picture of me and Mommy holding hands and gazing out over the lake. A blackbird was just over the center. Long ago. I had told Harley about this special wishing ceremony of ours. but I never thought he would remember how important it was to me.
"You drew this?"
"I watched you and Rain do that a few times
after you had told me about it. I guess it's not great, but you can get the idea at least."
"Great? It's more than great. Harley, this is wonderful. You have such a talent."
"I can do a little," he reluctantly admitted.
"Stop it. Harley Arnold. Stop making yourself sound like nobody. This is the best picture..."
My throat closed and opened with the ache in my heart.
"Oh Harley," I cried, the tears streaking down my cheeks freely. "It's the best gift of all!"
I threw my arms around him and hugged him and then kissed his cheek, but held onto him. He had his arms at my waist and for a moment, as if we had just opened a door, we stared into each other's eyes, neither retreating from what seemed to be the inevitable kiss, the soft meeting of our lips, the surrender of ourselves in a caress so gentle and yet so complete. I felt my heart soar. For a long moment after we parted. I kept my eyes closed as if that would keep his lips on mine and lock the memory forever in my heart.
"I gotta go," he said quickly and jumped to his feet. "Harley."
"I'd better get back and face the music." he said.
As if he had to flee from his true feelings, he rushed away, practically running.
Then he stopped, turned, and waved. "Happy birthday." he cried.
"Thank you."
He walked on. Moments later, he passed through a shadow and appeared on his front porch. I saw him hesitate, open the door, and disappear inside.
Finally.
I took a breath,
4
The Oak Tree
.
Every morning since he had bought himself his
motorcycle. Harley would be right behind Daddy and me as Daddy drove off to take me to the Dogwood School for Girls. Sometimes. Harley would be a little late in riling started, but he always managed to catch up to us before we made the turn at Spring Creek Road. We would go left and he would go right to the public school, Often. I would turn and wave, and he would lift his right hand, his face forward as if he had eyes at the side of his head or somehow could sense when I would look back to say so long for the day. I'd watch him disappear around the turn.
Almost the moment Harley bought the motorcycle with his savings and brought it home. Daddy made me promise in front of Mommy, practically keeping my hand on a stack of Bibles. that I would not ride behind Harley on his motorcycle. I suppose it wasn't very difficult to understand why they lived in such fear of any accidents. I remember how careful Daddy was teaching me how to ride a bicycle and how restrictive he and Mommy were about where I could ride it. Even though most of my friends were permitted to ride on the highway (some even riding from their homes to Dogwood). I had to remain an the property or ride in the park with Daddy.
Just as Mommy had ridden horses in equestrian class at Dogwood, so did I, I was told that I was a very good rider. Some of my girlfriends had their own horses and often I was invited to go on rides. I knew how nervous that made both my parents, considering what had happened to Mommy, somehow. Mommy swallowed the lump of terror in her throat, closed her eyes and said okay. Even so. I knew she was sitting on pins and needles until I came home safe and sound.
Weighing on her mind beside the fact that she had been so terribly injured in a horseback riding accident was her continual fear that the shadow of bad luck still hovered in the corner of our family's destiny, waiting for another opportunity to harm us. I could never forget the time when I was only five and I tripped while running down the stairs. I rolled and rolled, knocking my head against the steps. Mommy was so scared for a moment she couldn't find her voice. I sat up dazed, more frightened than injured, but she had me taken to the doctor nevertheless. It had always been like that for me: more panic than necessary whenever I cut or bruised myself, had a cold or the flu. Considering all that, it was not unexpected for my parents to be filled with terror the moment Harley showed up with his spiffy, new cycle.
Harley was so proud of it. He had taken most of the money he had earned working with Uncle Roy on construction jobs and working for Daddy cutting grass or doing odd jobs around the property; then shopped and shopped until he found the motorcycle he wanted and could afford. Uncle Roy didn't give him permission to buy it. but Harley somehow managed to get Aunt Glenda to agree and cosign an insurance policy. Uncle Roy swore he wouldn't pay a penny to maintain the motorcycle or pay for gas. From time to time during the year. Harley worked weekends at a roadside diner busing tables just to make enough to keep up his motorcycle and give himself some spending money. I guess he always had a sense of independence, but it really took shape when he reached the age of fourteen. He had that air of maturity about him, that self-confidence boys don't achieve until they are either nearly finished with college or out in the working world.
His independence made me nervous because I began to sense Harley's increasing detachment from his family. Too often he acted and lived like a tenant in his own home, a tenant who knew that the day was soon coming when he would pack up and leave for good. Uncle Roy still considered him to be a burden and Aunt Glenda wasn't taking enough interest in him. The only time Aunt Glenda went shopping to buy him any clothes or any of the things he needed was when Mommy practically forced her to come along with her.
Aunt Glenda hated being in public ever since the death of Latisha. It was as if she thought everyone was looking at her and somehow blaming her for her daughter's horrible illness. Mommy was afraid that deep inside her heart. Aunt Glenda really did feel responsible for Latishas death. There were enough religious and bigoted fanatics out there to tell her that she had defied some moral rule by marrying an African American and having a child with him. I never thought God would be any about something like that, certainly not if the two people really loved and cherished each other. Also. I thought it was just terrible that they believed God would take out his wrath on an innocent little girl.
"They don't think of it that way, honey," Mommy told me. "It restores their hate and their ugly thinking-- that's all they care about really. I'm just worried about Glenda,' she said, and she tried in so many ways to draw her back into social activities.
Aunt Glenda's reluctance was too strong, however. Time did not heal her it thickened and widened her scar, so that she became more and more withdrawn, even from concerns and activities that involved her son. Eventually, it was really up to Harley to get things for himself. On occasion, most often when I or Mommy and I were willing to go along with him. Uncle Roy took Harley to buy things Harley needed, but that was so rare. I could count the times on my hands.
And so Harley hardened and became further and further insulated. Sometimes. when I looked out my bedroom window and saw him strutting across the grounds, he did look like a trespasser. Uncle Roy forbade him to smoke: so he did it secretly, standing behind the garage or off in a wooded area-- just to be defiant, I thought.
When Harley was just a little boy, Uncle Roy made him keep his room and his things neat and organized as if he was sleeping in a military barracks. Harley often told me about Uncle Roy's sudden, unexpected inspections. To this day he wouldn't permit Harley to have a lock on his door. Up until last year, he was still running his inspections occasionally. If he found a pack of cigarettes or the bed sloppily made or clothes strewn about-- as I had found them the morning of my birthday-- he would rant and rave and then issue some punishment. Now, I thought Harley was being deliberately messy, just to show Uncle Roy that all his effort, all his growls and penalties were wasted efforts. The purchase of his motorcycle was the crowning moment in all this.
My parents didn't know that Harley was going to buy a motorcycle. Only Aunt Glenda had any indication, apparently, and she hadn't said anything to anyone about it, not even to Uncle Roy. We all heard him drive in with it. Daddy had just gotten home from work. I was the first person Harley wanted to see his motorcycle. He came right to the door to call me out. Of course, he wanted to take me for a ride
immediately, and I did almost get on behind him. but Mommy had come to the
front door and screamed. "NO!"
We both looked back at her and saw such abject terror on her face, neither of us could speak or move for a moment.
"It's too dangerous." she said in a calmer tone of voice. Daddy came up beside her and then down to me and Harley.
"Any passenger you take on this," he told Harley, "has to wear a helmet."
"Oh," Harley said: the next day he bought an
extra helmet to carry for passengers. He thought that
Daddy might permit me to ride with him now, but that
night Daddy and Mommy had made me make a
promise.
I felt terrible telling Harley. The light of
excitement, all the pride drained from his eyes. "It's just because it's me." he muttered.
"Everyone here thinks I'm going to destroy the
world."
He shot off, nearly spilling himself at the foot
of the driveway before I could offer any other
explanation. It did no good to shout after him. There
was too much noise. I heard him revving his engine
and speeding down the back road: my heart pounded,
fearing he would have a bad accident and everyone's
predictions for him would be satisfied. Probably
because he believed everyone was looking to get him
or blame him for something all the time, he was really
a very careful driver, keeping within the speed limits.
There was never a complaint about him and soon, the
sight of him on his motorcycle became nothing unusual. I. of course, was still prohibited from riding
along with him.
Anyway, the next school day after my birthday
party, Harley wasn't right behind us. I kept looking
back for him and was surprised when we had reached
the turn and he still hadn't appeared. I hadn't seen him
all day, the day before. Daddy's parents were there for
a late lunch: although we had invited Aunt Glenda and
Hudson 04 The End of the Rainbow Page 6
