Deep in the Heart of Me, page 36
"I don't want all that," I say stalking back to my bed and flopping down on it.
I hear him at the fireplace scooping ash. He goes out and in a few seconds I hear wood dumped in the tub, and he's setting the fire. Soon there is the crackle and smell of kindling taking off.
Then he's fussing around like my maid.
"You ain't staying," I say without looking at him.
He doesn't say anything to that, but I hear him moving still, packing my clothes into my duffel, not that I'm looking.
Next, he's filling the lamp, lighting it and setting the chairs right and the food he's brought. Finally, he nudges me. "Here," he says.
It's the plate of food and the way this goes I say 'No. Now get.' But that's not how it goes. I'm hungry. And whatever else, it’s not hard to be around him.
So I sit up some, and the fire is starting to pierce the cold, just a little. "Mom send you out here?"
He nods and shoves the food toward me again and this time, I take it.
“Did you see Sobe?” he asks. Do they all know my business?
"I told her to go on to school. She can go live in Europe for all I care," I say. I lie. But I know Sobe Bell will do whatever she pleases.
"She won't go. Not with the fascists," he says confidently.
I stare at him for a minute. He's more of a quiet, person, not always so sure. But that sounded so strong I want to lean on it myself even though I know it comes from Dad reading them the newspaper.
"Didn't stop her before," I say. "Miss Rivers mustn't fear the fascists."
"She has family in England. She tells Dad England isn't dangerous."
"She can go back then. By herself."
"She's American," he says like he's memorized the 'Miss Rivers Times.'
I don't want to talk about her anymore.
I take a good look at him. He's skinny and knobby and catching up to this deep voice he's got. Catching up some, but there's a way to go.
“Miss Pat's all right," he says.
"It's that side-car, ain't it? You take up for her because you like that ride."
"She's Sobe's guardian," he says.
"She doesn't know when to quit," I say. I don't know why I'm talking so much.
I just eat then. If he wasn't looking, I might lick my plate. Then I do anyway.
"Want more?" he says.
I think about it. What I want is to see Sobe. I don't like the way we left it. We were doing just fine before…well before we weren't. If we could just be by ourselves for a while. I should not have gone to that school. But she didn’t want to be Maman and I…I didn’t want her to be Maman. I had no plan to put so many children in her. I should have said that.
But that time has passed us by. I have a feeling the wheel won't hit that mark…. I broke with her. All this time…I am broken off with Sobe.
"What's it like in that State School?" Joseph says.
I laugh some while I get a smoke out of my coat. "You think I want to talk about that?"
"They say some of those places…they whip the boys and that," he says.
The way he's looking at me…I know how he can get. He lets things break his heart so easy.
"I'm home, ain't I?" I say lighting up.
He's going to ask me for a drag, but I'm not going to start it. Then he'll be bumming off me all the time, and that won't do.
Not that I'll be around much apparently.
"What do they say about it round here?" I say.
He chews on his thumb for a minute. "They say…'why'd he kill him?' That kind of thing. They say a lot, but we don't answer.
Except Ebbie…he fought a couple of times and Tillo hit him, and Ebbie lit into him. He's got a wallop."
I sit up. "When this happen?"
"Pat took care of it," he says. "I went over and told Uncle John."
"Not Dad?"
"He…was gone…seeing to you."
"Why'd Tillo go for Ebbie and not you?" I say. Joseph and Tillo are same age.
"I ignore it," he says.
"Ignore it?" I say.
This is travesty. It took me years, well all my life to get it fixed in their minds…don't mess with Clannans. And I'm gone one year, and we're knuckling to the Smiths?
"Well, I'm home now."
"No, you're not," he says. "You have to leave tomorrow to stay with Uncle Frank."
"I can take care of the Smiths before I go," I say.
"Utz ain't around. He works for Otto now."
"Since when does Otto Smith work?"
"Since he took poorly. Utz quit school. Tillo is hardly there. He'll quit altogether is my hope."
"Why do you keep going?"
"Well, Miss Pat…. Anyway, it's not so bad."
Miss Pat this and that. Lord, it's worse than I knew. She's got her claws in all of them.
"You wanted out worse than me," I remind him.
"It's something to do," he says.
"Oh...you sweet on someone?"
He gets very red.
"Oh," I say. Same age as me when I fell for Sobe.
I know I've pledged several times in my life, even at State School to do better by him.
I like this, smoking…maybe being with him. He's close to Ulie though they ain't much alike. But I been in this place…boys around. Most I won't give another thought to, even if they haunt me some. I can't fix their lot.
Ulie, end of May we're going for him.
I fall asleep somewhere in there, listening to him go on about the dairy Dad plans to build. It's comforting to know they carried on, and it hurts some too, but hurt doesn't keep me awake like it used to.
We wake for milking. Joseph does, then me. I feel heaviness on me.
It hasn't changed. Dad wears his goofy winter hat that covers his ears and snaps over the top of his head. Ebbie works quiet. Joseph too. That milk hits the pan, and it's warm in here, warm enough they let it down, and our hands grow warm on their big teats.
State school…it was the comfort, the closest thing to being home…milking. For a minute I’m confused. Where am I? And Joseph calls out to Dad, and I know.
I’m home. I kissed Sobe in here first time. I've gotten better at it, kissing. I ain't mad at her anymore. I don't know if I ever really was. I’m just sad now. Twisted inside.
At the house, Mom makes over me, and I go in back, and Pee-Wee has drawn my water, and I take my time washing up cause I haven't washed good since coming home. I remember…this…water splashing in the pan, the smell of Fels-Naptha…the others laying the table and the chatter. The gaggle…and the wounded herd that can’t hold its own with Tillo.
And I think of that cold lavatory at State and how they beat me there, those soap slick boards against my face. I won them over. But what if…that’s all I do? I just lose now. I keep losing? What if I used all the luck God was ever going to give me to stay alive in State School, and now…I’m out?
Tears sting my eyes, and it makes no sense at all. I wash them away. I scrub.
Pee-Wee watches me from the doorway, and I smile at him while I work the rag back of my neck some. I try to hide the trouble I feel, and he is shy and too bold all at the same time. He looks like Joseph. He acts like him too, maybe some Ebbie thrown in, and that's a strange combination for sure.
We have a good breakfast, and I don't have much to say, but Maman gives me too much food, and I eat all of it. Ebbie comes in from taking the milk cans down, and he used the sled.
It hasn’t changed. But I have. That’s the thing. Dad says to give it time, but I already know it won’t go back like it was.
"I'll hitchhike into Mauman."
"In this weather?" Mom says.
"It don't bother me," I say, and they are quiet and all looking at me, and even Granma is looking at me like I've sprouted antlers. "Well go on and talk," I say. Then they do, but it sounds like they are play-acting at first.
"We know you went to Sobe last night,” Elsie pipes up. “You have no right to tell Sobe she can't go to school or do anything else, Tonio Clannan."
I can't believe my ears. I look up from my pancakes and Elsie is giving me the evil eye. The spirit of Rivers is everywhere!
"Who asked you?" I say.
"You can't even write a letter, not one letter in a year!" she says.
"I wrote Mom," I say.
"The most pathetic letter…no news at all. You had her worried," Elsie yells.
I feel no pressure to defend myself. If I'd of written the truth, they wouldn't have allowed it to be sent, and I'd been in trouble. Not that I'd have written anyway, and never Elsie. It didn't pain me at all to not hear from her. I wish her no ill, but she's only given me grief. Mostly grief. I'm proud of her, but I don't require much other than her doing well and making the folks happy. So I've got nothing to say. Nothing I want to bother with.
My father would have me say how sorry I was, but I'm not sorry so I motion Joseph should speed it up.
"Go on and ignore me just like always," she says. "And we're supposed to all be happy because the little Lord and Master has returned. Well, I for one…I don't care!" She bolts from the table then, jarring everything some.
Mom says her name as Dad says, "Here, here."
I look at Joseph and shrug, then Ebbie, only he looks sympathetic to his twin.
Little Lord and Master? Where does she get her jibes? She's meaner than ever apparently.
Elsie is quickly back, finger in the air. "And you should apologize to Miss Rivers. She's the best thing to ever happen to this family. She's going to help me the way she's helping Sobe."
I am watching this performance and refusing to give her what she wants. She is driving the knife in me, but I’d die before I knuckle to her.
I don't like Rivers. And I might not like Elsie. Not very much.
"Good for you," I say, draining my glass of milk and standing.
"Oh, go on. I wouldn't want to make you late. But if you think about it, Sobe has many more boys around her now. Real gentlemen," Elsie says. “Fact is, Sobe doesn't want to get married until she's eighteen!" Elsie says in this loud ringing voice. "But you won't take no for an answer. I swear you are an embarrassment, Tonio," she says very dramatically. "She probably wants to go to Europe just so you can't follow!"
"All right," Dad says, barely lifting his eyes from the newspaper.
"It's true, but no one will say it," Elsie continues.
"How is it God gave us so many disobedient children," Dad asks Mom. "Children who can't even hear their own father when he says, that's enough!"
"We're the ones who had to go to school and answer all the questions and the taunting. Did Dad tell you how they threw eggs at our truck? We came out of church, and everyone saw it. Dad had to attend meetings, the church board, the school board. He got off the boards for not being able to rule his own house. They wanted to punish him…punish all of us for what you did!"
Dad stands quickly. "That is enough Miss Elsie," he roars.
"Why can't he know?" Elsie thundered back. "Why is he so favored that he can't know what this cost us in pride and money? Short-handed and the boys taking the brunt of it at school, what is so special about Tonio that he can't answer for his sins but if I don't put the dishes away in time I have to go to bed an hour early when all I want to do is study anyway!"
"Elsie!" Maman says.
"I'm sorry Mother. Dad. But Sobe is my friend too. He caused all this trouble to our family because he wouldn't listen to Sobe. He's a thief and a fool. It's common knowledge he stole Otto Smith's mule. He broke up the school, he's been in jail and reform school. He won't go to church, you just watch him. And now he smokes. He sets a poor example for the boys, he ignores the girls like they are beneath him, he's not home one day, and he's got every eye on him, all the attention, everyone worried because he doesn't have the sense God gave a billy goat when it comes to thinking of others. He sees his mother is ill, and he adds to her sorrow. I say…I say get yourself to Mauman and good bloody riddance!"
I've never known my father to lose control of the family, but I see he has now.
Elsie lets out a scream like a cow trying to deliver a breech calf. She picks up her half-eaten plate of breakfast and throws the plate at me. I duck just in time to allow it safe passage to the wall where it breaks apart, and her eggs go sliding down the wallpaper.
This seems to rouse them, and they are all talking at once with Pee-Wee crying over the top of it. I nod to Joseph, and I get my extra gloves and my neck scarf and hat from the lean-to. When Maman calls after, I pretend I don't hear. And I nearly don’t. There’s a roaring in my ears and a sinkhole in my middle. I can’t go down. Not here.
Outside in the cold air, I come to it, and the anger takes over, and I kick through the snow all the way to the barn while I pull on my gloves and wonder aloud, "Did she say that? Did she say any of that?"
I mean Sobe Bell. Where would Elsie get such ideas if she hadn't been talking straight to the source?
I wouldn't ask Elsie if they held my feet in boiling pitch.
And my family…they can go to the devil with her. I got plenty to keep me busy. I got the deliveries with the oil and baseball, and I could sell magazines. And…then I remember Ulie. I have to stay here so he can get out. Damn. Well, not until then.
They ain't gonna be put upon with me until May.
And that girl, that maddening…girl Sobe Bell.
Elsie…is right about her. I only know the girl in the picture it seems, the image of the girl that turned on me in the Ford…soon after, right after we’d…I’d touched her. It was pity. It’s all she’s got for me. I never felt such shame. Not even when we saw the townies at the games and wore their old shoes, not even that touches this.
Joseph comes, and we work in silence. He helps me get the sled in the barn and lead Tibby to harness. She said she wanted to marry me. Did I force her from the start?
I try to remember, and I know because my brain holds things. She said from the first she couldn't leave her dad. But that was because she was scared of him, wasn't she? He was off his rocker from what I knew. But she didn't think she could leave him because he didn't have anyone else.
And he was crazy. He was dragging her all over. He would have taken her again and…maybe I'd never see her…again.
That's what drove me. Was that wrong? Yes, it got fierce, and I was strong, and I pushed her to save her. I pushed like that…but…am I still pushing?
I'm persistent, I'll give that. But that's a notable quality Dad says. He says most people don't have it, and I always did stick to what I put my mind on.
I put my mind on her that first day, first glance of her in that car. I remember how powerful it was, just a second of her passing, she looked at me. Well, I'd never seen anything like her.
I still feel that way.
And I never let her go. I've held tight. Being away, I just held tighter.
"You reckon…I've…with Sobe…what Elsie said. You reckon, there's some truth…?" I say to Joseph as we put Old Sam to harness.
He stops buckling a strap and he is looking at me with trepidation.
And that's all the answer I really need.
Chapter 87
Bill got his own truck a couple months back while I was away. Uncle Frank runs the station while Pat and Mike run the other truck or work with Frank. So I ride with Bill on his route because him, and Mike don't get along if they spend too much time together, and it's no better with Pat.
Bill is pretty boastful about it, how Mike just isn't ready for the responsibility of taking this longer, more difficult route so Frank puts him on the easier route that runs closer to Mauman. And comes to ambition, Pat's no better. They'd rather run their dogs and drink whiskey than open a station or increase their territory. Now Bill likes a beer enough, but he doesn't touch that whiskey like they do. So Mike will probably live with Frank for the rest of his life, and Pat, what woman would ever have him with his wild ways? He hopes I learned my lesson. That Shaun getting killed might be best thing could of happened for me.
"How's that?" I say catching myself from opening and closing my fists.
He goes on then how Shaun was only going to lead me further astray and get me, a boy, killed trying to play a man's game and Pat had no business going for that sheriff with me.
"Wasn't like that," I say.
And he goes on how it was just like that, and I already know he ain't talking to me to hear me out, he's talking so I hear him.
In my mind, I call him little BB. Boastful Bill. While he jabbers, I keep my eyes out the window mostly, and I smirk at myself in the glass if I'm in a mean mood and if I'm not I think about playing ball, and I try to decide if I like first base best or third, then I make up that show where Sobe comes and watches me play in the minors and I'm really good, of course, and she's about so proud of me, and real pretty too sitting there, front row in a white dress. And that always leads to that time with her and how warm she was in that place where I put my hand and touched her like I did, and I have to stop it then cause that thought is best saved for when I'm alone.
So while I dream all this, I smoke it down and pretty soon Bill is just like a giant katydid making noise in the background you don't hardly pay attention to.
He also likes to give me advice, even though I don't ask for it except once or twice while I'm learning the ropes. It takes me about two days to figure everything out, but he wants to believe I have a lot to learn, and he loves to finish about every sentence with it, "You've got a lot to learn, boyo."
And he thinks he sings like Jimmie Rodgers and yodels like him too, and I got news for him. I roll the window down when he gets going, no matter how cold it is. I sit up on the door sometimes keeping my head and most of my body outside just to get away from that foul sound he makes when he tries to sing. He tries to laugh at me, then he sings all the more to show me I'm mistaking, he's really good, but if I stay out too long he starts hitting at me, and he gets mad. I come in and say, "Well, shut-up then," and he pouts around for a while and says he's gonna tell his pop I can't ride with him, and I say, "Suits me fine."
He's a blowhard pretty much. Least brightest of my cousins, that's all. I look at the ledger, and it takes him too long to figure the numbers and I say, let me do it, and he says I can't, but then a few days later he says I can and he watches every number I write, and sometimes he tells me I'm wrong, but then he stares at it and mutters and guess what, I'm always right.
