It is mid December and it has not yet snowed. The
trees look like calligraphic ink spilled against the overcast nickel canvas of
the sky. We are in Chicago for a school field trip at the Museum of Science and Industry. The Young Columbus contest is five weeks away. Christmas is less than two. I am working on my speech, sitting down at my desk across the window where the college girls strip chiseling into the page ever night with the same linguistic ardor that I wrote my father the letter when he told me I can no longer see Renae. I am rehearsing ideas. I am gesticulating with my arms in front of the full length mirror in the music room. We are at the museum. We walk through an exhibit of a bituminous coal mine. We walk through a German Submarine. Patrick is talking about Amy no stop. He tells me that he has plans to go to the bank and take out his life savings of 200 dollars out and buy Amy a bracelet like the one renae got me for Christmas only this one will be nicer since it will cost more and have an Irish wedding blessing written in Gaelic on the back. Patrick tells me that he thinks he can get his older cousin to reserve them a hotel room at the seedy Blarney Inn at the North side of town.
I have not spoken at all with Renae about Patrick and Amy but can speculate from her pensive sigh over the phone that Amy is just not that interested in Patrick.
You know, the Blarney Inn. That's the one where all the beds look like bag pipes and a mirror fell off the ceiling on that city council man last year."
“So Amy hasn’t called you all week?”
Patrick says dude, she has once.
Patrick says dude, she has once.
Somebody called me when I was in the shower but it might have been Tim. You know how he has voice sounds like a girls sometime.
"Patrick bro its been a week since you’ve heard from her."
“You think what?”
"Patrick it’s been over a week she hasn’t called you."
I ask Patrick how many times he calls Amy. He says three or four time a night but her brother always answers the phone and she's never home. Pat said that he even called over to Limestone and tried to have her paged but when they realized he wasn't an immediate family member the secretary hung up.
I stop. We are outside the exhibit showing
the human embryo in various life size stages of gestation.
Patrick looks at me and asks me what I know.
"Patrick bro its been a week since you’ve heard from her."
Patrick’s shoulders ascend and drop. He says the word so.
“So, bro, Listen I mean, she would contact you .”
Dude, we were pretty hot the other night. She just needs some time to calm down.
“No, Pat. She’s blowing you off.”
Patrick is pensive again. He crooks his eyebrows. He asks me what the fuck I mean.
“I mean that she really liked you on the phone at all and I totally believed that you guys connected. I just think that after your guys hung out in person…”
I stop. The last thing I want to do is rip apart a brother.
I am thinking about Renae. I have the bracelet manacled around the white of my wrist
“It’s just that maybe last week was all there was. I
talked with Renae and apparently every time she speaks with Amy..."
“Dude, your girlfriend is her best friend.” Patrick is quiet again,
We are looking at the world's largest fairy tale castle that looks like it is manufactured out of blue cardboard and cotton candy.
"Dude, you have to help me out with this one bro. You have to help me out. Your girlfriend is Amy's best friend. You have to talk with Renae and find out how Amy truly feels.
***
This is the year I am writing my speech myself. This is the year I tell mom and dad that I will go out and collect recommendations.
I am training for the young Columbus much as I trained for Cross-Country the year before. I keep notecards in my pocket, next to my bible, next to the picture of Renae Holiday. I go over the dynamics. I look outside myself in the mirror. Fort some reason I can’t picture London as vividly as I could picture Paris in years past. I have completely ignored the yellow frame every time the corner of my eyes espies the shot of a roving shadow.
I have taken almost a month off running fast. I am taking it easy. When I do run down the Christmas decorations of Moss Avenue it feels like I am running at a steady canter. Slowly I am building up my mileage.
***
We have gotten a brand new upright piano.
“We’re selling the grand piano,” Dad says. The grand piano with elephant tusk ivory. The grand piano that is in the music room where my parents keep the cool dresser with all their albums from when they were in college. The music room where I slaved laboriously over Alfred colored coated piano series. The music room where we played Box Car children under the baby grand piano while growing up when my mom used to baby sit my cousin Matthew. The piano room where I was thinking about the time I inadvertently saw my 2nd grade girlfriend stepping out of the inky shadow of her dance recital leotard, pressing my torso against the carpet when my father entered the room and told me that my Nana Grace, my first story teller, had died.
The piano where all three of us siblings have chipped parabolic tooth imprints on various legs.
“We don’t need two pianos." My father says. When my parents first moved into the house they purchased a grand piano before they bought a television so that they would always have music.
"They are actually going to come and move it Christmas eve morning. After they move the piano we can open presents. " I tell Renae waiting for an opportune time to bring up Patrick and Amy.
After the music room is vacant I am to move in. My sister Jenn will get my old bedroom across the hall. Beth will have the room she has shared with he sister all her life upstairs.
As is tradition, we always open presents Christmas Eve morning. This year we will be opening presents as soon as the grand piano is moved. Renae has already informed me that she is leaving early Christmas morning togo up to Chicago.
Reane has already told me what she is getting.
“My father is getting me a new stereo system plus a Disc Man. I pointed it out to them at Best Buy over the weekend and told them that was the system I wanted.”
Renae tells me that she’s supposed to look really surprised when she opens the package.
I tell Reane that my father is always pulling crazy jokes like that.
She doesn’t seem to be paying attention.
I miss you, Renae says.
She tells me that she really needs to see me sometime soon.
***
It’ll be pretty cool,” I tell Renae over the phone. Renae say she is excited about me coming to her father’s annual Christmas party. I still have not asked her how Amy feels about Pat. Her father's party is going to be a Sanders, a place where my father eats breakfast at all the time. I ask isn't that the bar you used to drive down to pick your father up when he was drunk/
"Just come. I can't wait to see you again. I miss you."
I tell her that I miss her too.
***
"Just come. I can't wait to see you again. I miss you."
I tell her that I miss her too.
***
The girls are doing the Community theatre play down
at Roosevelt. Two year sago it was Bye Bye Birdie and I kept the program and
kissed Principal black and White photo of Martha Thomas and my mother and both Karen
Christmas and her mom were also in the Chorus. Last year the playhouse did
Oklahoma Martha Thomas
They are performing Music Man. They are singing the
same songs that I fell in love with last summer. One of my sister Beth’s best friends
landed the role of Zaneeta and is ye Gadsing all over the place. It is a professional
production, ibid, there are adults. They go around the house humming Iowa
trouble and 76 trombones.
I am reliving
last summer through the chime of their voice.
I am working on my speech. I am thinking about the
possibility of setting foot on English soil.
I am thinking about the possibility of going someplace
far away.
***
I go after class to see Coach Ricca and tell him that I have still been running 30 miles a week. He smiles. I tell him that I haven’t been pushing it but I am getting ready for track and field. I tell him that I find myself running through the hills of Bradley park and ending up next to the Track at Minnen Field and timing my mile
“Last year as an eighth grader I never officially broke 5:00 minutes in the mile even though I was one of the fastest in ths state at the time.
Coach smiles. Sometimes the merlot-chakra of his forehead correlates with the subtle hint of red in his hair. He is smiling.
“Listen, Coach, I was wondering if I could ask a favor of you.”
***
I go after class to see Coach Ricca and tell him that I have still been running 30 miles a week. He smiles. I tell him that I haven’t been pushing it but I am getting ready for track and field. I tell him that I find myself running through the hills of Bradley park and ending up next to the Track at Minnen Field and timing my mile
“Last year as an eighth grader I never officially broke 5:00 minutes in the mile even though I was one of the fastest in ths state at the time.
Coach smiles. Sometimes the merlot-chakra of his forehead correlates with the subtle hint of red in his hair. He is smiling.
“Listen, Coach, I was wondering if I could ask a favor of you.”
Bob and Frank go crazy overboard Christmas decorations. Their house looks like a variegated Toy chest from the outside.
I have been purposefully ignoring Bob and Frank. Now I need their help.
As I walk in Bob tells me careful you don’t want to stand to close to Frank underneath the mistletoe.
“You have no clue what will be popping down your southern chimney.”
Bob and Frank laugh in unison. I laugh as well. It is always hard not to laugh when Bob and Frank are around.
They ask where I’ve been. They ask if they are overdue. I lie and tell them they are fine.
“Hey I was actually wonder if I could ask a favor of you guys.”
Frank elbows me in the ribcage and tells me that he’s always said he would hook me up with rubbers if I need them as I long as I tell them all the details. I say not that.
“The thing, for the last two years I’ve been in this contest. You have to get nominated for it. It’s a journal Star paper boy thing. The winner gets an all expense paid trip to Europe. The last two years it was to Paris. This year it is to England.”
Bob and Frank go crazy. Bob is actually familiar with the trip.
Frank fires up a cigarette.
“We see the add in the paper and we fill out a form to nominate you every year.”
There is laughter. I tell them thankyou.
"No, this year I was wondering if you could write me a recommendation. It doesn’t have to be anything large. Just a recommendation stating why I should win."
I tell Bob and Frank I know it sounds arrogant. They tell me not at all.
“I can give you an envelope and a stamp. I really don’t mean to inconvenience you. It’s just that you guys have always been so kind to me..”
Bob is placing is hand up like a police office halting traffic.
“Consider it done. Really, it would be an honor.”
I tell them thanks. I tell them I always enjoy how kind they treated me.
“Well have the letters to you when you collect next week.”
Bob and Frank tell me that it is no problem.
That it is no problem at all. As I am leaving I notice that they are watching Figure skating. I stop in front of their television. She is the most beautiful skater gliding contorting her body to the most beautiful song I have ever heard. She is swearing a lander outfit. She looks like an escaped snow angel.
The song sounds like the distilled yawn of a cherub. I look at the television again. I realize I am seeing Mary McCellan. Mary who lives down the street in the white house that looks like the White House. Mary who always screams out my name whenever she sees me. Mary with the twin brother who died in a car wreck last summer. Mary whose mom is like my surrogate mom and who despises that I go to Manual.
Bob turns to Frank and says watch out, it looks like someone is in love.
As I am walking home it begins to snow.
The song sounds like the distilled yawn of a cherub. I look at the television again. I realize I am seeing Mary McCellan. Mary who lives down the street in the white house that looks like the White House. Mary who always screams out my name whenever she sees me. Mary with the twin brother who died in a car wreck last summer. Mary whose mom is like my surrogate mom and who despises that I go to Manual.
Bob turns to Frank and says watch out, it looks like someone is in love.
As I am walking home it begins to snow.
That Friday night I call Amy. When her brother answers
and asks who is calling I say Dave. There is a pause.
I ask Amy what’s up with Patrick. She tells me that
nothing is up with Patrick.
“He talks bout you incessantly. He is worried about
you. He want to know if you are okay?”
Amy says she is fine, right as rain, couldn’t be
better.”
An awkward pause gnaws between us on the phone.
“Listen, just talk to him so he knows where you to stand. Obviously he has a
different perspective about the nature of your rapport.”
Amy says that she could talk to Patrick if she so
desired though she feels that she has nothing left to say to him.
“That’s just the thing. You need to convey that to him
because he is driving me batty drooling over you none stop. All I ever hear is
how he is madly in love with you. You need to call and verbalize just where you
stand in this relationship so he knows.”
Somehow I can see her lolling her head and talking to
me with her hand pressed out like a yield sign
“Amy he’s going crazy. You just need to talk to him. You just need to convey that to him. It is driving me batty. I don't know exactly what you did to him in the movie theatre last week but he's going nutzoid so unless you are willing to go down to the police department and have a restraining order warranted you need to talk him as gently as possible and let him know that this is over."
“Amy he’s going crazy. You just need to talk to him. You just need to convey that to him. It is driving me batty. I don't know exactly what you did to him in the movie theatre last week but he's going nutzoid so unless you are willing to go down to the police department and have a restraining order warranted you need to talk him as gently as possible and let him know that this is over."
Amy is not saying anything.
"Okay." She says, sounding as if she has a pack a day habit.
I tell her okay as well before telling her goodbye.
“Patrick can take care of himself, he’s a big boy.”
“I know,” I repeat again, for some reason feeling compelled to justify the adherent amour of my friends heart as if on stilts.
“I just think that your friend played his heart like some sort of junior high fiddle, that’s all, he’s been depressed ever since .”
Renae makes the comment stating that Patrick is always depressed no matter what. I tell her that she has a point.
I look at the gold bracelet manacled to the interior of my wrist with my name christened on the front in thick alphabetical block like font . Somehow this has become the most valuable thing I own. I think about what would happen if I gave Renae the confirmation ring that my grandmother gave me, the ring with the initials DVB etched inside. The ring that my parents explicitly told me was not to go on the fingers of any girl. Ever.
I think about the green Gideon bible lodged in my front right pocket and how I just cannot help but picture Renae unzipping her tight jeans that seem custom fit to accentuate the features of her ass, reeling her blouse north. I can’t help but wanting to sneak into the side window of her bedroom at night, the room with the giant James Dean poster splattered over her headboard, and, with the lurking toed-tip stealth of a burglar, traipse over her possessions of youth littered on her bedroom floor, past the backpack, the clarinet case, the bushes of sloughed jeans and blouses before looking at the face of the woman who is me so-called girlfriend, her hair tied back in a bow, her eyes melted into the topography of her cheekbones in a way that is very sexy indeed.
“I still think she played him,” I say, “I mean, common, if she doesn’t want to date him she should just tell him, not make out with him and lead him on. Seriously baby, your friends…”
“I love you too.” Renae says, in a sarcastic almost uppity patois, the way she responds when she is irked at me. Quickly we rectify. I tell her that I can’t stop thinking about her. I tell her that hearing the chimes of her voice is the pinnacle of my day. I use the word pinnacle even though she asks what that word means.
As is customary we tell each other “love you,” Before we hang up. Renae to call Amy and tell her the elbow rant of her boyfriend and how he thinks that his good friend somehow got played. I think about calling Patrick, but realize that he will inevitably call and bitch soon enough. Feeling the bible in my right pocket I try to refrain from the interior smile that would drip off of Renae’s face as she wakes up and the first thing her eyes fell into is the sight of my vision, the feeling of my lips planting kisses into the movie screen of her forehead before buttoning her lips with my lips, my body, on top of her body, a smile of filched excitement tucked into her lips before she tells me yes indeed.
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