by Peter Hedges
“None. She had this smile on her face that made her so endearing. The most endearing dead person I ever remember. My dad thought so, too.”
“She was a great teacher,” Tucker pipes up.
“I guess so, because you hardly ever see flowers like the ones she got. Students from Chicago and Minneapolis even. Most impressive was a Dick and Jane reader series arrangement sent from Des Moines. Lance Dodge the newscaster sent them.”
“NO WAY!” Tucker is in shock.
“I’m not lying. The arrangement must have cost three hundred dollars.”
“Lance Dodge was in Gilbert’s and my class,” Tucker says in hopes that this will impress.
“Really?”
I nod.
“Gilbert and me have known him since like we were two.”
“He moved here when we were seven,” I say.
“Lance is you guys’ age?”
I nod.
“I thought he was older. He’s done so much for a young guy.”
I don’t nod. “We all had Mrs. Brainer.”
“Well, people were mighty impressed with the floral display he sent. He must be quite a guy.”
Finally my toast arrives, cold and with no jelly on the side. Beverly continues to seek her revenge.
Out of nowhere Tucker begins this giggling/laughing/hacking attack that he can’t stop. “Oh God. Remember. Oh my God. No wonder he sent those flowers.”
Bobby is turning pale. Apparently he’s never suffered through a Tucker laughing spell.
“Second grade—Jesus!”
“Breathe, Tucker,” I say, imploring him to slow down.
“How could I have forgotten?”
Bobby encourages Tucker by saying repeatedly, “What happened? What happened?”
“It was before afternoon recess. I look over and Lance Dodge is sitting in a puddle of his own piss. It had run out his pants, down his chair. Remember how she made him clean it up in front of everybody and he started crying? He was such a pussy, Lance was. Gilbert—remember that?”
I shove the small plate of toast crusts at Tucker. Then I slide out of the booth and stand.
“Gilbert? Hey! Where you going?”
I leave the Ramp Cafe and drive home.
***
Ellen is sunbathing on the front lawn on the nicest towel we own. She says nothing to me and I’m in the house fast. I run the water faucet in the kitchen sink and fill a half-gallon jug and proceed to chug every drop of water. The phone rings. Amy calls to me, “It’s Tucker!”
“Tell him I’m not here.”
I put my mouth up to the faucet and gulp down as much as I can. My stomach is stretched full with water. Amy comes into the kitchen as I turn the faucet off.
“He was calling about toast. Apparently you forgot to pay for some toast.”
I take a paper towel and dry my mouth.
“Aren’t you supposed to be working?”
“At twelve.”
“Oh.”
I ask what time it is while I’m heading for the front door.
“Eleven thirty-fiveish.”
“Great! Bye, Amy.”
Ellen is rubbing lotion on her stomach as I shift my truck into reverse. Arnie has climbed the willow tree out back and is shaking a branch as if to wave. I wave back and drive away.
I pull into the parking lot of my old school. It is red brick, and the windows have been boarded up since it closed seven years ago. I went there for thirteen years. The summer after I graduated they closed it down due to declining enrollment. There are those who think the building should be torn down—as it has no apparent use. They’ll never do it, though. Too many memories for too many people.
I sit in my truck and remember going there. I look at the rusty playground equipment. The slides and swings are smaller now. I listen for the sounds of kids playing at recess, but there is only quiet. I lift my T-shirt and wipe the sweat off my face. Minutes pass.
When I spin out of the parking lot, my truck kicks up gravel. I hit Highway 2, the curvy, twisting highway, going twenty-two miles over the speed limit. I’m at the county cemetery in no time. I park to the far side. I walk to a certain grave where the dirt is brown and freshly dug. There is no tombstone yet—just a slip of paper, a tag, that identifies the deceased. My father had the same type of tag seventeen years ago. I guess dying never changes. An old woman is over near where Dad is buried, so I face away from her. My desire is not to offend the innocent. I am ready. I unzip my pants and proceed to pee all over Mrs. Brainer’s grave.
***
I speed back to town with my radio blaring. I sing along to a song by one of those whatever-happened-to-them? groups—Bachman-Turner Overdrive.
“Takin’ care of business
every day
Takin’ care of business
And workin’ overtime”
Back at the Ramp Cafe, the McBurney Funeral Home hearse is driving off with Tucker’s truck set to follow. I pull in behind him, blocking his exit.
Tucker is out fast, shouting, “I hate you, Gilbert. I hate you! I’m telling a story, a funny, funny story and you just leave like that! You don’t even pay your bill! I mean, some friend you are. Embarrassing me like that. I have pride, you know that? Huh? Did you know that!”
I let him go on for some time about how I don’t deserve his friendship. He sounds like a bad boy scout. Finally I say, “Hey, dummy.”
“I’m not the dummy! You are the dummy, Gilbert.”
“It wasn’t Lance Dodge who peed his pants.”
“Yes, it was. I was there.”
“No, dummy. It was me.”
I rolled up my window.
Tucker says, “You? No way. No way! …uhm… oh boy.”
I shift to reverse and begin to back out.
“Oh yeah.” Tucker remembers now. He’s frantically trying to apologize as I drive away.
If it were possible, I wouldn’t talk to Tucker for a week. I deserve better friends.
The Ramp Cafe is in the distance now and I’m alone with my thoughts. My only regret is that I didn’t pee on Mrs. Brainer while she was alive.
17
A case could be made that Gilbert Grape became the thinker, the dreamer that he is while stocking the many cans and bags and food items for the people of this town.
Over the years my technique has become so automatic, so natural, that I don’t need to think about what I’m doing. No, my thoughts wander off wherever they want. I’m usually not in the same place mentally that I appear to be physically. Either I’m in Des Moines at Merle Hay Mall or driving across the desert or standing on an Omaha rooftop waiting for a tornado to come ripping. Know this—I am rarely in this store or in this town in my thoughts.
I’m pricing the breakfast cereals when Mr. Lamson comes up behind me. “Wonderful surprises are in store for us all, Gilbert.”
Startled, I almost drop the Wheaties I’m holding. I manage a “Huh? What?”
“Surprised you, did I?”
“Yes, sir.”
“So you see my point.”
I nod.
“I knew you would.”
For years Mr. Lamson has taken great joy in surprising me. He’s hidden under the counter, behind the dog food, and once he almost froze to death in the freezer waiting for me to open it so he could yell “Surprise.” When I finally did, his eyebrows had begun to frost and his lips had turned blue.
I whisper under my breath, “Wonderful surprises—I’m waiting.”
Mr. Lamson sees my mouth move. “What was that?”
“Nothing, sir.”
Mrs. Lamson, who is in the little office cubicle waiting for money to count, calls out. “Dad, do they got some special going on at Food Land?”
“Not that I know of. Gilbert, anything going on at Food Land?”
“Oh, I’m not the one to ask. Never shopped there. Never will. Would rather die.”
“You do not mean that.”
“Sir,” I say, “I’m afraid tha
t I do. I go to a store for food. Not for…”
“They must have something going,” Mrs. Lamson chimes in, walking all over my words and not seeming to mind. “Because nobody is here.”
I can’t bring myself to tell them what Tucker told me the other day. It seems that Food Land installed an aquariumlike tank where they keep crabs or octopus or lobsters with their arms or claws or whatever taped shut. People crowd around; kids make faces at the creatures—glad, I guess, that they’re not the ones trapped inside.
I look up at the Wonder Bread clock. The forty-seven minutes I’ve worked today feel like forty-seven days.
“Gilbert, you sure you don’t know something we don’t know?”
“Honey,” Mr. Lamson says, “I’m sure Gilbert would fill us in if he knew something was up over there. Wouldn’t you?” Mr. Lamson smiles his yellow-toothed grin and glides down Aisle Two.
Mrs. Lamson starts singing the “Iowa Corn Song.”
“Ioway, Ioway
State of all the land
Joy on ev’ry hand
We’re from Ioway, Ioway
That’s where the tall corn grows.”
I feel a tap on my back. It’s Mr. Lamson—he’s circled around and his eyes look misty. “If only there was another woman like her. If there were two of her, you could have one,” he says.
Finally, for the first time in weeks, I’m able to say something and mean it. “You don’t know how much I would like that, Mr. Lamson.”
“Oh, I know, son. Believe me, I know.”
The singing stops. “What are you boys talking about?” she calls back. “You’re not poking fun at my music?”
“Never!” Mr. Lamson says.
“No, ma’am.”
“Then how come no applause?”
So me and the boss clap. He yells out a bravo and I toss a dime.
Outside, the Carver family station wagon drives by with the boys in back. Mrs. Betty Carver half waves. I turn away hoping she didn’t see me see her.
I uncrate a box of assorted Campbell’s soups. I stamp on the purple prices and sort them into flavors or types or whatever. And as I stack the cans, the image of that station wagon of hers stalled on Highway 13 flashes. I pulled over and helped her. I was almost seventeen and it was an easy fix, her car, and she seemed surprised that I could fix things, and I was surprised that a woman who’d seemed so uninteresting to me before could suddenly become so interesting. She complimented me on my skill and I replied—innocently, I might add—that I had always been pretty good with my hands. She said I was “adept,” and I said I didn’t know what that meant, and she said I should look it up in the dictionary, and I said I’m not interested in looking up things, that if you have to look it up then what is the point, and she said that she would be happy to teach me.
“Gilbert?”
Mr. Lamson is standing next to me. I listen without looking. My sights are on the soup cans.
“Between you and me…?”
“Yes, sir?”
“Man to man?”
Sensing his concern, I stop with the cans and turn his way. I look him in the eye and almost succeed in ignoring the Band-Aid that holds his broken glasses together.
“It’s those goddamned lobster tanks, isn’t it?”
“I think so, sir.” How did he know that I knew?
“Crap.”
“Sir, it’s just a fad. How long can lobsters in a tank be interesting? Flash and pizzazz and neon are but passing fancies. There will be a resurgence of simple dignity.”
“You think?”
“Yes, sir. You and your way. It—we will prevail.”
“You sound any more hopeful, Gilbert, I’ll begin to think I’m talking to the ghost of your father.”
I want to say, “I’ve never missed having a father, because of you,” but I stay quiet.
He whispers back to me, “Let’s keep those lobster tanks between us. It would break Mother’s heart.”
“I won’t say a thing.”
***
It’s later now and I’ve moved on to the coffee cans. As I zip along, I review the sequence of Mrs. Betty Carver in my life.
It was the summer after I graduated high school. The Carver family was in the checkout line and the boys were just babies. Mr. Carver was saying something to his wife about not buying candy. “Candy is bad for your teeth and why would you want to damage your wonderful teeth?” I was doing something, listening rather than working, and Mr. Lamson was ringing up their purchases. I was back by the metal stockroom door that swings, and Mrs. Carver walked right up to me, holding her newborn baby in one arm and a pound of bacon in the other. She said, “Gilbert?” I said, “May I help you, ma’am?” She spoke softly because there were other shoppers. “Forget it,” she said. “No, what?” I said. Her baby was dribbling on her nice breasts. I remember her words exactly. “Gilbert, will you come…” She swallowed. Her voice was shaky. “Ken works most days and I can drop the boys off at a sitter. Will you come see me some time?” Mr. Carver called from the cash register. “You coming, honey?” She said, “Just a second,” and continued whispering to me. “Come by Tuesday. I know that’s your day off. Can I expect you?” I remember wondering how she knew when my day off was and why she was looking at me in this new way, this eager way. All of a sudden I said, “Yes,” without thinking. She looked deep into my eyes, deeper than anyone ever had, to see if I was telling the truth. “I hope you’ll be there,” she said. Mr. Carver called again, “Honey, what are you doing?” While holding the drooling child, she exchanged one package of bacon for another and said loudly, “I’m looking for some better bacon!” The cash register was still ringing when Mr. Carver, who always speaks louder than he needs, said, “What’s wrong with what we’ve already got?”
***
I’ve finished pricing the coffee. I move on to the pickles. “Aren’t pickle prices higher than this?”
“Maybe at Food Land, Gilbert. Not here. We’ve always had a reasonable deal on pickles.”
That is an understatement.
I’m fast at pricing foods. I do the work that three or four of those high school puberty types do at the Food Land. This is not bragging. This is fact.
I stamp the first of several pickle jars and remember that Tuesday in June. It was seven years ago. I showered twice. We hid my truck in their garage and I sat in Mr. Carver’s chair. She brought out lemonade and cookies. She said nothing the entire time I sat there. I said “Thank you” when I left. She smiled as if to say “You’re welcome” but there were no words. This went on for six or seven Tuesdays. It was August before I walked in and took her head in my hands and kissed her. Her mouth tasted like coffee. September came and my classmates went to college. I stayed and studied Mrs. Carver.
***
“The pickles are done, what’s next?” The kneeling has made my legs stiff, so I stand and shake them out. The purple ink from the stamper is all over my hands. “Mr. Lamson, did you hear me? Boss?”
He’s ringing up a purchase at the cash register, so no answer comes from him. “What’s next?” I call out. “I’m on a roll.” Walking briskly down Aisle Three, I get a whiff of a certain perfume. My walking slows. I peek through the potato-chip rack. I see the hands of a girl getting change. The hands lift a large watermelon. Don’t let those hands be hers. I quietly move two bags of chips to get a better look. I see hair, black and full, shiny and clean. I see skin, such beautiful skin. A nose with a slope, yes. My heart is racing. I make a quick check for some flaw or mole or harelip. I haven’t had a good look at her teeth yet. Surely there has to be some imperfection.
Mr. Lamson says something about this particular watermelon being about a fifteen- to twenty-pound piece of fruit. He asks how she intends to get it home.
“Bicycle.”
Mr. Lamson calls out my name.
I usually beam with pride when my name is shouted across a room—but today, at this moment, I wish my name were Roy or Dale. Maybe Chadwick.
&nbs
p; “Gilbert! Gilbert!”
“He’s behind the chips.”
I step out quick and stand there certain that my fly is open or my hair is all matted and gross. How did she know where I was?
“Delivery, Gilbert. Would you be so kind?”
“Huh? What?”
“Delivery, son.”
“Yes,” I say, as if I have a choice.
The Becky girl turns. She seems totally unimpressed. She’s wearing one of those flower-patterned summer dresses, green and white. The kind of summer dress that my grandma would like her granddaughter to be wearing; the kind of dress Gilbert would like to help her hike up.
“Son, get moving.”
“Huh?” I stand there numb.
“Help the young lady already.”
“Yes. Yessir. Help.”
18
She holds the door for me. I wish she wouldn’t. I place the watermelon on the passenger seat. Without looking at her I say, “You can ride in back.”
“I have a bike.”
“The bike will fit in back, too,” I say without turning around.
“I prefer to pedal,” she says. She hops on her ten-speed and starts down Main Street. She cuts across the empty lot next to Carver’s Insurance. I follow, going slow, careful not to let the melon sitting next to me fall to the floor.
She pedals up the path to the water tower. My truck can’t go there so I wait for her to make a move. She’s a good distance from me; she faces my way and waits. So I wait. She’ll stay there all day, undoubtedly, so I get out of my truck and begin to walk toward her, cradling the melon. I’m about halfway there when she starts toward me. I expect her to stop but she zips past, almost knocking me over, and cuts back across the empty lot. She shoots across Main Street.
Me and the melon are back in the truck driving to find her, when I see the McBurney Funeral Home hearse make a U-turn. I pull up next to Bobby at the stoplight, one of three in Endora. He rolls down his passenger window.
“Did you see her? Did you see her!” he shouts.
“Afraid so,” I say.
The light stays red for an eternity.
“Bobby, how old are you!”
“Twenty-nine!”
“Aren’t we a little too old for this kind of thing?”