Bad Ideas

by Missy Marston

  She opened her car door and got in. She turned on the wipers, which cleared enough paper away so that she could see out of the windshield. She backed up fast so that the garbage can slid off the front of the hood. She couldn’t really see out the back window, but she didn’t care if there was anything or anyone behind her. Then she put it in drive and peeled away.

  Part 2

  So Long at the Fair

  Because the end of summer means the beginning of something else

  Mercy loves parades. She loves to see the tractors pulling the floats, the beauty queens, the horses, the marching girls in their uniforms sending their batons whirling into the air. The spray of candy flying off the backs of trailers, kids scrambling along the side of the road, filling their pockets. It is Old Home Week in Preston Mills. This means several things. It means boring things like tractor pulls and church lunches that take forever, where Mercy will dutifully eat soft carrots and green beans and sit still for hours without complaining. But it also means the fair, fireworks, and, tomorrow, a parade.

  Old Home Week also means the end of summer. It means that soon she will get to go to school.

  “Grandma Claire, can I go on the Tilt-a-Whirl?” Mercy and Claire are walking along the packed-dirt path of the midway, picking at giant puffs of gauzy pink cotton candy. Speckles shuffles along beside them, the leash hanging slack from Claire’s wrist. Trudy has gone off to find Jules, who is doing a rocket car “demonstration” somewhere on the edge of the fairground.

  “Maybe later, hon. How about the Merry-Go-Round?”

  “That’s for babies!”

  “Ferris wheel?”

  “OK. But later maybe we can go on the Tilt-a-Whirl?”

  “Maybe.”

  Because what goes up must come down

  Claire looks over at the Tilt-a-Whirl, the giant laughing clown head in the middle of the track, the cars wheeling around and up and down, thumps and screams escaping from underneath the metal canopies. She steers her charges toward the Ferris wheel, looking doubtfully at the attendant leaning against the fence. He is shirtless and tanned a deep red-brown. When he smiles, his teeth are very close to the same colour as his skin. The colour of baked beans, thinks Claire.

  “Two please!” Mercy hands him the tickets as Claire loops the leash around the fence. Speckles howls after them as they get on the ride. The attendant puts the bar down in front of them, which touches Claire’s belly but looks to be about six inches from Mercy. Claire puts her arm around the little girl and pulls her close. She closes her eyes as they rise up, up into the air, the metal of the contraption screeching. “Grandma! I can’t breathe!”

  “Sorry, hon.” Claire eases her grip on Mercy, opens her eyes, and looks with wonder across the fairground. She sees the other rides, the tops of the chip trucks, the tops of peoples’ heads in groups here and there, and to the left of it all, the wide grey rippling St. Lawrence River. “Oh, Mercy. Look at that.”

  Mercy is leaning across her grandmother’s lap, her hair blowing around, getting into Claire’s eyes and nose. “Jules is gonna jump right over that whole thing. He is gonna fly, Grandma Claire!”

  Oh, I hope not, thinks Claire. Surely not.

  Mercy spreads her arms wide like wings as they drop over the crest of the wheel and begin their descent.

  Because there are rude surprises in this life

  The car is pulled over onto the gravel shoulder of the road. Trudy is behind the wheel, fuming. Jules is staring out the passenger side, his left eye blackened and slowly swelling shut. His hair stands up in a plume at the back of his head. His clothes are covered in dirt. Mercy is crying. And Claire, poor Claire, is bent over, throwing up into the ditch beside the road. Mercy scrambles out of the car and starts patting Claire’s back.

  “I’m sorry, Grandma. I didn’t know it would be like that.” This is true. Mercy thought the Tilt-a-Whirl would be fun. Gentle. A slightly more exciting version of the Merry-Go-Round.

  But no.

  The minute it had started, she had been terrified. The ride lurched into motion and Mercy smacked her head against the back of the car. It swung this way and then that, it went up and down. She couldn’t tell which way it would go next. It threw them around, Mercy’s jeans sliding across the slippery seat. One minute she was on top of Grandma Claire; the next, Grandma Claire was crushing her against the side. Mercy had been sure they would be thrown right off the ride. She started to yell at the operator every time she could see him, Stop the ride! STOP THE RIDE!

  Mercy’s yelling had started within the first full rotation of the ride, around ten seconds in; but it just went on. And on. It swung and it lurched. It tilted and whirled. Both Mercy and Claire had found themselves praying for death.

  Claire coughs. Another volley of hot pink vomit splatters onto the grass in front of her feet. Mercy takes a step back.

  “Grandma Claire, I didn’t know.”

  “I knew.”

  “What?”

  “I knew what it would be like! That’s why I didn’t want to go on it! But you wouldn’t stop, Mercy. Tilt-a-Whirl this! Tilt-a-Whirl that! Well, you got your Tilt-a-Whirl, didn’t you?” Claire digs in her purse for a tissue, wipes her mouth, and heads back to the car. Mercy follows.

  “I didn’t like it either.” Mercy is squinting up at the sky. “I thought I would. But I didn’t.”

  Claire grunts. Rolls her eyes. They settle into the back seat.

  “Are you mad at me, Grandma Claire?”

  “No.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry I even had that idea. It was a bad idea.” She shakes her head and looks out the window. This day at the fair hadn’t turned out the way she thought it would.

  Sometimes it’s like that.

  Because sometimes it’s better to just turn around and walk away

  Jules’s day at the fair hadn’t gone the way he thought it would, either.

  When he showed up at the fairground, a crowd was already gathering around the edges of the field. Great! The bleachers were full. His plan was to do a short jump (a half-dozen junkyard cars between two wooden ramps), start up the show car — let it shoot some flames and sparks out of its back end — and then shake some hands. Strictly routine. Nothing fancy. He didn’t want to risk getting hurt again before the main event. The new date — now the third date — for the jump was less than a month away, if all went well. He had his jumpsuit on with the red maple leaves down the sides. Calm, cool, and collected.

  And then that ferret Sammy Harrison came scampering over. Big smile on his face. It seemed to Jules that Sammy was at his most cheerful when delivering bad news.

  “I wouldn’t go over there if I were you.”

  “What?”

  “People are pretty pissed off, Jules. It might be better just to lay low for a while.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Jules strained to look around Sammy’s giant blond head at the crowd milling around in the distance. Were they holding signs?

  “Let’s go, Jules.”

  Would it have been better to stop then? To turn around, walk back to his car, and go home? To spare himself this glimpse into the black heart of Preston Mills? Jules would never know. Because he did not turn around and walk away. What he did was push Sammy out of the way and walk over to the field as if everything were perfectly normal. Business as usual.

  As he approached the crowd, people grew quiet. His pace slowed as he looked up at the bleachers and saw about fifty men, women, and children looking at him with disgust. They held signs with slogans. Variations on a theme. JULES TREMBLAY IS A CHICKEN or, simply, CHICKENSHIT! or TREMBLAY: JUMP OR DIE! There was a subcategory, as well, that focused on his being French-Canadian: AU REVOIR, JULES! (He was impressed by this.) And, less kindly: DIE, FROG! A chant started . . . Jump.

  Jump.

  JUMP!

  JUMP! JUMP! JUMP!
/>   Jules thought maybe he could turn it around. A few jokes, a reassuring story. A reminder that he was real, human, like them. That he meant to jump. That it wasn’t his fault the jump had been delayed. Twice. He was not tricking them. He raised his hand above his head to get their attention. Then something sailed through the air, shining red. A candy apple hit him in the forehead, sending him back on his heels, almost knocking him over. A streak of bright red shone above his right eyebrow. Then a shower of debris followed: popcorn cartons, ice cream cones, apple cores. As he started backing away, he looked over at the show car and saw that all the windows had been broken and the tires slashed.

  Not knowing what else to do, he turned his back on the crowd and started to walk away. He saw Trudy coming toward him from the edge of the field, ducking, her hand shielding her face from being pelted with garbage.

  Jules heard the scrape of boots on dirt behind him. As he turned, he saw the smiling blockheaded face of Jimmy Munro.

  He saw a fat, clenched fist.

  Three bright flashes of light accompanied by a whirring sound.

  Whirr-whirr-whirr.

  A fluttering, dusky gloom filled his eyes.

  Then pure black.

  Because joy can fill you up and send you right up into the sky

  And just like that, summer is over.

  “Don’t worry, Mercy. It’s going to be OK.” Trudy is staring straight ahead, watching the road. How can she stand it? Mercy going to school. It is unspeakable. Well, she thinks, at least Jules is still around. Small mercies: the summer has come and gone and her boyfriend had not driven his car off a ramp into the river. Yet. Every time Trudy drives past the ramp, she glares at it, hoping to bring it crashing to the ground with her mind. It is not out of the question. One day, she saw a hunk of earth the size of a tractor-trailer just crumble off one side and go land-sliding across the field in pieces.

  She fiddles with the radio to see if she can find a good song. “Joy to the World” is playing. She can live with that. Joy to the fishes and the bullfrogs and all that.

  “It’s going to be great!” Mercy shouts over the music. She loves this song. She is bouncing a little in her seat, looking out the window. “When will we get there? This drive is long.”

  “Don’t let anybody push you around.” Trudy is feeling a little sick, shaky. It hadn’t hit her until this morning. This dread. She wishes she could keep Mercy at home with her and Claire forever.

  “Nobody’s gonna be mean to me, Trudy. We’re all going to be friends.” She turns to address her directly, to make sure she is listening. “They’re all just little kids like me, Trudy.” Mercy looks out the window again and sighs. “I wish Speckles could come to school. Why can’t dogs come to school with you, Trudy?”

  Trudy ignores the question, keeps driving. She is thinking about how, when she was in school, there were some kids who had terrified her, who had made every single day a trial. Mostly boys, but some girls, too. Kids who, if you said hello to them, would laugh in your face. But if you walked by without saying hello, they would deride you for being a snob, for being too good. They would trip you as you walked by or shove your shoulder so that you fell sideways. Kids who would love an excuse, any excuse at all, to punch you right in the face.

  She hadn’t realized until halfway through high school that she had developed a sort of system, an actual physical posture of avoidance. Rolling her shoulders forward so her chest would not stick out, hands in pockets, tucking her buttocks in. Staring at the ground or to the side when she passed people. Making herself smaller, quieter. Like a sad old beaten-up dog.

  It is too much.

  How can she let Mercy go, just to be swallowed up by it all? It doesn’t seem right. It doesn’t seem possible that there is no choice. That there is only one way for kids to grow up. But the car is parked now and her feet keep walking across the pavement. One foot in front of the other.

  They walk across the parking lot to the kindergarten playground, holding hands. Mercy is hopping on one foot. She looks so happy, like she can barely stay tethered to the ground. The morning air is just a little bit cool, and the white sun flashes through the leaves of the trees around the grassy yard. It is early and there are a few kids — maybe half a dozen — milling around. Mercy lets go of Trudy’s hand and runs across the grass. Trudy watches her as she stops and talks to one kid, then another, then another.

  Mercy pirouettes around them, her fine straight hair flying around in the breeze.

  She turns and looks back at Trudy for a moment, checking to see if she is still there.

  Trudy waves but stays where she is. Breathing. She looks down at her feet on the pavement. Tanned nut-brown in her Jesus sandals, the grass of the yard just past her big toes.

  When she looks up again, Mercy is standing face to face with another girl. They hold each other by both hands, their foreheads almost touching. Mercy is smiling with her head cocked to one side. Her knees are bent, sprung tight, like she is about to leap into the air.

  Like she is about to launch herself high into the pale blue morning sky.

  Because you don’t always want to hear what other people think

  Jules is meeting his hero.

  Lionel “Lightning” Jones. The world’s most famous daredevil. In his star-spangled leather jumpsuits and capes, he has jumped over cars, school busses, waterfalls, and canyons on his motorcycle. He has thick blond hair, a Pepsodent smile, and claims to have broken every bone in his body at least once. And the network has sent him to Preston Mills, Ontario, to look at the site of The Mile Jump.

  The cameras are rolling. Jules is sweating, baking in the heat of the September sun. Finally, some dry weather. Better late than never. Lightning Jones looks out over the end of the ramp, then down at his feet.

  “When’s the jump?”

  “September twenty-third. Ten days away!” Jules tries for a smile, thinks he might make some kind of joke, but nothing comes to him. His throat hurts. Lightning turns away from him, squints into the sunlight.

  “Shouldn’t the ground settle or something? Didn’t they just finish this thing?”

  “It’s fine. Totally fine. That’s what they tell me, anyway.” Jules laughs unconvincingly, clears his throat. “It has to be.” Only that last syllable doesn’t quite make it out. His voice stops abruptly. His throat is closing, Jules is sure of it. The camera swings back toward Lightning.

  “Sure looks like a dangerous jump to me, boy. If you land in that water, you better have someone to get you out quick.” He shakes his head and puts his hand on Jules’s shoulder. “I wouldn’t do it. No, sir.”

  Whump, whump, whump. Jules can hear his own heartbeat, and something shadowy darts at the outside edge of his vision. The air seems to hum around his head.

  Lightning pats Jules twice on the shoulder and turns on his big wide smile for the camera. “You never know. Could be the daredevil stunt to end them all, buddy!”

  The cameraman nods, takes the camera off his shoulder, and starts packing up. Lightning reaches out and shakes Jules’s hand. He shrugs and turns to walk away down the ramp. Jules turns to follow him and almost trips. Pins and needles shoot up his leg. His foot has fallen asleep. Goddamn thing. Always doing that these days.

  Two days later, Sammy calls to say the network thinks the jump is too risky to broadcast live.

  Jules is pretty sure he knows what that means.

  Because some rides are too rough

  Jules has driven for three and a half hours to see his roommates in a small-town rodeo. Trudy declined to accompany him.

  Mark has successfully ridden two bulls, both of them heavy and sluggish but just energetic enough to earn him some points and keep him in the game. Both times he ended his ride by neatly jumping off and landing on his feet. One more and it will have been worth it to come. The next one will not be so easy, though. Mark casts a glance at the bull in the chute.

>   The bull’s name is Frankincense and Murder, son of Frankenbull, grandson of Frankenstein’s Monster. So it goes. Generation after generation of thundering evil. The bull swings its head toward the clutch of cowboys behind him. Its eyes bulge so that a ring of white shows at the edges.

  Jules watches as Mark lowers himself onto the back of the bull, his legs spread wide, straining. He shimmies forward until his crotch is touching the rope that is wrapped once around the huge chest of the animal, behind its shoulders. James is standing beside him on a rung of the fence, pulling the rope tight. A third cowboy stands on top of the fence on the other side with one boot on the shoulder of the bull, trying to push it away from the side of the pen. The bull is the colour of wet sand and weighs about eighteen hundred pounds. Muscles ripple below its coarse-haired hide.

  Jules wonders again: Why do we do these things? What has brought us here?

  Mark’s gloved hand is palm up on the back of the bull, flattened under the first round of rope. James gives the rope another heave straight up, and then Mark grabs it and wraps it around his hand twice. He has to use his other hand to bend his fingers closed around it. The bull shifts against the side of the pen, pinning Mark’s leg. Slowly, the bull increases force until Mark is wincing with pain. The bull kicks the back of the pen and then crouches down, kneeling forward, unseating the cowboy.

  Fuck.

  Mark unwraps the rope and is lifted off. They will have to start all over again.

  For the first time, Jules thinks his friend looks like he is getting nervous.

  It starts to rain. The arena is turning to mud. Eight seconds is all Mark needs. Stay on the bull for eight seconds. Get to the final round. Win a thousand bucks. Drive home. Please. Jesus, thinks Jules. Just one more time.