Tommy didn’t care much for mechanical work. He dreamed of becoming a musician. Years ago, he’d saved up for a guitar and had taught himself to play. He was getting pretty good at it too.
His father had other plans for him. He insisted that one day Tommy would take over the business, and toward that end, he’d been teaching him. But no matter how well Tommy thought he was doing, the look on his adoptive father’s face said the same old thing—you didn’t do enough, Tommy, didn’t do it right, didn’t do it when I said I wanted it done.
“I’m sorry, Dad. I’ll stay home tomorrow and finish up Mr. Clark’s Chevy—”
John Cooper cut him off with a grunt. He was a man of few words and the grunt covered a whole lot of them. Mostly, Tommy didn’t want to hear them anyway. Gently, he set his mother back on her feet.
“Why don’t you go wash up for dinner, Tommy? You can work all this out later,” Laura said, smoothing her simple housedress.
She was wearing that nervous smile now— the one that made her look older and well… smaller somehow. Tommy took her cue and attempted to squeeze through the kitchen doorway past his father. John didn’t budge.
“Excuse me?”
Another grunt. As their eyes locked, Tommy turned sideways and squeezed through anyway, though John Cooper made sure that their shoulders bumped along the way.
Minutes later the Cooper family had gathered around the table. The clock on the wall said 6:15, but of course it was set to fifteen minutes too fast. Dinner was at six o’clock sharp in the Cooper household. Six o’clock, not six-ten or six-fifteen. The ticking of the clock was the loudest sound in the room as John Cooper carved the ham. ‘Time is money,’ it said.
“As long as you’re feeling better tonight, I’m going to need you to write out some bills, Laura,” John said, spearing a slice of ham and passing the platter. “We got doctor bills piling up.”
“I’ll get to it right after dinner,” she replied, passing the ham to Tommy’s half-sister, Julie, who was thirteen. Julie had the proper color hair and eyes—dark, like John’s.
“You’re not eating?” John asked, noticing that Laura hadn’t taken any ham.
“I’ll have a little something. Maybe just some bread and butter. I’m not real hungry tonight.”
Another grunt. This one said that maybe if she’d eat, she’d get well and stop causing all this trouble. Tommy had the ham now and helped himself to a slice.
“Bob Jackson must owe me pretty near fifty bucks by now.”
The mashed potatoes made the rounds next. ‘Tick-tock,’ the clock said,‘times a wastin’!’ John made to spoon the peas onto his plate. A look of disgust passed over his face as he glared into the bowl and then turned those steely eyes toward his wife.
“Christ, Laura! There’s hair in the peas! Now how am I supposed to eat that?”
Laura hadn’t time to answer him yet when he reached over and gave a quick tug on her short hair, coming away with an entire lock of the stuff. He looked as though he was going to be ill now and that didn’t make him happy at all. No one moved. No one breathed.
Grimacing, John Cooper tossed the lock of hair to the floor.
“Christ,” he repeated. “Now your hair’s falling out.”
Laura slid her chair back and made to get up.
“I’ll make some more,” she said, her cheeks red with embarrassment. “It’ll just take a few minutes.”
“Pass the peas,” Tommy demanded. His voice was tight, his blue eyes locked on John’s brown ones.
“Well, you’ll have to wait now, won’t you?” John answered coolly.
“Pass me the goddamned peas!”
Tommy didn’t wait for John to pass the bowl, but instead reached over and took it. He piled an extra spoonfull on his plate making sure he got the peas with the hair in them. That was his mother’s hair and he’d take it. He began shoveling peas, hair and all, into his mouth, glaring back at John as he swallowed.
“Sit down, Ma. The peas are fine,” Tommy said firmly. “In fact, they’re great. Best I ever had.”
Laura Cooper looked as if she’d like to run away. As if she’d had anyplace to run, she’d probably have run then. Instead she sat back down.
John Cooper took another swig of his beer and grunted. You make me sick, Tommy, with your wrong-colored hair and eyes. You make me god-awful sick!
They finished the meal in silence while the damnable clock ticked on.
CHAPTER TWO
Tommy knew something was wrong the minute he heard Beth’s voice on the other end of the phone line. She didn’t sound right—her voice tight, conversation short and to the point. Well, that and the fact that she had asked him to meet her at Sutter’s rock instead of the cemetery.
“Tommy, it’s me. I’m heading to Sutter’s Rock. Can you come?”
“Sheesh, Beth, I don’t know. If I don’t finish this Chevy this morn—”
“Please?”
And there it was. Beth needed him, Chevy be damned. He dropped the oily rag he’d been scrubbing his hands with, washed up quickly in the utility sink in the corner of the garage, removed his coveralls, and walked out the door. John would be pissed, but then again, John was always pissed. If it wasn’t this, it would be something else anyway. He’d worry about that later.
He made Sutter’s field within five minutes. Sutter’s Rock wasn’t much of a landmark, as landmarks go. It was just a rock, really, albeit a very, very large rock, but it was the only very large rock in Mr. Sutter’s sprawling cornfield. The cornfield itself stretched over several acres adjacent to the cemetery. And if you didn’t know the rock was there, if you’d never been around in the springtime before planting and seen the eight foot in circumference, by three feet high, flat-topped behemoth standing alone against the stark backdrop of furrowed soil, well then, you would certainly never have found it today.
It was much more difficult to spot during the peak summer season, what with an ocean of five-foot corn stalks surrounding it. It would be even harder to find in a month when the cow corn reached seven to ten feet tall. Tommy did know it was there though, and he knew how to find it. Studying the tops of the stalks, he identified an almost perfect circle, devoid of leaves and ears and silks jutting out of the tassels. Quickly, he worried his way up the cornrow, swatting leaves aside as he went.
Was she hurt? Had someone done something bad to her? Said something bad? Was she sick? This was one of the first things he thought of now, ever since the shock of his mother’s diagnosis. Life was uncertain. How quickly things could change!
Reaching the edge of the clearing where the rock lived, he could see that Beth was in a prone position, stretched out on her stomach, her head lying on her folded arms. She looked okay, at least physically. Running the short distance to the rock, he leaped up onto it, walked over, and sat cross-legged near her head. Beth didn’t look at him, nor did she move, or make in any way to acknowledge his arrival. Instead she turned her face away from him, letting her hair fall across it, as if to hide the tears that marred her cheeks.
“What is it, Babe? What’s wrong?” Tommy smoothed her hair back and wiped the tears away with the back of his fingers.
“Go away!”
“Babe? What is it?”
“It’s nothing, Tommy. You shouldn’t have come.”
It didn’t sound like nothing. It sounded like a whole lot of something.
“But you asked me to come! Beth? What is it, Honey?” He continued to stroke her hair as the tears flowed freely.
“I said it’s nothing. Gosh, Tommy, you can’t fix everything! Just go back home and forget I ever called you, okay?”
“Did I do something wrong?” Tommy worried.
“No.”
“Did someone do something to hurt you?”
“I said, leave me alone, damnit!”
That, however, was beyond Tommy’s natural ability. He rose to his feet, circled around her head, and reached down taking a hold of her arms. Tugging gently, he brought her up and into a sitt
ing position, and sat down again directly in front of her this time.
“Beth. Talk to me, Honey. What’s the matter?”
She looked him in the face now and he saw the shadow of pain cross her eyes. She opened her mouth as if to speak, was unable to, and bit down on her lower lip instead. Tommy reached in and pulled her to him, stroking her hair, and soothing her with his voice while she cried.
“Its okay, Beth. You get it all out now. We’ll talk when you’re ready.”
It turned out to be quite a few minutes until she was ready though, and Tommy spent them going over every single thing he’d done and said in the past few days, trying to determine if he was somehow the cause of all the waterworks. In fact, he had time to come up empty and try again before she drew in a huge gulp of air through her mouth, her nose being completely clogged with grief, and began hiccupping. That was so Beth! She was constantly getting the hiccups! He felt oddly father-like holding her this way. He remembered the day years ago that she’d had a raging case of the hiccups and he’d teased her until she popped him. He could still see her, hands planted on her hips, hiccupping to beat the band, and him laughing his head off, until she shot out with a right hook and nailed him hard in the jaw. She quieted now and then emitted another huge hiccup. Tommy stifled a giggle.
“It’s not funny, Tommy,” she warned pulling away from him, but her lip twitched just a little— just enough to hint at the birth of a smile. And just like that, Beth’s smile became Tommy’s smile. Another hiccup and those smiles turned into laughter.
Moments later, and much more relaxed, Tommy stripped off his tee-shirt and began mopping up her face. Casually, he teased away tears,mascara, and snot until the only thing left on her face was the smile, and then he tossed the shirt away on the rock.
“How about you tell me what’s wrong now,” he said, growing serious once again.
Beth looked directly into his eyes, and in all earnest, answered him this way:
“I’m a bug.”
And he’d be damned if it didn’t look like she was going to start crying again!
“Whaaa…?” He tried hard to wrap his head around what she was saying, but found the connection impossible to make.
She repeated herself, as if he merely hadn’t heard her the first time.
“You know… I’m a bug. I’m the bug,” she stressed. Tommy grew nervous all over again.
“You’re a bug? Chrissakes, Beth, a bug?”
He couldn’t believe he was hearing this. This was what he was probably going to get his ass kicked for, later on, when John got home and saw that he hadn’t finished changing the oil in the Chevy. She was a bug?
“Yes, a bug.”
And then she did start crying again, crying and gulping for air, spitting out random sentences in between.
“I’m a huge… (gulp) hairy… (gulp), flying germ-fest (gasp)… of a bug,” she cried. “I have a proboscis!”
“You have a probo—what?” Tommy looked at her in disbelief. He stood up now and began walking away from her, toward the far side of the rock. Circling, he looked desperately for a way out of this. There was nothing ahead but corn, nothing behind but a bug. His bug, he reminded himself and walked back.
“Can you please stop crying and try to make some sense?” he pleaded, as he sat back down.
“Don’t you remember Kafka?” she answered. “English class last year with Miss Counts?”
“English class,” he repeated. “You’re kidding, right? You’re upset about English class from last year? And you’re telling me this now?” He was confused as hell but at least she had stopped crying again.
“Don’t you remember reading that story ‘Metamorphosis’? The one Kafka wrote about the kid who turned into the giant bug? The one whose family was so horrified because they had a son who turned into a bug?”
“Okay, right.” He was starting to see now. Kind of. He did remember the story at least. “So what does that have to do with you, and with all of this?” He meant drama, but he didn’t say so.
“My sister was at the coffee shop the other day.”
And just like that she stopped. It was as if this was supposed to make complete and total sense now, as though that one statement explained everything.
“Okay…” he answered, trying his level best not to think about the trouble he was going to be in later. “And?”
“And she was with her snotty friends, you know, her very religious friends. The squeaky clean ones.” As she said this, she rubbed at a stubborn spot of oil that remained on Tommy’s cheek. “You know her friends, Tommy. They’re the ones who married well, and have two-point-five children, and two-story houses, with outrageous mortgages?”
Kathy was a full ten years her senior.
“Yeah, I know them,” he answered. “They’re the same people who come to our shop to get their oil changed. What about them?”
“Well, this is Kathy we’re talking about. Kathy— the one who wouldn’t even be in that two-story house if she hadn’t had an affair with Jeff Spencer that broke up his marriage to Joanne. Kathy who married Jeff within months of causing his divorce—”
“I know all of that.”
“And that was after her own divorce, which happened because she had another affair with Brian Douglas, and I don’t think his wife knows about any of that yet.”
“But what does any of this have to do with you?” Tommy pressed.
“Mr. Sutter was there.”
And she did it again! She abruptly stopped talking, as if he should understand completely now. Clearly he did not. Beth sighed and went on.
“Apparently he stopped by their table and mentioned that he’s seen us hanging out in the cemetery a lot. Wondered what we were up to.”
“Ahhh…” He was beginning to see now.
“And you know how she is. She built her fancy house out of the rubble left over from destroying other people’s lives, but she’s found Jesus now, and she’s all cleaned up!”
Light finally dawned for Tommy. “And because we’re hanging out in the cemetery, she assumes that we’re having sex all over hallowed ground? That we’re doing it on old Mr. Jackson’s grave?” Tommy giggled.
“It’s not funny, Tommy! She talked to Daddy about it.”
“Uh oh,” Tommy answered. It was starting to sound like it might not be so funny.
“Apparently, we’re scandalizing her and she’s embarrassed. She wants him to make me stop seeing you.”
“He’s not—”
“Nah, not yet, anyways. Daddy likes you a lot. But he doesn’t think we should go to the cemetery anymore. She also told him that I have an obsession with death and that it’s not normal. She hates my art, hates that I make art prints out of gravestone rubbings. Says the poetry I put on them is dark, and just weird.”
“Well, it is a little… unusual, Beth.”
“I thought you loved my art?” There was a definite increase in the tension in her voice now and this was starting to not go well.
“I do love your art!” he protested. “You know I do.”
“Well she’s got Daddy thinking that I am living my life with one foot in the grave, and he’s even wondering if I’m suicidal now.”
“Your sister’s a self-righteous idiot and God probably hates her.”
“Tommy!”
“Oh, that’s right. Only you can say that about your sister, huh?”
“Listen… I know that and you know that, but Daddy’s starting to look at me like I’m a bug. He watches me out of the corner of his eyes. He studies me, like I can’t see what he’s doing. She’s got Mom all worried too. It’s freaking me out, Tommy! I feel like I have eight legs.”
“You don’t have eight legs,” he answered calmly.
“Ya know what the worst thing is?” she said. “The worst thing is that this is Kathy we’re talking about. Kathy! The one who slept her way towards being a pillar of the community! Now Kathy is the good one and I’m the bad one? Because I like to do grave rubbing
s? And make art?”
“And ummm… have sex on Mr. Jackson’s vault?” Tommy laughed.
“It’s NOT funny!”
“Well, she’s right, ya know,” Tommy said. “She has a point.”
“Huh?” It was Beth’s turn to be confused, and her facial expression reflected that.
“Yep,” he answered. “You are a bug.” He stood up again and held out his hand for hers. She took it, rising as well, and he went on as he led her off of the rock and into the corn row. “To her you are a hideous bug. A really gross, gigantic, black fly-thingy with a probo-whatever, and acid spit, which you puke up onto people-food to soften it up and make it deliciously gooey so you can digest it.”
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