“Is Jenny there?”
“Why, yes.”
He handed over the phone.
“Hello?”
“Is this Jenny?”
“Yeah.”
It was the hardest invite yet.
“This is Edna Miller. I’m Mary Miller’s granddaughter.”
There was silence on the other end. A person might say “hi” or “I saw you at the store” or something. Edna leaned against the wall, twirling the phone’s long cord.
“We’re having a party for my grandfather next Saturday at six, and you’re invited.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes.”
“Um, OK. Yeah, I guess I can go.”
“Terrific. See you then.”
16
THE LOGISTICS
The phone rang off the hook for a few hours compared to its normal silence. Everyone who had been invited to Grandpa’s party had either answered the phone or RSVP’d right away, and they were all coming to the party. Edna found this unusual. She was used to her world, where degrees of busy-ness denoted standing. No one would immediately RSVP. At Jill’s seminars women often greeted each other with:
“How are you?!”
“Oh, busy. Crazed. Absolutely crazed.”
“Oh, me too. I’m totally crazed.”
Edna pictured these crazed women flailing around the shops, cafés and freeways of Los Angeles.
The initial steps that had seemed insurmountable—solidifying the date for the party and inviting people—were conquered, but there was no time to enjoy these victories. Edna had no idea what in the world to do with these people for several hours; eating a piece of Pineapple Upside-Down Cake would only take a few minutes. Parties had DJs or activities like attending a concert or a Lakers’ game, rock climbing or snorkeling. There was nothing to do here. And as quick as it may be to have a piece of cake, there wasn’t even anywhere to eat it. Edna looked around her grandparent’s bleak compound. Their two-seater picnic table might squeeze four. The dead weeds around it shook in the wind and seemed to taunt her, saying, “Go ahead. Try to make this place festive.”
Inside, the kitchen table barely fit her family around it when they were having a soda, never mind fifteen people with forks and plates. In any case, the table was strangely bolted to the floor and not in a convenient spot for people to walk around. There definitely weren’t enough chairs. Edna had invited a dozen people over, and she couldn’t even offer them a place to sit down.
In the real world, parties were assigned a planner, a theme and booked. Perfect Party did her last birthday, and Edna wondered if they would come to Dream Valley. Why couldn’t she order a party over the phone with her emergency credit card? If this was not an emergency, Edna didn’t know what was. She simply had to have a great party.
She knew she’d get in trouble for spending money without asking, but her parents would have already have seen pictures of the party by the time they got the bill. They might think it was a good thing for her to have done. It was something they’d do themselves, if they’d thought of it. Edna was sure she was doing the right thing, and even if not, they wouldn’t be as mad as if she bought games or a new iPad.
They still had “information” on landlines. Grandma had written down the number by the phone, so Edna was able to call Perfect Party once Grandma was outside and absorbed in moving rocks around her garden. The woman who answered was named Janice, and she sounded really nice. Edna did her best to sound like an adult. She loved ordering things; it was like waving a magic wand. Perfect Party had tables, chairs, glassware and catering. Edna ordered whatever she wanted or thought she might want in both white and blue. She needed a masculine color for Grandpa, but without pictures she couldn’t decide, so she’d choose once she saw them. Or maybe she would mix them. Perfect Party could set up anywhere they could drive to in less than five hours, and Dream Valley was only four hours away. All Janice needed was Edna’s credit card, and Edna felt very grown up saying the numbers to her. Janice had to run the card. Edna waited for a long time before she came back to the phone.
“Edna, honey, I’m afraid you’re beyond the limit on this card for the deposit.”
Edna had no idea that her credit card had a limit, but when she called the number on the back of it, she found out it was five thousand dollars. Whether that was a lot or a little for a deposit on a party didn’t matter as much as the fact that she couldn’t get a party brought out to Dream Valley with it. It wasn’t even enough when she cut what she asked for in half, and only in one color. If five thousand dollars wasn’t enough for a party deposit, it was not sufficient emergency funding for anything, and she planned to discuss this with her parents sometime when she was speaking to them again. Edna’s only source of money was those tyrants, but she couldn’t beg them to pay for this. With an over-five-thousand-dollar deposit, it was expensive enough for Jill to butt her nose into so she could control everything and, God forbid, be at. There was no point in having the party if there was any chance of that. Even Nanny wouldn’t help. Edna had asked her for money once, and Nanny had told her parents. She was crushed by the betrayal, and her allowance had been cut off for two weeks.
Edna couldn’t come up with an idea of how to have the party, but the day she invited everyone was going to come whether she liked it or not.
If the midday sun had a sound, it would be one of those menacing vibrations that drove people insane. This wasn’t helping. She got that scary, claustrophobic feeling, and her chest was tight. She was trapped at the cabin with nothing but her grandparents’ ugly furniture. She didn’t even see how Mrs. Anderson, with all her strength and tenacity, could find a solution to this problem. Could Mrs. Anderson chop down the eucalyptus trees and build a table and fifteen chairs with them?
Sick of looking at the porch and the cabin, Edna went down to the garage. She had been spending more and more time there. It should have had room for two cars, but it was crammed with stuff and barely fit the Bronco. It had cracks that let in wind and sand. Furniture that had come here from San Diego had never been unwrapped, but it was getting beaten down by the desert anyway, even under the blankets protecting it. The cabin didn’t have much room for furniture, but it wasn’t like it was ever going to. What was Grandma saving it for? Edna turned around the taxidermied raccoon and fox that stared at her. She couldn’t move the giant fish, so she just had to deal with its giant eyeball. She was eventually able to ignore it. Her grandparents must have been outdoorsy; their old tent leaned against a wall. It was more than likely unusable; Edna’s tent let in rain after being stored for two years. They’d probably never go camping again anyway.
It was weird to get to know someone after the fact when they weren’t dead yet, but being in Grandpa’s garage was a way for Edna to retroactively get to know him. He had been some kind of nutty tool collector, he had a mountain of rusty implements. Edna wasn’t sure how long it had been since Grandpa did things. Grandma seemed pretty organized, so the mess was probably his after years of neglect. Maybe it was left like this because of his illness. Edna wasn’t handy, but she put the different rusty items that looked alike together and created a tidy workshop a little at a time. She wondered if Grandpa would appreciate this, or if he was the type of person who clung to his chaos.
A sheet-metal case dominated a part of his worktable. She opened the bottom drawer first. It was mayhem, packed crusty batteries, flashlights, wire, more rusty tools, nuts and bolts, markers and pencils. She couldn’t even open it without emptying some out. Edna normally hated any kind of disorganized clutter, but this could be information. The air hung still and sweat dripped down her nose. Edna was so interested in Grandpa’s things, she didn’t even notice.
The second drawer was filled with cassette tapes. They were deteriorated; Edna couldn’t play them even if she had the machine to play them on. She decided to put Grandpa’s music on her phone when she got home. She found an old notepad from the Sand Castle Inn of Pismo Beach and wrote down what G
randpa’s music was. Edna had heard of Elvis Presley, the Beach Boys and the Rolling Stones, but she’d never heard of Jan and Dean, Hank Williams, the Kinks or the Ventures.
There were nails sticking out of the wall behind the table, and Edna hung tools on them as she thought about the logistics of her doomed party. Grandma was making Pineapple Upside-Down Cake for fifteen people, and it had to be fantastic. She couldn’t do that and be much help with anything else while she still had to take care of Grandpa. Anyway, Edna had promised to do “everything.” She couldn’t imagine what could change between today and then. It would have been easier to cancel the party when Johnny was the only one coming. This problem was not going away like it was supposed to.
She heard a faint, chirping sound coming from the loft, but she didn’t see the bird making it. The garage was so cluttered, she’d never looked up and noticed all the stuff stored above. Three surfboards rested on the rafters, each with a colorful design that had dulled over the years. They didn’t seem to belong in the desert, but they probably went fine with San Diego and Pismo Beach. Beneath the surfboards, bundles were tied off to the beams in a messy web of straps and bungees. The web held two metal folding tables.
17
THE BREEZY PERSONALITY AND THE DIRT
Johnny had gotten a haircut. Edna was shocked, though she knew boys often cut their hair short in the summer. She wasn’t sure if he was cuter with his hair long and wild or cropped short because he looked so good both ways. She might like it better long, but she liked it even better that he wasn’t attached to his hairstyle. She liked seeing more of his face. She liked seeing him.
“Hey, Edna.”
“Hi. How was your ride out?”
“Just fine.”
He always said it was just fine. It was a boring question, but she was still trying to sound easygoing and not too challenging. The breezy personality was working well. Johnny’d kissed her with the breezy personality. The breezy personality reminded her to act like a viable young woman and not an anxious, silly girl. Johnny went to get Grandma’s packages from the back of the truck.
“Nice haircut.”
“Thanks.”
“Johnny…”
“Yeah?”
“Would you help me get something down from the garage, for the party?”
“Sure. Be right out.”
He brought Grandma’s packages inside. Moments later Edna and Johnny walked down to the garage. Holding his hand would have been natural. It was only inches away from hers.
Johnny raised his eyebrow when he looked at the complicated bundles strapped to the beams. Edna loved to see his eyebrow go up when he was thinking, but this time she knew it was because the favor was more than he’d bargained for. She’d become a nuisance. She hadn’t considered the ton of random junk stashed up there in the way of the tables. She had been so excited about the tables to begin with, and then that she could ask Johnny to help her and have an excuse to interact with him. He got a big ladder and had to unhook a horse’s saddle and some fishing poles. He carefully handed them down to Edna. He looked around the rafters.
“Holy sh—there’s a bunch of guns up here.”
He took out a rifle from a long case that was dried out and falling apart. It was tied next to the surfboards. Johnny evaluated the rifle and saw that it wasn’t loaded. Clearly Johnny had handled guns before. Edna wasn’t sure, but this might have been the first time she’d ever seen a real gun and not a picture of one, or one that was a toy. No, she’d seen handguns on police, but not rifles or shotguns like these. Guns, in Edna’s realm, were part of what was wrong with the world, and no one should have them. Grandpa had a few different kinds. Johnny’s comfort with them mystified her. He checked them one at a time and set them on the area of the counter Edna had recently cleaned off.
“What do you think they’re doing here?”
“I don’t know. Zeke probably shot a little bit.”
“Oh.”
“Everybody has guns.”
“They do?”
“Uh-huh. Do you shoot?”
“No. Never.”
“It’s fun.”
“Really?”
Edna couldn’t imagine why it would be fun. Moments later Johnny set some cans from Grandma’s recycling out on rocks.
“That’s about fifty feet, a pretty good distance for a BB gun.”
He put some BBs into the gun, pumped it and handed it to Edna, who immediately recoiled from it.
“Tsk. No way.”
“Take it.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Go ahead and aim.”
Edna took it. She found one of the cans in its sight.
“That’s pretty good. You even have the butt tucked into your shoulder.”
“I’ve seen people aim rifles on TV.”
He moved her elbow down.
“Take a shot.”
She took one and looked after it. She’d missed, but she couldn’t tell by how much.
“These aren’t the right BBs for this gun, so it might be spinning off a little high and right.”
He looked into the sight and re-aimed the gun.
“Try to compensate a little low and left.”
Edna tried to compensate for the spin and for being thrown off with Johnny so close to her. She pulled the trigger. The can flew off the rock. She’d shot something, and she was actually proud of it.
“I did it!”
“Try it again.”
She missed the next two shots in a row.
“Pull the trigger after you exhale.”
“Seriously?”
He shrugged. “Yeah.”
Edna took aim.
“Don’t forget to compensate.”
She looked down the sight and estimated what she thought Johnny would have compensated. She inhaled, exhaled, and in a moment of stillness she pulled the trigger. The can flew off the rock.
“You’re a good teacher.”
“No, you’re a natural.”
“You go.”
“Finish ’em off.”
“No, you go.
She had to see him shoot. He aimed the gun and shot the first one clean. He missed the next one but tried again and hit it. He got all the cans that were left from where he stood. He thought it was funny that Edna was so impressed.
“It isn’t hard. You just did it.”
“Hey!”
She gave him an affectionate push. A quick memory of being on top of her in the Bronco flashed through his mind.
“Come on,” he said, “let’s get the tables.”
The mundane chore was a thrill for Edna. Johnny got on the ladder and reached up to undo the worn, leather straps holding them, which were actually old belts buckled together and knotted around the beams. The belts were so dried out, it was probably good they were taking this stuff down. Edna wondered if Grandpa did all this or if Grandma could have done it, or if her father or some other crazy person had. It was hard to imagine someone fastening these belt buckles together or understand why they didn’t just use rope. She tried to picture her grandparents storing their things or walking into the garage for the first time, but she abandoned that pursuit when she noticed Johnny’s T-shirt hiking up as he fought with the belt buckles. She could see his stomach.
Edna had seen boys in bathing suits year-round all her life, but she had never taken particular note of any boy’s stomach before. It was flat and had a faint line of hair beneath his navel. He reached higher, exposing more of it.
“Watch out, there’s a lot of—”
A dove flew out of the beams, startling Johnny, and he dumped years’ worth of old birds’ nests and debris that was trapped behind the tables onto Edna. Twigs, dirt and feathers fell onto her face. She felt a hundred little pricks in her eyes, and she gasped as she was momentarily blinded, breathing in dirt. A nest filled with chicks landed next to her, and their piercing squeals terrified her more.
“Edna. Oh my…let’s get you to the house.”
Johnny got down the ladder just in time to keep her from stepping on the nest. He picked Edna up and put her into the Bronco. She didn’t take her hands away from her face while he drove up the slope.
“What was that noise?”
“There were some chicks. Are you OK?”
“I think so. Did the chicks die?”
“No. Edna, I’m sorry—”
“It was an accident.”
She went straight into the bathroom. Edna cried intensely. She had reasons to be upset, but none of them seemed to justify such deep emotion. The dirt came off easily. She couldn’t stand to think about what she must have looked like with that dirt all over her. It was a slap in the face from fate, really, when she tried so hard to look good around Johnny. The worst thing was that he’d picked her up and she didn’t even enjoy it. Still, none of these things matched her distress. She didn’t come out of the shower for a long time. Grandma knocked on the door.
“Are you all right, Edna?”
“Yes.”
Crying over boys was exactly what Edna had been avoiding for the entire last year. She missed her old self, who couldn’t care less about a boy. Her old self might have gone as far as to think Johnny was an idiot for dumping dirt on her, but now she would never think that. If she hadn’t met him in the first place, she’d have easily convinced her parents to end this stupid punishment and she would have been out of there weeks ago, but she would never think of that now either. Edna didn’t know what to think. She came outside in her bathrobe. The heat felt good after crying for so long in the shower. It was good to dry out.
The red truck was gone. Johnny brought the tables up to the porch. He’d opened them and hosed them down. At least Edna assumed he had, because it probably wasn’t Grandma. Together the sturdy, metal folding tables would be long enough for everyone at the party to sit at. A note on one of them was held down with a rock, written on a blank Bishop’s receipt:
Edna, Really sorry again. Let me know if you need anything else for the party. J
His handwriting was blockish and looked like a boy’s, but it wasn’t sloppy. It was perfect, like everything else about him.
Edna in the Desert Page 10