Man of the Year

by Lou Cove

  Papa and I sit in the backyard under a new sun that is warm enough for Tshirts. I can almost imagine being in this yard forever, in this place I never wanted to be. Even the bickering and whining of my little brother and sister take on a warmth and comfort that I have never felt before. Family, for all its mayhem, is warm, and it holds me.

  The sudden lack of drama on Chestnut Street is as unsettling as it is comforting. For months, each day has been an unexpected adventure. Now, in the quiet aftermath, things feel more orderly. I can’t help but feel the other shoe is about to drop.

  Down the street, Glovey Butler approaches, her face determined. “I’d argue that this is more like what a centerfold should be,” she says, marching into our yard with a yellow-framed National Geographic. The cover flutters in the breeze, a deep blue photo of a submerged scuba diver reaching up to pat the underside of a dolphin.

  Papa takes the magazine in one hand, offering cheese, crackers, and nuts and a seat under the tortured branches of the bare Seckel tree. Glovey, dressed in black, opens a black umbrella to shield her white hair and whiter skin. I sit quietly reading Doc Savage Magazine #3: Frenzy in a Frozen Hell!

  “Hey, take a look at this, Lou,” Papa shifts. “Bird’s-eye view. You’re sitting right … about … here!”

  I toss my comic on the chair between me and Glovey and lean over Papa’s shoulder to get a closer look. “Wicked! It’s our street.”

  And it is: A full-bleed of Chestnut Street covering pages 578 and 579 of the April issue. A thin strip of white space at the bottom carries this caption:

  Tea from China and pepper from Sumatra helped build houses in Salem in the early 1800s. The town ranked among the nation’s leading ports when it sent its sailing ships racing to the Far East for exotic goods. Chestnut Street, above, exhibits many of the handsome Federal-period homes built by sea captains and merchants.

  Our house is right there at the center of the spread, six chimneys, my bedroom window, the patchwork slate of the roof, dark where shingles chipped off under my scrambling feet. The bay window of Frank’s living room is half hidden behind the trees, which are full, just beginning to turn. The photo was snapped in autumn, from a helicopter. I search the windows for a sign of my face, staring out to see what was making that sound overhead.

  “They did Chestnut Street and Marblehead Harbor,” Papa says proudly, “the two most beautiful spots on the North Shore. They really got it right, those Geographic folks.”

  “So they did,” Glovey agrees. “Apart from the grifters there at the end.”

  Papa ruffles the matte pages forward to a slightly smaller photo of Laurie Cabot, flanked by Penny and Jody, the three of them surrounded by Laurie’s magic circle—thirteen or fourteen more witches, all in black. Aside from the three Cabots, I don’t recognize the others. They might have worked at Laurie’s magic shop downtown or been at the house on a past visit, but my attentions are always on Penny. Laurie has her hands on the shoulders of a young girl, but Laurie is barely smiling, and neither is the girl. Penny and Jody are also stiff-faced. Most of the other witches are smiling. There is one guy, the tallest, who stands beside Jody, his face nearly covered by his long frizzy hair, who looks especially angry, ready to jump off the page and go all warlock on the unsuspecting reader.

  What are the chances that I’d live with a male centerfold, in a house that appears in a centerfold of a national magazine, in which the girl-witch love of my life shows up in the pictorial as well?

  I’m thinking: low.

  “They say witches find a more tolerant reception here in Salem than they did in 1692,” Papa reads. “Louis, you’re certainly a case in point,” he adds, chuckling.

  “Perhaps in some quarters.” Glovey sighs.

  “But look at this. Did you see the blue lightning bolt across the bottom of the page?” Papa holds the spread up and it’s true: there is an odd, cobalt fracture that runs left to right, at the witches’ knee level, from one side of the photo to the other.

  “Is that radiation from Three Mile Island?” I ask.

  “No!” Papa seems taken aback by the question. Then he pats my back reassuringly. “But it’s unexplained.”

  “Hocus pocus,” Glovey waves a wrinkled claw.

  “Really, Glovey? When have you ever seen a photograph in the Geographic that was anything but flawless?”

  “Read the sidebar,” she says. “The people at Eastman Kodak say it’s static electricity.”

  “Glovey, I hate to take issue with you, but I’ve had thousands of rolls of film developed in my time and I can’t remember ever seeing anything like this, not just on a roll, but even on a single frame. And they say ‘the same phenomenon occurs on every single shot, across multiple rolls’ of the coven. I’ve been a skeptic all along, but this is pretty convincing.”

  “Cove,” Glovey fixes on him. “I count on you to be a voice of reason in this otherwise unreasonable city. Please don’t fail me now.”

  “They quote Laurie as saying the electricity present in the room forms the perimeter of their magic circle,” Papa says. “Hard to argue with the evidence.”

  “I really can’t abide this.”

  I surge with pride at my father’s defense of Penny and her mother. He may revere Glovey, but that won’t keep him from speaking his mind. And in his mind, as in mine, the magic is real.

  *

  We go inside when it gets cold, eat dinner, and I settle down to watch Fantasy Island—an episode about two kids who send their divorcing parents to the island hoping they’ll fall back in love. Howie plops down beside me a few minutes in.

  “I’ll take Fantasy Island over Three Mile Island any day,” I muse.

  “A-fucking-men.”

  The phone rings. I don’t answer it—I never answer it—but Mama calls from downstairs a minute later and tells me it’s Penny on the line. I jump up and into the hall to talk to her.

  “Hey!” I launch into a stupid spiel about seeing her photo in National Geographic. “So wicked.” But she doesn’t want to talk about it. She wants me to know that she’s been thinking. Thinking really hard. About me and our friendship. About what happened in her bed and the kissing and the whole superpower thing. About how she loves me so much, but not the way she thinks I think she does. And she meant what she said, back in the bathroom stall. “Remember when I said boyfriends and girlfriends never last?” she asks. I nod but can’t answer out loud. “I thought a lot about that. About how good a friend you are. And I decided we’re not going to kiss like that again. We can’t. OK?” I shake my head, still unable to make words come out. “OK? Everybody else could just disappear for all I care, as long as we can still be friends. OK?”

  I have nothing to say, so I just let the call end awkwardly, my throat tightening with grief. Because it’s not OK. Maybe boyfriends and girlfriends don’t last, but the panic and loss eating my brain will never stop. The gash in my heart won’t heal. What is meant to be will never be. That’s not how stories are supposed to end.

  “How do I get her back?” I whisper to Howie when I return, fighting the urge to cry.

  “Women just want one thing, gringo. They want to be heard. Listen to what she’s saying. Be true to yourself, but make her feel heard.”

  “What if I don’t like what I hear?”

  “Then you just check in to Fantasy Island for a bit and hope for the best.” Howie puts an arm around me and we go back to watching the show. A few minutes pass and the phone rings again. I’m up and answering before the second ring can finish.

  “Hi,” I say, heart hammering, hoping she’s had a change of heart.

  “I need you to come ovah heah.” Gretchen. Ugh.

  “Where?” I ask, shoulders sagging, eyes searching the ceiling for help.

  “To the Fletchah’s.” Is she crying? “I’m babysitting. But I stepped on a nail. I’m bleedin’ wicked bad.”

  “Call 911.”

  “I can’t you butt fuckah! I’ll get in trouble. Get ovah heah. NOW!” />
  *

  I walk down Chestnut to Botts Court, where the Fletchers live, taking my time as I go.

  Gretchen opens the door standing on one foot. Blood has soaked the sole of her striped sock and is dribbling small puddles on the floorboards.

  “That’s bad,” I say, letting her put her arm around my shoulder as I lead her to the living room couch. It smells like cloves in here.

  “No shit, shuhlock,” she tries for edge but only gets to fear. I find a dishtowel in the kitchen and put it under her heel, then pull the sock gently from her foot.

  “That’s so gross,” I say, staring at the violent wound, open wide enough that the gelatinous white meat deep within her arch is visible. “I think I’m going to barf.”

  “Shut up! Get me a Band-Aid, yuh puss bucket.”

  “You’re going to need more than a Band-Aid,” I reply, heading for the bathroom.

  “Don’t wake up the kids!” she shushes me. “It took me two ow-ahs to get them to sleep.”

  I come back with a roll of gauze, a near-empty bottle of Bactine, and some aluminum butterfly fasteners. Gretchen squeals when I douse the hole in her foot with what’s left of the Bactine and grabs my shoulder, digging in with her stubby excuses for fingernails. “That huhts like a mutha fuckah,” she moans softly.

  I tell her about the electricity in all the photos of the witches while I wrap.

  “Guess how much I caih?” Gretchen pulls away, finishing the bandage job herself.

  “I’m just saying…”

  “Whatevah. Do ya see the bottle of schnapps on the table theah? Bring it ovah.” I do as she instructs and watch her chug three or four swallows before she takes another breath. “Now fill it with watah up to heah and come back ovah to the couch.”

  “Sure, your highness,” I bow mockingly.

  When I come back she sits up and has me put a pillow under her foot. Then she pulls off her sweater, revealing a thin tank-top blouse that I can see her bra through. “I need ta make out,” she says. “Come ovah heah.” She leans forward enough that I can smell the mint bite of schnapps, see the white curve of her breasts, which are bigger than I remember. “Come on!” she urges, pulling me toward her by my shirt and opening her mouth wide. I didn’t brush after dinner and my tongue tastes like cottage cheese and noodles. But Gretchen doesn’t seem to mind. Her tongue swirls around mine, licking it clean and searching around in the farthest corners of my mouth, clearing the dull taste and leaving a bracing alcohol-and-mint sweetness that makes me think of TV ads for fresh, clean feelings.

  It’s everything I want, just with the wrong person.

  I press into her, trying to imagine Penny beneath me, but it’s Gretchen, in all her fury. I reach beneath her blouse and she arches instead of contracting. I push her bra cup up and over, taking her full and naked breast in my hand, growing braver, squeezing in rhythm with her sharp, husky breath beside my ear. Gretchen jams her hips against mine and I feel a power surging that is new. Fearlessly, I push my hand down into Gretchen’s pants. Instead of buckling up and bolting out, as I worry she might, Gretchen sucks in her silky belly and lets my hand pass, over the front of her panties to the soft drop and into a mysterious slipperiness.

  We don’t have enough time to button or compose because the front door opens right into the living room. The Fletchers are home early, staring straight at us. At Gretchen’s bloody foot dangling. At my hand, emerging from her pants, unsure where to go.

  I leave Gretchen to be berated by her employers in glaringly unheroic fashion, but even as I turn to watch the front door slam behind me I see the expression on her face, and it is one of affection, not anger.

  As much as I am in Penny’s thrall, Gretchen has unexpectedly carved herself a space in my heart, and just in the nick of time. She’s the unforeseen radioactive catalyst in my own Marvel Tale, Issue #13, April 1979. Her mom may not be a witch and she may smell like cigarettes and talk like the late-night drunks at Dunkin’ Donuts, but she believes.

  I know what she feels like, and I want to feel it again.

  What You Cling To

  Bunny Yabba is paws-up. Pink eyes gone white. Finished.

  Papa yells at me for twenty minutes straight. Irresponsible. Lazy. Stupid. I stop listening after a while and start thinking logistics for making a waterless bong I saw in A Child’s Garden of Grass called a “steamboat.”

  Mama cries more than I expect. I’m not sure if that’s about Yabba or me or something else—my heart’s gone flat. The losses are piling up and I’m shutting down.

  When I drop by Howie’s room he’s filling a bag with magazines and clothes. “Time to hit the road, Cochise.”

  “What? Where?”

  “Home.”

  “Why? Again? Is it your mom? Her ankle?” I think this can’t be happening but of course this is happening. It always does. “Can’t we just wait until the votes come in? You’re going to win. I know it.”

  “And that pays … a complete wardrobe. But no cash. Brother gotta work.”

  “But it will mean lots of work—”

  “In LA,” he says, and I know it’s true. He puts his hands softly on my cheeks. “It’s just … time.”

  “It’s not time,” I shake my head, “Not yet.”

  “The Buddha says you only lose what you cling to,” he says. Another one of those sayings that say nothing to me.

  “Well, I lose everything.” Not just the houses. Everything. “Every friend. Every house. And now you. I didn’t want to move to this stupid city. But then you came. You came. And for once, I was happy. We all were.” This much is true.

  “If you think of things that way you’ll always be unhappy,” he says softly, sitting beside me on the bed. “The Buddha says ‘a spoon of salt in a glass of water makes the water undrinkable. A spoon of salt in a lake is almost unnoticed.’”

  “I don’t care what the fucking Buddha says. Or Lenny Bruce. Or Bob Dylan.”

  “OK. What I’m saying is that if you think of your life as a little glass then the hard moments, like this one, seem to fill every bit of the space you’ve got and they taste like shit. But if you think of your whole life as a big and magical lake, a wide-open adventure, then a few teardrops are just seasoning. They don’t spoil the whole thing.”

  “You’re spoiling it.”

  He gets up, softness leaving him. “We gotta go home. This isn’t real life anymore.”

  “You mean it’s starting to feel like real life. For the first time.” Papa appears, right on cue.

  Howie laughs. “Maybe your life, Jefe.”

  “Right. My life. Welcome to it. It’s about time, you know?” He points to Howie’s beads and the paintings and papier-mâché sculptures and the plastic toy characters all fucking each other in different positions on the mantle and the windowsill and the bedside table. “This den of iniquity is a fantasy. You can’t live like this forever.”

  “Can’t hurt to try,” Howie argues.

  “Really?” Papa snaps back. “Really can’t hurt? Try raising a family while you’re high all day. Making bupkes. Cheating on your wife. Try doing it that way.”

  “It’s better than being gone ten hours a day and taking martini lunches. What’s the difference?”

  “Everything I do, I do to make sure my family is safe and sound. Everything you do, you do to make sure your dick is stroked. By Playgirl. By my secretary.”

  Howie goes back to stuffing his bag. Not looking at us. Mad but not mad. Processing it all. Uncomfortable with the way this is going. This isn’t the Howie and Carly vibe.

  “Hey, maybe if you got that mythical grant and hired me then you wouldn’t be saying any of this,” Howie blurts suddenly. “I can’t support my family if you’re not paying me. So I’ve been taking care of your family for you. I thought that was our deal.”

  “Sure. I appreciate everything you’ve done. But that’s not a real job. And it’s not my job to get you a job. Carry your own water.”

  “Thanks for the
pep talk, Dad,” Howie snips in a tone so unlike him. “When did you start believing you’re The Man?”

  Papa flashes red when Howie says this. Those wide Papa eyes, telling you that you just crossed a line. “I believe in reality,” he says in a whisper. “You lost touch with that a long time ago.”

  “So many realities, Jefe. You just have to know how to dance between them.”

  “Look,” Papa appeals suddenly, his color drained, an unconvincing smile fixing his face. “You’re my brother. I don’t want you to go. But I can see you’ve made up your mind—”

  “No he hasn’t,” I push in, finally, feeling like this may be Papa’s fault. And if it isn’t, he’s not doing enough to help stop it.

  “He has,” Papa snaps. “He’s an adult. I’m sorry the grant never came through.” Then to Howie, in a political shift that is as jarring as it is mollifying: “Louis is right. The two of you? Being here. It’s been one of the best experiences our family has had in a very long time. There’s no way we’re going to end it on this note. So tonight’s a bon voyage party … Right after the bunny memorial. What a day.”

  Howie sighs heavily but he’s smiling.

  “I need you to give me a hand with this,” he says, handing me a duffel when Papa is gone. I help, but I know he doesn’t really need me.

  *

  “She was a little rabbit whose presence was rarely seen but always felt, here in this great house on Chestnut Street,” Papa says, officiating over the funeral that precedes the bon voyage. We bury Bunny Yabba at dusk under the pear tree in the backyard. Atjeh paws the fresh earth and I kick her away as we take turns remembering our fallen family member.

  “I can’t believe this is happening all at once,” Amanda shakes with new tears.

  “April showers,” Carly whispers, wrapping her arms around me and my sister. “But it’s almost May. It’s the cycle, love. Everything ends. Bunnies die, flowers fall, friends take different paths. But the flowers always come back. And it’s all right here with us,” she says, rubbing her warm palms on our cracked hearts. “We carry each other. Wherever we go. Do you feel it?”

  “I feel it,” Amanda whimpers.