Now Is the Hour

by Tom Spanbauer

  Granny’s hand, the old brown rope, the long, thin fingers. I put my hand on Granny’s hand, loose, thin skin on knobby bones. Her hand was warm.

  Granny’s eyes opened. Gold bars in her dark brown eternal eyes.

  George? she said.

  Then something in Indian.

  Granny? I said. It’s me, Rigby John Klusener. Are you all right?

  My butt went down onto Granny’s shiny wood floor. I put my hands under her head and shoulders, lifted slow. I moved my legs under her so her head was lying in my lap.

  Her heartbeat was in her hands, her heart beat the way she moved her head, her whole body was her heart beating.

  Granny’s eyes looked straight into my eyes. There was nothing in between.

  Then a whole long thing that Granny said, all in Indian, nothing I understand, but looking in Granny’s eyes, I understood a lot. Said the same things over and over, like the rosary or a litany you might say. How the morning light came in her kitchen window. The shade of the Lombardys. Hallucinations, the shadows the leaves made on the ground. Her damn dog, Bonanza. All the dead people in the photos above her bed. How much she loved her grandson. The recipes for what ailed you, when you ate too much horseshit, when your grandson came home all bloody and broken and drunk. Coffee and sugar and Sego Milk. The cedar tree, the tree of her ancestors. Her kerosene lamp at night in the kitchen window was the way to keep company with your dead.

  Those things and a lot more things I could never begin to know.

  Then Granny lifted her arm, made her finger into a pointer. Her heartbeat in the way she pointed.

  My pipe, she said. Get my pipe on the table.

  Heartbeat in Granny’s voice.

  I sat up high, my eyes just table height. Next to the covered silver sugar bowl and silver salt and pepper shakers and the silver butter dish, her corncob pipe.

  And is my tobacco up there? she said. Prince Albert in a can?

  Next to the corncob pipe, the red can of Prince Albert. Some old guy with a mustache and weird hat standing up straight.

  Yah, I said.

  Well, let him out, she said.

  I managed to reach the pipe, then slid the can of Prince Albert over slow.

  I got the can open, filled the pipe, all the while Granny’s dark eyes in the electric light, nothing in between.

  Help me up, she said.

  Granny sat up slow, mostly me helping her up. She leaned against the smooth green Majestic just above her head. The bright electric light shining down on her face. Her long hair undone, white hair falling down her shoulders, all the way to the floor.

  The heartbeat in Granny’s hands as she reached for the pipe. Granny puffed and puffed, smoke rising, the sweet sharp smell of Prince Albert.

  Just tell me one thing, Granny said.

  What’s that? I said.

  Who the hell are you again? she said.

  I’m Rigby John, I said. You remember. Klusener. George and I buck hay together.

  Oh hell! Granny said. You’re Rigby John. The boy George is in love with. A real sweetheart, that boy, coming from that family. Got a nice ass too. Never seen my grandson so smitten! George don’t know what the hell to do with himself!

  A gust of wind. In a moment, something opens up. Out of Granny’s lips, the word was a blow in my chest and love spread out all around over on my body.

  Granny held the pipe to her mouth. Her heartbeat in her hands. Big puffs of smoke billowing up.

  Then something I wasn’t expecting at all.

  Granny took the pipe out of her mouth, turned the mouthpiece toward me, and handed me the pipe. The pipe on my lips was wet and hot.

  Moments of gesture.

  So beautiful Granny right then, her eyes big, round, and dark, bars of gold, red rims all around. Like a child’s eyes. Full of life. Nothing in between.

  So careful, I laid the corncob pipe back into Granny’s open palms. The heartbeat in her palms. The pipe between Granny’s lips, puffing, puffing.

  You got to go tell George I’m dead, Granny said. He ain’t going to like it.

  The feeling in my arms that means I’m helpless.

  You’re not going to die, I said. Do you have a telephone?

  Tell him it’s a brand-new day, Granny said. Brand-new, son!

  You don’t have a telephone, do you?

  George is out tonight, Granny said. He’s more than likely at the Back Door. Do you know where the Back Door is?

  Let me help you into bed, I said. I’ll run get the pickup and call an ambulance.

  Granny put her hand to her mouth. I thought she was going to cough or cry. She started making a weird sound.

  Of course you know where the Back Door is, Granny said.

  No, I don’t, I said.

  The weird sound coming up and out of Granny, her eyes closed, her mouth open, the line of pink gums all the way around.

  Well, you’re sitting on it! Granny said.

  Laughter so hard out of Granny, it was scary. Laughter so hard, she could snap in two.

  And you know me. I can’t be around laughter like that without catching it too.

  So there we are, Granny and me on her shiny wood floor, smoking a corncob pipe, laughing our asses off.

  That’s how I plan to remember her, Granny, laughing.

  Then Granny went off again speaking Indian. A long line of words that made no sense. But the way Granny was saying the Indian words, the way she was looking at me and laughing, all’s I could do was laugh.

  Hooting and hollering, Granny and me, so hard Bonanza started barking.

  Shut up, Bonanza! Granny said.

  Then that quick, the laughter in Granny stopped.

  Granny’s old rope hand went up to her neck. Her head slid slow in an arch down the green enamel, her long white hair trailing.

  Bent over on the floor, Granny was only a pile of bones.

  I put my hand on her hair. Her hair soft and smooth, like when you pet a bird. I put my face down on the floor, right across from Granny’s face.

  Her heartbeat in her lips.

  The door in the alley, Granny said. Tell them you love flowers.

  Tell my grandson his name was on my lips.

  Granny said one word, an Indian word, and then even though her wide, round, dark eyes were open, even though the gold bars were in her eyes, even though everything else in the world didn’t change, that quick, Grandma Queep was gone.

  The other half, the dark half, that part of Pocatello, the two dives, the Working Man’s Club and Porters and Waiters, the part of Pocatello that exists only in a Judy Garland song.

  Niggertown.

  Looked like the Princess Theater to me.

  Or The Wizard of Oz when it goes from black and white to color.

  I was standing in the shadows, next to the big square metal dumpster painted dark blue. Behind me, weeds growing up, the cyclone fence, pieces of garbage and tumbleweeds stuck in the fence.

  Something like San Francisco about the old buildings. The long, sad windows with the paint peeling off. The rusted broken-down cast-iron fence. The garbage overflowing in the two garbage cans.

  The neon blue moon in the cracked window. WORKING MAN’S CLUB. Right next to the Working Man’s Club, another set of stairs that led up to a door. Above the door, the painted red sign with fancy gold letters, a sign like you’d see in the train station, PORTERS AND WAITERS.

  Slow, sinful saxophone jazz playing out from somewhere inside in there.

  I put my hand on the dumpster, leaned my body against it. The dumpster still smelled of new paint.

  Slumming. Just here to see how the other half lives.

  I thought if I stood there long enough, George in his shiny yellow dress, in the neon light of the blue neon moon, would walk out the door, step sideways down the steps, place each high red heel exactly on each step, the high tap of the heel on each step. Then at the bottom, George on the second step, George would sit down, reach in his red silk purse and pull out his Camel
s, tap one out, and light it.

  On the street, people all over the place, Mexican people, Indian people, black people, even some white people, up the stairs, down the stairs, into the doors and back out, drunk, dancing, the smell of marijuana.

  A yellow dog lifted his leg onto the cast-iron fence.

  Everything was there but George.

  The door in the alley, Granny’d said.

  I started walking. Rain pouring down on cement and pavement. The alley behind the Working Man’s Club and Porters and Waiters was dark shadows, darker than the rest of the night. Two-story buildings on each side. No streetlamps. Big potholes in the alley, puddles of water in the potholes.

  I pulled down my porkpie hat, pulled up my suit jacket lapels to close around my neck. I took a deep breath. A low light far away on the left.

  An intent in your life to fold your life around.

  Love.

  I put my eyes on that light, didn’t let my eyes go anywhere else, kept walking. For the longest time, all there was was only dark and rain and the crunch of my black Sunday shoes on gravel. My breath in and out. My heart.

  The light bulb above the door was covered by a piece of tin. Three cement steps went down to a burnt red steel door. On the steel jamb above the burnt red steel door, just under the light bulb, written in yellow Magic Marker, letters only an inch high: THE BACK DOOR.

  Of course you know where the back door is.

  I knocked once. Then once again, only louder. Then again real loud.

  Rain on my porkpie hat, rain on my shoulders. My black Sunday shoes, standing in a puddle of rain. Under the light, I lifted my right hand to the light. The knuckles were bloody again.

  I knocked with my left hand this time, the butt of my fist banging, banging on the burnt red door.

  So quiet. Nothing. Only rain.

  The door opened a crack.

  Light behind a tall white man. No lipstick, and I had to look up to his lips.

  What do you say? he said.

  George Serano? I said. Is George Serano in there?

  What do you say? the man said.

  He’s an Indian guy, about thirty-five years old, I said. He’s tall, got black, shiny hair.

  The door slammed closed. I leaned up against the door, pushed all my weight against it. Pounded and pounded on the door.

  For God’s sake! I yelled. Open the door! He’s George Serano, and he loves me!

  The door opened a crack.

  Yes, the tall man said. But do you love him?

  I squared my shoulders, took a deep breath. I cleared my throat so my voice wouldn’t be too high.

  OK, I said. I love him too.

  That’s so sweet, the man said. Now, look, in order to get in here, you got to say something. So say it already, and I’ll let you in.

  You know, he said. Roses . . . daisies . . . lilacs.

  Flowers! I said. Fucking flowers! I said, Of course I love flowers!

  The light inside went out when I walked in the door. I couldn’t see a thing. The door closed behind me, steel into steel, the locks latched. The tall man wore English Leather. He lifted my arms and patted me under my arms and down my body. Then from my socks on up inside my legs. He stopped just short of my balls. He took off my porkpie hat, then put the hat back on my head.

  His big hand on my shoulder gave me a firm push. In front of my face, something soft hanging down. The tall man opened the velvet curtain.

  One large L-shaped room. Knotty pine walls, brown-and-greentiled shiny floors. No bright lights. Only light from lamps. The lamp nearest me, on a low wood side table, cowboys on the lampshade. Below, lying on the shiny tile, a braided rug. Along the walls, couches and sofas, standing lamps. Paintings like in the thirties and forties. A tall ship with white masts on the ocean. A Lassie dog in a snowstorm who’d found a baby lamb. Exotic paintings of Egypt.

  Off to the right, a pool table under a hanging colored-glass lamp.

  Behind the pool table, a corner bookshelf made of knotty pine, wood sconces across the top. Books on the bookshelves.

  Straight ahead, in the center of the L, the bar was knotty pine too, with four or five stools. Behind the bar, no bigger than a wardrobe closet, bottles stacked up. Wooden tables and chairs all around. Early American. Ashtrays like wagon wheels on the tables. To the left, beyond the bar, the jukebox and the dance floor.

  It was quiet and warm. Only the music on the jukebox and low talking. Pool ball crack. Twenty, maybe thirty men. Most of them old men. Forty and fifty. Almost all of them were dancing. Paired up. Men dancing slow like a man and a woman. Dean Martin was singing, “You’re Nobody Till Somebody Loves You,” and everybody was singing along low.

  When the song was over, the men thanked their partner, went back to their tables, had a drink, lit up a smoke. When a new song started, “How Much Is That Doggy in the Window?,” the men got up again, got another partner, or the same partner, and started into dancing again, singing low.

  George wasn’t wearing a yellow dress. He was wearing a white shirt and a red bow tie and dress pants with suspenders. George was an Italian man. He was dancing with a man who, from behind, I swear, looked exactly like my father.

  George was leading.

  When George looked up and saw me, when he looked across the smoky room into my eyes, in that moment, I closed my eyes, tried to look away, but I could not. A gust of wind, a hawk, some large bird flying low. A feeling in my bones, instinct, whatever you want to call it. George could see it in my eyes.

  Billie Holiday started singing the song KSEI radio always played before it went off the air weeknights at nine-thirty.

  I’ll be seeing you in all the old familiar places.

  George walked across the room, took hold of my hand, my sore hand, led me out to the dance floor. All the men on the dance floor, the men at the tables, even the bartender, stopped and watched. George put his right hand on my back, held my left hand in the air.

  There I was dancing with a man, dancing with George.

  My shoulders up around my ears. My eyes were like they weren’t mine. I couldn’t make them look where I wanted them to. They were off staring into space at some goddamn knotty pine, and I wanted to look at George.

  What I had to say to George, I had to look at him to say it.

  Granny’s eyes, the way they looked at you, there was nothing in between.

  I closed my eyes tight, took a deep breath.

  George was in front of me.

  Shiny black hair, suntanned dark cinnamon skin, his dark eyes. The gold bars in his dark eyes. Thick lips the color of the rest of his skin. His sweat, buckskin and flint on the back of my throat. The part of the tomato that folds together red into the stem of green. Vaseline hair tonic. Old Spice.

  I knew all these things about George but never up this close.

  Our hands were palm to palm on my right, my fingers in between his fingers, or his fingers in between mine. My hand so thin and pink inside his big brown hand. My thumb, how it lay against his thumb. Our forearms touched too. His skin, my too short brown suit jacket and my white shirt poking out.

  The slow roll of the dance, now and then the brim of my hat touched his head. My brow and cheekbone, his cheekbone and jaw. Under my chin, my left thumb was on his red suspender. My thumb was trying to get underneath the suspender. I made my thumb stop.

  Under my left palm, starched white cotton and George’s shoulder.

  The low lamplight on his cheekbone. George’s ear. The breath from my nose into the hole of his ear. My nose only inches away from the place where his neck skin and white shirt collar met.

  My lips were even closer.

  The smell of starch and iron and cotton. Warm breath, tobacco, gin, and lime.

  George’s hand on my back, his little finger just there at the top crack of my ass. We were touching all along the whole left side of me, the whole right side of him.

  The slow roll of the dance, on that side our thighs touched, they came apart, our thighs t
ouched.

  And something else down there, loose and full.

  I’ll be seeing you in every lovely summer’s day.

  Just me and George and Billie Holiday dancing slow and close.

  I saw it coming from a long way off. His head was so still, his eyes on my lips. His lips stuck together as they came apart. Such a slow and graceful descent, the way his lips landed just right on my lips, round and firm-soft too.

  Whisker rub. His tongue in my mouth, a perfect French inhale. It was a kind of swoon. Something in George collapsed too. Or we both did. Who knows, at that moment, you couldn’t really tell us apart.

  It was the longest kiss I’d ever kissed.

  Then his lips slid off my mouth, on up my cheek, all the way up to my ear.

  George’s tongue was in my ear. We were heart to heart, hip to hip, thigh to thigh, two very good parades.

  I pulled my head back, put my forehead on George’s forehead.

  His dark eyes filled up. Two big tears rolled down his cheeks.

  Rig, George whispered.

  Then: Do people call you Rig?

  You know I loved my Granny very much.

  My heart pounding. My breath. You know me. Rubber lips. There was everything to say, but I couldn’t say a word.

  Eye to eye, as I was speaking, my lips touched George’s lips.

  Granny told me, I whispered, to tell you, I whispered, your name was on her lips.

  Your Indian name.

  On the dance floor, in the Back Door, Billie Holiday, there was no doubt, I was the only thing holding George Serano up.

  An intention in your life to fold your life around.

  I stood tall and strong and let him fall. His face against my chest. I reached down, put my arm under his knees, his legs dangled over my arm. One big heft, and I was holding George high in my arms.

  There was nowhere to go, no place I knew, no solid, silent place in all the world. So I stood, held George, knotty pine everywhere I looked, men staring. Just stood. Put that solid, silent place in the world inside me and stood.

  Stood and stood, held George, held his whole body, until he was quiet.

  At Granny’s door, when George reached for the green screen door, when he pulled it open by the latch, Bonanza didn’t bark. Inside, the light bulb was a bright shine.