The South Side Tour Guide

by Shelter Somerset

  With the passing of Christmas, Andy had become the surrogate “other” parent. The go-to guy. Not as he once stood for the Chicago PD, but as a friend, confidante, and mentor to his niece and nephew, who had suffered heartache and upheaval. A dependable fixture in a home that demanded calm.

  “But what can I do here?” Andy had asked Harden two days before New Year’s Eve while they’d sat at on the living room sofa, planning how to celebrate. “How can I make a living?”

  “Waterloo and Dubuque aren’t far. Lots of people around here commute there. And Dyersville and Duncan are growing like crazy. Maybe you could get a communications job with the tourist bureau. You have experience in public relations.”

  “It’s been such a long time,” Andy had said into his coffee. “Who will hire me after more than a year underemployed, and in this rancid economy?”

  “You could check with the local chamber of commerce,” Harden had said. “You might find something there.”

  Andy had figured that unlikely. In mid-January, he’d told Harden he must return to Chicago.

  “And do what?” Harden had said, his shiny blue eyes wide and glazed. He’d been preparing his briefcase at the kitchen table after Andy had escorted the kids to their school busses, but had frozen, peering at Andy.

  Andy had smiled. “I have a court date. I’m a witness to a triple homicide, remember?”

  Harden had smirked, one Andy had taken for as relief, and two days later when Andy had pulled his van out of the driveway for Chicago, Harden had stood on the porch, signaling a thumbs-up, but with a shaky smile.

  A neonate in a courtroom, Andy had acclimated to the dry heat and the lowbrow questioning. The defendants had sat to his left while he’d answered questions. Two toughs who’d looked more ridiculous in their trial suits than Andy had felt in his. They’d exchanged brief, penetrating glances. Andy had garnered strength from the trial judge, who’d showed a respectful, professional charisma that the prosecutor had lacked.

  Despite Andy being on Miss Steinen’s side, she had interrogated him from an angle that suggested Andy had been the bad guy. Her questioning had pierced him worse than the defendants’. Ignoring her insolence, he’d provided the truth with a terse and steady voice.

  Yes, he’d remembered the make and color of the car. Yes, he had recognized the baseball cap one of the defendants had worn. Yes, he’d been certain the shots had come from the Buick. No, he had not seen the faces of the shooters.

  It hadn’t mattered. Prosecutors had claimed only two men had been in the car, and both guns had fit the forensic evidence collected from the scene. Three more days of testimony, and the trial had ended. Andy had lacked the interest to wait around for the verdict. But that evening, he’d forced himself to watch the local news and learned that jurors had found both men guilty of second-degree murder. All that trouble for two seven-year sentences. Typical Chicago.

  Harden had grinned when Andy, pulling into the driveway with a U-Haul trailer behind him, had returned. Andy had decided to cancel his Chicago lease and pack his belongings. Most of it was junk. “We could store some of it in the garage or barn, or perhaps have a yard sale once it warms up,” he’d suggested to Harden. “It doesn’t mean I’m staying,” he’d said. “I just need a place to toss my hat for now.”

  While in Chicago, squeezing his things into his five-by-eight U-Haul trailer with Skeet’s haphazard help, Andy had decided to continue his tour enterprise—but in a new locale. Andy, the South Side Tour Guide, peddler of bloodletting and societal decay, would become the Iowa Tour Guide, purveyor of cornstalks and pastoral beauty. Harden had applauded the idea.

  “It’s just temporary,” Andy had emphasized. “Until a better opportunity comes along. Who knows? I might have to move back to Chicago.”

  He couldn’t charge people touring Iowa thirty-five bucks a head like he had in Chicago. But fifteen dollars per person with the lower cost of living—and a man to depend on for extra support—never seemed more lucrative to Andy.

  After a half-hour wait at the baseball site, Andy dropped off his passengers at the meet-up point, Duncan’s public library parking lot. Next, he headed for….

  Did he dare call Burr Oak Farm home? The kids never seemed to expect him to leave. He still questioned whether his remaining was a good idea, for any of them. At least a brighter perspective had peeled away the dark veil of malaise that had blurred his vision for so many years. The world seemed a happier place, one with satisfying principles.

  Pocketing eighty dollars total in tips and fees, he found everyone home from school and work. Mason had just arrived from his baseball practice and was heading for the kitchen, and Olivia and Harden were throwing together dinner. He looked for Kamila but realized her car was missing from the driveway. Harden must have sent her home early since it was Friday.

  Who were these people, Andy wondered, watching them from the kitchen doorway. Harden was cautioning Olivia not to spill the opened can of mushrooms, and Mason was pouring a tall glass of plum juice. Two of them shared a small portion of his blood, the other… Harden? In a sense, he and Harden shared much more.

  Perhaps that never became clearer than when Mason had carried his luggage upstairs the first day of his return, assuming Harden and Andy would share a bedroom. And then again, after Mason and Olivia had opened the family’s brand-new flat-screen television Christmas morning, and Mason had mentioned the old TV might do well in “their bedroom,” referring to Harden and Andy’s master suite.

  Then came Ken’s court appearance in early February, and Olivia had commented, after they had learned of Ken’s pleading “nolo contendere” to lesser charges, that her father was much better for Andy than that “bad man.” Five thousand dollars poorer, Ken had returned to Chicago, and Andy couldn’t have had agreed with Olivia more.

  They’d celebrated Mason’s twelfth birthday the weekend after Ken’s court appearance. The entire family and most of Mason’s school friends had gathered. Mrs. Krane had exhibited a youthful energy, doling out cupcakes and gifts. She’d been going to casino junkets in Dubuque and south of Waterloo with her girlfriends on weekends, and it had enlivened her. Everyone had become accustomed to “Uncle Andy.” Any hesitant wonderings had been concealed behind wide eyes and stiff, veiny necks. But Mason’s nascent adolescence had stirred additional worries for Andy.

  “What will their friends say if they ever think we’re together like a married couple?” Andy had asked Harden the night after the party while they’d sat up in bed. “They sometimes poke fun at him because of Lilly. Imagine what they might say about us.”

  “I suspect there might already be some gossip.”

  “And that doesn’t bother you?” Andy had shaken his head, waiting for Harden to show a semblance of unease.

  But Harden had shrugged. “The reality is, Andy, we very well could be a married couple. Two men can legally get a marriage license in Iowa, you know.”

  Andy had felt his face heat, similar to when Harden had kissed him at the kitchen sink in Streamwood. Wanting to shake off the sudden timidity, he’d said, “That’s not the point. You know what I mean.”

  Harden had responded with a soft brushing of two fingers over Andy’s lips. “Didn’t you tell me once not to overthink matters too much?”

  Noticing Andy staring at them from the kitchen doorway, Harden smiled. He asked how his latest tour had gone, and Andy answered affirmatively. Harden mentioned his flushing cheeks. The afternoon was warm, Andy said. He added they might have a balmy spring night. The kids were eager for a fun-filled weekend. Maybe they’d ride their bicycles tomorrow, Harden suggested, and Mason and Olivia cheered their support.

  Accustomed to the trek, Andy went upstairs to shower. He allowed the water to wash away the smells of farmland and earth. He enjoyed smelling like spicy farm soil and livestock dung after work more than city dirt. Yet concerns about sharing a bedroom with Harden continued to dog him.

  “What about Lillian?” Andy had said to Harden in Mar
ch while they’d sat on the porch swing, snug in sweaters and sipping coffee, after the kids had gone to bed. The hushed house had had a hot, desperate feel, restless for the eruption of spring, and both men had longed for fresh air.

  “We’ll worry about that pothole once we come to it,” Andy remembered Harden having said.

  “What if she comes back a changed woman?” Andy had pressed. “What then?”

  “Then I’ll be glad for her, happy that maybe she can begin a promising relationship with Olivia and Mason.”

  Andy had felt Harden’s eyes burn into the side of his face. “I mostly worry for the kids.”

  “I do too,” Harden had said. Then he had chuckled. “Olivia made one of her comments again today before you got home. She said that, with a new daddy, she worried Kamila might no longer be needed. Isn’t that priceless?”

  “That’s another thing,” Andy had said, trying to suppress the giddy lift to his soul that Olivia’s words had given him. “What about Kamila? She’s inserted herself pretty tight into this family.”

  “And she’ll always be a part of it for as long as she wants. This summer, once you begin working more hours on your tour business or if you get another job, we’ll still need her around. I think we can afford her. She likes you now. I can tell. She admires the love you show the kids.”

  “She knows about us.”

  Harden had shrugged. “And?”

  “Doesn’t any of this bother you at all?”

  “Does it bother you?”

  Andy failed to remember his exact response, if he had made any.

  Wrapped in a towel, he stepped out of the bathroom. Harden was standing in the middle of the bedroom, waiting for him. He had shut the door, and now he gestured for Andy to sit beside him on the bed. Facing Andy with a subtle gleam in his blue eyes, he told Andy how he’d talked to the kids earlier that day.

  “Talked about what?” Andy asked, his heart quickening for an unknown reason.

  “I wanted to alleviate some of your concerns,” Harden said. “I also wanted to ease up on the secrets. Families need honesty to survive. So I seated the kids in the living room before Mason left for his baseball practice, squatted down to eye level, and asked them how they felt about our relationship.”

  “What did they say?” Andy managed to eke past his tightening throat. He glanced over Harden’s shoulder, noticed for the first time that the photograph of Harden and Lillian had been removed.

  Harden told him Olivia had wanted to know if he was mad at women because of Mommy. “I told her no, that sometimes relationships between two consenting adults are about love and commitment and loyalty and friendship. It can fit all pegs. It’s not about anger.”

  “Why’s it a secret?” Olivia had asked. Harden said to Andy that her perceptiveness had always taken him aback.

  “It’s not really a secret, sweetheart,” he’d tried to explain. “More private. There’s a difference. A secret is something you never want to tell anyone. Something private is—”

  “Nobody else’s business,” Mason had jumped in, itching to take off for his game.

  Andy ruminated on his new stage in life through dinner, surveying the kids, perceptive of their awareness of his role in the family more than at any other time. All of a sudden, he realized that Mason had texted him that day after his father had confessed about their relationship.

  “Next Friday is my school’s spring recital,” Olivia said as she shoved Tater Tots into her mouth one after another. “You two have to come. All the parents will be there. It’s at night, so you don’t have to worry about work. Everyone has to come, Kamila too.”

  Harden smiled at Andy. “We’ll be there, sweetheart. We can’t wait to see how pretty you’ll look dressed like a daisy.”

  The following Monday, with coffee in hand, Andy walked the kids to the bottom of the driveway to await their school busses. He returned once the last one left and remained standing on the porch, enjoying the first genuinely warm morning offered by the emerging spring. Harden stepped outside and kissed him on the cheek, leaving behind the scent of his spicy aftershave. Andy watched him climb into his Jeep. He honked, and the wide tires kicked up gravel as he pulled out.

  From his altar, Andy sipped more coffee and stared into the vast farmland. Dick Carelli had returned to Burr Oak Farm, working day and night since the advent of daylight saving time. Dick’s corn had grown another few inches, from the look of the tassels tickling the blue sky. The cornhusks, the size of babies’ forearms with fuzzy little heads, were beginning to bud nicely from the stalks.

  Andy imagined his mother would be less accepting of his moving in with Harden and the kids full time. Then again, she seemed oblivious to most of the world these days. Rejected by a husband twenty-five years ago, who she still remained legally married to, she lived alone in her Streamwood rancher and spent her free time with a tight circle of coworker friends. She never seemed to glean anything from her life’s experiences, as if she were an observer, never a participant. Numb to the world.

  Andy studied his shiny green van. He was glad another work week loomed ahead. Six passengers had signed up for his new tour. Three on Wednesday, a solo on Friday, and two more on Saturday. He wondered how much more tedious it might be, escorting middle-aged folks and retirees around to the same sites over and over. But wasn’t all work monotonous?

  Squawking crows settled atop the barn roof. Andy gazed at them and pictured Lillian finding escape in that barn, the epitome of the life she had loathed and sought to soften through drugs. How long had it taken before Lillian could no longer endure her life? Andy shook his head. She probably would have found fault with Hawaii too, like he’d once told Harden. When had he said that? During one of their late-night chat sessions?

  Sweeping his gaze over the expansive cornfield, Andy seemed to have discovered something less weighty than Lilly. Ken might have done Andy a favor forcing him to Iowa. Or maybe the city’s thugs (for Andy was certain the city had sent his assailants, including those who had slashed his tires, to stop his business) deserved his gratitude. They had booted him from their city and inadvertently helped him discover a new land with a new meaning.

  He denied he was trying to justify his relationship with Harden. What remained in his life to rationalize? The more he pondered, the more he realized Harden was perhaps the most decent endeavor he’d experienced.

  Through Harden’s probing tongue and the genuineness of his embraces, Harden was forcing Andy to a higher level of living—not a lower one. Knotted in the arms of Harden Krane, former husband to his only sister, Andy found himself drifting from the shelter of his self-loathing world to Harden’s reassuring, vital one.

  Harden, bundled in thoughtful movement, symbolized motion. Life had kicked him hard—more than once—and he’d collected himself and soldiered forward. Many others, when faced with obstacles and challenges, chose to revert to backward ways like Andy and Lilly had. Not Harden Krane.

  Like the farmer that Harden yearned to become, he plowed ahead, sowing new life from dirt. Harden was a man of unadulterated action, even in his most silent, static state. Dreams propelled him. Almost animallike in his subconscious quest to live, day to day.

  The first time Andy had knelt before him, Harden had lain back and submitted to the pleasure. He hadn’t fought but a moment, a singular spasm evolved into acceptance and wanting. A man who, without weighty philosophies and ideologies to leave him bitter and corrupted because the world he’d created in his mind had failed to live up to his lofty expectations, lived to live.

  There had always been decay, death, and misery in the world. Harden, like perhaps his ancestors who’d settled the prairies, understood how to navigate through it. He exemplified the best of mankind.

  The sun rising higher shortened the house’s shadows. Andy walked inside, with the gentle slap of the storm door behind him. Even before reaching the kitchen to clean the family’s staggering breakfast mess, he presumed life alone in his studio apartment would b
e far worse. But fantasy wasn’t the same as reality. He’d often imagined that he and Lilly would be little children forever, and spend their lives licking sweet, sticky Pop-Ice and climbing mulberry trees.

  He clung to such wavering thoughts the entire week. Deliberating. Questioning. His tour business brought in another one hundred forty dollars. One passenger gave him a twenty-five-dollar tip after he’d persuaded Andy to take a special detour to the Trappist monastery south of Dubuque. Maybe Andy might add the site to his permanent tour. Perhaps even coordinate tours with local wine growers. Or include the nearby farm-toy factory. Endless possibilities stretched before him.

  After Andy had dropped off the last group at the Duncan Public Library on Saturday, he arrived home, the smell of smoking lighter fluid thick. He crossed under the shadow of the silo on the side of the house and found Harden in the backyard, standing before a smoldering grill.

  Harden looked up and smiled. “Such a nice day, the kids and I decided we’d grill for dinner tonight. Okay?”

  “Sounds good,” Andy said, chuckling inwardly at Harden, the grill sergeant.

  An hour later, they were eating barbeque chicken breasts and grilled sweet corn. Next, the kids raced for the swing set. Olivia slid down the slide a few times and joined Mason on the swings, shouting she could reach higher.

  “Watch us swing, Daddy and Uncle Andy,” Olivia said into the wind that whipped her long ponytails.

  “We’re watching,” Andy said.

  Harden stood straight, chest thrust out. “You’re swinging better than anyone on earth,” he called.

  They watched as the kids swung higher and higher, the tips of their sneakers aiming for the denim-blue sky.

  “What do you think?” Harden asked Andy.

  Andy shrugged. “I think it’s time to clean up.”