by Jan Burke
It rained that night, just like my knee said it would. My mom came in to check on me, saying she knew that the rain sometimes bothered me. I was feeling all right, though, and I told her I thought I would sleep fine. We smiled at each other, like we had a secret, a good secret. It was the first time in a few years that we had been happy at the same time.
I woke up when Harvey came home. When I heard him put the Imperial in the garage, I got out of bed and peeked from behind my bedroom door. I knew he had lied to my mom, and if he was drunk or started to get mean with her, I decided I was gonna bash him with one of my crutches.
He came in the front door. He was wet. I had to clamp my hand over my mouth to keep from laughing, because I realized that he had gone out without his umbrella. He looked silly. The rain and wind had messed up his hair, so that his long side—the side he tries to comb over his bald spot—was hanging straight down. He closed the front door really carefully, then he went into the bathroom near my bedroom, instead of the one off his room. At first I thought he was just sneaking in and trying not to wake up my mom, but he was in there a long time. When he came out, he was in his underwear. I almost busted a gut trying not to laugh. He tiptoed past me and went to bed. The clock was striking three.
I waited until I thought he might be asleep, then I went into the bathroom. There was water all over the place. He hadn’t mopped up after himself, so I took a towel and dried the floor and counter. It was while I was drying the floor that I saw the book of matches. It had a red cover on it, and it came from a place called Topper’s, an all-night restaurant down on South Street. I picked up the matchbook. A few of the matches had been used. The name “Mackie” was written on the inside, and just below that, “1417 A-3.” I closed the cover and looked at the address for Topper’s. 1400 South Street. I knew Harvey’s handwriting well enough to know that he had written that name and address.
What was he doing with matches? Harvey didn’t smoke. He hated smoke. I knew, because he made a big speech about it on the day he threw away my dad’s pipes. I had gone into the trash and taken them back out. I put them in a little wooden box, the same one where I kept a photo of my dad. I never looked at the photo or the pipes, but I kept them anyway. I thought my mom might have found the place I hid them, but so far, she hadn’t ratted on me.
I opened the laundry hamper. Harvey’s wet clothes were in there. I reached in and pulled out his shirt. No lipstick stains, and even without lifting it close to my nose, I could tell it didn’t have perfume on it. It could have used some. It smelled like smoke, a real strong kind of smoke. Not like a fire or anything, but stronger than a cigarette. A cigar, maybe. I had just put the shirt back in the hamper when the door flew open.
“What are you doing?” Harvey asked.
I should have said something like, “Ever heard of knocking?” or made some wisecrack, but I was too scared. I could feel the matchbook in my hand, hot as if I had lit all the matches in it at once.
Luckily, my mom woke up. “Harvey?” I heard her call. It sounded like she was standing in the hall.
“Oh, did I wake you up, sweetheart?” he said. My jaw dropped open. Harvey never talked to her like that after they got married.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I was just checking on the boy,” he said. He looked at me and asked, “Are you okay, son?”
Son. That made me sick to my stomach. I swallowed and said, “Just came in to get some aspirin.”
“Your leg bothering you because of this rain?” he asked, like he cared.
“I’ll be all right. Sorry I woke you up.”
My mom was at the door then, so I said, “Okay if I close the door? Now that I’m up . . . well, you know . . .”
Harvey laughed his fake laugh and put an arm around my mom. He closed the door.
I pulled a paper cup out of the dispenser in the bathroom. I turned the cup over and scratched the street numbers for Mackie and Topper’s, then put the matchbook back where I found it. By now, I was so scared I really did have to go, so I didn’t have to fake that. I flushed the toilet, then washed my hands. Finally, I put a little water in the cup. I opened the door. I turned to pick up the cup, and once again thought to myself that one of the things that stinks about crutches is that they take up your hands. I was going to try to carry the cup in my teeth, since it wasn’t very full, but my mom is great about seeing when I’m having trouble, so she said, “Would you like to have that cup of water on your nightstand?”
I nodded.
Harvey watched us go into my bedroom. He went into the bathroom again. My mom started fussing over me, talking about maybe taking me to a new doctor. I tried to pay attention to what she was saying, but the whole time, I was worrying about what Harvey was thinking. Could he tell that I saw the matchbook? After a few minutes he came back out, and he had this smile on his face. I knew the matches wouldn’t be on the floor now that he had figured out where he had dropped them and that he had picked them up. He felt safe. I didn’t. I drank the water and saved the bottom of the cup.
• • •
The next morning I got up early and went into the laundry room. Harvey’s clothes were still in the bathroom, but I wasn’t interested in them anyway. I put a load of his wash in the washing machine, checking his trouser pockets before I put them in. I made sixty cents just by collecting his change. I put it in my own pocket, right next to the waxy paper from the cup.
I had just started the washer when my mom and Harvey came into the kitchen. My mom got the percolator and the toaster going. Harvey glared at me while I straightened up the laundry room and put the soap away.
“You’re gonna turn him into a pansy, lettin’ him do little girl’s work like that,” he said to my mom when she brought him his coffee and toast.
“I like being able to help,” I said, before she could answer.
We both waited for him to come over and cuff me one for arguing with him first thing in the morning, but he just grunted and stirred a bunch of sugar into his coffee. He always put about half the sugar bowl into his coffee. You’d think it would have made him sweeter.
That morning, it seemed like it did. Once he woke up a little more, he started talking to her like a guy in a movie talks to a girl just before he kisses her. I left the house as soon as I could.
Before I left, I told my mom that I might be late home from school. I told her that I might catch a matinee with some of the other kids. I never do anything with other kids, and she seemed excited when I told her that lie. I felt bad about lying, even if it made her happy.
All day, I was a terrible student. I just kept thinking about the matchbook and about Mary Theresa’s father and Harvey and leopards that don’t change their spots.
After school, I took the city bus downtown. I got off at South Street, right in front of Topper’s.
The buildings are tall in that part of town. There wasn’t much sunlight, but up above the street, there were clotheslines between the buildings. The day was cloudy, so nobody had any clothes out, although I could have told them it wasn’t going to rain that afternoon. Not that there was anything to rain on—nothing was growing there. The sidewalks and street were still damp, though, and not many people were around. I was a little nervous.
I thought about going into Topper’s and asking if anybody knew a guy named Mackie, but decided that wouldn’t be too smart. I started down the street. The next address was 1405, Linden’s Tobacco Shop. I had already noticed that sometimes they skip numbers downtown. I stopped, thinking maybe that was where Harvey got the smoke on his clothes. Just then a man came out of the door and didn’t close it behind him as he left the shop. As I stood in the doorway, a sweet, familiar smell came to me, and I felt an ache in my chest. It was pipe tobacco. It made me think of my father, and how he always smelled like tobacco and Old Spice After Shave. A sourpussed man came to the door, said “No minors,” and shut it
in my face. The shop’s hours were painted on the door. It was closed on Sundays.
I moved down the sidewalk, reading signs, looking in windows. “Buzzy’s Newsstand—Out of Town Papers,” “South Street Sweets—Handmade Chocolates,” “Moore’s Hardware—Everything for Home and Garden,” “Suds-O-Mat—Coin-Operated Laundry.” Finally, I came to “The Coronet—Apartments to Let.” The address was 1417 South Street. The building looked older than Mary Theresa’s mother.
Inside, the Coronet was dark and smelled like a mixture of old b.o. and cooked cabbage. There was a thin, worn carpet in the hallway. A-3 was the second apartment on the left-hand side. I put my ear to the door. It was quiet. I moved back from the door and was trying to decide what to do when a man came into the building. I turned and pretended to be waiting for someone to answer the door of A-4.
The man was carrying a paper sack and smoking a cigar. The cigar not only smelled better than the hallway, it smelled exactly like the smoke on Harvey’s clothes. It had to be Mackie.
Mackie’s face was an okay face, except that his nose looked like he had run into a wall and stayed there for a while. He was big, but he didn’t look clumsy or dumb. I saw that the paper sack was from the hardware store. When he unlocked his door, I caught a glimpse of a shoulder holster. As he pulled the door open, he saw me watching him and gave me a mean look.
“Whaddaya want?” he said.
I swallowed hard and said, “I’m collecting donations for the Crippled Children’s Society.”
His eyes narrowed. “Oh yeah? Where’s your little collection can?”
“I can’t carry it and move around on the crutches,” I said.
“Hmpf. You won’t get anything there,” he said, nodding toward the other apartment. “The place is empty.”
“Oh. I guess I’ll be going then.”
I tried to move past him, but he pushed me hard against the wall, making me drop one of my crutches.
“No hurry, is there?” he said. “Let’s see if you’re really a cripple.”
That was easy. I dropped the other crutch, then reached down and pulled my right pant leg up. He did what anybody does when they see my bad leg. They stare at it, and not because it’s beautiful.
I used this chance to look past him into his apartment. From what I could see of it, it was small and neat. There was a table with two things on it: a flat, rectangular box and the part of a shot they call a syringe. It didn’t have a needle on it yet. You might think I’m showing off, but I knew it was called a syringe because I’ve spent a lot of time getting stuck by the full works, and sooner or later some nurse tells you more than you want to know about anything they do to you.
Mackie picked up my crutches. I was trying to see into the paper sack, but all I could make out was that it was some kind of can. When Mackie straightened up again, his neck and ears were turning red. Maybe that’s what made me bold enough to say, “I lied.”
His eyes narrowed again.
“I’m not collecting for Crippled Children. I was just trying to raise some movie money.”
He started laughing. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a silver dollar. He dropped it into my shirt pocket. “Kid, you earned it,” he said and went into his apartment.
I leaned against the wall for another minute, my heart thumping hard against that silver dollar. Then I left and made my way to the hardware store.
No other customers were in there. The old man behind the counter was reading a newspaper. I cleared my throat. “Excuse me, sir, but Mackie sent me over to pick up another can.”
“Another one? You can tell Mackie he’s got to come here himself.” He looked up at me and then looked away really fast. I’m used to it. “Look,” he said, talking into the newspaper, “I’m not selling weed killer to any kid, crippled or no. The stuff’s poisonous.” That’s the way he said it: “crippled or no.” Like I had come in there asking for special treatment.
I had too much on my mind to worry about it. I was thinking about why a guy who lived in a place like the Coronet would need weed killer. “What’s weed killer got in it, anyway?” I asked.
He folded his newspaper down and looked at me like my brain was as lame as my leg. “Arsenic. Eat a little of that and you’re a goner.”
• • •
At home that night, I kept an eye on Harvey. I noticed that even though he was still laying it on thick with my mom, he was nervous. He kept watching the clock on the mantel. My mom was in the kitchen, making lunches, and he kept looking between the kitchen and the clock. When the phone rang at eight, he jumped up to answer it, yelling, “I got it.” To the person on the phone, he said, “Just a sec.” He turned to me and said, “Get ready for bed.”
I thought of arguing, but changed my mind. I went into the hallway, and waited just out of sight. I hoped he’d talk as loud as he usually did. He tried to speak softly, but I could still hear him.
“No, no, that’s too soon. I have some arrangements to make.” He paused, then said, “Saturday, then. Good.”
That night, when my mom came in to say good night, I told her not to let Harvey fix her anything to eat, or take anything from him that came in a rectangular box. “He wants to poison you, Mom,” I whispered.
She laughed and said, “That matinee must have been a detective movie. I was waiting for you to tell me about your afternoon. Did you have a good time?”
It wasn’t easy, but I told her the truth. “I didn’t go to a movie,” I said.
“But I thought . . .”
“I went downtown. To South Street.”
She looked more scared than when I told her that her husband wanted to poison her.
“Please don’t tell Harvey!” I said.
“Don’t tell Harvey what?” I heard a voice say. He was standing in my bedroom door.
“Oh, that he got a bad grade on a spelling test,” my mom said. “But you wouldn’t get angry with him over a little thing like that, would you, dear?”
“No, of course not, sweetheart,” he said to her. He faked another laugh and walked off.
Although I don’t think Harvey knew it, she hadn’t meant it when she called him “dear.” And she had lied to him for my sake. Just when I had decided that meant she believed me about the poison, she said, “You and I will have a serious talk very soon, young man. Good night.” She kissed me, but I could tell she was mad.
• • •
That was a terrible week. Harvey was nervous, I was nervous, and my mom put me on restriction. I had to come straight home after school every day. I never got far enough in the story to tell her what happened when I went downtown; she just said that where Harvey went at night was his business, not mine, and that I should never lie to her again about where I was going.
We didn’t say much to one another. On Friday night, when she came in to say good night, I couldn’t even make myself say good night back. She stayed there at my bedside and said, “We were off to such a good start this week. I had hoped . . . well, that doesn’t matter now. I know you’re angry with me for putting you on restriction, but you gave me a scare. You’re all I have now, and I couldn’t bear to lose you.”
“You’re all I have, too,” I said, “I don’t mind the restriction. It’s just that you don’t believe anything I say.”
“No, that’s not it. It’s just that I think Harvey is trying to be a better husband. Maybe Father O’Brien has talked to him, I don’t know.”
“A leopard doesn’t change his spots,” I said.
“Harvey’s not a leopard.”
“He’s a snake.”
She sighed again. She kept sitting there.
All of a sudden, I remembered that Harvey had mentioned Saturday, which was the next day, and I sat up. I hugged her hard. “Please believe me,” I said. “Just this once.”
She was startled at first, probably becau
se that was two hugs in one week, which was two more than I’d given her since she married Harvey. She hugged back, and said, “You really are scared aren’t you?”
I nodded against her shoulder.
“Okay. I won’t let Harvey fix any meals for me or give me anything in a rectangular box. At least not until you get over this.” She sounded like she thought it was kind of funny. “I hope it will be soon, though.”
“Maybe as early as tomorrow,” I whispered, but I don’t think she heard me.
I hardly slept at all that night.
• • •
The next morning, Harvey left the house and didn’t come back until just before dinner. He wasn’t carrying anything with him when he came in the house, just went in and washed up. I watched every move he made, and he never went near any food.
“C’mon,” he said to me after dinner, “let’s go on down to the church.”
A new thought hit me. What if the weed killer was for someone else? What if Harvey hired Mackie to shoot my mom? “I don’t want to go,” I said.
“No more back-talk out of you, buster. Let’s go. Confessions will be over if we don’t get down there.”
I looked at my mom.
“Go on,” she said. “I’ll be fine.”
As Harvey walked with me to the car, I kept trying to think up some way to stay home. I knew what Mackie looked like. I knew he carried his gun in a shoulder holster. I knew he liked silver dollars, because I had one of his in my pocket.
I looked up, because Harvey was saying something to me. He had opened the car door for me, which was more than he usually did. “Pardon?”
“I said, get yourself situated. I’ve got a surprise for your mother.”
Before I could think of anything to say, he was opening the back door and picking up a package. A rectangular package. As he walked past me, I saw there was a label on it. South Street Sweets.
My mother took it from him, smiling and thanking him. “You know I can’t resist chocolates,” she said.
“Have one now,” he said.