Bells Above Greens

by David Xavier

  “My wife, beautiful rose that she was, she wanted Emery to be brought up in a Pentecostal church. A sing along service. People are whooping and yelling, dancing like idiots right there in church. You seen it?”

  “No sir.”

  “I took him out for a run in a stroller one day. Told my wife we’d be back in a flash. Had him baptized at Holy Cross instead. Father O’Hara was there waiting with the oil and water, and me in my jogging shorts at the altar. Not the first shotgun baptism he’s performed.”

  “You baptized him without her consent?”

  “Sure. She named him without mine.”

  “Did she find out?”

  “Sure she did. I told her. Said I was sorry she missed the ceremony.”

  “And then?”

  He shrugged. “And then she gave up on religion entirely.”

  We sat there for a while, finishing our fish and cocoa. A blackbird landed on the far side of the roof and ambled toward us before stopping sidelong and watching us. It moved over the peak of the roof, big shouldered like a buzzard.

  I turned back to Mr Callahan. “You don’t regret marrying her, do you?”

  He looked at me with eyes that still burned with delight. “Not a Goddamn bit.” His chin swept from one side to the other. I waited for him to cross himself but he did not. His hands stayed by his sides.

  He crumbled the paper in a ball, then stood and shuffled to the ladder, bending and twisting to find the best way to climb aboard it. “Well, this roof won’t fix itself.” He turned back. “Will it?”

  “We’d be out of a job if it did, sir.”

  Stepping down, he disappeared a foot at a time over the edge. He paused a moment when his eyes were even with the shingles.

  “But life is a whole lot easier when your wife is dragging you to church on Sunday.”

  Then he vanished in a magical cloud of breath, the clacking of the ladder giving away his prestige.

  Chapter Nine

  I waited in the stands with my arms draped over four empty seats. The aluminum stomp of thousands around me, a sea of school pride. I was the only student in his seat when the helmets ran from the tunnel, spreading out to take the field, to take the stadium, with a rush of cheers. The mystical shouts seeped into my bones and I came alive with the rejuvenated exuberance of an old man awakened from his bed, the pounding of green blood still ran hot in my veins.

  Liv was the first into the aisle, followed by Claire and Emery. I was swept up in the magic, caught in a banshee hoot, when I suddenly found myself surrounded by them.

  “You do have school spirit,” Liv said. I looked and found her with a smile.

  “You caught me.”

  “Don’t be embarrassed. I like it.”

  “He’s an Irish through and through,” Emery said with big-goggled eyes behind the thickest pair of frames in the stadium.

  “We need you in the stands,” Liv said. “We lost against Purdue.”

  “But we walloped Pittsburgh,” Emery said. “I bet we don’t lose another game all season. Sam, this is Claire.”

  The brunette cheerleader stood in front of him. She matched Liv in stature.

  “Nice to meet you,” I said. “Shouldn’t you be on the sidelines?”

  “Next year. I’m a sophomore.”

  “Emery likes younger women. He practically stalks them.”

  Emery reached behind and smacked me upside the head. Liv took to my arm and huddled in.

  “I wasn’t sure you would come,” I said.

  “Emery convinced me.”

  “It wasn’t difficult,” Emery leaned across the girls to me. “She finds shy boys irresistible.”

  “Is that true?”

  “It must be.” She stood on her toes and kissed my cheek.

  Within the hysterical shouts, I heard nothing. The game played out close, an exciting back and forth, and yet I remember only a few plays from the field. I was in the stands and there I stayed to play my own game. We huddled together in the cold, a pocket of happy warmth. When she stood to cheer, so did I, and then we would collapse again into the squeeze of sweaters, coats, and smiles.

  It turned out they did need me there. Notre Dame won by one point.

  Strolling through the campus afterward, flag-carrying greenmen running by us with victorious yells, Liv told me it was my voice in the stands that made all the difference.

  “You seem to know a lot about football for such a little girl.”

  She hugged me tight. “I should. My father once played here.”

  “No kidding.”

  “It runs deep. My grandfather played before him.”

  “Who’s your grandfather? Knute Rockne?”

  She laughed in a way that showed she recognized the name but not the details behind it. “You wouldn’t know them. They sat the bench mostly. Only played on special teams.”

  “Well that’s more than most kids get. Does your father still watch the games from the stands? I bet he can still play.”

  “He passed away,” she said.

  “I’m sorry. I got carried away.”

  “Don’t be sorry. It’s nobody’s fault.”

  “Well, he probably watches from above. He’s probably smiling down at us right now.”

  “Is that what you think?”

  “Don’t you?”

  “I don’t know. When a person is gone, they’re gone. It’s strange to think they’re still around somewhere, listening or watching. But people do become more important when they pass on. Don’t you think?”

  “I do.”

  Emery and I took the girls to a small sandwich shop off campus called The Ragged Trouser for a late lunch. The tables were filled to capacity and the line poured out the door and followed down the sidewalk, people fresh from victory, the excitement still breathing in their chests to keep them warm. The open door exhaled the smell of fresh bread. After the games, hungry or not, people followed their noses in flocks.

  Two boys stood off the curb, waving their shirts at passing cars like matadors, the bulls honking in shared triumph, the crisp sun glinting off their chrome horns, their windows marked with winning slogans in white shoe polish.

  “Let’s go somewhere else,” Emery said. “There won’t be a line.”

  “My vote is for Blarney’s,” I said. “Higgins will serve us on the side. We won’t have to wait.”

  Emery looked at the girls. “Do you like stale bread and oversalted ham?”

  “The beer is good.”

  “Anywhere where there’s a warm place to sit,” Claire said, bouncing in a little red coat.

  “Emery will keep you warm. Right Emery?”

  “Every time the chaperone looks away.”

  We walked under the gray sticks of trees, the scattered swirls of leaves crisping at our feet, cutting through a neighborhood to get to Blarney’s. People had ND flags on their porches, and banners slung gold and navy over fences, waving in breezy victory as we passed.

  The tavern was busy but Higgins had a booth open up against the wall and we filed in with the girls taking the inside spots. The dishes from the previous customers were still on the table. Claire rubbed her hands together and Liv released her short ponytail. Her blonde hair framed her red cheeks.

  “I just love your hair,” Claire said.

  “Oh thanks. I thought I could do waves with it, but it’s just too short.”

  “It’s beautiful. The perfect color.”

  Emery had removed his glasses and was squinting around. Claire flattened her hair with smooth hands, her eyes on Liv’s hair. Liv squirmed out of her coat, the mothy smell of a deep closet passed under my nose.

  Higgins rushed over, wiping his hands on his white apron. “Beer tap is self-serve for you boys today.”

  “Looks like dishes are too,” Emery said. He began to gather the plates and cups.

  “Give me your orders and I’ll put them on to burn.”

  Liv was looking at a menu.

  “Just four Flappy Shoes for u
s, Higgs,” I told him.

  “Okay.” He looked back over his shoulder. “Just mark down your beers. Don’t steal nothing.”

  “I’ll have a Coke,” Claire said.

  “She’s underage.” Emery had the dishes in his hands and came back with his fingers dipped in the lips of three pints and a Coke.

  “Hell, Emery. Fingers clean?”

  “I washed yesterday.”

  People continued to stream through the front doors looking around for a seat. The place carried the loud murmur of conversation. We had another beer while we waited. Higgins rushed over with the sandwiches and slid them across the table.

  “Gameday rush, folks,” he said. “Heaven sent.”

  Emery was pinching the top bun of his, peeking under. “Medium rare?”

  “Well done all around. Mark down your beers?”

  “Sure thing, Higgs,” Emery said. He handed Higgins a scribbled on napkin. “Need some help back there?”

  “Not from you. Customers like to be able to taste their food.”

  Emery shrugged and bit into his sandwich while the girls picked the onions and pickles from theirs. We had another beer and the girls had Cokes. My head was loosening up. The lights turned on overhead. It was almost a shock how dark it had become without them.

  “So that’s what I’ve been eating,” Emery said in the new light, a theatrical surprise on his face. Claire nudged him with her elbow.

  “You’re funny.”

  “Wait until you get him on the ice,” I said. I felt a kick under the table.

  “I have skates,” Liv said with big eyes. “We’ll have to go. All of us.”

  Emery gave me a fool’s grin across the table, his cheeks bloated with sandwich. When I looked at Liv a sharp twinkle gripped the corner of my eye, reflected light from a glass frame on the wall just behind and above her head, and pulled my face toward it. I looked away.

  “So, where are you from?” I asked Claire.

  “Detroit. Born and raised.”

  “How does one get here from there?”

  “Take the highway southwest until you see the Golden Dome.”

  “Isn’t that so? Midwesterners are summer bugs congregating to the golden light. I meant what saved you from walking among the apes who call themselves the Michigan Wolverines?”

  “Watch yourself,” she said with a smile, pointing a butter knife at me. “My father was one of those apes.”

  I held my hands up. “Just keeping the rivalry alive.”

  “It’s a wonderful rivalry. My mother was a Fighting Irish and my father was a Wolverine. I always sided with my father when I was a girl. He gave me a Michigan sweatshirt that I wore until the sleeves came up to my elbows.”

  “And here you are,” Liv said.

  “And here I am. I guess mother won.”

  “Mothers always win.”

  “Not mine,” Emery said. “Dad won all the arguments in our house.”

  “Your dad is sweet,” Claire told him. “He makes the same faces as you.”

  “You mean I make the same faces as him. I’ll wear his expressions and be him for Halloween.”

  “And every other day after that for the rest of your life,” I said. Emery laughed at the joke. He did have the same laugh as his father.

  “What about you, Sam?” Claire asked me. “Why did you come here?”

  “I liked the sports here.”

  “So much that he left poor Liv in the stands,” Emery said to the girls. Liv leaned her head against my shoulder the way a puppy does to cheer you up.

  “You’re quite the athlete yourself,” Claire said to me. “At the pep rally.”

  “Ah, he went easy on me.”

  Liv brought her head up and looked at me. I must have made a face that showed disinterest or embarrassment because she hid her curiosity and did not ask questions.

  “No he didn’t,” Emery said. “He was looking to take your head off.”

  “He was going half-speed. And he slipped.”

  “It must be a rush to be on the field,” Liv said.

  I wiped my hands in my napkin. “Let’s find out.”

  We finished eating and I ushered Liv out of the booth and positioned myself to keep her attention off Peter’s jersey. Emery filled two plastic water cups with Guinness to go and we paid Higgins on our way out. The streets were dark and the leaves crunched under our feet. Small groups of students were out, walking to Saturday night parties, the streetlamps playing yellow on their faces and frozen breath like ghostheads.

  “You aren’t going to break in, are you?” Liv asked.

  “No. Not breaking anything.”

  “I bet it’s fantastic at night.”

  I tipped up my plastic beer and saw blue and red lights through the bottom. A cruiser pulled up next to us at the curb and a cop leaned across to the window.

  “Going to a party?”

  “Yessir.”

  “What’s that you’re drinking?”

  “Apple cider,” Emery said.

  The cop looked at us for a moment and we stared back like idiots. He stepped out and crossed over to us. The girls stood behind us on the sidewalk with their shivering hands tucked under the most innocent looking faces they could manage. Emery fumbled his cup into the grass.

  “You’re a clumsy one, ain’t ya?”

  “Yes sir.”

  He looked at me. He was young in the streetlight, looking out from under his police cap with his head back. He had pimples on his chin.

  “What about you? Cider?”

  “No sir.”

  “Well, it’s not smart to have an open container of alcohol on the walks here.”

  “No sir, I never was one for smarts.” I shook my head at my own words.

  The cop looked us over. “Got an ID?”

  “Yes sir.” I stepped forward and set my cup on his cruiser hood.

  “Damnit, get that cup off my hood.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Unless you want a free ride in the back.”

  “No sir. I’ll pass on the offer.”

  I shook my head again and groped singlehandedly in my wallet for my ID while the cop seemed to grow in stature with each second.

  “Now see here, officer,” Liv stepped forward. “I’m freezing my tail off out here while you’re wasting time.”

  The cop and I both stood motionless, looking at her. She stepped in front of me, catching the young cop off guard.

  “Just a minute, ma’am -”

  “It’s only getting colder out here and you’re scraping the streets for drunkards,” Liv said, keeping her voice level and reasoning. “Well, take a good look at him. Does he seem drunk to you?”

  He stammered. “Well, no ma’am but -”

  “And take a look at any of us. Do we fit the bill?”

  “I don’t think so ma’am, I just -”

  “Having a few drinks is not a crime. Is it, officer?”

  “Technically, ma’am, you shouldn’t have -”

  “Why are you calling me ma’am? Do I look old to you?”

  “Not at all, ma’am. Not at all, miss.”

  She was smiling now. “You’re doing a wonderful job, officer. How boring your job would be if everyone followed the details. But there’s no harm in taking a little drink of Apple Cider now and again is there?”

  The officer cleared his throat. Somehow, an ashamed look came over his face.

  “We’re on our way home,” Liv said. “Was there anything more you needed from us?”

  He stood there and tried several times to say something before anything came out. He pointed to the cup in my hand.

  “I’m sorry, miss. It’s my job to…”

  Then Liv turned abruptly with her elbow cocked outward, catching my wrist purposely, which made me fumble the beer all over my shoes. The cop looked down at it for a moment and then raised his head back again.

  “Well.” He tipped his hat up from his eyebrows.

  “Yes sir?” I said, waiti
ng for him to take me away in a burlap sack.

  “You folks have a nice night.”

  He stepped off the curb and slowly climbed into his cruiser and drove away.

  “That’s one way out of a ticket,” I said. “It’s a little daring to get wordy with police, isn’t it?”

  Liv still had a sure smile on her lips. “Their job is to serve and protect. How dull our world would be if there were laws against where you can have a beer.”

  “But, there are,” I said.

  She winked at me. “Well who’s going to follow them? Follow the rules just enough to stay out of jail and not hurt anyone. That’s an interesting world.”

  I looked over my shoulder. “Apple cider, Emery?”

  “It seemed smart at the time. I was thinking on my feet.”

  We walked across the dark shaded grass, the gray sky above spread a globe of pale light. Notre Dame Stadium stood black upon the grass like some kind of ancient coliseum unearthed, the stadium lights reflecting glassy winks overhead.

  “Wait,” Liv said. She was hiding a mischievous smile. “There are guards.”

  “Guarding what?” I said. “Besides, you can talk our way out of it. You could probably get them to give us a tour.”

  Emery held his hands fingerlocked at his knees and I stepped up, grabbing the top of the chain link fence and wrestling my way over the top.

  “You’re about as quiet as the marching band.”

  I dropped over the other side and my footfalls echoed against the back of the stands. I ran to the ticket entrance and opened the door from the inside. Emery and Claire ducked in and ran ahead, disappearing into the darkness under the stands, flashing along the side through the corrugation of nightlight and shadow, their laughs following behind them.

  Liv was huddling herself in her own arms, looking about, and I took her hand and ran through the first tunnel in the stands, the field appearing gray and silent below us, the empty circle of stands still alive with soundless cheers.

  We ran down the aisle of stairs to the field, our footsteps slapping in the silence, the sweet smell of cold grass growing stronger. I jumped over the field rail and the grass muffled my landing far below. Liv leaned over, a figure against the silver matte seating, a great navy circle encasing the mighty ND in golden paint behind her.

  “You want me to jump like an army invasion?”