by David Xavier
“Thanks, Emery.”
He fought with the foothammer until the clip popped from his hands in a confetti-like explosion of nails that spilled down the roof slope, the galvanized tinkling of flat heads marching away in rebellion. He slowly lifted his head and looked at me, his magnified eyes behind those thick goggles, and tossed the failed invention.
“All right. We’ll get one nail gun.”
Chapter Twenty-One
I stood curbside with my back to the dorms, my back to the glass door and the steps I had stood upon so many times. I was wearing slacks and Elle had given me a borrowed tie to wear. I think she wanted me to look my best if I was to accompany her. To complete the confident image of success.
She came up the roundabout in a long, winged, baby-blue Chevrolet. She looked like a child behind the wheel, stretching her neck above the dash, looking for the curb. I gave her the hand signals used to land an aircraft and she laughed at herself when the front wheel rubbed the curb.
“This thing is enormous,” she said as she came around. I held the passenger door for her.
“What did you learn to drive in?” I asked. “A Volkswagen?”
“My dad’s Plymouth.”
“Always learn to drive in the biggest car available. Everything else seems small after that. You can speed around the corners like a bank robber.”
“Filling the streets with new drivers in oversized cars seems like a bad idea.”
“Not at all. Only the good drivers will survive and we’ll have created safer highways.”
We drove out of South Bend and merged the big car onto the black highway to Chicago. It felt strangely like I was leaving behind an old life and starting anew.
“We’ll be there in just under two hours,” I said. “You’re in charge of the radio.”
But she did not move to fiddle with the knobs. Instead, she put her head back on the chair and closed her eyes with a few deep breaths while the fidgets jumped inside her. She was dressed professionally; a conservative dress to make an impression, and her face held the delicate brushes of very little makeup. The slight amount she did wear accentuated the natural angles of her features perfectly. She must have been confident without it, I didn’t see a single blemish on her cheeks, and I remembered her the first time with her red lipstick. That must have been a last minute addition for nerves.
“Are you nervous?” I asked.
“Just excited.” She held her hand out and it shivered with anxiety. “I feel like this is the culmination of my college career. I can’t mess it up.”
“You’ll do fine.”
She reached between us to the back seat, her hand remaining a moment on my arm, her scent passing under my nose, a comfort. She came forward too soon with a folder of papers. A portfolio of clips to show the Tribune. She began to turn each page casually, as though it was a childhood book she had read many times before.
“Everything in order?”
“I’ve had this together for a month now, adding to it as necessary. I stayed up past midnight making sure it’s all organized, and yet I feel like it’s a mess.”
I put my hand on her’s. “It’s fine. Don’t look at it anymore, it’ll drive you insane.”
She did not move her hand away or shudder at mine. She took it and held it in her warm hands, closing the folder and looking out her window.
“I wouldn’t worry about Myles, either,” I said. “I stopped by and he seems to be fine.”
“Did you see him? Did you talk to him?”
“No. But his room was in order and it looks like he’s attending his classes.”
We drove on without the radio. It would have been a distraction. We talked about our favorite songs instead, singing the lyrics while the other guessed the song. We pointed out license plates from other states and we mimicked the call of cattle as we passed them by, black spots on the hillsides. We spoke like old friends about ourselves and what we wanted to do in the future.
“I thought I was going to be a nun when I grew up.”
“A nun?” I said. “I can picture you as a nun.”
“Mom always suggested it. It was her hope for me, not mine, but it grew on me.”
“A life of service, but a life nuntheless.” She didn’t laugh, and I looked at her. “Nonetheless, spelled n-u-n.”
She reached over and rubbed the back of my hair. I felt her smile from the passenger seat. “You have the same jokes as your brother.”
“Did he say that one already?”
I held my hands on the steering wheel, afraid to look over. Afraid I might look too long or say something with my eyes that should not be said. Elle had never used the word ‘brother’ to mention Peter before. It was always his name. He was always Peter. Now the absence of his name was heard loud and clear as if she had shouted it.
“Well, I’m glad you’re not a nun,” I said to fill the silence.
“Are you? I can still see myself as one sometimes. Mom wanted Myles to become a priest.”
It made me laugh. “I can’t see that one.” Only after I spoke did I realize she did not see the same humor I saw in it.
“I can,” she said. “He’s very perceptive of people. He cares a lot for what makes people happy and he tries so hard to make people smile.”
“Has he always been…the same as he is now?” I asked.
“Yes. He’s had a hard sense of justice built into him ever since he was a boy.”
Then we topped over a small hill and I looked in the distance at the towers of Chicago rising up on the other side. We passed under several bridges on our way in and Elle touched the Chevrolet emblem on the dashboard each time.
The streets were busy, attacked by sudden jaywalkers, messengers on skinny bicycles, the honks of daytime cabs, steam rising from underground, the lights of overhead signs, and the congested smell of hundreds of cars speeding in one lane and crawling in the other. A trolley bell echoed a block away and snuck around the building corners on river air. It seemed as though someone was calling out from a loudspeaker on the highest skyscraper. The dark glass of the towers mirrored a dozen different angles. We were both silent with open mouths.
Elle sat upright with her hands on the dashboard, trying to see it all. I hit almost every curb as I rounded the corners to downtown. I found the first open parking spot on the street and took it, backing into it as a friendly pedestrian stopped to guide me in.
“You need a smaller car in this town,” he told me.
I called out from the driver’s window. “I’m not moving until the city goes to sleep.”
“Good luck.” He tilted his head back in laughter as he walked away.
“Can you imagine living here?” Elle asked. “It’s so fast.”
“It’s fast all right. We should be close enough,” I said. “The Tribune offices are a couple blocks over. We can see the town on foot.”
“Thank you, driver,” she smiled and sat back in her seat with a bounce. “Now if you’ll get my door, I’ll get you your tip.”
“Some cabbie I’d make. Making you walk. I don’t deserve a nickel.”
“Don’t worry,” she said, gathering her portfolio. “You’ll earn it.”
There was a digital clock above us, scrolled in yellow lights, half spoiled by the sun, as dim as candles. “It’s twenty minutes to the hour. Should be plenty of time.”
“Actually, we’re an hour and twenty minutes early. I don’t go in until four.”
I looked around at the building walls that climbed to the clouds. “I’ll keep the meter running.”
We swam against the current of walkers: businessmen with the front of their suits dog-eared by the wind, their ties waving boneless arms over their shoulders, professional women in fitted skirts and high heels on the pavement. A lean man with torn hems and a scorched face stood against an alley wall and children in dirty clothing kicked a flattened can behind him.
At the corner I put my arm in front of Elle to stop her as a taxi sped around the turn. I took h
er hand and we ducked into the first doorway we saw, feeling almost sheltered from a storm.
“And you want to live here?” I asked. “I wouldn’t last a day.”
“Don’t say that. You’ll make me change my mind.”
I pointed to a hotdog cart on the sidewalk. “Let’s get a bite.”
We stood on an unhurried pedestrian bridge overlooking the Chicago River and ate our hotdogs with the building rise at our backs, the boats at our feet, and the wind at our face. We laughed together as Elle struggled to take a bite without having her hair blow into her face.
“I should pin it back and keep it there,” she said. “Or cut it short.”
“No, I like long hair. Don’t cut it.”
“All the professional women have short hair.”
“They don’t have hair like yours, though. It’d be a shame. Not all of them look like you.”
“And how do I look?”
The river reflected in her eyes and the sun highlighted her hair. I was about to tell her exactly what I saw when she blinked away the wind and, smirking with mischief, took the largest bite of her hotdog that I’ve ever seen a proper girl attempt.
“Is there a contest going on?” I made a show of looking around for one.
She almost laughed the bite right out into the river but she managed to keep her mouth shut and laughed through her nose until her joy watered out her eyes.
“Even when you’re trying to be gross it comes off as endearing. Don’t touch me with those fingers.”
I dodged her reaching greasy fingers.
“We had better get out of the wind. You’re going to look frazzled.”
“I doesn’t matter how I look.” She spoke from behind her fingers, her words filtered through full cheeks.
I turned and looked at her. Her hair had taken so much wind it seemed to have no correct way about it. It blew sideways, revealing her ear.
“You’ll want to hide those ears again,” I said.
“What do you mean?” She was running her fingers through a napkin.
“Has anyone ever told you how little your ears are?”
Disbelief spread across her face as it would to somebody who has probably never been given a disparaging comment about her looks in her life, but only half-believed the flattering comments she frequently received.
“Why, you’re as mean as can be. My ears are just right.”
“No, they’re shrunken and they stick out a little.” I walked two of my fingers in the air behind my own ear to demonstrate.
“They do not,” she said. “You’re looking for trouble.”
“Don’t worry. I have a hooked nose. You can make fun of it all you want if it makes you feel better.”
“No, I like your nose.”
“Do you? Rub the end of it for luck.”
“I don’t count on luck. The Tribune could be on the thirteenth floor and it wouldn’t matter.”
“You’re not superstitious? Not at all?”
“Not at all.”
“Then what was that business with the tunnels and touching the emblem in the car earlier?”
“That was just for tradition’s sake. Faith conquers luck.” She spoke her last sentence through a mask of beautifully blown hair.
“Would you hurry and come out of the wind?” I said. “You’re going to look like Dorothy in the twister.”
“I already told you. It doesn’t matter what I look like. You’re the one who needs to straighten up.”
It was because I was to take her portfolio into the Chicago Tribune offices for her. That was the reason for the slacks and tie. I was to be E. Quinn for a moment and scrawl the name into the front desk ledger in rough handwriting.
“It’s not an interview,” she told me. “You just hand it to the secretary at the front desk. I’m afraid if I do it they’ll pitch it in the wastebasket as soon as I turn my back. They wouldn’t look twice at the audition of a woman sportswriter.”
I stood there and looked at her as she pushed a strand of hair behind her ear, an ear that wasn’t so much small as it was beautiful.
“You’re scared, aren’t you?” I said.
She frowned her eyebrows. She probably didn’t think of herself as that before, and now she didn’t agree with the accusation.
“You called it gutsy when I did it for the South Bend writer’s position.”
“It was gutsy then. You were unknown and hardly had a scrap of words to your name.”
“I still don’t.”
“But, Elle, you do. You write the best columns in the paper. You can paint a player with a single word. I’ve read your articles. The games come alive on your pages. You have a fan club for goodness sake.” I held my hand to the top of my head for effect, as if I was trying to keep my mind from getting carried away.
She shook her head and spoke quietly. “They’re just boys. They don’t even read the words.”
“You brought me out here to turn in your folder. That doesn’t show much faith at all.”
She twisted inside her folded arms like a shy child. “It’s just a little favor. You won’t even have to talk to anybody.”
I held out the folder and didn’t say anything, letting the moment drag out until she gave in and grabbed it from my hands, marching a few steps before turning to face me. She was about to say something when I spoke instead.
“Tell the front desk you are Elle Quinn of the South Bend Tribune. Say it with pride.”
She fixed her hair and straightened her dress with a few quick moves of her hands. I held her compact-mirror for her while she touched up her eyes. Her lashes fanned and I watched her kiss her fingertip to her lips and I watched the tip of her nose as she spread her finger along her cheeks. I noticed for the first time she had faint freckles that must have been hiding under the bridge of her nose.
Then she snapped the mirror closed in my hands before I was ready, and I was looking into the biggest, brightest, kindest, and most frightened eyes on the planet.
“Here goes nothing,” she said.
“Here goes everything. I’ll listen for shouts of congratulations from the thirteenth floor.”
“You may want to watch for me jumping out.”
“I’d catch you.”
At the door to one of the tallest buildings, she paused and looked back at me. I was standing on the curb. People moved around her and people walked between us. She gave me a confident nod, and entered the doors with a deep breath.
I waited on the sidewalk watching the traffic of both cars and people gain and lose its fever, the building shadows bounce from different angles over the jungle of urban noise. I watched the people going in and out of the doors, looking at each of their faces and going on to the next. A noise would distract me, a bell, a horn, a shout, and I would look away long enough to feel like I missed her coming out of the door and I would look about with darting eyes to try and catch sight of her before the waves of walkers carried her away.
A man in a sandwich board spun on his heel and wandered back the way he came. A boy sat on a stack of the evening edition, collecting dimes from buyers, and a scruffy-looking man with an open box hanging from his neck scooped roasted candied nuts into twisted cones of yesterday’s edition and collected nickels.
It was dark when she came out. I saw the city lights reflect off the glass of the revolving doors and out she popped, looking winded and more nervous than ever.
“Was it an interview?” I asked.
“I guess you could call it that. It wasn’t supposed to be. I was just to leave the folder with the receptionist. There was a box behind the desk with dozens of folders just like mine. I didn’t want to get lost in the pile so I told the lady my name and the name of the South Bend Tribune.”
“Good.”
She held her head in her hand, looking at the ground as if retelling the details of a burglary. “I asked how many women had stopped by with their folders for the job and she told me I was the only one today.”
“Good,
” I said. “They’ll remember you. You’re already standing out from the crowd.”
“The editor came out and asked questions about my experience and what I could bring to the paper. He didn’t even open my folder to take a look. It was all for formality’s sake. A big mistake, Sam. You should have gone in for me. I would still be a name in the pile.”
She looked delicate in the dusk, huddled against the wall a dozen floors below the offices. I was proud of her. She had shown great courage against her insecurity.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she whispered.
“Like what? I’m proud of you.”
“The way Peter used to look at me.” She sank against the smooth stone walls, burying her face in her arms. “Don’t do it, please. You’re nice to me and I know why. Don’t say it.”
My heart wanted to speak but my head wouldn’t let it. I sat next to her against the wall and we watched the streets rush at the hour. She put her head on my shoulder, forgetting her day for a moment.
“We won’t get out of here for another couple of hours with the streets like this,” I said. “I’m not driving that boat through this traffic.”
“Sam, do you believe in soul mates?”
“What sort of a question is that?”
“Just a question. I’ve seen you with that girl.”
“What girl?”
“That girl. The blonde one. She’s pretty.”
“Does that make a soul mate? I might have a hundred then.”
“Do you think I met mine already?”
“Peter was wonderful,” I said. “I don’t know. Is a soul mate a Catholic ideal?”
“It’s for anybody. Would God have given me my soul mate and then taken him away so suddenly?”
“I don’t know. There’s a lot of things I don’t understand about God. There’s a lot of things I don’t understand about war, about why Peter had to go, about people and why they do the things they do. I don’t understand women either. There you have it. I’m a damn mess. You better get while the getting’s good.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
I was twisting wrenches for Wheels at the bicycle shop the next week. Not because I needed the work - I had a handful of rooftops in South Bend that I ignored - but because I lost his loaner bicycles outside the café the day of the street market.