Going for the Record

by Julie A. Swanson

  When I get home, Mom’s not back from her meeting yet, and I’m glad.

  “Want to come in, Clay?”

  “Sure.”

  “Raid the fridge, Clay. I’m going to go take these sweaty clothes off.”

  I try to pull my jersey over my head, but it gets caught up in the T-shirt underneath and nearly chokes me. Separating the shirts, I spot myself in the mirror, standing there holding the jersey up and the T-shirt down.

  WTIPSWBTBWI: the letters look aggravatingly the same backward as they do frontward. I yank the shirts off, one after the other, the neck of the T-shirt ripping as it catches going over my nose.

  “Clay,” I yell from my bedroom, “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be over here after all. My mom might be home any minute now.”

  “I thought we’d gotten beyond that, Leah.”

  “We have.” How do I tell him to get lost? “Clay, I just want to be alone right now. I know my moods must be hard to understand. It’s not you, though.”

  The minute he leaves, I run out to the deck with the sweaty old rag of a T-shirt. I lift the lid to the grill, squirt charcoal lighter across the letters, and throw a match on it. FOOM! The letters bubble and sizzle and curl up on themselves. The yellow fabric turns brown and then black as the fire spreads, leaving only the stink of plastic in its wake.

  There.

  I go back to my room to undress the rest of the way, and there it is, waiting, staring me flat in the face: my Wall of Fame.

  Wall of Fame. How full of myself I’ve been. I can’t look at it without wincing.

  It’s got to come down, all of it.

  One by one, I pull them off their nails: the plaques, the medals, the trophies, the framed certificates. Then I climb up on my desk chair and clear the shelf of trophies. A clean sweep. I pile them all on the floor, throw my dirty uniform over the heap, and dash into the bathroom.

  After my shower I’ll take it all out to the garbage.

  CHAPTER 31

  Saturday, October 4

  After weeks of sitting idle, my running shoes are crisp and curled up at the toes like elf boots. I lean over to tie my laces and feel a tweak at the back of each leg.

  My muscles are sore. I love this feeling, almost forgot what it’s like, that small ache when you stretch. I used to think it was a sign of growing stronger.

  Yeah, despite the nightmare of my comeback attempt yesterday, I realize one thing: I miss exercising. So I’m going to start running again. Today I’m going up to the cemetery, two miles there, two miles back. I go there everyday anyway; I might as well run.

  Standing at Dad’s grave, I feel hollow, emotionless, cold as stone. I can’t even bring myself to cry. I don’t know why I do this. He’s not here. It’s just his body under there. Just a bunch of bones and diseased tissue.

  It’s a respect thing, I guess. That, and I like to read his name on the stone. To know that he lived. I like that other people will see it, too, and that they’ll see Mom’s name beside his and know that he was loved.

  I never stay long.

  Mom’s sitting at the dining room table, writing thank-you notes. It’s all she does these days. She’s written hundreds of them.

  I sit on the floor beside her to stretch. “Aren’t you sick of doing that?”

  “No, actually I’m not. It’s kind of therapeutic. It gives me something to do.”

  “I wish I had something worthwhile to do.”

  Mom looks down at me. “You do. You’re going to school, seeing friends, playing soccer. You just went running.”

  “Yeah, but none of it means anything.”

  “How can you say that? You love doing those things.”

  “But I don’t feel any purpose. I need a goal. I need something I can get really fired up about.”

  “What about soccer?”

  “Nah, it’s not the same. I’m just not into it anymore.” Mom’s eyebrows bunch together. I’m not sure I want to explain it to her. I definitely don’t want to hear I told you so right now.

  “You know, Mom, how some of the things you used to worry about suddenly seemed so unimportant once Dad got sick?”

  She nods.

  “It’s like we spent so much time with Dad, reading the Bible, talking about life and what really matters, that now I go around separating the trivial things from the things that are truly worthwhile—in everything I do! I can’t help it. And so much of what I used to do seems totally unimportant in the big picture. I hear kids at school talking about clothes, hair, parties, and it makes me sick.”

  “I know what you mean, Leah. It’s like I’ve got one foot in this world and one foot in the next. It’s hard to join the living again, isn’t it?”

  For once Mom and I see eye to eye on something.

  “But you’ve got a lot of living left to do, Leah, and so do I. It’s not wrong to enjoy things. There’s so much beauty in this world, so much God put here for us to enjoy.”

  “I know, Mom, it’s just that I have no sense of purpose. I want to bounce out of bed like I used to, all fired up, knowing exactly what I was aiming to accomplish that day. I wonder if I’ll ever feel a drive like that again.”

  “You will. It’s just going to take some time. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

  “But I’m used to having a goal; if I don’t find one soon, I’m going to go crazy.”

  “Have a little patience while you work things out. Something will come to you.”

  “I was thinking, maybe I could volunteer in a soup kitchen or a homeless shelter. Or join Big Brothers/Big Sisters.”

  “Those are all fine ideas, Leah. You can go to college and get an education towards any number of service related professions. You could be a doctor, a counselor, a teacher.”

  “No, Mom, I need something I can do now. I don’t want to waste anymore time. I want to make a difference now.”

  Sunday, October 5

  All through church I think about it. What can I do? What really matters?

  I could tutor kids after school. I could join a cause like Habitat for Humanity or Save The Rainforest or Save the Whales.

  I think of all the people I know, all their jobs, and all the volunteer work they do. And then it comes to me: Heather, the job she has, how much it meant to Dad and us to have her there caring for him.

  I want to do what Heather does.

  When we get home from church, I call the Maple Valley Nursing Home. A woman answers.

  “Hi, my name is Leah Weiczynkowski. I’m a senior at Senior High and I’d like to volunteer.” It comes rolling off my tongue just as I rehearsed it.

  “We can always use volunteers,” the woman says. “When would you be available?”

  Monday, October 6

  I walk through the doors and smell urine. A hundred other clean, piney, lemony odors try to cover it up, but it’s there underneath it all.

  And the quiet. The weird, empty quiet. The hallway vibrates with it.

  All those old people. Rounded backs. Wheelchairs. Hospital beds. Tubes and bags. Gaping mouths. Vacant stares. Big ears, big noses. Sunken cheeks. Liver spots. That waxy white skin, paper thin, tinged blue and yellow.

  All these old, dying people, shuffling around. Every time I look at one, I see Dad. Dad, in a different bathrobe.

  And that’s what I’m trying to get rid of. This image of Dad as sick and old. Every time I picture him, he’s weak and thin like he was this summer.

  I stop and close my eyes. I go through my files, shuffling through the snapshots to get to the one I want: my tan, thick-middled, smiling dad, dressed to a tee, standing erect, wearing his photo grays.

  “Excuse me.”

  An old man with a walker is bumping towards me, and all my snapshots flutter away like cards in a game of fifty-two-pickup.

  I’m standing in the middle of the hallway. “Oh, sorry.” Stepping out of his way, I try to smile at him, but I can’t.

  A lump forms in my throat, and I grab the handrail on the wall.


  I can’t do this.

  I turn around and walk out before I even get to the check-in desk.

  CHAPTER 32

  Tuesday, October 7

  “Leah,” Mom yells from the other end of the house, “have you vacuumed the sunroom?” We’re doing some serious housecleaning for the first time since Dad died. A very fun after-school activity.

  “No, not yet,” I yell back.

  Doesn’t she know we lose thousands of skin cells and hundreds of hairs every day? Dad lay here for months, falling apart. There must be plenty of him still lying around on the floor in here. And I’m supposed to suck it all up? It seems so sad not to leave some trace of him. Wouldn’t it be comforting, years from now, to take your socks off at night and see a curly gray Einstein hanging from one of them?

  Not an hour, not a half hour, not fifteen minutes goes by that I don’t think about him.

  Sometimes I bury my nose in the armpits of his suits still hanging in the closet and wallow in his good musky smell.

  I sit down on the canister vacuum, elbows on my knees, chin in hands. It’s just too hard to believe that I’ll never see him again on this earth.

  I have dreams that he comes back to us. Not like Jesus and the resurrection; no, he just walks into the house one day, brought back to life and cured by modern medicine. And we’re never shocked to see him. It’s more like, “Dad! I’m so glad you’re back. Thank goodness for technology.”

  “Leah!” Mom shouts again. I turn on the vacuum, drowning her out, hopefully shutting her up. I stay on the vacuum holding the wand in the air so as not to suck up any precious stuff.

  Speaking of dreams, I’m waiting for a vision or a sign from Dad, one that will let me know he’s okay and that he’s watching over me. I do things to make him proud, things I wouldn’t bother doing if I didn’t feel like he was watching so I know I have a definite sense of his being out there somewhere.

  I have to believe that he’s out there, that he’s not just gone. In science we learned nothing can be created or destroyed; it only changes form. I know there’s that whole thing about from dust we come, to dust we return, but I’m not talking about his body. I’m talking about his spirit, his soul. It’s somewhere, in some form, and that form is not dirt. I want to know where it went, what it became, and how I can feel it again.

  Because right now I’m just feeling this huge void. I’m numb. I don’t feel like eating or watching TV or reading or going outside. All I can think to do is sleep and make the time pass faster—because as people are always saying—time heals. I doubt anything can heal this, but I’ve got no choice but to give it a shot.

  Gram says it never goes away, the void, but that it eventually does stop hurting. She should know. She’s been through a lot of deaths: her mom and dad, a brother, two sisters, a husband, a son. So I talk to her about it a lot.

  I think I’ll go call her right now. I turn off the vacuum and take the cordless phone into my room.

  Gram answers. “Yello?”

  “Green,” I say.

  “Oh, you!” Gram growls at my teasing of the way she says hello; I always answer red or green or blue. “So it’s you, Sweetie. How’s your mom doing?”

  “Eh.”

  “Well, you be strong for her.”

  “I will.”

  “So what’s the occasion?”

  “Nothing. I just wanted to talk to you.”

  “Well, it’s good to hear your voice. I miss youse.”

  “We miss you, too.”

  “So tell me what’s new.”

  “I’m going to start working at the restaurant after school and on weekends.”

  “Your pa would like that. Maybe you can take over for him someday.”

  “Ha.”

  “How’s school going?”

  “Good. All right. Not great. Gram, I try to keep busy, but it’s like I’m constantly bored. I try to fill up my time with anything and everything, but nothing works. I don’t think working at the restaurant is going to help either.”

  “Sweetie, stop trying to fill it up. I told you, the void never goes away. You can’t make it go away. You shouldn’t want it to go away.”

  “What?”

  “That’s your pa’s place in your heart, that void. It will always be there. No one and nothing can ever take his place. Don’t think of it as this empty hole you’ve got to fill. Keep it as a special place you can go to, a place full of memories. Let it stay open and don’t be afraid to visit it; that’s your sacred place. Go there when you miss him, when you want to feel close to him.”

  Gee, I never knew Gram was so warm and fuzzy.

  “But still, I wish I could find something worthwhile to do with my life, Gram. Something really noble, really important in the grand scheme of things.”

  “You know what Mother Theresa said, ‘We cannot do great things on this earth. We can only do small things with great love.’”

  When I get off the phone, I lie on my bed and think about all the things Gram said. I think long and hard.

  I like her way of thinking about the void. Leaving it be, keeping it as this secret spot to go to. It would be a relief, too, if I could stop trying to fill it, because nothing’s working.

  And that Mother Theresa quote. Maybe I won’t ever do any great humanitarian deed, but if I do every little thing all day long the best I can, if I say good morning like I mean it, and smile at everyone I meet, and open doors for people, maybe that’s enough. Maybe I will leave this world a better place.

  CHAPTER 33

  Friday, October 17

  I scrape plate after plate of coleslaw into the garbage. It’s Fish-’n’-Chips Night at the restaurant, and I reek. Last Friday when Clay picked me up, he pinched his nose and drove real fast all the way home, saying he didn’t want his leather soaking up the smell. He was kidding, but when I got home I really noticed it. It was even in my hair.

  Enzo comes bursting through the swinging doors. He’s always checking up on me, like I’m a china doll that might crack.

  “How’s it going?” he yells over the sprayers. “How’s my clean-up crew?”

  I grab him by the elbow on his sweep through to the kitchen. “Enzo, can I please graduate from clean-up crew to waitress?”

  Enzo’s good to me, but sometimes I feel like Cinderella. I used to be the owner’s daughter; now I’m begging to get out of scrubbing pots and pans.

  Enzo shakes his head. “For all your grace on the soccer field, you got the touch of an elephant with a tray in your hand.”

  It’s true. I’ve broken a lot of glasses.

  “But practice makes perfect, right? How am I going to get better if you never let me do it?”

  Enzo scrunches up his face. He knows I’ve got a point. “Okay. I’ll give you five o’clock to six o’clock, Monday nights. But that’s it until you show me you can handle a tray.”

  Enzo comes back about a half hour later and says in a real low voice, “Leah, will you do me a really big favor?”

  “Sure, what?”

  “The boys and I are trying to round up enough people for our match tomorrow, but it’s a strange weekend. Everyone’s out of town for one reason or another, and we’re one player shy of eleven-a-side. Will you play with us?”

  “Enzo.”

  Anything but that.

  “Please,” he begs. “What else have you got going? Come on; you can be on my team.” He flashes me his most charming grin.

  I know how much his Saturday matches mean to him. “Enzo, I haven’t played in weeks. You wouldn’t want me on your team, believe me.”

  “Leah, even in your most out-of-shape state, you’re still three steps ahead of a bunch of old men.”

  “Enzo.”

  “Come on. You of all people should know how I hate to miss a chance to play.”

  “Okay, but just this once,” I say. “Don’t ever ask me to do this again.”

  Saturday, October 18

  Enzo and the other guys don’t treat me li
ke a girl when we’re on the field. No, these guys go hard. They joke around and are good sports about everything, but they want to win.

  It’s fun. No pressure. No ego. Well, a little bit of ego, but it’s the right kind. It’s like it used to be—just plain fun. Soccer for soccer’s sake. I’m not the best player out here, either. There are some young guys, strong and fast and quick. And the older guys might be out of shape, but they’re skilled and smart, lifelong students of the game, like Enzo.

  It feels good. The soft tap, tap, tap of the ball at my feet as I dribble. I’m surprised. It’s like riding a bike. I didn’t forget how to play. I’m a little slow, but my touch is there.

  Enzo’s on my team and he keeps trying to set me up.

  I make a run far post, and he slots me a pass that’s right on the money. I fake the shot, take two touches to the side, and unload on the ball. It sails into the upper right corner.

  An electric surge passes through me as it tickles the net. I feel this joy well up in me, this foreign and nearly forgotten thrill. I feel guilty for feeling it, but it’s too simple to be anything but good.

  I want to jump and hoot and pump my fists. It’s so satisfying to score a goal! One simple little goal. I’d forgotten what a charge it gives you.

  It’s starting to rain, but we keep playing. I slide tackle, and when I get up the whole right side of my body is streaked green and brown. The backs of everyone’s legs are splattered with mud. We’re slipping and sliding. The ball drags through a puddle in a low spot, spraying water as it rolls. Three people are whacking at it, unable to get their footing. I laugh at the foolishness of the scene. This is war, down and dirty. Only the tough survive. We look like wet rats.

  I hope the game doesn’t get called on account of lightning. I’m having too much fun.

  I don’t even know who wins, the game was such a mess. But Enzo looks happy coming off the field, so it might have been us.

  We exchange a muddy handshake. “Thanks, Enzo. That was fun.”