by Mitch Cullin
Classique was communicating, a faint transmission: It’s okay. I’rn awake. Come get me-
Then no noise, no train, no breeze. My palms were sweating like crazy. But I was safe. I walked onto the porch and entered the house.
My father was in the chair. I could see the back of his head. And the map of Denmark was sagging, drooping over; a top corner had come unstuck. For a moment I considered fixing the map, but that meant getting close to him. He’d probably changed colors again, and the thought of his skin spooked me -- especially now that the farmhouse had grown darker. He was like the Mood Ring in my rnother’s jewelry box; sometimes turning blue, sometimes black. That ring never worked right.
The dressing gown lay in the entryway, at the front door, so I picked it up. The satin was so soft. I pressed it against my cheek.
"Smooth as a baby’s butt," I said, calmed by my own voice.
I have an idea, Classique was thinking.
What?
Come get me and I’ll tell you.
I cradled the dressing gown like a baby. There wasn’t a light for the stairs; it was pitchy, the steps were invisible. But I pretended a baby’s butt rested in the nook of my arms, and that made me happy.
"I love you so much,” I told the dressing gown. "You’re my dear sweet one."
And when I showed Classique my baby, she said, "It’s dead. It doesn’t have bones."
She was the only one awake on the wig.
"I don’t care. It’s smooth."
"It doesn’t have a pumping heart.”
"But you don’t too.”
"How do you know?” she said. "I might.”
"I’m sorry.”
I didn’t want to argue. She could be stubborn. If I argued with her, she wouldn’t explain her idea -- although I already understood what it was. So I gently laid the dressing gown on the pillow, then I slipped Classique onto my finger.
"Get the wig,” she said.
I grabbed the wig, tumbling Fashion Jeans and Magic Curl and Cut ’N Style across the mattress. Then I went into the bathroom and got the cosmetic bag. And before going, I noticed that the hatch was ajar, beyond which existed murkiness, outer space, a void where the Bog Man could hibernate. The attic wasn’t the same as in the daytime; it was another world, the black hole of What Rocks. I tried setting the latch, but the bolt wouldn’t stay in its notch. I pressed hard with my palm. When I let off, the bolt sprang back. So I removed a tiny toothbrush from the bag -- its bristles stained with mascara -- and wedged the hilt in the gap between the hatch and the baseboard.
"You don’t move,” I ordered the brush, "or you’ll die."
Sometimes toothbrushes died. The bristles dulled and that was that. Sneakers died too. And buildings. So did Moms and Dads. The planet was full of the dying, the dead, the gone. But if someone was beautiful, like Classique, they could go on forever. Death was ugly.
In the living room I whispered, "You’re a vision.”
The wig fit my father well, the blond coils almost concealed his ponytail.
"You’re a sensation.”
His face remained pallid. He hadn’t changed much during the day. And I was relieved. There was a compact of rouge in the cosmetic bag -- so I dabbed color on his cheeks, on his chin, on his earlobes, brightening the purple blotches. Then I removed the bonnet and put it on him.
He was pretty now. So I kissed his mouth. The skin felt fake and rubbery. I kissed him more than once, until the scarlet reddened his lips. Then I sat at his boots with Classique and admired him.
"We’re very proud of you,” I told him. "You’re Miss America."
And that night I slept in his room with the door locked. Just me and Classique. For a while, from the window, I watched the tower strobe flicker. But I didn’t stare too long. I didn’t want to get hypnotized. Then I lay on his mattress, very quietly. I shut my eyes, transmitting messages downstairs.
Daddy-? This is me. Am I coming in loud and clear? Daddy-? If you can hear me, say something. It’s me. Radio Jeliza-Rose, broadcasting from your bedroom. Are you there?
10
Sitting on the porch steps, I sipped from the gallon jug and then dribbled into Classique’s hair. There wasn’t any shampoo in What Rocks, so I pretended. I scrubbed her scalp like it was soapy. The water made her red hair look brown.
I called her Miss.
"How would you like it today, Miss?" And, "Miss, could I possibly interest you in some of our exclusive hair-care products?"
But she told me to just shampoo, to not talk.
"Yes, Miss."
The customer was always right, even when she was wrong. So I combed my fingers through Classique’s hair, pushed at her plastic skull, and shut up. And if she was my mother, I’d be tapping my fist on her head, like knocking on a door -- but softer. Then I'd uncoil my fist, letting my fingertips spread slowly out. It gave my mother the chills.
"Cracking an egg.”
"Do me now."
We took turns. My mother and I. Cracking eggs on each other’s heads. Often we rapped with both hands, two fists crumbling, and the fingertips would then drip all over, an oily feeling, trickling toward the neck, around the ears, the forehead. Gooseflesh. I loved that game.
Spider, Pinch, Blow -- another chill game.
"Spider crawling up your spine-"
Fingertips creeping along the back to the shoulders.
"Tight squeeze-"
Pinching the shoulder blades.
"Cold breeze-”
Blowing on the neck while dragging nails down the spine.
"Now you’ve got the chills."
It never failed. The bumps grew, rough and pimply. I’d rub my arms and neck so they’d go away. "Do it again," I’d tell my mother, once the bumps disappeared. "Just one more.”
"That’s what you said before.”
"But I promise._Just one more."
And sometimes we shampooed each other’s hair. But we didn’t use water or shampoo. We did it in her bedroom. It was all make-believe.
My mother always said, "Could I interest you in some of our exclusive hair-care products, miss?"
"No thank you,” I replied. "Not today.”
I wanted her to stroke my scalp without saying anything. I closed my eyes, knowing the massage wouldn’t last long, wishing she’d never stop. She could’ve put me asleep, easily; I would’ve liked that.
But Classique wasn’t growing sleepy. As I rinsed her hair, she was wide awake, gazing beyond the yard, studying the gray clouds that stretched overhead. The sun was hiding; I couldn’t see where.
That morning, fog hugged the ground, obscuring every- thing. In my father’s bedroom, I parted the curtains above the bed. "We’re flying,” I told Classique, imagining What Rocks adrift in some cloud. By the time I dressed and went outside with the jug, the fog had lifted. The farmhouse had descended through the grim sky, returning safely to Grandmother’s property.
Now I wrung Classique's hair, shaking the water from my hand, saying, "It’ll lightning. It’ll flood and What Rocks will float off with us.”
Then, in order to prevent frizziness, I smoothed her hair between my palms.
"You’re shiny," I told her. "You’re cleaner than soap.”
Classique ignored me. She was angry because I didn’t use shampoo. She thought I was spitting in her hair. And spit stunk. I explained that the water came from the jug, that I was only dribbling so she wouldn’t get too wet.
"What can I do?" I asked. "I’ll help you get happy."
"Do you want to check the radio? If it’s still there-”
"Do you?”
"Yes.”
We were of the same mind.
I ran as fast as possible toward the railroad tracks, holding Classique aloft; that way her hair would dry quicker. When we climbed the rise, I crouched in the weeds by the tracks, but the ghost wasn’t there. So I walked down into her meadow, which had an earthy, moist smell like after rain. Stormy clouds swirled over the sorghum and behind them a hazy sun
, round as the moon, hiding out.
Classique and I went to where we left the gift.
"She’s been here,” I said, squatting by the rocks.
The radio was gone.
"She found it.”
"And look what she did-”
The rocks were rearranged, spaced evenly, making a figure eight; in each loop a freshly planted bluebonnet. I saw it as a sign, an acknowledgment, a thank you. And a response was expected. So I set Classique in a loop, under a bluebonnet, and began shifting rocks. But I couldn’t think what to do. Another circle was pointless. A square or an arrow seemed dumb.
A smiley face then.
"The universal mark of friendship," was how my father described smiley faces. "In Japan or Holland or Mexico, it always means the same thing." He never gave autographs, just smiley faces with his initials jotted underneath the grin.
In my Big Chief sketch book, my father and I sat for hours at the dining table, drawing pictures with crayons. I made sunflowers or Barbies or stick figures parachuting. And he colored black grins, black-dot eyes, black-dot noses, of various shapes and sizes -- but unmistakable. He’d fill page after page with them. Once he made an American flag with nothing but red, white, and blue smiley faces.
Then there was the song he sometimes sang while tucking me in bed.
Don’t be wonderin’ if I love you
‘Cause I’m a lecherous so-and-so
Just take a hard look at my face
And my smile will let you know
All you think you need to know
And I hummed that song as my hands upheaved the rocks. The ghost would find my universal sign of friendship, and she’d probably laugh or smile. She’d probably whistle her pretty tune, fully aware that someone cared about her. The next day, I planned on returning -- then I could see what she created with the rocks.
But it didn’t happen like that.
I should’ve noticed Classique because she was looking past me, too horrified to speak; her blue eyes were huge and unblinking. But I wasn’t paying attention. I was busy working, pressing a rock into the soil with both hands.
The clouds parted. The sun suddenly shone behind me. A great shadow swept across my back and onto the half-finished rock grin -- the ghost’s broad silhouette, the beekeeper’s hood cast at an angle. I froze; my heart almost burst from my chest, my hands trembled.
"Child," her low voice said, "what are you doing?" She sounded like a man, like my father in the morning, his throat gravelly and hoarse.
I couldn’t answer. My legs couldn’t run. My hands wouldn’t stop shaking.
The shadow moved. I heard her footsteps clomping, , coming toward me. From the corners of my eyes, I saw the hem of her housedress swish by, the muddy brown high boots she wore.
Then she stood in front of me, nudging at the rocks with a boot tip, saying, "This won’t do, you know. You’ve ruined my cat eyes.”
Cat eyes? Not a figure eight then. But cat eyes, with bluebonnets for pupils.
I raised my head slowly, scanning the length of her; the white apron, the gray mittens, the pith helmet draped on all sides by the hood. Her arms were crossed. I could see her features in the mesh -- big nose, big jaw, gold-rimmed glasses.
Ghost, I thought, please leave. You’re scaring me.
"Are you mute, vandal?" she asked. "You can’t speak?
I shook my head.
"What’s that mean? No or yes?"
"I’m scared,” I muttered.
"Vandal is scared,” she said. "As you should be, I think.”
She had me confused with someone else.
"I’m not Vandal," I told her.
"What?”
"I’m not Vandal. I'm Jeliza-Rose."
"What kind of rose?”
"Jeliza-”
"Uh-huh,” she said, nodding. She repeated my name to her- self, rolling it around in her mouth like a marble. Then she went, "Well, a vandal by any other name -- do you understand?"
"No.”
She unfolded her arms, saying, "It doesn’t matter, I suppose."
Then she sighed, poking at the rocks again for a moment.
In the brooding sunlight, transfixed by the ghost, touching the ground with my fingertips, the fear that had seized me was now settling. I didn’t need to runaway just yet; I could wait a little longer.
"Any bees?"
I managed a shrug.
"One sting and I’m paralyzed,” she said. "One sting and I’m most likely dead."
"You’re dead,” I told her.
The ghost gasped as if I’d startled her. "What a thing to say," she said. "`What kind of child are you?”
I shrugged.
"Well then, if you see a bee -- or hear a bee -- you’ll say so, right?"
I nodded.
"If I’m stung and die, it’ll be your fault."
Her mittens were at the hood, turning up the mesh, bringing the net-like fabric over the helmet. The hair hanging on her forehead seemed unnaturally yellow, recalling the discolored corners of the brittle newspaper my father kept in his closet -- KING OF ROCK ‘N’ ROLL DEAD.
A ghost’s face?
Nope, thought Classique.
But she was white. She had a pinkish color, a jowly, abstracted appearance -- a weathered countenance that was also unforgiving, wrinkled, graceful. Her glasses lacked a left lens, the right lens was shaded and impenetrable.
"They’ll stay far," she was saying to herself, drawing a circle in the air. "They’ll mess elsewhere."
I wasn’t sure if she was referring to me and Classique, or the bees.
She clapped her hands together, once. She pivoted her head and spit. "That’ll keep them gone for a bit," she told me. "It usually works. You’d be surprised."
Then she knelt, scrutinizing the disrepair at her feet. And like a parachute sinking to the earth, the hem of her house- dress billowed and ruffled outward. She reached for the rocks I’d rearranged -- shaking her head some -- and began fixing her cat eyes.
"See, everything has a place,” she said, moving the rocks. "Even the smallest thing. If you tamper with something -- take it from its place -- there’s no order. And then there’s no light. Everything is chaos."
She paused and regarded Classique sitting under the bluebonnet.
"And is this for me?”
"It’s Classique. She’s my friend.”
She extracted Classique, pinching her between a forefinger and thumb, thrusting her out and away like a stinky sock.
"You should consider the company you keep, I think. Take it."
I leaned forward, gingerly accepting Classique. And I watched as the mittens patted dirt, adjusted the stems of the bluebonnet-pupils, hoisted rocks.
"Can I help you?”
"Certainly not. In fact, you’ll be going. I’ve nothing more to say. You’ve blinded a cat eye."
"But I can help.”
"Uh-huh, well, go and help me. Go, I mean. That’ll help me. You belong somewhere else.”
She squinted -- one eye showing, the other concealed behind that dark lens -- reminding me of a pirate. Then she grabbed the mesh, pulling it past her face, a door slamming shut.
It wasn’t fair; I could help with her garden. And now she was ignoring me. "You’re not a real ghost,” I said, standing.
"I should think not -- not yet.”
Rotten old woman, I thought.
And I regretted giving her the radio. She didn’t thank me -- and she was mean to Classique. So I left her. I turned and ran. But as I climbed the rise, she called after me.
"Rose-Jeliza," she said, "what else can you do?”
I played deaf. And scrambling onto the tracks, I stood upright, frowning, and gazed back down into the meadow. She was dusting the mittens on her apron, giving me a sideways glance.
"Child, what is it you like to do,” she pointed at the cat eyes, "besides messing with this?”
I couldn’t think, so I said what sprang first to mind: "I fight squirrels -- and I eat too."
She was quiet for a while. She scratched her chin through the mesh.
"Very well," she finally said. "If you come here around noon tomorrow we’ll eat, how’s that? But go now, go to where you came from, where you belong. I’ve nothing more to say. just come tomorrow then -- and forget your friend, she’s trouble.”
My frown straightened. "Okay," I said.
And heading toward the farmhouse, I forced a laugh, a cackle. I threw Classique in the air and caught her. If the ghost wasn’t really a ghost, at least she was friendly, almost. And tomorrow we’d eat together, maybe even crack eggs on each other.
But Classique was miserable. She sulked all the way home.
"She doesn’t hate you," I reassured her. "She doesn’t."
But Classique didn’t care what I had to say to her. And neither did I. She was trouble, after all.
Two
11
Classique, let me tell you about the picnic with the ghost, and what I saw and did afterwards. I’m so sorry you couldn’t go because the food was wonderful, better than crackers and peanut butter; she brought a tasty treat -- dark greasy meat like on a chicken thigh (I'm not sure that’s what it was though), served on a linen napkin that had lacy patterns. And apple juice. And pound cake, half a slice. I didn’t eat that much, but I still ate enough to make me sleepy.
But let me tell you first how I waited for the ghost.
Of course, she isn’t a ghost. You knew that. Her name is Dell, and she lives in the far-off mesquite cluster, in a small home made of gray and russet-colored stone. I followed her after our picnic, but she didn’t know. At least I don’t think she did.
But before, in her meadow, I sat cross-legged by the cat eyes for at least an hour. The sky was clear, the air breezy. The Johnsongrass murmured from time to time, as if someone was wandering among the sorghum -- but it was only the wind tricking me. And, as you know, I wore lipstick and rouge. My hands were clean (I’d washed up on the porch, using the gallon jug, splashing water into a cupped palm. Then I worked my front teeth under the crest of each fingernail, scraping out the dirt).