Tideland

by Mitch Cullin

  She shut her good eye, leaving the bad one open.

  "-this is revenge.”

  "A dead peeper," I said.

  She nodded.

  "Dreadful, isn’t it? But I see more than most -- even with eyes closed. Do you know this? Birds and rabbits -- they’re in my dreams -- and children hiding behind bushes, everything you can imagine. Of course, children behind bushes sometimes see more than they should. It’s best minding one’s own business, right? Otherwise, Rose, bad bad things might happen under the sun."

  She'd seen me and Classique. She knew we saw her sucking Patrick’s blood. My face turned bright red. I put my head down. For a second, I considered running, but I didn’t know where to go.

  "Horrible,” Dell was saying, sniffing. "Awful. You reek of the devil, Rose. Come with me."

  I followed her to the porch, where she dug a can of Lysol from a duffel bag and had me stand on the steps.

  "Seal your mouth and eyes,” she said. "Extend your arms and hold your breath.”

  She sprayed my dress and legs, my arms and hair, my sneakers and back. The Lysol felt sticky on my skin. And when I opened my mouth and inhaled, the disinfectant made me gag and cough.

  "Do your panties," she instructed, handing me the can.

  And as I raised my dress with one hand, spraying my panties with the other, Dell went to the duffel bags. She wound the drawstrings around her fingers, two bags in her left hand, two bags in her right hand. Then she squatted, preparing to lift -- but the squirrel caught her attention. He chattered on the roof, creating a racket.

  "Monster!” she shouted. "Nasty thing!”

  She upheaved, rising with the bags. The veins in her neck bulged as she trudged toward me.

  "I’m going home,” she said, straining, "while the bees are still napping. Dickens will fetch the basket tonight. He’ll bring you water and food. Tomorrow I’ll come for that nasty creature, that diseased brute.”

  She staggered past me, grunting as she ambled through the yard.

  "Bye,” I said, waving the Lysol can. "I’ll guard your spray. And I really like your cake too."

  And the next day, I watched from an upstairs window as Dell readied her ambush. It was like something in a cartoon -- twine tied to a stick in the yard, a stick set vertical -- propped between the ground and an upturned crate -- and the twine ceiling away, stretching into the Johnsongrass, where she now waited to spring her trap. And there on a plate, beneath the half-cocked crate, a carrot or an onion or a chunk of wood? I couldn’t tell. Then scampering over the roof, along the awning, down into the yard--how long did it take? Longer than a cartoon, I suppose, shorter than Romper Room. The squirrel was careful, not too fast, approaching the crate in furtive darts and sudden stops, sniffing as he crept toward the plate.

  "Watch out," I said.

  The twine tightened. The stick collapsed. And like a shark engulfing a minnow, the crate swallowed the squirrel in one chomp. But the squirrel fought; he struggled about, almost tipping the crate, resisting so violently that Dell had to run from the Johnsongrass and sit on her trap. She clutched an empty duffel bag, which, eventually, she worked underneath the crate, consuming the trap and the squirrel and the plate. Then she pulled the drawstrings and hoisted her load-the squirrel clawing inside the bag-and hiked to the cattle trail, whistling.

  Beer-Braised Squirrel, I thought. That’s what she’ll cook me. That’s what I’ll get.

  "Poor squirrel,” I told my father. "He’s doomed. He never had a chance."

  18

  The hospital was inside my father’s belly, a shadowy and grim place smelling of varnish.

  "A full recovery is expected," someone said. And dressed in green johnnies, my mother and Classique lay beside one another on gurneys. Three surgeon Barbies, breathing hard behind white masks, crowded around them with scalpels.

  "Fabulous,” said Classique-except she wasn’t quite Classique. She had a human body, long legs, a blond beehive. "Fantastic, darling, wonderful!"

  "Yes, sweety,” my mother concurred, "wonderful!”

  My mother looked like Dell. She wore a cowboy hat and smoked a cigar.

  And I was there too, somewhere.

  Just then a Barbie nurse appeared. Magic Curl? Or Fashion Jeans? I can’t say for sure. She carried an oversize brain, the size of a turkey, on a silver platter.

  "Your dinner is served,” said the nurse. "Set the table.”

  But what I understood her to mean was: "The brain is ready. Bring the patient.”

  And Classique was suddenly whisked away, blowing kisses as she went, telling me or my mother, "This is it! I’ve never been so happy! I’m alive!”

  "Yes,” my mother said, sitting up and exhaling smoke, "yes, yes!” Her johnny burst into flames.

  I awoke, sweating. It was afternoon, and sunlight blazed through my bedroom window, spilling over the mattress, warming me and my father. The varnish glistened like perspiration across his forehead. And I was stretched alongside him, pressed against the quilt, yawning.

  "Rise and shine," Cut ’N Style said.

  I’d fallen asleep with her on my finger. Now she hovered in front of my face.

  "Classique is alive," I told her. "She’s okay and happy.”

  "Just a dream,” she replied. "Trust me, I know. I was there, dear."

  Cut ’N Style sounded different, more like Classique.

  She said, "I know everything."

  "Stop it," I said. "Don’t pretend you’re her.”

  "That’s silly. I have no idea what you’re talking about-"

  I flicked her from my finger, sent her sailing. She flew to the floor, bounced and rolled, and finally slid to the edge of the stairs. She was knocked out before she could start crying.

  "It’s not just a dream,” I said. "You’re pretty stupid if you can’t see that -- even if you’re blind too!”

  Then I put an ear to the quilt, listening at my father’s rib cage, hoping that the operation was well underway, and that the surgeons’ voices could be caught. But I heard nothing.

  "Magic Curl,” I said softly, "Fashion Jeans -- it’s me, Jeliza- Rose. What’s happening in there? You’ll tell me, all right?”

  I listened some more, hearing only silence.

  Everyone’s sleeping, I thought. They’re still in the dream.

  So I tried making myself fall asleep again. I rested my head on the quilt, shut my eyes and began snoring. But it didn’t work. I was wide awake.

  "It’s not fair!”

  In frustration, I climbed from the mattress and rushed after Cut ’N Style. She was unconscious, probably at the hospital with Classique and my mother. I kicked her down the stairs, saying, "That’s what you get, you’re a bad dog!"

  And later, when Dickens arrived with food, I told him, "Cut ’N Style ruined my great dream. She woke me up and now I’ll never know."

  I was at the dining room table, and he was removing my meal from a paper sack, arranging each item -- thermos, foil-covered plate, slice of pound cake in a sandwich bag, fork and knife -- neatly before me.

  "She’s your friend?" he asked. "She fell in the hole and disappeared forever and I can’t find her."

  "That’s Classique,” I said, "not Cut ’N Style. Cut ’N Style is on the floor over there -- but Classique is in the hospital -- I dreamt her -- and I saw her with Mom and Mom was burning."

  Dickens frowned and shrugged. He didn’t understand, so I explained that Classique was no longer a head. She had a woman’s body. And she was getting a real brain.

  "Bet it costs a million dollars," he said. "I’d like a new brain sometimes -- I think a new one is shiny."

  "Yeah -- and it was a big brain. She was excited and I guess she wasn’t a doll anymore.”

  Dickens pulled the foil off the plate -- "She must be pretty" then unscrewed the thermos cap.

  "She is. She’s beautiful."

  He pushed the plate toward me -- greasy meat, two legs, a thigh or a breast.

  "Dell says eat what y
ou can and hide the leftovers in this-”

  He handed me the foil, which I smoothed in my lap as if it were a napkin. Then I sniffed at the meat, "Is it the squirrel?"

  "No,” he said, shaking his head. "No squirrel. Dell hates those. She won’t cook those -- she just won’t."

  "Oh," I said, reaching for the fork, "that’s good. I don’t think I like squirrel either.”

  And while eating, I thought about Classique’s operation. How was the brain put in? Did it hurt? Did she bleed? Is she different?

  Why did she need a brain anyway?

  Because it’s fabulous, dear. It’s fantastic, darling.

  "Fabulous," I said, picking at the meat. "Wonderful."

  Dickens glanced at me. He was in the living room, holding my father’s wig, his fingers combing the coils. Then I watched as he planted the wig on his bald head; the coils sank past his ears and forehead, adorning his shoulders. And -- wearing his goggles and swimming trunks and flip- flops, the wig askew -- he looked like a crazy woman, half- naked and loathsome.

  "I'm pretty pretty,” he said.

  "You’re funny,” I told him. "You’re weird.”

  "No, no,” he whined, "because I don’t want to be weird, okay? I’d like the red lips and then I’ll be beautiful."

  He needed more than red lips. He needed rouge, maybe mascara.

  "All right," I said, "I’ll fix your face."

  He clapped.

  "Yes, if you fix my face I’ll be happy.”

  "I will,” I said. "Except I better eat Dell’s cake first, better drink all my apple juice.”

  "And hide the leftovers."

  "I know that already.”

  But there wasn’t going to be any leftovers. I ate every piece of meat, chugged the apple juice, consumed the pound cake in three bites. Then I fetched Grandmother’s cosmetic bag -- my tummy feeling bloated and satiated, my meal swishing around inside, as I sprinted up and back down the stairs.

  "Sit still or else you’ll make me do it wrong,” I told Dickens, who fidgeted while I unzipped the bag. He was cross-legged on the living room floor, spine straight, hands squeezing his knees.

  "Won’t move a muscle," he said. "Don’t have muscles anyway, so I won’t move them.”

  I shushed him, and then emptied the cosmetic bag between us, shaking out the lipsticks and mascara and compacts and tweezers and cotton balls. I arranged the six lipsticks into a row.

  "Now, which one?"

  Scarlet Surrender or Pink Tango or Hyacinth or Sweet Vermilion or Chinese Red or Rose Blush.

  "That one,” he said, pointing at Pink Tango.

  "This is best," I said, taking Scarlet Surrender. "Puff your lips."

  He puckered.

  "Get ready-"

  It was difficult applying the scarlet evenly. Stay in the lines, I told myself -- but my hand moved too fast when doing his bottom lip, and I smeared lipstick across his chin. His upper lip went smoother; I only overshot once, reddening the end of his nose. But that was his fault. He sniffled and my hand jerked.

  "You’re Rudolph," I said.

  ‘'You are,” he replied.

  Then I dabbed on the rouge, brightening his cheeks, creating rosy circles.

  "Almost finished," I said, shutting the compact.

  He was gazing at me, his eyes magnified behind the goggles.

  Bug eyes, I thought. Creepy bug eyes.

  "I think you’re nice,” he said.

  And as I leaned forward, straightening the wig, he kissed my lips -- a nervous peck, which tickled and made me giggle.

  "That’s silly," I said, wiping my lips. "You got red on me, silly kisser.”

  'He glanced at his swimming trunks, embarrassed, and folded his hands over his crotch.

  "The old lady was a silly kisser too," he said. "She kissed me, but that’s when I was little and she was really old. Sometimes she did this in my mouth-”

  He stuck out his tongue and wiggled it.

  "--and that was fun. It was a snake, I think, or a goldfish dancing. She was awfully sweet too. Sometimes I’d be here all day just kissing with her. She’s a nice lady, except she’s dead.”

  I was both delighted and curious to hear him speak of Grandmother.

  "She’s Daddy’s mom," I said. "She never kissed me because I didn’t get born yet.” `

  "I think I knew that. I think maybe someone told that to me.”

  "Dickens, she was your girlfriend -- you were her boyfriend."

  He took his hands from his crotch and assumed an expression of sorrow.

  "No, I was her cutie. Her little cutie. Never been a boyfriend. Don’t know what that is, except if I got older I’d be her boyfriend, I suppose. If she didn’t die, you know. If she didn’t fall down the steps. Think she was coming to kiss me when she falled ‘cause I was there in the yard pulling weeds. And I ran away when she did that. But I didn’t know what to do. I was just little, you know. I was scared, I guess. She was nice."

  "She was old,” I told him, envisioning the chest in the attic, the junk stored within. "How old are you?”

  A worried, confused look settled on Dickens’ face.

  "I don’t know. I’m not an old man though. Dell says I’m a boy. She says l’m a baby. She says I’ll always be a baby ‘cause my brain got wired wrong.”

  You’ll buy a new brain, I thought. When you have the world’s biggest penny, you’ll get the operation.

  "You’re a little cutie,” I said.

  He smiled.

  "You’re a little cutie too.”

  So I kissed him.

  Then he kissed me.

  And we were laughing, our lips and teeth red with scarlet.

  "Silly kissers.”

  I was about to kiss him again when the quarry suddenly boomed, rattling the windows.

  "Uh-oh.”

  Dickens creased his brow. He stared at the ceiling for a moment, the blond coils slipping from his shoulders.

  "They’re expleding the gr0und,” he said. "They dynamite everything so there’s no more left. I seen them do it. I go there and see them. It’s bigger than firecrackers and bullets.”

  "I like firecrackers.”

  "l/Ie too. I really do. So if you want to see the boom hole, you’ll see the ocean to, if you want."

  I nodded.

  "I’ll show you, okay?"

  He reached for my hand.

  "Okay," I said.

  Then we kissed.

  19

  The captain was my boyfriend, my cutie. And I was his l/Irs. Captain, his special one. When he kissed me, my stomach did somersaults. When I kissed him, I wanted to stand on my head and sing. I wanted to spin in circles. Even while we gathered our expeditionary crew -- a Barbie arm as his first lieutenant, Cut ’N Style as my second Mrs. Captain -- I couldn’t stop thinking about those scarlet lips, so strange and exciting, making my belly tingle. Did he feel the same? Were my lips tingling someplace within him?

  "Onward,” he said, assuming his brave captain’s voice. "That ocean boom hole is at least four hundred miles from here."

  Four hundred miles in less than an hour. More like two miles, if that. But how far it seemed, how inhospitable. A desert of bulldozer tracks and chalky silt. No brush. No grass or bluebonnets, just dirt and sand.

  Soon my dress was dusty. I tasted grit. And Dickens’ wig had gone white. Limestone flour powdered the scarlet on his lips, the rouge on his cheeks. He wiped dust from the goggles.

  "If the wind blows bad and we don’t hold hands," he said, "then we’ll be lost and go blind and then we’ll fall in the hole alone or worse. So watch for the wind, okay? It’s a tornado sometimes or a dust devil. So we better be careful. You drop in this hole and you’re a goner for sure. You can’t fly, I don’t think. I can’t. I tried but I can’t. And I can’t swim either."

  We’d journeyed to the end of the world -- having traveled through Johnsongrass and tall weeds and across dirt roads and under barbwire, ignoring DANGER and NO TRESPASSING signs -- going wher
e the cream-colored earth sheered and staggered downward; mammoth ledges hewed from the quarried terrain, large enough for a giant to ascend.

  And there we lay, at the edge of a high rock cliff, gazing over the rim and into the quarry -- or into the boom hole, as Dickens labeled it -- pondering the murky water that spread out below us.

  "If you fell you’d clrop a hundred years until you splashed in the ocean.”

  "How far is that?"

  "Almost a thousand miles, I think.”

  The Hundred Year Ocean lined the very depths of this cliffbound gorge, still and dark beneath the surface.

  "But it’s a lake,” I said. "The ocean goes forever."

  "No,” Dickens replied, "no, no. ‘Cause it’s deeper than any lake, so don’t pretend you know, all right?”

  Then he explained that old cars and old trucks and all kinds of junk lurked somewhere underneath the water. And freshwater jellyfish, about the size of a penny and transparent. Years ago, he told me, three scuba divers drowned before they could find their way back to the surface.

  "‘Cause it don’t have a bottom,” he said. "Never did. These people go in sometimes and can’t get out. That’s why I got a submarine. That way I don’t drown at all.”

  How often had he explored the bottomless ocean in Lisa? A zillion million times, maybe. And what did he find? A battered bicycle, some tires, beer cans -- pennies? Hidden treasure?

  "Just outta space, blue and red stars too. But you can’t breath in space and Lisa is only a submarine, you know. She can’t be a rocketship and a submarine. But if you sink deep deep deep then you’ll reach the moon and much deeper is Mars and deeper than that is God and the baby Jesus, I think.”