Finding My Thunder

by Diane Munier

  Danny said we’d look in the next town but if they didn’t have one he would have to take what came and not complain. Well I was about dying for a cigarette but I didn’t want to light one up in front of Dickens. But Danny finally did and he offered me a drag and I looked back at the boy and he was staring at me and I said, “Don’t ever smoke. And don’t tell your mom I do.”

  And he said, “I’m not a snitch.”

  So I took a drag and I felt a little weird, knowing what Naomi would say, that we were here to be an example to others and hypocrites said do as I say and not as I do. But it tasted so good to pull on that smoke I didn’t care as much as I should have.

  “I’m such a hypocrite,” I whispered to Danny and he laughed.

  “Get over here,” he said.

  I didn’t want Dickens to feel left out. “Hey,” I said, “you want to come up here and sit by the door and I’ll sit in the middle for a while?”

  Danny groaned. “You sit still,” he warned Dickens as I scooted over and he climbed the seat to squeeze in by the door. Right away he started to play with the radio. Danny told him to cut it out.

  So I sat by Danny and he took my hand and we tooled down the highway with the hot wind beating through the windows. “Hey tell him one of those stories…hookman,” Danny said.

  “Oh yeah, tell me that,” Dickens said.

  So I did…telling him about this boy and girl who went to the drive in and it was a run-down place with scratchy speakers and there wasn’t hardly anyone there so they parked in the back by themselves….”

  “So they could kiss,” Dickens sang, and Danny laughed.

  “And they were all snuggled up watching the movie,” I said, “…and they heard something scratching on the trunk and he got out to look….”

  Up ahead were two girls hitchhiking. The one with her thumb out wore cut-off shorts and army like boots and a halter. The other sat on a suitcase with her legs crossed. More hippies. They looked kind of fearless and free like they lived on the road.

  “Oh, pick them up,” I said.

  “I thought you didn’t want me to,” he said, but he was already slowing down.

  The one with her thumb out signaled to the one sitting and they ran for the car. They opened the door and got in and the smell of sweaty bodies once again filled the car. “I’m Katrina,” thumb girl said, “and this is Joanne.”

  They asked how far we were going. Danny asked instead, “Where you headed?”

  “Well,” Katrina said, “damn you’re cute.” Then they both laughed, and I looked at Dickens and his eyes were huge with admiration and excitement for his big brother. I didn’t know what my face looked like.

  “This is my girl, Hilly,” Danny said.

  “Lucky,” Katrina said and I was speechless that of all the trees in the forest Danny Boyd was taking shelter behind me. And Joanne added in a low voice, “We don’t mind sharing.”

  Dickens fell against the seat and let his mouth drop wide with glee.

  “We’re only going to the next town,” I said even though it had been my bright idea to fill the car with free love.

  “That’s okay,” Joanne said. “Every mile we ride we don’t have to walk.” They were headed to an outdoor concert.

  Danny asked them if it had been hard to get rides.

  And they laughed and Jane said, “I like me a good ride.” And they laughed some more.

  Dickens’ face was so red I thought his cheeks might blow. He looked back there and Jane rubbed her hand through his hair. “Someday you’ll be a heartbreaker, too.”

  His legs went straight and his behind lifted off the seat. I put my hand on his knee and pushed him back into the seat.

  The was a truckstop ahead and Katrina and Joanne got excited about that. “We can get off there,” she said.

  “Least I hope so,” Joanne laughed.

  Once they were out I breathed a big sigh.

  “Dang,” Dickens said watching them walk away all roundy and twitchy hipped.

  “That’s the last of my bright ideas,” I told Danny and he laughed and kissed me.

  We were searching for hamburgers. There was a diner on the square in this little town we were in. It looked like Mac’s but bigger and brighter. Dickens was so excited his words tripped all over themselves. It didn’t seem to take too much to get him going.

  Danny led the way to the chrome covered door and held it wide and we went in. A big picture of a hamburger, fries and a chocolate shake was over the counter. “That’s what I want,” Dickens said loud enough to attract the attention of the three old crew cuts in there wearing their flannels in all the heat.

  We walked to a booth in the back. I used the bathroom and then Danny, then Dickens. Danny and me sat on one side and the other was blank waiting for Dickens to return. “He doesn’t get to go much…and they never eat out. So he gets excited,” Danny said.

  “Pretty much the same for me,” I said. “I’m excited too.”

  He kissed me again. The waitress cleared her throat and slapped down three menus with splattered plastic covers on them. Dickens slid into the booth other side then. “I want that,” he said pointing to the picture of the American trinity.

  “Chocolate shake or strawberry?”

  He flushed red and looked at Danny. “Chocolate?”

  “It’s your shake,” Danny said.

  “Could I have both?”

  “No. You can get another later.”

  “Okay,” he said like he was deciding the fate of the world. “Give me chocolate.”

  He tackled the rest of the decisions with equal concern—just catsup on his burger—extra salt on his fries. Okay, give him cheese on his burger too. And yes, Danny said, he could have a Coke on the side and a slice of peach pie.

  Danny and me ordered lickity-split and the gum chewing bee-hive hair was off with our orders.

  Danny put his arm around me and gave a squeeze.

  “Sickening,” Dickens said, his face all red again.

  We played tic-tac-toe on a napkin. I went first with an X. After I made it, Danny said, “That’s a kiss.” And he kissed me.

  Then when Dickens wrote an O, Danny said, “That’s a hug.” And he squeezed me again.

  He kept grinning at Dickens every time he kissed me or hugged me. It was working. The boy who didn’t want to answer to Dick was so grossed out and agitated he squirmed all over but it kept him occupied. Pretty soon we were engrossed in our little game and Danny continued to kiss me on the cheek and squeeze me around the shoulders as me and his brother filled those napkins.

  There was no happier meal than that greasy, sugary feast the waitress set before us. There was no happier time.

  The boy’s farm was located on the outskirts of a busy river town. All that was visible from the road was an iron gate with an arch overhead and a sign affixed high that said, “St. Joseph’s Boy’s Farm.” The gates were propped open for visiting day. The road was graveled and cut through woods and climbed upwards. Once it leveled out some there was another gate and a man who sat in a little roofed house. Danny pulled up there and gave him Sukey’s name.

  “Two visitors,” the man read from his clip-board, peering into the car.

  “Yeah, just two of us going in,” Danny said. He had to show the man his driver’s license. His mother had called ahead and made the appointment for him to visit. The guard asked for my identification, and Danny said, “She’s not going in. Just me and my brother.”

  Dickens leaned forward so the guard could see him.

  The old guy gave Danny two badges and told him what building to report to. We continued to drive onto the grounds and Danny parked the car by a big station wagon.

  “Well,” he rubbed over his thighs, “this is it then.” It was a bunch of buildings, a farm house, and a brick house looked like a school, then several buildings scattered about.

  Danny leaned forward and spoke to Dickens, “Take note not to ever come here,” he said. “This is where the bad boys go.
”

  “I ain’t ever coming here,” Dickens scoffed, but I could hear the fear in his voice.

  Danny turned to me then and he was looking at my lips so I kissed him. “He don’t know you’re along,” he said meaning Sukey didn’t know I was along or in Danny’s life at all.

  “I figured. But…is he locked up?”

  “Yeah. He’s confined…not locked up.”

  He kissed me again.

  Dickens said, “Yuck,” and got out.

  “I’m glad you came,” Danny whispered.

  “Me too,” I said.

  “You gonna be alright out here?”

  “Sure. I might go sit under that tree. I brought my book.”

  “We won’t be too long. He don’t have much to say I ain’t heard the hundred times he’s called the house.”

  “Go on,” I said. “I’ll be alright.”

  He got out and stretched and I could see his t-shirt ride up and his flat belly muscles and Lord. I felt a big sigh come out of me, heard it too. I could hear Nina Simone singing “Just say I Love Him,” like Mama used to play sometimes when I was lying in bed, Nina’s deep slow voice so full of the things I felt now, being in love.

  Danny told Dickens to get the box out of the trunk and he threw him the keys then he bent and looked in at me. “You gonna be alright?”

  I nodded, this smile on my face I hadn’t smiled before. It was new.

  “Pretty girl,” he whispered, and his eyes were kind of melty.

  “Pretty boy,” I whispered back and he laughed out loud and slammed the door. Then he leaned on the open window and stuck his head in and said, “Give me a kiss.”

  And I leaned over and put my hand on his dark forearm and felt the hair, the soft man and I kissed him. And he said, “Don’t talk to any of these losers. Anyone gives you trouble just wait in the car and lay on the horn.”

  I laughed then. “Are they walking around out here?”

  He laughed. “Some of them are. They can even work in the town. But there’s plenty of people around. Just…they’re probably horny as hell. Just ignore them. Maybe I shouldn’t have brought you.”

  “No,” I said because his good mood was leaving quick and he was looking around now. “I’ll be fine. Just get in there.”

  “Will you come on?” Dickens said holding the big box.

  “This won’t take long,” he said again, some worry now.

  I saw the badges on the dash and gave them to him. “Go on. I’ll be fine.” I pulled my book out of my bag.

  He pushed off then. I heard him say to Dickens, “Remember to keep your mouth shut about Hilly.” Then he took the box from his little brother and they walked the pretty long way to the big brick building.

  They had a similar walk but they didn’t really favor enough to be taken as brothers. I could see how Dickens worshipped Danny and hung on his every word. His face when he thought Danny was leaving him back in Ludicrous. I wasn’t the only one who would be nursing a broken heart the day Danny went away.

  I took my book over to the tree and got pretty comfortable against the trunk. I decided to turn to my favorite part and just skim. It was such a pretty day, and I was with Danny. It was weird to think Sukey was there, but I didn’t need to see him at least.

  There were a couple of families not so far away. One of them was having a picnic. A man threw a baseball back and forth with a boy around my age. If I was in a place like this…Naomi would find a way to come. And maybe Danny…if he was home.

  I thought of his stomach again, and how beautiful he was, and how this trip was nothing, not long enough, for I could sit by his side forever. I replayed how those two girls we picked up flirted with him, like I didn’t even matter. I couldn’t imagine how he gave me the time of day, but he had whispered, “Pretty Girl.” And me…I had been so bold…like Nina Simone…maybe like Mama had been once. I rubbed my hand over the skirt. She had worn this…that night I’d met Danny and when she was feeling good. She looked just like Ava Gardner a man said once when we were in town. I asked her who Ava Gardner was and Mama just laughed. “Men just talk like that for one thing,” she said. “They will lie and lie and lie to get it.”

  “Pretty girl,” I heard Danny say. You’re wrong, Mama. You didn’t ever meet Danny. That’s the thing.

  There was a boy came around and asked me my name and I told him, and he said his name was Peter and I said that was the name of my favorite artist and he said he thought I would say favorite apostle. He liked artist better. And I said well maybe the apostle Peter was an artist, and he said no, just a fisherman. And I asked him if he fished cause this place was on the river and he said he did and he liked it.

  I was laughing and I looked up and Danny was coming, Dickens behind swinging the empty box. Didn’t seem like they’d been in there very long. Boys. They probably forgot to talk or something.

  I stood up and dusted off and Peter had just asked who I was there to see and I nodded at Danny.

  “Hey,” Danny said but his eyes were not friendly. “We got to go now,” Danny said to me.

  “Okay,” I said like he should smile once in a while. He took my hand and I said, “See you,” to Peter.

  We all went to the car then and got in without too much fanfare.

  “What happened?” I asked him cause apparently he was upset. Dickens threw himself in back and stretched out on the seat face down.

  “I don’t know,” Danny said pulling out. When we passed Peter Danny flipped him the bird.

  Last I saw Peter he was looking at us like we were straight out of the Twilight Zone.

  “Why’d you do that for?” I asked Danny.

  Dickens lifted his head, “Do what?”

  “Hush Richard,” I said, then back to Danny, “Did you see him?”

  “Yeah I saw him…and saw you talkin’ to him just like I said not to. No self-preservation…none,” he said.

  He just kept staring ahead and driving out. He slowed at the guard’s little house again and the guard looked through the car and Danny had to get out and open the trunk and he looked in there, then Danny had to sign the clip-board and he got back in and drove to the gate and turned back onto the road that ran through the town.

  “Hungry,” Dickens said, still laying there.

  “We’ll stop in a little while,” Danny said his voice more gentle. But I could see the strength in his jaw as he kept tensing and releasing.

  I turned the radio on and Simon and Garfunkel were singing, “The Sounds of Silence.”

  We were silent for a long time. Danny drove and I put my feet up on the seat, my knees bent and I let the hot wind blow my hair around my face.

  Finally Danny had his hand on my arm and he was pulling on me and I looked behind and Dickens seemed to be asleep and I slid over next to Danny and his arm was across my lap and he had his hand on my thigh and he gripped me firmly, and such a feeling went through me that I couldn’t get close enough and he looked at me for a minute and there was emotion in his face, and this look that melted me inside. And pretty soon he pulled off the road and down this dirt road until it opened up a little into this cleared off place that widened the shoulder and he pulled over there and got out and pulled on me to follow and I did and he closed the door softly and Dickens did not so much as lift his head. He walked a ways to a bank on the river and he sat down on a log there and I sat beside him. He already had a cigarette in his mouth and his fingers pulled a book of matches from the pocket on his t-shirt. He lit that and pulled from it and sent that smoke up.

  “I shouldn’t of gone in there,” he said. “He threw a big fit to come home with me. Like a big baby…worse than Dickens did when he thought I was leaving him.” He shook his head. “They had to haul him off.” He smoked for a minute. “They’re thinking about sending him further in to a lock-down facility and he’ll be with the real offenders then.”

  I stayed quiet while he got it out.

  “I tried to set them an example. But here I brought Dickens all t
his way to get a dose of that. Like Paul don’t show it enough.”

  “You got my same problem.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Trying to fix things can’t be fixed.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Well…it just means you can’t help people who don’t care they are broken. Sukey has to want to get better. If he don’t care…you can’t fix it. He’ll just have to live it out…his choices.”

  “That’s like giving up.”

  “Or maybe…it’s really loving someone. Like about you going to war. You told me it’s what you want to do. So even if I don’t agree…I have to stand back…and stand by.”

  He stared at me his eyes dark as storm clouds fixing to burst. “I don’t understand one thing you just said.”

  “I said…let him go.”

  “I can’t. It wouldn’t be right.”

  “He has to want to do better.”

  “What do you think I been trying to teach him?”

  “He don’t want it. He wants to have fits and be mad. Maybe if he does suffer enough…maybe he’ll figure it out.”

  “There’s something wrong with him. Me going to war is a good choice. It’s honor. Him wanting to be a jailbird is shit. He’s breaking my mom’s heart and he’s teaching these others to be just like him.”

  “Danny…if I’m going into a pen with a dog who barks and bites…what would you tell me to do?”

  “Wouldn’t do me no good to say it cause you’d do what you wanted,” he said.

  “Okay then. I’m going to do what I want. So is everybody.”

  “You’re saying he’s a waste of time. He’s going to do what he wants.”

  “He’s…got a right to go straight to hell…if he wants.”

  He looked at me. “I fight,” he said.

  I nodded. “Find a better cause.”

  “You don’t understand,” he said.

  “You think I don’t?” I said.

  He stared at me some more, finished his smoke and stood up and pulled me up. He put his hands on my face. His thumbs stroked over my cheeks. “I’m fighting for you,” he said softly.