He leans back just a bit and looks at his hand. He decides he’ll do the best and most important thing first: ask about the policeman. Ruth probably made that up. “Ruth says you date a policeman?”
“Oh, she tells everybody that.”
“Do you?”
“Date a policeman?”
“No. Do you brush your teeth every night?”
“What?”
“Just a joke.” She sure missed that one. “Do you date a policeman?”
“It’s an off-and-on kind of thing.”
He nods, feeling something like dread. “So now I guess it’s kind of off . . . or is it?”
“It is, and I don’t know, I just . . . It’s difficult. He’s recently divorced, himself, and has a couple of kids. It’s very difficult to raise kids by yourself. That doesn’t mean . . . I mean, marriage is not something I’m thinking about this soon after being divorced.” She has on more eye makeup than she wears to work. That’s a good thing, he figures. She’s trying to look especially good—sexy, maybe.
“But I mean,” she continues, “there’s the whole money, or security, question, actually, but then too, even though my husband didn’t spend an awful lot of time with the kids, an hour a day makes a difference. That adds up.”
“Yep. That’s thirty hours a week.”
“A month, you mean.”
“Yes, a month.” What the hell am I doing? “I meant a month. About thirty hours a month . . . one a day.” Damn. Silence. “Can be thirty-one, some months,” says Carl. “Twenty-eight in—”
“February.” Anna smiles and looks around.
He leans back slightly, looks at his hand.
“You’re not dating anyone?” Anna asks.
Carl snaps his eyes up, bends to take a sip of 7UP. The clear plastic straw sticks in his nose. As he jerks his head up, it stays there. He grabs it.
She puts her hand over her mouth. Her eyes sparkle.
“Damn,” he says. “Stabbed by a straw.” He can’t help laughing either. “Oh, no. I’m not dating anybody. Not exactly. Not now.” He shouldn’t have asked about the policeman. Big mistake. Not this early anyway.
“‘Not exactly’?” she says.
“Well, actually, no. I’m not dating anyone.”
“What did you mean, ‘not exactly’?”
“Well, what I meant is . . . what I wanted . . . I didn’t want to seem like a . . . a loser.” Yes. Tell her the truth.
“Anybody who takes as good care of an aunt as you do can’t be a loser.”
“She’s always been my favorite aunt. Always made time for me. I think she had kind of a hard time with her husband. He was an alcoholic, and I think maybe abusive, though I don’t know that he ever hit her.”
“There are lots of ways to be abusive.”
“Yes, I guess so.”
“Did she have children?”
“No. None, except for me, in a way. She always gave me nice presents, took me places, let me drive her car. There weren’t many children on her side of the family—on my father’s side either, actually.”
“What was he like?”
“My father?”
“No. Your hairstylist.”
“Aha.”
She is smiling.
A waiter sets a new bowl of bar mix on the table, takes away the empty bowl. Carl picks up some mix. “He was a good father. Kind of quiet. What about your folks?”
“It’s just a plain family, except I’m close to my parents. They’ve always been staunch Democrats, liberals—which is why I try to keep them up in Virginia. They might slow my career down here, with Mr. Rhodes at the helm and all.”
“He’s not a bad boss, is he?”
“Oh, no. Not at all. I know exactly what he expects.” Carl tries to picture what is written in his hand. “How old is that woman that sits on the porch across from Mrs. Talbert? She looks kind of young—compared.”
“She is kind of young. Late fifties. She’s very sick and is just getting her voice back after an esophagus infection that they thought they couldn’t cure because of her immune-system deficiency. She’s also got . . . well, let’s just say she’s pretty sick.”
“Have you heard Miss Clara—what’s her last name?—curse?” he asks. He suddenly realizes his voice is way up there. Now he’ll have to lower it a little at a time, so there won’t be a sudden drop.
“Mrs. Cochran? Oh, yes. Definitely. When I leave to go home, and she’s on the porch, she says, ‘I know you’re tired. My ass is dragging too.’ There are some funny things that go on out on that porch. The other day they were all out there, and Mrs. Lowe’s great-niece, or great-great-niece, I guess it was, did a tap dance with a little tutu on and a tape deck playing music, and when it was over, they all clapped and Mrs. Talbert said, ‘That’s the best dancing I ever seen at a funeral.’”
Carl laughed. “Oh, man.” He checks his hand again. “What do you think about Preacher Flowers?”
Anna takes a swallow of her Diet Coke. “Well, I know the progress on his leg has slowed considerably. It suddenly got stiff, he says, but he seems to be having the time of his life on the porch with some of the ladies, so I think there may be some faking going on there. I think he might not want to leave.”
“That’s what I was thinking.”
“Except Mrs. Lowe and her niece, Emily, came in to complain about some kind of movement he’s trying to get started, and Mr. Rhodes is on his high horse about that. You sort of like him—Mr. Flowers—don’t you?”
“Well, at first I didn’t. I thought he was a kind of crackpot, which I still think he might be, but I’ve been wanting to play an electric bass for a long time, and he more or less dropped one in my lap.”
“You all sound good together.”
“Yeah, I kind of enjoyed that the other night.” Voice back up—get it down.
“He’s not as strange as his niece; I know that. Actually, I shouldn’t be talking out of shop, but she’s one pretty strange woman.”
Anna’s cell phone rings. “I’m sorry,” she says. “Hello? . . . Yes. . . . How much? . . . A hundred and three?” She looks at Carl. “We’ll be right there.” She snaps the phone cover shut. “I’m sorry. Lauren has a fever. It’s probably an ear infection. I was afraid of this. She wasn’t feeling well this afternoon.”
“No problem. Well, I mean it’s a problem, but I understand.” Carl feels sorry to leave, but the pressure to make conversation has lifted.
They head for Meadow Hill Gardens, where he has no chance for anything beyond a brief good-bye.
Shopping for High Heels
IT’S THE BIGGEST RABBIT Lil has ever seen. She and Clara wait in the lobby, all dressed up, sitting in wing chairs on each side of the large ceramic rabbit near the gas fireplace. They are waiting for Carl to take them shopping.
“That’s the biggest rabbit I’ve ever seen,” says Lil. She is dressed in her favorite sweat suit, the pink one, a green scarf, a green windbreaker, and brown loafers. “They ought to have another one in here to keep that one company.”
“I think it’s kind of stupid-looking,” says Clara. “So big. They ought to have some big ceramic hound dogs in here.” Clara wears tan Hush Puppies, green pants, and a blue jacket with green flowers on it.
An alarm sounds at the automatic doors. Lil knows who it is before she looks. Mr. Grayson—too close to the door. There he stands in that brown button-up sweater that hangs down to his butt. He is always waving imaginary butterflies away from his eyes—because of lead poisoning—and he isn’t allowed outside, so he has this little radio, or sensor or something, around his neck that sets off a door alarm if he gets too close. Lil has asked Anna about the lead poisoning, and she says it’s from a factory job up north. He never has any visitors.
Anna, returning from somewhere down the hall, stops and talks softly to Mr. Grayson, steering him away from the doors just as Lil sees Mr. Rhodes come in.
“Ladies,” says Mr. Rhodes. “So good to see you.”
“Mr. Rhodes?” Clara squints with her good eye. “What the hell’s happened to the corn bread around here?”
Lil notices him glancing at Clara’s name tag.
“I don’t know, Mrs. Cochran. But I’ll do my best to find out. What exactly is the problem with the corn bread?”
“The taste.”
“How so? Help me out.” He smiles.
“It don’t have much taste and it’s too crumbly. It falls apart.” That’s what Lil likes about Clara. She says what she thinks. Beatrice and Maudie can’t stand her cursing, and Lil pretends to be bothered by it, but she secretly doesn’t mind at all. It brightens the dullness of this . . . this life after life.
“I’ll get on that, Mrs. Cochran, and I’ll bet you it’s better next time I see you. I’ll be asking you about it.”
“My nephew is coming to take us shopping,” says Lil.
“Oh, that’s nice.”
“His name is Carl. You met him. Right out there on the porch. He just got promoted not all that long ago and he’s the best thing to me. I don’t know what I’d do without him.”
“Oh, yes. Fine young man.”
He’s thinking about something else, thinks Lil.
Carl, coming through the front door, sees Mr. Rhodes talking to his aunt and Mrs. Cochran and decides to drop in on Anna for a minute.
Anna’s office door is open. A man (a resident’s family member?) is sitting across from her desk, talking with her. Anna smiles at Carl, holds up a finger, signaling for him to wait one minute. Carl feels a rush of delight—she seems glad to see him.
He waits in the hall. She follows her visitor out her door, stops one step closer to Carl than he thinks normal. He looks up into her face and stands as tall as he can.
She steps back toward her office. “Come in and have a seat.”
As she turns, he looks at the heels of her shoes. They are flat. That’s not going to change, he thinks. He relaxes his vocal cords, coughs at the lowest pitch he can manage.
Carl sits, and Anna sits in the soft chair beside her desk. He’s only seen her sit there while he’s in her office. Maybe that means something good, though he can’t say exactly what. “I’m about to take Aunt Lil and Mrs. Cochran shopping. Do you want to come?”
“I’d love to, but I’m afraid I can’t.”
The word love holds on for a few seconds. “It should be a pretty exciting trip,” he says. “They want to buy some shoes.”
“That could be a prolonged process.” She has that way of slightly tilting her head.
“That’s what I’m afraid of.” Carl is suddenly conscious of what he’s wearing. Plaids are probably not in style anymore. He should have worn his solid white dress shirt, open at the collar. Like that picture of George Clooney.
There are two sharp knocks on the open door, and Mr. Rhodes walks into the office. “Hello, Anna. And you are. . . . ?” Mr. Rhodes extends his hand.
“Carl Turnage.” Big, strong hand.
“Oh, yes, your aunt was just telling me about you. I’ve seen you around. She’s very thankful for all your help. And she looks good.” He sits down in the remaining chair, seems relaxed and comfortable to Carl, like he’s in a place where he can be himself, where he might even tell a joke, laugh a bit. “By the way, Carl,” he says, “do you know Mr. Flowers—L. Ray?”
“I’ve talked to him out on the porch.”
“Do you know anything about a movement—or cult—he’s trying to start?”
“No, not really. I don’t know anything about it. I think he . . . I’ve just heard him talk about normal preacher things.”
“Well, we don’t want any trouble here that will upset the ladies.”
CARL DRIVES HIS TAURUS. Aunt Lil sits up front with him, and Mrs. Cochran sits in back behind Aunt Lil. As they pull out onto Langston Avenue, Aunt Lil turns and says loudly, “Don’t you wish you had a nephew that would do for you the way this one does for me?”
“I got two nephews,” says Mrs. Cochran. “They both work.”
Yeah, well, Carl thinks, bless your pointy little head. “I work,” he says. “I’ve just had a pretty flexible schedule in the last year or two. Some good people working for me. They know how to keep things going, you know?” He looks into the rearview mirror, sees the glaring glass eye behind the lens.
At Crosspoints Mall’s upper east entrance, Carl stops the car, gets out, and opens the back door to get the walkers. Aunt Lil’s billfold drops out of her saddlebag onto the asphalt. Carl picks it up and puts it back in the bag. Her saddlebag is navy blue. Mrs. Cochran’s is tan. As Carl parks the car, they stand in their walkers by the front door.
In Penney’s, the two ladies stop every few tables to look at items.
Carl moves on a few steps. “Let’s find the shoes. You all wanted to buy some shoes.” He waits. “You said you wanted to—”
“I need shoes,” says Mrs. Cochran.
“Well, let’s find the shoes.”
Carl’s men are installing aluminum awnings at the alumni house at Ballard College, and he needs to get by and check on them as soon as he can. He asks a saleslady where the shoes are. She says downstairs and points toward an escalator. He looks. How can . . . how can he get them down that safely?
At the escalator, he gives instructions: They are to wait up top. He’ll fold the walkers and take them down, then come back up and escort the ladies to the bottom, one at a time.
When Carl is about halfway down, Lil says to Clara, “Why are we waiting up here?”
“Beats me. You just step on a step. But you step on a crack and you bust your ass.”
Carl heads back up. He looks over at the down escalator and . . . and there they are, Aunt Lil and then Mrs. Cochran, floating down, their eyes locked straight ahead. He imagines Aunt Lil hitting bottom, never lifting her feet, and Mrs. Cochran tumbling over her. He turns to run back down, but there are too many people.
Up top, he looks down; they aren’t there. Good news, maybe. He heads down and finds them standing in their walkers—in menswear. Mrs. Cochran is examining neckties.
“You all were supposed to wait for me.”
Aunt Lil looks at him sharply. “What?”
“You all were—”
“Are those Cheerios painted on this tie?” Mrs. Cochran holds up a tie.
“You all were supposed to wait up top for me. I didn’t want you coming down by yourselves. No, I think they’re boat steering wheels.”
Mrs. Cochran looks at Carl through her thick glasses, over her bird-beak nose, her big glass eye not moving, a frown on her face, and says, “We were fine. Don’t they have elevators?”
Carl feels a little dense. Of course. “I didn’t think about that, but it doesn’t look like we need one, does it?”
“I don’t use elevators as a matter of principle,” says Aunt Lil.
“Then why’d you use the escalator?” Mrs. Cochran asks.
“Because they don’t have stairs anymore, do they? It’s like everything else: in with the complicated, out with the simple.”
“You can say that again.”
In the shoe department, Carl sits down while the ladies look at shoes just behind him.
“They all look so new,” says Mrs. Cochran.
“I hope so,” says Aunt Lil.
“I always liked a high heel. What do you think, Carl?”
Carl shrugs. “I don’t know.”
A few minutes later, he hears Mrs. Cochran say, “Help in a store these days is scarce as tits on a boar hog. I’ll just . . . sit down and put these on myself.” She rolls her walker around near Carl. The shoes are in her saddlebag. “I think they’re just my size. Let me get my glasses,” she says, still standing. This takes a few minutes. “Yep. Seven and a half. Just my size.” She slowly situates herself and sits down. So does Aunt Lil.
Carl pulls up a salesperson’s stool, sits, gets the new shoe on Mrs. Cochran’s right foot, helps her push her heel down into it. She smells like talcum powder and lavender
.
She starts to stand up, sits back.
“Don’t you want to put both of them on?” Carl asks her.
“No.”
“You probably need to get you some shoes with flat bottoms. It’s easy to turn your ankle in high heels.”
She starts to stand, sits again, then gives another push and stands. She starts out in her walker. She goes up on the high heel, down on the flat. Up on the high heel, down on the flat.
“I think you need flat bottoms.” Carl wishes Anna could see this. He looks around. “How about some of those white slip-ons?”
A clerk appears, and for another twenty minutes the ladies try on shoes, with the clerk going back into the stacks four or five times, and finally both Lil and Mrs. Cochran decide on white canvas slip-ons. They pay with their MasterCards.
Outside, Carl discovers a soft drizzle and the smell of hot asphalt, freshly wet. Lil and Mrs. Cochran wait under the sheltered lower east entrance while he gets the car.
L. RAY WORKS ON a sermon out on the porch. He looks up—to listen to Mrs. Lowe and Mrs. Satter-white, who are sitting nearby. Mrs. Lowe is complaining about somebody stealing a comb from her dresser top.
The sermon is about the name of his new movement, but he’s gotten nowhere. The name will come, just as rain will come. Think about naming rain. It finally gets called the best thing you can ever call it. Rain.
DARLA AVERY HOLDS her eyes on the back of L. Ray’s head as he writes. The two ladies over there stand to go in because of the rain. L. Ray rolls back away from the porch railing.
Darla will stay where she is. She’s dry.
She and L. Ray left the Club Oasis at about eleven. When she got in the front seat with him this time, she moved a little ways away from the passenger door, toward him. He didn’t say anything at all as they left, which seemed odd, and he had driven less than a mile when he turned onto a side road, drove a half mile or so, pulled over on the shoulder, cut the ignition. She thought to herself, This is where we neck. She was nervous, wondering what it would be like, wondering if a car might drive by.
And this is where it gets almost too embarrassing to think about.
Lunch at the Piccadilly Page 8