Birdie and Me

by J. M. M. Nuanez

“Yeah,” I say, looking down at my notebook as my breath catches, imagining the flames and heat again, the smell of burning plastic. It’s been three days since the fire and I’ve called Rosie seven times, but it always goes straight to voicemail. I’ve called Uncle Carl three times, but it just rings and rings. I wonder if he’ll ever plug the phone in without me or Rosie or Birdie there to encourage him. He’s never left it unplugged for so long.

  “I called you last night,” Krysten whispers.

  “Oh, I was . . . at a friend’s house.” She nods and I continue, “And I’m pretty sure my uncle just lets every number he doesn’t know go straight to the message machine. Sorry.”

  “It’s okay. I just wanted to make sure you were all right.”

  “I’m okay.”

  Other than everything being worse than it ever was.

  “At least her truck isn’t lost, right? The future is bright for quesadilla-pizza babies! That was really great of your uncle to help Rosie, by the way.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “My mom is friends with Rosie and Rosie told her about it before leaving for England. Your uncle—Patrick?—he helped Rosie salvage the truck. He convinced her he could fix it because I guess her insurance company said it was permanently ruined or something.”

  “Rosie is in England?”

  “Yeah. My mom said she left yesterday. Didn’t you know any of this?”

  Rosie is gone.

  “No, I didn’t know,” I say. “My uncle Patrick—he doesn’t tell us a whole lot.”

  “Yeah, my mom calls him Mr. Enigma.”

  “Mr. Enigma?”

  “You know, enigma, like a puzzle or a mystery.”

  I nod, but I can’t stop thinking about Rosie’s truck.

  The Quesadilla Ship might be saved.

  And Patrick’s helping her save it.

  **Observation #789: Enigma in Pants

  Maybe Patrick isn’t a clam in pants. Maybe he’s

  a puzzle

  a conundrum

  an enigma.

  B/c how can Patrick defend Birdie in front of Ross,

  but still make Birdie wear those Norman clothes?

  How can Patrick make us hot chocolate & buy us donuts

  & still keep us from seeing the only other family we have?

  & how can Patrick say that we aren’t slack to be picked up or problems to be fixed,

  when he still disappears into the silo shed?

  CHAPTER 17

  ONE ISLAND NEXT TO ANOTHER

  I have to knock five separate times before Janet finally yells at me to stop the racket.

  I’m surprised that after last night the front door is still unlocked like it usually is. I find Janet in bed, her head covered with a blanket, and I realize that maybe she hasn’t left this spot in hours, maybe even all day.

  She points toward the corner of her room.

  “Birdie left that evil number puzzle thing,” she says through the blanket. “Where is he, anyway?”

  “Patrick’s. He said the new clothes were itchy today. Are you going to Snip ’n’ Shine? Did you go this morning?”

  “Didn’t go. And not going.”

  “Come on, Janet.”

  “What? All I do there is sweep hair. And fold the towels when Captain Cherylene is feeling particularly generous.”

  “So now you’re just going to go to school and forget Snip ’n’ Shine?”

  “No, I’m giving that up too. Now let me sleep.”

  “Have you eaten anything?”

  She grunts and I leave her and go into the kitchen. The counters are still a mess, filled with open food containers, the empty pizza box, a fast-food bag, and lots of mugs and half-filled cups and soda cans. I throw everything away and fill the sink with dishes, hot water, and soap. I find an overripe banana and some bread and peanut butter in the fridge. I make us sandwiches and pour Janet a big glass of water. She’s still in the same position when I return to her room.

  “I made you a sandwich,” I say.

  “What are you, my mom, now?” she says through the blanket.

  I think she’s joking, so I laugh. “Yeah, right. Like your mom ever made a sandwich for you.”

  She uncovers her head and looks me in the eye. “She did. She used to make me cheese and mayonnaise sandwiches when I was a kid.” She takes the sandwich from the plate and it’s gone in a minute and then she drinks most of the water.

  “Hand me the brush,” she says, sighing, and I roll my eyes and hand it to her. She divides my hair into two sections down the middle of my head and starts brushing.

  I stare at her empty plate. I’ve never had a cheese and mayonnaise sandwich before.

  “My mama would sometimes disappear too,” I say. I feel the brush stop for just a moment. “Sometimes she disappeared into her room. Other times, when she had some grand idea in her head, she’d be gone out of the house.”

  Janet ties sections of my hair back and starts to braid.

  “But she made the best roasted tomato sandwiches and made up the best games.”

  She finishes one braid and then picks up another portion of hair.

  “What happened to her?” Janet asks in a quiet voice.

  “There was a car accident,” I say. “Black ice on the road. She passed away.”

  The brush stops. Janet lays it in her lap.

  Neither of us says anything and I’m grateful she isn’t asking a bunch of questions.

  “So my aunt Veronica and her husband live in this giant house that they built on a golf course,” Janet says. I can tell she’s trying to sound normal, but her voice is sad too. “They have two snot-faced kids and a new baby that poops literally every hour. My mom was uncomfortable the entire time and when she told them how I was working at a salon and how some customers were wanting to try me for their hair, they didn’t get it. All my aunt said to my mom was, ‘What about college? You’re not going to just let her cut hair for a living, are you? Don’t you want something better for her?’ She had her stupid plastic surgery nose curled up in the air like cutting hair was a job that smelled bad.” Janet stands up and walks around. “So we left. On the drive home my mom said we’d never go back there and I was glad. Rich stuck-up jerks.” I try not to look at her, but from the corner of my eye, I see her wipe her nose with her sleeve.

  My heart beats a few times, pounding hard because I’ve never heard Janet sound truly hurt.

  “But you know what’s horrible?” she says between sniffing. “All I could think was that at least my aunt had gone and married some rich dude. At least her kids have a real house and parents who are there and I didn’t see any bruises. A mom and a dad and a big house. At least she’s done that for her kids.” She looks over at me and her mascara is running all the way down her face to the end of her chin. “They have every perfect thing and they are still horrible. I just don’t get it.”

  She wipes her face with her sleeve. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I’m sorry for blabbing on like an idiot when your mom has passed away.”

  “You aren’t blabbing on like an idiot.”

  She kind of scoffs, but I can tell she’s trying to keep herself from crying again.

  “No one ever knows what to say,” I whisper.

  A great surge of sorrow presses on the inside of my head. But it’s okay to feel sadness when you are one island next to another. We are an archipelago.

  “It’s like everyone in my family disappears,” I say. “Uncle Carl has disappeared into his apartment. Rosie disappeared to England. And after everything that’s happened, Patrick still disappears into that stupid silo shed.”

  “Patrick still won’t let you see Carl?”

  “No. And I know if I could just go to Uncle Carl’s apartment, I could get him to plug his phone back in
. I could help him get better.”

  Janet picks up the brush again.

  “You know, I’ve never seen Patrick like he was last night. He really stood up to Ross. Can you tell him I said thank you?”

  “I will.”

  “And I can try to go to Carl’s. He probably won’t answer the door for me, but I can at least remind him that you and Birdie need him.”

  That’s when I realize that Janet’s right. It’s not just that he needs us. We need him.

  If that’s true of Uncle Carl, is it true of Patrick?

  **Observation #790: Grief

  Disappearing into apartments.

  Disappearing to another country.

  Disappearing into silo sheds.

  Disappearing with bad boyfriends.

  Disappearing under your blankets.

  Disappearing inside clothes that itch.

  Disappearing into a notebook.

  What else does grief look like?

  CHAPTER 18

  A SMALL WOODEN THING

  It’s been almost a week since the Quesadilla Ship fire and still no Uncle Carl. And now it’s Saturday. Balloon day. Today should have been the day Uncle Carl proposed up in a hot-air balloon and Rosie said yes.

  But instead, there will be two empty spots in the balloon basket. A total waste.

  I look through three books of Elizabeth Bishop poetry searching for something to recite for the project. Krysten said we should definitely open with a poem and I feel like she’s the kind of person who knows what she’s talking about when it comes to an effective presentation.

  But I’ve been looking for two hours and there isn’t one poem that I really care about. It’s hard to care about any of it.

  The house phone rings and Patrick answers it and then calls my name.

  “Janet’s on the phone,” he says when I come downstairs. Then he goes back outside to the garden, which he’s been slowly putting back together. He hasn’t asked Birdie or me to help.

  On the phone, Janet talks quickly. “Jacko, I only have a minute because I’m finishing up my break at Snip ’n’ Shine, and Cherylene’s glaring at me already, but I wanted to tell you that I went to Carl’s and he’s not doing great. He didn’t answer the door, but I know he’s in there because he called me a menace and said he’d call the authorities if I didn’t stop pounding on his door.”

  “When was this?”

  “Just a few minutes ago. I told him he was an idiot and not because of the fire. I said the fire was an accident and he’s an idiot because he’s left you and Birdie in Patrick’s prison and how could he be so selfish. And then I said that hiding away wasn’t going to solve anything and that him and Patrick need to get their problems sorted because this situation wasn’t helping anyone, and that until someone discovered a way to a dimension where everything was made of Honey Bunny Buns, he needed to figure out how to live and be a real uncle.”

  “You said all that?”

  “More or less. I tried to lay the guilt on pretty thick.”

  “Janet, you are a menace. An awesome menace.”

  “I know. I was in my element. But I really have to go now because Cherylene’s tapping her nails on the wall and that usually means I’m not moving fast enough and she’s about to put me back on sweeping duty.”

  I tell her thanks and when we hang up, my whole body is on the roller coaster and I immediately go outside and tell Patrick that Birdie and me really need to see Uncle Carl.

  But he just sighs and pulls his bandanna out of his pocket and wipes his face. “Jack. I don’t know how many times I have to say it: You can’t see him right now.”

  “But you can’t keep us from him forever.”

  “Carl isn’t in a state to be contacted.”

  “I know that, but we have to help him, don’t we?”

  He puffs his cheeks out. “No, we don’t.”

  “But he’s fifty percent of the family we have!”

  Patrick takes his gloves off and picks up a mesh sack of tulip bulbs and starts walking to the side of the house. “I’m not discussing Carl right now.”

  I follow him as he takes huge strides to the front yard.

  “You never want to discuss him!”

  “Not now, Jack.”

  He goes to the silo shed and starts fiddling with the lock and I stand next to him. “But you can’t keep avoiding him. He needs us. You can’t keep buying Birdie and me hot chocolate and pizza and donuts and then just expect us to forget about Uncle Carl. He’s our uncle. He’s your brother. How can you just disappear on him?”

  Patrick drops the shed lock. He turns around to face me. “Enough!” he says in a loud voice.

  I stomp inside the house, up the stairs, and into Birdie’s room. He’s sitting in his window seat with the Alexander McQueen book and his Book of Fabulous and I go straight to the drawer where he keeps his mad cap.

  “I need this!” I say, grabbing it without asking. Birdie just watches me as I pull it hard onto my head and then go into the other room. I pace around a few times and punch my pillow. Then I jump onto the bed and look out the window.

  Patrick is in the silo shed. Again.

  Twenty minutes later, when Birdie comes in the room with peanut butter and jelly rolled up in tortillas, I don’t say anything but I move over so he can sit on my bed.

  He knows I don’t want the stupid leftover pizza from last night’s dinner.

  “Patrick’s fixing the garden,” Birdie says. “But he didn’t fix the hole in the back fence, so that wild animal is just going to come back and destroy everything again.”

  I take a rolled tortilla.

  There’s the lightest line of purple nail polish on Birdie’s pinkie fingernail.

  “I hate that stupid silo shed,” I say.

  “Me too,” says Birdie.

  We finish eating the peanut butter and jelly and I’m about to open the last Honey Bunny Bun for us to share, when there’s a screech, a smash of metal, and then yelling from the front yard. Through the blinds, I see Uncle Carl detangling himself from his crashed bicycle.

  “These bushes!” Uncle Carl yells. He stumbles across the yard. “What you did ain’t right, brother! I should have told you earlier, I should have told you decades ago, but I’m a coward.” His words slur a little. “I’m a coward . . . but so are you! You come out here!”

  “I’m right here!” yells Patrick, coming out of the silo shed. “What are you doing?”

  Uncle Carl laughs like it’s the dumbest question he’s ever heard.

  Birdie and me run downstairs. Then we go through the front door and stop on the front step.

  Patrick’s telling Uncle Carl to calm down.

  Uncle Carl’s eyes go all big and he says he’ll show him calm and then climbs up on the hood of Patrick’s truck, yelling at Patrick the whole time, calling him all sorts of mean things. I worry that he’ll fall off the truck and am about to rush forward when Patrick yells, “Stop!”

  That’s when Uncle Carl starts laughing real hard. “Well, well, well,” he says. “Look at the state of this place. Mama and Dad would be disappointed you’ve turned their home into some kind of recluse’s spot, Patty. You ever heard of a new coat of paint? Or watering the grass?” He laughs again, slapping his thighs with his hands, but wobbles and puts his arms out to steady himself.

  “You get down from there!” yells Patrick.

  “Or what? You gonna come get me, big brother? Come on up, old man.”

  “I don’t have time for this.”

  “You never do, do you?” Uncle Carl spins around once, nearly falling off the hood. “Jeez, you’d think that you were the president of the U-S-of-A with how much time you don’t have.”

  Patrick yells again. “Get down from there, I said!” He moves closer to the truck as Uncle Carl tips to the left, then
catches himself. When he sees his brother advancing, he crawls to the top of the cab, streaking mud from his shoes on the windshield.

  “Come on up, Pattycake! Come get me.”

  He wobbles some more and I take a couple steps forward. Birdie hangs back. I’m starting to feel this pressure inside my body. After disappearing for a week, this is how he shows up. It would have been better if he’d just stayed home forever.

  Uncle Carl starts teasing Patrick and Patrick yells back. But they aren’t actually saying anything and no one is listening to me as I shout, “Come on, Uncle Carl, get down!” but he doesn’t stop talking and I know he’s making it so that him and Patrick go another five years without talking.

  “Stop!” I yell. “Why can’t everyone just stop!”

  But Uncle Carl starts talking. “You couldn’t stand that I was finally gonna get my Rosie, huh? You always said she was too good for me. And me and the kids had an awesome plan and now everything is ruined and you couldn’t be happier, am I right?”

  “You know that’s not true, Carl, now get down!”

  But now Carl is really upset, saying it is true and everyone knows it, and now Marlboro’s gone, and Rosie’s gone, and Birdie and me are gone. But Patrick’s shouting that he’s going to call the police if he doesn’t get down and I feel like each of my bones are about to explode, more than two hundred individual bombs ready to go off.

  So I pick up a big rock and yell, “You guys ruin everything!” and throw it, as hard as I can, toward the silo shed.

  It hits the center of the front window, which shatters instantly. Everything goes quiet. Both Patrick and Uncle Carl look at the shed with open mouths.

  “Get down!” I yell again. “You’re going to get hurt!”

  But saying that turns out to be a bad idea, because then Uncle Carl turns toward me and stomps on the truck’s roof, hollering, “What makes you think I’m not already hurt, huh? Any new hurt won’t be nothing new. Nothing. New.” He slams his foot down to the beat of the last two words. And that’s when the wind gusts and he loses his balance and goes tumbling off the truck.