Icy Sparks

by Gwyn Hyman Rubio

  Deirdre’s head popped up like a turtle’s, and for the first time I saw her face—blandly registering no discomfort.

  “Look at you!” Wilma growled, surveying her charge. “A stupid lump with a pretty name! It ain’t fair, I tell you! You get room and board. A cushy life. Ain’t a worry in your head.” She pulled a T-shirt down over the girl’s head, flattening her brushy hair. “All you retards are lucky,” she said, the T-shirt in place, the curls shooting out again like bedsprings. Wilma ran her hands through her own dark, stringy hair and grimaced. “Ignorance is bliss!” she pronounced, lifting up the girl, dropping her like a sack of onions into a wheelchair. “Let’s brush our teeth,” she said, pushing the wheelchair through another door, a private entrance to the girls’ communal bathroom.

  For several minutes, my hands perspired and my heart fluttered so much that I couldn’t move. Then, despite my fear, I wiped my hands on my dress, sucked in my stomach, threw back my shoulders, and cautiously crept into the bedroom. At the bathroom door, I peeked inside.

  Standing behind the wheelchair, which stood in front of a sink, Wilma was spreading toothpaste on a green hairbrush. With one fat hand, she grabbed a fistful of the girl’s hair, snatched back her head—causing her body, like a noisemaker, to unroll—then forced the thick bristles through her tightly closed lips. “Back and forth. Back and forth,” Wilma said, whipping the brush from one side of her mouth to the other. “Back and forth. Back and forth. Even you can grip this. Now you try!” she said, trying to insert the hairbrush into the girl’s clenched fist. But rather than take it, Deirdre—once more—snapped shut into a ball. “Try, you idiot!” Wilma yelled, uncoiling her, prizing open her fingers, shoving the brush into her crab-claw hand.

  Immediately Deirdre turned her hand over, smearing a path of toothpaste down her T-shirt.

  “Stupid shit!” Wilma shouted, smacking the brush from her hand, sending it flying against the yellow-tiled wall.

  Again, Deirdre rolled up. Like a caterpillar, she curled into a tight knot.

  “Stupid!” Wilma leaned over and turned on the faucet. “Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!” she screamed, cupping up water, tossing it upon Deirdre’s back.

  Mesmerized, I held in my breath and watched Deirdre, folding up tighter and tighter, burying her head, hiding her hair, until I could tolerate the sight no longer. Then, unable to control myself, I noisily whipped around, scurried back through the bedroom, and bolted out the door. “Maizy!” I said, running toward the end of the hallway where she stood with her back to me. “Maizy!” I repeated, rushing to her, throwing my arms around her waist when she turned around.

  Gently, she pushed me back. “What is it?” she said, looking intently into my eyes.

  But just as I was about to blurt out everything, I saw Wilma in my mind’s eye. Grinning strangely, she stood over me with a hairbrush in her hand. So I took one short breath and lied, “Nothing, Maizy. I missed you, that’s all.” Then, swallowing my knot of fear, I ran to my room.

  “Feeding time for the kiddies,” Wilma said.

  Through shuffling noises, the clanking of metal against metal, the squeaking cries of wheelchairs, the irritated voices of the staff, the bellows and groans of the patients, I heard every word Wilma said. Even though I was sitting at a table far away from her, I heard her mean voice. Lately, it seemed, meanness followed me. At Ginseng Elementary, meanness had introduced itself in Mrs. Stilton’s smile, in the way her Adam’s apple quivered when she sang, in the swing of her Ping-Pong paddle against my hands. Here, at Bluegrass State Hospital, sound waves from Wilma’s mouth carried meanness. Meanness, I reckoned, was more forceful than kindness. It had a mind of its own.

  Immediately I recognized the high, nasal voice from earlier in the morning. It was Delbert’s. “Hush your mouth, Wilma!” he said, standing near the side door, wiping off a table. “We’re getting sick and tired of your comments.”

  “Oh, I’m so scared!” Wilma snickered, shimmying all over. “Big, bad, manly Delbert Franklin is gonna get me.”

  “The devil’s already got hold of you,” he said. “He’s right there in your ugly face and in your nasty voice.”

  “Shucks!” Wilma said, making a face, holding out her fingers, making them tremble.

  Just then, the side door opened as two members of the kitchen staff rolled in stacks of trays on platforms. Maizy had said they drove over in a van from Hickory Hall, where all the meals for Bluegrass State Hospital were prepared. From the back of a van, the food was wheeled down a ramp through our kitchen’s back door. The small kitchen, which was kept locked most of the time, had a big gray refrigerator the size of our toolshed, and a little bitty stove. Fruit juices, milk, ice cream, cereals, and snacks could be found there. Meals that had earlier gone uneaten could also be warmed up. But mostly the kitchen housed the carts during mealtimes. I sniffed the air. The acrid odor of vinegar-washed tables mixed with the smell of overcooked ground beef.

  “Gordie’s having problems today.” Delbert spoke to Maizy, who had come in with the carts. She was standing beside him, reading the labels on the sides of trays. “More problems than usual. He’s butted me twice already. Almost knocked me out.”

  “I’ll keep an eye on him,” Maizy said, coming toward me. “Icy, I think you’ll like lunch today,” she said, placing the food in front of me.

  A hamburger, gray-colored as if it had been boiling in water for hours, an ice cream scoop of lumpy mashed potatoes, a thin, shriveled pickle, and two old candy canes, probably left over from last Christmas, stared up at me.

  “Good, huh?” Maizy asked.

  I eyed her and shrugged my shoulders, wondering how on earth she thought this meal was good, but her wafer-thin body gave her away; not once in her life had she eaten good-tasting food. Closing my eyes, I imagined Matanni and Patanni spooning up soup at the kitchen table. During the winter, Matanni made different kinds of soup each week. This week, she would be fixing butternut squash and apple cider soup. The apple cider was made from the tart Winesaps that grew behind our house. She’d measure out three cups of homemade cider then two cups of Essie’s whole cream. Then she’d add them to the bubbling, cooked squash. After which she’d plop in three dollops of butter. When the bowls were filled, Patanni would urgently bring his spoon toward him, dribbling soup down the front of his shirt. Matanni, on the other hand, would leisurely dip her spoon away from her. Her mama, she always said, had taught her manners. Sitting in front of this lump of gray meat clumped between two pieces of starchy white bread, I longed for my grandmother, for the steamy mist that clouded my face as I brought a spoonful of her soup to my mouth, for that warm heavy feeling in my stomach after I finished it.

  “You’re not a real kid,” Maizy’s voice interrupted my reverie. “All children like hamburgers.”

  “Come this way,” Delbert ordered, clutching a boy’s hand—the large, big-boned boy whom I had seen marching in the yard when I first arrived. With his crew-cut, jutting jaw, and seedy black eyes, he appeared older than the rest of us, fifteen maybe. His shoulders rippling like plowed furrows, the boy strutted across the floor, following Delbert.

  “Gordie, sit here,” the aide said, patting the top of the table. “See how clean it is.”

  “Did Gordie go crazy when the music started?” asked a large man in a white uniform from several feet away.

  “Naw, Tiny. He was just fine,” Delbert answered, steering Gordie to his spot at the table. “He didn’t butt nobody or nothing. Just me afterwards.”

  I stared at Tiny—six feet tall, barrel-chested, and potbellied—and wondered how he got his name.

  “That’s good,” Tiny said. “We’re making progress.”

  Gordie sat down rigidly, his spine pressed against the back of the chair. Carefully, he unfolded his napkin, placed it over his knees, and stared, steely-eyed, in front of him. Then a muscle in his face twitched, and the eerie flicker of a smile passed over his mouth.

  Now, leaning against a sofa, Tiny nodded know
ingly at Delbert, who, in turn, nodded back. I sat up in my chair and looked at the three of them.

  “Look at him, Tiny. He’s obsessed with Ruthie’s forehead.” Delbert pointed at a pretty teenage girl, around thirteen, sitting at the end of the table. “I’ll be relieved when her transfer comes through.”

  I turned my gaze to the girl, whose hair was cut short and curled under like the pictures Miss Emily had shown me of bobbed hair in the Roaring Twenties. She gripped a large spoon in her left hand, mechanically scooped up a mound of mashed potatoes, and shoveled it between her full, pink lips. Yet, even before she swallowed it, she was dipping her spoon into the potatoes again. Gordie, I noticed, was following the spoon’s metallic glitter as it traveled from the potatoes to her mouth. Back and forth. Back and forth. Whenever she swallowed, his mouth, opening and closing like a fish’s, mimicked hers. Potatoes oozed from the sides of her lips. They were smeared like paste down her chin. Watching her, Gordie glared.

  “He’s studying her,” Delbert said, slowly lifting up the tray. “I’m moving him over there”—he pointed with his little finger at a card table set up in the far right-hand corner of the room.

  “That’s why I set it up,” Tiny said, winking. “Lately he’s been going after Ruthie.”

  Delbert had turned toward Tiny and was turning back to grab Gordie’s arm when suddenly the boy jumped up, squared his shoulders, and charged like a bull over the top of the table in a beeline toward Ruthie’s forehead.

  “Gordie!” Delbert yelled, lunging for him.

  But it was too late. With one loud pow, Gordie’s forehead had already slammed into hers. Like a rubber band popping, she snapped back in her chair. “Owwooooo!” she bellowed, springing forward, pounding the table with her fists. “Owwooooo!” she cried, flipping her plate, mashed potatoes like miniature parachutes falling to the floor.

  Frantic, Delbert surged forward, casting his arms like a net way over the table and stopping Gordie’s head—which was poised to butt again.

  “Gordie!” Tiny skimmed across the polished floor and grabbed the boy’s arms from behind. “Cut it out!”

  “Owwooooo!” Ruthie cried, before leaning to one side and yanking out a handful of Deirdre’s hair.

  “Ruthie, no!” Maizy said, dashing over, wrapping her arms around Ruthie’s shoulders.

  Deirdre remained balled up and silent.

  Gordie snorted and pushed against the table. The table rattled forward. All the while, Tiny and Delbert, sandwiched together, were pulling back. Tiny had locked both arms around Gordie’s chest. Delbert was now holding on to Tiny’s arms.

  “Restraints!” Tiny hollered.

  “Restraints!” Delbert repeated, his sandy-colored hair plastered over his forehead.

  Maizy, still holding on to Ruthie, nodded at Wilma, who, grinning, left the room.

  “Thanks, Tiny!” Delbert said, releasing and extending one hand as Wilma returned, sauntering over with the leather restraints dangling from her fingertips.

  “Here!” she said, and plunked them into Delbert’s palm. “The Bull needs lassoing.”

  Chapter 18

  The odd-looking girl with pink gums, the one Wilma called the Mouth, threw out her bandaged arms and violently lunged forward, unable to move. Howling, she tugged and pulled at a rope around her waist, the end of which was looped through a metal ring attached to a tree. Every so often, while leaning to the front, the rope trembling from the stress, she’d feverishly snap her gums, angrily bring her arm to her mouth, and bite into the thick white bandage.

  “Delbert, come get Mary!” I heard Wilma scream, opening wide the door. “Take her back in, or she’ll bite through an artery.”

  Disconcerted, I looked around. The boy who drew pictures was standing in one place next to the building, waving a piece of paper in front of his face. Ruthie, in braces, was hobbling toward the door. Before I saw Stevie, I smelled him, coming up behind me, reeking of excrement. I pinched my nostrils and pivoted. “Come on, Stevie,” Tiny groaned, snatching his hand. “You, too. Back inside. You’ve messed your britches again.”

  “Maizy, where are those two girls?” I asked when we had finally settled down on a bench beneath the oak tree.

  “What girls?” Maizy asked.

  “The ones I saw when I arrived,” I said. “With curly hair and plaid jumpers.”

  Maizy thought for a moment. “Oh, yes,” she said, “them—the administrator’s daughters. Sometimes they play here.”

  “They don’t live here?” I asked.

  “Oh, no, sweetie,” she said. “They just visit.”

  Sighing, I stood up and wandered toward the swingsets, where the bird boy was swinging. Bored, I watched as he swished to and fro. When the swing flew back, he’d chirp, his blond hair flying around his head like down feathers. But the minute I came within two feet of him, he stretched out his long legs, plunged his feet into the ground, dirt swirling around his ankles, and came to a stop. I stared at his blond hair, aqua-blue eyes, and long, thin, graceful body; but he didn’t look back. In fact, he turned his head away, averting his eyes.

  “Reid!” Maizy said, walking over to where I stood. “I’m Miss Cockatoo from Sidney. Don’t you recognize me?”

  Reid, the bird boy, eased out of the swing, turned his head toward her, and clucked softly.

  Perching on her toes, Maizy arched her back, waved her arms slowly, and made tiny guttural noises.

  Reid responded, trilling softly.

  “This is my new friend,” Maizy said, motioning for me to step forward. “Her name is Icy. See the color of her hair?” With her fingers, Maizy fluffed out my hair. “She’s a yellow bird.”

  Reid closed his eyelids, tilted his head to the left, and chirped.

  “Reid. Reid. Reid,” Maizy sang, creeping closer, “Don’t be afraid,” she cheeped. “You know me. Miss Cockatoo from Sidney.” She inched next to him, extended her left arm, and touched the bottom of his shirt.

  Instantly he flashed open his eyes, threw out his arms, and screeched wildly. With bent knees and rounded chest, he swooped around her, circling and circling, cawing and cawing, frenetically waving his arms.

  Maizy raised her arms over her head and fluttered her fingers. “See?” she said soothingly. “I’ve got nothing. No restraints. Nothing.”

  Then, as quickly as he had begun, Reid stopped screeching. Instead, he raised his leg like a beautiful white heron and—with both arms flying gracefully by his sides—stood perfectly balanced. In this position, he perched and trilled for what seemed the longest time.

  Maizy and I, both quiet and thoughtful, backed away from him and sat back down on the grass near the sandbox. Lulled by the moment, enjoying this rare warm December day, I looked at Maizy and, for the first time, really saw her. Blond-haired, blue-eyed, and delicate, she was beautiful. Petite, only five feet two inches tall, she weighed no more than ninety pounds. Like her frame, her hands were small and fragile. So paper-thin was her skin that I could see the dark, threadlike veins beneath. Her nose was tiny yet well defined. When she breathed, her nostrils trembled. Every so often, her eyelids would flutter; she’d seem to drift off. A daydreamer myself, I recognized the symptoms.

  “You’re daydreaming, aren’t you?” I asked.

  The muscles around her mouth twitched. She shook her head once and stared at me. “Yes,” she answered, blinking her eyes. “I always daydream after lunch,” she said. “Full stomach, I guess. How did you know?”

  “My daddy was a great daydreamer,” I said. “Famous throughout the county, and he passed it on to me.”

  “Mountain folk are accomplished daydreamers,” she said. A faraway look came to her eyes. “I was born in the mountains, in a little town called Lollagag.”

  “A town of slowpokes.” I giggled, clapping my hand over my mouth.

  “Funny name, isn’t it?” she said. “But I like Lollagag ’cause a person can’t get lost there. She can’t get lost in a place where everybody knows her mama and daddy,
her mamaw and papaw, her aunts and uncles and cousins, her brothers and sisters. Where I was born people know me, and their knowing me makes me real. I’m known for more than just my name.”

  “It’s the same in Poplar Holler,” I said. “Except, sometimes, a person becomes known for all the wrong reasons.”

  But Maizy, with that distant look in her eyes, wasn’t listening. “Last year,” she said, “Mannie Comfrey, the old man who lives down the road from where I grew up, put up an electric fence. Not around his cow pasture, mind you, but around his house. Can you imagine it? An electric fence around your front yard? What for?”

  I cleared my throat, ready to guess, but Maizy broke in.

  “It’s for keeping people out,” she said. “Not for keeping cows in. These days, when I visit with Mannie—rocking on his wide front porch—I can hear that fence buzzing. The noise spins inside my ears, louder than the rocking, powerful like a swarm of angry yellow jackets. The voltage is set so high.”

  “Good night!” I said.

  “Last summer,” Maizy continued, “I accidently got caught in that fence of his. The hairs on my right leg sputtered. What I mean is, they sizzled like a match bursting into flame, curling around that wire.” Maizy closed her eyes. “Even now, if I’m real quiet and concentrate real hard, I can hear that sizzling sound. I can feel the heat from that deep fire and smell my leg hair burning. It’s a nasty, foul odor. The dear Lord sent me that electric fence. I reckon He wanted me to understand what cows go through. God does that, you know. He teaches you lessons.”