I focus on the muscles of my mouth and tell him, “My dad is. Is a pilot.”
“Really? That is quite interesting,” Karl says, moving away from the hang glider.
“Yes. He loves to fly. It was like Mark Twain said. The air up there. Pure. Fine. Brace-ing.”
“And you? You have flown? Do you agree?”
He could not know how crushing that is. “I do not—do not fly. So—do not know. But for you. It will be like that.”
“Pure and fine and bracing.” Karl gulps and drinks in the mountain-spring air that seems to trickle through the vents.
“Before takeoff. He did a Safety Dance.”
“It is good that he follows safety precautions,” Karl says approvingly.
“Yes. He did—but this Safety Dance is a real dance. It goes with the song. Men Without Hats.”
Karl looks baffled and intrigued. “I suppose that when men do not have hats, they become chilly, particularly up there, in the clouds. Dancing is good for getting the blood flowing.”
Strangely, that is what Lucy also said when she taught me to Safety Dance. It was one of those summer days that stretched long and hot and lazy, and people moved only when prodded and then in slow motion, and air conditioners spluttered and dripped onto unsuspecting heads. Evening came and with it relief, and after closing the shop Lucy and I ventured outside with the rest of the city and Union Square felt like a party. Vendors sold canvas prints and postcards of the skyline and T-shirts with slogans, and a clown teetered by on stilts and a woman took off her shirt to get a henna tattoo on her back. People draped themselves on rails and steps, minding their business, and the street was still warm from baking in the sun.
Lucy handed me a salted pretzel wrapped in a napkin and we joined a crowd that had gathered to watch a break dancing crew. The break-dancers spun on their heads and froze in intricate contortions while “Safety Dance” blared in the background.
“Hold on to your pretzel—it’s time to get the blood going,” Lucy said, and then, “Follow me.”
She skipped and swung her arms and encouraged me to do the same, and as I dodged and swayed and skipped, I could imagine that he was there too, dodging everyone pressed in close and loud and sticky, swaying and skipping next to Lucy, teaching me to do his dance.
That moment seems worlds away now, here with the monotonous drone of the lights and the bland standardized surfaces, hard enough to deflect thoughts.
“I can teach you. If you want,” I tell Karl, shrugging to pretend like I don’t care either way.
Karl pushes a few soda cans away with the inside of his foot. “If it is a trick of your pilot father, I would like to do it in advance of my launch as well. As you say—take it away.”
We wind our way through the aisles, clearing the floor as we go to create a serpentine runway. I play the song in my head and tap my foot and nod my head, and Karl arranges his body like mine and turns out a foot in the same angle and imitates my tapping. The echoes make me realize how foolish this is without the music but that can’t be helped now, not with Karl standing next to me bopping his chin and popping his hip and waiting for the next move in the sequence.
I launch myself down the runway, skipping, first my left foot and then my right, and Karl takes his cue and soon he is skipping in the aisle behind me. I make a left into the next aisle and begin swinging my arms above my head, first my left arm and then my right. Karl mimics the arm swing but his timing is off and his arms are stiff and he is still watching me closely so I fight to keep a straight face, and he is so engrossed in copying me that he skips into the jutting handle of a sink as he rounds the counter.
“You should warn me, this Safety Dance can be quite dangerous,” he says, massaging his side, and we grin at each other and start another loop up and down the aisles.
I loosen my arms and let them swing, and we skip in opposite directions and the same direction, our paths merging and diverging, and we keep weaving through the room until he shakes off the doubt and catches the rhythm and his limbs are stiff and gangly, unpredictable and confident.
“You are ready,” I say, resting against a counter and watching him Safety Dance across the runway, skimming over his grief. He makes a right and Safety Dances to a stop in front of me.
“Super,” he declares, and he wipes his forehead with his polishing cloth.
On our way out the door, he picks up the pink river shoe that Milton dropped. He loosens the strap so that the shoe is ready for stepping into, and he lines it up on the mat next to the other shoe and brushes past the light switch without turning it off.
When we reach the flea market, I look over at the chess tent but in place of Sammie and Roman there is a pink-faced man in a shaggy blue costume holding a Cookie Monster head in his lap. The owner of the extreme sports tent pitches himself over a row of tables like a skipping stone as Karl approaches.
“Another thrill-seeker,” he booms. “How about a camera mount?”
Karl makes his request and the owner leaps into action and yanks out a bin, and the whitewater roil in my stomach recedes. Karl issues a garbled exclamation and presses a fist against his mouth and the face of his black rubber watch flashes at me. The display features two square screens with the day of the week and the time to the second. FRI, it says, and 2:01:10, and the school bell is going to ring soon and it is time for me to move on and find Ruby Fontaine.
I thank Karl for lunch and he says, “Good luck,” and claps my shoulder.
“Keep the greasy side down,” I say, because Lucy says that is how pilots tell each other to stay safe and it is good advice for anyone.
As I leave, I can’t help turning back for a last look, just in time to see Karl break into his gawky Safety Dance, and back and forth he skips while behind him the owner searches through bins, twisting his head like a shiny doorknob.
I smile a little to think of Walter Lavender Sr. dancing around his plane, and as I walk away the distance between me and Karl grows but I can still picture the gaunt lines of his face filling out enough to remind him of being young and brazen in his faith. I am on my own again in my search for the Book and I have not found anything yet in my search for Walter Lavender Sr. But teaching Karl the Safety Dance has shored up my faith too, reminding me how to fend off my own grief for what is missing, and I can hold fast to the knowledge that Walter Lavender Sr. always meant to come back for me, and that whether I succeed or not, he still wants to be found.
19
The bell rings and the door swings open, catching me standing under the archway, examining the carvings in the stone. Propelled by fleeing students, I ricochet to the safety of the sidelines, and from there I rise to the balls of my feet and scan the scene. A bun, Junker said, and a backpack tag with her name on it. I look for a bun, and already I pick out three girls and a boy with a bun. I take a breath.
“RUBY!” I thunder, and there are a few glances my way but no responses. Kids walk by with their thumbs hooked around backpack straps and I sweep past rows of faces, trying to keep up.
“Ruby!” I call again. What if I miss her and what if I have already missed her, and I shout her name again and my heart grows heavier as the crowd thins.
The last few stragglers slog out. A girl kick-kicks by me with a Hacky Sack and I say, “Ruby?” and the Hacky Sack thwaps against her toe. It’s not her, and I lean against the black-iron fence and my back sinks into the fanged points. Milton sits and waits for me to finish thinking. How can I find her now? Can I find out something about her inside the school? It’s my best option, and I reach for Milton and the door opens before my hand touches it.
A girl marches out, trailed by three friends. She steps to the side, away from the arched entranceway and next to my stretch of fence, and the others flock around her. The tag on her backpack swings and the freckled girl on her right tugs on her elbow and says, “Ruby, my mom’s over there. See you a
t my birthday party on Sunday?”
And that’s her—I’ve found Ruby Fontaine and all is not lost yet, and a raft of hope inflates under me.
“I’m not sure,” Ruby says. Her hair is sleek and piled on top of her head in a big bun and she bounces impatiently on pink-slippered feet and strains her neck forward like that will take her closer to where she wants to be instead.
The freckled girl reddens and Ruby adds brightly, “I’m trying my hardest. I’ll beg Grandmother to take me. If not, I’ll see you at the boat races tonight—bye, Jane, bye, Heather, bye, Gabby.” She shakes her friends off and swivels toward me and narrows her eyes into sharp slits, glittering green against the caramel of her skin.
“How did you get there? There was no one behind me.” She advances, looking like she could spit fire as she glides on her pink slippers, and I shrink back and the tips of the iron fence dig into my fleece.
Her eyes pop open. “You skipped school! You did, didn’t you?” she says gleefully. “You’re not in my class. Are you twelve, too? You must be with Blaise. Or Kenner? Who are you, anyway?”
Milton senses my hesitation and whacks me with his tail, barks, and then he steps forward first, sniffing her hand in introduction. She busies herself petting him and admiring his coat, and that takes some pressure off me.
“That is Milton,” I say, grateful for the bridge he has built for me. “I am Walter.” The next part is easy, one of my familiar phrases for finding, and I show her the Book and say, “Have you seen it?”
She snatches it out of my hands and rifles through it and stills.
“I’ve seen this before. Oh my God, don’t you just love the artwork? Look at how the artist emphasizes the contrast, the use of light and shadow—you didn’t steal it, did you?” she says with a gust of accusatory passion.
I shake my head and take a breath. Maybe it will take me too long to explain but that can’t keep me from trying, and I tell her that the Book belongs to the shop and it became lost and some of my words do not come out straight but I keep going, telling her that I have been following the trail and I am still missing some pages, and her pointed glare softens.
“I only have one of the pages the little birdman gave me. It was my favorite one. I’d give it back, but it’s in my room and right now I’m going to the Met. There’s a new exhibition about death I want to see.”
She hitches her backpack higher. “See you later,” she tosses over her shoulder, quickening her stride.
I hurry to catch up with her. “I can come.”
“Pass,” she says. She tries to leave me behind again and I match her pace and she walks faster like we are in a competition.
“It is important,” I say, swinging my arms to keep up. She stops short and I speed-walk past. “Very important,” I emphasize, backpedaling.
She folds her arms and pins me with a threatening stare. “Fine. But don’t be lame.” She resumes walking. “It’s about the fashions of death,” she says without looking to see if I am following. “The dresses and accessories women wore during the stages of mourning. The way those styles have evolved over the century.”
“Morbid,” I say, shivering, at the same time she sighs, “Glamorous.”
The Met is a short four blocks away. Neither of us speaks. At the foot of the stairs, Ruby suddenly takes off and I look about wildly to see what she is running away from or toward.
“Race you,” she yells.
I look at the kinked blanket of steps and time seems to flow away from me and I wonder how long this will take. Does she understand how important the Book is? Milton looks at me and does a little side hop with his front legs—Better get to it.
I bound up the steps, picking my way around people lounging or reading books or watching the scene. The museum looms above, a stone palace with arched windows and towering columns, topped with elaborate sculptures.
We skid into the hall and Ruby is prowling in circles, waiting impatiently, and trees are sprinkled with lights and groups of people travel and wait and plan in different languages that echo from the vaulted ceiling and distant walls and marbled floor.
“That was easy,” she says, adjusting the straps of her backpack.
I stick out my tongue and she snickers. We bypass the admissions stand in front of the Egypt wing and Ruby flashes a card at the guard and tells me, “Grandfather is a patron,” which is a good thing because the admissions line seems to have broken. The guard makes a stern swiping gesture at Milton and Milton promptly sits on his polished shoes.
“Seeing Eye dog,” Ruby says, and hauls us away.
“Grandfather used to take me here all the time,” she says as we walk through an exhibit of Egyptian vases and reliefs. “We would spend the afternoon exploring the Cubiculum and the Chinese Garden Court, talking about ancient Egypt and van Gogh. Did you know he painted Starry Night in a lunatic asylum, after he cut off his ear? At the end of the afternoon, we would sit on the roof with hot chocolates. Once in a while he would order a martini, which according to E. B. White is the elixir of quietude but I’ll tell you something—pinkie-swear you won’t tell, Walter—”
She hooks her pinkie through mine and plants a kiss on her thumb. “Okay, I snuck a taste once when he went to the bathroom.” She pauses and whispers, “It burned like hell.” Her eyes water and I make a choking sound because it does not seem appropriate to laugh in the museum.
“Shhhh,” she says anyway. “We’re here.”
The entrance is down the stairs, white and black and spare and exquisite. We enter a softly lit showroom where people are gliding in unison in the same direction—counterclockwise—around a center platform, buoyed by a current of choral music, and I feel like I am interrupting a solemn proceeding. Ruby ignores the flow of the processional and shrugs out of her backpack and settles in front of a trio of mannequins wearing dresses in shades of black and somber cream and bruise-purple, with nipped waists and skirts like bells. Their cold elegant hands pluck at the air and curl under shawls.
A woman breezes by and her roomy white jumpsuit billows like a parachute and Milton trots after her, leading with his nose. I settle down beside Ruby and pull out my notebook, and I am distracted by a nearby rustle and I see that Ruby is flipping through her own notebook. It looks something like mine. Penciled lines rise from the page, the bell sleeves of a dress, a hint of curve to suggest a neck, and she smudges a line with her finger.
My mouth drops open and I stare, shake my head clear and write, INSTANCES OF RECOGNITION IN ACCIDENTAL PLACES—and a cough makes me pause, and Ruby raises her open notebook and clinks the spine against mine.
“Cheers, mate,” she says, to capture the strangeness of it.
“The house is pretty weird,” Ruby warns as we walk down the steps with Milton lashing out a path in front of us.
I think about the shop and about myself and say, “I do not mind.”
Ruby makes her cat’s eyes at me. “What does it matter if you mind or not?”
She hoists herself onto a ledge built along the side of a church and stretches her arms out, pointing her toes as she walks. “And, duh. You’ve got an art journal, too. We’re like, practically the same kind of person. I’m just saying you need to be prepared. You have to be careful not to touch anything, not even on accident. My little sister, Debbie? She’s eight, and she’s an angel. She was supposed to die when she was born and she lived. Except—my Mama and Daddy were supposed to live and they died when I was six and Debbie was in the hospital, but they were angels, too.”
That is not something I thought she would say. I thought she was the opposite of me; her world did not want for anything. I saw that she had friends or at least people who wanted to be her friend and invited her to their birthday parties, and I assumed she had two parents, and she did. But she doesn’t anymore, and although there is no unfinished feeling to it and she does not need to look, they are not here a
ll the same and that is not the perfect contentment I imagined for her, and I say, “I am sorry.”
She makes a bow with her foot. “The robber shot Daddy when he protected me and Mama, and when he shot Mama anyways she wrapped me up so that he forgot about me.” She wobbles and her toes strain and flex around the ledge through the pink leather. I hold out my arm but she stretches her arms wider and steadies herself, and she reaches toward the sky and points her toe again and swings her leg around in a bold arc.
“We live with Grandfather and Grandmother, that’s where we’re going. They used to ride on boats and I would stay with them when Mama and Daddy were taking care of Debbie. Now they have to take care of Debbie most of the time, which is a lot of work. Debbie has severe intellectual and physical disabilities, OCD, lymphedema . . .”
I have not heard some of those words before. Ruby says, “You’ll see,” and pirouettes off the ledge and lands gently on the ground like a spinning maple tree seed. She bounces on her toes as she waits for me.
“This book that you lost and you’re looking for. What’s so great about it?”
I show her the flyer. “It is part of the shop,” I say.
“There’s more to your story,” Ruby insists, and so I try to imagine the way Lucy tells it and I tell Ruby about the making and gifting of the Book and the shop awakening.
“It was part of the magic,” I say, thinking of people finding the shop and coming in for the first or fifteenth time with fresh eyes, open to small wonders and the awe of discovery. That is, until they stopped. I think of Lucy’s fingers leached of color, trembling over the letter, and I imagine the shop closing, my oil lamp winking out, and the roar of a plane passing over.
“There’s a real place like that?” The greens of her eyes swell but for me it is a sobering reminder of how there isn’t for now and maybe forever. After she gives me the one page she kept, I will still have one more page to find. I am getting close, but my search is far from over.
The Luster of Lost Things Page 19