The Big Shuffle

by Laura Pedersen

  Louise has given up cheerleading for good, lost her fascination with science, and now wants to become a social studies teacher. Mom is happy to see that Louise has college applications scattered about.

  As for me, my nineteenth birthday turns out to be very much like my ninth, with the family gathered around the table eating mom's homemade lasagna. Pink-and-white streamers running from the wall clock to the light fixture are up and the HAPPY BIRTHDAY sign is strung in its usual spot just below the black metal plaque with GRACE etched onto it in gold letters.

  The only difference is that Dad isn't here to place his hand over mine and guide the knife while making the first good-luck slice into the chocolate birthday cake. And Pastor Costello adds a round of “May the Good Lord Bless You,” to the usual “Happy Birthday,” which causes the candles to burn down extremely close to the cake. As always, Mom instructs me to “make a wish” before finally blowing them out.

  But I don't wish for anything. Life appears to have plenty of its own ideas, and at this point I'm just clinging to my little raft. My own loneliness seems necessary somehow, like the tiny knots on a necklace that keep the pearls in place.

  SEVENTY-THREE

  BERNARD IS PLOTTING A GARDEN FOR NEXT SPRING WITH A Moulin Rouge theme and the bulbs have to be planted before the ground freezes. He's discovered a tulip called Carnaval de Nice that has white petals flamed with dark red, which is serving as his inspiration. This is welcome news as it signals he's wearing down on the Chinese culture program. Because I know that the rest of us are. Particularly the CD of the Beijing Opera. For one thing, the word shrill comes to mind. Bernard insists that it's an acquired taste, much like chiffon.

  Rose has started preschool, but Gigi still has another year at home, and so she and Lillian and Rocky play together while Bernard works on his Web site and newsletter. My mom says she doesn't believe in preschool, though what I think she actually means is that she doesn't believe in paying for preschool.

  I must say that I'm not surprised to pull up one October morning and see a glint of blue move behind the bushes, peacock blue to be exact. Sure enough, a closer inspection reveals four peacocks strutting about, with Rocky and Gigi following at a safe distance to observe the exotic creatures.

  Inside the house Olivia, Bernard, Gil, and Ottavio are all gathered around the dining room table. Gil explains that he's taken the day off to prepare for his new play. Stacked in front of him are a dozen books open to various pages. Bernard is working over some plans to convert the basement into a playroom. Ottavio talks about building a shelter for the peacocks near the rabbit hutch.

  “Are the peacocks supposed to save on fertilizer?” I ask.

  “You'll never believe where they came from!” Bernard sounds like he's on his tenth cup of coffee. “Your friend Cappy called me the other day to see if I wanted to buy a crèche. Anyway, as I was leaving I heard the most unusual sound, like a cry for help. And Cappy said, ‘Those are peacocks. They bring me a tremendous amount of good luck, but my fiancée doesn't like them. I suppose I don't have to tell you that peacocks are considered to be sacred in China.’ ”

  “Of course I'm aware of that!” Bernard is positively self-congratulatory as he says, “I told Cappy they were an emblem of the Ming Dynasty and the peacock feather was awarded to show imperial favor and high rank. I immediately offered to buy them and said that we have a Chinese tea garden so the peacocks would be incredibly contented living here.”

  It's apparent that Bernard believes he talked Cappy into parting with his unbeloved birds. Cappy says that no one appreciates a gift nearly as much as they welcome paying for the pleasure of being swindled. I can't help but smile as I picture Cappy playing Bernard like a violin while Bernard considers himself to be the master wheeler-dealer.

  One of the peacocks lets out its signature help and Gil says, “If they're so happy here, then how come they keep screeching like that?”

  “They're adjusting,” says Bernard.

  Gil looks doubtful. “I think you got flimflammed by a bird trader,” says the man who grew up on a famous horse farm.

  “Why don't you do something by Samuel Beckett?” suggests

  Olivia, who has been paging through one of Gil's books of plays.

  “I think a few more people were counting on landing parts,” says Gil. “I never thought anyone cared about these little community theater productions, but when there wasn't a play this past spring everyone called wanting to know what happened.”

  “Didn't the Moose Lodge put on a variety show?” asks Olivia.

  “Hardly anyone went,” reports Gil.

  Bernard pretends to be aghast. “You mean they missed old Mr. Exner playing the washtub and Brenda Kolatch clog dancing?” Bernard places his hand on his chest and dramatically exclaims, “My heart be still!”

  “Luigi Pirandello,” suggests Ottavio. He's like having a representative of the Italian tourist board on hand, always promoting things from his home country.

  “Not if they're recovering from a variety show, darling.” Olivia gently places her hand on his arm. “I don't think Gil is after more realism so much as an escape from reality altogether.”

  “What about The Sound of Music,” Bernard says enthusiastically. “We can use all the children. Rose would be adorable as Gretl.”

  “And you'll star in the role of stage mother?” asks Gil.

  “Then how about Mame?” Bernard begins singing the title song. “ ‘You coax the blues right out of the horn, Mame

  “Are you auditioning for the lead?” asks Gil.

  “Of course not,” says Bernard. “I'll just be the understudy.”

  “Try again,” says Gil.

  “You've never done Tennessee Williams's Cat on a Hot Tin Roof”

  Gil rolls his eyes because the play involves alcoholism and homosexuality.

  “We can do a double feature with The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone,” suggests Bernard.

  “Isn't that the one where the old actress moves to Italy and dates young gigolos?” I ask.

  “Yes,” says Bernard. “Mother would be perfect for the lead. Don't you think?”

  Olivia ignores him and says, “How about Rutherford and Son?”

  “Never heard of it,” says Gil.

  “It's by a British woman named Githa Sowerby. The play premiered to excellent notices back in 1912 and was never heard from again. It's not included in anthologies because women's work was ignored until recently. The story revolves around a family business and the patriarch's ruthless attempts to sustain it. This leads to the psychic and moral destruction of everyone involved.”

  Gil doesn't appear very keen, but he's always polite, and says, “If you have a copy, I'll take a look.”

  Bernard sniffs. “It sounds more like some socialist tract written back in the days when British industry was buckling as a result of competition from the United States.”

  “It doesn't hurt for people to be reminded that capitalism comes at some expense,” admonishes Olivia.

  Gil stops in the middle of one book and says, “What about Our Town?”

  Bernard uses a nearby linen napkin to strangle himself. “Our Town?” he chokes out, as if Gil has just suggested featuring a beheading on the stage rather than a show. “There are no accents, no tragic southern belles, no nervous disorders, and worst of all—no big tap number!”

  “We never have a big tap number,” interjects Gil. “The stage is too small.”

  “There isn't so much as a feather boa!” Bernard is now lying prostrate on the dining room floor waving his napkin in the air like a distress flag.

  Olivia appears enthusiastic. “A good production should provide a sense of the rhythm of our own life as it touches those around us.”

  “Life?” moans Bernard. “It's about death!”

  SEVENTY-FOUR

  IT'S TWO IN THE AFTERNOON AND I'M PREPARING A SNACK FOR THE kids while my mother sips her tea at the kitchen table.

  “We received the most unusual pos
tcard,” she says, and hands me the piece of mail in question.

  There's a picture of a woman in a bikini on the front and at the bottom of the reverse side are the initials U.L.

  “Uncle Lenny!” The postmark reads St. Lucia, wherever that is. “Remember, I told you how he stayed with us while you were away?” Though I certainly didn't tell Mom all the details.

  “Oh, right—one of your dad's crazy twin sailor uncles,” she says. “He's the one who got the cat.”

  “That's Uncle Lenny,” I say.

  “What do you think it means?” she says.

  I study Uncle Lenny's scrawl on the back of the postcard: “50 miles out and down with high fever. Coma. Left for dead in deep freeze with 80-pound blue fin tuna. Awoke cold but cured. How the mates were surprised when Charley the Tuna started pounding on the hatch!”

  “I'm sure it's just another one of his wild stories,” I say. On the other hand, you could never be sure with Uncle Lenny.

  “Do you know what the leading cause of death is for women aged twenty-five through forty?” Mom asks.

  “Stroke?” I guess as I stack peanut-butter-and-jelly triangles onto a plate.

  “No. Halloween.”

  I can't believe that Mom actually told a joke. On the other hand, the dire look on her face doesn't indicate that she means it as a joke.

  Admittedly, organizing the kids and all their costumes for school this morning was a bit hectic. Especially because Davy's lion tail kept falling off, though I haven't ruled out that Francie was yanking on it. That would have been when she wasn't whacking us all over the head with her plastic machete, which was not as light a grade of plastic as it could have been. And Darlene's tiara wouldn't stay on no matter how many bobby pins I jammed into her hair.

  Then there's the candy corn that's stuck in all their pockets, and melted onto the clothes in the dryer. The kids love the stuff, especially making fangs on their teeth and sticking it up their nostrils. Sorry, but give me chocolate anytime. As far as I'm concerned, candy corn is the fruitcake of Halloween—it tastes disgusting, lasts forever, and the best thing you can do is find someone to give it to.

  Pastor Costello is off visiting a church member in the hospital, Louise is at her SAT prep course, and so it's just Mom and me in charge of preparing the troops for trick-or-treating.

  “It won't be that bad,” I assure her. “I'll take them around the neighborhood while you stay here and give out the candy.”

  “The temperature is dropping fast. They're going to have to wear coats,” she says ominously.

  “I'll put their coats on,” I say like a cockeyed optimist.

  My mother gives me a look that indicates I obviously have no memory of what it's like to put a coat on a child wearing a Halloween costume.

  Lillian races into the room half in and half out of her witch costume, following a nap that lasted all of five minutes. Not having experienced the thrill of a school party, she's raring to go.

  When the kids arrive home, it's obvious that they've already had way too much sugar—their voices are shrill and they run helter-skelter through the house searching for their buckets. Francie's machete was taken away at school and apparently the teacher “forgot” to give it back. Darlene's tiara is in two pieces and the bottom of her dress is torn from tripping over it in high-heeled plastic slippers.

  Davy's the real winner. His lion got in a fight with a bear and is torn from top to bottom. The costume is ruined, and I have to go down to the basement to look for something left over from last year. After much searching I find a suit for Batman's crime-fighting partner Robin.

  When I come back upstairs, Teddy is making scorch marks on the walls as he burns a cork to blacken his face for his hobo costume.

  “Aren't you a little old for trick-or-treating?”

  He scowls at me. “I'm going to a party.”

  “Sounds like a kissing party,” I say in a teasing voice.

  “Shut up!”

  I make kissing sounds in his ear and he ducks to get away from me.

  Darlene starts wailing in the other room. When I go into the living room her coat is on the floor and she's stomping on it while screeching that her costume will be ruined.

  “No it won't, sweetie.” I pick up the coat. “Everyone will know you're a princess because you're carrying a magic wand.” I don't mention the tiara because it's being held together with tinfoil and ready to fall off again. Or the fairy princess slippers that have to be replaced with boots now that a light snow is beginning to fall.

  Davy begins yelling when he sees the Robin costume I brought up from the basement.

  Mom looks as if she's about to start sobbing and sits down on the couch with a faraway look in her eyes.

  I go into the kitchen and grab Teddy, who is now dressed in oversized clothes, carrying a bandanna on a stick, and exiting through the back door.

  “Help me!” I plead with him. “Or else Mom is going to have another nervous breakdown.”

  That gets his attention. Teddy goes in and looks at the mess—kids crying, fur and fairy dust everywhere. Fortunately Teddy, who has recently become an official teenager, is now viewed as a God by the little kids, whereas I am an official grown-up pain in the neck, someone to be avoided at all costs, being that I cause misery in their young lives by serving vegetables and insisting on baths and bedtimes.

  They gaze up worshipfully at Teddy in his hobo outfit, which looks pretty good.

  “Why do you guys want to go in those stupid little-kid costumes?” he asks. “If you want I'll make you into bums like me.”

  The kids are very enthusiastic. Mom appears relieved.

  “Great, what do we do?” I ask.

  “I'm afraid we'll have to raid Dad's closet,” says Teddy.

  “Mom, can we use some of Dad's things?” I ask.

  “Sure,” she says. “I was just going to box it up for the church after Eric takes whatever he can use.”

  I put a few layers of regular clothes on the kids and then we add one of Dad's jackets with the sleeves rolled up. For the bottoms we cut the legs short on his pants and tie the waists with twine. Teddy makes hobo sacks out of red-and-white dish towels and darkens their faces with cork. The overall effect is superb and Mom even gets out the camera to take a photo, the first one since she's been home.

  Bernard arrives at half past five with his girls. There are only eight houses in their neighborhood, so I told them to come trick-or-treating over here after they finished. Gigi is dressed as a hippie and Rose is a little bumblebee. I think they're adorable, but Bernard is still recovering from the fact that his idea for their going as Joan and Jackie Collins was firmly rejected.

  SEVENTY-FIVE

  ON SUNDAY MORNING I DRIVE OVER TO THE COMMUNITY THEATER in order to work on the scenery for Our Town. The Palace was built as a movie house back in the 1920s. The façade is covered with large black and white tiles arranged to form an elaborate diamond pattern around three sets of chrome double doors that look as if they were ripped off an airplane. A triangular marquee juts out over the pavement above the ticket booth, a pillar on each side, and backlit silver stars encased in bricks of glass make up the lobby floor. In the early 1980s, after people started driving to the multiplex cinemas at the mall in Timpany, the movie theater slowly went bankrupt. Finally the Town Council took over the property and had it refurbished as a venue for special events.

  The theater was still empty most of the time, so Gil worked out a deal where he doesn't pay rent but gives half the ticket sales toward upkeep. And thus were born the Cosgrove Community Players.

  Louise has offered to help me with the scenery and shows up at exactly ten o'clock. She'll do anything to get out of church. However, I'm pleased to have another painter, at least until I discover that Louise has been working on the same six inches of soda shop background for the past hour.

  “Impressionism was created to save set designers a lot of work.” I take the brush and demonstrate.

  Louise sits
back and appears happy to let me continue.

  “So what's going on with you and Brandt?” I ask.

  “I don't know,” says Louise.

  “Are you still going out with him?”

  “I guess so,” says Louise.

  “You don't sound very enthusiastic about it,” I say.

  “It's just kind of boring,” she says.

  “You mean the abstinence thing?” I ask.

  Louise looks up sharply.

  “Brandt told me about it when he declared that you were his soul mate.”

  “He works and studies most of the time, and what they call a party is a bunch of guys making organic chemistry jokes and talking about what happened in the lab. We're supposed to do this for the next five years and then get married and, I don't know, have kids, I guess.”

  “Wow. You've got it all planned out.”

  “Yeah. I'm sixteen and it feels as if my life is already over.”

  It's quiet in the back except for the sound of the narrator speaking a few hundred feet away on the stage.

  “Think you'll get back together with Craig?” asks Louise.

  “He's with Megan now.”

  My name is being called from the auditorium, and suddenly Gil is standing above us, rather harried and with his script flapping around. “Hallie, please fill in for Paula—she's out sick again.”

  “And stay up until midnight painting your backdrops?” I reply. “No thanks. Get Bernard. He loves to read.”

  I turn to Louise and say, “Bernard was doing the lighting for a college production of Guys and Dolls, and after he performed “Adelaide's Lament” while the pianist was warming up, the director shouted, “Put Bernard in the dress and let him do the part.”