Dreamland Social Club

by Tara Altebrando

  “Appreciate it,” Leo said, shaking his hand and accepting the flashlight being offered. He nodded at Jane to follow him inside.

  The ladder in the center of the room led them up to a hatch that opened with a good hard shove from Leo. Jane stood on the ground, waiting for him to abandon the ladder. It took a minute—he looked around a bit—but then he lifted his legs out, scurried around, then stuck his head back down and shined the flashlight in her face. “Come on up,” he said.

  “You didn’t have to pay them, did you?” she asked.

  “Nah,” Leo said. “They both have unpaid bar tabs.”

  “Well, thanks,” she said.

  She climbed, the metal dusty and cold on her hands, and then took Leo’s hand at the top and stepped up onto the roof of the base.

  “You ready?” he said, and Jane nodded. She wasn’t sure what the point of any of this was, the re-creating, but she felt good—different—doing it, being out on nights like this. Jane was not the kind of girl who would scale the Parachute Jump with a boy at two in the morning. Or at least she hadn’t been until now.

  So they climbed, on the inner side of the tower, and Jane tried to imagine that she wasn’t climbing but instead was sitting in some kind of harness, being hauled to the top by cables. When she finally caught up with Leo, she said, “I think this is high enough.”

  He said, “Okay,” and hung his elbows on a rung and Jane did the same, to give her hands a break, and they just perched there for a minute with the wind blowing and the ocean right there crashing and churning, and Leo said, “Your mother was one crazy chick.”

  “Her mother used to pretend she was half-bird, and her father called himself Preemie,” Jane said.

  Leo said, “Good point.”

  “The Anchor actually looks kind of nice from here,” she said. It was true.

  “Well, take a mental picture, since it’ll probably be gone come spring.”

  “I don’t understand,” she said. “I mean, if they build new rides and stuff, won’t that mean more people? People who would drink at the Anchor?”

  “Loki owns the Anchor.”

  “I thought your dad owned—”

  “My dad owns the bar. The business. But Loki owns the property.”

  Oh.

  “And they keep jacking up my dad’s rent. It’s ridiculous. Probably illegal.”

  Oh, no.

  Jane said, “But if more people spent money there, and it made more money, then the rent wouldn’t be a big deal, right?”

  “You’re missing the point.” Leo shook his head. “They’ll knock the building down before they let the Anchor stay there. They’re even making anonymous calls to the health department about violations that totally don’t exist. Because that right there”—he nodded at the bar—“is where they want to put a big indoor water park or roller coaster or some bullshit, so they might not even renew my dad’s lease.”

  “Oh, no.” She said it out loud this time.

  “Oh, no is right,” he said. “They are seriously evil.”

  “My arms hurt,” she said, because it was the only thought she was having that she felt she could share, and Leo said, “Mine, too,” and so they went back the way they’d come—down the rungs and through the hatch, and down the ladder and out the door and then through the proper gate this time—with a thank-you for the guards—and then back out onto the boardwalk. And the whole time, all Jane could think was that she had to tell her father about Loki. About how awful a company it really was—fake health code violations?—and how he could not sell them the Tsunami.

  “Two down, two to do,” Leo said, and Jane pushed everything else aside but the keys and said, “I guess Wonder is next, since I still have no idea what ‘Bath’ means. But I still don’t know if it’s the Wonder Wheel or Wonderland.”

  “It sounds to me like a reconnaissance mission is in order.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can’t after school tomorrow—”

  Jane had seen new signs for the Dreamland Social Club meeting. Was that why? Or was it Venus? Or both?

  “But after school the next day, we’ll scope out the ‘Wonder’ stuff.”

  Sneaking back in was as hard as sneaking out. Either way you were caught. But just knowing that Leo was watching from beside that lamppost made her feel stealthy and calm and confident. She wondered what he thought while he watched her, what parts of her, specifically, he kept his eyes on, and whether he wondered those kinds of things, too, about her, when she was the one doing the looking. Then inside she wondered whether she’d ever find out what the deal was with him and Venus, and then up in her room she wondered whether he’d ever touch her or kiss her or want to. With Leo in her life, there were endless things to wonder about—not just the keys.

  CHAPTER six

  IT WAS A NIAGARA OF CONDOMS when Jane opened her locker before Pre-Calc. Hundreds upon hundreds of XXLs in square packets cascaded into the hall and formed a river of jagged rapids on the floor. She slammed the door shut, disappeared into the girls’ bathroom, and started to cry. The temptation to scratch something awful into the stall’s thick pink paint was enormous, but Jane wasn’t sure what she’d even write.

  She hadn’t been in there more than ten minutes before she heard a voice.

  “Jane. It’s Principal Jackson. Collect yourself and come to my office.”

  She took some toilet paper and blew her nose, then came out of the stall and went to the mirrors. She wiped the tears off her cheeks, took a deep breath, and headed out.

  Harvey Claverack was already in Jackson’s office. Cliff was there, too. “I’m telling you,” Harvey said, “I didn’t do it!”

  Cliff said, “Me neither.”

  “And I’m telling you that I don’t believe you.” Principal Jackson was twirling back and forth on her rotating desk chair. “You’ve been orchestrating a campaign of intimidation based on this nonsense about your grandfather and that dumb carousel horse and I want it to stop.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Harvey said, and the principal snapped, “I know what goes on in my school, Harvey.” Which was a surprise to Jane. Why did the principal even know or care? And how?

  Principal Jackson opened a desk drawer and pulled out the naked baby doll that Jane had dumped in the trash.

  “But it wasn’t us,” Cliff said.

  “This is your first and only warning,” the principal said. “One more misstep and you’re both suspended. Now apologize to Jane and go.”

  “Sorry, Jane,” Harvey said, in a sort of fake singsong.

  “Yeah,” Cliff said. “Sorry.”

  The whole scene was pathetic. It wasn’t like they meant it. Though their denials had been rather convincing, even Jane had to admit.

  “Now go!” Principal Jackson pointed to the door. “All of you!”

  “I want to meet with your father or your grandfather,” Jane said to Harvey’s and Cliff’s backs in the hallway, and they both turned. “I want to talk to someone else. Someone other than the two of you.”

  “And why should we let you do that?” Cliff said.

  “Because I have the horse.”

  “Fine,” Harvey said. “Come over after dinner. My grandfather’s always home, and my dad gets home from work at like seven.”

  “Fine,” she said.

  And that was that.

  Jane watched Leo closely all day, hoping that he’d validate what she felt, which was that last night had changed things between them. The way they’d sat so close and talked for so long, the easy way they had with each other, the charge she was sure had been in the air. It had to mean something. And nothing having to do with Loki or the Anchor could ever change that. It took the better part of the day before she got any indication that maybe he had felt it, too.

  “Hey,” he said to her on the way out of the cafeteria after lunch. He had a funny look in his eye, and she feared he was going to say something about the condoms, about her “date” with Legs
. How had she gotten herself into such a mess?

  “I can’t stop thinking about you.” He ran a hand through his hair, a mess of unwashed black strands. “About you and your mom, I mean. Those games. I swear I dreamed about the Elephant Hotel last night.”

  The next bell rang and he said, “Tomorrow afternoon.” He was backing away. “The Wonder stuff.”

  She had to consciously act calm when she nodded and said, “Yes. Definitely.”

  “Hot date?” someone said, and Jane turned to find Legs towering over her.

  “No,” she said.

  “Well, I should hope not,” he said, and then he added, “So Friday. I’ll pick you up around seven?”

  “I could just meet you there,” Jane said.

  “A gentleman such as myself could never allow it.” He headed off down the hall, and the bulletin board he’d been standing in front of revealed a new poster. It saiddreamland social club

  TODAY, ROOM 222

  Put yourself in the picture.

  The flush came before the stall door swung open, but Jane saw it only in the mirror’s reflection. She didn’t see anyone coming out of the stall and got spooked, so she whirled around, looked down, and saw Minnie Polinksy. She was wiping her cheeks and her eyes were bloodshot. She’d been crying.

  She looked up at Jane, took her hands away from her face with one more swipe of tears, and sighed loudly. She went down to the far end of the sink counter and pulled a small stool out from underneath. She climbed up, turned on the water, looked at herself in the mirror, and breathed hard, then looked over at Jane’s reflection.

  Jane didn’t have anything to say to her and Minnie didn’t seem to want to say anything either, but Jane’s feet wouldn’t move. She thought maybe she should tell Minnie that it wasn’t really a date. She hated that it seemed like she was in some way contributing to the breaking of Minnie’s tiny heart when Jane’s own heart wasn’t really into it. Jane would have stomped on anybody’s heart for Leo; not even Venus shooting daggers at her would make one bit of difference. But not for Legs.

  Minnie turned off her water and reached for a paper towel. She said, “He wants to be normal, you know.”

  Jane just waited.

  “It’s the only reason he wants to be with you and not me.” Paper towels looked like bath towels in Minnie’s small hands. “He thinks being with you will make him more normal.”

  Jane’s feet still hadn’t heeded her command to move when Minnie stepped back off the stool and walked out. Looking in the mirror just then, Jane suddenly felt newly determined to go rollerskating with Legs. Not to help him be normal—how could anyone possibly help anyone be that? least of all her?—but to prove that Legs had the right to go out with whomever he wanted . . . and so did she.

  This time when Jane walked past Room 222, she definitely saw Leo inside. So he was a member of the Dreamland Social Club. He had put himself in the picture.

  This time, she had half a mind to just open the door and walk in and sit down and see if anyone cared. Minnie was there, though, which was reason enough to stay out. In fact, there were now more reasons to stay away than to go in. Many, many more.

  Still, she needed to ask Babette for a homework assignment she’d missed when she’d been with Principal Jackson and the Claveracks. So she walked back up to the door and knocked. The voices inside went silent, and Jane just waited. Babette opened the door and said, “Well, hello, Jane.”

  Debbie stood up from a desk at the front of the room and H.T., who’d been sitting atop that desk with his back to the door, spun himself around, a wide white smile on his face. Leo looked up from where he was sitting next to Venus, their heads bent together over some sort of book or album. Minnie just stared and Legs did the same, though with a softer look in his eyes than his ex’s.

  “Well, hello, Babette,” Jane mimicked. “Can I get our homework assignment from Pre-Calc?”

  Babette looked back over her shoulder into the room; Jane watched a few of the others make and then drop eye contact with Babette, who turned back to Jane and said, “Can I swing by your house in like an hour?”

  “Sure,” Jane said, and then Babette all but closed the door in her face.

  CHAPTER seven

  AT HOME, MUSIC MADE OF STRINGS and swells emanated from the heating vents in the kitchen. Jane went out into the yard, opened the metal doors to the basement, and called out, “Dad?”

  “Yup!”

  Once downstairs, Jane saw an old record spinning on the Victrola.

  “This Victrola’s in great shape.” Her father turned down the volume. “And you’ll never believe this thing.” He pointed to a weird-looking cylinder and horn on the table. “Hang on.”

  He lifted the needle on the Victrola and went back to the cylindrical contraption and started to crank a handle on it. A woman’s high-pitched, garbled voice came from the horn, singing, “I’ll be your little honey, I will promise that, / Said Nellie as she rolled her dreamy eyes,/It’s a shame to take the money,/Said the bird on Nellie’s hat . . .”

  “Crazy, right?” he said.

  Jane thought, Yup, officially.

  “So how did the meeting go?” she asked, but her father was now singing along, cranking with intensity: “Then to Nellie Willie whispered as they fondly kissed,/I’ll bet that you were never kissed like that.”

  “Good! I think!” her father said, and Jane deduced that he was drunk. He sang the rest of the song with the lady on the weird funnel record—“Well, he don’t know Nellie like I do,/Said the saucy little bird on Nellie’s hat”—and then he plopped down on an old couch, out of breath.

  “There was a picket line.” He waved a hand. “I hadn’t been expecting that. Some woman stopped me and went on and on and on about Loki and said that I was making a deal with the devil.”

  “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about, Dad.”

  But he wasn’t listening. “You’d think I was single-handedly responsible for Loki owning the property the Anchor and Wonderland are on, like it’s my fault they might lose their leases. I told her that’s life. If you can’t afford to stay somewhere, then you can’t afford to stay. It’s nobody’s fault. It’s the way of the world.”

  Jane felt the thrum of dread. “What did she look like?”

  “I don’t know. Crazy. That’s what she looked. Pretty. Like super-sophisticated. But crazy.”

  Yes, probably Beth.

  “But it’s true that Loki is raising everyone’s rents like crazy,” Jane said. “Shutting people down. You don’t care?”

  Her father took his glasses off and said, “A horror made of cardboard, plastic, and appalling colors; a construction of hardened chewing gum and idiotic folklore taken straight out of comic books written for obese Americans.”

  “Dad,” Jane whined. “What are you talking about?”

  “You were too little to remember. No, wait.” He paused to think. “You weren’t even born yet. But when I worked on Euro Disney, the French people hated what was happening. They called the park ‘a horror made of cardboard.’ And worse. And there were protests from labor unions and problems with the housing requirements needed to support the massive staff the park needed to function.”

  “What’s your point?” Jane asked, though she already sort of knew.

  “You can’t please all of the people all of the time,” he said, and he started gathering up his documents. “Now I need to go run through my presentation a few times, honey. I’m sorry you’re upset about this, but it’s really nothing new.”

  “It’s new to me,” she said weakly.

  “I know.” He nodded. “And it’s complicated stuff. Especially if you know the people involved. But there’s really no right thing in a situation like this.”

  “Doesn’t mean there isn’t a wrong thing,” she said. Then, “What do you think Mom would make of all this? The Tsunami? The redevelopment?”

  “I don’t know.” He rubbed his eyes. “I only know that she loved this place and hated it, and
she was justified in both of those things. Maybe the development will get rid of some of the hate for the rest of us who are still here.”

  “I don’t hate it the way it is.” It felt like a lie. But a white one.

  “But you don’t love it either. You love its past and you love its potential, but only if it turns out to be what you want it to be.”

  “What’s so wrong with that?”

  “Nothing, except that it’s not really love. Love has to exist in the present tense, flaws and all. And anyway, it’s not the way the world really works.”

  Jane didn’t have the energy to argue, wasn’t sure he was wrong. “I’m going to see a man about a horse,” she said. “After dinner.”

  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” His eyebrows went up. “I could come with you.”

  “I’ll be okay. I just want to decide if we should give it to them or to someone else.”

  He said, “I can’t imagine anyone else would want the thing.”

  “They’re called museums, Dad.”

  “You think it’s worth something?” He seemed genuinely intrigued.

  “One of my teachers says it might be worth up to sixty thousand dollars. But that it’s priceless.”

  “Nothing is priceless.”

  “Do you really mean that?”

  “No, I don’t suppose I do.” He started to fiddle with another record. “You, my dear, are priceless.”

  Jane rolled her eyes and looked at her watch. “I’ve got a friend coming over.” She got up. “Try not to appear shocked when you discover that she is a goth dwarf.”

  “Look around,” her father said. “She’ll fit right in.”

  Babette wound up the mermaid doll. “So do you think he’s cute, at least?”

  “It’s broken,” Jane said, and thought again about telling Babette all about the keys the doll had hidden but wasn’t sure she wanted anyone but Leo to know about them. Not yet. She said, “Do I think who is cute?”