A young man of honorable mettle, Morgan felt compelled to ask an important question: “Do you think it will matter to the people there if I’m not technically—that is, completely, blind?”
There was a pause at the other end of the line. “How much vision have you got?”
“Fifty percent,” Morgan answered. It was a 15 percent lie. He never would have bent the truth this way if he wasn’t positive that his lie would one day be a 100 percent true. “I won’t let you down, Mr. Guffy,” he added. “I promise.”
The soon-to-be-former Blind Tom considered. “Good enough.”
The promise was an easy one to make. Morgan had always wanted to go back to southeastern Nebraska. He had relatives in that part of the country, near Blue Springs, and had visited them once when he was thirteen, in the summer of 1978.
It was a strange, eventful visit. A couple of days after he arrived, a huge tornado touched down outside a town not too far away and a little girl and her mother went missing.
Morgan joined the search effort, and in the process of tramping through a flattened, mud-splattered milo field near his great-uncle’s place, he came upon the remains of a baby grand piano. It was legless, and its top was gone so you could see its insides: gold strings—like a harp, kind of—and some bolt-looking things, and other parts Morgan didn’t have words for.
He’d never seen the insides of a piano. He’d never thought about a piano even having insides, really, or about how it produced music, so it had never occurred to him that the crucial and unseen parts of something so outwardly strong-looking and fine could be so horribly damaged.
Morgan was in the crowd watching when Bonnie Jones was rescued. Like everyone else, he was summoned to the ravine by the sound of music. He stood among the people of Emlyn Springs while they sang to her in a language he had never heard before, the language of his forefathers, in many voices that somehow sounded like one, and out in the open air, without a piano or an organ or even a guitar playing along.
After a photographer from National Geographic took a picture of the piano, Morgan got permission to have it hauled over to his great-aunt and great-uncle’s place. He cleaned it up and took it apart. It was a good project for a curious pubescent boy who was visiting relatives and didn’t have other kids to hang around with.
When his visit was over, the adults told him it would be impossible to take the piano back home to Michigan.
“What will happen to it?” Morgan asked.
When told that it would probably get busted up and taken to the dump, he grew upset, confounding his relatives, who knew him as a rule to be reasonable and compliant.
“You have to promise me you won’t get rid of it!” he insisted. “You have to save it for me, for the next time I come!”
The adults shook their heads, but they consented; it seemed to mean so much to the boy, and of course he was thirteen, going through all those baffling physical and emotional upheavals that beset young people at that time of life. So Uncle Howie hauled the piano’s remains into a corner of the barn, and there they stayed. They all expected that with the passage of time Morgan would forget about it. He didn’t visit that often.
It was after that summer that he started having trouble seeing the blackboard. He got dizzy walking down the school corridors. Bright sunlight started to hurt his eyes during the day; at nighttime it became harder and harder to see anything. That summer in Emlyn Springs was the last time he was just a kid, a normal kid with normal vision.
He always wondered about that little girl, whether she was still there, whether her mother was ever found.
So when Phineas William Guffy called and offered Morgan Geraint Jones the chance to answer to a new name and begin his professional life in the place where all those memories and that ruined piano lived, it seemed less like a random coincidence and more like a sign of divine grace.
If the deal was clinched for Mr. Guffy by Morgan’s solemn but personable sincerity, the deciding moment for Morgan came soon after he asked, “Wasn’t there a tornado in those parts in the late1970s? A woman and her little girl went missing?”
“There sure was,” Mr. Guffy replied.
“Whatever happened to her? What happened to her daughter?”
Mr. Guffy’s voice reflected a delighted surprise. “Why son,” he cried, “you’re talking about Flying Girl!” He then went on to tell his version of the story. Morgan remembers being grateful at the time that the phone call was on Mr. Guffy’s dime.
Morgan has always admired the pluck of his younger self. Hope’s piano became the only tangible evidence that the events of that summer really happened, that he really witnessed them. That it wasn’t all a dream.
He returned to Emlyn Springs, became Blind Tom, and transported the remains of Hope Jones’s piano from his great-uncle’s barn to the back room of the piano hospital. He felt as though he was finally claiming an identity and a life he’d chosen—or had chosen for him—long ago.
By the time he came back, Bonnie was sixteen. She didn’t recognize him; but then, there’s no reason why she would. He was just one of a herd of people on the ground when she was up in that tree, a boy then, and a stranger. Now he’s someone else.
And yet somehow the same, because he came here, settled here, and is linked to that self and this place by the visual memory of a seven-year-old girl caught up in a tree, the aural memory of voices conjoined in song, the tactile memory of a mud-splattered piano in a field. These memories won’t be compromised. They won’t fade, even though his eyesight will.
Blind Tom has never been able to think of Bonnie as Flying Girl; to him, she is a sleeping orb in the night sky, her small face lit from below by the hundreds of flashlights the townsfolk carried with them and shone up at her before she was brought down.
She could never belong to him—no more than the moon belongs to the wild creatures that sing to it.
Hope’s Diary, 1964:
There’s an ordinance against pedal pushers
Small-town life has begun to reveal itself—I should say, the less generous, mean-spirited side of small-town life.
Mid-morning, naptime, after some errands in town, I was taking Larken for a walk in the stroller when we were gestured near by Estella Axthelm. She was watering the planter boxes on her front porch. As I wheeled closer, I thought, how lovely, at last someone is going to initiate a conversation, maybe even invite me in for a cup of coffee or a glass of iced tea. I’d expected that sort of welcome, I realize now, especially since I married a native son.
I wheeled up the sidewalk, smiling my best smile, strategizing how best to begin the conversation—say something nice about her flowers, of course!—and was mid-compliment when she interrupted me.
“You need to go home and change your clothes,” she said.
“I beg your pardon?” I was sure I’d misheard. I was slightly distracted by the foreign quality of her speech, a kind of phony British sound to it.
Larken had begun to stir—any lack of motion she perceives instantly, no matter how deeply she’s asleep—and so I started pushing the stroller forward and backward. Miss A. continued to water her geraniums. She didn’t even make eye contact.
“That kind of tire isn’t appropriate,” I heard her say.
What was she talking about? Truly I felt as though the woman were speaking another language. Since her gaze was directed downward, I looked at the wheels on Larken’s stroller. They looked appropriate to me. I couldn’t imagine why Miss A. would be taking such umbrage at the wheels on a baby stroller.
Then I realized that she was referring to my clothing.
“My attire?” I asked. I was wearing denim pedal pushers, Keds, and a yellow polka-dot sleeveless blouse.
“Mothers in Emlyn Springs don’t dress like that,” she replied, finally gracing me with the full vituperative force of direct eye contact, which had an especially reproachful weight as she was still standing on the porch and so towered above me. I felt as though I were five years old. At th
at point, she turned her back and went into her house, letting the screen slam and pulling the front door closed in a way that let me know that an invitation to tea and cookies would not be forthcoming.
By this time, Larken was fully awake and had started to cry. So much for nap time. I stood there for a few more moments, unbelieving. Then I hauled Larken out of the stroller, carried her up to the porch, and let her entertain herself by pulling up every one of Miss A.’s geraniums—hateful, foul-smelling flowers—by the roots.
When I told L. about this—omitting my display of horticultural vandalism until I could gauge his reaction—he was dismissive.
“She didn’t mean it,” he said. “Small-town folks can be wary of strangers, that’s all, and she’s always been a prune, that one. Don’t take it so to heart.”
Needless to say, I didn’t mention the flowers, nor the four angry calls I received from Miss A. throughout the rest of the day. I hung up on her every time.
“Darling,” I said to Larken at bedtime—still wearing my inappropriate attire—“be kind to people.”
Llewellyn doesn’t seem to understand how hurtful this encounter was, how deeply it shook me. It set me wondering about other women in town. Do they all feel this way about me? That I’m trashy? That I’m undeserving?
Must go. Larken fussing.
Read a story about the posthumous publication of some poetry by a young woman named Sylvia Plath. American poet with children. Much lauded. I’m wondering if they might have any of her work at the library. I’m not hopeful, based on what I’ve seen of their collection, but I still plan on going tomorrow. It will be a nice outing for us.
Anyway, at the time of her death, she was married to—but separated from—an equally lauded poet. That must have been hell.
Some people doubt the authenticity of her intent, since she’d prearranged for someone to come to the flat early in the morning. Wasn’t she hoping this person would find her and save her? Surely she was bluffing. Weren’t her actions a plea for help rather than a real attempt?
Idiots. Of course not. She was seeing to the children, making sure they’d be taken care of when they woke up. I’d do the same. Any mother would.
Chapter 13
Sinkholes Can
Be Self-induced
There’s a new face at the gym. Gaelan notices her right away, at the beginning of his workout. He’s doing his cardio on one of the elliptical trainers; she’s directly opposite him on a stationary bike.
She’s praying. That’s his initial impression. Her lips are moving and her eyes are closed. Her intensity and self-absorption are unusual. This isn’t Gold’s Gym on Venice Beach. This is the YMCA in downtown Lincoln. It’s a fine facility and perfect for Gaelan’s purposes, but it’s not the place one expects to see people working out with such an inward-focused, reverential quality of concentration.
After studying her for several minutes, he realizes that she isn’t lost in prayer; she’s mouthing the words to every song on the Born to Run album, in sequence, keeping the beat during the instrumental solos.
By the time she gets to the next-to-last song, “Meeting Across the River,” Gaelan is listening to the album in his own head; he can hear the trumpet solo. And by the time “Jungleland” starts playing, he’s aligned his body rhythms with hers and they’re pedaling in sync.
They dismount their machines. “Hello,” he says.
“Hi!”
She’s a lot younger than he thought when he first saw her: early twenties, which puts her as much as fifteen, sixteen, maybe even seventeen years younger than he. Normally these kinds of guesstimations wouldn’t factor into Gaelan’s thinking; today, for some reason, they do—but only a little. She knows Springsteen, she doesn’t give off that crazy, desperate, stalker-in-the-making energy that Gaelan has come to recognize and run from after years of experience with female fans, she’s not wearing a wedding ring (not that marriage is an exclusionary factor in his selection process, it just makes things less complicated), and she’s very pretty in a tall, blonde, Nordic way—defined facial bones, long limbs. It’s easy to imagine her gracing the pages of one of those winter sports clothing catalogs, modeling stretch pants and a wool sweater and swishing down a ski slope.
Short of a few delicately phrased inquiries into her sexual history, Gaelan doesn’t need to know much more about this girl to make him interested in hosting her in his bedroom.
“You’re new here,” he says.
“I am, yes.” She’s extremely cut, but not bulked up, like a bodybuilder. Very lean.
“My name’s Gaelan.” And then—feeling like an asshole but unable to resist the possibility of impressing her—he adds, “Gaelan Jones. I do the weather on KLAN-KHAM.”
“Right!” she exclaims cheerfully. “I thought you looked familiar. She has that condition that causes her eyes to jiggle sporadically; there’s a name for it but he can’t remember what it is.
“I’m Rhiannon,” she adds. “I just moved here a couple of weeks ago.”
“Where from?”
“Oregon. I’m here on a grant.”
“At the U?”
“Yeah. Geology. Listen, I was supposed to meet my trainer, but he just called and said he was gonna be a little late and I should get started without him. You wanna spot me?”
“Sure.”
They head for the free weights. Around her exposed midriff, a smooth, taut ribbon of skin widens and narrows slightly as she moves. She’s wearing black, skin-hugging workout clothes: embroidered cropped pants and a spaghetti strap camisole.
Bodybuilders can talk all they want about the aesthetic marvels of a male six-pack; in Gaelan’s opinion, nothing compares to the posterior view of a woman’s musculature: that beautiful quadrant of glutes and hamstrings, the elegant, gentle slope of trapezieus skimming the shoulders and overlaying the wings of the scapulae.
She can’t weigh more than 110, and yet she loads 185 pounds on the bar and lies down on the bench. Is this a joke? Her face is deadpan, so Gaelan gets into the spotter’s position: legs set in a wide stance, arms outstretched and available.
“Ready?” he asks.
She exhales into her first press. Gaelan counts.
“One … two … three …”
She doesn’t focus on the bar when she’s doing her reps; she looks up at him with her strange eyes in a calm and openly curious way that Gaelan finds unsettling. It’s not an unfriendly look, but it’s not sexual either. It’s definitely not the look of a person bench-pressing one and a half times their body weight.
She doesn’t stop until she’s done twenty reps. Astounding.
“Thanks,” she says. “I guess it’s time to go up.”
“Yeah,” Gaelan laughs. “I guess.”
She peels herself off the bench and starts wiping it down—even though her body has left only the faintest silhouette of perspiration, a kind of shroud-of-Turin effect.
“So what are you studying?” he asks.
“Karsts.”
“Karsts?”
“Sinkholes. They can be self-induced. Not many people know that.” She indicates the bench. “Your turn.”
What to do? This is not his usual sequence. And yet.
“What do you start with?” she asks. “I’ll load it for you.”
“Two-fifty,” he says.
She puts a hand on his bicep. Her skin is surprisingly cool. He feels an answering tug in his groin. “You can do more,” she says. “Lie down. Close your eyes.”
He obeys, settling himself on the bench while she loads the bar.
When she’s done, he asks, “How much?”
“Never mind,” she replies, and when he opens his eyes she’s smiling down at him. “You know what they say,” she adds, winking. “What you don’t know won’t hurt you.”
He reaches up for the bar and stares into her shimmying eyes. “Listen, after this, you wanna go get something to eat?”
“Sure. That’d be great. But first …” She furrows her b
row, deepens her voice, and puts on an exaggerated Austrian accent. “We’re going to PUMP YOU UP! Come on now, baby. Give me eight. You can do this.”
She’s right. He can. He feels great.
“There are people who would kill for these seats, you know,” Larken says, fanning her face with a large stack of partially graded pop quizzes. Between the unseasonable heat, the nonstop screaming of several hundred thousand people—most of whom have been drinking alcohol since mid-morning—and the marching band’s insistence on playing “There Is No Place Like Nebraska” every five minutes, her head feels like an overinflated dirigible.
“There are people who would probably even marry me for these seats,” she continues. She swipes at her forehead before another curtain of sweat descends on her brows. “They’d be the same people, actually.”
Jon laughs. It’s not a real laugh. He’s been distracted all day.
“American football tickets as a dowry,” he says. “I’ll have to remember that when Esmé’s of marriageable age.”
“Here’s a thought: Next year we could scalp them and contribute the proceeds to her college fund.”
Jon smiles again, wanly. “Scalping is disallowed, remember?” He squints at the crowd on the opposite side of the stadium as if he expects to recognize a specific person among the squirming sea of red and white.
“Oh, right,” Larken replies with mock dismay. “Darn.”
They’re sitting in the middle of a six-seat block at the fifty-yard line of Husker Stadium. A large cooler occupies a third seat; the three other seats are conspicuously empty. Besides Jon, this week’s invitees were Mia, Esmé, and Rhonda, Mia’s acupuncturist friend. They were supposed to meet them at the start of the game but fourth quarter has already started and it’s obvious that she and Jon have been stood up. Larken’s best efforts to engender cheer this afternoon have all failed.
Jon looks at his watch. “I think I’ll go call Mia again”
“I’m sure they’re okay.” Larken chooses not to support this assertion by reminding Jon of Mia’s long-standing history as a no-show. “They must have just decided it was too hot.”
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