Keith does not usually say the B-word. He says the F-word, the S-word, and sweet Jesus. I can say sweet Jesus. That is not a bad word. Gary says jeez and crap because he has kids. John says the Ch-word, and David says the H-word. I do not say any of those things.
Keith has on a blue tie that looks just like mine only mine is green. I like green. I am bored. I kick my feet against the chair until Keith looks at me and puts a finger to his lips. That means I have to be quiet. I look around the room and listen. I am an auditor.
I sent copies of Perry’s will to John, David, and Louise as you suggested. I told them I thought it was in Perry’s best interest that they had this information. Just in case something happened to Perry. They were rather surprised, as you predicted.
Jeez! Did they say anything?
Not to me.
When I get home, I do my words. They are rice, rich, riches, Richter scale, rick, and rickets. I thought rick was a guy’s name, but it is a stack of hay. I think that is interesting. Words sometimes mean different things. Rice is a food. I do not like rice because it is little pieces and gets in my teeth. Rich. That is me. I am rich. That is so cool. Richter scale is about earthquakes. I think I was in an earthquake once. The ground shook. Or maybe somebody was mad. Rickets is a disease.
I did not hear from my cousin-brothers for two days. David called first.
“Perry, we heard about your will. We just wanted you to guard your assets. That’s all. Hell! I was only trying to protect you. Make sure you made the right decisions.”
I can make my own decisions, I think, but I sent him a check. I have to make each check amount smaller so I do not run out of money in my account and make the bank mad at me.
John called next.
“Don’t worry, Perry, we’ll always be there for you. Christ! We were all just concerned.” He breathes hard through the phone.
I mailed him and CeCe each a check.
Elaine calls. She asks if David came by. He was supposed to come by, not just call, she says. She sounds mad.
Careful, I hear Gram say.
I send her a check too.
When people are concerned, they want checks.
Everybody wants checks.
52
I bug Keith again and make him mad. I do not mean to, I just can’t understand why he doesn’t want to meet his son, Jason. See what he looks like. He could take a vacation and go. I would if I found out I had a son.
“Cherry and I can watch Diamond Girl,” I say. “Friends do jobs for each other like watch their stuff while they are gone. Don’t you want to see him?”
Cherry looks worried when I ask about Keith’s son. I can tell because she has wrinkles in her forehead. We sit in the cockpit. It is sprinkling. It always rains in Everett.
“Don’t be so freaking stupid! How many fucking times do I have to tell you? No. I. Do. Not. Want. To. See. Him. I was stupid. I was an ass. I signed my rights away. She married my best friend, Roger. Jason is his son now. So leave it the fuck alone!”
“Don’t talk to him like that!” Cherry speaks loud when she is mad. Her face is all red and not from her makeup. She puts a hand on Keith’s chest, but he pulls it off and leaps to his feet.
“Don’t you start with me, woman!” Keith jumps out of the cockpit and marches down the dock. We can hear his feet pound all the way to Yo.
Diamond Girl rocks with the force of his leaving, like she wants to follow. We hear the roar of Yo’s engine and the spatter of gravel in the parking lot. Cherry is shaking and her eyes are wet. She touches my hand.
“Don’t worry, Per, he doesn’t mean it. Really.” Then she starts to cry and I hold her.
“I know,” I say as I pat her back. “I know.” My feelings are hurt and my throat is thick.
Keith is my friend. I am unhappy. I hope he comes back.
“He’s trying to stop drinking you know,” Cherry says. “He is trying to stop.”
I tell Cherry I understand.
“Alcohol is the devil. The very devil himself. It’s a demon, Perry,” Gram said. “I wish I could help Keith see that. But he’ll have to see for himself. It’s the very devil.”
“Why?” I would ask Gram. “Why does he drink?”
“Demons and regrets,” she would say. “Demons and regrets. The two worst things in the world.”
“He’s trying to stop.” Cherry has stopped crying. She wipes her eyes on her shirt and sniffs.
“That’s good,” I tell her. “Gram always wanted him to stop. Keith always said he didn’t have a reason to.”
“He’ll have a reason to now. He’ll stop now, because he’ll have a reason.” Cherry sounds sure of herself and smiles while she rubs her belly.
My stomach flips. She is so pretty. I pat her hand. I am relieved. It worries me when Keith gets upset and mad. I do not like it.
We sit together in the cockpit. It feels like spring and the weather is warm.
“Perry?” Cherry says my name in a question. She licks her lips like she is nervous. “Ummm. Do you like working at Holsted’s?” she asks. It does not sound like that is what she really wanted to ask me.
“I love it. It’s the best job in the world,” I say. That is true.
“How long have you worked there?” She looks over at the parking lot like she is willing Keith to come back.
I have to count. “Almost sixteen years. A long time.” I try to think of something else to say. “How about you, Cherry? Do you like Holsted’s?”
Cherry pulls her sweatshirt down over the edge of her sweatpants.
“No one has ever asked me what I think about my job,” she says, “but yeah, I like it a lot. I love it actually. It’s the best job I ever had.”
It is quiet and the water laps against Diamond Girl. I wonder how long Keith will be gone.
“What’s that?” Cherry points to a bird.
“A baby gull. They are brown instead of white. You want to feed it? Where’s some bread?”
Keith never used to have much on his boat. Cherry goes below and brings up a package of crackers. We spend an hour breaking them up into pieces and tossing them into the air for the birds, and the water for the fish. We laugh and talk about birds, fish, and boats.
Keith is gone a long, long time. It is dusk. We hear Yo’s engine whine in the parking lot and then go silent. When he climbs into the cockpit, his shirt is wet. He is breathing hard like he has been running and not just driving Yo.
“I’m sorry, Per.” He grips my shoulder. “I’m so sorry.” He hugs me hard.
“I’m sorry, hon. Forgive me?” He wraps Cherry in his arms and kisses her so long, I have to look away. Cherry whispers something in his ear and he whispers back. They hold each other tight and turn into one giant person. I do not see where Keith starts and Cherry ends. They do not notice me leave.
When I look down out of my window later on, they are leaning against each other sitting in Diamond Girl’s cockpit. I stand there and watch the sun go behind the mountains.
I am an auditor, but there is nothing to hear except the beating of my heart. Now I am a watcher, I think, as I stand and stare out. Half of the sun shines, half is behind the jagged peaks. It sinks until just an edge is left.
I wondered where it went when I was young. It was one of my wonders.
“I wonder where the sun goes,” I would tell Gram.
“China,” she would say. “It goes to China and Australia.”
I think it would be wonderful to know so much. To be so smart that if someone asked you any question you could say the answer. Gram was like that. So smart. Keith is like that too. So is Cherry. I watch Keith and Cherry hold each other on Diamond Girl. I watch the sunset. I watch all the colors and try to say their names.
“Red, pink, orange, gray . . .” I say this softly, like I used to talk when I did not want to wake Gram up. “Purple, lilac, yellow . . .”
What’s the matter, Perry? I hear her voice. She is here with me. Like when I would come home crying from school
. Like when I would have a tough day at work before I knew what to do. Like when I missed sailing with Gramp.
What’s the matter, Perry? I hear her voice. And I talk to Gram.
I tell her how much I love Cherry and I cry.
I cry.
53
There’s been an accident.”
Gary’s face is serious. His voice is flat. "There has been a terrible accident.” He talks quietly into my ear. “I have to go. There may be some mistake. I have to go.”
“Who?” I ask. “Who is it?”
When a person dies in an accident, they have to be identified. They have to be identified, just in case it’s not them. In case it is someone else.
“Who?” I ask.
Gary looks down at the floor and says nothing. I see the tiny muscle in his jaw move and jump. I know. I think I know.
I ask Gram in my heart to please make it someone else. Please not make it Keith.
“Please, Gram?” I whisper. Please?
“Officer Mallory thinks it might be Keith,” Gary whispers softly. And he turns and walks out the door.
I put away boxes while I wait. Box after box. They are brown. I peel the tape carefully. I do not want it to rip. To tear.
Please, Gram.
Cherry is in the employee bathroom. She has to pee again.
“You gonna be in there all morning?” Manny bangs on the rest-room door.
“Now, don’t you start!” she shouts at him as she comes out.
“Quiet! Be quiet!” My voice hits the ceiling it is so loud.
They both stare at me with their mouths open but I look away and hide my face.
Keith teased Cherry this morning, right before he left for his AA meeting.
“Woman, you spend a lot of time in that bathroom. Are you ever coming out?” Keith rattled the knob. “I’m leaving now. Give me a kiss good-bye.”
“I’ll kiss you when you get back!” Cherry yelled through the door.
I cannot say anything. Gary told me not to until he was sure. Until he returns. I do not say a thing. I open box after box. Carefully. I do not tear the tape. I wish on the tape. If it does not rip, if it does not tear, then Keith is fine. Keith is okay.
Please, Gram.
Manny and Cherry both know something is wrong. They walk wide around me and do not talk.
I hear Gary’s Jeep before I see him. He walks through the door. His face has no color. No color at all. His voice is low and scratchy like when you walk on gravel. Low like a bulldozer far, far away. Low like an airplane so high you cannot see it.
Please, Gram.
When he tells us what happened Cherry’s mouth falls open, but nothing comes out. She gets smaller and smaller until she is gone. I am crying so hard my eyes are shut tight, but I make no sound. I hear nothing. Just a roar. A roar of sad.
Manny just says, “Jesus God. Jesus God. Jesus God.” Over and over.
Hitting a tree at fifty miles an hour is not a good thing. Keith was not even drinking. He came around a corner. There was a lady and two kids in the road. Their car was stopped and the hood was up. He had to hit them or a tree. He and Yo hit the tree hard. That is what the lady told Officer Mallory. That is what Officer Mallory told Gary on the phone. And that is what Gary told us when he got back from the morgue.
A morgue is a cold place they keep dead people.
“I want to see him! I didn’t kiss him good-bye. I want to kiss him good-bye!” Cherry wails.
“God, no, Cherry, please,” Gary says, and holds her shoulders.
“I have to, Gary. Please? Take me? Please?” Her voice is a piece of wind. I feel it in my chest. “Please?”
Gary takes us both to see Keith. We have to sit on a hard brown bench. The walls are green. We wait. The man asks us if we are sure.
“Are you sure? Are you sure you want to do this?” He is kind. I see that in his eyes. I want to say no.
No, I am not sure, but Cherry says yes. She says yes so hard I feel her breath on my neck. The man unzips the bag that Keith is in. He looks like he is asleep. We can only see part of his face. The rest is covered by a sheet. His beard has small bits of glass in it that glitter. They sparkle under the light. They are pieces from Yo’s shattered windshield. That is what the man says. I asked him at first if they were little jewels but he said no, and told me what they were. There is a small purple bruise above Keith’s brow and his skin looks empty like there is no one inside.
I hear a shudder. I feel it vibrate through me as Cherry bends down to kiss Keith’s cheek. I hold Cherry tight with my arm and with my other hand brush Keith’s hair off his forehead like he used to do to me.
“Your fucking hair’s in your eyes, Per.” That is what he used to say. “You look goofy. You look goofy, Per.”
“You don’t look goofy, Keith,” I say. “You don’t.” And my voice cracks.
I have never heard a sound like the one that Cherry is making. It is like her soul flying out. I shut my eyes tight because they are wet again.
It is harder than Gramp. Harder than Gram. Harder than anything. When I open my eyes, Cherry is being sick on the floor. She cannot stand and Gary helps me carry her back to the car.
We go to Everett General Hospital emergency room. The same place I got my arm fixed after I got beat up.
“Can we do something for her?” Gary asks the clerk at the counter.
“Please? Can’t you do anything? Give her something?” he asks the doctor.
They give Cherry a shot and a bottle of sadness pills.
I did not know you could get pills for sadness. It was something I did not know.
When we get back to the apartment, we lay Cherry down on the bed. Gary takes off her shoes, and covers her with Gram’s blanket. I stand and watch her lying there. My heart is breaking. I feel it breaking like Yo’s windshield. My heart has disappeared. It is gone. I want it back, but it has left with Keith.
“Stay with her, okay? I’ll get Sandy.” Gary hugs me and goes downstairs. I hear the engine of his Jeep rumble as he drives away. I am alone with Cherry.
Gary or Sandy would know what to do. What to say. I do not know what to do or say.
I drop to my knees next to the bed. There are black streaks of mascara over Cherry’s cheeks. Her eyes are open but her breathing is deep and slow.
I hold her head in my hands. I pat it like Keith did, over and over. Her eyes turn to me. They ask a question with no words. They ask a question that I am unable to answer.
I can only say, “I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry, Cherry,” I cry.
But her eyes just stare into space. They just stare.
I’m sorry, I hear Gram say.
“We’re all so sorry,” the fishermen say.
“So sorry,” our suppliers say.
“We’re so very, very sorry,” everyone says.
54
Diamond Girl’s engine starts on the first try. BROOM! BROOM!
I feel it shaking under my feet. I watched Keith take her out so often I knew I could do it myself.
I can do it myself, I think. I have no trouble casting off the lines. Gary’s family stands by helplessly and I tell them what to do. Where to sit. Cherry is beside me.
I hear Keith’s voice.
I could do it blindfolded.
I could do it with my head up my ass.
I could do it with one arm behind my back and jerk off at the same time.
Keith was crude and rude, Gram always said. She would laugh.
“That boy is crude and rude!” She loved Keith and I loved Keith too.
Six people on Diamond Girl are as much as she can handle. Gary brought three brand-new life jackets still wrapped in plastic from the store so we would have enough. The Coast Guard says you need one PFD, personal flotation device, for each person. My head says this over and over. PFD. PFD. PFD. In time with the engine as it throbs.
We head out towards Whidbey Island. The sky is so blue it looks fake. It looks like it is painted o
n. Like a picture. Like Cherry’s eye-shadow. There is one big cloud shaped like a flower. I like that. A flower for Keith. Puget Sound is green and shiny.
Diamond Girl cuts through the water.
THROB. THROB. THROB. Her engine goes.
Meagan and Kelly are quiet. They sit close to each other. Meagan ’s eyes run with tears. She liked Keith a lot, even though he called her a twerp. The one I worry about is Kelly. She has a mask face like Halloween and her eyes are dry. She is younger than I was when Gramp died.
I think I know how she feels.
I think I know what she must be thinking.
She and Keith argued. He teased her all the time. I know she feels guilty. I can see it in her eyes. I felt guilty for years about Gramp. I thought I killed him by going out for a sail. Kelly probably feels the same way. She and Keith fought just last week.
“Are those boobs I see, Tween?” he asked.
Sandy made the mistake of telling Keith that Kelly got her first bra.
“Drop dead, you fart-face! Drop dead!” Kelly shrieked.
He just laughed at her. We all did.
Drop dead.
Drop dead, Keith.
I know her words cannot be unsaid. They float behind her eyes. I know this. I hold her hand while I work the tiller.
“I didn’t mean it,” she whispers to me. “I swear I never meant it.”
“I know,” I tell her. “We all know. It’s okay. It will be okay.”
I am doing Keith’s job. It is up to me.
Steering. That is what he used to do. When I think of this, my tears come and I cannot see clearly. I let go of Kelly’s hand and Cherry puts her arms around me. I give the tiller to Gary, and he guides Keith’s boat.
We go out into the strait, and head into the current, until we feel it is the right place. The perfect place. A place Keith would want to be.
Spread my ashes out in the Sound, he told me. I want to travel the world for free.
I said that I would.
“I promise,” I told him.
And I keep my promise.
When we toss Keith’s ashes out into the water, the seagulls swoop and flap overhead. They think we are giving them food, but it is only Keith.
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