by Paul Zimmer
“It’s always fun sneaking out of that place, the feeling you get when you’re almost to the door and there’s still the danger of one of those desk nurses spotting you. When you’re outside and clear, it’s like a whole hod of bricks has been taken off your shoulders.” I take another pull on my Leinie. Louise is smiling as she reflects on our escape.
A moment has come. It seems to me that I should now do something or say something significant, but I don’t really know how to tell a woman that I like her. I’ve never expressed affection to anyone, but now I want very much to say something to Louise. So right in the middle of the Friday night Burkhum’s Tap crowd, I—Cyril, the abominable snowman—utter to the lady: “You know, I spent my whole life alone. That’s a long time to be talking to yourself. Being with you is like feeling what Oscar Robertson must have felt, making a fast break to the basket in the last seconds of a tie game. I’ve never said anything like this to anyone, but I have this feeling like I’ve never had before. I don’t feel so wasted when I’m with you. You make me feel happy.”
I spray all that out, and now I’m embarrassed. I’d been planning to say something like this for weeks, but it kept changing on me, and now I’ve probably left out some parts, but I’m glad I finally got something out, and I hope I got it right enough, because it’s the truth. My face feels hot.
Louise puts her hands over my gnarled digits and says, “Thank you, Cyril.” She looks out over the boisterous crowd, “I remember going to Paris for visits when I was a girl. Of course it dazzled me, but it couldn’t have been more exciting than Soldiers Grove is right now with you. Don’t blush, dear man. I’m happy to be with you. Let’s order another Leinenkugel so we can toast this moment. Do you suppose we could try a dance?”
I am flying again. A dance? With Louise. Oh my God! I’ve never danced in my life, but I want to hold Louise in my arms and take some steps. I’m going to give it my best shot!
The band has been playing mostly rockabilly, working the dancers hard. Some of those couples are really young and gymnastic, flying around the floor. Louise and I can’t afford to get knocked down. But we notice the band plays a slower number once in a while to rest the dancers, so we decide that one of these slow numbers will be the safest time for us to be out on the floor.
“How can we dance with canes?” I ask Louise.
She is scheming. “We’ll make them part of our dance. We have to use them to make our way to the floor anyway. We can make it short and easy. It will be fun, Cyril. Don’t worry. At first we can just stand in front of each other and sway to the right and left while we lean on our canes, then we can each turn all the way around twice while we have our canes planted on the floor, and come back to the front and sway a few more times. Then we can tuck the canes up under our left arms, take hold of each other with our right arms and make some turns together. Slowly. Remember to stay with the rhythm. That’s important. Maybe we can finish by stepping apart at the end, take a bow to each other. Short and sweet, but we will have done it. And it will be enough.”
“What a plan!” I say. “Diaghilev! Very classy. The cane dance.”
“We don’t want to fall on our faces out there. We’re just going to make a quiet statement, but we want to get it right.”
“How about another Leinenkugel?” I suggest.
“Perhaps we should just hold off and have a celebratory round after our dance,” Louise suggests.
The band is still bouncing the dancers around, so I excuse myself and go to the men’s room. I am nervous. When I shuffle back to our table the band is just starting a slow country waltz, so the dance floor is clearing as people return to their tables for a rest.
“Our time,” Louise announces. We are both just a little shaky, but we’ve made a good plan. I take her hand and help her up from her chair.
Cyril, I say to myself, this is it. You are on, boy! You are going to dance with the queen in front of everybody. If I’ve ever had an event in my life—this is it! I’m glad I made it to the men’s room. Tentatively we tap our way through the tables to the abandoned dance floor. There is a lull in the conversation as people begin to notice us.
“Let’s do it right,” Louise whispers. “We are not old fools!”
We stand on the dance floor facing each other, sway to the right and to the left as we lean on our canes, then turn slowly around them several times as we have planned. When we face each other again we tuck our canes up under an arm and move to take hold of each other.
This is such a delicious moment, I have been looking forward to it, to have Louise in my arms and be against her! I can feel her back moving, her arms holding me. We lean to each other and circle a few times, the band mercifully slows their tempo just a bit more. People are watching us do our steps and, I think to myself, the two of us, we are shimmering!
We finish and step back, tap our canes once, and bow to each other. We are done. We have danced. The Tap’s patrons are on their feet applauding us. Burkham is behind his bar, beaming and beating his hands together. There are a few cries of encore, more, more, but we are both weary now. We return to our table amidst the ovation. Louise is glistening and smiling. I have held that beautiful lady in my arms!
I have never felt like this in my life. The waitress arrives at our table with a tray full of Leinenkugels. Everyone is buying us rounds. But our evening is almost over.
In a short while we accept someone’s offer for a ride back to the home. We walk in the entrance and the night clerk looks up in surprise as we hasten past. When we arrive at Louise’s door, she turns, gives me another of her smiles, places her hand on my shoulder, and leans over to give me a kiss on the cheek. “Thank you, Cyril, I’ve had a wonderful evening,” and is gone.
The lights in the hallway grow dim as I struggle for breath, then they brighten and I almost collapse. I hang on and do a sort of prancing shuffle on my canes as I move back to my room. I say to myself: Cyril, you libertine, you’ve arrived at last! You have had one hell of a date! You are starting out late, but on top!
Years ago, when I was a kid, I bought a big remaindered copy of Shakespeare’s works at the bookstore in Viroqua. I spent months that summer, making my way slowly through the plays, taking a break from the brief lives and hiding from my plastered parents.
Shakespeare was tough sledding for me some of the time. But I could see, the man liked brief lives, too. I memorized whole passages as I read. It was a great summer by the standards of my youth. Most of those lines have slipped from my memory over the years, but I do remember something Bottom the Weaver said in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, after his magical night with Titania. He’s more than a little confused and dazzled, but he says: “The eye of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man’s hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his heart to report what my dream was.”
He’d had his dream moment, odd Bottom. Now, odd Cyril, you are having yours.
CHAPTER 12
Louise
The escape to Burkhum’s Tap has pried open our eyes. Now we envision nothing but further adventures together. We cannot abandon our canes—but there is more brio in our steps now. Our visions extend beyond this home, and we begin to scheme.
A minibus comes to the home twice a week to take residents to Walmart and Walgreens in Viroqua. Sometimes it makes day trips to local park sites and historical attractions, but Cyril and I are bored by these group trips. We have tasted real freedom and now we seek a further range. The excitement of escape is a large part of our experiences.
Today I awakened from a nap and had a vision. Why hadn’t I thought of this before? The old Dodge Ram truck that sits idle on my farm! It is still vigorous, I am sure. Heath loved that truck, took wonderful care of it, using it for many of his chores. I used to drive it to town for groceries and other shopping. Why should this wonderful vehicle waste away in the shed near our house, when it could become Cyril’s and my chariot? I believe Heath would be pleased for me if he knew this.
In
the book of regulations for the home it says we are not allowed to have vehicles on the premises, but who would notice one more blue Dodge truck amongst all the pickups parked around this place every day? The trick will be to manage sneaking it onto the parking lot without being noticed.
The farm is too far away for Cyril and me to make a hike on our canes and fetch it, so I will have to figure a way to get the truck and bring it back to the home without being noticed.
I’ve rented a few of our farm fields to a dour neighbor and he does necessary chores about the place, and checks the house for me occasionally. I could ask him to bring the truck in for me, but he is such a straitlaced, proper Lutheran I could never persuade him to help me break the rules of the home.
That man, Danderman. He lives in the independent living section of the home and has a car. He’s already asked me several times to go out to dinner with him. He could drive me afterward to the farm to pick up the truck. But Cyril dislikes the man intensely. Still, if Danderman could be used to help us accomplish our mission, it would open our lives to greater adventures.
The next time Danderman asks me to dinner I will accept his invitation. Cyril will be beside himself when I tell him—but what is a poor girl supposed to do? Something needs to be done.
Cyril’s face grows crimson when I tell him my plan. “I don’t want that guy getting romantic with you!” I begin to realize that probably my dear, new friend has never experienced jealousy. He is obviously surprised by how he feels. Despite my reassurances, he pouts like a little boy and looks away.
“Can’t we think of another way to get this done?” he insists. “That guy thinks he’s Artie Shaw or something. If he touches you, Louise, I swear I’ll brain him with one of my shillelaghs!”
But everything works out okay. I smile at Danderman the next time I see him in the dining hall, and he does not hesitate to invite me out. At dinner I work hard at boring him to distraction with my talk about art and music. He is more than ready to be rid of me by the time our desserts come. As he finishes his apple pie, I ask him to drop me off at my farm, claiming that I’m going to have an overnight to do some cleaning chores.
He looks at me slyly for a moment. What on earth, I think? Then I realize—this man is so preposterously vain, he believes I am hinting at a tête-à-tête! The bumptiousness of him! But then I tell him quite stridently in the restaurant that when I was in France I lived in Paris and posed as a female impersonator. I say it loud enough so that people at surrounding tables turn to gawk at us.
Danderman looks as if he’s swallowed a stingray. The waitress brings the bill and I loudly insist upon paying my half. Danderman drives me to my farm and almost pushes me out of his car.
The blue Dodge starts right up in its shed and has a full tank of gas. I turn the motor off while I check things out on the farm, coping with old memories. All of this bears overwhelming sadness, but I don’t believe Heath would begrudge me my enjoyment of these last experiences.
Sadly I finger my books and records, putting a few more things in a box to take back with me, waiting until dark to drive the truck into Soldiers Grove, and parking it in a far corner of the home lot.
I find Cyril waiting in the lobby when I slip in the door. But the poor dear has drifted off to sleep in a big green lounge chair. I gently awaken him and immediately he begins to fret about Danderman. I buy him a carton of chocolate milk from one of the vending machines and talk quietly with him until he is able to calm down.
“That creep thinks he’s Lothario!” Cyril fusses. “He didn’t try anything, did he?”
“He never got one of his nasty paws on me,” I assure Cyril. “I overpowered him with chatter. He couldn’t wait to be rid of me.”
I pat Cyril’s gnarled hand.
I’m very excited about what I accomplished tonight. “Now we have a chariot, my hero,” I announce to Cyril. “Who knows what fabulous mysteries lie ahead for us? We can dance our dances in La Crosse. Prairie du Chien? Milwaukee? Fond du Lac? Viroqua? Richland Center, Madison? Mineral Point? Do we dare think beyond Wisconsin? Des Moines? Iowa City? Minneapolis? Dubuque? Chicago? San Francisco? The world has suddenly yawned open to us!”
I am soaring and my dreams are large enough to frighten Cyril. But I have been at home all my life. Now I want to roam, to do some things. “We could drive to Chicago airport and take the overnight flight from Chicago to Paris,” I suggest. Cyril looks as if he might slip out of his chair onto the floor. I realize I am frightening him.
“But dear Cyril, my heart leaps up!” I tell him. “The road has opened. It beckons to us. The world is ours to see now, and possibilities are endless.”
“Maybe we should start slowly,” Cyril says cautiously. “If they throw us both out of this home, we’ll be lost like Hansel and Gretel wandering in the driftless hills. Where would we go? They’d find us wandering the streets some day, looking for cardboard to sleep under. Can’t we just start with a quiet picnic along the Kickapoo? Or a pork cutlet in Readstown? There’s a nice hotel bar in Boscobel. I’ll buy you a strawberry margarita.”
“That’s all very exciting,” I say. “Let’s start a list. But let’s allow ourselves to dream big, too. After some practice, we’ll take a few larger chances. Do we dare an overnight someplace? It would have to be done cannily, but we cannot waste this opportunity.”
Cyril is still stewing about Danderman. He’s thrashing in his green chair. “I just thought of who Danderman looks like,” he says: “Charles Laughton after he’d eaten fifty escargots and drunk a quart of brandy. I’m going to punch that man in the stomach and make him explode!”
Boys will be such silly boys. Cyril is cleverer than most, but he is still a boy. It has been a long day and I am weary. I quote to him from Mother Goose:
The man in the moon looked
Out of the moon
Looked out of the moon
And said,
’Tis time for all children
On the earth
To think about going to bed.
CHAPTER 13
Cyril
We’ve got to plan these early escapes carefully or we’ll blow our cover before we even get started. I’m a little worried, now that we’ve got wheels. Louise is acting like a sprung prisoner; she’s got huge ideas and wants to go everywhere at once. I’ve got the bug, too—but nice and easy, I urge her, cool and measured, that’s the only way. A little bit now, a little bit later—and timing is so important. Neither of us has ever traveled beyond Viroqua or Richland Center or Prairie du Chien in our adult lives. We need to practice.
But Louise’s restlessness is infectious, so it’s up to me to keep a lid on things. She was born in France, grew up there, sailed across the ocean, had a few adventures. I’ve always just looked at maps and dreamed about all the roads out there! I start itching even more than usual when I look at them now that we’ve got wheels; I place my finger down on a big map of the United States and run it around: Zanesville, Vacaville, Jasper, Valdosta, Vero Beach, Great Falls, Owensboro, Andalusia, Sag Harbor, Gallup, Queen City, Bangor, Cartersville, Pine Knob, Yonkers, Saginaw, Ruidoso, Opelousas, Mingo Junction, Slippery Rock, Glenwood Springs, Missoula, Knoxville, Chico, Wichita, Decorah, Boone, Roanoke, Scio. I want to go to all of them.
Louise has even bigger eyes—New York, Pittsburgh, Saint Louis, Chicago, Seattle, San Francisco, New Orleans, Savannah. Lord . . . even Paris, London! That’s the way she thinks.
Now I’m starting to think like Jack Kerouac. And Louise is much prettier than Neal Cassady. Let’s go!
Take it easy, Cyril! Cool it. Work your way out gradually. You’ll get to the moon yet, solve all the mysteries, touch all the places, just don’t get lost on the way or you’ll end up walking down some snowy highway again, peeing your pants and freezing your balls off.
So I try to rein Louise in a little bit, too. It is wonderful to see her so excited, she is so beautiful when her cheeks get red—but I try to make her focus a bit more locally, at least at first. Mor
ning excursions would probably be best to start, maybe once in a while extending one of our capers through the lunch hour—so long as we don’t do it so often that staff will start to take notice.
We’ve both signed contracts with the home, agreeing to their rules and restrictions. They have their own responsibilities, and government regulations they must follow. If they discover us breaking rules all the time, we could be expelled like truant school kids. We must take care.
Afternoons probably would not be so good. Old folks get sleepy in the afternoons. We need our naps. So it is mornings probably to slip out, and evenings—once in a while maybe we can dress up and sneak out for a fancy date night.
We begin with something elemental. I still have one of my old fishing rods in my room, and we discover a nice spinning rod and reel that Heath had kept behind the seat of the blue Dodge.
One morning we slip out through the parking lot to the truck, giggling like a couple of kids playing hooky. With tremendous excitement—and just a little guilt and nervousness—we drive slowly out of the lot, stop at a bait shop a short way out of town and buy night crawlers and shiners, then for our lunch I buy cheese curds, peanut butter, crackers, and a quart of orange pop and plastic glasses at the Mobil Quick Stop before we buzz off to a fishing spot I know along the Kickapoo River. The water is slow, and so is the fishing at first, only an occasional nibble. We don’t mind; it’s a sweet day. I find two fold-up chairs in the bed of the Dodge and set them up on the riverbank so we can sit while we’re fishing. Louise baits her own hook.
“Hemingway thought fishing was immortal activity,” I philosophize to Louise as I pull my bobber out of the water and cast it into a more likely place. “Here we are, like two gods. You know—you don’t grow older during the time you’re fishing. And you have to believe in the future. That’s what fishing is all about. In a few minutes I’m going to hook into a trout,” I assure Louise. “I’ll cook it over some burning sticks for our lunch.”