by Vicki Grove
She smiled and nodded. “I perceived it as a platinum blond woman of about thirty years, dressed in an inappropriately filmy and low-cut silver evening dress, bloodred lipstick, heavy false eyelashes, and what appeared to be real diamond jewelry, a bracelet and earring set. Marilyn Monroe was all the rage then, and this entity turned to me and said, in a breathy voice exactly like Marilyn’s, ‘In six minutes, using your human measurements, the window beneath the big clock in the library reading room will be hit by a rock thrown up by a lawn mower. It’ll shatter just all over the place.’ And then, as if this weren’t strange enough, she winked one of those heavy-lashed eyes at me and asked, ‘Do you think I’m as glamorous as a movie star? Or do you think I’d be even more glamorous with different eyes, maybe diamond ones?’”
I jabbed the air with my finger. “Yes, absolutely, Mrs. Beetlebaum! That was her!”
Mrs. Beetlebaum laughed. “You know, it’s interesting that she wore red cowboy boots when she appeared to you, because she wore red high heels when she appeared to me. And Karl, before he died, told me she appeared to him in a ruffled black and purple dress that was short enough to expose red velvet lace-up boots of the sort generally worn by women of his generation, though in black, certainly not in scarlet. He said she looked like a dance hall girl. It embarrassed poor Karl to even say ‘dance hall girl’ to me.”
I shook my head, still boggled by all this. “So what’d you do when you came face-to-face with her?”
Mrs. Beetlebaum turned back to the window. “Well, at first I assumed she was just some kook,” she said. “A library must expect and welcome even the most eccentric people, so I simply pushed my book cart back out the way I’d come, thinking I’d wait until she’d gone away before I shelved the books in that aisle. Oddly enough, though, something did make me go into the reading room, where I asked the two young men seated there to move into a different location. When the window in that room was hit by a rather large rock about three minutes later, all the ivy plants kept on that windowsill were shattered, as was the goldfish bowl on the desk beneath it. We barely managed to retrieve the three little goldfish in time. Once we settled them into a new container of water, the white one needed fifteen minutes of artificial respiration. . . .”
Mrs. Beetlebaum suddenly bent forward and crossed her arms. “Tucker, it’s the strangest thing, there’s a pebble on your window ledge that’s been . . . moving, dancing around. Would you come over here and take a look?”
I skulked over and glanced down at the pebble, trying to seem casual. “Well, see, that’s Trey’s rock. He had a can of those in his car, and he used to throw a handful up at my window when he wanted me.” Then suddenly, panic and sorrow ambushed me and I blurted, “I don’t know what I can do for him, Mrs. Beetlebaum, and he can’t tell me! I want to just . . . well, to just flick the rock away so it won’t haunt me like it’s doing, but I can’t do that either because it would be like flicking Trey away! So I just have to leave it out there and Trey keeps . . . keeps jiggling and jiggling it like that!”
Mrs. Beetlebaum stood straight and looked up to meet my eyes. I thought I’d see ridicule or disbelief in her expression, but she just seemed puzzled by how upset I was.
“But isn’t it obvious? Here. Open the window.”
I hung back, biting my lip like a scared little preschooler.
“Tucker, please, just open it.”
So I did, I jerked the window up, bracing myself for the rock to, what? Attack me?
Mrs. Beetlebaum reached down, picked up the rock, then lifted one of my hands. “Trey just wants you to treat this memento of your friendship like one of those prized racing shoes of yours.” She put the pebble on my palm. “Keep it somewhere special and think of him when you see it. That’s all he wants from you.”
I stood there staring down at my hand as a tidal wave of relief and new grief surged through my tangled brain and began making its way into my bloodstream. After a couple of minutes, I very carefully closed my fingers around Trey’s last rock.
I didn’t even notice that Mrs. Beetlebaum had left my side until she asked from across the room, “Tucker, what is this extraordinary document you have posted?”
I jerked up my head to see her reading Bud’s list again. “It’s some stuff Bud told me about driving and cars.” I cleared my throat and asked, “Mrs. Beetlebaum, do you think that list might be called, well, a code Bud went by when he drove?”
She took off her glasses and dropped them to dangle on this chain she had around her neck. “I once lost twelve dollars to Bud, playing poker at the senior center downtown. He was such fun, and it’s a shame his heart kept him cooped up at home in his final years. Yes, this sounds like his rules of the road, the code he drove by, and lived by.”
So she’d known Bud? I don’t know why that surprised me, but it sort of did.
She walked to my desk chair and sat down, then sighed and straightened her shoulders. “Well, Tucker, let me quickly finish telling you about Marilyn Monroe. I find myself tiring easily lately.”
I went to sit on the bed, close to the chair so she wouldn’t have to talk very loud. Also, I could hand her the obolus in case she forgot to take it with her.
“Well, let’s see,” she began. “It was closing time that same day at the library, about five o’clock. The head librarian sent me to look for tardy patrons in the restrooms, down all the aisles, in the basement children’s section, the usual places. I remember I came upon someone trying to finish reading an article on tennis in the periodicals room and urged him along, but otherwise the place was empty except for the three of us workers and the library cat, Dickens. My co-workers both had places to be, families to take care of, but I did not. I was utterly solitary and could only look forward to a dinner of fish sticks and asparagus, then an evening of watching public television as I yearned for bedtime and my dreams of Theo. So I told my boss I would stay for a few minutes and lock up after the tennis reader had finished. Presently, he did just that, finished the article and left through the turnstile. I locked the front door behind him, as I had already locked the back entrance to prevent late patrons from slipping in unnoticed.
“I decided to give the poor traumatized goldfish a final pinch of food, then I took my own coat and scarf from the little closet behind the circulation desk. I walked the length of the library as I wound my scarf, checking things once more, then I went through the lobby toward the front door, which was actually a double door, made entirely of glass. I mention this because I suddenly saw the reflection of the ferryman in that glass. It was following close behind me, gliding across the floor as though on wheels. It was huge, perhaps nine feet tall, all greenish in color, a shadowy presence concealed within a moldy cloak. I felt its cold breath as an icy wind along my neck, felt it right through my heavy scarf. My skin crawled and my heart raced, and though I was tempted to run that last several feet to the door, I knew I could not hope to escape my . . . pursuer.
“So I stopped and turned to face it, and in that split second it was able to slip into its glamorous facade again. The red heels, the filmy dress, the wild and loose platinum hair, the eyelashes—everything was the same except for the eyes. Its two eye sockets were now fitted with huge multi-faceted diamonds. No pupils, no irises, just two dazzling rocks. It came very close to me and said, in a breathy little-girl voice, ‘Diamonds are a girl’s best friend, know what I mean?’ And then it fastened those diamond eyes on me and mesmerized me, I guess you’d say. I don’t know how long I stood there mere inches from it, locked in place while it probed my deepest, most aching memories of . . . Theo.”
Mrs. Beetlebaum suddenly slumped forward and covered her face with her hands.
I was pretty sure she was just upset, not really sick or anything like that, but I had no clue what to do for her. “Uh, Mrs. Beetlebaum, are you okay? I could go get you a drink of water, or how about a snack? Somebody brought some of those sliders, like little tiny hamburgers with picante sauce all over them?”
&
nbsp; Too late, I remembered eating the last three or four of those. But she didn’t want them anyhow. She shook her head fast, almost like she was shivering.
“No, thank you, Tucker,” she whispered as she took a tissue from her sweater pocket. She dabbed at her eyes, then blew her nose. “I’ll be just fine in a moment.”
I nodded and waited. “The crazy hitchhiker girl did that to me too,” I told her quietly. “I mean the ferryman, that Charon? She, it, I mean? It somehow locked into my thoughts through my eyes so I’d tell it my . . . memories of the wreck and stuff.”
Mrs. Beetlebaum blew her nose again, then smiled at me in a sad way.
“Well, Tucker, I suppose that’s just . . . what happens, yes? The ferryman reads your life after a combination of sadness and the obolus draws him to confront you. And what he sees there helps him figure how to get you to surrender the coin. I don’t know how long I stood there, reliving the best days of my life, when Theo and I were so happy, and also reliving the worst, the dark days since Theo’s death. But I remember while I was still locked into that strange state, I began to hear the ocean, first faintly and then more and more insistently. It was the sound of my most wonderful memory, the sound of our honeymoon, mine and Theo’s, there on the Gulf of Mexico, in Florida. We had a tiny cabana for two weeks, right on the beach. A little green rowboat came with the package. And always, day and night, there was the mysterious, delicious sound of those waves.”
She squinted and shook her head. “But it was so very strange. I’d been remembering that sound, but then suddenly I heard the hum of the fluorescent lights as well and I knew I was awakening from my trance and coming back to the library. I smelled the books and looked down to see the scuffed tile floor, but when I looked straight ahead of me, all was lost in swirling, murky shadows. And still there was the sound of those waves breaking upon the beach somewhere quite, quite close.
“Then the Marilyn Monroe entity materialized a few feet in front of me, her eyes simply blue eyes again. She held out her hand and said to me, in that breathy voice, ‘Give me what you have in your pocket and I’ll take you where you long to go.’ And then she took several steps backward with her hand still out, like a TV hostess revealing some prize behind a curtain. And the swirling shadows parted so that I was suddenly staring right at the Gulf of Mexico, there where the library computer bank usually was. There where the big pink dinosaur sign ordinarily stood, directing patrons to the children’s room downstairs. It was now all churning water, and there was the evocative sound of seagulls, and there was a little green boat drifting in the distance, and . . . and . . .”
She closed her eyes and said in an urgent whisper, “My hand found my pocket and I clasped the obolus as hard as I could! Oh, how I yearned to pay the fare so I might sail away to the land I dreamed of, where my lost love was waiting for me!”
Mrs. Beetlebaum slowly turned her head to look down at the obolus there on my bed. She sat very still, her eyes glistening with longing as she clasped her hands in her lap and held them so tightly they shook. I knew she was standing on that dark shore in the landlocked library again. She longed to take back the coin, to make the decision she hadn’t made that day when she’d had the clear opportunity.
I knew all that because I was feeling that longing again myself. I had to shove my hands hard into my pockets to keep from reaching for that coin. I wondered if I could ever give up the feeling that I should have been with them, should have been the fourth guy to make the set complete, and also in some strange way to look after them. Could I give up that feeling when it would mean I was giving up the best friends I would ever have, saying good-bye in some more complete way than I could imagine doing? Could I ever figure out how to do that, to say good-bye and still remember? Could she give up the sad dreams she dreamed of recovering her lost love? Doubtful in both cases.
This wasn’t good. I gathered a breath, then whispered, “Uh, Mrs. Beetlebaum?”
She jerked, startled, then gave a deep sigh and used the chair arms to raise herself to a slow stand. “I must get to a yoga class tonight,” she murmured, clucking her tongue as she slowly straightened her back. “I missed two evenings last week and it has me stiff.”
She touched the knuckles of my hand, the one with Trey’s rock. “Keep that safe,” she said, then she gave me a wink and walked to the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow at school, Tucker.”
“Wait, Mrs. Beetlebaum! You didn’t say why you didn’t give up the coin!”
She had her hand on the doorknob, but she turned. “Actually, Tucker, it was the library cat, Dickens. As I stood entranced by the roiling water and that dear green boat, I felt Dickens winding himself around my ankles, and when I glanced down at him, he looked up at me with the expression cats have when they need you for something. He had just eaten, so I knew he simply wanted to be petted, and without thinking about it, I crouched and ran my hands over his sleek gray fur. And, well, I found I didn’t want to put my hand back into my pocket then. The coin was just too cold after the particular warmth that only comes from warm, beating, purring life.”
I picked up the obolus and wiped most of the mud on the hem of my T-shirt. “You almost forgot this, Mrs. Beetlebaum.” I hurried to her, holding it out.
But when I reached her, she put her hands on my shoulders and whispered, “Shall I tell you what truly happened, Tucker?” She narrowed her eyes, giving me a sly smile. “Dickens wound himself around my ankles, and I crouched to stroke him. He began to purr, and I suddenly had the most vivid memory of a small event from the early days of my marriage. I was still a college student when we married, struggling to pay my tuition from my library salary. Theo and I were in the park one summer afternoon, eating ice cream cones. There was a skinny little yellow stray kitten following us, and I found a large leaf and broke him off a chunk of my ice cream and cone. And while we crouched there watching the kitten eat, I mentioned to Theo that I was thinking I might quit school so I could use my salary at the library to help with our apartment rent. And Theo adamantly shook his head and leaned close to push my hair behind my ear. ‘You can’t quit school, you’re a born teacher,’ he said. ‘You’ll see. Teaching will be the love of your life.’ He himself was a math teacher, which made him a bit of an authority. I rolled my eyes and even laughed, I think, but because of what he’d said, I didn’t quit school. I was in my last semester when he died.”
Mrs. Beetlebaum gave my shoulders a squeeze, then released me. “Teaching has been the love of my life, Tucker, second only to Theo. I believe Theo somehow communicated that small but life-changing ice cream moment to me, through Dickens. And that’s what made me keep the obolus in my pocket and long for life again.”
She turned back to the door, opened it, and stepped through. “I am so sorry for your loss, Tucker. Bud was a fine man.” She waved good-bye over her shoulder.
“Mrs. Beetlebaum, you forgot the obolus!”
“It stays with you now, Tucker,” she said without turning. “Someday you will spot the person who should have it next. That’s part of the deal, so keep your eyes open, but at the same time, don’t act too quickly with so much at stake!”
XVI
I stationed myself at the kitchen sink that night and washed the dishes that had been accumulating all weekend. I gave the dishwasher a complete pass and just washed everything by hand, silverware, glasses, everything. I took my time. The voices of the people still stopping by the house flowed over me in a soothing, monotonous way without my having to actually follow conversations like I would have had to if I’d hung around in the living room.
I used the time to try and figure out where I should keep the obolus. My pocket was no good, not even for a minute. Even there on my bed it had brought unhealthy longings to both me and Mrs. Beetlebaum. Out in the open anywhere in my room felt unsafe for that same reason and also because it might get lost, or even be thrown away by Janet on a cleaning rampage. My dresser drawers would also be subject to Janet when she put away clean clothes. The
obolus looked like some video game token, some arcade souvenir. She could easily mistake it for worthless junk and decide to get rid of it.
At first, each time the dish drainer got full, I stopped washing and dried stuff myself, but at some point Officer Stephens wandered in, pulled the dish towel from my shoulder, and took over that part. I remember he mumbled a couple of times something about Janet being exhausted and he sure wished these good people would go home to bed now. I nodded and smiled from one side of my mouth, totally agreeing, but what could you do?
“Here, these are yours,” he said when we’d been working silently for a while. “I almost forgot why I came in here. Janet wanted me to pass them along to you.”
I glanced over. He was holding out a couple of car keys. “Keys to the Taurus?” I nodded and kept on swabbing a coffee cup. “Thanks.”
Janet had been talking about making me a set, for when she needed me to run some errand or for those occasions when I took her car to fill it or wash it. In fact, that afternoon I’d had to ask for her keys to take the Taurus around back so I could clean it.
“No, to the Olds,” Officer Stephens said. He put the two keys on the drain board and picked up one of the three wet bowls waiting for his attention. “Janet says it’s yours now. These keys are extras Bud had up in that old Vaseline jar where he kept his state quarter collection and his favorite chewed-up toothpick.” He chuckled.
I remember I froze in place with my dishcloth wadded into that cup. The suds in the sink sparkled in a strange way, all blue and filmy. I had never in my life felt the sort of weak-kneed desire for anything I was suddenly feeling for Bud’s car. The junk crammed into the glove compartment, the formfitting sags in the driver’s seat, the green dashboard lighting, the smells of grease and sweat and hair oil, the way the wind traveled so freely through it. It was like stepping back into a time when baseball was played on dirt fields and you got root beer in a glass mug, at least if Bud’s stories were to be believed.