Wheels (Tabor Heights Year Two)

by Michelle Levigne

  When Natalie got her notes transcribed, she wandered down to the gym to look for Tommy, since she was supposed to spend the day shadowing him. A flicker of nerves shot through her when she remembered that he had promised her a handicap, so she could get the full effect. She knew it had to do with a chair, but she couldn't trust Tommy not to make it interesting, and probably embarrassing at the same time.

  The gym was packed even fuller with volunteers than the last time she had glanced inside, if that were possible. Yet she could make out the lines wrapping around the various "stations" where people were getting their materials and assignments for the day. At one table, last-minute registrants picked up their information packets. At others, they were getting fitted with their disability for the day. On her right, Natalie saw people trying out eye patches or glasses with most of the vision blocked by black paper, and getting the feel of white canes. On her left, she watched volunteers fitting the awareness walkers with crutches and inflatable casts, or braces that locked arms or legs stiff and straight. One station immobilized people's arms to their sides, most likely simulating an amputation. Several people played around with plastic hooks attached to their fists with Ace bandages. Natalie wondered how long that particular disability would stand up against the day's activities. That was the point: to have people try to live as "normal" a life as possible with their simulated disabilities, and in as public a manner as possible, to impress on others the lessons they were learning themselves.

  Everyone heading out onto the streets of three communities wore tee-shirts in neon yellow, green, orange or pink, with the words, "Equal Access, Unequal Bodies," across the fronts in bold, black letters. On the back of their shirts was the awareness walk's logo: a silhouette of a tilted back wheelchair, caught at the bottom of a flight of steps.

  She found Tommy soon enough. He and some friends were having a race in the only open space in the entire gym, near the stage.

  "Of course. If there's a stage around, Tommy will find it," she muttered, and grinned as she headed around the perimeter of the crowded gym to meet up with him.

  She recognized some of the faces of the young men and children trying to race with Tommy. Some of them were authentic "gimps," as Tommy insisted on calling his group. One wore a brace on one leg, another had a false leg and wore shorts, displaying the point where the stump of her leg fit into a cup attached to a mechanical leg, gleaming silver and angular, like it came straight from I, Robot. Natalie only remembered one name and which face it went with.

  Toby was in his early twenties, just as much a jokester as Tommy, with an artificial leg from mid-thigh down. His shorts were so short, she could see the line where the stump of his thigh fit into the socket of the leg. He had stickers on the leg that read "Body by Mattel."

  Claire wove through the slowly depleting chaos and held up her arms, waving the racers to a halt.

  "Hey, gimp, who gave you a license to drive?"

  Tommy whizzed through the line of wheelchairs and skidded to a stop by popping back in a wheelie and twisting sideways. Natalie didn't know who was braver -- Claire, by holding her ground and not flinching away from an impending crash, or Tommy by risking tipping himself over with his move. A pang shot through her at the realization that he had had plenty of time, most of his life, to perfect his moves.

  "We do not need a license, puny mortal," he retorted, affecting what Natalie could only call a "B-Movie villain" accent. "We are Lizard Man. We are here to plot the overthrow of the able-bodied world!"

  "So let it be written -- so let it be done!" Toby shouted, echoed by the other racing participants. They laughed and high-fived each other.

  "When are you going to learn to behave?" Claire said.

  "Behave like what?" Tommy said, his voice going squeaky with mock innocence. Natalie thought she would swallow her tongue from fighting not to laugh.

  "I give up. When are you going to hit the streets?"

  "As soon as Tonto is ready." He turned and looked right at Natalie, killing her assumption that he didn't know she was there. "Natalie's heading out with me. As soon as she's ready, we're going." With a wicked grin, he pointed at the station where people were being paired with wheelchairs.

  "Don't be too hard on her, okay?" Claire said, turning to leave with a chuckle.

  "Who? Me? What makes you think I would be hard on her?"

  "I know you. That's why." She reached out to pat Natalie's shoulder as she passed her. "You have my permission to knock him out of his chair, if he gets too uppity. Just don't stay within arm's reach. He can climb up your legs faster than a tarantula."

  "Oh, thanks for the imagery," Natalie blurted. Despite the shiver running through her, she was able to laugh with Claire. The laughter faded quickly, ending in a gulp, as she responded to Tommy's imperious wave, beckoning her over to meet her vehicle for the afternoon.

  *****

  Within twenty minutes, they were heading out the doors of the Mission. Natalie couldn't help comparing it to a scene from a zombie movie she had watched once, just to try to figure out what the big draw was with zombies. All the people with their various borrowed handicaps, swerving and stumbling and banging into each other reminded her of a crowd of zombies lurching through a town, in search of fresh brains to eat. She tried to push the image from her mind because she needed all her concentration focused on figuring out how to maneuver her wheelchair. Tommy made it look so easy. Of course, he had well-defined muscles working for him, and lots of practice. She tried not to wince whenever her palms contacted the gritty surface of her wheels. How did Tommy get around town as quickly as he did without having hands blackened by everything those wheels touched? Maybe he had a bottle of hand sanitizer in his pocket, and discretely cleaned up every mile or so?

  "They're gonna be sorry," Tommy muttered, when a good third of their gaggle of wheelchair-bound volunteers headed for the doors on the other side of the lobby. He turned right, aiming to go down the long classroom hallway, to a side entrance.

  "Why?" Already she was puffing from the effort. How hard would it get when she was outside and had the traction of cement on her wheels, instead of the slickness of clean linoleum under her?

  "Big steps to go down for first-timers. I'd almost hang around to see who falls over, going down them, but I hate the sight of abee blood."

  She almost asked what abee blood was, but remembered -- abee stood for able-bodied. A quip rose to her lips, accusing Tommy of being a snob, looking down on the able-bodied from his gimp superiority.

  I'm turning into Tommy! He's a bad influence, for sure. Natalie muffled a giggle, and decided to save the remark for a better time. Preferably one when she could strike him silent for a few seconds.

  A muffled shout and laughter rose up behind them, and she supposed the first person to face the steps down from the front doors had fallen or tipped over. When she looked back, at least four wheelchair drivers had rejoined their group.

  The threshold on the door at the end of the hall required an extra-hard push to get over it, but Natalie preferred that to trying to figure out how to go down a step of any size right at the beginning of her wheelchair journey. Tommy seemed to have no problem handling three and four and five-inch high steps, going forward or backwards. But again, he had lots of experience.

  Their group of wheeling, stumbling, lurching, tapping, wobbling volunteers spread out when they hit the sidewalk alongside the building and headed away from the Mission in all directions. Natalie gladly let Tommy take the lead. The sidewalk was only wide enough for one wheelchair at a time, anyway. Four others followed them, all in wheelchairs. Toby was at the back of the group. She laughed, quickly losing her breath, when the irrepressible young man started singing with an exaggerated drawl, about lost little doggies in a cattle drive.

  Tommy led their caravan of wheelchairs into the center of town. With the pace he set, they reached Main before anyone else, even those who were on their own two feet rather than pushing themselves along. Natalie looked back s
everal times and saw non-disabled workers walking from one store to another, handing out flyers printed on paper the same eye-watering fluorescent green as their shirts.

  The plan of action was simple enough -- every time the volunteers encountered someone during their day of wandering around the community in their various stages of disability, they would give them a flyer and invite them to the Mission to learn about accessibility, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and what the local communities still needed to do to be within regulations.

  "Cross here," Tommy called, when they got to the third traffic light on the way up Main heading toward Sackley.

  He led the way when the light turned green for them. Natalie didn't pay attention to the ramp. She was too busy trying to judge her speed, to keep up with Tommy without riding up his backside. If she found out he deliberately varyied his speed to give her a hard time, she vowed she would indeed take out his center bolt and put him up on blocks.

  Then she forgot all her thoughts of revenge when they got to the other side of the intersection. Tommy tipped his chair back, settled his guide wheels onto the top of the three-inch-high curb, pushed hard, and popped up without any real seeming effort. Natalie narrowed her eyes at him, just waiting for the first smirk. Nothing. She looked around, thinking maybe this was one of those oddball intersections, where the city had only graded one side of the corner, instead of both, and she would just have to take a detour.

  No, there was no grading on either side of the corner. The nearest driveway that she could take to get up onto the sidewalk again lay about ten feet down the side street.

  Chapter Twelve

  "I don't believe this. Who would grade one side of the intersection, but not the other?" Natalie blurted, and didn't care that she came close to wailing.

  "Happens all the time," Tommy said with a shrug. There were muttered comments from the other two who had managed to get across the street before the light changed. "Shouldn't be too hard to get up."

  "Says you," someone muttered behind her. Natalie felt no need to echo the sentiment, since it had been expressed.

  "You should see the really steep curbs out in the older section of town."

  Natalie studied him, trying to determine if he was joking or serious. Tommy met her eyes without flinching or smiling. Finally, she gave in to the inevitable and approached the curb. She tried a few times to do as he had done, tilting the chair back to get the front wheels up to the top of the curb. It was harder than it looked. She allowed a brief flicker of admiration for Tommy's biceps. At the fourth try, she succeeded, but she couldn't lever the rest of the chair up.

  Meanwhile, from the corners of her eyes, she saw five able-bodied people walk by. They all had the same odd movement of their heads -- starting to turn to stare, then quickly looking away again. Was it as Tommy had theorized in his routine this morning, and they were afraid if they looked too long they would catch gimp germs through their eyeballs? Or were they afraid of being asked to help?

  What mattered was that three people in wheelchairs were stuck in front of the curb, with traffic sliding past them -- fortunately, this was a twenty-five-mile-per-hour zone -- and no one stopped to help.

  "I give up," she finally said. "Do I lose points for going down the street and using the driveway?"

  "Nope. I give you points for using common sense. What?" he said, grinning when she glared at him.

  "How do people without your muscles get up that curb? How long do people have to struggle without getting hit by an oncoming car? And what do they do in snow and rain?"

  "They either avoid this part of town, which is bad for the merchants, or they take a lot of detours. Or they have power chairs, so they don't have to worry about navigating and wearing out their arms pushing, going out of their way." He shrugged and hooked his thumb over his shoulder toward the nearest driveway. "You guys better get a move on. We've got a lot of ground to cover today."

  Natalie wanted to argue, but she decided it wasn't worth it. Tommy was visibly not joking or teasing at this point. She looked at the other two, who had hugged the curb as closely as they could to get out of the way of passing cars. They gave her wide-eyed looks, and she realized they depended on her to lead the way.

  That wasn't how today was supposed to go. Wasn't she just here for a story?

  Sighing, she turned her wheelchair and headed for the driveway. The light turned green again, and the others left behind crossed the street. It didn't help her mood any when they were both "natural gimps," and navigated the obstacle of the curb without hesitating. She hadn't felt this weak and awkward, and even a little helpless, in years.

  *****

  Franky peddled slowly down a side street on a bike borrowed from the Mission, with the plastic bag-wrapped box hidden inside a box that used to hold light bulbs, tied to the flat back of the very old, sturdy bike. He wobbled every time a car passed him, and made a visible effort not to look at every driver. He was dripping sweat, despite the comfortable cool of the September noonday, when he reached the neighborhood park at a dead end street, and got off his bike. He walked the bike, his hands white-knuckled with the tightness of his grip, and looked around, everywhere but at the man wearing jogging shorts and a BWU sweatshirt with the sleeves cut off, with a light brace strapped to his left leg. The man watched him approach, seated on top of a picnic table, elbows on his knees, hunched over and looking ten times more comfortable than Franky felt.

  "Mark Donovan sent me," the man said, when Franky approached. He cracked a grin when the younger man let out a gasping sigh of relief. "It's okay, Franky. I really am a cop. Just because I'm stuck at the front desk for the duration," he gestured at the brace on his leg, "it doesn't mean I'm not available for special assignments." He straightened up, revealing the gun tucked into his lap.

  "You think -- I wasn't exaggerating things, what Simon and Chuck'll do."

  "We believe you. Mark and the chief did some research, based on what you and your friends passed on. Those two are pretty nasty customers." He reached out and clapped a hand on Franky's shoulder. "I'm Truman Hess, by the way. I've seen you at church a couple times."

  "You have?" A wobbly smile flickered on and off his face. "Can I -- I just want to get rid of it."

  "What is it, do you know?"

  "Haven't broken the seal. Scared to." He shrugged as he put the kickstand down and reached back to untie the box from the back of the bike. "Figured somebody would say I took something, if it was open."

  "Smart." Truman waited, staying back a step from the bike as Franky untied it.

  *****

  Simon rode in the passenger seat, as always, making Chuck drive while he studied all the people on the sidewalks. With every block the car went down the residential sections of Tabor Heights, his lip curled up a little more and his frown lines deepened. Everywhere he looked, the sidewalks and crosswalks and parking lots and even the storefronts were full of people on crutches, in wheelchairs, using white canes, rolling and limping and lurching in every direction.

  "Must be some weird convention in town," he muttered, turning away from the sight of a tall young man wearing dark goggles, tapping his way down the sidewalk with a white cane and laughing, with one arm extended and waving from side to side as if feeling for obstacles.

  "Yeah -- a faith healer's nightmare!" Chuck laughed, but Simon wasn't amused.

  "How are we supposed to find one wheelchair in all this? Ricky said Franky put it in the cripple's backpack."

  "I still don't know why we have to drive around like this. Why not just wait for Franky to bring the package to us tonight like we told him?"

  "Franky's not at that Mission place like he should be. The girl on the phone said he was out checking on things. People who break patterns, they ain't safe. What if he decided to go into business for himself? What if he's out selling our stuff right now?"

  "He's too scared."

  "Yeah, maybe. But I figure we ought to check on good old Franky and make sure he's still scared."<
br />
  "He is. Since he got religion, the guy lost all his guts. But he's smart. He knows better than to cross us. Why can't we just wait for him to meet us tonight?"

  "I don't know. Something just doesn't feel right. And there's still that girl hanging with the cripple, who looks so familiar. What if she's a link to something big?" He turned back to the window and sneered at a clump of middle school girls racing each other down the sidewalk, thumping along on crutches, laughing and tottering and shrieking warnings to each other. "How are we supposed to find one freak in all this? They all look alike."

  "Franky'd be in that van they've always got him driving, right?"

  "You know how many vans there are in this town?"

  "So… we just look for a wheelchair meeting a van." He smirked when Simon glared at him, irked at his suggestion, which he should have thought of first.

  *****

  "You're a brave man, Franky," Truman said, as the two of them walked across the playground to the small parking lot where he had parked a motorcycle.

  "Then how come I'm ready to lose my lunch?" Franky managed a shaky smile. He had stopped sweating the moment the box went into Truman's possession.

  "My uncle used to say, only fools aren't afraid when they face danger."

  "Yeah?"

  "I know so -- I'm scared all the time, seems like, when I head out on duty and there's a chance of trouble. Doesn't mean you don't do what you know is right. Just means you pray twice as hard and fast as before, and be three times as careful." He tucked the box into the saddlebag tied to the back of the motorcycle, then turned around and held out his hand. Franky shook it.

  *****

  Simon stared out through the plate glass window of Stay-A-While as he waited for his order. Outside, Chuck approached a group of people with white canes nearing the café. He shook his head, sneering and confused and hating it, when two of the "blind" people took off their dark glasses and pulled out neon green sheets of paper, pointing out words on them as they read the information to Chuck.