What I Really Think of You

by M. E. Kerr

  When the little balls of fire started up toward the ceiling, Jesse asked me, “Did you ever do that, Opal?”

  “What are they?”

  Everyone was laughing and pointing at them.

  Jesse passed me a little wad of tissue from a bowl on the counter.

  Across the tissue in blue writing was Amaretti di Saronno.

  “Inside are little almond cookies,” Jesse told me. “You take the tissue off and make it into a tower, like this.”

  He finally got the tissue folded so it could stand.

  “What you do is light it,” he said, “and make a wish. If it goes all the way to the ceiling, you get your wish. Halfway, you half get it. If it fizzles out on you and doesn’t rise, you don’t get your wish.”

  He helped me fix one with his tiny hands. We built two, and then he struck a match.

  They both went up together, all the way.

  “Do you want to know my wish?” he said. “I wished you’d go to a party with me.”

  “Well, I will,” I said, and Jesse just laughed, throwing his head back, his eyes shut, face lit up like someone slain in the spirit. “Don’t you even want to know where it is, who’s giving it?”

  I shrugged, and he reached out and hugged me once with his arm. “Oh, Opal … What’d you wish?”

  “I wished we could get out of here,” I said.

  “We can!” he laughed. “Come on.”

  When I tell you what I really wished, you won’t laugh.

  But right then and there you would have.

  “Opal Ringer,” Mum said to me once, “you think about them too much. You think they think about you? You think about them, but they don’t think about you, so now you’re lopsided, honey. You got to straighten yourself out.”

  “I know it,” I said.

  I knew it.

  He carried both our shoes under his arm, after we tried walking on the too-soft sand in them. His tie was hanging down and flying in the wind, sweet face, and I would have said I don’t think we should while we were already going ahead because we couldn’t stop ourselves.

  His coat was around my shoulders and I was holding the empty sleeves thinking of them filled with his flesh and bones, hanging on to me like I hung on to them.

  He said, “What sign are you, Opal?”

  “You mean astrology?”

  “Yes. I’m a drawer straightener. That’s what Bud calls Virgos.”

  “Bud calls them that?” I said. “What does that mean?”

  “That we’re fussy or something. You know Bud. He’s always got some smart remark.”

  “One day he told me I had real pretty eyes,” I said. “He said, Opal, you’ve got real pretty eyes. …” And someday …

  Jesse just shrugged.

  I said, “I wonder when he’ll be back. Will he come back this summer?”

  “Who knows?” Jesse said.

  I felt happy thinking about Bud, walking with Jesse on the sand by the ocean, those two the only boys I ever cared anything about, mixing them up in my mind sometimes, like they were one person. Even though it wasn’t true I sometimes felt I knew Bud better, knew Bud’s heart, from knowing how he was with V. Chicken.

  Jesse asked me again what sign I was.

  “I’m Pisces, born February 28th,” I said, “but Daddy says astrology is from the anti-Christ. Says we shouldn’t look up our forecasts in the newspaper because it’s Satan’s talk.”

  “Do you believe that?”

  “I believe in The Rapture,” I said.

  “Do you really, Opal?”

  “Sure, don’t you?”

  “I haven’t figured out what I believe in.”

  “We shall all be changed, the Bible says. I believe that.”

  Jesse made his voice real deep and mysterious sounding, quoting from the Bible, “‘Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.’”

  “That’s right!” I said. “When we meet Jesus in the sky! I believe in that.”

  “I wish I could.”

  “You can. You just believe. Mum says you go to heaven without even dying when The Rapture comes.”

  “How does your mum feel about astrology?”

  “Same way he does. It’s from the anti-Christ.”

  “That party I just mentioned? It’s a dinner party at the Cheeks’. You have to wear a hat that represents your zodiac sign.”

  “How come?”

  “The theme of the dance this year is The Zodiac. The dinner’s before the dance. Have you ever been to the dance? I haven’t.”

  “What dance you talking about?”

  “Have you heard of The Last Dance? I’m inviting you if you want to go, Opal. Do you dance? Do you want to go?”

  “Do I want to go? I wanted to go to that thing my whole life!”

  “Now you’re going.”

  “Now I’m going!”

  We ran like fools, I swear my feet ran on the air with the earth down below me, and by the time we stopped, we were past the dunes and up to where the car was parked. I panted like an old dying dog, caught my breath, and felt my heart hammer; well, go ahead, hammer now, you got a good reason for once, told myself.

  He leaned against the car, out of breath too.

  “I’ll brush your feet off,” I said and he caught me before I could bend over to do it.

  “You do yours. I’ll do mine. It’s almost nine o’clock.”

  (“Have her back by nine,” Mum said when we left the house. I said, “Moo,” and she gave me a look.)

  When we got inside the car our breaths came back finally, and I felt so lonely and happy, let my hand next to him stay free on the seat beside us, wondering when he’d take it.

  I said, “What did you really think of me the first time you ever saw me?” I even shut my eyes. Darling … Someday … I waited, hear a pin drop.

  Next thing I knew the car motor was going, he was looking over his shoulder and backing out. “I thought you looked embarrassed because we’d come to the healing.”

  “Embarrassed? Is that your name for it?”

  You never know what you’re going to say or do. You never see behind things. You never know what you really wanted when things were going on, later told yourself well, what I wanted was for him to kiss me, for him to be Bud, say my name a hundred times, lips on the flesh of my cheeks, but that doesn’t mean you really did right then and there. That’s what amazes me.

  After that, Jesse Pegler called me a few times at the house. He wanted to know if Mum said I could go to the party and the dance. He wanted to help me figure out what hat I could fix up to wear.

  I think Daddy’s nose was out of joint from the time I went out with Jesse without asking his permission. I know Daddy didn’t like me going to the party and the dance, either, said he wouldn’t say yes and he wouldn’t say no. Said I should ask Jesus to tell me what to do.

  “Royal, one time won’t hurt her,” Mum said.

  “‘One time won’t hurt’ is Satan’s own slogan,” said Daddy. “But make your plans, make your plans if you can square it with your own conscience, Opal. Just don’t tie up the phone talking to that boy about it. Folks from The Hand have to reach us.”

  But he also added, “Seems like your fingers are around that mouthpiece or dunked in the water bowl, one or the other.”

  It wasn’t water in the bowl, anyway, but honey and vinegar I was using to force back my cuticles and bring up my moons. I’d read up on what to do back where the beauty books were in the Seaville library.

  Then one Saturday night Brother Barker Dudley came to our house from over in Riverhead, to talk about growing legs with Daddy. He was this roly-poly man, unordained, in a black suit with a diamond ring on his little finger, no hair, and sweat always on his upper lip. He smelled sweet from something he put on his face, and stood as near as he could to the floor fan. It was a scorcher night and Mum had her shoes on unlaced, sat in the armchair trying to make a breeze with Woman’s Day.

  Bobby
John’s back had been giving him trouble. I think the load on his heart over faking the healing was reaching around to his back. He wasn’t talking much to me, but he was always mumbling, “Recover themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him.” I’d ask him what good it did to keep repeating it, and he’d say he didn’t even know he was saying it under his breath. He was telling Brother Dudley about the pain under his left shoulder and his stiff neck, and Daddy was saying so much of it was in his head it wasn’t worth talking about to Brother Dudley. “Your problem is mental,” Daddy told him.

  That was all going on in our front room when the phone rang. I got off the couch fast and Daddy gave me the eye. “Not now, if it’s him again, Opal.”

  “I know it,” I said.

  It was him, asking me if I wanted to go down for a soda or a cherry Coke.

  “I can’t because we got company.”

  “I hope you’re thinking about your hat. Pisces is two fish swimming in opposite directions. Your lucky day is Friday.”

  “Yesterday was Friday and it wasn’t so lucky,” I said. “Five minutes to five, old Mrs. Farraday brung in every wool thing they had in their house for cleaning and storage.”

  I smiled to myself because it made him laugh hard, pictured him tossing his head back, a lock of his soft, yellow hair falling near his blue eyes, and him brushing it back with his small hand.

  I said, “I didn’t get out of that place before twenty after. Mrs. Bunch goes, ‘Staple a blue slip to each item and write it up on the pink slip.’ I go, ‘It’s five to five,’ and she goes, ‘I can tell time, Opal, well as you can.’”

  Daddy shouted in “OPAL!”

  “I’ll be on Dad’s show next Sunday,” Jesse said. “I just wanted to tell you to watch it. Sounds like someone wants you. I’ll say good-bye.”

  “Good-bye.”

  “Good-bye.”

  He laughed. “Well, hang up, Opal.”

  “Good-bye,” I said, and put down the phone’s arm.

  My face felt warm, and when I got back into the front room, Daddy was watching me real closely, frowning.

  “Did it ever occur to you that your trouble might be you’ve got one leg a little shorter than the other?” Brother Dudley asked Bobby John.

  “We didn’t make you come all the way here to check out my son, Brother Dudley,” said Daddy. “There’s nothing wrong with his legs.”

  “Well, let’s check it out, anyway,” Brother Dudley said.

  Bobby John sat down in a chair Mum brought in from the kitchen and took off his shoes, stuck his legs out.

  Brother Dudley knelt down to inspect them.

  “Whew!” Mum said, waving Woman’s Day. “Your socks are high, Bobby John!”

  “I didn’t know I was going to take my shoes off,” said Bobby John.

  “That aroma doesn’t bother me one bit,” Brother Dudley said. “If it did, the Lord wouldn’t be growing legs though me.”

  Brother Dudley drew a finger across the sweat beads on his upper lip, shook it, then took hold of Bobby John’s feet. “Ah ha!” he said. “See here?”

  “What do you see?” said Bobby John.

  Mum had put down the magazine and was opening a box of Good & Plenty.

  “Anyone wants one, I’ll pass it,” Mum said, shaking the box.

  “Bobby John,” said Brother Dudley, “your right leg is about three quarters of an inch shorter than your left one.”

  “Is it?” Bobby John said.

  “That might explain all the back trouble, stiff neck, and I bet sometimes you even have trouble straightening up.”

  “I swear I do,” said Bobby John.

  Then Brother Dudley began praying, right there down on one knee, holding Bobby John’s right foot. “I feel God wants me to pray for this leg, praise God. Lengthen this leg, straighten out this misalignment with Your power. I’m praying in the spirit that the power will come through me to level this leg. Heal!”

  “Praise the Lord,” Daddy joined in.

  “I can feel You use me, Jesus! I can feel this man’s foot growing.”

  “Praise the Lord, I can feel that,” said Bobby John.

  Mum was leaning forward, holding her face with her hands. She started in softly, “In the name of Jesus, shum ba la, shum ba la—”

  “It’s doing it, it’s doing it, it’s doing it,” Brother Dudley was chanting.

  “Praise the Lord,”—Daddy.

  I said, “Praise the Lord.”

  “… doing it, doing it, done!” Brother Dudley said.

  Brother Dudley got to his feet. “I think you’re going to feel a lot better, Bobby John, if not all better.”

  Bobby John said, “I do feel a little better.” He was looking at his legs stretched out in front of him.

  “Did it grow?” I asked him.

  “I do think it did,” said Bobby John.

  He got up and walked around. “I swear it might have.”

  Then Brother Dudley gave a whoop and hollered, “Unspeakable joy!”

  That was how leg growing came to be introduced at The Helping Hand Tabernacle.

  Before Brother Dudley left, he said, “My usual cut is sixty percent of the collection plate, but because of the hard times, Royal, Arnelle, I’m going fifty-fifty with you.”

  “You’re not lying, Bobby John?” Daddy asked him when Brother Dudley drove off!

  “Daddy, I don’t like being called a liar!” Bobby John’s troubles were making him testy; he could flare up at anything.

  “Grandfather Ringer grew legs,” Mum said.

  “There’s no doubt legs can be grown,” Daddy said. “I just don’t like any faking.”

  I could hear all this from downstairs while I sat up in my bedroom rocker.

  “Daddy, if you’re calling me a fake, you’re causing a breach between us nothing’s going to mend,” Bobby John hollered. “I might know of fakes, but I never faked myself, no matter how Satan tempted me.”

  “He’s not calling you a fake,” Mum said. “He’s just checking, honey, since we don’t know the man, just know he’s charismatic.”

  “What fakes you know of, I’d like to know,” said Daddy.

  “Oh, we all know of fakes. He’s just saying what we all know, Royal.”

  Warm nights made me ache with longing for nothing I knew about, and I let the light breeze brush my face, held my arms with my fingers, the Bible in my lap. I had the little lamp on, atop my card table, and a pen in my lap because I felt like writing something down.

  I could hear them going at it downstairs, tuned them out, tuned them in, enjoying the smell of the fresh coffee Mum was perking, thinking what would I write? Why would I want to write anything? What was getting into me?

  “Well, maybe we could try him out, don’t hurt to try him out,” Daddy was saying.

  “Daddy,” Bobby John answering him, “it’s what we need. The congregation’s dwindling down to nothing and we’re not fighting back!”

  “Don’t talk to me about fighting back. Your own girl friend left us soon as she got healed, didn’t even witness to us, witnessed up to them!”

  “She was from them, Royal,” Mum said. “She was never from us.”

  I opened the Bible to the flyleaf where I wrote last time.

  Baby, the Rain must Fall.

  June 28, 7:15 P.M.

  S. Mouth S. Shoppe.

  The telephone rang and my heart gave a leap, but my alarm said eleven-thirty, and I doubted he’d dare call that late at night.

  But I listened until I heard Daddy bellow, “Yes this is Reverend Ringer!”

  I unscrewed the top of the pen and held it ready, then it wrote itself seemed like, right under S. Mouth S. Shoppe.

  Wrote: Unspeakable joy!

  I let the ink dry, waited, put my finger across the words, smiling, and the little wind coming in, blowing the curtains like something little and alive moving gently behind them, nudging so sweetly at them.

  When I came away from wherever
it was I drifted to, I heard Daddy saying Willard Peyton was dead.

  I got up and went across to the door.

  “We lost him,” Daddy said.

  “God called him,” said Mum.

  Daddy said, “Seems that he left some money, poor old Willard, but I’m told he left five thousand dollars.”

  “Well, you can’t take it with you,” Mum said. “Who’d he leave it to?”

  “That’s the killer,” Daddy said, “though the good Lord knows I wouldn’t count it any kind of a blessing to profit from Willard’s passing.”

  “We got five thousand dollars, Daddy?” Bobby John said.

  Daddy said, “We don’t. Guy Pegler does.”

  Ten

  JESSE PEGLER

  DONALD DIVINE SAID SEAL was a dynamite-looking girl and a real sweetheart for taking in Yellow, but she wasn’t a Pegler, and Yellow’s story had to be told about a Pegler.

  “The whole point we want to get across,” said Donald, “is that Guy Pegler is flesh and blood, not just an image coming on the tube Sunday mornings. He lives in a house, he’s got a wife and kids, he worries about the oil bill, he’s part of the family of man but he’s also a family man.”

  So I found myself up on the white-and-gold balcony one Sunday morning, trying to keep my knees from knocking, and the gold tassels on my father’s blue robes from blowing in my eyes, while my father did his best to make us look like “just folks.”

  Somehow we’d pulled Yellow up there with us before we got on camera, Donald supporting him from behind, steadying his old legs every time one slipped, and telling him, “You’re a good old boy.”

  “What a face on this old mutt!” Donald said. “We ought to rename him Gold. I could sell Christmas trees to Scrooge with this guy for bait.”

  It was the Sunday of the “Happiest Man” sermon, but we cut out the lead-in hymn from The Challenge Choir, and put my father and me and Yellow in the spot.