All Your Pretty Dreams (4 page)

“
Oh, thank you. I do so
love them.” Margaret sighed, her cheeks pink, scanning her
pets.

“
I can see that. Up so
early.”

“
It’s the best time to
spray, just after dawn. The plants seem to be so receptive at this
hour. So open and fresh.”

“
I’m sure. Did you know
I’m a graduate student?” Isabel waved her helmet and veil.
“Entomology. Insects. Bugs.”

“
Oh. Ozzie told me. Very
interesting.” She looked like she’d been hit by a stun
gun.

Isabel cupped a perfect
pink rose in her hand. The chemical odor of pesticide hung
unpleasantly in the air, stinging her nose. “You belong to a garden
club?”

“
Strictly roses. Lots of
rose people hereabouts. We’re having a big party in a few weeks.
Right here in the garden, that’s why I have to get things just so.
The Rose Rave, we call it. The band will be— Oh! You students
should come.”

“
Sounds like fun. Are you
looking for speakers for your rose club? Because I have a thing I
do about insect life. In the garden, pollination and all that
jazz.”

“
Really. That sounds right
up our alley. There’s a meeting in three days. Monday evening, here
at the house. Usually we just compare notes, who has fungus, where
the aphids are bad. Some Rave details but—”

Curtis blared the horn.
The crew of Bee Wild-ers was slumped against the van, bleary-eyed.
Somebody moaned, “
Cofffeeee
.” Isabel turned back to
Margaret.

“
Monday? What
time?”

Chapter 3

The door stood open. Jonny
felt a surge of embarrassment for his grandfather, his entire
miserable existence exposed to passersby. Maybe he was past caring,
flat on his back in an old red flannel robe. His toes stuck up
under a white blanket. His face was slack, a spot of spit on the
corner of his mouth.

Worse than last time, his
mother had warned him. Unpredictable, sad, angry, depressed: a
roller coaster ride. Ozzie rarely mentioned his father these days.
It was too hard to talk about, the shell of a man so admired, full
of jokes and mischief and music. Elks Lodge president, apple
cooperative founder, first lieutenant in Korea, accordion player,
parish deacon— now this. Still robust in body, his barrel chest
rising and falling with each breath, making a mockery of the
mind.

Jonny shifted the accordion
on his back. Half an hour until Claude was back from breakfast. He
stepped into the room, his shoes squeaking on the linoleum as he
took off his instrument, sat down, and set it on his lap. In the
sterile quiet the question from his mother last night rang in his
head. “So you and Cuppie—? You think you’ll patch it
up?”

Margaret had sat on the
edge of his bed, eyebrows raised in hope. He had explained it all
to her. She would never give up.

“
I haven’t heard from her
in weeks.” He stood at the window of his room, looking down on the
Rainy Days Motor Inn. Two college girls were throwing a Frisbee in
the parking lot.

“
Maybe you should call
her. She might be waiting for you to say you’re sorry—”

“
I’m not
sorry.”

She fiddled with the hem of
her apron. “You seemed so perfect for each other.”

“
Maybe once.” He turned to
her. “We met when we were sixteen. I’m a different person
now.”

“
But so is
she.”

The truth was Cuppie hadn’t
changed at all. In March she announced her plan to go to Branson,
Missouri, as usual over spring break. She always went to a clogging
competition, and never asked him to come along because it was no
secret he hated clogging. She’d been at it since she could walk.
Why had he thought she’d give it up in the city? Because he gave up
the accordion?

He still didn’t know how he
finally got up the nerve to tell Cuppie the truth. His voice shook
a little. Was he going to hurt her? Was he nuts— throwing out
everything he knew, this marriage, this comfortable life? He told
her he wouldn’t be there when she got back. She stared at him with
glazed eyes, a dull smile, an expression of bored inattention. He’d
seen it before. She wasn’t listening. She didn’t believe him. She
was like a child who believed if she said the right things, her
faults would be overlooked. If she smiled and ignored what he was
saying, dismissed the raw truth he was revealing, she would get
that lollipop, that pat on the head. Maybe once those qualities
hadn’t mattered. But that genie had flown.

Tiny, ridiculous Cuppie.
Cupcake: her father’s name for her, like she was a sugary
confection, gulped down and forgotten like her real but
inappropriate name, Willow. His little sugar rush. Had she ever
loved him? Maybe he had only been a way out of Red Vine, Minnesota.
That at least made sense.

He sat down on the bed
beside his mother. “I wasn’t happy. Not for a long
time.”

A tear streaked down her
cheek. This was why he hadn’t come home till now. He knew he would
make his mother cry. “Happiness with your wife, or your husband,
that’s something to work toward, a goal. I do want you to be happy,
Jonny.” At the door she looked back. “It can be hard.”

At the nursing home Jonny
wondered about his parents. Were they happy? Did that even occur to
them? What was happiness when you were sixty? A pension, a bowling
team, a rose garden? He felt awful for making her sad. But a
divorce in the family wasn’t the end of the world. If he could
manage to muddle through, couldn’t she?

His grandmother appeared in
the doorway now, carrying a plate covered with foil. “Asleep again.
Maybe the smell of pie will wake him up.”

Nora held the uncovered
plate under Reinholt’s nose. “Blueberry pie, Holti. First of the
season.”

He opened his eyes. “There
you are, you crafty old fox.” She hit the button to raise the head
of the bed. Round and rosy-cheeked in a blue track suit and tennis
shoes, Nora had a busy crown of white hair and a smile for
everybody, as long as they agreed with her. Her voice was husky,
seductive— and annoyed. Reinholt had been her husband for more than
fifty years. But his present condition was anything but pleasant.
Even with him in the rest home, she doted on him, baked for him,
visited every day whether he knew her or not. “Look. Jonny’s here.
He’s come to play his accordion.”

Was he ready to play for
Holti? His grandfather looked blankly at him. “Who?”

“
Jonny. Your grandson.”
Nora turned to him. “He loves music. Go ahead. Whenever you’re
ready.” The urgency in her voice set his hands on the keys and
buttons.

“
I’m playing this for the
polka mass. It’s called ‘I Have Decided to Follow
Jesus.’”

Nora shook her head.
“Something lively. Please.”

“
I know that—” Reinholt
said. He pointed at the instrument with a shaky finger. “What’s
it?”

“
An accordion. It was
yours. You gave it to Jonny when he was a boy.”

“
Accordion,” his
grandfather repeated. “My accordion?”

Jonny launched into ‘Who’s
Gonna Dance the Polka.’ He hadn’t thought ahead about the words—
‘when we’re old and gray.’ Awkward. But he wasn’t going to sing it
and it was catchy. A tune he hadn’t practiced because the polka
mass was slamming him at the moment, but it had stuck with him all
these years. Reinholt had taught it to him when he was twelve, and
it was funny then. When he couldn’t imagine being old and gray and
still doing the polka.

Reinholt’s face softened.
Nora squeezed his hand. The accordion was loud in the small room,
bouncing off the walls. Jonny tried to play softer, draw a little
slower, but the accordion was what it was, a booming box of chords
that announced
Music, Baby, and Lots of
It
.

His grandparents tapped
their fingers on the blanket. Music had such power, to send you far
away. Reinholt probably remembered a place he danced, listened to a
polka, played a polka. A bandstand where he got everyone swinging
around the dance floor, holding onto a pretty girl you might just
marry if you played your cards right. Or maybe it was just the
beat— that magical swing that touched a forgotten place where he
wasn’t strapped to a bed, unable to remember who loved
him.

The music hung in the air
as Jonny played the last notes, shimmering like the unknowable
past. He closed his eyes. For a second Nora and Reinholt were
young, dancing, laughing, and the roof of the music hall echoed
with the promise of love.

If polka is all that, he
thought, can
do
that— I can love it, I
will
love it. Jonny opened his eyes. His grandfather
was staring at him with happy concentration.

“
I like it,” he
growled.

Jonny carried the paper
plate with blueberry pie down the hall. He was getting used to the
retirement home; he could find his way around— and without getting
creeped out. Patients like Reinholt were parked in wheelchairs and
wandering with aides. Others were inert, mumbling to themselves.
Most stared at him like he was from another planet. And he was,
thank God, but one day he’d probably check into Hotel End-of-Life
himself. What would his life be like from here to there? For once
he didn’t know. The future was a misty blob of question marks. He
felt guiltily young here, a child with smooth skin, a full head of
hair, and good knees.

Claude was lowering himself
into his comfortable chair and pushing aside his walker. He settled
the pie on his lap and praised Nora’s cooking. Her raspberry pie
was the best, but second was blueberry, then gooseberry.

“
Put it in the little
fridge,” he told Jonny. “I save it for later.”

“
I’m sure she’d bring you
another piece.”

Claude smiled. “Now, the
last rehearsal is tonight? And are you ready?”

“
I hope so.”

“
Hope? A thin little
thing, is it not? It doesn’t lift you up to the heavens, does it?
You need to be sure. Confident. That slays fear.”

“
And dominant seventh
chords?”

The old man chuckled. “Even
dominant sevenths.”

Dinner on Saturday was
chaotic. Nora had been invited by Jonny, Lenny by Ozzie, and
Wendy’s current admirer— they changed too often to be called
boyfriends— a thick-necked thug named Zachary, had invited himself.
Stumpy and his wife brought a sad lentil casserole and a chocolate
cake. Ozzie heated a ham on the grill with his signature coating of
marshmallow fluff toasted golden brown except for where it caught
on fire. There were laughter and diet jokes; Stumpy took it all in
stride. Jonny obsessed about some left-hand chords giving him
grief. So much for pre-puberty genius.

In the garage Jonny took
the accordion out of the case and held it gingerly. The scratches
across the pearly black case were almost like wrinkles. He felt
self-conscious with Stumpy looking on so asked him for some
pointers.

“
The thing is,” the big
man whispered, “Wendy can’t blow that horn to save her life. She
doesn’t play much but when she does, you’ve got to crank the
accordion. Let ‘er rip.”

Stumpy was as round and
bald as a cue ball, with hands like baseball mitts. How he was able
to hit single buttons with those fingers? Jonny was seized with an
urge to see Stumpy play the squeeze box.

“
Could you show me that
chord progression at the beginning of ‘One Day at a Time?’” It was
a waltz, and slow, and Jonny had no trouble keeping up with the
chord progression, but just then Ozzie clacked his sticks to bring
the rehearsal to order.

“
All yours, Jonny boy,”
Stumpy grinned, chocolate in his teeth.

The rehearsal limped along
for an hour. Ozzie argued with himself about the order of the
songs. Wendy refused to take advice from drummers or anyone else.
Jonny tried to focus and bit his tongue to keep from adding to the
mayhem. Sitting up front, Lenny had ideas he had to share, about
picking up the tempo mostly. He crossed his eyes at Jonny and
slumped into his chair.

Wendy announced she was
leaving and the rehearsal broke up. Lenny walked out into the
alley. “You’re my hero,” he said, clapping Jonny on the shoulder.
“How you can play those old croakers with a straight face, and
energy, I might add, is beyond me.”