Belly (23 page)

Occasionally the bus stopped and someone got on or off, Belly didn’t notice. He tried not to look at all these people who
couldn’t make enough money to buy their own cars. They were all of them white, a particular kind of pasty white, and everything
about them looked poor: their hair, clothes, the way they smelled, how many teeth they were missing, and the things they carried.
The nicest black people he’d ever met were not from Jefferson Terrace, the little embarrassment of a neighborhood on the East
Side, but in prison. They were drug dealers, sure, but they were decent guys. He spent four years in perfect racial integration
and now he was sealed on a bus full of white trash.

The bus stopped by the old mill at the end of Main Street in Ballston Spa, once abandoned and now remade into apartments,
an “Apartments for Rent” sign permanently affixed to the newly repointed brick facade. Belly made a mental note of the phone
number, though he knew what his daughters would say, or Loretta, or any of his old pals if they found he’d moved to Ballston
Spa, the town they thought of as Saratoga’s inbred cousin.

The wrinkly woman made her way to the front of the bus, lifting her feet over Belly’s splayed legs. She started to descend
the steps and she turned and looked at Belly and said, “You’re welcome,” and he folded his knees up and stared at them.

He got off at the next stop, stood in front of the blob of beige stucco, smoking one last cigarette—thank God for his good
friend the red lighter—before he had to report on his week of nothing, no job, no prospects, before he had to get his wrist
slapped by a pretty woman young enough to be his kid.

“You’re late,” Ms. Monroe said. “Don’t be late.”

“Sorry.” She led Belly back to her desk and he picked up a Plexiglas cube with pictures of kids on all six sides.

He picked it up and examined the photographs. “These yours?”

“Nope.”

“They’re not?”

She laughed. “I never had any kids. Those are just the pictures that came in the cube.”

“That’s weird.”

“Oh, for crying out loud, it was a gift from my coworkers.” She lowered her voice. “I’m just trying to be nice. I don’t want
the thing.”

“You want pictures of mine? I have three grandkids.” He reached for his wallet before he realized he carried no pictures of
them.

“I don’t like to surround myself with pictures of people I know,” she said. “It creeps me out.”

“What’s your first name?” Belly asked.

“Does this have to do with your parole?”

“Why don’t you have any kids?”

“Patty, and none of your business,” she said. “Now, listen, what’s going on with the job?”

“Do we have to talk about that?”

“Yes.”

He said, “I am a senior citizen. Did you know that? I’m retired.”

“No, you’re not. The government seized your assets five years ago and you’ve got to start over.”

Belly groaned.

“Listen, Mr. O’Leary, you should be grateful. Imagine being one of those guys who has to announce that he’s coming, who has
to see flyers with his mug shot plastered to every tree in the neighborhood. Imagine getting up every morning and having to
face that. You’re off easy, you’ve got the opposite problem, and you’re complaining?” She shook her head. “Some of you guys
are unbelievable.”

“Those men are sex offenders.”

“Yeah, but they’re men. They’re people. They’re trying to cope with what they did just like you are.”

“What did I do?”

“You want me to tell you?”

“Yes, I want you to tell me what I did wrong.”

She read from his file. “Violation of New York State Penal Code 225.05 and Federal Penal Code 211.10, Promotion of Illegal
Gambling in the second degree; 225.30, Possession of Illegal Gambling Records; 225.15, Profiting from Illegal Gambling. Advancing
Gambling. Engaging in a Bookmaking Business. Gambling Across State Lines. I could go on.”

“Yeah, but that’s what I’m saying, I’m not a sex offender. Why should I feel sorry for those guys? I didn’t do anything.”

Patty the parole officer looked up from the file. “Let’s see the sheet,” she said, glancing at her watch.

“I forgot it.”

“No, you didn’t.”

He took the crumpled paper with Margie’s lone signature scrawled on the top line. He never even got Gene to sign, never went
back to Wal-Mart to get their corporate check mark.

“Doesn’t look like you tried too hard.”

“Well, I did. I tried too hard.”

She took a form from his folder and picked up a pencil covered in bite marks.

“Have you been actively looking for a job?”

“Yes.”

“Have you been to any establishment where gambling is practiced?”

“No.”

“Have you used any illegal drugs?”

“No.”

“Have you used any alcohol?”

“No.”

“Have you engaged in any illegal activity?”

“No.”

She put her pencil down. “So what are we going to do about the job? I gave you a time limit… .” She ran her finger along the
file. “Until Monday. That leaves you the weekend.”

“There are no jobs in August. Everybody knows that. I have to wait till they all leave.”

“Did you get your license?”

“Not yet.”

“Why not?”

“I’ve been busy.”

“Doing what?”

He rubbed the knuckle of one hand with the other and said, “Looking for a job.”

“What’d you do in the can again?”

“I didn’t.”

“How’d you swing that?”

He patted the sides of his jeans. “Work release. Fake hips.”

She looked up. “What for?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” and she said, “Tell me,” and he said, “Too much tango.”

“No way.”

“It’s the truth,” he said. “Plus, arthritis.”

“Well, barring the possibility that you’re going to open a dance school in the next two days, you’ve got to find something
very soon.”

“How long do I have?”

“How long do you need?”

“How long do I really have?”

“You have the rest of your goddamned life to screw up if that’s what you want.”

He felt married after this exchange, and he wanted to hold her hand as she walked him to the door.

“That’s it?” he asked. “You’re letting me go?”

“You’re free,” she said. “And listen, I mean this: have a good weekend.”

He stood in the open doorway, his back frozen with air-conditioning, his front on fire from the heat wave, and he did not
want to step into the sunshine.

W
hen he got home Nora and the kids were gone, and she’d left a note on the table that read
Belly, we went swimming. Your statutory rape friend called.
Maybelline, it seemed, was still trying to make plans. Women never liked to hear, “Let’s just wait and see.”

He opened a beer and sat on the couch and was just about to drift off to sleep when he heard a knock. He lifted himself from
the couch, rubbed his eyes as he went to the door. Maybelline.

“Hi,” she said. “What are you doing?”

“What are you doing here?”

“Can you open the door?”

“I don’t know. What are you doing here?” He kept his arms folded across his chest.

“Belly, for crying out loud. Open the door.”

He swung the screen door open and stepped out before she could slip in.

“What do you want?”

“My car broke down. Can you give me a ride home?”

“I don’t have a license.”

“So? You always drive my car.”

“I don’t have a car.”

“That’s your truck, isn’t it? You’re always complaining about how you can’t drive your own truck.”

“Stop saying always.”

“Please, Belly? I can’t afford a cab. I took you out to dinner one too many times. I’m broke.”

“You took me out for drinks once.”

“I have no money.”

He looked at the Bronco in the driveway, quiet and patient like an obedient dog, his loyal little truck. “Okay. Fine. Hold
on.”

Nora’s keys hung on the hook by the sink. He could be there and back in an hour—it was 4:00 p.m. now, Nora usually started
dinner around 5:30. She didn’t even have to know.

He grabbed the keys, locked the door behind him, headed to the truck. She was still on the porch. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s
go.”

He unlocked his door and climbed in. Maybelline knocked lightly on the passenger window. “It’s locked,” she said.

She climbed in, her little sparkly purse set on her lap.

He started the car and backed out of the driveway. Almost five years had passed since he’d driven his own automobile, and
he felt like Apollo, mastering his metal chariot across the sky. He thought, I am an airplane. He could go anywhere he wanted.
Florida. Mexico. New York City. Or Ballston Spa.

Maybelline sat staring at her fingernails for the duration of the trip.

“What’s the matter with you?” he asked.

“I’m losing my job.”

Belly laughed. “What’d you do, steal that big white celebrity cake? You getting fired?”

She shook her head. “It’s not funny. They’re selling it. It’s going to be under new management. They’re putting something
else in there. I’m getting laid off.”

“You’re kidding. They’re not going to shut down the Springway Diner.” He banged his fist on the steering wheel, making it
beep accidentally.

“Yes, they are,” said Maybelline. “They’re closing it.”

“When?”

“Next month. Soon as the track’s up.”

He frowned the rest of the drive.

When he pulled up in front of her house, he leaned over her and unlocked her door, kept the car running.

“You’re not coming in?”

He shook his head.

“Belly, come on. Come in. I have Piels in the fridge. Two six-packs.”

“No, I’ve got to get back before Nora gets home.”

She leaned over and down, unzipped his fly.

“Oh, okay,” he said. “But just for a minute.”

He hated her room when he was standing in it, her ugly cats. “What are their names?” he asked.

“Birdie and Par,” she said. “I used to have Bogey and Eagle, too, but they got run over.”

“You’re a golfer? Bullshit.”

“My grampa was,” she said, but then she put her finger over his mouth to shush him. She pushed him down on her dollhouse bed
and straddled him, put her hand on his crotch.

“What’s the matter?” She cocked her head to the side and pursed her painted lips.

“Where’s the beer?”

She brought him a six-pack, and he chugged one beer down instantly and opened another. He kept drinking while she slipped
off his jeans and his boxers, he drank all six beers till the room softened and swayed while she tried to get him hard. It
never happened.

“Got to go,” he said.

“No, Belly.” She sat on his knees and put her hands on his shoulders. She said, “No,” again and he pushed against her, she
pushed down, they locked each other in a strange embrace, she leaned down and licked the scars that grinned along his hips
and he pressed against the side of her face until she slid off the bed onto her back, her legs in the air like a baby waiting
for a diaper change. He stood and put his clothes on.

Then she said, “Give me some money.”

He laughed. “I don’t have any.”

“You have money,” she said, and she started to cry. “You must. All that money from the bar, from the track.”

And now he understood why the pretty, crazy girl wanted him. He said, “I’m broke, too. Flat broke.”

He let her cry, let her pull on his arm with the might of a superhero, let her beg, and he watched her mascara run down her
cheeks till she looked like the Joker, let her scratch him with those crazy nails, try to unzip his jeans and press her mouth
into his crotch. He lit a cigarette with his circumcised lighter and watched her for a minute, took three puffs and threw
it down next to her on the shaggy white carpet, twisted the fire out with his foot. He let her lie on the floor, where she
pretended she was mourning something that had actually lived. He took her half-empty bottle of Old Grand-Dad and left.

He felt his legs wobbling beneath him a bit, it was still so hot, but he made it to the truck, started it up, he could go
anywhere—Florida, Mexico, New York City. Saratoga Springs.

He couldn’t go home yet, over the highway and through Burnt Hills to Spring Street where all his neighbors and daughters kept
track of his coming and going. It was late now, and dark, he’d long ago missed dinner or the chance of slipping in before
Nora could notice he’d stolen his own truck. So he kept driving, sipping hot whiskey from the bottle, another fifty-whiskey
night.

The sky lingered between dusk and night, and as Belly drove he saw a girl walking along the road, swinging her arms as she
walked. A young girl in a white sundress, and even though it was hot and the heat had seeped into the truck and surrounded
him, the girl wore a pink sweater over her shoulders. A pink cardigan. He could just make it out in the last bit of dark blue
gloaming light. She was barefoot, and carrying a tote bag, and walking quickly but not hurrying, walking past the grand old
houses of Ballston Spa. She looked like a girl from a picture book, a Disney movie. He slowed, he slowed, he paced her in
the big black truck.

What happened to the pink sweater, to his daughter’s pink sweater? It was horrible to be old. Untenable. All these gaps of
memory and information, retracing your steps, treading the same territory, just trying to recall. Only the things he wanted
excised still remained: the painful irony of aging, the brain’s big joke. He had not let them bury her in her favorite pink
sweater. How he hated that stupid pink sweater. How he hated the way she insisted on dressing like a bag lady after watching
those John Hughes movies with the martyred working-class girls, pretending to be poor.
You’re not poor,
he would yell at her.
I was poor. You don’t know what it’s like to be poor.
And how she would ignore him in those moments, those times when he couldn’t find his way back to an even temper, she would
just walk right out the door and let him steam. He needed his third daughter, but she was not a normal child: she didn’t need
him.