How Sweet It Is (14 page)
I hear a noise and, looking out the kitchen window, see a truck pull into the driveway. Jonas steps across the gravel. His large boots bound up the porch steps. The sun is setting behind him; wispy colors of rust and peach swirl along the sky. He taps at the door, and I yell, “Come in.” Eagerly, with a wide smile, he does. Maybe I will not have to eat my meal of peanut soup alone.
H
i, Deirdre,” Jonas says as he shuffles across the kitchen. His bandana is the color of a male cardinal, matching his wrinkled, red button-down shirt. I wonder if he ever irons. Or owns an iron.
“Want some soup?” I ask him.
“Soup?” He fills his lungs with the aroma from the kitchen. “Did I get here in time for dinner?” He produces a wide grin. Then he wants to know, “What’s inside?”
Grandpa said to taste all the flavors. I’ll let Jonas guess what’s in the soup. “You can eat some and then tell me.”
“I tell you?”
“Yes.”
“Will I like the soup?” He says each word slowly, in monotone. I could pick out his voice in a crowd any day. I have never known anyone who speaks like Jonas. Come to think of it, I have never known another mentally handicapped man.
I recall how, last time he was here, he shifted from foot to foot and said, “Yes siree” in almost every sentence. Could it be that Jonas actually feels comfortable around me now?
I refill my bowl and prepare one for him. He joins me at the dining room table. He eats without saying a word, fingers gripping the spoon, each bite absorbed by his ample mouth. I listen to the violins playing from the CD in the living room as Jonas methodically chews, even though one really doesn’t need to chew soup.
“Did you make this?” he asks as he reaches over to the napkin dispenser and pulls out a paper napkin to wipe his lips.
“I did. What do you think?”
Looking into his bowl, he says, “This is good. Lots of tastes in here.”
“Like?”
Closing his eyes, he recites his list. “Butter, peanuts, peanut butter, parsley, cream, milk, chicken, paprika, and… and… oil!”
I smile, amazed by his ability to pick out all those ingredients. I know what’s in the soup and yet I’m not certain I can taste each ingredient. “No oil,” I tell him. “But everything else is right.”
Jonas grins. “Well,” he says, “I got 99.9 percent of it right.” He seems pleased. “Pretty clever for a retard. Huh?”
I am surprised to hear him call himself this word.
“What is this music?” he asks as he strums his fingers against the top of the table.
“Vivaldi. Do you listen to music?”
His belt buckle says
EAGLES
in bronze letters. Pointing at it, he claims, “Eagles are what I like.”
Of course, I know this. People usually hum or sing what they like, and Jonas sang lines from his favorite Eagles songs as he tapped on the cabin’s water pipes during his first visit.
When he’s finished wiping his mouth, I ask, “So, Jonas, did you come by to check the pipes?”
“No, no pipes today.” He places the napkin by his bowl.
“You knew I was making soup and came by for that?”
“No, no soup.”
“No pipes and no soup?”
“A book.”
“A book?”
“Ernest let me borrow it. I forgot to give it back. Then he died.”
Jonas pushes away from the table, stands, and says, “Wait here, Deirdre.” He leaves the cabin, I hear a truck door open and slam, and then Jonas is inside once more. In his hand is a hardback book with a silly cover.
Oh, the Places You’ll Go
. Dr. Seuss. “Your grandfather let me borrow it.” Jonas hands me the book.
Miriam claimed this book meant a lot to her when she heard Grandpa read it. And now I hold Grandpa’s own copy.
“Thank you, Jonas.”
Jonas motions toward the bookcase in the living room. “It belongs there.”
“I’ll put it there, then.”
He says he’ll do it, and I watch his tall body kneel at the bottom of the bookshelf, where he fits the book between two others. He stands, brushes off his knees with his hands, and gives me another wide smile. “Today is your day, Deirdre!” he sings. “You’ll move mountains!”
Could this be another line from an Eagles song?
“Your grandfather told me that I can do whatever I put my mind in.”
Grinning, I ask, “And what do you put your mind in?”
“Peace, praiseworthy, excellent, and noble.”
This sounds vaguely familiar, like a Bible verse. Perhaps it’s one I see every day on the wall at The Center, although I can’t place exactly where it hangs. Across the bulletin board in the hallway? By the front door? I’m still pondering as Jonas, humming, shuffles out the front door and jumps into his truck.
After he leaves, I do two things. First, I check the back of the peanut butter jar for its list of ingredients. Reading the fine print, I see the line:
Made with saturated oil.
Jonas was right; he did taste oil in the peanut soup. Next, I find the Dr. Seuss book, sit on the couch, and start to read.
Congratulations! Today is your day.
A smile finds me as I realize that this is where Jonas got his line that he sang to me. The book is written to the reader, telling him or her that she will have good days and bad days, lonely times and happy ones. The end does tell me that I will succeed and move mountains.
The despair that came over me shortly after I was discharged from the hospital starts to creep in again. I feel it in my fingertips as I slip
Oh, the Places You’ll Go
back onto the shelf. I make sure to place it exactly where Jonas put it, right between a dark leather-bound book and a book on the Roman Empire. The leather-bound book is a Bible. I ease it from the shelf and recall with sweet nostalgia how I faithfully read my NIV Bible every night when I was about twenty. Then one day, life got busy and I became content with that. Bible reading began to be reserved for church services only. I was dating Lucas and…
Forcing thoughts of Lucas from my mind, I consider the lines in Grandpa’s letter. “
Trust God. Put your whole hand in His, not just one finger or two. Get to know the feel of your hand in His.”
I open the Bible, clearly one my grandfather read often, for many of the verses are underlined with pen. Familiar passages leap out at me, verses my own parents read to me from the family Bible. The pages smell like firewood and damp earth. Soon I’m curled on the couch with the quilt over me, absorbing passages from the New Testament. I read about the withered fig tree in Mark and the feeding of the five thousand. Turning over to Galatians, I read and reread the fruit-of-the-Spirit verses. In Ephesians, I see the command to get rid of malice and anger. My stomach twists, I pull the quilt tighter around my shoulders and then glide over that verse.
Eventually, the stars light up the sky and I lie on the couch, gazing at them through the glass in the A-frame ceiling. Again they seem so close, like I could reach out and latch onto one if I only lifted my arm.
Hungry, I heat up some more soup, look again for the raccoon bowl and, not finding it in any of the cupboards, ladle my dinner into the mug with the bear.
Oil. I can’t taste any oil. However, the peanut flavor is pronounced. Complimented by the fresh parsley, it does pique my taste buds.
————
I wake after midnight to the lullaby of the singing owl and feel as though my heart will break from pain. Sally would say that, medically, such a thing is impossible. Yet I wonder, has she ever felt what I am experiencing now? Sally has had men become friends, then boyfriends, and then, it always ends after a few months. She claims she hasn’t met that Special One yet. She pictures the scene, though. He’ll walk into the clinic with a large German shepherd and smile into her eyes as she asks, “What’s wrong with this sweet doggie?” She will examine the dog as Mr. Owner stands nearby. He’ll ask her out—eventually. He’ll be as much of a dog lover as she is and they will live happily ever after in a secluded house with a fireplace and at least ten pets.
Sally doesn’t know this pain I feel. But Jeannie likely does. She’s been married, and then disappointed.
All day yesterday I wondered why the ache was so large and pronounced. This isn’t just heartache. This is consuming, relentless pounding, even when I don’t think it’s there. This is the horned monster—anger.
If I want to stop living off Extra Strength Tylenol, I need to learn how to deal with this fierce emotion a lot better than I have been. But how do I do that? Anger has embedded itself into the crevices of my heart. I feel it when I drive, when I cook, when I teach, and, like tonight, when I wake from sleep.
Maybe I’ll need surgery in order to get it out.
T
he brochure for my cake business is finally ready to be printed. It is a tri-fold with a glossy color photo of my famous chocolate swirl cake made with two round tiers of chocolate butter cake and scoops of chocolate ice cream between them on the front.
How Sweet It Is: Cakes by Deena
is printed in 22-point Bookman Old Style font. I came up with the name for my business while sitting on the deck last night. The next four lines are in Arial, 16-point, and read:
Buttery custom-made cakes for all of your festive occasions!
Anniversaries, weddings, birthdays, and just any day.
Every day deserves a cake!
Order your cake today.
The following page lists the kinds of cakes available: butter, white velvet, chocolate butter, ice cream swirl, and almond. The sizes are given, and the prices. At the bottom is a short blurb about me and where I studied. The back side has my name and contact information in 10-point font. I’ve included my cell number because, although this cabin has a phone, I have yet to hear it ring. The brochure also says I need at least twenty-four hours’ notice on all cake orders.
Jeannie calls and asks how I’m doing. She is going to meet a blind date for coffee after a long shift at the hospital where she’s a pediatric nurse. “Only coffee at seven tonight. You know, in case he’s a dweeb.”
“And if he is what you’ve been looking for?” I ask.
“Then, we quickly finish our lattes and head over to Palacio del Rey for scallops. Or would you recommend the parsleyseasoned trout?”
I want to ask how she was set up with this man and what his name is and if she is going to color her hair to get rid of the gray for the evening, but she rushes to her reason for calling me. “Have you found a place to print your brochures?”
I tell her I have proofed the final text and copied the file onto a CD, but I haven’t found a printer yet.
“Deena, honey.” Jeannie’s voice is serene and has my full attention.
“Yes?”
“You have to know you have what it takes. Do you know that? Go for it!” With that, she says she has to hang up and find shoes to go with her dress. She sounds extremely excited about this date.
I fill my mind with thoughts of the Bible passages about love and trust, the story of the feeding of the five thousand with small loaves of bread and a few fish, and the accounts of bodies being healed by the touch of a hand. If Jesus healed people with broken hearts and limbs, consumed with demons and disease, surely He is able to help me.
Holding my completed brochure, I feel the sensation that yes, I am capable. I have not felt this way in months. Not since the accident. Not since Lucas plowed his 1987 Mustang into the Woodruff Arts Center and dumped me for Ella.
————
It was the ninth of January, a cold night by Atlanta standards. We were on our way to a concert by the Atlanta Symphony at the Woodruff Arts Center. Lucas had been late picking me up from my apartment, decided to take a shortcut, and suddenly had no idea where he was. I was fuming because he wouldn’t stop and ask for directions. The concert was to start in ten minutes. Lucas raised his voice at me, calling me a nag. I was shocked to hear that word fly off his lips. Never would I put up with that. I told him so, right there, as he cut corners and sailed through yellow traffic lights.
Then it started to rain, the drops mixing with ice and beating against the windshield. Lucas drove faster. He took a turn around Tenth Street and then went through a red light at Peachtree, going so fast I had to close my eyes. When he skidded on the wet pavement, my eyes flew open to see that we were hydroplaning off the street, right toward the Woodruff. I screamed; there was no hope of avoiding the side of the building.
