How the Hula Girl Sings (21 page)

I stared at that old white house for a long time, leaning against the rickety white wood fence, until a towheaded kid came outside. He had a dirty face and was missing a few teeth and was laughing to himself and started rolling right in the dirt.

“Hey, kid, there’s a big glass jar of pennies buried right under that porch. If you can find ’em under there, they’re all yours,” I said. I had saved all the pennies I could find for three summers and buried them under the porch in case I ever found myself in an emergency. I had never dug them up. They were still sitting under there, waiting to be set free. It seemed good as any other time. It seemed time to me.

This kid pulled himself to his small awkward feet and scratched his face for a while. “A jar of pennies? Is that true, mister?”

“Sure is.”

“Thanks!”

His tiny blue eyes lit up like magic as he crawled under the porch and began digging, singing some made-up song to himself. He plowed right through the soft dry dirt with a long narrow stick, moving his head from side to side as he whistled and hummed and smiled. I stood there a moment longer, until I could very nearly hear my own mother calling me on inside. I needed to do what was right. I needed to be a man. Do the thing that was hard and make a stand. It didn’t make all that much sense to me. But it wasn’t a choice I had to make alone. There was Junior and the sheriff and Charlene and Clutch, they’d all stand by me to judge a man on his past. A past he served, a debt he paid. Maybe it isn’t all as simple as time in jail. It hadn’t been for me. Maybe it’s a debt you can’t ever repay. When it came down to it, it wasn’t about the things we had done, it wasn’t about the crimes we had laid with our own hands, it wasn’t even about us, it came down to what kind of men believed they had the right to lay judgment.

I spat hard in the dirt and began the walk back to the hotel. The sun had gone completely from the sky. This was not a matter of pride. It was a matter of hope. The hope to be redeemed.

There was nothing else this town could do to me now.

last words at the bus depot

I walked into the Starlite to tell Charlene what I had decided. We still weren’t reconciled. I refused to see her. I couldn’t stare into her sweet face and have her staring back at me with a busted-up eye and bruises up and down my chin. So she kept calling me at work, crying, telling me how it was all her fault, me getting hurt, but the both of us knew it just wasn’t true. I had gotten myself into this predicament and there was no one else to blame but me.

So there was the waitress of all my hope, Charlene, serving a nice piece of blueberry pie to a bald man with silvery white teeth. She set the plate down and smiled, then turned and caught sight of me and gave a little start.

“Luce …” she whispered. “Oh my God, Luce …”

Her sweet brown eyes began to swell up with tears right away and she started to run into the back to cry, but I caught hold of her hand and walked with her to the shiny silver counter, mumbling her name the whole time.

“Oh, Luce, what did they do to you?”

Charlene looked up at the white bandage that ran over the left side of my face. I tried to give a little smile to let her know I was OK, but I wasn’t, and all I could offer was a wee little grin that showed all the deep-blue-and-black bruises gathered right under my chin.

“My god … I’m so sorry, Luce … I’m so sorry …”

She began to cry again, so I squeezed her hand tight and tried turning my face away a little so she wouldn’t have to stare at all that unpleasantness straight on.

“I came here to tell you something, Charlene, not to make you cry.”

“Tell me something? Jesus Luce, how can you even talk to me?”

“This isn’t your fault and you and I know it.”

Charlene shook her head, still crying. “Are you leaving on the bus tonight?”

I gritted my teeth together and shook my head. “That’s what I came to tell you.” I took a deep breath and let it all out. “I’m staying,” I said in a short mumbled breath.

“What?” Charlene whispered. “What did you just say?!” She let go of my hand and stared hard at my face.

“I said I’m staying all right.”

Charlene just shook her head and began to walk away, straight into the back.

“Wait!” I shouted.

“Why are you going to stay, Luce? What’s so goddamn important here?”

I took a deep breath and stared hard into her shiny brown eyes. “Well, you, for starts.” I frowned. “You’re worth staying for, for sure.”

Charlene sighed and looked down at her precious little feet. “Luce, I love you with all my heart. But you need to leave. You need to leave right now. If you can’t do it for yourself, do it for me.”

Then she moved right beside me and kissed my cheek and turned away, starting to cry all over again.

“Goodbye,” she mumbled, and ran away, disappearing behind the double silver doors to the back.

I shook my head and walked on out of the diner, starting to cry myself. I walked on back toward the hotel, and just as I got to the porch I felt a hunk of dirt smack the back of my head. It crumbled apart and fell down the back of my blue shirt mingling with the sweat on my back. I turned around and swore and tried to catch sight of who had thrown it, but there was no one around. Then, as I turned around again, another mound of dirt hit the back of my head, this time loaded down with a rock, and it made me lose my footing and I nearly slipped off the porch, but I grabbed the wooden railing and spun around and ran right for the dirty green bushes out front just as three or four lousy little kids shouted and took off, dropping hunks of dirt. I ran right after them and grabbed the slowest one and shook him so hard his lousy little red baseball cap flew off, and then I froze, I froze right where I stood.

Monte Slates.

“Monte …” I mumbled, feeling like crying right there. “Why, fella, why?”

“Eye for an eye, that’s what the Bible says.”

I held his arm tight, shaking my head.

“What did I do to you, pal? How did I wrong you?”

“Burned my dad’s hand.” He frowned. “Ran that little baby down, too.”

“Do you believe that’s all right? Throwing dirt at your own friends like that?”

“I figure if you’re a killer, you ain’t my friend. I figure if you’re a killer and done take a life, you ought to be killed yourself.”

“What about being forgiven and all that? What’s the Good Book say about that?”

“Not much I can remember. They hung up Jesus and nailed his hands to the cross and he didn’t do a thing. You kill somebody yourself, you deserve worse, I figure.”

There was nothing for me to say. I couldn’t argue with him.

I turned him loose and watched him run away, still scared as hell, holding his hand where I had grabbed him.

I walked on over to see Junior at work, but the Gas-N-Go was closed. That’s what the sign in the door said anyway. The big movable letter sign out front was empty. Clean and empty. Everything seemed wrong. I knocked on the gray glass once and saw Junior moving around inside. He came to the door and unlocked it and let me in. Junior’s big round face was covered in sweat. He was scared as hell. I could nearly see his big red heart beating right out of his big-barreled chest. His eyes were tiny and sharp. He looked ready to cry.

“How you doing, pal?” I asked.

“I’ve been better,” he mumbled.

I patted his shoulder and tried to smile. Clutch was standing behind the counter. I smiled and stared at his gray, wrinkly face. It was a face that belonged in a church. It was the face of some old and benevolent saint or king.

“I guess you come here to tell me you’re both quitting.”

“What if we intend to stay?” I asked.

Clutch stared at me and smiled. “I’d say I was awful proud of you.”

Junior stared at the windows, mumbling to himself. I stood beside him and frowned.

“Listen, Junior, if you aren’t sure … if you think we should leave …”

“No, it’s not that.” He frowned, shaking his big round head. “It’s just, I don’t know how wrong those folks are for wanting us to leave.”

“Christ Jesus, I know what you mean,” I whispered. “That’s the thing I can’t make right. I mean, I know it ain’t right for them to come after us like that, but … all the things they said, we did. I can’t change any of them now, but I wish … I wish I could take it all back.”

Clutch patted me on the shoulder, shaking his head.

“If it’s meant to be, it’s a thing you can’t change, Luce.”

“How’s that?” I asked.

“Maybe all these things happened for a reason. Maybe none of these things were a mistake at all.”

“You’re telling me you believe it wasn’t no mistake I ran that poor baby down?”

“No. I didn’t say that. But the Lord works in the strangest of ways. Maybe you’re not supposed to see it all as a mistake. Maybe you need to take something from it, something to save yourself. The way I see it, anyway, one life lost is better than two.”

I became still and silent and felt everything moving right through me. Then that hollow blue telephone rang. Clutch picked it up and after a few seconds handed it to me.

It was Charlene.

“I’m at the bus depot. I’m leaving town. I want you to come with me.”

“But—”

“If you ever want to see me again, my bus leaves at four o’clock. I’ll be waiting here until then.”

“But—”

That sweet woman hung up and I felt all the emptiness of the world fall upon my tongue.

“Who was that?” Junior asked.

“Charlene,” I mumbled.

“What is it?”

“She’s leaving town. She wants me to go.”

I made it the half-mile to the bus depot in a few minutes and found her sitting there in those lousy blue plastic chairs, holding a single brown suitcase upon her lap, crying there all alone to herself. Oh, my Charlene. Her curly brown hair was hanging in her face. She still had on her lousy Starlite Diner waitress uniform. Her legs were folded underneath her. She looked so delicate and small. I felt my heart breaking right in my chest. She looked up at me and tried to wipe the tears out of her eyes, but then she stopped trying to fight it and began crying some more, lowering her head.

“Jesus, Charlene, what are you doing to me?”

“To you?” she shouted. “To you? Luce, what are you doing to
me?”

“Well, hell, you just can’t pick up and leave like this.”

“That’s exactly what I’m doing. I’m not gonna stay in town and watch you get yourself hurt on account of me. So either you come with me now or never see me again.”

“Christ, Charlene, what about your folks?”

“I left them a note and told them I’d call them from L.A.”

“L.A.? You can’t go out there alone.”

“I was hoping you would come with me.”

“But … I … I can’t.”

“Why not? There’s nothing else here for you. You don’t have any family in town anymore. You don’t care about your parole. I’m sure you can convince Junior to leave. Why would you stay by yourself?”

“I gotta stay. Or else I’ll be running away from this the rest of my life.”

“If I tell you I’ll love you forever, will you come with me?” she asked, kissing my neck so gently, so sweetly. “If I tell you everything you want to hear right now, will you just get on this bus with me?”

All the words I had ever wanted to say slipped right away.

There was nothing I could think to tell her that would make her understand it all in a different way.

“Charlene …” I tried to mumble.

That sweet girl nodded and shook her head. “I know. You already said it. You can’t.”

“It isn’t you darling. I need to do this for me. Don’t you how it ate up Junior running away his whole life? Don’t you see what’s been done to his life because of some crime he’s been serving every day? I can’t run away or it’ll just follow me.”

I unclasped her hand and kissed her pearly fingertips.

“There’s no doubt in my mind we’ll be together again,” I said. “It’s a thing I know in my heart.”

“That’s a real nice thing to say while I’ll be worrying like a fool over you.”

“I’m just asking you to give me some time,” I said.

“But I can’t stay here,” she said.

“OK. Then send me the sweetest kiss over the lines as soon as you get to L.A.” I tried to smile.

“I love you.” She blushed. “I really do. I ought to have made you leave with me sooner. I was just afraid you hadn’t forgiven me for letting you down with the baby and all.” She kissed my hands and then held me tight. “But this thing between us is true. I can feel it beating there right in your heart. That’s why I love you. I love you because you weren’t afraid to fall in love with me. I don’t want to hear you say anything back because then it’ll sound like a lie and I know how you feel now anyway.”

I kissed her as hard as I dared and turned away without one other word. Then I was a full block away and I could hear the bus doors close and the brakes become undone and the wheels begin to pull away. I opened my lips and said a few single words that took on the weight of the whole cruel world.

“Goodbye, Charlene Dulaire.”

Then I turned and began walking back into town.

It was just beginning to get dark.

I walked out down La Harpie Road, way down off the side of the road. I skittered across any intersections and back toward the Gas-N-Go.

Junior was out front with a tiny brown bag full of plastic letters. He was carrying the ladder toward the big sign out front, then stopped when he saw me coming.

“I’m shaky as hell, Luce. You hold the ladder.”

I nodded and took it, watching him climb up awkwardly.

“What are you gonna write?” I asked.

“I don’t know yet.”

He opened up the bag and took out two rounded black letters
T
and an
O.

“Hey, let me ask you something,” I said. “It’s something I’ve wanted to know for a while anyways.

“OK,” he mumbled, still trying to eat.

“What the hell is your first name anyway?”

“My name?” He smiled.

“Sure, sure, it ain’t Junior, is it?”

“No.” He smiled. “It ain’t. It’s Ervis. Ervis Breen.”

“Ervis!” I smiled. “What kind of name is that?”

“Family name, I guess. I guess I’m named after someone or another. Never did like it much myself. My dad was the one who took to calling me Junior instead. Serves me better, I think.”