Silent Joe (13 page)

There was music, and a recorded voice announcing the show. Then she did an introduction. She told a little bit about my past and used the phrase "Acid Baby," which made my nerves bristle like it always did. When she spoke she kept her arms close to her sides and stared across the table at me like I was a zoo bear. Her voice was clear, with a little bit of a whisper in it, like she was only talking to one person. The earphones gave her head a funny shape and her curls stuck up behind the flat spot made by the band.

I'm a little hazy on how the first half of the interview went. I was nervous. I do remember that at first, my answers were just one or two words, and my voice was unusually thin and distant. I answered the same questions I'd answered a thousand times. I had stock responses all ready, from years of practice, and I gave them.

Thor. What happened. Pain. Memory. Surgery. Hillview. Other kids. Will and Mary Ann. School. Being known as "The Acid Baby." Baseball. College. Sheriff's Department. Working the jail. .

But then June studied me from across the table and I focused on her eyes, which caught the overhead light in a way that made them very bright. And I began to feel relaxed and comfortable.

"I admire the way you've overcome all this, Joe. I've been following your story for years. You've made a good life out of a tragic beginning. People need to know that
they
can do it, too."

"It was mainly my parents. My adoptive parents, I mean."

She asked me what advice I could give to people with problem especially young people. Where do you find genuine self-confidence? How do you keep away the anger and self-pity?

I gave her the stock answers I always give: believe in yourself, don’t be afraid to be different, remember that there are always people worse than you.

Then she asked something I'd never been asked before.

"Joe—what do you think when you look at a beautiful
face?"

Maybe it was the newness of the question. Maybe it was the funeral or the alcohol or the heat inside my suit. Maybe it was just because beautiful faces are one of the few subjects I feel qualified to address. I'm not sure what caused it, but I suddenly wanted to talk.

"I think that person is lucky. I love beautiful faces, Ms. Dauer. There are so many kinds. I could stare at one for hours. But you know something? It's not that easy to do. Not many people will let you look at their face unless you know them."

"You must know a lot of people."

"Some. But you don't want to just stare."

"No. So what do you do?"

She leaned back a little and watched me closely. I saw the light hitting her hair, and the bright sparkle in her eyes again. I was aware of the dusky half-light of the sound booth, and of the muted acoustics. For a moment it seemed like June Dauer was the only other person in the whole building. Like we were alone and I was talking only to her.

"I watch movies or TV, June. Read magazines. I like romantic comedies with perfect faces in them. Sometimes I'll go to crowded places where I can get lost and just observe. But it all happens so fast. The movies or TV shows end, the people on the beach walk on or turn away, the shoppers in the mall pass by, so there's not enough time to really enjoy and appreciate a face."

"I know what you mean. It's like you're in a different world than theirs. Cut off, separate. I feel the same way sometimes, sitting here in this studio and talking to people out in the real world."

Suddenly I realized what a pleasure it was to be talking to June Dauer. She looked so alone in that beam of light, surrounded by the near dark. I forgot where I was and why I was there, and that I had had too much to drink. And I just talked to her.

"Exactly, June. Like they're not
real
I mean, none of those faces are real, in the sense that you could touch one, especially the faces in a crowd. You definitely can't touch those."

"No, you don't want to try that."

"Not that I want touch. I do not want to touch or be touched."

June Dauer leaned forward toward her mike. She was frowning slightly, like her earphones weren't working right or something.

"Don't want to touch or be touched? Do you think that's healthy?"

"I never think about it, Ms. Dauer."

"I've never heard anyone say that before. Everyone is always so hungry for contact. But you know, it seems to me that you could find plenty of beautiful faces to have a cup of coffee with you, talk, let you appreciate them."

"I paid a model once, to sit still and let me stare. Tracy. She was young and just starting off and needed the money. She came back one time and let me stare at her again, three hours for three hundred dollars. What a face she had. Unimaginable beauty. We had coffee after the second time, then talked. I liked her very much. I thought about her every day, then every hour, then every minute. I didn't call for a while because I wanted to get myself under control, didn't want to seem needy and scare her off. Later, when I did call, her roommate said she'd moved to Milan. I wrote her but didn't hear back."

A pause then in our conversation, while June Dauer looked at me. "I think that's sad. Well, now that we're kind of on the subject, what about dating, Joe? Do you date?"

"To be honest, my experience with dating is limited. I'm aware of effect on women, and it doesn't seem right to frighten someone just I can stare at her face."

I realized I was doing just that—staring at June Dauer's face. I looked away but bumped my cheek against the mike. It made a tremendous amplified thud. She laughed. She had a wonderful laugh, one of the nicest heard.

"That was me, folks," she said. "Falling off my chair because Trona stared at me!"

I felt my face get hot, but I smiled. I try to smile as little as possible because it's not something people enjoy seeing.

"Joe, I've noticed that you have very good manners. Why?"

"To put people at ease. And years ago, I thought women might find good manners attractive."

"In general, we do. So . . ."

"But you need more than good manners. You've got to . . . it's hard explain. See . . . you don't want to be perceived as just a big scar under a hat saying yes, please. No, thank you. Or, it's a nice day today, isn't it, Ms. Dauer? You don't want to come off like a talking baboon, or an English butler morphed into Swamp Thing. You know what I mean?"

She paused just a beat, then. Like I'd caught her off guard.

"No, not really, Joe. But that's why I wanted you on the show. How
do
women react to you?"

"I had one date. She acted like being with me was completely normal. She fooled me until we were alone in her apartment and she asked to touch my face. I said she could touch it because I didn't want to disappoint her. I closed my eyes and set my jaws and waited. She took forever. I could hear her breathing. Then I felt her fingertip. I couldn't stand it. I held still as well as I could, but I started shaking. When I opened my eyes she was crying. I got up and apologized for making her cry, then left."

"Why did you leave?"

"Because she was crying. I don't want to be considered pathetic, Ms. Dauer. Repellent is acceptable. Repellent is appropriate. But pathetic is something I can't stand."

Again, that little pause before she spoke. And the same frown she'd had before.

"Let's change gears here. Joe Trona—what are you most proud of in your life?"

I thought about that. "That Will and Mary Ann Trona would take me."

The second I said that I remembered what I'd been doing just a few hours earlier. And then I remembered that night on Lind Street, and all the opportunities I'd had to make things come out better. And I realized I was talking to a whole county, not just to a woman who seemed sympathetic and easy to talk to.

"Are you proud of yourself at all, for the way you've handled adversity and overcome some pretty heavy roadblocks?"

"No."

"Okay, Joe—we've got two seconds left, so describe yourself in two words! Don't think—
two words!"

I heard the music start up.

"Come on, Joe!"

"Needs improvement," I said.

June Dauer's voice came over the music.

"Don't we all! Joe Trona
is
Real Live. So are
you
and don't forget it. This is June Dauer saying have a nice evening, and if you can't be happy then be quiet! 'Til next time."

She pushed away the mike, lifted off her earphones and set them down in front of her. The overhead light was still catching her eyes and she was still frowning.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome." I felt a warm wave of relief break over me, took a deep breath, sagged. I wondered if there was such a thing as Stockholm Syndrome for media guests, because I felt half in love with June Dauer for getting me through the show.

"Let's walk it off," she said. "I had a public-speaking guru in here one day, she was so nervous when it was over she went into the restroom and vomited."

"I'm not going to do that."

"Come on."

We went back to the lobby, then outside. We walked. I get extremely self-conscious around an attractive woman, so I tried to keep half a step ahead and a good yard aside from her.

"I am not diseased," she said.

"Sorry. I get in a hurry."

"So slow down. You can't outwalk your own nerves."

I slowed down. It was almost six o'clock by then but still light. Just starting to cool. It seemed like the afternoon could last forever, like it was a record that skipped and kept playing the same phrase over and over. Walking in the sunlight, I wondered at all I'd said to her in the last half hour. It already seemed a long time ago.

The KFOC studios were on a junior college campus, so we strolled past the low buildings and the kiosks flapping with fliers. The rubber trees were deep green and shiny and the students had worn wide paths across the corners of the grass.

I took off my jacket and folded it over my arm. A cool evening breeze came through my shirt. While I pretended to arrange the jacket on my arm I watched June Dauer, who was turned slightly away, looking at the clouds. The same breeze that cooled my back lifted the curls off her forehead and showed her ears. Little red rubies in them. I imagined cupping two handfuls of those stones and gently pouring them over her head, watching them spill through her dark curls, run down her shoulders and legs, bounce and clatter around her feet—I don't know why. Too much to drink, I guess.

Or maybe it was TUT. Will had told me a few things about love and women. He told me to look for a sinner with a sense of humor. He told to go into love with my eyes open and into marriage with my eyes shut. The other was
Look for TUT.

TUT is The Unknown Thing. Some women have it, some don't. You might see it first in her eyes. It might be in her voice. It might be in her hands. You
’ll
start to see it, then you
will
realize it's all over her. But you’ll never know what it is, because it's The Unknown Thing. TUT makes you come back. And back again and again. It's the glue, but you never know what it is. Mary Ann has gobs of it

.
I kept looking at June Dauer but she looked at me so I turned away, face going warm.

It was obviously TUT. I saw it in her face, her eyes, the straight firm line of her chin. I'd seen it before but never in such blazing clarity. And so much of it.

"How were the services, Joe?"

"Very good. Reverend Daniel released a million white doves in the Chapel of Light. Then opened the ceiling and they flew out."

"Beautiful."

"It was the first time they'd flown."

"How could you tell?"

"They raise them in pens."

"Wow, first time you use your wings and you get organ music and two thousand people watching."

We walked around in a big square and ended up outside the studio. She offered her hand and I shook it and looked at her. In the outside light she was much more beautiful. Her skin was dark and a little bit moist. Her eyes, which had looked black in the studio, were actually a rich brown.

"Thanks for opening up," she said. "You were very generous with me. And who knows, Joe? Maybe some listener out there has had some problems, too. Maybe you inspired him to get on with his life. Her life. Whatever. I mean, you helped me fill a half hour of time—that's my job. But maybe you did something more than that."

"I hope so."

I drove home, then turned around and drove back to KFOC again. It's about a twenty-minute ride.

I felt foolish sitting in that parking lot, so I drove home for the second time in an hour. But I felt wrong there, somehow . . . stalled, so I drove
back
to the KFOC studios and parked again and took a deep breath and walked quickly to the lobby.
The Unknown Thing
. I took off my hat and asked the receptionist if I could possibly see Ms. Dauer.