The Great Jeff Page 7

  Rich guffawed.

  “No, sir. It’s good,” Mom said. “You remember, Jeffie. Harvey’s pancakes?”

  Obviously I didn’t, and I was pretty sure she knew I didn’t, but maybe this was part of her plan, so whatever.

  After we were seated by a hostess who set three menus down in the center of the table, a grouchy high school girl came over with an order pad.

  “Mmm?” she said, working her eyebrows instead of speaking. She reminded me of Rich’s sister. Either that, or she was related to the creeps at the lake.

  “You’ll love the pancakes,” Mom told Rich.

  “Sold,” he said. “Double stack!”

  I went for a blueberry waffle and bacon.

  “Coffee for me, just now,” Mom said. Then, after the waitress had taken the menus away, Mom told us she needed to make a little side trip. “You eat. Then in, like, fifteen minutes, order me a couple of eggs—Jeff, you know how I like them—bacon, rye. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes, okay?”

  “Mom, where are you going?”

  “Just sit tight. Have fun. Boy talk!”

  “Mom, eww,” I said.

  She blew us a kiss and left.

  CHAPTER 17

  MEN

  We watched from our booth. She didn’t drive away, which was good, but crossed the parking lot on foot, then went down the main road a bit before she turned up another street.

  “Where’s she going?” Rich said, when our food arrived.

  I forked off a corner of waffle. My dad made waffles. It was one of the few things he made. These were better. No they weren’t. His were.

  “I have no clue,” I said.

  “Ha-ha, you’re clueless.”

  Not funny, but he was right. She’d had a look all morning when we were getting ready, a worried but sly expression. It reminded me of her “pulling one over” face, but I’m usually involved in that, and this time I wasn’t.

  “I’m not sure we’ve ever been here before either,” I said. “I don’t remember this diner. She’s up to something.”

  “But whup?” His mouth was full.

  “I’ll be back,” I said, standing up. “Hold down the table.”

  In my head I heard a voice say Is it going to fly? but Rich wasn’t quick enough to say it. He just gawked at me, his fork halfway to his mouth. “Don’t leabe me here.”

  “Eat some of my waffle if you want. I’ll be right back.”

  He swallowed. “I can have your waffle? I could, you know. I’m super-hungry.”

  “I’m not. Leave me two bites.”

  Skulking along the road she’d disappeared on, I finally spotted her on the front step of a small, shingled house surrounded by hedges. I snuck behind the one nearest the door, heard the bell, and crouched to listen. Even before anyone answered, my brain came up with the name Ronald Innes. It fell on me like a ton of bricks that her former boss-slash-boyfriend must live there.

  That was why Harvey’s for breakfast. That was why the whole thing.

  A man appeared and squeaked open the screen door. He was about her age or a couple of years younger. I guess she expected him to recognize her, because she sort of presented herself on the step, not saying a word. He finally spoke.

  “Mickie!”

  He hugged her up the final step onto the porch and invited her to sit on the sunny bench. They started talking. I crept closer until I made out some words, then froze.

  “Honey, you should meet my husband.”

  It wasn’t my mom who said that.

  She laughed. “Yeah, sure, Ron. Listen, I was wondering, I’m in the area until tomorrow, and I thought maybe—”

  “Bob,” he called over his shoulder. There was no response. “Bobby!” he called louder, then added to my mother, “We’ve been married, gosh, almost two years.”

  I did not see that coming. Neither did Mom.

  “You’re… Ron, what?”

  A second man appeared in the doorway, half inside, half out. He had a sleepy smile on his face as if he’d just woken up. He stepped onto the porch and you could see he was wearing some really wild pajama pants and a T-shirt with a potbelly under it.

  “Bobby, this is Michelle Hicks. But call her Mickie, right, Mickie?”

  Mom said nothing, just sat there as the other guy put his hand out.

  “Bob Dunne,” he said. “Pleased to meet you, Mickie.”

  “Come in and have coffee with us,” Ron said. “Have you eaten?”

  Mom stood up and backed quietly down the steps. She wobbled. I almost burst from the bushes to catch her, but she managed to steady herself.

  “No,” she said, and I saw her stiff smile in profile now. “No, no. I don’t want to impose. I’m happy for you. Really! I didn’t know you were married. I was just in the area. My son is waiting for me. His friend. They’re waiting.…”

  “Bring them over,” said Ron.

  “Absolutely,” said Bob, more awake now. “I brew a good cuppa. I sure need some. Come on in.” He reached out his hand again, but she was already on the walk, half turned toward my hedge.

  “No. Thank you,” she said. “No. I’m so happy for you. I’ll send a gift.”

  “Call me!” Ron called out. “If you come up here again. Good to see you!”

  Her eyes were wide and dark as if she’d seen a horrible accident and wanted to unsee it. I scooted away through some backyards, then ran to be at the restaurant before her. When I walked in, I found Rich talking to a policeman.

  He saw me and pointed. “There he is. My friend.”

  Sucking up a breath, I trotted over. “Sorry,” I said. “I needed to ask my mom something. She’s just coming back from the car.”

  The cop started shaking his head when Mom hurried in, calling, “I’m so sorry, so sorry.” She was flushed and looking back and forth from me to Rich to gauge what we’d said to the policeman so she could try to slip into whatever the story was. She did great. “I’m so sorry,” she said for the third time, “it was just a few minutes, after all. I needed something from the car—”

  “People see things, you know,” the cop said. “They report them now.”

  “I know, Officer,” she said in her most regular voice. “They’re thirteen, both of them, and they knew I was just going to the car.”

  The cop nodded a bunch of times, doubtful, but he took a good look at us and finally bought the story. After talking with the grumpy waitress and the hostess, he left with a coffee to go. Mom paid without eating, and we were silently back on the road to the cottage, which, the moment we got inside, seemed so much smaller than before.

  Rich said he had to use the bathroom right away, so Mom and I sat outside the cottage. Because the sun was in and out, it was cold, but not bad. The lake was calm and gray and long.

  “I was just out taking a walk,” she said. “I had gas.”

  “It’s cheaper here,” I joked.

  “No. I meant—”

  “I know, and it’s way too much information,” I said.

  She’d probably hoped something might happen, some miracle during the weekend away from our crummy lives. Probably all the way up to his front door, she hoped it would. She was looking for a bailout, or a handout, or whatever, and thought of this guy, how he was once her boss and how she liked him and she felt a spark, but she found there wasn’t any spark, and was totally embarrassed. I would be. In shock, too.

  “To tell you the truth, I popped in to see an old friend from work,” she said finally. “Five minutes, that’s all. Police make such a fuss.”

  I played along. “Huh. A guy? And he moved up here?”

  “I knew he moved up here a couple or three years ago,” she said. “It’s not like we kept in touch or anything. Not like that.”

  No kidding you didn’t keep in touch.

  “So is that why we came up here, Mom?”

  “No! No. Not really.” Then she sighed and stopped pretending. “I don’t know what I was thinking, Jeffie. I wasn’t thinking, that’s all
. We were a little close, once, him and me. I thought we were. I was wrong, I just found out.” A pause. “The air is beautiful, isn’t it?”

  “Colder than home.”

  “The truth is… is…” She snorted, a sound between crying and laughing. “I went to see Ron. My old boss. He lives near there. But he’s married now. I had no idea.”

  I guess I could have been funny, joke about Ron and Bob, but what was funny? They got married. They seemed like okay guys. Cool little house. Besides, what was funny about how disappointed Mom was?

  “Sorry,” I said.

  “Oh, Jeff.” She breathed and I think the air filled her lungs so much, it pushed on the inside of her eyes, because when I looked her face was wet.

  “Hey, Mom, don’t. Rich will see.…”

  “Your grandfather…” She sniffed up. “Grandpa… he was… everything…”

  Why she mentioned him right then, I didn’t get at first. Then I remembered Daddy, oh, Daddy, and that Grandpa was probably the last decent man she knew. It sure wasn’t my dad. Grandpa’s face came to me, his old white face sunk into the pillow.

  “He was everything,” she said.

  “I know. You miss him a lot. Me too—”

  “I mean,” she said, “he was everything. So many things in his life. He was a roofer. He paved roads. He could do anything with tools. He put in our kitchen cabinets, did you know that? Your father wouldn’t. Couldn’t. Your father doesn’t know a two-by-four from a Phillips head. Worthless. Your grandfather was in the army in Alaska, did he ever tell you? Oh, you were too young. He was a radio operator, doing spy things.”

  “Get out. Really?”

  “It’s near Russia, so he had to. After that he hiked back from the army. It took him three months, living in the wild. He was in California for a year or two, where he dug graves in churchyards, then Texas. He never lived in the same place twice. Always moving. In Chicago he worked on trains, then trains in Baltimore. That’s where he met Mommy, where I was born. We moved to New York after that. All for trains. He loved them. Even after the railroad lawyers chiseled him at the end, he loved his trains, loved moving. Until he couldn’t move anymore.”

  “I never knew that. Graves, huh? Maybe I should go as him for Halloween.”

  She laughed. “You could use the long shovel from the garage. And wear some old clothes. I wonder what he’d think of us, of me, all this—” She stopped short. Her face wrinkled up. “I wish we came to the lake more when we were happy. You know?”

  “I know. The last time, remember? We came back and Grandpa was sick.…”

  She covered her face. “Oh, keep quiet and tell me what we’re going to do!”

  I could have made a joke of that, too, talking with my mouth closed. Instead I slid my arm over her shoulders like a man would. “Mom. We’ll figure it out. We’ll deal. We don’t need much. Practically nothing. Two rooms. We kind of proved that.”

  “Nothing but each other,” she said. “You’re my silver lining, right? A real blessing.”

  It didn’t sound great. In fact, it sounded weird and bad. But I nodded. “A team.”

  There was the sound of gravel behind us, and Rich was there. “I just pooped twice. I mean, I thought I was done, then I wasn’t.”

  “What is with the too much information today?” I said.

  “Sorry, I think I caught something. Maybe from the pancakes. They were a little runny in the middle.”

  I laughed. “Now you are.”

  “Mrs. Hicks, do you think we can go home soon? Like now? I think I’m sick.”

  I surprised myself by still having my arm on Mom’s shoulders in front of Rich. I felt her shoulders move when she nodded okay.

  “Sure, honey,” she said. “We’ll pack up. It’ll probably rain tonight anyway.”

  “Okay,” he said. “Sorry. I might have to go again before we leave. Oh, man.” He pushed back into the cottage, leaving the door open.

  I snorted. “Maybe we should have had doughnuts instead.”

  “Because that would have made all the difference,” she said with a sigh.

  Then she wiped her eyes, kissed my cheek, and we went into the cottage.

  CHAPTER 18

  THE KEY TO NOTHING MUCH

  The drive back was quiet. Rich tried to keep his insides inside and that took all his concentration. I hated, hated, that we were already on the way home, but a part of me knew this was better. It was a mistake to drive so far and still find us there. At least at home we knew who we were. We belonged at home. No surprises. No brats.

  When we finally got off the highway, it was afternoon, clouding up and getting dark. It would rain after all. Mom drove through town and happened to pass St. Catherine’s. The parking lot was empty. I thought about Mrs. Tracy, and I wondered what she’d said in class when I didn’t return. Rich told me she’d moved up to teaching eighth grade, so she had to have most of the same kids from last year. When she told them I wasn’t coming back, did she put on that serious face she used to when she made announcements? Or did nobody care I was gone? Why would they?

  A few more turns and we were on Rich’s street.

  “Not the great getaway you expected, huh?” I said when we pulled up in front of his house. “Cops and getting sick and all.”

  He shrugged. “Nah. The cottage was cool. Mom’ll laugh when I tell her I stayed in a pink house. Tom and the other guys, too. Courtney’s pretty friendly to me now, too—”

  My neck froze. “Don’t tell Tom about this. Don’t say anything to him. You hear me?”

  His eyes went wide. “Whoa. Okay, I won’t.”

  The door opened. It was his mother. She said something when I left Rich on his doorstep. By the time I was sorry for screwing up the last few seconds of the stupid weekend, the front door had closed behind me. I slumped back into the car.

  “What do you care about your old school people?” Mom whined.

  “What do you care if I care? And I don’t care—”

  “You’re not going back to those kids, and the quicker you understand that—”

  “Well, you’re not going back to your job at the hospital either, so why do you still drink with your nurse friends like you’re still there? I know that’s where you go at night. You taught me what I know. You taught me everything. Just drive. Go! I don’t want to talk.”

  That began a deadly silent slow-motion drive back to our house.

  Since the mention of my grandfather that morning, his waxy face kept floating into my mind, how his head weighed into his pillow, the words he’d said that made no sense back then.

  “Aww, Jeffie,” he told me, a string of saliva dangling from lip to lip. His teeth were brown. “It goes fast.”

  “What goes fast, Grandpa?”

  “And only in one direction,” he said.

  “What goes fast? A train? Your train?”

  It wasn’t a train, stupid. It was his life. My life. Our lives.

  It was actually the little money that Grandpa had saved before he died that got me into St. Catherine’s in the first place. Why I can’t stop thinking about that place, I don’t know, but it all connects. Grandpa helped me start going there, my father helped me stop going there, I liked a girl there, she hated me, I hated Tom Bender, Rich’s mother hated me, I loved my mother, she slapped my five-year-old cheek, it all connected.

  Somebody had said, This isn’t everything. I’m not stuck here, but what the heck did she know?

  Mom drove the streets without breathing a word. I think she was finally spent, which isn’t a joke or a metaphor. She was worn down. Dry. Empty. The meeting with Ron had sucked everything out of her. It also didn’t help that I was a royal jerk. I was empty, too, nothing inside but nothing.

  The sky was dark blue by the time we pulled into the driveway. When we hauled our bags up the walk, I noticed the lights I’d left on timers were out.

  And the house key didn’t work.

  CHAPTER 19

  MY HOUSE

  She
jiggled the key in the door, wagged it back and forth. “Oh, lord, no.”

  “You have it upside down.”

  “My house! I can’t get in my house.”

  “Turn the key around.”

  She coughed out the words. “It won’t work!”

  “Because you didn’t do it right!” I tore the key ring from her shaking fingers and tried the lock myself. The key went in but it didn’t turn. I jostled it around as dumbly as she had. I slipped it straight out and back in. The lock was dead. It wouldn’t give.

  “Mom, what the heck? Why won’t it work?”

  Without waiting for her to blubber up an answer, I took the key to the side door, then to the back. Same thing. By the time I was around front, streetlights were popping on up and down the street.

  “How are we supposed to have our stuff?” she said weirdly. “This is where we live! What’s happening to me?” She flung her head around as if someone would jump out of the bushes and yell, Surprise!

  Then she bent toward the front window to read some clue from inside. I did, too. There wasn’t any clue. The living room was empty like we’d left it, only black.

  “Let me try again!” She rubbed the key between her fingers, because a piece of lint would obviously prevent a brass key from working a brass lock.

  “Try the other doors,” she said.

  “I just did—”

  “Do it again!”

  This time I noticed the lock on the back door glinting in the light from another house. It was new. When I ran back to tell her this, she was stuttering into her phone.

  “Uh-huh? Yes. Yes!” There was rumbling at the other end. “You b-better be!” Her voice cracked and she hung up.

  “Who were you talking to?”

  “The landlord,” she said. “‘I’ll be right there. I’ll be right there,’ he says. Except he was surprised to hear from me. As if he didn’t expect me to call. What kind of fool is he? He’d better be here soon. That’s all I have to say.”