Rodeo snow, p.10
Rodeo Snow, page 10
It’s true I thought, as the bell rang and Mr. Mac collapsed in his chair. Paul Wellstone did want my opinion on Iraq. He wasn’t just being nice to a kid. My eyes started watering, and I had to force myself to stop hearing him say, “I want your vote, Gene.” I felt Lark looking at me as everybody left. It was like she knew this secret about me. Even though I didn’t tell her. I knew Paul Wellstone and somehow knowing him changed me.
“Mr. Mac was mental today.” I heard Derrick say as we crowded out the door. I stopped and stepped back inside because I didn’t want to be around Derrick Martin or anyone right then. Mr. Mac was standing at the board, scrubbing it with the eraser. But Paul Wellstone’s name wouldn’t come off. He’d accidentally written it in permanent marker.
The rest of my day at school was miserable. I felt wrung out, like I’d been crying even though I hadn’t let myself cry at all. It was almost a relief that Andy was ignoring me and was totally focused on Corinne. Then there was Lark, who seemed to be lurking around our shared locker whenever I needed to get something. At least I had my nonexistent love life to distract me.
What did Andy have that I didn’t have, I asked myself as I collapsed on the couch after school. I ate an entire bag of potato chips while Yellow stared up at me. Just good looks, bizarre creative genius, a totally weird secondhand wardrobe . . . Corinne—that was all. I’d never had a girlfriend and Andy was on his third one, fourth if you counted grade school. “You and I have a lot in common,” I told Yellow, tossed him a chip and watched him dive for it. “We’re both pathetic.”
I thought back to Corinne’s skating on Saturday. I wondered if I could have skated that well if I’d gotten my good skates back. I wondered if Corinne would ever watch me skate and feel like I did when I watched her: like this rush of adrenaline and desire was racing through my body. Dre Powell. I had to get a Dre Powell DVD and work on skating like him. That was when I decided to see Sister Jude and offer to finish whatever she thought was left on the fence to get my skates back. They were the only thing I had that Andy didn’t. Skating was the only thing that was mine. Corinne’s and mine.
It was deserted at the Stairs. No nuns or homeless people in sight. I went to the side door and walked the unlit hall to Sister Jude’s office. Her door was open but there was no light coming from it. I peered in anyway, and there was Sister Jude hunched over her desk writing away. “You should have a light on. You’ll hurt your eyes,” I said, realizing I sounded like my mom.
“The light hurts my eyes.” Sister Jude looked up from her papers. “Sit down, Eugene. I need to talk to you.”
I sat down, and she kept working like I wasn’t there. I looked around, trying to estimate the ratio of angels to martyrs on her shelves and walls. I squinted at a painting of a guy. St. Stephen, it said on a plastic label on the frame. He had blood dripping from arrows stuck all over his body. Cool but creepy. I wondered if anyone else other than maybe some guy at Marvel comics had such bizarre stuff on their walls. I went completely around the room trying to count. There was a lot of stuff everywhere. I had finally figured out that it was more or less tied: angels = martyrs, when she looked up from her desk surprised to still see me there.
“Eugene,” she said, “I just wanted to finish this one section of our budget. I guess I’m a little distracted these days.”
“That’s okay.” I realized as my eyes adjusted to the dim light, that she’d been crying. I sighed. I couldn’t stand being around all of these people who used to have it together and were falling apart. I wondered if Paul Wellstone had any idea how much everyone depended on him to make sure everything turned out all right. I wondered why his stupid plane had to crash anyway.
“You probably came for your skates.”
“Well, yeah.”
She took the picture of her with Paul Wellstone and the vets down from the shelf and looked at it with a faraway look that reminded me of how my mom looked at pictures of me and Lily when we were little. She put it in front of me. I realized that one of the vets, he was younger and heavier there, was Billy.
“Did you ever hear the story about Wellstone’s big mis-take?” she asked.
“Mistake?” As far as I knew, everybody acted like he was this perfect person whose only mistake was to get on that airplane.
“When he was first elected. He wanted to make a statement against the Iraq War.”
“They’ve been talking about it for that long?”
“Different Iraq War, honey. Desert Storm. Bush’s father’s war,” she explained.
“Wow.” I guess there were too many wars for me to keep track of.
“Anyway, he gave this big arrogant speech in front of the Vietnam Memorial. Offended everyone.”
“Paul Wellstone?”
“Yes, honey. Then do you know what he did after everyone made fun of him and his political career was going down the toilet?”
“Ran away?” That’s what I would have done.
She sighed like my answer made her even sadder. “He apologized.” Her eyes brightened like she was remembering something happy. “Not only that, but he became a voice for vets—the people he pissed off the most. He helped people like Billy because of his mistake.” She looked down at the picture. “Billy loved Paul Wellstone,” she said. “Did you know Paul had a brother who was mentally ill?”
“No.” I wondered why she was telling me all this.
“I hate apologizing.”
I shrugged. Of course she hated apologizing. She hated admitting she was wrong. It was like she expected everyone to pretend she was perfect or something just because she was a nun.
“I’m sorry, Eugene.” She looked uncomfortable. “I thought it was a good idea having one of the kids who wrecked Billy’s camp work with him. To get to know him as a person. To stop thinking of him as a freak.”
“I don’t think of Billy as a freak.” She was doing it again, assuming the worst about me. “Could I have my skates now?”
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you, honey.” She looked like a shrunken, uncertain version of herself. “Your skates are gone, and Billy’s gone too. I think he took them.”
“He took them?”
She fumbled around in her desk drawer, pulled out some crumpled bills and handed them to me. “I’m sorry that’s all I’ve got—but I want you to have something. You did good work.”
“No thanks.” I tried to hand the money back. It was just a few dollars, nothing that would help replace a pair of $300 skates. Besides, I couldn’t take food out of the mouths of homeless people or cigarettes away from Sister Jude. “I need my skates,” I told her.
“Keep it,” she ordered, turning back into the Sister Jude I was used to.
I kept the money wadded in my fist. “I need my skates,” I repeated. “Why would Billy take my skates?”
“I don’t know. I’m not sure why Billy does anything.”
“I didn’t do anything to him.”
“He’s going through one of his bad periods. And I was distracted by everything and didn’t notice he’d stopped taking his medication.” She looked like she might cry again.
“My skates,” I said. “I need my skates.” Then I got really pathetic. “I love my skates.”
“I know that, honey,” Sister Jude said. “I think Billy knew that too. Maybe that’s why he took them.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“He didn’t used to be like this.” She blinked at me like all of the sudden she’d figured out how to once again make me useful. “You know, honey, he may try to reach you, or maybe he expects you to find him. You need to let me know if you hear from him. I need to get his medicine to him. I need to know he’s okay.”
“Yeah,” I said, because I didn’t know what else to tell her. I almost wished we had blown him up that night with the fireworks. All he’d done since then was to try to ruin my life. Then I felt guilty because for some reason Sister Jude cared what happened to him. But I figured that was her job.
I stood up. “Well, I gotta go.”
“You’ll let me know if you hear from him? It’s important, Eugene, very important.” She wouldn’t let this go, which annoyed me because it seemed like she cared more about that old bum Billy than about me and my skates.
“Yeah,” I said. And she turned back to her work, ignoring me again.
While she wasn’t looking, I took the wad of money and dropped it on her desk. The picture of the vets and Paul Wellstone looked back at me. I’d missed that one in my count. Was he an angel or a martyr, I wondered. Martyr, I decided. The martyrs won.
The Wellstone Memorial service was scheduled on the same night as Dad’s birthday. “You’re not going, are you?” I asked at supper a few days before, thinking how I didn’t want to miss his birthday dinner and cake.
“Of course I’m going,” Dad said. “We’re all going. It’s what I want for my birthday.”
“Can’t we just watch it on TV?”
“Gene, I invited your friend to go with us,” Mom said.
“What friend?” I asked, wondering what friend of mine would accept an invitation to go with my weird family to a memorial service.
“Lark.”
Chapter 12: Memorial
The doorbell rang.
“Gene, get the door,” Mom ordered, walking out of the room with Lily tagging along behind her.
“Why can’t you get it?” I complained, not moving from the couch.
“The timer just rang for Dad’s cake,” Mom said from the kitchen. Even though we were going to the memorial service that night at least she was baking a cake for Dad’s birthday.
“Lily can get it.” I didn’t move. Maybe if I stalled long enough the person who we knew was waiting would give up.
“Gene!”
I groaned, dragged myself to the door, then opened it.
Lark stood there dressed completely in black. She was wearing tight black jeans, a black T-shirt, black boots. The only thing that wasn’t black was her bright red lipstick. She smiled at me like she knew she looked good.
I didn’t smile back.
“Gotta get my skates,” I muttered, disappearing up the stairs, leaving her standing there.
If I skated to the memorial service, I could escape my family and Lark who were planning to walk there. Then I could look for Billy. I knew he’d be there. He was so into being one of Paul Wellstone’s vets. I’d skate him down and get my Shimas back. I had to get my skates back.
When I clomped down the stairs in my skates, my whole family was standing there looking disgusted with me. Lark looked embarrassed.
“You’re not wearing those to the service,” Mom said.
“I’ve got my shoes in my pack.”
She just shook her head, not saying anything because what she really wanted to do was lecture me about being nice to my imaginary friend Lark.
“Happy Birthday,” Lark said to Dad as we headed out. I ended up behind her and her tight jeans. She really did look good.
“I brought you this small gift.”
“Thanks.” Dad took this fancy little wrapped box from her and raised his eyebrows like he was worried it was jewelry.
“Open it! Open it!” Lily demanded.
“We have to get going,” Dad said.
“Take it with you,” Lark suggested. “You won’t regret it.”
We walked out the door as Dad opened the present and Lily said, “Chocolate!”
“Belgian chocolate,” Lark said. “The best chocolate in the world.”
I snorted.
“Belgian chocolate is the best chocolate in the world,” Dad, the know-it-all, informed me. “Thank you, Lark. I don’t have to share, do I?”
“You’d better,” Mom said. “Or we’ll steal it.”
He passed around the box and we each took one. We’d almost made it to the river and I hadn’t skated ahead yet. “What do you think, Gene?” Dad asked, as the most intense best chocolate I’d ever had in my life melted in my mouth. Lark looked at me like my answer would determine the entire future of our nonexistent relationship.
“Almost as good as a Kit Kat bar.”
“What?” Dad had a fit. “Why did I waste the best chocolate in the world on him?” He threw up his arms in fake agony.
“Gene’s lying,” Lily said. “This is really, really good,” she told Lark. “Look. He’s smiling.”
I tried not to smile, but it was pretty darn good. I noticed we’d reached the river and there I was still hanging out with Lark and my family. I looked over at her. She was smiling her red-lipped smile. She was sneaky, that Lark.
“This makes up for leaving the cake,” Mom said. I could tell she was feeling guilty about Dad not having much of a birthday celebration. She didn’t have to worry. This would be one birthday we’d always remember. The river was uncoiling next to us like a big lazy snake. It felt like we were on an adventure, not going to a funeral.
“M-I-S-S-I-S-S-I-P-P-I,” Lily spelled.
“Wait until I tell my parents I walked tonight by the Mississippi River,” Lark said. For her we lived in this magic place with a famous river down the road.
Mom took a deep breath. “I love the smell along the river this time of year. It smells like fall, like a big pile of leaves.”
“It smells like chocolate,” Lily said. “Is there any left?”
“Later, Lil,” Dad told her. “You’re supposed to savor it.”
We were all quiet as we savored the big muddy slug of water unwinding by our side and the crunch of leaves as we walked through them. We headed up toward the U to the memorial service. It was in Williams Arena where the Gophers basketball team usually played. I skated ahead but had to turn back. There were people everywhere. I realized I could lose my family in a second.
“Wow,” Lark said, reminding me of when she saw the crowd at the peace rally. She must have thought all we did was gather in crowds. Which was all we did at that point.
We got in a line that went around the block, but moved pretty fast into the building. I scrambled to exchange my skates for the shoes in my pack. Nobody checked my pack. They just handed me a program and a Wellstone green button that had one of his slogans on it: “Stand up / Keep Fighting.”
“Security’s not very tight.” Dad glanced at my backpack.
“I think they have other things on their minds,” Mom said.
I’d just noticed a group of guys there who had signs that said they were vets. I checked them out but they seemed to have better personal hygiene than Billy. If he was there, he was probably lurking in the shadows. Thousands of people filed into the auditorium. Looking for Billy was like looking at a page of Where’s Waldo.
We had good seats in the volunteer section, thanks to my parents. Mom and Lily sat on either side of Lark. Lark gave me this look, like I was supposed to butt in and do something about it. I just shrugged and sat at the end of the row next to my dad.
“Who is that man?” Lark pointed to this black guy in a suit walking around the main floor shaking hands with everybody and dazzling them with his smile. “Is he a movie star?”
“No, he just thinks he is,” Dad said. “That’s Jesse Jackson.”
“When he ran for president, Paul ran his Minnesota campaign. The Rainbow Coalition,” Mom explained.
“Oh, I’ve heard of him,” Lark said. “He, how do you say it, oozes with the charisma.” Just then Jesse Jackson looked up in our direction, grinned and waved. “Oooh,” Lark said and all the females around us, including Lily, started sighing over this guy like they just couldn’t help themselves.
“Oozes is about right,” Dad said snidely to me. In anticipation of Dad’s entertaining play by play, I congratulated myself on getting the best seat assignment.
By the time the service started, I’d given up looking for Billy. It was just too big of a crowd and I didn’t see a lot of Billy types. Most of the people there seemed to have taken a bath lately. They showed all these famous people making their entrances on big screens hanging over the stage. When Bill Clinton, yeah, the Bill Clinton who used to be president, came on screen smiling down on everyone, Dad laughed and said really loud to me over the noise of the crowd, “I can’t believe they’re playing “Love Train”—now that guy really oozes with the charisma.” When the couple of Republicans who dared to come showed up on the screen everybody booed. Everybody but us. Dad started to boo, but Mom elbowed him and leaned over to glare at me. I knew she was right but she wasn’t very fun.
There was all this music which was really good, especially the gospel stuff. This folk singer, Ann Reed sang this song about heroes, which made Dad get tears in his eyes. It was weird, I’d never thought of my dad having a hero. I thought that when you were an adult you were supposed to be one.
Each person who died in the plane crash had someone who talked about them. My favorite was the brother of this guy Will, who drove Paul Wellstone’s car. He told a story about how Will’s car had tinted windows so no one could see in. How Paul Wellstone would jump up and down and wave, trying to get the attention of anybody in traffic who had a Wellstone bumper sticker, and he couldn’t understand why everyone ignored him. Will, of course, was having too good of a time watching him make a fool of himself to tell him. This cracked me up but it also made me feel sad all of the sudden. I guess deep down I wanted to be one of those guys who worked for Paul Wellstone. How could I have missed him so much when I hardly knew him? It was like I missed taking for granted that he’d be there for me. That he’d be in my future.
I finally had to get up to go to the bathroom. I couldn’t believe how long this thing was lasting. Lark, who had probably been watching my every move, followed me. “I need to freshen up,” she said, like she was some ancient rich lady. I noticed her lips were kind of faded.
