White People

  He said there was one couch in it, plus a butane stove but no electric lights. The key stayed under three bricks in the weeds. He said, ‘A boy needs a place to go.’ I said, ‘Thanks,’—Then he asked about Mom and the others. I lied: how they were busy baking stuff to bring him, how they’d be out soon, a carful of pies. He made a face and asked which of my sisters had driven me here.

  I said, ‘Biked it.’ Well, he stared at me. ‘Not nine miles and on a Saturday. No. I’ve earned this, but you shouldn’t have to.’ He started crying then. It was hard, with the wire between us. Then, you might not believe this, Dave, but a black guard comes over and says, ‘No crying.’ I didn’t know they could do that—boss you like that—but in jail I guess they can do anything they please. Thing is, Granddad stopped. He told me, ‘I’ll make this up to you, Barker. Some of them say you’re not exactly college material, Bark, but we know better. You’re the best damn one. But, listen, hey, you walk that bike home, you hear me? Concentrate on what I’m saying. It’ll be dark by the time you get back to town but it’s worth it. Walk, hear me?’ I said I would. I left and went outside. My bike was missing. I figured that some convict’s kid had taken it. A poor kid deserved it more than me. Mom would buy me another one. I walked.”

  BARKER SAT STILL for a minute and a half. “What else?” I asked. “You sure?” He turned my way. I nodded. He took a breath.

  “WELL, I hung out in my new cabin a lot. It was just two blocks from the busiest service station in town but it seemed way off by itself. Nobody used the fairgrounds except during October and the County Fair. You could smell pine straw. At night, cars parked for three and four hours. Up one pine tree, a bra was tied—real old and gray now—a joke to everybody but maybe the girl that’d lost it. Out there, pine straw was all litterbugged with used rubbers. I thought they were some kind of white snail or clam or something. I knew they were yucky, I just didn’t know how they were yucky.

  I’d go into my house and I’d feel grown. I bought me some birds at the old mall with my own money. Two finches. I’d always wanted some Oriental type of birds. I got our dead parakeet’s cage, a white one, and I put them in there. They couldn’t sing, they just looked good. One was red and the other one was yellow, or one was yellow and one was red, I forget. I bought these seed balls and one pink plastic bird type of toy they could peck at. After school, I’d go sit on my man-sized sofa, with my birdcage nearby, finches all nervous, hopping, constant, me reading my comics—I’d never felt so good, Dave. I knew why my granddad liked it there—no phones, nobody asking him for favors. He’d take long naps on the couch. He’d make himself a cup of tea. He probably paced around the three empty rooms—not empty really: full of cobwebs and these coils of wire.

  I called my finches Huey and Dewey. I loved my Donald Duck comics. I kept all my funny-books in alphabetical order in the closet across from my brown sofa. Well, I had everything I needed, a couch, comics, cups of hot tea. I hated tea but I made about five cups a day because Granddad had bought so many bags in advance and I did like holding a hot mug while I read. So one day I’m sitting there curled up with a new comic—comics are never as good the second time, you know everything that’s next—so I’m sitting there happy and I hear my back door slam wide open. Grownups.

  Pronto, I duck into my comics closet, yank the door shut except for just one crack. First I hoped it’d be Granddad and his bust-out gang from the state pen. I didn’t believe it, just hoped, you know.

  In walks this young service-station guy from our busy Sunoco place, corner of Sycamore and Bolton. I heard him say, ‘Oh yeah, I use this place sometimes. Owner’s away a while.’ The mechanic wore a khaki uniform that zipped up its front. ‘Look, birds,’ a woman’s voice. He stared around. ‘I guess somebody else is onto Robby’s hideaway. Don’t sweat it.’ He heaved right down onto my couch, onto my new comic, his legs apart. He stared—mean-looking—at somebody else in the room with us. Robby had a reputation. He was about twenty-two, twice my age then—he seemed pretty old. Girls from my class used to hang around the Coke machine at Sunoco just so they could watch him, arm-deep up under motors. He’d scratch himself a lot. He had a real reputation. Robby was a redhead, almost a blond. His cloth outfit had so much oil soaked in, it looked to be leather. All day he’d been in sunshine or up underneath leaky cars and his big round arms were brown and greasy like … cooked food. Well, he kicked off his left loafer. It hit my door and about gave me a heart attack. It did. Then—he was flashing somebody a double-dare kind of look. Robby yanked down his suit’s big zipper maybe four inches, showing more tanned chest. The zipper made a chewing sound.

  I sat on the floor in the dark. My head tipped back against a hundred comics. I was gulping, all eyes, arms wrapped around my knees like going off the high-dive in a cannonball.

  When the woman sat beside him, I couldn’t believe this. You could of knocked me over with one of Huey or Dewey’s feathers. See, she was my best friend’s momma. I decided, No, must be her identical twin sister (a bad one) visiting from out of town. This lady led Methodist Youth Choir. Don’t laugh but she’d been my Cub Scout den mother. She was about ten years older than Robby, plump and prettyish but real real scared-looking.

  He says, ‘So, you kind of interested, hunh? You sure been giving old Rob some right serious looks for about a year now, ain’t it? I was wondering how many lube jobs one Buick could take, lady.’

  She studies her handbag, says, ‘Don’t call me Lady. My name’s Anne. Anne with an E.’ She added this like to make fun of herself for being here. I wanted to help her. She kept extra still, knees together, holding onto her purse for dear life, not daring to look around. I heard my birds fluttering, worried. I thought: If Robby opens this door, I am dead.

  ‘Anne with a E, huh? An-nie? Like Li’l Orphan. Well, Sandy’s here, Annie. Sandy’s been wanting to get you off by yourself. You ready for your big red dog Sandy?’

  ‘I didn’t think you’d talk like that,’ she said.

  I wanted to bust out of my comics closet and save her. One time on a Cub Scout field trip to New York City, the other boys laughed because I thought the Empire State Building was called something else. I said I couldn’t wait to see the Entire State Building. Well, they sure ragged me. I tried to make them see how it was big and all. I tried to make them see the logic. She said she understood how I’d got that. She said it was right ‘Original.’ We took the elevator. I tried to make up for it by eating nine hot dogs on a dare. Then I looked off the edge. That didn’t help. I got super-sick, Dave. The other mothers said I’d brought it on myself. But she was so nice, she said that being sick was nobody’s fault. Mrs…. the lady, she wet her blue hankie at a water fountain and held it to my head and told me not to look. She got me a postcard so, when I got down to the ground, I could study what I’d almost seen. Now, with her in trouble in my own shack, I felt like I should rescue her. She was saying, ‘I don’t know what I expected you to talk like, Robby. But not like this, not cheap, please.’

  Then he grinned, he howled like a dog. She laughed anyway. Huey and Dewey went wild in their cage. Robby held both his hands limp in front of him and panted like a regular hound. Then he asked her to help him with his zipper. She wouldn’t. Well then, Robby got mad, said, ‘It’s my lunch hour. You ain’t a customer here, lady. It’s your husband’s silver-gray Electra parked out back. You brought me here.—You’ve got yourself into this. You been giving me the look for about a year. I been a gentleman so far. Nobody’s forcing you. It ain’t a accident you’re here with me.—But, hey, you can leave. Get out. Go on.’

  She sighed but stayed put, sitting there like in a waiting room. Not looking, kneecaps locked together, handbag propped on her knees. Her fingers clutched that bag like her whole life was in it. ‘Give me that.’ He snatched the purse, and swatting her hands away, opened it. He prodded around, pulled out a tube of lipstick, said, ‘Annie, sit still.’ She did. She seemed as upset as she was interested. I told myself, She could leave. I stayed in
the dark. So much was happening in a half-inch stripe of sunshine. The lady didn’t move. Robby put red on her mouth—past her mouth, too much of it. She said, ‘Please, Robby.’ ‘ “Sandy,” ’ he told her. ‘You Annie, me Sandy Dog. Annie Girl, Sandy Boy. Sandy show Annie.’ He made low growling sounds. ‘Please,’ she tried but her mouth was stretched from how he kept painting it. ‘I’m not sure,’ the lady said. ‘I wanted to know you better, yes. But now I don’t feel … sure.’ ‘You will, Annie Mae. Open your Little Orphan shirt.’ She didn’t understand him. ‘ “Blouse” then, fancy pants, open your “Blouse,” lady.’ She did it but so slow. ‘Well,’ she said. ‘I don’t know about you, Robby. I really don’t.’ But she took her shirt off anyhow.

  My den mother was shivering in a bra, arms crossed over her. First his black hands pushed each arm down, studying her. Then Robby pulled at his zipper so his whole chest showed. He put the lipstick in her hand and showed her how to draw circles on the tops of his—you know, on his nipples. Then he took the tube and made X’s over the dots she’d drawn. They both looked down at his chest. I didn’t understand. It seemed like a kind of target practice. Next he snapped her bra up over her collarbones and he lipsticked hers. Next he threw the tube across the room against my door—but, since his shoe hit, this didn’t surprise me so much. Robby howled like a real dog. My poor finches were just chirping and flying against their cage, excited by animal noises. She was shaking her head. ‘You’d think a person such as myself … I’m having serious second thoughts here, Robert, really … I’m just not too convinced … that … that we …’

  Then Robby got up and stood in front of her, back to me. His hairdo was long on top, the way boys wore theirs then. He lashed it side to side, kept his hands, knuckles down, on his hips. Mrs…. the lady must have been helping him with the zipper. I heard it slide. I only guessed what they were starting to do. I’d been told about all this. But, too, I’d been told, say about the Eiffel Tower (we called it the Eye-ful). I no more expected to have this happening on my brown couch than I thought the Eye-ful would come in and then the Entire State Building would come in and they’d hop onto one another and start … rubbing … girders, or something.

  I wondered how Bobby had forced the lady to. I felt I should holler, ‘Methodist Youth Choir!’ I’d remind her who she really was around town. But I knew it’d be way worse for her—getting caught. I had never given this adult stuff much thought before. I sure did now. Since, I haven’t thought about too much else for long. Robby made worse doggy yips. He was a genius at acting like a dog. I watched him get down on all fours in front of the lady—he snouted clear up under her skirt, his whole noggin under cloth. Robby made rooting and barking noises—pig, then dog, then dog and pig mixed. It was funny but too scary to laugh at.

  He asked her to call him Big Sandy. She did. ‘Big Sandy,’ she said. Robby explained he had something to tell his Orphan gal but only in dog talk. ‘What?’ she asked. He said it, part-talking part-gargling, his mouth all up under her white legs. She hooked one thigh over his shoulder. One of her shoes fell off. The other—when her toes curled up, then let loose—would snap, snap, snap.

  I watched her eyes roll back then focus. She seemed to squint clear into my hiding place. She acted drowsy then completely scared awake—like at a horror movie in the worst part—then she’d doze off, then go dead, perk up overly alive, then half dead, then eyes all out like being electrocuted. It was something. She was leader of the whole Methodist Youth Choir. Her voice got bossy and husky, a leader’s voice. She went, ‘This is wrong, Robby. You’re so low, Bobert. You are a sick dog, we’ll get in deep trouble, Momma’s Sandy. Hungry Sandy, thirsty Sandy. Oh—not that, not there. Oh Jesus Sandy God. You won’t tell. How can we. I’ve never. What are we doing in this shack? Whose shack? We’re just too … It’s not me here. I’m not like this.’

  He tore off her panties and threw them at the birdcage. (Later I found silky britches on top of the cage, Huey and Dewey going ga-ga, thinking it was a pink cloud from heaven.) I watched grown-ups do everything fast then easy, back to front, speeding up. They slowed down and seemed to be feeling sorry, but I figured this was just to make it all last longer. I never heard such human noises. Not out of people free from jail or the state nuthouse. I mean, I’d heard boys make car sounds, ‘Uh-dunn. Uh-dunn.’ But this was like Noah’s ark or every zoo and out of two white people’s mouths. Both mouths were lipsticked ear to ear. They didn’t look nasty but pink as babies. It was wrestling. They never got all the way undressed—I saw things hooking them. Was like watching grown-ups playing, making stuff up the way kids’ll say, “You be this and I’ll be that.’ They seemed friskier and younger, nicer. I didn’t know how to join in. If I’d opened my door and smiled, they would have perished and then broke my neck. I didn’t join in but I sure was dying to.

  By the end, her pale Sunday suit had black grease handprints on the bottom and up around her neck and shoulders. Wet places stained both people where babies get stained. They’d turned halfway back into babies. They fell against each other, huffing like they’d forgot how grown-ups sit up straight. I mashed one hand over my mouth to keep from crying or panting, laughing out loud. The more they acted like slobbery babies, the older I felt, watching.

  First she sobbed. He laughed, and then she laughed at how she’d cried. She said, ‘What’s come over me, Sandy?’

  ‘Sandy has.’ He stroked her neck. ‘And Annie’s all over Sandy dog.’ He showed her. He blew across her forehead, cooling her off.

  She made him promise not to tell. He said he wouldn’t snitch if she’d meet him and his best buddy someplace else. ‘Oh no. No way.’ She pulled on her blouse and buttoned it. ‘That wasn’t part of our agreement, Robert.’

  ‘ “Agreement”?’ I like that. My lawyers didn’t exactly talk to your lawyers about no agreement. Show me your contract, Annie with a E.’ then he dives off the couch and is up under her skirt again. You could see that he liked it even better than the service station. She laughed, she pressed cloth down over his whole working head. Her legs went straight. She could hear him snuffling down up under there. Then Robby hollered, he yodeled right up into Mrs…. up into the lady.

  They sort of made up.

  After adults finally limped from sight and even after car doors slammed, I waited—sure they’d come back. I finally sneaked over and picked the pants off my birds’ roof. What a mess my couch was! I sat right down on such wet spots as they’d each left. The room smelled like nothing I’d ever smelled before. Too, it smelled like everything I’d ever smelled before but all in one room. Birds still went crazy from the zoo sounds and such tussling. In my own quiet way, Dave, I was going pretty crazy too.

  After that I saw Robby at the station, him winking at everything that moved, making wet sly clicking sounds with his mouth. Whenever I bent over to put air into my new bike’s tires, I’d look anywhere except Robby. But he noticed how nervous I acted and he got to teasing me. He’d sneak up behind and put the toe of his loafer against the seat of my jeans. Lord, I jumped. He liked that. He was some tease, that Robby, flashing his hair around like Lash LaRue. He’d crouch over my Schwinn. The air nozzle in my hand would sound like it was eating the tire. Robby’d say, real low and slimy, ‘How you like your air, regular or hi-test, slick?’ He’d made certain remarks, ‘Cat got your tongue, Too-Pretty-By-Half?’ He didn’t know what I’d seen but he could smell me remembering.—I dreaded him. Of course, Dave, Sunoco was not the only station in town. I worried Robby might force me into my house and down onto the couch. —I thought, ‘But he couldn’t do anything to me. I’m only eleven. Plus, I’m a boy.’ But next, I made pictures in my head, and I knew better. There were ways, I bet …

  I stayed clear of the cabin. I didn’t know why. I’d been stuck not nine feet from everything they did. I was scared of getting trapped again. I wanted to just live in that closet, drink tea, eat M & M’s, praying they’d come back.—Was about six days later I remembered: my birds were alon
e in the shack. They needed water and feeding every other day. I’d let them down. I worried about finches, out there by their lonesomes. But pretty soon it’d been over a week, ten days, twelve. The longer you stay away from certain things, the harder it is, breaking through to do them right. I told myself, ‘Huey and Dewey are total goners now.’ I kept clear of finding them, stiff—feet up on the bottom of the cage. I had dreams.

  I saw my den mother uptown running a church bake sale to help hungry Koreans. She was ordering everybody around like she usually did, charming enough to get away with it. I thought I’d feel super-ashamed to ever see her again. Instead I rushed right up. I chatted too much, too loud. I wanted to show that I forgave her. Of course, she didn’t know I’d seen her do all such stuff with greasy Robby. She just kept looking at me, part-gloating part-fretting. She handed me a raisin cupcake, free. We gave each other a long look. We partly smiled.

  After two and a half weeks, I knew my finches were way past dead. I didn’t understand why I’d done it. I’d been too lazy or spooked to bike out and do my duty. I belonged in prison—Finch Murderer. Finally I pedaled my bike in that direction. One day, you have to. The shack looked smaller, the paint peeled worse. I found the key under three bricks, unlocked, held my breath. I didn’t hear one sound from the front room, no hop, no cheep. Their cage hung from a hook on the wall and, to see into it, I had to stand up on my couch. Millet seed ground between my bare feet and the cushions. Birds had pecked clear through the back of their plastic food dish. It’d been shoved from the inside out, it’d skidded to a far corner of the room. My finches had slipped out their dish’s slot. Birds were gone—flown up a chimney or through one pane of busted window glass. Maybe they’d waited a week. When I didn’t show up and treat them right, birds broke out. They were now in pinewoods nearby. I wondered if they’d known all along that they could leave, if they’d only stayed because I fed them and was okay company.