Aunt Janet gasped. Lance and Polly giggled.
Herbert swallowed hard and flushed bright red. “Control yourself, Helen—”
Helen threw her fork and it landed in the middle of Herbert’s plate, then skittered off into his lap, bringing lasagna with it. “He wants to be a big man but he’s not. He’s a little man with lots of snot. Hooked fat nose, loose jiggling bottom. Fingers like worms, a dick like cotton.”
“You crazy bitch—” Herbert started.
Oh, now, that was it for Grandpa. He grabbed Herbert under his shoulders, yanked him out of his seat, and dragged him to the front door, his feet barely touching the ground as he cursed and squirmed. We heard fighting outside, then Grandpa came in, by himself, and sat down. He bent his head, crossed his hands, and prayed. We crossed our hands and bent our heads, too. Grandpa’s prayer was, “Lord, help me to control myself around the Devil’s henchman. Amen.”
Grandma flicked back her white curls and said, “Lord, please do Your work as You see fit with an evil person who is short and who was sitting at my table a second ago. Perhaps he needs to meet You face-to-face soon. Just a suggestion. In Your son’s name I pray.”
Ten minutes later we heard Herbert honking the horn of his car. In a flash, Aunt Janet was up, flustered, hurriedly gathering up her things, tripping on her feet.
Lance cried, “We’re in trouble now!”
Polly whimpered, “Help me! Now we’re going to get it. Help!”
They all popped up, pushing back their chairs, in the middle of dinner. Lance’s chair tumbled over. Polly ran into the couch. I was aghast. No one left Grandma’s table in the middle of dinner!
Grandpa stood up. “You all stay right here. I’ll take care of this.”
Grandpa shut the front door of our Schoolhouse House and all of us scrambled to the window and peeked outside through the lace curtains. I thought Grandpa was going to talk sense into Herbert, who was sitting in the car, horn on full blast. He didn’t. Grandpa had something in his hand, a tool of some sort, and he used it to pry open the hood of the Cadillac, then reached under it.
Within a second the honking stopped. Grandpa slammed the hood back down and marched back up the steps, the porch light illuminating his angry expression. He threw the tool onto the porch.
When he came inside he sat down, calm and quiet, and said, “Please, Janet, Lance, and Polly, enjoy your lasagna. You will not be leaving at this time.”
Aunt Janet sunk down into her chair. Helen reached across the table, grabbed Aunt Janet’s hand, and said, “Get rid of that snake. If he was my snake, I’d cut his head off.”
Grandma patted Aunt Janet’s shoulder. “This situation can be remedied. I have already prayed about it, and God told me to tell you to divorce him. He said you will be much happier without him. I heard it loud and clear.”
Lance’s and Polly’s mouths dropped to huge O’s.
Aunt Janet hung her head, chin to buttoned-down blouse. Herbert made her dress so frumpy.
“Glory, this is delicious,” Grandpa said, smoothing over the awkward moment. “You are the best cook this side of the Mississippi.” He took another bite. “No, I’m wrong. You are the best cook on both sides of the Mississippi.”
Grandpa had another bite of lasagna. “Rats. I’m wrong a second time. You, Glory sweetie, are the best cook on both sides of the Mississippi, the entire North American continent, and in all of Europe, including Turkey. A country called Turkey,” Grandpa mused. “How come we don’t have a country called French Fries? We have a country called Chile. We need a country called Chocolate Milkshake.”
Polly giggled.
Grandma laughed, a curl falling into her face.
Lance grinned.
Even Aunt Janet smiled.
About twenty minutes later we heard Herbert pounding up the steps.
He bellowed for Aunt Janet and the kids to come outside right that damn minute and get in the damn car.
“Janet, Lance, and Polly, you are to stay right here,” Grandpa said as he opened the front door and stepped out. We all, even Helen, scrambled to the windows to see the action and got there in time to see Herbert punch Grandpa in the face.
Grandpa’s face didn’t even move, that’s how solid my grandpa was. But then Grandpa’s fist came up and Herbert went flying off the porch, landing on his buttocks.
That’s when Helen took charge. “I’m going to take care of that snake. He makes me booger mad.” She gave Aunt Janet a kiss on the lips and a hug, then stuffed three napkins into her bra and darted out through the kitchen door to the garage. About one minute later we saw Helen skipping from the garage, her pink tutu bopping about over her green silky dress.
She was carrying an ax.
We all scrambled out to the front porch.
When Herbert saw that ax, he got behind his Cadillac and shrieked, “Albert, get your crazy daughter away from me.”
Well, now, Grandpa apparently had no inclination to do so. As we watched the scenario unfold, he said, “Glory, I would get out there and try to control our daughter, but I am so full of your delicious lasagna, I cannot move. Might give me indigestion.” He patted his stomach.
Helen released a long, pitched Tarzan cry.
And Grandma said, “I understand, sweetheart.” She wrapped an arm around his waist. “The cheese was very heavy tonight. Oh, my goodness, I can barely move myself.”
Helen pointed the ax toward the sky with one hand and stuck her middle finger up at Herbert with the other. She yelled, “An ax and a booger and a bottom-faced man, I’ll cut you up and dump you in a can.”
“Here, I’ll call Helen back into the house.” Grandma cleared her throat once, twice, then whispered, “Helen, please come back inside, dear.”
Helen started swinging that ax around her head in a circular motion.
“You think of everything, Glory,” Grandpa said. “I’ll help you out.” He sighed, then whispered, “All right, fun’s over. Come on in, Helen.”
Helen shrieked, “I’m going to cut off your stick, snake!”
Aunt Janet and Polly and Lance were gaping, but after a second they started laughing, trying to muffle the sound with their hands over their mouths as Helen chased Herbert. I laughed, but I didn’t bother to cover my mouth. I cheered, “Go, Helen! Get the snake! Hiss hiss!”
Helen stopped running for a mere second, turned toward all of us out on the porch, and bowed, quite elegantly, tutu bopping. She continued chasing Herbert around his Cadillac, and when she couldn’t catch up, she smashed the ax into the hood of the car.
Herbert shouted in protest, and she sang, hitting a high C, “Snake, snake, slimy snake, I’ll cut off your head and make a cake!”
She swung the ax onto the trunk.
Herbert screamed and swore.
Grandpa stroked his stomach. “Still too full to move.”
“Cakes are good, cakes are bad, I’ll use your balls and not my dad’s,” Helen trilled out. She broke the front windshield. “Sugar, salt, and flour, I’ll have you chopped up within an hour.”
Herbert swore.
Grandma whispered, “I think we’re done, Helen. How about some pie?”
“You can say luck.” Helen’s soprano dipped into the soft darkness of the night. “You can say muck. You can say duck, but you can’t say fuck.” She brought the ax down on a door. “You fucker. You’re bad to my Janet.”
This went on for quite a while.
I was so entertained. “Good work with the rhymes, Momma!”
Aunt Janet giggled.
“Do you think she’ll kill him?” Lance asked.
“Maybe,” Polly said. Neither seemed concerned.
“It’s cherry pie, Helen,” Grandma whispered.
Eventually Herbert escaped into his car, screaming obscenities, and took off.
He went straight to the police.
Grandpa called Uncle Peter, the chief.
The chief arrested Herbert for assault against Grandpa.
Th
at night, me, Polly, and Lance listened against the closed door of the den while Grandpa and Grandma told Aunt Janet to divorce Herbert. I heard the same arguments. Something about a man named Victor…. Herbert would declare her “unfit”…. Her alcohol problems…He would take the kids…. She had to protect them from him….
In the middle of it Helen walked in and declared, “Get rid of that snake! He poops the devil.”
For the next two weeks, Aunt Janet, Lance, and Polly were at our house. We all spent time with Sunshine. Polly, especially, loved Sunshine, loved holding her. We called her “our baby.”
At first they were nervous, all of them, jittery and unsmiling, as if they couldn’t get Herbert’s terrible aura off.
But then they let go of it, and we played in the stream, in the barn, on the property. We went to church, we made cookies, and we hung out with The Family.
When Herbert came back to get Aunt Janet, me and Polly and Lance had become blood brother and sisters.
I never forgot it.
Neither did they.
And, against my grandpa’s and grandma’s advice, Aunt Janet went back to Herbert, taking Lance and Polly with her, both crying.
We were careful with Sunshine around Helen. The baby’s crying sometimes made Helen run from the house. “Too noisy. A siren.” Her size made her nervous. “Too small,” she said. “She’ll break.” Her smell at times was not favorable, either. “Something is bad in that thing. A rotten egg or a skunk.” And the kicker: “They sent Trash Heap to watch me. I think she took my coat.”
She watched the baby from afar. Sometimes she’d wiggle her fingers in the air at Sunshine, her face intense, worried, confused. And sometimes Helen would wave at her. That was truly sad, Helen standing ten feet away and waving at her own child. When I saw her blowing Sunshine kisses as she lay in Grandma’s arms one time, but not coming near to hold her or hug her, I had to run outside to the garden and bury my head in my knees and cry by the carrots.
Even then, I got it. A mother, so whacked out by disease that she couldn’t have a relationship with her own child, was waving at her. “Hello, Trash Heap,” she called softly. “Hello, Trash Heap.” And then, “I don’t like you. You need to go home. Punk said bye. Get out. Good-bye.”
One fine day, when Grandma, me, Helen, and baby Sunshine were in the grocery store, Helen decided there were microphones in the bread loaves.
“Honey, there’s no microphones,” Grandma said. She put a calming hand on Helen’s arm. Helen was wearing her black rubber farm boots with the chicken wire and a trench coat over a lacy red negligee. On the way into the store she’d opened up her coat as if she was flashing people and sauntered on in, hips swaying.
“Yes, there are microphones,” Helen whispered. She had refused to button the trench coat. “They’re spying on me. They’re here to watch me. It’s a cushintong.”
“No, honey, they’re not spying. There’s no cushintong. It’s bread. Now, come on over with me and Stevie and let’s get a doughnut. You love doughnuts. Do you want a chocolate doughnut or a white sprinkled?”
But Helen was not to be dissuaded. Grandma had done up her blond hair into a bun and she ripped that bun down, her blond waves falling to her shoulders. She lunged for the shelves and started climbing them. Grandma reached for her and grabbed her around the waist. I grabbed at her boots. “Helen, come on, honey, let’s go have a delicious doughnut.”
“Momma, get down, please, please,” I begged her. I was so embarrassed. I saw one of my friends, a girl named Heather who lived on the next farm, staring at Helen, her eyes wide. “Momma, there’s no microphones.”
Helen kicked at me and Grandma until Grandma had to let go, and she scrambled to the top shelf in the bread aisle. Once there, she started throwing the bread off, then lay on her stomach, reached down to the second shelf, and started throwing the bread off there, too, despite our begging her not to. When all the bread was on the ground, she lay on the top shelf and covered her eyes with her arms. “I need my helmet! Get me my helmet! They’re trying to read my mind with the microphones.”
“Helen, I have your helmet at home. We’ll go home and get it lickety-split,” Grandma said, her face and voice calm. The helmet Helen wore was Grandpa’s when he was a football star at Ashville High School.
“You can come down, Momma. Here. You can wear my ribbon over your head until we get home. It’s okay, Momma, it’s okay. Please come down.” I glanced down the aisle. Heather was gone. Heather’s mother was friends with Grandma. Maybe she’d pulled Heather away to spare Grandma.
“I don’t want a ribbon. You’ll use it against my neck. Did you get my doughnut? Is that girl kid getting a doughnut?” Helen asked, pointing at me. “If she gets one, I get one.”
“You’ll get a doughnut—”
“First I’ll get my helmet on, then we’ll get a doughnut.”
“Helen, that’s right. Now, come on down.”
“No. Helmet first.” She punctuated her desire with a piercing, high C.
By this time several employees, including the manager, Stan Blackhawk, were there. Stan’s brother was one of the executives at Grandpa’s company. He was Native American and wore his hair in a long ponytail, as Stan did.
“Hello, Glory,” he said to Grandma, nodding to Helen on the top shelf, her arms covering her face. “Hello, Helen. Hello, Stevie.” He smiled at Sunshine in the stroller.
“Hello, Stan,” Grandma said, turning to shake his hand. “Oh, and hello, boys!” She smiled warmly. The two young men standing next to Stan were former students of Grandma’s.
They both grinned and hugged her. They all greeted me with cheerful hellos, and wasn’t I getting taller. I sure resembled my Grandma’s family line. Isn’t that dimple cute?
Well, you would have thought we were at the town picnic then. Grandma chatted, at length, with Stan and the young men. I heard about their mothers. One was having problems with her bladder; the other one was having problems with toenail fungus and had had a fight with her sister, Scootie. They still weren’t speaking.
Then she talked to Stan. Stan’s wife, Camille, was well. They had six kids and another was on the way. This one was clearly a “whoops” child, but he was happy about it. “The wife is not happy about being pregnant while having hot flashes, though.”
So they all chatted, and other people stopped on by and saw Helen lying on the top shelf, now singing, “We’re off to see the wizard.” They waved at her, ignored all the loaves of bread on the floor, and joined the conversation. Jackie Klind (a doctor in town) had discovered the greatest cure for warts, and she had fixed up two of the neighbors’ kids recently. Could Grandma come and help settle a dispute between the Phillipses and Montezes? They were having trouble with cattle crossing each other’s property and Jeremiah was threatening to shoot. How about that Fourth of July parade coming up, wouldn’t that be fun? Wasn’t it sad that Pho and Julie had broken up? Julie was heartbroken, hadn’t left her home for six days. Six days!
About an hour later Grandma decided it was time for us to move along. Helen had sung a number of songs, and you could believe you were listening to the radio, her voice was so haunting and lovely. But then Helen started making up her own love song and inserting swear words. It was something like, “Tulips and daffodils and bridges over blue streams, sunny days and raindrops and cartwheeling in the park, my heart is breaking…. my heart is so sad…. my heart is fuuucckkkkeed uppppp, it is so fuuuuccckkkked upppp…”
Grandma did not appreciate swear words. “Sugar, come on down, now. I’m hungry. Let’s get those doughnuts.”
“Not unless I can get a helmet,” Helen said, stopping her song abruptly. “I’m not coming down. It’s dangerous. I need to smother Command Center. Punk, too. He’s back. Red eyes.”
Well, we all thought on that, and then Derek, one of the young men, decided he would run home and get his football helmet, and he did and he brought it back and he climbed up to the top shelf and helped Helen get it on. She h
ad to move her foil hat around a little bit, but then we were all set.
She sat up, fiddled with the helmet, declared, “I’ve got some control now,” and came on down. Everyone said hello, Helen said hello back and, “I’ve got some songs in me.” She sang another show tune. We clapped at the end. Mr. Tsong cried. His late wife loved that song.
“Now, Stan, you be sure to charge me for this mess.”
To which Stan said, “I wouldn’t think of it, Glory. Not a chance. We’ll clean this ol’ place up in a jiffy.” And all our friends grabbed some bread and it was cleaned up in a jiffy. Then Grandma took Helen’s arm, took her leave of everyone with an I can’t believe how big you boys are and thanks, Stan, say hello to Camille for me, and it was lovely to chat with you, Barb and Chris and Sandy and hug hug hug, and off we went after they told me how pretty I was and growing so tall. Wasn’t that dimple cute?
We got the doughnuts, which Helen licked, and our groceries.
The checker was a friend of Helen’s from first grade.
“Hello, Helen,” she said. “How are you?”
“Shut up,” she said. “You can’t convince me to give up my brain.”
Danka nodded. “Okay, Helen. I won’t even try.” She didn’t say another word.
Helen did not want to take off the helmet for a week. She even insisted on showering with it on. Grandma and Grandpa did not fight this because the helmet did, indeed, seem to be helping. Maybe it muted the voices. Maybe it simply made Helen feel safer or more protected. Maybe she needed the weight on her head. Who knew?
What soon became clear, though, is how much she did not like Sunshine.
When Sunshine was about a year old, Grandma found Helen leaning over her crib one morning in the bedroom we shared, growling at her. A couple of months later, Helen put a sheet over Sunshine’s whole body when she was sleeping and told us, “Trash Heap is gone now.”