I leaned against the side of the motor home, not realizing until I heard the sobbing that I was right beneath the bedroom window. I could hear every sound from within clearly. Uncle Palaver's sobs became louder. /Ye got to go to him, I thought. Something terrible is happening.
I charged toward the front door, opening it quickly and stepping into the motor home, Then I hurried down to the bedroom door and listened. He was still sobbing, but it was softer. I knocked,
"Uncle Palaver, are you all right?"
"What are you doing?" I heard, and spun around.
Uncle Palaver was sitting at the wheel, drinking from his bottle. I looked at him and then at the door and then back to him.
"You'd better go to sleep," he said. "We have another big day tomorrow."
He turned away and stared out the window.
I could still hear what surely was his sobbing coming from the bedroom.
Why did he want that to go on? Didn't he hear it, too? He just sat there, drinking and staring out the window at the darkness. I felt my nerve endings crackling and stepped into the bathroom.
Afterward.
I
climbed into my bunk, but trying to catch sleep made me feel like one of those greyhound dogs on a dog racetrack trying to catch the mechanical rabbit. Around and around I went, exhausting myself, but not falling asleep.
Finally, a good hour or so later. I felt fatigue settle into me like water soaking in a sponge. Uncle Palaver was still sipping his bourbon and looking out the window below me.
Before I fell asleep. I sobbed silently myself.
Being
,
on the road wasn't as adventurous and wonderful as I had expected.
It was just a different journey through a maze of disappointments and sadness.
Everyone, after all, was chasing that unattainable rabbit.
I was tired and achy the next day. The bunk was cramped and uncomfortable for me because I had tossed and turned all night, apparently. I went through the same breakfast illusion with Uncle Palaver. He made the oatmeal and took it to Destiny in the bedroom. I drank more coffee and found I was too hungry to eat just my plain eggs. I ravished the Danish that was still there.
Just as before. Uncle Palaver seemed to have no hangover from his night of continuous drinking. He took out the Destiny doll in the afternoon, and he and I practiced with the transmitter until he was satisfied I could perform the tricks well enough for him to entrust it to me.
I had a chance to look at the life-size puppet more closely, and I was impressed with the detailed attention to her face, right down to a small birthmark right under her lower lip. Why would that have mattered? Who could possibly see such a thing from the audience? Uncle Palaver was able to have the doll in a standing position as well as sitting, and for the first time. I wondered if some of the publicity shots and posters pictures he had sent us weren't taken of him and the doll and not the real Destiny.
I avoided going to the theater and confronting Russell for as long as I could, but when it was time for the performance. I had to accompany Uncle Palaver. Russell was there backstage. He didn't say anything to me. He just smiled, wagged his finger, and walked off to give someone orders. I breathed a sigh of relief. At least he wasn't going to say anything to Uncle Palaver.
He ran through the same performance, only at the end, with me now activating the doll, he made a far more dramatic exit. Heads turned in surprised when he charged up the aisle and out the front door, slamming it behind him. He glanced surreptitiously at me as he flew by, but everyone's attention was centered on him, and then, in confusion, they turned to the doll. He had made a point of my counting to at least sixty. The audience actually began to stir restlessly. I could see it in their faces. They were all wondering what was going on. How long were they supposed to sit there? When would he return?
Then I pressed the first button. and Destiny came to life. To me, the applause that followed seemed louder and more vigorous than the applause the night before. Uncle Palaver returned and walked down the aisle bowing. He smiled my way, and I knew I had done well.
Afterward, as we were packing up. Russell approached from behind me and whispered, "I saw what you two did. Sneaky." He laughed at my surprise. "Stay cool," he said. "Maybe when you return, if you return, you'll be more experienced."
In what? I thought. Destroying myself? No, thank you. Russell Blackman,
We got everything settled in the motor home. and Uncle Palaver decided he wanted to get under way as soon as possible.
"You did real good. April, real good," he told me. "I might start thinking of other ways to bring you into the show."
"Really? I'd love that." I told him, and decided I would get my weight down so I could fit into that silver-sequined suit soon.
He went to his cabinet and took out his bottle of bourbon. After a quick swig, he said he was going to drive most of the night. He saw my eyes go to the bottle of whiskey.
"Don't you worry about it. I don't drink much when I drive. Just one to get me calm is enough."
We had a number of performances on the schedule that would take us to Northern California, eventually reaching the Napa Valley area by late spring. The distances between venues were not great, but he said he liked to have time to relax before a show. I went to bed and let the movement of the motor home rock me to sleep. Sometime before morning, I woke and realized he had parked the motor home in another supermarket parking lot. I saw the light was still on in the living room and could just make out the bottle on the table and his legs on the sofa. The bottle looked nearly empty.
How long before I had arrived had he been drinking like this? I wondered. How long could he continue to drink so much every night? I was afraid to be critical of anything, but when I woke up again and saw him hovering over a cup of coffee, I wondered aloud if he were suffering from a hangover.
He laughed. "Naw, never do. I don't drink that much," he said. "Just enough to take the edge off. Don't worry yourself. I'm fine."
Nevertheless, before we left the area the next day, he made sure to buy himself six more bottles of bourbon and store them in the closet. During the days, he taught me some of his tricks, especially the simpler sleight-of-hand ones such as the self-tying
handkerchief, the cut and restored string, the coin through an elbow, and something he called the Houdini Rubber Band Escape, which made it look as if he caused a rubber band to jump magically from his forefinger and index finger to the last two on his hand, and then he showed me the vanishing knot trick using a handkerchief. Finally, he showed me how to do one he had performed often at our house, delighting even Daddy. It was called the Unbreakable Match. He would put a wooden match into a handkerchief, ask me or Daddy to break it, and after we had, he pronounced some gibberish, and, voila, the match was whole again. The secret to this was simply to have two wooden matches, one concealed in the hem of the handkerchief.
These weren't tricks he used onstage, but he explained that from time to time, he performed at conventions or was part of a group of entertainers hired for elaborate parties. The tricks, as old and as simple as they were, were still favorites, he said.
It took me a while to get them all, but they were just illusions and, eventually, easy for me to do. I had mixed emotions about it as he showed me the secrets or the techniques. When I was little. I loved believing in magic and in Uncle Palaver's powers. Now that he was revealing that it was all fake in one way or another. I felt disappointment slipping in under my sense of accomplishment.
In the end, there was no magic, no real wondrous events after all. Everything was simply an illusion. Uncle Palaver was falling off the pedestal on which I had placed him. One part of me clung to the idea that he was still exceptional. He had a talent for performing all the illusions well, and that was something of an accomplishment, but another part of me, perhaps the dreamer, the child in me, suddenly saw him as a phony, a liar, a deceiver. It was all false, untrue. I suppose the closest comparison I could make was when I, or any child, suddenly realized Santa Claus was a fiction.
"You'd better watch yourself. You'd better not shout," was no longer a viable warning. Gifts were just gifts. Wishes didn't really matter. Yet, ironically perhaps, when we became older and were parents, all of us would tell our own children the same stories, the same fantasies. Somehow, inside us, we knew that. for a while at least, it was precious and important to believe in fairy tales.
Watching Uncle Palaver drink himself to sleep every night, knowing the secret behind every illusion he performed on the stage, pushing the transmitter buttons, and fooling the audience myself into believing something wondrous had just occurred gradually hardened and saddened me I gazed into the faces of the various audiences we faced night after night on the road. Grown-ups and children alike were so desperate to believe, to escape from the world in which they were living. I could almost hear them thinking.
Please, do something to help me believe there is more than this, so I can go home tonight dreaming and remembering my childhood faiths.
In a true sense. Uncle Palaver was able to do that for them.
April, respect and admire him for that,
I thought and urged my inner self. However, there was another voice, bitter, laughing, angry, warning me to open my eves and stop fooling myself.
The journey you're on has an end, too,
this voice said,
and one day, you have to look. into the mirror and see who you really are and realize
-
what you're really doing with your life. This isn't the medicine
-
wheel, and it isn't the wheel of fortune, April. It's just a wheel. You're only going in circles and getting nowhere.
At one of our stops, I sent Brenda a letter with the address Uncle Palaver had given me for her to send whatever she was supposed to send me. Things were forwarded from there to our stops in advance. The second check that arrived had a letter with it. I had been on the road with Uncle Palaver for months now. I had lost some weight and had tried on the sequin suit. Celia had been right about one thing: my body was developing rapidly, almost as if it had just remembered it should. The suit fit. but I didn't like the way my thighs still bulged. so I decided to keep it in the closet for a while longer and wait before accompanying Uncle Palaver onstage to hand him tricks or crawl into that magic box.
The letter from Brenda was short but left me feeling sad for her. I went up into my bunk and just looked at her handwriting on the envelope. Finally. I had the nerve to open and read it.
.
Dear April,
Enclosed is a check for your month's
allowance. I have arranged with Mr. Weiss, our attorney, to have these checks forwarded directly from his office from now on. The reason is, I have decided to drop out of college. I know you will be shocked about it, but I'm not giving up sports. I'm turning professional sooner than I expected, and I've decided I can always return to college to finish my degree when I want or need to do that.
I especially would like to avoid seeing Celia these days. She has found someone new, and it seems I can't avoid running into them all the time. It not like me to run from anyone or anything, and I'm not. I've just decided I'm happier on a court floor than a classroom floor
.
for now.
And you were right about this house. To come home to it and be alone in it is very depressing. At times, I find myself envying you. Maybe you did make the right decision. Who knows?
Sometimes, I just sit and think about all that has happened to us so quickly. It seems like a dream. The other day, I saw a father and his young children playing basketball in their driveway, and I thought about Daddy and those days when he and I were at it with such fury. We exhausted each other, but somehow, afterward, I felt closer to him than ever. It was lust a look in his eyes that to me was better than a kiss.
Anyway, watch for me on the sports pages. The next win is for you.
Brenda
.
It was nearly a full minute before I realized I
was crying. The tears were streaming dawn my cheeks and dripping off my chin. I put the letter back into the envelope and then put it under my pillow. I would read it often, because when I did. I could hear her voice clearly in my head, and it was as
if
we were still living together, still sisters. A part of me longed for that life, regardless of how unhappy I had been and how far I had fled.
In spite of what I had always fantasized about Uncle Palaver's life, it became patently clear to me that he, just like people who were settled in one place, followed a daily and often monotonous routine. He often did most of the driving during the night but always seemed to pull aver before morning so he could sit and drink or go back to the bedroom and replay the conversations tapes he had made with Destiny. Of course. I knew these were fictitious conversations. Her voice was his voice projected through the doll. Whether they were from memories of actual conversations or not. I did not know. Regardless of what I had anticipated and hoped, he did not volunteer information about Destiny and him.
I tried through subtle questions to find out more. "When did you meet her?" I asked, and he
simply replied. "Sometime ago."
"Where?" I followed, and he said. "At one of
my performances."
"What brought you two together?"
"It was magic," he replied. "Simply magic." He would then take on a dark, cold look, as if
he had somehow sunk deeper into his own body. He
didn't reply to any additional questions, and the look
on his face frightened me enough to drop the subject.
After a while, he would snap out of his reverie and
talk about the next town, the next audience. He spent his days practicing his illusions and
thinking up new ones.
"The good thing about being on the road," he
told me. "is that for each audience, your show is
brand-new. I either don't return for some time--
years, in fact-- or it's for the first time. That way,
everything is a real surprise."
I asked him about his cruise trips and
performances, and he did talk at length about them,
the places he had visited and the friends he had made. "But these are temporary friendships," he
added, "The ship moves on after you disembark, and unless you get back on that ship soon afterward, the
names and faces dissipate like smoke in a short time." It occurred to me that he really didn't have any
close friends. When I asked him about it, he nodded
and admitted that was one terrible disadvantage to
being on the road and being a performer.
"The only people I stay in contact with these
days are my booking agent, my lawyer, my
accountant, and some theater owners I know and will
see from time to time. I don't really speak to anyone
from my past. Destiny," he said. "She's the closest
person to me now, now that your mother is gone." "You have me. too. Uncle Palaver," I reminded
him, and he smiled.
"Yes. I have you, too. But you can't stay with
me forever and ever. April. After this performing
season, you have to think about your own future.
College maybe. huh?"
"Maybe," I said.
Even the idea of thinking about a future
frightened me. What would I do? Where would I go?
Why couldn't I do this forever?
As time passed. I realized Uncle Palaver was
drinking more and more. His complexion took on a
pale yellow glow, and he was not eating well, either. Even though his face was gaunt, his stomach seemed to swell. He complained about his pants not fitting him, as if it were the fault of his pants and not his fault. but I noticed his arms and legs were swelling as well. For hours during the days now, he would retreat to the bedroom and sleep beside his Destiny. I would peer in and see him lying there, his arm embracing the
doll.
Once, I was embarrassed and shocked to
discover him totally naked beside it. It actually
frightened me more than shocked me. I closed the
door as quickly as I could and made up my mind
never to spy on him again. For his part, he didn't
appear to notice or care about my observations. He
talked about Destiny's illness as though it had just
recently been diagnosed, and he always retreated to
his lecture about people who loved each other
standing by each other through thick and thin. If he
realized he was living in an illusion, he drowned the
realization in his drinking. For him, it seemed to be
the answer.
One day, however, he drank a little too close to
a performance. For the first time since I had joined
him, he fumbled and messed up an illusion so badly
the audience actually gasped. He got hold of himself and completed the performance. but I could see the
theater owner looking at him suspiciously afterward. I thought about warning him, talking to him
about the drinking, but every time I started the
discussion, he grew tight-lipped and slightly angry. I
was sure that if I nagged him about it, he would surely
choose the whiskey over me and ask me to go home. I
even considered hiding his whiskey in the hopes he'd
forget and think he had run out of it, but despite his
stupor, he always was quite aware of what was going
on around him. It was troubling. but I didn't know
what to do.
And then, one night, after he had brought the
doll back to the motor home and placed it in the
bedroom, an idea occurred to me. It was a little
frightening even to consider doing it. I was worried
about his reaction. He could easily think I was teasing
or mocking him, and it would surely make him very
angry at me. It could be the cause of his asking me to
leave, but witnessing his continuous degeneration was
enough to give me the courage and the reason to do it. We were sitting in the living room having a
light lunch and watching television. He had messed up
one of his tricks again the night before but had
recovered before the audience realized it. Of course. I knew immediately. It put him off his rhythm, and he actually cut the performance short. going to our finish ten or fifteen minutes before he was scheduled to do so. I didn't say anything about it to him, but the theater manager asked him if everything was all right. I heard him say, "You seemed a little distracted
tonight."
Uncle Palaver assured him he was fine and
blamed any loss of rhythm on his introduction of a
new trick. Of course, there was nothing that new in
the act. and I could see the manager knew it. too.
He's
going to lose bookings,
I thought. It was inevitable. My voice was actually trembling when I began,
but I was determined to try. "When you were at the
supermarket this morning. I heard Destiny call for
you." I said, and he turned to me slowly, a smile
freezing on his face.
"What?"
"I was sure I had heard her. so
I
went to the
bedroom to see what she wanted, and we had a nice
talk about you."
"What kind of talk? What are you talking about.
April?" he demanded.
My heart thumped, and my breath caught in my
throat. but I gathered strength and determination and continued. "She said she was worried about you, warned you were worrying too much about her and
because of that maybe drinking a little too much." He stared at me. I held my breath. Would he
scream, shout, tell me to leave?
"Aw," he said, waving his hand. "She worries
too much. I'll speak to her. She's always picking on
that. I know when too much is too much." he said
firmly.
I hoped I had put something in his mind.
though. If he believed Destiny wanted him to cut
down, he might do it.
He continued to eat and watch television and
then suddenly stopped chewing and turned sharply to
me. I held my breath again.
"Don't you go counting my drinks and telling
her anything," he warned.
"I won't. She knows what she knows herself." I
said.
He considered my answer, nodded, and
returned to watching television.
My risky idea didn't have much of an effect on
him. however. If anything. I thought his drinking got
worse. I kept track by the number of bottles he drank
and bought and saw it was increasing. Then I noticed
something even more frightening.
First. I thought it was just some ketchup stain or
tomato sauce, but soon I realized he was spitting up
blood occasionally. I saw it on tissues. and I saw it on
his cloth handkerchief. He did his best to hide it from
me, even though I had taken on the responsibility of
doing our laundry. We had a small washing machine
in the motor home, but often we took the time to stop
at a Laundromat and do a larger washing.
The second thing I noticed that put alarm in me
was his trembling. I watched him practicing his
sleight-of-hand tricks one afternoon and saw that he
was dropping things, confusing things. His hands
were trembling. The only way he seemed to be able to
stop it was to take another drink. It was developing
into a mad, destructive cycle, and I was standing by
watching helplessly.
Once, when I saw he had put half a bottle of
bourbon back into the closet. I took advantage of an
opportunity when he was out and emptied half of that,
filling it with water back to where it was. I held my
breath when he drank from it. He didn't seem to notice
anything at first, but then he just drank it all faster and
went to a new bottle.
Perhaps worrying about him was a reason for my losing weight even faster, but one day. I suddenly noticed I looked taller and thinner. I tried on the sequin suit and saw it fit much better and actually looked flattering. Perhaps if I told him I was ready to join him onstage, he would change his behavior. I thought. When he stepped back into the motor home. I
was still dressed in the suit and showed him how it fit. Instead of making him happy and encouraged,
he grew sad before my eyes.
"Seeing that costume brings back some happy
memories, some happy lost memories," he said, and
went to the bedroom.
Ironically, what I had hoped would bring him
out of the darkness had simply driven him down
deeper into it. That night, he didn't even start our
drive. He went right to his drinking. He was asleep on
the sofa when I woke in the morning, his bottles
emptied. I woke him, but he stumbled into the
bathroom. where I heard him vomit, Later, I found he
had spit up more blood. When he came out, he went
directly to the bedroom and closed the door. I realized we were not going to make it to our
next show if we didn't start out immediately. I pleaded
with him to come out and start the drive, but all I
heard was some sobbing and muffled speech.
I
had watched him drive the motor home enough to know how to do it and decided to start us on our way myself. I was nervous. A few times. I annoyed some drivers behind us. but I managed to get us onto the right highways and move us along far enough so that when he did come out, we were within striking distance of the next theater. He was surprised, and he wasn't as angry as I'd imagined he might be. He blamed himself and told me Destiny had chastised him. He claimed he was making a promise to both of
us to reform himself.
Somehow, despite his condition and despite his
fumbling and tired, weary appearance, he managed to
get through the show. When we returned to the motor
home, he did not, as was his habit, immediately begin
to drink. He said he would drive a little and get some
sleep. I made him something to eat, a scrambled egg
sandwich, and he ate and drank some coffee. Feeling
hopeful. I went to sleep myself. Perhaps this near
professional disaster indeed had woken him up to
what was happening. I thought.
However, when I rose in the morning. I found
him like always, sprawled on the sofa, his arms
twisted and his leg dangling, the emptied bottle of
whiskey on the table. We had one hundred seventyfive miles or so to drive, which wasn't all that much
considering show time, but he was just as incapable of
driving this day as he had been the day before. Once
again, he went into the bathroom and vomited.
Afterward, he stumbled back to the bedroom. I cried to myself and waited, hoping he would
rise, shower, dress, and drive, hoping he would
somehow restore himself as he had miraculously done
before. When he didn't come out. I reluctantly went to
the driver's seat and started up the vehicle, hoping the
sound of the engine and the movement of the motor
home would raise him and bring him to his senses, but
he didn't emerge from the bedroom.
I was following the map we had but realized
about a half hour into the trip that I had missed an
important turn and had actually gone a good forty
miles out of our way. I pulled the van over and
studied the map, searching for the best way to repair
the itinerary. It meant taking a side road through what
looked like farmland and the beginning of the
vineyards. The road wasn't as wide as the main one,
and the macadam was broken and full of areas where
rain had washed out sections. The motor home
bounced so much at times that I was sure he would
emerge to see what was happening, but he didn't. I drove as slowly as I could, but the time was worrying me. If I got lost again or broke down, he would be
enraged for sure.
I came to another crossroad and pulled over to
study the map more closely and be sure I'd made the
right decision. As it turned out. I hadn't. The road I
chose was even worse than the road I had been on,
and after ten miles. I saw a sign that indicated it was
not a through road. Panic seized me, and I stopped.
There was no place nearby to turn around. I was afraid
that if I attempted a broken U-turn. I might get the
motor home stuck in what looked like a soft road
shoulder.
It's no use, I thought. I have to wake him and
tell hire What's happened. I left the engine running
and went back to the bedroom door, knocking and
calling to him. He did not respond. I knocked harder
and listened. It was silent. He wasn't even playing his
tapes. I tried the doorknob but found the door was
locked.
"Uncle Palaver, please wake up. I'm afraid
we're lost," I called, waited, listened, and knocked so
hard I was really pounding.
Still, there was no response.
I turned and twisted the doorknob and pushed and rapped on the door. Finally, the tiny lock that held it shut gave way, and the door flew open, with me stumbling awkwardly forward and into the room.
I
caught myself on the edge of the bed and looked at Uncle Palaver lying with his leg twisted over the Destiny doll, his eyes slightly opened, a stream of dried blood streaking down his chin from the corner
of his mouth.
His fingers were locked on the transmitter we
used in the show, and the doll's head was moving
slightly from side to side as if it were saying, No, no,
no.
I screamed, but he did not awaken.
Panic submerged me in a pool of ice. For a few
moments. I couldn't move, couldn't get my arms or
legs to do anything. Then I reached out to shake him.
His body shook, but his eyes didn't change. They were
so glassy they resembled the Destiny doll's eyes.
Slowly. I brought my fingers to his face. When I felt
the coldness in his skin, it was as if I had swallowed a
ball of fire that immediately exploded around my
heart.
"Uncle Palaver!" I shouted.
And then I did the strangest thing I thought
possible. I actually turned to the Destiny doll, as if I believed it could somehow help me. The head