Johnny Angel (9 page)

And once they got home, she gave him milk and cookies. Johnny had gone upstairs, back to his room, to put away his jacket. And a few minutes later, Bobby rushed upstairs, and Alice stayed in the kitchen to slice some vegetables for dinner. She had promised to make Charlotte's favorite dinner, of southern fried chicken, and mashed potatoes, with the zucchini fritters she loved.

Charlotte came home late that afternoon, and she went outside almost immediately to shoot some baskets, just as Johnny had done at her age, and after a while Alice was chilly, and went upstairs to get a sweater. She could hear sounds coming from Bobby's room. He was playing one of his talking tapes that she had bought for him, to inspire him, but the program had never worked. It had been a nice thought though. She poked her head into the room and blew him a kiss, and she saw Johnny sitting on the window seat, watching Bobby and saying nothing. And Alice winked at him, before going back downstairs to the kitchen. She had almost finished making dinner when Johnny came back downstairs and looked longingly at a plate of cookies. But no matter how normal he looked to her, he could not eat them. There were some things he didn't do, and few he missed as much as her cookies and apple pie.

“Is Bobby okay?” she asked, looking distracted, as she put the last touches on the zucchini fritters.

“He's fine,” Johnny said matter-of-factly, as he hopped up on one of the kitchen counters. He was swinging his feet just the way Bobby would have. “He sees me,” he said, and then waited for his mother's reaction to what he'd said.

“Who sees you?” she asked, putting something back in the refrigerator, and taking something else out.

“Bobby,” Johnny said, and then grinned as she came out of the refrigerator in rapid reverse, and stared at him.

“How do you know?”

“I can tell. Besides, he touched me,” he said as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

“You let him? See you, I mean? Are you supposed to do that?”

“I don't know. I didn't think anyone could except you, Mom. But he does.” He looked happy about it.

“Did you scare him?” she asked, looking worried.

“Of course not. Why would he be scared of me? Did he look scared to you when you walked into the room a few minutes ago?”

“No, he didn't.” At least he couldn't tell anyone. Maybe that was why “they” had let Bobby see him too. “What did you tell him?”

“That I came back for a visit, and I can't stay. But I'll be here for a little while, pretty much what I told you. It's the truth. He was happy to see me. God, I love him, Mom.” Johnny had always been wonderful with him. He had been thirteen the summer Jim had had the accident with him, and Johnny had been devastated when he thought Bobby wouldn't survive. And forever after, he had been his great defender. “I talked to him for a long time about wanting to come to see him because I never said good-bye.” Alice's eyes filled with tears as she listened, and then she smiled at the son she loved so much. She loved all her children, but she knew more than ever now how much she loved this one.

“It must have been you I heard when I went upstairs. I thought it was one of the tapes I bought him. You'd better watch out that Charlie and Dad don't hear you talking to him.” If they could. He nodded then, as Bobby wandered into the kitchen. And he grinned broadly when he saw Johnny with his mom.

“This is pretty exciting, Bobby, isn't it?” she said softly, and he nodded, looking from one to the other. “But we can't tell anyone,” not that he could have, or would have anyway. But it touched her heart to see that his eyes were dancing. “Do you suppose the whole family will get to see you eventually?” Alice asked Johnny. “We all missed you. Dad and Charlotte did too.”

“Maybe they don't need to see me as badly as you two.” But the truth was he didn't know the reason. He would have given anything if Becky could see him too, and she missed him desperately, but it was obvious she couldn't see him. “I don't know how this thing works, or why, Mom. It just does. We have to accept it. The rules are pretty stringent. I'm not supposed to scare anyone, make trouble for anyone, or complicate anyone's life. I'm here to fix things, that's all.”

“Like what?” She was still curious about it, and Bobby was listening intently.

“I don't know yet. Just ‘things.’ You know, like you fixing dinner,” he teased her, and she grinned at him, just as they heard Jim's car pull into the driveway. She glanced out the window to make sure it was him, and she could see Charlotte still shooting baskets outside. And much to her chagrin, Alice saw Jim walk right past Charlotte. She glanced at her father, and the two never exchanged a word. Alice turned back to her sons, and Johnny hopped off the kitchen counter, took Bobby's hand, led him out of the kitchen, and up the stairs just as their father walked in. And an instant later, Alice heard them close the door to Bobby's bedroom. Jim had already opened the refrigerator and helped himself to a beer, and she thought he looked exhausted.

“Hard day, dear?” she asked.

“No worse than usual,” he said, as she took their dinner out of the oven. “How was yours?” he asked, without much interest. He seemed particularly distracted, and not in the mood to talk.

“Fine. Uneventful.” She almost said, “I was just talking to the boys when you drove in,” but of course she couldn't. Instead, she signaled to Charlotte outside, and ran upstairs to get Bobby. He and Johnny were sitting on the floor of his room, and she spoke to them in a whisper, turning first to her elder son. “Okay, time for you to go play, sweetheart. Bobby has to come down to dinner now.”

“I could come too.” Johnny looked a little hurt to be left out, even if he couldn't eat. “No one will see me, Mom.”

“Bobby and I will, and what if we do something to give it away?” This was more than a little odd.

“Then everyone will think you're both crazy.” Johnny laughed at her, and Bobby smiled one of his rare, wide smiles. With Johnny near at hand, he suddenly seemed far more expansive, and happier than he had been in months. “Okay, I'll go see Becky. I'll come home after dinner.” It was just like having him alive again, ricocheting between the two houses. And he had a lot more time to spend with them, without school or work, or any obvious obligations. Whatever he had come here to “fix” was obviously not a full-time job. He was spending a lot of time with his mother and Bobby, and hanging around Becky. But Alice no longer needed to worry about him, she was just happy to have him there.

She took Bobby by the hand and led him downstairs, as Johnny followed close behind them, and they joined Charlotte and Jim in the kitchen. Charlie was telling him about the game they'd played that afternoon, and how well it had gone, and for once he showed a little interest, though not much. And a minute later, he interrupted her and told her about the trophy Johnny had won for basketball at her age.

“He was the best all-around athlete I've ever seen,” Jim said proudly, and Johnny spoke loudly at him, although he couldn't hear.

“No,
she
is, Dad! Get with it!” But neither of them heard him, as he waved at Bobby and his mother and walked out of the house through the front door. He opened and closed it so gently that no one heard him. And Bobby looked at his mother with wide eyes. They both knew that a miracle of sorts was happening to them, and the secret they shared seemed to bring them closer together than they'd ever been. She gently touched his shoulder as he took his seat between Charlotte and his dad.

It was an ordinary evening for them, and Johnny didn't come home until Alice was already in bed, reading.

“How was Becky?” his mother asked, peering at him over her reading glasses. She had just started to wear them, and Johnny said he liked them, which made her smile.

“She has a date tomorrow night,” he said victoriously.

“How did that happen?” Alice looked stunned. They had just been talking about how sad her life was.

“She met a guy at work today. He's a junior at UCLA, and he took a semester off to work for his father. He called tonight to ask her out.” He sounded pleased as he told her, but he had mixed feelings about it. His name was Buzz and he was really handsome, and bright and nice. His father owned a chain of liquor stores, and he drove a Mercedes. He even liked kids, and had three brothers and two sisters himself. “I'm not sure he's good enough for her,” Johnny told his mom, looking pensive. “But he looked okay to me when he walked into the drugstore. He went to the same high school we did. He recognized Becky as soon as he walked in. He graduated the year we were sophomores, and he always liked her, but he never asked her out before.”

“Did you set that up for her?” his mother asked him with curiosity and admiration. It had been a nice thing for him to do, if he had, and he looked as though he felt good about it too.

“I think so,” he said. He was not entirely sure yet of either his effect or his powers. “Charlie's still up, by the way. Isn't it kind of late for her?”

“Not really,” his mother smiled. He was so grownup now, in some ways, and still her little boy in others. “She's fourteen. You went to bed even later than that at her age,” she said, amused by his policing his sister, just as she saw Jim walk into the room, looking tired. Neither of them had heard him come in, and he seemed more sober than he usually was at that hour.

“Who were you talking to?” he asked, looking straight at her.

“Oh … I… myself … I do that sometimes when I'm alone.” She tried to look nonchalant.

“You'd better watch that,” he teased her. “People are going to start saying funny things about you.” She nodded, and Johnny left discreetly, and went to his own room. “You've been in awfully good spirits for the past few days. Any special reason?”

“Just feeling better, I guess. I think my ulcer's healing.” And she didn't seem as consumed with grief as she had been. He had noticed that about her. He had noticed a number of things. The nice dinner she'd made for them that night, the easy way she talked to him. She didn't seem as agonized or as strained. The kids were in better shape too. He just wished that business was better. But at least their family seemed to be slowly on the mend, not that any of them would ever forget losing Johnny, or be the same again. Nor could he forgive himself for the accident he'd had with Bobby, and what the trauma of it had cost him. A lifetime of silence would serve to remind him of his own part in it, no matter how he might try to forget, or what methods he used to anesthetize himself.

They lay in bed and talked for a while that night, and she couldn't help wondering if he was drinking less, or just tolerating it better. It was hard to tell. And as though to confirm it, the next morning she found half the beers untouched in the six-pack next to his chair in the living room. She put them back in the refrigerator, just as Johnny came down the stairs in his varsity jacket. He had asked her to drive him to Pam's beauty school that morning. There was something he wanted to see there, and Alice had nothing else to do so she'd agreed to drive him. She loved driving him places, just the way she had when he was a little boy. She had always enjoyed the time they spent together in the car.

“What exactly am I supposed to say to Pam when we walk in?” Alice asked in the car as she drove him. He was playing with the radio, and switching from one station to the other, enjoying all his favorite music. He was having a ball.

“Boy, I really missed that,” he said, looking happy, as she laughed, and reminded him that she had never visited Pam at work before, and she might find it a little odd. “Tell her you want to get your hair done.”

“And then what? Why are we going there?”

“I'm not sure yet. There's someone I'm supposed to see. I figured it out last night. I'll tell you about it later,” he said, putting the volume up so high that he could no longer hear her. And five minutes later, they were at the beauty school, and Pam looked startled to see Alice when she walked in.

“Are you okay?” She looked a little euphoric to Pam. Pam was beginning to wonder if they had put Alice on Prozac for her ulcer. She had been behaving just a little oddly, and she seemed strangely cheerful now all the time.

“I'm fine. I just thought it might be fun to get my hair done.”

“Why? Are you going somewhere?”

“I'm going out to lunch afterward,” Alice explained, trying to look normal, but feeling a little odd as she saw Johnny play with one of the dryers while she and Pam talked. “Don't play with that,” Alice said, looking distracted, as Pam stared at her. She had no idea what Alice was talking about.

“Don't play with what?”

“I meant, don't play with my hair. Let's just do it.”

“Sure, Alice, no problem,” Pam said in a soothing tone. She was genuinely worried about her, but Alice looked fine, and she seemed to be in good spirits. Her ulcer was obviously getting better. But she was definitely a little strange these days.

Pam got one of the students to wash Alice's hair, and a few minutes later she assigned another student to give her a trim, and a third one was going to set it. And through it all, Johnny came and went with an official air. He looked very busy. And when he came back an hour later, his mother's hair was done, in a very stylish pageboy. And he had a man in tow. He was a rep from a line of hair products. He told Pam he was based in L.A., but had come to the area to introduce his products at local beauty salons and schools like this one. He was wearing a coat and tie, his hair was cut short, he looked respectable, and he was pleasant and interesting as he chatted with Pam and Johnny's mother. Alice thought he was very good looking, although Pam seemed not to notice. She wasn't interested in meeting men. But they were still talking when Alice left. Pam had refused to let her pay for her new hairdo and smiled as she waved good-bye.

“Did you do that?” she asked her son, and he feigned innocence.

“Do what?”

“Bring that guy in, with the line of hair products. Did you have anything to do with that, Johnny?”

“I have better things to do than fix Becky's mom up with a blind date. That is not why I came here,” he said, looking dignified well beyond his years.