Joyland (33 page)

“I’ll be back as soon as I get them home,” I told Fred. “Put in some extra hours.”

He shook his head. “You’re eighty-six for today. Get to bed early, and be here tomorrow at six. Pack a couple of extra sandwiches, because we’ll all be working late. Turns out that storm’s moving a little faster than the weather forecasters expected.”

Annie looked alarmed. “Should I pack some stuff and take Mike to town, do you think? I’d hate to when he’s so tired, but—”

“Check the radio this evening,” Fred advised. “If NOAA issues a coastal evacuation order, you’ll hear it in plenty of time, but I don’t think that’ll happen. This is just going to be your basic cap of wind. I’m a little worried about the high rides, that’s all—the Thunderball, the Shaker, and the Spin.”

“They’ll be okay,” Lane said. “They stood up to Agnes last year, and that was a bona fide hurricane.”

“Does this storm have a name?” Mike asked.

“They’re calling it Gilda,” Lane said. “But it’s no hurricane, just a little old subtropical depression.”

Fred said, “Winds are supposed to start picking up around midnight, and the heavy rain’ll start an hour or two later. Lane’s probably right about the big rides, but it’s still going to be a busy day. Have you got a slicker, Dev?”

“Sure.”

“You’ll want to wear it.”

The weather forecast we heard on WKLM as we left the park eased Annie’s mind. The winds generated by Gilda weren’t expected to top thirty miles an hour, with occasionally higher gusts. There might be some beach erosion and minor flooding inland, but that was about it. The dj called it “great kite-flying weather,” which made us all laugh. We had a history now, and that was nice.

Mike was almost asleep by the time we arrived back at the big Victorian on Beach Row. I lifted him into his wheelchair. It wasn’t much of a chore; I’d put on muscle in the last four months, and with those horrible braces off, he couldn’t have weighed seventy pounds. Milo once more paced the chair as I rolled it up the ramp and into the house.

Mike needed the toilet, but when his mother tried to take over the wheelchair handles, Mike asked if I’d do it, instead. I rolled him into the bathroom, helped him to stand, and eased down his elastic-waisted pants while he held onto the grab bars.

“I hate it when she has to help me. I feel like a baby.”

Maybe, but he pissed with a healthy kid’s vigor. Then, as he leaned forward to push the flush handle, he staggered and almost took a header into the toilet bowl. I had to catch him.

“Thanks, Dev. I already washed my hair once today.” That made me laugh, and Mike grinned. “I wish we
were
going to have a hurricane. That’d be boss.”

“You might not think so if it happened.” I was remembering Hurricane Doria, two years before. It hit New Hampshire and Maine packing ninety-mile-an-hour winds, knocking down trees all over Portsmouth, Kittery, Sanford, and the Berwieks. One big old pine just missed our house, our basement flooded, and the power had been out for four days.

“I wouldn’t want stuff to fall down at the park, I guess. That’s just about the best place in the world. That I’ve ever been, anyway.”

“Good. Hold on, kid, let me get your pants back up. Can’t have you mooning your mother.”

That made him laugh again, only the laughter turned to coughing. Annie took over when we came out, rolling him down the hall to the bedroom. “Don’t you sneak out on me, Devin,” she called back over her shoulder.

Since I had the afternoon off, I had no intention of sneaking out on her if she wanted me to stay awhile. I strolled around the parlor, looking at things that were probably expensive but not terribly interesting—not to a young man of twenty-one, anyway. A huge picture window, almost wall-to-wall, saved what would otherwise have been a gloomy room, flooding it with light. The window looked out on the back patio, the boardwalk, and the ocean. I could see the first clouds feathering in from the southeast, but the sky overhead was still bright blue. I remember thinking that I’d made it to the big house after all, although I’d probably never have a chance to count all the bathrooms. I remember thinking about the Alice band, and wondering if Lane would see it when he put the wayward car back under cover. What else was I thinking? That I had seen a ghost after all. Just not of a person.

Annie came back. “He wants to see you, but don’t stay long.”

“Okay.”

“Third door on the right.”

I went down the hall, knocked lightly, and let myself in. Once you got past the grab bars, the oxygen tanks in the corner, and the leg braces standing at steely attention beside the bed, it could have been any boys room. There was no baseball glove and no skateboard propped against the wall, but there were posters of Mark Spitz and Miami Dolphins running back Larry Csonka. In the place of honor above the bed, the Beatles were crossing Abbey Road.

There was a faint smell of liniment. Mike looked very small in the bed, all but lost under a green coverlet. Milo was curled up, nose to tail, beside him, and Mike was stroking his fur absently. It was hard to believe this was the same kid who had raised his hands triumphantly over his head at the apogee of the Carolina Spin. He didn’t look sad, though. He looked almost radiant.

“Did you see her, Dev? Did you see her when she left?”

I shook my head, smiling. I had been jealous of Tom, but not of Mike. Never of Mike.

“I wish my grampa had been there. He would have seen her, and heard what she said when she left.”

“What
did
she say?”

“Thanks. She meant both of us. And she told you to be careful. Are you sure you didn’t hear her? Even a little?”

I shook my head again. No, not even a little.

“But you
know.”
His face was too pale and tired, the face of a boy who was very sick, but his eyes were alive and healthy. “You
know,
don’t you?”

“Yes.” Thinking of the Alice band. “Mike, do you know what happened to her?”

“Someone killed her.” Very low.

“I don’t suppose she told you . . .”

But there was no need to finish. He was shaking his head.

“You need to sleep,” I said.

“Yeah, I’ll feel better after a nap. I always do.” His eyes closed, then slowly opened again. “The Spin was the best. The hoister. It’s like flying.”

“Yes,” I said. “It is like that.”

This time when his eyes closed, they didn’t re-open. I walked to the door as quietly as I could. As I put my hand on the knob, he said, “Be careful, Dev. It’s not white.”

I looked back. He was sleeping. I’m sure he was. Only Milo was watching me. I left, closing the door softly.

Annie was in the kitchen. “I’m making coffee, but maybe you’d rather have a beer? I’ve got Blue Ribbon.”

“Coffee would be fine.”

“What do you think of the place?”

I decided to tell the truth. “The furnishings are a little elderly for my taste, but I never went to interior decorating school.”

“Nor did I,” she said. “Never even finished college.”

“Join the club.”

“Ah, but you will. You’ll get over the girl who dumped you, and you’ll go back to school, and you’ll finish, and you’ll march off into a brilliant future.”

“How do you know about—”

“The girl? One, you might as well be wearing a sandwich board. Two, Mike knows. He told me. He’s been
my
brilliant future. Once upon a time I was going to major in anthropology. I was going to win a gold medal at the Olympics. I was going to see strange and fabulous places and be the Margaret Mead of my generation. I was going to write books and do my best to earn back my father’s love. Do you know who he is?”

“My landlady says he’s a preacher.”

“Indeed he is. Buddy Ross, the man in the white suit. He also has a great head of white hair. He looks like an older version of the Man from Glad in the TV ads. Mega church; big radio presence; now TV. Offstage, he’s an asshole with a few good points.” She poured two cups of coffee. “But that’s pretty much true of all of us, isn’t it? I think so.”

“You sound like someone with regrets.” It wasn’t the politest thing to say, but we were beyond that. I hoped so, at least.

She brought the coffee and sat down opposite me. “Like the song says, I’ve had a few. But Mike’s a great kid, and give my father this—he’s taken care of us financially so I could be with Mike full-time. The way I look at it, checkbook love is better than no love at all. I made a decision today. I think it happened when you were wearing that silly costume and doing that silly dance. While I was watching Mike laugh.”

“Tell me.”

“I decided to give my father what he wants, which is to be invited back into my son’s life before it’s too late. He said terrible things about how God caused Mike’s MD to punish me for my supposed sins, but I’ve got to put that behind me. If I wait for an apology, I’ll be waiting a long time . . . because in his heart, Dad still believes that’s true.”

“I’m sorry.”

She shrugged, as if it were of no matter. “I was wrong about not letting Mike go to Joyland, and I’ve been wrong about holding onto my old grudges and insisting on some sort of fucked-up
quid pro quo.
My son isn’t goods in a trading post. Do you think thirty-one’s too old to grow up, Dev?”

“Ask me when I get there.”

She laughed.
“Touché.
Excuse me a minute.”

She was gone for almost five. I sat at the kitchen table, sipping my coffee. When she came back, she was holding her sweater in her right hand. Her stomach was tanned. Her bra was a pale blue, almost matching her faded jeans.

“Mike’s fast asleep,” she said. “Would you like to go upstairs with me, Devin?”

Her bedroom was large but plain, as if, even after all the months she had spent here, she’d never fully unpacked. She turned to me and linked her arms around my neck. Her eyes were very wide and very calm. A trace of a smile touched the corners of her mouth, making soft dimples. “ ‘I bet you could do better, if you had half a chance.’ Remember me saying that?”

“Yes.”

“Is that a bet I’d win?”

Her mouth was sweet and damp. I could taste her breath.

She drew back and said, “It can only be this once. You have to understand that.”

I didn’t want to, but I did. “Just as long as it’s not . . . you know . . .”

She was really smiling now, almost laughing. I could see teeth as well as dimples. “As long as it’s not a thank-you fuck? It’s not, believe me. The last time I had a kid like you, I was a kid myself.” She took my right hand and put it on the silky cup covering her left breast. I could feel the soft, steady beat of her heart. “I must not have let go of all my daddy issues yet, because I feel delightfully wicked.”

We kissed again. Her hands dropped to my belt and unbuckled it. There was the soft rasp as my zipper went down, and then the side of her palm was sliding along the hard ridge beneath my shorts. I gasped.

“Dev?”

“What?”

“Have you ever done this before? Don’t you dare lie to me.”

“No.”

“Was she an idiot? This girl of yours?”

“I guess we both were.”

She smiled, slipped a cool hand inside my underwear, and gripped me. That sure hold, coupled with her gently moving thumb, made all of Wendy’s efforts at boyfriend satisfaction seem very minor league. “So you’re a virgin.”