Roll with the Punches (18 page)

Wheezing and puffing, Dad immediately started chattering at us like a school kid after a field trip. "So you guys had the same idea as me, coming down to see the beach on a nice day!" He paused for breath. "Beach still looks the same as it did when I was twenty."
Wheeze
. "Little windy, but cheerful. Lots of people and kids. It never changes much, does it, Rhonda? But walking up that—"
wheeze,
"—hill back to the car, man, I wasn't sure I'd make it with these old legs."

"Dad, where's your car?"

Music Man made a vague gesture, "Oh, up here where I usually put it, somewhere in the streets. You know, on my way down here, I went by Rhonda's house to talk to her," he said to a grinning Dal. "Very busy there. I think that James boy was there. Do you know him, Ed?"

I cut in, "Dad, you must be mistaken. First, my condo complex is always quiet. Second, James is working, and third, Dal doesn't know him. And, fourth, I work, Dad, except when I get emergency calls—"

Dal shushed me, and Music Man continued. "Then I started driving, and I intended to go see Ethel, but then when I got on the freeway, the car just seemed to steer itself down here. Isn't that funny?"

"No, it's not," I started, and Dal shushed me again. I said, "Well, it might have been funny if … "
the same thing hadn't happened to me two days before.

Dal pointed at me in a
shut up
kind of way.

A hot gust of Santa Ana wind blew in Music Man's window. I hated the wind. I hated people shushing me and pointing at me. I pretty much hated this whole day, this whole week, the whole idea of family dementia and worrying whether it could be contagious. Jammed here in the back seat amid piles of my skating gear, I could see two male necks: one lean, tan, possibly-criminal neck under messy black hair and an earring, and one saggy, pale, clueless neck under limp gray locks. For a split second, I flashed on Raymond Chandler's image of Santa Ana winds making women test the blades of their carving knives and eye their husband's necks. Such temptation, with my Swiss army knife right there in my purse.

Dal said casually, "Was that Joan Didion or Raymond Chandler who talked about the Santa Ana Winds making people argue and get all sullen and crazy?"

"Both," I barked, staring harder at Dal's neck while he asked Music Man about Mom’s health. I sat there steaming until we finally found the Chevy, hidden under a giant wisteria vine in somebody's carport on Goldenrod Street, the nasty blue card dangling from its mirror.

Dal turned to me before helping Dad out, brown eyes twinkling. "Thanks for not strangling me."

"Oh, it wasn't strangling I imagined."

"You gonna be okay driving back alone?" he said. The earring winked.

And just like that, the Santa Ana spell broke and I was sane again. I kissed Dad and gladly sent the two hoodlums off together in the air-conditioned Chevy. Then I poured water down my front and steamed my way back up toward the hospital in my 130-degree car. Feeling like a giant sticky bun from the county fair, I flung an arm out the window and switched off the radio news about firefighting battalions at nearby brushfires and the dangers of dehydration during these hot winds. I stuck in a humpback whale CD, imagined myself in icy water, and pondered my list of book thief suspects once again.

Mom was still pale, but she was sitting up, wearing a cute little flowered dressing gown with pink piping around the collar. Another orderly was jumping to her bidding.

She frowned at me. "Honey, why are you rubbing your behind? Did Bing drag you on his leash again? He did that to your father twice, so we have the neighbor boy walk him now. I should have told you."

I sat gingerly in a chair and blew out a long hiss. "Just a little too much exercise."

"Oh. Did you fall skating?"

I lurched up. "Mom, how do you know I skate?"

"I saw the skates in your trunk, when I was looking for my glasses."

"Your what?"

"Your father has taken to hiding things as pranks, and one day when you were at our house on the computer—"

"Mom, he doesn't just hide stuff. He rearranges the whole house. And he takes off by himself. Listen, he shouldn't be driving anymore."

"Honey, did you see the flowers my book club brought me? Aren't they nice?" A big Chinese vase sat on the table, full of mums. She flipped the TV on.

"Yeah, they're nice. But Mom—"

She pointed at the TV. "That news anchor, Dennis McGee's gaining weight. Could you get me my purse?"

I folded my arms.

She reached her hand out and touched my hair. "I really think you could do with a haircut, Rhonda. That length just isn't very—and the bangs are way too long. Don't they get in your eyes?"

Her dinner suddenly showed up, carried by a frowning, stomping aide.
"
Gracias
,
Maria Com
puesta,
"
Mom said.
As the girl left, she whispered, "They're all crabby today. Those Santa Ana winds are putting everyone in such a nasty mood.”

If she only knew. "Yeah, every ax-murderer, hog-butcher, and house-stealer in the county is out and about. But Mom—"

"I'm still dizzy when I walk today." She opened the lid on her serving plate. "Oh, not more gloppy vegetables, rice and chicken! You want some?"

"Okay, I give up. I'm calling Monica tomorrow. Music Man disappeared today, got all the way to the beach on his own, and scared me shitless. And you're not helping."

She put her fork down. "Don’t say ‘shit’ dear. Look, this is between him and me. It's hard on his knee to drive very much, so normally he doesn't. But he likes to hit the 99¢ Store for a little cream soda now and then. He likes the independence, and I think it's good for him. You and Arlene shouldn't have made such a big deal about this little beach trip today. Calling the police and all. We go down there for a walk twice a month, and he was due."

"Why didn't you say so? He didn't leave a note! He didn’t even get that we’d be concerned."

"When did your father ever leave a note?" Good point. "Did Ed move in okay?"

"Mom, he's thirty-six years old with no BA, no armed service and no job. Where's he spent the last eighteen years? At McDonald's?"
Or in prison?

She started on her chicken. "Hmm. He may have been up on the reservation with his mother. Sioux or Cree, I think. Janice Baker's actually his stepmother. Her husband, Jim, had a short marriage to Ed's real mother, but she couldn't stand it here and moved back to the reservation in one of those
M
-states, Missouri or Michigan. Then Janice and Jim married and had four more kids, all architects like their father. Designing hotels and casinos. I wish you'd gone for something creative like that, honey."

"Hey, I
am
creative! I write!" I did a facepalm.

"But you never make any money at it, so what use is it, really?"

That was me. "Just Rhonda," chasing useless writing dreams. I put my water bottle to my forehead.

She made a face at her vegetables. "Ed had asthma or something, didn't do well with Midwestern weather, so he stayed here with the Bakers through high school. Then maybe he went back to the reservation, but I don't think he stayed. Could you get my hand lotion? Oh, this weather. My friend Alma can't go outside in these winds. Her asthma kicks up terribly.”

"So Ed is—?"

"Well, not your real settled type. He's bummed around some, I think. Is there a problem with him?"

"I don’t know." So he wasn't an ax murderer or a psycho. Just a farmhand drifter.

Her eyes lit up. "But listen, that James is really something in action. That quick Heimlich. Wow. If I were you, I'd go after him.”

"You knew it wasn't a party trick?"

"Honey, I may be Christian Scientist, but I know choking when I see it. I watched the whole St. Elsewhere series three times. Such cute doctors.”

I stared open-mouthed.

She said, "Hey, I'm Vanna Mom. While this is my room, it's my job to make sure everyone's comfortable here. I was just sorry that little girl you brought in, the mosquito type who was hyperventilating in that corner, got so worried about your near death.”

*
      
*
      
*

Not up for the long rush-hour drive home to Rancho Santa Margarita, I bought some takeout lasagna and a bottle of Coke and schlepped back to Acorn Street. When I got there, both Dal and Dad were sacked out snoring in their beds with Bing curled at Dal's feet. Hey, he’d left the door to his room open a crack. Well, it was really my brother's dark, musty room-cave full of high school basketball and tennis trophies. But it was only 7:30 p.m., so it was weird. I felt a bit like Goldilocks as I ate alone, thinking hard about my book.

Then Harley called.

I said, "If I start over, write another great story, would anyone buy it if my name's completely ruined?"

"Maybe," she said. "These days, negative publicity can be as good as positive—it's name recognition that counts.”

"Which I'll have in spades if this gets out."

"You'll be infamous. How could you get your name out of the sewer?" she said.

"Only by exposing Reynard's baggy butt. Which means talking to a lawyer and returning to the Amazons for Monday practice and a shot at their writing group. Something tells me there's a connection there."

"Okay. What time? I'm dying to meet the rest of your little friends."

*
      
*
      
*

No one ever got up for dinner that night. A big relief. I'd been pretty rude, and so had Dal. But really. He'd been living at home? No college degree? But everybody had a degree. Even the Amazons: Largot was a pharmacist, Kween Viktorious an X-ray technologist, and E. Lizard Butt was a computer programmer. I'd had my own Master’s Degree in library science by age twenty-four. Granted, I'd lived with my parents after that for a while, but you wouldn't catch me going back there now, like old Dal.

At 9:00, I looked at the phone. Friday night. If I called James and a woman answered, I'd be crushed. I looked in the mirror. Boudicca the Warrior Queen looked back, saying,
Do it!
So I did. And in ten minutes I had a date for the next day.

*
      
*
      
*

I woke early Saturday morning and did chin-ups until I smelled bacon and coffee. I ran toward the kitchen and stopped in the hall. Somehow, Dal, fully dressed, had taken charge of the pancake turner while Music Man, also neatly dressed, poured coffee and set the table. But Dal wasn't very good at catching flipped pancakes. Bing hopped between three half-cooked cakes on the floor, dodging Dal's legs and slurping like a fluffy pig.

I turned and caught sight of myself, a grungy harpy, in the hall mirror, and scurried back to my room. Ten minutes later, with hair corralled by Hello Kitty and body swathed in Hanes and Levis, I entered the kitchen. Dal turned from shoveling food onto plates. For a bare second, his eyes widened, and he looked me up and down.

I checked my
That's
Ms. Perfect
to You
T-shirt for chocolate spots. Nope.

Music Man, already well into his stack of cakes at the table, said, "Oh, Rhonda. Do you know Ed, here? He's staying with us for a while. He was an algebra student of mine way back when. But he wasn't very good."

I smiled a little. "Oh? He's not that great a cook, either. Bing got most of the pancakes."

Dal held out a well-filled plate to me, then pulled them back. "Then you don’t want these?"

I grabbed the plate and stuck out my tongue.

"Want bacon?" Dal pointed to a plate of it.

I sat down. "Bacon? Dad, I thought we were out. Where did this come from?"

"I got it early this morning. At Shop Rite."

"Dad, I don't want you driving anymore. Yesterday, you scared me driving so far away without leaving a note. Where are your car keys?"

Music Man looked up from the sports section of the newspaper. "Rhonda. I did not scare anyone. I was a gentleman all day.”

My neck stiffened in preparation for war. "Listen, Dad. You can't drive anymore. Really." I crossed my fingers behind my back. "Mom said.”

Dal sat and poured syrup over his cakes.

"Dad," I kept on. "You can't drive. You're too old. You—"

A huge fist came down on the table. "Damn it! I'm the best driver there is, Rhonda. And I'll drive whenever I want, wherever I want, and with whomever I want until the day I die."

I mumbled, "Until you wrap the car around a pole.”

Dal watched warily.

Music Man said, "Stop fussing at me, Rhonda, or I'll send you to your room."

I held out my hand. "Dad, I’m not ten! And it's not safe! Come on, give me the keys.”

"Stop it!" Dad threw his plate at me, sending juice and food all over the table and my clean shirt. He got up and stomped out the door. Dal stood there a minute, perplexed, then rocketed outside just as the Chevy motor started up.

"Old coot!" My shirt and my pancakes were drenched in milk and juice. I wanted to race outside and scream at the old butthead, but my legs felt like lead. So I sat with my head in my hands as orange juice and syrup soaked through my shirt to my bra and milk dripped onto the floor. Bing was in piggy dog heaven.

Finally, I got up to shower and change my clothes. When I returned to the kitchen, Dal was calmly mopping up the huge mess and Dad was back at the table like nothing had happened. A pink donut box sat by him.

"Hey, Ed. Got more bacon? Rhonda, Ed and I got so tired flying kites yesterday, we forgot to have dinner last night. Boy, we're starved this morning.”

"Kites? You flew kites?" I put my dishes in the sink and looked at Dal.

The Indian shrugged and handed me some fresh hotcakes.

Music Man said, "Boy, that wind was somethin'. You know, down at the park by the school. You should have seen us with the rainbow delta and the parrot. You always loved flying kites.”

I had, but we hadn't flown kites by the elementary school for a good fifteen years. Damn. While I'd been stuck in a hospital room with my irritating mother, my fickle father had had fun with the parrot kite and his new roommate. And not me.