This One Time With Julia (3 page)

“On a boat, Joe. Everybody has a secret dream they never speak to anyone. This is mine. I never mentioned it before because it seemed impossible.”

“We’d be sailors.”

“I’d never make any plan that would require us to hold down steady jobs. No, if we sail, we sail like princes. Our own boat, with our own crew. If anything we’ll be captains, but only when we feel like it. Eighteen is old enough to be a captain in most countries where we’ll be going.”

“You have a boat now?”

“I can buy one.” Alvin slid his little suitcase across the table and unzipped it so I could see inside. I have no idea how much money was really in there, but it was obviously too much to ever count. “If we play our cards right, this money can be a boat by tomorrow morning.”

I never asked Alvin where he got so much money, but I have a feeling that he might have told me the whole story right then and there, while I was sitting there staring at it. If I had just paid attention, then everything might have turned out differently. But I was so stunned by how much cash was in that bag that I missed everything he said. Then I smelled my cheeseburger; the waitress was coming back over. Alvin zipped up the bag and put it down next to his chair. He didn’t talk again until she’d gone away.

“I’ve checked into some prices, Joe. We have enough to sail like princes for a year or two and then retire in comfort anywhere we choose. There are beaches in Brazil where the water is warmer than your bathtub.”

“And never come back?”

“What do you have here that you can’t leave behind?”

I didn’t like being put on the spot, but I tried my best to come up with an answer. “I was thinking about becoming an astronaut.”

“Then you’re in the wrong place. There’s no space program in Los Angeles. But most of the finest astronauts of all time started out as sailors. We can certainly put your training on our itinerary.”

“Marcus is here.”

“Marcus.” Alvin started to get angry. “What did he tell you? That I’m bad for you?”

I nodded.

“That my life had probably fallen apart? That I’d try to talk you into something stupid? That you shouldn’t go along with it?”

Now that I heard Alvin repeat it all, I could remember that Marcus had told me all of these things. “Yes.”

“Did you believe him?”

“I can’t remember.”

“Joe?”

“I can’t swim. Would we have to do a lot of swimming?”

“I need you, Joe.”

I’d never heard him say that before, so I didn’t know how much I’d enjoy hearing it. I’d never been on a sailboat before, and I didn’t know anything about the ocean. I didn’t know if we’d be fishing for whales, or living in some house made out of snow, or if we’d end up floating down a river through the jungle somewhere, but it was exciting to think about sailing around the whole world with him. And I believe we really would have done it too, if we’d had a little more time.

“I need you,” repeated Alvin. “Right now you’re just about the only person I can stand. I’ve had some pretty bad luck lately.”

“What happened?”

“She’s gone.” He put his hands over his eyes and his whole body started to shake. For a second I thought he was laughing, but then I realized he was sobbing all over the place. He tried to cover his eyes, but the tears came out from under his palms. I started crying too.

“Stop it,” he said. “Don’t cry, Joe.”

“I can’t help it.” I wiped my face and blew my nose into a napkin, but I still couldn’t stop. This always happened to me whenever Alvin cried, and there was nothing I could do. “I’m sorry,” I said.

“Please stop. I can’t take it.”

“Then you stop. You stop crying.”

“You don’t even know what you’re crying about.”

“It’s not my fault,” I said. “You shouldn’t have started crying in the first place.”

“Okay, I’m stopping. I’m stopping now. Goddammit, Joe.”

Alvin took a few deep breaths and managed to calm himself down. Pretty soon I stopped too. “Okay, no more crying from anybody. Have you ever seen me smoke a cigarette?”

“No.”

“Well, you’re about to. I just started today.” Soon Alvin had a cigarette in his mouth. He took a pack of matches off the table. “They say a cigarette takes fifteen minutes off your life, but a sitcom takes twice that long, and it’s still a half hour well spent. What am I doing?” he said. “I have a perfectly good lighter, so why am I trying to strike a match? And why on my lighter? Why strike a match on a perfectly good lighter?”

He stood up. I knew he wanted to climb on the chair again, but he realized it was a bad idea, so he just stood over the table, rocking back and forth, and looking down at me. “A grown man should never strike a match on a lighter. There is no place for it in a functioning person’s life. It means that something has gone terribly wrong.” He sort of fell back into his chair, and used the lighter on the cigarette, and tried a puff on it, and made a miserable face, and coughed up all this smoke into my eyes. “Julia’s gone.”

“Who?”

“The girl, Joe. The girl I ran away with. She left me. I wasn’t strong enough to keep her, in the end.” He held his empty glass up to one eye, and then the other one, until he wasn’t crying anymore. His eyes were all puffy and red. He tried to smile. “But there is certainly a bright side. Suppose we decided to get married some day. I get a normal job. We take out a loan to buy a nicer car. In middle age she starts to cook these watery soups. We raise a child with a predictable sense of humor. I’m probably lucky the whole situation went so horribly wrong.”

“But what happened?”

Alvin took a long, careful look around the room. Then he leaned across the table and whispered, “I went a little bit on tilt.”

The restaurant. The cheeseburger. The waitress with the funny, worried eyes. Outside afterward the street was dark and quiet. Alvin squinted up and down the sidewalk as he untied the doggie. “Do me a favor, Joe. Go around the corner and see if anybody’s been waiting for us in the parking lot.”

“Why?”

“It’ll be fun. Just pretend you’re a spy.”

I walked around the corner. The parking lot was even darker than the street, but a little farther down, behind the restaurant, I remember that the ground was sparkling. When I got a little closer, I saw it was because of all these bottle caps in the street. They’d been run over so many times they’d been pushed into the asphalt, and now they were part of the street. I guess it was the moon that made them glitter like that. Those bottle caps were pretty, and so I went over to look at them.

When I got back, Alvin was lying on the hood of the car, sleeping. The doggie was licking his arms. When I shook him, he sat up right away and said, “Have you driven at all lately?”

“I could try.”

“Okay, okay. I’ll drive.”

It was extremely dangerous, the way he drove me home. It seemed almost like he was hoping we would get into an accident, and at the same time he was trying to tell me this complicated puzzle about three doors and a lion. I couldn’t make head or tail of it. Somehow we made it to Marcus’s apartment without crashing into anything. Alvin parked the car but didn’t turn it off.

“Is Marcus here?”

“He went to bed early, I think. He has a big game tomorrow.”

“Oh yeah? Where at?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Marcus go away a lot?”

“Pretty often.”

“He seems okay?”

“I think he seems okay.”

“I bet he’s full of practical advice. I bet he presents you with a pamphlet on achieving excellence. I wish I could stand to be in the same room with him. Here’s the thing about Marcus . . .” Alvin rested his head on the steering wheel. He looked so tired. I think he’d forgotten what he wanted to say. Then he sat up suddenly and looked at me. “I’ve done something pretty stupid,” he said. “That’s why it’s a very good time to sail around the world where nobody can find me. But I can’t imagine going without you. I need you, Joe.”

“Could you say that one more time?”

“Please tell me that you’re coming.”

I felt like I should wait before I answered him. I knew I was breaking all my promises to Marcus, but I couldn’t remember what any of them were. I couldn’t remember anything I’d been doing since Alvin left, except for that I’d been sort of waiting for my life to start again. Tomorrow the sun would come up and we’d be a team again. I put my hand on his shoulder. “Of course I’ll come,” I said. “When have I not come?”

Alvin hugged me. “Good for you, Joe.” I couldn’t hug him back well because my seat belt was still on, but I could feel that he was shivering. “I’m sorry I left you with him for so long.”

“That’s okay.”

We finished hugging. I unsnapped my seat belt and opened the door.

“Do you understand why I had to do it?” he asked.

“You fell in love.”

“That’s right. I fell in love with Julia. And so I really had no choice.”

Later on I found out exactly what Alvin meant, because I fell in love with Julia too, but at the time I couldn’t understand it. I got out of the car. “Thanks for driving me home.”

“Just remember to charge up your cell phone tonight. I’ll call you when it’s time to leave for the airport. We’ll have to find some plane tickets somewhere. Don’t forget to pack your new shirt.”

“I’ll put it in my book bag.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow. Sleep tight, Joe.”

“Goodnight, Alvin.”

After he drove away, I walked back to the McDonald’s one more time to say good-bye. They were just barely still open, and Francisco was the only cashier left. I jumped over the counter without even asking and pumped his hand while I gave him the good news, and said my good-byes. Then I told him, “Just kiss her!” and ran home to pack a little bit, my wallet and some socks and underwear, and a couple of extra shirts. I hoped that Alvin would understand that I didn’t want to wear that plastic yellow shirt for the rest of my life. I plugged in my cell phone so it would charge like crazy all night long, and as I was falling asleep with the phone in my hand, I started to remember the whole day. I’d ridden the bus in the rain. The angry bald man fixed my phone. Marcus kicked the basketball over the fence. Francisco. Carmen. Alvin brought that doggie in a car. The restaurant. There were heat lamps. Alvin cried and tried to smoke a cigarette. The bottle caps that sparkled in the street. Life is so full of impossible things that I can’t understand. Now I remember that when I went to check the parking lot, there
had
been someone waiting there in a parked car, sitting quietly and watching. But I got distracted by those bottle caps and forgot to take a second look, or say anything to Alvin when I got back. Why couldn’t I remember that before?

CHAPTER TWO

That night I dreamed
we had sailed all the way to Japan, and Alvin was standing in a kimono with his arms spread on top of a windy mountain, while I chopped up a pile of wood. I woke up under Marcus’s orange quilt, staring at my wall, and I could smell the swimming pool outside the apartment building. While I lay there for a minute remembering where I was, I suddenly got very nervous and confused, like I wasn’t quite sure that my life would work out. It only lasted for a minute or two. When it was over I got up and got dressed, packed my book bag, and then sat on the bed waiting for Alvin’s call.

He never called. I waited the whole morning and some of the afternoon, and then decided to go to his motel, but I couldn’t remember its name or anything about where it was, so I spent that whole terrible day walking lost around the valley, sweating, looking everywhere for that motel, and I never found it. By the time it started to get dark, I was dizzy and my feet were tired. My head hurt, and when I saw a fountain in the middle of this little park, I realized how thirsty I was. It was the kind of fountain that shoots up water when you don’t expect it, and it had this pretty decent pool around it. The whole place smelled a little bit like trash because of a dumpster too close by. Next to the dumpster two kids were smashing bottles in a language that I couldn’t understand. Behind them I saw a couple throwing bread at a huge crowd of pigeons, who were fighting over it like little children. Someone had thrown out this terrible sofa right in the middle of the park, and a dog came limping by, dragging one leg, and everything out there was dirty or breaking or broken, and I was lost and I had no idea what to do. I dunked my head into the fountain and yelled into the water for a while, and then I just started gulping like crazy, drinking as much of the fountain as I could, and the more I drank the thirstier I got. I stayed down there gulping and yelling and swallowing water until I knew I was about to drown. When I finally came up for air, Alvin was standing there laughing at me.

“God bless you, Joe.”

“Why are you laughing?”

“Because I knew you’d forget the name of the motel.”

“Remind me one time.”

“The White Palms.”

“That’s it. That’s the only part I couldn’t remember.” I was still panting like a dog. “Am I close?”

“We’re seven miles away. God bless you, Joe.”

“I looked all day for you. What happened? Why didn’t you call?”

“I changed my mind. The trip is off.”

“What?”

“That’s what I came here to tell you. I decided to go by myself.”

“Why?”

“I can’t make you live my dream, can I?”

“But I wanted to go.”

“No, you’d hate the ocean, believe me. You can’t even swim, for one thing, and you wouldn’t like all that traveling. The farther we went, the nastier things you’d have to eat. And you’ve built up a nice life for yourself here.”

“Dammit,” I said.

“Hey,” said Alvin. “Don’t get angry.”

“I can’t help it.”

“Find a way.”

“I just really wanted to go. Why can’t I go?”

“Because the decision has already been made.”

“You couldn’t change your mind again?”

Alvin shook his head. “Impossible. I’m already gone.”

“What?”

“I’m already gone, Joe. I’m on a flight to Miami. I found the perfect sailboat, and we’re crewing up this afternoon. I’ll be on the ocean by sundown!”

I couldn’t make any sense of what Alvin was saying, and then suddenly I understood. I wasn’t talking to the real Alvin. I took his hands and, sure enough, they felt cold. It was like taking the hands of a statue. This is why I tried not to touch Alvin when he appeared like this. He always felt cold in a way that could never be warmed up.

“Isn’t that strange?” he said. “I don’t feel cold at all.”

“Why did you have to leave so early?”

“I found a last-minute deal on a flight that was too good to pass up. But I’ll be back in town before you know it. We’ll have an incredible time.”

Something about this situation felt familiar, and then I remembered that Marcus had also predicted this, that after Alvin convinced me to give up my whole life for him, everything would fall apart, and he would abandon me again.

“You lied to me,” I said.

“Lied to you? Now you’ve stumped me. You’ll have to explain.”

“You said you needed me.”

“That’s so wonderful, Joe. God bless you for saying that out loud. You don’t remember the general direction of the food you ate last night, but you claim total recall of every single word I spoke to you. Besides, what’s the difference? I’m still here, aren’t I?”

“It’s not the same.”

“Come on, don’t have your first bad mood right now. Do you remember the name of the motel?”

“Remind me one more time.”

“The White Palms Motel.”

“The White Palms Motel.”

“It’s truly amazing how far away you are. We’re not even in the same zip code.”

“Why am I going to the motel if you’re not even there?”

“Max is still there.”

“Who?”

“My dog,” said Alvin. “If I try to take him sailing around the world, it’s very likely that he’ll drown, so you’ll have to take over until I get back. He’s waiting for you in my room.”

“What do I do with him?”

“Food, water, and a walk or two, and otherwise he runs completely on his own. Dogs need even less to stay alive than we do. I’d call it a favor if it weren’t so easy. If you want my car, the keys are always in the muffler. Are you ready to look for a taxi, or are you going to drink the rest of that water?”

“Just a little more.”

I bent down for one last long drink of water. When I came up for air, Alvin had disappeared. The two boys had finished smashing all their bottles, and now they were trying to throw each other into the fountain. Everybody else was gone.

“The White Palms Motel.” I repeated the name out loud until I found a cab driver to say it to. It wasn’t a cheap cab ride. I really had walked a long way. I recognized the motel as soon as I arrived, and the little restaurant next door where we had eaten the night before. Alvin’s car was in the parking lot. I guess it was my car now. I’d never been inside a motel before, though I’d seen them plenty of times on TV. The lobby was a little like an old movie theater, with the counter and everything, except it was a less friendly place and smelled more like cigarettes. The framed pictures on the walls were all photographs of the motel over the years. Part of the ceiling was covered with a white sheet that flapped in the breeze from outside. Behind the front desk, the manager was watching TV with the sound off while he played some classical music on this tiny radio. He was already angry with me. I guess Alvin hadn’t told anyone he was leaving the dog behind in his room, and the dog had been barking all day, and nobody wanted to go in there to calm him down.

“Pretty scary surprise for the maid,” he said. “You’re not supposed to have dogs in this place anyway. Another hour and I would’ve called the pound.”

I was used to people being furious at me for something Alvin had done. He made a lot of people angry. That was just the way he lived. I lived my whole life on tilt also, even worse most of the time, but it was different with Alvin because it seemed like he did it on purpose. “Don’t worry, I’m here to take the dog away.”

“Who are you, his friend?”

“His twin brother.”

“You don’t look it.”

“Well, I am.”

“Can you prove it?”

I did the best I could. I could never get a driver’s license in a million years, but I had my ATM card, and it satisfied him once he’d squinted at it for a while.

“I’ll go and get the key. Will you calm that girl down?”

“What girl?”

“I figured you would know her. She got here an hour ago, looking for him. She’s totally hysterical. Three times already I’ve had to stop her from calling Missing Persons.”

“He’s not missing. He flew to Florida to buy a boat.”

“Well, you’d better explain that to her. Who’s going to pay for the day the dog spent in the room?”

“I guess I am. That card should probably work.” I’d given him my bank card, but I mostly used it at the ATM, so I was trying like hell to remember my signature.

“I’ll go and get the key. She’s in the Hawaiian Lounge, in the back. Please try to calm her down. The last thing we need is a bunch of police running around here. It’s just not how I want to spend my birthday.”

That’s when I noticed he had a little plate behind the counter with a cupcake on it, with a little candle that still hadn’t been lit. After he disappeared into the back, I went into the Hawaiian Lounge. It was mostly just a television and an empty watercooler, but they did have a palm tree growing in the middle, planted in an enormous coconut. This girl was sitting on the rim of the coconut, holding a magazine she wasn’t reading. I noticed her hair right away, because it was such a bright, strong red color that I’d never seen before. Her legs were so long that at first I thought she might be as old as Marcus. But the closer I got, the younger she looked, until finally we were face-to-face and I saw that she was about my age. Her eyebrows and lashes were lighter than her hair, almost blonde, and she had obviously been crying pretty recently, so her eyes were big and wet and green and a little bit wild. She had such an emotional face. I don’t know. I just always thought Julia was really beautiful.

“Are you okay?”

“Who are you?”

“I’m Alvin’s brother Joe.”

“Really?” She blew her nose into some tissues and dried off her face with her sleeve. I waited while she took a better look at me. “But you don’t look like him at all.”

“I know.”

“Your whole face is different. How come Alvin never mentioned that?” She wouldn’t stop looking at my face, and then she reached out her fingertips, and for a second I was sure she was about to touch my cheek, but she stopped herself halfway, and then somehow we wound up shaking hands. “I’m Julia.”

“From Tennessee.”

“That’s right.”

I didn’t mention it, but she also looked completely different than I’d pictured her. I’d always imagined Julia as a dragon who had been eating Alvin for six months and then finally spit him out. I’d never really thought of her as a real person. But now I could see why Alvin had fallen in love with her on the beach that day. It was exciting just to have her looking at me.

“I’m supposed to calm you down.”

“For who, the manager? I can’t get that guy to take me seriously. What did he say about me?”

“He just asked me to talk to you.”

“I’ll calm down when Alvin comes back.”

“He’s not coming back.”

“He’s not?”

“He’s probably in the middle of the ocean by now. He left this morning to go sailing all around the world. ”

“How do you know?”

“He told me.”

“Really?” Julia chewed her hair a little as she thought this over. “So he finally went. I can’t believe it. I never thought he would actually go.” She gave me this goofy grin and shot herself in the head with an imaginary pistol. “Now I feel like an idiot.”

“Why?”

“I got totally hysterical, flying out here like a maniac for no reason. Ruining that poor man’s birthday. My parents think I’m at a roller-skating festival with Angie. I don’t even know if there is such a thing.”

This was already the longest I’d ever talked to a girl I didn’t already know, and I could easily have kept going too, but the manager came back with the key. He hadn’t cheered up at all. We had to walk through the whole parking lot to the end of the motel, and then up this nasty yellow staircase to Alvin’s room. We could hear the dog barking while the manager got the door open, but when we finally got into the room, it was totally empty and clean. This made everyone pretty confused, until we realized the dog had been locked in the bathroom all day. He recognized Julia as soon as she let him out, and tried to lick her hands while she tried to scratch his chin.

“Max,” she said. “Did the maid lock you in there? Sit, Max!”

Max didn’t sit right away, and so Julia had to sort of push his butt down. “I knew Alvin wasn’t ready for a dog,” she told him. “Who’s supposed to take care of you now?”

“I am,” I said.

“What?”

“Just until Alvin gets back.”

“That’s pretty nice of you.”

“It is?”

“You’re taking care of a dog he never should have adopted in the first place, so he can go sailing around the world. Yeah, I’d say that’s pretty nice.”

It hadn’t occurred to me, but now that Julia felt so strongly about it, it did seem like a pretty nice thing to do. I went over to pet the dog a little bit. His nose felt like an ice cube. He’d done this little poop on the floor of the bathroom, right next to the toilet and everything, and it didn’t even smell too bad. I really think he handled himself pretty damn well, considering his situation. He was a pretty good dog so far. “So I’ll just put the room on your card,” said the manager.