Wish (15 page)

Up.

Down.

Up.

Down.

And then I couldn't believe my eyes. Howard just turned back around and went on his way like nothing had even happened.

Well, I can tell you for sure there weren't enough pineapples in the world to keep me from running straight at T.J., full steam ahead. I kept my arms stiff in front of me and bam! I shoved him so hard his head snapped back and he crashed face-first into the dirt.

I confess I was more than a little surprised when he got right up and shoved me back, knocking me to the ground. I scrambled to my feet and was ready to haul off and bust him one when Miss Rhonda stepped between me and T.J. with her fists jammed into her waist and a look of pure horror on her face.

“Stop it right now!” she hollered. “That is
not
Bible school behavior!”

So that's how I ended up sitting on a church pew with T. J. Rainey, listening to Miss Rhonda talk about forgiveness and kindness and goodness and grace and all that stuff. It seemed to me like Audrey Mitchell ought to be sitting here in her perfect sneakers while Miss Rhonda quoted some stuff about doing unto others. Every once in a while, T.J. shot me a glare and I shot one right back.

When Bertha came to pick me up, Miss Rhonda had to go and tell her what happened. Bertha nodded and said “Oh, dear,” and “Yes, ma'am,” and “I will,” and then we rode home in silence. Mama would've been hollering at me, asking me what in the world was wrong with me and can't I go one dern day without causing trouble. But not Bertha. She reached over and patted my knee and said, “You are a good friend to Howard, Charlie.”

When we got home, me and Wishbone went out front and sat in the shade of the dogwood tree. The air was still and hot. The red-dirt yard dry and dusty. Bertha's nasturtiums by the front door spilled over the sides of the flowerpots and drooped onto the ground. The sprinkler sputtered in circles out in the garden, leaving glistening drops of water dripping off the okra and settling into little pools inside the yellow flowers of the cucumber plants.

When I'd first gotten to Colby, most of that garden had been just rows of tiny green plants poking out of the ground. But now, plump red tomatoes grew fatter every day, yellow flowers turned into bright green zucchini, and pole beans hung in clusters from vines that snaked up twine to form leafy tepees.

A blue jay landed in the yard near us and Wishbone's ears perked up. He cocked his head and watched that bird hop in and out of the marigolds along the fence. I put my arm around him and rubbed his long, velvety ears between my fingers. He licked my face, his tail swishing back and forth on the dusty ground.

“I swear that dog loves you to pieces,” Bertha kept telling me.

And I do believe it was true. He'd gotten to where he wouldn't let me out of his sight, following me around from room to room, laying by my chair at the kitchen table, sleeping with his head on my feet out on the porch. I didn't even need to keep him on a leash out in the yard anymore. He stayed right by my side everywhere I went. He might trot over to sniff a shrub or snap at the bumblebees on the clover by the porch, but he always glanced back to make sure I was still there. And every time he did that, I loved him more.

After a while, Bertha came outside and brought us saltine crackers with peanut butter. She let Wishbone eat one right off of her hand and didn't even care when he slobbered on her. Then out of the clear blue she said, “Charlie, I really admire you for sticking up for Howard like you did today.”

Admired me?

Well, that was a first.

I was pretty sure nobody on earth had ever admired me before.

“You do?” I said.

She nodded. “I do.”

And so we sat out there in the shade of the dogwood while the sun beat down on the dirt yard. Bertha told me a story about when she and Mama were little girls and went to a lake one summer.

“Carla had never been in water deeper than a bathtub in her life,” Bertha said. “So when she fell off the dock into that murky water, everybody went crazy. But, I swear, she popped right up like a cork without so much as a sputter. Then she just floated on her back staring up at the sky while everybody ran up and down the dock hollering and carrying on and my uncle Jarod jumped in after her and ruined his brand-new wristwatch.” Bertha chuckled and swatted at gnats that were hovering over Wishbone as he slept. “That girl was a walking wonder sometimes,” she said.

Of course, I couldn't help but ask myself how a woman who can't get out of bed and get her feet on the ground could be a walking wonder, but I was still basking in the glow of being admired. So, for once, I kept quiet and didn't mess things up.

“And one time,” Bertha went on, “she snipped all the buttons off my blouses.” She cut the air with her fingers like scissors. “
Snip
,
snip
,
snip
. Right off onto the floor.”

“Why'd she do that?”

“Beats the heck out of me,” she said. “She did the craziest things you ever saw.” She reached over suddenly and grabbed my knee. “Well, not
crazy
crazy, but just, you know, kind of, well,
odd
.”

She let go of my knee and went back to swatting gnats away from Wishbone. “About the only thing I remember our poor mama ever saying was, ‘Carla, stop that.'”

I nodded. I had a perfect picture in my mind of little Carla snipping those buttons.
Snip
,
snip
,
snip
.

Before long, Gus's car came bouncing and squeaking up the gravel driveway.

“Hey, Butterbean,” he called out the window.

Then he got out, kissed Bertha on the cheek, patted Wishbone on the head, and told me I was a ray of sunshine at the end of a long, sorry day.

That night in bed, I laid on top of the cool sheets with Wishbone's soft, warm body next to me. I thought about my broken family back in Raleigh and wondered if they were thinking about me, a ray of sunshine at the end of a long, sorry day.

 

Twenty–Six

“What's that?”

Audrey Mitchell pointed to my hand as we played Bible bingo in the fellowship hall. It had been raining all morning, so we hadn't been able to go outside and have a balloon race like Miss Rhonda had planned for us to do.

I looked down at the drawing I had done on the back of my hand with a pen.

“A blackbird in a cage,” I said, flipping my hair the way Jackie flips hers.

Audrey screwed up her face like she'd just seen a dead possum squashed flat in the middle of the road.

“Check it out,” I said, thrusting my hand toward her face and winking. I'd been trying to do all the things Jackie does. Flipping my hair and winking. Acting cool and confident. But so far, it didn't seem to be working. Most of those kids at Bible school still treated me like I had cooties.

“What's it for?” Audrey said.

And then the darnedest thing happened. I guess being a ray of sunshine had given me some
real
confidence, not
pretend
confidence, because I looked her square in the eye and said, “It's the same as the tattoo my daddy has on
his
hand.”

The minute those confident words came out, old Mr. Doubt tapped me on the shoulder and said, “
Now
look what you've done. She's gonna ask you where your daddy is, and
then
what are you gonna say?”

But miracle of miracles, Audrey did
not
ask me where my daddy was. She just said, “Oh,” and studied her Bible bingo card.

So I pushed Mr. Doubt aside and said, “His name is Scrappy, and he's getting corrected.”

Audrey put another token on her bingo card. “What does that mean?” she asked.

“Means he's getting corrected,” I said. “He'll be home any day now.”

“So then are you going back to Raleigh?” she said.

At that, Howard's head shot up from studying his bingo card and he stared at me.

“Um, yeah,” I said. “Sure.”

“When?” Howard said.

I shrugged. “I don't know. However long it takes for Scrappy to get corrected, I guess.”

Suddenly my confidence began to spin out of control. Faster and faster until it rose right up through the ceiling and out the roof of Rocky Creek Baptist Church, disappearing into the sky and leaving me there in the fellowship hall with a stomachache. I licked my thumb and wiped at that blackbird tattoo, leaving a smudgy black spot on my hand.

Suddenly somebody yelled, “Bingo!” and Miss Rhonda clapped her hands and pointed to the table full of prizes. Coloring books and glittery pens and erasers shaped like Noah's ark.

“Clear your cards,” Miss Rhonda said. “Let's start a new game.”

*   *   *

Later that day, me and Howard sat on the Odoms' front porch steps watching Wishbone and Cotton playing in the sprinkler. Cotton jumped over puddles of muddy water while Wishbone scampered along behind him, ears flopping and tail wagging.

“I been wondering about something,” Howard said, scratching at mosquito bites on his freckled leg. “How come you shoved T.J. at Bible school yesterday?”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I mean, why'd you shove him?”

“He was making fun of you, Howard.”

“I know.”

I stared at him. His eyebrows were squeezed together over his glasses, and he looked so serious, for a minute I almost laughed. But then he said, “He was making fun of
me
, not
you
.”

“Then you're the one who should've shoved him,” I said.

“Naw.”

“Why not?” I said. “Why do you let kids make fun of you and don't do one dern thing about it?”

“'Cause I'd be shoving somebody every day of my life.”

“So?”

“So, what good is that?”

We sat in silence for a few minutes. Cotton was stomping in the mud and Wishbone was snapping at the water swirling out of the sprinkler.

“But why'd
you
shove T.J.?” Howard asked.

“Because he was being mean to you.” I wiped muddy water off my legs. “Duh,” I added.

“Why do you care about that?”

“'Cause you're my friend,” I said. “I don't like kids to be mean to my friends, okay?”

“I'm your friend?”

“Sure you are,” I said. “Duh,” I added again.

“I am?”

“Well, yeah.”

“Then my wish came true!”

“It did?”

“Yeah.” Howard blushed a little, his white freckly face turning pale pink. “Well, part of it anyway. I wished for two things. So, since one of 'em has come true, I can tell it to you. I wished that we'd be friends.”

Well, dang! I never would've guessed that! You'd think that a redheaded boy with glasses who was named Howard and had an up-down walk would have a lot more to wish for than being friends with me. But I admit I felt a smile on my face and hope in my heart, 'cause maybe wishes really
do
come true. Maybe some wishes just take longer than others.

 

Twenty–Seven

The next day after Bible school, Wishbone and I were sitting out front while Gus worked in the garden. Tiny wrens and sparrows hopped around the yard and fluttered up to the bird feeder on the fencepost. After a while, Bertha came out with a couple of cats trailing along behind her. She smelled like lavender and I couldn't help but notice how much she looked like Mama, with her hair curling around her face and her eyes crinkled up at the edges.

I figured she was going to tell me a story about some lady in her knitting group or something, but she said, “I found that note.”

My stomach squeezed up and I felt kind of scared for a minute.

“Um…”

“That note in your lunch box?” she said.

Well, what in the world could I say now? I felt like a big, dumb baby for writing that note. I wanted Bertha to go away. I did
not
want to talk about that note.

But Bertha did not go away. She sat petting the cat purring in her lap and gazing out at Gus weeding in the garden. And then she said, “You know, Charlie, me and Gus always wanted children.” She rubbed Wishbone's belly with her bare foot. “We have had many blessings in our life together, but having children has not been one of them. So, um…”

I watched her foot rubbing Wishbone and waited.

“Well,” she said. “I guess I'm just not too good at doing things that mothers do.”

My heart sank and I scrambled to think of something to say, but I couldn't.

“When I saw that note I wanted to kick myself,” she went on. “How come I didn't think how much a little girl would love a note like that in her lunch box? I wished like anything I had thought to do that but I didn't. Just like I didn't think how silly that rainbow lunch box was.”

And then there was her hand on my knee. It was dark and tan from hours in the sun. Fingernails rough and dirty from pulling weeds in the garden.

“So, I hope you'll be patient with me while I learn,” she said.

I hung my head and nodded. I should've said something nice to her. I should've said, “Oh, don't even worry about it. That rainbow lunch box was no big deal.” I should've said, “I don't even care about that dumb note.”

But the truth was, all I could do was sit there feeling her warm hand and breathing her lavender smell.

“Let's go help Gus,” she said.

So the three of us pulled weeds and picked beans and pinched dead flowers off the marigolds. Wishbone sat outside the gate and whined to get in, but he wasn't allowed because of his digging.

When we were done, we climbed into Gus's car and picked up Howard before heading down the mountain to get ice cream. Wishbone stuck his head out the window, his ears flapping like crazy in the wind, while me and Howard sang Bible school songs.