Rosie comes out with our quesadillas and one of her eyebrows goes way up.
Uncle Carl kneels dramatically at Rosie’s feet. “Mi querida, mi amor.” He holds up the cupcake box like he’s offering a sword. “Marry me, Rosemary Wilson.”
“No thanks, but I will take the cupcake.” She takes the box from his hand, sits on the curb, and he plops down next to her.
“But I biked all the way to the mall for that,” he says. “Throw a dog a bone. How many nos can one man handle?”
“You biked all the way to the mall just for this cupcake?” Rosie says.
“And the gourmet donuts for my favorite niece and nephew.” He tosses the bag toward us. “They were handing out free balloons, Mr. Bird. Thought you’d want one.” He looks at Birdie and his bushy eyebrows go up and down in exaggerated excitement. Sometimes I wonder if he thinks that Birdie is still the four-year-old kid he met five years ago.
“I thought you were going to the Social Security office, which we all know is closed on the weekends,” says Rosie. “And you got all spiffed up to go too.”
“Well, I was on a top secret mission and I had to throw you off my trail.”
“Top secret mission?” I say as I dig through the donut bag.
“Yes, and even you two beautiful ladies and this strapping young lad won’t get the secret out of me. These lips are sealed tight.”
“Right,” says Rosie, “just like your super-secret way of getting free cable? Is it as secret as that?”
Uncle Carl closes his eyes and shakes his head. “I can’t say I know what you’re talking about.”
Rosie rolls her eyes and Uncle Carl winks at me as he lights a cigarette. “Well now. Looks like Janet got ahold of you,” he says, pointing his cigarette at my head.
“She was helping Janet showcase her hair-styling skills,” says Birdie.
“So you let the menace touch your hair again?” asks Uncle Carl.
“Don’t call her that,” says Rosie. The funny thing is that sometimes I think Janet likes to be called the town menace. Like that maybe it gives her some kind of power or something.
Rosie asks, “Who’s going to defend that girl when I’m not here?”
In less than three weeks, Rosie’s taking a trip back to England. I guess her dad is sick now and her stepmom needs some help with getting his affairs in order.
I take a bite of quesadilla, which is fried to golden perfection. The saltiness is a good companion to the sugary donut. I go back and forth, taking a bite of one, savoring it, and then taking a bite of the other. Sometimes when I’m eating Rosie’s quesadillas, I feel like my life is maybe totally fine.
Uncle Carl taps his cigarette over an ashtray that Rosie keeps on the sidewalk near the Quesadilla Ship just for him.
I’m waiting for him to ask about Patrick’s house, but maybe he’s hoping one of us will say something first.
Or maybe all of us are pretending that nothing’s changed in the last twenty-four hours.
A group of people walk up, looking like they’re headed to the hot-air balloon rides, which launch from a spot across town and over the hill. They’ve got expensive-looking coats on. “Back to the grindstone.” Rosie heads back to her truck.
“So,” Uncle Carl says after Rosie is gone. “Looks like you’ve survived one day with the old man.”
Birdie says, “And Duke the dog, who doesn’t care about anyone except Patrick.”
“Patrick even gave him some of the steak he made us,” I say.
“Wow, steak, huh?” says Uncle Carl. “The goat’s pulling out all the stops to impress you. Got money to throw around, I guess.”
Clam. Goat. Old man.
Birdie shrugs. “I wish we could live with you, Uncle Carl.”
Uncle Carl stubs out his cigarette and blows the last of the smoke toward the sky. “Me too, kid. But the old man’s got more room, and a better job, and he’s just . . . better. For you.”
Birdie says, “I really don’t care about sleeping on a couch. I don’t mind. It’s a great couch, actually.”
Uncle Carl kind of laughs and then shakes his head and sighs. “Did you guys already eat all the Honey Bunny Buns? Do you need more?”
I stand up and say, “I have to go to the bathroom.” And then I walk up to Uncle Carl’s apartment.
In the kitchen, I dig through the junk drawer until I find the picture of a younger Uncle Carl and a teenage Mama, and the best thing about this picture is that she looks exactly like me. The same thick eyebrows and frizzy hair—not at all shiny, smooth, and styled like she normally had it. In the photo, Uncle Carl is looking off to the side, but Mama is looking right at the camera.
Under her wild bangs, her eye makeup is smudgy and dark, but she has that same look she’d get when a Wolf Day was coming. Fired up but also resolved and defiant. Her cropped T-shirt and tight jeans look strangely like something Janet would wear.
I close Uncle Carl’s drawer and look over at the couch. I almost trick myself into thinking that we still live here. That later today I’ll unfold the futon and lie down and try to sleep.
Birdie and me are here, but our home and Mama’s things are seven and a half hours away in another state. Thinking of Mama and Janet makes me realize that I need to be more determined too.
**Observation #776: Things I Already Know About the Bus
The bus station is in the next town, 16 minutes away.
We have to take a local bus from the sidewalk in front of Uncle Carl’s apartment to get there.
Then bus #331 takes 8 hours and 51 minutes to get to Portland, Oregon.
For a long-distance bus, the cost of an adult ticket is $32. Kids are $26.
Local buses cost $1.75.
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