Benz and was a banker, but none of us ever saw him. Certainly did keep her knee-deep in gifts, though.
The end of last summer, after all the brawls and the bruises and the incident at the bowling alley, I got in kind of a weird place. After July, after meeting Borgo, I cooled my jets briefly. Focused on something else for a few weeks. Focused on Belle. End of August I saw her at a pizza joint with her dad and she looked so different. She was trashy and brilliant at the same time, like a million-dollar gutter punk. After I’d finished dinner I hung around until she left and then I followed her. Creepy, yes, but necessary. Kind of I missed Belle. I needed to know what was going on.
I trailed her like a true detective.
I went slow. I swerved in and out of traffic. When she pulled into a parking garage on Welton, I paused behind a Dumpster and watched her go into an apartment building. Then I ditched my ride and ran in after her, saw her duck into an elevator and took the stairs pausing at each floor to see-cautiously as ever-just where she was getting off. And, of course, she saw me.
Belle reeked of pot and her eyes were watering fierce but she stayed staring at me. Me, hiding behind an ornamental plant, and looking so guilty. There was no hiding it. I just stood up, waved, said, “Hey, Belle. Yeah, I was following you.”
She made this snicker sound and actually put a hand on her hip like this was a scene in a sitcom. “Ade, how embarrassing is this for you?”
“Pretty embarrassing.”
“Why are you following me?”
“Just wanted to see what you’ve been up to. I saw you at the pizza place, noticed how different you’re looking, and figured it might be an interesting mystery to try and solve. You know, Junior Detective style. So what are you up to?”
“If you had any real abilities, Ade, you’d already know.”
And with that she flicked me off and marched down a hallway.
Flash forward to now, my body swimming with good vibrations, and only girl ever to call me a failure for not delivering a future where I leave her for someone else. Belle is, sitting here with the thick eyeliner and the drop- dead body, the one girlfriend I’ve had who left me for not being me enough.
As she gets out of the car, Belle winks at me and asks, “You okay to drive, Ade?”
“Sure,” I say. “Professional, remember?”
Belle blows me a kiss and walks back to her car and peels out.
Woozy, I nod.
Slowly. Drunkenly.
The Buzz pummeling me into bliss.
NINE
I get home in a record forty-five minutes.
Normally it takes me ten but I’m delirious enough from the knockout that I have to pull over every few blocks and close my eyes to stop from seeing double. Most of the way I go ten miles an hour.
Thankfully, I can use the front door. Too early for the freaks.
At home I doze off in front of the TV for the whole day. Eat nothing. Drink a soda. Mom’s at All Souls and doesn’t get home until night. She wakes me up off the couch, turns off the tube, and sits down on the rug and sobs at the sight of me.
“Bad this time?” I ask.
Mom nods.
I try and stand, but just fall over. Pass out. When I wake up again Mom’s putting a cold compress on my head and holding a mirror to my mouth. “To make sure you’re still breathing,” she says. “Your left pupil, it’s almost totally blown out.”
“Greater than six?”
“It’s like ten millimeters, Ade.”
“Damn.”
Mom makes beef with snow peas and sesame cauliflower and I eat dinner lying down but puke up most of it. Mom, with a bucket at the ready, says, “I don’t even know why you bother eating in the first place.”
“I saw her again last night, Mom.”
“That’s wonderful.”
“It was. But complicated.”
“Ummm, women are always complicated.”
I move the conversation forward to avoid hearing more biblical passages.
“Mom, you ever worry about the fact that I failed most of my classes last year?”
She pats my head. “No, baby. This, this is just a stepping-stone to the better you.”
“Better?”
“The you with Christ.”
On the back of the pantry door Mom’s got this black velvet painting of Jesus she picked up at a flea market in Pueblo. In this painting, J.C. is young and vibrant and he’s got a halo of sunbeams around his head. He’s sitting on a lawn and kids are sitting in his lap. Kids of every color and creed. All of them total stereotypes. The Native American kid, he’s got a feather in his long black hair. The white girl, she’s blond with blue eyes and rosy cheeks. The black kid, he’s got an Afro and a multicolored African robe on. Mom’s always loved looking at this painting. She says that the one white boy, the kid with brown eyes and sneakers, is me. The one white boy, he’s closest to Christ, sitting right in the middle of his lap. Sitting with his head right at Our Lord’s heart. Even if I get old and frail and miserable or if I’m strung out on drugs and wasted away with my teeth gone or a drooling vegetable from all the concussions, Mom’ll still see me as this one kid. To her, I’ll always be right there with Jesus.
Tonight I don’t try to say anything about Mom’s obsession. I don’t make a crack or sigh like I usually do. Just try to clear the puke taste from my mouth by swallowing so many times that I’m all out of spit and my mouth is dry. Mom, hands on my head again, fingers in my hair, says, “You never talk to your dad about this, do you?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because Dad isn’t alive anymore, Mom.”
“When was the last time you went to the hospital to see him? You remember, used to be that you’d go every day after school. Pedal your bike all the way, cheeks all flushed, huffing and puffing. Your shirt so sweaty I’d have to wash it twice to get the-”
“I was in middle school, Mom. That was years ago.”
Mom puts on a frown. It’s disappointment more than anything.
“What if I told you that he needs you? Right now more than ever, Ade. He cares about you. It’s just that he… he’s kind of lost out there. He’s in limbo and needs a voice to guide him back.”
I give in. Sigh loud. “I went to see him four months ago. And it wasn’t Dad. Not the dad I grew up with. Not the one who taught me how to ride a bike or do a flip turn. Not him, Mom. Not that guy. That guy is like this emaciated thing. You know, like when the mad townspeople crack open the crypt to stake the vampire and they find… well, they find something like what’s lying in that hospital bed.”
Mom has tears forming but wipes them away before they can run. “Ade, you’re being very cruel…”
I lean in, give my mom a hug. Hold her tight and in my arms she shakes. Then I say, “It’s hard for me. I don’t like being reminded of who he used to be. I’m not sure what to believe, either. I’m not sure that he’s there. I know you think he is. That maybe talking to him will help him, but I’m not so convinced. You know what Dr. Ruby says. She says that Dad’s not actually-”
“I know,” Mom sobs. “I know.” And then, pulling herself away, straightening herself out, pushing back her hair and her glasses, she says, “We can go visit him together sometime. That would be nice, wouldn’t it? If we go as a family?”
I nod and then notice a text on my phone. It’s from Jimi.
