Tales from the Inner Ring

Matt takes off--rough outline for a future chapter

         Bob--I always called him Mr. Willits at the diner because I didn't want the old guys saying it was a disgrazia, disgrace, for me to call him Bob--Bob saw that Grandpop was waiting for me at the diner.  We knew that because he was alone, staring at a used Bulletin with a coffee, at the far end of the counter, away from where the old men sat in the morning.  The old men . . . I wish I'd never taught Tim the old Italian curse words. Now he'd know when they would mean when they'd point to us with their figlio di puttana, son of a whore. 

         For me, it was kind of cool to have a Mom who ran away from home. I mean, we wouldn't be stuck in the whole nuclear family meltdown thing.  Funny.  I kind of hoped Jennifer would be covering.  We could have a laugh or two about it, and I know she likes serious conversations.  I'd even sneaked a copy of her note to school and made a copy of it. But Grandpa, uncle Pete, Zi Tony . . . there was something in the way they cursed in Italian. Like when we were little kids and got in trouble at the table.  There was nothing more embarrassing than a holiday dinner when all the parents, uncles, aunts, grandparents switched to Italian and pointed at you. We'd imitate them, and got a good idea of the curse words.  My cousin Sal even made an Italin Curse Word Dictionary.  So Timmy--he could be at little league and understand them!  Well, I'd have to deal with that later.  Bob just said a quick hello to grandpa and then left us alone.

         "You must be hungry.  You always liked Salisbury steaks, with the mushroom gravy, right?"  The diner still had real fried onions, not like these new plastic places, so he didn't even ask, just ordered quick, like a businessman.  He even had a jacket on, the kind where old guys keep appointment books in the top, inside pockets.  "Your sister's at band.  Tim's going home with that Robby kid." he said, patting the pocket, accidentally.  "So it looks like we're on our own."

         I expected Grandpop to go on about the ladies--women, they'd say--in Mom's group.  He'd tease her, saying how Marla's chanting reminded him of Aunt Josephine's  daily Rosary, how Joan going on about the joys of homemade bread inspired his hope that women would begin making homemade raviolis again, how they were right let the kids stay out during their meetings, since, he remembered, women talked about things like the time Aunt Louise -- then he noticed Tim and I were there, and stopped.  "I'll just say if you girls keep looking to find yourselves, one day you'll find yourselves back in South Philly," he teased them. 

         But now he just flipped through the paper.  Quiet--like he was trying to get on my nerves, like when you can't sleep and you hear sink drip.  When the quiet in between drives you nuts.  Every once in a while, he'd say something about a picture, an article.  Arabs hijacked another plane. He stops a while.  People went around picking up trash for Earth Day.  He just says thanks to Janice as she brings our dinners, and stops talking.  Some woman gets so into Primal Scream therapy that the neighbors call the cops, and she moves to something called a woman's group home.  He stops again.  I'm tired of his trip now.
         
         "She can go off and do her own thing, go get with  . . . " I wanted say something worse, but I just couldn't, especially since I think Janice is looking at me, sideways.  I must be louder than I thought. "She can go get with a whole commune if that's what she wants.  As long as I don't have to hear about it or see it.  Really, grandpa"

         "Then why are you stabbing your steak like you're trying to kill it. It's already dead," Grandpop says, picking at his stuffed peppers, slowly. 

         "Timmy," I told him.  "He struck out three times yesterday.  He's faking sick to skip practice, he wants to quit."  Grandpa said of course Timmy had too much on his mind to play right.  That was just not fair, laying the whole poor-kid-with-the-crazy-mom trip on a little kid. 

          He put his fork down and looked at me, like he was thinking, patting something in his  "Bravo, un bravo ragazzo, un bravo fratello". 

         "Grandpop, what's up" I said.  He wasn't using any words from the Dictionary, so I had no idea what he was saying.

         "You're a good boy, a good brother," he translated, then went back to finishing up his stuffed peppers. I got hungry too, and since I had the special, I asked for some rice pudding for desert. 

         "I didn't think you kids liked sports so much," he teased me, thinking about the time Ken and Scott and Glen and I sacrificed Keith's basketball [ booth entry 2].  Janice came up with the pudding, but Grandpop gave her a look and she didn't say anything.  She did come back and spray some extra whipped cream on the top, though.

         I told him I didn't want Timmy on some fascist uniform power gig, but it helped him get into the groove in his new school.  "It's like a high, you know, when he's bouncing around, going on about the new friends he's making at Nash, like he's high on life.  You know about a contact high, Grandpop?"  I asked.  The pudding was good.

         He pushed his plate away, smiled, and just said "Yeah.  I got a couple kids myself, you know. . . Janice, can you get him a coffee, please."  He pulled out a couple of cigarettes from his other jacket pocket, not in a pack because he didn't really smoke, he just bummed them sometimes.  He gave me one.  Like he was turning me on.  I took a puff or two, but coughed.  Natural tobacco would probably be cool, but the chemicals are probably bad for you.

         "It's OK," he said, about me putting out the cigarette, but I saw he was getting mad.  Dad had always told me I didn't want to see Grandpop get really mad, and I didn't believe him.  Until now.  There weren't any funny Italian curse words, and he didn't jump up and down, waving his hands.  No, his eyes just drilled into you, and he shook his head back and forth, slowly, biting his bottom lip.  You could hear him breathing out, through his teeth, as he shook his head.  Almost like an ffff sound.  It was scary.

         "He's distracted now,  Can't really keep his mind on the ball.  And that's a disgrace.  When he fumbles around the ball and they put him on the bench, he might quit."  I tried to put a happy face on things, telling Grandpa that things would be OK, but just kept shaking his head.

         "You know how you have that crush on that girl Jennifer?" he says.

         "Wait a minute." I said, starting to get angry.  Janice just put my cup down.

         "OK," he says, sipping his coffee.  "There's not really a good word for an older woman--and she isn't really a girl anymore--who is your picture of what you want."  I started to argue, but he just waved the cigarette before he put it out.  "Call her a Lady in a White Dress, like in the fairy tales."  I just shook my head, yes, OK, let's see where you're head's at.  So he tells me that a Mom is always a little boy's idea of the Lady, and no way, no way can he go out and compete if she's not there, in the stands, like in the movies where the Lady is waving the handkerchief. 

         "You're a real gentleman, grandpop, you know that," I said.  Sometimes I think it's not cool that old guys like him just hang out and talk about the old days.  They usually don't seem relevant, you know.  But today, the way I was squirming as he told me what I was thinking, grandpop kind of blew my mind.  I could almost believe the story about how Grandpop named the town by accident.

         "Bob didn't let you use the chain saw today, did he?" Grandpop almost whispered.  My mind was more than blown, and I couldn't say anything, or even play with my pudding.  I wondered what Grandpa could be getting to.

         "I talked to him," he said.  "You're more distracted than you think.  That's why Bob and I aren't letting you hurt yourself with that saw."  I went ballistic on him; well, I didn't curse, so maybe that's why he let me go on.  I told him how he was destroying the one space where I felt comfortable. Being up there in the trees, above all of the people like nuns talking about who'd go to hell, like Mom's friends with their 'A woman without a man is like  a fish without a bicycle' bumper stickers.  Above Nixon's Silent Majority which wouldn't shut up, and the idea that I might end up in a rice paddy which stunk like the scum on the bottom of a creek.  Up in the trees you could hear birds, the chain saws, and smell the fresh wood as the saw bit into a branch, the hot spicy tar we used on the pruned branches.  I'd look out and see other trees we'd done, and my legs could remember how they balanced themselves on this or that branch, how they held my weight.  It was the best gig, not really work, but I could get the bread I needed.

         For some reason, Janice brought be a Black and White milkshake, I think Grandpa told her when I wasn't listening. I pushed it towards him, well, the glass anyway.  She always gives me the big steel cup for the blender, and I noticed she still had the perfect balance of syrup and vanilla.  "So what am I supposed to do now?" I asked him.  Did he want me to something for Dad, Mom.  He didn't mention 

  "First, drink up.  It's starting to get busy here."  He flipped a twenty onto the counter where the sandwich had been.  "Thanks Janice" he called out.  Then he pulled a wad of cash, thicker than a stuffed wallet, from his jacket pocket,"Get her."  His grandson stared at him, wondering about all the lectures about caution and care.  His grandpa enjoyed the questioning look in his eyes, didn't realize that his own look was that of a very young man.  "Take Tim if you need to.  One thousand, five hundred to start".

         "But, but " I couldn't say anything intelligent, so Grandpop just went on.

         "Don't let her whore around in front of him.  She's his mother.  Other than that, what hasn't he seen already?" he asked.  I mentioned Dad, but he just said he'd take care of his boy, while I take care of Tim.  "But school," I asked.

         "If you can't handle a job you really want, you won't handle school right anyway.  Don't waste your time.  A few days of school won't make the difference between a genius and a jackass," he said.  But I just sat there like a jackass, for a bit.

         "Go.  Anybody ask, you're driving the car for me.  You can call if you need to, but I think you'll handle things on your own.  Good luck"  He stood up to shake my hand, then he just split.