“Okay,” I said, and before she stopped squealing, I had the new cart hitched up and we were rolling. Cinnamon sat in Dootsie’s lap. Along the way I tried to explain the situation as best I could. I told her that Charlie was sad because he missed his wife, and he came here every day. I told her that we must respect his feelings and not bother him. I was simply going to give him the gift and maybe say a brief something, and then we would go. Dootsie was to stand by me and not say a word. Usually I rode my bike into the cemetery. This time I parked at the entrance. I put Cinnamon in my pocket. As Dootsie climbed from her cart, I knelt in front of her, held her by the shoulders, and looked her in the eye. “Do you understand all that now?”
She nodded vigorously. “Yep,” she said. “And I’m not gonna say a word.” To prove it, she locked her lips and threw away the key.
We headed for the grave site. Dootsie pointed. She whispered, “Is that Charlie?”
“Yes,” I whispered, “now shhh.”
We approached him from the side. If he could see us out of the corner of his eye, he didn’t show it. My kneecaps were Jell-O. If Dootsie hadn’t been there, I think I would have turned and run. I kept telling myself: He accepted your donuts. He’s only a man. He won’t bite you. I also kept hearing Perry’s voice: Who do you think you are?
As always, he sat in the aluminum chair with green and white strapping. He wore a white short-sleeved shirt, black pants and shoes, white socks. His shins were almost as white as his socks. The old black lunch pail sat in the grass. The red and yellow plaid scarf was draped across his thigh. For the first time it struck me that that was all. No magazine, no book, no portable radio or TV, no headphones—nothing else to “do,” nothing else to help him pass the time. Even in death, Grace was all he needed. In his own way, he was echoing the legend of the Lenape girl. He had already leaped—it was just taking him longer to fall.
We stopped a few feet away. Still, he didn’t seem to know we were there. Dootsie’s tiny hand was wrapped around my finger. When I finally dared to look directly at his face, I discovered to my horror that he was faintly smiling. No doubt he was reliving a happy moment with Grace or maybe having a conversation with her. I was mortified. You idiot! You busybody! Get out! Leave the man in peace! Run! And I might have, had he not suddenly turned his head and looked up at us. For the first time I was fully seeing the face that Grace had lived with. The smile was gone. His eyes, out from under the shade of the cap brim, were looking at us from another place. Grief had not pared him down. He was beefy. His wrists were thick as hoagie rolls, his arms blotchy and red and white-haired from the summer’s sun. There was a thready logo above the pocket of his white shirt. It said GOSHEN GEAR WORKS. “I’m sorry—” I stammered. “I—” I didn’t have a clue what to say.
All of a sudden Dootsie snatched the gift from me, thrust it out to him, and piped, “Happy birthday, Charlie!”
I just stood there like a dunce while Dootsie took over. When Charlie failed to take the gift, Dootsie laid it in his lap. He didn’t take his eyes off her. Dootsie didn’t wait very long before saying, “Aren’tcha gonna open it?” She didn’t wait for an answer. She grabbed it and tore off the paper and ripped open the box. She took it out. “Look!”
He looked at the gift, at her, at me. “It’s a mister,” I said. “You spray it on yourself to keep cool in the hot weather.”
Dootsie shook the plastic bottle. “Look—we already filled it with water. Want me to spray you?” She took his non-reply for a yes. She sprayed one of his forearms. Droplets glistened like dew on the freckled white meadow of hair. He kept staring at his arm. At last he reached out. He took the mister from her hand. He sprayed his other arm. Dootsie snatched the bottle back. She sprayed her own face. Then mine. Then his. He blinked. She yelped, “Yes!” and jumped up and down and twirled around and sprinted twice around the tombstone and handed the mister back to him. Still he had not cracked a smile, but his eyes were different now, they were here.
Dootsie propped herself in front of him. “So, Charlie, how old are you today?”
Charlie showed her with fingers. Dootsie counted them up. “Eleven?”
“Seventy-four,” I said. At first I thought it was cute, answering the little girl’s number question with fingers; then something else occurred to me.
“I’m six,” Dootsie was saying. “Stargirl is sixteen. She got dumped.”
He was looking a little confused. I was looking a little miffed.
I stepped in front of him and waited for him to look up at me. I pointed to my ear and enunciated as clearly as I could, “Can you hear?”
He shook his head no.
I put my hand on Dootsie’s shoulder. “Charlie can’t hear you.”
Dootsie cupped her hands around her mouth, and before I could stop her she bellowed full into his face, “CAN? YOU? HEAR? ME?”
He looked up at me. He was smiling. I thought: We’re sharing something! Two grown-ups smiling over the antics of a little kid. Then he was reaching into a pocket and pulling out a pinkish thingy and putting it in his ear. He leaned in to Dootsie’s face. “Now I can hear you.”
Nosy me, I asked him, “Why weren’t you wearing it?”
“I don’t never wear it here,” he said. “So I can hear Grace better.”
His voice was gruff, callused like his meaty hands.
Dootsie looked at me, at him. “Is Grace your wife who died?”
He nodded.
“And you’re sad because she died, aren’t you?”
He nodded.
She said, “I’ll be sad with you, Charlie.” She climbed onto his lap and hugged him. He closed his eyes and stroked her hair. I stared at the tombstone.
When she climbed down from his lap, she propped her elbows on his knees and said, “Are you going to the Blob Festibal?”
He shook his head. “No.”
“I am,” she said brightly. “I’m going as Mrs. Blob. I’m going to win!”
He looked at me. “Mrs. Blob?”
I shrugged. “Her idea.” I tapped Dootsie. “Okay, young lady, time to go. We’ve bothered Charlie enough for one day.” I pulled her to her feet.
She stuck out her arm. “Nice to meet you, Charlie.” Before he could respond she cried out, “Wait! I forgot!” She pulled Cinnamon from my pocket. She held him in front of Charlie’s face. She held out Cinnamon’s tiny paw. “You have to meet Cimmamum.”
Charlie didn’t bat an eyelash. He took Cinnamon’s tiny paw between his thumb and forefinger and shook it. Dootsie tugged at him till he bent over. She sat Cinnamon on his shoulder. He straightened up. He and Cinnamon looked at each other. He turned to the gravestone and—proudly, it seemed to me—posed for Grace.
“Well…,” I said at last, not trusting myself to say more. I returned Cinnamon to my pocket.
Dootsie grabbed Charlie’s hand and shook it. “Goodbye, Charlie.” She waved at the tombstone. “Goodbye, Mrs. Charlie.”
“Goodbye—” said Charlie, and looked at me, frowning.
“She’s Dootsie,” I said.
The frown stayed.
Dootsie said it this time, tugging him back down to her: “Doot-sie.”
He nodded.
“Say it,” she said.
He almost grinned. “Dootsie.”
I led her away, then heard him call, “Hey.” I turned. “You?”
“Stargirl.” I saw the puzzled look. “Really,” I said.
He smiled. “Funny names, you two.”
We continued walking and he called again: “Hey.” I turned. “The donuts.” He pointed. “You?”
I nodded. “Me.”
He didn’t actually say the words “thank you.” He didn’t have to.
As I climbed onto my bike, I wondered why in the world I ever hesitated to bring Dootsie along.
August 16
Thursday. The one day in the week I’m up earlier than the mockingbird. Today I was up earlier than usual. I pretended my mother didn’t notice.
I go on Thursdays.
I had said that to him on the roof. Was I just giving information? Or more?
I practically ran to Calendar Hill.
He wasn’t there.
Why should he be? I hadn’t flat-out asked him to come (dummy).
I walked about the field. I joined the singing insects. The moon rose higher and higher. Was the moon looking for him too? I scanned the horizon for shadows. I walked about with the flashlight on, so I couldn’t be missed by anyone nearby. When the sun arrived I planted the new marker and went home.
August 18
I did errands downtown for Betty Lou today. I was in the dollar store, paying for lightbulbs and hairpins at the checkout counter, when I looked out the window and saw Perry across the street. With a girl. Ponytail. Not red-haired Stephanie. Ponytail was holding something out to him. He took a bite of it. She playfully kicked him in the behind. He playfully kicked her. They laughed and jostled on up the street.
Suddenly I had to talk to Alvina. Now. I ran to Margie’s.
“Alvina in?” I said, breathless.
Margie thumbed over her shoulder. “Back.”
I almost cheered. I pushed through the swinging door. Alvina was cleaning donut trays.
I had my first question ready—my life could not proceed without the answer—but I didn’t want to be too obvious. I started out with everyday chitchat, waiting for an opening. When it came, I tried to sound as if it had just occurred to me: “Oh yeah…remember that guy? Perry? What’s his last name, anyway?”
She snapped donut crumbs from a rag. “Delloplane,” she said.
Ah, Perry Delloplane. “You think he’s cute?” Where did that come from? I hadn’t planned to say that.
Alvina was giving me and my question an I-smell-a-skunk face when Margie’s voice came roaring from out front: “Alvina!”
A customer had spilled a MargieMocha all over the floor, and Alvina had to mop it up. Then she had to take over the counter while Margie went to the bathroom. One thing after another occupied Alvina for the next hour, so I finally gave up and left.
I am a mess. Like that MargieMocha, I am spilled across a floor, but there’s nobody to mop me up. I have only one thing to show for the day: Perry Delloplane. The sound of a name. It is a grape in my mouth. I roll it over and over on my tongue—perrydelloplaneperrydelloplaneperrydelloplaneperrydelloplane— but when I try to crush it with my teeth, it slips away.
August 19
Today the mockingbird doesn’t sound happy. It sounds as if it’s coming apart. As if the very heart of itself—its song—is breaking into pieces and flying off in a hundred directions.
August 21
I do my job. I weed the gardens of other people. I pull out the weeds and put them in plastic bags and the people throw them out with the trash. When I am finished there is nothing left but flowers and other proper, upstanding not-weeds. I sometimes almost hear the flowers say to me, Ah…thank you for getting rid of that riffraff. It was junking up the neighborhood. I’ve become pretty good at telling weeds from not-weeds. But every once in a while I have my doubts. I come across an especially difficult root. I pull and it doesn’t come out. I pull again. It resists. I dig my gloved fingers into the soil and grab it with both hands and pull yet again. It begins to come out, but I can see it’s going to take several more hard pulls. And that’s when the doubts begin. I begin to wonder: Have I made a mistake? Is this really a weed? If it’s not supposed to be here, why is it resisting so? But it’s too late now. There’s nothing to do with a plant half pulled but to go all the way. And so I tug some more, and finally, shedding clods of dirt and worms, it breaks free of the earth—and I try not to hear the tiny, anguished cry.
August 23
Another Thursday morning on Calendar Hill. By myself.
A TV crew came to Bridge Street today. They were filming the Blob banner and the front of the Colonial Theatre. They interviewed the mayor, who said, “It was our lucky day when The Blob crawled into town.”
My mother talked me out of dressing up Cinnamon and taking him as Frankenrat. She pointed out that in a crowd like that, someone might panic at the sight of a rat. It might not be safe for Cinnamon.
No such problem with Dootsie. My mother was so pleased with the Mrs. Blob outfit that she came with me to deliver it. The moment Dootsie saw it she put it on—which was pretty easy, since all she had to do was lower it over her whole self. No arms, no legs to deal with. My mother had sewn together a couple of sheets, dyed pink, and stitched clumps of cushion foam throughout the space between. The result was a pink, lumpy, formless droop—a Blob—that reminded me of a giant, rumpled sock. There were two eyeholes and, lest anyone mistake the Mrs. for a Mr., a cute little thimble-shaped hat. The droop was purposely made much too long, so that the hem crumpled about her feet and oozed across the floor. Mrs. Blob looked as if she were sprouting wings as two hidden arms punched upward and she declared, “I’m a winner!” Then she came sliming after us—and we ran screaming from the house.
August 24
By 6 p.m. Bridge Street was mobbed with Blobs and other assorted despicables, as all monsters were eligible for the contest. Demons, witches, zombies, skeletons, aliens, phantoms, ghouls, cannibals—and Blobs—all came slogging down the sidewalks toward the Colonial Theatre.
The theater lobby was Monstrosity Grand Central. I spotted a blood-splattered hag with one elegant fingernail. She was accompanied by a short Frankenstein and a man I assumed to be Mr. Klecko. I spotted the ponytailed girl I had seen Perry with. And red-haired Stephanie from the pool. But no Perry.
Everyone was reaching for Margie’s fried dough Blobogobs. This was where Dootsie ran into a snag. Because my mother had not given the costume a mouth hole (“The Blob doesn’t have a mouth,” she said, “the Blob is a mouth”), I had to feed Dootsie her Blobbogob through an eyehole.
When the last seat in the balcony was filled, the monsters were invited backstage. One by one they came out from behind the curtain and crossed the stage to the hoots and whistles of the crowd. Dootsie started out well—she even got a few wolf whistles. Then she had problems. She tripped over her hem and fell. When she got up, she felt for her hat and discovered it wasn’t on her head, it was still on the floor, but she didn’t know exactly where because her eyeholes were now at the back of her head and she couldn’t see. She was crawling blindly around the floor, feeling for her hat—really looking like a Blob now—and crawled right off the edge of the stage. I jumped up and yelled, “Dootsie!”—but a judge was there, catching her. He put her back, stood her up, replaced her hat, and pulled her eyeholes around to her eyes. She hiked her sheet up to her neck, showing the world she wore nothing else but her Babar the Elephant underpants, and ran off the stage to laughter and the loudest ovation of the night.
There were two sections: little kids and big kids. The little-kid winner was…“Dootsie Pringle!” Among the big kids, Alvina got an honorable mention. I wished Betty Lou were there to see it all.
When the monsters were back in their seats, the lights went down and the movie began. What I had heard about the movie was true—it’s more funny than scary, at least to the older kids and the adults in the audience. But that didn’t stop the little kids from screaming every time the Blob oozed across the screen. The big scene came over an hour into the film: the Blob oozing out of the projection booth, the audience screaming, stampeding under the marquee and into the street—The film suddenly stopped, freezing the fleeing figures in mid-scream, calf-length skirts and pompadours flying. The theater lights went on. A basso voice came over the PA: “Okay, Blobbonians, this is the moment you’ve been waiting for. The most famous moment in horror movie history—and it took place rrrrright here, in yyyour Colonial Theatre. Now is your chance to relive that history. Finish your Blobbogobs, spritz up your vocal cords, and get rrrrrrready to scream, Blobbonians. And remember—parents, hold on to your children. Nobody gets trampled. Nobody gets hurt. This is civilized bedlam. One row at a ti
me. Starting at the back. Last row first. Slow and easy does it into the lobby—and then out the door and…lllllllllet ’er rip! The cameras are rolling. Back row, get going…NNNNNOW!”
We weren’t supposed to act terrified until we hit the sidewalk, but as soon as the announcer said “NNNNNOW!” every little kid screamed. The rows funneled into the aisles. We were in one of the front rows, so by the time we reached the lobby the bedlam from outside was backwashing over us, and for the first time in my life I felt the force of a stampeding mob. Afraid for Dootsie, I started to lift her, but she broke away from me and plunged into the crowd, waving her arms inside her pink sheet, shoving aside other little kids in her panic to escape the creeping goo, tripping over the sheet, falling on her face, getting up, the mob trampling her thimble hat. I lost sight of her, then spotted her as we were swept through the doors and into the screaming blaze of the marquee and TV lights. I grabbed the top of her and a moment later had nothing but a pink sheet in my hand as she ran screaming down the middle of Bridge Street, naked except for her sneakers and Babar the Elephant undies.
I caught her at the traffic light. She was laughing and yelling: “I’m ternified!” I wrapped the sheet around her till she looked like a tiny Roman with a sloppy toga. We joined the after-panic crowd milling outside the theater. Many were going back in to watch the rest of the movie. We were about to join them when Dootsie shouted: “Perry!” She broke from me and ran to Pizza Dee-Lite, directly across the street from the Colonial. Perry was sitting at a table at the front window, watching the festivities. Red-haired Stephanie sat across from him.
I watched as Dootsie burst into the restaurant and announced, “I won!” and leaped into Perry’s lap. Stephanie laughed. A two-pronged fork of jealousy stabbed deep into me.