Dance Real Slow (12 page)

There is so much I don't know; so many things are not easy. Often, I wonder how this life found me. What I had wanted was to be a trial attorney, a litigator. To practice law, really
practice
it. Perform in courtrooms with slippery maple banisters and marble walkways and people, lots of people, weighted down with documents and urgency. And to live someplace with contemporary art galleries and Thai restaurants and public transportation. Someplace un-Kansas.

But here I am, settling a homestead on the grainy, wind-burned soil of the Great Plains. And last week I sat out behind our porch, cutting hemp rope into sections for a winter storm fence and wrapping the ends with twine so it wouldn't unravel. Whipping is what they call it—whipping the end of a rope.

Who is there to talk to about such things? The “fellas” at Duritz Hardware? Afterwards, the rope bound and stored like garden hose, I walked into the kitchen,
swollen with the fuzzy pride of accomplishment. Look what I did, I wanted to announce to someone with whom I could share a six-pack. Instead, I found Calvin rocking his knuckles against the refrigerator, leaving fine dimples of blackberry jam. He appeared bewildered, listening to the scraping sound of the seeds against the smooth door. Troubled. Like a little fucking retard-boy. He knew his actions were wrong. My anger came quick, prickling along the elastic skin of my throat. I grabbed the first thing I could, whatever was close. Chewing half a paper napkin, I blew spit wads at Calvin—small, white amoebas that filled his face like sores.

Later, I closed the door to my room and pressed my lower back against the bottom—sort of a human door-jamb. Calvin stayed in the hall, gurgling, kicking. Sometimes—many times—I simply want to be alone. Son-less and alone. Let me figure this life out by myself.

Now the office smells of cigarette smoke. There is something soothing, almost cathartic about sitting in the dark. Like you belong among the desks and chairs and bookshelves; you are no longer simply surrounded by objects, but you become part of them. Even if someone else were to enter the room, you would remain hidden, a piece of living, breathing furniture to be passed over with a flashlight.

Shortly after Calvin and I first moved to Tarent, the two of us were sitting Indian-style on the floor of what is now Calvin's bedroom—me refolding clothes that had been disturbed along the trip, and Calvin watching, rolling a toy race car back and forth over his shin. Suddenly,
one of the town's generators stopped working, although we didn't know this at the time, and the electricity in our house shut off. The two of us were quiet for a few moments and then, very matter-of-factly, Calvin said, “So this is Kansas.” I thought it a very profound statement for someone his age and I told him so, though he did not understand. And later, when I leaned over him at bedside, a candle flickering brick-colored hues onto his face, he asked if it would always be this way, without lights. I said no, that they would be up again in the morning. “We need them more at night,” he said, blowing the candle so hard that the milky wax pooled around the wick jumped, splattering his night table with flecks that hardened before I left the room.

A loud smacking noise breaks my train of thought—the thumping as a ball is kicked into the hallway walls, followed by Charlotte's voice telling Calvin to come back and hold her hand because she cannot see anything.

“There's a row of light switches right outside the door,” I say, rising and stepping into the hall.

“Oh, good,” Charlotte says, with a start. “That's better.”

Briefly, Calvin has disappeared. But as I prepare to yell for him, he rounds the corner, his shirt halfuntucked, banded with a large stripe of black grease rising nearly to his chest.

“What happened to you?” I ask.

“Nuthin'.”

“What do you mean,
‘nuthin'
'? How did that get on your shirt?”

“From underneath.”

“Underneath what?”

“That,” he says, pointing at an enormous steel dolly used to roll wrestling mats into the gymnasium. “I was tryin' to get the ball out.”

“How'd the ball get there in the first place?”

Calvin shrugs.

“Did you kick it there?”

“Maybe. I'm not really sure. See, I kicked it first … and then … well—”

“Okay. Sit down in there”—I gesture toward Coach Miller's office—“and we'll try to clean.”

After I have wiped as much of the grease from Calvin's shirt as will come off without the aid of a washing machine, we say our goodbyes to Charlotte and leave for the supermarket. Once there, we don't take long to fill our cart, for now we have the routine down to a science. The science of a single father and his son buying only those things that they truly need to survive the week: milk, skinless chicken parts, bottled tomato sauce, elbow-shaped pasta, cans of soup, baked beans, and corn, apples, bananas to be sliced onto cereal. Then the tradeoff: the son grimacing as the father takes iceberg lettuce, celery stalks, mushrooms, and fresh green beans; the son pointing to animal-shaped cookies, ice cream, and, not to forget, chocolate-flavored sauce. The total is not expensive, for in Tarent, Kansas, it does not cost much to feed one and a half people.

We sit in the parking lot behind the Stop 'n' Shop, Calvin holding the can of chocolate sauce against his thigh, for fear of losing it among the six bags lining the
backseat. Suddenly, a small brown pebble-shaped object lands on the hood of the car with a ping. Then, slowly, another and another, until finally, in a rush, an avalanche of the objects slams down in a heap with such force that it causes the car to sway slightly forward. It also causes Calvin to jerk back, as if a victim of whiplash, and scream out in terror. The car is parked in a slot directly beside an eight-foot-high ramp leading into the back of the store, and as I get out, I can see a woman leaning over the rail, still clinging to a once-swollen green-and-red bag.

“Oh, gosh,” she says, smoothing out the bag against her stomach and chest. “I'm
so
sorry. I kinda lost my grip and as it slipped I tried to catch it on the railing, but it split open at the bottom.”

She is talking about the bag, which, as it turns out, was filled with Purina Dog Chow.

“You want to feed your dog from the hood of my car?” I ask.

She straightens, at first not sure if I am serious or not. But we both smile at the same time and then she quickly starts down the ramp, toward the front end of my car. Her hair is a light, buttery red, cut blunt above the slope of her shoulders. She is wearing a black turtleneck and oversized, faded jeans that are frayed white at the knees and back pockets. They are cinched loosely around her waist by a wide belt with an oblong, silver Western buckle.

“Look at this,” she says, staring at the mound of dog food. “I'm so sorry. Really.”

“Don't worry about it.”

“Oh, Jesus! I've scared him to death.”

She is looking through the windshield at Calvin, who is still pale and squeezing the can of syrup with both hands.

“Come on out here, Cal.”

I walk over to his side of the car and unfasten his safety belt, pulling him free. But he has not removed his eyes from the pile, mesmerized by its unfamiliarity.

“It's dog food, Cal,” I say, taking a kernel that managed to lodge itself under the windshield wiper and handing it to him. “See?”

He taps at it with his fingernail, and then releases a long sigh that practically forces his rib cage in upon itself. “Dog food,” he says, as if he knew all along. As if that is the only possible thing it could be.

“Well,” she says, cocking her head and walking a few steps closer. “I guess what we need is a giant Dustbuster.”

Calvin climbs on the bumper and shoves his face toward the pile, taking several sniffs.

“How 'bout this?” I remove a box of plastic trash bags from our groceries. “We could fill a couple of these and then you can still use the food.”

“Oh, wow. That would be great.”

Her eyes are a slate-blue with tiny, precise pupils that seem nearly to explode when she reaches for a trash bag.

“Here you go, Cal,” I say, handing him a bag, too. “Fill ‘er up.”

He looks puzzled, so I grab two palmfuls of dog food and dump them into his bag.

“With hands?” he asks, for I am constantly telling him not to use his hands, to use a fork or spoon or shovel instead. How can adults be trusted? he must wonder.

“Yep. With hands.”

He smiles and then digs in, balancing the dog food against the insides of his wrists and forearms. As he tips the food into the bag, a few pieces drop on the asphalt lot.

“Careful. See if you can keep any from falling on the ground.”

He is concentrating now, his tongue folded between his teeth and lips at the corner of his mouth. Every few seconds he turns to look at me or at the woman, as if to let us know that he's doing it right, making a contribution.

The dog food will fit into one bag, but we use three, not wanting the plastic to tear when lifted. The woman has tight, closely carved muscles and I can see those in the back of her thighs flex, pulling up the slack in her jeans as she bends over. We dump the sacks into the back of her truck, which is dark blue and dirty and familiar. Hanging from the rearview mirror are a pair of red-and-black-and-white miniature sneakers, the same sneakers that belong to Noah Ward. When I ask her if this is Noah's truck she says it is not, that it is hers but she lets him drive it most days, while she is working. She says Noah is her younger brother, and from the way she speaks of him, the tone of her voice, I get the sense I'm not the first person to have had trouble with him. She is a veterinarian-in-training, but she also tends bar three nights a week at Cale's, which is two blocks from
my office. Sometimes Harper and I eat lunch there. She also tells me her name is Zoe.

Calvin has been uninterested in Zoe and my conversation and he is hoisting himself onto the truck's running board to peer into the window at a quite excited dog. Zoe walks over and opens the door, setting loose a large golden retriever who begins running around in a panic, not sure what to smell first.

“This is Argos,” says Zoe, crouching down to rub the dog on its neck.

“Huh?” says Calvin.

“Argos. He's named after Ulysses' dog in the
Odyssey
. Do you know what that is?”

She looks toward me when she asks the question and I shake my head.

“Of course not.” She seems slightly embarrassed. “He's named from a book. After a dog in a book.”

This Calvin understands, and while he pets Argos he turns to me and asks, “Do we have that book?”

“I'm not sure, Cal. Maybe packed up with the stuff in the basement.”

“Oh.” He waits a moment and says, “'Cuz I'd like to hear it.”

He likes the idea that a dog's name can come from a book. Then, inspired, Calvin runs to where qur car is parked and bends to pick up several pieces of spilled dog food, which he promptly surrenders to Argos.

“Cal, you have to ask people before you go feeding their dog.”

Halfheartedly he turns to Zoe and says, “Can I feed Ar-gus?”

“Sure.”

Zoe and I lean against the back of her truck while Argos sits patiently, eagerly, as Calvin dispenses one kernel at a time.

“So, how do you know my brother?”

“From school. I'm kind of filling in for Carl Miller coaching the basketball team.”

“And do you like it?”

“Really, I don't think I'm very good. I mean, it's not like I've got any experience.”

“But do you like it?”

“Yeah.” I pause, because I had not really thought about that question until now. “I guess I do.”

“What about the boys? How have they been treating you?”

“Oh, they're fine.”

“Really?”

She is grinning and I'm not sure what she is leading at.

“Most of them.”

“Ahh,” she says, crossing her arms. “Just most of them. Any troublemakers you'd care to point out?”

Now I start to smile, too. “I'll take the Fifth.”

“That's all right. He's a pain in the ass for us, too.”

Calvin comes over and wants a few more pieces of dog food, from inside the knotted bags. I tell him no, that we need to be getting some food in him.

Argos shakes himself through the scissor of Calvin's legs, from behind, and Calvin grabs the dog's collar and begins play-riding, like on a horse.

“Give a whinny,” says Zoe, looking Argos in the eyes.

“He could be my pet horse,” says Calvin.

“Have you ever been on a horse?”

At first, Calvin says nothing, and then, “On a real horse?”

“Yep. On a real horse.”

He shakes his head.

“Maybe sometime you'd like to go for a ride on my horse.”

Calvin's mouth opens wide, with awe, as if he is going to shout out with excitement. Just as suddenly he slams it shut, tipping his head and staring at Zoe with quizzical, somewhat doubting eyes. “Do you
really
have a horse?”

“Sure I have a horse. Do you think I'd promise you a horse ride if I didn't?”

Calvin shrugs and then turns to me, tugging at the sleeve of my jacket. “Hey, maybe we could go over there now for a little ride,” he says.

“Not now, Cal. Another day.”

“When other day? Tomorrow? Could we go tomorrow?”

“Actually, tomorrow's not so good for me,” Zoe says. “But how's Saturday?”

“How's Saturday, Pop?”

They have me cornered. I tell them Saturday afternoon is good and then Zoe writes down the directions on the back of a McDonald's napkin to where her horse is stabled. She uses a felt-tip pen and the ink bleeds sloppy.

During the car ride home, Calvin is full of questions about the horse ride: Will he have to wear boots? Will he get to ride by
himself?
How big is a real horse? Could he have his own horse someday? However, I am more interested in Zoe and I ask Calvin what he thought of her.