An Ocean in Iowa (16 page)

But the girls had no interest in even tasting it.

The Judge smiled tensely and said, “It’s edible. More than edible. It’s healthy. Eat around the burnt parts, all right?” Then he put a slice of meat loaf on each of their plates.

“Dad,” Claire said, “drive us to McDonald’s.”

“Yeah, Dad,” Maggie said.

“This is perfectly good!” the Judge shouted. “You’re to eat what’s served. I’m not a restaurant.”

“That’s good,” Claire said, “because you’d have no customers.”

“Scotty’s eating it.”

Scotty had taken a bite and tried not to make a face as he chewed.

“He hates it,” Maggie said.

“You like it, don’t you, Scotty?”

Scotty leaned over his plate and spit out the half-chewed meat loaf. He had tried but he couldn’t swallow it.

“Aw, crap,” the Judge said, scooping the rest of the meat
loaf up in his hands, moving to the back door, kicking it open with his foot. He heaved the burnt meat loaf like a football. It landed in the snow.

The Judge returned to his chair and ate in silence. None of the Ocean children moved. Each of them stared down at their plates. After the Judge finished eating, he wiped his mouth with his napkin and said, “None of you know how lucky you are. Do you? You have no idea.”

***

The next night the Judge made spaghetti. Claire and Maggie both commented on how good it smelled. The Judge thanked them and announced he had come up with a new family activity. In an effort to make the family meal more pleasant, and to teach his children the importance of gratitude, the Judge instituted a predinner ritual. Before grace, and always going from youngest to oldest, each family member was to list what they were thankful for on that particular day.

Scotty paused the first time, because he wasn’t good at this yet. Before the next several dinners he would stammer for a long time, and Maggie would sigh, Claire would press her mouth into a forced smile, and the Judge would wait patiently, because it was important to find something to be thankful for.

Scotty would say, “I’m thankful for the snow.”

Maggie would grunt.

The Judge would say, “It’s something.”

And Scotty would repeat, “Yeah, it’s something.”

“And what else, Scotty, are you thankful for?”

And he would say, “My new tooth,” or he’d mention a new toy. Once he was thankful for everything everyone else was thankful for.

Maggie’s thank-yous were usually material—a lipstick, a
curling iron, or her new go-go boots. Claire’s thank-yous were often of a political nature. “I’m thankful for the lives of the Kennedy brothers and Martin Luther King, Jr. I’m thankful I received my POW bracelet in the mail.”

The Judge always looked each child in the eye and then said, “I’m thankful for my wonderful kids.”

***

One night Scotty listed everything he could think up. “I’m thankful for corn muffins and… my new shoes and… and Tang breakfast drink… and that I’m not frozen in the freezer.”

“Hear! Hear!” the Judge said. Word had spread around the neighborhood about the Conways’ puppy.

“Anything else, Scotty?”

“Huh?”

“That you’re thankful for?”

“Oh yeah. Sheila.”

“Sheila?” the Judge asked. “Who is Sheila?”

Scotty wouldn’t say.

Claire asked, “Does Scotty have a girlfriend?”

“No.”

“Then who is Sheila?”

***

Later, as they did laundry, Claire asked Scotty to describe her. He did the best he could explaining her hair, her smile, the size of her eyes.

Claire poured in detergent. They were doing a load of whites. “What’s Sheila’s last name? If she’s that pretty, you better tell me her name.”

“No,” Scotty said.

“Then I don’t believe you.”

“She’s real.”

“Let me see her.”

“You’ve seen her and you don’t even know it.”

***

Tim Myerly’s mom was named Sheila. Scotty had heard Mr. Myerly call her that the previous Sunday. “Sheila,” he kept saying, “Sheila, it’s time to go home.”

If he were ever to speak with her, Scotty decided, he’d never call her Sheila—better to call her Tim’s Mom. She’d like that, he thought. She’d smile.

Lately Scotty had been tagging along with Tim after Sunday services. Tim didn’t trust Scotty because he appeared too friendly. But soon the boys were playing during every coffee hour. Sometimes Tim’s younger brother, Jeff, who had just turned five but was taller than Scotty, played, too. Rounding out the Myerly family, there was the baby sister, six-month-old Elizabeth, and the father, a salesman for Massey-Ferguson tractors. But most important, there was Tim Myerly’s mom, whose effortless smile made Scotty think he was one of her own.

While the adults socialized in the parish hall, Scotty would play hide-and-seek with the Myerly brothers. Whether he was hiding or whether he was “it,” Scotty found a way to sneak downstairs to the nursery. There he would linger behind people and doors staring at Tim Myerly’s mom, who always stood holding Elizabeth, talking with Mrs. Hargroves or Miss Jeannette Snead, in the center of the nursery.

Each week Scotty yearned for Mrs. Sheila Myerly to do one thing. He would wait. She never failed him. It always came after Sheila handed Elizabeth over to one of her women friends.
(Tim or Jeff might run past and she might say, “Boys, not so fast.” She said it in such a way a boy would never want to run fast again.)

Scotty’s favorite moment began as she opened her shiny black purse. Somehow she never searched or fumbled; she never removed anything extra. Without pause and without even the slightest glance down, she produced a long, white cigarette. The cigarette went to her lips. She reached in again and out came a silver lighter. She lit the cigarette, inhaled slowly, her cheeks sinking in. She looked up and exhaled her smoke in thin, perfect streams. A white cloud of smoke floated above her and Scotty wanted more than anything for it to blow his way.

(6)

On a Friday night in early February, ten of Maggie’s closest friends came to the house for a birthday party sleep-over. The Judge made sloppy joes and Claire made a cake, and there were presents, but mainly the party consisted of girls staying up most of the night, wrapped in their sleeping bags, talking about girl matters.

In the morning Scotty found Maggie and her friends spread out in their sleeping bags, so he was forced to watch cartoons on the black-and-white TV in the Judge’s room.

Later, when the girls finally woke up, the Judge made French toast, much of which he burned.

***

That Sunday a minor snowstorm almost ruined the second part of Maggie’s birthday weekend. Scotty, Maggie, and Claire had been dropped off at the Des Moines Ice Arena, home of the minor league hockey team, the Des Moines Capitals. On non-game days, the arena was open to the public for ice skating. And since Maggie had received a pair of perfectly sized white skates from Joan in the mail, she was eager to try them out.

The Judge reminded them as they climbed out of the car that Joan was driving the ninety miles from Iowa City, and the snow would most likely delay her. If she hadn’t arrived by the end of the skating session, they were to call the Judge and he would come get them.

Scotty stood near the concession stand peering over the ice rink wall. He had no interest in skating himself, but he didn’t mind watching: He especially liked when people fell.

A pair of cold hands covered his eyes, and a familiar voice said, “Guess who?” (Joan had arrived in time to catch the final fifteen minutes of the afternoon skate.) He pulled her hands away, turned, and saw her. She appeared clear-eyed, her cheeks pink from the winter air, and she kissed him on the forehead, making a loud smack. Then she scanned the ice rink looking for the girls. She found Claire circling in the center of the ice. Then, at the far end of the rink, where the opposition’s goal would be if it were a hockey game, she saw Maggie wobbling along, her ankles turned in. Joan shouted and waved.

“Look at them,” she told Scotty. “They’re good.”

“Yeah,” Scotty said.

“Why aren’t you skating?”

“It’s stupid.”

“Oh, well, that’s all right.”

Joan had been a cheerleader in college and anyone watching
would have seen a hint of the kind of cheerleader she had been: peppy, loud, animated. But the more vocal and more supportive Joan became, the more Scotty wanted to go home.

When the announcement came over the loudspeaker asking the skaters to clear the rink, those on the ice let out a collective moan. As the girls skated toward the exit door, Joan told them they could skate for another session if they wanted. “No,” Maggie said, quickly unlacing and removing her skates. She already had the beginnings of a blister.

While Joan and the girls talked, Scotty watched as a special machine, resembling a street cleaner, drove out onto the rink. It sprayed water over the cut, gashed ice. This smoothed over the rough edges and made the surface look like the glaze on a doughnut.

***

After a brisk walk across the street to Shakey’s Pizza, Joan and her children settled into a corner booth. Joan shared a pitcher of Pepsi with the girls. No beer, they would report later to the Judge,
no beer.
Scotty drank 7-UP. He studied the red-and-white-checkered tablecloth with its blotches of tomato paste and crumbs from previous pizza crusts.

Maggie asked if it was okay to order a Suicide pizza (which consisted of every topping Shakey’s offered). Joan said, “It’s your day, Maggie.”

Trying to cram weeks of life into an hour of pizza and conversation proved not easy, as Maggie and Joan were both eager to talk. Maggie recounted her party. And Joan said she was glad it had gone well.

On a television that hung above the place where soda pop and beer were served, Scotty watched the opening moments of
Wide World of Sports
(“The thrill of victory, the agony of
defeat!”). On the screen, a skier fell and flipped over and rolled and bounced and skidded for hundreds of yards. Every week he made the same fall. Scotty always wondered how badly the skier was hurt.

Joan spoke about how nice it was being back in school. She hinted that next time they got together, they could all study. She explained how she had given up art and felt great about it. She wanted to learn something useful. She wanted to help people. Claire told her mother that she was proud, and Maggie agreed. Joan described her apartment in Iowa City. “Barely enough room for me, but soon I will get a bigger place with a fold-out sofa. You all can come and visit.”

Outside, the snow was accumulating on the street faster than the street plows could remove it.

Scotty said little during the eating of pizza. He didn’t like pizza.

Maggie accused him of never trying it.

“Yes, I have.”

Claire asked Scotty when he last had eaten it.

Scotty shrugged.

“Maybe you’ll like it. It’s a scientific fact that your taste buds change every twenty-one days.”

“No way,” Scotty said.

“It’s true.”

“No way!”

Apparently Claire had read an “Ask Andy” column in the paper that had explained all about taste buds. Children from all over America wrote Andy with their questions—Why does a butterfly have dots on its wings? What is a drone bee?—and each day Andy chose a winner question and answered it. The winner got a set of junior encyclopedias, and, best of all, his name and hometown printed in the paper.

“Andy said that taste buds change every twenty-one days.”

Joan interrupted and said that Scotty didn’t have to eat it if he didn’t want to. She tried to order him a hamburger or fried chicken but Shakey’s only served pizza. “Maybe,” she said, “I can run you over to McDonald’s.”

Maggie interrupted, “No one is going anywhere. Scotty just wants attention.”

A group of boys about Maggie’s age came in from the cold. Soon after they sat down, several pizzas arrived for them. They had phoned ahead. The center pizza had twelve candles on it.

The entire restaurant joined in and sang “Happy Birthday.”

Joan became distracted. She flagged down the waitress and whispered something in her ear.

“It’s okay, Mom,” Maggie said.

“No. No, it’s not.”

Scotty didn’t know what Joan was planning, but the waitress appeared annoyed.

Joan said that she would order another pizza then, but it must have candles. She put her arm around Maggie, smiled to the waitress, and said, “She’s eleven today.”

The waitress said she would see what she could do and left.

“Mom, my birthday was Friday.”

“I know. But she doesn’t need to know that.” Then Joan looked suddenly sad. “I didn’t know they did such things here.”

“It’s really okay,” Claire said. “Maggie already had a party. She had cake and candles, she had everything.”

Joan said for her kids not to worry. Turning to Scotty, and perhaps to change the subject altogether, she said, “Scotty, you seem different.”

“Yeah, he’s different all right,” Maggie told Joan. “Look at his teeth.”

Scotty had a couple of permanent teeth that had grown in. The Judge called them man-sized teeth in a boy-sized mouth. According to Maggie, they looked like big poster boards, and she had threatened to paint messages on them: No Parking or Child Crossing. “Or maybe,” she said, “I’ll write a report on them and bring you to school for Mrs. Mendenhall to grade.

Joan said, “It’s not his teeth that I was thinking of.” Then she squeezed his knee under the table. Scotty said, “Ow.”

***

While waiting for the birthday pizza, Joan began to run out of things to talk about. She gave Maggie a handful of quarters with the order that she play whatever she wanted on the jukebox. “Dizzy” and “Crystal Blue Persuasion” and “I Can’t Get Next to You” were her first three choices.

While Joan tried to get the waitress’s attention, Claire sent Scotty to see if the Judge had arrived. Scotty opened the door and saw the Dodge Dart idling, snowflakes swirling around the headlights, the wipers batting away the flakes at the moment they hit the windshield.

Back at the booth, Joan was arguing with the waitress: “It’s just a simple pizza with candles. It shouldn’t take that long.”