Get in Trouble: Stories (4 page)

It was a gorgeous room, all shades of orange and rust and gold and pink and tangerine. The walls were finished in leafy shapes and vines cut from all kinds of dresses and T-shirts and what have you. Fran’s ma had spent the better part of a year going through thrift stores, choosing clothes for their patterns and textures and colors. Gold-leaf snakes and fishes swam through the leaf shapes. When the sun came up in the morning, Fran remembered, it was almost blinding.

There was a crazy quilt on the bed, pink and gold. The bed itself was shaped like a swan. There was a willow chest at the foot of the bed to lay out your clothes on. The mattress was stuffed with the down of crow feathers. Fran had helped her mother shoot the crows and pluck their feathers. She thought they’d killed about a hundred.

“Wow,” Ophelia said. “I keep saying that. Wow, wow, wow.”

“I always thought it was like being stuck inside a bottle of orange Nehi,” Fran said. “But in a good way.”

“I like orange Nehi,” Ophelia said. “But this is like outer space.”

There was a stack of books on the table beside the bed. Like everything else in the room, all the books had been picked out for the colors on their jackets. Fran’s ma had told her how once the room had been another set of colors. Greens and blues, maybe? Willow and peacock and midnight colors? And who had brought the bits up for the room that time? Fran’s great-grandfather or someone even further along the family tree?
Who had first begun to take care of the summer people? Her mother had doled out stories sparingly, and so Fran had only a piecemeal sort of history.

Hard to figure out what would please Ophelia to hear anyway, and what would trouble her. All of it seemed pleasing and troubling to Fran, in equal measure after so many years.

“The door you slipped my envelope under,” she said, finally. “You oughtn’t ever go in there.”

Ophelia looked interested. “Like Bluebeard,” she said.

Fran said, “It’s how they come and go. Even they don’t open that door very often, I guess.” She’d peeped through the keyhole once and seen a bloody river. She bet if you passed through that door, you weren’t likely to return.

“Can I ask you another stupid question?” Ophelia said. “Where are they right now?”

“They’re here,” Fran said. “Or out in the woods chasing nightjars. I told you I don’t see them much.”

“So how do they tell you what they need you to do?”

“They get in my head,” Fran said. “It’s hard to explain. They just get in there and poke at me. Like having a really bad itch or something that goes away when I do what they want me to.”

“Oh, Fran,” Ophelia said. “Maybe I don’t like your summer people as much as I thought I did.”

Fran said, “It’s not always awful. I guess what it is, is complicated.”

“I guess I won’t complain the next time my mom tells me I have to help her polish the silver. Should we eat our sandwiches now, or should we save them for when we wake up in the middle of the night?” Ophelia asked. “I have this idea that seeing your heart’s desire probably makes you hungry.”

“I can’t stay,” Fran said, surprised. She saw Ophelia’s expression and said, “Well, hell. I thought you understood. This is just for you.”

Ophelia continued to look at her dubiously. “Is it because there’s just the one bed? I could sleep on the floor. You know, if you’re worried I might be planning to
lez out
on you.”

“It isn’t that,” Fran said. “They only let a body sleep here once. Once and no more.”

“You’re going to leave me up here alone?” Ophelia said.

“Yes,” Fran said. “Unless you decide you want to come back down with me. If you’re afraid.”

“If I did, could I come back another time?” Ophelia said.

“No.”

Ophelia sat down on the golden quilt and smoothed it with her fingers. She chewed her lip, not meeting Fran’s eye.

“Okay. I’ll do it.” She laughed. “How could I not do it? Right?”

“If you’re sure,” Fran said.

“I’m not sure, but I couldn’t stand it if you sent me away now,” Ophelia said. “When you slept here, were you afraid?”

“A little,” Fran said. “But the bed was comfortable, and I kept the light on. I read for a while and then I fell asleep.”

“Did you see your heart’s desire?” Ophelia said.

“I saw it,” Fran said, and then said no more.

“Okay, then,” Ophelia said. “I guess you should go. You should go, right?”

“I’ll come back in the morning,” Fran said. “I’ll be here afore you even wake.”

“Thanks,” Ophelia said.

But Fran didn’t go. She said, “Did you mean it when you said you wanted to help?”

“Look after the house?” Ophelia said. “Yeah, absolutely. You really ought to go out to San Francisco someday. You shouldn’t have to stay here your whole life without ever having a vacation or anything. I mean, you’re not a slave, right?”

“I don’t know what I am,” Fran said. “I guess one day I’ll have to figure that out.”

Ophelia said, “Anyway, we can talk about it tomorrow. Over breakfast. You can tell me about the suckiest parts of the job and I’ll tell you what my heart’s desire turns out to be.”

“Oh,” Fran said. “I almost forgot. When you wake up tomorrow, don’t be surprised if they’ve left you a gift. The summer people. It’ll be something they think you need or want. But you don’t have to accept it. You don’t have to worry about being rude that way.”

“Okay,” Ophelia said. “I will consider whether I really need or want my present. I won’t let false glamour deceive me.”

“Good,” Fran said. Then she bent over Ophelia where she was sitting on the bed and kissed her on the forehead. “Sleep well, ’Phelia. Good dreams.”

Fran left the house without any interference from the summer people. She couldn’t tell if she’d expected to find any. As she came down the stairs, she said rather more fiercely than she’d meant to: “Be nice to her. Don’t play no tricks.” She looked in on the queen, who was molting again.

She went out the front door instead of the back, which was
something she’d always wanted to do. Nothing bad happened, and she walked down the hill feeling strangely put out. She went over everything in her head, wondering what still needed doing that she hadn’t done. Nothing, she decided. Everything was taken care of.

Except, of course, it wasn’t. The first item was the guitar, leaned up against the door of her house. It was a beautiful instrument. The strings, she thought, were silver. When she struck them, the tone was pure and sweet and reminded her—as it was no doubt meant to—of Ophelia’s singing voice. The keys were made of gold and shaped like owl heads, and there was mother-of-pearl inlay across the boards like a spray of roses. It was the gaudiest gewgaw they’d yet made her a gift of.

“Well, all right,” she said. “I guess you don’t mind what I told her.” She laughed out loud with relief.

“Why everwho did you tell what?” someone said.

She picked up the guitar and held it like a weapon in front of her. “Daddy?”

“Put that down,” the voice said. A man stepped forward out of the shadow of the rosebushes. “I’m not your damn daddy. Although, come to think of it, I would like to know where he is.”

“Ryan Shoemaker,” Fran said. She put the guitar down on the ground. A second man stepped forward. “And Kyle Rainey.”

“Howdy, Fran,” said Kyle. He spat. “We were lookin’ for your pappy, like Ryan says.”

“If he calls I’ll let him know you were up here looking for him,” Fran said.

Ryan lit up a cigarette, looked at her over the flame. “It was your daddy we wanted to ask, but I guess you could help us out instead.”

“It don’t seem likely somehow,” Fran said. “But go on.”

“Your daddy was meaning to drop off some of the sweet stuff the other night,” Kyle said. “Only, he started thinking about it on the drive down, and that’s never been a good idea where your daddy is concerned. He decided Jesus wanted him to pour out every last drop, and that’s what he did all the way down the mountain. If he weren’t a lucky man, some spark might’ve cotched while he were pouring, but I guess Jesus don’t want to meet him face-to-face just yet.”

“And if that weren’t bad enough,” Ryan said, “when he got to the convenience, Jesus wanted him to get into the van and smash up all Andy’s liquor, too. Time we realized what was going on, there weren’t much left besides two bottles of Kahlua and a six-pack of wine coolers.”

“One of them smashed, too,” Kyle said. “And then he took off afore we could have a word with him.”

“Well, I’m sorry for your troubles, but I don’t see what it has to do with me,” Fran said.

“What it has to do is we conferred some about it. Seems to us your pappy could provide us with entrée to some of the finest homes in the area. I hear summer people like their tipples.”

“So then,” Fran said, “if I have this right, you’re hoping my daddy will make his restitution by becoming your accessory in breaking and entering.”

“Or he could pay poor Andy back in kind,” Ryan said. “With some of that good stuff.”

“He’ll have to run that by Jesus,” Fran said. “I ’spect it’s a better bet than the other, but you might have to wait till he and Jesus have had enough of each other.”

“The thing is,” Ryan said, “I’m not a patient man. And it may
be so that your pappy is out of our reach at present moment, but here you are. And I’m guessing you can get us into a house or two.”

“Or you could point us in the direction of your daddy’s private stash,” Kyle said.

“And if I don’t choose to do neither?” Fran asked, crossing her arms.

“Here’s the kicker, so to speak, Fran,” Kyle said. “Ryan has not been in a good mood these last few days. He bit a sheriff’s deputy on the arm last night in a bar. Which is why we weren’t up here sooner.”

Fran stepped back. “Wait up. Okay? I’ll tell you a thing if you promise not to tell my daddy. Okay? There’s an old house farther up the road that nobody except me and my daddy knows about. Nobody lives there, and so my daddy put his still up in it. He’s got all sorts of articles stashed up there. I’ll take you up. But you can’t tell him what I done.”

“Course not, darlin’,” Kyle said. “We don’t aim to cause a rift in the family. Just to get what we have coming.”

And so Fran found herself climbing right back up that same road. She got her feet wet crossing the drain but kept as far ahead of Kyle and Ryan as she dared.

When they got up to the house, Kyle whistled. “Fancy sort of ruin.”

“Wait’ll you see what’s inside,” Fran said. She led them around to the back, then held the door open. “Sorry about the lights. The power goes off more than it stays on. My daddy usually brings up a flashlight. Want me to fetch one?”

“We got matches,” Ryan said. “You stay right there.”

“The still is in the room over on the right. Mind how you
go. He’s got it set up in a kind of maze, with the newspapers and all.”

“Dark as hell at the damned stroke of midnight,” Kyle said. He felt his way down the hall. “I think I’m at the door. Sure enough, smells like what I’m lookin’ for. Guess I’ll just follow my nose. No booby traps or nothing like that?”

“No, sir,” Fran said. “He’d’ve blowed himself up a long time before now if he tried that.”

“I might as well take in the sights,” Ryan said, the lit end of his cigarette flaring.

“Yes, sir,” Fran said.

“And might there be a pisser in this heap?”

“Third door on the left, once you go up,” Fran said. “The door sticks some.”

She waited until he was at the top of the stairs before she slipped out the back door again. She could hear Kyle fumbling toward the center of the Queen’s Room. She wondered what the queen would make of Kyle. She wasn’t worried about Ophelia at all. Ophelia was an invited guest. And anyhow, the summer people didn’t let anything happen to the ones who looked after them.

One of the summer people was sprawled on the porch swing when she came out. He was whittling a stick with a sharp knife.

“Evening,” Fran said and bobbed her head.

The summer personage didn’t even look up at her. He was one of the ones so pretty it almost hurt to peep at him, but you couldn’t not stare, neither. That was one of the ways they cotched you, Fran figured. Like wild animals when someone shone a light at them. She finally tore her gaze away and ran down the stairs like the devil was after her. When she stopped to look back, he was still setting there, smiling and whittling that poor stick down.

She sold the guitar when she got to New York City. What was left of her daddy’s two hundred dollars had bought her a Greyhound ticket and a couple of burgers at the bus station. The guitar got her six hundred more, and she used that to buy a ticket to Paris, where she met a Lebanese boy who was squatting in an old factory. One day she came back from her under-the-table job at a hotel and found him looking through her backpack. He had the monkey egg in his hand. He wound it up and put it down on the dirty floor to dance. They both watched until it ran down.
“Très joli,”
he said.

It was a few days after Christmas, and there was snow melting in her hair. They didn’t have heat in the squat, or even running water. She’d had a bad cough for a few days. She sat down next to her boy, and when he started to wind up the monkey egg again, she put her hand out to make him stop.

She didn’t remember packing it. And of course, maybe she hadn’t. For all she knew, they had winter places as well as summer places. She would bet they got around.

A few days later, the Lebanese boy ran off, no doubt looking for someplace warmer. The monkey egg went with him. After that, all she had to remind herself of home was the tent that she kept folded up like a dirty handkerchief in her wallet.

It’s been two years, and every now and again while Fran is cleaning rooms in the pension, she closes the door and sets up the kerchief tent and gets inside. She looks out the window at the two apple trees, the dead one and the living. She tells herself that one day soon she will go home again.

I Can See Right Through You