The Orange Blossom Special (11 page)

“That makes us even,” said Crystal, pushing her chair away from the table. “Because I am just as sick of whatever hysterical thing you're going through.”

Ella continued to serve the ham, as though she hadn't heard a word. Crystal ran from the room. “I'll talk to her,” said Charlie, leaving Maynard and Victoria alone at the table.

“She seems upset,” said Maynard.

“Oh, pooh! It's just one of her attention-getting tantrums,” said Victoria.

Maynard stabbed some peas with his fork. “I see you've been reading your Spock again.”

When Charlie caught up with Crystal, she was sitting on a hammock in the backyard, pushing herself back and forth with her bare feet. Charlie grabbed the hammock long enough to sit down beside her. Together they rocked back and forth. “That woman is a moron,” said Crystal.

“That woman is our mother,” he answered.

“Our tough luck then.”

Charlie leaned into his sister. “I heard that boy died last night,” he said. “That's why you're so upset, isn't it?”

“I was over at Dinah's this afternoon,” she began. “You know she had this weird thing with him. She was real sad, of course. Her mother came home from work early and made us fries and cherry Cokes. It was this big deal, I think. Dinah wouldn't touch any of it. Her mother got all teary and said that Dinah knew far too many dead people. ‘She has to think about the living,' she said. Then she made me promise her that I'd help Dinah get over this. I said I would. But I also told Dinah we'd go to Eddie's funeral, you know, to say goodbye. I mean I promised, so now, what am I supposed to do?”

Charlie knew exactly what she should do. “You need to go to that funeral,” he said. “I'll help you get there. Let's keep it between us.”

“You're the best,” said Crystal, poking at his naked toes with hers. Had Charlie been anybody else's brother, she'd have dismissed him as a goody-goody. But to her he was unique and heroic—the one sane thing standing between her and a cuckoo mother and preoccupied father.

“We'd better get back to the ham,” said Charlie. “Ella worked on it all afternoon.”

After dinner, Maynard and Victoria went to watch Walter Cronkite,
Crystal went to call Dinah, and Charlie helped Ella with the dishes. He told her about Eddie and Dinah, and Crystal's promise to Mrs. Lockhart. The more she concentrated, the more Ella creased her brow. Charlie used to kid her that she listened with her forehead.

“There ain't no question about it,” she said. “That boy needs a proper send-off. We're going to that burial.”

“Who's ‘we'?” asked Charlie.

“You, me, and them two girls,” she said. “Who'd you think I meant?”

As much as anything, Ella loved a good funeral. Any right of passage that showed the Lord's hand was worth celebrating. Besides, hadn't she long ago taken responsibility for Charlie Landy's deliverance? It gave her pause to think that, in all the seventeen years she had known him, this would be the first time they would ever stand together in a house of worship. “I know this is a sign, Lord,” she prayed silently, raising her eyes to the skylight above the sink. “Thank you for this moment of opportunity, and may you accept into your glory the poor young soul of Eddie Fingers.”

On Saturday morning, Ella told Victoria she was taking Charlie, Dinah, and Crystal to a school function. “Well, isn't that sweet,” Victoria answered, thinking she'd call Baldy's and see if she could squeeze in a manicure. She'd gotten used to filling in the time alone on weekends with what she liked to call visits to her helpers. When else do I have the time to get all this maintenance work done, she asked herself while dialing Jésus's number.

W
EEKENDS WERE THE
hardest for Tessie Lockhart. When Jerry was alive, she luxuriated in Saturday mornings. Jerry would wake up around eight. She'd hear him prepare the coffee and talk to Dinah and the sound of him underfoot would lull her back to sleep
for another hour. When she awoke, she'd call out his name and he'd come to her with a cup of hot tea. If Dinah was watching television, he'd get back into bed. “God invented Tom and Jerry,” he'd always say, “so man could procreate.” And then they would make love. The rest of the weekend, they would run errands, take long car rides, go out for an early Sunday dinner of meatloaf and hash browns—the things that families do together. Those days would float by. There'd be no accounting for how they'd fill the time.

Without Jerry, every hour of the weekend took on great moment. On Saturdays, before Dinah went off with Crystal, Tessie would lie and tell her daughter, “Oh gosh, I have so many errands and things that need fixing around the house, I don't know where to begin.” In truth, after straightening the house and shopping for groceries, she would find herself with hours to fill. Sometimes, she'd park the car and walk around the campus at the university. She'd fall in step with a group of girls, and imagine herself a co-ed talking about tonight's fraternity party and worrying about the biology test on Mondays. She liked daydreaming about these girls because their stories were just starting, their lives so full of possibility. It was easier on her than her other pastime, wandering through Grumman's department store pretending to look at glassware and washing machines. That's where the families were, touching or leaning into each other as naturally as puppies in a crate.

On this Saturday, Dinah left earlier than usual. She told her mother that Gainesville Junior High was having an all-day party in honor of the last day of school. “You are dressed to the nines!” Tessie said, when she saw Dinah in a black shirtwaist dress with her black patent-leather pumps and her hair up in a twist.

“What kind of party did you say this was?”

“Oh, you know, kind of formal. There'll be speeches and songs
and stuff like that. Crystal and me, you know, we're going together from her house.”

Lately Tessie was feeling bogged down by all of her daughter's “you knows” and “stuff like that.” For a girl who gets As in writing, she can barely speak English, thought Tessie. But she wasn't in the mood to correct her grammar or tell her to quit squeezing the pimple on her chin. Horrified by the relief she felt that Dinah was leaving, she kissed her on the cheek and told her to have a good time. Then, she looked at the time sprawled out ahead of her. It was nine o'clock; the temperature was already eighty-six degrees. “The hell with it,” she said out loud. “This is my morning, and I'll do exactly what I want.” She poured herself a cup of coffee, then got back into bed with the latest copy of
Life
magazine. On the cover was a picture of Mr. and Mrs. Sherman Adams in fly-fishing gear with the words “The Adamses Relax” underneath it. Adams, who had resigned his position as Chief of Staff to President Eisenhower several months earlier because he'd accepted a vicuna coat from a businessman, was wearing a tam-o'-shanter and squinting into the sun. Mrs. Adams had on a fishing vest and a toothy smile and looked like Jerry Lewis in drag. Both were wearing waders. “Sturdy people,” was the last thing Tessie remembered thinking before dozing off. “I wonder if they really have sex.”

The sound of a ringing phone called her back from sleep. The voice on the other end was husky and familiar.

“This is your lucky day, Dottie Lockhart,” it said. “Mr. Fixit has come to town.”

“Who is this?” she said, still groggy from her nap.

“I fix cars, sinks, screen doors, and hi-fi's. You name it, I fix it.”

“Is this who I think it is?”

“I don't know. Who do you think it is?”

“Oh golly. Hi. What are you doing here?”

“I told you. I've come to town to fix your hi-fi and anything else that needs repairing.”

Tessie didn't know how to answer that.

“Can I come over?” he asked, slightly hoarse.

“Here? Now?”

“That's what I had in mind.”

All Tessie could think of saying was “You're married.” But she didn't.

“I suppose so.”

“It'll take me fifteen minutes to get to your house,” he said.

“How do you know where my house is?”

“What's the matter? You don't think I can read? It's in the phone book, page 218 under Lockhart. See ya soon.”

Tessie put the phone in the cradle and stared at her hand putting the phone in the cradle. “Jerry, what have I done? What am I going to do?” she cried.

Tessie showered, washed her hair, combed it straight back the way she'd seen Grace Kelly wear hers in some magazine. She put on a pair of black slacks and a plain white jersey blouse. Shoes. It was important to wear shoes. Barefoot was too informal, too intimate. Flats, not sandals. Brush teeth. Lipstick, no Jean Naté, the strand of little pearls, perfect as baby's teeth. Music? Shouldn't there be music? Nothing too mushy. Hank Williams. Perfect. Oh nuts. Hi-fi's not working. Answer the bell.

The Baron stood at the other side of the screen door. A look of uncertainty crossed his face as they stared at each other through the gray mesh. “You will let me in, won't you?” he asked.

“Oh sure.” Tessie laughed.

She undid the latch and opened the door. They stepped as close to each other as they could without touching.

“Hello,” he said.

Tessie in her flat shoes was a few inches shorter than he was. She watched the perspiration zigzag across his rutted skin. In this morning light, his eyes shone amber and green. The smell of Old Spice caught in her throat.

“Hello to you,” she said.

“So, let's get to work,” he said. “Where is it?”

“Where's what?”

“The hi-fi. I'm here to fix your hi-fi. Why'd you think I came?”

Tessie jumped, as though his words had snapped her out of something. “Sure,” she said, pointing to a mahogany consul with Mag-navox scripted in chrome across one of the cloth speakers. She lifted the lid and showed him the inside, where the turntable and spindle were taped up like mummies. “Just another job for Mr. Fixit,” he said, rubbing his left bicep. “Ya got a screwdriver?”

For the next twenty minutes, he spliced wires and screwed the turntable back together. He worked in silence. The snaky veins around his temples became prominent the more he concentrated. When he was finished, he wiped his hands together, stood up, and straightened his trousers. “That's done,” he said. “I guess we should test it.” He looked through the small pile of records stacked on her bookshelf and pulled out a 45 rpm.

“They asked me how I knew, all who loved were true . . .” The luscious chords of the Platters filled the room like a church choir.

Suddenly Tessie felt like a sixteen-year-old waiting for a boy to ask her to dance. She played with her pearls and stared at the floor. Barone stood with his hands at his side, his arms bowed as if he were about to start running.

“Will you dance with me?” he said.

“Gladly,” she said, and stepped forward. He put his arms around her waist, she wrapped hers around his neck. They rocked back and
forth, not really dancing at all. The Old Spice mixed with sweat. She could feel his heart beating. Slowly, he let his hands drop from her waist to the bottom of her spine and then again, until one was under each side of her buttocks. He held her with such force that if Tessie had picked up her feet and wrapped them around him, they wouldn't have tipped forward. She slipped her hand into his open shirt and felt the hair on his chest and the swell of muscle underneath it. With the little sense that was left in her, she forced herself not to nuzzle her face into the reassuring nest of black hair. She just kept running her hand back and forth in the same spot, taking in his smell, letting the sweetness of the music carry her to a place beyond reason.

Barone circled her cheeks with his hands, each motion getting harder and more urgent until it felt like he was already inside her. Either her legs gave out, or he pulled her to the floor, or both happened at the same time. They tugged at each other, discarding their clothes as fast as they could. When they were naked, he stopped and held her away from him. “My God, Dot,” he said, catching his breath. “You are so ripe.” He placed his hands between her legs and she heard herself moaning. “Take me. Please, take me.” Tessie had never said those words out loud. They came out like a growl, the voice of an animal, not anyone she knew. Barone slid inside her. He lay on top of her, and held her by the wrists as they rushed forward. “
Ay, Ay,
” he yelled. “Ay,
Ay.
” She heard herself scream and felt the tears on her cheeks. He held her tight: her tears, their sweat, what came from their bodies. She buried her head under his arm, afraid that he would see the naked want on her face. “I never thought I would love again,” she cried into his armpit. He stroked her wet hair. “Child,” he said. “My poor child.”

Tessie finally came back to the world: the floor, the clothes strewn around her. She heard the sound of the needle skipping at the end of the record, the ringing of the phone. She needed to say something
that would get them from this moment into another, the one where they could be Tess from Lithographics and Barone Antonucci from Fort Lauderdale. But it was too late for that.

“Is that what you yell at Jai Alai?” she asked. “Ay,
ay.
Is that where it comes from?”

“You're a real smartass, aren't you?” he said, kissing her on the forehead. “The phone's ringing.”

“No one calls me on a Saturday morning.” The ringing was persistent.

“Someone is calling you now.”

Tessie pulled away from Barone and ran into the kitchen. The voice at the other end had a forced evenness to it.

“Mrs. Lockhart?”

“Yes.”

“This is Arnold Kamfer, I run the Kamfer funeral parlor?” His inflection rose to a question. “Everything is fine, but your daughter, Dinah Lockhart, is here. She's a little under the weather.”