Tortuga (28 page)

“I won't tell Ismelda that you loved me,” she whispered and slipped into the dark.

The catcalls and cheering turned in my direction.

“Hey! Is that Tortuga? Is Tortuga getting some?” Mike called.

“Yeah! Tortuga's making out!” someone answered.

“Híjola! Tortuga's getting some!”

“He's not a turtle anymore! He's a lizard!”

“Oh my, el Lagarto—”

Everybody laughed and cheered three times for el Lagarto. I laughed with them. My heart was pounding and my legs and arms were trembling, but I felt great. Yeah, I thought, el Lagarto on his way home.

Flashes of fire returned our attention to the screen. A mob of angry men armed with rifles and torches had hunted down the monster. They cursed at him and taunted him.

I raised my fist and cursed back. “You sonsofbitches! You can't kill our hero! He's going to screw your women and screw all of you!”

“Yaaaaaay!” the kids took on the cheer. “Leave our hero alone!” “You tell 'em Lagarto!”

We hissed the angry men and cheered our hero. Popcorn, candy wrappers, a pair of panties and dixie cups full of ice splattered against the screen.

“Down in front!” the people in the back shouted. “Shut up!”

“Fuck all of you!” Mike shouted. “Can't you see our hero's in trouble!” But it was too late. The monster had been driven back in confusion. All he wanted to do was to talk to them, because he, too, was a man, but they had turned on him. For a moment he turned and looked at us, but we couldn't help him. If we could have we would have warned him about the fear in people, but now it was too late. Hate curled on his lips and anger burned in his eyes. He had no choice but to protect himself.

“Get 'em, Frankie! Get 'em!” we cheered when we saw him raise the club.

“Don't let 'em push you around, Frankie!”

“Give it to them!”

“Down in front!” “Quaaaaaaaaa-yet!”

The mob pulled back, cursing the creation of the mad doctor, and setting fire to the castle. Inside the laboratory our hero turned on his creator. Full of anger and frustration he blamed the mad doctor for his torment. They clutched at each other and stumbled around the laboratory like two giant bears locked in a death dance. Outside the mob cheered as the flames licked at the castle walls. The roaring fire danced in their evil, frightened eyes.

I shuddered and turned away. Our hero and the doctor crashed against the same machine which earlier charged the monster with life. Now it sputtered with fire and hissed as it burned them alive. A loud explosion rocked the theatre as the castle collapsed in a shower of sparks.

In the bright light the mob cheered. We remained silent, tears wet our eyes. Someone sang a mournful,

Poor ole Frankie

He never got a kiss …

Poor ole Frankie

He don' know what he miss …

“That was a dumb ending,” someone whispered in the dark, but we were too tired even to throw popcorn at the screen. We felt double-crossed by the ending.

Then Sadsack started screaming in the dark. I couldn't tell what was happening but Mike later told me that Sadsack had tried to make it with a girl who wore leg braces and had gotten his tool caught. He screamed bloody murder until Mike and Ronco pulled him free.

“You damn weirdo,” I heard the girl curse, “no wonder they call you Sadsack! You can't do anything right!” Then she stalked away. Everybody was laughing and trying to find out what had happened.

“My tool! My tool!” I heard Sadsack groan, “Oh, it's ruined!”

“What's going on here? What's the matter?” the manager cried. A crowd had formed around Sadsack, wanting to know what happened.

“It's okay, everything's under control,” Mike assured the manager. “Okay, gang, let's go home!”

The clothes from the pile had already been reclaimed, the wheelchairs righted and crutches returned to their owners. We filed out, leaving the nervous manager scratching his head and shaking it from side to side. We were exhausted but happy.

On the way out Buck slapped my back and said, “Damn that Rosita's a beautiful woman … I'm goin' marry her someday. And that Sadsack's crazier than a bronc that ate loco weed! Whooo-wee, did you see what he tried to do?”

We laughed. “It was crazy,” I said.

“Fantastic!” Buck said.

I had to agree. I looked for Cynthia, but I couldn't see her in the crowd and when we got outside into the blinding, glaring light we heard a loud commotion and I forgot about her.

“Something's up!” Buck shouted and pushed his chair forward. I followed. Right outside the theatre the jocks had surrounded Mike and Sandra. They were razzing them in a bad way.

“Hey, the movie freaks got loose!” the ring leader laughed.

“I didn't know there was a circus in town,” his girlfriend added.

“Step right this way and see the one-legged woman—” I heard him shout. I broke through the crowd in time to see Mike swing and the big jock double over.

When his girlfriend leaned over to help him Sandra rammed her with her crutch and shouted, “Step this way and see the girl with a crutch up her ass!”

The girl screamed and jumped up. Sandra swung her crutch again and drove it into the girl's stomach. One of the high school boys grabbed Mike from behind and they spun on the sheet of ice. Then Ronco shouted his war cry and went crashing into them.

“Eeeeeeee-jola! Chingasos! Blows!” He crashed his chair into the kid that held Mike, swung him around and hit him as hard as he could in the face. I heard the jock's nose crunch and saw the blood spurt out. Mike and Ronco had powerful arms, and the jocks had underestimated that. That and the fact that on the ice the wheelchairs were steadier than sliding feet.

A third boy jumped in, but by that time Buck had whipped out his rope. The lariat zipped through the air and when Buck jerked the noose tightened around the boy's neck and flipped him off his feet.

We cheered. Cries of “Fight! Fight!” filled the cold air. The Nurse, who had spent the movie time drinking coffee across the street, rushed into the pile shouting, “Stop it! Stop it!” and when she hit the ice she slid into the free-for-all and went under. “Saaaaaam-son! Help me!” she cried out.

Ronco tore into the rest of the jocks. He'd hit one then push him towards Mike, and Mike would clobber the poor bastard and trip him into the pile. And everytime the jock that Buck had lassoed regained his footing Buck would shout, “Yahoo! Ride 'em cowboy!” jerk the rope and send the bully crashing into the ice again.

Those of us who couldn't get into the middle of the brawl let loose with snowballs. The girls had jumped in to help Sandra, too. They grabbed the cheerleaders by the hair and spun them around the ice. It was a bloody, screaming free-for-all. Even Samson dipped into the pile and pulled two jocks off Ronco. He held them up by their collars, grinned, then slammed their heads together and tossed them aside. We cheered and he took a short bow, repeated his act then courteously helped the poor Nurse to her feet.

“Everybody in the bus!” the Nurse shouted. We drew back and began to board reluctantly. The jocks had pulled back. They had been whipped, and now the manager ran around threatening everybody with the sheriff. The people who had gathered to watch the fight stood around laughing or looking dumbly with open mouths.

“Get in the bus! Get in the bus!” the Nurse shouted. Mudo and Tuerto climbed down from the top of the bus which they had used as a good position to clobber the jocks with snowballs and ice chunks.

“Dirty fighters,” the jocks called out.

“We showed you!” Mike called back and raised a fist.

“Hot dog, we got those sombitches!”

“They can't mess with us and get away with it!” Ronco laughed.

Samson loaded the last chair and closed the door. The manager was having difficulty holding the jocks back. They realized they had been beaten and they were mad as the crazy hornets they had sewn on their jackets. They surrounded the bus and pounded furiously on it. Some of the kids pulled down their windows and spit on them.

“We'll get you the next time!” their leader swore.

“Yeah! Don't ever come back to town you damn freaks!” a girl added.

They scooped up snow, packed it into hard snowballs and bombarded the bus. But Samson had already closed the door and started the bus. As it jerked away from the theatre the snowballs splattered harmlessly against its side. We threw fingers and waved.

“You couldn't fight your way out of a paper bag!” Ronco taunted them as we drove away. He turned to us and added, “Damn I wish I had a drink—” He grinned. One eye was red and his upper lip was cut and bleeding.

“Pick on someone your own size next time!” Mike shouted.

“Mike! Boys!” the Nurse tried to calm us down, “Everybody sit down! I have to count to see if anybody got left!” Her hat rested awkwardly on the side of her head, her hair was disarranged and she shouted for order, but she was smiling. It was the first time I had ever seen her smile.

“Yah, yah, 'an don' go-go mess wid us!” Mudo stuttered and we howled with laughter.

“Sticks and stones may hurt my bones! But names will never hurt me!” Sandra yelled, but we were already out of reach of their snowballs and they couldn't hear us.

Samson turned the chugging bus up the hill into the bright afternoon sun. We settled down to lick our wounds and to recount the battle. The boys who had received cuts told how they got them and compared them, and they shyly let the girls fuss over them. Everybody was exhausted, but floating high with the excitement of the fight. The girls picked up the tune of our fight song and sang.

Oh we're the girls of the institute!

We like to smoke and we like to chew

And we love the boys that like to screw!

Everybody joined them in a resounding, “One-two! One-two!”

We laughed and cheered and filled the bus with thunder. We talked about the movie and about the fight and how great the adventure had been, and then we settled back into our seats and chairs and relaxed as the slow chugging bus made its way up the hill. Bobby Dee, a small kid who could really play the harmonica warbled a tune, and a long-haired girl next to him sang softly, the words from Cawliga, the Indian who never got a kiss, the man who was like Frankenstein in the movie, the man who was like all of us …

Poooooooor ole Cawliga …

He never got a kissss
…

Poooor ole Caaaaaaw-liga!

He don' know whaad he missed
.

We listened quietly to the sad song. Even Samson, squinting into the light, hummed the tune. The Nurse straightened her cap and sighed relief. The words of the song drifted out the open windows to mix with the warm spring air which had come to melt the snow. Somewhere a meadowlark sang. The air was full of love and strange longings. I looked across the aisle at Cynthia and she smiled and blushed. She smoothed her skirt around her lap and sat quietly. I smiled and turned to look across the valley at Tortuga. There was a trace of spring green on his sides. Beneath him the river was a sheen of silver light in the setting sun. The glaring light flashed across my window, and I strained to look at the budding cottonwood trees which lined the river … smiled, looked and saw the circle of white beneath the trees, my first communion girls dancing in a ring … holding hands and dancing in a wide circle, a dance of spring … and I remembered it was almost Easter. They turned and looked at me as the bus climbed the hill, and I thought I recognized them, knew them all … Ida and June and Agnes and Rita … innocent faces taken from the angels of limbo, the babes of the Virgin in the picture at church … and dancing with them for the first time was Cynthia. The light filled the bus, filled it with spring's song, glowed white as it envoloped us, filtered through the bare spring trees and danced off the white dresses of the dancing girls … reflected from the windows of the bus and swirled like a kaleidoscope as the bus turned and turned, climbing the hill, becoming the end of a bright dream, the kind one has on summer days … and they had smiled and waved, out of that time so far away, so much a part of my memory, they had waved and welcomed me … they were waiting for me to return, crippled lizard that I was, I would find peace in their arms, I would shine like a new mystery in their hearts …

The bus floated in the strong, white light of spring. Overcome with joy and love I closed my eyes and listened to the song forming in my dreams.…

20

I returned to therapy every day. After a workout with KC, I sat in the whirlpool bath and felt the stiffness in the muscles drain away as Tortuga's waters massaged me with their magic. Since the incident at the pool Danny had stayed close to me. He was always near-by. When I looked at him and let him know I was aware of him he would look startled, as if he had been caught staring, then he would move away. Otherwise, he stuck close to me, watching me, closely following my progress.

Once he gathered enough nerve to draw close to me and whisper his anguish. “What do they look like?” he asked, and before I could answer he was gone. His entire side was withered now, and his arm bent him over until he shuffled like an old man weighted down by the hump of age settling on his back. The next time he drew close he almost cried as he hoarsely whispered, “W-Why are they being kept alive? Why?” I felt his pain and I was filled with pity for him.

I knew he was afraid, afraid he would wind up like one of the vegetables in Salomón's ward. His uncurable disease was drying him up and pulling him into their world. Sometimes he whispered that he heard them calling him, and he cursed them. They had become his only obsession, that's all he wanted to talk about, and so everybody had deserted him, even his two friends Mudo and Tuerto. They were still playing their pranks and practical jokes, but Danny had withdrawn from everybody. When he wasn't following me he wandered the halls alone, muttering to himself, rubbing his withered arm, and cautiously working his way to the door which led to the vegetable patch and the other wards. They told me he spent a lot of time looking at the door, as if he was building up the courage to enter the dark hall, and instead he always turned away in a fit of anguish.