Carry Me Home (5 page)

Brian lent him his car. Rob drove slowly, circuitously through downtown and Small Mill, across the old steel truss bridge, up 154 to the edge of New New Town. His stomach fluttered. The road whipped by more quickly than he imagined it could. He headed east on the county road past the subdivision, then south into rolling country and scattered farms, then east again, the old road twisting to follow the level, finally climbing over a ridge and falling into a narrow valley. He lit cigarette after cigarette, at times realizing he still had one going in the ashtray as he lit the next. The breeze coming off the road through the floor vents was hot. His feet sweated in the jumpboots. Beneath the dress green’s blouse his shirt was saturated. What to say? he thought. What to say? Ask her to marry you, he thought. Ask her. No. Not yet. Don’t be stupid. Beads of perspiration formed high on his forehead. It seemed hotter than Nam. What to say? He smiled thinking about her smile, her eyes. He put his left hand out the window, tried to deflect more wind into the car. Great way to see yer gal, he thought. Stinking sticky with sweat.

This is too much, he thought, expecting her to be ready if I’m totally unexpected. I should call. He drove farther south and east then pulled into the shade at the side of the road. His thoughts were jumbled, dull. Was he going to see her response to his uniform, to him strong if skinny, hard, the conquering hero returned ready to storm the world for his lady? He rejected that notion, thought of her, of her eyes, face, smell, her poise and grace.

He was going to see Stacy whom he loved, whom he had loved for four years, lived with for one wonderful month on leave before going overseas, written to innumerable times.

He drove to her house, walked into the yard, went to the door. His feet barely touched the ground, his body felt weightless, numb, on autopilot, dumb, happy. Stacy would be—

Before he could imagine how she would look, what she would say, Stacy’s mother opened the door. “Robert!” she cried. “Robert!” She threw her arms around him. Hugged him, kissed him the way he had hoped his own mother would have hugged and kissed him. He liked Stacy’s mom; she had always liked him.

“Hi Ma.” He smiled casually, relaxed, the nervousness dissipating at finding her there, finding the house unchanged. “How ya doin, Sweetheart?”

She looked at him smiling, about to answer, then her face contorted. She coughed.

“Ma? What is it? I’m okay,” he jested, trying to lighten things up, back things up to when she was smiling. “Look, no holes.”

“Robert, you’re not going to like this,” she said looking up at him, pitying him, pleading with her eyes as if to say, Please let him not mind, not care, not hate.

“What’s the matter?” He was floating again. Jittery. “Where’s Stacy?”

“She’s on the sun porch.”

Wapinski did not hesitate. He walked through the house to the back. Through the window he could see Stacy on the porch. He couldn’t believe how beautiful she was, how sexy she looked in a bathing suit, her legs glistening with tanning oil. He stared for half a second before he saw the guy. Wapinski opened the door, stepped onto the porch, his chest puffed up, lats flared, shoulders tense under his uniform, teeth clenched. He stood legs apart, like a statue, solid, planted before them. He couldn’t move, couldn’t talk, then if he did move or speak he wasn’t aware of it. Perhaps they talked for several minutes. Perhaps he shook the guy’s hand. Perhaps he wished him well. Then he backed out, retreated, retreated to the car, withdrew, capitulated. Then all he could hear was Stacy saying, “I want you to meet my fiancé.... I want you to meet my fiancé.... I want you to meet my fiancé....” over and over and over. He loosened his blouse, removed his tie, unbuttoned his shirt. He looked at the slip of paper she had handed him as she’d shuffled him out. There was a name, address and phone number.
Bea Hollands (Red)
. “You remember her,” Stacy had said, but he hadn’t really heard, had heard with his ears but not his brain. “She said when you got back she wanted you to stop by and say hello.”

*
This poem, along with the form of the monument described, is from the 1883 obelisk at Shelton, Connecticut.

I
REMEMBER WHEN THE
town wasn’t so big, when it was just growing. We’d moved into the New Town subdivision into one of the first houses so it faced 154 and the old houses of Creeks Bend, which Pa said were built right after the war to house all the veterans who’d just come back, built of “tin cans and cardboard and held together with bubble gum” is what my Pa would say. I remember one time my Ma, Josephine, she took us to Morris’, the grocery downtown on Second Street ’cause the only market in our section was in Creeks Bend and it was owned by the Holland family and they overcharged for everything. Or so Pa said. That must of been nineteen fifty ... four, no, five, nineteen fifty-five cause I remember Mark was just over a year and Ma carried him on her shoulder the whole time she was shopping and Joe and I kind of tagged along behind bein a bit scared cause Morris’ was in Lutzburgh and most of the people who shopped there were like the Hartleys or the Merediths or the Cadwalders, which was Miriam Wapinski’s maiden name and which she used sometimes and would probably always of used but the kids were Wapinski on the school register and she’d be ever explaining ...

That’s not what I was thinking though. I mean I was thinking maybe about the first time I saw Bobby but maybe it wasn’t the first time and maybe it wasn’t him. I never like asked him about it cause if it’d been me, I’d av been embarrassed.

I remember there weren’t a lot of people in the store, but there were some, two or three in every aisle. And there were a bunch waiting to check out cause Mr. Morris’ daughter was at the register and she still had to look at the keys—not like him or even most of the high school kids he’d trained who could shoot their fingers over the numbers without looking and without making mistakes either.

But what I remember, it was a real hot day, maybe August, summer, cause we weren’t in school, and Ma was carrying Mark, and Joe and I were putting things in the carriage when she told us, or foolin’ around if she wasn’t lookin. And up there by the check out was this lady with two kids—if it was Wapinski, Brian wasn’t with em cause he’s about as old as my oldest brother, John, who wasn’t with us either. But I think it was Miriam and Bobby and his kid sister, Joanne, and Miriam is fixing a curl on Joanne’s head and we’re coming up the aisle behind them. I can see this even though it’s really sunny out front and the people are mostly silhouettes against the big windows. I can more than see it. I can hear it. We’re at the end of the aisle near the big, three-sided Campbell’s soup display and I’m getting the chicken noodle and Joe’s getting the tomato because Ma said to do it that way.

“You listen to me young man ...” That’s the way it started. I turned around and she had Bobby by the arm, like right in the armpit and she’s got him cranked up so one foot’s just touchin the floor and his shoulder is almost in his ear. Her face was really pretty except she was red around the eyes like somethin from Halloween. “You listen to me ...” she says harsh but quiet like nobody is suppose to hear except that there wasn’t any other noise and everybody kind of put their heads down but everybody heard. “... if you touch one more thing, you’re going to get it. Do you hear me?!”

He didn’t say anything and she let go his shoulder and he sagged like his body was a sack of potatoes and he put his head down. They moved up in line so they only had one lady before them. We began the turn down the next aisle—oh yeah, I remember—we were getting paper plates too for a picnic we were going to have with Aunt Isabella and Uncle James’ family, my cousin Jimmy and I were real close, and Aunt Helen was going to come, too. Joe and I were already in the next aisle and Ma was carrying Mark and maneuvering the cart behind the line and Miriam gave her a look like how-dare-you-dago-scum-come-in-here when there’s this big crash and I turn and soup cans are rolling all over the place and Miriam explodes—“ROBERT!”

I mean, she like comes unglued. “You little bastard!” She grabs him again, right by the armpit again, and she lifts him and she smacks him on the ass hard enough to knock his feet from under him but he doesn’t fall cause she’s got him by the armpit. “You little bastard! How many times ...”

“I didn’t.” His voice was high. I remember it was like high and thin.

“Don’t give me that.” She’s shaking him with every word. “Don’t give me that. Do you think I’m stupid?!” And she’s dragging him to the front of the store, screaming really angry but controlling the volume and Joanne’s smirking like, “Ha! Ha! Robbie did it again.” And Joe and I are kind of hiding behind the carriage and Ma—only my Ma would do this—she’s holding Mark and she’s already picked up half the cans and is rebuilding the display like it was her job.

Miriam’s still berating him. She just left their cart right in the register lane and she smacked him again good as they went through the door and I swear his pants were wet. Ma’s got me and Joe pickin up the last cans and there are people comin’ to the front of the store and I think they’re thinkin we knocked it down. And I look out the window and the Wapinskis had a big sedan, you know, maybe a Packard, and I see her shove him in the back door and he’s about to sit on the seat and she shoves him onto the floor and slams the door and I think I saw him cryin.

Then Ma says to Joe and me, she says, “Get a jar of the Heinz India Relish that Daddy likes, okay? I’m going to get in line. You don’t want to be late with your paper route.”

Yeah, I was almost eight, Joe was a month short of nine, and we delivered the newspapers to the houses that were already built and occupied in New Town, and Jimmy used to help sometime, too. Bobby Wapinski must of been nine, too. Nine and a half.

F
OR THE NEXT SEVEN
days the heat and humidity increased. Thunderstorms erupted over Mill Creek Falls then vanished without having cooled the air or lowered the humidity. The waters of the Loyalsock raged with runoff, crashed against the high rock mounds in the creek’s center, swirled in the natural stone kettles. For seven days Robert Wapinski stayed drunk. He had not yet hit bottom, wasn’t even close. The homecoming whirlpool had not yet sucked him down to its greatest depths, would not until he was sickened, horrified, not by the behavior of others but by his own.

The two days after seeing Stacy, Wapinski was stupid sloppy exhausted falling-down drunk. Brian and Cheryl bickered about it, Brian telling her to give him time, yet after only two days he told Rob that his presence was wearing thin. Wapinski hit his stride with the bottle on Tuesday and for the next five days he was standing up controlled drunk, the kind of self-medicated drunken state where one no longer is aware of his feelings or thoughts yet can still function. Sunday morning would find him looking up to see the top of the curb.

“What’s this?” he asked his mother.

“Your bankbook,” she answered passively, as if the obvious should not need asking.

“I sent you four hundred dollars a month,” he said.

“And that’s what I deposited.”

“What happened to the rest of the money?”

“Well, you owed us some money, you know.”

“God damn it! No! No, I don’t know. There should be five grand in here.”

“You did maintain a room here.”

“What?!” This was too incredible.

“We kept your room for you. All your clothes and other possessions are there.”

“There’s only three thousand dollars here.”

“I talked it over with Doug and he said that we could get a hundred and fifty dollars a month for a room in this part of town. That’s what some of the men at the mill pay, and their rooms aren’t even in the Lutzburgh section. It’s only fair. Besides,” she said flatly, “the money went right back into the house. Those cabinets are all wood and—”

“And you bought a fuckin TV too.”

“Don’t talk that way in my house.”

“You can keep your fuckin house and your fuckin room.”

“You’re just going to throw it away on some stupid car, aren’t you?”

“That’s my business.” He’d picked out a car at Lloyd’s Autoland. He wanted to pay cash.

“You’re just like your father.”

“Wha—? That again! God damn. I’ll come back for my shit.”

“I’m not going to say it again,” she screamed. “Don’t you ever talk to me that way!”

Wednesday morning. The car brought back his smile. It made him feel like High School Harry but it was a good feeling and it was his first car and it was dazzling. He had never owned a vehicle before: in high school because he was saving his money for college; in college because there simply wasn’t enough money after tuition, room, board and books. Carefully he guided the used black-and-red two-door convertible from the lot at Lloyd’s. His legs slid on the red Naugahyde of the front bucket seat as he blipped the throttle and the hopped-up Mustang 289 torqued over, the posi-traction rear end dropped and grabbed, the radials grabbed the pavement.

His smile spread. The waxed and polished finish gleamed in the early day sun. He unleashed the Mustang’s power on Mill Creek Road, roared past the New Mill, climbed the hill past the junkyard and the town dump turnoff, slid into the ninety-degree left below the Old Mill and the cascade at the falls before throttling back for the esses. Then feeling elated, he again punched it, zooming northwest through pasturelands toward Grandpa Wapinski’s. He cooled down a mile before the family farm, stopped, turned around, headed back toward town. One surprise appearance was enough. He drove his new car to the dog pound behind the town dump, parked, went to the door, looked back and felt good. He went in, checked out the animals, left, drove to the unemployment office, registered, gazed at the girls. Then he drove to the state store and bought two bottles of scotch. He bought beer and cigarettes, groceries for Brian and Cheryl and a sleeping bag.

On Thursday Bobby went back to the dog pound. He cuddled two Newfoundland-mix pups, an Old Yeller dog, a large black lab-terrier mix. In one cage, by himself, was a four- or five-month-old German shepherd-husky mutt. “Hey boy,” Wapinski called. The dog growled. “Well, fuc—What’s the matter?” Wapinski stepped forward. The dog leaped at the cage door, barked viciously, snarled. “Come on, boy. What’s yer name? Come on.”