Making Faces (24 page)

Ambrose circled pancakes. About an hour
later, Fern stood in the doorway of the bakery. Her hair hung in
curly disarray down her back and she was wearing a pale pink
T-shirt with white jeans and sandals. She'd taken off her bright
blue Jolley's Supermarket apron and had slicked some gloss on her
lips. Ambrose wondered if it was the flavored kind and looked
away.

“Hi. So . . . I like pancakes too.” Fern
grimaced like she had said something incredibly embarrassing or
stupid. He realized she was still a little afraid to talk to him.
He didn't blame her. He hadn't been terribly friendly, and he was
pretty scary looking.

“You aren't working tomorrow night, right?
Doesn't Mrs. Luebke come in on Saturday and Sunday nights?” she
rushed, the words tumbling out as if she had practiced them.

He nodded, waiting.

“Would you want to come with me and Bailey
for pancakes? We go to Larry's at midnight sometimes. It makes us
feel like grown-ups to have pancakes past our bedtimes.” Fern
smiled winsomely, that part obviously wasn't rehearsed, and Ambrose
realized she had a dimple in her right cheek. He couldn't look away
from that little dent in her creamy skin. It disappeared as her
smile faltered.

“Uh, sure,” Ambrose said hastily, realizing
he'd waited too long to respond. He instantly regretted his words.
He didn't want to go to Larry's. Someone would see him and it would
be awkward.

The dimple was back. Fern beamed and rocked
back and forth onto her toes. “Okay. Um, I'll pick you up at
midnight, okay? We have to take Bailey's mom's van because, well,
you know . . . the wheelchair. Okay, bye.” Fern turned and stumbled
out the door and Ambrose smiled at her retreating form. She was
extremely cute. And he felt like he was thirteen, going on his
first date to the bowling alley.

There is something so comforting about
pancakes at midnight. The smell of warm butter, maple syrup, and
blueberries hit him like a gale force wind and Ambrose moaned at
the simple pleasure of unhealthy food at an ungodly hour. It was
almost enough to take away his fear of curious stares and the
attempts people made to act like there was nothing wrong with his
appearance. Bailey led the way into the sleepy dining room and
motored to a booth in the corner that obviously worked for his
wheelchair. Fern followed him and Ambrose brought up the rear,
refusing to look left or right or count the number of patrons in
the place. The tables around them were empty at least. Fern paused,
letting Ambrose choose his seat and he slid gratefully onto the
bench that allowed his left side to face the room. Fern slid across
from him and bounced a little, the way a kid automatically does
when sitting on something with some spring in it. His legs were too
long and crowded hers beneath the table, and he shifted, feeling
the warmth of her slim calf against his. She didn't move away.

Bailey maneuvered his chair right up to the
end of the table. It hit him at chest level, which he claimed was
perfect. Fern carefully propped his arms on the table so that when
his food came he could lean forward against the edge and kind of
shovel the food into his mouth. She ordered for the two of them,
Bailey obviously trusting her to know what he wanted.

The waitress seemed to take the three of them
in stride. They were definitely an odd trio, Ambrose realized. It
was midnight and the joint was almost empty, just as Fern had
promised, but he could see their reflection in the windows that
surrounded their booth, and the picture they made was comical.

Ambrose had covered his head with a black,
knit stocking cap. His T-shirt was also black. Combined with his
size and his messed up face, he looked more than a little scary,
and if he hadn't been accompanied by a kid in a wheelchair and a
little redhead in pigtails, he could have passed as someone from a
slasher movie.

Bailey's wheelchair sat lower than the
benches of the booth, and it made him look small and hunched,
younger than his twenty-one years. He wore a Hoosiers jersey and a
backwards baseball cap over his light brown hair. Fern was wearing
her hair in two loose ponytails that hung over her shoulders and
curled against her breasts. Her lemon-yellow T-shirt was snug and
claimed that she wasn't short, she was fun-sized. Ambrose found
himself agreeing wholeheartedly with the T-shirt, and wondered
briefly just how fun it would be to kiss her smiling mouth and wrap
his arms around her little body. She looked like MaryAnne on
Gilligan's Island
, except with Ginger's hair color. It was a
very appealing combination. Ambrose gave himself a mental slap and
pushed the thought away. They were eating pancakes with Bailey.
This was not a date. There would be no goodnight kiss at the end of
it. Not now. Not ever.

“I can't wait to eat.” Fern sighed, smiling
happily after the waitress left with their orders. I'm starving.”
The soft lighting swinging above his head wasn't going to allow him
to hide anything from Fern, who now faced him, but there was
nothing he could do about that. He could spend the meal staring out
the window, giving her a view of his unscathed cheek. But he was
hungry too . . . and he was weary of giving a damn.

Ambrose hadn't been to Larry's since the
night after he'd taken state, senior year. That night he'd been
surrounded by his friends and they had eaten themselves sick. Any
wrestler knows that nothing feels as good as eating without fear of
the morning scales. The season was officially over and most of them
would never weigh in again. The reality of the end would hit soon
enough, but that night they celebrated. Like Bailey, he didn't need
to look at the menu.

When his pancakes came he toasted his friends
silently, letting the thick syrup baptize the memory. The butter
followed the syrup over the side, and he scooped it up and placed
it back on top of the stack, watching it lose its shape and cascade
down the sides once more. He ate without contributing to the
conversation, but Bailey spoke enough for the three of them, and
Fern seemed content to carry her end when Bailey had to swallow.
Bailey did pretty well feeding himself, although his arms would
slip now and again and Fern would have to prop them back up. When
he was finished, Fern helped him place his hands back on the
armrests of his chair, only to be informed of a new problem.

“Fern, my nose itches something fierce.”
Bailey was trying to wiggle his nose to alleviate his
discomfort.

Fern lifted Bailey's arm, supporting his
elbow and placing his hand on his nose so that he could scratch to
his heart's content. Then she placed his hand back in his lap.

She caught Ambrose watching and explained
needlessly, “If I scratch it for him, I never seem to get it. It's
better if I just help him do it himself.”

“Yep. It's our version of 'a hand up not a
hand out,'“ Bailey said.

“I must have had syrup on my fingers. Now my
nose is sticky!” Bailey laughed and Fern rolled her eyes. She
wetted the tip of her napkin in her water glass and dabbed at his
nose. “Better?”

Bailey wiggled it, testing for syrup residue.
“I think you got it. Ambrose, I've been trying for many years to
lick my nose, but I was not blessed with a particularly long
tongue.” Bailey proceeded to show Ambrose how close he could come
to sticking the tip of his tongue in his left nostril. Ambrose
found himself smiling at Bailey's efforts and the way his eyes
crossed as he focused his attention on his nose.

“So Ambrose, you coming with us tomorrow?
We're going to head over to Seely to hit the double-feature at the
drive in. Fern will bring the lawn chairs and snacks and I'll bring
my adorable self. Whaddaya say?”

Seely had an old drive-in movie theater that
was still a main attraction in the summertime. People drove a
couple of hours just to enjoy a movie lying in the backs of their
trucks or sitting in the front seats of their cars.

It would be dark. Nobody would see him. It
sounded . . . fun. He could just hear the guys laughing at him. He
was hanging out with Bailey and Fern. Oh, how the mighty had
fallen.

Ambrose found he couldn't keep his attention
on the screen. The sound was tinny and the speaker was closer to
his bad ear, making it hard for him to tell what was being said. He
should have spoken up when they'd arranged the chairs, but he had
wanted to sit to Fern's right so his left side would be facing her,
and he'd said nothing. She sat between him and Bailey and made sure
Bailey had everything he needed, holding his drink up to his mouth
so he could sip through the straw, and keeping a steady stream of
popcorn coming. Ambrose finally gave up on the movie and just
focused on the way it felt to sit outside, the wind ruffling Fern's
hair, the smell of popcorn wafting around him, summer in the air.
Last summer he'd been in the hospital. The summer before that,
Iraq. He didn't want to think about Iraq. Not now. He pushed the
thought away and focused on the pair beside him.

Bailey and Fern enjoyed themselves
thoroughly, laughing and listening intently. Ambrose marveled at
their innocence and their simple appreciation of the littlest
things. Fern got laughing so hard at one part that she snorted.
Bailey howled, snorting every once in a while throughout the rest
of the film just to tease her. She turned to Ambrose and grimaced,
rolling her eyes as if she needed moral support to combat the
lunatic to her left.

The clouds rolled in toward the end of the
first show and the second feature was canceled due to the gathering
storm. Fern rushed around picking up chairs and trash, pushing
Bailey up the ramp into the vehicle as the thunder cracked and the
first drops plopped heavily against the windshield.

They pulled into a gas station on the
outskirts of Hannah Lake after midnight, and before Ambrose could
offer, Fern was jumping out of the van and slamming the door
against the driving rain, running inside to pay for the gas. She
was a bundle of efficiency, and Ambrose wondered if Fern thought
she needed to take care of him like she took care of Bailey. The
thought made him feel sick. Was that the image he projected?

“Fern has Ugly Girl Syndrome.” Bailey said,
out of the blue. “Also known as UGS.”

“Fern's not ugly,” Ambrose said, his eyebrows
sinking low over his dark eyes, distracted momentarily from his
depressing thoughts.

“Not now. But she was.” Bailey said
matter-of-factly. “She had those gnarly teeth and those inch-thick
glasses. And she was always so skinny and pasty. Not good looking.
At all.”

Ambrose shot a look of disgust over his
shoulder at Fern's cousin and Bailey surprised him by laughing.

“You can't punch a man in a wheel-chair,
Ambrose. And I'm kidding. I just wanted to see what you'd say. She
wasn't that bad. But she grew up thinking she was ugly. She doesn't
realize that she shed the ugly a long time ago. She's beautiful
now. And she's just as pretty on the inside, which is a side benny
of UGS. See, ugly girls actually have to work on their
personalities and their brains because they can't get by on their
looks, not like you and me, you know, the beautiful people.” Bailey
smiled impishly and waggled his eyebrows.

“Fern doesn't have a clue how pretty she is.
That makes her priceless. Make sure you snatch her up before she
clues in to her good looks, Brosey.”

Ambrose eyed Bailey balefully. Ambrose wasn't
interested in being manipulated, even by Bailey Sheen. He stepped
out of the van without responding to Bailey's commentary and
rounded the vehicle to the side with the gas tank, not wanting Fern
to stand out in the rain putting gas in the car while he sat in the
passenger seat being waited on. It was early June and the rain
wasn't cold, but it was coming down hard, and he was soaked almost
instantly. Fern ran out of the station and saw him waiting by the
pumps.