Niagara Motel (11 page)

“Yeah, but you're not,” I said.

“But I
could
be,” she said.

“People are usually good,” I said.

Sherry looked at Meredith. Meredith rolled her eyes, and they both shook their heads.

I looked at the baby then wished I hadn't. She started to cry. Her cries filled up the whole car.

“Hey, would you mind feeding Charity a little formula?” Sherry said. “Since you're back there. It'd save me having to stop.”

“Um, sure. I guess,” I said.

“Great! Just look in that bag beside you. There's a bottle in there. It's all mixed up already, maybe just give it a few shakes.” She turned to Meredith. “Have to feed her formula now. She's allergic to breast milk
and
cow's milk. Best thing for her, doctor says. Did you know babies aren't supposed to have cow's milk?”

Meredith nodded. “I've heard that.”

“Do you think you'll breast feed or do formula?”

“I … I don't know,” Meredith said.

“I think a combination of the two is the way to go, personally. Then, when you're not available, someone else can feed her.” Sherry grinned.

I brought the bottle to the baby's mouth and she started sucking on it. Her eyes got wide and bright and then kind of glazed over. I had to tip it up a little bit for her to get it all out, but within a minute or two it was all gone and I put the empty bottle back in the bag.

“Thanks, hon. You're a doll,” Sherry said.

“No problem.” I leaned my head against the window and closed my eyes. When I opened them again we were stopped at a Texaco station and no one was in the car but the monster-baby and me.

I had been having a horrible dream. Sherry had crashed the car and she and Meredith were killed instantly. Their blood covered the windshield. I had to save the baby. I had to drag that fat-head baby out of a burning car and carry it to safety and it was so, so heavy. It weighed 80,000 pounds. It took all the strength I had to carry it. But I did. I saved it.

Meredith got back in the car then and a wave of relief washed over me.

“Sherry's in the bathroom,” she said.

“Okay.”

“Let's get out here and find another ride. She'll be turning off soon anyways.”

The baby started to cry. Then it started to scream. It screamed and screamed and screamed and screamed. Its face turned red. Its body turned red. Then its face turned purple.

“Meredith?”

“What?”

“Do you really think that baby's cute?” I whispered.

She rolled her eyes. “Let's go.” The quiet of the night outside the car was like stepping into a warm bath.

“Hey,” Sherry said, jogging up to us. “Sorry I took so long. There was a line-up.”

“I think we're going to look for another ride now,” Meredith
said. “But thanks so much, eh.”

“Oh,” Sherry said. She looked like someone had just punched her in the stomach. “Okay. If that's what you want.”

“It is,” Meredith said.

“Thanks,” I said, and stuck out my hand. Sherry hesitated for a moment, then took it. Her handshake was like holding a dead fish. Sherry looked at Meredith and then pulled her in for a hug.

“Bye,” Meredith said into Sherry's fuzz-head.

“Good luck to youse,” Sherry said with a little catch in her voice. Then she pulled away and tooted the horn twice.

After we used the bathrooms and bought some snacks, Meredith and I stood in front of the store under the red and blue neon sign that buzzed and flashed on and off and spelled out O-P-E-N one letter at a time.

15

“Are you sure you want to go to L.A.?” Meredith said.

“Positive.”

“I mean,
really
sure?”

“I'm a hundred-percent sure.”

“It's okay if you want to change your mind. No one will blame you. We can probably even make it back to the falls tonight.”

“Meredith, listen, I've never been more sure of anything in my whole entire life. I'm going to L.A. to find out if Sam Malone is my father. You don't have to come. I mean, I hope you do, I want you to, but I understand if you don't want to.”

“Don't you mean the actor, Ted Danson?”

“No. I mean Sam Malone.”

Meredith lit a cigarette and took a long drag and blew it out the side of her mouth while she stared at me, her green eyes all narrowed and suspicious. “You're serious.”

“Yes.”

“How the hell do you think you're going to find
him?
”

“Go to Paramount Pictures in Hollywood, just like the bartender said.”

“And what if once you get there, nothing's like you thought it would be?”

“Well, this is the most important thing I've ever done. And I have to do it. Plus, Gina could die. And I don't want to have to live at Bright Light until I'm nineteen.”

“Can't blame you for that,” she said. Meredith sighed then looked at me with a lopsided smile. “You know what I like about you?”

“No,” I said.

“You're kind of crazy.”

I shrugged.

“But in a good way.”

We waited in front of the gas station store for a good long while. I'm not sure how long. Long enough for Meredith to smoke three cigarettes and for both of us to finish our snacks and drinks. Some people pulled in for gas and left and some people came in to buy cigarettes and coffee, but most of them were in a hurry and none of them were quite right. Then along came a guy in a blue Toyota 4Runner. He wore a John Deere hat, jeans, and flip-flops, and whistled the song from
The Little Mermaid
as he filled his tank. He smiled and nodded as he passed us and went into the store to pay for his gas.

“I think we should ask him,” Meredith said.

“I don't know. What if he's a creep? And besides, who wears flip-flops in April?”

“He's not a creep.”

“How can you know that?”

“I get these feelings about people,” she said. “I can't explain it. I can just tell. He'll be good.”

Lyle was from Maine, and he was going to his friend Ricky's wedding in Cincinnati, Ohio, but he had to drive all night because he'd left Maine late because there was a six-foot swell and Lyle was a surfer and he'd wanted to stay for it. But he had to be in Cincinnati for the wedding at eleven a.m. because he was the best man. The best thing about Lyle was that he had a big old Golden Retriever named Belinda in the back of the 4Runner. She was friendly as anything, and there were a bunch of blankets and pillows back there too, so I climbed into the back and let Meredith sit up front with Lyle, which she probably preferred because he smiled a lot and had dimples in his cheeks, and I don't know anything about teenage girls except that they go bananas for guys with dimples. I lay down and Belinda licked my hand, then I scratched her behind the ears and she wagged her
tail so much that it slapped against my leg and whacked against the inside of the truck, but eventually she calmed down and turned in a circle three times then lay down beside me and we fell asleep like that.

When I woke up, I peeked around at Meredith to make sure she was okay and that Lyle hadn't done anything creepy to her. She was conked out with her mouth hanging open and looked peaceful enough. Her hair splayed out around her shoulders in all directions. Her hands were folded over her belly. She had her big black hoodie on so you couldn't really see too much of her belly, but you could see something, like she was hiding a small pumpkin there. I wondered if most people could tell that Meredith was pregnant or if they just thought she was a bit fat.

“How're you doing back there, champ? You need to stop or anything?”

“I'm okay,” I said.

“Okey dokey,” Lyle said. “You just let me know if you need anything.”

And then I felt guilty for thinking bad things about Lyle because he really was an all right guy. Belinda stirred in her sleep and kicked her legs and I wondered what she was dreaming about. I petted her big face and head and watched as her black lips curled up into a smile.

“Lyle?”

“Yeah?” Lyle looked at me in the rear-view mirror.

“Do you have a dad?”

“I did.” He nodded. “He passed away last year.”

“How did he die?”

Lyle cleared his throat. “Car accident,” he said. “Drinking and driving.”

“Oh,” I said.

“He killed a little kid too. A three-year-old boy.” Lyle squinted into the oncoming headlights.

“Did you get to talk to him before he died?” I asked.

“Yeah, I did, actually.”

“What did you say?”

“I told him he was an idiot and that I loved him.”

“Did you forgive him?” I said.

“I don't know,” Lyle said. “I think I'm still trying to.”

Then we were both quiet for a while and the sky started to lighten around the edges. Lyle turned on the radio and it was “Stand by Me” by Ben E. King, which is an old song but still really good, and Lyle didn't change the station and I was glad for it.

The sky was lemon yellow as we pulled into the Motel 6 parking lot in Cincinnati. Belinda stretched and yawned and shoved her face into my hand. Lyle got out and then Meredith and Belinda and I did too. He put his arms over his head and stretched back, looking up to the sky behind him. He patted his thigh and Belinda ran to him and nosed his leg.

“Well, guys, it's been a slice,” Lyle said, grinning and slapping Belinda's butt. She whined and did a little dog-dance around us.

“Thanks so much for the ride,” Meredith said.

“Yeah, thanks, Lyle,” I said.

“Hey, no sweat. You can probably grab breakfast somewhere around here.” He looked up and down the strip. “Then just stand on that side of the road, this road we came in on, and you'll probably be in Tennessee before Ricky can say I do.” Lyle laughed and so did we.

I said goodbye to Belinda and gave her a good scratch behind the ears and let her lick my face. Meredith gave her a couple of pats on the head, and then Lyle whistled and Belinda ran to him and he gave us a little wave then turned toward the office of the motel and we went the other way down the street.

We found a place that was open called The Diner on Sycamore
and slid into a red booth next to the window. There was a jukebox in the corner playing “Hit the Road Jack,” and I'm pretty sure it was Ray Charles singing it. I like Ray Charles a lot because he's proof that just because you're blind doesn't mean you can't play piano and also be a great singer, which pretty much means that anyone can do anything if they really, really want to.

“Wasn't he great?” Meredith said. “I told you he would be good.”

“Yep. You were right.”

“And wasn't he beautiful?”

“I don't know,” I said.

“
Come on!
”

“I don't really know what makes a person beautiful or not,” I said.

“Seriously?”

I shrugged.

“I wish we could've rode with him the whole way,” she said.

“I liked his dog.”

Meredith rolled her eyes. Then the waitress came and took our order. She wore a nametag that read “Andie.” One of her eyes was brown and the other one was blue, and I thought that probably qualified her as beautiful. Andie had curly blonde hair piled up on top of her head in a loose bun. After she wrote down our order, she stuck her pencil into her bun and walked away. I watched to see if the pencil would fall out, but it didn't, it stayed put. I thought maybe when my hair got a bit longer, I would try putting it up like that and sticking pencils and pens and markers and glue sticks and whatever else I wanted in there, and if it stayed, then I wouldn't even have to get a new pencil case for school. I could just stick everything in my hair, and it would never get lost.

“Do you think we should call Chad?” I said.

“Why would we call Chad?”

“I don't know, to tell him about his car. In case he wants to go get it or something.”

“Fuck Chad,” Meredith said. Then our food arrived, and we didn't say anything more about it.

After we finished eating, Meredith ordered us two chocolate shakes to go because she said we didn't know how long we would have to wait for our next ride, and we didn't want to be stranded on the side of the highway with nothing to eat or drink. I knew that Meredith would be a good mom because she thought about stuff like that.

The sun was shining and the spring air had that warm-dirt smell in it, and we didn't have to wait very long for our next ride. I wasn't even finished my milkshake before a guy in a white Dodge van stopped in front of us. He popped open the passenger door and gave us a big smile and said, “Hop in, kids!”

Meredith and I looked at each other.

“What do you think?” I said to her out of the side of my mouth.

“I don't know,” she said.

“Where ya headed?”

“Los Angeles,” I said.

“Well, I'm going to Oklahoma City if you want to come,” the driver said.

Meredith whispered, “That's a long way from here. We should go.”

So we got in the van. This time, I sat up front.

“Oh,
shit
,” Meredith said as she climbed into the back.

I turned around to see what she was worried about, and there must have been 200 guns back there. Shotguns, handguns, rifles, a whole crap-load of guns.

“Don't worry,” the guy said. “They're not loaded.”

“Are you sure?” Meredith said.

“Not a single one of those is loaded, swear on my life. They're for the shows.”

“What shows?” Meredith said, still standing up in the back of the van.

“The gun shows. I drive around and take these babies to different gun shows in every state. Collectors look at them, sometimes buy them, we talk about the NRA, the second amendment, all that good stuff.”

“What's the second amendment?” I said.

“You're kidding, right?” he said.

I shook my head.

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, what are they teaching you kids in school these days? You don't know your own
constitution?
The Bill of Rights?”

Meredith sat down and slid the back door closed, hard. “We're Canadian,” she said.

“Oh. Well, that explains it.” He started driving. He had a buzz cut and kind of a goofy-looking face. He wore a grey T-shirt that said
ARMY
across the front. He told us his name was Timothy and he'd been a soldier in the Gulf War. He'd been awarded a Bronze Star for valor and a bunch of other medals I can't remember. “Ate, slept, and shit in the desert for four months,” he said. “After that, you can do just about anything.” He hated Iraq and what he had to do there, which was kill people. Kids too. He hated the United States government and everything they stood for. He said the US government was the worst bunch of scum-sucking hypocrites in the entire world.

“So how come you're going to Oklahoma City?” Meredith asked.

“I could tell you,” he said. “But then I'd have to kill you.”

I'm not sure if he was joking or not.

We drove for a long time, and Timothy talked a lot, mostly about guns and the government and Kuwait. Meredith fell asleep, and I half-listened to Timothy while I watched the farms and fields and rivers pass by the window.

Sometime in the late afternoon, Meredith said she needed a washroom and I remembered that I had to call Gina. Timothy said no problem and stopped at the next gas station. I found a payphone in the back of the store and called the hospital. I let it ring about a thousand times until
finally
someone picked up, but it wasn't Gina, it was Heather. We talked for a bit and she asked me if I wanted her to wake Gina up and I said no but to tell her I called. She told me she would, and then we hung up.

We got back in the van and had driven about ten minutes when Timothy looked back at Meredith and then turned to me and said, “Either of you guys ever shoot a gun?”

“No,” Meredith said.

I shook my head.

“You want to?” Timothy asked.

“No,” Meredith said. “Definitely not.”

I shrugged.

“How old are you?” he said.

“Eleven,” I said.

“And no one's taught you how to shoot a gun yet? What do you guys do up in Canada anyways?”

“I thought you said these weren't loaded,” Meredith said.

“Well, they're not, but I have ammo with me,” he said. “Never leave home without it.” He grinned. “That's my constitutional right.”

“God bless America,” Meredith said. And I could tell without even looking at her that she was rolling her eyes back there.

Timothy pulled over. He opened the back doors and started banging and clanking things around.

“I don't like this,” Meredith said.

“What should we do?” I said.

“I don't know,” she said. “Get out and run?”

“What if he shoots us? He got all those medals in the war. He's probably a sharp shooter.”

“Why would he shoot us? We haven't done anything to him.”

“I don't know, just because we're running away he might shoot us.”

Then Timothy yelled, “This is going to be so fun! You guys are going to love this.”

Meredith looked at me, her green eyes wide and bright with fear.

“Okay,” I whispered. “The most important thing is not to panic.”

“Come on, get out of there!” Timothy came around and slid Meredith's side door open.