Road To Nowhere (8 page)

“Near the end of the second semester she met a man. She wasn’t looking for a relationship, although she was desperately lonely. It was just one of those things that happened. The relationship was cursed. The man was a teacher, and he was a married teacher, in his mid-thirties. His name was Henry and he taught art. He saw some of her work – she showed it to him in a brave moment after talking to him. He fell for her because she was a natural genius and he was an academic hack. That’s what he told her. But maybe he fell for her because he was as lonely as she was.

“He wasn’t a bad man, Henry. He was a patient teacher. His students loved him. He just didn’t have any talent, and his wife was always nagging him to quit teaching and get a commercial job where she thought he’d make more money, but where he knew he would fail miserably. He wasn’t handsome at all, not like John. In fact, he was the opposite of John in every respect. He was so mild mannered that he had a hard time protecting his place in line at the movies. He wore thick glasses and was helpless without them. He had an ulcer and was always chewing Maalox tablets.

“But he was a comfort to Candy. He took her to dinner and helped her with her homework. But their relationship had severe limits placed on it. He wasn’t ready to leave his wife – he told her that right at the start. And the administration couldn’t find out about their affair or he’d lose his job. They went to late dinners, late movies, and he always wore a hat. Henry’s wife didn’t seem to care. She was having her own affair with a building contractor.

“You might think Candy was a fool to get involved with such a man and I don’t think that Candy would have argued with you. Her eyes were open. She knew where her affair was headed, which was nowhere. But she liked Henry, she really did. She may even have loved him, although not in the same way she had loved John. In her heart she had decided she was never going to love anyone as much as she loved John.

“Strangely enough, the whole time Candy was with Henry, she drew very little. For one thing, if it was risky for her to take art classes before, it was doubly risky now. Henry couldn’t be seen with her on campus. Then there was the difference in their abilities. It was her talent that had caught his eye but when he was away from class, he later explained, he liked to forget drawing. Sure, he would comment on a drawing if she showed it to him. He would offer constructive criticism – things to do to improve. Yet he really did not encourage her. Maybe he was jealous. Maybe he was just trying to spare her a dead-end career. Berkeley had more starving artists than any other city in the world.

“Summer break came. Candy stayed in Berkeley. She had tasted freedom and she didn’t want to have to live under her parents’ roof anymore. She got a job at a department store and one as a waitress – just to make ends meet. Her parents refused to send her money as long as she wasn’t taking classes. But she felt she needed a break from studying. She had managed to complete the second semester with a C average and hadn't dropped any more classes. She continued to see Henry. His wife went to Europe for the summer and she saw him more than ever. She even slept at his house a few times. Henry didn’t have any kids. He didn't think he ever wanted them. They were careful – they thought – and never had sex without using a condom. But condoms need to fail only once to fail altogether.

“Candy got pregnant. School had restarted and Henry’s wife was back in town by the time Candy found out. She waited two months before telling Henry, or even checking for sure that she was expecting. She was in a classic denial mode. It couldn’t be happening to her, she thought. It would go away. She would wake up one morning and there wouldn’t be a foetus growing in her womb. But she wasn't stupid. She’d had a lot of experience with denial. She was a master at it, and knew all the signs. Finally she went to the campus doctor and had the bad news confirmed.

“Candy told Henry while they were eating popcorn in the middle of a science-fiction movie about an alien spaceship that was really a part of the mind of God come to visit Earth to save everyone, even the wicked. Candy never did find out how the movie ended. Henry led her by the hand out of the theatre and asked her to please repeat what she had just said. He had heard her right the first time, the poor guy.

“Henry wanted her to have an abortion. She agreed that would probably be best. He offered to pay for it, and she said OK to that, too. She didn’t have much money. He even offered to take her to the clinic. No, she replied. Too many people might see. Her thoughts were in chaos. She wasn’t trying to deceive Henry. She wanted to think about things a little more. But she didn’t tell him that. She just said she’d take care of things.

“Candy took the next day off school and went to San Francisco – to the Golden Gate Bridge. For a long time she stood on the bridge with the boats passing beneath her and enjoyed the breeze lifting her hair and the salty tang of the ocean in her nose. She didn’t know why she had chosen that particular place to make such an important decision. Nothing happened on the bridge that helped her make up her mind. She received no sign from God. But when she stepped off the bridge she was clear about what she had to do. She felt it deep inside – an absolute conviction that she had to keep her baby. It was good her mind was so clearly made up. Else she couldn’t have endured what was to follow.

“Henry got mad when he heard of her decision. He spent hours trying to get her to change her mind. She was too young to be a mother. She had to finish school. He was too old to be a dad. He would get fired if the truth came out. Candy reassured him as best she could. You see, she wasn’t asking anything from him. He didn’t have to give her a thing, she said. He didn’t have to acknowledge to anyone that the child was his. Henry listened to her as she tried to explain why she
needed
to keep the child, but since she didn't even know why, she didn't get very far. But where was there to go? She wanted the baby and he didn’t. Their relationship ended that night, although neither of them admitted it for another month. By then Candy was seeing Henry seldom. She didn’t see him at all when she began to show in a big way.

“Candy’s child was born on Valentine’s Day – a small dark-haired baby boy of five pounds six ounces. She named him John, but always called him Johnny. Neither Henry nor her parents were present at the birth. They weren’t to blame. Candy gave birth to Johnny in a hospital in a small town on the Oregon coast. She had moved there to get away from it all and to try to start over. By this time she had dropped out of school and gone on to welfare. In a sense her life was in ruins. She had no degree, no money, no man. But Johnny was born healthy and beautiful, and she loved him more than she had ever loved anyone. Or she loved him as much as she had loved John. She always thought of John as the father of the baby, and not Henry. It made no sense, she knew, but that was how she felt.”

Poppy Corn fell silent. She reached in her coat and knocked out a cigarette. Coughing, she lit it and took a long drag. She stared out the window at the ocean. The waves were black foam, rolling towards invisible sand. Teresa kept waiting for her to continue, but the strange girl remained silent.

“Well?” Teresa said finally.

“I’m tired of talking,” Poppy said.

“Good,” Free said. “I’m tired of listening.”

“You’re the one who wanted to hear the story,” Poppy said.

Free twisted round. He was going to have a stiff neck by the time they arrived where they were going – wherever that was. “I wanted to hear the story minus all the added B.S.,” he said.

Poppy tapped her ashes into her palm. Teresa could see the girl in her rear-view mirror. “There was no B.S. I just knew her better than you is all.”

“You made her out to be a saint,” Free said.

Poppy chuckled softly. “Hardly.”

“But did Candy ever get back together with John?” Teresa asked. She had really got into these characters – despite herself.

“No,” Poppy said.

“What?” Teresa grimaced. “You mean they never saw each other again?”

“They saw each other,” Poppy said. “A few years later – one more time – on a dark and stormy night. Do you want to tell them about that night, Jack?”

Free was sullen. “No.”

“Come on,” Poppy taunted.

Free suddenly smiled. Teresa watched him out of the corner of her eye. The smile was a curious affair: mischievous, grim, excited – all rolled into one. He glanced over at Teresa.

“Where did we leave John?” he asked.

“He had just got out of juvenile hall and was searching for Candy,” Teresa said.

“I didn’t tell you he was searching for Candy,” Free said seriously.

Teresa stammered. “I – I must have misunderstood you.”

Free stared at her a moment more before refocusing the road in front of them. The endless road – a single broken white line brushed by headlights that showed nothing new. Teresa wondered if she hadn’t half hypnotized herself, driving so late at night, listening to this story. No, it wasn’t just the story. It was Free and Poppy’s voices. They both had such unusual, sleepy voices – as if they were related, maybe brother and sister.

“I’ll tell you what happened to John when he got out,” Free said finally. “I’ll tell you the truth. That’s all I can do.”

CHAPTER SIX

“It’s true what Poppy said,” Free began. “John didn’t get out of juvenile hall until after Candy had been at school for three weeks. He didn’t call her parents to ask for her phone number because he knew they wouldn’t give it to him. He also wasn’t sure if he wanted to see Candy right away, and the longer he thought about it the more certain he was. He was mad at her. He had spent hours in juvenile hall thinking about how she had taken it for granted that he was going to help her cheat on her test. She had done so because she was too lazy to study, and because she never thought about his risk. Of course, he hadn’t minded helping her until he got caught. But that was just the point – he shouldn’t have been caught. She should have swallowed the cheat sheet the second that Annie – or Sally, or whatever her name was – had raised her whiny voice. John had spent an incredible amount of hours thinking about how Candy had frozen at that critical moment. It bugged him, it really did. He only needed her help that one time and she let him down.

“He was also embarrassed to get in touch with her. She was in college, and he was just out of juvenile hall. He wanted to get his life back together before he called her – to show her that he had bounced back after a hard rap. Even though he was mad, he had every intention of seeing her eventually. He missed her more than he could stand, and had spent many nights in juvenile hall remembering them lying together on the beach. Those had been the happiest days of his life.

“John's stepdad lied to Candy when he said that John never came home after getting out. John did go home – for one day. That was all it took for his stepdad to get on his case, calling him a no-good teacher beater and saying he’d never amount to anything. John repaid him by busting his nose. Juvenile hall had not improved his tolerance for abuse. It’s hard to stay in someone’s house once you’ve broken his nose. On his first day of freedom, John was out on the streets before the sun even set.

“He didn’t have many friends but he had some. He was able to stay at a few guys' houses for a few days. But he had to get a job quick. He didn’t want to go back to the garage where he had worked before. He didn't want to do anything he had done before. He wanted to start fresh, stay out of trouble, and make a million dollars so he never had to kiss anybody's ass. At nineteen John was already tired of being pushed around.

“He got a job in a bakery. It wasn’t an ordinary mom and pop place. It was the bakery for one of the largest food chains in the western United States. The place was gigantic – several football fields long. You couldn’t get within a mile of it and not smell the baking dough. You couldn’t work there and not smell like yeast. The place was hot – it felt like it never got below a hundred degrees inside. But the job had advantages. First, it was a union job and the pay was better than at most places. Second, he could work the graveyard shift and have most of his day free to do what he wanted.

“Finally, the job they put him on was easy. The bakery had five machines that sealed various bakery goods in plastic – things like rolls and Danish, stuff like that. John’s job was to take the machines apart and clean them. They got clogged pretty quick. The guy who had had the job before John must have been a goof off. The head of the bakery – his name was Tyler – believed that if a guy worked his tail off he could clean all five machines in eight hours. Of course, John was good with machines. He wasn't working at the bakery more than two weeks when he got his job down to three hours. That meant he could take five hours off – if he could stay out of sight – and at the same time give the impression that he was busy with his machines.

“Like I said, the bakery was huge. It had its own shower room, on the upper level. But none of the employees used the showers. The architect who designed the plant didn’t realize that when a guy got off work he didn’t want to hang around any longer than he had to. He could take a shower as easily at home. John would come on at eleven at night, and by two in the morning he’d have his machines sparkling clean and ready for another day of cinnamon rolls. Then he would head on up to the showers and hide in a stall, reading, listening to tapes, or taking a nap. Sure, occasionally one of the night janitors would find him crashed out. But these guys had no love for the company. They admired a guy who could get his work done and take time off.

“John had it pretty good at the bakery - in the beginning. But things were not going so great outside in the world. He got himself a small apartment in a cheap part of town and that was OK. John never cared where he laid his head as long as there wasn’t someone around who was going to wake him up with a kick in the ear. But it was only during this time that John learned to what lengths his chemistry teacher had gone to keep him out of getting into a decent college. See, John figured he would work full-time for a few months, get a little money together, and go off to school. His first choice was the University of San Francisco. He figured he’d be able to see Candy as much as he wanted. Yeah, he hadn’t even called her but he was planning how he was going to spend the next four years with her – or however long it took for them to graduate.