Sparkle (9 page)

“He doesn’t want somebody else, Mark,” she said. “He has a set routine, and it’s important that he stick to it. I’m part of it. And to tell you the truth, I like it. It’s one of my favorite parts of the week. He’s a very cool person.”

“Cool? He never even says anything.”

“Maybe that’s one of the things I like about him,” Jolie said with a grin.

“It’s part of my job to look out for your personal safety.”

Something about that comment made Jolie laugh out loud.

Mark stopped walking. “You think that’s funny?” He looked slightly pained. “I’m really scoring points here, aren’t I?”

“Sorry. It’s not you. I appreciate your concern. I’m sorry for whatever you’ve been through. But come on, Mark. I’m a big girl. Eddie’s one of the safest people I know. And besides, what could he possibly do to me in the zoo?”

Mark looked around. They were alone.

“You got me there,” he said.

Chapter 13

Joe stubbed another smoke in the van’s overflowing ashtray, trying hard to hide his irritation.

“Cab, Joe,” Eddie said.

Technically, it was only the twenty-fifth time he had said it during the ride to the zoo. But it felt more like the millionth to Joe. After more than thirty years together, Eddie’s repetitiveness was a potent weapon in any dispute. He was holding an unopened green glass bottle of Sparkle Soda between his knees. His canvas Mariners bag was on the floor at his feet.

“How come you’re not drinking your Sparkle?” Joe asked, trying to change the subject.

“For Jolie. A…gift.”

“That’s nice.” Joe was slightly taken aback by Eddie’s use of an unfamiliar phrase, but it was a good sign. Maybe he could get Eddie refocused on Jolie.

“Cab, Joe,” Eddie repeated.

“Listen, Eddie,” Joe began. He held his breath for a moment before speaking, then forced the words to come out calmly and distinctly. “The zoo’s too far. Cabs cost money. They charge by the mile. It’s too expensive, and it’s too far.”

“Cab, Joe.”

Joe tried another tack. “Can I think about it?”

It worked, sort of. Eddie fell silent, and Joe was able to spend the rest of the twenty-minute drive in peace, smoking, counting cars, and holding his breath at stoplights.

They drove into the Woodfield Park Zoo lot. Joe parked crookedly, got out, and opened Eddie’s door. Eddie slid out.

“Cab, Joe.”

Joe held his tongue.

The weather had cleared up almost completely since the day before. Just a few fat puffy clouds drifted high in the Tiffany-blue sky. The brothers walked together to the benches outside the entrance where Joe always left Eddie to wait for Jolie. Joe had won the argument for now by forfeit. He knew Eddie was irritated with him, although his brother looked as placid as ever. Joe was fine with that. There were times, brotherly love and devotion notwithstanding, when there was nothing so satisfying as pissing Eddie off.

“Go away, Joe,” Eddie said.

That proved it. Score one for Joe. If there was a slight uplift in Eddie’s tone when he told Joe to go, everything was cool. But if he said it totally flat, like today, he was not happy. Also, he usually didn’t say it until after he’d pulled the Shiny Gold out of his canvas Mariners bag.

“Okay, Eddie.” Joe dragged on his cigarette to keep from smiling. No need to rub it in. “See you later.”

Eddie pulled out his Shiny Gold and a towel, and carefully wiped the bench. “Bye-bye, stains,” he said flatly, looking at Joe’s knees.

Whoa. That was serious. Eddie wasn’t fooling around. He was giving Joe a clear warning to leave him alone. Perversely, Joe felt like hanging around and asking Eddie some random questions. But he could see that Eddie was getting provoked. It was fun up to a point, but there was no way in hell Joe wanted to risk making Eddie really upset. This was Joe’s only free day, too.

“All right, already,” Joe said. “Have a great day, bro.” He walked away.

Eddie put the Shiny Gold back into his bag, and then reached into his pocket for his sunglasses and put them on. He sat down and looked straight ahead.

“Cab, Joe.”

As Joe climbed into the van, he saw Jolie walk up to Eddie. Right on time, as always. Eddie stood up and took off his glasses. Jolie said a couple of words to him and he sat back down. She headed in Joe’s direction.

Jolie knew what the brothers did for a living, but she wasn’t aware that Joe never participated in any actual cleaning. If she had, she might not have felt so warmly toward him. Nearly a year of Saturdays had made her feel she had a stake in Eddie’s well-being.

She walked up to the driver’s side window. “Morning, Joe.”

“Hey, Jolie.” Joe did his best to sound noncommittal.

“These are for you.” She handed him an envelope. “Just a few forms. You think you can bring them back next week?”

Joe found himself tongue-tied, as he often was in Jolie’s presence. Her hair was shoulder-length, thick and black, her eyes a piercing pale blue. Her nose was small, and she had full lips and pale creamy skin. She didn’t seem to wear any make-up. And despite the frumpiness of her zoo uniform, her slenderness and soft curves were impossible to hide.

Beyond her looks, Jolie seemed happy to be alive, happy in her work, and ready to see the humor in any situation. Joe couldn’t relate to any of that. It made him want to get away as soon as possible.

“Sure,” he said. “Oh, yeah, I should t-t-tell you. Eddie brought you a present.”

Jolie was surprised. “A present? Did I tell you my birthday’s on Monday?”

“No. It’s just a bottle of Sparkle. But if you could, act a little excited.”

“I understand.” Jolie was relieved it wasn’t anything more. “How you guys doing? How’s work?”

“I don’t know.” Joe sounded impatient, although he thought he was being kind by keeping the truth to himself. “Jolie, I wanted to tell you I appreciate what you’re doing. I know Eddie can be …” He didn’t know how to finish the sentence and trailed off.

“It’s not a problem, Joe. I like Eddie. We get along fine.”

“You probably better not keep him waiting.” Joe turned his head to blow smoke into the cab instead of at Jolie.

Jolie stopped rolling her eyes just in time to keep him from seeing. “Okay, Joe,” she said. “See you this afternoon.” She turned and walked away.

Once she was out of earshot, Joe turned the key in the ignition. “Poor Eddie.”

Chapter 14

“Beautiful,” Joe muttered, as he drove through the lot and squealed into traffic. What an idiot.

He knew that Jolie treated Eddie exactly right. He also knew that Eddie cared about her more than was good for him. Who wouldn’t? It was too bad. Eddie was going to get his feelings hurt someday, and then there’d be hell to pay—and Joe was responsible because he knew it was coming and he wasn’t doing anything to stop it. He was being selfish. Eddie’s zoo day gave Joe his only precious taste of what being normal would be like. But the day of reckoning would come. Nobody understood more than Joe how attached Eddie could get to something. Someday Jolie would go away and when she did it was going to be bad and it was going to be deep and it was going to take a long time to get over.

Even though he couldn’t help but predict a bad outcome down the road, Joe resolved to be prepared. He’d done the calculus in his head, and decided today’s freedom was a good enough bargain for tomorrow’s pain. When it came, Joe would put his head down and deal with the consequences. For now, the deal with the state meant that things were going to hold steady for a good long time, and that was at least a temporary load off his mind.

As always after dropping Eddie off, Joe headed straight to the Ravenna Sports Bar. The Mariners were starting a series at Tampa Bay. It was an early game. He’d take some notes, fiddle with his stats, drink a few beers, and eat a Reuben. Just like a real person.

He messed with the radio until the game blared out of the van’s single tinny speaker. He still had time to make a last-minute twenty-buck bet.

Even though Joe bet regularly, the anticipation of it always gave him a bit of a chill. His dad used to bet, one of several ways the old man had gotten himself into serious trouble. The thing that genuinely spooked Joe was the idea that he might end up like him. In fact, the only decent advice his dad had ever given him was, “Whatever you do, don’t end up like me.”

Joe had taken it to heart. The paradoxical hope that he could simultaneously honor his father’s wishes and escape his influence was one of the most powerful undercurrents in his life. Still, they had a few things in common. Like his dad, Joe’s short list of passions was dominated by baseball. But their approaches to the game were wildly different. Joe was obsessed with player statistics, something his dad never gave a damn about. Joe collected numbers all season long; RBIs, ERAs, and slugging percentages filled his head and his spiral-bound notebooks. But it seemed futile to have such knowledge and mastery of baseball if he didn’t do something with it.

Betting and winning showed the world that his obsession had a tangible value. Joe had to bet; it kept baseball from being a waste of time. As long as he won more than he lost, which he consistently did, then the time he spent on baseball was justifiable. Not that he had to justify it to anyone but himself—but any kind of enjoyment for its own sake put Joe on edge. He felt as if he was being watched and judged by unseen eyes, as if he was doing something bad and might get caught, with nebulous but horrible consequences. Even though he couldn’t see any way around betting, Joe felt he could avoid being like his dad if he locked the habit inside an escape-proof cage of self-imposed regulations.

Ironclad Rule #1: No more than twenty bucks a bet, or a hundred a week. Every time he even had the urge to bet more than twenty dollars, he’d think of his dad and start to have a panic attack.

Rule #2: Bet only on baseball.

Rule #3: Place a bet only after “The Star Spangled Banner” has been sung. This rule was based on the fact that he wanted to see the players as they were right before the game, if only for a brief moment. He didn’t need to see them run or throw or field. It was enough to see them standing in line with their hands on their hearts. Joe had an uncanny knack for picking up valuable information during that slow-pan closeup of the players lined up on the baseline. Who was fired up. Who wanted to be somewhere else. Who was in pain. Stuff like that changed the outcomes of games every day.

Joe rarely used a bookie to place his bets. It seemed too serious, even for him. And it reminded him of his dad. Joe walked a fine line. His betting couldn’t be strictly for fun, but it couldn’t be in any way “professional” either. The rules he lived by were more complicated and arcane than the rules of baseball itself, and they were absolutely clear in his mind. Joe didn’t care for interacting with strangers. Betting was the notable exception. He’d often pick out a likely looking person at the bar and challenge him. The uncharacteristic boldness of talking to a stranger gave him an illusory normal, almost social feeling. Not everyone would take a bet after a game had started, but Joe got his payoff whether his adversary had taken him up on the bet or not. It wasn’t so much the money as the chance to mutter, “I told you so” under his breath to the world. One sucker at a time.

On the van radio, the play-by-play guy announced that Henderson had tried to steal second and had gotten pegged out coming back to first. Joe stopped counting cars. He pulled out his mini-cassette recorder and clicked it on. He was beginning to suspect that something was going on with Ricky.

Joe always carried the mini-cassette clipped inside his breast pocket. When something occurred to him, he’d make himself a verbal note to look up the stat. But he didn’t use the notes or the stats to place his bets. What Joe really knew about baseball, he knew strictly by looking.

“Check stolen bases, Henderson, past two months,” he said.

He was starting to feel pretty good by the time he pulled into the Ravenna’s parking lot. Something interesting was going on with the Ms. The sun was shining, for once. Eddie was being taken care of.

Best of all, Joe would get to spend a little time with the Ravenna’s bartender, LaVonne Wilson.

Chapter 15

Eddie’s eyes rested peacefully on Jolie as she spoke with Joe in the parking lot. Looking at her from a distance like this was a comfortable treat.

It was going to be a busy day at the zoo. Kids and adults walked past Eddie in a steady stream, but they were all vague and indistinct. Jolie was clear and bright. Eddie studied her as she walked toward him. Was there some kind of aura surrounding her today?

When she was twenty feet away, his gaze involuntarily shifted from her face to the ground. He took off his sunglasses and stood up, as he always did when Jolie walked up to his bench.

Jolie liked that. There was something gentlemanly, paradoxically old-fashioned and boyish about his polite shyness. She smiled at Eddie. He could feel it.

“Morning, Eddie,” she said. “Ready for a great day?”

Eddie felt a surge of energy. He inhaled deeply. The air here was incredible, rich with spring and animals and kids. And now there was Jolie’s freshness, too.

“Uh-huh,” he said. He reached into his bag and pulled out the green and yellow glass bottle of Sparkle. “Sparkle,” he announced, holding it out to her.

Eddie knew that when Jolie took it, their hands might touch. He was willing to take the chance today—more than willing. He looked at his own hand holding the bottle. It seemed far away.

He never moved, but he felt himself free-fall backward as he watched Jolie’s hand reach out, skin glowing, tiny hairs raised, delicate veins pulsing. He felt the cold sweat of green glass mingle with the warm salty dampness of his own palm.

Jolie took the Sparkle carefully, making sure she didn’t touch Eddie. She knew that physical contact made him uncomfortable. “Thanks, Eddie. Is this for me?”

Eddie felt an unpleasant wash of agitation as he realized he was disappointed; there had been no contact. This wasn’t what his dream had shown him. Today, unlike any other day, it would have been okay if Jolie had touched him. He wanted her to. So why hadn’t it happened?