The Trouble Way (35 page)

Bella was already smarter than Pulley-boy.

Priscilla said to her once, “You’re my little doll.”

Bella said,
“I’m not a doll, I’m a little girl.”

Priscilla said,
“It’s like saying you’re my little sweetie-pie.”

Bella said,
“How ‘bout you’re my little mashed potato? Then she turned to me and said, “Papa, you’re my little green bean.”

I was amazed that she picked up the concept of metaphors or whatever they
’re called. Maybe I should ask someone. She could probably be hired at that hardware store and take Pulley-boy’s position, and she is a year shy of being into the middle single digits in age.

One time, Bella and I were lying on the couch watching cartoons. She was right next to me. Out of the blue, she looked up at me, nearly nose-close to my face, looking directly into my eyes and said,
“Papa, you don’t have beautiful eyes.”

Well, I never really thought I had beautiful eyes, at least not for quite a few years. A few women have said I had pretty blue eyes way back when. But I have to admit, I was just a little bit hurt when my little Bella said that. Actually, more like crushed.

I said, “I don’t?” I have to say that I might have been fishing for a little sympathy in my voice but it didn’t have any effect on her.

She said,
“No .............................. You have handsome eyes.”

I
’ll tell you that was one long, painful pause, but she made up for it about a brazillian times when she said that last part. I think that might have a lasting effect on whether I try to make her take a nap too early or not. I wonder if she knows what she is doing, you know, laying plans.

“
I wish you were my daddy,” she said, “you take care of me.” She’s the best granddaughter in the whole wide world. And the smartest. Actually, I stole that line from her. She said, “Papa, you are the best grandfather in the whole wide world.”

It was during the holidays and Bella and I were sitting at the kitchen counter. I drew a picture of Rudolph and we were coloring it together. I began coloring Rudolph
’s nose blue. When she saw the color I was using she said, “This isn’t the right way, this is the Trouble Way.” I’ve been living my entire life doing things the “Trouble Way,” and here she was, three, and she already knew there was such a thing as the Trouble Way. I wish she’d been there to advise me on my disastrous first marriage, talk about a path down the Trouble Way.

She is growing up fast and often calls me on her mom
’s cell phone. Once, I answered the phone to hear her voice.

“
Hello, sweetie. How are you today?”

“
Good,” Bella said. “What are you doing right now?”

It was not a repeat of my,
“How are you?” She was carrying on a grown-up conversation with me and it took me by surprise. Like many of the things that Bella says, I wrote it down.

Present

“Bella … are you going to sleep all damn day?” Don said rattling the tent pole and slapping the tent fabric. “Bella … hey … you still kickin’?”

“
Give me a damn second,” Bella said. “What time is it?”

“
Hell, Bella, how do I know, I ain’t got no watch. Maybe nine or ten.”

“
What in the hell are you waking me up at the butt-crack of dawn for? Christ, you ol’ cripple, go back to sleep. You nuts?” Bella wadded up the flannel shirt she used for a pillow under her head and pulled the sleeping bag close around her shoulders and over her head and pulled the wool stocking cap further down over her ears.

“
Screw you, you old witch,” Don said. “I’m going to find something to eat. If you’re not coming, stay here and sleep your life away, you crabby ol’ biddy … what’s left of it.”

“
Pipe down, I’m trying to sleep.” Bella said. She heard rustling and peeked out of the folds of her sleeping bag and caught Don, red-handed, rifling the pocket of her prize possession, her old Navy pea coat. She scored it from a garage sale for a buck. The lady said she didn’t have any use for it anymore since her husband died. There was a two-dollar tag on it but the old lady selling it took pity on her when she said she only had a dollar and added, “The nights were getting quite chilly.” It was the only piece of clothing she put on a coat hanger that hung from a wire loop attached to the tent pole. She pulled her arm from the sleeping bag, felt for the walking stick she always kept close by and swung it up and gave his arm a sound whack and grabbed her coat from the hook. “Get out of my damn coat.”

“Yeow.”
What the hell ya doin’? He recoiled out of the tent flap. “Jeez woman, you damn near broke my arm. I just wanted a smoke. You got any smokes?”

“
Hell no, I ain’t got no smokes. Go get them the same place I do, for crimeinie sake, out of the damn gutter. Who the hell do you think you are, the Imperial King of Mud Flats?”

“
I’m getting the hell out of here,” Don said. “I don’t have to put up with this abuse. We ain’t married, if you hadn’t noticed.”

“
If you go to Hy Vee, see if they dumped any fruit, would ya?”

“
I’ll bring you some rotten apples to match your rotten disposition,” Don said and pulled his jacket around his ears.

“
Watch out for those damn cameras,” Bella said, peering out of the tent flaps. “And don’t bring any cops back with you.”

“
You’re a crazy loon, you know that Bella? There’s no goddamned cameras and I haven’t seen a flat-foot down here in a rat’s age.

“
There’s cameras under those bridges, you old fool,” Bella said. “I’ve seen ‘em. Just stay away from the high ground under the bridges. Walk along that path I showed you close to the water. I don’t know how many times I have to tell you that before it sinks into that pea-brain of yours.”

“
I thought you were going back to sleep,” Don said and turned toward town.

“
And, stay away from those tourists; they’re a bunch of nosy do-gooders. I don’t trust a damn one of them. Most likely work for the authorities.”

Don had managed to limp only about a fifty yards and was nearly to the underpass at the bridge when he turned and saw Bella scampering to catch up. He put a bit more oomph into his gate but he knew it was useless; he couldn
’t outrun a two-legged dog with a steel spring trap on one leg. Bella was clasping her over-size pea coat closed with one hand and carrying a green eco-friendly shopping bag and her walking stick in the other. He could see her shoelaces flying loose on her sneakers. She was gaining on him fast.

She caught up and grabbed his arm. She had exhausted her air supply in her sprint to catch up and had to steady herself on her walking stick to catch her breath.
“You woke me up and I couldn’t get back to sleep so I’m coming with you, like it or not, so you don’t get into any damn trouble you can’t get out of,” Bella said. “Give me a second to catch my wind.”

“
Tie your goddamn shoes or you’ll trip and find yourself floating ass-end up in the river,” Don said. “I’ll wait, but I ain’t got all day.”

She sat on the damp grass and tied her shoes and reached out for a hand up.

“Not that way, you ol’ fool,” she said between gasps for air. “I told you about the cameras.” She pulled on his jacket and forced him along her route down closer to the river, away from where she knew she saw the cameras under the superstructure of the bridge. She guided him down to a path that led over large boulders at the river’s edge.

“
I don’t like going this way either, I’m afraid to death of water, but I’m more afraid of the authorities. They’re watching us all the time. See that Don, there’s one right there.” She pointed her walking stick at a box under the bridge and pulled her collar to cover her face and her wool stocking cap over her ears.

“
That’s a damn electrical box, you ol’ loon, or a street light or something,” Don said breaking loose of her grip. “The only thing new that anybody has put anyplace are those phones along the walking path for those uppity tourist in case they have a flat tire on one of their fancy-schmancy bicycles.” He turned to make his way back up the incline to the trail. “You know I can’t climb down there over those big rocks with this bum leg. I don’t know how many times I have to tell you before it gets through that thick skull of yours.”

“
Don’t say I didn’t give you fair warning,” she said and continued on.

Don watched her navigate down the bank and onto the rocky path while he limped back up the incline and walked along the beaten route, right under the electrical box under the bridge and by one of the new phones on a stand beside the trail.

“You’ll be sorry. The cops have your ugly mug on record now,” she hollered as the distance between them steadily increased. “Don’t be crying to me when your crippled be-hind is sitting in jail. I ain’t got no money for no bail. It’ll all be on you, I gave you fair warning.”

She left him to walk on the levy and she hugged the river on the narrow rock
-strewn path below. She stepped over boulders and the driftwood thrown up when the river rose, ever wary of her nearness to the water, and met up with him on the far side of the bridge. After they had made their separate ways beneath the bridge, they climbed the bank and caught the easy walking trail.

Hy-Vee, the nearest grocery store to their
squatter’s camp by the river, was about a mile from the bridge and there were exactly ten trashcans along the way. Bella lucked out on the first trashcan, the one in the Knappa Freight Company truck lot, near the river just beyond the levy. She could always count on the truck drivers to dump their soda cans in that bin. Some of the drivers even put their empties on top of the trashcan so she didn’t have to sort through all the filthy trash to get a few five-centers. Seemed like there were always trucks pulling in and out at all hours of the day and night. The parking lot lights even kept her awake at night. She made it a routine to check that can two and sometimes three times a day. Bella collected sixteen returnables and put them in her eco-friendly shopping bag.

When they reached the store parking lot of Hy-Vee, they headed straight to the back of the building.

“Give me a hand, you old coot,” Bella said and took Don’s helping hand and flung her leg over the edge and climbed into the dumpster.

“
I see London, I see France, I see –

“
Jackpot,” she said and pulled up a garbage bag filled with several apples and oranges. “Here, take this and see if there’s anything worth anything in there.”

Don scattered the contents of the bag on the ground and scrutinized the apples with the eye of a class-A dumpster diver.
“Shit, only a couple apples half worth keeping, most are completely rotten. One orange. Looks like someone beat us to the punch. That’s why you have to get up early; I keep trying to tell you. There’s a lot of competition now days. What else you got?”

“
Here, see if there’s anything in this,” Bella said and threw a plastic bag of rolls out to him and ducked back into the dumpster for more rummaging beneath the cardboard boxes.

When she finished her
tossing the last garbage bag full and began climbing out, Don had counted several bruised apples, three rolls, a few carrots, and a half dozen dented cans of Star of the Sea chunk light tuna and the left-overs of someone’s Happy Meal, and one orange.

Bella had one leg over the edge of the dumpster when the receiving door rolled up with the clattering of its chain. A wiry gentleman with short, slicked back, black hair, sides cut to military standards, had two black plastic garbage bags, one in each hand and an unlit cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth appeared in the doorway.
“Howdy, folks. How are you two on this fine morning?”

Bella and Don looked at each other and Bella reached out her hand for help out of the dumpster. Neither spoke.

“My name’s John.” He hurried over to give Bella a second helping hand. “Didn’t mean to give you a start. You don’t have anything to worry about. I’m about as low on the food chain as a person could get. Part-time in the produce department.

Bella made it to the ground and the two stood looking at the gentleman.
“I’m Don. I used to work in one of these big boxes back in the day. The place went broke. Back on the West Coast.”

“
I’m please to make your acquaintance,” John said and dropped the garbage bags and put out his hand. “Doing a little grocery shopping I see. And what might your name be, miss?”

“
My name’s Bella. I ain’t giving you my last name. Ain’t nobody’s beeswax. We can put it all back, nothing but rotten apples and a few dented cans.” Bella pointed to the bag at Don’s feet they had collected.

“
Like I said, I don’t have any authority,” John said. “What you do is none of my beeswax, just like you say. But, I’ll tell you something. It’s my job to throw out the stuff that is not one-hundred percent fresh and I can’t give it to anybody. Those are the rules and I follow them one-hundred percent.”

“
We won’t go messin’ in your dumpster anymore, Mr. John,” Bella said.

“
Listen up, I’m only going to say this one time,” John said. “Starting tomorrow, I’ll collect all the produce that is not one-hundred percent fresh and I toss it out at ten-thirty am, sharp. I damn near got shot out of the sky over there in Nam back in the seventies and my arm hasn’t worked all that great ever since. So, what I do is, I put the spoiled produce in one bag and toss it in the dumpster. The produce that is not so bad as I wouldn’t eat it, but the store won’t sell and won’t give it away, I put it in this here other bag.”

John stopped talking and put his left foot up on a ledge on the side of the dumpster and pulled up his pant leg. He reached inside his sock and slid a pack of Luckys out. From the other sock, he got a Zippo lighter.
“Care for a smoke?” John flipped his wrist and several cigarettes appeared to jump out of the pack.

“
Thank you,” Bella said and took one.

“
You the man,” Don said and limped closer and took one.

John fingered his Zippo and snapped his fingers and the lid of the lighter flipped open. With his thumb, he rolled the roller and a four-inch flame jumped from the lighter. With his back to the wind, he lit his cigarette and flipped the lighter closed. He did the same finger magic on his torch and lit Bella
’s. When the flame got too hot for his thumb, he closed the lid and repeated the action for Don. He put the lighter into his right sock and was about to do the same with the Luckys in his left when he paused. He flipped his wrist again and pulled four cigarettes from the pack and held out two for each of them.

“
You definitely the man,” Don said and Bella nodded agreement and smiled.

“
Anyway, back to business.” He unconsciously returned the Luckys to his left sock. “I put the second bag behind this here electrical box where nobody can see it. Cause my arm is injured and I can’t throw both bags out at once. So, what I do is, I come back about eleven and get this bag that I put behind the electrical box and I toss it into the dumpster. And, there you have it.”

“
Well, It’s been a pleasure,” Don said. “Always nice to meet another vet who’s spent some time in the bush.

“
Looks like you got an injury too,” John said gesturing to Don’s leg.

“
Yeah,” Don said, “old Audie Murphy got his ass shot off and he turned into a millionaire; I took one in the ass and live under a blue tarp.”

“
Well, Audie Murphy got a chest full of medals for is trouble but he’s dead now,” John said. “And, there ain’t no dirt on top that blue tarp.” He reached out to take Don’s hand again. “The pleasure’s been all mine,” John said. “It’s nice to have met you Bella.” He touched his right eyebrow in a casual salute. “I have to get back inside now. Oh, one more thing, sometimes I toss out the stale bakery goods, rolls, and stuff. I put them in that bag too, in a separate bag inside. It’s my job to tell you not to take any of the trash. But like I said before, I got no authority, so if you were to take anything, ain’t nothing I could do about it even if I had a mind to, which I don’t. That’s way above my pay grade. You folks have a good day.” John took a final drag on his Lucky, flicked it into the gutter, went back into receiving, gave a final wave, and rolled down the door.