Why Aren't You Smiling? (14 page)

“It's cool,” pronounced Rick. “Do you promise to henceforth neither lie, nor swear, nor kill, nor abandon your body to any form of luxury, and never renounce your faith for fear of water, fire, or any other manner of death?”

“I do.”

“Where's the part about all the stuff he shouldn't be eating?” asked Beth.

“We agreed we're not doing the eating thing,” Bob relied sharply.

“You
agreed,” Susan interjected. “You agreed with yourself.”

“Peace!” admonished Rick, his eyes flashing. He raised his hands off my head ceremoniously, bent over to dip them in the water, then stood erect again. “Verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and the spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. And one mightier than I cometh, whose sandals I am not worthy to loosen, who shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and fire. He shall heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, and cast out devils. And he that believeth in Him shall also do these things. Leonard, accept you the commandment to do these good works?”

I hesitated, not really sure I was up to raising the dead or casting out devils. What was I getting into? I stared into the faces surrounding me. The Forever Family, despite their tendency to bicker (well, they
were
a family), appeared reasonably cool and happy. Rick, though, was positively radiant. He couldn't have looked any more transcendentally awesome with a halo. I croaked out, “I do.”

Rick shook his wet fingers on me. Tiny droplets of cool splattered my chest and shoulders and neck. “Behold, I give unto you the power to tread on serpents and scorpions! And if you would receive this power you must keep all the commandments of Christ and hate The World and all that is in it, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. For The World and its lusts passeth away, while whosoever does the will of God abideth forever. Hate ye the solid garment of flesh with all its vanities and vexations of spirit. Leonard, do you renounce The World?”

I looked into Rick's eyes, bottomless wells of compassion and wisdom, conduits to the spiritual plane. Why did my Love for him vex my spirit so? “I'll try.”

Jonas agreed, “That's all anyone can do, man.”

Rick's voice grew joyous and triumphant. “Leonard, before these witnesses you have repented your sins, forgiven your enemies, and renounced The World. You are born anew!” He flung a bit more water on me. Then everyone stepped forward, put their hands on my head, and chanted in unison. “Adoremus, Patrem, et Filium et Spiritum Sanctam. Adoremus, Patrem, et Filium et Spiritum Sanctam. Adoremus, Patrem, et Filium et Spiritum Sanctam.”

Over the next few days I discovered that, much to my amazement, the Forever Family somehow managed to survive without television, board games, or pets to occupy their days. They devoted the bulk of their waking hours to what Jonas called “Holy Loafing.” This involved long aimless walks, reading the Bible, staring at vegetation, praying silently, chatting about nothing, and taking huge bong hits after which they lolled around with the self-satisfied indolence of cats. Instead of trotting along like it was supposed to, time at Pleroma just sort of oozed forward aimlessly, like a garden slug. I couldn't get the hang of doing nothing and quickly found myself painfully bored. I missed my dog Frodo, Danny's library, my parents' conversation, and (far more than I cared to admit) the televised hilarity of Mary Tyler Moore and Carol Burnett.

Aside from the morning gardening, the only burst of activity came in the late afternoon when Rick closed the living room curtains, signaling to the town that Pleroma was open for business. Almost immediately, bleary-eyed high school stoners began turning up on the doorstep in search of narcotic bliss. Great care was made to dress up these transactions as social calls. Chips and dip appeared on the table, Pink Floyd or Fleetwood Mac went on the hi-fi, and Cokes or beers were doled out, one per customer. The vibe was Mellow Party, except that the conversation never really flowed. The kids just whined about school or offered up vacuous gossip about their peers, to which the Forever Family responded with semi-surreptitious Christian wisdom. When wordage ground to a complete halt (which it did often), Rick would organize a round of bibliomancy, just as he had with me, oh so long ago. The stoners submitted to all the proselytizing with embarrassed smiles and noncommittal head nodding. “Yeah, Jesus is pretty far out, for sure.” Clearly they just wanted to get their drugs and split.

Once, a scruffy boy with stringy hair posed a question that had occurred to me on numerous occasions: “Isn't smoking grass, like, some kind of sin or some shit like that?”

Rick smiled beatifically and waxed Biblical, “Unto the pure, all things are pure.”

After a sufficient length of awkward conversation, the stoners would very casually inquire about the possibility of purchasing weed. Sometimes the sale was transacted in the living room, but occasionally Rick and the party in question would discreetly disappear into his bedroom to conduct their illicit business. This usually took a very long time. Far longer than I could ever imagine that it should.

After the pot sales, the Forever Family would eat dinner, then it was bedtime. I was always on the couch, and Rick was alone in his room, but for everyone else, the sleeping arrangements changed nightly. I gathered, from overhearing the occasional squeal and moan, that chastity was not among the cherished virtues at Pleroma. Though I tried to banish all thoughts of lovemaking from my mind, I invariably had to relieve my tension (as I thought of it) in the bathroom once or twice nightly in order to sleep. Usually this was done without thought, but sometimes the image of a Rick-like Christ bathed in silvery white light and dressed only in a loincloth would flash in my mind at the culminating moment.

Thanks to the abnormal penchant for togetherness of Pleroma's denizens, it was several days before I was able to corner Rick alone. He was in the back, gazing up at the pine trees surrounding the yard with a look of wonderment. “Rick, I… I have something I need to talk to you about. I did something bad.”

“Trees…” began Rick, in the slow cadence he used when sermonizing, “are like advertisements. Advertisements for God.”

“There was this kid at school who was always picking on me. He squashed my lunch and threw my books in the trash and was always punching me in the arm till I was black and blue. And one day this kid flicked my nose with his fingers and I just sort of snapped and smooshed my cupcake in his face and knocked him over and it was like I wasn't even me, I was this animal, this Hate Machine…”

“They're not just ads, they're miracles. More beautiful than anything produced by the hand of man…”

I grew annoyed. Was he even listening? “So I was a Hate Machine and I wanted to
kill
him! I slapped his
face?

Rick reluctantly turned his attention from the miraculous trees to me. “Hate is not The Answer Leonard.”

“Yeah, I know!”

“Jesus said, ‘Pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven.'”

“What I'm saying is that I flipped. I lost it. This kid had been pounding on me for years. Humiliating me. I tried to Love him, and sometimes I did, but he tripped me and spat on me and called me a fag and ripped up my homework….” I felt tears well up in my eyes. “I wanted to be his friend…” I'd never known this before, but on saying it, I knew it was true. “I did Love Douglas. And when he, you know, made fun of me and had his friends hold me down so he could punch me for no reason and…” I dissolved into sobs.

“Oh, Leonard.” Rick turned back to the trees. “Look at that majesty!” He pointed to the pines. “They're like the Lilies of the Valley. No toil. No spinning.”

A wave of anger washed over me. What in hell was he going on about? I stopped crying. “So what should I do?”

“What can you do? The past is past. Did you apologize?”

“No, because I'm not sorry. I mean, I'm sorry I hurt his bad arm, which apparently I did, though I never heard anything about a bad arm before and why was he always fighting me anyway if he had such a bad arm? But now he leaves me alone, it's like fighting back worked. They say violence never solves anything, but it's… it's great! I can walk down the hall and nobody slams me into a locker, nobody trips me. I'm not sorry.”

“Like trees,” lectured Rick, “our wisdom grows slowly. It can take years for us to reach the majestic heights. But as long as we strive to grow upward, toward the sun, toward God…”

I tuned out Rick's attempt at spiritual guidance. He was, in a different way, just as lame as my parents.

Jonas strode down the street with the brisk efficiency of someone on his way to a business meeting, which in a way he was. As I scampered to keep up, he spoke to me over his shoulder. “See, there's plenty kids who'd probably love to cop from us but don't want to come out to Pleroma 'cause they're scared of being seen with freaks. Meanwhile, we can't go downtown or near the school 'cause of the pi… police. But nobody here knows you, plus you look sorta innocent.” Innocent? This gave me a shock. I dressed like a Burnout and had even stopped shaving above my lip, leaving a few hairs that would someday (soon?) become a manly mustache. Jonas continued. “Plus you're the right age. So all you have to do is make friends with the kids…”

Despite the sweltering afternoon heat, the prospect of this undercover job sent icicles up my spine. I didn't make friends easily. I tried not to sound too whiny. “But I won't know what to say.”

“You don't have to say anything special. Just find out if they turn on, and if they do, tell them you've got a friend with some excellent shit waiting over on the corner of Broad and Lake. What could be easier?”

“I don't even know where Broad and Lake meet,” I protested.

Jonas looked at me like I was being dense. “The kids will. This town is the size of a postage stamp.”

All around us, the town basked in warm, late afternoon sun. Everything seemed so pleasant and normal I couldn't quite make myself believe I was stepping into a life of crime. I knew better than to believe the films they showed at school in which pot was the first step on a road leading to speed, jail, heroin, unemployment, poor hygiene, angel dust, insanity, and death. Both the Burnouts and Danny's friends were always dealing to each other and none of them ever flipped out or got sent up the river. I'd even spied on these transactions and they were occasions for a bit of smirking furtiveness, but that was all. Still, selling pot was very illegal and I'd never been cool or daring enough to break the law before, except for sneaking into the movie theater that one time, a law I'd quickly unbroken by paying for it afterwards. Yet when Rick had asked me at lunch if I'd help out the business, I'd said, “Sure,” without even a second thought. I wanted to help Rick out any and every way I could.

We arrived across the street from a bone-chillingly picturesque town square replete with a statue of some forgotten war hero under a canopy of leafy trees. As Jonas had promised, a half-dozen teens sat on a pair of park benches looking bored out of their skulls.

“I'd better stay here,” said Jonas., looking around. “I'm carrying.” We stood for a few seconds as I examined my quarry. They wore nondescript jeans and tee-shirts so I couldn't immediately place them in my teenage taxonomy, but a few were expertly smoking cigarettes, which didn't bode well. “OK,” announced Jonas. “Time to get to work.”

“I can't just go up and say hi,” I protested, an unpleasant whiny tone creeping into my voice.

“Sure you can,” urgd Jonas.

I felt like I was talking to my parents. “But…”

Jonas's voice turned soothing. “They're just kids, just like you.”

There was a twinge of pity in Jonas's eyes that embarrassed me. “OK. Sure. I'll be fine.”

I marched myself across the street, every step an agony of foreboding. The teens were now just a few yards in front of me, slouching all over their benches with the belligerently bad posture of the perennially disaffected. Clearly, these were not junior hippies but tough kids who might not just laugh at me (as I'd originally feared) but deliver a thrashing. As I entered the park, a blond boy with huge muscles looked my way with an expression of pure hatred. I pretended to look at my watch and realize I was late, then tuned around and left the park, an operation that would've been more convincing had I actually been wearing a watch.

Jonas looked incredulous. “What happened?”

“They didn't look like they'd be interested.”

Jonas was perplexed and annoyed. “You didn't even talk to them.”

“It wouldn't have done any good. They… they aren't the sort of kids who talk to kids like me. I wish I could be more help.”

Jonas examined me with his dark, beady eyes. “You're not a people person, are you Leonard?

“Nuh-uh,” I admitted.

He shot me a steely look. “Time to learn.” He grabbed my shoulders and gently but firmly spun me around and gave me a little push towards the teens. I squelched my panic, puffed out my chest, and walked back into the park. I tried to look casual as I approached where they were sprawled.

“Hey,” I said to the teen closest to me, a girl with vacant eyes.

“Hey,” she said. “What's happening?” She took a long drag on a cigarette.

Fear froze my brain. “Not much.”

With excruciating slowness, she exhaled a lung full of smoke that, though I was a yard away, made me want to cough. “You new in town or visiting or like what?”

“Visiting.”

Next to her, the blond guy with big muscles glanced my way. “You are such a fag. Why are you such a fag?” he asked in a mock curious voice, as if he were really wondering. The teens all exploded into spiteful laughter.

People had been asking me similar questions since third grade, but I'd never thought of a good reply. “I'm not,” I said, trying not to sound scared or offended. Thankfully, I had the perfect way to change the subject. “Anyone looking to buy any marijuana?”