A Ford in the River Page 5

  The next day it was different, even though we got out on the beach early. What we saw was molded in sand. It was lying on its stomach. It had a head and a gorilla’s back. What sort of person would do this thing? The sun took a sudden lurch up, beaming light on the blade of the kitchen knife thrust into this gorilla’s back.

  “You get all kinds on the beach,” I said.

  Linda gave me a look. “This guy has a weird sense of humor.”

  “You said guy.”

  “I mean guy,” Linda said.

  “So maybe it wasn’t a guy. Supposing a woman did it.”

  “Put a knife in a man made out of sand?”

  “He could have been two-timing her. In this woman’s imagination, I mean.”

  “A woman wouldn’t do that,” Linda said, sitting up very straight in her chair. “A woman might shoot her lover but she wouldn’t make a thing like this.”

  This was true, but I had to have my say—because of the thing itself, just doing this thing behind our backs, not as a threat, as a joke.

  “This woman must be a weirdo,” I said. “She must be taking it out on men.”

  “Is that what you think?”

  “That’s what I think.”

  I could feel the sun heating up. It was time for us to set up the umbrella. Linda yanked out the telescoped rod, and began to work it into the sand.

  “I know that’s not what you really think.” Linda said. “What do you think? You tell me.”

  “I’ll show you instead,” I said.

  I pulled the kitchen knife out of the sand thing and threw it into the water. Then I pulverized the sand thing.

  We ate lunch out, at a beachside oyster bar. We played goofy golf, did some other things. When we came back there were these people.

  There were six of them, three couples. They were standing around a catamaran. It was beached and the sail was furled—not twenty feet from the chairs. Two of the women were wearing one-piece bathing suits. You could tell they were trying to watch their weight, but being middle-aged, they showed fat. These women were with two middle-aged men, big men without much fat on them. The girl in the red French-cut was the first to sit down in one of the chairs. Her boy friend didn’t adjust the back. Not this time, not like yesterday. The others took a walk down the beach, disappearing from view for the day.

  We spent the day sitting by the pool, which wasn’t much, not a whole lot more than postage stamp size. The girl in the red French-cut and her boy friend sat out by themselves in the chairs. Not twenty feet from the chairs the catamaran had its hull and mast in our faces, the mast straight up, the sail furled.

  That night we went back to the country and western place, but the singer wasn’t there. We didn’t dance. We listened. We nursed our drinks for an hour or so; then we drove back to the motel.

  The catamaran was on its side, its mast away from the water. I could push it into the water and tow it on down the beach. But I would have had to do that by myself. Linda wouldn’t be helping me. We were standing out in front of our room, looking down and out at the catamaran. The catamaran was still twenty feet or so from the chairs, but I wanted to move it still farther.

  Linda said nothing doing. “Supposing you got away with it. They’d find their boat. They’d bring it back.”

  We sat in the chairs in front of our room, in the glare from the overhead light. I talked to Linda about what else I could do. Talk to them maybe, about the chairs. Tell them the chairs were for everybody. The beach, it didn’t belong to them.

  “I don’t want you doing that. Don’t lower yourself,” Linda said.

  The next morning they were all out there. It didn’t come as any surprise. The sail was unfurled. The catamaran was ready to launch, on its runners, pointed away from the chairs. The sail, it was pretty to look at, from the window of our motel room. The upper section was sky blue. There were bands of red and yellow and green, then the dark blue bottom section. Already their towels were draped on the chairs. There were lawn chairs stacked nearby. Soon the women were setting the lawn chairs up.

  “That’s it,” I said. “We go down there.”

  I had already put on my swim trunks. Linda was still in her nightgown.

  “We take our umbrella and go,” I said. “Or we check out. We go somewhere else.”

  Linda came up to me in her nightgown. “You’re making too big a deal out of this. But if you want to go, we’ll go home.”

  “I’m not going home. I’m going out there,” I said. “You coming?” I waited until Linda said yes. I waited for her to put on her suit before I went outside to get the sun umbrella. Linda followed me down to the beach.

  But we didn’t get to the spot I’d picked without seeing the next thing they did, them starting it, starting to put up the tent. The women laid out this plastic sheet, sky blue like the top of the sail. It was going to be a tent without flaps, what was going up around the chairs. The women bulging in the wrong places stuck tent pegs in the sand. That’s what the older women were doing while the girl in the red French-cut looked out at the Gulf. All three men were knocking the tent pegs in, with a hammer, chucking and chunking. Finally, the girl in the red French-cut picked up a tent peg. I watched her push it into the sand. I heard the sea oats rustling, the chucking and chunking. In front of us, the tent was almost up. The women were moving their lawn chairs in.

  We wanted to let these people know that we could do what we liked, so we went in the water, right in front of their tent. Coming out, I saw a tent pole go down. It was windy, the plastic was tearing loose. All three women, they got the poles back in place, and the men, they hammered in the pegs. They were doing that when we left.

  Linda picked up the beach towels. I followed her with the umbrella. At the door to our room, Linda laid the beach towels out on the railing to dry. I laid the sun umbrella on the concrete.

  From our room we could see what was going on. The women in one-piece bathing suits were sitting in their lawn chairs. Their towels were draped over the beach chairs The men pushed off in the catamaran. The girl in the red French-cut, she sat down in a lawn chair and set her foot on the arm of one of the beach chairs. She bent from the waist like she was touching her toes.

  “She’s painting her toenails,” Linda said.

  “So she’s painting her toenails on the arm of my chair. If you ask me that’s rubbing your nose in it.”

  “I didn’t ask you,” Linda came back. “And if you think that’s your chair you’re mistaken. I’m the one who sat in it last.”

  “I know you’re the one who sat in it last. And I know we didn’t each have our own chair, but if I remember correctly, I sat in that chair most of the time, the one that girl’s got her foot on.”

  Linda didn’t say anything else to me about the chairs. “I’m ready to leave when you are,” she said.

  “Anytime,” I said, “we’ll pack up and leave.”

  Linda left me sitting at the window. I heard her plop her suitcase on the bed, yank open dresser drawers. We’d go home and pick up where we left off. In a minute or two I’d start packing.

  The girl moved her foot on the arm of the chair, just another chair on the beach.

  A Ford in the River

  I buzz the door at the end of the corridor, the red light flashes, the door opens, I check in at the nursing station, ask how Susan’s doing, the same the nurse says. I don’t see her pacing, so I go to her room. Susan’s wearing a purple blouse over her nightgown, tan panty hose, one house slipper. She tells me to sit on the edge of her bed while she goes out to get her hourly allotted cigarette. I wait a little while for her to come back before going to the dayroom. I put her dirty clothes in the plastic bag that I brought to take them home in.

  Jimmy Ray is in the day room. He’s waiting for us to get started. Already he’s laid out the Scrabble board, having turned the tiles face down in the box.
I’m conscious of Susan close to me, a cigarette ash on a silk scarf, cigarette smoke in my lungs. Then Susan puts out her cigarette. She has smoked it down to the filter. She sets the filter next to the Scrabble board. When I put it in one of the ashtrays, she puts it back next to the Scrabble board.

  Jimmy isn’t much of a Scrabble player, and sometimes he doesn’t follow the rules. He will play contractions and brand name words. I watch him edge in the D tile in ford. He has already played the O and the R, playing vertically off the F in buffs. But Jimmy hasn’t a brand name in mind. He has a ford in a river in mind. Susan’s holding a glazed doughnut that she hadn’t gotten around to eating yet. I play two O’s and a D off ford, carefully putting each tile in its square. I get triple word points off dodo. Jimmy plays hearts off the S in buffs.

  We’re getting the weather on Channel Four. The weather woman is forecasting rain. There is this black man, Big Tim, with his coffee, smoking a cigarette. I’ve been keeping Big Tim in cigarettes. I leave the cigarettes at the nursing station with instructions to give them to Big Tim because I know he would take care of Susan, look out for her in the corridor. Big Tim is in charge of the refreshment room; he hands out coffee and soft drinks. One time I lined up for a soft drink but he shook his head, not for visitors.

  I play two tiles vertically, an S and an E, off the A in hearts. I do the adding up, write down the score. Susan is back in the dayroom with her uneaten glazed doughnut. I am about to play shut off the H. Susan puts her hands on the card table, rocking the tiles loose on the board. Jimmy hooks his thumbs in his belt. I put the tiles back in the box, the tiles first, then the board, trying not to listen to Susan. She wants me to go to her room. She doesn’t want me with Jimmy. I tell Jimmy we’ll play again next time.

  “I said let’s go to my room,” Susan says.

  Susan is tapping her right foot. I have seen her tap her right foot before when she wanted to get money out of me. It would always be her right foot until I say something, yes or no. Today I say yes; we will go to her room.

  My wife, Peggy, turns on the washing machine. She waits for the level of water to rise before putting in the detergent. She has the dial set for warm/cold, for Susan’s blouses and washable sweaters. The camisoles, panties, and T-shirts are on high-to-low heat, in the dryer. Water trickles into the washing machine. Peggy waits with a scoop of detergent. I am holding Susan’s wash basket, the one she used while she was living with us, in the garage apartment behind the house. Peggy is watching the level rise. She puts in half a cup of detergent. This is my signal to move away so Peggy can put in Susan’s clothes.

  Peggy lowers the lid and and spreads her arms, palms flattened on the washer. She looks past me at the stairs, through the window across from the washing machine, running up past Susan’s window. Neither one of us wants to climb these stairs. We haven’t cleaned up Susan’s apartment yet. This is something we will do together, put Susan’s apartment in order. Peggy won’t do this without me. We will pry loose candles and clotted wax from saucers and paperback books. There are the cigarettes Susan smoked. They are standing in rows on a window sill, on her vanity, in the bathroom. Peggy will leave the cigarettes to me. She will do the dusting and vacuuming.

  Peggy moves to the door of the laundry room. She stands in the door, she wants to keep me inside. Then I realize she isn’t blocking my way. She is asking me to bring the ironing board, folded up next to the water heater. The iron is in Susan’s apartment. One of us will have to get it.

  I haven’t seen Shirley Ray in the store before. Shirley Ray is wearing the pants suit that she usually wears in the ward. She would watch us sometimes, playing Scrabble, but never for very long. Shirley hands me a prescription, for an antidepressant, Elevil.

  “Remember me. I’m Jimmy’s mother,” she says. “I’ve seen you two playing Scrabble.”

  I ask her how Jimmy is doing before I go to fill the prescription. About the same, she tells me. When I come back with the prescription, Shirley touches one teardrop earring with the edge of a painted fingernail. The plastic container she holds up to the light so the capsules show through its apricot haze. Shirley rummages in her pocketbook. She has a checkbook and a ballpoint pen. I tell her we can’t take her check because she doesn’t have an account here. She asks me if we take credit cards. I tell her to go to the tobacco counter. Someone there will take her credit card. Shirley’s eyes narrow like Jimmy’s when he is about to make his play. She is moving the checkbook slightly, tapping an edge on the ball of her thumb. Then she comes out with it, about Jimmy.

  “There’s something I think you should know. My son Jimmy tried to kill me. Jimmy pointed a shotgun at me. I was lucky, my brother was there. Next time he might not be there.”

  I don’t tell Shirley I know about that. I’ve heard about it, from Big Tim. I look away from her, at aisle 6-A, toothpaste, dental floss, shaving cream. I know Shirley has things to say to me. I look at my row of prescriptions, lined up in their plastic containers. Witch doctor’s mumbo jumbo, voodoo incantations might work better, but I am a pharmacist. I have to stick to what I know.

  Shirley pulls out her billfold, spreads it out on the prescription counter. She shows me a family photograph of Jimmy and Shirley together, in the backyard in front of a gas grill. Jimmy is wearing a barbecue apron. He has his arm around Shirley. Beside Jimmy, Shirley looks small and frail.

  “That’s Jimmy when he was fourteen. Jimmy’s Dad took that picture.”

  I tell Shirley Jimmy looks good, and she shows me a second photograph. Jimmy is riding a bicycle. I think of Susan on her first bicycle, with a nice little smile for her father.

  “Jimmy was okay before Jack left. You can tell that in the picture.”

  “Maybe he’ll be okay again.”

  “That’s never going to happen. I can’t trust Jimmy anymore. I don’t know what he’ll do next.”

  Another customer is approaching, an old man, one of the regulars here. Shirley moves aside to let him in. He waves a prescription at me, and I take it and go to fill it. I measure out the loaf-shaped pills, put the cap on the container. I put the prescription in the computer. Shirley watches me stick the label on. She puts the billfold back in her pocketbook, and I wait for Shirley to leave the store.

  Susan has not gotten better. The insurance will pay for thirty days. In eight days we will either have to bring her home or go to the probate judge and petition to have her committed to Stockton. We have to decide what to do next, how long we think we can have Susan here if she isn’t better in nine days. Peggy sees no alternative; Susan will have to be taken to Stockton.

  Peggy sips on her iced tea, looking up from her pinochle hand. We are sitting out on our screened-in porch. The melds are laid out on the tiles. It is Peggy’s turn to lead. She leads a ten of diamonds, trumps. I play the jack from a meld. Then I lead from the melds, king of clubs. Peggy plays the nine of clubs. She draws from the stock and leads from a meld. Susan’s window over the garage is shut; the venetian blind is closed. We finish, add up our tricks. Peggy shuffles the cards with authority, riffling the interlocked cards off her thumbs. I have seen her do this at her bridge club, with her friends, without looking down. I’ve heard her keep up a conversation, shuffling the cards, dealing out bridge hands, seen her do this on my way to Susan’s apartment with Susan’s meds in a plastic pillbox, pills with different shapes and colors, in each compartment, pills with one shape, one color.

  Peggy is wearing the dress she wore to church. She has already been to the psychiatric ward. She has seen Susan in restraints. That hasn’t caused Peggy to change her mind. I tell Peggy we should try to keep Susan at home. Peggy stops shuffling the cards. “I won’t put up with it,” she says. I say nothing. What is there for me to say?

  We play pinochle for another hour; then I drive across town to the hospital. The head nurse says they have rules. Susan has to stay in restraints, but they will take one of the wrist straps off
. I can hear Susan yelling and cursing. Usually a nurse at the station will tell me to come back tomorrow. But today I can see my daughter. I can sit with her for as long as for ten minutes. I ask the head nurse for a cigarette from her pack at the nursing station. An orderly unbuckles one wrist strap. I light Susan’s cigarette and watch her smoke. She complains about being in restraints, and I tell her I’ll see what I can do. I tell her I will come back in an hour. I will bring her a cigarette, in an hour.

  I leave Susan and go to the dayroom. Jimmy is waiting for me. He is wearing jeans and cowboy boots. Already he’s laid out the Scrabble board, having turned the tiles face down in the box. We get started; we draw out tiles. Jimmy looks at his tile rack. His shoulders are hunched as he picks out a tile. He plays accept. I write down his score. I play my tiles vertically off the E. I play tee, as in golf tee. That is only good for three points. Jimmy starts cracking his knuckles. He puts his right fist in his cupped left hand. There is something he wants to tell me. He says he tried to call his father today, but all he got was the answering machine. Jimmy picks up a tile and edges it in, an E, off the T in golf tee. “I know why I never see him. He’s with this woman who hates me. She doesn’t want him to see me.”

  I play exit off of tee. Jimmy plays bed off of exit.

  “My mother, she wants to see me. But she doesn’t want me in the house.”

  I wait until his agitation goes, like a hand has passed over his face. I play speed off the D in bed, for a double word, write down the score. I can play deep, but instead I play speed. Big Tim and another black man come in; they go to the Ping-Pong table. I still have thirty minutes to wait before I take Susan her cigarette. The Ping-Pong ball rolls across the room. We can all hear Susan yelling because the room she is in doesn’t have a door.

  I hold out Susan’s cigarette and put it, lighted, between her lips. She waits to blow the smoke out. Susan tells me I have to take her home. The head nurse says Susan will be out of restraints when her behavior becomes acceptable. She says I can take Jimmy outside. She allows us out in the courtyard. Big Tim and some others are going out, have permission to take this smoke break outside.