mumbled about the almost-successful 1876 plot to steal Abraham Lincoln’s body in hopes of exchanging it for the release of a prisoner, about how sometimes you had to do bad things for virtuous ends. I told him to get his shit, we had work to do.
“We” was a generous way to put it. His inebriated fingers no longer functioned properly. He made a mess of the sod. His tarps weren’t level and dirt ran like rainwater. Repeatedly I saved us from imminent disaster, often having to wrench some crappy shovel from his blundering hands. I was usually the one to crowbar the casket, and when I found Polaroids I did my best to keep them to myself.
His humiliation became suffocating. He had gone through maybe two dozen shovels since the New Year. He acted out perilously, digging in broad daylight or during the traffic peaks of Memorial Day and Mother’s Day. I called him stupid. He called me a chicken. It was after one of these fights that I returned from school to find him sprawled across the hearth. He had shit his pants. I dragged him to the bathroom, stripped him of his soiled clothes, and shoved him beneath the freezing shower. Moments like these shucked him of all leverage. He agreed to any deal I offered. Yes, he’d sign that F-filled report card or write a note fabricating an excuse for my continued absences—anything I wanted, as long as I did not speak of what he had become.
In mid-May, as I cased a memorial park two hours down the interstate from Bloughton, I came upon a funeral in progress. One of the mourners was Claire, the caseworker who had prepared me as best she could for life in Bloughton. To get a better look, I edged within twenty feet of her. In her simple black dress and dark lipstick she looked even prettier than I remembered. I thought about saying hello. Maybe I would look to her like a man now, maybe we could go out for coffee. Mere Reality was swept away with the breeze. Then the last invocation was spoken and the crowd broke apart and for a moment she looked right at me. There was no recognition. She looped her arm through that of a man who was probably her husband and walked away. I forced myself to laugh. Such warm, live flesh was not for me.
18.
TED POINTED AT THE bar for the third time. Beyond his manicured nails the dots and lines made weeds and thorns. I blew but my lungs withheld, knowing better than my brain they would need all their strength for the evening’s dig. My fingers, too, reserved their strength. The notes that I emitted dribbled like blood.
I yawned behind the mouthpiece and glanced at the clock. It was nearly six, time to get home and suit up for work. Ted frowned and stood up straight. He reached over and shut the sheet music. I was grateful. I rubbed the notes from where they had embedded into my eyes.
When I looked again, he was still standing there staring. I waited for Next lesson, then. It didn’t come. I cleared my throat. I set the trumpet in my lap. For whatever reason, dismissal still seemed compulsory.
“We have an understanding,” he said finally. “I know that. But I would like permission to speak freely.”
I shrugged. “Okay.”
He crossed his arms. “Why do you keep coming?”
I shrugged again. “I don’t know.”
“Classes, you don’t attend. Trumpet lessons, though, you come all the way here for. Why is that?”
“Like I said.”
“You can’t continue this way,” he said. “Eventually they’ll flunk you. You already know that. One day soon you won’t be a student here anymore.”
“All right.” I pulled off the mouthpiece.
“And I’m going to tell you something else. I don’t care. Flunk out. You don’t like something, stop it. You don’t like going to school, stop going. But don’t you stop these lessons. Whatever you do. We’ll meet somewhere else if necessary. We’ll play outside, on weekends if it comes to that. But one thing we’ll not ever do is stop. Am I making myself clear?”
I stared at my lap, incapacitated with a feeling of inevitable abandonment.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because it’s all you have.” He said it with such confidence that I recoiled. “Someday when it’s over, whatever it is that’s got you, we’ll play together, you on trumpet, me on clarinet. I’ll lend you albums to listen to that will inspire you. You can lend me some,