I looked at Timmy. “Wow. Two floor shows tonight.”
Timmy snorted a mischievous laugh and said, in a conspiratorial tone, “Terrible, just terrible.”
Jackson came inside, closing the door behind him. “You know, some night that woman is going to haul off and knock my teeth down my throat. And I’ll probably deserve it.”
“I keep a camera at the ready for that very day,” replied the Reverend. He shook Jackson’s hand. “Thanks for coming, Ted.”
Jackson shrugged. “My social calendar suddenly cleared up.”
We all knew that Jackson’s wife had left him after she miscarried. She’s living down in Oregon with her sister now. Jackson was elected Sheriff last year, after having served as a deputy for something like six years. The new title and new uniform and new power hadn’t changed him at all; he still looked like he was waiting for someone to come out of the shadows and take it all away from him. He and the Reverend both have a tense, lonely way about them, which is I guess what drew them together as friends. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what they had in common, but I guess that doesn’t really matter when there’s someone you can always depend on for company and small talk over a cup of coffee or a sandwich or a smoke.
They stood there chatting about Jackson’s new responsibilities, the upcoming City Council budget meetings, the weather, and just when I was about to interrupt and ask what was going on, Jackson said, “So how long you need me here?” The Reverend checked his watch. “An hour, two at the most.” “What’s going on?” I asked. “Popsicle Patrol,” said the Reverend. “You need to go warm up the van.”
I looked out at the freezing rain—which was coming down even harder than before—and nodded my head. “I was wondering if we were going to do that tonight.” And I had been. I said good-bye to Timmy and was making my way toward the back when a little voice behind me said: “Mister, the tape won’t play.”
She stood there in all her three-year-old radiance, mussed hair, a smudge on one of her cheeks, hands on hips, one foot impatiently tapping, lower lip sticking out in what I’d bet was a well-practiced pout. I wanted to wrap her up and take her home with me.
“Is the tape broken?” I said, kneeling down so we could see eye to eye.
She tsk’d, rolled her eyes, and sighed. “Noooooo, it’s not broken. It just won’t play. They’re not the same thing, y’know.”
I looked toward the “lounge”—an area near one of the corners with three chairs, a sofa, a coffee table, and a television set—and saw the girl’s mother, brother, and dog staring at us. The dog in particular seemed irritated that the tape wasn’t doing its part to share in the duties of entertaining the kids. I told the little girl I’d see what I could do, and she grabbed my hand, dragging me toward the TV.
As soon as I knelt down in front of it I saw the problem. “It’s not the tape, honey—the VCR has to be set on Channel 3 or it doesn’t come through the TV.”
“Well, did you set it?”
“Missy!” said her mother. Then, to me: “Sorry. She really wants to watch the tape and she gets…a little impatient.”
“That’s okay.” I set the VCR and cued up the tape. This was a good one: A Charlie Brown Christmas, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Frosty the Snowman, and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. The Reverend had taped a bunch of holiday specials and movies for folks to watch, to make their holidays here less depressing.
“My name’s Beth,” said the woman. “This is Melissa—”
“—Missy,” said the little girl.”
“Missy…excuse me. This is Kyle, and that bundle of fur on the floor is Lump”
Lump’s face was buried between his paws, but he managed to raise up one ear in greeting.
Missy walked over toward me, pointing. “What happened to your ear, Mister?”
“Melissa!” snapped Beth.
“It’s okay,” I said, touching the knot of scar tissue that clung to the side of my skull. I looked at Missy, trying to decide just how much of the truth to tell her. “Well, you see, Missy, I don’t have much of an ear left, so I can only hear out of the other one.”
Once again, she tsk’d at me, shaking her head. “I know you only got one ear, I see that. I mean, what happened to your ear?” “You mean why isn’t it there anymore?” “Uh-huh.” “I got hit in the head.”
“Huh? You mean you can get…not-hearing and lose your ear from being hit in the head?”
I nodded. “If you get knocked out and land in the snow like I did.”
“Wow…you musta got hit real hard.”
“Yep. I was out for about five hours.” I hoped she wouldn’t quiz me further; I don’t lie well.
Beth saved me by mussing Kyle’s hair and making him groan. She told Missy that was enough, stop bothering the nice man, then looked at me. “We’re on our way to Indiana. We’re going to…stay with my folks for a while.”
“Gramma and Grampa told us we could come stay with them because our Daddy’s dead,” said Kyle matter-of-factly, as if he understood all about death and had accepted it and was wise beyond his years; which, in a way, I guess he was: bad wisdom is still wisdom.
As soon as he said “dead”, Beth shot me a look that was equal parts fear and pleading, and that’s all it took for me to know the rest of the story: Daddy wasn’t dead, Daddy was some white-trash asshole who’d decided he’d enough responsibility for one lifetime, and so took the car (or, more likely, the truck), all the money, and however much beer he could fit in the cooler and abandoned his family—odds are in an apartment from which they were about to be evicted anyway, leaving her to fend not only for herself but two kids and a dog. I wondered how Daddy had “died”, and if Beth had taken care to cover her tracks so he couldn’t suddenly resurrect himself from the dead once they were Indiana.
All of this I saw in her eyes for that brief moment; I nodded my head in understanding, and was rewarded with one of the most luminous smiles of gratitude I’d ever seen. These kids had nothing to worry about, not with this woman as their mother. I felt sorry for anyone stupid enough to try and pull anything on them. If Daddy did suddenly come back from the dead and show up in Indiana, my guess was he wouldn’t be out of that grave for long.
I pointed to the VCR, triumphant. Missy and Kyle applauded my efforts. I took a bow, then said: “Would you guys like some popcorn and sodas to snack on?”
I expected both of them to shout yes, but instead they looked at their mother, who shrugged and looked at me. “Can I have some too?”
“You were here in time for dinner, right?”
“Oh, uh…yes, we were. I just…the kids don’t get treats too often and….”
“I’ll make extra,” I said. “And don’t worry—we keep plenty on hand.” Which we did, at the Reverend’s insistence. Don’t ask me why, but somehow eating popcorn and sipping a soda while watching a good movie or a cartoon seems to make everyone happy, at least for a while. A mouthful of popcorn and you’re a kid again, at the movies with all the other kids, having a good time and enjoying the hell out of life, not at the end of your rope in a homeless shelter right before Thanksgiving and wondering where’d you’d be come Christmas morning. I guess for a lot of the people who come through here, the smell of popcorn is the smell of childhood, and that can make things easier, if only for a little while.